motive—as philosophers—the love of truth. With Professor James this paper holds such a claim to be mere "self-deception and pretence," and insists that, "whether men admit or deny the fact, passion always plays some part in making them reject or hold to systems, and volition, whether predestinate or unpredestinate, always will play a part in deciding when to encourage and when to suppress one's doubts."[1] So far is the philosopher from being what he has generally supposed himself, qua philosopher, to be, a pure intellect animated solely by the love of truth, that if he were such, there would be no philosophy or philosophies. The very existence of systems of philosophy is conclusive proof that their authors, like the common people whose heads are not in the stars, are determined as to what they will believe, in part at least, by considerations with which the pure intellect would have nothing to do.
J. P. Gordy.
- ↑ Philosophical Review, Vol. II, p. 214.
