them all, and propositions have been formed, of which we shall indicate the true significance in the proper places. Beginning at once and limit ing ourselves solely to the question of the exist ence of a peculiar practical form, it is easy to understand why it has so often been maintained against the intellectual and theoretical exclusivists, that the will consists, not of knowledge, but of feeling; that the principle of action, far from being an intellectual principle, is sentimental emotion; that in order to produce a volition, reason, ideas, and facts perceived do not suffice, but that it is necessary that all these things be transformed into feelings, which must take possession of the soul; that the base of life lived, that is, of practical life, is not thought, but feeling, and so on. With these formulae was recognized the peculiarity of the practical activity. The theory of feeling in respect of the practical represents progress as compared with the intellectualistic theory, because the appearance of indeterminateness is progress as compared with bad determinateness, and contains in itself the new and more complete determinateness.
Negation of But in this very way of ours of understanding the value of these formulae, is implied their ACTIVITY IN GENERAL 31 resolute negation, when they tend to persist, after having accomplished their function, and to maintain side by side with the theory of the practical a third general form of the spirit, namely feeling. No spiritual fact or manifestation of activity can be adduced, which, examined without superficiality, is not reducible to an act of fancy, intellect and perception, that is, of theory (when it is not at once revealed as an abstraction or as a merely psychological class of these acts); or to an act of utilitarian or ethical volition (when it is not here too a psychological class, variously designated as aspirations, passions, affections, and the like). Let him who will search his spirit and attempt to indicate one single act, differing from the above, as something new and original and deserving of the special denomina tion of feeling.
This constatation of fact (we repeat the its deductive exclusion.
warning) is but the first step in the complete philosophical demonstration, which demands that we show not only that a third form does not exist, but that it cannot exist. This demonstration will be given further on, and will coincide with that of the demonstration of the necessity of the two forms, theoretical and practical; a duality that is unity and a unity that is duality.
32 PHILOSOPHY OF PRACTICAL PT.I Recognizing the legitimacy of the demand for a philosophical deduction of the forms of the spirit, and therefore of a deductive exclusion of those that are spurious and wrongly adopted, it seems that if it be somewhat delayed, such a mode of exclusion will also yield clearer results.
Ill RELATION OF THE PRACTICAL TO THE THEORETIC ACTIVITY FREED from the equivocal third term, which is Precedence of ieelmg, and now passing to the problem of the activity. relation between the theoretical and the practical activity enunciated, (we must in the first place declare the thesis that the practical activity presupposes the theoretical. ) Will is impossible without knowledge; as is knowledge, so is will.
In recognizing this precedence of knowledge The unity of to will, (we do not wish to posit as thinkable the co-presence ,. of the practical.
a theoretical man or a theoretical moment altogether deprived of will, This would be an unreal abstraction, inadmissible in philosophy, which operates solely with real abstractions, that is, with universal concretes. The forms of the spirit are distinct and not separate, and when the spirit is found in one of its forms, or is explicit in it, the other forms are also in it, 33 34 PHILOSOPHY OF PRACTICAL FT.
but implicit, or, as is also said, concomitant, j If theoretical and cogne0£itive man were not at the same time volitional, he would not even be able to stand on his feet and look at the sky, and, literally speaking, if he were not alive, he would not be able to think (and thinking is both an act of life and an act of will, which is called attention). Were he not to will, he would be unable to pass from waking to sleep and from sleep to waking. (Thus in order to be purely theoretical, it is necessary to be at the same time in some degree practical; the energy of pure fancy and of pure thought springs from the trunk of volition. ) Hence the importance of the will for the aesthetic and intellectual life; the will is not theory, nor is it the force that makes grain to grow or guides the course of rivers, but as it assists the culture of grain or restrains the destructive impetus of rivers, so it assists and restrains the force of fancy and of thought, causing them to act in the best way, that is, to be as they really ought to be, namely, fancy and thought in their purest manifestation. The practical activity, therefore, acts in this way, and as it drags the man of science from his study and the artist from his studio, if it be necessary to defend his country or to watch at the bedside ACTIVITY IN GENERAL 35 of his sick father, so it commands the artist and the man of science to fulfil their special mission and to be themselves in an eminent degree.
