,,the ,,philosophy ,,of ,,spiritual ,,activity ,a ,modern ,philosophy of ,life ,developed by ,scientific ,methods ,by ,,rudolf ,,steiner ,ph4,d4 7,vienna7 ,being an ,enlarged and ,revised ,edition of ,the ,philosophy of ,freedom1 together with the ,original ,thesis on ,truth and ,science ,,authorized ,,translation ,,by ,professor ,mrs4 ,r4 ,f4 ,,alfred ,,hoernl ,g4 ,p4 ,putnam's ,sons ,london ,new ,york ,,editor',s ,,note ,the following pages are a translation of ,dr4 ,steiner's ,philosophie der ,freiheit1 which was published in ,germany some twenty years ago4 ,the edition was soon exhausted1 and has never been reprinted2 copies are much sought after but very difficult to obtain4 ,the popularity of ,dr4 ,steiner's later works upon ethics1 mysticism1 and kindred subjects has caused people to forget his earlier work upon philosophy in spite of the fact that he makes frequent references to this book and it contains the germs of which many of his present views are the logical outcome4 ,for the above reasons1 and with the author's sanction1 ,i have decided to publish a translation4 ,i have had the good fortune to have been able to secure as joint translators ,mrs4 ,hoernl1 who1 after graduating in the ,university of the ,cape of ,good ,hope1 continued her studies in the ,universities of ,cambridge1 ,leipzig1 ,paris1 and ,bonn1 and her husband1 ,mr4 ,r4 ,f4 ,alfred ,hoernl1 ,assistant ,professor of ,philosophy at ,harvard ,university1 ,u4,s4,a41 formerly ,jenkyns ,exhibitioner1 ,balliol ,college1 ,oxford1 their thorough knowledge of philosophy and their complete command of the ,german and ,english languages enabling them to overcome the difficulty of finding adequate ,english equivalents for the terms of ,german ,philosophy4 ,i am glad to seize this opportunity of acknowledging my indebtedness to these two1 without whom this publication could not have been undertaken4 ,,harry ,,collison4 ,march #aiaf4 ,,editor',s ,,note ,,to ,,second ,,edition ,in #aiah ,dr4 ,steiner published a revised edition of the ,philosophie der ,freiheit4 ,for the translation of the new passages added to1 and of the incidental changes made in1 this revised edition ,i am indebted to ,mr4 ,hoernl1 now ,professor of ,philosophy in the ,armstrong ,college 7,newcastle-upon-,tyne71 ,university of ,durham4 ,at the author's request ,i have changed the title to ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity1 and throughout the entire work freedom should be taken to mean spiritual activity4 ,dr4 ,steiner's ,ph4 ,d4 ,thesis on ,truth and ,science1 originally published as a prelude to ,the ,philosophy of ,freedom1 has1 with his consent1 been translated for this edition and been added at the end of this volume4 ,h4 ,c4 ,march #aiba4 ,,contents ,,chap4 ,,page ,,preface ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah7 ,,xi ,,the ,,theory ,,of ,,freedom ,i ,,conscious ,,human ,,action #a ,,ii ,,why ,,the ,,desire ,,for ,,knowledge ,,is ,,fundamental #ad ,,iii ,,thought ,,as ,,the ,,instrument ,,of ,,knowledge #bd ,,iv ,,the ,,world ,,as ,,percept #dh ,v ,,our ,,knowledge ,,of ,,the ,,world #gc ,,vi ,,human ,,individuality #aja ,,vii ,,are ,,there ,,limits ,,to ,,knowledge8 #aji ,,the ,,reality ,,of ,,freedom ,,viii ,,the ,,factors ,,of ,,life #acg ,,ix ,,the ,,idea ,,of ,,freedom #adf ,x ,,monism ,,and ,,the ,,philosophy ,,of ,,spiritual ,,activity #agh ,,xi ,,world-,,purpose ,,and ,,life-,,purpose 7,,the ,,destiny ,,of ,,man7 #aij ,,xii ,,moral ,,imagination 7,,darwin ,,and ,,morality7 #aih ,,xiii ,,the ,,value ,,of ,,life 7,,optimism ,,and ,,pessimism7 #bac ,,xiv ,,the ,,individual ,,and ,,the ,,genus #bej ,,ultimate ,,questions ,,xv ,,the ,,consequences ,,of ,,monism #bei ,,truth ,,and ,,science ,i ,,preliminary ,,observations #bgg ,,ii ,,the ,,fundamental ,,problem ,,of ,,kant',s ,,theory ,,of ,,knowledge #bhj ,,iii ,,theory ,,of ,,knowledge ,,since ,,kant #bia ,,iv ,,the ,,starting-,,points ,,of ,,the ,,theory ,,of ,,knowledge #cjd ,v ,,knowledge ,,and ,,reality #cai ,,vi ,,theory ,,of ,,knowledge ,,without ,,presuppositions ,,versus ,,fichte',s ,,theory ,,of ,,science #cbi ,,vii ,,concluding ,,remarks3 ,,epistemological #cdg ,,viii ,,concluding ,,remarks3 ,,practical #cea ,,appendices ,i ,,addition ,,to ,,revised ,,edition ,,of ,,the ,,philosophy ,,of ,,freedom #aiah #ceg ,,ii ,,revised ,,introduction ,,to ,,the ,,philosophy ,,of ,,freedom #cfh ,,iii ,,preface ,,to ,,original ,,edition ,,of ,,truth ,,and ,,science #cgd ,,iv ,,introduction ,,to ,,original ,,edition ,,of ,,truth ,,and ,,science #cha ,,preface ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah7 ,there are two fundamental problems in the life of the human mind1 to one or other of which everything belongs that is to be discussed in this book4 ,one of these problems concerns the possibility of attaining to such a view of the essential nature of man as will serve as a support for whatever else comes into his life by way of experience or of science1 and yet is subject to the suspicion of having no support in itself and of being liable to be driven1 by doubt and criticism1 into the limbo of uncertainties4 ,the other problem is this3 ,is man1 as voluntary agent1 entitled to attribute freedom to himself1 or is freedom a mere illusion begotten of his inability to recognise the threads of necessity on which his volition1 like any natural event1 depends8 ,it is no artificial tissue of theories which provokes this question4 ,in a certain mood it presents itself quite naturally to the human mind4 ,and it is easy to feel that a mind lacks something of its full stature which has never once confronted with the utmost seriousness of inquiry the two possibilities--freedom or necessity4 ,this book is intended to show that the spiritual experiences which the second problem causes man to undergo1 depend upon the position he is able to take up towards the first problem4 ,an attempt will be made to prove that there is a view concerning the essential nature of man which can support the rest of knowledge2 and1 further1 an attempt to point out how with this view we gain a complete justification for the idea of free will1 provided only that we have first discovered that region of the mind in which free volition can unfold itself4 ,the view to which we here refer is one which1 once gained1 is capable of becoming part and parcel of the very life of the mind itself4 ,the answer given to the two problems will not be of the purely theoretical sort which1 once mastered1 may be carried about as a mere piece of memory-knowledge4 ,such an answer would1 for the whole manner of thinking adopted in this book1 be no real answer at all4 ,the book will not give a finished and complete answer of this sort1 but point to a field of spiritual experience in which man's own inward spiritual activity supplies a living answer to these questions1 as often as he needs one4 ,whoever has once discovered the region of the mind where these questions arise1 will find precisely in his actual acquaintance with this region all that he needs for the solution of his two problems4 ,with the knowledge thus acquired he may then1 as desire or fate dictate1 adventure further into the breadths and depths of this unfathomable life of ours4 ,thus it would appear that there is a kind of knowledge which proves its justification and validity by its own inner life as well as by the kinship of its own life with the whole life of the human mind4 ,this is how ,i conceived the contents of this book when ,i first wrote it twenty-five years ago4 ,to-day1 once again1 ,i have to set down similar sentences if ,i am to characterise the leading thoughts of my book4 ,at the original writing ,i contented myself with saying no more than was in the strictest sense connected with the fundamental problems which ,i have outlined4 ,if anyone should be astonished at not finding in this book as yet any reference to that region of the world of spiritual experience of which ,i have given an account in my later writings1 ,i would ask him to bear in mind that it was not my purpose at that time to set down the results of spiritual research1 but first to lay the foundations on which such results can rest4 ,the ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity contains no special results of this spiritual sort1 as little as it contains special results of the natural sciences4 ,but what it does contain is1 in my judgment1 indispensable for anyone who desires a secure foundation for such knowledge4 ,what ,i have said in this book may be acceptable even to some who1 for reasons of their own1 refuse to have anything to do with the results of my researches into the ,spiritual ,realm4 ,but anyone who finds something to attract him in my inquiries into the ,spiritual ,realm may well appreciate the importance of what ,i was here trying to do4 ,it is this3 to show that open-minded consideration simply of the two problems which ,i have indicated and which are fundamental for all knowledge1 leads to the view that man lives in the midst of a genuine ,spiritual ,world4 ,the aim of this book is to demonstrate1 prior to our entry upon spiritual experience1 that knowledge of the ,spiritual ,world is a fact4 ,this demonstration is so conducted that it is never necessary1 in order to accept the present arguments1 to cast furtive glances at the experiences on which ,i have dwelt in my later writings4 ,all that is necessary is that the reader should be willing and able to adapt himself to the manner of the present discussions4 ,thus it seems to me that in one sense this book occupies a position completely independent of my writings on strictly spiritual matters4 ,yet in another sense it seems to be most intimately connected with them4 ,these considerations have moved me now1 after a lapse of twenty-five years1 to re-publish the contents of this book in the main without essential alterations4 ,i have only made additions of some length to a number of chapters4 ,the misunderstandings of my argument with which ,i have met seemed to make these more detailed elaborations necessary4 ,actual changes of text have been made by me only where it seemed to me now that ,i had said clumsily what ,i meant to say a quarter of a century ago4 7,only malice could find in these changes occasion to suggest that ,i have changed my fundamental conviction47 ,for many years my book has been out of print4 ,in spite of the fact1 which is apparent from what ,i have just said1 that my utterances of twenty-five years ago about these problems still seem to me just as relevant today1 ,i hesitated a long time about the completion of this revised edition4 ,again and again ,i have asked myself whether ,i ought not1 at this point or that1 to define my position towards the numerous philosophical theories which have been put forward since the publication of the first edition4 ,yet my preoccupation in recent years with researches into the purely ,spiritual ,realm prevented my doing as ,i could have wished4 ,however1 a survey1 as thorough as ,i could make it1 of the philosophical literature of the present day has convinced me that such a critical discussion1 alluring though it would be in itself1 would be out of place in the context of what my book has to say4 ,all that1 from the point of view of the ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity1 it seemed to me necessary to say about recent philosophical tendencies may be found in the second volume of my ,riddles of ,philosophy4 ,,rudolf ,,steiner4 ,april #aiah4 ,,the ,,theory ,,of ,,freedom ,i ,,conscious ,,human ,,action ,is man free in action and thought1 or is he bound by an iron necessity8 ,there are few questions on which so much ingenuity has been expended4 ,the idea of freedom has found enthusiastic supporters and stubborn opponents in plenty4 ,there are those who1 in their moral fervour1 label anyone a man of limited intelligence who can deny so patent a fact as freedom4 ,opposed to them are others who regard it as the acme of unscientific thinking for anyone to believe that the uniformity of natural law is broken in the sphere of human action and thought4 ,one and the same thing is thus proclaimed1 now as the most precious possession of humanity1 now as its most fatal illusion4 ,infinite subtlety has been employed to explain how human freedom can be consistent with determinism in nature of which man1 after all1 is a part4 ,others have been at no less pains to explain how such a delusion as this could have arisen4 ,that we are dealing here with one of the most important questions for life1 religion1 conduct1 science1 must be clear to every one whose most prominent trait of character is not the reverse of thoroughness4 ,it is one of the sad signs of the superficiality of present-day thought1 that a book which attempts to develop a new faith out of the results of recent scientific research 7,david ,friedrich ,strauss1 ,der alte und neue ,glaube71 has nothing more to say on this question than these words3 ,with the question of the freedom of the human will we are not concerned4 ,the alleged freedom of indifferent choice has been recognised as an empty illusion by every philosophy worthy of the name4 ,the determination of the moral value of human conduct and character remains untouched by this problem4 ,it is not because ,i consider that the book in which it occurs has any special importance that ,i quote this passage1 but because it seems to me to express the only view to which the thought of the majority of our contemporaries is able to rise in this matter4 ,every one who has grown beyond the kindergarten-stage of science appears to know nowadays that freedom cannot consist in choosing1 at one's pleasure1 one or other of two possible courses of action4 ,there is always1 so we are told1 a perfectly definite reason why1 out of several possible actions1 we carry out just one and no other4 ,this seems quite obvious4 ,nevertheless1 down to the present day1 the main attacks of the opponents of freedom are directed only against freedom of choice4 ,even ,herbert ,spencer1 in fact1 whose doctrines are gaining ground daily1 says1 ,that every one is at liberty to desire or not to desire1 which is the real proposition involved in the dogma of free will1 is negatived as much by the analysis of consciousness1 as by the contents of the preceding chapters 7,the ,principles of ,psychology1 ,part ,,iv1 chap4 ix1 par4 #bai74 ,others1 too1 start from the same point of view in combating the concept of free will4 ,the germs of all the relevant arguments are to be found as early as ,spinoza4 ,all that he brought forward in clear and simple language against the idea of freedom has since been repeated times without number1 but as a rule enveloped in the most sophisticated arguments1 so that it is difficult to recognise the straightforward train of thought which is alone in question4 ,spinoza writes in a letter of ,october or ,november1 #afgd1 ,i call a thing free which exists and acts from the pure necessity of its nature1 and ,i call that unfree1 of which the being and action are precisely and fixedly determined by something else4 ,thus1 e4g41 ,god1 though necessary1 is free because he exists only through the necessity of his own nature4 ,similarly1 ,god knows himself and all else as free1 because it follows solely from the necessity of his nature that he knows all4 ,you see1 therefore1 that for me freedom consists not in free decision1 but in free necessity4 ,but let us come down to created things which are all determined by external causes to exist and to act in a fixed and definite manner4 ,to perceive this more clearly1 let us imagine a perfectly simple case4 ,a stone1 for example1 receives from an external cause acting upon it a certain quantity of motion1 by reason of which it necessarily continues to move1 after the impact of the external cause has ceased4 ,the continued motion of the stone is due to compulsion1 not to the necessity of its own nature1 because it requires to be defined by the impact of an external cause4 ,what is true here for the stone is true also for every other particular thing1 however complicated and many-sided it may be1 namely1 that everything is necessarily determined by external causes to exist and to act in a fixed and definite manner4 ,now1 pray1 assume that this stone during its motion thinks and knows that it is striving to the best of its power to continue in motion4 ,this stone which is conscious only of its striving and is by no means indifferent1 will believe that it is absolutely free1 and that it continues in motion for no other reason than its own will to continue4 ,now this is that human freedom which everybody claims to possess and which consists in nothing but this1 that men are conscious of their desires1 but ignorant of the causes by which they are determined4 ,thus the child believes that he desires milk of his own free will1 the angry boy regards his desire for vengeance as free1 and the coward his desire for flight4 ,again1 the drunken man believes that he says of his own free will what1 sober again1 he would fain have left unsaid1 and as this prejudice is innate in all men1 it is difficult to free oneself from it4 ,for1 although experience teaches us often enough that man least of all can temper his desires1 and that1 moved by conflicting passions1 he perceives the better and pursues the worse1 yet he considers himself free because there are some things which he desires less strongly1 and some desires which he can easily inhibit through the recollection of something else which it is often possible to recall4 ,it is easy to detect the fundamental error of this view1 because it is so clearly and definitely expressed4 ,the same necessity by which a stone makes a definite movement as the result of an impact1 is said to compel a man to carry out an action when impelled thereto by any cause4 ,it is only because man is conscious of his action1 that he thinks himself to be its originator4 ,in doing so1 he overlooks the fact that he is driven by a cause which he must obey unconditionally4 ,the error in this train of thought is easily brought to light4 ,spinoza1 and all who think like him1 overlook the fact that man not only is conscious of his action1 but also may become conscious of the cause which guides him4 ,anyone can see that a child is not free when he desires milk1 nor the drunken man when he says things which he later regrets4 ,neither knows anything of the causes1 working deep within their organisms1 which exercise irresistible control over them4 ,but is it justifiable to lump together actions of this kind with those in which a man is conscious not only of his actions but also of their causes8 ,are the actions of men really all of one kind8 ,should the act of a soldier on the field of battle1 of the scientific researcher in his laboratory1 of the statesman in the most complicated diplomatic negotiations1 be placed on the same level with that of the child when he desires milk8 ,it is1 no doubt1 true that it is best to seek the solution of a problem where the conditions are simplest4 ,but lack of ability to see distinctions has before now caused endless confusion4 ,there is1 after all1 a profound difference between knowing the motive of my action and not knowing it4 ,at first sight this seems a self-evident truth4 ,and yet the opponents of freedom never ask themselves whether a motive of action which ,i recognise and understand1 is to be regarded as compulsory for me in the same sense as the organic process which causes the child to cry for milk4 ,eduard von ,hartmann1 in his ,phnomenologie des ,sittlichen ,bewusstseins 7p4 #dea71 asserts that the human will depends on two chief factors1 the motives and the character4 ,if one regards men as all alike1 or at any rate the differences between them as negligible1 then their will appears as determined from without1 viz41 by the circumstances with which they come in contact4 ,but if one bears in mind that men adopt an idea as the motive of their conduct1 only if their character is such that this idea arouses a desire in them1 then men appear as determined from within and not from without4 ,now1 because an idea1 given to us from without1 must first in accordance with our characters be adopted as a motive1 men believe that they are free1 i4e41 independent of external influences4 ,the truth1 however1 according to ,eduard von ,hartmann1 is that even though we must first adopt an idea as a motive1 we do so not arbitrarily1 but according to the disposition of our characters1 that is1 we are anything but free4 ,here again the difference between motives1 which ,i allow to influence me only after ,i have consciously made them my own1 and those which ,i follow without any clear knowledge of them1 is absolutely ignored4 ,this leads us straight to the standpoint from which the subject will be treated here4 ,have we any right to consider the question of the freedom of the will by itself at all8 ,and if not1 with what other question must it necessarily be connected8 ,if there is a difference between conscious and unconscious motives of action1 then the action in which the former issue should be judged differently from the action which springs from blind impulse4 ,hence our first question will concern this difference1 and on the result of this inquiry will depend what attitude we ought to take up towards the question of freedom proper4 ,what does it mean to have knowledge of the motives of one's actions8 ,too little attention has been paid to this question1 because1 unfortunately1 man who is an indivisible whole has always been torn asunder by us4 ,the agent has been divorced from the knower1 whilst he who matters more than everything else1 viz41 the man who acts because he knows1 has been utterly overlooked4 ,it is said that man is free when he is controlled only by his reason1 and not by his animal passions4 ,or1 again1 that to be free means to be able to determine one's life and action by purposes and deliberate decisions4 ,nothing is gained by assertions of this sort4 ,for the question is just whether reason1 purposes1 and decisions exercise the same kind of compulsion over a man as his animal passions4 ,if1 without my doing1 a rational decision occurs in me with the same necessity with which hunger and thirst happen to me1 then ,i must needs obey it1 and my freedom is an illusion4 ,another form of expression runs3 to be free means1 not that we can will what we will1 but that we can do what we will4 ,this thought has been expressed with great clearness by the poet-philosopher ,robert ,hamerling in his ,atomistik des ,willens4 ,man can1 it is true1 do what he wills1 but he cannot will what he wills1 because his will is determined by motives6 ,he cannot will what he wills8 ,let us consider these phrases more closely4 ,have they any intelligible meaning8 ,does freedom of will1 then1 mean being able to will without ground1 without motive8 ,what does willing mean if not to have grounds for doing1 or striving to do1 this rather than that8 ,to will anything without ground or motive would mean to will something without willing it4 ,the concept of motive is indissolubly bound up with that of will4 ,without the determining motive the will is an empty faculty2 it is the motive which makes it active and real4 ,it is1 therefore1 quite true that the human will is not 'free1' inasmuch as its direction is always determined by the strongest motive4 ,but1 on the other hand1 it must be admitted that it is absurd to speak1 in contrast with this 'unfreedom1' of a conceivable 'freedom' of the will1 which would consist in being able to will what one does not will 7,atomistik des ,willens1 p4 #bac ff474 ,here1 again1 only motives in general are mentioned1 without taking into account the difference between unconscious and conscious motives4 ,if a motive affects me1 and ,i am compelled to act on it because it proves to be the strongest of its kind1 then the idea of freedom ceases to have any meaning4 ,how should it matter to me whether ,i can do a thing or not1 if ,i am forced by the motive to do it8 ,the primary question is1 not whether ,i can do a thing or not when impelled by a motive1 but whether the only motives are such as impel me with absolute necessity4 ,if ,i must will something1 then ,i may well be absolutely indifferent as to whether ,i can also do it4 ,and if1 through my character1 or through circumstances prevailing in my environment1 a motive is forced on me which to my thinking is unreasonable1 then ,i should even have to be glad if ,i could not do what ,i will4 ,the question is1 not whether ,i can carry out a decision once made1 but how ,i come to make the decision4 ,what distinguishes man from all other organic beings is his rational thought4 ,activity is common to him with other organisms4 ,nothing is gained by seeking analogies in the animal world to clear up the concept of freedom as applied to the actions of human beings4 ,modern science loves these analogies4 ,when scientists have succeeded in finding among animals something similar to human behaviour1 they believe they have touched on the most important question of the science of man4 ,to what misunderstandings this view leads is seen1 for example1 in the book ,die ,illusion der ,willensfreiheit1 by ,p4 ,ree1 #ahhe1 where1 on ,page #e1 the following remark on freedom appears3 ,it is easy to explain why the movement of a stone seems to us necessary1 while the volition of a donkey does not4 ,the causes which set the stone in motion are external and visible1 while the causes which determine the donkey's volition are internal and invisible4 ,between us and the place of their activity there is the skull cap of the ass4444 ,the causal nexus is not visible and is therefore thought to be non-existent4 ,the volition1 it is explained1 is1 indeed1 the cause of the donkey's turning round1 but is itself unconditioned2 it is an absolute beginning4 ,here again human actions in which there is a consciousness of the motives are simply ignored1 for ,ree declares1 that between us and the sphere of their activity there is the skull cap of the ass4 ,as these words show1 it has not so much as dawned on ,ree that there are actions1 not indeed of the ass1 but of human beings1 in which the motive1 become conscious1 lies between us and the action4 ,ree demonstrates his blindness once again a few pages further on1 when he says1 ,we do not perceive the causes by which our will is determined1 hence we think it is not causally determined at all4 ,but enough of examples which prove that many argue against freedom without knowing in the least what freedom is4 ,that an action of which the agent does not know why he performs it1 cannot be free goes without saying4 ,but what of the freedom of an action about the motives of which we reflect8 ,this leads us to the question of the origin and meaning of thought4 ,for without the recognition of the activity of mind which is called thought1 it is impossible to understand what is meant either by knowledge of something or by action4 ,when we know what thought in general means1 it will be easier to see clearly the role which thought plays in human action4 ,as ,hegel rightly says1 ,it is thought which turns the soul1 common to us and animals1 into spirit4 ,hence it is thought which we may expect to give to human action its characteristic stamp4 ,i do not mean to imply that all our actions spring only from the sober deliberations of our reason4 ,i am very far from calling only those actions human in the highest sense1 which proceed from abstract judgments4 ,but as soon as our conduct rises above the sphere of the satisfaction of purely animal desires1 our motives are always shaped by thoughts4 ,love1 pity1 and patriotism are motives of action which cannot be analysed away into cold concepts of the understanding4 ,it is said that here the heart1 the soul1 hold sway4 ,this is no doubt true4 ,but the heart and the soul create no motives4 ,they presuppose them4 ,pity enters my heart when the thought of a person who arouses pity had appeared in my consciousness4 ,the way to the heart is through the head4 ,love is no exception4 ,whenever it is not merely the expression of bare sexual instinct1 it depends on the thoughts we form of the loved one4 ,and the more we idealise the loved one in our thoughts1 the more blessed is our love4 ,here1 too1 thought is the father of feeling4 ,it is said that love makes us blind to the failings of the loved one4 ,but the opposite view can be taken1 namely that it is precisely for the good points that love opens the eyes4 ,many pass by these good points without notice4 ,one1 however1 perceives them1 and just because he does1 love awakens in his soul4 ,what else has he done except perceive what hundreds have failed to see8 ,love is not theirs1 because they lack the perception4 ,from whatever point we regard the subject1 it becomes more and more clear that the question of the nature of human action presupposes that of the origin of thought4 ,i shall1 therefore1 turn next to this question4 ,,ii ,,why ,,the ,,desire ,,for ,,knowledge ,,is ,,fundamental ,zwei ,seelen wohnen1 ach6 in meiner ,brust1 ,die eine will sich von der andern trennen2 ,die eine hlt1 in derber ,liebeslust1 ,sich an die ,welt mit klammernden ,organen2 ,die andre hebt gewaltsam sich vom ,dust ,zu den ,gefilden hoher ,ahnen4 #a ,faust ,i1 #aaab-aaag4 ,in these words ,goethe expresses a trait which is deeply ingrained in human nature4 ,man is not a self-contained unity4 ,he demands ever more than the world1 of itself1 offers him4 ,nature has endowed us with needs2 among them are some the satisfaction of which she leaves to our own activity4 ,however abundant the gifts which we have received1 still more abundant are our desires4 ,we seem born to dissatisfaction4 ,and our desire for knowledge is but a special instance of this unsatisfied striving4 ,suppose we look twice at a tree4 ,the first time we see its branches at rest1 the second time in motion4 ,we are not satisfied with this observation4 ,why1 we ask1 does the tree appear to us now at rest1 then in motion8 ,every glance at nature evokes in us a multitude of questions4 ,every phenomenon we meet presents a new problem to be solved4 ,every experience is to us a riddle4 ,we observe that from the egg there emerges a creature like the mother animal1 and we ask for the reason of the likeness4 ,we observe a living being grow and develop to a determinate degree of perfection1 and we seek the conditions of this experience4 ,nowhere are we satisfied with the facts which nature spreads out before our senses4 ,everywhere we seek what we call the explanation of these facts4 ,the something more which we seek in things1 over and above what is immediately given to us in them1 splits our whole being into two parts4 ,we become conscious of our opposition to the world4 ,we oppose ourselves to the world as independent beings4 ,the universe has for us two opposite poles3 ,self and ,world4 ,we erect this barrier between ourselves and the world as soon as consciousness is first kindled in us4 ,but we never cease to feel that1 in spite of all1 we belong to the world1 that there is a connecting link between it and us1 and that we are beings within1 and not without1 the universe4 ,this feeling makes us strive to bridge over this opposition1 and ultimately the whole spiritual striving of mankind is nothing but the bridging of this opposition4 ,the history of our spiritual life is a continuous seeking after union between ourselves and the world4 ,religion1 ,art1 and ,science follow1 one and all1 this goal4 ,the religious man seeks in the revelation1 which ,god grants him1 the solution of the world problem1 which his ,self1 dissatisfied with the world of mere phenomena1 sets him as a task4 ,the artist seeks to embody in his material the ideas which are his ,self1 that he may thus reconcile the spirit which lives within him and the outer world4 ,he1 too1 feels dissatisfied with the world of mere appearances1 and seeks to mould into it that something more which his ,self supplies and which transcends appearances4 ,the thinker searches for the laws of phenomena4 ,he strives to master by thought what he experiences by observation4 ,only when we have transformed the world-content into our thought-content do we recapture the connection which we had ourselves broken off4 ,we shall see later that this goal can be reached only if we penetrate much more deeply than is often done into the nature of the scientist's problem4 ,the whole situation1 as ,i have here stated it1 meets us1 on the stage of history1 in the conflict between the one-world theory1 or ,monism1 and the two-world theory1 or ,dualism4 ,dualism pays attention only to the separation between the ,self and the ,world1 which the consciousness of man has brought about4 ,all its efforts consist in a vain struggle to reconcile these opposites1 which it calls now ,mind and ,matter1 now ,subject and ,object1 now ,thought and ,appearance4 ,the ,dualist feels that there must be a bridge between the two worlds1 but is not able to find it4 ,in so far as man is aware of himself as ,i1 he cannot but put down this ,i in thought on the side of ,spirit2 and in opposing to this ,i the world1 he is bound to reckon on the world's side the realm of percepts given to the senses1 i4e41 the ,material ,world4 ,in doing so1 man assigns a position to himself within this very antithesis of ,spirit and ,matter4 ,he is the more compelled to do so because his own body belongs to the ,material ,world4 ,thus the ,i1 or ,ego1 belongs as a part to the realm of ,spirit2 the material objects and processes which are perceived by the senses belong to the ,world4 ,all the riddles which belong to ,spirit and ,matter1 man must inevitably rediscover in the fundamental riddle of his own nature4 ,monism pays attention only to the unity and tries either to deny or to slur over the opposites1 present though they are4 ,neither of these two points of view can satisfy us1 for they do not do justice to the facts4 ,the ,dualist sees in ,mind 7,self7 and ,matter 7,world7 two essentially different entities1 and cannot therefore understand how they can interact with one another4 ,how should ,mind be aware of what goes on in ,matter1 seeing that the essential nature of ,matter is quite alien to ,mind8 ,or how in these circumstances should ,mind act upon ,matter1 so as to translate its intentions into actions8 ,the most absurd hypotheses have been propounded to answer these questions4 ,however1 up to the present the ,monists are not in a much better position4 ,they have tried three different ways of meeting the difficulty4 ,either they deny ,mind and become ,materialists2 or they deny ,matter in order to seek their salvation as ,spiritualists2 or they assert that1 even in the simplest entities in the world1 ,mind and ,matter are indissolubly bound together1 so that there is no need to marvel at the appearance in man of these two modes of existence1 seeing that they are never found apart4 ,materialism can never offer a satisfactory explanation of the world4 ,for every attempt at an explanation must begin with the formation of thoughts about the phenomena of the world4 ,materialism1 thus1 begins with the thought of ,matter or material processes4 ,but1 in doing so1 it is ipso facto confronted by two different sets of facts1 viz41 the material world and the thoughts about it4 ,the ,materialist seeks to make these latter intelligible by regarding them as purely material processes4 ,he believes that thinking takes place in the brain1 much in the same way that digestion takes place in the animal organs4 ,just as he ascribes mechanical1 chemical1 and organic processes to ,nature1 so he credits her in certain circumstances with the capacity to think4 ,he overlooks that1 in doing so1 he is merely shifting the problem from one place to another4 ,instead of to himself he ascribes the power of thought to ,matter4 ,and thus he is back again at his starting-point4 ,how does ,matter come to think of its own nature8 ,why is it not simply satisfied with itself and content to accept its own existence8 ,the ,materialist has turned his attention away from the definite subject1 his own self1 and occupies himself with an indefinite shadowy somewhat4 ,and here the old problem meets him again4 ,the materialistic theory cannot solve the problem2 it can only shift it to another place4 ,what of the ,spiritualistic theory8 ,the pure ,spiritualist denies to ,matter all independent existence and regards it merely as a product of ,spirit4 ,but when he tries to apply this theory to the solution of the riddle of his own human nature1 he finds himself caught in a tight place4 ,over against the ,i1 or ,ego1 which can be ranged on the side of ,spirit1 there stands directly the world of the senses4 ,no spiritual approach to it seems open4 ,it has to be perceived and experienced by the ,ego with the help of material processes4 ,such material processes the ,ego does not discover in itself1 so long as it regards its own nature as exclusively spiritual4 ,from all that it achieves by its own spiritual effort1 the sensible world is ever excluded4 ,it seems as if the ,ego had to concede that the world would be a closed book to it1 unless it could establish a non-spiritual relation to the world4 ,similarly1 when it comes to acting1 we have to translate our purposes into realities with the help of material things and forces4 ,we are1 therefore1 dependent on the outer world4 ,the most extreme ,spiritualist1 or1 if you prefer it1 ,idealist1 is ,johann ,gottlieb ,fichte4 ,he attempts to deduce the whole edifice of the world from the ,ego4 ,what he has actually accomplished is a magnificent thought-picture of the world1 without any empirical content4 ,as little as it is possible for the ,materialist to argue the ,mind away1 just as little is it possible for the ,idealist to do without the outer world of ,matter4 ,when man directs his theoretical reflection upon the ,ego1 he perceives1 in the first instance1 only the work of the ,ego in the conceptual elaboration of the world of ideas4 ,hence a philosophy the direction of which is spiritualistic1 may feel tempted1 in view of man's own essential nature1 to acknowledge nothing of spirit except this world of ideas4 ,in this way ,spiritualism becomes one-sided ,idealism4 ,instead of going on to penetrate through the world of ideas to the spiritual world1 idealism identifies the spiritual world with the world of ideas itself4 ,as a result1 it is compelled to remain fixed with its world-view in the circle of the activity of the ,ego1 as if it were bewitched4 ,a curious variant of ,idealism is to be found in the theory which ,f4 ,a4 ,lange has put forward in his widely read ,history of ,materialism4 ,he holds that the ,materialists are quite right in declaring all phenomena1 including our thoughts1 to be the product of purely material processes1 but1 in turn1 ,matter and its processes are for him themselves the product of our thinking4 ,the senses give us only the effects of things1 not true copies1 much less the things themselves4 ,but among these mere effects we must include the senses themselves together with the brain and the molecular vibrations which we assume to go on there4 ,that is1 our thinking is produced by the material processes1 and these by our thinking4 ,lange's philosophy is thus nothing more than the philosophical analogon of the story of honest ,baron ,mnchhausen1 who holds himself up in the air by his own pigtail4 ,the third form of ,monism is that which finds even in the simplest real 7the atom7 the union of both ,matter and ,mind4 ,but nothing is gained by this either1 except that the question1 the origin of which is really in our consciousness1 is shifted to another place4 ,how comes it that the simple real manifests itself in a two-fold manner1 if it is an indivisible unity8 ,against all these theories we must urge the fact that we meet with the basal and fundamental opposition first in our own consciousness4 ,it is we ourselves who break away from the bosom of ,nature and contrast ourselves as ,self with the ,world4 ,goethe has given classic expression to this in his essay ,nature4 ,living in the midst of her 7,nature7 we are strangers to her4 ,ceaselessly she speaks to us1 yet betrays none of her secrets4 ,but ,goethe knows the reverse side too3 ,mankind is all in her1 and she in all mankind4 ,however true it may be that we have estranged ourselves from ,nature1 it is none the less true that we feel we are in her and belong to her4 ,it can be only her own life which pulses also in us4 ,we must find the way back to her again4 ,a simple reflection may point this way out to us4 ,we have1 it is true1 torn ourselves away from ,nature1 but we must none the less have carried away something of her in our own selves4 ,this quality of ,nature in us we must seek out1 and then we shall discover our connection with her once more4 ,dualism neglects to do this4 ,it considers the human mind as a spiritual entity utterly alien to ,nature and attempts somehow to hitch it on to ,nature4 ,no wonder that it cannot find the coupling link4 ,we can find ,nature outside of us only if we have first learnt to know her within us4 ,the ,natural within us must be our guide to her4 ,this marks out our path of inquiry4 ,we shall attempt no speculations concerning the interaction of ,mind and ,matter4 ,we shall rather probe into the depths of our own being1 to find there those elements which we saved in our flight from ,nature4 ,the examination of our own being must bring the solution of the problem4 ,we must reach a point where we can say1 ,this is no longer merely ',i1' this is something which is more than ',i4' ,i am well aware that many who have read thus far will not consider my discussion in keeping with the present state of science4 ,to such criticism ,i can reply only that ,i have so far not been concerned with any scientific results1 but simply with the description of what every one of us experiences in his own consciousness4 ,that a few phrases have slipped in about attempts to reconcile ,mind and the ,world has been due solely to the desire to elucidate the actual facts4 ,i have therefore made no attempt to give to the expressions ,self1 ,mind1 ,world1 ,nature1 the precise meaning which they usually bear in ,psychology and ,philosophy4 ,the ordinary consciousness ignores the sharp distinctions of the sciences1 and so far my purpose has been solely to record the facts of everyday experience4 ,i am concerned1 not with the way in which science1 so far1 has interpreted consciousness1 but with the way in which we experience it in every moment of our lives4 ,,iii ,,thought ,,as ,,the ,,instrument ,,of ,,knowledge ,when ,i observe how a billiard ball1 when struck1 communicates its motion to another1 ,i remain entirely without influence on the process before me4 ,the direction and velocity of the motion of the second ball is determined by the direction and velocity of the first4 ,as long as ,i remain a mere spectator1 ,i can say nothing about the motion of the second ball until after it has happened4 ,it is quite different when ,i begin to reflect on the content of my observations4 ,the purpose of my reflection is to construct concepts of the process4 ,i connect the concept of an elastic ball with certain other concepts of mechanics1 and consider the special circumstances which obtain in the instance in question4 ,i try1 in other words1 to add to the process which takes place without my interference1 a second process which takes place in the conceptual sphere4 ,this latter process is dependent on me4 ,this is shown by the fact that ,i can rest content with the observation1 and renounce all search for concepts if ,i have no need of them4 ,if1 therefore1 this need is present1 then ,i am not content until ,i have established a definite connection among the concepts1 ball1 elasticity1 motion1 impact1 velocity1 etc41 so that they apply to the observed process in a definite way4 ,as surely as the occurrence of the observed process is independent of me1 so surely is the occurrence of the conceptual process dependent on me4 ,we shall have to consider later whether this activity of mine really proceeds from my own independent being1 or whether those modern physiologists are right who say that we cannot think as we will1 but that we must think exactly as the thoughts and thought-connections determine1 which happen to be in our minds at any given moment4 7,cp4 ,ziehen1 ,leitfaden der ,physiologischen ,psychologie1 ,jena1 #ahic1 p4 #aga47 ,for the present we wish merely to establish the fact that we constantly feel obliged to seek for concepts and connections of concepts1 which stand in definite relation to the objects and processes which are given independently of us4 ,whether this activity is really ours1 or whether we are determined to it by an unalterable necessity1 is a question which we need not decide at present4 ,what is unquestionable is that the activity appears1 in the first instance1 to be ours4 ,we know for certain that concepts are not given together with the objects to which they correspond4 ,my being the agent in the conceptual process may be an illusion2 but there is no doubt that to immediate observation ,i appear to be active4 ,our present question is1 what do we gain by supplementing a process with a conceptual counterpart8 ,there is a far-reaching difference between the ways in which1 for me1 the parts of a process are related to one another before1 and after1 the discovery of the corresponding concepts4 ,mere observation can trace the parts of a given process as they occur1 but their connection remains obscure without the help of concepts4 ,i observe the first billiard ball move towards the second in a certain direction and with a certain velocity4 ,what will happen after the impact ,i cannot tell in advance4 ,i can once more only watch it happen with my eyes4 ,suppose someone obstructs my view of the field where the process is happening1 at the moment when the impact occurs1 then1 as mere spectator1 ,i remain ignorant of what goes on4 ,the situation is very different1 if prior to the obstructing of my view ,i have discovered the concepts corresponding to the nexus of events4 ,in that case ,i can say what occurs1 even when ,i am no longer able to observe4 ,there is nothing in a merely observed process or object to show its relation to other processes or objects4 ,this relation becomes manifest only when observation is combined with thought4 ,observation and thought are the two points of departure for all the spiritual striving of man1 in so far as he is conscious of such striving4 ,the workings of common sense1 as well as the most complicated scientific researches1 rest on these two fundamental pillars of our minds4 ,philosophers have started from various ultimate antitheses1 ,idea and ,reality1 ,subject and ,object1 ,appearance and ,thing-in-itself1 ,ego and ,non-,ego1 ,idea and ,will1 ,concept and ,matter1 ,force and ,substance1 the ,conscious and the ,unconscious4 ,it is1 however1 easy to show that all these antitheses are subsequent to that between ,observation and ,thought1 this being for man the most important4 ,whatever principle we choose to lay down1 we must either prove that somewhere we have observed it1 or we must enunciate it in the form of a clear concept which can be re-thought by any other thinker4 ,every philosopher who sets out to discuss his fundamental principles1 must express them in conceptual form and thus use thought4 ,he therefore indirectly admits that his activity presupposes thought4 ,we leave open here the question whether thought or something else is the chief factor in the development of the world4 ,but it is at any rate clear that the philosopher can gain no knowledge of this development without thought4 ,in the occurrence of phenomena thought may play a secondary part1 but it is quite certain that it plays a chief part in the construction of a theory about them4 ,as regards observation1 our need of it is due to our organisation4 ,our thought about a horse and the object horse are two things which for us have separate existences4 ,the object is accessible to us only by means of observation4 ,as little as we can construct a concept of a horse by mere staring at the animal1 just as little are we able by mere thought to produce the corresponding object4 ,in time observation actually precedes thought4 ,for we become familiar with thought itself in the first instance by observation4 ,it was essentially a description of an observation when1 at the beginning of this chapter1 we gave an account of how thought is kindled by an objective process and transcends the merely given4 ,whatever enters the circle of our experiences becomes an object of apprehension to us first through observation4 ,all contents of sensations1 all perceptions1 intuitions1 feelings1 acts of will1 dreams and fancies1 images1 concepts1 ideas1 all illusions and hallucinations1 are given to us through observation4 ,but thought as an object of observation differs essentially from all other objects4 ,the observation of a table1 or a tree1 occurs in me as soon as those objects appear within the horizon of my field of consciousness4 ,yet ,i do not1 at the same time1 observe my thought about these things4 ,i observe the table1 but ,i carry on a process of thought about the table without at the same moment observing this thought-process4 ,i must first take up a standpoint outside of my own activity1 if ,i want to observe my thought about the table1 as well as the table4 ,whereas the observation of things and processes1 and the thinking about them1 are everyday occurrences making up the continuous current of my life1 the observation of the thought-process itself is an exceptional attitude to adopt4 ,this fact must be taken into account1 when we come to determine the relations of thought as an object of observation to all other objects4 ,we must be quite clear about the fact that1 in observing the thought-processes1 we are applying to them a method which is our normal attitude in the study of all other objects in the world1 but which in the ordinary course of that study is usually not applied to thought itself4 ,someone might object that what ,i have said about thinking applies equally to feeling and to all other mental activities4 ,thus it is said that when1 e4g41 ,i have a feeling of pleasure1 the feeling is kindled by the object1 but it is this object ,i observe1 not the feeling of pleasure4 ,this objection1 however1 is based on an error4 ,pleasure does not stand at all in the same relation to its object as the concept constructed by thought4 ,i am conscious1 in the most positive way1 that the concept of a thing is formed through my activity2 whereas a feeling of pleasure is produced in me by an object in a way similar to that in which1 e4g41 a change is caused in an object by a stone which falls on it4 ,for observation1 a pleasure is given in exactly the same way as the event which causes it4 ,the same is not true of concepts4 ,i can ask why an event arouses in me a feeling of pleasure4 ,but ,i certainly cannot ask why an occurrence causes in me a certain number of concepts4 ,the question would be simply meaningless4 ,in thinking about an occurrence1 ,i am not concerned with it as an effect on me4 ,i learn nothing about myself from knowing the concepts which correspond to the observed change caused in a pane of glass by a stone thrown against it4 ,but ,i do learn something about myself when ,i know the feeling which a certain occurrence arouses in me4 ,when ,i say of an object which ,i perceive1 this is a rose1 ,i say absolutely nothing about myself2 but when ,i say of the same thing that it causes a feeling of pleasure in me1 ,i characterise not only the rose1 but also myself in my relation to the rose4 ,there can1 therefore1 be no question of putting thought and feeling on a level as objects of observation4 ,and the same could easily be shown of other activities of the human mind4 ,unlike thought1 they must be classed with any other observed objects or events4 ,the peculiar nature of thought lies just in this1 that it is an activity which is directed solely on the observed object and not on the thinking subject4 ,this is apparent even from the way in which we express our thoughts about an object1 as distinct from our feelings or acts of will4 ,when ,i see an object and recognise it as a table1 ,i do not as a rule say1 ,i am thinking of a table1 but1 this is a table4 ,on the other hand1 ,i do say1 ,i am pleased with the table4 ,in the former case1 ,i am not at all interested in stating that ,i have entered into a relation with the table2 whereas1 in the second case1 it is just this relation which matters4 ,in saying1 ,i am thinking of a table1 ,i adopt the exceptional point of view characterised above1 in which something is made the object of observation which is always present in our mental activity1 without being itself normally an observed object4 ,the peculiar nature of thought consists just in this1 that the thinker forgets his thinking while actually engaged in it4 ,it is not thinking which occupies his attention1 but rather the object of thought which he observes4 ,the first point1 then1 to notice about thought is that it is the unobserved element in our ordinary mental life4 ,the reason why we do not notice the thinking which goes on in our ordinary mental life is no other than this1 that it is our own activity4 ,whatever ,i do not myself produce appears in my field of consciousness as an object2 ,i contrast it with myself as something the existence of which is independent of me4 ,it forces itself upon me4 ,i must accept it as the presupposition of my thinking4 ,as long as ,i think about the object1 ,i am absorbed in it1 my attention is turned on it4 ,to be thus absorbed in the object is just to contemplate it by thought4 ,i attend1 not to my activity1 but to its object4 ,in other words1 whilst ,i am thinking ,i pay no heed to my thinking which is of my own making1 but only to the object of my thinking which is not of my making4 ,i am1 moreover1 in exactly the same position when ,i adopt the exceptional point of view and think of my own thought-processes4 ,i can never observe my present thought1 ,i can only make my past experiences of thought-processes subsequently the objects of fresh thoughts4 ,if ,i wanted to watch my present thought1 ,i should have to split myself into two persons1 one to think1 the other to observe this thinking4 ,but this is impossible4 ,i can only accomplish it in two separate acts4 ,the observed thought-processes are never those in which ,i am actually engaged but others4 ,whether1 for this purpose1 ,i make observations on my own former thoughts1 or follow the thought-processes of another person1 or finally1 as in the example of the motions of the billiard balls1 assume an imaginary thought-process1 is immaterial4 ,there are two things which are incompatible with one another3 productive activity and the theoretical contemplation of that activity4 ,this is recognised even in the ,first ,book of ,moses4 ,it represents ,god as creating the world in the first six days1 and only after its completion is any contemplation of the world possible3 ,and ,god saw everything that he had made and1 behold1 it was very good4 ,the same applies to our thinking4 ,it must be there first1 if we would observe it4 ,the reason why it is impossible to observe the thought-process in its actual occurrence at any given moment1 is the same as that which makes it possible for us to know it more immediately and more intimately than any other process in the world4 ,just because it is our own creation do we know the characteristic features of its course1 the manner in which the process1 in detail1 takes place4 ,what in the other spheres of observation we can discover only indirectly1 viz41 the relevant objective nexus and the relations of the individual objects1 that is known to us immediately in the case of thought4 ,i do not know off-hand why1 for perception1 thunder follows lightning1 but ,i know immediately1 from the content of the two concepts1 why my thought connects the concept of thunder with that of lightning4 ,it does not matter for my argument whether my concepts of thunder and lightning are correct4 ,the connection between the concepts ,i have is clear to me1 and that through the very concepts themselves4 ,this transparent clearness in the observation of our thought-processes is quite independent of our knowledge of the physiological basis of thought4 ,i am speaking here of thought in the sense in which it is the object of our observation of our own mental activity4 ,for this purpose it is quite irrelevant how one material process in my brain causes or influences another1 whilst ,i am carrying on a process of thought4 ,what ,i observe1 in studying a thought-process1 is1 not what process in my brain connects the concept of thunder with that of lightning1 but what is my reason for bringing these two concepts into a definite relation4 ,introspection shows that1 in linking thought with thought1 ,i am guided by their content1 not by the material processes in the brain4 ,this remark would be quite superfluous in a less materialistic age than ours4 ,to-day1 however1 when there are people who believe that1 when we know what matter is1 we shall know also how it thinks1 it is necessary to affirm the possibility of speaking of thought without trespassing on the domain of brain physiology4 ,many people to-day find it difficult to grasp the concept of thought in its purity4 ,anyone who challenges the account of thought which ,i have given here1 by quoting ,cabanis' statement that the brain secretes thoughts as the liver does gall or the spittle-glands spittle1 etc4 simply does not know of what ,i am talking4 ,he attempts to discover thought by the same method of mere observation which we apply to the other objects that make up the world4 ,but he cannot find it in this way1 because1 as ,i have shown1 it eludes just this ordinary observation4 ,whoever cannot transcend ,materialism lacks the ability to throw himself into the exceptional attitude ,i have described1 in which he becomes conscious of what in all other mental activity remains unconscious4 ,it is as useless to discuss thought with one who is not willing to adopt this attitude1 as it would be to discuss colour with a blind man4 ,let him not imagine1 however1 that we regard physiological processes as thought4 ,he fails to explain thought1 because he is not even aware that it is there4 ,for every one1 however1 who has the ability to observe thought1 and with good will every normal man has this ability1 this observation is the most important he can make4 ,for he observes something which he himself produces4 ,he is not confronted by what is to begin with a strange object1 but by his own activity4 ,he knows how that which he observes has come to be4 ,he perceives clearly its connections and relations4 ,he gains a firm point from which he can1 with well-founded hopes1 seek an explanation of the other phenomena of the world4 ,the feeling that he had found such a firm foundation1 induced the father of modern philosophy1 ,descartes1 to base the whole of human knowledge on the principle1 ,i think1 therefore ,i am4 ,all other things1 all other processes1 are independent of me4 ,whether they be truth1 or illusion1 or dream1 ,i know not4 ,there is only one thing of which ,i am absolutely certain1 for ,i myself am the author of its indubitable existence2 and that is my thought4 ,whatever other origin it may have in addition1 whether it come from ,god or from elsewhere1 of one thing ,i am sure1 that it exists in the sense that ,i myself produce it4 ,descartes had1 to begin with1 no justification for reading any other meaning into his principle4 ,all he had a right to assert was that1 in apprehending myself as thinking1 ,i apprehend myself1 within the world-system1 in that activity which is most uniquely characteristic of me4 ,what the added words therefore ,i am are intended to mean has been much debated4 ,they can have a meaning on one condition only4 ,the simplest assertion ,i can make of a thing is1 that it is1 that it exists4 ,what kind of existence1 in detail1 it has1 can in no case be determined on the spot1 as soon as the thing enters within the horizon of my experience4 ,each object must be studied in its relations to others1 before we can determine the sense in which we can speak of its existence4 ,an experienced process may be a complex of percepts1 or it may be a dream1 an hallucination1 etc4 ,in short1 ,i cannot say in what sense it exists4 ,i can never read off the kind of existence from the process itself1 for ,i can discover it only when ,i consider the process in its relation to other things4 ,but this1 again1 yields me no knowledge beyond just its relation to other things4 ,my inquiry touches firm ground only when ,i find an object1 the reason of the existence of which ,i can gather from itself4 ,such an object ,i am myself in so far as ,i think1 for ,i qualify my existence by the determinate and self-contained content of my thought-activity4 ,from here ,i can go on to ask whether other things exist in the same or in some other sense4 ,when thought is made an object of observation1 something which usually escapes our attention is added to the other observed contents of the world4 ,but the usual manner of observation1 such as is employed also for other objects1 is in no way altered4 ,we add to the number of objects of observation1 but not to the number of methods4 ,when we are observing other things1 there enters among the world-processes--among which ,i now include observation--one process which is overlooked4 ,there is present something different from every other kind of process1 something which is not taken into account4 ,but when ,i make an object of my own thinking1 there is no such neglected element present4 ,for what lurks now in the background is just thought itself over again4 ,the object of observation is qualitatively identical with the activity directed upon it4 ,this is another characteristic feature of thought-processes4 ,when we make them objects of observation1 we are not compelled to do so with the help of something qualitatively different1 but can remain within the realm of thought4 ,when ,i weave a tissue of thoughts round an independently given object1 ,i transcend my observation1 and the question then arises1 ,what right have ,i to do this8 ,why do ,i not passively let the object impress itself on me8 ,how is it possible for my thought to be relevantly related to the object8 ,these are questions which every one must put to himself who reflects on his own thought-processes4 ,but all these questions lapse when we think about thought itself4 ,we then add nothing to our thought that is foreign to it1 and therefore have no need to justify any such addition4 ,schelling says3 ,to know ,nature means to create ,nature4 ,if we take these words of the daring philosopher of ,nature literally1 we shall have to renounce for ever all hope of gaining knowledge of ,nature4 ,for ,nature after all exists1 and if we have to create it over again1 we must know the principles according to which it has originated in the first instance4 ,we should have to borrow from ,nature as it exists the conditions of existence for the ,nature which we are about to create4 ,but this borrowing1 which would have to precede the creating1 would be a knowing of ,nature1 and would be this even if after the borrowing no creation at all were attempted4 ,the only kind of ,nature which it would be possible to create without previous knowledge1 would be a ,nature different from the existing one4 ,what is impossible with ,nature1 viz41 creation prior to knowledge1 that we accomplish in the act of thought4 ,were we to refrain from thinking until we had first gained knowledge of it1 we should never think at all4 ,we must resolutely think straight ahead1 and then afterwards by introspective analysis gain knowledge of our own processes4 ,thus we ourselves create the thought-processes which we then make objects of observation4 ,the existence of all other objects is provided for us without any activity on our part4 ,my contention that we must think before we can make thought an object of knowledge1 might easily be countered by the apparently equally valid contention that we cannot wait with digesting until we have first observed the process of digestion4 ,this objection would be similar to that brought by ,pascal against ,descartes1 when he asserted we might also say ,i walk1 therefore ,i am4 ,certainly ,i must digest resolutely and not wait until ,i have studied the physiological process of digestion4 ,but ,i could only compare this with the analysis of thought if1 after digestion1 ,i set myself not to analyse it by thought1 but to eat and digest it4 ,it is not without reason that1 while digestion cannot become the object of digestion1 thought can very well become the object of thought4 ,this then is indisputable1 that in thinking we have got hold of one bit of the world-process which requires our presence if anything is to happen4 ,and that is the very point that matters4 ,the very reason why things seem so puzzling is just that ,i play no part in their production4 ,they are simply given to me1 whereas ,i know how thought is produced4 ,hence there can be no more fundamental starting-point than thought from which to regard all world-processes4 ,i should like still to mention a widely current error which prevails with regard to thought4 ,it is often said that thought1 in its real nature1 is never experienced4 ,the thought-processes which connect our perceptions with one another1 and weave about them a network of concepts1 are not at all the same as those which our analysis afterwards extracts from the objects of perception1 in order to make them the