r]cnv wtottov eivai ev p,eya\q> 7re$i(p kva arayyv
yevvr)dr]vai, kcli kva Koafiov ev rught not to be called a compositum, bnt a totum" &c,
lolds good absolutely of matter also, which is simply
ipace become perceptible. On the other hand, the infinite
livisibility of matter, which the antithesis asserts, follows
i priori and incontrovertibly from that of space, which it
ills. This proposition has absolutely nothing against it ;
ind therefore Kant also (p. 513 ; V. 541), when he speaks
leriously and in his own person, no longer as the mouth-
)iece of the aSiieos X070?, presents it as objective truth ;
tnd also in the " Metaphysical First Principles of Natural
Science" (p. 108, first edition), the proposition, "Matter is
nfinitely divisible," is placed at the beginning of the proof
)f the first proposition of mechanics as established truth,
laving appeared and been proved as the fourth proposition
n the Dynamics. But here Kant spoils the proof of the
mtithesis by the greatest obscurity of style and useless
iccumulation of words, with the cunning intention that
;he evidence of the antithesis shall not throw the sophisms
)f the thesis too much into the shade. Atoms are no
accessary thought of the reason, but merely an hypothesis
for the explanation of the difference of the specific gravity
jf bodies. But Kant himself has shown, in the dynamics
jf his " Metaphysical First Principles of Natural Science,"
that this can be otherwise, and indeed better and more
simply explained than by atomism. In this, however, he
was anticipated by Priestley, " On Matter and Spirit,"
sect. 1. Indeed, even in Aristotle, " Phys." iv. 9, the
fundamental thought of this is to be found.
The argument for the third thesis is a very fine
sophism, and is really Kant's pretended principle of pure
reason itself entirely unadulterated and unchanged. It
tries to prove the finiteness of the series of causes by
saying that, in order to be sufficient, a cause must contain
U2 CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
the complete sum of the conditions from which the suc-
ceeding state, the effect, proceeds. For the completeness
of the determinations present together in the state which is
the cause, the argument now substitutes the completeness
of the series of causes by which that state itself was brought
to actuality; and because completeness presupposes the
condition of being rounded off or closed in, and this again
presupposes finiteness, the argument infers from this a
first cause, closing the series and therefore unconditioned.
But the juggling is obvious. In order to conceive the
state A. as the sufficient cause of the state B., I assume
that it contains the sum of the necessary determinations
from the co-existence of which the estate B. inevitably
follows. Now by this my demand upon it as a sufficient
cause is entirely satisfied, and has no direct connection
with the question how the state A. itself came to be;
this rather belongs to an entirely different consideration,
in which I regard the said state A. no more as cause, but
as itself an effect; in which case another state again
must be related to it, just as it was related to B. The
assumption of the finiteness of the series of causes and
effects, and accordingly of a first beginning, appeal*
nowhere in this as necessary, any more than the present-
ness of the present moment requires us to assume a
beginning of time itself. It only comes to be added on
account of the laziness of the speculating individual
That this assumption lies in the acceptance of a cause as
a sufficient reason is thus unfairly arrived at and false, as
I have shown at length above when considering the
Kantian principle of pure reason which coincides with
this thesis. In illustration of the assertion of this false
thesis, Kant is bold enough in his observations upon it to
give as an example of an unconditioned beginning his
rising from his chair ; as if it were not just as impossible
for him to rise without a motive as for a ball to roll
without a cause. I certainly do not need to prove the
baselessness of the appeal which, induced by a sense ol
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 113
weakness, he makes to the philosophers of antiquity, by
quoting from Ocellus Lucanus, the Eleatics, &c., not to
speak of the Hindus. Against the proof of this anti-
thesis, as in the case of the previous ones, there is nothing
to advance.
The fourth conflict is, as I have already remarked,
really tautological with the third; and the proof of the
thesis is also essentially the same as that of the preceding
one. His assertion that every conditioned presupposes
a complete series of conditions, and therefore a series
which ends with an unconditioned, is a petitio principii,
which must simply be denied. Everything conditioned
presupposes nothing but its condition ; that this is again
conditioned raises a new consideration which is not
directly contained in the first.
A certain appearance of probability cannot be denied
to the antinomy ; yet it is remarkable that no part of
the Kantian philosophy has met so little contradiction,
indeed has found so much acceptance, as this exceed-
ingly paradoxical doctrine. Almost all philosophical
parties and text-books have regarded it as valid, and
nave also repeatedly reconstructed it; while nearly all
Kant's other doctrines have been contested, and indeed
:here have never been wanting some perverse minds
ffhich rejected even the transcendental aesthetic. The
mdivided assent which the antinomy, on the other hand,
las met with may ultimately arise from the fact that
certain persons regard with inward satisfaction the point
it which the understanding is so thoroughly brought to
1 standstill, having hit upon something which at once is
ind is not, so that they actually have before them here the
ixth trick of Philadelphia in Lichtenberg's broadsheet.
If we examine the real meaning of Kant's Critical Solu-
ion of the cosmological problem which now follows, we
ind that it is not what he gives it out to be, the solution
>f the problem by the disclosure that both sides, starting
rom false assumptions, are wrong in the first and second
VOL. 11. h
H4 CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
conflicts, and that in the third and fourth both are rig]
It is really the confirmation of the antitheses by the ex-
planation of their assertions.
First Kant asserts, in this solution, obviously wrongl;
that both sides started from the assumption, as their firsi
principle, that with the conditioned the completed (thus
rounded off) series of its conditions is given. Only the
thesis laid down this proposition, Kant's principle of pure
reason, as the ground of its assertions ; the antithesis, on
the other hand, expressly denied it throughout, and asserted
the contrary. Further, Kant charges both sides with this
assumption, that the world exists in itself, i.e., indepen-
dently of being known and of the forms of this knowledge,
but this assumption also is only made by the thesis ; in-
deed, it is so far from forming the ground of the assertions
of the antithesis that it is absolutely inconsistent with
them. For that it should all be given is absolutely con-
tradictory of the conception of an infinite series. It is
therefore essential to it that it should always exist only
with reference to the process of going through it, and not
independently of this. On the other hand, in the assump-
tion of definite limits also lies that of a whole whicl
exists absolutely and independently of the process o
completely measuring it. Thus it is only the thesis tha
makes the false assumption of a self-existent universe
i.e., a universe given prior to all knowledge, and to whicl
knowledge came as to something external to itself. Th
antithesis from the outset combats this assumption absc
lutely ; for the infinity of the series which it asserts merel
under the guidance of the principle of sufficient reaso
can only exist if the regressus is fully carried out, bi
not independently of it. As the object in general pr
supposes the subject, so also the object which is determine
as an endless chain of conditions necessarily presuppos
in the subject the kind of knowledge corresponding
this, that is, the constant following of the links of tpj
chain. But this is just what Kant gives as the solvl j
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 115
of the problem, and so often repeats : "The infinity of the
world is only through the regressus, not before it." This
his solution of the conflict is thus really only the decision
in favour of the antithesis in the assertion of which this
truth already lies, while it is altogether inconsistent with
the assertions of the thesis. If the antithesis had asserted
that the world consisted of infinite series of reasons and
consequents, and yet existed independently of the idea
and its regressive series, thus in itself, and therefore con-
stituted a given whole, it would have contradicted not
only the thesis but also itself. For an infinite can never
be given as a whole, nor an endless series exist, except as
an endless progress ; nor can what is boundless constitute
a whole. Thus this assumption, of which Kant asserts
that it led both sides into error, belongs only to the thesis.
It is already a doctrine of Aristotle's that an infinity
can never be actu, i.e., actual and given, but only potentid.
Ovk eaTiv evepyeia eivcu to aireipov . . . aX\' a&vvarov to
evreXe-^eca ov arrupov {infinitum non potest esse actu: . . .
sed impossibile, oxtu esse infinitum), Metaph. K. 10. Further:
nor evepyeiav fiev yap ovbev eaTiv aireipov, Bvvajiei Se errc
Tnv Siaipeaiv (nihil enim actu infinitum est, sed potentia
tantum, nempe divisione ipsa). De generat. et cori'upt.,
i., 3. He develops this fully in the " Physics," iii. 5 and
6, where to a certain extent he gives the perfectly correct
solution of the whole of the antinomies. He expounds
the antinomies in his short way, and then says, " A medi-
ator (SiaLTTjTov) is required;" upon which he gives the
solution that the infinite, both of the world in space and
in time and in division, is never before the regressus, or
progresses, but in it. This truth lies then in the rightly
apprehended conception of the infinite. Thus one mis-
understands himself if he imagines that he can think the
infinite, of whatever kind it may be, as something objec-
tively present and complete, and independent of the re-
gressus.
Indeed if, reversing the procedure, we take as the
u6 CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
starting-point what Kant gives as the solution of the
conflict, the assertion of the antithesis follows exactly
from it. Thus : if the world is not an unconditioned
whole and does not exist absolutely but only in the idea,
and if its series of reasons and consequents do not exist
before the regressus of the ideas of them but only through
this regressus, then the. world cannot contain determined
and finite series, because their determination and limita-
tion would necessarily be independent of the idea, which
would then only come afterwards ; but all its series must
be infinite, i.e., inexhaustible by any idea.
On p. 506 ; V. 534, Kant tries to prove from the
falseness of both sides the transcendental ideality of
the phenomenon, and begins, " If the world is a whole
existing by itself, it is either finite or infinite." But this
is false ; a whole existing of itself cannot possibly be
infinite. That ideality may rather be concluded from
the infinity of the series in the world in the following
manner: If the series of reasons and consequents in
the world are absolutely without end, the world cannot
be a given whole independent of the idea; for such a
world always presupposes definite limits, just as on the
contrary infinite series presuppose an infinite regressus.
Therefore, the presupposed infinity of the series must be
determined through the form of reason and consequent,
and this again through the form of knowledge of the
subject ; thus the world as it is known must exist only
in the idea of the subject.
Now whether Kant himself was aware or not that hi*
critical solution of the problem is really a decision ii
favour of the antithesis, I am unable to decide. For i
depends upon whether what Schelling has somewher*
very happily called Kant's system of accommodatioi
extended so far; or whether Kant's mind was her
already involved in an unconscious accommodation t
the influence of his time and surroundings.
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 117
The solution of the third antinomy, the subject of
which was the Idea of freedom, deserves a special con-
sideration, because it is for us very well worth notice that
it is just here in connection with the Idea of freedom
that Kant is obliged to speak more fully of the thing in
itself, which was hitherto only seen in the background.
This is very explicable to us since we have recognised
the thing in itself as the vrill. Speaking generally, this
is the point at which the Kantian philosophy leads to
mine, or at which mine springs out of his as its parent
stem. One will be convinced of this if one reads with
attention pp. 536 and 537; V. 564 and 565, of the
"Critique of Pure Eeason," and, further, compares these
passages with the introduction to the " Critique of Judg-
ment," pp. xviii. and xix. of the third edition, or p. 13 of
Ilosenkranz's edition, where indeed it is said : " The
conception of freedom can in its object (that is then the
will) present to the mind a thing in itself, but not in
perception; the conception of nature, on the other hand,
can present its object to the mind in perception, but not
as a thing in itself." But specially let any one read con-
cerning the solution of the antinomies the fifty-third
paragraph of the Prolegomena, and then honestly answer
the question whether all that is said there does not sound
like a riddle to which my doctrine is the answer. Kant
never completed his thought ; I have merely carried out
his work. Accordingly, what Kant says o^y of the
human phenomenon I have extended to all piienomena
in general, as differing from the human phenomenon only
in degree, that their true being is something absolutely
free, i.e., a will. It appears from my work how fruitful
this insight is in connection with Kant's doctrine of the
ideality of space, time, and causality.
Kant has nowhere made the thing in itself the subject
of a special exposition or distinct deduction ; but, when-
ever he wants it, he introduces it at once by means of the
conclusion that the phenomenon, thus the visible world,
118 CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
must have a reason, an intelligible cause, which is not a
phenomenon, and therefore belongs to no possible expe-
rience. He does this after having assiduously insisted
that the categories, and thus causality also, had a use
which was absolutely confined to possible experience;
that they were merely forms of the understanding, which
served to spell out the phenomena of the world of sense,
beyond which, on the other hand, they had no signifi-
cance, &c, &c. Therefore, he denies in the most uncom-
promising manner their application to things beyond
experience, and rightly explains and at once rejects all
earlier dogmatism as based upon the neglect of this law.
The incredible inconsistency which Kant here fell into
was soon noticed, and used by his first opponents to
make attacks on his philosophy to which it could offer no
resistance. For certainly we apply the law of causality
entirely a priori and before all experience to the changes
felt in our organs of sense. But, on this very account,
this law is just as much of subjective origin as these
sensations themselves, and thus does not lead to a thing
in itself. The truth is, that upon the path of the idea one
can never get beyond the idea ; it is a rounded-off whole,
and has in its own resources no clue leading to the nature
of the thing in itself, which is toto genere different from
it. If we were merely perceiving beings, the way to the
thing in itself would be absolutely cut off from us. Only
the other side of our own being can disclose to us the
other side of the inner being of things. This path I have
followed. But Kant's inference to the thing in itaefl
contrary as it is to his own teaching, obtains some exeiB
from the following circumstance. He does not say, as
truth required, simply and absolutely that the object is
conditioned by the subject, and conversely ; but only that
the manner of the appearance of the object is conditioned
by the forms of knowledge of the subject, which, there-
fore, also come a 'priori to consciousness. But that no*
which in opposition to this is only known a posteriori u
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 119
for him the immediate effect of the thing in itself, which
becomes phenomenon only in its passage through these
forms which are given a priori. From this point of view
it is to some extent explicable how it could escape him
that objectivity in general belongs to the form of the
phenomenon, and is just as much conditioned by subjec-
tivity in general as the mode of appearing of the object
is conditioned by the forms of knowledge of the subject ;
that thus if a thing in itself must be assumed, it abso-
lutely cannot be an object, which however he always
assumes it to be, but such a thing in itself must neces-
sarily lie in a sphere toto genere different from the idea
(from knowing and being known), and therefore could
least of all be arrived at through the laws of the com-
bination of objects among themselves.
With the proof of the thing in itself it has happened to
Kant precisely as with that of the a priori nature of the
law of causality. Both doctrines are true, but their proof
is false. They thus belong to the class of true conclu-
sions from false premises. I have retained them both,
but have proved them in an entirely different way, and
with certainty.
The thing in itself I have neither introduced surrepti-
tiously nor inferred according to laws which exclude it,
because they really belong to its phenomenal appearance ;
nor, in general, have I arrived at it by roundabout ways.
On the contrary, I have shown it directly, there where it
lies immediately, in the will, which reveals itself to every
one directly as the in-itself of his own phenomenal being.
And it is also this immediate knowledge of his own
will out of which in human consciousness the concep-
tion of freedom springs ; for certainly the will, as world-
creating, as thing in itself, is free from the principle of
sufficient reason, and therewith from all necessity, thus is
completely independent, free, and indeed almighty. Yet,
in truth, this only holds good of the will in itself, not of
its manifestations, the individuals, who, just through the
l?/n CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
will itself, are unalterably determined as its manifestations
in time. But in the ordinary consciousness, unenlightened
by philosophy, the will is at once confused with its mani-
festation, and what belongs only to the former is attributed
to the latter, whence arises the illusion of the uncondi-
tioned freedom of the individual Therefore Spinoza says
rightly that if the projected stone had consciousness, it
would believe that it flew of its own free will. For cer-
tainly the in-itself of the stone also is the will, which alone
is free ; but, as in all its manifestations, here also, where it
appears as a stone, it is already fully determined. But of
all this enough has already been said in the text of this
work.
Kant fails to understand and overlooks this immediate
origin of the conception of freedom in every human con-
sciousness, and therefore he now places (p. 533 ; V. 561)
the source of that conception in a very subtle speculation,
through which the unconditioned, to which the reason must
always tend, leads us to hypostatise the conception of free-
dom, and it is only upon this transcendent Idea of freedom
that the practical conception of it is supposed to be founded.
In the " Critique of Practical Reason," 6, and p. 158 of
the fourth and 235 of Rosenkranz's edition, he yet deduces
this last conception differently by saying that the cate-
gorical imperative presupposes it. The speculative Idea
is accordingly only the primary source of the conception
of freedom for the sake of this presupposition, but here
it obtains both significance and application. Neither,
however, is the case. For the delusion of a perfect
freedom of the individual in his particular actions is most
lively in the conviction of the least cultivated man who
has never reflected, and it is thus founded on no specula-
tion, although often assumed by speculation from without
Thus only philosophers, and indeed only the most profound
of them, are free from it, and also the most thoughtful and
enlightened of the writers of the Church.
It follows, then, from all that has been said, that the
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 121
true source of- the conception of freedom is in no way
essentially an inference, either from the speculative Idea
of an unconditioned cause, nor from the fact that it is
presupposed by the categorical imperative. But it springs
directly from the consciousness in which each one recog-
nises himself at once as the will, i.e., as that which, as the
thing in itself, has not the principle of sufficient reason
for its form, and which itself depends upon nothing, but
on which everything else rather depends. Every one, how-
ever, does not recognise himself at once with the critical
and reflective insight of philosophy as a determined mani-
festation of this will which has already entered time, as we
might say, an act of will distinguished from that will to
live itself ; and, therefore, instead of recognising his whole
existence as an act of his freedom, he rather seeks for
freedom in his individual actions. Upon this point I
refer the reader to my prize-essay on the freedom of the
will.
Now if Kant, as he here pretends, and also apparently
did in earlier cases, had merely inferred the thing in itself,
and that with the great inconsistency of an inference
absolutely forbidden by himself, what a remarkable acci-
dent would it then, be that here, where for the first time
he approaches the thing in itself more closely and explains
it, he should recognise in it at once the will, the free will
showing itself in the world only in temporal manifesta-
tions ! I therefore really assume, though it cannot be
proved, that whenever Kant spoke of the thing in itself,
in the obscure depths of his mind he already always in-
distinctly thought of the wilL This receives support from
a passage in the preface to the second edition of the
" Critique of Pure Eeason," pp. xxvii. and xxviii., in Eosen-
kranz's edition, p. 677 of the Supplement.
For the rest, it is just this predetermined solution of the
sham third conflict that affords Kant the opportunity of
expressing very beautifully the deepest thoughts of his
whole philosophy. This is the case in the whole of the
122 CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
' Sixth Section of the Antinomy of Pure Reason ; " b
above all, in the exposition of the opposition between tb
empirical and the intelligible character, p. 534-550; V.
562-578, which I number amonj the most admirable
things that have ever been said by man. (As a supple-
mental explanation of this passage, compare a parallel
passage in the Critique of Practical Reason, p. 169-179
of the fourth edition, or p. 224-231 of Rosenkranz's edi-
tion.) It is yet all the more to be regretted that this is
here not in its right place, partly because it is not found
in the way which the exposition states, and therefore
could be otherwise deduced than it is, partly because it
does not fulfil the end for which it is there the solution
of the sham antinomy. The intelligible character, the
thing in itself, is inferred from the phenomenon by tflj
inconsistent use of the category of causality beyond the
sphere of all phenomena, which has already been suffi-
ciently condemned. In this case the will of man (which
Kant entitles reason, most improperly, and with an un-
pardonable breach of all use of language) is set up as the
thing in itself, with an appeal to an unconditioned ough^
the categorical imperative, which is postulated without
more ado.
Now, instead of all this, the plain open procedure would
have been to start directly from the will, and prove it U
be the in-itself of our own phenomenal being, recognisec
without any mediation ; and then to give that exposition
the empirical and the intelligible character to explain ho?
all actions, although necessitated by motives, yet, both b;
their author and by the disinterested judge, are necesttSi
and absolutely ascribed to the former himself and alone, a
depending solely upon him, to whom therefore guilt an
merit are attributed in respect of them. This alone w
the straight path to the knowledge of that which is nc
phenomenon, and therefore will not be found by the hel
of the laws of the phenomenon, but is that which revv]
itself through the phenomenon, becomes knowable, obj# I
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 123
tifies itself the will to live. It would then have had to
be exhibited merely by analogy as the inner nature of
every phenomenon. Then, however, it certainly could not
have been said that in lifeless or even animal nature no
faculty can be thought except as sensuously conditioned
(p. 546; V. 574), which in Kant's language is simply
saying that the explanation, according to the law of
causality, exhausts the inner nature of these phenomena,
and thus in their case, very inconsistently, the thing in
itself disappears. Through the false position and the
roundabout deduction according with it which the exposi-
tion of the thing in itself has received from Kant, the
whole conception of it has also become falsified. For the
will or the thing in itself, found through the investigation
of an unconditioned cause, appears here related to the
phenomenon as cause to effect. But this relation exists
only within the phenomenal world, therefore presupposes
it, and cannot connect the phenomenal world itself with
what lies outside it, and is toto genere different from it.
Further, the intended end, the solution of the third
antinomy by the decision that both sides, each in a diffe-
rent sense, are right, is not reached at all. For neither the
thesis nor the antithesis have anything to do with the
thing in itself, but entirely with the phenomenon, the
objective world, the world as idea. This it is, and abso-
lutely nothing else, of which the thesis tries to show, by
means of the sophistry we have laid bare, that it contains
unconditioned causes, and it is also this of which the
antithesis rightly denies that it contains such causes.
Therefore the whole exposition of the transcendental free-
dom of the will, so far as it is a thing in itself, which is
given here in justification of the thesis, excellent as it is
in itself, is yet here entirely a ii&rafiacn*; eia aXko yevos.
For the transcendental freedom of the will which is ex-
pounded is by no means the unconditioned causality of a
cause, which the thesis asserts, because it is of the essence
of a cause that it must be a phenomenon, and not some-
124 CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
thing which lies beyond all phenomena and is toto genert
different.
If what is spoken of is cause and effect, the relation
of the will to the manifestation (or of the intelligible
character to the empirical) must never be introduced, as
happens here : for it is entirely different from causal re-
lation. However, here also, in this solution of the anti-
nomy, it is said with truth that the empirical character of
man, like that of every other cause in nature, is unalterably
determined, and therefore that his actions necessarily take
place in accordance with the external influences; therefore
also, in spite of all transcendental freedom (i.e., indepen-
dence of the will in itself of the laws of the connection of
its manifestation), no man has the power of himself to
begin a series of actious, which, however, was asserted by
the thesis. Thus also freedom has no causality ; for only
the will is free, and it lies outside nature or the pheno-
menon, which is just its objectification, but does not stand
in a causal relation to it, for this relation is only found
within the sphere of the phenomenon, thus presupposes
it, and cannot embrace the phenomenon itself and connect
it with what is expressly not a phenomenon. The world
itself can only be explained through the will (for it is the
will itself, so far as it manifests itself), and not through
causality. But in the world causality is the sole principle
of explanation, and everything happens simply according
to the laws of nature. Thus the ri^ht lies entirely on the
side of the antithesis, which sticks to the question in
hand, and uses that principle of explanation which is
valid with regard to it; therefore it needs no apoloffl
The thesis, on the other hand, is supposed to be got out of
the matter by an apology, which first passes over to some-
thing quite different from the question at issue, and then
assumes a principle of explanation which is inapplicable
to it.
The fourth conflict is, as has already been said, in its
real meaning tautological with the third. In its solution
U
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 125
Kant develops still more the untenable nature of the thesis ;
while for its truth, on the other hand, and its pretended
consistency with the antithesis, he advances no reason, as
conversely he is able to bring no reason against the anti-
thesis. The assumption of the thesis he introduces quite
apologetically, and yet calls it himself (p. 562 ; V. 590)
an arbitrary presupposition, the object of which might
well in itself be impossible, and shows merely an utterly
impotent endeavour to find a corner for it somewhere
where it will be safe from the prevailing might of the
antithesis, only to avoid disclosing the emptiness of the
whole of his once-loved assertion of the necessary anti-
nomy in human reason.
Now follows the chapter on the transcendental ideal,
which carries us back at once to the rigid Scholasticism
of the Middle Ages. One imagines one is listening to
Anselm of Canterbury himself. The ens realissimum, the
essence of all realities, the content of all affirmative pro-
positions, appears, and indeed claims to be a necessary
thought of the reason. I for my part must confess that
to my reason such a thought is impossible, and that I am
not able to think anything definite in connection with the
words which denote it.
Moreover, I do not doubt that Kant was compelled to
write this extraordinary chapter, so unworthy of him,
simply by his fondness for architectonic symmetry. The
three principal objects of the Scholastic philosophy (which,
as we have said, if understood in the wider sense, may be
regarded as continuing down to Kant), the soul, the world,
and God, are supposed to be deduced from the three pos-
sible major propositions of syllogisms, though it is plain
that they have arisen, and can arise, simply and solely
through the unconditioned application of the principle of
sufficient reason. Now, after the soul had been forced
into the categorical judgment, and the hypothetical was
126 CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
set apart for the world, ihere remained for the third
Idea nothing but the disjunctive major. Fortunately
there existed a previous work in this direction, the ens
realissimum of the Scholastics, together with the onto-
logical proof of the existence of God set up in a rudi-
mentary form by Anselm of Canterbury and then per-
fected by Descartes. This was joyfully made use of by
Kant, with some reminiscence also of an earlier Latin
work of his youth. However, the sacrifice which Kant
makes to his love of architectonic symmetry in this
chapter is exceedingly great. In defiance of all truth,
what one must regard as the grotesque idea of an essence
of all possible realities is made an essential and necessary
thought of the reason. For the deduction of this Kant
makes use of the false assertion that our knowledge of
particular things arises from a progressive limitation of
general conceptions ; thus also of a most general concep-
tion of all which contains all reality in itself. In this he
stands just as much in contradiction with his own teac
ing as with the truth, for exactly the converse is the ci
Our knowledge starts with the particular and is extend
to the general, and all general conceptions arise by abstrac-
tion from real, particular things known by perception, and
this can be carried on to the most general of all concep-
tions, which includes everything under it, but almost
nothing in it. Thus Kant has here placed the procedure
of our faculty of knowledge just upside down, and thus
might well be accused of having given occasion to a philo-
sophical charletanism that has become famous in our
day, which, instead of recognising that conceptions are
thoughts abstracted from things, makes, on the contrary
the conceptions first, and sees in things only concrete
conceptions, thus bringing to market the world turned
upside down as a philosophical buffoonery, which of
course necessarily found great acceptance.
Even if we assume that every reason must, or at least
can, attain to the conception of God, even without rev
s ne
z
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 127
tion, this clearly takes place only under the guidance of
causality. This is so evident that it requires no proof.
Therefore Chr. Wolf says (Cosmologia Generalis, prcef.,
p. 1) : Sane in theologia naturali existentiam Numinis e
principiis cosmologicis demonstramus. Contingentia uni-
versi et ordinis naturae, una cum impossibilitate casus, sunt
scala, per quam a mundo hoc adspectabili ad Deum ascen-
ditur. And, before him, Leibnitz said, in connection
with the law of causality : Sans ce grand principe on ne
saurait venir a la preuve de I 'existence de Dim. On the
other hand, the thought which is worked out in this
chapter is so far from being essential and necessary to
reason, that it is rather to be regarded as a veritable
masterpiece of the monstrous productions of an age
which, through strange circumstances, fell into the most
singular aberrations and perversities, such as the age of
the Scholastics was an age which is unparalleled in the
history of the world, and can never return again. This
Scholasticism, as it advanced to its final form, certainly
derived the principal proof of the existence of God from
the conception of the ens realissimum, and only then used
the other proofs as accessory. This, however, is mere
methodology, and proves nothing as to the origin of
theology in the human mind. Kant has here taken the
procedure of Scholasticism for that of reason a mistake
which indeed he has made more than once. If it were
true that according to the essential laws of reason the Idea
of God proceeds from the disjunctive syllogism under the
form of an Idea of the most real being, this Idea would
also have existed in the philosophy of antiquity ; but of
the ens realissimum there is nowhere a trace in any of
the ancient philosophers, although some of them certainly
teach that there is a Creator of the world, yet only as the
^iver of form to the matter which exists without him,
5e/iioup7o?, a being whom they yet infer simply and solely
.u accordance with the law of causality. It is true that
Sextus Empiricus (adv. Math., ix. 88) quotes an argu-
128 CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
ment of Cleanthes, which some have held to be the
ontological proof. This, however, it is not, but merely an
inference from analogy ; because experience teaches that
upon earth one being is always better than another, and
man, indeed, as the best, closes the series, but yet has
many faults ; therefore there must exist beings who are still
better, and finally one being who is best of all (KpaTunov,
apicnov), and this would be God.
On the detailed refutation of speculative theology which
now follows I have only briefly to remark that it, and in
general the whole criticism of the three so-called Ideas of
reason, thus the whole Dialectic of Pure Reason, is indeed
to a certain extent the goal and end of the whole work :
yet this polemical part has not really an absolutely uni-
versal, permanent, and purely philosophical interest, such
as is possessed by the preceding doctrinal part, i.c, the
aesthetic and analytic ; but rather a temporary and local
interest, because it stands in a special relation to the
leading points of the philosophy which prevailed in Europe
up till the time of Kant, the complete overthrow of which
was yet, to his immortal credit, achieved by him through
this polemic He has eliminated theism from philosophy;
for in it, as a science and not a system of faith, only that
can find a place which is either empirically given or estab-
lished by valid proofs. Naturally we only mean here the
real seriously understood philosophy which is concerned
with the truth, and nothing else ; and by no means the
jest of philosophy taught in the universities, in which, aftei
Kant as before him, speculative theology plays the principal
part, and where, also, after as before him, the soul appears
without ceremony as a familiar person. For it is the philo-
sophy endowed with salaries and fees, and, indeed, als(
with titles of Hofrath, which, looking proudly down fron
its height, remains for forty years entirely unaware of fll
existence of little people like me, and would be thoroughly
fl
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 129
glad to be rid ' of the old Kant with his Critiques, that
they might drink the health of Leibnitz with all their
hearts. It is further to be remarked here, that as Kant
was confessedly led to his doctrine of the a priori nature
of the conception of causality by Hume's scepticism with
regard to that conception, it may be that in the same way
Kant's criticism of all speculative theology had its occasion
in Hume's criticism of all popular theology, which he had
given in his " Natural History of Religion," a book so well
worth reading, and in the " Dialogues on Natural Religion."
Indeed, it may be that Kant wished to a certain extent to
supplement this. For the first-named work of Hume is
really a critique of popular theology, the pitiable condi-
tion of which it seeks to show ; while, on the other hand,
it points to rational or speculative theology as the genuine,
and that which is worthy of respect. But Kant now dis-
closes the groundlessness of the latter, and leaves, on the
other hand, popular theology untouched, nay, even estab-
lishes it in a nobler form as a faith based upon moral
feeling. This was afterwards distorted by the philoso-
phasters into rational apprehensions, consciousness of
God, or intellectual intuitions of the supersensible, of the
divine, &c, &c. ; while Kant, as he demolished old and
revered errors, and knew the danger of doing so, rather
wished through the moral theology merely to substitute a
few weak temporary supports, so that the ruin might not
fall on him, but that he might have time to escape.
Now, as regards the performance of the task, no critique
of reason was necessary for the refutation of the ontological
proof of the existence of God ; for without presupposing
:he aesthetic and analytic, it is quite easy to make clear
;hat that ontological proof is nothing but a subtle playing
ivith conceptions which is quite powerless to produce con-
viction. There is a chapter in the " Organon " of Aristotle
.vhich suffices as fully for the refutation of the ontological
Droof as if it had been written intentionally with that
purpose. It is the seventh chapter of the second book of
vol. n. I
130 CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
the i'" AncUyt. Post." Among other things, it is expressly
said there : " to Be eivai ovk ovaiu ovSevi," i.e., existentia
nunquam ad essentiam rei pertinet.
The refutation of the cosmological proof is an applica-
tion to a given case of the doctrine of the Critique as
expounded up to that point, and there is nothing to be
said against it. The physico-theological proof is a mere
amplification of the cosmological, which it presupposes,
and it finds its full refutation only in the * Critique of
Judgment." I refer the reader in this connection to the
rubric, " Comparative Anatomy," in my work on the Will
in Nature.
In the criticism of this proof Kant has only to do
as we have already said, with speculative theology, anc
limits himself to the School. If, on the contrary, he hat
had life and popular theology also in view, he would hav
been obliged to add a fourth proof to the three he ha
considered that proof which is really the effective om
with the great mass of men, and which in Kant's technics
language might best be called the keraunological. It i
the proof which is founded upon the needy, impotent, an<
dependent condition of man as opposed to natural force?
which are infinitely superior, inscrutable, and for the mos
part threatening evil; to which is added man's nature
inclination to personify everything, and finally the hop
of effecting something by prayers and flattery, and eve
by gifts. In every human undertaking there is somethin
which is not in our power and does not come within ot
calculations ; the wish to win this for oneself is the origi
of the gods. " Primus in orbe Deos fecit timor " is an ol
and true saying of Petronius. It is principally this pro<
which is criticised by Hume, who throughout appears i
Kant's forerunner in the writings referred to above. Bi
those whom Kant has placed in a position of permanei
embarrassment by his criticism of speculative theolo$
are the professors of philosophy. Salaried by Chrisfll
governments, they dare not give up the chief article
II
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 131
aith. 1 Now, how do these gentlemen help themselves ?
'hey simply declare that the existence of God is self-
vident. Indeed ! After the ancient world, at the expense
f its conscience, had worked miracles to prove it, and
lie modern world, at the expense of its understanding,
ad brought into the field ontological, cosmological, and
hysico-theological proofs to these gentlemen it is self-
vident. And from this self-evident God they then explain
le world : that is their philosophy.
Till Kant came there was a real dilemma between
laterialism and theism, i.e., between the assumption that
blind chance, or that an intelligence working from with-
it in accordance with purposes and conceptions, had
ought about the world, neque ddbatur tertium. There-
ire atheism and materialism were the same ; hence the
)ubt whether there really could be an atheist, i.e., a man
ho really could attribute to blind chance the disposition
': nature, so full of design, especially organised nature,
je, for example, Bacon's Essays (sermones Jldeles), Essay
5, on Atheism. In the opinion of the great mass of
en, and of the English, who in such things belong
itirely to the great mass (the mob), this is still the case,
en with their most celebrated men of learning. One
is only to look at Owen's " Osteologie Compared" of 1855,
eface, p. 11, 12, where he stands always before the old
ilemma between Democritus and Epicurus on the one
:le, and an intelligence on the other, in which la con-
Kant said, " It is very absurd the late Professor Bachmann who,
1 expect enlightenment from rea- in the Jena Litteraturzeitung for
, and yet to prescribe to her July 1840, No. 126, so indiscreetly
lorehand which side she must blurted out the maxim of all his
i:essarily take" ("Critique of Pure colleagues. However, it is worth
lason," p. 747 ; V. 775). On the noticing, as regards the character-
( er hand, the following is the istics of the University philosophy,
ive assertion of a professor of how here the truth, if it will not
llosophyin our own time : "If a suit and adapt itself, is shown the
jlosophy denies the reality of the door without ceremony, with, "Be
f damental ideas of Christianity, off, truth ! we cannot make use of
i s either false, or, even if true, it you. Do we owe you anything !
I let useless." That is to say, for Do you pay us ? Then be off 1 "
F feasors of philosophy. It was
132 CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
.
l.wi
;lem.
naissance d"un Stre tel que Vhomme a exists avant
I'homme fit son apparition. All design must have pro
ceeded from an intelligence ; he has never even dreamt
doubting this. Yet in the lecture based upon this
modified preface, delivered in the Academie des Sciences
the 5th September 1853, he says, with childish naiv
" La Uliologie, ou la theologie scientifique " {Com/ptes
Sept. 1853), that is for him precisely the same thing!
anything in nature designed ? then it is a work of inl
tion, of reflection, of intelligence. Yet, certainly,
has such an Englishman and the AcadSmie des Scietu
to do with the " Critique of Judgment," or, indeed,
my book upon the Will in Nature ? These gentle:
do not see so far below them. These illustres con 4
disdain metaphysics and the philosophie allemande: th
confine themselves to the old woman's philosophy. T
validity of that disjunctive major, that dilemma betwe
materialism and theism, rests, however, upon the assun
tion that the present given world is the world of things
themselves; that consequently there is no other order
things than the empirical But after the world and
order had through Kant become mere phenomenon, 1
laws of which rest principally upon the forms of
intellect, the existence and nature of things and of j
world no longer required to be explained according to j
analogy of the changes perceived or effected by us in )
world ; nor must that which we comprehend as means ; I
end have necessarily arisen as the consequence of a sim r
knowledge Thus, inasmuch as Kant, through his im]
taut distinction between phenomenon and thing in its ',
withdrew the foundation from theism, he opened, on e
other hand, the way to entirely different and more profo J
explanations of existence.
In the chapter on the ultimate aim of the natural *
lectic of reason it is asserted that the three transeen ' :
Ideas are of value as regulative principles for the adva J*
ment of the knowledge of nature. But Kant can be J
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 133
ave been serious in making this assertion. At least its
pposite, that these assumptions are restrictive and fatal
d all investigation of nature, is to every natural philo-
Dpher beyond doubt. To test this by an example, let any
ne consider whether the assumption of the soul as an
nmaterial, simple, thinking substance would have been
ecessarily advantageous or in the highest degree impeding
) the truths which Cabanis has so beautifully expounded,
r to the discoveries of Flourens, Marshall Hall, and Ch.
ell. Indeed Kant himself says (Prolegomena, 44),
The Ideas of the reason are opposed and hindering to
le maxims of the rational knowlege of nature."
It is certainly not the least merit of Frederick the
-reat, that under his Government Kant could develop
imself, and dared to publish the " Critique of Pure
,eason." Hardly under any other Government would a
daried professor have ventured such a thing. Kant was
bliged to promise the immediate successor of the great
ing that he would write no mora
I might consider that I could dispense with the criticism
? the ethical part of the Kantian philosophy here because
have given a detailed and thorough criticism of it
venty-two years later than the present work in the
Beiden Grundproblemen der Fthik." However, what is
3re retained from the first edition, and for the sake of
impleteness must not be omitted, may serve as a suitable
traduction to that later and much more thorough criti-
sm, to which in the main I therefore refer the reader.
On account of Kant's love of architectonic symmetry,
ie theoretical reason had also to have a pendant. The
Mlectus practicus of the Scholastics, which again springs
om the vov$ TrpatcTiicos of Aristotle (De Anima, iii. 10,
id Polit., vii. c. 14 : 6 p.ev yap Trpa/cTiicos eari X070?, 6 8e
opyTiKos), provides the word ready made. Yet here
mething quite different is denoted by it not as there,
I
134 CRITICISM OF THE KANtlAN PHILOSOPHY.
the reason directed to technical skill. Here the practical
reason appears as the source and origin of the undeniable
ethical significance of human action, and of all virtue, all
nobleness, and every attainable degree of holiness. All
this accordingly should come from mere reason, and de-
mand nothing but this. To act rationally and to act vir-
tuously; nobly, holily, would be one and the same ; and
to act selfishly, wickedly, viciously, would be merely to
act irrationally. However, all times and peoples and
languages have distinguished the two, and held them to be
quite different things ; and so does every one even at the
present day who knows nothing of the language of the new
school, i.e., the whole world, with the exception of a small
company of German savants. Every one but these last
understands by virtuous conduct and a rational course of
life two entirely different things. To say that the sublime
founder of the Christian religion, whose life is presented
to us as the pattern of all virtue, was the most rational of
all men would be called a very unbecoming and even a
blasphemous way of speaking; and almost as much sc
if it were said that His precepts contained all the best
directions for a perfectly rational life. Further, that h(
who, in accordance with these precepts, instead of taking
thought for his own future needs, always relieves th<
greater present wants of others, without further motive
nay, gives all his goods to the poor, in order then, desti
tute of all means of subsistence, to go and preach fr
others also the virtue which he practises himself; thi
very one rightly honours ; but who ventures to extol i
\ / as the highest pitch of reasonableness f And finally, wh
praises it as a rational deed that Arnold von Winkelriec
with surpassing courage, clasped the hostile spears again.'
his own body in order to gain victory and deliverance ft
his countrymen ? On the other hand, if we see a ma
who from his youth upwards deliberates with exception!
foresight how he may procure for himself an easy comp<
tence, the means for the support of wife and children,
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 135
good name among men, outward honour and distinction,
and in doing so never allows himself to be led astray or
induced to lose sight of his end by the charm of present
pleasures or the satisfaction of defying the arrogance of
the powerful, or the desire of revenging insults and un-
deserved humiliations he has suffered, or the attractions of
useless aesthetic or philosophical occupations of the mind,
or travels in interesting lands, but with great consistency
works towards his one end, who ventures to deny that
such a philistine is in quite an extraordinary degree rational,
even if he has made use of some means which are not praise-
worthy but are yet without danger ? Nay, more, if a bad
man, with deliberate shrewdness, through a well-thought-
out plan attains to riches and honours, and even to thrones
and crowns, and then with the acutest cunning gets the
better of neighbouring states, overcomes them one by
one, and now becomes a conqueror of the world, and in
doing so is not led astray by any respect for right, any
sense of humanity, but with sharp consistency tramples
down and dashes to pieces everything that opposes his
plan, without compassion plunges millions into misery of
every kind, condemns millions to bleed and die, yet royally
rewards and always protects his adherents and helpers,
never forgetting anything, and thus reaches his end, who
does not see that such a man must go to work in a most
rational manner ? that, as a powerful understanding was
needed to form the plans, their execution demanded the
3omplete command of the reason, and indeed properly of
practical reason ? Or are the precepts which the pru-
ient and consistent, the thoughtful and far-seeing Machia-
velli prescribes to the prince irrational ? x
1 By the way, Machiavelli's prob- purely the political one how, if he so
em was the solution of the question wills, he can carry it out. And the
low the prince, as a prince, was to solution of this problem he gives just
ceep himself on the throne in spite of as one writes directions for playing
nternal and external enemies. His chess, with which it would be folly
problem was thus by no means the to mix up the answer to the ques-
ithical problem whether a prince, as tion whether from an ethical point
* man, ought to will such things, but of view it is advisable to play chess
/
~v
136 CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY.
l Ab wickedness is quite consistent with reason, and in-
deed only becomes really terrible in this conjunction, so,
conversely, nobleness is sometimes joined with want of
reason. To this may be attributed the action of Corio-
lanus, who, after he had applied all his strength for years
to the accomplishment of his revenge upon the Romans,
when at length the time came, allowed himself to be
softened by the prayers of the Senate and the tears of his
mother and wife, gave up the revenge he had so long and
so painfully prepared, and indeed, by thus bringing on
himself the just anger of the Volscians, died for those
very Romans whose thanklessness he knew and desired
so intensely to punish. Finally, for the sake of complete-
ness, it may be mentioned that reason may very well exist
along with want of understanding. This is the case when
a foolish maxim is chosen, but is followed out consistently.
An example of this is afforded by the case of the Princess
Isabella, daughter of Philip II., who vowed that she would
not put on a clean chemise so long as Ostend remained
unconquered, and kept her word through three years. In
general all vows are of this class, whose origin is a want
of insight as regards the law of causality, i.e., want of
understanding; nevertheless it is rational to fulfil them
if one is of such narrow understanding as to make them.
In agreement with what we have said, we see the
writers who appeared just before Kant place the con-
science, as the seat of the moral impulses, in opposition to
the reason. Thus Rousseau, in the fourth book of " Umile,"
says : " La raison nous trompe, mais la conscience ne trompe
jamais; " and further on : "U est impossible tfexpliquer par
les consequences de notre nature leprincipe immddiat de la con-
science independant de la raison mSme." Still further : " Ma
sentimens naturels parlaient pour Vinterit commun, ma raison
rapportait tout a moi. . . . On a beau vouloir etablir la vrrtu
at all To reproach Machiavelli not begin his instructions with a
with the immorality of his writ- moral lecture against murder and
ing is just the same as to reproach slaughter.
a fencing-master because he does
Jl
CRITICISM OF THE KANTIAN PHILOSOPHY. 137
par la raison seul, quelle solide base peut-on lui donner ? " In
the " BSveries du Promeneur," prom. 4 Sine, he says : " Dane
toutes les questions de morale difjicilesje me suis toujour s Men
trouve" de les resoudre par le dictamen de la conscience, plutdt
que par les lumiires de la raison." Indeed Aristotle already
says expressly (Eth. Magna, i. 5) that the virtues have
their seat in the a\oyq> popup T779 yfrv)(7j<; (in parte irra-
tionali animi), and not in the Xoyov eypvri {in parte
rationali). In accordance with this, Stobaeus says (Eel.,
ii., c. 7), speaking of the Peripatetics : " Trjv tjOcktiv aperrjv
{hroXafiftavovat irepc to aXoyov fipo$ ycyveadac ttjs ^f^?,
ttc8i] Bcfieprj 7r/)o? ttjv trapovaav dewpcav viredevro ttjv
'r" v X 7 l v > T0 ^ v ^wywov e^ovaav, to 6 aXoyov. Kac irepc
(lev to Xoytfcov tt\v /caAo/car/adcav ycyvecrdav, Kac ttjv (ppovrj-
(Tiv, Kac tt]v a/YXjbvoiav, tcai ao2 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER IV.
all possible experience ; this was an important, profound,
and a late appergu, which appeared in the form of the
problem as to the possibility of synthetic judgments a priori,
and has actually opened up the way to a deeper know-
ledge. This problem is the watchword of the Kantian
philosophy, as the former proposition is that of the
Cartesian, and shows e oicov e*9 ola.
Kant very fitly places his investigations concerning
time and space at the head of all the rest. For to the
speculative mind these questions present themselves before
all others : what is time ? what is this that consists of
mere movement, without anything that moves it? and
what is space? this omnipresent nothing, out of which
nothing that exists can escape without ceasing to be
anything at all ?
