When man is considered relatively to his external existence in the
sensible world and nature, to which by his body he belongs and forms a
constituent part, then the three elements of which, as regarded from
this point of view, his whole being or essence appears to consist, are
body, soul, and spirit. Now, not even from these are schism and conflict
excluded. There is little or no harmony between the higher and spiritual
principle of the inner man and the outer world to which properly his
sensuous faculty belongs. The natural wants and the organic laws of our
corporeal life are at issue with the moral law of the inward
feelings--with the exalted requisitions of the soaring thought and the
profound desire of the pure spirit. The struggle between these two
distinct laws or ordinances of life, the higher and the lower, forms,
perhaps, the chief problem which in his moral destination on earth man
has to solve. At least it constitutes the first beginning and step
thereof. No doubt, the external frame of the human body, with its
wonderful organization, presents in the prime of its development the
corporeal image of a more exalted and more spiritual beauty. In its
highest and happiest expansion--in its noblest forms--in many a bright
gleam, for instance, of animated expression on the countenance of
youth--we read the graceful reflection of a more than earthly
loveliness. The stamp of man’s heavenly origin is not quite extinct or
completely defaced even in his frame. But on the other hand, it is
exposed and subject to innumerable injuries, sufferings, diseases, and
corruptions; so that we feel at once the truth of the Apostle’s words,
in calling it the “body of this death.” Added, then, to the other two
elements of man’s being, spirit and soul, the organic body forms the
third constituent, in which, however, is contained the ground and
occasion of conflict and strife. In the inner man, indeed, taken by
itself, and in soul and spirit, as the two constituents of his higher
life, there is involved no absolute element of discord. No doubt even
here the harmony is liable to many disturbances, and perfect unison,
perhaps, is very rarely to be met with; but still the discord has not
its ground in the essential constitution of these two principles of
soul and spirit. The contrariety between reason and fancy, understanding
and will, though existing in the fourfold consciousness of man in its
present state, prevails not there by any law of necessity. It is not a
result of their essential constitution. Simply, the spirit is the more
active faculty of the whole higher principle and of its internal life,
the soul the more passive one. I have designedly employed the expression
the _more_ active, and the _more_ passive, while thus speaking of soul
and of spirit; for perfectly passive, and entirely devoid of liberty,
the feeling and loving soul is not, as neither, on the other hand, is
the spirit perfectly active and independent. The latter stands in need
of the fellowship of the soul and of the life-giving feeling to kindle
and to expand it. To a certain degree, both spirit and soul, or at least
the preponderance of the one or the other, are dependent on the
organization and organic differences of sex. In general, we may at least
assert and admit this much: that, viz., spirit or thought predominates
in man, but spirit or soul in the female sex. But even here (so
incalculably great is the diversity of human character and disposition,
so various are the methods and forms of education and moral culture)
many exceptions, either by way of complication or deviation from the
original simple relation, are found to subsist. In no case, moreover,
can this preponderance of the reigning element be taken or understood as
a total isolation or severance from the other. On the contrary, there
are manifold transitions and fusions in the reciprocal action of soul
and spirit. In the same way that there are peculiar modes of thought, a
special kind of intellect, which, by a happy divination, goes infallibly
to the point and the truth, and is entirely the judgment of feeling--the
issue, in short, of the _feeling_ soul; so, too, there are many
impressions on the feelings (an ardent love, for instance, and a purely
intellectual enthusiasm), which take their origin immediately out of
some thought, or generally from the understanding. And, in fact, the
very separation of the two generally does but lead to their more
intimate union, and furnish a new bond of unity. Thought and feeling
stand reciprocally in need of each other. As thought gains new life and
animation from the rich feeling, with its facile, tender, and profound
emotions, deriving therefrom its vital nourishment and sustenance, even
so the feelings are not unfrequently first awakened, and very often
strengthened and elevated, by the lofty flight of thought in its bold
and searching investigations. It is even this that constitutes, in part
at least, the attraction of social intercourse, the charm of love, and
the happiness of a well-assorted union, which does but become more close
by years--the one party finding in the other the intellectual or (if the
term be preferred) the psychological complement of his own being and
character.
