CERTAINTY OF THE HUMAN RACE, AND PHILOSOPHICAL CERTAINTY.
16. Certainty does not originate in reflection; it is the spontaneous
product of man's nature, and is annexed to the direct act of the
intellectual and sensitive faculties. It is a condition necessary to
the exercise of both, and without it life were a chaos; we therefore
possess it instinctively, and without any reflection, and we enjoy the
fruit of this as of all those other benefits of the Creator, which are
inseparably joined to our existence.
17. It is, then, necessary to distinguish between the certainty of the
human race and philosophical certainty, although, to speak frankly, it
is not easy to conceive what can be the value of any human certainty
distinct from that of the human race. If we set aside the efforts
which the philosopher sometimes makes to discover the basis of human
knowledge, we shall readily find him confounded with the rest of
mankind. This cavil leaves no trace in his mind with respect to the
certainty of all that the human race is certain of. He then discovers
that the doubt which he felt was not a real doubt, although he may
have deluded himself into a contrary belief. His doubts were simple
suppositions, nothing more. When his meditation is over, and perhaps
even while it lasts, he finds that he is as certain as the most
ignorant individual of his internal acts, the existence of his own
body, of other bodies around him, and of a thousand other things, which
constitute the amount of knowledge requisite to the wants of life.
Question all, from the infant of a few summers, to the sage of many
years and mature judgment, on the certainty of their own existence,
their acts internal or external, their friends and relatives, the
people among whom they dwell, objects seen or heard of, and you will
not detect any hesitation in their answers, or any kind of difference
in the grades of their certainty. If they have no knowledge of the
philosophical questions touching these matters, you may read in their
countenances wonder and astonishment that any one should seriously
investigate things so _evident_.
18. Impossible as it is for us to know in what manner the sensitive,
intellectual, and moral powers of children are developed, it is equally
impossible to prove a _a priori_, by analyzing the operations of his
mind, that reflex acts do not concur to the formation of certainty;
but it will not be difficult to find proofs of this in the exercise
of these faculties when well developed. If we observe attentively,
we shall see that the child's faculties habitually operate in a
direct, not a reflex manner; which shows that the development is made
directly, not by reflection. Were the primitive development the work
of reflexion, the reflective power would be great in the child. But
this is not the case. Very few men are ever endowed with it, and in the
greater part of them it is very nearly null. They who attain to it,
acquire it only by assiduous labor, and not without great violence to
himself, can any one pass from direct to reflex cognition.
19. No matter what you teach a child, he perceives it indeed, but call
his attention to the perception itself, and his understanding is at
once obscured and confused. Let us make the experiment. Suppose we
would teach a child the elements of geometry.
"Do you see this figure bounded by three lines? It is called a
triangle; the lines are called sides, and the points where they unite
the vertices of the angles."--"I understand that."--"Do you see this
other figure bounded by four lines? It is called quadrilateral, and,
like the triangle, has its sides and vertices of angles."--"Very
well."--"Can a quadrilateral figure be a triangle, or _vice
versa_?"--"It cannot."--"Never?"--"Never."--"Why not?"--"One has three,
and the other four sides: how then can they be the same thing?"--"Who
knows? It may seem so to you, but--"--"See here! This has three, and
this four sides; and three and four are not the same thing."
Torture his understanding as much as you please, but you cannot drive
him from his position: and thus we see that his perception and his
reason operate directly, that is, by direct application to the object.
Of himself he does not direct his attention to his own internal acts,
does not think upon his own thoughts, does not combine reflex ideas,
nor seek in them the certainty of his judgment.
20. And here we detect a vital error in the art of thinking as it has
hitherto been taught. The young intellect is exercised in reflection,
the most difficult part of science, which is as inconsiderate as it
would be to commence his physical development by the most painful
gymnastic exercises. Man's scientific development should be governed by
his natural development, which is direct not reflex.
21. Let us apply this remark to the exercise of the senses. "Do you
hear that music?" asks the child.--"What music?"--"Did you not hear
it? Are you deaf?"--"It _seems_ to you that you hear it."--"But, sir,
I hear it so distinctly! How can it be possible?"--"But how do you
know?"--"I hear it."
From his _I hear it_ you cannot drive him: he will not hesitate a
moment, nor will he appeal to any reflex act in order to avoid your
importunities. "_I hear it_: do not you hear it?" He asks nothing
more, and all your philosophy cannot equal the _irresistible force_
of sensation which assures him that there is music, and that whoever
doubts it is either deaf or in jest.
