The World as Will and Idea Volume II Part 8

the discovery of which is on the Continent of Europe always ascribed to Newton, while in England the learned at least know very well that it belongs to Robert Hooke, who in the year 1666, in a "Communication to the Royal Society," expounds it quite distinctly, although only as an hypothesis and without proof. The princ.i.p.al pa.s.sage of this communication is quoted in Dugald Stewart's "Philosophy of the Human Mind," and is probably taken from Robert Hooke's Posthumous Works. The history of the matter, and how Newton got into difficulty by it, is also to be found in the "_Biographie Universelle_," article Newton. Hooke's priority is treated as an established fact in a short history of astronomy, _Quarterly Review_, August 1828. Further details on this subject are to be found in my "_Parerga_," vol. ii., -- 86 (second edition, -- 88). The story of the fall of an apple is a fable as groundless as it is popular, and is quite without authority.

(2) To No. 18 of Matter.

_The quant.i.ty of a motion_ (_quant.i.tas motus_, already in Descartes) is the product of the ma.s.s into the velocity.

This law is the basis not only of the doctrine of impact in mechanics, but also of that of equilibrium in statics. From the force of impact which two bodies with the same velocity exert the relation of their ma.s.ses to each other may be determined. Thus of two hammers striking with the same velocity, the one which has the greater ma.s.s will drive the nail deeper into the wall or the post deeper into the earth. For example, a hammer weighing six pounds with a velocity = 6 effects as much as a hammer weighing three pounds with a velocity = 12, for in both cases the quant.i.ty of motion or the momentum = 36. Of two b.a.l.l.s rolling at the same pace, the one which has the greater ma.s.s will impel a third ball at rest to a greater distance than the ball of less ma.s.s can. For the ma.s.s of the first multiplied by the same velocity gives a _greater quant.i.ty of motion_, or a _greater momentum_. The cannon carries further than the gun, because an equal velocity communicated to a much greater ma.s.s gives a much _greater quant.i.ty of motion_, which resists longer the r.e.t.a.r.ding effect of gravity.

For the same reason, the same arm will throw a lead bullet further than a stone one of equal magnitude, or a large stone further than quite a small one. And therefore also a case-shot does not carry so far as a ball-shot.

The same law lies at the foundation of the theory of the lever and of the balance. For here also the smaller ma.s.s, on the longer arm of the lever or beam of the balance, has a greater velocity in falling; and multiplied by this it may be equal to, or indeed exceed, the _quant.i.ty of motion_ or the _momentum_ of the greater ma.s.s at the shorter arm of the lever. In the state of rest brought about by _equilibrium_ this velocity exists merely in intention or virtually, _potentia_, not _actu_; but it acts just as well as _actu_, which is very remarkable.

The following explanation will be more easily understood now that these truths have been called to mind.

The quant.i.ty of a given matter can only be estimated in general according to its force, and its force can only be known in its _expression_. Now when we are considering matter only as regards its quant.i.ty, not its quality, this expression can only be mechanical, _i.e._, it can only consist in motion which it imparts to other matter. For only in motion does the force of matter become, so to speak, _alive_; hence the expression _vis viva_ for the manifestation of force of matter in motion.

Accordingly the only measure of the quant.i.ty of a given matter is the _quant.i.ty of its motion_, or its _momentum_. In this, however, if it is given, the _quant.i.ty_ of matter still appears in conjunction and amalgamated with its other factor, _velocity_. Therefore if we want to know the quant.i.ty of matter (the ma.s.s) this other factor must be eliminated. Now the velocity is known directly; for it is _S/T_. But the other factor, which remains when this is eliminated, can always be known only _relatively_ in comparison with other ma.s.ses, which again can only be known themselves by means of the _quant.i.ty of their motion_, or their _momentum_, thus in their combination with velocity. We must therefore compare one _quant.i.ty of motion_ with the other, and then subtract the velocity from both, in order to see how much each of them owed to its ma.s.s. This is done by weighing the ma.s.ses against each other, in which that _quant.i.ty of motion_ is compared which, in each of the two ma.s.ses, calls forth the attractive power of the earth that acts upon both only in proportion to their _quant.i.ty_. Therefore there are two kinds of weighing.

Either we impart to the two ma.s.ses to be compared _equal_ velocity, in order to find out which of the two now _communicates_ motion to the other, thus itself _has_ a greater quant.i.ty of motion, which, since the velocity is the same on both sides, is to be ascribed to the other factor of the _quant.i.ty of motion_ or the _momentum_, thus to the ma.s.s (common balance).

Or we weigh, by investigating how much _more velocity_ the one ma.s.s must receive than the other has, in order to be equal to the latter in _quant.i.ty of motion_ or _momentum_, and therefore allow no more motion to be communicated to itself by the other; for then in proportion as its velocity must exceed that of the other, its ma.s.s, _i.e._, the quant.i.ty of its matter, is less than that of the other (steelyard). This estimation of ma.s.ses by weighing depends upon the favourable circ.u.mstance that the moving force, in itself, acts upon both quite equally, and each of the two is in a position to _communicate_ to the other directly its surplus _quant.i.ty of motion_ or _momentum_, so that it becomes visible.

The substance of these doctrines has long ago been expressed by Newton and Kant, but through the connection and the clearness of this exposition I believe I have made it more intelligible, so that that insight is possible for all which I regarded as necessary for the justification of proposition No. 18.

Second Half. The Doctrine of the Abstract Idea, or Thinking.

Chapter V.(16) On The Irrational Intellect.

It must be possible to arrive at a complete knowledge of the consciousness of the brutes, for we can construct it by abstracting certain properties of our own consciousness. On the other hand, there enters into the consciousness of the brute instinct, which is much more developed in all of them than in man, and in some of them extends to what we call mechanical instinct.

