matter, which, while it introduces another state with necessity, yet
suffers just as great a change itself as that which it causes; which is
expressed in the rule, “action and reaction are equal.” Further, in the
case of what is properly speaking a cause, the effect increases directly
in proportion to the cause, and therefore also the reaction. So that, if
once the mode of operation be known, the degree of the effect may be
measured and calculated from the degree of the intensity of the cause; and
conversely the degree of the intensity of the cause may be calculated from
the degree of the effect. Such causes, properly so called, operate in all
the phenomena of mechanics, chemistry, and so forth; in short, in all the
changes of unorganised bodies. On the other hand, I call a _stimulus_,
such a cause as sustains no reaction proportional to its effect, and the
intensity of which does not vary directly in proportion to the intensity
of its effect, so that the effect cannot be measured by it. On the
contrary, a small increase of the stimulus may cause a very great increase
of the effect, or conversely, it may eliminate the previous effect
altogether, and so forth. All effects upon organised bodies as such are of
this kind. All properly organic and vegetative changes of the animal body
must therefore be referred to stimuli, not to mere causes. But the
stimulus, like every cause and motive generally, never determines more
than the point of time and space at which the manifestation of every force
is to take place, and does not determine the inner nature of the force
itself which is manifested. This inner nature we know, from our previous
investigation, is will, to which therefore we ascribe both the unconscious
and the conscious changes of the body. The stimulus holds the mean, forms
the transition between the motive, which is causality accompanied
throughout by knowledge, and the cause in the narrowest sense. In
particular cases it is sometimes nearer a motive, sometimes nearer a
cause, but yet it can always be distinguished from both. Thus, for
example, the rising of the sap in a plant follows upon stimuli, and cannot
be explained from mere causes, according to the laws of hydraulics or
capillary attraction; yet it is certainly assisted by these, and
altogether approaches very near to a purely causal change. On the other
hand, the movements of the _Hedysarum gyrans_ and the _Mimosa pudica_,
although still following upon mere stimuli, are yet very like movements
which follow upon motives, and seem almost to wish to make the transition.
The contraction of the pupils of the eyes as the light is increased is due
to stimuli, but it passes into movement which is due to motive; for it
takes place, because too strong lights would affect the retina painfully,
and to avoid this we contract the pupils. The occasion of an erection is a
motive, because it is an idea, yet it operates with the necessity of a
stimulus, _i.e._, it cannot be resisted, but we must put the idea away in
order to make it cease to affect us. This is also the case with disgusting
things, which excite the desire to vomit. Thus we have treated the
instinct of animals as an actual link, of quite a distinct kind, between
movement following upon stimuli, and action following upon a known motive.
Now we might be asked to regard breathing as another link of this kind. It
has been disputed whether it belongs to the voluntary or the involuntary
movements, that is to say, whether it follows upon motive or stimulus, and
perhaps it may be explained as something which is between the two.
Marshall Hall (“On the Diseases of the Nervous System,” § 293 sq.)
explains it as a mixed function, for it is partly under the influence of
the cerebral (voluntary), and partly under that of the spinal
(non-voluntary) nerves. However, we are finally obliged to number it with
the expressions of will which result from motives. For other motives,
_i.e._, mere ideas, can determine the will to check it or accelerate it,
and, as is the case with every other voluntary action, it seems to us that
we could give up breathing altogether and voluntarily suffocate. And in
fact we could do so if any other motive influenced the will sufficiently
strongly to overcome the pressing desire for air. According to some
accounts Diogenes actually put an end to his life in this way (Diog.
Laert. VI. 76). Certain negroes also are said to have done this (F. B.
Osiander “On Suicide” [1813] pp. 170-180). If this be true, it affords us
a good example of the influence of abstract motives, _i.e._, of the
victory of distinctively rational over merely animal will. For, that
breathing is at least partially conditioned by cerebral activity is shown
by the fact that the primary cause of death from prussic acid is that it
paralyses the brain, and so, indirectly, restricts the breathing; but if
the breathing be artificially maintained till the stupefaction of the
brain has passed away, death will not ensue. We may also observe in
passing that breathing affords us the most obvious example of the fact
that motives act with just as much necessity as stimuli, or as causes in
the narrowest sense of the word, and their operation can only be
neutralised by antagonistic motives, as action is neutralised by
re-action. For, in the case of breathing, the illusion that we can stop
when we like is much weaker than in the case of other movements which
follow upon motives; because in breathing the motive is very powerful,
very near to us, and its satisfaction is very easy, for the muscles which
accomplish it are never tired, nothing, as a rule, obstructs it, and the
whole process is supported by the most inveterate habit of the individual.
