And that is the general conclusion with regard to Nature to which we are driven. The physical world is the relation between physical things. And the relation, on the one side, presupposes them as physical, while apart from it, on the other side, they certainly are not so. Nature is the phenomenal relation of the unknown to the unknown; and the terms cannot, because unknown, even be said to be related, since they cannot themselves be said to be anything at all. Let us develope this further.
That the outer world is only for my organs ap- pears inevitable. But what is an organ except so far as it is known? And how can it be known but as itself the state of an organ? If then you are asked to find an organ which is a physical object, you can no more find it than a body which itself is a body. Each is a state of something else, which is never more than a state — and the something escapes us. The same consequence, again, is palpable if we take refuge in the brain. If the world is my brain- state, then what is my own brain? That is nothing but the state of some brain, I need not proceed to ask whose.1 It is, in any case, not real as a physical thing, unless you reduce it to the adjective of a physical thing. And this illusive quest goes on for ever. It can never lead you to what is more than either an adjective of, or a relation between, — what you cannot find.
There is no escaping from this circle. Let us take the instance of a double perception of touch, a and 5. Then a is only a state of the organ C, and b is only a state of the organ D. And if you wish to say that either C or D is itself real as a body, you can only do so on the witness of another organ E or F. You 1 For me my own brain in the end must be a state of my own NATURE. 265 can in no case arrive at a something material ex- isting as a substantive; you are compelled to wander without end from one adjective to another adjective. And in double perception the twofold evidence does not show that each side is body. It leads to the conclusion that neither side is more than a dependant, on we do not know what.
And if we consult common experience, we gain no support for one side of our antinomy. It is clear that, for the existence of our organism, we find there the same evidence as for the existence of outer objects. We have a witness which, with our body, gives us the environment as equally real. For we never, under any circumstances, are without some external sensation. If you receive, in the ordinary sense, the testimony of our organs, then, if the outer world is not real, our organs are not real. You have both sides given as on a level, or you have neither side at all. And to say that one side is the sub- stantive, to which the other belongs, as an appendage or appurtenance, seems quite against reason. We are, in brief, confirmed in the conclusion we had reached. Both Nature and my body exist neces- sarily with and for one another. And both, on examination, turn out to be nothing apart from their relation. We find in each no essence which is not infected by appearance to the other.
And with this we are brought to an unavoidable result1 The physical world is an appearance; it is phenomenal throughout. It is the relation of two unknowns, which, because they are unknown, we cannot have any right to regard as really two, or as related at all. It is an imperfect way of appre- hension, which gives us qualities and relations, each the condition of and yet presupposing the* other.
1 This result (the reader must remember) rests, not merely on the above, but on the discussions of our First Book. The titles of some chapters there should be a sulii* tent reference.
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And we have no means of knowing how this confu- sion and perplexity is resolved in the Absolute. The material world is an incorrect, a one-sided, and self-contradictory appearance of the Real. It is the reaction of two unknown things, things, which, to be related, must each be something by itself, and yet, apart from their relation, are nothing at all. In other words it is a diversity which, as we regard it, is not real, but which somehow, in all its fulness, enters into and perfects the life of the Universe. But, as to the manner in which it is included, we are unable to say anything.
But is this circular connexion, this baseless inter- relation between the organism and Nature, a mis- take to be set aside? Most emphatically not so, for it seems a vital scheme, and a necessary way of happening among our appearances. It is an ar- rangement among phenomena by which the ex- tended only comes to us in relation with another extended which we call an organism. You cannot have certain qualities, of touch, or sight, or hearing, unless there is with them a certain connection of other qualities. Nature has phenomenal reality as a grouping and as laws of sequence and co-existence, holding good within a certain section of that which appears to us. But, if you attempt to make it more, you will re-enter those mazes from which we found no exit. You are led to take the physical world as a mere adjective of my body, and you find that my body, on the other hand, is not one whit more substantival. It is itself for ever the state of something further and beyond. And, as we per- ceived in our First Book, you can neither take the qualities, that are called primary, as real without the secondary, nor again the latter as existing apart from my feeling. These are all distinctions which, as we saw, are reduced, and which come together in the one great totality of absolute experience. They are lost there for our vision, but survive most NATURE. 267 assuredly in that which absorbs them. Nature is but one part of the feeling whole, which we have separated by our abstraction, and enlarged by theo- retical necessity and contrivance. And then we set up this fragment as self-existing; and what is some- times called " science " goes out of its way to make a gross mistake. It takes an intellectual construc- tion of the conditions of mere appearance for inde- pendent reality. And it would thrust this fiction on us as the one thing which has solid being. But thus it turns into sheer error a relative truth. It discredits that which, as a working point of view, is fully justified by success, and stands high above criticism.
