No More Learning

The reason [Grund] for such misinterpretations, which in large measure other systems have also experienced, lies in the general misunderstanding of the law of identity or the meaning of the copula in judgment. It can at once be made comprehensible to a child that in no possible proposition (which according to the assumed explanation states the identity of the subject with the predicate) is stated a sameness [Einerleiheit] or even only an unmediated connection of these two--in so far as, for example, the proposition, "This body is blue," does not have the meaning that the body is, in and through that in and through which it is a body, also blue, but rather only the meaning that the same thing which is this body is also blue, although not in the same respect: and yet this assumption, which indicates complete ignorance regarding the nature [Wesen] of the copula, has constantly been made in rela- tion to the higher application of the law of identity in our time. For ex- ample, if one puts forward the proposition: "The perfect is the imper- fect," the meaning is this: the imperfect is not due to that through which it is imperfect, but rather through the perfect that is in it; how- ever, in our time it has this meaning: the perfect and the imperfect are the same [einerlei], all is the same [gleich] in itself, the worst and the best, foolishness and wisdom. Or: good is evil, which means to say roughly that evil does not have the power to exist through itself; that within evil which has being is (considered in and for itself) the good. This is interpreted in the following manner: the eternal difference between justice and injustice, virtue and vice is denied; both are logi- cally the same. | Or, if in a different turn of phrase, necessary and free things are explained as One, the meaning of which is that the
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same thing (in the final judgment) which is the essence of the moral world is also the essence of nature, then this is understood as follows: free things are nothing but forces of nature, coil springs [Springfeder], which, like any other, are subject to mechanism. The same thing oc- curs in the proposition that the soul is one with the body, which is interpreted as suggesting that the soul is material, air, ether, nerve fluid, and the like; for the reverse, that the body is the soul, or, in the preceding proposition, that the seemingly necessary is in itself free, though it is at once just as valid to infer from the proposition, is in a well-considered way set aside. Such misunderstandings, which, if they are not deliberate, presuppose a level of dialectical immaturity that Greek philosophy surpasses almost in its first steps, make recom- mending the thorough study of logic into a pressing duty. The ancients' profoundly meaningful [tiefsinnig] logic differentiated subject and predicate as what precedes and what follows (antecedens et conse- quens) and thereby expressed the real meaning of the law of identity. 13 This relation persists even in tautological propositions, if they are not to be utterly without meaning. Whoever says, "The body is body," surely thinks something different with respect to the subject of the sen- tence than with respect to the predicate; with respect to the former namely, unity, with respect to the latter, the individual properties con- tained within the concept of body that relate to it as antecedens to con- sequens. Just this is the meaning of another ancient explanation ac- cording to which subject and predicate are set against each other as what is enfolded to what is unfolded (implicitum et explicitum). * |
* Mr. Reinhold, too, who wanted to re-create all of philosophy through logic, does not, however, seem to recognize what Leibniz, in whose footsteps he claims to walk, said about the meaning of the copula in regard to the objec- tions of Wissowatius (Opp. T. I ed. Dutens, p. 11) and still toils away in this labyrinth, where he confuses identity with sameness. In a paper before us is the following passage from him: "According to the demands of Plato and Leibniz, the duty of philosophy consists in showing the subordination of the finite to the infinite, according to the demands of Xenophanes, Bruno, Spinoza, and Schelling, in showing the unconditional unity of both. " To the extent that unity in the sense of opposition is obviously supposed to de- note sameness here, I assure Mr. Reinhold that he is mistaken at least in re- gard to both of the last named. Where is there a more incisive expression for the subordination of the finite to | the infinite to be found than the one