That time and space depend on the subject, are the
mode in which the process of objective apperception is
brought about in the brain, has already a sufficient proof
in the absolute impossibility of thinking away time and
space, while we can very easily think away everything
that is presented in them. The hand can leave go of
everything except itself. However, I wish here to illus-
trate by a few examples and deductions the more exact
proofs of this truth which are given by Kant, not for
the purpose of refuting stupid objections, but for the
use of those who may have to expound Kant's doctrine
in future.
" A right-angled equilateral triangle " contains no logical
contradiction ; for the predicates do not by any means
cancel the subject, nor are they inconsistent with each
other. It is only when their object is constructed in pure
perception that the impossibility of their union in it
appears. Now if on this account we were to regard
this as a contradiction, then so would every physical
impossibility, only discovered to be such after the lapse
of centuries, be a contradiction; for example, the com-
position of a metal from its elements, or a mammal with
ON KNOWLEDGE A PRIORI. 203
more or fewer than seven cervical vertebra, 1 or horns
and upper incisors in the same animal. But only logical
impossibility is a contradiction, not physical, and just as
little mathematical. Equilateral and rectangled do not
contradict each other (they coexist in the square), nor
does either of them contradict a triangle. Therefore the
incompatibility of the above conceptions can never be
known by mere thinking, but is only discovered by percep-
tion merely mental perception, however, which requires
no experience, no real object. We should also refer here
to the proposition of Giordano Bruno, which is also found
in Aristotle : " An infinitely large body is necessarily im-
movable" a proposition which cannot rest either upon
experience or upon the principle of contradiction, since it
speaks of things which cannot occur in any experience, and
the conceptions " infinitely large " and " movable " do not
contradict each other ; but it is only pure perception that
informs us that motion demands a space outside the body,
while its infinite size leaves no space over. Suppose, now,
it should be objected to the first mathematical example
that it is only a question of how complete a conception
of a triangle the person judging has : if the conception
is quite complete it will also contain the impossibility
of a triangle being rectangular and also equilateral. The
answer to this is : assume that his conception is not so
complete, yet without recourse to experience he can, by
the mere construction of the triangle in his imagination,
extend his conception of it and convince himself for ever
of the impossibility of this combination of these con-
ceptions. This process, however, is a synthetic judgment
a priori, that is, a judgment through which, independently
of all experience, and yet with validity for all experience,
we form and perfect our conceptions. For, in general,
whether a given judgment is analytical or synthetical can
only be determined in the particular case according as
1 That the three-toed sloth has yet Owen still states this, " Osttologit
nine must be regarded as a mistake ; Comp.," p. 405.
204 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER IV.
the conception of the subject in the mind of the person
judging is more or less complete. The conception "cat"
contains in the mind of a Cuvier a hundred times more
than in that of his servant; therefore the same judg-
ments about it will be synthetical for the latter, and only
analytical for the former. But if we take the concep-
tions objectively, and now wish to decide whether a given
judgment is analytical or synthetical, we must change the
predicate into its contradictory opposite, and apply this to
the subject without a cupola. If this gives a contradictio
in adjecto, then the judgment was analytical ; otherwise it
was synthetical.
That Arithmetic rests on the pure intuition or perception
of time is not so evident as that Geometry is based upon
that of space. 1 It can be proved, however, in the following
manner. All counting consists in the repeated affirmation
of unity. Only for the purpose of always knowing how
often we have already affirmed unity do we mark it each
time with another word : these are the numerals. Now
repetition is only possible through succession. But suc-
cession, that is, being after one another, depends directly
upon the intuition or perception of time. It is a con-
ception which can only be understood by means of this ;
1 This, however, does not excuse the end to condemn without cere-
a professor of philosophy who, sitting mony the fundamental teaching of
in Kant's chair, expresses himself a great genius in a tone of peremptory
thus : "That mathematics as such decision, just as if it were Hegelian
contains arithmetic and geometry is foolery. We must not, however, fail
correct. It is incorrect, however, to notice that these little people
to conceive arithmetic as the science struggle to escape from the track of
of time, really for no other reason great thinkers. They would there-
than to give a pendant (sic) to fore have done better not to attack
geometry as the science of space" Kant, but to content themselves
(Rosenkranz in the " Dculschen with giving their public full details
Museum," 1857, May 14, No. 20). about God, the soul, the actual free-
ThiB is the fruit of Hegelism. If dom of the will, and whatever ba-
the mind is once thoroughly de- longs to that sort of thing, and then
bauched with its senseless jargon, to have indulged in a private luxury
serious Kantian philosophy will no in their dark back-shop, the philo-
longer enter it. The audacity to sophical journal ; there they may
talk at random about what one does do whatever they like without c> n-
not understand has been inherited straint. for no one sees it.
from the master, and one comes in
ON KNOWLEDGE A PRIORI. 205
and thus counting also is only possible by means of time.
This dependence of all counting upon time is also be-
trayed by the fact that in all languages multiplication
is expressed by "time," thus by a time- concept : sexies,
ea/?, sixfois, sex mal. But simple counting is already a
multiplication by one, and for this reason in Pestalozzi's
educational establishment the children are always made
to multiply thus : " Two times two is four times one."
Aristotle already recognised the close relationship of
number and time, and expounded it in the fourteenth
chapter of the fourth book of the " Physics." Time is for
him " the number of motion " (" 6 xpovo? apiO/uo? ea-rc tcw-
7/o-ecDrofessors of philosophy in our own day that cause and
ffect are simultaneous can be refuted by the fact that in
ases in which the succession cannot be perceived on
ccount of its great rapidity, we yet assume it with
VOL. H.
210 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER IV.
certainty a priori, and with it the lapse of a certain time
Thus, for example, we know that a certain time must
elapse between the falling of the flint and the projection
of the bullet, although we cannot perceive it, and that
this time must further be divided between several events
that occur in a strictly determined succession the fall-
ing of the flint, the striking of the spark, ignition, the
spread of the fire, the explosion, and the projection of the
bullet. No man ever perceived this succession of events ;
but because we know which is the cause of the others, we
thereby also know which must precede the others in time,
and consequently also that during the course of the whole
series a certain time must elapse, although it is so short
that it escapes our empirical apprehension ; for no one
will assert that the projection of the bullet is actually
simultaneous with the falling of the flint. Tims not only
the law of causality, but also its relation to time, and the
necessity of the succession of cause and effect, is known to
us a priori. If we know which of two events is the cause
and which is the effect, we also know which precedes the
other in time ; if, on the contrary, we do not know which
is cause and which effect, but only know in general that
they are causally connected, we seek to discover the suc-
cession empirically, and according to that we determine
which is the cause and which the effect The falseness of
the assertion that cause and effect are simultaneous further
appears from the following consideration. An unbroken
chain of causes and effects fills the whole of time. (For
if this chain were broken the world would stand still, or
in order to set it in motion again an effect without a cause
would have to appear.) Now if every effect were simul-
taneous with its cause, then every effect would be moved
up into the time of its cause, and a chain of causes and
effects containing as many links as before would fill no
time at all, still less an infinite time, but would be all
together in one moment. Thus, under the assumption that
cause and effect are simultaneous, the course of the world
I
ON KNOWLEDGE A PRIORI. 211
shrinks up into an affair of a moment. This proof is
analogous to the proof that every sheet of paper must
have a certain thickness, because otherwise the whole
book would have none. To say when the cause ceases
and the effect begins is in almost all cases difficult, and
often impossible. For the changes (i.e., the succession of
states) are continuous, like the time which they fill, and
therefore also, like it, they are infinitely divisible. But
their succession is as necessarily determined and as un-
mistakable as that of the moments of time itself, and each
of them is called, with reference to the one which precedes
it, " effect," and with reference to the one which follows
it, " cause."
Every change in the material world can only take 'place be-
cause another has immediately preceded it: this is the true and
the whole content of the law of causality. But no concep-
tion has been more misused in philosophy than that of cause,
by means of the favourite trick or blunder of conceiving it
:oo widely, taking it too generally, through abstract think-
ng. Since Scholasticism, indeed properly since Plato and
Aristotle, philosophy has been for the most part a systematic
nisuse 0/ general conceptions. Such, for example, are sub-
stance, ground, cause, the good, perfection, necessity, and
rery many others. A tendency of the mind to work with
uch abstract and too widely comprehended conceptions
las shown itself almost at all times. It may ultimately
est upon a certain indolence of the intellect, which finds
t too difficult a task to be constantly controlling thought
>y perception. By degrees such unduly wide conceptions
ome to be used almost like algebraical symbols, and tossed
bout like them, and thus philosophy is reduced to a mere
rocess of combination, a kind of reckoning which (like all
alculations) employs and demands only the lower facul-
es. Indeed there finally results from this a mere juggling
'ith words, of which the most shocking example is afforded
s by the mind-destroying Hegelism, in which it is carried
) the extent of pure nonsense. But Scholasticism also
212 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER IV.
often degenerated into word-juggling. Nay even the
" Topi " of Aristotle very abstract principles, conceived
with absolute generality, which one could apply to the
most different kinds of subjects, and always bring into the
field in arguing either pro or contra have also their origin
in this misuse of general conceptions. We find innumer-
able examples of the way the Schoolmen worked with such
abstractions in their writings, especially in those of Thomas
Aquinas. But philosophy really pursued the path which
was entered on by the Schoolmen down to the time of
Locke and Kant, who at last bethought themselves as to
the origin of conceptions. Indeed we find Kant himself,
in his earlier years, still upon that path, in his " Proof of
the Existence of God" (p. 191 of the first volume of
Kosenkranz's edition), where the conceptions substance,
ground, reality, are used in such a way as would never
have been possible if he had gone back to the source of
these conceptions and to their true content which is deter-
mined thereby. For then he would have found as the
source and content of substance simply matter, of ground
(if things of the real world are in question) simply cause,
that is, the prior change which brings about the latei
change, &c. It is true that in this case such an investi-
gation would not have led to the intended result. But
everywhere, as here, such unduly wide conceptions, undei
which, therefore, more was subsumed than their true con-
tent would have justified, there have arisen false principles
and from these false systems. Spinoza's whole method
of demonstration rests upon such uninvestigated and toe
widely comprehended conceptions. Now here lies th(
great merit of Locke, who, in order to counteract all tha 1
dogmatic unreality, insisted upon the investigation of th<
origin of the conceptions, and thus led back to perception
and experience. Bacon had worked in a similar frame
mind, yet more with reference to Physics than to Meta
physics. Kant followed the path entered upon by Lock*
but in a higher sense and much further, as has already bee
ON KNOWLEDGE A PRIORI. 213
mentioned above. To the men of mere show who succeeded
in diverting the attention of the public from Kant to
themselves the results obtained by Locke and Kant were
inconvenient. But in such a case they know how to
ignore both the dead and the living. Thus without
hesitation they forsook the only right path which had
at last been found by those wise men, and philosophised
at random with all kinds of indiscriminately collected
conceptions, unconcerned as to their origin and content,
till at last the substance of the Hegelian philosophy, wise
beyond measure, was that the conceptions had no origin
at all, but were rather themselves the origin and source of
things. But Kant has erred in this respect. He has too
much neglected empirical perception for the sake of pure
perception a point which I have fully discussed in my
criticism of his philosophy. With me perception is through-
out the source of all knowledge. I early recognised the
misleading and insidious nature of abstractions, and in
18 1 3, in my essay on the principle of sufficient reason, I
pointed out the difference of the relations which are thought
under this conception. General conceptions must indeed be
the material in which philosophy deposits and stores up
its knowledge, but not the source from which it draws
it; the terminus ad quern, not a quo. It is not, as Kant
defines it, a science drawn from conceptions, but a science
in conceptions. Thus the conception of causality also,
with which we are here concerned, has always been taken
far too widely by philosophers for the furtherance of their
dogmatic ends, and much was imported into it which does
not belong to it at all. Hence arose propositions such as
the following : " All that is has its cause " " the effect
cannot contain more than the cause, thus nothing that
was not also in the cause " " causa est nobilior suo effectu"
and many others just as unwarranted. The following
subtilty of that insipid gossip Proclus affords an elaborate
and specially lucid example of this. It occurs in his
" Institutio Theologica" $j6: " Tlav to airo aKCvrjrov yiyvo-
214 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER IV.
fievov aiTias, a/xeTa/3\i]T0V e^et ttjv inrapf;t,v' irav 8e to airo
Ktvovfievrjs, fiera^XrjTTjv' ei eavTov." (Quidquid ab immobili causa manat,
immutdbilem habet essentiam [substantiam]. Quidquid vero
a mobili causa manat, essentiam habet mutabilem. Si enim,
ilhid, quod aliquid facit, est prorsus immobile, non per
motum, sed per ipsum Esse producit ipsum secundum ex se
ipso.) Excellent ! But just show me a cause which is not
itself set in motion : it is simply impossible. But here,
as in so many cases, abstraction has thought away all
determinations down to that one which it is desired to
make use of without regard to the fact that the latter
cannot exist without the former. The only correct ex-
pression of the law of causality is this : Every change lias
its cause in another change which immediately precedes it.
If something happens, i.e., if a new state of things appears,
i.e., if something is changed, then something else must
have changed immediately before, and something else again
before this, and so on ad infinitum, for a first cause is as
impossible to conceive as a beginning of time or a limit
of space. More than this the law of causality does not
assert. Thus its claims only arise in the case of changes.
So long as nothing changes there can be no question of
a cause. For there is no a priori ground for inferring
from the existence of given things, i.e states of matter,
their previous non-existence, and from this again their
coming into being, that is to say, there is no a priori
ground for inferring a change. Therefore the mere exist-
ence of a thing does not justify us in inferring that it
has a cause. Yet there may be a posteriori reasons,
that is, reasons drawn from previous experience, for the
assumption that the present state or condition did not
always exist, but has only come into existence in con-
sequence of another state, and therefore by means of a
change, the cause of which is then to be sought, and also
the cause of this cause. Here then we are involved in
ON KNOWLEDGE A PRIORI. 215
the infinite regresms to which the application of the law
of causality always leads. We said above : " Things, i.e.,
states or conditions of matter" for change and causality
have only to do with states or conditions. It is these
states which we understand by form, in the wider sense ;
and only the forms change, the matter is permanent.
Thus it is only the form which is subject to the law of
causality. But the form constitutes the thing, i.e., it is
tie ground of the difference of things ; while matter must
be thought as the same in all. Therefore the School-
men said, "Forma dat esse rei;" more accurately this
proposition would run : Forma dat rei essentiam, materia
existeniam. Therefore the question as to the cause of a
thing $ ways concerns merely its form, i.e., its state or
quality,\nd not its matter, and indeed only the former so
far as we^ave grounds for assuming that it has not always
existed, b+, has come into being by means of a change. The
union of fom and matter, or of essentia and existentia, gives
the co7icre^e w hich is always particular; thus, the thing.
And it is ta forms whose union with matter, i.e., whose
appearance 1. matter by means of a change, are subject to
the law of ca\ a lity. By taking the conception too widely
in the abstract^ mistake slipped in of extending causality
to the thing acutely, that is, to its whole inner nature
and existence, t^ a i so to matter, and ultimately it was
thought justifiau, to ask for a cause of the world itself.
This is the orig. f the cosmological proof. This proof
begins by inferri, f rom t he existence of the world its
non-existence, wh^ preceded its existence, and such an
inference is quite u us tifiable ; it ends, however, with the
most fearful inconsi, ncVj f or lt does away altogether with
the law of causality rom w hi c h alone it derives all its
evidencing power, for stopg at a fi rst caU se, and will not
go further ; thus ends* ft were? by committing parricide,
as the bees kill the d les a f ter they have served their
end. All the talk aty t he absolute is referable to a
shamefast, and thereto disguised cosmological proof,
216 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER IV.
which, in the face of the " Critique of Pure Eeason," has
passed for philosophy in Germany for the last sixty years.
What does the absolute mean ? Something that is, and of
which (under pain of punishment) we dare not ask further
whence and why it is. A precious rarity for professors of
philosophy ! In the case, however, of the honestly ex-
pressed cosmological proof, through the assumption of a
first cause, and therefore of a first beginning in a timr
which has absolutely no beginning, this beginning is alwa*s
pushed further back by the question : Why not earlirf" ?
And so far back indeed that one never gets down fom
it to the present, but is always marvelling that the ppsent
itself did not occur already millions of years ag- In
general, then, the law of causality applies to all thngs in
the world, but not to the world itself, for it is immanent
in the world, not transcendent ; with it it co*es into
action, and with it it is abolished. This depends itimately
upon the fact that it belongs to the mere frm of our
understanding, like the whole of the objerive world,
which accordingly is merely phenomenal, nd is con-
ditioned by the understanding. Thus the la of causality
has full application, without any exception, t a U things in
the world, of course in respect of their form, ' the variation
of these forms, and thus to their changes. It is valid for
the actions of men as for the impact of a ,on e, yet, as we
have said always, merely with regard to rj(riv, ei rt eanv,
ecirep fir} ei>8e%eTai fyeveaOcu fjbrjBev ex firjSevo?." (JSternum
esse, inguit, quicquid est, siquidem fieri non potest, ut ex
nihUo quippiam existat.) Here, then, Xenophanes judges
as to the origin of things, as regards its possibility, and
of this origin he can have had no experience, even by
analogy ; nor indeed does he appeal to experience, but
judges apodictically, and therefore a priori How can
he do this if as a stranger he looks from without into a
world that exists purely objectively, that is, independently
of his knowledge ? How can he, an ephemeral being
hurrying past, to whom only a hasty glance into such a
world is permitted, judge apodictically, a priori and
without experience concerning that world, the possibility
of its existence and origin ? The solution of this riddle
is that the man has only to do with his own ideas, which
as such are the work of his brain, and the constitution
of which is merely the manner or mode in which alone
the function of his brain can be fulfilled, i.e., the form
of his perception. He thus judges only as to the pluno~
mena of his own brain, and declares what enters into its
forms, time, space, and causality, and what does not In
this he is perfectly at home and speaks apodictically.
In a like sense, then, the following table of the Prcedica-
bilia a priori of time, space, and matter is to be taken :
ON KNOWLEDGE A PRIORI.
221
PK^EDICABILIA A PRIORI.
Of Time.
(i) There is only one
Time, and all different
times are parts of it.
(2) Different times
are not simultaneous
but successive.
(3) Time cannot be
thought away, but
everything can be
thought away from it.
(4) Time has three
divisions, the past, the
present, and the future,
which constitute two
directions and a centre
of indifference.
(5) Time is infinitely
divisible.
(6) Time is homogene-
ous and a Continuum,
i.e., no one of its parts
is different from the
rest, nor separated from
it by anything that is
not time.
(7) Time has no be-
ginning and no end, but
all beginning and end
is in it.
(8) By reason of time
we count.
(9) Rhythm is only
in time.
(10) We know the
laws of time a priori.
Of Space.
(1) There is only one
Space, and all different
spaces are parts of it.
(2) Different spaces
are not successive but
simultaneous.
(3) Space cannot be
thought away, but
everything can be
thought away from it.
(4) Space has three
dimensions height,
breadth, and length.
(5) Space is infinitely
divisible.
(6) Space is homo-
geneous and a Continu-
um, i.e., no one of its
parts is different from
the rest, nor separated
from it by anything
that is not space.
(7) Space has no lim-
its, but all limits are
in it.
(8) By reason of space
we measure.
(9) Symmetry is only
in space.
(10) We know the
laws of space a priori.
Of Matter.
(1) There is only one Mat-
ter, and all different mate-
rials are different states of
matter ; as such it is called
Substance.
(2) Different matters (ma-
terials) are not so through
substance but through acci-
dents.
(3) Annihilation of matter
is inconceivable, but anni-
hilation of all its forms and
qualities is conceivable.
(4) Matter exists, i.e., acts
in all the dimensions of
space and throughout the
whole length of time, and
thus these two are united
and thereby filled. In this
consists the true nature of
matter ; thus it is through
and through causality.
(5) Matter is infinitely di-
visible.
(6) Matter is homogeneous
and a Continuum, i.e., it
does not consist of originally
different (homoiomeria) or
originally separated parts
(atoms) ; it is therefore not
composed of parts, which
would necessarily be sepa-
rated by something that was
not matter.
(7) Matter has no origin
and no end, but all coming
into being and passing away
are in it.
(8) By reason of matter
we weigh.
(9) Equilibrium is only in
matter.
(10) We know the laws of
the substance of all acci-
dents a priori.
222
FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER IV.
Of Time.
Of Space.
(n) Time can be per-
ceived a priori, al-
though only in the
form of a line.
(12) Time has no per-
manence, but passes
away as soon as it is
there.
(13) Time never rests.
(14) Everything that
exists in time has dura-
tion.
(15) Time has no dura-
tion, but all duration
is in it, and is the
persistence of what is
permanent in contrast
with its restless course.
(16) All motion is
only possible in time.
(17) Velocity is, in
equal spaces, in inverse
proportion to the time.
(18) Time is not meas-
urable directly through
itself, but only indirect-
ly through motion,
which is in space and
time together : thus
the motion of the sun
and of the clock meas-
ure time.
(19) Time is omni-
present. Every part
of time is everywhere,
i.e., in all space, at
ouce.
Of Matter.
(n) Space is imme-
diately perceptible a
priori.
(12) Space can never
pass away, but endures
through all time.
(13) Space is immov-
able.
(14) Everything that
exists in space has a
position.
(15) Space has no mo-
tion, but all motion is
in it, and it is the
change of position of
what is moved, in con-
trast with its uubroken
rest.
(16) All motion is
only possible in space.
(17) Velocity is, in
equal times, in direct
proportion to the space.
(18) Space is measur-
able directly through
itself, and indirectly
through motion, which
is in time and space
together : hence, for
example, an hour's
journey, and the dis-
tance of the fixed stars
expressed as the tra-
velling of light for so
many years.
(19) Space is eternal.
Every part of it exists
always.
(n) Matter can only be
thought a priori.
( 12) The accidents change ;
the substance remains.
(13) Matter is indifferent
to rest and motion ; i.e., it
is originally disposed to-
wards neither of the two.
(14) Everything material
has the capacity for action.
(15) Matter is what is per-
manent in time and mov-
able in space ; by the com-
parison of what rests wiih
what is moved we measure
duration.
(16) All motion is only
possible to matter.
(17) The magnitude of the
motion, the velocity being
equal, is in direct geometri-
cal proportion to the matter
(mass).
(18) Matter as such (mass)
is measurable, i.e., deter-
minable as regards its quan-
tity only indirectly, unly
through the amount of the
motion which it receives
and imparts when it is re-
1 pelled or attracted.
(19) Matter is absolute.
That is, it neither conies
into being nor passes away,
and thus its quantity cau
neither be increased not
diminished.
ON KNOWLEDGE A PRIORI.
723
Of Time.
(20) In time taken
by itself everything
would be in succession.
(21) Time makes the
change of accidents pos-
sible.
(22) Every part of
time contains all parts
of matter.
(23) Time is the prin-
cipium in dividuationis.
(24) The now has no
duration.
(25) Time in itself is
empty and without pro-
perties.
(26) Every moment
is conditioned by the
preceding moment, and
is only because the lat-
ter has ceased to be.
(Principle of sufficient
reason of existence in
time. See my essay on
the principle of suffi-
cient reason. )
(27) Time makes ar-
ithmetic possible.
(28) The simple ele-
ment in arithmetic is
unity.
Of Space.
(20) In space taken
by itself everything
would be simultane-
ous.
(21) Space makes the
permanence of sub-
stance possible.
(22) No part of space
contains the same mat-
ter as another.
(23) Space is the prin-
cipium individuation is.
(24) The point has no
extension.
(25) Space in itself is
em pty and without pro-
perties.
(26) By the position
of every limit in space
with reference to any
other limit, its position
with reference to every
possible limit is pre-
cisely determined.
(Principle of sufficient
reason of existence in
space.)
(27) Space makes geo-
metry possible.
(28) The simple ele-
ment in geometry is
the point.
Of Matter.
(20, 21) Matter unites the
ceaseless flight of time with
the rigid immobility of
space ; therefore it is the
permanent substance of the
changing accidents. Causa-
lity determines this change
for every place at every
time, and thereby combines
time and space, and consti-
tutes the whole nature of
matter.
(22) For matter is both
permanent and impene-
trable.
(23) Individuals are ma-
terial.
(24) The atom has no
reality.
(25) Matter in itself is
without form and quality,
and likewise inert, i.e., in-
different to rest or motion,
thus without properties.
(26) Every change in mat-
ter can take place only on
account of another change
which preceded it ; and
therefore a first change,
and thus also a first state
of matter, is just as incon-
ceivable as a beginning of
time or a limit of space.
(Principle of sufficient reason
of becoming.)
(27) Matter, as that which
is movable in space, makes
phoronomy possible.
(28) The simple element
in phoronomy is the atom.
224. FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER IV.
NOTES TO THE ANNEXED TABLE.
(i) To No. 4 of Matter.
The essence of matter is acting, it is acting itself, in the abstract, thus
acting in general apart from all difference of the kind of action : it is through
and through causality. On this account it is itself, as regards its existence,
not subject to the law of causality, and thus has neither come into being
nor passes away, for otherwise the law of causality would be applied to
itself. Since now causality is known to us a priori, the conception of
matter, as the indestructible basis of all that exists, can so far take its place
in the knowledge we possess a priori, inasmuch as it is only the realisation
of an a priori form of our knowledge. For as soon as we see anything that
acts or is causally efficient it presents itself to ipso as material, and con-
versely anything material presents itself as necessarily active or causally
efficient. They are in fact interchangeable conceptions. Therefore the
word "actual " is used as synonymous with " material ; " and also the Greek
kot' ertpyeuw, in opposition to Kara Svrafiw, reveals the same source, for
tvepytia. signifies action in general; so also with actu in opposition to po>
tentia, and the English "actually" for "vrirklich." What is called space-
occupation, or impenetrability, and regarded as the essential predicate of
body {i.e. of what is material), is merely that kind of action which belongs te
all bodies without exception, the mechanical. It is this universality alone,
by virtue of which it belongs to the conception of body, and follows a prion
from this conception, and therefore cannot be thought away from it without
doing away with the conception itself it is this, I say, that distinguishes it
from any other kind of action, such as that of electricity or chemistry, or
light or heat. Kant has very accurately analysed this space-occupation of
the mechanical mode of activity into repulsive and attractive force, just as
a given mechanical force is analysed into two others by means of the parallelo-
gram of forces. But this is really only the thoughtful analysis of the phe-
nomenon into its two constituent parts. The two forces in conjunction
exhibit the body within its own limits, that is, in a definite volume, while
the one alone would diffuse it into infinity, and the other alone would con-
tract it to a point. Notwithstanding this reciprocal balancing or neutralisa-
tion, the body still acts upon other bodies which contest its space with the
first force, repelling them, and with the other force, in gravitation, attracting
all bodies in general. So that the two forces are not extinguished in their
product, as, for instance, two equal forces acting in different directions, or
+ E and - E, or oxygen and hydrogen in water. That impenetrability and
gravity really exactly coincide is shown by their empirical inseparableness.
in that the one never appears without the other, although we can separate
them in thought.
I must not, however, omit to mention that the doctrine of Kant referred
to, which forms the fundamental thought of the second part of his "Meta-
physical First Principles of Natural Science," thus of the Dynamics, was
distinctly and fully expounded before Kant by Priestley, in his exoafl^B
"Disquisitions on Matter and Spirit," i and 2, a book which appeared
ON KNOWLEDGE A PRIORI. 225
in 1777, and the second edition in 1782, while Kant's work was published in
1786. Unconscious recollection may certainly be assumed in the case of
subsidiary thoughts, flashes of wit, comparisons, &c, but not in the case of
the principal and fundamental thought. Shall we then believe that Kant
silently appropriated such important thoughts of anoiher man? and this
from a book which at that time was new ? Or that this book was unknown
to him, and that the same thoughts sprang up in two minds within a short
time? The explanation, also, which Kant gives, in the "Metaphysical First
Principles of Natural Science " (first edition, p. 88 ; Rosenkranz's edition,
p. 384), of the real difference between fluids and solids, is in substance already
to be found in Kaspar Freidr. "Wolff's "Theory of Generation," Berlin 1764,
p. 132. But what are we to say if we find Kant's most important and
brilliant doctrine, that of the ideality of space and the merely phenomenal
existence of the corporeal world, already expressed by Maupertuis thirty
years earlier ? This will be found more fully referred to in Frauenstadt's
letters on my philosophy, Letter 14. Maupertuis expresses this paradoxical
doctrine so decidedly, and yet without adducing any proof of it, that one
must suppose that he also took it from somewhere else. It is very desirable
that the matter should be further investigated, and as this woidd demand
tiresome and extensive researches, some German Academy might very well
make the question the subject of a prize essay. Now in the same relation
as that in which Kant here stands to Priestley, and perhaps also to Kaspar
"Wolff, and Maupertuis or his predecessor, Laplace stands to Kant. For
the principal and fundamental thought of Laplace's admirable and certainly
correct theory of the origin of the planetary system, which is set forth in
his "Exposition du Systeme du Monde" liv. v. c. 2, was expressed by Kant
nearly fifty years before, in 1755, in his " Naturgeschichte und Theorie des
Himmels," and more fully in 1763 in his " Einzig moglichen Beweisgrund des
Daseyns Gottes," ch. 7. Moreover, in the later work he gives us to under-
stand that Lambert in his " Kosmologischeti Brief en," 1761, tacitly adopted
that doctrine from him, and these letters at the same time also appeared in
French (Lettres Cosmologiques tur la Constitution de VUnivers). We are
therefore obliged to assume that Laplace knew that Kantian doctrine.
Certainly he expounds the matter more thoroughly, strikingly, and fully,
and at the same time more simply than Kant, as is natural from his more
profound astronomical knowledge ; yet in the main it is to be found clearly
expressed in Kant, and on account of the importance of the matter, would
alone have been sufficient to make his name immortal. It cannot but
disturb us very much if we find minds of the first order under suspicion of
dishonesty, which would be a scandal to those of the lowest order. For we
feel that theft is even more inexcusable in a rich man than in a poor one.
We dare not, however, be silent ; for here we are posterity, and must be just,
as we hope that posterity will some day be just to us. Therefore, as a third
example, I will add to these cases, that the fundamental thoughts of the
"Metamorphosis of Plants," by Goethe, were already expressed by Kaspar
Wolff in 1764 in his "Theory of Generation," p. 148, 229, 243, &c. Indeed,
is it otherwise with the system of gravitation f the discovery of which is on
the Continent of Europe always ascribed to Newton, while in England the
learned at least know very well that it belongs to Robert Hooke, who in
she year 1666, in a "Communication to the Royal Society, " expounds it
mite distinctly, although only as an hypothesis and without proof. The
VOL. II, P
226 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER IV.
principal passage of this communication is quoted in Dugald Stewart's
" Philosophy of the Human Mind," and is probably taken from Robert Hooke's
Posthumous Works. The history of the matter, and how Newton got into
difficulty by it, is also to be found in the " Biographic Universelle," article
Newton. Hooke's priority is treated as an established fact in a short
history of astronomy, Quarterly Review, August 1828. Further details on
this subject are to be found in my " Parerga," voL ii., 86 (second edition,
88). The story of the fall of an apple is a fable as groundless as it is
popular, and is quite without authority.
(2) To No. 18 of Matter.
The quantity of a motion (quantitas motus, already in Descartes) is the
product of the mass into the velocity.
This law is the basis not only of the doctrine of impact in mechanics, bat
also of that of equilibrium in statics. From the force of impact which two
bodies with the same velocity exert the relation of their masses to each
other may be determined. Thus of two hammers striking with the same
velocity, the one which has the greater mass will drive the nail deeper into
the wall or the post deeper into the earth. For example, a hammer weigh-
ing six pounds with a velocity = 6 effects as much as a hammer weighing
three pounds with a velocity = 12, for in both cases the quantity of motion
or the momentum = 36. Of two balls rolling at the same pace, the one
which has the greater mass will impel a third ball at rest to a greater
distance than the ball of less mass can. For the mass of the first multiplied
by the same velocity gives a greater quantity of motion, or a greater momen-
tum. The cannon carries further than the gun, because an equal velocity
communicated to a much greater mass gives a much greater quantity 0)
motion, which resists longer the retarding effect of gravity. For the same
reason, the same arm will throw a lead bullet further than a stone one of
equal magnitude, or a large stone further than quite a small one. And
therefore also a case-shot does not carry so far as a ball-shot.
The same law lies at the foundation of the theory of the lever and of the
balance. For here also the smaller mass, on the longer arm of the lever or
beam of the balance, has a greater velocity in falling; and multiplied by
this it may be equal to, or indeed exceed, the quantity of motion or the
momentum of the greater mass at the shorter arm of the lever. In the state
of rest brought about by equilibrium this velocity exists merely in intention
or virtually, potentid, not actu ; but it acts just as well as actu, which is very
remarkable.
The following explanation will be more easily understood now that these
truths have been called to mind.
The quantity of a given matter can only be estimated in general according
to its force, and its force can only be known in its expression. Now when
we are considering matter only as regards its quantity, not its quality, this
expression can only be mechanical, i.e., it can only consist in motion which
it imparts to other matter. For only in motion does the force of mutter
become, so to speak, alive; hence the expression vis viva for the manifesta-
tion of force of matter in motion. Accordingly the only measure of the
quantity of a given matter is the quantity of its motion, or its momentum.
In this, however, if it is given, the quantity of matter still appears in oon-
ON KNOWLEDGE A PRIORI. 227
junction and amalgamated with its other factor, velocity. Therefore if we
want to know the quantity of matter (the mass) this other factor must be
eliminated. Now the velocity is known directly ; for it is ~ But the other
factor, which remains when this is eliminated, can always be known only
relatively in comparison with other masses, which again can only be known
themselves by means of the quantity of their motion, or their momentum,
thus in their combination with velocity. "We must therefore compare one
quantity of motion with the other, and then subtract the velocity from both,
in order to see how much each of them owed to its mass. This is done by
weighing the masses against each other, in which that quantity of motion is
compared which, in each of the two masses, calls forth the attractive power
of the earth that acts upon both only in proportion to their quantity.
Therefore there are two kinds of weighing. Either we impart to the two
masses to be compared equal velocity, in order to find out which of the two
now communicates motion to the other, thus itself has a greater quantity of
motion, which, since the velocity is the same on both sides, is to be ascribed
to the other factor of the quantity of motion or the momentum, thus to the
mass (common balance). Or we weigh, by investigating how much mart
velocity the one mass must receive than the other has, in order to be equal
to the latter in quantity of motion or momentum, and therefore allow no
more motion to be communicated to itself by the other ; for then in propor-
tion as its velocity must exceed that of the other, its mass, i.e., the quantity
of its matter, is less than that of the other (steelyard). This estimation of
masses by weighing depends upon the favourable circumstance that the
moving force, in itself, acts upon both quite equally, and each of the two is
in a position to communicate to the other directly its surplus quantity of
motion or momentum, so that it becomes visible.
The substance of these doctrines has long ago been expressed by Newton
and Kant, but through the connection and the clearness of this exposition
I believe I have made it more intelligible, so that that insight is possible for
nil which I regarded as necessary for the justification of proposition No. 18.
( 228 )
Second f&atf.
THE DOCTRINE OF THE ABSTRACT IDEA, OR
THINKING.
CHAPTER V.i
ON THE IRRATIONAL INTELLECT.
It must be possible to arrive at a complete knowledge of
the consciousness of the brutes, for we can construct it
by abstracting certain properties of our own consciousness.
On the other hand, there enters into the consciousness of
the brute instinct, which is much more developed in all of
them than in man, and in some of them extends to what
we call mechanical instinct.
The brutes have understanding without having reason,
and therefore they have knowledge of perception but no
abstract knowledge. They apprehend correctly, and also
grasp the immediate causal connection, in the case of the
higher species even through several links of its chain, but
they do not, properly speaking, think. For they lack con-
ceptions, that is, abstract ideas. The first consequence of
this, however, is the want of a proper memory, which
applies even to the most sagacious of the brutes, and it
is just this which constitutes the principal difference be-
tween their consciousness and that of men. Perfect in-
telligence depends upon the distinct consciousness of thf
1 This chapter, along with the one which follows it, is connected wit!
8 and 9 of the first book.
ON THE. IRRATIONAL INTELLECT. 229
past and of the eventual future, as such, and in connection
with the present. The special memory which this de-
mands is therefore an orderly, connected, and thinking
retrospective recollection. This, however, is only possible
by means of general conceptions, the assistance of which is
required by what is entirely individual, in order that it
may be recalled in its order and connection. For the
boundless multitude of things and events of the same
and similar kinds, in the course of our life, does not admit
directly of a perceptible and individual recollection of
each particular, for which neither the powers of the most
comprehensive memory nor our time would be sufficient.
Therefore all this can only be preserved by subsuming it
under general conceptions, and the consequent reference to
relatively few principles, by means of which we then have
always at command an orderly and adequate survey of
our past. We can only present to ourselves in perception
particular scenes of the past, but the time that has passed
since then and its content we are conscious of only in the
abstract by means of conceptions of things and numbers
which now represent days and years, together with their
content. The memory of the brutes, on the contrary, like
their whole intellect, is confined to what they 'perceive,, and
primarily consists merely in the fact that a recurring im-
pression presents itself as having already been experienced,
for the present perception revivifies the traces of an earlier
one. Their memory is therefore always dependent upon
what is now actually present. Just on this account, how-
ever, this excites anew the sensation and the mood which
the earlier phenomenon produced. Thus the dog recog-
nises acquaintances, distinguishes friends from enemies,
easily finds again the path it has once travelled, the houses
it has once visited, and at the sight of a plate or a stick
is at once put into the mood associated with them. All
kinds of training depend upon the use of this perceptive
memory and on the force of habit, which in the case of
animals is specially strong. It is therefore just as dine-
230 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER V.
rent from human education as perception is from thinking.
We ourselves are in certain cases, in which memory proper
refuses us its service, confined to that merely perceptive
recollection, and thus we can measure the difference be-
tween the two from our own experience. For example,
at the sight of a person whom it appears to us we know,
although we are not able to remember when or where
we saw him ; or again, when we visit a place where we
once were in early childhood, that is, while our reason
was yet undeveloped, and which we have therefore
entirely forgotten, and yet feel that the present impres-
sion is one which we have already experienced. This
is the nature of all the recollections of the brutes. We
have only to add that in the case of the most saga-
cious this merely perceptive memory rises to a certain
degree of phantasy, which again assists it, and by virtue
of which, for example, the image of its absent master
floats before the mind of the dog and excites a longing
after him, so that when he remains away long it seeks for
him everywhere. Its dreams also depend upon this phan-
tasy. The consciousness of the brutes is accordingly a
mere succession of presents, none of which, however, exist
as future before they appear, nor as past after they have
vanished; which is the specific difference of human con-
sciousness. Hence the brutes have infinitely less to suffer
than we have, because they know no other pains but those
which the present directly brings. But the present is with-
out extension, while the future and the past, which contain
most of the causes of our suffering, are widely extended,
and to their actual content there is added that which is
merely possible, which opens up an unlimited field for
desire and aversion. The brutes, on the contrary, undis-
turbed by these, enjoy quietly and peacefully each present
moment, even if it is only bearable. Human beings of
very limited capacity perhaps approach them in this.
Further, the sufferings which belong purely to the present
can only be physical. Indeed the brutes do not properly
ON THE IRRATIONAL INTELLECT. 23 1
Bpeaking feel death : they can only know it when it ap-
pears, and then they are already no more. Thus then the
life of the brute is a continuous present. It lives on
without reflection, and exists wholly in the present ; even
the great majority of men live with very little reflection.
Another consequence of the special nature of the intellect
of the brutes, which we have explained is the perfect
accordance of their consciousness with their environment.
Between the brute and the external world there is
nothing, but between us and the external world there is
tlways our thought about it, which makes us often inap-
proachable to it, and it to us. Only in the case of children
and very primitive men is this wall of partition so thin
that in order to see what goes on in them we only need to
ee what goes on round about them. Therefore the brutes
are incapable alike of purpose and dissimulation; they
rtserve nothing. In this respect the dog stands to the
mm in the same relation as a glass goblet to a metal one,
aid this helps greatly to endear the dog so much to us,
for it affords us great pleasure to see all those inclinations
anc emotions which we so often conceal displayed simply
and openly in him. In general, the brutes always play, as
it Wire, with their hand exposed ; and therefore we con-
tenrjlate with so much pleasure their behaviour towards
each other, both when they belong to the same and to
diffesnt species. It is characterised by a certain stamp
of innocence, in contrast to the conduct of men, which is
withcrawn from the innocence of nature by the entrance
of reaon, and with it of prudence or deliberation. Hence
huma. conduct has throughout the stamp of intention or
delibeate purpose, the absence of which, and the conse-
quent letermination by the impulse of the moment, is the
fundaiental characteristic of all the action of the brutes.
No brue is capable of a purpose properly so-called. To
conceiv and follow out a purpose is the prerogative of man,
and it s a prerogative which is rich in consequences.
Certain/ an instinct like that of the bird of passage or the
232 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER V.
bee, still more a permanent, persistent desire, a longing like
that of the dog for its absent master, may present the
appearance of a purpose, with which, however, it must
not be confounded. Now all this has its ultimate ground
in the relation between the human and the brute in-
tellect, which may also be thus expressed : The brutes
have only direct knowledge, while we, in addition to
this, have indirect knowledge ; and the advantage which
in many things for example, in trigonometry and;
analysis, in machine work instead of hand work, &c /
indirect has over direct knowledge appears here alsc.
Thus again we may say: The brutes have only a single
intellect, we a double intellect, both perceptive and thinking,
and the operation of the two often go on independently or
each other. We perceive one thing, and we think another
Often, again, they act upon each other. This way of put"
ting the matter enables us specially to understand th
above, as contrasted with the concealment of man.
However, the law natura nonfacit saltus is not entirsly
suspended even with regard to the intellect of the broes,
though certainly the step from the brute to the huaan
intelligence is the greatest which nature has made in the
production of her creatures. In the most favoured hdi-
viduals of the highest species of the brutes there certinly
sometimes appears, always to our astonishment, a aint
trace of reflection, reason, the comprehension of wons, of
thought, purpose, and deliberation. The most stiking
indications of this kind are afforded by the elephant, *hose
highly developed intelligence is heightened and suported
by an experience of a lifetime which sometimes e.tends
to two hundred years. He has often given unmistkable
signs, recorded in well-known anecdotes, of premedtation,
which, in the case of brutes, always astonishes u more
than anything else. Such, for instance, is the stor of the
tailor on whom an elephant revenged himself for picking
him with a needle. I wish, however, to resce from
ON THE IRRATIONAL INTELLECT. 233
oblivion a parallel case to this, because it has the advan-
tage of being authenticated by judicial investigation. On
the 27th of August 1830 there was held at Morpeth, in
England, a coroner's inquest on the keeper, Baptist Bern-
hard, who was killed by his elephant. It appeared from
the evidence that two years before he had offended the
elephant grossly, and now, without any occasion, but on
a favourable opportunity, the elephant had seized him and
crushed him. (See the Spectator and other English papers
of that day.) For special information on the intelligence
of brutes I recommend Leroy's excellent book, " Sur
V Intelligence des Animaicx," nouv. 4d. 1802.
( 234 )
CHAPTER VL
ON THE DOCTRINE OF ABSTRACT OR RATIONAL
KNOWLEDGE.
The outward impression upon the senses, together with
the mood which it alone awakens in us, vanishes with
the presence of the thing. Therefore these two cannot of
themselves constitute experience proper, whose teaching is
to guide our conduct for the future. The image of that
impression which the imagination preserves is originally
weaker than the impression itself, and becomes weaker
and weaker daily, until in time it disappears altogether.
There is only one thing which is not subject either to the
instantaneous vanishing of the impression or to the gradual
disappearance of its image, and is therefore free from the
power of time. This is the conception. In it, then, the teach-
ing of experience must be stored up, and it alone is suited
to be a safe guide to our steps in life. Therefore Seneca
says rightly, " Si vis tibi omnia subjicere, te subjice rationi"
(Ep. 37). And I add to this that the essential condition of
surpassing others in actual life is that we should reflect
or deliberate. Such an important tool of the intellect as
the concept evidently cannot be identical with the word,
this mere sound, which as an impression of sense passes
with the moment, or as a phantasm of hearing dies away
with time. Yet the concept is an idea, the distinct con-
sciousness and preservation of which are bound up with
the word. Hence the Greeks called word, concept, rela-
tion, thought, and reason by the name of the first, o X0709.
Yet the concept is perfectly different both from the word,
ON ABSTRACT OR RATIONAL KNOWLEDGE. 235
to which it is joined, and from the perceptions, from which
it has originated. It is of an entirely different nature
from these impressions of the senses. Yet it is able to
take up into itself all the results of perception, and give
them back again unchanged and undiminished after the
longest period of time; thus alone does experience arise.
