He assumes that the necessary laws are not universally valid, just as I assume the contrary. That assumption is as much a postulate as mine is—and I refuse to grant it. It is impossible, therefore, that he and I can ever come into contact. His positions and mine are founded on totally different principles, and must therefore follow diametrically opposite courses; just as two geometries would be radically different, and incapable of refuting each other—the one of which proceeded on the axiom that a straight line is the shortest between two points, and the other on the axiom that it is the longest.
It is true that Mr Fraser has attempted to state, but certainly not to evolve, some reason for his refusal. He says, rather in a confused way, that our human knowledge "explodes in a series of contradictions" when the assumption is entertained that all reason is amenable to certain necessary laws. And this is the sole ground on which he refuses to concede, and endeavours to rebut, the assumption.
The ordinary reader will experience some difficulty in understanding what is meant by our knowledge exploding in contradictions; and his very inability to comprehend these words will probably lead him to infer that they are more potent than they really are. The unintelligible is a powerful spell to conjure with. There is more here, people think, than meets the eye. In this review Mr Fraser has not uttered one word in explanation either of his peculiar phraseology, or of any bearing which it may have on the groundwork of my speculations. And very little more satisfaction is to be obtained from his essay entitled, "The Insoluble Problem." He has trusted exclusively to the faith of his readers.
I shall endeavour to supply the elucidation which my critic has entirely withheld in his review of my work, and afforded only very imperfectly in his article on "The Insoluble Problem." There are, it is said, certain counter-propositions respecting space or time, neither of which we can construe positively to our minds. Thus, we must affirm that time either had an infinite non-commencement, or that it had an absolute commencement. But neither of these can we conceive; we cannot