However, defenders of the foregoing claim will now say that pantheism does not speak at all about the fact that God is everything (which is not easy to avoid according to the common notion of his properties), but rather about the fact that things are nothing, that this system abolishes all individuality. Yet it seems that this new de- termination contradicts the preceding one, for, if things are nothing, how is it possible to blend | God with them? Then there is nothing anywhere but pure unblemished divinity. Or, if there is nothing besides God (not simply extra, but rather also praeter Deum), how can he be all things, other than merely in words, so that the whole
by Spinoza referred to above? The living must take issue with calumnies against those who are no longer present--just as we expect that, in a simi- lar case, those living after us will in regard to us. I speak only of Spinoza and ask what should one call this practice of asserting fecklessly what one finds good about systems without being thoroughly acquainted with them, as if it were a trifle to read into them this or that creation of one's fancy? In ordinary, moral society it would be called unconscionable. According to another passage in the same paper, the fundamental mistake of all more re- cent philosophy, just as of earlier philosophy, lies for Mr. R. in the non- differentiation (in confusing, mixing up) of unity (identity) and connection (nexus), as well as of variety (diversity) and difference. This is not the first example where Mr. R. finds in his opponents exactly those errors that he has brought to them. This seems to be the way that he takes the necessary medicina mentis for himself; just as one wants to have examples that peo- ple with excitable imaginations can be cured by means of remedies that they have had others take for them. For who makes the error of confusing what one calls unity--but which really is sameness--with connection in re- gard to earlier and more recent philosophy more decidedly than precisely Mr. R. himself who interprets the inclusion of things in God as Spinoza's as- sertion of their alikeness [Gleichheit] and who generally holds non- diversity (according to substance or essence) for non-difference (accord- ing to form or logical concept). If Spinoza is actually to be understood in this manner, as Mr. R. interprets him, then the well-known proposition, that the thing and the concept of the thing are one, would have to be under- stood as if, for example, one could defeat the enemy with the concept of an army rather than with the army, and so forth, consequences which the se- rious and thoughtful man certainly finds himself to be too good for.
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concept seems therefore to dissolve and vanish into nothingness? In any event, the question arises as to whether much is gained by rais- ing such labels from the dead that, though they may indeed be ones to hold in honor in the history of heresy, yet appear to be much too crude a way of handling products of the mind in which, as in the most delicate natural phenomena, fine [leise] determinations cause essen- tial changes. It might still be open to doubt whether the last-noted de- termination should even be applicable to Spinoza. For, if besides (praeter) substance, he recognizes nothing but its mere affections, which he declares things to be, then this concept is admittedly a purely negative one that expresses nothing essential or positive. In- itially, however, it serves merely to determine the relationship of things to God but not what they may be, considered for themselves. Yet, from the absence of this determination, it cannot be concluded that things contain nothing positive whatsoever (even if always in a derived manner). Spinoza's most astringent expression is likely this here: The individual being is substance itself considered as one of its modifications, that is, consequences. 14 Let's posit now that infinite substance = A, and the same considered in one of its consequences = A/a: thus the positive in A/a is still A; but on this basis it does not follow that A/a = A, that is, that infinite substance considered in its conse- quences is the same [einerlei] as infinite substance considered as such; or, in other words, it does not follow that A/a is not a particular in- dividual substance (even though a consequence of A). This is of course not set out in Spinoza; but here we are speaking first about pantheism in general; hence, the question is only whether the view presented is inconsistent with Spinozism itself. This will be asserted with difficulty, since it has been admitted that Leibniz's monads, which are entirely what | is in the preceding expression A/a, are not a decisive aid against Spinozism. Many statements by Spinoza remain enigmatic without a supplement of this sort, for example, that the essence of the human soul is a living concept of God that is declared to be eternal (not transitory). Therefore, even if substance dwelt only momentarily in its other consequences A/ b, A/c . . . it would surely dwell in that consequence, in the human soul = a, eternally and, therefore, A/a would be divided from itself as A in an eternal and irreversible manner.