The brutes have understanding without having reason, and therefore they have knowledge of perception but no abstract knowledge. They apprehend correctly, and also grasp the immediate causal connection, in the case of the higher species even through several links of its chain, but they do not, properly speaking, _think_. For they lack _conceptions_, that is, abstract ideas. The first consequence of this, however, is the want of a proper memory, which applies even to the most sagacious of the brutes, and it is just this which const.i.tutes the princ.i.p.al difference between their consciousness and that of men. Perfect intelligence depends upon the distinct consciousness of the past and of the eventual future, _as such_, and in connection with the present. The special memory which this demands is therefore an orderly, connected, and thinking retrospective recollection. This, however, is only possible by means of _general conceptions_, the a.s.sistance of which is required by what is entirely individual, in order that it may be recalled in its order and connection.

For the boundless mult.i.tude of things and events of the same and similar kinds, in the course of our life, does not admit directly of a perceptible and individual recollection of each particular, for which neither the powers of the most comprehensive memory nor our time would be sufficient.

Therefore all this can only be preserved by subsuming it under general conceptions, and the consequent reference to relatively few principles, by means of which we then have always at command an orderly and adequate survey of our past. We can only present to ourselves in perception particular scenes of the past, but the time that has pa.s.sed since then and its content we are conscious of only in the abstract by means of conceptions of things and numbers which now represent days and years, together with their content. The memory of the brutes, on the contrary, like their whole intellect, is confined to what they _perceive_, and primarily consists merely in the fact that a recurring impression presents itself as having already been experienced, for the present perception revivifies the traces of an earlier one. Their memory is therefore always dependent upon what is now actually present. Just on this account, however, this excites anew the sensation and the mood which the earlier phenomenon produced. Thus the dog recognises acquaintances, distinguishes friends from enemies, easily finds again the path it has once travelled, the houses it has once visited, and at the sight of a plate or a stick is at once put into the mood a.s.sociated with them. All kinds of training depend upon the use of this perceptive memory and on the force of habit, which in the case of animals is specially strong. It is therefore just as different from human education as perception is from thinking. We ourselves are in certain cases, in which memory proper refuses us its service, confined to that merely perceptive recollection, and thus we can measure the difference between the two from our own experience. For example, at the sight of a person whom it appears to us we know, although we are not able to remember when or where we saw him; or again, when we visit a place where we once were in early childhood, that is, while our reason was yet undeveloped, and which we have therefore entirely forgotten, and yet feel that the present impression is one which we have already experienced. This is the nature of all the recollections of the brutes. We have only to add that in the case of the most sagacious this merely perceptive memory rises to a certain degree of _phantasy_, which again a.s.sists it, and by virtue of which, for example, the image of its absent master floats before the mind of the dog and excites a longing after him, so that when he remains away long it seeks for him everywhere.

Its dreams also depend upon this phantasy. The consciousness of the brutes is accordingly a mere succession of presents, none of which, however, exist as future before they appear, nor as past after they have vanished; which is the specific difference of human consciousness. Hence the brutes have infinitely less to _suffer_ than we have, because they know no other pains but those which the _present_ directly brings. But the present is without extension, while the future and the past, which contain most of the causes of our suffering, are widely extended, and to their actual content there is added that which is merely possible, which opens up an unlimited field for desire and aversion. The brutes, on the contrary, undisturbed by these, enjoy quietly and peacefully each present moment, even if it is only bearable. Human beings of very limited capacity perhaps approach them in this. Further, the sufferings which belong _purely_ to the present can only be physical. Indeed the brutes do not properly speaking feel death: they can only know it when it appears, and then they are already no more. Thus then the life of the brute is a continuous present. It lives on without reflection, and exists wholly in the present; even the great majority of men live with very little reflection. Another consequence of the special nature of the intellect of the brutes, which we have explained is the perfect accordance of their consciousness with their environment. Between the brute and the external world there is nothing, but between us and the external world there is always our thought about it, which makes us often inapproachable to it, and it to us. Only in the case of children and very primitive men is this wall of part.i.tion so thin that in order to see what goes on in them we only need to see what goes on round about them. Therefore the brutes are incapable alike of purpose and dissimulation; they reserve nothing. In this respect the dog stands to the man in the same relation as a gla.s.s goblet to a metal one, and this helps greatly to endear the dog so much to us, for it affords us great pleasure to see all those inclinations and emotions which we so often conceal displayed simply and openly in him. In general, the brutes always play, as it were, with their hand exposed; and therefore we contemplate with so much pleasure their behaviour towards each other, both when they belong to the same and to different species. It is characterised by a certain stamp of innocence, in contrast to the conduct of men, which is withdrawn from the innocence of nature by the entrance of reason, and with it of prudence or deliberation. Hence human conduct has throughout the stamp of intention or deliberate purpose, the absence of which, and the consequent determination by the impulse of the moment, is the fundamental characteristic of all the action of the brutes. No brute is capable of a purpose properly so-called. To conceive and follow out a purpose is the prerogative of man, and it is a prerogative which is rich in consequences.

Certainly an instinct like that of the bird of pa.s.sage or the bee, still more a permanent, persistent desire, a longing like that of the dog for its absent master, may present the appearance of a purpose, with which, however, it must not be confounded. Now all this has its ultimate ground in the relation between the human and the brute intellect, which may also be thus expressed: The brutes have only _direct_ knowledge, while we, in addition to this, have _indirect_ knowledge; and the advantage which in many things-for example, in trigonometry and a.n.a.lysis, in machine work instead of hand work, &c.-indirect has over direct knowledge appears here also. Thus again we may say: The brutes have only a _single_ intellect, we a _double_ intellect, both perceptive and thinking, and the operation of the two often go on independently of each other. We perceive one thing, and we think another. Often, again, they act upon each other. This way of putting the matter enables us specially to understand that natural openness and naivete of the brutes, referred to above, as contrasted with the concealment of man.

