of sense. And this brings us back to our old dis- tinction. Every truth must appear, and must subor- dinate existence; but this appearance is not the same thing as to be present, properly and as such, within given limits of sense-perception. With the general principles of science we may perhaps See this at once. And again, with regard to the neces- sary appearances of art or religion, the same con- clusion is evident. The eternal experience, in every case, fails to enter into the series of space or of time; or it enters that series improperly, and with a show which in various ways contradicts its essence. To be nearer the central heart of things is to domin- ate the extremities more widely; but it is not to appear there except incompletely and partially through a sign, an unsubstantial and a fugitive mode of expression. Nothing anywhere, not even the realized and solid moral "will, can either be quite real, as it exists in time, or can quite appear in its own essential character. But still the ultimate Reality, where all appearance as such is merged, is in the end the actual identity of idea and existence. And, throughout our world, whatever is individual is more real and true; for it contains within its own limits a wider region of the Absolute, and it possesses more intensely the type of self-sufficiency. Or, to put it otherwise, the interval between such an element and the Absolute is smaller. We should require less alteration, less destruction of its own special nature, in order to make this higher element completely real.
We may now pass from this general principle to notice various points of interest, and, in the first place, to consider some difficulties handed on to this chapter. The problems of unperceived Nature, of dispositions in the soul, and the meaning in general of " potential " existence, require our attention. And I must begin by calling attention to an error.
DEGREES OF TRUTH AND REALITY. 383 We have seen that an idea is more true in propor- tion as it approaches Reality. And it approaches Reality in proportion as it grows internally more complete. And from this we possibly might con- clude that thought, if completed as such, would itself be real; or that the ideal conditions, if fully there, would be the same as actual perfection. But such a conclusion would not hold; for we have found that mere thought could never, as such, be completed; and it therefore remains internally in- consistent and defective. And we have perceived, on the other side, that thought, completed, is forced to transcend itself. It has then to become one thing with sense and feeling. And, since these conditions of its perfection are partly alien to itself, we cannot say either that, by itself, it can arrive at completion, or that, when perfected, it, as such, any longer exists.
And, with this, we may advance to the considera- tion of several questions. We found (Chapter xxii.) that parts of the physical world might exist, and yet might exist, for us, only in the shape of thought. But we realized also that in the Absolute, where the contents of all finite selves are fused, these thought- existences must, in some way, be re-combined with sense. And the same conclusion held good also with psychical dispositions (Chapter xxiii.). These, in their proper character, have no being except in the world of thought For they, as we saw, are con- ditional; and the conditional, as such, has not actual existence. But once more here the ideas — how in detail we cannot say — must find their complement in the Whole. With the addition of this other side they will make part of the concrete Reality.
Our present chapter, perhaps, may have helped us to see more clearly on these points. For we have found that ideal conditions, to be complete and in this way to become real, must transcend themselves. They have to pass beyond the world 384 REALITY.
of mere thought. And we have seen, in the second place, that every idea must possess a certain amount both of truth and reality. The ideal content must appear in the region of existence; and we have found that we have no right ever to regard it as unreal, because it is unable, as such, to show itself and to occupy a place there. We may now apply this principle both to the capacities of the soul, and to the unseen part of Nature. The former cannot properly exist, and the latter (so far as we saw) certainly need not do so. We may consider them each to be, as such, incapable of appearance. But this admission (we now have learnt) does not weaken, by itself, their claim to be real. And the amount of their reality, when our standard is applied, will depend on their importance, on the influence and bearing which each of them possesses in the universe.
Each of them will fall under the head of " poten- tial existence," and we may pass on to consider the meaning of this phrase. The words " potential," and " latent," and " nascent," and we may add " vir- tual " and " tendency," are employed too often. They are used in order to imply that a certain thing exists; and this, although either we ought to know, or know, that the thing certainly does not exist. It would be hard to over-estimate the service rendered by these terms to some writers on philo- sophy. But that is not our business here. Potential existence means a set of conditions, one part of which is present at a certain point of space or time, while the other part remains ideal. It is used generally without any clear perception as to how much is wanted in order to make these conditions complete. And then the whole is spoken of, and is regarded, as existing at the point where actually but a portion of its factors are present. Such an abuse clearly is indefensible.
" Potential existence " is fairly applicable in the DEGREES OF TRUTH AND REALITY. 385 following sense. We may mean by it that something somehow appears already in a given point of time, although it does not as yet appear fully or in its own proper character. I will try to show later the positive conditions required for this use, but it is better to begin by pointing out where it is quite inadmissible. We ought not to speak of potential existence where, if the existence were made actual, the fact given now would be quite gone. That part of the conditions which appears at present, must pro- duce causally the rest; and, in order for this to hap- pen, foreign matter must be added. But, if so much is added that the individuality of this first appear- ance is wholly destroyed, or is even overwhelmed and swamped — "potential existence" is inapplicable. Thus the death of a man may result from the lodg- ment of a cherry-stone; but to speak of every cherry-stone as, therefore, the potential death of a man, and to talk of such a death as appearing already in any and every stone, would surely be extravagant. For so large an amount of foreign conditions must contribute to the result, that, in the end, the condition and the consequence are joined externally by chance. We may perhaps apprehend this more clearly by a grosser instance of misuse.