If, proceeding further, one wished now to explain the genuine character of pantheism as the denial not of individuality but of free- dom, then many systems otherwise essentially distinguished from
pantheism would be included in the concept of it. For, until the dis- covery of idealism, a genuine concept of freedom was lacking in all the more recent systems, in that of Leibniz as well as in that of Spi- noza;15 and a freedom--as it has been thought by many among us who also pride ourselves on having the liveliest feeling of it according to which it consists precisely in the mere rule of the intelligent princi- ple over sensuality and the desires--such a freedom might still be de- rived even from Spinoza, not in a forced way [nicht zur Not], but rather easily and even more decisively. Hence, it appears that the de- nial or assertion of freedom in general is based on something com- pletely other than the assumption or non-assumption of pantheism (the immanence of things in God). For, if, admittedly, it seems at first glance as if freedom, which was unable to maintain itself in opposi- tion to God, had perished in identity here, then one can say that this appearance is only the result of an imperfect and empty notion of the law of identity. This principle does not express a unity which, turning itself in the circle of seamless sameness [Einerleiheit], would not be progressive and, thus, insensate or lifeless. The unity of this law is an immediately creative one. In the relation of | subject and predicate we have already shown that of ground and consequence, and the law of the ground [Gesetz des Grundes] is for that reason just as original as the law of identity. 16 Therefore, the eternal must also be a ground immediately and as it is in itself. That of which the eternal is a ground through its being is in this respect dependent and, from the point of view of immanence, also something contained within the eternal. But dependence does not abolish independence, it does not even abolish freedom. Dependence does not determine its being and says only that the dependent, whatever it also may be, can be a con- sequence only of that of which it is a dependent; dependence does not say what the dependent is or is not. Every organic individual ex- ists, as something that has become, only through another, and in this respect is dependent according to its becoming but by no means ac- cording to its Being. It is not inconsistent, says Leibniz, that he who is God is at the same time begotten or vice versa; just as little is it a contradiction that he who is the son of a man is also himself a man. On the contrary, it would be far more contradictory, if the dependent or consequent were not independent. That would be a dependency with- out a dependent, a consequence without a consequent (consequentia absque consequente) and, thus, no real consequence, that is, the whole
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concept would abolish itself. The same is valid for the containment [Begriffensein] of one thing within another. An individual body part, like the eye, is only possible within the whole of an organism; none- theless, it has its own life for itself, indeed, its own kind of freedom, which it obviously proves through the disease of which it is capable. Were that which is contained in another not itself alive, then there would be containment without some thing being contained, that is, nothing would be contained. 17 A much higher standpoint is granted by consideration of the divine being itself, the idea of which would be fully contradicted by a consequence which is not the begetting, that is, the positing of, something independent. God is not a god of the dead but of the living. It is not comprehensible how the most perfect being could find pleasure even in the most perfect machine possible. However one may conceive of the way in which beings proceed from God, the way can never be mechanical, not mere production or instal- lation | whereby the product is nothing for itself; just as little can it be emanation where what flows out remains the same as that from which it flows, therefore nothing individual, nothing independent. The procession [Folge] of things from God is a self-revelation of God. But God can only reveal himself to himself in what is like him, in free beings acting on their own, for whose Being there is no ground other than God but who are as God is. He speaks, and they are there. Were all beings in the world but thoughts in the divine mind, they would have to be living already for that very reason. Thoughts are thus probably generated by the soul; but the thought generated is an inde- pendent power, continuing to act on its own, indeed, growing within the human soul in such a way that it restrains and subjugates its own mother. 18 Yet, the divine imagination, which is the cause of differen- tiation [Spezifikation] of beings in the world, is not like its human counterpart in that the latter grants merely ideal reality to created beings [Scho? pfungen]. The representations [Repra? sentationen] of the divinity can be independent beings only; for what is the limiting ele- ment in our representations [Vorstellungen] other than exactly that we see what is not independent? God looks at the things in them- selves. 19 Only the eternal is in itself as based in itself, will, freedom. The concept of a derived absoluteness or divinity is so little contra- dictory that it is rather the central concept of philosophy as a whole. Such a divinity befits nature. So little does immanence in God contradict freedom that precisely only what is free is in God to the
extent it is free, and what is not free is necessarily outside of [ausser] God to the extent that it is not free.