object of study4 ,what we have unconsciously woven into things is1 so we are told1 something widely different from what subsequent analysis recovers out of them4 ,those who hold this view do not see that it is impossible to escape from thought4 ,i cannot get outside thought when ,i want to observe it4 ,we should never forget that the distinction between thought which goes on unconsciously and thought which is consciously analysed1 is a purely external one and irrelevant to our discussion4 ,i do not in any way alter a thing by making it an object of thought4 ,i can well imagine that a being with quite different sense-organs1 and with a differently constructed intelligence1 would have a very different idea of a horse from mine1 but ,i cannot think that my own thought becomes different because ,i make it an object of knowledge4 ,i myself observe my own processes4 ,we are not talking here of how my thought-processes appear to an intelligence different from mine1 but how they appear to me4 ,in any case1 the idea which another mind forms of my thought cannot be truer than the one which ,i form myself4 ,only if the thought-processes were not my own1 but the activity of a being quite different from me1 could ,i maintain that1 notwithstanding my forming a definite idea of these thought-processes1 their real nature was beyond my comprehension4 ,so far1 there is not the slightest reason why ,i should regard my thought from any other point of view than my own4 ,i contemplate the rest of the world by means of thought4 ,how should ,i make of my thought an exception8 ,i think ,i have given sufficient reasons for making thought the starting-point for my theory of the world4 ,when ,archimedes had discovered the lever1 he thought he could lift the whole cosmos out of its hinges1 if only he could find a point of support for his instrument4 ,he needed a point which was self-supporting4 ,in thought we have a principle which is self-subsisting4 ,let us try1 therefore1 to understand the world starting with thought as our basis4 ,thought can be grasped by thought4 ,the question is whether by thought we can also grasp something other than thought4 ,i have so far spoken of thought without taking any account of its vehicle1 the human consciousness4 ,most present-day philosophers would object that1 before there can be thought1 there must be consciousness4 ,hence we ought to start1 not from thought1 but from consciousness4 ,there is no thought1 they say without consciousness4 ,in reply ,i would urge that1 in order to clear up the relation between thought and consciousness1 ,i must think about it4 ,hence ,i presuppose thought4 ,one might1 it is true1 retort that1 though a philosopher who wishes to understand consciousness1 naturally makes use of thought1 and so far presupposes it1 in the ordinary course of life thought arises within consciousness and therefore presupposes that4 ,were this answer given to the world-creator1 when he was about to create thought1 it would1 without doubt1 be to the point4 ,thought cannot1 of course1 come into being before consciousness4 ,the philosopher1 however1 is not concerned with the creation of the world1 but with the understanding of it4 ,hence he is in search of the starting-point1 not for creation1 but for the understanding of the world4 ,it seems to me very strange that philosophers are reproached for troubling themselves1 above all1 about the correctness of their principles1 instead of turning straight to the objects which they seek to understand4 ,the world-creator had above all to know how to find a vehicle for thought2 the philosopher must seek a firm basis for the understanding of what is given4 ,what does it help us to start with consciousness and make it an object of thought1 if we have not first inquired how far it is possible at all to gain any knowledge of things by thought8 ,we must first consider thought quite impartially without relation to a thinking subject or to an object of thought4 ,for subject and object are both concepts constructed by thought4 ,there is no denying that thought must be understood before anything else can be understood4 ,whoever denies this1 fails to realise that man is not the first link in the chain of creation but the last4 ,hence1 in order to explain the world by means of concepts1 we cannot start from the elements of existence which came first in time1 but we must begin with those which are nearest and most intimately connected with us4 ,we cannot1 with a leap1 transport ourselves to the beginning of the world1 in order to begin our analysis there1 but we must start from the present and see whether we cannot advance from the later to the earlier4 ,as long as ,geology fabled fantastic revolutions to account for the present state of the earth1 it groped in darkness4 ,it was only when it began to study the processes at present at work on the earth1 and from these to argue back to the past1 that it gained a firm foundation4 ,as long as ,philosophy assumes all sorts of principles1 such as atom1 motion1 matter1 will1 the unconscious1 it will hang in the air4 ,the philosopher can reach his goal only if he adopts that which is last in time as first in his theory4 ,this absolutely last in the world-process is thought4 ,there are people who say it is impossible to ascertain with certainty whether thought is right or wrong1 and that1 so far1 our starting-point is a doubtful one4 ,it would be just as intelligent to raise doubts as to whether a tree is in itself right or wrong4 ,thought is a fact1 and it is meaningless to speak of the truth or falsity of a fact4 ,i can1 at most1 be in doubt as to whether thought is rightly employed1 just as ,i can doubt whether a certain tree supplies wood adapted to the making of this or that useful object4 ,it is just the purpose of this book to show how far the application of thought to the world is right or wrong4 ,i can understand anyone doubting whether1 by means of thought1 we can gain any knowledge of the world1 but it is unintelligible to me how anyone can doubt that thought in itself is right4 ,,addition ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah74 ,in the preceding discussion ,i have pointed out the importance of the difference between thinking and all other activities of mind4 ,this difference is a fact which is patent to genuinely unprejudiced observation4 ,an observer who does not try to see the facts without preconception will be tempted to bring against my argumentation such objections as these3 ,when ,i think about a rose1 there is involved nothing more than a relation of my ,i to the rose1 just as when ,i feel the beauty of the rose4 ,there subsists a relation between ,i and object in thinking precisely as there does1 e4g41 in feeling or perceiving4 ,those who urge this objection fail to bear in mind that it is only in the activity of thinking that the ,i1 or ,ego1 knows itself to be identical1 right into all the ramifications of the activity1 with that which does the thinking4 ,of no other activity of mind can we say the same4 ,for example1 in a feeling of pleasure it is easy for a really careful observer to discriminate between the extent to which the ,ego knows itself to be identical with what is active in the feeling1 and the extent to which there is something passive in the ,ego1 so that the pleasure is merely something which happens to the ,ego4 ,the same applies to the other mental activities4 ,the main thing is not to confuse the having of images with the elaboration of ideas by thinking4 ,images may appear in the mind dream-wise1 like vague intimations4 ,but this is not thinking4 ,true1 someone might now urge3 ,if this is what you mean by thinking1 then your thinking contains willing1 and you have to do1 not with mere thinking1 but with the will to think4 ,however1 this would justify us only in saying3 ,genuine thinking must always be willed thinking4 ,but this is quite irrelevant to the characterisation of thinking as this has been given in the preceding discussion4 ,let it be granted that the nature of thinking necessarily implies its being willed1 the point which matters is that nothing is willed which1 in being carried out1 fails to appear to the ,ego as an activity completely its own and under its own supervision4 ,indeed1 we must say that thinking appears to the observer as through and through willed1 precisely because of its nature as above defined4 ,if we genuinely try to master all the facts which are relevant to a judgment about the nature of thinking1 we cannot fail to observe that1 as a mental activity1 thinking has the unique character which is here in question4 ,a reader of whose powers the author of this book has a very high opinion1 has objected that it is impossible to speak about thinking as we are here doing1 because the supposed observation of active thinking is nothing but an illusion4 ,in reality1 what is observed is only the results of an unconscious activity which lies at the basis of thinking4 ,it is only because1 and just because1 this unconscious activity escapes observation1 that the deceptive appearance of the self-existence of the observed thinking arises1 just as when an illumination by means of a rapid succession of electric sparks makes us believe that we see a movement4 ,this objection1 likewise1 rests solely on an inaccurate view of the facts4 ,the objection ignores that it is the ,ego itself which1 identical with the thinking1 observes from within its own activity4 ,the ,ego would have to stand outside the thinking in order to suffer the sort of deception which is caused by an illumination with a rapid succession of electric sparks4 ,one might say rather that to indulge in such an analogy is to deceive oneself wilfully1 just as if someone1 seeing a moving light1 were obstinately to affirm that it is being freshly lit by an unknown hand at every point where it appears4 ,no1 whoever is bent on seeing in thought anything else than an activity produced--and observable by--the ,ego has first to shut his eyes to the plain facts that are there for the looking1 in order then to invent a hypothetical activity as the basis of thinking4 ,if he does not wilfully blind himself1 he must recognise that all these hypothetical additions to thinking take him away from its real nature4 ,unprejudiced observation shows that nothing is to be counted as belonging to the nature of thinking except what is found in thinking itself4 ,it is impossible to discover the cause of thinking by going outside the realm of thought4 ,,iv ,,the ,,world ,,as ,,percept ,the products of thinking are concepts and ideas4 ,what a concept is cannot be expressed in words4 ,words can do no more than draw our attention to the fact that we have concepts4 ,when someone perceives a tree1 the perception acts as a stimulus for thought4 ,thus an ideal element is added to the perceived object1 and the perceiver regards the object and its ideal complement as belonging together4 ,when the object disappears from the field of his perception1 the ideal counterpart alone remains4 ,this latter is the concept of the object4 ,the wider the range of our experience1 the larger becomes the number of our concepts4 ,moreover1 concepts are not by any means found in isolation one from the other4 ,they combine to form an ordered and systematic whole4 ,the concept organism1 e4g41 combines with those of development according to law1 growth1 and others4 ,other concepts based on particular objects fuse completely with one another4 ,all concepts formed from particular lions fuse in the universal concept lion4 ,in this way1 all the separate concepts combine to form a closed1 conceptual system within which each has its special place4 ,ideas do not differ qualitatively from concepts4 ,they are but fuller1 more saturated1 more comprehensive concepts4 ,i attach special importance to the necessity of bearing in mind1 here1 that ,i make thought my starting-point1 and not concepts and ideas which are first gained by means of thought4 ,these latter presuppose thought4 ,my remarks regarding the self-dependent1 self-sufficient character of thought cannot1 therefore1 be simply transferred to concepts4 7,i make special mention of this1 because it is here that ,i differ from ,hegel1 who regards the concept as something primary and ultimate47 ,concepts cannot be derived from perception4 ,this is apparent from the fact that1 as man grows up1 he slowly and gradually builds up the concepts corresponding to the objects which surround him4 ,concepts are added to perception4 ,a philosopher1 widely read at the present day 7,herbert ,spencer71 describes the mental process which we perform upon perception as follows3 ,if1 when walking through the fields some day in ,september1 you hear a rustle a few yards in advance1 and on observing the ditch-side where it occurs1 see the herbage agitated1 you will probably turn towards the spot to learn by what this sound and motion are produced4 ,as you approach there flutters into the ditch a partridge2 on seeing which your curiosity is satisfied--you have what you call an explanation of the appearances4 ,the explanation1 mark1 amounts to this--that whereas throughout life you have had countless experiences of disturbance among small stationary bodies1 accompanying the movement of other bodies among them1 and have generalised the relation between such disturbances and such movements1 you consider this particular disturbance explained on finding it to present an instance of the like relation 7,first ,principles1 ,part ,i1 par4 #bc74 ,a closer analysis leads to a very different description from that here given4 ,when ,i hear a noise1 my first demand is for the concept which fits this percept4 ,without this concept1 the noise is to me a mere noise4 ,whoever does not reflect further1 hears just the noise and is satisfied with that4 ,but my thought makes it clear to me that the noise is to be regarded as an effect4 ,thus it is only when ,i combine the concept of effect with the percept of a noise that ,i am led to go beyond the particular percept and seek for its cause4 ,the concept of effect calls up that of cause1 and my next step is to look for the agent1 which ,i find1 say1 in a partridge4 ,but these concepts1 cause and effect1 can never be gained through mere perception1 however many instances we bring under review4 ,perception evokes thought1 and it is this which shows me how to link separate experiences together4 ,if one demands of a strictly objective science that it should take its data from perception alone1 one must demand also that it abandon all thought4 ,for thought1 by its very nature1 transcends the objects of perception4 ,it is time now to pass from thought to the thinker4 ,for it is through the thinker that thought and perception are combined4 ,the human mind is the stage on which concept and percept meet and are linked to one another4 ,in saying this1 we already characterise this 7human7 consciousness4 ,it mediates between thought and perception4 ,in perception the object appears as given1 in thought the mind seems to itself to be active4 ,it regards the thing as object and itself as the thinking subject4 ,when thought is directed upon the perceptual world we have consciousness of objects2 when it is directed upon itself we have self-consciousness4 ,human consciousness must1 of necessity1 be at the same time self-consciousness1 because it is a consciousness which thinks4 ,for1 when thought contemplates its own activity it makes an object for study of its own essential nature1 it makes an object of itself as subject4 ,it is important to note here that it is only by means of thinking that ,i am able to determine myself as subject and contrast myself with objects4 ,therefore thinking must never be regarded as a merely subjective activity4 ,thinking transcends the distinction of subject and object4 ,it produces these two concepts just as it produces all others4 ,when1 therefore1 ,i1 as thinking subject1 refer a concept to an object1 we must not regard this reference as something purely subjective4 ,it is not the subject1 but thought1 which makes the reference4 ,the subject does not think because it is a subject1 rather it conceives itself to be a subject because it can think4 ,the activity of consciousness1 in so far as it thinks1 is thus not merely subjective4 ,rather it is neither subjective nor objective2 it transcends both these concepts4 ,i ought never to say that ,i1 as an individual subject1 think1 but rather that ,i1 as subject1 exist myself by the grace of thought4 ,thought thus takes me out of myself and relates me to objects4 ,at the same time it separates me from them1 inasmuch as ,i1 as subject1 am set over against the objects4 ,it is just this which constitutes the double nature of man4 ,his thought embraces himself and the rest of the world4 ,but by this same act of thought he determines himself also as an individual1 in contrast with the objective world4 ,we must next ask ourselves how the other element1 which we have so far simply called the perceptual object and which comes1 in consciousness1 into contact with thought1 enters into thought at all8 ,in order to answer this question1 we must eliminate from the field of consciousness everything which has been imported by thought4 ,for1 at any moment1 the content of consciousness is always shot through with concepts in the most various ways4 ,let us assume that a being with fully developed human intelligence originated out of nothing and confronted the world4 ,all that it there perceived before its thought began to act would be the pure content of perception4 ,the world so far would appear to this being as a mere chaotic aggregate of sense-data1 colours1 sounds1 sensations of pressure1 of warmth1 of taste1 of smell1 and1 lastly1 feelings of pleasure and pain4 ,this mass constitutes the world of pure unthinking perception4 ,over against it stands thought1 ready to begin its activity as soon as it can find a point of attack4 ,experience shows that the opportunity is not long in coming4 ,thought is able to draw threads from one sense-datum to another4 ,it brings definite concepts to bear on these data and thus establishes a relation between them4 ,we have seen above how a noise which we hear is connected with another content by our identifying the first as the effect of the second4 ,if now we recollect that the activity of thought is on no account to be considered as merely subjective1 then we shall not be tempted to believe that the relations thus established by thought have merely subjective validity4 ,our next task is to discover by means of thought what relation the above-mentioned immediate sense-data have to the conscious subject4 ,the ambiguity of current speech makes it advisable for me to come to an agreement with my readers concerning the meaning of a word which ,i shall have to employ in what follows4 ,i shall apply the name percepts to the immediate sense-data enumerated above1 in so far as the subject consciously apprehends them4 ,it is1 then1 not the process of perception1 but the object of this process which ,i call the percept4 ,i reject the term sensation1 because this has a definite meaning in ,physiology which is narrower than that of my term percept4 ,i can speak of feeling as a percept1 but not as a sensation in the physiological sense of the term4 ,before ,i can have cognisance of my feeling it must become a percept for me4 ,the manner in which1 through observation1 we gain knowledge of our thought-processes is such that when we first begin to notice thought1 it too may be called a percept4 ,the unreflective man regards his percepts1 such as they appear to his immediate apprehension1 as things having a wholly independent existence4 ,when he sees a tree he believes that it stands in the form which he sees1 with the colours of all its parts1 etc41 there on the spot towards which his gaze is directed4 ,when the same man sees the sun in the morning appear as a disc on the horizon1 and follows the course of this disc1 he believes that the phenomenon exists and occurs 7by itself7 exactly as he perceives it4 ,to this belief he clings until he meets with further percepts which contradict his former ones4 ,the child who has as yet had no experience of distance grasps at the moon1 and does not correct its first impression as to the real distance until a second percept contradicts the first4 ,every extension of the circle of my percepts compels me to correct my picture of the world4 ,we see this in everyday life1 as well as in the mental development of mankind4 ,the picture which the ancients made for themselves of the relation of the earth to the sun and other heavenly bodies1 had to be replaced by another when ,copernicus found that it contradicted percepts which in those early days were unknown4 ,a man who had been born blind said1 when operated on by ,dr4 ,franz1 that the idea of the size of objects which he had formed before his operation by his sense of touch was a very different one4 ,he had to correct his tactual percepts by his visual percepts4 ,how is it that we are compelled to make these continual corrections in our observations8 ,a single reflection supplies the answer to this question4 ,when ,i stand at one end of an avenue1 the trees at the other end1 away from me1 seem smaller and nearer together than those where ,i stand4 ,but the scene which ,i perceive changes when ,i change the place from which ,i am looking4 ,the exact form in which it presents itself to me is1 therefore1 dependent on a condition which inheres1 not in the object1 but in me1 the percipient4 ,it is all the same to the avenue where ,i stand4 ,but the picture of it which ,i receive depends essentially on my standpoint4 ,in the same way1 it makes no difference to the sun and the planetary system that human beings happen to perceive them from the earth2 but the picture of the heavens which human beings have is determined by the fact that they inhabit the earth4 ,this dependence of our percepts on our points of observation is the easiest kind of dependence to understand4 ,the matter becomes more difficult when we realise further that our perceptual world is dependent on our bodily and mental organisation4 ,the physicist teaches us that within the space in which we hear a sound there are vibrations of the air1 and that there are vibrations also in the particles of the body which we regard as the cause of the sound4 ,these vibrations are perceived as sounds only if we have normally constructed ears4 ,without them the whole world would be for us for ever silent4 ,again1 the physiologist teaches us that there are men who perceive nothing of the wonderful display of colours which surrounds us4 ,in their world there are only degrees of light and dark4 ,others are blind only to one colour1 e4g41 red4 ,their world lacks this colour tone1 and hence it is actually a different one from that of the average man4 ,i should like to call the dependence of my perceptual world on my point of observation mathematical1 and its dependence on my organisation qualitative4 ,the former determines proportions of size and mutual distances of my percepts1 the latter their quality4 ,the fact that ,i see a red surface as red--this qualitative determination--depends on the structure of my eye4 ,my percepts1 then1 are in the first instance subjective4 ,the recognition of the subjective character of our percepts may easily lead us to doubt whether there is any objective basis for them at all4 ,when we know that a percept1 e4g41 that of a red colour or of a certain tone1 is not possible without a specific structure of our organism1 we may easily be led to believe that it has no being at all apart from our subjective organisation1 that it has no kind of existence apart from the act of perceiving of which it is the object4 ,the classical representative of this theory is ,george ,berkeley1 who held that from the moment we realise the importance of a subject for perception1 we are no longer able to believe in the existence of a world apart from a conscious mind4 ,some truths there are so near and obvious to the mind that man need only open his eyes to see them4 ,such ,i take this important one to be1 viz41 that all the choir of heaven and the furniture of the earth--in a word1 all those bodies which compose the mighty frame of the world--have not any subsistence without a mind2 that their being is to be perceived or known2 that consequently1 so long as they are not actually perceived by me1 or do not exist in my mind or that of any other created spirit1 they must either have no existence at all or else subsist in the mind of some ,eternal ,spirit 7,berkeley1 ,of the ,principles of ,human ,knowledge1 ,part ,i1 ,section #f74 ,on this view1 when we take away the act of perceiving1 nothing remains of the percept4 ,there is no colour when none is seen1 no sound when none is heard4 ,extension1 form1 and motion exist as little as colour and sound apart from the act of perception4 ,we never perceive bare extension or shape4 ,these are always joined with colour or some other quality1 which are undoubtedly dependent on the subject4 ,if these latter disappear when we cease to perceive1 the former1 being connected with them1 must disappear likewise4 ,if it is urged that1 even though figure1 colour1 sound1 etc41 have no existence except in the act of perception1 yet there must be things which exist apart from perception and which are similar to the percepts in our minds1 then the view we have mentioned would answer1 that a colour can be similar only to a colour1 a figure to a figure4 ,our percepts can be similar only to our percepts and to nothing else4 ,even what we call a thing is nothing but a collection of percepts which are connected in a definite way4 ,if ,i strip a table of its shape1 extension1 colour1 etc4--in short1 of all that is merely my percepts--then nothing remains over4 ,if we follow this view to its logical conclusion1 we are led to the assertion that the objects of my perceptions exist only through me1 and only in as far as1 and as long as1 ,i perceive them4 ,they disappear with my perceiving and have no meaning apart from it4 ,apart from my percepts ,i know of no objects and cannot know of any4 ,no objection can be made to this assertion as long as we take into account merely the general fact that the percept is determined in part by the organisation of the subject4 ,the matter would be far otherwise if we were in a position to say what part exactly is played by our perceiving in the occurrence of a percept4 ,we should know then what happens to a percept whilst it is being perceived1 and we should also be able to determine what character it must possess before it comes to be perceived4 ,this leads us to turn our attention from the object of a perception to the subject of it4 ,i am aware not only of other things but also of myself4 ,the content of my perception of myself consists1 in the first instance1 in that ,i am something stable in contrast with the ever coming and going flux of percepts4 ,the awareness of myself accompanies in my consciousness the awareness of all other percepts4 ,when ,i am absorbed in the perception of a given object ,i am1 for the time being1 aware only of this object4 ,next ,i become aware also of myself4 ,i am then conscious1 not only of the object1 but also of my ,self as opposed to and observing the object4 ,i do not merely see a tree1 ,i know also that it is ,i who see it4 ,i know1 moreover1 that some process takes place in me when ,i observe a tree4 ,when the tree disappears from my field of vision1 an after-effect of this process remains1 viz41 an image of the tree4 ,this image has become associated with my ,self during my perception4 ,my ,self has become enriched2 to its content a new element has been added4 ,this element ,i call my idea of the tree4 ,i should never have occasion to talk of ideas1 were ,i not aware of my own ,self4 ,percepts would come and go2 ,i should let them slip by4 ,it is only because ,i am aware of my ,self1 and observe that with each perception the content of the ,self is changed1 that ,i am compelled to connect the perception of the object with the changes in the content of my ,self1 and to speak of having an idea4 ,that ,i have ideas is in the same sense matter of observation to me as that other objects have colour1 sound1 etc4 ,i am now also able to distinguish these other objects1 which stand over against me1 by the name of the outer world1 whereas the contents of my perception of my ,self form my inner world4 ,the failure to recognise the true relation between idea and object has led to the greatest misunderstandings in modern philosophy4 ,the fact that ,i perceive a change in myself1 that my ,self undergoes a modification1 has been thrust into the foreground1 whilst the object which causes these modifications is altogether ignored4 ,in consequence it has been said that we perceive1 not objects1 but only our ideas4 ,i know1 so it is said1 nothing of the table in itself1 which is the object of my perception1 but only of the changes which occur within me when ,i perceive a table4 ,this theory should not be confused with the ,berkeleyan theory mentioned above4 ,berkeley maintains the subjective nature of my perceptual contents1 but he does not say that ,i can know only my own ideas4 ,he limits my knowledge to my ideas because1 on his view1 there are no objects other than ideas4 ,what ,i perceive as a table no longer exists1 according to ,berkeley1 when ,i cease to look at it4 ,this is why ,berkeley holds that our percepts are created directly by the omnipotence of ,god4 ,i see a table because ,god causes this percept in me4 ,for ,berkeley1 therefore1 nothing is real except ,god and human spirits4 ,what we call the world exists only in spirits4 ,what the nave man calls the outer world1 or material nature1 is for ,berkeley non-existent4 ,this theory is confronted by the now predominant ,kantian view which limits our knowledge of the world to our ideas1 not because of any conviction that nothing beyond these ideas exists1 but because it holds that we are so organised that we can have knowledge only of the changes within our own selves1 not of the things-in-themselves which are the causes of these changes4 ,this view concludes from the fact that ,i know only my own ideas1 not that there is no reality independent of them1 but only that the subject cannot have direct knowledge of such reality4 ,the mind can merely through the medium of its subjective thoughts imagine it1 conceive it1 know it1 or perhaps also fail to know it 7,o4 ,liebmann1 ,zur ,analysis der ,wirklichkeit1 p4 #bh74 ,kantians believe that their principles are absolutely certain1 indeed immediately evident1 without any proof4 ,the most fundamental principle which the philosopher must begin by grasping clearly1 consists in the recognition that our knowledge1 in the first instance1 does not extend beyond our ideas4 ,our ideas are all that we immediately have and experience1 and just because we have immediate experience of them the most radical doubt cannot rob us of this knowledge4 ,on the other hand1 the knowledge which transcends my ideas--taking ideas here in the widest possible sense1 so as to include all psychical processes--is not proof against doubt4 ,hence1 at the very beginning of all philosophy we must explicitly set down all knowledge which transcends ideas as open to doubt4 ,these are the opening sentences of ,volkelt's book on ,kant's ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,what is here put forward as an immediate and self-evident truth is1 in reality1 the conclusion of a piece of argument which runs as follows4 ,nave common sense believes that things1 just as we perceive them1 exist also outside our minds4 ,physics1 ,physiology1 and ,psychology1 however1 teach us that our percepts are dependent on our organisation1 and that therefore we cannot know anything about external objects except what our organisation transmits to us4 ,the objects which we perceive are thus modifications of our organisation1 not things-in-themselves4 ,this line of thought has1 in fact1 been characterised by ,ed4 von ,hartmann as the one which leads necessarily to the conviction that we can have direct knowledge only of our own ideas 7cp4 his ,grundproblem der ,erkenntnistheorie1 pp4 #af-dj74 ,because outside our organisms we find vibrations of particles and of air1 which are perceived by us as sounds1 it is concluded that what we call sound is nothing more than a subjective reaction of our organisms to these motions in the external world4 ,similarly1 colour and heat are inferred to be merely modifications of our organisms4 ,and1 further1 these two kinds of percepts are held to be the effects of processes in the external world which are utterly different from what we experience as heat or as colour4 ,when these processes stimulate the nerves in the skin of my body1 ,i perceive heat2 when they stimulate the optical nerve ,i perceive light and colour4 ,light1 colour1 and heat1 then1 are the reactions of my sensory nerves to external stimuli4 ,similarly1 the sense of touch reveals to me1 not the objects of the outer world1 but only states of my own body4 ,the physicist holds that bodies are composed of infinitely small particles called molecules1 and that these molecules are not in direct contact with one another1 but have definite intervals between them4 ,between them1 therefore1 is empty space4 ,across this space they act on one another by attraction and repulsion4 ,if ,i put my hand on a body1 the molecules of my hand by no means touch those of the body directly1 but there remains a certain distance between body and hand1 and what ,i experience as the body's resistance is nothing but the effect of the force of repulsion which its molecules exert on my hand4 ,i am absolutely external to the body and experience only its effects on my organism4 ,the theory of the so-called ,specific ,nervous ,energy1 which has been advanced by ,j4 ,mller1 supplements these speculations4 ,it asserts that each sense has the peculiarity that it reacts to all external stimuli in only one definite way4 ,if the optic nerve is stimulated1 light sensations result1 irrespective of whether the stimulation is due to what we call light1 or to mechanical pressure1 or an electrical current4 ,on the other hand1 the same external stimulus applied to different senses gives rise to different sensations4 ,the conclusion from these facts seems to be1 that our sense-organs can give us knowledge only of what occurs in themselves1 but not of the external world4 ,they determine our percepts1 each according to its own nature4 ,physiology shows1 further1 that there can be no direct knowledge even of the effects which objects produce on our sense-organs4 ,through his study of the processes which occur in our own bodies1 the physiologist finds that1 even in the sense-organs1 the effects of the external process are modified in the most diverse ways4 ,we can see this most clearly in the case of eye and ear4 ,both are very complicated organs which modify the external stimulus considerably1 before they conduct it to the corresponding nerve4 ,from the peripheral end of the nerve the modified stimulus is then conducted to the brain4 ,here the central organs must in turn be stimulated4 ,the conclusion is1 therefore1 drawn that the external process undergoes a series of transformations before it reaches consciousness4 ,the brain processes are connected by so many intermediate links with the external stimuli1 that any similarity between them is out of the question4 ,what the brain ultimately transmits to the soul is neither external processes1 nor processes in the sense-organs1 but only such as occur in the brain4 ,but even these are not apprehended immediately by the soul4 ,what we finally have in consciousness are not brain processes at all1 but sensations4 ,my sensation of red has absolutely no similarity with the process which occurs in the brain when ,i sense red4 ,the sensation1 again1 occurs as an effect in the mind1 and the brain process is only its cause4 ,this is why ,hartmann 7,grundproblem der ,erkenntnistheorie1 p4 #cg7 says1 ,what the subject experiences is therefore only modifications of his own psychical states and nothing else4 ,however1 when ,i have sensations1 they are very far as yet from being grouped in those complexes which ,i perceive as things4 ,only single sensations can be transmitted to me by the brain4 ,the sensations of hardness and softness are transmitted to me by the organ of touch1 those of colour and light by the organ of sight4 ,yet all these are found united in one object4 ,this unification must1 therefore1 be brought about by the soul itself2 that is1 the soul constructs things out of the separate sensations which the brain conveys to it4 ,my brain conveys to me singly1 and by widely different paths1 the visual1 tactual1 and auditory sensations which the soul then combines into the idea of a trumpet4 ,thus1 what is really the result of a process 7i4e41 the idea of a trumpet71 is for my consciousness the primary datum4 ,in this result nothing can any longer be found of what exists outside of me and originally stimulated my sense-organs4 ,the external object is lost entirely on the way to the brain and through the brain to the soul4 ,it would be hard to find in the history of human speculation another edifice of thought which has been built up with greater ingenuity1 and which yet1 on closer analysis1 collapses into nothing4 ,let us look a little closer at the way it has been constructed4 ,the theory starts with what is given in nave consciousness1 i4e41 with things as perceived4 ,it proceeds to show that none of the qualities which we find in these things would exist for us1 had we no sense-organs4 ,no eye--no colour4 ,therefore1 the colour is not1 as yet1 present in the stimulus which affects the eye4 ,it arises first through the interaction of the eye and the object4 ,the latter is1 therefore1 colourless4 ,but neither is the colour in the eye1 for in the eye there is only a chemical1 or physical1 process which is first conducted by the optic nerve to the brain1 and there initiates another process4 ,even this is not yet the colour4 ,that is only produced in the soul by means of the brain process4 ,even then it does not yet appear in consciousness1 but is first referred by the soul to a body in the external world4 ,there ,i finally perceive it1 as a quality of this body4 ,we have travelled in a complete circle4 ,we are conscious of a coloured object4 ,that is the starting-point4 ,here thought begins its construction4 ,if ,i had no eye1 the object would be1 for me1 colourless4 ,i cannot1 therefore1 attribute the colour to the object4 ,i must look for it elsewhere4 ,i look for it1 first1 in the eye--in vain2 in the nerve--in vain2 in the brain--in vain once more2 in the soul--here ,i find it indeed1 but not attached to the object4 ,i recover the coloured body only on returning to my starting-point4 ,the circle is completed4 ,the theory leads me to identify what the nave man regards as existing outside of him1 as really a product of my mind4 ,as long as one stops here everything seems to fit beautifully4 ,but we must go over the argument once more from the beginning4 ,hitherto ,i have used1 as my starting-point1 the object1 i4e41 the external percept of which up to now1 from my nave standpoint1 ,i had a totally wrong conception4 ,i thought that the percept1 just as ,i perceive it1 had objective existence4 ,but now ,i observe that it disappears with my act of perception1 that it is only a modification of my mental state4 ,have ,i1 then1 any right at all to start from it in my arguments8 ,can ,i say of it that it acts on my soul8 ,i must henceforth treat the table of which formerly ,i believed that it acted on me1 and produced an idea of itself in me1 as itself an idea4 ,but from this it follows logically that my sense-organs1 and the processes in them are also merely subjective4 ,i have no right to talk of a real eye but only of my idea of an eye4 ,exactly the same is true of the nerve paths1 and the brain processes1 and even of the process in the soul itself1 through which things are supposed to be constructed out of the chaos of diverse sensations4 ,if assuming the truth of the first circle of argumentation1 ,i run through the steps of my cognitive activity once more1 the latter reveals itself as a tissue of ideas which1 as such1 cannot act on one another4 ,i cannot say that my idea of the object acts on my idea of the eye1 and that from this interaction results my idea of colour4 ,but it is necessary that ,i should say this4 ,for as soon as ,i see clearly that my sense-organs and their activity1 my nerve- and soul-processes1 can also be known to me only through perception1 the argument which ,i have outlined reveals itself in its full absurdity4 ,it is quite true that ,i can have no percept without the corresponding sense-organ4 ,but just as little can ,i be aware of a sense-organ without perception4 ,from the percept of a table ,i can pass to the eye which sees it1 or the nerves in the skin which touches it1 but what takes place in these ,i can1 in turn1 learn only from perception4 ,and then ,i soon perceive that there is no trace of similarity between the process which takes place in the eye and the colour which ,i see4 ,i cannot get rid of colour sensations by pointing to the process which takes place in the eye whilst ,i perceive a colour4 ,no more can ,i re-discover the colour in the nerve- or brain-processes4 ,i only add a new percept1 localised within the organism1 to the first percept which the nave man localises outside of his organism4 ,i only pass from one percept to another4 ,moreover1 there is a break in the whole argument4 ,i can follow the processes in my organism up to those in my brain1 even though my assumptions become more and more hypothetical as ,i approach the central processes of the brain4 ,the method of external observation ceases with the process in my brain1 more particularly with the process which ,i should observe1 if ,i could treat the brain with the instruments and methods of ,physics and ,chemistry4 ,the method of internal observation1 or introspection1 begins with the sensations1 and includes the construction of things out of the material of sense-data4 ,at the point of transition from brain process to sensation1 there is a break in the sequence of observation4 ,the theory which ,i have here described1 and which calls itself ,critical ,idealism1 in contrast to the standpoint of nave common sense which it calls ,nave ,realism1 makes the mistake of characterising one group of percepts as ideas1 whilst taking another group in the very same sense as the ,nave ,realism which it apparently refutes4 ,it establishes the ideal character of percepts by accepting navely1 as objectively valid facts1 the percepts connected with one's own body2 and1 in addition1 it fails to see that it confuses two spheres of observation1 between which it can find no connecting link4 ,critical ,idealism can refute ,nave ,realism only by itself assuming1 in nave-realistic fashion1 that one's own organism has objective existence4 ,as soon as the ,idealist realises that the percepts connected with his own organism stand on exactly the same footing as those which ,nave ,realism assumes to have objective existence1 he can no longer use the former as a safe foundation for his theory4 ,he would1 to be consistent1 have to regard his own organism also as a mere complex of ideas4 ,but this removes the possibility of regarding the content of the perceptual world as a product of the mind's organisation4 ,one would have to assume that the idea colour was only a modification of the idea eye4 ,so-called ,critical ,idealism can be established only by borrowing the assumptions of ,nave ,realism4 ,the apparent refutation of the latter is achieved only by uncritically accepting its own assumptions as valid in another sphere4 ,this much1 then1 is certain3 ,analysis within the world of percepts cannot establish ,critical ,idealism1 and1 consequently1 cannot strip percepts of their objective character4 ,still less is it legitimate to represent the principle that the perceptual world is my idea as self-evident and needing no proof4 ,schopenhauer begins his chief work1 ,the ,world as ,will and ,idea1 with the words3 ,the world is my idea--this is a truth which holds good for everything that lives and knows1 though man alone can bring it into reflective and abstract consciousness4 ,if he really does this1 he has attained to philosophical wisdom4 ,it then becomes clear and certain to him that what he knows is not a sun and an earth1 but only an eye that sees a sun1 a hand that feels an earth2 that the world which surrounds him is there only in idea1 i4e41 only in relation to something else1 the consciousness which is himself4 ,if any truth can be asserted a priori1 it is this3 for it is the expression of the most general form of all possible and thinkable experience1 a form which is more general than time1 or space1 or causality1 for they all presuppose it 444 7,the ,world as ,will and ,idea1 ,book ,i1 par4 #a74 ,this whole theory is wrecked by the fact1 already mentioned above1 that the eyes and the hand are just as much percepts as the sun and the earth4 ,using ,schopenhauer's vocabulary in his own sense1 ,i might maintain against him that my eye which sees the sun1 and my hand which feels the earth1 are my ideas just like the sun and the earth themselves4 ,that1 put in this way1 the whole theory cancels itself1 is clear without further argument4 ,for only my real eye and my real hand1 but not my ideas eye and hand1 could own the ideas sun and earth as modifications4 ,yet it is only in terms of these ideas that ,critical ,idealism has the right to speak4 ,critical ,idealism is totally unable to gain an insight unto the relation of percept to idea4 ,it cannot make the separation1 mentioned on p4 #eh1 between what happens to the percept in the process of perception and what must be inherent in it prior to perception4 ,we must therefore attempt this problem in another way4 ,v ,,our ,,knowledge ,,of ,,the ,,world ,from the foregoing considerations it follows that it is impossible to prove1 by analysis of the content of our perceptions1 that our percepts are ideas4 ,this is supposed to be proved by showing that1 if the process of perceiving takes place in the way in which we conceive it in accordance with the nave-realistic assumptions concerning the psychological and physiological constitution of human individuals1 then we have to do1 not with things themselves1 but merely with our ideas of things4 ,now1 if ,nave ,realism1 when consistently thought out1 leads to results which directly contradict its presuppositions1 then these presuppositions must be discarded as unsuitable for the foundation of a theory of the world4 ,in any case1 it is inadmissible to reject the presuppositions and yet accept the consequences1 as the ,critical ,idealist does who bases his assertion that the world is my idea on the line of argument indicated above4 7,eduard von ,hartmann gives in his work ,das ,grundproblem der ,erkenntnistheorie a full account of this line of argument47 ,the truth of ,critical ,idealism is one thing1 the persuasiveness of its proofs another4 ,how it stands with the former1 will appear later in the course of our argument1 but the persuasiveness of its proofs is nil4 ,if one builds a house1 and the ground floor collapses whilst the first floor is being built1 then the first floor collapses too4 ,nave ,realism and ,critical ,idealism are related to one another like the ground floor to the first floor in this simile4 ,for one who holds that the whole perceptual world is only an ideal world1 and1 moreover1 the effect of things unknown to him acting on his soul1 the real problem of knowledge is naturally concerned1 not with the ideas present only in the soul1 but with the things which lie outside his consciousness1 and which are independent of him4 ,he asks1 ,how much can we learn about them indirectly1 seeing that we cannot observe them directly8 ,from this point of view1 he is concerned1 not with the connection of his conscious percepts with one another1 but with their causes which transcend his consciousness and exist independently of him1 whereas the percepts1 on his view1 disappear as soon as he turns his sense-organs away from the things themselves4 ,our consciousness1 on this view1 works like a mirror from which the pictures of definite things disappear the very moment its reflecting surface is not turned towards them4 ,if1 now1 we do not see the things themselves1 but only their reflections1 we must obtain knowledge of the nature of the former indirectly by drawing conclusions from the character of the latter4 ,the whole of modern science adopts this point of view1 when it uses percepts only as a means of obtaining information about the motions of matter which lie behind them1 and which alone really are4 ,if the philosopher1 as ,critical ,idealist1 admits real existence at all1 then his sole aim is to gain knowledge of this real existence indirectly by means of his ideas4 ,his interest ignores the subjective world of ideas1 and pursues instead the causes of these ideas4 ,the ,critical ,idealist can1 however1 go even further and say1 ,i am confined to the world of my own ideas and cannot escape from it4 ,if ,i conceive a thing beyond my ideas1 this concept1 once more1 is nothing but my idea4 ,an ,idealist of this type will either deny the thing-in-itself entirely or1 at any rate1 assert that it has no significance for human minds1 i4e41 that it is as good as non-existent since we can know nothing of it4 ,to this kind of ,critical ,idealist the whole world seems a chaotic dream1 in the face of which all striving for knowledge is simply meaningless4 ,for him there can be only two sorts of men3 7#a7 victims of the illusion that the dreams they have woven themselves are real things1 and 7#b7 wise men who see through the nothingness of this dream world1 and who gradually lose all desire to trouble themselves further about it4 ,from this point of view1 even one's own personality may become a mere dream phantom4 ,just as during sleep there appears among my dream-images an image of myself1 so in waking consciousness the idea of my own ,self is added to the idea of the outer world4 ,i have then given to me in consciousness1 not my real ,self1 but only my idea of my ,self4 ,whoever denies that things exist1 or1 at least1 that we can know anything of them1 must also deny the existence1 respectively the knowledge1 of one's own personality4 ,this is how the ,critical ,idealist comes to maintain that ,all reality transforms itself into a wonderful dream1 without a life which is the object of the dream1 and without a mind which has the dream2 into a dream which is nothing but a dream of itself4 7,cp4 ,fichte1 ,die ,bestimmung des ,menschen47 ,whether he who believes that he recognises immediate experience to be a dream1 postulates nothing behind this dream1 or whether he relates his ideas to actual things1 is immaterial4 ,in both cases life itself must lose all scientific interest for him4 ,however1 whereas for those who believe that the whole of accessible reality is exhausted in dreams1 all science is an absurdity1 for those who feel compelled to argue from ideas to things1 science consists in studying these things-in-themselves4 ,the first of these theories of the world may be called ,absolute ,illusionism1 the second is called ,transcendental ,realism #b by its most rigorously logical exponent1 ,eduard von ,hartmann4 ,these two points of view have this in common with ,nave ,realism1 that they seek to gain a footing in the world by means of an analysis of percepts4 ,within this sphere1 however1 they are unable to find any stable point4 ,one of the most important questions for an adherent of ,transcendental ,realism would have to be1 how the ,ego constructs the world of ideas out of itself4 ,a world of ideas which was given to us1 and which disappeared as soon as we shut our senses to the external world1 might provoke an earnest desire for knowledge1 in so far as it was a means for investigating indirectly the world of the self-existing ,self4 ,if the things of our experience were ideas1 then our everyday life would be like a dream1 and the discovery of the true facts like waking4 ,even our dream-images interest us as long as we dream and1 consequently1 do not detect their dream character4 ,but as soon as we wake1 we no longer look for the connections of our dream-images among themselves1 but rather for the physical1 physiological1 and psychological processes which underlie them4 ,in the same way1 a philosopher who holds the world to be his idea1 cannot be interested in the reciprocal relations of the details within the world4 ,if he admits the existence of a real ,ego at all1 then his question will be1 not how one of his ideas is associated with another1 but what takes place in the ,soul which is independent of these ideas1 while a certain train of ideas passes through his consciousness4 ,if ,i dream that ,i am drinking wine which makes my throat burn1 and then wake up with a fit of coughing 7cp4 ,weygandt1 ,entstehung der ,trume1 #ahic7 ,i cease1 the moment ,i wake1 to be interested in the dream-experience for its own sake4 ,my attention is now concerned only with the physiological and psychological processes by means of which the irritation which causes me to cough1 comes to be symbolically expressed in the dream4 ,similarly1 once the philosopher is convinced that the given world consists of nothing but ideas1 his interest is bound to switch from them at once to the soul which is the reality lying behind them4 ,the matter is more serious1 however1 for the ,illusionist who denies the existence of an ,ego behind the ideas1 or at least holds this ,ego to be unknowable4 ,we might very easily be led to such a view by the reflection that1 in contrast to dreaming1 there is the waking state in which we have the opportunity to detect our dreams1 and to realise the real relations of things1 but that there is no state of the self which is related similarly to our waking conscious life4 ,every adherent of this view fails entirely to see that there is1 in fact1 something which is to mere perception what our waking experience to our dreams4 ,this something is thought4 ,the nave man cannot be charged with failure to perceive this4 ,he accepts life as it is1 and regards things as real just as they present themselves to him in experience4 ,the first step1 however1 which we take beyond this standpoint can be only this1 that we ask how thought is related to perception4 ,it makes no difference whether or no the percept1 as given to me1 has a continuous existence before and after ,i perceive it4 ,if ,i want to assert anything whatever about it1 ,i can do so only with the help of thought4 ,when ,i assert that the world is my idea1 ,i have enunciated the result of an act of thought1 and if my thought is not applicable to the world1 then my result is false4 ,between a percept and every kind of judgment about it there intervenes thought4 ,the reason why1 in our discussion about things1 we generally overlook the part played by thought1 has already been given above 7p4 #ca74 ,it lies in the fact that our attention is concentrated only on the object about which we think1 but not at the same time on the thinking itself4 ,the nave mind1 therefore1 treats thought as something which has nothing to do with things1 but stands altogether aloof from them and makes its theories about them4 ,the theory which the thinker constructs concerning the phenomena of the world is regarded1 not as part of the real things1 but as existing only in men's heads4 ,the world is complete in itself even without this theory4 ,it is all ready-made and finished with all its substances and forces1 and of this ready-made world man makes himself a picture4 ,whoever thinks thus need only be asked one question4 ,what right have you to declare the world to be complete without thought8 ,does not the world cause thoughts in the minds of men with the same necessity as it causes the blossoms on plants8 ,plant a seed in the earth4 ,it puts forth roots and stem1 it unfolds into leaves and blossoms4 ,set the plant before yourselves4 ,it connects itself1 in your minds1 with a definite concept4 ,why should this concept belong any less to the whole plant than leaf and blossom8 ,you say the leaves and blossoms exist quite apart from an experiencing subject4 ,the concept appears only when a human being makes an object of the plant4 ,quite so4 ,but leaves and blossoms also appear on the plant only if there is soil in which the seed can be planted1 and light and air in which the blossoms and leaves can unfold4 ,just so the concept of a plant arises when a thinking being comes into contact with the plant4 ,it is quite arbitrary to regard the sum of what we experience of a thing through bare perception as a totality1 a whole1 while that which thought reveals in it is regarded as a mere accretion which has nothing to do with the thing itself4 ,if ,i am given a rosebud to-day1 the percept that offers itself to me is complete only for the moment4 ,if ,i put the bud into water1 ,i shall to-morrow get a very different picture of my object4 ,if ,i watch the rosebud without interruption1 ,i shall see to-day's state gradually change into to-morrow's through an infinite number of intermediate stages4 ,the picture which presents itself to me at any one moment is only a chance section out of the continuous process of growth in which the object is engaged4 ,if ,i do not put the bud into water1 a whole series of states1 the possibility of which lay in the bud1 will not be realised4 ,similarly1 ,i may be prevented to-morrow from watching the blossom further1 and thus carry away an incomplete picture of it4 ,it would be a quite unscientific and arbitrary judgment which declared of any haphazard appearance of a thing1 this is the thing4 ,to regard the sum of perceptual appearances as the thing is no more legitimate4 ,it might be quite possible for a mind to receive the concept at the same time as1 and together with1 the percept4 ,to such a mind it would never occur that the concept did not belong to the thing4 ,it would have to ascribe to the concept an existence indivisibly bound up with the thing4 ,let me make myself clearer by another example4 ,if ,i throw a stone horizontally through the air1 ,i perceive it in different places at different times4 ,i connect these places so as to form a line4 ,mathematics teaches me to distinguish various kinds of lines1 one of which is the parabola4 ,i know a parabola to be a line which is produced by a point moving according to a certain well-defined law4 ,if ,i analyse the conditions under which the stone thrown by me moves1 ,i find that the line of its flight is identical with the line ,i know as a parabola4 ,that the stone moves exactly in a parabola is a result of the given conditions and follows necessarily from them4 ,the form of the parabola belongs to the whole phenomenon as much as any other feature of it4 ,the hypothetical mind described above which has no need of the roundabout way of thought1 would find itself presented1 not only with a sequence of visual percepts at different points1 but1 as part and parcel of these phenomena1 also with the parabolic form of the line of flight1 which we can add to the phenomenon only by an act of thought4 ,it is not due to the real objects that they appear to us at first without their conceptual sides1 but to our mental organisation4 ,our whole organisation functions in such a way that in the apprehension of every real thing the relevant elements come to us from two sources1 viz41 from perception and from thought4 ,the nature of things is indifferent to the way ,i am organised for apprehending them4 ,the breach between perception and thought exists only from the moment that ,i confront objects as spectator4 ,but which elements do1 and which do not1 belong to the objects1 cannot depend on the manner in which ,i obtain my knowledge of them4 ,man is a being with many limitations4 ,first of all1 he is a thing among other things4 ,his existence is in space and time4 ,hence but a limited portion of the total universe can ever be given to him4 ,this limited portion1 however1 is linked up with other parts on every side both in time and in space4 ,if our existence were so linked with things that every process in the object world were also a process in us1 there would be no difference between us and things4 ,neither would there be any individual objects for us4 ,all processes and events would then pass continuously one into the other4 ,the cosmos would be a unity and a whole complete in itself4 ,the stream of events would nowhere be interrupted4 ,but owing to our limitations we perceive as an individual object what1 in truth1 is not an individual object at all4 ,nowhere1 e4g41 is the particular quality red to be found by itself in abstraction4 ,it is surrounded on all sides by other qualities to which it belongs1 and without which it could not subsist4 ,for us1 however1 it is necessary to isolate certain sections of the world and to consider them by themselves4 ,our eye can seize only single colours one after another out of a manifold colour-complex1 our understanding only single concepts out of a connected conceptual system4 ,this isolation is a subjective act1 which is due to the fact that we are not identical with the world-process1 but are only things among other things4 ,it is of the greatest importance for us to determine the relation of ourselves1 as things1 to all other things4 ,the determining of this relation must be distinguished from merely becoming conscious of ourselves4 ,for this self-awareness we depend on perception just as we do for our awareness of any other thing4 ,the perception of myself reveals to me a number of qualities which ,i combine into an apprehension of my personality as a whole1 just as ,i combine the qualities1 yellow1 metallic1 hard1 etc41 in the unity gold4 ,this kind of self-consciousness does not take me beyond the sphere of what belongs to me4 ,hence it must be distinguished from the determination of myself by thought4 ,just as ,i determine by thought the place of any single percept of the external world in the whole cosmic system1 so ,i fit by an act of thought what ,i perceive in myself into the order of the world-process4 ,my self-observation restricts me within definite limits1 but my thought has nothing to do with these limits4 ,in this sense ,i am a two-sided being4 ,i am contained within the sphere which ,i apprehend as that of my personality1 but ,i am also the possessor of an activity which1 from a higher standpoint1 determines my finite existence4 ,thought is not individual like sensation and feeling2 it is universal4 ,it receives an individual stamp in each separate human being only because it comes to be related to his individual feelings and sensations4 ,by means of these particular colourings of the universal thought1 individual men are distinguished from one another4 ,there is only one single concept of triangle4 ,it is quite immaterial for the content of this concept whether it is in ,a's consciousness or in ,b's4 ,it will1 however1 be grasped by each of the two minds in its own individual way4 ,this thought conflicts with a common prejudice which is very hard to overcome4 ,the victims of this prejudice are unable to see that the concept of a triangle which my mind grasps is the same as the concept which my neighbour's mind grasps4 ,the nave man believes himself to be the creator of his concepts4 ,hence he believes that each person has his private concepts4 ,one of the first things which philosophic thought requires of us is to overcome this prejudice4 ,the one single concept of triangle does not split up into many concepts because it is thought by many minds4 ,for the thought of the many is itself a unity4 ,in thought we have the element which welds each man's special individuality into one whole with the cosmos4 ,in so far as we sense and feel 7perceive71 we are isolated individuals2 in so far as we think1 we are the ,all-,one ,being which pervades everything4 ,this is the deeper meaning of our two-sided nature4 ,we are conscious of an absolute principle revealing itself in us1 a principle which is universal4 ,but we experience it1 not as it issues from the centre of the world1 but rather at a point on the periphery4 ,were the former the case1 we should know1 as soon as ever we became conscious1 the solution of the whole world problem4 ,but since we stand at a point on the periphery1 and find that our own being is confined within definite limits1 we must explore the region which lies beyond our own being with the help of thought1 which is the universal cosmic principle manifesting itself in our minds4 ,the fact that thought1 in us1 reaches out beyond our separate existence and relates itself to the universal world-order1 gives rise to the desire for knowledge in us4 ,beings without thought do not experience this desire4 ,when they come in contact with other things no questions arise for them4 ,these other things remain external to such beings4 ,but in thinking beings the concept confronts the external thing4 ,it is that part of the thing which we receive not from without1 but from within4 ,to assimilate1 to unite1 the two elements1 the inner and the outer1 that is the function of knowledge4 ,the percept1 thus1 is not something finished and self-contained1 but one side only of the total reality4 ,the other side is the concept4 ,the act of cognition is the synthesis of percept and concept4 ,and it is only the union of percept and concept which constitutes the whole thing4 ,the preceding discussion shows clearly that it is futile to