" We have acquired both from experience: we know " from experience that rational beings like ourselves " exist around us, and also the marks by which they " are distinguishable from irrational creatures." This might be the answer of those who are unaccustomed to strict philosophical inquiry. But such an answer would be superficial and unsatisfactory; it would in deed be no answer to our question, but to an entirely different one. The experience which is here appealed to, is also felt by the Egoists, who nevertheless are LECTURE II. 187 not thoroughly refuted by it. Experience only teaches us that the conception of reasonable beings around us is a part of our empirical consciousness; and about that there is no dispute, — no Egoist has ever denied it. The question is, whether there be anything be yond this conception which corresponds to the concep tion itself; whether reasonable beings exist around us independently of our conceptions of them, and even if we had no such conceptions; — and on this matter ex perience has nothing whatever to teach us so surely as it is only experience; that is to say, — the system of our conceptions.
Experience can at most teach us that there are phe nomena which appear to be the results of rational causes; but it can never teach us that these causes actually exist as reasonable beings in themselves, for being in itself is no object of experience.
We ourselves first introduce such a being into ex perience; — it is only we ourselves who explain our experience by assuming the existence of rational beings around us. But by what right do we furnish this explanation? This right must be strictly proved before it is made use of, for its validity can only be grounded on its evidence, and not upon its actual use: — and thus we have not advanced a single step, but return again to the question with which we set out: — How do we come to assume and admit the existence of reasonable beings around us?
The theoretical domain of philosophy is unquestion ably exhausted by the fundamental researches of the Critical School: all questions which still remain un answered, must be answered upon practical principles, — and in this way I shall now proceed. We must now 188 THE VOCATION OF THE SCHOLAR.
try whether the proposed question can be answered on such principles.
The highest impulse in man is, according to our last lecture, the impulse towards Identity, — towards per fect harmony with himself; — and, in order that he may be in constant harmony with himself, towards the harmony of all external things with his necessary ideas of them. There must not merely be nothing con tradictory to his ideas, so that the existence or non- existence of an external representative of these ideas might be indifferent to him, but there must actually be something corresponding to his ideas. All the ideas which exist in the Ego must have a representative, an antitype, in the Non-Ego: — thus is his impulse determined.
There exists in man the idea of Reason, and of reasonable acts and thoughts, and he is necessitated to realize this idea not only within himself but also without himself. It is thus one of his wants that there should be around him reasonable beings like himself.
He cannot produce such beings; but he lays the idea of them at the foundation of his observation of the Non-Ego, and expects to find something there corresponding to it. The first mark of rationality which presents itself is of a merely negative character, — efficiency founded on ideas, — activity guided by a purpose. Whatever bears the marks of design may have a reasonable author; that to which the notion of design cannot be applied has certainly no reasonable author. But this characteristic is ambiguous; — the agreement of many things in one end is the mark of design, but there are many kinds of agreement which LECTURE II. 189 may be explained by mere natural laws, — if not by mechanical, then by organic laws; — hence we still require a distinctive mark whereby we may confidently infer from a particular phenomenon the existence of a reasonable cause. Nature proceeds, even in the ful filment of her designs, by necessary laws; — Reason always proceeds with freedom. Hence the agreement of many things in one end which is pursued with freedom, is the sure and infallible characteristic of rationality as manifested in its results. We now inquire, — How can man distinguish a phenomenon in his experience produced by necessity, from a phe nomenon produced by freedom?
I cannot be immediately conscious of a freedom which exists out of myself, — I cannot even be con scious of a freedom which exists within myself, that is, of my own freedom; for essential freedom is the first condition of consciousness, and hence cannot He within its sphere of observation. But I may be conscious of this, — that I am not conscious of any other cause for a particular determination of my empirical Ego through my will, than this will itself; — and this non- consciousness of constraining cause may be called a consciousness of freedom, if it be duly explained be forehand; and we shall call it so here. In this sense, then, man may be conscious of his own free activity.