However inadequate such a general deduction is in itself for one who sees deeper, it surely makes it sufficiently clear that the denial of formal freedom is not necessarily connected with pantheism. We do not expect that one will oppose Spinozism to us. No small daring be- longs to the claim that system, as it is brought together in the head of any one individual, is the system of reason kat' eksoch ? en, the for- ever unchangeable. What, then, does one understand by Spinozism? Perhaps his entire doctrine as it is presented in the man's writings, therefore, for example, | in his mechanistic physics as well? Or, in ac- cordance with which principle does one wish to distinguish and di- vide up things where everything is supposed to be full of extraordi- nary and singular consistency? It will always remain a striking phenomenon in the history of the development of the German spirit that at any time the claim could have been made: the system, which heaps God together with things, the created being together with the creator (as it was understood), and which subjugates all under a blind, thoughtless necessity, is the only one rationally possible--the only one to be developed from pure reason! To understand the claim one has to recall the prevailing spirit of an earlier era. Then the me- chanistic way of thinking, which reached the summit of its infamy in French atheism, had captured almost all minds; in Germany as well one began to take this manner of seeing and explaining for the genu- ine and sole philosophy. 20 Since, however, the native German disposi- tion [Gemu? t] could never assimilate these consequences to itself, for that reason there first emerged the discord [Zwiespalt] of head and heart that was characteristic of more recent philosophical literature: one abhorred the consequences without freeing oneself from the basis [Grund] of this way of thinking or rising to a better one. One wanted to declare these consequences, and since the German mind could only take hold of the mechanistic philosophy from its (suppos- edly) highest expression, the terrible truth was declared in this way: all philosophy--absolutely all--that is purely rational is or becomes Spinozism! Everyone now was warned about the abyss; it was laid bare before all; the only remedy which still seemed possible was seized; that bold word only could bring on the crisis and frighten Ger- mans away from the corrupting philosophy and lead them back to the heart, to inner feeling and belief. 21 Nowadays, since this way of
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thinking is long gone, and the higher light of idealism shines for us, the same claim would be neither comprehensible to an equal degree nor would it also promise the same consequences. * |
And here then, once and for all, our definite opinion about Spinoz- ism! This system is not fatalism because it allows things to be con- tained in God; for, as we have shown, pantheism at least makes for- mal freedom not impossible. Spinoza therefore must be a fatalist for a completely different reason, one independent of pantheism. The error of his system lies by no means in his placing things in God but in the fact that they are things--in the abstract concept of beings in the world, indeed of infinite substance itself, which for him is exactly also a thing. Hence his arguments against freedom are entirely determinis- tic, in no way pantheistic. He treats the will also as a thing and then proves very naturally that it would have to be determined in all its ac- tivity through another thing that is in turn determined by another, and so on ad infinitum. Hence the lifelessness of his system, the ster- ility of its form, the poverty of concepts and expressions, the unre- lenting severity of definitions that goes together excellently with the abstract means of presentation; hence his mechanistic view of nature follows quite naturally as well. Or does one doubt that the basic views of Spinozism must already be essentially changed by a dy- namic notion of nature? If the doctrine that all things are contained in God is the ground of the whole system, then, at the very least, it must first be brought to life and torn from abstraction before it can become the principle of a system of reason. How general are the expressions that finite beings are modifications or consequences | of God; what a
* In a review of the recent writings by | Fichte in the Heidelberg Annuals of Literature (vol. 1, No. 6, p. 139), the advice that Mr. Fr. Schlegel gives to the latter is to stick exclusively to Spinoza in his polemical efforts because in Spinoza alone the utterly complete system of pantheism in form and con- sequence is encountered--one which, according to the statement cited above, would be at the same time the system of pure reason. Incidentally, this advice may indeed offer certain advantages, yet it strikes one as strange that Mr. Fichte is without doubt of the opinion that Spinozism (as Spinozism) has already been refuted through the Doctrine of Knowledge [Wissenschaftslehre] in which he is entirely correct--or is idealism perhaps not the work of reason, and the supposedly sad honor of being a system of reason remains only for pantheism and Spinozism?
