MENTAL SYSTEMS 6l
truth, but often ends by convincing himself that the other is a liar. Controversy can not be intellectually profitable and can only be morally hurtful, if conducted without a full recognition of the extreme difficulty with which men can understand one another especially in matters which involve their more important reflective systems of ideas. Asso ciated with the same terms in the opposing minds there will always be different suggestions, implications, references more or less remote in a word, different atmospheres of meaning which it is quite impossible to communicate to one another. This general setting of a term in a mental sys tem is often the most important element of its meaning ; and not only do the antagonists in a controversy fail to appre hend this part of each other s meaning, but, on the contrary, each imparts to a term used by the other the particular at mosphere of meaning which it has in his own mind. Con troversy, therefore, has been and must continue to be a comparatively barren exercise of the human understanding; and, unless conducted with great self-control and supreme humility of spirit, will not only not clarify the truth but will darken it by clouds of passion.
5. The problem of co-operation. In the light of these principles we can see why it is so much easier as a rule to get men to agree on things to be done than on a system to be believed; and why it is easier to secure agreement on specific things to be done than on a general statement of policy, the latter implying a more extensive unity in their systems of thought. Men can often unite in doing a certain thing, when they cannot at all unite in a statement of the reasons why it should be done ; and the more elaborate such a statement is the less likely is agreement in it. A large number of persons may approve a certain act, but back of the approval may lie very different systems of ideas and courses of reasoning; for the use meanings, which are built up unreflectively in the ordinary activities of life, are usually, in mature minds, connected up with a broader sys tem of reflectively organized concepts. The narrow use
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