If through our own free activity, of which we are conscious in the sense above indicated, the character of the activity apparent in the substance which expe rience presents to us is so changed that this activity is no longer to be explained according to the law by which we formerly judged it, but according to that which we have laid at the foundation of our own free 190 THE VOCATION OF THE SCHOLAR.
action, and which is quite opposed to the former; — then we cannot explain this altered view of the ac tivity apparent in experience, otherwise than by the supposition that the cause to which we refer it is likewise reasonable and free. Hence arises, — to use the Kantian terminology, — a free reciprocal activity founded on ideas, — a community pervaded by design; — and it is this which I call Society. The idea of Society is thus strictly defined.
It is one of the fundamental impulses of man to be necessitated to assume the existence around him of reasonable beings like himself; but he can only assume their existence under the condition of entering into Society with them, according to the meaning of that word as above explained. The social impulse thus belongs to the fundamental impulses of man. It is man's vocation to live in Society — he must live in Society; — he is no complete man, but contradicts his own being, if he live in a state of isolation.
You see how important it is not to confound the abstract idea of Society, with that particular empiric ally-conditioned form of Society, which we call the State. Political Society is not a part of the absolute purpose of human life (whatever a great man may have said to the contrary); but it is,. under certain conditions, a possible means towards the formation of a perfect Society. Like all human institutions, which are merely means to an end, the State constantly tends towards its own annihilation; the ultimate aim of all government is to make government superfluous. That Age is of a surety not now present with us, — and I know not how many myriads, or perhaps myriads of myriads, of years may elapse before it arrive, — (we LECTURE II. 191 LECTURE II. 191 have not now to deal with a practical rule of life, but with the vindication of a speculative principle); — that Age is not now, but it is certain that in the a priori, fore-ordered course of the human race such a period does exist, when all political combinations shall have become unnecessary. That is the time when, in place of strength or cunning, Reason alone shall be acknow ledged as the supreme judge of all; — acknowledged I say; for although men may even then go astray, and by their errors do hurt to their fellow-men, yet they will then be open to conviction of their error, and, when convinced of it, will be willing to return and make amends for their fault. Until that Age shall arrive, we cannot be true men.
According to what we have said, free reciprocal activity is the positive character of Society. It is an end to itself; and hence is effected solely and absolutely for its own sake. This assertion, that Society is its own end, is however not at all incompatible with an other, — that the form of this association should pos sess a special law which shall give it a more definite aim.
The fundamental impulse of humanity was to dis cover reasonable beings like ourselves, — or men. The conception of man is an ideal conception, because the destiny of man, in so far as he is such, is unattainable. Each individual has his own particular ideal of man in general; these ideals are different in degree, though not in kind; each tries by his own ideal every being whom he recognises as a man. By this fundamental impulse each is prompted to seek in others a likeness to his own ideal; he inquires, he observes on all sides, and when he finds men below this ideal, he strives to 192 THE VOCATION OF THE SCHOLAR.
elevate them to it. In this struggle of mind with mind, he always triumphs who is the highest and best man; — and thus from the idea of Society arises that of the perfection of the race, and we have thus also discovered the ultimate purpose of all Society as such. When it appears as if the higher and better man had no influence on the low and uncultivated, we are partly deceived in our judgment, — since we often expect to find the fruit already ripe before the seed has had time to germinate and unfold, — and it may partly arise from this, that the better man perhaps stands at too high an elevation above the uncultivated, that they have too few points of contact with each other, and hence cannot sufficiently act upon each other; — a posi tion which retards civilization to an incredible extent, and the remedy for which we shall point out at the proper time. But on the whole, the ultimate triumph of the better man is certain: — a calming and consoling thought for the friend of humanity and of truth when he looks out upon the open war of light with darkness. The light shall surely triumph at last; — we cannot indeed predict the time, — but it is already a pledge of victory, of near victory, when darkness is compelled to come forth to an open encounter. She loves con cealment, — she is already lost when forced out into the open day.
Thus far, then, the result of our inquiries shows, that man is destined for Society; — among the capaci ties which, according to his vocation as laid down in our former lecture, he is destined to improve and per fect, there is also the social capacity.