gulf there is to fill here, what questions there are to answer! One could look at the rigidity of Spinozism as at Pygmalion's statue that had to be made animate [beseelt] through the warm breath of love;22 but this comparison is incomplete since Spinozism is more like a work sketched out only in barest outline in which many still missing or un- finished features would first become noticeable if it were made ani- mate. It would be preferable to compare Spinozism to the most an- cient images of divinities which appeared that much more mysterious the less their features bespoke individuality and liveliness. In a word, it is a one-sidedly realist system, which expression indeed sounds less damning than pantheism, yet indicates what is characteristic of the system far more correctly and is also not employed here for the first time. It would be irksome to repeat the many explanations that have been made concerning this point in the author's early writings. A mu- tual saturation of realism and idealism in each other was the declared intent of his efforts. Spinoza's basic concept, when infused by spirit (and, in one essential point, changed) by the principle of idealism, re- ceived a living basis in the higher forms of investigation of nature and the recognized unity of the dynamic with the emotional and spiritual; out of this grew the philosophy of nature, which as pure physics was indeed able to stand for itself, yet at any time in regard to the whole of philosophy was only considered as a part, namely the real part that would be capable of rising up into the genuine system of reason only through completion by the ideal part in which freedom rules. It was claimed that in this rising up (of freedom) the final empowering [po- tenzierende] act was found through which all of nature transfigured it- self in feeling, intelligence and, finally, in will. 23 In the final and highest judgment, there is no other Being than will. Will is primal Being [Ur- sein] to which alone all predicates of Being apply: groundlessness, eternality, independence from time, self-affirmation. All of philosophy strives only to find this highest expression. 24
In our times philosophy has been raised up to this point by | ideal- ism, and only at this point are we really able to begin the investiga- tion of our topic in so far as it by no means could have been our in- tention to take into account all those difficulties that can be raised and were raised long ago against the concept of freedom from the one-sidedly realistic or dogmatic system. Still, idealism itself, no mat- ter how high it has taken us in this respect, and as certain as it is that we have it to thank for the first complete concept of formal freedom,
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is yet nothing less than a completed system for itself, and it leaves us no guidance in the doctrine of freedom as soon as we wish to enter into what is more exact and decisive. In the first connection we note that, for idealism which has been constructed into a system, it is by no means adequate to claim that "activity, life and freedom only are the truly real" with which even Fichte's subjective idealism (which misunderstands itself) can coexist; rather, it is required that the re- verse also be shown, that everything real (nature, the world of things) has activity, life and freedom as its ground or, in Fichte's ex- pression, that not only is I-hood all, but also the reverse, that all is I- hood. 25 The thought of making freedom the one and all of philosophy has set the human mind free in general, not merely with respect to it- self, and brought about a more forceful change in all divisions of knowledge than any prior revolution. The idealist concept is the true consecration for the higher philosophy of our time and, especially, for its higher realism. Were those who would judge or appropriate this realism to ponder that freedom is its innermost presupposition, in what a totally different light would they consider and grasp it! Only one who has tasted freedom can feel the longing to make everything analogous to it, to spread it throughout the whole universe. One who does not come to philosophy by this path follows and merely imi- tates what others do without any feeling for why they do it. It will al- ways remain odd, however, that Kant, after having first distinguished things-in-themselves from appearances | only negatively through their independence from time and later treating independence from time and freedom as correlate concepts in the metaphysical discus- sions of his Critique of Practical Reason, did not go further toward the thought of transferring this only possible positive concept of the in- itself also to things; thereby he would immediately have raised him- self to a higher standpoint of reflection and above the negativity that is the character of his theoretical philosophy. 26 From another per- spective, however, if freedom really is the positive concept of the in- itself, the investigation concerning human freedom is thrown back again into the general, in so far as the intelligible on which it was alone grounded is also the essence of things-in-themselves. Mere idealism does not reach far enough, therefore, in order to show the specific difference [Differenz], that is, precisely what is the distinc- tiveness, of human freedom. Likewise, it would be an error to think that pantheism has been abolished and destroyed by idealism, a view
that could only arise from the confusion of pantheism with one- sided realism. For it is entirely the same for pantheism as such whether individual things are in an absolute substance or just as many individual wills are included in a primal will [Urwille]. In the first case, pantheism would be realist, in the other, idealist, but its grounding concept remains the same. Precisely here it is evident for the time being that the most profound difficulties inherent in the con- cept of freedom will be just as little resolvable through idealism, taken by itself, than through any other partial system. Idealism pro- vides namely, on the one hand, only the most general concept of free- dom and, on the other hand, a merely formal one. But the real and vital concept is that freedom is the capacity for good and evil.
