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CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 THIS BOOK IS ONE OF A 
 COLLECTION MADE BY 
 
 BENNO LOEWY 
 1854-1919 
 
 AND BEQUEATHED TO 
 CORNELL UNIVERSITY 
 
Cornell University Library 
 
 3 1924 031 333 028 
 olin.anx 
 
The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31 924031 333028 
 
HISTOUICAL SUEVEY. 
 
London t 
 
 A. and G. A. Spottiewoodb, 
 
 Nflw-street-Square. 
 
HISTOEICAL SURVEY 
 
 SPECULATIVE PHILOSOPHY 
 
 KANT TO HEGEL; 
 
 DESIGNED AS AN IINTRODUCTION 10 THE OPINIONS OF THE 
 EECENT SCHOOLS: 
 
 BY 
 
 HEIMICH MOEITZ CHALTEATJS, 
 
 PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHT IN THE 
 UMIVERSITX OF KIEL. 
 
 TRANSLATED PEOM THE FOURTH EDITION OF THE GERMAN 
 
 BY 
 
 ALFRED TULK. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 LONGMAN, BEOWN, GREEN, AND LONGMANS. 
 
 1854. 
 
TEAT^SLATOK'S IfOTICE. 
 
 The Author himself having stated at sufficient length in 
 his Preface the object of the present work, the Translator 
 does not feel it incumbent upon him to do more than 
 observe that he has endeavoured throughout to remain 
 faithful to his text ; particular regard having being paid 
 to the rendering of the metaphysical terms employed 
 by the different writers, so that the unity of thought 
 pervading their respective systems might be adequately 
 preserved. If, however, despite his best efforts, obscuri- 
 ties of language should be found to exist, the Translator 
 cannot take the burden of such wholly upon himself. It 
 is well known to all students that difficulties of no ordinary 
 kind have to be encountered in German Philosophy — 
 difficulties not only of subject-matter, but of form, — in 
 dealing with which as literal a translation as possible 
 becomes oftentimes the last resource. 
 
 March, 1854. 
 
 A 3 
 
AUTHOR'S PREFACE. 
 
 The present work originated in a series of Discourses 
 delivered before a select circle at Dresden, in the winter 
 of 1835-6 ; the majority of my audience consisting of 
 persons fulfilling important offices of State, all of whom 
 honoured Philosophy; while some were even distinguished 
 in different departments of literature, and belonged in 
 their university career to the blooming period of the 
 Kantian-Jacobian philosophy, but had no longer any lei- 
 sure, amid the weight of professional duties? for keeping 
 pace with the progress of the science, or making them- 
 selves acquainted with what had been published upon the 
 highest matters that concern humanity, in the. field of 
 philosophy ; added to which, the strange terminology of 
 objective speculation in the recent school had become 
 difficult of comprehension for those accustomed' to the 
 ordinary modes of thought and expression adopted by the 
 earlier subjective writers. 
 
 If it was impossible to set aside these difficulties — at all 
 events it was worth making the attempt to lighten them — 
 
 A i 
 
viii author's peeface. 
 
 and at the same time to supply the wants of several younger 
 students who had joined my class. The approbation with 
 which the oral discourses were received, encouraged the 
 author to lay them before a wider circle in a printed form, 
 ,and in doing this to remain as true as possible to the 
 original mode of exposition. Hence comes the style of 
 lecture in which they are written, and together with this 
 style repetitions that are not wholly justifiable, and which 
 by many readers will be viewed in the light, perhaps, of 
 so many tedious digressions. Still, in subsequent editions 
 it seemed impossible wholly to do away with this feature, 
 without injuring the original character and bearing of the 
 whole work; for it was above all needful for me to take 
 into consideration the requirements of the younger portion 
 of my audience, so that they might, during the intervals 
 snatched from their studies at the academies, find in this 
 book an agreeable guide — not one indeed that should tho- 
 roughly "satisfy their minds, but which might serve, to 
 a certain extent, to set them to rights upon the conflict 
 of philosophic opinions which is now being waged, and so 
 incite and place them in a position to consult the original 
 authorities* This Historical Development is intended 
 throughout to call forth the mental activity of the reader ; 
 and instead of leading him to anticipate at any early stage 
 of inquiry the more mature judgments of a later one, to 
 allow him, on the contrary, to make trial of his own powers 
 
AUTHOR S PEEFACB. IX 
 
 of thought, for in this alone an unprejudiced judgment 
 and philosophical knowledge consists. 
 
 As regards myself, my own philosophical opinions in- 
 sured to me, as I thought, a free standing-point external 
 to the conflicting parties; I resolved therefore upon in- 
 truding them as little as possible into the body or historical 
 portion of the work and only at the end of my labours, 
 where the systems of the present day cease to criticise 
 each other, or where criticism itself is still a matter sub 
 judice, did I feel myself fully justified in letting them 
 appear together with some concluding remarks, in order 
 that my own impartiality might not appear to be an am- 
 biguous virtue, which had brought the reader into a state 
 of sceptical indecision, only to leave him to himself with- 
 out counsel of any kind, and, consequently, in the end 
 more dismayed than encouraged. Still, however, these 
 critical additions must not even in this new edition be by 
 any means regarded as forming a basis for any views of 
 my own, as though the whole book had been written 
 with this design. It is not long since I laid before the 
 public such a groundwork in my " Entwurf eines Systems 
 der Wissenschaftslehre," Kiel, 1 846 ; but such neither was 
 nor is the tendency of the present work, which, setting 
 out in a manner quite independent of the former, or upon 
 purely historical grounds, attempts, in a negative or un- 
 prejudiced manner, to assist in dispelling the delusion pre- 
 
X AUTHOR S PREFACE. 
 
 valent In the schools formerly, and still to a certain degree 
 at ptesent — namely, that philosophy in its last develop- 
 ment is a finished and perfected science. 
 
 Next to impartiality, clearness was the first rule to be 
 observed in my work ; and then, wherever this was no 
 longer attainable, owing to the nature of the subject and 
 the peculiar terminology of the schools, cautious limita- 
 tion became the second rule that had to be kept in view. 
 Only it seemed to me indispensable to enter deeply into 
 the principles of the difierent systems, their further de- 
 velopment being for the most part summed up in general 
 characteristics; for it did not lie in my original plan to 
 give a survey, uniform as regards its extent in all parts, 
 and diverging into practical questions, any more than a 
 perfect historical consideration of all the connecting and 
 complementary links that lie between the main systems, 
 excellent though the former may be of their kind. 
 
 No important objections having been made to my Im- 
 partiality and clearness, this part of the book, which is 
 and ought to be the chief matter, has met, to my great 
 satisfaction, with an approval almost beyond expectation, 
 considering how relative always are the wants of readers 
 and the notion of a popularity, which should satisfy all 
 demands, and not at the same time dispense too much 
 with scientific' accuracy. I have, therefore, as in the 
 second edition, which appeared in 1839, and In the third. 
 
AUTHOR S PREFACE. XI 
 
 of 1843, SO also in this fourth edition, endeavoured to 
 remain as faithful as possible to the original character of 
 the work, and have in certain parts left it quite unaltered ; 
 though upon the whole an attempt has been made to gain 
 a further step, by letting the popular style gradually 
 give place towards the end to a stricter form of exposi- 
 tion, so that more is certainly required of the reader in 
 the sequel than in the beginning of the work. This does 
 not only seem admissible as a piece of didactics, but to be 
 imperatively demanded by the content. Besides, since 
 the period of the first publication of these lectures, ten 
 years ago, the mental wants and mode of thinking of the 
 public have made such a rapid revolution, that the Kantian 
 method of regarding philosophy is now no longer that which 
 generally prevails, but rather a return must be made to it 
 from another more modern point of view. Accordingly, 
 if it appeared already indispensable in the third edition 
 to perfect for cotemporaries the representation of the 
 Kantian system, and if, upon the other hand, the author 
 was induced by the direction taken by Philosophy sub- 
 sequent to Hegel, and especially by Schelling's latter 
 opinions, to round off the whole development of the sub- 
 ject since Kant's time in a more definite manner than had 
 been done in former editions ; so also did the present seem 
 the time for directing attention, not only to the above- 
 mentioned Neo-Schellingian philosophy, but also to the 
 
Xll AUTHOR 8 PREFACE. 
 
 so-called second doctrine of Fichte, and for inserting in 
 its proper place a brief characteristic of Schleiermacher's 
 philosophic views, which were omitted in the earlier 
 editions. 
 
 Even the remaining portions of the work have not been 
 left without improvement, so that the present edition may 
 be justly regarded as " thoroughly revised and enlarged." 
 
 Kiel, Jan. 1. 1848. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 UEGTURE I. 
 
 Introdttction. — Object of the present Discourses, p. 1. Idea of Philosophy, 
 p. 3. Scientific sketch of the History of Philosophy, p. 6. Its connection 
 with the Empiricism or Sensationalism of Locke, p. 9. Scepticism, and 
 its Tindioation upon empirical grounds, p. 12. Hume's Theory of Causa- 
 tion, p. 14. 
 
 LECTURE n. 
 
 Kaut. — General problem of his critical investigations, p. 21. Critick of 
 Pure or Theoretical Season ; its principle, p. 32. Categories of the Un- 
 derstanding, p. 27. Ideas of the Reason, p. 35. 
 
 LECTURE ni. 
 
 Critick of the proofs of the Existence of God, p. 43. Critick of Practical 
 Reason, p. 49. Critick of the Faculty of Judgment, p. 52. A fresh pro- 
 blem for Philosophy, p. 55. Divergence of Philosophy into opposite di- 
 rections, p. 57. Jacobi, p. 58. His difference from Kant, p. 59. The 
 Reason a faculty of perceiving positive truths, p. 61. Uncertain character 
 of Jacobi s philosophy, p. 63. 
 
 LECTURE IV. 
 
 General remarks upon the two-fold direction taken by Philosophy towards 
 Being and Reality upon the one hand, or Origination (movement) and 
 Thought (ideality) upon the other, p. 68. Herbabt, p. 70. Principles of 
 his system, p. 71. The notion of Being, p. 74. The absolutely simple 
 elements of material phenomena, or the Reals, p. 75. Their immateriality, 
 p. 77. Connexion free from contradiction of the Existent with the given 
 phenomenon, p. 80. Arrangement of Herbart's system, p. 83. Its method, 
 p. 85. Its problem, p. 88. 
 
XIV CONTENTS 
 
 LECTURE V 
 
 Methodical solution of the Contradictions, p. 90. The Accidental Views, 
 p. 94. Ontology, p. 95. Synechology, p. 103. Problem of Organization, 
 p. 113. 
 
 Eidology, p. 116. Theory of the Representative process (VorstdUn), 
 p. 121. Its Statics and Mechanics, p. 122. Soul-monad, p. 127. Glance 
 at the Practical Philosophy, p. 132. Criticism of Herbart's system, p. 137. 
 
 LECTURE VT. 
 
 J. G. Fichtb's individual Subjectivism, p. 148. Object of the "Wissen- 
 schaftslehre," or Theory of Knowledge, p. 149. The Ego as principle, 
 p. 158. 
 
 LECTURE Vn. 
 
 Fichte's philosophic views of Religion and Morality, p. 164. Criticism of 
 his System, p. 171. 
 
 LECTURE Vni. 
 
 Fichte's more recent views, p. 176. Schleiehmacher, p. 183. The 
 Absolute, p. 185. The Egoes, p. 186. Relation of the Absolute and 
 theEgoes, p. 187. Schleiermacher's Idea of Philosophy, p. 190. His 
 Theology, Ethics, and the Criticism of his system, p. 192. 
 
 LECTURE rx. 
 
 Schblling's universal Objectivism in opposition to the subjective Idealism of 
 Fichte, p. 198. Real or objective principle, p. 199. Method and Theory 
 of Cognition, p. 201. Intellectual Intuition, p. 215. Identity of Being 
 and Thinking, p. 217. Differentiation of the Absolute into Subjectivity 
 and Objectivity, p. 218. 
 
 LECTURE X. 
 
 ScHBLLiNa's Philosophy of Nature, p. 221. The bUnd working of the im- 
 mediate Subject-Ol^ect, p. 222. The preponderating Objectivity, or natra'e- 
 side of the Absolute, p. 228. Inorganic nature in its first potency. Matter, 
 p. 231. Light and Gravity, p. 232. Magnetism and Electricity, p. 234. 
 The second potency, or Chemical process, p. 236. Organic or living nature 
 in the third potency, p. 237. 
 
CONTENTS. XV 
 
 LECTURE XI. 
 
 Animal Sensibility and its transition into Consciousness, p. 243. Immanence 
 of the Spirit in real nature, p. 246. Analogous to the artistic power or 
 productivity, p. 248. Ideality, per se, in the human being, p. 251. Art, 
 Religiou, and PhUosophy, p. 252. Pantheism of Schelling, p. 253, which, 
 being discerned by the author himself, becomes again the problem, p. 257. 
 Of human Freedom and Sin, p. 258. 
 
 LECTURE Xn 
 
 Sohblltng's recent views, p. 265. The world has its ground in that which 
 in God is not God, p. 266. Difference between Schelling and Hegel, p. 272. 
 Doctrine of Potency, p. 277. Origin of the present state of the world 
 through the " fall" of the first man, p. 285. Retrospective view of that 
 process, as exemplified in History, p. 287. 
 
 LECTURE Xni. 
 
 Hegel, p. 295. The Immanent Idea, potential object {Begriff), or negativity 
 as principle of his system, in contradistinction to ScheUing's doctrine of 
 Intellectual Intuition, p. 299. The Phenomenology, p. 300. 
 
 LECTURE XIV. 
 
 Hegel's system, p. 312. Its general Arrangement, p. 313. The Logic, Cate- 
 gories of Being, p. 315. Categories of Essence, p. 323. 
 
 LECTURE XV. 
 
 Continuation of the Categories of Essence, p. 328. Categories of the Idea, 
 or potential object (Begriff), p. 332. The Subject or subjective Logic, 
 p. 336. The Object, p. 338, and the Idea in its Identity {Idee), p. 349. 
 
 LECTURE XVL 
 
 Continuation of the Idea in its Identity, or Identity of Subjectivity and Objec- 
 tivity, p. 350. Relation of the Logic to the Philosophy of Nature, p. 354. 
 Survey of the Philosophy of Nature, p. 356. Philosophy of the Mind, 
 p. 359. 
 
XVI CONTENTS, 
 
 LECTURE XVII. 
 
 Concluding remarks upon the pretended completion by Hegd of all philo- 
 sophicaljgystems, p. 364. External crisis and division of his school into 
 opposite tendencies, p. 36.5. Conditioned by internal and unsolved contra^ 
 dictions present both in the Principle, p. 370. Method, p. 373, and Result, 
 p. 379. Criticism of Hegel's System, p. 382. Comprehensive Survey of 
 the whole historical development of Philosophy, p. 385. 
 
HISTORICAL SURYEY, 
 
 ETC. 
 
 LECTURE I. 
 
 INTEOnCCTION. — SCIEOTIFIC VIEW OP THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHT. — 
 ITS CONlfECTION WITH THE DOCTEINE OF SENSATIONALISM. 
 
 Having offered to deliver, before the present circle, a series of 
 discourses upon the progress and character of the recent Specu- 
 lative Philosophy, the proposal has, I find, on its very first 
 announcement, attracted far more attention than I could have 
 promised myself, — a proof, to my mind, that the want of in- 
 struction upon this subject has been so generally and vividly 
 felt both by the learned of a former school, and by those of the' 
 rising generation, that it cannot be owing to any want of rea- 
 diness in the hearers, if the attempts which have been already 
 made to divulge to a wider circle of educated persons the 
 mystery of the recent speculative school, have hitherto met 
 with but little success. Meanwhile, if some have failed in the 
 clearness and simplicity of language, so necessary in treating 
 such a topic, while others, in the endeavour to render them- 
 selves generally intelligible, have proved far too deficient in 
 scientific profundity ; as for myself, it is the time which, I feel, 
 has been wanting (considering the few winter evenings devoted 
 to my audience amid the press of other manifold duties) for ex- 
 patiating with proper repose and caution over this boundless 
 field of inquiry. 
 
 But, apart from these considerations, the chief difiiculty lies, 
 without doubt, in the subject itself. For the new school has of 
 late expressly declared its philosophy to be an esoteric science, 
 which will always remain confined to a narrow circle of the 
 initiated, and ought to be so, because it can only be called 
 philosophy so long as it retains its scientific form as a veil im- 
 penetrable to the unpractised eye. 
 
 Certainly (and let us not in this matter be deceived by our 
 expectations) — certainly it is perfectly true, that philosophy 
 
2 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 only deserves its name in so far as it strictly preserves its own 
 scientific form, and that we do not philosophise when we treat 
 philosophic subjects historically, and imagine that philosophy 
 itself can be understood from the results of a philosophical 
 system. For this is just as impossible, as to gain a clear idea 
 of arithmetic from learning by heart certain ready-made calcu- 
 lations, such as tables of interest, &c. 
 
 Every thing here depends upon the independent activity and 
 freedom of thought. Hence the method of teaching this science 
 differs altogether from the exposition of any positive branch of 
 knowledge : it cannot indeed impart or suggest any thing posi- 
 tive ; but it can merely, to speak with Socrates, deliver as a 
 fiaiei/rpia the power of thought in the listener, so that this may 
 act freely and of itself. 
 
 Philosophy is not opposed to the healthy common sense of 
 humanity, but its demands continually transcend the ordinary 
 powers of the latter, and require of it much more than it 
 is conscious of being able to perform. Common sense alone shall 
 have the right to understand and judge of every thing ; nor 
 must it believe any thing which it has not experienced in itself, 
 i. e. in the internal consciousness : in the sphere of philosophy 
 nothing is to be taken as a matter of faith, but all and every 
 thing, which we admit, is to be admitted only because we have 
 attained to an internal conviction upon the subject, or because 
 we know it. 
 
 Theoretical philosophy is nothing more than the self-ac- 
 quired insight into the method by which we may attain to a 
 certain knowledge of any thing ; hence it is science or know- 
 ledge pre-eminently so called. In every thing which can be 
 known, philosophy must not support mere opinion and faith, 
 but must rather abrogate them as such, and change them into 
 I certain knowledge : within its sphere it tolerates no uncer- 
 tainty, but its sphere reaches only so far as knowledge extends. 
 Every thing, which in the strictest sense of the word we cannot 
 be said to know, it must separate, and can allow it no other 
 importance than that qf the ultra, the transcendent, which, 
 lying beyond the boundary line of philosophy, is only service- 
 able in order to mark out its limits. 
 
 In what this special kind of knowledge consists, whether it 
 has any necessary limits, and what these may be, cannot be in- 
 dicated beforehand, for on this point the different philosophic 
 systems are not agreed. There are systems,-^ and we shall find 
 the most recent ones to be such, — which essentially indeed ac- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 3 
 
 knowledge no such limits ; and every philosophy, even the 
 least pretending, strives, at least, to remove these limits further 
 off; its aim being constantly a more perfect and expanded 
 sphere of knowledge. But as yet philosophy has not attained 
 to perfect knowledge ; it is not yet the ettioti^/jjj, after which 
 Plato strove ; and it must still content itself with the modest 
 name of a longing endeavour after, or love of wisdom. 
 
 This love of knowledge is innate. It does not, properly 
 speaking, depend upon man at all, whether he will philoso- 
 phise or not ; he must do it, and he does it instinctively, each 
 one in his own way : but it still depends upon himself how 
 far he wiU go, and how soon in his inquiries he will give way 
 more or less to indolence and habit. "With a thousand to 
 one," says Lessing, " the goal of their reflection is the point at 
 which they have become weary of reflection," but still such 
 persons will at least possess a phantom of knowledge, call it 
 their conviction, and believe they possess in it something 
 genuine. 
 
 But as the true science pursues a course which is remote 
 from ordinary minds, so the latter perceive only the results of 
 the philosophic inquiry of the preceding age ; and these results 
 now ferment among the masses, as opinions imbibed, know- 
 ledges acquired, principles adopted, in fact, only as an inherited] 
 belief; and this supplies subjectively, for each individual, the 
 place of self-acquired convictions. For the possessors such 
 opinions are philosophy, because a certain activity of mind 
 was necessary in order to obtain them ; but, by one who takes a 
 higher point of view, they cannot certainly be regarded as such. 
 For — and this appears to me the most trenchant distinction 
 between the really learned and the so-called uninstructed 
 man — ' the really learned man, or scholar, as he ought to be, is 
 once and for ever withdrawn from the element of blind faith ; 
 he is one who would know what others believe, judge what 
 others accept without proof, and from whom a judgment of his 
 own is expected, for which he may even be made answerable 
 to the state itself. The judge, the teacher, the physician — 
 must each act according to his own convictions ; this is not 
 only allowed them, but has become a matter of conscience, and 
 in so far as they ground this conviction upon certain ultimate 
 fixed principles, they are philosophers, and move within the 
 sphere of that science which, properly speaking, is the scien- 
 tifick of all disciplines. 
 
 The scientific, reflecting man, is, I said, for ever withdrawn 
 
 B 2 
 
4 HISTOEICAL SUEVEV. 
 
 from the dominion of mere authoritative belief and unreflecting 
 opinion, and can never return to his old state of conviction, 
 peace, and satisfaction, but by passing through the whole range 
 of the science of philosophy. 
 
 First, and in the greatest degree, is this shown in the sphere of 
 faith, so called, in its more restricted sense, — i. e. that of reli- 
 gious conviction. We regard, indeed, generally the three ideas, 
 Grod, freedom, and immortality, as the chief subject-matter or 
 content of philosophy, and this again as the means by which to 
 arrive at a settled conviction upon these highest concerns. Thus 
 philosophy becomes, at the same time, a business of the heart ; 
 it must, it ought to be so, at least for every one who has once 
 outgrown his childish faith, and yet not become on tliat account 
 indifferent to the highest, holiest truth, and who has not been 
 led astray by that common irony, which exclaims, " What is 
 Truth ?" 
 
 It was, indeed, the tree of knowledge which was tasted at the 
 beginning; and had this fruit been really a foi-bidden fruit for 
 man, he ought never to have indulged himself in thinking. But 
 now, since Adam, we are all bewitched ; we cannot desist from 
 thinking, and so, unable to retrace our steps, we must press 
 forward or advance. 
 
 Faith, by which is here meant especially blind faith upon 
 authority, has, so to speak, vanished from the mind of the 
 educated man, and there no longer exists any formula that 
 shall succeed in conjuring it back again ; in truth, this vain 
 attempt must be denominated the especial torment of our age. 
 Thus, then, in all high and holy things nothing more will re- 
 main but free and rational self- conviction ; and this, philosophy, 
 both in its theoretical and practical departments, must finally 
 bring about. This is the obscurely felt reason why we should 
 be so willing to trust her as a guide, if she only performed what 
 is her office. But most men demand of her, not only truth, 
 but also prescribe to her what truth is to be ; she must plead 
 and win the cause of their wishes and pretensions, however 
 impure and alloyed these may be ; she must pronounce that to 
 be just and holy which is advantageous and convenient for 
 themselves. 
 
 But even the best frequently pursue the path of this science 
 only in order to regain the lost, the faith of childhood ; they 
 would have not so much a higher and purer, but they would have 
 again that gentle twilight, the old, wonted, and agreeable truth; 
 their eyes ache, if philosophy imparts more light than these 
 can bear, and they call it a consuming fire. 
 
INTRODUCTIOK. 5 
 
 If, however, it is frequently neither light nor fire that pro- 
 ceeds from philosophy, but rather darkness and cold, what then 
 remains for us, who have once tasted of that fruit of knowledge, 
 what else, we would ask, but bravely to endure this ordeal, 
 whether of fire or frost? When a philosophical system, by 
 which is to be understood a mere step on this wide path of 
 inquiry, does not appear to conduct us at once to the goal, but 
 in place of leading us perceptibly nearer to it, seems rather to 
 lead us astray, then, most of us complain, very justly, of the 
 deception ; for few men have time enough to advance more than 
 a step forward in the course of their life ; thus, they reject or 
 cast aside this or that system of philosophy as false, and after 
 some vain attempts, despairing entirely of any success, dis- 
 engage themselves from their guide, and plunge back into that 
 state of faitli, that absence of philosophy, in which they felt as 
 happy as children at home. But alas ! this late return to home 
 is invariably followed by more sorrowful than appeasing re- 
 sults, for it is not at the same time a return into the period of 
 childhood ; and thus every attempt to reproduce or bring back 
 artificially that naive faith, proves nothing but a poetic dream, 
 that serves only to remind us of what we have irrevocably lost. 
 
 There ■was a time when in the Sahbath's calm 
 Heaven's kiss of love fell on me like the spring ; 
 Then full of mystery was the deep-toned bell, 
 And then a prayer — it was a blessed thing. 
 I may not seek those spheres beyond all strife, 
 From whence the gentle message hath descended, 
 Yet with the wonted sound my youth is blended, 
 And even now it calls me back to life. 
 
 If, however, we have once given up, like Faust, the hope of 
 finding in philosophy a clear demonstration of those ideas, then 
 it ceases to be of general human interest. This remarkable 
 change in the views and confidence of the public appears during 
 the last thirty years to have actually taken place ; whereas, pre- 
 vious to that time, the science was long studied with feelings of 
 hearty participation and comfort. When, however, philosophy 
 on the one hand tacitly admitted, and on the other openly 
 declared, that she could and would do nothing but render first 
 of all nature comprehensible, and presumed to draw down 
 even the highest ideas within the circle of natural necessity, 
 then was she forsaken, for the most part, by her admirers ; 
 men were content with a little logic and psychology for the 
 purposes of the school and pulpit ; and metaphysics found with 
 
 B 3 
 
6 HISTORICAL SUBVET. 
 
 some few natural philosophers and physiologists but a scanty 
 and precarious subsistence. To the majority of educated per- 
 sons, the muse of Plato, clad in the drapery of the so-called 
 nature-philosophy and pantheism, appeared like a dismal som- 
 nambulist, and every one who was unwilling to fall out with his 
 Christian conscience held himself far aloof from her, and kept 
 his peace. 
 
 On a sudden, however, philosophy stripped off her fantastic 
 raiment, and reassumed an independent position, as strict 
 discipline, as thoroughly pure and dry logic, in the profes- 
 sor's chair. The scholar rejoiced in her renewed scientific 
 dignity as his teacher, and readily encased himself within the 
 narrow formulse of logic, for this constraint was ever more 
 agreeable to the Germans than a loose or slovenly mode of 
 expressing their thoughts. But, unfortunately, philosophy had 
 adopted a language so unintelligible and almost foreign, that 
 for a long time no one was able freely to translate her discourse 
 into his own mode of thought, nor did most of the philosophers 
 by profession, — not to mention the public, — understand how 
 to interpret her with certainty, and that which the few initiated 
 reported openly concerning her sounded, in detached sentences, 
 as nonsensical and blasphemous. Certainly, the misunderstand- 
 ing and variance between the schools and ordinary life could 
 not be greater. 
 
 Nevertheless, that very man who, it is said, has left the whole 
 of philosophy to congeal into an impenetrable ice, has given 
 prevalence to a certain view of the history of philosophy, or 
 the successive development and connection of the different 
 systems, from which, as a right view, we cannot withhold our 
 approbation, though we might not at present be able to enter 
 into the deeper grounds of this phenomenon, or might probably 
 explain it in a very different manner from Hegel.* 
 
 For while the customary view is this, that all systems have 
 been hitherto only unsuccessful attempts to solve* the riddle of 
 the universe, that men have struck at random into this or that 
 path of inquiry, but have hitherto missed the right one at the 
 very outset, and have on that account been always compelled to 
 begin the same work anew ; while this, I say, was, and still is 
 in part, the customary opinion, we shall have, according to that 
 new view of Hegel, to discover a very close, nay, even organic, 
 
 *. Hegel's Geschichte der Philosophie. Werke, Bd. xiii. p. 22. et seq. ; 
 Phauomenologie, Vor. p. 3. 
 
INTBODUCTION. 7 
 
 connection among the different systems ; in so far as it is 
 evident that the human mind, always advancing (but espe- 
 cially since the emancipation of philosophy from the fetters 
 of the positive theology, in which it had lain bound during the 
 scholastic period), has been incessantly engaged in its self- 
 development. For just as the awakening of the consciousness 
 in every individual passes through certain stages of develop- 
 ment, at first contents itself with an unthinking and sensational 
 intuition, but soon desiring to understand what it sees, enters 
 upon the region of the understanding, which evokes an unex- 
 pected light, though at the same time doubts and contradictions, 
 and entangles itself in its own theorems, so that it is con- 
 strained to take a higher stand-point, by which the conscious- 
 ness shall be finally elevated into pure rationality, — just as this 
 is the psychological process in the individual, so is it also in the 
 race, i. e. in the historical consciousness of humanity, manifest- 
 ing itself most distinctly upon each stage of the formation of 
 the science properly so called. 
 
 If Hegel had regarded his system as constituting the ulti- 
 mate and highest stage, or as the completion of this historical 
 consciousness, beyond which no further progress were, in es- 
 sentials, possible, the same would have happened to him as to 
 most great philosophers, who, each in his turn, imagines that 
 be has brought the stone of Sisyphus to a stand-still, — he would 
 have erred; while his disciples, in proclaiming this supposed 
 triumph with all earnestness, would have done neither morq 
 nor less than what at different periods of philosophy the faith- 
 ful adherents of all masters have done, though by these very 
 means they have plainly injured both the master and his art. 
 
 Hegel's system, like all preceding ones, is rather to be re- 
 garded as a period or individual step in the progressive move- 
 ment of mental inquiry ; and if in this system, philosophy 
 in its progress has really planted one foot firmly, it now only 
 remains for her, supported upon this, to make a new and on- 
 ward step. 
 
 For why should philosophy be the only stationary thing in 
 the wide world of matter and spirit? As in the whole of 
 nature there is no standing still, but only movement, nay, 
 when closely regarded, in the very movement itself no perfect 
 repetition takes place; as even the life of nature has its epochs 
 or periods, and, consequently, a history in the proper sense of 
 the word ; epochs too that lie at an incomparably greater dis- 
 tance from each other than those of human history, — thus, as 
 
 B 4 
 
8 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 nature herself has progressed, and still progresses in vast pe- 
 riods of creation, which, after a length of time, are first ren- 
 dered visible in some measure to our dawning intelligence in 
 the strata and fossil deposits of the earth's crust, or in the 
 change of position in the earth's axis in reference to the polar 
 star, — so also has the human mind steadily passed through its 
 phases of history or development, a fact already proved by our 
 comparatively short history of the world, and the still shorter 
 history of philosophy. 
 
 As we see that, in the organism of nature, one antagonism 
 constantly presupposes the other, — that one leaf upoii a branch 
 evokes an opposite, — as it were, to maintain the balance or 
 equilibrium of girowth, — so also is this law in operation in the 
 growth of the mind, in the organic development of the con- 
 sciousness. Whjle on the whole a certain progress is attained, 
 the change in particulars is evoked by opposites ; for we see 
 how constantly one philosophical fundamental view, if only 
 definitely expressed, of necessity exhibits a one-sided character. 
 Then immediately arises, evoked by the law of contradictions, 
 an opposite system ; the struggle of opponent criticism begins, 
 but both extremes serve only to elicit a new view, — to set a 
 fresh bud or eye, as it were, upon the tree of knowledge, — 
 which is again destined to pass through the same process of 
 development. Whether and at what time this development 
 may lead to a blossom, which would be at the same time its 
 consummation or ultimate development, is for us at present an 
 unanswerable question : for, with an actual completion of the 
 consciousness, the human race would at the same time have at- 
 tained the goal of its possible development ; and the planet 
 itself, at least in its present form, have served out the time 
 allotted for the general economy of minds, and what might 
 happen further upon it would belong to a future period of the 
 worMs history, concerning which we cannot at present indulge 
 in any conjectures. 
 
 After the great deluge of nations and gradual regeneration of 
 political life during the Middle ages, philosophy was naturally 
 obliged, like every other art and science, to begin a new 
 structure upon old foundations. In the writings of the an- 
 cients the outer works were, so to speak, raised for a philosophy 
 of the consciousness ; and to the Greeks we should and must go 
 to school for the purposes of preliminary instruction. But, in 
 this case, the instructors were heathens and the scholars Chris- 
 
INTRODUCTION. 9 
 
 tians ; and so from this spiritual marriage sprung of necessity 
 an off-shoot of a peculiar nature, which in the beginning stood 
 decidedly under the surveillance of the mother theology, ere it 
 could emancipate itself at a later period, and freely emulate its 
 Hellenic father. There exists, historically speaking, only a 
 Grecian and German philosophy : the latter has sprung up 
 within the bosom of Christian education ; for every thing that 
 was new and not ancient in the mental reformation of Europe 
 is of Teutonic origin. 
 
 That antagonism of the philosophical systems which has 
 been alluded to above, which had already declared itself among 
 the Greeks as Platonism and Aristotelism, and, in the dominant 
 age of scholasticism, as realism and nominalism, reappeared 
 at a later period in the writings of Descartes and Locke. 
 Descartes, as the originator of a Platonising view of the so-called 
 doctrine of innate ideas, adopted the spiritualistic tendency in 
 philosophy, and had for his followers Spinoza, Malebranche, 
 and Leibnitz. Locke was driven, through opposition to 
 Descartes, to become the champion or defender of sensation- 
 alism, and was followed in France by Condillac, Helvetius, and 
 others, who, in the most cultivated language of that period, 
 procured for their system the most general diffusion. 
 
 The cause, however, of this general diffusion was by no 
 means of a merely external character, dependent upon the lan- 
 guage and cotemporaneous position of the French literature, 
 but was rather of an internal nature, and concealed within this 
 form of philosophy itself. 
 
 The Sensationalism of Locke may be characterised in general 
 as that view which presents itself as the first and most natural 
 to the human being upon reflection, and one with which it may 
 be said we all content ourselves in the ordinary matters of life, 
 domestic or otherwise. 
 
 Now, in approaching nearer to my present purpose, and first 
 of all looking around me for a basis that may'serve as a common 
 starting-point for the investigation, this view of Locke at once 
 presents itself to my mind, both as that mode of thinking which 
 is to be presupposed upon the part of the understanding, when 
 it has advanced no further in reflection, and, at the same time, 
 as representing a phase that constitutes a definite moment^ or 
 period in the historical development of philosophy. But, seeing 
 that this view is to serve, as aforesaid, only as a basis for 
 bringing into mutual illustration and connection the further de- 
 
10 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 velopment of philosophy, I shall enter upon no comprehensive 
 delineation of its features, but only allude to them in so far as 
 is suflBcient for our present purpose. 
 
 In every child, says Locke*, it is evident, that only those re- 
 presentations or images enter the mind, whose objects lie within 
 the circle of its outward vision. Originally, the mind is to be 
 regarded as a blank table {tabula rasa), which is gradually 
 painted over and filled up" by the images of outward objects 
 that impinge upon it. All images come originally, without any 
 exception, through the senses into the consciousness ; in the 
 mind there resides, originally, not a single idea, developed or 
 undeveloped ; in a word, none are innate. The mind comports 
 itself, in reference to the images of all kinds, only as a power of 
 apprehension, and that indeed, in the commencement, more in a 
 passive than an active manner. The external object must work 
 ■jupon our soul, exercise upon it some impetus or pressure, which 
 propagates a movement, through our nerves or vital spirits, to 
 the brain, and there produces corresponding copies or repre- 
 sentations of the objects. 
 
 The objects are thus reflected in the consciousness, as in a 
 mirror ;■ or directly affect the nerves of smell, taste, &c., by the 
 medium of dissolved particles. So also with the movements 
 and changes that occur only in our soul,; to observe these 
 we have a special, or what has been called inner sense. In 
 short, every representation depends originally upon a mecha- 
 nical impression, conveyed through or by means of the body, 
 into the soul. And here the impressions are treasured up in 
 the memory, and, as opportunity offers, recalled. 
 
 But, at the same time also, the human understanding mani. 
 fests itself as a faculty of judgment, seeing that it distinguishes 
 and compares the images that have been conveyed to it from 
 the outer world, unites those that are similar, and separates 
 those that are dissimilar. We now arrange the innumerable 
 individuals together, according to the resemblance observed 
 between them, into entire classes ; the names for which we 
 apply, without distinction, to every individual of its class as a 
 generic name, and by these means avoid the impossibility of 
 giving each single object a separate title. Thus originate, as is 
 well known, the general conceptions from the special represent- 
 ations or images of individual beings, by means of the abstract- 
 ing and reflective activity of the understanding. For while we 
 
 * An Essay concerning the Human Understanding, London, 1690. 
 
INTRODUCTION. 11 
 
 comprise very many similar beings, e. g., under the general 
 notion or idea of animal, we, in doing this, take note only of 
 those signs which occur to all as common or characteristic, 
 and abstract from these those that are peculiar to each in par- 
 ticular, and by which it is distinguished from all the rest ; 
 designating those signs that have been adopted to form the no- 
 tion the essential, in contradistinction to the others as unes- 
 sential or accidental signs or definitions. 
 
 We have not, however, merely ideas of definite objects and 
 their properties, but also of the relations in which the former 
 stand to us and to each other ; e. g. those of proximity or dis- 
 tance — i. e. of space, of time, number, unity, multiplicity, and 
 such like. Thus, the idea of infinity originates from the per- 
 ception that, in the act of numbering, or the adding together of 
 individual spaces and times, we cannot come to an end. Thus, 
 for example, a sailor may think the sea has no bottom, when he 
 has sunk his sounding-lead, and found none. It is the same 
 with the so-called moral ideas, and — to mention the two fol- 
 lowing particularly, as they are of special importance for our 
 present object — with the ideas of substance and cause. 
 
 We remark, in one and the same thing, difierent properties, 
 e. g., the cubic form, weight, yellow colour, &c. Now, these 
 properties must inhere or be attached to something internal, be 
 supported, and, as it were, kept together by something ; and 
 this internal aliquid or something, that unites them, we term the 
 subjacent, sustenant, or substantia, although nothing further is 
 known as to what this said something in itself — i. e. apart from 
 all those properties — may be. Now, in this same manner origi- 
 nates the notion of cause and eflfect, from those relations of 
 things that are perceptible by the senses ; since we observe that 
 the origination and passing away of innumerable things in 
 nature is dependent upon the activity of other accessory and 
 antecedent things. 
 
 Thus, general judgments must finally be referred to sensa- 
 tions, and must rest upon actual experience, in which, by means 
 of observation, we perceive the contradictory and concordant; 
 and in the latter of these two, the ground of all certainty. 
 
 The certainty of our actually beholding things out of our- 
 selves does not indeed admit of demonstration, but depends 
 upon our perceiving and being conscious that it is quite a 
 different matter whether we see things before us, which we 
 could not see otherwise than they are, or whether, on the con- 
 trary, we represent things before us of our own accord, in 
 
12 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 which case we can change in the idea or representation what- 
 ever we please. The certainty thus depends on the perception 
 of our own passivity and want of freedom during the sensational 
 intuition ; did we ourselves evoke these ideas from an internal 
 disposition and power, we could never then be certain of the 
 objective existence of objects. That, however, our intuitions 
 or copies of things agree truly with, or are adequate to, the 
 things out of us, results from the fact that, were they not to 
 proceed from the things themselves, we should have to engender 
 them by means of our understanding. Now the understanding 
 can deal with every thing that lias been brought to it by means 
 of the senses ; it can analyze all images, and put together their 
 parts in a far more varied manner than as they occur in na- 
 ture ; but it cannot create the single parts from out itself. No 
 blind person, for example, has an idea or representation of 
 colours, no deaf person of sounds, abd so on. Now, as the 
 understanding can merely separate and put together what has 
 been given it, the origin of our ideas, — even the mathematical, 
 — must depend upon the regular influence of things and their 
 relations upon ourselves. Now, as our knowledge is merely 
 limited to experience, nothing can at bottom be asserted as 
 generally valid, because experience never becomes wholly ex- 
 hausted, and that which has not hitherto happened may pro- 
 bably happen in the future, because that might become true 
 which has at present been held to be impossible. 
 
 Such is empiricism or sensationalism in its fundamental out- 
 lines. It did not occur to us, in tracing these, to say any thing 
 new, but rather to point out how diverse kinds of natural sug- 
 gestions, which we may encounter in the sequel, have been 
 already brought forward long ago, but are so constituted as 
 not to admit of our resting content with them, although that 
 very system remained even in Germany, for a considerable time, 
 the undisputed basis upon which philosophy was built. 
 
 Scepticism, which certainly never builds any thing for itself, 
 but only demolishes what is threatening to fall in, applied itself 
 at length to this old, crumbling edifice ; and it was the Scotch- 
 man, David Hume, who, as Kant says, " struck the spark with 
 which a light might well have been kindled, had it come in 
 contact with any combustible matter."* 
 
 * Prolegomena zu einer jeden kunftigen Metaphysik, p. 7, Sammtl. 
 Werke, iii. d. Ausg. v. Rosenkranz. 
 
INTRODUCTIOS-. ^ 13 
 
 But why, we ask ourselves, before proceeding further, — 
 why enter upon the present road, and to what end is the in- 
 quiry concerning the origin of our cognitions ? The question is 
 one upon whose solution depends, first of all, the certainty of 
 all cognitions, the treatment of which constitutes the substance 
 of all theoretical philosophy. How so ? it may be asked, and 
 why cannot we rest content with the simple natural view given 
 by Locke, as being that which prevails almost universally in 
 ordinary life ? We cannot content ourselves with it for this 
 reason, that when the truth of all our convictions is made to 
 depend ultimately upon sensational impressions, and thus upon 
 external experience, there can be (as is shown at the conclu- 
 sion of Locke's statement) no irrefragably certain knowledge, no 
 unshaken credulity, no point in the whole compass of our con- 
 sciousness, that might be considered firm and persistent; but 
 every thing, being devoid of order and law in the manifold 
 series of ideas, would pass by us and within us as an un- 
 meaning jugglery. With such a doctrine we could not pre- 
 suppose with any certainty an order and connection in the 
 actual world, much less elevate ourselves with confidence to 
 the transcendent, or to the ideas of God, freedom, and immor- 
 tality ; since these ideas do not depend at all upon sensational 
 impressions, and would consequently appear only as a fiction or 
 scheme of the understanding devoid of all external authority. 
 
 That we have varied acquirements, inward perceptions and 
 ideas, is a well known matter of fact ; but then the question 
 arises, does any thing in reality correspond to these ideas ? 
 And if any thing does correspond to them, is it constituted just 
 as these ideas denote ? With regard to many — nay, most— of the 
 sensuous images, a slight degree of reflection serves to teach us 
 that the reality cannot so correspond to them, as we ordinarily 
 concede, e.g., the colours which are produced by the refraction 
 of light, the sounds engendered by the vibrations of air, can 
 they indeed be said to exist apart from us as colours and tones, 
 or are they such only in relation to our eye and ear ? And 
 still more, the sweetness and acidity, the warmth and cold 
 that we feel, are they not obviously mere subjective conditions ? 
 Does the sweetness exist elsewhere than upon our tongue, or in 
 our act of tasting ? and the feeling of cold, is it not obviously 
 an afiFection, a disposition of our body ? These affections may 
 certainly depend upon something definite in nature, but that 
 which we perceive on their occurrence upon and in ourselves, 
 is only our behaviour in reference to those natural powers, and 
 
14 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 what tliese natural conditions are in themselves— i. e, apart from 
 our sensations, — remains at present perfectly unknown to us. 
 The question has been ever this,— whence come all our inward 
 perceptions or ideas ? "What is their true origin ? Are they 
 produced within us, and by the mind itself, only upon the occur- 
 rence of certain external causes ? or are they at least partly 
 derived from the objects, so that we have in them an apt and 
 perfectly corresponding, i. e. true likeness, or not ? And granted 
 that such were the case, how do we discover it, and how 
 can we attain to the certamty that the matter is actually so ? 
 Where lies the surety for it ? 
 
 Such then is the fundamental question, which must precede 
 all metaphysics. Locke has said, all our representations or in- 
 ward perceptions are derived originally from the objects ; from 
 these inward perceptions the understanding forms its general 
 conceptions; from the general conceptions are compounded the 
 judgments, conclusions, the whole of logic, and finally the entire 
 system of our thought and belief. Thus the whole system ulti- 
 mately and fundamentally depends upon the truth of the sen- 
 sational impressions ; but if an assumption does not admit of 
 being ultimately referred to such or such an impression, then 
 the assumption itself and all that should follow from it turns 
 out to be a fiction. That, for example, a general connection 
 takes place in the world among things and events, that con- 
 sequently there is a general concatenation of cause and effect^ 
 we know merely on this account, because we can point to this 
 connection in reality, and frequently enough experience it our- 
 selves. 
 
 Now David Hume * subjected this proposition especially to 
 a closer examination. Do we actually see the connection be- 
 tween two things, or phenomena, of which the one is regarded 
 as the cause, the other as the effect ? By no means. The in- 
 ternal connection, the mysteriously acting invisible power, not 
 only eludes our observation, but there is also no principle that 
 might reveal to our understanding with certainty and necessity, 
 upon the occasion of every phenomenon that we witness, the 
 constantly present and hidden cause. Many thousand times do 
 we witness phenomena in nature of which we cannot discover 
 the cause, and such is even the ordinary case ; nevertheless 
 we presuppose each time a cause, although it is unknown to us. 
 
 * David Hume's Treatise of Human Nature, &c. London, 1738. Es- 
 says, vol. ii. Inquiry concerning the Human Understanding, Edinb. 1748. 
 
INXEODUCTIOK 15 
 
 Nothing without a cause, we say, — and in thus expressing our- 
 selves we appeal to a law of the understanding, the law of the 
 sufficient reason. But if we thus allow the understanding to 
 transport its laws without more ado into nature, how then 
 do matters really stand ? We have first of all assumed that the 
 understanding ought only to adopt that as certain and true 
 which admits of demonstration by or from experience, and now 
 we would pursue the reverse course, and allow the understand- 
 ing to prescribe to experience what it has firmly settled apriori 
 to be true. As the hidden working forces are represented nei- 
 ther to the internal nor the external perception, the rule of 
 cause and eflfect must be originally abstracted from the succes- 
 sion or sequence of time, within which things are wont to occur, 
 and so it becomes an instinctive habit to presuppose a certain 
 regular sequence in every day phenomena. This sequence, 
 however, is by no means necessary and certain ; for nature 
 rather exhibits just as much irregularity in her course ; and 
 if, accordingly, the general validity of this rule, as being with- 
 out exception, is to depend merely upon experience, why then 
 it is false. Granted, that since the commencement of our his- 
 tory, we may have observed in certain phenomena the strictest 
 regularity, as, e.g., that the sun rises every morning j does it 
 follow necessarily from the many thousand years during which 
 this phenomenon has been repeated, that it must always pro- 
 ceed in the same way? Is it not conceivable that at some 
 future time, about the usual hour of morning, the sun may be 
 absent ? From experience, at least, we could not prove such to 
 be an impossibility. 
 
16 HISTORICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 LECTURE II. 
 
 In order that we might become certain of the truth of our in- 
 ward perceptions, it appeared above all things requisite to 
 know their origin. Locise had already found himself called 
 upon to make the attempt to investigate or trace this origin, 
 and so to institute a Critick, which, in its tendency, bore the 
 greatest resemblance to the later undertaking of Kant, although 
 both led to wholly different, nay, opposite results. If Kant, as 
 we shall presently see, sought to base the certainty of our 
 cognition of outward objects upon the subjective necessity of 
 thought, Locke had rather derived the necessity of thought 
 from the objects themselves. Inward perceptions, which we do 
 not voluntarily produce, must, according to him, be produced 
 by the objects ; and thus things must be present and be consti- 
 tuted like their copies, the representations ; for otherwise their 
 existence and content would not be explicable. Thus the in- 
 ward perceptions are directly true in so far as they depend 
 upon the things, and are not produced hy ourselves ; in a word, 
 in order to recognise truth, thought must wholly accommodate 
 itself to things, and retain their impressions pure and free 
 from its own additions and alterations. So far Locke. 
 
 Hume set out from the same principle, but he showed that 
 ' we only perceive through impressions the coexistence and se- 
 quence of outward things. These single impressions are clear 
 and defined, and are to be well distinguished from each other ; 
 but of their essential connection, there is found to be no impres- 
 sion, and yet there must be an impression, if, according to the 
 above rule, such a connection is to be for us a matter of cer- 
 tainty. The forces which we adopt and regard as occult causes, 
 from which the effects must proceed, are only products of our 
 imagination ; they serve, properly speaking, only as a testimony 
 and confession upon our part that we do not know the source 
 of the phenomena. Cause, effect, and force are inward per- 
 ceptions or ideas devoid of all objective signification, for ex- 
 perience furnishes only the simple elements, which the memory 
 within us disposes and connects together; thus, the connec- 
 tion which we term causality, is only a product familiarised by 
 habit or custom, only our subjective addition to phenomena, 
 
KANT. ] t 
 
 but is not derived from any thing of an objective character, 
 and is consequently devoid of any objective validity. 
 
 Thus we know nothing of universal and necessary laws, by 
 which the connection of things and the course of the world may 
 be governed ; all our calculations and expectations are conse- 
 quently built upon a baseless supposition: we cannot here 
 speak of absolute certainty, for at the most the analogy of 
 certain frequently repeated series of phenomena admits only of 
 a higher or lower degree of probability. Added to this, that 
 experience but too frequently contradicts that supposition, for 
 the irregular course of events often sets at defiance all regu- 
 larity and calculation. If, however, there is no causal nexus 
 cognisable between the objects of experience, still less is one 
 cognisable between them and a transcendent cause ; so that one 
 is not in the least degree justified in thence concluding as to 
 the existence of a Divine Author. 
 
 Through this scepticism, all the foundations of philosophy 
 became at once, as is seen, of an unsettled character ; for if the 
 necessary connection of singulars with each other is denied, 
 then all the foundations and deductions of reason are done 
 away with, and a groundless uncertainty is put in the place of 
 objective knowledge. 
 
 Hume had consequently shaken the empiricism of Locke to 
 the very foundation ; but Hume himself stood, in doing this, 
 upon one and the same g:50und with Locke ; for by that which 
 was empirical he shook the fabric of empiricism. Kani was 
 just busied at that time with the Wolfian metaphysics, which 
 had adopted the sensationalism of Locke into the system of 
 Leibnitz ; so that, through this channel, the above shock was 
 directly communicated to the philosopher of Konigsberg. He 
 perceived it, and traced it to its source. For a long time he 
 wrote nothing of a speculative nature, until finally, in the year 
 1781, he could come forward with his principal work, matured 
 in silence, and creating subsequently an epoch in philosophy, 
 the Critick of Pure Reason.* 
 
 While Locke and Hume had critically investigated the origin 
 of the individual representations, and had reverted to ex- 
 
 * " I wrote," he says in a letter to Moses Mendelsohn, " this product of 
 at least twelve years of diligent reflection within a period of from four to 
 five months, paying indeed the greatest attention to the content, but unable; 
 borne away, as it were, upon the wings of thought, to bestow that care 
 upon the style which might have promoted a readier insight into my 
 meaning on the part of the reader." 
 
 C 
 
18 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 perience as their source, Kant now proceeded to make the 
 origin of experience the main subject of his critical investi- 
 gation ; this grand extension of the philosophical horizon at 
 once testifying to the elevated position of his new point of 
 view. From empiricism, as soon as it is made the founda- 
 tion and principle of all certainty, springs scepticism ; and this 
 Kant had fully recognised. Thus he could not contradict 
 the objections of Hume, which were derived from the same 
 source, but he rather availed himself of them, suffered them 
 to hold good, and took up, as perfectly well grounded, the funda- 
 mental position of that sceptic, namely, that experience teaches 
 Tis nothing of causality and a necessary conformity to law in 
 nature. Of this position, however, he made a wholly different 
 and unexpected use, since he discovered therein the nega- 
 tive confirmation of an ideal and subjective certainty. " I 
 freely confess," he says, " that it was David Hume who first 
 roused me from my dogmatic slumber, and gave a different 
 direction to my investigations in the field of speculative philo- 
 sophy. Hume threw no light upon this mode of cognition, 
 but still he struck a spark, at which a light might have been 
 kindled had a sufficiently inflammable substance been met with, 
 whose faint smouldering might have been gradually fed and 
 fanned into a flame." It is quite correct to affirm that causality 
 is a notion, which we add to and bring to bear upon pheno- 
 mena ; for this notion is not abstracted from experience itself, 
 as from a plurality of cases and according to analogy ; but from 
 all this there follows the direct opposite of what Hume would 
 maintain ; for this philosopher concluded that, because that 
 notion does not originate or proceed from objectivity, but from 
 ourselves, it is not universally and necessarily valid. But the 
 direct contrary to this conclusion must be inferred, for if 
 this notion originated in experience, then it would be acci- 
 dental and wanting in necessity and universality ; for expe- 
 rience does not always remain the same, is not the same to 
 every one, and is not perfected at any one moment of time. 
 1 Thus a notion can only be necessary and universal, when it is 
 ' derived from the nature of our thought, i. e. from our reason, 
 for this last is one, universal and common to all men. Ex- 
 perience is a product consisting of two factors ; and in so far 
 as it is produced by the factor of our common laws of intelli- 
 gence, it is of necessity universally valid and elevated above 
 all casualty or contingence. This it is which philosophy has 
 opposed to the scepticism which throws doubt upon the pos- 
 
KANT. 1 9 
 
 sibility of a generally valid science. Hence the renowned 
 declaration of Kant (in the preface to the second edition of 
 the Critick of Pure Reason), " Hitherto it has been assumed 
 that all our cognition must regulate itself according to the 
 objects; but all attempts to make any thing out of them a 
 priori, through notions whereby our cognition might be en- 
 larged, proved, under this supposition, abortive. Let us, then, 
 try for once whether we do not succeed better with the 
 problems of metaphysics, by assuming that the objects must 
 regulate themselves according to our cognition, a mode of 
 viewing the subject which accords so much better with the 
 desired possibility of a cognition of them a priori, as being 
 one which must decide something concerning objects before 
 they are given us. The circumstances are in this case pre- 
 cisely the same as with the first thoughts of Copernicus, who, 
 finding that his attempt to explain the motions of the heavenly 
 bodies did not succeed, when he assumed the whole starry host 
 to revolve around the spectator, tried whether he should not 
 succeed better if he left the spectator himself to turn, and 
 the stars on the contrary at rest." 
 
 This explanation contains, in fact, the programme to that 
 idealistic revolution which, no less rich in results for the do- 
 main of philosophy than that of Copernicus for astronomy, was 
 begun by Kant, perfected by Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel, and 
 recently reappears with Schelling, as brought back to the 
 starting-point of Kant. Whence this retrograde step in phi- 
 losophy, and whether or no it was necessary, we are not 
 yet able, in the commencement of our inquiries, distinctly to 
 recognise : but we already see thus much beforehand, that 
 Kant's philosophy rests upon two principles, an idealistic sub- 
 jective, and an empirical objective principle; if, however, he 
 was convinced as of a fundamental truth, that all scepticism 
 was derived from empiricism, why did he, along with that 
 idealism just proclaimed, again have recourse to the dangerous 
 element of empiricism ? 
 
 "Were we to set before him the decisive alternative, as to 
 whether the thinking subject produces the whole world of phe- 
 nomena purely from itself, or receives the latter from the , 
 objects or things, his reply would be ; neither of the two 
 factors work exclusively, but both together. The combina- 
 tions and relations of the single component parts are con- 
 tributed by the subject, from out its thinking understanding : 
 and this Kant terms the Form ; while, on the other hand, the 
 
 c2 
 
20 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 material, i. e. the elements of the content of our inward per- 
 ceptions, are contributed by objects external to us ; and this 
 he calls the matter of Sensation. Accordingly, it must be said ; 
 that were no objects present, there would be no phenomena; 
 but if there were no understanding to apprehend them, if these 
 individual phenomena were to find no common point of union 
 in man's inward nature, but even here were to appear and dis- 
 appear in a fugitive and unconnected manner — then there 
 would be no experience. Thus, in case or if phenomena are 
 present, they must admit of being adjusted and fashioned ac- 
 cording to the laws of the understanding, in order that a 
 coherent or connected experience, — a knowledge, as it is 
 generally called, — may originate ; but that such phenomena, 
 and the things which lie at their basis, are present, does not 
 admit of being proved a priori from any law of the understand- 
 ing. It only admits of being said a priori, of what kind 
 {quomodo) all possible experience may be, in case it is ; not, 
 however, whether and th,at (quod) it is. In short, the notions 
 of things, but not their Existence, the essentia only can be con- 
 ceived a priori, but not the existentia proved a priori ; " from 
 the mere representation of a thing, we cannot in any way elicit 
 the reality." 
 
 This is the other, non-idealistic moment of the philosophy of 
 Kant. But this, though seeming to be the only real and cer- 
 tain point, can only teach us unquestionable truth in the single 
 case in which it is present, and where its presence is felt. ' This 
 truth, however, reaches only so far as this very perception 
 goes,'t. e., to the accidental existence of a definite finite object;; 
 for, as to any thing universal, conformable to law, or necessary, 
 this empirical moment of itself can teach us nothing. Besides, 
 after so long and mature an experience, the possible case 
 always remains, i. e. is conceivable, that at one time or other 
 the directly opposite may happen, as in the example of the sun- 
 rise afore-mentioned. That very something, which is to be 
 immoveably true, absolutely necessary, and universally valid, 
 with and for all men, can directly depend upon nothing else but 
 the original constitution of our own thinking faculty. Hence, 
 for example, the propositions of mathematics are not of such, 
 constraining certainty, because they may be to a certain extent 
 abstracted from the forms and relations of nature, but inversely, 
 because they depend only upon the subjective necessity of our 
 thought. As to whatever can and may occur in nature, this 
 does not admit of being known ; it merely admits of being 
 
KANT. 21 
 
 known for certain, how, through all eternity, men do regard 
 nature, what they will in general discern therein as laws so 
 long as men are men, i. e. so long; as they preserve the present 
 constitution of their understanding and reason. From this 
 constitution then, when once recognised, we may conclude as to 
 what will constantly and eternally be true and certain for all 
 men. Were we, for example, to compare the mode of intuition 
 common to all men, to an eye-glass polished or coloured in a 
 certain manner, with which they originally came into the world, 
 and were we to call this glass the constitution of the human un- 
 derstanding, why then we should know for certain that all who 
 look through it must discern objects in this and in no other 
 manner ; and every individual man, e. g. a philosopher, would be 
 forced to conclude from his own mode of intuition, or from his 
 understanding, how all his fellow men must view the same 
 nature. Thus it is only from a subjective constitution of the 
 mind that we can determine what, with all the diversity and 
 uncertainty of individual cases of experience, so soon as they 
 occur, must still appear, without exception, necessary and uni- 
 versally valid for all men, as truth. 
 
 In this case, truth and certainty will not so much be founded 
 upon the agreement of the representations or images, with 
 their objects, as upon the universality and necessity of certain 
 representations and modes of representation for the human 
 understanding. We can indeed, according to Kant, merely 
 know how all men must of necessity represent the things 
 or objects to themselves, not, however, whether these repre- 
 sentations are fully adequate to the objects to which they are 
 to correspond. With that certainty man must be content ; it 
 expresses that which for him and his kind must be irrefragably 
 true. And what more would we have? It is true that man 
 merely knows how things appear to him ; he has before him, and 
 is acquainted only with their manifestations or phenomena, 
 with, as it were, the image of outward things variously refracted 
 through that above-mentioned glass of the understanding upon 
 the mirror of his soul : on his part, he is acquainted only with 
 the relation that subsists between himself and external things; 
 he knows merely how he comports himself in reference to 
 objects, not, however, as to what the things are, and how they 
 may be constituted in themselves, and apart from this relation ; 
 for whatever way he begins his inquiry, through whatever 
 sense he seeks to set himself in relation with things, he still 
 
 C 3 
 
22 HISTORICAL SURVET. 
 
 sees and feels them constantly through his sense alone, and the 
 one sense, e. g. the organ of touch, may serve well enough to 
 rectify or correct the affection of another, such as that of sight ; 
 but he never can pass out of himself above the sphere of the 
 senses, nor by means of them, nor draw the things themselves 
 directly within the pale of his consciousness. The things in 
 themselves, by which with undeniable certainty impressions are 
 made upon our senses, are not to be demonstrated away ; but 
 we know nothing further of them than that they are, and that 
 they are the cause of our momentary sensations ; from them, 
 indeed, we derive nothing more than these sensations, but these 
 are altogether of a subjective character, i. e. involuntary as to 
 their origin, but still in their nature nothing more than certain 
 states of our psychical nature. 
 
 Turning now from this preliminary view of Kant's system, 
 to a closer examination of its most important points, it is ne^ 
 cessary to state beforehand, that we intend, in the following 
 sketch, strictly to confine ourselves to the pure and original 
 theory of Kant, and to separate from it every thing which 
 holds good indeed as Kantianism, but belongs in fact more to 
 his scholars and successors, especially to the further elaboration 
 of his practical philosophy, and to the combination of Kantian 
 and Jacobian ideas. 
 
 To the characteristics of his critical undertaking belongs 
 also the mode of exposition which he selected; it plainly points 
 to the ultimate design, which was constantly present to him, 
 nearer or more remotely, throughout all his philosophising. His 
 Critick was, as he said, directed against all dogmatism in philo- 
 sophy. By dogmatism is here meant every unproved assump- 
 tion, as well as laying down of rules from thoughtless custom, 
 or upon authority ; in short, the direct opposite of the critically 
 testing procedure : assertions without proof are dogmatic. In 
 all this, however, Kant had especially in view the philosophy 
 of his time, or the Wolfian metaphysics. The latter made no 
 use indeed of authoritative propositions, but it placed mathe- 
 matics and logic as a method and orgamon at the basis of cog- 
 nition, without having previously inquired into the full power 
 of these sciences, and estimated their compass or extent. 
 Should it be found, however (as was certainly proved by the 
 critical test), that these miethods admit only of being applied 
 to the region of the finite, or the spatio-temporal and sen- 
 suous world of phenomena, it follows, that, if extended beyond 
 this limit, and brought to bear upon the contemplation and 
 
KANT. 23 
 
 comprehension of the transcendent, that the latter would 
 be thereby rendered perceptible by the senses, and the infinite 
 itself rendered finite ; thus, either mere contradictions would 
 originate, or no infinite and unconditioned whatever would 
 seem to exist, because all which might be so regarded must 
 resolve itself under that method of consideration into mere 
 phenomena, or into sensuo-natiiral existence, by which means 
 the door is opened to that destructive sensationalism of the 
 English and French, to materialism and naturalism, while a 
 pure theism and a pure system of morality would be rendered 
 scientifically impossible. Now it was this ethical interest that 
 originally moved the sage of Konigsberg to bury himself anew 
 in the secret depths of speculative thought, not in order to 
 prop up the hollow foundations of eudasmonism, and to do 
 homage to the mode of thinking of his age, but with a view of 
 opposing himself to it with sharpened weapons. 
 
 In this sense, his struggle against the Wolfian and every 
 other kind of dogmatism held good. But when he incidentally 
 declared, after having examined the means of cognition, which 
 we find in our reason, that matters might be constantly dealt 
 ■with in the same manner, i.e. logically, and when again he 
 called this very procedure a dogmatism, but one that was now 
 permitted or justifiable, still no great stress is to be laid upon 
 these expressions though they are certainly contradictory in 
 character, seeing that he associated that permission expressly 
 with the condition, that intellectual speculation is to keep 
 strictly within the confines of the phenomenal world. The con- 
 tradiction of which he was guilty consisted, at least verbally, 
 only in this, that he had and knew of no other method of cog- 
 nition than the logical ; and since this was the only method 
 applicable to the finite, in this way the infinite must be regarded 
 as uncognisable, and nevertheless its existence ought to be for 
 us a matter of certainty. Yet, with all this, it is readily con- 
 ceivable from that ethical point of view, how Kant was convinced 
 that he had conferred a greater service to humanity by having 
 pointed out the limits of knowledge, than even by establish- 
 ing its certainty within these limits. Is it, he thought, im- 
 possible to break through these barriers in a speculative 
 way ? Still in this very impossibility, an ultramundane sphere 
 is acknowledged, and perhaps another path is pointed out, by 
 which to approach it. This, then, is the double object of the 
 Critick of Pure Eeason; to annihilate scepticism within the 
 
 c 4 
 
24 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 limits of the phenomenal world as submitted to the senses, and 
 also to mark off exactly the line beyond which the desire of 
 knowledge must not venture to soar. 
 
 The first problem was grappled with by Kant in the follow- 
 ing manner. Experience shows us in the direct perception not 
 only what is manifold, but this also combined, in a certain 
 manner, into things or unities endowed with different proper- 
 ties, and many things again with one another, so as to constitute 
 whole series of phenomena. Here then the material as well 
 as the form, i. e., the combination (synthesis) is given. These 
 combinations we can resolve into their several constituent 
 parts, and what we have accomplished in our thoughts is but 
 an analysis of parts, which we can in like manner recom- 
 pound or put together as we found them, without, in doing 
 this, comprehending in the least degree any thing of the ne- 
 cessity of that previous connection. This necessity is only seen 
 into when the thing and its attribute, or, speaking generally, 
 the logical subject and predicate, must be thought of as iden- 
 tical, e.ff. body and extension. The judgment, that all bodies 
 are extended, is essentially different from that of all bodies 
 being heavy, for nothing of the conception of gravity or 
 weight lies in the conception of a body ; but in the representa- 
 tion of corporeity is already contained that of extension, and I 
 cannot forbear thinking of the latter while I think of the 
 former. This is the essential nature of the analytical judg- 
 ment a priori. Hence, in such cases, there is no difficulty 
 and uncertainty as to combination ; for it is necessary or in- 
 evitable. 
 
 Still, however, these analytical judgments are only judg- 
 ments of an explanatory not an amplifying character ; we learn 
 thereby nothing new, but only illustrate what we already 
 know. We have, however, actually to deal with the extension 
 of our knowledge by the logical path beyond the actual, 
 even beyond all possible experience into the region of that 
 which is never manifested to the senses ; for the ideas of 
 freedom, immortality, and deity, will ever remain the highest 
 subjects for reflection. Now, if we could find a means of accom- 
 plishing, and that indeed a priori with logical certainty, such 
 amplifying judgments, or those wherein the predicate does not 
 reside originally in the subject, we should then have attained 
 what we wish, and what is really the problem of philosophy ; 
 we should, in the first place^ perfectly comprehend the internal 
 connection of things among themselves, and we might hope 
 
KANT. 25 
 
 to be able to throw a bridge from the region of experience to 
 the opposite one or that of the transcendent. 
 
 In this sense, Kant summed up the problem of the Critick 
 in the cardinal question, — " How far synthetical judgments d 
 priori are possible"? We readily enough perceive that, in 
 this question, Kant, after his fashion, asked nothing more nor 
 less than how speculation, in a general sense, is possible ? 
 for in its essence, what has been called speculation is nothing 
 else than a fathoming or investigation of truth by means of 
 such amplifying judgments a priori. With Kant, the reply to 
 the above question as regards the sphere of possible experience 
 turned out of an affirmative, but for the supersensuous or 
 transcendent sphere of a negative character. TThe grounds of 
 this twofold decision are clearly set forth in the two first 
 leading divisions of the Critick, viz., the transcendental Logic 
 and Dialectic ; and consist, to speak generally, in this, — that 
 without an application of that a priori synthesis, no experience 
 whatever, i. e. no coherent consciousness, would be possible ; 
 but in fact, there is such a consciousness, so that that supposi- 
 tion must come into full play. Nevertheless, as regards the 
 application of this synthesis to the transcendent, the directly 
 opposite is shown to be the result ; for through its application 
 not only is nothing gained, no connection and unity of thought 
 attained, but rather contradictions and sins against logic are 
 produced, so that its use must here be cast aside. 
 
 As concerns the region of experience we have hitherto, in- 
 duced by Hume, spoken only of the conception of causality, 
 i. e. of the connection of cause and effect, which the human 
 understanding finds itself necessitated to think of as associated 
 with phenomena. But this connection is not the only one 
 which we believe that we perceive among outward things ; 
 they are related also to each other, as essence and properties 
 (substance and accident), and thus of the modes of combination, 
 and of the relations subsisting amongst things, there are several, 
 which we have to regard as a subjective transfer on our 
 part to them. It is of great importance to become acquainted 
 with all these, in order that we may know what in the 
 different representations truly belongs to ourselves, i. e., to 
 the activity of our understanding, and what as appertaining to 
 the sensations or; phenomena proceeds from the impressions 
 made upon us by outward things. The sensations afford, says 
 Kant, the content or material of the individual representations ; 
 the understanding gives the forms and ^relations in which the 
 
26 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 former are placed in union with each other, and united to 
 form an empirical whole. 
 
 Kant saw at once, that the most universal and highest con- 
 ceptions must have an entirely different origin to the experience 
 of the senses ; that they were in themselves, it is true, but 
 empty forms, yet universally necessary in all thinking and 
 cognition ; and by this very criterion of universality and neces- 
 sity, he believed that he had recognised them to be, as above 
 indicated, of a subjective character, and resident a priori in the 
 cognitive faculty of man. 
 
 Still, however, we must not represent to ourselves the most 
 universal ideas of relation, as those of cause and effect, sub- 
 stance and accident, and such like, as being ready prepared 
 and present to the human consciousness a priori, previous to 
 all reflection, — in a word, not as innate conceptions and ideas, 
 — for, what is mentally innate, are only certain modes of pro- 
 cedure employed in cognising and judging. Thus, if we take 
 cognisance of any thing, and judge of it, we must do so accord- 
 ing to those possible ways and means; we consequently regard 
 things, as they are related to each other, as causes and effects, 
 substances and accidents, in quite an involuntary manner ; we 
 do this involuntarily, and even the thoughtless child does it, 
 who has never in its life thought of the abstract notion of 
 these relations. This point of view is merely a mode or 
 necessary law of our vision, of which indeed, at a later period 
 of life, when reflection has been cultivated, and attention 
 directed to the forms of our mental activity, we become con- 
 scious to ourselves abstractedly, and which we are then enabled 
 to indicate in language by substantive words. The under- 
 standing itself can render these ways and means, these laws 
 of its own movement, an object of attention, and reduce them 
 to certain abstract conceptions or notions, which are, however, 
 by no means to be confounded with innate cognitions, or ideas, 
 in the sense adopted by Plato and Descartes, but are rather to 
 be viewed as direct products of the understanding, while en- 
 gaged in the process of abstraction. 
 
 Would we now know perfectly, what, and how many such, 
 modes of combination the understanding has within its power, 
 and how many such general fundamental notions will accord- 
 ingly be possible, we need only, says Kant, look to the different 
 modes or forms of the judgment, as pointed out to us by the 
 science of logic ; for to judge, means no more than to combine 
 one representation (as subject) with another (as predicate). 
 
KANT. 27 
 
 Now, logic shows that there are, upon the whole, twelve differ- 
 ent modes or forms of judging ; so that the understanding has 
 twelve different modes of bringing together its scattered repre- 
 sentations. Such then are the original and universal modes of 
 action, or laws observed in its dealings, by the understanding. 
 "We can easily find them out, when we abstract, in the different 
 judgments, all the objects upon which sentence is passed, and 
 look only to the relation between the subject and predicate. I 
 say, for example, when it thunders, then also has it lightened. 
 This is the hypothetical form of judgment, in which, at bottom, 
 reference is obviously made to what, expressed in abstracto, is 
 called the relation of causality — cause and effect. Or, I say, 
 the lightning is electric (categorical form of judgment); in 
 which case, the relation of the subject, lightning, to the predi- 
 cate, electric, is that of substance and accident. 
 
 In this way result, by means of abstraction from the twelve 
 known forms of judgment, the twelve familiar fundamental 
 notions of the understanding, viz. unity, plurality, totality; 
 reality, negation, limitation ; substantiality, causality, reciprocal 
 action ; possibility, actuality, and necessity. 
 
 Of what and in whatever way the understanding thinks, it 
 never thinks otherwise than in these twelve forms, which we 
 can, in the manner above specified, comprehend in abstracto as 
 general relations, and designate as Categories, after the prece- 
 dent or example of Aristotle. They all express only possible 
 modes of the connection of thoughts (synthesis) ; and all the 
 thousand combinations which, as Gothe says, " one step strikes 
 out in the tissue of the thoughts," admit, according to Kant, of 
 being reduced to these twelve features of a hidden mechanism of 
 the thinking process. 
 
 Let us here pause awhile, in order to see where we are. We 
 have before us in the categories, not laws of nature, according 
 to which the natural objects external to us live and move and 
 are ; we have but recognised laws of our own thinking nature, 
 of the understanding, within and according to which laws 
 it must act, or which, so to speak, constitute the net in which it is 
 involved. Hence, these necessities of thought or categories can 
 only tell us how the relations of things to each other must be 
 thought of; but they do tell us this, in an absolute, universal, 
 and valid manner, for all rational human thought in reference 
 to things ; and, this it is which, as already said, philosophy has 
 to oppose to scepticism. 
 
28 HISTORICAL SUETET. 
 
 Thus the understanding, apart from these laws, which are 
 nothing else than the only possible modes of apprehending 
 any given material, is in itself a thoroughly empty and 
 unproductive faculty; it merely elaborates what is given it, 
 and given it are the intuitions of sense. (Kant designates all 
 kinds of sensuous impressions, not merely that of vision, by 
 the general term Intuitions.) That there are things, and what 
 they are in fact, we cannot learn or prove by any judgment of 
 the understanding ; for, granted that it may be proved for cer- 
 tain that the circle must be round or the triangle three-sided ; 
 still, this only amounts to saying that such an object must 
 be thus thought of, but not that there is any real circle or 
 triangle. The drift of every judgment, even of the catego- 
 rical kind, is only this — if there is x, then this x must be 
 = X, or else it is not conceivable; capability of being thought 
 of or conceived is not, however, reality. 
 
 Thus, the matter-of-fact existence of any thing can never be 
 absolutely proved by the understanding, but can only be ex- 
 hibited, or set forth in the experience, or referred to under the 
 supposition of an otherwise inexplicable phenomenon, and thus 
 in all cases only empirically. This experience must be added to, 
 and must contribute to the understanding, the material which it 
 has to elaborate ; or otherwise the understanding remains for 
 itself wholly void, and merely busies itself internally with its 
 own activity, which hovers before it as an object. It stands in 
 need, therefore, for its forms of an actual material derived from 
 experience; which is only furnished us through the senses ; or 
 as Kant has named them collectively, the intuitive faculty, 
 which is based on " the capacity of being affected hy sensuous 
 objects." 
 
 Unfortunately, Kant has not carried out, from its very com- 
 inencementj this investigation into the first origin of sensuous 
 representations, into the possibility of sense-impressions upon the 
 soul, the ordinary hypothesis of certain mental faculties, &c. ; but 
 he certainly started in this subject from the views, which were 
 current at his time, of Locke ; contented himself with having 
 proved the existence of such intuitions in the mind nega- 
 tively, namely, from the absolutely void character of the un- 
 derstanding pro se ; treated the whole question as transcendent, 
 but yet criticised and changed in the course of his investigation 
 so much as regards the original impressions, that, at last, little 
 or nothing more remained of them ; so that, " without this ordi- 
 
KANT. 29 
 
 nary view," one cannot, to use the language of Jacobi*, "enter 
 into the system of Kant, but with the same one cannot abide 
 therein ; for contrary as it may be to the spirit of the Kantian 
 philosophy to speak of objects as making impressions upon the 
 senses, and in this way bringing about representations, still it 
 does not admit of being clearly seen how, without this supposi-. 
 tion, the philosophy of Kant could justify itself, and attain to 
 any exposition of its doctrinal system." 
 
 Without discussing the true cardinal question, as to what 
 the consciousness may be, — a defect which Carl Leonhard 
 Reinhold first of all felt and sought to better by his theory of • 
 the imaginative faculty, — Kant took up the notion of con- 
 sciousness as he found it, and only investigated what might be 
 sensuously empirical in the matter-of-fact content that was 
 to be found in the consciousness, and what might be of a sub- 
 jective a priori character ; of the latter he pointed out the 
 origin in the nature of the understanding ; as to what re- 
 mained, it should and must be derived from without, and the 
 mind comports itself in reference to this in a " receptive" man- 
 ner. Receptivity and spontaneity are inseparably combined in 
 the perception, and work together, the first contributing the 
 material, the latter the form to every experience.")" 
 
 Would we now, — in returning to our above-mentioned 
 question, — know what belongs to the one and what to the other 
 factor ; would we separate our subjective addition from the 
 objective factor, in order to have the latter pure and, so to 
 speak, in its full truth, we then encounter the peculiar difii- 
 culty, that of being unable to speak about a pure, immediate 
 apprehension of the given in the consciousness, without, at 
 the same time, in and with the apprehension investing the 
 given with a subjective form. Now, this point being clear in 
 reference to the so-called secondary properties of things 
 which have been already mentioned above, such as heat, cold, 
 colour, taste, and such like, there remain only the so-called 
 primary qualities, i. e. those that are mathematically cog-! 
 Disable, quantity, extention, duration, and so forth. 
 
 If, however, we here, within the sphere of intuition, vindicate 
 the same Kantian criterion of a-priority as above in that of 
 
 * In der Beilage zu dem Gesprach iiber Idealismus tmd Eealismus. 
 Samtl. Werke, Bd. 2. p. 303. 
 
 t Kritik der reinen Vernunft, v. Anfang und in der Einleitung zur 
 transcendentalen Logik. 
 
30 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 the understanding, and accordingly acknowledge that here also 
 every thing, which in the intuitive process bears on itself the 
 character of universality and necessity, is an a priori or subjec- 
 tive addition, — it follows that we must again abstract from the 
 objective content the general form of all sense-objects, namely, 
 time and space. 
 
 Thus, all determinations of space and time, such as quan- 
 tity, position, relative duration, and succession, are subjec- 
 tive additions, and not inherent in the things themselves. So 
 soon as we represent any thing to ourselves intuitively, we 
 must posite it in space and time ; these are the general modes 
 of intuition that reside in us, and without them no intuition 
 would be possible ; they are the antecedent conditions of its 
 possibility, are consequently given a priori, and are no more 
 abstracted from experience than those general categories, 
 above cited, of the understanding ; space and time are the 
 categories of the sensitive faculty, present indeed originally in 
 the mind, though just as little as the categories of the under- 
 standing, in the state of ready prepared notions, or as a mere 
 dead framework, but as the mind's way of acting when in the 
 state of intuition. Nevertheless, Kant does not call them 
 categories, but, to distinguish them from the latter, universal 
 schemata or forms of the sensuous intuition. 
 
 Accordingly, the whole aspect and content, the whole phe- 
 nomenon or appearance of things, as they are presented to our 
 inward eye, is in its nature subjective, and there is nothing in 
 this which we can regard as the nature of the thing in itself. 
 What then, it may be asked, remains of the sensations, the 
 content as empirically presupposed ? If of the true nature of 
 things in themselves, as they occur to us only in space and 
 time, we can learn actually nothing either through the senses or 
 the understanding, still, before we can know such to be the case, 
 we must learn always from experience that they are there and 
 actually present. Every thing is for us only a phenomenon, but 
 that a phenomenon exists or is present, and thus the existence or 
 nonexistence of a phenomenon must be given us a posteriori. 
 Thus, the objects to be presupposed must so far exercise their 
 influence upon us, as to make known to us their existence ; the 
 phenomena within us (whether corresponding little or much 
 with the objects) must be evoked by a definite external some- 
 thing, though even this could in no other way be accomplished 
 than, as it were, like the finger which, touching the chords of an 
 
KANT. 31 
 
 instrument, awakes the slumbering tones. Let us pause awhile 
 over an example which Kant himself has given.* "In a rain- 
 bow," says he, "we shall indeed, in accordance with the ordinary 
 mode of representation, first of all call the coloured arch a phe- 
 nomenon present merely for us and our visual sense, but shall 
 regard the rain-drops as the actual and true thing in itself that 
 lies at the bottom of this phenomenon. But let us now con- 
 sider that these drops again are only empirical phenomena, and. 
 then their round form, nay, even the space in which they are 
 formed, are nothing in themselves but a mere modification or 
 principle of our sensuous intuition ; with all this, however, the 
 object itself remains to us completely unknown." Could any 
 thing further be added to this explanation, let us imagine 
 oiyselves to be looking into a kaleidoscope. As we turn it 
 round different kinds of figures make their appearance, though 
 the poloured bodies remain the same. I know well that the 
 whole of the phenomenon (the juxtaposition and combination of 
 the bits of glass, now to form a rose, now, on the other hand, a 
 star) is not objectively the actual one, but is only effected 
 by the position of the reflecting glasses, and thus by the con- 
 struction of my organ (here=understanding). It may, how- 
 ever, be retorted that, if the combinations are not real, still 
 the elements that are combined, viz. the several corpuscules 
 themselves, with their colour, form, and nature, are actually 
 as I see them. By no means. As regards their colour, and 
 secondary qualities in general, the mere appearance of these 
 has long since been determined ; and as to what might be most 
 certain in them, namely, their size, form, number, &c., in a 
 word, the mathematical qualities without which they could 
 not even be thought of as existing, all this is, on that very 
 account, the more certainly of an a priori and subjective 
 character." If now, at the conclusion of this so-called Kantian 
 esthetics (doctrine of sensuous intuition), we renew our ques- 
 tion as to what then, in the representations, properly pro- 
 ceeds from the things themselves ; nothing remains for us but 
 the answer that, it is the existence only of a definite represent- 
 ation at a definite time and in a definite place, or the " bow" 
 and the "here" which originates from things in themselves. As 
 to what concerns this bare " existence," without any determined 
 cognition of that, which is present, this will be shown fur- 
 ther on. 
 
 With these certainly unsatisfactory results, we now turn 
 * Kritik der reinen Vernunft Iste. Ausg., p. 45. 
 
32 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 from the senses and the understanding, to the highest faculty 
 of the human mind, or to the reason, in order here, if possible, 
 to obtain better counsel.* 
 
 In doing this, it is especially necessary once again to re- 
 mind the reader, that the doctrine of the rational notions or 
 ideas is here taken purely in the sense adopted by their teacher, 
 and that every misinterpretation is set aside, which this doc- 
 trine subsequently experienced, particularly in the pains taken 
 by Kant's disciples to bring the signification of ideas in a prac- 
 tical sense into accordance with the theory of their origin and 
 logical use. 
 
 Kant himself has used the word "reason" in a double, 
 namely, in a wider and a more restricted sense. In the former 
 sense, it implies as much as the whole human faculty of cogni- 
 tion ; and hence Kant called his entire investigation of this 
 faculty a Critick of Pure Reason. In the latter, or stricter 
 sense, the reason is with Kant distinct fi-om the understanding, 
 and a certain limit is marked out between the two, though this 
 limit is no longer at the present day respected, even by his fol- 
 lowers, in the same manner. The understanding was with Kant, 
 in the stricter sense, that very faculty, vrhich by means of its 
 rules brings order and connection into the sensuous intuitions. 
 The reason, upon the other hand, is, in the stricter sense, the 
 faculty which by its laws brings again unity and connection 
 into the use of the understanding. 
 
 This takes place by the confirmation of the judgments of the 
 understanding upon higher principles, i. e. by conclusions. Thus 
 the reason has here the function of a faculty for forming con- 
 clusions ; and this is what has been called by Kant, the formal 
 use of the reason. Now, just as the understanding, as the 
 faculty of judging, can at the same time become conscious to 
 itself of the rules or forms of this its activity, and can reduce 
 these to abstract notions (categories ), so also can the reason, as 
 the faculty of forming conclusions, become self-conscious of the 
 rules or forms of this process, and in like manner comprehend 
 and represent the same, as abstract notions of a higher kind, i. e. 
 as ideas, which are the same for it as the categories are for the 
 understanding ; for the efforts of the understanding, however, 
 these ideas of reason become as it were the terminal or goal-points, 
 for they represent to the understanding the unconditionality and 
 absolute completeness, which is to be attained in knowledge, and 
 
 * Kritik der reinen Vernunft. Elementarlehre ii. Th. ii. Abth. II. 
 J. Buch. 
 
KANT. 33 
 
 which the understanding by itself, busied with objects of 
 experience, can in this its empirical sphere never discover. 
 Thus, every single j udgment of the understanding, e. g. that 
 gold is undecomposible, remains unproved, and hence of an 
 unsatisfactory character for our rational desire after per- 
 fected knowledge, until we have found the proposition, which 
 contains the ground or principle of this assertion, and have 
 placed this principle before the judgment in the form of a 
 syllogism ; thus, the elements are undecomposible, gold is an 
 element, consequently gold is undecomposible. Again, we may 
 probably have to prove this major proposition, that the elements 
 are undecomposible, and for this purpose we must seek after 
 a still higher and more general principle, and so on, until 
 we arrive at some one highest, and perfectly certain truth. 
 Thus, in this logical procedure, when regarded from a general 
 point of view, we see a general tendency upon the part of 
 the cognitive faculty to a complete, unconditional, or absolute 
 knowledge.* 
 
 Now, as for the understanding there were just as many 
 categories as there are modes of combination between predi- 
 cate and subject, i. e. forms of judgment, so also for the 
 reason there will be just as many ideas as there are modes of 
 combination of the judgments among one another to form con- 
 clusions, — syllogistic forms. Now, of these there are three ; the 
 categorical, hypotheticad, and disjunctive ; all three advance 
 forwards through syllogistic series, thus all three are the kinds 
 or modes of this onward march, and indicate or imply the 
 tendency of the thinking process towards the summit of per- 
 fection, or^ to absolute cognition, this tendency being sa- 
 tisfied in a threefold manner, — categorically, hypothetically, 
 and disjunctively ; in a categorical manner, when the perfec- 
 tion of the connection is attained according to the logical re- 
 lation of subject and predicate (or substance and accident) ; in 
 an hypothetical manner, when the perfection is reached accord- 
 ing to the relation of cause and effect ; and disjunctively when 
 the same is reached according to the relation of the parts and 
 the whole. This threefold perfection, reduced to abstract no- 
 tions, and designated by substantive words, is in the first case 
 that of absolute substantiality (Subjectkeit) ; in the second, 
 that of absolute dependence or conditionality of all singulars 
 
 * Kritik der reinen Vemunft, p. 323. und 325. Iste Ausgabe. Joh. 
 Schulze, Erlauterungen iiber Kant's Kritik der reinen Vernuifl't, Konigs- 
 Iserg, 1784, p. 91. et seq. Fries, Neue Kritik der Vemunft, Bd. ii. p. 32. 
 
 P 
 
34 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 among one another to constitute a whole ; in the third, that of 
 the complex or perfection of every thing that is conceivable as 
 possible. "Were we now to take this subjective tendency to 
 perfection which here hovers as a rule before the reason and 
 renders it the goal of the understanding, otherwise losing itself 
 in particulars, and because this tendency imparts to the under- 
 standing some final direction, transfer it to the reality itself, 
 and then, regarding as we may the categories of the under- 
 standing as conditions of nature in themselves, think in like 
 manner of these categories of the reason as realised ; the latter 
 then appear, first, as the idea of an absolute subject (which we 
 think of chiefly as an immortal soul) ; secondly, as the idea of 
 nature or the world (the totality of all conditions and phe- 
 nomena) ; and thirdly, as the most perfect Essence, or the Deity, 
 ens realissimum, which is the complex of all reality, or that 
 which excludes all negations, all defect. These three ideas 
 would thus furnish the principles of the three divisions of meta- 
 physics, namely, rational psychology, cosmology, and theology ; 
 they would constitute a durable foundation for metaphysics, if 
 only it could be determined, that these ideas, which originally 
 indicate only forms or laws of our subjective activity of reason, 
 were on that very account to refer to something essential in 
 reality, or, in other words, that, apart from the above specified 
 logico-iorsmS. use of them in framing conclusions, they were to 
 admit in theory of another, or the so-called material use. This 
 use they certainly obtain in the practical philosophy, where 
 these ideas have a causal character in reference to our actions, 
 and appear as the ideal of virtue, justice, and such like ; the 
 further development of which subjects, however, does not 
 belong to this place. 
 
 If we now seek to fathom still further the relation of the 
 reason to the understanding, we then impinge in Kant upon the 
 definitely expressed twofold question (Kritik, ed. i. p. 305.), 
 " Can we isolate the reason (i. e. from the understanding), and 
 is the reason then a peculiar source of notions and judgments, 
 which originate solely from it ; and does the reason thereby bear 
 reference to objects of a special, and by it alone, cognisable 
 character?" ' Kant's reply is, that the reason does admit of 
 being isolated ; it admits of being easily recognised as a special 
 faculty distinct from the understanding in this way, that the 
 understanding has to deal directly with the sensitive faculty, 
 but the reason directly with the understanding. The former 
 has reference to experience, but the latter has to deal only 
 
KANT. 35 
 
 with itself, with the rational process of thought, and busies 
 itself solely with the completion of our subjective consciousness. 
 This becomes still more distinct, if we compare and distinguish 
 the objects with which the two faculties, each in its own 
 sphere, are engaged. The understanding has its notions and 
 judgments framed according to its categories ; such, properly- 
 speaking, and in themselves, are relations of thought, which 
 are, however, expressly and exclusively applied to experience, 
 and can and ought to obtain in the external world their 
 verification and content. The reason has, on the contrary, to 
 deal with ideas, i. e., with representations, of which the reason 
 itself knows and declares that they never find their object in 
 any sensuous experience, that they are only pure products, 
 syntheses of the reason itself, the truth or falsity of which 
 cannot be confirmed or discovered by any experience.* " The 
 reason," says Kant, " here busies itself merely with itself, and 
 broods over its own conceptions." All pure cognitions of the 
 understanding are characterised by having their notions given 
 in experience, and their principles admit of being confirmed 
 by experience, while, on the contrary, the transcendent cogni- 
 tions of reason neither, as concerns their ideas, are given in 
 experience, nor do their propositions ever admit of being con- 
 firmed in or refuted by experience ; hence the errors wliich 
 have probably crept into this branch of our inquiry can be dis^- 
 covered by nothing else but pure reason. 
 
 Thus, according'to Kant, we cannot distinguish between con- 
 ception and idea so as to afiirm, as has been often done, that 
 a conception or notion originates from experience, but that an 
 idea is an a priori cognition of transcendent things. For 
 neither of them originates from experience, neither of them 
 is given a priori ready prepared or innate as an abstract repre- 
 sentation in the consciousness. The original mental activity is 
 given only in their definite forms and modes, and from these 
 innate modes and laws we make for ourselves, in abstracto, a 
 conception or an idea. 
 
 - Thus Kant believed that he had pointed out, in the most de-i 
 finite manner, that there is indeed a higher faculty in man, 
 distinct from the understanding, that this has special repre- 
 sentations differing from the conceptions of the understanding, 
 tut that these are thoroughly devoid of all application to i-eality, 
 nay, that they are not even capable, like the a priori concep- 
 tions of the understanding, of any confirmation by experience, 
 » Kritik, p. 308. et seq. Proleg. § 56. et seq. 
 s 2 
 
38 HISTOBICAL SURVEY. 
 
 but that thej are rather, to speak quite correctly, framed by 
 the reason, -with the consciousness that no object corresponds 
 to thetn in reality. On this account, he considers it as his 
 greatest merit, in regard to metaphysics, to have revealed this 
 distinction between conceptions of the understanding and ideas 
 of the reason ; since the former must always be applied to ex- 
 perience, while the latter, as their application to experience 
 is not admissible, must, as often as notwithstanding they are 
 applied to it, bring about in metaphysics only contradictions 
 and phantoms of the brain. 
 
 From all this we readily discern, that the reason, as Kant 
 comprehended it, is at bottom only a purely formal, logical 
 iiiculty of reflection in a higher potence or degree ; that it 
 really differs, when reduced to these limits, in no respect from 
 the understanding; just as its ideas also, in accordance with 
 their origin and use, are none other than the highest con- 
 ceptions of abstraction or reflection of which our thinking 
 faculty is capable. For to what purpose does the reason 
 frame its ideas? and what use is granted them in the theory 
 of cognition ? Kant limits their application to one of a 
 regulative (not a constitutive) character ; regulative as re- 
 gards the tendency of the understanding to strive constantly 
 within, but never beyond its sphere, namely, of experience, 
 after a more perfect state of cognition — a goal, after which the 
 understanding must never cease to strive, although it never 
 can attain it. " In the domain of cognition," says Kant in the 
 Preface to his Kritik der Urtheilakraft, " no other faculty than 
 the understanding can suggest constitutive principles of cogni- 
 tion a priori, and the Critick (of Theoretical Eeason) leaves 
 nothing but what the understanding prescribes a priori, as a 
 law for nature, or as an abstract complex of phenomena, but 
 banishes all other pure notions among those ideas, which, 
 though they abound for our theoretical faculty of cognition, 
 are not therefore useless or superfluous, but serve as regu- 
 lative principles to restrain, in part, the anxious pretensions of 
 the understanding, and partly to guide it in the consideration 
 of nature to a principle of perfection (though it can never 
 attain this), and by these means to promote the final object 
 of all cognition. Thus it was truly the understanding, which 
 having its own domain, and that indeed within the faculty of 
 cognition, in so far as it contains constitutive principles of 
 cognition a priori, was to be secured by the generally so-called 
 Critick of Pure Reason against all, competitors in sole pos- 
 
KANT. 37 
 
 session of this domain. In like manner, its proper domain has 
 been assigned to the reason, which no where, save in respect 
 to the faculty of desire or aspiration, contains constitutive 
 principles a priori." 
 
 In fact, we do not know whether, in accordance with this 
 limitation, the reason prescribes laws to the understanding, or 
 whether the latter serves the reason ; the reason gives the un- 
 derstanding its direction, but forbids it to arrogate to itself any 
 independent cognition within the sphere of reality ; the reason 
 ranks upon the one hand above the understanding, and pre- 
 scribes to it regulative principles, by indicating directly to it 
 the goals after which it is to strive, but at the same time 
 also pointing out the limit beyond which it is not to pass, 
 a goal which it is not even to get possession of. The under- 
 standing, on the contrary, in possession of the only instru- 
 ment for making objectively valid cognitions, forbids in its 
 turn the reason from holding its ideas as any thing actual or 
 real, and accuses it of incompetent extravagance so soon as, in- 
 dependently of the understanding, the reason presumes to 
 cognise any thing of itself. Hence Jacobi, in his essay entitled, 
 "Ueber das Unternehmen des Kriticismus, die Vernunft zu 
 Verstande zu bringen,"* says, "according to Kant's mode of 
 reconciliation, the following contrast exists between the two 
 faculties ; the reason has to forbid to the understanding; the 
 process of negation, the understanding, on the contrary, to the 
 reason that of affirmation ; the reason has to respect the un- 
 derstanding, and is positively circumscribed by it ; the under- 
 standing, on the contrary, obtains from the reason only an 
 apparent limitation, a negative circumscription, and without 
 giving up its own intelligibility, makes use of the ideas of the 
 reason in order to expand to the utmost degree its own 
 sphere. The reason sits in the upper, the understanding in the 
 lower house ; the latter representing the sensitive faculty, the 
 real sovereignty, witliout whose ratification nothing can have 
 any validity or worth." 
 
 In order, however, to show the inapplicability of ideas to 
 actual objects, it was not enough to have pointed out their sub- 
 jective origin, — for this had been also done with the categories 
 of the understanding, — but the insufficiency of such a use of 
 the reason must be exposed also in the results. This was 
 done in the section which Kant calls the Dialectik of Reason. 
 The reason is there proved, from its nature, to be purely for- 
 » Sammtl. Werke, iii. p. 82. 
 D 3 
 
38 HISTOEICAL SUEVET. 
 
 mal, and useful merely for logical purposes, and most strikingly 
 BO, from the fact that contradictions and paralogisms appear, as 
 soon as we attribute objective truth to ideas, i. e. so soon as 
 ■we think of that which they indicate, as being actually existing 
 objects. 
 
 We easily perceive that the first idea, or the notion of sub* 
 stance, in the mode in which it has been usually, and also in 
 the school of Wolf, apprehended, would be nothing but an 
 empty logical notion of relation, applicable merely to the form 
 of the thinking process, the act of synthesis itself. We 
 usually regard each thing as a definite something (substance), 
 which has in itself different qualities (accidents) ; e. g. salt is 
 a substance, which has a cubic form, a definite savour, a 
 definite hardness, weight, and is of a white colour; if, how- 
 ever, we separate these five (or more) qualities, which we 
 think of as dependent upon the body in question, and then ask 
 ourselves what is left, it is found, that with all the accidents, 
 every thing, even the substance itself, is gone, and hence we see 
 clearly, that by the so-called substance, is only meant the 
 abstract complex, comprehension, or synthesis of these qualities 
 in the consciousness, but not something over and above them, 
 which made up as it were their hidden nucleus or essence. In 
 this case, the relation stands the same as it does with the 
 whole ; a whole disappears, when we take away all the parts 
 ■whereof it consists. There is, however, a single essence, which 
 here appears to form an exception to the above rule, and in 
 which we seem to have detected and retained, when abstraction 
 is made of all accidents, a pure subject, a true substance ; and 
 this is our own soul. For the accidents or determinations of 
 the soul are representations, feelings, and such like; in short, all 
 that takes place upon or within the soul, is but a modification, 
 a change of its nature ; and thus the soul itself, in which 
 something must take place, must be present, and lie at the 
 foundation. It here seems that we have encountered a true, 
 pure subject, and that indeed, directly within ourselves, within 
 our owii "consciousness, a subject that is directly self-conscious 
 of its personality, identity, and so on. But, nevertheless, 
 when closely considered, the reality of this subject depends, ac- 
 cording to Kant, upon only one conclusion, and that indeed 
 a false one or paralogism, although such is unavoidable — un- 
 avoidable, because we always find ourselves necessitated to 
 presuppose in the accidents, changes, and determinations, a 
 something which is changed; but, still, a false conclusion. 
 
KANT. 39 
 
 because only the modifications of this thinking, feeling sub- 
 ject, enter our consciousness ; its modifications only, i. e. its 
 changing feelings, thoughts, and consequently its accidents, 
 enter our consciousness, but never the pure subject or substance 
 of the soul in itself. This last remains eternally unknown to 
 us, and never becomes an object of the internal, let alone the 
 external experience ; the adoption of its existence merely de- 
 pends upon a conclusion of the reason, but one which is a 
 paralogism or false one.* Thus it fares with this subject, 
 as with every other ; we know just as little of the interior of 
 the soul as of the essence of material things ; if we abstract all 
 thinking, feeling, and such like, in short, all accidents from the 
 same, there remains for us nothing but a void, the bare, logical 
 complex, which can signify nothing but the comprehension 
 of ail those accidents in the consciousness, or, as Kant says, 
 only the form of the apperception, which belongs to every ex- 
 perience, and accompanies it as the thought, " I think." But, 
 if even for the functions of thinking, a common subject must be 
 presupposed, which we call Ego, still this thing would be in 
 itself only the thought of an abstract something, in its essence 
 quite uncognisable, and all the conclusions, whereby we invest 
 it with the attributes of immateriality, incorruptibility, per- 
 sonality, immortality, &c., would be paralogisms, because they 
 transfer that which holds good of the bare thoughtj or the bare 
 and certainly simple representation of the Ego, to a real 
 essence lying at bottom, and so, in forming the conclusion, 
 take the logical subject in a double sense, whence originates 
 the well-known fallacy, which is called sophisma figura 
 dictionis. " It is obvious,'' says Kant, " that the subject, which 
 is appended by the little word Ego to the thought in the pro- 
 position 'I think,' contains not the least quality, nor any 
 cognisable element. It signifies a something, whose represent- 
 ation must certainly be simple, because we determine nothing 
 whatever in it, and nothing whatever can well be represented 
 more simply than by the notion of a bare something. The 
 simplicity, however, of the representation of a subject is not 
 on that account a cognition of the simplicity of the subject 
 itself; for abstraction is entirely made of qualities, when the 
 subject is solely indicated by the utterly empty expression,' 
 Ego." And just as it is with simplicity, so it is also with 
 the conclusions framed upon the remaining pretended qualities 
 of that subject ; — in short, by the Ego, or this pretended sim- 
 * Kritik der reinen Vernunft, p. 431. et seq. 
 D 4 
 
40 HISTOEICAL BUEVET. 
 
 pie' substance, which is placed beneath thought as a thinking 
 something, is truly implied nothing more than the " function of 
 the synthesis," i. e. the activity of thought itself, without any 
 intuition or object, and thus it holds good only as the condition 
 of all our cognitions, as the form of intellectual unity, into which 
 they are combined, but not of any object to be specified. 
 
 We have extracted these statements from Kant, because of 
 their especial importance to us in the sequel, when we come to 
 consider the reverse application made of them by Herbart and by 
 Fichte. With Kant, this line of argumentation was first of all 
 directed against the Wolfian school, and so far, it fully hit the 
 point intended, seeing that this very school endeavoured in the 
 same way to prove a reality; and substantiality of the soul or 
 mind, which amounted in the end to nothing else but the 
 simple " condition " above mentioned. 
 
 As to what concerns the second idea, that of the universe, 
 or nature, which should lead to a rational cosmology, the 
 reason lays claim to absolute perfection in the composition 
 of the universe, of quantity, qualitj'-, causality (relation), and 
 necessity (modality). As regards the psychological idea^ no- 
 thing whatever, as has been shown, admits of being validly 
 proved ; here, however, in reference to the world, the spatio- 
 temporal, we encounter the strange phenomenon, that at any 
 time, the opposite of one view admits of being proved as 
 well as the other, the thesis as well as the antithesis. Such 
 are the remarkable contradictions of the reason with itself, 
 or the so-called Antinomies. 
 
 I can, forsooth, neither represent to myself, that the world 
 has no beginning in time, nor that it has one ; neither that it 
 has nor has not any limits in space. I can represent to myself, 
 that any substance could be continually divided into smaller 
 and ever smaller parts, without my ever arriving at the smallest 
 divisions, or at any thing indivisible; but I cannot, on the 
 other hand, represent to myself this process of division as 
 being eternally continued, because, so soon as one thinks of 
 the whole as compounded or put together, one presupposes at 
 the same time along with it particles or atoms, that are re- 
 garded in themselves as single. Thirdly, if I am obliged to 
 think to myself that whatever happens has a cause, and every 
 cause in its turn another cause, on which it is founded, it follows 
 that I must ultimately think to myself of a first cause, which has 
 for itself no ulterior cause, and is consequently unconditioned, 
 absolute, or free. And lastly, a highest, as the necessarily 
 
KANT. 41 
 
 presupposed cause of the world, can neither be represented as 
 immanent, or residing in the world itself, since, then, the world 
 must have its cause within itself, i. e. the world must, before 
 it existed, have created itself; nor can I think of this world- 
 cause as external to or above the world, and distinct from it in 
 a temporo-spatial manner, or as extramundane, since then the 
 very connection of the world, as an effect with its cause, being 
 wholly suppressed, would consequently admit of no explanation ; 
 still, as a true beginning of the world, the world-cause must 
 be thought of as connected in time and space with its product, 
 like germ and plant, and so immanent in character. 
 
 These contradictions necessarily originate from my applying 
 the forms of finitude to that infinite which my reason strives to 
 attain ; or in turn, this infinite to the complex of the finite, the 
 world. In a word, what vexes me in these antinomies, is the 
 self-contradicting and hence impossible problems, which I set 
 before myself; namely, to think the infinite finite, or the finite 
 infinite. For while I posite the finite infinitely, I can never 
 come to an end, and so fall into a progressus in infinitum, which 
 at the very first outset has the same fate which it will have in 
 every attempt that is repeated into the endless; I add finite to 
 finite, space to "space, time to time, cause to cause, and such 
 like ; but as that, which I add, is in its nature only a finite, and 
 thus the same which I had already, I never reach the end, or 
 perfect state ; the problem constantly originates anew, and it 
 fares with me, as Haller says, of Eternity, — 
 
 Monstrous numbers heap I up. 
 
 Millions piling mountains high, 
 Time unto time I add, 
 
 World heaped on world doth lie. 
 Yet, when I from this fearful height 
 
 Bewildered look again for thee ; 
 Though -waxed a thousandfold in might, 
 
 The numbers — yield no part of thee ! 
 
 Thus, Kant is of opinion that we must, upon consideration, 
 acknowledge that so soon as we speak of the universe or world, 
 we have to deal with the thoroughly finite, and cannot, without 
 contradiction, transfer to the latter the form of the infinite, 
 the ideas ; or, as he expresses it, apply what is only a form of 
 the phenomenon to the being and essence (or thing in itself). 
 For in this way, the All or the universe would, on the one hand, 
 be resolved without foundation and nucleus into a bare mani- 
 festation ; and, on the other hand, this manifestation would at the 
 
42 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 Same time be explained as the essence per se. Now, as we 
 necessarily presuppose such an internal essence, and cannot 
 regard the phenomenon as constituting this, that very essence 
 or thing in itself remains, apart from the phenomenon, totally 
 uncognisable by our reason. Thus, Kant would rather con- 
 sider the manifested being as wholly abstracted from its pheno- 
 menal form, than the latter as identified with the former, and 
 this from a fear of wholly losing, by such a step, the infinite, 
 as positively existing pro se, and in this way of relapsing again 
 into an absolute naturalism and sensationalism. Nevertheless, 
 when the subsequent philosophy pursued this very path, it was 
 inevitable that the dialectick, which Kant here represents as a 
 sophistic game, and limits to this subject of the phenomenal 
 world, should elevate itself to a comprehensive method, expand 
 itself over the whole system, comprise every thing within itself, 
 and convert philosophy itself into a philosophy of nature, and 
 with this, render all its content, nature, and nature the abso- 
 lute. Kant sought for, but did not find a formula, in which, 
 while the infinite was retained together with the finite, the 
 two were, nevertheless, kept or held together without their 
 absolute identification. So much then concerning these so- 
 called Antinomies. 
 
KANT. 43 
 
 LECTURE III. 
 KANT (continued), jacobi. 
 
 Kant declared that it is as impossible to prove the actual 
 existence of our own soul as a special self-subsistent substance, 
 or as a real subject, as to comprehend the existence of an all- 
 embracing world-system, and finally to demonstrate also the 
 existence of God ; for the attempts to do this do not indeed 
 lead, in the first and third idea, to obvious contradictions, as 
 in the second, but depend upon paralogisms or false conclusions, 
 and are, logically speaking, devoid of all power. 
 
 This is most distinctly shown in the third idea, which we 
 have now to regard still more closely, namely the idea of Deity, 
 or the most perfect essence, which originates solely from the 
 form of the disjunctive syllogism*, a form which aims at the 
 absolute perfection of the members of a division, or the com- 
 plex of all that is possible or cogitable within a certain sphere. 
 This perfection, being hypostasized, gives the idea of an abso- 
 lutely perfect essence (ens realissimum). Now, this idea, from 
 its including the definition of an individual essence, a personality 
 or personification within itself, Kant does not call an idea, but 
 an ideal, and pre-eminently indeed, the ideal of pure reason. 
 
 But here again, the same illusion, as in the previous instance, 
 creeps in. The whole idea is, properly speaking, nothing more 
 than the form of the disjunctive syllogism in abstracto, nothing 
 but the logical conception of the absolute integrity, of all the 
 essential parts, which appertain unto a whole, the conception 
 of the highest conceivable unity in the fulness of the highest 
 perfection, and free from any gap or deficiency. Now this 
 abstract notion, and one that cannot be represented in the con- 
 crete, which has no more real existence than the expressions, 
 justice, goodness, beauty, truth, and others — in a word, this 
 bare ultimatum of thought — must first be realised, hypostasized, 
 and personified by means of the imagination, in order to ren- 
 der it that which we are accustomed to think of to ourselves 
 under the term God. 
 
 * A is either 6 or c or d; now A is neither c nor b, thus it is d; for ex- 
 ample, an angle is either a right angle, an acute, or an obtuse angle ; now 
 it is not a right angle, and so on. 
 
44 HISTORICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 Now, since we learn nothing by merely negative definitions, 
 unless a thoroughly definite idea is already presupposed and 
 present to the mind, an omnitudo realitatis, which could com- 
 prehend the whole fulness of positive qualities within itself; 
 it follows that that conception or idea of an ens realissimum 
 is, as a measure or ideal, the condition certainly of a perfect 
 cognition, without which we could not sufficiently judge the in- 
 dividual, limited and special things, seeing that this can only be 
 done by surveying them in all their possible bearings and rela- 
 tions, or, in a word, the singular in the totality. But even if 
 this requirement of the reason to apprehend things perfectly, 
 presupposes such an idea, it still does not follow from this, 
 that to the idea must correspond an existence, and an actual 
 persistent essence apart from our thought. To admit this is to 
 attempt to found what has been called an ontological proo^. 
 which, repeated under a variety of forms since the time of 
 Anselm of Canterbury, was at length restricted by some dis- 
 ciples of Wolf to the formula, that among the predicates 
 contained in the conception of the most absolutely perfect 
 (God), that also of existence belonged, the existentia or reality 
 being a complement of .the possibility, but the most perfect, 
 the complex only of all conceivable possibilities. Hence, 
 Kant saw himself induced to criticise this and the remain- 
 ing proofs of the existence of God. It is not his intention 
 to represent the dialectic of this " Ideal of Reason " as one 
 resulting in contradictions, like that of the antimonies, but 
 only to point out the formal or logical insufficiency of the 
 proofs adduced. There are, he says, only three kinds of proof; 
 for we either proceed in dealing with these from a definite 
 experience, namely, from the teleogical constitution of the world 
 (physico-theological proof) or from general experience (cosmo- 
 logical), or finally, from no experience whatever, and then abide 
 by that conception a priori (ontological proof). If, therefore, 
 in the sequel, he posited in place of these abortive proofs some- 
 thing else, or the moral foundation, still he would not acknow- 
 ledge the latter to be a proof, but called it a postulate of the 
 practical reason. 
 
 As regards the ontological proof, it is clear, in the first place, 
 from the origin above indicated of the idea of the most perfect 
 essence, that it is, properly speaking, only the hypostasizing of a 
 logical law of thought, and is no essence in itself; but apart even 
 from this consideration, it is easy to detect the illogical procedure 
 in this hypostasizing. It amounts to the confounding, already 
 
KANT. 45 
 
 censured in the paralogisms, of the logical and the actual ob- 
 ject. We have spoken at all times of the absolutely necessary 
 essence, and sought to prove its existence, but have not taken the 
 pains to inquire whether and how we could think to ourselves 
 of a thing of this kind. A nominal explanation of the matter 
 is indeed quite easy, namely, that there may be something, 
 whose non-being is impossible ; but in this way we do not be- 
 come one jot wiser in respect to the conditions which render it 
 impossible to regard the non-being of such a thing as abso- 
 lutely inconceivable, and yet these conditions are, properly 
 speaking, that very something which we would know and indi- 
 cate by the above proof. 
 
