justice that their intricacy, their remoteness, and the long and deep studies which have gone to their making, would in reason demand. But I will set before you, as clearly as I can, the main points on which I think the evening’s discussion turns, adding such comments on the conceptions and arguments as my own way of thinking suggests.
I
THE CRITERION OF REALITY IN A CONCEPTION
I am glad I can tell you, first of all, that there is a profound agreement among all the previous speakers in the important matter of the foundation on which all of this evening’s reasonings rest; yes, I am confident I may go farther, and say that we are all agreed upon this, and, further, as to the entire foundation of philosophy itself. I agree with all three of the previous speakers in the great tenet that evidently underlies their whole way of thinking. Our common philosophy is Idealism — that explanation of the world which maintains that the only thing absolutely real is mind; that all material and all temporal existences take their being from mind, from consciousness that thinks and experiences; that out of consciousness they all issue, to consciousness are presented, and that presence to consciousness constitutes their entire reality and entire existence. But this great foundation-theme may be uttered in very various ways; and your other
