senses in which the term "real" is used by ordinary people, in order to discover how far their meanings are consistent with one another, and how far, if at all, they are inconsistent with idealism. Mr. Schiller brings a whole scholastic apparatus of distinctions to bear upon me, and complains that I have not recognized the differences between the psychological, the epistemological, and the metaphysical questions that may be asked about reality. Now, as I have not fully ascertained what Mr. Schiller and his friends mean by "reality," I am not able to discuss all the questions on which, he says, my paper "trenches." Nor can I admit that all his distinctions are valid. He will find, indeed, that I did (on p. 282) recognize the distinction between philosophy and psychology, meaning by the latter an empirical "natural science" which excludes or professes to exclude "metaphysics." By metaphysics Mr. Schiller seems to mean ontology. If so, I certainly never meant to raise any metaphysical question at all; for I cannot see how a science of things as they are in themselves apart from our knowledge of them, is a possible science. Ontological questions cannot be answered, because they cannot be intelligibly asked. Mr. Schiller may therefore assume that in dealing with the question of the meaning of an ordinary English word, I was dealing with an "epistemological" problem and with a "metaphysical" only in so far as metaphysics is identical with the criticism of conceptions and with the working out of the necessary consequences of the conditions of knowledge. But I am unable to say how far my views are "Neo-Hegelian" (for I do not know what that means) or how far they are not rather Palæo-Kantian (for I am not quite sure what Kant meant).
Mr. Schiller thinks that "the discussion of the question – What is reality? – presupposes a settlement of the question – Is there reality? – in the affirmative" (p. 536, foot). For my part I am quite unable to discuss the question whether "reality" exists until I know what is meant by reality. Before I discuss what a griffin or a chimera is, must I presuppose that the griffin and the chimera exist? On this principle one could never disprove the existence of any absurdity that any one chose to talk about. "The primary psychological fact," says Mr. Schiller (p. 537), "is that everything that is is real, and that the burden of proof lies on those who deny that anything is real." To "deny that anything is real" is an ambiguous phrase. Does the burden of proof rest with the person who denies that a round square or an unfelt sensation is real? If so, the burden is not a very heavy one. On the other hand, if Mr.
