some one occasion of his existence’: this is the most concrete of all the meanings. The word ‘Cæsar’ may mean ‘the historic route of Cæsar’s life from his Cæsarian birth to his Cæsarian assassination.’ The word ‘Cæsar’ may mean ‘the common form, or pattern, repeated in each occasion of Cæsar’s life.’ You may legitimately choose any one of these meanings; but when you have made your choice, you must in that context stick to it.
This doctrine of the nature of the life-history of an enduring organism holds for all types of organisms, which have attained to unity of experience, for electrons as well as for men. But mankind has gained a richness of experiential content denied to electrons. Whenever the ‘all or none’ principle holds, we are in some way dealing with one actual entity, and not with a society of such entities, nor with the analysis of components contributory to one such entity.
This lecture has maintained the doctrine of a direct experience of an external world. It is impossible fully to argue this thesis without getting too far away from my topic. I need only refer you to the first portion of Santayana’s recent book, Scepticism and Animal Faith, for a conclusive