All the arguments that have been used in the critique of past and.that are used in the present, to maintain the dependence of the theoretical upon the practical activity, are of value for what of truth they contain, that is, only to demonstrate this unity of the spiritual functions that we have recognized, and the indispensability of the voli tional force for the health of the cognoscitive spirit. But the passage from this thesis to the other, that the true is the production of the will, is nothing but a sophism, founded on the double signification of the word " production." It should be clear that to assist the work of thought with the will is one thing and that to substitute the will for the work of thought is another. To claim to substitute the will for the work of thought, is equivalent to the negation of that force that should be assisted; it is the most open proclamation of scepticism, the most com plete distrust of the true and of the possibility of attaining to it. This attempt is now called pragmatism, or is at any rate one of the meanings of the word, with which the school of the greatest confusion that has ever appeared in 36 PHILOSOPHY OF PRACTICAL PT.
philosophy adorns itself in our day. This school mixes together the most divergent theses — that of the stimulating effect that the will has upon thought, that other of the volitional or arbitrary moment, by means of which perceptions and historical data are reduced to abstract types in the natural disciplines, or postulates laid down for the construction of mathematical classes. The third form, which might be called the Baconian prejudice, maintains the exclusive utility of the natural sciences and mathematics for the well- being of life. The fourth thesis is positivistic: here it is maintained that we cannot know any thing save what we ourselves arbitrarily com press into the formula and classes of mathematics and of naturalism. The fifth thesis is a romantic exaggeration of the principle of creative power in man, substituting the caprice of the individual for the universal spirit. The sixth, something between silliness and Jesuistry, recommends the utility of making one's illusions and believing them to be true. The seventh is superstitious, occultist and spiritistic — and there are others that we omit. If pragmatism has had and preserves any attraction, it owes this to the truth of its first and second theses and to the half truth of the fifth. All the ithree are however heterogeneous ACTIVITY IN GENERAL 37 in themselves and unreconcilable with the others, which are most fallacious. But we repeat with the old philosophers that whoever in thinking says, ''Thus I will it," is lost for truth.
Certain reservations that are made to the critique of above truth from the point of view of that philo- objections. sophy, which we have called psychological, are scarcely deserving of brief mention. We find in treatises of Psychology that knowledge does pre cede the practical act, but only in the higher forms of volition, whereas in its lower forms are found only impulses, tendencies, appetites, al together blind of any knowledge. Thus they are able to talk of involuntary forms of the practical activity, of a will that is not a will, when once the true will has been defined, as precisely appetition illumined by previous know ledge. The blind will of certain metaphysicians is derived from such excogitations of psycho logists, who make of it a practical act without intelligence. They have here attributed the value of reality to a crude concept of class, a thing that happens not infrequently. A blind will is however unthinkable. Every form of the practical activity, be it as poor and rudimentary as you like (and let as many classes and gradations as you will be formed), presupposes knowledge 38 PHILOSOPHY OF PRACTICAL PT.
of some sort. In animals too? will be asked. In animals too, provided they be, and in so far as they are centres of life, and so of perceptions and of will. This is also true of vegetables and of minerals, always with the above hypothesis. We must banish every form of aristocracy from the Philosophy of the practical, as we have banished it from ^Esthetic, from Logic, from Historic, esteeming it most harmful to the proper understanding of those activities. The aristocratic illusion is closely allied to that one which makes us believe that we, shut up in the egotism of our empirical individuality, are alone aware of the truth, that we alone feel the beautiful, that we alone know how to love, and so on. But reality is democratic.