22. Had the faculties of the child been developed by alternate direct
and reflex acts; had he, when acquiring knowledge of things, thought
of something besides the things themselves; evidently a continuation
of such acts would have left some impression on his mind, and urged
to assign the motives of his certainty, he would indicate those very
means that he made use of in the gradual development of his faculties;
he would abstract the object, retire into himself, think upon his own
thought in one way or another, and thus encounter the difficulty.
Nothing of this character takes place, which proves that no such
reflex acts have been performed, that there have been only perceptions
accompanied by internal consciousness and certainty of their existence;
but all in a confused, instinctive manner, without any thing like
philosophical reflection.
23. What has been said of the child, may be proved true also of adults,
however clear and perfect their intellect. If not initiated into
questions of philosophy, they will give very nearly the same answers to
difficulties proposed on the same matters, and even upon many others
more exposed to doubt. Experience proves better than all ratiocination
that no one acquires certainty by reflex acts.
24. Philosophers teach that the sources of certainty are the internal
sense or consciousness of acts, the external senses, common sense,
reason, and authority. A few examples will show us that there is
reflection in all these, and how most men, and even philosophers, when
they act like men and not like philosophers, think.
25. Suppose a clear-headed person, one however who is ignorant of the
questions of certainty, has just seen some monument, the _Escurial_
for instance, which leaves a lively and lasting impression on his
mind, and while he recollects his gratification on seeing it, try to
make him doubt the existence of this recollection in his mind, and
its correspondence as well with the act of seeing as with the edifice
itself, and he will very certainly think you are in jest, or will
be astounded, and will suspect you of being out of your senses. He
discovers no difference between things different as are the actual
existence of his recollection, its correspondence with the past act of
seeing, and the agreement of both with the edifice seen. He knows in
this case no more than a child of six years: "I recollect it, I saw it,
it is as I recollect it." This is all his science: he neither reflects,
nor separates; all is direct and simultaneous.
No matter what suppositions you make, you can never get from the
majority of men any better account of the phenomena of the internal
sense, than you got from the supposed individual's recollection of
the _Escurial_: "all that I know is that it is so." There are here no
reflex acts; certainty attends the direct act, and no philosophical
considerations can add one iota to the security given by the very
force of things, and the instinct of nature.
26. Example of the testimony of the senses.
If we see any object, no matter what, at a proper distance and in
sufficient light, we judge of its size, figure, and color, and we
are very confident of the truth of our judgment, although we may
never, in all our life, have thought of a theory of sensation, or
of the relations of our organs, either to each other or to external
objects. No reflex act accompanies the formation of our judgment; all
is done instinctively, and without the intervention of philosophical
considerations. We see it, and nothing else: this is enough for
certainty. It is only after having handled books in which the question
of certainty is agitated, that we turn our attention to our own acts;
but this attention, it is to be remarked, lasts only so long as we are
engaged in the scientific analysis; when this is forgotten, which it
very soon is, we return to our general routine, and seldom recur to
philosophy.
Note well that we speak here of the certainty of the judgment formed
in consequence of sensation only in so far as it is connected with
the uses of life, and not at all of its greater or less exactness
with respect to the nature of things. Thus it matters little that we
consider colors as inherent qualities of bodies, although in reality
they are not; it is sufficient that the judgment formed does not
in any sense change our relations to objects, whatever may be the
philosophical theory.
27. Example of common sense.
In the presence of a numerous assembly, throw a quantity of printer's
types at random upon the ground, and tell the bystanders that their
names will all be found printed. They will all with one accord laugh at
your folly. But what is the reason of this? Have they all reflected
upon the basis of their certainty? Assuredly they have not.
28. Example of reason.
We all reason, and in many cases rightly. Without art or reflection
of any kind, we often distinguish the solid from the futile, the
sophistical from the conclusive. This does not require us to regard the
course of our understanding; without scarcely noticing it we follow
the right road; and a man may, in his life, have formed a thousand
rigorous and exact ratiocinations without ever having once attended
to his method of reasoning. Even those most versed in the dialectic
art, repeatedly forget it; they perhaps follow it very correctly in
practice, but they pay no express attention to any one of its rules.
29. Ideologists have written whole volumes on the operations of
our understanding, and the simple rustic performs these operations
without thinking that he performs them. How much has been written on
abstraction, generalization, and universals! Yet this is all well
regulated in the mind of every man, ignorant as he may be of a science
which examines it. In his language you will find the universal and the
particular expressed, and every thing occupying its proper place in his
discourse: he encounters no difficulty in his direct acts. But call
his attention to these acts themselves, to abstraction for example;
and what was in the direct act so clear and lucid, becomes a chaos the
moment it passes to the reflex order.