And yet all motives act with the same necessity. The knowledge that
necessity is common to movements following upon motives, and those
following upon stimuli, makes it easier for us to understand that that
also which takes place in our bodily organism in accordance with stimuli
and in obedience to law, is yet, according to its inner nature—will, which
in all its manifestations, though never in itself, is subordinated to the
principle of sufficient reason, that is, to necessity.(32) Accordingly, we
shall not rest contented with recognising that animals, both in their
actions and also in their whole existence, bodily structure and
organisation, are manifestations of will; but we shall extend to plants
also this immediate knowledge of the essential nature of things which is
given to us alone. Now all the movements of plants follow upon stimuli;
for the absence of knowledge, and the movement following upon motives
which is conditioned by knowledge, constitutes the only essential
difference between animals and plants. Therefore, what appears for the
idea as plant life, as mere vegetation, as blindly impelling force, we
shall claim, according to its inner nature, for will, and recognise it as
just that which constitutes the basis of our own phenomenal being, as it
expresses itself in our actions, and also in the whole existence of our
body itself.
It only remains for us to take the final step, the extension of our way of
looking at things to all those forces which act in nature in accordance
with universal, unchangeable laws, in conformity with which the movements
of all those bodies take place, which are wholly without organs, and have
therefore no susceptibility for stimuli, and have no knowledge, which is
the necessary condition of motives. Thus we must also apply the key to the
understanding of the inner nature of things, which the immediate knowledge
of our own existence alone can give us, to those phenomena of the
unorganised world which are most remote from us. And if we consider them
attentively, if we observe the strong and unceasing impulse with which the
waters hurry to the ocean, the persistency with which the magnet turns
ever to the north pole, the readiness with which iron flies to the magnet,
the eagerness with which the electric poles seek to be re-united, and
which, just like human desire, is increased by obstacles; if we see the
crystal quickly and suddenly take form with such wonderful regularity of
construction, which is clearly only a perfectly definite and accurately
determined impulse in different directions, seized and retained by
crystallisation; if we observe the choice with which bodies repel and
attract each other, combine and separate, when they are set free in a
fluid state, and emancipated from the bonds of rigidness; lastly, if we
feel directly how a burden which hampers our body by its gravitation
towards the earth, unceasingly presses and strains upon it in pursuit of
its one tendency; if we observe all this, I say, it will require no great
effort of the imagination to recognise, even at so great a distance, our
own nature. That which in us pursues its ends by the light of knowledge;
but here, in the weakest of its manifestations, only strives blindly and
dumbly in a one-sided and unchangeable manner, must yet in both cases come
under the name of will, as it is everywhere one and the same—just as the
first dim light of dawn must share the name of sunlight with the rays of
the full mid-day. For the name _will_ denotes that which is the inner
nature of everything in the world, and the one kernel of every phenomenon.
Yet the remoteness, and indeed the appearance of absolute difference
between the phenomena of unorganised nature and the will which we know as
the inner reality of our own being, arises chiefly from the contrast
between the completely determined conformity to law of the one species of
phenomena, and the apparently unfettered freedom of the other. For in man,
individuality makes itself powerfully felt. Every one has a character of
his own; and therefore the same motive has not the same influence over
all, and a thousand circumstances which exist in the wide sphere of the
knowledge of the individual, but are unknown to others, modify its effect.
Therefore action cannot be predetermined from the motive alone, for the
other factor is wanting, the accurate acquaintance with the individual
character, and with the knowledge which accompanies it. On the other hand,
the phenomena of the forces of nature illustrate the opposite extreme.