From the psychological point of view yet another objection has been raised. Knowledge (it is affirmed) cannot be the indispensable base of the will, if, as is the case, the ignorant are often far more effective than many learned men and philosophers. These latter, they say, although possessing very great knowledge, and no less a stock of good intentions, yet do not know how to direct their lives successfully. But it is evident that in these cases the so-called ignorant possess just that knowledge which is necessary for the ACTIVITY IN GENERAL 39 purpose and is lacking to the learned and to the philosopher, who would themselves be the ignorant in such a case. Nicholas Macchiavelli was ignorant as compared with Giovanni dalle Bande Nere, when he kept the spectators waiting two hours in the sun, while he was attempting to dispose three thousand infantry according to the directions that he had written. This he would never have succeeded in doing, had not Signer Giovanni, with the help of drummers and in the twinkling of an eye caused them to execute the various manoeuvres and afterwards carried Master Nicholas to dine, who, save for him, would hot have dined at all that day.1 The knowledge required for the practical act Nature of the theoretical is not that of the artist, nor of the philosopher, precedence of the practical: or rather, it is these two also, but only in so far historical knowledge.
as both are to be found as elements co-operating in that ultimate and complete knowledge which is historical. If the first be called intuition, the second concept, and the third perception, and the third be looked upon as the result of the two preceding, it will be said that the knowledge required for the practical act is perceptive. Hence the common saying that praises the sure eye of the practical man; hence, too, the close bond 1 Bandello, Novelle, i. 40, intro.
40 PHILOSOPHY OF PRACTICAL PT.
between historical sense and practical and political sense; hence, too, the justifiable diffidence of those who, unable to grasp effectual reality, hope to attain to it by force of mere syllogisms and abstractions, or believe that they have attained to it, when they have erected an imaginary edifice. They prove by so doing that they can never be practical men, at least in the sphere of action at which they are then aiming.
Such knowledge is not of itself the practical act. The historian as such is a contemplative, not a practical man or politician. If that spark which is volition, do not spring forth, the material of knowledge does not catch fire and is not transformed into the material of the practical. But that knowledge is the condition, and if the condition be not the conditioned, yet one cannot have the conditioned without the condition. In this last signification, it is true that action is knowledge, will, and wisdom, that is to say, in the sense that willing and acting presuppose knowledge and wisdom. In this sense, and considered solely in the stage of the cognos- citive investigation which will form the base of action, the deliberation is a theoretical fact. The customary expressions of logical, rational, judicious actions, are metaphors, because action ACTIVITY IN GENERAL 41 may be weak or energetic, coherent or in coherent; but it will not have those predicates which are proper to theoretical acts that precede actions, on which the metaphors aforesaid are founded. As are these acts, so originate the practical act, will, and action. We can act in so far as we have knowledge. Volition is not the surrounding world which the spirit perceives; it is a beginning, a new fact. But this fact has its roots in the surrounding world, this beginning is irradiated with the colours of things that man has perceived as a theoretical spirit, before he took action as a practical spirit.
It is important to observe, as much to pre- its continual changeability.
vent an equivoke into which many fall, as because of the consequences that will follow from holding it, that we must not look upon the perceptive knowledge of reality that surrounds us as a firm basis, upon which we act, by trans lating the formed volition into act. For were this so, we should have to assume that the surrounding world, perceived by the spirit, stops after the perceptive act, which is not the case. ;That world changes every second, the perceptive act perceives the new and the different, and the volitional act changes according to that real and perceived change. Percp^tion and volition PT.
Precedent.
Critiqite of concepts and practical judgments.
42 PHILOSOPHY OF PRACTICAL alternate every instant; in order to will, we must touch the earth at every instant, in order to resume force and direction. NO other Continuous perception and continuous change, theoretic that is the necessary theoretic condition of voli tion. It is necessary and unique. No other theoretical element is needed, because every other is contained in it, and beyond it no other is thinkable.
But if this be true and no other theoretic element save that precede the volition, then we find in the aforesaid theory the criticism of a series of other theories, generally admitted in the Philosophy of the practical, not less than in ordinary thought, none of which can be retained without alterations and corrections.