 We quote, indeed, examples from mathematics of necessary 
 propositions, for example, that a triangle has of necessity three 
 angles ; but all the examples we can adduce of such a necessity 
 are, without exception, examples only oi judgments, but not of 
 things and their existence. It is necessary for a triangle to 
 have three angles, if, forsooth, it exists ; or, when once the idea 
 of a triangle is thought of, it must be thought of as having three 
 angles ; that, however, it must be so thought of, does not follow 
 from the relation of the logical subject and predicate in the 
 judgment, and just as little, that if thought of, it should actually 
 he, or exist. From all such examples we perceive, rather, that, 
 in order to prove the necessity of such an existence, we must 
 already have presupposed this existence ; but whether this suppo- 
 sition be necessary remains thoroughly unproved. In an iden. 
 tical judgment, such as the above, where the three angles (the 
 predicate) and the triangle (the subject) are one and the same, I 
 cannot suppress the angles and leave the triangle remaining— 
 for this would be a contradiction ; but I can posite the two toge- 
 ther, or also suppress them, without contradiction ; thus, the 
 triangle itself is not even necessary. "Now the same holds good 
 of the idea of an absolutely necessary essence. If you suppress 
 its existence, you thus suppress the thing itself, with all its pre- 
 dicates, and where then shall the contradiction originate ?" i. e. 
 how shall a necessity of thinldng of it be admitted ? Now, 
 there remains no escape for us but to say, that if this holds 
 good of some and of many things, there are still subjects, 
 and especially one, namely, that of the most real being, which 
 cannot be suppressed at all in thought, and so must remain, if 
 even I suppress every other. This, however, can absolutely 
 hold good only of thought itself, but not of any subject posited 
 as existing out of my thought, not even of the absolute ; for 
 
46 HISTOEICAL SUEVET. 
 
 either it would be identical with thought, and would then be 
 nothing "pro se," or it would not be identical; and then no 
 contradiction with the thought would originate, if I were to sup- 
 press it. "I ask you," says Kant, " is the proposition, tliis or 
 that thing exists, an analytical (identical) or synthetical pro- 
 position ? If it be the former, you add nothing through the 
 existence of the thing to your thought of the thing ; but then 
 either the thought that is in you must he the thing itself, or you 
 YiAYBSupposed an existence, as appertaining to the possibility,, 
 and concluded as to the existence, on the pretence of the inter- 
 nal possibility." We see distinctly how near Kant was to ex- 
 pressing himself in the manner to which Hegel at a far later pe- 
 riod found himself constrained, when on the same path of inquiry : 
 the Absolute (God) is the mere essence which is thinking and 
 thought of, because it is that in us which thinks ; thinking is 
 identical with what is thought ("the thought that is in you is 
 the thing itself,") or, the Absolute is. the thinking process itself, 
 and so cannot be suppressed without the thinking process being 
 itself suppressed. Thus, the ontological proof can only succeed 
 upon the basis of an absolute idealism, or idealistic pantheism ; 
 this last, however, was thoroughly contrary to Kant's views ; 
 so that, from his stand-point, he could not consent to that line 
 of argument in reference to the infinite (God), inasmuch as 
 it is, as is self-evident, applicable to the representations of 
 finite things. In the former, as in the latter case, the thought 
 and the existence fall, with Kant, absolutely asunder ; and the 
 thought has God as an existent (essence in itself) just as apart 
 from itself as any other object ; for example, like a hundred 
 thalers, which are no more actually present for myself, if I only 
 think them, than any thing is wanting to the sum of a hundred 
 real dollars, in case I do not think them. The actual or real 
 contains nothing more and nothing less than that which is re- 
 presented or set before the mind ; " a hundred real dollars 
 contain not a jot more or less than a hundred possible dollars," 
 for were my representation to express, in the least degree,, any 
 thing else than what lies in the reality, this representation would 
 then not be the directly adequate representation of this object. 
 Thus, from the mere notion of a thing, its existence admits by 
 no means of being " elicited," but, something more is requi-« 
 site for this purpose, namely, a direct perception of the object j- 
 this, however, in the present instance, as with all ideas, is im- 
 possible, because their objects cannot be given in any possible ex- 
 perience — the- experience deals with the finite, and is itself 
 
KANT. 47 
 
 never completed ; that, however, which corresponds to the ideas 
 must be the infinite, absolutely unconditioned and universal. 
 
 With the ontological proof, however, the two other kinds 
 stand and fall likewise. The cosmological, which Leibnitz 
 termed the proof " a contingentia mundi," begins or sets out 
 from experience, and that indeed from the object of all possible 
 experience, I.e. the universe, and thus is not wholly of an a priori 
 character. It depends, upon the one hand, upon the existence of 
 the world, and because this is a something accidental, not bearing 
 its cause within itself, infers, upon the other hand, the un- 
 conditioned. Kant, however, says, that if the ontological proof 
 were correct, it would then stand in no need of this cosmolo- 
 gical proof; but if the former be not correct, then the latter 
 proves nothing, for it again relies upon the ontological, namely, 
 upon the supposition that an ens realissimum must necessarily be 
 or exist. If the thing whose existence is inferred be accidental, 
 then the cause also is as accidental as the thing is ; and as the 
 latter can be dispensed with, so also can the former. Thus the 
 proof does not lead at all to an essence necessary in itself, still 
 less to one that is absolutely perfect, and which we call God. This 
 must be already proved ontologically ; but were this presup- 
 posed being a necessary one, then the matter under consideration 
 would be inverted and the things would be also necessary, and 
 consequently it would require no proof. Thus the world is either 
 to be comprehended itself as necessary, and then there is no 
 special extramundane God ; or it is accidental, and then also, a 
 most perfect and divine being is unnecessary. Thus this so- 
 called cosmologicdl proof is nothing else than a surreptitious 
 inversion of the ontological one, but is no more stringent than 
 the latter. 
 
 Now, as neither the conception of the most perfect Being in 
 itself, nor that of accidental existence, suffices, for basing proofs 
 upon, it only remains for us to form our conclusions from a 
 definite experience, and indeed from the association and form 
 of things in this empirical world, which appears as one con- 
 formable to purpose or design, to be well and wisely disposed. 
 The proof which is deduced from the world's conformity t(^ 
 purpose, is called the physico-theological. Now, true indeed it 
 is that the present world reveals to us such an immeasurable 
 scene of variety, teleogical adaptation, order, and beauty, that we 
 may reasonably enough fall into astonishment and wonder at its 
 contemplation, and think of the primitive cause of this arrange- 
 ment as of a mind and will perfect beyond all comparison. 
 
48 HISTOEICAL SDEVET. 
 
 * This proof deserves, therefore, to be mentioned always with 
 respect ; it is the oldest, clearest, and that which is most adapted 
 to the ordinary human understanding." Nevertheless it cannot 
 lay claim also to apodictical certainty. For, in the first place, 
 this process of thought, built upon the analogy of human works 
 of art, can only lead us to a wise author of the form of the 
 world, but not of its substance or matter also, and consequently 
 to an architect only of the world, but not to a creator of it 
 and an all-sufficient primordial being. In order to prove the 
 latter also, we must return to the cosmological proof, and (since 
 this, as has been shown, proves by itself alone nothing) we 
 must ultimately have recourse to the ontological, which is and 
 remains always the final basis of the whole argumentation. 
 Add to this, that if experience could actually instruct us con- 
 cerning teleogical adaptation and wisdom pervading the events 
 of nature, it would still become just as doubtful as in the cos- 
 mological proof, whether we ought not in that case rather to 
 bestow upon nature an immanent blindly-working law of life, 
 than ascribe to it a supramundane and spiritual author ; but if 
 experience does not demonstrate to us a perfect and constantly 
 uniform regularity — experience, as aforesaid, never indicating, 
 in fact, absolute perfection — it follows that the argument in 
 behalf of an a,bsolutely wise and most perfect author falls to 
 the ground; for, if the manifest imperfections of things were 
 equally to be laid to his account, the author would then appear 
 at the most only as a relativehf mighty, wise, and benevolent 
 being. But, finally, there holds good of all these proofs, 
 what we were reminded of in the beginning, that by virtue of 
 the principle of causality, definitions are transferred to the tran- 
 scendent being, which, according to the Critick, have validity 
 only in the domain of sensuous phenomena, since the necessity 
 of such synthetical judgments a priori followed only upon this, 
 that without them no experience would be possible ; where, 
 however, there is and can be no experience whatever, as here 
 within the pale of ideas, that foundation also falls away, and 
 with it all the apparent authenticity that has been derived 
 therefrom. 
 
 Since then, it has been made out, as a consequence of the 
 Critick of Pure Reason, that the proper objects of metaphysics, 
 namely, God, universe, and mind (freedom, subjective being) 
 are wholly inaccessible to our cognition, and lie beyond the 
 limit of all philosophical knowledge, — nay, further, as it is proved, 
 that those ideas are originally, and in good truth abstract 
 
KANT. 49 
 
 indications only of our human form of thought, and, as being 
 borrowed from the latter, are thus forms, which we first ab- 
 stract, then by means of the so-called real use of the reason 
 objectify (or think of as objects) and in part personify, — it 
 follows from all that has been said that we cannot indulge the 
 least hope of ever learning, by the help of speculation, whether 
 or not there are transcendent beings that correspond to these 
 ideas ; nay, if we look to the established natural origin, pri- 
 mary signification of these ideas, it follows in fact that every 
 firm foundation as regards the confidence of our belief in the 
 existence of such objects is withdrawn, and that we should be 
 given up to the most inconsolable doubt, if no other and better 
 foundation were possible. Far from wishing to attack those 
 objects and charge them with the contradiction, Kant rather 
 turns his dialectic against the method of cognising and proving 
 them, considering that this only is scientifically worthless and 
 futile, as tending to debase the objects themselves into notions 
 full of contradictions. 
 
 Nevertheless, in order to aid, in another way, the highest 
 interests of humanity, and to rebuild, what he had demolished 
 with the one hand, more firmly and fairly with the other, 
 Kant felt that, quitting the sphere of true philosophical 
 knowledge, he must have recourse to another sphere, or that of 
 practical rational belief. And here it was, in fact, that he 
 acquired by his doctrine an approbation and consent among 
 educated persons, which was just as great in itself as the revo- 
 lution which he had occasioned in the school of philosophy by 
 the theoretical part of his system. The conviction of the truth 
 of the transcendent, which we obtain in this way, should be 
 considered as in nowise inferior in certainty to the theoretical 
 truth. "We are not indeed able to acquire any cognitions upon 
 the subject, but still we may acquire certainty, certainty indeed 
 though not knowledge in its true sense. Kant even wrote a 
 Metaphysics of Ethicks, and a Critick of Practical Reason, but 
 protested most emphatically against all empirical dealing with 
 the moral principle, which, though established by him a priori, 
 was, nevertheless, not to be called a true knowledge and cogni- 
 tion, but only belief. 
 
 " Finally, and once for all," says Kant, " a pure moral philo- 
 sophy must be worked out, which is to be purified from every 
 
 E 
 
50 HISTORICAL SCBVET. 
 
 empirico- anthropological ingredient."* "For so soon as we 
 adopt what is empirically given in the principles of such phi- 
 losophy, we defile that which ought to be, by that which is 
 but is not as it should be, elevate that which should not be to 
 a law, and so corrupt the morals." Now it is this point of view 
 which properly distinguishes Kant's ethics from every preced* 
 ing science of morals, and especially from that of Wolf; foE the 
 latter, paying no regard to the source from whence the material 
 or subject-matter proceeds, whether a priori from the reason, or 
 a posteriori from the sensuous experience, applied itself di- 
 rectly in an uncritical manner to the material which the empi- 
 rical psychology presented, i. e. to the description of that which 
 human beings usually desire and readily perform, formed from 
 this, by abstraction, notions more or less universal, and in this 
 way brought about only a system of that which usually hap- 
 pens, in other words, a system of eudaemonism. 
 
 In searching then in a pure a priori manner for a principle 
 and determinations, Kant was desirous of grappling with the 
 innermost and highest principle of the human mind — that 
 which, in the theoretical reason, would not admit of being 
 apprehended as substance and Ego — as & principle of freedom, 
 and dragging it forth into open daylight. This principle he 
 detected, and established therewith the centre of gravity of his 
 whole philosophy, as well as that of the later and most recent 
 schools. With the closer determinations of this principle, how- 
 ever, and the further genetic deduction of the content, matters 
 remained as of old through want of a speculative method. As 
 in the theoretical part of the system, the transcendent and 
 ■unconditioned, though every where presupposed under the 
 name of the " thing in itself," was not however more closely 
 defined and cognised, so also here, in the practical part, the 
 principle of freedom remains perfectly void, indefinite, and 
 abstract ; it appears like a germ, impulse, or well-spring, from 
 which every thing or nothing can proceed, being devoid of any 
 internal nature or pre-established organisation. Devoid of de- 
 termination, as it is in itself, it emerges or passes out of itself 
 into externality, and so, from this, receives for the first time a 
 configuration or form ; the content which it obtains, it obtains 
 only from the other principle, the empirical ; for this content 
 consists of inclinations and desires; and what these human 
 impulses may be and to what they tend can only be determined 
 
 * Einleitung zur Rechtslehre, p. 16. Grundlegung zur Metaph. der Sitten, 
 Vorrede. 
 
KANT. 51 
 
 by the feeling of pleasure and disgust, consequently not a 
 priori, but by or through experience. Now, in order not to 
 come into conflict " heteronomically " with these physical de- 
 terminations, but to assert its antonomy, or at least its auto- 
 cracy, the principle of freedom must never venture so far in 
 its dealings with this heterogeneous material as to suffer the 
 same to hold good for its own nature ; as a self-subsistent 
 principle and as freedom it can only preserve itself in the 
 antagonism and conflict with that material, and in this very 
 struggle consists virtue and morality. Accordingly, the subject 
 must posite itself alone, as its end or aim, the maintenance 
 of its abstract freedom ; and, for the sake of this aim, it must 
 not venture to pursue any objective one, since by giving itself 
 up to some foreign purpose, it would surrender its own self; 
 for were the realisation of an object to become the aim and 
 motive of the will, the subject would then have conceded to 
 that object a deficiency as felt to exist within itself, would 
 have subordinated itself to the object, degraded itself into 
 the means for another, while this in turn would have become 
 its lord or master. Thus the subject, in order to be free, 
 must divest itself entirely of the natural desires, must do 
 what is good in conformity with duty only and for the 
 good's sake, but not from mere inclination. Since, however, 
 it was not said in what the content of this good or virtue 
 consists, there thus remained for the subject only the ne- 
 gative determination, of immunity, absolution, and freedom 
 from every sensuous element. In this way, the Kantian moral 
 drove the Ego, in a stoical fashion, back from the conflict with 
 the natural impulses and with life, into itself, instead of letting 
 it be positively a freely-active power of nature. Besides, 
 this principle of human freedom is nothing of an individual or 
 self-interested character, for it says, in merely a general way, 
 will and act constantly in such wise that you never lower the 
 humanity within you to a mere means, and thus as little in 
 others as in yourself ; this law, however, of the " categorical 
 imperative," as Kant called it, remained by virtue of this very 
 apprehension of it as " law " necessarily imprisoned in an 
 antagonism to another external element, and on that account 
 fundamentally and essentially within the category of justice, 
 without attaining to the higher stage of freedom, or to morality 
 in the stricter sense, which must nevertheless be distinguished 
 from the sphere of justice or right. 
 
 Despite, therefore, the declaration that was made by Kant of 
 
 E 2 
 
52 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 his wishing to erect a pure metaphysics of morality a priori, 
 his ethics remained, from the above-mentioned reasons, a mixed, 
 or half-empirical, half-philosophic science, not a pure, but a 
 so-called applied philosophy, instead of being recognised, as 
 it ought to be, in conformity with the original plan and ten- 
 dency, as the direct conclusion and crowning summit of the 
 whole system, even of the metaphysics or doctrine of cognition, 
 i. e. of the theoretical philosophy. 
 
 We believe that we do not err, when we discern in this re- 
 sult an explanatory hint as to the direction which was at once 
 taken by the stream of philosophical inquiry subsequently to 
 the time of Kant. The ethical principle, the freedom, is the 
 centre of gravity with Kant and the moving spring of the 
 whole modern philosophy. With Kant, however, the point is 
 already seen, upon which this principle impinges and finds 
 itself retarded ; it is the impenetrable empiricism, the un- 
 cognised, uncomprehended nature, which still mightily and 
 perversely opposes that principle, as a strange, gloomy ob- 
 ject, as a something directly given, a limit of the will as well 
 as of the cognition. Natural science must first of all aid in 
 breaking through this barrier, and rendering translucent this 
 gloomy objectivity. Busied apparently with other and utterly 
 profane things, or with the natura bruta, the philosophy of 
 nature stands nevertheless in the service, and works in the in- 
 terests of ethics, to render smooth the pathway of freedom, and 
 conduct this repudiated principle to its full rights. Without 
 this interest and without this aim, though probably not dis- 
 tinctly known to itself, the science of nature would be but a 
 partner of trade and a playmate of idle curiosity. 
 
 Kant himself was impelled by this mysterious presentiment ;, 
 his favourite studies had always been natural science and an- 
 thropology ; and upon these subjects he wrote so much, that, 
 the number of his treatises almost equals that of Aristotle, and 
 finally, by his " Metaphysischen Anfangsgriinde der Natur- 
 wissenschaft," he struck out a new path of cognition in this 
 department. But still more remarkable is it, that having di- 
 vided the system of philosophy, according to ancient usage, 
 into a theoretical and practical branch, he should himself dis- 
 cover traces therein of a deficiency or gap, and so intercalated 
 between these two halves a third part under the title of a 
 Kritik der Urtheilskraft, which was indeed to form a connecting 
 
KANT. 53 
 
 link or copula between the two, but has in fact for its content 
 a theory of the teleological notion, by means of which, if Kant 
 had been in earnest with the subject, the subjectivity of the 
 theoretical portion would have been completely suppressed, 
 and the abstract character of the ethical principle successfully 
 filled up. In fact, Kant had in that work, but without clearly 
 recognising it, encountered the deeper point of mediation, 
 which in the sequel proved a new and fruitful germ of thought, 
 while his own school troubled itself for a long time in vain, to 
 discover a common principle for the two parts of his system, — 
 the theoretical and practical philosophy, — and felt deeply the 
 schism that prevailed between them. In the theoretical part, 
 for example, it is shown that what is necessarily thought is 
 on that very account purely subjective, and declares nothing 
 whatever of that which is in itself objectively real, and does not 
 even correspond to it ; while, on the other hand, in the prac- 
 tical part, it is shown, that certain representations, just because 
 they are subjectively necessary (for otherwise no rational deal- 
 ing with them would be possible), must correspond to something 
 objectively true. At what point now are we to stop ? By prac- 
 tice we are indeed constrained to adopt the latter position, but 
 by theories, wherein, properly speaking, the scientio foundation 
 of this practice had been sought for, we are left in the lurch. 
 The practical theory of belief stood in need of an entirely new 
 foundation, and between this and the theory of cognition there 
 was no connection ; such a connection was first contrived at a 
 later period through essential modifications wrought in the one 
 and the other doctrine by his followers.* 
 
 The Critick of the Faculty of Judgment seeks to mediate or 
 bridge over this gap in the following manner. The principle 
 of freedom or the practical reason must exert an influence upon 
 nature ; now if it is to exercise a causal agency upon the 
 course of things, which continue their progress of necessity 
 and according to their laws, these two kingdoms cannot be en- 
 tirely separated, nor be heterogeneous. Both nature and free- 
 dom must admit of being mediated in a certain manner for our 
 understanding. This mediating principle resides in the feel- 
 ing, namely, of pleasure and disgust, and thus in that which 
 was previously reckoned as the empirical content of the ra- 
 tional consciousness, and on which account ethics have been 
 regarded as a mixed science. This feeling, however, is, pro- 
 perly speaking, a direct judgment, not logically developed, but, 
 
 * Compare Schelling, philos. Schriften, I. p. 264. 
 E 3 
 
54 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 as it were, anticipatihg fhe thinking cognition, so as to pro- 
 nounce upon the conformity to purpose of sensuously percep- 
 tible objects, and this partly for our ■■ faculty of cognition, and 
 thus as an jesthetic satisfaction of an intellectual kind ; but 
 partly too upon the conformity of the sensuous appearance of 
 the object to its own essence or conception, seeing that the 
 judgment is passed as to how far the latter corresponds more or 
 less with that which, from its specific nature, it can and ought 
 to be. This internal essence (the thing in itself), which lies 
 at the bottom of the objective phenomena, is then regarded as if 
 it were its own creator, or artist, as it were, working full of 
 design by means of the understanding and consciousness. Thus, 
 to nature is attributfed an artistic understanding, which, in 
 Kant's opinion, she certainly has not, /or she works blindly 
 and of necessity, but still we can so deal with her, as if 
 she worked with consciousness and design, in order that we 
 may, upon such grounds, explain to ourselves her products. 
 We, who ourselves possess understanding, can again detect in 
 these products an understanding, consequently, our own fa- 
 miliar nature, and can in this way render nature comprehen- 
 sible to ourselves, althoughj with her, as is self-evident, matters 
 do not really stand thus. Now, if Kant had not by these con- 
 tradictory and evasive statements retracted at once what he pre- 
 supposed, the undiscernibility of the thing itself would have 
 disappeared, the antagonistic character of nature have become 
 perfectly transparent, related to,' and associated with us to such 
 a degree, that even in the ethics no struggle and no opposition 
 against nature would have held good, but man would have 
 moved in it as in that which was his own peculiar province, 
 free and without hindrance. 
 
 "We must decline the task of entering further into the practical 
 philosophy, since it is not an exposition but only a connection 
 of its content with metaphysical principles which has been 
 here attempted ; what has been mentioned will however suflSce 
 to indicate the knot whose disentanglement or solution is now 
 the further problem of philosophy, and the point which it has 
 to hold fast by, if it would move securely forward with a dis- 
 tinct consciousness of the object it has in view. If now the 
 point at issue is, whether empiricism should be radically exter- 
 minated from philosophy, at least from the principle of the 
 latter, because, as was shown by Hume, it is the root of all 
 scepticism, and, as Kant was himself convinced, is at once the 
 germ of all eudaemonism, why, we ask, once for all, and in 
 
KANT. 55 
 
 conclusion, — why did he not lay his hand to this root of all 
 the mischief ? To banish from the system of philosophy all 
 content which is of empirical origin, and consequently im- 
 proved and doubtful, is a pretension which, since the time of 
 Descartes, and especially since that of Kant, has been repeatedly 
 insisted upon more or less as concerns at least the beginning 
 of the system ; we must, it is said, make abstraction at the 
 very outset of every thing which we know or believe that we 
 know, in order that we may find a principle certain in itself, 
 and then from or upon this establish something further. Now 
 that which stands in such connection with a principle of in- 
 trinsic certainty that it cannot be denied without denying the 
 principle itself, must be just as positive and incontestible as the 
 latter. This has been always postulated and its fulfilment 
 undertaken. But that other element, which is to be posited in 
 connection with the principle, or, according to Kant, to be at- 
 tained by synthetical judgments a 'priori, this we have been 
 continually obliged to receive again from experience. 
 
 For how should it be otherwise? Does the man who is 
 born blind produce a priori from himself the representn 
 ation of colour, or the deaf and dumb man that of sounds ? 
 Must we not, if we are to know any thing of natural ob- 
 jects, possess our five senses in a healthy state? and are we not 
 from the first moment of life in constant relation with the 
 external world, which, even if we had the power to engender 
 every thing within ourselves, does not once leave us time suf- 
 ficient for making the attempt ? Already this psychological 
 observation seems to cut off all further inquiries ; for at the 
 utmost it concedes to the individual human being an indepen- 
 dent reproduction of the impressions received, but not an 
 o/^iMa^ production of the representations. But yet more. Were 
 we in a condition to produce all cognitions purely out of our- 
 selves by a process of thought, or, as it is said, by natural 
 reason, how then should we stand in need of a preparatory re- 
 velation and education by external or historical means from a 
 higher or divine source, or how could such education be neces- 
 sary and possible ? The theological interests of belief here find 
 common cause for apprehension, and for being induced to re- 
 vert again in good time to empiricism. But the moral philoso- 
 pher also, and the philosopher in a less restricted sense, may 
 well pause to consider, before matters are brought to an actual 
 attempt, how, even if they have already recognised empiri- 
 cism to be the root of all evil, and heartily resolved to themselves 
 
 E 4 
 
56 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 to root it out, how in all conscience they are to reinstate a 
 priori, or in a purely genetic and creative manner, the fulness 
 which empirical knowledge procured for them ? Should mat- 
 ters succeed with them to some extent in the department of 
 ethics, still a similar success would not on that account be met 
 with in the sphere of physical science and of history'; or are we 
 to construct and invent the whole history of nature and of the 
 world in an a priori manner ? But granting even that we 
 could at least discover the general laws of nature with just as 
 much certainty a jsn'on" as the mathematician does those of the 
 heavenly and earthly mechanism, — how then are matters to 
 stand in respect to our cognition of God ? Must we not, in 
 order to cognise God a priori transport ourselves into the place 
 of God, or in order to find him within ourselves, and demonstrate 
 him from ourselves, be in ourselves God himself, or at all events 
 divine ? If, however, we human beings are the divine, what 
 then remains of God? Is not this pantheism, or — what 
 amounts to the same thing — naturalistic pankosmism ? In fact, 
 it may be truly said that this foolhardy attempt upon the part 
 of the human understanding, to transfer itself into God or God 
 into itself, is but the audacity in which Mephistopheles delights, 
 when exclaiming, 
 
 " Ay ! only trust to that old text, and take 
 The counsel of my antient friend, the snake, 
 And soon will come a time when yon shall see 
 Good cause for grief, though ' like to God ' you he.'' 
 
 Now, to invite philosophy to such an undertaking would imply 
 nothing less than to entice her cunningly to the verge of some 
 dizzy precipice, in order that she might more certainly topple 
 over, break her neck, and leave once and for ever a free field 
 open to the empirical belief upon authority, while to us is left 
 the choice alone between this belief from feelings of despair, and 
 the despair itself. It would seem, then, that all well-wishers to 
 the cause of philosophy must cautiously endeavour to bring 
 about a coalition between that science and empiricism, and 
 must consequently dissuade others in every way from a purely 
 genetic method, which could only have been contrived with the 
 above dangerous intention. Healthy common sense, the good 
 will, the aim of philosophy itself — all appear to unite and 
 conspire against the attempt to construct an absolute ideal- 
 ism, or, what amounts to the same thing, a pure monism, which, 
 whether partaking of a material or spiritual pantheistic or 
 
KANT. 57 
 
 pankosmic character, would be a self-engendering and unmixed 
 system of Identity. 
 
 Yet, nevertheless, philosophy, since Kant has not forborne 
 from striving after a pure genetic method, and, through this, 
 after a pure self-excogitated system ; she has bestowed more 
 confidence on the principle laid down by Kant, that empiri- 
 cism leads to a slavish serving of the senses, than to the warn- 
 ing against a pantheism, which must lead to precisely the 
 same result. Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel went boldly for- 
 wards on that road to arrive at the absolutely One. But mean- 
 while the warning, upon the other hand, was not neglected ; 
 many believed that they knew already beforehand the result of 
 such audacity, for they had it directly before their eyes, in the 
 writings of Spinoza. Prudence takes advice, and the next step 
 was an unhesitating consciousness of the present stand-point in 
 philosophy, as of a crisis. In Kant two principles, idealism 
 and empiricism, were still held dualistically together; we 
 could, while arriving through the reason at absolute unity, 
 either acknowledge the one idealistic principle to be the genuine 
 root of all knowledge, and abide subjectively by this alone, or 
 we could in turn make empiricism, and consequently a multi- 
 tude of objective beginnings and principles, the point of our 
 departure, in order thus to attain from the opposite side to their 
 unity in the consciousness, which unity had been made by the 
 idealists their starting point. In this empirical way, Herbart 
 dealt most definitively with the question before us. Finally, 
 however, we can also, recognising the dualism of Kant, strive 
 directly after a fusion of both principles into a real ideal- 
 ism, and in this way, without actually giving up the Kantian 
 stand-point, endeavour to promote the objects of a fresh school. 
 To the latter point the labours of Jacobi, Leonhard Rein- 
 hold, and especially Fries, were directed, each in his own 
 way ; of Jacobi more in the negative manner, since with him, 
 as will be presently shown, knowledge degenerated at once into 
 an absence of knowledge, and this again into a belief from sheer 
 •despair ; of the remaining three in a positive manner, but still 
 again in an empirical fashion, namely by psychological media- 
 tion, Keinhold* employing for this purpose the imagination, 
 
 ♦ An estimate has been formed of his neglected merits hy his son Ernst 
 Reinhold, in the Handb. der allgem. Geschichte der philos. Gotha, 1830; 
 2ter Thl. 2te Abth. p. 140. etseq. See also Schelling in der Abhandlung ; 
 vom Ich, als Princip der Philosophie. Tiibingen, 1795, p. 32. et seq. ; und 
 Herbart, allgem. Metaphysik, Bd. i. p. 224. et seq. 
 
58 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 Fries, (approximating more closely to Jacobi,) the feelings and 
 presentiments. It was Eeinhold who first of all expressed the 
 positive demand for one principle in philosophy, and entertained 
 the fruitful thought of coming to some universal agreement upon 
 the subject by a theory of the consciousness*, — a thought which, 
 though constantly re-entertained since then, has unfortunately 
 not been carried out as yet in a satisfactory manner, — since he 
 distinguished subject, object, and the representation that oscil- 
 lates between the two, and, from the matter-of-fact existence of 
 the representations, as well as from their nature, proved that in 
 the subject there must necessarily be presupposed bothreceptivity 
 for the objectively given material, as well as spontaneity for the 
 form which is subjectively added to the representations. Eein- 
 hold sought, indeed, by this theory, as it is said, to support the 
 Kantian system, but, in thereby directing attention to a most 
 profound and single basis, he was the cause of foundations being 
 laid upon which the Kantian edifice could no longer subsist in 
 its integrity. Salomon Maimon f and Gottlob Ernst Schulze % 
 proved besides that the Critick had not the power of eradi- 
 cating scepticism, which had again emerged to the surface of 
 philosophy, though under a new form. 
 
 No one, however, among the philosophers of that period, came 
 forward, with, upon the one hand, so much recognition of the 
 merits of the thinker of Konigsberg, upon the other, in such 
 decided opposition to him, as Friedrieh fliinrich Jacobi, the 
 philosopher of Pempelfort. 
 
 He ventured, in the name of all who were unprejudiced, to 
 conduct the defence of the natural point of view, and did, this 
 with such striking eloquence, that his style of writing, as re- 
 mote from scholastic stifihess as from the superficial character 
 of polite literature, will ever hold good as a model ; though we 
 
 * Versuch einer neuen Theorie des mensohlichen Vorstellungsvermo- 
 gens, Prag und Jena, 1789. Ueber das Fundament des phjL Wi^sen^ 
 Jena, 1791. p. 68. 
 
 t Streifereien im Gebiet der Philosophie, Berlin, 1793-8. Eritisclie 
 Untersuohungen fiber den Menschlichen Geist oder das hohere Erkennt- 
 niss und Willensvermbgen. Leipzig, 1797-8. 
 
 ^ Aenesidemus, oder fiber die Fundamente der von dem Herrn prof. 
 Eeinhold in Jena gelieferten Elementarphilosophie, &c. Helmstadt, 1792. 
 (anonym.) 
 
JACOBI, 59 
 
 must not forget that, as regards the exposition of his free philo- 
 sophical confession of faith, his conviction based upon direct 
 facts of the leligions/eeling, he did not require for the systematic 
 elaboration and methodising of this position a direct principle, 
 and that he only made use of the philosophical armour nega- 
 tively, or, in so far, as he appeared in a polemical aspect. 
 
 Briefly to indicate his merits ; it was he who perceived that 
 there dwelt in the human soul a deep and mysterious treasure, 
 which had not as yet been searched for, nay, one to which allusion 
 had been scarcely made ; and if he had not himself the power to 
 win this treasure, he yet defended it victoriously against un- 
 believers, and incessantly directed the attention of contempo- 
 raries towards it. In this he expressed what every educated 
 person felt more or less, so that there was not wanting to him in 
 the wider circle of readers a sincere though silent participation, 
 and thus at the present day, consciously or unconsciously, the 
 greatest part of the educated public ranks upon his side. 
 
 As to what concerns the understanding, Jacob! agreed fully 
 with Kant, in considering that all its activity consists in a mere 
 arranging and fashioning of the material that ' is obtained else- 
 where, in doing which the understanding itself takes cognizance 
 of this its arranging function, and erects the same into rules of 
 thought — as logic; this logic, however, regarded in itself, is 
 devoid of all content, so that the understanding cannot treat of 
 the nature of the world in itselfj but only of the mode in which 
 we elaborate or work out the representations that have been 
 obtained. 
 
 Here, however, in speaking of a content that has been brought 
 to us by the senses, and the form bestowed upon this content, 
 Jacobi separated in a different manner, and more strictly than 
 Kant had done, what belongs to the sense, as an organ, and what 
 to the understanding. How that which is imparted or given by 
 the senses enters into us, and becomes a sensation, he declared 
 to be an inscrutable mystery ; enough that it does actually 
 enter, and with this entrance brings along with it at the same 
 time into the consciousness the direct certainty of the given 
 being. Now the certainty that the being is there, and that too 
 without our co-operation, is so undeniable a fact, that we exalt 
 it without hesitation as being above every proof, and must re- 
 gard it as requiring none whatever. Before or while sensations 
 originate in us, the understanding does not as yet perceive them ; 
 but so soon as we feel, the affection has already taken place; so 
 that we can in nowise spy' out or take by surprise its origin. 
 
60 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 The understanding, as the self-observing faculty of man, always 
 finds the representations, sensations, and feelings, ready before- 
 hand ; they are there before it can see how or whence they 
 came; it discerns, generally speaking, nothing whatever in 
 itself, until these representations and sensations are actually 
 present or directly given, i. e., have arrived at completion in a 
 manner quite inaccessible to self-observation, but probably by a 
 reciprocal action between the senses and the objects; a reci- 
 procal action, which certainly remains for us a wonder, and on 
 this account, because the pressure or impetus of a body upon a 
 spiritual element, such as the soul, or a reciprocal action of two 
 things that are diflFerent, toto genere, is thoroughly inexplicable. 
 The business of the consciousness is only this, to bring first of all 
 separation, definite character, and order into this troubled flood, 
 this chaos of undistinguished sensations.* 
 
 Kant had indeed adopted such a reciprocal action of the senses 
 and the things in themselves ; he had adopted the opinion, that 
 things affect us some how or other ; but that which we perceive 
 as an affection in ourselves, was, according to his view, so 
 thoroughly blended with the peculiar additional element of the 
 understanding (which he here called imagination), that the mul- 
 tiplicity of the sensuous impressions themselves could hold good 
 as a perfectly subjective workmanship, or one no longer cor- 
 responding in any degree to the object. He had, in short, ex- 
 plained the whole nature upon which we gaze as a subjectivBly 
 necessary phenomenon, so that Jacobi entirely missed in tihe 
 sphere of the sensitive faculty the material which must be and 
 remain there as positively given, if the understanding is to 
 have any foundation. 
 
 Thus Jacobi appealed to the principle, that the images, the 
 whole multiplicity of representations in us, is present there ; 
 and to this principle he appealed as to a/aci, which is not only 
 raised above all doubt, but which constitutes the first basis for 
 any further reflection. In this way he rendered prominent for 
 the first time the moment of immediateness, as one of a basis 
 or foundation, which, even if the thought approaches it as a 
 mediating agent, must remain in the thought itself as a basis 
 and condition of development. It will be shown in the sequel 
 how important this is ; but for the present we will make a single 
 remark by way of anticipation. If the nature of the sensations 
 and representations be actually and mainly explicable, as Kant 
 would have it, from the constitution of the understanding — does, 
 
 * Kubn, Jacobi und die philosopliie seiner Zeit, p. 283. 
 
JACOBI. 61 
 
 finally, as Fichte would have it, all the definite multiplicity 
 of representations depend upon the activity of the understand- 
 ing) — it follows that we have no longer any original element 
 in the sensations, but only the constitution of the understand- 
 ing as a principle before us; the understanding alone remains 
 as that which is true and essential — it, the understanding, it 
 alone — appearing to us in its operations ; while there are no 
 longer things, no longer an external world, and in fact nothing 
 real, which could correspond to the ideal copy. 
 
 In order, then, to preserve the certainty of our belief in an 
 outward world, the consciousness must, upon this stand-point 
 of inquiry, necessarily hold fast at once by the direct matter- 
 of-fact existence of the sensations and representations, and 
 must not presume to wish to explain them from an internal 
 constitution of the understanding, for with such an explanation 
 they become at once subjective products of the understanding, 
 and we can no longer preserve ourselves from idealism. 
 
 Now, as soon as Jacobi had, within the domain of the sensi- 
 tive faculty, gained for it, as an acknowledged possession, the 
 absolutely inexplicable matter-of-fact character, it naturally 
 followed that he would make the same privilege hold good with 
 a similar result in a higher sphere of the mind, namely, in the 
 reason. This point it was that truly engaged his attention; his 
 philosophic gaze was constantly directed to the polar star of the 
 world beyond, unto " divine things." With him, however, rea- 
 son — Vernunft, as it is called in German, from Vernehmen, to 
 perceive or understand — was something quite different to the lo- 
 gical faculty, such as Kant had represented it in his theoretical 
 philosophy. Jacobi said, that just as our sense is a faculty for 
 perceiving that which is directly present to us in the sphere of 
 the concrete, so also is the reason a sense, a faculty for directly 
 perceiving what is present to us in the transcendent sphere of 
 the mind. We are no more able to declare how and whence 
 occurs this real existence of ideas in us than we were previously 
 to explain the how of the sensations of sense — but they are really 
 present ; this fact is true, undeniable, and needs no demon- 
 stration. Upon this point, Jacobi could argue in a striking 
 manner against Kant. Has not Kant, he asked, adopted the 
 matter-of-fact existence of the ideas in his practical philosophy, 
 and regarded them as being the ultimate and most certain 
 point? Does he not here content himself, and rightly, with 
 letting the matter-of-fact existence of the moral law (the so- 
 called categorical imperative) hold good as the most irre- 
 
62 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 fragable of all ? If lie did this in the theory of the practice, ho-w 
 could he presume to do directly the reverse in the theory of 
 knowledge ? Why should that which in the former case was 
 irrefragable, count for nothing in the latter? 
 
 In fact, Jacobi has here sounded a fundamental error of Kant, 
 that of wishing to base what is directly certain — that, upon 
 which every thing else might be built — upon another and 
 deeper something, by which means the first became of a waver- 
 ing or uncertain character. 
 
 Yet, while admitting all this, we cannot pause abruptly at 
 what Jacobi has pointed out as the first and ultimate stage of 
 inquiry — namely, in the sphere of the sensitive faculty, the 
 sensations, and in that of the reason, the ideas of the good, the 
 beautiful, and the true; for in the present instance, the question 
 is not as' to his having correctly discovered what is actually 
 the first or primary fact in the consciousness, but only as to 
 his having indicated the matter-of-fact quality as the essential 
 character of that in which the true foundation of knowledge 
 could be recognised; and as having given utterance to the 
 simple proposition ; you derive every thing which is to hold 
 good to you as certain from higher sources, and yet you would 
 have every thing demonstrated. But how then is this finally to 
 be done with the highest principle, or with the ultimate truth ? 
 Here you must at length come to a stand-still, by admitting a 
 matter-of-fact existence. For even when you would set up an 
 axiom, such as two things that equal a third are equal to one 
 another, — as the last anchor of truth, what do you express by 
 that ? You say, that such is a matter-of-fact certainty, which 
 fesides as a law of thought present in every human mind ; and 
 thus you appeal to the being, to the matter-of-fact existence of 
 this law of thought. Now as to that which exists, which pre- 
 sents and forces itself directly upon us, as, for example, the 
 present being of our laws of thought and such like, attention 
 can only be directed to it as to a something present, or, as it were, 
 set before the consciousness, butitcan never be demonstrated, i. e. 
 logically deduced, from higher and more general propositionss 
 TBis error, however, was the heirloom of the scholastic philoso- 
 phy, — a logical superstition, which was soon acknowledged by 
 other contemporaries, and especially by Fries, who called it with- 
 out hesitation the Kantian prejudice*, and on that very ac^ 
 count laboured diligently by anthropological investigations, into 
 
 » Neue Kritik der Vernunft, Bd. 1. Vorrede. 
 
JACOBI. 63 
 
 what actually occurs in the mind during cognition, to avoid the ' 
 same error. 
 
 By proving that the logico-synthetic method is useless for 
 metaphysics, Jacobi exercised a beneficial influence upon the 
 progress of philosophy, and it is this point which, from among his 
 many other merits in expounding truth, we have here brought 
 forward as being the most essential. 
 
 Endowed with penetration, he tracked the mysterious source 
 of our presentiments of the Highest and Divine up to the point 
 where they declare themselves to be matters of direct percep- 
 tion or feeling ; he did not consent to their being nothing more 
 than, according to Kant, obscure intimations of the logical fetter 
 while engaged in clenching a conclusion, but he rather directed 
 attention to them as the proper treasure and concealed riches 
 of the human soul, which we must indeed preserve, as he 
 thought, without indulging in any blameable curiosity, unless 
 we would trifle them altogether away : to every one who ven- 
 tures with the torch of knowledge into this sanctuary, it fares 
 as with the youth before the veiled image at Sais. 
 
 Now with a view, not of unveiling this image, but only of 
 pointing out its existence, Jacobi gave vent to manifold varieties 
 and modes of expression ; what he merely called at an earlier 
 period of his writings /aiVA, then/eeZiwjf, and internal revelation 
 of the Divine, he finally designated, as has been said, as reason 
 in the strictest and most appropriate sense, in order to dis- 
 tinguish it from that which Kant had termed the formal use 
 of the reason, and which was in fact only a function of the 
 understanding. Jacobi never intended to lay down a system 
 of philosophy; nay, he could not at anytime have desired to do 
 this, since during his inquiries into Spinoza, the conviction had 
 been early forced upon him, and subsequently confirmed, that 
 every systematic attempt, aiming at strict demonstration, must 
 of necessity diverge into a system of Identity, whether this be 
 one of materialism or idealism, naturalism or pantheism : every 
 system of unity, the more it is governed by strict rules and 
 circumscribed within itself, must be a system of necessity, and 
 consequently of fatalism ; but such a system contradicts itself, 
 is impossible as truth, and, on that very account, faith only re- 
 mains for us, as that which acknowledges incomprehensible 
 truths. The hypothesis of an unconditioned is incomprehensible, 
 because it does not reveal the connection of the unconditioned, 
 and conditioned, although it of necessity refers the latter to the 
 former. No necessary transition however of the unconditionee^ 
 
64 HISTORICAL SUKVET. 
 
 to the conditioned reveals itself; the universal cannot be merged 
 directly in the particular ; that which is one in its essence (the 
 absolute mind) cannot enter into that which is in essence not 
 one (nature) ; i. e. God, who in his essence is a real notion or 
 idea, a spiritual-personal individual, cannot at the same time 
 be comprehended as a formal 'complex or ambitus of natural 
 things that are separated among themselves.* "We shall return 
 again later on to this point, in considering the doctrine of 
 Schleierm acher . 
 
 If, with these philosophic assertions, which concealed in 
 themselves a deep presentiment of the truth, but couched in the 
 above form were of an insufficient character, Jacobi trod too 
 closely upon the most sensitive part of the matter, still, accord- 
 ing to his opinion, such rational belief should be by no means a 
 blind belief upon authority, a mere plausible or passive recep^- 
 tion and adoption of certain dogmas, but should be constantly 
 invested with the right of critically repulsing whatever is 
 opposed to reason. Nay more, he maintained most decidedly 
 (against Claudius), that it was not the historical fact, for example^ 
 the appearance of the Son of God, but conscience and self-feel- 
 ing which constituted the main fact in religion, and one day 
 pronounced to his son the memorable and never to be forgotten 
 words : " Despite every insufficiency in our philosophic reason- 
 ings, we must still continue to philosophise, must do this, or 
 become catholic, there being no third course for our adoption." 
 But with all this, Jacobi never succeeded in discovering for 
 himself and others the word which solves the riddle, and in this 
 consciousness he declared the discovery to be impossible. To 
 express what he really wished, the word "feeling" is in fact 
 more appropriate than that " reason " which was selected at a 
 later period of his career. For in the feeling there is still 
 presupposed a substantial, indiffijrent unity of the feeling and 
 felt, and the feeling is the priionitive commencement of this 
 unity, resolving itself in the heart and mind. In the act of 
 feeling, we have, he considered, the real, actual, and essential, 
 constantly present simultaneously or along with the ideal, but 
 this real vanishes wholly from us at a later period in the re- 
 flection of the understanding, so that the ideal only remains of a 
 one-sided character. As in the sensuous sensation, that which 
 is felt to be external is really present and even felt, while in 
 the bare representation of a past sensation there is no longer 
 such a relation of the subject to objects, but the subject is 
 * Von den gotfliohen Dingen. Beilage C. Sammtliche Werke, iii. p. 454. 
 
JACOBI. 65 
 
 alone in itself per se, so also in the higher spiritual sphere 
 the same distinction exists between feeling and tliinking. 
 He therefore designated, as was above remarked, this feeling 
 of communion with Grod by the word reason, but regarded 
 this reason only as an organ for the transcendent, not as an 
 independent faculty engendering, but only receiving ideas, as a 
 receptivity, along with which the object, the Divine itself, 
 might be given, and be directly present as an internal revela- 
 tion, which he placed beside the external revelation through 
 the medium of the senses. It does not engender ideas, as the 
 understanding does conceptions or notions, which are not on 
 that very account independent natures, but it is a quiescent 
 contemplation which must precede the understanding before 
 the latter can reflect upon it, and thus it corresponds in the 
 sphere of the transcendent to the intuitive faculty in the sphere 
 of the sensuous. They both presuppose, each in its own way, 
 a being and real something, which can be known apart from 
 the thinking process, for without such a real being, the pre- 
 sumed knowledge would be no truth, and the reason itself a 
 nonentity. 
 
 That to the knowing must correspond an intrinsic truth, 
 to the subject an object, which is in itself subject and per- 
 sonality, this is, properly speaking, the kernel which Jacobi 
 was intent upon freeing from all the envelopes or coverings 
 of the consciousness : he only unveiled it deficiently ; but 
 insufficient as was his delineation of it, for the strict claims 
 of science, still his opinion, as opposed to the formalism of 
 Kant and every one-sided idealism, was invested with such 
 general and potent interest, that we cannot wonder how, 
 despite all the outcry and scoffing at his "Glaubens-or 
 Gefiihlsphilosophie," he could not only abide by this principle 
 unvanquished, but again live anew in the memory of the most 
 recent times. It is true that, instead of further following out 
 that presentiment of truth on the speculative road, he forestalled 
 such inquiry, by placing in opposition to all speculation this 
 undeveloped form, as one that was essential to the truth and 
 irremoveable ; for, as he said, speculation must end in abso- 
 lute idealism, which must become nothing else than nihilism 
 and fatalism. Jacobi also believed that with this measure of his 
 own consciousness, he had already measured that of the human 
 mind collectively, and so dreamt that philosophy had come to 
 an end, without at the same time perceiving that in this way 
 he had defeated his own cause. For while he would hold fast by 
 
66 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 the personality of God a3 well as of the human being, he placed 
 the essence of the latter, namely, the self-consciousness, in the 
 middle as a merely passive state, receptive both in the upward 
 and downward direction of the divine and natural, and rendered 
 it in this way a medium devoid of self, — not a self-illuminating 
 fixed star, but the empty space, in which two stars shine 
 through one another. As a deeper foundation for that which 
 he intended, nothing could have been more welcome to him 
 than Schelling's modified system of Identity, which, in fact 
 laid just such a groundwork as Jacobi intended, — namely, a 
 foundation in which ideality and reality, being and thought, 
 are, previous to all difierence, originally identical *; but Jacobi, 
 waxing old, was already prejudiced against this bold and youth- 
 ful manifestation ; he saw in it only the ghost of Spinoza risen 
 from the grave, to banish which, his own formulse were no 
 longer potent enough. He cleared the field for a generation 
 which soon took no further interest about any thing in his- 
 writings, save only those propositions in which he had cast 
 suspicions upon and condemned the first metamorphosis which 
 philosophy under the title of the science had necessarily to 
 undergo. 
 
 A certain reviewer says as aptly as beautifully of Jacobi, 
 "Jacobi is like a solitary thinker, who at dawn of day found 
 some ancient riddle, hewn in an eternal rock. He believes in 
 the riddle, but in vain endeavours to solve it. He carries it 
 about with him the whole day, coaxes out of it some important 
 meaning, coins this into doctrines and images which delight 
 the hearers, and animate them with noble wishes and presenti- 
 ments ; but the solution fails, and he lays himself down to rest 
 at eventide in the hope that some divine dream or the morrow 
 will give to his longing the true interpretation, in which he 
 has so firmly believed." 
 
 We take leave of Jacobi with the grateful acknowledgment 
 that he has at all events brought us to comprehend that there 
 can be a content of the consciousness, or, if one will, of the 
 mind or soul, which lies already potentially in the conscious- 
 ness, before the real consciousness knows about it, and of 
 which content the latter faculty may in some way obtain a 
 more successful mastery than hitherto, drawing it forth from 
 the obscure region of presentiment and feeling, into the light 
 of knowledge. Still, however, in spite of that warning, it is 
 
 * Schelling's Denkmal der Sehrift von den gbttl. Dingen, &e., p. 7. 
 
JACOBI. 67 
 
 natural that, dissatisfied with that quiet or unphilosophical 
 possession, inquiring minds should seek at all risks for further 
 enlightenment ; for the philosopher, as well as the poet, can 
 say of himself — 
 
 To quell the impulse I should Talnly striye, 
 Which ceaseless in my hosom day and night 
 Alternates ever.^ — Life were life no more 
 Were I to cease to poetise, to dream. 
 Wouldst thou forbid the cunning worm to spin, 
 For that he spins himself still nearer death? 
 From his own being, he unfoldeth still 
 The costly texture, nor suspends his toil 
 Till in his shroud he hath immured himself. 
 
 f2 
 
68 HISTOEICAL SURVET. 
 
 LECTUEE IV. 
 
 Jacobi persevered, as was shown, in asserting that there is an 
 existence, an essence, which is not merely to be thought of as 
 a pure activity, but that there resides fundamentally in things 
 as well as in the consciousness some real, existing element, 
 whose being is not to be derived from thought or action, but, 
 inversely from that element is first to be derived the actual ac- 
 tion and thought. This statement he subsequently vindicated 
 in opposition to Fichte, but at an earlier period also against 
 Mendelsohn, the disciple of Wolf — that things were not merely 
 a phenomenon or appearance, nor minds a mere thinking 
 process, but that there was in both, as it were, a nucleus, a 
 reality, or inherent essence, which could not, however,- be 
 further cognised, i. e. we could discover for it no adequate 
 act of thought or conception ; — and for this very reason, 
 that being or reality in itself always expresses something in 
 itself quiescent, persistent, and irnmutable. To this, however, 
 thinking and cognition are in themselves the direct opposite, 
 seeing that they imply activity and motion. This proposition, 
 which is here appended to the previous sketch of Jacobi's doc- 
 trine, may prove very important for us in the sequel, when we 
 come to regard the opposite direction which was thereupon 
 taken by philosophy, namely, to annihilate every quiescent, and 
 in the proper sense of the word existent (non-becoming, non- 
 acting), because this objective being, in order to be understood, 
 must itself be converted into notions, and at the same time 
 be elevated into something that is thought of. 
 
 I, therefore, insert, by way of anticipation, in order that the 
 point of view to be taken in the following lectures may be better 
 determined, the following consideration, which meanwhile can, 
 at a later period, be further carried out and completed. 
 
 If we apprehend quite clearly the conception of the existent or 
 substance, and do not connect or confound it with that of cause 
 or principle, we then perceive that by the substance, when firmly 
 retained in this abstraction, is meant only the quiescent, the 
 immutably existent, which depends in this its existence upon 
 nothing else, and upon which also, nothing actually depends. 
 Thus, if we represent to ourselves that gold, as a certain sub- 
 stance, is devoid of sound, of a yellow colour, and of a certain 
 form, we think of these properties as upon, or perhaps within, 
 
HERBART. 69 
 
 the gold ; we do not, however, as long as we thus regard it, gain 
 any insight into how the substance of the gold is the cause, 
 tor example, of the yellow colour, seeing that we do not in the 
 present instance think of any causal connection as subsisting 
 between the substance and its properties. It will be shown 
 later on, that the notion of substance and that of causality, 
 or, more correctly speaking, of principle, must be in all cases 
 united, nay, that they probably indicate but one and the same 
 relation in the things perse; — but that such is the case, of 
 this we must first be convinced, and the notion of substance by 
 itself alone does not affirm this. Substance really indicates 
 nothing more than something which is devoid of accident, 
 inherence, and predicate, — being not a mere condition or 
 quality in or for another, but its very self this other, the self- 
 subsistent, persistent, absolutely independent, — in a word, the 
 direct opposite of dependence. 
 
 If, on the contrary, we combine the notion of substance 
 with that of principle, regarding every thing that actually 
 is, as being at the same time active, effective, and involving 
 in itself a causality, then every thing appears to us alive. 
 But if we abide strictly by the logico-abstract notion of mere 
 being, or, more strictly speaking, of substance, without mixing 
 up with it any thing whatever of the notion of principle, — ■ 
 if, in other words, we think of the essence of things onli/ 
 as substances, then every thing stands singly for and by itself, 
 nothing whatever is effected, and if one thing even depends 
 upon another, it is only in an accidental or indifferent manner, 
 neither originating from this its sustainer, nor explicable from 
 its essence. 
 
 Now, the above considerations may serve to indicate the two- 
 fold tendency which after Kant's time animated the systems of 
 philosophy, and caused them to diverge from one another. 
 Upon the one hand, the essence of things was taken in a one- 
 sided manner, as pure principle, pure causality, no substance 
 of an active kind being transferred to the principle. This 
 tendency may be called the Dynamical, that which, carried out 
 consecutively from the Kantian doctrine of nature, must ne- 
 cessarily take the idealistic turn. The other tendency, built 
 upon a one-sided abstraction, suffers all things to subsist as ex- 
 istent substances, devoid of internal motion and life, as atoms, 
 to which, if any thing is to become, the impulse must be given 
 from without. This is the Mechanico-realistic view.* 
 
 • Herbart's Psychologie, Bd. ii.. p. 506. et seq. 
 F 3 
 
70 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 Now, while the former or dynamico-idealistic tendency found 
 immediately after Kant's fime its most zealous and subtle re- 
 presentatives in Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel, still the realistic 
 view did not remain wholly disregarded ; Jacobi already leaned 
 towards it ; but subsequently Johann Friedrich Herhart ap- 
 peared more decidedly in its behalf, by which nothing further 
 is implied, than a decided preponderance on that thinker's 
 part of the realistic as a fundamental view over the dynamical, 
 and not a pure and perfect mechanism or atomism, as will be 
 presently more definitely pointed out. It cannot, historically 
 speaking, be a matter of indifference which side of the subject 
 we first proceed to trace. For Fichte and Schelling made 
 their appearance at an earlier period than Herbart, whose 
 " Hauptpuncte der Metaphysik" first came before the public 
 in the year 1808 ; the latter, too, has, during his whole life, dis- 
 played the most decided opposition to both those writers, as 
 well as Hegel, and has, in the controversy, put forth his best 
 strength against the dynamical tendency of philosophy. Never- 
 theless, for the sake of gaining an easier insight into our au- 
 thor's views, we may set aside the polemico-critical portion of 
 his writings, and the more so, seeing that it was chiefly directed 
 against Kant, Reinhold, Fichte, the philosophy of Schelling in 
 its first form, partly also against the school of Wolf, and in so 
 far is of less interest to us at present ; and since we would be- 
 come acquainted only with the positive side of his system, it 
 appears more conformable to our present purpose, to place his 
 system at once nearer to that of Kant, with which, as regards 
 subject-matter, it stands in the closest connection, than by en- 
 tering upon that long route of inquiry, which we must traverse 
 upon the other hand with the above-mentioned speculative dy- 
 namicists, to interrupt the close union of these three thinkers 
 by the intercalation of a wholly heterogeneous or different mode 
 of viewing the subject. 
 
 Since Kant, as Jacobi reproached him, had undermined, upon 
 the one hand, the experience of the senses, and caused it to eva- 
 porate into bare appearance, while, upon the other hand, he 
 silently rested upon it for support, appealing repeatedly to the 
 " matter of the sensations" as the only content and material'of the 
 cognition, it followed that his method of reasoning, both a priori 
 and a posteriori, naturally presented upon either side a sepa-. 
 rate point, which could be seized upon afresh and selected as a 
 point of support. Now while the dynamical party above alluded 
 to, convinced, of the necessity of one absolute principle for the 
 
HEEBAET. 71 
 
 science, found an immediate resting^point in the a priori prin- 
 ciple, in the absolute Ego, Herbart defended the empirical 
 stand-point in so far as he recognised in the real objective fact 
 given in perception, i. e. in the natural and unprejudiced view of 
 the external world common to all reasonable men, the necessary 
 and abiding foundation for further philosophic inquiries, but in 
 this objective fact he did not acknowledge a mere isolated some- 
 thing, but an infinite number of real principles, problems, and 
 starting-points for philosophical inquiry. The sum and sub- 
 stance of our ordinary views and convictions, that state of the 
 consciousness, which can be regarded as human in a general 
 sense, this is the something which we directly encounter upon 
 beginning to philosophise ; and it is upon this point alone, 
 upon this given, that we can philosophise, i. e. adjust our repre- 
 sentations, conceptions, and ideas by means of reflection, but we 
 can never create any thing from one general and empty idea, 
 such as that of the so-called absolute, which, closely examined, 
 is nothing more than a void abstraction of the given. Philoso- 
 phy is therefore, according to Herbart, nothing else but a 
 scientific elaboration and adjustment of our general conceptions 
 in behalf of the cognition of the real objective fact ; we must 
 and will comprehend the nature that is within us and without 
 us, and form to ourselves true notions of it corresponding to 
 its essence ; this is the object and goal of all reflection. 
 
 Provisionally, therefore, we adopt every thing just as we find 
 it in our consciousness; for this is to be the material which 
 we elaborate : we take this material, the infinitely numerous 
 sensations, representations, and notions, not as if we had therein 
 what is actually true, but as the mass, which is first to fashion 
 itself for us into a coherent totality of truth; for were we not to 
 regard the material in this light, then nothing whatever would 
 remain for us, either as starting-point, mainstay, or scope of our 
 inquiry. Granted even, that many things may be in a very 
 different state to what they appear to us, still for this very ap- 
 pearance there must be some ground from which it proceeds ; 
 this ground must be discovered, and so the appearance itself 
 necessarily leads us thither in search of the truth. Thus the 
 appearance cannot be merely dismissed or passed over in an 
 off-hand manner; for we cannot certainly entertain any right 
 notion of the essence of things, unless at the same time the 
 appearance can be explained from its conception or notion. 
 Even the natural appearance, how much more then the true 
 
 F 4 
 
72 HISTORICAL SDEVEr. 
 
 in our empirical cognition, is the real test of the philosophically 
 discovered opinion ; and in so far the objective fact is not , only 
 the point of departure for all investigation, but finally remains 
 as the only means whereby we may put to the test and rectify 
 the whole calculation. 
 
 This is one of the fundamental principles, which it is incum- 
 bent upon us to hold fast provisionally* But the other is no 
 less important ; for of itself alone no empiricism can be a crite* 
 rion of truth, still less, however, be or be called philosophy. 
 For it is shown that the usual representations which we have 
 of things and their connection with each other, and, as a con- 
 sequence of this, the general notions abstracted from our 
 observation of them, bear in; themselves upon closer examina- 
 tion a greater or. less amount of contradictions, and are not 
 therefore adapted to take the place of established truths, and to 
 be elaborated into a system. These contradictions, which espe- 
 cially appear in the highest and most universal notions, when 
 applied to the actually existent, have been indeed disclosed by 
 Kant, in the paralogism and the antinomies, though they were 
 already no secret to the ancient philosophers ; while Hegel has 
 even made them to constitute the proper essence of the under- 
 standing and (as we shall see) of existence itself. But hitherto 
 no one has known how to deal with these contradictions ; for, 
 instead of finding a means of purifying the notions themselves 
 from all contradictions, and then transporting to them the 
 given, these contradictions have been left .standing, and then 
 either a doubt has been raised as to the capability of our underr 
 standing to cognise any thing truly, or, upon the other hand, as 
 to the reality of the things themselves, to which those notions, 
 along with their contradictory elements, must be applied. Thus, 
 from such improvident dealing with the matter, must, in the 
 first place, originate Scepticism, and then — since the reality 
 
 of all things, even to one's own thought, has been denied 
 
 Idealism. 
 
 We now turn from these preliminary considerations to Her- 
 bart's system in itself. 
 
 We have already seen that a slight refection upon the so- 
 called secondary properties of things must awaken a doubt in 
 us, as to whether the things are so constituted in themselves 
 as they appear to us. Now, if this doubt be once awakened, 
 and we have become sensible,, at least in regard to some of 
 the so-called properties of things, that they do not belong at 
 all to the things, but to ourselves, as subjective modifications 
 
HEKBAET. 73 
 
 \of our feeling and faculty of apprehension, then scepticism 
 Ipdvances at once without a pause to the question as to whe- 
 ther any thing whatever corresponds objectively to this sub- 
 jective appearance, or whether, in a word, there are things 
 in themselves. Thus, in the first place, we would doubt only 
 tl^e conformity and truth of the qualities represented, and 
 noiw we doubt also the being or existence of the things them- 
 selves. The former may be called the lower, the latter the 
 higher stage of scepticism. 
 
 If, however, we have once reached this stage of thought, 
 then scepticism has reached, as it were, its culminating point, 
 and we then begin seriously to consider, whether, if the exist- 
 ence of all reality were negated and suppressed, the appearance 
 also, nay, even the representation and thought, which would 
 be still the directly active source of this doubting, would not at 
 the same time be suppressed along with the thing, and be no 
 longer present; and so we return to the thesis of Descartes 
 — cogito, ergo sum ; the cogitare itself, or this mental activity, 
 being still present as a certainty. This activity, however, as 
 being the only remaining ultimate fact, or direct certainty, 
 becomes now a pure idealistic basis, from which proceeding, 
 and upon which supported, we purpose to cast a bridge over 
 into the actual world. Whether, and in what way this at- 
 tempt may succeed, of this point the idealistic systems of phi- 
 losophy have to render account. Herbart denies this, and does 
 not acknowledge this standing-point to be true, but regards it 
 as an aberrant attempt upon the part of the thinking process, 
 in which we must at once discern error and feel ourselves 
 driven back to the truth. 
 
 To the pure idealist nothing more is left at last (as will be 
 shown in the case of Fichte) than his own thinking process, 
 and thus an activity, without any thing, whether a spiritual or 
 bodily substance, which is active. The question then arises, 
 whether such a pure activity, living and soaring by itself alone, 
 can be thought of, and if even thought of abstractedly, ij e. 
 if even the understanding could think of the essence, which 
 is active, and its activity as separate, whether we could then 
 affirm of the latter that it is. In a certain sense indeed we 
 can evidently affirm this, and we do so frequently, but we then 
 miss at the same time also a something, which should be active, 
 should think, &c., and yet we can only think to ourselves of the 
 thought and action as a certain condition or determination of 
 that very essence, to which belongs being or existence in the 
 
74 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 proper sense. Thus the above question leads first of all to a 
 close investigation into what is really meant hj the word 
 
 In the first place, we must draw a rigid line of distinction 
 with more caution than is usually done between being or Vo be 
 (as a verb) and the existent, the real, actual, or the essence.* 
 As to the notion of being, which here especially concerns 
 us, it signifies, first, that very relation of an object to our 
 thinking process, by virtue of which it subsists quite inde- 
 pendently of the thought, and does not vanish when even it 
 ceases to be thought of by ourselves, or by any one else. 
 For example, a mountain is, i. e. it remains arid does not dis- 
 appear, although I do not represent it to my mind for a long 
 time ; nor does it occur to me to believe that the mountain 
 Gould not have been there as long as 1 did not think of it. 
 Now, the same independence of our representative faculty, 
 which we ascribe to the things that are, a thing must also 
 possess, in reference to all other things, if we would truly 
 say of it, it is. Thus, for example, we could not say of 
 the brilliancy of the rainbow that it is, or is something for 
 itself in the same sense of the word as we could say this of the 
 drops in which the rays of the sun are mirrored ; but we would 
 say that the brilliancy exists only through the sun, and its 
 relation to the drop, and that of the drop to our eye. In like 
 manner, of motion, distance, and the like, of all which we 
 ascribe to a thing as properties, so far as these, taken in a 
 strict sense, are mere notions of relation, we cannot say of any 
 one of them it is, i. e. it is something in itself, seeing that it does 
 not subsist by itself alone, but only upon and in, or for and by 
 some other. The notion of being, strictly apprehended, implies 
 as much as absolute being, and excludes every notion of re- 
 lativity and independence ; for in so far as any thing is not in 
 itself, but depends upon some other, it is on that very account 
 not itself, and the notion of being does not belong to it. That 
 very something of which we say, it is, is consequently regarded 
 as self-subsistent, as independent both of our thought and also 
 of the conditions of other things. Thus the notion, of being 
 implies (according to Herbart) a perfectly independent position ; 
 but, meanwhile, we must not be led by this expression to infer 
 that the position — the being of the thing^originates for the 
 
 * Herbart's allgemeine Metaphysik, nebst den Anfangen der phil. 
 Naturlehre. Konigsberg, 1828—1829, 2ter. Bd. p. 73. et seq. 
 
HERBAET. 73 
 
 first time through our positing, i. e. by a process of thought. 
 If we posite a thing as absolute, we do but think of it as a 
 thing unthought, and not a mere representation ; there here 
 takes place upon our part no positing in the active and transi- 
 tive sense of this verb, any more than upon the part of the 
 thing there is a process of becoming posited by us, but the 
 expression is of quite a neutral character, meaning only a self- 
 existence, subsistence for itself ; and it is this entire neutrality 
 with regard to being all that is thought or effected, which corre- 
 sponds to the notion of being. Thus, being is here understood 
 by Herbart in a perfectly rigid sense, and means as much 
 as absolute being. Being thus signifies merely a kind and 
 mode of positing. Let any one take the word being on the 
 present occasion purely as a verb, and as infinitive, and he will 
 at once recal to mind that this being is itself naught, but 
 merely expresses the relation of something to our thinking 
 process and to other things, namely, the self-substantiality, 
 the self-subsistence. Hence it may be aptly said, being is 
 not This proposition has a meaning or sense, which must 
 serve to remind us, that whenever it is said it is, or is not, a 
 something must every time be added or spoken of. Just as 
 little as running, standing, or hovering, is any thing by itself, 
 so also with being; the question turns every time upon the 
 what, or that something which runs, stands, hovers, or in a 
 general sense is. By this time it will be understood, when 
 furthermore it is said, that to the being belongs at all times a 
 what, or something, that exists, a quale ; and that we cannot 
 speak of the being, but only of the existent, as of something 
 really actual. In so far as the being is attributed to a some- 
 thing, is the latter a reale, and reality belongs to it ; but this 
 logical separation of the something which is, and of the being 
 which belongs to it, must not mislead us into supposing that 
 the something is any thing by itself apart from its being, and 
 that the latter is any thing without the former ; in the reality that 
 quale is the very existent, and the existent is the quale, or they 
 are one and the same ; and so, when we say of a quale, that 
 it is, the notion of it gains no new ingredient, but it remains 
 what it was before (as a something thought) in respect to its 
 whole content, as Kant has already made evident by the well- 
 known example of the hundred thalers. 
 
 Thus the existent is always a quale, a something, which is 
 regarded as existent. But every quale cannot be regarded 
 as°(absolutely) existent ; many qualities will not support the 
 
76 HISTOKICAL SURVEY. 
 
 absolute position ; philosophy at least will be obliged to deny 
 to much, of what in ordinary parlance is said to be, the 
 attribute of being, according as this notion, as we see, has been 
 limited to the stricter definition of the absolute or pure and true 
 being ; for at all events in many things, as regards their nature, 
 contradictions to the idea of absoluteness will present them- 
 selves, and hence render the application of this idea to them 
 impossible. To give up entirely the idea of reality, or to apply 
 it to nothing whatever, is impossible; the idea must find its 
 application in nature, or else every thing would be represented 
 as null and void, as nought ; yet notwithstanding it cannot be 
 transferred without distinction to all things and their notions, 
 since the latter, so soon as we think them, resist the absolute 
 position. Thus we shall have first of all to define closely 
 what is understood by the notion of reality or of being (ap- 
 plied to things) ; and secondly, the notions which we entertain 
 of the actual, at least those most comprehensive and important 
 ones, whose reality we may be least able to give up, must be 
 submitted to the trial, as to whether they accord In their content 
 with that notion of absolute position, i. e., whether as soon as 
 they are thought, they admit of being posited as actually exists 
 ent or not ; in the latter case, however, they must rest content 
 with such a remodelling or determination, as may render them 
 capable of being posited by an act of thought as existent 
 without entering into any contradiction with themselves. 
 
 In the first place, it is essential to the idea of the absolute 
 position or the being, that the quality of that which is to be 
 posited should be absolutely positive or affirmative, i. e., con- 
 tain no negation or limitation, which might again Suppress the 
 character of absoluteness. Every negation, namely, is either 
 the directly contradictory opposite of position, and is conse- 
 quently a suppression of the being, or it is so, as being contrary 
 to the latter in a certain relation, hypothetically and relatively. 
 As to any thing that cannot subsist by itself, but which, in order 
 to be, must, as it were, cleave to something else, as for example, 
 the shine or glitter upon a nature endowed with that property, 
 to such only a relative being, i. e., no true being in the proper 
 sense of the word can be attributed, nor can it hold good for 
 any thing real. No limitation of any kind whatever admits of 
 being thought of, without a positive element, which becomes 
 limited, having been previously posited.. 
 
 Secondly, it is essential to the idea of the absolute position- 
 that the quality of that which is to be posited should be abso- 
 
HEEBAET. 77 
 
 lately simple, i. e., should not be thought of in any way as 
 a plurality or as internal antagonisms. For if we would think 
 of the real as a compound of a and b, then two cases only would 
 be possible ; either a of itself alone, and b also of itself alone 
 would be absolute and real, and then each thus regarded by 
 itself would be a simple real, and hence the composition would 
 be unnecessary ; or neither of the two regarded by itself would 
 be real and absolute, and then no reality could originate from 
 the composition or reciprocal dependence. We must not in the 
 present instance deceive ourselves by the abstract notion of the 
 unity, in which we believe it possible to unite two different 
 sorts of things ; for this could only signify an inclusion in 
 thought of two things either real already or non-real. Were 
 we to say, that a is only through b, and b through a to attain 
 reality, we should then have the self-contradictory idea of a 
 causa sui; we should, in fact, posite something which has first 
 to create itself, which could not thus be regarded as yet present, 
 and consequently could produce nothing. 
 
 Thirdly, the quality of the existent is absolutely vndejinable 
 by notions of quantity, the existent as such can never be re- 
 garded as 9i,qwantum, i. e., divisible, extended in space and time. 
 Let it be well understood that we are here speaking of the 
 real by or in itself. We can indeed transport the real into uni- 
 versal space, and in like manner into time, but in either case 
 only as something in itself unspatial and immutable, just as we 
 may posite also the mathematical point in space, and determine 
 from it the distance and position (or place) of other points,'.but 
 cannot say of the point itself that it is spatially extended, or in- 
 cludes in itself a space. It has no space in itself, and hence the 
 predicate of space is perfectly foreign to its own nature. That 
 such is the case already follows from the second position above 
 stated ; for where quantity (extension in time and space) is, 
 parts also are conceivable ; these parts are to be thought of as 
 parts of the real, and thus again in themselves as something 
 real; thus, there would be either a number of reals (which is not 
 impossible), but then the singular and simple would be real, 
 and there would be no need of the composition ; or the reality 
 would first orignate through the inclusion of the details in an 
 unity, and then the same dilemma, above alluded to, would 
 reappear. Thus time and space are to be denied to the 
 idea of the real in itself, but not on that account to the 
 relations which may subsist between several reals ; these rela- 
 tions, namely, first appear to a third party, or to the observer 
 
78 HISTORICAL SUEVET, 
 
 from without, but do not belong to the real itself, just as in the 
 nature of the mathematical point not the smallest change takes 
 place, however many other points be posited in relation to 
 it (by a geometer). The question, as to whether there is 
 actually more than one real, cannot be decided a priori; for 
 in the conception or notion of the real, according to Herbart's 
 express declaration, there resides nothing which may exclude 
 the thought of numerical quantity; but no multitude of parts 
 or qualities is to be posited in one and the same real, and 
 hence no qualities of space and time, seeing that these notions 
 include within themselves infinite divisibility, and would con- 
 sequently transfer the same also to the real. If, however, it is 
 once forbidden us to think of the real in any way as divisible, 
 it follows from this that we durst not represent it to ourselves 
 as a continuum. This representation, namely, that of a constant 
 quantity, depends upon this, that we think of successive parts 
 in the real, but as constantly disappearing and blending into 
 one another, only in order immediately again to suppress them ; 
 thus a procedure of thought is undertaken in respect to the 
 single real, which, from what has been already said, is not even 
 applicable to it, but relates only to space and time, which have 
 been improperly imposed upon the real as a scheme of the exist- 
 ence. As with the constancy of parts, so is it also for the same 
 reasons with the notion of infinity. This also implies only a 
 failure upon the part of the representative process, which grows 
 weary of including the many (as parts of the continuum), and 
 with this its own action can never come to an end. The being 
 (the absolute position) is a thoughtj once for all ready prepared; 
 a something, with whose positing we can never arrive at com- 
 pletion, for what is never to be wholly posited would be no 
 absolute ; the idea of being would not admit of being applied 
 to it any more than it can be applied to space as such — the in- 
 finite (merely represented) void, the infinite nothing — and to 
 time as such. 
 
 Now if in this way the notion of Being itself, which is the 
 firmly abiding and fundamental element of the whole science of 
 Metaphysics, has been provisionally sifted and rendered clear, 
 we may confidently pass with it to experience, i. e., to that which 
 is given us a posteriori, in order by means of that notion to 
 think to ourselves correctly of the essence of things, or gaze at 
 these, as it were, in the right light. In doing this we must 
 not forget that our notion of being, or, as it has now been 
 defined more closely, the notion of absolute reality, is not to 
 
HEEBAET. 79 
 
 be confounded with the existent or the real itself; for objects 
 are in themselves the latter, but the former is only our way and 
 method of thinking of them. If now we were to regard the 
 being, the existence, as a quality along with other qualities in the 
 thing, — were we to make the being a predicate of the actual, — 
 then we should fall into an error, which Kant has already em- 
 phatically denounced, and which would henceforth render the 
 whole system of Herbart unintelligible. In complete contra- 
 diction to this, the most recent Idenlity-philosophy regards, as 
 we shall see later on, that very being as the something itself, 
 which is present, recognises in it the essence of creative nature, 
 the life and immediate real itself. Herbart, on the contrary, 
 distinguishes well, like Kant, the notion of being from other 
 notions, and the posited something from other objects ; but the 
 characteristics of the notion as such are not those of the some- 
 thing, and vice versa. The being, which in itself is nothing but 
 my position, is positively not to be confounded with the quali- 
 ties of the something, not to be misplaced among these, or 
 rendered the first and essential quality of the object in itself. 
 This confusion readily enough creeps in, when anything posited 
 as actual is doubted of, or when I, being moved by experience 
 or reflection, have withdrawn or negated my originally simple 
 position, or when I may still doubt whether I regard an object 
 as actual or only as a thing of thought, i. e., whether I am to re- 
 new and confirm the first position already withdrawn, or, what 
 amounts to the same thing, again to negate the negation. 
 
 In the following passage from Herbart's Metaph. vol. ii. 
 p. 86., we find the fundamental and characteristic view of the 
 whole system thus expressed : " The notion of being indi- 
 cates, properly speaking, nothing but the avowal that we 
 have in regard to the object raised an unnecessary question, 
 namely, as to whether all is done when the object is posited. 
 Instead of understanding that we are in the present case busy 
 only at bottom with ourselves, we fall easily into imagining that 
 we have said something of the object. The thought of the real 
 object was comparable with thoughts of another kind ; the 
 former is to remain unlimited, the latter are to be held in check, 
 so that they, the void or empty thoughts, may not hold good 
 for more than they are worth. If now we take the first of these 
 two opposite determinations as one not merely to be bestowed 
 upon the thought of the object, but upon the object itself, why 
 then the being is erroneously converted into a quality, and the 
 error of the old school returns in full force. This error, how- 
 
80 HISTORICAL SUBVET. 
 
 ever, as is well known, consisted in so regarding the being of 
 things, as if it was indwelling or inherent in them." 
 
 Herbart would say, that the signification of the conception or 
 notion is not the same as the intellectual movement of the con- 
 ceptive faculty, although it is true that nothing can lie in the 
 notion which we have not first placed there by a movement of 
 thought ; for we cannot once for all know and afllrm any thing 
 of a something, which is not known, thought, or conceived. 
 From this condition of all speculation we can and ought not 
 to wish to withdraw ourselves. "We are completely shut up 
 in our own notions, and just because we are so, notions decide 
 concerning the real nature of things."* If we really know 
 nothing at all of a beyond, of a real nature of things, we could 
 not even presuppose it, and could not once negatively define it. 
 But as soon as we regard this real nature as a something for us, 
 and as identical with our notions, we suppress its true notion. 
 Thus, that which we mean by it, is not to be confounded with 
 notion, and its notion is just this, that it is the opposite of every 
 subjective idea of an actual thought-activity. Thus we have 
 a notion of the real, the existent, but must not confound this 
 our notion, i. e., the way and method in which the supposed ob- 
 ject presents itself to our mind, with the object itself. In the 
 present instance, Herbart does not direct his polemics against 
 the general principle of our only transferring to the objects 
 that which is thought of in the notions ; this principle, which 
 is acknowledged even by the most recent Identity-philosophy, 
 only in a different way to what it was by the Wolfian school, 
 remains here also in full force, but the question here turns upon 
 a special case. The notion of being is, as is well known, the 
 most abstract and empty of all notions ; on that account Her- 
 bart has good grounds for denying that in the same any sign of 
 an existing thing, any aliquid, or any directly definite character 
 can be met with; and on that very account nothing is to be 
 predicated by or through it of the object; for we have only to 
 think over the notion correctly and clearly to discover that in it 
 there resides nothing, no quality, no something, but that it is 
 rather applied to the what or quale. 
 
 Now whence, and in what way, it may be asked, comes such 
 a something to be added to the being, to be imperatively re- 
 quired by this notion, so soon as it is to enter upon any general ; 
 application. This something, according to Herbart, does not 
 
 * Einleitung in die Philos. § 114. 
 
HERBART. 81 
 
 admit of being developed or analysed from out the eihpty notion 
 of being, but it is postulated by it, comes to it from elsewhere, 
 must, in a word, be given to it, and that indeed directly. . The 
 something is directly given in the sensation ; for it is founded 
 on fact, and to prove a priori that something must exist would 
 be impossible, unless something were directly given ; still less 
 can it be determined a priori how much must be given, and 
 how the many must be constituted in itself, and so on. The 
 manifold, given in the sensation, necessitates directly and in the 
 first place positions, which must often upon closer considera- 
 tion be withdrawn. We arrived, as already mentioned, in the 
 passage through the lower and higher stage of scepticism, at, 
 first of all, the general result, that posite we must; and then came 
 the question as to how we must posite; and hence it follows, that 
 the something which is posited cannot be so constituted and 
 thought of as to contradict the nature and form of the position, 
 and thereby bring the thinking process into contradiction with 
 itself, while wholly or in part suppressing the position. In this 
 case, the particular quality of the existent in itself remains 
 constantly unknown ; for by virtue of its being a something 
 posited, positive, nothing whatever (nothing definite) is known 
 of it; we cannot even know how it is in itself; but, that many 
 and manifold reals may be posited, is deducible from the di- 
 versity of the appearance, and follows upon the one hand from 
 this multiplicity or diversity of the phenomena, and on the 
 other, from the simplicity of the existing real in itself ; for one 
 kind of real could not afford a diversified appearance ; but a 
 diflferent real will under different combinations appear different. 
 Let us then, first of all, follow out the phenomenon awhile in 
 this manner, as far as is consistent with brevity. In the begin- 
 ning, the unembarrassed and inexperienced subject posites much 
 which it must again retract at a later period ; in a word, it pre- 
 supposes every thing to be real, whatever or howsoever it may 
 appear. Upon closer consideration, however, much turns out 
 to be only an appearance or semblance, and this the subject 
 must take upon itself as its own representation or as subjective? 
 that only which is not a mere appearance is, and is actually, 
 and this only can be given. Thus the positing begins with 
 that which is directly felt (PsyChol. § 141.); or, in other words, 
 red, blue, sweet, and such like, would be the positive element. 
 The latter, however, are very soon reduced by reflection to the 
 condition of properties or inherences, and the things in which 
 they inhere now hold good only for that which is to b^ posited 
 
 Q 
 
82 HISTORICAL 6UKVEY. 
 
 and that which reallj is. But even here we cannot stop, for we 
 observe that the things are aggregate states of several reals, 
 and the dements are now regarded as existent. " Thus fares it 
 with the notion of existence; it continually withdraws itself 
 more and more behind what is given through the senses, and 
 the distance constantly becomes wider between this given and 
 the real on which it js founded, and whereby it is explained. 
 The notion of existence, however, must at every formative 
 stage of the cognition be somewhere recognisable, for otherwise 
 every thing would be represented as zero or natight." It is at 
 length found that the position returns to the absolutely simple 
 element, which lies indeed at the basis of the sensations, though 
 it is not perceived as such, but rather as a tissue of manifold 
 combinations and gradations, and with this element alone,, that 
 positing which had been sceptically negated, is confidently 
 repeated. 
 
 As to the question, why we do not persist in our scepticism ? 
 the reply is, because once for all the thinking process can- 
 not remain in a state of self-contradiction ; the contradiction 
 that here prevails depending upon this, that in the thinking 
 process the necessary notion of existence comes into oppo^tion 
 with the as necessary and unavoidable abstractions from direct 
 experience. Granted, that this reality of experience is but the 
 reality of an appearance, still the actual appearance compels 
 us, as soon as it is acknowledged to be a mere appearance, to 
 posite a something real, since the appearance is that which 
 cannot exist for itself alone, but only by and through the essen- 
 .tial. If, on the contrary, we had in all that is given both as 
 to matter and form (for it js not merely single sensations, but 
 combinations of them that are given), if in this, just as it is pre- 
 sented to us, we had an uncontradictory and harmonious wliole, 
 our thought would then be in agreement with experience, and 
 no refining whatever of the general empirical notions (of those 
 sums of experience which we comprehend in the consciousness) 
 would be necessary. It so happens, however, that these 
 empirical notions, as they are psychologically developed, are 
 found to be full of contradictions, so that, on the one hand, we 
 cannot, without having recourse to the greatest of all contra- 
 dictions, suppress all existence, nor, on the other, without ad- 
 mitting many partial contradictions, can we retain the seVeral 
 notions of experience as we psychologically find them; upon 
 this opposition and the consequent elaboration of the notions, 
 arises the necessity for Metaphysics. 
 
HEEBAET. 83 
 
 Before, however, we enter upon more special details, let us 
 take a glance at the arrangement of Herbart's system in 
 general ; for, having gained an insight into the architecture and 
 connection of this system, which differs essentially in these 
 respects from the earlier as well as later systems of philosophy^ 
 especially from that of Hegel, a proper light will at the same 
 time he cast upon the method or methods of this philosophising. 
 "While with Hegel, in his logic, nature-philosophy, and phi- 
 losophy of mind, we every where encounter a tripartite system, 
 bound together by a single, formal, and real principle, and 
 conditionated by one decisive method, which repeats itself 
 jn a rhythmic and symmetrical manner throughout ; so also in 
 Herbart's system we find, it is true, such a threefold division, 
 — but one which, apart from many other considerations, differs 
 wholly from that of Hegel's system in this, that the three 
 cardinal divisions, or the Logic, Metaphysics, and -Esthetics, 
 are neither bound together by a common, real, or formal prin- 
 ciple, nor do they acknowledge, as presiding over them, any 
 general and fundamental doctrine, which might contain and 
 determine such a fundamental principle. This inability to 
 deduce the three divisions of philosophical science from one 
 another, is to be recognised as " a fact of the consciousness," 
 not indeed directly, yet in so far as, in the course of the investi- 
 gation, the independence of the principles, as a matter of internal 
 experience, or as something given, is critically demonstrated. 
 What Herbart gives as an "Introduction" to his philosopy, and 
 the followers of Hegel compare with his Phsenomenologie, is no 
 more than the latter a part of the system which, based on the 
 organism of the whole, yet independent and essentially different 
 as r^ards its content from that of the rest of the system, may 
 serve' as the absolute foundation of the remainder ; but it has 
 only a didactic propsedeutic object, namely to prepare the 
 mind of the student for what follows. 
 
 Of Esthetics, under which title Herbart understands the 
 practical philosophy, we shall make mention further on, as far 
 as is consistent with our limits. With the general principles of 
 Lo"-ic, we may presume that most persons are familiar, and will 
 only remind them that Herbart lays particular stress upon the 
 fact that, as a science, it is conversant indeed with representa- 
 tion's, but not with the act of forming them ; thus not with their 
 psychological origination, but only with the notions as prepared, 
 already fixed, or completed. As little also does it trouble itself 
 about the things or objects which may actually correspon4 to 
 
 G 3 
 
84 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 these notions. What it has to deal with are solely the relations 
 which the notions form among themselves, in that they partly 
 exclude or partly include one another. Each notion can only 
 be held once, but it can come before us in different combina- 
 tions, and so in a different manner, i. e. as a characteristic ; 
 when blended with another notion, it can then appear itself as 
 another ; but the elements or notions of which such combina- 
 tions are composed are always supposed to be present and ready 
 made. Logic cannot on that account solve all the problems of 
 metaphysics, and must not be regarded as a general organon for 
 philosophy, seeing that it admits onlyjol an atomistic synthesis 
 of notions : it only shows what admits of being put together, 
 and what not ; but it shows neither an original unity nor gra- 
 dation, nor has it any interest whatever in combining the many 
 and manifold into an unity, — an interest which philosophy 
 derives from another source. Logic only forbids what is im* 
 possible in thought, without urging the latter to the combination 
 of the possible only ; its veto must be respected, but it cannot 
 itself create any thing positive ; it allows or merely forbids, but 
 does not lay claim to certain combinations, for these must be 
 already given, if such claims or postulates are to have any 
 previous foundation. An original genesis or positing does not 
 lie within the domain of logic. Thus logic is so constituted, as 
 we shall see further on in the Dialectics, that only something 
 appears as necessary when it is the presupposition or condi- 
 tion of a something already posited, so that this latter could 
 not be, nor be thought of, without the former, and therefore, 
 as Herbart says, it has in the presupposed a necessary comple- 
 mentary notion ; e. g. if an appearance be there, there must 
 also be a manifested essence ; if passivity, activity also ; and 
 such like. 
 
 In regard to the Metaphysics, which we especially keep in 
 ■view, it is to be remembered that this title is taken both in a 
 wider and stricter sense ; in the wider sense it embraces, first, 
 the general, and secondly, the special metaphysics ; the former 
 takes the place of the ancient ontology (but itself contains a 
 section which is specially called Ontology), and prepares the 
 fundamental notions for applied metaphysics, which last resolves 
 itself into psychology, nature-philosophy (instead of cosmology), 
 and doctrine of religion. On the other hand, by Metaphysics 
 in the stricter sense is meant that general or precise form of 
 doctrine which we have now to consider. 
 
 To gain, however, a satisfactory insight into the train of 
 
HERBART. 85 
 
 thought, and the method adopted by this Metaphysics, we must 
 once again recall to mind the psychological course which is 
 involuntarily adopted by the natural consciousness. Startin" 
 from sensations or determinations empirically given, it works 
 them up into representations, and these again into general or 
 collective notions, or making abstraction of the special, com- 
 prehends what is common to the different phenomena. By 
 such notions, however, are merely meant abbreviations of ex- 
 perience, and they have a sense and value only in so far as 
 they are taken for signs of the given manifold, while in so 
 doing we think of the empirically given singular, as having 
 in those general notions been comprehended after a certain 
 scheme or manner. All depends upon the singular being 
 actually present and actually given in the sensation (internal 
 and external experience) ; or otherwise, those general or col- 
 lective notions would have nothing to which they might refer, 
 — would be schemes only abstracted from schemes, and con- 
 sequently, quite useless for the cognition of the actual. We 
 must guard ourselves, therefore, against mixing up with them 
 such general notions as are probably fictions only, or hypotheses 
 of a certain philosophy in vogue, e. g. the so-called different 
 faculties of the soul ; moreover, such notions as refer only to the 
 logical relations of thought, possibility, capability of being 
 thought, &c., or lastly, such as should bear reference to the 
 objectivity of the world, but which are so abstract that they 
 offer no point of association with the given, e. g. the nothing, 
 infinity, and even the existence, the becoming, &c. Metaphysics 
 certainly requires general, and in this sense, abstract notions ; 
 for if it is to throw an explanatory light upon the infinite mul- 
 tiplicity of the directly given, as many problems would be 
 presented to it as there are objects of experience, and in this 
 way its task would be an endless one, unless it were to com- 
 prehend the given in general classes. 
 
 Now, such general rubrics or notions are these three in 
 particular. Thing, Matter, and Ego. The thing itself must 
 attain be regarded from a double point of view, for it first ap- 
 pears as a unity composed of several characteristics or properties, 
 and then as something changeable. Matter also would fall 
 under the notion of thing, and in like manner the Ego, unless, 
 in the former, the peculiar characteristic of a definite spatial 
 extension, and, in the latter, the peculiar phenomenon of self- 
 consciousness were to present themselves; it is this last in 
 particular which opens up per se the world of direct internal 
 
 o 3 
 
86 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 experience, from which again it is certainly admissible to form 
 conclusions as to the internal behaviour of the natural objects 
 which are plainly external to us ; provided only that this be 
 done with the greatest caution, and not without necessary 
 foundation. ' 
 
 Thus far the thinking process has advanced without meeting 
 any obstacle ; but now, upon closer consideration, unexpected 
 difficulties are at once disclosed ; for in its cardinal notions, 
 which are to be rendered applicable to every thing actual, it 
 encounters contradictions in the thing, the matter, and the Ego. 
 These are to be posited as existing, both on account of their 
 origin from the given, and on account of their reference to it ; 
 but this position, their existence, falls at once into opposition 
 to the multiplicity and mutability, -which these notions include 
 in themselves. These notions are given, for they are derived 
 from actual phenomena, and cannot be given up, seeing that we 
 cannot do away by negation with the reality to which they 
 refer ; on the other hand, we cannot concede one jot of the 
 notion of the real, as it must be thought of in itself, namely, as 
 single, purely positive, indivisible, &c., without at the same 
 time suppressing the reality itself. 
 
 Now, how to unite the two, to remove the contradiction, to 
 render the given conceivable, and the conceivable suitable to 
 the given, such is the problem of Metaphysics, and that indeed 
 of its first division, or the Ontology, in reference to the 
 manifold and changing thing in itself ; in the second depart- 
 ment, or the Synechology, in reference to matter or the appear- 
 ance of the real in space, time, and motion ; and thirdly, in re- 
 ference to those peculiar phenomena which occur directly within 
 the sphere of the consciousness itself, or in the Ego, Eidology. 
 If, then, as has been already pointed out, the inquiry starting 
 from the given arrives at a recognition of the contradictions, 
 which lie in that (or its collective notions), it follows, that it has 
 to regard all these notions as just so many different problems 
 given, and to obtain from this consideration the special method 
 by which, conformably to each problem, the contradictions are 
 to be solved. Now, in so far as the contradiction, however 
 varied in form it may appear, has yet in itself this common 
 feature, that a conflict of the existence (or internal unity of the 
 real essence) and the multiplicity of the phenomenon enter into 
 one apparently simple notion, in so far also the methods to be 
 applied to it admit of being reduced to one common formula, 
 which Herbart specially designates by the name of the " Me-. 
 
HEEBART. 87 
 
 thod of Relations." Thus upon this method turns the fun- 
 damental problem of all theory and speculation. 2nd. When 
 subjected to these methods, the fundamental notions of meta- 
 physics certainly remain no longer in their original form ; 
 an insight is opened up behind all experience- and pheno- 
 menon into that relation of the real which lies at the basis 
 of the phenomenon or (as will be shown presently) of many 
 reals among themselves ; a relation which, although it is not 
 perceptible to the eye of sense, is yet of such a kind, that by 
 it the empirical phenomenon may be perfectly explained. For if 
 the inquiry has in such a manner ascended into that sphere, it 
 must then take care that the cognitions there obtained should be 
 used as principles, conceivably and free of contradiction, for the 
 further explanation of the given, i. e., that in them, as the 
 principles, the possibility should be pointed out of attemf)ting a 
 further derivation of the general laws and relations, from which 
 the given can be explained, and by means of which we may 
 thus approach again the world of phenomena. Now, as in this 
 way the whole investigation sets out from the given, and after 
 soaring upwards into the transcendent descends back again to 
 the given, it describes, as Herbart says, a curve, the ascending 
 part of which requires a different method to the descend- 
 ing ; for it started with a logical analysis of the given notions ; 
 driven further onwards by the conti-adiction it attained to the 
 Method of Relations, in which analysis and synthesis go hand 
 in hand ; and lastly, through a constructive synthesis, it again 
 sinks down towards the given, in order, in the portions of ap- 
 plied metaphysics, the nature-philosophy and psychplogy, to 
 render valid the formal principles which it has won. 
 
 The Method of Eelations, as I said beforehand, bears special 
 reference to the fundamental problem of all metaphysics, 
 namely, to the contradiction which resides therein, that one 
 essence is to separate into manifold differences, and yet with this 
 remain one and the same ; it is the principle of the recent phi- 
 losophy of Identity, and has been, as we shall see further on, 
 spoken of as the Identity of the identical and non-identical. 
 This contradiction lies, 1st, in the notion of the thing with 
 several characteristics, — the problem of inherence, as, when 
 we say, gold is heavy, yellow, fusible, and so on, all these 
 different characteristics are one, i. e. they are the thing we call 
 gold. None of these characteristics by itself alone is gold ; 
 thus, if one of the most essential be taken away, the rest would 
 not constitute gold; and let them all be taken away, and 
 
 G 4 
 
88 HISTOKICAL STJRVET. 
 
 then the gold would no longer remain as such, "for nothing 
 whatever would remain ; thus, the many characteristics are, 
 and are together only characteristics of one, the thing ; and so 
 this last is a unity which is a plurality, — a thought this, which 
 eontradicts itself. 
 
 Still more strikingly is the same contradiction shown in the 
 notion of the changeable thing (or of causality). A thing which 
 changes holds good always after the change for the same thing 
 which it was before the change ; if it had become completely 
 transformed, then it would not have changed itself in fact,- but 
 rather a wholly different thing would have supplied its place. 
 That which is to change itself must essentially remain the 
 same, and still not the same. This is obvious to the dullest 
 understanding ; and now then comes the question, — how are 
 we to think of any thing thus? i. e. how is the contradiction to 
 be solved ? 
 
 Moreover, the notion of matter, which here comes into con- 
 sideration as the space-filling solid, involves, in like manner, a 
 contradiction in itself, since it appears of necessity to consist, as 
 being a definite spatial quantum, of single particles, infinitely 
 small, but which admit of no further division, while, on the 
 other hand, these particles, from the very fact that collectively 
 they are to fill space, each also by itself filling space, are con-> 
 sequently further divisible, and cannot be in themselves simple. 
 
 Lastly, it is the Ego, no less than the remaining problems, 
 which succumbs to the same difficulties. That, namely, which 
 every one understands by his Ego, is here not the whole com- 
 plex of determinations partly external and personal, but is the 
 deepest, innermost point of his self-consciousness, in so far as it 
 knows itself to be that which is equi-persistent and identical 
 in a multiplicity, and in the vicissitude of transient conditions. 
 Thus, the Ego is to be the simple element in a variety of de- 
 terminations^ and the persistent in the midst of restless changej 
 a contradiction, which places it at once in the same category 
 with the first two of the above problems ; with this peculiar 
 feature, however, that this problem does not, like the former 
 ones, fall within the sphere of the external, but solely of the 
 internal experience, and that, while the self-consciousness 
 seeks after a real in itself, or after its true self, as that which is 
 to be knowing in opposition to the known, it finds no such pure 
 subject, but in every such subject would have again rather an 
 object, — a something known. It is the idea of the absolute 
 subject-object, which here specially comes before us in opposi- 
 
HERBAET. 89 
 
 tion to Fichte's idealism, and which will occupy our attention 
 repeatedly further on. 
 
 If, now, by these general remarks, we have arrived at the 
 conviction, that contradictions are certainly to be found in the 
 most important fundamental notions of metaphysics, and that in 
 such contradictions the thought cannot remain at a stand-still ; 
 the next point is to look round for the expedients which the 
 method offers for solving them, without in doing this disturbing 
 or falsifying the notions themselves. For this must no more be 
 done than, on the other hand, thought must be allowed to oppose 
 itself; or the very contradiction, just as it is, be (with Hegel) 
 made to constitute the nature of things. The contradiction 
 which incites the thinking process to advance, and which is, 
 properly speaking, the elastic spring of metaphysics, would, if it 
 were retained, rather paralyse the thinking process ; it is, in a 
 word, the "logical monster" which swallows all thought; the 
 contradiction plainly proving the impossibility. 
 
90 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 LECTURE V. 
 
 HEBBABT (cORfJRUed). 
 
 By the sensuous perception, indeed, every thing that holds good 
 for a something externally circumscribed, existing per se, and 
 thus as an unity, is at the same time represented in itself as a 
 multiplicity of predicates ; but whether now these predicates 
 admit of being referred again to different elements, or real and 
 essential component parts, which form themselves into an 
 siggregate in the one thing, or whether, upon the other hand, to 
 a manifold appearance coexisting with an internal simplicity 
 of essence, or in whatever way we may explain this relation 
 of unity and diversity — upon this point the sensuous percep- 
 tion can decide no more, than the ^avraala, or representative 
 power of the mind, which is subservient to it ; enough, that 
 the real beings are simultaneously represented as simple and 
 manifold, and that it was this very fundamental contradiction 
 which, reduced to the most concise form of expression, led to 
 the doctrine of the Identity of the identical and non-identical — 
 that a was at once a and also not a, a proposition which, as is 
 well known, stands opposed to the first axiom of formal logic. 
 
 If we now turn with this problem to Herbart, we discover 
 the formula, by which this contradiction is to be solved, in the 
 already mentioned Method of Relations. Herbart himself 
 gives a preliminary and popular explanation of this operation 
 of- thought at p. 302. of his Encycl. : "If," says he, "you 
 propose to yourself to pbsite one something, which you can no 
 more posite as simple than you can reject it altogether, posite it 
 then as manifold ; but in doing this beware of disintegrating 
 the many, for thereby the former difficulty would return ; but 
 bear in mind, that of the many, so far as4t stands in reciprocal 
 combination, something may possibly hold good, which would 
 of the singular be absurd or out of place." The same expla- 
 nation is indicated elsewhere*, by the following formula. Let a 
 contradictory notion (^A) contain within itself the two mutually 
 antagonistic members m and n. The nearest point to which 
 given contradictions would drive us would be, without doubt, 
 to deny, i. e. to separate the unit A, which should unite the 
 opposites, and yet cannot do so. This separation, however, 
 
 * Hauptpnnote L Psycliol. Bd. i. p. 128. Metaph. Bd. ii. p. 50. et seq. 
 
HE HEART. 91 
 
 runs counter to the problem, namely, the given phenomenon, 
 and would wholly suppress a necessary notion. Thus this 
 unity (^A) cannot be separated. "VVe accordingly press for- 
 wards in the inquiry, and deny the unity of that which is here 
 opposed : one m cannot be equivalent to the n, but instead of 
 the one we must posite several. "We should, however, miss the 
 goal of which we are in search, if we were to regard each of 
 these m's as separate ; for in that case, the same contradiction 
 renews itself with each singly or by itself. We must then 
 regard the several m's from some other point of view than 
 as single m's, i. e. we must take them together, and assume 
 that in the combination of the m originates the n, or what 
 amounts to the same, each m not singly, but together with 
 the other m is equivalent to n. Thus the unassisted eye (the 
 sensuous perception) sees double stars, that shine in concert 
 like single ones. The eye, properly speaking, sees nothing 
 false ; the appearance is that of one star (like that A in the 
 previous instance), which cannot be denied ; but that, what 
 we see is one star in itself (m) can be denied ; we now dis- 
 tinguish through the telescope (corresponding to the Method) 
 two or more stars, and now discern that the lustre which 
 shone upon the unassisted eye is only the result of the cluster- 
 ing of several stars ; for if these were removed from one 
 another (or posited as separate), then the lustre would not be 
 one, and certainly not such as it is. 
 
 We see now in what sense analysis and synthesis here en- 
 counter or meet each other (Met. § 182.). By analysis of the 
 contradictory notion, thei-e is found to be a duality or plurality of 
 the real component parts ; this is retained ; the unity, however, 
 such as the empirical notion originally allowed it to appear, is 
 now no longer an unity of the essence, but of the appearance, 
 which is either simple or complex, i. e. an actual occurrence, 
 but in itself no essence transmuting, changing, or differencing 
 itself. From the mutual combination or gradation, in which 
 certain simple notions are given, results a condition ; a cannot 
 be posited without b, nor inversely ; so that neither of them is 
 to be posited absolutely, but each becomes the condition of the 
 Otlier. Now, as regards this specially required supplementary 
 notion, the thinking process has not to go far, or, as it were, at 
 random in search of it, beyond the originally given notion and 
 its parts (this latter notion, which was only apparently simple, 
 being in fact compound), but finds it within the sphere of the 
 same notion in those very component parts, to the recognition 
 
92 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 of whicli the thinking process had been previously conducted 
 by the analysis of the notion. 
 
 In Hegel, also, we shall meet with an analysis and synthesis 
 in the solution of the same problem ; but with this difference, — < 
 Hegel, after the division or analysis of the momenta of the 
 notion has been effected, brings the divided elements again 
 together, or comprehends them in one substantial unity ; for 
 after this distinction has been effected, comes the consciousness 
 that neither of these two momenta can maintain itself per se, 
 but that they can only subsist together in and through one 
 another, or mutually hold and support one another. With 
 Herbart too the same consciousness is indeed present, but bears 
 reference only to the phenomenon, whose different momenta, 
 being unseparated, are blended together. The substantial uni- 
 ties, however, from which this phenomenon proceeds, remain in 
 themselves behind the phenomenon as special, self-subsistent 
 reals (monads), which are not really conditioned, i. e. they 
 are only indifferently aggregated, but hold no necessary rela- 
 tion to one another; they stand merely in themselves in a cer- 
 tain relation, though no conditioning takes place between them, 
 but in the contemplative subject (thus external to them), and in 
 this subject (that is, our thinking process), the substantial unity 
 of the (objective) essence becomes, despite all unity of the phe- 
 nomenon, suppressed ; that methodical separation was this very 
 suppression of the essential unity, which was dissolved by the 
 several mUs having been posited, each as a substance per se, 
 existing per se as real. A reunion indeed appears, but it is 
 one only as to external form^And is no identification of essence, 
 but merely a coexistence of several reals in or near one another 
 according to place, but not according to substance. Thus the 
 conjunction which ensues is no dialectic or necessary one, 
 grounded in the unity of the nature of the real itself, but one 
 which experience forces upon the philosopher. Thus the sepa- 
 rate and analysed component parts do not require for their own 
 sake their reunion ; for, as being real in themselves, they have 
 no need to adapt themselves to any relation, for they are 
 self-subsistent or independent, and from their very nature in- 
 sulated; it is only the whole notion which, on account of its 
 origin from experience, demands the reconjunction of its ele- 
 ments.* 
 
 Now while by the advocates of the Identity-philosophy an 
 
 • Metaph. Bd. ii. p. 49, 50. 
 
HERBART. 93 
 
 objection may be raised to tbis view as completely suppress- 
 ing all essential fundamental relation in truth and reality, all 
 substantial unity in an objective sense, its upholders might 
 on the other hand assail their opinions somewhat after the 
 following manner: — Tour momenta do not subsist by them- 
 selves, and independent of one another, for this very reason, 
 that you have not posited them correctly, i. e. as actually 
 and objectively existing. If you would by this, your proce- 
 dure of thought, think of and cognise that which truly and 
 actually exists, you must then posite what you have thought, 
 namely, the momenta, as existing, i. e. as independent alto- 
 gether of your own and every other thought, and as indepen- 
 dent among one another; or else you have posited nothing 
 more than thoughts ; you have posited thoughts as such, but 
 not as symbols for the existent ; you have, in a word, not 
 even thought of the existence. Had you thought what you 
 wished (and you wished to cognise the existing), you would 
 then have posited the momenta also as existing, and could 
 not, unless you would completely extinguish the same thought, 
 take back again this posited into the unity of the essence, 
 for this restoration is nothing else than a suppression of the 
 existence. You say that you cannot, on account of its content, 
 posite the unity as existing per se, and yet this very con- 
 tent (the kind of existence or posited existence) is only such, 
 because you have so posited it ; complete the positing truly, as 
 you must do, if you would arrive with certainty at the real, 
 and you will see how admirably every thing, so far from abid- 
 ing by itself,, can be brought into a connection, which per- 
 fectly replaces the real ground or foundation of reality that 
 was missed by you, or, at least, suffices to demonstrate within 
 certain limits the substantial relation of things, and that too 
 in a manner which does not openly set at defiance the logical 
 laws of thought ; all this, instead of constantly positing what 
 is thought as a thought, remaining thus immanent within 
 the absolutely shifting sphere of action, or of absolute thought, 
 and your realities remaining no realities by themselves, no na- 
 ture, nothing but an absolute spirit in the form of spirituality, 
 but not in that of a separate existence, or the world, in short, 
 nothing but a pantheism, a cosmicism, or absolute idealism 
 spun out of your own thoughts ! 
 
 Now, I know not how far a disciple of Herbart might be 
 content or not with having the above apostrophe thrust, as it 
 were, upon him. Still less is it my opinion, that the advocates 
 
94 HISTOBICAL SURVEY. 
 
 of the Identity-philosophy will be forthwith silenced by such 
 an objection ; besides, we have not yet heard what they have 
 to say, and can on that account pass no sweeping sentence upon 
 them beforehand. What has just been said is intended only 
 to serve as a means of arousing attention to the difficult and 
 probably contradictory points at issue, and in this way pro- 
 moting an understanding of, and interest in, the subject, 
 without meanwhile wishing to sway and imprison the judg- 
 ment by preoccupying it in any manner. 
 
 Having now dwelt in sufficient detail for our purpose upon 
 the foundation of Herbart's system, we may be allowed to bring 
 forward just so much from the content, properly so called, as 
 is necessary to affiDrd us some glimpse or at least a general 
 perception, of the way in which Herbart, setting out from that 
 basis, arrives at the explanation of the given. 
 
 At the very outset of this inquiry, we meet with a certain 
 expedient of method, which must be of the greatest import- 
 ance, considering the apparent impossibility of one and the 
 same real, although in different combinations with other reals, 
 yet without detriment to its simplicity and essential immuta- 
 bility, being able to appear as something else. Now this ex- 
 pedient or resource consists in so-called Accidental views. By 
 this expression, it is not meant that fortuitous or lucky thoughts 
 should be introduced into the science of philosophy, but only 
 thus much in reference to the above problem, that one and the 
 same notion can frequently, without undergoing the slightest 
 change in essentials, be regarded in very different relations to 
 other notions ; thus the straight line may be thpught of at one 
 time as a tangent, at another as the radius of a circle, without 
 ceasing on that account to be one and the same straight line. 
 A tone can be regarded as a third, a fifth, a seventh, or an 
 octave, from other tones, as harmonious or inharmonious, 
 without ceasing to be one and the same tone. Tangent and 
 radius are indeed different notions, when they are each regarded 
 per se, but they coalesce into one when they are thought of as 
 contained in the higher notion common to them both. As to 
 this higher notion, that of the straight line, it is not essential 
 that it should stand in this or that conjunction, in which it 
 becomes a radius or tangent, but merely accidental ; such 
 are merely characteristics of it in our eyes, and may thus 
 be aptly called accidental views. In mathematics this ex- 
 pedient is in general use. so that many problems could not be 
 solved without it ; and even in the metaphysical construction 
 
HERBAET. ,95 
 
 of notions, an analogous application may be made of it, pro- 
 vided that the given problems themselves point thereunto. 
 
 If we now return to these same problems, and first to those of 
 the Ontology, namely, to the thing with different characteristics 
 (relation of substantiality and inherence), and to the self- 
 changing thing (relation of causality and dependence), the 
 question directly arises, — for what are we to take every spe- 
 cial and apparently simple thing ? How is it to be thought 
 of as constituted in itself? As a complex or aggregate of 
 many simple reals or monads, which have entered into a more 
 or less constant conjunction among themselves, so that their 
 grouping, by its empirical recurrence, is regarded by us as one 
 thing. Thus, just as Herschel, with the artificial assistance 
 afforded to bis eye by the telescope, has lately recognised se- 
 veral nebulae, which to the naked eye appeared as single stars, 
 to be in fact double stars, or whole clusters of stars ; so Herbart 
 discovers in the one thing whole heaps of simple substances 
 or monads. 
 
 We have here made use of the expression substances, because 
 after the preceding considerations it seemed to us the most ap- 
 posite for the self-existent. Herbart, however, abstains from 
 using the word in this connection, and calls his monads only 
 Teals, reserving the former expression for a relation which we 
 shall have to examine more closely hereafter. Nay more, we must 
 take the present opportunity of acknowledging that even the 
 word monads is avoided by Herbart, probably from their remind- 
 ing him too much of the monads of Leibnitz, which certainly 
 differ from his ; or probably because monadssLre more frequently 
 ret^arded as synonymous with molecules, when in fact they are 
 something else ; and least of all would it please Herbart to have 
 his reals called atoms, or his system by the name of an atomic 
 theory. From this latter I, in justice, refrain; but to call the 
 system a monadologie, or doctrine of monads, although it differs 
 in essential points from the scheme of Leibnitz, must be here 
 allowed for the sake of brevity, as will be still more evident 
 when we come to treat of the Eidology. 
 
 "We should, however, justly take offence at the expression 
 above used of heap or aggregate, to imply the complex of 
 monads, of which an individual thing may consist, if we were 
 to abide by the notion of a mere aggregate only. Where many 
 things remain constantly together, where, as we have already 
 seen and shall see yet further on, these forms also of combina- 
 tion must be recognised as empirical data, and consequently 
 
96 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 as pointing also to an objectively real combination, in such 
 case this combination can hardly be called a mere aggregate, for 
 this word would only express a certain accidental coexistence of 
 the several component parts, or mere external grouping devoid 
 of an internal and essential bond of coherence. It cannot in- 
 deed be denied, that the things are in reality to be thought of 
 as actually conjoined monads. Just as they appear to us to 
 be united, so they are also in point of fact ; and where they do 
 not appear so to us, they really would not be so. But the ques» 
 tion does not turn upon whether the monads are really united 
 amongst themselves, but how they are united. That which we 
 miss in the hitherto established notion of the thing, is not 
 truly the assemblage of its elementary component parts, but the 
 dynamical and chiefly the organic union, which we perceive 
 among the parts or members of many natural products, and 
 which we believe that we must presuppose.* A merely ex- 
 ternal or mechanical union, a kind of conglomerate association 
 of parts, might indeed be ascribed to inorganic or earthy bodies, 
 but not to the organic. This latter point, however, the idea of 
 life, does not belong to this division of the subject. 
 