But now a similar complement for the void and deficiency which, even in
the most favored dispositions, enjoying the highest advantages of
learning and culture, still remains in man’s consciousness and internal
existence, may be found in yet another wise, and by a far superior
method. We may, for instance, seek this consummation of our nature in
that Being who contains in Himself the fullness of all might and of all
existence--of all life and of all love--and out of whom both soul and
spirit proceed and take their beginning. Now, if we should wish to form
an idea of the heavenly state of supreme felicity, such, at least, as in
forecasting hope we may suppose it to be, and indeed are justified in so
doing, then we may doubtless think of it as such that in it both soul
and spirit, sunk in the abyss of eternal love, will rest perfectly
satisfied. Or rather, in a living communion of thought and feeling, they
will most intimately sympathize in this ineffable majesty, being
absorbed in the never-failing stream of the infinite plenitude of
divinity. In this state of bliss, the body will be dissolved and no
longer existent. At least transfigured and changed, it will remain
nothing more than the pure, luminous veil [_Lichthülle_] of the immortal
soul and the spirit, now totally and freely emancipated. For it will no
longer be possible, with any propriety, to think of the body as separate
and distinct from the soul and spirit, as in truth and fundamentally it
will not be separate from them. Now, for this blissful state of perfect
union with the supreme essence, no less than for those single and rare
moments of mental ravishment, during which, even in this earthly life,
man occasionally, though transiently, does, by vivid thought, transport
himself to such a state, the third element, which as the connecting link
must accrue to these two fundamental energies of man’s inward being and
existence, in order to complete and perfect it, is God Himself. For it
is here even as in the external world of sense; there must be a third
element. There, however, it is the body, which, as no less essential
than the other two, completes the existence of the total man. Merely
psychologically regarded, and when we adhere and limit ourselves to the
given sphere of the internal consciousness, the triple principle of
man’s being is neither God, soul, and spirit, as in the higher blissful
state, nor even body, soul, and spirit, as in this material world, but
simply spirit, soul, and sense. These are the three elements of the
mind, which as such immediately concern us at present, and form the
essential basis of the following considerations.
Much is there that attaches itself to this principle, or follows from
it. It would consequently only lead to confusion were we at present to
take a full survey of all these cognate matters and consequences, and
lay them before you at the outset. Many of them will arise much more
naturally afterward. Even the treating, and the elucidation, of the
relation in which the senses, as the third element of the human mind,
stands to the other two, and the place which it holds among them, will
hereafter come more appropriately before us. And this is especially true
of a question which, however, has an important bearing on the matter
before us--the question, viz., whether or not some particular faculty,
either of soul or spirit, is to be regarded as an internal sense, a
moral instinct, or an immediate perception and intuition of the highest
and best. And, connected with this inquiry, is the remark, that even in
the usual outward senses there lies a spark of higher spiritual
perception--such, for instance, as the artistic eye for beauty of form
and color, and for grace of motion, or the musical ear for lovely sounds
and measures; so that even the senses are not so purely corporeal, so
totally material and grossly sensuous, as at the first glance they
appear. But there is another topic which here enforces itself on our
consideration, and which, for the correct apprehension of the whole
matter, is even still more important than that of the relation which
sense holds to the other two elements of man’s consciousness. And this
is to determine whether these two, soul and spirit, are really
different, or whether it be not probable that, as the active and the
passive powers and aspects of a higher principle in man, they are, on
the whole, one and the same, and consequently ought not, in thought
even, to be unduly separated and distinguished. But however this
question is to be answered, even though in man they be really and
necessarily united, still a relative distinction of them is justified by
that preponderance of one or the other which manifests itself at
different times and in different relations of life. But a weighty reason
exists for supposing that they are essentially two elements. A fair
presumption that, after all, soul and spirit are not perhaps one and the
same under two several sets, arises from a comparison of man with other
created spirits, if only it be allowed us to make a further application
of a parallel which, on a certain hypothesis, we have already hazarded.
For, however problematical at most the results of such comparisons may
appear, still in such cases as the present they are often very useful.