We have seen, so far, that mere Nature is not real. Nature is but an appearance within the re- ality; it is a partial and imperfect manifestation of the Absolute. The physical world is an abstraction, which, for certain purposes is properly considered by itself, but which, if taken as standing in its own right, becomes at once self-contradictory. We must now develope this general view in some part of its detail.
But, before proceeding, I will deal with a point of some interest We, so far, have treated the physical world as extended, and a doubt may be raised whether such an assumption can be justified. Extension, I may be told, is not essential to Nature; for the extended need not always be physical, nor again the physical always extended. And it is bet- ter at once to attempt to get clear on this point. It is, in the first place, quite true that not all of the ex- tended forms part of Nature. For I may think of, and may imagine, things extended at my pleasure, and it is impossible to suppose that all these psych- ical facts take a place within our physical system. Yet, upon the other hand, I do not see how we can deny their extension. That which for my mind is 268 REALITY.
extended, must be so as a fact, whether it does, or does not, belong to what we call Nature. Take, for example, some common illusion of sense. In that we actually may have a perception of extension, and to call this false does not show that it is not some- how spatial. But, if so, Nature and extension will not coincide. Hence we are forced to seek the dis- tinctive essence of Nature elsewhere, and in some non-spatial character.
In its bare principle I am able to accept this con- clusion. The essence of Nature is to appear as a region standing outside the psychical, and as (in some part) suffering and causing change independent of that. Or, at the very least, Nature must not be always directly dependent on soul. Nature presup- poses the distinction of the not-self from the self. It is that part of the world which is not inseparably one thing in experience with those internal groups which feel pleasure and pain. It is the attendant medium by which selves are made manifest to one another. But it shows an existence and laws not be- longing to these selves; and, to some extent at least, it appears indifferent to their feelings, and thoughts, and volitions. It is this independence which would seem to be the distinctive mark of Nature.
And, if so, it may be urged that Nature is per- haps not extended, and I think we must admit that such a Nature is possible. We may imagine groups of qualities, for example sounds or smells, arranged in such a way as to appear independent of the psych- ical. These qualities might seem to go their own ways without any, or much, regard to our ideas or likings; and they might maintain such an order as to form a stable and permanent not-self. These groups, again, might serve as the means of communication between souls, and, in short, might answer every known purpose for which Nature exists. Even as things are, when these secondary qualities are local- ized in outer space, we regard them as physical; NATURE. 269 and there is a doubt, therefore, whether any such localization is necessary. And, for myself, I am unable to perceive that it is so. Certainly, if I try to imagine an unextended world of this kind, I ad- mit that, against my will, I give it a spatial character. But, so far as I see, this may arise from mere in- firmity; and the idea of an unextended Nature seems, for my knowledge at least, not self-contra- dictory.
But, having gone as far as this, I am unable to go farther. A Nature without extension I admit to be possible, but I can discover no good reason for tak- ing it as actual. For the physical world, which we encounter, is certainly spatial; and we have no in- terest in trying to seek out any other. If Nature on our view were reality, the case would be altered; and we should then be forced to entertain every doubt about its essence. But for us Nature is ap- pearance, inconsistent and untrue; and hence the supposition of another Nature, free from extension, could furnish no help. This supposition does not remove the contradictions - from actual extension, which in any case is still a fact. And, again, even within itself, the supposition cannot be made con- sistent with itself. We may, therefore, pass on with- out troubling ourselves with such a mere possibility. We cannot conclude that all Nature essentially must have extension. But, since at any rate our physical world is extended, and since the hypothesis of another kind of Nature has no interest, that idea may be dismissed. I shall henceforth take Nature as appearing always in the form of space.1 Let us return from this digression. We are to 1 I may perhaps add that " resistance " is no sufficient answer to the question " What is Nature? " A persisting idea may in the fullest sense u resist "; but can we find in that the essence of what we mean by the physical world? The claims of "resist ance " have, however, been disposed of already, pp. 1 16, 225, 263.