However, the law _natura non facit saltus_ is not entirely suspended even with regard to the intellect of the brutes, though certainly the step from the brute to the human intelligence is the greatest which nature has made in the production of her creatures. In the most favoured individuals of the highest species of the brutes there certainly sometimes appears, always to our astonishment, a faint trace of reflection, reason, the comprehension of words, of thought, purpose, and deliberation. The most striking indications of this kind are afforded by the elephant, whose highly developed intelligence is heightened and supported by an experience of a lifetime which sometimes extends to two hundred years. He has often given unmistakable signs, recorded in well-known anecdotes, of premeditation, which, in the case of brutes, always astonishes us more than anything else. Such, for instance, is the story of the tailor on whom an elephant revenged himself for p.r.i.c.king him with a needle. I wish, however, to rescue from oblivion a parallel case to this, because it has the advantage of being authenticated by judicial investigation. On the 27th of August 1830 there was held at Morpeth, in England, a coroner's inquest on the keeper, Baptist Bernhard, who was killed by his elephant.

It appeared from the evidence that two years before he had offended the elephant grossly, and now, without any occasion, but on a favourable opportunity, the elephant had seized him and crushed him. (See the _Spectator_ and other English papers of that day.) For special information on the intelligence of brutes I recommend Leroy's excellent book, "_Sur l'Intelligence des Animaux_," _nouv. ed._ 1802.

Chapter VI. On The Doctrine of Abstract or Rational Knowledge.

The outward impression upon the senses, together with the mood which it alone awakens in us, vanishes with the presence of the thing. Therefore these two cannot of themselves const.i.tute _experience_ proper, whose teaching is to guide our conduct for the future. The image of that impression which the imagination preserves is originally weaker than the impression itself, and becomes weaker and weaker daily, until in time it disappears altogether. There is only one thing which is not subject either to the instantaneous vanis.h.i.+ng of the impression or to the gradual disappearance of its image, and is therefore free from the power of time.

This is the _conception_. In it, then, the teaching of experience must be stored up, and it alone is suited to be a safe guide to our steps in life.

Therefore Seneca says rightly, "_Si vis tibi omnia subjicere, te subjice rationi_" (Ep. 37). And I add to this that the essential condition of surpa.s.sing others in actual life is that we should reflect or deliberate.

Such an important tool of the intellect as the _concept_ evidently cannot be identical with the _word_, this mere sound, which as an impression of sense pa.s.ses with the moment, or as a phantasm of hearing dies away with time. Yet the concept is an idea, the distinct consciousness and preservation of which are bound up with the word. Hence the Greeks called word, concept, relation, thought, and reason by the name of the first, ?

?????. Yet the concept is perfectly different both from the word, to which it is joined, and from the perceptions, from which it has originated. It is of an entirely different nature from these impressions of the senses.

Yet it is able to take up into itself all the results of perception, and give them back again unchanged and undiminished after the longest period of time; thus alone does _experience_ arise. But the concept preserves, not what is perceived nor what is then felt, but only what is essential in these, in an entirely altered form, and yet as an adequate representative of them. Just as flowers cannot be preserved, but their ethereal oil, their essence, with the same smell and the same virtues, can be. The action that has been guided by correct conceptions will, in the result, coincide with the real object aimed at. We may judge of the inestimable value of conceptions, and consequently of the reason, if we glance for a moment at the infinite mult.i.tude and variety of the things and conditions that coexist and succeed each other, and then consider that speech and writing (the signs of conceptions) are capable of affording us accurate information as to everything and every relation when and wherever it may have been; for comparatively _few_ conceptions can contain and represent an infinite number of things and conditions. In our own reflection _abstraction_ is a throwing off of useless baggage for the sake of more easily handling the knowledge which is to be compared, and has therefore to be turned about in all directions. We allow much that is unessential, and therefore only confusing, to fall away from the real things, and work with few but essential determinations thought in the abstract. But just because general conceptions are only formed by thinking away and leaving out existing qualities, and are therefore the emptier the more general they are, the use of this procedure is confined to the _working up_ of knowledge which we have already acquired. This working up includes the drawing of conclusions from premisses contained in our knowledge. New insight, on the contrary, can only be obtained by the help of the faculty of judgment, from perception, which alone is complete and rich knowledge.

Further, because the content and the extent of the concepts stand in inverse relation to each other, and thus the more is thought _under_ a concept, the less is thought _in_ it, concepts form a graduated series, a hierarchy, from the most special to the most general, at the lower end of which scholastic realism is almost right, and at the upper end nominalism.

For the most special conception is almost the individual, thus almost real; and the most general conception, _e.g._, being (_i.e._, the infinitive of the copula), is scarcely anything but a word. Therefore philosophical systems which confine themselves to such very general conceptions, without going down to the real, are little more than mere juggling with words. For since all abstraction consists in thinking away, the further we push it the less we have left over. Therefore, if I read those modern philosophemes which move constantly in the widest abstractions, I am soon quite unable, in spite of all attention, to think almost anything more in connection with them; for I receive no material for thought, but am supposed to work with mere empty sh.e.l.ls, which gives me a feeling like that which we experience when we try to throw very light bodies; the strength and also the exertion are there, but there is no object to receive them, so as to supply the other moment of motion. If any one wants to experience this let him read the writings of the disciples of Sch.e.l.ling, or still better of the Hegelians. _Simple conceptions_ would necessarily be such as could not be broken up. Accordingly they could never be the subject of an a.n.a.lytical judgment. This I hold to be impossible, for if we think a conception we must also be able to give its content. What are commonly adduced as examples of simple conceptions are really not conceptions at all, but partly mere sensations-as, for instance, those of some special colour; partly the forms of perception which are known to us _a priori_, thus properly the ultimate elements of _perceptive knowledge_. But this itself is for the whole system of our thought what granite is for geology, the ultimate firm basis which supports all, and beyond which we cannot go. The _distinctness_ of a conception demands not only that we should be able to separate its predicates, but also that we should be able to a.n.a.lyse these even if they are abstractions, and so on until we reach knowledge of _perception_, and thus refer to concrete things through the distinct perception of which the final abstractions are verified and reality guaranteed to them, as well as to all the higher abstractions which rest upon them. Therefore the ordinary explanation that the conception is distinct as soon as we can give its predicates is not sufficient. For the separating of these predicates may lead perhaps to more conceptions; and so on again without there being that ultimate basis of perceptions which imparts reality to all those conceptions. Take, for example, the conception "spirit," and a.n.a.lyse it into its predicates: "A thinking, willing, immaterial, simple, indestructible being that does not occupy s.p.a.ce." Nothing is yet distinctly thought about it, because the elements of these conceptions cannot be verified by means of perceptions, for a thinking being without a brain is like a digesting being without a stomach. Only perceptions are, properly speaking, _clear_, not conceptions; these at the most can only be distinct. Hence also, absurd as it was, "clear and confused" were coupled together and used as synonymous when knowledge of perception was explained as merely a confused abstract knowledge, because the latter kind of knowledge alone was distinct. This was first done by Duns Scotus, but Leibnitz has substantially the same view, upon which his "_Ident.i.tas Indiscernibilium_" depends. (See Kant's refutation of this, p. 275 of the first edition of the Critique of Pure Reason.)