They tend, at least, to give a sharp and precise determination of the
peculiar and characteristic features of man’s consciousness. Now, the
free and pure spirits far surpass man in energy of will--in activity and
power--and, secondly, in rapidity and clearness of apprehension,
possessing as they do an intellect immediately intuitive. In these
properties, as contrasted with the mutability and weakness of man’s
vacillating will, the slowness of his groping and erring intellect, the
angels have greatly the advantage of man. But, on the other hand, the
human mind or spirit possesses in its peculiar creative fertility a vast
prerogative, which can not--not, at least, in the same degree--be
ascribed even to the pure creatures of light. And, in truth, it is on
the soul, which is not merely receptive or sentient, but also inwardly
productive, lovingly creative, and ever giving new forms and shapes to
the old and common, that the creative faculty of invention, so
distinctive of man, ultimately rests. At least, it forms the inner
foundation and root out of which it springs and rises. Fancy, indeed,
with its external shape and visible manifestion in art, is only one
portion of it. But still the other part also of the soul, viz., the
reason, when directed to its right end, and so long as it remains within
its natural limits, is a faculty of endless intellectual development,
infinite advance, and perfectionment. And, in truth, the position is by
no means new, that perfectibility or the faculty of endless improvement
(which, however, is associated with an equally great and no less
infinite faculty of deterioration), is the essential and wholly peculiar
prerogative of man. It is his characteristic property. With regard to
the other aspect or portion of the same property, the productive fancy
namely, and its creative productions, a similar view to our own--and,
indeed, under the same parallel and hypothesis--is expressed in the
poet’s assertion already quoted--
“Thy knowledge thou sharest with superior spirits;
Art, oh man! thou hast alone.”[63]
Only the term “art” must here be understood in a wide and comprehensive
signification, so as to take in language. Or, rather, language itself is
the general, all-embracing art of man. For nowhere does art evince its
peculiar, internal, and intellectual fertility, its creative faculty of
invention, so striking as in this wonderful structure of human language,
with its many compartments. Man, we might well say, in general terms, is
a production of nature that has attained to the perfection of language.
In other words, he is a spirit to whom, before all other creatures, the
word explanatory and declaratory, the guiding, the communicative, and
even the commanding word, is lent, imparted, committed, or conveyed, and
even therein consists his original, marvelous, and high dignity, so far
surpassing the ordinary standard of creation.
On this account, therefore, it is only natural and consistent, _i.e._,
agreeable to man’s nature and dignity, that the comparative
juxtaposition and parallel which is to lead to a more correct
characterization of the human mind, with its peculiar faculties and
properties, should, as I said, be directed upward, rather than, as is
usually done, downward to the brutes, and to the animal consciousness,
if, indeed, we may justly ascribe such to them. Now, in this method of
comparison I would go a step farther, for by so doing I hope to promote
the more perfect understanding of the whole, and also to arrive at a
correct and accurate notion of the several faculties of man’s spirit and
of the powers of his soul. Which, then, of man’s faculties or powers may
be rightly attributed to the Deity, and which not? To answer this
question, however, it is not my intention to enter into any very
difficult and abstruse investigations, such as would neither be very
apposite to this place, and perhaps (to speak generally) would be
absolutely without and beyond the limits of the human understanding. It
will be sufficient for my purpose throughout to take for granted what,
according to the universal feeling of mankind, is generally admitted,
and which is even as generally intelligible, as it is easy of
apprehension and clear. But when I thus without hesitation take for
granted a universal belief in the existence of a divine principle,
notwithstanding the doubt which in the human mind springs up against
all else, so also against the highest object of faith, I do so with a
deliberate view and purpose. For I shall reserve the solution of this
grave problem to a later period of my sketch and exposition of the
thinking consciousness and of a true living science. It is there, in
truth, that it will find its most natural and appropriate place. Here,
however, for the purposes of our intended comparison, which, as the
instance itself will prove, is likely to be highly instructive, it will
be sufficient if I confine myself to a single remark. The little that we
know or can with certainty predicate of God may be comprised almost in
the few words, “God is a spirit.” It is by virtue of this proposition
that we ascribe to Him an omniscient intellect and an all-mighty will.
Both these attributes or powers of God, are, it is self-evident, in the
most perfect harmony, and can scarcely be separated from one another;
whereas in man they are frequently widely divergent, at times even
hostilely oppose each other, and at best do but check and limit their
mutual action. Here, however, arises the question whether in strict
propriety we may venture to ascribe to the Deity any of the other mental
faculties and powers which man is conscious of, though on a greater and
different scale, and in a very extended sense?
Now, in the creative energy of God, there is, in truth, comprised the
plenitude of all fertility, and, if it be allowable so to speak, an
inexhaustible source of all invention.