They act according to universal laws, without variation, without
individuality in accordance with openly manifest circumstances, subject to
the most exact predetermination; and the same force of nature appears in
its million phenomena in precisely the same way. In order to explain this
point and prove the identity of the _one_ indivisible will in all its
different phenomena, in the weakest as in the strongest, we must first of
all consider the relation of the will as thing-in-itself to its phenomena,
that is, the relation of the world as will to the world as idea; for this
will open to us the best way to a more thorough investigation of the whole
subject we are considering in this second book.(33)
§ 24. We have learnt from the great Kant that time, space, and causality,
with their entire constitution, and the possibility of all their forms,
are present in our consciousness quite independently of the objects which
appear in them, and which constitute their content; or, in other words,
they can be arrived at just as well if we start from the subject as if we
start from the object. Therefore, with equal accuracy, we may call them
either forms of intuition or perception of the subject, or qualities of
the object _as object_ (with Kant, phenomenon), _i.e._, _idea_. We may
also regard these forms as the irreducible boundary between object and
subject. All objects must therefore exist in them, yet the subject,
independently of the phenomenal object, possesses and surveys them
completely. But if the objects appearing in these forms are not to be
empty phantoms, but are to have a meaning, they must refer to something,
must be the expression of something which is not, like themselves, object,
idea, a merely relative existence for a subject, but which exists without
such dependence upon something which stands over against it as a condition
of its being, and independent of the forms of such a thing, _i.e._, _is
not idea_, but a _thing-in-itself_. Consequently it may at least be asked:
Are these ideas, these objects, something more than or apart from the fact
that they are ideas, objects of the subject? And what would they be in
this sense? What is that other side of them which is _toto genere_
different from idea? What is the thing-in-itself? _The will_, we have
answered, but for the present I set that answer aside.
Whatever the thing-in-itself may be, Kant is right in his conclusion that
time, space, and causality (which we afterwards found to be forms of the
principle of sufficient reason, the general expression of the forms of the
phenomenon) are not its properties, but come to it only after, and so far
as, it has become idea. That is, they belong only to its phenomenal
existence, not to itself. For since the subject fully understands and
constructs them out of itself, independently of all object, they must be
dependent upon _existence as idea_ as such, not upon that which becomes
idea. They must be the form of the idea as such; but not qualities of that
which has assumed this form. They must be already given with the mere
antithesis of subject and object (not as concepts but as facts), and
consequently they must be only the more exact determination of the form of
knowledge in general, whose most universal determination is that
antithesis itself. Now, that in the phenomenon, in the object, which is in
its turn conditioned by time, space and causality, inasmuch as it can only
become idea by means of them, namely _multiplicity_, through co-existence
and succession, _change_ and _permanence_ through the law of causality,
_matter_ which can only become idea under the presupposition of causality,
and lastly, all that becomes idea only by means of these,—all this, I say,
as a whole, does not in reality belong to that which appears, to that
which has passed into the form of idea, but belongs merely to this form
itself. And conversely, that in the phenomenon which is not conditioned
through time, space and causality, and which cannot be referred to them,
nor explained in accordance with them, is precisely that in which the
thing manifested, the thing-in-itself, directly reveals itself. It follows
from this that the most complete capacity for being known, that is to say,
the greatest clearness, distinctness, and susceptibility of exhaustive
explanation, will necessarily belong to that which pertains to knowledge
_as such_, and thus to the _form_ of knowledge; but not to that which in
itself is not idea, not object, but which has become knowledge only
through entering these forms; in other words, has become idea, object.
Thus only that which depends entirely upon being an object of knowledge,
upon existing as idea in general and _as such_ (not upon that which
_becomes_ known, and has only _become_ idea), which therefore belongs
without distinction to everything that is known, and which, on that
account, is found just as well if we start from the subject as if we start
from the object,—this alone can afford us without reserve a sufficient,
exhaustive knowledge, a knowledge which is clear to the very foundation.