The close connection of the conception with the word, thus of speech with reason, which was touched on above, rests ultimately upon the following ground. _Time_ is throughout the form of our whole consciousness, with its inward and outward apprehension. Conceptions, on the other hand, which originate through abstraction and are perfectly general ideas, different from all particular things, have in this property indeed a certain measure of objective existence, which does not, however, belong to any series of events in time. Therefore in order to enter the immediate present of an individual consciousness, and thus to admit of being introduced into a series of events in time, they must to a certain extent be reduced again to the nature of individual things, individualised, and therefore linked to an idea of sense. Such an idea is the _word_. It is accordingly the sensible sign of the conception, and as such the necessary means of _fixing_ it, that is, of presenting it to the consciousness, which is bound up with the form of time, and thus establis.h.i.+ng a connection between the reason, whose objects are merely general universals, knowing neither place nor time, and consciousness, which is bound up with time, is sensuous, and so far purely animal. Only by this means is the reproduction at pleasure, thus the recollection and preservation, of conceptions possible and open to us; and only by means of this, again, are the operations which are undertaken with conceptions possible-judgment, inference, comparison, limitation, &c. It is true it sometimes happens that conceptions occupy consciousness without their signs, as when we run through a train of reasoning so rapidly that we could not think the words in the time. But such cases are exceptions, which presuppose great exercise of the reason, which it could only have obtained by means of language. How much the use of reason is bound up with speech we see in the case of the deaf and dumb, who, if they have learnt no kind of language, show scarcely more intelligence than the ourang-outang or the elephant.

For their reason is almost entirely potential, not actual.

Words and speech are thus the indispensable means of distinct thought. But as every means, every machine, at once burdens and hinders, so also does language; for it forces the fluid and modifiable thoughts, with their infinitely fine distinctions of difference, into certain rigid, permanent forms, and thus in fixing also fetters them. This hindrance is to some extent got rid of by learning several languages. For in these the thought is poured from one mould into another, and somewhat alters its form in each, so that it becomes more and more freed from all form and clothing, and thus its own proper nature comes more distinctly into consciousness, and it recovers again its original capacity for modification. The ancient languages render this service very much better than the modern, because, on account of their great difference from the latter, the same thoughts are expressed in them in quite another way, and must thus a.s.sume a very different form; besides which the more perfect grammar of the ancient languages renders a more artistic and more perfect construction of the thoughts and their connection possible. Thus a Greek or a Roman might perhaps content himself with his own language, but he who understands nothing but some single modern patois will soon betray this poverty in writing and speaking; for his thoughts, firmly bound to such narrow stereotyped forms, must appear awkward and monotonous. Genius certainly makes up for this as for everything else, for example in Shakespeare.

Burke, in his "Inquiry into the Sublime and Beautiful," p. 5, -- 4 and 5, has given a perfectly correct and very elaborate exposition of what I laid down in -- 9 of the first volume, that the words of a speech are perfectly understood without calling up ideas of perception, pictures in our heads.

But he draws from this the entirely false conclusion that we hear, apprehend, and make use of words without connecting with them any idea whatever; whereas he ought to have drawn the conclusion that all ideas are not perceptible images, but that precisely those ideas which must be expressed by means of words are abstract notions or conceptions, and these from their very nature are not perceptible. Just because words impart only general conceptions, which are perfectly different from ideas of perception, when, for example, an event is recounted all the hearers will receive the same conceptions; but if afterwards they wish to make the incident clear to themselves, each of them will call up in his imagination a different _image_ of it, which differs considerably from the correct image that is possessed only by the eye-witness. This is the primary reason (which, however, is accompanied by others) why every fact is necessarily distorted by being repeatedly told. The second recounter communicates conceptions which he has abstracted from the image of _his own_ imagination, and from these conceptions the third now forms another image differing still more widely from the truth, and this again he translates into conceptions, and so the process goes on. Whoever is sufficiently matter of fact to stick to the conceptions imparted to him, and repeat them, will prove the most truthful reporter.

The best and most intelligent exposition of the essence and nature of conceptions which I have been able to find is in Thomas Reid's "Essays on the Powers of Human Mind," vol. ii., Essay 5, ch. 6. This was afterwards condemned by Dugald Stewart in his "Philosophy of the Human Mind." Not to waste paper I will only briefly remark with regard to the latter that he belongs to that large cla.s.s who have obtained an undeserved reputation through favour and friends, and therefore I can only advise that not an hour should be wasted over the scribbling of this shallow writer.

The princely scholastic Pico de Mirandula already saw that reason is the faculty of abstract ideas, and understanding the faculty of ideas of perception. For in his book, "_De Imaginatione_," ch. 11, he carefully distinguishes understanding and reason, and explains the latter as the discursive faculty peculiar to man, and the former as the intuitive faculty, allied to the kind of knowledge which is proper to the angels, and indeed to G.o.d. Spinoza also characterises reason quite correctly as the faculty of framing general conceptions (Eth., ii. prop. 40, schol. 2).