But still, as every one must at once feel, a productive faculty of
imagination and a creative fancy can not on this account be ascribed to
Him; for, were we to do so, we should step at once into the domain of
mythology with its fabulous gods. And even as little, in strict
propriety and accuracy of language, can we attribute to God the faculty
of reason, which, in man, is the opposite of fancy. Reason is the
connecting, inferring, discursive faculty of thought. But all this, with
its graduated series of ideas or conceptions, is not applicable to the
Deity, for in Him all must be thought of as standing at once and
immediately before the divine mind, or, rather, as directly emanating
from Him. Consequently, in a strict sense, and following a rigorous
precision of a thoroughly correct designation, we may indeed ascribe to
God an immediately cognizant and intuitive understanding, but not
reason; since, by this term, it is only by a violent abuse of language
and a total conversion of ideas that a faculty of intellectual
intuition can be understood. One kind alone, or branch of reason, is
immediately intuitive; and that is the conscience, or the moral
instinct, for the appreciation of whatever is good or evil, right or
wrong. This might not inaptly be called an applied reason; viz., a
reason applied to the will and to its inmost motives, and to its just
commencing, still inchoate determinations, out of which external actions
ultimately issue. But even because conscience is an immediate perception
of right and wrong, a moral instinct for good and evil, and,
consequently, in form, wholly distinct from that function of reason
which infers and deduces consequences, I am indisposed to give it such a
name, and would rather regard it as a peculiar faculty of soul or heart,
subsisting by itself, and intermediate between will and reason. In any
case, it would be superfluous to observe how highly inappropriate it
would be to designate by this name that warning or punitive judicial
vision with which God looks through and penetrates the inmost heart,
even though we must seek here the root and origin of the lucid oracles
and simple revelations of the human conscience. As a property, however,
it can only be ascribed to those beings who, like man, behold the law of
God far above them, but by no means to that Being who is Himself the sum
and source of all moral laws. But let us now revert to our first
question of the predication of reason to the Deity. If, in our present
reigning systems, and especially in the latest German philosophy, reason
is, notwithstanding, ascribed to Him, or, rather, the eternal,
unconditional, and absolute reason is itself called God, and rationality
is made to be His essence; this is but the immediate consequence of the
predominantly pantheistic tendency of these systems, in which the Deity
is identified with the mundane All, and resolved into the universal
essence. For, inasmuch as it was felt that it could not be merely the
all-producing and all-absorbing--the all-bearing, infinite, vital power
of the heathen systems of nature--and, since a more scientific
designation was required, nothing remained for the totally abstract
designation of the one All, but the name of that faculty which even in
the human mind forms the principle of unity.
No doubt, in the preceding centuries, one or two great teachers have
employed very similar, if not identical expressions, in reference to the
Deity; still this, to my mind, appears an exception from the general
rule, to be explained and justified only by individual terminology and
points of view. And, at any rate, it is much safer to follow the ancient
usage on this point. Accordingly, I have made it a law scrupulously to
observe it throughout. But if people will at once subvert the ancient
modes of speech, and completely interchange and confuse the ordinary
signification of the terms reason and understanding, then all must
naturally turn on the thing itself and the internal thoughts and the
proper meaning which lies at the bottom of them. And then, by a due
consideration of these, a mutual understanding may perhaps be eventually
arrived at, notwithstanding the different modes of speech. With most of
the writers and philosophers of the present day this, perhaps, is
scarcely to be hoped for. The grave question, however, here (and which,
as it lies at the bottom, must ultimately decide on this difference of
phraseology), is this--whether philosophy in general is, according to
the rationalistic way of thinking, a mere philosophy of reason, or a
higher philosophy of the spirit and of spiritual revelation, or, indeed,
of a divine experience.
Further, whenever, in the olden phraseology, there are ascribed to the
Deity, memory and even desires, not to say impulses, which, viewed
nearly in the same light as man’s appetites and passions, are designated
by the same terms, all this is to be understood in the same way as the
expressions concerning His all-seeing eye, His ear, and His mighty arm.
They are merely figurative and symbolical phrases. In the use of them
there is no pretension to scientific accuracy, with which understanding
and will are universally and actually ascribed to Him. They are devoid
even of that apparent probability which gives rise to the question,
whether imagination and reason can, with the same propriety as the
former two, be attributed to Him. With as little truth can a soul be
ascribed to Him. For this is, exclusively, a passive faculty; whereas,
in God, all is energy and activity. The expression, however, of a soul
of God, is found, by way of exception from the general usage, in a few
among ancient writers.
A more correct mode of indicating what is meant by this term would be to
say that God is love, and that love is even His essence. Or the same
idea would be well conveyed by speaking, under the form of a living
force and property, of God’s fatherly heart as the center of His being,
of His omnipotence and omniscience, and of the infinite love which
results from the two. No doubt even this expression of God’s fatherly
heart is merely figurative and symbolical. Still it is one of high
significance, and, as such, it is not a mere figure without meaning.
