Spirit. And with this insight, mortal, be free, and for ever released from the fear which has degraded and tormented thee! Thou wilt no longer tremble at a necessity which exists only in thine own thought; no longer fear to be crushed by things which are the product of thine own mind; no longer place thyself, the thinking being, in the same class with the thoughts which proceed from thee. As long as thou couldst believe that a system of things, such as thou hast described, really existed out of, and independently of, thee, and that thou thyself mightst be but a link in this chain, such a fear was well grounded. Now when thou hast seen that all this exists only in and through thyself, thou wilt doubtless no longer fear that which thou dost now recognise as thine own creation.
458 THE VOCATION OF MAN.
It was from this fear only that I wished to set thee free. Thou art delivered from it, and I now leave thee to thyself.
/. Stay, deceitful Spirit! Is this all the wisdom towards which thou hast directed my hopes, and dost thou boast that thou hast set me free? Thou hast set me free, it is true: — thou hast absolved me from all dependence; for thou hast transformed myself, and everything around me on which I could possibly be dependent, into nothing. Thou hast abolished neces sity by annihilating all existence.
Spirit. Is the danger so great?
/. And thou canst jest! — According to thy system.
Spirit. My system? Whatever we have agreed upon, we have produced in common; we have laboured to gether, and thou hast understood everything as well as myself; — but it would be difficult for thee at pre sent even to guess- at my true and perfect mode of thought.
/. Call thy thoughts by what name thou wilt; by all that thou hast hitherto said, there is nothing, ab solutely nothing but presentations, — modes of con sciousness, and of consciousness only. But a presenta tion is to me only the picture, the shadow of a reality; in itself it cannot satisfy me, and has not the smallest worth. I might be content that this material world without me should vanish into a mere picture, or be dissolved into a shadow; — I am not dependent on it: but according to thy previous reasoning, I myself disappear no less than it; I myself am transformed into a mere presentation, without meaning and without purpose. Or tell me, is it otherwise?
BOOK II. KNOWLEDGE. 459 Spirit. I say nothing in my own name. Examine, — help thyself!
/. I appear to myself as a body existing in space, with organs of sense and of action, as a physical force governed by a will. Of all this thou wilt say, as thou hast before said of objects out of myself, the thinking being, that it is a product of sensation, intuition, and thought combined.
Spirit. Undoubtedly. I will even show thee, step by step, if thou desirest it, the laws according to which thou appearest to thyself in consciousness as an organic body, with such and such senses, — as a physical force, &c., and thou wilt be compelled to admit the truth of what I show thee.
I. I foresee that result. As I have been compelled to admit that what I call sweet, red, hard, and so on, is nothing more than my own affection; and that only by intuition and thought it is transposed into space out of myself, and regarded as the property of something existing independently of me; so shall I also be com pelled to admit that this body, with all its organs, is nothing but a sensible manifestation, in a determinate portion of space, of myself the inward thinking being; — that /, the spiritual entity, the pure intelligence, and /, the bodily frame in the physical world, are one and the same, merely viewed from two different sides, and conceived of by two different faculties; — the first by pure thought, the second by external intuition.
Spirit. This would certainly be the result of any inquiry that might be instituted.
/. And this thinking, spiritual entity, this intelli gence which by intuition is transformed into an earthly body, — what can even it be, according to these principles, 460 THE VOCATION OF MAN.
but a product of my own thought, something which is so conceived of by me only because I am compelled to imagine its existence by virtue of a law to me wholly inconceivable, proceeding from nothing and tending to nothing.
Spirit. It is possible.
/. Thou becomest timid and wavering. It is not possible only: it is necessary, according to these prin ciples.