Such facts would not need to be mentioned if it were not for the tricks that have been played in the last fifty years by the whole of the philosophasters of Germany with the conception _reason_. For they have tried, with shameless audacity, to smuggle in under this name an entirely spurious faculty of immediate, metaphysical, so-called super-sensuous knowledge. The reason proper, on the other hand, they call _understanding_, and the understanding proper, as something quite strange to them, they overlook altogether, and ascribe its intuitive functions to sensibility.

In the case of all things in this world new drawbacks or disadvantages cleave to every source of aid, to every gain, to every advantage; and thus reason also, which gives to man such great advantages over the brutes, carries with it its special disadvantages, and opens for him paths of error into which the brutes can never stray. Through it a new species of motives, to which the brute is not accessible, obtains power over his will. These are the _abstract_ motives, the mere thoughts, which are by no means always drawn from his own experience, but often come to him only through the talk and example of others, through tradition and literature.

Having become accessible to thought, he is at once exposed to error. But every error must sooner or later do harm, and the greater the error the greater the harm it will do. The individual error must be atoned for by him who cherishes it, and often he has to pay dearly for it. And the same thing holds good on a large scale of the common errors of whole nations.

Therefore it cannot too often be repeated that every error wherever we meet it, is to be pursued and rooted out as an enemy of mankind, and that there can be no such thing as privileged or sanctioned error. The thinker ought to attack it, even if humanity should cry out with pain, like a sick man whose ulcer the physician touches. The brute can never stray far from the path of nature; for its motives lie only in the world of perception, where only the possible, indeed only the actual, finds room. On the other hand, all that is only imaginable, and therefore also the false, the impossible, the absurd, and senseless, enters into abstract conceptions, into thoughts and words. Since now all partake of reason, but few of judgment, the consequence is that man is exposed to delusion, for he is abandoned to every conceivable chimera which any one talks him into, and which, acting on his will as a motive, may influence him to perversities and follies of every kind, to the most unheard-of extravagances, and also to actions most contrary to his animal nature. True culture, in which knowledge and judgment go hand in hand, can only be brought to bear on a few; and still fewer are capable of receiving it. For the great ma.s.s of men a kind of training everywhere takes its place. It is effected by example, custom, and the very early and firm impression of certain conceptions, before any experience, understanding, or judgment were there to disturb the work. Thus thoughts are implanted, which afterward cling as firmly, and are as incapable of being shaken by any instruction as if they were _inborn_; and indeed they have often been regarded, even by philosophers, as such. In this way we can, with the same trouble, imbue men with what is right and rational, or with what is most absurd. For example, we can accustom them to approach this or that idol with holy dread, and at the mention of its name to prostrate in the dust not only their bodies but their whole spirit; to sacrifice their property and their lives willingly to words, to names, to the defence of the strangest whims; to attach arbitrarily the greatest honour or the deepest disgrace to this or that, and to prize highly or disdain everything accordingly with full inward conviction; to renounce all animal food, as in Hindustan, or to devour still warm and quivering pieces, cut from the living animal, as in Abyssinia; to eat men, as in New Zealand, or to sacrifice their children to Moloch; to castrate themselves, to fling themselves voluntarily on the funeral piles of the dead-in a word, to do anything we please. Hence the Crusades, the extravagances of fanatical sects; hence Chiliasts and Flagellants, persecutions, _autos da fe_, and all that is offered by the long register of human perversities. Lest it should be thought that only the dark ages afford such examples, I shall add a couple of more modern instances. In the year 1818 there went from Wurtemberg 7000 Chiliasts to the neighbourhood of Ararat, because the new kingdom of G.o.d, specially announced by Jung Stilling, was to appear there.(17) Gall relates that in his time a mother killed her child and roasted it in order to cure her husband's rheumatism with its fat.(18) The tragical side of error lies in the practical, the comical is reserved for the theoretical. For example, if we could firmly persuade three men that the sun is not the cause of daylight, we might hope to see it soon established as the general conviction. In Germany it was possible to proclaim as the greatest philosopher of all ages Hegel, a repulsive, mindless charlatan, an unparalleled scribbler of nonsense, and for twenty years many thousands have believed it stubbornly and firmly; and indeed, outside Germany, the Danish Academy entered the lists against myself for his fame, and sought to have him regarded as a _summus philosophus_. (Upon this see the preface to my _Grundproblemen der Ethik_.) These, then, are the disadvantages which, on account of the rarity of judgment, attach to the existence of reason. We must add to them the possibility of madness. The brutes do not go mad, although the carnivora are subject to fury, and the ruminants to a sort of delirium.

Chapter VII.(19) On The Relation of the Concrete Knowledge of Perception to Abstract Knowledge.

It has been shown that conceptions derive their material from knowledge of perception, and therefore the entire structure of our world of thought rests upon the world of perception. We must therefore be able to go back from every conception, even if only indirectly through intermediate conceptions, to the perceptions from which it is either itself directly derived or those conceptions are derived of which it is again an abstraction. That is to say, we must be able to support it with perceptions which stand to the abstractions in the relation of examples.