For, the higher and profounder spiritual philosophy, from Plato down to
Leibnitz, has ever purposely employed such symbols and figures to
indicate that which properly is inexpressible. In fact, it has always
preferred them to the abstract notions employed by the rationalizing
systems of our own lifeless metaphysics of naught, which, as they are
void in themselves, so do they in reality say nothing.
Thus, then, has the very first step in this comparative psychology
carried us, at once, to the utmost limits of what is knowable by man.
Still it has tended, in passing, to place in an eminently distinct light
many important matters and essential properties and faculties which
belong to our present sphere of psychological inquiry. It is now,
however, necessary for me to turn my regards back to the point from
which we started. In order to commence our philosophy of life with the
center of life and of man’s whole consciousness, we set out from a
psychological fact, which immediately impresses itself on the awakening
consciousness. This fact is the perception of the discord which reigns
in our entire self, and especially of the deep-rooted dissension which,
in their usual state, divides the four principal faculties of the
consciousness, according to the twofold contrariety of understanding and
will, and of reason and fancy. I will here merely add the remark, that
further still, another essential property of man, and a state equally
characteristic and peculiar to him, is closely associated with, and,
indeed, is grounded in this internal discord, viz., the freedom of the
will and the state of doubt. Now, this freedom of will which belongs to
man is very different from the freedom of God, or even from that of the
pure spirits who were first created. The notion of free will, however,
is so deeply and firmly grounded in our inmost feelings, that man’s
universal conviction of it can never be wholly undermined by any doubts
of the reason, however subtilely advanced, and, in appearance,
demonstratively urgent. No objection or difficulty can totally
extinguish and annihilate the persuasion of its truth within our breast.
For even after the greatest shock which our faith in ourselves may
sustain, either from reflection or from subtilely refining on the
subject--after what, apparently, is a complete refutation of its truth,
this divine and inborn prejudice (if I may so term it) of our intrinsic
freedom still springs up again. As the inextinguishable vital flame of
the spirit, it rises anew from the expiring embers of those deadening
doubts, which are themselves nothing more than the dead notions and null
phantoms of a false semblance of thought. Now this freedom of will is a
liberty of choice, _i.e._, a will long vacillating between two different
series of ideas--of opposing grounds and reasons, and, at last, deciding
for one or the other. This volition, however, is, by its nature, so
little decided, and frequently finds so great difficulty in coming to a
decision, that even when externally it has already concluded its
deliberations, it often becomes again undecided and begins anew to
hesitate. Or this freedom of choice in man may otherwise be described
and thought of as a decision of the understanding, which compares
together two different volitions, carefully weighs the conflicting
grounds in favor of each, and, at last, in its final judgment,
recognizes the preference to one or the other. Consequently, this free
will and choice, so peculiar to man, depends intimately and essentially
upon that controversy between understanding and will, which, if not
inborn, has become, at least, a second nature to him. I have spoken of
this freedom of will as peculiar to man, since it is not necessary, and
rather would be a most arbitrary hypothesis, were we to go so far as to
assert, that, assuming the existence of other free but created essences,
our own special kind of freedom is the only possible and conceivable
one. Still, for our present purpose, it is allowable to make such a
purely hypothetical simile and comparison, if (a point on which the
experiment itself must decide) it be likely to render our own peculiar
form of consciousness more intelligible and conceivable. In this sense,
then, we may go on to say, that we must conceive the liberty of the
blessed spirits as being in its essence very different from that of
man’s. As such it belongs to beings who have long passed beyond the
probation of the still undecided choice, or who, at the very beginning
of their existence, were, by the design of the Creator, withdrawn from
it, and have, consequently, attained to eternal freedom, together with
undisturbed and undisturbable peace in God, who is the sum and
inexhaustible source, as well as the unfathomable, of all freedom, no
less than of all life.