270 REALITY.
consider Nature as possessed of extension, and we have seen that mere Nature has no reality. We may now proceed to a series of subordinate ques- tions, and the first of these is about the world which is called inorganic. Is there in fact such a thing as inorganic Nature? Now, if by this we meant a region or division of existence, not subserving and entering into the one experience of the Whole, the question already would have been settled. There cannot exist an arrangement which fails to perfect, and to minister directly to, the feeling of the Abso- lute. Nor again, since in the Absolute all comes together, could there be anything inorganic in the sense of standing apart from some essential relation to finite organisms. Any such mutilations as these have long ago been condemned, and it is in another sense that we must inquire about the inorganic.
By an organism we are to understand a more or less permanent arrangement of qualities and rela- tions, such as at once falls outside of, and yet imme- diately subserves, a distinct unity of feeling. We are to mean a phenomenal group with which a felt particularity is connected in a way to be discussed in the next chapter. At least this is the sense in which, however incorrectly, I am about to use the word. The question, therefore, here will be whether there are elements in Nature, which fail to make a part of some such finite arrangement. The inquiry is intelligible, but for metaphysics it seems to have no importance.
The question in the first place, I think, cannot be answered. For, if we consider it in the abstract, I find no good ground for either affirmation or denial. I know no reason why in the Absolute there should not be qualities, which fail to be connected, as a body, with some finite soul. And, upon the other hand, I see no special cause for supposing that these exist. And when, leaving the abstract point of view, we regard this problem from the side of con- NATURE. 271 crete iacts, then, so far as I perceive, we are able to make no advance. For as to that which can, and that which cannot, play the part of an organism, we know very little. A sameness greater or less with our own bodies is the basis from which we conclude to other bodies and souls. And what this inference loses in exactitude (Chapter xxi.), it gains on the other hand in extent, by acquiring a greater range of application. And it would seem almost impos- sible, from this ground, to produce a satisfactory negative result. A certain likeness of outward form, and again some amount of similarity in action, are what we stand on when we argue to psychical life. But our failure, on the other side, to discover these symptoms is no sufficient warrant for positive de- nial.1 There may surely beyond our knowledge be strange arrangements of qualities, which serve as the condition of unknown personal unities. Given a certain degree of difference in the outward form, and a certain divergence in the way of manifestation, and we should fail at once to perceive the presence of an organism. But would it, therefore, always not exist? Or can we assume, because we have found out the nature of some organisms, that we have exhausted that of all? Have we an ascertained essence, outside of which no variation is possible? Any such contention would seem to be indefensible. Every fragment of visible Nature might, so far as is known, serve as part in some organism not like our bodies. And, if we consider further how much of Nature may be hid from our view, we shall surely be still less inclined to dogmatism. For that which we see may be combined in an organic unity with the invisible; and, again, one and the same element might have a position and function in any number of organisms. But there is no advantage in trying to fill the unknown with our fancies. It should be 1 It is natural in this connection to refer to Fechner's vigorous advocacy.
272 REALITY.
clear, when we reflect, that we are in no condition on this point to fix a limit to the possible.1 Ar- rangements, apparently quite different from our own, and expressing themselves in what seems a wholly unlike way, might be directly connected with finite centres of feeling. And our result here must be this, that, except in relation to our ignorance, we can- not call the least portion of Nature inorganic. For Some practical purposes, of course, the case is radi- cally altered. We of course there have a perfect right to act upon ignorance. We not only may, but even must, often treat the unseen as non-existent. But in metaphysics such an attitude cannot be justified.2 We, on one side, have positive know- ledge that some parts of Nature are organisms; but whether, upon the other side, anything inorganic exists or not, we have no means of judging. Hence to give an answer to our question is impossible.
But this inability seems a matter of no importance. For finite organisms, as we have seen, are but pheno- menal appearance, and both their division and their unity is transcended in the Absolute. And assured- ly the inorganic, if it exists, will be still more unreal. It will, in any case, not merely be bound in relation with organisms, but will, together with them, be in- cluded in a single and all-absorbing experience, It will become a feature and an element in that Whole where no diversity is lost, but where the oneness is something much more than organic. And with this I will pass on to a further inquiry.
We have seen that beyond experience nothing can exist, and hence no part of Nature can fall out- side of the Absolute's perfection. But the question as to the necessity of experience may still be raised 1 If we consider further the possibility of diverse material systems, and of the compenetrability of bodies within each system, we shall be even less disposed to dogmatize. See below, pp. 287, 289.