Thus we see that reflection, whose object is the act performed, is of
very little importance even in reasoning, its most reflective medium.
30. Example of authority.
All civilized people know the existence of _England_, but most of them
know this only from having heard or read of it, that is, by authority.
Their certainty of the existence of England evidently is not surpassed
by that of objects of their own vision; and yet how many of them have
ever thought of analyzing the foundations of such a certainty? Yet
is the certainty of those who have examined it greater than that of
those who have not examined it? In the present case, as in an infinity
of others analogous to it, there is no intervention of reflex acts:
certainty is here formed instinctively, and needs no medium invented by
philosophers.
31. These examples show that philosophers take a very different road
to certainty from that taught by nature. He who created all things
out of nothing, has provided them with all that is necessary to the
exercise of their functions according to their respective positions in
the universe; and one of the first necessities of an intelligent being
is the certainty of some truths. What would become of us, if before
beginning to receive impressions, and before the germination of primary
ideas in our understanding, we were obliged to perform the painful task
of elaborating some system capable of saving us from uncertainty? Were
it thus, our intellect would perish at its very birth, for no sooner
would it open its eyes to the light than it would be involved in the
chaos of its own cavils, and it could never, with its scattered forces,
succeed in dissipating the clouds which would arise on all sides, and
which would finally sink it in total darkness.
If the greatest philosophers, the most clear and acute intellects, the
strongest and most vigorous geniuses have labored to so little purpose
to establish solid principles, such as might serve for the foundations
of science, what would have happened had not the Creator succored us in
this necessity, and given certainty to the tender intellect, just as he
prepared for the preservation of the body the milk that nourishes and
the air that vivifies it?
32. If any part of science ought to be regarded as purely speculative,
it is undoubtedly the part which concerns certainty; and this
proposition, paradoxical as it may seem at first sight, is true, and
can be easily demonstrated.
33. What does philosophy here propose to do? To produce certainty? But
it exists independently of all philosophical systems, and mankind were
certain of many things before ever any one thought of such questions.
Moreover, since the question was first raised, few, compared with the
whole human race, have examined it; so it is now, and so it will be;
and all the theories invented on this point can have no effect upon the
fact of certainty. What has been said of its production may be said of
the attempt to consolidate it. When have the generality of men had, or
when will they have, time and opportunity to examine these questions?
34. Philosophy could here have produced nothing but skepticism, for the
variety and opposition of systems were more calculated to create than
to dissipate doubts. Happily nature is the most invincible opponent of
skepticism; the sage's dreams pass not from his library to the every
day uses of the life of ordinary men, or even of those who labor under
or imagine them.
35. Philosophy here can propose to itself no more reasonable object
than simply to examine the foundations of certainty, with the sole view
of more thoroughly knowing the human mind, not of making any change
in practice; just as astronomers observe the course of the stars,
investigate and determine the laws to which they are subject, without
therefore presuming to be able to modify them.
36. But even this supposition places philosophy in a very
unsatisfactory position; for if we recollect what we have already
established, we shall see that science observes a real and true
phenomenon, but gives it a gratuitous explanation, by making an
imaginary analysis of it.
Experience has in fact shown our understanding to be guided by no one
of the considerations made by philosophers; its assent, when it is
accompanied by the greatest certainty, is a spontaneous product of a
natural instinct, not of combinations; it is a firm adhesion exacted
by the evidence of the truth, the power of the internal sense, or
the impulse of instinct; not a conviction produced by a series of
ratiocinations. These combinations and ratiocinations therefore exist
only in the mind of philosophers, not in reality; when, therefore, they
attempt to designate the foundations of certainty, we are told what
could or should have been, but not what is.
If philosophers would only be guided by their own systems, and would
not forget them nor set them aside as soon as, or even before, they
have finished explaining them, it might be said, that even if no reason
can be given for human certainty, one can be given for philosophical
certainty; but since these same philosophers make no use of these
scientific means save when developing them _ex professo_, it follows
that their pretended foundations are a mere theory, having little or no
connection with the reality.
37. This demonstration of the vanity of philosophical systems relating
to the foundation of certainty, far from leading to skepticism, has a
directly contrary tendency; for it makes us appreciate at their true
value, the emptiness of our cavils, compares their impotence with the
irresistible force of nature, and thus destroys that foolish pride
which would make us superior to the laws imposed upon our understanding
by the Creator himself; it places us in the channel through which
the torrent of humanity has for ages run; and it disposes us to
receive with sound philosophy what the laws of our nature force us to
accept.(3)