This destination of man for Society in the abstract, although arising out of the innermost and purest ele- LECTURE II. 193 ments of human nature, is yet, as a mere impulse, subordinate to the highest law of constant internal harmony, or the moral law, and by it must be still further defined and brought under a strict rule. When we have discovered this rule, we shall have found the vocation of man in Society, which is the object of our present inquiry and of all the preceding reflections.
The social impulse is, in the first place, negatively defined by the law of absolute harmony; — it must not contradict itself. The impulse leads to reciprocal acti vity, to mutual influence, mutual giving and receiving, mutual suffering and doing, — not to mere causality — not to mere activity, of which others are but the passive objects. The impulse requires us to discover free reasonable beings around us, and to enter into Society with them; it does not demand subordination as in the material world, but co-ordination. If we do not allow freedom to the reasonable beings whom we seek around us, we take into account merely their theo retical use, not their free practical rationality; we do not enter into Society with them, but we ride them as useful animals, and so place our social impulse in op position to itself. But what do I say? — we place our social impulse in opposition to itself? No: rather we do not possess this higher impulse at all; humanity is not yet so far cultivated within us; we ourselves still stand on the lowest grade of imperfect humanity, — or slavery. We ourselves have not yet attained to a con sciousness of our freedom and self-activity, for then we should necessarily desire to see around us similar, — that is, free beings. We are slaves ourselves; — and look around us but for slaves. Rousseau says — "A man often considers himself the lord of others, who is yet s 194 THE VOCATION OF THE SCHOLAR.
more a slave than they." He might with still greater justice have said — " He who considers himself the lord of others is himself a slave." Even should he not bear the outward badge of servitude, yet he has most surely the soul of a slave, and will basely cringe before the first stronger man who subdues him. He only is free, who would make all around him free likewise; and does really make them free, by a certain influence the sources of which have never been observed. Under his eye we breathe more freely; we feel that nothing has power to oppress, hinder, or confine us; we feel an unwonted desire to be and to do all things which self-respect does not forbid.
Man may use irrational things as means for the accomplishment of his purposes, but not rational beings; he may not even use these as means for attain ing the end of their own being; he may not act upon them as upon dead matter or upon the beasts, so as to prosecute his designs with them without taking their freedom into account; he may not make any reason able being either virtuous, or wise, or happy against his own will. Laying aside the fact that such an attempt would be utterly fruitless, — that no being can become virtuous, or wise, or happy, but by his own labour and exertion; — laying aside the fact that man cannot do this, yet even if he could, or believed he could, he must not even desire to do it; for it is unjust, and by so doing he would be placed in opposition to himself.
The social impulse is also positively defined by the law of perfect internal harmony, and thus we arrive at the peculiar vocation of man in Society. All the indi viduals who compose the human race differ from each LECTURE II. 195 other; there is only one thing in which they entirely agree; — that is, their ultimate end — perfection. Per fection has but one form; it is equal to itself: could all men become perfect, could they attain their highest and ultimate end, they would all be equal to each other, — they would be only one, — but one single subject. But in Society each strives to make others perfect, at least according to his own standard of perfection; to raise them to the ideal of humanity which he has formed. Thus, the last, highest end of Society is per fect unity and unanimity of all its possible members. But since the attainment of this end supposes the attainment of the destination of each individual man, — the attainment of absolute perfection; — so it is quite as impossible as the latter, — it is unattainable, unless man were to lay aside his humanity and become God. Perfect unity with ah1 the individuals of his race is thus indeed the ultimate end, but not the vocation, of man in Society.
But to approach nearer this end, — constantly to approach nearer to it, — this he can and ought to do. This approximation towards perfect unity and unani mity with all men may be called co-operation. Thus co-operation, growing ever firmer at its centre and ever wider in its circumference, is the true vocation of man in Society: — but such a co-operation is only possible by means of ever-growing improvement, for it is only in relation to their ultimate destination that men are at one, or can become united. We may therefore say, that mutual improvement, — improvement of ourselves by the freely admitted action of others upon us, and improvement of others by our reaction upon them as upon free beings, — is our vocation in Society.