But the concept preserves, not what is perceived nor what
is then felt, but only what is essential in these, in an
entirely altered form, and yet as an adequate representa-
tive of them. Just as flowers cannot be preserved, but
their ethereal oil, their essence, with the same smell and
the same virtues, can be. The action that has been guided
by correct conceptions will, in the result, coincide with the
real object aimed at. We may judge of the inestimable
value of conceptions, and consequently of the reason, if we
glance for a moment at the infinite multitude and variety
of the things and conditions that coexist and succeed each
other, and then consider that speech and writing (the
signs of conceptions) are capable of affording us accurate
information as to everything and every relation when
and wherever it may have been ; for comparatively few
conceptions can contain and represent an infinite number
of things and conditions. In our own reflection abstrac-
tion is a throwing off of useless baggage for the sake
of more easily handling the knowledge which is to be
compared, and has therefore to be turned about in all
directions. We allow much that is unessential, and
' therefore only confusing, to fall away from the real
things, and work with few but essential determinations
thought in the abstract. But just because general con-
ceptions are only formed by thinking away and leaving
out existing qualities, and are therefore the emptier the
more general they are, the use of this procedure is confined
to the working up of knowledge which we have already
acquired. This working up includes the drawing of con-
clusions from premisses contained in our knowledge. New
insight, on the contrary, can only be obtained by the help
V
236 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VI.
of the faculty of judgment, from perception, which alone
is complete and rich knowledge. Further, because the
content and the extent of the concepts stand in inverse
relation to each other, and thus the more is thought un-
der a concept, the less is thought in it, concepts form a
graduated series, a hierarchy, from the most special to the
most general, at the lower end of which scholastic realism
is almost right, and at the upper end nominalism. For the
most special conception is almost the individual, thus
almost real ; and the most general conception, e.g., being
(i.e., the infinitive of the copula), is scarcely anything but
a word. Therefore philosophical systems which confine
themselves to such very general conceptions, without
going down to the real, are little more than mere jug-
gling with words. For since all abstraction consists in
thinking away, the further we push it the less we have
left over. Therefore, if I read those modern philoso-
phemes which move constantly in the widest abstrac-
tions, I am soon quite unable, in spite of all attention,
to think almost anything more in connection with them ;
for I receive no material for thought, but am supposed to
work with mere empty shells, which gives me a feeling like
that which we experience when we try to throw very light
bodies; the strength and also the exertion are there, but
there is no object to receive them, so as to supply the other
moment of motion. If any one wants to experience this
let him read the writings of the disciples of Schelling, or
still better of the Hegelians. Simple conceptions would
necessarily be such as could not be broken up. Accordingly
they could never be the subject of an analytical judgment.
This I hold to be impossible, for if we think a conception
we must also be able to give its content. What are com-
monly adduced as examples of simple conceptions are really
not conceptions at all, but partly mere sensations as, foi
instance, those of some special colour ; partly the form*
of perception which are known to us a priori, thus pro-
perly the ultimate elements of perceptive knowledge. Hu
ON ABSTRACT OR RATIONAL KNOWLEDGE. 237
this itself is for the whole system of our thought what
granite is for geology, the ultimate firm basis which sup-
ports all, and beyond which we cannot go. The distinct-
ness of a conception demands not only that we should be
able to separate its predicates, but also that we should be
able to analyse these even if they are abstractions, and so
on until we reach knowledge of perception, and thus refer
to concrete things through the distinct perception of which
the final abstractions are verified and reality guaran-
teed to them, as well as to all the higher abstractions
which rest upon them. Therefore the ordinary explana-
tion that the conception is distinct as soon as we can
give its predicates is not sufficient. For the separating
of these predicates may lead perhaps to more concep-
tions ; and so on again without there being that ultimate
basis of perceptions which imparts reality to all those
conceptions. Take, for example, the conception " spirit,"
and analyse it into its predicates : " A thinking, will-
ing, immaterial, simple, indestructible being that does
not occupy space." Nothing is yet distinctly thought
about it, because the elements of these conceptions
cannot be verified by means of perceptions, for a thinking
being without a brain is like a digesting being without
a stomach. Only perceptions are, properly speaking,
clear, not conceptions; these at the most can only be
distinct. Hence also, absurd as it was, " clear and con-
fused" were coupled together and used as synonymous
when knowledge of perception was explained as merely
a confused abstract knowledge, because the latter kind
of knowledge alone was distinct. This was first done
by Duns Scotus, but Leibnitz has substantially the same
view, upon which his "Identitas Indiscemibiliwm," depends.
(See Kant's refutation of this, p. 275 of the first edition
of the Critique of Pure Eeason.)
The close connection of the conception with the word,
thus of speech with reason, which was touched on above,
rests ultimately upon the following ground. Time is
throughout the form of our whole consciousness, with its
238 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VI.
inward and outward apprehension. Conceptions, on the
other hand, which originate through abstraction and are
perfectly general ideas, different from all particular things,
have in this property indeed a certain measure of objec-
tive existence, which does not, however, belong to any
series of events in time. Therefore in order to enter the
immediate present of an individual consciousness, and
thus to admit of being introduced into a series of events
in time, they must to a certain extent be reduced again
to the nature of individual things, individualised, and
therefore linked to an idea of sense. Such an idea is the
word. It is accordingly the sensible sign of the concep-
tion, and as such the necessary means of fixing it, that is,
of presenting it to the consciousness, which is bound up
with the form of time, and thus establishing a connection
between the reason, whose objects are merely general
universals, knowing neither place nor time, and con-
sciousness, which is bound up with time, is sensuous, and
so far purely animal. Only by this means is the repro-
duction at pleasure, thus the recollection and preserva-
tion, of conceptions possible and open to us; and only
by means of this, again, are the operations which are
undertaken with conceptions possible judgment, infer-
ence, comparison, limitation, &c. It is true it sometimes
happens that conceptions occupy consciousness without
their signs, as when we run through a train of reasoning
so rapidly that we could not think the words in the time.
But such cases are exceptions, which presuppose great
exercise of the reason, which it could only have obtained
by means of language. How much the use of reason is
bound up with speech we see in the case of the deaf
and dumb, who, if they have learnt no kind of language,
show scarcely more intelligence than the ourang-outang
or the elephant. For their reason is almost entirely
potential, not actual.
Words and speech are thus the indispensable means
of distinct thought But as every means, every machine,
I
ON ABSTRACT OR RATIONAL KNOWLEDGE. 239
at once burdens and hinders, so also does language;
for it forces the fluid and modifiable thoughts, with
their infinitely fine distinctions of difference, into certain
rigid, permanent forms, and thus in fixing also fetters
them. This hindrance is to some extent got rid of by
learning several languages. For in these the thought
is poured from one mould into another, and somewhat
alters its form in each, so that it becomes more and more
freed from all form and clothing, and thus its own proper
nature comes more distinctly into consciousness, and it
recovers again its original capacity for modification. The
ancient languages render this service very much better
than the modern, because, on account of their great dif-
ference from the latter, the same thoughts are expressed
in them in quite another way, and must thus assume
a very different form ; besides which the more perfect
grammar of the ancient languages renders a more artistic
and more perfect construction of the thoughts and their
connection possible. Thus a Greek or a Roman might
perhaps content himself with his own language, but he
who understands nothing but some single modern patois
will soon betray this poverty in writing and speaking;
for his thoughts, firmly bound to such narrow stereotyped
forms, must appear awkward and monotonous. Genius
certainly makes up for this as for everything else, for
example in Shakespeare.
Burke, in his " Inquiry into the Sublime and Beautiful,"
p. 5, 4 and 5, has given a perfectly correct and very
elaborate exposition of what I laid down in 9 of the first
volume, that the words of a speech are perfectly under-
stood without calling up ideas of perception, pictures in
our heads. But he draws from this the entirely false con-
clusion that we hear, apprehend, and make use of words
without connecting with them any idea whatever; whereas
he ought to have drawn the conclusion that all ideas are
not perceptible images, but that precisely those ideas which
must be expressed by means of words are abstract notions
240 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VI.
or conceptions, and these from their very nature are not
perceptible. Just because words impart only general
conceptions, which are perfectly different from ideas of
perception, when, for example, an event is recounted all
the hearers will receive the same conceptions ; but if after-
wards they wish to make the incident clear to themselves,
each of them will call up in his imagination a different
image of it, which differs considerably from the correct
image that is possessed only by the eye-witness. This is
the primary reason (which, however, is accompanied by
others) why every fact is necessarily distorted by being
repeatedly told. The second recounter communicates con-
ceptions which he has abstracted from the image of his
own imagination, and from these conceptions the third
now forms another image differing still more widely from
the truth, and this again he translates into conceptions,
and so the process goes on. Whoever is sufficiently matter
of fact to stick to the conceptions imparted to him, and
repeat them, will prove the most truthful reporter.
The best and most intelligent exposition of the essence
and nature of conceptions which I have been able to find
is in Thomas Eeid's "Essays on the Powers of Human
Mind," vol. ii., Essay 5, ch. 6. This was afterwards con-
demned by Dugald Stewart in his " Philosophy of the
Human Mind." Not to waste paper I will only briefly
remark with regard to the latter that he belongs to
that large class who have obtained an undeserved repu-
tation through favour and friends, and therefore I can
only advise that not an hour should be wasted over the
scribbling of this shallow writer.
The princely scholastic Pico de Mirandula already saw
that reason is the faculty of abstract ideas, and under-
standing the faculty of ideas of perception. For in his
book, " De Imaginatione," ch. 11, he carefully distinguishes
understanding and reason, and explains the latter as the
discursive faculty peculiar to man, and the former as the
intuitive faculty, allied to the kind of knowledge which is
I
ON ABSTRACT OR RATIONAL KNOWLEDGE. 241
proper to the angels, and indeed to God. Spinoza also
characterises reason quite correctly as the faculty of
framing general conceptions (Eth., ii. prop. 40, schol. 2).
Such facts would not need to be mentioned if it were not
for the tricks that have been played in the last fifty years
by the whole of the philosophasters of Germany with the
conception reason. For they have tried, with shameless
audacity, to smuggle in under this name an entirely
spurious faculty of immediate, metaphysical, so-called
super-sensuous knowledge. The reason proper, on the
other hand, they call understanding, and the understand-
ing proper, as something quite strange to them, they over-
look altogether, and ascribe its intuitive functions to
sensibility.
In the case of all things in this world new drawbacks
or disadvantages cleave to every source of aid, to every
gain, to every advantage ; and thus reason also, which gives
to man such great advantages over the brutes, carries with
it its special disadvantages, and opens for him paths of
error into which the brutes can never stray. Through
it a new species of motives, to which the brute is not
accessible, obtains power over his will. These are the
abstract motives, the mere thoughts, which are by no
means always drawn from his own experience, but often
come to him only through the talk and example of others,
through tradition and literature. Having become accessible
to thought, he is at once exposed to error. But every error
must sooner or later do harm, and the greater the error
the greater the harm it will do. The individual error
must be atoned for by him who cherishes it, and often he
aas to pay dearly for it. And the same thing holds good
m a large scale of the common errors of whole nations.
Therefore it cannot too often be repeated that every error
vvherever we meet it, is to be pursued and rooted out as
m enemy of mankind, and that there can be no such
'hing as privileged or sanctioned error. The thinker
>ught to attack it, even if humanity should cry out with
VOL. II. Q
242 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VI.
pain, like a sick man whose ulcer the physician touches.
The brute can never stray far from the path of nature ;
for its motives lie only in the world of perception, where
only the possible, indeed only the actual, finds room. Oi
the other hand, all that is only imaginable, and therefore
also the false, the impossible, the absurd, and senseless,
enters into abstract conceptions, into thoughts and words.
Since now all partake of reason, but few of judgment, the
consequence is that man is exposed to delusion, for he is
abandoned to every conceivable chimera which any one
talks him into, and which, acting on his will as a motive,
may influence him to perversities and follies of every kind,
to the most unheard-of extravagances, and also to actions
most contrary to his animal nature. True culture, in
which knowledge and judgment go hand in hand, can
only be brought to bear on a few ; and still fewer are
capable of receiving it. For the great mass of men
a kind of training everywhere takes its place. It is
effected by example, custom, and the very early and firm
impression of certain conceptions, before any experience,
understanding, or judgment were there to disturb the
work. Thus thoughts are implanted, which afterward
cling as firmly, and are as incapable of being shaker
by any instruction as if they were inborn; and indeec
they have often been regarded, even by philosophers
as such. In this way we can, with the same trouble
imbue men with what is right and rational, or wit!
what is most absurd. For example, we can accustoi
them to approach this or that idol with holy dread, and a
the mention of its name to prostrate in the dust not onl
their bodies but their whole spirit ; to sacrifice their pre
perty and their lives willingly to words, to names, to tfc
defence of the strangest whims ; to attach arbitrarily tl
greatest honour or the deepest disgrace to this or that, an
to prize highly or disdain everything accordingly wit
full inward conviction ; to renounce all animal food, as :
Hindustan, or to devour still warm and quivering piec<
ON THE DOCTRINE OF KNOWLEDGE. 243
cut from the living animal, as in Abyssinia ; to eat men, as
in New Zealand, or to sacrifice their children to Moloch ;
to castrate themselves, to fling themselves voluntarily on
the funeral piles of the dead in a word, to do anything
we please. Hence the Crusades, the extravagances of
fanatical sects ; hence Chiliasts and Flagellants, persecu-
tions, autos da fe, and all that is offered by the long
register of human perversities. Lest it should be thought
that only the dark ages afford such examples, I shall add
a couple of more modern instances. In the year 1818
there went from Wiirtemberg 7000 Chiliasts to the neigh-
bourhood of Ararat, because the new kingdom of God,
specially announced by Jung Stilling; was to appear there. 1
Gall relates that in his time a mother killed her child and
roasted it in order to cure her husband's rheumatism with
its fat. 8 The tragical side of error lies in the practical, the
3omical is reserved for the theoretical. For example, if
we could firmly persuade three men that the sun is not
:he cause of daylight, we might hope to see it soon
established as the general conviction. In Germany it
vas possible to proclaim as the greatest philosopher of all
iges Hegel, a repulsive, mindless charlatan, an unparalleled
cribbler of nonsense, and for twenty years many thou-
ands have believed it stubbornly and firmly ; and indeed,
utside Germany, the Danish Academy entered the lists
gainst myself for his fame, and sought to have him re-
arded as a su/mmus philosophus. (Upon this see the
reface to my Grundproblemen der ffihik.) These, then,
re the disadvantages which, on account of the rarity of
ldgment, attach to the existence of reason. We must
id to them the possibility of madness. The brutes do
ot go mad, although the carnivora are subject to fury,
id the ruminants to a sort of delirium.
1 Hlgen's " Zeitschrift fiir His- 2 Gall et Spurzheim, " Des Dis-
'ische Theologie," 1839, part i. positions lnnies" 181 I, p. 253.
182.
( 244 )
CHAPTER VIL 1
ON THE RELATION OF THE CONCRETE KNOWLEDGE 01
PERCEPTION TO ABSTRACT KNOWLEDGE.
It has been shown that conceptions derive their material
from knowledge of perception, and therefore the entire
structure of our world of thought rests upon the world
of perception. We must therefore be able to go back
from every conception, even if only indirectly through
intermediate conceptions, to the perceptions from which it
is either itself directly derived or those conceptions are
derived of which it is again an abstraction. That is to
say, we must be able to support it with perceptions which
stand to the abstractions in the relation of examples
These perceptions thus afford the real content of all oui
thought, and whenever they are wanting we have not hat
conceptions but mere words in our heads. In this respec
our intellect is like a bank, which, if it is to be sound
must have cash in its safe, so as to be able to meet al
the notes it has issued, in case of demand ; the perception
are the cash, the conceptions are the notes. In this sens
the perceptions might very appropriately be called primar,
and the conceptions, on the other hand, secondary idea
Not quite so aptly, the Schoolmen, following the exainp'
of Aristotle (Metaph., vi. u, xl i), called real thin;
substantia primce, and the conceptions substantias secund<
Books impart only secondary ideas. Mere conceptions
a thing without perception give only a general knowled
of it. We only have a thorough understanding of thin
and their relations so far as we are able to represent the
1 This chapter is connected with 12 of the first volume.
CONCRETE AND ABSTRACT KNOWLEDGE. 245
to ourselves in pure, distinct perceptions, without the aid
of words. To explain words by words, to compare concepts
with concepts, in which most philosophising consists, is a
trivial shifting about of the concept-spheres in order to
see which goes into the other and which does not. At the
best we can in this way only arrive at conclusions ; but
even conclusions give no really new knowledge, but only
show us all that lay in the knowledge we already pos-
sessed, and what part of it perhaps might be applicable
to the particular case. On the other hand, to perceive, to
allow the things themselves to speak to us, to apprehend
new relations of them, and then to take up and deposit all
this in conceptions, in order to possess it with certainty
that gives new knowledge. But, while almost every one is
capable of comparing conceptions with conceptions, to com-
pare conceptions with perceptions is a gift of the select few.
It is the condition, according to the degree of its perfection,
of wit, judgment, ingenuity, genius. The former faculty,
on the contrary, results in little more than possibly rational
reflections. The inmost kernel of all genuine and actual
knowledge is a perception; and every new truth is the
profit or gain yielded by a perception. All original think-
ing takes place in images, and this is why imagination is
so necessary an instrument of thought, and minds that
lack imagination will never accomplish much, unless it
be in mathematics. On the other hand, merely abstract
thoughts, which have no kernel of perception, are like
cloud-structures, without realit) 7 . Even writing and speak-
ing, whether didactic or poetical, has for its final aim to
guide the reader to the same concrete knowledge from
which the author started ; if it has not this aim it is bad.
This is why the contemplation and observing of every
real thing, as soon as it presents something new to
the observer, is more instructive than any reading or
hearing. For indeed, if we go to the bottom of the matter,
all truth and wisdom, nay, the ultimate secret of things, is
contained in each real object, yet certainly only in concreto,
246 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VII.
just as gold lies hidden in the ore ; the difficulty is to ex
tract it. From a book, on the contrary, at the best we only
receive the truth at second hand, and oftener not at all.
In most books, putting out of account those that are
thoroughly bad, the author, when their content is not
altogether empirical, has certainly thought but not per-
ceived ; he has written from reflection, not from intuition,
and it is this that makes them commonplace and tedious.
"For what the author has thought could always have been
thought by the reader also, if he had taken the same
trouble ; indeed it consists simply of intelligent thought,
full exposition of what is implicite contained in the theme.
But no actually new knowledge comes in this way into
the world ; this is only created in the moment of percep-
tion, of direct comprehension of a new side of the thing.
When, therefore, on the contrary, sight has formed the
foundation of an author's thought, it is as if he wrote
from a land where the reader has never been, for all is
fresh and new, because it is drawn directly from the
original source of all knowledge. Let me illustrate the
distinction here touched upon by a perfectly easy and
simple example. Any commonplace writer might easily
describe profound contemplation or petrifying astonish-
ment by saying : " He stood like a statue ; " but Cervantes
says : " Like a clothed statue, for the wind moved his gar-
ments" {Don Quixote, book vi. ch. 19). It is thus that all
great minds have ever thought in presence of the perception,
and kept their gaze steadfastly upon it in their thought
We recognise this from this fact, among others, that even
the most opposite of them so often agree and coincide
in some particular ; because they all speak of the same
thing which they all had before their eyes, the world, the
perceived reality ; indeed in a certain degree they all say
the same thing, and others never believe them. We
recognise it further in the appropriateness and originality
of the expression, which is always perfectly adapted to
the subject because it has beeu inspired by perception, in
CONCRBTt AND ABSTRA CT KNO W LEDGE. 247
the naivete of the language, the freshness of the imagery,
and the impressiveness of the similes, all of which quali-
ties, without exception, distinguish the works of great
minds, and, on the contrary, are always wanting in the
works of others. Accordingly only commonplace forms
of expression and trite figures are at the service of the
latter, and they never dare to allow themselves to be
natural, under penalty of displaying their vulgarity in all
its dreary barrenness; instead of this they are affected
mannerists. Hence Buffon says : " Le style est Vlwmmi
mime." If men of commonplace mind write poetry they
have certain traditional conventional opinions, passions,
noble sentiments, &c, which they have received in the
abstract, and attribute to the heroes of their poems, who
are in this way reduced to mere personifications of those
opinions, and are thus themselves to a certain extent
abstractions, and therefore insipid and tiresome. If they
philosophise, they have taken in a few wide abstract
conceptions, which they turn about in all directions, as if
they had to do with algebraical equations, and hope that
something will come of it ; at the most we see that they
have all read the same things. Such a tossing to and fro
of abstract conceptions, after the manner of algebraical
equations, which is now-a-days called dialectic, does not,
like real algebra, afford certain results ; for here the con-
ception which is represented by the word is not a fixed
and perfectly definite quality, such as are symbolised by
the letters in algebra, but is wavering and ambiguous,
and capable of extension and contraction. Strictly speak-
ing, all thinking, i.e., combining of abstract conceptions,
has at the most the recollections of earlier perceptions for
its material, and this only indirectly, so far as it consti-
tutes the foundation of all conceptions. Eeal knowledge,
on the contrary, that is, immediate knowledge, is percep-
tion alone, new, fresh perception itself. Now the concepts
which the reason has framed and the memory has pre-
served cannot all be present to consciousness at once, but
248 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VII.
only a very small number of them at a time. On the other
hand, the energy with which we apprehend what is present
in perception, in which really all that is essential in all
things generally is virtually contained and represented, is
apprehended, fills the consciousness in one moment with
its whole power. Upon this depends the infinite superiority
of genius to learning ; they stand to each other as the text
of an ancient classic to its commentary. All truth and
all wisdom really lies ultimately in perception. But this
unfortunately can neither be retained nor communicated.
The objective conditions of such communication can cer-
tainly be presented to others purified and illustrated
through plastic and pictorial art, and even much more
directly through poetry ; but it depends so much upon sub-
jective conditions, which are not at the command of every
one, and of no one at all times, nay, indeed in the higher
degrees of perfection, are only the gift of the favoured
few. Only the worst knowledge, abstract, secondary
knowledge, the conception, the mere shadow of true know-
ledge, is unconditionally communicable. If perceptions
were communicable, that would be a communication worth
the trouble ; but at last every one must remain in his own
skin and skull, and no one can help another. To enrich
the conception from perception is the unceasing endeavour
of poetry and philosophy. However, the aims of man are 1
essentially practical; and for these it is sufficient that
what he has apprehended through perception should leave
traces in him, by virtue of which he will recognise it in
the next similar case; thus he becomes possessed of
worldly wisdom. Thus, as a rule, the man of the world
cannot teach his accumulated truth and wisdom, but
only make use of it ; he rightly comprehends each event
as it happens, and determines what is in conformity with
it. That books will not take the place of experience nor
learning of genius are two kindred phenomena. Then
common ground is that the abstract can never take the
place of the concrete. Books therefore do not take tki
CONCRETE AND ABSTRACT KNOWLEDGE. 249
place of experience, because conceptions always remain
general, and consequently do not get down to the par-
ticular, which, however, is just what has to be dealt with
in life ; and, besides this, all conceptions are abstracted
from what is particular and perceived in experience, and
therefore one must have come to know these in order
adequately to understand even the general conceptions
which the books communicate. Learning cannot take the
place of genius, because it also affords merely conceptions,
but the knowledge of genius consists in the apprehension
of the (Platonic) Ideas of things, and therefore is essentially
intuitive. Thus in the first of these phenomena the
objective condition of perceptive or intuitive knowledge is
wanting; in the second the subjective; the former may
be attained, the latter cannot.
Wisdom and genius, these two summits of the Parnassus
of human knowledge, have their foundation not in the
abstract and discursive, but in the perceptive faculty.
Wisdom proper is something intuitive, not something
abstract It does not consist in principles and thoughts,
which one can carry about ready in his mind, as results of
his own research or that of others ; but it is the whole
manner in which the world presents itself in his mind.
This varies so much that on account of it the wise man
lives in another world from the fool, and the genius sees
another world from the blockhead. That the works of the
man of genius immeasurably surpass those of all others
arises simply from the fact that the world which he sees,
and from which he takes his utterances, is so much clearer,
as it were more profoundly worked out, than that in the
minds of others, which certainly contains the same objects,
but is to the world of the man of genius as the Chinese
picture without shading and perspective is to the finished
oil-painting. The material is in all minds the same ; but
; the difference lies in the perfection of the form which
it assumes in each, upon which the numerous grades
of intelligence ultimately depend. These grades thus
250 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VII.
exist in the root, in the perceptive or intuitive appre*
hension, and do not first appear in the abstract Hence
original mental superiority shows itself so easily when
the occasion arises, and is at once felt and hated by
others.
In practical life the intuitive knowledge of the under-
standing is able to guide our action and behaviour directly,
while the abstract knowledge of the reason can only do so
by means of the memory. Hence arises the superiority of
intuitive knowledge in all cases which admit of no time
, for reflection ; thus for daily intercourse, in which, just on
this account, women excel. Only those who intuitively
know the nature of men as they are as a rule, and thug
comprehend the individuality of the person before them,
will understand how to manage him with certainty and
rightly. Another may know by heart all the three hun-
dred maxims of Gracian, but this will not save him from
stupid mistakes and misconceptions if he lacks that in-
tuitive knowledge. For all abstract knowledge affords
us primarily mere general principles and rules ; but the
particular case is almost never to be carried out exactly
according to the rule ; then the rule itself has to be pre-
sented to us at the right time by the memory, which
seldom punctually happens ; then the propositio minor has
to be formed out of the present case, and finally the con-
clusion drawn. Before all this is done the opportunity
has generally turned its back upon us, and then those
excellent principles and rules serve at the most to enable
us to measure the magnitude of the error we have com-
mitted. Certainly with time we gain in this way experi-
ence and practice, which slowly grows to knowledge of
the world, and thus, in connection with this, the abstract
rules may certainly become fruitful. On the other hand,
the intuitive knowledge, which always apprehends only the
particular, stands in immediate relation to the present
case. ReJe, case, and application are for it one, and action
follows immediately upon it. This explains why in real
CONCRETE AND ABSTRACT KNOWLEDGE. 251
life the scholar, whose pre-eminence lies in the province
of abstract knowledge, is so far surpassed by the man of
the world, whose pre-eminence consists in perfect intuitive
knowledge, which original disposition conferred on him,
and a rich experience has developed. The two kinds of
knowledge always stand to each other in the relation of
paper money and hard cash ; and as there are many cases
and circumstances in which the former is to be preferred
to the latter, so there are also things and situations for
which abstract knowledge is more useful than intuitive.
If, for example, it is a conception that in some case guides
our action, when it is once grasped it has the advantage
of being unalterable, and therefore under its guidance we go
to work with perfect certainty and consistency. But this
certainty which the conception confers on the subjective
side is outweighed by the uncertainty which accompanies
it on the objective side. The whole conception may be
false and groundless, or the object to be dealt with may
not come under it, for it may be either not at all or not
altogether of the kind which belongs to it. Now if in the
particular case we suddenly become conscious of some-
thing of this sort, we are put out altogether ; if we do not
become conscious of it, the result brings it to light. There-
fore Vauvenargue says: "Personne riest sujet a plus def aides,
que ceux qui n'agissent que par reflexion" If, on the con-
trary, it is direct perception of the objects to be dealt with
and their relations that guides our action, we easily hesitate
at every step, for the perception is always modifiable, is am-
biguous, has inexhaustible details in itself, and shows many
sides in succession ; we act therefore without full confi-
dence. But the subjective uncertainty is compensated by
the objective certainty, for here there is no conception
between the object and us, we never lose sight of it ; if
therefore we only see correctly what we have before us
and what we do, we shall hit the mark. Our action then
is perfectly sure only when it is guided by a conception
the right ground of which, its completeness, and applica-
252 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VII.
bility to the given cause is perfectly certain. Action
in accordance with conceptions may pass into pedantry,
action in accordance with the perceived impression into
levity and folly.
Perception is not only the source of all knowledge, but
is itself knowledge tear e^oxv^> is the only unconditionally
true, genuine knowledge completely worthy of the name.
For it alone imparts insight properly so called, it alone m^
actually assimilated by man, passes into his nature, and
can with full reason be called his; while the conceptions
merely cling to him. In the fourth book we see indeed
that true virtue proceeds from knowledge of perception or
intuitive knowledge; for only those actions which are
directly called forth by this, and therefore are performed
purely from the impulse of our own nature, are properly
symptoms of our true and unalterable character; not so
those which, resulting from reflection and its dogmas,
are often extorted from the character, and therefore have
no unalterable ground in us. But wisdom also, the true
view of life, the correct eye, and the searching judgment,
proceeds from the way in which the man apprehends the
perceptible world, but not from his mere abstract know-
ledge, i.e., not from abstract conceptions. The basis or
ultimate content of every science consists, not in proofs,
nor in what is proved, but in the unproved foundation
of the proofs, which can finally be apprehended only
through perception. So also the basis of the true wisdom
and real insight of each man does not consist in concep-
tions and in abstract rational knowledge, but in what is
perceived, and in the degree of acuteness, accuracy, and
profundity with which he has apprehended it. He who
excels here knows the (Platonic) Ideas of the world and
life ; every case he has seen represents for him innumer-
able cases; he always apprehends each being according
to its true nature, and his action, like his judgment,
corresponds to his insight. By degrees also his coun-
tenance assumes the expression of penetration, of true
CONCRETE AND ABSTRACT KNOWLEDGE. 253
intelligence, and, if it goes far enough, of wisdom. For
it is pre-eminence in knowledge of perception alone that
stamps its impression upon the features also; while
pre-eminence in abstract knowledge cannot do this. In
accordance with what has been said, we find in all classes
men of intellectual superiority, and often quite without
learning. Natural understanding can take the place of
almost every degree of culture, but no culture can take
the place of natural understanding. The scholar has the
advantage of such men in the possession of a wealth of
cases and facts (historical knowledge) and of causal
determinations (natural science), all in well-ordered con-
nection, easily surveyed ; but yet with all this he has not
a more accurate and profound insight into what is truly
essential in all these cases, facts, and causations. The
unlearned man of acuteness and penetration knows how
to dispense with this wealth ; we can make use of much ;
we can do with little. One case in his own experience
teaches him more than many a scholar is taught by a
thousand cases which he knows, but does not, properly
Bpeaking, understand. For the little knowledge of that
unlearned man is living, because every fact that is known
to him is supported by accurate and well-apprehended
perception, and thus represents for him a thousand
similar facts. On the contrary, the much knowledge of
the ordinary scholar is dead, because even if it does not
consist, as is often the case, in mere words, it consists en-
tirely in abstract knowledge. This, however, receives its
value only through the perceptive knowledge of the indivi-
dual with which it must connect itself, and which must ulti-
mately realise all the conceptions. If now this perceptive
knowledge is very scanty, such a mind is like a bank with
liabilities tenfold in excess of its cash reserve, whereby in
the end it becomes bankrupt. Therefore, while the right
apprehension of the perceptible world has impressed the
stamp of insight and wisdom on the brow of many an un-
learned man, the face of many a scholar bears no other
254 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VII.
trace of his much study than that of exhaustion and
weariness from excessive and forced straining of the
memory in the unnatural accumulation of dead concep-
tions. Moreover, the insight of such a man is often so
puerile, so weak and silly, that we must suppose that the
excessive strain upon the faculty of indirect knowledge,
which is concerned with abstractions, directly weakens
the power of immediate perceptive knowledge, and the
natural and clear vision is more and more blinded by the
light of books. At any rate the constant streaming in of
the thoughts of others must confine and suppress our
own, and indeed in the long run paralyse the power of
thought if it has not that high degree of elasticity which
is able to withstand that unnatural stream. Therefore
ceaseless reading and study directly injures the mind
the more so that completeness and constant connection of
the system of our own thought and knowledge must pay
the penalty if we so often arbitrarily interrupt it in order
to gain room for a line of thought entirely strange to us.
To banish my own thought in order to make room for
that of a book would seem to me like what Shakespeai
censures in the tourists of his time, that they sold theii
own land to see that of others. Yet the inclination foi
reading of most scholars is a kind of fuga vacui, from the
poverty of their own minds, which forcibly draws in the
thoughts of others. In order to have thoughts they must
read something; just as lifeless bodies are only moved
from without ; while the man who thinks for himself is
like a living body that moves of itself. Indeed it is dan-
gerous to read about a subject before we have thought
about it ourselves. For along with the new material the
old point of view and treatment of it creeps into the mind,
all the more so as laziness and apathy counsel us to accept
what has already been thought, and allow it to pass for
truth. This now insinuates itself, and henceforward our
thought on the subject always takes the accustomed path,
like brooks that are guided by ditches ; to find a thought
II
CONCRETE AND ABSTRACT KNOWLEDGE. 255
of our own, a new thought, is then doubly difficult. This
contributes much to the want of originality on the part of
scholars. Add to this that they suppose that, like other people,
they must divide their time between pleasure and work.
Now they regard reading as their work and special calling,
and therefore they gorge themselves with it, beyond what
they can digest. Then reading no longer plays the part of
the mere initiator of thought, but takes its place altogether ;
for they think of the subject just as long as they are read-
ing about it, thus with the mind of another, not with their
own. But when the book is laid aside entirely different
things make much more lively claims upon their interest
their private affairs, and then the theatre, card-playing,
skittles, the news of the day, and gossip. The man of
thought is so because such things have no interest for
him. He is interested only in his problems, with which
therefore he is always occupied, by himself and without
a book. To give ourselves this interest, if we have not
got it, is impossible. This is the crucial point And
upon this also depends the fact that the former always
speak only of what they have read, while the latter, on
the contrary, speaks of what he has thought, and that they
are, as Pope says :
"For ever reading, never to be read."
The mind is naturally free, not a slave ; only what it
does willingly, of its own accord, succeeds. On the other
hand, the compulsory exertion of a mind in studies for
which it is not qualified, or when it has become tired, or
in general too continuously and invito, Minerva, dulls the
brain, just as reading by moonlight dulls the eyes. This is
especially the case with the straining of the immature
brain in the earlier years of childhood. I believe that the
learning of Latin and Greek grammar from the sixth to the
twelfth year lays the foundation of the subsequent stupidity
of most scholars. At any rate the mind requires the
aourishment of materials from without. All that we eat
is not at once incorporated in the organism, but only so
256 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VII.
much of it as is digested ; so that ouly a small part of it
is assimilated, and the remainder passes away ; and thus
to eat more than we can assimilate is useless and injurious.
It is precisely the same with what we read. Only so far
as it gives food for thought does it increase our insight
and true knowledge. Therefore Heracleitus says : " iroXv
tiadia vow ov BtSao-tcei" (multiscitia non dot intdlectum).
It seems, however, to me that learning may be compared
to a heavy suit of armour, which certainly makes the
strong man quite invincible, but to the weak man is a
burden under which lie sinks altogether.
The exposition given in our third book of the knowledge
of the (Platonic) Ideas, as the highest attainable by man,
and at the same time entirely perceptive or intuitive know-
ledge, is a proof that the source of true wisdom does not
lie in abstract rational knowledge, but in the clear and
profound apprehension of the world in perception. There-
fore wise men may live in any age, and those of the past
remain wise men for all succeeding generations. Learn-
ing, on the contrary, is relative ; the learned men of the
past are for the most part children as compared with us,
and require indulgence.
But to him who studies in order to gain insight books
and studies are only steps of the ladder by which he
climbs to the summit of knowledge. As soon as a round
of the ladder has raised him a step, he leaves it behind
him. The many, on the other hand, who study in order
to fill their memory do not use the rounds of the ladder
to mount by, but take them off, and load themselves with
them to carry them away, rejoicing at the increasing
weight of the burden. They remain always below, be-
cause they bear what ought to have borne them.
Upon the truth set forth here, that the kernel of all
knowledge is the perceptive or intuitive apprehension, de-
pends the true and profound remark of Helvetius, that
the really characteristic and original views of which a
gifted individual is capable, and the working up, develop-
CONCRETE AND ABSTRACT KNOWLEDGE. 257
ment, and manifold application of which is the material
of all his works, even if written much later, can arise in
him only up to the thirty-fifth or at the latest the fortieth
year of his life, and are really the result of combinations
he has made in his early youth. For they are not mere
connections of abstract conceptions, but his own intuitive
comprehension of the objective world and the nature of
things. Now, that this intuitive apprehension must have
completed its work by the age mentioned above depends
partly on the fact that by that time the ectypes of all
(Platonic) Ideas must have presented themselves to the
man, and therefore cannot appear later with the strength
of the first impression ; partly on this, that the highest
energy of brain activity is demanded for this quintessence
:>f all knowledge, for this proof before the letter of the
ipprehension, and this highest energy of the brain is depen-
dent on the freshness and flexibility of its fibres and the
apidity with which the arterial blood flows to the brain.
Jut this again is at its strongest only as long as the arte-
ial system has a decided predominance over the venous
ystem, which begins to decline after the thirtieth year,
ntil at last, after the forty-second year, the venous
y'stem obtains the upper hand, as Cabanis has admirably
ad instructively explained. Therefore the years between
venty and thirty and the first few years after thirty are
>t the intellect what May is for the trees ; only then do
ie blossoms appear of which all the later fruits are the
ivelopment. The world of perception has made its
lpression, and thereby laid the foundation of all the
ibsequent thoughts of the individual. He may by
i Section make clearer what he has apprehended; he
uy yet acquire much knowledge as nourishment for the
flit which has once set ; he may extend his views, correct
h conceptions and judgments, it may be only through
edless combinations that he becomes completely master
c the materials he has gained ; indeed he will generally
p>duce his best works much later, as the greatest heat
701+ II. K
258 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VII.
begins with the decline of the day, but he can no longer
hope for new original knowledge from the one living foun-
tain of perception. It is this that Byron feels when h
breaks forth into his wonderfully beautiful lament :
M No more no more oh ! never more on me
The freshness of the heart can fall like dew,
Which out of all the lovely things we see
Extracts emotions beautiful and new,
Hived in our bosoms like the bag o' the bee :
Think'st thou the honey with those objects grew I
Alas ! 'twas not in them, but iu thy power
To double even the sweetness of a flow Br."
Through all that I have said hitherto I hope I have
placed in a clear light the important truth that since al
abstract knowledge springs from knowledge of perception,
it obtains its whole value from its relation to the latter,
thus from the fact that its conceptions, or the abstractions
which they denote, can be realised, t.*., proved, through
perceptions ; and, moreover, that most depends upon th<
quality of these perceptions. Conceptions and abstrac-
tions which do not ultimately refer to perceptions an
like paths in the wood that end without leading out of it
The great value of conceptions lies in the fact that b;
means of them the original material of knowledge is mor
easily handled, surveyed, and arranged. But althoug
many kinds of logical and dialectical operations are po:
sible with them, yet no entirely original and new knov
ledge will result from these ; that is to say, no knowledj
whose material neither lay already in perception nor w;
drawn from self-consciousness. This is the true meanii
of the doctrine attributed to Aristotle : Nihil est in \
tellectu, nisi quod antea fuerit in sensu. It is also t
meaning of the Lockeian philosophy, which made for ev
an epoch in philosophy, because it commenced at last t
serious discussion of the question as to the origin of c
knowledge. It is also principally what the " Critique
Pure Reason " teaches. It also desires that we should i
I
CONCRETE AND ABSTRACT KNOWLEDGE. 259
remain at the conceptions, but go back to their source, thus
to perception ; only with the true and important addition
that what holds good of the perception also extends to its
subjective conditions, thus to the forms which lie pre-
disposed in the perceiving and thinking brain as its
natural functions ; although these at least virtualiter
precede the actual sense-perception, i.e., are a priori, and
therefore do not depend upon sense-perception, but it upon
them. For these forms themselves have indeed no other
end, nor service, than to produce the empirical perception
on the nerves of sense being excited, as other forms are
determined afterwards to construct thoughts in the ab-
stract from the material of perception. The "Critique
of Pure Eeason" is therefore related to the Lockeian
philosophy as the analysis of the infinite to elementary
geometry, but is yet throughout to be regarded as the
continuation of the Lockeian philosophy. The given mate-
rial of every philosophy is accordingly nothing else than
the empirical consciousness, which divides itself into the
consciousness of one's own self (self-consciousness) and
the consciousness of other things (external perception).
For this alone is what is immediately and actually given.
Every philosophy which, instead of starting from this,
takes for its starting-point arbitrarily chosen abstract
conceptions, such as, for example, absolute, absolute sub-
stance, God, infinity, finitude, absolute identity, being,
essence, &c, &c, moves in the air without support, and
can therefore never lead to a real result. Yet in all ages
philosophers have attempted it with such materials ; and
hence even Kant sometimes, according to the common
usage, and more from custom than consistency, defines
philosophy as a science of mere conceptions. But such
a science would really undertake to extract from the
partial ideas (for that is what the abstractions are) what
is not to be found in the complete ideas (the perceptions),
:rom which the former were drawn by abstraction. The
possibility of the syllogism leads to this mistake, because
26o FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VII.
here the combination of the judgments gives a new result,
although more apparent than real, for the syllogism only
brings out what already lay in the given judgments ; for
it is true the conclusion cannot contain more than the
premisses. Conceptions are certainly the material of
philosophy, but only as marble is the material of the
sculptor. It is not to work out of them but in them ; that
is to say, it is to deposit its results in them, but not to
start from them as what is given. Whoever wishes to
see a glaring example of such a false procedure from
mere conceptions may look at the " Institutio Theologica "
of Proclus in order to convince himself of the vanity
of that whole method. There abstractions such as " kv,
fr\r)8o<;, ayadov, irapayov kcli irapwyofievov, avrap/ces, aircov,
KpeLrrov,Kivr]Tov, aKiv7]rov,Kivovfievov" (unum, mvlta, bonum,
producens et productum, sibi suffveiens, causa, melius, mobile,
immobile, motum), &c, are indiscriminately collected, but
the perceptions to which alone they owe their origin
and content ignored and contemptuously disregarded. A
theology is then constructed from these conceptions, but
its goal, the 0eo?, is kept concealed ; thus the whole pro-
cedure is apparently unprejudiced, as if the reader did not
know at the first page, just as well as the author, what
it is all to end in. I have already quoted a fragment of
this above. This production of Proclus is really quite
peculiarly adapted to make clear how utterly useless and
illusory such combinations of abstract conceptions are, for
we can make of them whatever we will, especially if we
further take advantage of the ambiguity of many words,
such, for example, as Kpeirrov. If such an architect of
conceptions were present in person we would only have
to ask naively where all the things are of which he has
so much to tell us, and whence he knows the laws from
which he draws his conclusions concerning them. He
would then soon be obliged to turn to empirical percep-
tion, in which alone the real world exhibits itself, from
which those conceptions are drawn. Then we would onl)
I
CONCRETE AND ABSTRACT KNOWLEDGE. 261
have to ask further why he did not honestly start from
the given perception of such a world, so that at every
step his assertions could be proved by it, instead of opera-
ting with conceptions, which are yet drawn from percep-
tion alone, and therefore can have no further validity
than that which it imparts to them. But of course this
is just his trick. Through such conceptions, in which,
by virtue of abstraction, what is inseparable is thought
as separate, and what cannot be united as united, he goes
far beyond the perception which was their source, and thus
beyond the limits of their applicability, to an entirely
different world from that which supplied the material
for building, but just on this account to a world of
chimeras. I have here referred to Proclus because in him
this procedure becomes specially clear through the frank
audacity with which he carries it out. But in Plato also
we find some examples of this kind, though not so glar-
ing; and in general the philosophical literature of all
ages affords a multitude of instances of the same thing.
That of our own time is rich in them. Consider, for ex-
ample, the writings of the school of Schelling, and observe
the constructions that are built up out of abstractions like
finite and infinite being, non-being, other being activity,
hindrance, product determining, being determined, deter-
minateness limit, limiting, being limited unity, plurality,
multiplicity identity, diversity, indifference thinking,
being, essence, &c. Not only does all that has been said
above hold good of constructions out of such materials,
but because an infinite amount can be thought through
such wide abstractions, only veiy little indeed can be
thought in them ; they are empty husks. But thus the
matter of the whole philosophising becomes astonishingly
trifling and paltry, and hence arises that unutterable and
sxcruciating tediousness which is characteristic of all such
writings. If indeed I now chose to call to mind the way
n which Hegel and his companions have abused such
vide and empty abstractions, I should have to fear that
262 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VII.
both the reader and I myself would be ill ; for the most
nauseous tediousness hangs over the empty word-juggling
of this loathsome philophaster.
That in 'practical philosophy also no wisdom is brought
to light from mere abstract conceptions is the one thing
to be learnt from the ethical dissertations of the theologian
Schleiermacher, with the delivery of which he has wearied
the Berlin Academy for a number of years, and which are
shortly to appear in a collected form. In them only
abstract conceptions, such as duty, virtue, highest good,
moral law, &c, are taken as the starting-point, without
further introduction than that they commonly occur in
ethical systems, and are now treated as given realities.
He then discusses these from all sides with great subtilty,
but, on the other hand, never makes for the source of these
conceptions, for the thing itself, the actual human life, to
which alone they are related, from which they ought to
be drawn, and with which morality has, properly speaking,
to do. On this account these diatribes are just as unfruit-
ful and useless as they are tedious, which is saying a great
deaL At all times we find persons, like this theologian,
who is too fond of philosophising, famous while they are
alive, afterwards soon forgotten. My advice is rather to
read those whose fate has been the opposite of this, for
time is short and valuable.
Now although, in accordance with all that has been
said, wide, abstract conceptions, which can be realised in
no perception, must never be the source of knowledge, the
starting-point or the proper material of philosophy, yet
sometimes particular results of philosophy are such as can
only be thought in the abstract, and cannot be proved by
any perception. Knowledge of this kind will certainly
only be half knowledge ; it will, as it were, only point
out the place where what is to be known lies ; but this
remains concealed. Therefore we should only be satisfied
with such conceptions in the most extreme case, and wher
we have reached the limit of the knowledge possible t*
CONCRETE AND ABSTRACT KNOWLEDGE. 263
our faculties. An example of this might perhaps be the
conception of a being out of time ; such as the proposi-
tion : the indestructibility of our true being by death is
not a continued existence of it. "With conceptions of this
sort the firm ground which supports our whole knowledge,
the perceptible, seems to waver. Therefore philosophy
may certainly at times, and in case of necessity, extend to
such knowledge, but it must never begin with it.