 In the Ontology the above problem can only be comprehended 
 in a more general sense, by its being shown to what extent the 
 notion of the real, when once iirmly established, admits of the 
 reciprocal influence of one real upon another ; or, in a word, 
 how far a relation of causality admits of being adopted and 
 determined, or not. In the notion of the real itself, which we 
 must retain inviolate, we found with the absolute position, no- 
 thing more than a state of absolute simplicity, immutability, 
 and freedom from quantity, or space, and time, and this posi- 
 tion excluded every character of relation, dependence, and 
 limitation of the being.f It is clear, then, that of. such essences 
 it can only be said, that several are together ; for that we see ; 
 
 * The -vrord Aggregate may be aptly enough used " in respect to the re- 
 presentation, hut not in respect to the representative process and its 
 mechanism." (Herbart, Psyehologie, B. ii. p. 261.) " For the characteris- 
 tics (we must never forget) are not linked together hy any bond whatever, 
 nor are they conjoined by any synthetic act, but it is solely by virtue of the 
 unity of the soul, and the constantly contemporaneous apprehension, that 
 all representations of these characteristics complicate themselves into a 
 single undivided act of the representative process, into a single total force.'' 
 
 f Psychol, ii. p. 320. The category of cause is merely to be referred to 
 the changes of relation, not to the existent in itself, but in this respect it is 
 a necessary correlate, since change of the accidental (the accidents), such 
 as change always is, cannot be thought of without a cause. 
 
HERBAET. 97 
 
 but not why they are together ; unless we were to seek for the 
 rationale of this from beyond the given and without the pale 
 of the science of metaphysics, either in the practical part 
 of the philosophy or in the sphere of belief. We must in the 
 present instance remember that Metaphysics is not called upon 
 to devise a cosmogony, which remains once for all an unattain- 
 able something, but that its business is only to reconcile the 
 given, and the forms of this with the logical forms of thought, 
 i. e. to render them comprehensible, but not, by transcending the 
 given, to enter upon a perfectly inaccessible field of inquiry. 
 How far, notwithstanding, a further advance in this direction 
 is possible, will be shown further on. If metaphysics is to ex- 
 hibit a general rationale of this question a priori, it can find it 
 nowhere else than within the notion of the real itself. In this 
 notion, however, we should search in vain for such a means 
 of coherence of the monads among themselves as to form 
 definite groups. The real is the absolutely self-subsistent, that 
 which stands in need of nothing else ; no real can admit of any 
 real influence being exercised upon itself, for it is immut- 
 able, and for the same reason cannot undergo any internal 
 change. Thus, instead of assuming certain forces, influences, 
 activity, and passivity, as present in the monads, we must limit 
 ourselves to saying, that because the real appears in certain 
 constant groups, it must always have the same relations ; and 
 now we may proceed to inquire, how, in the actual combinations 
 of the reals, that very relation, which is usually apprehended 
 under the title of relation of inherence, is to be thought of. 
 This relation, however, must at the same time appear as depend- 
 ence, i. e. one of the reals must be the cause which connects 
 the others w^ith itself. Now causes may be either immanent 
 or transient. When a substance is thought of as immanent 
 cause (real ground) it is then one and the same with its acci- 
 dents or characteristics, the latter being only its form or pheno- 
 menon, and indeed posited by it ; thus the substance, although 
 perfectly simple, would yet work out of its own self both its ex- 
 istence and the mode of that existe^ice ; it would be a causa sui, 
 or an absolute becoming— a notion this, which contradicts itself. 
 This mode of representation has been already rejected in the in- 
 vestigation of the thing and its characteristics. Transient causes, 
 on the contrary, are causes which consist in the influences 
 wrought by one thing upon the sphere of anotherj and which 
 produce changes in the latter; thus to these causes belong at 
 least two things, and the effect does not remain in the active 
 
 H 
 
98 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 thing, but is transferred to the other. Yet even this repre- 
 sentation is here entirelj out of place ; for real influences of one 
 real upon another contradict the notion of the absolute reality. 
 No more can we think of such influences as produced by powers 
 which, as it were, stretch invisible arms from out one real, and 
 beyond it, into the very being or powers of the other. For, 
 apart from the fact that such powers without a real support are 
 inconceivable, it also follows, upon some reflection, that the word 
 power indicates nothing but the efifect presupposed and thought 
 of as possible. An effect held in a state of suspense, or still' 
 expected, is a possible effect, i, e. not an actual, but only a con- 
 ceivable one; we assign to it a cause, which, however, still 
 remains at rest, that is to say, is nothing else than what we 
 think or posite it in thought, consequently as possible, and such 
 a cause we call power or capacity ; a cause, however, which 
 does not act, is a contradiction, cause and effect being correlative 
 ideas or notions. 
 
 Now, if nothing is gained by all this, the question then 
 arises, how in the group of monads, which, taken together, con- 
 stitute a thing, one monad can be thought of as the cause of the 
 union ; for one among the many monads must play the part of 
 substance and principle, in order that the form of the unity of 
 the thing may he explained. This is the point upon which, 
 properly speaking, the whole question turns, and which must be 
 explained, for this unity is a given phenomenon. It may indeed 
 be said, that not only is the juxtaposition and persistence to be 
 explained, but, above all things, the original encounter or com- 
 ing together of the monads; for by this latter only is the former 
 rendered perfectly clear. As regards, however, the coming 
 together, we must, to explain this, presuppose, first, that the 
 monads had not been together; secondly, space and time; thirdly, 
 motion ; all these being notions with which as yet we have had 
 nothing to do. Thus the question is at present merely to be 
 confined to the causes of the real given unity of the thing. 
 Now this phenomenon is produced by one out of the many reals 
 which are grouped together into one thing, taking the place of 
 the middle point of union. This real, however,, is, as was said, 
 by no means the immanent cause of the different characteristics 
 that appear in it, and these characteristics are not mere modifi-» 
 cations of the one substantial real, seeing that such would con- 
 tradict the notion of the real ; but on that very account many 
 reals must be assumed as present together, because the real 
 essence, which we call substance, cannot be answerable for (in 
 
HEEBAET. 99 
 
 the notion, whicli we have gained empirically) plurality and 
 unity contradicting one another. Thus the many reals, which 
 lie at the basis of the characteristics, are so many causes, each 
 by itself, of a phenomenon which is just as manifold. Now, 
 however, no real appears in the given connection by itself 
 alone (for a purely simple real could, per se, never appear 
 as a phenomenon) ; but as such, and as they appear, they 
 appear only in the aforesaid connection, none being alone, 
 but one with the other. This complicated appearance of 
 each one points at once to another, this again probably to 
 another, and so on ; and if we now assume that one of these 
 many monads asserts such a position among the rest, that 
 they all in their turn point at length to this one, unite them- 
 selves all like radii of the collective phenomenon in this one, 
 as the middle point, why then this last will afford the point 
 of union of the manifold appearance, and thereby effect its 
 unity, consequently supply the place of the substance sought 
 for, while all the rest furnish the causes of the manifested 
 characteristics and are themselves in turn, through their posi- 
 tion, the causes of that one appearing as the substance. In 
 this sense, namely, as having reference only to the relations 
 in which several reals stand to each other, does the notion of 
 causality connect itself with that of substantiality, though not, 
 however, in the sense adopted by the advocates of the Iden- 
 tity-philosophy, with whom the notion of causality is consi- 
 dered to represent with greater truth that of substantiality, 
 and the very causal itself is posited in the place of the sub- 
 stantial and real. Thus much in brief, in order to suggest 
 how far removed is that very something, which might be 
 explained as the substance of a thing, from being the one 
 collective cause of all its characteristics and appearances, and at 
 the same time by way of indicating more closely what meaning 
 Herbart attaches to the word substance when taken in a more 
 restricted sense than is usually done. 
 
 With the notion, however, of cause and effect, is intimately 
 connected that of change, and we have accordingly still left 
 for our solution the second problem of Ontology, the thing with 
 changing characteristics. The notion of change must, in the 
 first place, be cleared from the contradictions that infest it, 
 just as was done with the notion of the thing with several cha- 
 racteristics. In the latter case the thing was to be regarded as 
 identical with the different characteristics that belong to it; 
 in the present instance the thing must be identical with its 
 
 B 2 
 
M)0 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 changing and successive characteristics : it must change, and 
 still remain entitled both in and after the change to be called 
 the same thing. If we imagine that the thing is composed 
 of several characteristics, that it is to be regarded as their 
 complex, and that some of them change, while others remain, 
 or entirely new ones are added to them, then the thing can in 
 nowise be regarded as the complex of the same characteristics 
 before and after the change, and thus can in nowise be called 
 the same thing ; for each characteristic here lays an equal 
 claim to essentiality, seeing that at the outset they all of them 
 together constituted or made up the thing. 
 
 According to Herbart, we can (as already mentioned) think 
 of the change as taking place in a threefold manner ; either as 
 proceeding from external causes, or by self-determination, or 
 finally, as absolute origination or becoming. It is, however, 
 only the first kind of change which is admissible ; and now we 
 may readily guess what the solution of the problem will be, 
 and, from thenccj what view of the self-changing thing will 
 follow. The thing is, as already shown, not one real, but a 
 complex of several real monads ; some of these monads remain, 
 i. e. are still present in the thing changed, the same after it has 
 undergone that process as they were before, namely, those 
 which are the cause of the so-called essential, i. e. persistent 
 characteristics of the thing ; meanwhile, other monads have 
 taken the place of the rest. Thus, while we find the causes of 
 all changes to be coincident with the shifting to and fro of as 
 many real component parts of the thing, the opinion, that a 
 single substance lying at the basis of all phenomena could pro- 
 duce all these diiFerent efiects from out of and from within 
 itself — consequently, by self-mutation — must be rejected as 
 thoroughly inadmissible. In this sense, there is no internal 
 process of change, no self-determination, no becoming and life, 
 no living essence ; the monads are and remain in themselves 
 immutable ; they do not become in themselves different as to 
 their quality, but they are originally distinct from one another, 
 and maintain each of them its quality without undergoing any 
 any change. The changes of the thing, to which the given 
 appearance points, are merely caused by the different kinds of 
 outward approximation or divergence from each other qf the 
 monads, — by their shifting to and fro; but of this, the first 
 motive or determining influence can be no more explained 
 in metaphysics, than the coexistence or non-coexistence of the 
 monad. It is only when a series of changes in nature has been 
 
HEEBAET. 101 
 
 already observed empirically, that any thing admits of being 
 determined in physics touching its further course. Metaphysics 
 says merely, if such and such monads are so and so together, 
 such and such phenomena must ensue ; or if such and such 
 phenomena are given, such and such monads must have accord- 
 ingly come together ; and with this step, metaphysics has done 
 what is its business, namely, perfected the explanation of the 
 given. 
 
 Meanwhile, however, Metaphysics has not by this statement 
 fully satisfied experience ; for the latter, so it seems, does not 
 merely point out changes in the external relations, but also in 
 the interior of the substances. Our own Ego is a witness of 
 this. Now, what may hold good of one simple substance, and 
 this our own soul, would hold good also in respect to all other 
 reals. If the approximation of different qualia produces differ- 
 ent phenomena, and these in every case accommodated to the 
 qualities, we cannot think otherwise than that each monad 
 must become the cause of a different appearance in other 
 monads, and that these others exercise in turn the same influ- 
 ence upon the former, so that, with the approximation, the 
 internal condition also of each monad must, in conformity with 
 the qualities of the others, be in a certain way determined and 
 changed. 
 
 An actual change in the interior of each monad would, how- 
 ever, be a change of its essence, which, from all that has been 
 already stated, is quite impossible ; such a change could merely 
 take place apparently, but not actually^ Thus the question 
 originates, what actvally does occur in each monad along with 
 this change ? for that something does occur, the given pheno- 
 menon teaches us, and this phenomenon must be explained. 
 
 Now, of that which takes place in the monad when it encoun- 
 ters other monads of an opposite quality, we may, by means of 
 the Accidental Views, form such an idea as, upon the one hand, 
 denotes an actual occurrence *, yet, upon the other, imputes no 
 actual change to that monad's original quality. The absolutely 
 existent, the substance, is that which subsists by and maintains 
 itself: this is what lies involved in the very notion of it. 
 Thus every thing which can occur in it reduces itself to a 
 kind, or, rather, a mere analogue of activity, namely, to an 
 act of self-preservation. Since, then, the monads are in them- 
 selves qualitatively, distinct from each other, they bear a 
 different relation to each other; and since one and the same 
 * Wirkliches Geschehen. 
 H 3 
 
102 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 monad a holds a different relation to b than to c, and to this 
 again than to d, and so on, it follows that this different relation, 
 determined by its approximation to other monads, allows of 
 different views being entertained of its quality, although the 
 said quality remains immutable in itself. The self-preser- 
 vation would in no case cease, even if a monad were by itself 
 alone ; but the kind of self-preservation, or its behaviour, will 
 differ according to the relation in which its own quality stands 
 to the quality of some other monad. Under different qualities, 
 namely, the most diversified relations admit of being thought 
 of. They may, for example, be directly or indirectly opposed 
 to each other ; they may be disparate (i. e. having no relation 
 to each other, as cold and colour, sweetness and sound) ; they 
 may be similar, or even equivalent to each other. Now, in 
 proportion to the difference of their qualities, must be the 
 diversity which takes place in respect to the degree of strength 
 which is necessary to the self-preservation, and that indeed not 
 merely against one, but, at the same time, several monads of 
 different or like qualities, which, in turn, may be among them- 
 selves in a state of manifold antagonism. Against like or 
 even wholly disparate qualities, no special- self-preservation 
 whatever would be necessary, because these qualities could oc- 
 casion no disturbance in the essence of the monad; but. opposite 
 qualities seem impelled of necessity to mutually suppress and 
 annihilate one another (which here certainly cannot ensue); 
 on that account the self-preservation of each monad will appear, 
 in this case, to be increased and modified according to the 
 nature or condition of the antagonism. The opposite states of 
 the reals in their aggregation, admit, therefore, of being re- 
 garded as resisting forces, to which conatus or effort there 
 corresponds upon the other hand an arresting process, anB both 
 may, withOHt, any injury being done to the simplicity of the 
 real, be regarded as the suflSicient rationale of all actual 
 phenomena. It is indeed quite correct, that in no case does 
 a disturbance and change of the existing essence as such 
 actually ensue ; but we think that this does not ensue just 
 because the monad preserves itself; thus we presuppose in 
 thought a possible disturbance, and this possibility, in its turn, 
 causes the self-preservation which is opposed to it to appear as 
 a specially evoked or stimulated activity, and as a tension of 
 monads defending, as it were, themselves, though, regarded in 
 itself, nothing more occurs in the monad than what always 
 does, namely, its completely neutral persistence. Let us bear 
 in mind, if we stand in need of comparisons, the different 
 
UERBAET. 103 
 
 relation of one and the same tone to another, its harmony or 
 dissonance, or of one and the same colour, e. g. grey, which, 
 when placed near black, will appear as white, near white, on 
 the contrary, as black. Thus, the self-preservation, this single 
 act, if we may so call it, remaining eternally the same in itself, 
 will admit of just as many views, or will seem just as often to 
 be a changing state of the monad itself, as manifold qualities 
 concur with it. The only thing then which can be said to be 
 not a mere apparent, but an actual occurrence in the essence of 
 the monads, is this self-preservation, to which, as to the last 
 single spark of activity, change, and vital manifestation, all 
 which can ever occur in the single, non-quantitative, and in 
 itself immutable real, must ultimately be reduced. So much as 
 regards the Ontology. 
 
 The second part of the Metaphysics, the Synechology (from 
 (Twex^Q, coherent, constant), has for its leading object the 
 problem of corporeal matter, with which the inquiry, which in 
 the Ontology lost itself chiefly in the intellectual sphere behind 
 the phenomena, seeks again to approach the directly given and 
 sensuous phenomenon. It must, from all that has been already 
 said, excite in us a feeling of wonder, how from monads, 
 which themselves fill no space, but, like mathematical points, 
 are devoid of all extension, nevertheless, when brought to- 
 gether, an essence at least apparently extended, such as matter 
 is, may be formed. And even if we were to imagine the most 
 closely aggregated points as constituting a space-filling mass, 
 still one characteristic of matter, especially that of stability, 
 which is usually ascribed to it, would be wanting. For while 
 we say that matter, even its smallest part, constantly occupies 
 a space, we do but think to ourselves of parts, which contain in 
 themselves no further discreet parts, but which are, by virtue 
 of their own extension, constant quantities in themselves. 
 Now, in this lies at the same time the contradiction, that we 
 must, upon the one hand, think of such parts as being no fur- 
 ther divisible ; while still, upon the other, at least in thought, 
 the division may continue to all eternity without ever coming 
 to an indivisible point.* Thus the notion of stability, which at 
 Uie same time occasions a contradiction, as soon as we would 
 apply it to the real, and think of real, constant quanta, i. e. 
 matter — this notion it is, which must be chiefly tested, before 
 any thing admits of being established concerning the possibility 
 of matter. 
 
 * For further information see Hertart's Metaph. § 240. et seq. 
 M 4 
 
104 
 
 HISTORICAL SURTET. 
 
 Matter, however, was only thouglit of as a constant quantity, 
 i. e. as in itself or from its nature extended without distinction, 
 because we are always obliged to think of it as extended in 
 space, and because, from experience, we find it in this form. 
 Thus the contradictory element, which enters into the notion 
 of a material real, depends upon the space (and, as we shall 
 see, the time also) which we have mixed up with the essence of 
 the real. But if we separate this element, then nothing is left 
 remaining but the above monads devoid of quantity, and with 
 these it is impossible to discern how we may construct such a 
 continuum as matter represents, and must, in fact, be. 
 
 Kant had regarded time and space as subjective forms of 
 intuition, and had consequently denied their objectivity. We, 
 however, who do not adopt this doctrine of innate categories, 
 must nevertheless point out in the objective world some ground 
 of explanation for the existence of space and time, even if the3e 
 forms were for us a mere appearance. Every appearance, and 
 especially one so universal and inevitable as the spatiality of 
 things, points to a relation in the objective world. That objec- 
 tive relations must lie at the root of the appearance, follows 
 from our having no power whatever of determining the seve- 
 ral, individually determined, space-and-time relations of things, 
 as they appear to us, but from our finding them at once deter- 
 mined in experience. We ourselves have not the least power 
 to increase or diminish the quantity or duration of a phenome- 
 non ; we find the phenomenon, or thing, within certain fixed 
 limits, and the whole — with the material of the sensation being 
 in every instance associated, its, spatio-temporal form also — is 
 given us, the one as well as the other. It is true, that space 
 aind time are not. given immediately/ in the sensation, yet still 
 mediately ; or else we could not determine the forms and ex- 
 istence of things by observation. Now, granted even that space 
 and time are transferred by us to the phenomena, it does not 
 follow that we, while observing this, must again withdraw 
 What has been transferred. We must rather, necessitated by the 
 thought itself, ascribe to space and time objective truth ; for 
 just as these categories proved themselves to be relations, that 
 must of necessity be thought of, so do they retain upon specu- 
 lative grounds their right also in reality. " Thus much, in- 
 deed," says Herbart*, "is found upon closer investigation to 
 be true, that we need not associate in thought the determi- 
 nations of space, and what resembles them, with the original 
 * Encycl. p. 308. 
 
HEEBART. 105 
 
 reality of every single real among things in themselves ; for 
 our thought of the singular leads to nothing. The things 
 in themselves must be taken together, if we would comprehend 
 experience. And now it is found, upon further inquiry, that 
 the comprehensive thinking process, independently of any sen- 
 suous element, unavoidably adopts anew the same spatial form, 
 and must, according to determined rules, bestow this upon the 
 aggregate of things, with a full consciousness of its own kind 
 and mode of procedure ; hence in the Metaphysics, the doc- 
 trine of Intelligible Space." 
 
 All this undoubtedly points to objective relations ; and now 
 comes the question, how we are to think of these relations with- 
 out contradiction and as sufficiently explanatory of the given ; 
 but w^e must not, therefore, declare with Kant, that the whole 
 relation is merely subjective, that is to say, that space and time 
 are an illusion. Thus, in order to determine this important 
 point fundamentally, it was necessary to construct an entirely 
 new theory of these so-called forms of intuition, and this 
 theory was presented by Herbart under the title of a construc- 
 tion oi Intelligible Space. Into the details of this theory* we 
 cannot here enter, on account of its peculiar difficulty, extent, 
 and mathematical treatment ; but we must rest content with 
 the general observation that Herbart, without mixing up with 
 it any intuition and empirical representation, such as we have 
 already of space, first elicits this notion through a process of 
 abstract mathematical construction, since starting I'rom the 
 mathematical point, and taking this alone (thus something 
 perfectly devoid of space), he nevertheless, by an atomistic 
 strir^ing together of such points, originates the line ; thus the 
 first dimension, and so on with the others ; whereas in geometry 
 and in other metaphysical systems, the line is drawn by a con- 
 tinuous movement of the point in space, and consequently in 
 . space already presupposed. " Suppose, for the sake of simpli- 
 city, only two essences, we have then also two places. These 
 are quite separate, but without any distance. They are toge- 
 ther. Let us now retain the together, but put, since the place is 
 accidental to the essence, one in the place of the other, and there 
 then originates for the second essence a third point (the simple 
 place of the simple essence). The second point now lies directly 
 between the first and the third, because for the latter there is no 
 other transition or passage whatever than through the second. 
 
 * Hertart's Metaphysik.'Bd. ii. p. 199. et seq. Desselben, Psychologiei 
 Bd. ii. p. 120. et seq., pp. 68. 473., Bd. i. p. 378. 
 
106 HISTORICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 The same process, continued upon the same principle, has foi* 
 its result an infinite ^a;erf straight line." • 
 
 I forbear from entering further into this construction. 
 Enough, if the aforesaid suffices to render intelligible what 
 follows. The object in view is attained if by these means the 
 above-mentioned difficulty is obviated, namely, as to how an 
 extended something can be thought of as originating from the 
 unspatial, and if we see that there is no necessity whatever of 
 transferring the space into the monads themselves, although 
 the monads in their connection appear to us as continua. 
 Space is and remains absolutely excluded from the interior of 
 the monads, and nevertheless it is possible to think of them in 
 spatial relations. At the same time the Kantian antinomy of 
 the divisibility of matter is solved and explained : divisibility 
 merely applies to empty space, as a continuum ; but this is 
 empty, i. e., it is nothing in itself; it is or expresses merely the 
 relation in which the reals appear to stand to one another. 
 That such is the case is evident from the simplest thought-ex- 
 periment. If I set before myself a simple monad by itself, I cannot 
 determine any place whatever as being that, where or in which 
 it is ; it is in no place whatever ; it is, one might say, every 
 where, wherever we may please to transfer it, and is still no- 
 where in a definite spot. It first attains a place, or comes as it 
 were first to a fixed position, by my thinking to myself of a 
 second point, from which it must be at a definite distance. 
 Thus I transport both points into a common representation of 
 space, and think of them to myself as connected by a space. 
 
 Now this leads us at the same time further on to the repre- 
 sentations of rest and motion. Neither the one nor the other 
 can be perceived at one single point, nor even thought of at one 
 given point, and consequently they do not fall within the notion 
 of the real in itself ; but both conditions belong merely to the re- 
 lations in which several reals are thought of as standing to one 
 another. Motion especially must, as we imagine, be something 
 which belongs to the real in itself, or must be a property of its 
 essence. It is sufficiently evident, however, from what has been 
 said, that from the a priori notion of the real, nothing whatever 
 of that kind can be inferred. The possibility of the monads 
 being in motion requires no proof ; for motion, as well as rest, 
 must be given, if one or the other is to be predicated of the 
 monads. Metaphysics can neither prove that the monads have 
 been originally quiescent, nor that they have been in motion ; 
 * Hauptpunkte, d. Met. p. 228., in Hertart's kl. Schrften, Bd. i. 
 
BEEBART. 107 
 
 by their nature they are neither this nor that ; both conditions 
 are equally possible ; so that no question whatever can be raised 
 about the absolute cause of the motion — for the motion has 
 none whatever ; but only when, in a movement or in a rest 
 already given, a change or transition were to take place from 
 one monad to the other, should we inquire about the special 
 cause of this, and then only could an answer to the question be 
 afforded by experience and the sciences which minister unto it. 
 " Besides, among a number of mutually independent bodies, 
 motion is always to be expected as their original relation 
 in space; rest, on the contrary, being infinitely improbablej 
 because this latter, among the numberless possibilities of greater 
 or less velocity, is only a single case, namely, that in which the 
 velocity would = 0. (Metaph. i. p. 430.*) A thing appears 
 to us, the observers, to be in motion when, in contemplating or 
 representing it, we are unable to connect it with another thing, 
 seeing that it incessantly escapes from this connection with an- 
 other, thought of as a stationary point. Added to this, in order 
 to represent a thing in motion, we require some other thing or 
 point to be firmly established in thought ; but this point can- 
 not, as we saw, be firmly established without a third, this third 
 point without a fourth, and so on, and thus the whole points to 
 a web, a network of relations spun out in our thoughts, for the 
 which there is nowhere to be found in the whole universe of 
 space an absolute first fixed or moveable point of connection ; 
 a proof that the whole representation merely implies a relative 
 relation, and that indeed relative to the spectator. No stream 
 can be regarded as flowing, unless fixed banks are given ; while 
 travelling in a carriage, we believe at times that we are stand- 
 ing still, and that we see the trees in motion.f 
 
 Now, what holds good of motion, holds good also of the ele- 
 ments out of which this notion is composed ; or of space, and 
 in like manner also of time, for this is only the measure of 
 velocity, and the greater or lesser velocity indicates nothing 
 more than the way in which we fail to comprehend and establish 
 one point along with the other — the continual escaping of the 
 one from the space in which we would place it along with the 
 other. Thus time holds good for us merely as a notion of re- 
 
 * Thus the Rest is here suhsumed or taken in, as a kind of motion, 
 under the generic idea of motion, while it is ohviously the pure negation 
 of motion. 
 
 f Compare the very lucid exposition of Herbart's ideas by Hartenstein, 
 Probleme und Grundlehren der allg. Metaphysik. Leipzig, 1836. 
 
108 HISTORICAL SURVET. 
 
 lation, and like duration tells us nothing of the thoroughly time- 
 less nature of the real in itself. 
 
 The result of Herbart's doctrine of Intelligible Space might 
 accordingly be summed up as follows: — Space is not, as Kant 
 affirmed, a merely subjective form of our sensuous representa- 
 tion, but it is, as well as time, a general abstraction from the 
 objective relations of the several monads or things among 
 themselves, but this only in reference to a spectator : it is thus 
 an appearance, but one that is objective, given, not merely 
 passing Over or transferred from us to the relations of the 
 things, but in like manner from them to us. In accordance 
 then with what we are taught by this investigation of intelli- 
 gible space, the latter wholly coincides in the results, — but not 
 in the grounds of cognition, with sensuous space. It has, like 
 this, three dimensions; it has reference in like manner to the 
 relations and positions of the monads themselves, just as the 
 sensuous space (represented and psychological) bears reference 
 to the represented things ; in short, there is no actual difference 
 between the two, they both coincide or relapse together into 
 one and the same notion. The union and separation of the 
 reals in the space, in which we have to think of the reals in 
 themselves, corresponds completely with the shifting to and fro 
 in that sensuous space in which we behold the essences. 
 
 Space and time having been thus, as it were, liberated from 
 the Kantian interdict, and reclaimed from Metaphysics, we 
 return to the leading object of Synechology, namely, Matter. 
 Matter was, as you will remember, regarded as an aggregation of 
 mathematically punctual monads. And it was the plurality of 
 these monads which produced the appearance of an extended 
 continuum. If a definite number of reals be -pTesent together 
 according to all dimensions of space, they will produce for the 
 spectator the appearance of extension, or all will seem to flow 
 together into one extended essence. This representation does not 
 suflice in order to explain all the phenomena of the material 
 world. - We miss in particular the key to those phenomena 
 which we ascribe in nature to the attractive and repulsive 
 forces, forces which, according to Herbart's system, cannot be 
 adopted. Nature, however, shows incontestably, that many 
 bodies are no accidental aggregate of real parts, but that their 
 form, the position and number of their parts, their density, in- 
 ternal and external structure, &c., seem to depend upon an in- 
 ternal ' process of life and activity in the bodies themselves, 
 especially when we bear in mind organic structures. We com- 
 
HEKBART. 109 
 
 roonly attribute this to certain forces, and reduce these, accord- 
 ing to the direction of their operations, to attraction and repul- 
 sion. Now, however, as was said, since nothing is explained 
 by the word " force," we must in its place suppose some other 
 principle, some other causality of cohesion and form. Here then 
 is shown, in the first place (what is admitted also by recent 
 Chemistry),, that the predicate of impenetrability does not belong 
 to matter, though it was once regarded as an essential property. 
 Just as a mathematical point admits of being thought of as 
 exactly coincident with others in the same spot, so also may 
 the monads, like the points in this respect, be represented as 
 one in the other, in the same space. Thus here also Herbart 
 differs from the earlier supporters of the Atomic theory. 
 
 . Attraction and repulsion are, however, notions which, pro- 
 perly speaking, bear reference only to impenetrable elementary 
 component parts, and presuppose such ; if the latter are defi- 
 cient, then there is no longer any ground for taking refuge in 
 those hypothetical representations, and it is merely left for us 
 to explain the appearance of such operations. Let us bear in 
 mind that nothing more is required for our construction of 
 spatial relations than the two notions of association and non- 
 assooiation, and that from these proceeds of itself the mid- 
 notion of imperfect association, which will now be thought of 
 as a partial penetration, just as the perfect association must 
 be represented as a total one. (Whoever might object to a 
 partial penetration of mathematical points being even thought 
 of, need only be reminded of many kinds of geometrical pro- 
 blems, in which the geometer in like manner avails himself of 
 this fiction.) The question now comes, as to what will actually 
 happen in two reals that occupy such a position. The actual 
 occurrence consisted, as is known, in the self-preservation. If 
 then the external grouping of things admits of being derived 
 from an internal activity of the essences (such was the above 
 postulate), it can be effected by nothing else than by this self- 
 preservation. Thus, if an attraction is to ensue, we must 
 assume the attracting monad a to be internally in such a state 
 that it strives in itself to penetrate the other, h ; of this state 
 the self-preservation in a must be the cause ; the self-preser- 
 vation must in a certain way have been already excited ; the 
 monad b must thus have penetrated into a, but not perfectly, or 
 else that effort could no longer take place ; thus that very re- 
 lation must have intervened which we previously called the im- 
 perfect association. By such a penetration, although it is only 
 
110 HISTORICAL SUEYET. 
 
 partial, we must further admit that the whole monad is placed 
 in the state of'self-preservation, because no parts admit of being 
 thought of in its simple essence (parts can only be thought of 
 in the space through which the monads press upon one an- 
 other) ; thus in the monad a originates an internal state which 
 is not in conformity with its external relation, and to which 
 only the perfect association of both could correspond. Now the 
 suppression of this state can be effected by either a perfect in- 
 terpenetration or perfect separation of the monads ; thus 
 either the one or the other will ensue, according as the monad 
 can fulfil the requisite grade of self-preservation or not ; if it 
 cannot, for example, ' do this at the same time towards several 
 monads of opposite quality, it must then — for in every case, it 
 must maintain itself as a real — recede, or (what amounts to 
 the same thing) seem to repel the penetrating monads, but in 
 the opposite case must seem to attract them. 
 
 Now here we may return once again to the question with 
 which we introduced the Synechology, namely, as to how from 
 monads, which are quite immaterial and spaceless, yet, when 
 they are aggregated, a being at least apparently extended, such 
 as matter is, may originate ; and how from what is quite invi- 
 sible, or what for the sensuous representation were as naught, 
 a visible, firm, and solid body may proceed. Thus, suppose 
 that a number of monads were present in a given space. Sa 
 long as they are represented as separate, nothing will follow 
 as a result, nothing will be perceivable. As little too would 
 the conditions that are necessary for the formation of matter 
 be afforded if these monads were all to be of a like nature ; 
 they must rather be of an opposite nature, for otherwise the 
 cause of the actual occurrence would be wanting, and, moreover, 
 these different monads must be thought of in an imperfect 
 state of association. Now, then, self-preservation, and with 
 that attraction also, would come into play, and the latter will, 
 if it encounters no obstacle, advance to a perfect state of 
 reciprocal penetration. In such a case, however, the monads 
 would again collapse into a single mathematical point, and 
 consequently no matter would originate. At this point, comes 
 in repulsion. In order at the same time to produce the 
 latter, not merely two, but several, at least three, monads 
 must be presupposed in an imperfect state of association. Thus 
 we suppose that two monads, that are like each other, to- 
 gether penetrate a third, which is opposed to them. This 
 would happen if the self-preservation of this third were great 
 
HEEBAET. lit 
 
 enough to suflSce for the two others ; if it is not sufficient, 
 then repulsion ensues, or it will drive out or expel the two 
 others to as great a distance from itself as its internal state 
 requires ; and these two or several monads would now occupy 
 a space and be represented as molecules, which again cluster 
 together in the same manner, and finally represent a visible 
 mass, which can be of the most diflferent degrees of density, 
 according as the internal qualitative antagonisms and the 
 attraction that follows thereon is weak or strong. 
 
 In the present case, where the external position of the 
 monadsj the configuration, cohesion, rigidity, and so on of 
 matter, is regarded as a result of the internal state [(not in- 
 versely), an incongruence of the two states is presupposed, 
 but an incongruence which cannot remain as such. It is true, 
 that these states must in a certain way correspond to, but also 
 at the same time contradict, each other. Upon the one hand, 
 the greater or less degree of self-preservation which is called 
 forth in the imperfect association of the monads, so far depends 
 upon this external position as it accommodates itself to the 
 greater or less degree of coincidence ; it will be the weaker the 
 less the external position has encroached upon the self-preser- 
 vation. In so far the internal is certainly conditioned by the 
 external. But with this partial penetration the actual occur- 
 rence is distributed in equal proportions among all parts of the 
 monads, even of those that are not penetrated (at least we must 
 so consider the matter to ourselves in accordance with the fiction 
 or assumption) ; thus, the actual occurrence, namely, that this 
 state is the total state of the monads, and what follows from 
 this, the attraction and repulsion, is, in its commencement, 
 not a consequence of the association (this is a mere condition), 
 but follows rather from the simple nature and quality of the 
 monads. Thus, that incongruence of states cannot, as already 
 said, subsist, nor be permanently maintained ; it is in our 
 thoughts, as in phenomena, only the transition or resolving of 
 the contradiction into the congruence ; and this it is which the 
 above statement implies : the external position adapts itself to 
 the internal state. 
 
 The above theory of attraction and repulsion, which, accord- 
 ing to Herbart's own examples (Met. ii. p. 271.), can be re- 
 presented by several balls interpenetrating each other, denotes 
 nothing more than this, that, since there are no transient 
 forces encroaching from one real through the empty space 
 
112 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 upon another, a direct causality only and mutual action, and 
 by means of this alone, an operation at a distance, i. e. upon 
 distant monads, can be thought of, which operation either 
 results in the mutual penetration (chemical penetration) of 
 the monads or not ; a mutual action which solely depends upon 
 the self-preservation that is reciprocally excited, and whose 
 result is dependent upon the quality and number of the monads 
 that encounter each other in space. From the very fact that 
 a mutual action is spoken of, which depends as much upon the 
 reciprocal self-preservation as upon the reciprocal determina- 
 tions of the monads, we cannot charge this theory with teaching 
 a purely mechanical doctrine. 
 
 Still, however, a doubt must be raised as to the logical pre- 
 cision upon which Herbert every where lays so much stress, 
 when we find that, along with the fundamental notion of the 
 simplicity and absolute immutability of the real, a certain in- 
 ternal capability of formation upon its part is, at the same time, 
 asserted. To produce, namely, those internal shifting states, 
 which were introduced under the name of self-preservations, 
 among monads, the monad can only be constrained by given 
 external causes, by the association with other monads of op- 
 posite qualities. Now, how these states may continue after the 
 association of the monad has been annulled, nay, even remain 
 to such a degree under its control, that it has the power to 
 renew them as if by memory, and how this is all to be re- 
 conciled with the original simple quality of the monads, are 
 points which we certainly, do not understand. Experience,- it 
 is true, necessitates such an assumption ; and Herbart, there- 
 fore, believes that he has done enough in his way, if he has 
 pointed out a route by which this empirical demand may be 
 satisfied, without one's being obliged on that account to adopt 
 the idea of preformed germs, and a free organic self-develop- 
 ment, in the sense of the Dynamic philosophers — to whose 
 theory he has a perfect horror. The monad is and remains 
 simple, every thing which can here be called development into 
 an organism being an attraction and repulsion of other monads 
 by means of the above described preliminaries of the actual oc- 
 currence. It will be sufficient for our purpose if, in conclusion, 
 we bring this matter more closely into view by an example bor- 
 rowed, as nearly as possible in his own words, from Herbart's 
 Philosophy of Nature, concerning the nutritive process which 
 occurs in the cellular tissue of animals and plants. (Met. 
 p. 426.) 
 
HEKBAET. 113 
 
 We must first of ail transport ourselves to the lowest 
 point of organisation, that in which animal is scarcely to 
 be distinguished from vegetable life. If pure water evapo- 
 rates, nothing else can ever be left behind but pure water. 
 But if the water contains any heterogeneous elements, the 
 latter will, during its evaporation, in case they remain behind, 
 approximate gradually to one another. If they are hete- 
 rogeneous, they come at the moment of contact — by which 
 is here meant their entering into imperfect association — 
 completely together, and combine in a chemical manner ; i. e. 
 according to the above theory of the actual occurrence, this 
 imperfect association, or presupposed external position of 
 the monads, cannot subsist, unless the internal state cor- 
 respond to it; in the imperfect association, however, the 
 internal state was a self-preservation aroused in all parts, 
 and thus it was necessary for the monads completely to in- 
 terpenetrate each other, i. e. chemically. So, e. g. with the 
 lime which water in a boiling state precipitates. If the 
 parts are homogeneous, and devoid of all determination of 
 internal state, nothing whatever ensues ; if, however, on 
 the contrary, they are homogeneous in their quality, but have 
 at the same time also, by virtue of the supposed internal 
 power which they possess of adapting themselves, passed out 
 of previous combinations into any heterogeneous states of 
 self-preservation, they then come, it is true, in contact, but 
 their incipient penetration is at the same time also associated 
 with a reciprocal arrest of their internal states ; an arrest (the 
 perfect explanation of which the reader will find further on 
 in the Psychology), but which here depends upon this, that 
 the internal states or self-preservations stand in an antagonism 
 which renders impossible or retards their perfect blending, and 
 as a consequence, also, the perfect penetration of the monads. 
 A relatively deeper penetration will nevertheless take place in 
 an extremely imperfect association, for in such a position 
 each monad begins to evoke in the other the same self-pre- 
 servation, and thence ensues the condition, already familiar 
 to us, of attraction. This, however, merely refers to the pre- 
 supposed heterogeneous states : the quality of the monads 
 themselves must be homogeneous ; this homogeneous quality, in 
 which no attraction finds place, now retards, with uncontrollable 
 necessity, the penetration, which would occur in perfectly hete- 
 rogeneous elements ; time is thus lost, and between this 
 arrest and that attractive self-preservation, oscillations en- 
 
 I 
 
114 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 sue, which will, according to given circumstances, be quicker 
 or slower. 
 
 If now, in the surrounding water, we imagine not merely two 
 such elements, but many of them, to be present, and these suffi- 
 ciently near one another, there then follows an approach by 
 mediate attraction, and a communication of the oscillation from 
 the first two (or more) elements, which have fallen into this 
 relation with each other. Now, since the arrest increases, the 
 deeper the elements enter into one another, while the attraction, 
 on the contrary, will, under the same relation, be stronger and 
 quicker the more imperfect the association of the elements, it 
 follows, that the more remote elements, which are subsequently 
 and only indirectly implicated in the same process, will become 
 more attracted, and will strive from the periphery towards the 
 middle point, as being those elements from wluch the movement, 
 in the first place, set out ; between these, on the contrary, so soon 
 as, in the progress of the process of the elements, too many are 
 attracted and accumulated together, some repulsion will straight- 
 way ensue. Accordingly, at that point in the water, where 
 what has been just described takes place, there is constant 
 movement. How far now will this movement gain ground? 
 Is there not a limit at which it stops ? Some definite form, 
 which proceeds from it ? 
 
 "Let us suppose that, round about certain elements, there 
 were to be every where present, as is natural, such elements as 
 resemble them, it follows upon such conditions that, in a spheri- 
 cal space, the latter will be first attracted at that spot where 
 the former begun the process, but that then, also, just like these, 
 they will be gradually moved outwards in radii from the same 
 spot ; this latter movement, however, not displacing the elements 
 so entirely that one of them can disengage itself from the rest. 
 In the fitst place, there are no grounds for any considerable 
 velocity,' but the oscillations adapt themselves to the gradual 
 arrests of the internal states in every element ; moreover, there 
 always remains a ground of connection, because each element, 
 in conformity with the other, represents something opposed to 
 the first supposition. Now, while in the midst of the spherical 
 space there is still a lively oscillation, the periphery becomes more 
 at rest. ■ Those very elements which have already passed from 
 within outwards, are more in the equilibrium of their older 
 and newer internal state ; accordingly they do not merely 
 attract each other, but the result of this, a definite mutual 
 position, is less disturbed by oscillation; it approximates to 
 
HERBART. 115 
 
 fixity, and with the greater security, the more the water con- 
 tinues to evaporate. Besides, the elements which were present 
 in the midst are gradually displaced from direct communication 
 with the rest of the water, because they are surrounded by 
 those other elements. If, however, the surroundings are not 
 closed in a perfectly uniform manner, (and how should they be 
 so, unless the originally given position of the elements was pos- 
 sessed of a geometrical uniformity ?) then the communication 
 with the external water remains open, and consequently, in that 
 direction, the above process of attracting new elements still 
 continues to set out from the middle ; hence, the repulsion also 
 renews itself in all directions ; and because a limit is already 
 set to this by a kind of fixed periphery, the envelope or case 
 must be constantly becoming denser and more defined, while 
 the whole expands from within, so long as it draws in nourish- 
 ment through the openings from without." 
 
 " We may now proceed to consider," continues Herhart, 
 " whether this description is good enough for a so-called Infu- 
 sory animal. That it is an animal, we cannot be assured ; 
 but that those microscopic objects which usher in the green 
 matter of decomposing water, better deserve the name of ani- 
 mals, no one will undertake to prove to us. Thus much is 
 clear, that the least stimulus afforded by any thing external, 
 by light, by heat, or else by extraneous elements which may 
 be found in the same water, can and must change both the 
 movement as well as the form." 
 
 After these, in our opinion, characteristic experiments, which 
 now, considering the manifold return of Chemistry to the 
 molecular theory, as well as the progressive microscopic dis- 
 coveries of Ehrenberg, Caignard de la Tour, and others, are 
 invested with a peculiar interest ; we must leave it to natural 
 philosophers, and still more to physiologists, to determine in how 
 far they may favour these views, and how far, with them alone, 
 without assuming an immanent purpose or nisus. formativus 
 in the organisms, they may advance, or rather return to the 
 deepest grounds, in their explanation of natural structures ; 
 and let us here content ourselves with observing that many 
 obscure points which yet prevail, especially in the doctrine of 
 the actual occurrence, will receive a more satisfactory explana- 
 tion in the last part of the Metaphysics, namely, the Eidology 
 and Psychology, to which we now proceed. 
 
 I 2 
 
116 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 CONimUATlON AND CONCLUSION OF HEEBAET S PHILOSOPHT. 
 
 Matter, or the intrinsic nature of the corporeal world and its 
 spatio-temporal relations, having been determined, it only re- 
 mains for us to consider more closely the doctrine of the mind, 
 or, what in other metaphysical treatises would be called, per- 
 haps, pneumatology or rational psychology. This doctrine 
 follows as a postulate from what has gone before ; for there is 
 still wanting a point of coincidence, in which all appearance as 
 a totality of manifold elements may meet to form an unity, and 
 this unity can be found nowhere else than in the Ego. With 
 Herbart, in whose philosophy every thing rests upon the 
 given, this investigation likewise can only proceed from an 
 empirical basis, and that indeed specially from the human mind, 
 as being that to which, as the support of the subjective phe- 
 nomena, every thing else is manifested, and hence this doctrine 
 is called Eidology, from Gr. eiS&jXov, an image. 
 
 And here let me observe, that the varepov irporepov, which I 
 commit in treating of Herbart's system before that of Fichte, 
 would involve us undeniably in great inconveniences, if it were; 
 our intention to set before the reader the whole strength of 
 Herbart's polemics, and, together with the positive, the critical 
 portion of his labours also. As, however, the whole matter 
 here depends upon our seeing fairly and simply set before us 
 the peculiar positive doctrine of this thinker, divested of all 
 its surrounding and often tedious weight of controversy, that 
 historical anticipation which is here entered upon cannot es- 
 sentially injure the present exposition, and still less distort its 
 subject-matter. 
 
 The Ego, of which every one speaks as of himself, is first of 
 all his own person ; and by this is meant every thing which is 
 a positive constituent both of his mind and body. But in the 
 present instance, we are not speaking of the personal Ego, 
 which, to characterise satisfactorily, would require a long series 
 of predicates, a self-description, and autobiography. But the 
 question turns upon the so-called pure or absolute Ego, to 
 which we ultimately come when we separate in thought all 
 which is only a state or condition of our mind. This Ego, for 
 so it calls itself, rests in the very depths of our self-conscious- 
 ness ; it does not speak of its body only, but also of its sensations, 
 representations, and desires, in short, of all its activity as of 
 something which it possesses, which is in it, and proceeds from 
 
HEEBAET. 117 
 
 it, as from the one innermost and unchangeable centre of the 
 essence, the axis or pivot of all thinking and doing. Now, this 
 Ego not only represents to itself the outward world, but also its 
 own self; and if it asks itself what this is, the answer is given 
 by itself, — I am the being which represents the world and 
 myself to myself. The Ego represents itself; it has or makes 
 itself an image of itself; thus, the essential characteristic of 
 the Ego is the self-consciousness : beyond this, it finds in itself 
 no other characteristic ; it cognises itself or knows of itself 
 only as of a self- consciousness. 
 
 But now, then, comes the question, is the Ego actually an 
 essence, or is it merely self-consciousness? A knowledge — no 
 matter whether of itself or of another — is only a certain state, 
 an activity ; and we cannot think of this without an essence 
 which is in this state, or which is the source of this activity. 
 Thus much appears to be clear ; the Ego must also be something 
 real in itself. Besides, no one will regard himself merely as an 
 activity, namely, belonging to something else ; but if any thing 
 is directly certain for us, if any thing is established in and 
 together with us, it is undoubtedly this, that at the bottom of 
 our personality resides a single self-subsistent essence, which 
 remains under all circumstances the same in itself. And so set- 
 ting out from this given fact, we must acknowledge the Ego to 
 be something real. 
 
 The Ego is thus a real, but a real with many properties, 
 changing states, powers, capacities, activities, and sufferings. 
 Here we have again the contradictory notion of the thing with 
 many and changing characteristics, with which we are already 
 familiar. But, in the present instance, we shall find a special 
 contradiction in the notion of the pure Ego, as it has been 
 usually, and especially since Fichte's time, understood. The 
 Ego must be that which knows itself, thus the subject before 
 which its own image floats as object. This image, the object, 
 must be wholly ^the same as the subject is, or must wholly ex- 
 press, give back, or truly reflect, as from a mirror, the subject ; 
 on which account, Fichte called the Ego the absolute subject- 
 object, or the identity of subject and object. But can that real 
 essence, which by its activity produces this reflection, ever con- 
 template itself immediately in its own image ? What then does 
 it behold therein ? A reflected Ego, an Ego as object ; object, 
 however, it must not be, but the reverse ; an Ego beheld would 
 be an object, and thus certainly not the Ego itself, but the non- 
 Ego. The act of seeing cannot see itself; the eye cannot behold 
 
 I 3 
 
118 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 itself; so also with the Ego; it beholds only its image, as an 
 image which represents a spectator, as a representation which 
 represents itself as representing, and so on, so that it would be 
 extended to an infinite series of self-representing representa-i 
 tions, or would resemble a row of persons each of whom gazes 
 at his fellow. Thus subject and object can never be set forth 
 as one and the same, without involving a contradiction, nay 
 more, with Herbart, this last is the greatest and most incon- 
 ceivable of all contradictions. 
 
 Now, however, the Ego, just as it is, is given without doubt. 
 Thus it can, as little as other given phenomena, be dismissed in an 
 off-hand manner, but its notion must be purified from the con- 
 tradiction, the phenomenon of the Ego must be explained in the 
 internal experience. Here again the Method of Eelations stands 
 us in good stead. It rested, as we have seen, upon this point, 
 that the contradictory notion (which is here the subject-object) 
 was separated into its component parts or elements, and some- 
 thing was predicated of these which would not have held good 
 of each of them individually. Now, here it is not the represent- 
 ing subject, but rather the object only, which can be multiplied ; 
 the method indeed does not decide thereupon, but the problem 
 itself suggests the application of the method, for it is self-evident 
 that the object (the represented Ego) *ill be the momentum 
 to be multiplied ; I, the knowing, gaze upon myself in the 
 thousandfold states of feeling, thinking, willing, &c., and all 
 these representations of myself are called my Ego. Thus, the 
 object must be multiplied, and of the association of these 
 numerous Ego-objects, that must hold good which cannot of 
 any single definite representation of the Ego, namely, their 
 equivalence to the Ego-subjects. " At present thus much is 
 clear, that the quality of the self or Ego {Ichheif) rests upon a 
 manifold objective basis, each part whereof is accidental to it, 
 in so far as the remaining parts would still serve the Ego for its 
 support, in case that part were taken away. I suppose myself 
 to be this or that (represent myself now in one way, now in 
 another), but I am bound to neither, so long as I can change." 
 (Psychol. 1. p. 104.) 
 
 The above, however, is not yet the complete solution of the 
 riddle ; it is only the first necessary step towards it. " In the 
 first place, if several objects are represented, something in them 
 belongs to the representing agent, namely, their comprehensiail 
 in one act of representation, and what further originates from' 
 this. Thence also must proceed the desired modification, by 
 
HERBART. 119 
 
 means of which something may be observed in the different 
 olgects, which would belong to none of them taken singly, and 
 which, upon that very account, may probably appertain to us. 
 Thus, the representation of myself remains indeed dependent 
 upon the representation of the objects, bears , reference to it 
 but nevertheless does not coincide therewith." 
 
 Now, however, it is obvious that the numerous objects, as a 
 mere sum of represented states or determinations, do not suffice 
 to exhaust the proper notion of the Ego's quality, or of the self- 
 consciousness. A subject, entirely imprisoned by turns in differ- 
 ent feelings and intuitions, has still no clear self-consciousness ; 
 it must be able to oppose itself to these its states as the per- 
 sistent, identical element in all of them, and so distinguish 
 itself from them. Guided by the objects, these single states, 
 we must, through them, come to a knowledge of ourselves ; but 
 meanwhile, in order that the quality of the Ego may form that 
 antagonism to all these inherent determinations (by virtue of 
 which it is in the midst of its connection with, to be still dis- 
 tinguished, from them), we must rise above the objectivity, 
 instead of becoming firmly imbedded or imprisoned therein. 
 The investigation ■ must not take the reverse course, and 
 voluntarily presuppose an absolute Ego, which may by ab- 
 solute spontaneity evoke all determinations in itself; such 
 an Ego does not actually exist, but is only a philosophical, ab- 
 straction. What is irrefragably given and true, in the case 
 before us, is, as may be learnt by any one from his own obser- 
 vation, this ; that we certainly live in the objectivity, and are 
 wholly taken up by it, before we gradually arrive at self- 
 consciousiiess ; and so we obviously come, in the first place, to a 
 knowledge of ourselves from out the representation of the 
 extraneous and objective. Now, as the consciousness of the 
 pure Ego, or self, is not present prior to the objects, but the 
 latter rather prior to the former, which last is only a supposition 
 to which we are gradually driven, "it follows that in this ob- 
 jective alone can lie the cause of our being lifted out of its 
 representation, the represented itself in its multiplicity being so 
 constituted as to loosen the fetters in which a subject would be 
 imprisoned, which could merely learn to know objects, but 
 never itself." (Loc. cit. p. 108.) 
 
 Thus, the single definite representations must in some way 
 transport us from out their representative process; this, 
 however, is done not by the single representations per se, as 
 such, but they must in their association be so related, that one 
 
 I 4 
 
120 HISTORICAL SURVET. 
 
 lessens the other, i. e. arrests, but does not extinguish it, seeing 
 that in the relation of arrest the passively arresting representa- 
 tion must be present as well as the actively arresting one, 
 whereby may be explained the preservation of the_ memory 
 during the state of obfuscation. Manifold representations must 
 thus condition one another, if a self-consciousness is to be pos- 
 sible. Thus, for example, the representation of one colour 
 displaces that of another, one sensation of taste or feeling the 
 other, and of this fact we are soon convinced when, for instance, 
 in the Logic it is said, that we may think even of disparate 
 characteristics together, i..e. of such as belong to wholly different 
 spheres or series (of sensation), such as red, fragrant, round, 
 but not of such as belong to a common category (red, yellow, 
 white), and may unite the former into one notion {e.g. into 
 that of the rose). " Through this contradiction, arrest or dis- 
 turbance, comes movement into the mind, and not merely 
 movement, but also formative power." 
 
 By this theory of reciprocal arrest, in which ultimately the 
 origin of the most perfect self-consciousness and of pure 
 thought, as well as all progressive kinds and degrees of dis- 
 tinctness of the consciousness find their explanation, Her- 
 bart has rendered completely superfluous the older theories 
 of different mental faculties and powers for the different 
 functions of the mind, e. g. a faculty of sensation, feeling, recol- 
 lection, and representation, and so on, as being a method of 
 explanation which is both unmeaning and thoughtless, and has 
 been one of the first strenuously to oppose this psychological 
 view. 
 
 We have already, in treating of the problems of inherence 
 and causality, spoken of the self-preservations of two or more 
 reals in relation to one another, and because there the discourse 
 was merely concerning an antagonism of real essences, we could 
 only think to ourselves of the self-preservations as directed 
 against disturbances which would ensue if it were possible for 
 a real essence to be actually disturbed or destroyed, thus against 
 disturbances which do not in the process actually take place. 
 Here, however, in the Psychology, where we are speaking also 
 of disturbances or arrests, the relation is one of a wholly differ- 
 ent kind ; for here these arrests do actually or in very fact 
 ensue ; for in this sphere, which is that of the consciousness, 
 the arrests do not take place between several real essences, but 
 between mere representations, to which the absolute position 
 is not even transferred, i. e. the representations, having their 
 
HEEBAET. 121 
 
 existence only in the self-preservation of the soul, must not be 
 regarded as simple essences existent per se, but as being mani- 
 foldly compounded in themselves, susceptible of disturbance, 
 and thus of a wholly different nature to the simple self-pre- 
 servations of the reals themselves. The individual definite kind 
 of self-preservation o^ the soul, i. e. some definite representation, 
 is to the soul and its general simple self-preservation, accidental 
 in the proper sense of the word ; the self-preservation, as such, 
 continues just as it is determined in itself, and by some other 
 acting upon it from without ; the qualitative element of the 
 soul is not afiected by it, but the modifications only (states) of 
 the general self-preservation reciprocally modify one another. 
 Now, how or in what way these states must become modified, 
 if self-consciousness is to be the result, we shall see further on, 
 but they must become reciprocally modified, because they all 
 occur within one sphere, namely, within the one self-preserva- 
 tion of the one soul-monad, and have within this sphere their 
 common, their substantial element ; wherefore, on the other 
 hand, just because they participate in this element, they may 
 reappear in a certain relation of independence to each other, 
 and may behave as potencies, though certainly changeable ones, 
 towards one another. Thus, in a certain way, they will admit 
 of being viewed and dealt with as similar to the self-preser- 
 vations within their own sphere of the reals, as being, like the 
 latter, opposed to each other, homogeneous, but also unequal in 
 strength and weakness, so that they arrest or accelerate each 
 other and condition each other in the most manifold, nay, the 
 most infinitely diversified manner, and so constitute in their 
 association a system partly blended, partly discrete, as will 
 presently be more clearly shown. 
 
 If now we have consented to admit, that the pure self-con- 
 sciousness presupposes a multiplicity of determinate Ego-re- 
 presentations as its basis, and that this so-called idea is ab- 
 stracted as the general element from these numerous determi- 
 nations of the Ego, — it follows that the Ego-subject, of which we 
 are speaking, is by no means to be confounded in itself with 
 the real soul-monad, but that related to these its determinations 
 (the numerous Ego.-objects), blended with, and at the same 
 time distinct from them, it is not the real Ego, the soul, but 
 only the actual knowing, the self-consciousness, and, as such, 
 cannot and need not sustain the absolute position which in the 
 outset it was necessary to apply to the contradictory notion 
 of the subject-object. Now, however, Herbart does not con- 
 
122 HISTORICAL SUETET. 
 
 tent himself with regarding this pure activity, the self-con- 
 sciousness itself, as something substantial and absolute, as Fichte 
 does ; but for the very reason, that the absolute position does 
 not admit of being transferred to this manifold One, he trans- 
 fers this position back to a fundamental soul-monad, in whose 
 sphere, i. e. in whose self-preservation, all this doing or action 
 finds its substantial basis. This again is one of the points in 
 which the presupposed view of existence, already confirmed in 
 the Ontology, comes prominently before us. Without, however, 
 dwelling upon this point afresh, we proceed to consider more 
 closely that "mechanism" which takes place in the mind 
 among the single representations themselves, and which is to 
 have as a general result the formation of the consciousness. 
 
 We can, properly speaking, call the single representations 
 forces, which oppose but do not annihilate one another. Dur-. 
 ing this resistance, they do not indeed remain wholly un- 
 changed, but still they are not qualitatively altered ; their 
 something, or that which is represented, remains the same ob- 
 ject, whether represented or not. But what is changed is 
 the degree of strength upon which their vivacity, distinctness, 
 or obfuscation depends. "All depends upon the sum of 
 arrestation (or of the resistance), and the relation of arrest. 
 The former is, as it were, the burden to be distributed, which 
 originates from the antagonisms of the representation,. If we 
 knew how to deal with this burden, and were familiar with the 
 relation in which the different representations stand tt> it, we 
 should then find out by an easy calculation of proportions the 
 statical or constant point of each representation, i.e. the ground 
 of its obfuscation in the equilibrium." (Lehrb. zur Psychol, p. 
 14.) We might now imagine that, because we stand constantly 
 in relation to innumerable other reals. Innumerable represent- 
 ations also must be constantly present with us at the same 
 time. This, however, is not the case, for one representation 
 only is specially present, and usually in confiict, as it were, with 
 another. The whole matter amounts to this. The relations to 
 the objects, and consequently those representations which corr 
 respond to them, are not all of equal strength ; hence, one 
 of them enfeebles or arrests the other, by distinguishing it- 
 self above all the rest. Still, of two representations only, 
 neither of them can, as may be readily understood, completelyt 
 suppress the other, and for this very reason, because they are 
 engaged in mutual conflict ; but among three or more repre- 
 sentations, one may indeed be wholly displaced, and, despite its 
 
HEEBAET. 123 
 
 constant endeavour to emerge again, may be rendered as ineffec- 
 tive as if it were thoroughly absent. The suppressed representa- 
 tions do not on that account entirely disappear, but only linger as 
 it were at the verge of the consciousness, awaiting the favour- 
 able moment when they may emerge from their obscurity, 
 when the dominant representation is either enfeebled, or some 
 new one has stepped in, which appropriates, by virtue of a 
 certain relation of quality, that previously displaced represent- 
 ation, and so with united powers presses forwards at the 
 same time with it. Now, just as the equilibrium of repre-i 
 sentations present in the consciousness can be calculated by 
 the rules of statics, so can this pressure of representations 
 which have sunk down below the static level, and are again 
 striving to reinstate themselves, be calculated according to 
 mechanical rules, or rather, this mathematical theory can be 
 aptly called a statics and mechanics of the mind, although 
 in the present instance we are not really discoursing about 
 laws of inertia, parallelogram of forces, leverage, or antagonism 
 of moving power and thing moved. 
 
 Those repressed representations, that linger on the verge of 
 the consciousness, and of which it may be said, that they en- 
 deavour to reappear, while in so doing, although unobserved 
 by ourselves, they still act continually upon the representations 
 present in the consciousness — of these unconscious and but 
 dimly working representations, we may say, we feel them, 
 without being able to characterize them more closely ; in other 
 words, they are the feelings, and as such are to be well dis- 
 tinguished from the sensations. They manifest themselves, ac- 
 cording to the greater or less success of their impulsive effort, 
 as desires, and the desire becomes the will when it unites itself 
 with the representation or hope of success, with the hope of 
 being able to reappear as a dominant, present sensation. This 
 state becomes an end or object, and all allied representations 
 converge for its attainment.* 
 
 Hitherto we have been speaking only of representations as 
 of simple potencies ; but it lies in the very nature of the case, 
 
 * " If a representation is continually urged against an obstruction, so that, 
 in place of yielding to the latter, it makes its way, it is then called a desire. 
 For -vrhat would the desire have but satisfaction ? and what is satisfaction 
 but the perfected representation of that which was desired? Is there a 
 single enjoyment or delight that is not an act of the consciousness ? A 
 lively fantasy creates to itself enjoyment, at least so long as it succeeds, 
 despite the obstruction, in perfecting the representation, and nothing else 
 but this success constitutes the vivacity of the fantasy. Is it still a question 
 how understanding and will may be one ? " Hauptpuncte, § 13. 
 
124 HISTOEICAL SURVET. 
 
 that this will be by no means their usual relation ; for as a 
 rule all our representations are entangled and blended together 
 in the most manifold manner. These combinations are, how- 
 ever, all essentially of two kinds ; they are, namely, either com- 
 plieations or gradations. The so-called disparate representa- 
 tions, appertaining to different series and originating from 
 different senses, e. g. blue and red, sweet, yellow and soft, and 
 so on, will complicate each other ; but the opposite ones, or 
 those that belong to one and the same series, will blend toge- 
 ther, as e. g. two colours, such as red and blue, when they go to 
 form violet. Thus each thing, with several characteristics, is 
 a complication ; to the gradations belong especially the aesthe- 
 tic, harmonising or disharmonising relations. Now, such an 
 entire complication or gradation yields, in respect to the ar- 
 rest and endeavour, a total force, the action of which, however, 
 and its calculation will naturally become more complicated 
 than that of the single representations ; nay, more, it soon 
 becomes impossible to follow out by the , calculation these 
 intricate complexions ; and hence the latter is restricted only 
 to the determination of simple and general laws. 
 
 We refrain from venturing deeper into this labyrinth, in 
 which mathematics alone can furnish the clue of Ariadne, and 
 must content ourselves with tracing out more closely the origin 
 of what are usually called abstract notions, to which class the 
 Ego belongs, and in doing this we must, on account of the 
 difficulty of the subject, rest satisfied with gleaning only some 
 general ideas. It is evident, from what has been already said, 
 and is besides a well known fact, that in the first place there 
 are single representations, which proceed from single isolated 
 sensations, as red, round, sweet, and such like; then come com- 
 pound representations and notions, such as a thing with several 
 characteristics is ; but, finally, there are abstract notions also, 
 to which direct sensuous intuitions do not, as with the two 
 former, correspond. The genesis of these abstractions dnd 
 ideas, and the answer which is at the same time involved in 
 the question as to how the thinking subject arrives at them, or 
 makes its own representation the object of the representation ; 
 — this it is which must especially interest us as being one of 
 the most remarkable, but also the most difficult, problems in 
 the doctrine of the human mind. 
 
 Now, as there are no special powers and faculties of the 
 mind, so also there is no special faculty of abstraction. The de- 
 velopment of the mind, when psychologically regarded, pursues 
 
HEREART. 125 
 
 rather, in general, the following course. We need not here in- 
 quire into how the combination or synthesis of the individual 
 representations is formed, for the former is originally given 
 with the representations themselves, and the division or analysis 
 takes place quite gradually. "For a child of the tenderest 
 age," says Herbart, " there are no single things whatever, but 
 entire aggregates, which only separate themselves in space in 
 a successive process of representation."* In the first chaos 
 of the representations it is chiefly the movement of indi- 
 vidual things, by which the aggregate is dismembered, and 
 by which a plurality of things originates for the representa- 
 tive process. " At first, the table appears one with the 
 ground upon which it stands, as well as the table-top one with 
 its legs ; but the table is moved from the spot where it stood, 
 while the top is not separated from the feet. "What is not dis- 
 joined or separated, preserves in the representation its original 
 unity." " Now, as the aggregates are gradually resolved into 
 individual things, so the things again into their characteristics, 
 and such like." If, now, the single things have assumed a 
 separate position, there are then formed from them certain 
 " collective impressions" i. e. complexions, or what are called 
 also " general notions," generic ideas, such as tree, man, 
 in which what is similar among the partial rejfresentations 
 gains an equilibrium or balance over the heterogeneous or 
 diverse, seeing that by repeated apprehensions of similar ob- 
 jects, the similar constantly becomes elevated in rank, while the 
 diverse, arrested at a point of persistent obscurity, and pressed 
 down beneath the verge of the consciousness, no longer attains 
 to the evolution of the whole series of remaining characteristics 
 united with it. It is true that nothing can be actually severed 
 and lost from complexions that are once formed ; some partial 
 representations (characteristics) may be merely checked or 
 obscured ; but even the obscured ones always form with those, 
 of which we are conscious, a collective force, as we saw 
 above, and all appear again in the series, if they are able to 
 develop themselves freely in some other way. Such series or 
 results of united representations, in which one and the same 
 object has been seen, e. ff. a man, now working in his garden, 
 now reading a book, then on horseback, complicate and inter- 
 sect indeed, in the most manifold manner, other series, in which. 
 
 * Lehrb. d. Psychologie, p. 194. et seq., Psychol, als Wissench., § 117., 
 etseq., § 132. et seq. 
 
126 HISTORICAL STJEVET. 
 
 the same proximate representation, gardein, book, horse, oc- 
 curs, and therefore become checked in the most manifold man- 
 ner, while the representation of the man constitutes the com- 
 mon nucleus or point in which those series in their turn meet 
 each other. If now a representation is freed from its original 
 connection, so that it can oscillate, as it were, isolated and unde- 
 termined between several other representations, as a subject 
 in union with predicates, yet as subject also can at the same 
 time be distinguished from them, it follows that several such 
 series are necessary, in which the same subject occurs, but 
 also just as many arrests of the remaining partial representa- 
 tions, which were originally in direct connection with it as 
 predicates* 
 
 It is true that the above are not yet abstractions in the high- 
 est sense, nor are they logical and metaphysical notions; but the 
 formation of the collective impressions hitherto regarded, in 
 which also language plays a prominent part, still depends for 
 the most part upon the accidentally successive apprehension of 
 empirical events, and can on that account lay no claim in phi- 
 losophy to universality, but may well strengthen the position, 
 that not merely the stuff or material of the sensation, as Kant 
 would have it, but also Reform of the combinations, is at the 
 same time given. Matters stand quite differently with the lo- 
 gical and metaphysical abstractions or notions. These indeed are 
 general notions also, but pure and conipletely severed from 
 the complications, in which they occur, and in which the 
 series, which they recall, is no longer developed in memory; 
 or in which the representative process no longer reaches 
 to the fulness of their extent ; they are artificial products 
 of thought, to which no reality corresponds, and only serve the 
 thought itself as goal -points, as "logical ideals" in the sense 
 probably in which Kant regarded the ideas of the reason, as 
 regulative for the formal use of the understanding. In such a 
 case, we can only ask, how it comes to pass that we think of 
 and approach nearer and nearer to such ideals. The ques- 
 tion is already answered in part by what has gone before, 
 provided we have arrived at any clear perception of where the 
 judgment has its seat, or at least its premises. 
 
 Abstract notions, like the above, have been to such a degree 
 divested of aU their relations, that they have in fact lost all their 
 content also ; for as with the notion of the substance of a thing 
 nothing whatever was left after we had stripped the thing of 
 all its properties, so also with the Ego ; here also it was but the 
 
HEBBART. 127 
 
 bare or naked notion of the collective relation which remained 
 as a medium or point of reference for the manifold Ego-objects, 
 thus a mere empty spot, to which the manifold relations all 
 point as to their goal-point or formal unity. Now, how and 
 why, upon ontological grounds, a real, the soul, must be placed 
 under this point (which soul, on that very account, appears only 
 in the Psychology as a substratum of activities), has been 
 already pointed out.* 
 
 "We will here say a few words concerning this very soul in 
 its connection with the body, and concerning life. Herbart 
 limits this latter notion to a far narrower sphere of natural 
 phenomena than is usually done in the " pMlosophies of na- 
 ture." We have already, in speaking of the construction of 
 matter, given, by way of example, the genesis or production of a 
 natural object, of which it was doubtful as yet whether it was 
 to hold good as an animal, a plant, or a crystallisation. And 
 now, by advancing a step further, we may again connect the 
 present inquiry with what has gone before. One chief requi- 
 site explanation of life is this, that we must hazard the hypo- 
 thesis, that self-preservations, which have been, in the first places 
 reciprocally aroused in the association of several reals, may, in the 
 next place, continue when these reals have again stepped out of 
 connection with each other. If it is ever possible to carry out 
 this assertion (a point which we here leave quite undecided), it 
 can only be done with some show of proof in the Eidology, where 
 we have come to assume in one and the same essence a whole 
 system of determinations that reciprocally check, hold, blend 
 with, and presuppose one another, — in short, a microcosm, or 
 little world-totality per se. Now, if we persist in viewing the 
 soul-monad as that which is capable in regard to its self-preser- 
 vation of a permanent formation in its interior, and of so being a 
 supporter in itself of states, which states may again be the 
 cause under favourable relations with other monads of a defi- 
 nite external form and movement, we have then won, in the 
 present instance, a direct principle of assimilation and organisa- 
 tion, which may be employed forthwith as an explanation of 
 vital phenomena. " That the internal formation of the ele- 
 ments," says Herbart, " still continues after their complete se- 
 paration, is shown in the remarkable capacity they have of 
 becoming assimilated, whereby the organic materials serve as 
 salutary food for other yet living organisms. The existence of 
 the higher plants and animals depends, as is well known, upon 
 • Compare Hartenstein's Metaph. p. 47 K 
 
128 HISTORICAI. SUKVEY. 
 
 the fact, that nourishment has been prepared for them through 
 the lower organisms." (Psychol, ii p. 450. et seq.) 
 
 If, now, we first of all take into consideration the union and 
 mutual action of body and soul, we do not encounter, according 
 to our theory, that incomprehensible feature which is most 
 frequently looked out for, and for this very reason, that soul and 
 body are not toto genere, like spiritual and material, opposed to 
 one another, but consist of one and the same internal or funda- 
 mental essence, the real ; while the soul is but a single monad, 
 and that very one which in the whole system of the person 
 supplies the place of the substance-monad. As concerns in the 
 first place, the actions which proceed from this monad to the 
 periphery, or to the different members of the body, in other 
 words, the voluntary movements ; we have above all things to 
 bear in mind that there is no special faculty of volition, but 
 merely definite individual movements within the sphere of the 
 soul's self-preservations, namely, movements of such represent- 
 ations or self-preservations (states) as strive to come forth 
 and again emancipate themselves from the condition of arrest 
 in which they are. We have seen, moreover, that to every 
 sort of change of the internal state of a monad, changes will 
 also correspond in the position of those very monads, with 
 which the former finds itself in imperfect association, and that 
 these changes in the monads immediately surrounding it, have 
 as a result other changes in the more remote monads united 
 only mediately or indirectly with the substance-monad. " Now 
 we know that the soul is associated with the nerves at one end, 
 a fact which constitutes, in the present instance, the general 
 condition of all causality; furthermore, that the nerve, which is 
 presented to us as a coherent thread, must be a chain of simple 
 but imperfectly connected essences ; finally, that in such a chain 
 we must invariably expect the slightest change in the internal 
 state of one essence to have some influence upon the disturbances, 
 and consequently upon the self-preservations of all essences in 
 the chain. Thus this influence, running along the nervous fibres, 
 can propagate itself through space (only not through a void 
 space), without being in the slightest degree of a spatial kind." 
 In like manner the nerve is upon its side connected with the 
 muscles and modifies their internal states ; from this originates 
 at the same time a change in the position of the muscular 
 molecules, an approximation of the latter among themselves, con- 
 traction, or, in the directly opposite case, relaxation. 
 
 From all tljat has been said, it can scarcely require any 
 
HEBBART. 129 
 
 special exposition to show how, upon the other hand, external 
 disturbances are propagated inwards to the soul and there be- 
 come representations, i. e., corresponding modifications of the 
 self-preservation. If once we could explain the so-called vo- 
 luntary movement, which characterises in the strict sense of 
 the word, aU that is called living, we might then explain 
 also the power of locomotion and every thing else, which is 
 peculiar to the bodily phenomena of the vital principle. As 
 concerns the much-talked-of seat of the soul, Herbart says* 
 " it is probable that the soul has no permanent spot, else some 
 distinct middle point or centre in the brain would have struck 
 the attention of physiologists as being that to which all con- 
 verges. But the whole middle region, in which the sensorium 
 commune has been long since sought for, may furnish a resi- 
 dence for the soul. Thus, the soul may move itself to and fro 
 upon or rather within the pons Varolii, provided that we do 
 not search after a canal for this movement, for there is no need 
 of any ; no more than light requires the pores of the trans- 
 parent body, which it permeates in the truest sense of the 
 word in every possible direction. Besides, it is self-evident, 
 that, when the soul moves, this is not done by virtue of its 
 willing so to do (for it knows nothing of it), but because in 
 their turn, as previously, its internal states, united with those 
 of the brain, must be first the cause and then the result of its 
 change of place, and this by virtue of the necessity, everywhere 
 present, that the external and internal state should properly 
 correspond to each other." 
 
 As to the movements which the soul produces in the nerves 
 and muscles, the real mechanism of these is completely un- 
 known. Of course ! for this mechanism depends upon self-pre- 
 servations in other reals, which bear no direct relation to the 
 soul. There hovers before the soul, when it wills any thing 
 determinate, not as before a machinist that part of the machine 
 which must be touched in order to produce the intended effect, 
 but only the representation of this efiect. What then is the 
 mediating link between this representation of a purpose and 
 the muscular movement which is to realise it ? In actions pro- 
 perly so called, which are to be carried out with full conscious- 
 ness, this mediating moment must in some way or other enter 
 the consciousness. It must consist of a definite feeling, 
 " which is combined with each fiexion and control of the 
 members, whether intentional or accidental — this feeling being 
 complicated with volition, or, more strictly speaking, with 
 
 K 
 
130 HISTOEICAL StJEVET. 
 
 those very representations which are the active element in 
 the exercise of the will ; and herein lies the middle term or 
 member of the above-mentioned connection." Through this 
 conscious feeling we bring our own movements, which at first, 
 as in the child and in the inexperienced artist, are wholly or 
 only partially involuntary, gradually under our control. Every 
 movement in the joints excites a definite feeling, and at the 
 same instant the movement also, and its further result is ex- 
 ternally perceived ; if now at a later period the representation 
 of this result, when once observed, is raised to the rank of a de- 
 sire, then by the same complication is reawakened also that feel- 
 ing which accompanies it, and which is in itself that self-preser^ ■' 
 vation of the soul, to which correspond the definite nervous and * 
 muscular states which are here required. 
 
 We conclude our account of Herbart's Psychology with a 
 figurative illustration of what the author himself has selected as 
 the " most luminous application" of the principles pursued by 
 him in that work. (Psych, ii. p. 4.). This is the State. " The 
 state, viewed as a society, which may be protected by a power 
 residing within itself," is, says Herbart, " as perfect a contra- 
 diction as the notion of the Ego, or any one of what are com- 
 monly regarded by metaphysicians as universal ideas ; for the 
 power can just as well destroy as protect, and a society which 
 is to maintain itself by its own power, must necessarily turn 
 this power against itself, and so give rise to internal faction, 
 but not to a fixed or stable constitution. The notion involves 
 a contradiction ; yet nevertheless there are states : thus, that 
 notion is no correct expression of the reality ; it must covertly : 
 refer to the characteristics, which were not thought of in itj 
 but which nevertheless belong to it and suppress what is con- 
 tradictory therein. These points of relation are powers of a 
 psychological nature, inasmuch as the state becomes realised to 
 the extent in which these powers are, and work within it, 
 namely, as custom and the course of business together with the 
 recognition of and insight into the necessity of the latter. This 
 necessity, however, is partly internal, partly external ; the ex- 
 ternal is the conflict with other states or peoples, which corre- 
 sponds to the self-preservation of the real against another real, 
 and especially concerns the wars which a state has to carry on 
 for its own existence. In this lies, as for single soul-monads, 
 so also historically for many states, the chief cause of their 
 improvement ; " and we shall find that most states, if they 
 were to stand alone, or were given up entirely to themselves,- 
 
HEEBABT. 131 
 
 would really know nothing of their capabilities ; as in like 
 manner a single human being knows nothing of what he would 
 be, when apart from all society. The internal necessity, 
 however, corresponds exactly to the psychological relations, 
 with which we have already been made acquainted under the 
 names, statics and mechanics, of the representations. "The 
 active working powers in society are unquestionably in their 
 origin of a psychological nature ; they meet together or en- 
 counter each other, in so far as they are represented by speech 
 and by our dealings in the common world of the senses. In the 
 latter they arrest or check each other ; and suph is the general 
 drama of conflicting interests and social anxieties." If now 
 we adopt the idea of an imperfect association, a kind of patri- 
 archal state, or something similar, as being the primeval con- 
 dition of humanity that directly precedes true civilisation, it 
 follows, that we find men already united in different groups 
 of greater or lesser extent — these corresponding, as it were, 
 to the collective impressions or representations of things. 
 Many very unequal forces will soon, however, come into colli- 
 sion with each other. " What first strikes us are the v/ell- 
 known confines of the consciousness, which are here converted 
 into confines of the social influence. It is quite clear, that 
 a few powerful individuals, or those who are supported by 
 trusty followers, can and must in any strong conflict of all the 
 powers against one another (according to the above developed 
 calculations), render completely inefficient a number, how- 
 ever great, of weaker isolated individuals. But then there re- 
 mains between the more powerful individuals a pressure and 
 counter-pressure, as though those feeble individuals were not 
 even present. By the activity of each a part is knit together ; no 
 one remains wholly exempt from the process of arrest." Those 
 who in the historical formation of states could from the very 
 beginning take no part whatever in their consolidation, owing to 
 their being depressed below those confines, would remain the 
 depressed class, yet one constantly ready under all relations 
 to strive again, like the obscured representations, for the as- 
 cendency, and so constituting a potency silently but always at 
 work. Those individuals who fall beneath the confines "must, 
 to allay their wants, become beggars, or else submit themselves 
 to be used as servants, and so will attach themselves to certain 
 persons who pay for their services. Now so long as the com- 
 munity (or those who have been blended together by the pro- 
 cess of arrest) adopts them, they belong to it as to their lorda 
 
 K 2 
 
132 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 and masters ; they will be regarded by the latter as an useful 
 property or possession, and will have no other means of escaping 
 from this bondage than by attempting to flee without knowing 
 whither." Above the confines or verge even of the social in» 
 fluence the equilibrium varies among individuals ; many sink 
 down, many rise, while a few separate themselves as persons of 
 rank from the herd or common people to whom no regard or at- 
 tention is paid. Now one is the most illustrious of all, namely, 
 the prince ; with him the consciousness or individual feeling of 
 those that rank next to him blends imperceptibly ; all look to 
 him, follow him in his movements, and depend upon him ; while 
 he in turn, finding them tractable, makes use of this as an advan- 
 tage to himself. Such is the connection of events in the oldest 
 monarchies. Yet this tractability also has its limits ; for the 
 prince dreads most, as regards his authority, those who rank 
 nearest to him, the nobility ; he has recourse to the common 
 people, not so much in order to elevate them, but to blend them 
 among themselves into a collective force ; he gives them a con'» 
 stitution — in a word, makes them burghers or free citizens. 
 Enough now of this comparison of the state with the psycholo- 
 gical processes of the individual human consciousness. We see 
 at once how closely these doctrines are connected, and how in 
 each system they will evolve themselves consistently together. 
 
 In fact, when we say that Herbart's system is characterised, in 
 opposition to that of Hegel, by a preponderance of the mechanical 
 view, we do but make use of his own words. " Had I not," says 
 Herbart, " been previously convinced by the practical philoso- 
 phy, the psychological mechanism had easily filled me with the 
 same terror that leads many to shut their eyes in its presence,' 
 who can no more bear to look into the interior of the human 
 mind, than they can regard the inside of the body without 
 horror or disgust." (Psychol, i. p. 79.) 
 
 Hence, upon one who undertakes to report Herbart's opinions 
 the obligation is imposed of saying at least as much of those 
 practical principles as is sufficient to rescue the connection^'; 
 or rather non-connection, of the theories which have been just 
 adduced from a doubtful obscurity which may well seduce the 
 ignorant into cherishing prejudices against the moral purity 
 and worth of Herbart's practical philosophy, though the pre- 
 sence of these elements is acknowledged even by the opponents 
 of his system. Since, however, this wide field of inquiry lies 
 beyond the prescribed limits of these discourses, we must here 
 
HEEBAET. 133 
 
 test content with, only some brief remarks. Herbart will not 
 have, as might be imagined from what has gone before, any 
 innate special privileges, for all innate psychological forms, all 
 original facts of the consciousness or special faculties, are 
 with him a nonentity, and such rights would, as a consequence 
 of his doctrine of law, lead not to justice, but to injustice and 
 contentioni In like manner Herbart lays down no original law- 
 giving moral feeling : he rejects the categorical imperative of 
 Kant, " not merely because innate forms would amount to this, 
 but because the moral feeling, together with the disposition to- 
 wards moral obedience that springs from it, is to be derived as 
 a collective result from the different practical ideas, which are 
 in their turn engendered by as many different judgments of an 
 aesthetic kind," as will be presently seen more clearly. Kant's 
 categorical imperative was merely a formal precept or command ; 
 Herbart's principle, on the contrary, does not lack the content, 
 the something, which should be done ; but this prineiple lies in 
 those involuntary judgments of an aesthetic kind, which, being 
 thoroughly freed from the caprices of our will, have fallen beyond 
 the relations of the latter into the consciousness. There is with 
 him, as we have seen, no special will-faculty, and the will is 
 no special power, least of all the substantial one, or truly real 
 element ; but it is grounded psychologically in the aspiring 
 representations. As little, also, with him, is there a transcen- 
 dental freedom in the rigid sense in which we shall encounter 
 it in Fichte, or in that sense in which it would directly co- 
 incide with the essence and substantial willing, as the root 
 of all being per se. Herbart, however, does not deny the 
 moral and judicial freedom ; he only seeks to rescue the no- 
 tion of it from being resolved into a wholly abstract, inde- 
 finite, and empty independence, and finds it in the well-marked 
 and perfect independence of a definite character. "Man 
 should know and feel that he acts in conformity with insight 
 or judgment, for in this consists the very essence of his in- 
 ward or spiritual freedom;" or freedom is " the combined faculty 
 of judging and arriving at a perfectly accordant resolution." It 
 is thus a capacity or power of doing, and involves just as much 
 a correct mode of judging as the consequent resolution and power 
 of action. But in the ordinary theories upon this subject, the 
 two component parts or elements which lie therein are not pro- 
 perly distinguished, — namely, upon the One hand, the arbitrary 
 character of the power to do, and, upon the other, the necessity 
 and incorruptible precision of the judgment. The will, wb.en 
 
 K 3 
 
134 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 realised in an individual case, is to the moral aesthetic judgment 
 of the conscience just as accidental a matter as a deed or action 
 is to a law-book. On that account Herbart especially insists 
 upon a decided separation of the principles of the theoretical 
 and practical philosophy, considering that they should not ap- 
 proximate in their points of starting, but for the first time only 
 in their results. The principles of Ethics reside in that in- 
 voluntary/ judgment of an aesthetic kind which acts with logical 
 severity according to the moral ideal, with which a given act 
 of the will has been compared. The theoretical philosophy 
 has, however, only to deal with the actual, and thus in the 
 Psychology with the wiU-movements, or with that which is ac- 
 tually willed. That which is a real object of cognition, and 
 that, which apart from that aesthetical act of judging, cannot 
 be understood, are to be separated ; but not, as in the systems 
 of Identity, to be resolved under the name of freedom into an 
 unity of a law of the reason that wills and fulfils itself; More- 
 over, as for the theoretical act of judging, no "good" or " evil " 
 is present, so also does the practical not trouble itself about 
 the question, whether any thing has been, nay, can or cannot 
 be accomplished.* 
 
 When in the mind several representations would simulta- 
 neously rise up and enter into conflict with each other, there 
 then comes into play the practical deliberation, which ultimately 
 reduces the selection that is made of them to one single purpose 
 or end in view. Thus the general volition, the power of coming 
 to a decision, the character of a man, will especially depend upon 
 the fact of his having rendered in his consciousness a certain 
 body of representations, a definite kind of mental images, persist- 
 ent, prominent, and thereby of such power that the other repre- 
 sentations become enfeebled by constant subjection, or are early 
 prevented from gaining any entrance whatever into the con- 
 sciousness. In the sway of this governing body of represent- 
 ations, which the longer it is established the more indisputable 
 it becomes, consists the habit and main object of volition. 
 
 Since man, by virtue of his self-consciousness, can contem- 
 plate his own states, and judge according to the idea of the good 
 and beautiful, there follows from this the conscience ; for there is 
 not only a conscience in a moral point of view, but a conscience 
 also of the truth, with which rules of art, nay even rules of 
 worldly prudence or wisdom, may be carried out. Now to these 
 ideas of the beautiful and good, says Herbart, there is added an 
 
 * Herbart uber philos. Studiiun. Kleine phil. Schriften, Bd. i, p. 151. 
 
HERBAET. 135 
 
 original testimony or evidence in the human consciousness : it 
 is not necessary to subject them to the same elaboration and 
 rectification as metaphysical notions ; but they are directly ap- 
 plicable to the passing of valid judgments, namely, of approval 
 and displeasure. They cannot even be first logically corrected ; 
 they must appear only in their purity and clearness ; for indeed 
 in many individuals they are frequently obscured and defaced 
 by the mass of subordinate representations. The fundamental 
 idea of them all is that oi Beauty (the koXov, which comprehends 
 the morally good within itself). And now let the beautiful 
 be but freed from impeding and perplexing representations of a 
 subordinate kind, depicted in its original state of purity and dis- 
 tinctness, while especially protected against being confounded 
 with the merely agreeable and useful, and every one recognises 
 and knows that, as something persistent, universal, and abiding, 
 it is well to be distinguished from the satisfaction of shifting 
 desires. This unveiling and portraying of the beautiful consti- 
 tutes the main business of the Practical philosophy, which hence 
 is j^sthelics in a wider sense, as we see, than what is usually 
 bestowed upon the word. Esthetics is a practical science, i. e. 
 it takes the idea that is given it of beauty, and with that sets to 
 work at the given. Thus, it consists of a series of artistic 
 rules, which instruct the artist how he is to deal with the object 
 upon which he is engaged, in order that it may correspond to 
 that idea, and so, instead of displeasing, may prove a source of 
 pleasure to himself or others. From the remainder of the 
 beautiful, however, the moral element detaches itself, as being 
 that very something, which is not merely possessed as a thing 
 of worth, but which itself determines the unconditioned worth 
 of individual persons. 
 
 As regards the Beautiful in the stricter sense, it is a matter of 
 indifierence as to whether we would be practical artists and re- 
 present it. It is merely a rule and law for the practical artist, 
 and the aesthetic conscience enforces obedience to it on whoever 
 has once selected it as his study and occupation. But there are 
 also technical rules *, says Herbart, whose prescripts carry in 
 themselves the character of a necessary law for all men, just 
 because all men must, by virtue of their whole existence, 
 elaborate this definite object of nature — namely, themselves; 
 the technical rules that are here indicated being the doctrine of 
 virtue. This doctrine rests upon the so-called practical ideas, 
 
 * Lehrbuch znr Einleitung in die Fhilosophie, 3te. Ausg. Konigsberg, 
 1804, p. 26. 
 
 K 4 
 
136 HISTOEICAL SUEVET. 
 
 t>{ which there are several, and of which five are especially to be 
 taken into account : 1st, the idea of internal or moral freedom ; 
 2nd, the idea of perfection (e. c/. of culture); 3rd, of benevolence 
 or of goodness; 4th, of justice; and 5th, of moderation. The 
 chief relation that is to be regarded in the doctrine of virtue, 
 as having to deal principally with the honourable and dis- 
 honourable, is the conformity of the will and judgment as acts 
 in one and the same rational being. Either the individual 
 affirms in his will what in his judgment he scorns, or he 
 neglects in the former what in the latter he prescribes to him- 
 self, or, lastly, his will and judgment are in conformity with one 
 another. This harmony it is which directly pleases us in a 
 moral sense, as being the morally beautiful, the virtue thought 
 of as an ideal, the declaration also of moral freedom. Justice in 
 particular springs from the voluntary establishment of harmony 
 between the wills of different human beings, and is thought of 
 as a rule which should obviate contention. Its validity and 
 sanctity depend upon the disapproval of contention, and cannot, 
 without a dangerous confusion of ideas, be built up upon any 
 other basis.* 
 
 Lastly, as regards the settlement of the religious question, 
 Herbart believes that what is especially required of him is, not 
 to regard, with Kant, the idea of conformity to purpose as a 
 purely subjective idea of the reason, which man only bestows 
 upon the course of nature, but rather to deduce the idea, toge- 
 ther with all empirical intuitions and notions, from nature itself, 
 or to demonstrate it in the same, i. e. in our empirical repre- 
 sentations."f If the world actually exists as a whole disposed 
 according to design, it follows that we must inquire also for the 
 author of this arrangement, and shall find him in an essence that 
 is above us, but not merely within our vision, which would only 
 transfer the reason of man to nature. This belief in a Spirit of 
 Order, little as it is grounded on demonstration, yet depends 
 directly upon the same conclusions, and has the same certainty 
 as the belief by which every man is convinced of the existence 
 of other rational spirits ; for of my fellow-men, I see only forms 
 and teleological acts, and that these proceed from rational 
 thought is only a belief, but one so worthy of confidence, that 
 
 * Herbart's practical philosophy has been further carried out by Har- 
 tenstein in his " Grundbegriife der ethischen Wissenschaften," 1844. For 
 a concise survey and general idea of this work see the Jenaische Liter. 
 Anzeige, 1845. No. 16, et seq. 
 
 f Lehrbuch zur Einleitung in die Philosophic, 3te. Ausg. Konigsberg, 
 1804. p. 243, et seq, - 
 
HEUBART. 137 
 
 it stands iil certainty above all knowledge. To carry out in 
 scientific detail a Cosmogony is indeed impossible, but, as to what 
 belongs to the domain of real concrete existences, the position 
 is indisputable, that they are in substance created. To the 
 substance belong accidents ; these, however, may be regarded as 
 raised above the infinitely manifold possibility of the accidental 
 views by preparatory disturbances and movements. " Besides, 
 all metaphysics, so long as it does not, like mathematics, enjoy 
 general consent, and is only comprised or thought of as investi- 
 gation, can neither encroach upon experience nor upon the 
 feelings of those who live only in belief."* 
 
 It is evident at a glance that Herbart has so far kept to 
 the Xantian stage of philosophy as to admit of no true cogni- 
 tion and knowing of the qualities of the existent and of things, 
 but, like Kant, only of a cognition of phenomena. -Since, 
 however, the varying sensations, as well as their connection or 
 form, are still directly and undeniably given, while these, 
 although an appearance only in themselves, yet presuppose a 
 phenomenal or real element external to or without the soul, it 
 follows that the presence or existence of a real world, apart 
 from the Ego, is proved ; and that the soul also stands in con- 
 nection with this. The origin of the sensations is no longer a 
 riddle, so soon as we regard them as self-preservations ; but it 
 does not follow from this self-preservation that the sensations 
 truly correspond to the qualities of the reals, but rather that 
 they are purely subjective, and in so far an appearance. 
 Each monad lives shut up within itself together with its own 
 sensations ; in my soul-monad, no other monad can ever 
 convert itself directly into my knowing or sensation. This is 
 the subjective aspect or feature of the system, which we must 
 not, however, by any means, confound with subjective idealism ; 
 nay more, it stands in direct opposition to the latter, inasmuch 
 as with Herbart the diversity of the sensations, i. e. of the 
 relations of the self-preservation, point in general of necessity 
 
 * Hanptpiincte, § 14. We meet only in Herbart with some scattered 
 aphorisms of a Philosophy of Religion. As. regards, however, what may be 
 achieved in this respect by his theory, which is essentially based upon a 
 pare moral, the reader may consult the Religions-philosophie of Drobisch. 
 Leipzig, 1840. 
 
138 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 to actual real objects, to a diversity of the real, and this again to 
 a corresponding multiplicity of reciprocal relations, while the 
 subjective idealism, such as we shall encounter presently in 
 Fichte, explains the things to be pure spontaneous products of 
 the Ego. Herbart, on the contrary, says of his real world ; it is 
 only the relations, not that which stands in these relations, which 
 we cognise ; all our metaphysical knowledge bears reference to 
 the form, not to the quaUty, the material of the real in itself. 
 This intrinsic nature {Ansieh) of the real, says he, does not 
 concern the human being ; it concerns him only to learn what 
 the things are for him ; and this he is taught by a long and 
 faithful observation of experience. We cognise no substance 
 whatever, and as each substance is merely conceivable as a 
 quale, no quality whatever in itself. " In our circle of experi- 
 ence, we picture only to ourselves the concurrence or disinte- 
 gration of such unities as determine among each other the 
 groups of unities, by virtue of which they are to appear to us. 
 Experience merely consists in a tissue or web of relations. 
 The given contains only that objective appearance which is 
 valid for all spectators, but can furnish no predicates of the 
 things themselves. Yet how much, e. g., have the astronomers 
 made out of such an appearance, by united skill and power ! 
 The ordinary human being draws thence his usual worldly 
 prudence, the satisfaction of his desires, and the remedies for 
 his pains. For all this, the knowledge of the true qualities, 
 and of what actually takes place in the substances, is neither 
 necessary nor useful, nor possessed of any influence whatever. ' 
 We live once and for all in relations, and need nothing further.. 
 It is the metaphysician alone who perceives how remote the 
 true real and the actual occurrence are from our usual sphere 
 of thought."* 
 
 The true objective cognition of qualities, and of what actually , 
 takes place in the substances, is not necessary for the ordinary, 
 purposes of life ; enough, if we only know how any thing is 
 for or in relation to us. If, however, we would concede this 
 point for the sake of getting agreeably through life, still it 
 would be impossible thereby to explain in a satisfactory man- 
 ner, either that higher object and impulse, which is in itself a 
 valuable acquisition, namely, the intellectual object of cognising 
 truth for the sake of the cognition, or those ethical and reli- 
 gious objects of the human mind which are inseparably united 
 with this. The modest judgment, apparently so befitting us, 
 * Allgem. Metaphys. Bd. ii. p. 414. 
 
HEKBAET. 139 
 
 concerning human reason as limited, the refuge in belief, when- 
 ever and because we cannot directly know nor comprehend the 
 highest verities, — this it is which every where leaves behind 
 a thorn in the mind and a pang of doubt that is not to be 
 silenced. It is not the mere pride of knowledge, but an ill-con- 
 cealed contradiction that stings us, a contradiction in which a 
 definite philosophising has first entangled us, and then left us 
 without advice, because it no longer knows how to help itself, 
 and would like, accordingly, to shift the burden upon the 
 shoulders of human reason. But here also we encounter the 
 same error. Herbart strives to remove in detail the contra- 
 dictions from the special notions, and then lets the contradiction 
 stand upon the whole. A general defect which pervades the 
 whole of his Metaphysics is, that the objective truth is wholly 
 devoid of any unity or substantial bond of connection, of which, 
 although subjectively — yet only subjectively — we might be 
 conscious, and which, if our knowing is to hold any fundamental 
 and essentially adequate relation to being, might be set as a 
 postulate to the objectivity. The relations of the real, which 
 should supply this deficiency, the repulsion, and especially the 
 attraction, resolve themselves into a mere subjective appearance. 
 We find, indeed, how this appearance can originate in us, the 
 observing subjects, and, granted the premises, how it must 
 originate, but by so much, the less do we experience the ob- 
 jective truth, the actual occurrence or that which really takes 
 place. It is but too frequently the case that we render the 
 phenomena conceivable by certain fictions, e. g., when we 
 would represent the spaceless monads as globules that wholly 
 or partially penetrate each other; but that which would render 
 the fact conceivable, is the fictitious element therein, and this 
 must again be negated : thus, of these views of Herbart, which 
 directly concern the cardinal point of his whole system, we 
 may say, as Jacobi did of Kant's system, " one cannot get into 
 it without them, and with them one cannot remain therein." 
 
 The whole system formed itself in Herbart's mind in opposi- 
 tion to and in conflict with the Idealism of Fiehte, with which 
 he was dissatisfied ; and, in direct opposition to this idealism, 
 Herbart is in the right, so far as he insists upon an objective, 
 real existence ; for such right he will maintain against every 
 System of idealistic monism. A second fundamental defect of 
 this form of idealism was its utter inability to prove and con- 
 ceive of the emergence of an infinitely manifold content from 
 out the abstract principle of the Ego, which was no ground or 
 
140 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 substratum for such a production. In opposition to this, Her- 
 bart persisted in declaring that from a single abstract factor no 
 multiplicity of phenomena could be explained. Thereby he 
 renders valid an all-important fundamental canon, one which 
 has been violated both by ancient metaphysicians, and by the 
 professors of the subsequent Identity-systems, — namely, that of 
 the sufficient reason, by virtue of which the higher and more 
 concrete cannot spring out of nor be derived from the lowei? 
 and more abstract, nor be evaded by the assumption of a 
 "potency," which is neither acknowledged to be real, nor 
 mental ; but, as will be shown further on, is commonly placed 
 as an indifference at the bottom of both forms of existence. 
 
 Now, while on this point, no less than on others which have 
 preceded it, we would not hesitate to do full justice to our 
 author ; we cannot, for all that, forbear from placing Herbart 
 as the counterpart of Fichte upon the same line with the 
 latter, though at its opposite extremity, so that the two must 
 form a mutual complement to one another, provided only that 
 they are apprehended from a higher point of view. We must 
 say that Fichte is the same monadologue, but from the sub« 
 jective, that Herbart is from the objective, point of view. The 
 latter regards all from without, and, accordingly, every thing 
 appears to him as an existing object, the special determinations 
 of thought even appearing after the fashion of things : the 
 former transports himself directly into the place of the thinking 
 subject, is himself the monadic Ego, and every thing converts 
 itsdf with him into pure thought-determinations, and the 
 objects emerge from him only as thoughts of the subject. 
 Both, however, have an equally abstract void being, as their 
 principle and essence, for while Fichte admits the fulness of 
 thought as being directly present and given in the Ego, but 
 not produced by it; Herbart must presuppose the funda-< 
 mental elements of things to be objectively devoid of produc- 
 tion. Hence, with Herbart, a " Cosmogony " is not merely 
 non-deducible, but is, in fact, a contradiction, being not merely 
 inconceivable, but also impossible, and, as a direct consequence 
 of this, a free creation also. Herbart, indeed, lays the chief 
 stress upon this point ; that, for a world of monads originally 
 represented as chaotic, no necessary ground could be afforded 
 for an orderly and teleological development, but that, should 
 this world have assumed any form, to regard such as a 
 matter of accident, would be untenable; that, consequently, 
 from the actual conformity to purpose which is perceived in 
 
HERBAET. 141 
 
 the world, we must conclude that there is an author conscious 
 to himself of an object ; but as this author must himself be 
 thought of as monad, and, as of the monads or reals, it univer- 
 sally holds good that they only, in and through their association 
 with others, by virtue of the " self-preservation," spiritually de- 
 termine themselves and perfect their states, it follows, that a 
 series of assumptions and suppositions is forced upon us, which^ 
 if, as the system justifies us by its notion of substance, we were 
 to transfer by analogy from finite things to God, we must 
 either have as a result a very inadequate notion of God and 
 his activity, or we must not at all apply it to the highest 
 essence, so that we here find ourselves given up to ignorance 
 and incomprehensibility. 
 
 Herbart cannot relax one jot of the strictness with which he 
 regards the notion of being ; for from this only arise . the 
 contradictions, which entail, as a direct consequence, their me- 
 thod of solution, i. e. his whole Metaphysics, if the notion of 
 existence admitted of being in any way easily dealt with. But, 
 this not being the case, we are prevented from taking the internal 
 states of the real essences as any thing more than an ap- 
 pearance, which only originates for the spectator, who gazes 
 upon them in their manifold groupings ; an appearance which, 
 being then subjective as it is in the Ego of the spectator, is 
 again mirrored over into the interior of the realsj where it 
 must in like manner be an internal state as in the subject ; 
 and again, because these states have been previously compre- 
 hended only as external relations of the reals among them- 
 selves, it follows that the psychological states in the subject 
 also are external relations only of the representations among 
 themselves. Nevertheless, here in the subject, the Ego is the 
 common substance of the representations, which are mere 
 inherences of it, although to each other they hold the rela- 
 tion of real essences. If, however, the actual occurrence, or 
 the movement and combination of the real essences, is to find 
 objectively its ultimate ground of explanation in their in- 
 ternal states, it is necessary to transfer the collective image, 
 which holds good of the interior of the subject, to the associa- 
 tion of the objective group, to the complexion or the thing 
 itself: but then the form of the complexion or the associ- 
 ation inevitably becomes something as substantially single as 
 the Ego itself. Thus, there is either no single self and self- 
 consciousness, or the form of unity of the things is just as 
 substantial as the subjective self; both which cases, howr 
 
142 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 ever, run counter to the hypothesis. With all this hangs in 
 closest connection what has been already noticed above^ con- 
 cerning the plastic nature of the essences as regards their intert 
 nal states, resembling, as it were, a re-collection of the latter ; 
 when either the essences appear isolated as a many-sided con- 
 dition of states, which is no longer consistent with the strict 
 notion of a simple quale as such, or, to evoke multiplicity and 
 change in them, an actual association of monads is required. 
 
 All this and much more, which might be pointed out as in- 
 volving difiBculties unsolved, will ultimately find its source in 
 the principle and method of the whole system, to which in con- 
 clusion we will once again revert. We do not, however, meet 
 with a single principle, as a starting point, but with an infinite 
 number of beginnings, and the unity which is craved by the 
 science of philosophy must first be produced in the end, i. e. in 
 the result. The whole system is the direct reverse of a genetic 
 one, such as Idealism when perfected would be ; it is not from 
 the point of unity of the eye that the cone of light, which might 
 « depict a plurality of objects, streams forth, but from many ob- 
 jective points the rays converge together to a focus in the eye, 
 i. e. in the subject. In this way the unity is only subjective, 
 not objective ; it is only in the knowing, not in the being or 
 existence. Thus, if a substantial unity was known, i. e. not 
 merely thought of, but presupposed also as existing in itself, as 
 truth, something false would then be known or rather only 
 thought of; thus in the thinking process or consciousness, a 
 something, a form, must be posited, which must not hold good 
 of the objects, namely, the unity or thoroughly substantial bond 
 of connection. It follows, therefore, as a direct consequence of 
 this, that Herbart says, what holds good of the notion as notion, 
 does not hold good of the existent, or of what is posited by this 
 notion ; for a notion is a representation, a mere inherence and 
 modification of the state of the subject, and is thus the direct 
 reverse or negation of the true objective being per se ; to 
 confound the one with the other would infallibly lead to ideal- 
 ism, and would leave no real being whatever external to or 
 without the subject. By the same right, however, the relation 
 admits also of being reversed. If all and every thing that is, 
 be real and self-subsistent, then there ia no more in the know- 
 ing than in the being an all-embracing unity ; each monad is 
 together with its representations — or whatever else we please 
 to call its modifications — absolutely shut up within itself, 
 isolated, an idealism in itself per se, and of a real world-unity 
 
HEBBART. 143 
 
 ■without itself, it can know nothing whatever, because none 
 such exists ; even the present appearance can prove nothing, 
 for it is only the peculiar appearance of the monad in itself, 
 as being the ground and consequently productive source of 
 that appearance ; but this again would be wholly at variance 
 with the hypothesis. 
 
 Herbart himself acknowledges that there is only something 
 for us, so far as it is known ; within the subjectivity itself and 
 by virtue of logical necessity is the certainty alone to be at- 
 tained of an objectivity perhaps utterly distinct from us, or 
 devoid of any influence. He requires, however, that such an 
 objectivity should be actually present ; for to insist upon the 
 strictness of the notion of being is to negate, and with that 
 to dismiss every solution of objective truth into the region 
 only of subjective thought. This, aS already said, is the one 
 side of the system that stands in full and unshakeable strength 
 against every system of Idealism and Identity. A system has 
 no truth, and' is therefore false in itself, so soon as refusing to 
 acknowledge being to be a free, true, and independent being per 
 se, it absolutely and directly identifies the thinking process with 
 the being. Now then is this truth to be logically or empirically 
 confirmed, i. e., raised to a state of certainty ? If scientifically, 
 then without doubt this must be done in a logical manner, i. e, 
 by pointing out the contradiction which might lie in an opposite 
 assertion. The knowing must know the existent, or else it is 
 no knowledge, no truth. Nevertheless we find, so soon as we • 
 press forwards to this at least formally universal principle, the 
 idea of the knowing or of truth, that Herbart is not distinctly 
 conscious of it. He occasionally rejects even this principle as 
 unfruitful, and instead of attempting, if only in the simplest 
 analytical way, to find out whether any thing admits of being 
 deduced from it, or whether (to use his own words) this notion 
 points to definite complementary notions, he aifirms, that we can 
 do nothing with it, without either falling back again upon the 
 favourite doctrine of psychological faculties or else hypostasizing 
 the activity of thought, i. e. rendering it a constituent of the 
 thinking subject.* 
 
 Upon the other hand, Herbart raises the question : if all 
 speculation and scientific interest turns upon unity and depends 
 upon the instinct for it, is this unity to be merely a subjective 
 unity in the sphere of the thoughts, or an objective unity also 
 
 * Tiber philos. Studium. Kleine Schriiiten, Bd. i. p. 161. 
 
144 HISTOKICAL SURVEY. 
 
 of the things ? is it, in short, to be both a principle of philosophy,- 
 as also the expression of nature in the aggregate ?* The answer 
 is," so far as the thinker thinks the real, he stands in need of the 
 unity ; for in his contemplations of nature a general connection 
 must prevail ; in so far, however, as to the question, what he 
 thinks, the reply is — the real ; that want or requirement falls 
 away entirely, arid on this very account, that it lies in every 
 instance not in the what or something, but only in the thinking 
 process." Thus we have, in fact, a want or necessity of the 
 thought, which consists in cognising the truth, and thus thinks 
 ing of it as it is ; and nevertheless we cannot cognise and think 
 of it as it is, without thinking it. otherwise than it is. If by this 
 Herbart would only say, with Kant, that the thought, I think, 
 must accompany all my representations, in order to elevate the 
 thinking process to the self ^consciousness, and that this thought 
 may serve as a corrective against falling into the error, whiph is 
 close at hand, of confounding subjectivity and objectivity, idea- 
 lity and reality — it follows that this reminiscence of the formal 
 distinction of thought from that which is posited by it, is, as 
 has been said, a point which it is of especial importance should, 
 be rendered again valid in our own time. But meanwhile thia. 
 distinction must not be rendered a material one of the content,, 
 and extended so as to imply that, although, subjectively, unity 
 may be present, yet that, objectively, it has no meaning and 
 truth. 
 
 It must surprise us to find how, on the one hand, it is admitted 
 that the absolute position, the hastily granted being, must 
 in numberless cases be withdrawn, because the something to 
 which it has been attributed does not sustain it ; while, upon 
 the other, an equally a priori mention is made of qualities, and 
 without any closer determination single qualia are posited as 
 real essences, which, upon closer consideration, just because they 
 are mere qualities, resolve themselves into relative states and 
 relapse into dialectics, so that in the end no essence whatever is 
 left as truly existing and self-subsistent per se, except those 
 which are themselves Egoes or thinking subjects. It is, how-, 
 ever, a striking fact, that Herbart, as well as any one of the 
 more recent philosophers, acknowledges the insufficiency of the 
 ordinary formal or analytical logic to solve the highest meta- 
 physical problems, and has shown that the reason for this es- 
 sentially depends upon our taking the notions and their momenta 
 or characteristics as ready-made or given ; and so dealing with 
 
 * Tiber philos. Studium, p. 131. et seq. 
 
HEEBAET. 145 
 
 them, that only compositions and decompositions, but no essen- 
 tial unity, is either produced or presupposed. It hence dis- 
 closes no substantial copula or bond, no proper ground either 
 of unity or multiplicity: it lacks this ground, and with this 
 the deepest point into which philosophy has to inquire. In 
 place of this comes in, with Herbart, where the problems 
 demand it, the Method of Relations, which sets out indeed 
 from an objective unity (the m in the^), but by rendering this 
 m by subdivision into several jm's, equivalent to the n, sup- 
 presses objectively and in truth the substantial unity, and 
 leaves the latter to subsist only subjectively in A, i. e. in the 
 appearance or phenomenon for us. Thus, this method is, in 
 fact, a reduction and adjustment of the problems in question to 
 or for the old logical method of regarding them, which has been 
 already declared to be insufficient. 
 
 Much of what might here find a place will be more readily 
 understood, when we come to treat of the other side of philoso- 
 phy as represented by the Idealists and Monists. We must not, 
 however, upon the above grounds, find fault with the unpre- 
 judiced student of philosophy, if he turns with only excited, 
 but unsatisfied, curiosity to other masters, who, at least, pro- 
 mise him full satisfaction. 
 
146 HISTOEICAL SUE VET. 
 
 LECTURE VI. 
 
 The result of the former discourses, and with this the present 
 one is now in its turn to be more closely connected, may be 
 briefly expressed as follows. 
 