These perceptions thus afford the real content of all our thought, and whenever they are wanting we have not had conceptions but mere words in our heads. In this respect our intellect is like a bank, which, if it is to be sound, must have cash in its safe, so as to be able to meet all the notes it has issued, in case of demand; the perceptions are the cash, the conceptions are the notes. In this sense the perceptions might very appropriately be called _primary_, and the conceptions, on the other hand, _secondary_ ideas. Not quite so aptly, the Schoolmen, following the example of Aristotle (_Metaph._, vi. 11, xi. 1), called real things _substantiae primae_, and the conceptions _substantiae secundae_. Books impart only secondary ideas. Mere conceptions of a thing without perception give only a general knowledge of it. We only have a thorough understanding of things and their relations so far as we are able to represent them to ourselves in pure, distinct perceptions, without the aid of words. To explain words by words, to compare concepts with concepts, in which most philosophising consists, is a trivial s.h.i.+fting about of the concept-spheres in order to see which goes into the other and which does not. At the best we can in this way only arrive at conclusions; but even conclusions give no really new knowledge, but only show us all that lay in the knowledge we already possessed, and what part of it perhaps might be applicable to the particular case. On the other hand, to perceive, to allow the things themselves to speak to us, to apprehend new relations of them, and then to take up and deposit all this in conceptions, in order to possess it with certainty-that gives new knowledge. But, while almost every one is capable of comparing conceptions with conceptions, to compare conceptions with perceptions is a gift of the select few. It is the condition, according to the degree of its perfection, of wit, judgment, ingenuity, genius. The former faculty, on the contrary, results in little more than possibly rational reflections. The inmost kernel of all genuine and actual knowledge is a perception; and every new truth is the profit or gain yielded by a perception. All original thinking takes place in images, and this is why imagination is so necessary an instrument of thought, and minds that lack imagination will never accomplish much, unless it be in mathematics. On the other hand, merely abstract thoughts, which have no kernel of perception, are like cloud-structures, without reality. Even writing and speaking, whether didactic or poetical, has for its final aim to guide the reader to the same concrete knowledge from which the author started; if it has not this aim it is bad. This is why the contemplation and observing of every real thing, as soon as it presents something new to the observer, is more instructive than any reading or hearing. For indeed, if we go to the bottom of the matter, all truth and wisdom, nay, the ultimate secret of things, is contained in each real object, yet certainly only _in concreto_, just as gold lies hidden in the ore; the difficulty is to extract it. From a book, on the contrary, at the best we only receive the truth at second hand, and oftener not at all.

In most books, putting out of account those that are thoroughly bad, the author, when their content is not altogether empirical, has certainly _thought_ but not _perceived_; he has written from reflection, not from intuition, and it is this that makes them commonplace and tedious. For what the author has thought could always have been thought by the reader also, if he had taken the same trouble; indeed it consists simply of intelligent thought, full exposition of what is _implicite_ contained in the theme. But no actually new knowledge comes in this way into the world; this is only created in the moment of perception, of direct comprehension of a new side of the thing. When, therefore, on the contrary, _sight_ has formed the foundation of an author's thought, it is as if he wrote from a land where the reader has never been, for all is fresh and new, because it is drawn directly from the original source of all knowledge. Let me ill.u.s.trate the distinction here touched upon by a perfectly easy and simple example. Any commonplace writer might easily describe profound contemplation or petrifying astonishment by saying: "He stood like a statue;" but Cervantes says: "Like a clothed statue, for the wind moved his garments" (_Don Quixote_, book vi. ch. 19). It is thus that all great minds have ever _thought in presence of the perception_, and kept their gaze steadfastly upon it in their thought. We recognise this from this fact, among others, that even the most opposite of them so often agree and coincide in some particular; because they all speak of the same thing which they all had before their eyes, the world, the perceived reality; indeed in a certain degree they all say the same thing, and others never believe them. We recognise it further in the appropriateness and originality of the expression, which is always perfectly adapted to the subject because it has been inspired by perception, in the naivete of the language, the freshness of the imagery, and the impressiveness of the similes, all of which qualities, without exception, distinguish the works of great minds, and, on the contrary, are always wanting in the works of others. Accordingly only commonplace forms of expression and trite figures are at the service of the latter, and they never dare to allow themselves to be natural, under penalty of displaying their vulgarity in all its dreary barrenness; instead of this they are affected mannerists. Hence Buffon says: "_Le style est l'homme meme_." If men of commonplace mind write poetry they have certain traditional conventional opinions, pa.s.sions, n.o.ble sentiments, &c., which they have received in the abstract, and attribute to the heroes of their poems, who are in this way reduced to mere personifications of those opinions, and are thus themselves to a certain extent abstractions, and therefore insipid and tiresome. If they philosophise, they have taken in a few wide abstract conceptions, which they turn about in all directions, as if they had to do with algebraical equations, and hope that something will come of it; at the most we see that they have all read the same things. Such a tossing to and fro of abstract conceptions, after the manner of algebraical equations, which is now-a-days called dialectic, does not, like real algebra, afford certain results; for here the conception which is represented by the word is not a fixed and perfectly definite quality, such as are symbolised by the letters in algebra, but is wavering and ambiguous, and capable of extension and contraction. Strictly speaking, all thinking, _i.e._, combining of abstract conceptions, has at the most the _recollections_ of earlier perceptions for its material, and this only indirectly, so far as it const.i.tutes the foundation of all conceptions. Real knowledge, on the contrary, that is, immediate knowledge, is perception alone, new, fresh perception itself. Now the concepts which the reason has framed and the memory has preserved cannot all be present to consciousness at once, but only a very small number of them at a time. On the other hand, the energy with which we apprehend what is present in perception, in which really all that is essential in all things generally is virtually contained and represented, is apprehended, fills the consciousness in one moment with its whole power. Upon this depends the infinite superiority of genius to learning; they stand to each other as the text of an ancient cla.s.sic to its commentary. All truth and all wisdom really lies ultimately in perception. But this unfortunately can neither be retained nor communicated. The _objective_ conditions of such communication can certainly be presented to others purified and ill.u.s.trated through plastic and pictorial art, and even much more directly through poetry; but it depends so much upon _subjective_ conditions, which are not at the command of every one, and of no one at all times, nay, indeed in the higher degrees of perfection, are only the gift of the favoured few. Only the worst knowledge, abstract, secondary knowledge, the conception, the mere shadow of true knowledge, is unconditionally communicable. If perceptions were communicable, that would be a communication worth the trouble; but at last every one must remain in his own skin and skull, and no one can help another. To enrich the conception from perception is the unceasing endeavour of poetry and philosophy. However, the aims of man are essentially _practical_; and for these it is sufficient that what he has apprehended through perception should leave traces in him, by virtue of which he will recognise it in the next similar case; thus he becomes possessed of worldly wisdom. Thus, as a rule, the man of the world cannot teach his acc.u.mulated truth and wisdom, but only make use of it; he rightly comprehends each event as it happens, and determines what is in conformity with it. That books will not take the place of experience nor learning of genius are two kindred phenomena. Their common ground is that the abstract can never take the place of the concrete. Books therefore do not take the place of experience, because _conceptions_ always remain _general_, and consequently do not get down to the particular, which, however, is just what has to be dealt with in life; and, besides this, all conceptions are abstracted from what is particular and perceived in experience, and therefore one must have come to know these in order adequately to understand even the general conceptions which the books communicate. Learning cannot take the place of genius, because it also affords merely conceptions, but the knowledge of genius consists in the apprehension of the (Platonic) Ideas of things, and therefore is essentially intuitive. Thus in the first of these phenomena the _objective_ condition of perceptive or intuitive knowledge is wanting; in the second the _subjective_; the former may be attained, the latter cannot.