The working with wide abstractions, which is con-
demned above, to the entire neglect of the perceptive
knowledge from which they are drawn, and which is
[therefore their permanent and natural controller, was at
(all times the principal source of the errors of dogmatic
[philosophy. A science constructed from the mere com-
parison of conceptions, that is, from general principles,
could only be certain if all its principles were synthetical
a priori, as is the case in mathematics : for only such
admit of no exceptions. If, on the other hand, the prin-
ciples have any empirical content, we must keep this con-
stantly at hand, to control the general principles. For no
truths which are in any way drawn from experience are
ever unconditionally true. They have therefore only an
approximately universal validity ; for here there is no
rule without an exception. If now I link these principles
together by means of the intersection of their concept-
spheres, one conception might very easily touch the other
precisely where the exception lies. But if this happens
even only once in the course of a long train of reasoning,
the whole structure is loosed from its foundation and
moves in the air. If, for example, I say, " The ruminants
have no front incisors," and apply this and what follows
from it to the camel, it all becomes false, for it only holds
good of horned ruminants. What Kant calls das Ver-
nilnfteln, mere abstract reasoning, and so often condemns,
is just of this sort. For it consists simply in subsuming
conceptions under conceptions, without reference to their
origin, and without proof of the correctness and exclusive-
264 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER VII.
ness of such subsumption a method whereby we can
arrive by longer or shorter circuits at almost any result
we choose to set before us as our goal. Hence this mere
abstract reasoning differs only in degree from sophistica-
tion strictly so called. But sophistication is in the theo-
retical sphere exactly what chicanery i3 in the practical.
Yet even Plato himself has very frequently permitted
such mere abstract reasoning; and Proclus, as we have
already mentioned, has, after the manner of all imitators,
carried this fault of his model much further. Dionysius the
Areopagite, " Be Divinis Nominibus" is also strongly af-
fected with this. But even in the fragments of the Eleatic
Melissus we already find distinct examples of such mere
abstract reasoning (especially 2-5 in Brandis' Comment.
Eleat.) His procedure with the conceptions, which never
touch the reality from which they have their content, but,
moving in the atmosphere of abstact universality, pass
away beyond it, resembles blows which never hit the mark.
A good pattern of such mere abstract reasoning is the " De
Diis et Mundo " of the philosopher Sallustius Biichelchen ;
especially chaps. 7, 12, and 17. But a perfect gem of
philosophical mere abstract reasoning passing into decided
sophistication is the following reasoning of the Platonist,
Maximus of Tyre, which I shall quote, as it is short:
Every injustice is the taking away of a good. There is
no other good than virtue: but virtue cannot be taken
away : thus it is not possible that the virtuous can suffer
injustice from the wicked. It now remains either that
no injustice can be suffered, or that it is suffered by the
wicked from the wicked. But the wicked man possesses
no good at all, for only virtue is a good ; therefore none
can be taken from him. Thus he also can suffer no in-
justice. Thus injustice is an impossible thing." The
original, which is less concise through repetitions, runs
thus : " ASitcia eari aatpecri<; ayadoV to Be ayadov ti av
17) aWo 7] apenj ; r) Se apery avaipaiperov. Ovk aSiKrjae-
rac TOivvv 6 ttjv apeTtjv e^top, rj ovk eariv a&iKia afyaipeoK
:01s 1
II
CONCRETE AND ABSTRACT KNOWLEDGE. 265
ayaOov' ovBev yap ayaOov ayr} > on the contrary, is primarily an inference fro:
the reason to the consequents, though it is afterwan
carried out modo tollente, in that it proves the no:
existence of a necessary consequent, and thereby destro;
I
ON LOGIC IN GENERAL. 291
the truth of the assumed reason. On this account it is
always perfectly certain, and accomplishes more by a
single example in contrarium than the induction does by
innumerable examples in favour of the proposition pro-
pounded. So much easier is it to refute than to prove, to
jverthrow than to establish.
( 292 )
CHAPTER X.
ON THE SYLLOGISM.
Although it is very hard to establish a new and correc
view of a subject which for more than two thousam
years has been handled by innumerable writers, ant
which, moreover, does not receive additions through th
growth of experience, yet this must not deter me fror
presenting to the thinker for examination the followin
attempt of this kind.
An inference is that operation of our reason by virtue (
which, through the comparison of two judgments a thii
judgment arises, without the assistance of any knowled^
otherwise obtained. The condition of this is that the.
two judgments have one conception in common, for othe
wise they are foreign to each other and have no cor
munity. But under this condition they become the fath
and mother of a child that contains in itself something
both. Moreover, this operation is no arbitrary act, b
an act of the reason, which, when it has considered su
judgments, performs it of itself according to its own la^
So far it is objective, not subjective, and therefore subj(
to the strictest rules.
We may ask in passing whether he who draws an infl
ence really learns something new from the new pro]
sition, something previously unknown to him ?
absolutely ; but yet to a certain extent he does. W.
he learns lay in what he knew : thus he knew it also, 1
he did not know that he knew it ; which is as if he 1 I
something, but did not know that he had it, and thi *
a tni
ON THE SYLLOGISM. 293
just the same as if he had it not. He knew it only im-
plicite, now he knows it explicite ; but this distinction
may be so great that the conclusion appears to him a
new truth. For example :
All diamonds are stones ;
All diamonds are combustible :
Therefore some stones are combustible.
The nature of inference consequently consists in this, that
we bring it to distinct consciousness that we have already
thought in the premisses what is asserted in the con-
elusion. It is therefore a means of becoming more dis-
tinctly conscious of one's own knowledge, of learning
more fully, or becoming aware of what one knows. The
knowledge which is afforded by the conclusion was latent,
ind therefore had just as little effect as latent heat has
m the thermometer. Whoever has salt has also chlorine ;
aut it is as if he had it not, for it can only act as chlorine
f it is chemically evolved ; thus only, then, does he really
Dossess it. It is the same with the gain which a mere
jonclusion from already known premisses affords : a previ-
msly bound or latent knowledge is thereby set free. These
somparisons may indeed seem to be somewhat strained, but
r et they really are not. For because we draw many of the
)ossible inferences from our knowledge very soon, very
apidly, and without formality, and therefore have no dis-
inct recollection of them, it seems to us as if no premisses
or possible conclusions remained long stored up unused,
>ut as if we already had also conclusions prepared for all
he premisses within reach of our knowledge. But this is
ot always the case ; on the contrary, two premisses may
ave for a long time an isolated existence in the same mind,
ill at last some occasion brings them together, and then
ae conclusion suddenly appears, as the spark comes from
le steel and the stone only when they are struck together,
n reality the premisses assumed from without, both for
heoretical insight and for motives, which bring about re-
olves, often lie for a long time in us, and become, partly
294 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER X.
through half-conscious, and even inarticulate, processes of
thought, compared with the rest of our stock of knowledge,
reflected upon, and, as it were, shaken up together, till at
last the right major finds the right minor, and these imme-
diately take up their proper places, and at once the conclu-
sion exists as a light that has suddenly arisen for us, without
any action on our part, as if it were an inspiration ; for we
cannot comprehend how we and others have so long been
in ignorance of it. It is true that in a happily organised
mind this process goes on more quickly and easily than in
ordinary minds ; and just because it is carried on spon-
taneously and without distinct consciousness it cannot be
learned. Therefore Goethe says : " How easy anything is
he knows who has discovered it, he knows who has attained
to it." As an illustration of the process of thought here
described we may compare it to those padlocks which con-
sist of rings with letters ; hanging on the box of a travelling
carriage, they are shaken so long that at last the letters oi
the word come together in their order and the lock opens
For the rest, we must also remember that the syllogisn
consists in the process of thought itself, and the word.'
and propositions through which it is expressed onlj
indicate the traces it has left behind it they are relatec
to it as the sound-figures of sand are related to the note:
whose vibrations they express. When we reflect upoi
something, we collect our data, reduce them to judgments
which are all quickly brought together and compared, an<
thereby the conclusions which it is possible to draw froc
them are instantly arrived at by means of the use of al
the three syllogistic figures. Yet on account of the grea
rapidity of this operation only a few words are used, an
sometimes none at all, and only the conclusion is formall
expressed. Thus it sometimes happens that because i
this way, or even merely intuitively, i.e., by a happ
appergu, we have brought some new truth to consciousnes
we now treat it as a conclusion and seek premisses for i
that is, we desire to prove it, for as a rule knowledg
ON THE SYLLOGISM.
295
exists earlier than its proofs. We then go through our
stock of knowledge in order to see whether we can find
some truth in it in which the newly discovered truth was
already implicitly contained, or two propositions which
would give this as a result if they were brought together
according to rule. On the other hand, every judicial
proceeding affords a most complete and imposing syllo-
gism, a syllogism in the first figure. The civil or criminal
transgression complained of is the minor; it is established
by the prosecutor. The law applicable to the case is the
major. The judgment is the conclusion, which therefore,
as something necessary, is "merely recognised" by the
judge.
But now I shall attempt to give the simplest and most
correct exposition of the peculiar mechanism of inference.
Judging, this elementary and most important process
of thought, consists in the comparison of two concep-
tions ; inference in the comparison of two judgments. Yet
ordinarily in text-books inference is also referred to
the comparison of conceptions, though of three, because
from the relation which two of these conceptions have
to a third their relation to each other may be known.
Truth cannot be denied to this view also; and since it
iffords opportunity for the perceptible demonstration of
syllogistic relations by means of drawn concept-spheres,
1 method approved of by me in the text, it has the
idvantage of making the matter easily comprehensible.
But it seems to me that here, as in so many cases, com-
prehensibility is attained at the cost of thoroughness.
The real process of thought in inference, with which the
:hree syllogistic figures and their necessity precisely agree,
.3 not thus recognised. In inference we operate not with
nere conceptions but with whole judgments, to which
piality, which lies only in the copula and not in the
3onceptions, and also quantity are absolutely essential,
ind indeed we have further to add modality. That
exposition of inference as a relation of three conceptions
496 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER X.
fails in this, that it at once resolves the judgments into
their ultimate elements (the conceptions), and thus the
means of combining these is lost, and that which is
peculiar to the judgments as such and in their complete-
ness, which is just what constitutes the necessity of the
conclusion which follows from them, is lost sight of. It
thus falls into an error analogous to that which organic
chemistry would commit if, for example, in the analysis
of plants it were at once to reduce them to their ultimate
elements, when it would find in all plants carbon, hydro-
gen, and oxygen, but would lose the specific differences, to
obtain which it is necessary to stop at their more special
elements, the so-called alkaloids, and to take care to
analyse these in their turn. From three given concep-
tions no conclusion can as yet be drawn. It may certainly
be said : the relation of two of them to the third must
be given with them. But it is just Hie Judgments which
combine these conceptions, that are the expression of
this relation; thus judgments, not mere conceptions, are
the material of the inference. Accordingly inference is
essentially a comparison of two judgments. The process
of thought in our mind is concerned with these and the
thoughts expressed by them, not merely with three con-
ceptions. This is the case even when this process is
imperfectly or not at all expressed in words; and it is
as such, as a bringing together of the complete and un-
analysed judgments, that we must consider it in order
properly to understand the technical procedure of infer-
ence. From this there will then also follow the necessity
for three really rational syllogistic figures.
As in the exposition of syllogistic reasoning by means
of concept-spheres these are presented to the mind under
the form of circles, so in the exposition by means of
entire judgments we have to think these under the form
of rods, which, for the purpose of comparison, are held
together now by one end, now by the other. The different
ways in which this can take place give the three figures
ON THE SYLLOGISM. 297
Since now every premiss contains its subject and its
predicate, these two conceptions are to be imagined as
situated at the two ends of each rod. The two judgments
are now compared with reference to the two different
conceptions in them; for, as has already been said, the
third conception must be the same in both, and is there-
fore subject to no comparison, but is that vnth which, that
is, in reference to which, the other two are compared ; it
is the middle. The latter is acC3rdingly always only the
means and not the chief concern. The two different con-
ceptions, on the other hand, are the subject of reflection,
and to find out their relation to each other by means of
the judgments in which they are contained is the aim of
the syllogism. Therefore the conclusion speaks only of
them, not of the middle, which was only a means, a
measuring rod, which we let fall as soon as it has served
its end. Now if this conception which is identical in both
propositions, thus the middle, is the subject of one pre-
miss, the conception to be compared with it must be the
predicate, and conversely. Here at once is established a
'priori the possibility of three cases ; either the subject of
one premiss is compared with the predicate of the other,
or the subject of the one with the subject of the other,
or, finally, the predicate of the one with the predicate of
the other. Hence arise the three syllogistic figures of
Aristotle ; the fourth, which was added somewhat im-
pertinently, is ungenuine and a spurious form. It is attri-
buted to Galenus, but this rests only on Arabian authority.
Each of the three figures exhibits a perfectly different, cor-
rect, and natural thought-process of the reason in inference.
If in the two judgments to be compared the relation be-
tween the predicate of the one and the subject of the otlier
is the object of the comparison, the first figure appears.
This figure alone has the advantage that the conceptions
which in the conclusion are subject and predicate both
appear already in the same character in the premisses;
while in the two other figures one of them must always
298 FIRST BOOK CHAPTER X.
change its roll in the conclusion. But thus in the first
figure the result is always less novel and surprising than
in the other two. Now this advantage in the first figure is
obtained by the fact that the predicate of the major is
compared with the subject of the minor, but not conversely,
which is therefore here essential, and involves that the
middle should assume both the positions, i.e., it is the sub-
ject in the major and the predicate in the minor. And from
this again arises its subordinate significance, for it appears
as a mere weight which we lay at pleasure now in one
scale and now in the other. The course of thought in
this figure is, that the predicate of the major is attributed
to the subject of the minor, because the subject of the
major is the predicate of the minor, or, in the negative
case, the converse holds for the same reason. Thus here a
property is attributed to the things thought through a con-
ception, because it depends upon another property which
we already know they possess ; or conversely. Therefore
here the guiding principle is : Nbta notce est nota rei ipsius,
et repugnans notce repugned rei ipsi.
If, on the other hand, we compare two judgments with
the intention of bringing out the relation which the sub-
jects of both may have to each other, we must take as the
common measure their predicate. This will accordingly
be here the middle, and must therefore be the same in
both judgments. Hence arises the second figure. In it
the relation of two subjects to each other is determined
by that which they have as their common predicate. But
this relation can only have significance if the same predi-
cate is attributed to the one subject and denied of the
other, for thus it becomes an essential ground of distinc-
tion between the two. For if it were attributed to both
the subjects this could decide nothing as to their relation
to each other, for almost every predicate belongs to innu-
merable subjects. Still less would it decide this relation
if the predicate were denied of both the subjects. From
this follows the fundamental characteristic of the s
ON THE SYLLOGISM 299
figure, that the premisses must be of opposite quality ; the
one must affirm and the other deny. Therefore here the
principal rule is : Sit altera negans ; the corollary of which
is : E meris ajjirmativis nihil sequiter; a rule which is some-
times transgressed in a loose argument obscured by many
parenthetical propositions. The course of thought which
this figure exhibits distinctly appears from what has been
said. It is the investigation of two kinds of things with
the view of distinguishing them, thus of establishing that
they are not of the same species ; which is here decided by
showing that a certain property is essential to the one
kind, which the other lacks. That this course of thought
assumes the second figure of its own accord, and ex-
presses itself clearly only in it, will be shown by an
example :
All fishes have cold blood ;
No whale has cold blood :
Thus no whale is a fish.
In the first figure, on the other hand, this thought ex-
hibits itself in a weak, forced, and ultimately patched-up
form:
Nothing that has cold blood is a whale ;
All fishes have cold blood :
Thus no fish is a whale,
And consequently no whale is a fish.
Take also an example with an affirmative minor :
No Mohamedan is a Jew ;
Some Turks are Jews :
Therefore some Turks are not Mohamedans.
As the guiding principle for this figure I therefore
give, for the mood with the negative minor : Gui repugned
nota, etiam repugned notatum; and for the mood with the
affirmative minor : Notato repugnat id cui nota repugnat.
Translated these may be thus combined : Two subjects
which stand in opposite relations to one predicate have a
negative relation to each other.
The third case is that in which we place two judgments
300 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER X.
together in order to investigate the relation of their predi-
cates. Hence arises the third Jlgure,in which accordingly the
middle appears in both premisses as the subject It is also
here the tertium corrvparationis, the measure which is ap-
plied to both the conceptions which are to be investigated,
or, as it were, a chemical reagent, with which we test
them both in order to learn from their relation to it what
relation exists between themselves. Thus, then, the con-
clusion declares whether a relation of subject and predi-
cate exists between the two, and to what extent this is
the case. Accordingly, what exhibits itself in this figure
is reflection concerning two properties which we are in-
clined to regard either as incompatible, or else as insepa-
rable, and in order to decide this we attempt to make
them the predicates of one subject in two judgments.
From this it results either that both properties belong
to the same thing, consequently their compatibility, or else
that a thing has the one but not the other, consequently
their separableness. The former in all moods with two
affirmative premisses, the latter in all moods with one
negative ; for example :
Some brutes can speak ;
All brutes are irrational :
Therefore some irrational beings can speak.
According to Kant {Die Falscke SpUzfinigkeit, 4) this
inference would only be conclusive if we added in thought :
" Therefore some irrational beings are brutes." But this
seems to be here quite superfluous and by no means the
natural process of thought. But in order to carry out the
same process of thought directly by means of the first
figure I must say :
" All brutes are irrational ;
Some beings that can speak are brute?,"
which is clearly not the natural course of thought; in-
deed the conclusion which would then follow, "Some
beings that can speak are irrational," would have to be
converted in order to preserve the conclusion which the
ON THE SYLLOGISM. 301
third figure gives of itself, and at which the whole course
of thought has aimed. Let us take another example :
All alkalis float in water ;
All alkalis are metals :
Therefore some metals float in water.
When this is transposed into the first figure the minor
must be converted, and thus runs : " Some metals are
alkalis." It therefore merely asserts that some metals lie
(QQ,
in the sphere " alkalis," thus Wikan.U ileum J , while our
actual knowledge is that all alkalis lie in the sphere
/ Metal*. N.
"metals," thus: ( ^-v ] It follows that if the first
figure is to be regarded as the only normal one, in order
to think naturally we would have to think less than we
know, and to think indefinitely while we know definitely.
This assumption has too much against it Thus in general
it must be denied that when we draw inferences in the
second and third figures we tacitly convert a proposition.
On the contrary, the third, and also the second, figure
exhibits just as rational a process of thought as the first.
Let us now consider another example of the other class
of the third figure, in which the separableness of two
predicates is the result ; on account of which one premiss
must here be negative :
No Buddhist believes in a God ;
Some Buddhists are rational :
Therefore some rational beings do not believe in a God.
As in the examples given above the compatibility of
two properties is the problem of reflection, now their
separableness is its problem, which here also must be de-
cided by comparing them with one subject and showing
302 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER X.
that one of them is present in it without the other. Thus
the end is directly attained, while by means of the first
figure it could only be attained indirectly. For in order
to reduce the syllogism to the first figure we must convert
the minor, and therefore say : " Some rational beings are
Buddhists," which would be only a faulty expression of
its meaning, which really is: "Some Buddhists are yet
certainly rational."
As the guiding principle of this figure I therefore give :
for the affirmative moods: Ejusdem rei notce, modo sit
altera universalis, sibi invicem sunt notce particulares ; and
for the negative moods: Nota rei competens, notce eidem
repugnanti, particulariter repugnat, modo sit altera univer-
salis. Translated : If two predicates are affirmed of one
subject, and at least one of them universally, they are
also affirmed of each other particularly ; and, on the con-
trary, they are denied of each other particularly when-
ever one of them contradicts the subject of which the
other is affirmed; provided always that either the con-
tradiction or the affirmation be universal.
In the fourth figure the subject of the major has to
be compared with the predicate of the minor; but in
the conclusion they must both exchange their value and
position, so that what was the subject of the major appears
as the predicate of the conclusion, and what was the
predicate of the minor appears as the subject of the con-
clusion. By this it becomes apparent that this figure is
merely the first, wilfully turned upside down, and by no
means the expression of a real process of thought natural
to the reason.
On the other hand, the first three figures are the ectypes
of three real and essentially different operations of thought
They have this in common, that they consist in the com-
parison of two judgments; but such a comparison only
becomes fruitful when these judgments have one con-
ception in common. If we present the premisses to our
imagination under the sensible form of two rods, we can
ON THE SYLLOGISM. 303
think of this conception as a clasp that links them to
each other ; indeed in lecturing one might provide oneself
with such rods. On the other hand, the three figures are
distinguished by this, that those judgments are compared
either with reference to the subjects of both, or to the pre-
dicates of both, or lastly, with reference to the subject of
the one and the predicate of the other. Since now every
conception has the property of being subject or predicate
only because it is already part of a judgment, this con-
firms my view that in the syllogism only judgments are
primarily compared, and conceptions only because they
are parts of judgments. In the comparison of two judg-
ments, however, the essential question is, in respect of
what are they compared? not by what means are they
compared? The former consists of the concepts which
are different in the two judgments ; the latter consists of
the middle, that is, the conception which is identical in
both. It is therefore not the right point of view which
Lambert, and indeed really Aristotle, and almost all the
moderns have taken in starting from the middle in the
analysis of syllogisms, and making it the principal matter
and its position the essential characteristic of the syllo-
gisms. On the contrary, its roll is only secondary, and
its position a consequence of the logical value of the
conceptions which are really to be compared in the syllo-
gism. These may be compared to two substances which
are to be chemically tested, and the middle to the reagent
by which they are tested. It therefore always takes the
place which the conceptions to be compared leave vacant,
and does not appear again in the conclusion. It is selected
according to our knowledge of its relation to both the
conceptions and its suitableness for the place it has to
take up. Therefore in many cases we can change it at
pleasure for another without affecting the syllogism. For
example, in the syllogism :
All men are mortal ;
Caius is a man :
304 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER X.
I can exchange the middle " man " for " animal exist*
ence." In the syllogism :
All diamonds are stones ;
All diamonds are combustible :
I can exchange the middle " diamond " for " anthracite *
As an external mark by which we can recognise at once
the figure of a syllogism the middle is certainly very
useful. But as the fundamental characteristic of a thing
which is to be explained, we must take what is essential
to it ; and what is essential here is, whether we place two
propositions together in order to compare their predicates
or their subjects, or the predicate of the one and the
subject of the other.
Therefore, in order as premisses to yield a conclusion,
two judgments must have a conception in common;
further, they must not both be negative, nor both parti-
cular ; and lastly, in the case in which the conceptions to
be compared are the subjects of both, they must not both
be affirmative.
The voltaic pile may be regarded as a sensible image of
the syllogism. Its point of indifference, at the centre,
represents the middle, which holds together the two pre-
misses, and by virtue of which they have the power of
yielding a conclusion. The two different conceptions, on
the other hand, which are really what is to be compared,
are represented by the two opposite poles of the pile.
Only because these are brought together by means of
their two conducting wires, which represent the copulas
of the two judgments, is the spark emitted upon their
contact the new light of the conclusion.
T
II
( 305 )
CHAPTER XL 1
ON BHETORIO.
Eloquence is the faculty of awakening in others our
/iew of a thing, or our opinion about it, of kindling in
;hem our feeling concerning it, and thus putting them
n sympathy with us. And all this by conducting the
tream of our thought into their minds, through the
aedium of words, with such force as to carry their
hought from the direction it has already taken, and
weep it along with ours in its course. The more their
revious course of thought differs from ours, the greater
i this achievement. From this it is easily understood
ow personal conviction and passion make a man elo-
uent; and in general, eloquence is more the gift of
ature than the work of art; yet here, also, art will
lpport nature.
In order to convince another of a truth which conflicts
ith an error he firmly holds, the first rule to be observed,
an easy and natural one : let the premisses come first, and
e conclusion follow. Yet this rule is seldom observed,
it reversed; for zeal, eagerness, and dogmatic positive-
's urge us to proclaim the conclusion loudly and noisily
;ainst him who adheres to the opposed error. This easily
akes him shy, and now he opposes his will to all reasons
d premisses, knowing already to what conclusion they
ad. Therefore we ought rather to keep the conclusion
(mpletely concealed, and only advance the premisses
This chapter is connected with the conclusion of 9 of the first volume.
VOL. IL U
306 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XI.
distinctly, fully, and in different lights. Indeed, if possibl
we ought not to express the conclusion at all. It
come necessarily and regularly of its own accord into the
reason of the hearers, and the conviction thus born in
themselves will be all the more genuine, and will also
be accompanied by self-esteem instead of shame. Id
difficult cases we may even assume the air of desiring tc
arrive at a quite opposite conclusion from that which we
really have in view. An example of this is the famous
speech of Antony in Shakspeare's " Julius Caesar."
In defending a thing many persons err by confident!}
advancing everything imaginable that can be said for it
mixing up together what is true, half true, and merel;
plausible. But the false is soon recognised, or at any rat
felt, and throws suspicion also upon the cogent and tru
arguments which were brought forward along with i
Give then the true and weighty pure and alone,
beware of defending a truth with inadequate, and there
fore, since they are set up as adequate, sophistical reasons
for the opponent upsets these, and thereby gains tl
appearance of having upset the truth itself which m
supported by them, that is, he makes argumenta c
hominem hold good as argumenta ad rem. The Chine
go, perhaps, too far the other way, for they have tl
saying: "He who is eloquent and has a sharp tongi
may always leave half of a sentence unspoken ; and )
who has right on his side may confidently yield thre
tenths of his assertion."
( 307 )
CHAPTER XII.1
OK THE DOCTRINE OF SCIENCE.
^ROM the analysis of the different functions of our intellect
iven in the whole of the preceding chapters, it is clear
hat for a correct use of it, either in a theoretical or a
ractical reference, the following conditions are demanded :
[.) The correct apprehension through perception of the
sal things taken into consideration, and of all their
>sential properties and relations, thus of all data. (2.)
he construction of correct conceptions out of these ; thus
e connotation of those properties under correct abstrac-
ms, which now become the material of the subsequent
inking. (3.) The comparison of those conceptions both
.th the perceived object and among themselves, and
th the rest of our store of conceptions, so that correct
jlgments, pertinent to the matter in hand, and fully
cnprehending and exhausting it, may proceed from them;
tis the right estimation of the matter. (4.) The placing
t;ether or combination of those judgments as the premisses
syllogisms. This may be done very differently accord-
H to the choice and arrangement of the judgments, and
y> the actual result of the whole operation primarily
d>ends upon it. What is really of importance here is
tit from among so many possible combinations of those
A'erent judgments which have to do with the matter
fr$ deliberation should hit upon the very ones which
sire the purpose and are decisive. But if in the first
action, that is, in the apprehension through perception
1 This chapter is connected with 14 of the first volume.
308 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XII.
of the things and relations, any single essential point hi
been overlooked, the correctness of all the succee
operations of the mind cannot prevent the result fro:
being false; for there lie the data, the material of the
whole investigation. Without the certainty that these are
correctly and completely collected, one ought to abstain,
in important matters, from any definite decision.
A conception is correct ; a judgment is true.; a body if
real ; and a relation is evident. A proposition of immedi-
ate certainty is an axiom. Only the fundamental principle
of logic, and those of mathematics drawn a priori from in
tuition or perception, and finally also the law of causality
have immediate certainty. A proposition of indirec
certainty is a maxim, and that by means of which i
obtains its certainty is the proof. If immediate certaint
is attributed to a proposition which has no such certaint}
this is a petitio principii. A proposition which appea
directly to the empirical perception is an assertion: t
confront it with such perception demands judgmeD
Empirical perception can primarily afford us only pa
ticular, not universal truths. Through manifold repetitic
and confirmation such truths indeed obtain a certain ur
versality also, but it is only comparative and prec
rious, because it is still always open to attack. But if
proposition has absolute universality, the perception
which it appeals is not empirical but a priori. Th
Logic and Mathematics alone are absolutely certs
sciences ; but they really teach us only what we alrea
knew beforehand. For they are merely explanations
that of which we are conscious a priori, the forms of c
own knowledge, the one being concerned with the for
of thinking, the other with those of perceiving. Theref
we spin them entirely out of ourselves. All other sci
tific knowledge is empirical.
A proof proves too much if it extends to things or cf J
of which that which is to be proved clearly does not 1 J
good j therefore it is refuted apagogically by these.
ON THE DOCTRINE OF SCIENCE. 309
deductio ad absurdum properly consists in this, that we
take a false assertion which has been made as the major
proposition of a syllogism, then add to it a correct minor,
and arrive at a conclusion which clearly contradicts facts
of experience or unquestionable truths. But by some
round-about way such a refutation must be possible of
svery false doctrine. For the defender of this will yet
3ertainly recognise and admit some truth or other, and
:hen the consequences of this, and on the other hand
;hose of the false assertion, must be followed out until
ye arrive at two propositions which directly contradict
jach other. We find many examples in Plato of this
)eautiful artifice of genuine dialectic.
A correct hypothesis is nothing more than the true and
jomplete expression of the present fact, which the origi-
lator of the hypothesis has intuitively apprehended in
ts real nature and inner connection. For it tells us only
vhat really takes place here.
The opposition of the analytical and synthetical methods
ve find already indicated by Aristotle, yet perhaps first
istinctly described by Proclus, who says quite correctly :
MeOohoi 8e irapaBiBovrac' KaWiarrj fiev f) Sta T17? ava-
.uo-ea>? eir' ap^rjv ofxoXoyovfievrjv avayovaa to t^qrovfievov
v Kai IIXaTcov, to? re analogous to the eTrar/ayyr) and a7rajy(oyr) explained
1 chapter ix. ; only the latter are not used to establish
repositions, but always to overthrow them. The analy-
eal method proceeds from the facts ; the particular, to the
inciple or rule ; the universal, or from the consequents
the reasons ; the other conversely. Therefore it would
3io FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XII.
be much more correct to call them the inductive and the
deductive methods, for the customary names are unsuitable
and do not fully express the things.
If a philosopher tries to begin by thinking out the
methods in accordance with which he will philosophise,
he is like a poet who first writes a system of aesthetics in
order to poetise in accordance with it. Both of them may
be compared to a man who first sings himself a tune and
afterwards dances to it. The thinkiug mind must find
its way from original tendency. Eule and application,
method and achievement, must, like matter and form,
be inseparable. But after we have reached the goal we
may consider the path we have followed. ./Esthetics and
methodology are, from their nature, younger than poetry
and philosophy ; as grammar is younger than language,
thorough bass younger than music, and logic younger than
thought.
This is a fitting place to make, in passing, a remark by
means of which I should like to check a growing evi]
while there is yet time. That Latin has ceased to be the
language of all scientific investigations has the disad-
vantage that there is no longer an immediately commor
scientific literature for the whole of Europe, but nationa
literatures. And thus every scholar is primarily limitei
to a much smaller public, and moreover to a public ham
pered with national points of view and prejudices. Thei
he must now learn the four principal European languages
as well as the two ancient languages. In this it will be
great assistance to him that the termini technici of al
sciences (with the exception of mineralogy) are, as an in
heritance from our predecessors, Latin or Greek. Therefoi
all nations wisely retain these. Only the Germans hav
hit upon the unfortunate idea of wishing to Germanis
the termini technici of all the sciences. This has tw
great disadvantages. First, the foreign and also the Ge
man scholar is obliged to learn all the technical tern
of his science twice, which, when there are many t
II
ON THE DOCTRINE OF SCIENCE. 311
example, in Anatomy is an incredibly tiresome and
lengthy business. If the other nations were not in this
respect wiser than the Germans, we would have the
trouble of learning every terminus technieus five times.
If the Germans carry this further, foreign men of learning
will leave their books altogether unread ; for besides this
fault they are for the most part too diffuse, and are writ-
;en in a careless, bad, and often affected and objectionable
*tyle, and besides are generally conceived with a rude
iisregard of the reader and his requirements. Secondly,
hose Germanised forms of the termini technici are almost
.hroughout long, patched-up, stupidly chosen, awkward,
arring words, not clearly separated from the rest of the
anguage, which therefore impress themselves with diffi-
ulty upon the memory, while the Greek and Latin ex-
tressions chosen by the ancient and memorable founders
if the sciences possess the whole of the opposite good
qualities, and easily impress themselves on the memory
>y their sonorous sound. What an ugly, harsh-sound-
ug word, for instance, is " Stickstoff" instead of azot !
Verbum," " substantiv" " adjectiv," are remembered and
istinguished more easily than " Zeitwort" " Nenntvort,"
Beiwort," or even " Umstandswort " instead of "adver-
ium." In Anatomy it is quite unsupportable, and more-
ver vulgar and low. Even " Pulsader " and " Blutader "
re more exposed to momentary confusion than " Arterie "
nd " Vene ; " but utterly bewildering are such expressions
3 " Fruchthdlter," " Fruchtgang," and " Fruchtleiter " in-
;ead of " uterus," " vagina," and " tuba Faloppii," which yet
very doctor must know, and which he will find sufficient
I all European languages. In the same way "Speiche " and
Elleribogenrohre " instead of " radius " and " ulna," which
II Europe has understood for thousands of years. Where-
>re then this clumsy, confusing, drawling, and awkward
ermanising? Not less objectionable is the translation
the technical terms in Logic, in which our gifted profes-
)rs of philosophy are the creators of a new terminology,
312 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XII.
and almost every one of them has his own. "Wit
G. E. Schulze, for example, the subject is called " Gtwi
hegriff" the predicate " Beilegungsbegriff ; " then there
" Beilegungsschlusse," " VoraussetzungsscMilsse," and "Bntge-
gensetzungsschliisse ; " the judgments have " Grosse," " Be-
schaffenJieit," " Verhaltniss" and " Zuverldssigkeit" ijt.,
quantity, quality, relation, and modality. The same per-
verse influence of this Germanising mania is to be found
in all the sciences. The Latin and Greek expressions have
the further advantage that they stamp the scientific con-
ception as such, and distinguish it from the words oi
common intercourse, and the ideas which cling to then:
through association ; while, for example, " Speisebrei " in-
stead of chyme seems to refer to the food of little children
and " Lungensack " instead of pleura, and " Herzbeutel '
instead of pericardium seem to have been invented 03
butchers rather than anatomists. Besides this, the mos
immediate necessity of learning the ancient languages de
pends upon the old termini technici, and they are mort
and more in danger of being neglected through the use
living languages in learned investigations. But if it come
to this, if the spirit of the ancients bound up with thei
languages disappears from a liberal education, then coarse
ness, insipidity, and vulgarity will take possession of th
whole of literature. For the works of the ancients ar
the pole-star of every artistic or literary effort ; if it set
they are lost. Even now we can observe from the misei
able and puerile style of most writers that they hav
never written Latin. 1 The study of the classical authoi
is very properly called the study of Humanity, for throug
it the student first becomes a man again, for he entei
1 A principal use of the study of Therefore we ought to pursue tl
the ancients is that it preserves study of the ancients all our lif
us from verbosity ; for the ancients although reducing the time devot*
always take pains to write concisely to it. The ancients knew that v
and pregnantly, and the error of al- ought not to write as we spea
most all moderns is verbosity, which The moderns, on the other ban
the most recent try to make up for are not even ashamed to print le
by suppressing syllables and letters, tures they have delivered.
ON THE DOCTRINE OF SCIENCE. 313
into the world which was still free from all the absurdities
of the Middle Ages and of romanticism, which afterwards
penetrated so deeply into mankind in Europe that even
now every one comes into the world covered with it, and
has first to strip it off simply to become a man again.
Think not that your modern wisdom can ever supply the
place of that initiation into manhood; ye are not, like
the Greeks and Eomans, born freemen, unfettered sons of
nature. Ye are first the sons and heirs of the barbarous
Middle Ages and of their madness, of infamous priestcraft,
and of half-brutal, half-childish chivalry. Though both
now gradually approach their end, yet ye cannot yet stand
on your own feet. Without the school of the ancients
your literature will degenerate into vulgar gossip and dull
philistinism. Thus for all these reasons it is my well-
intended counsel that an end be put at once to the
Germanising mania condemned above.
I shall further take the opportunity of denouncing here
the disorder which for some years has been introduced
into German orthography in an unprecedented manner.
Scribblers of every species have heard something of
conciseness of expression, but do not know that this
consists in the careful omission of everything super-
fluous (to which, it is true, the whole of their writings
belong), but imagine they can arrive at it by clipping the
words as swindlers clip coin; and every syllable which
appears to them superfluous, because they do not feel its
value, they cut off without more ado. For example, our
ancestors, with true tact, said " Beweis" and " Veriveis;"
but, on the other hand, " Nachweisung." The fine distinc-
tion analogous to that between " Versuch" and " Versu-
chung," "Betracht " and "Betrachtung" is not perceptible to
dull ears and thick skulls ; therefore they have invented
the word " Nachweis," which has come at once into gene-
ral use, for this only requires that an idea should be
thoroughly awkward and a blunder very gross. Accord-
ingly a similar amputation has already been proposed in in-
SH FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XII.
numerable words ; for example, instead of " Untersitchung n
is written " Untersuch ; " nay, even instead of " allmalig,'
" malig ;" instead of "beinahe," "nahe;" instead of " be-
stdndig," " stdndig." If a Frenchman took upon himself
to write "prbs " instead of "presque," or if an Englishman
wrote " most " instead of " almost," they would be laughed
at by every one as fools ; but in Germany whoever does
this sort of thing passes for a man of originality. Chemists
already write " loslich " and " unloslich " instead of " unauf-
loslich" and if the grammarians do not rap them over
the knuckles they will rob the language of a valuable
word. Knots, shoe-strings, and also conglomerates of
which the cement is softened, and all analogous things
are " loslich " (can be loosed) ; but what is " aujloslich"
(soluble), on the other hand, is whatever vanishes in a
liquid, like salt in water. " Auflosen " (to dissolve) is the
terminus ad hoc, which says this and nothing else, marking
out a definite conception ; but our acute improvers of the
language wish to empty it into the general rinsing-pan
" losen " (to loosen) ; they would therefore in consistency be
obliged to make " losen " also take the place everywhere
of "ablasen" (to relieve, used of guards), "auslosen" (to
release), " einlosen" (to redeem), &c, and in these, as in
the former case, deprive the language of definiteness of
expression. But to make the language poorer by a word
means to make the thought of the nation poorer by a
conception. Yet this is the tendency of the united efforts
of almost all our writers of books for the last ten or
twenty years. For what I have shown here by one ex-
ample can be supported by a hundred others, and the
meanest stinting of syllables prevails like a disease. The
miserable wretches actually count the letters, and do not
hesitate to mutilate a word, or to use one in a false sense,
whenever by doing so they can gain two letters. He
who is capable of no new thoughts will at least bring new
words to market, and every ink-slinger regards it as his
vocation to improve the language. Journalists practise
ON THE DOCTRINE OF SCIENCE. 315
this most shamelessly ; and since their papers, on account
of the trivial nature of their contents, have the largest
public, indeed a public which for the most part reads
nothing else, a great danger threatens the language
through them. I therefore seriously advise that they
should be subjected to an orthographical censorship, or
that they should be made to pay a fine for every unusual
or mutilated word; for what could be more improper
than that changes of language should proceed from the
lowest branch of literature? Language, especially a
relatively speaking original language like German, is the
most valuable inheritance of a nation, and it is also an
exceedingly complicated work of art, easily injured, and
which cannot again be restored, therefore a noli me tangere.
Other nations have felt this, and have shown great piety
towards their languages, although far less complete than
German. Therefore the language of Dante and Petrarch
differs only in trifles from that of to-day; Montaigne is
still quite readable, and so also is Shakspeare in his
oldest editions. For a German indeed it is good to have
somewhat long words in his mouth ; for he thinks slowly,
and they give him time to reflect. But this prevailing
economy of language shows itself in yet more character-
istic phenomena. For example, in opposition to all logic
and grammar, they use the imperfect for the perfect and
pluperfect ; they often stick the auxiliary verb in their
pocket ; they use the ablative instead of the genitive ; for
the sake of omitting a couple of logical particles they
make such intricate sentences that one has to read them
four times over in order to get at the sense ; for it is only
the paper and not the reader's time that they care to
spare. In proper names, after the manner of Hotten-
tots, they do not indicate the case either by inflection or
article : the reader may guess it. But they are specially
fond of contracting the double vowel and dropping the
lengthening h, those letters sacred to prosody ; which is
just the same thing as if we wanted to banish rj and to
316 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XII.
from Greek, and make e and o take their place. Whoever
writes Scham, Marchen, Mass, Spass, ought also to write
Lon, Son, Stat, Sat, Jar, Al, &c. But since writing is the
copy of speech, posterity will imagine that one ought
to speak as one writes ; and then of the German language
there will only remain a narrow, mouth- distorting, jarring
noise of consonants, and all prosody will be lost. The
spelling " LUeratur " instead of the correct " LUteratur "
is also very much liked, because it saves a letter. In
defence of this the participle of the verb linere is given
as the root of the word. But linere means to smear;
therefore the favoured spelling might actually be correct
for the greater part of German bookmaking ; so that one
could distinguish a very small " LUteratur " from a very
extensive " LUeratur." In order to write concisely let a
man improve his style and shun all useless gossip and
chatter, and then he will not need to cut out syllables
and letters on account of the dearness of paper. But
to write so many useless pages, useless sheets, useless
books, and then to want to make up this waste of
time and paper at the cost of the innocent syllables and
letters that is truly the superlative of what is called
in English being penny wise and pound foolish. It is to
be regretted that there is no German Academy to take
charge of the language against literary sans-culottism,
especially in an age when even those who are ignorant
of the ancient language venture to employ the press.
I have expressed my mind more fully on the whole sub-
ject of the inexcusable mischief being done at the present
day to the German language in my "Parerga," voL ii.
chap. 23.
In my essay on the principle of sufficient reas< n, 51,
I already proposed a first classification of the scien<
accordance with the form of the principle of sufficient
reason which reigns in them ; and I also touched upon
it again in 7 and 1 5 of the first volume of this work.
I will give here a small attempt at such a classification,
ON THE DOCTRINE OF SCIENCE. 317
which will yet no doubt be susceptible of much improve-
ment and perfecting :
L Pure a priori Sciences.
1. The doctrine of the ground of being.
(a.) In space : Geometry.
(&.) In time : Arithmetic and Algebra.
2. The doctrine of the ground of knowing : Logic.
II. Empirical or a posteriori Sciences. All based upon
the ground of becoming, i.e., the law of causalty, and upon
the three modes of that law.
1. The doctrine of causes.
(a.) Universal : Mechanics, Hydrodynamics,
Physics, Chemistry.
(6.) Particular : Astronomy, Mineralogy, Geo-
logy, Technology, Pharmacy.
2. The doctrine of stimuli.
(a.) Universal : Physiology of plants and
animals, together with the ancillary
science, Anatomy.
(5.) Particular: Botany, Zoology, Zootomy,
Comparative Physiology, Pathology,
Therapeutics.
3. The doctrine of motives.
(a.) Universal : Ethics, Psychology.
(b.) Particular : Jurisprudence, History.
Philosophy or Metaphysics, as the doctrine of conscious-
ness and its contents in general, or of the whole of expe-
rience as such, does not appear in the list, because it does
not at once pursue the investigation which the principle
of sufficient reason prescribes, but first has this principle
itself as its object. It is to be regarded as the thorough
bass of all sciences, but belongs to a higher class than
they do, and is almost as much related to art as to science.
As in music every particular period must correspond to
the tonality to which thorough bass has advanced, so every
318 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XII.
author, in proportion to the line he follows, must bear the
stamp of the philosophy which prevails in his time. But
besides this, every science has also its special philosophy ;
and therefore we speak of the philosophy of botany, of zo-
ology, of history, &c. By this we must reasonably under-
stand nothing more than the chief results of each science
itself, regarded and comprehended from the highest, that is
the most general, point of view which is possible within
that science. These general results connect themselves
directly with general philosophy, for they supply it with
important data, and relieve it from the labour of seeking
these itself in the philosophically raw material of the
special sciences. These special philosophies therefore
stand as a mediating link between their special sciences
and philosophy proper. For since the latter has to give
the most general explanations concerning the whole of
things, these must also be capable of being brought down
and applied to the individual of every species of thing.
The philosophy of each science, however, arises indepen-
dently of philosophy in general, from the data of its own
science itself. Therefore it does not need to wait till that
philosophy at last be found ; but if worked out in advance
it will certainly agree with the true universal philosophy.
This, on the other hand, must be capable of receiving
confirmation and illustration from the philosophies of
the particular sciences ; for the most general truth must
be capable of being proved through the more special
truths. Goethe has afforded a beautiful example of
the philosophy of zoology in his reflections on Dalton's
and Pander's skeletons of rodents (Hefte zur Morphologie,
1824). And like merit in connection with the same science
belongs to Kielmayer, Delamark, Geoffroy St. Hilaire,
Cuvier, and many others, in that they have all brought
out clearly the complete analogy, the inner relation-
ship, the permanent type, and systematic connection of
animal forms. Empirical sciences pursued purely for
their own sake and without philosophical tendency are
ON THE DOCTRINE OF SCIENCE. 319
like a face without eyes. They are, however, a suitable
occupation for men of good capacity who yet lack the
highest faculties, which would even be a hindrance to
minute investigations of such a kind. Such men concen-
trate their whole power and their whole knowledge upon
one limited field, in which, therefore, on condition of re-
maining in entire ignorance of everything else, they can
attain to the most complete knowledge possible; while
the philosopher must survey all fields of knowledge, and
indeed to a certain extent be at home in them; and
thus that complete knowledge which can only be at-
tained by the study of detail is necessarily denied him.
