alteration, is a problem not attempted. And when the self changes in time, are we able to justify the inconsistency which most palpably appears, or, rather, stares us in the face? You may say that we are each assured of our personal identity in a way in which we are not assured of the sameness of things. But this is, unfortunately, quite irrelevant to the question. That selves exist, and are identical in some sense, is indubitable. But the doubt is whether their sameness, as we apprehend it, is really intelligible, and whether it can be true in the character in which it comes to us. Because otherwise, while it will be certain that the self and its identity somehow belong to reality, it will be equally certain that this fact has somehow been essentially misapprehended. And our conclusion must be that, since, as such, it contradicts itself, this fact must, as such, be unreal. The self also will in the end be no more than appearance.
This question turns, I presume, on the possibility of finding some special experience which will furnish a new point of view. It is, of course, admitted that the self presents us with fresh matter, and with an increased complication. The point in debate is whether at the same time it supplies us with any key to the whole puzzle about reality. Does it give an experience by the help of which we can understand the way in which diversity is harmonized? Or, failing that, does it remove all necessity for such an understanding? I am convinced that both these questions must be answered in the negative.
(a) For mere feeling, to begin the inquiry with this, gives no answer to our riddle. It may be said truly that in feeling, if you take it low enough down, there is plurality with unity and without contradiction. There being no relations and no terms, and yet, on the other side, more than bare simplicity, we experience a concrete whole as