2 On the main principle see Chapter xxvii.
NATURE. 273 in a modified sense. Is there any Nature not ex- perienced by a finite subject? Can we suppose in the Absolute a margin of physical qualities, which, so to speak, do not pass through some finite perci- pient? Of course, if this is so, we cannot perceive them. But the question is whether, notwithstanding, we may, or even must, suppose that such a margin exists, (a) Is a physical fact, which is not /or some finite sentient being, a thing which is possible? And (6), in the next place, have we sufficient ground to take it also as real?
(a) In defence, first, of its possibility there is something to be said. " Admitted," we shall be told, " that relation to a finite soul is the condition under which Nature appears to us, it does not follow that this condition is indispensable. To assert that those very qualities, which we meet under certain conditions, can exist apart from them, is perhaps going too far. But, on the other side, some quali- ties of the sort we call sensible might not require (so to speak) to be developed on or filtered through a particular soul. These qualities in the end, like all the rest, would certainly, as such, be absorbed in the Absolute; but they (so to speak) might find their way to this end by themselves, and might not re- quire the mediation of a finite sentience." But this defence, it seems to me, is insufficient. We can think, in a manner, of sensible quality apart from a soul, but the doubt is whether such a manner is really legitimate. The question is, when we have abstracted from finite centres of feeling, whether we have not removed all meaning from sensible quality And again, if we admit that in the Absolute there may be matter not contained in finite experience, can we go on to make this matter a part of Nature, and call it physical? These two questions appear to be vitally distinct.
A margin of experience, not the experience of any finite centre, we shall find (Chapter xxvii.) can- 274 REALITY.
not be called impossible. But it seems another thing to place such matter in Nature. For Nature is constituted and upheld by a division in experience. It is, in its essence, a product of distinction and op- position. And to take this product as existing out- side finite centres seems indefensible. The Nature that falls outside, we must insist, may perhaps not be nothing, but it is not Nature. If it is fact, it is fact which we must not call physical.
But this whole enquiry, on the other hand, seems unimportant and almost idle. For, though unper- ceived by finite souls, all Nature would enter into one experience with the contents of these souls. And hence the want of apprehension by, and pas- sage through, a particular focus would lose in the end its significance. Thus, even if we admit fact, not included in finite centres of sentience, our view of the Absolute, after all, will not be altered. But such fact, we have seen, could not be properly phys- ical.
(6) A part of Nature, not apprehended by finite mind, we have found in some sense is barely possible. But we may be told now, on the other hand, that it is necessary to assume it. There are such difficul- ties in the way of any other conclusion that we may seem to have no choice. Nature is too wide, we may hear, to be taken in by any number of sentient beings. And again Nature is in part not perceptible at all. My own brain, while I am alive, is an ob- vious instance of this. And we may think further of the objects known only by the microscope, and of the bodies, intangible and invisible, assured to us by science. And the mountains, that endure always, must be more than the sensations of short-lived mortals, and indeed were there in the time before organic life was developed. In the face of these objections, it may be said, we are unable to persist. The necessity of finite souls for the existence of Nature cannot possibly be maintained. And NATURE. 275 hence a physical world, not apprehended by these perceiving centres, must somehow be postulated.
The objections at first may seem weighty, but I will endeavour to show that they cannot stand criticism. And I will begin by laying down a neces- sary distinction. The physical world exists, of course, independent of me, and does not depend on the accident of my sensations. A mountain is, whether I happen to perceive it or not This truth is certain; but, on the other hand, its meaning is ambiguous, and it may be taken in two very different senses. We may call these senses, if we please, categorical and hypothetical. You may either assert that the mountain always actually is, as it is when it is perceived. Or you may mean only that it is al- ways something apart from sensible perception; and that whenever it is perceived, it then developes its familiar character. And a confusion between the mountain, as it is in itself, and as it becomes for an observer, is perhaps our most usual state of mind. But such an obscurity would be fatal to the present enquiry.
(i.) I will take the objections, first, as applying to what we have called the categorical sense. Nature must be in itself, as we perceive it to be; and, if so, Nature must fall partly beyond finite minds — this is, so far, the argument urged against our view. But this argument surely would be based upon our mere ignorance. For we have seen that organisms unlike our own, arrangements pervading and absorbing the whole extent of Nature, may very well exist. And as to the modes of perception which are possible with these organisms, we can lay down no limit. But if so, there is no reason why all Nature should not be always in relation to finite sentience. Every part of it may be now actually, for some other mind, precisely what it would be for us, if we happened to perceive it And objects invisible like my brain, or found only by the microscope, need not cause us to 276 REALITY.