But this consists of nothing but those forms of all phenomena of which we
are conscious _a priori_, and which may be generally expressed as the
principle of sufficient reason. Now, the forms of this principle which
occur in knowledge of perception (with which alone we are here concerned)
are time, space, and causality. The whole of pure mathematics and pure
natural science _a priori_ is based entirely upon these. Therefore it is
only in these sciences that knowledge finds no obscurity, does not rest
upon what is incomprehensible (groundless, _i.e._, will), upon what cannot
be further deduced. It is on this account that Kant wanted, as we have
said, to apply the name science specially and even exclusively to these
branches of knowledge together with logic. But, on the other hand, these
branches of knowledge show us nothing more than mere connections,
relations of one idea to another, form devoid of all content. All content
which they receive, every phenomenon which fills these forms, contains
something which is no longer completely knowable in its whole nature,
something which can no longer be entirely explained through something
else, something then which is groundless, through which consequently the
knowledge loses its evidence and ceases to be completely lucid. This that
withholds itself from investigation, however, is the thing-in-itself, is
that which is essentially not idea, not object of knowledge, but has only
become knowable by entering that form. The form is originally foreign to
it, and the thing-in-itself can never become entirely one with it, can
never be referred to mere form, and, since this form is the principle of
sufficient reason, can never be completely explained. If therefore all
mathematics affords us an exhaustive knowledge of that which in the
phenomena is quantity, position, number, in a word, spatial and temporal
relations; if all etiology gives us a complete account of the regular
conditions under which phenomena, with all their determinations, appear in
time and space, but, with it all, teaches us nothing more than why in each
case this particular phenomenon must appear just at this time here, and at
this place now; it is clear that with their assistance we can never
penetrate to the inner nature of things. There always remains something
which no explanation can venture to attack, but which it always
presupposes; the forces of nature, the definite mode of operation of
things, the quality and character of every phenomenon, that which is
without ground, that which does not depend upon the form of the
phenomenal, the principle of sufficient reason, but is something to which
this form in itself is foreign, something which has yet entered this form,
and now appears according to its law, a law, however, which only
determines the appearance, not that which appears, only the how, not the
what, only the form, not the content. Mechanics, physics, and chemistry
teach the rules and laws according to which the forces of impenetrability,
gravitation, rigidity, fluidity, cohesion, elasticity, heat, light,
affinity, magnetism, electricity, &c., operate; that is to say, the law,
the rule which these forces observe whenever they enter time and space.
But do what we will, the forces themselves remain _qualitates occultæ_.
For it is just the thing-in-itself, which, because it is manifested,
exhibits these phenomena, which are entirely different from itself. In its
manifestation, indeed, it is completely subordinated to the principle of
sufficient reason as the form of the idea, but it can never itself be
referred to this form, and therefore cannot be fully explained
etiologically, can never be completely fathomed. It is certainly perfectly
comprehensible so far as it has assumed that form, that is, so far as it
is phenomenon, but its inner nature is not in the least explained by the
fact that it can thus be comprehended. Therefore the more necessity any
knowledge carries with it, the more there is in it of that which cannot be
otherwise thought or presented in perception—as, for example,
space-relations—the clearer and more sufficing then it is, the less pure
objective content it has, or the less reality, properly so called, is
given in it. And conversely, the more there is in it which must be
conceived as mere chance, and the more it impresses us as given merely
empirically, the more proper objectivity and true reality is there in such
knowledge, and at the same time, the more that is inexplicable, that is,
that cannot be deduced from anything else.
It is true that at all times an etiology, unmindful of its real aim, has
striven to reduce all organised life to chemism or electricity; all
chemism, that is to say quality, again to mechanism (action determined by
the shape of the atom), this again sometimes to the object of phoronomy,
_i.e._, the combination of time and space, which makes motion possible,
sometimes to the object of mere geometry, _i.e._, position in space (much
in the same way as we rightly deduce the diminution of an effect from the
square of the distance, and the theory of the lever in a purely
geometrical manner): geometry may finally be reduced to arithmetic, which,
on account of its one dimension, is of all the forms of the principle of
sufficient reason, the most intelligible, comprehensible, and completely
susceptible of investigation. As instances of the method generally
indicated here, we may refer to the atoms of Democritus, the vortex of
Descartes, the mechanical physics of Lesage, which towards the end of last
century tried to explain both chemical affinities and gravitation
mechanically by impact and pressure, as may be seen in detail in “_Lucrèce
Neutonien_;” Reil’s form and combination as the cause of animal life, also
tends in this direction. Finally, the crude materialism which even now in
the middle of the nineteenth century has been served up again under the
ignorant delusion that it is original, belongs distinctly to this class.
