made progress, and drawn nearer to its final result.
But since that reflection—not in so far as it is undertaken or not undertaken, for in this respect it is free, as we have seen, but in so far as it is undertaken in accordance with laws, (that is, in so far as it is determined in character, if it is undertaken)—does also belong to the necessary manner of acting of the intelligence, its laws would necessarily occur in the system of that manner of acting; and thus one might well observe—after the science were finished—whether they were correct; that is, whether they agreed with the former or not. In other words, it would seem that it were possible to furnish an evident proof of the correctness of our scientific system after it had been finished.
But the laws of reflection, which we would thus discover in the course of the science of knowledge as the only possible ones whereby a science of knowledge could be possible, are, after all—even though they agree with those laws of reflection which we had presupposed as the rules of our investigation—the result of their previous application, and we thus discover here a new circle.
Certain laws of reflection have been presupposed by us; and now, in the course of the science of knowledge, we discover the same laws as the only correct ones; ergo, our presupposition has been true, and our science of knowledge is perfectly correct in form. If we had presupposed other laws, we doubtlessly should have discovered other laws in our science of knowledge as the only correct ones, and the only question would have been whether they agreed with the presupposed laws or not. If they did not, we should be sure either that the presupposed laws were wrong, or the discovered laws, or, which is most probable, both. It is, therefore, not allowable to draw such a conclusion in a circle. We merely conclude from the harmony of the presupposed and the discovered laws of reflection that the system is correct. This, to be sure, is only a negative proof, which gives simply probability. If the presupposed and the discovered laws do not agree, then the system is surely false. If they do agree, it may be correct. But it must not necessarily be correct; for although—if there is a system in human knowledge—such an agreement or harmony can only be discovered in one way, if the conclusions are rightly drawn, it always remains possible that the harmony may be the result of two incorrectly drawn conclusions, which cancel each other and thus produce harmony. It is as if I tested a calculation of division by multiplication. If I do not obtain the desired sum as product, I may be sure that I have made a mistake in calculating; but if I do obtain it, it is merely probable that I have calculated correctly; for I might have made both in division and multiplication the same mistake; for instance, might in both have counted 5 X 9 = 36. It is thus with the science of knowledge. That science is not only the rule, but, at the same time, the calculation. Whosoever doubts the correctness of our product, does not on that account doubt the ever-valid law that we must posit the one factor as many times as the other one has units; he only doubts whether we have correctly observed this law.
Hence, even the highest unity of the system, which is the negative proof of its correctness, leaves always something which can never be strictly proven, but only accepted as probable; namely, that this unity has not been the result of chance, or of incorrect conclusions. Various means may be devised to heighten this probability; the series of propositions may be gone over in thought again and again; one may reverse the method and compare the account from the result back to the fundamental principle; or one may reflect again upon the reflection, etc., etc.; the probability always becomes greater, but never becomes certainty. If one is only conscious of having investigated honestly, and not having had in mind the final results one wished to discover, this probability may well suffice, and an objector to the correctness of our system may well be required to show up the error in our conclusions; but it will never do to claim infallibility. The system of the human mind, whereof the science of knowledge is to be the representation, is absolutely certain and infallible; every thing grounded in it is absolutely true; it never errs, and whatever has ever necessarily been, or ever necessarily will be, in any human soul, is true. If men erred, the fault lay not in the necessary, but in the freedom of reflection, which substituted one law for another. And if our science of knowledge is a correct representation of this system, it is absolutely certain and infallible as that system; but the very question is, whether our representation is or is not correct, and of this we can never furnish a strict conclusion, but only a probable proof. Our science of knowledge has truth only on the condition and in so far as its representation is a correct one. We are not the legislators of the human mind, but its historians; not newspaper writers, it is true, but pragmatic history-writers.