seek for any other common element in the separate things of the world than the ideal content which thinking supplies4 ,all attempts to discover any other principle of unity in the world than this internally coherent ideal content1 which we gain for ourselves by the conceptual analysis of our percepts1 are bound to fail4 ,neither a personal ,god1 nor force1 nor matter1 nor the blind will 7of ,schopenhauer and ,hartmann71 can be accepted by us as the universal principle of unity in the world4 ,these principles all belong only to a limited sphere of our experience4 ,personality we experience only in ourselves1 force and matter only in external things4 ,the will1 again1 can be regarded only as the expression of the activity of our finite personalities4 ,schopenhauer wants to avoid making abstract thought the principle of unity in the world1 and seeks instead something which presents itself to him immediately as real4 ,this philosopher holds that we can never solve the riddle of the world so long as we regard it as an external world4 ,in fact1 the meaning for which we seek of that world which is present to us only as our idea1 or the transition from the world as mere idea of the knowing subject to whatever it may be besides this1 would never be found if the investigator himself were nothing more than the pure knowing subject 7a winged cherub without a body74 ,but he himself is rooted in that world3 he finds himself in it as an individual1 that is to say1 his knowledge1 which is the necessary supporter of the whole world as idea1 is yet always given through the medium of a body1 whose affections are1 as we have shown1 the starting-point for the understanding in the perception of that world4 ,his body is1 for the pure knowing subject1 an idea like every other idea1 an object among objects4 ,its movements and actions are so far known to him in precisely the same way as the changes of all other perceived objects1 and would be just as strange and incomprehensible to him if their meaning were not explained for him in an entirely different way4444 ,the body is given in two entirely different ways to the subject of knowledge1 who becomes an individual only through his identity with it4 ,it is given as an idea in intelligent perception1 as an object among objects and subject to the laws of objects4 ,and it is also given in quite a different way as that which is immediately known to every one1 and is signified by the word 'will4' ,every true act of his will is also at once and without exception a movement of his body4 ,the act of will and the movement of the body are not two different things objectively known1 which the bond of causality unites2 they do not stand in the relation of cause and effect2 they are one and the same1 but they are given in entirely different ways--immediately1 and again in perception for the understanding4 7,the ,world as ,will and ,idea1 ,book #b1 #ah47 ,schopenhauer considers himself entitled by these arguments to hold that the will becomes objectified in the human body4 ,he believes that in the activities of the body he has an immediate experience of reality1 of the thing-in-itself in the concrete4 ,against these arguments we must urge that the activities of our body become known to us only through self-observation1 and that1 as such1 they are in no way superior to other percepts4 ,if we want to know their real nature1 we can do so only by means of thought1 i4e41 by fitting them into the ideal system of our concepts and ideas4 ,one of the most deeply rooted prejudices of the nave mind is the opinion that thinking is abstract and empty of any concrete content4 ,at best1 we are told1 it supplies but an ideal counterpart of the unity of the world1 but never that unity itself4 ,whoever holds this view has never made clear to himself what a percept apart from concepts really is4 ,let us see what this world of bare percepts is4 ,a mere juxtaposition in space1 a mere succession in time1 a chaos of disconnected particulars--that is what it is4 ,none of these things which come and go on the stage of perception has any connection with any other4 ,the world is a multiplicity of objects without distinctions of value4 ,none plays any greater part in the nexus of the world than any other4 ,in order to realise that this or that fact has a greater importance than another we must go to thought4 ,as long as we do not think1 the rudimentary organ of an animal which has no significance in its life1 appears equal in value to its more important limbs4 ,the particular facts reveal their meaning1 in themselves and in their relations with other parts of the world1 only when thought spins its threads from thing to thing4 ,this activity of thinking has always a content4 ,for it is only through a perfectly definite concrete content that ,i can know why the snail belongs to a lower type of organisation than the lion4 ,the mere appearance1 the percept1 gives me no content which could inform me as to the degree of perfection of the organisation4 ,thought contributes this content to the percept from the world of concepts and ideas4 ,in contrast with the content of perception which is given to us from without1 the content of thought appears within our minds4 ,the form in which thought first appears in consciousness we will call intuition4 ,intuition is to thoughts what observation is to percepts4 ,intuition and observation are the sources of our knowledge4 ,an external object which we observe remains unintelligible to us1 until the corresponding intuition arises within us which adds to the reality those sides of it which are lacking in the percept4 ,to anyone who is incapable of supplying the relevant intuitions1 the full nature of the real remains a sealed book4 ,just as the colour-blind person sees only differences of brightness without any colour qualities1 so the mind which lacks intuition sees only disconnected fragments of percepts4 ,to explain a thing1 to make it intelligible1 means nothing else than to place it in the context from which it has been torn by the peculiar organisation of our minds1 described above4 ,nothing can possibly exist cut off from the universe4 ,hence all isolation of objects has only subjective validity for minds organised like ours4 ,for us the universe is split up into above and below1 before and after1 cause and effect1 object and idea1 matter and force1 object and subject1 etc4 ,the objects which1 in observation1 appear to us as separate1 become combined1 bit by bit1 through the coherent1 unified system of our intuitions4 ,by thought we fuse again into one whole all that perception has separated4 ,an object presents riddles to our understanding so long as it exists in isolation4 ,but this is an abstraction of our own making and can be unmade again in the world of concepts4 ,except through thought and perception nothing is given to us directly4 ,the question now arises as to the interpretation of percepts on our theory4 ,we have learnt that the proof which ,critical ,idealism offers for the subjective nature of percepts collapses4 ,but the exhibition of the falsity of the proof is not1 by itself1 sufficient to show that the doctrine itself is an error4 ,critical ,idealism does not base its proof on the absolute nature of thought1 but relies on the argument that ,nave ,realism1 when followed to its logical conclusion1 contradicts itself4 ,how does the matter appear when we recognise the absoluteness of thought8 ,let us assume that a certain percept1 e4g41 red1 appears in consciousness4 ,to continued observation1 the percept shows itself to be connected with other percepts1 e4g41 a certain figure1 temperature1 and touch-qualities4 ,this complex of percepts ,i call an object in the world of sense4 ,i can now ask myself3 ,over and above the percepts just mentioned1 what else is there in the section of space in which they are8 ,i shall then find mechanical1 chemical1 and other processes in that section of space4 ,i next go further and study the processes which take place between the object and my sense-organs4 ,i shall find oscillations in an elastic medium1 the character of which has not the least in common with the percepts from which ,i started4 ,i get the same result if ,i trace further the connection between sense-organs and brain4 ,in each of these inquiries ,i gather new percepts1 but the connecting thread which binds all these spatially and temporally separated percepts into one whole1 is thought4 ,the air vibrations which carry sound are given to me as percepts just like the sound4 ,thought alone links all these percepts one to the other and exhibits them in their reciprocal relations4 ,we have no right to say that over and above our immediate percepts there is anything except the ideal nexus of precepts 7which thought has to reveal74 ,the relation of the object perceived to the perceiving subject1 which relation transcends the bare percept1 is therefore purely ideal1 i4e41 capable of being expressed only through concepts4 ,only if it were possible to perceive how the object of perception affects the perceiving subject1 or1 alternatively1 only if ,i could watch the construction of the perceptual complex through the subject1 could we speak as modern ,physiology1 and the ,critical ,idealism which is based on it1 speak4 ,their theory confuses an ideal relation 7that of the object to the subject7 with a process of which we could speak only if it were possible to perceive it4 ,the proposition1 ,no colour without a colour-sensing eye1 cannot be taken to mean that the eye produces the colour1 but only that an ideal relation1 recognisable by thought1 subsists between the percept colour and the percept eye4 ,to empirical science belongs the task of ascertaining how the properties of the eye and those of the colours are related to one another2 by means of what structures the organ of sight makes possible the perception of colours1 etc4 ,i can trace how one percept succeeds another and how one is related to others in space1 and ,i can formulate these relations in conceptual terms1 but ,i can never perceive how a percept originates out of the non-perceptible4 ,all attempts to seek any relations between percepts other than conceptual relations must of necessity fail4 ,what then is a percept8 ,this question1 asked in this general way1 is absurd4 ,a percept appears always as a perfectly determinate1 concrete content4 ,this content is immediately given and is completely contained in the given4 ,the only question one can ask concerning the given content is1 what it is apart from perception1 that is1 what it is for thought4 ,the question concerning the what of a percept can1 therefore1 only refer to the conceptual intuition which corresponds to the percept4 ,from this point of view1 the problem of the subjectivity of percepts1 in the sense in which the ,critical ,idealists debate it1 cannot be raised at all4 ,only that which is experienced as belonging to the subject can be termed subjective4 ,to form a link between subject and object is impossible for any real process1 in the nave sense of the word real1 in which it means a process which can be perceived4 ,that is possible only for thought4 ,for us1 then1 objective means that which1 for perception1 presents itself as external to the perceiving subject4 ,as subject of perception ,i remain perceptible to myself after the table which now stands before me has disappeared from my field of observation4 ,the perception of the table has produced a modification in me which persists like myself4 ,i preserve an image of the table which now forms part of my ,self4 ,modern ,psychology terms this image a memory-idea4 ,now this is the only thing which has any right to be called the idea of the table4 ,for it is the perceptible modification of my own mental state through the presence of the table in my visual field4 ,moreover1 it does not mean a modification in some ,ego-in-itself behind the perceiving subject1 but the modification of the perceiving subject itself4 ,the idea is1 therefore1 a subjective percept1 in contrast with the objective percept which occurs when the object is present in the perceptual field4 ,the false identification of the subjective with this objective percept leads to the misunderstanding of ,idealism3 ,the world is my idea4 ,our next task must be to define the concept of idea more nearly4 ,what we have said about it so far does not give us the concept1 but only shows us where in the perceptual field ideas are to be found4 ,the exact concept of idea will also make it possible for us to obtain a satisfactory understanding of the relation of idea and object4 ,this will then lead us over the border-line1 where the relation of subject to object is brought down from the purely conceptual field of knowledge into concrete individual life4 ,once we know how we are to conceive the world1 it will be an easy task to adapt ourselves to it4 ,only when we know to what object we are to devote our activity can we put our whole energy into our actions4 ,,addition ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah74 ,the view which ,i have here outlined may be regarded as one to which man is led as it were spontaneously1 as soon as he begins to reflect about his relation to the world4 ,he then finds himself caught in a system of thoughts which dissolves for him as fast as he frames it4 ,the thoughts which form this system are such that the purely theoretical refutation of them does not exhaust our task4 ,we have to live through them1 in order to understand the confusion into which they lead us1 and to find the way out4 ,they must figure in any discussion of the relation of man to the world1 not for the sake of refuting others whom one believes to be holding mistaken views about this relation1 but because it is necessary to understand the confusion in which all first efforts at reflection about such a relation are apt to issue4 ,one needs to learn by experience how to refute oneself with respect to these first reflections4 ,this is the point of view from which the arguments of the preceding chapter are to be understood4 ,whoever tries to work out for himself a theory of the relation of man to the world1 becomes aware of the fact that he creates this relation1 at least in part1 by forming ideas about the things and events in the world4 ,in consequence1 his attention is deflected from what exists outside in the world and directed towards his inner world1 the realm of his ideas4 ,he begins to say to himself1 ,it is impossible for me to stand in relation to any thing or event1 unless an idea appears in me4 ,from this fact1 once noticed1 it is but a step to the theory3 all that ,i experience is only my ideas2 of the existence of a world outside ,i know only in so far as it is an idea in me4 ,with this theory1 man abandons the standpoint of ,nave ,realism which he occupies prior to all reflection about his relation to the world4 ,so long as he stands there1 he believes that he is dealing with real things1 but reflection about himself drives him away from this position4 ,reflection does not reveal to his gaze a real world such as nave consciousness claims to have before it4 ,reflection reveals to him only his ideas2 they interpose themselves between his own nature and a supposedly real world1 such as the nave point of view confidently affirms4 ,the interposition of the world of ideas prevents man from perceiving any longer such a real world4 ,he must suppose that he is blind to such a reality4 ,thus arises the concept of a thing-in-itself which is inaccessible to knowledge4 ,so long as we consider only the relation to the world into which man appears to enter through the stream of his ideas1 we can hardly avoid framing this type of theory4 ,yet we cannot remain at the point of view of ,nave ,realism except at the price of closing our minds artificially to the desire for knowledge4 ,the existence of this desire for knowledge about the relation of man to the world proves that the nave point of view must be abandoned4 ,if the nave point of view yielded anything which we could acknowledge as truth1 we could not experience this desire4 ,but mere abandonment of the nave point of view does not lead to any other view which we could regard as true1 so long as we retain1 without noticing it1 the type of theory which the nave point of view imposes on us4 ,this is the mistake made by the man who says1 ,i experience only my ideas1 and though ,i think that ,i am dealing with real things1 ,i am actually conscious of nothing but my ideas of real things4 ,i must1 therefore1 suppose that genuine realities1 things-in-themselves1 exist only outside the boundary of my consciousness2 that they are inaccessible to my immediate knowledge2 but that they somehow come into contact with me and influence me so as to make a world of ideas arise in me4 ,whoever thinks thus1 duplicates in thought the world before him by adding another4 ,but1 strictly he ought to begin his whole theorising over again with regard to this second world4 ,for the unknown thing-in-itself1 in its relation to man's own nature1 is conceived in exactly the same way as is the known thing of the navely realistic point of view4 ,there is only one way of escaping from the confusion into which one falls1 by critical reflection on this nave point of view4 ,this is to observe that1 at the very heart of everything we can experience1 be it within the mind or outside in the world of perception1 there is something which does not share the fate of an idea interposing itself between the real event and the contemplating mind4 ,this something is thinking4 ,with regard to thinking we can maintain the point of view of ,nave ,realism4 ,if we mistakenly abandon it1 it is only because we have learnt that we must abandon it for other mental activities1 but overlook that what we have found to be true for other activities1 does not apply to thinking4 ,when we realise this1 we gain access to the further insight that1 in thinking and through thinking1 man necessarily comes to know the very thing to which he appears to blind himself by interposing between the world and himself the stream of his ideas4 ,a critic highly esteemed by the author of this book has objected that this discussion of thinking stops at a navely realistic theory of thinking1 as shown by the fact that the real world and the world of ideas are held to be identical4 ,however1 the author believes himself to have shown in this very discussion that the validity of ,nave ,realism1 as applied to thinking1 results inevitably from an unprejudiced study of thinking2 and that ,nave ,realism1 in so far as it is invalid for other mental activities1 is overcome through the recognition of the true nature of thinking4 ,,vi ,,human ,,individuality ,philosophers have found the chief difficulty in the explanation of ideas in the fact that we are not identical with the external objects1 and yet our ideas must have a form corresponding to their objects4 ,but on closer inspection it turns out that this difficulty does not really exist4 ,we certainly are not identical with the external things1 but we belong together with them to one and the same world4 ,the stream of the universal cosmic process passes through that segment of the world which1 to my perception1 is myself as subject4 ,so far as my perception goes1 ,i am1 in the first instance1 confined within the limits bounded by my skin4 ,but all that is contained within the skin belongs to the cosmos as a whole4 ,hence1 for a relation to subsist between my organism and an object external to me1 it is by no means necessary that something of the object should slip into me1 or make an impression on my mind1 like a signet-ring on wax4 ,the question1 ,how do ,i gain knowledge of that tree ten feet away from me1 is utterly misleading4 ,it springs from the view that the boundaries of my body are absolute barriers1 through which information about external things filters into me4 ,the forces which are active within my body are the same as those which exist outside4 ,i am1 therefore1 really identical with the objects2 not1 however1 ,i in so far as ,i am subject of perception1 but ,i in so far as ,i am a part within the universal cosmic process4 ,the percept of the tree belongs to the same whole as my ,self4 ,the universal cosmic process produces alike1 here the percept of the tree1 and there the percept of my ,self4 ,were ,i a world-creator instead of a world-knower1 subject and object 7percept and self7 would originate in one act4 ,for they condition one another reciprocally4 ,as world-knower ,i can discover the common element in both1 so far as they are complementary aspects of the world1 only through thought which by means of concepts relates the one to the other4 ,the most difficult to drive from the field are the so-called physiological proofs of the subjectivity of our percepts4 ,when ,i exert pressure on the skin of my body1 ,i experience it as a pressure sensation4 ,this same pressure can be sensed as light by the eye1 as sound by the ear4 ,i experience an electrical shock by the eye as light1 by the ear as sound1 by the nerves of the skin as touch1 and by the nose as a smell of phosphorus4 ,what follows from these facts8 ,only this3 ,i experience an electrical shock1 or1 as the case may be1 a pressure followed by a light1 or a sound1 or1 it may be1 a certain smell1 etc4 ,if there were no eye present1 then no light quality would accompany the perception of the mechanical vibrations in my environment2 without the presence of the ear1 no sound1 etc4 ,but what right have we to say that in the absence of sense-organs the whole process would not exist at all8 ,all those who1 from the fact that an electrical process causes a sensation of light in the eye1 conclude that what we sense as light is only a mechanical process of motion1 forget that they are only arguing from one percept to another1 and not at all to something altogether transcending percepts4 ,just as we can say that the eye perceives a mechanical process of motion in its surroundings as light1 so we can affirm that every change in an object1 determined by natural law1 is perceived by us as a process of motion4 ,if ,i draw twelve pictures of a horse on the circumference of a rotating disc1 reproducing exactly the positions which the horse's body successively assumes in movement1 ,i can1 by rotating the disc1 produce the illusion of movement4 ,i need only look through an opening in such a way that1 at regular intervals1 ,i perceive the successive positions of the horse4 ,i perceive1 not separate pictures of twelve horses1 but one picture of a single galloping horse4 ,the above-mentioned physiological facts cannot1 therefore1 throw any light on the relation of percept to idea4 ,hence1 we must seek a relation some other way4 ,the moment a percept appears in my field of consciousness1 thought1 too1 becomes active in me4 ,a member of my thought-system1 a definite intuition1 a concept1 connects itself with the percept4 ,when1 next1 the percept disappears from my field of vision1 what remains8 ,the intuition1 with the reference to the particular percept which it acquired in the moment of perception4 ,the degree of vividness with which ,i can subsequently recall this reference depends on the manner in which my mental and bodily organism is working4 ,an idea is nothing but an intuition related to a particular percept2 it is a concept which was once connected with a certain percept1 and which retains this reference to the percept4 ,my concept of a lion is not constructed out of my percepts of a lion2 but my idea of a lion is formed under the guidance of the percepts4 ,i can teach someone to form the concept of a lion without his ever having seen a lion1 but ,i can never give him a living idea of it without the help of his own perception4 ,an idea is therefore nothing but an individualised concept4 ,and now we can see how real objects can be represented to us by ideas4 ,the full reality of a thing is present to us in the moment of observation through the combination of concept and percept4 ,the concept acquires by means of the percept an individualised form1 a relation to this particular percept4 ,in this individualised form which carries with it1 as an essential feature1 the reference to the percept1 it continues to exist in us and constitutes the idea of the thing in question4 ,if we come across a second thing with which the same concept connects itself1 we recognise the second as being of the same kind as the first2 if we come across the same thing twice1 we find in our conceptual system1 not merely a corresponding concept1 but the individualised concept with its characteristic relation to this same object1 and thus we recognise the object again4 ,the idea1 then1 stands between the percept and the concept4 ,it is the determinate concept which points to the percept4 ,the sum of my ideas may be called my experience4 ,the man who has the greater number of individualised concepts will be the man of richer experience4 ,a man who lacks all power of intuition is not capable of acquiring experience4 ,the objects simply disappear again from the field of his consciousness1 because he lacks the concepts which he ought to bring into relation with them4 ,on the other hand1 a man whose faculty of thought is well developed1 but whose perception functions badly owing to his clumsy sense-organs1 will be no better able to gain experience4 ,he can1 it is true1 by one means and another acquire concepts2 but the living reference to particular objects is lacking to his intuitions4 ,the unthinking traveller and the student absorbed in abstract conceptual systems are alike incapable of acquiring a rich experience4 ,reality presents itself to us as the union of percept and concept2 and the subjective representation of this reality presents itself to us as idea4 ,if our personality expressed itself only in cognition1 the totality of all that is objective would be contained in percept1 concept and idea4 ,however1 we are not satisfied merely to refer percepts1 by means of thinking1 to concepts1 but we relate them also to our private subjectivity1 our individual ,ego4 ,the expression of this relation to us as individuals is feeling1 which manifests itself as pleasure and pain4 ,thinking and feeling correspond to the two-fold nature of our being to which reference has already been made4 ,by means of thought we take an active part in the universal cosmic process4 ,by means of feeling we withdraw ourselves into the narrow precincts of our own being4 ,thought links us to the world2 feeling leads us back into ourselves and thus makes us individuals4 ,were we merely thinking and perceiving beings1 our whole life would flow along in monotonous indifference4 ,could we only know ourselves as ,selves1 we should be totally indifferent to ourselves4 ,it is only because with self-knowledge we experience self-feeling1 and with the perception of objects pleasure and pain1 that we live as individuals whose existence is not exhausted by the conceptual relations in which they stand to the rest of the world1 but who have a special value in themselves4 ,one might be tempted to regard the life of feeling as something more richly saturated with reality than the apprehension of the world by thought4 ,but the reply to this is that the life of feeling1 after all1 has this richer meaning only for my individual self4 ,for the universe as a whole my feelings can be of value only if1 as percepts of myself1 they enter into connection with a concept and in this roundabout way become links in the cosmos4 ,our life is a continual oscillation between our share in the universal world-process and our own individual existence4 ,the farther we ascend into the universal nature of thought where the individual1 at last1 interests us only as an example1 an instance1 of the concept1 the more the character of something individual1 of the quite determinate1 unique personality1 becomes lost in us4 ,the farther we descend into the depths of our own private life and allow the vibrations of our feelings to accompany all our experiences of the outer world1 the more we cut ourselves off from the universal life4 ,true individuality belongs to him whose feelings reach up to the farthest possible extent into the region of the ideal4 ,there are men in whom even the most general ideas still bear that peculiar personal tinge which shows unmistakably their connection with their author4 ,there are others whose concepts come before us as devoid of any trace of individual colouring as if they had not been produced by a being of flesh and blood at all4 ,even ideas give to our conceptual life an individual stamp4 ,each one of us has his special standpoint from which he looks out on the world4 ,his concepts link themselves to his percepts4 ,he has his own special way of forming general concepts4 ,this special character results for each of us from his special standpoint in the world1 from the way in which the range of his percepts is dependent on the place in the whole where he exists4 ,the conditions of individuality here indicated1 we call the milieu4 ,this special character of our experience must be distinguished from another which depends on our peculiar organisation4 ,each of us1 as we know1 is organised as a unique1 fully determined individual4 ,each of us combines special feelings1 and these in the most varying degrees of intensity1 with his percepts4 ,this is just the individual element in the personality of each of us4 ,it is what remains over when we have allowed fully for all the determining factors in our milieu4 ,a life of feeling1 wholly devoid of thought1 would gradually lose all connection with the world4 ,but man is meant to be a whole1 and knowledge of objects will go hand-in-hand for him with the development and education of the feeling-side of his nature4 ,feeling is the means whereby1 in the first instance1 concepts gain concrete life4 ,,vii ,,are ,,there ,,any ,,limits ,,to ,,knowledge8 ,we have established that the elements for the explanation of reality are to be taken from the two spheres of perception and thought4 ,it is due1 as we have seen1 to our organisation that the full totality of reality1 including our own selves as subjects1 appears at first as a duality4 ,knowledge transcends this duality by fusing the two elements of reality1 the percept and the concept1 into the complete thing4 ,let us call the manner in which the world presents itself to us1 before by means of knowledge it has taken on its true nature1 the world of appearance1 in distinction from the unified whole composed of percept and concept4 ,we can then say1 ,the world is given to us as a duality 7,dualism71 and knowledge transforms it into a unity 7,monism74 ,a philosophy which starts from this basal principle may be called a ,monistic philosophy1 or ,monism4 ,opposed to this is the theory of two worlds1 or ,dualism4 ,the latter does not1 by any means1 assume merely that there are two sides of a single reality1 which are kept apart by our organisation1 but that there are two worlds totally distinct from one another4 ,it then tries to find in one of these two worlds the principle of explanation for the other4 ,dualism rests on a false conception of what we call knowledge4 ,it divides the whole of reality into two spheres1 each of which has its own laws1 and it leaves these two worlds standing outside one another4 ,it is from a ,dualism such as this that there arises the distinction between the object of perception and the thing-in-itself1 which ,kant introduced into philosophy1 and which1 to the present day1 we have not succeeded in expelling4 ,according to our interpretation1 it is due to the nature of our organisation that a particular object can be given to us only as a percept4 ,thought transcends this particularity by assigning to each percept its proper place in the world as a whole4 ,as long as we determine the separate parts of the cosmos as percepts1 we are simply following1 in this sorting out1 a law of our subjective constitution4 ,if1 however1 we regard all percepts1 taken together1 merely as one part1 and contrast with this a second part1 viz41 the things-in-themselves1 then our philosophy is building castles-in-the-air4 ,we are then engaged in mere playing with concepts4 ,we construct an artificial opposition1 but we can find no content for the second of these opposites1 seeing that no content for a particular thing can be found except in perception4 ,every kind of reality which is assumed to exist outside the sphere of perception and conception must be relegated to the limbo of unverified hypotheses4 ,to this category belongs the thing-in-itself4 ,it is1 of course1 quite natural that a ,dualistic thinker should be unable to find the connection between the world-principle which he hypothetically assumes and the facts that are given in experience4 ,for the hypothetical world-principle itself a content can be found only by borrowing it from experience and shutting one's eyes to the fact of the borrowing4 ,otherwise it remains an empty and meaningless concept1 a mere form without content4 ,in this case the ,dualistic thinker generally asserts that the content of this concept is inaccessible to our knowledge4 ,we can know only that such a content exists1 but not what it is4 ,in either case it is impossible to transcend ,dualism4 ,even though one were to import a few abstract elements from the world of experience into the content of the thing-in-itself1 it would still remain impossible to reduce the rich concrete life of experience to those few elements1 which are1 after all1 themselves taken from experience4 ,du ,bois-,reymond lays it down that the imperceptible atoms of matter produce sensation and feeling by means of their position and motion1 and then infers from this premise that we can never find a satisfactory explanation of how matter and motion produce sensation and feeling1 for it is absolutely and for ever unintelligible that it should be other than indifferent to a number of atoms of carbon1 hydrogen1 and nitrogen1 etc41 how they lie and move1 how they lay or moved1 or how they will lie and will move4 ,it is in no way intelligible how consciousness can come into existence through their interaction4 ,this conclusion is characteristic of the whole tendency of this school of thought4 ,position and motion are abstracted from the rich world of percepts4 ,they are then transferred to the fictitious world of atoms4 ,and then we are astonished that we fail to evolve concrete life out of this principle of our own making1 which we have borrowed from the world of percepts4 ,that the ,dualist1 working as he does with a completely empty concept of the thing-in-itself1 can reach no explanation of the world1 follows from the very definition of his principle which has been given above4 ,in any case1 the ,dualist finds it necessary to set impassable barriers to our faculty of knowledge4 ,a follower of the ,monistic theory of the world knows that all he needs to explain any given phenomenon in the world is to be found within this world itself4 ,what prevents him from finding it can be only chance limitations in space and time1 or defects of his organisation1 i4e41 not of human organisation in general1 but only of his own4 ,it follows from the concept of knowledge1 as defined by us1 that there can be no talk of any limits of knowledge4 ,knowledge is not a concern of the universe in general1 but one which men must settle for themselves4 ,external things demand no explanation4 ,they exist and act on one another according to laws which thought can discover4 ,they exist in indivisible unity with these laws4 ,but we1 in our self-hood1 confront them1 grasping at first only what we have called percepts4 ,however1 within ourselves we find the power to discover also the other part of reality4 ,only when the ,self has combined for itself the two elements of reality which are indivisibly bound up with one another in the world1 is our thirst for knowledge stilled4 ,the ,self is then again in contact with reality4 ,the presuppositions for the development of knowledge thus exist through and for the ,self4 ,it is the ,self which sets itself the problems of knowledge4 ,it takes them from thought1 an element which in itself is absolutely clear and transparent4 ,if we set ourselves questions which we cannot answer1 it must be because the content of the questions is not in all respects clear and distinct4 ,it is not the world which sets questions to us1 but we who set them to ourselves4 ,i can imagine that it would be quite impossible for me to answer a question which ,i happened to find written down somewhere1 without knowing the universe of discourse from which the content of the question is taken4 ,in knowledge we are concerned with questions which arise for us through the fact that a world of percepts1 conditioned by time1 space1 and our subjective organisation1 stands over against a world of concepts expressing the totality of the universe4 ,our task consists in the assimilation to one another of these two spheres1 with both of which we are familiar4 ,there is no room here for talking about limits of knowledge4 ,it may be that1 at a particular moment1 this or that remains unexplained because1 through chance obstacles1 we are prevented from perceiving the things involved4 ,what is not found to-day1 however1 may easily be found to-morrow4 ,the limits due to these causes are only contingent1 and must be overcome by the progress of perception and thought4 ,dualism makes the mistake of transferring the opposition of subject and object1 which has meaning only within the perceptual world1 to pure conceptual entities outside this world4 ,now the distinct and separate things in the perceptual world remain separated only so long as the perceiver refrains from thinking4 ,for thought cancels all separation and reveals it as due to purely subjective conditions4 ,the ,dualist1 therefore1 transfers to entities transcending the perceptual world abstract determinations which1 even in the perceptual world1 have no absolute1 but only relative1 validity4 ,he thus divides the two factors concerned in the process of knowledge1 viz41 percept and concept1 into four3 7#a7 the object in itself2 7#b7 the percept which the subject has of the object2 7#c7 the subject2 7#d7 the concept which relates the percept to the object in itself4 ,the relation between subject and object is real2 the subject is really 7dynamically7 influenced by the object4 ,this real process does not appear in consciousness4 ,but it evokes in the subject a response to the stimulation from the object4 ,the result of this response is the percept4 ,this1 at length1 appears in consciousness4 ,the object has an objective 7independent of the subject7 reality1 the percept a subjective reality4 ,this subjective reality is referred by the subject to the object4 ,this reference is an ideal one4 ,dualism thus divides the process of knowledge into two parts4 ,the one part1 viz41 the production of the perceptual object by the thing-in-itself1 he conceives of as taking place outside consciousness1 whereas the other1 the combination of percept with concept and the latter's reference to the thing-in-itself1 takes place1 according to him1 in consciousness4 ,with such presuppositions1 it is clear why the ,dualist regards his concepts merely as subjective representations of what is really external to his consciousness4 ,the objectively real process in the subject by means of which the percept is produced1 and still more the objective relations between things-in-themselves1 remain for the ,dualist inaccessible to direct knowledge4 ,according to him1 man can get only conceptual representations of the objectively real4 ,the bond of unity which connects things-in-themselves with one another1 and also objectively with the individual minds 7as things-in-themselves7 of each of us1 exists beyond our consciousness in a ,divine ,being of whom1 once more1 we have merely a conceptual representation4 ,the ,dualist believes that the whole world would be dissolved into a mere abstract scheme of concepts1 did he not posit the existence of real connections beside the conceptual ones4 ,in other words1 the ideal principles which thinking discovers are too airy for the ,dualist1 and he seeks1 in addition1 real principles with which to support them4 ,let us examine these real principles a little more closely4 ,the nave man 7,nave ,realist7 regards the objects of sense-experience as realities4 ,the fact that his hands can grasp1 and his eyes see1 these objects is for him sufficient guarantee of their reality4 ,nothing exists that cannot be perceived is1 in fact1 the first axiom of the nave man2 and it is held to be equally valid in its converse3 ,everything which is perceived exists4 ,the best proof for this assertion is the nave man's belief in immortality and in ghosts4 ,he thinks of the soul as a fine kind of matter perceptible by the senses which1 in special circumstances1 may actually become visible to the ordinary man 7belief in ghosts74 ,in contrast with this1 his real1 world1 the ,nave ,realist regards everything else1 especially the world of ideas1 as unreal1 or merely ideal4 ,what we add to objects by thinking is merely thoughts about the objects4 ,thought adds nothing real to the percept4 ,but it is not only with reference to the existence of things that the nave man regards perception as the sole guarantee of reality1 but also with reference to the existence of processes4 ,a thing1 according to him1 can act on another only when a force actually present to perception issues from the one and acts upon the other4 ,the older physicists thought that very fine kinds of substances emanate from the objects and penetrate through the sense-organs into the soul4 ,the actual perception of these substances is impossible only because of the coarseness of our sense-organs relatively to the fineness of these substances4 ,in principle1 the reason for attributing reality to these substances was the same as that for attributing it to the objects of the sensible world1 viz41 their kind of existence1 which was conceived to be analogous to that of perceptual reality4 ,the self-contained being of ideas is not thought of by the nave mind as real in the same sense4 ,an object conceived merely in idea is regarded as a chimera until sense-perception can furnish proof of its reality4 ,in short1 the nave man demands1 in addition to the ideal evidence of his thinking1 the real evidence of his senses4 ,in this need of the nave man lies the ground for the origin of the belief in revelation4 ,the ,god whom we apprehend by thought remains always merely our idea of ,god4 ,the nave consciousness demands that ,god should manifest ,himself in ways accessible to the senses4 ,god must appear in the flesh1 and must attest his ,godhead to our senses by the changing of water into wine4 ,even knowledge itself is conceived by the nave mind as a process analogous to sense-perception4 ,things1 it is thought1 make an impression on the mind1 or send out copies of themselves which enter through our senses1 etc4 ,what the nave man can perceive with his senses he regards as real1 and what he cannot perceive 7,god1 soul1 knowledge1 etc47 he regards as analogous to what he can perceive4 ,on the basis of ,nave ,realism1 science can consist only in an exact description of the content of perception4 ,concepts are only means to this end4 ,they exist to provide ideal counterparts of percepts4 ,with the things themselves they have nothing to do4 ,for the ,nave ,realist only the individual tulips1 which we can see1 are real4 ,the universal idea of tulip is to him an abstraction1 the unreal thought-picture which the mind constructs for itself out of the characteristics common to all tulips4 ,nave ,realism1 with its fundamental principle of the reality of all percepts1 contradicts experience1 which teaches us that the content of percepts is of a transitory nature4 ,the tulip ,i see is real to-day2 in a year it will have vanished into nothingness4 ,what persists is the species tulip4 ,this species is1 however1 for the ,nave ,realist merely an idea1 not a reality4 ,thus this theory of the world finds itself in the paradoxical position of seeing its realities arise and perish1 while that which1 by contrast with its realities1 it regards as unreal endures4 ,hence ,nave ,realism is compelled to acknowledge the existence of something ideal by the side of percepts4 ,it must include within itself entities which cannot be perceived by the senses4 ,in admitting them1 it escapes contradicting itself by conceiving their existence as analogous to that of objects of sense4 ,such hypothetical realities are the invisible forces by means of which the objects of sense-perception act on one another4 ,another such reality is heredity1 the effects of which survive the individual1 and which is the reason why from the individual a new being develops which is similar to it1 and by means of which the species is maintained4 ,the soul1 the life-principle permeating the organic body1 is another such reality which the nave mind is always found conceiving in analogy to realities of sense-perception4 ,and1 lastly1 the ,divine ,being1 as conceived by the nave mind1 is such a hypothetical entity4 ,the ,deity is thought of as acting in a manner exactly corresponding to that which we can perceive in man himself1 i4e41 the ,deity is conceived anthropomorphically4 ,modern ,physics traces sensations back to the movements of the smallest particles of bodies and of an infinitely fine substance1 called ether4 ,what we experience1 e4g41 as warmth is a movement of the parts of a body which causes the warmth in the space occupied by that body4 ,here again something imperceptible is conceived on the analogy of what is perceptible4 ,thus1 in terms of perception1 the analogon to the concept body is1 say1 the interior of a room1 shut in on all sides1 in which elastic balls are moving in all directions1 impinging one on another1 bouncing on and off the walls1 etc4 ,without such assumptions the world of the ,nave ,realist would collapse into a disconnected chaos of percepts1 without mutual relations1 and having no unity within itself4 ,it is clear1 however1 that ,nave ,realism can make these assumptions only by contradicting itself4 ,if it would remain true to its fundamental principle1 that only what is perceived is real1 then it ought not to assume a reality where it perceives nothing4 ,the imperceptible forces of which perceptible things are the bearers are1 in fact1 illegitimate hypotheses from the standpoint of ,nave ,realism4 ,but because ,nave ,realism knows no other realities1 it invests its hypothetical forces with perceptual content4 ,it thus transfers a form of existence 7the existence of percepts7 to a sphere where the only means of making any assertion concerning such existence1 viz41 sense-perception1 is lacking4 ,this self-contradictory theory leads to ,metaphysical ,realism4 ,the latter constructs1 beside the perceptible reality1 an imperceptible one which it conceives on the analogy of the former4 ,metaphysical ,realism is1 therefore1 of necessity ,dualistic4 ,wherever the ,metaphysical ,realist observes a relation between perceptible things 7mutual approach through movement1 the entrance of an object into consciousness1 etc471 there he posits a reality4 ,however1 the relation of which he becomes aware cannot be perceived but only expressed by means of thought4 ,the ideal relation is thereupon arbitrarily assimilated to something perceptible4 ,thus1 according to this theory1 the world is composed of the objects of perception which are in ceaseless flux1 arising and disappearing1 and of imperceptible forces by which the perceptible objects are produced1 and which are permanent4 ,metaphysical ,realism is a self-contradictory mixture of ,nave ,realism and ,idealism4 ,its forces are imperceptible entities endowed with the qualities proper to percepts4 ,the ,metaphysical ,realist has made up his mind to acknowledge in addition to the sphere for the existence of which he has an instrument of knowledge in sense-perception1 the existence of another sphere for which this instrument fails1 and which can be known only by means of thought4 ,but he cannot make up his mind at the same time to acknowledge that the mode of existence which thought reveals1 viz41 the concept 7or idea71 has equal rights with percepts4 ,if we are to avoid the contradiction of imperceptible percepts1 we must admit that1 for us1 the relations which thought traces between percepts can have no other mode of existence than that of concepts4 ,if one rejects the untenable part of ,metaphysical ,realism1 there remains the concept of the world as the aggregate of percepts and their conceptual 7ideal7 relations4 ,metaphysical ,realism1 then1 merges itself in a view of the world according to which the principle of perceptibility holds for percepts1 and that of conceivability for the relations between the percepts4 ,this view of the world has no room1 in addition to the perceptual and conceptual worlds1 for a third sphere in which both principles1 the so-called real principle and the ideal principle1 are simultaneously valid4 ,when the ,metaphysical ,realist asserts that1 beside the ideal relation between the perceived object and the perceiving subject1 there must be a real relation between the percept as thing-in-itself and the subject as thing-in-itself 7the so-called individual mind71 he is basing his assertion on the false assumption of a real process1 imperceptible but analogous to the processes in the world of percepts4 ,further1 when the ,metaphysical ,realist asserts that we stand in a conscious ideal relation to our world of percepts1 but that to the real world we can have only a dynamic 7force7 relation1 he repeats the mistake we have already criticised4 ,we can talk of a dynamic relation only within the world of percepts 7in the sphere of the sense of touch71 but not outside that world4 ,let us call the view which we have just characterised1 and into which ,metaphysical ,realism merges when it discards its contradictory elements1 ,monism1 because it combines one-sided ,realism and ,idealism into a higher unity4 ,for ,nave ,realism1 the real world is an aggregate of percepts2 for ,metaphysical ,realism1 reality belongs not only to percepts but also to imperceptible forces2 ,monism replaces forces by ideal relations which are supplied by thought4 ,these relations are the laws of nature4 ,a law of nature is nothing but the conceptual expression for the connection of certain percepts4 ,monism is never called upon to ask whether there are any principles of explanation for reality other than percepts and concepts4 ,the ,monist knows that in the whole realm of the real there is no occasion for this question4 ,in the perceptual world1 as immediately apprehended1 he sees one-half of reality2 in the union of this world with the world of concepts he finds full reality4 ,the ,metaphysical ,realist might object that1 relatively to our organisation1 our knowledge may be complete in itself1 that no part may be lacking1 but that we do not know how the world appears to a mind organised differently from our own4 ,to this the ,monist will reply1 ,maybe there are intelligences other than human2 and maybe also that their percepts are different from ours1 if they have perception at all4 ,but this is irrelevant to me for the following reasons4 ,through my perceptions1 i4e41 through this specifically human mode of perception1 ,i1 as subject1 am confronted with the object4 ,the nexus of things is thereby broken4 ,the subject reconstructs the nexus by means of thought4 ,in doing so it re-inserts itself into the context of the world as a whole4 ,as it is only through the ,self1 as subject1 that the whole appears rent in two between percept and concept1 the reunion of those two factors will give us complete knowledge4 ,for beings with a different perceptual world 7e4g41 if they had twice our number of sense-organs7 the nexus would appear broken in another place1 and the reconstruction would accordingly have to take a form specifically adapted to such beings4 ,the question concerning the limits of knowledge troubles only ,nave and ,metaphysical ,realism1 both of which see in the contents of mind only ideal representations of the real world4 ,for1 to these theories1 whatever falls outside the subject is something absolute1 a self-contained whole1 and the subject's mental content is a copy which is wholly external to this absolute4 ,the completeness of knowledge depends on the greater or lesser degree of resemblance between the representation and the absolute object4 ,a being with fewer senses than man will perceive less of the world1 one with more senses will perceive more4 ,the former's knowledge will1 therefore1 be less complete than the latter's4 ,for ,monism1 the situation is different4 ,the point where the unity of the world appears to be rent asunder into subject and object depends on the organisation of the percipient4 ,the object is not absolute but merely relative to the nature of the subject4 ,the bridging of the gap1 therefore1 can take place only in the quite specific way which is characteristic of the human subject4 ,as soon as the ,self1 which in perception is set over against the world1 is again re-inserted into the world-nexus by constructive thought1 all further questioning ceases1 having been but a result of the separation4 ,a differently constituted being would have a differently constituted knowledge4 ,our own knowledge suffices to answer the questions which result from our own mental constitution4 ,metaphysical ,realism must ask1 ,what is it that gives us our percepts8 ,what is it that stimulates the subject8 ,monism holds that percepts are determined by the subject4 ,but in thought the subject has1 at the same time1 the instrument for transcending this determination of which it is itself the author4 ,the ,metaphysical ,realist is faced by a further difficulty when he seeks to explain the similarity of the world-views of different human individuals4 ,he has to ask himself1 ,how is it that my theory of the world1 built up out of subjectively determined percepts and out of concepts1 turns out to be the same as that which another individual is also building up out of these same two subjective factors8 ,how1 in any case1 is it possible for me to argue from my own subjective view of the world to that of another human being8 ,the ,metaphysical ,realist thinks he can infer the similarity of the subjective world-views of different human beings from their ability to get on with one another in practical life4 ,from this similarity of world-views he infers further the likeness to one another of individual minds1 meaning by individual mind the ,i-in-itself underlying each subject4 ,we have here an inference from a number of effects to the character of the underlying causes4 ,we believe that after we have observed a sufficiently large number of instances1 we know the connection sufficiently to know how the inferred causes will act in other instances4 ,such an inference is called an inductive inference4 ,we shall be obliged to modify its results1 if further observation yields some unexpected fact1 because the character of our conclusion is1 after all1 determined only by the particular details of our actual observations4 ,the ,metaphysical ,realist asserts that this knowledge of causes1 though restricted by these conditions1 is quite sufficient for practical life4 ,inductive inference is the fundamental method of modern ,metaphysical ,realism4 ,at one time it was thought that out of concepts we could evolve something that would no longer be a concept4 ,it was thought that the metaphysical reals1 which ,metaphysical ,realism after all requires1 could be known by means of concepts4 ,this method of philosophising is now out of date4 ,instead it is thought that from a sufficiently large number of perceptual facts we can infer the character of the thing-in-itself which lies behind these facts4 ,formerly it was from concepts1 now it is from percepts1 that the ,realist seeks to evolve the metaphysically real4 ,because concepts are before the mind in transparent clearness1 it was thought that we might deduce from them the metaphysically real with absolute certainty4 ,percepts are not given with the same transparent clearness4 ,each fresh one is a little different from others of the same kind which preceded it4 ,in principle1 therefore1 anything inferred from past experience is somewhat modified by each subsequent experience4 ,the character of the metaphysically real thus obtained can therefore be only relatively true1 for it is open to correction by further instances4 ,the character of ,von ,hartmann's ,metaphysics depends on this methodological principle4 ,the motto on the title-page of his first important book is1 ,speculative results gained by the inductive method of ,science4 ,the form which the ,metaphysical ,realist at the present day gives to his things-in-themselves is obtained by inductive inferences4 ,consideration of the process of knowledge has convinced him of the existence of an objectively-real world-nexus1 over and above the subjective world which we know by means of percepts and concepts4 ,the nature of this reality he thinks he can determine by inductive inferences from his percepts4 ,,addition ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah74 ,the unprejudiced study of experience1 in perceiving and conceiving1 such as we have attempted to describe it in the preceding chapters1 is liable to be interfered with again and again by certain ideas which spring from the soil of natural science4 ,thus1 taking our stand on science1 we say that the eye perceives in the spectrum colours from red to violet4 ,but beyond violet there lie rays within the compass of the spectrum to which corresponds1 not a colour perceived by the eye1 but a chemical effect4 ,similarly1 beyond the rays which make us perceive red1 there are rays which have only heat effects4 ,these and similar phenomena lead1 on reflection1 to the view that the range of man's perceptual world is defined by the range of his senses1 and that he would perceive a very different world if he had additional1 or altogether different1 senses4 ,those who like to indulge in far-roaming fancies in this direction1 for which the brilliant discoveries of recent scientific research provide a highly tempting occasion1 may well be led to confess that nothing enters the field of man's observation except what can affect his senses1 as these have been determined by his whole organisation4 ,man has no right to regard his percepts1 limited as these are by his organisation1 as in any way a standard to which reality must conform4 ,every new sense would confront him with a different picture of reality4 ,within its proper limits1 this is a wholly justified view4 ,but if anyone lets himself be confused by this view in the unprejudiced study of the relation of percept and concept1 as set forth in these chapters1 he blocks the path for himself to a knowledge of man and the world which is rooted in reality4 ,the experience of the essential nature of thought1 i4e41 the active construction of the world of concepts1 is something wholly different from the experience of a perceptible object through the senses4 ,whatever additional senses man might have1 not one would give him reality1 if his thinking did not organise with its concepts whatever he perceived by means of such a sense4 ,every sense1 whatever its kind1 provided only it is organised by thought1 enables man to live right in the real4 ,the fancy-picture of other perceptual worlds1 made possible by other senses1 has nothing to do with the problem of how it is that man stands in the midst of reality4 ,we must clearly understand that every perceptual picture of the world owes its form to the physical organisation of the percipient1 but that only the percepts which have been organised by the living labour of thought lead us into reality4 ,fanciful speculations concerning the way the world would appear to other than human souls1 can give us no occasion to want to understand man's relation to the world4 ,such a desire comes only with the recognition that every percept presents only a part of the reality it contains1 and that1 consequently1 it leads us away from its own proper reality4 ,this recognition is supplemented by the further one that thinking leads us into the part of reality which the percept conceals in itself4 ,another difficulty in the way of the unprejudiced study of the relation we have here described1 between percept and concept as elaborated by thought1 may be met with occasionally1 when in the field of physics the necessity arises of speaking1 not of immediately perceptible elements1 but of non-perceptible magnitudes1 such as1 e4g41 lines of electric or magnetic force4 ,it may seem as if the elements of reality of which physicists speak1 had no connection either with what is perceptible1 or with the concepts which active thinking has elaborated4 ,yet such a view would depend on self-deception4 ,the main point is that all the results of physical research1 except illegitimate hypotheses which ought to be excluded1 have been gained through perceiving and conceiving4 ,entities which are seemingly non-perceptible1 are referred by the physicists' sound instinct for knowledge to the field in which actual percepts lie1 and they are dealt with in thought by means of the concepts which are commonly applied in this field4 ,the magnitudes in a field of electric or magnetic force are reached1 in their essence1 by no other cognitive process than the one which connects percept and concept4--,an increase or a modification of human senses would yield a different perceptual picture1 an enrichment or a modification of human experience4 ,but genuine knowledge could be gained out of this new experience only through the mutual co-operation of concept and percept4 ,the deepening of knowledge depends on the powers of intuition which express themselves in thinking 7see page #ij74 ,intuition may1 in those experiences in which thinking expresses itself1 dive either into deeper or shallower levels of reality4 ,an expansion of the perceptual picture may supply stimuli for1 and thus indirectly promote1 this diving of intuition4 ,but this diving into the depth1 through which we attain reality1 ought never to be confused with the contrast between a wider and a narrower perceptual picture1 which always contains only half of reality1 as that is conditioned by the structure of the knower's organism4 ,those who do not lose themselves in abstractions will understand how for a knowledge of human nature the fact is relevant1 that physics must infer the existence1 in the field of percepts1 of elements to which no sense is adapted as it is to colour or sound4 ,human nature1 taken concretely1 is determined not only by what1 in virtue of his physical organisation1 man opposes to himself as immediate percept1 but also by all else which he excludes from this immediate percept4 ,just as life needs unconscious sleep alongside of conscious waking experience1 so man's experience of himself needs over and above the sphere of his sense-perception another sphere--and a much bigger one--of non-perceptible elements belonging to the same field from which the percepts of the senses come4 ,implicitly all this was already laid down in the original argument of this book4 ,the author adds the present amplification of the argument1 because he has found by experience that some readers have not read attentively enough4 ,it is to be remembered1 too1 that the idea of perception1 developed in this book1 is not to be confused with the idea of external sense-perception which is but a special case of the former4 ,the reader will gather from what has preceded1 but even more from what will be expounded later1 that everything is here taken as percept which sensuously or spiritually enters into man's experience1 so long as it has not yet been seized upon by the actively constructed concept4 ,no senses1 as we ordinarily understand the term1 are necessary in order to have percepts of a psychical or spiritual kind4 ,it may be urged that this extension of ordinary usage is illegitimate4 ,but the extension is absolutely indispensable1 unless we are to be prevented by the current sense of a word from enlarging our knowledge of certain realms of facts4 ,if we use percept only as meaning sense-percept1 we shall never advance beyond sense-percepts to a concept fit for the purposes of knowledge4 ,it is sometimes necessary to enlarge a concept in order that it may get its appropriate meaning within a narrower field4 ,again1 it is at times necessary to add to the original content of a concept1 in order that the original thought may be justified or1 perhaps1 readjusted4 ,thus we find it said here in this book3 ,an idea is nothing but an individualised concept4 ,it has been objected that this is a solecism4 ,but this terminology is necessary if we are to find out what an idea really is4 ,how can we expect any progress in knowledge1 if every one who finds himself compelled to readjust concepts1 is to be met by the objection3 ,this is a solecism8 ,,the ,,reality ,,of ,,freedom ,,viii ,,the ,,factors ,,of ,,life ,let us recapitulate the results gained in the previous chapters4 ,the world appears to man as a multiplicity1 as an aggregate of separate entities4 ,he himself is one of these entities1 a thing among things4 ,of this structure of the world we say simply that it is given1 and inasmuch as we do not construct it by conscious activity1 but simply find it1 we say that it consists of percepts4 ,within this world of percepts we perceive ourselves4 ,this percept of ,self would remain merely one among many other percepts1 did it not give rise to something which proves capable of