ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the Irving Babbitt view that reality must be achieved first of all through imagination and actual conduct. While Babbitt holds an exaggerated opinion of the shortcomings of modern theories of knowledge as represented by Kant, he legitimately reacts against failures to understand the role of imagination and will in leading man towards reality. According to Babbitt, insights attained through the reinterpretation of ethico-religious symbols should form the basis in the modern world for revised modes of life and social arrangements, and above all for a new education. Styles of more secular or worldly life have been developed by mankind which can also be apprehended imaginatively and seen to contain reality. Intuition of the happiness and reality of moral action tends to call forth practical willing having the same quality. The intellectual element in the conjoint training of imagination and character Babbitt calls criticism, which means philosophical history.