 Kant, in striving to put an end to every false and unproved 
 supposition, or to all dogmatising in philosophy, found that we 
 mirror over into the objective world the kind and mode of our 
 vision, or the subjective arrangement of our perceptive and 
 thinking faculty ; that this world never comes directly with us 
 into view, but only by means of the categories of our sense and 
 ■understanding; and that consequently , all experience, every- 
 thing which comes before us as a world and an event of that 
 world, is only the reflex in our consciousness of a perfectly un- 
 known external, and thus is only the phenomenon, as it must 
 fashion itself within us according to internal laws of the mind, 
 — a phenomenon, in which we may very well detect our 
 mental organisation, or, so to speak, the optical arrangement of 
 our mental eye, but not the nature of the objects, or how they 
 may happen to be in themselves. 
 
 Nevertheless, objects, which are reflected, must be present 
 external to or without us, since otherwise our sense and under- 
 standing would be absolutely devoid of content ; for the under- 
 standing, as the activity which flrst impresses upon that content 
 within us a definite form, fashions and arranges it, and in like 
 manner the theoretical reason, which in its turn brings order 
 and systematic unity into this formed or moulded content of 
 the understanding, are both in themselves absolutely empty, 
 being mere formative activities for a material to be obtained 
 through the senses ; but they have at the same time the capa- 
 bility of reflecting upon these their functions and operations, 
 in a word, upon their own action, and then by becoming purely 
 conscious in abstracto of these, apart from all material, of 
 erecting their proceedings into rules, or what is commonly 
 called Logic ; but in doing this they but too readily forget that 
 they have no content in themselves, no other object than them- 
 selves, in short, only their own empty mode of activity set before 
 them, and so they regard also these subjective forms of acti- 
 vity, when comprised under certain notions, or categories and 
 
riCHTE. 147 
 
 ideas, as something real, or as laws, to whicli in actual nature 
 similar arrangements must correspond, because they so sub- 
 jectively think them. Thus the notions that correspond to the 
 categories of the senses, such as space and time, those of the 
 understanding, as substantiality, causality, and such like ; and 
 those of the reason, absolute subjective being, or mind (soul), 
 the totality of phenomena or world-unity, and the idea of the 
 fundamental and primary essence, the complex of all reality 
 or God — all these notions and ideas only originate from our 
 objectifying, hypostasizing, and even personifying the kind and 
 mode of our thinking activity, to do which, however, the imagi- 
 native faculty is not competent. 
 
 Such was the result of the Kantian Critick of Pure Reason. 
 Jacobi had, upon the other hand, appealed to the matter-of-fact 
 existence, both of the sensuous intuitions as well as of the ideas 
 in the reason, and had rejected every genetic explanation of 
 them as inadmissible ; he had suggested, that just as every in- 
 fluence of sensuo-corporeal impressions upon a mental conscious- 
 ness was inexplicable, but still actually present, so also was 
 the reason not a higher logical understanding, but a faculty 
 designed for perception, a higher sense, and that the ideas were 
 actually, i. e. in an inexplicable manner, given in and together 
 with it. He had — and that was the chief result of his labours 
 — directed attention to a richer content of the human mind, 
 which could be perceived and gradually disclosed by the 
 reason. Thus, the reason held good with Jacobi for a sense, 
 or for that faculty of perception which is given us that we may 
 become conscious, and that indeed directly, of the mysteries of 
 our own spiritual essence, or of the nature and fulness of that 
 which within us is called mind. 
 
 In this way was distinctly mapped out by Kant and Jacobi 
 the twofold tendency or direction which philosophy was to 
 assume : it either took the images and ideas as a matter-of-faCt 
 basis ; appealed to the undeniable fact, we have them, they are 
 there, and to the equally undeniable fact, that they originate 
 for us, we know not how ; and continued to build upon this 
 empirical foundation by making a constant appeal to a ready 
 prepared existence — such was the Eealistic view, which has 
 for its fundamental notion that of different substances, real, 
 immutable, and directly present; a doctrine, this; first dis- 
 tinctly declared by Herbart, who has hitherto pursued this 
 tendency in the most consistent manner ; — or philosophy sought, 
 in the next place, as Kant has done with the general notions of 
 
 L 2 
 
148 HISTORICAL SUETET. 
 
 the understanding and the ideas, to explain their origin geneti- 
 cally, by proving the speculative and thinking mind of man to be 
 itself the creative author of these notions, and then represent- 
 ing these notions as products of the reason. Such was that 
 tendency, which would ultimately explain all from the vital 
 principle, and has hence been denominated the Dynamico- 
 idealistic view. Now it is this view which we must proceed to 
 characterise in its progressive development through the writings 
 of Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel. 
 
 While for a long time the greater number of philosophical 
 writers persisted in the endeavour to combine Kant's Critick 
 and Jacobi's rational belief, and work them out together into a 
 tenable system, a point to which an impetus was especially given 
 by Carl Leonhard Reinhold (first of all in Jena, and then in 
 Kiel), it happened that Johann Gottlob Fichte (born at Kam- 
 menau in the Oberlausitz May 18th, 1762, and at that time 
 acting as private teacher in Switzerland) became, by his own 
 confession, fully convinced* (just as Kant had formerly been 
 by Hume) through the sceptical writings of Salomon Maimon 
 and Jacob Ernst Schulze, that as yet philosophy had by no 
 means risen to the rank or dignity of an evident science. 
 
 Now, in order that we may not lose our way throughout the 
 whole of Kchte's undertaking by an error at starting, 'it is 
 positively necessary to think distinctly to oneself of the object 
 and goal, which was incessantly pursued by this acute and 
 thoroughly scientific thinker. 
 
 We have already seen, at the very outset of our inquirieSj 
 that philosophy aspires after knowledge, where otherwise faith 
 and opinion alone prevaiL But that knowledge can only be 
 attained through the consecutive steps of a system, which has 
 been built up on an intrinsically certain foundation, and that 
 indeed in sach a way that one position sustains the other, so that 
 all of them may be finally reduced to one fundamental position 
 or principle, as being that which is directly certain. If now 
 such a system has been built up with a strict regard to truth 
 and to definite rules, philosophy, or the love of knowing, has 
 attained her goal, being now no longer philosophy, but actual 
 knowledge, episteme, or absolute science. Now this was the 
 point which Fichte yearned to attain (as every one does, who 
 * Begrifif der Wissenschaftslehre, Weimar, 1794. Preface, p. 3. 
 
FICHTE. 149 
 
 has once distinctly thought out the idea of philosophy). Im- 
 pelled no less than Kant, in the depths of his own nature, by 
 the strongest ethical consciousness, he would make an end to 
 philosophy, if possible, and restore the science or knowledge 
 in its' place. On that account he called his system " Wissen- 
 schaftslehre,'' or Theory of Knowledge ; in short, it was to be 
 nothing more nor less than a method of instruction as to the 
 mode by which a thorough and strictly scientific knowledge 
 could be accomplished or brought about. In doing this he 
 believed and was firmly convinced that the material for this 
 purpose, or the stuff, as it were, for this edifice, had been 
 perfectly supplied by Kant, and that nothing else was wanting 
 than its arrangement, in order to let the science obtained by 
 that philosopher come forth triumphantly and overwhelmingly 
 in its full character of sterling and immoveable strength. 
 
 The main point in this was of course to find out the principle, 
 which, though nowhere distinctly expressed by Kant, was yet 
 that upon which Kant's own view of the matter depended. Kant 
 had reduced aU. to the internal a priori arrangement of our 
 thinking faculty, which was with him based upon a number of con- 
 tiguous peculiarities and special laws, i. e. the categories. These 
 were in part involved in contradictions with one another, and 
 above all there was no means of arriving at any unity of con- 
 sciousness, no absolutely first and last principle to be found, so 
 long as two different sources of our knowledge were adopted, 
 whereof the one was to lie in the depths of our own mental nature 
 the other external to us in the influences of unknown things. 
 Fichte, however, was firmly convinced that that master-mind 
 had been misunderstood when it was saddled with contradictions, 
 or when it was believed that Kant, in his deepest reasonings, 
 rested, by turns,' first on the sensuous phenomenon, in order to 
 confirm the judgments of the understanding, and then on the 
 a priori nature of the mind, in order to confirm the pheno- 
 menon. Such a twofold procedure as this, betraying as it 
 does an utter want of one common and deepest point of support, 
 should not, he believed, be attributed to the master of philoso- 
 phy, and hence he regarded all this as a misunderstanding. 
 
 He was actually not aware, that, while seeking to expound 
 the true sense of the Kantian Criticism, another and a new 
 system was silently evolving itself ; and was not convinced of 
 this fact until Kant himself in the Intelligenzblatte, No. 109. 
 der allgemeinen Literaturzeitung, 1799, and at the same time 
 in the Hamburger Correspondent, protested in a formal and 
 
 L 3 
 
150 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 most decisive manner against the exposition made by Fichte of 
 his doctrine. 
 
 Fichte — that I may express my opinion at the very outset — 
 has not only during his lifetime been upon all sides misunder- 
 stood, but is still partly so in the sense to which an almost general 
 credence has been given, namely, that nothing is to be gained 
 from his idealism, and that it is not worth one's trouble to study 
 it. One usually passes him by in studying the philosophy of the 
 present age, and yet in his system alone lies the hey to the 
 comprehension of all the more recent systems. 
 
 In the first place, if not a thoroughly false, it is still a dis- 
 torted view, and an impeding prejudice, when one goes upon 
 the judgment drawn from hearsay, which says, that Fichte 
 was convinced that he himself, or his own Ego, made up or pro- 
 jected in a dazzling light the world before itself, that no world 
 could exist, and that, properly speaking, Fichte alone could be 
 present with his magic-lantern in universal space. " Such," says 
 Fichte himself, "is that unmeaning, irrational, and bottomless 
 Idealism and Egoism, which only offended courtiers and cap- 
 tious philosophers have palmed upon me." To deny the existence 
 of the world was not even Fichte's intention ; nay, what is 
 more, it continues to subsist for him unassailed in its reality^ 
 but upon other grounds than those which are usually adopted}' 
 and he even busied himself in the practical part of his philoso- 
 phy with exhibiting and justifying this reality in the light of 
 a higher necessity. But in venturing thus far, he was much 
 too consistent or logical to let any thing hold good in the theo- 
 retical part of his system that did not admit of being strictly 
 proved from his principle ; he would not deny the objective , 
 world, but he repudiated every explanation of our knowledge 
 that depended upon the common assumption of an external 
 influence, as being one which would at the same time invest 
 our freedom and self-activity with external limits. What he 
 desired, was to furnish a Theory of Knowledge, and to establish 
 it of one piece, in the strictest connection and in perfect unity ; 
 and this he could not do otherwise than by keeping himself 
 strictly to the stand-point of the subjective principle. Every 
 thing, which may possibly be and occur external to 'us, takes 
 place, it is clear, external to us and to our consciousness; 
 that it occurs and how it occurs, we positively learn only from 
 within, or within our subjective sphere of thought. Thus, is 
 the image that is reflected in me a reflex from without ; I can 
 only know this through being necessitated by my own inward 
 
FICHTE. 151 
 
 nature and reason to adopt and presuppose such influencing 
 objects. I see that these phenomena are present in me ; and 
 whence are they ? Whether I have engendered them myself, 
 or another than my Ego has evoked and occasioned them in 
 this my Ego; still in either case my Ego has been actively 
 engaged in the matter. I can absolutely know nothing beyond 
 what is present within me, or in my consciousness, as a some- 
 thing known ; does my reason find itself necessitated, i. e. by 
 its own rational laws of thought, to assume something external 
 to me, stiU it is this very reason, i. e. my own Ego, which, 
 thinks, presupposes these things to be without me, or, as 
 Fichte expresses himself, posites them. Such, then, is that 
 calumniated idealism upon which so much crude and cheap wit 
 has been expended, yet which still to every one who thinks 
 over the matter in any degree must obviously appear to be 
 the only consistent road for philosophy to tread. 
 
 Thus, that which the things external to me are to be, the 
 reason or the understanding has obviously thought in them ; 
 for in first presupposing them, we presuppose them also with 
 certain qualities — in short, all that we ascribe to things, or 
 regard as being derived from them, is first bestowed definitely 
 by us upon them ; the true and original drift of all this, being, 
 that the consciousness has representations in itself, and. that 
 our own understanding presupposes things, in order that it 
 may explain the origin of these representations. Thus we 
 have before us a thoroughly internal action and essence : first 
 of aU, images'and representations; secondly, the representation 
 of things without us ; and then, as being likewise thought by the 
 understanding, the relation and reciprocal action of these things 
 and those copies among themselves : thus we have nothing 
 whatever beyond images and thoughts, for the things also, in 
 so far as we think them, are still only something thought. It 
 must accordingly be possible to discover, in this thoroughly 
 subjective sphere of life and movement, a thoroughly immanent 
 and subjective theory, and upon this to build up a thoroughly 
 consistent system. 
 
 Such is Fichte's fundamental view. We see from this that 
 he had, as already said, no intention whatever of denying 
 the presence of things external to us ; — that he did not think 
 even of this — but simply declared that aU that we could 
 know of things without us, even their bare existence, is still- 
 within us, and, in so far as all this arrives at the consciousness, 
 is only a thought, a something thought of, and that indeed by 
 
 L 4 
 
152 HISTORIOAIi SUKVET. 
 
 US, being thought of in each man by his own Ego — and each 
 one of us is only justified in speaking of his Ego — and so also 
 in philosophy of the Ego, in a general sense. 
 
 Now, whether Fichte, either in the course or at the outset 
 of his investigation, had reflected sufficiently so as to perceive 
 that his stand-point, as subject, necessarily presupposes of itself 
 an objectwity, or external world, which limits the subject and 
 influences it by acting upon it, is a question to be determined 
 later on. Thus much, however, is certain, that even after 
 the discovery of such an influence to be presupposed, stiU the 
 effect of this, as it is manifested in the consciousness (and only 
 in so far can we speak of it), can only be regarded as a subject 
 tive process, as a something felt and thought ; and that we 
 shall never and nowhere find a means of thus thinking of 
 reality external to us, as it is, unless we first discover and 
 directly perceive in our own consciousness some real or es- 
 sential element; for thus alone can we suppose what is in- 
 ternally perceived to exist externally in like quality ; or in so 
 far only as we may discover a reality in our own soul, can we 
 have an acquaintance with realities in the same sense external 
 to us, namely, by a kind of analogy or multiplication of our 
 own real essence. On that very account Fichte was as intent 
 upon discovering a. single principle for the theoretical philo- 
 sophy, as in maintaining the same absolutely free for the prac- 
 tical. So soon as, with Eeinhold, we place at the foundation 
 of our reasoning an Ego determined by real facts of the con- 
 sciousness, the question at once arises for consideration as to 
 the condition of this passively conditioned state ; thus the con- 
 ditionating (the object) becomes forthwith elevated above the 
 Ego, becomes itself a principle, and the Ego ceases to act 
 absolutely and freely. To these preliminary observations, I 
 will only add the following. It will at the outset facilitate 
 the understanding of Fichte's, and in the next place of Scheli? 
 ling's views also, if we assume that there are unconscious re- 
 presentations, i. e. determinations, modifications of the mind^ 
 internal states of the soul, or states, in which the mental 
 nature is, before the consciousness perceives itself therein. It 
 is throughout presupposed by Fichte, that the consciousness is 
 but an inward perception of this already present state ; the 
 consciousness then suddenly perceives these states, determina- 
 tions, i. e. feelings and representations, in itself, finds itself 
 already in them, or them in itself, and as it is not conscious of 
 having evoked these freely by its own activity, or as, properly 
 
FICHTE. 153 
 
 Speaking, having had any share in them, it feels them to b6 
 passive states, i. e, determinations not caused by itself, but by 
 something else, although in fact they have been self-posited, 
 but not as yet adapted as such for the self-consciousness. 
 
 Hence to the natural and unprejudiced man, the question does 
 not occur, as to whether he has in any way evoked these intui- 
 tions of himself; no, he sees the things and believes that he 
 sees them ; he does not even distinguish his representations from 
 the things ; he does not even think, so as to perceive that he 
 can only have in himself images of the things ; but he be- 
 lieves that he looks out of himself and sees the things them- 
 selves. That, however, it may be merely images of things 
 present which we have, is a thought which is first awakened in 
 us by philosophical reflection. 
 
 The next step that he makes is to compare his representa- 
 tion with the thing, to ascertain if the former be correct. How 
 then does he begin to do this ? He shuts, as it were, or averts 
 his eyes, retains the image internally and then again looks 
 forth at the thing, as he believes. But, thirdly, he must re- 
 flect still more closely in order to discern that this pro- 
 cedure is none other than a comparison of the representations 
 with the intuitions, and that the image in the intuition is just 
 as much a subjective image as the image of the representation. 
 Thus, he compares images with images, and all that he really 
 does consists, in good truth, only in investigating whether in 
 the original image, which was present in him as an intuition, 
 any thing may have been peradventure altered by him in his 
 representation. The thought of wishing to compare our repre- 
 sentations with the things in themselves, in order to see whe- 
 ther they accord, depends altogether upon the inconsiderate 
 supposition that we can arrive in any way at a direct know- 
 ledge of the thing in itself. How indeed could we attain to this 
 in any other way than by representations of it ? The jug- 
 glery that deceives us vanishes instantly when we hold fast 
 'by this one position, which is easily understood, namely, that 
 to wish to represent things as they are in themselves implies 
 nothing more than to desire to be able to represent things 
 without representing them, or to wish to have a representation 
 of things without any representation of them. 
 
 Even the Original intuition, in which, so long as I behold it, I 
 can alter nothing, which is there, in fact, without mj having 
 contributed any thing to it by means of the consciousness, is 
 and remains only a modification of my soul, in a word, a some- 
 
154 HISTORICAL SITE VET. 
 
 thing subjective. The only characteristic, by which we distin- 
 guish the intuition given us from the free representation, resides 
 only in my subjective consciousness, namely, in being conscious 
 to myself of not having acted freely in its production. 
 
 Now, the whole question turns upon this point: whence 
 comes this consciousness or feeling of non-freedom in me, with 
 which the present intuition, in contradistinction to the free re- 
 presentation, is accompanied ? 
 
 With this question, we have at once entered the sphere of 
 subjectivity, and from out this we cannot with the self-cons- 
 sciousness escape, so that the following answer only admits of 
 being given ; the consciousness perceives in itself a want, a 
 negation of its own self-activity in the intuitions, and hence 
 that very consciousness presupposes, seeing that every thing 
 must have a cause, other essences, by which those intuitions 
 are to be determined or caused. The consciousness, or, as 
 Fichte says, the Ego, presupposes something, something which 
 it is not itself, out of or apart from itself ; it posites a non-Ego, 
 says Fichte, and ascribes to this other essence the activity, the 
 causality, which it is not conscious of exercising itself. Thus 
 the supposition or representation of things or Egoes out of us 
 is only a thought of the Ego, a supposition, which the Ego itself 
 makes, but one to which it is only impelled by its own sub- 
 jective laws of thought, namely, by the logical law of the suffi- 
 cient reason, which resides in the Ego, and nowhere else. 
 
 Thus, the true procedure in the consciousness is not, as is 
 usually believed, that there are things, and that our representa- 
 tions originate from them ; but the truth of the matter stands 
 thus : there are representations, images in us, to which we attain- 
 in an unconscious manner ; in order now to explain their origiflj; 
 I first think to myself oi things without me. Thus, man first 
 creates for himself the things in his thinking process, he repre- 
 sents them to himself, thinks of them, and only in so far are 
 they present to him. He even thinks and so disposes of them 
 each time, that they correspond to the intuitions, or that the 
 intuitions correspond to them ; thus he endows them each time 
 according to the actual intuitions with all corresponding pro- 
 perties, thinks of the thing every time exactly as its intuition 
 is — or, to speak more definitely, he objectifies this his really r^ 
 subjective intuition; or posites — what is really within him 
 — as out of himself before himself. Thus what is first and 
 immediate was the image in us ; this image we have objectified^- 
 i. e. set it as an object before us. Do we now ask, whence 
 
FICHTB. 155 
 
 came this first image, or the intuition itself? we can no longer 
 answer, from the objects; for the representation, "object," 
 is itself a representation, and that indeed not the primary, 
 but the second representation, which has been posited by us 
 for the sake of the subjective image. If I have once posited 
 the object with deliberation, I cannot truly say that towards 
 this object, posited by myself, I hold a passive relation, nor 
 that I, just as I am, am an effect of this object, since this 
 object is rather an effect of me. Such is the well-known 
 circle, out of which philosophy when it has taken the above 
 stand-point cannot escape, and of which it must become fully 
 conscious to itself as of a paralogism or false conclusion, in- 
 cidental always to the return of what has been called healthy 
 common-sense. 
 
 The sensation, the image, is present in my consciousness ; 
 thus only, and nothing further can I say, for I know not how it 
 has originated in me or how it has entered me. It is there 
 and complete, and this indeed has been effected without a free 
 conscious activity of my Ego ; yet still in any case by an ac- 
 tivity of the Ego, for the Ego must be active in the represent- 
 ation, and even in the sensation, or else it would be dead, insen- 
 sible, non-representing, in a word, neither life nor spirit. Thus 
 the representation or the sensation has, such as it is, originated 
 through an unfree and unconscious activity of the Ego. Thus 
 there is a sphere in the thinking process, or in the mental ac- 
 tivity which has its seat below the consciousness — a sphere 
 that lies at the basis of the latter, and wherein something is 
 accomplished, or the mind has adjusted itself to a certain 
 determination, before the time has arrived for reflecting upon 
 this its state, and thus it finds itself already imprisoned therein 
 at the very moment that it becomes aware of it, or when 
 opposing this its state to itself, or rather itself in this state 
 to itself, it renders itself the object of its own contemplation, 
 or rather, setting itself in this state over against itself, 
 renders itself the object of its own intuition. For to reflect, 
 or to meditate upon itself, to become conscious of itself, is 
 none other than to behold itself internally, to render itself an 
 object, so that the contemplating subject has opposed itself to 
 itself, as the very object which is — a self-intuition this, in 
 which, as the etymology of the word Sich-selhstanchauen 
 teaches us, one represents oneself to oneself (se sibi) i. e. sets 
 oneself internally before oneself. 
 
 We spoke of this lower and unconscious sphere of our sub- 
 
156 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 Jectivity, in which the thinking and cognising mind — or, to 
 speak with Fichte, the Ego— at length perceives itself to he 
 imprisoned in certain determinations, i. e. sensations or repre- 
 sentations. To derive these determinations from the influences 
 of external things did not succeed, because, to explain these 
 states, we first posite the things themselves, and would conse- 
 quently form our conclusions in a circle ; thus nothing more is left 
 to us, than to say with Fichte, — we here stand upon the limits 
 of our knowledge ; this is at once the nature, the law, or rather 
 ihemcomprehensible limit of the Effo. In all this thus much is 
 certain, that all sensations, feelings, or representations, — even if 
 they may depend upon some exciting cause from without, — ^yet 
 as they are, and as they enter our consciousness, are in this 
 their form and essence nothing more than determinations 
 of the Ego within its own thoroughly subjective sphere, and, 
 although originally framed in a sphere that underlie the 
 Sonsciousness, are yet in constant accordance with the laws and 
 iiature of the Ego. Hence, the important position, that in 
 the very first sensuous intuitions and, images the form of the 
 understanding is already present, and the former are not pure 
 copies of things. If, for example, we imagine the soul to 
 resemble a stringed instrument, which, to give forth a sound, 
 awaits the contact of the musician's tfinger, while still it 
 is only upon this contact that the string develops the sound 
 that already resided in it, and the whole instrument the har- 
 mony of tones that dwelt potentially therein, — tones that slum- 
 ber as it were a priori in the strings ; and if to these the 
 contact of the finger imparts nothing of its own nature, but 
 rather from the sound we infer the inner quality or nature of 
 the string itself; — how much more must this be the case with 
 a thoroughly living and independent essence, such as is the 
 human Ego ! 
 
 In this way, and without detriment to those limits, we shall 
 be always enabled to cognise from the present intuitions and 
 thoughts the true nature of the Ego ; and all these Self-determi- 
 nations will be but a revelation of. its essence, i. e. that I see 
 any thing definite, and how I see it, or the phenomenon, which 
 holds good to me as an object, will be at one ahd the same time 
 the reflex of my internal laws of intuition and also their pro- 
 duct. Just as the little green, red, or gold clouds which the 
 eye, when blinded for any length of time by the sun, sees flit- 
 ting before it, reveal only a certain internal disposition of the 
 organ of sight ; so also do the qualities, in which the things, 
 
FICHTE. 157 
 
 nay, the whole world, mirrors itself before us, reveal the inter- 
 nal natural constitution of our mental faculty of seeing, of our 
 intelligence. Thus, these determinations, the whole multipli- 
 city of our internal world, which we supposed that we derived 
 from without, must originate, and that too in all their definite 
 character, from within, seeing that they are self-determinations 
 of the living consciousness. It is the laws of life, residing in 
 the consciousness, constituting its very essence, or, in a word, 
 the nature of the consciousness, which appear as hindrances 
 and determinations of the free activity of the representative 
 power. So that, in order to arrive at the consciousness, we 
 must arrive at the determined consciousness, at definite repre- 
 sentations ; for the boundless activity would lose itself in the 
 Infinite, would represent nothing whatever, unless it could and 
 were in the most diversified manner, to impede, arrest, hold fast, 
 and modify itself in its formative process, so as to constitute 
 definite images. Every determination is a negation of the in- 
 finite power of thought. Thus upon general grounds we per- 
 ceive that, and why the consciousness must altogether have 
 such a constitution, such vital laws or immanent limits of its 
 essence, that it may arrive at a representation, that, virtually 
 present, it may realise itself actually also or in fact ; that an 
 intelligence, a consciousness may actually be brought about, 
 without which and without its product, namely, the whole 
 world of phenomena, man could not even attain to his proper 
 destination, practical and moral, upon which point the whole 
 matter ultimately turns. Thus, that limits axe necessary is 
 a priori understood ; but why they are so constituted, that, 
 as a consequence of them, now this, now that sensuous object, 
 is straightway manifested in the individual, is just as inex- 
 plicable as it is necessary that for the universal and highest 
 aim of philosophy it should be known ; enough, that man 
 at every instant sees material and opportunity before him 
 for action, and in action for fulfilling his moral'destination ; 
 for thereby alone does the singular obtain its true" meaning 
 or worth, and the whole its final and fundamental expla- 
 nation. Such then are what were so called by Fichte 
 himself, "the inexplicable, absolute limits" of the theo- 
 retical philosophy or science ; for here the latter directly im- 
 pinges upon the boundary of practical cognition, and this 
 last was constantly present to this earnest thinker as the main 
 point even in his purely theoretical investigations. These ab- 
 solute limits of the intelligence or Ego supplied with him the 
 
158 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 place of every external impetus or of the thing in itself as 
 presupposed by Kant, and differ only from this by not being 
 without, but within, the Ego, and thus to be sought for as im- 
 manent in the peculiar nature of the subject, which in this 
 view remained perfectly free and independent of any thing else, 
 while at the same time these limits are the covert principle 
 which has as a result the illusion of things in themselves, — 
 an illusion, which, as Fichte says, he must thoroughly exter- 
 minate from philosophy. 
 
 After giving this general characteristick of Fichte's system, it 
 is necessary, in the next place, to report what is needful con-s 
 corning the systematic application of it at least in its funda- 
 mental outlines. And in doing this, we must first of all set 
 aside the usual error, which regards Fichte as having left 
 behind him his system in a form completely worked out, fixed 
 and satisfactory to himself. Of this form the first outline of his 
 philosophy which he has given in his " Grundlegung der Wist 
 senschaftslehre," Weimar, 1794, is usually taken as an example. 
 But this essay was, properly speaking, a merely preliminary" 
 step to the more mature elaboration of the system, and was 
 destined to serve as a kind of guide to his auditors, but sa- 
 tisfied him so little subsequently, that he even altered through- 
 out the language there used, and in his later writings, no longer 
 made use of the fundamental word in the whole system, the 
 far-famed or notorious " Ego and Non-Ego." He was in the 
 main convinced, that his doctrine admitted of being represented 
 in very different forms (upon this point his letters to Keinhold 
 are particularly instructive), and he has himself left behind 
 him no less than five veritable modifications of his doctrinej 
 as may be found at present in the posthumous essays published 
 by his son. 
 
 Meanwhile, seeing that that first outline of his system made 
 an epoch in philosophy, and that repeated reference will] be 
 made to it in what follows ; we must here follow out in it 
 what is necessary for the purposes of instruction. 
 
 The principle of all philosophy, that which is at once the 
 most certain and primary starting-point for us, must, as a con- 
 sequence of what has been said, be necessarily sought for 
 within us, within the domain of subjective thought, not, with" 
 out or external to us. We can, however, with Kant, know 
 j ust as little of the spiritual substance of our essence in itself, as 
 of the substance of the world ; nay, it may perhaps be proved, 
 that the supposition of such a substance, as being something in 
 
ncHTE. 159 
 
 itself unknown, is equally ungrounded. We need consequently 
 (and this is a fundamental position) make no use ■jrhatever of 
 such a spiritual substance, or soul as it may otherwise be 
 caDed, as a starting-point, or point of support for the whole 
 system. Such was Fichte's decided opinion, at least in the 
 early period of his philosophical career. That very something 
 which is given us directly to cognise, is no being whatever, 
 no substance, but an activity ; it is the act of representing, of 
 forming internal images, the consciousness. Thus, with him, 
 substance, when he uses this word, is only thought of as im- 
 plying in a general sense absolute change ; accident being a 
 something determined, that changes with another changing 
 something.* Our consciousness is at every instant busied with 
 some definite representation ; these individual representations 
 we must separate from the idea of the consciousness, if we 
 would comprehend it purely in itself, as a faculty for thinking 
 all that is possible. Even in the change or alternation of dif- 
 ferent representations that move in succession before our in- 
 ward eye, we remark that such an inward eye, which appre- 
 hends all in succession, is present, and does not pass by with 
 those images. Thus the consciousness is the central point, 
 in which all representations unite ; it is the faculty or power 
 which sees ; being by no means a substratum, but the activity, 
 the seeing process itself. Now this consciousness, intelligence, 
 or the Ego, is or becomes that actually which it is potentially, 
 by knowing itself, by representing itself to itself {se sihi) ; 
 thus in a certain manner it creates itself, the knowledge 
 rendering itself self-consciousness ; and this is the first fact 
 which is directly certain, and which stands in no need of 
 being ascertained by inference, or which, in a word, admits 
 of no demonstration. 
 
 Thus, this self-consciousness is brought about by the Ego 
 representing itself; and in this process we can distinguish, 
 first of all, the Ego, as a representing subject, from the Ego as 
 object, or the represented Ego — the representing from its 
 representation ; but at the same time we see that both in their 
 content are one and the same. The Ego is here intuition both- 
 in the active and passive sense of this word, i. e. the contem- 
 plating and also the contemplated. Still, however, this self- 
 consciousness is quite empty, i. e. the Ego is cognisant of it- 
 self as an intuitive process, but more than this it does not know 
 about itself; it represents itself directly as an act of vision, 
 
 * Wissensoliaftslehre, Neue. Aufz. p. 73. Sammtliche Werke, Bd. i. 
 p. 72. 
 
160 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 but in this act there is nothing which it could see, but only 
 the activity, the bare contemplation itself. 
 
 Thus the first principle of the " Wissenschaftslehre," or 
 Theory of Science, is this ; a consciousness of itself takes place, 
 or, the Ego represents itself to itself, — the subject Ego holds 
 its own image as- object before itself, makes itself the object of 
 its mental intuition ; or, as Fiehte expresses it, the Ego posites 
 itself. This is the primitive act of all knowledge. Upon 
 closer attention being paid to the matter, we at once observe, 
 that to such an intuition which merely contemplates itself, 
 but nothing else, the name "JEgo," or at least that of subject, 
 cannot as yet be applied. If, however, this name and this idea 
 is notwithstanding used (and Fiehte used it), why then with 
 this direct supposition another something is certainly posited 
 at the same time,tiie non-Ego. — Upon this supposition Fiehte 
 proceeds as follows. » - 
 
 The second act of the consciousness, directly united and in- 
 separable from the first, is this, that the consciousness opposes 
 itself to every other, distinguishes itself as a definite represent- 
 ation from every other, which is not this representation, and 
 by this very antagonism first perceives itself. The Ego posites 
 the non-Ego, but of this it knows or as yet thinks no more 
 than that this non-Ego is its own simple antagonism, and thus 
 is not itself. 
 
 Through these two first principles, opposite ideas are given ; 
 but these are to be united in one and the same consciousness; 
 the way in which this happens is a special and third funda- 
 mental law of the thinking process, namely, that of the mutual 
 limitation of these two representations ; the Ego is that which 
 the non-Ego is not, and the non-Ego is that which, the Ego is 
 not. Both are to be opposed in the consciousness, without the 
 unity of the latter being thereby suppressed ; the formula now 
 stands thus: the Ego posites itself as determined (limited) by 
 the nan-Ego, i, e. that faculty of knowing which was here- 
 tofore thought of as pure or empty consciousness, as yet wholly 
 void of determination, has taken to itself a determination, 
 namely, the representation of a non-Ego (an alterum, a world), 
 yet nevertheless, as in so doing to remain at the same time con- 
 scious of this its thought ; it has determined itself to a repre- 
 sentation, with the consciousness that this representation or in- 
 ternal self-determination is only its own representation, only a 
 modification of itself. The more now that the consciousness is, 
 as it were, absorbed in and occupied with this its representation, 
 
FIGHTE. 161 
 
 by so much the less does it succeed in becoming conscibus of its 
 own activity of itself ; and the more, on the other hand, that it 
 reflects upon itself as activity, by so much the less does it 
 bury itself in the definite representation or object virhich it 
 sets before itself. 
 
 All this is, properly speaking, only the scientific form in- 
 vented by Fichte for the above popular statement, that the 
 consciousness, the representative or internal formative and con- 
 templating process, is a pure productivity from itself. Now, 
 this consciousness is found, when strictly regarded, to have an 
 objective external world involved in an occult manner in its 
 principle, this principle being the Ego, namely, the individual, 
 definite or finite Ego ; on which account, for the sake of this 
 its own nature, and thus from itself, it necessarily opposes itself 
 to some other, and some other to itself. Thus, this other or 
 non-Ego is manifested in accordance with the second principle, 
 as a product of the Ego, — as an opposition necessary and in- 
 voluntary indeed, but still as an opposition, which is designed 
 or framed by the Ego according to its own indwelling laws of 
 thought ; so that the subject or Ego will be also the mediating 
 author of all the reactions resulting from that original opposi- 
 tion, and will have as an ultimate resource to derive the same 
 from its own capacity and activity. That the Ego represents 
 to itself objects or non-Egoes, is but a proof of its own activity, 
 though this activity may not hold good as a voluntary one ; 
 voluntary it certainly is not, but necessary only from its own 
 internal laws of thought, its nature being derived from its own 
 original determination and peculiar quality, so that the Ego 
 always remains absolutely free, i. e. independent of every other, 
 or of all external and foreign infiuence. 
 
 Let us now add to the above that very passage from his 
 writings, in which Fichte has expressed himself most distinctly 
 in reference to his idealism, for it is one which is especially 
 worthy of note, inasmuch as it renders clear at the same time 
 the sense in which Fichte regarded the idea of being, the sub- 
 stantial, in opposition to the active and thinking process, and 
 also how that idea gradually resolved itself with him into the 
 latter agent.* " Idealism," says he, " explains the determina- 
 tions of the consciousness from the actions of the intelligence. 
 It regards the latter or the intelligence as only active and abso- 
 lute, but not passive ; and not passive, because as a conse- 
 quence of its postulate it is the first and highest, and to this 
 
 * Fichte's and Niethammer's Phil. Journal 5., Bd. i. Hft. p. 34. efseq. 
 Sammtliche Werke, Bd. i. p. 440. 
 
162 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 nothing is antecedent, from which a passive state' would admit 
 of being explained. Upon the same grounds, no true being 
 or state of persistence belongs to it, because this is the result 
 of a mutual action ; and nothing is present, or assumed to 
 be so, with which the intelligence could be placed in co-ope- 
 ration. The intelligence is to the idealist an action, and abso- 
 lutely nothing more ; for it is not even to be called active^ 
 seeing that by this adjective mode of expression, a something 
 persistent is indicated, in which the activity is inherent. Ideal- 
 ism, however, has no grounds for adopting any such something, 
 since it does not lie in its principle, and every thing is first 
 to be deduced from this. Now, from the dealings of the intelli- 
 gence, certain definite representations are to be derived, such as 
 those which familiarly occur in the consciousness, as of a 
 world, namely, a world present without our aid, material, 
 existing in space, and such like. But from an essence in itself 
 wholly undetermined, nothing definite admits of being deduced, 
 it being impossible to here apply the formula of all deduction, 
 the thesis cognoscendi; consequently, that action which is 
 laid at the basis of the intelligence must be of a determinate 
 kind, and truly so, since the intelligence is itself the highest 
 ground of explanation, as being an action determined by itself 
 and its own essence, but not by any thing external to it. The 
 hypothesis of idealism will accordingly stand as follows : the 
 intelligence acts, but it can act only by virtue of its own es- 
 sence in a certain way ; if we now think of this necessary 
 mode of action apart from its agent, we may very appropriately 
 call it the laws of the agent ca: activity. And thus there are 
 necessary laws of the intelligence. In this way, the feeling 
 of necessity, which accompanies the definite representations, is 
 rendered comprehensible ; for the intelligence does not then feel 
 any impression from without, but it feels in that action (the 
 thinking process) the limits of its own nature. In so far then 
 as idealism institutes this only rational, definite, and actually ; 
 ■explanatory hypothesis of necessary laws of the intelligence, 
 is it called the critical or transcendental. A transcendent, or 
 whoUy bottomless idealism would be a system that attempted 
 to derive the definite representations from the free and per- 
 fectly lawless action of the intelligence, — a perfectly contra- 
 dictory supposition, since, as we have been already reminded, 
 the thesis cognoscendi is not applicable to such an action," 
 
 _" It is the direct problem of the ' Wissenschaftslehre,' " says 
 Fichte in another place, "to point out how the involuntary re- 
 presentations, such as seeing, hearing, and such like, proceed 
 
PICHTE. 163 
 
 altogether from owe'* own activity, and thus how to construct a 
 priori the representations according to laws of thought. To 
 this science there stands opposed no ready prepared being, for 
 it admits of no ready prepared or absolutely given, in short, of 
 nothing which appears to us absolutely as thing and being. It 
 rather exhibits the origination, and draws that forth into the 
 light of the consciousness, just as we ourselves have brought 
 about its representation, Thus it resolves and renders fluid 
 all being'; all being as a persistent, quiescent something, 
 vanishes before it ; it looks only to its own rendering or con- 
 structive process, and so recognises all objects as special 
 products of the consciousness and thought. This and this 
 only (says Fichte further on) is the sign that we are phi- 
 losophising upon the right track, when, forsooth, we have no 
 longer any eye for ready prepared objective existence, but 
 only for origination — when to us all that is, is first constructed 
 before our inward eye; for thus only is an insight gained 
 into the origination and essence, the inward and true life of 
 the mind. If once we comprehend the thinking and repre- 
 sentative process as a perfect activity, shut up the conscious- 
 ness absolutely within itself, abide by the position that nothing 
 can enter the latter save as something known, represented, self- 
 imagined — in a word, as ideal, — &ndi then regard this defi- 
 nitely as a product of the consciousness itself, — why then it 
 only remains for us to pronounce all representations as well 
 as intuitions to be without exception our own creations, and to 
 seek in the next place in the Ego for the ground of our 
 ascribing objective reality to the one and not to the other. 
 The being — the objective reality — can be for us merely 
 a being that is thottght, a thought reality, thought by us, and 
 consequently in this sense self-produced. Have we once recog- 
 nised the law, according to which this construction and projec- 
 tion takes place ? we must then also acknowledge with perfect 
 conviction that the objectivity and reality, the being itself, is 
 but a subjective representation. We know the optical laws 
 according to which this appearance is produced ; but before the 
 higher consciousness all objective existence, as actual, whoUy 
 vanishes ; nothing remains as truly actual, than the very work- 
 ing within us, or that merely from which we set out, namely 
 the subjective activity; in a word, there is only a thinking, re- 
 presenting, imagining process, an activity united to certain, 
 laws indwelling in itself ; these laws are none other than the 
 invariable kind and mode of that activity, and this activity is. 
 itself the absolute and only actual or real. 
 
 M 2 
 
164 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 LECTURE VII. 
 
 CONTINCATION OF FICHTE's PHLLOSOPHr. 
 
 After the summary sketch which has been attempted, in the- 
 last discourse, of the substance of the older "Wissenschaftslehre," 
 it remains for us now to take the requisite glance at the 
 practical part of that system, and, above all, to consider the 
 remaining question, how from that theory of cognition we may 
 arrive yet further at the transcendent world and a religious 
 belief or knowledge. 
 
 Upon this point Fichte, in accordance with his own theory, 
 could not express himself otherwise than he did in the me- 
 morable essay which was condemned and had for its result 
 his retirement from Jena.* From the contemplation of the 
 world, as it lies before our senses, we can derive no proof of 
 the existence of the Deity, nor even form any conclusion as to 
 his attributes, for this very world has ceased, when confronted 
 by the transcendental idealist, to exist as an independent 
 essence, " being nothing more than the view of our own activity 
 rendered perceptible to the senses according to conceivable laws 
 of reason, or that of mere intelligence acting within certain in- 
 comprehensible limits, in the which we are enclosed." While 
 the common sense of humanity regards the world as external to 
 and completely independent of itself, thus as self-subsi stent, 
 the idealist recognises in it only the reflex of his own mental 
 activity: thus to him it is no longer a self-subsistent some- 
 thing; it has, with all the so-called things in themselves, 
 changed into a product of his Ego, and that product one of an 
 involuntary character, for the Ego finds itself compelled by its 
 nature to posite a non-Ego, or the whole image of the world as 
 opposed to itself. It finds itself necessitated to do this by a 
 determination that incomprehensibly dwells within itself, by 
 the inward impulse of its own nature, by its natural determina- 
 tion or limit, as Fichte calls it. On that account the world 
 which is mirrored forth from the Ego is to be regarded as 
 nothing else than the revelation, or efiect of this internal natu- 
 ral determination of the Ego, this being the very source from 
 
 * In the eighth volume of the Journal, edited by Fichte and Nietham- 
 mer. See Journal, 1798. Samjntl. Werke, Bd. 5. 
 
PICHTE. 165 
 
 which it proceeds. It is clear then that, from the quality of this 
 world-image, which is indeed but a transcript or copy of the 
 Ego, we cannot form conclusions as to a supramundane cre- 
 ator, such as those do who regard the world as a real ob- 
 jective reality. The idealist sees in the world-image only his 
 own product ; thus, if he asks for the creator, he discovers only 
 himself, his representative faculty, and the laws of this which 
 dwell within him. Thus, in this way man never gets above 
 or beyond himself, or never attains that which he seeks — a 
 Deity. With him the only real or primitive foundation from 
 which all proceeds is the subjective activity of the Ego, and 
 that which apparently hovers before him is still, from being a 
 something known, only a modification of this activity ; while 
 if, on the other hand, it be said, that the fetters or limits im- 
 posed by nature upon the Ego, as its natural determination, 
 must still depend upon a power that hovers external to and 
 above it, the objection may at once be repelled by observing 
 that these very limits, in so far as we become conscious of them, 
 as a something perceived, felt, or known, are and remain sub- 
 jective perceptions, and thus products of the Ego, while, in so 
 far as they are not perceived, they are not indeed present. 
 
 Thus, the only immediate reality * is the real power of the 
 Ego as a working, active element, or rather the Ego is itself this • 
 working activity, this life ; it is a creation of all activities out of 
 itself, both of the so-called voluntary as well as representa,tive 
 acts : what this power effects, that also it knows, or it can at 
 least bring it before the consciousness; and what it knows, that 
 also it has worked out, for of that which we do not ourselves 
 effect there can be no consciousness. The power is one and 
 the same, though it is at one time apprehended in the con- 
 sciousness with regard to its mere activity as a process of ac- 
 tion, at another as reflection upon itself or as knowledge, and is, 
 consequently, now represented as a real power which works as 
 such without knowing it, and then as knowledge only. This 
 separation of what is one in itself and indistinguishable into 
 subject and object, constitutes the very process of becoming 
 conscious; thus, Icnowing and being are not fundamentally 
 separated,.but become so for the first time in the consciousness ; 
 that which becomes separated, or the primitive power which is 
 in itself unseparated, is the Absolute, — in other words, the 
 human activity is itself the Absolute, being that operation which 
 
 * Das System der Sittenlehre nach den Principien der Wissenschafts^ 
 lehre von J. G. Fichte. Jena und. Leipzig, 1798. Vorrede, p. 7,, et seq. 
 
 M 3 
 
166 HISTORICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 mirrors itself in each' of its acfs. Now while to the ordinary 
 consciousness the action' by which something definite is re- 
 presented appears to precede the consciousness of this some- 
 thing, or, in other words, because I cannot become conscious 
 to myself of a representation until I have represented or 
 created it in myself, and then set this representation, as it were, 
 permanently before myself; it follows, that the activity appears, 
 as it were, to require two different powers, or, if we may so 
 speak, two spiritual hands. By the one the activity is grasped 
 and held forth, by the other it is touched and investigated. If, 
 now, it is forgotten that this activity is one and the same 
 power, we then distinguish two powers, and the object held 
 forth (which is really nothing else but activity itself suspended 
 in a certain act) seems then to be the principle which deter- 
 mines my intuition, knowledge, or intelligence, and so the sub- 
 jective becomes dependent upon the objective ; for, by the 
 proximate ground of its material determination residing in that 
 something which hovers before it, or what, in the truest sense 
 of the word, it imagines, the subjective appears to be merely 
 passively recipient, or perceptive, but by no means an active 
 process of production. 
 
 Thus the Ego, or absolute activity, is seen 'to be in good 
 truth the principle and author of all its own modifications, and 
 we can say nothing more of it, than that it is spontaneity, being 
 in its essence self-subsistent, independent, and free from all 
 foreign impressions and determinations ; that all determinations 
 and limitations which occur in the consciousness, instead of 
 being derived from without, are or exist only within its very 
 self, so that it is completely independent, thus at least nega- 
 tively free, and — because every thing, which appears to deter-* 
 mine it, is only a something produced by itself — positively 
 free also. 
 
 But this free action, continues Fichte, is not, therefore, arbi- 
 trary ; ;it has and sets before itself its own purpose or object, 
 not, however, obtaining this purpose from without, but positing 
 it of or by itself. I myself and my necessary rational object 
 are or constitute the transcendent and sublime. Thus Fichte 
 here assumes a subjective object, the proper object of the Ego, 
 beyond which he does not venture to speculate any furthei*. 
 He thinks of it to himself as the direct rational nature, the 
 reason in the concrete, the true and special essence of the 
 human spirit, the one realistic point which is to be met with 
 in his system ; and to ask further, why Mid whence this end or 
 
PICHTE. 167 
 
 object? is as much as to ask why the true is true, why the in- 
 concievable is not at the same time capable of being thought. In 
 short, this self-object is the innermost and deepest truth of our 
 own nature, the most special something which we possess, what, 
 in a word, we ourselves are, what we desire^ and what |we need. 
 What in conformity to this we strive after, we try to obtain for 
 the sake of ourselves ; nor could we do otherwise, even if we 
 would : thus, there is no object forced or imposed upon the Ego, 
 but one only that is posited by the Ego itself ; and while in this 
 way expression is given to what the Ego should or ought to be, 
 the Ego declares only in reality what it desires ; the catego- 
 rical imperative, is not, however, derived from without, but from 
 the innermost depths of the Ego's own [essence ; being, so to 
 speak, the extension and yearning of its nature after develop- 
 ment ; and on that very account no question can be raised as to 
 any principle that lies higher : the absolute principle being found 
 in the quality of the Ego itself. Thus the Ego, to use a Leib- 
 nitzian form of expression, is ever more virtuellement than it is 
 effectivement (reellemeni) ; it develops every thing out of itself, 
 because it carries originally, or potentially, in an unconscious 
 state every thing in itself, of the which it first becomes con- 
 scious, when it has arrived at a real objective phase of develop- 
 ment ; and thus the " Wissenschaftslehre" depicts the kind 
 and method of this self-development of the consciousness, as it 
 gradually recalls to mind or recollects its content — a view this 
 of the immanent or egoistic conformity to purpose, which, sub- 
 jective in character as it is, we shall find in the subsequent 
 systems to be forthwith expanded into the notion of the Abso- 
 lute. Now in so far as that content of self is not present in a 
 state of perfect development, but only potentially, it is called its 
 own object, and thus every thing depends upon the Ego truly 
 seizing upon that object which is posited to it by its own es- 
 sence, and as it is itself all action, all spontaneity, realising this 
 object by real action also. If the Ego were not to comprehend 
 or form a conception of this its own proper object, but were to 
 deny it, it would then deny itself; for this very object being 
 its internal nature or essence, it must thus eo ipso assume the 
 practicability of its action as possible, for to set before itself any 
 thing as an object, is only, in other words, to presuppose or set 
 something in the future as actual, and thus as possible also. 
 Hence the proposition, what I should, that also I can, do. If 
 now I cannot entertain any doubts whatever as to the practica- 
 bility, of what my true, i. e., my moral nature demands, then hy 
 
 TS. 4 
 
168 HISTOEICAL SUEVET. 
 
 this at the same time the whole phenomenal world of sensuous 
 things (which hitherto appeared only as a perfectly purposeless, 
 incomprehensible, transitory, and on that account deceptive 
 juggle) obtains for the first time, on the practical stand-point} i 
 its purpose, signification, and that sanction also of necessity 
 which theory had no power to impart to it. It is true that from 
 this moral point of view, the whole previously abrogated opinion 
 concerning actuality as a reality of the objective world, deter- 
 mining the subjects and rendering them dependent upon itself 
 (a view this upheld by realism and common sense), cannot be 
 reinstated as by the stroke of an enchanter's wand; — -for this 
 would amount to withdrawing the whole preceding theory as 
 something superfluous and false, and annihilating upon the 
 practical stand-point what, upon the theoretical, has been 
 diligently built up ; but here a purpose only is discerned or the 
 reason seen why, conformably to our nature, a world must 
 appear to us in this phenomenon, being the only means, i. e., 
 condition for attaining our own object ; for without such a phe- 
 nomenon there would be no arriving at any definite action, 
 which still is our absolute destination. Activity in general, and 
 so also activity of the Ego, cannot even be thought of without 
 the antagonism of the internal and external or subject and ob- 
 ject, of something from out which it must proceed, and some- 
 thing to which it must return. Thus, all which is contained in 
 this phenomenon, from the object that is absolutely posited by 
 myself at the one end, to the raw material of the world at the 
 other ; all this, like my own body, for example, is but the medi- 
 ating members of the phenomenon, and consequently itself phe- 
 nomena. The only positively true and actual is and remains 
 my independence and freedom, whose indwelling limits are but 
 the form of the human consciousness, the form of the intelligent 
 side of our activity. " These limits are and remain, it is true, 
 incomprehensible in their origin. But what matters it to you ? 
 exclaims the practical philosopher; their signification is the 
 clearest and most certain point that there is ; they are, or con- 
 stitute, your definite post in the moral order of things. What 
 you perceive by means of them has reality, the only reality 
 which concerns you and which exists for you ; in them you have 
 the abiding exponent of the law of duty, the living expression 
 of that which you should do since there is something that ought 
 to be done. Our world is the material of our duty ; this is the 
 proper real element in things, the true element of all pheno- 
 mena." " Thus, it.js not ■vyithout reason and purpose, that the 
 
PICHTE. 169 
 
 world coristantly'obtrudes itself upon us as a reality. With the 
 same irrefragability and truth with which our own nature 
 proclaims itself in the law of duty as conscience, so also does the 
 reality of the world proclaim itself as such, since only in and 
 by means of it can that highest purpose of existence prove or 
 substantiate itself." Thus the reality of the world depends, as we 
 see, not upon a knowledge, but upon a belief which on its part is 
 rooted again in the necessity of realising the law of duty, which 
 without such a world does not admit of being realised. Thus 
 the whole world, born from out the original disposition of our 
 nature, remains indeed the reflected image of our hidden nature, 
 and is its revelation ; the whole, however, is a thoroughly moral 
 arrangement and serves moral objects. " Such then is the true 
 belief, for the moral order which we adopt, is the Divine." 
 
 " This, then, is the sum and substance of our belief. The 
 living and active moral order is Grod ; we need no other God, 
 and can comprehend no other." In other words, we are unable 
 to perceive any thing as Divine, but this very order which re- 
 sides within and works in and through us. Were we to in- 
 fer that, where order shows itself, an original disposer must 
 be presupposed, still we are by no means justified in this 
 conclusion*; for it is made by the understanding, and solely 
 within the sphere of sensuous experience, in order to knife 
 the fugitive or transitory phenomenon to a persistent substra- 
 tum, which is always material. But here we must pause at 
 the transient, or at the pure action ; for this itself is the imme- 
 diate and only valid scheme ; and whoever makes the above 
 conclusion seeks and obtains inevitably a persistent corporeal 
 substratum for the pure action of the Deity." If we call God a 
 spirit, we then attribute to him extension (persistence) in time, 
 in order that we may attach to his unity the manifold action ; 
 but spirit or soul has merely a negative sense, meaning neither 
 more nor less than the negation of body. This expression is a 
 make-shift of our thinking process, which having first dispensed 
 in thought with every thing sensuously persistent, material, 
 places something in the place of the subject, which should not 
 really be, and yet must be ; though as a positive expression to 
 serve for a definition of the Divine nature, it is wholly useless. 
 
 The order, however, the prevailing law, can and must be 
 thought of as absolute, nor does it require any higher ground of 
 
 . * Der Herausgeber des philosoph. Journals gerichtiche Verantwortungs- 
 sohriften gegen die Anklage des Atheismus. Herausgegeben von J. Gi 
 Fichte. Jena, 1799. p. 43. et seq. SammtL Werke, Bd. v. p. 263. 
 
170 HISTORICAL SUKVEY. 
 
 explanation. If it is believed that we must, in addition to the 
 above order, think of a personal being, by whom this law was 
 given, this order administered, still in this personal essence we 
 must again presuppose that order, as willing, mode of action, 
 holy power, or under any other abstract notion, and so this last 
 would remain always the First and Highest, the Absolute, as 
 sought and presupposed. Besides, the supposition of a personal 
 God, such as is usually made, is nothing but an anthropomor- 
 phism or transference of human limits and imperfections to God, 
 and is involved in contradictions. Thus Fichte shows that the 
 ideas of a Divine consciousness, a personality and extramun- 
 dane existence, are nothing but unseemly limitations, by which 
 the highest essence would only be rendered finite, and reduced 
 to our own level, since these notions would necessarily include 
 the idea of a spatially and temporally extended substance, which, 
 once for all, is inappropriate to the Deity. Our thinking pro- 
 cess is altogether schematic, i.e. constructive, representative; 
 of the transcendent we become conscious only under the scheme 
 of action, of activity ; of the sensuous, under the scheme of ex- 
 tension, of materiality. Now, God is to be thought of by the 
 first scheme as " an order of events," but by no means as a form 
 of extension * ; it cannot be said of him that he is substance or 
 any thing ; for this would amount, according to our system, to 
 afiirming that he is an extended matter, and admits of being 
 seen, heard," &c. " He is not a being or existence, but a pure 
 action, i. e. the life and soul of a transcendent world-order, just 
 as I also, a finite intelligence, am no being, but a pure actionj 
 an action in conformity with duty, as member of that tran- 
 scendent world-order." ' ' All our thinking process," continues 
 Fichte, " is one of limitation, and in this very respect is called 
 conception, i. e. a grasping together from out a mass of the 
 definable, so that something constantly remains beyond the 
 described limit, which is not included in, and thus does not 
 belong to, the conception or notion. All reality which we 
 apprehend is only finite, and is so because it is we who appre-- 
 hend it. Every thing, which is any thing for us, is such only in 
 so far as it is not so mething else ; all position is only possible 
 by or through negation, so that the word to determine means in 
 itself nothing else than to limit or circumscribe." With these 
 
 * See the -work last referred to, pp. 37, 40. Compare, 3. G. Fichte's 
 Leben und literarischer Briefwechsel, herausgegeben von seinem Sohne, 
 if, H, Fichte. Sulzbach, 1830, part i. p. 346. u. ; part ii. p. 306. 
 
PIGHTE. 171 
 
 propositions Fichte evidently approaches very close to the con- 
 clusions which at present, well nigh half a century since he 
 wrote, have been confidently deduced from them ; though, with 
 less confidence, he himself declared at that time, that God 
 ceases to be infinite, as soon as he is made the object of a no- 
 tion, or as soon as he is to become definitely represented or 
 conceived of. " For," he says, " if we would call God a conscious- 
 ness, it follows that we apply to him the limit of the human 
 consciousness; if we get rid of this limit, by thought, then 
 there remains to us a knowledge which is quite incomprehen- 
 sible ; and this might well be ascribed to God, who, so to speak, 
 is in this sense pure consciousness, intelligence, spiritual life 
 and activity, save only that we could form no notion of such 
 attributes, and on that account would rather abstain from this 
 approximative definition, and that, too, out of strict regard to 
 philosophical accuracy ; for every conception of the Deity would 
 be an idol." On that very account, there can be no proper 
 proofs of the existence of a God, because proofs are only me- 
 diated cognitions. Belief, however, in a transcendent or super- 
 sensuous world is an immediate truth. The postulate of a 
 transcendent world-order is the first and only abstraction which 
 is given to man, is the one and only true absolute. 
 
 In endeavouring now to form to ourselves some general 
 estimate of Fichte's system, it appears to us that it is an 
 Idealism which originally commenced with the explanation of 
 objective reality — as at bottom, indeed, all philosophy has hi- 
 •therto done ; but which, in the present instance, was associated 
 with the distinct perception that nothing objective as such — 
 no direct influence from any thing' objective — could ever pene- 
 trate the consciousness ; but that all knowledge of the presence 
 of something else, each intuition, representation, and transcript 
 of an object, could only be a knowledge thereof, but not the 
 object itself. The clearness of this view rendered a strict 
 idealism inevitable ; and, as a consequence of this, the starting- 
 point and main-stay of all special knowledge and conviction 
 can and must of necessity be sought for subjectively, or in 
 the consciousness alone. This consciousness, this spiritual 
 activity, is that alone which directly perceives itself in itself; 
 and all that it perceives is already present in it, as represented, 
 being nothing more than a modification, determination, and 
 change of that activity ; the consciousness, or the Ego, is its 
 own object, and has no other immediate object than itself ; thus 
 it is subject-object, or self-object, being quite alone with and 
 
172 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 hy itself. It must] so regard itself, or else it would readmit the 
 ■idea, which has been constantly rejected, of an immediate influ- 
 ence entering from without into the consciousness. To repel this 
 influence, and with it, at the same time, as a matter of course, to 
 banish irrevocably all duplicity and dualism, was Fichte's 
 •first rule and problem ; since, by this incomprehensibility and 
 duality, when posited in the principle, all unity of exposition', 
 and consequently the whole of systematic philosophy, is rendered 
 impossible. Finally,, to explain all from one principle, to re- 
 duce the whole as such to the unity of the consciousness, is the 
 very postulate and drift of all demonstration, as well as of all 
 insight into the problems of philosophical research. 
 
 Thus the Ego must set out with regarding all modifi- 
 cations of the consciousness, not merely as determinations 
 absolutely present within or with it, like accidents in the sub- 
 stance ; but simultaneously, or rather exclusively, as effects of 
 •the consciousness, as products and self-determinations of the 
 absolute self-activity : all representations must not be conceived 
 «f as a something present in the mind, but as an activity, or as 
 products that have issued from the mind's own creative power ; 
 they must be explained as a result of pure activity, this being 
 their only foundation. The ''Ego must abide by this point, that 
 it is the first and only immediate real, that in it every totality of 
 conditions is to be met with, that it is the complex of all, the 
 absolutely independent and free, i. e., absolute creator per se 
 and complex of all that occurs within itself. 
 
 But here we come at once to a stand-still. If this absolute 
 JEgo be, in the manner above specified, the true subject-object, 
 because, as a consequence of the two first principles of the sys- 
 tem, it posites itself in opposition to the non-Ego, i. e., becomes 
 for the first time conscious of itself only by and in this anta- 
 gonism, while apart ■ from the latter, no self-consciousness 
 whatever originates, — it follows, that both parts of the an- 
 tagonism, the Ego and non-Ego, must be posited with equal 
 necessity ; that, in other words, if we were to suppress the 
 Ego, the non-Ego would, at the same time, vanish ; and in- 
 versely, that, with the suppression of the opposite non-Ego, 
 the Ego would, at the same time, be no longer distinct in the 
 .consciousness, i. e., no longer present there as such. The two 
 can only be simultaneously retained together, i. e., with the 
 express consciousness in the consciousness of the antagonism ; 
 and there is no ground whatever for subsequently explaining 
 Jhe. non-Ego as being less absolute and necessary than the Ego. 
 
FICHTE, 17^ 
 
 AvS regards, however, the fact of every definite being dialecti- 
 cally thought of and known merely through its antagonism 
 being simultaneously retained in the consciousness, this very 
 general law was, indeed, incidentally alluded to by Fichte, but 
 was not recognised and applied by him in its full sense, as was 
 done, at a later period, by Hegel. Thus, if the principle of 
 Fichte included a germ, also, of the Absolute Identity, or, as we 
 might here say, of Kealism as well as Idealism, it follows that, 
 by virtue of the hypothesis and method, either the objective- 
 realistic moment would be in the course of the system sub- 
 jected to the ideal, or this to the former, i. e., it would abide 
 by a dialectick, which would have, in the principle, an unvan- 
 quished dualism, and would lead only to an alternation, or at 
 least reciprocity, of the two sides, but not to the monism that 
 is aimed at ; not even if, as subsequently occurred, this Ego 
 was declared together with its method to be absolute ; for this 
 statement would change only the name, but not the essence 
 or fact itself. 
 
 There thus remained a one-sided, subjective idealism of the 
 finite Ego ; and with this comes the question — has the human 
 consciousness, as a pure and directly self-knowing subjective 
 activity, as the all-embracing activity>and creator of its universe^ 
 the power to regard and contemplate all that which hovers 
 before it, and which it requires ? or does it directly perceive, in; 
 and through itself, that it is not this totality ? It does perceive 
 this according to Fichte's own confession ; for it impinges upon 
 incomprehensible, absolute limits of its omnipotence ; and it is 
 in vain that it says to itself, these limits or determinations reside 
 in thee, they constitute thy own nature, they are not without 
 thee in a foreign something, which might limit and circumscribe 
 thee. This all amounts to one and the same thing : " the Ego 
 remains," to use the words of Hegel*, " still imprisoned, whether 
 it lies in the bonds of its own, or in those of an external nature. 
 For that these bonds are inexplicable to the Ego, depends 
 upon their being foreign to it, and not resulting from the notion 
 which the free Ego has of itself. The Ego, i.e. the thoroughly 
 free activity, must evidently be the first, or absolute, which 
 posites every ^thing else, without, however, presupposing any 
 other higher something, from which to account for its existence 
 and conditions ; this Ego, which can only gaze upon itself 
 to see how it determines itself with absolute self-determination, 
 —this Ego, which frames or devises every thing alone and of 
 * Hegel's Werke, vol. i. p. 12S. 
 
J 74 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 itself, Still finds itself in empirical fetters, or perceives itself to be 
 determined by something which it has not itself devised ; these 
 fetters then must belong to its essence, — its essence, however, 
 should be absolute, thoroughly free. Thus it appertains to the 
 conception and essence of the absolutely free and self-subsistent 
 not to be free and independent — an assertion this, "which 
 amounts to the most stubborn of contradictions." * To break, 
 however, through these barriers, to comprehend this incompre- 
 hensible law of its essence imposed upon the Ego, is at once 
 the highest object and desideratum of philosophy. 
 
 As regards, however, such a purely subjective knowledge, 
 which engenders, according to indwelling laws of its activity, 
 both itself and its determinations absolutely from itself, which 
 instinctively or inevitably projecting before itself tlie whole 
 empirical world-image, contemplates this image in no other way 
 than by suffering it to hover before itself as a reflex of the in- 
 ternal constitution of the Ego ; from such knowledge we should 
 naturally expect both the power and ability of deducing all the 
 laws of nature as reflections of its own laws of representation in 
 the "most perfect manner, in a word, of erecting a perfect system 
 of speculative Physics. Matters, however, do not come to this 
 point, just because those laws remain incomprehensible to the 
 Ego; the Ego sees only what it must mirror forth in consequence 
 of such laws, but their internal connection and mechanism it 
 does not comprehend. It cannot therefore attain to a successive 
 genesis of the content of nature, this content being given or 
 present to it, from the beginning ; the laws of the thinking 
 process are only formal categories of the understanding, all 
 being, as with Kant, only of subjective import and devoid in 
 themselves of any true organic connection ; consequently their 
 reflexes can, in that which is contemplated, the supposeiil 
 nature, establish no productivity. "The product of this! 
 idealism, a sphere of empiricism without content and of purely 
 accidental multiplicity, stands opposed to an empty thinking 
 process. If the empty thinking process be as an active and real 
 force opposed to a null and void world of images, as is done in 
 the practical part of Fichte's doctrine, why then this is illogical; 
 for with the positing of a real power the relation to another real 
 is posited, and this it is which Fichte would deny." Such is 
 Hegel's judgment. We find that the contradiction is not solved 
 because Fichte, together with his Ego, presupposed only a finite 
 Ego, hence posited ; or rather assumed and presupposed without 
 ♦ Hegel, op. cit. p. 127. 
 
riCHTE, 175 
 
 further investigation a something standing at the very outset in 
 opposition to another, while in all this nothing else lay involved 
 but a psychological empiricism, a remnant of Locke's teachings . 
 Thus posited, the Ego can be thought of as engaged in nothing 
 else but a reciprocal action with other objects as real as itself. 
 Nevertheless this finite Ego is to be regarded as truly infinite, 
 and on that account we are not to speak of several real Egoes 
 acting upon or infiuencing one another, because, as shown above, 
 the non-Ego does not actually proceed from the Ego, but only 
 remains as its representation ; in this non-Ego, however, the 
 whole world is enclpsed. Now had Fichte actually arrived at 
 the conviction, that apart from the Ego there was nothing real, 
 and that the non-Ego, the world, was in itself utterly null and 
 void, only an empty appearance, he would then have been con- 
 strained to acknowledge, as Hegel declares*, "that the Ego is 
 just as null and void also; for as finite Ego it can only exist in 
 as much as it is conditioned by the non-Ego." Thus ended 
 Fichte's idealism, to use Jacobi's expression, in nihilism. If at 
 the very outset the same dignity or grade of rank had been 
 logically assigned to this non-Ego as to its true antagonism, the 
 Ego, then, the intrinsic development of the system, would have 
 been from the v_ery beginning at an end, and the system would 
 have been recognised as of a compound nature or a real 
 idealism. Thus, the fundamental deficiency of the system — . 
 judged from Fichte's own stand-point — was the incompleteness 
 of the idealism, because the thinking process in the very be- 
 ginning as subject, and yet without an object, was posited as 
 an individually determined subject or Ego. What right, we 
 may ask, had Fichte to call the thinking process, which was 
 in reality there, ^ — to call this process decidedly or completely 
 Ms own ? what if it were in reality the absolute and sole 
 thinking process, for which it was to pass ? 
 
 * Hegel's Kritick of Fichte's System, 1802, in 2nd vol. of Critical 
 Journal by Hegel and Schelling, reprinted in Hegel's ■works, vol. i. p. 158. 
 ist seq. For Jacobi's Sendschreiben an Fichte, see Jacobi's works. 
 
176 HISTOKICAL SURVEY. 
 
 LECTURE Vni. 
 
 FICHTE's later views. — SCHlErEEMACHEB. 
 
 Such, in essentials, was Fichte's system in its earlier form, int 
 which form it is really to be viewed as the connecting link and 
 progressive step from Kant to the more recent systems ; nay, 
 more, as the true introduction and key to the philosophy of the 
 present century. As concerns the general course of philoso- 
 phical inquiry, this earlier system of Fichte may be truly re- 
 garded as containing t"he problem, which he set before himself, 
 and which he has solved, so that at this point the thread to be 
 unravelled fell into the hands of his younger contemporary and 
 scholar, Schelling, and caused the general attention of the philo- 
 sophic public to be directed towards the latter. Tet, meanwhile, 
 it seems but due to the claims of historical justice, that we briefly 
 characterise the progress which Fichte himself made in his later 
 dissertations beyond the limits of the first " Wissenschaftslehre," 
 and still more the close connection in which the philosophical 
 views of Schleiermacher stand to the later doctrine of Fichte, 
 as being that with which the opinions of several younger philo^ 
 sophers have been recently associated. This second form of 
 Fichte's doctrine, which is usually called his realistic or prac- 
 tical period, is contained in his writings of 1800 — 12 j namely^ 
 in the essay " Upon the Destination of Man," and in the " Post- 
 humous "Works " edited by his son, in three volumes. (Bonn, 
 1834.) 
 
 , Now, in these writings, we find not only, a completely new 
 terminology and exposition of what had gone before, but also, 
 as a point which here especially concerns us, a reappearance 
 in essentials of his earlier doctrine, so that this, although ex- 
 ceeded, is nevertheless not annihilated or withdrawn, but is at 
 the same time included and preserved in his later doctrine. 
 
 If we were to call this later change in his opinions his realistic 
 period, and contrast this with his earlier doctrines of idealism, 
 such a distinction would, in a double point of view, be incorrect ; 
 for, on the one hand, Fichte was never that subjective idealist in 
 the sense in which he has been long regarded and misunderstood; 
 while, on the other, this second period is not a perfect realism, 
 
PICHTE. 177 
 
 renouncing tlie idealism, but is rather to be called an objec- 
 tive or absolute idealism. If already, in the first period, the 
 existence of the outward world was by no means denied, as 
 though Fichte's individual Ego was the only existing and cer- 
 tain something, but a system of Egoes and non-Egoes was re- 
 cognised with, at the same time, a definite multiplicity of them, 
 and a law elevated above all caprice, as ruling over all that is 
 known,, still Fichte seemed to be only busy, at first, with ex- 
 plaining this knowledge, and establishing the truth of the known. 
 At the bottom, however, of this theoretical purpose, lay a deeper 
 ultimate object; it was not only a gnostically contemplative 
 interest in knowledge as such, that moved him, but the deeper 
 ethical desire of preserving the absolute independence and spon- 
 taneous activity, the freedom or autonomy of the human Ego : 
 while, upon this ground, no reality and causality whatever was 
 to be conceded to things in the sense adopted by the sensa- 
 tionalists, of their filling up the void Ego with representations 
 from an external and foreign source, and so determining and 
 circumscribing it in every way; for even theoretically, we can 
 only know with certainty and fathom what we ourselves pro- 
 duce from the depths of our subjectivity, while, of an absolutely 
 transcendent, nothing whatever can be known or said. Fichte 
 had in his thoughts, at the very beginning, the pure causality 
 and promethean nature of the thinking Ego, but he did not 
 regard these merely as a final aim of development in time, but 
 posited them from the very beginning, so that the Ego must 
 regard the things in a primordially productive manner.* Em- 
 piricism reverses the whole matter; but the truth is, that the 
 ideal principle in the subject is the productive one, "that the 
 external senses, together with all their objects, are grounded 
 only in the universal thinking process, and that a sensuous per- 
 . ception is present only in the latter, as a something thought of, 
 as a determination of the universal consciousness, but is by 
 no means separated from the consciousness or possible in 
 itself." Thus Fichte everywhere preserves the bond of connec- 
 tion with his earlier principles, and resting upon them as a 
 basis proceeds to carry out and elevate the realistic moment, 
 which lies unmistakeably in the Ego and its general nature. 
 Fichte searches altogether for the real, not vnthout the Egoes in 
 the things, like Locke and other sensationalists, but constantly 
 only in the Ego and its deepest principle. Here, in the self- 
 
 * Sammtlicfae Werke, vii. p. 304, et seq., 375, et seg., viii. 386, et seq., v. 
 434, et seq. 
 
 N 
 
178 HISTOKICAL SURVEY. 
 
 conciousness of the individual finite Egoes, a universal self- 
 conciousness is gradually unfolded to him, an Ego in itself or 
 an absolute Ego, in whose broad foundation all individual Egoes 
 are, as it were, rooted, and into whose unity they all, while 
 maintaining their own essence, return. To him the universal 
 unity of the Absolute among and in all particulars discloses 
 itself more or less after the fashion of Spinoza. But while thus 
 assuming a reality, and that, indeed, an absolute and single one, 
 he resolutely persisted in. affirming that this reality lies only 
 in the Egoes, and is that creative moral will, which, by means 
 of the infinitely endowed Egoes, projects the world and all its 
 phenomena from out this point. This fundamental moment 
 of the Ego, which opposes to itself the non-Egoes, — the same 
 doctrine this as was previously taught by Fichte — is the fun- 
 damental source of all being, the only primordial real. Now, 
 however, we must distinguish the particular individual, or finite 
 Ego, and the infinite Ego, or absolute. "We, as intelligent 
 essences, are, in respect to what we are in ourselves, by no means 
 that absolute Being ; but we are connected with it by the inner- 
 most root of our existence, since apart from it we could not be 
 or exist."* 
 
 Meanwhile Fichte does not regard this universal or funda- 
 mental essence as being by any means a quiescent substance or 
 dead thing in itself, but, in this point also, he remains true to 
 his earlier positions, that, " every notion of being, as such, must 
 be expunged from our thoughts, and be in all instances compre- 
 hended as only a thinking activity, action, and life." Even the 
 absolute Ego, which he calls " Pure Knowledge," " Absolute 
 Consciousness," is to be taken in the same sense as the human 
 Ego, namely, as pure activity ; it is the all-governing, self-exis- 
 tent (objectively universal) reason, not indeed a knowledge of 
 one object, but the transcendental ground of all objective know- 
 ledge, the actively moral and omnipotent world-order, the 
 living, absolute law, which, on account of the incessant activity, 
 which it is in itself, is called the absolute (real) mil. The 
 "Wissenschaftslehre" has not, however, to deal with this being 
 in itself, but with its manifestation, for it is everywhere and 
 throughout a formative activity, an absolute formative process, ' 
 or "formative essence;" an image, however, is not the being 
 itself, although the image points at once to a being of which it 
 is the image. Thus the "Wissenschaftslehre" is a theory of 
 phenomena, and in this sense it is that of the most real expe- 
 * Zum seligen Leben. Werke, V. p. 448. 
 
FICHTE. 179 
 
 rience, being the theory of what we ourselves experience and 
 do; there is no other existence, "for existence implies only 
 " being" in the understanding, for both are thoroughly identical ; 
 the understanding, however, is not an understanding of nothing, 
 but of the phenomenon ; and this again is not the phenomenon 
 of nothing, but of the Absolute, and thus through the middle 
 term of the understanding existence is based upon being, is 
 related to it, and also understands this relation.* Now, how- 
 ever, do the human Egoes belong to the absolute being, or are 
 they to be ranged upon the side of the phenomenon ? They 
 are the very act of the understanding of the distinction of both 
 sides in the Absolute itself.f 
 
 The Absolute taken abstractedly or in itself would be the 
 boundless and indefinitely infinite One, the same in all Egoes ; 
 but it is at the same time a ground, a primitive ground or 
 foundation of all and in all ; the individual Egoes, as being the 
 manifold revelations of what is grounded in it, do but avail 
 themselves of it ; their being consists in the function of allowing 
 that universal to appear in the antagonistic quality of the 
 understanding, i. e. in the reflection which is peculiar to the 
 Ego, and consequently in the actual consciousness ; hence in 
 them, the being is first distinguished from the thinking process, 
 and they are themselves this primitively iu&gmg activity of the 
 understanding, which is at the same time an infinite specifi- 
 cation of the manifold content. Thus the Egoes, taken together 
 as specialities, constitute the totality of the modes of revelation 
 of the Absolute, and every Ego manifests from its immanent 
 " genius " that, which in its place in the total connection is 
 necessary, and ought not to be otherwise, or that which is im- 
 perative and conformable to duty. 
 
 This Absolute is God, and "God is intrinsically One; being in 
 himself one and the same without change or shadow of turning." 
 In so far now as we ourselves are this divine existence itself, 
 no separation, distinction, nor division, can take place. Now, 
 however, that manifold of being is found in the reality ; hence 
 comes the question, whence and from what principle is this 
 manifold reality ? The manifold, as such, is only an appear- 
 ance ; it is indeed there, but we cannot bestow upon it, as 
 being the diverse and mutable, the predicate of being, for this 
 properly belongs only to the One and the Same.| " Thus no 
 division can occur directly in that act of the divine existence, 
 
 * Nachgelassene Werke, i. 360, et seg. f Op. cit. p. 571. 
 
 ^ Anweisung zum seligen Leben. Werke, V. p. 450. 
 
 N 2 
 
180 HISTORICAL 8URVET. 
 
 but must occur without or beyond it ; nevertheless in such a 
 way, that this ' outer ' is obviously connected directly with 
 that living act, and is necessarily consequent upon it, so that 
 at this point no chasm between us and the Deity and our 
 irretrievable repulsion can by any means be established/' Into 
 the self-exclusive points of the freedom (of the Egoes) the 
 divine essence does not enter whole and undivided, but it enters 
 into them only in a one-sided manner ; beyond these points, how- 
 ever, it enters divested of all obscurity, just as it is in itself, 
 continually forming itself in infinitum, in the form of that con- 
 tinuously flowing life which is inseparable from the idea of 
 its own simple undivided life. Now this eternal efflux of the 
 divine life is the true innermost and deepest root of the exist- 
 ence." " It is the persistent, eternal, and unchangeable will of 
 the absolute reality to develop itself continually, as of necessity 
 it must." 
 
 Thus Fichte endeavours, in a variety of ways, to find an ade- 
 quate expression for the relation of the finite free Egoes to the 
 absolute One. He believes that he has established their distinc- 
 tion by limiting the human consciousness (when taken in a 
 stricter sense) to the antagonisms and distinctions of the sen- 
 suous phenomena, within the pale of which the human under- 
 standing moves ; of these the understanding has the most 
 searching knowledge, just because it produces them itself; but 
 upon retracing its steps back, to the very root of its own nature, 
 it then comprehends that which is devoid of all difference, the 
 principle or source in which to it all definite thoughts originate, 
 and from which, in like manner, all definite thoughts proceed, 
 so that, as Fichte well said in agreement with Schleiermacher 
 and Jacobi, here only a direct feeling, but no conceivable dis- 
 crimination in thought is possible. Thus, the divine, from its 
 being the primitive source of all rationally moral world-order, 
 is abstract reason, but we cannot clothe_ and confine it in any 
 definite form.* Nevertheless Fichte ascribes to the Absolute, 
 regarded abstractedly, no more consciousness, than he did in 
 the first period of his writings ; and the rationale of this we 
 find to consist in the Absolute being, with him, that very funda- 
 mental moment which is present in the Egoes themselves ; that 
 part of the Ego — if I may so express myself — which appeared 
 indeed to be a source of activity, but, when regarded per se or 
 by itself alone, and apart from the other moment of the non- 
 Egoes, to be indeterminate and indifferent. Here then the Egoes, 
 * Briefe an Reinhold im Leben. und Briefwechsel, Bd. ii. p. 305. 
 
FICHTE, 181 
 
 ID thinking conformably to the understanding, take upon them- 
 selves the place of the discriminating reflective activity ; and 
 thus pass with their activity to a certain degree beyond that 
 absolute indifference-point, although the act of discrimination 
 proceeds from this, and cannot be posited without it ; or, in 
 other words, since Fichte viewed the finite Ego, as positing 
 from an indifference-point all the multiplicity of representations 
 (although the latter must be ever present simultaneously with 
 the former and inversely), and then explained this point as the 
 universal reality of the Divine Being, it follows inevitably that 
 the Deity could in itself be nothing else than a moment in the 
 Ego ; though it can, no more than the latter, be posited without 
 its second moment, or without an actual world of Egoes, — can- 
 not be thought of as Creator antecedent or prior to a world, but 
 is only the immanent point of unity and relation for a world that 
 is to be presupposed as co-eternal with it. With all this, how- 
 ever, the idea of absolute causality is infringed, and the same con- 
 tradiction steps in as in the case of the finite Ego, which is to 
 be absolute ground of all its determinations, but is yet depend- 
 ent dialectically, with its own existence, upon the already exist- 
 ing determinations. 
 
 If now, as Fichte himself discerned, nothing is to be derived 
 from so abstract a fundamental moment, when taken by itself 
 alone, since the Ego finds itself always enclosed in " incompre- 
 hensible limits," it follows that it must break through these with 
 an incessant self-activity, so as to arrive at self-freedom. 
 Fichte points out, both psychologically and historically, a sys- 
 tematic progress in this restless process of elevation, and be- 
 comes in this way the author of a noble Philosophy of the 
 History of humanity.* In this three leading stand-points or 
 periods must be distinguished. First of all, the Ego stands 
 upon the sensuous stand-point of happiness; for since each Ego, 
 as a one-sided and partial existence of the divine universal 
 being, represents some special function of the divine will ; so 
 also it first comprehends itself in this its particularity, and re- 
 gards itself as a whole, by opposing itself to other in like manner 
 particular wills, and in this way asserting an exclusive being. 
 Its will is not, therefore, one with the universal divine will, 
 but is rather in antagonism to this, and in a state of disunion. 
 In this way the Ego comes, secondly, to the point where it makes 
 a choice between two wills, and has to form a resolution, whether 
 it will determine itself in conformity to its own individual or ta 
 
 * Anweisung z. sel. Leben, Bd. v. p. 510, et seq. 
 
 S 3 
 
182 HISTOKICAL SURVEY. 
 
 the eternal will. TKis position, upon the part of the Ego and 
 the choice (liberum arbitrium), associated with the consciousness 
 of being able to form some different and positive resolution, is 
 the stand-point of the law. But, thirdly, this state of antagonism 
 must also be suppressed, in order, finally, that the state of pure 
 and free morality, and with this that oi blessedness, may supervene. 
 Here the idea of a possible independence of the individual will 
 vanishes entirely in presence of the absolute will ; " the Ego 
 as it was now rielapses into the pure divine existence, and we 
 cannot, strictly speaking, say that the divine will becomes that 
 of the Ego ; seeing that there are no longer two beings, but 
 only one, no longer two wills, but only one and the same will 
 which is all in all. So long as man ever yearns to be any thing 
 of himself, God does not come to him, for no man can become 
 God. So soon, however, as he purely and radically annihilates 
 himself, God alone remains, and is all in all. Man cannot en- 
 gender God, but he can annihilate himself as the true negation, 
 and then he sinks or relapses into God." Thus that general 
 harmony of the blessed life is realised, to which the system of 
 absolute morality aspires ; and it is not an absolute progress in 
 infinitum, but a definite object and goal of general glorification, 
 which is kept in view, this being not unjustly compared with 
 that to which the Alexandrian gnostics, Proclus for instance, 
 turned their gaze as to the end of all things. " Finally, — for 
 what must needs be the end ? says Fichte ; all must arrive at 
 the sure haven of eternal rest and blessedness ; at length the ■ 
 divine kingdom must appear in all its might, majesty, and 
 dominion." 
 
 Who, however, does not see, upon comparing this end with 
 the beginning of the system, that Fichte here, in opposition to 
 the former theory of the Ego, and of the moral doctrine, lets 
 the Ego thoroughly dissolve and vanish into the Absolute? 
 This radical self-annihilation, this "love" that gives itself up 
 without any restraint, is here called religion ; but how different 
 it is from his earlier moral doctrine " of joyful well-doing " ! 
 If, during this present life, an all-governing will perfects itself 
 through the whole current of events by means of the Egoes, and 
 their representations, which are bound together by necessary 
 laws, how then is the determinism which lurks in the back- 
 ground to be averted or to be combined with human freedom ? 
 Of the human being who has become enlightened as to the true 
 reality, it is said " nothing surprises him, whatever occurs 
 around him, whether he comprehends it or not : he knows of a 
 
SCHLBIEEMACHEE. 183 
 
 certainty, that it is in the world of God, and that nothing can 
 be in this, which does not tend to good as its end. He has no 
 fear for the future, for the absolutely Blessed guides him 
 eternally towards it ; he has no repentance over the past, for 
 in so far as he was not in God, he was nothing, and the past is 
 now past, and for the first time since his reception into the 
 Deity is he born unto life ; in so far, however, as he was in 
 God, is that right and good which he has done." How, 
 however, the human Ego could maintain any independence and 
 freedom in the presence of the Absolute, remained an obscure 
 and uncertain point, because, what is preeminently the funda- 
 mental defect of the system was never satisfactorily explained, 
 namely, as to how the finite Ego, simple in itself and indifferently 
 devoid of determination, and in like manner the just as abstract 
 infinite Ego, can be the determining cause of a multiplicity that 
 is to proceed from it or depend upon it. As to the former the 
 things or their images, so to the latter the whole world must be 
 primordially given, and neither in the one nor the other can the 
 possibility of a free creation be comprehended. 
 
 If the weak side of Fichte's system was, as has just been 
 said, undoubtedly this, that from the abstract ground of the 
 Ego the multiplicity of the representations which should proceed 
 from it as non-Egoes cannot be derived, — and was Fichte himself 
 • constantly obliged by his reflective nature to distinguish the 
 Ego from the non-Ego and inversely, and to refer both sides 
 to each other, but nevertheless offered in this way not the 
 slightest explanation of how the content of this Ego, the infinite 
 fulness of the things or images, sprung originally from within 
 it ; it followed that, in this state of matters, the next and most 
 natural step was to return to the assumption of a real world of 
 things, and a real nature both around and without us. 
 
 This was done by Friedrich Schleiermacher, born at Breslau 
 1 768, died 1834, in Berlin. Although, as a theologian belonging 
 to the Reformed church, he never wholly denied the influence 
 of his earliest education within the bosom of the Moravian 
 brethren ; " piety," he himself says, " was the maternal body, 
 within whose holy sanctuary my young life was nurtured and 
 prepared for entering upon that world which was as yet a 
 sealed book ; in this body my spirit breathed, ere it had found 
 for itself its peculiar sphere in science and the experience of 
 life." Meanwhile, as it lies quite beyond the limits of this work 
 
 N 4 
 
184 HISTOEICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 to describe in detail the epoch which was made by Schlerer- 
 macher in the domain of Theology, we must be content with 
 inserting in this place a sketch of the characteristic features of 
 his philosophy, in the which he neither wished to found a new 
 system nor a new school, so that it is partly to be regarded as 
 a resume of what had hitherto been done by Fichte, and partly 
 as forming unquestionably a transitional step to the following 
 standing-points. 
 
 While, as regards the reality of the non-Egoes, i. e. of natural 
 things and real experience, Schleiermacher freed himself from 
 the unsatisfactory idealism of Fichte, by adopting a real re- 
 ciprocal action of thinking and being, and returned to Kanfs 
 view of the world, in which there still lay a sensational element 
 derived from Locke, he yet agreed with Fichte, in adopting, 
 like that author did in the earlier portion of his career, an in- 
 dependent, individual Ego ; but at the same time also, as was 
 done at a later period by Fichte, he adopted a real connection 
 of this Ego with a single absolute primeval cause, and still more 
 strongly did he insist upon this connection, as being manifested 
 in Airect feeling. That he adopted an empirical element in our 
 knowledge, does not, however, place him simply upon Kant's 
 stand-point, and still less behind this upon the post taken up by 
 the sensationalist school, for he differs from the latter class of 
 philosophers by vindicating the idealistic moment in opposition 
 to the material one, and from Kant, by assuming that the tiou- 
 menon, or intrinsic nature of things, may be cognised by us, 
 seeing that he wished to establish an adequate knowledge, to- 
 gether with objective validity, in place of the bare possibility of 
 cognising the phenomenon only, and to found this real know- 
 ledge upon a general fundamental substance, common to the 
 Egoes and the things, in and by which a real influence of the 
 things upon the mind, or inversely, and thus a mediation of 
 the knowledge in us by means of things, and an objective activity 
 of the will upon the things, becomes comprehensible. 
 
 This homogeneous fundamental essence, which we first take 
 into consideration, by the assumption of which Schleiermacher 
 entered into such close relationship, not only with Fichte's later 
 doctrine, but with Spinoza and Schelling also — this essence 
 or substance, in which the dualism of thinking and being is re- 
 duced at bottom to a unity, is to be posited as the indifference of 
 both, of reality and ideality, i. e. as an essence, in which these 
 differences having been extinguished, are no longer present, 
 jso that the dusdistic antagonism is no radical one, or a dualism 
 
SCHLEIERMACHEE. 185 
 
 Irhat di-vides into two principles, but is only to be met with in 
 the world of finite essences. Hence Schleiermacher called this 
 his philosophical stand-point, that of the unity of idealism and 
 lealism, and with this, probably, quite independently of Fichte 
 fl,nd Schelling, and having perhaps had his attention directed 
 to it by Jacobi, he associated at once the doctrine of the " holy 
 and repudiated Spinoza," in which he believed that he had 
 found the solid and substantial basis, which lifted him not 
 •only above the one-sidednesses of idealism, but also of material- 
 ism ; he availed himself, however, the more readily of the point 
 of support aflForded by Spinoza's doctrine of the All-one, since 
 therein he could contemplate, as a necessary hypothesis for his 
 religious principle, the " absolute feeling of dependence." 
 
 Although in his later years, when he had studied more 
 ■closely the original works of Spinoza, his predilection for that 
 renowned thinker was withdrawn more in favour of a plato- 
 nising view of the subject, still it may be justly said of his 
 earlier opinions, that his mode of apprehending the doctrine of 
 substance difiered always essentially from that of Spinoza. 
 With Schleiermacher this doctrine is, in a philosophical point of 
 view, a means only for blending or fusing together Fichte's 
 monistic idealism, and Kant's dualism ; for with him, indeed, 
 we never encounter that decided pantheism of Spinoza, which 
 regards the absolutely and singly existing substance as the 
 essence of all things, but the things as mere abstract forms, 
 devoid of essence, and transitory, in which that substance, as 
 the only eternal and divine, exists ; so that a world, as distin- 
 guishable from God, does not even exist, and hence the pan- 
 theism is of a completely acosmic character. In opposition to 
 this Spinozism, but certainly not without involving himself in a 
 contradiction, and at the cost too of some logical consistency, 
 Schleiermacher distinguished very definitely the existence of 
 the world from the existence of the absolute substance, which 
 with Spinoza he called " God." The absolute substance or the 
 Absolute is with Schleiermacher, in the strictest sense of the 
 word, an unity and self-homogeneity, which excludes from itself 
 all diff'erences, determinations, and actions, and in the which, 
 when we endeavour to think of it, the power of framing con- 
 ceptions attains its extreme point, since we can only think of 
 the definite, the formed, or of that the limits of which are 
 mapped out in distinction to something else. This substance, 
 which is not to be comprised in any definite thought, which is 
 to be uttered only negatively, or as to what it is not, is not- 
 
186 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 withstanding, a necessary hypothesis of all definite thinking, 
 beinor, and knowledge, as also of all action of things upon one 
 another, and of the intelligence upon material things, and is 
 thus an altogether necessary postulate for all knowledge, and 
 all active volition. Nevertheless, Schleiermacher does not, like 
 Spinoza, regard this divine substance as entering into all finite 
 things, and directly constituting the existence of all of them! in 
 the aggregate ; but with him, all finite things taken together 
 are, arid remain, the complex only of finite natures, and this 
 complex is the universe or world. Thus the world is opposed 
 to the Infinite One, just as the many are to the one, and is in 
 nowise identical with God. From the infinite in itself, Schleier- 
 macher considers that every quality of distinction, both the 
 maten'al one of things among themselves, as also the main dis- 
 tinction of thinking and being, or intelligence and nature, is 
 in the strictest manner excluded. It would be but a rendering 
 of the infinite finite, consequently a contradiction (in adjecto), 
 if we were to regard the Deity as being identical with things, or 
 things in their aggregate as being God. In this way the 
 world obtains upon its side, in spite of its being necessarily 
 dependent on God, and upon Gad's existence, a certain relative 
 independence as the totality of every thing definite, finite, and 
 changeable. 
 
 Despite, therefore, the actual negative dependence and the 
 absolute feeling of dependence, the individual Egoes are, and 
 remain, insolubly self-subsistent in this general substantial 
 medium. For since the substance determines nothing, but only 
 supports and unites the determined in itself, it follows, that the 
 individual minds are principles that determine themselves and 
 something else, save only that their definite and individual nature 
 must be accommodated to the universal whole, of which the 
 minds are integrant members. As in that universal whole, the 
 infinite multiplicity is exhausted, while this multiplicity of in- 
 dividual essences is determined by their mutual relation to each 
 other, and also by the whole ; it follows, that each individual 
 Ego has its definite mode of existence and action portioned^: 
 out to it, of necessity, by a kind of pre-established harmony ; 
 each Ego having its specific calling, function, " talent," or en- 
 dowment. In this respect, Schleiermacher is, upon the one 
 hand, a complete determinist ; while, upon the other hand, he 
 believed that he had, — by this specific individuality, whereby 
 each Ego becomes the representative of a moment in the whole, 
 and one that of necessity belongs to the absolute totality, — sue- 
 
SCHLEIEEMACHEE. 187 
 
 ceeded in strengthening the individuality, personality, and inde- 
 pendence of the latter. To the objection that may be raised 
 against this view, as giving rise rather to a thoroughly dependent 
 particularity and deficiency, than to a totality of each individual 
 per se, he replies, that each, as well as all, has a share in the 
 Absolute, the one and the homogeneous ; and hence, in the uni- 
 versal reason, whose universality is demanded and presupposed 
 by that very multiplicity. Each individual has, also, in his self- 
 consciousness and conscience, an incontestable knowledge of this, 
 his participation and dependence upon the Absqlute. Now, to 
 speak critically, if this substantial unity were to be in itself not 
 merely the abstract unity, but were to serve for more than a col- 
 lective complex, in which the differences would not merely be 
 contained and supported, as upon a basis, it follows, that the 
 general element which corresponds to it in the subjective reason, 
 or self-consciousness, would be more than a formal complex of 
 everything special and particular ; the individuals would become 
 true personalities, as Schleiermacher would, without doubt, 
 have them ; for, according to his view of the matter, we seem 
 to encounter in the world more of the spontaneous activity of 
 the finite individual essences, than of the energetic activity of 
 God ; and it is not so much to be feared that the Absolute should 
 effect every thing by suppressing only human freedom, as that, 
 on the contrary, God should be lowered to the condition of the 
 passive substance : nevertheless, this would, according to Schlei- 
 ermacher's view, be directly the case, if the Divinity were ever 
 to engage himself actively in the world ; for then the latter 
 would, in the conflict of finite things, hold a passive relation, — 
 a disadvantageous state this, which could only be evaded by 
 our plainly . withholding both attributes, activity as well as 
 passivity, from the Absolute. 
 
 If, then, the whole argument is to turn out satisfactorily, the 
 main point is obviously to determine the relation in which the 
 infinite stands to the finite Ego. Upon this question we find 
 laid down, as a general basis, only what follows. As the Abso- 
 lute is in itself perfectly undefinable, so, also, is it to be posited 
 in reference to its relation to the world ; and as there the de- 
 terminate thinking and knowing comes to an end, i. e., the 
 Absolute itself cannot, properly speaking, be known, it follows 
 that neither can its relation to the world be known, nor 
 cognised by definite thought, and then expressed. But this 
 inability to cognise the Absolute is not to be charged as a 
 weakness upon the part of our own limited reason ; but it follows 
 
188 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 from the notion of the Absolute itself being perfectly undefinable, 
 incognisable, and inconceivable. It is not, however, with this 
 want of knowledge, or ignorance, as with the other ; for while of 
 the totality of natural objects we can have no adequate, no 
 wholly perfect knowledge, but only such as may be obtained 
 from the subjective foundation of our individual and limi^ted 
 sphere of thought ; yet, by an unlimited mind, this totality 
 would be comprehensible ; and we even approximate to it 
 continually in the progress of our education, although we never 
 actually attain to it ; but, in the former case, the ground of the 
 impossibility of arriving at any knowledge lies objectively in 
 the nature of the Absolute itself. Thus, there can be no true 
 knowledge and comprehension of the Absolute ; but still there ia 
 an inward or spiritual perception of the Absolute Being, which 
 is the minimum of knowledge vanishing into the indifference 
 of the indiscriminate state, and of the consciousness emerging 
 from the indifference, and passing over to the difference, — an 
 inward perception which, in this very act, is, at the same time, 
 affected by the indifference ; whereby we may, in some mea- 
 sure, render account to ourselves of that relation. This in- 
 ward, spiritual perception ia Feeling. Here, again Schleier- 
 macher agrees with Jacobi, although upon different grounds ; 
 for with the latter, the feeling was only an imperfect but imme- 
 diate apprehension of the activity of God ; and for God he did 
 not presuppose an indefinite substance, but a personal spirit. 
 With Schleiermacher, the feeling, from its not being the sen- 
 suous organic sensation, but the religious, absolute feeling of de- 
 pendence, is a mode of mediation which is adequate to its object, 
 because it is its very self the suppression of alldefinite distinctions 
 in the object felt, and of the antagonism of subjectivity and 
 objectivity. In the feeling, no object stands opposed to us, but 
 we are directly one with it; here, also, in particular, is the anta- 
 gonism between willing and knowing suppressed, or the knowing 
 passes, on the one band, through the indifference-point of the 
 feeling, into willing upon the other, and this again into the 
 former by the same route; for if knowledge proceeds from an 
 influence of the objects, while inversely the will acts by an ope- 
 ration from within us upon the objects, it follows that an in- 
 difference-point must here lie between them both in the subject, 
 in which these antagonisms again relapse into the absolute in- 
 difference. If there were no point of union, no common bond 
 of connection between willing and thinking, they would both 
 fall utterly asunder, an interval = would intervene between 
 
SCHLBIEKMACHER. 189 
 
 all our acts of thinking and willing, and thus the unity of our 
 consciousness would be utterly disintegrated. Thus, the in- 
 difference of feeling is seen at once to be the continued 
 potency which leads not only to a constant renewal of will- 
 ■determinationa, but also to determinate series of thoughts. 
 Thus, to the objection raised, that if in feeling the character of 
 difference and antagonism is suppressed, every trace of con- 
 sciousness must also vanish, and thus the feeling itself sink 
 ■down to zero, Schleiermacher replies, that the subject upon this 
 very retrogression of itself into utter indifference, or in its 
 progress from this into the different, comprehends itself in the 
 moment of distinguishing them both, so that in this moment 
 a minimum of the one extreme is always apprehended simul- 
 taneously together with the other, before it wholly disappears. 
 Nay, the evanescence of this moment from the memory is by no 
 means connected with the appearance of the knowing and willing 
 upon the world of antagonisms ; on the contrary, this feeling 
 must of necessity accompany the mind, during its actual life in 
 the world, as a permanent substratum for all definite acts of 
 thinking and willing. The absolute feeling of dependence, 
 which is the sum and substance of all religion, is distinct from 
 every other physical feeling of relative dependence upon external 
 things as determining us ; for over against this, there constantly 
 remains, at the same time, a relative feeling of freedom, in the 
 which we are conscious of being able to act upon the things, 
 and of letting them act or not, as we please, upon our- 
 selves. Of this feeling, however, OTer against the Absolute, 
 there remains to us not the smallest trace ; for in regard to 
 this, we cannot will, i. e., be spontaneously active ; it is im- 
 possible, and self-contradictory, to seek to define or determine, 
 in any way, the absolute Being, since this itself is plainly 
 the indefinite pure Being ; thus the Absolute can be no more 
 willed, than it can be known. Here we do but encounter our 
 own absolute dependence, and that of things also; and the 
 feeling of this dependence is religion, as regards the funda- 
 mental nature of which all men resemble each, other, but hold a 
 different relation among themselves, according to the degree in 
 which God's consciousness is active in them. As regards the 
 ideas, or representations, which men spontaneously frame to 
 themselves of the Absolute, and their relation to it, there may 
 be very different religious doctrines and theologies ; but in all 
 these forms, the true religious element is that feeling, a reality 
 which is something essentially different from every kind of 
 
190 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 theory or speculation in which the essence of religion does not 
 even consist ; for religion is not a mere process of thinking or 
 knowing. 
 
 If we now turn from the consideration of the real objective 
 condition of the matter in itself, to that of human knowledge 
 and science in the true sense of the word, we find Schleier- 
 macher entertaining the lofty notion of Philosophy, as being 
 the central science, which, as with Plato and Aristotle, soars 
 above all the special ones. It does not engender, a priori the 
 content of these sciences, but it determines their form, since it 
 harmonises all the given content into a whole, produces the 
 positive connection of all special notions, determines these cri- 
 tically by the sum of their total connections, and in this way 
 produces the systematic consciousness, in the formal conclusive 
 character of which it consists. With all this, however, we 
 must at the same time bear in mind the limited sense, which 
 by Schleiermacher, as well as Kant, is attached to the word 
 " knowledge." Knowledge bears a double character, first, in 
 its being the general method, alike unto all men, of represent- 
 ing and forming to themselves notions of things; and, secondly, 
 in its bearing reference to the being of things, and including in 
 itself, not merely a thinking process, but a positive knowledge 
 of objects corresponding to the notion of their being. The 
 former character is conditioned by the latter; and this objective 
 validity of knowledge includes that general character of the 
 representative process, so that Schleiermacher lays most stress 
 upon the latter, for in the objective truth of what is thought 
 the correct thoughts of all men concur. Thus, instead of ren- 
 dering prominent the first criterion, in which case his philo- 
 sophy would have gained a more subjectively idealistic cha- 
 racter than in Kant ; it was by the predominance of the latter 
 ■criterion invested with an objectively cognitive theoretical 
 character. Hence knowledge and all science have their free 
 play only in the sphere of the world, thus within the finite 
 antagonisms of thinking and being and of the thinking finite 
 essences (Egoes) with one another and with the nature of things. 
 Thus philosophy is, in the truest sense of the word, world- 
 wisdom-; but inasmuch as this or the experience upon which it 
 rests, is never completed, philosophy also is never completed, 
 but strives continually towards this goal, and finds itself con- 
 stantly in a state of infinite approximation thereunto. 
 
 All true knowledge has indeed a double factor — empiricism, 
 which, as with Kant, furnishes the content of our notions, and 
 
SCHLElEEMACHER. 191 
 
 the intelligence, which imparts the form to this content, which, 
 without it would be chaotic ; while, to the thinking activity, 
 on the other hand, a formal function only belongs. Over 
 against the theoretical activity of cognition, stands the prac- 
 tical activity of the will, i. e. the activity of the Ego, by virtue of 
 which it transfers its notional forms to the external world, and 
 therein embodies them, so that these conceptions or notions here 
 become active principles, or notions having an end or object in 
 view. As for the content of philosophy, the special real sciences 
 must elaborate and prepare this ; this content is originally 
 given only as empirical material, and the reason is not originally 
 self-conscious of this material, until it has elaborated it ; the 
 reason only manifests itself actively, when by the active human 
 being it is on account of the " organising activity " imagined to 
 be in nature, nature being animated with reason, so that this 
 rational form is now manifested to the human being in an 
 objectively comprehensible manner, and the organised reality 
 becomes the symbol for the symbolising, L e. the cognitive 
 activity of the reason. Without the content, which is to be 
 adopted by us only through the medium of objectivity, philo- 
 sophy would only have to deal with abstract logical formulae. 
 It has, therefore, in order to become a science, upon the one 
 hand, to reduce by a process of abstraction the given manifold 
 content of cognition to general notions, i. e. to deal with it 
 inductively, and upon the other by an exercise of the judgment 
 to deduce with dialectic precision, through the medium of oppo- 
 sites, that content from out the notional unity. The formulae 
 discovered by induction, and the "schemata" determined by 
 deduction, coalesce into the intellectual intuition as being now 
 full of meaning and critically justified. Had philosophy the 
 power of producing originally all content from out of the reason, 
 or even of reproducing that content perfectly with only the 
 assistance of the given, it would in the latter case be a perfect, 
 in the former an absolute science ; but for the present at least 
 philosophy is unable to do this, being only one side of the 
 truth, namely the formal, while from its penetration into the 
 given content originates for the first time the highest form of 
 knowledge, or that which Schleiermacher, to use his own ex- 
 pression, regards as a " technical " (intellectual) intuition. So 
 far as philosophy busies itself with the forms of thought as 
 such, it is logic ; so far as it penetrates in thought the content 
 that is given us, thus cognises the being and elevates it to 
 knowledge, it is metaphysics, which is the fundamental science 
 
192 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 of philosophy. Schleiermacher, however, includes the two parte- 
 of it, the metaphysical division of the general doctrine of cog- 
 nition and the special logical, together under the name of 
 Dialectick. Under this general division comes in due order every 
 thing that is conceivable, consisting, upon the one hand, of nature,, 
 upon the other, of the sphere of conscious action, consequently 
 of physics and ethics, so that on the whole the ancient division^ 
 of philosophy into dialectick, physics, and ethics is reestablished.- 
 
 If we now take a concluding glance at the theology and ethics- 
 of Schleiermacher (for with speculative physics he has not 
 specially concerned himself) it might at the first glance seem 
 difficult to discern how Schleiermacher, as a theologian, could 
 have associated with his metaphysics, as above characterised, a- 
 Christian theology and Christology, seeing that the Deity is so 
 firmly enclosed within itself, and is so bare and devoid of all 
 definitions. In fact, Schleiermacher does not connect hi* 
 special doctrine of religion and belief with this objective prin- 
 ciple, in order to deduce something more from it scientifically;, 
 but setting aside all speculation, he passes over to the human 
 subject, in order to take his stand-point here in the absolute' 
 feeling of dependence. This feeling is, indeed, essentially one 
 of a general and abstract character, but on that very account 
 it stands the more in need of being determined from some other 
 source, or by the channel of history. Now Schleiermacher' 
 transplants us at once into that definite state of religious feeling^ 
 which is characteristic of the Christian frame of mind, and with 
 him this state serves, not only as the criterium of what is to be 
 rejected as contradictory, but also as the positive principle of 
 what must be presupposed as a necessary condition, and thus,, 
 of all that without which that very feeling could not be present 
 and alive within us. The position which he assumes is thus of 
 a psychological, historical, and the method of a critically pos- 
 tulating, character. 
 
 The true Christian feeling and consciousness of religion, is 
 not, however, limited to the abstract and general feeling of de- 
 pendence upon higher powers, but, when defined more closely^ 
 its sphere of action is seen to include the antagonism between 
 the consciousness of guilt or sin, and the certainty of atonement,, 
 or grace. The former state consists, not so much in the con- 
 sciousnes of definite acts of injustice, as in the deeper self-con- 
 sciousness of weakness, and a feeling of dependence as regards 
 the individual sensuous will, so that one's piety is not only too 
 feeble to pervade all the moments of life's conduct, but one's 
 
SCHLEIERMACHEE. 193 
 
 ■whole view of the world besides ; this state of weakness on our 
 part, as regards our consciousness of God, is the sin for which 
 we are answerable. The state of grace, on the contrary, hovers 
 before the Christian as the power of the divine consciousness 
 within him, to govern all states of his mind and conduct in life, 
 and in this consciousness he becomes reconciled to being freed 
 from the dominion of sin. This state, however, cannot be re- 
 garded as one which is any way attained or even attainable 
 by the human being, in so far as he is placed by his nature in 
 the antagonisms of finitude : in order to subdue the finitude 
 both in the singular and the whole, i. e. the world, he neces- 
 sarily stands in need of an infinite principle lying beyond this 
 finitude, and this principle must be imparted to him. The 
 Christian, however, linows that this communication is only 
 granted him through the mediation of an historical Eedeemer. 
 If even we were to assume that this communication came to 
 us through the world in the ordinary course of civilisation, 
 still it could only be by the Christian church in the world ; 
 for the world itself, as the complex of the finite, is utterly 
 sinful, and has neither power to elevate another, nor itself, 
 above this state. The redemption must proceed from a prin- 
 ciple, elevated above all sinfulness, which was and is the per- 
 sonality of Jesus, to which our traditional knowledge points as 
 to a definite historical phenomenon. He alone imparts to us 
 the strength of his divine consciousness, as in him alone was 
 this divine consciousness attained; not merely by a gradual 
 process, or by degrees, but absolutely so as to perfectly pervade 
 his whole personality, and govern his whole life ; and thus he 
 can work continually, in the Christian community, as a pure 
 archetypal form of instruction, — sacrificing himself for us in 
 the fulness of his love. 
 
 Now while Christian dogmatism possesses, in this precise 
 feeling of devotion, which betrays a real state within us, an 
 infallible criterion of Christian belief and knowledge ; from the 
 same principle, also, springs Christian ethics — in so far, 
 namely, as this feeling of confidence in God, conditioned by 
 communion with the Redeemer, is the motive of a practical or 
 truly Christian conduct of life. Hence, Christian ethics are as 
 distinct from general or philosophical ethics, as the Christian 
 doctrine of belief is from metaphysics. 
 
 Philosophical Ethics originate from the general self-con-r 
 sciousness of the will, and is a science that may be represented 
 in a speculative form. Upon the one hand, it presupposes 
 
 o 
 
194 HISTORICAL SUKVEY. 
 
 physics ; for the humail being finds itself, from the beginning, 
 abeady organised by nature as or for a rational being ; save 
 only that reason and nature are here, in a directly unconscious 
 manner, one. Now the problem of the science consists in ren- 
 dering itself, by the action of the reason, more and more con- 
 scious, and by the conscious (subjective) reason gaining a 
 greater mastery over nature, i. e., it consists in the universal 
 effort of the reason to penetrate what in nature is isolated — to 
 render it its own organ, and animate it, until the whole nature 
 of our earth's surface has entered into the service of the reason, 
 and the latter become the dominant or governing soul of that 
 universal body of nature ; a goal this, which must, indeed, 
 constantly hover before the science of ethics, but which it 
 never attains ; for, with the actual suppression of that antago- 
 nism, the science which essentially consists in the process and 
 struggle of this suppression, would be itself suppressed, and 
 its place supplied by a, thoroughly rationalised nature, i. e., 
 general state of blessedness.* 
 
 We are forbidden, by the general plan of these discourses, 
 from entering further into the moral doctrine ; and will only add, 
 that Schleiermacher was the first who denounced the one-sided 
 character which ethics present when they are handled, either 
 from the point of view of the highest good, or of virtue, or of 
 duty. What he wished for was, a knowledge of these three 
 points of view, as united, though it was the doctrine of goodness 
 especially which he made to rank, as the principal one, above 
 the others. To this step he was especially moved by the de- 
 ficiencies of the earlier outlines of ethical science given by 
 Kant and Fiohte, who had formularized the moral doctrine 
 throughout into a doctrine of duty, though in this was in- 
 volved the character of a dualistic antagonism of the subjective 
 will and objective law, which can never be wholly reduced to 
 the level of perfect freedom, unless both are essentially one and 
 the same in the natural will. If in this we seem to run the 
 risk of eudaemonism, still, upon the other hand, the possibility 
 must not be denied in the outset of our being ultimately able 
 to rise above the legal sphere of justice up to the state of 
 perfect freedom in love ; and this goal Schleiermacher has, in 
 his religious moral doctrine, especially kept in view. Indeed, 
 
 * The comprehension of Schleiermacher's philosophy has been recently 
 facilitated by Julius Schaller in his Lectures (Vorlesungen) upon Schleier- 
 macher, Halle, 1844, and by Weissenbotn's Lectures upon Schleiermacher's 
 Bialectiek and Dogmatik, Leipzig, 1847. 
 