But even irrespectively of this freedom of choice for actual life and
its particular objects and motives--irrespectively, also, of the freedom
which is conversant about external actions, and of the inward moving
causes of the will which contain the first ground and hidden germ of the
former, and of that state of uncertainty which follows therefrom, and
which not unfrequently long vacillates between one side and
another--there are, also, in pure thought, simply as such, a similar
state of internal hesitation or doubt--_i.e._, of a thought hostilely
attacking, undermining and destroying, denying, and annihilating even
consciousness and cogitation itself. Left wholly to ourselves, when,
closing our regards to the external world, and without any definite
object, we calmly commit ourselves to the stream of purely internal
thought, we soon become sensible of this fact. On the one hand, there
crowd on the mind the impressions of the outward senses, and the
manifold creations of the peculiar, never-resting faculty of cogitation,
seeking to gain the mastery over and to carry it along with them. On the
other side, the distinguishing and discerning reason comes in with its
questions and doubts, and chemical analysis, to resolve every thing
finally into naught, and to explain all the conceptions of the mind as
groundless and unsubstantial, as so many pure illusions of the senses,
conceits of caprice, prejudices of a limited understanding, and mere
pictures or creations of fancy. Thus, then, the ever-swelling flood of
thought in man’s inner being and cogitation is not any calmly-flowing
stream, in which wave quietly follows and succeeds to wave, as through
rich and fertile plains it pursues its course from some distant source
to the wide and open sea. The fearful conflict of thought is rather some
double current, where, amid the crags and rocks, the pent-in waters,
confining one another, beat up into foaming breakers--or, still more
dangerous, beneath their apparently calm and smooth surface, they form
the tearing whirlpool with its bottomless abyss, which, at the least
incautious approach, hurries, irresistibly, into its vortex the tossing
little boat of man’s brief existence. For the most part it is only in
natures originally, at least, highly endowed and noble, that doubt and
this internal struggle of thought rise to the height of despair. These
alone are finally driven, by the rejection of all belief in themselves,
into utter ruin both of soul and spirit. The tendency, however, to a
state of struggle and doubt is universal. It seems to be nothing less
than a characteristic property of human nature, and to have its
foundation in the dissension subsisting between reason and fancy, which
has so firmly established itself in the mind of man. It may happen, no
doubt, that in a mind whose opinions are settled both in theory and
practice, no instability will be found to subsist in the plans which
guide and regulate life, but that, on the contrary, they are, on the
whole, followed out with fixed resolution and decided energy. And yet,
even in such a case, particular doubts will occasionally arise affecting
many matters (which, although subordinate to the fundamental laws of
life, are, nevertheless, far from being unimportant), so as to force
upon us the remark, or even to extort the confession that, in general,
such a state of immovable determination does not belong to human nature,
and that this internal conflict forms one element of that warfare of
life to which man is called. The predisposition to this I have referred
to the discord between reason and fancy, and, for brevity’s sake, I have
employed, throughout, the latter designation for it. I must, however,
avail myself of the present occasion to observe, that fancy is not
limited merely to poetry and the fine arts, and their respective
creations, but inasmuch as all productive thought belongs to the
imagination in the same way that the negative does to the reason, it
also co-operates more or less with science. It is, therefore, chiefly in
this latter and larger sense that we here employ the term, since it is
from the contradictions of the productive and negative thought that the
struggle and state of doubt arise.
The first truth, then, that psychology arrives at, is the internal
discord within our fourfold and divided consciousness. Having commenced
with a slight characteristic sketch of this fact, I have attempted to
give a further and deeper grounding, and to invest it with a higher and
profounder significance. To this first perception we appended, as the
second member in the series of our philosophical investigation, the idea
of a triplicity of consciousness as restored to its perfect and living
action. According to this view, the simple division of the mind is into
spirit, soul, and sense. And this will, in all our subsequent Lectures,
form the basis of our psychological reflections on the human mind. It
will also serve as the transition from the ordinary state of the
consciousness in discord with itself, and with its fourfold division, to
the reunited triple consciousness. We shall make it the starting-point
and first step in this philosophy, which, as it sets out from life, is
also to lead to a higher life.
But now, even in the mind’s ordinary state there are many such
beginnings of a higher order of things--many moments of a more
concentrated energy, which bespeak a joint operation of the otherwise
divided faculties and powers of soul and spirit, and have for their
result a partial restoration, at least, of harmony to this otherwise
dismembered whole. Among these I would mention, first of all, that inner
fixity of character, where thought, will, and conduct are consistent
throughout; secondly, a true artistic genius in the creations both of
poetic and plastic fancy. Lastly, there is that ardent and disinterested
love, with its magnanimous self-sacrifices, which, though it surpasses
all the limits of reason, can not, nevertheless, be looked upon as a
mere imagination or illusion of fancy, forming as it does a profound and
natural energy of the human soul, and constituting in truth its true and
proper essence. No doubt the external phenomenon and effect of this
elevated principle of the soul is often tarnished and lessened by the
dull admixture of earthly ardor, and the bewilderment of passion. A true
and perfect manifestation of the feeling, consequently, is no less rare
than the truly felicitous creations of real artistic genius. Still it is
to it that we must look for the first principle of a higher living
thought and the true science thereof. The truly loving soul needs only
the excitement and guidance of a mind or spirit ripened and matured in
divine experience. Accordingly, the consciousness thus restored to unity
and completeness of perfection becomes actively operative in its triple
energy. And in the same manner the spirit striving with most ardent
aspiration after the divine, requires nothing but such an animating
contact with the loving soul, in order to attain fully and effectually
to its desired end.