Therefore the former may be compared to those Geneva
workmen of whom one makes only' wheels, another only
springs, and a third only chains. The philosopher, on
the other hand, is like the watchmaker, who alone pro-
duces a whole out of all these which has motion and
significance. They may also be compared to the musi-
cians of an orchestra, each of whom is master of his own
instrument ; and the philosopher, on the other hand, to the
conductor, who must know the nature and use of every
instrument, yet without being able to play them all, or
even one of them, with great perfection. Scotus Erigena
includes all sciences under the name Scientia, in opposi-
tion to philosophy, which he calls Soupientia. The same
distinction was already made by the Pythagoreans; as
may be seen from Stobseus (Floril., vol. i. p. 20), where
it is very clearly and neatly explained. But a much
happier and more piquant comparison of the relation of
the two kinds of mental effort to each other has been
so often repeated by the ancients that we no longer know
to whom it belongs. Diogenes Laertius (ii. 79) attributes
it to Aristippus, Stobseus (Floril., tit. iv. no) to Aristo of
Chios ; the Scholiast of Aristotle ascribes it to him (p. 8 of
the Berlin edition), but Plutarch (Be Puer. Educ., c. 10)
attributes it to Bio " Qui ajebai, sicut Penelopes proci,
320
FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XII.
quum non possent cum Penelope concumbere, rem cum ejus
ancillis habuissent ; ita qui philosophiam nequeunt appre-
hendere eos in alliis nullius pretii diciplinis sese conterere."
In our predominantly empirical and historical age it can
do no harm to recall this.
( 321 )
CHAPTER XIII. 1
ON THE METHODS OF MATHEMATICS.
Euclid's method of demonstration has brought forth from
ts own womb its most striking parody and caricature in
he famous controversy on the theory of parallels, and
he attempts, which are repeated every year, to prove the
Seventh axiom. This axiom asserts, and indeed supports
ts assertion by the indirect evidence of a third inter-
acting line, that two lines inclining towards each other
for that is just the meaning of "less than two right
ngles") if produced far enough must meet a truth
'hich is supposed to be too complicated to pass as self-
vident, and therefore requires a demonstration. Such a
emonstration, however, cannot be produced, just because
lere is nothing that is not immediate. This scruple of
mscience reminds me of Schiller's question of law :
"For years I have used my nose for smelling. Have I,
ten, actually a right to it that can be proved ? " Indeed
seems to me that the logical method is hereby reduced
absurdity. Yet it is just through the controversies
)out this, together with the vain attempts to prove what
directly certain as merely indirectly certain, that the
lf-sufficingness and clearness of intuitive evidence ap-
ars in contrast with the uselessness and difficulty of
^ical proof a contrast which is no less instructive than
nusing. The direct certainty is not allowed to be valid
Ire, because it is no mere logical certainty following from
13 conceptions, thus resting only upon the relation of the
1 This chapter is connected with 1 5 of the first volume.
VOL. H. X
322 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XIII.
predicate to the subject, according to the principle
contradiction. That axiom, however, is a synthetica
proposition a priori, and as such has the guarantee o
pure, not empirical, perception, which is just as immediat
and certain as the principle of contradiction itself, fror
which all demonstrations first derive their certainty
Ultimately this holds good of every geometrical theoren
and it is quite arbitrary where we draw the line betwee
what is directly certain and what has first to be demor
strated. It surprises me that the eighth axiom is nc
rather attacked. "Figures which coincide with eac
other are equal to each other." For " coinciding wit
each other" is either a mere tautology or somethir
purely empirical which does not belong to pure percei
tion but to external sensuous experience. It presuppos-
that the figures may be moved ; but only matter is mo -
able in space. Therefore this appeal to coincidence leav
pure space the one element of geometry in order
pass over to what is material and empirical.
The reputed motto of the Platonic lecture-room, " Aye
fieTpijTos /j.7]Si<; ewtro)," of which mathematicians are
proud, was no doubt inspired by the fact tb.at Plato i
garded the geometrical figures as intermediate existenc
between the eternal Ideas and particular things,
Aristotle frequently mentions in his "Metaphysics" (esj
cially i. c. 6, p. 887, 998, et Scholia, p. 827, ed. Ben
Moreover, the opposition between those self-exist*
eternal forms, or Ideas, and the transitory individi.
things, was most easily made comprehensible in geomei
cal figures, and thereby laid the foundation of the d
trine of Ideas, which is the central point of the philosor '
of Plato, and indeed his only serious and decided th
retical dogma. In expounding it, therefore, he started fr 1
geometry. In the same sense we are told that he regar< i
geometry as a preliminary exercise through which a
mind of the pupil accustomed itself to deal with incoi
real objects, having hitherto in practical life had
ON THE METHODS OF MATHEMATICS. 323
do with corporeal things (Schol. inAristot., p. 12, 15). This,
then, is the sense in which Plato recommended geometry
to the philosopher ; and therefore one is not justified in
extending it further. I rather recommend, as an investi-
gation of the influence of mathematics upon our mental
powers, and their value for scientific culture in general,
a very thorough and learned discussion, in the form of
a review of a book by Whewell in the Edinburgh Beview
of January 1836. Its author, who afterwards published
it with some other discussions, with his name, is Sir W.
Hamilton, Professor of Logic and Metaphysics in Scot-
land. This work has also found a German translator,
md has appeared by itself under the title, " Uieber den
Werth und Unwerth der Mathematik " aus dem Englishen,
1836. The conclusion the author arrives at is that the
/alue of mathematics is only indirect, and lies in the
implication to ends which are only attainable through
hem; but in themselves mathematics leave the mind
vhere they find it, and are by no means conducive to
ts general culture and development, nay, even a decided
indrance. This conclusion is not only proved by tho-
ough dianoiological investigation of the mathematical
ctivity of the mind, but is also confirmed by a very
;arned accumulation of examples and authorities. The
nly direct use which is left to mathematics is that it
in accustom restless and unsteady minds to fix their
Mention. Even Descartes, who was yet himself famous
5 a mathematician, held the same opinion with regard
mathematics. In the " Vie de Descartes par BaiLlet"
393, it is said, Liv. ii. c. 6, p. 54: " Sa propre experience
ivait convaincu du pen cCutiliU des mathtmatiques, surtout
rsqu'on ne les cultive que pour elles mimes. . . . II ne
yait rien de moins solide, que de s'occuper de nombres tout
nples et de figures imaginaires" &c.
( 324 )
CHAPTER XIV.
ON THE ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS.
The presence of ideas and thoughts in our consciousnesf
is as strictly subordinated to the principle of sufficieni
reason in its different forms as the movement of bodies
to the law of causality. It is ju3t as little possible tha
a thought can appear in the mind without an occasioi
as that a body can be set in motion without a cause
Now this occasion is either external, thus an impressioi
of the senses, or internal, thus itself also a thought whic
introduces another thought by means of association. Thi
again depends either upon a relation of reason and cor
sequent between the two ; or upon similarity, even mei
analogy ; or lastly upon the circumstance that they wei
both first apprehended at the same time, which agai
may have its ground in the proximity in space of the
objects. The last two cases are denoted by the woi
& propos. The predominance of one of these three bom
of association of thoughts over the others is characterist
of the intellectual worth of the man. The first narai
will predominate in thoughtful and profound minds, tl
second in witty, ingenious, and poetical minds, and t
third in minds of limited capacity. Not less characterisl
is the degree of facility with which one thought reca
others that stand in any kind of relation to it : tl
constitutes the activeness of the mind. But the i
possibility of the appearance of a thought without
sufficient occasion, even when there is the strongest des
to call it up, is proved by all the cases in which wo
ON THE ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS. 325
ourselves in vain to recollect something, and go through
the whole store of our thoughts in order to find any one
that may be associated with the one we seek; if we
find the former, the latter is also found. Whoever wishes
to call up something in his memory first seeks for a
thread with which it is connected by the association
of thoughts. Upon this depends mnemonics: it aims at
providing us with easily found occasioners or causes for
all the conceptions, thoughts, or words which are to be
preserved. But the worst of it is that these occasioners
themselves have first to be recalled, and this again re-
quires an occasioner. How much the occasion accom-
plishes in memory may be shown in this way. If we have
n ead in a book of anecdotes say fifty anecdotes, and then
aave laid it aside, immediately afterwards we will some-
times be unable to recollect a single one of them. But
f the occasion comes, or if a thought occurs to us which
las any analogy with one of those anecdotes, it imme-
liately comes back to us; and so with the whole fifty
is opportunity offers. The same thing holds good of
II that we read. Our immediate remembrance of
vords, that is, our remembrance of them without the
ssistance of mnemonic contrivances, and with it our
rhole faculty of speech, ultimately depends upon the
irect association of thoughts. For the learning of lan-
uage consists in this, that once for all we so connect a
onception with a word that this word will always occur
D us along with this conception, and this conception will
lways occur to us along with this word. "We have after-
'ards to repeat the same process in learning every new
mguage ; yet if we learn a language for passive and not
)r active use that is, to read, but not to speak, as, for
sample, most of us learn Greek then the connection is
le-sided, for the conception occurs to us along with the
ord, but the word does not always occur to us along with
te conception. The same procedure as in language be-
>mes apparent in the particular case, in the learning of
326 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XIV.
every new proper name. But sometimes we do not trust
ourselves to connect directly the name of this person, or
town, river, mountain, plant, animal, &c, with the thought
of each so firmly that it will call each of them up of it-
self ; and then we assist ourselves mnemonically, and con-
nect the image of the person or thing with any perceptible
quality the name of which occurs in that of the persor
or thing. Yet this is only a temporary prop to lean on
later we let it drop, for the association of thoughts be
comes an immediate support
The search of memory for a clue shows itself in i
peculiar manner in the case of a dream which we hav<
forgotten on awaking, for in this case we seek in vain fo
that which a few minutes before occupied our minds wit!
the strength of the clearest present, but now has entire!
disappeared. We grasp at any lingering impression b
which may hang the clue that by virtue of associatio
would call that dream back again into our conscious
ness. According to Kieser, " Tellurismus," Bd. ii. 27
memory even of what passed in magnetic-somnainbuk
sleep may possibly sometimes be aroused by a sensib'
sign found when awake. It depends upon the san
impossibility of the appearance of a thought withoi
its occasion that if we propose to do anything at a del
nite time, this can only take place if we either think
nothing else till then, or if at the determined time v
are reminded of it by something, which may either 1
an external impression arranged beforehand or a thoug'
which is itself again brought about in the regular wa
Both, then, belong to the class of motives. Every mornii
when we awake our consciousness is a tabula rasa, whic
however, quickly fills itself again. First it is the si
roundings of the previous evening which now reappe;
and remind us of what we thought in these surrounding
to this the events of the previous day link themselves
and so one thought rapidly recalls the others, till all tl
occupied us yesterday is there again. Upon the fact tl
ON THE ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS. 327
this takes place properly depends the health of the mind,
as opposed to madness, which, as is shown in the third
book, consists in the existence of great blanks in the
memory of past events. But how completely sleep breaks
the thread of memory, so that each morning it has to be
taken up again, we see in particular cases of the incom-
pleteness of this operation. For example, sometimes we
cannot recall in the morning a melody which the night
before ran in our head till we were tired of it.
The cases in which a thought or a picture of the fancy
suddenly came into our mind without any conscious occa-
sion seem to afford an exception to what has been said.
Yet this is for the most part an illusion, which rests on
the fact that the occasion was so trifling and the thought
itself so vivid and interesting, that the former is instantly
driven out of consciousness. Yet sometimes the cause of
such an instantaneous appearance of an idea may be an
internal physical impression either of the parts of the
brain on each other or of the organic nervous system upon
the brain.
In general our internal process of thought is in reality
not so simple as the theory of it ; for here it is involved in
many ways. To make the matter clear to our imagination,
let us compare our consciousness to a sheet of water of
some depth. Then the distinctly conscious thoughts are
merely the surface ; while, on the other hand, the indis-
tinct thoughts, the feelings, the after sensation of percep-
tions and of experience generally, mingled with the special
disposition of our own will, which is the kernel of our
being, is the mass of the water. Now the mass of the
whole consciousness is more or less, in proportion to the
ntellectual activity, in constant motion, and what rise to
:he surface, in consequence of this, are the clear pictures
)f the fancy or the distinct, conscious thoughts expressed
n words and the resolves of the will. The whole process
)f our thought and purpose seldom lies on the surface,
-hat is, consists in a combination of distinctly thought
y
328 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XIV.
judgments ; although we strive against this in order that we
may be able to explain our thought to ourselves and others.
But ordinarily it is in the obscure depths of the mind that
the rumination of the materials received from without takes
place, through which they are worked up into thoughts ;
and it goes on almost as unconsciously as the conversion of
nourishment into the humours and substance of the body.
Hence it is that we can often give no account of the origin
of our deepest thoughts. They are the birth of our myste-
rious inner life. Judgments, thoughts, purposes, rise from
out that deep unexpectedly and to our own surprise. A
letter brings us unlooked-for and important news, in con-
sequence of which our thoughts and motives are disordered
we get rid of the matter for the present, and think nc
more about it ; but next day, or on the third or fourth
day after, the whole situation sometimes stands distinctly
before us, with what we have to do in the circumstances
Consciousness is the mere surface of our mind, of which
as of the earth, we do not know the inside, but only th(
crust
But in the last instance, or in the secret of our inne:
being, what sets in activity the association of though
itself, the laws of which were set forth above, is the vrill
which urges its servant the intellect, according to th
measure of its powers, to link thought to thought, to re
call the similar, the contemporaneous, to recognise reason
and consequents. For it is to the interest of the wi]
that, in general, one should think, so that one may b
well equipped for all cases that may arise. Therefore th
form of the principle of sufficient reason which govern
the association of thoughts and keeps it active is ult;
mately the law of motivation. For that which rules th
sensorium, and determines it to follow the analogy or otht
association of thoughts in this or that direction, is th
will of the thinking subject. Now just as here the lav*
of the connection of ideas subsist only upon the basis <
the will, so also in the real world the causal connectio
ON THE ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS. 329
of bodies really subsists only upon the basis of the will,
which manifests itself in the phenomena of this world.
On this account the explanation from causes is never
absolute and exhaustive, but leads back to forces of nature
as their condition, and the inner being of the latter is just
the will as thing in itself. In saying this, however, I
have certainly anticipated the following book.
But because now the outward (sensible) occasions of
the presence of our ideas, just as well as the inner occa-
sions (those of association), and both independently of
each other, constantly affect the consciousness, there arise
from this the frequent interruptions of our course of
thought, which introduce a certain cutting up and con-
fusion of our thinking. This belongs to its imperfections
which cannot be explained away, and which we shall now
consider in a separate chapter.
( 33 )
J
CHAPTER XV.
ON THE ESSENTIAL IMPERFECTIONS OF THE INTELLECT.
Oub self-consciousness has not space but only time as its
form, and therefore we do not think in three dimensions,
as we perceive, but only in one, thus in a line, without
breadth or depth. This is the source of the greatest of
the essential imperfections of our intellect. We can know
all things only in succession, and can become conscious
of only one at a time, indeed even of this one only under
the condition that for the time we forget everything else,
thus are absolutely unconscious of everything else, so that
for the time it ceases to exist as far as we are concerned.
In respect of this quality our intellect may be compared
to a telescope with a very narrow field of vision; just
because our consciousness is not stationary but fleeting.
The intellect apprehends only successively, and in order
to grasp one thing must let another go, retaining nothing
but traces of it, which are ever becoming weaker. The
thought which is vividly present to me now must after a
little while have escaped me altogether ; and if a good
night's sleep intervene, it may be that I shall never find
it again, unless it is connected with my personal interests,
that is, with my will, which always commands the field.
Upon this imperfection of the intellect depends the
disconnected and often fragmentary nature of our course
of thought, which I have already touched on at the close
of last chapter ; and from this again arises the unavoidable
distraction of our thinking. Sometimes external impre3-
ON THE IMPERFECTIONS OF THE INTELLECT. 331
sions of sense throng in upon it, disturbing and interrupt-
ing it, forcing different kinds of things upon it every
moment ; sometimes one thought draws in another by the
bond of association, and is now itself dislodged by it;
sometimes, lastly, the intellect itself is not capable of
fixing itself very long and continuously at a time upon
one thought, but as the eye when it gazes long at one
object is soon unable to see it any more distinctly, because
the outlines run into each other and become confused,
until finally all is obscure, so through long-continued
reflection upon one subject our thinking also is gradually
confused, becomes dull, and ends in complete stupor.
Therefore after a certain time, which varies with the
individual, we must for the present give up every medita-
tion or deliberation which has had the fortune to remain
undisturbed, but yet has not been brought to an end,
even if it concerns a matter which is most important and
pertinent to us ; and we must dismiss from our conscious-
ness the subject which interests us so much, however
heavily our anxiety about it may weigh upon us, in order
to occupy ourselves now with insignificant and indifferent
things. During this time that important subject no
longer exists for us; it is like the heat in cold water,
latent. If now we resume it again at another time, we
approach it like a new thing, with which we become
acquainted anew, although more quickly, and the agree-
able or disagreeable impression of it is also produced
anew upon our will. We ourselves, however, do not
come back quite unchanged. For with the physical
composition of the humours and tension of the nerves,
which constantly changes with the hours, days, and years,
our mood and point of view also changes. Moreover, the
different kinds of ideas which have been there in the
meantime have left an echo behind them, the tone of
which influences the ideas which follow. Therefore the
same thing appears to us at different times, in the morn-
ing, in the evening, at mid-day, or on another day, often
332 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XV.
very different; opposite views of it now press upon each
other and increase our doubt. Hence we speak of sleeping
upon a matter, and for important determinations we de-
mand a long time for consideration. Now, although this
quality of our intellect, as springing from its weakness,
has its evident disadvantages, yet, on the other hand, it
affords the advantage that after the distraction and the
physical change we return to our subject as comparatively
new beings, fresh and strange, and thus are able to see
it repeatedly in very different lights. From all this it
is plain that human consciousness and thought is in its
nature necessarily fragmentary, on account of which the
theoretical and practical results which are achieved by
piecing together such fragments are for the most part
defective. In this our thinking consciousness is like a
magic lantern, in the focus of which only one picture can
appear at a time, and each, even if it represents the
noblest objects, must yet soon pass away in order to make
room for others of a different, and even most vulgar,
description. In practical matters the most important
plans and resolutions are formed in general; but others
are subordinated to these as means to an end, and others
again are subordinated to these, and so on down to the
particular case that has to be carried out in concrete.
They do not, however, come to be carried out in the order
of their dignity, but while we are occupied with plans
which are great and general, we have to contend with the
most trifling details and the cares of the moment. In
this way our consciousness becomes still more desultory.
In general, theoretical occupations of the mind unfit us
for practical affairs, and vice versd.
In consequence of the inevitably distracted and frag-
mentary nature of all our thinking, which has been pointed
out, and the mingling of ideas of different kinds thereby
introduced, to which even the noblest human minds are
subject, we really have only half a consciousness with
which to grope about in the labyrinth of our life and the
ON THE IMPERFECTIONS OF THE INTELLECT. 333
obscurity of our investigations ; bright moments some-
times illuminate our path like lightning. But what is
to be expected of heads of which even the wisest is every
night the scene of the strangest and most senseless dreams,
and which has to take up its meditations again on awaken-
ing from these ? Clearly a consciousness which is subject
to such great limitations is little suited for solving the
riddle of the world ; and such an endeavour would neces-
sarily appear strange and pitiful to a being of a higher
order whose intellect had not time as its form, and whose
thinking had thus true completeness and unity Indeed
it is really wonderful that we are not completely confused
by the very heterogeneous mixture 'of ideas and fragments
of thought of every kind which are constantly crossing each
other in our minds, but are yet always able to see our
way again and make everything agree together. Clearly
there must exist a simpler thread upon which everything
ranges itself together : but what is this ? Memory alone
is not sufficient, for it has essential limitations of which
I shall speak shortly, and besides this, it is exceedingly
imperfect and untrustworthy. The logical ego or even
the transcendental synthetic unity of apperception are ex-
pressions and explanations which will not easily serve
to make the matter comprehensible; they will rather
suggest to many :
*"Tis true your beard is curly, yet it will not draw you the bolt."
Kant's proposition, "The I think must accompany all
our ideas," is insufficient; for the "I" is an unknown
quantity, i.e., it is itself a secret. That which gives unity
and connection to consciousness in that it runs through
all its ideas, and is thus its substratum, its permanent
supporter, cannot itself be conditioned by consciousness,
therefore cannot be an idea. Eather it must be the prius
of consciousness, and the root of the tree of which that
is the fruit. This, I say, is the will. It alone is un-
changeable and absolutely identical, and has brought
33* FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XV.
forth consciousness for its own ends. Therefore it is also
the will which gives it unity and holds together all its
ideas and thoughts, accompanying them like a continuous
harmony. Without it the intellect would no longer have
the unity of consciousness, as a mirror in which now this
and now that successively presents itself, or at the most
only so much as a convex mirror whose rays unite in an
imaginary point behind its surface. But the will alone is
that which is permanent and unchangeable in conscious-
ness. It is the will which holds together all thoughts
and ideas as means to its ends, and tinges them with the
colour of its own character, its mood, and its interests,
commands the attention, and holds in its hand the train
of motives whose influence ultimately sets memory and
the association of ideas in activity ; at bottom it is the
will that is spoken of whenever " I " appears in a judg-
ment. Thus it is the true and final point of unity of
consciousness, and the bond of all its functions and acts ;
it does not itself, however, belong to the intellect, but is
only itsjroot, soii^ce^and controller.
From the form of time and the single dimension of
the series of ideas, on account of which, in order to take
up one, the intellect must let all the others fall, there
follows not only its distraction, but also its forgetfvlness.
Most of what it lets fall it never takes up again ; especi-
ally since the taking up again is bound to the principle
of sufficient reason, and thus demands an occasion which
the association of thoughts and motivation have first to
supply; an occasion, however, which may be the more
remote and smaller in proportion as our sensibility for
it is heightened by our interest in the subject. But
memory, as I have already shown in the essay on the
principle of sufficient reason, is not a store-house, but
merely a faculty acquired by practice of calling up ideas
at pleasure, which must therefore constantly be kept
in practice by use; for otherwise it will gradually be
lost. Accordingly the knowledge even of the learned
ON THE IMPERFECTIONS OF THE INTELLECT. 335
man exists only virtualiter as an acquired facility in
calling up certain ideas; actualiter, on the other hand,
it also is confined to one idea, and is only conscious of
this one at a time. Hence arises a strange contrast
between what he knows potentid and what he knows
ache ; that is, between his knowledge and what he thinks
at any moment : the former is an immense and always
somewhat chaotic mass, the latter is a single distinct
thought. The relation resembles that between the in-
numerable stars of the heavens and the limited field of
vision of the telescope ; it appears in a striking manner
when upon some occasion he wishes to call distinctly
to his remembrance some particular circumstance in his
knowledge, and time and trouble are required to produce
it from that chaos. Eapidity in doing this is a special
gift, but is very dependent upon day and hour ; therefore
memory sometimes refuses us its service, even in things
which at another time it has readily at hand. This
consideration calls us in our studies to strive more to
attain to correct insight than to increase our learning,
and to lay it to heart that the quality of knowledge is
more important than its quantity. The latter imparts to
books only thickness, the former thoroughness and also
style ; for it is an intensive quantity, while the other is
merely extensive. It consists in the distinctness and com-
pleteness of the conceptions, together with the purity and
accuracy of the knowledge of perception which forms
their foundation ; therefore the whole of knowledge in
all its parts is penetrated by it, and in proportion as it is
so is valuable or trifling. With a small quantity, but of
good quality, one achieves more than with a very large
quantity of bad quality.
The most perfect and satisfactory knowledge is that of
perception, but it is limited absolutely to the particular,
the individual. The combination of the many and the
different in one idea is only possible through the conception,
that is, through the omission of the differences ; therefore
336 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XV.
this is a very imperfect manner of presenting things to
the mind. Certainly the particular also can be directly
comprehended as a universal, if it is raised to the (Pla-
tonic) Idea ; but in this process, which I have analysed
in the third book, the intellect already passes beyond
the limits of individuality, and therefore of time ; more-
over it is only an exception.
These inner and essential imperfections of the intellect
are further increased by a disturbance which, to a certain
extent, is external to it, but yet is unceasing the influence
exerted by the will upon all its operations whenever it
is in any way concerned in their result. Every passion,
indeed every inclination and aversion, tinges the objects
of knowledge with its colour. Of most common occurrence
is the falsifying of knowledge which is brought about
by wishes and hopes, for they picture to us the scarcely
possible as probable and well nigh certain, and make
us almost incapable of comprehending what is opposed
to it : fear acts in a similar way ; and every preconceived
opinion, every partiality, and, as has been said, every
interest, every emotion and inclination of the will, acts in
an analogous manner.
To all these imperfections of the intellect we have
finally to add this, that it grows old with the brain, that
is, like all physiological functions, it loses its energy in
later years, whereby all its imperfections are then much
increased.
The defective nature of the intellect here set forth
will not, however, surprise us if we look back at its origin
and destiny as established by me in the second book.
Nature has produced it for the service of an individual
will. Therefore it is only designed to know things so far
as they afford the motives of such a will, but not to
fathom them or comprehend their true being. Human
intellect is only a higher gradation of the intellect of
the brutes ; and as this is entirely confined to the present,
our intellect also bears strong traces of this limitation.
ON THE IMPERFECTIONS OF THE INTELLECT. 337
Therefore our memory and recollection is something very
imperfect. How little of all that we have done, experi-
enced, learnt, or read, can we recall I And even this
little for the most part only laboriously and imperfectly.
For the same reasons is it so very difficult for us to keep
ourselves free from the impressions of the present. Un-
consciousness is the original and natural condition of all
things, and therefore also the basis from which, in par-
ticular species of beings, consciousness results as their
highest efflorescence; wherefore even then unconscious-
ness always continues to predominate. Accordingly most
existences are without consciousness; but yet they act
according to the laws of their nature, i.e., of their will.
Plants have at most a very weak analogue of conscious-
ness ; the lowest species of animals only the dawn of it.
But even after it has ascended through the whole series
of animals to man and his reason, the unconsciousness of
plants, from which it started, still remains the foundation,
and may be traced in the necessity for sleep, and also in
all those essential and great imperfections, here set forth,
of every intellect produced through physiological functions;
and of another intellect we have no conception.
The imperfections here proved to be essential to the
intellect are constantly increased, however, in particular
cases, by non-essential imperfections. The intellect is
never in every respect what it possibly might be. The
perfections possible to it are so opposed that they exclude
each other. Therefore no man can be at once Plato and
Aristotle, or Shakspeare and Newton, or Kant and Goethe.
The imperfections of the intellect, on the contrary, consort
very well together ; therefore in reality it for the most part
remains far below what it might be. Its functions depend
upon so very many conditions, which we can only compre-
hend as anatomical and physiological, in the phenomenon
in which alone they are given us, that a decidedly excelling
intellect, even in one respect alone, is among the rarest of
uatural phenomena. Therefore the productions of such an
vol. 11. Y
338 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XV.
intellect are preserved through thousands of years, indeec
every relic of such a highly favoured individual become;
a most valuable treasure. From such an intellect dowi
to that which approaches imbecility the gradations an
innumerable. And primarily, in conformity with thes<
gradations, the mental horizon of each of us varies ver
much from the mere comprehension of the present, whic)
even the brute has, to that which also embraces the nex
hour, the day, even the morrow, the week, the year, th
life, the century, the thousand years, up to that of the cod
sciousness which has almost always present, even thoug
obscurely dawning, the horizon of the infinite, and whos
thoughts therefore assume a character in keeping wit
this. Further, that difference among intelligences show
itself in the rapidity of their thinking, which is very in
portant, and which may be as different and as finely gradv.
ated as that of the points in the radius of a revolving dis>
The remoteness of the consequents and reasons to whic
any one's thought can extend seems to stand in a certai
relation to the rapidity of his thinking, for the greate:
exertion of thought-power in general can only last quit
a short time, and yet only while it lasts can a thought 1
thought out in its complete unity. It therefore amoun
to this, how far the intellect can pursue it in so short
time, thus what length of path it can travel in it. C
the other hand, in the case of some, rapidity may be mai
up for by the greater duration of that time of perfect
concentrated thought. Probably the slow and lastii
thought makes the mathematical mind, while rapidity
thought makes the genius. The latter is a flight, tl
former a sure advance upon firm ground, step by ste
Yet even in the sciences, whenever it is no longer
question of mere quantities, but of understanding t
nature of phenomena, this last kind of thinking is i
adequate. This is shown, for example, by Newton's theo
of colour, and later by Biot's nonsense about colour rin;
which yet agrees with the whole atomistic method
ON THE IMPERFECTIONS OF THE INTELLECT. 339
treating light among the French, with its moldcules de
lumibre, and in general with their fixed idea of reducing
everything in nature to mere mechanical effects. Lastly,
the great individual diversity of intelligence we are
speaking about shows itself excellently in the degrees
of the clearness of understanding, and accordingly in
the distinctness of the whole thinking. To one man that
is to understand which to another is only in some
degree to observe; the one is already done and at the
goal while the other is only at the beginning; to the
one that is the solution which to the other is only the
problem. This depends on the quality of thought and
knowledge, which was already referred to above. As
in rooms the degree of light varies, so does it in minds.
We can detect this quality of the whole thought as soon
as we have read only a few pages of an author. For
in doing so we have been obliged to understand both
with his understanding and in his sense; and there-
fore before we know all that he has thought we see
already how he thinks, what is the formal nature, the
texture of his thinking, which remains the same in every-
:hing about which he thinks, and whose expression is
:he train of thought and the style. In this we feel at
mce the pace, the flexibleness and lightness, even indeed
'he soaring power of his mind; or, on the contrary, its
lulness, formality, lameness and leaden quality. For, as
anguage is the expression of the mind of a nation, style
s the more immediate expression of the mind of an
.uthor than even his physiognomy. We throw a book
side when we observe that in it we enter an obscurer
egion than our own, unless we have to learn from it
aere facts, not thoughts. Apart from mere facts, only
hat author will afford us profit whose understanding
i keener and clearer than our own, who forwards our
linking instead of hindering it, like the dull mind that
'ill force us to keep pace with the toad-like course of
s thought ; thus that author with whose mind it gives
340 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XV.
us sensible relief and assistance sometimes to think, by
whom we feel ourselves borne where we could not have
gone alone. Goethe once said to me that if he read a
page of Kant he felt as if he entered a brightly lighted
room. Inferior minds are so not merely because they
are distorted, and therefore judge falsely, but primarily
through the indistinctness of their whole thinking, which
may be compared to seeing through a bad telescope
when all the outlines appear indistinct and as if ob-
literated, and the different objects run into each other.
The weak understanding of such minds shrinks froir
the demand for distinctness of conceptions, and thereforf
they do not themselves make this claim upon it, but pu'
up with haziness ; and to satisfy themselves with this the]
gladly have recourse to words, especially such as denotx
indefinite, very abstract, unusual conceptions which ar
hard to explain ; such, for example, as infinite and finite
sensible and supersensible, the Idea of being, Ideas c
the reason, the absolute, the Idea of the good, th
divine, moral freedon, power of spontaneous generatioi
the absolute Idea, subject-object, &c. The like of thes
they confidently fling about, imagine they really expres
thoughts, and expect every one to be content with then]
for the highest summit of wisdom which they can see :
to have at command such ready-made words for ever
possible question. This immense satisfaction in words
thoroughly characteristic of inferior minds. It depenc
simply upon their incapacity for distinct conception
whenever these must rise above the most trivial ar
simple relations. Hence upon the weakness and indolen
of their intellect, and indeed upon the secret consciou
ness of this, which in the case of scholars is bound \
with the early learnt and hard necessity of passing thei
selves off as thinking beings, to meet which demand
all cases they keep such a suitable store of ready-ma
words. It must really be amusing to see a professor
philosophy of this kind in the chair, who bond Jide delivt
ON THE IMPERFECTIONS OF THE INTELLECT. 341
such a juggle of words destitute of thoughts, quite sin-
cerely, under the delusion that they are really thoughts,
and in front of him the students, who just as bond fide, i.e.,
under the same delusion, listen attentively and take notes,
while yet in reality neither the one nor the other goes
beyond the words, but rather these words themselves, to-
gether with the audible scratching of pens, are the only
realities in the whole matter. This peculiar satisfaction in
words has more than anything else to do with the per-
petuation of errors. For, relying on the words and phrases
received from his predecessors, each one confidently passes
over obscurities and problems, and thus these are pro-
pagated through centuries from book to book; and the
thinking man, especially in youth, is in doubt whether it
may be that he is incapable of understanding it, or that
there is really nothing here to understand ; and similarly,
whether for others the problem which they all slink past
with such comical seriousness by the same path is no
problem at all, or whether it is only that they will not
see it. Many truths remain undiscovered simply on this
account, that no one has the courage to look the problem
in the face and grapple with it. On the contrary, the
distinctness of thought and clearness of conceptions
peculiar to eminent minds produces the effect that even
known truths when brought forward by them gain new
light, or at least a new stimulus. If we hear them or read
them, it is as if we exchanged a bad telescope for a good
one. Let one only read, for example, in Euler's " Letters
to the Princess," his exposition of the fundamental truths
of mechanics and optics. Upon this rests the remark of
Diderot in the Neveu de Rameau, that only the perfect
masters are capable of teaching really well the elements of
1 science ; just because it is only they who really under-
stand the questions, and for them words never take the
olace of thoughts.
But we ought to know that inferior minds are the
ule, good minds the exception, eminent minds very rare,
342 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XV.
and genius a portent. How otherwise could a human
race consisting of about eight hundred million individuals
have left so much after six thousand years to discover, to
invent, to think out, and to say ? The intellect is calcu-
lated for the support of the individual alone, and as a rule
it is only barely sufficient even for this. But nature has
wisely been very sparing of conferring a larger measure ;
for the man of limited intelligence can survey the few
and simple relations which lie within reach of his narrow
sphere of action, and can control the levers of them with
much greater ease than could the eminently intellectual
man who commands an incomparably larger sphere anc
works with long levers. Thus the insect sees everything
on its stem or leaf with the most minute exactness, anc
better than we, and yet is not aware of the man wh<,
stands within three steps of it. This is the reason of th<
slyness of half-witted persons, and the ground of th<
paradox : H y a un mystbre dans V esprit des gens
rien ont pas. For practical life genius is about as usefu
v as an astral telescope in a theatre. Thus, with regar<
to the intellect nature is highly aristocratic. The dis
tinctions which it has established are greater than thos
which are made in any country by birth, rank, wealtl
or caste. But in the aristocracy of intellect, as in othe
aristocracies, there are many thousands of plebeians fc
one nobleman, many millions for one prince, and the grea
multitude of men are mere populace, mob, rabble, I
canaille. Now certainly there is a glaring contrast be
tween the scale of rank of nature and that of conventioi
and their agreement is only to be hoped for in a golde
age. Meanwhile those who stand very high in the or
scale of rank and in the other have this in common, tht
for the most part they live in exalted isolation, to whic
Byron refers when he says :
* To feel me in the solitude of kings
Without the po'Arer that makes them bear a crown."
Proph. of Dante, c
ON THE IMPERFECTIONS OF THE INTELLECT. 343
For intellect is a differentiating, and therefore a separating
principle. Its different grades, far more than those of
mere culture, give to each man different conceptions, in
consequence of which each man lives to a certain extent
in a different world, in which he can directly meet those
only who are like himself, and can only attempt to speak
to the rest and make himself understood by them from
a distance. Great differences in the grade and in the
cultivation of the understanding fix a wide gulf between
man and man, which can only be crossed by benevolence ;
for it is, on the contrary, the unifying principle, which
identifies every one else with its own self. Yet the con-
nection remains a moral one ; it cannot become intellectual.
Indeed, when the degree of culture is about the same,
the conversation between a man of great intellect and an
ordinary man is like the journey together of two men, one
of whom rides on a spirited horse and the other goes on
foot. It soon becomes very trying to both of them, and
for any length of time impossible. For a short way the
rider can indeed dismount, in order to walk with the
other, though even then the impatience of his horse will
give him much to do.
But the public could be benefited by nothing so much
is by the recognition of that intellectual aristocracy of
wture. By virtue of such recognition it would compre-
lend that when facts are concerned, thus when the
natter has to be decided from experiments, travels, codes,
dstories, and chronicles, the normal mind is certainly
ufficient; but, on the other hand, when mere thoughts
re in question, especially those thoughts the material or
ata of which are within reach of every one, thus when it
i really only a question of thinking before others, decided
3flectiveness, native eminence, which only nature bestows,
ad that very seldom, is inevitably demanded, and no one
eserves to be heard who does not at once give proofs
! this. If the public could be brought to see this for
self, it would no longer waste the time which is sparingly
r
344
FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XV.
measured out to it for its culture on the productions of
ordinary minds, thus on the innumerable botches of poetry
and philosophy which are produced every day. It would
no longer seize always what is newest, in the childish
delusion that books, like eggs, must be enjoyed while
they are fresh, but would confine itself to the works of
the few select and chosen minds of all ages and nations
would strive to learn to know and understand them, anc
might thus by degrees attain to true culture. And then
also, those thousands of uncalled-for productions which
like tares, hinder the growth of the good wheat wouh
be discontinued.
( 345 )
CHAPTER XVL 1
ON THE PRACTICAL USE OF REASON AND ON STOICISM.
In the seventh chapter I have shown that, in the theo-
retical sphere, procedure based upon conceptions suffices
for mediocre achievements only, while great achievements,
on the other hand, demand that we should draw from
perception itself as the primary source of all knowledge.
In the practical sphere, however, the converse is the case.
Here determination by what is perceived is the way of
the brutes, but is unworthy of man, who has conceptions
to guide his conduct, and is thus emancipated from the
power of what is actually perceptibly present, to which
the brute is unconditionally given over. In proportion
as a man makes good this prerogative his conduct may
be called rational, and only in this sense can we speak
of practical reason, not in the Kantian sense, the inadmis-
sibility of which I have thoroughly exposed in my prize
essay on the foundation of morals.
It is not easy, however, to let oneself be determined
by conceptions alone; for the directly present external
world, with its perceptible reality, intrudes itself forcibly
even on the strongest mind. But it is just in con-
quering this impression, in destroying its illusion, that
the human spirit shows its worth and greatness. Thus
if incitements to lust and pleasure leave it unaffected,
if the threats and fury of enraged enemies do not shake
it, if the entreaties of erring friends do not make its
1 This chapter is connected with 16 of the first volume.
346 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVI.
purpose waver, and the delusive forms with which pre-
concerted plots surround it leave it unmoved, if the scorn
of fools and of the vulgar herd does not disturb it nor
trouble it as to its own worth, then it seems to stand
under the influence of a spirit-world, visible to it alone
(and this is the world of conceptions), before which that
perceptibly present world which lies open to all dissolves
like a phantom. But, on the other hand, what gives to
the external world and visible reality their great power
over the mind is their nearness and directness. As the
magnetic needle, which is kept in its position by the
combined action of widely distributed forces of nature
embracing the whole earth, can yet be perturbed and set
in violent oscillation by a small piece of iron, if only it
comes quite close to it, so even a great mind can some-
times be disconcerted and perturbed by trifling events and
insignificant men, if only they affect it very closely, and
the deliberate purpose can be for the moment shaken
by a trivial but immediately present counter motive.
For the influence of the motives is subject to a law which
is directly opposed to the law according to which weights
act on a balance, and in consequence of it a very small
motive, which, however, lies very near to us, can out-
weigh one which in itself is much stronger, but which
only affects us from a distance. But it is this quality
of the mind, by reason of which it allows itself to be
determined in accordance with this law, and does not
withdraw itself from it by the strength of actual practical
reason, which the ancients denoted by animi impotentia,
which really signifies ratio regendce voluntatis impotens.
Every emotion {animi perturbatio) simply arises from the
fact that an idea which affects our will comes so exces-
sively near to us that it conceals everything else from
us, and we can no longer see anything but it, so that
for the moment we become incapable of taking account
of things of another kind. It would be a valuable safe-
guard against this if we were to bring ourselves to regard
r
ON THE USE OF REASON AND STOICISM. 347
the present, by the assistance of imagination, as if it
were past, and should thus accustom our apperception
to the epistolary style of the Romans. Yet conversely
we are very well able to regard what is long past as so
vividly present that old emotions which have long been
asleep are thereby reawakened in their full strength.
Thus also no one would be irritated or disconcerted
by a misfortune, a disappointment, if reason always kept
present to him what man really js : the most needy of
creatures, daily and hourly abandoned to innumerable
misfortunes, great and small, to BeiXorarov ooov, who has
therefore to live in constant care and fear. Herodotus
already says, " Uav eopa" (homo totivs
est calamitas).
The application of reason to practice primarily ac-
complishes this. It reconstructs what is one-sided and
defective in knowledge of mere perception, and makes
use of the contrasts or oppositions which it presents, to
correct each other, so that thus the objectively true
result is arrived at. For example, if we look simply
at the bad action of a man we will condemn him; on
the other hand, if we consider merely the need that
moved him to it, we will compassionate him : reason, by
means of its conceptions, weighs the two, and leads to
the conclusion that he must be restrained, restricted, and
curbed by a proportionate punishment.
I am again reminded here of Seneca's saying : " Si vis
tibi omnia subjicere, te subjice rationi" Since, however,
as was shown in the fourth book, the nature of suffering
9 O
is positive, and that of pleasure negative, he who takes
abstract or rational knowledge as the rule of his conduct,
and therefore constantly reflects on its consequences and
on the future, will very frequently have to practise
sustine et abstine, for in order to obtain the life that is
most free from pain he generally sacrifices its keenest
joys and pleasures, mindful of Aristotle's " 6 povcfw; to
akviTov Siw/cei. ov to rjSv" (guod dolore vacat, non quod
348 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVI.
suave est, persequitur vir prudens). Therefore with him
the future constantly borrows from the present, instead
of the present borrowing from the future, as is the case
with a frivolous fool, who thus becomes impoverished and
finally bankrupt In the case of the former reason must,
for the most part, assume the rdle of a churlish mentor,
and unceasingly call for renunciations, without being able
to promise anything in return, except a fairly painless
existence. This rests on the fact that reason, by means
of its conceptions, surveys the whole of life, whose outcome,
in the happiest conceivable case, can be no other than
what we have said.
When this striving after a painless existence, so far as
it might be attainable by the application of and strict
adherence to rational reflection and acquired knowledge
of the true nature of life, was carried out with the greatest
consistency and to the utmost extreme, it produced cyni-
cism, from which stoicism afterwards proceeded. I wish
briefly here to bring this out more fully for the sake of
establishing more firmly the concluding exposition of our
first book.
All ancient moral systems, with the single exception of
that of Plato, were guides to a happy life. Accordingly
in them the end of virtue was entirely in this life, not
beyond death. For to them it is only the right path to
a truly happy life ; and on this account the wise choose
it. Hence arise those lengthy debates chiefly preserved
for us by Cicero, those keen and constantly renewed
investigations, whether virtue quite alone and in itself
is really sufficient for a happy life, or whether this
further requires some external condition ; whether the
virtuous and wise may also be happy on the rack and the
wheel, or in the bull of Phalaris ; or whether it does not
go as far as this. For certainly this would be the touch-
stone of an ethical system of this kind ; the practice of
it must give happiness directly and unconditionally. If
it cannot do this it does not accomplish what it ought,
Mi-
ON THE USE OF REASON AND STOICISM. 349
and must be rejected. It is therefore with truth and
in accordance with the Christian point of view that
Augustine prefaces his exposition of the moral systems
of the ancients (De Civ. Dei, lib. xix. c. 1) with the
explanation : " Exponenda sunt nobis argumenta morta-
lium, quibus sibi ipsi beatitudinem faccrc IN hujus yitje
INFELICITATE moliti sunt ; ut ab eorum rebus vanis spes
nostra quid differat clarescat. De finibus bonorum et
malorum multa inter se philosophi disputarunt; quam
qucestionem maxima intentione versantes, invcnire conati
sunt, quid efficiat hominem beatum: Mud enim est finis
bonorum." I wish to place beyond all doubt the eu-
dsemonistic end which we have ascribed to all ancient
ethics by several express statements of the ancients them-
selves. Aristotle says in the " Eth. Magna" i. 4: "'H
evhaifiovut ev T(p ev %yv eari, to Be ev Zflv ev tcd Kara ra<;
aperas %yv." (Felicitas in bene vivendo posita est : verum
bene vivere est in eo positum, ut secundum virtutem vivamus),
with which may be compared " Eth. Nicom." i. 5. " Cic.
Tusc" v. 1 : " Nam, quum ea causa impulerit eos, qui primi
se ad philosophies studia contulerunt, ut, omnibus rebus post-
habitis, totos se in optimo vitoz statu exquirendo collocarent ;
profecto spe beate vivendi tantam in eo studio curam operam-
que posuerunt. According to Plutarch (De Repugn. Stoic,
c. xviii.) Chrysippus said : " To Kara /caiciav tflv tw /ca/co-
Saifioveos %yv ravrov eari." ( Vitiose vivere idem est quod
vivere infeliciter.) Ibid., c. 26 : " 'H <$>povwcn tflv Kara vo~tv, aWa p.r\ 7rpo, Atoryemjt, Kc&e\ei'
Novvos eirei /Scores avrapicea Sol-av toe^as
QnjTots, Kot fwT/s oifiov eXa^poraTijj'."
(^Jra quidem absumit tempus, sed tempore numquam
Interitura tua est gloria, Diogenes :
Quandoquidem ad vitam miseris mortalibtis aquam
Monstrata estfacilis, te duce, et ampla via.)