This perceiving, thinking, willing, intelligent entity, or whatever else thou mayest name that which pos sesses the faculties of perception, thought, and so forth; — that in which these faculties inhere, or in whatever other way thou mayest express this thought; — how do I attain a knowledge of it? Am I immediately con scious of it? How can I be? It is only of actual and specific acts of perception, thought, will, &c., as of particular occurrences, that I am immediately con scious; not of the 'capacities through which they are performed, and still less of a being in whom these capacities inhere. I perceive, directly and intuitively, this specific thought which occupies me during the present moment, and other specific thoughts in other moments; and here this inward intellectual intuition, this immediate consciousness, ends. This inward, intuitive thought, now becomes itself an object of thought; but according to the laws under which alone I can think, it seems to me imperfect and incomplete, just as formerly the thought of my sensible states was but an imper fect thought. As formerly to mere passivity I un consciously superadded in thought an active element, so here to my determinate state (my actual thought or will) I superadd a determinable element (an infinite, BOOK II. KNOWLEDGE. 4G1 possible thought or mill) simply because / must do so, and for the same reason, but without being conscious of this mental apposition. This manifold possible thought I further comprehend as one definite whole; — once more because I must do so, since I am unable to comprehend anything indefinite, — and thus I obtain the idea of a finite capacity of thought, and — since this idea carries with it the notion of a something indepen dent of the thought itself — of a being or entity which possesses this capacity.
But, on higher principles, it may be made still more conceivable how this thinking being is produced by its own thought. Thought in general is genetic, as suming the previous creation of an object immediately revealed, and occupying itself with the description of this object. Intuition gives the naked fact, and nothing more. Thought explains this fact, and unites it to another, not found in intuition, but produced purely by thought itself, from which it, the fact, proceeds. So here. I am conscious of a determinate thought; thus far, and no farther, does intuitive consciousness carry me. I think this determinate thought, that is, I bring it forth from an indeterminate, but determinable, possibility of thought. In this way I proceed with everything determinate which is presented in immediate consciousness, and thus arise for me all those series of capacities, and of beings possessing these capacities, whose existence I assume.
Spirit. Even with respect to thyself, therefore, thou art conscious only that thou feelest, perceivest, or thinkest, in this or that determinate manner?
/. That /feel, / perceive, / think? — that I, as the efficient principle, produce the sensation, the intuition, s s the thought'/ By no means! Not even HO much M this have thy principles loft inc.
tyiri/. I'otsibly.
/. Necessarily; — for HCC: All thnt 1 know is my consciousness itself. AH consciousness in either mi immediate or u mediate consciousness. The first is sclf- consciousncfla; (he second, consciousness of that which in not myself. What I cull /, is therefore absolutely nothing more than a certuin modification of conscious- ii- •.. which in called /, just because, it in immediate, returning into itself, and not directed outward. Since all other COnfciouinoM is pottiblo only under the con dition of tin. immediate consciousness, it in obvious that tin. con§oioutn6M which is ctdled 1 must ac company.ill my other conception!, he ncceMHarily con tained in them, although not always clearly perceived hy me, and that in each moment of my connciousness I must refer everything to this /, and not to the par ticular thing out of myself thought of at the moment, in this way the / would at every moment vanish, and n-iippcar; and lor every new conception a new / would arise, and this / would never signify anything more than ii«f iln tliimj.
This scattered self-consciousness is now comhincd hy thought, — hy mere thought, 1 say — and presented in the unity of a supposed capacity of thought. Ac cording to this supposition, all conceptions which an- accompanied hy the immediate consciousness already spoken of, must proceed from one and the same capa city, which niln iv. in one and the same entity; and thus there arises for me the notion of the identity and personality of my 7, anil of an ellicient and real power in this person, - necessarily u mere fiction, since this HOOK II. KNOWl.KmJK. 4(W capacity and this entity are themselves only supposi tions.
Spirit. Thou roasonest correctly.
/. And tlum hast pleasure in this! 1 may then indeed say " it is thought," — and yet 1 can scarcely say even this; — rather, strictly speaking, 1 ought to say " the thought appears that I feel, perceive, think." —but by no moans that " 1 fed, perceive, think." The first only is fact; the second is an imaginary addition to the fact.
Spirit. It is well expressed.
/. There is nothing enduring, either out of me. or in me, but only a ceaseless change. 1 know of no being, not even of my own. There is no being. I myself ab solutely know not, and am not. Pictures are: — they are the only things which exist, and they know of them selves after the fashion of pictures: — pictures which float, past without there being anything past which they tloat; which, by means of like pictures, are connected with each other: — pictures without anything which is pictured in them, without significance and without aim. 1 myself am one of these pictures; — nay, I am not even this, but merely a, confused picture of the pictures. All reality is transformed into a strange dream, without a life which is dreamed of, and with out, a mind which dreams it; — into a dream which is woven together in a dream of itself. Intuition is the dream; thought, — the source of all the being and all the reality which 1 imagine, of my own being, my own powers, and my own purposes, — is the dream of that dream.