In the series of combining elements or principles of union for the
otherwise divided consciousness there is yet another phenomenon, both
great and comprehensive in itself, and which also reveals itself as such
in actual life and experience. And this phenomenon is furnished by
language, with its wonderful variety and yet truly artistic uniformity.
For it is the vital product of the whole inner man. All the faculties
both of soul and spirit, however discordant generally, combine each, in
their full share and measure, to perfect this their conjoint production.
And yet, after all, many traces of inherent imperfection are visible
therein. It is only in the highest creations of artistic genius,
manifesting itself either in poetry or some other form of language, and
then only in the brightest and happiest moments of inspiration, that we
meet with the perfect harmony of a complete and united consciousness, in
which all its faculties work together in combined and living action.
In language, all the four principal powers have a nearly equal part and
share. The grammatical structure, the rules for the changes and
declensions of words, and their syntax, are furnished by the reason.
From the fancy, on the other hand, is derived whatever is figurative;
and how very far does not this reach, extending as it does into the
primary and natural signification of words, which often no longer
exists, or at least is rarely traceable? Lastly, the clear and distinct
arrangement of the parts, the nicely-finished and beautiful shape of the
whole of any composition, whether poetical or rhetorical, civil or
scientific, are the contributions of the understanding. And so, also,
whatever is truly characteristic--whatever, in short, goes beyond the
mere instinctive cry of animal nature, and the childlike, oft-times
childish imitation of external sounds--in short, that deep and spiritual
significance, that characteristic meaning which, in the original
stem-syllable and radical words of some rich old language, invariably is
regarded as a beauty, must be ascribed to the understanding, which so
profoundly seizes and precisely designates whatever is peculiar, unless,
perhaps, it is preferred to assign it to an immediate feeling, which
wonderfully harmonizes with or responds to it. Moreover, the magic force
of a commanding will, which carries all before it by its intrinsic
energy, is at least noticeable in those few brilliant passages of
highest inspiration or perfect poetic delineation, from whose clear and
perspicuous language, the apparently ineffable, shining forth like an
electric spark, kindles and influences every sensitive and kindred mind.
But before I go deeper into the question of the origin of language, and
examine the correct idea of this all-embracing and wonderful faculty of
speech, as man’s most remarkable and peculiar property, I would call
your attention to the intimate connection subsisting between thought and
speech, which is throughout reciprocal. For as speech must be regarded
as a thinking, outwardly projected and manifested, so, too, thinking
itself is but an inward speaking and a never-ending dialogue with one’s
self.
Judging, from all appearances, the consciousness of animals, so far as
we are justified in ascribing it to them, is perfectly simple, but sadly
defective and limited. But even here, however, the several melodious
courses of irrational and seemingly unconscious sounds appear like so
many echoes of a better foretime--lost traces of ancient memory, and
which, together with the moving and mournful cry of deep, painful
longing, seem to make tolerably clear to us the notion of the creature
waiting and groaning for its emancipation. Highly simple, too, but in
quite a different respect, is the consciousness or thought of the free
spirits in their pure activity, such as we may and ought to represent it
to ourselves--like the ray of light which in its rapid descent
penetrates all space. But marvelously intricate, on the other hand, and
highly complicated, is the so manifoldly rich, and, at the same time, so
versatile and changeable consciousness of man. Such, at least, is the
impression which a serious and searching glance into the unfathomable
depths of our inward man enforces upon us. And, indeed, just as in the
triple operation of the consciousness, when restored to the full
perfection of life, we may trace a certain faint signature of man’s
pristine likeness to the Creator, so also a slight vestige of the same
kind is, we might fancy, discoverable in its unfathomable depth, which,
however, now reveals itself in quite a different form from its original
nature, and appears to be converted into its opposite. How often does
the thought that seeks to penetrate the mysteries of nature--the hidden
thinker within man--believe that he has completely solved the riddle of
existence, and is able to explain and rightly interpret the many-meaning
but obscure words of the sphinx within us! And even then, when he most
flatters himself with his own ingenuity, this miserable Œdipus of his
own destiny is stricken with even more fatal and incurable blindness
than the old Theban, and can not discern the abyss of error into which
his whole life has been hurrying, and into which it is at last plunged
headlong and precipitated. Ever laboring to seize the changing Proteus
of its own self, our Ego may, perhaps, often arrive at a rare amazement
at the enigma of existence, and also is even seized many a time with a
light terror. Never, however, by itself, let it think and seek as it
may, will it be able, without some other guide, to find the object of
its longing, and, in its tragic blindness, to discover the clue of the
labyrinthic mazes of its own thoughts, and at last to arrive at harmony
with itself.