Accordingly the fundamental thought of cynicism is that
life in its simplest and nakedest form, with the hardships
that belong to it by nature, is the most endurable, and is
therefore to be chosen ; for every assistance, convenience,
gratification, and pleasure by means of which men seek to
make life more agreeable only brings with it new and
greater ills than originally belonged to it. Therefore we
may regard the following sentence as the expression of the
kernel of the doctrine of cynicism : " Atoyevr)*; efioa 7ro\-
Xa/a? Xeyaw, rov tcov avdoiTcwv ftiov pahiov xnro rav Oecov
BeBoaQai, airoiceicpvcpdcu Be avrov tyjravvronv /J,e\i7rr)Kra
/cat fivpa tcai ra 7rapaTr\r] rjuLv (i.e., does not depend upon us) is at once
Iso ov Trpos r)fiapi%(o
ra yvyv ofteva;" that is: "If he is a stranger to th
universe who does not know what is in ic, no les
is he a stranger who does not know how things g
on in it." Also Seneca's eleventh chapter, "Be Trai
quilitate Animi" is a complete proof of this view. Tl
opinion of the Stoics amounts on the whole to thi
that if a man has watched for a while the juggling illusic
of happiness and then uses his reason, he must recogni:
both the rapid changes of the dice and the intrinsic wort)
lessness of the counters, and therefore must hencefonl
remain unmoved. Taken generally the Stoical point
view may be thus expressed : our suffering always arisl
from the want of agreement between our wishes and t'l
course of the world. Therefore one of these two mt^
be changed and adapted to the other. Since now tA
course of things is not in our power (ovk f}fiiv), *l
must direct our volitions and desires according to tt
course of things: for the will alone is eft 77/uu. T)i
adaptation of volition to the course of the external wor ,
thus to the nature of things, is very often understcl
under the ambiguous Kara i\6croov TrXfjdos dSvparov elvai " (vulgus philosophum
esse impossible est. Be Rep., vi. p. 89, Bip.) On the other
hand, the only stumbling-stone is this, that religions never
dare to confess their allegorical nature, but have to assert
that they are true sensu proprio. They thereby encroach
on the province of metaphysics proper, and call forth the
antagonism of the latter, which has therefore expressed
itself at all times when it was not chained up. The con-
troversy which is so perseveringly carried on in our own
day between supernaturalists and rationalists also rests on
the failure to recognise the allegorical nature of all religion.
Both wish to have Christianity true sensu proprio ; in this
sense the former wish to maintain it without deduction,
as it were with skin and hair ; and thus they have a hard
stand to make against the knowledge and general culture
of the age. The latter wish to explain away all that
is properly Christian ; whereupon they retain something
which is neither sensu proprio nor sensu allegorico true,
but rather a mere platitude, little better than Judaism,
or at the most a shallow Pelagianism, and, what is worst,
an abject optimism, absolutely foreign to Christianity
proper. Moreover, the attempt to found a religion upon
reason removes it into the other class of metaphysics,
that which has its authentication in itself, thus to the
foreign ground of the philosophical systems, and into the
conflict which these wage against each other in their own
arena, and consequently exposes it to the light fire of
scepticism and the heavy artillery of the " Critique of
Pure Eeason ; " but for it to venture there would be clear
presumption.
It would be most beneficial to both kinds of meta-
physics that each of them should remain clearly separated
from the other and confine itself to its own province, that
it may there be able to develop its nature fully. Instead
of which, through the whole Christian era, the endeavour
vol. 11. 2 A
37o FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.
has been to bring about a fusion of the two, for the dogmas
and conceptions of the one have been carried over into the
other, whereby both are spoiled. This has taken place in
the most open manner in our own day in that strange her-
maphrodite or centaur, the so-called philosophy of religion,
which, as a kind of gnosis, endeavours to interpret the
given religion, and to explain what is true sensu allegorico
through something which is true sensu proprio. But for
this we would have to know and possess the truth sensu
proprio already ; and in that case such an interpretation
would be superfluous. For to seek first to find meta-
physics, i.e., the truth sensu proprio, merely out of religion
by explanation and interpretation would be a doubtful
and dangerous undertaking, to which one would only
make up one's mind if it were proved that truth, like
iron and other base metals, could only be found in a
mixed, not in a pure form, and therefore one could only
obtain it by reduction from the mixed ore.
Religions are necessary for the people, and an inestim-
able benefit to them. But if they oppose themselves to
the progress of mankind in the knowledge of the truth,
they must with the utmost possible forbearance be set
aside. And to require that a great mind a Shakspeare;
a Goethe should make the dogmas of any religion im-
plicitly, bond fide, et sensu proprio, his conviction is to
require that a giant should put on the shoe of a dwarf.
Eeligions, being calculated with reference to the power
of comprehension of the great mass of men, can only have
indirect, not immediate truth. To require of them the
latter is as if one wished to read the letters set up in the
form-chase, instead of their impression. The value of s
religion will accordingly depend upon the greater or less
content of truth which it contains under the veil of alle
gory, and then upon the greater or less distinctness witl
which it becomes visible through this veil, thus upon tin
transparency of the latter. It almost seems that, as th<
oldest languages are the most perfect, so also are the oldes
D
ON MAWS NEED OF METAPHYSICS. 371
religions. If I were to take the results of my philosophy
as the standard of truth, I would be obliged to concede to
Buddhism the pre-eminence over the rest. In any case
it must be a satisfaction to me to see my teaching in such
close agreement with a religion which the majority of
men upon the earth hold as their own; for it numbers
far more adherents than any other. This agreement,
however, must be the more, satisfactory to me because
in my philosophising I have certainly not been under
its influence. For up till 18 18, when my work appeared,
there were very few, exceedingly incomplete and scanty,
accounts of Buddhism to be found in Europe, which were
almost entirely limited to a few essays in the earlier
volumes of "Asiatic Eesearches," and were principally
concerned with the Buddhism of the Burmese. Only
since then has fuller information about this religion
gradually reached us, chiefly through the profound and
instructive essays of the meritorious member of the St.
Petersburg Academy, J. J. Schmidt, in the proceedings
of his Academy, and then little by little through several
English and Erench scholars, so that I was able to give
a fairly numerous list of the best works on this religion
in my work, " JJeber den Willen in der Natur" under the
heading Sinologie. Unfortunately Csoma Korosi, that per-
severing Hungarian, who, in order to study the language
and sacred writings of Buddhism, spent many years in
Tibet, and for the most part in Buddhist monasteries,
was carried off by death just as he was beginning to work
out for us the results of his researches. I cannot, how-
ever, deny the pleasure with which I read, in his pro-
visional accounts, several passages cited directly from the
Kahgyur itself; for example, the following conversation
of the dying Buddha with Brahma, who is doing him
homage : " There is a description of their conversation on
the subject of creation, by whom was the world made ?
Shakya asks several questions of Brahma, whether was
tt he who made or produced such and such things, and
372 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.
endowed or blessed them with such and such virtues or
properties, whether was it he who caused the several
revolutions in the destruction and regeneration of the
world. He denies that he had ever done anything to
that effect. At last he himself asks Shakya how the
world was made, by whom ? Here are attributed all
changes in the world to the moral works of the animal
beings, and it is stated that in the world all is illusion,
there is no reality in the things ; all is empty. Brahma,
being instructed in his doctrine, becomes his follower"
(Asiatic Eesearches, voL xx. p. 434).
I cannot place, as is always done, the fundamental
difference of all religions in the question whether they
are monotheistic, polytheistic, pantheistic, or atheistic,
but only in the question whether they are optimistic or
pessimistic, that is, whether they present the existence of
the world as justified by itself, and therefore praise and
value it, or regard it as something that can only be con-
ceived as the consequence of our guilt, and therefore
properly ought not to be, because they recognise that
pain and death cannot lie in the eternal, original, and
immutable order of things, in that which in every respect
ought to be. The power by virtue of which Christianity
was able to overcome first Judaism, and then the heathen-
ism of Greece and Eome, lies solely in its pessimism, in
the confession that our state is both exceedingly wretched
and sinful, while Judaism and heathenism were opti-
mistic. That truth, profoundly and painfully felt by all,
penetrated, and bore in its train the need of redemption.
I turn to a general consideration of the other kind of
metaphysics, that which has its authentication in itself,
and is called philosophy. I remind the reader of its origin
mentioned above, in a wonder concerning the world ami
our own existence, inasmuch as these press upon the intel-
lect as a riddle, the solution of which therefore occupies
mankind without intermission. Here, then, I wish firs
of all to draw attention to the fact that this could not
ON MAN'S NEED OF METAPHYSICS. 373
the case if, in Spinoza's sense, which in our own day has
so often been brought forward again under modern forms
and expositions as pantheism, the world were an " absolute
substance," and therefore an absolutely necessary existence.
For this means that it exists with so great a necessity
that beside it every other necessity comprehensible to our
understanding as such must appear as an accident. It
would then be something which comprehended in itself
not only all actual but also all possible existence, so that,
as Spinoza indeed declares, its possibility and its actuality
would be absolutely one. Its non-being would therefore
be impossibility itself; thus it would be something the
non-being or other-being of which must be completely
inconceivable, and which could therefore just as little be
thought away as, for example, space or time. And since,
further, we ourselves would be parts, modes, attributes, or
accidents of such an absolute substance, which would be
the only thing that, in any sense, could ever or anywhere
exist, our and its existence, together with its properties,
would necessarily be very far from presenting itself to us
as remarkable, problematical, and indeed as an unfathom-
able and ever-disquieting riddle, but, on the contrary,
would be far more self-evident than that two and two
make four. For we would necessarily be incapable of
thinking anything else than that the world is, and is,
as it is ; and therefore we would necessarily be as little
conscious of its existence as such, i.e., as a problem for
reflection, as we are of the incredibly fast motion of our
planet.
All this, however, is absolutely not the case. Only to
the brutes, who are without thought, does the world and
existence appear as a matter of course ; to man, on the
contrary, it is a problem, of which even the most unedu-
cated and narrow-minded becomes vividly conscious in
certain brighter moments, but which enters more distinctly
and more permanently into the consciousness of each one
of us the clearer and more enlightened that conscious-
374 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.
ness is, and the more material for thought it has acquire
through culture, which all ultimately rises, in minds tha
are naturally adapted for philosophising, to Plato's " davfia-
e>, fMaXa (f>L\o(rovcrec avveT7) eTniXoaroia Trpayrr),
Kdl KddoXoV OVTWS, OTl TTpOOTT}' Kdl 7T6/H TOV OVTOS 7) OV,
Tavrr}<; av eirj deayprjaai." (Si igitur noil est aliqua alia sub-
stantia, prceter eas, quae natura consistunt, physica profecto
'prima scientia esset : quodsi autem est aliqua substantia
immobilis, hcec prior et philosophia prima, et universalis sic,
quod prima ; et de ente, prout ens est, speculari hujus est),
"Metaph." v. I. Such an absolute system of physics as is
described above, which leaves room for no metaphysics,
would make the Natura naturata into the Natura natu-
rans; it would be physics established on the throne of
metaphysics, yet it would comport itself in this high
position almost like Holberg's theatrical would-be poli-
tician who was made burgomaster. Indeed behind the
reproach of atheism, in itself absurd, and for the most
part malicious, there lies, as its inner meaning and truth,
which gives it strength, the obscure conception of such an
absolute system of physics without metaphysics. Certainly
such a system would necessarily be destructive of ethics ;
and while Theism has falsely been held to be inseparable
from morality, this is really true only of metaphysics in
general, i.e., of the knowledge that the order of nature is
not the only and absolute order of things. Therefore we
may set up this as the necessary Credo of all just and
380 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.
good men : " I believe in metaphysics." In this respect it
is important and necessary that one should convince one-
self of the untenable nature of an absolute system of physics,
all the more as this, the true naturalism, is a point of view
which of its own accord and ever anew presses itself upon
a man, and can only be done away with through profound
speculation. In this respect, however, all kinds of systems
and faiths, so far and so long as they are accepted, certainly
serve as a substitute for such speculation. But that a
fundamentally false view presses itself upon man of its
own accord, and must first be skilfully removed, is explic-
able from the fact that the intellect is not originally
intended to instruct us concerning the nature of things,
but only to show us their relations, with reference to our
will ; it is, as we shall find in the second book, only the
medium of motives. Now, that the world schematises
itself in the intellect in a manner which exhibits quite a
different order of things from the absolutely true one,
because it shows us, not their kernel, but only their outer
shell, happens accidentally, and cannot be used as a
reproach to the intellect; all the less as it nevertheless
finds in itself the means of rectifying this error, in that it
arrives at the distinction between the phenomenal appear-
ance and the inner being of things, which distinction
existed in substance at all times, only for the most part
was very imperfectly brought to consciousness, and there-
fore was inadequately expressed, indeed often appeared in
strange clothing. The Christian mystics, when they call
it the light of nature, declare the intellect to be inadequate
to the comprehension of the true nature of things. It is,
as it were, a mere surface force, like electricity, and does
not penetrate to the inner being.
The insufficiency of pure naturalism appears, as we have
said, first of all, on the empirical path itself, through the
circumstance that every physical explanation explains the
particular from its cause ; but the chain of these causes, as
we know a priori, and therefore with perfect certainty,
ON MAN'S NEED OF METAPHYSICS. 381
runs back to infinity, so that absolutely no cause could
ever be the first. Then, however, the effect of every cause
is referred to a law of nature, and this finally to a force of
nature, which now remains as the absolutely inexplicable.
But this inexplicable, to which all phenomena of this so
clearly given and naturally explicable world, from the
highest to the lowest, are referred, just shows that the
whole nature of such explanation is only conditional, as
it were only ex concessis, and by no means the true and
sufficient one; therefore I said above that physically
everything and nothing is explicable. That absolutely
inexplicable element which pervades all phenomena, which
is most striking in the highest, e.g., in generation, but yet
is just as truly present in the lowest, e.g., in mechanical
phenomena, points to an entirely different kind of order
of things lying at the foundation of the physical order,
which is just what Kant calls the order of things in
themselves, and winch is the goal of metaphysics. But,
secondly, the insufficiency of pure naturalism comes out
clearly from that fundamental philosophical truth, which
we have fully considered in the first half of this book, and
which is also the theme of the " Critique of Pure Eeason ;"
the truth that every object, both as regards its objective
existence in general and as regards the manner (forms) of
this existence, is throughout conditioned by the knowing
subject, hence is merely a phenomenon, not a thing in
itself. This is explained in 7 of the first volume, and it
is there shown that nothing can be more clumsy than that,
after the manner of all materialists, one should blindly take
the objective as simply given in order to derive everything
from it without paying any regard to the subjective, through
which, however, nay, in which alone the former exists.
Samples of this procedure are most readily afforded us
by the fashionable materialism of our own day, which
has thereby become a philosophy well suited for barbers'
and apothecaries' apprentices. For it, in its innocence,
matter, assumed without reflection as absolutely real, is
382 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.
the thing in self, and the one capacity of a thing in itsel
is impulsive force, for all other qualities can only be inani
festations of this.
With naturalism, then, or the purely physical way of
looking at things, we shall never attain our end ; it is like
a sum that never comes out. Causal series without begin-
ning or end, fundamental forces which are inscrutable,
endless space, beginningless time, infinite divisibility of
matter, and all this further conditioned by a knowing
brain, in which alone it exists just like a dream, and
without which it vanishes constitute the labyrinth in
which naturalism leads us ceaselessly round. The height
to which in our time the natural sciences have risen in
this respect entirely throws into the shade all previous
centuries, and is a summit which mankind reaches for the
first time. But however great are the advances which
physics (understood in the wide sense of the ancients)
may make, not the smallest step towards metaphysics is
thereby taken, just as a plane can never obtain cubical
content by being indefinitely extended. For all such
advances will only perfect our knowledge of the pheno-
menon; while metaphysics strives to pass beyond the
phenomenal appearance itself, to that which so appears.
And if indeed it had the assistance of an entire and com-
plete experience, it would, as regards the main point, be
in no way advantaged by it. Nay, even if one wandered
through all the planets and fixed stars, one would thereby
have made no step in metaphysics. It is rather the case
that the greatest advances of physics will make the need
of metaphysics ever more felt ; for it is just the corrected,
extended, and more thorough knowledge of nature which,
on the one hand, always undermines and ultimately over-
throws the metaphysical assumptions which till then have
prevailed, but, on the other hand, presents the problem
of metaphysics itself more distinctly, more correctly, and
more fully, and separates it more clearly from all that
is merely physical; moreover, the more perfectly and
ON MAN'S NEED OF METAPHYSICS. 383
accurately known nature of the particular thing more
pressingly demands the explanation of the whole and the
general, which, the more correctly, thoroughly, and com-
pletely it is known empirically, only presents itself as the
more mysterious. Certainly the individual, simple inves-
tigator of nature, in a special branch of physics, does not at
once become clearly conscious of all this ; he rather sleeps
contentedly by the side of his chosen maid, in the house
of Odysseus, banishing all thoughts of Penelope (cf. ch. 12
at the end). Hence we see at the present day the husk
of nature investigated in its minutest details, the intes-
tines of intestinal worms and the vermin of vermin known
to a nicety. But if some one comes, as, for example, I
do, and speaks of the kernel of nature, they will not listen ;
they even think it has nothing to do with the matter, and
go on sifting their husks. One finds oneself tempted to
call that over-microscopical and micrological investigator
of nature the cotquean of nature. But those persons who
believe that crucibles and retorts are the true and only
source of all wisdom are in their own way just as per-
verse as were formerly their antipodes the Scholastics.
As the latter, absolutely confined to their abstract con-
ceptions, used these as their weapons, neither knowing
nor investigating anything outside them, so the Mrmer,
absolutely confined to their empiricism, allow nothing to
be true except what their eyes behold, and believe they
can thus arrive at the ultimate ground of things, not
discerning that between the phenomenon and that which
manifests itself in it, the thing in itself, there is a deep
gulf, a radical difference, which can only be cleared up by
the knowledge and accurate delimitation of the subjective
element of the phenomenon, and the insight that the
ultimate and most important conclusions concerning the
nature of things can only be drawn from self-conscious-
ness ; yet without all this one cannot advance a step
beyond what is directly given to the senses, thus can get
no further than to the problem. Yet, on the other hand,
384 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.
it is to be observed that the most perfect possible know-,
ledge of nature is the corrected statement of the problem of
metaphysics. Therefore no one ought to venture upon
this without having first acquired a knowledge of all the
branches of natural science, which, though general, shall
be thorough, clear, and connected. For the problem must
precede its solution. Then, however, the investigator
must turn his glance inward; for the intellectual and
ethical phenomena are more important than the physical,
in the same proportion as, for example, animal magnetism
is a far more important phenomenon than mineral mag-
netism. The last fundamental secret man carries within
himself, and this is accessible to him in the most imme-
diate manner ; therefore it is only here that he can hope
to find the key to the riddle of the world and gain a clue
to the nature of all things. The special province of meta-
physics thus certainly lies in what has been called mental
philosophy.
" The ranks of living creatures thou dost lead
Before me, teaching me to know my brothers
In air and water and the silent wood :
Then to the cave secure thou leadest me,
Then sbow'st me mine own self, and in my breast
The deep, mysterious miracles unfold." 1
Finally, then, as regards the source or the foundation of
metaphysical knowledge, I have already declared myself
above to be opposed to the assumption, which is even re-
peated by Kant, that it must lie in mere conceptions. In
no knowledge can conceptions be what is first ; for they
are always derived from some perception. What has
led, however, to that assumption is probably the example
of mathematics. Mathematics can leave perception alto-
gether, and, as is especially the case in algebra, trigono-
metry, and analysis, can operate with purely abstract
conceptions, nay, with conceptions which are represented
1 [Bayard Taylor's translation of Faust, vol. i. iSo. Tra.]
ON MAN'S NEED OF METAPHYSICS. 385
only by signs instead of words, and can yet arrive at a
perfectly certain result, which is still so remote that any
one who adhered to the firm ground of perception could
not arrive at it. But the possibility of this depends, as
Kant has clearly shown, on the fact that the conceptions
of mathematics are derived from the most certain and
definite of all perceptions, from the a priori and yet in-
tuitively known relations of quantity, and can therefore
be constantly realised again and controlled by these, either
arithmetically, by performing the calculations which are
merely indicated by those signs, or geometrically, by means
of what Kant calls the construction of the conceptions.
This advantage, on the other hand, is not possessed by the
conceptions out of which it was believed metaphysics could
be built up ; such, for example, as essence, being, substance,
perfection, necessity, reality, finite, infinite, absolute, ground,
&c. For such conceptions are by no means original, as
fallen from heaven, or innate ; but they also, like all con-
ceptions, are derived from perceptions ; and as, unlike the
conceptions of mathematics, they do not contain the mere
form of perception, but more, empirical perceptions must
lie at their foundation. Thus nothing can be drawn from
them which the empirical perceptions did not also contain,
that is, nothing which was not a matter of experience, and
which, since these conceptions are very wide abstractions,
we would receive with much greater certainty at first
hand from experience. For from conceptions nothing
more can ever be drawn than the perceptions from which
they are derived contain. If we desire pure conceptions,
ie., such as have no empirical source, the only ones that
can be produced are those which concern space and time,
ie., the merely formal part of perception, consequently
only the mathematical conceptions, or at most also the
conception of causality, which indeed does not originate
in experience, but yet only comes into consciousness by
means of it (first in sense-perception) ; therefore experience
indeed is only possible by means of it ; but it also is only
vol. n. 2 B
386 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.
valid in the sphere of experience, on which account Kant
has shown that it only serves to communicate the connec-
tion of experience, and not to transcend it ; that thus it
admits only of physical application, not of metaphysical.
Certainly only its a priori origin can give apodictic certainty
to any knowledge ; but this limits it to the mere form of
experience in general, for it shows that it is conditioned
by the subjective nature of the intellect Such knowledge,
then, far from taking us beyond experience, gives only one
part of experience itself, the formal part, which belongs
to it throughout, and therefore is universal, consequently
mere form without content. Since now metaphysics can
least of all be confined to this, it must have also empirical
sources of knowledge ; therefore that preconceived idea of
a metaphysic to be found purely a priori is necessarily vain.
It is really apetitioprincipii of Kant's, which he expresses
most distinctly in i of the Prolegomena, that metaphysics
must not draw its fundamental conceptions and principles
from experience. In this it is assumed beforehand that
only what we knew before all experience can extend
beyond all possible experience. Supported by this, Kant
then comes and shows that all such knowledge is nothing
more than the form of the intellect for the purpose of
experience, and consequently can never lead beyond ex-
perience, from which he then rightly deduces the impossi-
bility of all metaphysics. But does it not rather seem
utterly perverse that in order to discover the secret of
experience, i.e., of the world which alone lies before us, we
should look quite away from it, ignore its content, and
take and use for its material only the empty forms of
which we are conscious a priori ? Is it not rather in
keeping with the matter that the science of experience in
general, and as such, should also be drawn from experience ?
Its problem itself is given it empirically; why should
not the solution of it call in the assistance of experience ?
Is it not senseless that he who speaks of the nature of
things should not look at things themselves, but should
uld
ON MAN'S NEED OF METAPHYSICS. 387
confine himself to certain abstract conceptions ? The task
of metaphysics is certainly not the observation of particular
experiences, but yet it is the correct explanation of experi-
ence as a whole. Its foundation must therefore, at any
rate, be of an empirical nature. Indeed the a priori
nature of a part of human knowledge will be apprehended
by it as a given fact, from which it will infer the sub-
jective origin of the same. Only because the conscious-
ness of its a priori nature accompanies it is it called by
Kant transcendental as distinguished from transcendent,
which signifies " passing beyond all possibility of experi-
ence," and has its opposite in immanent, i.e., remaining
within the limits of experience. I gladly recall the
original meaning of this expression introduced by Kant,
with which, as also with that of the Categories, and many
others, the apes of philosophy carry on their game at the
present day. Now, besides this, the source of the know-
ledge of metaphysics is not outer experience alone, but
also inner. Indeed, what is most peculiar to it, that by
which the decisive step which alone can solve the great
question becomes possible for it, consists, as I have fully
and thoroughly proved in " Ueber den Willen in der Natur"
under the heading, " Physische Astronomic" in this, that
at the right place it combines outer experience with inner,
and uses the latter as a key to the former.
The origin of metaphysics in empirical sources of
knowledge, which is here set forth, and which cannot
'airly be denied, deprives it certainly of that kind of
ipodictic certainty which is only possible through know-
edge a priori. This remains the possession of logic and
nathematics sciences, however, which really only teach
vhat every one knows already, though not distinctly. At
nost the primary elements of natural science may also be
(educed from knowledge a priori. By this confession
aetaphysics only surrenders an ancient claim, which,
ccording to what has been said above, rested upon mis-
nderstanding, and against which the great diversity and
388 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.
changeableness of metaphysical systems, and also the con-
stantly accompanying scepticism, in eveiy age has testified
Yet against the possibility of metaphysics in general this
changeableness cannot be urged, for the same thing affects
just as much all branches of natural science, chemistry,
physics, geology, zoology, &c, and even history has not
remained exempt from it. But when once, as far as the
limits of human intellect allow, a true system of meta-
physics shall have been found, the unchangeableness of a
science which is known a priori will yet belong to it ; for
its foundation can only be experience in general, and not
the particular and special experiences by which, on the
other hand, the natural sciences are constantly modified
and new material is always being provided for history.
For experience as a whole and in general will never
change its character for a new one.
The next question is : How can a science drawn from
experience pass beyond it and so merit the name of meta-
physics ? It cannot do so perhaps in the same way as we
find a fourth number from three proportionate ones, or a
triangle from two sides and an angle. This was the way
of the pre-Kantian dogmatism, which, according to certain
laws known to us a priori, sought to reason from the given
to the not given, from the consequent to the reason, thus
from experience to that which could not possibly be given
in any experience. Kant proved the impossibility of a
metaphysic upon this path, in that he showed that although
these laws were not drawn from experience, they were only
valid for experience. He therefore rightly taught that in
such a way we cannot transcend the possibility of all ex-
perience. But there are other paths to metaphysics. The
whole of experience is like a cryptograph, and philosophy
the deciphering of it, the correctness of which is proved
by the connection appearing everywhere. If this whole
is only profoundly enough comprehended, and the innei
experience is connected with the outer, it must be capable
of being interpreted, explained from itself. Since Kant
ON MAN'S NEED OF METAPHYSICS. 389
has irrefutably proved to us that experience in general
proceeds from two elements, the forms of knowledge and
the inner nature of things, and that these two may be dis-
tinguished in experience from each other, as that of which
we are conscious a priori and that which is added a pos-
teriori, it is possible, at least in general, to say, what in
the given experience, which is primarily merely phenome-
nal, belongs to the form of this phenomenon, conditioned
by the intellect, and what, after deducting this, remains
over for the thing in itself. And although no one can dis-
cern the thing in itself through the veil of the forms of
perception, on the other hand every one carries it in him-
self, indeed is it himself; therefore in self-consciousness
it must be in some way accessible to him, even though
only conditionally. Thus the bridge by which meta-
physics passes beyond experience is nothing else than
that analysis of experience into phenomenon and thing
in itself in which I have placed Kant's greatest merit.
For it contains the proof of a kernel of the phenomenon
different from the phenomenon itself. This can indeed
never be entirely separated from the phenomenon and
regarded in itself as an ens extramundanum, but is always
known only in its relations to and connections with the
phenomenon itself. But the interpretation and explana-
tion of the latter, in relation to the former, which is its
inner kernel, is capable of affording us information with
regard to it which does not otherwise come into conscious-
ness. In this sense, then, metaphysics goes beyond the
phenomenon, i.e., nature, to that which is concealed in or
behind it (to fiera to vai/cov), always regarding it, how-
ever, merely as that which manifests itself in the pheno-
menon, not as independent of all phenomenal appearance ;
it therefore remains immanent, and does not become tran-
scendent. For it never disengages itself entirely from
experience, but remains merely its interpretation and
explanation, since it never speaks of the thing in itself
otherwise than in its relation to the phenomenon. This
39
FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.
at least is the sense in which I, with reference through-
out to the limitations of human knowledge proved by
Kant, have attempted to solve the problem of metaphysics.
Therefore his Prolegomena to future metaphysics will be
valid and suitable for mine also. Accordingly it never
really goes beyond experience, but only discloses the true
understanding of the world which lies before it in experi-
ence. It is neither, according to the definition of meta-
physics which even Kant repeats, a science of mere con-
ceptions, nor is it a system of deductions from a priori
principles, the uselessness of which for the end of meta-
physics has been shown by Kant. But it is rational
knowledge, drawn from perception of the external actual
world and the information which the most intimate fact
of self-consciousness affords us concerning it, deposited in
distinct conceptions. It is accordingly the science of ex-
perience ; but its subject and its source is not particular
experiences, but the totality of all experience. I com-
pletely accept Kant's doctrine that the world of experience
is merely phenomenal, and that the a priori knowledge is
valid only in relation to phenomena ; but I add that just
as phenomenal appearance, it is the manifestation of that
which appears, and with him I call this the thing in itself.
This must therefore express its nature and character in
the world of experience, and consequently it must be
possible to interpret these from this world, and indeed
from the matter, not the mere form, of experience. Accord-
ingly philosophy is nothing but the correct and universal
understanding of experience itself, the true exposition of its
meaning and content. To this the metaphysical, i.e., that
which is merely clothed in the phenomenon and veiled in
its forms, is that which is related to it as thought to words.
Such a deciphering of the world with reference to that
which manifests itself in it must receive its confirmation
from itself, through the agreement with each other in
which it places the very diverse phenomena of the world,
and which without it we do not perceive. If we find a
ON MAN'S NEED OF METAPHYSICS. 391
document the alphabet of which is unknown, we endea-
vour to make it out until we hit upon an hypothesis as to
the significance of the letters in accordance with which
they make up comprehensible words and connected sen-
tences. Then, however, there remains no doubt as to the
correctness of the deciphering, because it is not possible
that the agreement and connection in which all the letters
of that writing are placed by this explanation is merely
accidental, and that by attributing quite a different value
to the letters we could also recognise words and sentences
in this arrangement of them. In the same way the de-
ciphering of the world must completely prove itself from
itself. It must throw equal light upon all the phenomena
of the world, and also bring the most heterogeneous into
agreement, so that the contradiction between those which
are most in contrast may be abolished. This proof from
itself is . the mark of genuineness. For every false de-
ciphering, even if it is suitable for some phenomena, will
conflict all the more glaringly with the rest So, for
example, the optimism of Leibnitz conflicts with the pal-
pable misery of existence ; the doctrine of Spinoza, that
the world is the only possible and absolutely necessary
substance, is incompatible with our wonder at its exist-
ence and nature ; the Wolfian doctrine, that man obtains
his Eanstentia and Essentia from a will foreign to himself,
is contradicted by our moral responsibility for the actions
which proceed with strict necessity from these, in conflict
with the motives ; the oft-repeated doctrine of the progres-
sive development of man to an ever higher perfection, or
in general of any kind of becoming by means of the pro-
cess of the world, is opposed to the a priori knowledge
that at any point of time an infinite time has already run
its course, and consequently all that is supposed to come
with time would necessarily have already existed ; and in
this way an interminable list might be given of the con-
tradictions of dogmatic assumptions with the given reality
of things. On the other hand, I must deny that any doc-
392 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.
trine of my philosophy could fairly be added to such a
list, because each of them has been thought out in the
presence of the perceived reality, and none of them has
its root in abstract conceptions alone. There is yet in it
a fundamental thought which is applied to all the phe-
nomena of the world as their key; but it proves itself
to be the right alphabet at the application of which all
words and sentences have sense and significance. The
discovered answer to a riddle shows itself to be the right
one by the fact that all that is said in the riddle is
suitable to it. In the same way my doctrine introduces
agreement and connection into the confusion of the con-
trasting phenomena of this world, and solves the innume-
rable contradictions which, when regarded from any other
point of view, it presents. Therefore, so far, it is like
a sum that comes out right, yet by no means in the
sense that it leaves no problem over to solve, no possible
question unanswered. To assert anything of that sort
would be a presumptuous denial of the limits of human
knowledge in general. Whatever torch we may kindle,
and whatever space it may light, our horizon will always
remain bounded by profound night For the ultimate
solution of the riddle of the world must necessarily be
concerned with the things in themselves, no longer with
the phenomena. But all our forms of knowledge are
adapted to the phenomena alone ; therefore we must com-
prehend everything through coexistence, succession, and
causal relations. These forms, however, have meaning
and significance only with reference to the phenomenon ;
the things in themselves and their possible relations can-
not be apprehended by means of those forms. Therefore
the actual, positive solution of the riddle of the world
must be something that human intellect is absolutely
incapable of grasping and thinking ; so that if a being of
a higher kind were to come and take all pains to impart
it to us, we would be absolutely incapable of understand-
ing anything of his expositions. Those, therefore, who pro-
ON MAN'S NEED OF METAPHYSICS. 393
fess to know the ultimate, i.e., the first ground of things,
thus a primordial being, an absolute, or whatever else
they choose to call it, together with the process, the
reasons, motives, or whatever it may be, in consequence
of which the world arises from it, or springs, or falls, or
is produced, set in existence, "discharged," and ushered
forth, are playing tricks, are vain boasters, when indeed
they are not charlatans.
I regard it as a great excellence of my philosophy that all
its truths have been found independently of each other, by
contemplation of the real world ; but their unity and agree-
ment, about which I had been unconcerned, has always
afterwards appeared of itself. Hence also it is rich, and
has wide-spreading roots in the ground of perceptible
reality, from which all nourishment of abstract truths
springs ; and hence, again, it is not wearisome a quality
which, to judge from the philosophical writings of the last
fifty years, one might regard as essential to philosophy. If,
on the other hand, all the doctrines of a philosophy are
merely deduced the one out of the other, and ultimately
indeed all out of one first principle, it must be poor and
meagre, and consequently wearisome, for nothing can follow
from a proposition except what it really already says itself.
Moreover, in this case everything depends upon the cor-
rectness of one proposition, and by a single mistake in the
deduction the truth of the whole would be endangered.
Still less security is given by the systems which start
from an intellectual intuition, i.e., a kind of ecstasy or
clairvoyance. All knowledge so obtained must be rejected
as subjective, individual, and consequently problematical.
Even if it actually existed it would not be communicable,
for only the normal knowledge of the brain is communi-
cable; if it is abstract, through conceptions and words; if
purely perceptible or concrete, through works of art.
If, as so often happens, metaphysics is reproached with
having made so little progress, it ought also to be con-
sidered that no other science has grown up like it under
394 riRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.
constant oppression, none has been so hampered and
hindered from without as it has always been by the
religion of every land, which, everywhere in possession of
a monopoly of metaphysical knowledge, regards meta-
physics as a weed growing beside it, as an unlicensed
worker, as a horde of gipsies, and as a rule tolerates it
only under the condition that it accommodates itself to
serve and follow it For where has there ever been true
freedom of thought? It has been vaunted sufficiently;
but whenever it wishes to go further than perhaps to
differ about the subordinate dogmas of the religion of the
country, a holy shudder seizes the prophets of tolerance,
and they say : " Not a step further ! " What progress of
metaphysics was possible under such oppression? Nay,
this constraint which the privileged metaphysics exercises
is not confined to the communication of thoughts, but
extends to thinking itself, for its dogmas are so firmly
imprinted in the tender, plastic, trustful, and thoughtless
age of childhood, with studied solemnity and serious airs,
that from that time forward they grow with the brain, and
almost assume the nature of innate thoughts, which some
philosophers have therefore really held them to be, and
still more have pretended to do so. Yet nothing can so
firmly resist the comprehension of even the problem of
metaphysics as a previous solution of it intruded upoD
and early implanted in the mind. For the necessary
starting-point for all genuine philosophy is the deep
feeling of the Socratic : " This one thing I know, that I
know nothing." The ancients were in this respect in a
better position than we are, for their national religions
certainly limited somewhat the imparting of thoughts ; but
they did not interfere with the freedom of thought itself,
because they were not formally and solemnly impressed
upon children, and in general were not taken so seriously.
Therefore in metaphysics the ancients are still our
teachers.
Whenever metaphysics is reproached with its small pro-
ON MAN'S NEED OF METAPHYSICS. 395
gress, and with not having yet reached its goal in spite
of such sustained efforts, one ought further to consider
that in the meanwhile it has constantly performed the in-
valuable service of limiting the boundless claims of the
privileged metaphysics, and yet at the same time combat-
ing naturalism and materialism proper, which are called
forth by it as an inevitable reaction. Consider to what a
pitch the arrogance of the priesthood of every religion
would rise if the belief in their doctrines was as firm and
blind as they really wish. Look back also at the wars,
disturbances, rebellions, and revolutions in Europe from
the eighth to the eighteenth century; how few will be
found that have not had as their essence, or their pre-
text, some controversy about beliefs, thus a metaphysical
problem, which became the occasion of exciting nations
against each other. Yet is that whole thousand years a
continual slaughter, now on the battlefield, now on the
scaffold, now in the streets, in metaphysical interests!
I wish I had an authentic list of all crimes which Chris-
tianity has really prevented, and all good deeds it has
really performed, that I might be able to place them in the
other scale of the balance.
Lastly, as regards the obligations of metaphysics, it has
only one ; for it is one which endures no other beside it
the obligation to be true. If one would impose other obli-
gations upon it besides this, such as to be spiritualistic,
optimistic, monotheistic, or even only to be moral, one
cannot know beforehand whether this would not interfere
with the fulfilment of that first obligation, without which
all its other achievements must clearly be worthless. A
given philosophy has accordingly no other standard of its
value than that of truth. For the rest, philosophy is essen-
tially world-wisdom: its problem is the world. It has to
do with this alone, and leaves the gods in peace expects,
however, in return, to be left in peace by them.
Supplements to tfje Seconfc ISooft*
* ' Ihr folget falscher Spur,
Denkt nicht, wir scherzen !
1st nicht der Kern der Natur
Menachen im Herzen ? ' "
Goethe.
SUPPLEMENTS TO THE SECOND BOOK.
CHAPTEE XVIII. 1
ON THE POSSIBILITY OF KNOWING THE THING IN ITSELF.
In 1836 I already published, under the title " Ueber den
Willen in der Natur " (second ed., 1854 ; third ed., 1867),
the most essential supplement to this book, which contains
the most peculiar and important step in my philosophy,
the transition from the phenomenon to the thing in itself,
which Kant gave up as impossible. It would be a great
mistake to regard the foreign conclusions with which I
have there connected my expositions as the real material
and subject of that work, which, though small as regards
its extent, is of weighty import. These conclusions are
rather the mere occasion starting from which I have there
expounded that fundamental truth of my philosophy with
so much greater clearness than anywhere else, and brought
it down to the empirical knowledge of nature. And in-
deed this is done most exhaustively and stringently under
the heading "Physische Astronomie; " so that I dare not hope
ever to find a more correct or accurate expression of that
core of my philosophy than is given there. Whoever desires
to know my philosophy thoroughly and to test it seriously
must therefore give attention before everything to that
section. Thus, in general, all that is said in that little
work would form the chief content of these supplements,
if it had not to be excluded on account of having preceded
1 This chapter is connected with 18 of the first volume,
400 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XVIII.
them; but, on the other hand, I here take for gran
that it is known, for otherwise the very best would be
wanting.
I wish now first of all to make a few preliminary obser-
vations from a general point of view as to the sense in
which we can speak of a knowledge of the thing in itself
and of its necessary limitation.
What is knowledge? It is primarily and essentially
idea. What is idea? A very complicated physiological
process in the brain of an animal, the result of which is
the consciousness of a picture there. Clearly the relation
between such a picture and something entirely different
from the animal in whose brain it exists can only be a very
indirect one. This is perhaps the simplest and most com-
prehensible way of disclosing the deep gulf "between the ideal
and the real. This belongs to the things of which, like the
motion of the earth, we are not directly conscious ; there-
fore the ancients did not observe it, just as they did not
observe the motion of the earth. Once pointed out, on
the other hand, first by Descartes, it has ever since given
philosophers no rest. But after Kant had at last proved
in the most thorough manner the complete diversity of the
ideal and the real, it was an attempt, as bold as it was
absurd, yet perfectly correctly calculated with reference
to the philosophical public in Germany, and consequently
crowned with brilliant results, to try to assert the absolute
identity of the two by dogmatic utterances, on the strength
of a pretended intellectual intuition. In truth, on the
contrary, a subjective and an objective existence, a being
for self and a being for others, a consciousness of one*!
own self, and a consciousness of other things, is given
directly, and the two are given in such a fundamental!
different manner that no other difference can comp
with this. About himself every one knows directly, about
all others only very indirectly. This is the fact and the
problem.
Whether, on the other hand, through further processes
ing
are
ON KNOWING THE THING IN ITSELF. 401
in the interior of a brain, general conceptions ( Universalia)
are abstracted from the perceptible ideas or images that
have arisen within it, for the assistance of further com-
binations, whereby knowledge becomes rational, and is
now called thinking this is here no longer the essential
question, but is of subordinate significance. For all such
conceptions receive their content only from the perceptible
idea, which is therefore primary knowledge, and has con-
sequently alone to be taken account of in an investigation
of the relation between the ideal and the real. It there-
fore shows entire ignorance of the problem, or at least
it is very inept, to wish to define that relation as that
between being and thinking. Thinking has primarily only
a relation to perceiving, but perception has a relation to the
real being of what is perceived, and this last is the great
problem with which we are here concerned. Empirical
being, on the other hand, as it lies before us, is nothing
else than simply being given in perception; but the
relation of the latter to thinking is no riddle, for the con-
ceptions, thus the immediate materials of thought, are
obviously abstracted from perception, which no reason-
able man can doubt It may be said in passing that one can
see how important the choice of expressions in philosophy
is from the fact that that inept expression condemned
above, and the misunderstanding which arose from it,
became the foundation of the whole Hegelian pseudo-
philosophy, which has occupied the German public for
:wenty-five years.
! If, however, it should be said : " The perception is itself
;he knowledge of the thing in itself: for it is the effect of that
vhich is outside of us, and as this acts, so it is : its action
s just its being;" to this we reply: (1.) that the law of
ausality, as has been sufficiently proved, is of subjective
rigin, as well as the sensation from which the perception
rises ; (2.) that at any rate time and space, in which the
bject presents itself, are of subjective origin ; (3.) that if
le being of the object consists simply in its action, this
vol. n. 2 c
+02 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XV III.
means that it consists merely in the changes which it
brings about in others ; therefore itself and in itself it is
nothing at all. Only of matter is it true, as I have said in
the text, and worked out in the essay on the principle of
sufficient reason, at the end of 21, that its being consists
in its action, that it is through and through only causa-
lity, thus is itself causality objectively regarded ; hence,
however, it is also nothing in itself (17 v\r) to a\i]6ivov
yfrevSos, materia mendacium verax), but as an ingredient
in the perceived object, is a mere abstraction, which
for itself alone can be given in no experience. It will
be fully considered later on in a chapter of its own.
But the perceived object must be something in itself,
and not merely something for otliers. For otherwise it
would be altogether merely idea, and we would have an
absolute idealism, which would ultimately become theo-
retical egoism, with which all reality disappears and the
world becomes a mere subjective phantasm. If, however,
without further question, we stop altogether at the world
as idea, then certainly it is all one whether I explain
objects as ideas in my head or as phenomena exhibiting
themselves in time and space ; for time and space them-
selves exist only in my head. In this sense, then, an
identity of the ideal and the real might always be affirmed;
only, after Kant, this would not be saying anything new.
Besides this, however, the nature of things and of the phe-
nomenal world would clearly not be thereby exhausted;
but with it we would always remain still upon the ideal
side. The real side must be something toto generc diffe-
rent from the world as idea, it must be that which things
are in themselves; and it is this entire diversity between
the ideal and the real which Kant has proved in the most
thorough manner.
Locke had denied to the senses the knowledge of things
as they are in themselves ; but Kant denied this also to
the perceiving understanding, under which name I here
comprehend what he calls the pure sensibility, and, as it
V
ON KNOWING THE THING IN ITSELF. 403
is given a priori, the law of causality which brings about
the empirical perception. Not only are both right, but we
can also see quite directly that a contradiction lies in the
assertion that a thing is known as it is in and for itself, i.e.,
outside of knowledge. For all knowing is, as we have said,
essentially a perceiving of ideas ; but my perception of ideas,
just because it is mine, can never be identical with the inner
nature of the thing outside of me. The being in and for
, itself, of everything,, must necessarily be subjective; in the
idea of another, however, it exists just as necessarily as
1 objective a difference which can never be fully reconciled.
For by it the whole nature of its existence is fundamentally
changed ; as objective it presupposes a foreign subject, as
whose idea it exists, and, moreover, as Kant has shown,
has entered forms which are foreign to its own nature,
just because they belong to that foreign subject, whose
knowledge is only possible by means of them. If I, ab-
sorbed in this reflection, perceive, let us say lifeless bodies,
! of easily surveyed magnitude and regular, comprehensible
form, and now attempt to conceive this spatial existence,
, in its three dimensions, as their being in itself, consequently
as the existence which to the things is subjective, the im-
possibility of the thing is at once apparent to me, for I can
never think those objective forms as the being which to
the things is subjective, rather I become directly conscious
that what I there perceive is only a picture produced in
my brain, and existing only for me as the knowing subject,
which cannot constitute the ultimate, and therefore sub-
jective, being in and for itself of even these lifeless bodies.