SCHLEIEEMACHER. 195 
 
 the general tendency of this more recent philosophy is, as has 
 been frequently observed, to confirm the freedom of the indi- 
 vidual. Kant, indeed, with his dualism, could not effect this 
 otherwise than by making the Ego sacrifice the desires which 
 confounded it with nature, and then take stoical refuge back 
 into itself. Fichte, more energetic in character, preferred anni- 
 hilating or reducing the reality of objective nature to a mere, 
 although necessary, mode of representation upon the part of the 
 Ego, rather than give up any thing of the infinite principle of 
 freedom ; but, in this way, he lapsed into the path of absolute 
 idealism, which, with his successors, veered round into a deifica- 
 tion of the Ego. Lastly, Shleiermacher left the reality of nature 
 to subsist, but identified, to such an extent, the reason that is 
 immanent therein with the self-conscious reason of the subject^ 
 that ethics threatened to become physics, and inversely. 
 
 As regards Schleiermacher's philosophy in general, the reason 
 why it arrives at no satisfactory result is, without doubt, to be 
 sought for in its deficient notion of God. It has been already 
 observed, that what was to be feared was not so much that, in 
 his system, [the absolute substance, by entering the world, 
 should be made its solitary and energetic soul, and aU freedom 
 of man be suppressed ; as rather inversely, that it must seem 
 as though the finite Egoes would get the mastery over this 
 formless substance, and, by dint of their significant intelligence, 
 deal with it as with a passive substratum. Since, however, 
 Schleiermacher has declared this substance to be the whole 
 absolute, and this absolute to be God, it follows, that he can- 
 not admit any kind of entrance of this substantial and original 
 essence into the forms and conflicts of finitude. In this way, 
 the existence of the world is only negatively conditioned by 
 that essence, i. e., the absolute is only that without which 
 higher, more concrete principles could not exist and work, 
 which they require to do in order to realise themselves and 
 become spontaneously active; though, in fact, such a con- 
 dition, by being only negative as regards other positively deter- 
 mining principles, is nothing more than what is called, in the 
 wider sense, matter or substratum. Now, since from it alone 
 no world can proceed, such a world must, if it exists, be pre- 
 supposed in and along with it from eternity, thus devoid of free 
 creation ; and, since Schleiermacher repeatedly gives utterance 
 to the expression " without God no world, and without world 
 no Deity," the absolute appears, upon the one hand, to be dialec- 
 tically conditioned and dependent upon the finite, as inversely 
 
 o 2 
 
196 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 the latter upon the former. Accordingly, despite every caution 
 being taken against the Absolute entering into the sphere of 
 the finite, and the Deity becoming again degraded to the con- 
 dition of a powerless and passive substratum, it appeared, ne- 
 vertheless, to be inversely at the cost of the self-subsistency of 
 all finite creatures, that the same Deity was elevated to the 
 xank of an omnipotent casiiality, to the potency of all "be- 
 coming," and to the single formal principle of all. The idea of 
 the true Absolute appears only to be saved, and the last trace 
 •of the dualism of the material and formal principle to be extin- 
 guished, when the Absolute is regarded, not only as the abstract 
 indifierence, but as such, at the same time, the living prin- 
 ciple of all difference ; when universally immanent in all things, 
 it enters not so much energetically into a present world of 
 opposites, as rather evolves these in the very beginning from 
 itself, or, by distinguishing and determining itself in itself, 
 unfolds itself into the totality of the world's reality. This 
 total subversion of the hitherto current view of the world, 
 appeared with justice to be the next and necessary point that 
 must be taken into consideration; and it was the youthful 
 iSchelling who ventured upon this bold and daring step. 
 
SCHELLING. 197 
 
 LECTURE IX. 
 
 SCHELLING. 
 
 We left the science of philosophy upon the earlier standing- 
 point assumed by Fichte, with the following result: all our 
 knowledge is a subjective activity; no one can know and learn 
 more than what resides or occurs within the sphere of his own 
 Ego, i. e. his self-consciousness, and all which there occurs is a 
 spontaneous activity of the consciousness. "Whatever there may 
 be external to or without this sphere, — and that there is some- 
 thing, we are constrained upon the practical stand-point at least 
 io presuppose, although never directly sensible of it — whatever 
 may occur external to the Ego, at all events admits only of 
 being perceived internally, and can be regarded as an object 
 upon subjective grounds alone. These grounds or principles, 
 however, may be reduced, when regarded from our subjective 
 sphere, to the fact of our free activity some how or other feeling 
 itself arrested or retarded; — retarded, but whether through 
 limits and fetters that reside in the Ego itself, or in another 
 Ego external to it, such was still the question. Fichte said ; 
 even if we assume that our free activity is retarded and deter- 
 mined by another Ego, still this very assumption is only a 
 thought proceeding from us, and holds good in theoretical phi- 
 losophy for nothing else than a subjective law of thought, 
 according to which we, in thinking, ascribe as much activity 
 to the non-Ego, as we find our own activity retarded, and at- 
 tribute to the Ego as much free activity as we deny to the 
 non-Ego. Thus, the non-Ego is, as our representation, in so 
 far effected by ourselves as we are mentally active, and, on 
 the other hand, the non-Ego acts in so far upon us, as we 
 acknowledge ourselves to be passive, i. e. deny activity in our- 
 selves, and ascribe it to the non-Ego. — Now, in order to assert 
 the absolute unity of the Ego, as principle of the science, and, 
 — what to him was of the greatest importance — its absolute 
 freedom, Fichte transferred those limits to the nature of the 
 subject, without perceiving, that by these very means he di^ 
 rectly suppressed the absolute character of the Ego, and ren- 
 dered it unfit to be the only absolute principle of philosophy. 
 Besides, there remained with him, as with former philosophers, 
 
 o 3 
 
198 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 a circumstance that was as good as disregarded, but which is of 
 the most decided importance, namely, the content or intrinsic 
 worth of the non-Ego, the nature, in other words, of the posited 
 objects themselves, these being, as is self-evident, of the great- 
 est variety, so that, if not for all objects indiscriminately, yet, 
 for the sake of this specific content, something may be declared 
 concerning its being or non-being. 
 
 Schelling at once observed the one-sided subjectivity of this 
 so-called knowledge. In fact, we can, according to Fichte, 
 merely know of our own ideal activity ; or, with him there was 
 merely a consciousness of consciousness, a thinking of thought. 
 To know, however, implies to be certain of the reality of that 
 which one perceives or represents to oneself; thus, in know- 
 ledgCj an actual something that becomes known, is constantly 
 presupposed ; a knowledge devoid of any thing which becomes 
 known, or which is real or actual in itself, apart from the 
 knowledge, contradicts itself, and would be a knowledge of no- 
 thing, an empty dream. In fact, with Fichte (in the older 
 " Wissenschaftslehre"), there existed only knowledge for itself 
 alone and nothing else; the only thing that actually existed 
 being consciousness,' i. e. thought. Moreover, this consciousness 
 was not to be thought of as present in a soul or mind, but as an 
 activity per se, a pure actual process of thought ; and beyond 
 this there was nothing, not even a thinking element — an es- 
 sence, namely, wherein the thinking process might occur. 
 
 Let us now learn what further additions were made by 
 Schelling to this question, and that indeed in the very first 
 period of his philosophical career. He asserted that if a know- 
 ledge is to take place, there must be also something which is 
 known, or, in other words, so soon as a knowledge occurs, a 
 being also must be admitted. This, however, refers only to 
 the antagonism of the finite Ego to the external world, not to 
 an universal antagonism of thought and being, or of subjec- 
 tivity and objectivity in the Absolute. SchelHng, in the pre- 
 sent instance and at a far later period, declared the absolute to 
 be the universal reason.* Now, it had certainly been rendered 
 clear by Fichte, that we can in a general sense, or at least 
 proximately and immeciiafeh/, know only of our own being ; and 
 consequently this being, in so far as it is mirrored in the con- 
 eciousness, or self-consciousness, was at all events to be taken or 
 rather retained as the starting-point. It was discovered fur- 
 ther, that all knowing and thinking consists in an internal ob- 
 * See Jahrbiiclier der MediciD, 1, 1. 
 
SCHELLING. 199 
 
 jectifying, ''representing,"setting before itself, or internal sever- 
 ance of what is thought from that which thinks, in an internal 
 antagonism, and that this is the fundamental form of all mental 
 activity. Through this internal process of separation or dis- 
 tinction, there originates to us a thinking principle, a middle 
 point absolutely active from itself, and an action or tension pro- 
 ceeding from this, or, as it were, a sphere, that expands in rays 
 from that point ; in a word, there originates what, on the one 
 hand, is designated subject, and on the other, object. Both 
 constitute in themselves one and the same essence, a Subject- 
 Object, but we have in this to distinguish the point as the ab- 
 solutely active and producing, from the sphere or the product. 
 That point, which in itself and apart from its sphere, can only 
 be regarded as a pure abstract Ego, i. e. as absolutely subject, 
 but never as object in itself, is the absolute source and starting- 
 point of all activity ; from it every thing proceeds, every thing 
 emerges, and having reached the circumference, sets itself, as it 
 were vis-a-vis, as an object before it, becomes a point of resist- 
 ance for the Ego. Thus, all objects are such only as being 
 thought, or exist only in so far as they have been thought ; 
 the Ego exists, however, in so far as it thinks. In the Ego 
 must reside the absolute ground of all that issues from it ; but 
 this resides originally in it, only in a possible manner, or poten- 
 tially, being not as yet worked out, i. e. not as yet real or 
 in actu. The Ego is altogether life, it is an energy that evokes 
 from itself into existence what does not yet exist; and just as 
 we are not self-conscious of the thought until we think it, so 
 also does the Ego not become conscious of that which resides 
 in a possible manner within it as the subject, until it objec- 
 tifies the former, i. c. transplants it from the centre into the cir- 
 cumference, or fashions it from out itself. 
 
 Now, if Schelling had with all this proceeded to establish the 
 notion of a thoroughly real and effectively active Ego or ab- 
 solute subject, he would then have reencountered the antago- 
 nism which became lost with Fichte in an empty and one-sided 
 knowledge. But with SchelMng there was something present, 
 that was known. This something, however, did not with him 
 reside without the Ego, as an external Ego or object, but con- 
 stantly within this sphere, so that the object was indeed imma- 
 nent, yet from the activity of the subject itself being regarded 
 as a real operation, it had, while opposed to, really emerged from 
 out the subject. This object was none other than the essence 
 emerged from the centrum, the unfolded nature of the Ego 
 
 o 4 
 
200 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 itself; in a word, it was that very something expanded in time 
 and space, which had previously lain contracted and undis- 
 tinguishable in the central point of the Ego. 
 
 All that lies potentially, so to speak, and originally in a state 
 of undistinguishable contraction in the Ego, becomes evolved 
 by the very spontaneity of this Ego ; it now exists in actu, as 
 it had previously existed only potentia; i. e. it now really 
 exists, or is present for the first time ; for of the potential 
 being, we can only say with impropriety that it is, or at aU 
 events not in the same sense as in speaking of the actual ex- 
 istence of the manifested essence. Thus, that antagonism 
 which was previously felt to be wanting, is here found between 
 the absolute producent Ego, or the subject upon the one hand, 
 and the product, the representation or object, upon the other. 
 Now, however, that Ego (and this is not to be overlooked) is, 
 in accordance with the earlier investigations of Fichte, not to be 
 thought of as a material nucleus or rigid being, — for the abso- 
 lute subject would then be represented as object, which from its 
 very nature it never can be, — but the true notion of the 
 being which belongs to the subject is this, that we represent 
 to ourselves this Ego as perfect activity, productivity, will or 
 volition, and finally as strenuous or energetic freedom.* 
 
 The same result is to be obtained also by another path of 
 inquiry. If the act of knowing, as we saw, in order to be true 
 knowledge, must be no empty thinking or idle visionary dream- 
 ing, but must have a something known, or object of which to 
 know ; so, upon the other hand, this knowledge cannot be in any 
 way separated from this its known object or content, or regarded, 
 as any thing whoUy severed from the latter. If knowing is not 
 to differ from the true being and essence of that which it knows, 
 if it is, as it were, to wholly pervade and internally comprehend 
 this essence, then knowledge upon the one hand, and its ob- 
 ject upon the other, or the knowing and the known, must be 
 of a similar kind and nature ; nay, more, a true knowing can 
 only be a knowledge of itself in an undivided unity of knowing 
 and known, of subject and object; it can in the strictest sense 
 of the word be only a knowledge of itself, a «eZ/-consciousness. 
 Thus, the consciousness must not regard within itself the sub- 
 stance of the soul (if one may so speak), as a something different 
 
 * Consult especially the Treatises that serve as an introduction to the 
 Idealismus der Wissenschaftslehre. In Schelling's philosoph. Schriften, 
 Bd. i. p. 239. 
 
SCHELLING. 201 
 
 from itself, and objectively impenetrable, or, as it were, stand 
 before it, contemplate it ah extra, or hover over it, but knowing 
 and being must essentially in themselves be of one and the same 
 kind. The thinking process is, — is absolutely and immediately; 
 that such a process takes place, no one can doubt who thinks 
 {cogitare est). This is what has been called by Schelling, the 
 self-affirmation of thinking or being, in so far, namely, as all 
 being is in itself an actual or real thinking, both being identical. 
 Kant had already, in his metaphysical " Anfangsgriinde der 
 Naturwissenschaft," resolved matter into a play of active 
 forces ; Fichte had wholly suppressed being, in the sense in 
 which it is thought of as a something persistent, quiescent, 
 substantially existing, or merely objectively present ; and had 
 shown that being is to be regarded as a perfect activity and 
 life ; he had pointed this out in the subjective Ego, and con- 
 sequently exhibited this Ego as absolute activity, with, at the 
 same time, the antithetical rhythm or method of this activity. 
 What we have now to bear in mind is this : that what Fichte 
 had declared to be a merely ideal activity, — a partly conscious 
 and partly unconscious thinking process, — Schelling represented 
 as being, in essence, both an actual and real activity; or in other 
 words, to use his own expression, the Ideal and Real are radi- 
 cally identical. 
 
 This root, however, or the Absolute (the fundamental Ego), 
 Schelling recognised at once (as has been observed), in the 
 practical moment of Fichte's doctrine, in the practical Ego or 
 absolute volition and action, with which at the same time he 
 admirably associated the theory of immanent self-purpose, 
 which had been advanced by Kant in the " Kritik der IJrtheils- 
 kraft." Now if we earnestly) regard this immanent teleological 
 effort or volition, so to speak, as the first punctum saliens, from 
 which every thing is worked out, it follows, that the real for- 
 mation precedes the ideal one ; this volition or effort is at once 
 a life, or that which, regarded by us as a bodily side, emerges 
 altogether by activity into reality. Schelling accordingly ap- 
 pears to have been the first who, by reducing these premises 
 given in the philosophy of his time to a conclusion, expressed 
 what had hitherto been the instinctive tendency of the modern 
 consciousness. He broke through at one stroke all the limits 
 and fetters of the subjective principle, boldly expanded this, 
 as the circumscribed Ego of Fichte, into the general sphere of 
 the world, and thus stood with one step at once in the Abso- 
 lute and Real. 
 
202 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 From this point, however, it must Tae possible to work out a 
 definite theory. If we have once acknowledged the absolute 
 reason to be an absolute activity, the question next arises, — 
 what is the law or form of this activity ? or in what rhythm does 
 it move itself.? As such a form we recognise by means of re- 
 flection the movement in time and space. Time and space are 
 the fundamental forms of our activity, and especially of the 
 first or original mental activity, which is met with in the con- 
 sciousness, the intuition. Temporo-spatial representation is=in- 
 tuition. Time'and space were, according to Kant, the forms in 
 which sensational intuition occurs. But, taken in a strict 
 sense, they are not forms residing ready prepared in the mind, 
 or, as it were, mounted by nature before the latter, like spec- 
 tacle glasses, but they are (like the categories) only the way or 
 method in which the Ego contemplates itself, and thus they 
 constitute the peculiar law of its intuition ; nay more, they are 
 really the intuitive process itself which takes place in this way 
 and in no other. £egarded from a strict point of view, space is 
 nothing else than the self^expanding, extending activity, the 
 looking out into the distant, the Infinite. Now this extension 
 (or space) would have neither goal nor boundary, would be a 
 sphere devoid of periphery, unless time were to be added, as 
 a limitation of the intuitive activity. "The original mea- 
 sure of all space is the time which is required by' an uni- 
 formly moved body (a movement) to traverse it ; and inversely, 
 the original measure of time is the space which such a body 
 (as the sun) traverses." " Time and space are therefore ne- 
 cessary conditions of all intuition." Without time the subject 
 would be formless, the intuition would pass into the Infinite, 
 without pause and cessation ; but without space, without ex- 
 tension, no object whatever could arrive at completion. Thus 
 time, as the measure and limitation of spatial motion, is some- 
 thing negative ; while, on the contrary, the space measured 
 through and included within these limits, i. e. the extension 
 itself, as the sphere, is something positive. Thus intuition is 
 rendered possible by two absolutely antagonistic activities; 
 one of these being of a positive kind, the other of a negative, 
 for the one extends, the other limits, negates. In this way, 
 then, the representation, the object, consists in a common pro- 
 duct of these two activities ; the so-called content it obtains 
 from the expanding, the form from the contracting, activity. 
 The whole product is nothing but a product of the original and 
 absolute self-activity. 
 
SCHELLING. 203 
 
 Now, if we have acknowledged space and time to he the 
 original form of an activity, namely, of the sensatio^nal intui- 
 tion, and to be of an ideal character, it will become still more 
 evident to ms, that the same form is that also of all real ac- 
 tivity or motion. For an (originally internal) activity, which 
 successively (arrested, as it were, by time in every point) ex- 
 tends itself in a space, appears, when regarded externally, as 
 motion ; motion is a common product of space and time, being 
 that which corresponds externally to the succession of repre- 
 sentations. Thus expansion and contraction will be also the 
 form of the so-called material nature, as regarded by us ex- 
 ternally, or of natural life. 
 
 Thus Schelling retained, indeed, the theory of the Ego, which 
 Fichte had made the principle of knowledge, as a principle 
 also, but amplified it at the same time into a general scheme 
 of the universe. He even declared that he had always held 
 this view as constituting the true opinion of Fichte, and had from 
 the very beginning regarded Fichte's system in no other light. 
 In Schelling's early writings there are certainly to be found the 
 most unmistakeable traces of this view. The absolute Ego is 
 a general complex of all reality. The Absolute, when regarded 
 traly as Absolute, cannot, indeed, be otherwise thought of 
 than as one and omnicomprehensive, or, in other words, two or 
 more absolutes cannot be posited together ; the rational idea 
 of totality and unity, the highest of all ideas, imperatively de- 
 mands this. Fichte's Ego was that very conception which 
 every man has of his own Ego ; Schelling's Ego is the truly 
 absolute and universal Ego, which every one finds within and 
 out of himself, the nature. The all or universe, which Spinoza 
 had thought of as a single absolute substance, presents itself to 
 Schelling in the form of the only infinite Subjeet-Objeet, the 
 world — or universal Ego. 
 
 Now, if, instead of thinking of our own psychical nature, in 
 which ideal activities occur in the form already indicated, we 
 think to ourselves of the universe, as the grand unity or world- 
 Ego, being active in itself after a similar manner, we shall then 
 readily comprehend how, by such a temporo-spatial movement, 
 by such an activity of the universal Ego in itself, all objects, 
 in a word, every thing that is, arrives at completion — how all 
 or every thing, like sonorous figures in a moved medium, as- 
 sumes a form or shape. We have already seen that our indi- 
 vidual finite Ego, which is only a part of the great whole, is, 
 by virtue of its own nature, so full of power and life in itself, 
 
204 HISTOEICAL SUKVEY. 
 
 that in the sport or play of those two activities, there is inter- 
 nally born or evolved a true creation out of nothing, an infinity 
 of manifold intuitions in us. This multiplicity of determinations 
 is not evoked in us by the influence of manifold external objects 
 or things in themselves, but it is the birth or product of the po- 
 tential fulness of our nature. It is, really and truly, the univer- 
 sal world-nature which here acts in me, as in one of her innu- 
 merable points, as well as every where else ; and on that account 
 we have an immediate knowledge of this nature ; or, more 
 correctly speaking, it is the universal nature, that here within 
 us knows something of or perceives itself, the nature, which has 
 organised itself into human souls, into humanity, and by means 
 of these its organs cognises itself. We human beings are, as it 
 were, but the innumerable individual eyes through which the 
 infinite world-spirit regards itself. We are real or actual as 
 regards our internal essence ; namely, we are all, taken collec- 
 tively, world-spirit, but we are not actual as regards the form 
 of our self-subsistence, or in so far as we imagine ourselves to 
 be something individual, independent, special, and, in a word, 
 other than that universal nature-spirit. That which is imaginary 
 and unsubstantial in us, is the absolute personality with which 
 the individual flatters himself; for what is his, can in the full 
 sense of the word be only the universal vital force and power 
 of nature, in the pulses and successive formations of which this 
 Toj earthly organisation is but a fleeting moment, or one that 
 passes by. 
 
 , Before, however, we can enter further into this part of the 
 Schellingian doctrine, the Philosophy of Nature, it is necessary 
 to test the theory of the consciousness still more closely, and 
 become acquainted with the method upon which all that follows, 
 and especially that which in the more restricted and modern 
 sense of the word is called Speculation, depends. 
 
 The Tinreflected, unconscious action, as we may call it, of the 
 vital or psychical power stands, so long as it is only this and 
 knows nothing of itself, upon the very same stage with the 
 action of the so-called blind and outward forces of nature, and 
 nothing constitutes the distinction between the conscious and 
 unconscious activities, but that want of reflection upon itself, 
 i. e., as will be shown more distinctly further on, the want 
 of freedom in those natural essences which cannot repeat or 
 represent to themselves their own activity as one of a sponta- 
 neous character. That blind activity is met with just as much 
 in the lower regions of human life, as it is perceived to be 
 
SCHELLIN6. 205 
 
 generally distributed among the objects of nature. The whole 
 distinction between them is just this, — that this natural activity 
 cannot contemplate itself, nor even perceive what it is and does, 
 that the objects of nature cannot become objects to themselves, 
 but are always viewed in their activity by other objects that 
 stand external to them, and thus are merely objects for others. 
 Man alone is, in the state of creation with which he is ac- 
 quainted, subject and also object for himself; he is the only 
 active, and in this activity, self-conscious essence, the only ab- 
 solute Subject-Object or self-object. 
 
 '■■ If, however, the knowledge of his own activity were not 
 originally and simultaneously in itself this activitj', — were the 
 actually self-stirring, moving, and creative vital activity in us, 
 not the same as that which only in a higher potence or de- 
 gree is manifested as sensation, intuition, and linowledge,' — 
 and, inversely, were these which in the stricter sense are called 
 spiritual functions, not originally and in themselves those same ' 
 actually working forces of nature, — then indeed no true self- 
 consciousness would, in the strictest sense of the word, be 
 possible, i. e. no knowledge of self; nay more, upon closer 
 consideration, it is that very identity of knowing and being, 
 which healthy common sense or the instinctive logic of lan- 
 guage has expressed by the compound word Bewusstseyn, con- 
 sciousness, i. e. being conscious. 
 
 In order to have a perfect self-consciousness,, we must pre- 
 sume that the self or being which is to be known coalesces witli 
 the knowledge, or is in itself one and the same therewith ; or 
 otherwise there would still be for the knowledge an object, a 
 dark nucleus in the inmost of the phenomena, which it would not 
 have the power to penetrate ; but so soon as the knowledge has 
 gained an insight into the fact, that that which I term being or 
 essence is internally, as regards its true nucleus, i. e. its true 
 hidden content, none other than the very same play of activities 
 which the knowledge is, then for the first time the knowing 
 and known, or the ideal and real, perfectly correspond to each 
 other, knowledge being then of a true character, and as such really 
 deserving its name ; so that of this knowledge, the well-known 
 saying, "that no created spirit dives into the interior of na- 
 ture," no longer holds good. On the contrary, the spirit does 
 dive into and wholly penetrate the latter ; for it finds again in 
 all nature only itself. The statement above made, that thought 
 must have a real object, a being, in order that it may be know- 
 ledge and truth, is not suppressed by this identity, inasmuch as 
 
206 HISTOEICAIi SUEVBY. 
 
 the thought itself is assumed to be real, i. e. being or reality ; it was 
 only suppressed by Fichte, when he opposed the thinking process 
 as non-reality or non-being, to being. If meanwhile, despite of 
 all this, some wavering and unsatisfactory element still appears 
 to dwell in these views of ScheUing, this is but incidental to 
 his standing-point at that period, and to that of the so-called 
 Identity-philosophy in general, and will be brought to light 
 further on. 
 
 Let us now contrast with these views, first of all, the usual 
 mode in which one commonly thinks to oneself of the origin 
 of knowledge and the relation which it bears to objective being;. 
 in order that by disclosing the true sense and ground of the 
 recent Speculative Philosophy, we may clear away the impedi- 
 ments which still prevent so many persons from gaining an in- 
 sight into its leading features. I should indeed hesitate after so 
 long a digression, in again laying claim to a trial of patience 
 upon the part of my hearers, did not every thing which I shall 
 have to say in the sequel depend directly upon this point. 
 
 Let us once again recall to mind the usual theory of cognition, 
 as it was prematurely taught us in old works upon logic. The 
 thousands of different objects in the world make impressions 
 upon our senses, and bring about intuitions or pictures of them- 
 selves in our perceptive faculty. For as many different things 
 as I behold, so many different figurative copies have I in my 
 sense and memory. But by what species of magic they have 
 really entered my consciousness, it concerns me not to inquire ; 
 enough, they are there. In order now to bring this confused 
 host of objects into order and connection, I compare the indi- 
 vidual objects with each othex', co-arrange them according to 
 their similarity, and devise for myself general class-schemes or 
 generic conceptions, that guide me in making my arrangementsi 
 Upon seeing then in future some new object, I am often indeed 
 at a loss to know, at first, under what kind or genus it may 
 happen to fall ; I find, however, upon closer consideration, the 
 corresponding generic conception, and so soon as I have found 
 it and applied it to the intuition of this definite individual, or 
 have by a process of judgment brought the individual under that 
 generic conception, I then recover my thoughts instantly, cog- 
 nise and comprehend the fact. I find, for example, in my walks, 
 a certain something ; I regard it closely, turn it round upon all 
 sides, have, it is true, a distinct perception of it, but do not know 
 what it is. Now, if any one recalls to my memory the common 
 word or conception under which it comes, and says, for example, 
 
SCHELLING. 207 
 
 it is a shell ; then, from that very moment a light breaks in 
 upon me, there arises an understanding, comprehension, and 
 consciousness of the previously enigmatical object, and I say, I 
 now know what it is. 
 
 Such is the logical judgment which is passed in recognising 
 or cognising facts, and so far the psychological process is in the 
 main accurately described ; nor can the above statement be in 
 any way denied ; but we cannot pause or rest content in our 
 inquiry at this point, as is commonly done. 
 
 For, upon the other hand, say the recent speculative philoso- 
 phers, with all this you have not yet explained to us what we 
 would properly have explained ; nay, you appear not once to 
 have understood our question, namely, as to how ihntjirst per- 
 ception, seeing or cognition of the individual object itself, takes 
 place. We readily concede to you that logical arrangement of 
 single intuitions under notions, when one has already single 
 intuitions as well as general notions in the consciousness ; but 
 how, in the first place, does one get at these ? That is the ques- 
 tion. The true riddle to be solved is not as to how order and 
 connection are brought to bear upon the whole multiplicity of 
 images already known, and treasured up in the memory ; but 
 this, — as to how any single image first enters the consciousness, 
 or, if you will, how an impression, a motion or determination of 
 the psychical organ, can convert itself into a something known. 
 
 The very first image that is given or imparted to us by an 
 object obviously supplies us at once with the place of a com- 
 mon notion ; so that later on, whenever we see a similar object, 
 we are reminded of the first image, compare them together, and 
 refer the later seen object to the first, seeing that we recognise 
 it as the same, — as being identical with the first, or at least 
 recognise in essentials the sameness of character that pervades 
 them both. If, however, the object first given becomes the type 
 and conception for all similar objects, how then has that first 
 object been cognised and perceived ? How have we, in a word, 
 perceived this object, and become conscious to ourselves of 
 its presence ? 
 
 Now in this case we have to deal with something very difierent 
 to the logical judgment ; for we are now speaking of a mental 
 function, which must precede every act of judging, or not merely 
 of representations and notions that are found ready prepared 
 in the consciousness, and of its demeanour with them, but first 
 of all of the preparation {Fertig-werden), or process of origi- 
 nation of the so-called perceptions, and thus of that fundamental 
 
208 HISTORICAL SUKVEY. 
 
 question, whicli you upon your stand-point ordinarily express 
 thus: how do impressions from material objects enter my 
 immaterial soul ? or how comes it that the impressions mecha- 
 nically excited in the psychical organ are on a sudden con- 
 verted into consciousness ? As regards this question, logic is 
 of no use whatever, because it only brings into order the 
 representations as they have been found j:eady prepared.; The 
 above process, however, of "preparation" was at the ut- 
 most but superficially treated of in the scanty psychological 
 introductions to logical compendia; or when expounded more 
 fully in works of a special character, every true explanation of 
 it was at once rendered impossible, by the writers resting con- 
 tent, in their endeavour to explain that mental phenomenon, 
 with presupposing " a mental faculty," and for all the different 
 kinds of mental phenomena, "different mental faculties or 
 powers." It was not perceived that, in having recourse to these 
 make-shifts, words only were coined, as in every case where 
 one says, such or such a phenomenon is to be explained by the 
 very power that produces the phenomenon. 
 
 Such is the ground upon which the speculative philosophers 
 resist not only the earlier or logical, but also the psychological 
 mode of explanation. They might just as well call their own 
 explanation a logical or psychological one, only this must be 
 done in a very different sense to that in which these expres- 
 sions are usually taken. 
 
 We return now from the above digression to inquire what is 
 the purport of Schelling's exposition of the same matter. It 
 is to be found already traced in outline by Fichte, who, acting 
 upon the impulse given by Kant, may properly be styled the 
 first inventor of the speculative method. Schelling, however, 
 was the first to bring the method prominently forward, and to 
 give it an objective signification ; Hegel to complete it. Of the 
 internal mental process, as described by these philosophers, it 
 may be incidentally nbserved, that it cannot be proved or 
 demonstrated to any one in the ordinary sense of the word, but 
 is to be regarded as a general psychological fact, as an internal 
 experience, and immediate necessity. Every one must put it 
 to his own test, whether he perceives and finds to be ratified 
 within himself or not, that which those writers declare ; who- 
 soever does not find it, to him — they say — we can never 
 prove it ; every thing depends, upon each one of us possessing 
 as much activity of mind and acuteness of self-observation, as 
 is necessary to the inquiry, for there is no other thinking 
 process than that of seZ^-reflection. 
 
SCHELLING. 209 
 
 We can, as already said, have an immediate perception, 
 understanding, and pervading consciousness of nothing else 
 than what we ourselves mentally, are, and perform. Now, the 
 intuitions of sense are, as has been shown, within us, and, 
 even if were they to originate from certain exciting causes 
 from without us, still as being known intuitions or perceptions 
 they are at all events only products of our own mental activity. 
 (I do not say, of absolute freedom, but only of activity, in 
 contradistinction to a mere receptive passivity.) Thus, the 
 sensuous perceptions are in themselves direct products of our 
 activity, though still in its lower or instinctive sphere ; for 
 we saw that they took place through a mental expansion 
 or contraction, or through a spatio-temporal process of repre- 
 sentation. They are first of all and in themselves unconscious 
 and involuntary products of the mind; they first become /or 
 us or for ourselves, i. e., our own possession, when the intui- 
 tions have been recognised as our own activities by means of 
 reflection, or, in other words, when in the act of producing 
 them we take heed at the same time to this our act, not merely 
 in reference to them as the product, but to ourselves, the pro- 
 ducent. Such representations, which, apart from a reflec- 
 tion of the above kind, are still present within us, are called 
 intuitions or images, and as such always abide with us as 
 determinations of our consciousness, although not understood, 
 nor reflected upon ; they are there, and we act conformably to 
 them, without knowing or reflecting that they are there, and 
 how we have arrived at them; upon which very account 
 we inevitably regard them not as our own free product and 
 fabrication, but as a something existent, in a word, as 
 objects. When, however, by a free act of repetition the 
 very same image presents itself as a special act of our activity, 
 we then call the intuition, in the stricter sense, our own 
 representation, and become conscious to ourselves^ in and by 
 that repetition, of our representative self-activity,, seeing that 
 we can evoke or bring this activity into play at our own 
 pleasure, or again let it subside. This original intuition, or 
 now actual representation, serves us henceforth as a model or 
 scheme for similar intuitions, and expands itself, in a manner 
 well known, by abstraction being made of unessential acces- 
 sories, to the more and more general conception or notion. 
 Such is its relation to other intuitions. It remains, however, 
 for us to deal with its relation to ourselves, as the intuitive 
 agent; i. e., we would know how, speaking individually, I get 
 
 p 
 
210 HISTOBICAL SUEVET. 
 
 possession of or master the intuition so as to call it mine, or 
 how I come to see that I have it, i. e. become conscious to 
 myself of its determination, which was in the beginning blindly- 
 present within me. We would, if I may so express myself; 
 behold the wonderful transubstantiation of the real psychical 
 determination into a thought. 
 
 Intuition is thus an act, but an unreflected act of the mind, 
 an act, of which the mind does not even know that it is its own 
 act. This act, however, is freely repeated by its own power 
 and activity, and on this account with the self-conscious- 
 ness, that this object, this my representation, is only my own 
 activity, only my own consciousness, i. e. that I myself am it. I 
 now acknowledge the image for the first, time to be my own 
 activity, to be myself, to be perfectly translucent, and that 
 which previously appeared to me as an impending foreign 
 object and existence, is to me now a subjective object only, a 
 determination of myself, whereof I see at the same time also 
 that it is a seZ^-determination of myself, that — let the cause or 
 occasion of its presence in the soul be what it may. — yet that 
 the whole image formed is nothing else than a formative 
 process of my representative activity, a moment of this activity 
 retained in the act of fashioning or representing. 
 
 Now, that the represented image, as being only a product 
 of my representative act, is, as it were, extruded or thrust 
 forth from the centrum of my Ego into the sphere of the latter, 
 is an observation which I can only make, by distinguish- 
 ing the represented image, as product from the act of repre- 
 sentation, the productive process. Each time, howevfiE, that I 
 repeat the act of representation, the product also re-originates 
 of necessity at the same time, so that I cannot keep the two 
 apart. If I bury or lose myself again in the product, I then 
 experience nothing of my action, and I am again in the unrer 
 fleeted condition of the intuition, out of which I would emerge, 
 above which I would raise myself, and which I would make the 
 direct object of my observation. Nevertheless, that the mind 
 becomes conscious in abstracto of this its action, is a matter 
 of fact. Thus, the human mind possesses the energy, the 
 disposition to free itself from its blind intuitions ; and hence 
 the success of this operation depends solely upon the freedomk 
 or automatic power which has been originally granted , it, this 
 freedom being the deepest groundwork or substratum of the 
 self-consciousness. This self-deliverance or emancipation, how- 
 ever, proceeds in a gradual manner. I first of all succeed in 
 
SCHELLING. 211 
 
 distinguishing the free representation from the immediate in- 
 tuition ; between the two there must be a difference, in order 
 that they may be distinguished, and that, when I represent, I 
 may not believe that I am also gazing at some outward object. 
 That first definite empirical intuition served me, as we saw 
 above, so soon as I can once repeat it freely from memory as a 
 representation, as the pattern or rule of my activity which was 
 again to be thus disposed. The schema or conception becomes 
 the rule, or indicates the general method by which my activity 
 modifies itself ; the conception being the representation of the 
 activity, by means of which I bring about the object, the in- 
 tuition. Thus, in the conception, I have really indicated the 
 activity as such in abstracto, apart from the intuition that is 
 produced by it — and this was what I would have ; I would 
 become conscious of my activity, without again, in doing this, 
 immersing myself in the state of the intuitive process. Now 
 the conception constantly differs from the intuition, in being 
 general, indefinite, and devoid of all the accessories of unessential 
 determinations, yet notwithstanding it would again coalesce, in 
 the act of cognising, with the intuition into one consciousness, 
 if we did not know how to keep the two asunder in the mind, 
 while yet we unite them in the cognition (of an object). This 
 keeping of them asunder in the act of uniting them, takes 
 place in the judgment ; and this is the completion of the 
 consciousness. Animals also have conceptions or notions, i. e. 
 they have common images or schemata ; but they cannot judge, 
 i. e. they cannot keep the schema and intuition apart from 
 each other in the act of cognition, and on that very account 
 they have no self-consciousness. For, in passing a judgment, 
 as, for example, when I say that " this here is a tree," the 
 present intuition of this here (the object) and the conception 
 (tree) are to me identical —conception and intuition coinciding ; 
 ». e. the modification which occurs in my mind, while it modi- 
 fies itself to that definite image, and the conception, which is, 
 as already said, its reflection in so doing upon this its self- 
 activity — ^both — the product and the producing act, are at one 
 with each other ; but nevertheless, in the mind they are at the 
 same time separated, i. e. the self-consciousness, that / cognise 
 the tree, accompanies that act, and is never wholly ex- 
 tinguished. In or by the act of intuition there originates 
 to me the (mental) product ; I am myself my product, my whole 
 mental activity has merged itself in this product, and, in 
 this condition, there is wanting to me a resting-point in my, 
 
 p 2 
 
212 HISTOEICAL SUKVEY. 
 
 self, so as to distinguish myself from my product. This dis-« 
 tinction (and with this, of course, the abiding self-conscious- 
 ness) is merely possible, when I distinguish myself during 
 the act of intuition from the product of intuition, or when, 
 in other words, by distinguishing myself, my Ego, therefrom 
 as the producent or true productive activity (with both Fiohte 
 and Schelling the Ego is in itself a thorough activity) — I thus 
 distinguish my activity from the product. Now, this side^ 
 glance, so to speak, at my activity, is the conception ; thus 
 the unconscious cognition or understanding of any object (an 
 intuition) is only accomplished by the act of judging, i. e. as 
 much by an union as by a distinction of the thought and what 
 is thought of in the act of cognition. 
 
 All these momenta, however, of intuition, distinction, cog-> 
 nition, and judgment, are simultaneously present in the con- 
 sciousness ; it is only in the contemplation and description of 
 them that they appear separated, seeing that one cannot regard 
 and describe them otherwise than successively. In the actual 
 psychical process all occurs, so to speak, at one stroke ; all 
 these momenta do not follow consecutively upon each other, but 
 mutually presuppose one another, and one must even in theory 
 reunite what has at first been unnaturally separated by the 
 mental anatomy of abstraction. The possibility of abstract- 
 ing and judging, from which proceeds the self-conscious- 
 ness, does not admit of being ultimately reduced to more than 
 a self-determination or freedom of the mind. This self-deter- 
 mination is called will; the pure form of the will is freedom; 
 it is the principle both of the consciousness as well as of free 
 moral action, and in this way is shown to be the common prin- 
 ciple both of theoretical and practical philosophy.* 
 
 If that, which has here been called a conception or notion, 
 is as regards its origin a free activity of the Ego, but was as 
 regards its content but the intuition repeated with self-con- 
 sciousness, it follows from this, that even in the intuition nothing 
 else whatever can reside, than what may be afterwards elevated 
 to the consciousness, i. e. brought by free reproduction to the state 
 of a conception. In so far as we are not in this mental state, the 
 intuition remains blind in regard to us, i. e. an unconscious 
 state. Out of this state, however, we elevate ourselves gradu- 
 ally, according as we may convert it more or less into distinct 
 
 * Compare the treatise already cited in the pWIos. Sohriften, Bd. i. 
 pp. 255 — 260., and the System of Transcendental Idealism, Tubingen, 
 iSOO, p. 288. < 
 
SCHELLIN6. 213 
 
 conceptions, through the middle states of sensation, feeling, and 
 such like, up to the clearest self-understanding or intelligence. 
 Without any relation to or reflection upon myself, i. e. without 
 any separation of the Ego from its state or condition, no per- 
 ception whatever (/wwewer-rfew). is possible, which could deserve 
 the name of a consciousness. How could I imagine any thing 
 in the original intuition, if I could not do this with conscious- 
 ness, i. e. by reflection upon my Ego, i. e. upon my own activity? 
 Hence it follows that in the intuition there always resides just 
 as much, or that we in exercising the process of intuition 
 constantly observe only as much, as we are conscious of to 
 ourselves, or as consequently resides in the conception that we 
 have of the intuition. Were any thing more to reside therein, 
 we could still learn it only by conceptions ; and hence the con- 
 ception is, in the sphere of the consciousness, that alone by 
 which we have to abide ; by it, i. e. in it we recognise for the 
 first time what resides in the intuition, or, as we commonly say, 
 in the objects. 
 
 This is the signification of the conception or notion as being 
 the re-objectifted image or copy of single definite intuitions. 
 Thus, upon this stand-point of the consciousness, the notions 
 are always more or less definite, individualised images, which 
 occur as general representations in the consciousness, and then 
 as such, are submitted to the faculty of abstraction, and conse- 
 quently, to the known logical judgments. Such conceptive 
 images or schemata are indeed derived, to a certain extent, 
 from empirical sources ; but beyond this point we only get 
 possession of them, at first, as abstractions from the individual 
 
 definite images of the real consciousness, the intuitions 
 
 With all this, however, no concession is made in behalf of their 
 being derived originally from without, by means of the intui- 
 tions ; nay more, it is not even incumbent upon us to consider 
 that the intuitions from which they may be abstracted were 
 merely obtained from that source. The intuitions themselves 
 are merely images present within, or modifications of, the soul, 
 which, although dependent upon external stimulus, and at first 
 unconscious, still has always produced them by its own activity. 
 The conceptions only originate empirically for us in so far as 
 they are repetitions or copies of the intuitions that are ac- 
 tually present in the consciousness, though concerning their 
 external or internal origin nothing has as yet been ascertained. 
 We can only admit as a certainty that the conceptions, as they 
 appear in the ordinary consciousness, are abstracted from 
 
 p 3 
 
214 HISTORICAL STJBVET. 
 
 intuitions ; that they are, when in this imperfect stage of the 
 self-consciousness, only accompanied by an obscure feeling of 
 that self-activity of the mind, in which they really consist ; for 
 that they are altogether this, is first clearly perceived, when we 
 have discovered that every conception indicates but the activity 
 with which I first produced the intuition. 
 
 This, however, can only be perceived by the disciplined 
 philosophical consciousness. Simultaneously with the first 
 sensuous perception, comes the determining activity of the 
 mind, which brings the images to their definite state, reducing 
 them, as it were, to their outlines ; Or, in other words, it is the 
 understanding, which brings into definite images within the 
 sphere of the intuitive consciousness, the positive activity of 
 the Ego, which in itself launches forth wholly into the remote 
 and indeterminate. Such is the circumscribing, defining, 
 separating, and discriminating activity, of which mention has 
 been already made, and which we here re-encounter under the 
 more definite title of the understanding. This understanding, 
 however, is first perceived by reflection subsequently to the 
 intuition, and the image is present to us, as already said, before 
 that reflection appears. To any one who would now become 
 conscious to himself of the mode of action observed during the 
 first intuition, the object or intuition naturally appears to be 
 the prius or antitype by which, upon the reproduction of the 
 same representation, the activity muse be regulated ; it appears 
 as that from which the conception must be abstracted, and from 
 which, in the usual empirical consciousness, such an abstraction 
 is actually made, although the true process stands in a relation 
 the reverse of this ; the object having in fact been first pro- 
 duced by the conception, and, on this very account, because the 
 conception is the mode of action, by which the object of the 
 intuition is in the first place engendered or produced. 
 
 We thus perceive that in thinking from the image that has 
 been effected within us, we gradually re-elicit in so doing, by 
 abstraction, the conception of our self-activity from the product 
 or intuition, this conception being that by means of which we 
 had first unconsciously devised the image itself. We resemble 
 in the exercise of abstract and reflective thought, a painter 
 who stands before his own work, which by virtue of his artistic 
 instinct^ he has happily achieved he knows not how ; but now 
 he proceeds to analyse it by means of the understanding, in 
 order that in this, his own product, he may again cognise the 
 method of his activity, the artistic treatment, and the rules by 
 
SCHELLING. 215 
 
 which, without his knowing it, he had first created the work. 
 In us all representations and intuitions are small and in- 
 voluntarily created art-products, the which, however, from 
 the very fact of their being involuntarily created, had better 
 be called natural products, or products of our own nature ; 
 for it is this internal creative nature which is continually 
 putting forth, objectifying, from the middle point or centre of 
 our essence, that which potentially resides therein ; and thus by 
 this theory of the consciousness, we find ourselves brought back 
 to the point from which we started. 
 
 From the above statements we shall see clearly upon what 
 grounds and to what extent the (usually so called) Aristotelian 
 logic is, by the Speculative philosophers, despised. They only 
 reject the latter in so far as it does not serve to explain the fun- 
 damental problem, but, by always presupposing ready prepared 
 notions, deals with these externally by a combining and decom- 
 posing process, instead of diving into their genesis or origin, 
 They therefore circumscribe the logic within narrower limits, 
 assigning to it a definite but subordinate post in the system. 
 As an organon or means for solving the fundamental problem 
 they substitute, in the place of psychology or logic, the so- 
 called speculative method, which first assumed a definite form 
 with Hegel, but which we find to be already present as a con- 
 structive method with both Fichte and Schelling, and which 
 essentially depends upon the so frequently and warmly con- 
 tested doctrine of " Intellectual Intuition." Now this intuition 
 or perception consists in that very activity of the inward sense, 
 by virtue of which both a definite intuition is produced, and at 
 the same time an intuitive percieption is attained of the method 
 of this productive process. In this way we, as it were, lie in 
 wait for the producing nature within us, and surprise her, so to 
 speak, in her most secret laboratory ; thus, speculation, when 
 regarded in the strictest sense, will be the power of creative 
 construction that resides in thought itself, whereby the human 
 mind at once perceives its own laws, but with these laws, 
 at the same time also, the products that are produced in con- 
 formity with them. As, however, the mind finds itself in the 
 middle point or centre of the universal consciousness of nature, 
 or the human consciousness is itself the point to which the 
 general activity of nature converges, it thus cognises simul- 
 taneously together with its own essence every essence and law 
 also, as well as all the definite content of the universal nature 
 or worldrspirit^ for all that is real is throughout life, aU life ia 
 
 p 4 
 
216 HISTORICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 an intuitive process, and the intellectual intuition cognises in 
 the intuition, and thus directly in itself, the actual or real. All 
 this will be rendered more distinct further on ; but meanwhile 
 thus much is already evident, that the so-called "intellectual in-s 
 tuition " is and can imply only the general basis or condition 
 that is to be presupposed of speculation. By itself alone it 
 resembles the direct process of artistic production ; — hence this 
 stand-point and conception of art held good for a long time as 
 the highest — but just as the latter is susceptible and stands 
 in need of a theory, so also does the intellectual intuition re- 
 quire a definite methodising, unless it is to degenerate into an 
 unscientific game of the imagination. 
 
 Thus, speculation, regarded prima facie,'is certainly of an 
 idealistic character, seeing that it depends upon subjectively 
 idealistic observations and principles ; for a direct, full, and 
 penetrating consciousness we can only have of ourselves, or of 
 our own process of thought and action, that only which we 
 sufi^er to originate in our thoughts being to us perfectly clear 
 and comprehensible, both in its essence as well as origin, but 
 not that which is only present for us in the intuition as object, 
 or which as a foreign essence is to be regarded as external. 
 Now it follows from the exposition already given of the problem 
 in question, that in the act of intuition the activity of the under- 
 standing already prevails ; that we in the intuition or contem- 
 plation of the objects, form the objects themselves, at first only 
 unconsciously and involuntarily ; .that these objects are nothing 
 more than our own subjective nature projected, developed, and 
 objectified by us, the subject. We can thus get possession of the 
 whole internal nature of the objects, of all natural objects, or 
 rather of our intuitions of them, down to the deepest root of 
 their existence ; rendering to ourselves all objective existence 
 transparent in its most internal essence, by bringing only to 
 the consciousness what the understanding has first, in a state 
 of unconscious intuition, deposited in it ; for according to what 
 has been already said, more than this will not be therein met 
 with. Thus, then, as already said, the human mind does by 
 means of the intellectual intuition, penetrate to the innermost of 
 nature ; it penetrates her wholly, for nature is the all-one, 
 and of her the individual human being is but an integrant 
 part, all other parts being to him the very same that he is 
 himself. His own essence, although individual, is not merely 
 an analogous copy or likeness of the universal essence, but it 
 is one with this ; and the essence of nature is mind, although 
 
SCHELLING. 217 
 
 indeed upon many inferior stages of self-development this is 
 Btill a slumbering, dreaming mind. All activities of nature are, 
 however, in themselves none other than activities regarded 
 objectively by us as movements, which activities we bring sub- 
 jectively as mental activity within us to the state of self-con- 
 sciousness. 
 
 Thus, have we cognised in ourselves, what reality, essence 
 or being is, in a general sense : the being is the life, which 
 unconsciously perceives itself; self-conscious life is thinking, 
 and thinking is self-conscious being ; being is the thought 
 that directly afSrms its existence, and directly apprehends 
 itself as vitally existing (absolute self-affirmation). The being, 
 the reality, or the life, is that universal nature which is in- 
 cessantly working out itself, the natura naturans, which, 
 unfolding itself, assumes a form, and in all its forms reveals only 
 its own manifested essence and life. 
 
 This life, confined within itself, i. e., self-confining and 
 evolving itself into forms, which from its nature is always 
 striving after self-evolution, and which bears within itself the 
 tendency or infinite longing to objectify itself, — this life, we 
 will regard as the truly real ; and because as such it is a real 
 effect of power, it is indeed to be called a being, aye, pre- 
 eminently such ; but it must by no means be thought of on 
 that account as a being in itself quiescent or dead, or bearing 
 in itself a quiescent and immutable substratum, a dead, sub- 
 stantial nucleus ; that which it bears within itself, or rather is 
 itself, in its innermost and deepest point, is the absolute quality 
 of self (lehhdi) above indicated, the volition or will ; the inner- 
 most nucleus is the living ground of subjectivity, which puts 
 forth every thing by absolute self-development from out itself, 
 which, as potence and power continually converts the possible 
 into the actual, the subjectively implied or involved into the 
 objectively unfolded or evolved. This eternal evolution is 
 nature, but this evolution is gradual ; the eternal life poten- 
 tialises itself in time from the less perfect to the more perfect. 
 Potentially, indeed, i. e. possibly, or fundamentally, that 
 which was first of all present, was certainly the most perfect, 
 the most perfect power or might ; but it was present at first 
 merely as a power and possibility, i. e., potentia, while actually 
 {actualiter) it first became gradually more perfect, from the- 
 state that was in act {actu) imperfect. Had the most perfect 
 been present from the very commencement in its entire evolved 
 actuality, as a world full of objects, how, it may be asked, 
 
218 HISTORICAL SUKVET. 
 
 could that most perfect have reconverted itself later on into a 
 less perfect ? Thus, the evolution of the universal essence of 
 nature must from the beginning gradually advance from lower 
 to higher ; hence we encounter in nature a certain kind of 
 self-perfectibilitj, an eternal progress or process, a higher 
 elevation or lifting up of itself from potency to potency; and so 
 nature has a history of itself, a progressive course of life, which 
 it is the special province of the Philosophy of Nature to 
 disclose. The highest goal and terminal point of this evolution 
 is that, where this, in the beginning blindly working life, 
 attains in its fullest development to the consciousness of itself. 
 The law, however, or, so to speak, the rhythmic movement, 
 whereby nature elevates herself from one stage to another, is 
 the same at all stagey only at every later stage it enters upon a 
 higher potency than at the earlier one ; it is everywhere, upon 
 the lowest as well as the highest stage, the selfsame mode of 
 activity, namely, an objectifying of self to self; first of all, a 
 putting forth of what resides in the subject, and then again a 
 retrograde reflection from this objectively created content, of 
 the subject upon itself, a distinguishing of itself from its object^ 
 while with this it remains continually united and is at bottom 
 the same essence — in a word, a polarisation between subjectivity 
 and objectivity, a pulsating process of expansion and contrac" 
 tion, a proceeding from itself outwards and a retrogression to 
 itself. Such is the philosophical method that completely corre- 
 sponds to the nature of the matter, — a method that with 
 Schelling moves in quantitative antagonisms of a pltis or 
 minus of reality and ideality; and this very rhythm is also 
 the getieral form of the single, undivided life of nature, in 
 which form it acts unconsciously upon the lower (materially 
 real) stages, but in which, upon the highest stage (when it has 
 entered upon the potency of man), it comprehends and cognises 
 itself. In so far, now, as this original essence, having become 
 intelligible to itself in man, still recognises in the rest of nature 
 also, or as it were in all its members, its own life and essence,* 
 — in a word, here contemplates as objective, what it perceives 
 in a directly subjective manner in the human beings it 
 follows. that all knowledge has, so to speak, two poles, subject 
 and object, knowing and known ; and thus also there are, 
 actually, but two fundamental sciences, or rather but two modes 
 of viewing one and the same life from two diiFerent points of 
 view : first, the Philosophy of Mind, the self-consciousness of 
 the subject — Tranecendental Idealism ; and secondly, the Philoi 
 
SCHELLIN6. 219: 
 
 sophy of Nature, the being or life, objectively regarded from- 
 its real side and its development, i. e. as natural life. 
 
 Both sciences must mutually complete and presuppose each 
 other, just as one pole does the other, and it is impossible 
 to set out from the one without being impelled towards the 
 other. " This," says Schelling, " and nothing else, lies at the 
 bottom of our endeavours to bring theory to bear upon the 
 phenomena of nature. The highest perfection of the na- 
 tural sciences would be the perfect spiritualisation of nature's 
 laws into laws of intuition and of thought. The phenomena 
 (the material) must, as regards ourselves, completely disappear, 
 and the laws only, or the formal, be left remaining. Hence 
 it comes to pass, that the more the regular or normal in nature 
 comes into view, by so much the more does the veil or covering 
 vanish, the phenomena themselves becoming more spiritual, 
 and at length ceasing altogether. Optical phenomena are 
 nothing else but a geometry, whose lines are drawn by the 
 light, and this very light itself is but of a doubtfully material 
 nature. In the phenomena of magnetism all trace of matter 
 disappears, and of the phenomena of gravitation, which even 
 natural philosophers would have us believe that they can only 
 Comprehend as directly spiritual influences, nothing remains 
 behind but the law, the carrying out of which upon a grand 
 scale is or constitutes the mechanism of the heavenly motions. 
 The perfected theory of nature would be that by virtue of 
 which the whole of nature might resolve itself into intelligence.- 
 The dead and unconscious products of nature are only abortive 
 or unsuccessful attempts upon the part of nature to reflect 
 herself; the so-called dead nature being, altogether, but an 
 unripe intelligence ; so that in and through her phenomena the 
 character of intelligence is still, though unconsciously, revealed. 
 The highest goal, that of becoming wholly an object to herself, 
 is first attained by nature through the highest and final Stage, 
 that of reflection, which is none other than man, or, to speak 
 more generally, is that which we call reason, through which 
 nature first completely returns into herself, and whereby the 
 fact becomes obvious, ^that nature is originally identical with 
 that which in us is cognised as intelligent and conscious." * 
 
 Such was the judgment pronounced by Schelling, at least in 
 
 the earlier portion of his philosophical career, which is usually 
 
 distinguished, as you know, from his later views by the name 
 
 of the Identity or Nature-philosophy, We might, if we were 
 
 * System of Transcendental Idealism, p. 5. 
 
220 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 to trace the series of his writings with strict historical accuracyv 
 point out in succession no less than three, four, nay, probably 
 five, irregular modifications of his doctrine. Upon the whole, 
 however, there is but one essential difference that presents 
 itself as paramount to our notice, namely, that existing be- 
 tween the earlier Nature-pantheistic and the later Theosophicsl 
 view with its leaning towards theism, so that it seems at least 
 to be perfectly sufficient for our purpose, if we abide by this one 
 point of distinction. Besides, Schelling himself has repeatedly 
 declared, that the exposition of his system of philosophy given 
 in the first volume of the " Neue Zeitschrift fiir spekulative 
 Physik," 1802, was the one which, in his own estimation, "had 
 thriven to maturity," but that it contains only the first part of 
 his system, namely, the objective part, which deals with na- 
 ture ; as to the philosophy of mind, which presupposes, but does 
 not retract the former branch of inquiry, this he has not yet dis- 
 closed in its whole compass or extent, but has always kept it 
 firmly in view. A deeper principle may indeed have been in-, 
 volved in the objective portion of his system ; but from its- 
 having been undeveloped and so misunderstood, one has, by 
 dwelling too closely upon its natural side, produced a one-sided 
 system of necessity, and such like. As regards the state of 
 our own opinion on this matter, we will endeavour later on to 
 set this before the reader, and meanwhile we will return %t 
 once to the stand-point of the "Nature-philosophy" above 
 alluded to. 
 
SCHELLING. 221 
 
 LECTURE X. 
 
 SCHELUNG'S philosophy of NATnEB. 
 
 Several of my audience have expressed a wish to find them- 
 selves, at the commencement of each new discourse, placed, hy 
 a repetition of the results of the preceding one, in a condition of 
 mind that should enable them to follow out the continuation 
 of the subject in a more perfect and coherent manner. Now, 
 though the present course of lectures is already rich enough 
 in repetitions, I am the better pleased to adapt it still further 
 to the above wish, since in this way, as I hope, we may the 
 more distinctly and profoundly master the subject of philosophy 
 under its present change of form. 
 
 We shall never succeed in contemplating nature with the 
 eyes of Schelling, unless we first of all get rid of that usual 
 mode of representation which perceives in all individual things 
 but so many self-subsistent and in themselves dead bodies or 
 substances, which, endowed however with powers or forces, act 
 upon other substances and upon ourselves. Every single object 
 works indeed upon some other object ; and the whole of nature 
 is such a mutual operation of its individual parts with each 
 other and upon themselves; but the interior of the things, 
 their matter or substance, as we call it, is no such substance 
 at all, and has no such powers as are commonly imagined. 
 What then is such a substance to be in or by itself? How is 
 it to be thought of, how is it to be explained ? That is the main 
 question. It is by no means to be regarded as a nucleus dead 
 in itself and devoid of motion, unto which — and who knows 
 how ? — living powers may only have been annexed ; but it 
 consists intrinsically or in itself of such powers, or more cor- 
 rectly speaking, activities, which meeting each other in the 
 space that the body occupies, mutually support one another, 
 enter into a state of tension, and so produce the solid something 
 which appears to us as body or matter. Matter is impenetrable, 
 it is said, i. e. it oflfers resistance to external pressure; but 
 this very resistance which it offers in the direction- outwards 
 is an activity, a tension in the matter, by means of which it 
 fills up and asserts to itself a certain space, and prevents other 
 bodies from entering therein. Thus, we must first of all 
 
222 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 accustom ourselves to discern, even in the rigid and dead, a 
 constant conatus and tension (though bound and fettered) of 
 the vital activity. If we now admit yet further that this 
 materiality is only the lowest stage of the universal life of 
 nature, which develops itself upon the higher stages and upon 
 those of the organic essence, with a constantly increasing energy, 
 internal self-mobility and freedom, and if we presuppose that 
 this development follows one and the same constant law from 
 the lowest and most rigid existence of the stone or mineral up 
 to the play of thoughts in the human brain, consisting, in shor^ 
 of a self-movement continuously entering upom higher and higher 
 potencies or powers, it follows, that in this general self-move- 
 ment and activity of nature, the law of the world, which, when 
 perceived and cognised by itself upon the highest stage, is called 
 reason, will become cognisable and representable upon the 
 lowest stages as an unconscious and obscure instinct of nature ; 
 and if in all this we never forget the main point, namely, that 
 apart from this living impulse, movement, and activity, there 
 is nothing material or real whereupon or wherein these indi- 
 cations of power occur, but that the very real and material itself 
 consists intrinsically of the play of these mutually determining 
 activities, we may then be enablad to grasp at once intelligibly 
 and intuitively the principle of the whole system ; that all is 
 in its essence one and the same. This essence is in itself life. 
 It is called nature {naturu naturans), in the sense of its being 
 thought of at first only as a potency, a possibility of becoming 
 (werden) all and every thing, but not as yet beingi (seiend) 
 every thing ; and it is called world or universe (natura natu- 
 rata) in so far as it is continually originating, becoming, of has 
 become what, in accordance with that nature it is_destineid to 
 become. Both, namely, the nature as principle {grimd) aad the 
 nature as a phenomenon or manifestation of itself, are together 
 the same, single, total, absolute. The explicated or unfolded 
 nature, i. e. all individual natural essences, repose in that nature 
 as in their ground and essence ; for they are all only forms or 
 figures of this essence, which has in these forms objectified and 
 manifested itself. Regarded by themselves they would be 
 nothing but bare forms, i. e. forms void in themselves, having 
 neither content nor subsistence ; in so far however as that 
 essence has itself entered into all these forms and constituted 
 their inward nature, do they represent the very absolute itself; 
 and thus the absolute, infinite essence or being is not separated 
 from nature, above or external to her (the former being, as it 
 
SCHELLING. 223 
 
 were, in heaven, and the latter upon earth), hut thej, these 
 natural things and we ourselves,— all that is within and around 
 us IS the omnipresent eternal being and essence in its process of 
 evolution or development. On this account also, in the unfold- 
 ing of each single thing, the essence and law of the absolute 
 may, so to speak, be contemplated within a small compass, 
 the singular being at one and the same time a likeness or a 
 repetition of the whole. 
 
 In each single germ, whether of animal or plant, the vital 
 power appears in the beginning imprisoned in a state of non- 
 development, or in a subjectivity as yet confined within itself. 
 Now, this elastic principle of life compressed, as it were, to a 
 point, must free itself from this imprisoned state, and must 
 from the mathematical point, as its indifferent centre, expand 
 ;tself by virtue of its activity, and thus, in its development or 
 its product, which is the self-representation of its own essence, 
 become the object unto itself; the power thus liberated or set 
 free must emerge by its own active operation into the circum- 
 ference ; in a word, what originally lay virtually or potentially 
 in that punctum saliens, first makes its appearance through this 
 self-objectifying of its own included content. 
 
 Thus, the observing naturalist has the germ of the chick in 
 the egg as an object before him, while still in itself it is a sub- 
 ject, and the process of development becomes clear to him by 
 an objective perception of the invariable regularity of the 
 transformation, which proceeds solely from the interior, the 
 complex of this vital point ; — for the heat that is conveyed to 
 the ovum from without contributes nothing else to its develop- 
 ment than a solution of the rigidity of those bonds within 
 which lay the living germ. Still less does'fhe naturalist add 
 any thing to the matter before us; this internal something 
 elaborates or works out its own self, in order to become really 
 and in act {acta) what in possibility and power, or by its 
 nature, it already is. It fulfils itself with a blind impulse, and 
 without itself knowing how, as an organising life; just as if 
 an idea, a type, or a pattern hovered before it, to which it must 
 conform ; — this idea or this conception does not, however, re- 
 side external to it, but, as its original nature, within it — it 
 frees itself from the bare form of the germ, extends and divides 
 itself, until finally, it has accomplished or objectified in the very 
 fact or reality what in itself it had the determination, possi- 
 bility, and power of becoming, — of becoming only what it 
 should and would be, but which in itself it is not. 
 
224 HISTORICAL, SURVEY. 
 
 That germ of the embryo chick in the egg strives, I said, to 
 unfold itself into a certain perfect structure, just as if it had a 
 type or pattern before it by which to mould itself. This pat- 
 tern, however, the chick does not actually confront or have 
 before itself, but it was the peculiar internal nature which 
 prescribed these movements and formations ; in short, the pecu- 
 liar nature, as natura naturans, which is here present in a 
 single and definite natural object, known by the distinctive 
 name of "fowl." Thus, the real fundamental and vital principle 
 which reflects itself in the idea, is the real itself, though still 
 in the undeveloped condition of the essence ; it is that which im- 
 parts to the activity the definite direction, or rather vital dispo* 
 sition and determination, though this is still only implidtlyi 
 present or undeveloped, in the original contraction of the essence. 
 We thus recognise the idea as the internal natural determination 
 of each object that develops itself in a vital manner. Were the 
 chick during its development to know any thing of itself, or 
 could the observer from without transport himself into the sub- 
 jectivity or point of view of the self-developing object, or, in 
 other words, enter with his conscious activity into the place of 
 the unconsciously self-developing germ of life, he would then 
 have the idea of the developing life, the form, to which it has 
 yet to come, present to him, as an antitype, an idea or exemplary 
 and would endeavour to realise it in a freely active manner ; 
 but he must at the same time bear in mind, that this antitype 
 is in good truth only his own internal natural impulse, that 
 that conception or idea is only his own internal determination' 
 that comes before him as a thing of thought, and that the 
 obligation which he feels imposed upon him as a duty of 
 thus originating or becoming, is that special living nature an- 
 nouncing itself in the feeling as an impulse or motive. It is 
 clear how closely this is connected with the theory of know.* 
 ledge above given, and in how far the teleological theory of Kant 
 is here dealt earnestly with, i. e. how it is rendered an objective 
 truth. 
 
 Thus, in the singular as well as in the general, a law is here! 
 exhibited, a blindly-working internal necessity, which appears, 
 however, only as necessity, from the fact of our regarding it. 
 from without as an objective phenomenon. The germ must 
 elaborate or work itself out unto that which dwelt unconsciously 
 and blindly in it ; for it cannot do otherwise. If w& now 
 transport ourselves into the place of the germ, and there com- 
 mence its elaboration as our own process, in a manner strictly 
 
SCHELLIN6. 225 
 
 Conformable to our own nature, and hence with the conscious- 
 ness that we ourselves are acting (and no other things upon 
 us), it follows, that the above process of the germ, regarded 
 from the subjective stand-point, appears to us to be perfectly 
 free, in so far as we are enabled without hindrance to develop 
 our own nature, in other words, our own volition, the most 
 characteristic feature which we possess, or what fundamentally 
 in our essence we ourselves are. A law, I said, is shown to be 
 present ; but this law is not one that is imposed ; it is the 
 special yearning of the germ after development, the elasticity 
 of its own special nature; the operation of this law is a suc- 
 cessive self-liberation, self-satisfaction, and consequent declara- 
 tion of freedom ; and thus it is already seen provisionally, 
 how far freedom and necessity may signify in themselves one 
 and the same thing. 
 
 While, however, to the higher stages of self-consciousness and 
 of freedom, the universal essence or nature develops itself, as we 
 saw, only historically, i. e. successively in time, from one stage or 
 degree to the other ; and although no time can be thought of, 
 wherein the Absolute could ever have existed alone as a merely 
 abstract principle of nature, without the actual nature, or the 
 world, — for to such a principle alone and by itself, that which 
 we term existence could not belong, — although the world and 
 its principle, or that primordial Absolute, must thus be thought 
 of as eternal, still, by all this the idea of a successive per- 
 fectibility in the mode of the world's existence, or that of 
 a natura naturata, will not be excluded, but, on the contrary, 
 imperatively demanded, for the reasons already stated; and 
 not once only, but at all times, the idea of a progressive pro- 
 cess of origination or becoming must be taken for granted. 
 
 Now, since the world-principle never was inactive, and since 
 this working activity is the very existence of essences or of 
 nature itself, we must, in the attempt to construct the world, 
 first of all completely divest ourselves of any thoughts about a^ 
 definite creation in time. So also, on the present occasion, 
 where we are entering upon the domain of the Philosophy of 
 Nature, we must dismiss at once from our minds any thoughts 
 about the Deity, and think of the All-one, or the Absolute, with 
 which we have here to deal, as associated only with nature, and 
 reserve that expression of the highest essence or Beity until 
 a later point of our inquiry. It is true that within nature 
 every where, and not merely in man alone, more or less of 
 jaind and consciousness is declared ; but we would observe al» 
 
 Q 
 
226 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 the very outset in due order^ that consciousness and thought, 
 which, in the stricter sense we call mind, can only manifest 
 themselves in or upon some real existence, or combined only 
 with real essences, but that they are never by themselves alone 
 in abstracto, or, as it were, hovering as a pure thinking process 
 in the void. Setting aside all these anticipatory ideas, of God, 
 Creator, and Spirit, we have, as has been said, in the first place 
 to deal only with nature in its most imperfect, first, and, so to 
 speak, rudest formation. 
 
 As now in every individual germ, so also does nature act in 
 the. great whole. As in the germ of the egg we assumed a 
 blindly working power or impulse, which, as if acquainted with 
 its destination, organised itself into the reality, so also in the 
 whole there is a nature antecedent or prior to the nature, i. e. 
 an impulse or tendency previous to the formation, a law before 
 its execution or fulfilment, a possibility before the realityj and 
 thus a natura naturans prior to the natura naturata, or rather 
 residing fundamentally within the latter everywhere, as a sub' 
 stance full of power. 
 
 We can, however, to such a principle, regarded as merely a 
 pure potency or possibility, attribute, before it has begun to 
 work, no being whatever. It can, indeed, be thought of ab- 
 stractedly, but, apart from its action, it cannot be ; for the merely 
 possible is not yet actual. An flJc^waZ principle is an operative or 
 worhing principle, and thus is no longer the pure idea of the 
 bare potency by itself alone, but of the potency in actu. But 
 just as little as the pure potency is by itself alone, or per se, so 
 also with the operation ; an operation devoid of a working prin- 
 ciple, and a principle devoid of operation — both are not : there 
 is, or exists, merely an operation, which has the ground of its 
 movement in itself; there exists merely a principle which is 
 comprehended in operation. Thus, that which truly exists — 
 the existenee or being — is an operation that has its prin- 
 ciple within itself, i. e. an absolute operation. Thus, nature, re- 
 garded in that first light, was that which is not yet existent 
 =pure potency ; but nature from this second point of view 
 indicates the actual world spread out visibly before us, or the 
 universal being, to which we ourselves also belong ; and this 
 actual nature is now no longer that mere primary potency in 
 abstracto, but it is potency and operation together and insepa- 
 rable-^in a word, it is the first identity; These principles, 
 Which Sohelling, even in his most recent expositions upon the 
 subject, does not deny, but only endeavours to determine yet 
 
SCHELLING. 227 
 
 further, are already found as distinct principles in his earlier 
 writings. 
 
 Thus, this being, which we regard at present as wholly uni- 
 versal in character and void of distinction, consists in an infinite 
 existence, i. e. in a continual ex-sistere, in an emergence and 
 manifestation of the principle in the action ; it is intrinsically 
 an activity, and that indeed a self-activity ; for it has its prin- 
 ciple not external to or without itself, but vnthin itself, being 
 of itself both principle and action. Thus, the principle of the 
 world does not lie without nor before it, but within it. We 
 cannot adopt the idea of a Creator having preceded the existence 
 of the world, for by such an assumption we should only be 
 misled into the paralogism or false conclusion that the principle 
 must be present prior to or before the action. A principle 
 which is already by itself, before it works, is called a cause. If 
 however the question is concerning the principle of the universe, 
 i. e. of being altogether, then of this another already existent 
 cannot be the principle, but only a non-existent, i. e. that primary 
 potency, which taken, however, per se, or as (g'wa) potency, 
 was not even present until it worked, or entered first by means 
 of its working into existence, differing not from this its active 
 existence, nor capable of being retained per se, or by itself. 
 Hence it follows that the world and its principle are both co- 
 eternal ; for in so far as they are, they are the same. 
 
 Thus, being is the absolute, primordial, and in itself infinite 
 working = nature. Now in so far as the potency in nature has 
 attained reality, it is called subjectivity ; and in so far as the 
 being or existence is thought of as being effected by that sub- 
 jectivity, it is called objectivity : the being, in so far as it is its 
 own principle, is subjectivity ; the being, in so far as it is sus- 
 tained or effected, as it were, by this internal principle, is called 
 objectivity ; — both being in reality not distinct from each other, 
 but the same : the being is and remains the Identity qf subjec- 
 tivity and objectivity : a = b. 
 
 Now, however, let us think to ourselves of this being, hitherto 
 regarded as infinite and void of distinction, as being in 
 itself organised and destined to the greatest possible multiplicity. 
 Each part, then, regarded by itself, and contrasted with other 
 individual parts, will appear, one more pre-eminently than the 
 other, to belong to the subjective or the objective side of the 
 infinite essence. We shall, indeed, in no part of the universe 
 encounter either absolutely pure subjectivity or absolutely pure 
 objectivity ; for pure absolute subjectivity would be = to the 
 
 Q 2 
 
228 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 bare primary potency (whicli as such is not), and pure, ab- 
 solute objectivity would be = to a being devoid of all potency 
 in itself, and thus to an impossible being. "What is, is or consists 
 of both together, though the one or the other element ma.j pre- 
 ponderate, when compared with other parts, and thus only in the 
 singular and finite, where comparison is admissible ; but not in 
 the universal and the whole, where an absolute equilibrium — an 
 absolute identity, prevails. 
 
 Attention must now be paid to that preponderating element 
 as to a quantitative difference, in order that we may indicate the 
 method by virtue of which the potentialisation is to be rendered 
 comprehensible, or the process by which the lower may develop 
 itself into the higher ; in short, the simple into the multiplicity, 
 such as is represented by the numberless and diversified objects 
 of the world. All difference in the being can only depend 
 upon a relative preponderance of the subjective or objective 
 element. Now if we think of being in a general sense as 
 a line thus : — 
 
 then the side a — C will represent the preponderating subjec- 
 tivity, the side C — b the preponderating objectivity of the 
 collective identity indicated by the entire line C, so that by these 
 letters is displayed at one and the same time the indifference-, 
 point, or equilibrium of the two sides. Now, however, the 
 whole being is neither pure subjectivity at the point a, nor 
 pure objectivity at the point b ; because to these two notions, 
 as we saw, no being whatever belongs, but the subjective and 
 objective element are everywhere distributed. Let now the 
 
 line — r be thought of as divided into an infinite number of 
 a b 
 
 parts ; in all the parts which lie between a — C, more subjec- 
 tivity would, relatively speaking, prevail, than in those between 
 (7 — b; but in each single fragment of the line there would 
 simultaneously ensue one pole with relative subjectivity a, and 
 an opposite one with relative objectivity b, and an indifference- 
 point also between the two, which at the same time is or ex- 
 presses a totality — in the first case an absolute, but here in 
 the singular a relative totality. Thus, the possibility, i. e. the 
 power of conceiving the limitation or finiting of the infinite, is 
 exhibited, this process consisting, however, only in a distinguish- 
 ing of itself from itself, and thus in an activity of the infinite 
 
SCHELLIN6, 229 
 
 being in itself, whereby it always remains one and the same 
 essence in and by itself. 
 
 Thus, being is self-activity ; and as for ourselves, we have no 
 other direct knowledge of self-activity than the self- activity of 
 our own thought. And thus, if we would comprehend the self- 
 activity of the absolute subject- object, or of nature, we think to 
 ourselves of this self-activity as a thinking process, a represent- 
 ation of the absolute subject ; we transport ourselves accordingly 
 into the internal or middle point of the universe, and just as 
 the creations or images of our own thoughts are merely tran- 
 sitory objects, so also the thought-images or products of the 
 universal spirit of nature are forms, which have in like manner 
 as such, no essentiality in themselves ; but as they are in truth 
 only the spirit that has moulded itself to or assumed a shape, the 
 spirit haying entered them, and in them declared itself as ex- 
 isting, — it follows, that they are real and actual — just as our 
 own mental images are something, namely, the fashioned or 
 moulded mind which, internally within us, while we think 
 them, pours itself forth in these forms. Accordingly, to the 
 mere human thought belongs a being as well as to the real 
 things without us ; for us, the thinkers, our own thought cer- 
 tainly appears to have no reality, because it is we who think it, 
 and know that it would have, without and apart from our 
 thinking process, no self-subsistence ; in a word, because we 
 see through the subjectivity of our thought-objects. Thus, 
 the infinite essence looks through the subjectivity of all its crea- 
 tures, i. e. their identity with itself, and knows (if it has con- 
 sciousness in a general sense) that these forms, which we call 
 natural things and gaze upon as without us, are only its own 
 thoughts unseparated from itself. 
 
 Thus, every real is a subjective or objective activity, according 
 as it gazes upon itself or not ; an activity that views itself, i. e. 
 is conscious of itself, is to itself subjective, i. e. is that which it 
 altogether is, also for itself. An activity, on the contrary, which 
 does not gaze upon itself is only in, itself; it is, what it is, not 
 for itself, has not as yet come to itself, and can neither see itself 
 as a subjective or objective activity. In itself, however, it is 
 the same activity, which it is, even when it gazes upon itself. 
 An activity which views itself appears to itself as self-activity; 
 but an activity which is beheld only by the eyes of another, 
 appears as objective motion. Now in all things — in the whole 
 of nature, — as we saw, there is indeed a subjective element; 
 for nature is in itself absolute self-motion, but not every ia- 
 
 (t 3 
 
230 HISTOEICAL SUEVET. 
 
 dividual part or each, organ of this nature can, as a singleness 
 or individuality, perceive itself in this self-motion: there are 
 individual essences, in whom that self-motion has not yet heen 
 developed into self-intuition, and which are thus in a state of 
 preponderating objectivity, when compared with others that are, 
 what they are, by or for themselves, i. e. are essences, in which 
 the self-activity of nature regards itself. 
 
 Nature, however, before it arrives at self-consciousness, is 
 already self-activity ; the form or mode of movement of this 
 activity is, as we have seen, a continual objectifying of that 
 which lies implicitly in its subjective element ; this objectifying 
 actually takes place, is a real objectifying of itself, but is not a 
 free mental process, i. e. the activity occurs and can become 
 an object to itself, i. e. can contemplate itself internally after a 
 certain fashion, but it cannot arrive at consciousness, because 
 it is here in a state of preponderating objectivity, i. e. Is not 
 independent and free, as in the human mind ; for it is, as we 
 have already seen, the real, actual freedom or spirituality, which 
 constitutes the groundwork of self-consciousness. Any thing 
 which is more worked upon than self- working, cannot be what 
 it is, pro se, or for itself. 
 
 . Thus, the same takes place in the sphere of objectivity as in 
 that of subjectivity, but in an unconscious manner ; the ac- 
 tivities of nature run parallel with and are the same as those of 
 the mind or thinking process, except that they occur without 
 any thing like knowledge or thought. By the theory of the con- 
 sciousness we were taught that mental activity consists in the 
 first place of an intuition, and that this intuition consisted in 
 the subject becoming an object: in the intuition the mind evolves 
 itself wholly into a definite form; and for the first time when 
 it perceives itself in this its efflux or action, when it again 
 contemplates its intuition or renders itself the object, beholds 
 and becomes conscious of itself, does it arrive at the conception 
 or notion of what it is. Now, the same relation, which in us is 
 ideal and subjective, is found also in nature, but in this as 
 real and objective. 
 
 The original being, which, regarded from a subjective point 
 of view, is creative self-activity, can be only objectively re- 
 garded as motion, and this indeed of a twofold character, 
 consisting of two movements that are opposed to each other. 
 To the objectifying activity, by which, upon the ideal side, 
 the first process of intuition is efiected, corresponds upon the 
 objective side the expansive movement; while to the com- 
 
SCHELLING. 231 
 
 prehensive activity, which there recoils upon the subject, here 
 corresponds the contracting movement ; expansion and con- 
 traction being the two factors of the material being, or matter. 
 Matter is " being " in its first form, the primum existens, — the 
 root of all things ; but much as it may seem to be but a rigid 
 and dead something only, it is still only to be thought of in- 
 trinsically as the unity or polar tension of those powers or factors 
 acting in opposite directions. That these active powers, as 
 expansion and contraction in the material world, are the same 
 in themselves as intuition and conception upon the ideal stage, 
 results from what follows. The expanding force must be 
 regarded as the first positive factor, for it engenders the idea of 
 spatiality and extension, or rather it is itself a self-extension, 
 like unto intuition. This intuitive process would, if regarded 
 from a real and objective point of view, lose itself in the infinite ; 
 for the direction of this activity is to what is of infinite mag- 
 nitude. In like manner the intuitive gsize of the mind, its vision 
 or contemplation, would go forth into the infinite, unless it were 
 to arrive at some hindrance, determination, and form : such 
 an unbounded mental contemplation or thought engenders 
 only what is void of distinction and empty, the space. Space 
 is nothing more than the mere activity of contemplation, ob- 
 jectively posited — the act of extension posited as extension. 
 Now, opposite to this positive activity stands the negative, that 
 process which circumscribes, limits, arrests, and by these very 
 means determines and forms. To this activity corresponds time. 
 Time is the continual negation of space, the retarding element 
 in the movement, the succession in the activity ; it gives 
 measure and scope, leads the tendency of the thinking or in- 
 tuitive process back into itself, and moulds it into definite out- 
 lines and notions ; as in like manner it posites the real notion in 
 the material world; i. e., just as the former positive and space- 
 producing activity is directed to the infinitely great, so is the 
 negative directed to the infinitely small: as the former is 
 objectifying, the latter is subjectifying, or directed back to the 
 subjectivity. If the former is the explication or unfolding of 
 the hidden principle, the latter is that which intrinsically 
 includes and brings, or unites, into a definite compass every 
 thing, not only in the sphere of the ideal, but also of the real. 
 
 This negative activity, it may be also said, is the general 
 connecting bond or copula which pervades the universe ; through 
 it subsist all outlines, forms, and boundaries in nature, just as 
 in the thought all outlines of images and notions ; it is that 
 
 « 4 
 
232 Historical survey. 
 
 wMch intrinsically includes, grasps, and unites, not only in the 
 great whole, but also in the singular. Through it the universe 
 obtains an unity, the singular a fixed limitation, the universe 
 an eternity, the singular a relative duration; but were this 
 negative force to prevail alone, all space would vanish, the 
 universe would shrivel up to a point in itself, and the many 
 points into one mathematical point; and were that positive 
 force alone to prevail, then the universe would resolve itself 
 into an infinite void ; and in both cases nothing would be. 
 Thus, neither of these activities eodsts at any time or anywhere 
 purely for itself alone, but each only in and by the other, 
 preponderating only in a relative manner. 
 
 As a relatively preponderating force in objective nature, it 
 is called gravity, and appears as matter. If we indicate the 
 positive factor by a, the negative by b, then the gravity or the 
 matter can be indicated by a = 6. Thus this predominant 
 negative principle is the mother (materies) of every formation 
 in the singular, of every limitation or finiting of the positive 
 and indiscriminate being; it is, as being the conjunctive, the 
 creative element also, and consequently is that which, strictly 
 speaking, is the only real or realising ; for the real is not that 
 which is bound (the content), but is the conjunctive or binding ; 
 the conjunctive activity — the real notion — being the true and 
 only creative force, in which all things subsist. Now, although 
 it may sound rather contradictory to point in the present instance 
 to the negative as being the real, yet this contradiction vanishes 
 at once; if we bear in mind that the negative here indicates 
 the actual activity that is engaged in determining and forming. 
 United with this, governed by it, but in inward antagonism to 
 it, stands the positive factor a, as the ideal one. This activity, 
 although in itself directed to the infinite, can, where it has 
 entered into the kingdom of finitude (or gravity), only partially 
 declare itself, in so far as it does this in a general sense, i. e. 
 enters into opposition with the products of gravity. It stands 
 in the relation of a subjective and ideal activity — as intuitioa 
 — to that objective real activity, and is called in nature, light. 
 Light is the thought of nature, or rather its self-intuitioij. For 
 us hliman beings, who stand upon a higher stage, light appears 
 as a movement, which we see taking place objectively; but 
 tWs movement is for nature, thus in the objective sense, what 
 thought is for us, a contemplation of ourselves. Light is the 
 soul, the spiritual (although unconscious) activity of the world, 
 a thought, which, while filling a space, is yet a spatial act of 
 
SCHELLING. 233 
 
 self-intuition. Thus, just as in the ideal sphere, or in the 
 consciousness, the sensuous representation was at once a com- 
 mon product of positive outward contemplation (Hinschauen), 
 and of the negatively limiting understanding ; while the real 
 process of becoming conscious arrived at completion by the 
 fact of our again contemplating this our intuitive process, or, 
 in other words, the activity of the latter rendered itself again 
 the object for itself, and thus elevated itself above itself ; — so 
 also does the same process hold good in the material sphere. 
 The positive activity, combined with the negative, contributed 
 to form the product, and was, as it were, by being absorbed in 
 the latter (the matter), no longer in this condition an object 
 unto itself; but it elevates itself above itself, and renders itself 
 in this state the object for itself, or contemplates itself, — light 
 being that which illumines and renders manifest itself and also 
 another. 
 
 By light, indeed, we must not understand the phenomenon 
 only which is manifested to us as fire or solar ray ; for by light 
 is rather implied the sound (the internal vibration of matter), 
 the heat and true light, in the most perfect sense ; this activity,, 
 however, is manifested for the most ■ part in nature, where a 
 self-separation and liberation takes place of the positive from 
 the negative factor, as in combustion, chemical actions, and such 
 like. Everywhere is that positively active essence manifested, 
 which by the ancients was called ether, and regarded as the 
 universally distributed and positive primordial element. " The 
 darkness of gravity and the splendour of the light-essence first 
 produce together the fair form of life, and perfect the thing 
 into a truly real object, as we call it." * Thus, in existing 
 nature, the light holds the relation of subject; the matter, as the 
 more gloomy essence imprisoned within itself, the relation of 
 object for the light, or, more correctly speaking, nature itself 
 the universal essence, is here in the state of light and gravity, 
 and, as light, is the intuition or perception of herself. The 
 light first unfolds or loosens the bond of gravity, sets rest into 
 motion, and is in nature the inner life, — or, to speak with 
 Plato, the kingly soul of the whole, the universal soul of the 
 universe. From the mutual struggle of light and gravity the 
 whole system of nature, as we now behold it, has emerged. 
 On that account nature has a true history (Schelling says), and 
 
 • Sohelling's Athandlung iiber das Verhaltniss deS Kealen und Idealen 
 in der Natnr., p. xxxvi., prefixed to the Essay entitled " Von der Weltseele," 
 Ed, 3rd. Hamburgh, 1809. 
 
234 HISTOKICAL SURVEY. 
 
 this history of nature is the beginning of the world's history, 
 because in it an eternal progress is taking place; an eternal 
 progress, however, presupposes that formerly there was ac- 
 tually a more imperfect state than the present one; without 
 progress there is no rational life, no life without conflict or 
 struggle. 
 
 The process upon which light and matter had first of all to 
 enter, in order to form themselves into the world, and to esta- 
 blish matter in its different forms, is the magneto-electrico- 
 chemical process. The chemical process is but the organic pro- 
 cess deferred, and is consequently the antecedent stage of the 
 third and highest potency which nature can attain, that, namely, 
 of organic self-subsistent life. 
 
 Upon the stage of materiality, to which we have traced the 
 development of nature's essence, or on the stage of flnitude, 
 the light appeared as a subjective element of the second potency, 
 as an internal but still blind and improperly so-called intuitive 
 process. Nature upon this stage is to be regarded as an essence, 
 whose soul or moving principle is the light ; the light again 
 subdues and governs matter, in so far as gravity allows this ; 
 and in this conflict it develops matter, and itself in the same, 
 to the entire multiplicity of distinctions, which, regarded in 
 the singular, are finite, inorganic masses or inanimate things, 
 but in the whole are to be viewed as the animated members 
 of the infinite body of nature or the whole material world. 
 
 In so far now as gravity, as the uniting principle, prevails 
 among these finite things, and stretches like an universal and 
 synthetic bond of connection around and through them all (as 
 a band around what is bound), do the single parts exhibit the 
 conatus or endeavour to enter into mutual connection and 
 dependence upon each other. Thus, gravity appears as a 
 force of cohesion between single bodies, or, what amounts to 
 the same, is manifested as magnetism, i. e. as the expression of 
 the original totality and unity of the essence at every point of 
 its existence. The universal copula or bond seeks to comprise 
 or gather together every singular in its grasp, and so to re- 
 present matter as a continuity, a whole. Thus, the totality of 
 material being may be represented by the plan of an infinite 
 magnet, i. e of a line, the poles of which portray the existence, 
 i. e. the manifestation in their activity of the expansive and 
 contractile forces. 
 
 Matter, however, is only in a state of actual, space-filling 
 existence, because it has in itself, simultaneously with the ne- 
 
SCHELLING. 235 
 
 gative factor, the positive or space-giving factor also ; and 
 because in each point of the universal magnet, which it repre- 
 sents, matter, i. e. magnet, is repeated, or because each part of 
 the matter, when present only in a potential or possible state, 
 can constitute itself into the actual positive and negative pole, 
 with a point of indifference, and consequently, each part, from 
 being itself matter, will, like the matter in the whole,^ en- 
 deavour to render itself per se a magnet, as is shown very 
 distinctly in the efifort of a mass to crystallise. Thus, all 
 special matters or bodies of the universe will exhibit the en- 
 deavour to form themselves per se into perfect magnets, i. e. to 
 be, as material bodies, self-subsistent. In so far magnetism is 
 the principle which renders matter a whole, but in this whole 
 re-establishes partial wholes ; so that it is the principle of 
 formation, of union within itself, in the whole as well as in the 
 singular. 
 
 Now all single matters, or what appear to us as such, consist, 
 as we remember, only in the relative plus or minus of positivity 
 and negativity, whereby they are distinguished as single objects 
 from others, and maintain themselves in the antagonism. If 
 now, each singular is to constitute itself the magnet, i. e. the 
 totality, the one that is relatively more positive will abstract 
 as much negativity from that which is relatively more negative 
 — and inversely — until it has set itself, as it were, in a state of 
 internal equilibrium, and established itself as a whole. Thus, 
 different bodies will strive to unite, to attract each other ; 
 indifferent ones, on the contrary, that is, such as are neither of 
 them either predominantly negative or positive, will repel 
 each other, and thus the same law which there declared itself 
 as magnetism, here appears in the conflict of the singular 
 with the singular as electricity. Electricity is the eternal 
 and universal bond, which in the singulars manifests the im- 
 perfection of each of them as such, and consequently the 
 totality only of two opposites ; while magnetism, as the temporal 
 bond, seeks to comprise the totality in the singulars or details. 
 In electrical phenomena the antagonism, which is to be united, 
 of positive and negative, is distributed over two different indi- 
 viduals, and upon contact one loses at the other what it has 
 specially for itself, and through which it was a particular and 
 distinct aliquid per se. Two different bodies, of which one is 
 positive, the other magnetic, are in a state of mutual relation like 
 the two poles of one magnet ; but in tlieir separation from each 
 Other they are electrically related, just as in their union they 
 
236 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 would be magnetically related. If we unite them, there then 
 originates in the contact a common indifference-point, and they 
 again represent a single magnet— a totality. In the entire line 
 ■which was previously adduced as the symbol of matter, and 
 thus of the universal magnet, each single part takes its place 
 either nearer to the positive or nearer to the negative pole ; 
 each part is in itself again a small magnet ; but every such 
 partial magnet, regarded by itself as a whole, is again related 
 to other such magnets as relative positivity or negativity, 
 according as it has its place in the entire magnet nearer to this 
 or to that pole. There are, so to speak, magnets, which are 
 relatively more positive and more negative, which, if they were 
 to come into contact, would together only make up the two 
 poles of one magnet, and this phenomenon is electricity. This 
 electricity is the expression or representation of the twofold 
 character of what is one in itself; magnetism is the expression 
 of the unity of two opposites, it is that in one, which electricity 
 is in two bodies. 
 
 The increase of cohesion in the parts of a body is at the 
 same time its more perfect magnetisation; for the bodies 
 become more perfect magnets in themselves the more firmly 
 they are united into a whole (t. e. into the magnet) ; and this 
 binding together is the effect of the force of gravity in matter. 
 Diminution of cohesion, on the contrary, or the loosening of 
 what is bound, will be the effect of the positive principle, the 
 luminar or light-essence. The light-essence, as being the 
 loosening and expanding principle, is opposed to the binding 
 magnetism ; it loosens its ties, where it can i where, on the 
 contrary, the force of cohesion becomes powerful, the light- 
 essence is dispelled, and is presented to us in a free state as 
 heat or coloric ; hence comes the heat or even development of 
 light in every electrical process. 
 
 Now, since magnetism in the whole and singulars exists 
 only under the form of identity, but electricity only under the 
 form of duplicity, it follows, that the real law of nature, to be 
 an unity in the antagonism, and antagonism in the unity, 
 is manifested perfectly neither in magnetism alone, nor in 
 electricity alone, but that the totality of the dynamic process 
 (the Identity of the indifference and difference) is fir^t pre- 
 sented to us in that occurrence which combines both phe- 
 nomena, namely, in galvanism, or in the chemism or chemical 
 action which depends upon it. 
 
 There thu£ originates in the chemical process a third elementi 
 
SCHELLING. 237 
 
 namely, a higter bond between those two activities; and in 
 this third they both unite or equalise each other, since by this 
 they are both governed ; they bear a similar relation to this 
 higher element, that the parts do to the totality, or as the 
 accidents to the substance (substance not being different from 
 the accidents), not existing apart from them, but being their 
 real complex or bond of connection. Thus, magnetism and 
 electricity constitute the chemical process, in the which, never- 
 theless, no absolute creation, but only a conversion, takes place; 
 each part of the matter loses as such in this process its in- 
 dependence, and becomes the object, the sport, as it were, of a 
 higher activity which has become free, or of an increased 
 self-mobility on the part of nature. All chemical separation 
 into a duplicity that is held asunder consists, with Schelling, 
 in a potentialisation of matter into oxygen and hydrogen ; all 
 -chemical composition, on the contrary, in a depotentialisation of 
 matter to the indifference of water. " In the domain of gravity, 
 water is as being the expression of this third bond, this true 
 identity, or that in which the archetype of matter is repre- 
 sented in the purest manner, that thing pre-eminently from 
 which aU productivity proceeds, and into which it returns. 
 -From gravity, as the principle of limitation, water derives its 
 fluid state ; while from the light-essence is derived the fact, that 
 in it the part is like unto the whole." * 
 
 "In the sphere of gravity, the type or manifestation of it as 
 such, i. e. as the potence that prevails previous to light, is what is 
 properly called matter, i. e. the^xed or immoveable ; the type of 
 the light-essence as such, i. e, everywhere, where it relatively 
 predominates in the sphere of materiality, is the air; in this last 
 the whole is exhibited as developed in the singular, since each 
 part is absolutely of the nature of the whole, while the ex- 
 istence of the immoveable depends upon this, that the parts are 
 relatively different from, or polarically opposed to, each other." 
 Thus, the indifference of the two, the true medium of material 
 nature, is the water. 
 
 So far we have been dealing with the being of nature as 
 elementary, i. e. inorganic ; if this is seen to be no chaos, so 
 neither is there any lack of individuation in the several parts, 
 i. e. of organic elaboration ; for upon individuation nature pro- 
 ceeds throughout. Her progress in the aggregate was a dis- 
 tinguishing of what is primordially undistinguished, an evolution 
 of the undeveloped and of that which was accumulated in the 
 * Ueher das Verhaltniss des Realen nad Idealen, p. xlii. 
 
238 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 subjective sphere, consequently, an individualising into distinct 
 parts, and of these parts again in themselves, in such a way, 
 however, that the positive essence remains in all and each 
 eternally one, just as nature herself, as an invisible eternal 
 band, encircles all and each, and unites them into the whole. 
 Thus, nature organises herself in her existence into the world, 
 *'. e. to the totality (of parts), in the unity (of the great whole) ; 
 her existence is, as being this living self-organisation, her own 
 universal and special object. Thus, if we regard nature in 
 general, as one infinite organism, it follows, that each part in 
 her is only serviceable to the whole, has no existence and no 
 object per se, but the object of its existence is only to fulfil a 
 definite function in behalf of the whole; each has its object 
 out of itself, being neither its own object, nor an organism per 
 se. Since, however, nature, by virtue of her final object, which 
 is constantly to evolve or unfold her own essence more per- 
 fectly, and in this evolution to render it the object to her- 
 self, is constantly tending towards the higher individuation 
 of single objects, so also does slie endeavour in like manner 
 to represent relative totalities in the singular, as, upon the 
 other hand, to again embrace these totalities as partial wholes 
 into the one great organism. Thus, the universal bond de- 
 clares its presence also in a certain degree in the singular, 
 and in this represents the form of the totality. " Where, how*' 
 ever, the same higher copula or bond declares its presence 
 in the singular, there then exists a microcosm, organism, or 
 perfected representation of the universal life of the substance 
 in a special life. The same unity which includes and foresees 
 all, which adapts the movements of universal nature, the still and 
 static as well as the mighty and universal changes, to the idea 
 of the whole, and constantly brings back every thing into the 
 eternal circle, the same divine unity it is, which, craving end- 
 lessly after positive afiirmation, moulds itself into plant and 
 animal, when, with irresistible power, the moment being fixed 
 for their manifestation, it seeks to convert earth, air, and water 
 into living beings or images of its universal life." * 
 
 Thus, nature or the universal essence does not pause, with 
 having potentialised itself to the luminar or light-essence, 
 but craves also to become in this its new duplicity and activity 
 an object again unto itself ; it yearns to have light and matter, 
 as they stand in conflict with each other, brought before it in 
 this struggle, lowered to the state of objects, and then to lift 
 * Verhaltniss des Realeu und Idealen, p. xlv. 
 
SCHELLING. 239 
 
 itself as a fresh subject above this conflict and govern it. Now, 
 this happens, when nature potentialises herself into life. As 
 vital principle, vital or formative impulse (call it what you 
 will), she now sports more freely with light and matter than 
 she did before, when, being still light, she prevailed over 
 matter. Thus she now becomes = a, the third potency. 
 
 It must now be seen how the development of nature arrives 
 at this third stage. We left her above in her activity as a 
 chemical process. This might already be regarded as an or- 
 ganising process, but still one that is, as it were, continually 
 abortive, and for this reason, because nature is here, in the 
 continual motion and transmutation of herself, completely 
 involved and imprisoned in a state of oscillation, like the 
 sea in its general ebb and flow, and can at no point, as it were, 
 comprehend and sustain herself, because the vacillation of each 
 individual or single part obeys a law which lies for each exter- 
 nal to it. Thus, nature here attains in none of her products to 
 what she really is, or intends to represent, appearing nowhere 
 as self-subsistent life in herself. This point is first attained 
 in those cases where she reveals herself in the singular as 
 self-dependence, i. e. organism. 
 
 Thus, the question is, how does the chemical become the 
 organic process? It is clear at the outset, that something 
 must enter the chemical process, which had not been hither- 
 to present therein; it is likewise clear, that this something 
 can come from no other source than out of the depths of 
 the infinite nature herself, i. e. must be already present there 
 in a potential state. Something must in the first place accede 
 to the chemical process, because this, if left to itself, would 
 soon come to a state of rest, since the two principles striving 
 after equilibrium, and in whose action the chemical process 
 consists, would soon find their equilibrium, and neutralise them- 
 selves into a common product. That something must accord- 
 ingly bring itself to bear as a continually external influence, in 
 order that the chemical process in the organism (whether plant 
 or animal) may be maintained by a constantly renewed dis- 
 turbance of the equilibrium, and in this way duration be bestowed 
 upon the process. Thus, to the organic life belong again two 
 factors; the one (in itself already a duplicity of factors or 
 forces) in the individually determined matter, the other exter- 
 nal to this in the universal, all-embracing, or circumambient 
 ether, or appertaining altogether to the general positive essence 
 ef nature. The things are related as the negative element to 
 
240 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 this positive factor ; in them prevails the principle which is de- 
 rived from gravity, and which forms and originally determines 
 the relation of combination ; in short, the material notion of the 
 thing as a living rule of formation, or as maternal principle. The 
 other principle, however, lies external to the individual things ; 
 it is that which continually incites and maintains the process, 
 developing it to actual existence in space, and is thus thepaternal 
 generative principle, and corresponds to the ether or light- 
 essence. Thus, the light is, as positive factor, the father ; the 
 gravity, as negative, the mother of all things. The latter lies 
 as ground and formative notion enclosed in the essence of the 
 individual things, and constitutes the individual essence ; it is 
 a part of that infinite potency, which declares or affirms itself 
 in the finite. 
 
 Now, however, the main point to be regarded, is not the 
 ready-prepared dead products, the things as formed or circum- 
 scribed matter, but the moving and forming process itself; it 
 is not the product, but the productive process, which is the life 
 of nature, i. e. the true nature itself; so soon as the process 
 has arrived at the ready prepared (neutralised) product, the 
 caput mortuum is also ready, and life is at an end. The whole 
 of material nature, in so far as it consists of immoveable products, 
 is only the spirit that has already died in its products ; the 
 formed material in its rigid state is everywhere but a monu- 
 ment of the past. The process itself is the main fact, for it 
 is the life, and the life is the continual existence ; beyond this 
 there is no existence for the singular than this origination or 
 becoming in time ; the form of this origination, or the law of 
 this movement, is the living self-exposition and comprehension 
 of nature. 
 
 Thus, the life and existence of organic essences depends upon 
 this, that the chemical process, as it ceases in them, is constantly 
 being renewed, that in them an antagonistic process is continually 
 opposed to the former processes, and thus that the organic life 
 is a process of processes, which in their sequence mutually and 
 constantly evoke each other anew. The organisations, known 
 to us, are divisible into animals and plants. The plant re- 
 presents the organic process upon a lower stage than the 
 animal. The chemical process, in which the so-called vegetable 
 life (vegetation) consists, is a continual resolution into hy- 
 drogen and oxygen. The former of these elements, as the 
 combustible, remains behind in the plant (as carbon), the 
 oxygen is expired, and the organs of the plant, its leaves, ar& 
 
SCHELLING. 241. 
 
 nothing more than a structure, which has, as it were, become 
 hardened by this function of expiration (just as a crystal might 
 be said to be nothing else than the movement of the crys- 
 tallising process, in a state, as it were, of concretion.) Thus, the 
 plant constantly advances to a state of greater deoxydation, and 
 the product is finally that which leaves behind the body of the 
 plant as a completely deoxydised [combustible. Thus, the life 
 of the plant can only be sustained for any length of time by 
 new oxygen being constantly conveyed to it, which oxygen it 
 must, according to its nature, give out or expire, and this is 
 efiected by means of light. The light always develops in the 
 plant new oxygen, and thereby evokes the familiar phenomenon 
 of colour, which disappears so soon as the plant is withdrawn 
 from the light. 
 
 In the animal process, on the contrary, the reverse takes 
 place. The animal nutrition consists in a continual reception 
 and retention within itself of oxygen. The atmospheric air 
 (oxygen gas) which the plant breathes out is decomposed in 
 the animal's lung, i. e. taken up into the blood, distributed with 
 the blood through the arteries into the different organs of the 
 body, and reabsorbed, so that the blood streams back again 
 deoxydised through the veins, in order to obtain fresh oxygen 
 from the air, and so begin again the circulation. Thus, in the 
 organs a certain attractive force and capacity for the oxygen 
 that is to be absorbed from the blood must be maintained, in 
 order that the process may not come to a stand-still. This 
 continual restoration of the power or capacity of the organs 
 consists in the irritability which is bestowed upon them, and 
 which is manifested as mobility. 
 
 Thus, the organising nature has opposed to the animal pro- 
 cess in the animal itself, the irritability, and by these means 
 prevented the former from standing still or exhausting itself 
 with a few respirations. She has accordingly united in the 
 animal what appears only in a separate state in other products, 
 having bestowed upon the chemical process an antagonism within 
 itself, which prevents its coming to a stand-still in one and the 
 same subject. In this way the self-mobility, by which the 
 animal is distinguished from the plant, becomes for the first 
 time comprehensible. The system of its movements is. a me- 
 chanism circumscribed within itself, and from the very fact of its 
 being circumscribed in an individual, it can attain a free, i. e. 
 spontaneous movement. It can attain to this, but that it actually 
 does so, depends upon a third capacity of the animal nature, which 
 
 K 
 
242 HISTORICAL SUKVET. 
 
 is opposed to irritability, just as this is to the chemical process 
 (reproduction), namely, upon the sensibility which is first awak- 
 ened in animals. For the first time in this triplicity of functions 
 (a part of Schelling's system, which Eschenmeyer has especially 
 worked out), does life present itself as an organic whole circum- 
 scribed within itself. The irritability can be represented or 
 thought of as an impulse to movement, and as such it re- 
 presents the positive, spatially intuitive, and expanding mo- 
 ment. This impulse or tendency is, however, in itself, devoid 
 of all determinations, and, as it were, perfectly formless : it 
 first obtains form and special determination through the nega- 
 tive moment, which is here portrayed by the sensibility. This 
 sensibility is, as regards itself, wholly determined by the inward 
 individual nature of the subject ; it depends, indeed, only 
 upon this nature, what pecaliar feature every action from 
 without upon the subject wiU assume : thus, for example, the 
 vibration of the air is only sound for an ear that hears, the 
 sweet is only sweet for the tongue, the light only light for the 
 eye, and so on ; and thus all movements are what they appear, 
 only within and for the organic essence, by whom they are 
 perceived or apprehended. It is only by the determinate kind 
 of reaction, which an essence, from its own nature, opposes to 
 the impression, that this impression becomes what it is for the 
 same essence — only by a determinate kind of reaction-r— thus, by_ 
 an activity in conflict with passivity or by an internal specific 
 movement, and that indeed of a voluntary character; this 
 last, however, depends upon irritability, and so irritability and 
 sensibility mutually determine each other ; since the former, so 
 to speak, affords the material, the positive ; the latter, the form, 
 the negative ; both together first producing the conformation, 
 which may be regarded as the peculiar life of organic essences. 
 " If, lastly," says Schelling *, " we comprehend irritability and 
 sensibility in one notion together, then originates the notion of 
 instinct (for the impulse to motion determined by sensibility 
 is instinct); and thus we have, by a gradual separation and 
 reunion of tlie opposite properties in the animal, arrived at the 
 highest synthesis, in which what is voluntary and involuntary, 
 accidental and necessary in the animal functions, is completely 
 united. 
 
 * Weltseele, p. 292. 
 
SCHELLING. 243 
 
 LECTURE XI. 
 
 schellikg's philosophy of nature, etc. — (eontinited). 
 
 We had, my friends, arrived, at the conclusion of the last dis- 
 course, at a comprehension of the internal processes of the 
 animal organic nature, as the unity of reproduction, irritability, 
 and sensibility. The animal nature is irritable, in so far as it 
 manifests spontaneous movement upon the reception of any 
 stimulus or excitement ; the animal here appears by virtue of 
 the exclusive character (abgesehlossenheit) of its organisation 
 to be a perfect automaton, for it is no longer (like inorganic 
 bodies) moved merely mechanically from without, but it moves 
 itself dynamically from itself; and even if this spontaneous 
 movement were to result only from the application of an ex- 
 ternal stimulus, still, despite of this, it would always continue to 
 be a living, i. e. organically spontaneous or self-originated 
 motion. Now to this irritability, sensibility was added and 
 internally opposed. By the latter, however, we cannot at 
 present form any idea of what in the human being is called 
 the sensitive faculty ; for with this there is commonly blended 
 the notion of the consciousness, which has not as yet been 
 deduced. By sensibility is here meant, in the objective sphere, 
 only certain kinds of movement which are opposed to those of 
 irritability, so that, if we regard the latter as the positively 
 expansive movements (those that augment the capacity of the 
 organs), we must look upon the actions of sensibility as the 
 negatively limiting and determining ones. Thus, sensibility is 
 the regulating (normiretide) and determining activity of the 
 individual ; it imposes upon all the movements that result 
 from irritability the law or form, imparts to them that very 
 quality which they must possess in order to correspond to the 
 real idea of the whole, or to represent this idea in a temporo- 
 Bpatial manner ; and thus brings into the sphere of irritability, 
 and through this into the whole reproductive sphere, the specific 
 character of the race, and stamps the idea of this upon the 
 being of the individual. 
 ^ Hence sensibility and irritability taken together furnish the 
 
244 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 notion of instinct, i. e. of a natural impulse, which is deter- 
 mined by sensation ; — by sensation, not as implying that, in the 
 present instance, this determination is effected by a more or 
 less distinct consciousness, but as simply expressing the mate- 
 rial element of the sensation, or that with which we have 
 already become acquainted, as the movements occurring and 
 the determinations present in the bodily organ. You will 
 remember, my friends, that we set out in the theory' of the 
 consciousness with the following statements ; namely, that the 
 unreflected, unconscious action of the psychical powers stands 
 upon the same level with the action of the so-called blind forces 
 of nature, and that nothing else constitutes the distinction 
 between unconscious and conscious activities, than the want of 
 self-reflection, which can occur for the first time only in a 
 subject which is actually in itself an individual subject, i. e. an 
 organic whole, and not a mere part of something else. It is 
 only in a subject, such as we have already raised and con- 
 structed in the Nature-philosophy, step by step, one that consti- 
 tutes for itself a living whole, and which is endowed with 
 -voluntary motion, that the activity of nature has become 
 individual self-activity, and has attained a grade of self-mobility 
 and freedom, in which for the first time it is possible to accom- 
 plish the last and highest stage of reflection, and in this way 
 to elicit from the natural being the first gleam of the conscious- 
 ness, i. e. the consciousness of self. 
 