So profound, moreover, and lasting is this our intrinsic dualism and
duplicity--(and I use the term here, not in its usual moral sense, but
in a higher signification, which is purely psychological and
metaphysical)--so deeply is this dualism rooted in our consciousness,
that even when we are, or at least think ourselves alone, we still think
as two, and are constrained, as it were, to recognize our inmost
profoundest being as essentially dramatic. This colloquy with self, or
generally, this internal dialogue, is so perfectly that natural form of
human thinking, that even the saintly solitaries of bygone centuries,
who, in the Egyptian deserts or the Alpine hermitages, devoted a half
life to meditation on divine things and mysteries, were often not able
otherwise to indicate the result of such meditations, to invest it in
another dress, to bring it into any other form of exposition than that
of a dialogue of the soul with God. And in all religions, what properly
is true prayer but a kind of dialogue, a confidential opening of the
heart to the universal Father, or a filial solicitation of His
benevolence?
But to pass over at once to the directly opposite aspect of the matter:
even in the classical works of cultivated antiquity, at a time when
these depths of a loveful feeling were not yet so widely developed, nor
so completely revealed and unveiled, we meet with this same phenomenon
in another form, and one indeed of the highest intellectual clearness
and brilliancy--in the graceful ornament, viz., of a truly exquisite
diction. I am alluding to the characteristic distinction of the
discourses and teaching of Socrates--that peculiar irony, such as it is
found in the Platonic dialogues, and of which only a very slight trace
is to be found in the works of some of the earliest poets. For what else
is this scientific irony of the inquiring thought and of the highest
cognition, than a consciousness which, while it clearly perceives the
secret contradictions which beset the mind, even in its most earnest
pursuit of the highest aim of life, has attained, nevertheless, to
perfect harmony with itself.
I must not, however, omit to remind you that this term in modern
phraseology has fallen very far below its primary meaning, and is often
so taken as to designate nothing more than a mere playful mockery. In
its original Socratic sense, however, such as it is found in the whole
series of the thought and the internal structure of Plato’s dialogues,
where it is developed to its fullest measure and proportion, irony
signifies nothing else than this amazement of the thinking spirit at
itself, which so often dissolves in a light, gentle laugh. And this
light laugh again oftentimes beneath its cheerful surface conceals and
involves a deeper and profounder sense, another and a higher
significance, even the most exalted seriousness. In the thoroughly
dramatic development and exposition of thought which we meet with in the
works of Plato, the dialogical form is essentially predominant. Even if
all the superscriptions of names and persons, all forms of address and
reply, and, in short, the whole conversational garb, were taken away
from it, and we were merely to follow the inner threads of the thought
according to their connection and course, the whole would, nevertheless,
remain a dialogue, where each answer calls forth a new question, and the
eddying stream of speech and counter-speech, or, rather, of thought and
counter-thought, moves livingly onward. And unquestionably this form of
inner dialogue is, if not in every case equally applicable and
absolutely necessary, still it is all but essential, and at least highly
natural and very appropriate to every form of living thought and its
vivid enunciation. And in this sense even the continuous unbroken speech
of a single person may also assume the character of a dialogue. Yes, I
must confess that as it is my first object to attain to the greatest
possible perspicuity of a vivid development of ideas, I should then most
confidently believe that I had gained my end, if the present Lectures
should in any degree make the same impression on you as a dialogue
would--if they should appear like a series of questions, to which some
of you, if not throughout, yet here and there, should in your heart give
a tacit answer and assent--or even (and in this case still more so,
indeed) if, in the whole context of these Lectures, you should find and
believe to discover for many questions which your own hearts, your own
reflections and life itself suggested, if not a full, satisfactory
answer, yet at least one directly meeting the difficulty, and full of
suggestions for its solution.