But, on the other hand, I must not assume that even these
lifeless bodies exist only in my idea, but, since they have
inscrutable qualities, and, by virtue of these, activity, I
must concede to them a being in itself of some kind. But
this very iuscrutableness of the properties, while, on the
one hand, it certainly points to something which exists
independently of our knowledge, gives also, on the other
hand, the empirical proof that our knowledge, because it
/
404 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XVIII.
consists simply in framing ideas by means of subjective
forms, affords us always mere phenomena, not the true
being of things. This is the explanation of the fact that
in all that we know there remains hidden from us a certain
something, as quite inscrutable, and we are obliged to con-
fess that we cannot thoroughly understand even the com-
monest and simplest phenomena. For it is not merely the
highest productions of nature, living creatures, or the com-
plicated phenomena of the unorganised world that remain
inscrutable to us, but even every rock-crystal, every iron-
pyrite, by reason of its crystallographical, optical, chemical,
and electrical properties, is to the searching consideration
and investigation an abyss of incomprehensibilities and
mysteries. This could not be the case if we knew things
as they are in themselves ; for then at least the simpler phe-
nomena, the path to whose qualities was not barred for us
by ignorance, would necessarily be thoroughly compre-
hensible to us, and their whole being and nature would
be able to pass over into our knowledge. Thus it lies not
in the defectiveness of our acquaintance with things, but
in the nature of knowledge itself. For if our perception,
and consequently the whole empirical comprehension of
the things that present themselves to us, is already essen-
tially and in the main determined by our faculty of know-
ledge, and conditioned by its forms and functions, it can-
not but be that things exhibit themselves in a manner
which is quite different from their own inner nature, and
therefore appear as in a mask, which allows us merely
to assume what is concealed beneath it, but never to
know it ; hence, then, it gleams through as an inscrutable
mystery, and never can the nature of anything entire and
without reserve pass over into knowledge ; but much less
can any real thing be construed a priori, like a mathema-
tical problem. Thus the empirical inscrutableness of all
natural things is a proof a posteriori of the ideality and
merely phenomenal-actuality of their empirical existence.
According to all this, upon the path of objective know-
ON KNOWING THE THING IN ITSELF. 405
ledge, hence starting from the idea, one will never get be-
yond the idea, i.e., the phenomenon. One will thus remain
at the outside of things, and will never be able to penetrate
to their inner nature and investigate what they are in them-
selves, i.e., for themselves. So far I agree with Kant. But,
as the counterpart of this truth, I have given prominence to
this other truth, that we are not merely the knowing subject,
but, in another aspect, we ourselves also belong to the inner
nature that is to be known, we ourselves are the thing in
itself; that therefore a way from within stands open for
us to that inner nature belonging to things themselves,
to which we cannot penetrate from without, as it were a
subterranean passage, a secret alliance, which, as if by
treachery, places us at once within the fortress which it
was impossible to take by assault from without. The
thing in itself can, as such, only come into consciousness
quite directly, in this way, that it is itself conscious of
itself: to wish to know it objectively is to desire something
contradictory. Everything objective is idea, therefore
appearance, mere phenomenon of the brain.
Kant's chief result may in substance be thus concisely
stated : " All conceptions which have not at their founda-
tion a perception in space and time (sensuous intuition),
that is to say then, which have not been drawn from
such a perception, are absolutely empty, i.e., give no
knowledge. But since now perception can afford us only
phenomena, not things in themselves, we have also abso-
lutely no knowledge of things in themselves." I grant
this of everything, with the single exception of the know-
ledge which each of us has of his own willing: this is
neither a perception (for all perception is spatial) nor is it
empty ; rather it is more real than any other. Further, it
is not a priori, like merely formal knowledge, but entirely
a posteriori; hence also we cannot anticipate it in the
particular case, but are hereby often convicted of error
concerning ourselves. In fact, our willing is the one
opportunity which we have of understanding from within
406 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XVIII.
any event which exhibits itself without, consequently the
one thing which is known to us immediately, and not, like
all the rest, merely given in the idea. Here, then, lies the
* datum which alone is able to become the key to everything
else, or, as I have said, the single narrow door to the truth.
: Accordinglv we must learn to understand nature from our-
k selves, not conversely ourselves from nature. What is
known to us immediately must give us the explanation of
what we only know indirectly, not conversely. Do we
perhaps understand the rolling of a ball when it has re-
ceived an impulse more thoroughly than our movement
when we feel a motive? Many may imagine so, but I
say it is the reverse. Yet we shall attain to the know-
ledge that what is essential in both the occurrences just
mentioned is identical; although identical in the same
way as the lowest audible note of harmony is the same as
the note of the same name ten octaves higher.
Meanwhile it should be carefully observed, and I have
always kept it in mind, that even the inward experience
which we have of our own will by no means affords us an
exhaustive and adequate knowledge of the thing in itself.
Tiiis would be the case if it were entirely an immediate
experience ; but it is effected in this way : the will, with
and by means of the corporisation, provides itself also with
an intellect (for the sake of its relations to the external
world), and through this now knows itself as will in self-
consciousness (the necessary counterpart of the external
world); this knowledge therefore of the thing in itself
is not fully adequate. First of all, it is bound to the
form of the idea, it is apprehension, and as such falls
asunder into subject and object. For even in self-con-
sciousness the I is not absolutely simple, but consists of a
knower, the intellect, and a known, the will The former
J is not known, and the latter does not know, though both
unite in the consciousness of an I. But just on this
account that I is not thoroughly intimate with itself, as it
were transparent, but is opaque, and therefore remains a
ON KNOWING THE THING IN ITSELF. 407
riddle to itself, thus even in inner knowledge there also
exists a difference between the true being of its object and
the apprehension of it in the knowing subject. Yet inner
knowledge is free from two forms which belong to outer
knowledge, the form of space and the form of causality,
which is the means of effecting all sense-perception. On
the other hand, there still remains the form of time, and
that of being known and knowing in general. Accord-
ingly in this inner knowledge the thing in itself has
indeed in great measure thrown off its veil, but still does
not yet appear quite naked. In consequence of the form
of time which still adheres to it, every one knows his will
only in its successive acts, and not as a whole, in and for
itself: therefore no one knows his character a 'priori, but
only learns it through experience and always incom-
pletely. But yet the apprehension, in which we know
the affections and acts of our own will, is far more imme-
diate than any other. It is the point at which the thing
in itself most directly enters the phenomenon and is most
closely examined by the knowing subject ; therefore the
event thus intimately known is alone fitted to become the
interpreter of all others.
For in every emergence of an act of will from the ob-
scure depths of our inner being into the knowing con-
sciousness a direct transition occurs of the thing in itself,
which lies outside time, into the phenomenal world. Ac-
cordingly the act of will is indeed only the closest and
most distinct manifestation of the thing in itself; yet it
follows from this that if all other manifestations or phe-
nomena could be known by us as directly and inwardly,
we would be obliged to assert them to be that which the
will is in us. Thus in this sense I teach that the inner
nature of everything is will, and I call will the thing in
itself. Kant's doctrine of the unknowableness of the
i I thing in itself is hereby modified to this extent, that the
i thing in itself is only not absolutely and from the very
foundation knowable, that yet by far the most immediate
r
\
i
408 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XVIII.
of its phenomena, which by this imraediateness is toto
genere distinguished from all the rest, represents it for us ;
and accordingly we have to refer the whole world of phe-
nomena to that one in which the thing in itself appears
in the very thinnest of veils, and only still remains pheno-
menon in so far as my intellect, which alone is capable
of knowledge, remains ever distinguished from me as the
willing subject, and moreover does not even in inner per-
fection put off the form of knowledge of time.
Accordingly, even after this last and furthest step, the
question may still be raised, what that will, which ex-
hibits itself in the world and as the world, ultimately and
absolutely is in itself ? i.e., what it is, regarded altogether
apart from the fact that it exhibits itself as will, or in
general appears, i.e., in general is known. This question
can never be answered : because, as we have said, becom-
ing known is itself the contradictory of being in itself,
and everything that is known is as such only phenomenal.
But the possibility of this question shows that the thing
in itself, which we know most directly in the will, may
have, entirely outside all possible phenomenal appearance,
ways of existing, determinations, qualities, which are abso-
lutely unknowable and incomprehensible to us, and which
remain as the nature of the thing in itself, when, as is
explained in the fourth book, it has voluntarily abrogated
itself as will, and has therefore retired altogether from the
phenomenon, and for our knowledge, i.e., as regards the
world of phenomena, has passed into empty nothingness.
If the will were simply and absolutely the thing in itself
this nothing would also be absolute, instead of which it
expressly presents itself to us there as only relative.
I now proceed to supplement with a few considerations
pertinent to the subject the exposition given both in our
second book and in the work " Ueber den WiUen in der
Natur," of the doctrine that what makes itself known to
us in the most immediate knowledge as will is also that
which objectifies itself at different grades in all the phe-
ON KNOWING THE THING IN ITSELF. 409
noinena of this world ; and I shall begin by citing a num-
ber of psychological facts which prove that first of all in
our own consciousness the will always appears as primary
and fundamental, and throughout asserts its superiority to
the intellect, which, on the other hand, always presents
itself as secondary, subordinate, and conditioned. This
proof is the more necessary as all philosophers before
me, from the first to the last, place the true being or
the kernel of man in the knowing consciousness, and
accordingly have conceived and explained the I, or,
in the case of many of them, its transcendental hypo-
stasis called soul, as primarily and essentially knowing,
nay, thinking, and only in consequence of this, secondarily
and derivatively, as willing. This ancient and universal
radical error, this enormous irparov yfrevSos and fundamen-
tal varepop irporepov, must before everything be set aside,
and instead of it the true state of the case must be
brought to perfectly distinct consciousness. Since, how-
ever, this is done here for the first time, after thousands of
years of philosophising, some fulness of statement will be
appropriate. The remarkable phenomenon, that in this
most essential point all philosophers have erred, nay, have
exactly reversed the truth, might, especially in the case
of those of the Christian era, be partly explicable from the
fact that they all had the intention of presenting man as
distinguished as widely as possible from the brutes, yet at
the same time obscurely felt that the difference between
them lies in the intellect, not in the will ; whence there
arose unconsciously within them an inclination to make
the intellect the essential and principal thing, and even
to explain volition as a mere function of the intellect.
Hence also the conception of a soul is not only inadmis-
sible, because it is a transcendent hypostasis, as is proved
by the " Critique of Pure Eeason," but it becomes the
source of irremediable errors, because in its " simple sub-
stance " it establishes beforehand an indivisible unity of
knowledge and will, the separation of which is just the
4io SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XVIII.
path to the truth. That conception must therefore appear
no more in philosophy, but may be left to German doc-
tors and physiologists, who, after they have laid aside
scalpel and spattle, amuse themselves by philosophising
with the conceptions they received when they were con-
firmed. They might certainly try their luck in England.
The French physiologists and zootomists have (till lately)
kept themselves free from that reproach.
The first consequence of their common fundamental
error, which is very inconvenient to all these philosophers,
is this : since in death the knowing consciousness obvi-
ously perishes, they must either allow death to be the
annihilation of the man, to which our inner being is op-
posed, or they must have recourse to the assumption of
a continued existence of the knowing consciousness, which
requires a strong faith, for his own experience has suffi-
ciently proved to every one the thorough and complete
dependence of the knowing consciousness upon the brain,
and one can just as easily believe in digestion without a
stomach as in a knowing consciousness without a brain.
My philosophy alone leads out of this dilemma, for it for
the first time places the true being of man not in the con-
sciousness but in the will, which is not essentially bound
up with consciousness, but is related to consciousness, ie.,
to knowledge, as substance to accident, as something illu-
minated to the light, as the string to the resounding-board,
and which enters consciousness from within as the cor-
poreal world does from without. Now we can compre-
hend the indestructibleness of this our real kernel and true
being, in spite of the evident ceasing of consciousness in
death, and the corresponding non-existence of it before
birth. For the intellect is as perishable as the brain,
whose product or rather whose action it is. But the brain,
like the whole organism, is the product or phenomenon,
in short, the subordinate of the will, which alone is
imperishable.
( 4" )
CHAPTER XTX.i
ON THE PRIMACY OF THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS.
The will, as the thing in itself, constitutes the inner, true,
and indestructible nature of man ; in itself, however, it
is unconscious. For consciousness is conditioned by the
intellect, and the intellect is a mere accident of our being ;
for it is a function of the brain, which, together with the
nerves and spinal cord connected with it, is a mere fruit, a
product, nay, so far, a parasite of the rest of the organism ;
for it does not directly enter into its inner constitution,
but merely serves the end of self-preservation by regulat-
ing the relations of the organism to the external world.
The organism itself, on the other hand, is the visibility,
the objectivity, of the individual will, the image of it as
it presents itself in that very brain (which in the first
book we learned to recognise as the condition of the objec-
tive world in general), therefore also brought about by its
forms of knowledge, space, time, and causality, and conse-
quently presenting itself as extended, successively acting,
and material, i.e., as something operative or efficient. The
members are both directly felt and also perceived by
means of the senses only in the brain. According to this
one may say : The intellect is the secondary phenomenon ;
the organism the primary phenomenon, that is, the imme-
diate manifestation of the will ; the will is metaphysi-
cal, the intellect physical ; the intellect, like its objects,
is merely phenomenal appearance ; the will alone is the
thing in itself. Then, in a more and more figurative sense,
1 This chapter is connected with 19 of the first volume.
412 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
thus by way of simile : The will is the substance of man,
the intellect the accident; the will is the matter, the
intellect is the form ; the will is warmth, the intellect
is light.
We shall now first of all verify and also elucidate thia
thesis by the following facts connected with the inner
life of man ; and on this opportunity perhaps more will be
done for the knowledge of the inner man than is to be
found in many systematic psychologies.
i. Not only the consciousness of other things, i.e., the
apprehension of the external world, but also self-conscious-
ness, contains, as was mentioned already above, a knower
and a known; otherwise it would not be consciousness.
For consciousness consists in knowing; but knowing re-
quires a knower and a known ; therefore there could be
no self-consciousness if there were not in it also a known
opposed to the knower and different from it. As there
can be no object without a subject, so also there can
be no subject without an object, i.e., no knower without
something different from it which is known. Therefore
a consciousness which is through and through pure in-
telligence is impossible. The intelligence is like the sun,
which does not illuminate space if there is no object from
which its rays are reflected. The knower himself, as such,
cannot be known ; otherwise he would be the known of
another knower. But now, as the known in self-conscious-
ness we find exclusively the will. For not merely willing
and purposing in the narrowest sense, but also all striving,
wishing, shunning, hoping, fearing, loving, hating, in short,
all that directly constitutes our own weal and woe, desire
and aversion, is clearly only affection of the will, is a mov-
ing, a modification of willing and not- willing, is just that
which, if it takes outward effect, exhibits itself as an act of
will proper. 1 In all knowledge, however, the known is first
1 It is remarkable that Augustine preceding book he had brought under
already knew this. In the fourteenth four categories, cupiditas, timor, la-
book, "De Civ. Dei," c 6, he speaks of titia, tristitia, and says : " Voluntas est
the affectionibus animi, which in the quippe in omnibus, imo omnes nihil
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 413
and essential, not the knower ; for the former is the irpat-
TOTfTro?, the latter the eKTwro^. Therefore in self-con-
sciousness also the known, thus the will, must be what is
first and original ; the knower, on the other hand, only what
is secondary, that which has been added, the mirror. They
are related very much as the luminous to the reflecting
body ; or, again, as the vibrating strings to the resounding-
board, in which case the note produced would be conscious-
ness. We may also regard the plant as a like symbol of
consciousness. It has, we know, two poles, the root and the
corona : the former struggling into darkness, moisture, and
cold, the latter into light, dryness, and warmth; then,
as the point of indifference of the two poles, where they
part asunder, close to the ground, the collum (rhizoma, le
collet). The root is what is essential, original, perennial,
the death of which involves that of the corona, is thus the
primary ; the corona, on the other hand, is the ostensible,
but it has sprung from something else, and it passes away
without the root dying ; it is thus secondary. The root
represents the will, the corona the intellect, and the point
of indifference of the two, the collum, would be the I,
which, as their common termination, belongs to both. This
I is the pro tempore identical subject of knowing and will-
ing, whose identity I called in my very first essay (on the
principle of sufficient reason), and in my first philosophical
wonder, the miracle tear egoxv v - I* is the temporal start-
ing-point and connecting-link of the whole phenomenon,
\i.e., of the objectification of the will : it conditions indeed
the phenomenon, but is also conditioned by it. This com-
parison may even be carried to the individual nature of
men. As a large corona commonly springs only from a
large root, so the greatest intellectual capabilities are only
found in connection with a vehement and passionate will.
A genius of a phlegmatic character and weak passions
aliud, quam voluntates sunt : nam volumus t et quid est metus atque tris-
quid est cupiditas et Icetitia, nisi vo- titia, nisi voluntas in dissensionem a&
luntas in eorum consensioncm, qua his, quce nolumus ? cet"
414 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
would resemble those succulent plants that, with a con-
siderable corona consisting of thick leaves, have very small
roots ; will not, however, be found. That vehemence of
will and passionateness of character are conditions of
heightened intelligence exhibits itself physiologically
through the fact that the activity of the brain is condi-
tioned by the movement which the great arteries running
towards the basis cerebri impart to it with each pulsation;
therefore an energetic pulse, and even, according to Bichat,
a short neck, is a requisite of great activity of the brain.
But the opposite of the above certainly occurs : vehement
desires, passionate, violent character, along with weak in-
tellect, i.e., a small brain of bad conformation in a thick
skulL This is a phenomenon as common as it is repulsive :
we might perhaps compare it to beetroot
2. But in order not merely to describe consciousness
figuratively, but to know it thoroughly, we have first of
all to find out what appears in the same way in every
consciousness, and therefore, as the common and constant
element, will also be the essential. Then we shall consider
what distinguishes one consciousness from another, which
accordingly will be the adventitious and secondary element.
Consciousness is positively only known to us as a pro-
perty of animal nature ; therefore we must not, and indeed
cannot, think of it otherwise than as animal consciousness,
so that this expression is tautological. Now, that which
in every animal consciousness, even the most imperfect
and the weakest, is always present, nay, lies at its founda-
tion, is an immediate sense of longing, and of the alternate
satisfaction and non-satisfaction of it, in very different
degrees. This we know to a certain extent a priori. F
marvellously different as the innumerable species of animals
are, and strange as some new form, never seen before,
appears to us, we yet assume beforehand its inmost nature,
with perfect certainty, as well known, and indeed fully
confided to us. We know that the animal wills, indeed
also what it wills, existence, well-being, life, and propaga-
nt
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 415
tion ; and since in this we presuppose with perfect certainty-
identity with us, we do not hesitate to attribute to it un-
changed all the affections of will which we know in our-
selves, and speak at once of its desire, aversion, fear, ano-er,
hatred, love, joy, sorrow, longing, &c. On the other hand,
whenever phenomena of mere knowledge come to be spoken
of we fall at once into uncertainty. We do not venture
to say that the animal conceives, thinks, judges, knows :
we only attribute to it with certainty ideas in general;
because without them its mill could not have those emo-
tions referred to above. But with regard to the definite
manner of knowing of the brutes and the precise limits of
it in a given species, we have only indefinite conceptions,
and make conjectures. Hence our understanding with
them is also often difficult, and is only brought about by
skill, in consequence of experience and practice. Here
then lie distinctions of consciousness. On the other hand,
a longing, desiring, wishing, or a detesting, shunning, and
['not wishing, is proper to every consciousness: man has
it in common with the polyp. This is accordingly the
essential element in and the basis of every consciousness.
The difference of the manifestations of this in the different
species of animal beings depends upon the various exten-
sion of their sphere of knowledge, in which the motives of
those manifestations lie. "We understand directly from
our own nature all actions and behaviour of the brutes
which express movements of the will ; therefore, so far,
we sympathise with them in various ways. On the other
hand, the gulf between us and them results simply and
solely from the difference of intellect. The gulf which
lies between a very sagacious brute and a man of very
limited capacity is perhaps not much greater than that
which exists between a blockhead and a man of genius ;
therefore here also the resemblance between them in
another aspect, which springs from the likeness of their
inclinations and emotions, and assimilates them again
to each other, sometimes appears with surprising promi-
416 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
nence, and excites astonishment. This consideration makes
Jf< s it clear that in all animal natures the trill is what is
primary and substantial, the intellect again is secondary.
( adventitious, indeed a mere tool for the service of the
) former, and is more or less complete and complicated,
( according to the demands of this service. As a species of
animals is furnished with hoofs, claws, hands, wings, horns,
or teeth according to the aims of its will, so also is it fur-
nished with a more or less developed brain, whose function
is the intelligence necessary for its endurance. The more
complicated the organisation becomes, in the ascending
series of animals, the more numerous also are its wants,
and the more varied and specially determined the objects
which are capable of satisfying them ; hence the more com-
plicated and distant the paths by which these are to be
obtained, which must now be all known and found : there-
fore in the same proportion the ideas of the animal must
be more versatile, accurate, definite, and connected, and
also its attention must be more highly strung, more sus-
tained, and more easily roused, consequently its intellect
must be more developed and perfect. Accordingly we
see the organ of intelligence, the cerebral system, together
* with all the organs of sense, keep pace with the increasing
wants and the complication of the organism ; and the in-
crease of the part of consciousness that has to do with
ideas (as opposed to the willing part) exhibits itself in a
* bodily form in the ever-increasing proportion of the brain
in general to the rest of the nervous system, and of the
cerebrum to the cerebellum ; for (according to Flourens)
the former is the workshop of ideas, while the latter is the
disposer and orderer of movements. The last step which
nature has taken in this respect is, however, dispropor-
tionately great. For in man not only does the faculty
of ideas of perception, which alone existed hitherto,
reach the highest degree of perfection, but the abstract
idea, thought, i.e., reason, and with it reflection, is added,
Through this important advance of the intellect, thus
**'
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 417
of the secondary part of consciousness, it now gains a
preponderance over the primary part, in so far as it
becomes henceforward the predominantly active part.
While in the brute the immediate sense of its satisfied
or unsatisfied desire constitutes by far the most important
part of its consciousness, and the more so indeed the
lower the grade of the animal, so that the lowest animals
are only distinguished from plants by the addition of a
dull idea, in man the opposite is the case. Vehement as are
his desires, even more vehement than those of any brute,
rising to the level of passions, yet his consciousness
remains continuously and predominantly occupied and
filled with ideas and thoughts. Without doubt this has
been the principal occasion of that fundamental error of
all philosophers on account of which they make thought
that which is essential and primary in the so-called soul,
ie., in the inner or spiritual life of man, always placing it
first, but will, as a mere product of thought, they regard yjt %
as only a subordinate addition and consequence of it. ^v^
But if willing merely proceeded from knowing, how could
the brutes, even the lower grades of them, with so very
little knowledge, often show such an unconquerable and
vehement will? Accordingly, since that fundamental
error of the philosophers makes, as it were, the accident
the substance, it leads them into mistaken paths, which
there is afterwards no way of getting out of. Now this
relative predominance of the knowing consciousness over
the desiring, consequently of the secondary part over
the primary, which appears in man, may, in particular
exceptionally favoured individuals, go so far that at the
1 moments of its highest ascendancy, the secondary or
: knowing part of consciousness detaches itself altogether
[ from the willing part, and passes into free activity for itself,
I ie., untouched by the will, and consequently no longer
serving it. Thus it becomes purely objective, and the clear
mirror of the world, and from it the conceptions of genius
then arise, which are the subject of our third book.
VOL. n. 2D
4i 8 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
3. If we run through the series of grades of animals
downwards, we see the intellect always becoming weaker
and less perfect, but we by no means observe a corre-
sponding degradation of the will. Rather it retains every-
where its identical nature and shows itself in the form of
great attachment to life, care for the individual and the
species, egoism and regardlessness of all others, together
with the emotions that spring from these. Even in the
smallest insect the will is present, complete and entire ; it
wills what it wills as decidedly and completely as the
^/ * man. The difference lies merely in what it wills, i.e., in
the motives, which, however, are the affair of the intellect.
m lt~ina r eed, as the secondary part of consciousness, and
bound to the bodily organism, has innumerable degrees of
completeness, and is in general essentially limited and
imperfect. The will, on the contrary, as original and the
thing in itself, can never be imperfect, but every act of
will is all that it can be. On account of the simplicity
which belongs to the will as the thing in itself, the meta-
physical in the phenomenon, its nature admits of no
degrees, but is always completely itself. Only its excite-
ment has degrees, from the weakest inclination to the
passion, and also its susceptibility to excitement, thus its
vehemence from the phlegmatic to the choleric tempera-
ment. The intellect, on the other hand, has not merely
degrees of excitement, from sleepiness to being in the vein,
and inspiration, but also degrees of its nature, of the com-
pleteness of this, which accordingly rises gradually from
the lowest animals, which can only obscurely apprehend,
up to man, and here again from the fool to the genius.
< The will alone is everywhere completely itself. For its
function is of the utmost simplicity ; it consists in willing
and not willing, which goes on with the greatest ease,
without effort, and requires no practice. Knowing, on the
contrary, has multifarious functions, and never takes
place entirely without effort, which is required to fix the
attention and to maKe clear the object, and at a highe
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 419
3tage is certainly needed for thinking and deliberation ;
;herefore it is also capable of great improvement through
jxercise and education. If the intellect presents a simple,
3erceptible object to the will, the latter expresses at once
ts approval or disapproval of it, and this even if the
nteilect has laboriously inquired and pondered, in order
rom numerous data, by means of difficult combinations,
iltimately to arrive at the conclusion as to which of the
wo seems to be most in conformity with the interests of
he will. The latter has meanwhile been idly resting, and
vhen the conclusion is arrived at it enters, as the Sultan
nters the Divan, merely to express again its monotonous
pproval or disapproval, which certainly may vary in
;egree, but in its nature remains always the same.
! This fundamentally different nature of the will and the
atellect, the essential simplicity and originality of the
ormer, in contrast to the complicated and secondary char-
cter of the latter, becomes still more clear to us if we
bserve their remarkable interaction within us, and now
onsider in the particular case, how the images and
loughts which arise in the intellect move the will, and
ow entirely separated and different are the parts which
jae two play. We can indeed perceive this even in
3tual events which excite the will in a lively manner,
hile primarily and in themselves they are merely objects
I the intellect. But, on the one hand, it is here not so
rident that this reality primarily existed only in the
tellect; and, on the other hand, the change does not
merally take place so rapidly as is necessary if the thing
1 to be easily surveyed, and thereby become thoroughly
>mprehensible. Both of these conditions, however, are
lulled if it is merely thoughts and phantasies which we
Wow to act on the will. If, for example, alone with our-
;lves, we think over our personal circumstances, and now
jrhaps vividly present to ourselves the menace of an
stually present danger and the possibility of an unfortu-
l.te issue, anxiety at once compresses the heart, and the
420 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
blood ceases to circulate in the veins. But if then the
intellect passes to the possibility of an opposite issue, and
lets the imagination picture the long hoped for happiness
thereby attained, all the pulses quicken at once with jcy
and the heart feels light as a feather, till the intellect
awakes from its dream. Thereupon, suppose that an occa-
sion should lead the memory to an insult or injury once
suffered long ago, at once anger and bitterness pour into
the breast that was but now at peace. But then arises,
called up by accident, the image of a long-lost love, with
which the whole romance and its magic scenes is con-
nected; then that anger will at once give place to pro-
found longing and sadness. Finally, if there occurs to ua
some former humiliating incident, we shrink together,
would like to sink out of sight, blush with shame, and
often try forcibly to distract and divert our thoughts by
some loud exclamation, as if to scare some evil spirit,
One sees, the intellect plays, and the will must dance to
it. Indeed the intellect makes the will play the part of a
f child which is alternately thrown at pleasure into joyful
or sad moods by the chatter and tales of its nurse. This
depends upon the fact that the will is itself without
knowledge, and the understanding which is given to it if J
without will Therefore the former is like a body which
is moved, the latter like the causes which set it in motion,
for it is the medium of motives. Yet in all this the pri-
macy of the will becomes clear again, if this will, which
as we have shown, becomes the sport of the intellect as
soon as it allows the latter to control it, once makes it*
supremacy in the last instance felt by prohibiting the
intellect from entertaining certain ideas, absolutely pre-
venting certain trains of thought from arising, because
it knows, i.e., learns from that very intellect, that thej
would awaken in it some one of the emotions set fortl
above. It now bridles the intellect, and compels it to tun
to other things. Hard as this often may be, it must ye -
be accomplished as soon as the will is in earnest about it
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 421
for the resistance in this case does not proceed from the
intellect, which always remains indifferent, but from the
will itself, which in one respect has an inclination towards
an idea that in another respect it abhors. It is in itself
interesting to the will simply because it excites it, but at
the same time abstract knowledge tells it that this idea
will aimlessly cause it a shock of painful or unworthy
emotion : it now decides in conformity with this abstract
knowledge, and compels the obedience of the intellect.
This is called " being master of oneself." Clearly the
master here is the will, the servant the intellect, for in the
last instance the will always keeps the upper hand, and
therefore constitutes the true core, the inner being of
man. In this respect the title Hyefiovucop would belong
to the will ; yet it seems, on the other hand, to apply to the
intellect, because it is the leader and guide, like the valet
de place who conducts a stranger. In truth, however, the
happiest figure of the relation of the two is the strong
blind man who carries on his shoulders the lame man who
can see.
The relation of the will to the intellect here explained
may also be further recognised in the fact that the intel-
lect is originally entirely a stranger to the purposes of the
will. It supplies the motives to the will, but it only learns
afterwards, completely a posteriori, how they have affected
it, as one who makes a chemical experiment applies the
reagents and awaits the result. Indeed the intellect
remains so completely excluded from the real decisions
and secret purposes of its own will that sometimes it can
only learn them like those of a stranger, by spying upon
them and surprising them, and must catch the will in
the act of expressing itself in order to get at its real
intentions. For example, I have conceived a plan, about
which, however, I have still some scruple, but the feasible-
ness of which, as regards its possibility, is completely
uncertain, for it depends upon external and still unde-
cided circumstances. It would therefore certainly be un-
A
422 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
necessary to come to a decision about it at present, and so
for the time I leave the matter as it is. Now in such a case
I often do not know how firmly I am already attached to
that plan in secret, and how much, in spite of the scruple.
I wish to carry it out: that is, my intellect does not
know. But now only let me receive news that it is prac-
ticable, at once there rises within me a jubilant, irresis-
tible gladness, that passes through my whole being and
takes permanent possession of it, to my own astonishment.
For now my intellect learns for the first time how firmly
my will had laid hold of that plan, and how thoroughly
the plan suited it, while the intellect had regarded it as
* entirely problematical, and had with difficulty been able
to overcome that scruple. Or in another case, I have
entered eagerly into a contract which I believed to be
very much in accordance with my wishes. But as the
matter progresses the disadvantages and burdens of it are
felt, and I begin to suspect that I even repent of what I
so eagerly pursued ; yet I rid myself of this feeling by
assuring myself that even if I were not bound I would
follow the same course. Now, however, the contract is
unexpectedly broken by the other side, and I perceive with
astonishment that this happens to my great satisfaction
and relief. Often we don't know what we wish or what
we fear. We may entertain a wish for years without even
confessing it to ourselves, or even allowing it to come to
clear consciousness ; for the intellect must know nothing
about it, because the good opinion which we have of our-
selves might thereby suffer. But if it is fulfilled we learn
from our joy, not without shame, that we have wished this.
For example, the death of a near relation whose heir we
are. And sometimes we do not know what we really fear,
because we lack the courage to bring it to distinct con-
sciousnesss. Indeed we are often in error as to the real
motive from which we have done something or left it
undone, till at last perhaps an accident discovers to us the
secret, and we know that what we have held to be the
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 423
motive was' not the true one, but another which we had
not wished to confess to ourselves, because it by no means
accorded with the good opinion we entertained of our-
selves. For example, we refrain from doing something
on purely moral grounds, as we believe, but afterwards we
discover that we were only restrained by fear, for as soon
as all danger is removed we do it. In particular cases
this may go so far that a man does not even guess the
true motive of his action, nay, does not believe himself
capable of being influenced by such a motive ; and yet it
is the true motive of his action. "We may remark in
passing that in all this we have a confirmation and ex-
planation of the rule of Larochefoucauld : " L' amour-propre
est plus habile que le plus habile homme du monde;" nay,
even a commentary on the Delphic yva>6i aavrov and its
difficulty. If now, on the contrary, as all philosophers
imagine, the intellect constituted our t rue natur e and the
purposes of the w ill were a mere resultfof knowledge, then
only the motive from which we imagined that we acted
would be decisive of our moral worth ; in analogy with
the fact that the intention, not the result, is in this respect
decisive. But really then the distinction between imagined
and true motive would be impossible. Thus all cases here
set forth, to which every one who pays attention may
observe analogous cases in himself, show us how the
intellect is so strange to the will that it is sometimes
even mystified by it: for it indeed supplies it with
motives, but does not penetrate into the secret workshop
of its purposes. It is indeed a confidant of the will, but
a confidant that is not told everything. This is also
further confirmed by the fact, which almost every one will
some time have the opportunity of observing in himself,
that sometimes the intellect does not thoroughly trust the
will. If we have formed some great and bold purpose,
which as such is yet really only a promise made by the
will to the intellect, there often remains within us a slight
unconfessed doubt whether we are quite in earnest about
424 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
it, whether in carrying it out we will not waver or draw
back, but will have sufficient firmness and persistency to
fulfil it. It therefore requires the deed to convince us
ourselves of the sincerity of the purpose.
All these facts prove the absolute difference of the will
and the intellect, the primacy of the former and the sub-
ordinate position of the latter.
4. The intellect becomes tired ; the will is never tired.
After sustained work with the head we feel the tiredness
of the brain, just like that of the arm after sustained
bodily work. All knowing is accompanied with effort;
willing, on the contrary, is our very nature, whose mani-
festations take place without any weariness and entirely
of their own accord. Therefore, if our will is strongly
excited, as in all emotions, thus in anger, fear, desire,
grief, &c, and we are now called upon to know, perhaps
with the view of correcting the motives of that emotion,
the violence which we must do ourselves for this purpose
is evidence of the transition from the original natural
activity proper to ourselves to the derived, indirect, and
forced activity. For the will alone is avrofiaTo?, and
therefore a/ca/xaTos tcai aynparo? rjfiara iravra (lassitu-
dinis et senii expers in sempitemum). It alone is active
without being called upon, and therefore often too early
and too much, and it knows no weariness. Infants who
scarcely show the first weak trace of intelligence are
already full of self-will : through unlimited, aimless roar-
ing and shrieking they show the pressure of will with
which they swell, while their willing has yet no object,
i.e., they will without knowing what they will. What
Cabanis has observed is also in point here : " Toutes ces
passions, qui se succtdent d'une manniire si rapide, et se
peignent avec tant de naivete", sur le visage mobile des en/ants.
Tandis que lesfaibles muscles de leurs brasetde leurs jambes
savent encore a peine former quelque mouvemens inde'eis, les
muscles de la face expriment deja par des mouvemens dis-
tincts presque toute la suite des affections gtntrales proprcs
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 425
la nature humaine: et V observateur attentif rcconnait facile-
ment dans ce tableau les traits caracUristiques de I'homme
futur " (Rapports du Physique et Moral, vol. i. p. 123). The
intellect, on the contrary, develops slowly, following the
completion of the brain and the maturity of the whole
organism, which are its conditions, just because it is
merely a somatic function. It is because the brain
attains its full size in the seventh year that from that
time forward children become so remarkably intelligent,
inquisitive, and reasonable. But then comes puberty ; to
a certain extent it affords a support to the brain, or a
resounding-board, and raises the intellect at once by a
large step, as it were by an octave, corresponding to the
lowering of the voice by that amount. But at once the
animal desires and passions that now appear resist the
reasonableness that has hitherto prevailed and to which
they have been added. Further evidence is given of the
indefatigable nature of the will by the fault which is,
more or less, peculiar to all men by nature, and is only
overcome by education precipitation. It consists in this,
that the will hurries to its work before the time. This
work is the purely active and executive part, which ought
only to begin when the explorative and deliberative part,
thus the work of knowing, has been completely and
thoroughly carried out. But this time is seldom waited
for. Scarcely are a few data concerning the circumstances
before us, or the event that has occurred, or the opinion
of others conveyed to us, superficially comprehended and
hastily gathered together by knowledge, than from the
depths of our being the will, always ready and never weary,
comes forth unasked, and shows itself as terror, fear, hope,
joy, desire, envy, grief, zeal, anger, or courage, and leads
to rash words and deeds, which are generally followed by
repentance when time has taught us that the hegemoni-
con, the intellect, has not been able to finish half its work
of comprehending the circumstances, reflecting on their
connection, and deciding what is prudent, because the will
426 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
did not wait for it, but sprang forward long before its
time with " Now it is my turn ! " and at once began the
active work, without the intellect being able to resist, aa
it is a mere slave and bondman of the will, and not, like
it, avTo/j,a.To<;, nor active from its own power and its own
impulse ; therefore it is easily pushed aside and silenced
by a nod of the will, while on its part it is scarcely able,
with the greatest efforts, to bring the will even to a brief
pause, in order to speak. This is why the people are so
rare, and are found almost only among Spaniards, Turks,
and perhaps Englishmen, who even under circumstances
of provocation keep the liead uppermost, imperturbably pro-
ceed to comprehend and investigate the state of affairs,
and when others would already be beside themselves, con
mucho sosiego, still ask further questions, which is some-
thing quite different from the indifference founded upon
apathy and stupidity of many Germans and Dutchmen.
Iffland used to give an excellent representation of this
admirable quality, as Hetmann of the Cossacks, in Ben-
jowski, when the conspirators have enticed him into their
tent and hold a rifle to his head, with the warning that
they will fire it if he utters a cry, Iffland blew into the
mouth of the rifle to try whether it was loaded. Of ten
things that annoy us, nine would not be able to do so if
we understood them thoroughly in their causes, and there-
fore knew their necessity and true nature ; but we would
do this much oftener if we made them the object of re-
flection before making them the object of wrath and
indignation. For what bridle and bit are to an unmanage-
able horse the intellect is for the will in man ; by this
bridle it must be controlled by means of instruction,
exhortation, culture, &c, for in itself it is as wild and
impetuous an impulse as the force that appears in the
descending waterfall, nay, as we know, it is at bottom
identical with this. In the height of anger, in intoxica-
tion, in despair, it has taken the bit between its teeth, has
run away, and follows its original nature. In the Mania
)
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 427
sine delirio it has lost bridle and bit altogether, and shows
now most distinctly its original nature, and that the in-
tellect is as different from it as the bridle from the horse.
In this condition it may also be compared to a clock
which, when a certain screw is taken away, runs down
without stopping.
Thus this consideration also shows us the will as that
which is original, and therefore metaphysical; the intel-
lect, on the other hand, as something subordinate and
physical. For as such the latter is, like everything physi-
cal, subject to vis inertice, consequently only active if it is
set agoing by something else, the will, which rules it,
manages it, rouses it to effort, in short, imparts to it the
activity which does not originally reside in it. Therefore
it willingly rests whenever it is permitted to do so, often
declares itself lazy and disinclined to activity; through
continued effort it becomes weary to the point of complete
stupefaction, is exhausted, like the voltaic pile, through
repeated shocks. Hence all continuous mental work de-
mands pauses and rest, otherwise stupidity and incapacity
ensue, at first of course only temporarily ; but if this rest
is persistently denied to the intellect it will become ex-
cessively and continuously fatigued, and the consequence
is a permanent deterioration of it, which in an old man
may pass into complete incapacity, into childishness, im-
becility, and madness. It is not to be attributed to age
in and for itself, but to long-continued tyrannical over-
exertion of the intellect or brain, if this misfortune ap-
pears in the last years of life. This is the explanation
of the fact that Swift became mad, Kant became
childish, Walter Scott, and also Wordsworth, Southey,
and many minorum gentium, became dull and incapable.
Goethe remained to the end clear, strong, and active-
minded, because he, who was always a man of the world
and a courtier, never carried on his mental occupations
with self-compulsion. The same holds good of Wieland
and of Kuebel, who lived to the age of ninety-one, and also
428 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
of Voltaire. Now all this proves how very subordinate
' and physical and what a mere tool the intellect is. Just
on this account it requires, during almost a third part of
its lifetime, the entire suspension of its activity in sleep,
i.e., the rest of the brain, of which it is the mere func-
tion, and which therefore just as truly precedes it as the
stomach precedes digestion, or as a body precedes its impul-
sion, and with which in old age it flags and decays. The
* will, on the contrary, as the thing in itself, is never lazy,
is absolutely untiring, its activity is its essence, it never
ceases willing, and when, during deep sleep, it is forsaken
of the intellect, and therefore cannot act outwardly in
accordance with motives, it is active as the vital force,
cares the more uninterruptedly for the inner economy of
the organism, and as vis natures medicatrix sets in order
again the irregularities that have crept into it. For it is
not, like the intellect, a function of the body ; but the body
is its function ; therefore it is, ordine rerum, prior to the
body, as its metaphysical substratum, as the in-itself of
its phenomenal appearance. It shares its unwearying
nature, for the time that life lasts, with the heart, that
primum mobile of the organism, which has therefore be-
come its symbol and synonym. Moreover, it does not
disappear in the old man, but still continues to will what
it has willed, and indeed becomes firmer, more inflexible,
than it was in youth, more implacable, self-willed, and
unmanageable, because the intellect has become less sus-
ceptible : therefore in old age the man can perhaps only
be matched by taking advantage of the weakness of his
intellect.
Moreover, the prevailing weakness and imperfection of
the intellect, as it is shown in the want of judgment,
narrow-mindedness, perversity, and folly of the great
majority of men, would be quite inexplicable if the in-
tellect were not subordinate, adventitious, and merely
instrumental, but the immediate and original nature of
the so-called soul, or in general of the inner man : as all
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 429
philosophers have hitherto assumed it to be. For how
'could the original nature in its immediate and peculiar
function so constantly err and fail ? The truly original
in human consciousness, the willing, always goes on with
perfect success; every being wills unceasingly, capably,
and decidedly. To regard the immorality in the will as an
imperfection of it would be a fundamentally false point of
view. For morality has rather a source which really lies
above nature, and therefore its utterances are in contra-
diction with it. Therefore morality is in direct opposition
to the natural will, which in itself is completely egoistic
indeed the pursuit of the path of morality leads to the
abolition of the will. On this subject I refer to our fourth
book and to my prize essay, " Ueber das Fundament der
Moral"
5. That the will is what is real and essential in man,
t and the intellect only subordinate, conditioned, and pro-
duced, is also to be seen in the fact that the latter can
carry on its function with perfect purity and correctness
only so long as the will is silent and pauses. On the
other hand, the function of the intellect is disturbed by
every observable excitement of the will, and its result is
falsified by the intermixture of the latter ; but the con-
verse does not hold, that the intellect should in the same
way be a hindrance to the will. Thus the moon cannot
shine when the sun is in the heavens, but when the moon
is in the heavens it does not prevent the sun from shining.
A great fright often deprives us of our senses to such
an extent that we are petrified, or else do the most absurd
things ; for example, when fire has broken out run right
into the flames. Anger makes us no longer know what
we do, still less what we say. Zeal, therefore called blind,
makes us incapable of weighing the arguments of others,
or even of seeking out and setting in order our own. Joy
makes us inconsiderate, reckless, and foolhardy, and desire
acts almost in the same way. Fear prevents us from see-
ing and laying hold of the resources that are still present,
43Q SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
and often lie close beside us. Therefore for overcoming
sudden dangers, and also for fighting with opponents and
enemies, the most essential qualifications are coolness and
presence of mind. The former consists in the silence of
the will so that the intellect can act ; the latter in the
undisturbed activity of the intellect under the pressure of
events acting on the will ; therefore the former is the con-
dition of the latter, and the two are nearly related ; they
are seldom to be found, and always only in a limited
degree. But they are of inestimable advantage, because
they permit the use of the intellect just at those times
when we stand most in need of it, and therefore confer
decided superiority. He who is without them only knows
what he should have done or said when the opportunity
has passed. It is very appropriately said of him who is
violently moved, i.e., whose will is so strongly excited that
it destroys the purity of the function of the intellect, he is
disarmed; for the correct knowledge of the circumstances
and relations is our defence and weapon in the conflict
with things and with men. In this sense Balthazar Gra-
cian says : " Us la passion enemiga declarada de la cordura "
(Passion is the declared enemy of prudence). If now the
intellect were not something completely different from the
will, but, as has been hitherto supposed, knowing and will-
ing had the same root, and were equally original functions
of an absolutely simple nature, then with the rousing and
heightening of the will, in which the emotion consists, the
intellect would necessarily also be heightened ; but, as we
have seen, it is rather hindered and depressed by this;
whence the ancients called emotion animi perturbatio.
The intellect is really like the reflecting surface of water,
but the water itself is like the will, whose disturbance
therefore at once destroys the clearness of that mirror and
the distinctness of its images. The organism is the will
itself, is embodied will, i.e., will objectively perceived in
the brain. Therefore many of its functions, such as res-
piration, circulation, secretion of bile, and muscular power.
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 431
are heightened and accelerated by the pleasurable, and in
general the healthy, emotions. The intellect, on the other
hand, is the mere function of the brain, which is only
nourished and supported by the organism as a parasite.
Therefore every perturbation of the will, and with it of
the organism, must disturb and paralyse the function of
the brain, which exists for itself and for no other wants
than its own, which are simply rest and nourishment.
But this disturbing influence of the activity of the will
upon the intellect can be shown, not only in the perturba-
tions brought about by emotions, but also in many other,
more gradual, and therefore more lasting falsifications of
thought by our inclinations. Hope makes us regard what
we wish, and fear what we are apprehensive of, as pro-
bable and near, and both exaggerate their object. Plato
(according to iElian, V.H., 13, 28) very beautifully called
hope the dream of the waking. Its nature lies in this,
that the will, when its servant the intellect is not able to
produce what it wishes, obliges it at least to picture it
> before it, in general to undertake the roll of comforter, to
appease its lord with fables, as a nurse a child, and so to
dress these out that they gain an appearance of likelihood.
