e
Spinoza. Having got so far, I may consider further, referring to another
demonstration in the book, that if some one gives Spinoza joy--Hobbes,
for instance--my delight in Spinoza's increased perfection, consequent
upon his joy and my love of him, accompanied by the idea of Hobbes, its
external cause, constitutes love on my part for the redoubtable Hobbes
as well. Thus the periphery of my affections may expand indefinitely,
till it includes the infinite, the ultimate external cause of all my
titillations. But how these interesting discoveries are interrupted
before long by a desire for food, or by an indomitable sense that Hobbes
and the infinite are things I do _not_ love, is something that my
dialectic cannot deduce; for it was the values radiating from a given
impulse, the implications of its instant object, that were being
explicated, not at all the natural forces that carry a man through that
impulse and beyond it to the next phase of his dream, a phase which if
it continues the former episode must continue it spontaneously, by grace
of mechanical forces.

When dialectic is thus introduced into psychology, an intensive
knowledge of the heart is given out for distributive knowledge of
events. Such a study, when made by a man of genius, may furnish good
spiritual reading, for it will reveal what our passions mean and what
sentiments they would lead to if they could remain fixed and dictate all
further action. This insight may make us aware of strange
inconsistencies in our souls, and seeing how contrary some of our ideals
are to others and how horrible, in some cases, would be their ultimate
expression, we may be shocked into setting our house in order; and in
trying to understand ourselves we may actually develop a self that can
be understood. Meantime this inner discipline will not enlighten us
about the march of affairs. It will not give us a key to evolution,
either in ourselves or in others. Even while we refine our aspirations,
the ground they sprang from will be eaten away beneath our feet. Instead
of developing yesterday's passion, to-day may breed quite another in its
place; and if, having grown old and set in our mental posture, we are
incapable of assuming another, and are condemned to carrying on the
dialectic of our early visions into a new-born world, to be a
schoolmaster's measuring-rod for life's infinite exuberance, we shall
find ourselves at once in a foreign country, speaking a language that
nob