19G THE VOCATION OF THE SCHOLAR.
And in order to fulfil this vocation, and fulfil it always more and more thoroughly, we need a quali fication which can only be acquired and improved by culture; and indeed a qualification of a double nature: an ability to give, or to act upon others as upon free beings; — and an openness to receive, or to derive the greatest advantage from the action of others upon us. Of both we shall speak particularly in the proper place We must especially strive to acquire the latter, when we possess the former in a high degree; — otherwise we cease to advance, and consequently retrograde. Seldom is any man so perfect, but he may be much improved through the agency of any other man, in some perhaps apparently unimportant or neglected point of culture.
I know few more sublime conceptions, than the idea of this universal inter-action of the whole human race on itself; this ceaseless life and activity; this eager emulation to give and to receive, — the noblest strife in which man can take a part; this general indentation of countless wheels into each other, whose common motive-power is freedom; and the beautiful har mony which is the result of all. " Whoever thou art," may each of us say — " whoever thou art, if thou bear the form of man, thou too art a member of this great commonwealth; — through what count less media soever our mutual influence may be trans mitted, still by that title I act upon thee, and thou on me; — no one who bears the stamp of Reason on his front, however rudely impressed, exists in vain for me. But I know thee not, — thou knowest not me! — Oh! so surely as we have a common calling to be good, ever to become better, — so surely — though LECTURE II. 197 LECTURE II. 197 millions of ages may first pass away — (what is time!) — so surely shall a period at last arrive when I may receive thee too into my sphere of action, — when I may do good to thee, and receive good from thee in return; when my heart may be united to thine also, by the fairest possible bond, — a mutual interchange of free and generous love.
ON THE DISTINCTION OF CLASSES IN SOCIETY.
THE vocation of man as an individual, as well as the vocation of man in society, is now before you. The Scholar is only invested with his distinctive character when considered as a member of society. We may therefore proceed to the inquiry, — What is the peculiar vocation of the Scholar in society? But the Scholar is not merely a member of society; he is also a member of a particular class in society: at least it is customary to speak of the Scholar-class, — with what propriety or impropriety will appear in due time.
Our chief inquiry — What is the vocation of the Scholar (i — thus pre-supposes the solution of a third and very important question, besides those two which we have already answered; — this, namely, — Whence arises the difference of Classes in Society? — or, What is the source of the inequality existing among men?
It will be readily understood without previous ex planation, that tlu's word Class does not mean anything which has come to pass fortuitously and without our aid, but something determined and arranged by free choice according to a concerted purpose. For an in equality which occurs fortuitously and without our aid, i. e. for physical inequality, Nature is accountable; LECTURE III. 199 but inequality of classes seems to be a moral inequality, with respect to which, therefore, the question naturally arises, — By what right do different classes exist?
Attempts have often been made to answer this question; and proceeding merely on the grounds of experience, the numerous purposes which are accom plished by such a division and the many advantages which are gained by it have been as rhapsodically enumerated as they are eagerly laid hold of; but by such means any other question may sooner be answered than the one we have proposed. The advantage of a certain disposition of things does not prove its justice; and we did not propose the historical question, — What purpose had man in this arrangement? — but the moral question, — Whether it was lawful for him to bring it about, whatever purpose he might have had in view by so doing. The question must be answered on the principles of Reason, pure as well as practical; and such an answer has, so far as I know, never yet been even attempted. To prepare for it, I must lay down a few general scientific principles.
All the laws of Reason are founded in our spiritual nature; but they only arrive at empirical consciousness through an experience to which they are applicable; and the more frequently such application takes place, the more intimately do they become interwoven with this consciousness. It is thus with all the laws of Reason; — it is thus especially with the practical, which do not, like the theoretical, terminate in a mere act of judgment, but proceed to an activity without us, and announce themselves to consciousness under the form of impulses. The foundation of all impulses lies in our own being: — but not more than the foundation.