connecting all percepts one with another and1 therefore1 the aggregate of all other percepts with the percept of ,self4 ,this something which emerges is no longer a mere percept2 neither is it1 like percepts1 simply given4 ,it is produced by our activity4 ,it appears1 in the first instance1 bound up with what each of us perceives as his ,self4 ,in its inner significance1 however1 it transcends the ,self4 ,it adds to the separate percepts ideal determinations1 which1 however1 are related to one another1 and which are grounded in a whole4 ,what self-perception yields is ideally determined by this something in the same way as all other percepts1 and placed as subject1 or ,i1 over against the objects4 ,this something is thought1 and the ideal determinations are the concepts and ideas4 ,thought1 therefore1 first manifests itself in connection with the percept of self4 ,but it is not merely subjective1 for the ,self characterises itself as subject only with the help of thought4 ,this relation of the ,self to itself by means of thought is one of the fundamental determinations of our personal lives4 ,through it we lead a purely ideal existence4 ,by means of it we are aware of ourselves as thinking beings4 ,this determination of our lives would remain a purely conceptual 7logical7 one1 if it were not supplemented by other determinations of our ,selves4 ,our lives would then exhaust themselves in establishing ideal connections between percepts themselves1 and between them and ourselves4 ,if we call this establishment of an ideal relation an act of cognition1 and the resulting condition of ourselves knowledge1 then1 assuming the above supposition to be true1 we should have to consider ourselves as beings who merely apprehend or know4 ,the supposition is1 however1 untrue4 ,we relate percepts to ourselves not merely ideally1 through concepts1 but also1 as we have already seen1 through feeling4 ,in short1 the content of our lives is not merely conceptual4 ,the ,nave ,realist holds that the personality actually lives more genuinely in the life of feeling than in the purely ideal activity of knowledge4 ,from his point of view he is quite right in interpreting the matter in this way4 ,feeling plays on the subjective side exactly the part which percepts play on the objective side4 ,from the principle of ,nave ,realism1 that everything is real which can be perceived1 it follows that feeling is the guarantee of the reality of one's own personality4 ,monism1 however1 must bestow on feeling the same supplementation which it considers necessary for percepts1 if these are to stand to us for reality in its full nature4 ,for ,monism1 feeling is an incomplete reality1 which1 in the form in which it first appears to us1 lacks as yet its second factor1 the concept or idea4 ,this is why1 in actual life1 feelings1 like percepts1 appear prior to knowledge4 ,at first1 we have merely a feeling of existence2 and it is only in the course of our gradual development1 that we attain to the point at which the concept of ,self emerges from within the blind mass of feelings which fills our existence4 ,however1 what for us does not appear until later1 is from the first indissolubly bound up with our feelings4 ,this is how the nave man comes to believe that in feeling he grasps existence immediately1 in knowledge only mediately4 ,the development of the affective life1 therefore1 appears to him more important than anything else4 ,not until he has grasped the unity of the world through feeling will he believe that he has comprehended it4 ,he attempts to make feeling rather than thought the instrument of knowledge4 ,now a feeling is entirely individual1 something equivalent to a percept4 ,hence a philosophy of feeling makes a cosmic principle out of something which has significance only within my own personality4 ,anyone who holds this view attempts to infuse his own self into the whole world4 ,what the ,monist strives to grasp by means of concepts the philosopher of feeling tries to attain through feeling1 and he looks on his own felt union with objects as more immediate than knowledge4 ,the tendency just described1 the philosophy of feeling1 is ,mysticism4 ,the error in this view is that it seeks to possess by immediate experience what must be known1 that it seeks to develop feeling1 which is individual1 into a universal principle4 ,a feeling is a purely individual activity4 ,it is the relation of the external world to the subject1 in so far as this relation finds expression in a purely subjective experience4 ,there is yet another expression of human personality4 ,the ,self1 through thought1 takes part in the universal world-life4 ,through thought it establishes purely ideal 7conceptual7 relations between percepts and itself1 and between itself and percepts4 ,in feeling1 it has immediate experience of the relation of objects to itself as subject4 ,in will1 the opposite is the case4 ,in volition1 we are concerned once more with a percept1 viz41 that of the individual relation of the self to what is objective4 ,whatever in the act of will is not an ideal factor1 is just as much mere object of perception as is any object in the external world4 ,nevertheless1 the ,nave ,realist believes here again that he has before him something far more real than can ever be attained by thought4 ,he sees in the will an element in which he is immediately aware of an activity1 a causation1 in contrast with thought which afterwards grasps this activity in conceptual form4 ,on this view1 the realisation by the ,self of its will is a process which is experienced immediately4 ,the adherent of this philosophy believes that in the will he has really got hold of one end of reality4 ,whereas he can follow other occurrences only from the outside by means of perception1 he is confident that in his will he experiences a real process quite immediately4 ,the mode of existence presented to him by the will within himself becomes for him the fundamental reality of the universe4 ,his own will appears to him as a special case of the general world-process2 hence the latter is conceived as a universal will4 ,the will becomes the principle of reality just as1 in ,mysticism1 feeling becomes the principle of knowledge4 ,this kind of theory is called ,voluntarism 7,thelism74 ,it makes something which can be experienced only individually the dominant factor of the world4 ,voluntarism can as little be called scientific as can ,mysticism4 ,for both assert that the conceptual interpretation of the world is inadequate4 ,both demand1 in addition to a principle of being which is ideal1 also a principle which is real4 ,but as perception is our only means of apprehending these so-called real principles1 the assertion of ,mysticism and ,voluntarism coincides with the view that we have two sources of knowledge1 viz41 thought and perception1 the latter finding individual expression as will and feeling4 ,since the immediate experiences which flow from the one source cannot be directly absorbed into the thoughts which flow from the other1 perception 7immediate experience7 and thought remain side by side1 without any higher form of experience to mediate between them4 ,beside the conceptual principle to which we attain by means of knowledge1 there is also a real principle which must be immediately experienced4 ,in other words1 ,mysticism and ,voluntarism are both forms of ,nave ,realism1 because they subscribe to the doctrine that the immediately perceived 7experienced7 is real4 ,compared with ,nave ,realism in its primitive form1 they are guilty of the yet further inconsistency of accepting one definite form of perception 7feeling1 respectively will7 as the exclusive means of knowing reality4 ,yet they can do this only so long as they cling to the general principle that everything that is perceived is real4 ,they ought1 therefore1 to attach an equal value to external perception for purposes of knowledge4 ,voluntarism turns into ,metaphysical ,realism1 when it asserts the existence of will also in those spheres of reality in which will can no longer1 as in the individual subject1 be immediately experienced4 ,it assumes hypothetically that a principle holds outside subjective experience1 for the existence of which1 nevertheless1 subjective experience is the sole criterion4 ,as a form of ,metaphysical ,realism1 ,voluntarism is open to the criticism developed in the preceding chapter1 a criticism which makes it necessary to overcome the contradictory element in every form of ,metaphysical ,realism1 and to recognise that the will is a universal world-process only in so far as it is ideally related to the rest of the world4 ,,addition ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah74 ,the difficulty of seizing the essential nature of thinking by observation lies in this1 that it has generally eluded the introspecting mind all too easily by the time that the mind tries to bring it into the focus of attention4 ,nothing but the lifeless abstract1 the corpse of living thought1 then remains for inspection4 ,when we consider only this abstract1 we find it hard1 by contrast1 to resist yielding to the mysticism of feeling1 or1 again1 to the metaphysics of will1 both of which are full of life4 ,we are tempted to regard it as odd that anyone should want to seize the essence of reality in mere thoughts4 ,but if we once succeed in really holding fast the living essence of thinking1 we learn to understand that the self-abandonment to feelings1 or the intuiting of the will1 cannot even be compared with the inward wealth of this life of thinking1 which we experience as within itself ever at rest1 yet at the same time ever in movement4 ,still less is it possible to rank will and feeling above thinking4 ,it is owing precisely to this wealth1 to this inward abundance of experience1 that the image of thinking which presents itself to our ordinary attitude of mind1 should appear lifeless and abstract4 ,no other activity of the human mind is so easily misapprehended as thinking4 ,will and feeling still fill the mind with warmth even when we live through them again in memory4 ,thinking all too readily leaves us cold in recollection2 it is as if the life of the mind had dried out4 ,but this is really nothing but the strongly marked shadow thrown by its luminous1 warm nature penetrating deeply into the phenomena of the world4 ,this penetration is effected by the activity of thinking with a spontaneous outpouring of power--a power of spiritual love4 ,there is no room here for the objection that thus to perceive love in the activity of thinking is to endow thinking with a feeling and a love which are not part of it4 ,this objection is1 in truth1 a confirmation of the view here advocated4 ,if we turn towards the essential nature of thinking1 we find in it both feeling and will1 and both these in their most profoundly real forms4 ,if we turn away from thinking and towards mere feeling and will1 these lose for us their genuine reality4 ,if we are willing to make of thinking an intuitive experience1 we can do justice1 also1 to experiences of the type of feeling and will4 ,but the mysticism of feeling and the metaphysics of will do not know how to do justice to the penetration of reality which partakes at once of intuition and of thought4 ,they conclude but too readily that they themselves are rooted in reality1 but that the intuitive thinker1 untouched by feeling1 blind to reality1 forms out of abstract thoughts a shadowy1 chilly picture of the world4 ,,ix ,,the ,,idea ,,of ,,freedom ,the concept tree is conditioned for our knowledge by the percept tree4 ,there is only one determinate concept which ,i can select from the general system of concepts and apply to a given percept4 ,the connection of concept and percept is mediately and objectively determined by thought in conformity with the percept4 ,the connection between a percept and its concept is recognised after the act of perception1 but the relevance of the one to the other is determined by the character of each4 ,very different is the result when we consider knowledge1 and1 more particularly1 the relation of man to the world which occurs in knowledge4 ,in the preceding chapters the attempt has been made to show that an unprejudiced examination of this relation is able to throw light on its nature4 ,a correct understanding of this examination leads to the conclusion that thinking may be intuitively apprehended in its unique1 self-contained nature4 ,those who find it necessary1 for the explanation of thinking as such1 to invoke something else1 e4g41 physical brain-processes1 or unconscious spiritual processes lying behind the conscious thinking which they observe1 fail to grasp the facts which an unprejudiced examination yields4 ,when we observe our thinking1 we live during the observation immediately within the essence of a spiritual1 self-sustaining activity4 ,indeed1 we may even affirm that if we want to grasp the essential nature of ,spirit in the form in which it immediately presents itself to man1 we need but look at our own self-sustaining thinking4 ,for the study of thinking two things coincide which elsewhere must always appear apart1 viz41 concept and percept4 ,if we fail to see this1 we shall be unable to regard the concepts which we have elaborated in response to percepts as anything but shadowy copies of these percepts1 and we shall take the percepts as presenting to us reality as it really is4 ,we shall1 further1 build up for ourselves a metaphysical world after the pattern of the world of percepts4 ,we shall1 each according to his habitual ideas1 call this world a world of atoms1 or of will1 or of unconscious spirit1 and so on4 ,and we shall fail to notice that all the time we have been doing nothing but erecting hypothetically a metaphysical world modeled on the world we perceive4 ,but if we clearly apprehend what thinking consists in1 we shall recognise that percepts present to us only a portion of reality1 and that the complementary portion which alone imparts to reality its full character as real1 is experienced by us in the organisation of percepts by thought4 ,we shall regard all thought1 not as a shadowy copy of reality1 but as a self-sustaining spiritual essence4 ,we shall be able to say of it1 that it is revealed to us in consciousness through intuition4 ,intuition is the purely spiritual conscious experience of a purely spiritual content4 ,it is only through intuition that we can grasp the essence of thinking4 ,to win through1 by means of unprejudiced observation1 to the recognition of this truth of the intuitive essence of thinking requires an effort4 ,but without this effort we shall not succeed in clearing the way for a theory of the psycho-physical organisation of man4 ,we recognise that this organisation can produce no effect whatever on the essential nature of thinking4 ,at first sight this seems to be contradicted by patent and obvious facts4 ,for ordinary experience1 human thinking occurs only in connection with1 and by means of1 such an organisation4 ,this dependence on psycho-physical organisation is so prominent that its true bearing can be appreciated by us only if we recognise1 that in the essential nature of thinking this organisation plays no part whatever4 ,once we appreciate this1 we can no longer fail to notice how peculiar is the relation of human organisation to thought4 ,for this organisation contributes nothing to the essential nature of thought1 but recedes whenever thought becomes active4 ,it suspends its own activity1 it yields ground4 ,and the ground thus set free is occupied by thought4 ,the essence which is active in thought has a two-fold function3 first it restricts the human organisation in its own activity2 next1 it steps into the place of that organisation4 ,yes1 even the former1 the restriction of human organisation1 is an effect of the activity of thought1 and more particularly of that part of it which prepares the manifestation of thinking4 ,this explains the sense in which thinking has its counterpart in the organisation of the body4 ,once we perceive this1 we can no longer misapprehend the significance for thinking of this physical counterpart4 ,when we walk over soft ground our feet leave deep tracks in the soil4 ,we shall not be tempted to say that the forces of the ground1 from below1 have formed these tracks4 ,we shall not attribute to these forces any share in the production of the tracks4 ,just so1 if with open minds we observe the essential nature of thinking1 we shall not attribute any share in that nature to the traces in the physical organism which thinking produces in preparing its manifestation through the body4 #c ,an important question1 however1 confronts us here4 ,if human organisation has no part in the essential nature of thinking1 what is its function within the whole nature of man8 ,well1 the effects of thinking upon this organisation have no bearing upon the essence of thinking1 but they have a bearing upon the origin of the ,i1 or ,ego-consciousness1 through thinking4 ,thinking1 in its unique character1 constitutes the real ,ego1 but it does not constitute1 as such1 the ,ego-consciousness4 ,to see this we have but to study thinking with an open mind4 ,the ,ego is to be found in thinking4 ,the ,ego-consciousness arises through the traces which1 in the sense above explained1 the activity of thinking impresses upon our general consciousness4 ,the ,ego-consciousness thus arises through the physical organisation4 ,this view must not1 however1 be taken to imply that the ,ego-consciousness1 once it has arisen1 remains dependent on the physical organisation4 ,on the contrary1 once it exists it is taken up into thought and shares henceforth thought's spiritual self-subsistence4 ,the ,ego-consciousness is built upon human organisation4 ,the latter is the source of all acts of will4 ,following out the direction of the preceding exposition1 we can gain insight into the connection of thought1 conscious ,ego1 and act of will1 only by studying first how an act of will issues from human organisation4 #d ,in a particular act of will we must distinguish two factors3 the motive and the spring of action4 ,the motive is a factor of the nature of concept or idea2 the spring of action is the factor in will which is directly determined in the human organisation4 ,the conceptual factor1 or motive1 is the momentary determining cause of an act of will2 the spring of action is the permanent determining factor in the individual4 ,the motive of an act of will can be only a pure concept1 or else a concept with a definite relation to perception1 i4e41 an idea4 ,universal and individual concepts 7ideas7 become motives of will by influencing the human individual and determining him to action in a particular direction4 ,one and the same concept1 however1 or one and the same idea1 influence different individuals differently4 ,they determine different men to different actions4 ,an act of will is1 therefore1 not merely the outcome of a concept or an idea1 but also of the individual make-up of human beings4 ,this individual make-up we will call1 following ,eduard von ,hartmann1 the characterological disposition4 ,the manner in which concept and idea act on the characterological disposition of a man gives to his life a definite moral or ethical stamp4 ,the characterological disposition consists of the more or less permanent content of the individual's life1 that is1 of his habitual ideas and feelings4 ,whether an idea which enters my mind at this moment stimulates me to an act of will or not1 depends on its relation to my other ideal contents1 and also to my peculiar modes of feeling4 ,my ideal content1 in turn1 is conditioned by the sum total of those concepts which have1 in the course of my individual life1 come in contact with percepts1 that is1 have become ideas4 ,this1 again1 depends on my greater or lesser capacity for intuition1 and on the range of my perception1 that is1 on the subjective and objective factors of my experiences1 on the structure of my mind and on my environment4 ,my affective life more especially determines my characterological disposition4 ,whether ,i shall make a certain idea or concept the motive for action will depend on whether it gives me pleasure or pain4 ,these are the factors which we have to consider in an act of will4 ,the immediately present idea or concept1 which becomes the motive1 determines the end or the purpose of my will2 my characterological disposition determines me to direct my activity towards this end4 ,the idea of taking a walk in the next half-hour determines the end of my action4 ,but this idea is raised to the level of a motive only if it meets with a suitable characterological disposition1 that is1 if during my past life ,i have formed the ideas of the wholesomeness of walking and the value of health2 and1 further1 if the idea of walking is accompanied by a feeling of pleasure4 ,we must1 therefore1 distinguish 7#a7 the possible subjective dispositions which are likely to turn given ideas and concepts into motives1 and 7#b7 the possible ideas and concepts which are capable of so influencing my characterological disposition that an act of will results4 ,the former are for morality the springs of action1 the latter its ends4 ,the springs of action in the moral life can be discovered by analysing the elements of which individual life is composed4 ,the first level of individual life is that of perception1 more particularly sense-perception4 ,this is the stage of our individual lives in which a percept translates itself into will immediately1 without the intervention of either a feeling or a concept4 ,the spring of action here involved may be called simply instinct4 ,our lower1 purely animal1 needs 7hunger1 sexual intercourse1 etc47 find their satisfaction in this way4 ,the main characteristic of instinctive life is the immediacy with which the percept starts off the act of will4 ,this kind of determination of the will1 which belongs originally only to the life of the lower senses1 may1 however1 become extended also to the percepts of the higher senses4 ,we may react to the percept of a certain event in the external world without reflecting on what we do1 and without any special feeling connecting itself with the percept4 ,we have examples of this especially in our ordinary conventional intercourse with men4 ,the spring of this kind of action is called tact or moral good taste4 ,the more often such immediate reactions to a percept occur1 the more the agent will prove himself able to act purely under the guidance of tact2 that is1 tact becomes his characterological disposition4 ,the second level of human life is feeling4 ,definite feelings accompany the percepts of the external world4 ,these feelings may become springs of action4 ,when ,i see a hungry man1 my pity for him may become the spring of my action4 ,such feelings1 for example1 are modesty1 pride1 sense of honour1 humility1 remorse1 pity1 revenge1 gratitude1 piety1 loyalty1 love1 and duty4 #e ,the third and last level of life is to have thoughts and ideas4 ,an idea or a concept may become the motive of an action through mere reflection4 ,ideas become motives because1 in the course of my life1 ,i regularly connect certain aims of my will with percepts which recur again and again in a more or less modified form4 ,hence it is that1 with men who are not wholly without experience1 the occurrence of certain percepts is always accompanied also by the consciousness of ideas of actions1 which they have themselves carried out in similar cases or which they have seen others carry out4 ,these ideas float before their minds as determining models in all subsequent decisions2 they become parts of their characterological disposition4 ,we may give the name of practical experience to the spring of action just described4 ,practical experience merges gradually into purely tactful behaviour4 ,that happens1 when definite typical pictures of actions have become so closely connected in our minds with ideas of certain situations in life1 that1 in any given instance1 we omit all deliberation based on experience and pass immediately from the percept to the action4 ,the highest level of individual life is that of conceptual thought without reference to any definite perceptual content4 ,we determine the content of a concept through pure intuition on the basis of an ideal system4 ,such a concept contains1 at first1 no reference to any definite percepts4 ,when an act of will comes about under the influence of a concept which refers to a percept1 i4e41 under the influence of an idea1 then it is the percept which determines our action indirectly by way of the concept4 ,but when we act under the influence of pure intuitions1 the spring of our action is pure thought4 ,as it is the custom in philosophy to call pure thought reason1 we may perhaps be justified in giving the name of practical reason to the spring of action characteristic of this level of life4 ,the clearest account of this spring of action has been given by ,kreyenbhl 7,philosophische ,monatshefte1 vol4 xviii1 ,no4 #c74 ,in my opinion his article on this subject is one of the most important contributions to present-day philosophy1 more especially to ,ethics4 ,kreyenbhl calls the spring of action1 of which we are treating1 the practical a priori i4e41 a spring of action issuing immediately from my intuition4 ,it is clear that such a spring of action can no longer be counted in the strictest sense as part of the characterological disposition4 ,for what is here effective in me as a spring of action is no longer something purely individual1 but the ideal1 and hence universal1 content of my intuition4 ,as soon as ,i regard this content as the valid basis and starting-point of an action1 ,i pass over into willing1 irrespective of whether the concept was already in my mind beforehand1 or whether it only occurs to me immediately before the action1 that is1 irrespective of whether it was present in the form of a disposition in me or not4 ,a real act of will results only when a present impulse to action1 in the form of a concept or idea1 acts on the characterological disposition4 ,such an impulse thereupon becomes the motive of the will4 ,the motives of moral conduct are ideas and concepts4 ,there are ,moralists who see in feeling also a motive of morality2 they assert1 e4g41 that the end of moral conduct is to secure the greatest possible quantity of pleasure for the agent4 ,pleasure itself1 however1 can never be a motive2 at best only the idea of pleasure can act as motive4 ,the idea of a future pleasure1 but not the feeling itself1 can act on my characterological disposition4 ,for the feeling does not yet exist in the moment of action2 on the contrary1 it has first to be produced by the action4 ,the idea of one's own or another's well-being is1 however1 rightly regarded as a motive of the will4 ,the principle of producing the greatest quantity of pleasure for oneself through one's action1 that is1 to attain individual happiness1 is called ,egoism4 ,the attainment of this individual happiness is sought either by thinking ruthlessly only of one's own good1 and striving to attain it even at the cost of the happiness of other individuals 7,pure ,egoism71 or by promoting the good of others1 either because one anticipates indirectly a favourable influence on one's own happiness through the happiness of others1 or because one fears to endanger one's own interest by injuring others 7,morality of ,prudence74 ,the special content of the egoistical principle of morality will depend on the ideas which we form of what constitutes our own1 or others'1 good4 ,a man will determine the content of his egoistical striving in accordance with what he regards as one of life's good things 7luxury1 hope of happiness1 deliverance from different evils1 etc474 ,further1 the purely conceptual content of an action is to be regarded as yet another kind of motive4 ,this content has no reference1 like the idea of one's own pleasure1 solely to the particular action1 but to the deduction of an action from a system of moral principles4 ,these moral principles1 in the form of abstract concepts1 may guide the individual's moral life without his worrying himself about the origin of his concepts4 ,in that case1 we feel merely the moral necessity of submitting to a moral concept which1 in the form of law1 controls our actions4 ,the justification of this necessity we leave to those who demand from us moral subjection1 that is1 to those whose moral authority over us we acknowledge 7the head of the family1 the state1 social custom1 the authority of the church1 divine revelation74 ,we meet with a special kind of these moral principles when the law is not proclaimed to us by an external authority1 but comes from our own selves 7moral autonomy74 ,in this case we believe that we hear the voice1 to which we have to submit ourselves1 in our own souls4 ,the name for this voice is conscience4 ,it is a great moral advance when a man no longer takes as the motive of his action the commands of an external or internal authority1 but tries to understand the reason why a given maxim of action ought to be effective as a motive in him4 ,this is the advance from morality based on authority to action from moral insight4 ,at this level of morality1 a man will try to discover the demands of the moral life1 and will let his action be determined by this knowledge4 ,such demands are 7#a7 the greatest possible happiness of humanity as a whole purely for its own sake1 7#b7 the progress of civilisation1 or the moral development of mankind towards ever greater perfection1 7#c7 the realisation of individual moral ends conceived by an act of pure intuition4 ,the greatest possible happiness of humanity as a whole will naturally be differently conceived by different people4 ,the above-mentioned maxim does not imply any definite idea of this happiness1 but rather means that every one who acknowledges this principle strives to do all that1 in his opinion1 most promotes the good of the whole of humanity4 ,the progress of civilisation is seen to be a special application of the moral principle just mentioned1 at any rate for those to whom the goods which civilisation produces bring feelings of pleasure4 ,however1 they will have to pay the price of progress in the destruction and annihilation of many things which also contribute to the happiness of humanity4 ,it is1 however1 also possible that some men look upon the progress of civilisation as a moral necessity1 quite apart from the feelings of pleasure which it brings4 ,if so1 the progress of civilisation will be a new moral principle for them1 different from the previous one4 ,both the principle of the public good1 and that of the progress of civilisation1 alike depend on the way in which we apply the content of our moral ideas to particular experiences 7percepts74 ,the highest principle of morality which we can conceive1 however1 is that which contains1 to start with1 no such reference to particular experiences1 but which springs from the source of pure intuition and does not seek until later any connection with percepts1 i4e41 with life4 ,the determination of what ought to be willed issues here from a point of view very different from that of the previous two principles4 ,whoever accepts the principle of the public good will in all his actions ask first what his ideals contribute to this public good4 ,the upholder of the progress of civilisation as the principle of morality will act similarly4 ,there is1 however1 a still higher mode of conduct which1 in a given case1 does not start from any single limited moral ideal1 but which sees a certain value in all moral principles1 always asking whether this or that principle is more important in a particular case4 ,it may happen that a man considers in certain circumstances the promotion of the public good1 in others that of the progress of civilisation1 and in yet others the furthering of his own private good1 to be the right course1 and makes that the motive of his action4 ,but when all other grounds of determination take second place1 then we rely1 in the first place1 on conceptual intuition itself4 ,all other motives now drop out of sight1 and the ideal content of an action alone becomes its motive4 ,among the levels of characterological disposition1 we have singled out as the highest that which manifests itself as pure thought1 or practical reason4 ,among the motives1 we have just singled out conceptual intuition as the highest4 ,on nearer consideration1 we now perceive that at this level of morality the spring of action and the motive coincide1 i4e41 that neither a predetermined characterological disposition1 nor an external moral principle accepted on authority1 influence our conduct4 ,the action1 therefore1 is neither a merely stereotyped one which follows the rules of a moral code1 nor is it automatically performed in response to an external impulse4 ,rather it is determined solely through its ideal content4 ,for such an action to be possible1 we must first be capable of moral intuitions4 ,whoever lacks the capacity to think out for himself the moral principles that apply in each particular case1 will never rise to the level of genuine individual willing4 ,kant's principle of morality3 ,act so that the principle of your action may be valid for all men--is the exact opposite of ours4 ,his principle would mean death to all individual action4 ,the norm for me can never be what all men would do1 but rather what it is right for me to do in each special case4 ,a superficial criticism might urge against these arguments3 ,how can an action be individually adapted to the special case and the special situation1 and yet at the same time be ideally determined by pure intuition8 ,this objection rests on a confusion of the moral motive with the perceptual content of an action4 ,the latter1 indeed1 may be a motive1 and is actually a motive when we act for the progress of culture1 or from pure egoism1 etc41 but in action based on pure moral intuition it never is a motive4 ,of course1 my ,self takes notice of these perceptual contents1 but it does not allow itself to be determined by them4 ,the content is used only to construct a theoretical concept1 but the corresponding moral concept is not derived from the object4 ,the theoretical concept of a given situation which faces me1 is a moral concept also only if ,i adopt the standpoint of a particular moral principle4 ,if ,i base all my conduct on the principle of the progress of civilisation1 then my way through life is tied down to a fixed route4 ,from every occurrence which comes to my notice and attracts my interest there springs a moral duty1 viz41 to do my tiny share towards using this occurrence in the service of the progress of civilisation4 ,in addition to the concept which reveals to me the connections of events or objects according to the laws of nature1 there is also a moral label attached to them which contains for me1 as a moral agent1 ethical directions as to how ,i have to conduct myself4 ,at a higher level these moral labels disappear1 and my action is determined in each particular instance by my idea2 and more particularly by the idea which is suggested to me by the concrete instance4 ,men vary greatly in their capacity for intuition4 ,in some1 ideas bubble up like a spring1 others acquire them with much labour4 ,the situations in which men live1 and which are the scenes of their actions1 are no less widely different4 ,the conduct of a man will depend1 therefore1 on the manner in which his faculty of intuition reacts to a given situation4 ,the aggregate of the ideas which are effective in us1 the concrete content of our intuitions1 constitute that which is individual in each of us1 notwithstanding the universal character of our ideas4 ,in so far as this intuitive content has reference to action1 it constitutes the moral substance of the individual4 ,to let this substance express itself in his life is the moral principle of the man who regards all other moral principles as subordinate4 ,we may call this point of view ,ethical ,individualism4 ,the determining factor of an action1 in any concrete instance1 is the discovery of the corresponding purely individual intuition4 ,at this level of morality1 there can be no question of general moral concepts 7norms1 laws74 ,general norms always presuppose concrete facts from which they can be deduced4 ,but facts have first to be created by human action4 ,when we look for the regulating principles 7the conceptual principles guiding the actions of individuals1 peoples1 epochs71 we obtain a system of ,ethics which is not a science of moral norms1 but rather a science of morality as a natural fact4 ,only the laws discovered in this way are related to human action as the laws of nature are related to particular phenomena4 ,these laws1 however1 are very far from being identical with the impulses on which we base our actions4 ,if we want to understand how man's moral will gives rise to an action1 we must first study the relation of this will to the action4 ,for this purpose we must single out for study those actions in which this relation is the determining factor4 ,when ,i1 or another1 subsequently review my action we may discover what moral principles come into play in it4 ,but so long as ,i am acting1 ,i am influenced1 not by these moral principles1 but by my love for the object which ,i want to realise through my action4 ,i ask no man and no moral code1 whether ,i shall perform this action or not4 ,on the contrary1 ,i carry it out as soon as ,i have formed the idea of it4 ,this alone makes it my action4 ,if a man acts because he accepts certain moral norms1 his action is the outcome of the principles which compose his moral code4 ,he merely carries out orders4 ,he is a superior kind of automaton4 ,inject some stimulus to action into his mind1 and at once the clock-work of his moral principles will begin to work and run its prescribed course1 so as to issue in an action which is ,christian1 or humane1 or unselfish1 or calculated to promote the progress of culture4 ,it is only when ,i follow solely my love for the object1 that it is ,i1 myself1 who act4 ,at this level of morality1 ,i acknowledge no lord over me1 neither an external authority1 nor the so-called voice of my conscience4 ,i acknowledge no external principle of my action1 because ,i have found in myself the ground for my action1 viz41 my love of the action4 ,i do not ask whether my action is good or bad2 ,i perform it1 because ,i am in love with it4 ,my action is good when1 with loving intuition1 ,i insert myself in the right way into the world-nexus as ,i experience it intuitively2 it is bad when this is not the case4 ,neither do ,i ask myself how another man would act in my position4 ,on the contrary1 ,i act as ,i1 this unique individuality1 will to act4 ,no general usage1 no common custom1 no general maxim current among men1 no moral norm guides me1 but my love for the action4 ,i feel no compulsion1 neither the compulsion of nature which dominates me through my instincts1 nor the compulsion of the moral commandments4 ,my will is simply to realise what in me lies4 ,those who hold to general moral norms will reply to these arguments that1 if every one has the right to live himself out and to do what he pleases1 there can be no distinction between a good and a bad action2 every fraudulent impulse in me has the same right to issue in action as the intention to serve the general good4 ,it is not the mere fact of my having conceived the idea of an action which ought to determine me as a moral agent1 but the further examination of whether it is a good or an evil action4 ,only if it is good ought ,i to carry it out4 ,this objection is easily intelligible1 and yet it had its root in what is but a misapprehension of my meaning4 ,my reply to it is this3 ,if we want to get at the essence of human volition1 we must distinguish between the path along which volition attains to a certain degree of development1 and the unique character which it assumes as it approaches its goal4 ,it is on the path towards the goal that the norms play a legitimate part4 ,the goal consists in the realisation of moral aims which are apprehended by pure intuition4 ,man attains such aims in proportion as he is able to rise at all to the level at which intuition grasps the ideal content of the world4 ,in any particular volition1 other elements will1 as a rule1 be mixed up1 as motives or springs of action1 with such moral aims4 ,but1 for all that1 intuition may be1 wholly or in part1 the determining factor in human volition4 ,what we ought to do1 that we do4 ,we supply the stage upon which duty becomes deed4 ,it is our own action which1 as such1 issues from us4 ,the impulse1 then1 can only be wholly individual4 ,and1 in fact1 only a volition which issues out of intuition can be individual4 ,it is only in an age in which immature men regard the blind instincts as part of a man's individuality1 that the act of a criminal can be described as living out one's individuality in the same sense1 in which the embodiment in action of a pure intuition can be so described4 ,the animal instinct which drives a man to a criminal act does not spring from intuition1 and does not belong to what is individual in him1 but rather to that which is most general in him1 to that which is equally present in all individuals4 ,the individual element in me is not my organism with its instincts and feelings1 but rather the unified world of ideas which reveals itself through this organism4 ,my instincts1 cravings1 passions1 justify no further assertion about me than that ,i belong to the general species man4 ,the fact that something ideal expresses itself in its own unique way through these instincts1 passions1 and feelings1 constitutes my individuality4 ,my instincts and cravings make me the sort of man of whom there are twelve to the dozen4 ,the unique character of the idea1 by means of which ,i distinguish myself within the dozen as ,i1 makes of me an individual4 ,only a being other than myself could distinguish me from others by the difference in my animal nature4 ,by thought1 i4e41 by the active grasping of the ideal element working itself out through my organism1 ,i distinguish myself from others4 ,hence it is impossible to say of the action of a criminal that it issues from the idea within him4 ,indeed1 the characteristic feature of criminal actions is precisely that they spring from the non-ideal elements in man4 ,an act the grounds for which lie in the ideal part of my individual nature is free4 ,every other act1 whether done under the compulsion of nature or under the obligation imposed by a moral norm1 is unfree4 ,that man alone is free who in every moment of his life is able to obey only himself4 ,a moral act is my act only when it can be called free in this sense4 ,so far we are concerned here with the presuppositions under which an act of will is felt to be free2 the sequel will show how this purely ethical concept of freedom is realised in the essential nature of man4 ,action on the basis of freedom does not exclude1 but include1 the moral laws4 ,it only shows that it stands on a higher level than actions which are dictated by these laws4 ,why should my act serve the general good less well when ,i do it from pure love of it1 than when ,i perform it because it is a duty to serve the general good8 ,the concept of duty excludes freedom1 because it will not acknowledge the right of individuality1 but demands the subjection of individuality to a general norm4 ,freedom of action is conceivable only from the standpoint of ,ethical ,individualism4 ,but how about the possibility of social life for men1 if each aims only at asserting his own individuality8 ,this question expresses yet another objection on the part of ,moralism wrongly understood4 ,the ,moralist believes that a social community is possible only if all men are held together by a common moral order4 ,this shows that the ,moralist does not understand the community of the world of ideas4 ,he does not realise that the world of ideas which inspires me is no other than that which inspires my fellow-men4 ,this identity is1 indeed1 but a conclusion from our experience of the world4 ,however1 it cannot be anything else4 ,for if we could recognise it in any other way than by observation1 it would follow that universal norms1 not individual experience1 were dominant in its sphere4 ,individuality is possible only if every individual knows others only through individual observation4 ,i differ from my neighbour1 not at all because we are living in two entirely different mental worlds1 but because from our common world of ideas we receive different intuitions4 ,he desires to live out his intuitions1 ,i mine4 ,if we both draw our intuitions really from the world of ideas1 and do not obey mere external impulses 7physical or moral71 then we cannot but meet one another in striving for the same aims1 in having the same intentions4 ,a moral misunderstanding1 a clash of aims1 is impossible between men who are free4 ,only the morally unfree who blindly follow their natural instincts or the commands of duty1 turn their backs on their neighbours1 if these do not obey the same instincts and the same laws as themselves4 ,to live in love of action and to let live in understanding of the other's volition1 this is the fundamental maxim of the free man4 ,he knows no other ought than that with which his will intuitively puts itself in harmony4 ,how he shall will in any given case1 that will be determined for him by the range of his ideas4 ,if sociability were not deeply rooted in human nature1 no external laws would be able to inoculate us with it4 ,it is only because human individuals are akin in spirit that they can live out their lives side by side4 ,the free man lives out his life in the full confidence that all other free men belong to one spiritual world with himself1 and that their intentions will coincide with his4 ,the free man does not demand agreement from his fellow-men1 but he expects it none the less1 believing that it is inherent in human nature4 ,i am not referring here to the necessity for this or that external institution4 ,i refer to the disposition1 to the state of mind1 through which a man1 aware of himself as one of a group of fellow-men for whom he cares1 comes nearest to living up to the ideal of human dignity4 ,there are many who will say that the concept of the free man which ,i have here developed1 is a chimera nowhere to be found realised1 and that we have got to deal with actual human beings1 from whom we can expect morality only if they obey some moral law1 i4e41 if they regard their moral task as a duty and do not simply follow their inclinations and loves4 ,i do not deny this4 ,only a blind man could do that4 ,but1 if so1 away with all this hypocrisy of morality6 ,let us say simply that human nature must be compelled to act as long as it is not free4 ,whether the compulsion of man's unfree nature is effected by physical force or through moral laws1 whether man is unfree because he indulges his unmeasured sexual desire1 or because he is bound tight in the bonds of conventional morality1 is quite immaterial4 ,only let us not assert that such a man can rightly call his actions his own1 seeing that he is driven to them by an external force4 ,but in the midst of all this network of compulsion1 there arise free spirits who1 in all the welter of customs1 legal codes1 religious observances1 etc41 learn to be true to themselves4 ,they are free in so far as they obey only themselves2 unfree in so far as they submit to control4 ,which of us can say that he is really free in all his actions8 ,yet in each of us there dwells something deeper in which the free man finds expression4 ,our life is made up of free and unfree actions4 ,we cannot1 however1 form a final and adequate concept of human nature without coming upon the free spirit as its purest expression4 ,after all1 we are men in the fullest sense only in so far as we are free4 ,this is an ideal1 many will say4 ,doubtless2 but it is an ideal which is a real element in us working up to the surface of our nature4 ,it is no ideal born of mere imagination or dream1 but one which has life1 and which manifests itself clearly even in the least developed form of its existence4 ,if men were nothing but natural objects1 the search for ideals1 that is1 for ideas which as yet are not actual but the realisation of which we demand1 would be an impossibility4 ,in dealing with external objects the idea is determined by the percept4 ,we have done our share when we have recognised the connection between idea and percept4 ,but with a human being the case is different4 ,the content of his existence is not determined without him4 ,his concept of his true self as a moral being 7free spirit7 is not a priori united objectively with the perceptual content man1 so that knowledge need only register the fact subsequently4 ,man must by his own act unite his concept with the percept man4 ,concept and percept coincide with one another in this instance1 only in so far as the individual himself makes them coincide4 ,this he can do only if he has found the concept of the free spirit1 that is1 if he has found the concept of his own ,self4 ,in the objective world1 a boundary-line is drawn by our organisation between percept and concept4 ,knowledge breaks down this barrier4 ,in our subjective nature this barrier is no less present4 ,the individual overcomes it in the course of his development1 by embodying his concept of himself in his outward existence4 ,hence man's moral life and his intellectual life lead him both alike to his two-fold nature1 perception 7immediate experience7 and thought4 ,the intellectual life overcomes his two-fold nature by means of knowledge1 the moral life succeeds through the actual realisation of the free spirit4 ,every being has its inborn concept 7the laws of its being and action71 but in external objects this concept is indissolubly bound up with the percept1 and separated from it only in the organisation of human minds4 ,in human beings concept and percept are1 at first1 actually separated1 to be just as actually reunited by them4 ,someone might object that to our percept of a man there corresponds at every moment of his life a definite concept1 just as with external objects4 ,i can construct for myself the concept of an average man1 and ,i may also have given to me a percept to fit this pattern4 ,suppose now ,i add to this the concept of a free spirit1 then ,i have two concepts for the same object4 ,such an objection is one-sided4 ,as object of perception ,i am subject to perpetual change4 ,as a child ,i was one thing1 another as a youth1 yet another as a man4 ,moreover1 at every moment ,i am different1 as percept1 from what ,i was the moment before4 ,these changes may take place in such a way that either it is always only the same 7average7 man who exhibits himself in them1 or that they represent the expression of a free spirit4 ,such are the changes which my actions1 as objects of perception1 undergo4 ,in the perceptual object man there is given the possibility of transformation1 just as in the plant-seed there lies the possibility of growth into a fully developed plant4 ,the plant transforms itself in growth1 because of the objective law of nature which is inherent in it4 ,the human being remains in his undeveloped state1 unless he takes hold of the material for transformation within him and develops himself through his own energy4 ,nature makes of man merely a natural being2 ,society makes of him a being who acts in obedience to law2 only he himself can make a free man of himself4 ,at a definite stage in his development ,nature releases man from her fetters2 ,society carries his development a step further2 he alone can give himself the final polish4 ,the theory of free morality1 then1 does not assert that the free spirit is the only form in which man can exist4 ,it looks upon the freedom of the spirit only as the last stage in man's evolution4 ,this is not to deny that conduct in obedience to norms has its legitimate place as a stage in development4 ,the point is that we cannot acknowledge it to be the absolute standpoint in morality4 ,for the free spirit transcends norms1 in the sense that he is insensible to them as commands1 but regulates his conduct in accordance with his impulses 7intuitions74 ,when ,kant apostrophises duty3 ,duty6 ,thou sublime and mighty name1 that dost embrace nothing charming or insinuating1 but requirest submission1 thou that holdest forth a law 444 before which all inclinations are dumb1 even though they secretly counterwork it1 #f then the free spirit replies3 ,freedom6 thou kindly and humane name1 which dost embrace within thyself all that is morally most charming1 all that insinuates itself most into my humanity1 and which makest me the servant of nobody1 which holdest forth no law1 but waitest what my inclination itself will proclaim as law1 because it resists every law that is forced upon it4 ,this is the contrast of morality according to law and according to freedom4 ,the philistine who looks upon the ,state as embodied morality is sure to look upon the free spirit as a danger to the ,state4 ,but that is only because his view is narrowly focused on a limited period of time4 ,if he were able to look beyond1 he would soon find that it is but on rare occasions that the free spirit needs to go beyond the laws of his state1 and that it never needs to confront them with any real contradiction4 ,for the laws of the state1 one and all1 have had their origin in the intuitions of free spirits1 just like all other objective laws of morality4 ,there is no traditional law enforced by the authority of a family1 which was not1 once upon a time1 intuitively conceived and laid down by an ancestor4 ,similarly the conventional laws of morality are first of all established by particular men1 and the laws of the state are always born in the brain of a statesman4 ,these free spirits have set up laws over the rest of mankind1 and only he is unfree who forgets this origin and makes them either divine commands1 or objective moral duties1 or--falsely mystical--the authoritative voice of his own conscience4 ,he1 on the other hand1 who does not forget the origin of laws1 but looks for it in man1 will respect them as belonging to the same world of ideas which is the source also of his own moral intuitions4 ,if he thinks his intuitions better than the existing laws1 he will try to put them into the place of the latter4 ,if he thinks the laws justified1 he will act in accordance with them as if they were his own intuitions4 ,man does not exist in order to found a moral order of the world4 ,anyone who maintains that he does1 stands in his theory of man still at that same point1 at which natural science stood when it believed that a bull has horns in order that it may butt4 ,scientists1 happily1 have cast the concept of objective purposes in nature into the limbo of dead theories4 ,for ,ethics1 it is more difficult to achieve the same emancipation4 ,but just as horns do not exist for the sake of butting1 but butting because of horns1 so man does not exist for the sake of morality1 but morality exists through man4 ,the free man acts morally because he has a moral idea1 he does not act in order to be moral4 ,human individuals are the presupposition of a moral world order4 ,the human individual is the fountain of all morality and the centre of all life4 ,state and society exist only because they have necessarily grown out of the life of individuals4 ,that state and society1 in turn1 should react upon the lives of individuals1 is no more difficult to comprehend1 than that the butting which is the result of the existence of horns1 reacts in turn upon the further development of the horns1 which would become atrophied by prolonged disuse4 ,similarly1 the individual must degenerate if he leads an isolated existence beyond the pale of human society4 ,that is just the reason why the social order arises1 viz41 that it may react favourably upon the individual4 ,x ,,monism ,,and ,,the ,,philosophy ,,of ,,spiritual ,,activity ,the nave man who acknowledges nothing as real except what he can see with his eyes and grasp with his hands1 demands for his moral life1 too1 grounds of action which are perceptible to his senses4 ,he wants some one who will impart to him these grounds of action in a manner that his senses can apprehend4 ,he is ready to allow these grounds of action to be dictated to him as commands by anyone whom he considers wiser or more powerful than himself1 or whom he acknowledges1 for whatever reason1 to be a power superior to himself4 ,this accounts for the moral principles enumerated above1 viz41 the principles which rest on the authority of family1 state1 society1 church1 and ,god4 ,the most narrow-minded man still submits to the authority of some single fellow-man4 ,he who is a little more progressive allows his moral conduct to be dictated by a majority 7state1 society74 ,in every case he relies on some power which is present to his senses4 ,when1 at last1 the conviction dawns on someone that his authorities are1 at bottom1 human beings just as weak as himself1 then he seeks refuge with a higher power1 with a ,divine ,being1 whom1 in turn1 he endows with qualities perceptible to the senses4 ,he conceives this ,being as communicating to him the ideal content of his moral life by way of his senses--believing1 for example1 that ,god appears in the flaming bush1 or that ,he moves about among men in manifest human shape1 and that their ears can hear ,his voice telling them what they are to do and what not to do4 ,the highest stage of development which ,nave ,realism attains in the sphere of morality is that at which the moral law 7the moral idea7 is conceived as having no connection with any external being1 but1 hypothetically1 as being an absolute power in one's own consciousness4 ,what man first listened to as the voice of ,god1 to that he now listens as an independent power in his own mind which he calls conscience4 ,this conception1 however1 takes us already beyond the level of the nave consciousness into the sphere where moral laws are treated as independent norms4 ,they are there no longer made dependent on a human mind1 but are turned into self-existent metaphysical entities4 ,they are analogous to the visible-invisible forces of ,metaphysical ,realism4 ,hence also they appear always as a corollary of ,metaphysical ,realism1 which seeks reality1 not in the part which human nature1 through its thinking1 plays in making reality what it is1 but which hypothetically posits reality over and above the facts of experience4 ,hence these extra-human moral norms always appear as corollaries of ,metaphysical ,realism4 ,for this theory is bound to look for the origin of morality likewise in the sphere of extra-human reality4 ,there are different possible views of its origin4 ,if the thing-in-itself is unthinking and acts according to purely mechanical laws1 as modern ,materialism conceives that it does1 then it must also produce out of itself1 by purely mechanical necessity1 the human individual and all that belongs to him4 ,on that view the consciousness of freedom can be nothing more than an illusion4 ,for whilst ,i consider myself the author of my action1 it is the matter of which ,i am composed and the movements which are going on in it that determine me4 ,i imagine myself free1 but actually all my actions are nothing but the effects of the metabolism which is the basis of my physical and mental organisation4 ,it is only because we do not know the motives which compel us that we have the feeling of freedom4 ,we must emphasise that the feeling of freedom depends on the absence of external compelling motives4 ,our actions are as much subject to necessity as our thoughts 7,ziehen1 ,leitfaden der ,physiologischen ,psychologie1 pp4 #bjg1 ff474 #g ,another possibility is that some one will find in a spiritual being the ,absolute lying behind all phenomena4 ,if so1 he will look for the spring of action in some kind of spiritual power4 ,he will regard the moral principles which his reason contains as the manifestation of this spiritual being1 which pursues in men its own special purposes4 ,moral laws appear to the ,dualist1 who holds this view1 as dictated by the ,absolute1 and man's only task is to discover1 by means of his reason1 the decisions of the ,absolute and to carry them out4 ,for the ,dualist1 the moral order of the world is the visible symbol of the higher order that lies behind it4 ,our human morality is a revelation of the divine world-order4 ,it is not man who matters in this moral order but reality in itself1 that is1 ,god4 ,man ought to do what ,god wills4 ,eduard von ,hartmann1 who identifies reality1 as such1 with ,god1 and who treats ,god's existence as a life of suffering1 believes that the ,divine ,being has created the world in order to gain1 by means of the world1 release from his infinite suffering4 ,hence this philosopher regards the moral evolution of humanity as a process1 the function of which is the redemption of ,god4 ,only through the building up of a moral world-order on the part of rational1 self-conscious individuals is it possible for the world-process to approximate to its goal4 ,real existence is the incarnation of ,god4 ,the world-process is the passion of ,god who has become flesh1 and at the same time the way of redemption for ,him who was crucified in the flesh2 and morality is our co-operation in the shortening of this process of suffering and redemption 7,hartmann1 ,phnomenologie des sittlichen ,bewusstseins1 #hga74 ,on this view1 man does not act because he wills1 but he must act because it is ,god's will to be redeemed4 ,whereas the ,materialistic ,dualist turns man into an automaton1 the action of which is nothing but the effect of causality according to purely mechanical laws1 the ,spiritualistic ,dualist 7i4e41 he who treats the ,absolute1 the thing-in-itself1 as a spiritual something in which man with his conscious experience has no share71 makes man the slave of the will of the ,absolute4 ,neither ,materialism1 nor ,spiritualism1 nor in general ,metaphysical ,realism which infers1 as true reality1 an extra-human something which it does not experience1 have any room for freedom4 ,nave and ,metaphysical ,realism1 if they are to be consistent1 have to deny freedom for one and the same reason1 viz41 because1 for them1 man does nothing but carry out1 or execute1 principles necessarily imposed upon him4 ,nave ,realism destroys freedom by subjecting man to authority1 whether it be that of a perceptible being1 or that of a being conceived on the analogy of perceptible beings1 or1 lastly1 that of the abstract voice of conscience4 ,the ,metaphysician1 content merely to infer an extra-human reality1 is unable to acknowledge freedom because1 for him1 man is determined1 mechanically or morally1 by a thing-in-itself4 ,monism will have to admit the partial justification of ,nave ,realism1 with which it agrees in admitting the part played by the world of percepts4 ,he who is incapable of producing moral ideas through intuition must receive them from others4 ,in so far as a man receives his moral principles from without he is actually unfree4 ,but ,monism ascribes to the idea the same importance as to the percept4 ,the idea can manifest itself only in human individuals4 ,in so far as man obeys the impulses coming from this side he is free4 ,but ,monism denies all justification to ,metaphysics1 and consequently also to the impulses of action which are derived from so-called things-in-themselves4 ,according to the ,monistic view1 man's action is unfree when he obeys some perceptible external compulsion2 it is free when he obeys none but himself4 ,there is no room in ,monism for any kind of unconscious compulsion hidden behind percept and concept4 ,if anybody maintains of the action of a fellow-man that it has not been freely done1 he is bound to produce within the visible world the thing or the person or the institution which has caused the agent to act4 ,and if he supports his contention by an appeal to causes of action lying outside the real world of our percepts and thoughts1 then ,monism must decline to take account of such an assertion4 ,according to the ,monistic theory1 then1 man's action is partly free1 partly unfree4 ,he is conscious of himself as unfree in the world of percepts1 and he realises in himself the spirit which is free4 ,the moral laws which his inferences compel the ,metaphysician to regard as issuing from a higher power have1 according to the upholder of ,monism1 been conceived by men themselves4 ,to him the moral order is neither a mere image of a purely mechanical order of nature nor of the divine government of the world1 but through and through the free creation of men4 ,it is not man's business to realise ,god's will in the world1 but his own4 ,he carries out his own decisions and intentions1 not those of another being4 ,monism does not find behind human agents a ruler of the world1 determining them to act according to his will4 ,men pursue only their own human ends4 ,moreover1 each individual pursues his own private ends4 ,for the world of ideas realises itself1 not in a community1 but only in individual men4 ,what appears as the common goal of a community is nothing but the result of the separate volitions of its individual members1 and most commonly of a few outstanding men whom the rest follow as their leaders4 ,each one of us has it in him to be a free spirit1 just as every rosebud is potentially a rose4 ,monism1 then1 is in the sphere of genuinely moral action the true philosophy of freedom4 ,being also a philosophy of reality1 it rejects the metaphysical 7unreal7 restriction of the free