 Irritability and sensibility, so far as we have become ac- 
 quainted with them, still belong entirely to the sphere of that 
 blind activity which prevails even in the lower or animal 
 ■ regions of human life : they are in themselves unconscious. 
 The act, however, of becoming conscious consisted, as we saw, 
 in this, — that the activity which had first of all coalesced with 
 or been absorbed, as it were, in its product, liberates itself from 
 the latter, repeats itself freely for itself, contemplates itself as 
 activity, and in this very way becomes the object unto itself, 
 just as previously it was an object only for some looker-on from 
 without. Thus, should the activity, which occurs in a blindly 
 instinctive manner, assume a new phase, and render itself in 
 this way by an internal process its own object, it follows, that 
 from the unconscious state of pure reactionary movement, or 
 of mere outward sensation, perception, i. e. the first degree 
 of consciousness, would originate. So long as the activity of 
 the living subject coalesces entirely with its product, there is 
 no real internal antagonisation of ideal and real, subject an^ 
 
SCHELLINa. 245 
 
 object, and, consequently, no consciousness. The animal feels, 
 but as in a dream ; it does not perceive or feel that it feels, it 
 does not see that it sees. • 
 
 ' The new stage, upon which the natural being first enters 
 fully, when it has arrived at Man, will, in its turn, depend on 
 the same process, or upon that internal division and opposition 
 (with retention at the same time of unity) ; during which pro- 
 cess every thing, without reserve, which hitherto as objective 
 — as the whole kingdom of unconsciously working nature, or 
 finally, as subject-object — had been in a state of undistinguishable 
 combination, enters definitively upon the other sidei upon that 
 of the objectivity, and leaves behind on the present one only 
 the pure subjectivity. The subject, which during this process, 
 may be regarded as synonymous with life, A', may now upon 
 the stage of the consciousness be called intelligence. A* : this sub- 
 ject now stands as a thinking knowledge or idealistic moment 
 opposed to the whole former or real and objective sphere, 
 for it exists only as knowledge, and has all besides as an 
 existing world, confronting, as it were, or opposite to, itself. 
 With this stage we have entered into another region, that of 
 intelligence, whereof more will be said further on. At present, 
 however, it is clear, from what has been said, that every thing 
 which now appears to us as objective, holds good on that very 
 account as real; while every thing that remains behind as 
 subjective will be regarded as ideal, or as a mere process of 
 thinking and knowing. Even that which has become objective, 
 we now know to be in itself nothing but a thorough activity or 
 motion ; that which is usually present to the understanding as 
 objective being, as substance, matter, and kernel of the pheno^ 
 mena, is nothing but the spontaneous activity of nature, which 
 continues to repeat itself for itself, until this its activity in its 
 pure form, or finally, nothing but this pure form, as the law of 
 the activity that constitutes and determines every thing, hovers 
 before itself; until it thus cognises and discerns that every 
 thing that exists is only a determination of activity, a form 
 only of itself, and that itself, the creative nature, is one and 
 the same with its form, and in this form alone works, i. e, is 
 actual or real. And now, at the conclusion of this general 
 sketch, I trust it has been seen with sufficient clearness, that 
 the ideal and real, which are usually set before the understand- 
 ing as two irreconcileable opposites, or the knowing (thinking) 
 and being, hold in fact the relation only of two poles of one 
 and the same intrinsic indifference, or that the real and ideal 
 
 E 3 
 
246 HISTORICAL SUBVfif. 
 
 are identical in the Absolute.* "With this result, however, we 
 have but been led back in the course of the investigation to 
 the point from which we set out, and I need not indulge in any 
 further repetition of what will readily enough find its own 
 place in connection with this my last discourse but one upon 
 the philosophy of Schelling. 
 
 If the result of natural science consist in this, that all forces 
 of the universe ultimately return into representative forces; 
 if all origination and life, and thus the eternally self-producing 
 nature, be in itself indeed a blind system of dynamics (for 
 of mechanics we must not speak), but still a dynamical or 
 organic system, which, while personating in its reality the un- 
 conscious thought, is that same spiritual and active being 
 which in us hutnan beings occurs at first unconsciously and 
 involuntarily, before it appears in its own reflex and become 
 conscious, — it follows, that, for the sake of this identity, all the 
 activity of nature will not only appear to us to be in conformity 
 with a purpose or design, but must be so in itself, although in 
 itself it is blind, and has no representation of the objects, which 
 it involuntarily pursues and attains. Nature works throughout 
 in conformity to purpose, but not with a feeling of intention 
 (absichtsvoll), so that all her products will have a purpose, 
 though they are not evoked by her with the consciousness of 
 such, i. e, with intent. Hence it may even be said, that nature 
 acts rationally without consciousness ; or, that the whole system 
 displayed in the living operations of nature, is the existing 
 reason ; a. position this, which Hegel at a later period expanded 
 over the whole, even the historical department of knowledge, 
 affirming, " that all that is real is rational." 
 
 In the human consciousness, where knowing and being have 
 already separated, the thought and intention precedes ©r goes 
 before the act, while the act realises the thought ; the product 
 becoming previously prepared as an idea, then in the next place 
 as object. In nature, matters stand otherwise ; for here the 
 product originates or becomes, without a distinct representation 
 thereof having preceded it; it originates oris created — we say — 
 in a thoughtless and instinctive manner, i. e. according to laws, 
 which are .laws of the thinking process, but which are not 
 reflected upon and cognised as such. Thus, in the whole of 
 nature is indeed displayed to us a conformity to purpose and 
 wisdom, but merely on this account, because the unconscious 
 
 * Consult, amobg others, Schelling's Lectures upon the Methods of 
 AcademicalStudy, Tubingen, 1803, p. U.etseq. 
 
SCHELLING. 247 
 
 activity of nature — the dream-life of the nature-spirit in its 
 unconsciousness — harmonises of necessity with the conscious 
 activity ; or, strictly speaking, because the former activity is the 
 same in itself, which the latter has become fer se. 
 
 Such is the distinction of the immanent conformity to purpose 
 from that external kind which is usually adopted by theological 
 writers. In consequence of that newer view we must not re- 
 gard nature as the blind instrument or dead matter, with which 
 a self-conscious architect of the universe realises definite 
 and distinctly foreseen designs, which, foreign in themselves to 
 the matter, are impressed, as it (were, from without upon it. 
 In such a view of the question, the God who would act thus 
 would, upon the one hand, be, it is true, of an extramundane 
 character, but at the same time only an universal architect, a 
 demiurge or world-maker, but not a true world-author of sub- 
 stance as well as form ; and, upon the other hand, the bulk of 
 the world would remain a dead substratum or chaos* and would 
 be, as it usually appears to the imprisoned senses, a lifeless, 
 powerless, plastic material, which awaited only the hand of an 
 artificer, but of which it would be impossible to comprehend 
 how and by what sort of power it could thus have come for itself 
 alone into existence and then have continued to subsist. Thus, 
 nature is robbed of all that charm which she can only have for 
 us, when we regard her as an homogeneous, self-subsistent, or 
 living essence, and in her feel by prescience that there is, though 
 lying in a deep slumber, a breathing and mysteriously working 
 spirit, which, like the soul of the suckling infant, that is inter- 
 twined with its own body, is alive and like unto ours in every 
 respect, save only that all of what with us has already revealed it- 
 self in immeasurable abundance, lies there concealed in the inner 
 fulness of the system, — the idea. Hence the sympathy of the 
 sensuous observer with the slumbering child ; hence the charm 
 that nature has for the sympathising spirit of man, and which 
 no poets have expressed more beautifully than the German, 
 and none more genially than Ludwig Tieck, especially in 
 several parts of his " Phantasus," " Zerbino," and other works. 
 All the threads of this dawning sympathy and accordant 
 thought are torn asunder, so soon as unconscious nature is 
 made the mere mechanism of an extramundane intelligence ; so 
 soon as another poet says, " Soulless a ball of fire revolves, 
 where once life's fulness flowed through all creation." 
 
 " Through the endeavour," says Schelling *, " to explain 
 
 • System of Transcendental Idealism, p. 446. et seq, ; 
 
 B 4 
 
248 HISTOKICAL SURVEY. 
 
 nature as a teleological production, i. e. as designed, the cha- 
 racter of nature and that very something which renders her 
 nature, is suppressed. For the peculiar character of nature 
 depends upon this ; that it is in its mechanism, and although 
 itself nothing but blind mechanism, yet conformable to purpose. 
 Thus, if I suppress the mechanism, I suppress the nature itself. 
 The whole charm with which, for example, organic nature is 
 invested, depends upon the contradiction, that this nature, 
 although a product of blind natural forces, is still thoroughly 
 and intrinsically conformable to purpose. If nature presents 
 itself to us as nothing more than an aggregate of dead objects, 
 which chance has thrown together, or, what here amounts to 
 the same, a power that is foreign to it has disposed, for the 
 purposes of our food and maintenance, why then she is veiled 
 to the philosophic as well as artistic gaze. To the inspired 
 inquirer alone is nature the holy, ever-creating, and primordial 
 force of the world, that engenders and actively produces all 
 things from itself."* 
 
 The immanent life of nature is that unreflected mode of 
 intuition, which unconsciously, yet like consciousness, and as 
 blind instinct, works the more surely in conformity with pur- 
 pose, since object and tendency have not yet become free, but 
 are stiU united, as it were, with the power itself. If, however, 
 we are to gain a distinct notion of this unconscious working of 
 nature within and without us, and to speak intelligibly of it, 
 all depends upon this, that we solve the difficulty of forming to 
 ourselves from out an unconscious state or operation a con- 
 scious, or, at all events, analogous idea. Thus, in order that we 
 may perfectly comprehend nature, there must be present in our 
 intelligence some psychical phenomenon, or kind of intuition, 
 in which the Ego has worked by itself in a both conscious 
 and unconscious manner ; — unconsciously, in order that it may 
 stand upon the same plane with nature ; but consciously, at the 
 same time also, in order that it may simultaneously observe 
 this action of nature within itself. With such an activity the 
 whole problem of Transcendental philosophy would be solved, 
 and we should have fully unveiled the mystery as to what 
 nature and we ourselves are. 
 
 This contradiction becomes, however, really solved by the 
 existence ^within us of the productive power of imagination, 
 —the poetic or artistic activity. This embraces in itself, what in 
 
 * Abhand. iiber das Verhaltniss der bildenden Kiinste zur Natur. Phil. 
 Schriften, Bd. L p. 346. 
 
SCHELLING. 249 
 
 nature and in thought appear only to be separated, namely, the 
 identity of the conscious and unconscious action of the Ego, 
 together with the express self-consciousness of this identity. 
 Reflection and intuition, or the free, self-observing process of 
 thought, and, on the other hand, that dream-like resignation to 
 the phantasy which seems to sport with our mental powers — 
 these two states appear incompatible, the one seeming con- 
 stantly to recede in the proportion in which the other takes ita 
 place ; like the two buckets, of which it is said, — 
 
 " If to the month the one you bring. 
 The other to the ground must swing." 
 
 It is only with the poet or artist that matters succeed in a won- 
 derful manner ; for while he allows the nature of his spirit, or the 
 godlike genius that is in him, blindly to work and gives 
 himself up to it, it is still he himself who thus works, and 
 works to a certain degree with forethought, according to ideas> 
 or with design and calculation. He feels himself inspired, i. e. 
 possessed as if by spirits, or Scufwvwg, in the oldest sense of the 
 word ; he feels an endeavour and a life within himself, an 
 infinite something, which, almost without his co-operation, will 
 press forwards and manifest itself, though this it can only do in 
 finite and limited forms. He is conscious to himself of that 
 endeavour, and expresses it with the most perfect confidence ; 
 but he can never express it wholly ; for to the true artist there 
 always remains behind infinitely much that lies concealed in 
 the unfathomable, though creative, depths of his spirit. As 
 regards this contradiction, that the in itself infinite and inex- 
 haustible by thought must yet be brought within the limits of an 
 intuition, that the incomprehensibly unconscious must yet be 
 comprised in an intuition, — of this must a true work of art 
 bear witness upon every occasion, for such a work is a voluntary- 
 involuntary, willed and created work, and yet one that has by 
 a miracle been achieved ; it is the product of, that which, cor- 
 responding to the instinct of the animal, we properly designate 
 within the sphere of conscious reason by the word genius. 
 
 In order to render more distinct the relation of natural and 
 artificial products, I cannot refrain from concluding this section 
 with a passage from the/classical discourse delivered by Schelling 
 at Munich in the year 1807, " Upon the Relation of the Plastic 
 Arts to Nature."* 
 
 * Philos. Schriften, Bd. i. p. 347—57. 
 
250 HISTOKICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 " If art is to imitate nature, she must seek to emulate the 
 creative power of the latter, not to apprehend in a tedious 
 architectonic manner the hollow scaffolding of her outward 
 forms, and from these transfer an image as vacant to the 
 canvass. It was only to the Greeks endowed with taste, who 
 could everywhere feel the trace of a living and working essence, 
 that true divinities could originate from out of nature. If we 
 do not regard things as to their essence, but only as to their 
 void and abstract form, they speak nothing to our inward 
 perception." — "Contemplate the most beautiful forms, and what 
 remains if you have denied the active principle that is in them ? 
 Nothing but mere abstract qualities, such as extension and 
 relations of space. That one part of matter lies near or outside 
 another, does this contribute any thing to its inward nature, or 
 the reverse ? Obviously the latter. It is not the bare juxta- 
 position of parts that, makes the form, but the kind or manner 
 of juxtaposition: this, however, can only be determined by a 
 positive force opposed to the disjunctivity, and subordinating 
 the multiplicity of the parts to the unity of a single idea, from 
 the force that operates in the crystal, up to that which, like a 
 soft magnetic stream, gives to the particles of matter in hu- 
 man structures such mutual arrangement and dependence, as 
 serves to render visible the idea of their essential unity and 
 beauty. It is not, however, merely as an active principle, but 
 as intelligence and effective science, that the essence must be 
 manifested in the fOrln, if we are fully to comprehend it. For, 
 if all unity can be only intellectual in its nature and origin, 
 whithet does all investigation of nature tend, if not to the 
 discovery of the same science in her ? For that in which there 
 is no intelligence cannot be an object of the intelligence ; that 
 which is devoid of perception cannot be perceived. The science 
 by which nature works is not indeed like human science, which is 
 associated with reflection upon itself; for in nature the idea is not 
 distinct from the deed, nor the design from the execution. Hence 
 the crude matter strives blindly, as it were, after regular shape, 
 and unconsciously assumes pure stereometric forms, that belong 
 indeed to the domain of ideas, and are something spiritual in 
 the material. With the stars is inborn the most exalted number 
 and geometry, which they execute in their movements without 
 any notion of such plan. More distinctly, though still incom- 
 prehensibly to themselves, appears the living perception in 
 animals, whom we see, though wandering here and there 
 without deliberation, to perform countless works far nobler than 
 
SCHELLING. 251 
 
 themselves ; the bird, intoxicated with music, eicelling itself 
 in tones that are fuU of soul; the small art-gifted creature, 
 without practice and instruction, producing light works of archi* 
 tecture; but all guided by a superior spirit, which already 
 shines in single flashes of intelligence, but nowhere comes forth 
 as a full sun except in man." 
 
 We had in following out the dynamical process of nature, 
 arrived at that stage where the subjective as A of the fourth 
 potency had struggled up to the state of pure knowledge or in- 
 telligence. Hence upon this stage it is nothing more than 
 knowledge; and thus as spirit in this sense it is no material sub- 
 stratum whatever, endowed with consciousness, but now exists 
 purified at length from every material element, in its perfect 
 subjectivity as a pure idealistic activity only, or as knowledge, 
 which has before itself the whole real world of being as some- 
 thing opposed to it, or as being ; it has, in short, become the 
 intuitive perception of its own intuition. As such it exists 
 among the objects of terrestrial nature only in the human race. 
 By this knowledge, the infinite or spiritual, the knowledge of 
 nature, and (in so far as man himself is a real product of nature) 
 the human being stands opposed to himself ; in himself, however, 
 a new process is declared into which the ideal enters by itself 
 alone ; in other words, the thinking process renders itself in a 
 constantly ascending scale of instances the object of self-intuition 
 or of reflection upon itself. Thus, for example, the already, 
 in itself, ideal intuition or representation becomes, as a product 
 of thought, the object again of a higher self-intuition of the 
 thinking subject ; the whole activity ascends in the individual 
 both theoretically and practically, from the stage of feeling and 
 sensation to that of intuition, representation, and desire, and 
 from this finally to rational thought and action, because even 
 the individual, by virtue of his innate nature, cannot remain in 
 any state of imprisonment or bondage, and so the human spirit 
 gradually attains in itself, as we are taught by a true psychology, 
 the stage of the clearest consciousness of itself and of the world 
 — an elevation this, which is at the same time also a real in- 
 ternal self-liberation of the mental activity, as has been shown 
 above. 
 
 At this period in which the human being is conscious at first 
 only of itself, and acts as an independent essence, it is, as it 
 
252 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 were, furthest removed from God, as the central essence, or is,' 
 together with its freedom, completely severed from him, and 
 ■with the perception of this state is also given, at the same time, 
 the disposition to return unto him. The infinitude, however, 
 which is present in man as the finite being, as an ideal, 
 knowledge, or consciousness, and takes part in his finitude, bears 
 to this, his practical freedom, the relation of necessity, law, 
 conscience ; so that there originates within him an antagonism of 
 necessity and freedom, and from this originates a new process 
 — that of history. The human being discerns a knowledge, a 
 providence, that overrules his freedom, — a spirit, to which he 
 subjects himself, and of which he becomes the instrument. As 
 a free man, he still sees this power external to or without him- 
 self, and, as an independent essence, opposes himself to it in 
 the self-consciousness, or submits himself to it, though still as 
 to an external and to him foreign power. He does not,' as yet, 
 perceive the true relation, namely, that he himself is an in- 
 tegrant part of that power, or that the Absolute is not really 
 separated from him, but that the infinite is also in him the 
 finite. This identity he does not as yet discern ; nevertheless, 
 it is eternally and constantly present, for the infinite spirit 
 works in him and through him, but first of all in such a manner 
 that the human being, in the noble works which that spirit 
 produces through him, bears only a partial or involuntary re- 
 lation to it as its organ or instrument ; thus, by revelation in 
 different degrees, the return of man to God is ushered in and 
 accomplished — this whole period being one in which human 
 nature shows itself to be an instrument of the Most High. 
 This was at first, as we have already seen, the period or stage of 
 art. Poetry, inspiration, or the daemonic element which is here 
 active in man, is equivalent to the infinite spirit, or it is the mind 
 of man himself, which, without perceiving how it is done, re- 
 veals itself as the infinite, and thus in its finite state from the 
 side of its infinity. Thus the first revelation of the infinite is 
 art, as we find to have been especially the case among the ancient 
 Greeks. A second stage is that of the religious belief, which 
 has indeed comprehended the All-one as such in the highest 
 abstraction of its essence, but into this has left every sensuous 
 finite, every creature, to relapse as being a mere moment of the 
 All-one, and as being in itself a transient something, which 
 finally disappears (as in several Oriental religions, especially 
 Buddhism)'. Lastly, the third and highest stage is the insight 
 into the" true relation of the subjective and objective, the abr 
 
SCHELLING. 253 
 
 solute knowledge or true philosophy, which unites the objectivity 
 of art with the subjectivity of reUgion. 
 
 Such is a preliminary survey of the plan of the whole system, 
 in which lies unfolded the most magnificent and infinite world- 
 drama as a history, whose beginning commences in an eternity 
 preceding the present creation of the world. 
 
 Let us now take a glance, in the next place, at the well known 
 doctrine of Schelling concerning the origination of the finite 
 essence in or from the Absolute, i. e. at the process which is 
 usually designated by the word creation. It is clear from all 
 that has been hitherto adduced, that we cannot, owing to the po- 
 sitions assumed in the Nature-philosophy, speak of a true creation 
 of things, if by this it is understood that the things are merely 
 effectuated or brought to pass, as in that case the primary 
 essence would evoke the things into existence without itself 
 entering into them and abiding there. Were the Absolute, 
 which is AU-in-All, not to enter into the creature, why then the 
 creature, in order to subsist independently of the Absolute, must 
 have a being of its own, and a ground of this being in and by 
 itself, quite independent of the primordial principle of the 
 universe ; for were it absolute in itself, and opposed to the first 
 Absolute, why then the latter would be limited and confined by 
 the former, and, consequently, could no longer be contemplated 
 as the infinite. If the identity of both, and, with this, the 
 whole speculative system is to be maintained, then the primor- 
 dial one and absolute essence must itself, in some way or other, 
 enter into the finite and be immanent therein. Now it is in 
 this way that we arrive at the celebrated Pantheism of Schelling, 
 a second point in our inquiry, which claims a closer examination. 
 
 In the first place, as regards creation, we should, according 
 to the principles of the Nature-philosophy, reverse the whole 
 relation of the matter before us if we were to represent to our- 
 selves, as is usually done, first the eternal spirit and then the 
 material world, as being produced with consciousness upon the 
 part of the former ; we must, rather in consequence of all 
 that has been hitherto advanced, suppose, in the first place, a 
 real world, within or without which the spirit, as such, elevates 
 and perfects itself- Matter was the primum existens, and the 
 principle that preceded it, i, e. not in time, but only by virtue of 
 a logical supposition, was the potentia, power or potency not as 
 yet existing. In matter the subjective constantly elevated 
 itself more triumphantly from one stage to another, as light, 
 life, spirit, up to absolute subjectivity, i.e. to pure ideality, unto 
 
254 HISTOEICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 which every thing else became objective, or, in other words, 
 real. Thus, the spirit was actually not the first, but the last, 
 that originated, and in this sense we cannot regard the spirit 
 as the creator of the world. 
 
 The absolute subject or universal Ego is, upon its highest 
 stage, the universal spirit, and is, consequently, that very element 
 in the macrocosm which the human consciousness is in the 
 microcosm. Just as the human germ, when once impregnated, 
 unconsciously develops itself up to the perfect organism, and 
 ultimately reflects upon itself, so also did the infinite nature 
 develop itself in the world, and enter upon the stage of spi- 
 rituality, i. e. cognise, objectify itself in its own perfected work, 
 as being that with which it is and remains ever one in itself. 
 Thus, upon the spiritual stage, or in the human being, the activity 
 of nature ceases to be really productive, being, as a thinking 
 process, only ideal ; it has become purely subjective, and on 
 that account its products are only subjective products, thoughts, 
 ideas, formal repetitions merely of the real creative a,ctivity, 
 apart from the created, seeing that it purely repeats itself for 
 itself, and no longer enters into the product ; it is thus dis- 
 tinguished as thinking process from th6 real, i. e. the external, 
 objective, productive vital force. In this state of a purely ideal 
 activity, repeating or contemplating itself ideally, and^ius as 
 knowledge, does this activity exist by itself and apart from the 
 product, only in so far as it is no longer, as before, absorbed 
 and imprisoned in the product itself. It exists as a special 
 function of the vital activity, namely, as a higher function (in 
 a higher potency or degree), i. e. as self-hood {Ichheit) or self- 
 consciousness per se, without however being in itself really dis- 
 tinct from the vital power, but, as it were, another and second 
 soul together with the latter. Thus, the human individual soul 
 is not only the blindly-working, self-forming vital impulse, but 
 ■is also, in a higher degree of function, the self-contemplating 
 thought or self-consciousness = spirit. Let us, then, guided by 
 this, analogy, endeavour to think of the universal essence, the 
 world-soul, unto whose productions all things, even our own 
 souls, belong as integrant parts or determinations. As a world- 
 soul, an unconsciously self-evolving nature, we have already 
 become acquainted with it. We saw that it elevates itself to 
 the stage of consciousness in the human being, for in this its 
 last product nature has perfectly, as an object before herself, 
 that which previously lay involved or implicitly within its 
 essence and power {potentia) : the human being i? the thought 
 
SCHEX.LING. 253 
 
 of nature, in which thought nature represents herself; the 
 perfect transcript or copy of the Absolute, for the thought is 
 itself absolute, i. e. free, having the, principle of self-hood in 
 itself, and in so far representing the absolute self-hood of the 
 world-Ego. In all real products of nature the producent nature 
 {i. e. the Absolute) is one and the same with these its products, 
 and in nowise differs from them ; nay more, these products, 
 these natural things, do not even subsist as special essences per 
 se, but they are only the nature-activity fixing or imbodying itself 
 at certain points of its course. How it is possible for such single 
 fixations or antagonisms to originate in the universal fluid has 
 been pointed out in the theory of magnetism and gravity. The 
 Absolute and One, in so far as it works as a material power of 
 gravity, is the universal bond which both establishes each 
 single position in the universe per se, and also unites them all 
 together into the whole ; in short, it is that all-pervading, re- 
 straining, and sustaining force which brings both materially 
 amd really every singular, as a something bound or circum- 
 scribed, into itself or within its own sphere. In so far the 
 Absolute, as being the primordial unit that differences itself 
 within itself, into light and gravity, was also one and the same 
 with the material world. In this potency of the merely real- 
 objective sphere there is no single or really independently 
 existent essence. But with this potency the Absolute has not 
 yet come to the end of its process ; for this process proceeds, 
 of necessity, from the very nature of the Absolute, which 
 consists in constantly objectifying the potentially possible, the 
 concealed intrinsic nature itself, and rendering it a distinct 
 per se (FUrsich). Thus, this process first attains completion, 
 when the Absolute wholly, i. e. as Absolute, regards itself as an 
 independent, free process of creation, and truly contemplates 
 itself in its counterpart or likeness, the world. In the world, 
 however, it attains to this self-intuition only upon the stage of 
 humanity, or, what amounts to the same thing, of the reason 
 knowing itself as such, — of the perfected consciousness, or the 
 state of independence and freedom. Thus, in the human being 
 the Absolute is or exists, for the first time, as a perfect subject, 
 i. e. as real knowledge, being no longer a merely real or natural 
 process of action. It is true that in the human being the 
 Absolute still works as a real process, as organising world-soul 
 or real vital principle ; but in its higher function, as spirit, it is 
 knowledge, has the whole world set, as it were, as an object 
 before itself, and ultimately (in philosophy) cognises itself per- 
 
256 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 fectly by gazing upon itself as the identity of the two — in the 
 teal action as an unconscious, in the ideal as a conscious process 
 of thought. 
 
 ■ The Absolute, I said, first attains in humanity to true self- 
 consciousness ; for consciousness presupposes a spiritual tran- 
 script or copy of what the spirit is in itself ; for only in the 
 perfect reflex of its nature does the primordial essence discern 
 or cognise itself. Thus, if this cognition is to be a true one, 
 the copy must so completely correspond to the original as to be 
 the very aspect of the original itself. Now the Absolute or 
 universal nature is never, even in its blind activity, any thing 
 else, or never works otherwise ; for, as the real or incarnate law 
 of the reason, it was hitherto the blindly-working reason itself ; 
 though nature, and thus this reason which is synonymous, no- 
 where comes in the whole circle of things to a knowledge of 
 itself until it has arrived at the human being ; consequently 
 man in general, i. e. the idea of the human being (not this or 
 that individual man), is the first reflex of the absolute reason, in 
 the which it beholds itself ; for in that reflex the Absolute arrived, 
 for the first time, at the antagonism of knowing and being. Man 
 himself exists as personality, i. e. as a free absolute individual by 
 himself, merely in and by his self-consciousness ; this alone sets 
 him free from the general but blind concatenation of nature, 
 and thus his inmost essence, or the very ground of his existence, 
 is. an ideal principle : he is, in his inmost nature or essence, 
 nothing but actual self-consciousness ; and this principle of 
 personality and self-subsistence is, in the innermost ground of 
 our nature, that very Absolute, which first in the form of the 
 special vital impulse, and later on as freedom and self-conscious- 
 ness, severs itself in a spontaneously active manner from the 
 general concatenation of nature, and indeed for the first time 
 perfectly in the genesis of the human self-consciousness, which 
 Ficbte has already described as the primitive power of the 
 Ego or self-hood. 
 
 How now is the above severance or separation from the 
 continuum of universal being to be thought of? The world- 
 spirit progressed in its eternal process, until it had attained the 
 stage of self-consciousness. The act of becoming conscious to 
 itself of itself consisted, however, in an antagonisation of subject .. 
 tivity and objectivity; for the last object to which it must arrive, 
 in order that the absolute subject may perfectly discern itself 
 therein, was the idea of the human being, ?. e. of the reason — 
 *he reason as (^qua) such cognising itself. This idea was the 
 
SCHELLING. 257 
 
 true likeness of the Absolute ; but if it is to actually represent 
 in itself the absolute character of the Absolute, why then it 
 must be absolute itself, i. e., it cannot be represented as a mere 
 object, nor as a bare predicate of the Absolute (for if so it would 
 not represent the absolute state of self-subsistence), but it 
 must be so posited in the Absolute, as to be capable of being 
 ■per se. Now, since all is really a thinking process, every 
 thing that is or exists being either a thinking process or a 
 something thought of (subject or object), the "thought of" being, 
 however, the dependent, the thinking process the Absolute, it 
 is necessary so to think of what had been originally thought 
 of by God, as being also a self-thinking process, so that the 
 self-subsistent may, as such, be both represented and es- 
 tablished. A true self-thinking process is subject, and thus 
 the idea (the thought of) becomes in itself that which thinks, 
 i. e., the perfectly self-active and free, and begins with this 
 act to be per se, or by itself. Thus, all that proceeds from the 
 unity of the absolute being, or which seems to disengage itself 
 from this, must have already in that unity the possibility of being 
 per se : the reality, however, of the separated existence can 
 only reside in what is separated from the absolute being ; and 
 this separation can only be an ideal one, and can only take place 
 in proportion as an essence by its mode of being in the Absolute 
 is rendered capable of being itself the unity.* 
 
 With all this, however, the main difficulty must in the first 
 place be removed, upon which we necessarily impinge in every 
 theory of creation, and which has been already alluded to above ; 
 namely, as to how any thing can subsist by itself, thus be 
 absolute, apart from the universal Absolute. If every subsistent 
 owes its origin and continued subsistence to the sole Absolute, 
 or lives and moves in and by it, like a part in the whole, why 
 then it is only to be comprehended as an accident of a substance, 
 and has no subsistence by itself. If, on the contrary, it is abso- 
 lute by itself, it is then apart from the unity of the Absolute, 
 and accordingly there would be many Absolutes, and above all 
 these there could be no ulterior Absolute, no highest, no common 
 bond, seeing that they would cease, when imited, to be absolute. 
 So long as we only continue to contemplate the series of un- 
 conscious natural products we do not encounter the above 
 difficulty, but it comes out in full force, so soon as we arrive 
 
 * Bruno oder iiber das gottliohe und natiirliohe Princip der Dinge, 
 Berlin, 1802, p. 131. Consult Philosophie und Religion, Tubingen, 1804, 
 p. 20. et seq. 
 
258 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 at the antagonism presented by human freedom to the freedom 
 of the Absolute. Hence, even with Scbelling this point be- 
 came a stumbling-block ; and accordingly we find him cruising 
 for a long while in a cautious manner about this precipice, hard 
 by which lie the ruins of so many former systems, overwhelmed 
 in the depths of time : and lo ! the onward course of his bark 
 is stopped ; and he seems as though in doubt how and in what 
 fresh direction he shall wend his way. 
 
 The doctrine of universal unity, as already promulgated by 
 Spinosa, and in ancient times under a similar form by the 
 Eleatic school of pJiilosophers, appears completely to exclude, 
 if not every real and qualitative distinction, at all events, a 
 genuine self or jaer-se-subsistence of the particular. On this 
 point Schelling, in his philosophical researches into the Essence 
 of Human Freedom *, expressed himself as follows : 
 
 If the Absolute is every thing, and things are only the tem- 
 porary forms which the Absolute assumes, it is clear, so' one 
 says, that things in themselves do not really possess any essential 
 character, and so there must merely exist an Absolute, eternally 
 transforming itself in an inexhaustible manner ; but apart from 
 this, neither a material nor spiritual world. This system con- 
 sequently abrogates entirely the individuality of the world's 
 concrete existences and especially that of human beings. 
 
 But, says Schelling, matters do not stand thus, "The things 
 certainly contain in themselves some positive or essential 
 elemen'^ although not originally, but only in a derivative 
 manner. For if we assume, that the individual essence in 
 itself may be at the same time the infinite substance, — namely, a 
 special modification of it, or, what amounts to the same thing, 
 that the infinite substance has so modified itself in some one 
 point of itself, that this its form or modification appears to be 
 an individual thing, — it follows, that the substance is to be 
 thought of as the immanent ground in the individual essence, 
 by or through which the latter continues to subsist in this its 
 form. Were we farther to assume that the Absolute or the 
 substance abides in some of these forms (which, because the 
 Absolute is a .something spiritual, we may term also notions or 
 conceptions), as e. g. in the human mind, not in a transitory but 
 eternal manner, why then this form and the Absolute abiding 
 in it would be also eternally separated from the universal 
 Absolute. It is true that this form, and consequently the ex- 
 istence of the individual essence, is, from its having its ground 
 only in the Absolute, dependent upon and comprehended in it. 
 * Von der menscbliclien Freiheit : first puWshed in 1809. 
 
SCHELLING. 259 
 
 " But," continues Sohelling, " dependence does not abrogate 
 independence, nor even freedom. It does not determine the 
 essence, and only implies that the dependent, whatever it may 
 constantly be (in itself), can only be a result of that upon 
 which it is dependent : it does not declare what it may or what 
 It may not be. Every organic individual is or exists as a 
 something that has originated only by or through some other, 
 and in so far is dependent as to origination, but not as to 
 being." "It is, e.g., no contradiction that he, who is the son 
 of a certain individual, is himself a man, like the latter. On 
 the contrary, for the dependent or consequent not to be self- 
 subsistent would be far more contradictory. In such a case 
 there would be a dependence without a dependent, a result 
 without a resultant {consequentia absque consequente), and 
 hence also no actual result, i. e. the whole notion would become 
 self-abrogated or annulled. The same holds good of being 
 comprehended in another. The individual member, such as 
 the eye, is only possible in the entirety of an organism, yet 
 nevertheless it has a life by itself, nay, a kind of freedom, as is 
 clearly proved by the diseases of which it is susceptible. Were 
 that which is comprehended in another not to be alive in 
 itself, why then there would be a state of comprehension without 
 a comprehended, i. e. there would be nothing comprehended."* 
 Thus Schelling affirms in general that the categories of cause 
 and effect, and of substance and accident, when applied to the 
 Absolute and the universe, do not prevent us from regarding 
 that which is contemplated as a result of the accident of the 
 Absloute, being in its turn in other respects both ground and 
 substance; and so by clearing away this logical impediment 
 he endeavours to pave the way for a theory of creation, in 
 accordance with which the human being, although grounded as 
 to his essence in the Absolute, may yet, as to the form of his 
 being, be regarded as absolutely self-subsistent ; while, upon 
 the other hand, the Absolute, although entering into and co- 
 operating with all its productions, may nevertheless as Absolute 
 (as to form) appear above and apart from the human being as 
 self-subsistent. We must here, he says, pay strict attention 
 to what is meant by the copula in a logical thesis or proposition. 
 It does not imply an identity of character between the subject 
 and predicate. If, e.g., I say this body is blue, I do not mean 
 by this that the body in question is nothing more than what 
 we call blue (blue colour), but merely that this body, among 
 
 » Op. cit. p. 413. 
 s 2 
 
260 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 other qualities which it has, is also blue. In like manner, when 
 it is said that the Absolute is the things, or all things are the 
 Absolute, this does not amount to saying, that the Absolute is 
 nothing more than the things ; but only that among other 
 predicates it is or constitutes the things. As regards, how- 
 ever, what the Absolute may be besides, and how the idea or 
 conception of it may be completely determined, of this no men- 
 tion has as yet been made. 
 
 Thus, it is not the intention of Schelling to sever things, 
 or even human beings as regards their real essence, wholly 
 from the Absolute and from the connection of the universal 
 forces ; for he says, that it is possible, i. e. conceivable, that 
 man, as regards his real essence, may be a component part of 
 the Absolute, and notwithstanding may persist in a form of 
 being which would give him the character of the Absolute or of 
 self-subsistence. Man may be justly called a result and mo- 
 dification of the Absolute ; but he is and remains such merely 
 in his one-sided relation to the universal Absolute ; in another 
 relation he would be probably the direct reverse of this, just 
 as a son, although the consequens of his father, is in himself 
 probably a father likewise. 
 
 While, however, we must think of the human being as con- 
 tinually as to its essence forming an integrant part of the 
 Absolute, it does not follow from this that he is altogether or in 
 every respect non-independent and devoid of liberty. " But," 
 continues Schelling, "the very reverse ; for the immanence or 
 indwelling of the Absolute within us, or our immanence in the 
 Absolute, is the only means we have of preserving our freedom." 
 Most persons, if candidly disposed, would confess that, according 
 to the constitution of their own ideas, the freedom of the indi- 
 vidual appears to them to stand in direct contradiction to 
 almost all the qualities of a highest being, as, for example, that 
 of omnipotence ; for by freedom a power that is unconditioned 
 a« to principle is declared to be both apart from and in proxi- 
 mity with the divine power, — a position this, which, according 
 to:those ideas or notions, is inconceivable. As the sun in the 
 firmament extinguishes all the heavenly lights, so also and far 
 more does the infinite power extinguish every finite. Absolute 
 causality in one essence leaves to all others only an uncon- 
 ditioned passivity. Besides, the dependence of all concrete 
 existences in the universe upon God, and even their continu- 
 ance, are but in themselves a constant renewal of creation, in 
 the which the finite essence is still not produced as an indefinite 
 
SGHELLING. 261 
 
 universal, but as a definite individual form endowed with a 
 certain measure, and no other, of thoughts, endeavours, and 
 actions. To say that God withholds his almighty power, so 
 that man may act, or that he suiFers the freedom to exist, 
 explains nothing : were God to withdraw his power for a single 
 instant man would cease to be. Now, against this line of 
 argumentation what other resource is left us than to preserve 
 the human being along with his freedom (since this last is incon- 
 ceivable as opposed to the Almighty) within the divine nature 
 itself; and to say that man is not without but in God, and 
 that his activity is itself part and parcel of the Divine Life." — 
 " So little do immanence in God and freedom contradict one 
 another, that only what is free is, in so far as it is so,- in God, 
 while what is devoid of freedom, is, in so far as it is so, of ne- 
 cessity without God."* 
 
 In all, however, that has been here adduced, we certainly discern 
 no direct proof of the human being actually holding such a re- 
 lation to the Absolute ; for from the above logical deduction we 
 merely see that it is not impossible, i. e. not inconceivable, for 
 man to be immanent in the Absolute, and yet, at the same time, 
 also, to be independent ; while the passages last quoted contain 
 more of an apagogie than direct proof of the fact, since they 
 point only to the difficulties that beset the ordinary doctrine of 
 freedom, and which drive us, it is true, to adopt an opposite 
 view, while, nevertheless, this view could only stand at first as 
 a postulate or article of belief, for which we have yet to seek 
 for the intelligible form and solution of the contradiction. 
 
 Apart, however, from such a general logical formula, other 
 unexpected difficulties present themselves, especially when from 
 this philosophical standing-point we take a retrospective glance 
 at the sum and substance of Christian theology. By this the 
 freedom of man is at once regarded from the side of hisi sinful- 
 ness or tendency to err, and so soon as we bring this doctrine 
 forwards in company with that of Schelling, we are involved 
 by his theory of the immanence of things in. God in other still 
 more insoluble contradictions ; for it seems to conflict with the 
 notorious imperfections of the world, and especially with the 
 existence of evil, and, by deifying all, to render all good and 
 wholly to deny the evil. 
 
 Here then it was no longer possible to avoid giving a definite 
 answer to the demand which was raised, for a closer definition 
 of Pantheism. Thus much is evident from all that has been 
 
 * Von der menscU. Freiheit, p. 403. 4 15-. 
 s 3 
 
262 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 said, that Schelling teaches an immanence of the Absolute, and, 
 in so far as we call this God, of God in finite things, conse- 
 quently an identity of the creature with God in a certain sense, 
 though not in that of positive identity ; for even if we think 
 of the eternal, and in itself sole power of nature, as pervading 
 all the structures of the universe, supporting and maintaining 
 them as its forms, so that without this power the things them- 
 selves would be as naught, still we are not justified, upon that 
 account, in saying that all things in the aggregate are God, or 
 that the highest being is nothing more than the complex, the 
 collective of all existing things. The absolute essence may, 
 indeed, although it is, or is in, the things, be yet, at the same 
 time, far more, namely, spirit, i. e. absolutely rational knowledge 
 and volition. Did we not detect the same feature in the human 
 microcosm ? The vital principle of our body and the intel- 
 ligence, together with conscience and reason, are not two dif- 
 ferent souls dwelling near to each other, but are one and the 
 same principle of personality ; and yet we map out this prin- 
 ciple, and often too abruptly, into its functions, calling it in one 
 case spirit, in the other vital impulse, sensitive faculty, desire, 
 and such like. Ifow this principle manifests itself and exists 
 in this and that form as the same, but it also opposes itself, as 
 it were, polarically to itself, and elevates itself during the process 
 in the manner above pointed out, from the state of blind in- 
 stinct up to that of the purest reason, without ceasing, when it 
 has become this last, to act at the same time, upon the other 
 hand, as blind instinct still. 
 
 Thus, the Absolute, in its primordial potencies, as light and 
 gravity, can be the supporter or substance of the concrete 
 existences of the universe, while, at the same time, in its 
 highest potency, or in its function of self-conscious reason and 
 freedom, it can elevate itself above the whole world and creature, 
 and contemplate these as objects, or itself in the latter. Now, 
 to the Absolute upon this apex of spirituality, and-thus in direct 
 antagonism to the creature, is justly bestowed the title of Deity, 
 a title from which, while the Absolute was in the state of the 
 lower potencies, we were obliged to refrain. 
 
 Thus, if by Pantheism nothing more is to be understood than 
 this kind of immanence of things in God, it follows that Schel- 
 ling's doctrine is thoroughly pantheistic, and the system will 
 never be able to clear itself from this immanence without re- 
 nouncing itself entirely. XTpon the other hand, the doctrine of 
 identity thus modified, or more closely defined, is, as has just 
 
SCHELLIN6. 263 
 
 been shown, no more one of materialism and fatalism than that 
 of Fichte. 
 
 ^ Nevertheless, we still encounter in Schelling's system con- 
 siderable mental obstacles or stumbling-blocks; for apart, 
 namely, from the cardinal question, with which we will not 
 here meddle, as to whether a potentialising of the lower and 
 more imperfect into the higher and more perfect, is logically 
 conceivable, it strikes us, in the first place, that by that imma- 
 nence of the world in God, the world in its inward nature and 
 laws becomes identified with the sole, and, consequently, highest 
 and divine nature, and is thus declared to be absolutely perfect 
 and rational, a position this with which, upon empirical grounds, 
 the glaring imperfections, ills and sins, of the human being 
 would seem to be irreconcilable ; then, in the next place, if 
 nature works in a manner unpremeditated, first as a merely 
 (blindly) existing reason or nature in herself, and after a certain 
 process (effected in the human being), returns as the same 
 reason to herself, or became the conscious reason, it follows, 
 that the whole system of the universe must of necessity be con- 
 verted into a logico-rational system, into a pure logical mecha- 
 nism or rationalism, conformable to which all being and becom- 
 ing could not exist otherwise than as a law of unerring neces- 
 sity — a conclusion, this, which was subsequently followed out 
 by Hegel ; and, finally, it follows, despite all the diversity 
 which the Absolute might possess when upon the stage of the 
 world's spirituality, that it was nevertheless subjected in itself 
 to a process by which it first became the Deity, which it pre- 
 viously was not ; a God, however, that has originated or become, 
 or a perfectibility of the Deity, is and remains an idea thoroughly 
 opposed to our own feelings and to the Christian religion. 
 
 Hence these three difficulties, so closely connected with one 
 another, must be removed if the system is to be perfectly re- 
 conciled with the life of experience and with religious feeling, 
 or is to correspond to the object of philosophy, i. e. to impart 
 the highest consciousness, and in this way celebrate the triumph 
 of universal conviction. 
 
 It is clear, if I may so express myself, that, if this object is 
 to be attained, we cannot, without depotentialising the signifi- 
 cation of the first promulgated system, proceed logically to 
 its redintegration {zum Theilganzen fuglich abgehen). As 
 yet it has not pleased the author to declare himself in writing 
 
 8 4 
 
264 HISTOEICAL SURVEr. 
 
 upon these points ; the first of them only, the existence of evil, 
 having been treated of in the Essay upon Human Freedom, with 
 which we may compare the controversial treatise that appeared 
 in 1812, entitled " Denkmal der Schrift von den gottlichen 
 Dingen ;" of the second point we have a categorical explanation 
 in his preface to a translation of Cousins's well known work *, 
 where he declares that he has framed his system as the 
 system of freedom, and as a positive historical doctrine, going 
 hand in hand with, and even resting partly upon, experience 
 for support, and that it is directly opposed to the empty 
 logical rationalism or system of necessity into which, under 
 Hegel's hands, the beginning of his system, or the Nature- 
 philosophy, was transformed. As regards, however, the third 
 point, namely, that the reason demands an uncreated, abori- 
 ginally conscious, free, and consequently personal God, who is 
 to be contemplated as free creator also of the world — upon this 
 we can only gather, at present, some significant hints from 
 Schelling's immediate scholars, especially Beckers.f 
 
 From all this it is clear, in my opinion, that Schelling's latest 
 doctrine neither stands in any direct opposition to his former, 
 and well known doctrine, nor is built upon a wholly new 
 foundation ; but that it will certainly assign to the Nature-phi- 
 losophy another place and purport in the system to what it 
 appeared to have before, though still the outline to be expected 
 — unless we are altogether deceived — will, in essentials, contain 
 only a more scientific development of what has been already 
 indicated in unmistakeable characters and hints in several 
 published essays, and especially in the Researches into Human 
 Freedom. 
 
 Thus any attempt to combine what is already well known 
 with what has only recently become so, would, were we to deal 
 even with the subject in the most general manner, be obviously 
 venturesome and premature. 
 
 * Victor Cousin's French and German Philosophy, translated from the 
 French by Dr. Hubert Beckers, with critical preface by 6. von Schelling, 
 1834. 
 
 f Dr. Hubert Beckers, iiber E. F. Goschel's Versuch eines Erweises 
 der personl. Unsterblichkeit, u. s. -w. Hamburgh, 1836. As to -what has 
 been most recently published, -whether called for or not, in papers and 
 periodicals, since the time of Schelling's appearance in Berlin, — aU tes- 
 timony of this kind must be accepted with the greatest caution. 
 
SCHELLING. 265 
 
 LECTURE XII. 
 
 schelling's eecent views. 
 
 In the Treatise upon Human Freedom, one of the most im- 
 portant, as regards the speculative nature of its contents, with 
 which Schelling has furnished us in the later, or at least tran- 
 sitional period of his career, we find him, as it were, summing 
 up and concluding his earlier system in the following words 
 (page 419.) : " To bring Realism and Idealism into a state 
 of reciprocal penetration, such has been the declared object 
 of all my endeavours. The notion of the absolute sub- 
 Stance, which was regarded by Spinoza as the passive and 
 lifeless (the inanimate image, so to speak, of Pygmalion) ob- 
 tained by the higher method of contemplating nature, and from 
 the unity that was recognised as subsisting between the dyna- 
 mical and the psychical or mental, a living basis, out of which 
 grew the Philosophy of Nature, which may, indeed, subsist by 
 itself as a merely physical science, but which, when considered 
 in reference to the whole of philosophy, must invariably be 
 regarded as that real portion of the latter, which, by a process 
 of redintegration through the influence of the ideal, in which 
 freedom prevails, becomes susceptible of elevation into the true 
 sphere or system of rational thought. In this freedom it was 
 said that we encounter the last potentialising act, whereby the 
 whole of nature became transfigured into sensation, intelli- 
 gence, and finally into will. In the last and highest instance 
 there is no other being whatever than volition. Volition is 
 primordial being, and with this alone all its predicates of 
 groundlessness, independence of time, and self-affirmation con- 
 form. The whole aim or endeavour of philosophy is but to 
 discover this final judgment or decision." 
 
 It is not, however, sufficient to conceive only of the Absolute 
 as an universal Ego and as free will ; but it must be shown also 
 that singulars, such as natural essences, and especially the indi- 
 vidual Ego of human beings, carry this freedom as their ground 
 or foundation within themselves. This has been already done, 
 in pointing out the identity of the human Ego with the abso- 
 lute primordial essence. 
 
266 HISTORICAL StTEVET. 
 
 Now, the positive essence of human freedom, as it is mani- 
 fested in direct consciousness and in history, consists in this, — 
 that the freedom is a capacity both for good and evil ; every 
 other notion that is formed of it, such as independence and such 
 like, being only negative, and affording us no information as to its 
 real nature. In tlus " capacity, however," says Schelling, " lies 
 involved a point of the profoundest difficulty in the whole 
 doctrine of freedom," and, since freedom is the positive notion 
 of the essence in itself, of the greatest difficulty also in the 
 whole range of philosophical inquiry ; for " we cannot per- 
 ceive how from God, who is contemplated as pure goodness, a 
 capacity for evil can proceed. Thus, human freedom cannot 
 with justice or propriety be derived from God, but must have 
 a root independent of God, at least in so far as it contains 
 within itself a capacity for evil." If the Absolute or free 
 essence be the immanent nature of things, and especially of 
 human souls, it follows inevitably that the evil must be re- 
 garded as being shared by the infinite essence, the substance of 
 the Deity, the primitive will itself, in which case the notion 
 of an all-perfect nature would be utterly suppressed ; — or the 
 reality of evil must be denied, a position which, being inadmis- 
 sible and contradictory to all experience, would again suppress 
 the notion of freedom. It is true that there are some who, 
 like Leibnitz, do not directly deny the existence of wrong and 
 moral evil in the world, but attribute it only to a privation 
 or want of good, and to a limitation of power ; but even in this 
 way the difficulty of the question is not diminished, for the 
 ground of such privation or limitation of good in the world 
 can ultimately be discovered only in the general and primor- 
 dial order of the world, and consequently in its author. In 
 short, in order to explain the ability in a God-created being of 
 acting in decided opposition to God, we must strike, if possible, 
 into some other road than that which has been hitherto trod ; 
 for, from aU. that has been hitherto said, we must not, nor 
 can we, give up the immanence of the Absolute in the finite, 
 but must assume that that, which, proceeding from the Absolute 
 or divine, is immanent in the finite nature, cannot be the whole 
 absolute essence of the Deity, nor especially that something 
 which directly constitutes the divine element in the Absolute. 
 This, however, leads to a distinction of something in God him- 
 self, which even in him cannot be called divine, or to our re- 
 garding the Absolute from a peculiar point of view, in the which 
 it is not divine ; for " if the things are in any way to be separated 
 
SCHELLINU. 267 
 
 from God, and still their immanence to be retained, they must 
 then have their foundation in that which in God is not 
 himself." 
 
 What now is that very something in God vrhich is not him- 
 self ? Or contemplated from what point of view is the Abso- 
 lute not to be called God ? This question leads us back to a 
 new, or, at all events, a modification of the former theory of the 
 Absolute, the leading outlines of which we likewise find in the 
 above-mentioned treatise. Compared and combined with what 
 has been elsewhere made known upon this subject, the above 
 theory admits, to my mind, of being more closely expounded 
 in the following manner. 
 
 In answering the above question it is designed to show that 
 the evil does not exist in God, but only in the creature, in 
 short, moral evil only in man. On that account the creature- 
 world must be to a certain extent independent of God, and in 
 this state it is possible for it to exist, either without partici- 
 pating in the will of God, or by being obliged to express this 
 will only in an involuntary manner. Li a general sense only 
 one original cause can be adopted as being that from which 
 all proceeds and wherein all subsists. This cause was, and 
 is continually to be sought for, in God — in God — though 
 God is, just as he is, not merely this original cause, but, 
 while including the latter in himself, is still, apart from it, 
 something else. The world has the same original cause in 
 itself, and by being this, is thus identical with God, though 
 in like manner it is not this original cause, but is besides 
 something else. Thus, we have two conceptions ; original 
 cause and existence. Hitherto we have taken these corre- 
 lative notions in such a sense as to regard the world as the 
 existence of the cause, and both together as being God, who 
 exists as world ; the world being the temporo-spatial existence 
 of God himself: in this way, however, God— apart from his 
 existence or the world — came to hold the place of a mere 
 cause or principle, and this could no longer sufllce us as 
 adequate to the true nature of God — for God cannot be a 
 mere original cause, potency or power, seeing we had already 
 developed the notion so far as to inevitably acknowledge him 
 to be freedom, will, intelligence ; and such he was in his ex- 
 istence and reality as true Deity. Were the world to be the 
 existent God, why then it must be a thoroughly spiritual and 
 perfect being, which cannot at least be said of our present 
 world. Let us then, setting aside for the present the existence 
 
268 HISTORICAL SUBVEY. 
 
 and nature of this present world, follow out the theory of 
 God's existence by himself as Deity, in order that we may see 
 if a point or source is to be found in the latter from which may 
 be derived the existence of the world, without its becoming 
 identified with the existing Deity itself. 
 
 " Since nothing is prior to or apart from God," says 
 Schelling (p. 429.), "he must have the principle of his exist- 
 ence within himself; this principle, however, not being God, 
 absolutely regarded, i. e., in so far as he exists," for that is 
 assuredly but the principle of God's- existence, and not at the 
 same time this existence also, although neither can be thought 
 of without the other, and they reciprocally presuppose each 
 other, so that as to time no prior or posterior can be predicated 
 of them. " If now the world is to differ or be distinct from 
 God, why then the world must originate from a principle 
 distinct from God : as however nothing can be apart from the 
 Absolute (which is in God), it follows that this contradiction is 
 only to be solved by the world having its foundation in the 
 mere original cause, which is also that of the divine existence, 
 but nevertheless may be also that of things. 
 
 Would we bring this cause, with which we have already 
 become acquainted, under the title of the absolute potency or 
 natura naturans, "more closely within the sphere of ordinary 
 human capacities, we mi^fht say, that it is the longing felt by 
 the eternal one to give birth to itself. Hence contemplated by 
 itself it is also will, but a will, in which there is no under- 
 standing, and on that account not a self-subsistent and perfect 
 will," for a nature which has not yet gazed with the eye of con- 
 sciousness upon itself and its determination, is only a blind 
 impulse. " We speak, however, of the nature of the long- 
 ing, regarded abstractedly or in and by itself, as being that 
 which must be kept in view, although it has been long since 
 displaced by that higher element, which has been developed 
 from it, and although we cannot apprehend it with the senses, 
 but only by the spirit and the thoughts," i, e. abstractedly, 
 being partially detached and separated from its necessary cor- 
 relate — for it is only by a kind of abstraction that a cause 
 per se can be retained in thought, since in reality it is con- 
 stantly and simultaneously in and together with its results, the 
 existence. But let this cause or impulse have manifested itself, 
 or have passed into a state of activity, and then it has in its 
 act (the existent) revealed itself, and can now, as subject and 
 object, beeome also the unity of both spirit and consciousness. 
 
SCHELLING. 269 
 
 Regarded in itself alone and apart from this existence, this prin- 
 ciple or impulse is to be viewed as devoid of intelligence, as 
 that which in the things is the material noumenon {Ansich), 
 " the incomprehensible basis of the reality, the never manifested 
 remnant, or that which with the greatest effort upon our part 
 does not admit of being resolved into intelligence, but which 
 remains eternally at the bottom of all things." " All birth is a 
 birth from darkness into light ; the seed must be sunk in the 
 earth and must perish in the darkness, that the fair heavenly 
 form may lift and unfold itself in the sun's rays. Man is 
 formed in the body of his mother, and from the gloom of the un- 
 intelligent (from feeling and from longing, that glorious mother 
 of knowledge) spring up for the first time the clear, the lucid 
 thoughts." 
 
 Such, then, is the eternal course of nature, out of darkness 
 into light, from the undetermined state to that of specialisation 
 — out of the germ into the blossom. Hence we have, first of 
 all, a " dark or obscure principle," which we may regard as 
 the common root of Deity as well as of the world, and which in 
 itself is neither of these, neither the real Deity nor the real 
 universe, and from which something may thus be deduced, 
 which cannot, therefore, be said to be deduced from the Deity. 
 
 In the " Denkmal," to whose pages we now have recourse, we 
 find that to those philosophers who would place as "antecedent" 
 at the summit of the whole system a divine intelligence and a 
 moral will only, devoid of any groundwork of reality, the question 
 is proposed by Schelling as to whether this pure intelligence 
 must also precede the intelligence itself in God ; whether a mere 
 intelligence so blank and bare could depend upon itself, could 
 be or eanst as mere intelligence, seeing that the thinking process 
 is the direct opposite of being, and is, as it were, as subtle 
 and void as the latter is dense and substantial. That, how- 
 ever, which is the beginning of an intelligence (in itself) cannot 
 be intelligent, since otherwise there would be no characteristic; 
 distiifction ; nor can it even be absolutely non-intelligent, just 
 because it is the possibility of an intelligence. Thus it will 
 be of a mean or intermediate character, i. e. it will act with 
 wisdom, but, as it were, witb an innate, instinctive, blind, and 
 as yet unconscious wisdom, just as we see ecstatics frequently 
 act, who utter sayings full of intelligence, not, however, as the 
 result of reflection, but as if from pure inspiration.* In all 
 this we do but recognise again that absolutely identical, real- 
 * Denkmal der Schrift, &o. p. 84. 
 
270 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 ideal as it is prior to all development, or is to be presupposed 
 prior to all production, as that, namely, which must and will he 
 determined, or which will determine itself, but which, on that 
 very account, must be premised as a something as yet undeter- 
 mined, or a being antecedent to all difference, in the presence 
 of which, however, nothing can be thought of, and which, on 
 that very account, is designated by Schelling under the title of 
 the " Immemorial " ( UnvordenklicK).* 
 
 This immemorial does not, however, merely precede all the 
 real distinctions that issue from, or which are posited in it, but 
 also the thinking process itself; it is the positive, the existent,' 
 which, despite every endeavour on the part of the thinking 
 process, does not admit of being resolved into thought ; in a 
 word, it is the primordial existent. On that very account it is 
 no product of the thinking process, no creature of the mind, 
 since we cannot posite the thinking spirit as existent prior to it, 
 but it is uncreated, eternal, and present simultaneously together 
 with the thinking spirit. As to ourselves^ we must, in the psy- 
 chological process of our thoughts, rather conceive of the 
 thinking process as issuing from that being, than believe that 
 we can derive this being from a creative intelligence ; in short, 
 this being is posited as simultaneously in and together with 
 God, and while it is God's real aspect or original cause, may 
 become also a cause of the universe ; hence it is divine, 
 although it is not God himself, and may become the cause 
 of the universe, but is not of necessity the latter. Thus, 
 it is to be regarded as the material possibility or potency of 
 a creation in God, and, by virtue of its nature (which is the 
 immediate identity of reality and ideality), it will feel in itself 
 the ardent desire or longing to become what it may and ought 
 to become ; a longing which does not belong to God as God, 
 the eternally transcendent f, but only to that which,5 though 
 existent in God, is not God. Hence this potential ideal-reality, 
 or ideal-real potentiality, this yearning principle,, is characterised 
 by Schelling as the mysterious wisdom instinctively present 
 with, and hovering, as it were^, before God, and pointing out to 
 him, as it were, the possibility of a creation, unto which he 
 freely determines himself ; though, with all this, it is difficult 
 
 * To this absolute principle attention has been directed, among other 
 ■vrriters, by Ch. A. Weisse, in his Essay entitled " The Philosophical Pro- 
 blem of the Present (der Gegenwart)." Leipsig, 1842. 
 
 f AUgemeine Zeitschrift von Deutschen fiir Deutsche, i. p. 94. 
 
SCHBLLING. 271 
 
 to discern, by any effort of abstraction, upon what logically 
 necessary reasons an eternal intelligence is to be presupposed 
 ag. coexistent with that real cause in God, if this real cause 
 can be in and by itself alone a creative potency, without 
 the co-operation therein of the intelligence. Does no other 
 function, then, belong to the latter than that of merely looking on ? 
 
 All depends, continues Schelling, upon our representing to 
 ourselves this sport of wisdom (this genesis of the world of 
 ideas in which God gazes upon the archetypes of creation, the 
 graduated series of generic forms) in its origination or process 
 of becoming, but at the same time keeping God himself, the 
 transcendent, apart from this process ; a process which, never- 
 theless, occurs fundamentally in himself, and whereby he himself 
 is, in the eminent sense of the word, God, or becomes God the 
 Father, provided only that this primordial principle so pregnant 
 with life be not confounded with him, the Father, since this 
 principle is only the generative potency, the airipfia tov 6eov. 
 The process occurs in God for God ; for God is assuredly the 
 ultimate cause and ultimate object thereof, though this sphere 
 of reality in God has at the same time its own peculiar life. 
 
 This process is what ScheUing, by his newer " doctrine of 
 potency," endeavours to render intelligible, and which, if we 
 understand him aright, is to supply the place of a general and 
 fundamental scientific theory of the Absolute. This position 
 had been originally occupied in the modern schemes of philo- 
 sophy by the Philosophy of Nature. In this way, however, the 
 Philosophy of Nature, as it was first set forth by Schelling and 
 published as the first part of his system, obtained a doubtful 
 signification, for one could not tell whether thereby, in a pan- 
 theistic sense, was truly meant the process of origination and 
 the essence, of the real nature, the self-potentialisation of the 
 natura bruta up to the absolute spirit, or, in other words, that 
 God sprung from nature ; or whether this representation in- 
 dicated only the development or psychological course of the 
 subjective thinking process, regarded as that logically necessary 
 process, whereby the thought succeeded in at length getting 
 possession of the idea of the Absolute, but then having attained 
 to what the true positive beginning and primitive source of the 
 real creation may be, had, as it were, to cast aside that scaffolding 
 in order to set out from that " Immemorial " to a theory of free 
 creation. So far, Schelling. Hegel, however, was and remained 
 of the opposite opinion. 
 
 Before, however, entering upon a sketch of what has been 
 
272 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 called the Neoschellingian system, the present is the fitting' 
 place for pointing out, in the words of its author*, the mode in 
 which that system is divided and separated from the opposite 
 view taken by Hegel of the Philosophy of Nature. " That 
 very philosophy," says he, " which in modern times has been 
 most positively reproached for its agreement with the doctrines 
 of Spinoza, had in its infinite subject-object, i. e. in the absolute 
 subject, which by nature objectifies itself (becomes the object), 
 but again emerges triumphantly from out that objectivity or finite 
 state, and only withdraws into a higher potency of subjectivity, 
 until, having exhausted its entire possibility (of becoming ob- 
 jective), it remains as subject victorious over all — in this subject 
 that philosophy had indeed a principle of necessary progress. If, 
 however, the purely rational be not inconceivable, or, in a word, 
 pure subject, it follows, that that subject, which, ascending in 
 the manner aforesaid, advances from each objectivity to only a 
 higher subjectivity, is with this determination no longer the 
 merely inconceivable, purely rational, but this very determi- 
 nation was an empirical one, and imposed upon that philosophy 
 by a living apprehension of the reality, or from the necessity of 
 ensuring to itself the means of an advance or progress. A later 
 comer (Hegel) has done away with this empirical element by 
 substituting, in the place of the living actual (to which the 
 former philosophy had bestowed the quality of receding from 
 above and out of its counterpart (the object) into itself), the 
 logical notion, to which, by the strangest' contrivance, or hypo- 
 stasizing, he ascribes a similar necessary process of spon- 
 taneous motion. The principle of the movement he must needs 
 preserve, for without such a principle there was no point from 
 whence to set out ; but he changed the subject of the latter, 
 this subject being, as already said, the logical notion ; and the 
 first hypothesis of the philosophy that nominally presupposed 
 nothing, was, that this purely logical notion has, as such, the 
 quality or nature of changing suddenly of itself (as it were 
 tumbling over — for the subjectivity of the philosopher must be 
 wholly excluded) into its counterpart, in order to return, in the 
 next place, by a process of reflection, into itself; steps these 
 which may be thought of as regards some living, real entity, 
 but of the bare notion can neither be thought nor imagined, 
 though utterance may be given unto them. This attempt to return 
 by means of the notions of an already well developed realistic 
 philosophy (for such a philosophy has been worked at since the 
 time of Des Cartes) to the stand-point of scholasticism, and to 
 * Victor Cousin, op. cit. p. xiii. 
 
SCHELL1N6. 273 
 
 begin metaphysics with a purely rational notion, exclusive of 
 every empirical element, although this was neither discovered 
 nor rightly cognised, while the empirical, which was a priori re- 
 jected, was again ushered in stealthily through the differentiation 
 or self-belying process of the idea — this episode in the history 
 of the more recent philosophy, if it has not served to develop 
 the latter any further, has at least served to point out afresh that 
 it is impossible to get at reality by means of the purely rational, 
 for just as all those forms which are characterised as a priori 
 really include within themselves the negative element only of 
 all knowledge (that without which none is possible) but not the 
 positive (that by which it originates), and as in this way the 
 character of universality and necessity which they bear in 
 themselves is only presented to us as a negative one ; so likewise 
 in that absolute prius (which, by being absolutely universal and 
 necessary — that which is a sheer nonentity and utterly incon- 
 ceivable — can only be the self-existent, ai/ro to ov), we can 
 discern only the negatively universal, that without which nothing 
 is, but not that whereby any thing is. If now we aspire to attain 
 the latter point, i. e. the positive cause of all, and hence also a 
 positive science, it is easily seen that we have no power of 
 arriving at the positive (though that which bears in itself the 
 negative) either by starting upon the empirical route only (for 
 this does not suffice for the notion of the universal essence, 
 which is in its nature a priori, or a notion possible only in pure 
 thought), nor by that of rationalism (which cannot, upon its 
 part, get beyond the mere necessity of thought)." By that 
 which must be added to the a priori thinking is, however, to be 
 understood, continues SchelUng, neither an empirical psycho- 
 logy, nor such an empiricism as is at present upheld by the 
 French and most German writers, under the title of a sen- 
 sational system, which denies aU that is universal and necessary 
 in human knowledge ; but it will be taken in the higher sense, 
 in which, it may be said, that the true God is not the mere 
 universal essence, but at the same time a special or empirical 
 one. Now it is in this very way that an union of both essences 
 in a sense which has hitherto not been dreamt of, will be effected ; 
 they will coalesce into one and the same notion, from which, as 
 a common source, are derived not only the highest' law of the 
 thinking process, all secondary laws of thought and the prin- 
 ciples of all negative or so-called purely rational sciences, but 
 upon the other hand the positive content of the highest (and 
 alone properly to be so called) science. 
 
274 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 We could not "avoid making this long extract, "because, ex- 
 cepting this, we possess as yet no authentic document of Schel- 
 ling concerning his new views, which could express in so decided 
 a manner the whole essence of philosophy, and the position it 
 occupies in reference not only to empiricism, but to the whole 
 body of philosophic knowledge. "What at the conclusion is indi- 
 cated by the science, properly socalled, is the positive philosophy 
 itself, though that very portion which must precede it and de- 
 duce all principles of the purely rational sciences from one 
 common source, is, so it seems, an universal theory of cognition 
 or doctrine of knowledge. 
 
 As regards, however, our own opinion, we consider the ac- 
 knowledgment made in the beginning of the above quotation 
 to be especially worthy of remark, namely, that the assumption 
 of a pure subject external to, or rather within the formally 
 rational movement of thought, is an empirical determination 
 imposed upon philosophy by the necessity of ensuring to itself 
 the means of progress. This determination is no doubt said to 
 be empirical, because this postulate, that may indeed be fur- 
 nished, but not satisfied by a rational process of thought, was 
 filled by the "living apprehension of the reality," in which 
 postulate the very living itself made its appearance as a direct: 
 and positive principle. 
 
 If now, relying on ourselves, we follow out this investigation 
 somewhat further, it appears to us that Schelling must have 
 found therein, at the very outset, this stumbling-block ; that in 
 a purely rational system, i. e. in one which, like the Hegelian, 
 presents a series of categories, which are indeed originally 
 forms of the understanding or reason, i. e. kinds and modes of 
 the thinking process abstracted from the latter by reflection 
 upon itself, but which, if the thinking process is to hold good 
 as. identical with beingj are to be regarded also objectively as 
 forms and kinds of being, thus, not as mere subjective cate- 
 gories of the understanding, as with £ant, but as categories 
 also of nature, and ultimately of the intelligence or the whole 
 universe, denoting at the same time, the different kinds of con- 
 crete existence, — that in such a system of metaphysics or ob- 
 jective logic, the impossibility is soon discerned of advancing 
 from a lower to a higher category, or of developing, by a neces- 
 sary sequence, one sphere of conception from another.* If once 
 an entire notion or genus be present to our thoughts as given 
 
 * Jahrbiicher der Medizin, Bd. 1. Hft. I. § 51. " There is no ascent 
 of cognition up to God, but only immediate discernment." 
 
SCHELLING. 275 
 
 or presupposed, it is true that the same admits of being supplied 
 or filled up with its requisite determinations, or, in other words, 
 the logical ambitus ( tjmfang) with the logical eomplexus {In- 
 halt), seeing that the latter does but imply the necessary and not 
 inconceivable conditions under which that whole or genus can 
 he posited; but meanwhile this logical procedure does not con- 
 duct us beyond the given generic notion or genus, and if a 
 higher notion is to be framed, it follows, that it likewise must be 
 either given or, at least, engendered in some other way, or by 
 some other method, than that rationalistic-logical one, or dia- 
 lectic method, as Hegel calls it. In order to arrive at the 
 highest, the highest must be already present in some a priori 
 manner in the reason, i. e, must be potentially there; the 
 reason must " a priori be in possession of the absolute prius." 
 To this point, however, we will return, later on, in treating of the 
 Hegelian Phenomenology, having merely directed attention to 
 it at present, with a view of showing why or upon what grounds 
 the reason was by Schelling declared to be a mere faculty of 
 cognition, but not of knowledge, and how, as a consequence of 
 this fundamental view, the reason of different ages or gene- 
 rations must now be said to have first raised itself, in reality, 
 from one stage to another, or rather have been really raised and 
 emancipated ere it could, by reflecting upon itself, comprehend 
 itself as that which it now is ; in short, there must belong to 
 the reason a real, historical, self-occurring process, if the self-ex- 
 istent is to manifest itself successively as a higher grade of know- 
 ledge. It is evident that, in this way, a moment of experience 
 or a moment of immediateness is admitted as an element of 
 philosophical development, and one which, in a system of pure 
 logical "rationalism" neither has nor could have any place. 
 It is quite a different thing whether we abide with Schelling 
 by this discovery, believe that we must make use of it henceforth 
 as a direct proof of the general impotency of a purely rational 
 science, and simply pointing out the necessity of such a com- 
 plement to philosophy, adopt this altogether and elaborate it, 
 or whether we allow this discovery to excite in us the hope 
 of discerning in the reason itself some other more compre- 
 hensive method, some genetic power, by which it is in a con- 
 dition, though in another way, and setting out from a different 
 principle to that which has been hitherto assumed, to develop 
 itself freely from or out of itself. Now, this genesis or inherent 
 power of production was, as we shall see by and by, the dis- 
 tinct objeot to which the labours of Hegel were directed : though 
 
 T 2 
 
276 HISTOEICAL STJRVET. 
 
 whether the method invented by him suffices for this purpose; 
 and whether his fundamental principle of the identity of think- 
 ing and being be the correct one is in its turn another question, 
 which the present is not the fitting place to answer. Were 
 the method only a negative one, as Schelling critically cha- 
 racterises it, and one that was imprisoned within the con- 
 fines of logical necessity, then Schelling wotild certainly have 
 been justified in his statement, that even after Hegel "Philo- 
 sophy had to undergo a great revolution, which, on the one 
 hand, would insure the positive explanation of reality with- 
 out, upon the other hamd, withdrawing from the reason its 
 great privilege of being in possession of the absolute Prius, 
 even that of the Deity'' * 
 
 In the same way Schelling even now declares that the reason 
 or thinking process is by itself alone without any empirical 
 element able to comprehend the notions or essence of all things, 
 nay, even of the highest essence or God — the quomodo aliquid 
 sit — but not the real being or existence ; it can only comprehend 
 what and how some thing mai/ be, but not that it is, quod sit ; 
 this last must be somehow or other given, and even the Highest 
 must ffiee or reveal itself unto us, if we are to be certain of 
 its existence. We cannot prove by our own thinking process, 
 a priori, that God exists, but inversely only, that the existent 
 is divine ; and then comes the question how and to what extent 
 the existent is or is not God himself, but only that which in 
 God is not God. So soon as I say of another essence, it is, 
 I interrupt the continuity of my thinking process with this 
 being, and there is no longer any identity present of the thinking 
 process and the existence ; thus the thinking process or notion 
 can in no wise attain to the being of the object itself, but 
 would on the contrary simultaneously suppress the latter, if 
 it were to identify therewith its act of thought ; hence the 
 rational process of thought suffices only to prove the possi- 
 bility of being or non-being, the objective possibility, but not 
 the reality, — a position this, in which Schelling reverts, it 
 is evident, to Kant, though we are not, however, justified in 
 affirming that he has wholly surrendered himself a prisoner to 
 Kant's subjectivism ; the position being, so it seems, but the 
 necessary result of a system which would not be absolutely 
 pantheistic in character. 
 
 * Victor Cousin, op. cit. p. xviii. 
 
SCHELLING. 277 
 
 ' Let us now return from the above digression to the system 
 itself, and in the first place to the Doctrine of Potency, which is 
 not a new doctrine or theory of nature, but belongs to theology 
 and has to render comprehensible the fact of a real moment 
 united with the spiritual existing in God from all eternity. 
 This real or existent is posited as the prius, not as to time, but 
 in the logico-dialectic construction. The being is that with 
 which we must set out, for nothing can precede it, not even the 
 thinking process, for the being can proceed from nothing dif- 
 ferent to itself, neither from the non-being, nor from the think- 
 ing process, nor from a mere potency, and not from the thinking 
 process, seeing that it anticipates or precludes thought, and is on 
 that account the "immemorial, or " Unvordenklicbe ;" if then 
 there is to be any thought, a being or existent must be present 
 which thinks. This being is not, however, the abstract ev or ov of 
 the Eleatic school of philosophy, nor is it the materia prima, 
 which would only be the potency of being, so that of the latter its 
 mere potency would exist, which is inconceivable. The being 
 must on the contrary be presupposed as devoid of beginning, 
 and like Spinoza's substance with all its "modes." This posi- 
 tively immediate being, which has never before been poten- 
 tially, is the pure immemorially actual existent in actu puro 
 existentia. It has not been produced by a present notion, but 
 is in the strictest sense original ; it is that which the theologians 
 term aseitas ; but it does not as yet correspond to the entire 
 notion of a God : to this there appertains another moment, 
 namely, that this existence should include also the potency or 
 power ; this last is not to be overlooked, but is to be simultane- 
 ously posited together with the existence, but not, be it re- 
 membered, prior to or before it. That it cannot be antecedently 
 posited does not prevent us from positing it subsequently -, the 
 notion of the existence does not contradict this corollary, al- 
 though it does not necessarily demand it. The ordinary nega- 
 tive philosophy begins with the potency, the not yet existent^ 
 the possible : but such a potency does not admit of being 
 posited to any degree or retained, for it must forthwith pass into 
 actual being ; nor can we think of it without this, although we 
 may posite the being without the potency or power. Hence 
 such a potency appears, when posited as a principle, not to be 
 free ; but as regards a being this is not the case : we may posite a 
 being at once as bearing in itself an undeveloped potency, for the 
 possible admits indeed of being posited, as not yet existential in 
 and together with an existent, but not by itself alone as a bare or 
 
 T 3 
 
278 HISTORICAL, SURVEY. 
 
 naked existere of mere possibility. Thus, says Schelling, we 
 are compelled by the necessary logical process of thinking 
 a priori (or by the negative philosophy) to perceive that the 
 Absolute must be posited as existent sine initio, but not to 
 bestow upon it a potency that is awakening in it ; this is at 
 present a bare hypothesis, which can be subsequently maintained 
 (upon other grounds) ; it is one that is only logically possible, 
 not necessary ; we can only profceed to it by " thinking freely" 
 from out the first thesis ; the " positive philosophy does not set 
 out with the necessary thinking process." In this way Schelling 
 declares, if we are not mistaken in so interpreting his state- 
 ments, that there is no necessary progress from the more ab- 
 stract or lower, to the more concrete and higher, but, indeed, 
 from the latter to the former as being its premises. Schelling, 
 however, seems to require for that ascent an empirical ground 
 a posteriori. 
 
 If now the being has taken up its own potency as we assume, 
 into itself, it follows that the first A appears in the second 
 potency (A^). Thus, the first being becomes Jthe power of 
 itself, potentia potentice, for the possibility of passing over from 
 the actual being into the mere potency is, or constitutes, the 
 true potentiality and freedom ; that which actually exists can 
 now remain in its (first) existence, but can also retire from out 
 of it into the mere potency in itself, nothing obliging it to pass 
 over into existence, as was the case when we attempted to 
 posite in the first place the potency. The existent has in its 
 being already the firm point of support, which it requires for its 
 ability, for it may or may not pass over into the potency. This 
 possibility presents to the eternal existent a being, or another 
 mode of existence, which it may will and select ; so that that 
 first being now becomes, what it was not previously, a being 
 that has been willed, and this other being appears as an acci- 
 dental, which may or may not he. For while the potency pre- 
 sents to that which is imprisoned in the pure being the object 
 of a possible volition, it becomes conscious of itself as master 
 of a being which is not as yet, and thereby becomes simultane- 
 ously free from the state of immemorial being over which it is 
 lord or master ; in a word, escapes freely from itself. 
 
 But what now is this other merely possible being, which 
 appears in the eternal ? If we call it B to distinguish it 
 from the first pure being A, which in this way is no longer 
 a merely pure being, but in possession of the being = A2; 
 it is an essence which at first is necessary by its nature, 
 and such can only be regarded as opposed to the accidental. 
 
SCHELLING. 279 
 
 while the being of the B becomes for the present only a 
 possible, accidental, or something that may not be ; the for- 
 mer alone is the so-called ens necessarium, the latter the 
 eontingens. The necessary being could not, so long as it 
 was immemorial being, prove itself to be necessary.; it can 
 only effect this in the accidental, though even there it must 
 prove itself to be necessary. It is an universal law that 
 nothing should remain undetermined; it is, however, the 
 law of the Deity itself, and appears to be external to the 
 latter only so long as it (the Deity) is itself thought of as 
 pure being. We have not, however, to think of this law 
 as to time, but the eternal essence looks forth from eternity 
 (without time) upon itself as a being of capacity by a mere 
 act of its will ; that position was merely a momentary 
 thoughts Thus, the will is really the first, and hence the 
 moments are inverted as to their order of rank ; the blind 
 being proving itself to be the impotent, — the being capable, the 
 positive and primordial. In this being with capacity, which 
 hovers, as it were, between the two, resides the power of God, 
 and the true notion of God himself; who has thus raised Him- 
 self for the first time to his idea, being now transcendent, spirit, 
 or intelligence, and thus = A^. This third possibility of being 
 is that which presents itself to him as what should be, the 
 ultimate and proper design or object of the whole. God is the 
 superabundant and absolutely free spirit, that soars even above 
 that wherein He is spirit, not being fettered in Himself as 
 spirit (in the form of spirituality or the thinking process), but 
 dealing with Himself as a spirit only, as a potency of Himself. 
 iSuch is the truly transcendent or God ; it is related as notion 
 -to the pure existent act, though it does not precede this, the 
 being preceding it. If what is immemorial raises itself to that 
 which by its nature is necessary, it elevates itself into its idea, 
 and becomes what it should be ; what, as essence, did not at first 
 require the existence, is God. To be lord or master of one's own 
 being is what constitutes the notion of personality ; to be lord 
 over all being is equivalent to the notion of absolute personality. 
 As such we must think to ourselves of God from the very 
 .beginning. From eternity he saw Himself as Lord suspend 
 his immemorial being, so that it became to him by means of a 
 necessary process the self-willed, and hence for the first time, 
 divine being. 
 
 Thus, we have a personal Deity above or antecedent to all 
 the world's reality, in a word, a God, who does not stand, in 
 
 T 4 
 
280 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 need of the world in order to arrive at existence and self-con- 
 sciousness. As regards, however, the world, we have in the 
 Deity only its possibility, but not as yet its reality ; its possi- 
 bility lying still decreed and concealed in G-od. Is it asked, in 
 what way God can find himself moved, to let this possibility 
 become reality, i. e. to create the universe ? Not for his own 
 sake, we answer, not by the necessity of a logical process, 
 nor by that of a blind physical process ; for God knows before- 
 hand what will ensue, and has not first to learn this. Yet, 
 meanwhile, we have not to I'epresent to ourselves the creation 
 in the usual mode, as a projection of the world from out the 
 idea in^o the reality. For the creation consists assuredly of a 
 process that occurs in God, namely, in the suspension and suc- 
 cessive reinstatement of the actually necessary being ; between 
 these two moments lies the universe or world, God does not 
 renounce himself in the world, or does not become the world — 
 the adoption of this view being compulsory only with those 
 who admit of his being previously present there in himself 
 (ansich) or potentially, i. e. in idea ; but he elevates himself 
 from the world into his divinity, suspends his world-being, and 
 retires into himself, having previously renounced himself as 
 an actually necessary being. At the same time, however, God 
 does not suspend this his act in order to arrive at himself — for 
 this he is already, — but upon objective grounds," in order to 
 let a being difierent from him come, in place of the first being, 
 into existence. In this way the accidental being steps into 
 reality, and we have here again to bear in mind what was 
 posited above as B ; to this B, or potency, existence is by 
 God's will permitted for the purpose of letting an acci- 
 dental being, different from himself, become ultimately per- 
 meated by the necessary being. This B is to be thought 
 of as pure potency, i. e. as spontaneity or will, which differs 
 at first from the intelligence, by being a formless arbitrary 
 impulse opposed to the latter; it is only potentially intelli- 
 gence, and thus it has constantly to potentialise itself from 
 blind will or impulse up to intelligence; it is the potency 
 of life, as primordiaUy present in God, the potency of the 
 divine life. God it was, who as Lord of aU three potencies, 
 allowed the manifold positions which these potencies might 
 occupy towards each other to pass before him after the manner 
 of an experiment, and as an image, idea, or vision. This B, as 
 a possibility, sporting, as it were, before him (maya, mater, 
 fVelfamme, materia), presented itself to him as the potency of a 
 
SCHELLIN6. 281 
 
 blind being, as natwra naturans, imparting to him, the Creator,- 
 his knowledge of a future world. In the beginning, uncon- 
 scious, it retires gradually step by step into itself, gathers 
 itself up into a state of internal potentiality, and so becomes at 
 last for itself, self-conscious, or intelligence. In accordance 
 with this its object, it is called in the Proverbs of Solomony 
 Chochma or Wisdom. Just as in God himself we must set the 
 pure being prior to the spirit, so also here and everywhere 
 can the consciousness only originate from the unconscious, and 
 God cannot himself produce what is immediately or directly 
 conscious. The light springs only from out the bosom of 
 darkness; an intelligence that has originated or become, has 
 the unintelligent only for its commencement. (By the way 
 this certainly appears to contradict the above-mentioned canon 
 or rule, that the higher cannot be derived from the lower.) 
 Upon the lower stages nature only assumes the impression or 
 stamp of intelligence, but in Man the intelligence has become 
 of such a nature as to break through this, having become 
 actually what the blind being was only potentially. 
 
 In this then lay the purpose or ultimate design of the whole 
 process, for it was only that such an intelligent being might 
 originate as might have a joint knowledge of its being for the 
 sake of such knowledge, thus might see itself known and 
 acknowledged by others, — that God could will and set at work 
 the actual process, which is called creation, but which is no- 
 thing else than a suspension of the directly immanent or in-i 
 dwelling activity of God, in that which in him is not his selfy 
 while he himself stands to such a degree as a causa causarum 
 above the world-process, that this process or the reality of 
 nature, consists only in a tension of the three potencies towards 
 each other, as of a plurality of causes. Already prior to the 
 creation, God had these potencies within himself, but he alone 
 it was that worked in them, or else they had not been set in a 
 state of free activity towards each other. Thus, the reality of 
 the world or the creation is the permitted appearance of the 
 separation and tension of the potencies from out the unity of 
 the original plan. God himself has, as it were, retired and now 
 holds a negative relation towards them, he being that without 
 which they certaiuly could not be what they are at present, 
 namely, positive and spontaneously working forces. That such 
 has been the antecedent realisation of the world, we know a 
 posteriori, for we ourselves make use of a real world, but it 
 cannot be deduced with logical necessity, for it is no necessary 
 
282 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 act of the Absolute, and is on that account not to be compre- 
 hended a priori, as, generally speaking, no free act can be ; but 
 it is a certainty, because we ourselves see before us such a real 
 nature ascending by mediate degrees, and developing itself 
 into the immaterial or spiritual state. Thus, the motive actu- 
 ating God to creation is this, that, although he knew himself 
 to be Lord of being, there was still something which he re- 
 quired, namely, to be acknowledged or known ; this desire or 
 craving to be known is peculiar in the highest degree to the 
 nobler natures, and so we need not hesitate to attribute the 
 feeling of this want to the Deity, though in himself be lacketh 
 nothing. The object of God willing this process, as shown 
 above, is, that the potency set without him may become the 
 agent of a joint-knowledge of the whole creation. 
 
 If we here venture to interrupt for an .instant the present 
 exposition, it is only with a view of expressing our agreement 
 with this last-mentioned thought of Schelling, in which, by 
 advancing unmistakeably beyond the limits of his former Philo- 
 sophy of Nature he is led to believe that he must seek the 
 ultimate key to the riddle of the universe, not in physical and 
 blindly working laws or categories of nature, but in the ethical 
 categories of freedon. Here it is obviously the (usually in- 
 appropriately so-called) moral necessity, which takes the place 
 of the physical one ; for the desire of knowing oneself to be 
 recognised by others is without doubt an ethical motive, and can 
 only be manifested in a personality ; for, that the self-conscious 
 and self-recognisant should neither wish nor feel that it ought to 
 know itself recognised by others would only be a contradiction 
 to the idea of personality, but not to that of a physical power, 
 however absolute. Nevertheless, we cannot, in spite of all this, 
 avoid observing, that even this ethical category, or that of per^ 
 sonal right and what belongs to the Ego (Egoitat), is not the 
 highest which can set the process in motion, and then, as it 
 were, wind up the account. Even this feeling of what belongs 
 to the Ego, self-justified though it may be, is, when taken in the 
 best sense, neither as yet the will of truth in itself, absolute and 
 entirely free from every desideratum, nor the fully disinterested 
 love; for that feeling would have the creature, the object, not for 
 the sake of the object itself, its aim not being as yet of a purely 
 objective kind, for its dealings with it are only for the sake of 
 self-satisfaction, and the creature is to serve only as its means 
 to that end, being but the throne upon which the splendour 
 of the Deity exalts itself. Such, however, is neither the final 
 nor yet perfect expression of adult human personality ; and the 
 
SCHELLING. 283 
 
 more this serves merely as a means, by so much the more does 
 the Deity remain as regards itself fettered unto means, conse- 
 quently devoid of freedom, and does remain so, because its will 
 is here bound down to power as the object, and that indeed, in 
 the present instance a power potentialised, i. e. acknowledged. 
 This power must indeed remain at bottom or potentially unsup^ 
 pressed, despite the recognition and certainty of being acknow- 
 ledged, for, without this certainty and truth of the personality, 
 the third element, that of the will of truth, which sets before 
 itself an absolutely objective purpose, in a word, the wise love, 
 would be impossible ; yet, nevertheless, this third element must 
 come into operation, or rather it must, as a final object of the 
 whole, have been that which lay first at its foundation, if all is 
 to be solved in a perfectly clear and satisfactory manner, which, 
 seeing that we are here speaking of the world's object, must be 
 done. Meanwhile, we could hardly have found a better oppor- 
 tunity for weaving these remarks into a connected thought, and 
 so placing them in their proper light, than in this passage where 
 Schelling himself leads us so near to the point upon which the 
 whole matter turns ; and we may be therefore pardoned for 
 having interrupted the thread of a narrative which we now pro- 
 ceed to resume. 
 
 Schelling distinguishes this world-process, which, together 
 with its potencies, occurs in God, from God Himself ; so that the 
 first potency is not to be confounded with God the Father, being 
 in him but the generative principle, the natura gignens. In like 
 manner the second potency is indeed the Son, but not immedi- 
 ately so, but only after that first potency, the matter, has been 
 brought into subjection by it, controlled, reduced to form, and, 
 as it were, exspired. Finally, the Spirit|is the third potency 
 with which we have to deal as that true element that should 
 imperatively become and be, as the final object in the whole 
 process. These three potencies are or constitute the Elohim, 
 from all eternity, not being created, but existing only as real 
 persons after the completion of the process, in which, seeing 
 that it contains within itself in a definite series of degrees all 
 ideas or generic notions, was contained the archetypal, pre- 
 mundane, or immanently divine world. Thus, by the co-opera- 
 tion of the three potencies this harmonious world came to pass, 
 and the potencies are in itself intertwined or blended together 
 in it in an harmonious manner ; for they enclosed this content, 
 and were held by the same in its harmonious relations. The 
 complex, however, of all potencies, the totality of all genera in 
 
284 HISTORICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 perfect organisation and unity,— ig, as is well known, th^ human 
 being. Thus, that complex was and may simply be called man, 
 Adam Cadmon, environed and hedged in as it were, by the 
 potencies — in paradise — and destined himself to maintain the 
 potencies in suitable subordination and harmony. Thus, God 
 with the three potencies of nature and with man in harmo- 
 nious unity, constituted the first creation, which is not to be 
 confounded with the present order or disorder of things. With 
 this mental image or representation, a monotheism, and one that 
 truly deserves the name, is rendered possible. By such a 
 monotheism we cannot understand either a mere theism or 
 pantheism, for both, when strictly regarded, amount to the 
 same thing. If the theist says there is but one God, he does 
 this invariably with the simultaneous thought of a world that 
 is not God, but leaves the relation between them wholly un- 
 determined ; thus, the world becomes to him, unobservedly, 
 utterly independent, nay, more, it becomes an Absolute, a god 
 for itself ; and so he would have two gods alongside of each 
 other, were it not that this very duality is denied by that 
 miserable theistic monotheism, and so both blend incessantly 
 into one, and pantheism is the result. Now Pantheism, such 
 as we find it in the writings of Spinoza, converts a moment of 
 the Deity, substance, or blind being, into the whole or perfect 
 God ; while, indeed, according to our view of the matter, the 
 universe in and together with God is only one, or God as sub"- 
 stance is but one ; still, however, it is only the true monotheism 
 that sets the question in its right light, its sole purpose being to 
 declare that, apart from the one and only true God, no other 
 being can be God in the same sense, while dualism, tritheism, or 
 polytheism are to be rejected as being mere multiplications of this 
 one and the same idea ; but it is by no means said that God is 
 absolutely the one and only being, and that apart from him 
 there is nothing, or (what amounts to the same) that all that 
 there is, is God, for in this way pantheism would be established, 
 seeing that we should then admit of many kinds of existences, 
 though thinking of them only as modes of the existence of the 
 All-one. This identification originates only from our not disr 
 •tinguishing what in God is God from what in God is not God ; 
 God in the first sense is alone, but not all that is God (in the 
 second and wider sense) is this God (in the first sense). We 
 must afiirm of the universe, or whole, that it is the one, and 
 that this one is certainly divine, or is God in the wider ac- 
 ceptation of the teim ; but as regards this eternal existent we 
 
SCHELLINU. 285 
 
 must now proceed to make distinctions in it, and declare that 
 there is in the same a something that is not God per se or for 
 himself. We cannot, as already mentioned above, proceed in 
 thought from the idea of this true. God to the other universal 
 being, but, inversely, we may succeed in arriving from out the 
 immemorial being at the notion or idea of God. And this is 
 the characteristic distinction between the positive and negative 
 philosophy, that the former, setting out from the being or 
 existence as that which is absolutely to be presupposed, ad- 
 vances to the notions or conceptions of the thinking process, 
 while the latter starting from the thinking process would arrive 
 at being, or "pluck it out" (herausklauben), as Kant said, 
 from the bare notion. The negative philosophy was necessary, 
 and must, so to speak, be pushed to the very extreme, in order 
 that it may render apparent the necessity of the positive 
 foundation by proving itself to be onlynegative in character. 
 Accordingly the negative philosophy is only to be viewed as 
 the historical propsedeutick or preparation for the positive ; il 
 is only the ascending or retrogressive part of the road, which 
 the thinking process must take ; but, arrived at the summit, we 
 must make ourselves masters of the positive principle, we 
 must lay hold of it in order to possess it, we must will to 
 have it, for it cannot be imbibed by the rationalistic process of 
 thought ; but we must seize hold of it in order that, setting out 
 from thence, we may arrive again, in our further progress as 
 it were, downwards, at the empirical reality. This return and 
 retrogression cannot, however, consist in simply retracing the 
 same stations or series of categories by which we have as- 
 cended ; for then we should arrive at the absurd result of God 
 creating man, and then the created man giving issue to the 
 animals, the animals to the plants, the plants to the soil beneath 
 them, and so on. On the contrary, it is from those principles 
 that the historical pathway is to be followed out, so that it may 
 be seen how that the chasm which is met with between the 
 accredited beginnings of the world's history (the historical 
 ■period) and those antemundane beginnings is filled up, and how 
 the whole process of evolution becomes one coherent history, 
 self-intelligible, and explanatory of all, even to the present 
 nature and condition of the world. 
 
 As, however, it is impossible, on account of the whole con- 
 dition of* the world of experience, and especially the sin and 
 wickedness that is present therein, to regard the present world 
 as identical with that divinely immanent and eternal creation, 
 
286 HISTOKICAL SURVEY. 
 
 seeing that it exhibits the most unmistakeable traces of a 
 mighty disturbance and of a course of things which is only 
 gradually returning, both in the field of nature as well as his- 
 tory, to the ancient order ; it follows, that, upon these grounds, a 
 mighty subversion must be assumed of that divine and primeval 
 world; and if such a subversion cannot be proved to be an 
 unconditioned necessity — such logical despotism failing in the 
 present instance altogether — why, then, it presents itself as 
 the only means, not only of achieving the actual freedom of 
 cregited human beings, but the truly free personality of those 
 antemundane potencies, or the realisation of their personality 
 as such. Such a subversion as may ultimately lead to the 
 good and to what ought to be, is not in itself, indeed, to be 
 regarded as of an obligatory or imperative character, thus, not 
 as being for itself alone willed by God, although as means to 
 an end it will not have been wwwiUed even by Him. There is 
 a great difference between the evil and that which is merely 
 not the good ; the former is that which ought positively not 
 to be, and which should have no right to exist ; but the 
 latter is only that which is not as yet what it should be, or 
 the ultimate object itself. Of such a kind was that sub- 
 version which did not happen contrary to God's will, nor even 
 through or by the latter, did not proceed from God as God, 
 was not willed by him, but was also not unwilled; thus, was 
 only permitted because God saw therein the possibility of 
 a final good. There is even in God a kind of irony which 
 brings to light from out the deed the opposite of that which 
 is intended ; for his thoughts are not our thoughts, and our 
 thoughts were not his thoughts when the universio took place 
 through the first man, whereby that solitary unit became 
 both an aversum and perversum. Thus, Adam, destined as he 
 was to preserve the paradisaical unity of life with which he 
 was created, nevertheless desired to hold a free relation by or 
 for himself to God ; it was sufficient for him to know himself 
 to be a capable being, in order to do what he could to disturb 
 the relation of the potencies ; he would in fact exist per se or 
 for himself, and thus he would arouse the first potency from the 
 depths in which, as a supporter, a substance, and hTroKstfievov, it 
 had been repressed within him, and actuate it again or restore it 
 to the state of the actus purus : had this succeeded perfecjtly, 
 and had God allowed it, why then the creation and man himself 
 would have been utterly annihilated ; but God would not have 
 this, but prevented it by his will, not indeed by a direct but only 
 
SCHELLING. 28« 
 
 an indirect manifestation of this, for God could really continue 
 to work upon this disorder only negatively, i. e. by his dis- 
 pleasure. Thus, man would again throw the potencies into a 
 state of contention or tension ; and thus, having of himself 
 aroused the primitive cause within himself, he lost the do- 
 minion (of the spirit) over himself and over the potencies of 
 nature. This direct dominion was snatched from him by the 
 "fall of man," but, as will be presently seen, that he might 
 thereby attain, througb the instrumentality of a struggle only, 
 to a state of true glory, or from a state that was unmerited to 
 one that was deserved. 
 
 The second potency is the Son, by this time, however, in a 
 state of humiliation ; he has now to struggle with the first 
 potency, or the matter, that has become limitless ; he is the 
 world's soul, which has to reorganise this material, but by this 
 gradual subjugation to bring himself again to himself, to become 
 spiritualised — personified. He is the Logos already active in 
 the world prior to the appearance of Jesus, but in a state of 
 ecstatic being ; he has the power over the first potency, which, 
 is given up to him to control, to bring back again to its 
 limits and foundation, and so, at length, to surrender this 
 power which was transferred to him back again to the Father ; 
 this being accomplished by him with free obedience, according 
 to the testimony of Holy Writ. That perfect restoration or 
 bringing back to the Father will be only perfected at the end 
 of the world ; but humanity has already traversed the first or 
 antechristian period up to the decision of the victory, and, in 
 part, the postchristian period, and now progresses in this, the 
 perfected dominion of the Spirit towards a far future, the 
 universal kingdom of God. 
 
 Thus, the world's history divides itself into two great periods 
 of time, that preceding and that subsequent to the revelation 
 of the Son ; its deepest signification or import consists in our 
 comprehending this revelation, and the mythological process 
 that preceded it in the consciousness of different nations : the 
 latter, however, is only the gradual process of development by 
 which the former was ushered in ; and thus the revelation is 
 not to be comprehended at all without the mythology. The 
 philosophy of revelation and that of mythology form together 
 the inseparable content of the system of positive, historical 
 philosophy, which is therefore intrinsically, or in its essence^ 
 the philosophy of history, but of a history not within the usual 
 
288 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 limits of the historical, but stretching from the beginning to 
 the end, from eternity to eternity. 
 
 Thus, mythology represents the process of the human con- 
 sciousness of the Absolute, but is not merely to be dealt with 
 in a one-sided manner, as if this consciousness of the different 
 peoples had subsisted only in a perfectly groundless and inex- 
 plicable state of error and ignorance, in a subjective state, to 
 which had corresponded no real relation whatever to the uni- 
 versal or to nature ; but this consciousness has a certain relative 
 truth for those times, peoples, and natural circumstances. The 
 human beings lived and moved actually in the tension of the 
 universal potencies ; and these struggled forth from within the 
 consciousness of humanity, out of the natural state of being, up 
 to self-subsistence and spirituality, to subjectivity from out the 
 ecstatic objectivity. The mythological consciousness is not 
 indeed the developing self-consciousness of God himself, for 
 " God himself," just as he hovers untouched and freely over 
 the world, so also over this process ; it is at once a process 
 of the world and of consciousness, and has for its result the 
 reinstatement of self-consciousness in man, and with that of the 
 true divine consciousness within him. 
 
 In him the same potencies are active, and gain successively 
 the power or dominion, as in the first creation ; for simultane- 
 ously with the reinstatement of the potencies in their dignity, 
 must the true divine consciousness of humanity be also re- 
 established. This takes place in corresponding historical pe- 
 riods of the world and of reli^on, which were distributed like 
 parts in a great drama to the peoples of olden times. The first 
 period is that of the dominion of the boundless being, or first 
 potency, which has gained the mastery over the human con- 
 sciousness and held, it prisoner in magic. To this potency 
 corresponds the astral religion or Zabism, and together with 
 this, the mode of life of those human beings, who, without any 
 state-organisation or division into separate communities, lived 
 a nomadic life boundless and objectless, as are in heaven the 
 scattered members of the starry host. The movement that 
 prevailed among all these was the source and object of their 
 worship ; they were immersed, so to speak, in this movement, 
 and it was the immanent law of their life, for them such a 
 worship becoming thus a matter of necessity ; for this cosmical 
 potency held them in bondage and together, until the crisis 
 came of the division of nations; and until then the Divine 
 appeared but as Uranus or heaven's King. 
 
SCHELLING. 289 
 
 Before, however, the second period makes its appearance, and 
 before the first potency has been thoroughly displaced or sub- 
 dued by the second, it enters into a state of conflict with the 
 latter ; it yields and becomes gradually enfeebled, and this tran- 
 sition from the dominion of the first to that of the second 
 principle is in the imaginative manner of antiquity expressed 
 by the former becoming feminine in nature, or by the Ourauos 
 becoming the Urania. The boundless undetermined being of 
 the first principle is by the accession of the second reduced 
 for the first time to a definite state ; in fact, to the dimly felt 
 but mighty power of sidereal motion succeeds the worship of 
 the Queen of Heaven, who, according to Herodotus, was chiefly 
 worshipped in Babylon under the name of Mylitta, 
 
 But, meanwhile, the second potency is only a means, not an 
 object or end; the object, as being the third imperative, or 
 that which really should or ought-to-be, is with the entrance of 
 the second principle already kept in view at each period of 
 the process, and is foreboded by the religious consciousness. 
 This third imperative, which lies at the root of the anti- 
 Hellenic mythology, is or is represented by Dionysus. Before, 
 however, this idea gains an actual entrance into and dominion 
 over the minds of the people, there previously occurs, as already 
 mentioned, a protracted struggle in history between the first 
 and second principle; the first principle rebels afresh against 
 the second and reassumes the male aspect or form, as is 
 directly exemplified by the Baal of the Phoenicians, Egyptians, 
 &c. This Baal does not as yet acknowledge the other god, 
 but has him exclusively beside him as Moloch or Cronos, and 
 so the third free and emancipating principle cannot as yet ap- 
 pear in its state of freedom, being still a suffering vanquished 
 son of God, such as is presented to us in the idea of Hercules, 
 whose lot it is not to obtain dominion or power. Finally, 
 even Cronos becomes feminine, becomes the Bhsea, who is 
 the magna mater of many gods, just as Urania indicated that 
 consciousness, to which the Uranus, the one power of Heaven 
 dispersed among the numerous material constellations, had 
 become objective. So long as the consciousness itself, by being 
 still rapt or ecstatically merged in the Absolute, as the dominant 
 potency, was identical with this, monotheism prevailed. But 
 this direct or immediate monotheism is not the right one ; for 
 just as that in itself formless potency becomes, when reduced 
 to form and subjected to the organising power, lowered to the 
 material of the latter, so also does it become now in this form 
 
 u 
 
290 HISTORICAL SURVEY, 
 
 an object to the consciousness ; the consciousness stepping forth 
 from out of it, setting itself free, and entering into an anta- 
 gonistic relation .to it. Hence, the human consciousness is the 
 result of this theogonic process, ajid upon it the latter is built 
 up ; it is, howrever, the final cause also, not only the hearth or 
 central fire, but the deeper ground also of that theogonic pro- 
 cess, by which the spirit as such obtains dominion in the world, 
 the spirit being the third potency self-reproductive in that 
 conflict and struggling into the light of existence. 
 
 Now, the Egyptian and Indian mythology are a direct tran- 
 sition to this birth, which becomes perfected in the Grecian. 
 We must, however, distinguish the popular polytheism of the 
 Greeks, taken in its true sense, from the mejining which was 
 implied by the mythical process in the mysteries; for these 
 mysteries, which had essentially to do with the birth and domi- 
 nion of Dionysus, represented the nucleus or kernel of the 
 Grecian mythology. Dionysus, the coming, the triumphant 
 god, is the god of the human consciousness ; he is the deliverer 
 of the latter from the real or physical powers, and invests the 
 spirit with dominion over nature. He and Demetrius are 
 together the deities of vinedressing and agriculture ; this, how- 
 ever, is not to be regarded as the superficial symbolisation of an- 
 idea, but simply as expressing that among the Greeks, definitely 
 organised as they were, both politically and legally, the human 
 consciousness was as subjective as it was objective in the earlier 
 nomadic movement of Zabism. 
 
 The peculiar signification of the Grecian mythology, and that 
 which distinguishes its content from that of the earlier beliefs^ 
 is this, that in it the third principle, the intelligence,, gains at 
 once the supreme power. The Grecian gods are no longerv 
 merely real potencies, but formal ones, of a spiritual kind; 
 the reality is echoed, as it were, in them, but it no longer 
 rules over the consciousness. The first potency is there 
 brought completely to a state of rest, for it has become in-, 
 visible. Hades ; the real principle having here been repelled and 
 subdued as to its intrinsic nature, now stands again below all 
 as the ground and basis of the whole plurality of gods, the 
 whole Olympus resting upon it. As a single real principle,, 
 however, or as the substantiality of all, the overruUng form 
 of the plurality stands opposed to it; it is no individual god, 
 excluded together with his power from the rest, but it is in all ;- 
 and thus in the Grecian consciousness the idea of unity is 
 united consistently enough with the plurality of the formal gods. 
 
SCHELLING. 291 
 
 Now, this essential feature of the Grecian mythology was com- 
 prised in the mysteries, and in them was represented not as 
 traditional doctrine, but as contemplative history. That po- 
 tency, Dionysus, which had from the beginning really worked 
 upon the whole process as a final causey was here now in his 
 historical metamorphosis the true content. He was in the first 
 place, or when in the form of the first material potency, Diony- 
 sus Zagreus, who being reduced to his real or intrinsic nature, 
 became Hades, and was so called, from the fact of his giving 
 up his formless monarchy, and becoming the founder of all 
 kinds of wealth (Pluto), both in the world of nature and of 
 humanity; Dionysus being thus the giver or dispenser of all gifts. 
 Between, however, the first formless unity and the third living 
 beauty, propitiated with every profusion of form, lay the period 
 of the so-called Theban or second Dionysus, a time of wild 
 conflict between this god and the material deities of a past or 
 older time, when Orpheus, Pentheus, and others, who opposed 
 themselves, as adherents of the old principle, to the coming god, 
 were dispersed. Finally, the third, triumphant Dionysus, is 
 the joyful, exulting, blessed and blessing lacchos; he recon- 
 ciles the still mourning consciousness (Demeter), with the plu- 
 rality of gods ; for this and the unity of this principle, form 
 and matter, are united in that beauty which prescribes measure 
 and harmony, a beauty this in which the life of the Greeks, 
 freed from natural constraint, first attained to a state of youthful 
 freedom. 
 
 Nevertheless lacchos was only exhibited at first in the 
 mysteries as an infant, to distinguish him, it would seem, from 
 Zagreus, the god of the past, as well as from the then existing 
 plurality of gods ; for he was first thought of only as a god of 
 the future, and thus, )[in a manner replete with meaning, was 
 mystically made the symbol of a truth that was yet to come ; 
 though it is true that the mythological consciousness could 
 riot know, but could at best only have a presentiment of that 
 truth. Hitherto religion has been seen to be a spontaneous 
 growth of nature ; being not as yet revealed. This last 
 must in its content be an event, a deed, not merely a doctrine 
 about realities long since past ; for the founding of Christianity 
 is in itself such a reality manifested for the first time. God 
 has onlysufiered the "subversion" to exist from the beginning 
 for the sake of this fact which was to ensue, or because of the 
 redemption; this is the object to which all that hitherto 
 occurred was but a preparatory work; but on that very 
 
 u 2 
 
292 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 account the ahte-Ctristian consciousness could know nothing 
 of the redemption, and no human consciousness could ever 
 attain thereunto, so long as this fact did not actually ensue 
 in an historical manner. 
 
 From all that has been just stated, it will be easily per- 
 ceived that in the content of the Philosophy of Revelation, into 
 which we cannot now enter any further, Schelling has recourse 
 to a verbal interpretation of Holy Writ; for, from the 
 most difficult passages of the latter, when regarded from the 
 above points of view, a surprising sense or meaning is fre-^ 
 quently elicited, though at the same time we should find it 
 hard to affirm that in doing this the spiritual interpreter agrees 
 in every instance with the orthodox believer. The decree and 
 work of the redemption can, says Schelling, be no more 
 apprehended and comprehended a priori by the reason than 
 that of the creation ; revelation contains a supernatural content, 
 and must do so, or else it would be no revelation, no something 
 truly revealed to the human reason ; but it is not on that 
 account absolutely incomprehensible, for it does not contend 
 against the reason ; but we must will to comprehend it, we 
 must say, with Anselm, credo ut intelligam, and then that 
 which at the first glance appeared offensive to the intellect 
 finds in the whole its necessary place and meaning : nluch that 
 a superficial system of rationalism has given up on the plea of 
 accommodation appears then to be invested with the deepest 
 sense, as e. g. the doctrine of Satan and of evil spirits or angels. 
 This doctrine hangs in the closest connection with the natural 
 resistance of the material principle to being led voluntarily 
 back from the state of actual reality into that of intrinsic being 
 or potentiality- Satan has been called the ; principle of ne- 
 gation, and he is such, for he is , constantly resisting the 
 formative and proportioning potency, and would, if he could, 
 destroy all form and reduce the world to nothing. As a 
 potency, however, and kept within due limits, as it is so long 
 as the will does not abandon itself to its influence and so create 
 for it, an existence — in short, as a potency, — it need not be 
 wanting in the divine economy. By the subversion or "fall" 
 this principle became universally prevalent, but it had not on that 
 account a personality; this, or a semblance of such, being first 
 of all obtained, when hemmed in, as it were, by the oppositely 
 working potency, , it became placed in a state of extreme 
 tension. Hence these powers were most violent at the time 
 when they were brought nearest to their subjugation, and what 
 
SCHELLING. 293 
 
 is reported to us of the frequent demoniac appearances ahd of 
 the temptation in the time of Jesus and the apostles, is not to 
 be set aside by any thoughtless or inconsiderate interpretation. 
 Satan is no creature, but his essence is laid in one of the 
 eternal potencies ; he does not, however, appear from the very 
 beginning, as evil, but first becomes so: in himself he was 
 and must be the principle that solicits or renders the evil mani- 
 fest, without being the evil itself; he cannot, as it were, brook 
 that naive and ignorant innocence should be in possession of 
 blessedness without having deserved it. On that very account 
 we must neither ridicule nor slander him, but must rather take 
 care lest we voluntarily give to him room and existence ; for 
 by himself he has no existence, but exists only in and by the 
 will giving itself up to him — being, in a word, the principle 
 that is constantly hungering after existence and unobservedly 
 stealing in. At present evil has not been brought to a full 
 state of exspiration or been put to death in the world ; it will be 
 first completely vanquished on that day when there is one fold 
 and one shepherd, and the Son shall again resign the dominion 
 to the Father. 
 
 I cannot, my friends, close this sketch of the characteristic 
 features of Schelling's Philosophy without this double reser- 
 vation ; in the first place, that I may be allowed to retract any 
 errors that, owing to the imperfection and obscurity of the 
 sources from which I have been obliged to draw, may easily have 
 crept in ; and also, in the next place, that from the position given 
 to this system before that of Hegel, no previous conclusion should 
 be formed as to its rank. In placing it there regard was only had 
 to convenience of exposition, for if we had once buried our- 
 selves in the doctrines and formulas of Hegel we should not so 
 readily have found our way back again to Schelling ; and thus, 
 indeed, we are enabled to furnish an account of philosophical 
 opinions which, though more recent than the Hegelian system 
 (next to be treated of), not only encroach upon, but are framed 
 in most decided opposition to the latter. An opportunity will, 
 however, present itself, at the conclusion of the present 
 lectures, of instituting a comparison between the two, so that 
 we will here rest content with directing your attention to the 
 Theory of Potencies in general, i. e. to the theory and method 
 of deducing from the lowest or most inferior stage, or from 
 
 V a 
 
294 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 the formless matter, every thing that is higher, up to the 
 highest intelligence and freedom. Such a theory seemed, as 
 we have already seen in Fichte and Schleiermacher, to be first 
 of aU requisite in order that the Absolute, the sole substance, 
 might not appear as a dead substratum and feeble passive 
 matter, which would be contradictory to their idea of Deity as 
 an abstract principle of unity. Thus, the substance must, some- 
 how or other, be animated or endowed with life in itself. This 
 however was done by regarding it as the potency, real possibility, 
 or Ivpafite as with Aristotle. In order now to truly animate this 
 substance and represent it as the sole generative and productive 
 principle, it did not suffice to posite it as the mere possibility' 
 of an ulterior and cooperative development : for, let even such 
 a possibility be or remain what it is, there would still be re- 
 quired a second principle external to it in order to excite it to 
 formative metamorphoses or changes ; thus, what — if this be- 
 ginning and this evolution be once presupposed — is demanded 
 as a matter of logical consistency, is the necessity that must 
 reside abstractedly in such a principle for developing itself ; it 
 is only when this has been pointed out that full satisfaction 
 seems to be given to the scientific or philosophical demand for 
 such a conception ; and this, then, was the problem set before 
 himself by Hegel. 
 
