260 NEW BOOKS. "remain substantially inviolable" he "puts forth this essay in times which " he " is compelled to regard as by no means favourable to its most unprejudiced and practically effective reception ". So long as we are dealing with " The Virtuous Life " this moral earnest- ness and the religious convictions to which it is due add to, rather than detract from, the value of the teaching. The author's account, historical and descriptive, of the particular virtues, under the convenient old- fashioned division into Virtues of the Will, of the Judgment, of Feeling, is excellent. The analysis is clear, sensible, straightforward ; the protest against undue straining of words in the interests of some narrow psy- chology conveys a useful warning ; the occasional epigrams are distinctly to the point, and the author's meaning is brought out by illustrations which show width of reading and shrewdness of observation. But, from a treatise which claims to be a " fundamental discussion of ultimate prob- lems," we have a right to expect more than thoughtful suggestions for the general reader. Clearness of definition of the more important terms, cogency of reasoning from premisses to conclusion, some justification of premisses assumed, are essential to a scientific or philosophic treatment of any subject, and they are all absent from Prof. Ladd's treatise. Rejecting all a priori methods the author prefers to " follow the lowlier and more humble but much surer and safer path of psychological and historical inquiry ". " This empirical path " (he truthfully adds) " conducts us irresistibly to the presence of the ultimate metaphysical problems." When, however, we examine the inductive process so sketched we find that the problems are already solved to begin with, and the facts which should form our starting-point are looked at through the coloured medium of this solution. These empirical facts are two : " Man is, as a matter of fact, a moral being. Man is also, as an equally sure matter of fact, a religious being." Further examination shows " the practical insufficiency of morality to sustain and elevate its own principles without support and help from religion ". " Religion imparts warmth and vitality to morality ; " so much so that, " if the postulates of religion which the constitution and history of man seem to warrant him in accepting be made the faith of the Soul and the guide of the practical life, many of the practical antinomies of Ethics are either completely solved, or much relieved". From this it follows that morality must be based upon Religion by identifying the Ground of Morality with the World Ground, and " conceiving of this World Ground as the ideally righteous and holy personal God ". This God is the Creator and Sustainer of Reality. Man is His child and knows this Reality, for it is not true that knowledge is of phenomena or that human mental functionings are open to scepticism. " On the contrary, reality is implicate in all knowledge ; and in every exercise of the knowing faculty the testimony plainly is I, the actual, am not afar off, but nigh thee, even within, an integral part of thy Self, the knower. The doubt of this truth the truth of all truths is so irrational, so absurd, that it does not even admit of a consistent and intelligible statement by one mind to another, or by any one to one's own conscious mind." It is impossible to reason with, very difficult even to criticise, a writer whose conception of a fundamental discussion of ultimate problems differs so much from that of ordinary people. But for the reader who can conscientiously adopt Prof. Ladd's Weltanschauung the book is of con- siderable value. A fair summary of its contents would run somewhat as follows : Ye are Christians, walk worthily of your Vocation your Voca- tion is to realise the Moral Life the Moral Life is not a theoretical abstraction but a concrete Personal Ideal functioning in certain definite
