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Excerpt from The Physics of Idealism: A Thesis Presented to the University Faculty of Cornell University for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy The extreme subjectivism which this statement of the idealistic position entails is a matter of regret. Wherever it is dominant idealism fights at a marked disadvantage. The suppression of subjectivism has been the perennial struggle of the idealist. The idealist does not actually mean that the mind of the individual constructs for itself a. Field of consciousness which is its universe, and that the universe so known carries with it no implication or evidence of an existent reality external to the consciousness of the individual mind. He can no more dispense with such a reality than his Opponent can dispense with the material world. It is the principle which makes the world a system, and causes the universe constructed by one mind to harmonize with that constructed by another. From the standpoint 'of the individual, this may be called an external world. It is not external to the mind, if by external we understand something opposed to the mind and distinct from it. On the contrary, for most forms of idealism this universal principle must be immanent in the mind, and may in this sense be called internal. It is external, however, in the sense that it involves immensely more than the conscious ness of the single individual. Its sphere of activitv lies largely outside the consciousness of the finite subject, and it is in this extra-mental sphere that we must find the ground and explanation of the cosmic order. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original,