Spirit. Thou hast well understood it all. Kmploy the sharpest expressions to make this result hateful, if thou 464 THE VOCATION OF MAN.
must submit to it. And this thou must do. Thou hast clearly seen that it cannot be otherwise. Or wilt thou retract thy admissions, and justify thy retracta tion on principle?
/. By no means. I have seen, and now see clearly, that it is so; yet I cannot believe it.
Spirit. Thou seest it clearly, and yet canst not be lieve it? That is a different matter.
7. Thou art a profligate spirit: thy knowledge itself is profligacy, and springs from profligacy; and I can not thank thee for having led me on this path!
Spirit. Short-sighted mortal! When men venture to look into being, and see as far as themselves, and a little further, — such as thou art call it profligacy. I have allowed thee to deduce the results of our inquiry in thine own way, to analyze them, and to clothe them in hateful expressions. Didst thou then think that these results were less known to me than to thyself, that I did not understand, as well as thou, how by these principles all reality was thoroughly annihilated, and transformed into a dream? Didst thou then take me for a blind admirer and advocate of this system, as a complete system of the human mind?
Thou didst desire to know, and thou hadst taken a wrong road. Thou didst seek knowledge where no knowledge can reach, and hadst even persuaded thy self that thou hadst obtained an insight into something which is opposed to the very nature of all insight. I found thee in this condition. I wished to free thee BOOK II. KNOWLEDGE. 465 from thy false knowledge; but by no means to bring thee the true.
Thou didst desire to know of thy knowledge. Art thou surprised that in this way thou didst discover no thing more than that of which thou desiredst to know, — thy knowledge itself; and wouldst thou have had it otherwise? What has its origin in and through know ledge, is merely knowledge. All knowledge, however, is but pictures, representations; and there is always something awanting in it, — that which corresponds to the representation. This want cannot be supplied by knowledge; a system of mere knowledge is ne cessarily a system of mere pictures, wholly without reality, significance, or aim. Didst thou expect any thing else? AVouldst thou change the very nature of thy mind, and desire thy knowledge to be something more than knowledge?
The reality, in the perception of which thou didst formerly believe, — a material world already existing independently of thee, of which thou didst fear to be come the slave, — has vanished; for this whole material world arises only through knowledge, and is itself our knowledge; — but knowledge is not reality, just because it is knowledge. Thou hast seen through the illusion; and, without belying thy better insight, thou canst never again give thyself up to it. This is the sole merit which I claim for the system which we have to gether discovered; — it destroys and annihilates error. It cannot give us truth, for it is in itself absolutely empty. Thou dost now seek, and with good right, as I well know, something real lying beyond mere ap- S S 2 466 THE VOCATION OF MAN.
pearance, another reality than that which is thus an nihilated. But in vain wouldst thou labour to create this reality by means of thy knowledge, or out of thy knowledge; or to embrace it by thy understanding. If thou hast no other organ by which to apprehend it, it will never be found by thee.
But thou hast such an organ. Arouse and animate it, and thou wilt attain to perfect tranquillity. I leave thee alone with thyself.
BOOK THIRD FAITH.
(469) BOOK III. FAITH.
TERRIBLE Spirit, thy discourse has smitten me to the ground. But thou referrest me to myself, and what were I, could anything out of myself irrecoverably cast me down? I will, — yes, surely I will follow thy counsel.
What seekest thou, then, my complaining heart? What is it that excites thee against a system to which my understanding cannot raise the slightest objection?
This it is: — I demand something beyond a mere presentation or conception; something that is, has been, and will be, even if the presentation were not; and which the presentation only records, without producing it, or in the smallest degree changing it. A mere pre sentation I now see to be a deceptive show; my pre sentations must have a meaning beneath them, and if my entire knowledge revealed to me nothing but know ledge, I would be defrauded of my whole life. That there is nothing whatever but my presentations or con ceptions, is, to the natural sense of mankind, a silly and ridiculous conceit which no man can seriously enter tain, and which requires no refutation. To the better- informed judgment, which knows the deep, and, by mere reasoning, irrefragable grounds for this assertion, it is a prostrating, annihilating thought.