A piece of bread, eaten by a poet, may be a condi- tion required for the production of a lyrical poem. But would any one place such a poem's existence already virtually in each piece of food, which may be considered likely by any chance to make its wTay into a poet?
These absurdities may serve to suggest the pro per employment of our term. It is applicabl wherever the factor present is considered capable o producing the rest; and it must effect this without the entire loss of its own existing character. The individuality, in other words, must throughout the process be continuous; and the end must very largely be due to the beginning. And these are 386 REALITY.
386 REALITY.
two aspects of one principle. For clearly, if more than a certain amount of external conditions are brought in, the ideal identity of the beginning and of the end is destroyed. And, if so, obviously the result itself was not there at the first, and could in no rational sense have already appeared there. The ordinary example of the egg, which itself later be- comes a fowl, is thus a legitimate application of potential existence. On the other hand to call every man, without distinction, a potential case of scarlet fever, would at least border on inaccuracy. While to assert that he now is already such products as can be produced only by his own disintegration, would be obviously absurd. Potential existence can, in brief, be used only where "development" or "evolution" retains its proper meaning. And by the meaning of evolution I do not understand that arbitrary mis- use of the term, which has been advocated by a so-called " System of Philosophy."
Under certain conditions, then, the idea of poten- tial being may be employed. But I must add at once that it can be employed nowhere with complete truth and accuracy. For, in order for anything to evolve itself, outer conditions must come in; and it is impossible in the end to assign a limit to the extent of this foreign matter. The genuine cause always must be the whole cause, and the whole cause never could be complete until it had taken in the universe.1 This is no mere speculative refine- ment, but a difficulty experienced in working; and we met it lately while enquiring into the body and soul (Chapter xxiii.). In strictness you can never assert that a thing will be, because of that which it is; but, where you cannot assert this, potential existence is partly inaccurate. It must be applied more or less vaguely, and more or less on suffer- ance. We are, in brief, placed between two dangers. If, with anything finite, you refuse wholly to pre- 1 And this is impossible. See Chapters vi. and xviii.
DEGREES OF TRUTH AND REALITY. 387 dicate its relations — relations necessarily in part external, and in part, therefore, variable — then your account of this thing will fall short and be empty. But, otherwise, you will be affirming of the thing that which only it may be.
And, once driven to enter on this course, you are hurried away beyond all landmarks. You are forced indefinitely to go on expanding the subject of your predicates, until at last it has disappeared into something quite different. And hence, in employ- ing potential existence, we are, so to speak, on an inclined plane. We start by saying, "A is such that, under probable conditions, its nature will de- velope into B; and therefore, because of this, I venture already to call it £." And we end by claiming that, because A may possibly be made to pass into another result C, C may, therefore, on this account, be predicated already. And we have to hold to this, although C, to but a very small extent, has been produced by A, and although, in the result, A itself may have totally vanished.
We must therefore admit that potential existence implies, to some extent, a compromise. Its use, in fact, cannot be defined upon a very strict principle. Still, by bearing in mind what the term endeavours to mean, and what it always must be taken more or less to involve, we may, in practice, succeed in employing it conveniently and safely. But it will remain, in the end, a wide-spread source of confu- sion and danger. The more a writer feels himself led naturally to have recourse to this phrase, the better cause he probably has for at least attempting to avoid it It may throw light on several problems, if we consider further the general nature of Possibility and Chance.1 We touched on this subject above, 1 On Possibility compare Chapter xxvii, and Principles of Logic, Book I., Chap. vii.
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when we enquired if complete possibility is the same as reality (p. 383). Our answer to that question may be summed up thus: Possibility implies the separation of thought from existence; but, on the other hand, since these two extremes are essentially one, each, while divided from the other, is internally defective. Hence if the possible could be com- pleted as such, it would have passed into the real. But, in reaching this goal, it would have ceased altogether to be mere thought, and it would in con- sequence, therefore, be no longer possibility.
The possible implies always the partial division of idea from reality. It is, properly, the conse- quence in thought from an ideal antecedent. It follows from a set of conditions, a system which is never complete in itself, and which is not taken to be real, as auch, except through part of its area. But this last qualification is necessary. The pos- sible, itself, is not real; but its essence partly trans- cends ideas, and it has no meaning at all unless it is possible really. It must be developed from, and be relative to, a real basis. And, hence, there can be no such thing as unconditional possibility. The possible, in other words, is always relative. And, if it attempts to be free, it ceases to be itself.