This is the point of most profound difficulty in the entire doctrine of freedom, one which has been perceived in all times and which does not affect merely this or that system but, more or less, all. * | Yet, it affects most noticeably the concept of immanence; for either real evil is admitted and, hence, it is inevitable that evil be posited within infinite substance or the primal will itself, whereby the con- cept of a most perfect being is utterly destroyed, or the reality of evil must in some way be denied, whereby, however, at the same time the real concept of freedom vanishes. 27 The difficulty is no slighter though, if even the most distant connection between God and beings in the world is assumed; for even this connection is limited to a so- called mere concursus [coming-together, coincidence] or to that nec- essary participation [Mitwirkung] of God in his creatures' actions, which must be assumed due to the essential dependence of the lat- ter on God, incidentally, even when freedom is asserted. Thus God appears undeniably to share responsibility for evil in so far as per- mitting an entirely dependent being to do evil is surely not much bet- ter than to cause it to do so. Or, likewise, the reality of evil must be denied in one way or another. The proposition that everything posi- tive in creatures comes from God must also be asserted in this system. If it is now assumed that there is something positive in evil, then this positive comes also from God. Against this can be objected:
* Mr. Fr. Schlegel has the merit of asserting this difficulty especially against pantheism in his book on India and in several other places, | where it is only to be regretted that this astute scholar did not see fit to communicate his own point of view on the origin of evil and its relation to the good.
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the positive element of evil is good in so far as it is positive. Evil does not thereby disappear, although it is also not explained. For, if what has being in evil is good, whence that in which this being is, the basis that actually constitutes evil? Completely distinct from this assertion (though frequently, even recently, confused with it) is the assertion that in evil there is nowhere anything positive or, differently ex- pressed, that evil does not exist at all (not even with, or connected to, another positive) but rather that all actions are more or less posi- tive, and the distinction among them is merely a plus or minus of com- pleteness, whereby no opposition is established and, therefore, evil utterly | disappears. This would be the second possible assumption in regard to the proposition that everything positive comes from God. Then the force that appears in evil, though it would indeed be compar- atively less complete than that appearing in the good, yet considered in itself or aside from the comparison would surely be a complete whole itself which, thus, like any other, must be derived from God. What we call evil in this is only the lower degree of perfection, which appears merely for our comparison as a deficiency; in nature there is none. It is not to be denied that this is the true view of Spinoza. Some- one could attempt to bypass this dilemma through the answer: the positive that comes from God is freedom that in itself is indifferent to- ward good and evil; yet, if he but thinks of this indifference not merely negatively yet rather as a vital, positive capacity for good and evil, it is not comprehensible how a capacity for evil can result from God who is regarded as pure goodness. It is evident from this, to note in passing, that, if freedom really is what it must be according to this concept (and it unmistakably is), the derivation of freedom from God at- tempted above is then likely also not correct; for, if freedom is a capac- ity for evil, then it must have a root independent of God. Driven by this argument, one can be tempted to throw oneself into the arms of dualism. This system, however, if it is really thought as the doctrine of two absolutely different and mutually independent principles, is only a system of the self-destruction and despair of reason. But if the funda- mental being [Grundwesen] of evil is thought in some sense as depen- dent on that of the good, then the whole difficulty of the descent [Ab- kunft] of evil from good, though concentrated on One Being, is, however, thereby increased rather than diminished. Even if it is as- sumed that this second being was originally created good and
through its own fault fell away from the primal being, then the first ca- pacity for an act striving against God always remains inexplicable in all the previous systems. Hence, even if one | wished at last to abolish not only the identity, but every connection of beings in the world with God and wished to regard their entire current existence and, thus, that of the world, as an estrangement [Entfernung] from God, the difficulty would be removed only one point further but it would not be abol- ished. For, in order to be able to flow out from God, they had to exist already in some manner, and, thus, the emanation doctrine would be the least able to be opposed to pantheism since it presupposes an original existence of things in God and obviously, therefore, panthe- ism. To clarify this estrangement, however, only the following could be assumed: it is either an involuntary estrangement on the part of things but not on the part of God in which case they are cast out by God into a condition of disaffection and malice, and, therefore, God is the originator of this condition. Or it is involuntary on both sides, having been caused, for instance, by an overflow [U? berfluss] of being as some say, an utterly untenable idea. Or it is voluntary on the part of things, a tearing oneself away from God, therefore the consequence of a culpability from which ever deeper abasement [Herabsinken] re- sults; this first culpability is, then, precisely already evil itself, and hence reason provides no explanation of its origin. Without this auxil- iary thought, however, which, if it explains evil in the world, on the other hand entirely obliterates the good and introduces instead of pantheism a pandemonism, every genuine opposition of good and evil just vanishes in the system of emanation; what is first loses itself in in- finitely many intermediary levels through a gradual weakening into that which no longer has any appearance of the good, roughly as Ploti- nus* subtly, but unsatisfactorily, describes the transition from the original good into matter and evil. Accordingly, through a constant subordination and estrangement, something final emerges beyond which nothing more can come into being, and precisely this (which is incapable of further production) is evil. Or: if there is something after what is first, then there must also be something final that has nothing more in itself from that which is first, and this is matter and the neces- sity of evil. 28 |
* Ennead. I, L. VIII, c. 8.