470 THE VOCATION OF MAN.
And what is, then, this something lying beyond all presentation, towards which I stretch forward with such ardent longing? What is the power with which it draws me towards it? What is the central point in my soul to which it is attached, and with which only it can be effaced?
" Not merely TO KNOW, but according to thy know ledge TO DO, is thy vocation:" — thus is it loudly pro claimed in the innermost depths of my soul, as soon as I recollect myself for a moment, and turn my ob servation upon myself. " Not for idle contemplation of thyself, not for brooding over devout sensations; — no, for action art thou here; thine action, and thine action alone, determines thy worth."
This voice leads me from presentation, from mere cognition, to something which lies beyond it, and is entirely opposed to it; to something which is greater and higher than all knowledge, and which contains within itself the end and object of all knowledge. When I act, I doubtless know that I act, and how I act; but this knowledge is not the act itself, but only the observation of it. This voice thus announces to me precisely that which I sought; a something lying beyond mere knowledge, and, in its nature, wholly independent of it.
Thus it is, I know it immediately. But having once entered within the domain of speculation, the doubt which has been awakened within me, will secretly endure, and will continue to disturb me. Since I have placed myself in this position, I can obtain no complete satisfaction until everything which I accept is justified before the tribunal of speculation. I have thus to ask myself, — how is it thus? Whence arises that voice in BOOK III. FAITH. 471 my soul which directs me to something beyond mere presentation and knowledge?
There is within me an impulse to absolute, inde pendent self-activity. Nothing is more insupportable to me, than to be merely by another, for another, and through another; I must be something for myself and by myself alone. This impulse I feel along with the perception of my own existence, it is inseparably united to my consciousness of myself.
I explain this feeling to myself, by reflection; and add to this blind impulse the power of sight, by thought. According to this impulse I must act as an absolutely independent being: — thus I understand and translate the impulse. I must be independent. Who am I? Subject and object in one, — the conscious being and that of which I am conscious, gifted with intuitive knowledge and myself revealed in that intuition, the thinking mind and myself the object of the thought — inseparable, and ever present to each other. As both, must I be what I am, absolutely by myself alone; — by myself originate conceptions, — by myself produce a condition of things lying beyond these conceptions. But how is the latter possible? To nothing I cannot unite any being whatever; from nothing there can never arise something; my objective thought is necessarily mediative only. But any being which is united to another being, does thereby, by means of this other being, become dependent; — it is no longer a primary, original, and genetic, but only a secondary and derived being. I am constrained to unite myself to something; — to another being I cannot unite myself, without losing that independence which is the condition of my own existence.
472 THE VOCATION OF MAN.
My conception and origination of a purpose, how ever, is, by its very nature, absolutely free, — producing something out of nothing. To such a conception I must unite my activity, in order that it may be pos sible to regard it as free, and as proceeding absolutely from myself alone.
In the following manner, therefore, do I conceive of my independence as /. I ascribe to myself the power of originating a conception simply because I originate it, of originating this conception simply because I originate this one, — by the absolute sovereignty of my self as an intelligence. I further ascribe to myself the power of manifesting this conception beyond itself by means of an action; — ascribe to myself a real, active power, capable of producing something beyond itself. — a power which is entirely different from the mere power of conception. These conceptions, which are called conceptions of design, or purposes, are not, like the conceptions of mere knowledge, copies of something already given, but rather types of something yet to be produced; the real power lies beyond them, and is in itself independent of them; — it only receives from them its immediate determinations, which are apprehended by knowledge. Such an independent power it is that, in consequence of this impulse, I ascribe to myself.
Here then, it appears, is the point to which the consciousness of all reality unites itself; — the real efficiency of my conception, and the real power of action which, in consequence of it, I am compelled to ascribe to myself, is this point. Let it be as it may with the reality of a sensible world beyond me; I possess reality and comprehend it, — it lies within my own being, it is native to myself.
BOOK III. FAITH. 473 I conceive this, my real power of action, in thought, but I do not create it by thought. The immediate feeling of my impulse to independent activity lies at the foundation of this thought; the thought does no more than pourtray this feeling, and accept it in its own form, — the form of thought. This procedure may, I think, be vindicated before the tribunal of speculation.
