_There is present a something given--the world._
It presents itself as an endlessly vast sum of processes. Where there
is a process there is happening. Where something happens, there
adequate causes are demanded.
Every attempt to comprehend adequate causes leads backwards in endless
series, since each cause comprehended is something which itself in
turn demands an adequate cause, and so on backwards without ever a
conclusion.
_Faith_ is that particular form of mental life which from this fact
draws the inference that for the human mind a real comprehension
is impossible, since behind the physical there stands a something
transcendent, a force, with reference to which all life-phenomena
become that which their name expresses: _phenomena of a “life”_ which
faith for the most part designates by the word “_god_.”
This force stationed behind the physical, to which faith traces
back all that happens, must be an “adequate cause in itself,” hence
something contrary to sense in the fullest meaning of the words.
For all that is, without exception, requires an adequate cause. An
“adequate cause in itself” would thus be that something which by
its simple existence would give the lie to this thought-necessity,
inasmuch as itself would be that which would have no adequate cause.
When the thought-necessity of an adequate cause is thus satisfied with
an “adequate cause in itself,” this just means: it is satisfied _in a
fashion contrary to sense_.
The essence of all that is contrary to sense consists in this, that
when followed out in thought, it deprives itself of the possibility of
existence. A mistake in an arithmetical sum is the most familiar form
of what is contrary to sense. It is something that in correct thinking
is by itself deprived of all possibility of existence; it is something
that makes its appearance only that it may appear no more.
In like case stands faith. Does it essay to think that in which it
believes, then must that present itself to it in one or other relation
or form--that is, conceptually. A transcendent, however, that presents
itself conceptually is transcendent no longer, but, on the contrary,
the one completely conceptualized thing there is in the world, inasmuch
as its whole existence just consists of the concept of it. Accordingly,
when faith ventures to think, it deprives itself of the possibility of
existence; when it does not think, it has no existence _as faith_, and
therefore no existence at all.
When, as in these days frequently happens, people complain of the
ever-increasing decay of faith, the reason mostly given is, that
faith does not contain a sufficiency of what is of value to the
understanding. The believer must know what, how, and why he believes,
and not have his faith based simply upon feeling. But this is somewhat
the same as if one should reproach darkness with not containing a
sufficiency of light among its ingredients. Is light present, then
there can be no darkness; is understanding present, then there can be
no faith. _Credo ut intelligam_ is the most vain of all wishes.
_Pantheism_ in its noblest form, that of the Indian _Vedanta_,
endeavours to avoid this dilemma by conceiving of its divine in purely
negative terms. But the famous “neti, neti”--“not this, not this”--of
the Upanishads, is a definition too, and so a limitation.
Through this its essential characteristic, of itself in being thought
out, depriving itself of the possibility of existence, faith takes its
place--as third in the trio--along with illusion and error.
_Illusion_ is what I call a mistaken view; _error_, what I call a
mistaken experience. When I mistake a rope for a snake, a train of ants
for a crack in the ground, these are illusions. When I hold infusoria
to have their origin in the infusion of hay, or look upon the evening
and the morning star as two different orbs, these are errors.
Upon this, its community of nature with illusion and error, is based
another essential characteristic of faith--namely, the impossibility,
when once it has vanished, of its ever again coming to life. Once
the rope on my path which I formerly mistook for a snake has been
recognized by me for a rope, never again can I voluntarily return to
my illusion. I can, indeed, by force of imagination, represent it to
myself as a snake, but this representation no longer “works”; it no
longer excites fear. And in just the same way I can quite successfully
recall the conditions under which certain optical and acoustic
delusions made their appearance, but they are illusions that are dead.
The like holds good of error and, for a third, of faith.
People who call for a resuscitation of vanished faith, and by some
means or other hope to see it effected, know not what it is that they
hope and call for. They are calling for the restoration of a vanished
ignorance--an utter inconceivability.
Now there exists one great distinction between faith, on the one hand,
and illusion and error on the other; in this respect, namely, that the
two latter have the physical, the material for their object, hence can
be checked and set right by this--that is, by reality. Faith, however,
that has for its object the non-physical, the non-material, which
is just whatever the believer chooses to conceive it to be, cannot
be checked and set right by reality. On the contrary, the believer
interprets the entire world in accordance with his concept, devours, so
to speak, the world’s entire content of reality, and sets up a view of
the world that is _unreal_, seeing that he interprets the physical from
the transcendental standpoint--that is, abnormally; and therefore he is
never in the position to be set right by reality, since he never can
knock up against contradictions. One must know that one does not know
before one can let oneself be taught.
In perfect accordance with this essential feature of faith (so far as
the theory of knowledge is concerned) is its morality and religion:
_both are contrary to sense_.
The essence of all morality is to be found in selflessness. Every
act of selflessness requires a motive. To possess a motive one must
exercise cognition, comprehension.
As a matter of fact the essential nature of every faith-morality is
selfish, despite all its acts of renunciation. Here one practises
renunciation like a man who stints himself of a certain amount of money
and invests it in a lottery. As he parts with his money that he may win
back more in its place, so here the believer gives up money, goods,
life--yea, honour and truth, everything, if so be he may draw the first
prize above.
The essence of all religion consists in the search for the aim and
goal of life. This search faith satisfies by referring life as a whole
to a something transcendent. But the existence of the transcendent
is nothing else but the concept of it. To refer life as a whole to
a transcendent thus means nothing but to refer itself to itself,
which--so to speak--is the analytical expression for ignorance.
Further development of these ideas is not essential to our task. Here
we have only to bear well in mind that, as the world-theory from the
standpoint of faith is one contrary to sense, so also is its morality
and its religion. All three are functions of a nescience, and therefore
void of actuality.