HEGEL. 295 
 
 LECTUEE Xin. 
 
 The first impression that was made upon the age by Schelling's 
 Philosophy of Nature was, with the majority of his younger 
 fellow-workers, that of a brilliant, nay, dazzling phenomenon, 
 while to the rest, especially ihe older students, it appeared like 
 an extravagant phantasmagoria or vision. While writers, such 
 as Oken and SteflFens, by following out in Schelling's spirit the 
 natural sciences, were led to the happiest results *, Hegel, 
 setting out, just as Schelling had done, from Fichte, undertook 
 to reduce what the author of the more recent Nature-Philosophy 
 had scanned with a genial eye, and aphoristically sketched, into 
 the strict form of a regular, scientific system, and entered 
 therewith upon a far more difficult and arid task than the 
 numerous admirers of Schelling, who, revelling in the new 
 light, " hastened only to enjpy it," as Hegel himself said, and in 
 their hurry were well nigh upsetting the lamp from which it 
 blazed. In fact the new organon of philosophy disclosed by 
 Schelling in his doctrine of " intellectual intuition," was so 
 exposed to the risk of being confounded with the flights of a 
 poetic fancy, that the misuse which had been made of it by 
 ignoi-ant enthusiasts, brought the more recent philosophy itself, 
 which was simply called Nature- Philosophy, into great discredit 
 with more intelligent and judicious minds. Against this dis- 
 orderly procedure Hegel has worked successfully with uncom- 
 
 * To Lorenz Oken, in particular, belongs the merit, not of having heeri 
 the first to Burmise, but to discover, i. e. to make known by demonstration, 
 that the Cranial bones in the Vertebrata are constructed upon the same 
 type as the bones composing the spinal column, — that they are, in fact, 
 " TertebrEB expanded and otherwise modified to enclose the expanded ter- 
 mination of the spinal cord, the brain." The Essay containing this beautiful 
 thought is entitled " Uber die Bedeutnng der Schadelknochen." Jena, 
 1S07. Eecent researches, conducted under the guidance of this Essay, 
 have but served to prove the truth and justice of Oken's theory, and so 
 make good its claim to be regarded as the most definite contribution 
 that has yet been made to the study of Animal Morphology, or that branch 
 of organic science which investigates the laws that determine, within 
 certain limits. Animal Forms. ( ?V.) 
 
 n 4 
 
296 HISTOBICAL SURVEY. 
 
 promising rigour'; and whatever opinion may be formed in other 
 respects of his labours, it must still be acknowledged without 
 party prejudice, that he has, by his systematic example, put a 
 stop to the confusion, and reawakened and shown to the assi- 
 duous spirit of the educated German that we must not, in 
 order to find the truth, " go-a-hunting in thought after ad- 
 ventures." In fact Hegel's system has, during' the last ten 
 years, gained such a general influence, that it is impossible at 
 present to hold any discourse upon philosophic subjects without 
 having thoroughly studied and comprehended this system ; 
 besides, to utterly ignore the system in a state of despair as to 
 the results, or to wish to get at the goal of the inquiry by some 
 roundabout way, instead of traversing the proper road, is but 
 the step taken by a self-satisfied ignorance. 
 
 It is true that Hegel was convinced of his agreement with 
 Schelling in all essential points, and intended only to give, as 
 above mentioned, a scientific form and fixity to the doctrines 
 which had been already expressed, i. e., to render them for the 
 first time a perfect science. But, already in his first work, the 
 Phanomenolegie des Geistes, which embraced a wider field than 
 that of any of his predecessors, we see that the essential points 
 assumed a different form to what they had done with Schelling ; 
 and though the latter has recently agreed with their author 
 no more than Kant formerly did with his pupil Fichte, still 
 we cannot dispute the praise that is due to the pupil for having 
 carried out in a consistent manner the first idea that was 
 common to them both, while, on the other hand, it remains a 
 doubtful matter, whether the first inventor has in his own plan, 
 which in the beginning did not embrace all parts of the science 
 with equal caution, remained in the sequel perfectly true to 
 himself. 
 
 We have already treated of what Schelling called his method 
 of Intellectual Intuition, and have endeavoured to ascend 
 under its guidance to the standing-point, which is also that 
 from which Hegel viewed the world and commenced his specu- 
 lations. He did not, however, merely set out from that point, 
 but treated the ascent to it in a scientifically systematic man- 
 ner, and expressed his theory thereof in the " Phanomenologie 
 des Geistes." This book is now regarded as the propaedeutick, 
 which brings the, consciousness by a systematic route to the 
 same height which we have ascended upon the historical. 
 
 Let us transport ourselves, before proceeding to this height, 
 once again to the earlier standing-point of Schelling. The 
 
HEGEL. 297 
 
 Absolute, or that which was Called by Spin6za the universal 
 substance, and thus that essence which forms the infinitely 
 numerous things from out itself, or fashions itself into the in- 
 finitude of things, which is or constitutes the world — this 
 universal aether which is first of all to be thought of as simple 
 and devoid of determination, was not by Schelling regarded in 
 the light of a dead substance into which life and motion might 
 be inspired or infused from without as if by some higher spirit, 
 but as being the living, universal, and primordial essence of all 
 things themselves ; and then in order to express at the same 
 time in this notion the most general fundamental law, the 
 archetype or rhythm, which it obeyed in all its moving and 
 living, he declared the Absolute to be the unlimited eternal 
 Subject-Object, i. e. the living principle, which in obedience to 
 its own nature eternally transports itself from the state of sub- 
 jectivity into that of objectivity, and then returns as from an 
 elastic tension within itself to the subjectivity, yet in such wise 
 that its new state from being after each return more enriched 
 in internal determinations, as well as in the freedom of de- 
 termining itself, becomes more elevated in character, so that 
 ipso actu by its working, i. e. the carrying out of that which 
 lay potentially (implicitly) in it, it becomes gradually /or itself 
 that which it had the intrinsic power of becoming. Now 
 in this lie unmistakeably the direct outlines of a pure ration- 
 alism and absolute idealism, such as Hegel arrived at, when, 
 holding fast by this rhythmical movement of thought, he de- 
 clared that it was itself the sum total of reality. Still, upon 
 the other hand, there must be constantly retained an original 
 and in every thought-movement insoluble element, namely the 
 identical basis of the ideal and real, and this has been without 
 doubt Schelling's opinion always. Let us, however, bear in 
 mind that even in Schelling we have encountered propositions, 
 such as the following : — all motion and activity, all vital im- 
 pulse, even that of nature, is only an unconscious process of 
 thought, or happens in the form of the latter ; the more in 
 nature what is normal or conformable to law becomes apparent, 
 by so much the more spiritual do her workings appear ; optical 
 phenomena are but a system of geometry, the lines of which 
 are traced by the light, and the perfected theory of nature 
 would be that by virtue of which the whole of nature should 
 resolve itself into an intelligence ; finally, let us remember, 
 that this utterly unconscious, but teleologically working life 
 comes at length in man to itself, i, e. comprehends itself as the 
 
298 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 absolute rationality, so that the Absolute and Universal itself was 
 characterised as the Absolute reason, which, present objectively, 
 or leaving its impress everywhere, becomes in man conscious of 
 itself: if to this we add, that all that exists, all things ap- 
 parently persistent in form, in a word, that matter in the most 
 universal sense consists only of forces, and the forces them- 
 selves only of life or activities, it follows, that in the end 
 nothing remains but an universal normally self-forming pro- 
 cess, a natura naturans, which in its inmost essence can be 
 nothing else than a striving and living, expanding and extend- 
 ing, shaping and organising process, obedient to an indwelling 
 natural law, and that this law is all in all, that it is the abso- 
 lute reason, or yet more, that the Absolute itself is the living 
 reason. Thus, all that has been hitherto thought of as the 
 essence, in which the reason dwells, disappears, nothing being 
 left than just a law, an universal mode of action or natural 
 necessity, a reality (Ansich), which must be acknowledged to 
 be an utterly empty abstraction, unless it had for its consum- 
 mation the self-activity, the absolute life, or, in other words, 
 unless it is acknowledged to be just as really practical as 
 logically formal. We have, so to speak, a living law, which 
 fulfils itself, or an absolute power which is simultaneously and 
 in itself its own law, A logical cosmos, or system of the universe, 
 instead of the moral one as previously propounded by Fichte. 
 All that is or exists is nothing but the actual self-moulding of 
 the reason, all being motion and activity^ the inmost essence 
 of things themselves being but this process of action and life, 
 and this living process being the form of the thinking process, 
 or more correctly speaking, the actual thinking process itself. 
 Thus, what 'previously hovered constantly before us as a sub- 
 stantial essence lying at the basis of things, is in the present 
 instance dissolved at once and at length utterly disappears, 
 seeing that we cannot imagine this essence to be either a 
 material supporter of life intrinsically dead and only animated 
 for the first time by motion, or anything else than the actual 
 energy of the thinking process only, concerning which the only 
 doubt that remains at present is, whether in the very begin- 
 ning, and at one stroke, it must be presupposed to be the per- 
 fected active system of thought, or absolute spirit, or must be 
 conceived of as a thinking process, at first void and abstract, 
 but gradually fulfilling itself so as to be subjected in itself to a 
 history or intrinsic process of development. In either case, 
 however, we have, at the very outset, an absolute activity ; and 
 
HEGEL. 299 
 
 that indeed not merely a determinate activity, but one that by 
 its absolute form of movement is simply necessary and could 
 not be otherwise than what it is. Now, how can we express 
 in the most concise and characteristic manner the form of this 
 activity as an universal form of being and thinking (such as it 
 has already revealed itself to us) ?. Hegel does this by the 
 word, absolute conception, and puts this in the place of the 
 subject-object of Schelling, declaring thereby, at the same time, 
 the universal activity — the thinking process* — to be sub- 
 stance itself, or a something that admits in nowise of being 
 separated from its form : if, however, this form-activity is, as 
 it were, to be exhibited in its inmost kernel, or quintessence, 
 the latter then appears as the .immanent infinite negativity, an 
 expression this, the sense of which will become clear in what 
 follows. 
 
 Although Schelling had advanced to this point — to that, 
 namely, of pronouncing the absolute substance to be the absolute 
 Subject-Object or world-Ego, %eyond which there was nothing 
 else that might determine it, but which as the living and 
 universal primitive essence absolutely determines and moulds 
 itself; and although Hegel familiarly declared in the same 
 sense f , that, in his opinion, the whole question depended " not 
 upon our apprehending and pronouncing the "true" to be a 
 substance (dead, like that of Spinoza), but positively to be 
 subject," still it is evident, at the same time, that even in this 
 apprehension of the matter, these two thinkers occupy no longer 
 the same standing-point. Schelling, despite the above decla- 
 ration, takes his stand before the absolute substance, and 
 regards it as a matter of observation, being by virtue of his 
 method engaged in the process of intuition; Hegel plants 
 himself, so to speak, in the substance, and is the substance 
 itself, or it is his immanent thinking process, his method being 
 that process in a direct state of logical movement. For Schelling 
 the subjectivity as well as the objectivity is objective, and 
 hence both appear to be something real, the difference between 
 them being only quantitative ; Hegel's substance is the ideal 
 
 * Hegel's Encycklopadie, §'86., " If the Ego = Ego, or the intellectiiftr 
 intuition be really regarded as the first (most immediate, or principle of 
 the system), it is evident that it is, in this ptire and immediate state, none 
 other than Being, just as the pure Being is inversely none other than 
 this abstract, pure process of thought or intuition, including, however, 
 within itself, the mediation." 
 
 f Hegel's Phanomenologie des Geistes, p. 14. 
 
300 HISTOEXCAL SURVEY. 
 
 self-determining unity, the idea (Begriff"-), the differences of 
 this being with him logically different determinations. 
 
 This identity of thinking and being was, however, as Hegel 
 says, first advanced only as a bare assertion, but not yet proved. 
 With Kant dualism still prevailed, with Fichte subjectiveism ; 
 but from the latter having regarded his Ego in the very outset 
 as subjective and finite, he had simultaneously and immediately 
 acknowledged an objectivity and infinitude apart from the 
 Ego as subjective, for with the one statement the other also is 
 made. This dualism, remaining thus unsubdued, was sud- 
 denly gathered up by Schelling into an absolute unity, an 
 identity of real and ideal. A statement, however, of this kind 
 not appearing to be justified, but, to use Hegel's expression^- 
 " shot as if out of a pistol," was now to be proved and shown 
 to be a necessity. Now, in making this attempt, Hegel 
 likewise set but, which is to be well borne in mind, from the 
 dualism of the ordinary consciousness ; for the goal or object 
 in the present instance was thennonism in which that dualism 
 should coalesce so as to enable us to start from thence as a 
 world of antagonisms or opposites. Thus the "Phanomen- 
 ologie des Geistes," which undertook that office, was to form 
 the first and, as it were, analytical part of the system. 
 
 If, however, — we may observe beforehand — the Pheno- 
 menology had been in fact the first and fundamental part of 
 the system, it follows that, from its having as an hypothesis- 
 that dualism, that this would have become the basis of the 
 whole system, and the latter have consequently obtained, like 
 the Kantian system, a double principle, an empirical and an 
 a priori, or an objective and subjective principle; so that the 
 system would in this way, instead of being built upon a pure 
 foundation within itself, have rested upon a point of support 
 external to or without itself. Besides, it is seen in the Pheno- 
 menology itself,, as it lies before usj that it does not actually 
 comprise a definitely circumscribed portion, but the collective 
 content of the whole system, however unequally this may be 
 carried out. We have, in fact, in the Phenomenology the 
 system in its first form. Thus, its original position must be 
 altered, especially as regards its third part, so that, while 
 holding good as a propsedeutick for philosophical minds of 
 the present day, it may step forth as a whole from its connec- 
 tion with the system, and distribute its content, newly elaborated,, 
 Over different points of the latter. 
 
 In the Phenomenology as a ppopaedeutick to the whole system, 
 
HEGEL. 301 
 
 the philosopher, first of all, retraces the stages of the ordinary 
 un philosophical consciousness, or transports himself into the 
 common mode of sensuous intuition ; he traverses, as it were, 
 in recollection the formative or developmental stages of the 
 philosophic consciousness, and shows how and by what neces- 
 sity the latter has felt itself impelled from one step to another. 
 This necessity obviously depends upon this, — that between each 
 subordinate stage of development and the mind, as it exists at 
 present as philosophical consciousness, a difference is met with 
 that becomes the contradiction, because on all stages of de- 
 velopment it is the one identical subject which appears dis- 
 similar or unlike to itself, i. e. otherwise than what it already is 
 intrinsically or in itself. This state of being and yet non-being, 
 but still of being imperative or being that should be, continues 
 to urge on the process until the contradiction is removed, i. e. 
 uutil the mind has arrived at a cognition of, and certainty 
 concerning itself. Now the stages which are inevitably met 
 with in every mind or subject mat is educated up to the philo- 
 sophical standing-point of the present, have been at the same 
 time the general fundamental views of the different ages of 
 humanity and the standing-points of the different systems of 
 philosophy, so that the Phenomenology can hold good not only 
 for a psychological history of the development of the individual 
 subject but for a history of philosophy reduced to its leading 
 or essential features, in the which, names, dates, and all other 
 accidental adjuncts with which the systems have been en- 
 tangled in their historical appearance, are omitted, and the 
 pure progress only of the developmental process itself is dis- 
 played. 
 
 This developmental or formative process passes through three 
 cardinal periods, which may be characterised, first, as bare 
 consciousness ; secondly, as self-consciousness ; and, thirdly, as 
 absolute consciousness or reason. Each of these three stages 
 has again the same number of gradations in itself, and the 
 relation of all these progressions among themselves is this, — 
 that the consciousness does not only advance from the lower to 
 the higher stage in the manner above mentioned, but carries 
 up and retains the method of intuition and thought of the 
 lower stage to and upon the higher, seeing that the former 
 does not absolutely disappear when the latter has made its 
 appearance, but is subsumed by this, taken up in itself, or, as 
 Hegel says, suppressed. This word. *' au/heben," to suppress, 
 has in the German the double sense of toUere and conservare, 
 
302 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 and means just what is here intended, namely, the assumption 
 and retention of a mode of intuition, which hitherto was itself 
 the point of view from which the world was regarded under a 
 higher aspect, so that that mode now becomes, with all its 
 content, a fresh content and object of the consciousness. Thus, 
 e. g. does the consciousness regard, in the beginning, all things 
 as fixed, persistent, and self-subsistent essences ; later on, as 
 unspfestantial, transient, and perishable phenomena ; finally, as 
 necessary limitations grounded in the universal essence ; why 
 then that first mode of intuition is explained at the same time 
 in the higher consciousness, is justified to a certain degree, 
 and continues, though lowered to its definite value. We will 
 now attempt to point out the course of this phenomenological 
 development in its leading momenta. 
 
 Not only the child at the first dawn of reflection, but the 
 ordinary individual as well as the philosopher, finds himself, as 
 often as he opens his eyes and gazes upon the outer or existing 
 world, brought, at least, for an instant into that direct relation 
 to the objects which must be constantly vanquished and me- 
 diated anew. The first glance is one of an always more or less 
 unconscious character, or one in which the objects infinitely 
 numerous and manifold, while presented to us with a certainty 
 on our part as to their existence, are, however, neither under- 
 stood nor comprehended as to their principle and essence. We 
 imagine, indeed, that with this gaze at the world without us, 
 we have at once received an infinite abundance of perceptions, 
 but this appearance depends upon the fact of our having, as 
 adult and educated beings, been already provided with a store 
 of notions and knowledges, with which we bring every novelty 
 for the moment into connection. It is no easy matter to separate 
 from the pure act of intuition that which lies already known, 
 cognised, and comprehended in our soul, and which becomes 
 Siinalgamated simultaneously with the above process. Could 
 we, however, distinguish exactly what is present alone and 
 primarily in the act of intuition as such, it would then be seen, 
 that of the object at the first glance we can know and affirm 
 nothing more than — it is there, exists, is a " there," a "present."- 
 At the first glance the object reveals to us no greater fulness- 
 and multiplicity, nor is a representation of it within us mapped 
 out and endowed with that precision or limitation, which is 
 present to us later on. 
 
 Thus, what in the first intuition or upon the first stage of the 
 sensuous consciousness we are able to affirm of the object, is 
 
HEGEL, 303 
 
 simply this, that it is. We ascribe to it, in other words, a being 
 or existence. It is, however, soon seen that this being is 
 nothing more than a being " there," " here," or " at present," 
 linked to the moment, transitory, in short, no true being ; for, 
 upon the one hand, by the same experience which showed to us 
 the being of the object is the disappearance or non-being of the 
 latter forthwith declared, — as when e. g. we have said it is warm 
 or it is fine, the conviction is immediately forced upon ns that it 
 is no longer warm and no longer fine, — while, on the other hand, 
 the being which we ascribe to the object independently of our 
 sight, hearing, or general sensation, is present itself only in and 
 with the sensation ; for warm or clear, and indeed every quality 
 of this kind, implies only an affection of our sensitive faculty, 
 and thus a determined state, which is present rather in us than 
 by itself or objectively. 
 
 It follows from this that the objective being of this first stage, 
 or that of sensuous certainty, and this direct certainty itself 
 has been dissolved. The qualitative distinctions, in which the 
 objective being consisted, we must take to ourselves, inasmuch 
 as they are far more subjective than objective. With all this, 
 however, the objectivity itself is not yet suppressed ; for, 
 granted that the distinctions fall within us, or within the sphere 
 of our own subjectivity, still that, upon the occurrence of 
 which the distinctions are felt by us, and which calls forth 
 these sensations in us, is the thing in itself, as something 
 constantly objective, existent, and antecedent, as we suppose, 
 to the sensations. If the single qualities have no objective 
 truth, it follows that we must derive instead the true from 
 all the qualities, and call this on that very account per- 
 ception : the qualities cannot certainly be per se or by them- 
 selves, but they must inhere in something that constitutes their 
 common substratum. This is the second stage of the con- 
 sciousness, and the latter rests for a long time content with this 
 new fund of certainty. With, however, the dialectick of the 
 thing and its qualities, we are already familiar through for- 
 mer systems of philosophy ; but it is here reinstated in such 
 a way, that, inasmuch as we are necessitated to acknowledge 
 the qualities as inherences of ourselves, and as such to appro- 
 priate them, we must of necessity take even the thing in itself 
 in like manner to ourselves, i. e., must confess that we are the 
 thing or subject itself in which those qualities inhere ; for that 
 very something, in which the qualities are, is still the same as 
 that which has the qualities, and this we ourselves were. 
 
304 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 Hence, the consciousness or the subject itself has become not 
 only the nucleus but substratum of the chequered world of 
 idifferences, which in the beginning were presented to us with 
 a direct confidence on our part of their being an objectively 
 existing world ; the whole has consequently become subjective, 
 or the subject has become a whole, a totality of determina- 
 tions. With this, however, the consciousness itself has, at the 
 same time, become a thing with many qualities, which are 
 just as much and just as little self-subsistent as the thing in 
 itself. In the dialectick of this relation, it is seen, on the one 
 hand, that I can as little subtract the common element or the 
 thing and essence in itself, without therewith suppressing the 
 qualities, and so being obliged to leave either both or neither 
 simultaneously posited ; while, on the other, that so soon as I 
 posite the one as a self-subsistent being, I thereby suppress the 
 being of the other, and inversely. 
 
 This condition of relation and reference, or, in other words, 
 this vitally restless process of self-reflection within itself, is the 
 third stage and the result of the first process ; herein the con- 
 sciousness has cognised or become acquainted with its own na- 
 ture, i. e. itself, or it has perceived itself as reflection, i. e. as 
 understanding. In this stage, however, by virtue of its con- 
 nection with the two preceding stages, the nature and essence 
 6f the things or objects, as they floated in the beginning before 
 the consciousness, is at the same time revealed to and pervaded 
 by the latter. It was seen, that the subject itself must be re- 
 garded as a thing possessed of many qualities, and as being in 
 itself that reflection ; consequently nothing else can be declared 
 and known of the things, than that their being in itself is like- 
 wise this reflective process. Hence, the understanding in cog- 
 nising its own nature, has unveiled to itself the nature even of 
 the things ; the spell is withdrawn from the eyes of the physical 
 inquirer, and silence imposed upon the old complaint that no 
 created spirit can dive into the interior of nature, but must 
 only content itself with the external husk or shell. That 
 transition and couYersion of the simple state of a thing in itself 
 into the development of qualities, and the return of these into 
 that state of singleness, out of which they are at the same time 
 born anew — this incessant living proceiss, is the essence of the 
 things themselves. The hidden forces from which phenomena 
 are generally derived, imply nothing more than this form of 
 subjectiveness or real being, in the which, however, nothing 
 else, no further mystery, lies concealed than what is constantly 
 
HEGEL. 305 
 
 being divulged ; for force is merely the abstract expression for 
 the latent quality of that which is obviously the phenomenon, 
 or for the identity of the manifold or diverse, the which, while 
 it appears in the phenomenon, is and remains simultaneously 
 also that reality, just because the latter is the process of mani- 
 festation. The reality or essence is the manifesting, self-deter- 
 mining essence itself in a state of inward and inseparable 
 unity. Both sides of the essence are thus present together 
 simultaneously, and though the essence per se, as being that 
 which is persistent in the change, may be distinguished from 
 the latter ; still nothing more is implied by it than the self-per- 
 sistence of the process itself — the law. If then we seek for a 
 transcendent world in or behind the reality, it follows, that it 
 can only be regarded as this intrinsic reality or formal kingdom 
 of persistent laws, which are, however, abstractedly for them- 
 selves alone nothing existent, but only the persistent state of 
 the reality itself. 
 
 Hitherto, the consciousness has been occupied with the repre- 
 sentation of a distinction of itself as subject and a world as 
 object, though recognising at the same time also the identity of 
 both. Consequently, the distinction could not be one of a 
 real and;J qualitative character, but only a formal one ; i. e., 
 the natural being, which is utterly the same as the con- 
 sciousness, is only the consciousness doubled in the repre- 
 sentation, or is itself only the representation, which the subject 
 has made of itself and set before itself {sihi) as a something 
 existing. For, if we retain again closely in our minds the 
 course of the above-mentioned development, we perceive that 
 the subject must gradually take to itself all objective being, and 
 consequently acknowledge, that that which was previously pre- 
 sented to it as objectively existing, is its own subjective action; 
 it has, in short, while stripping off the objectivity bit by bit, 
 preserved itself to the last, and has altogether and in all cog- 
 nised nothing but its own action and essence. The self-reflec- 
 tion has consequently arrived at a standing-point, where all 
 being apart from the subject disappears, and it is solely in itself 
 by itself. If the first standing-point of the consciousness, 
 where the latter relied upon the reality of things, or, in other 
 words, upon the noumenon, or thing in itself, may be regarded ■ 
 as being Kantian in character, we do but recognise in the present 
 one, where the consciousness is solely in possession of itself, and 
 may be consequently called self-consciousness, the standing- 
 point of Fichte's subjective idealism. 
 
306 HISTOEICAIi SURVEY. 
 
 The thinking process has here in the knowledge of itself, or 
 as a self-consciousness, dived into its own hidden nucleus or 
 essence, is a totality of subjective determinations, or is in itself 
 per se ; but now comes the question, what is its real relation in 
 this process, and how does it think these determinations ? By- 
 virtue of its origin from direct consciousness it has indeed 
 taken this form of immediateness into itself, but has not at the 
 same time subdued it in its own interior. It is still only the 
 category of the quality of the thing which is subjectified ; the 
 subject has indeed retired into itself, but has not as yet 
 thoroughly mediated the thought-determinations which are 
 directly present within itself; so that the consciousness is im- 
 prisoned within itself in a peculiar amphiboly or state of doubt. 
 For, not having as yet fully dissolved per se the quality of the 
 thing, i. e. still knowing itself more or less as a thing, and 
 things being only finite individualities presupposing other 
 things beyond them, there thus originates to the self -conscious- 
 ness, while negating them, a constant series of objectively self- 
 subsistent things. The self-consciousness is placed as a middle 
 state or condition between the lower and higher consciousness ; 
 so long as it is self-conseiousness, it is also the continuous pro- 
 cess of mediation, and works uninterruptedly at the task of 
 reinstating itself as a triumphant subjectivity from out the 
 objectivity, for in this action it consists, this being its inward 
 nature or essence, and it continues only so long as this labour 
 lasts, seeing thait it has therein its self-certainty, or feels and 
 maintains itself solely by virtue of this activity or process. 
 Thus, while it has constantly to be freeing itself from the- 
 objectivity, it yet required the latter, and is inevitably or by 
 its own nature rekted to it ; being, as a self-cognisant reflec- 
 tion, this very state of relation and amphiboly. Since then the 
 Ego or subject is this reflection, it follows, that it is the ne- 
 cessity not only of positing but of suppressing the self-sub- 
 sistence of things ; so soon as these appear to be established 
 and self-subsistent, the task devolves inevitably upon the Ego 
 of negating this self-subsistence, in order that it may prove 
 itself to be the positing activity, the self-determination, and, in 
 like manner, when the things are suppressed, of letting them 
 be again posited. 
 
 The process of the self-consciousness advances in like man- 
 ner by definite stages, and this already mentioned action is first 
 of all the desire of suppressing the exclusive being of the 
 objects, or, in other words, of not sufieriug them to oppose any 
 
HEGEL. 307 
 
 limit or barrier to itself, the exclusive Ego. Hence, the Ego 
 becomes practical, feels certain wants and requirements, and 
 undertakes the task of subjecting the objects to itself by elabo- 
 rating and digesting them, or by an assimilation and intussuscep- 
 tion of them, of converting them entirely into itself, rendering 
 them organs of its will, or, what amounts to the same thing, or- 
 ganising itself into the condition of an object, and then dealing 
 with this as with its own body and possession. It follows from 
 this that the self-subsistence of the natural objects is suppressed, 
 for they are reduced afresh to accidents and qualities of the 
 subject ; but we know also from the dialectick of the quality of 
 the thing that this self-subsistence of qualities reoriginates so 
 soon as it is suppressed ; and this is also seen to be the case in 
 the present instance, where the satisfaction of the desires alter- 
 nates in like manner with their reawakening, just as was the 
 case with the origination and disappearance of the noumenon or 
 thing in itself in and together with its qualities. The difference 
 is only this, that the practical process presupposes the corre- 
 sponding theoretical one, for the groundwork of the impulse is 
 the feeling.* It is true that the Ego is here simultaneously placed 
 . upon the practical standing-point, while in the bare conscious^ 
 Hess it stood only upon the theoretical ; but this distinction is none ' 
 whatever for the consciousness, for even in the practical sphere 
 we have j ust as much to deal with sensations, and thus, with 
 moments of consciousness, or with the inward perception of self- 
 satisfaction or of want ; and the will makes no difference, for in 
 the theoretical process there is present, as in the practical, just 
 the same endeavour or volition to suppress the negation or limit 
 of the objectivity, save only that this endeavour is in the 
 former a direct, in the latter a reflected effort, or one that falls 
 within the pale of the consciousness. Willing and thinking are, 
 as was already said by Spinoza, in themselves the same ; being 
 and thought, apprehended as activity, are in themselves iden- 
 tical. 
 
 As regards this point it will be dif5cult for those who have an 
 unprejudiced sense of reality to agree with the philosophy now 
 before them, nay, even to follow it, and we have certainly come 
 now to a point in which even the idealism of Fichte is con- 
 verted into realism. The ordinary consciousness will find a 
 difficulty in persuading itself that hunger and thirst, cold and 
 heat, are only a something that by a process which takes place 
 in the subjective self-consciousness admits of being suppressed. 
 
 • Compare Hegel's Eneyclopiidie, § 359. 
 X 3 
 
308 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 If matters were to depend only upon the energy of one's self- 
 determination, why then the person in distress who is in 
 danger of starvation, or of perishing by thirst or fire, would 
 have the means of his deliverance close at hand. In order 
 then that we may set to rights objections of this kind, such as 
 are raised by the so-called common sense of humanity, we must 
 hold fast by the systematic connection of thoughts, from or out 
 of which reflections like these tend inevitably to withdraw 
 us. Thus, when the negation of objectivity is spoken of, the 
 distinction only is meant of sensation and bare representation, 
 though both are, despite this difference, states of the conscious- 
 ness ; whether or no the finite Ego can in every situation in 
 life freely determine itself, is another question. Moreover, we 
 must bear in mind that the subject in this its subjective ideal- 
 ism, if it does but resolutely accomplish and wholly perfect the 
 latter, stands at once in the midst of the reality, seeing that 
 then there would be no more distinction between the ideal and 
 real, or, in other words, the ideal would be at one and the 
 same time real and the real also ideal ; lastly, if we bear in 
 mind that an imagined danger, e. g. such as is presented to us 
 in sleep, alarms us no less than a real one, it is then seen, that 
 a representation, of which we do not know that it is merely 
 such, has no less reality for us than the real itself ; or more 
 correctly speaking, that the real itself in the representation can 
 only in so far as it is known, believed in, and felt, be a practical 
 moment for us, but not so in so far as it does not enter in any 
 way into our consciousness. The self-consciousness is, as was 
 said, from its very nature, in this constant state of amphiboly 
 or doubt, and oscillates between a real and ideal world, being 
 itself this ambiguity, while the will is a " divine irony " or mode 
 of declaring the objective to be and also not to be. Now 
 this it is which, as the mystery of dialectick, belongs to the eso- 
 teric student of philosophy. The unbiassed human understand- 
 ing either does not reflect at all, and its intuitions hold good 
 to it as things, in vphich case it is the common, or what is called 
 cosmopolitan consciousness ; or it does reflect and is conscious 
 to itself that it has representations, and that these, as being its 
 own, are not the things, though it presupposes at the same time 
 that by them the things are cognised as they are, and in this 
 case it is the naive synthesis of idealism and realism. The 
 philosophising self-consciousness of this stage will, however, 
 needs be sceptical upon the one hand and subjective on the 
 other. It is this, dialectick which the mind, after traversing. 
 
HEGEL. 509 
 
 must survive, in order that the synthesis of the human under-» 
 standing may become certain or positive as to itself, for, if it 
 had not this very amphiboly behind itself, it would not be a 
 certainty ; now this is just (in our opinion) the standing-point, 
 at which the dialectick finds its momentary justification. 
 
 With all this, however, the self-consciousness is not yet at 
 one with itself. We have hitherto regarded it as opposed 
 merely to the nature that is devoid of self; its content consist- 
 ing only of its own determinations, which are not personalities 
 but that which objectively, not persons, but natural objects, 
 matters are ; thus, the subject was justified in declaring itself 
 to be the power of things, the ruler and lord of nature. The 
 self-consciousness has not yet discovered among the objects its 
 like, and on that very account will fall far short of having 
 wholly discovered itself ; or, in other words, it cannot as yet 
 find its like because it has not as yet fully comprehended itself. 
 So long as the person knows only of himself as of a thing the 
 self-consciousness has no representation in itself, which it can 
 objectify, and in doing this cognise another as person. The 
 self-consciousness as personality awakes simultaneously with 
 the recognition of another self-consciousness as person, and 
 inversely. Is it asked from what side this potentialisation is 
 to proceed? Hegel sets it before us as a process in an ex- 
 ternal historical form, though one which is strictly of an 
 internal kind, not admitting of being brought to pass by itself 
 in one isolated subject, but only among several subjects standing 
 in reciprocal relation, yet, nevertheless, in such a way that 
 they ail obtain simultaneously in themselves their now true 
 and personal self-consciousness. He calls this process one of 
 recoffnition," and carries it out in such a way that in the con- 
 currence of the subjects, which are at first only objects of the 
 consciousness to one another like natural objects, a struggle 
 is brought about of life and death ; which struggle, however, 
 cannot terminate with the actual annihilation of the one, 
 because thereby that something which should be attained would 
 be negated, namely the consciousness of free personality which 
 the stronger one must, by virtue of his being a man akin to 
 others of his kind, acknowledge even in the weaker, and not 
 injure without injuring himself. Such is the dialectick of the 
 notion of justice, or right, which is involved in many diffi- 
 culties, but, such as it is, is here presented to you in its first or 
 leading outlines. 
 
 In this process each Ego has attained for itself, as an in- 
 
 X 3 
 
310 HISTORICAL SURVEY, 
 
 dividual "this," the reGognition of its freedom and self- sub- 
 sistence, and that indeed from other Egoes, and acknowledges 
 the latter in turn to be its equals, or to be the counterpart or 
 equivalent of itself. This then is the "universal self-con- 
 sciousness" the positive knowledge of oneself in some other 
 self, each of these selfs as being a free individuality having 
 absolute self-subsistence. All are consequently in and for 
 themselves free, as regards action and self'-consciousness ; -wq 
 have, in short, an atomistic plurality of Egoes, but all being 
 alike and not qualitatively distinct in their nature from each 
 other, it follows, that they will now feel themselves to be 
 an universal spiritual substance-, and will inwardly perceive^ 
 and, especially as family and nation, declare themselves, in 
 exalted outbursts of love and patriotism, to be this substantial 
 unity. 
 
 " With this the third and highest sphere of the consciousness 
 is attained, the consciousness of the Absolute or the reason, and 
 the reason is the above-mentioned substance or substratum of 
 all subjects. Now, seeing that the individual finite Ego re- 
 cognises itself to be a part of that universal, it acknow- 
 ledges also that its determinations, which were previously 
 regarded as subjecti^'e, are in this common element deter- 
 minations of the universal ; for every Ego belongs, together 
 with its content, to that universal substance ; and in this all is 
 objective as well as subjective ; it is objefctive or opposed to 
 itself in itself, and subjectivity as well as objectivity implies 
 nothing more than the antagonism of the finite Egoes to each 
 other ; what, in a word, is subjective in the one is objective to 
 the other, and the reverse : but in the universal Ego all is 
 subjective, and this subjective has all that is objectively cor- 
 relative, subdued, or put under itselt; We thus encounter the 
 same relation in the absolute world-Ego as was held by sub- 
 jective idealism in the finite Ego ; as in the latter there were 
 only internal, subjective, or thought-objects, so in the absolute 
 idealism or monism, the distinction between the ideal and real 
 is suppressed, all is just as real as ideal, and in this way is 
 perfected and attained what the Phenomenology had set before 
 it as an object, " that the true be apprehended and expressed, 
 not merely as substance, but, to an equal degree, as subject." 
 
 Tliis rational process of thought, — which is now no longer 
 apart from and contemplative of the substance, but is itself the 
 substance, i. e. the subject, which contemplates and determines 
 itself, — is the truth of all knowledge, in the which being and 
 
HEGEL. 311 
 
 thinking are no longer apart from each other, for being is no 
 longer an object for the thinking process, but the thinking 
 process is itself the object of the thinking process, and on that 
 account is called being though this in itself is only what has 
 been thought by the thinking process, the reason having become 
 objective to itself, and so perceiving and determining nothing 
 but itself. We thus arrive as a result at the Aristotelian voitaiQ 
 rfjQ vofitreioQ, the self-thinking process of thought, or the self- 
 knowing truth, Absolute Idealism, which in itself is absolute 
 ■realism, or an identity in which these antagonisms have co- 
 alesced, in order to generate or engender themselves anew, 
 without positing therewith a duplicity of principles ; seeing that 
 the production of the antagonisms or, to speak more concisely, 
 the process of self -opposition or absolute negativity, is the one 
 absolutely self-moving principle. 
 
 X4 
 
312 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 LECTURE XIV. 
 
 HEGEL — (continued.') 
 
 •Hitherto we have been tracing the course of the Pheno- 
 menology, in order that we may with the principle there ob- 
 tained and justified, namely, that of the Identity of thinking 
 and being, proceed in the next place to the system itself. But 
 in doing this we must not omit to mention that Hegel begins 
 the whole of his system, as well as most of its leading divisions, 
 with a preliminary scheme or survey of its general arrangement, 
 but does not forget to declare expressly at the same time that 
 such preliminaries have only an historical value, determine 
 nothing beforehand as to the end and object of the investigation, 
 and therefore hold good for nothing more than a prefixed table 
 of contents ; for to regard them as any thing belonging to the 
 subject-matter itself, would be in opposition to his postulate or 
 assumption, namely, that philosophy has thoroughly to refrain 
 from all preconceived opinions and quietly to await the steps 
 by which its own methodical development will inevitably con- 
 duct it. Philosophy must not presuppose any thing, and must 
 therefore begin with the most abstract and void of all pro- 
 positions, with the naught itself, and then give up to the power 
 of the method to show how this beginning will develop, and by 
 a process of spontaneous growth gradually fashion itself into a 
 more concrete and perfect organism. Hence the beginning of 
 the system is obviously distinct from that of the Phenome- 
 nology ; for in this the consciousness was placed in the midst 
 of reality, the intelligence, already in a state of philosophical 
 education, transferring itself back to the beginnings of its 
 education, and so falling by this abstraction of itself into a kind 
 of tension; while in the system itself we have a purely objective 
 beginning, an empty indefinite " being ", which the philosophi- 
 sing subject is not in any way to violate nor interfere with. It is 
 true, as we already know, that this being is in itself the intrinsic 
 identity of being and thinking ; but this foreknowledge of ours 
 lies, like the Phenomenology itself through which it is obtained, 
 external to the system and its contents. That beginning is ex- 
 
HEGEL. 313 
 
 pressly defined to be the abstract, immediate, objective being, 
 and with this nothing more is to be thought of, or mixed up, 
 each thought of a definite end, or of an ultimate object already- 
 given, being kept perfectly in abeyance. 
 
 Thus, in order that we may not transfer to the system any 
 thing^ that, according to the author's view does not reside 
 therein, we must refrain strictly from all accessory thoughts 
 and suppositions, and, starting from the first and simplest 
 category, the lowest and " most empty " being, abandon our- 
 selves confidently to the genetic power of the method. If, 
 despite of this, we previously fix our eyes upon the whole 
 system, its beginning, middle, and end, this must not be done, 
 according to Hegel, with a view of anticipating in a secret 
 manner, the end or goal of the system, in and together with 
 its beginning, but only with a view of obtaining for ourselves 
 a preliminary survey that may help us in gaining information 
 more readily upon the whole subject. 
 
 We have already in the Phenomenology learnt thus much of 
 the method, that everywhere the idea or notion appears first of 
 aU in its immediateness, or intrinsic reality, that it then passes 
 judgment upon itself or becomes resolved into its opposite, and 
 ultimately coalesces from out these antagonisms. From this 
 very method results the whole structure or subdivision of the 
 system. The Absolute, the being-thinking or Idee, has to 
 pass through three momenta, and in the first place to present 
 itself as bare idea in and for itself; secondly, in its differ- 
 entiation or objective state, externality; and thirdly, as the 
 idea that has returned from its externality into itself : in the first 
 state it is the purely logical Idee, the thinking process taken in 
 the stricter sense as such in and for itself ; in the second, it is 
 the Idee in its externality, or departure from itself into a tem- 
 porospatial disjunctivity, i. e. nature; and in the third, it is the 
 mind or intelligence. Accordingly, the whole of philosophy, or 
 the thinking process, which has comprehended itself in this its 
 active state, has three cardinal divisions, — the Logic, which 
 with Hegel, as is readily seen, implies also Metaphysics; 
 the Philosophy of Nature ; and Philosophy of Mind. If, 
 forsooth, we regard the material objects of nature as such as 
 they are in themselves, why then we who contemplate or regard 
 them have discovered what they are in themselves, and have 
 become acquainted with their inward nature or essence ; but 
 they, the objects, do not know themselves, they are not present 
 /or themselves, but only for others ; the essence that is working 
 
314 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 and (as we know) thinking in them, or the absolute Idee, is 
 Veiled in them from its own gaze, or does not comprehend 
 itself; it is only present absolutely, without being what it really 
 should be, namely, per sear/or itself; and thus nature is the 
 idea {Idee) in its differentiation. Directly opposed to this natural 
 state stands that of the Idee as bare, abstract thinking, where 
 it is only by itself and not in the condition of differentiation, or 
 has this last only within itself (as thought-objects). If now, as 
 such, it believes in the outset, that it apprehends itself as a 
 subjective thinking process merely in its subjectivity, and has 
 hothing in common with the objective and real being, it follows, 
 that this view is proved within the very sphere of its own 
 thinking process to be false ; for it perceives that the essence 
 and action, the real and the true, are not an alterum, or something 
 that differs from it, and accordingly, guided thither by its 
 own thinking process, it comprehends itself at the end of the 
 logic as the subjective and objective activity, or as the only 
 true reality; in short, what it is and how it is in itself — as mind. 
 Hence the mind is the return from the state of exterioration to 
 that of being in and for itself, and this syllogism eternally 
 returning into itself is the synthesis of the logical and natural 
 course, which constitutes the third part of the system, the 
 Philosophy of Mind. 
 
 Within each of these three cardinal divisions the same 
 rhythmical movement repeats itself and produces a like three- 
 fold division. The Logic has to deal (o) with the first imme- 
 diateness or with being (i) ; this divides itself into the antago- 
 nism of essence and existence, and these finally coalesce together 
 to form the idea {Begriff) with which we have already become 
 acquainted both in its real as well as ideal import, as the living 
 circulation of momenta including itself within itself. 
 
 In like manner with the Philosophy of Nature. It resolves 
 itself into Mechanics, i. e., into the doctrine of the external 
 relation of many singulars, in which each appears as a whole 
 and self-subsistent ; into Physics, which corresponds to the 
 logical category of the essence, and into Organvcs, which com- 
 prises the real idea, as its immanent or own proper object, or 
 the process of mineral, vegetable, and animal life. 
 
 Finally, in the Philosophy of Mind is developed, in the first 
 place, the being of the subjective mind, or that which otherwise 
 is commonly understood by psychology; in the next place, 
 when in the manner essentially laid down in the Phenomeno- 
 logy, the individual has arrived at the stage of rational con- 
 
HEGEL. 315 
 
 sciousness, we encounter the objective mind, i. e. this very 
 rationality represented as externally organised in the social 
 life of human beings, in order, finally, at the conclusion of the 
 whole, or in the absolute science, to perfect itself as the uni- 
 versal spiritual process of art, religion, and philosophy, which 
 is the ethereal life of the mind itself. 
 
 Each of these nine divisions of the system resolves itself 
 methodically into three momenta, these again into three, and 
 so on in the most special manner, except in the Philosophy 
 of Nature where a departure takes place from the general rule, 
 since we there meet with a quadruple division. Now, if in this 
 systematic arrangement, it may appear as if attention was paid 
 only to the constantly more definite and special individuation of 
 the singular, and as if the latter were to be determined and com- 
 prehended only from the whole, still, if by the whole or universal 
 is understood an ultimate object already declared or expressed in 
 the beginning, such is not the case, for the development runs 
 on, so to speak, along the threads of the individual categories^ 
 so that from the more abstract originates the more concrete, 
 from the lower the higher, from the less perfect the more 
 perfect, and that solely by virtue of the method, i. e. by 
 means of negations, without to this end the vivification of any 
 other element, whether empiricism or a presupposed ultimate 
 object, being required ; in short, Hegel in his system and its 
 method, rests content with the declaration, that in the intro- 
 ductory category or abstract being, all the content which is 
 aimed at lies already implicitly or in itself, by virtue of the 
 intrinsic identity of this being with the rational process of 
 thought, and as for the rest he refers us to the logical experi- 
 ment of the development, which we will now proceed to trace 
 as far as is possible in a brief manner. 
 
 The Logic begins with the most simple abstraction of all, that 
 of being. We know indeed, that this being is identical with 
 bare thought or is the thinking process in itself; but, at this 
 its first appearance no evidence is afforded us of such identity, 
 and we are not aware that the being which is now presented 
 us is the very reflex of the thinking process which objectifies 
 itself therein. The thinking process is of an exceedingly move- 
 able aelf-determining nature, but in the being at the first glance 
 
316 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 nothing of this kind is as yet to be perceived ; it will soon, 
 however, be seen, upon fixed attention being directed to it, 
 what occurs ; for we have nothing to do but to watch the 
 transformations of the being. This being holds the same rela- 
 tion to the thinking process as the predicate does to the subject 
 in the logical judgment, for it declares (or predicates) what 
 the subject is ; it is the perceived for the perceiving Ego, the 
 reflex of the eye in a mirror for the eye that sees ; now just as 
 the latter cannot gaze directly at its own form and movement, 
 but only at its reflected image, while this again only yields a fac- 
 simile of that which is looking into the mirror, so also in this 
 objective being will the whole subjective nature of the thinking 
 process gradually reveal itself. 
 
 In the first place, what is this being, or what do we discern 
 therein ? We can only say that we distinguish as yet nothing 
 in it, nay more, that we cannot distinguish it from the void or 
 absolute naught. We bestow " being " as a predicate upon all 
 possible things, all qualities, nay, all thoughts without distinc- 
 tion, i. e. we say of every thing, if is, or that to every thing 
 being belongs, though not in a prominent sense, as if by this it was 
 meant to affirm that every thing is self-subsistent, eternal, and 
 absolutely per se, but in the general and utterly indeterminate 
 sense in which the logical copula is used for all that is but pos- 
 sible. If even we set aside all other predicates, by which 
 objects are more closely defined, there still, however, remains 
 this common, though in fact, non-affirmative being, which we 
 may predicate of every thing without distinction. Thus, this 
 being is a purely indeterminate state ; it is the thinking pro- 
 cess, which thinks of nothing ; the intuition, which looks di- 
 rectly forth, without gazing at any thing ; it is as though we 
 gazed upon the wide heavens, of which we cannot say, they are 
 blue, or are not the earth, or are not ourselves ; for we have 
 here made utter abstraction of every thing, have clean for- 
 gotten every aUenim, and hence have nothing with which to 
 compare this objectivity, or whereat, by distinguishing, to 
 determine it. 
 
 Although we might now imagine, that we have got in the 
 being something fixed and self-subsistent, or, at all events, 
 the very reverse of naught, we shall, notwithstanding, discern 
 and be constrained to acknowledge, upon Hegel's method, that 
 this being is in fact naught. Thus, being and naught are 
 indentical ; i. e. the supposed being has changed before our eyes 
 into the naught, or proved itself to be such ; it has wholly and 
 
HEGEL. 317 
 
 utterly become naught. Being does not merely border upon 
 naught, as if the former were here and the latter there, or the 
 one were to commence where the other ceases, both meanwhile 
 excluding each other ; but no, they are both one and the same 
 eodem loco et tempore ; I may speak at one time of being, at 
 another of naught, but by this I do not mean that they are two, 
 but only one and the same. Such then is the contradictory con- 
 tradiction as posited or existing, which was formerly held in 
 logical works to be an absolute impossibility, namely, that being 
 and non-being are the same. Yet, nevertheless, matters stand 
 thus. For it is just this very contradiction or actual self-contra- 
 dicting process that is, for it is in itself the movement of thought, 
 the absolute negativity, the continual opposition or antagoni- 
 zation of itself to itself (se sibi), the process of dividing and 
 judging, the sub-objectivity of the Ego in itself. 
 
 Now, with this point we have gained at once what we were 
 in search of, and what must follow as a matter of course ; for 
 behold, as if present before you in its first and purest form, the 
 moveable nature of the thinking process. It has, unobservedly, 
 become to us an object of intuition, and appears as origination 
 or becoming. In this origination^ being and naught are sup- 
 pressed, i. e. simultaneously preserved and contained ; for if we 
 analyse what is implied by the act of becoming, it is seen to be 
 an alternating process of origination and evanescence, or of 
 evanescence and origination, a continual transition from the 
 being into the naught and a continual proceeding from the 
 naught into being. 
 
 Such is the first Trilogy ; the unity of being, naught, and 
 origination, or of position, negation, and limitation ; but, as has 
 been already said, we have not by the latter term to think of 
 any external limitation, but only of the internal self-diflferencing 
 of this movement, or of the oscillation and vibration between 
 being and non-being. In this first methodical thesis, antithesis, 
 and synthesis, whereof the latter consists in a process or course 
 of gradually closer self-determination, we have at once an 
 example or type of all succeeding theses, and shall understand 
 these the more readily, by referring to the above simple move- 
 ment of thought. 
 
 Thus, what appeared in the beginning to be a simple, not 
 to say pure, being, has now become one that is in itself of a 
 more definite kind ; for it has, as a result of the above process, 
 proved itself to be such, and has, as it were, as a new product, 
 retired from active life, in other words, it has shown that the 
 
318 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 being, as we imagined, is, more correctly and definitely speaking, 
 to be called only an existence. Existence is a " here " or " now," 
 a demonstrative this or present being (for as yet it certainly does 
 not admit of any closer definition), the same, in other words, 
 that was presented to us as an object in the Phenomenology. 
 Hence it is that which admits of being predicated of each 
 definite being or something— ^\n short, of every something, i. e. 
 it is the general predicate which declares that that something 
 is a " there "- or " here "- existent. 
 
 In this bare existence, however, is comprised the disap- 
 pearance, or process of continuous cessation, which characterised 
 the origination or becoming, and each something is by virtue 
 of this, its predicate of mere present being, a finite ; that 
 whereby it is distinguished from another finite is a mere 
 quality, nay, closely considered, it is itself a mere quality, and 
 this word, in its most general acceptation, means nothing more 
 than " being not this or that," or being otherwise — i. e. 
 an alterum. We can take no note whatever of its existence, or 
 cannot distinguish any thing, unless simultaneously or succes- 
 sively an alterum were also to be present from which it might 
 be distinguished, or, rather, from which it objectively dis- 
 tinguishes itself, for on that account only do we distinguish it. 
 Returning to the example already given, we can only say, the 
 heaven is blue because it is not any thing else, e. g. not green,, 
 like the earth. That, however, which, apart from all examples, 
 must in a general and logical sense be predicated of the 
 existent, as its nature, is, as a consequence of what has been 
 stated, the finitude, by which at the same time the character of 
 mutability is to be understood. 
 
 It now devolves again upon the existence or the definite 
 positive something, and upon the other hand its negation, 
 namely the limit or finitude, to coalesce together into a 
 synthesis. Since, however, the alterum of the something is 
 itself an alterum, or because something is constantly limited by 
 an alterum or something else, finite being limited by finite, it 
 follows, that, in the present instance, an endless finitude, a 
 constantly progressive differentialiaation, comes at once into 
 play, and having itself no end or termination appears on that 
 account as infinitude. Finitude and infinitude are, indeed, 
 usually regafiied as opposites, which fully exclude each other 
 and enter our thoughts only by turns. But with this sup- 
 position only, an endless change of position or negation, or a 
 reciprocal line of demarcation between the finite and infinite, 
 
HEGEL. 319 
 
 yould be brought before the intuitive faculty, a progressus in 
 infinitum, which Hegel calls a miserable kind of infinity ; for 
 we may easily convince ourselves that in this way the true 
 infinity has not been thought of, for we let it cease precisely at 
 the point or moment of time where the finitude begins, so that 
 the former is as it were on the other side, the latter on this ; 
 for so soon now as one is bounded ofi" and suppressed by the 
 other, the infinity itself becomes again a finitude. What is 
 imperatively required is an identity of the two, like what 
 occurred in the origination or becoming, as the synthesis of 
 being and naught. Thus, the true infinity and at the same 
 time the truth of existence — consequently of the being also 
 that has been simultaneously resolved into that — is, that the 
 infinite be regarded as a constant transition into qualitative 
 determinations, and that indeed from one to the other, so that 
 it does not therewith pass out of itself, but coalesces in itself 
 together with itself. It is itself this process of self-transform- 
 ation ; for just because it is throughout a determination or a 
 finitude that distinguishes itself from itself, each one of these 
 determinations, when effaced, is by this process the opposite or 
 reverse of itself, i. e. has become different to, or is not that 
 which it was before, or has become that which previously it 
 was not, but which previously the other deterniination external 
 to it was. This other determination was, however, the direct 
 negation of what the first was, thus directly that whereunto 
 the first has now become, so that one has become reciprocally 
 the other, or regarded in toto, — and this is true infinity or 
 change — the general origination is again present, but with this 
 difference, that it is a definite, qualitative origination, a deter- 
 mination of itself in itself, or to use the language of Jacob 
 Bohmen, a qualification of itself. 
 
 In this way the second phase of being is perfected and its 
 result settles down as a quiescent precipitate, but only to begin 
 the process at the same time anew. This result is the bei7ig 
 per se ; and this being per se is that infinite relation to itself 
 which, in the infinite, proved itself to be direct self-determi- 
 nation. In the present case there is nothing external, no 
 alterum, to which the infinite could hold any relation ; for the 
 infinite must be the whole and can only be related to itself, 
 can no longer distinguish itself from an alterum, but only in 
 itself, being throughout this moveable process of relation. Thus, 
 the existent per se appears at first as one, or as a singleness 
 in itself that excludes every alterum. And in all this we now 
 
320 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 recognise the revealed nature of being, namely that that which 
 we really understand by being, this being per se, is not a 
 being related to an alterum or something else resting or 
 dependent upon this, but is a state of self-subsistence. It is 
 the being which the Atomist, for example, ascribes to his 
 atoms or monads, which, in a negative sense, implies a complete 
 independence of an alterum, in a positive sense, a perfect 
 being per se, having its own centre or gravitating point within 
 itself. 
 
 We have, however, to bear in mind that in this being per se 
 the existence and infinity are suppressed, and that thus it is 
 not the abstract being which the Atomist would insist upon, 
 yet cannot preserve from the process of origination and tran- 
 sition into its alterum, into which it is irresistibly drawn in 
 order finally to reappear or originate in this more definite 
 form. Each essence is in itself what all others are, or each- 
 regarded by itself alone would become all in itself, and 
 consequently the collective content, which was represented as 
 existing apart from it; and this very dialectic phenomenon 
 is the process which here again originates. If I regard a unit 
 per se, why then all other units are excluded or repelled from 
 it ; for the positive relation of self to self, this attraction or 
 contraction in itself, the retention of self within self, or self- 
 preservation, is simultaneously and intrinsically the repulsion' 
 of the alterum. Look at the movement of several molecules in 
 a single substance; while each of them attracts intrinsically 
 and in itself the parts of the fluid that immediately surrounds 
 it, they will appear to retire from the other molecules, diverge 
 from each other in opposite directions, consequently repel each 
 Other ; and this same movement, which appears as repulsion, 
 is at the same time, the above process of becoming attracted. 
 Thus, repulsion and attraction are identical, and in this identity 
 the first relation of self to self as well as its negation (re- 
 pulsion) have become reunited in the process : those opposites 
 are not to be regarded as two forces and principles operating 
 through each other, and together constituting matter, but to 
 be thought of dialectically as one and the same, or as this 
 negativity, of which they furnish the most distinct proof. 
 
 With the being per se or for itself the first part of the 
 doctrine of being or the so-called quality is perfected. We 
 have traced this doctrine through the moments of each separate 
 thesis, in order that in these we might at the same time 
 furnish examples of the dialectic method. Now, just as the 
 
HEGEL. 321 
 
 latter moves between the momenta of each individual category, 
 so also does it prevail between the categories themselves, and 
 we now proceed to ascend by somewhat larger steps the fol- 
 lowing stages. 
 
 The quality, as exhibited at length in the being per se, 
 was the being of the things themselves, recognised in its 
 truth: the differences of objectivity, which we call matter, 
 consist of qualities, or are themselves thoroughly qualitative, the 
 quality being identical with the being. This identity is now to 
 be negated. The negation of the quality is not, however, nega- 
 tion in the absolute sense, so that through it the abstract naught 
 may reappear, but it is the determined negation or direct 
 opposite only of quality or of the immediate unity of quality 
 and being, so that this unity it is which is suppressed, whereby 
 the quality becomes established as a quality indifferent to the 
 being, i. e. to the qualitatively determined being, and dis- 
 tinguishable from it, i. e. the quality turns out to be a quantity. 
 Into this the quality has itself passed over ; for the quantity is 
 the same as what the quality was ultimately proved to be, the 
 attraction and repulsion of the latter passing over in the present 
 instance into the two momenta of stability and discretion, in the 
 mutual relation of which consists every process of figures and 
 calculation. Thus, the definite quantity, the state of plus or 
 minus, is something by which the specific quality of matters 
 and the matters themselves do not appear by any means to be 
 changed ; for we can subtract more or less from one and 
 the same body without its qualitative nature being thereby con- 
 verted into something different. Quantity is in its nature that 
 which is externally definable, every quantity appearing as a de- 
 finite quantity or quantum. The difference of quantity is, how- 
 ever, or amounts only to, limit. This limit or determinate state 
 of quantity can, however, taken as it here is in a mathe- 
 matical sense, be either an extensive or intensive determination 
 of quantity, which last is called degree, a determinate state 
 which does not indeed express in itself any internal determi- 
 nation of the essence or nature of the something, but is only 
 measured and determined by external and in like manner 
 merely quantitative determinations. For example, ten degrees 
 of cold, or the tenth degree, is an intensity only in reference to 
 the ninth or eleventh degree, and so on ; though still an ap- 
 proximation is already made to the quality, which seemed 
 above to have wholly disappeared in the quantity. Thus, the 
 cold is cold only, and the heat only heat, through its degree, 
 
322 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 and thus by virtue of quantitative determination ; and we may 
 how see how it happens that by change of quantity the quality,-, 
 or inversely, becomes at the same time different to what it 
 was ; thus, ice becomes by a change of temperature fluid water, 
 water passes into the state of vapour, &c. 
 
 Hence, the degree, as being a quantitative determination- 
 with which a certain quality must be associated, is proved 
 to be really the ratio of measure. Measure, however, is »> 
 relation of two quanta to each other, as is seen clearly and 
 perfectly in relations of potency, square root of numbers, &c. 
 In the midst of the quantity, which a thoroughly external and 
 indifferent relation of the numbers to each other seemed to 
 comprise, thoroughly definite and unchangeable relations of 
 quanta to other quanta are declared ; and the cubic root, for. 
 example, is no longer an external scale or rule, but an internal 
 law of growth or increase, by which the so-called infinite 
 quantities may be determined. Lastly, the fundamental rela^ 
 tion of quantity, which has just been seen to be a continuity 
 and discretion, or an unity and plurality, is most distinctly de^ 
 clared in the relations of potencies, where the calculation is no 
 longer made with quanta as such, but with their relations (ex- 
 ponents), whereby this abstract category gains in itself again 
 a resting point and organisation, nay more, the most definite 
 ratio, which suffers it to reappear as an expression of quality or 
 rather to coalesce itself with the latter. Thus, it is distinctly 
 seen in stochiometric tables of chemical combinations, how the 
 quality is directly dependent upon quantitative relations, or 
 really consists itself of these, and how the specific (the quan- 
 tity) is itself of a quantitative nature, an internal measure, a 
 relation to itself. 
 
 Thus, while the quality is determined by the quantity, and 
 this again by the former, the one becoming simultaneously, 
 changed together with the other, we again encounter the well- 
 known progressus in infinitum ; from each relation of quantity 
 that passes beyond a definite specific measure another and new 
 quale must originate, and this again must pass over by continu- 
 ous enlargement into a new one, and so on in infinitum. This 
 process into the infinite is, however, solved both here, and 
 everywhere else where it comes into play, by the fact of re- 
 flection being brought to bear upon the act that accompanies it. 
 For, even here nothing more really occurs than the interchange 
 or shifting to and fro of two opposite determinations, a recipro-. 
 cation, which, repeat it as often as we please, leads to no goal. 
 
HEGEL. 323 
 
 and means just as much at first as it does at last. Thus, this 
 movement, just as it is, is the synthesis -which is to be firmly 
 retained, the thought that was actually thought, the true ; and 
 hence the category of measure is elevated as a mutual and 
 abstract relation of two quantitativo-qualitative determinations 
 up to the movement of the reflective process. It is the same 
 movement which has already been shown to occur in the being 
 per se as attraction and repulsion, and then in the quantity 
 as continuity and discretion : but here in the measure, it has 
 become objectively and fully apparent through the fact itself, 
 seeing that the measure directly represented a relation of two 
 sides, which are, however, in themselves the same thing, namely, 
 quanta ; thus, a relation of what ^is related to itself, so that 
 the quantity being now a simple relation of self to self, proves 
 itself to have therewith receded into quality, or to be identical 
 with this. 
 
 Kow, with this identity we have reached a new, a higher 
 logical stage. With quality, quantity, and their synthesis, or 
 the process of measure, the first logical cycle, or the sphere of 
 being in general, is completed. Its result was the movement of 
 reflection within itself, and this, objectified or posited, is or 
 constitutes essence. Eegarded phenomenologically, we have 
 now stepped from the stage of direct intuition into that of 
 the understanding. 
 
 If, hitherto, all the points that we have been contemplating 
 appeared to lie near or external to each other, or successively to 
 make room for one another, and then to disappear, so soon as a 
 new something entered the field, just as in the sensuous intuition 
 when the one, for example, the clear sky appears, the other, the 
 cloudy atmosphere, has passed away, without the one being the 
 ground of the other, or capable of maintaining itself as present 
 in and together with the other ; so also does this relation of 
 externality change into its counterpart, into the mutually in- 
 volved being of the opposite, and the relations now to be regarded 
 are concrete identities of two momenta simultaneously existing 
 in, with, and by each other. The intuition was previously of 
 a direct or immediate nature, i. e., not as yet objectified ; the 
 contemplative subject saw not the process of contemplation 
 itself, but only its determinations, the objects ; but it now sees 
 objectively the above process or determination, and its deter- 
 minations at one and the same time ; and the objectivities, which 
 now appear, are or imply just this objective unity of deter-, 
 mination and determinate state. 
 
 T 2 
 
324 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 . With the essence — in which, that we may recognise its move- 
 able nature, we must think of the infinitive mood of the obsolete 
 verb wesen — a deeper insight is afforded into the nature of the 
 Absolute or absolutely existent ; and we no longer persist in 
 calling this directly being or existence, but now call it essence, 
 indicating thereby that double nature, internal binary divi- 
 sion or state of antagonism, which now lies stamped, as it 
 were, or impressed, on the subject-matter itself, as well as on 
 the titles by which we shall henceforth designate the Absolute. 
 These titles are thorough ideas of reflection, relative or corre- 
 lative ideas, correlates which no longer involve their relation or 
 antithesis in a merely hidden manner, or merely in themselves, but 
 exhibit it openly per se or for themselves. The determinations 
 which the essence assumes are, therefore, of a different nature, 
 and endowed with a different character to those that occur in 
 the sphere of being ; for there these determinations or qualities 
 were directly the something, that is, disappears and becomes an- 
 other, while here, on the contrary, the determinations are posited 
 by the essence itself, seeing that it resolves itself into them, and 
 is in them its own reappearance ; for, since neither of these an- 
 titheses, c. g., cause and effect, can be without the other, it 
 follows that they appear to be conditioned by, and dependent 
 upon, one another, neither by itself alone sustaining the absolute 
 position, but a being only through or by b, and b through a ; 
 thus, in this category, true being, being per se or genuine 
 self-subsistence, is really absent, and is found again, for the 
 first time, in the third sphere, in that of the, properly so-called. 
 Idea; here at bottom only the appearance, but not the true 
 being occurs. The essence reveals itself at once as the process 
 of reflection, as the activity of self-polarisation, inward self- 
 opposition, division, or negativity, though still occurring imme- 
 diately and in itself. Thus, we may say that the essence of 
 things is the intelligence of nature, being the same act as the 
 understanding is in us, namely, a judging, self-discriminating 
 or reflective process, an internal reflection or manifestation 
 within itself. 
 
 We must now take a closer glance at the peculiar nature 
 of all the determinations of reflexion that are here mentioned. 
 We saw that, as correlates, each one of them has its subsistence 
 and being only with and by the other, but not for itself alone. 
 This state of being conditioned, the one by the other, is what 
 the understanding does not usually regard with sufficient atten- 
 tion, for by virtue of its own nature or disposition, to distin- 
 
HEGEL. 325 
 
 guish every thing, it sets them all as distinct and self-subsistent 
 essences over against each other, not bearing in mind that when 
 placed in this isolated position, not one of them can maintain 
 itself. Such is the self-contradictory nature of all determi- 
 nations of reflection, which, with internal unity, still preserve 
 to each other the appearance of isolated self -subsistence, because 
 they are derived at once from the category of mere exist- 
 ence ; while in the category of the essence that appearance 
 is completely stripped off, and the reflective determinations 
 must, by virtue of the dialectick, i. e., of their own self-suppres- 
 sion into each other in the act of thought, be completely trans- 
 ferred to the sphere of the true, and, in the stricter sense, so- 
 called Idea. 
 
 Now, those counterparts, or opposites, bear reference altoge- 
 ther to the definite antagonism of indifference and difference, 
 identity and difference, matter and form, internal and external, 
 and especially positive and negative. It is true that by 
 essence we usually think at first of the substratum, which has 
 in itself certain determinate states, or which lies at the bottom 
 of these. These determinate states, modes, and forms could 
 not, however, subsist, or be in any manner apart for themselves 
 alone, seeing that they are per se, a mere appearance, though, 
 in reference to the essence, they are its phenomenon or mani- 
 festation. Hence they are not to be separated from the 
 essence, but to every present appearance there must be at 
 bottom a real or essential element, or, to use the expression of 
 Herbart, for every appearance there must be a real to which the 
 former points. Thus, the appearance is not, accprding to the 
 usual mode of representation, to be severed from the essence, 
 nor laid down in any way as a self or per «e-existent. The 
 whole question depends upon how inwardly and essentially, 
 or how superficially we think to ourselves of this connection. 
 
 The simple, as essence, holds good in the first place as the 
 positive, or self-existent, while the determinate state, on the- 
 other hand, is, as the negative, non-existent in itself, posited 
 only by another, namely, by the positive. But it has been 
 already shown previously (for even by Herbart this dialectic 
 expression has been used for the idea of being), that the positive 
 is only to be thought of and determined as the non-negative, or 
 as negation of negation, just as in turn the negative is only 
 thought of as the negation of the positive. If, however, we 
 would separate the negative from the positive, and affirm that 
 the positive is not at the same time negative, but still, with all 
 
 Y 3 
 
326 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 this, let the negative — at least, as appearance— be and subsist 
 as actually present, why, then, this appearance, existing apart 
 from the positive, must subsist per se, and consequently be again 
 a positive ; hence it is seen that while this negative is at the 
 same time positive, the positive holds at the same time a nega- 
 tive relation in it, i. e., the whole question amounts to this, 
 that in the reality both determinations are suppressed in the 
 identity. Thus, both hold through themselves, or through their 
 own idea, a mutual relation, or can only be comprehended 
 through each other, the one by and with the other. Hence the 
 essence, which is truly thought of in this process as the existent, 
 is the very process of relation or reflection ; this negativity, 
 as being thought of and represented, is the true object, the 
 nature of the things, the interior, the essence, the noumenon or 
 thing in itself. 
 
 Position and negation are the 'two determinations which, in 
 this category of essence, are, so to speak, quite at home, and they 
 repeat themselves dialectically (just as being and naught did 
 above) in all kinds of formulae and modes of expression, which 
 here gradually come to pass. Thus, for example, even in nature 
 the universal matter is apprehended as the positive, the form as 
 the negative. Matter must be in itself the absolutely simple and 
 self-subsistent, the form or shape, on the contrary, the negative, 
 transitory. But, regarded more closely, the matter itself ap- 
 pears upon its gide to be self-subsistent, only because it is no 
 longer thought of as simple, but is reflection in itself, i. e., in- 
 volves ground and existence simultaneously in itself, and hence, 
 as existing or real matter, has at once the definite state or form 
 in itself, which we would separate from it as a form-deter- 
 mination. The same relations hold good of the expressions 
 power and manifestation, and with what is understood by inner 
 and outer ; for these two are only apprehensions of one intrin-: 
 sically present relation of the fact itself, and succumb to the 
 same dialectick which befel the positive and negative. 
 
 In order now to vanquish all these abstract antagonisms of 
 the understanding, Hegel sets out first from the side of the 
 essence, and shows how this of necessity thoroughly resolves 
 itself into phenomena, leaves behind no fixed substratum, but 
 is the thorough activity of the manifestation itself. And then, 
 upon the other hand, he shows that this manifestation is not a 
 void, unsubstantial appearance, but is, on the contrary, the same 
 as the essence, a real and actual existence or process of existing. 
 Thus, at the end is again revealed to us what was said at the 
 
HEGEL. 327 
 
 beginning, that it is altogether the reflection, which lies at the 
 root of these antagonisms, and in them only carries out its 
 essence, i. e. is what we call by this name. It is this an- 
 tagonising process, and relation of self to self in the antago- 
 nisms ; or, in short, it has the import of the copula in the 
 judgment, and the whole sphere corresponds, in the closest 
 manner objectively to the logical judgment subjectively. The 
 copula, in the judgment, falls or steps in between the subject 
 and predicate, consequently separates these two momenta, which 
 in the idea were immediately one, — divides or judges them, 
 — but is at the same time, what its name implies, their con- 
 junction, or rather relation and unity, and as this double func- 
 tion it is here seen to be objectively the essence. 
 
 We have, therefore, in the first place, an identity, which we 
 suppose to be such without any differences, just as we are com- 
 liionly in the habit of thinking the essence only as a simple 
 ground at principle from or out of which certain determinations 
 proceed. But the well known proposition of the ratio suffieiens 
 requires that in this ground the grounded should be contained 
 in a definite manner — ideally, potentially, by possibility, and 
 such like. Thus, we transfer at once the grounded, the result 
 or phenomenon itself, involuntarily into the ground or principle. 
 But, since here this developed multiplicity of determinations 
 would be again directly present, the ground would again be 
 wanting to it, or it would be a phenomenon without ground, i. e. 
 a mere appearance, and this in turn cannot be posited as exist- 
 ing or actual without the ground or essence, so that the reflection 
 sees itself finally necessitated to abstain from all attempts at 
 separation, and to recognise as dialectick the formulae in which 
 it sought to complete the identification of the sides. 
 
 T 4 
 
328 HISTORICAL SUKVET. 
 
 LECTURE XV. 
 
 HEGEL — (continued.) 
 
 In the conflict into which the thinking process fell with dialectic 
 necessity, while within the category of essence, it is chiefly the 
 relation of possibility and necessity that interests the under- 
 standing, and it may be well regarded as no mere incapacity upoa 
 the part of the latter, if it refuses to acknowledge the momenta of 
 the antithetical state as being thoroughly identical. It is, doubt- 
 less, a certain ethical instinct, by which the understanding is led- 
 to maintain at least the possibility for itself, and not to let it effect 
 a sudden transition, as it were, blindly into reality, since it 
 discerns therein a point of support, which human freedom, as 
 a possibility, but not as a necessity of manifesting itself, seems 
 absolutely to require. Nevertheless, it struggles in vain within 
 this sphere to free itself from the dialectic power ; it escapes 
 like a very Proteus by passing from one form into the other, 
 but everywhere attests, that within the reflection no single 
 momentum vouchsafes a secure resting-place, for every one of 
 them changes suddenly into its opposite, nay more, every one 
 is at once the alterum in itself. 
 
 Thus, even here there remains only the involuted process of 
 self-contradiction, the living negativity or reflective process, 
 in which the nature of the intelligent thinking process has 
 become the object to itself ; and hence the law of nature, as it 
 hovers before us objectively in the play of physical phenomena, 
 is to be recognised as the immanent special nature of the un- 
 derstanding, while the laws or categories, as Kant termed 
 them, of the latter, are to be regarded as nature or reality 
 itself. All subjectivism is consequently overcome, for all sub- 
 jectivity per se has been transferred to the phenomenon ; na- 
 ture, no more than the human understanding, conceals within 
 itself an unveilable something or profound mysfery ; the veil is 
 lifted from the Isis ; nature — as we have already become con- 
 vinced in the Phenomenology — having no interior which is 
 not an exterior, internal and external power and manifestation 
 being the same in one act, — one, because there is in truth but 
 
HEGEL. 329 
 
 one process of self-manifestation and recollection, i. e., because 
 in fact, it is only the reality, this actual operation or process 
 itself, which we call the actual or real. 
 
 The reality, which results as the truth of the essence and 
 manifestation is, in itself, the absolute relation, and appears as 
 necessity, so long as the sides of that relation are regarded 
 as self-dependencies, though nevertheless, by virtue of their 
 internal identity, they cannot declare themselves to be self- 
 subsistent, but subject only to control. The reality now appears 
 like aU categories, first in its immediateness, i. e., in the sense 
 in which we commonly use this expression, when we think 
 thereby of the existing universe, nature, and so on. The reality 
 is, indeed, by virtue of its origin from that relation (of the 
 essence and phenomenon), a relation always, but is, as it were, 
 a resting-point of the inward relation to itself, i. e., it is sub- 
 stantiality and accidentality, and the unity of this relation is 
 substance. Substance is tlie same as necessity, the inevitable 
 process of self-mutation and conversion, in short, the contra- 
 diction or negativity of the essence in itself. Substance and 
 accident are indeed opposed to each other, but they hold exactly 
 the same mutual relation as do essence and phenomenon. The 
 substance is the totality of the accidents, and the accidents are 
 nothing but the manifestation of the substance, which is not a 
 formal or external complex and ambitus of the accidents, but 
 is itself the process of transition into these determinations, and 
 consequently the form-giving activity, in which transition it 
 is at one with or retires into itself. Thus, the substance has 
 with Hegel a far more comprehensive meaning than in other 
 systems of philosophy, where it is partly regarded as being a 
 dead substratum, and partly as being that which, as the 
 abstract essence, the one formless side or basis, has been already 
 overcome. The substance is here the direct permanent process 
 or absolute transition of the form and content into each other ; 
 it is the same process which the reality, the absolute or im- 
 mediate action, is : action or activity is, however, an achieving 
 of something, a determining, particularising, formative process, 
 while at the same time what is formed, or the content, is not 
 in itself to be separated from this formative power. All that 
 is formed appears for itself to be devoid of individuality, to be 
 accidental, transitory, and evanescent into the substance as into 
 a dark, formless abyss. Such is the old eastern mode of con- 
 templating the Absolute ; one which, revived by Spinoza in 
 modern times, has been justly styled pantheism or pancosmism. 
 
330 HISTORICAL, SURVEY. 
 
 and which finds its direct reverse in Leibnitz, who admits, in 
 place of the mere accidents, monads as independent free indi- 
 vidualities, and so debases the substance to an utterly passive 
 condition. 
 
 As regards that formless abyss of substance or gloomy sub- 
 stratum (amounting, in fact, to its entire absence), it would be 
 impossible to comprehend how it is to arrive at definite shapes 
 and forms of its own self. Hegel justly misses iu the ponderose 
 or leaden substance of Spinosa all beginning and ground of 
 movement, and posites in its place the necessity of movement, 
 the restless negativity. This amphibolic power is the con- 
 stantly actual operation, an active and determining process, 
 which the reality already was, and is therefore to be recognised 
 as causality. 
 
 In so far as the accidents must not merely exist as such, or 
 accidentally in the substance, but the substance is their ground, 
 which as substance determines itself, it follows, that it is cause,, 
 i. e. that it is the original fact in the sense already mentioned, 
 namely, the substantial identity or real possibility, which, as 
 such, must be thought of as continuous and immanent in the 
 reality ; for were the internal power to be withdrawn from the 
 effect, why then the former would forthwith collapse into itself ; 
 and were the power not to act, why then it would be powerless^ 
 inefficient, or no power whatever. There is no content in the 
 effect that is not in the cause, but there is nothing also in the 
 cause which is not of an active nature. In the representation) 
 to ourselves of finite things* cause and effect are usually re- 
 garded as two distinct existences ; first, we say, comes the 
 lightning and then the thunder, first it rains and then it be-^ 
 comes wet. A slight reflection, however, serves to teach us that 
 the effect cannot be separated by any interval of time from the 
 cause ; the same bursting asunder and movement of the air,< 
 which is the lightning, is at the same time the vibration of air 
 which is the thunder ; and where rain is, moisture or wet is present 
 also. Any lapse of time in the sequence of events does not 
 appertain at all to the intrinsic relation of cause and effect ; 
 each cause achieves its proximate effect, i. e. its own effect 
 immediately, this in turn the next one, and so on. Thus, here 
 again, there originates the weU-known progressus in infinituwif 
 in the which, however, by going backwards, we do not arrive: 
 at a first cause, or, if forwards, at a terminal effect. We have 
 had the same phenomenon already brought before us by Kant 
 under the title of an " antinomy ;" of the same kind are aU such. 
 
HEGEL. 331 
 
 relations of reflection and dialectical opposites of the categor/ 
 of essence. -In this reflective process, matters do not depend 
 alone upon our making the distinction, and so repelling, as it 
 were, the effect produced from the cause, but just as much upon 
 our retaining firmly in our minds the identity of the two, or 
 that which was before indicated as their common substance. 
 If we proceed in the infinite series only from cause to effect, 
 and from this effect as a new cause to a new effect, which is in 
 turn a cause of some other effect, it follows, that we wholly dis- 
 regard what lies directly involved in the relation of causality, 
 namely, that something is merely a cause, and is so called, in 
 so far as it has or achieves an effect, and something in turn is 
 only to be termed an effect in so far as it has a cause ; so that 
 the relation doubles, as it were, upon itself, or is seen to be one 
 of a reciprocal kind, the effect being as much the cause of its 
 cause, as cause is effect of its effect, or both being thus the 
 same or identical. 
 
 . The relation of causality merely extends into the infinite, in 
 those cases where we omit to notice that one of the two 
 momenta invariably appears at first as the immediately present, 
 and on that account as cause, while the other appears as me- 
 diated and posited, and therefore as effect. But in good truth, 
 that first immediate is itself something posited. "We have 
 already declared, that moisture is result of rain, but we may 
 just as well declare that it is a cause of the latter, the whole- 
 question depending upon which of the two we set out with ; 
 the moisture evaporates, forms clouds, the clouds dissolve in 
 rain, the rain produces the wet ; the moisture or wet is thus as 
 much a cause as an effect ; and in like manner the rain, in like 
 manner the clouds, each member, in short, of the chain, being 
 this binary partition or amphiboly in itself. The same remarks 
 may be applied also to the Ego as subject-object. The Ego- 
 object or contemplated Ego is indeed that which is posited 
 originally by the Ego-subject, but seeing that it is present as 
 immediateness, it acts as cause, i. e. the Ego is only through the, 
 non-Ego an Ego, or the subject is only through the object, 
 although the non-Ego and the object has first been posited 
 by the subject, and was not present prior to or before it. 
 That which was in a hidden manner the posited, turns out to 
 be the positing, the cause ; but it is just as evident that th^ 
 object was a something posited or the effect ; in this way the 
 relation is turned roundabout, the one member of it becoming: 
 first mediated through the other, and then the latter through, 
 
332 HISTOKICAL SURVEY. 
 
 the former, so that both now are in truth reciprocally mediated, 
 while neither of them any longer immediately exists. 
 
 In fact, with all this, casualty has in the fullest sense of the 
 word become a reciprocal action, and this action or mutual me- 
 diation is consequently the truth of what was previously appre- 
 hended in a one-sided manner as a category of cause. " In the 
 reciprocal action," says Hegel, "the infinite progress of causality 
 is truly suppressed, while the rectilinear progression from 
 causes to effects and from effects to causes is in itself bent 
 round and back to a relation included or comprised within 
 itself. Thus, for example, in political speculations it has 
 been said, that the character of a people depends upon its 
 form of government, and then, in the next place, that the go- 
 vernment itself is derived from the people's character, until, 
 finally, we now come to regard both as mutually conditioned by 
 or through each other. 
 
 Nevertheless, this relation is and remains always an incom- 
 prehensible one, so long as its two sides are assumed to be 
 separate substances, the one passive, the other active, acting 
 in an external and mechanical manner upon each other. If 
 the internal identity of both sides is not at the same time 
 firmly kept in view, that reciprocal action cannot be compre- 
 hended, a fact this, which is strikingly exemplified in the 
 reciprocal action of body and soul. It is in every instance 
 comprehanded for the first time, when that which is usually 
 represented as a bare relation, or, as it were, the void mean 
 or distance between the two members, is itself posited as the 
 substantial energy of the spontaneous act of distinction, or as 
 the real indifference which undergoes a partition of itself into 
 the two sides, i. e. as that which is the energy of the absolute 
 negativity, and in which we now recognise in turn the unveiled 
 or posited necessity, or the substantial identity in its original 
 reality and activity. 
 
 Now, this truth of necessity is freedom, and the truth of the 
 substance is the Idea, i. e. the selfssubsistency, which being the 
 process of self-repulsion from itself into distinct self-sub- 
 sistents, is, as such a process, identical with itself, and is in 
 itself this continuous reciprocal action. 
 
 We have now reached the third division of the Logic, the 
 theory or doctrine of what Hegel terms the speculative Idea 
 {Begriff), We need not be reminded, that with this word is 
 associated another and far more definite meaning than is 
 usually done, when by idea is understood every abstract and 
 
HEGEL. 333 
 
 empty form of thought, a formal complex, a class of essences, 
 or what in language is commonly indicated by appellatives or 
 generic names. This vague meaning has, in short, given place 
 to one of a very definite and peculiar kind, to the closer consi- 
 deration of which we will now turn. 
 
 What the Idea is, may be recognised in the clearest manner 
 in the self-consciousness or the Ego, " for the idea, in so far as 
 it is to grow or thrive into an existence that is free, is naught 
 else than the Ego or pure self-consciousness." In the present 
 instance three momenta admit of being distinguished ; the Ego 
 as pure Ego is, 1st, the thinking process in toto, thought in 
 itself, or potency of thought ; 2ndly, it is the same process 
 determined, i. e. it thinks something, has an 'object, definite 
 thought, or is in some state of determination, for only when it 
 thinks of something definite is it an actual thinking process, 
 and because the thinking process and the thought are one 
 inseparable unity, it follows that the self-determining thinking 
 process is, 3rdly, individuality or Ego. The sphere of the 
 idea is not, however, limited merely to the self-consciousness ; 
 but this last, the self-conscious idea, is a direct ascension 
 or continuous education of the idea itself within its own 
 sphere, up to a higher existence, more commensurate with its 
 nature. To the conceivable being corresponds in nature the 
 organic element, or that which bears its own proper object 
 and its power of development or production within itself. We 
 cannot, however, with any propriety declare the three parts of 
 the Logic, the doctrine of being, essence and idea, to be the 
 metaphysics of the inorganic, organic, and spiritual ; for such 
 a view of the matter would be distorted and incorrect ; but, 
 according to Hegel's own statement, we must regard as corre- 
 sponding to being, the abstract representation of space and time, 
 to the essence, space replete and time replete, and lastly, to the 
 idea only, the whole as organism and life. Thus, the doctrine 
 of the idea discloses the higher standing-point, from whence 
 what is inferior is to be regarded, and in which it first appears 
 in its true light, just as naturalists, while admitting to a certain 
 extent the division of nature into organic, animate, and inanimate 
 beings, have yet acknowledged and declared, upon regarding 
 the universe from the higher and true point of view, that all is 
 but a great organism, an universal life, and " that nothing in 
 nature is dead." For nothing can appear to be dead and inor- 
 ganic, except when it is sundei-ed from its connection, and 
 j-egarded no longer as a vital moment and plastic form of the 
 
334 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 universal, but isolatedly as a thing per se. We set out, in fact, 
 with this ordinary mode of contemplation, as being that which 
 prevails in the two first spheres of the Logic ; but the dia- 
 lectick of these spheres constitutes at the same time the pro- 
 gressive steps to the higher and true comprehension of being, 
 namely, to that of the Idea, in which that lower existence is 
 also brought under consideration, and by not being suffered 
 wholly to evaporate, becomes placed in its true light. 
 
 Thus, the truly real or actual is that which from its inward 
 nature can itself subsist and appear as a singular, per se. 
 In the beginning, or in the sphere of being, we had, it is true, 
 individualities also before us, but they were not strictly entitled 
 to the rank of intrinsically individual essences, but were only 
 finite determinations, qualities abstractedly retained per se, thus 
 mere determinations, and hence something posited, conditioned, 
 dependent, which, passed by as a change and, without stopping, 
 became suddenly converted into an alterum or other. In the 
 sphere of the essence the existence was seen to be divided, on 
 either ■ side, into two determinations reciprocally conditioning 
 each other, but forasmuch as each had per se its essence 
 extraneous to itself, they were exposed or given up to the 
 necessity of the connection, and thus had in themselves only an 
 apparent self-subsistence, or semblance of such. Finally, in the 
 idea this relative state of being has become the absolute, the 
 true being per se, and this self-being has declared itself to be 
 an absolute reality, or actual process, which at the same time 
 bears reference to itself, and as such a singular actively 
 maintains itself. Thus, here in the individual, so far as it is 
 isolated per se, resides the special power, also, of becoming, 
 being, and remaining such ; the individual is a whole, a totality 
 for itself, whose determinate states are self-determinations ; self- 
 determinations in whose alternation or change the self, namely, 
 that power or the universal, neither does nor can change 
 and pass by, just because it is the universal, not the individual 
 definite state. The ideal is thus eternal, but eternal only, in 
 so far as it is the universal, or nature itself ; but what, on the 
 contrary, is in it an individual and particular limitation, is given 
 up altogether to change, for it is a mere modus existendi. We 
 shall return to this point further on ; at present it is seen that 
 the essence, as idea, has far more taken into than separated from 
 itself all multiplicity, or at all events the power thereunto ; that 
 it has consequently become not abstractedly simple, but in this 
 sense concrete ; it is seen too that in order to portray an indi->. 
 vidual being as durable, truly being and outlasting all change. 
 
HEGEL. 335 
 
 we must not think of it as qualitatively simple, and by abstrac- 
 tion dispose of all diversity and multiplicity, but must strike 
 into a road the direct reverse of this. Thus, the singular, 
 vfhich each existing idea is, is not on that account abstractedly 
 simple, but comprises the power within itself of all possible 
 determinate states, and is, in so far as it attains to existence, 
 present itself in these states, and is thus every time itself some- 
 thing determined or definite. The individual is thus from its 
 fundamental essence or its identity with itself simultaneously 
 and constantly the universal, and at the same time, from its 
 determinate state, the special. Universality, speciality, and 
 individuality are accordingly the three momenta of the idea, 
 and are present in it as an unity. The universal is that which 
 in the logical definition the genus is, the particular what the 
 differentia specifiea or species is, while the individual is 
 the defined object. 
 
 The idea, however, as it is first of all presented to us prior 
 to all further development, is at first a direct or immediate 
 ground, and corresponds to the immediately existing principle 
 of life or organisation in the organisms previous to the state of 
 its realisation or self-exposition. Yet, as such a ground, it is 
 already one that is potentially rich, concrete, and self-deter- 
 mining, and, in reference to that which it is to work out and 
 become, an immanent object or purpose unto itself. Thus, it is 
 as yet in its subjective condition, present as a subjective idea, 
 and to be regarded as such, i. e. as that which from its nature . 
 it is indeed in itself but has not as yet realised to itself. Thus, 
 it hovers in the present instance directly before our thinking 
 process as the formal process itself, being still the thinking 
 process of the observer ; the observer has indeed discovered 
 what the idea is in itself, and sees also in the things without 
 himself a comprehensible being; but the idea, which these 
 objects include in themselves, has in them not as yet entered 
 into or become a matter of the consciousness ; thus, while the 
 thinker thinks the idea, he thinks and observes his own- 
 thinking process, and in this the nature of the true being or 
 idea altogether, but at first only as the idea is formally in itself, 
 or without any reference to its reality. 
 
 The second point is now to observe how this subjective idea 
 imparts its existence to itself, or represents itself in its own 
 objectivity, as the real idea that has emerged from its inward 
 state and passed over into existence. Thus, it has its own 
 existence, is and is actually per se, seeing that from its own 
 
336 HISTOBICAI, SURVEY. 
 
 nature it cannot be without existence. Nevertheless, it is even 
 in this state still immersed at first in its own existence, being 
 wholly absorbed therein : for just as it was heretofore wholly 
 subjective, so at present it is wholly objective, being not as yet 
 that which it is for itself, but only for the observer ; being, as 
 an animal and vegetable soul, as creative life, still immersed 
 directly in the body, distributed and absorbed therein, being 
 internal and external, soul and body in one. But this internal 
 state is only that of universality, while the externality, or 
 materiality is but the determinate state of one and the same 
 idea; this idea has become, from being a mere principle, a 
 now existing body, and this " becoming " or self-realisation 
 continues, until the idea is perfectly realised — the idea which 
 is already free in itself, existing per se, and thus becoming per- 
 fect also, a perfect being for itself of that which it is intrinsi- 
 cally or in itself, i. e. arriving at self-consciousness and the 
 conscious freedom of the self-determination. It becomes and 
 is this, and is thus present for the first time in a perfect state, 
 or is the thinking self-cognisant or conscious idea in this its 
 simultaneously, material, and objective existence; thus, the 
 Idea {Begriff) is Subject-Object, or, to use Hegel's own ex- 
 pression, the Idea in its Identity {Idee). 
 
 We return now from this preliminary survey back to the 
 Idea {Begriff). Thus, the idea in the stricter sense, regarded 
 purely as to its form, yields that which is usually called 
 formal, but which, properly speaking, ought to be termed 
 subjective logic; the latter accordingly finds in the present 
 system its subordinate place. It has been seen, how the idea 
 undergoes partition into the jvdgment and in the conclusion 
 again coalesces into the totality of the momenta. We pass 
 over this section " of subjective logic," observing only, that 
 the whole familiar content of ordinary logic is here brought 
 before us, though arranged in an essentially dififerent manner 
 and viewed in an entirely new light. For while, namely, the 
 different relations of the idea, the forms of the judgment and 
 conclusion, are successively derived without any immanent 
 principle from the practice of thought, the exposition of those 
 relations here depends upon our developing in this subjective 
 sphere the formative momenta of the thinking process, as being 
 that genesis which of necessity continuously determines itself 
 and in like manner repeats and verifies itself also in the re- 
 maining parts of the system as a logical form-activity that has 
 become objective. 
 
HEGEL. 337 
 
 The momentum of universality is the idea, as the substance 
 which remains identical with itself in the midst of all diiFer- 
 ences, the thinking process or infinite negativity itself; the par- 
 ticularity is determinate universality, the species or that -which 
 Plato called the ideas ; while the identity of particularity and 
 universality is individuality. The universal is only actual as 
 a^ singular, i, e. the genus exists only in exemplars or indi- 
 viduals, each of which represents the whole genus, so that the 
 singular is the universal. The idea is consequently an imme- 
 diate and inseparable unity, but not an abstract or empty one. 
 The differences which are included in it, are manifested in the 
 judgment, or become, so to speak, logically existent. The 
 judgment runs thus ; the subject is the predicate ; for example, 
 the individual (Caius) is mortal. Here the copula seems at 
 first to express a diremption of the momenta ; but it expresses 
 just as much their identity or substantial bond ; and this is 
 seen to be the case in the conclusion, where the copula unfolds 
 itself into the definite middle term, which is the common 
 ground, or that in which both the momenta are identical, as 
 in the common race, e. g. Man ; Caius is mortal upon this 
 ground, because he is a man. None of the^e three termini or 
 momenta is for itself ; Caius (the individual) is here the same as 
 man is, and man is the same as mortal ; each has consequently 
 the distinction of universality, particularity, and individuality, 
 in itself, which distinction is by the three judgments, whereof 
 the syllogism consists, just as much posited as suppressed, so that 
 the conclusion represents in itself the now unfolded unity of 
 the idea, or the course and process (mediation) of the idea, the 
 result of this being an acknowledgment of the now consistent 
 unity, in which none of the three momenta subsists for itself, 
 but each only by means of the other ; so that that which is 
 the whole, is constantly and immediately present at the same 
 time. The result is therefore a fresh immediateness, which 
 proceeds from suppression of the mediation, i. e. it is a being, 
 which is identical in itself with the self-mediation in itself, or is 
 itself the latter. 
 
 At the conclusion of the "subjective logic," we again en- 
 counter the sudden conversion of the merely subjective into the 
 merely objective. The being of the idea is a being in itself and 
 for itself, a fact this which takes place in and for itself,, and is 
 consequently again the objectivity.* The idea is that in which 
 
 * Hegel's Lo^k, iii. p. 171. 
 z 
 
338 HISTOEICAL SUEVET. 
 
 immediateness and mediation are the same, or in which the 
 idea and being, essentia and existentia, are identical, the sub- 
 jectivity being immediate objectivity, the thinking process the 
 being. This transition or sudden conversion of the pure sub- 
 jectivity or idea into pure objectivity is a necessary conse- 
 quence, seeing that the idea has been acknowledged to be the 
 absolute negativity or the self-determining and self-subsistent. 
 It is the same transition as that of the idea of God into the 
 existence of God, and the self-dissolution of the logical idea 
 into the reality of nature : a sudden conversion or self-muta- 
 tion of the subjectivity directly into objectivity, or the ma- 
 nifestation of the identity of the two in themselves, the same 
 act of reflection, in which consisted phenomenologically the 
 transition of the consciousness into, the self-consciousness, or 
 the direct belief in the objectivity of what is represented in 
 the perception of subjective idealism, which self-same act here 
 turns into a perception of the subjective ideality as objec- 
 tivity ; for where only subjective determinations hover before 
 it, this subjective objectivity is at the same time the only ob- 
 jectivity, which is present, and which is not to be distinguished 
 from an external real. 
 
 We are consequently suddenly withdrawn from the sphere 
 of the subjective logic, and transported into the region of objec- 
 tivity, or into the " doctrine of the object," which resolves itself 
 into "mechanism, chemism, and teleology." The content of 
 the so-called " objective logic," or the doctrine of being and 
 essence, must here return, though comprehended from a higher 
 point of view ; for now stands before us, for the first time, the 
 whole, the totality, as idea, i. e. in its truth. Now, we are 
 already famUiar with what lay in itself at the foundation of 
 that finitude and dissevered state of the shifting phenbmena, 
 namely, the substantial unity of the idea ; for this is — we know 
 — the intrinsically working ground or principle. The idea 
 itself had directly entered into and been converted into the 
 entire fulness of its determination, and had become the soul 
 of its several menifcers, without, however, being as yet in this 
 organization a soul for itself, i. e. mind ; it had therewith 
 lost its being for itself, and been obliged to reinstate itself from 
 out this material or natural state, i. e. to return from the ob- 
 jectivity into the subjectivity in and for itself. As a formal 
 totality (universality) of the members it is estranged from it- 
 self, and enters into relation with them as with a something 
 alien and external, for the whole of nature thoroughly consists 
 
HEGEL. 339 
 
 of this externality, disjunctivity, and temporo-spatiality, and 
 thus all things in her hold an external relation to each other ; 
 and this relation is mechanism, which must occupy a place in 
 the sphere of logical thought, just as much as in nature, for 
 the latter reflects itself in the former, and there is altogether 
 nothing that cannot be thought of or cognised in an adequate 
 manner. 
 
 In mechanism the influence of one object upon another is 
 so manifested, that both objects remain during its exercise as 
 self-subsistent, as they are, but impart a determinate state to 
 each other. Thus, one and the same determinate state is here 
 continued over from one to the other. In this the essence of 
 the objects holds the relation only of the abstract-universal, 
 in itself indeterminate but determinable element, which is in 
 all the same identity ; the form of the individuality of external 
 objects is in this wholly unessential, and can offer no resistance 
 to that determination which pervades them. Thus, bodies are 
 altogether permeated by heat, magnetism, electricity, and the 
 imponderable agents, and show, in this way, that their passive 
 determinability by external communication, is founded only 
 in the identity or universality of their essence ; even common 
 sense here acknowledges the rule, that like can only act upon 
 like. Thus, the identity or universal essence is seen to be 
 that very side from which the objects have an existence open 
 for others. 
 
 With all this communication, however, the objects still re- 
 main at the same time single and persistent in their self-sub- 
 sistence, or they reinstate again the individuality which belongs 
 to them as ideas, in the universality ; in short, they re-act. 
 But this does not imply that they suppress the action, but 
 that they transfer it to themselves, and receive it as their own, 
 so that the fprocess is dispersed among the objects, disinte- 
 grated among them, or in them undergoes a particularisation. 
 Thus, the universal disperses itself among the objects, so that 
 each object obtains in itself a share thereof, and asserts itself 
 as a singular while it suppresses the influence as an universal 
 one in itself. Now this influence becomes in the singular cen- 
 trality, and so constitutes the individual self-subsistence of the. 
 objects ; but the action has with this passed over at the same 
 time into a state of rest — into a per-se-hemg of the individual 
 objects, which owe that which they now are, or the "how" of 
 what they are, only to that communication from without, and 
 to such a degree, that this quality does not appear as one that. 
 
 z 2 
 
340 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 was derived from the nature of the object, but externally im- 
 posed upon it from some foreign source. 
 
 Accordingly, the object is proved to be, upon the one hand, 
 the indeterminate universal, which behaves in a passive, ua- 
 elastic, and dependent manner ; though, upon the other, it has at 
 the same time a self-subsistence or independence impenetrable 
 by another. Now, the same contradiction or difference which 
 the individual object here exhibits in itself, the objects have 
 also among themselves, namely, that of self-subsistent indivi- 
 duality and dependent universality. The greater and stronger 
 embraces and pervades the weaker, seeing that it adopts it and 
 constitutes one sphere along with it. Still it subdues the 
 latter only in so far as the latter presents some resistance to it ; 
 thus, were the latter to be thoroughly passive, porous, and 
 dependent, no relation with it would be possible: a ball 
 traverses, indeed, a firmly fixed board, but not a handkerchief 
 flying loose in the wind. Now, it is in truth easy to perceive 
 that in this way the passive object directly maintains itself, 
 and does so only in so far as its essence is identical with the 
 influencing power {a character which was formerly declared to 
 be its unprotected state or weakness), thus is itself universal, 
 and gifted with a capacity for what is communicated ; it suc- 
 cumbs, however, to the power with all the particular determi- 
 nate states that are not adapted to this (as, for example, the 
 board, with its brittleness and immobility), which it cannot 
 take up into itself and render its own states or predicates, 
 or in the which it cannot preserve itself as subject. Thus, 
 the power is only in this second aspect something foreign to 
 an object ; as being universal, it is the power which is not 
 foreign to' the individual object, but is its own substance, in 
 which it encounters itself as in its own possession, and has 
 its subsistence or definite existence, and this, indeed, because 
 or in so far as the individual object is itself an essential de- 
 termination of the universal. Thus, the merely external indi- 
 viduality, depending upon no universally essential distinction, 
 i. e. the individual exemplar, as such, certainly and invariably" 
 succumbs, while the universal subsists in it as an essential de- 
 termination, and continuously renews itself in the singular. 
 
 The self-subsistence and unity of individual essences, which, 
 as objects, consist of a multiplicity of predicates, is manifested, 
 as' we saw, in the sphere of mechanism as their middle point 
 (centrality). This multiplicity, as being a spatial disjunct! vity, 
 is seen to be a collection of numerous objects distributed within 
 
HEGEL. 341 
 
 a certain range, which are dependent upon the centre, and find 
 in this their point of union or relation. Now, what appears to 
 be an attractive force of the centre traversing all the objects, 
 as, e. g., in the atmosphere of our planet, together with all its 
 creatures, is, in fact, only the momentum of universality or 
 identity of essence, whereof all such manifold formations consist, 
 just, for example, as the terrestrial creatures are but the de- 
 terminations and specifications of the earth-essence. The 
 earth, as one of the heavenly bodies, is an individual ; it is an 
 idea, i. e. an universal, which is at the same time a something 
 in itself manifold, determinate, and thereby remains a singular, 
 individual, or one whole, because all its parts hold a mutual re- 
 lation, and hence constitute an unity that appears in the material 
 world as centrality. Among themselves those definite single 
 parts again hold the relation of a whole, being, as objects, in a 
 state of disjunetivity and proximity to each other, and on that 
 very account exercising repulsion, pressure, and so on towards 
 'each other. This relation does not, however, take place be- 
 tween the peripheric objects and the central body; for the 
 latter is or constitutes the obiects, is their essence, and they all 
 consist essentially of the universal essence of the central body, 
 and are in it in a state of rest, depending in it upon themselves. 
 Such central bodies are no longer to be called mere objects^ 
 for their determinations, the whole multiplicity of essences, 
 which the central body has as its own modifications in itself, are 
 immanent in it, or it is as an universal essence immanent in 
 these as their determining principle. 
 
 Since, however, as essence it is distributed among the indi- 
 vidual, and for themselves non-self-subsistent objects, and 
 because as essence it still exists in the form of a spatial dis- 
 junetivity, all those objects participate not only in this fixity of 
 essence, but also in its form, and so carry each of them a centre 
 in itself, and are, as relative centre or individuals, placed 
 spatially without or external to that first absolute centre. 
 Thus, the latter represents the logical universal idea under which 
 those relative centres, as species or particularities, are subsumed 
 or taken in, and as these relative individualities are centralised 
 in themselves, and bear relation to that which in them is of a 
 persistent nature. or essence, they are consequently related to 
 the universal in them, which was, however, nothing else but 
 that universal centrality. Thus, logically, regarded, they form 
 likewise a conclusion, in which the relation to itself is at the 
 same time a striving after an absolute mid-point or centre, 
 
 z 3 
 
342 HISTORICAL SURVEY, 
 
 which in the material world is manifested as centripetal force, 
 or as the identical gravity of the central body, which the peri- 
 pheric individuals strive towards as to their subject, while they 
 maintain themselves simultaneously as subjects. 
 
 Hence the mechanism has become at once a free mechanism ; 
 the different objects have in the universal and pervading per- 
 sistency of essence (which maintains itself in the particularisa- 
 tion identical with itself), or in the gravity, their essence, and 
 are consequently subjects that are not subjected to a purely 
 external mechanical pressure and impulse, but to a law only. 
 Every law, however, is, in the true sense, just as much an in- 
 ternal as external power, i. e. it is a peculiar power, will, and 
 obligation inherent in the individual itself. As, for example, 
 in the state, while the general laws are felt by the individual to 
 be at once a prescript or command, a foreign external will or 
 constraint, it is still seen that if the laws be rational, they do 
 but express the collective will of all, and thus that wherein each 
 individual has his part to play, or in which he recognises again 
 his own will and freedom of action. So also in nature. The 
 world is one great whole, one real idea. It lies, as we saw, in 
 the nature of the idea, not to remain an abstract, empty uni- 
 versal, but its existence is the particularisatiou itself, and the 
 actual world is this particular. In nature, the idea is the self- 
 particularising universal gravity, the universal process of self- 
 relation to self, or self-contraction, which in every point is 
 related to itself, posites relative centra, subjects, in itself, and 
 even in these never ceases to hold relation to itself. Now it is 
 in these individual subjects that nature succeeds in first escaping 
 from the rigidity of spatially separated parts into free fluidity 
 and unimpeded mobility, which then potentialises itself, as we 
 have seen, still further on into persistency of soul. 
 
 Nevertheless, the universal does not as yet exist as an anta- 
 gonism to the material, but is omnipresent in it as its funda- 
 mental substratum or essence, and constitutes the nature and 
 power of all determinate states, though it is not as yet for 
 itself, but only as an immanent law of nature. The centre has 
 here diverged asunder into its periphery, has distributed itself 
 over the whole, and while it still remains, as idea, the collective 
 relation to itself as a whole, it has placed itself in the parts 
 themselves into states of tension with itself, or rather, these 
 parts themselves are but the actual states of tension of the 
 universal in itself. As tensions, however, they are opposites 
 and counterparts, consequently, determinate qualitative states 
 
HEGEL. 343 
 
 or differences, which tend towards each other, and would 
 return together into the unity. Hence the centrality is at 
 present a relation of these negative and tensed objectivities to 
 each other, and the free mechanism has now passed over into 
 ehemism, i. e. the self-judgment (^Sich-ur-theilen) in the 
 sphere of objectivity. 
 
 The chemical relation wholly corresponds in turn to the 
 judgment in the subjective logic, and to the category of essence 
 in the objective. The chemical element is not like the indi- 
 vidual in the mechanism, an existent, or totality per se, but is 
 a difference, a determinate state, which declares at once its one- 
 sidedness and non-independence, points to an "alterum," and 
 has thus fallen anew under necessity ; for the whole, to which 
 it belongs, is indeed an universal, formless, but nothing in- 
 dividual, being but an idea, whose momenta are found to be 
 distributed over two different objects ; it strives, therefore, to 
 free itself from this existence, which is incommensurate with 
 its intrinsic nature or its idea, and to return to an unity with 
 itself; yearns constantly to render itself a real whole in the 
 existence, and that indeed with an irresistible and most inevi- 
 table natural force. Thither tend not merely the phenomena 
 and laws of chemistry in the real sense, but this logical funda- 
 mental relation embraces all which occurs in physics as an 
 elementary, meteorological, magnetic, electric, and, finally, che- 
 mical process. 
 
 Mechanism was only the first and whoUy external form of 
 objectivity, which obtrudes itself upon the empirical observer ; 
 we, however, abide by this too frequently, and transfer it to 
 the region, for example, of life and mind, to which it does not 
 belong, or in which it plays but a subordinate part ; for it is only 
 in nature among the utterly abstract relations of matter that 
 mechanism prevails. The same remarks hold good of the 
 chemical process with which, st,3 was remarked, there is in the 
 Logic associated the ulterior signification of dynamicism as 
 opposed to mechanism. 
 
 StiU, we may well wonder, how these ideas and the idea 
 even of life are to come within the range of logic, unless in 
 every instance we bear in mind, that content and form, or that 
 which is thought of and the mode in which we think it, are 
 never to be separated, that the logic is accordingly at one and 
 the same time a doctrine of metaphysics or cognition, and that 
 the doctrine of the idea must be the doctrine also of its forma- 
 tion. In mechanism as well as in ehemism, the logical form is 
 
 Z 4 
 
344 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 to be recognised as that which confers rationality upon objective 
 nature, and renders it comprehensible for our understanding 
 as a process of logical necessity. This logical form or this^Jntel- 
 ligence of nature is the syllogistic form, in which the momenta 
 of the objectivity are manifested, whether we view them as 
 mechanism from the quantitative, or as chemism from the 
 qualitative side. As in the syllogism, each terminus in the 
 series can be regarded as a radius or middle one, which judges 
 as well as unites the two others, so also is this exhibited in the 
 momenta of mechanism, especially in the so-called mechanics 
 of the infinite — in absolute mechanism — which, nevertheless, 
 repeats itself also in the singular. We can, for example, 
 regard the central body, the universal space, and the bodies of 
 the periphery, as such termini, the identity of which is gravity, 
 i. e. attraction and repulsion. This latter, the material or na- 
 ture existing in a spatially disjunctive state, this negativity, 
 appears as the medius or judgment, which extends to both its 
 extremes, and, consequently, as the universal or positing ; or, 
 even the momentum of particularity, i. e. the individual bodies 
 themselves, may be regarded as centra, but which, by virtue of 
 their material nature, have just as much their centre out of 
 themselves, and, consequently, through this their " internal " 
 coalesce with each other ; or, finally, the whole may be re- 
 garded as a singular whose centrality bears reference to non- 
 independent objects by a medium which unites in itself their 
 centra as non-independent momenta. Even in ordinary con- 
 sciousness, we take at one time the earth's attraction as the 
 cause of the fall, at another the weight of the falling body, and 
 then again this movement itself as the identity of the two ; 
 here also we posite as ground, now the one, now the other, 
 and with this affirm but one and the same thing, the union or 
 substantial unity of the two in themselves. 
 
 In chemism the object has or is itself a definite quality ; but 
 as idea it must not only be a determinate state, but the totality 
 of determinations ; it is thus involved in the contradiction of 
 the actual existence and the noumenon or real being, and it 
 strives to suppress this contradiction. As in iuechanism, the 
 falling body has its centre of gravity out of itself, so has the 
 object the chemical " alterum " out of itself, to which it is 
 attracted by its so-called affinity. The ground of this attrac- 
 tion, to which it succumbs, is the identity which both extremes 
 are in themselves, the indifference, which is projected into dif- 
 ferences. Even here these extremes may appear at one time 
 
HEGEL. 345 
 
 to be the agent or middle-term, at another the substantial 
 identity itself. 
 
 Now, the course of the chemical differentiation, neutralisa- 
 tion, and reduction, jj^Ws as a result the suppression of the 
 externality or objectivity of the momenta themselves. This 
 objectivity consisted in the immediateness wherein the momenta 
 were found to exist. Just as cause and effect were elevated 
 into reciprocal action, so also, in the present instance, the differ- 
 ences met with proved themselves to be, in the first place, 
 immediate, though they were in their relation proved to be 
 only dependent momenta, which endeavoured to return to their 
 identity; thus, the latter was recognised as being produced, 
 mediated, and posited by the former ; but still with all this, the 
 identity is simultaneously acknowledged and presupposed to be 
 the original element, or that alone in which the differences could 
 have their ground or foundatior, and by which they themselves 
 were in fact, for the first time, posited and mediated. Now, in 
 this way the immediateness, in which the objectivity consisted, 
 is suppressed upon both sides, both sides are mediated, the one 
 indeed by the other, and the result is the self-mediation of the 
 whole in itself, and consequently, the idea itself is again repre- 
 sented as a living unity, this being a self-mediation, and the 
 self-mediation a self-objectifying or self-realisation. This, 
 however, is the living organism. " The idea, which has here- 
 with suppressed all the momenta of its objective existence as 
 external and posited them in its simple unity, is by these means 
 perfectly freed from objective externality, to which it bears 
 only the relation of an unessential reality ; this objectively free 
 idea being the purpose or object." 
 