Now in this the intellect must do violence to its own nature,
which aims at the truth, for it compels it, contrary to its
own laws, to regard as true things which are neither true
nor probable, and often scarcely possible, only in order to
appease, quiet, and send to sleep for a while the restless
and unmanageable will. Here we see clearly who is master
and who is servant. Many may well have observed that
if a matter which is of importance to them may turn out
in several different ways, and they have brought all of
these into one disjunctive judgment which in their opinion
is complete, the actual result is yet quite another, and one
wholly unexpected by them : but perhaps they will not
have considered this, that this result was then almost
always the one which was unfavourable to them. The ex-
planation of this is, that while their intellect intended to
432 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
survey the possibilities completely, the worst of all rernainc
quite invisible to it ; because the will, as it were, coverec
it with its hand, that is, it so mastered the intellect that
it was quite incapable of glancing at the worst case of all,
although, since it actually came to pass, this was also the
most probable case. Yet in very melancholy dispositions,
or in those that have become prudent through experi-
ence like this, the process is reversed, for here apprehen-
sion plays the part which was formerly played by hope.
The first appearance of danger throws them into ground-
less anxiety. If the intellect begins to investigate the
matter it is rejected as incompetent, nay, as a deceitful
sophist, because the heart is to be believed, whose fears
are now actually allowed to pass for arguments as to the
reality and greatness of the danger. So then the intellect
dare make no search for good reasons on the other side,
which, if left to itself, it would soon recognise, but is
obliged at once to picture to them the most unfortunate
issue, even if it itself can scarcely think this issue possible :
" Such as we know is false, yet dread in sooth,
Because the worst is ever nearest truth."
Byron (Lara, c 1).
Love and Tiate falsify our judgment entirely. In our
enemies we see nothing but faults in our loved ones no-
thing but excellences, and even their faults appear to us
amiable. Our interest, of whatever kind it may be, exer-
cises a like secret power over our judgment ; what is in
conformity with it at once seems to us fair, just, and
reasonable ; what runs contrary to it presents itself to us,
in perfect seriousness, as unjust and outrageous, or injudi-
cious and absurd. Hence so many prejudices of position,
profession, nationality, sect, and religion. A conceivec
hypothesis gives us lynx-eyes for all that confirms it, and
makes us blind to all that contradicts it. What is opposec
to our party, our plan, our wish, our hope, we often can-
not comprehend and grasp at all, while it is clear to ever)
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 433
one else; but what is favourable to these, on the other
fiand, strikes our eye from afar. What the heart opposes
the head will not admit. We firmly retain many errors
all through life, and take care never to examine their
ground, merely from a fear, of which we ourselves are con-
scious, that we might make the discovery that we had so
long believed and so often asserted what is false. Thus
then is the intellect daily befooled and corrupted by the
impositions of inclination. This has been very beauti-
fully expressed by Bacon of Verulam in the words : Intel-
lectus LUMINIS SICCI non est ; sed recijpit infusionem a volun-
tate et affectibus : id quod generat ad quod milt scientias ;
quod enim mavult homo, id potius credit. Innumeris modis,
iisque interdum imperceptibilibus, affectus intellectum im-
buit et inficit (Org. Nov., i. 14). Clearly it is also this that
opposes all new fundamental opinions in the sciences and
all refutations of sanctioned errors, for one will not easily
see the truth of that which convicts one of incredible want
of thought. It is explicable, on this ground alone, that the
truths of Goethe's doctrine of colours, which are so clear
and simple, are still denied by the physicists ; and thus
Goethe himself has had to learn what a much harder posi-
tion one has if one promises men instruction than if one
promises them amusement. Hence it is much more for-
tunate to be born a poet than a philosopher. But the
more obstinately an error was held by the other side, the
more shameful does the conviction afterwards become.
In the case of an overthrown system, as in the case of a
conquered army, the most prudent is he who first runs
away from it.
A trifling and absurd, but striking example of that
mysterious and immediate power which the will exercises
over the intellect, is the fact that in doing accounts we
nake mistakes much oftener in our own favour than to
>ur disadvantage, and this without the slightest dishonest
ntention, merely from the unconscious tendency to
liminish our Debit and increase our Credit.
VOL. H. 2B
*34 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
Lastly, the fact is also in point here, that when advice
is given the slightest aim or purpose of the adviser gene-
rally outweighs his insight, however great it may be;
therefore we dare not assume that he speaks from the
latter when we suspect the existence of the former. How
little perfect sincerity is to be expected even from other-
wise honest persons whenever their interests are in any
way concerned we can gather from the fact that we so
often deceive ourselves when hope bribes us, or fear be-
fools us, or suspicion torments us, or vanity flatters us, or
an hypothesis blinds us, or a small aim which is close at
hand injures a greater but more distant one ; for in this
we see the direct and unconscious disadvantageous influ-
ence of the will upon knowledge. Accordingly it ought
not to surprise us if in asking advice the will of the per-
son asked directly dictates the answer even before the
question could penetrate to the forum of his judgment.
I wish in a single word to point out here what will be
fully explained in the following book, that the most per-
fect knowledge, thus the purely objective comprehension
of the world, i.e. t the comprehension of genius, is condi-
tioned by a silence of the will so profound that while it
lasts even the individuality vanishes from consciousness
and the man remains as the pure subject of knowing, which
is the correlative of the Idea.
The disturbing influence of the will upon the intellect,
which is proved by all these phenomena, and, on the other
hand, the weakness and frailty of the latter, on account of
which it is incapable of working rightly whenever the will
is in any way moved, gives us then another proof that
the will is the radical part of our nature, and acts with
original power, while the intellect, as adventitious and in
many ways conditioned, can only act in a subordinate and
conditional manner.
There is no direct disturbance of the will by the intel-
lect corresponding to the disturbance and clouding ol
knowledge by the will that has been shown. Indeed
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 435
cannot well conceive such a thing. No one will wish to
'construe as such the fact that motives wrongly taken up
lead the will astray, for this is a fault of the intellect irf*
its own function, which is committed quite within its
own province, and the influence of which upon the will
is entirely indirect. It would be plausible to attribute
9 irresolution to this, for in its case, through the conflict of
the motives which the intellect presents to the will, the
latter is brought to a standstill, thus is hindered. But
when we consider it more closely, it becomes very clear
that the cause of this hindrance does not lie in the ac-
tivity of the intellect as such, but entirely in external
objects which are brought about by it, for in this case they
stand in precisely such a relation to the will, which is here
interested, that they draw it with nearly equal strength in
different directions. This real cause merely acts through
the intellect as the medium of motives, though certainly
under the assumption that it is keen enough to compre-
hend the objects in their manifold relations. Irresolu-
tion, as a trait of character, is just as much conditioned
by qualities of the will as of the intellect. It is certainly
not peculiar to exceedingly limited minds, for their weak
understanding does not allow them to discover such mani-
fold qualities and relations in things, and moreover is so
little fitted for the exertion of reflection and pondering
these, and then the probable consequences of each step,
that they rather decide at once according to the first
impression, or according to some simple rule of conduct.
The converse of this occurs in the case of persons of con-
siderable understanding. Therefore, whenever such per-
sons also possess a tender care for their own well-being,
i.e., a very sensitive egoism, which constantly desires to
come off well and always to be safe, this introduces a cer-
tain anxiety at every step, and thereby irresolution. This
quality therefore indicates throughout not a want of
understanding but a want of courage. Yet very eminent
minds survey the relations and their probable develop-
436 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
merits with such rapidity and certainty, that if they are
only supported by some courage they thereby acquire
that quick decision and resolution that fits them to play
an important part in the affairs of the world, if time and
circumstances afford them the opportunity.
The only decided, direct restriction and disturbance
which the will can suffer from the intellect as such may
indeed be the quite exceptional one, which is the conse-
quence of an abnormally preponderating development of
the intellect, thus of that high endowment which has been
defined as genius. This is decidedly a hindrance to the
energy of the character, and consequently to the power of
action. Hence it is not the really great minds that make
historical characters, because they are capable of bridling
and ruling the mass of men and carrying out the affairs
of the world ; but for this persons of much less capacity
of mind are qualified when they have great firmness,
decision, and persistency of will, such as is quite incon-
sistent with very high intelligence. Accordingly, where
this very high intelligence exists we actually have a case
in which the intellect directly restricts the will.
6. In opposition to the hindrances and restrictions
which it has been shown the intellect suffers from the
will, I wish now to show, in a few examples, how, con-
versely, the functions of the intellect are sometimes aided
and heightened by the incitement and spur of the will ; so
that in this also we may recognise the primary nature of
the one and the secondary nature of the other, and it may
become clear that the intellect stands to the will in the
relation of a tool.
A motive which affects us strongly, such as a yearning
desire or a pressing need, sometimes raises the intellect
to a degree of which we had not previously believed it
capable. Difficult circumstances, which impose upon us
the necessity of certain achievements, develop entirely
new talents in us, the germs of which were hidden from
us, and for which we did not credit ourselves with any
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 437
capacity. The understanding of the stupidest man be-
comes keen when objects are in question that closely
concern his wishes ; he now observes, weighs, and dis-
tinguishes with the greatest delicacy even the smallest
circumstances that have reference to his wishes or fears.
This has much to do with the cunning of half-witted
persons, which is often remarked with surprise. On this
account Isaiah rightly says, vexatio dot intellectum, which
is therefore also used as a proverb. Akin to it is the
German proverb, " Die Noth ist die Mutter der Kunste "
(" Necessity is the mother of the arts ") ; when, however, the
fine arts are to be excepted, because the heart of every
one of their works, that is, the conception, must proceed
from a perfectly will- less, and only thereby purely objective,
perception, if they are to be genuine. Even the under-
standing of the brutes is increased considerably by neces-
sity, so that in cases of difficulty they accomplish things
at which we are astonished. For example, they almost all
calculate that it is safer not to run away when they
believe they are not seen ; therefore the hare lies still in
the furrow of the field and lets the sportsman pass close
to it; insects, when they cannot escape, pretend to be
dead, &c. We may obtain a fuller knowledge of this
influence from the special history of the self-education of
the wolf, under the spur of the great difficulty of its
position in civilised Europe; it is to be found in the
second letter of Leroy's excellent book, " Zettres sur I'in-
telligence et la perfectibiliU des animaiix." Immediately
afterwards, in the third letter, there follows the high
school of the fox, which in an equally difficult position
has far less physical strength. In its case, however, this
is made up for by great understanding ; yet only through
the constant struggle with want on the one hand and
; danger on the other, thus under the spur of the will, does
it attain that high degree of cunning which distinguishes
it especially in old age. In all these enhancements of the
intellect the will plays the part of a rider who with the
438 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
spur urges the horse beyond the natural measure of its
strength.
In the same way the memory is enhanced through the
pressure of the will. Even if it is otherwise weak, it
preserves perfectly what has value for the ruling passion.
The lover forgets no opportunity favourable to him, the
ambitious man forgets no circumstance that can forward
his plans, the avaricious man never forgets the loss he has
suffered, the proud man never forgets an injury to his
honour, the vain man remembers every word of praise and
the most trifling distinction that falls to his lot. And this
also extends to the brutes: the horse stops at the inn
where once long ago it was fed ; dogs have an excellent
memory for all occasions, times, and places that have
afforded them choice morsels ; and foxes for the different
hiding-places in which they have stored their plunder.
Self-consideration affords opportunity for finer observa-
tions in this regard. Sometimes, through an interruption,
it has entirely escaped me what I have just been thinking
about, or even what news I have just heard. Now if the
matter had in any way even the most distant personal
interest, the after-feeling of the impression which it made
upon the will has remained. I am still quite conscious
how far it affected me agreeably or disagreeably, and also
of the special manner in which this happened, whether,
even in the slightest degree, it vexed me, or made me
anxious, or irritated me, or depressed me, or produced the
opposite of these affections. Thus the mere relation of
the thing to my will is retained in the memory after the
thing itself has vanished, and this often becomes the clue
to lead us back to the thing itself. The sight of a man
sometimes affects us in an analogous manner, for we
remember merely in general that we have had something
to do with him, yet without knowing where, when, or
what it was, or who he is. But the sight of him still
recalls pretty accurately the feeling which our dealings
with him excited in us, whether it was agTeeable or dis-
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 439
agreeable, and also in what degree and in what way.
Thus our memory has preserved only the response of
the will, and not that which called it forth. We might
call what lies at the foundation of this process the
memory of the heart ; it is much more intimate than that
of the head. Yet at bottom the connection of the two is
so far-reaching that if we reflect deeply upon the matter
we will arrive at the conclusion that memory in general
requires the support of a will as a connecting point, or
rather as a thread upon which the memories can range
themselves, and which holds them firmly together, or that
the will is, as it were, the ground to which the individual
memories cleave, and without which they could not last ;
and that therefore in a pure intelligence, i.e., in a merely
knowing and absolutely will-less being, a memory cannot
well be conceived. Accordingly the improvement of the
memory under the spur of the ruling passion, which has
been shown above, is only the higher degree of that which
takes place in all retention and recollection ; for its basis
and condition is always the will. Thus in all this also it
becomes clear how very much more essential to us the
will is than the intellect. The following facts may also
serve to confirm this.
The intellect often obeys the will ; for example, if we
wishto remember something, and after some effort succeed;
so also if we wish now to ponder something carefully and
deliberately, and in many such cases. Sometimes, again,
the intellect refuses to obey the will ; for example, if we
try in vain to fix our minds upon something, or if we call
in vain upon the memory for something that was intrusted
to it. The anger of the will against the intellect on such
occasions makes its relation to it and the difference of the
two very plain. Indeed the intellect, vexed by this anger,
sometimes officiously brings what was asked of it hours
afterwards, or even the following morning, quite unex-
pectedly and unseasonably. On the other hand, the will
never really obeys the intellect ; but the latter is only the
7
>
440 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
ministerial council of that sovereign ; it presents all kinds
of things to the will, which then selects what is in con-
formity with its nature, though in doing so it determines
itself with necessity, because this nature is unchangeable
and the motives now lie before it. Hence no system of
ethics is possible which moulds and improves the will
itself. For all teaching only affects knowledge, and know-
ledge never determines the will itself, i.e., the fundamental
character of willing, but only its application to the circum-
stances present. Rectified knowledge can only modify
conduct so far as it proves more exactly and judges more
correctly what objects of the will's choice are within its
reach ; so that the will now measures its relation to things
more correctly, sees more clearly what it desires, and con-
sequently is less subject to error in its choice. But over the
will itself, over the main tendency or fundamental maxim
of it, the intellect has no power. To believe that know-
ledge really and fundamentally determines the will is like
believing that the lantern which a man carries by night is
the primum mobile of his steps. Whoever, taught by experi-
ence or the admonitions of others, knows and laments a fun-
damental fault of his character, firmly and honestly forms
the intention to reform and give it up; but in spite of this, on
the first opportunity, the fault receives free course. New re-
pentance, new intentions, new transgressions. When this
has been gone through several times he becomes conscious
that he cannot improve himself, that the fault lies in his
nature and personality, indeed is one with this. Now he
will blame and curse his nature and personality, will have
a painful feeling, which may rise to anguish of conscious-
ness, but to change these he is not able. Here we see that
which condemns and that which is condemned distinctly
separate : we see the former as a merely theoretical faculty,
picturing and presenting the praiseworthy, and therefore
desirable, course of life, but the other as something real
and unchangeably present, going quite a different way in
spite of the former: and then again the first remaining
if
M
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 441
behind with impotent lamentations over the nature of
the other, with which, through this very distress, it again
identifies itself. Will and intellect here separate very
distinctly. But here the will shows itself as the stronger,,
the invincible, unchangeable, primitive, and at the same
time as the essential thing in question, for the intellect
deplores its errors, and finds no comfort in the correctness
of the knowledge, as its own function. Thus the intellect
gjshows itself entirely secondary, as the spectator of the
deeds of another, which it accompanies with impotent
praise and blame, and also as determinable from without,
because it learns from experience, weighs and alters its
precepts. Special illustrations of this subject will be found
in the "Parerga," vol. ii. 1 18 (second ed., 1 19.) Accord-
ingly, a comparison of our manner of thinking at different
periods of our life will present a strange mixture of per-
manence and changeableness. On the one hand, the moral
tendency of the man in his prime and the old man is still
the same as was that of the boy ; on the other hand, much
has become so strange to him that he no longer knows
himself, and wonders how he ever could have done or said
this and that. In the first half of life to-day for the most
part laughs at yesterday, indeed looks down on it with
contempt; in the second half, on the contrary, it more
and more looks back at it with envy. But on closer
examination it will be found that the changeable element
was the intellect, with its functions of insight and know-
ledge, which, daily appropriating new material from with-
out, presents a constantly changing system of thought,
while, besides this, it itself rises and sinks with the growth
and decay of the organism. The will, on the contrary, the
basis of this, thus the inclinations, passions, and emotions,
the character, shows itself as what is unalterable in con-
sciousness. Yet we have to take account of the modifica-
tions that depend upon physical capacities for enjoyment,
and hence upon age. Thus, for example, the eagerness
for sensuous pleasure will show itself in childhood as a
442 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
love of dainties, in youth and manhood as the tendency
to sensuality, and in old age again as a love of dainties.
7. If, as is generally assumed, the will proceeded from
knowledge, as its result or product, then where there is
much will there would necessarily also be much know-
ledge, insight, and understanding. This, however, is abso-
lutely not the case ; rather, we find in many men a strong,
i.e., decided, resolute, persistent, unbending, wayward, and
vehement will, combined with a very weak and incapable
understanding, so that every one who has to do with them
is thrown into despair, for their will remains inaccessible
to all reasons and ideas, and is not to be got at, so that it
is hidden, as it were, in a sack, out of which it wills
blindly. Brute3 have often violent, often stubborn wills,
but yet very little understanding. Finally, plants only
will without any knowledge at alL
% If willing sprang merely from knowledge, our anger
would necessarily be in every case exactly proportionate
to the occasion, or at least to our relation to it, for it
would be nothing more than the result of the present
* knowledge. This, however, is rarely the case ; rather,
anger generally goes far beyond the occasion. Our fury
and rage, the furor brevis, often upon small occasions, and
without error regarding them, is like the raging of an evil
spirit which, having been shut up, only waits its oppor-
tunity to dare to break loose, and now rejoices that it has
found it. This could not be the case if the foundation
of our nature were a knower, and willing were merely a
result of knowledge; for how came there into the result
what did not lie in the elements ? The conclusion cannot
contain more than the premisses. Thus here also the
' will shows itself as of a nature quite different from know-
ledge, which only serves it for communication with the
external world, but then the will follows the laws of its
own nature without taking from the intellect anything
but the occasion.
The intellect, as the mere tool of the will, is as different
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 443
from it as the hammer from the smith. So long as in a
conversation the intellect alone is active it remains cold. ~?
It is almost as if the man himself were not present. More-
over, he cannot then, properly speaking, compromise him-
self, but at the most can make himself ridiculous. Only
when the will comes into play is the man really present :
now he becomes warm, nay, it often happens, hot. It is
always the will to which we ascribe the warmth of life ;
on the other hand, we say the cold understanding, or to
investigate a thing coolly, i.e., to think without being influ-
enced by the will. If we attempt to reverse the relation,
and to regard the will as the tool of the intellect, it is as
if we made the smith the tool of the hammer.
Nothing is more provoking, when we are arguing against
a man with reasons and explanations, and taking all pains
to convince him, under the impression that we have only
to do with his understanding, than to discover at last that
he will not understand ; that thus we had to do with his
mil, which shuts itself up against the truth and brings
into the field wilful misunderstandings, chicaneries, and
sophisms in order to intrench itself behind its understand-
ing and its pretended want of insight. Then he is cer-
tainly not to be got at, for reasons and proofs applied
against the will are like the blows of a phantom pro-
duced by mirrors against a solid body. Hence the saying
so often repeated, " Stat pro ratione voluntas!' Sufficient
evidence of what has been said is afforded by ordinary
life. But unfortunately proofs of it are also to be found
on the path of the sciences. The recognition of the most
important truths, of the rarest achievements, will be
looked for in vain from those who have an interest in
preventing them from being accepted, an interest which
either springs from the fact that such truths contradict
what they themselves daily teach, or else from this, that
they dare not make use of them and teach them; or if
all this be not the case they will not accept them, because
the watchword of mediocrity will always be, Si quelqu'un
444 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
excelle parmi tious, qu'il aille exceller ailleurs, as Helvetius
has admirably rendered the saying of the Ephesian in the
fifth book of Cicero's " Tvsadance " (c. 36), or as a saying
of the Abyssinian Fit Arari puts it, "Among quartzes
adamant is outlawed." Thus whoever expects from thi3
always numerous band a just estimation of what he has
done will find himself very much deceived, and perhaps
for a while he will not be able to understand their be-
haviour, till at last he finds out that while he applied
himself to ktwwledge he had to do with the vnll, thus is
precisely in the position described above, nay, is really
like a man who brings his case before a court the judges
of which have all been bribed. Yet in particular cases he
will receive the fullest proof that their will and not their
insight opposed him, when one or other of them makes up
his mind to plagiarism. Then he will see with astonish-
ment what good judges they are, what correct perception
of the merit of others they have, and how well they know
how to find out the best, like the sparrows, who never
miss the ripest cherries.
The counterpart of the victorious resistance of the will
to knowledge here set forth appears if in expounding our
reasons and proofs we have the will of those addressed
with us. Then all are at once convinced, all arguments
are telling, and the matter is at once clear as the day.
This is well known to popular speakers. In the one case,
as in the other, the will shows itself as that which has
original power, against which the intellect can do nothing.
8. But now we shall take into consideration the indi-
vidual qualities, thus excellences and faults of the will
and character on the one hand, and of the intellect on the
other, in order to make clear, in their relation to each
other, and their relative worth, the complete difference
of the two fundamental faculties. History and experi-
ence teach that the two appear quite independently of
each other. That the greatest excellence of mind will not
easily be found combined with equal excellence of char-
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 445
acter is sufficiently explained by the extraordinary rarity
of both, while their opposites are everywhere the order of
the day ; hence we also daily find the latter in union.
However, we never infer a good will from a superior mind,
nor the latter from the former, nor the opposite from the
opposite, but every unprejudiced person accepts them
as perfectly distinct qualities, the presence of which
each for itself has to be learned from experience. Great
narrowness of mind may coexist with great goodness of
heart, and I do not believe Balthazar Gracian was right
in saying (Discrete, p. 406), "Ho ay simple, que no sea
malicioso " (" There is no simpleton who would not be mali-
cious "), though he has the Spanish proverb in his favour,
" Nunca la necedad anduvo sin malicia " (" Stupidity is
never without malice"). Yet it may be that many stupid
persons become malicious for the same reason as many
hunchbacks, from bitterness on account of the neglect
they have suffered from nature, and because they think
they can occasionally make up for what they lack in
understanding through malicious cunning, seeking in this
a brief triumph. From this, by the way, it is also com-
prehensible why almost every one easily becomes mali-
cious in the presence of a very superior mind. On the
other hand, again, stupid people have very often the repu-
tation of special good-hearted ness, which yet so seldom
proves to be the case that I could not help wondering
how they had gained it, till I was able to flatter myself
that I had found the key to it in what follows. Moved
by a secret inclination, every one likes best to choose
for his more intimate intercourse some one to whom
he is a little superior in understanding, for only in this
case does he find himself at his ease, because, according to
Hobbes, " Omnis animi voluptas, omnisque alacritas in eo
sita est, quod quis habeat, quibuscum conferens se, possit
magnifies sentire de se ipso " (Be Cive, i. 5). Tor the
same reason every one avoids him who is superior to him-
self; wherefore Lichtenberg quite rightly observes: "To
446 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
certain men a man of mind is a more odious production
than the most pronounced rogue." And similarly Helve-
tius says : " Les gens mAdiocres ont un instinct sur et prompt,
pour connditre et fuir les gens d 'esprit!' And Dr. Johnson
assures us that " there is nothing by which a man exas-
perates most people more than by displaying a superior
ability of brilliancy in conversation. They seem pleased
at the time, but their envy makes them curse him
in their hearts " (Boswell ; aet. anno 74). In order to
bring this truth, so universal and so carefully concealed,
more relentlessly to light, I add the expression of it by
Merck, the celebrated friend of Goethe's youth, from his
story " Lindor : " " He possessed talents which were given
him by nature and acquired by himself through learning ;
and thus it happened that in most society he left the
worthy members of it far behind. If, in the moment of
delight at the sight of an extraordinary man, the public
swallows these superiorities also, without actually at once
putting a bad construction upon them, yet a certain im-
pression of this phenomenon remains behind, which, if it is
often repeated, may on serious occasions have disagreeable
future consequences for him who is guilty of it. Without
any one consciously noting that on this occasion he was
insulted, no one is sorry to place himself tacitly in the
way of the advancement of this man. Thus on this ac-
count great mental superiority isolates more than any-
thing else, and makes one, at least silently, hated. Now
it is the opposite of this that makes stupid people so gene-
rally liked ; especially since many can only find in them
what, according to the law of their nature referred to
above, they must seek. Yet this the true reason of such
an inclination no one will confess to himself, still less to
others ; and therefore, as a plausible pretext for it, will
impute to those he has selected a special goodness of
heart, which, as we have said, is in reality only very
rarely and accidentally found in combination with mental
incapacity. Want of understanding is accordingly by
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 447
means favourable or akin to goodness of character. But, on
the other hand, it cannot be asserted that great understand-
ing is so ; nay, rather, no scoundrel has in general been
without it. Indeed even the highest intellectual emi-
nence can coexist with the worst moral depravity. An
example of this is afforded by Bacon of Verulam : " Un-
grateful, filled with the lust of power, wicked and base, he
at last went so far that, as Lord Chancellor and the highest
judge of the realm, he frequently allowed himself to be
bribed in civil actions. Impeached before his peers, he
confessed himself guilty, was expelled by them from the
House of Lords, and condemned to a fine of forty thousand
pounds and imprisonment in the Tower " (see the review
of the latest edition of Bacon's Works in the Edinburgh
Review, August 1837). Hence also Pope called him "the
wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind " (" Essay on Man,"
iv. 282). A similar example is afforded by the historian
Guicciardini, of whom Eosini says in the Notizie Storiche,
drawn from good contemporary sources, which is given in
his historical romance " Luisa Strozzi : " " Da coloro, che
pongono Vingegno e il sapere al di sopra di tutte le umane
qualitdb, questo uomo sard riguardato come fra i piiju grandi
del suo secolo : ma da quelli, che reputano la virtii dovere
andare innanzi a tutto, non potra esecrarsi abbastanza la
sua memoria. Esso fu il piu crudele fra i cittadini a
perseguitare, uccidere e confinare," &C 1
If now it is said of one man, " He has a good heart,
though a bad head," but of another, " He has a very good
head, yet a bad heart," every one feels that in the first case
the praise far outweighs the blame in the other case the
reverse. Answering to this, we see that if some one has
done a bad deed his friends and he himself try to remove
the guilt from the will to the intellect, and to give out that
1 By those who place mind and dence of everything else his memory
learning above all other human can never be execrated enough. He
qualities this man will be reckoned was the cruelest of the citizens in
the greatest of his century. But persecuting, putting to death, and
by those who let virtue take prece- banishing.
448 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
faults of the heart were faults of the head ; roguish tricks
they will call errors, will say they were merely want of
understanding, want of reflection, light-mindedness, folly ;
nay, if need be, they will plead a paroxysm, momentary
mental aberration, and if a heavy crime is in question,
even madness, only in order to free the will from the guilt
And in the same way, we ourselves, if we have caused
a misfortune or injury, will before others and ourselves
willingly impeach our stultitia, simply in order to escape
the reproach of malitia. In the same way, in the case of
the equally unjust decision of the judge, the difference,
whether he has erred or been bribed, is so infinitely great.
All this sufficiently proves that the will alone is the real
and essential, the kernel of the man, and the intellect
is merely its tool, which may be constantly faulty without
the will being concerned. The accusation of want of
understanding is, at the moral judgment-seat, no accusa-
tion at all ; on the contrary, it even gives privileges.
And so also, before the courts of the world, it is every-
where sufficient to deliver a criminal from all punishment
that his guilt should be transferred from his will to his
intellect, by proving either unavoidable error or mental
derangement, for then it is of no more consequence than
if hand or foot had slipped against the will. I have fully
discussed this in the appendix, " Ueber die Intellektuelle
Freiheit" to my prize essay on the freedom of the will,
to which I refer to avoid repetition.
Everywhere those who are responsible for any piece of
work appeal, in the event of its turning out unsatisfac-
torily, to their good intentions, of which there was no
lack. Hereby they believe that they secure the essential,
that for which they are properly answerable, and their
true self ; the inadequacy of their faculties, on the other
hand, they regard as the want of a suitable tool.
If a man is stupid, we excuse him by saying that he
cannot help it ; but if we were to excuse a bad man on
the same grounds we would be laughed at. And yet the
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNBSS. 449
one, like the other, is innate. This proves that the will is
' the man proper, the intellect merely its tool.
Thus it is always only our willing that is regarded as
depending upon ourselves, i.e., as the expression of our
true nature, and for which we are therefore made respon-
sible. Therefore it is absurd and unjust if we are taken
to task for our beliefs, thus for our knowledge: for we
are obliged to regard this as something which, although it
changes in us, is as little in our power as the events of the
external world. And here, also, it is clear that the will
alone is the inner and true nature of man ; the intellect, on
the contrary, with its operations, which go 011 as regularly
as the external world, stands to the will in the relation of
something external to it, a mere tool.
High mental capacities have always been regarded as
the gift of nature or the gods ; and on that account they
have been called Gaben, Begdbung, ingenii dotes, gifts (a
man highly gifted), regarding them as something different
from the man himself, something that has fallen to his lot
through favour. No one, on the contrary, has ever taken
this view of moral excellences, although they also are
innate; they have rather always been regarded as some-
thing proceeding from the man himself, essentially belong-
ing to him, nay, constituting his very self. But it follows
now from this that the will is the true nature of man ; the
intellect, on the other hand, is secondary, a tool, a gift.
Answering to this, all religions promise a reward beyond
life, in eternity, for excellences of the will or heart, but
none for excellences of the head or understanding. Virtue
expects its reward in that world ; prudence hopes for it
in this ; genius, again, neither in this world nor in that ;
it is its own reward. Accordingly the will is the eternal
j part, the intellect the temporal.
Connection, communion, intercourse among men is based,
as a rule, upon relations which concern the will, not upon
such as concern the intellect. The first kind of communion
may be called the material, the other the formal. Of the
VOL. 11. 2 F
450 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
former kind are the bonds of family and relationship, and
further, all connections that rest upon any common aim or
interest, such as that of trade or profession, of the corpora-
tion, the party, the faction, &c. In these it merely amounts
to a question of views, of aims; along with which there
may be the greatest diversity of intellectual capacity and
culture. Therefore not only can any one live in peace and
unity with any one else, but can act with him and be allied
to him for the common good of both. Marriage also is a
bond of the heart, not of the head. It is different, how-
ever, with merely formal communion, which aims only at
an exchange of thought ; this demands a certain equality
of intellectual capacity and culture. Great differences in
this respect place between man and man an impassable
gulf : such lies, for example, between a man of great mind
and a fool, between a scholar and a peasant, between a
courtier and a sailor. Natures as heterogeneous as this
have therefore trouble in making themselves intelligible
so long as it is a question of exchanging thoughts, ideas,
and views. Nevertheless close material friendship may
exist between them, and they may be faithful allies, con-
spirators, or men under mutual pledges. For in all that
concerns the will alone, which includes friendship, enmity,
honesty, fidelity, falseness, and treachery, they are perfectly
homogeneous, formed of the same clay, and neither mind
nor culture make any difference here; indeed here the
ignorant man often shames the scholar, the sailor the
courtier. For at the different grades of culture there are
the same virtues and vices, emotions and passions ; and
although somewhat modified in their expression, they very
soon mutually recognise each other even in the most
heterogeneous individuals, upon which the similarly dis-
posed agree and the opposed are at enmity.
Brilliant qualities of mind win admiration, but never
affection ; this is reserved for the moral, the qualities of
the character. Every one will choose as his friend the
honest, the good-natured, and even the agreeable, com-
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 451
plaisant man, who easily concurs, rather than the merely
able man. Indeed many will be preferred to the latter,
on account of insignificant, accidental, outward qualities
which just suit the inclination of another. Only the man
who has much mind himself will wish able men for his
society ; his friendship, on the other hand, he will bestow
with reference to moral qualities ; for upon this depends his
really high appreciation of a man in whom a single good
trait of character conceals and expiates great want of un-
derstanding. The known goodness of a character makes
us patient and yielding towards weaknesses of understand-
ing, as also towards the dulness and childishness of age.
A distinctly noble character along with the entire absence
of intellectual excellence and culture presents itself as
lacking nothing ; while, on the contrary, even the greatest
mind, if affected with important moral faults, will always
appear blamable. For as torches and fireworks become
pale and insignificant in the presence of the sun, so intel-
lect, nay, genius, and also beauty, are outshone and eclipsed
by the goodness of the heart. When this appears in a high
degree it can make up for the want of those qualities to
such an extent that one is ashamed of having missed them.
Even the most limited understanding, and also grotesque
ugliness, whenever extraordinary goodness of heart declares
itself as accompanying them, become as it were transfigured,
outshone by a beauty of a higher kind, for now a wisdom
speaks out of them before which all other wisdom must
be dumb. For goodness of heart is a transcendent quality ;
it belongs to an order of things that reaches beyond this
life, and is incommensurable with any other perfection.
When it is present in a high degree it makes the heart so
large that it embraces the world, so that now everything
lies within it, no longer without ; for it identifies all natures
with its own. It then extends to others also that bound-
less indulgence which otherwise each one only bestows on
lself. Such a man is incapable of becoming angry ; even
the malicious mockery and sneers of others have drawn
452 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
attention to his own intellectual or physical faults, he only
reproaches himself in his heart for having been the occa-
sion of such expressions, and therefore, without doing vio-
lence to his own feelings, proceeds to treat those persons
in the kindest manner, confidently hoping that they will
turn from their error with regard to him, and recognise
themselves in him also. What is wit and genius against
this ? what is Bacon of Verulam ?
Our estimation of our own selves leads to the same
result as we have here obtained by considering our esti-
mation of others. How different is the self-satisfaction
which we experience in a moral regard from that which
we experience in an intellectual regard ! The former
arises when, looking back on our conduct, we see that with
great sacrifices we have practised fidelity and honesty,
that we have helped many, forgiven many, have behaved
better to others than they have behaved to us ; so that we
can say with King Lear, "lama man more sinned against
than sinning ; " and to its fullest extent if perhaps some
noble deed shines in our memory. A deep seriousness
will accompany the still peace which such a review affords
us ; and if we see that others are inferior to us here, this
will not cause us any joy, but we will rather deplore it,
and sincerely wish that they were as we are. How entirely
differently does the knowledge of our intellectual superio-
rity affect us ! Its ground bass is really the saying of
Hobbes quoted above : Omnis animi voluptas, omnisque
alacritas in eo sita est, quod quis habeat, quibuscum conferens
8e, possit magnifice sentire de se ipso. Arrogant, triumphant
vanity, proud, contemptuous looking down on others, in-
ordinate delight in the consciousness of decided and con-
siderable superiority, akin to pride of physical advantages,
that is the result here. This opposition between the
two kinds of self-satisfaction shows that the one concerns
our true inner and eternal nature, the other a more exter-
nal, merely temporal, and indeed scarcely more than a mere
physical excellence. The intellect is in fact simply the
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 453
function of the brain; the will, on the contrary, is that whose
function is the whole man, according to his being and nature.
If, looking without us, we reflect that o /3to? /3pa^v?, 17
Se re^vv fiatcpa (vita brevis, ars longa), and consider how
the greatest and most beautiful minds, often when they
have scarcely reached the summit of their power, and the
greatest scholars, when they have only just attained to a
thorough knowledge of their science, are snatched away
by death, we are confirmed in this, that the meaning and
end of life is not intellectual but moral.
The complete difference between the mental and moral
1 qualities displays itself lastly in the fact that the intellect
suffers very important changes through time, while the
will and character remain untouched by it. The new-
born child has as yet no use of its understanding, but
obtains it within the first two months to the extent of
perception and apprehension of the things in the external
world a process which I have described more fully in my
essay, " Ueber das Sehn und die Farben," p. 10 of the
second (and third) edition. The growth of reason to the
point of speech, and thereby of thought, follows this first
and most important step much more slowly, generally
only in the third year; yet the early childhood remains
hopelessly abandoned to silliness and folly, primarily
because the brain still lacks physical completeness, which,
both as regards its size and texture, it only attains in the
seventh year. But then for its energetic activity there is
still wanting the antagonism of the genital system; it
therefore only begins with puberty. Through this, how-
ever, the intellect has only attained to the capacity for its
psychical improvement ; this itself can only be won by
practice, experience, and instruction. Thus as soon as the
mind has escaped from the folly of childhood it falls into
the snares of innumerable errors, prejudices, and chimeras,
sometimes of the absurdest and crudest kind, which it
obstinately sticks to, till experience gradually removes
them, and many of them also are insensibly lost. All
454 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
this takes many years to happen, so that one grants it
majority indeed soon after the twentieth year, yet has
placed full maturity, years of discretion, not before the
fortieth year. But while this psychical education, rest-
ing upon help from without, is still in process of growth,
the inner physical energy of the brain already begins to
sink again. This has reached its real calminating point
about the thirtieth year, on account of its dependence upon
the pressure of blood and the effect of the pulsation upon
the brain, and through this again upon the predominance
of the arterial over the venous system, and the fresh ten-
derness of the brain fibre, and also on account of the energy
of the genital system. After the thirty-fifth year a slight
diminution of the physical energy of the brain becomes
noticeable, which, through the gradually approaching pre-
dominance of the venous over the arterial system, and also
through the increasing firmer and drier consistency of the
brain fibre, more and more takes place, and would be much
more observable if it were not that, on the other hand, the
psychical perfecting, through exercise, experience, increase
of knowledge, and acquired skill in the use of it, counter-
acts it an antagonism which fortunately lasts to an ad-
vanced age, for the brain becomes more and more like a
worn-out instrument. But yet the diminution of the
original energy of the intellect, resting entirely upon
organic conditions, continues, slowly indeed, but unceas-
ingly : the faculty of original conception, the imagination,
the plastic power, the memory, become noticeably weaker ;
and so it goes on step by step downwards into old age,
garrulous, without memory, half-unconscious, and ulti-
mately quite childish.
The will, on the contrary, is not affected by all this
becoming, this change and vicissitude, but is from begin-
ning to end unalterably the same. Willing does not
require to be learned like knowing, but succeeds perfectly
at once. The new-born child makes violent movements,
rages, and cries ; it wills in the most vehement manner,
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 455
though it does not yet know what it wills. For the
medium of motives, the intellect, is not yet fully de-
veloped. The will is in darkness concerning the external
world, in which its objects lie, and now rages like a
prisoner against the walls and bars of his dungeon. But
little by little it becomes light : at once the fundamental
traits of universal human willing, and, at the same time,
the individual modification of it here present, announce
themselves. The already appearing character shows itself
indeed at first in weak and uncertain outline, on account
of the defective service of the intellect, which has to
present it with motives ; but to the attentive observer it
soon declares its complete presence, and in a short time it
becomes unmistakable. The characteristics appear which
last through the whole of life ; the principal tendencies of
the will, the easily excited emotions, the ruling passion,
declare themselves. Therefore the events at school stand
to those of the future life for the most part as the dumb-
show in " Hamlet" that precedes the play to be given at the
court, and foretells its content in the form of pantomime,
stands to the play itself. But it is by no means possible
to prognosticate in the same way the future intellectual
capacities of the man from those shown in the boy ; rather
as a rule the ingenia prcecocia, prodigies, turn out block-
heads ; genius, on the contrary, is often in childhood of
slow conception, and comprehends with difficulty, just
because it comprehends deeply. This is how it is that
every one relates laughing and without reserve the follies
and stupidities of his childhood. For example, Goethe,
how he threw all the kitchen crockery out of the window
(Dichtung und Wahrheit, vol. i. p. 7) ; for we know that
all this only concerns what changes. On the other hand,
a prudent man will not favour us with the bad features,
the malicious or deceitful actions, of his youth, for he feels
that they also bear witness to his present character. I
have been told that when Gall, the phrenologist and
investigator of man, had to put himself into connection
456 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
with a man as yet unknown to him, he used to get him to
speak about his youthful years and actions, in order, if
possible, to gather from these the distinctive traits of his
character ; because this must still be the same now. This
is the reason why we are indifferent to the follies and
want of understanding of our youthful years, and even
look back on them with smiling satisfaction, while the
bad features of character even of that time, the ill-natured
actions and the misdeeds then committed exist even in old
age as inextinguishable reproaches, and trouble our con-
sciences. Now, just as the character appears complete, so
it remains unaltered to old age. The advance of age, which
gradually consumes the intellectual powers, leaves the
moral qualities untouched. The goodness of the heart
still makes the old man honoured and loved when his
head already shows the weaknesses which are the com-
mencement of second childhood. Gentleness, patience,
honesty, veracity, disinterestedness, philanthropy, &c, re-
main through the whole life, and are not lost through the
weaknesses of old age ; in every clear moment of the worn-
out old man they come forth undiminished, like the sun
from the winter clouds. And, on the other hand, malice,
spite, avarice, hard-heartedness, infidelity, egoism, and
baseness of every kind also remain undiminished to our
latest years. We would not believe but would laugh at
any one who said to us, " In former years I was a mali-
cious rogue, but now I am an honest and noble-minded
man." Therefore Sir Walter Scott, in the " Fortunes of
Nigel," has shown very beautifully, in the case of the old
usurer, how burning avarice, egoism, and injustice are still
in their full strength, like a poisonous plant in autumn,
when the intellect has already become childish. The only
alterations that take place in our inclinations are those
which result directly from the decrease of our physical
strength, and with it of our capacities for enjoyment.
Thus voluptuousness will make way for intemperance, the
love of splendour for avarice, and vanity for ambition;
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 457
just like the man who before he has a beard will wear a
false one, and later, when his own beard has become grey,
will dye it brown. Thus while all organic forces, muscu-
lar power, the senses, the memory, wit, understanding,
genius, wear themselves out, and in old age become dull,
the will alone remains undecayed and unaltered : the
strength and the tendency of willing remains the same.
Indeed in many points the will shows itself still more
decided in age : thus, in the clinging to life, which, it is
well known, increases ; also in the firmness and persistency
with regard to what it has once embraced, in obstinacy ;
which is explicable from the fact that the susceptibility of
the intellect for other impressions, and thereby the move-
ment of the will by motives streaming in upon it, has
diminished. Hence the implacable nature of the anger
and hate of old persons
u The young man's wrath is like light straw on fire,
But like red-hot steel is the old man's ire."
Old Ballad.
From all these considerations it becomes unmistakable
to the more penetrating glance that, while the intellect has
to run through a long series of gradual developments, but
then, like everything physical, must encounter decay, the
will takes no part in this, except so far as it has to con-
tend at first with the imperfection of its tool, the intellect,
and, again, at last with its worn-out condition, but itself
appears perfect and remains unchanged, not subject to
the laws of time and of becoming and passing away in it.
Thus in this way it makes itself known as that which
is metaphysical, not itself belonging to the phenomenal
world.
9. The universally used and generally very well under-
stood expressions heart and head have sprung from a true
feeling of the fundamental distinction here in question ;
therefore they are also apt and significant, and occur in
all languages. Nee cor nee caput habet, says Seneca of the
Emperor Claudius (Zudus de morte Claudii Ccesaris, c. 8).
458 SECOND BOOK. CHAPTER XIX.
The heart, this primum mobile of the animal life, has
with perfect justice been chosen as the symbol, nay, the
synonym, of the will, as the primary kernel of our pheno-
menon, and denotes this in opposition to the intellect,
which is exactly identical with the head. All that, in the
widest sense, is matter of the will, as wish, passion, joy,
grief, goodness, wickedness, also what we are wont to
understand under " Gemiith," and what Homer expresses
through (f)t\ov rjrop, is attributed to the heart. Accord-
ingly we say : He has a bad heart ; his heart is in the
thing ; it comes from his heart ; it cut him to the
heart ; it breaks his heart ; his heart bleeds ; the
heart leaps for joy ; who can see the heart of man ? it
is heart-rending, heart-crushing, heart-breaking, heart-
inspiring, heart - touching ; he is good-hearted, hard-
hearted, heartless, stout-hearted, faint-hearted, &c. &c.
Quite specially, however, love affairs are called affairs of
the heart, affaires de coeur ; because the sexual impulse is
the focus of the will, and the selection with reference to it
constitutes the chief concern of natural, human volition,
the ground of which I shall show in a full chapter sup-
plementary to the fourth book. Byron in " Don Juan,"
c. xl v. 34, is satirical about love being to women an affair
of the head instead of an affair of the heart On the other
hand, the head denotes everything that is matter of know-
ledge. Hence a man of head, a good head, a fine head, a
bad head, to lose one's head, to keep one's head upper-
most, &c. Heart and head signifies the whole man. But
the head is always the second, the derived ; for it is not
the centre but the highest efflorescence of the body.
When a hero dies his heart is embalmed, not his brain ;
on the other hand, we like to preserve the skull of the
poet, the artist, and the philosopher. So Raphael's skull
was preserved in the Academia di S. Luca at Rome, though
it has lately been proved not to be genuine ; in Stockholm
in 1820 the skull of Descartes was sold by auction. 1
1 The Times of 18th October 1845 ; from the Athenceum.
ON THE WILL IN SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS. 459
A true feeling of the real relation between will, in-
tellect, and life is also expressed in the Latin language.
The intellect is mens, vov