200 THE VOCATION OF THE SCHOLAR.
Every impulse must be awakened by experience if it is to arrive at consciousness, and must be developed by numerous experiences of the same kind, if it is to be come a desire, and its appropriate gratification a want of man. Experience, however, does not depend upon ourselves, and therefore neither does the awakening nor the development of our impulses.
The independent Non-Ego as the foundation of ex perience, or Nature, — is manifold; no one part of it is perfectly the same as another; — this principle is maintained and even strictly proved in the Kantian philosophy. It follows from this, that its action on the human mind is of a very varied character, and calls forth the capacities and talents of men nowhere in the same manner. By these different ways in which Nature acts upon man, are individuals, and what we call their peculiar, empirical, individual character, de termined; — and in this respect we may say that no individual is perfectly like another in his awakened and developed capacities. Hence arises a physical in equality, to which we not only have not contributed, but which we even cannot remove by our freedom; for before we can, through freedom, resist the influence of Nature upon us, we must first have arrived at the consciousness and use of this freedom; but we cannot arrive thereat except by that awakening and unfolding of our impulses which does not depend upon our selves.
But the highest law of man and of all reasonable beings, — the law of perfect internal harmony, of abso lute identity, — in so far as this law becomes positive and material by means of special individual applications, demands that all the faculties of the individual shall LECTURE III. 201 be uniformly developed, — all his capacities cultivated to the highest possible perfection; — a demand, the object of which cannot be realized by the mere law itself, because the fulfilment of the law, as we have said, does not depend upon the law itself, nor upon our will which is determinable by the law, but upon the free action of Mature.
If we apply this law to society, — if we make the supposition that there are many reasonable beings in existence, — then the demand that all the faculties of the individual should be uniformly cultivated includes also the demand that all reasonable beings should be cultivated uniformly with each other. If the faculties of all are essentially the same. — as they are, since they areair*ftjcmdcd-upon pure Reason, — if they are all to be cultivated after a similar fashion, which is what the law requires, — then the result of such a cultivation must be similar capacities in every respect equal to each other: — and thus by another way we arrive at the ultimate end of all society, as declared in our former lecture, — the perfect equality of all its members.
We have already shown in our last lecture that the mere law cannot, of itself, realize the object of this de mand, any more than it can realize that of the demand on which our present lecture is founded. But Free- Will can and ought to strive constantly to approach nearer this ultimate end.
And here the activity of the social impulse comes into play, which also proceeds upon this same purpose, and is the means of the requisite continual approxima tion to it. The social impulse, or the impulse towards mutual cooperation with free reasonable beings as such, includes the two following impulses: the communicative 202 THE VOCATION OF THE SCHOLAR.
impulse, — that is, the impulse to impart to others that form of culture which we ourselves possess most com pletely, to make others, as far as possible, like ourselves, like the better self within us; — and the receptive im pulse, — that is, the impulse to receive from others that form of culture which they possess most completely, and in which we are deficient. Thus the defect _of.Nature injjn in tipwnrlinrl ~hy TJnnnnn nnrl Frpprlpjnj the partial culture which Nature has given to the individual be comes the property of the whole race, and the race in turn bestows all its culture upon him; — it gives him all the culture which is possible under the determining conditions of Nature, if we suppose that all the indi viduals who are possible under these conditions do actually exist. Nature cultivates each individual only in part; but she bestows culture at every point where she encounters reasonable beings. Reason unites these points, presents to Nature a firmly compacted and ex tended front, and compels her to cultivate the^Race at least in all its particular capacities, since she will not bestow that culture upon the Individual. Reason has already, by means of the social impulse, provided for the equal distribution of the culture thus acquired among the individual members of society, and will provide for it still further; for the sway of Nature does not extend here.
Reason will take care that each individual receive from the hands of society, the whole and complete cultivation which he cannot obtain immediately from Nature. Society will gather together the possessions of every individual member into a common fund for the free use of all, and thus multiply them by the number of those who share their advantages; the de- LECTURE III. 203