spirit as emphatically as it acknowledges the physical and historical 7navely real7 restrictions of the nave man4 ,inasmuch as it does not look upon man as a finished product1 exhibiting in every moment of his life his full nature1 it considers idle the dispute whether man1 as such1 is free or not4 ,it looks upon man as a developing being1 and asks whether1 in the course of this development1 he can reach the stage of the free spirit4 ,monism knows that ,nature does not send forth man ready-made as a free spirit1 but that she leads him up to a certain stage1 from which he continues to develop still as an unfree being1 until he reaches the point where he finds his own self4 ,monism perceives clearly that a being acting under physical or moral compulsion cannot be truly moral4 ,it regards the stages of automatic action 7in accordance with natural impulses and instincts71 and of obedient action 7in accordance with moral norms71 as a necessary propdeutic for morality1 but it understands that it is possible for the free spirit to transcend both these transitory stages4 ,monism emancipates man in general from all the self-imposed fetters of the maxims of nave morality1 and from all the externally imposed maxims of speculative ,metaphysicians4 ,the former ,monism can as little eliminate from the world as it can eliminate percepts4 ,the latter it rejects1 because it looks for all principles of explanation of the phenomena of the world within that world and not outside it4 ,just as ,monism refuses even to entertain the thought of cognitive principles other than those applicable to men 7p4 #abe71 so it rejects also the concept of moral maxims other than those originated by men4 ,human morality1 like human knowledge1 is conditioned by human nature1 and just as beings of a higher order would probably mean by knowledge something very different from what we mean by it1 so we may assume that other beings would have a very different morality4 ,for ,monists1 morality is a specifically human quality1 and freedom the human way being moral4 #a4 ,,addition ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah74 ,in forming a judgment about the argument of the two preceding chapters1 a difficulty may arise from what may appear to be a contradiction4 ,on the one side1 we have spoken of the experience of thinking as one the significance of which is universal and equally valid for every human consciousness4 ,on the other side1 we have pointed out that the ideas which we realise in moral action and which are homogeneous with those that thinking elaborates1 manifest themselves in every human consciousness in a uniquely individual way4 ,if we cannot get beyond regarding this antithesis as a contradiction1 and if we do not recognise that in the living intuition of this actually existing antithesis a piece of man's essential nature reveals itself1 we shall not be able to apprehend in the true light either what knowledge is or what freedom is4 ,those who think of concepts as nothing more than abstractions from the world of percepts1 and who do not acknowledge the part which intuition plays1 cannot but regard as a pure contradiction the thought for which we have here claimed reality4 ,but if we understand how ideas are experienced intuitively in their self-sustaining essence1 we see clearly that1 in knowledge1 man lives and enters into the world of ideas as into something which is identical for all men4 ,on the other hand1 when man derives from that world the intuitions for his voluntary actions1 he individualises a member of the world of ideas by that same activity which he practises as a universally human one in the spiritual and ideal process of cognition4 ,the apparent contradiction between the universal character of cognitive ideas and the individual character of moral ideas becomes1 when intuited in its reality1 a living concept4 ,it is a criterion of the essential nature of man that what we intuitively apprehend of his nature oscillates1 like a living pendulum1 between knowledge which is universally valid1 and individualised experience of this universal content4 ,those who fail to perceive the one oscillation in its real character1 will regard thinking as a merely subjective human activity4 ,for those who are unable to grasp the other oscillation1 man's activity in thinking will seem to lose all individual life4 ,knowledge is to the former1 the moral life to the latter1 an unintelligible fact4 ,both will fall back on all sorts of ideas for the explanation of the one or of the other1 because both either do not understand at all how thinking can be intuitively experienced1 or1 else1 misunderstand it as an activity which merely abstracts4 #b4 ,,addition ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah74 ,on page #ahj ,i have spoken of ,materialism4 ,i am well aware that there are thinkers1 like the above-mentioned ,th4 ,ziehen1 who do not call themselves ,materialists at all1 but yet who must be called so from the point of view adopted in this book4 ,it does not matter whether a thinker says that for him the world is not restricted to merely material being1 and that1 therefore1 he is not a ,materialist4 ,no1 what matters is whether he develops concepts which are applicable only to material being4 ,anyone who says1 our action1 like our thought1 is necessarily determined1 lays down a concept which is applicable only to material processes1 but not applicable either to what we do or to what we are4 ,and if he were to think out what his concept implies1 he would end by thinking materialistically4 ,he saves himself from this fate only by the same inconsistency which so often results from not thinking one's thoughts out to the end4 ,it is often said nowadays that the ,materialism of the nineteenth century is scientifically dead4 ,but in truth it is not so4 ,it is only that nowadays we frequently fail to notice that we have no other ideas than those which apply only to the material world4 ,thus recent ,materialism is disguised1 whereas in the second half of the nineteenth century it openly flaunted itself4 ,towards a theory which apprehends the world spiritually the camouflaged ,materialism of the present is no less intolerant than the self-confessed ,materialism of the last century4 ,but it deceives many who think they have a right to reject a theory of the world in terms of ,spirit1 on the ground that the scientific world-view has long ago abandoned ,materialism4 ,,xi ,,world-,,purpose ,,and ,,life-,,purpose 7,,the ,,destiny ,,of ,,man7 ,among the manifold currents in the spiritual life of humanity there is one which we must now trace1 and which we may call the elimination of the concept of purpose from spheres to which it does not belong4 ,adaptation to purpose is a special kind of sequence of phenomena4 ,such adaptation is genuinely real only when1 in contrast to the relation of cause and effect in which the antecedent event determines the subsequent1 the subsequent event determines the antecedent4 ,this is possible only in the sphere of human actions4 ,man performs actions which he first presents to himself in idea1 and he allows himself to be determined to action by this idea4 ,the consequent1 i4e41 the action1 influences by means of the idea the antecedent1 i4e41 the human agent4 ,if the sequence is to have purposive character1 it is absolutely necessary to have this circuitous process through human ideas4 ,in the process which we can analyse into cause and effect1 we must distinguish percept from concept4 ,the percept of the cause precedes the percept of the effect4 ,cause and effect would simply stand side by side in our consciousness1 if we were not able to connect them with one another through the corresponding concepts4 ,the percept of the effect must always be consequent upon the percept of the cause4 ,if the effect is to have a real influence upon the cause1 it can do so only by means of the conceptual factor4 ,for the perceptual factor of the effect simply does not exist prior to the perceptual factor of the cause4 ,whoever maintains that the flower is the purpose of the root1 i4e41 that the former determines the latter1 can make good this assertion only concerning that factor in the flower which his thought reveals in it4 ,the perceptual factor of the flower is not yet in existence at the time when the root originates4 ,in order to have a purposive connection1 it is not only necessary to have an ideal connection of consequent and antecedent according to law1 but the concept 7law7 of the effect must really1 i4e41 by means of a perceptible process1 influence the cause4 ,such a perceptible influence of a concept upon something else is to be observed only in human actions4 ,hence this is the only sphere in which the concept of purpose is applicable4 ,the nave consciousness1 which regards as real only what is perceptible1 attempts1 as we have repeatedly pointed out1 to introduce perceptible factors even where only ideal factors can actually be found4 ,in sequences of perceptible events it looks for perceptible connections1 or1 failing to find them1 it imports them by imagination4 ,the concept of purpose1 valid for subjective actions1 is very convenient for inventing such imaginary connections4 ,the nave mind knows how it produces events itself1 and consequently concludes that ,nature proceeds likewise4 ,in the connections of ,nature which are purely ideal it finds1 not only invisible forces1 but also invisible real purposes4 ,man makes his tools to suit his purposes4 ,on the same principle1 so the ,nave ,realist imagines1 the ,creator constructs all organisms4 ,it is but slowly that this mistaken concept of purpose is being driven out of the sciences4 ,in philosophy1 even at the present day1 it still does a good deal of mischief4 ,philosophers still ask such questions as1 ,what is the purpose of the world8 ,what is the function 7and consequently the purpose7 of man8 etc4 ,monism rejects the concept of purpose in every sphere1 with the sole exception of human action4 ,it looks for laws of ,nature1 but not for purposes of ,nature4 ,purposes of ,nature1 no less than invisible forces 7p4 #aah71 are arbitrary assumptions4 ,but even life-purposes which man does not set up for himself1 are1 from the standpoint of ,monism1 illegitimate assumptions4 ,nothing is purposive except what man has made so1 for only the realisation of ideas originates anything purposive4 ,but an idea becomes effective1 in the realistic sense1 only in human actions4 ,hence life has no other purpose or function than the one which man gives to it4 ,if the question be asked1 ,what is man's purpose in life8 ,monism has but one answer3 ,the purpose which he gives to himself4 ,i have no predestined mission in the world2 my mission1 at any one moment1 is that which ,i choose for myself4 ,i do not enter upon life's voyage with a fixed route mapped out for me4 ,ideas are realised only by human agents4 ,consequently1 it is illegitimate to speak of the embodiment of ideas by history4 ,all such statements as history is the evolution of man towards freedom1 or the realisation of the moral world-order1 etc41 are1 from a ,monistic point of view1 untenable4 ,the supporters of the concept of purpose believe that1 in surrendering it1 they are forced to surrender also all unity and order in the world4 ,listen1 for example1 to ,robert ,hamerling 7,atomistik des ,willens1 vol4 ii1 p4 #bja73 ,as long as there are instincts in ,nature1 so long is it foolish to deny purposes in ,nature4 ,just as the structure of a limb of the human body is not determined and conditioned by an idea of this limb1 floating somewhere in mid-air1 but by its connection with the more inclusive whole1 the body1 to which the limb belongs1 so the structure of every natural object1 be it plant1 animal1 or man1 is not determined and conditioned by an idea of it floating in mid-air1 but by the formative principle of the more inclusive whole of ,nature which unfolds and organises itself in a purposive manner4 ,and on page #aia of the same volume we read3 ,teleology maintains only that1 in spite of the thousand misfits and miseries of this natural life1 there is a high degree of adaptation to purpose and plan unmistakable in the formations and developments of ,nature--an adaptation1 however1 which is realised only within the limits of natural laws1 and which does not tend to the production of some imaginary fairy-land1 in which life would not be confronted by death1 growth by decay1 with all the more or less unpleasant1 but quite unavoidable1 intermediary stages between them4 ,when the critics of ,teleology oppose a laboriously collected rubbish-heap of partial or complete1 imaginary or real1 maladaptations to a world full of wonders of purposive adaptation1 such as ,nature exhibits in all her domains1 then ,i consider this just as amusing---- ,what is here meant by purposive adaptation8 ,nothing but the consonance of percepts within a whole4 ,but1 since all percepts are based upon laws 7ideas71 which we discover by means of thinking1 it follows that the orderly coherence of the members of a perceptual whole is nothing more than the ideal 7logical7 coherence of the members of the ideal whole which is contained in this perceptual whole4 ,to say that an animal or a man is not determined by an idea floating in mid-air is a misleading way of putting it1 and the view which the critic attacks loses its apparent absurdity as soon as the phrase is put right4 ,an animal certainly is not determined by an idea floating in mid-air1 but it is determined by an idea inborn in it and constituting the law of its nature4 ,it is just because the idea is not external to the natural object1 but is operative in it as its very essence1 that we cannot speak here of adaptation to purpose4 ,those who deny that natural objects are determined from without 7and it does not matter1 in this context1 whether it be by an idea floating in mid-air or existing in the mind of a creator of the world71 are the very men who ought to admit that such an object is not determined by purpose and plan from without1 but by cause and law from within4 ,a machine is produced in accordance with a purpose1 if ,i establish a connection between its parts which is not given in ,nature4 ,the purposive character of the combinations which ,i effect consists just in this1 that ,i embody my idea of the working of the machine in the machine itself4 ,in this way the machine comes into existence as an object of perception embodying a corresponding idea4 ,natural objects have a very similar character4 ,whoever calls a thing purposive because its form is in accordance with plan or law may1 if he so please1 call natural objects also purposive1 provided only that he does not confuse this kind of purposiveness with that which belongs to a subjective human action4 ,in order to have a purpose1 it is absolutely necessary that the efficient cause should be a concept1 more precisely a concept of the effect4 ,but in ,nature we can nowhere point to concepts operating as causes4 ,a concept is never anything but the ideal nexus of cause and effect4 ,causes occur in ,nature only in the form of percepts4 ,dualism may talk of cosmic and natural purposes4 ,wherever for our perception there is a nexus of cause and effect according to law1 there the ,dualist is free to assume that we have but the image of a nexus in which the ,absolute has realised its purposes4 ,for ,monism1 on the other hand1 the rejection of an ,absolute ,reality implies also the rejection of the assumption of purposes in ,world and ,nature4 ,,addition ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah74 ,no one who1 with an open mind1 has followed the preceding argument1 will come to the conclusion that the author1 in rejecting the concept of purpose for extra-human facts1 intended to side with those thinkers who reject this concept in order to be able to regard1 first1 everything outside human action and1 next1 human action itself1 as a purely natural process4 ,against such misunderstanding the author should be protected by the fact that the process of thinking is in this book represented as a purely spiritual process4 ,the reason for rejecting the concept of purpose even for the spiritual world1 so far as it lies outside human action1 is that in this world there is revealed something higher than a purpose1 such as is realised in human life4 ,and when we characterise as erroneous the attempt to conceive the destiny of the human race as purposive according to the pattern of human purposiveness1 we mean that the individual adopts purposes1 and that the result of the total activity of humanity is composed of these individual purposes4 ,this result is something higher than its component parts1 the purposes of individual men4 ,,xii ,,moral ,,imagination 7,,darwin ,,and ,,morality7 ,a free spirit acts according to his impulses1 i4e41 intuitions1 which his thought has selected out of the whole world of his ideas4 ,for an unfree spirit1 the reason why he singles out a particular intuition from his world of ideas1 in order to make it the basis of an action1 lies in the perceptual world which is given to him1 i4e41 in his past experiences4 ,he recalls1 before making a decision1 what some one else has done1 or recommended as proper in an analogous case1 or what ,god has commanded to be done in such a case1 etc41 and he acts on these recollections4 ,a free spirit dispenses with these preliminaries4 ,his decision is absolutely original4 ,he cares as little what others have done in such a case as what commands they have laid down4 ,he has purely ideal 7logical7 reasons which determine him to select a particular concept out of the sum of his concepts1 and to realise it in action4 ,but his action will belong to perceptible reality4 ,consequently1 what he achieves will coincide with a definite content of perception4 ,his concept will have to be realised in a concrete particular event4 ,as a concept it will not contain this event as particular4 ,it will refer to the event only in its generic character1 just as1 in general1 a concept is related to a percept1 e4g41 the concept lion to a particular lion4 ,the link between concept and percept is the idea 7cp4 pp4 #ajd ff74 ,to the unfree spirit this intermediate link is given from the outset4 ,motives exist in his consciousness from the first in the form of ideas4 ,whenever he intends to do anything he acts as he has seen others act1 or he obeys the instructions he receives in each separate case4 ,hence authority is most effective in the form of examples1 i4e41 in the form of traditional patterns of particular actions handed down for the guidance of the unfree spirit4 ,a ,christian models his conduct less on the teaching than on the pattern of the ,saviour4 ,rules have less value for telling men positively what to do than for telling them what to leave undone4 ,laws take on the form of universal concepts only when they forbid actions1 not when they prescribe actions4 ,laws concerning what we ought to do must be given to the unfree spirit in wholly concrete form4 ,clean the street in front of your door6 ,pay your taxes to such and such an amount to the tax-collector6 etc4 ,conceptual form belongs to laws which inhibit actions4 ,thou shalt not steal6 ,thou shalt not commit adultery6 ,but these laws1 too1 influence the unfree spirit only by means of a concrete idea1 e4g41 the idea of the punishments attached by human authority1 or of the pangs of conscience1 or of eternal damnation1 etc4 ,even when the motive to an action exists in universal conceptual form 7e4g41 ,thou shalt do good to thy fellow-men6 ,thou shalt live so that thou promotest best thy welfare671 there still remains to be found1 in the particular case1 the concrete idea of the action 7the relation of the concept to a content of perception74 ,for a free spirit who is not guided by any model nor by fear of punishment1 etc41 this translation of the concept into an idea is always necessary4 ,concrete ideas are formed by us on the basis of our concepts by means of the imagination4 ,hence what the free spirit needs in order to realise his concepts1 in order to assert himself in the world1 is moral imagination4 ,this is the source of the free spirit's action4 ,only those men1 therefore1 who are endowed with moral imagination are1 properly speaking1 morally productive4 ,those who merely preach morality1 i4e41 those who merely excogitate moral rules without being able to condense them into concrete ideas1 are morally unproductive4 ,they are like those critics who can explain very competently how a work of art ought to be made1 but who are themselves incapable of the smallest artistic production4 ,moral imagination1 in order to realise its ideas1 must enter into a determinate sphere of percepts4 ,human action does not create percepts1 but transforms already existing percepts and gives them a new character4 ,in order to be able to transform a definite object of perception1 or a sum of such objects1 in accordance with a moral idea1 it is necessary to understand the object's law 7its mode of action which one intends to transform1 or to which one wants to give a new direction74 ,further1 it is necessary to discover the procedure by which it is possible to change the given law into the new one4 ,this part of effective moral activity depends on knowledge of the particular world of phenomena with which one has got to deal4 ,we shall1 therefore1 find it in some branch of scientific knowledge4 ,moral action1 then1 presupposes1 in addition to the faculty of moral concepts #h and of moral imagination1 the ability to alter the world of percepts without violating the natural laws by which they are connected4 ,this ability is moral technique4 ,it may be learnt in the same sense in which science in general may be learnt4 ,for1 in general1 men are better able to find concepts for the world as it is1 than productively to originate out of their imaginations future1 and as yet non-existing1 actions4 ,hence1 it is very well possible for men without moral imagination to receive moral ideas from others1 and to embody these skilfully in the actual world4 ,vice versa1 it may happen that men with moral imagination lack technical skill1 and are dependent on the service of other men for the realisation of their ideas4 ,in so far as we require for moral action knowledge of the objects upon which we are about to act1 our action depends upon such knowledge4 ,what we need to know here are the laws of nature4 ,these belong to the ,natural ,sciences1 not to ,ethics4 ,moral imagination and the faculty of moral concepts can become objects of theory only after they have first been employed by the individual4 ,but1 thus regarded1 they no longer regulate life1 but have already regulated it4 ,they must now be treated as efficient causes1 like all other causes 7they are purposes only for the subject74 ,the study of them is1 as it were1 the ,natural ,science of moral ideas4 ,ethics as a ,normative ,science1 over and above this science1 is impossible4 ,some would maintain the normative character of moral laws at least in the sense that ,ethics is to be taken as a kind of dietetic which1 from the conditions of the organism's life1 deduces general rules1 on the basis of which it hopes to give detailed directions to the body 7,paulsen1 ,system der ,ethik74 ,this comparison is mistaken1 because our moral life cannot be compared with the life of the organism4 ,the behaviour of the organism occurs without any volition on our part4 ,its laws are fixed data in our world2 hence we can discover them and apply them when discovered4 ,moral laws1 on the other hand1 do not exist until we create them4 ,we cannot apply them until we have created them4 ,the error is due to the fact that moral laws are not at every moment new creations1 but are handed down by tradition4 ,those which we take over from our ancestors appear to be given like the natural laws of the organism4 ,but it does not follow that a later generation has the right to apply them in the same way as dietetic rules4 ,for they apply to individuals1 and not1 like natural laws1 to specimens of a genus4 ,considered as an organism1 ,i am such a generic specimen1 and ,i shall live in accordance with nature if ,i apply the laws of my genus to my particular case4 ,as a moral agent ,i am an individual and have my own private laws4 #i ,the view here upheld appears to contradict that fundamental doctrine of modern ,natural ,science which is known as the ,theory of ,evolution4 ,but it only appears to do so4 ,by evolution we mean the real development of the later out of the earlier in accordance with natural law4 ,in the organic world1 evolution means that the later 7more perfect7 organic forms are real descendants of the earlier 7imperfect7 forms1 and have grown out of them in accordance with natural laws4 ,the upholders of the theory of organic evolution believe that there was once a time on our earth1 when we could have observed with our own eyes the gradual evolution of reptiles out of ,proto-,amniotes1 supposing that we could have been present as men1 and had been endowed with a sufficiently long span of life4 ,similarly1 ,evolutionists suppose that man could have watched the development of the solar system out of the primordial nebula of the ,kant-,laplace hypothesis1 if he could have occupied a suitable spot in the world-ether during that infinitely long period4 ,but no ,evolutionist will dream of maintaining that he could from his concept of the primordial ,amnion deduce that of the reptile with all its qualities1 even if he had never seen a reptile4 ,just as little would it be possible to derive the solar system from the concept of the ,kant-,laplace nebula1 if this concept of an original nebula had been formed only from the percept of the nebula4 ,in other words1 if the ,evolutionist is to think consistently1 he is bound to maintain that out of earlier phases of evolution later ones really develop2 that once the concept of the imperfect and that of the perfect have been given1 we can understand the connection4 ,but in no case will he admit that the concept formed from the earlier phases is1 in itself1 sufficient for deducing from it the later phases4 ,from this it follows for ,ethics that1 whilst we can understand the connection of later moral concepts with earlier ones1 it is not possible to deduce a single new moral idea from earlier ones4 ,the individual1 as a moral being1 produces his own content4 ,this content1 thus produced1 is for ,ethics a datum1 as much as reptiles are a datum for ,natural ,science4 ,reptiles have evolved out of the ,proto-,amniotes1 but the scientist cannot manufacture the concept of reptiles out of the concept of the ,proto-,amniotes4 ,later moral ideas evolve out of the earlier ones1 but ,ethics cannot manufacture out of the moral principles of an earlier age those of a later one4 ,the confusion is due to the fact that1 as scientists1 we start with the facts before us1 and then make a theory about them1 whereas in moral action we first produce the facts ourselves1 and then theorise about them4 ,in the evolution of the moral world-order we accomplish what1 at a lower level1 ,nature accomplishes3 we alter some part of the perceptual world4 ,hence the ethical norm cannot straightway be made an object of knowledge1 like a law of nature1 for it must first be created4 ,only when that has been done can the norm become an object of knowledge4 ,but is it not possible to make the old a measure for the new8 ,is not every man compelled to measure the deliverances of his moral imagination by the standard of traditional moral principles8 ,if he would be truly productive in morality1 such measuring is as much an absurdity as it would be an absurdity if one were to measure a new species in nature by an old one and say that reptiles1 because they do not agree with the ,proto-,amniotes1 are an illegitimate 7degenerate7 species4 ,ethical ,individualism1 then1 so far from being in opposition to the theory of evolution1 is a direct consequence of it4 ,haeckel's genealogical tree1 from protozoa up to man as an organic being1 ought to be capable of being worked out without a breach of natural law1 and without a gap in its uniform evolution1 up to the individual as a being with a determinate moral nature4 ,but1 whilst it is quite true that the moral ideas of the individual have perceptibly grown out of those of his ancestors1 it is also true that the individual is morally barren1 unless he has moral ideas of his own4 ,the same ,ethical ,individualism which ,i have developed on the basis of the preceding principles1 might be equally well developed on the basis of the theory of evolution4 ,the final result would be the same2 only the path by which it was reached would be different4 ,that absolutely new moral ideas should be developed by the moral imagination is for the theory of evolution no more inexplicable than the development of one animal species out of another1 provided only that this theory1 as a ,monistic world-view1 rejects1 in morality as in science1 every transcendent 7metaphysical7 influence4 ,in doing so1 it follows the same principle by which it is guided in seeking the causes of new organic forms in forms already existing1 but not in the interference of an extra-mundane ,god1 who produces every new species in accordance with a new creative idea through supernatural interference4 ,just as ,monism has no use for supernatural creative ideas in explaining living organisms1 so it is equally impossible for it to derive the moral world-order from causes which do not lie within the world4 ,it cannot admit any continuous supernatural influence upon moral life 7divine government of the world from the outside71 nor an influence either through a particular act of revelation at a particular moment in history 7giving of the ten commandments71 or through ,god's appearance on the earth 7,divinity of ,christ #aj74 ,moral processes are1 for ,monism1 natural products like everything else that exists1 and their causes must be looked for in nature1 i4e41 in man1 because man is the bearer of morality4 ,ethical ,individualism1 then1 is the crown of the edifice that ,darwin and ,haeckel have erected for ,natural ,science4 ,it is the theory of evolution applied to the moral life4 ,anyone who restricts the concept of the natural from the outset to an artificially limited and narrowed sphere1 is easily tempted not to allow any room within it for free individual action4 ,the consistent ,evolutionist does not easily fall a prey to such a narrow-minded view4 ,he cannot let the process of evolution terminate with the ape1 and acknowledge for man a supernatural origin4 ,again1 he cannot stop short at the organic reactions of man and regard only these as natural4 ,he has to treat also the life of moral self-determination as the continuation of organic life4 ,the ,evolutionist1 then1 in accordance with his fundamental principles1 can maintain only that moral action evolves out of the less perfect forms of natural processes4 ,he must leave the characterisation of action1 i4e41 its determination as free action1 to the immediate observation of each agent4 ,all that he maintains is only that men have developed out of non-human ancestors4 ,what the nature of men actually is must be determined by observation of men themselves4 ,the results of this observation cannot possibly contradict the history of evolution4 ,only the assertion that the results are such as to exclude their being due to a natural world-order would contradict recent developments in the ,natural ,sciences4 #aa ,ethical ,individualism1 then1 has nothing to fear from a ,natural ,science which understands itself4 ,observation yields freedom as the characteristic quality of the perfect form of human action4 ,freedom must be attributed to the human will1 in so far as the will realises purely ideal intuitions4 ,for these are not the effects of a necessity acting upon them from without1 but are grounded in themselves4 ,when we find that an action embodies such an ideal intuition1 we feel it to be free4 ,freedom consists in this character of an action4 ,what1 then1 from the standpoint of nature are we to say of the distinction1 already mentioned above 7p4 #h71 between the two statements1 ,to be free means to be able to do what you will1 and ,to be able1 as you please1 to strive or not to strive is the real meaning of the dogma of free will8 ,hamerling bases his theory of free will precisely on this distinction1 by declaring the first statement to be correct but the second to be an absurd tautology4 ,he says1 ,i can do what ,i will1 but to say ,i can will what ,i will is an empty tautology4 ,whether ,i am able to do1 i4e41 to make real1 what ,i will1 i4e41 what ,i have set before myself as my idea of action1 that depends on external circumstances and on my technical skill 7cp4 p4 #bjj74 ,to be free means to be able to determine by moral imagination out of oneself those ideas 7motives7 which lie at the basis of action4 ,freedom is impossible if anything other than ,i myself 7whether a mechanical process or ,god7 determines my moral ideas4 ,in other words1 ,i am free only when ,i myself produce these ideas1 but not when ,i am merely able to realise the ideas which another being has implanted in me4 ,a free being is one who can will what he regards as right4 ,whoever does anything other than what he wills must be impelled to it by motives which do not lie in himself4 ,such a man is unfree in his action4 ,accordingly1 to be able to will1 as you please1 what you consider right or wrong means to be free or unfree as you please4 ,this is1 of course1 just as absurd as to identify freedom with the faculty of doing what one is compelled to will4 ,but this is just what ,hamerling maintains when he says1 ,it is perfectly true that the will is always determined by motives1 but it is absurd to say that on this ground it is unfree2 for a greater freedom can neither be desired nor conceived than the freedom to realise oneself in proportion to one's own power and strength of will4 ,on the contrary1 it is well possible to desire a greater freedom and that a true freedom1 viz41 the freedom to determine for oneself the motives of one's volitions4 ,under certain conditions a man may be induced to abandon the execution of his will2 but to allow others to prescribe to him what he shall do--in other words1 to will what another and not what he himself regards as right--to this a man will submit only when he does not feel free4 ,external powers may prevent me from doing what ,i will1 but that is only to condemn me to do nothing or to be unfree4 ,not until they enslave my spirit1 drive my motives out of my head1 and put their own motives in the place of mine1 do they really aim at making me unfree4 ,that is the reason why the church attacks not only the mere doing1 but especially the impure thoughts1 i4e41 motives of my action4 ,and for the church all those motives are impure which she has not herself authorised4 ,a church does not produce genuine slaves until her priests turn themselves into advisers of consciences1 i4e41 until the faithful depend upon the church1 i4e41 upon the confessional1 for the motives of their actions4 ,,addition ,,to ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah74 ,in these chapters ,i have given an account of how every one may experience in his actions something which makes him aware that his will is free4 ,it is especially important to recognise that we derive the right to call an act of will free from the experience of an ideal intuition realising itself in the act4 ,this can be nothing but a datum of observation1 in the sense that we observe the development of human volition in the direction towards the goal of attaining the possibility of just such volition sustained by purely ideal intuition4 ,this attainment is possible because the ideal intuition is effective through nothing but its own self-dependent essence4 ,where such an intuition is present in the mind1 it has not developed itself out of the processes in the organism 7cp4 pp4 #adf ff471 but the organic processes have retired to make room for the ideal processes4 ,observation of an act of will which embodies an intuition shows that out of it1 likewise1 all organically necessary activity has retired4 ,the act of will is free4 ,no one can observe this freedom of will who is unable to see how free will consists in this1 that1 first1 the intuitive factor lames and represses the necessary activity of the human organism1 and then puts in its place the spiritual activity of a will guided by ideas4 ,only those who are unable to observe these two factors in the free act of will believe that every act of will is unfree4 ,those who are able to observe them win through to the recognition that man is unfree in so far as he fails to repress organic activity completely1 but that this unfreedom is tending towards freedom1 and that this freedom1 so far from being an abstract ideal1 is a directive force inherent in human nature4 ,man is free in proportion as he succeeds in realising in his acts of will the same disposition of mind1 which possesses him when he is conscious in himself of the formation of purely ideal 7spiritual7 intuitions4 ,,xiii ,,the ,,value ,,of ,,life 7,,optimism ,,and ,,pessimism7 ,a counterpart of the question concerning the purpose and function of life 7cp4 pp4 #aij ff47 is the question concerning its value4 ,we meet here with two mutually opposed views1 and between them with all conceivable attempts at compromise4 ,one view says that this world is the best conceivable which could exist at all1 and that to live and act in it is a good of inestimable value4 ,everything that exists displays harmonious and purposive co-operation and is worthy of admiration4 ,even what is apparently bad and evil may1 from a higher point of view1 be seen to be a good1 for it represents an agreeable contrast with the good4 ,we are the more able to appreciate the good when it is clearly contrasted with evil4 ,moreover1 evil is not genuinely real2 it is only that we perceive as evil a lesser degree of good4 ,evil is the absence of good1 it has no positive import of its own4 ,the other view maintains that life is full of misery and agony4 ,everywhere pain outweighs pleasure1 sorrow outweighs joy4 ,existence is a burden1 and non-existence would1 from every point of view1 be preferable to existence4 ,the chief representatives of the former view1 i4e41 ,optimism1 are ,shaftesbury and ,leibnitz2 the chief representatives of the second1 i4e41 ,pessimism1 are ,schopenhauer and ,eduard von ,hartmann4 ,leibnitz says the world is the best of all possible worlds4 ,a better one is impossible4 ,for ,god is good and wise4 ,a good ,god wills to create the best possible world1 a wise ,god knows which is the best possible4 ,he is able to distinguish the best from all other and worse possibilities4 ,only an evil or an unwise ,god would be able to create a world worse than the best possible4 ,whoever starts from this point of view will find it easy to lay down the direction which human action must follow1 in order to make its contribution to the greatest good of the universe4 ,all that man need do will be to find out the counsels of ,god and to act in accordance with them4 ,if he knows what ,god's purposes are concerning the world and the human race1 he will be able1 for his part1 to do what is right4 ,and he will be happy in the feeling that he is adding his share to all the other good in the world4 ,from this optimistic standpoint1 then1 life is worth living4 ,it is such as to stimulate us to co-operate with1 and enter into1 it4 ,quite different is the picture ,schopenhauer paints4 ,he thinks of ultimate reality not as an all-wise and all-beneficent being1 but as blind striving or will4 ,eternal striving1 ceaseless craving for satisfaction which yet is ever beyond reach1 these are the fundamental characteristics of all will4 ,for as soon as we have attained what we want1 a fresh need springs up1 and so on4 ,satisfaction1 when it occurs1 endures always only for an infinitesimal time4 ,the whole rest of our lives is unsatisfied craving1 i4e41 discontent and suffering4 ,when at last blind craving is dulled1 every definite content is gone from our lives4 ,existence is filled with nothing but an endless ennui4 ,hence the best we can do is to throttle all desires and needs within us and exterminate the will4 ,schopenhauer's ,pessimism leads to complete inactivity2 its moral aim is universal idleness4 ,by a very different argument ,von ,hartmann attempts to establish ,pessimism and to make use of it for ,ethics4 ,he attempts1 in keeping with the fashion of our age1 to base his world-view on experience4 ,by observation of life he hopes to discover whether there is more pain or more pleasure in the world4 ,he passes in review before the tribunal of reason whatever men consider to be happiness and a good1 in order to show that all apparent satisfaction turns out1 on closer inspection1 to be nothing but illusion4 ,it is illusion when we believe that in health1 youth1 freedom1 sufficient income1 love 7sexual satisfaction71 pity1 friendship and family life1 honour1 reputation1 glory1 power1 religious edification1 pursuit of science and of art1 hope of a life after death1 participation in the advancement of civilisation--that in all these we have sources of happiness and satisfaction4 ,soberly considered1 every enjoyment brings much more evil and misery than pleasure into the world4 ,the disagreeableness of the morning after is always greater than the agreeableness of intoxication4 ,pain far outweighs pleasure in the world4 ,no man1 even though relatively the happiest1 would1 if asked1 wish to live through this miserable life a second time4 ,now1 since ,hartmann does not deny the presence of an ideal factor 7wisdom7 in the world1 but1 on the contrary1 grants to it equal rights with blind striving 7will71 he can attribute the creation of the world to his ,absolute ,being only on condition that ,he makes the pain in the world subserve a world-purpose that is wise4 ,but the pain of created beings is nothing but ,god's pain itself1 for the life of ,nature as a whole is identical with the life of ,god4 ,an ,all-wise ,being can aim only at release from pain1 and since all existence is pain1 at release from existence4 ,hence the purpose of the creation of the world is to transform existence into the non-existence which is so much better4 ,the world-process is nothing but a continuous battle against ,god's pain1 a battle which ends with the annihilation of all existence4 ,the moral life for men1 therefore1 will consist in taking part in the annihilation of existence4 ,the reason why ,god has created the world is that through the world he may free himself from his infinite pain4 ,the world must be regarded1 as it were1 as an itching eruption on the ,absolute1 by means of which the unconscious healing power of the ,absolute rids itself of an inward disease2 or it may be regarded as a painful drawing-plaster which the ,all-,one applies to itself in order first to divert the inner pain outwards1 and then to get rid of it altogether4 ,human beings are members of the world4 ,in their sufferings ,god suffers4 ,he has created them in order to split up in them his infinite pain4 ,the pain which each one of us suffers is but a drop in the infinite ocean of ,god's pain 7,hartmann1 ,phnomenologie des ,sittlichen ,bewusstseins1 pp4 #hff ff474 ,it is man's duty to permeate his whole being with the recognition that the pursuit of individual satisfaction 7,egoism7 is a folly1 and that he ought to be guided solely by the task of assisting in the redemption of ,god by unselfish service of the world-process4 ,thus1 in contrast with the ,pessimism of ,schopenhauer1 that of ,von ,hartmann leads us to devoted activity in a sublime cause4 ,but what of the claim that this view is based on experience8 ,to strive after satisfaction means that our activity reaches out beyond the actual content of our lives4 ,a creature is hungry1 i4e41 it desires satiety1 when its organic functions demand for their continuation the supply of fresh life-materials in the form of nourishment4 ,the pursuit of honour consists in that a man does not regard what he personally does or leaves undone as valuable unless it is endorsed by the approval of others from without4 ,the striving for knowledge arises when a man is not content with the world which he sees1 hears1 etc41 so long as he has not understood it4 ,the fulfilment of the striving causes pleasure in the individual who strives1 failure causes pain4 ,it is important here to observe that pleasure and pain are attached only to the fulfilment or non-fulfilment of my striving4 ,the striving itself is by no means to be regarded as a pain4 ,hence1 if we find that1 in the very moment in which a striving is fulfilled1 at once a new striving arises1 this is no ground for saying that pleasure has given birth to pain1 because enjoyment in every case gives rise to a desire for its repetition1 or for a fresh pleasure4 ,i can speak of pain only when desire runs up against the impossibility of fulfilment4 ,even when an enjoyment that ,i have had causes in me the desire for the experience of a greater1 more subtle1 and more exotic pleasure1 ,i have no right to speak of this desire as a pain caused by the previous pleasure until the means fail me to gain the greater and more subtle pleasure4 ,i have no right to regard pleasure as the cause of pain unless pain follows on pleasure as its consequence by natural law1 e4g41 when a woman's sexual pleasure is followed by the suffering of child-birth and the cares of nursing4 ,if striving caused pain1 then the removal of striving ought to be accompanied by pleasure4 ,but the very reverse is true4 ,to have no striving in one's life causes boredom1 and boredom is always accompanied by displeasure4 ,now1 since it may be a long time before a striving meets with fulfilment1 and since1 in the interval1 it is content with the hope of fulfilment1 we must acknowledge that there is no connection in principle between pain and striving1 but that pain depends solely on the non-fulfilment of the striving4 ,schopenhauer1 then1 is wrong1 in any case1 in regarding desire or striving 7will7 as being in principle the source of pain4 ,in truth1 the very reverse of this is correct4 ,striving 7desire7 is in itself pleasurable4 ,who does not know the pleasure which is caused by the hope of a remote but intensely desired enjoyment8 ,this pleasure is the companion of all labour1 the results of which will be enjoyed by us only in the future4 ,it is a pleasure which is wholly independent of the attainment of the end4 ,for when the aim has been attained1 the pleasure of satisfaction is added as a fresh thrill to the pleasure of striving4 ,if anyone were to argue that the pain caused by the non-attainment of an aim is increased by the pain of disappointed hope1 and that thus1 in the end1 the pain of non-fulfilment will still always outweigh the utmost possible pleasure of fulfilment1 we shall have to reply that the reverse may be the case1 and that the recollection of past pleasure at a time of unsatisfied desire will as often mitigate the displeasure of non-satisfaction4 ,whoever at the moment when his hopes suffer shipwreck exclaims1 ,i have done my part1 proves thereby my assertion4 ,the blessed feeling of having willed the best within one's powers is ignored by all who make every unsatisfied desire an occasion for asserting that1 not only has the pleasure of fulfilment been lost1 but that the enjoyment of the striving itself has been destroyed4 ,the satisfaction of a desire causes pleasure and its non-satisfaction causes pain4 ,but we have no right to infer from this fact that pleasure is nothing but the satisfaction of a desire1 and pain nothing but its non-satisfaction4 ,both pleasure and pain may be experienced without being the consequence of desire4 ,all illness is pain not preceded by any desire4 ,if anyone were to maintain that illness is unsatisfied desire for health1 he would commit the error of regarding the inevitable and unconscious wish not to fall ill as a positive desire4 ,when some one receives a legacy from a rich relative of whose existence he had not the faintest idea1 he experiences a pleasure without having felt any preceding desire4 ,hence1 if we set out to inquire whether the balance is on the side of pleasure or of pain1 we must allow in our calculation for the pleasure of striving1 the pleasure of the satisfaction of striving1 and the pleasure which comes to us without any striving whatever4 ,on the debit side we shall have to enter the displeasure of boredom1 the displeasure of unfulfilled striving1 and1 lastly1 the displeasure which comes to us without any striving on our part4 ,under this last heading we shall have to put also the displeasure caused by work that has been forced upon us1 not chosen by ourselves4 ,this leads us to the question1 ,what is the right method for striking the balance between the credit and the debit columns8 ,eduard von ,hartmann asserts that reason holds the scales4 ,it is true that he says 7,philosophie des ,unbewussten1 #gth edition1 vol4 ii4 p4 #bij73 ,pain and pleasure exist only in so far as they are actually being felt4 ,it follows that there can be no standard for pleasure other than the subjective standard of feeling4 ,i must feel whether the sum of my disagreeable feelings1 contrasted with my agreeable feelings1 results in me in a balance of pleasure or of pain4 ,but1 notwithstanding this1 ,von ,hartmann maintains that though the value of the life of every being can be set down only according to its own subjective measure1 yet it follows by no means that every being is able to compute the correct algebraic sum of all the feelings of its life--or1 in other words1 that its total estimate of its own life1 with regard to its subjective feelings1 should be correct4 ,but this means that rational estimation of feelings is reinstated as the standard of value4 #ab ,it is because ,von ,hartmann holds this view that he thinks it necessary1 in order to arrive at a correct valuation of life1 to clear out of the way those factors which falsify our judgment about the balance of pleasure and of pain4 ,he tries to do this in two ways3 first1 by showing that our desire 7instinct1 will7 operates as a disturbing factor in the sober estimation of feeling-values2 e4g41 whereas we ought to judge that sexual enjoyment is a source of evil1 we are beguiled by the fact that the sexual instinct is very strong in us1 into pretending to experience a pleasure which does not occur in the alleged intensity at all4 ,we are bent on indulging ourselves1 hence we do not acknowledge to ourselves that the indulgence makes us suffer4 ,secondly1 ,von ,hartmann subjects feelings to a criticism designed to show1 that the objects to which our feelings attach themselves reveal themselves as illusions when examined by reason1 and that our feelings are destroyed from the moment that our constantly growing insight sees through the illusions4 ,von ,hartmann1 then1 conceives the matter as follows4 ,suppose an ambitious man wants to determine clearly whether1 up to the moment of his inquiry1 there has been a surplus of pleasure or of pain in his life4 ,he has to eliminate two sources of error that may affect his judgment4 ,being ambitious1 this fundamental feature of his character will make him see all the pleasures of the public recognition of his achievements larger than they are1 and all the insults suffered through rebuffs smaller than they are4 ,at the time when he suffered the rebuffs he felt the insults just because he is ambitious1 but in recollection they appear to him in a milder light1 whereas the pleasures of recognition to which he is so much more susceptible leave a far deeper impression4 ,undeniably1 it is a real benefit to an ambitious man that it should be so1 for the deception diminishes his pain in the moment of self-analysis4 ,but1 none the less1 it falsifies his judgments4 ,the sufferings which he now reviews as through a veil were actually experienced by him in all their intensity4 ,hence he enters them at a wrong valuation on the debit side of his account4 ,in order to arrive at a correct estimate1 an ambitious man would have to lay aside his ambition for the time of his inquiry4 ,he would have to review his past life without any distorting glasses before his mind's eye1 else he will resemble a merchant who1 in making up his books1 enters among the items on the credit side his own zeal in business4 ,but ,von ,hartmann goes even further4 ,he says the ambitious man must make clear to himself that the public recognition which he craves is not worth having4 ,by himself1 or with the guidance of others1 he must attain the insight that rational beings cannot attach any value to recognition by others1 seeing that in all matters which are not vital questions of development1 or which have not been definitely settled by science1 it is always as certain as anything can be that the majority is wrong and the minority right4 ,whoever makes ambition the lode-star of his life puts the happiness of his life at the mercy of so fallible a judgment 7,philosophie des ,unbewussten1 vol4 ii1 p4 #ccb74 ,if the ambitious man acknowledges all this to himself1 he is bound to regard all the achievements of his ambition as illusions1 including even the feelings which attach themselves to the satisfaction of his ambitious desires4 ,this is the reason why ,von ,hartmann says that we must also strike out of the balance-sheet of our life-values whatever is seen to be illusory in our feelings of pleasure4 ,what remains after that represents the sum-total of pleasure in life1 and this sum is so small compared with the sum-total of pain that life is no enjoyment and non-existence preferable to existence4 ,but whilst it is immediately evident that the interference of the instinct of ambition produces self-deception in striking the balance of pleasures and thus leads to a false result1 we must none the less challenge what ,von ,hartmann says concerning the illusory character of the objects to which pleasure is attached4 ,for the elimination1 from the credit-side of life1 of all pleasurable feelings which accompany actual or supposed illusions would positively falsify the balance of pleasure and of pain4 ,an ambitious man has genuinely enjoyed the acclamations of the multitude1 irrespective of whether subsequently he himself1 or some other person1 recognises that this acclamation is an illusion4 ,the pleasure1 once enjoyed1 is not one whit diminished by such recognition4 ,consequently the elimination of all these illusory feelings from life's balance1 so far from making our judgment about our feelings more correct1 actually cancels out of life feelings which were genuinely there4 ,and why are these feelings to be eliminated8 ,he who has them derives pleasure from them2 he who has overcome them1 gains through the experience of self-conquest 7not through the vain emotion3 ,what a noble fellow ,i am6 but through the objective sources of pleasure which lie in the self-conquest7 a pleasure which is1 indeed1 spiritualised1 but none the less valuable for that4 ,if we strike feelings from the credit side of pleasure in our account1 on the ground that they are attached to objects which turn out to have been illusory1 we make the value of life dependent1 not on the quantity1 but on the quality of pleasure1 and this1 in turn1 on the value of the objects which cause the pleasure4 ,but if ,i am to determine the value of life only by the quantity of pleasure or pain which it brings1 ,i have no right to presuppose something else by which first to determine the positive or negative value of pleasure4 ,if ,i say ,i want to compare quantity of pleasure and quantity of pain1 in order to see which is greater1 ,i am bound to bring into my account all pleasures and pains in their actual intensities1 regardless of whether they are based on illusions or not4 ,if ,i credit a pleasure which rests on an illusion with a lesser value for life than one which can justify itself before the tribunal of reason1 ,i make the value of life dependent on factors other than mere quantity of pleasure4 ,whoever1 like ,eduard von ,hartmann1 puts down pleasure as less valuable when it is attached to a worthless object1 is like a merchant who enters the considerable profits of a toy-factory at only one-quarter of their real value on the ground that the factory produces nothing but playthings for children4 ,if the point is simply to weigh quantity of pleasure against quantity of pain1 we ought to leave the illusory character of the objects of some pleasures entirely out of account4 ,the method1 then1 which ,von ,hartmann recommends1 viz41 rational criticism of the quantities of pleasure and pain produced by life1 has taught us so far how we are to get the data for our calculation1 i4e41 what we are to put down on the one side of our account and what on the other4 ,but how are we to make the actual calculation8 ,is reason able also to strike the balance8 ,a merchant makes a miscalculation when the gain calculated by him does not balance with the profits which he has demonstrably enjoyed from his business or is still expecting to enjoy4 ,similarly1 the philosopher will undoubtedly have made a mistake in his estimate1 if he cannot demonstrate in actual feeling the surplus of pleasure or1 as the case may be1 of pain which his manipulation of the account may have yielded4 ,for the present ,i shall not criticise the calculations of those ,pessimists who support their estimate of the value of the world by an appeal to reason4 ,but if we are to decide whether to carry on the business of life or not1 we shall demand first to be shown where the alleged balance of pain is to be found4 ,here we touch the point where reason is not in a position by itself to determine the surplus of pleasure or of pain1 but where it must exhibit this surplus in life as something actually felt4 ,for man reaches reality not through concepts by themselves1 but through the interpenetration of concepts and percepts 7and feelings are percepts7 which thinking brings about 7cp4 pp4 #hb ff474 ,a merchant will give up his business only when the loss of goods1 as calculated by his accountant1 is actually confirmed by the facts4 ,if the facts do not bear out the calculation1 he asks his accountant to check the account once more4 ,that is exactly what a man will do in the business of life4 ,if a philosopher wants to prove to him that the pain is far greater than the pleasure1 but that he does not feel it so1 then he will reply3 ,you have made a mistake in your theorisings2 repeat your analysis once more4 ,but if there comes a time in a business when the losses are really so great that the firm's credit no longer suffices to satisfy the creditors1 bankruptcy results1 even though the merchant may avoid keeping himself informed by careful accounts about the state of his affairs4 ,similarly1 supposing the quantity of pain in a man's life became at any time so great that no hope 7credit7 of future pleasure could help him to get over the pain1 the bankruptcy of life's business would inevitably follow4 ,now the number of those who commit suicide is relatively small compared with the number of those who live bravely on4 ,only very few men give up the business of life because of the pain involved4 ,what follows8 ,either that it is untrue to say that the quantity of pain is greater than the quantity of pleasure1 or that we do not make the continuation of life dependent on the quantity of felt pleasure or pain4 ,in a very curious way1 ,eduard von ,hartmann's ,pessimism1 having concluded that life is valueless because it contains a surplus of pain1 yet affirms the necessity of going on with life4 ,this necessity lies in the fact that the world-purpose mentioned above 7p4 #baf7 can be achieved only by the ceaseless1 devoted labour of human beings4 ,but so long as men still pursue their egoistical appetites they are unfit for this devoted labour4 ,it is not until experience and reason have convinced them that the pleasures which ,egoism pursues are incapable of attainment1 that they give themselves up to their proper task4 ,in this way the pessimistic conviction is offered as the fountain of unselfishness4 ,an education based on ,pessimism is to exterminate ,egoism by convincing it of the hopelessness of achieving its aims4 ,according to this view1 then1 the striving for pleasure is fundamentally inherent in human nature4 ,it is only through the insight into the impossibility of satisfaction that this striving abdicates in favour of the higher tasks of humanity4 ,it is1 however1 impossible to say of this ethical theory1 which expects from the establishment of ,pessimism a devotion to unselfish ends in life1 that it really overcomes ,egoism in the proper sense of the word4 ,the moral ideas are said not to be strong enough to dominate the will until man has learnt that the selfish striving after pleasure cannot lead to any satisfaction4 ,man1 whose selfishness desires the grapes of pleasure1 finds them sour because he cannot attain them1 and so he turns his back on them and devotes himself to an unselfish life4 ,moral ideals1 then1 according to the opinion of ,pessimists1 are too weak to overcome ,egoism1 but they establish their kingdom on the territory which previous recognition of the hopelessness of ,egoism has cleared for them4 ,if men by nature strive after pleasure but are unable to attain it1 it follows that annihilation of existence and salvation through non-existence are the only rational ends4 ,and if we accept the view that the real bearer of the pain of the world is ,god1 it follows that the task of men consists in helping to bring about the salvation of ,god4 ,to commit suicide does not advance1 but hinders1 the realisation of this aim4 ,god must rationally be conceived as having created men for the sole purpose of bringing about his salvation through their action1 else would creation be purposeless4 ,every one of us has to perform his own definite task in the general work of salvation4 ,if he withdraws from the task by suicide1 another has to do the work which was intended for him4 ,somebody else must bear in his stead the agony of existence4 ,and since in every being it is1 at bottom1 ,god who is the ultimate bearer of all pain1 it follows that to commit suicide does not in the least diminish the quantity of ,god's pain1 but rather imposes upon ,god the additional difficulty of providing a substitute4 ,this whole theory presupposes that pleasure is the standard of value for life4 ,now life manifests itself through a number of instincts 7needs74 ,if the value of life depended on its producing more pleasure than pain1 an instinct would have to be called valueless which brought to its owner a balance of pain4 ,let us1 if you please1 inspect instinct and pleasure1 in order to see whether the former can be measured by the latter4 ,and lest we give rise to the suspicion that life does not begin for us below the sphere of the aristocrats of the intellect1 we shall begin our examination with a purely animal need1 viz41 hunger4 ,hunger arises when our organs are unable to continue functioning without a fresh supply of food4 ,what a hungry man desires1 in the first instance1 is to have his hunger stilled4 ,as soon as the supply of nourishment has reached the point where hunger ceases1 everything has been attained that the food-instinct craves4 ,the pleasure which is connected with satiety consists1 to begin with1 in the removal of the pain which is caused by hunger4 ,but to the mere food-instinct there is added a further need4 ,for man does not merely desire to restore1 by the consumption of food1 the disturbance in the functioning of his organs1 or to get rid of the pain of hunger1 but he seeks to effect this to the accompaniment of pleasurable sensations of taste4 ,when he feels hungry1 and is within half an hour of a meal to which he looks forward with pleasure1 he avoids spoiling his enjoyment of the better food by taking inferior food which might satisfy his hunger sooner4 ,he needs hunger in order to get the full enjoyment out of his meal4 ,thus hunger becomes for him at the same time a cause of pleasure4 ,supposing all the hunger in the world could be satisfied1 we should get the total quantity of pleasure which we owe to the existence of the desire for nourishment4 ,but we should still have to add the additional pleasure which gourmets gain by cultivating the sensibility of their taste-nerves beyond the common measure4 ,the greatest conceivable value of this quantity of pleasure would be reached1 if no need remained unsatisfied which was in any way connected with this kind of pleasure1 and if with the smooth of pleasure we had not at the same time to take a certain amount of the rough of pain4 ,modern ,science holds the view that ,nature produces more life than it can maintain1 i4e41 that ,nature also produces more hunger than it is able to satisfy4 ,the surplus of life thus produced is condemned to a painful death in the struggle for existence4 ,granted that the needs of life are1 at every moment of the world-process1 greater than the available means of satisfaction1 and that the enjoyment of life is correspondingly diminished1 yet such enjoyment as actually occurs is not one whit reduced thereby4 ,wherever a desire is satisfied1 there the corresponding quantity of pleasure exists1 even though in the creature itself which desires1 or in its fellow-creatures1 there are a large number of unsatisfied instincts4 ,what is diminished is1 not the quantity1 but the value of the enjoyment of life4 ,if only a part of the needs of a living creature find satisfaction1 it experiences still a corresponding pleasure4 ,this