We shall understand this, perhaps, better, if we recall the nature of relative chance (Chapter xix.). Chance is the given fact which falls outside of some ideal whole or system. And any element, not in- cluded within such a universal, is, in relation to that universal, bare fact, and so relative chance. Chance, in other words, would not be actual chance, if it were not also more. It is viewed in negative relation to some idea, but it could not exist in relation unless in itself it were ideal already. And with relative possibility, again, we find a counterpart implication. The possible itself would not be possible, if it were not more, and if it were not partially real. There must be an actual basis in DEGREES OF TRUTH AND REALITY. 389 which a part of its conditions is realized, though, by and in the possible, this actual basis need not be expressed, but may be merely understood. And, since the conditions are manifold, and since the part which is taken as real is largely variable, possibility varies accordingly. Its way of completing itself, and in particular the actual basis which it implies, are both capable of diversity. Thus the possibility of an element is different, according as it is under- stood in these diverse relations. Possibility and chance, we may say, stand to one another thus. An actual fact more or less ignores the ideal com- plement which, within its own being, it involves. And hence, if you view it merely in relation to some system which falls outside itself, the actual fact is, so far, chance. The possible, on the other hand, explicitly isolates one part of the ideal complement, and, at the same time, implies, more or less vaguely, its real completion. It fluctuates, therefore, with the various conditions which are taken as neces- sary to complete it. But of these conditions part must have actual existence, or must, as such, be real.
And this account still holds good, when we pass to the lowest grade of possibility. I take an idea, which, in the first place, I cannot call unmeaning. And this idea, secondly, I do not see to contradict itself or the Reality. I therefore assume that it has not this defect. And, merely on the strength of this, I go on to call such an idea possible. It might seem as if here we had passed from relative to unconditional possibility; but that view would be erroneous. The possible here is still a consequence from conditions, part of which is actual. For, though of its special conditions we know nothing, we are not quite ignorant. We have assumed in it more or less of the general character, material and formal, which is owned by Reality. This character is its actual basis and real ground of possibility.
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And, without this, the idea would cease altogether to be possible.
What are we to say then about the possibility, or about the chance, which is bare, and which is not relative, but absolute and unconditional? We must say of either that it presents one aspect of the same fundamental error. Each expresses in a different way the same main self-contradiction; and it may perhaps be worth while to exhibit this in detail. With mere possibility the given want of all con- nection with the Real is construed into a ground for positive predication. Bare chance, again, gives us as a fact, and gives us therefore in relation, an element which it still persists is unrelated. I will go on to explain this statement.
I have an idea, and, because in my opinion I know nothing about it, I am to call it possible. Now, if the idea has a meaning, and is taken not to contradict itself, this (as we have seen) is, at once, a positive character in the idea. And this gives a known reason for, at once so far, regarding it as actual. And such a possibility, because in relation with an attribute of the Real, we have seen, is still but a relative possibility. In absolute possi- bility we are supposed to be without this knowledge. There, merely because I do not find any relation between my idea and the Reality, I am to assert, upon this, that my idea is compatible. And the assertion clearly is inconsistent. Compatible means that which in part is perceived to be true; it means that which internally is connected with the Real. And this implies assimilation, and it involves pene- tration of the element by some quality or qualities of the Real. If the element is compatible it will be preserved, though with a greater or less destruction of its particular character. But in bare possibility I have perverted the sense of compatible. Because I find absence of incompatibility, because, that is, DEGREES OF TRUTH AND REALITY. 39 1 I am without a certain perception, I am to call my idea compatible. On the ground of my sheer ignor- ance, in other words, I am to know that my idea is assimilated, and that, to a greater or less extent, it will survive in Reality. But such a position is irrational.
That which is unconditionally possible is viewed apart from, and is supposed to remain undetermined by, relation to the Real. There are no seen relations, and therefore none, and therefore no alien relations which can penetrate and dissolve our supposed idea. And we hold to this, even when the idea is applied to the Real. But a relation to the Real implies essentially a relation to what the Real pos- sesses, and hence to have no relations of one's own means to have them all from the outside. Bare possibility is therefore, against its will, one extreme of relatedness. For it is conjoined de facto with the Reality, as we have that in our minds; and, since the conjunction is external, the relatedness is given by outer necessity. But necessary relation of an element to that which is outside means, as we know, the disruption of this element internally. The merely possible, if it could exist, would be, therefore, for all we know, sheer error. For it would, so far as we know, be an idea, which, in no way and to no extent, is accepted by Reality. But possibility, in this sense, has contradicted itself. Without an actual basis in, and without a positive connection with, Reality, the possible is, in short, not possible at all.1 1 It may be worth while to notice that Possibility, if you try to make it unconditional, is the same thing as one sense of Incon- ceivability or Impossibility. The Impossible really is that which contradicts positive knowledge (Chapter xxvii.). It is never that which you merely (ail to connect with Reality. But, if you wrong- ly took it in this sense, and if you based it on mere privation, it would unawares have turned round into the unconditionally possible. For that is actually incompatible with the Reality, as 4e facto we have the Reality in our minds. Each of these ideas, 39 2 REALITY.