Or better, there are not so many various theories to criticize; there is rather one theory, which presents itself under different aspects and assumes various names. This theory consists substantially in affirming that with the complex of cognitions, of which we have hitherto treated (all of which are summed up in the historical judgment), we do not yet possess that one which is necessary, before we can proceed to volition and action. A special form of concepts and judgments which can be called practical, must, it is said, ACTIVITY IN GENERAL 43 appear; these render the will possible, by inter posing themselves between the previous merely historical judgment and the will. Is it not indubitable that we possess practical concepts, that is, concepts of classes of action or of supreme guides to action, concepts of things good, of ideals, of ends, and that we effect Judgments of value by the application of those concepts to the image of given actions? Is it not indubitable that those judgments and those concepts refer, not to the simple present fact, but to the future? How could we will, if we did not know what is good to will, and that a given possible action corre sponds to that concept of good?
Now it is undeniable that we in fact possess Posteriority of the above-mentioned concepts and judgments, the practical act.
But what we must absolutely deny is that they differ in any respect from other concepts and theo retical judgments, and that they deserve to be distinguished from these as practical and that they have the future for their object. The future, that which is not, is not an object of knowledge; the material of the judgment, whether it con cern actions or thoughts, does not alter its logical and theoretical character; the concepts of modes of action are concepts neither more nor less than those of modes of thought. With this 44 PHILOSOPHY OF PRACTICAL PT.
negation we at the same time deny the possibility of their interposing themselves between know ledge and will. Those judgments, far from being anterior to the will, are posterior to it.
Let us state a simple case and observe the course of analysis on the lines of the theory here criticized. It is winter-time; I am cold; there is a wood close by, and I know that by cutting wood one can light a fire and that fire gives heat: I therefore resolve to cut wood. According to that theory, the spiritual process would be ex pressed in the following chain of propositions: I know the actual situation, that is to say, that I am cold, that wood gives fire and fire heat, and that there exists wood that can be cut; I possess the concept that it is a good thing to provide for the health of the body; I judge that with heat I shall procure health during the winter, and that in consequence heat is a good thing and the cutting of wood, without which I cannot pro cure heat, is also good. Having made all these constatations, I set in motion the spring of my will, and I will to cut the wood. — The process as above described seems real and controllable by every one; but it is, on the contrary, illusory. The practical judgment: "I shall act well in cutting the wood" really means, "I will to cut the ACTIVITY IN GENERAL 45 wood; " " this is a good thing " really means, " I will this." I may change my will a moment after, substituting for this volition one that is different or contrary, that does not matter. At the moment that I formed that judgment, I must have seen myself in the volitional attitude of a man cutting wood; the will must have come first. Otherwise the judgment would never have existed. Given the first actual situation and its complete expres sion in the judgment, no other judgment can arise, if the actual situation do not change and nothing new supervene. This new thing is always my will, which, when the situation changes (as in the example, if I walk from the house to the tree, or if I simply move my body in an imperceptible manner in the direction of the action willed), by adding to the actual reality something that was not there before, provides material for a new judgment. This judgment is called practical, but it is theoretical, like the others that precede it; a judgment believed to precede the volition, whereas in reality it follows it; a judgment believed to condition a future act of will, whereas it is in reality the past act of will looking at itself \j in the glass; a judgment that is not really practical but historical.
The illusion that things happen differently is 46 PHILOSOPHY OF PRACTICAL FT.