What! Shall I, once more, knowingly and inten tionally deceive myself? This procedure can by no means be justified before that strict tribunal.
I feel within me an impulse and an effort towards outward activity; this appears to be true, and to be the only truth which belongs to the matter. Since it is I who feel this impulse, and since I cannot pass be yond myself, either with my whole consciousness, or in particular with my capacity of sensation, — since this / itself is the last point at which I feel this impulse, there fore it certainly appears to me as an impulse founded in myself, to an activity also founded in myself. Might it not be however that this impulse, although unper- ceivcd by me, is in reality the impulse of a foreign power invisible to me, and that notion of independence merely a delusion, arising from my sphere of vision being limited to myself alone? I have no reason to as sume this, but just as little reason to deny it. I must confess that I absolutely know nothing, and can know nothing, about it.
Do I then indeed feel that real power of free action, which, strangely enough, I ascribe to myself without knowing anything of it? By no means; — it is merely the determinable element, which, by the well-known T t 474 THE VOCATION OF MAN.
laws of thought whereby all capacities and all powers arise, we are compelled to add in imagination to the determinate element — the real action, which itself is, in like manner, only an assumption.
Is that procession, from the mere conception to an imaginary realization of it, anything more than the usual and well-known procedure of all objective thought, which always strives to be, not mere thought, but something more? By what dishonesty can this pro cedure be made of more value here than in any other case? — can it possess any deeper significance, when to the conception of a thought it adds a realization of this thought, than when to the conception of this table it adds an actual and present table? " The conception of a purpose, a particular determination of events in me, appears in a double shape, — partly as subjective — a Thought; partly as objective — an Action." What reason, which would not unquestionably itself stand in need of a genetic deduction, could I adduce against this explanation?
I say that I feel this impulse: — it is therefore I my self who say so, and think so while I say it? Do I then really feel, or only think that I feel? Is not all which I call feeling only a presentation produced by my objec tive process of thought, and indeed the first transition point of all objectivity? And then again, do I really think, or do I merely think that I think? And do I think that I really think, or merely that I possess the idea of thinking? What can hinder speculation from raising such questions, and continuing to raise them without end? What can I answer, and where is there a point at which I can command such ques tionings to cease? I know, and must admit, that each definite act of consciousness may be made the subject BOOK III. FAITH. 475 of reflection, and a new consciousness of the first con sciousness may thus be created; and that thereby the immediate consciousness is raised a step higher, and the first consciousness darkened and made doubtful; and that to this ladder there is no highest step. I know that all scepticism rests upon this process, and that the system which has so violently prostrated me is founded on the adoption and the clear consciousness of it.
I know that if I am not merely to play another per plexing game with this system, but intend really and practically to adopt it, I must refuse obedience to that voice within me. I cannot will to act, for according to that system I cannot knoiu whether I can really act or not: — I can never believe that I truly act; that which seems to be my action must appear to me as entirely without meaning, as a mere delusive picture. All earnestness and all interest is withdrawn from my life; and life, as well as thought, is transformed into a mere play, which proceeds from nothing and tends to nothing.
Shall I then refuse obedience to that inward voice? I will not do so. I will freely accept the vocation which this impulse assigns to me, and in this resolution I will lay hold at once of thought, in all its reality and truthfulness, and on the reality of all things which are pre- supposed therein. I will restrict myself to the position of natural thought in which this impulse places me, and cast from me all those over-refined and subtile inquiries which alone could make me doubtful of its truth.
I understand thee now, sublime Spirit! I have found the organ by which to apprehend this reality, and, with this, probably all other reality. Knowledge is not this 476 THE VOCATION OF MAN.
organ: — no knowledge can be its own foundation, its own proof; every knowledge pre- supposes another higher knowledge on which it is founded, and to this ascent there is no end. It is FAITH, that voluntary acquiescence in the view which is naturally presented to us, because only through this view we can fulfil our vocation; — this it is, which first lends a sanction to knowledge, and raises to certainty and conviction that which without it might be mere delusion. It is not knowledge, but a resolution of the will to admit the validity of knowledge.