pleasure is inferior in value in proportion as it is inadequate to the total demand of life within a given group of desires4 ,we might represent this value as a fraction1 the numerator of which is the actually experienced pleasure1 whilst the denominator is the sum-total of needs4 ,this fraction has the value #a when the numerator and the denominator are equal1 i4e41 when all needs are also satisfied4 ,the fraction becomes greater than #a when a creature experiences more pleasure than its desires demand4 ,it becomes smaller than #a when the quantity of pleasure falls short of the sum-total of desires4 ,but the fraction can never have the value #j so long as the numerator has any value at all1 however small4 ,if a man were to make up the account before his death and to distribute in imagination over the whole of life the quantity belonging to a particular instinct 7e4g41 hunger71 as well as the demands of this instinct1 then the total pleasure which he has experienced might have only a very small value1 but this value would never become altogether nil4 ,if the quantity of pleasure remains constant1 then with every increase in the needs of the creature the value of the pleasure diminishes4 ,the same is true for the totality of life in ,nature4 ,the greater the number of creatures in proportion to those which are able fully to satisfy their instincts1 the smaller is the average pleasure-value of life4 ,the cheques on life's pleasure which are drawn in our favour in the form of our instincts1 become increasingly less valuable in proportion as we cannot expect to cash them at their full face value4 ,suppose ,i get enough to eat on three days and am then compelled to go hungry for another three days1 the actual pleasure on the three days of eating is not thereby diminished4 ,but ,i have now to think of it as distributed over six days1 and this reduces its value for my food-instinct by half4 ,the same applies to the quantity of pleasure as measured by the degree of my need4 ,suppose ,i have hunger enough for two sandwiches and can only get one1 the pleasure which this one gives me has only half the value it would have had if the eating of it had stilled my hunger4 ,this is the way in which we determine the value of a pleasure in life4 ,we determine it by the needs of life4 ,our desires supply the measure2 pleasure is what is measured4 ,the pleasure of stilling hunger has value only because hunger exists1 and it has determinate value through the proportion which it bears to the intensity of the hunger4 ,unfulfilled demands of our life throw their shadow even upon fulfilled desires1 and thus detract from the value of pleasurable hours4 ,but we may speak also of the present value of a feeling of pleasure4 ,this value is the smaller1 the more insignificant the pleasure is in proportion to the duration and intensity of our desire4 ,a quantity of pleasure has its full value for us when its duration and degree exactly coincide with our desire4 ,a quantity of pleasure which is smaller than our desire diminishes the value of the pleasure4 ,a quantity which is greater produces a surplus which has not been demanded and which is felt as pleasure only so long as1 whilst enjoying the pleasure1 we can correspondingly increase the intensity of our desire4 ,if we are not able to keep pace in the increase of our desire with the increase in pleasure1 then pleasure turns into displeasure4 ,the object which would otherwise satisfy us1 when it assails us unbidden makes us suffer4 ,this proves that pleasure has value for us only so long as we have desires by which to measure it4 ,an excess of pleasurable feeling turns into pain4 ,this may be observed especially in those men whose desire for a given kind of pleasure is very small4 ,in people whose desire for food is dulled1 eating easily produces nausea4 ,this again shows that desire is the measure of value for pleasure4 ,now ,pessimism might reply that an unsatisfied desire for food produces1 not only the pain of a lost enjoyment1 but also positive ills1 agony1 and misery in the world4 ,it appeals for confirmation to the untold misery of all who are harassed by anxieties about food1 and to the vast amount of pain which for these unfortunates results indirectly from their lack of food4 ,and if it wants to extend its assertion also to non-human nature1 it can point to the agonies of animals which1 in certain seasons1 die from lack of food4 ,concerning all these evils the ,pessimist maintains that they far outweigh the quantity of pleasure which the food-instinct brings into the world4 ,there is no doubt that it is possible to compare pleasure and pain one with another1 and determine the surplus of the one or the other as we determine commercial gain or loss4 ,but if ,pessimists think that a surplus on the side of pain is a ground for inferring that life is valueless1 they fall into the mistake of making a calculation which in actual life is never made4 ,our desire1 in any given case1 is directed to a particular object4 ,the value of the pleasure of satisfaction1 as we have seen1 will be the greater in proportion as the quantity of the pleasure is greater relatively to the intensity of our desire4 #ac ,it depends1 further1 on this intensity how large a quantity of pain we are willing to bear in order to gain the pleasure4 ,we compare the quantity of pain1 not with the quantity of pleasure1 but with the intensity of our desire4 ,he who finds great pleasure in eating will1 by reason of his pleasure in better times1 be more easily able to bear a period of hunger than one who does not derive pleasure from the satisfaction of the instinct for food4 ,a woman who wants a child compares the pleasures resulting from the possession of a child1 not with the quantities of pain due to pregnancy1 birth1 nursing1 etc41 but with her desire for the possession of the child4 ,we never aim at a certain quantity of pleasure in the abstract1 but at concrete satisfaction of a perfectly determinate kind4 ,when we are aiming at a definite object or a definite sensation1 it will not satisfy us to be offered some other object or some other sensation1 even though they give the same amount of pleasure4 ,if we desire satisfaction of hunger1 we cannot substitute for the pleasure which this satisfaction would bring a pleasure equally great but produced by a walk4 ,only if our desire were1 quite generally1 for a certain quantity of pleasure1 would it have to die away at once if this pleasure were unattainable except at the price of an even greater quantity of pain4 ,but because we desire a determinate kind of satisfaction1 we experience the pleasure of realisation even when1 along with it1 we have to bear an even greater pain4 ,the instincts of living beings tend in a determinate direction and aim at concrete objects1 and it is just for this reason that it is impossible1 in our calculations1 to set down as an equivalent factor the quantities of pain which we have to bear in the pursuit of our object4 ,provided the desire is sufficiently intense to be still to some degree in existence even after having overcome the pain--however great that pain1 taken in the abstract1 may be--the pleasure of satisfaction may still be enjoyed to its full extent4 ,the desire1 therefore1 does not measure the pain directly against the pleasure which we attain1 but indirectly by measuring the pain 7proportionately7 against its own intensity4 ,the question is not whether the pleasure to be gained is greater than the pain1 but whether the desire for the object at which we aim is greater than the inhibitory effect of the pain which we have to face4 ,if the inhibition is greater than the desire1 the latter yields to the inevitable1 slackens1 and ceases to strive4 ,but inasmuch as we strive after a determinate kind of satisfaction1 the pleasure we gain thereby acquires an importance which makes it possible1 once satisfaction has been attained1 to allow in our calculation for the inevitable pain only in so far as it has diminished the intensity of our desire4 ,if ,i am passionately fond of beautiful views1 ,i never calculate the amount of pleasure which the view from the mountain-top gives me as compared directly with the pain of the toilsome ascent and descent2 but ,i reflect whether1 after having overcome all difficulties1 my desire for the view will still be sufficiently intense4 ,thus pleasure and pain can be made commensurate only mediately through the intensity of the desire4 ,hence the question is not at all whether there is a surplus of pleasure or of pain1 but whether the desire for pleasure is sufficiently intense to overcome the pain4 ,a proof for the accuracy of this view is to be found in the fact1 that we put a higher value on pleasure when it has to be purchased at the price of great pain than when it simply falls into our lap like a gift from heaven4 ,when sufferings and agonies have toned down our desire and yet after all our aim is attained1 then the pleasure is all the greater in proportion to the intensity of the desire that has survived4 ,now it is just this proportion which1 as ,i have shown 7p4 #bcc71 represents the value of the pleasure4 ,a further proof is to be found in the fact that all living creatures 7including men7 develop their instincts as long as they are able to bear the opposition of pains and agonies4 ,the struggle for existence is but a consequence of this fact4 ,all living creatures strive to expand1 and only those abandon the struggle whose desires are throttled by the overwhelming magnitude of the difficulties with which they meet4 ,every living creature seeks food until sheer lack of food destroys its life4 ,man1 too1 does not turn his hand against himself until1 rightly or wrongly1 he believes that he cannot attain those aims in life which alone seem to him worth striving for4 ,so long as he still believes in the possibility of attaining what he thinks worth striving for1 he will battle against all pains and miseries4 ,philosophy would have to convince man that striving is rational only when pleasure outweighs pain1 for it is his nature to strive for the attainment of the objects which he desires1 so long as he can bear the inevitable incidental pain1 however great that may be4 ,such a philosophy1 however1 would be mistaken1 because it would make the human will dependent on a factor 7the surplus of pleasure over pain7 which1 at first1 is wholly foreign to man's point of view4 ,the original measure of his will is his desire1 and desire asserts itself as long as it can4 ,if ,i am compelled1 in purchasing a certain quantity of apples1 to take twice as many rotten ones as sound ones--because the seller wishes to clear out his stock--,i shall not hesitate a moment to take the bad apples as well1 if ,i put so high a value on the smaller quantity of good apples that ,i am prepared1 in addition to the purchase price1 to bear also the expense for the transportation of the rotten goods4 ,this example illustrates the relation between the quantities of pleasure and of pain which are caused by a given instinct4 ,i determine the value of the good apples1 not by subtracting the sum of the good from that of the bad ones1 but by the fact that1 in spite of the presence of the bad ones1 ,i still attach a value to the good ones4 ,just as ,i leave out of account the bad apples in the enjoyment of the good ones1 so ,i surrender myself to the satisfaction of a desire after having shaken off the inevitable pains4 ,supposing even ,pessimism were in the right with its assertion that the world contains more pain than pleasure1 it would nevertheless have no influence upon the will1 for living beings would still strive after such pleasure as remains4 ,the empirical proof that pain overbalances pleasure is indeed effective for showing up the futility of that school of philosophy1 which looks for the value of life in a surplus of pleasure 7,eudmonism71 but not for exhibiting the will1 as such1 as irrational4 ,for the will is not set upon a surplus of pleasure1 but on whatever quantity of pleasure remains after subtracting the pain4 ,this remaining pleasure still appears always as an object worth pursuing4 ,an attempt has been made to refute ,pessimism by asserting that it is impossible to determine by calculation the surplus of pleasure or of pain in the world4 ,the possibility of every calculation depends on our being able to compare the things to be calculated in respect of their quantity4 ,every pain and every pleasure has a definite quantity 7intensity and duration74 ,further1 we can compare pleasurable feelings of different kinds one with another1 at least approximately1 with regard to their intensity4 ,we know whether we derive more pleasure from a good cigar or from a good joke4 ,no objection can be raised against the comparability of different pleasures and pains in respect of their intensity4 ,the thinker who sets himself the task of determining the surplus of pleasure or pain in the world1 starts from presuppositions which are undeniably legitimate4 ,it is possible to maintain that the ,pessimistic results are false1 but it is not possible to doubt that quantities of pleasure and pain can be scientifically estimated1 and that the surplus of the one or the other can thereby be determined4 ,it is incorrect1 however1 to assert that from this calculation any conclusions can be drawn for the human will4 ,the cases in which we really make the value of our activity dependent on whether pleasure or pain shows a surplus1 are those in which the objects towards which our activity is directed are indifferent to us4 ,if it is a question whether1 after the day's work1 ,i am to amuse myself by a game or by light conversation1 and if ,i am totally indifferent what ,i do so long as it amuses me1 then ,i simply ask myself3 ,what gives me the greatest surplus of pleasure8 ,and ,i abandon the activity altogether if the scales incline towards the side of displeasure4 ,if we are buying a toy for a child we consider1 in selecting1 what will give him the greatest pleasure1 but in all other cases we are not determined exclusively by considerations of the balance of pleasure4 ,hence1 if ,pessimistic thinkers believe that they are preparing the ground for an unselfish devotion to the work of civilisation1 by demonstrating that there is a greater quantity of pain than of pleasure in life1 they forget altogether that the human will is so constituted that it cannot be influenced by this knowledge4 ,the whole striving of men is directed towards the greatest possible satisfaction that is attainable after overcoming all difficulties4 ,the hope of this satisfaction is the basis of all human activity4 ,the work of every single individual and the whole achievement of civilisation have their roots in this hope4 ,the ,pessimistic theory of ,ethics thinks it necessary to represent the pursuit of pleasure as impossible1 in order that man may devote himself to his proper moral tasks4 ,but these moral tasks are nothing but the concrete natural and spiritual instincts2 and he strives to satisfy these notwithstanding all incidental pain4 ,the pursuit of pleasure1 then1 which the ,pessimist sets himself to eradicate is nowhere to be found4 ,but the tasks which man has to fulfil are fulfilled by him because from his very nature he wills to fulfil them4 ,the ,pessimistic system of ,ethics maintains that a man cannot devote himself to what he recognises as his task in life until he has first given up the desire for pleasure4 ,but no system of ,ethics can ever invent other tasks than the realisation of those satisfactions which human desires demand1 and the fulfilment of man's moral ideas4 ,no ,ethical theory can deprive him of the pleasure which he experiences in the realisation of what he desires4 ,when the ,pessimist says1 ,do not strive after pleasure1 for pleasure is unattainable2 strive instead after what you recognise to be your task1 we must reply that it is human nature to strive to do one's tasks1 and that philosophy has gone astray in inventing the principle that man strives for nothing but pleasure4 ,he aims at the satisfaction of what his nature demands1 and the attainment of this satisfaction is to him a pleasure4 ,pessimistic ,ethics1 in demanding that we should strive1 not after pleasure1 but after the realisation of what we recognise as our task1 lays its finger on the very thing which man wills in virtue of his own nature4 ,there is no need for man to be turned inside out by philosophy1 there is no need for him to discard his nature1 in order to be moral4 ,morality means striving for an end so long as the pain connected with this striving does not inhibit the desire for the end altogether2 and this is the essence of all genuine will4 ,ethics is not founded on the eradication of all desire for pleasure1 in order that1 in its place1 bloodless moral ideas may set up their rule where no strong desire for pleasure stands in their way1 but it is based on the strong will1 sustained by ideal intuitions1 which attains its end even when the path to it is full of thorns4 ,moral ideals have their root in the moral imagination of man4 ,their realisation depends on the desire for them being sufficiently intense to overcome pains and agonies4 ,they are man's own intuitions4 ,in them his spirit braces itself to action4 ,they are what he wills1 because their realisation is his highest pleasure4 ,he needs no ,ethical theory first to forbid him to strive for pleasure and then to prescribe to him what he shall strive for4 ,he will1 of himself1 strive for moral ideals provided his moral imagination is sufficiently active to inspire him with the intuitions1 which give strength to his will to overcome all resistance4 ,if a man strives towards sublimely great ideals1 it is because they are the content of his will1 and because their realisation will bring him an enjoyment compared with which the pleasure which inferior spirits draw from the satisfaction of their commonplace needs is a mere nothing4 ,idealists delight in translating their ideals into reality4 ,anyone who wants to eradicate the pleasure which the fulfilment of human desires brings1 will have first to degrade man to the position of a slave who does not act because he wills1 but because he must4 ,for the attainment of the object of will gives pleasure4 ,what we call the good is not what a man must do1 but what he wills to do when he unfolds the fulness of his nature4 ,anyone who does not acknowledge this must deprive man of all the objects of his will1 and then prescribe to him from without what he is to make the content of his will4 ,man values the satisfaction of a desire because the desire springs from his own nature4 ,what he attains is valuable because it is the object of his will4 ,if we deny any value to the ends which men do will1 then we shall have to look for the ends that are valuable among objects which men do not will4 ,a system of ,ethics1 then1 which is built up on ,pessimism has its root in the contempt for man's moral imagination4 ,only he who does not consider the individual human mind capable of determining for itself the content of its striving1 can look for the sum and substance of will in the craving for pleasure4 ,a man without imagination does not create moral ideas2 they must be imparted to him4 ,physical nature sees to it that he seeks the satisfaction of his lower desires2 but for the development of the whole man the desires which have their origin in the spirit are fully as necessary4 ,only those who believe that man has no such spiritual desires at all can maintain that they must be imparted to him from without4 ,on that view it will also be correct to say that it is man's duty to do what he does not will to do4 ,every ,ethical system which demands of man that he should suppress his will in order to fulfil tasks which he does not will1 works1 not with the whole man1 but with a stunted being who lacks the faculty of spiritual desires4 ,for a man who has been harmoniously developed1 the so-called ideas of the ,good lie1 not without1 but within the range of his will4 ,moral action consists1 not in the extirpation of one's individual will1 but in the fullest development of human nature4 ,to regard moral ideals as attainable only on condition that man destroys his individual will1 is to ignore the fact that these ideals are as much rooted in man's will as the satisfaction of the so-called animal instincts4 ,it cannot be denied that the views here outlined may easily be misunderstood4 ,immature youths without any moral imagination like to look upon the instincts of their half-developed natures as the full substance of humanity1 and reject all moral ideas which they have not themselves originated1 in order that they may live themselves out without restriction4 ,but it goes without saying that a theory which holds for a fully developed man does not hold for half-developed boys4 ,anyone who still requires to be brought by education to the point where his moral nature breaks through the shell of his lower passions1 cannot expect to be measured by the same standard as a mature man4 ,but it was not my intention to set down what a half-fledged youth requires to be taught1 but the essential nature of a mature man4 ,my intention was to demonstrate the possibility of freedom1 which becomes manifest1 not in actions physically or psychically determined1 but in actions sustained2 by spiritual intuitions4 ,every mature man is the maker of his own value4 ,he does not aim at pleasure1 which comes to him as a gift of grace on the part of ,nature or of the ,creator2 nor does he live for the sake of what he recognises as duty1 after he has put away from him the desire for pleasure4 ,he acts as he wills1 that is1 in accordance with his moral intuitions2 and he finds in the attainment of what he wills the true enjoyment of life4 ,he determines the value of his life by measuring his attainments against his aims4 ,an ,ethical system which puts ought in the place of will1 duty in the place of inclination1 is consistent in determining the value of man by the ratio between the demands of duty and his actual achievements4 ,it applies to man a measure that is external to his own nature4 ,the view which ,i have here developed points man back to himself4 ,it recognises as the true value of life nothing except what each individual regards as such by the measure of his own will4 ,a value of life which the individual does not recognise is as little acknowledged by my views as a purpose of life which does not spring from the value thus recognised4 ,my view looks upon the individual as his own master and the assessor of his own value4 ,,addition ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah74 ,the argument of this chapter is open to misapprehension by those who obstinately insist on the apparent objection1 that the will1 as such1 is the irrational factor in man1 and that its irrationality should be exhibited in order to make man see1 that the goal of his moral endeavour ought to be his ultimate emancipation from will4 ,precisely such an illusory objection has been brought against me by a competent critic who urged that it is the business of the philosopher to make good what animals and most men thoughtlessly forget1 viz41 to strike a genuine balance of life's account4 ,but the objection ignores precisely the main point4 ,if freedom is to be realised1 the will in human nature must be sustained by intuitive thinking4 ,at the same time we find that the will may also be determined by factors other than intuition1 and that morality and its work can have no other root than the free realisation of intuition issuing from man's essential nature4 ,ethical ,individualism is well fitted to exhibit morality in its full dignity4 ,it does not regard true morality as the outward conformity of the will to a norm4 ,morality1 for it1 consists in the actions which issue from the unfolding of man's moral will as an integral part of his whole nature1 so that immorality appears to man as a stunting and crippling of his nature4 ,,xiv ,,the ,,individual ,,and ,,the ,,genus ,the view that man is a wholly self-contained1 free individuality stands in apparent conflict with the facts1 that he appears as a member of a natural whole 7race1 tribe1 nation1 family1 male or female sex71 and that he acts within a whole 7state1 church1 etc474 ,he exhibits the general characteristics of the community to which he belongs1 and gives to his actions a content which is defined by the place which he occupies within a social whole4 ,this being so1 is any individuality left at all8 ,can we regard man as a whole in himself1 in view of the fact that he grows out of a whole and fits as a member into a whole8 ,the character and function of a member of a whole are defined by the whole4 ,a tribe is a whole1 and all members of the tribe exhibit the peculiar characteristics which are conditioned by the nature of the tribe4 ,the character and activity of the individual member are determined by the character of the tribe4 ,hence the physiognomy and the conduct of the individual have something generic about them4 ,when we ask why this or that in a man is so or so1 we are referred from the individual to the genus4 ,the genus explains why something in the individual appears in the form observed by us4 ,but man emancipates himself from these generic characteristics4 ,he develops qualities and activities the reason for which we can seek only in himself4 ,the generic factors serve him only as a means to develop his own individual nature4 ,he uses the peculiarities with which nature has endowed him as material1 and gives them a form which expresses his own individuality4 ,we seek in vain for the reason of such an expression of a man's individuality in the laws of the genus4 ,we are dealing here with an individual who can be explained only through himself4 ,if a man has reached the point of emancipation from what is generic in him1 and we still attempt to explain all his qualities by reference to the character of the genus1 then we lack the organ for apprehending what is individual4 ,it is impossible to understand a human being completely if one makes the concept of the genus the basis of one's judgment4 ,the tendency to judge according to the genus is most persistent where differences of sex are involved4 ,man sees in woman1 woman in man1 almost always too much of the generic characteristics of the other's sex1 and too little of what is individual in the other4 ,in practical life this does less harm to men than to women4 ,the social position of women is1 in most instances1 so low because it is not determined by the individual characteristics of each woman herself1 but by the general ideas which are current concerning the natural function and needs of woman4 ,a man's activity in life is determined by his individual capacity and inclination1 whereas a woman's activity is supposed to be determined solely by the fact that she is just a woman4 ,woman is to be the slave of the generic1 of the general idea of womanhood4 ,so long as men debate whether woman1 from her natural disposition1 is fitted for this1 that1 or the other profession1 the so-called ,woman's ,question will never advance beyond the most elementary stage4 ,what it lies in woman's nature to strive for had better be left to woman herself to decide4 ,if it is true that women are fitted only for that profession which is theirs at present1 then they will hardly have it in them to attain any other4 ,but they must be allowed to decide for themselves what is conformable to their nature4 ,to all who fear an upheaval of our social structure1 should women be treated as individuals and not as specimens of their sex1 we need only reply that a social structure in which the status of one-half of humanity is unworthy of a human being stands itself in great need of improvement4 #ad ,anyone who judges human beings according to their generic character stops short at the very point beyond which they begin to be individuals whose activity rests on free self-determination4 ,whatever lies short of this point may naturally become matter for scientific study4 ,thus the characteristics of race1 tribe1 nation1 and sex are the subject-matter of special sciences4 ,only men who are simply specimens of the genus could possibly fit the generic picture which the methods of these sciences produce4 ,but all these sciences are unable to get as far as the unique character of the single individual4 ,where the sphere of freedom 7thinking and acting7 begins1 there the possibility of determining the individual according to the laws of his genus ceases4 ,the conceptual content which man1 by an act of thought1 has to connect with percepts1 in order to possess himself fully of reality 7cp4 pp4 #hc ff471 cannot be fixed by anyone once and for all1 and handed down to humanity ready-made4 ,the individual must gain his concepts through his own intuition4 ,it is impossible to deduce from any concept of the genus how the individual ought to think2 that depends singly and solely on the individual himself4 ,so1 again1 it is just as impossible to determine1 on the basis of the universal characteristics of human nature1 what concrete ends the individual will set before himself4 ,anyone who wants to understand the single individual must penetrate to the innermost core of his being1 and not stop short at those qualities which he shares with others4 ,in this sense every single human being is a problem4 ,and every science which deals only with abstract thoughts and generic concepts is but a preparation for the kind of knowledge which we gain when a human individual communicates to us his way of viewing the world1 and for that other kind of knowledge which each of us gains from the content of his own will4 ,wherever we feel that here we are dealing with a man who has emancipated his thinking from all that is generic1 and his will from the grooves typical of his kind1 there we must cease to call in any concepts of our own making if we would understand his nature4 ,knowledge consists in the combination by thought of a concept and a percept4 ,with all other objects the observer has to gain his concepts through his intuition4 ,but if the problem is to understand a free individuality1 we need only to take over into our own minds those concepts by which the individual determines himself1 in their pure form 7without admixture74 ,those who always mix their own ideas into their judgment on another person can never attain to the understanding of an individuality4 ,just as the free individual emancipates himself from the characteristics of the genus1 so our knowledge of the individual must emancipate itself from the methods by which we understand what is generic4 ,a man counts as a free spirit in a human community only to the degree in which he has emancipated himself1 in the way we have indicated1 from all that is generic4 ,no man is all genus1 none is all individuality2 but every man gradually emancipates a greater or lesser sphere of his being1 both from the generic characteristics of animal life1 and from the laws of human authorities which rule him despotically4 ,in respect of that part of his nature for which man is not able to win this freedom for himself1 he forms a member within the organism of nature and of spirit4 ,he lives1 in this respect1 by the imitation of others1 or in obedience to their command4 ,but ethical value belongs only to that part of his conduct which springs from his intuitions4 ,and whatever moral instincts man possesses through the inheritance of social instincts1 acquire ethical value through being taken up into his intuitions4 ,in such ethical intuitions all moral activity of men has its root4 ,to put this differently3 the moral life of humanity is the sum-total of the products of the moral imagination of free human individuals4 ,this is ,monism's confession of faith4 ,,ultimate ,,questions ,,xv ,,the ,,consequences ,,of ,,monism ,an explanation of ,nature on a single principle1 or1 in other words1 ,monism1 derives from human experience all the material which it requires for the explanation of the world4 ,in the same way1 it looks for the springs of action also within the world of observation1 i4e41 in that human part of ,nature which is accessible to our self-observation1 and more particularly in the moral imagination4 ,monism declines to seek outside that world the ultimate grounds of the world which we perceive and think4 ,for ,monism1 the unity which reflective observation adds to the manifold multiplicity of percepts1 is identical with the unity which the human desire for knowledge demands1 and through which this desire seeks entrance into the physical and spiritual realms4 ,whoever looks for another unity behind this one1 only shows that he fails to perceive the coincidence of the results of thinking with the demands of the instinct for knowledge4 ,a particular human individual is not something cut off from the universe4 ,he is a part of the universe1 and his connection with the cosmic whole is broken1 not in reality1 but only for our perception4 ,at first we apprehend the human part of the universe as a self-existing thing1 because we are unable to perceive the cords and ropes by which the fundamental forces of the cosmos keep turning the wheel of our life4 ,all who remain at this perceptual standpoint see the part of the whole as if it were a truly independent1 self-existing thing1 a monad which gains all its knowledge of the rest of the world in some mysterious manner from without4 ,but ,monism has shown that we can believe in this independence only so long as thought does not gather our percepts into the network of the conceptual world4 ,as soon as this happens1 all partial existence in the universe1 all isolated being1 reveals itself as a mere appearance due to perception4 ,existence as a self-contained totality can be predicated only of the universe as a whole4 ,thought destroys the appearances due to perception and assigns to our individual existence a place in the life of the cosmos4 ,the unity of the conceptual world which contains all objective percepts1 has room also within itself for the content of our subjective personality4 ,thought gives us the true structure of reality as a self-contained unity1 whereas the multiplicity of percepts is but an appearance conditioned by our organisation 7cp4 pp4 #agh ff474 ,the recognition of the true unity of reality1 as against the appearance of multiplicity1 is at all times the goal of human thought4 ,science strives to apprehend our apparently disconnected percepts as a unity by tracing their inter-relations according to natural law4 ,but1 owing to the prejudice that an inter-relation discovered by human thought has only a subjective validity1 thinkers have sought the true ground of unity in some object transcending the world of our experience 7,god1 will1 absolute spirit1 etc474 ,further1 basing themselves on this prejudice1 men have tried to gain1 in addition to their knowledge of inter-relations within experience1 a second kind of knowledge transcending experience1 which should reveal the connection between empirical inter-relations and those realities which lie beyond the limits of experience 7,metaphysics74 ,the reason why1 by logical thinking1 we understand the nexus of the world1 was thought to be that an original creator has built up the world according to logical laws1 and1 similarly1 the ground of our actions was thought to lie in the will of this original being4 ,it was overlooked that thinking embraces in one grasp the subjective and the objective1 and that it communicates to us the whole of reality in the union which it effects between percept and concept4 ,only so long as we contemplate the laws which pervade and determine all percepts1 in the abstract form of concepts1 do we indeed deal only with something purely subjective4 ,but this subjectivity does not belong to the content of the concept which1 by means of thought1 is added to the percept4 ,this content is taken1 not from the subject1 but from reality4 ,it is that part of reality which is inaccessible to perception4 ,it is experience1 but not the kind of experience which comes from perception4 ,those who cannot understand that the concept is something real1 have in mind only the abstract form1 in which we fix and isolate the concept4 ,but in this isolation1 the concept is as much dependent solely on our organisation as is the percept4 ,the tree which ,i perceive1 taken in isolation by itself1 has no existence2 it exists only as a member in the immense mechanism of ,nature1 and is possible only in real connection with ,nature4 ,an abstract concept1 taken by itself1 has as little reality as a percept taken by itself4 ,the percept is that part of reality which is given objectively1 the concept that part which is given subjectively 7by intuition2 cp4 pp4 #ij ff474 ,our mental organisation breaks up reality into these two factors4 ,the one factor is apprehended by perception1 the other by intuition4 ,only the union of the two1 which consists of the percept fitted according to law into its place in the universe1 is reality in its full character4 ,if we take mere percepts by themselves1 we have no reality but only a disconnected chaos4 ,if we take the laws which determine percepts by themselves1 we have nothing but abstract concepts4 ,reality is not to be found in the abstract concept4 ,it is revealed to the contemplative act of thought which regards neither the concept by itself nor the percept by itself1 but the union of both4 ,even the most orthodox ,idealist will not deny that we live in the real world 7that1 as real beings1 we are rooted in it72 but he will deny that our knowledge1 by means of its ideas1 is able to grasp reality as we live it4 ,as against this view1 ,monism shows that thought is neither subjective nor objective1 but a principle which holds together both these sides of reality4 ,the contemplative act of thought is a cognitive process which belongs itself to the sequence of real events4 ,by thought we overcome1 within the limits of experience itself1 the one-sidedness of mere perception4 ,we are not able by means of abstract conceptual hypotheses 7purely conceptual speculation7 to puzzle out the nature of the real1 but in so far as we find for our percepts the right concepts we live in the real4 ,monism does not seek to supplement experience by something unknowable 7transcending experience71 but finds reality in concept and percept4 ,it does not manufacture a metaphysical system out of pure concepts1 because it looks upon concepts as only one side of reality1 viz41 the side which remains hidden from perception1 but is meaningless except in union with percepts4 ,but ,monism gives man the conviction that he lives in the world of reality1 and has no need to seek beyond the world for a higher reality4 ,it refuses to look for ,absolute ,reality anywhere but in experience1 because it recognises reality in the very content of experience4 ,monism is satisfied with this reality1 because it knows that our thought points to no other4 ,what ,dualism seeks beyond the world of experience1 that ,monism finds in this world itself4 ,monism shows that our knowledge grasps reality in its true nature1 not in a purely subjective image4 ,it holds the conceptual content of the world to be identical for all human individuals 7cp4 pp4 #hd ff474 ,according to ,monistic principles1 every human individual regards every other as akin to himself1 because it is the same world-content which expresses itself in all4 ,in the single conceptual world there are not as many concepts of lion as there are individuals who form the thought of lion1 but only one4 ,and the concept which ,a adds to the percept of lion is identical with ,b's concept except so far as1 in each case1 it is apprehended by a different perceiving subject 7cp4 p4 #he74 ,thought leads all perceiving subjects back to the ideal unity in all multiplicity1 which is common to them all4 ,there is but one ideal world1 but it realises itself in human subjects as in a multiplicity of individuals4 ,so long as man apprehends himself merely by self-observation1 he looks upon himself as this particular being1 but so soon as he becomes conscious of the ideal world which shines forth within him1 and which embraces all particulars within itself1 he perceives that the ,absolute ,reality lives within him4 ,dualism fixes upon the ,divine ,being as that which permeates all men and lives in them all4 ,monism finds this universal ,divine ,life in ,reality itself4 ,the ideal content of another subject is also my content1 and ,i regard it as a different content only so long as ,i perceive1 but no longer when ,i think4 ,every man embraces in his thought only a part of the total world of ideas1 and so far1 individuals are distinguished one from another also by the actual contents of their thought4 ,but all these contents belong to a self-contained whole1 which comprises within itself the thought-contents of all men4 ,hence every man1 in so far as he thinks1 lays hold of the universal ,reality which pervades all men4 ,to fill one's life with such thought-content is to live in ,reality1 and at the same time to live in ,god4 ,the thought of a ,beyond owes its origin to the misconception of those who believe that this world cannot have the ground of its existence in itself4 ,they do not understand that1 by thinking1 they discover just what they demand for the explanation of the perceptual world4 ,this is the reason why no speculation has ever produced any content which has not been borrowed from reality as it is given to us4 ,a personal ,god is nothing but a human being transplanted into the ,beyond4 ,schopenhauer's ,will is the human will made absolute4 ,hartmann's ,unconscious1 made up of idea and will1 is but a compound of two abstractions drawn from experience4 ,exactly the same is true of all other transcendent principles4 ,the truth is that the human mind never transcends the reality in which it lives4 ,indeed1 it has no need to transcend it1 seeing that this world contains everything that is required for its own explanation4 ,if philosophers declare themselves finally content when they have deduced the world from principles which they borrow from experience and then transplant into an hypothetical ,beyond1 the same satisfaction ought to be possible1 if these same principles are allowed to remain in this world to which they belong anyhow4 ,all attempts to transcend the world are purely illusory1 and the principles transplanted into the ,beyond do not explain the world any better than the principles which are immanent in it4 ,when thought understands itself1 it does not demand any such transcendence at all1 for there is no thought-content which does not find within the world a perceptual content1 in union with which it can form a real object4 ,the objects of imagination1 too1 are contents which have no validity1 until they have been transformed into ideas that refer to a perceptual content4 ,through this perceptual content they have their place in reality4 ,a concept the content of which is supposed to lie beyond the world which is given to us1 is an abstraction to which no reality corresponds4 ,thought can discover only the concepts of reality2 in order to find reality itself1 we need also perception4 ,an ,absolute ,being for which we invent a content1 is a hypothesis which no thought can entertain that understands itself4 ,monism does not deny ideal factors2 indeed1 it refuses to recognise as fully real a perceptual content which has no ideal counterpart1 but it finds nothing within the whole range of thought that is not immanent within this world of ours4 ,a science which restricts itself to a description of percepts1 without advancing to their ideal complements1 is1 for ,monism1 but a fragment4 ,but ,monism regards as equally fragmentary all abstract concepts which do not find their complement in percepts1 and which fit nowhere into the conceptual net that embraces the whole perceptual world4 ,hence it knows no ideas referring to objects lying beyond our experience and supposed to form the content of purely hypothetical ,metaphysics4 ,whatever mankind has produced in the way of such ideas ,monism regards as abstractions from experience1 whose origin in experience has been overlooked by their authors4 ,just as little1 according to ,monistic principles1 are the ends of our actions capable of being derived from the ,beyond4 ,so far as we can think them1 they must have their origin in human intuition4 ,man does not adopt the purposes of an objective 7transcendent7 being as his own individual purposes1 but he pursues the ends which his own moral imagination sets before him4 ,the idea which realises itself in an action is selected by the agent from the single ideal world and made the basis of his will4 ,consequently his action is not a realisation of commands which have been thrust into this world from the ,beyond1 but of human intuitions which belong to this world4 ,for ,monism there is no ruler of the world standing outside of us and determining the aim and direction of our actions4 ,there is for man no transcendent ground of existence1 the counsels of which he might discover1 in order thence to learn the ends to which he ought to direct his action4 ,man must rest wholly upon himself4 ,he must himself give a content to his action4 ,it is in vain that he seeks outside the world in which he lives for motives of his will4 ,if he is to go at all beyond the satisfaction of the natural instincts for which ,mother ,nature has provided1 he must look for motives in his own moral imagination1 unless he finds it more convenient to let them be determined for him by the moral imagination of others4 ,in other words1 he must either cease acting altogether1 or else act from motives which he selects for himself from the world of his ideas1 or which others select for him from that same world4 ,if he develops at all beyond a life absorbed in sensuous instincts and in the execution of the commands of others1 then there is nothing that can determine him except himself4 ,he has to act from a motive which he gives to himself and which nothing else can determine for him except himself4 ,it is true that this motive is ideally determined in the single world of ideas2 but in actual fact it must be selected by the agent from that world and translated into reality4 ,monism can find the ground for the actual realisation of an idea through human action only in the human being himself4 ,that an idea should pass into action must be willed by man before it can happen4 ,such a will consequently has its ground only in man himself4 ,man1 on this view1 is the ultimate determinant of his action4 ,he is free4 #a4 ,,addition ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah74 ,in the second part of this book the attempt has been made to justify the conviction that freedom is to be found in human conduct as it really is4 ,for this purpose it was necessary to sort out1 from the whole sphere of human conduct1 those actions with respect to which unprejudiced self-observation may appropriately speak of freedom4 ,these are the actions which appear as realisations of ideal intuitions4 ,no other actions will be called free by an unprejudiced observer4 ,however1 open-minded self-observation compels man to regard himself as endowed with the capacity for progress on the road towards ethical intuitions and their realisation4 ,yet this open-minded observation of the ethical nature of man is1 by itself1 insufficient to constitute the final court of appeal for the question of freedom4 ,for1 suppose intuitive thinking had itself sprung from some other essence2 suppose its essence were not grounded in itself1 then the consciousness of freedom1 which issues from moral conduct1 would prove to be a mere illusion4 ,but the second part of this book finds its natural support in the first part1 which presents intuitive thinking as an inward spiritual activity which man experiences as such4 ,to appreciate through experience this essence of thinking is equivalent to recognising the freedom of intuitive thinking4 ,and once we know that this thinking is free1 we know also the sphere within which will may be called free4 ,we shall regard man as a free agent1 if on the basis of inner experience we may attribute to the life of intuitive thinking a self-sustaining essence4 ,whoever cannot do this will be unable to discover any wholly unassailable road to the belief in freedom4 ,the experience to which we here refer reveals in consciousness intuitive thinking1 the reality of which does not depend merely on our being conscious of it4 ,freedom1 too1 is thereby revealed as the characteristic of all actions which issue from the intuitions of consciousness4 #b4 ,,addition ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition 7#aiah74 ,the argumentation of this book is built up on the fact of intuitive thinking1 which may be experienced in a purely spiritual way1 and which every perception inserts into reality so that reality comes thereby to be known4 ,all that this book aimed at presenting was the result of a survey from the basis of our experience of intuitive thinking4 ,however1 the intention also was to emphasise the systematic interpretation which this thinking1 as experienced by us1 demands4 ,it demands that we shall not deny its presence in cognition as a self-sustaining experience4 ,it demands that we acknowledge its capacity for experiencing reality in co-operation with perception1 and that we do not make it seek reality in a world outside experience and accessible only to inference1 in the face of which human thinking would be only a subjective activity4 ,this view characterises thinking as that factor in man through which he inserts himself spiritually into reality4 7,and1 strictly1 no one should confuse this kind of world-view1 which is based on thinking as directly experienced1 with mere ,rationalism47 ,but1 on the other hand1 the whole tenor of the preceding argumentation shows that perception yields a determination of reality for human knowledge only when it is taken hold of in thinking4 ,outside of thinking there is nothing to characterise reality for what it is4 ,hence we have no right to imagine that sense-perception is the only witness to reality4 ,whatever comes to us by way of perception on our journey through life1 we cannot but expect4 ,the only point open to question would be whether1 from the exclusive point of view of thinking as we intuitively experience it1 we have a right to expect that over and above sensuous perception there is also spiritual perception4 ,this expectation is justified4 ,for1 though intuitive thinking is1 on the one hand1 an active process taking place in the human mind1 it is1 on the other hand1 also a spiritual perception mediated by no sense-organ4 ,it is a perception in which the percipient is himself active1 and a self-activity which is at the same time perceived4 ,in intuitive thinking man enters a spiritual world also as a percipient4 ,whatever within this world presents itself to him as percept in the same way in which the spiritual world of his own thinking so presents itself1 that is recognised by him as constituting a world of spiritual perception4 ,this world of spiritual perception we may suppose to be standing in the same relation to thinking as does1 on the sensuous side1 the world of sense-perception4 ,man does not experience the world of spiritual perception as an alien something1 because he is already familiar in his intuitive thinking with an experience of purely spiritual character4 ,with such a world of spiritual perception a number of the writings are concerned which ,i have published since this present book appeared4 ,the ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity lays the philosophical foundation for these later writings4 ,for it attempts to show that in the very experience of thinking1 rightly understood1 we experience ,spirit4 ,this is the reason why it appears to the author that no one will stop short of entering the world of spiritual perception who has been able to adopt1 in all seriousness1 the point of view of the ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity4 ,true1 logical deduction--by syllogisms--will not extract out of the contents of this book the contents of the author's later books4 ,but a living understanding of what is meant in this book by intuitive thinking will naturally prepare the way for living entry into the world of spiritual perception4 ,,truth ,,and ,,science #ae ,i ,,preliminary ,,observations ,theory of ,knowledge aims at being a scientific investigation of the very fact which all other sciences take for granted without examination1 viz41 knowing or knowledge-getting itself4 ,to say this is to attribute to it1 from the very start1 the character of being the fundamental philosophical discipline4 ,for1 it is only this discipline which can tell us what value and significance belong to the insight gained by the other sciences4 ,in this respect it is the foundation for all scientific endeavour4 ,but1 it is clear that the ,theory of ,knowledge can fulfil its task only if it works without any presuppositions of its own1 so far as that is possible in view of the nature of human knowledge4 ,this is probably conceded on all sides4 ,and yet1 a more detailed examination of the better-known epistemological systems reveals that1 at the very starting-point of the inquiry1 there is made a whole series of assumptions which detract considerably from the plausibility of the rest of the argument4 ,in particular1 it is noticeable how frequently certain hidden assumptions are made in the very formulation of the fundamental problems of epistemology4 ,but1 if a science begins by misstating its problems1 we must despair from the start of finding the right solution4 ,the history of the sciences teaches us that countless errors1 from which whole epochs have suffered1 are to be traced wholly and solely to the fact that certain problems were wrongly formulated4 ,for illustrations there is no need to go back to ,aristotle or to the ,ars ,magna ,lulliana4 ,there are plenty of examples in more recent times4 ,the numerous questions concerning the purposes of the rudimentary organs of certain organisms could be correctly formulated only after the discovery of the fundamental law of biogenesis had created the necessary conditions4 ,as long as ,biology was under the influence of teleological concepts1 it was impossible to put these problems in a form permitting a satisfactory answer4 ,what fantastic ideas1 for example1 were current concerning the purpose of the so-called pineal gland1 so long as it was fashionable to frame biological questions in terms of purpose4 ,an answer was not achieved until the solution of the problem was sought by the method of ,comparative ,anatomy1 and scientists asked whether this organ might not be merely a residual survival in man from a lower evolutionary level4 ,or1 to mention yet another example1 consider the modifications in certain physical problems after the discovery of the laws of the mechanical equivalents of heat and of the conservation of energy6 ,in short1 the success of scientific investigations depends essentially upon the investigator's ability to formulate his problems correctly4 ,even though the ,theory of ,knowledge1 as the presupposition of all other sciences1 occupies a position very different from theirs1 we may yet expect that for it1 too1 successful progress in its investigations will become possible only when the fundamental questions have been put in the correct form4 ,the following discussions aim1 in the first place1 at such a formulation of the problem of knowledge as will do justice to the character of the ,theory of ,knowledge as a discipline which is without any presuppositions whatever4 ,their secondary aim is to throw light on the relation of ,j4 ,g4 ,fichte's ,wissenschaftslehre to such a fundamental philosophical discipline4 ,the reason why precisely ,fichte's attempt to provide an absolutely certain basis for the sciences will be brought into closer relation with our own philosophical programme1 will become clear of itself in the course of our investigation4 ,,ii ,,the ,,fundamental ,,problem ,,of ,,kant',s ,,theory ,,of ,,knowledge ,it is usual to designate ,kant as the founder of the ,theory of ,knowledge in the modern sense4 ,against this view it might plausibly be argued that the history of philosophy records prior to ,kant numerous investigations which deserve to be regarded as something more than mere beginnings of such a science4 ,thus ,volkelt1 in his fundamental work on the ,theory of ,knowledge1 #af remarks that the critical treatment of this discipline took its origin already with ,locke4 ,but in the writings of even older philosophers1 yes1 even in the philosophy of ,ancient ,greece1 discussions are to be found which at the present day are usually undertaken under the heading of ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,however1 ,kant has revolutionised all problems under this head from their very depths up1 and1 following him1 numerous thinkers have worked them through so thoroughly that all the older attempts at solutions may be found over again either in ,kant himself or else in his successors4 ,hence1 for the purposes of a purely systematic1 as distinct from a historical1 study of the ,theory of ,knowledge1 there is not much danger of omitting any important phenomenon by taking account only of the period since ,kant burst upon the world with his ,critique of ,pure ,reason4 ,all previous epistemological achievements are recapitulated during this period4 ,the fundamental question of ,kant's ,theory of ,knowledge is1 ,how are synthetic judgments a priori possible8 ,let us consider this question for a moment in respect of its freedom from presuppositions4 ,kant asks the question precisely because he believes that we can attain unconditionally certain knowledge only if we are able to prove the validity of synthetic judgments a priori4 ,he says3 ,should this question be answered in a satisfactory way1 we shall at the same time learn what part reason plays in the foundation and completion of those sciences which contain a theoretical a priori knowledge of objects2 #ag and1 further1 ,metaphysics stands and falls with the solution of this problem1 on which1 therefore1 the very existence of ,metaphysics absolutely depends4 #ah ,are there any presuppositions in this question1 as formulated by ,kant8 ,yes1 there are4 ,for the possibility of a system of absolutely certain knowledge is made dependent on its being built up exclusively out of judgments which are synthetic and acquired independently of all experience4 ,synthetic is ,kant's term for judgments in which the concept of the predicate adds to the concept of the subject something which lies wholly outside the subject1 although it stands in some connection with the subject1 #ai whereas in analytic judgments the predicate affirms only what is already 7implicitly7 contained in the subject4 ,this is not the place for considering the acute objections which ,johannes ,rehmke #bj brings forward against this classification of judgments4 ,for our present purpose1 it is enough to understand that we can attain to genuine knowledge only through judgments which add to one concept another the content of which was not1 for us at least1 contained in that of the former4 ,if we choose to call this class of judgments1 with ,kant1 synthetic1 we may agree that knowledge in judgment form is obtainable only where the connection of predicate and subject is of this synthetic sort4 ,but1 the case is very different with the second half of ,kant's question1 which demands that these judgments are to be formed a priori1 i4e41 independently of all experience4 ,for one thing1 it is altogether possible #ba that such judgments do not occur at all4 ,at the start of the ,theory of ,knowledge we must hold entirely open the question1 whether we arrive at any judgments otherwise than by experience1 or only by experience4 ,indeed1 to unprejudiced reflection the alleged independence of experience seems from the first to be impossible4 ,for1 let the object of our knowledge be what it may--it must1 surely1 always present itself to us at some time in an immediate and unique way2 in short1 it must become for us an experience4 ,mathematical judgments1 too1 are known by us in no other way than by our experiencing them in particular concrete cases4 ,even if1 with ,otto ,liebmann1 #bb for example1 we treat them as founded upon a certain organisation of our consciousness1 this empirical character is none the less manifest4 ,we shall then say that this or that proposition is necessarily valid1 because the denial of its truth would imply the denial of our consciousness1 but the content of a proposition can enter our knowledge only by its becoming an experience for us in exactly the same way in which a process in the outer world of nature does so4 ,let the content of such a proposition include factors which guarantee its absolute validity1 or let its validity be based on other grounds--in either case1 ,i can possess myself of it only in one way and in no other3 it must be presented to me in experience4 ,this is the first objection to ,kant's view4 ,the other objection lies in this1 that we have no right1 at the outset of our epistemological investigations1 to affirm that no absolutely certain knowledge can have its source in experience4 ,without doubt1 it is easily conceivable that experience itself might contain a criterion guaranteeing the certainty of all knowledge which has an empirical source4 ,thus1 ,kant's formulation of the problem implies two presuppositions4 ,the first is that we need1 over and above experience1 another source of cognitions4 ,the second is that all knowledge from experience has only conditional validity4 ,kant entirely fails to realise that these two propositions are open to doubt1 that they stand in need of critical examination4 ,he takes them over as unquestioned assumptions from the dogmatic philosophy of his predecessors and makes them the basis of his own critical inquiries4 ,the dogmatic thinkers assume the validity of these two propositions and simply apply them in order to get from each the kind of knowledge which it guarantees4 ,kant assumed their validity and only asks1 ,what are the conditions of their validity8 ,but1 what if they are not valid at all8 ,in that case1 the edifice of ,kantian doctrine lacks all foundation whatever4 ,the whole argumentation of the five sections which precede ,kant's formulation of the problem1 amounts to an attempt to prove that the propositions of ,mathematics are synthetic4 #bc ,but1 precisely the two presuppositions which we have pointed out are retained as mere assumptions in his discussions4 ,in the ,introduction to the ,second ,edition of the ,critique of ,pure ,reason we read1 experience can tell us that a thing is so and so1 but not that it cannot be otherwise1 and1 experience never bestows on its judgments true or strict universality1 but only the assumed and relative universality of induction4 #bd ,in ,prologomena1 #be we find it said1 ,first1 as regards the sources of metaphysics1 the very concept of ,metaphysics implies that they cannot be empirical4 ,the principles of ,metaphysics 7where the term 'principles' includes1 not merely its fundamental propositions1 but also its fundamental concepts71 can never be gained from experience1 for the knowledge of the metaphysician has precisely to be1 not physical1 but 'metaphysical1' i4e41 lying beyond the reach of experience4 ,lastly ,kant says in the ,critique of ,pure ,reason3 ,the first thing to notice is1 that no truly mathematical judgments are empirical1 but always a priori4 ,they carry necessity on their very face1 and therefore cannot be derived from experience4 ,should anyone demur to this1 ,i am willing to limit my assertion to the propositions of ,pure ,mathematics1 which1 as everybody will admit1 are not empirical judgments1 but perfectly pure a priori knowledge4 #bf ,we may open the ,critique of ,pure ,reason wherever we please1 we shall always find that in all its discussions these two dogmatic propositions are taken for granted4 ,cohen #bg and ,stadler #bh attempt to prove that ,kant has established the a priori character of the propositions of ,mathematics and ,pure ,natural ,science4 ,but all that ,kant tries to do in the ,critique may be summed up as follows4 ,the fact that ,mathematics and ,pure ,natural ,science are a priori sciences implies that the form of all experience has its ground in the subject4 ,hence1 all that is given by experience is the matter of sensations4 ,this matter is synthesised by the forms1 inherent in the mind1 into the system of empirical science4 ,it is only as principles of order for the matter of sense that the formal principles of the a priori theories have function and significance4 ,they make empirical science possible1 but they cannot transcend it4 ,these formal principles are nothing but the synthetic judgments a priori1 which therefore extend1 as conditions of all possible empirical knowledge1 as far as that knowledge but no further4 ,thus1 the ,critique of ,pure ,reason1 so far from proving the a priori character of ,mathematics and ,pure ,natural ,science1 does but delimit the sphere of their applicability on the assumption that their principles must become known independently of experience4 ,indeed1 ,kant is so far from attempting a proof of the a priori character of these principles1 that he simply excludes that part of ,mathematics 7see the quotation above7 in which1 even according to his view1 that character might be called in question1 and confines himself to the part in which he thinks he can infer the a priori character from the bare concepts involved4 ,johannes ,volkelt1 