276 REALITY.
hesitate. For we cannot deny that there may be some faculty of sense to which at all times they are obvious. And the mountains that endure may, for all that we know, have been visible always. They may have been perceived through their past as we perceive them to-day. If we can set no bounds to the existence and the powers of sentient beings, the objection, so far, has been based on a false assump- tion of knowledge.1 (ii.) But this line of reply, perhaps, may be carried too far. It cannot be refuted, and yet we feel that it tends to become extravagant. It may be possible that Nature throughout is perceived always, and thus always is, as we should perceive it; but we need not rest our whole weight on this assumption. Our conclusion will be borne out by something less. For beyond the things perceived by sense there ex- tends the world of thought. Nature will not merely be the region that is presented and also thought of, but it will, in addition, include matter which is only thought of. Nature will hence be limited solely by the range of our intellects. It will be the phy- sical universe apprehended in any way whatever by finite souls.
Outside of this boundary there is no Nature. We may employ the idea of a pre-organic time, or of a physical world from which all sentience has dis- appeared. But, with the knowledge that we possess, we cannot, even in a relative sense, take this result as universal. It could hold only with respect to those organisms which we know, and, if carried fur- ther, it obviously becomes invalid. And again, such a truth, where it is true, can be merely phenomenal. For, in any case, there is no history or progress in the Absolute (Chapter xxvi). A Nature without sentience is, in short, a mere construction for science, 1 " Tis ignorance that makes a barren waste ' Of all beyond itself."
NATURE. 277 and it possesses a very partial reality.1 Nor are the imperceptibles of physics in any better case. Apart from the plain contradictions which prove them to be barely phenomenal, their nature clearly exists but in relation to thought. For, not being perceived by any finite, they are not, as such, perceived at all; and what reality they possess is not sensible, but merely abstract.
Our conclusion then, so far, will be this. Nature may extend beyond the region actually perceived by the finite, but certainly not beyond the limits of finite thought In the Absolute possibly there is a mar- gin not contained in finite experiences (Chapter xxvii.), but this possible margin cannot properly be taken as physical. For, included in Nature, it would be qualified by a relation to finite mind. But the existence of Nature, as mere thought, at once leads to a difficulty. For a physical world, to be real, must clearly be sensible. And to exist other- wise than for sense is but to exist hypothetically. If so, Nature, at least in part, is not actually Nature, but merely is what becomes so under certain con- ditions. It seems another fact, a something else, which indeed we think of, but which, merely in itself and merely as we think of it, is not physical reality. Thus, on our view, Nature to this extent seems not to be fact; and we shall have been driven, in the end, to deny part of its physical existence.
This conclusion urged against us, I admit, is in one sense inevitable. The Nature that is thought of, and that we assume not to be perceived by any mind, is, in the strict sense, not Nature.2 Yet such a result, rightly interpreted, need cause us no trouble. We shall understand it better when we have discussed the meaning of conditional existence (Chapter xxiv.); I will however attempt to deal 1 See more below, p. 283.
1 That is, of course, so long as Nature is confined to actual physical fact 2 78 REALITY.
here with the present difficulty. And what that comes to is briefly this. Nature on the one side must be actual, and if so, must be sensible; but, upon the other hand, it seems in part to be merely intelligible. This is the problem, and the solution is that what for us is intelligible only, is more for the Absolute. There somehow, we do not know how, what we think is perceived. Everything there is merged and re-absorbed in an experience intuitive, at once and in itself, of both ideas and facts.
What we merely think is not real, because in thinking there is a division of the " what " from the " that." But, none the less, every thought gives us actual content; and the presence of that content is fact, quite as hard as any possible perception. And so the Nature, that is thought of, to that extent does exist, and does possess a certain amount of positive character. Hence in the Absolute, where all con- tent is re- blended with existence, the Nature thought of will gain once more an intuitional form. It will come together with itself and with other sides of the Universe, and will make its special contribution to the riches of the Whole. It is not as we think of it, it is not as it becomes when in our experience thought is succeeded by perception. It is something which, only under certain conditions, turns to phy- sical fact revealed to our senses. But because in the Absolute it is an element of reality, though not known, as there experienced, to any finite mind, — because, again, we rightly judge it to be physical fact, if it became perceived by sense — therefore al- ready it is fact, hypothetical but still independent. Nature in this sense is not dependent on the fancies of the individual, and yet it has no content but what