Wisdom and genius, these two summits of the Parna.s.sus of human knowledge, have their foundation not in the abstract and discursive, but in the perceptive faculty. Wisdom proper is something intuitive, not something abstract. It does not consist in principles and thoughts, which one can carry about ready in his mind, as results of his own research or that of others; but it is the whole manner in which the world presents itself in his mind. This varies so much that on account of it the wise man lives in another world from the fool, and the genius sees another world from the blockhead. That the works of the man of genius immeasurably surpa.s.s those of all others arises simply from the fact that the world which he sees, and from which he takes his utterances, is so much clearer, as it were more profoundly worked out, than that in the minds of others, which certainly contains the same objects, but is to the world of the man of genius as the Chinese picture without shading and perspective is to the finished oil-painting. The material is in all minds the same; but the difference lies in the perfection of the form which it a.s.sumes in each, upon which the numerous grades of intelligence ultimately depend. These grades thus exist in the root, in the _perceptive_ or _intuitive_ apprehension, and do not first appear in the abstract. Hence original mental superiority shows itself so easily when the occasion arises, and is at once felt and hated by others.

In practical life the intuitive knowledge of the understanding is able to guide our action and behaviour directly, while the abstract knowledge of the reason can only do so by means of the memory. Hence arises the superiority of intuitive knowledge in all cases which admit of no time for reflection; thus for daily intercourse, in which, just on this account, women excel. Only those who intuitively know the nature of men as they are as a rule, and thus comprehend the individuality of the person before them, will understand how to manage him with certainty and rightly.

Another may know by heart all the three hundred maxims of Gracian, but this will not save him from stupid mistakes and misconceptions if he lacks that intuitive knowledge. For all _abstract knowledge_ affords us primarily mere general principles and rules; but the particular case is almost never to be carried out exactly according to the rule; then the rule itself has to be presented to us at the right time by the memory, which seldom punctually happens; then the _propositio minor_ has to be formed out of the present case, and finally the conclusion drawn. Before all this is done the opportunity has generally turned its back upon us, and then those excellent principles and rules serve at the most to enable us to measure the magnitude of the error we have committed. Certainly with time we gain in this way experience and practice, which slowly grows to knowledge of the world, and thus, in connection with this, the abstract rules may certainly become fruitful. On the other hand, the _intuitive knowledge_, which always apprehends only the particular, stands in immediate relation to the present case. Rule, case, and application are for it one, and action follows immediately upon it. This explains why in real life the scholar, whose pre-eminence lies in the province of abstract knowledge, is so far surpa.s.sed by the man of the world, whose pre-eminence consists in perfect intuitive knowledge, which original disposition conferred on him, and a rich experience has developed. The two kinds of knowledge always stand to each other in the relation of paper money and hard cash; and as there are many cases and circ.u.mstances in which the former is to be preferred to the latter, so there are also things and situations for which abstract knowledge is more useful than intuitive. If, for example, it is a conception that in some case guides our action, when it is once grasped it has the advantage of being unalterable, and therefore under its guidance we go to work with perfect certainty and consistency. But this certainty which the conception confers on the subjective side is outweighed by the uncertainty which accompanies it on the objective side. The whole conception may be false and groundless, or the object to be dealt with may not come under it, for it may be either not at all or not altogether of the kind which belongs to it. Now if in the particular case we suddenly become conscious of something of this sort, we are put out altogether; if we do not become conscious of it, the result brings it to light. Therefore Vauvenargue says: "_Personne n'est sujet a plus de fautes, que ceux qui n'agissent que par reflexion_." If, on the contrary, it is direct perception of the objects to be dealt with and their relations that guides our action, we easily hesitate at every step, for the perception is always modifiable, is ambiguous, has inexhaustible details in itself, and shows many sides in succession; we act therefore without full confidence. But the subjective uncertainty is compensated by the objective certainty, for here there is no conception between the object and us, we never lose sight of it; if therefore we only see correctly what we have before us and what we do, we shall hit the mark. Our action then is perfectly sure only when it is guided by a conception the right ground of which, its completeness, and applicability to the given cause is perfectly certain. Action in accordance with conceptions may pa.s.s into pedantry, action in accordance with the perceived impression into levity and folly.