too1 comes to the conclusion that ,kant starts from the explicit presupposition that there actually does exist knowledge which is universal and necessary4 ,he goes on to remark1 ,this presupposition which ,kant has never explicitly questioned1 is so profoundly contradictory to the character of a truly critical ,theory of ,knowledge1 that the question must be seriously put whether the ,critique is to be accepted as critical ,theory of ,knowledge at all4 ,volkelt does1 indeed1 decide that there are good grounds for answering this question in the affirmative1 but still1 as he says1 this dogmatic assumption does disturb the critical attitude of ,kant's epistemology in the most far-reaching way4 #bi ,in short1 ,volkelt1 too1 finds that the ,critique of ,pure ,reason is not a ,theory of ,knowledge free from all assumptions4 ,in substantial agreement with our view are also the views of ,o4 ,liebmann1 #cj ,holder1 #ca ,windelband1 #cb ,ueberweg1 #cc ,eduard von ,hartmann1 #cd and ,kuno ,fischer1 #ce all of whom acknowledge that ,kant makes the a priori character of ,pure ,mathematics and ,physics the basis of his whole argumentation4 ,the propositions that we really have knowledge which is independent of all experience1 and that experience can furnish knowledge of only relative universality1 could be accepted by us as valid only if they were conclusions deduced from other propositions4 ,it would be absolutely necessary for these propositions to be preceded by an inquiry into the essential nature of experience1 as well as by another inquiry into the essential nature of knowing4 ,the former might justify the first1 the latter the second1 of the above two propositions4 ,it would be possible to reply to the objections which we have urged against the ,critique of ,pure ,reason1 as follows4 ,it might be said that every ,theory of ,knowledge must first lead the reader to the place where the starting-point1 free from all presuppositions1 is to be found4 ,for1 the knowledge which we have at any given moment of our lives is far removed from this starting-point1 so that we must first be artificially led back to it4 ,now1 it is true that some such mutual understanding between author and reader concerning the starting-point of the science is necessary in all ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,but such an understanding ought on no account to go beyond showing how far the alleged starting-point of knowing is truly such4 ,it ought to consist of purely self-evident1 analytic propositions4 ,it ought not to lay down any positive1 substantial affirmations which influence1 as in ,kant1 the content of the subsequent argumentation4 ,moreover1 it is the duty of the epistemologist to show that the starting-point which he alleges is really free from all presuppositions4 ,but all this has nothing to do with the essential nature of that starting-point4 ,it lies wholly outside the starting-point and makes no affirmations about it4 ,at the beginning of mathematical instruction1 too1 the teacher must exert himself to convince the pupil of the axiomatic character of certain principles4 ,but no one will maintain that the content of the axioms is in any way made dependent on these prior discussions of their axiomatic character4 #cf ,in exactly the same way1 the epistemologist1 in his introductory remarks1 ought to show the method by which we can reach a starting-point free from all presuppositions4 ,but the real content of the starting-point ought to be independent of the reflections by which it is discovered4 ,there is1 most certainly1 a wide difference between such an introduction to the ,theory of ,knowledge and ,kant's way of beginning with affirmations of quite definite1 dogmatic character4 ,,iii ,,theory ,,of ,,knowledge ,,since ,,kant ,kant's mistaken formulation of the problem has had a greater or lesser influence on all subsequent students of the ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,for ,kant1 the view that all objects which are given to us in experience are ideas in our minds is a consequence of his theory of the a priori4 ,for nearly all his successors1 it has become the first principle and starting-point of their epistemological systems4 ,it is said that the first and most immediate truth is1 simply and solely1 the proposition that we know our own ideas4 ,this has come to be a well-nigh universal conviction among philosophers4 ,g4 ,e4 ,schulze maintains in his nesidemus1 as early as #agib1 that all our cognitions are mere ideas and that we can never transcend our ideas4 ,schopenhauer puts forward1 with all the philosophical pathos which distinguishes him1 the view that the permanent achievement of ,kant's philosophy is the thesis that the world is my idea4 ,to ,eduard von ,hartmann this thesis is so incontestable1 that he addresses his treatise1 ,kritische ,grundlegung des ,transcendentalen ,realismus1 exclusively to readers who have achieved critical emancipation from the nave identification of the world of perception with the thing-in-itself4 ,he demands of them that they shall have made clear to themselves the absolute heterogeneity of the object of perception which through the act of representation has been given as a subjective and ideal content of consciousness1 and of the thing-in-itself which is independent of the act of representation and of the form of consciousness and which exists in its own right4 ,his readers are required to be thoroughly convinced that the whole of what is immediately given to us consists of ideas4 #cg ,in his latest work on ,theory of ,knowledge1 ,hartmann does1 indeed1 attempt to give reasons for this view4 ,what value should be attached to these reasons by an unprejudiced ,theory of ,knowledge will appear in the further course of our discussions4 ,otto ,liebmann posits as the sacrosanct first principle of the ,theory of ,knowledge the proposition1 ,consciousness cannot transcend itself4 #ch ,volkelt has called the proposition that the first and most immediate truth is the limitation of all our knowledge1 in the first instance1 to our own ideas exclusively1 the positivistic principle of knowledge4 ,he regards only those theories of knowledge as in the fullest sense critical which place this principle1 as the only fixed starting-point of philosophy1 at the head of their discussions and then consistently think out its consequences4 #ci ,other philosophers place other propositions at the head of the ,theory of ,knowledge1 e4g41 the proposition that its real problem concerns the relation between ,thought and ,being1 and the possibility of a mediation between them2 #dj or that it concerns the way in which ,being becomes an object of ,consciousness2 #da and many others4 ,kirchmann starts from two epistemological axioms1 ,whatever is perceived is1 and1 ,whatever is self-contradictory1 is not4 #db ,according to ,e4 ,l4 ,fischer1 knowledge is the science of something actual1 something real1 #dc and he criticises this dogma as little as does ,goering who asserts similarly1 ,to know means always to know something which is4 ,this is a fact which cannot be denied either by scepticism or by ,kant's critical philosophy4 #dd ,these two latter thinkers simply lay down the law3 ,this is what knowledge is4 ,they do not trouble to ask themselves with what right they do it4 ,but1 even if these various propositions were correct1 or led to correct formulations of the problem1 it would still be impossible to discuss them at the outset of the ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,for1 they all belong1 as positive and definite cognitions1 within the realm of knowledge4 ,to say that my knowledge extends1 in the first instance1 only to my ideas1 is to express in a perfectly definite judgment something which ,i know4 ,in this judgment ,i qualify the world which is given to me by the predicate existing in the form of idea4 ,but how am ,i to know1 prior to all knowledge1 that the objects given to me are ideas8 ,the best way to convince ourselves of the truth of the assertion that this proposition has no right to be put at the head of the ,theory of ,knowledge1 is to retrace the way which the human mind must follow in order to reach this proposition1 which has become almost an integral part of the whole modern scientific consciousness4 ,the considerations which have led to it are systematically summarised1 with approximate exhaustiveness1 in ,part ,i of ,eduard von ,hartmann's treatise1 ,das ,grundproblem der ,erkenntnistheorie4 ,his statement1 there1 may serve as a sort of guiding-thread for us in our task of reviewing the reasons which may lead to the acceptance of this proposition4 ,these reasons are physical1 psycho-physical1 physiological1 and properly philosophical4 ,the ,physicist is led by observation of the phenomena which occur in our environment when1 e4g41 we experience a sensation of sound1 to the view that there is nothing in these phenomena which in the very least resembles what we perceive immediately as sound4 ,outside1 in the space which surrounds us1 nothing is to be found except longitudinal oscillations of bodies and of the air4 ,thence it is inferred that what in ordinary life we call sound or tone is nothing but the subjective reaction of our organism to these wave-like oscillations4 ,similarly1 it is inferred that light and colour and heat are purely subjective4 ,the phenomena of colour-dispersion1 of refraction1 of interference1 of polarisation1 teach us that to the just-mentioned sensations there correspond in the outer space certain transverse oscillations which we feel compelled to ascribe1 in part to the bodies1 in part to an immeasurably fine1 elastic fluid1 the ether4 ,further1 the ,physicist is driven by certain phenomena in the world of bodies to abandon the belief in the continuity of objects in space1 and to analyse them into systems of exceedingly minute particles 7molecules1 atoms71 the size of which1 relatively to the distances between them1 is immeasurably small4 ,thence it is inferred that all action of bodies on each other is across the empty intervening space1 and is thus a genuine actio in distans4 ,the ,physicist believes himself justified in holding that the action of bodies on our senses of touch and temperature does not take place through direct contact1 because there must always remain a definite1 if small1 distance between the body and the spot on the skin which it is said to touch4 ,thence it is said to follow that what we sense as hardness or heat in bodies is nothing but the reactions of the end-organs of our touch- and temperature-nerves to the molecular forces of bodies which act upon them across empty space4 ,these considerations from the sphere of ,physics are supplemented by the ,psycho-physicists with their doctrine of specific sense-energies4 ,j4 ,mller has shown that every sense can be affected only in its own characteristic way as determined by its organisation1 and that its reaction is always of the same kind whatever may be the external stimulus4 ,if the optical nerve is stimulated1 light-sensations are experienced by us regardless of whether the stimulus was pressure1 or an electric current1 or light4 ,on the other hand1 the same external phenomena produce quite different sensations according as they are perceived by different senses4 ,from these facts the inference has been drawn that there occurs only one sort of phenomenon in the external world1 viz41 motions1 and that the variety of qualities of the world we perceive is essentially a reaction of our senses to these motions4 ,according to this view1 we do not perceive the external world as such1 but only the subjective sensations which it evokes in us4 ,physiology adds its quota to the physical arguments4 ,physics deals with the phenomena which occur outside our organisms and which correspond to our percepts4 ,physiology seeks to investigate the processes which go on in man's own body when a certain sensation is evoked in him4 ,it teaches us that the epidermis is wholly insensitive to the stimuli in the external world4 ,thus1 e4g41 if external stimuli are to affect the end-organs of our touch-nerves on the surface of our bodies1 the oscillations which occur outside our bodies have to be transmitted through the epidermis4 ,in the case of the senses of hearing and of sight1 the external motions have1 in addition1 to be modified by a number of structures in the sense-organs1 before they reach the nerves4 ,the nerves have to conduct the effects produced in the end-organs up to the central organ1 and only then can take place the process by means of which purely mechanical changes in the brain produce sensations4 ,it is clear that the stimulus which acts upon the sense-organs is so completely changed by the transformations which it undergoes1 that every trace of resemblance between the initial impression on the sense-organs and the final sensation in consciousness must be obliterated4 ,hartmann sums up the outcome of these considerations in these words3 ,this content of consciousness consists1 originally1 of sensations which are the reflex responses of the soul to the molecular motions in the highest cortical centres1 but which have not the faintest resemblance to the molecular motions by which they are elicited4 ,if we think this line of argument through to the end1 we must agree that1 assuming it to be correct1 there survives in the content of our consciousness not the least element of what may be called external existence4 ,to the physical and physiological objections against so-called ,nave ,realism ,hartmann adds some further objections which he describes as philosophical in the strict sense4 ,a logical examination of the physical and physiological objections reveals that1 after all1 the desired conclusion can be reached only if we start from the existence and nexus of external objects1 just as these are assumed by the ordinary nave consciousness1 and then inquire how this external world can enter the consciousness of beings with organisms such as ours4 ,we have seen that every trace of such an external world is lost on the way from the impression on the sense-organ to the appearance of the sensation in our consciousness1 and that in the latter nothing survives except our ideas4 ,hence1 we have to assume that the picture of the external world which we actually have1 has been built up by the soul on the basis of the sensations given to it4 ,first1 the soul constructs out of the data of the senses of touch and sight a picture of the world in space1 and then the sensations of the other senses are fitted into this space-system4 ,when we are compelled to think of a certain complex of sensations as belonging together1 we are led to the concept of substance and regard substance as the bearer of sense-qualities4 ,when we observe that some sense-qualities disappear from a substance and that others appear in their place1 we ascribe this event in the world of phenomena to a change regulated by the law of causality4 ,thus1 according to this view1 our whole world-picture is composed of subjective sensations which are ordered by the activity of our own souls4 ,hartmann says1 ,what the subject perceives is always only modifications of its own psychic states and nothing else4 #de ,now let us ask ourselves1 ,how do we come by such a view8 ,the bare skeleton of the line of thought which leads to it is as follows4 ,supposing an external world exists1 we do not perceive it as such but transform it through our organisation into a world of ideas4 ,this is a supposition which1 when consistently thought out1 destroys itself4 ,but is this reflection capable of supporting any positive alternative8 ,are we justified in regarding the world1 which is given to us1 as the subjective content of ideas because the assumptions of the nave consciousness1 logically followed out1 lead to this conclusion8 ,our purpose is1 rather1 to exhibit these assumptions themselves as untenable4 ,yet1 so far we should have found only that it is possible for a premise to be false and yet for the conclusion drawn from it to be true4 ,granted that this may happen1 yet we can never regard the conclusion as proved by means of that premise4 ,it is usual to apply the title of ,nave ,realism to the theory which accepts as self-evident and indubitable the reality of the world-picture which is immediately given to us4 ,the opposite theory1 which regards this world as merely the content of our consciousness1 is called ,transcendental ,idealism4 ,hence1 we may sum up the outcome of the above discussion by saying1 ,transcendental ,idealism demonstrates its own truth1 by employing the premises of the ,nave ,realism which it seeks to refute4 ,transcendental ,idealism is true1 if ,nave ,realism is false4 ,but the falsity of the latter is shown only by assuming it to be true4 ,once we clearly realise this situation1 we have no choice but to abandon this line of argument and to try another4 ,but are we to trust to good luck1 and experiment about until we hit by accident upon the right line8 ,this is ,eduard von ,hartmann's view when he believes himself to have shown the validity of his own epistemological standpoint1 on the ground that his theory explains the phenomena whereas its rivals do not4 ,according to his view1 the several philosophical systems are engaged in a sort of struggle for existence in which the fittest is ultimately accepted as victor4 ,but this method appears to us to be unsuitable1 if only for the reason that there may well be several hypotheses which explain the phenomena equally satisfactorily4 ,hence1 we had better keep to the above line of thought for the refutation of ,nave ,realism1 and see where precisely its deficiency lies4 ,for1 after all1 ,nave ,realism is the view from which we all start out4 ,for this reason alone it is advisable to begin by setting it right4 ,when we have once understood why it must be defective1 we shall be led upon the right path with far greater certainty than if we proceed simply at haphazard4 ,the subjectivism which we have sketched above is the result of the elaboration of certain facts by thought4 ,thus1 it takes for granted that1 from given facts as starting-point1 we can by consistent thinking1 i4e41 by logical combination of certain observations1 gain correct conclusions4 ,but our right thus to employ our thinking remains unexamined4 ,there1 precisely1 lies the weakness of this method4 ,whereas ,nave ,realism starts from the unexamined assumption that the contents of our perceptual experience have objective reality1 the ,idealism just described starts from the no less unexamined conviction that by the use of thought we can reach conclusions which are scientifically valid4 ,in contrast to ,nave ,realism1 we may call this point of view ,nave ,rationalism4 ,in order to justify this term1 it may be well to insert here a brief comment on the concept of the ,nave4 ,a4 ,dring1 in his essay ber den ,begriff des ,naiven ,realismus1 #df attempts a more precise determination of this concept4 ,he says1 ,the concept of the ,nave marks as it were the zero-point on the scale of our reflection upon our own activity4 ,in content the ,nave may well coincide with the ,true1 for1 although the ,nave is unreflecting and1 therefore1 uncritical or a-critical1 yet this lack of reflection and criticism excludes only the objective assurance of truth4 ,it implies the possibility and the danger of error1 but it does not imply the necessity of error4 ,there are nave modes of feeling and willing as there are nave modes of apprehending and thinking1 in the widest sense of the latter term4 ,further1 there are nave modes of expressing these inward states in contrast with their repression or modification through consideration for others and through reflection4 ,nave activity is not influenced1 at least not consciously1 by tradition1 education1 or imposed rule4 ,it is in all spheres 7as its root nativus1 brings out71 unconscious1 impulsive1 instinctive1 dmonic activity4 ,starting from this account1 we will try to determine the concept of the ,nave still more precisely4 ,in every activity we may consider two aspects--the activity itself and our consciousness of its conformity to a law4 ,we may be wholly absorbed in the former1 without caring at all for the latter4 ,the artist is in this position1 who does not know in reflective form the laws of his creative activity but yet practises these laws by feeling and sense4 ,we call him nave4 ,but there is a kind of self-observation which inquires into the laws of one's own activity and which replaces the nave attitude1 just described1 by the consciousness of knowing exactly the scope and justification of all one does4 ,this we will call critical4 ,this account seems to us best to hit off the meaning of this concept which1 more or less clearly understood1 has since ,kant acquired citizen-rights in the world of philosophy4 ,critical reflection is1 thus1 the opposite of nave consciousness4 ,we call an attitude critical which makes itself master of the laws of its own activity in order to know how far it can rely on them and what are their limits4 ,theory of ,knowledge can be nothing if not a critical science4 ,its object is precisely the most subjective activity of man--knowing4 ,what it aims at exhibiting is the laws to which knowing conforms4 ,hence1 the nave attitude is wholly excluded from this science4 ,its claim to strength lies precisely in that it achieves what many minds1 interested in practice rather than in theory1 pride themselves on never having attempted1 viz41 thinking about thought4 ,,iv ,,the ,,starting-,,points ,,of ,,the ,,theory ,,of ,,knowledge ,at the beginning of an epistemological inquiry we must1 in accordance with the conclusions we have reached1 put aside everything which we have come to know4 ,for1 knowledge is something which man has produced1 something which he has originated by his activity4 ,if the ,theory of ,knowledge is really to extend the light of its explanation over the whole field of what we know1 it must set out from a point which has remained wholly untouched by cognitive activity--indeed which rather furnishes the first impulse for this activity4 ,the point at which we must start lies outside of what we know4 ,it cannot as yet itself be an item of knowledge4 ,but we must look for it immediately prior to the act of cognition1 so that the very next step which man takes shall be a cognitive act4 ,the method for determining this absolutely first starting-point must be such that nothing enters into it which is already the result of cognitive activity4 ,there is nothing but the immediately-given world-picture with which we can make a start of this sort4 ,this means the picture of the world which is presented to man before he has in any way transformed it by cognitive activity1 i4e41 before he has made the very least judgment about it or submitted it to the very smallest determination by thinking4 ,what thus passes initially through our minds and what our minds pass through--this incoherent picture which is not yet differentiated into particular elements1 in which nothing seems distinguished from1 nothing related to1 nothing determined by1 anything else1 this is the ,immediately-,given4 ,on this level of existence--if the phrase is permissible--no object1 no event1 is as yet more important or more significant than any other4 ,the rudimentary organ of an animal1 which1 in the light of the knowledge belonging to a higher level of existence1 is perhaps seen to be without any importance whatever for the development and life of the animal1 comes before us with the same claim to our attention as the noblest and most necessary part of the organism4 ,prior to all cognitive activity nothing in our picture of the world appears as substance1 nothing as quality1 nothing as cause or as effect4 ,the contrasts of matter and spirit1 of body and soul1 have not yet arisen4 ,every other predicate1 too1 must be kept away from the world-picture presented at this level4 ,we may think of it neither as reality nor as appearance1 neither as subjective nor as objective1 neither as necessary nor as contingent4 ,we cannot decide at this stage whether it is thing-in-itself or mere idea4 ,for1 we have seen already that the conclusions of ,physics and ,physiology1 which lead us to subsume the ,given under one or other of the above heads1 must not be made the basis on which to build the ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,suppose a being with fully-developed human intelligence were to be suddenly created out of ,nothing and confronted with the world1 the first impression made by the world on his senses and his thought would be pretty much what we have here called the immediately-given world-picture4 ,of course1 no actual man at any moment of his life has nothing but this original world-picture before him4 ,in his mental development there is nowhere a sharp line between pure1 passive reception of the ,given from without and the cognitive apprehension of it by ,thought4 ,this fact might suggest critical doubts concerning our method of determining the starting-point of the ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,thus1 e4g41 ,eduard von ,hartmann remarks3 ,we do not ask what is the content of consciousness of a child just awakening to conscious life1 nor of an animal on the lowest rung of the ladder of organisms4 ,for1 of these things philosophising man has no experience1 and1 if he tries to reconstruct the content of consciousness of beings on primitive biogenetic or ontogenetic levels1 he cannot but base his conclusions on his own personal experience4 ,hence1 our first task is to determine what is the content of consciousness which philosophising man discovers in himself when he begins his philosophical reflection4 #dg ,but1 the objection to this view is that the picture of the world with which we begin philosophical reflection1 is already qualified by predicates which are the results solely of knowledge4 ,we have no right to accept these predicates without question4 ,on the contrary1 we must carefully extract them from out of the world-picture1 in order that it may appear in its purity without any admixture due to the process of cognition4 ,in general1 the dividing line between what is given and what is added by cognition cannot be identified with any single moment of human development1 but must be drawn artificially4 ,but this can be done at every level of development1 provided only we divide correctly what is presented to us prior to cognition1 without any determination by thinking1 from what is made of it by cognition4 ,now1 it may be objected that we have already piled up a whole host of thought-determinations in the very process of extracting the alleged primitive world-picture out of the complete picture into which man's cognitive elaboration has transformed it4 ,but1 in defence we must urge that all our conceptual apparatus was employed1 not for the characterisation of the primitive world-picture1 nor for the determination of its qualities1 but solely for the guidance of our analysis1 in order to lead it to the point where knowledge recognises that it began4 ,hence1 there can be no question of the truth or error1 correctness or incorrectness1 of the reflections which1 according to our view1 precede the moment which brings us to the starting-point of the ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,their purpose is solely to guide us conveniently to that point4 ,nobody who is about to occupy himself with epistemological problems1 stands at the same time at what we have rightly called the starting-point of knowledge1 for his knowledge is already1 up to a certain degree1 developed4 ,nothing but analysis with the help of concepts enables us to eliminate from our developed knowledge all the gains of cognitive activity and to determine the starting-point which precedes all such activity4 ,but the concepts thus employed have no cognitive value4 ,they have the purely negative task to eliminate out of our field of vision whatever is the result of cognitive activity and to lead us to the point where this activity first begins4 ,the present discussions point the way to those primitive beginnings upon which the cognitive activity sets to work1 but they form no part of such activity4 ,thus1 whatever ,theory of ,knowledge has to say in the process of determining the starting-point1 must be judged1 not as true or false1 but only as fit or unfit for this purpose4 ,error is excluded1 too1 from that starting-point itself4 ,for1 error can begin only with the activity of cognition2 prior to this1 it cannot occur4 ,this last proposition is compatible only with the kind of ,theory of ,knowledge which sets out from our line of thought4 ,for1 a theory which sets out from some object 7or subject7 with a definite conceptual determination is liable to error from the very start1 viz41 in this very determination4 ,whether this determination is justified or not1 depends on the laws which the cognitive act establishes4 ,this is a question to which only the course of the epistemological inquiry itself can supply the answer4 ,all error is excluded only when ,i can say that ,i have eliminated all conceptual determinations which are the results of my cognitive activity1 and that ,i retain nothing but what enters the circle of my experience without any activity on my part4 ,where1 on principle1 ,i abstain from every positive affirmation1 there ,i cannot fall into error4 ,from the epistemological point of view1 error can occur only within the sphere of cognitive activity4 ,an illusion of the senses is no error4 ,the fact that the rising moon appears to us bigger than the moon overhead is not an error1 but a phenomenon fully explained by the laws of nature4 ,an error would result only1 if thought1 in ordering the data of perception1 were to put a false interpretation on the bigger or smaller size of the moon4 ,but such an interpretation would lie within the sphere of cognitive activity4 ,if knowledge is really to be understood in its essential nature1 we must1 without doubt1 begin our study of it at the point where it originates1 where it starts4 ,moreover1 it is clear that whatever precedes its starting-point has no legitimate place in any explanatory ,theory of ,knowledge1 but must simply be taken for granted4 ,it is the task of science1 in its several branches1 to study the essential nature of all that we are here taking for granted4 ,our aim1 here1 is not to acquire specific knowledge of this or that1 but to investigate knowledge as such4 ,we must first understand the act of cognition1 before we can judge what significance to attach to the affirmations about the content of the world which come to be made in the process of getting to know that content4 ,for this reason1 we abstain from every attempt to determine what is immediately-given1 so long as we are ignorant of the relation of our determinations to what is determined by them4 ,not even the concept of the immediately-given affirms any positive determination of what precedes cognition4 ,its only purpose is to point towards the ,given1 to direct our attention upon it4 ,here1 at the starting-point of the ,theory of ,knowledge1 the term merely expresses1 in conceptual form1 the initial relation of the cognitive activity to the world-content4 ,the choice of this term allows even for the case that the whole world-content should turn out to be nothing but a figment of our own ,ego1 i4e41 that the most extreme subjectivism should be right4 ,for1 of course1 subjectivism does not express a fact which is given4 ,it can1 at best1 be only the result of theoretical considerations4 ,its truth1 in other words1 needs to be established by the ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,it cannot serve as the presupposition of that theory4 ,this immediately-given world-content includes everything which can appear within the horizon of our experience1 in the widest sense of this term1 viz41 sensations1 percepts1 intuitions1 feelings1 volitions1 dreams1 fancies1 representations1 concepts1 ideas4 ,illusions1 too1 and hallucinations stand at this level exactly on a par with other elements of the world-content4 ,only theoretical considerations can teach us in what relations illusions1 etc41 stand to other percepts4 ,a ,theory of ,knowledge which starts from the assumption that all the experiences just enumerated are contents of our consciousness1 finds itself confronted at once by the question3 ,how do we transcend our consciousness so as to apprehend reality8 ,where is the jumping-board which will launch us from the subjective into the trans-subjective8 ,for us1 the situation is quite different4 ,for us1 consciousness and the idea of the ,ego are1 primarily1 only items in the ,immediately-,given1 and the relation of the latter to the two former has first to be discovered by knowledge4 ,we do not start from consciousness in order to determine the nature of knowledge1 but1 vice versa1 we start from knowledge in order to determine consciousness and the relation of subject to object4 ,seeing that1 at the outset1 we attach no predicates whatever to the ,given1 we are bound to ask3 ,how is it that we are able to determine it at all8 ,how is it possible to start knowledge anywhere at all8 ,how do we come to designate one item of the world-content1 as1 e4g41 percept1 another as concept1 a third as reality1 others as appearance1 as cause1 as effect8 ,how do we come to differentiate ourselves from what is objective1 and to contrast ,ego and ,non-,ego8 ,we must discover the bridge which leads from the picture of the world as given to the picture of it which our cognitive activity unfolds4 ,but the following difficulty confronts us4 ,so long as we do nothing but passively gaze at the ,given1 we can nowhere find a point which knowledge can take hold of and from which it can develop its interpretations4 ,somewhere in the ,given we must discover the spot where we can get to work1 where something homogeneous to cognition meets us4 ,if everything were merely given1 we should never get beyond the bare gazing outwards into the external world and a no less bare gazing inwards into the privacy of our inner world4 ,we should1 at most1 be able to describe1 but never to understand1 the objects outside of us4 ,our concepts would stand in a purely external1 not in an internal1 relation to that to which they apply4 ,if there is to be knowledge1 everything depends on there being1 somewhere within the ,given1 a field in which our cognitive activity does not merely presuppose the ,given1 but is at work in the very heart of the ,given itself4 ,in other words1 the very strictness with which we hold fast the ,given1 as merely given1 must reveal that not everything is given4 ,our demand for the ,given turns out to have been one which1 in being strictly maintained1 partially cancels itself4 ,we have insisted on the demand1 lest we should arbitrarily fix upon some point as the starting-point of the ,theory of ,knowledge1 instead of making a genuine effort to discover it4 ,in our sense of the word given1 everything may be given1 even what in its own innermost nature is not given4 ,that is to say1 the latter presents itself1 in that case1 to us purely formally as given1 but reveals itself1 on closer inspection1 for what it really is4 ,the whole difficulty in understanding knowledge lies in that we do not create the world-content out of ourselves4 ,if we did so create it1 there would be no knowledge at all4 ,only objects which are given can occasion questions for me4 ,objects which ,i create receive their determinations by my act4 ,hence1 ,i do not need to ask whether these determinations are true or false4 ,this1 then1 is the second point in our ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,it consists in the postulate that there must1 within the sphere of the ,given1 be a point at which our activity does not float in a vacuum1 at which the world-content itself enters into our activity4 ,we have already determined the starting-point of the ,theory of ,knowledge by assigning it a place wholly antecedent to all cognitive activity1 lest we should distort that activity by some prejudice borrowed from among its own results4 ,now we determine the first step in the development of our knowledge in such a way that1 once more1 there can be no question of error or incorrectness4 ,for1 we affirm no judgment about anything whatsoever1 but merely state the condition which must be fulfilled if knowledge is to be acquired at all4 ,it is all-important that we should1 with the most complete critical self-consciousness1 keep before our minds the fact that we are postulating the very character which that part of the world-content must possess on which our cognitive activity can begin to operate4 ,nothing else is1 in fact1 possible4 ,as given1 the world-content is wholly without determinations4 ,no part of it can by itself furnish the impulse for order to begin to be introduced into the chaos4 ,hence1 cognitive activity must issue its edict and declare what the character of that part is to be4 ,such an edict in no way infringes the character of the ,given as such4 ,it introduces no arbitrary affirmation into science4 ,for1 in truth1 it affirms nothing4 ,it merely declares that1 if the possibility of knowledge is to be explicable at all1 we need to look for a field like the one above described4 ,if there is such a field1 knowledge can be explained2 if not1 not4 ,we began our ,theory of ,knowledge with the ,given as a whole2 now we limit our requirement to the singling out of a particular field within the ,given4 ,let us come to closer grips with this requirement4 ,where within the world-picture do we find something which is not merely given1 but is given only in so far as it is at the same time created by the cognitive activity8 ,we need to be absolutely clear that this creative activity must1 in its turn1 be given to us in all its immediacy4 ,no inferences must be required in order to know that it occurs4 ,thence it follows1 at once1 that sense-data do not meet our requirement4 ,for1 the fact that they do not occur without our activity is known to us1 not immediately1 but as an inference from physical and physiological arguments4 ,on the other hand1 we do know immediately that it is only in and through the cognitive act that concepts and ideas enter into the sphere of the ,immediately-,given4 ,hence1 no one is deceived concerning the character of concepts and ideas4 ,it is possible to mistake a hallucination for an object given from without1 but no one is ever likely to believe that his concepts are given without the activity of his own thinking4 ,a lunatic will regard as real1 though they are in fact unreal1 only things and relations which have attached to them the predicate of actuality1 but he will never say of his concepts and ideas that they have come into the world without his activity4 ,everything else in our world-picture is such that it must be given1 if it is to be experienced by us4 ,only of our concepts and ideas is the opposite true3 they must be produced by us1 if they are to be experienced4 ,they1 and only they1 are given in a way which might be called intellectual intuition4 ,kant and the modern philosophers who follow him deny altogether that man possesses this kind of intuition1 on the ground that all our thinking refers solely to objects and is absolutely impotent to produce anything out of itself1 whereas in intellectual intuition form and matter must be given together4 ,but1 is not precisely this actually the case with pure concepts and ideas8 #dh ,to see this1 we must consider them purely in the form in which1 as yet1 they are quite free from all empirical content4 ,in order1 e4g41 to comprehend the pure concept of causality1 we must go1 not to a particular instance of causality nor to the sum of all instances1 but to the pure concept itself4 ,particular causes and effects must be discovered by investigation in the world1 but causality as a ,form of ,thought must be created by ourselves before we can discover causes in the world4 ,if we hold fast to ,kant's thesis that concepts without percepts are empty1 it becomes unintelligible how the determination of the ,given by concepts is to be possible4 ,for1 suppose there are given two items of the world-content1 a and b4 ,in order to find a relation between them1 ,i must be guided in my search by a rule of determinate content4 ,such a rule ,i can only create in the act of cognition itself4 ,i cannot derive it from the object1 because it is only with the help of the rule that the object is to receive its determinations4 ,such a rule1 therefore1 for the determination of the real has its being wholly in purely conceptual form4 ,before passing on1 we must meet a possible objection4 ,it might seem as if in our argument we had unconsciously assigned a prominent part to the idea of the ,ego1 or the personal subject1 and as if we employed this idea in the development of our line of thought1 without having established our right to do so4 ,for example1 we have said that we produce concepts1 or that we make this or that demand4 ,but these are mere forms of speech which play no part in our argument4 ,that the cognitive act is the act of1 and originates in1 an ,ego1 can1 as we have already pointed out1 be affirmed only as an inference in the process of knowledge itself4 ,strictly1 we ought at the outset to speak only of cognitive activity without so much as mentioning a cognitive agent4 ,for1 all that has been established so far amounts to no more than this1 7#a7 that something is given1 and 7#b7 that at a certain point within the given there originates the postulate set forth above2 also1 that concepts and ideas are the entities which answer to that postulate4 ,this is not to deny that the point at which the postulate originates is the ,ego4 ,but1 in the first instance1 we are content to establish these two steps in the ,theory of ,knowledge in their abstract purity4 ,v ,,knowledge ,,and ,,reality ,concepts and ideas1 then1 though themselves part of the ,given1 yet at the same time take us beyond the ,given4 ,thus1 they make it possible to determine also the nature of the other modes of cognitive activity4 ,by means of a postulate1 we have selected a special part out of the given world-picture1 because it is the very essence of knowledge to proceed from a part with just this character4 ,thus1 we have made the selection solely in order to be able to understand knowledge4 ,but1 we must clearly confess to ourselves that by this selection we have artificially torn in two the unity of the given world-picture4 ,we must bear in mind that the part which we have divorced from the ,given still continues1 quite apart from our postulate and independently of it1 to stand in a necessary connection with the world as given4 ,this fact determines the next step forward in the ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,it will consist in restoring the unity which we have destroyed in order to show how knowledge is possible4 ,this restoration will consist in thinking about the world as given4 ,the act of thinking about the world actually effects the synthesis of the two parts of the given world-content--of the ,given which we survey up to the horizon of our experience1 and of the part which1 in order to be also given1 must be produced by us in the activity of cognition4 ,the cognitive act is the synthesis of these two factors4 ,in every single cognitive act the one factor appears as something produced in the act itself and as added to the other factor which is the pure datum4 ,it is only at the very start of the ,theory of ,knowledge that the factor which otherwise appears as always produced1 appears also as given4 ,to think about the world is to transmute the given world by means of concepts and ideas4 ,thinking1 thus1 is in very truth the act which brings about knowledge4 ,knowledge can arise only if thinking1 out of itself1 introduces order into the content of the world as given4 ,thinking is itself an activity which produces a content of its own in the moment of cognition4 ,hence1 the content cognised1 in so far as it has its origin solely in thinking1 offers no difficulty to cognition4 ,we need only observe it1 for in its essential nature it is immediately given to us4 ,the description of thinking is also the science of thinking4 ,in fact1 ,logic was never anything but a description of the forms of thinking1 never a demonstrative science4 ,for1 demonstration occurs only when there is a synthesis of the products of thinking with a content otherwise given4 ,hence1 ,gideon ,spicker is quite right when he says in his book1 ,lessing's ,weltanschauung 7p4 #e73 ,we have no means of knowing1 either empirically or logically1 whether the results of thinking1 as such1 are true4 ,we may add that1 since demonstration already presupposes thinking1 thinking itself cannot be demonstrated4 ,we can demonstrate a particular fact1 but we cannot demonstrate the process of demonstrating itself4 ,we can only describe what a demonstration is4 ,all logical theory is wholly empirical4 ,logic is a science which consists only of observation4 ,but if we want to get to know anything over and above our thinking1 we can do so only with the help of thinking4 ,that is to say1 our thinking must apply itself to something given and transform its chaotic into a systematic connection with the world-picture4 ,thinking1 then1 in its application to the world as given1 is a formative principle4 ,the process is as follows4 ,first1 thinking selects certain details out of the totality of the ,given4 ,for1 in the ,given1 there are strictly no individual details1 but only an undifferentiated continuum4 ,next1 thinking relates the selected details to each other according to the forms which it has itself produced4 ,and1 lastly1 it determines what follows from this relation4 ,the act of relating two distinct items of the world-content to each other does not imply that thinking arbitrarily determines something about them4 ,thinking waits and sees what is the spontaneous consequence of the relation established4 ,with this consequence we have at last some degree of knowledge of the two selected items of the world-content4 ,suppose the world-content reveals nothing of its nature in response to the establishment of such a relation1 then the effort of thinking must miscarry1 and a fresh effort must take its place4 ,all cognitions consist in this1 that two or more items of the ,given are brought into relation with each other by us and that we apprehend what follows from this relation4 ,without doubt1 many of our efforts of thinking miscarry1 not only in the sciences1 as is amply proved by their history1 but also in ordinary life4 ,but in the simple cases of mistake which are1 after all1 the commonest1 the correct thought so rapidly replaces the incorrect1 that the latter is never1 or rarely1 noticed4 ,kant1 in his theory of the synthetic unity of apperception1 had an inkling of this activity of thought in the systematic organisation of the world-content1 as we have here developed it4 ,but his failure to appreciate clearly the real function of thinking is revealed by the fact1 that he believes himself able to deduce the a priori laws of ,pure ,natural ,science from the rules according to which this synthetic activity proceeds4 ,kant has overlooked that the synthetic activity of thinking is merely the preparation for the discovery of natural laws properly so-called4 ,suppose we select two items1 a and b1 from the ,given4 ,for knowledge to arise of a nexus according to law between a and b1 the first requirement is that thinking should so relate a and b1 that the relation may appear to us as given4 ,thus1 the content proper of the law of nature is derived from what is given1 and the sole function of thinking is to establish such relations between the items of the world-picture that the laws to which they are subject become manifest4 ,the pure synthetic activity of thinking is not the source of any objective laws whatever4 ,we must inquire what part thinking plays in the formation of our scientific world-picture as distinct from the merely given one4 ,it follows from our account that thinking supplies the formal principle of the conformity of phenomena to law4 ,suppose1 in our example above1 that a is the cause1 b the effect4 ,unless thinking were able to produce the concept of causality1 we should never be able to know that a and b were causally connected4 ,but1 in order that we may know1 in the given case1 that a is the cause and b the effect1 it is necessary for a and b to possess the characteristics which we mean when we speak of cause and effect4 ,a similar analysis applies to the other categories of thought4 ,it will be appropriate to notice here in a few words ,hume's discussion of causality4 ,according to ,hume1 the concepts of cause and effect have their origin solely in custom4 ,we observe repeatedly that one event follows another and become accustomed to think of them as causally connected1 so that we expect the second to occur as soon as we have observed the first4 ,this theory1 however1 springs from a totally mistaken view of the causal relation4 ,suppose for several days running ,i observe the same person whenever ,i step out of the door of my house1 ,i shall gradually form the habit of expecting the temporal sequence of the two events4 ,but1 it will never occur to me to think that there is any causal connection between my own appearance and that of the other person at the same spot4 ,i shall call in aid essentially other items of the world-content in order to explain the coincidence of these events4 ,in short1 we determine the causal nexus of two events1 not according to their temporal sequence1 but according to the essential character of the items of the world-content which we call1 respectively1 cause and effect4 ,from this purely formal activity of our thinking in the construction of the scientific picture of the world1 it follows that the content of every cognition cannot be fixed a priori in advance of observation 7in which thinking comes to grips with the ,given71 but must be derived completely and exhaustively from observation4 ,in this sense1 all our cognitions are empirical4 ,nor is it possible to see how it could be otherwise4 ,for1 ,kant's judgments a priori are at bottom1 not cognitions1 but postulates4 ,on ,kant's principles1 all we can ever say is only this1 that if a thing is to become the object of possible experience1 it must conform to these laws4 ,they are1 therefore1 rules which the subject prescribes to all objects4 ,but1 we should rather expect cognitions of the ,given to have their source1 not in the constitution of the subject1 but in that of the object4 ,thinking makes no a priori affirmations about the ,given4 ,but it creates the forms1 on the basis of which the conformity of phenomena to law becomes manifest a posteriori4 ,from our point of view1 it is impossible to determine anything a priori about the degree of certainty belonging to a judgment which embodies knowledge thus gained4 ,for1 certainty1 too1 derives from nothing other than the ,given4 ,perhaps it will be objected that observation never establishes anything except that a certain nexus of phenomena actually occurs1 but not that it must occur1 and will always occur1 in like conditions4 ,but1 this suggestion1 too1 is in error4 ,for any nexus which ,i apprehend between elements in the world-picture is1 on our principles1 nothing but what is grounded in these elements themselves4 ,it is not imported into these elements by thinking1 but belongs to them essentially1 and must1 therefore1 necessarily exist whenever they themselves exist4 ,only a view which regards all scientific research as nothing but the endeavour to correlate the facts of experience by means of principles which are subjective and external to the facts1 can hold that the nexus of a and b may to-day obey one law and to-morrow another 7,j4 ,s4 ,mill74 ,on the other hand1 if we see clearly that the laws of nature have their source in the ,given1 and that1 therefore1 the nexus of phenomena essentially depends upon1 and is determined by1 them1 we shall never think of talking of a merely relative universality of the laws which are derived from observation4 ,this is1 of course1 not to assert that any given law which we have once accepted as correct1 must be absolutely valid4 ,but when1 later1 a negative instance overthrows a law1 the reason is1 not that the law from the first could be inferred only with relative universality1 but that it had not at first been inferred correctly4 ,a genuine law of nature is nothing but the formulation of a nexus in the given world-picture1 and it exists as little without the facts which it determines1 as these exist without it4 ,above1 we have laid down that it is the essence of the cognitive activity to transmute1 by thinking1 the given world-picture by means of concepts and ideas4 ,what follows from this fact8 ,if the ,immediately-,given were a totality complete in itself1 the work which thinking does upon it in cognition would be both impossible and unnecessary4 ,we should simply accept the ,given1 as it is1 and be satisfied with it as such4 ,cognitive activity is possible only because in the ,given something lies hidden which does not yet reveal itself so long as we gaze at the ,given in its immediacy1 but which becomes manifest with the aid of the order which thinking introduces4 ,prior to the work of thinking1 the ,given does not possess the fulness of its own complete nature4 ,this point becomes still more obvious by considering in greater detail the two factors involved in the act of cognition4 ,the first factor is the ,given4 ,being given is not a quality of the ,given1 but merely a term expressing its relation to the second factor in the act of cognition4 ,this second factor1 viz41 the conceptual content of the ,given1 is found by our thought in the act of cognition to be necessarily connected with the ,given4 ,two questions arise3 7#a7 ,where are the ,given and the ,concept differentiated8 7#b7 ,where are they united8 ,the answer to these two questions is to be found1 beyond any doubt1 in the preceding discussions4 ,they are differentiated solely in the act of cognition4 ,they are united in the ,given4 ,thence it follows necessarily that the conceptual content is but a part of the ,given1 and that the act of cognition consists in re-uniting with each other the two parts of the world-picture which are1 at first1 given to it in separation4 ,the given world-picture thus attains its completion only through that mediate kind of givenness which thinking brings about4 ,in its original immediacy the world-picture is altogether incomplete4 ,if the conceptual content were from the first united with the ,given in our world-picture1 there would be no cognition4 ,for1 no need could ever arise of transcending the ,given4 ,so1 again1 if by thinking and in thinking we could create the whole world-content1 once more there would be no cognition4 ,for1 what we create ourselves we do not need to cognise4 ,hence1 cognition exists because the world-content is given to us originally in a form which is incomplete1 which does not contain it as a whole1 but which1 over and above what it presents immediately1 owns another1 no less essential1 aspect4 ,this second aspect of the world-content--an aspect not originally given--is revealed by cognition4 ,pure thinking presents in the abstract1 not empty forms1 but a sum of determinations 7categories7 which serve as forms for the rest of the world-content4 ,the world-content can be called ,,reality only in the form which it acquires through cognition and in which both aspects of it are united4 ,,vi ,,theory ,,of ,,knowledge ,,without ,,presuppositions ,,versus ,,fichte',s ,,theory ,,of ,,science ,so far1 we have determined the idea of knowledge4 ,this idea is given immediately in the human consciousness whenever it functions cognitively4 ,to the ,ego1 as the centre #di of consciousness1 are given immediately external and internal perceptions1 as well as its own existence4 ,the ,ego feels impelled to find more in the ,given than it immediately contains4 ,over against the given world1 a second world1 the world of thinking1 unfolds itself for the ,ego and the ,ego unites these two by realising1 of its own free will1 the idea of knowledge which we have determined4 ,this accounts for the fundamental difference between the way in which in the objects of human consciousness itself the concept and the ,immediately-,given unite to form ,reality in its wholeness1 and the way in which their union obtains in the rest of the world-content4 ,for every other part of the world-content we must assume that the union of the two factors is original and necessary from the first1 and that it is only for cognition1 when cognition begins1 that an artificial separation has supervened1 but that cognition in the end undoes the separation in keeping with the original and essential unity of the object-world4 ,for consciousness the case is quite otherwise4 ,here the union exists only when it is achieved by the living activity of consciousness itself4 ,with every other kind of object1 the separation of the two factors is significant1 not for the object1 but only for knowledge4 ,their union is here original1 their separation derivative4 ,cognition effects a separation only because it must first separate before it can achieve union by its own methods4 ,but1 for consciousness1 the ,concept and the ,given are originally separate4 ,union is here derivative1 and that is why cognition has the character which we have described4 ,just because in consciousness ,idea and ,given appear in separation1 does the whole of reality split itself for consciousness into these two factors4 ,and1 again1 just because consciousness can bring about the union of the two factors only by its own activity1 can it reach full reality only by performing the act of cognition4 ,the remaining categories 7ideas7 would be necessarily united with the corresponding lands of the ,given1 even if they were not taken up into cognition4 ,but the idea of cognition can be united with the ,given which corresponds to it1 only by the activity of consciousness4 ,real consciousness exists only in realising itself4 ,with these remarks we believe ourselves to be sufficiently equipped for laying bare the root-error of ,fichte's ,wissenschaftslehre and1 at the same time1 for supplying the key to the understanding of it4 ,fichte is among all ,kant's successors the one who has felt most vividly that nothing but a theory of consciousness can supply the foundation for all the sciences4 ,but he never clearly understood why this is so4 ,he felt that the act which we have called the second step in the ,theory of ,knowledge and which we have formulated as a postulate1 must really be performed by the ,ego4 ,this may be seen1 e4g41 from the following passage4 ,the ,theory of ,science1 then1 arises1 as itself a systematic discipline1 just as do all possible sciences in so far as they are systematic1 through a certain act of freedom1 the determinate function of which is1 more particularly1 to make us conscious of the characteristic activity of intelligence as such4 ,the result of this free act is that the necessary activity of intelligence1 which in itself already is form1 is further taken up as matter into a fresh form of cognition or consciousness4 #ej ,what does ,fichte here mean by the activity of the intelligence1 when we translate what he has obscurely felt into clear concepts8 ,nothing but the realisation of the idea of knowledge1 taking place in consciousness4 ,had this been perfectly clear to ,fichte1 he ought to have expressed his view simply by saying1 ,it is the task of the ,theory of ,science to bring cognition1 in so far as it is still an unreflective activity of the ',ego1' into reflective consciousness2 it has to show that the realisation of the idea of cognition in actual fact is a necessary activity of the ',ego4' ,fichte tries to determine the activity of the ,ego4 ,he declares that the being1 the essence of which consists solely in this that it posits itself as existing1 is the ,ego as absolute subject4 #ea ,this positing of the ,ego is for ,fichte the original1 unconditioned act which lies at the basis of all the rest of consciousness4 #eb ,it follows that the ,ego1 in ,fichte's sense1 can likewise begin all its activity only through an absolute fiat of the will4 ,but1 it is impossible for ,fichte to supply any sort of content for this activity which his ,ego absolutely posits4 ,for1 ,fichte can name nothing upon which this activity might direct itself1 or by which it might be determined4 ,his ,ego is supposed to perform an act4 ,yes1 but what is it to do8 ,fichte failed to define the concept of cognition which the ,ego is to realise1 and1 in consequence1 he struggled in vain to find any way of advancing from his absolute act to the detailed determinations of the ,ego4 ,nay1 in the end he declares that the inquiry into the manner of this advance lies outside the scope of his theory4 ,in his deduction of the idea of cognition he starts neither from an absolute act of the ,ego1 nor from one of the ,non-,ego1 but from a state of being determined which is1 at the same time1 an act of determining4 ,his reason for this is that nothing else either is1 or can be1 immediately contained in consciousness4 ,his theory leaves it wholly vague what determines1 in turn1 this determination4 ,and it is this vagueness which drives us on beyond ,fichte's theory into the practical part of the ,wissenschaftslehre4 #ec ,but1 by this turn ,fichte destroys all knowledge whatsoever4 ,for1 the practical activity of the ,ego belongs to quite a different sphere4 ,the postulate which we have put forward above can1 indeed1 be realised--so much is clear--only by a free act of the ,ego4 ,but1 if this act is to be a cognitive act1 the all-important point is that its voluntary decision should be to realise the idea of cognition4 ,it is1 no doubt1 true that the ,ego by its own free will can do many other things as well4 ,but1 what matters for the epistemological foundation of the sciences is not a definition of what it is for the ,ego to be free1 but of what it is to know4 ,fichte has allowed himself to be too much influenced by his subjective tendency to present the freedom of human personality in the brightest light4 ,harms1 in his address on ,the ,philosophy of ,fichte 7p4 #ae71 rightly remarks1 ,his world-view is predominantly and exclusively ethical1 and the same character is exhibited by his ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,knowledge would have absolutely nothing to do1 if all spheres of reality were given in their totality4 ,but1 seeing that the ,ego1 so long as it has not been1 by thinking1 inserted into its place in the systematic whole of the world-picture1 exists merely as an immediately-given something1 it is not enough merely to point out what it does4 ,fichte1 however1 believes that all we need to do concerning the ,ego is to seek and find it4 ,we have to seek and find the absolutely first1 wholly unconditioned principle of all human knowledge4 ,being absolutely first1 this principle admits neither of proof nor of determination4 #ed ,we have seen that proof and determination are out of place solely as applied to the content of ,pure ,logic4 ,but the ,ego is a part of reality1 and this makes it necessary to establish that this or that category is actually to be found in the ,given4 ,fichte has failed to do this4 ,and this is the reason why he has given such a mistaken form to his ,theory of ,science4 ,zeller remarks #ee that the logical formul by means of which ,fichte seeks to reach the concept of the ,ego1 do but ill disguise his predetermined purpose at any price to reach this starting-point for his theory4 ,this comment applies to the first form 7#agid7 which ,fichte gave to his ,wissenschaftslehre4 ,taking it1 then1 as established that ,fichte1 in keeping with the whole trend of his philosophical thinking1 could not1 in fact1 rest content with any other starting-point for knowledge than an absolute and arbitrary act1 we have the choice between only two ways of making this start intelligible4 ,the one way was to seize upon some one among the empirical activities of consciousness and to strip off1 one by one1 all the characteristics of it which do not follow originally from its essential nature1 until the pure concept of the ,ego had been crystallised out4 ,the other way was to begin1 straightway1 with the original activity of the ,ego1 and to exhibit its nature by introspection and reflection4 ,fichte followed the first way at the outset of his philosophical thinking1 but in the course of it he gradually switched over to the other4 ,basing himself upon ,kant's synthesis of transcendental apperception1 ,fichte concluded that the whole activity of the ,ego in the synthesis of the matter of experience proceeds according to the forms of the judgment4 ,to judge is to connect a predicate with a subject--an act of which the purely formal expression is a a4 ,this proposition would be impossible if the x which connects predicate and subject1 did not rest upon a power to affirm unconditionally4 ,for1 the proposition does not mean1 a exists2 it means1 if a exists1 then there exists a4 ,thus1 a is most certainly not affirmed absolutely4 ,hence1 if there is to be an absolute1 unconditionally valid affirmation1 there is no alternative but to declare the act of affirming itself to be absolute4 ,whereas a is conditioned1 the affirming of a is unconditioned4 ,this affirming is the act of the ,ego which1 thus1 possesses the power to affirm absolutely and without conditions4 ,in the proposition1 a a1 the one a is affirmed only on condition of the other being presupposed4 ,moreover1 the