 In here speaking of designs or purposes, we must not merely 
 think of certain representations of a rational essence, which it 
 would realise, and to which it uses certain materials as means. 
 For, by design is here meant that immanent design, which 
 Kant, as already pointed out by Schelling, was the first after 
 Aristotle, to introduce into philosophy in his " Naturlehre " and 
 " Kritik der Urtheilskraft." The immanent design manifests 
 itself in such essences as are still in the form of an embryo or 
 germ, as a direct living impulse to grow, develope, evolve 
 themselves bodily and spiritually, in short, to realise or become 
 actually what as to their capacity, tendency, potency, or inter- 
 nal determination, they may and ought to become. The exe- 
 cution or carrying out of this design is the organic process, 
 or life. 
 
346 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 Thus, the design, or the subjective idea, as being essentially 
 an endeavour and impulse to posite itself externally, is exempt 
 from the transition ; i. e. as being idea and self-purpose only 
 — not mere cause and effect, — the essence maintains itself 
 under every change, as that which it was from the beginning, 
 and does not pass over into an "alterum;" thus, it alone has, as 
 was already shown above, aU. change under its power or con- 
 trol, and does not fall in the dissolution into an unconnected 
 externality of mechanical parts, nor into the perishable state 
 to which all other previous forms of being fall a prey. Now, 
 in so far as the design is a subjective one — and this it is in 
 the outset — it is the immediate design, and ranks of itself still 
 within the sphere of immediateness or objectivity, is still 
 affected by externality, and has an objective world opposed to 
 itself, to which it bears relation. The design is here, in the be-, 
 ginning of its process, still subjective in itself, and has first to 
 realise itself as design. As a living something it is also a 
 particular and singular, and is, consequently, related of necessity 
 to an " alterum," which " alterum," though still an external, is 
 indeed finite and transitory in itself when compared with that 
 living something, and is dealt with by it as such. Life, as the 
 immediate purpose to itself, is the negation of this externality, 
 or of the objects or means of life ; it is the process of self- 
 activity, which is continually engaged in suppressing the con- 
 tradiction, which consists in that which is proper to the life of 
 the individual, that over which it has power or control, still 
 yearning to announce itself as something strange and self- 
 subsistent, a state of separation this which is felt as want and, 
 requirement, hunger, thirsty &c., by the individual. Hence, 
 life is a continual negation of externality, and this process is its 
 own proper object, wherein it both has and feels itself. But 
 just because it is in itself this alone, it follows that it cannot 
 be, unless that externality were at the same time present ; the 
 negation would cease, so soon as there were nothing to negate ; 
 the perfected negation of the objectivity would be its own 
 negation. Since then it is thus necessarily or dialectically 
 related in itself to externality, i.e. is itself external (as body) 
 in itself, it must constantly reinstate the objectivity, or this 
 constantly re-originates to it — like the desire from the grati- 
 fication. The immediateness met with is only suppressed by 
 the movement of the. object, in order that it may be posited, as 
 determined and posited by it, the idea itself, thus, only ia 
 order that the subject in this suppression and positing may 
 
HEGEL. 347 
 
 satisfy and maintain itself as a process of spontaneous activity. 
 Thus, the true final purpose is the freedom of the subject, or the 
 development of itself as a subject triumphant over all. 
 
 The definite finite subject encounters objects directly in the 
 sphere of finitude, unto which it has to impart its own internal 
 determinate state, and render them equivalent to its subjective 
 object, i. e., to deal with them as means. That which is used 
 as means is indeed an existing object, but does not hold good 
 as a final purpose, but for an intrinsically worthless being, 
 which we may use as a merely mechanical or chemical object, 
 but which cannot maintain itself independently against the 
 activity of the design. Hence the object has the character of 
 being powerless against the design, and being obliged to serve 
 it ; for the design is its subjectivity or soul, having in it its 
 external members ; for " he who can count six stallions may 
 go up to four and twenty," while the child has in the beginning 
 not even its own limbs under its own power. Even our own 
 limbs, so long as they assert their external nature against us, 
 or are not as yet permeated by the subjective design, are not as 
 yet our own possession. 
 
 Since, however, the design in the present instance relates to 
 a determinate natural and finite object, it follows that it is itself 
 a determinate, finite, and hence external design ; it required, 
 in order that it might be negation, and this a determinate 
 negation, that determinate object also, and accordingly a mean 
 or series of means, because all are finite, in order to arrive 
 successively through them at the totality of all ; it is not as yet 
 itself the design carried out, but is first the beginning, which 
 constantly re-originates as it is laid aside, i. e., the designs 
 themselves constantly become means, the executive subject 
 being constantly engaged in traversing this series, which is a 
 progressus in infinitum, and being in itself the constant process 
 of mediation. 
 
 With this, however, this process is itself suppressed, and as 
 process converted into the design, for the life has itself for the 
 design or purpose, and takes delight in a constant activity 
 of mediation, and yearns to be this. Man makes for himself 
 the plough as a means for agriculture, this again being a 
 means for sowing, the sowing for the crop or harvest, while 
 the latter, as the purpose and product of the whole process, is 
 itself again consumed, is a means of supporting life, while the 
 life itself consists and passes by in this restless process of media- 
 tion ; hence in itself it is a retrogressive process, and this pro- 
 
348 HISTORICAL SUKVET. 
 
 cess is the activity that bears relation to itself, the design now 
 carried out, or the self-executing final purpose. Thus, the ex- 
 ecution or mediation does not differ from the design in the whole 
 or absolute, for they are identical. The design is, therefore, as 
 regards its content, none other than the chemical and mechanical 
 relation, or it has this very relation as its content, for these 
 relations come under its dominion, or pass, aa was shown, by 
 themselves back into the design, which lies at their foundation, 
 and consequently includes within itself the whole riches or 
 totality of finite designs, as a continuously progressive process 
 of nature. In other words, such is the pervading order, con- 
 formity to law and purpose, which is the objective reason 
 eternally present in nature. This collective content now 
 appears as one that abides in the constant realisation of the 
 design, and the teleogical process, whereby nothing comes into 
 the world that was not in itself already involved in the process, 
 is but a " translation or transference of the idea, existing as 
 idea, into the objectivity ; this transference into a presupposed 
 ' alterum,' being confluence or conjunction of the idea by itself 
 with itself." " It may therefore be said of the teleogical ac- 
 tivity, that in it the end is the beginning, the result the prin- 
 ciple, the effect the cause, that it is a becoming of what has 
 become, that in it that only which already exists comes into 
 existence," and such like. Thus, the causa efficiens, instru- 
 mentalis, and finalis, are the perfectly posited three momenta 
 of the idea or the three termini of the syllogism, and in this 
 their circulation have become manifested as a living unity fully 
 unfolded in itself. 
 
 Thus, the final purpose, as accomplished and absolute, does 
 not go beyond itself, double itself, or does not posite an object 
 as its equal for the final purpose, but it is in itself the objective 
 design, i. e., the absolute self-subsistent and self-relative teleo- 
 logical activity, or the whole as its own purpose is immediately 
 in itself the true objective design, because it is the perfected 
 subjective design, in the same sense that the absolute subject is 
 in itself the absolute object also. The dialectick, which has 
 been already expounded, repeats itself here also, namely, in 
 the mutual action of the idea in itself with itself as an identity 
 of subjectivity and objectivity. The objectivity appeared 
 indeed as the first-given, the immediate ; but the activity of 
 the subjective design consisted in suppressing this immediate- 
 ness, not indeed the content of the objective world, but only 
 this its form, the objectivity. Thus, this side of the subject 
 
HEGEL. 349 
 
 •was first suppressed in order only that it might be itself re- 
 established ; in short, it must remain what it is, but only that 
 it may be permeated by the subject which enters into it, or, 
 ■what amounts to the same thing, adopts it into itself, renders it 
 its own. The subject or the design is a conqueror, with whom 
 we have nothing to do but to acknowledge his power ; in the 
 conquered domains every thing abides by his laws and customs, 
 he himself ruling only by them and as conqueror accommodat- 
 ing himself to them. Now, since the subject (as living body) 
 has in this way gone forth into externality, and now supports 
 this in itself, it follows, that the former has the latter for its 
 own content, and is thoroughly occupied and filled with this 
 real externality. Hence, the synthesis of these two momenta, 
 subjectivity and objectivity, is here also, like all syntheses, the 
 movement of the transposition or translation into both kinds 
 of form, in which process, as was said, the content remains 
 the same, but the activity or becoming is the form -activity, 
 which distinguishes itself as such from the other form of itself, 
 namely, the immediate existence, for this only is the external 
 reality, and becomes conscious of itself as the identity of both. 
 As this identity of subjectivity and objectivity the idea {_Beg- 
 riff) is now the Idea in its identity {Idee). 
 
350 HISTORICAL STJEVET. 
 
 LECTURE XVI. 
 
 HEGEL — conclusion. 
 
 We have now arrived at the Idea in its identity (^Idee), i. e. at 
 the Identity of subjectivity and objectivity. This idea is the 
 highest truth, and in it all the other inferior standing-points of 
 the Logic are suppressed. The truth is the thinking process, 
 knowing itself as being, or the same process which has become 
 the being per se, or the self-knowing. Thinking and being are 
 in the absolute truth thoroughly identical, as has been already 
 seen at the conclusion of the Phenomenology. Even the idea 
 in its identity is, like every synthesis, a process *, because the 
 identity of idea and objectivity, which it is, is or exists and 
 maintains itself, only by being dialectic, i. e. by being the nega- 
 tivity itself, which, as substance or principle, namely, as a con- 
 tinuous act of negation, maintains itself in, all the opposites^ 
 through which it passes, seeing that the idea or potential object 
 (JBegriff) imparts to itself objectivity, and from this withdraws 
 itself back into the subjectivity. Hence, it follows that the 
 expression unity of subjectivity and objectivity, infinity and 
 finitude, thinking and being, and so on, is really inadequate 
 and false, if by such unity we were to think only of a rest or 
 neutralisation of the two sides. On the contrary, by the idea 
 in its identity is essentially implied a state of incessant acti- 
 vity, or a process. Although, as we see, the idea in its iden- 
 tity, as absolute synthesis, takes the place of the origination 
 or becoming, still Hegel's language, elsewhere in his writings, 
 would make it appear that the origination is incidental only to 
 the side of material nature and external reality, and that at the 
 bottom of this, as being the finite and. transitory, lies the idea 
 as the internal being] ; a view of the matter which has doubtless 
 been retained by one branch of his pupils, although, if consis- 
 tently carried out, it would displace the whole ground-plan of 
 Hegel's system, and must be by this rather suppressed, seeing 
 that the idea {Begriff) is the substance of the phenomenon ; 
 while the substance, as we know, is the absolute negativity, the 
 
 * Encyclop. § 315. f Logik, iii. p. 241. 
 
HEGEL. 351 
 
 actuality of the judgment itself. In the idea in its identity, the 
 idea and reality or subjectivity and objectivity are indeed to be 
 distinguished, but in such a manner that the idea in its identity 
 is itself the distinguishing act or absolute judgment, namely, 
 of a subjectivity, which per se would be abstract, and of an ob- 
 jectivity, which />er se would be a groundless multiplicity devoid 
 of unity. The objectivity is the realisation of the design, or is 
 that wherein the subject realises itself, it is an objectivity 
 posited by the activity of the design, and which, as posited 
 being, has its subsistence and form only as being pervaded by 
 its subject. As objectivity it is externality, and hence is itself 
 a momentum of the idea, or the flnitude, mutability, and pheno- 
 menon which was the immediateness of the existence, from 
 which the idea always elevates itself triumphantly, or which it 
 suppresses in itself, so that the latter always succumbs to the 
 unity of the idea, in order that, posited afresh by it, it may issue 
 forth or proceed from it. 
 
 Now,, although the idea in its identity is this process, still at 
 first it is such only immediately ; the idea is in its own com- 
 mensurate and teleogical reality not as yet for itself, but only 
 at first in itself as idea ; it is still an immediate process of self- 
 realisation, i. e. it is life ; as idea it is in this external incorpo- 
 ration and life only the omnipresent soul that is effused into the 
 totality of its members as an universal organising process. It 
 consequently enters upon division, that is, exists as single living 
 individuals. But as absolute negativity or universal soul it 
 is just as much the suppression as positing of this form, and 
 hence is the process of the genus, which maintains itself as 
 such, while the individuals, as being indifferent, constantly suc- 
 cumb to and relapse into the universal, which is the same unit 
 in them all. So soon as the universal idea realises itself, it 
 enters upon a material state, but this by virtue of its nature is 
 a disjunctivity, a plurality, a thorough objectivity in itself; 
 so that from this realisation the idea has again to withdraw into 
 unity and being in itself, i. e. into the ideal state. Hence, the 
 death or suppression of that being out of itself, or of the reality 
 in the ideality, is thg second momentum of the process, just as 
 the first was the immediate posited being. This second mo- 
 mentum or conversion of the reality into ideaKty is the act of 
 cognition. 
 
 In cognition the subject has become mind; as mind the idea 
 in its identity exists freely for itself, for it has itself only for 
 the object, or the objectivity itself for its idea ; it has become 
 
352 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 this pure identity and substantial unity by means of itself, this 
 unity being now a pure distinguishing of itself within itself. 
 It has the whole fulness of the objective being in itself for 
 itself, as objectivity, but this objectivity is its own, being no 
 longer a heterogeneous objectivity, obstructing and limiting it 
 externally; it has the objectivity as a subjective objectivity 
 within itself, because it has recognised the former as pervaded 
 and posited by itself, as an objectivity indeed, but, as was evi, 
 dent in the teleology, as one that, opposed to the universal sub- 
 stance, has no power of abiding self-subsistence. The idea, in 
 its identity as life, posites, it is true, the objectivity from the very 
 commencement, but without being cognisant of this act ; hence 
 when it becomes cognition and reflects upon itself, the objec- 
 tivity is present to itjas existing, given. This form of the world's 
 immediateness, which is, properly speaking, an illusion and uni- 
 versal error, from which the mind has by dint of labour to eman- 
 cipate itself, becomes now suppressed by the act of cognition, and 
 this act is itself the successive process of suppression. For the 
 first time at the end of the process has the absolute subject '— and 
 every individual subject, as truly cognising, is itself this uni- 
 versal subject in its own internal substance — attained to a 
 thorough knowledge of itself, and presupposes itself as universe, 
 and that indeed directly as an external, but already intelligible 
 and understood universe, pervaded by the idea. We now com- 
 prehend how, at the very beginning of the logical process, 
 where the subject was as yet direct intuition only, a certainty, 
 cognition, knowledge of the truth, and consciousness could be 
 present, seeing that the identity of thinking and being in itself 
 was constantly present, which has now become for itself a 
 certainty, and been cognised as such. 
 
 Cognition, in the stricter sense, or theoretical cognition, is, 
 it is true, only the one side of the process, but this side reveals 
 itself also as identical with the other, namely, the practical 
 side, or that of the will, as has been likewise pointed out 
 already in the Phenomenology. As cognition, as theory, has 
 for a product the truth, so the practical process has the good. 
 The identity of the subjectivity and objectivity, or of the ideal 
 and real, is eternally in the idee and in itself. On that very 
 account, the subject sets out in the very beginning with belief 
 in the cognition, that its cognition is true, that it cognises 
 the world, and, indeed, a true and actual world. Since, how- 
 ever, this identity is, in the beginning, not as yet known by 
 the subject itself, it follows that the impulse is there, to posite 
 
HEGEL. 353 
 
 it, or, negatively expressed, to point to the intrinsically perish- 
 able dualistic aatagonism as null and void, and to suppress 
 it. So long as the subject stands opposed to an objectivity, 
 and this, again, to a subject, or ideality and reality are ex- 
 clusively opposed to each other, both are finite ; but the subject 
 has to free itself from this finitude and one-sidedness, and to 
 subject_ itself to the objectivity. This is effected by taking up 
 the existing universe into the thinking process, or, what 
 amounts to the same, by an infusion of the thinking process,. 
 i. e. of the rational design, into the objectivity ; both are in 
 themselves one and the same process; but viewed from this 
 or that side, the process appears different, i. e. either theoretical 
 or practical. This gradual and progressiye assimilation of the 
 given material, is the education of the understanding, which 
 it is the special province of the Psychology and Phenomenology 
 to carry out, the logic having here only to deal with the nature 
 and method of this process in quite a general sense, i. e. to 
 point out the method of this education of the intelligence, 
 or the so-called logical analysis and synthesis. 
 , Parallel with this merely intelligent, and not as yet abso- 
 lutely rational theoretical action, runs the practically intelligent 
 or will-principle, which is first to make the world what it 
 should or ought to be. " The immediate or present does not hold 
 good to the will as a fixed being, but only as an appearance 
 or nothingness in itself. Contradictions here occur, in which we 
 find ourselves driven round to the standing-point of morality. 
 In a practical relation this is altogether the standing-point of the 
 Kantian and Fichtean philosophy. The good must be realised ; 
 we have to work so as to produce it, and the will is but the 
 self-working good. Were, then, the world to be what it ought 
 to be, why then, with this stage, the activity of the will would 
 cease. Thus, the will requires that its design should not 
 be realised ; and in this way we rightly speak of the finite 
 character of the will." We here encounter the same process 
 which was previously present in the teleology as 1b.e course of 
 mediation, which mediation was, as life — its own design. The 
 solution, therefore, of the contradiction, or the synthesis of the 
 two sides, consists here also " in the will returning in its result 
 to the supposition of the cognition, and hence into the unity 
 of the theoretical and practical idea {Idee). The will knows 
 the purpose ^or design to be its own, and the intelligence re- 
 gards the world as the actual idea {Begriff). Such is the 
 true rank or position held by the rational cognition." It is 
 
 A A 
 
354 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 not, as already said above, changed in content or in fact. What 
 is suppressed and changed, " constitutes only the surface, not 
 the true essence of the world. The latter is the idea ex- 
 istent in and for itself, and thus the world is itself the idea 
 in its identity." The good, the final purpose of the world, is 
 or exists only by constantly producing itself. The good and 
 rational is constantly actual, and all that is actual or real is 
 rational, seeing that it (namely, the world itself) externally 
 posites itself as design or purpose, and as activity or process 
 eternally produces itself. 
 
 Such, then, in conclusion, is the absolute idea (Tdee), the 
 unity of the theoretical and practical idea, or of the idea of 
 life and cognition : it is the life in its rational necessity know- 
 ing itself, while this necessity is the self-knowing truth or 
 reality. For itself, the absolute idea is the pure form of the 
 idea {Begriff), as being this fluid or living process of self- 
 movement and determination. This pure form is the method 
 which has moved and ramified itself throughout the whole 
 course of the system, and filled itself with determinations. The 
 methodical movement, this immanent necessity or negativity, 
 is the principle which pervades and governs as a soul the 
 whole organism of the science, includes and is the true being 
 in itself, and is finally also the result: it is the idea as judg- 
 ment and conclusion ; the thinking process in its spontaneous 
 movement ; the reason, the eternally genetic, restless origina- 
 tion or becoming both within, from and to itself. 
 
 We have thus traced in detail the content of the Logic 
 which forms the nucleus of the system, as far as was admissible 
 for the object of the present discourses. As regards the second 
 and third parts of the system, the Philosophy of Nature and 
 of Mind, we must limit ourselves partly to an examination of 
 the systematic position which they hold in reference to the 
 Logic, and partly to characterising their content by bringing 
 forward the results. 
 
 The most difficult point appears to be the detection of a ne- 
 cessary transition from the Logic to the Philosophy of Nature ; 
 and it is this very point, also, to which the opponents of Hegel, 
 with Schelling at their head, have been busy in directing their 
 most vehement attacks. According to Hegel's opinion, the 
 Logic has, in its final result, returned again into the idea of the 
 
HKGEL. 355 
 
 idea as a logical process circulating within itself, or into the 
 idea of the method, which from the beginning was its soul 
 and hypothesis. This methodical process, together with its 
 whole potential content, or the logical idea in its identity, now 
 reassumes the place of a reality (Ansich), or one that is not 
 as yet actual, but which has to pass over into reality. It 
 becomes the new and now universal thesis of the universal 
 process. But, if we say not yet, by this is not meant that the 
 logical is anyhow to be posited as prior to the reality in time, 
 but as present rather with this, and this again with it eternally 
 and simultaneously, as will be pointed out further on. Hence 
 the transition of the thesis into the antithesis is here also, as 
 in each particular member of the system, an unlimited con- 
 version or metamorphosis into its differentiation, namely, into 
 the direct opposite of the logical being in and within itself, or 
 of the unreality into the reality, i. e. into the absolute exterior- 
 ation of nature*, from which it will have to gather itself up 
 again into the unity, which, however, like every synthesis, is 
 a process of eternal and simultaneous self-dissolution and re- 
 trogression, I. e. is Mind. 
 
 Of this differentiation and state of alienation from itself, 
 which is or constitutes the immediateness of nature, we have 
 already spoken in the Logic, and it was the original state, 
 from which the Logic had to liberate itself; so that we must 
 now expect to find this doctrine in its principles completely 
 exhausted, and the natural objectivity substantially resolved 
 into the idea ; but " seeing that the object is here dealt with 
 according to its thought-determination, it follows, that we have . 
 now in the course of our inquiry to make mention of the 
 empirical phenomenon which corresponds to this, and to point 
 out that it does actually correspond thereunto." f The whole 
 connection of the system does not, however, admit of our re- 
 garding the Philosophy of Nature as only a logic applied to a 
 given empirical material, nor as a further exposition and dis- 
 tribution of logical principles in the detail of natural genera 
 and species, but the import of the being of nature is only to be 
 systematically apprehended as the universal judgment into which 
 the absolute idea relapses in itself. As little also should we 
 get at the sense of the whole system if the Logic were regarded 
 at once as an actual thinking process, as a divine self-conscious- 
 ness maintaining itself behind or above nature in a theistical 
 fashion ; for this notion would forestal the conclusion, that the 
 
 » Hegel's Encyclopad. § 244. 247. f Encyclop. § 246. 
 
 A A 2 
 
356 HISTORICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 Absolute first comes within the nature-process itself, and in- 
 deed in man, to itself, i. e. to self-consciousness. If, therefore, 
 it is said of the logic that it is the Absolute or God, as it were, 
 prior to or before the creation of the world, it follows, that we 
 must add to this the clause, and simultaneously before his own 
 self-realisation, although he is never unrealised, i. e. is, as an 
 universe, eternal. Thus, to the logic there belongs no real or 
 actual being, for it is nowhere else actual than in the thinking 
 process of the human being ; it is for itself an abstractum, it is 
 the — scarcely definable— wowMewa^ being {Ansichsein), a king'' 
 dom of laws, a shadow-land of unessential forms — the same 
 as the categories were with Kant, as being neither innate nor 
 ready-prepared notions or ideas; and on this very account, 
 that it is such, it is not and cannot be per se, but only 
 identical with the world's reality, so that we have not so much 
 to search for or crave a transition from the logical mind into 
 nature, there being none such in itself, as rather to perceive or 
 gain a glimpse of that identity only. Nevertheless, in nature, 
 which by virtue of its idea is a being thoroughly objective in 
 itself, external, and one that has passed disjunctively into its 
 momenta, there remains in force that "Ansich," active as it 
 were in the background or in the depths ; for " nature is in- 
 deed to be regarded as a system of stages, whereof the one 
 necessarily proceeds from the other (the higher races from the 
 lower), but not as if the one was naturally engendered from the 
 other, but only in the internal idea in its identity which consti- 
 tutes the ground or foundation of nature. The metamorphosis 
 belongs only to the idea as such, seeing that its change alone is 
 or constitutes development.* Of nature, on the contrary, exter- 
 nality is a characteristic feature, the distinctions falling asun- 
 der and appearing as indifierent existences." 
 
 Now, as regards the content of the Nature-philosophy, we 
 find that, for the very sake of that subdivision and externality, 
 the categories of quantity here precede those of quality, and 
 that for the same reason the antitheses are not simple negations 
 of the theses, but are themselves antitheses of two members, 
 seeing that the thesis itself declares a continuous existence 
 together with its negative determination ; for the rest, how- 
 ever, we here encounter, for the second time, the logical division 
 and development of the categories, with names altered and 
 borrowed from their empirical sense. The division corresponds 
 to the momenta of the idea ; the universal is here the absolute 
 * Enoyclop. §249. 
 
HEGEL. 357 
 
 disjunctivity, the space with its negation, time, and their syn- 
 thesis, the movement ; this whole doctrine, which corresponds 
 to the logical quantity, being called mechanics. The absolute 
 mechanic (that of the Infinite), which corresponds to the 
 category of measure, and contains the universal principles of 
 astronomy, leads to qualitative, i. e. physical determination. 
 With the externally qualitative relations of the heavenly bodies 
 is also given their qualitative nature, namely, the light as a 
 substratum, and its negation the darkness. The former mani- 
 fests itself in the single body of light, the sun, the latter partly 
 ia the lunar, partly in the eomptary bodies, i. e. partly in the 
 positively solid, partly in the nebulously dissolved, cosmic 
 matter. The synthesis of both is the planet Kar E^oxriv, the 
 earth, which is regarded as a " body of individual totality," in 
 which the rigidity is resolved by the separation into real differ- 
 ences, while solution is restrained by the individual centrality. 
 These liberated differences are the elements, not the chemical 
 oives, but the ordinarily so-called elements or true processes, 
 which continually pass into each other and constitute the life of 
 the earth, i. e. the meteorological process. To this change of 
 forms, however, the earth is opposed as a real unity, subject or 
 ground of the elementary process, and that change struggles 
 against the connecting gravity of the earth's matter. The 
 matter separates itself within itself according to the specific 
 weight of its differences, and in it appear the different degrees 
 of density and cohesion ; while elasticity, sound, and finally the 
 solution of the specific form into the formlessness of the heavy 
 matter, together with heat or caloric, are the phenomena of this 
 antagonism. By heat, and finally by the process of combus- 
 tion, the previously united elements relapse into a totality 
 per se of existing individual forms, and are, as such, an object 
 of the third part of the Physics. The immediate form as such, 
 the simple difference passing through a state of tension from 
 the absolute formlessness or indifierence-point, into extremes, 
 is magnetism ; nevertheless, this is, so to speak, only the abstract 
 form of the form itself, namely, the simple activity of the im- 
 mediate process of self-differencing, which, having passed over 
 into its quiescent product, becomes the crystal. If, now, the 
 opposite poles of magnetism separate per se into positivity and 
 negativity, why, then, this is the phenomenon of electricity ; 
 while, lastly, the neutralisation of this tension into different 
 relations constitutes the chemical process, its products being 
 the so-called chemical elements. 
 
 A A 3 
 
358 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 The suppression as well as positing of these real contradic- 
 tions or tensions, has its ground in the identity of the essence, 
 to which they all belong as to a substantial unity, and which is 
 the living negativity itself. Thus, the external reciprocal action, 
 as in the logic, so also here passes over into the organick or 
 biology. Now here the process presents itsplf as an uni- 
 versa,l earth-life or organisation of the planetary mass — geo- 
 logical process — which nevertheless appears as a past evolution 
 that has come to a state of rest, and only continues in the 
 youngest formations. The individual or particular life next 
 breaks out into the vegetable ^ nature ; but the plant is as yet 
 only an individual, which consists of many individuals, each 
 single twig being a fresh addition, a growing plant repeating 
 itself upon the plant ; the individuality has not as yet become 
 lord of the particularity. The organising unity pervading all, 
 which as such reflects also within itself and becomes sub- 
 jectivity per se, soul and self-feeling or consciousness, is the 
 third stage, — the animal process, or life, as it is called, in tjie 
 stricter sense. 
 
 The animal process of life is not only one that fashions 
 itself for and from itself into the individual, but it is also in 
 relation to inorganic nature one of assimilation or mediation 
 with the external world, and that indeed both theoretically by 
 the senses, as practically by the nutrient functions. The 
 teleology of mediation here repeats itself on both sides. Both 
 processes, however, that of the formative individuation and 
 that of the mediation, unite synthetically in the generic process. 
 For since the individual life is related to the universal sub- 
 stance, and finds the latter not merely out of itself in inorganic 
 nature, as in a sphere that is foreign to it, but, as its possession, 
 its own internal element, and one that is common to all indi- 
 viduals, or that wherein they live, it follows, that the individuals 
 therein are as genus, a substantial unity, which, as generic sub- 
 stance, may be regarded as universal, which realises itself and 
 exists in many individuals. Thus, while the individual, by 
 virtue of consciousness or self-feeling, retires into itself,, it 
 coalesces in this interior with the general universal. While 
 now, in the externality of the nature-process, this coalescing 
 of the genus into itself is in like manner only an external 
 process, the process of sexual union remains, and in its pro- 
 duction falls again asunder into the difference of the sexes; so 
 that the genus only> but not the individuals, maintains itself, 
 and continues as this process of origination and decay: in short, 
 
HEGEL. 359 
 
 that which has been inwardly manifested in the process as an 
 active principle, namely, the genus or substantial universality 
 itself, the life as such, has here arrived at the state of being 
 per se. We here pause at the same transition, which the Logic 
 had to make when it advanced from the objective idea {Begriff) 
 to the idea in its Identity {Idee) ; the step is now from nature 
 to mind, and in the system itself from the Philosophy of 
 Nature to that of Mind. 
 
 The Philosophy of the Mind, the third and concluding part 
 of the whole system, is divisible into the philosophy of the sub- 
 jective mind, where, together with anthropology, the previously 
 developed content of the Phenomenology as propaideutick finds 
 its systematic place ; then into the doctrine of the objective, and 
 finally into that of the absolute mind. By " objective mind " 
 Hegel understands the rational organisation of the idea {Idee) 
 of justice, morality, and custom having become objective and 
 real. The Phenomenology terminates in its last, theoretico- 
 practical part, which is specially called " psychology," with the 
 idea {Idee) of blessedness, i. e. the representation produced by 
 reflection on the part of the understanding of the satisfaction 
 of every impulse ; in this universal object the particular wills 
 of the many coalesce into a common rational will, in the 
 realisation of which each finds also its particular object, indi- 
 vidual satisfaction, and consequently /reectow. This universal 
 objective will is the " objective mindj' Now the free will first 
 of all realises itself as individual, i. e., as person, by which wa 
 are not to understand the personality of mind and body in the 
 stricter sense, but all that belongs externally to the perfect 
 organisation of the individual freedom, such as property of any 
 kind, for all, in fact, is preordained or established to become 
 aa involuntary member of the human being, his means and 
 instrument, so that he first possesses within this compass his 
 own self, his own ability and capacity. In that case, however, 
 the free will also returns at the same time from this exter. 
 nality and reality to reflect upon itself, and is in that also for 
 itself; such being the privilege of the subjective will, namely, 
 the morality, to be also particularly and individually determined 
 per se. Morality has, as we perceive, in the present instance, a 
 subordinate, nay, more, an ambiguous meaning : as a moral 
 inclination locked up within itself it would become a beatific 
 state, an inactivity or want of action, and would consequently 
 degenerate into immorality ; for its content is that which is 
 upright and just, and what is upright must be done, must be 
 
 A A 4 
 
360 HISTOBIOAL SURVEY. 
 
 realised. Justice and duty being thorough correlates, there is 
 no duty in me to which also the justice of another would not 
 correspond, and inversely. There is no distinction to be drawn 
 between duties of right in the stricter senses and those of the so- 
 called moral conscience or duties of love. Justice and morality 
 do not , bear the mutual relation of stages, but of sides or 
 momenta to each . other, the former being the objective, . the 
 latter the subjective momentum, the content being one and the 
 same ; and there is altogether no ethical content in the subject 
 which must not also live out and realise itself, nor any holy 
 state of disposition which is not to be also a work of sanctity.^ 
 Hence both sides comprise in their synthesis, the truth, or that 
 which Hegel designates specially as the prevailing moral, or do- 
 minant morality. 
 
 Morality is the substantial, universal, and rational will, as 
 the reality which is commensurate to the idea, the willed and 
 consummated necessity, which being as such a self-realised act 
 of the mind is the existing freedom. The family, the community 
 of citizens, and the constitution of the state, are the momenta 
 of this objective and really existing rationality. In this the 
 mind is the free substance, the universal, which has its reality in 
 the individuals, and coalesces into the particularity, which con- 
 stitutes the special mind of the people or its national spirit. By 
 virtue of this speciality which characterises the universal mind, 
 at each period of time and in each people in whom it realises 
 itself, it is constantly imprisoned within a limit, from which it 
 strives to free itself successively by the education of the people ;. 
 buf seeing that the nationality, i. e. the existence of a people as 
 a definite people, is essentially connected or bound up with this 
 limit, it follows, that the people themselves succumb in that 
 process of emancipation ; for each has only in his due time and 
 as member of this succession his right to exist and to govern ; 
 the world-spirit does not regard all its members as . entitled, 
 to equal rank, but only that people which.is dominant at any. 
 period as being the one absolutely entitled to govern the rest j 
 these last being not even acknowledged by the rulers them-", 
 selves to be of equal birth. Thus, nomadic races are not re-: 
 garded by the stationary and civilised races, as sovereign 
 powers, but are styled barbarians that have been left behind 
 upon the lower stages of civilisation, and as such they are, 
 treated, warred against, and subdued. There resides in the-, 
 absolute ideai {Idee) of each people only as much as it is worth. 
 in its life's principle or core, and has the [power to perform ;■ 
 
HEGEL. S61 
 
 hence what is most powerful in a people resides actually in the 
 right and that of the stronger class, and strength is their right, 
 ideally as well as really ; the physical power and the rational 
 right here coinciding. If then one people must submit to 
 being subdued by another, this is only the actual and necessary 
 result of the principle or idea {Idee) which animates it being a 
 rationally subordinate one, or a category to be negated by the 
 higher one in the absolute mind or thinking process. " The 
 world's history is the world's judgment." 
 
 Since, however, peoples or nations are, by virtue of their in- 
 dividuality and particularity being connected with physical 
 relations, still burdened with the limits of the natural state, 
 it follows, that the absolute world-spirit or intelligence has in 
 no single people its actual totality and universality. Of these 
 wants and antagonisms of the finite state, the Absolute has still 
 to divest itself, in order that it may be for itself a knowledge 
 of itself as the absolute mind or as the actual truth. The sub- 
 jective mind, as in the Psychology, and the objective, as it has 
 been presented to us in the doctrine of right, are the momenta 
 of the absolute mind, which is their identity and reality. We 
 can call this whole sphere of the absolute mind religion, knowr 
 ledge of the absolute substance of itself : in the special and pro- 
 per sense, however, this spiiere is confined to one, namely the 
 middle, of the three stages of this knowledge, for this know- 
 ledge is itself a process, and indeed the absolute process which 
 passes through the form of immediateness, being per se, and 
 being in and for self. 
 
 The immediate form of this knowledge is that of intuition 
 and representation of the absolute mind in itself, the form of 
 beauty, God or mind is here only manifesting itself to the 
 senses as the immediate unity of mind and nature. The mo- 
 ment of universality is here as yet abstract for itself, has its 
 content only in natural determinations, and hence relapses 
 again into finitude ; finiting and objectively particularising it- 
 self into the particular or local deities of a people, or becoming, 
 in a word, polytheism. The Absolute has here its subjectivity or 
 consciousness only in the inspiration of the artist and prophet, 
 or in a slavish pathos, which yearns to express the Highest, 
 but feels itself as yet driven only or impelled to this by the 
 instinctive impulse of genius. Such is Art, which produces 
 the Highest, but, as it were, blindly, i. e. immediately, for this 
 is the nature of the idea of beauty, that itself and its product 
 are directly one, the idea manifesting itself immediately to the 
 
362 HISTORICAL SUEVET. 
 
 senses, and both having, as it were, grown up together in a 
 natural way. This fair or beautiful art, as being the still 
 unantagonistic consciousness of the Absolute, or the religion of 
 art and beauty, is directly impelled, however, on account of 
 this undecided state, above and beyond this stage. For be- 
 cause the subject has not itself for itself, and in distinction 
 to the external, finite and transitory phenomenon, but is only 
 with and through the latter, it follows, that it must ap- 
 pear to itself as transient, its feeling of self dying out in the 
 nothingness of its finite existence ; for this last was only the 
 self-consciousness of an individual, but not that of the race 
 maintaining itself eternally in the midst of all change. 
 
 This latter phase is mediated by the life in the state, which 
 subjects the self-will to the collective will, and thereby sinks the 
 individual self-consciousness into its universal substance, the 
 moral mind, from which the living organisation of the indi- 
 vidual subjects is again born anew, because the substance has 
 its very reality only in this form. The Absolute is accordingly 
 this revelation of itself in the organised plurality of subjects, 
 who upon their side know themselves to be identical with the 
 Absolute, which in them attains to being per se, and unto self- 
 consciousness. Such in its essence is '■^revealed religion" a 
 relation of the absolute to itself, God's self-consciousness of 
 himself in the human being. But, because this knowledge here 
 stands upon the stage of the intelligent self-consciousness, i. e. 
 of reflection and representation, it follows, that it imparts to 
 the momenta of its content a self-subsistency in reference to 
 each other ; human beings thinking of God as an essence 
 existing per se, and of themselves likewise as free beings ex- 
 isting for themselves. This, however, is a contradiction, just 
 because with this self-subsistence, the identity is present at 
 the same time in the religious consciousness, and the subject 
 distinctly feels himself to be dependent upon the Deity, and 
 consequently negates as much as posites his self-subsistence 
 and freedom. This contradiction must be, and is, suppressed, 
 seeing that the religion of the mind or Christianity pervades 
 and develops in thought the true doctrine of atonement already 
 contained in it, but expressed as a mystery, and the notion of 
 the divine humanity and so-called Trinity, which constitute 
 the speculative nucleus of this " absolute " religion, and with 
 this elevates belief into knowledge, religion into Philosophy. 
 
 Here again we encounter the three momenta of the idea 
 (^Begriff), which pass over in a threefold syllogism into each 
 
HEGEL. 363 
 
 Other, and effect by their mediation the unity. The univer- 
 sality can be regarded as the absolute essence (the Father) 
 which by the world's reality (the Son, as the momentum of 
 particularity) mediates itself into the identity (the Holy Ghost 
 or Spirit) ; in like manner can the mind, as being the concrete 
 identity or unity of these two sides, and finally also the mean or 
 mediating process itself, the world's reality or the Son, be ele- 
 vated to the rank of mediator. Philosophy thus completely re- 
 solves the rigid self-subsistence of the momenta of the Absolute, 
 which the religious consciousness still opposes to each other, 
 into the living stream of the absolute proces?, which is the 
 true form of the idea, and wherein the thinking process has 
 vanquished all antagonisms and arrived at reconciliation with 
 itself, i. e, at the state of absolute spirituality, as being the truth 
 cognisant of or knowing itself. This idea of philosophy, as 
 being the self- thinking Idea in its Identity, is thus "the Logical, 
 in the sense of its being universality established in the con- 
 crete content as in its reality. The science has in this way 
 retired into its beginning, and the logical result is the Mental^ 
 which has proved itself to be truth existing in and for itself." 
 
364 HISTORICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 LECTURE XVII. 
 
 CONCLUDING REFLECTIONS. 
 
 Whoeter has succeeded in surveying the Hegelian system in 
 its totality, will now have presented to his intuitive faculty the 
 revolving epicycloid of its categories as universal mind, and this 
 ultimately in the absolute idea (Idee), as the eternally self- 
 thinking truth. Philosophy, now perfected, stands no longer 
 without and prior to the universe, but is the real being itself 
 which has arrived in it at perfect self-consciousness. The an- 
 titheses of ideality and reality are only internal self-distinctions 
 of the Absolute framed within itself; we may call the whole 
 system just as well Absolute Idealism as Eealism, and in this 
 very way is attained what should be attained, the all-pervadiog 
 self-cognition of the universe in itself, which has this point of 
 penetration of itself in the consciousness of the human species, 
 and knows itself in the science of the latter, so that the human 
 being knows or becomes cognisant of itself in its science as the 
 all-pervading absolute knowledge. Arrived at this point then, 
 itwas asked, what more can possibly be left for us to attain, 
 what higher standing-point for philosophy can be thought 
 of? The absolutely highest point seemed to be gained, philo- 
 sophy, at least upon the whole, to be perfected, and what re- 
 mained to be a mere matter having reference only to details. 
 Accordingly, the Hegelian workmen gathered themselves to- 
 gether, in order that they might celebrate the final erection 
 of an edifice which it had taken thousands of years to build. 
 The voice of the exoterics was then — now fifteen years ago — 
 scoffed at, when they called to mind, that the same festival had 
 been so often celebrated before, and the same cry of exultation 
 raised successively in each school of philosophy by the heralds 
 of her universal wisdom ; for the founder of every new system 
 must of necessity feel convinced that he it is who to the 
 building has affixed the key-stone. As regards, however, this 
 the most recent or Hegelian system, if it makes the idea of 
 absolute progress the direct principle and law of the universe, 
 it does but deal ironically with itself, in hoping for the absolute 
 
CONCLUSION. 365 
 
 persistence of such a scheme ; for this new and pretended' key- 
 stone will but share the fate of the stone of Sisyphus. 
 
 That which was not acknowledged at the time, soon/however, 
 declared itself to be a fact, for in the school itself a schism took 
 place concerning the authentic interpretation of Hegel's doctrine 
 and opinions. His followers divided into a Right and Left, into 
 Hegelians and Young Hegelites, and in the middle remained a 
 feeble centre, which was in good truth only the eiSidXov of 
 Hegel, the body of his posthumous and collective works. For 
 as has happened hitherto with each philosopher of repute, 
 that while imbodying in his writings a deep amount of truth, 
 he has but partially elaborated, fashioned, and systematically 
 evolved this, or else left it behind him ill-shaped or moulded 
 in itself, so also, in our opinion, was the same the case with 
 Hegel. The immediate problem of philosophy subsequent to 
 Kant, was to overcome the subjectivism of his stand-point, 
 and advance to an actual knowledge and willing of objective 
 truth. Fichte, Schelling, and Hegel have grappled with this 
 problem, and the latter has methodically carried it out. While, 
 however, it might seem as though the whole matter was in this 
 way completed, it is evident at once that that -direct passage 
 from subjectivity to objectivity has been effected at the cost of 
 the subjectivity, and thus a third problem presents itself as left 
 for solution, namely, the concrete union of the two sides, in 
 which the objectivity is not, as in Kant and Fichte, extinguished, 
 nor the subjectivity demolished,'as with Schelling and Hegel, in 
 the objectivity, but both arrive at their just claims — a point 
 this which was, doubtless, by Hegel wished and intended also. 
 If now, we were to abide by this deeper intention, why then we 
 must, in order to bring it into the light, as it were, of day, 
 complete the form also ; but if we abide by that form of the 
 Hegelian philosophy, which is represented by the disciples of 
 the Left, it follows that we must separate from it all that, 
 strictly speaking, does not appear therein, and so must depart 
 from Hegel's intention, nay more, as a direct consequence, from 
 his very principle and standing-point also : there will come out, 
 as has been already proved in fact, a one-sided objective Neo- 
 Spinosizm, utterly opposed to the deeper subjectivity, which 
 Heg«l strove to attain ; and this of necessity, on account of its 
 one-sidedness, may at the same time be just as well regarded as 
 a subjectivism, which ends anew in empiricism or scepticism, 
 and in this very way completes before the eyes of contempo- 
 raries the true critick of the original system as such, i. e. as to 
 
366 HISTOEICAL SUEVEY. 
 
 its scientific form ; for it is not what a philosopher intends and 
 wishes, but keeps to himself with a feeling of self-assurance, 
 that renders him a philosopher, and ensures him any amount of 
 influence upon the science, but the logical forms which he 
 evolves, the systematic despotism which he knows how to 
 grasp, this is what constitutes the philosophical element within 
 him. No one has more striven after this unity of content and 
 form than Hegel himself, and by this he must accordingly be 
 understood and judged of. 
 
 In the beginning, the system, as being opposed to the 
 Kantian rationalism, held good as orthodox, especially since it 
 reassumed the doctrince of the Trinity, which had been set 
 aside ; and pretended to commemorate the mysteries of Christi- 
 anity from behind the veil of its terminology in a clearer or 
 glorified light. Criticism, however, speedily dispelled this 
 cloud, and the community of initiated followers, divided partly 
 into such as openly confessed that they were no Christians at 
 all, and levied war against the church with downright zeal 
 and abuse ; partly into those who, being undeceived as to the 
 system, renounced Hegelianism altogether, and either sought, 
 as has recently occurred,, for satisfaction in Schelling, or else 
 returned, in far greater number, back to the standing-point of 
 Kant ; and, finally, into those whose intention was to stop where 
 Hegel did, and who recognised in his system, as its true con- 
 tent, a theism that could be retained in conjunction with 
 Christianity. Attention has been directed, in our former 
 lectures upon this doctrine, to several passages, showing how 
 and to what extent a certain amphiboly admits of this mode of 
 interpretation ; but with this, how we inevitably enter, not 
 only into contradiction with the principle, but with the method 
 and arrangement of the whole system. 
 
 Philosophy must certainly look with indifierence at the so- 
 called consequences of a system, even if the latter were to 
 consist of discrepancies with the orthodoxy of the church ; 
 for granted, even, that Christianity is the pure truth, who can 
 answer for the orthodoxy prevalent at any one period being 
 pure Christianity? A philosophical system, which opposes 
 the latter, may possibly be more Christian than the latter it- 
 self ; and, in fact, history proves that it is philosophy which 
 has incessantly co-operated in the laboratory of the church as 
 a most active servant in assisting to purify her dogmas. Still, 
 among all consequences, there is one which philosophy does 
 not endure; the inconsequence or contradiction whereby a 
 
CONCLUSION. 367 
 
 system negates itself — a system, L e., a certain form of philo- 
 sophy, but not the philosophy itself. For were the philosophy 
 to declare that it rested tola quanta upon the contradiction 
 only, and that it had therein its sole existence as philosophy, 
 why then this existence would assuredly be only an apparent 
 or phenomenal existence ; and then (seeing that every appear- 
 ance must have a ground or substratum), it would be requisite 
 yet further to explain how philosophy could merely busy itself 
 with that which, regarded per se, has only an apparent self- 
 existence, i. e., with the sensuotis world of phenomena, or with 
 nature in the stricter sense, whereby, indeed, a certain elbow- 
 room is permitted it within the pale of true knowledge, but, 
 at the same time, all beyond this — such as the region of posi- 
 tive belief or religious truth — must, as a necessary foundation, 
 be undermined. All this, however, may in its turn be afSrmed 
 from out the logical principle of contradiction, and for the sake 
 of this principle, and in this way may be claimed by philosophy 
 as a something proved, or a philosopheme, and consequently 
 as its own possession : in short, if the question is not to de- 
 generate into a logomachy or battle of mere words, it follows, 
 that, if a radical distinction is to be retained, philosophy must 
 either render the contradiction that which distinguishes it 
 from belief (but, then, observe, philosophy gives itself up, and 
 we must, with Aristotle, leave such sophistry to stand un- 
 heeded, because it proves that nothing admits of being proved), 
 or if, on the other hand, philosophy would have the contradic- 
 tion respected and rational, why then belief lOMst take it under 
 its protection, but would, with its credo quia absurdum, make 
 now-a-days but few proselytes, and, as a Protestant form of 
 orthodoxy, would negate itself just as much as that sophism 
 negates itself, by the same procedure, as philosophy. Tlius, 
 between the two, no absolute antagonism whatever can ex- 
 ist, but only a , relative distinction ; and if in all thinking 
 and knowing content and form are inseparable elements, the 
 hope, at least, for the present, is left us, that at some future 
 period, when philosophy with the true form shall have found 
 also the true content, and theology, for the true content, the 
 true form, that then, in fact, there will actually be but one 
 truth reconciled in itself, and this truth a certainty also : until 
 then, however, theology would commit as great a wrong by 
 entering into an intimate alliance with philosophy, as phi- 
 losophy would do by proclaiming itself to be absolutely perfect, 
 while it still had but one content (mere nature) abiding by 
 
368 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 which it would, although unable to comprehend Christianityj 
 declare its specific content to be only a retrograde movement 
 of humanily, or a now — God be praised! — episode in the 
 world's history, out of which we have escaped. 
 
 Thus, if as a rigid consequence of the Hegelian method, we 
 find that not only of necessity, but avowedly by the progressive 
 part of his school, the existence of a personal God is admitted 
 neither without nor within the universe, but is reduced simply 
 to the knowledge of the human being ; that, furthermore, the 
 hope of an individual continuance of the soul after death is 
 scofied at as a sensuously selfish illusion ; and, finally, that the 
 antagonism of good and^ evil is, in this way, indirectly sup- 
 pressed, the latter being regarded as necessary, the former as 
 relatively good — according to time and circumstances, — while 
 both may relapse into each other ; still, in these results, hard 
 even as they are, we could not, taken by themselves, find any_ 
 means of refuting the system, but only the strongest challenge 
 set before us for entering upon its criticism. The criticism, 
 however, of an entire system, as such, cannot meddle with iso- 
 lated points ; for the fate of a system does not depend upon 
 single errors, which are here and there met with as interwoven 
 with its general structure, but upon the totality, the systematic 
 arrangement, of the whole ; for this is the test of the prin- 
 ciple, and the more logical and exclusive the system is, by 
 so much the more summary must be the process by which we 
 have to deal with it. Now we cannot discern in the principle, 
 by itself alone, that which lies implicitly therein, and still less 
 the method, which takes its starting-point therefrom ; for every 
 principle yields a definite method in conformity with itself, and 
 lets a definite content be developed from it ; while what does 
 not reside in it, it repudiates or denies. All this, however, 
 is seen, for the first time, in the explication — the' system it- 
 self, — and in this sense we may certainly declare the conse- 
 quences or results of a definite philosophy to be its critick, 
 provided only that by results be understood the collective or- 
 ganism of the system as regards both its content and compass. 
 As regards the latter, this is seen most immediately in its his- 
 torical connections, and finds in the History of Philosophy the 
 full measure or value of its relative deserts. A principle may 
 be justified in so far as it is a principle for a 'part of the entire 
 systematic organism — for example, the abstract being, the idea 
 of life, and other notions of the same sort ; but it may, at the 
 same time, also, be unjustified, when it is made to hold good for 
 
CONCLUSION. 369 
 
 the fundamental principle of the whole. All the chief categories 
 have gradually come forward historically as principles of philo- 
 sophy, and all have, in conformity with their own nature, pro- 
 duced systems more or less comprehensive. Each nation and 
 epoch of time has its spiritual principle, i. e., it has attained to a 
 certain stage of mental profundity, whicli has been brought by 
 some later or subsequent philosophy before the consciousness, 
 and adopted into the organism of the whole at the proper place. 
 That which is present simultaneously in the system as fulness 
 of content, was manifested successively as an historical fact ; so 
 that each historical standing-point is a part of the system, and 
 the last comprehensive system includes the collective content of 
 history within itself. If, now, the historical principles lose in 
 the system, where they appear as subordinate, the absolute 
 character to which, at their time, they pretended, it follows, 
 upon the other hand, that every system which raises itself above 
 the antecedent ones, must substantiate its appeal to such a 
 position by providing for, and organically receiving, those prin- 
 ciples ; in default of which procedure, it must be itself acknow- 
 ledged to be a one-sided or actually lower stage of conscious- 
 ness. Thus, history exercises for itself a certain criticism over 
 the systematick, just as the latter does over the former ; so that 
 we should justly view with suspicion a system which would 
 transport us back to the Aristotelian standing-point, or to the 
 mode of thought prevalent in the early ages of Christianity. To 
 become, however, fully aware of all this, it is requisite to com- 
 pare the different systems, and consequently to possess a com- 
 prehensive historical knowledge of, and intimate acquaintance 
 with, them, — conditions to which our own times are at length 
 sufficiently matured, — so that at the presejit day we seem pro- 
 vided with all the necessary requirements both for citicising 
 the past and detecting any peculiar feature which our own 
 age may summon into life. Thus, whether we tackle the 
 problem of criticism from the systematic or historical point of 
 view, it will, at the present time, when history and speculation 
 scientifically pervade each other, be achievable only in a com- 
 prehensive manner, by taking a survey of the *iiole, and not 
 merely setting out from any one principle, unless this principle 
 is itself the idea of the totality, the systematick, the organism of 
 philosophy, or by whatever other name we please to call it, 
 and which, strictly regarded, is none other than the idea of the 
 -absolute design. 
 
 Returning now from tliese general observations back to Hegel, 
 
370 HISTORICAL SUEVEY, 
 
 and connecting with them the assertion that philosophy is un- 
 assailable by any article of belief that lies external to it, it 
 follows, that this security cannot be based upon any thing else 
 than the positive notion of the philosophy itself, which implies 
 that the latter carries its point or centre of gravitation within 
 itself. A system which were not to rest on itself, but to seek 
 some other point of support out of itself, whether in positive 
 dogmas or in empiricism, could not presume to be treated 
 according to that privilege of philosophy, but would renounce 
 itself. True philosophy will, indeed, exclude neither empiricism 
 nor Christian articles of belief from itself, but rather adopt and 
 preserve them, though unable to make them its starting-point. 
 So soon as we perceive any indications in a system of its de- 
 pending upon those elements or upon hypotheses (which are not 
 constructed out of itself, i. e. are not the exclusive products of 
 its own conception), it follows, that as philosophy such a sys- 
 tem is at once refuted. Hegel's system lays claim to being 
 the philosophy itself ; so that above all things it must stand 
 the test of being free from hypothesis. 
 
 Here, however, at the very outset of our inquiries, we en- 
 counter a suspicious circumstance in the fact that Hegel, in his 
 systematic consciousness, held it necessary to give to the prin- 
 ciple of Logic, or being-thinking, a phenomenological foundation, 
 which sets out and commences itself from the dualism of the 
 empirical consciousness. This dualism is, indeed, to he elevated 
 into the monism of the thinking process, the empirical moment 
 is to vanish by degrees entirely from the content, but at the 
 same time nothing is absolutely to disappear or vanish, but 
 only to become elevated while "suppressed." Now, we will not 
 enter at present so far into the question as to ask, whether these 
 steps are arrived at, or, if they were so, whether, along with 
 the immediateness to be mediated, the mediating process, i- e. 
 the essential content, would not disappear, and the whole 
 result become null and void, — we will set this point aside for 
 the present, seeing that it entails upon us nothing less than a 
 justification of the dualism and empiricism in the principle, — ■ 
 but we simply ask, what could justify Hegel in setting out 
 from the antagonism of the sensuous consciousness as an 
 original ielement ? Is this originality any thing else than an 
 historico- psychological element, and has it any other meaning 
 for philosophy than that only of an exoteric or propaideutic 
 nature? Why set out from the dualism of the actual con- 
 ,seiousness, which is obviously an hypothesis, and not rather 
 
CONCLUSION. 371 
 
 from monism, — " in order," says Heo;el, " that this might not 
 be shot as out of a pistol ? " But is it any the less a dualism ? 
 Philosophically regarded, the monism is the original element, 
 or the unity of the idea, the dualism, the second element, or the 
 judgment, into which the original idea resolves itself. Now, 
 Hegel, it is true, remains absolutely in the judgments as the 
 original element (the negativity in itself); but by what right? 
 Has this consequence originated only from that half-empirical 
 beginning, or is, inversely, this beginning (which is still dealt 
 with itself as a mere hypothesis) a consequence of the judg- 
 ment being the logically original element, the principle? With 
 Hegel the method supplies the principle, and finally supplies 
 also the result ; it is all in all ; and whence comes that ? Is it 
 based somehow upon that impure empiricism of the beginning? 
 Nevertheless the system in contradiction therewith deals every- 
 where with the idea, the unity, as the original element, or thesis, 
 — posites it in every instance as the first immediate and the 
 judgment as the second element. 
 
 Hegel himself appears to have recognised this contradiction, 
 and on that account to have eliminated the Phenomenology 
 from the system, in order that by casting aside all empirical 
 elements, he might start from a pure monistic principle. But 
 the question arises whether Hegel, in freeing himself from 
 this form, although unessential, i. e. as regards the whole me- 
 thod, could have remained imprisoned in it, and have unob- 
 servedly admitted this hypothesis into the system^ The principle 
 itself, or the absolute negativity, appears to bear testimony to 
 this. Negativity is nothing else than what is usually called the 
 power of forming a judgment, the movement or process of 
 diremption itself, which, as proceeding directly from itself, 
 is the origination or becoming, and as a contradiction of itself 
 in itself, the necessity ; a turning about, an oscillation, which, 
 so to speak, must have under itself an hypomochlion or lever, 
 but which cannot float freely in the air. This origination, 
 though everywhere apparent at first as a third element, namely 
 as synthesis, turns out with Hegel to be in truth the original 
 element in itself, and the form of immediateness or the being of 
 the idea {Begriff), as unity is in this way lowered to the con- 
 dition of a falsity, nay more, declared to be an error. The 
 real being everywhere resolves itself into a being per se in the 
 sense, as if there had been no such real being given, as seemed 
 to be present ; in short, the real being is no being, but an ori- 
 eination or actual activity. Thus, there is either no real being 
 
 ^ BB 2 
 
372 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 ■whatever, not even as such in the origination, or the whole 
 logic, which is the real being of the whole system, is as such 
 present per se, i. e. as an actual thinking process per se or as 
 subjectivity within the world's reality. Now, this would be 
 the view entertained by a Platonising theism, and decidedly 
 contradicts the Aristotelian character of the Hegelian system. 
 Now, if the system in this point falls into contradiction with 
 itself, it follows, that the source of the latter is to be sought for 
 in nothing else than that which has been made the principle, 
 namely, in the absolute negativity, which, as diremption, lacks 
 in itself the inseparable point of unity, or in which the unity 
 as substratum and origin does not uphold itself, so that a change 
 only of unity and antagonistic duality exists and is acknow- 
 ledged, but not an irremoveable fundamental unity continuing 
 in the antagonism. Tlie ordinary human understanding gives 
 utterance to this when it declares that there is no movement by 
 itself alone without a something that moves, and that it is im- 
 possible to think of movement without a something quiescent 
 or at rest. Without that fundamental unity the negativity itself 
 becomes as that which it ought to be, namely, as contradiction 
 and necessity, annihilated, because a duality- can only be a con- 
 tradiction, and on that account a restless negativity, when it 
 preserves at the same time the unity and immediateness of the 
 being in itself, but not so soon as it is itself rendered the single 
 immediateness, which, logically speaking, is impossible. As a 
 pure abstract principle per se, the negativity and necessity sup- 
 presses itself, i. e. it can only be, when it preserves the funda- 
 mentally essential identity as its own ground within itself, and 
 thus is not regarded as a principle but only as a momentum of 
 the principle; by this is meant that the necessity is not the 
 Absolute, but, indirectly, that what is free is the absolute prin- 
 ciple, yet a free element, which subsumes the necessity as 
 momentum, without being identical with it. In this synthesis, 
 being and origination are not neutralised so as to become the 
 dead unity, because with the being there is not combined a 
 quiescent attribute or quality, but synthetically the move- 
 able origination itself ; so that being and origination now pre- 
 sent themselves as the true essence (not indeed in Hegel's 
 sense) or as the idea (essentia). The naught, which Hegel 
 places at the beginning of the logic alongside of the being, 
 or into which he rather leaves the being to convert itself^ 
 can in this place, i. e. as negation of the being-thinking, 
 be only the so-called nihil negativum, or that naught only, 
 
CONCLUSION. 373 
 
 which, to he truly thought of, must not be thought of at all, so 
 that thus in the principle itself thinking and non-thinking may 
 have place alternately, or the principle itself be or be not 
 alternately, or, as it were, may blaze up and be extinguished. 
 But in fact, that naught is with Hegel only an heirloom of the 
 scheme of Fichte, namely, the non-Ego, whereby is meant not 
 naught, but another Ego (an Ego, but not my Ego), and is thus 
 posited rather as the duplication of the real Ego than as its 
 annihilation. This admits indeed of being said of the definite 
 individual and finite Ego of Fichte, but not of the Absolute, to 
 ■which Hegel has transferred this scheme of thought. 
 
 Now, what holds good in a general sense of the principle, 
 the so-called absolute negativity, that it is none other than the 
 moment of judgment which already presupposes an idea that 
 is to judge itself, must be asserted also concerning the dia- 
 kctick — the word being taken in its true and definite sense : 
 in which in like manner we may gaze only upon this momentum 
 of the method, but not the whole speculative method itself. 
 The idea, which must be first presupposed or previously given, 
 in order that we may advance to the activity of judgment, is 
 the definite genus, but at first only abstractedly thought of 
 (without any explicated content), a definite, more or less lofty, 
 category of essence in its immediateness or being. Now 
 this moves itself dialectically in itself, in conformity only with 
 its own nature ; but by virtue of this nature or its own con- 
 ception, it does not get beyond itself to a higher genus, but 
 only fills itself with its own content, i. e., with the lower special 
 ideas or categories, which are necessary to it as hypotheses and 
 conditions of its own existence, or with whose non-existence 
 it would itself be suppressed, just as the triangle could not 
 exist unless it were to include in itself, as its premises, space, 
 line, and angle. Thus, the dialectick, as a necessary movement 
 and determination of thought, depends in its turn upon the 
 contradiction, that what is posited as existent cannot also be 
 simultaneously regarded as non-posited. The whole, however, 
 's posited or presupposed in so far as it is genus, or category, 
 or conception; and with' this must also of necessity be posited 
 the essentially particular. This necessity, however, or the 
 contradiction, which would originate if that were not done, 
 presupposes itself the antecedent position of the idea, without 
 which it would not itself be present. Thus, to the dialectick 
 is at once prescribed a definite object or goal, for it is first set 
 in movement by that supposition, and that goal is the definite; 
 
 BBS 
 
374 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 special idea within which it elevates itself, and which is con-- 
 sequently for it the goal or purpose set before it, and which it 
 strives towards, or which, as final cause, first really evokes it. 
 Now'tiiis purpose cannot in our opinion be originally produced in 
 a genetic manner by the dialectick, but the object rather produces 
 the dialectick, and is itself the originally present. Accordingly, 
 there can be no dialectic method, which, without any hy- 
 pothetic element, can start purely from the lowest category, 
 and then contemplate this as potentialising itself beyond its 
 own nature into higher genera. We miss, with Schelling, 
 this power of the mere idea in the sense already alluded to (in 
 the thirteenth Lecture) in making mention of Cousins' Essay ; 
 but, nevertheless, we differ from him in this, that we do not 
 find ourselves thrown back, by this circumstance, upon the 
 necessity of an cwj^mcoZ foundation for philosophy, but perceive 
 therein only the higher necessity of seizing the absolute idea 
 as the original and immanent self-object which constitutes 
 our mental nature, as the ground or substratum which brings 
 out the philosophising process of thought, phenomenologically, 
 from each lower category of essence up to the absolute state 
 of spirituality and freedom. This absolute idea, however, from 
 which philosophy has to set out, or which, as principle, unfolds 
 itself into the system, is none other than the idea of philosophy 
 itself.* 
 
 On that account, this process has with Hegel its steady 
 progress, for he begins by speaking only of the philosophising 
 subject; and this is his hypothetical starting-point, nay, more, 
 it is the philosophising process, and, as such, is from the be- 
 ginning elevated in itself above and beyond all natural ex- 
 istence, into which it only admits itself with its representation, 
 without abandoning or giving up itself. Where, however, 
 Hegel takes the natural categories as truly objective, i. e., so 
 thinks them as they must be thought of, if they are actually 
 to be or constitute the real universe, as in the Philosophy of 
 Nature, he acknowledges himself " that they are a system of 
 stages, one of which is not engendered from the other in a natural 
 way, but only in the internal idea in its identity, as consti- 
 tuting the ground or substratum of nature." Thus, he here 
 acknowledges that the mind must phenomenologically grapple 
 with its subjectivity, or descend into itself as the absolute idea 
 
 * For an attempt to carry oat systematically the system of pare Phi- 
 losophy from this, its own principle, see the author's Entwurf eines 
 Systems der Wissenschaftslehre. Kiel 1846. 
 
coNCLusioiir. 375 
 
 in its identity, in order constantly to kindle anew its prome- 
 thean torch, as often as an advance is to be made from lower 
 notions or categories to higher ones ; and thus by this is im- 
 plied that the human mind must be somehow or other already 
 in possession of the highest idea {Idee), if it is to find its definite 
 content by descending, retrogressively, into the necessary con- 
 ditions, without which even that idea could not exist : for it 
 cannot arrive from below upwards through the graduated series 
 of these conditions at the highest idea, since it cannot by the 
 help of any method — at least, not by the negative-dialectic 
 one — engender them, as it were, artificially, without practising 
 a deception upon itself. If the natural categories thought of 
 as truly objective, and as holding true relations with each' other, 
 corresponding to the reality, do not, as Hegel himself confesses, 
 lead of necessity from below upwards, liow, then, could this 
 take place in that very part of the logic which bears the name 
 of objective, and busies itself with these natural categories? 
 "We are of opinion that the apparently objective progress is 
 here also no true or genuinely objective one, but a hidden 
 phenomenological one, which results only from the ultimate 
 design known and willed beforehand, namely, the absolute 
 subjectivity, although Hegel does not admit this, but aims at 
 going to work in a purely objective, genetic manner. If, upon 
 the one hand, we take away this ultimate design, i. e. the ready- 
 prepared subject of the philosopher with its fundamental ac- 
 tivity, and then, without, upon the other hand, letting ourselves 
 be blinded by the potentialising aspect of the dialectick, abide 
 only by the objectivity, it follows, that we must necessarily 
 seek for the progress of the thinking process from one category 
 to another by the empirical route, and arrive also at the con- 
 viction that, without experience, there will be no such progress 
 or advance.* In this light Schelling, also, among others, 
 f ppears to regard the present question, and in this way to 
 ii dulge a hope that experience itself may be strengthened 
 . to becoming a necessary postulate for philosophy as a system. 
 The very same notion was also present to Aristotle with more 
 or less distinctness, for even he does not discover and furnish 
 any necessary transition and connection of the categories frbm 
 below upwards, but takes them up singly as empirical, and then 
 arranges them. Hegel reproaches him for this, and finds there- 
 in, as a result, a want of organic unity in the whole system, 
 declaring that Aristotle was not acquainted with the principle 
 
 * Trendelenburg, Logische Untersuchungen, Bd. i. Sect. iii. 
 B B 4 
 
376 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 of absolute negativity, as being that alone which could dialecti- 
 cally mediate this progress. From genus to genus, however, 
 we are impelled by no immanent necessity : each principle (or 
 generic idea) gives forth and lives out what resides in it ; for 
 it continues to reproduce its genus, and produces nothing better 
 than it was itself. There lies no absolute contradiction in the 
 lower special ideas in themselves, for such would involve the, 
 impossibility of these ideas themselves ; so that, as such, they 
 would not exist even a moment, setting aside the fact of their 
 being able to form a concrete system of nature. 
 
 Thus much will suffice in order to explain the motives for 
 affirming that the dialectick, just as Hegel has elevated it to the 
 method of philosophy, is not the whole, but only a part or 
 moment of the speculative method. No dialectick can originally 
 posite and begin ; it can only originate from behind the posit- 
 ing, and point out what must be posited simultaneously and 
 together with the first position, or what, if not simultaneously 
 posited, would suppress the posited itself: it has, in truth, a 
 critical value; but for itself alone, without a positive moment, 
 it degenerates into a negative action, which has been already 
 pointed out, by Aristotle, with a perfectly clear insight into 
 the matter, to be sophistic. As regards the characteristics of 
 true speculation, we can only indicate these at present as far as 
 is necessary for affi)rding some insight into the deficiency of that 
 method. The speculative method, as is clear from what has 
 gone before, posites beginning and ending both at once : it 
 posites, in the first place (to use a familiar expression), the 
 ambitus of the idea, in order, in the next place, necessitated 
 by this, to fill up the idea with the complexus that belong^ 
 to, and lies already involved in, it ; i. e., it begins with the ab- 
 stract notion of design, both in establishing the individual 
 categories, as also in devising the whole system of the science 
 of truth. For were it to posite, in the first place, only a part 
 or a moment of the same, why. then it would indeed arrive 
 dialectically at the filling up of this portion, but not beyond 
 this at the totality. What else, however, can this unity of 
 beginning and end be than the very unity of the idea, and that, 
 indeed, in the very first place, the idea of philosophy, the love 
 of wisdom itself? Beginning thus purely from itself, i. e., from 
 its abstract notion, and utterly unconcerned, at present, about 
 every thing else, it grows and mediates itself as a pure love 
 of science thoroughly from itself, — is its own ground, its own 
 means, and its own object — in a word, its own phenomenology 
 
CONCLUSION. 377 
 
 or teleology. The further progress, however, is this, that 
 abstract, indeed, though all-comprehensive, as it at first appears, 
 It discedes, in the next place, into i-ts most universal and com- 
 prehensive momenta, i.e., into the proximate distinctions of 
 the collective content, which will be the leading divisions or 
 parts of the system ; but each of these is itself again a notion 
 or sphere of categories, which perfects the same judgment in 
 itself, and hence particularises and determines itself. Thus, 
 the determination and judging proceeds from the more compre- 
 hensive to the particular, while still the whole remains as sub- 
 stantial unity and pervading substratum unsuppressed in power, 
 and ultimately reappears, as embracing that particular content 
 in itself as concrete unity of essence. Hence the system sets 
 out from the strictest monism, and has for its final object or 
 goal the specific individuation ; while in that rigid monism 
 alone is found the scientific justification for attaining that goal. 
 Without, however, venturing, in the present instance, to depict 
 the leading outlines of a new system, let us return back to the 
 Hegelian, that we may point out therein the traces of such a 
 specified teleology as that which would originate and is impelled 
 towards the light, but by Hegel himself is still misapprehended, 
 nay, treated with scorn. 
 
 In doing this, I am reminded of what has been previously, 
 though cursorily, said (in the fifteenth Lecture) about the 
 systematic arrangement of the whole system. Attention was 
 there directed, upon coming to the beginning of the Logic, to 
 the fact that Hegel, as a rule, prefaced both the whole and the 
 principal sections of his system with a table of contents or 
 schematic survey of its subdivision, but constantly accompanied 
 this with the express declaration that it was not to serve as 
 a means for anticipating or determining the end or object of 
 the whole system. Nevertheless, the ternary divisions into 
 which the universal idea previously resolves itself, would 
 appear, such as they are, to be, in themselves, dialectically and 
 methodically justified, had Hegel only confided in them, and 
 not, with an almost superstitious fear, been withheld from 
 determining any thing beforehand as to the limit or goal. 
 For why should not the dialectick hold good of the mostunir 
 versal and comprehensive notions, as well as the most special, 
 and effect, within the limited range of the latter, what it can- 
 not do in the comprehensive sphere of the former ? A deter- 
 mination anticipating in this way the special through the 
 universal, and hence an a priori determination, would be what 
 
378 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 we call an intentional method, or one that sets an object or 
 purpose before itself; but, regarded in this light, the whole 
 system would obtain an essentially different character to that 
 which it now has, where the categories, so to speat, are spun 
 out in a linear manner, and the lower is by negation of itself 
 to engender from itself the next higher one — a negation this 
 which, as a contradiction of itself in itself, or as an internal 
 impossibility/ of being, reduces, such as it is, the principle of 
 necessity to the most rigid state of coercion that can possibly 
 be conceived. This, however, it is said, cannot be the case, 
 because in this process each principle, while it works, always 
 negates itself, and while turning over into its counterpart, loses 
 itself. Through the pretension that is constantly being in- 
 sisted upon of conserving what has been, and thinking of it as 
 a condition of the higher together with this, that higher itself 
 comes into existence only by a momentary death of the ante- 
 cedent, and we are at a loss to know where the genetic power 
 of transubstantiation — for such it is, and not a metamorphosis 
 — must really reside, unless the thinking subject changes 
 itself into the means. The antecedent element is obviously 
 extinguished only by the fault of the method and systematick, 
 and the subsequent element steps into the spot that has become 
 empty upon the disappearance of its predecessor. Thus, a 
 movement of constant negation is present which resembles that 
 which is made by workmen in a tread-mill, who, while always 
 lifting their feet, do not get away from one spot, because the 
 basis upon which they stand is at each step withdrawn ; so that 
 this beginning, seen from a distance, appears to be utterly 
 without result and aim — a labour of Sisyphus, or one that is 
 undertaken only for the sake of the movement. 
 
 In this image we recognise at a glance the fundamental cate- 
 gory of the whole system: where, as in physical life and pros- 
 perity, the means themselves are a design or purpose, here that 
 category supplies their place ; but where the mediation extends 
 to the being of an objective purpose, and thus is itself truly 
 posited as that which is, namely, as means, there this method 
 and sytematick is insufficient and contrary to design. If we 
 agree with Hegel, in regarding form and content as inseparable, 
 it follows, that we must also declare that his system, by virtue 
 of its form, does not get beyond that very content, which is the 
 idea of life and the prosperity of temporal existence. All higher 
 ideas and purposes, however, so soon as they have been dragged 
 into or under this form, can themselves appear only as life, or 
 
CONCLUSION. 379 
 
 as this sensuous-psychical reality, this being the case also with 
 the category of substantiality, which, not being throughout the 
 whole system truly vanquished, is ultimately manifested every- 
 where as the restless movement of the process, the mediation 
 being the object itself. 
 
 Is, however, the Hegelian system, it will be asked, acquainted 
 with no category of design or purpose, and has it not in its own 
 course a pervading teleology or argument from design ? Cer- 
 tainly, but the subordinate, mistaken position of the category 
 causes the design to be one only of a subjective, selfish, and self- 
 interested character. Hegel is not acquainted with the mean- 
 ing of the objective design, i. e. the Love ; the tendency of the 
 whole system, by setting out from dualism, reverts of necessity 
 into an absolute monism ; it consumes and digests in a selfish 
 manner every self-subsistent within the insatiable unity of the 
 absolute substance, while a system, that sets out from monism, 
 would have the opposite disposition, i. e. the tendency to posite 
 true objective purposes of its own. The same lot befalls Hegel's 
 system as is encountered by every philosophy which, in order 
 that it may justify with positive certainty the empirical element, 
 adopts at once into its principle the empirical dualism of a sub- 
 jective Ego and an objective world : such a procedure leads to 
 nothing else than to monistic subjectivism, while this again is 
 of such a kind that, in order to maintain itself, it veers round 
 into immediate objectivism, empiricism, and eudiemonism, 
 though, as is well known, it does not arrive there at a state of 
 rest, but remains the eternal origination or becoming, which 
 never arrives at reconciliation with itself, to say nothing of its 
 attaining to the thought and desire of positing an object for 
 the sake of such object. Theoretically regarded, the knowledge 
 which is here attained is only a knowledge of the subject 
 touching its own being, and hence a subjective knowledge, a 
 self-consciousness of the intelligence only, which thinks the 
 existence of objects to be their non-being pe7- se, i. e. the nega- 
 tion of the truth of the objective being. And seeing that to 
 the system in this way the true notion of objective being is 
 wanting, it follows, that this defect veers back again also into 
 the being of the subject ; this also not being a true being, but 
 only an origination, an appearance. As regards the strict and 
 definite comprehension of the notion of the objectivity of being ; 
 of this, Herbart's system, though excluding from it all origina- 
 tion, is in possession, while to the Hegelian it is utterly wanting. 
 On that account the intelligence is and remains with Hegel, 
 
380 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 theoretically as well as practically, a dialectic and necessary 
 process of suppressing as well as positing the objective, and 
 hence it is a knowledge and craving which has no true being 
 for its object and content, no objective truth — a position this, 
 which Hegel converts into the directly opposite one, seeing that 
 he never escapes from the dialectick of the understanding, and 
 never penetrates through it to the idea of the real concrete 
 truth, in which the objective has subjectivity also in itself, and, 
 is, on that account, the truth, which may be known, not merely 
 thought of. That an object may by the absolute subject be 
 willed into the state of real subject-being per se, i. e into one 
 of actual freedom, and may be dismissed, i. e. rendered with 
 the special self-satisfaction of the subject the objective purpose 
 which it has in view, is a point utterly foreign to the present 
 system, though in that we recognise the most essential truth 
 not only of knowledge, but of the good, and thus the only true 
 principle of Ethics also, this principle being the goal that is to 
 be set before philosophy, which by its name and idea declares 
 itself beforehand to be not only a craving (^i\ta) after know- 
 ledge, but also after practical wisdom [iroipia). 
 
 "What, on the contrary, is here called morality, and which is 
 craved unreasonably from the human being, is only a sacrificing 
 of the condition of self into the abyss of the absolute substance, 
 which, being in itself devoid of love, does not justify the duty 
 of this "sacrifice; for the so-called goodness of Hegel's Deity 
 consists only in the gratification of its own activity, by positing 
 individuals incessantly ; its love only, in getting exclusive 
 possession of itself in them, while, finally, its justice is declared 
 to be but the power of exposing the nothingness of all that 
 has been posited, i. e. annihilating the latter according to the 
 principle of Mephistophiles : 
 
 . . . . " for, of all that rises, never 
 One thing appears but what deserves to go 
 To ruin and destruction." 
 
 In good truth, the Platonic god was better than this modern 
 child-devouring Saturn ; for when he created self-subsistent 
 divine beings, he said, " I am your creator and father ; all the 
 works generated by me are by ray will indissoluble ; for all that 
 is bound is soluble; to desire, however, to dissolve what is 
 beautifully harmonised and well-disposed, is the mark of an evil 
 nature. Now, inasmuch as you have been generated or have 
 become, you are not indeed immortal nor wholly indissoluble, 
 
CONCLUSION". 381 
 
 yet you shall never be dissolved nor become subject to death, 
 because in my will you have got a stronger and mightier bond 
 than that by which you were bound when first created. 
 
 The Hegelian fundamental schema — Being, Naught, Ori- 
 gination — does not correspond to the scheme of objective tele- 
 ology, — -principle, means; and effect; but the origination or 
 process, L e. the means, is interposed as an eternal self-mediation 
 in the place of the purpose. The system cannot, therefore, 
 evolve itself to the point at which the ground or principle 
 might range as the self-thinking subjectivity opposite to or over 
 against a definite objectivity, but the former has and maintains 
 even as idea (idee), its own intrinsic value only upon and in the 
 objectivity, which hence is no more any thing per se than the 
 ground or principle ; all lies only involved in the midst of the 
 origination, and this process, proceeding from an empty principle, 
 passes out into an abstract naught, produces nothing, but re- 
 produces only itself, being thus a null and void act of production. 
 This is the circle, or, strictly speaking, the oscillation between 
 two extremes, the alternation or change, within which the Ab- 
 solute may not merely be said to move, but which it actually is 
 or constitutes in itself; it is, as has been said, the eternal and 
 inevitable process of self-mutation and gyration, or that neces- 
 sity which is or exists only as an eternal process of conversion 
 or sudden change. The momentum of the subjective principle 
 is indeed to be in the Absolute, or, as it is represented in the 
 system, to be the logic in itself (God, as it were, before the 
 creation of the world) ; and this expression of Hegel's is still 
 retained in part by his earlier pupils ; but this logical principle 
 is still, as a consequence of the whole systematick, not a think- 
 ing process in the sense of an actual mental activity per se, but 
 is only actual upon the domain of the world's reality, i. e. in so 
 far as men think, or God has his consciousness, his spiritual 
 existence, not per se, but in human beings; and the human 
 beings are God, in so far as they think and will the universal, 
 and that which in the universal is persistent and rational. That 
 the human being objectifies and hypostasizes this his own think- 
 ing process, is the idea of the religious standing-point, but one 
 which, when dragged, as has been very recently done by the 
 Left-hand party of the school, in a perfectly logical and barefaced 
 manner, into the light of noon-day, turns out to be only an 
 anthropologico-psychological standing-point, which, in philo- 
 sophical thinking, suppresses itself and turns out to be false. 
 In this way, such philosophising, instead of having actually 
 
S82 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 progressed, has returned in essentials unmistakeably to the 
 Kantian standing-point, and the Critick of that author, so far as 
 it was subjective in character, has in this way in a most un- 
 expected manner concluded its course ; for as we remember, 
 even for that Critick, the ideas of the reason were not justifiable 
 hypotheses of the mere mode of subjective thinking, personified 
 laws of thought devoid of objective truth and being, and con- 
 taining no knowledge of truth, but they were only a belief, the 
 truth of which was with Kant to be imperatively based upon 
 some other grounds, namely, the ethical — while in the present 
 instance^such belief relapses utterly as a deception into naught, 
 which would have been impossible in the historical course of phi- 
 losophy, if the author of the Critick had succeeded in achieving 
 what he wished for and 'acknowledged to be necessary, namely, 
 the elevation of the ethical categories of freedom into a " Meta- 
 physics of Morals," i. e, into a special and absolute series of 
 fundamental principles, concluding and, as it were, crowning 
 the system of the doctrine of science. 
 
 Let us now return, in conclusion, once again back to the 
 systematic arrangement of the whole system. Hegel had at 
 first, as has been mentioned, the intention of placing the first 
 part of the system in the Phenomenology ; had this been done, 
 the Logic would have formed the second, and the Philosophy of 
 Nature and of Mind, taken together, the third part. The 
 Phenomenology would then have presented an ascending, ana- 
 lytically retrogressive tendency, or one that returns back to the 
 true principle ; the Logic would, as it were, have vibrated at 
 the apex or centre of the whole system ; and the last part would, 
 as that which has been called by Weisse and others a real 
 philosophy, have represented the synthesis of the two preceding 
 stages, but at the same time also the reduction or return to the 
 beginning of the first part. In the sequel, however, another 
 arrangement of the system was preferred, the real philosophy 
 being separated into two parts, and the latter, the Philosophy of 
 Mind, brouglit to a state of reduction in the Logic. Now, here 
 it is obvious that two different kinds of fundamental views, 
 the dialeotick reflection and the ternary division of the idea 
 (Begriff), intercept each other in a confused manner, for the 
 former has not suffered the latter to arrive at the thorough 
 stage of objective teleology ; the subjective design or principle 
 must once more yield to the mysterious reality, the transcendent 
 or antecedent being, as to an unutterable abstraction, the 
 spiritual personality of God lost its existence, and, because the 
 
CONCLirSION. 383 
 
 reality had to obtain this, it first found this immediately in the 
 world's reality, whereby this obtained in the real philosophy 
 such a doubtful position and meaning, by blending again 
 together with that reality into a bare or wretched unity, that 
 the whole became a monism devoid of subjectivity, and, in fact, 
 repeated that Spinozism which Hegel had set before himself in 
 the Phenomenology as a problem to be overcome. If we regard 
 the system as it lies before us, we can, by insisting upon the 
 content, recognise therein only a threefold repetition. The 
 system in its first form is the Phenomenology, the second elabora- 
 tion of it is the Logic, and the third the Philosophy of Nature 
 and Mind ; each begins from the beginning and is thoroughly 
 carried out, but the transition from one to the other is, as 
 Schelling first declared of the connection of the Logic and 
 Nature-philosophy, thoroughly indistinct and unaccountable ; 
 for, according to our view, it is not a transition or progress, 
 but rather a conversion which is there to be recognised. Had 
 Hegel abided by his first view of the matter, why then the Logic 
 would have taken a more decided post than at present, and 
 instead of representing in itself a perpetual whirl or circula- 
 tion, would have taken a place like that of the philosophia 
 prima with Aristotle, i. e. it would have soared to tlie summit 
 of the whole system, and have rendered itself what at the 
 present day an universal theory of science must be, a confirma- 
 tion of the principles of all sciences or so-called individual 
 disciplines, which derive their origin in all directions from it as 
 the main-stay of all scientifick, resting in itself or gravitating 
 upon the idea of absolute truth. 
 
 As to that mysterious " Ansich " to which the logical mind 
 has been, by virtue of the systematick, degraded, we have been 
 unable to discover in it any thing else than a new word for the 
 old notion of potency. In fact, this is shown to be the obscure 
 point upon the meaning of which the two different views of the 
 schools, namely, the theistic and naturalistic-monistic, part com- 
 pany with each other. It is the same point, too, upon which 
 impinges the principal opposition between the neo-Schellingian 
 and old Hegelian philosophies. If we set aside the theistic 
 notion as virtually Hegelian, it may then be said that Hegel 
 regards this fundamental reality as ideality, Schelling as reality^ 
 so that the old Hegelians reproach, upon that account, the doc- 
 trines of Schelling with letting the mind originate from the 
 matter, while they themselves profess to have, as a principle, 
 the absolute intelUgence as the eternal reason. If, however, we 
 
384 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 look, upon the one hand, at the state of suspense in which the idea 
 of the reason "existing in itself" is ordinarily regarded, and, 
 upon the other, at the obstinate retention of the " negativity" and 
 method, it follows that we must, if a decided opinion is now de- 
 manded of us in regard to the position held by these two systems, 
 declare, without reserve, that Hegel appears to have advanced 
 in so far bayond the stand-point of the earlier and later Philo- 
 sophy of Nature, inasmuch as he recognises the Absolute to 
 be intelligence or mind; for since, as has been already observed 
 (Lecture xiv.) Hegel does not stand before, but in, the thinking 
 process, it follows, that if we regard the pure result of the 
 whole, and in doing this, disregard the methodical contradic- 
 tions in the details, an absolute monism is that alone which 
 ultimately remains as the Absolute and One, the only truly 
 existent ; if however, we estimate this result very highly, or 
 insist upon its importance, we must not, at the same time, also 
 omit to notice what to us appears a defect, namely, that this 
 absolute idealistic monism is not recognised for what it is, 
 namely, as idealism and subjectivity of the Absolute, but is, at 
 the same time, and under the same aspect, declared to be the 
 reality of the universe. To have recognised this latter point is, 
 without doubt, Schelling's most recent merit, so that we must 
 acknowledge that, with this consciousness, Schelling goes beyond 
 Hegel, and is justified in declaring that all philosophy hitherto 
 is only a propaideutick, destined to prepare and conduct the con- 
 sciousness up to that point, and that he has here grappled, for 
 the first time, with the true, real principle as a positive deduc- 
 tion, from whence must now begin a wholly different method of 
 philosophising, a progressive one, corresponding with the cate- 
 gories of creative freedom : in fact, we see in this statement, 
 for the first time, the prospect of a system, which, setting out 
 from a Deity existing in itself, and abiding by such as the prin- 
 ciple, strives to comprehend the creation of the universe as its 
 free act, a problem in which alone a glimpse seems to be afforded 
 into the true content of our modern Christian act of thinking 
 and willing, and not merely into that of the Pagan epoch. If 
 now we openly declare that this very problem appears to us to 
 be insoluble in any other way than by virtue of the ethical 
 categories, and that we express ourselves the more confidently 
 the more we are convinced that the method leading to this goal 
 . — the teleological — is none other than the dialectico-logical 
 which has arrived at a perfectly definite state of perfection in 
 itself, it follows, that we must still, as is but just or equitable, 
 
CONCLUSION. 385 
 
 refrain from passing any definite judgment upon the perform- 
 ances of the great master so long as they themselves lie before 
 us in an imperfect and unauthenticated state. 
 
 We will conclude our present /labours with a general his- 
 torical sketch. As in judging of the last system we found 
 that a philosophy which had attained to the possession of a 
 comprehensive systematic consciousness of itself afforded to 
 criticism no other point of attack than that of its general ar- 
 rangement, so also a perfect critical view and survey of the 
 present standing-point of philosophy is not to be obtained 
 from any single system, not even the last, nor to be ex- 
 pected from those persons who hold by this system only, or 
 regard it by the light only of modern precedents. Upon this 
 point a clear and perfect consciousness is only to be gained by 
 contemplating the antagonism between the philosophy of the 
 Middle Ages and of Antiquity, or by taking a survey of the 
 whole developmental course of the culture of the human mind.* 
 History, though philosophically regarded, here enters upon 
 its true privileges or rights. Accordingly, to take up this 
 position in a perfect manner, it is necessary to enter upon a 
 wider survey of the subject than that which is conceded to us 
 by the standing-point usually chosen. We have in the present 
 work traversed but a comparatively small, although rich, divi- 
 sion of the whole development of Philosophy — in short, its 
 last or modern phase only ; and have seen in this that the chief 
 business of human thought is and must be to discover and 
 comprehend principle, means, and end, both in the singular and 
 in the whole. AU three moments ought to be one or united ; 
 but they must also be distinguished, and, each in its own place, 
 must necessarily be that to which, by this place, it is entitled 
 or justified. To find the true formula for this relation has 
 been, as the whole history of philosophy teaches us, the pro- 
 blem from Pythagoras down to Hegel : incessantly has the 
 human mind laboured with this intention, and, without having 
 in itself a distinct consciousness of the fact, worked within the 
 pale of this formula, in order to obtain possession of it for it- 
 
 * In this respect we especially recommend Braniss, Uebersicht des 
 Bntwickelungsganges der Philosophie in der alten und mittleren Zeit. 
 Breslau, 1842 ; and as regards the epoch preparatory to that of Kant, 
 J. H. Fichte, Beitrage zur Characteristik der neueren Philosophie, Ed. 2nd, 
 Sulztach 1841; Erdmann, Gesch. der neueren Phil. Bd. ii. Abth. 2. 
 Leipzig, 1842. Consult also Hillehrand, der Organismus der Phil. Idee, &o. 
 Dresden u. Leipzig, 1842. 
 
 c c 
 
386 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 self. It has, however, succeeded only by degrees in evolving 
 the method, and, with this form, the appropriate content also. 
 The method has its own development and history, but this latter 
 coalesces, in every instance, with the principle as well as with 
 the system or the objective product and result. Pagan anti- 
 quity and Grecian philosophy stood within this idea ; though, 
 in its immediateness, this idea is only that of Beauty. There 
 the principle is present as the psychical essence, the purpose or 
 end being the direct phenomenon, or reality ; the means is the 
 life, but the life itself is still all, being consequently the object 
 also, and must be so, seeing that the principle in the phenome- 
 non and the phenomenon in the principle are, at bottom, inces- 
 santly blossoming and decaying : neither of them being in itself 
 per se, it follows, that neither of them can be the object, and 
 nothing remains than to erect into the object or purpose the 
 blossoming and decay, or this mediating movement itself, al- 
 though in this way it falls into a state of contradiction, and can- 
 not, as life, support the dignity of the absolute teleological 
 being, but relapses into the progressus in infinitum — into 
 that which absolutely should be, i. e., into an infinite ending. 
 
 The human self-consciousness cannot rest content with this, 
 for it is thereby placed in a state of most trenchant and painful 
 contradiction — into the negation of itself, so soon as it reflects 
 upon the true meaning of this category. Antiquity stood, in 
 the beginning, in this idea (Idee) without reflection, like a child 
 that does not yet think of death, because it has life still before 
 it, and the Jirsf question is, certainly, how to live. It could 
 not, however, remain in this state, the content ofi this idea or 
 its truth admitting of no. abiding satisfaction, for it does not 
 consent to positing, as object, what in itself is only means. 
 The ancient consciousness broke forth ; Christianity rendered 
 prominent the true purpose or end ; but with this a dualism 
 and relation of the two elements was at first posited, namely, 
 of the purpose as product, the principle as producent— -of man 
 upon the one side, and Deity upon the other. The thinking 
 process of mediation began afresh, and this time it began, of 
 necessity, in a negative direction, i. e,, in one that resolved or 
 led back the doubt to unity, a direction, however, which could 
 not, upon the other hand, have furnished the Pagan result. 
 
 Fostered in its infancy, and brought up upon the mother 
 soil of Greece, philosophy now applied herself within the early 
 Christian, i. e. Grecian church, in a direct and wholly objec- 
 tive manner to the problem of the Deity. To this it transferred 
 
CONCLUSION. 387 
 
 the Platonic formula, the idea of beauty ; elaborated, moreover, 
 the dogma of the Trinity, but, by defining this only in an 
 objective manner, without setting it in its true relation to the 
 world and humanity, it remained on that very account a dogma 
 only, not a philosopheme. In this point philosophy forgot both 
 the world and itself, while Oriental Christianity, utterly im- 
 mersed in the state of objective contemplation, could find but 
 little activity in its own bosom, seeing that the external rela- 
 tions of its people and states were but ill adapted to awaken the 
 self-consciousness : the mind preferred seeking refuge from 
 reality and itself in the supramundane objectivity as in a per- 
 fect asylum, there to lose and bury itself in the unattainable 
 depths of the Deity. The Christian Neoplatonist could not 
 preserve the one-sided state in which he oscillated ; and if he 
 wished that the category of his consciousness should bear re- 
 lation to God and also to humanity, it followed that the latter 
 fell back, as an empty accident, into the substance of the Deity, 
 from out of which it could be lifted only by the grace of belief, 
 but not by the idea of philosophy. 
 
 A more powerful individual feeling or self-consciousness was 
 infused, for the first time, with the fresh blood of Germany 
 into European humanity. It blended at once with the Grseco- 
 Roman element into the Romanism of the Middle Ages, both as 
 regards morals, language, and modes of thought. But humanity, 
 or the anthropological element, as it was termed by the dog- 
 matists, was soon put forth by these Orientals so soon as they 
 began to philosophise, nay, more, it advanced so far as to be- 
 come Pelagianism. The reinstated energy of the subject, the 
 human being, and, indeed, of the individual, of personality, 
 soon asserted its rights ; and as it knew how to put itself in just 
 possession of a worldly possession in the state, as opposed to 
 the church, and to declare itself by its practical activity, it 
 again succeeded in gaining a scientific possession of nature, 
 culled from the Arabians mathematics and physics, which were 
 all but lost, and, finally, the Grecian sources of learning them- 
 selves from out the dust of cloisters, and ultimately the whole 
 treasure of antiquity from Italy and Byzantium, in order to re- 
 elaborate within itself, under the form of a new humanity, the 
 art, and with it the koXov kui ayadov of the Grecians. The fruit 
 of all this was the triumph of the world's energy, as elevated 
 to the stage of merit in works, and of individuality, although 
 of an abstract kind as in Nominalism. 
 
 The third, which was really a German period, hegan in the 
 c c 2 
 
388 HISTOEICAL SURVEY. 
 
 universal sense and spirit so characteristic of tlie people. If, 
 since the times of Augustine and Anselm, the elaboration of 
 the subjective state had been, upon the whole, uninterrupted, 
 though engaged at the same time in struggling with a clerical 
 realism, which endeavoured to stifle its individual independence, 
 it follows, that it was now the problem of the Protestant world, 
 — and this problem is certainly a most difficult one, only to 
 be solved ultimately and fully by a scientific method, — to bring 
 the objectivism of early Christianity and the subjectivism of 
 the Middle Ages into an unity of reconciliation. The Pro- 
 testant belief has constantly, though dogmatically, clung to this 
 problem in so far as its most vehement representatives were 
 inwardly conscious of its origin. Philosophy, however, in order 
 to play the part of a mediator scientifically, was obliged, of 
 necessity, to drive the antagonism to its ultimate point, i. e., 
 to the most trenchant antithesis, and, as Philosophy, she was 
 wholly justified in taking part with the subjectivity, and re- 
 instating the subject where possible, as the Absolute. Hence 
 we encounter the atomism of the finite Egoes in a similar 
 manner with Fichte as well as Herbart. As regards the con- 
 tent of their systems, both have that atomism, although under 
 an opposite phase of representation (the former in the subjec- 
 tive, the latter in the objective method) ; and from this we 
 may well infer what has really been the deepest ground of the 
 atomism, and what common interest it is which has led, at 
 diflferent times, powerful minds to oppose it as a doctrine to that 
 of an overwhelming pantheism : we shall, for such an interest, 
 ultimately discover an ethical ground — the ground of indi- 
 vidual self- feeling. Now, however, as opposed to this subjective 
 or objective atomism, the monism must reassert its rights. The 
 Fichtean subject, comprehended at first as a totality, utterly 
 shut up within itself, launched out with Schelling and Hegel 
 partly into an objective realism, partly into an objective spiri- 
 tualism, but in both cases into pantheism ; and the present age 
 is now sufficiently matured for distinctly recognising in these 
 forms and phases the problem at which it has hitherto laboured 
 with more or less consciousness of the final purpose that emerges 
 in unmistakeable clearness from out the whole. 
 
 Having arrived now at the end of our labours, let us return 
 once more to that question which has been already mooted twice, 
 though interruptedly, in the course of our history, namely, as to 
 whether, upon the one hand, it is not a mischievous pretension 
 upon the part of the philosophising subject, and one that admits 
 
CONCLUSION, 389 
 
 only of being had recourse to through a kind of thoughtlessness, 
 when it endeavours to elevate itself to the standing-point of 
 the Absolute, and in absolute knowledge to occupy, as it were, 
 the place of God; and whether, on the other hand, this hazardous 
 entei'prise is not necessarily craved by philosophy itself, so long 
 as it aims to be philosophy alone, and does not content itself 
 with a relative certainty. This problem we see Hegel responding 
 to, by assuming a pantheistic identity of the human being and 
 God, in which identity, when regarded at least from a strict and 
 logical point of view, the Deity itself arrives, for the first time, 
 by virtue of human cognition, to the state of consciousnes — a 
 solution this of the problem, which explains perfectly, it is true, 
 the absolute knowledge in us,' but on that very account affords 
 little satisfaction to the religious ideas, and to this we may add 
 the philosophical notion also of Deity. In Schelling, on the 
 contrary,'we find at present, unless we are deceived, that an 
 entirely different, nay, opposite tendency, is at work, towards 
 the solution of that difficulty : a system is sought to be attained 
 in which experience is to come into its full rights, which it must 
 have if the knowledge of the Absolute in us human beings is 
 to be rendered comprehensible by revelation, and justified from 
 a personal relation of God to humanity. To this phase of philo- 
 sophic development we naturally look forward full of hopes, but 
 meanwhile we content ourselves with the following view of the 
 matter, which, in our opinion, is as free from mystical pedantry 
 as it is satisfactory from its simplicity, which neither blinds by 
 its glare, nor is yet deficient in light and heat, a view by which 
 we certainly arrive in our reason, at the means and justification 
 of the knowledge of the Absolute, because God, by virtue of 
 his love that sets before itself objective purposes, comes also m 
 these his designs to us, and this so soon as we acknowledge him 
 to be the holy and sanctifying spirit; and this we recognise in 
 that which is our own yearning nature, when it is as it should 
 be, i. e. when it has attained in itself to a reconciliation that is 
 free of contradiction, or to the freedom of contradiction in 
 thought and will. With this purpose of the Absolute realised 
 in ourselves, the Absolute itself has been recognised and com- 
 prehended not only in its eternal being as intelligence, i. e. not 
 merely according to its so-called metaphysical qualities, but 
 also in its will and eternal councils or decrees^ as objective truth 
 also, unsuppressed by any theory of identification with our own 
 nature. How far this idea may lie within the compass of a 
 speculative method, and be thus scientifically possible, upon this 
 
 c c 3 
 
390 HISTORICAL SURVEY. 
 
 point the present is not the fitting place for entering any further ; 
 attention has been only directed to it with a view of showing 
 how upon this standing-point both absolute monism, as also 
 atomistic monadism, have their full rights ; and hence we, with 
 our present knowledge, seem fully justified in the position we 
 have assigned at once to the systems of Hegel and Herbart, 
 seeing that to the mediation of these two standing-points, which 
 theoretically may be reduced to the simplest formula of becoming 
 and being, we would direct attention as to the problem not only 
 of the present, but the future. As to the root of all evil, i. e. 
 of all unsuccessful and sophistical torment — this from the very 
 beginning we have declared dualism in the principle to be ; it is 
 only a freely self-determining, in the strictest sense monistic, 
 but by no means abstract Absolute, which has the power in its 
 all-sufficient omnipotence to press forwards to the objective esta- 
 blishment of its designs, and, elevated above all egotism, to cre- 
 ate out of love to the object, which last must not be dualistically 
 given and originally set aside, but must be grounded as to its 
 existence in its will. In this way only can the principle main- 
 tain itself as such per se, and it is only when the principle has 
 the power to do this that it can also create, so that the created 
 is, remains, and is immortal per se ; for he who so wills it is 
 himself immortal, i. e. elevated above our death and our life. 
 Belief is in direct possession of this truth, but as truth, it can 
 only know a knowledge that has become adequate to its idea ; 
 the human being is itself a self, and will, on that account, have 
 a certainty of his own, which he cannot in turn attain without 
 the certainty of Deity, i. e. not without knowing the Deity itself 
 to be intelligent ; for if the Deity neither desires to know nor 
 does know the human being such as he is, it follows that he 
 cannot know himself to be such ; and on that account in his 
 knowledge there must be both truth of knowledge and knowledge 
 of truth at the same time. We see how, with Hegel, a further 
 division of the history of mind has run its course, and in this 
 relation we acknowledge him to be the achiever of a great phi- 
 losophical past, such as his own philosophical consciousness when 
 directed backwards towards the past — not to what should be, 
 the future -ogives utterance to in these words : "For the first 
 time in the maturity of reality the ideal appears opposite to the 
 real, and the former builds up to itself the same world, when 
 apprehended in its substance, in the form of an intellectual 
 domain. If pbilosophy paints her grey in grey, then a form of 
 life has become old, and with grey in grey she does not grow 
 
CONCLUSION. 391 
 
 young again, but only admits of being recognised ; for the first 
 time with the break of day begins the Owl of Minerva her 
 flight." It is the evening star which in this philosophy shines 
 upon us, but we hope to gaze upon it again as morning star also, 
 and meanwhile exclaim with the poet, 
 
 " No bar the spirit world hath ever borne — 
 It Is thy thought is shut, thy heart is dead : 
 Up ! scholar, bathe, unwearied and unworn. 
 Thine earthly breast in morning's beams of red." 
 
 0C4 
 
INDEX. 
 
 CHALTBiinS, 
 
 Eemarks upon Hegel's pretensions to a perfect system of Philosophy, 
 
 p. 364. 
 On the Division of the Hegelian School into opposite parties, p. 365. 
 
 Conditioned by internal contradictions unsolved both in the Principle, 
 
 p. 370.; the Method, p. 372.; and Eesult, p. 379. 
 General criticism of Hegel's Systematick, p. 382. 
 Comprehensive survey of the whole historical course of Philosophy, p. 38 5. 
 
 PiCHTE, p. 146. 
 
 Keviev? of Kant's Critick of Pure Reason, p; 146. 
 
 Eeview of Jacobi's philosophy, p. 147. 
 
 Subsequent division of Philosophy into Realism and Dynamioo-Idealism 
 
 p. 147. 
 Mchte's individual Subjectivism, p. 148. 
 His Theory of Knowledge (Wissenschaftslehre), p. 149. 
 Endeavour to account for the non-Ego by supposition of certain " absolute 
 
 and inexplicable limits " inherent in the constitution of the principle or 
 
 Ego, p. 157. 
 The Ego as principle of all philosophy, p. 158. 
 Subjective idea of God as active moral order, p. 169. 
 General estimate of Fichte's system, p. 171. 
 Criticism of it by Hegel, p. 174. 
 Fichte's later Realistic or practical views, p. 176. 
 Relation of Absolute to finite free Egoes, p. 180. 
 His Philosophy of History, p. 181. 
 Idea of a Blessed life, p. 182. 
 
 Hegel, p. 295. 
 
 Retrospective glance at Schelling's Philosophy of Nature, and Doctrine 
 of the Absolute, 295—99. 
 
394 INDEX. 
 
 Principle of Hegel's system — the Idea in its incessant process of self- 
 realisation and self -recognition — in contradistinction to the Objective 
 subject-object of Schelling's Intellectual Intuition, p. 299. 
 
 His Phenomenology, p. 300. 
 
 Identification by Hegel of the Rational Process of thought, self-opposition 
 or absolute negativih/, with the Aristotelian doctrine of v6ri<ris rrjs 
 voiiafois, p. 311. 
 
 Hegel's system and its divisions, pp. 313-14. 
 
 Logic. Categories of Being, p. 315. 
 
 Categories of Essence, p. 324. 
 
 Continuation of the latter, p. 328. 
 
 Categories of the Idea (Begriff), p. 332. 
 
 The Subject or Subjective Logic, p. 336.; the Object, p. 338.; and Idea, 
 (idee) in its Identity, p. 349. 
 
 Continuation of the Idee as Identity of Subjectivity and Objectivity, p. 350. 
 
 Transition from the Logic to Philosophy of Nature, p. 354. 
 
 Survey of the Nature-Philosophy, p. 356. Philosophy of Mind, p. 359. 
 
 Hekbart, p. 68. 
 Eealistic tendency of his Philosophy, p. 70. 
 His defence of the Empirical as opposed to the Dynamical standing-point, 
 
 p. 71. 
 His notion of Philosophy as being an analysis and investigation of our 
 
 Ideas, p. 71. 
 Definition of the word Being {Seyn), p. 74. 
 Problem of Metaphysics, p. 86. Its division into Ontology, Synechology, 
 
 and Eidology, p. 86. 
 His Method of Relations, p. 87. Difierence between Herbart and the 
 
 advocates of the Identity-philosophy, p. 93. 
 His Accidental Views, p. 94. 
 His Ontology, p. 95. 
 His Synechology, p. 103. 
 His doctrine of Intelligible Space, p. 105. 
 Space not merely a subjective form, as with Kant, p. 108. 
 Leading object of Synechology — Matter, p. 108. 
 His Philosophy of Nature, p. 112. 
 His Eidology, or science of Mental phenomena, p. 116. 
 Definition of the State, p. 130. 
 Difference between Herbart's Practical philosophy and the views of Kant 
 
 and Eichte, p. 133. 
 General review and Criticism of Hej:bart's philosophy, pp. 137 — 45. 
 
INDEX. 395 
 
 Home, p. 12. 
 His Scepticism, p. 12. 
 Theory of Causation, p. 14. 
 
 Jacobi, pp. 58 — 67. 
 His characteristick of Kant, p. 37. 
 
 His doctrine of knowledge, as based upon faith or intuition, p. 59. 
 His points of agreement with, and difference from, Kant, p. 59. 
 His doctrine of Reason as a perception of spiritual things, p. 61. 
 Criticism of Jacobi's opinions, p. 65. 
 Hegel's remarks upon Jacobi, p. 66. 
 
 Kant, p. 16. 
 Problem of the Critick ofjPure Reason, p. 19. 
 Matter and Form, the elements of Knowledge, p. 20. 
 Universality and Necessity, p. 21. 
 
 Difference between Analytical and Synthetical Judgments, p. 24. 
 How far Synthetical judgments d priori are possible? p. 25, 
 Categories of the Understanding, p. 27. 
 Space and Time, as forms of the sensuous intuition, p. 80. 
 Syllogistic forms of our Reasoning faculty, p. 33. 
 Distinction of the Reason from the Understanding, p. 35. 
 Ideas of the Reason as a faculty distinct from the Understanding, p. 35. 
 Regulative (but not constitutive) character of such Ideas, p. 36. 
 The Reason of a purely formal nature ; its paralogisms, p. 38, 
 Antinomies of the Reason, p. 40. 
 Criticism of the proofs of the Existence of Deity, p. 44. 
 The proper objects of Metaphysics wholly inaccessible to our cognition, 
 
 p. 48. 
 Autonomy of the will as a ground of moral action, p. 50. 
 Categorical Imperative, or absolute moral law, p. 51. 
 Critick of the Faculty of Judgment, p. 53. 
 Criticism of Kant's opinions, pp. 55 — 58. 
 
 Locke, p. 9. 
 His Sensationalism, p. 9. 
 
 The mind a tabula rasa, p. 10. Our general Judgments rest upon 
 experience, p. 11. 
 
 Metaphysics. 
 Its fundamental question, p. 13. 
 
 Oken. 
 Discoverer of the Homologies of the Cranial Vertebrae, p. 295. 
 
396 INDEX. 
 
 PmLOSOPHT. 
 
 Its object, p. 2. Love of it innate, p. 3. Triumph over blind Faith, p. 4. 
 Not stationary, but progressive, p. 7. 
 
 SCHELLDie, p. 197. 
 
 Eeview of Pichte's subjective Idealism, p. 197. 
 , Schelling's admission of an universal Objective reality, p. 198. 
 Realistic principle, p. 199. 
 Its potentiality and actuality, p. 200. 
 Method and Theory of Cognition {Erkenntniss), p. 201. 
 Space and Time not mere forms, but activities of the Intuitive process, 
 
 p. 202. 
 Speculation, theory and method of, p. 204. 
 Doctrine of Intellectual Intuition, p. 215. 
 Division of Philosophy into Transcendental Idealism and the Philosophy 
 
 of Nature, p. 218. 
 Philosophy of Nature, p. 221. 
 The Absolute essence as Subject, natwa naturans, or power, possibility, or 
 
 potency of becoming the Absolute object or universe, natwa naturata, 
 
 p. 222. 
 Blind or unconscious working of the Absolute subject-object, p. 223. 
 Differences of the Subject-Object or absolute Identity only quantitative, 
 
 p. 227. 
 Inorganic nature, in its first potency ; matter, p. 231. 
 Light and Gravity, p. 232. 
 Magnetism and Electricity, p. 234. 
 Second Potency or Chemical process, p. 236. 
 Organic or living nature in third Potency, p. 237. 
 Transition from the sensibility of animal nature to consciousness, p- 
 
 243. 
 Immanence of the Spirit in Nature, p. 246. 
 Analogy of this with the Artistic activity, p. 248. 
 Arrival of the dynamic process of nature at pure knowledge or Ideality, 
 
 p. 251. 
 Art, Religion, and Philosophy, p. 252. 
 Pantheism of Schelling, p. 253. Perceived by the author himself, p. 256. 
 
 Becomes again the problem in his theory of human Freedom and Sin, 
 
 p. 258. 
 Criticism of that doctrine, p. 261. 
 Author's concluding remarks, pp. 263-4. 
 Schelling's recent views, p. 265. 
 The universe has its ground in what in God is not Qbi, p. 266. 
 
INDEX. 397 
 
 Schelling's distinction of his own doctrines from those of Hegel, p. 272. 
 
 Doctrine of Potency, p. 277. 
 
 Origination of the present state of the world through the " Fall of Man," 
 
 p. 287. 
 Reduction of that process to the mythological course of History, p. 288. 
 Remarks on the doctrine of Potency as a theory of the Absolute. Its 
 
 insufficiency as a doctrine of mere possibility leads to that of necessity, 
 
 as with Hegel, p. 294. 
 
 SCHLEIEEMACHER, p. 183. 
 
 His views of Philosophy intermediate between Kant and Pichte, p. 184. 
 
 His religious principle, p. 185. 
 
 His doctrine of Feeling as that of absolute dependence upon God, p. 188. 
 
 His Platonic idea of Philosophy as a central science, p. 190. 
 
 His notion of true knowledge, p. 191. 
 
 His Bialectick, p. 192. 
 
 His Theology and Ethics, p. 192. 
 
 Criticism of Schleiermacher's philosophy, pp. 194 — 196. 
 
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