_Perception_ is not only the _source_ of all knowledge, but is itself knowledge ?at? e?????, is the only unconditionally true, genuine knowledge completely worthy of the name. For it alone imparts _insight_ properly so called, it alone is actually a.s.similated by man, pa.s.ses into his nature, and can with full reason be called _his_; while the conceptions merely cling to him. In the fourth book we see indeed that true virtue proceeds from knowledge of perception or intuitive knowledge; for only those actions which are directly called forth by this, and therefore are performed purely from the impulse of our own nature, are properly symptoms of our true and unalterable character; not so those which, resulting from reflection and its dogmas, are often extorted from the character, and therefore have no unalterable ground in us. But _wisdom_ also, the true view of life, the correct eye, and the searching judgment, proceeds from the way in which the man apprehends the perceptible world, but not from his mere abstract knowledge, _i.e._, not from abstract conceptions. The basis or ultimate content of every science consists, not in proofs, nor in what is proved, but in the unproved foundation of the proofs, which can finally be apprehended only through perception. So also the basis of the true wisdom and real insight of each man does not consist in conceptions and in abstract rational knowledge, but in what is perceived, and in the degree of acuteness, accuracy, and profundity with which he has apprehended it. He who excels here knows the (Platonic) Ideas of the world and life; every case he has seen represents for him innumerable cases; he always apprehends each being according to its true nature, and his action, like his judgment, corresponds to his insight. By degrees also his countenance a.s.sumes the expression of penetration, of true intelligence, and, if it goes far enough, of wisdom. For it is pre-eminence in knowledge of perception alone that stamps its impression upon the features also; while pre-eminence in abstract knowledge cannot do this. In accordance with what has been said, we find in all cla.s.ses men of intellectual superiority, and often quite without learning. Natural understanding can take the place of almost every degree of culture, but no culture can take the place of natural understanding. The scholar has the advantage of such men in the possession of a wealth of cases and facts (historical knowledge) and of causal determinations (natural science), all in well-ordered connection, easily surveyed; but yet with all this he has not a more accurate and profound insight into what is truly essential in all these cases, facts, and causations. The unlearned man of acuteness and penetration knows how to dispense with this wealth; we can make use of much; we can do with little. One case in his own experience teaches him more than many a scholar is taught by a thousand cases which he _knows_, but does not, properly speaking, _understand_. For the little knowledge of that unlearned man is living, because every fact that is known to him is supported by accurate and well-apprehended perception, and thus represents for him a thousand similar facts. On the contrary, the much knowledge of the ordinary scholar is _dead_, because even if it does not consist, as is often the case, in mere words, it consists entirely in abstract knowledge.

This, however, receives its value only through the _perceptive_ knowledge of the individual with which it must connect itself, and which must ultimately realise all the conceptions. If now this perceptive knowledge is very scanty, such a mind is like a bank with liabilities tenfold in excess of its cash reserve, whereby in the end it becomes bankrupt.

Therefore, while the right apprehension of the perceptible world has impressed the stamp of insight and wisdom on the brow of many an unlearned man, the face of many a scholar bears no other trace of his much study than that of exhaustion and weariness from excessive and forced straining of the memory in the unnatural acc.u.mulation of dead conceptions. Moreover, the insight of such a man is often so puerile, so weak and silly, that we must suppose that the excessive strain upon the faculty of indirect knowledge, which is concerned with abstractions, directly weakens the power of immediate perceptive knowledge, and the natural and clear vision is more and more blinded by the light of books. At any rate the constant streaming in of the thoughts of others must confine and suppress our own, and indeed in the long run paralyse the power of thought if it has not that high degree of elasticity which is able to withstand that unnatural stream. Therefore ceaseless reading and study directly injures the mind-the more so that completeness and constant connection of the system of our own thought and knowledge must pay the penalty if we so often arbitrarily interrupt it in order to gain room for a line of thought entirely strange to us. To banish my own thought in order to make room for that of a book would seem to me like what Shakespeare censures in the tourists of his time, that they sold their own land to see that of others.

Yet the inclination for reading of most scholars is a kind of _fuga vacui_, from the poverty of their own minds, which forcibly draws in the thoughts of others. In order to have thoughts they must read something; just as lifeless bodies are only moved from without; while the man who thinks for himself is like a living body that moves of itself. Indeed it is dangerous to read about a subject before we have thought about it ourselves. For along with the new material the old point of view and treatment of it creeps into the mind, all the more so as laziness and apathy counsel us to accept what has already been thought, and allow it to pa.s.s for truth. This now insinuates itself, and henceforward our thought on the subject always takes the accustomed path, like brooks that are guided by ditches; to find a thought of our own, a new thought, is then doubly difficult. This contributes much to the want of originality on the part of scholars. Add to this that they suppose that, like other people, they must divide their time between pleasure and work. Now they regard reading as their work and special calling, and therefore they gorge themselves with it, beyond what they can digest. Then reading no longer plays the part of the mere initiator of thought, but takes its place altogether; for they think of the subject just as long as they are reading about it, thus with the mind of another, not with their own. But when the book is laid aside entirely different things make much more lively claims upon their interest; their private affairs, and then the theatre, card-playing, skittles, the news of the day, and gossip. The man of thought is so because such things have no interest for him. He is interested only in his problems, with which therefore he is always occupied, by himself and without a book. To give ourselves this interest, if we have not got it, is impossible. This is the crucial point. And upon this also depends the fact that the former always speak only of what they have read, while the latter, on the contrary, speaks of what he has thought, and that they are, as Pope says:

"For ever reading, never to be read."

The mind is naturally free, not a slave; only what it does willingly, of its own accord, succeeds. On the other hand, the compulsory exertion of a mind in studies for which it is not qualified, or when it has become tired, or in general too continuously and _invita Minerva_, dulls the brain, just as reading by moonlight dulls the eyes. This is especially the case with the straining of the immature brain in the earlier years of childhood. I believe that the learning of Latin and Greek grammar from the sixth to the twelfth year lays the foundation of the subsequent stupidity of most scholars. At any rate the mind requires the nourishment of materials from without. All that we eat is not at once incorporated in the organism, but only so much of it as is digested; so that only a small part of it is a.s.similated, and the remainder pa.s.ses away; and thus to eat more than we can a.s.similate is useless and injurious. It is precisely the same with what we read. Only so far as it gives food for thought does it increase our insight and true knowledge. Therefore Heracleitus says: "p???a??a ???? ?? d?das?e?" (_multiscitia non dat intellectum_). It seems, however, to me that learning may be compared to a heavy suit of armour, which certainly makes the strong man quite invincible, but to the weak man is a burden under which he sinks altogether.