They apply it to religion, and declare that the dogmas of religion are dreams; but when they pass from the dogmas of religion to those of morality, they not only do not use their test, but unconsciously they denounce it with the utmost vehemence.

Thus Mr.Leslie Stephen, in the very essay from which I have just now quoted, not only has recourse, for giving weight to his arguments, to such ethical epithets as _low_, _lofty_, and even _sacred_, but he puts forward as his own motive for speaking, a belief which on his own showing is a dream.

That motive, he says, is devotion to truth for its own sake--the only principle that is really worthy of man.

His argument is simply this.

It is man's holiest and most important duty to discover the truth at all costs, and the one test of truth is physical verification.