caused by the fact that we possess judgments concerning our past volitions, which are after wards collected into abstract formulae, such as that "it is well to cut wood." But, on the one hand, those formulae and judgments are in their turn formed from previous volitions, and on the other, those formulae do not possess any absolute value in the single and concrete situation, so that they can be modified and substituted for others that affirm the opposite. The question is not whether cutting wood has been as a rule a good thing for me in the past, nor whether I have generally willed it in the past: the question is to will it at this moment, that is, to posit the cutting of wood at this moment as a good thing. Posteriority of As is the case with the pretended practical the practical the practical concepts. judgments and concepts of classes formed upon them, so the concepts that they imply, of things good> of ideals^ of ends, of actions worthy of being willed, and so on, do not precede, but follow the volition that has taken place. These concepts are the incipient reflection, scientific and philo sophical, upon the spontaneous acts of the will, and we cannot practise science nor philosophize save about facts that have already taken place: if the fact do not precede, there can be no theory. Certainly theory does not do other than ACTIVITY IN GENERAL 47 seek out the already created and give the real principles of actions in the form of thought principles, in the same manner as Logic dis covers those principles that live and operate in logical thought. But since the formula of the principle of contradiction is not necessary for thinking without contradiction, but presupposes it, so the concepts of ends, of things good, and of ideals are not necessary for volitions, but pre suppose them.
The thesis of the will as knowledge draws origin of intellectual! st support from the mistaken belief in the practical andsentimentalist principles and judgments that precede volition, as doctrines. also does the proposition that he who knows what is good for him also wishes it, and that he who does not wish it does not know it. This thesis is to be inverted, because to know what is good for one means that one has willed it. From the opposite point of view, the other thesis, of the impossibility of volition unless feeling be inter posed between what is known and the will, is to be attributed to a like mistaken belief. Feeling is held to give, as it were, a particular value to facts, and to cause them to be felt as they should be felt, or to be changed. The customary merit possessed by theories of feeling is to be recognized in this thesis: that is to say, it has awakened or 48 PHILOSOPHY OF PRACTICAL PT.
reawakened consciousness of the peculiarity of the practical act in respect to intellectualistic reductions and identifications. This merit is not altogether lacking to the general theory of practical judgments itself. These, although called judgments, were classified differently to all the others, precisely because they were practical. The concepts Having thus shown that it is not true that of end and means. man first knows the end and then wills it, it is possible to establish with greater precision what is to be understood by end. The end, then, in universal, is the concept itself of will. Con sidered in the single act, as this or that end, it is nothing but this or that determinate volition. Hence is also to be derived a better definition of its relation to the means, which it is usual to con ceive empirically and erroneously as a part of volition and action at the service of another part. An act of will is an infrangible unity and can be taken as divided only for practical convenience. In the volitional act, all is volition; nothing is means, and all is end. The means is nothing but the actual situation, from which the volitional act takes its start, and is in that way really distinguished from the end. Distinction and unification take place together, because, as has been remarked, the volition is not the situation, ACTIVITY IN GENERAL 49 yet, on the other hand, as the volition, so the situation: the one varies as a function of the other. Hence the absurdity of the maxim, that the end justifies the means. This maxim is of an empirical character and has sometimes been employed to justify actions erroneously held to be unjustifiable, and more often to make pass as just actions that were unjustifiable. As the end, so the means, but the means is what is given and has no need of justification. The end is what has been willed and must be justified in itself.
The idea that we generally have of finality is critique of ..11 the end as plan to be eliminated, owing to the continual change- or as fixed design.
ability of the means, that is, of the actual situation, which would posit the end as something fixed, as a plan to be carried out. The difference between the finality of man and that of nature has recently been made to reside in nature: which has seemed to act upon a plan which she changes, remakes, and accommodates at every moment, according to contingencies, so that the point of arrival is not for her predetermined or predeter- minable. But the same can be said of the human will and of its finality. The will too changes at every moment, as the movement of a swimmer or of an athlete changes at every moment, 50 PHILOSOPHY OF PRACTICAL PT.
according to the motion of the sea or of the rival athlete, and according to the varying measure or quality of his own strength in the course of the volitional process. Man acts, case for case and from instant to instant, realizing his will of every instant, not that abstract conception which is called a plan. Hence also arises the confirmation of the belief that there do not exist fixed types and models of actions. He who seeks and awaits such models and types does not know how to will. He is without that initiative, that creativeness, that genius, which is not less indispensable to the practical activity than to art and philosophy. The win and It will seem that the will thus becomes will of