affirming is an act of the ,ego4 ,if a is affirmed in the ,ego1 it is affirmed4 #ef ,this connection is possible only on condition that there is in the ,ego something always self-identical1 which effects the transition from the one a to the other4 ,the above-mentioned x is this self-identical aspect of the ,ego4 ,the ,ego which affirms the one a is the same ,ego as that which affirms the other a4 ,this is to say ,ego ,ego4 ,but this proposition1 expressed in judgment-form1 ,if the ,ego is1 it is1 is meaningless4 ,for1 the ,ego is not affirmed on condition of another ,ego having been presupposed1 but it presupposes itself4 ,in short1 the ,ego is absolute and unconditioned4 ,the hypothetical judgment-form which is the form of all judgments1 so long as the absolute ,ego is not presupposed1 changes for the ,ego into the form of the categorical affirmation of existence1 ,i am unconditionally4 ,fichte has another way of putting this3 the ,ego originally affirms its own existence4 #eg ,clearly1 this whole deduction is nothing but a sort of elementary school-drill by means of which ,fichte tries to lead his readers to the point at which they will perceive for themselves the unconditioned activity of the ,ego4 ,his aim is to put clearly before their eyes that fundamental activity of the ,ego in the absence of which there is no such thing as an ,ego at all4 ,let us now look back1 once more1 over ,fichte's line of thought4 ,on closer inspection1 it becomes obvious that it contains a leap--a leap1 moreover1 which throws grave doubts upon the correctness of his theory of the original act of the ,ego4 ,what precisely is it that is absolute in the affirmation of the ,ego8 ,take the judgment1 ,if a exists1 then there exists a4 ,the a is affirmed by the ,ego4 ,so far there is no room for doubt4 ,but1 though the act is unconditioned1 yet the ,ego must affirm something in particular4 ,it cannot affirm an activity in general and as such2 it can affirm only a particular1 determinate activity4 ,in short1 the affirmation must have a content4 ,but1 it cannot derive this content from itself1 for else we should get nothing but affirmations of acts of affirmation in infinitum4 ,hence1 there must be something which is realised by this affirming1 by this absolute activity of the ,ego4 ,if the ,ego does not seize upon something given in order to affirm it1 it can do nothing at all1 and1 consequently1 it cannot affirm either4 ,this is proved1 too1 by ,fichte's proposition1 the ,ego affirms its own existence4 ,existence1 here1 is a category4 ,thus1 we are back at our own position3 the activity of the ,ego consists in that it affirms1 of its own free will1 the concepts and ideas inherent in the ,given4 ,if ,fichte had not unconsciously been determined to exhibit the ,ego as existing1 he would have got nowhere at all4 ,if1 instead1 he had built up the concept of cognition1 he would have reached the true starting-point of the ,theory of ,knowledge1 viz41 ,the ,ego affirms the act of cognition4 ,because ,fichte failed to make clear to himself what determines the activity of the ,ego1 he fixed simply upon the affirmation of its own existence as the character of that activity4 ,but1 this is at once to restrict the absolute activity of the ,ego4 ,for1 if nothing is unconditioned except the ,ego's affirmation of its own existence1 then every other activity of the ,ego is conditioned4 ,moreover1 the way is cut off for passing from the unconditioned to the conditioned4 ,if the ,ego is unconditioned only in the affirmation of its own existence1 then at once there is cut off all possibility of affirming by an original act anything other than its own existence4 ,hence1 the necessity arises to assign a ground for all the other activities of the ,ego4 ,but ,fichte1 as we have seen above1 sought for such a ground in vain4 ,this is the reason why he shifted to the second of the two ways1 indicated above1 for the deduction of the ,ego4 ,already in #agig1 in his ,erste ,einleitung in die ,wissenschaftslehre1 he recommends self-observation as the right method for studying the ,ego in its true1 original character4 ,observe and watch thyself1 turn thy eye away from all that surrounds thee and look into thyself--this is the first demand which philosophy makes upon its disciple4 ,the topic of our discourse1 is1 not anything outside thyself1 but thyself alone4 #eh ,this introduction to the ,theory of ,science is1 in truth1 in one way much superior to the other4 ,for1 self-observation does not make us acquainted with the activity of the ,ego one-sidedly in a fixed direction4 ,it exhibits that activity1 not merely as affirming its own existence1 but as striving1 in its many-sided development1 to comprehend by thinking the world-content which is immediately-given4 ,to self-observation1 the ,ego reveals itself as engaged in building up its world-picture by the synthesis of the ,given with concepts4 ,but1 anyone who has not accompanied us in our line of thought above1 and who1 consequently1 does not know that the ,ego can grasp the whole content of reality only on condition of applying its ,thought-,forms to the ,given1 is liable to regard cognition as a mere process of spinning the world out of the ,ego itself4 ,hence1 for ,fichte the world-picture tends increasingly to become a construction of the ,ego4 ,he emphasises more and more that the main point in the ,wissenschaftslehre is to awaken the sense which is able to watch the ,ego in this constructing of its world4 ,he who is able thus to watch stands1 for ,fichte1 on a higher level of knowledge than he who has eyes only for the finished construct1 the ready-made world4 ,if we fix our eyes only on the world of objects1 we fail to perceive that1 but for the creative activity of the ,ego1 that world would not exist4 ,if1 on the other hand1 we watch the ,ego in its constructive activity1 we understand the ground of the finished world-picture4 ,we know how it has come to be what it is4 ,we understand it as the conclusion for which we have the premises4 ,the ordinary consciousness sees only what has been affirmed1 what has been determined thus or thus4 ,it lacks the insight into the premises1 into the grounds why an affirmation is just as it is and not otherwise4 ,to mediate the knowledge of these premises is1 according to ,fichte1 the task of a wholly new sense4 ,this is expressed most clearly in the ,einleitungsvorlesungen in die ,wissenschaftslehre4 #ei ,my theory presupposes a wholly novel inward sense-organ1 by means of which a new world is given which does not exist for the ordinary man at all4 ,or1 again1 ,the world of this novel sense1 and thereby this sense itself1 are hereby for the present clearly determined3 it is the world in which we see the premises on which is grounded the judgment1 ',something exists'2 it is the ground of existence which1 just because it is the ground of existence1 cannot1 in its turn1 be said to be or to be an existence4 #fj ,but1 here1 too1 ,fichte lacks clear insight into the activity of the ,ego4 ,he has never worked his way through to it4 ,that is why his ,wissenschaftslehre could not become what else1 from its whole design1 it ought to have become1 viz41 a ,theory of ,knowledge as the fundamental discipline of philosophy4 ,for1 after it had once been recognised that the activity of the ,ego must be affirmed by the ,ego itself1 it was very easy to think that the activity receives its determination also from the ,ego4 ,but how else can this happen except we assign a content to the purely formal activity of the ,ego8 ,if the ,ego is really to import a content into its activity which1 else1 is wholly undetermined1 then the nature of that content must also be determined4 ,for1 failing this1 it could at best be realised only by some thing-in-itself in the ,ego1 of which the ,ego would be the instrument1 but not by the ,ego itself4 ,if ,fichte had attempted to furnish this determination1 he would have been led to the concept of cognition which it is the task of the ,ego to realise4 ,fichte's ,wissenschaftslehre proves that even the acutest thinker fails to make fruitful contributions to any philosophical discussion1 unless he lays hold of the correct ,thought-,form 7category1 idea7 which1 supplemented by the ,given1 yields reality4 ,such a thinker is like a man who fails to hear the most glorious melodies which are being played for him1 because he has no ear for tunes4 ,if we are to determine the nature of consciousness1 as given1 we must be able to rise to1 and make our own1 the idea of consciousness4 ,at one point ,fichte is actually quite close to the true view4 ,he declares1 in the ,einleitungen zur ,wissenschaftslehre 7#agig71 that there are two theoretical systems1 viz41 ,dogmatism1 for which the ,ego is determined by the objects1 and ,idealism1 for which the objects are determined by the ,ego4 ,both are1 according to him1 established as possible theories of the world2 both can be developed into self-consistent systems4 ,but1 if we throw in our lot with ,dogmatism1 we must abandon the independence of the ,ego and make it dependent on the thing-in-itself4 ,if we do not want to do this1 we must adopt ,idealism4 ,the philosopher's choice between these two systems is left by ,fichte wholly to the preference of the ,ego4 ,but he adds that if the ,ego desires to preserve its independence1 it will give up the belief in external things and surrender itself to ,idealism4 ,but1 what ,fichte forgot was the consideration that the ,ego cannot make any genuine1 well-grounded decision or choice1 unless something is presupposed which helps the ,ego to choose4 ,all the ,ego's attempts at determination remain empty and without content1 if the ,ego does not find something wholly determinate and full of content1 which enables it to determine the ,given1 and thereby also to choose between ,idealism and ,dogmatism4 ,this something wholly determinate and full of content is1 precisely1 the world of ,thought4 ,and the determination of the ,given by thinking is1 precisely1 what we call cognition4 ,we may take ,fichte where we please--everywhere we find that his line of thought at once gets meaning and substance1 as soon as we conceive his grey1 empty activity of the ,ego to be filled and regulated by what we have called the process of cognition4 ,the fact that the ,ego is free to enter into activity out of itself1 makes it possible for it1 by free self-determination1 to realise the category of cognition1 whereas in the rest of the world all categories are connected by objective necessity with the ,given which corresponds to them4 ,the investigation of the nature of free self-determination will be the task of ,ethics and ,metaphysics1 based on our ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,these disciplines1 too1 will have to debate the question whether the ,ego is able to realise other ideas1 besides the idea of cognition4 ,but1 that the realisation of the idea of cognition issues from a free act has been made sufficiently clear in the course of our discussions above4 ,for1 the synthesis1 effected by the ,ego1 of the ,immediately-,given and of the ,form of ,thought appropriate to it1 which two factors of reality remain otherwise always divorced from each other in consciousness1 can be brought about only by an act of freedom4 ,moreover1 our arguments throw1 in another way1 quite a fresh light on ,critical ,idealism4 ,to any close student of ,fichte's system it will appear as if ,fichte cared for nothing so much as for the defence of the proposition1 that nothing can enter the ,ego from without1 that nothing can appear in the ,ego which was not the ,ego's own original creation4 ,now1 it is beyond all dispute that no type of ,idealism will ever be able to derive from within the ,ego that form of the world-content which we have called the ,immediately-,given4 ,for1 this form can only be given2 it can never be constructed by thinking4 ,in proof of this1 it is enough to reflect that1 even if the whole series of colours were given to us except one1 we should not be able to fill in that one out of the bare ,ego4 ,we can form an image of the most remote countries1 though we have never seen them1 provided we have once personally experienced1 as given1 the details which go to form the image4 ,we then build up the total picture1 according to the instructions supplied to us1 out of the particular facts which we have ourselves experienced4 ,but we shall strive in vain to invent out of ourselves even a single perceptual element which has never appeared within the sphere of what has been given to us4 ,it is one thing to be merely acquainted with the world2 it is another to have knowledge of its essential nature4 ,this nature1 for all that it is closely identified with the world-content1 does not become clear to us unless we build up reality ourselves out of the ,given and the ,forms of ,thought4 ,the real what of the ,given comes to be affirmed for the ,ego only through the ,ego itself4 ,the ,ego would have no occasion to affirm the nature of the ,given for itself1 if it did not find itself confronted at the outset by the ,given in wholly indeterminate form4 ,thus1 the essential nature of the world is affirmed1 not apart from1 but through1 the ,ego4 ,the true form of reality is not the first form in which it presents itself to the ,ego1 but the last form which it receives through the activity of the ,ego4 ,that first form is1 in fact1 without any importance for the objective world and counts only as the basis for the process of cognition4 ,hence1 it is not the form given to the world by theory which is subjective1 but rather the form in which the world is originally given to the ,ego4 ,if1 following ,volkelt and others1 we call the given world experience1 our view amounts to saying3 ,the world-picture presents itself1 owing to the constitution of our consciousness1 in subjective form as experience1 but science completes it and makes its true nature manifest4 ,our ,theory of ,knowledge supplies the basis for an ,idealism which1 in the true sense of the word1 understands itself4 ,it supplies good grounds for the conviction that thinking brings home to us the essential nature of the world4 ,nothing but thinking can exhibit the relations of the parts of the world-content1 be it the relation of the heat of the sun to the stone which it warms1 or the relation of the ,ego to the external world4 ,thinking alone has the function of determining all things in their relations to each other4 ,the objection might still be urged by the followers of ,kant1 that the determination1 above-described1 of the ,given holds1 after all1 only for the ,ego4 ,our reply must be1 consistently with our principles1 that the distinction between ,ego and ,outer ,world1 too1 holds only within the ,given1 and that1 therefore1 it is irrelevant to insist on the phrase1 for the ,ego1 in the face of the activity of thinking which unites all opposites4 ,the ,ego1 as divorced from the outer world1 disappears completely in the process of thinking out the nature of the world4 ,hence it becomes meaningless still to talk of determinations which hold only for the ,ego4 ,,vii ,,concluding ,,remarks3 ,,epistemological ,we have laid the foundations of the ,theory of ,knowledge as the science of the significance of all human knowledge4 ,it alone clears up for us the relation of the contents of the separate sciences to the world4 ,it enables us1 with the help of the sciences1 to attain to a philosophical world-view4 ,positive knowledge is acquired by us through particular cognitions2 what the value of our knowledge is1 considered as knowledge of reality1 we learn through the ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,by holding fast strictly to this principle1 and by employing no particular cognitions in our argumentation1 we have transcended all one-sided world-views4 ,one-sidedness1 as a rule1 results from the fact that the inquiry1 instead of concentrating on the process of cognition itself1 busies itself about some object of that process4 ,if our arguments are sound1 ,dogmatism must abandon its thing-in-itself as fundamental principle1 and ,subjective ,idealism its ,ego1 for both these owe their determinate natures in their relation to each other first to thinking4 ,scepticism must give up its doubts whether the world can be known1 for there is no room for doubt with reference to the ,given1 because it is as yet untouched by any of the predicates which cognition confers on it4 ,on the other hand1 if ,scepticism were to assert that thinking can never apprehend things as they are1 its assertion1 being itself possible only through thinking1 would be self-contradictory4 ,for1 to justify doubt by thinking is to admit by implication that thinking can produce grounds sufficient to establish certainty4 ,lastly1 our theory of knowledge transcends both one-sided ,empiricism and one-sided ,rationalism in uniting both at a higher level4 ,thus it does justice to both4 ,it justifies ,empiricism by showing that all positive knowledge about the ,given is obtainable only through direct contact with the ,given4 ,and ,rationalism1 too1 receives its due in our argument1 seeing that we hold thinking to be the necessary and exclusive instrument of knowledge4 ,the world-view which has the closest affinity to ours1 as we have here built it up on epistemological foundations1 is that of ,a4 ,e4 ,biedermann4 #fa ,but ,biedermann requires for the justification of his point of view dogmatic theses which are quite out of place in ,theory of ,knowledge4 ,thus1 e4g41 he works with the concepts of ,being1 ,substance1 ,space1 ,time1 etc41 without having first analysed the cognitive process by itself4 ,instead of establishing the fact that the cognitive process consists1 to begin with1 only of the two elements1 the ,given and ,thought1 he talks of the ,kinds of ,being of the real4 ,for example1 in ,section #ae1 he says3 ,every content of consciousness includes within itself two fundamental facts--it presents to us1 as given1 two kinds of ,being which we contrast with each other as sensuous and spiritual1 thing-like and idea-like1 ,being4 ,and in ,section #ai3 ,whatever has a spatio-temporal existence1 exists materially2 that which is the ground of all existence and the subject of life has an idea-like existence1 is real as having an ideal ,being4 ,this sort of argument belongs1 not to the ,theory of ,knowledge1 but to ,metaphysics1 which latter presupposes ,theory of ,knowledge as its foundation4 ,we must admit that ,biedermann's doctrine has many points of similarity with ours2 but our method has not a single point of contact with his4 ,hence1 we have had no occasion to compare our position directly with his4 ,biedermann's aim is to gain an epistemological standpoint with the help of a few metaphysical axioms4 ,our aim is to reach1 through an analysis of the process of cognition1 a theory of reality4 ,and we believe that we have succeeded in showing1 that all the disputes between philosophical systems result from the fact that their authors have sought to attain knowledge about some object or other 7,thing1 ,self1 ,consciousness1 etc471 without having first given close study to that which alone can throw light on whatever else we know1 viz41 the nature of knowledge itself4 ,,viii ,,concluding ,,remarks3 ,,practical ,the aim of the preceding discussions has been to throw light on the relation of our personality1 as knower1 to the objective world4 ,what does it signify for us to possess knowledge and science8 ,this was the question to which we sought the answer4 ,we have seen that it is just in our knowing that the innermost kernel of the world manifestly reveals itself4 ,the harmony1 subject to law1 which reigns throughout the whole world1 reveals itself precisely in human cognition4 ,it is1 therefore1 part of the destiny of man to elevate the fundamental laws of the world1 which do indeed regulate the whole of existence but which would never become existent in themselves1 into the realm of realities which appear4 ,this precisely is the essential nature of knowledge that in it the world-ground is made manifest which in the object-world can never be discovered4 ,knowing is--metaphorically speaking--a continual merging of one's life into the world-ground4 ,such a view is bound to throw light also on our practical attitude towards life4 ,our conduct is1 in its whole character1 determined by our moral ideals4 ,these are the ideas we have of our tasks in life1 or1 in other words1 of the ends which we set ourselves to achieve by our action4 ,our conduct is a part of the total world-process4 ,consequently1 it1 too1 is subject to the universal laws which regulate this process4 ,now1 every event in the universe has two sides which must be distinguished3 its external sequence in time and space1 and its internal conformity to law4 ,the apprehension of this conformity of human conduct to law is but a special case of knowledge4 ,hence1 the conclusions at which we have arrived concerning the nature of knowledge must apply to this sort of knowledge1 too4 ,to apprehend oneself as a person who acts is to possess the relevant laws of conduct1 i4e41 the moral concepts and ideals1 in the form of knowledge4 ,it is this knowledge of the conformity of our conduct to law which makes our conduct truly ours4 ,for1 in that case1 the conformity is given1 not as external to the object in which the action appears1 but as the very substance of the object engaged in living activity4 ,the object1 here1 is our own ,ego4 ,if the ,ego has with its knowledge really penetrated the essential nature of conduct1 then it feels that it is thereby master of its conduct4 ,short of this1 the laws of conduct confront us as something external4 ,they master us4 ,what we achieve1 we achieve under the compulsion which they wield over us4 ,but this compulsion ceases1 as soon as their alien character has been transformed into the ,ego's very own activity4 ,thereafter1 the law no longer rules over us1 but rules in us over the actions which issue from our ,ego4 ,to perform an act in obedience to a law which is external to the agent is to be unfree4 ,to perform it in obedience to the agent's own law is to be free4 ,to gain knowledge of the laws of one's own conduct is to become conscious of one's freedom4 ,the process of cognition is1 thus1 according to our arguments1 the process of the development of freedom4 ,not all human conduct has this character4 ,there are many cases in which we do not know the laws of our conduct4 ,this part of our conduct is the unfree part of our activity4 ,over against it stands the part the laws of which we make completely our own4 ,this is the realm of freedom4 ,it is only in so far as our life falls into this realm that it can be called moral4 ,to transform the actions which are unfree into actions which are free--this is the task of self-development for every individual1 this is likewise the task of the whole human race4 ,thus1 the most important problem for all human thinking is to conceive man as a personality grounded upon itself and free4 ,,appendices ,,appendix ,i ,,addition ,,to ,,the ,,revised ,,edition ,,of ,,the ,,philosophy ,,of ,,freedom1 #aiah4 ,various criticisms on the part of philosophers with which this book met immediately upon its publication1 induce me to add to this ,revised ,edition the following brief statement4 ,i can well understand that there are readers who are interested in the rest of the book1 but who will look upon what follows as a tissue of abstract concepts which to them is irrelevant and makes no appeal4 ,they may1 if they choose1 leave this brief statement unread4 ,but in philosophy problems present themselves which have their origin rather in certain prejudices on the thinker's part than in the natural progression of normal human thinking4 ,with the main body of this book it seems to me to be the duty of every one to concern himself1 who is striving for clearness about the essential nature of man and his relation to the world4 ,what follows is rather a problem the discussion of which certain philosophers demand as necessary to a treatment of the topics of this book1 because these philosophers1 by their whole way of thinking1 have created certain difficulties which do not otherwise occur4 ,if ,i were to pass by these problems entirely1 certain people would be quick to accuse me of dilettantism1 etc4 ,the impression would thus be created that the author of the views set down in this book has not thought out his position with regard to these problems because he has not discussed them in his book4 ,the problem to which ,i refer is this3 there are thinkers who find a particular difficulty in understanding how another mind can act on one's own4 ,they say3 the world of my consciousness is a closed circle within me2 so is the world of another's consciousness within him4 ,i cannot look into the world of another's mind4 ,how1 then1 do ,i know that he and ,i are in a common world8 ,the theory according to which we can from the conscious world infer an unconscious world which never can enter consciousness1 attempts to solve this difficulty as follows4 ,the world1 it says1 which ,i have in my consciousness is the representation in me of a real world to which my consciousness has no access4 ,in this transcendent world exist the unknown agents which cause the world in my consciousness4 ,in it1 too1 exists my own real self1 of which likewise ,i have only a representation in my consciousness4 ,in it1 lastly1 exists the essential self of the fellow-man who confronts me4 ,whatever passes in the consciousness of my fellow-man corresponds to a reality in his transcendent essence which is independent of his consciousness4 ,his essential nature acts in that realm which1 on this theory1 is equally beyond consciousness4 ,thus an impression is made in my consciousness which represents there what is present in another's consciousness and wholly beyond the reach of my direct awareness4 ,clearly the point of this theory is to add to the world accessible to my consciousness an hypothetical world which is to my immediate experience inaccessible4 ,this is done to avoid the supposed alternative of having to say that the external world1 which ,i regard as existing before me1 is nothing but the world of my consciousness1 with the absurd--solipsistic--corollary that other persons likewise exist only within my consciousness4 ,several epistemological tendencies in recent speculation have joined in creating this problem4 ,but it is possible to attain to clearness about it by surveying the situation from the point of view of spiritual perception which underlies the exposition of this book4 ,what is it that1 in the first instance1 ,i have before me when ,i confront another person8 ,to begin with1 there is the sensuous appearance of the other's body1 as given in perception4 ,to this we might add the auditory perception of what he is saying1 and so forth4 ,all this ,i apprehend1 not with a passive stare1 but by the activity of my thinking which is set in motion4 ,through the thinking with which ,i now confront the other person1 the percept of him becomes1 as it were1 psychically transparent4 ,as my thinking apprehends the percept1 ,i am compelled to judge that what ,i perceive is really quite other than it appears to the outer senses4 ,the sensuous appearance1 in being what it immediately is1 reveals something else which it is mediately4 ,in presenting itself to me as a distinct object1 it1 at the same time1 extinguishes itself as a mere sensuous appearance4 ,but in thus extinguishing itself it reveals a character which1 so long as it affects me1 compels me as a thinking being to extinguish my own thinking and to put its thinking in the place of mine4 ,its thinking is then apprehended by my thinking as an experience like my own4 ,thus ,i have really perceived another's thinking4 ,for the immediate percept1 in extinguishing itself as sensuous appearance1 is apprehended by my thinking4 ,it is a profess which passes wholly in my consciousness and consists in this1 that the other's thinking takes the place of my thinking4 ,the self-extinction of the sensuous appearance actually abolishes the separation between the spheres of the two consciousnesses4 ,in my own consciousness this fusion manifests itself in that1 so long as ,i experience the contents of the other's consciousness1 ,i am aware of my own consciousness as little as ,i am aware of it in dreamless sleep4 ,just as my waking consciousness is eliminated from the latter1 so are the contents of my own consciousness eliminated from my perception of the contents of another's consciousness4 ,two things tend to deceive us about the true facts4 ,the first is that1 in perceiving another person1 the extinction of the contents of one's own consciousness is replaced not1 as in sleep1 by unconsciousness1 but by the contents of the other's consciousness4 ,the other is that my consciousness of my own self oscillates so rapidly between extinction and recurrence1 that these alternations usually escape observation4 ,the whole problem is to be solved1 not through artificial construction of concepts1 involving an inference from what is in consciousness to what always must transcend consciousness1 but through genuine experience of the connection between thinking and perceiving4 ,the same remark applies to many other problems which appear in philosophical literature4 ,philosophers should seek the road to unprejudiced spiritual observation1 instead of hiding reality behind an artificial frontage of concepts4 ,in a monograph by ,eduard von ,hartmann on ,the ,ultimate ,problems of ,epistemology and ,metaphysics 7in the ,zeitschrift fr ,philosophie und philosophische ,kritik1 ,vol4 #ajh1 p4 #ee71 my ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity has been classed with the philosophical tendency which seeks to build upon an epistemological ,monism4 ,eduard von ,hartmann rejects this position as untenable1 for the following reasons4 ,according to the point of view maintained in his monograph1 there are only three possible positions in the theory of knowledge4 ,the first consists in remaining true to the nave point of view1 which regards objects of sense-perception as real things existing outside the human mind4 ,this1 urges ,von ,hartmann1 implies a lack of critical reflection4 ,i fail to realise that with all my contents of consciousness ,i remain imprisoned in my own consciousness4 ,i fail to perceive that ,i am dealing1 not with a table-in-itself1 but only with a phenomenon in my own consciousness4 ,if ,i stop at this point of view1 or if for whatever reasons ,i return to it1 ,i am a ,nave ,realist4 ,but this whole position is untenable1 for it ignores that consciousness has no other objects than its own contents4 ,the second position consists in appreciating this situation and confessing it to oneself4 ,as a result1 ,i become a ,transcendental ,idealist4 ,as such1 says ,von ,hartmann1 ,i am obliged to deny that a thing-in-itself can ever appear in any way within the human mind4 ,but1 if developed with unflinching consistency1 this view ends in ,absolute ,illusionism4 ,for the world which confronts me is now transformed into a mere sum of contents of consciousness1 and1 moreover1 of contents of my private consciousness4 ,the objects of other human minds1 too1 ,i am then compelled to conceive--absurdly enough--as present solely in my own consciousness4 ,hence1 the only tenable position1 according to ,von ,hartmann1 is the third1 viz41 ,transcendental ,realism4 ,on this view1 there are things-in-themselves1 but consciousness can have no dealings with them by way of immediate experience4 ,existing beyond the sphere of human consciousness1 they cause1 in a way of which we remain unconscious1 the appearance of objects in consciousness4 ,these things-in-themselves are known only by inference from the contents of consciousness1 which are immediately experienced but for that very reason1 purely ideal4 ,eduard von ,hartmann maintains in the monograph cited above1 that epistemological ,monism--for such he takes my point of view to be--is bound to declare itself identical with one or other of the above three positions2 and that its failure to do so is due only to its inconsistency in not drawing the actual consequences of its presuppositions4 ,the monograph goes on to say3 ,if we want to find out which epistemological position a so-called ,epistemological ,monist occupies1 all we have to do is to put to him certain questions and compel him to answer them4 ,for1 out of his own initiative1 no ,monist will condescend to state his views on these points1 and likewise he will seek to dodge in every way giving a straight answer to our questions1 because every answer he may give will betray that ,epistemological ,monism does not differ from one or other of the three positions4 ,our questions are the following3 7#a7 ,are things continuous or intermittent in their existence8 ,if the answer is 'continuous1' we have before us some one of the forms of ,nave ,realism4 ,if the answer is 'intermittent1' we have ,transcendental ,idealism4 ,but if the answer is3 ',they are1 on the one hand1 continuous1 viz41 as contents of the ,absolute ,mind1 or as unconscious ideas1 or as permanent possibilities of perception1 but1 on the other hand1 intermittent1 viz41 as contents of finite consciousness1' we recognise ,transcendental ,realism4 7#b7 ,when three persons are sitting at a table1 how many distinct tables are there8 ,the ,nave ,realist answers 'one'2 the ,transcendental ,idealist answers 'three'2 but the ,transcendental ,realist answers 'four4' ,this last answer does1 indeed1 presuppose that it is legitimate to group together in the single question1 ',how many tables8' things so unlike each other as the one table which is the 'thing-in-itself' and the three tables which are the objects of perception in the three perceivers' minds4 ,if this seems too great a licence to anyone1 he will have to answer 'one and three1' instead of 'four4' 7#c7 ,when two persons are alone together in a room1 how many distinct persons are there8 ,if you answer 'two'--you are a ,nave ,realist4 ,if you answer 'four1' viz41 in each of the two minds one ',i' and one ',other1' you are a ,transcendental ,idealist4 ,if you answer 'six1' viz41 two persons as 'things-in-themselves' and four persons as ideal objects in the two minds1 you are a ,transcendental ,realist4 ,in order to show that ,epistemological ,monism is not one of these three positions1 we should have to give other answers than the above to each of these three questions4 ,but ,i cannot imagine what answers these could be4 ,the answers of the ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity would have to be3 7#a7 ,whoever apprehends only what he perceives of a thing and mistakes these percepts for the reality of the thing1 is a ,nave ,realist4 ,he does not realise that1 strictly1 he ought to regard these perceptual contents as existing only so long as he is looking at the objects1 so that he ought to conceive the objects before him as intermittent4 ,as soon1 however1 as it becomes clear to him that reality is to be met with only in the percepts which are organised by thinking1 he attains to the insight that the percepts which appear as intermittent events1 reveal themselves as continuously in existence as soon as they are interpreted by the constructions of thought4 ,hence continuity of existence must be predicated of the contents of perception which living thought has organised4 ,only that part which is only perceived1 not thought1 would have to be regarded as intermittent if--which is not the case--there were such a part4 7#b7 ,when three persons are sitting at a table1 how many distinct tables are there8 ,there is only one table4 ,but so long as the three persons stop short at their perceptual images1 they ought to say3 ,these percepts are not the reality at all4 ,as soon as they pass on to the table as apprehended by thinking1 there is revealed to them the one real table4 ,they are then united with their three contents of consciousness in this one reality4 7#c7 ,when two persons are alone together in a room1 how many distinct persons are there8 ,most assuredly there are not six--not even in the sense of the ,transcendental ,realist's theory--but only two4 ,only1 at first1 each person has nothing but the unreal percept of himself and of the other person4 ,there are four such percepts1 the presence of which in the minds of the two persons is the stimulus for the apprehension of reality by their thinking4 ,in this activity of thinking each of the two persons transcends the sphere of his own consciousness4 ,a living awareness of the consciousness of the other person as well as of his own arises in each4 ,in these moments of living awareness the persons are as little imprisoned within their consciousness as they are in sleep4 ,but at other moments consciousness of this identification with the other returns1 so that each person1 in the experience of thinking1 apprehends consciously both himself and the other person4 ,i know that a ,transcendental ,realist describes this view as a relapse into ,nave ,realism4 ,but1 then1 ,i have already pointed out in this book that ,nave ,realism retains its justification for our thinking as we actually experience it4 ,the ,transcendental ,realist ignores the true situation in the process of cognition completely4 ,he cuts himself off from the facts by a tissue of concepts and entangles himself in it4 ,moreover1 the ,monism which appears in the ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity ought not to be labelled epistemological1 but1 if an epithet is wanted1 then a ,monism of ,thought4 ,all this has been misunderstood by ,eduard von ,hartmann4 ,ignoring all that is specific in the argumentation of the ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity1 he has charged me with having attempted to combine ,hegel's ,universalistic ,panlogism with ,hume's ,individualistic ,phenomenalism 7,zeitschrift fr ,philosophie1 vol4 #ajh1 p4 #ga1 note74 ,but1 in truth1 the ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity has nothing whatever to do with the two positions which it is accused of trying to combine4 7,this1 too1 is the reason why ,i could feel no interest in polemics against1 e4g41 the ,epistemological ,monism of ,johannes ,rehmke4 ,the point of view of the ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity is simply quite different from what ,eduard von ,hartmann and others call ,epistemological ,monism47 ,,appendix ,,ii ,,revised ,,introduction ,,to ,,philosophy ,,of ,,freedom4 ,the following chapter reproduces1 in all essentials1 the pages which stood as a sort of ,introduction in the first edition of this book4 ,inasmuch as it rather reflects the mood out of which ,i composed this book twenty-five years ago1 than has any direct bearing on its contents1 ,i print it here as an ,appendix4 ,i do not want to omit it altogether1 because the suggestion keeps cropping up that ,i want to suppress some of my earlier writings on account of my later works on spiritual matters4 ,our age is one which is unwilling to seek truth anywhere but in the depths of human nature4 #fb ,of the following two well-known paths described by ,schiller1 it is the second which will to-day be found most useful3 ,wahrheit suchen wir beide1 du aussen im ,leben1 ich innen ,in dem ,herzen1 und so findet sie jeder gewiss4 ,ist das ,auge gesund1 so begegnet es aussen dem ,schpfer ,ist es das ,herz1 dann gewiss spiegelt es innen die ,welt4 #fc ,a truth which comes to us from without bears ever the stamp of uncertainty4 ,conviction attaches only to what appears as truth to each of us in our own hearts4 ,truth alone can give us confidence in developing our powers4 ,he who is tortured by doubts finds his powers lamed4 ,in a world the riddle of which baffles him1 he can find no aim for his activity4 ,we no longer want to believe2 we want to know4 ,belief demands the acceptance of truths which we do not wholly comprehend4 ,but the individuality which seeks to experience everything in the depths of its own being1 is repelled by what it cannot understand4 ,only that knowledge will satisfy us which springs from the inner life of the personality1 and submits itself to no external norm4 ,again1 we do not want any knowledge which has encased itself once and for all in hide-bound formulas1 and which is preserved in ,encyclopdias valid for all time4 ,each of us claims the right to start from the facts that lie nearest to hand1 from his own immediate experiences1 and thence to ascend to a knowledge of the whole universe4 ,we strive after certainty in knowledge1 but each in his own way4 ,our scientific theories1 too1 are no longer to be formulated as if we were unconditionally compelled to accept them4 ,none of us would wish to give a scientific work a title like ,fichte's ,a ,pellucid ,account for the ,general ,public concerning the ,real ,nature of the ,newest ,philosophy4 ,an ,attempt to ,compel the ,readers to ,understand4 ,nowadays there is no attempt to compel anyone to understand4 ,we claim no agreement from anyone whom a distinct individual need does not drive to a certain view4 ,we do not seek nowadays to cram facts of knowledge even into the immature human being1 the child4 ,we seek rather to develop his faculties in such a way that his understanding may depend no longer on our compulsion1 but on his will4 ,i am under no illusion concerning the characteristics of the present age4 ,i know how many flaunt a manner of life which lacks all individuality and follows only the prevailing fashion4 ,but ,i know also that many of my contemporaries strive to order their lives in the direction of the principles ,i have indicated4 ,to them ,i would dedicate this book4 ,it does not pretend to offer the only possible way to ,truth1 it only describes the path chosen by one whose heart is set upon ,truth4 ,the reader will be led at first into somewhat abstract regions1 where thought must draw sharp outlines1 if it is to reach secure conclusions4 ,but he will also be led out of these arid concepts into concrete life4 ,i am fully convinced that one cannot do without soaring into the ethereal realm of abstraction1 if one's experience is to penetrate life in all directions4 ,he who is limited to the pleasures of the senses misses the sweetest enjoyments of life4 ,the ,oriental sages make their disciples live for years a life of resignation and asceticism before they impart to them their own wisdom4 ,the ,western world no longer demands pious exercises and ascetic practices as a preparation for science1 but it does require a sincere willingness to withdraw oneself awhile from the immediate impressions of life1 and to betake oneself into the realm of pure thought4 ,the spheres of life are many and for each there develops a special science4 ,but life itself is one1 and the more the sciences strive to penetrate deeply into their separate spheres1 the more they withdraw themselves from the vision of the world as a living whole4 ,there must be one supreme science which seeks in the separate sciences the elements for leading men back once more to the fullness of life4 ,the scientific specialist seeks in his studies to gain a knowledge of the world and its workings4 ,this book has a philosophical aim3 science itself is here infused with the life of an organic whole4 ,the special sciences are stages on the way to this all-inclusive science4 ,a similar relation is found in the arts4 ,the composer in his work employs the rules of the theory of composition4 ,this latter is an accumulation of principles1 knowledge of which is a necessary presupposition for composing4 ,in the act of composing1 the rules of theory become the servants of life1 of reality4 ,in exactly the same way philosophy is an art4 ,all genuine philosophers have been artists in concepts4 ,human ideas have been the medium of their art1 and scientific method their artistic technique4 ,abstract thinking thus gains concrete individual life4 ,ideas turn into life-forces4 ,we have no longer merely a knowledge about things1 but we have now made knowledge a real1 self-determining organism4 ,our consciousness1 alive and active1 has risen beyond a mere passive reception of truths4 ,how philosophy1 as an art1 is related to freedom2 what freedom is2 and whether we do1 or can1 participate in it--these are the principal problems of my book4 ,all other scientific discussions are put in only because they ultimately throw light on these questions which are1 in my opinion1 the most intimate that concern mankind4 ,these pages offer a ,philosophy of ,freedom4 ,all science would be nothing but the satisfaction of idle curiosity did it not strive to enhance the existential value of human personality4 ,the true value of the sciences is seen only when we are shown the importance of their results for humanity4 ,the final aim of an individuality can never be the cultivation of any single faculty1 but only the development of all capacities which slumber within us4 ,knowledge has value only in so far as it contributes to the all-round unfolding of the whole nature of man4 ,this book1 therefore1 does not conceive the relation between science and life in such a way that man must bow down before the world of ideas and devote his powers to its service4 ,on the contrary1 it shows that he takes possession of the world of ideas in order to use them for his human aims1 which transcend those of mere science4 ,man must confront ideas as master1 lest he become their slave4 ,,appendix ,,iii ,,preface ,,to ,,the ,,original ,,edition ,,of ,,truth ,,and ,,science ,contemporary philosophy suffers from a morbid belief in ,kant4 ,to help towards our emancipation from this belief is the aim of the present essay4 ,it would indeed be criminal to try and minimise the debt which the development of ,german philosophy owes to ,kant's immortal work4 ,but it is high time to acknowledge that the only way of laying the foundations for a truly satisfying view of the world and of human life is to put ourselves in decisive opposition to the spirit of ,kant4 ,what is it that ,kant has achieved8 ,he has shown that the transcendent ground of the world which lies beyond the data of our senses and the categories of our reason1 and which his predecessors sought to determine by means of empty concepts1 is inaccessible to our knowledge4 ,from this he concluded that all our scientific thinking must keep within the limits of possible experience1 and is incapable of attaining to knowledge of the transcendent and ultimate ground of the world1 i4e41 of the thing-in-itself4 ,but what if this thing-in-itself1 this whole transcendent ground of the world1 should be nothing but a fiction8 ,it is easy to see that this is precisely what it is4 ,an instinct inseparable from human nature impels us to search for the innermost essence of things1 for their ultimate principles4 ,it is the basis of all scientific enquiry4 ,but1 there is not the least reason to look for this ultimate ground outside the world of our senses and of our spirit1 unless a thorough and comprehensive examination of this world should reveal within it elements which point unmistakably to an external cause4 ,the present essay attempts to prove that all the principles which we need in order to explain our world and make it intelligible1 are within reach of our thought4 ,thus1 the assumption of explanatory principles lying outside our world turns out to be the prejudice of an extinct philosophy which lived on vain dogmatic fancies4 ,this ought to have been ,kant's conclusion1 too1 if he had really enquired into the powers of human thought4 ,instead1 he demonstrated in the most complicated way that the constitution of our cognitive faculties does not permit us to reach the ultimate principles which lie beyond our experience4 ,but we have no reason whatever for positing these principles in any such ,beyond4 ,thus ,kant has indeed refuted dogmatic philosophy1 but he has put nothing in its place4 ,hence1 all ,german philosophy which succeeded ,kant has evolved everywhere in opposition to him4 ,fichte1 ,schelling1 ,hegel simply ignored the limits fixed by ,kant for our knowledge and sought the ultimate principles1 not beyond1 but within1 the world accessible to human reason4 ,even ,schopenhauer1 though he does declare the conclusions of ,kant's ,critique of ,pure ,reason to be eternal and irrefutable truths1 cannot avoid seeking knowledge of the ultimate grounds of the world along paths widely divergent from those of his master4 ,but the fatal mistake of all these thinkers was that they sought knowledge of ultimate truths1 without having laid the foundation for such an enterprise in a preliminary investigation of the nature of knowledge itself4 ,hence1 the proud intellectual edifices erected by ,fichte1 ,schelling and ,hegel have no foundation to rest on4 ,the lack of such foundations reacts most unfavourably upon the arguments of these thinkers4 ,ignorant of the importance of the world of pure ideas and of its relation to the realm of sense-perception1 they built error upon error1 one-sidedness upon one-sidedness4 ,no wonder that their over-bold systems proved unable to withstand the storms of an age which recked nothing of philosophy4 ,no wonder that many good things in these systems were pitilessly swept away along with the errors4 ,to remedy the defect which has just been indicated is the purpose of the following investigations4 ,they will not imitate ,kant by explaining what our minds can not know3 their aim is to show what our minds can know4 ,the outcome of these investigations is that truth is not1 as the current view has it1 an ideal reproduction of a some real object1 but a free product of the human spirit1 which would not exist anywhere at all unless we ourselves produced it4 ,it is not the task of knowledge to reproduce in conceptual form something already existing independently4 ,its task is to create a wholly new realm which1 united with the world of sense-data1 ends by yielding us reality in the full sense4 ,in this way1 man's supreme activity1 the creative productivity of his spirit1 finds its organic place in the universal world-process4 ,without this activity it would be impossible to conceive the world-process as a totality complete in itself4 ,man does not confront the world-process as a passive spectator who merely copies in his mind the events which occur1 without his participation1 in the cosmos without4 ,he is an active co-creator in the world-process1 and his knowledge is the most perfect member of the organism of the universe4 ,this view carries with it an important consequence for our conduct1 for our moral ideals4 ,these1 too1 must be regarded1 not as copies of an external standard1 but as rooted within us4 ,similarly1 we refuse to look upon our moral laws as the behests of any power outside us4 ,we know no categorical imperative which1 like a voice from the ,beyond1 prescribes to us what to do or to leave undone4 ,our moral ideals are our own free creations4 ,all we have to do is to carry out what we prescribe to ourselves as the norm of our conduct4 ,thus1 the concept of truth as a free act leads to a theory of morals based on the concept of a perfectly free personality4 ,these theses1 of course1 are valid only for that part of our conduct the laws of which our thinking penetrates with complete comprehension4 ,so long as the laws of our conduct are merely natural motives or remain obscure to our conceptual thinking1 it may be possible from a higher spiritual level to perceive how far they are founded in our individuality1 but we ourselves experience them as influencing us from without1 as compelling us to action4 ,every time that we succeed in penetrating such a motive with clear understanding1 we make a fresh conquest in the realm of freedom4 ,the relation of these views to the theory of ,eduard von ,hartmann1 who is the most significant figure in contemporary philosophy1 will be made clear to the reader in detail in the course of this essay1 especially as regards the problem of knowledge4 ,a prelude to a ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity--this is what the present essay offers4 ,that philosophy itself1 completely worked out1 will shortly follow4 ,the ultimate aim of all science is to increase the value of existence for human personality4 ,whoever does not devote himself to science with this aim in view is merely modelling himself in his own work upon some master4 ,if he researches1 it is merely because that happens to be what he has been taught to do4 ,but not for him is the title of a free thinker4 ,the sciences are seen in their true value only when philosophy explains the human significance of their results4 ,to make a contribution to such an explanation was my aim4 ,but1 perhaps1 our present-day science scorns all philosophical vindication6 ,if so1 two things are certain4 ,one is that this essay of mine is superfluous4 ,the other is that modern thinkers are lost in the wood and do not know what they want4 ,in concluding this ,preface1 ,i cannot omit a personal observation4 ,up to now ,i have expounded all my philosophical views on the basis of ,goethe's world-view1 into which ,i was first introduced by my dear and revered teacher1 ,karl ,julius ,schrer1 who to me stands in the very forefront of ,goethe-students1 because his gaze is ever focussed beyond the particular upon the universal ,ideas4 ,but1 with this essay ,i hope to have shown that the edifice of my thought is a whole which has its foundations in itself and which does not need to be derived from ,goethe's world-view4 ,my theories1 as they are here set forth and as they will presently be amplified in the ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity1 have grown up in the course of many years4 ,nothing but a deep sense of gratitude leads me to add that the affectionate sympathy of the ,specht family in ,vienna1 during the period when ,i was the tutor of its children1 provided me with an environment1 than which ,i could not have wished a better1 for the development of my ideas4 ,in the same spirit1 ,i would add1 further1 that ,i owe to the stimulating conversations with my very dear friend1 ,miss ,rosa ,mayreder1 of ,vienna1 the mood which ,i needed for putting into final form many of the thoughts which ,i have sketched provisionally as germs of my ,philosophy of ,spiritual ,activity4 ,her own literary efforts1 which express the sensitive and high-minded nature of a true artist1 are likely before long to be presented to the public4 ,vienna1 ,december1 #ahia4 ,,appendix ,,iv ,,introduction ,,to ,,original ,,edition ,,of ,,truth ,,and ,,science ,the aim of the following discussions is to reduce the act of cognition1 by analysis1 to its ultimate elements and thus to discover a correct formulation of the problem of knowledge and a way to its solution4 ,they criticise all theories of knowledge which are based on ,kant's line of thought1 in order to show that along this road no solution of the problem of knowledge can ever be found4 ,it is1 however1 due to the fundamental spade-work which ,volkelt has done in his thorough examination of the concept of experience1 #fd to acknowledge that without his preliminary labours the precise determination1 which ,i have here attempted of the concept of the ,given would have been very much more difficult4 ,however1 we are cherishing the hope that we have laid the foundations for our emancipation from the ,subjectivism which attaches to all theories of knowledge that start from ,kant4 ,we believe ourselves to have achieved this emancipation through showing that the subjective form1 in which the picture of the world presents itself to the act of cognition1 prior to its elaboration by science1 is nothing but a necessary stage of transition which is overcome in the very process of knowledge itself4 ,for us1 experience1 so-called1 which ,positivism and ,neo-,kantianism would like to represent as the only thing which is certain1 is precisely the most subjective of all4 ,in demonstrating this1 we also show that ,objective ,idealism is the inevitable conclusion of a theory of knowledge which understands itself4 ,it differs from the metaphysical and absolute ,idealism of ,hegel in this1 that it seeks in the subject of knowledge the ground for the diremption of reality into given existence and concept1 and that it looks for the reconciliation of this divorce1 not in an objective world-dialectic1 but in the subjective process of cognition4 ,the present writer has already once before advocated this point of view in print1 viz41 in the ,outlines of a ,theory of ,knowledge 7,berlin and ,stuttgart1 #ahhe74 ,however1 that book differs essentially in method from the present essay1 and it also lacks the analytic reduction of knowledge to its ultimate elements4 ,,notes #a ,two souls1 alas6 reside within my breast1 ,and each withdraws from1 and repels1 its brother4 ,one with tenacious organs holds in love ,and clinging lust the world in its embraces2 ,the other strongly sweeps1 this dust above1 ,into the high ancestral spaces4 ,faust1 ,part ,i1 ,scene #b4 7,bayard ,taylor's translation47 #b ,knowledge is transcendental when it is aware that nothing can be asserted directly about the thing-in-itself but makes indirect inferences from the subjective which is known to the unknown which lies beyond the subjective 7transcendental74 ,the thing-in-itself is1 according to this view1 beyond the sphere of the world of immediate experience2 in other words1 it is transcendent4 ,our world can1 however1 be transcendentally related to the transcendent4 ,hartmann's theory is called ,realism because it proceeds from the subjective1 the mental1 to the transcendent1 the real4 #c ,the way in which the above view has influenced psychology1 physiology1 etc41 in various directions has been set forth by the author in works published after this book4 ,here he is concerned only with characterising the results of an open-minded study of thinking itself4 #d ,the passage from page #adf down to this point has been added1 or rewritten1 for the present ,revised ,edition4 7#aiah74 #e ,a complete catalogue of the principles of morality 7from the point of view of ,metaphysical ,realism7 may be found in ,eduard von ,hartmann's ,phnomenologie des sittlichen ,bewusstseins4 #f ,translation by ,abbott1 ,kant's ,theory of ,ethics1 p4 #ahj2 ,critique of ,pure ,practical ,reason1 chap4 iii4 #g ,for the manner in which ,i have here spoken of ,materialism1 and for the justification of so speaking of it1 see the ,addition at the end of this chapter4 #h ,only a superficial critic will find in the use of the word faculty1 in this and other passages1 a relapse into the old-fashioned doctrine of faculties of the soul4 #i ,when ,paulsen1 p4 #ae of the book mentioned above1 says3 ,different natural endowments and different conditions of life demand both a different bodily and also a different mental and moral diet1 he is very close to the correct view1 but yet he misses the decisive point4 ,in so far as ,i am an individual1 ,i need no diet4 ,dietetic means the art of bringing a particular specimen into harmony with the universal laws of the genus4 ,but as an individual ,i am not a specimen of a genus4 #aj ,the ,editor would call the reader's attention to the fact that this book was written in #ahid4 ,for many years ,dr4 ,steiner's efforts have been chiefly concentrated in upholding the ,divinity of ,christ consistently with the broader lines of the ,christian ,churches4 #aa ,we are entitled to speak of thoughts 7ethical ideas7 as objects of observation4 ,for1 although the products of thinking do not enter the field of observation1 so long as the thinking goes on1 they may well become objects of observation subsequently4 ,in this way we have gained our characterisation of action4 #ab ,those who want to settle by calculation whether the sum total of pleasure or that of pain is bigger1 ignore that they are subjecting to calculation something which is nowhere experienced4 ,feeling does not calculate1 and what matters for the real valuing of life is what we really experience1 not what results from an imaginary calculation4 #ac ,we disregard here the case where excessive increase of pleasure turns pleasure into pain4 #ad ,immediately upon the publication of this book 7#ahid71 critics objected to the above arguments that1 even now1 within the generic character of her sex1 a woman is able to shape her life individually1 just as she pleases1 and far more freely than a man who is already de-individualised1 first by the school1 and later by war and profession4 ,i am aware that this objection will be urged to-day1 even more strongly4 ,none the less1 ,i feel bound to let my sentences stand1 in the hope that there are readers who appreciate how violently such an objection runs counter to the concept of freedom advocated in this book1 and who will interpret my sentences above by another standard than that of man's loss of individuality through school and profession4 #ae ,the ,preface and ,introduction to the original edition of ,truth and ,science are printed as ,appendix ,,iii and ,appendix ,,iv at the end of this volume4 #af l4c41 p4 #bj4 #ag cf4 ,kant1 ,critique of ,pure ,reason1 ,intr4 to #bnd edit41 ,section vi4 #ah ,prolegomena1 ,section v4 #ai ,critique of ,pure ,reason1 ,intr41 ,section iv4 #bj cf4 his ,analyse der ,wirklichkeit1 ,gedanken und ,tatsachen4 #ba ,possible here means merely conceivable4 #bb cf4 ,die ,welt als ,wahrnehmung und ,begriff1 pp4 #afa ff4 #bc ,this attempt1 by the way1 is one which the objections of ,robert ,zimmermann 7ber ,kant's mathematisches ,vorurteil und dessen ,folgen7 show to be1 if not wholly mistaken1 at least highly questionable4 #bd ,critique of ,pure ,reason1 ,intr4 to #bnd edit41 ,section ii4 #be cf4 ,kant's ,theorie der ,erfahrung1 pp4 #ij ff4 #bf l4c41 ,section v4 #bg cf4 ,kant's ,theorie der ,erfahrung1 pp4 #ij ff4 #bh cf4 ,die ,grundstze der reinen ,erkenntnistheorie in der ,kantischen ,philosophie1 p4 #gf4 #bi l4c41 p4 #ba4 #cj ,zur ,analyse der ,wirklichkeit1 pp4 #baa ff4 #ca ,darstellung der ,kantischen ,erkenntnistheorie1 p4 #ad4 #cb ,vierteljahrsschrift fr ,wissenschaftliche ,philosophie1 #ahgg1 p4 #bci4 #cc ,system der ,logik1 #crd edit41 pp4 #chj ff4 #cd ,kritische ,grundlagen des ,transcendentalen ,realismus1 pp4 #adb-agb4 #ce ,geschichte der ,neueren ,philosophie1 ,vol4 v41 p4 #fj4 ,volkelt is mistaken about ,fischer when he says 7,kant's ,erkenntnistheorie1 p4 #aih1 n47 that it is not clear from ,fischer's account whether1 in his opinion1 ,kant takes for granted only the psychological fact of the occurrence of universal and necessary judgments1 but also their objective validity and truth4 ,for1 in the passage referred to above1 ,fischer says that the chief difficulty of the ,critique of ,pure ,reason is to be found in the fact that its fundamental positions rest on certain presuppositions which have to be granted if the rest is to be valid4 ,these presuppositions consist for ,fischer1 too1 in this1 that first the fact of knowledge is affirmed1 and then analysis reveals the cognitive faculties by means of which that fact itself is explained4 #cf ,how far our own epistemological discussions conform to this method1 will be shown in ,section iv1 ,the ,starting-points of the ,theory of ,knowledge4 #cg l4c41 ,preface1 p4 x4 #ch ,zur ,analyse der ,wirklichkeit 7,strassburg1 #ahgf71 p4 #bh4 #ci ,kant's ,erkenntnistheorie1 ,section i4 #dj ,a4 ,dorner1 ,das menschliche ,erkennen 7,berlin1 #ahhg74 #da ,rehmke1 l4c4 #db ,die ,lehre vom ,wissen 7,berlin1 #ahfh74 #dc ,die ,grundfragen der ,erkenntnistheorie 7,mainz1 #ahhg7 p4 #che4 #dd ,system der kritischen ,philosophie1 ,i4 ,teil1 p4 #beg4 #de ,das ,grundproblem der ,erkenntnistheorie1 p4 #cg4 #df ,philosophische ,monatshefte1 ,vol4 xxvi 7#ahij71 p4 #cij4 #dg ,das ,grundproblem der ,erkenntnistheorie1 p4 #a4 #dh ,by concept ,i mean a rule for the synthesis of the disconnected data of perception into a unity4 ,causality1 e4g41 is a concept4 ,by idea ,i mean nothing but a concept of richer connotation4 ,organism1 taken quite generally1 is an example of an idea4 #di ,it ought not to be necessary to say that the term centre1 here1 is not intended to affirm a theory concerning the nature of consciousness1 but is used merely as a shorthand expression for the total physiognomy of consciousness4 #ej ,fichte's ,smtliche ,werke1 ,vol4 ,i1 p4 #ga4 #ea l4c41 ,vol4 ,i1 p4 #ig4 #eb l4c41 ,vol4 ,i1 p4 #ia4 #ec l4c41 ,vol4 ,i1 p4 #agh4 #ed l4c41 ,vol4 ,i1 p4 #ia4 #ee ,geschichte der ,philosophie1 p4 #fje4 #ef ,fichte1 ,smtliche ,werke1 ,vol4 ,i1 p4 #id4 #eg l4c41 ,vol4 ,i1 p4 #ih4 #eh l4c41 ,vol4 ,i1 p4 #dbb4 #ei ,delivered in the autumn of #ahac at the ,university of ,berlin4 ,see ,nachgelassene ,werke1 ,vol4 ,i1 p4 #d4 #fj l4c41 ,vol4 ,i1 p4 #af4 #fa cf4 his ,christliche ,dogmatik1 #bnd edit41 #ahhd-e4 ,the epistemological arguments are in ,vol4 ,i4 ,an exhaustive discussion of his point of view has been furnished by ,e4 von ,hartmann4 ,see his ,kritische ,wanderungen durch die ,philosophie der ,gegenwart1 pp4 #bjj ff4 #fb ,only the very first opening sentences 7in the first edition7 of this argument have been altogether omitted here1 because they seem to me to-day wholly irrelevant4 ,but the rest of the chapter seems to me even to day relevant and necessary1 in spite1 nay1 because1 of the scientific bias of contemporary thought4 #fc ,truth seek we both--,thou in the life without thee and around2 ,i in the heart within4 ,by both can ,truth alike be found4 ,the healthy eye can through the world the great ,creator track2 ,the healthy heart is but the glass which gives ,creation back4 ,bulwer4 #fd ,erfahrung und ,denken1 ,kritische ,grundlegung der ,erkenntnistheorie1 von ,johannes ,volkelt 7,hamburg und ,leipzig1 #ahhf74