BELIEF 147
ter of fact that neither of these assumptions is ever realized in the experience of finite minds. The correlation is never perfect and the conditions are always changing. The closed mind, therefore, falls into an increasingly serious maladjust ment to the actual conditions of life, which is only another way of saying into increasingly hurtful error and opposi tion to the truth ; and this means that its activities are ever increasingly destructive to itself and others. To assume this attitude is to abdicate both the primary and the second ary functions of the mind ; for we must remember that its primary function is to receive impressions from the environ ment and direct conduct according to them, and if all pres entations not in agreement with the existing mental system are to be on that ground rejected, this function is no longer performed so far as its most important value for life is con cerned. It also means the discontinuance of the function of thinking, for the characteristic mark of thought is the comparison of ideas with one another, and its most impor tant value for life is the resolution of conflicts between them, the elimination of the totally false and the correlation of those which are in any measure true into a higher unity, a larger truth. For the close mind the thinking does not pass beyond the primary stage of perceiving the disagree ment with the present mental system, whereupon the new idea is instantly judged as false. The most dangerous man in politics excepting him whose vote is for sale is the one who will not consider new ideas, and the same attitude of mind in religion is a constant obstruction to the progress of the truth.
The only mental attitude, therefore, which is consistent with the maintenance and development of life is that of the open mind, which is exposed, indeed, to the dangers of doubt but which is also accessible to larger truth, whose shadow doubt so often is. In this attitude we may move forever upward toward the infinitely distant goal of abso lute truth, the perfect mental correlation with the universe of reality. The open mind is as far removed from the
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