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 constitute _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 vanishing 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
surpassing 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 passes 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, ὁ
λογος. 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 multitude 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 shells, 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
Schelling, 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 analytical 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 analyse 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
analyse it into its predicates: “A thinking, willing, immaterial, simple,
indestructible being that does not occupy space.” 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 “_Identitas
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 establishing 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 assume 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 class 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 God. 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 mass 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 Würtemberg 7000 Chiliasts to
the neighbourhood of Ararat, because the new kingdom of God, 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.