This twofold labour or task, which consists in making the necessary
pass into reality in us and in making out of us reality subject to
the law of necessity, is urged upon us as a duty by two opposing
forces, which are justly styled impulsions or instincts, because
they impel us to realise their object. The first of these
impulsions, which I shall call the sensuous instinct, issues from
the physical existence of roan, or from sensuous nature; and it is
this instinct which tends to enclose him in the limits of time and
to make of him a material being; I do not say to give him matter,
for to do that a certain free activity of the personality would be
necessary, which, receiving matter, distinguishes it from the Ego,
or what is permanent. By matter I only understand in this place the
change or reality that fills time. Consequently the instinct
requires that there should be change, and that time should contain
something. This simply filled state of time is named sensation, and
it is only in this state that physical existence manifests itself.
As all that is in time is successive, it follows by that fact alone
that something is: all the remainder is excluded. When one note on
an instrument is touched, among all those that it virtually offers,
this note alone is real. When man is actually modified, the infinite
possibility of all his modifications is limited to this single mode
of existence. Thus, then, the exclusive action of sensuous impulsion
has for its necessary consequence the narrowest limitation. In this
state man is only a unity of magnitude, a complete moment in time;
or, to speak more correctly, he is not, for his personality is
suppressed as long as sensation holds sway over him and carries time
along with it.
This instinct extends its domains over the entire sphere of the
finite in man, and as form is only revealed in matter, and the
absolute by means of its limits, the total manifestation of human
nature is connected on a close analysis with the sensuous instinct.
But though it is only this instinct that awakens and develops what
exists virtually in man, it is nevertheless this very instinct which
renders his perfection impossible. It binds down to the world of
sense by indestructible ties the spirit that tends higher and it
calls back to the limits of the present, abstraction Which had its
free development in the sphere of the infinite. No doubt, thought
can escape it for a moment, and a firm will victoriously resists its
exigencies; but soon compressed nature resumes her rights to give an
imperious reality to our existence, to give it contents, substance,
knowledge, and an aim for our activity.
The second impulsion, which may be named the formal instinct, issues
from the absolute existence of man, or from his rational nature, and
tends to set free, and bring harmony into the diversity of its
manifestations, and to maintain personality notwithstanding all the
changes of state. As this personality, being an absolute and
indivisible unity, can never be in contradiction with itself, as we
are ourselves for ever, this impulsion, which tends to maintain
personality, can never exact in one time anything but what it exacts
and requires for ever. It therefore decides for always what it
decides now, and orders now what it orders for ever. Hence it
embraces the whole series of times, or what comes to the same thing,
it suppresses time and change. It wishes the real to be necessary
and eternal, and it wishes the eternal and the necessary to be real;
in other terms, it tends to truth and justice.
If the sensuous instinct only produces ACCIDENTS, the formal
instinct gives laws, laws for every judgment when it is a question
of knowledge, laws for every will when it is a question of action.
Whether, therefore, we recognise an object or conceive an objective
value to a state of the subject, whether we act in virtue of
knowledge or make of the objective the determining principle of our
state; in both cases we withdraw this state from the jurisdiction of
time, and we attribute to it reality for all men and for all time,
that is, universality and necessity. Feeling can only say: "That is
true FOR THIS SUBJECT AND AT THIS MOMENT," and there may come
another moment, another subject, which withdraws the affirmation
from the actual feeling. But when once thought pronounces and says:
"THAT IS" it decides for ever and ever, and the validity of its
decision is guaranteed by the personality itself, which defies all
change. Inclination can only say: "That is good FOR YOUR
INDIVIDUALITY and PRESENT NECESSITY?" but the changing current of
affairs will sweep them away, and what you ardently desire to-day
will form the object of your aversion to-morrow. But when the moral
feeling says: "That ought to be," it decides for ever. If you
confess the truth because it is the truth, and if you practice
justice because it is justice, you have made of a particular case
the law of all possible cases, and treated one moment of your life
as eternity.
Accordingly, when the formal impulse holds sway and the pure object
acts in us, the being attains its highest expansion, all barriers
disappear, and from the unity of magnitude in which man was enclosed
by a narrow sensuousness, he rises to the UNITY OF IDEA, which
embraces and keeps subject the entire sphere of phenomena. During
this operation we are no longer in time, but time is in us with its
infinite succession. We are no longer individuals but a species; the
judgment of all spirits is expressed by our own, and the choice of
all hearts is represented by our own act.