It stupidly denies vital force, and first of all tries to explain the
phenomena of life from physical and chemical forces, and those again from
the mechanical effects of the matter, position, form, and motion of
imagined atoms, and thus seeks to reduce all the forces of nature to
action and reaction as its thing-in-itself. According to this teaching,
light is the mechanical vibration or undulation of an imaginary ether,
postulated for this end. This ether, if it reaches the eye, beats rapidly
upon the retina, and gives us the knowledge of colour. Thus, for example,
four hundred and eighty-three billion beats in a second give red, and
seven hundred and twenty-seven billion beats in a second give violet. Upon
this theory, persons who are colour-blind must be those who are unable to
count the beats, must they not? Such crass, mechanical, clumsy, and
certainly knotty theories, which remind one of Democritus, are quite
worthy of those who, fifty years after the appearance of Goethe’s doctrine
of colour, still believe in Newton’s homogeneous light, and are not
ashamed to say so. They will find that what is overlooked in the child
(Democritus) will not be forgiven to the man. They might indeed, some day,
come to an ignominious end; but then every one would slink away and
pretend that he never had anything to do with them. We shall soon have to
speak again of this false reduction of the forces of nature to each other;
so much for the present. Supposing this theory were possible, all would
certainly be explained and established and finally reduced to an
arithmetical problem, which would then be the holiest thing in the temple
of wisdom, to which the principle of sufficient reason would at last have
happily conducted us. But all content of the phenomenon would have
disappeared, and the mere form would remain. The “what appears” would be
referred to the “how it appears,” and this “how” would be what is _a
priori_ knowable, therefore entirely dependent on the subject, therefore
only for the subject, therefore, lastly, mere phantom, idea and form of
idea, through and through: no thing-in-itself could be demanded.
Supposing, then, that this were possible, the whole world would be derived
from the subject, and in fact, that would be accomplished which Fichte
wanted to _seem_ to accomplish by his empty bombast. But it is not
possible: phantasies, sophisms, castles in the air, have been constructed
in this way, but science never. The many and multifarious phenomena in
nature have been successfully referred to particular original forces, and
as often as this has been done, a real advance has been made. Several
forces and qualities, which were at first regarded as different, have been
derived from each other, and thus their number has been curtailed. (For
example, magnetism from electricity.) Etiology will have reached its goal
when it has recognised and exhibited as such all the original forces of
nature, and established their mode of operation, _i.e._, the law according
to which, under the guidance of causality, their phenomena appear in time
and space, and determine their position with regard to each other. But
certain original forces will always remain over; there will always remain
as an insoluble residuum a content of phenomena which cannot be referred
to their form, and thus cannot be explained from something else in
accordance with the principle of sufficient reason. For in everything in
nature there is something of which no ground can ever be assigned, of
which no explanation is possible, and no ulterior cause is to be sought.
This is the specific nature of its action, _i.e._, the nature of its
existence, its being. Of each particular effect of the thing a cause may
be certainly indicated, from which it follows that it must act just at
this time and in this place; but no cause can ever be found from which it
follows that a thing acts in general, and precisely in the way it does. If
it has no other qualities, if it is merely a mote in a sunbeam, it yet
exhibits this unfathomable something, at least as weight and
impenetrability. But this, I say, is to the mote what his will is to a
man; and, like the human will, it is, according to its inner nature, not
subject to explanation; nay, more—it is in itself identical with this
will. It is true that a motive may be given for every manifestation of
will, for every act of will at a particular time and in a particular
place, upon which it must necessarily follow, under the presupposition of
the character of the man. But no reason can ever be given that the man has
this character; that he wills at all; that, of several motives, just this
one and no other, or indeed that any motive at all, moves his will. That
which in the case of man is the unfathomable character which is
presupposed in every explanation of his actions from motives is, in the
case of every unorganised body, its definitive quality—the mode of its
action, the manifestations of which are occasioned by impressions from
without, while it itself, on the contrary, is determined by nothing
outside itself, and thus is also inexplicable. Its particular
manifestations, through which alone it becomes visible, are subordinated
to the principle of sufficient reason; it itself is groundless. This was
in substance rightly understood by the schoolmen, who called it _forma
substantialis_. (Cf. Suarez, Disput. Metaph., disp. xv. sect. 1.)