Add to this the circumstance that a system may really be correct as a whole, though its separate parts have not complete evidence. Here and there an incorrect conclusion may have been drawn, suggestive propositions may have been left out, other propositions which can be proven may have been asserted without proof or established by incorrect proof; and yet the most important results may be correct. This seems impossible; it seems as if a hair-breadth deviation from the straight line would necessarily lead to infinitely increasing deviation; and thus indeed it would be if man had to produce all his knowledge by clear conscious thinking; whereas rather the fundamental genius of reason unconsciously guides him and leads him by new errors from the straight path of his formaliter and logically correct argument back to the materialiter only correct result, which he would never have reached again had he persisted in logically carrying out his wrong proposition.
Even, therefore, if a universally valid science of knowledge should be established, the philosophical judgment will still have an infinite field wherein to work its ultimate perfection; it will have to fill up blanks, to make more strict the proofs, and clearer to determine the determinations.
I have two more remarks to add: The science of knowledge presupposes the rules of reflection and abstraction as well known and valid; it must do so necessarily, and need not be ashamed or make a secret of it. That science may express itself and draw conclusions like any other science, it may presuppose all logical rules and apply all conceptions which it needs. But these presuppositions are merely made to make itself intelligible; hence, without drawing any consequences therefrom. Every thing provable must be proven; with the exception of that first and highest fundamental principle, all propositions must be deduced. Hence, for instance, neither the logical proposition of opposition or contradiction, which is the ground of all analysis, nor the logical proposition of the ground, (nothing is opposite which is not related in a third, and nothing is related which is not opposed in a third, the proposition which is the ground of all synthesis,) is deduced from the absolute first principle, though they are deduced from the two fundamental principles which rest upon it. These two latter principles are also fundamental principles, it is true, but they are not absolute, only part of them is absolute; hence, these fundamental principles as well as the logical propositions which rest upon them need not be proven, but must be deduced. I explain myself clearer.
That which the science of knowledge establishes is a proposition, thought and put into words; that in the human mind which corresponds to it is an act of that mind, which in itself need not be thought at all. Nothing must be presupposed to this act than that without which the act as act would be impossible; and this is not tacitly presupposed, but the science of knowledge has to establish it clearly and distinctly as that without which the act would be impossible. Let the act be, for instance, D, the fourth in the series A, B, C, D; then the act C must be preposited to the act D, and shown as the exclusive condition of the act D; to the act C, again, the act B must be preposited, etc., etc. But the act A, the first act, is absolutely and unconditionally possible; and hence nothing is to be preposited as the condition of its possibility.
The thinking of this act A is, however, a quite different act, which presupposes far more. Suppose this thinking of A to be, in the series of acts about to be established, D, then A, B, and C must necessarily be presupposed as grounds of its possibility; and since that thinking (of A) is to be the first business of the science of knowledge. A, B, and C must be tacitly presupposed. It is not till you get to D that the presuppositions of the first can be proven; but as soon as you get this proof, you will have presupposed something else. The form of the science is thus always in advance of its content; and this is the reason why the science as such can only attain probability. The represented and the representation are in two different series. In the first series nothing is presupposed which is not proven; but for the possibility of the second you always must presuppose what can not be proven till later. The reflection which rules in the whole science of knowledge, in so far as it is a science, is a representing. But from this it does not follow that every thing about which it reflects must also be merely a representing. In the science of knowledge the Ego is represented; but from this it does not follow that the Ego is represented as merely representing; for other determinations of the Ego may be discovered in it. The Ego as philosophizing subject is undoubtedly merely representing; but the Ego as object of the philosophizing may be something more. Representing is the highest and absolute first act of the philosopher as such; but the absolute first act of the human mind may well be of another kind. That it will turn out to be so appears probable, in advance of all experience, from simply this reason: that the representation may be completely exhausted, and that its acting is altogether necessary, and must, therefore, have a final ground of its necessity, which, as final ground, can have no higher one. A science, therefore, which is erected on the conception of representation, might well be a very useful introduction to the science, but could not be the science of knowledge itself. But this much follows certainly from the above, that the collective modes of acting of the intelligence, which the science of knowledge is to exhaust, can be received in consciousness only in the form of representation; that is to say, only in so far as they are represented.
Notes