39 2 REALITY.
There is a like self-contradiction in absolute chance. The absolutely contingent would mean a fact which is given free from all internal connection with its context. It would have to stand without relation, or rather with all its relations outside. But, since a thing must be determined by the re- lations in which it stands, the absolutely contingent would thus be utterly determined from the outside. And so, by consequence, chance would involve com- plete internal dissipation. It would hence implicitly preclude the given existence which explicitly it postulates. Unless chance is more than mere chance, and thus consents to be relative, it fails to be itself. Relative chance implies inclusion within some ideal whole, and, on that basis, asserts an external relation to some other whole. But chance, made absolute, has to affirm a positive existence in relation, while insisting that all relations fall outside this existence. And such an idea contradicts itself.
Or, again, we may bring out the same discrepancy thus. In the case of a given element we fail to see its connection with some system. We do not per- ceive in its content the internal relations to what is beyond it — relations which, because they are ideal, are necessary and eternal. Then, upon the ground of this failure, we go on to a denial, and we insist that no such internal relations are present. But every relation, as we have learnt, essentially pene- trates the being of its terms, and, in this sense, is intrinsical; or, in other words, every relation must be a relation of content. And hence the element, deprived by bare chance of all ideal relations, is unrelated altogether. But, if unrelated and unde- termined, it is no longer any separate element at all. It cannot have the existence ascribed to it by absolute chance.
Chance and possibility may be called two different in short, is viciously based on privation, and each is a different aspect of the same self-contradictory complex DEGREES OF TRUTH AND REALITY. 393 aspects of one complex. Relative chance stands for something which is, but is, in part, not connected and understood. It is therefore that which exists, but, in part, only somehow. The relatively possible is, on the other hand, what is understood incom- pletely, and yet is taken, more or less only somehow, to be real. Each is thus an imperfect way of representing reality. Or we may, if we please, repeat the distinction in another form. In bare chance something is to be given, and therefore given in a connection of outer relations; and it yet is regarded as not intrinsically related. The abstractly possible, again, is the not-related; but it is taken, at the same time, in relation with reality, and is, therefore, unawares given with external relations. Chance forgets, we may say, the essential connec- tion; and possibility forgets its de facto relation to the Real, that is, its given external conjunction with context. Chance belongs to the world of existence and possibility to thought; but each contains at bottom the same defect, and each, against its will, when taken bare, becomes external necessity.1 If the possible could be given, it would be indifferently chance or fate. If chance is thought of, it is at once but merely possible; for what is contingent has no complete connection with Reality.
With this I will pass from a subject, on which J have dwelt perhaps too long. There is no such thing as absolute chance, or as mere external neces- sity, or as unconditional possibility. The possible must, in part, be really, and that means internally, necessary. And the same, again, is true of the 1 The identity, in the end, of possibility with chance, and of chance with external or brute necessity, has instructive conse- quences. It would obviously give the proper ground for an estimate of that which vulgarly is termed Free Will. This doctrine may in philosophy be considered obsolete, though it will continue to flourish in popular Ethics. As soon as its meaning is appre- hended, it loses all plausibility. But the popular moralist will always exist by not knowing what he means.
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contingent. Each idea is relative, and each lays stress on an opposite aspect of the same complex. And hence each, forced to a one-sided extreme, disappears altogether.
We are led from this to ask whether there are degrees of possibility and contingency, and our answer to this question must be affirmative. To be more or less possible, and to be more or less true, and intrinsically necessary, — and, from the other side, to be less or more contingent — are, in the end, all the same. And we may verify here, in passing, the twofold application of our standard. That which is more possible is either internally more harmonious and inclusive; it is, in other words, nearer to a complete totality of content, such as would involve passage into, and unity with, the Real. Or the more possible is, on the other hand, partly realized in a larger number of ideal groups. Every contact, even with a point in the temporal series, means ideal connection with a concrete group of relations. Hence the more widely possible is that which finds a smaller amount of content lying wholly outside its own area. It is, in other words, the more individual, the truer, and more real. And, since it contains more connections, it has in itself more internal necessity. For a like reason, on the other side, increase of contingency means growth in falseness. That which, so far as it exists, has more external necessity — more conjunction from the outside with intelligible systems — has, therefore, less connection with any. It is hence more empty, and, as we have seen, on that account less self-contained and harmonious. This brief account, however in- correct to the eye of common sense, may perhaps, as part of our main thesis, be found defensible.