psychological point of view might be equivalent to the idealistic
doctrine that the articulation of human thought constitutes the only
structure of the universe, and its whole history. According to this
view, pragmatism would seem to be a revised version of the
transcendental logic, leaving logic still transcendental, that is,
still concerned with the evolution of the categories. The revision
would consist chiefly in this, that empirical verification, utility,
and survival would take the place of dialectical irony as the force
governing the evolution. It would still remain possible for other
methods of approach than this transcendental pragmatism, for instinct,
perhaps, or for revelation, to bring us into contact with
things-in-themselves. A junction might thus be effected with the
system of M. Bergson, which would lead to this curious result: that
pragmatic logic would be the method of intelligence, because
intelligence is merely a method, useful in practice, for the symbolic
and improper representation of reality; while another non-pragmatic
method--sympathy and dream--would alone be able to put us in
possession of direct knowledge and genuine truth. So that, after all,
the pragmatic "truth" of working ideas would turn out to be what it
has seemed hitherto to mankind, namely, no real truth, but rather a
convenient sort of fiction, which ceases to deceive when once its
merely pragmatic value is discounted by criticism. I remember once
putting a question on this subject to Professor James; and his answer
was one which I am glad to be able to record. In relation to his
having said that "as far as the past facts go, there is no difference
... be the atoms or be the God their cause,"[7] I asked whether, if
God had been the cause, apart from the value of the idea of him in our
calculations, his existence would not have made a difference to him,
as he would be presumably self-conscious. "Of course," said Professor
James, "but I wasn't considering that side of the matter; I was
thinking of our idea." The choice of the subjective point of view,
then, was deliberate here, and frankly arbitrary; it was not intended
to exclude the possibility or legitimacy of the objective attitude.
And the original reason for deliberately ignoring, in this way, the
realistic way of thinking, even while admitting that it represents the
real state of affairs, would have been, I suppose, that what could be
verified was always some further effect of