mmediate decision, and inquiry deliberately
postpones decision. It is only a persistent desire to "get at
the bottom of the matter" that will act as a check upon the
demands of social life and of individual impatience which rush
us to conclusions. In most men, as earlier noted, the sharp
edge of curiosity becomes easily blunted. They are content,
outside their own immediate personal interests, "to take
things for granted." They glide over the surfaces of events,
they cease to query the authenticity of facts, or to examine
their relevance and their significance, or to be concerned about
their completeness. For an example, one has but to listen to
or partake in the average discussion of any political or social
issue of the present day. There are few men who retain, even
as far as middle life, a genuinely inquiring interest in men and
affairs. Their curiosity is dulled by fatigue and the pressure
of their own interests and preoccupations, and they allow
their prejudices and formulas to pass for judgments and conclusions.
The scientist is the man in whom curiosity has
become a permanent passion, who, as long as he lives, is
unwilling to forego inquiry into the processes of Nature, or of
human relations.

THINKING BEGINS WITH A PROBLEM. While the general habit
of inquiry is developed in the satisfaction of the instinct of
curiosity, any particular investigation begins with a felt
difficulty. By difficulty is not meant one of an imperative
and practical kind, but any problem whether theoretical or
practical. For many men, it is true, thinking occurs only
when instinct and habit are inadequate to adjust them to
their environment. Any problem of daily life affords an
example. To borrow an illustration from Professor Dewey:

A man traveling in an unfamiliar region comes to a branching of
the roads. Having no sure knowledge to fall back upon, he is
brought to a standstill of hesitation and suspense. Which road is
right? And how shall the perplexity be resolved? There are but
two alternatives. He must either blindly and arbitrarily take his
course, trusting to luck for the outcome, or he must discover grounds
for the conclusion that a given road is right.[1]

[Footnote l: Dewey: _How We Think_, p. 10.]

To the inquiring mind, purely theoretical difficulties or
discrepancies will provoke thought. To the astronomer an
unaccounted-for perturbation in the path of a planet provokes
inquiry; the chemist is challenged by a curiou