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According to these reflections, it just does not seem appropriate to throw the entire burden of this difficulty only on a single system, especially since the supposedly higher one opposed to it affords so little satisfaction. The generalities of idealism also cannot be of help here. Nothing at all can be achieved with such abstract concepts of God as actus purissumus [purest actuality], the likes of which earlier philosophy put forward, or with such concepts as more recent philo- sophy has brought forth again and again out of a concern to remove God quite far indeed from all of nature. God is something more real than a merely moral world order and has entirely different and more vital motive forces in himself than the desolate subtlety of abstract idealists attributes to him. The abhorrence of everything real that finds the spiritual befouled through any contact with the latter must of course also blind one's eye to the origin of evil. Idealism, if it does not have as its basis a living realism, becomes just as empty and ab- stract a system as that of Leibniz, Spinoza, or any other dogmatist. The entire new European philosophy since its beginning (with Des- cartes) has the common defect that nature is not available for it and that it lacks a living ground. Spinoza's realism is thereby as abstract as the idealism of Leibniz. Idealism is the soul of philosophy; realism is the body; only both together can constitute a living whole. 29 The latter can never provide the principle but must be the ground and medium in which the former makes itself real and takes on flesh and blood. If a philosophy is lacking this living foundation, which is com- monly a sign that the ideal principle was originally only weakly at work within it, then it loses itself in those systems whose abstract concepts of aseity, modifications, and so forth, stand in the sharpest contrast with the living force and richness of reality.
Where, however, the ideal principle is actually active to a great degree but cannot find a reconciling and mediating basis, it generates a bleak and wild en- thusiasm that breaks out into self-mutilation or, like the priests of the Phrygian goddess, | self-castration which is achieved in philosophy through the renunciation of reason and science. 30
It seemed necessary to begin this treatise with the correction of es- sential concepts that have always been confused, but especially in re- cent times. Hence, the preceding remarks are to be considered merely as an introduction to our genuine investigation. We have al- ready explained: that point of view which is fully adequate to the task to be undertaken here can only be developed from the fundamental
principles of a true philosophy of nature. We do not deny for that rea- son that this correct point of view has not been present in isolated minds for a long time already. But it is also precisely these minds that sought the living ground of nature without fear of the ever trite words of slander against real philosophy, like materialism, pantheism, and so on, and who were natural philosophers (in both senses of the word) in contrast to the dogmatists and abstract idealists who dis- missed them as mystics. 31
The natural philosophy of our time has first advanced in science the distinction between being in so far as it exists and being in so far as it is merely the ground of existence. 32 This distinction is as old as its first scientific presentation. * Notwithstanding that it is precisely this point at which natural philosophy most decisively turns away from Spinoza's path, in Germany it could indeed still be claimed up to this time that its metaphysical principles were the same as those of Spinoza; and, although it is precisely this distinction which at the same time brings about the most decisive differentiation of nature from God, this has not prevented accusation that it is a confusion of God and nature. Since this is the same distinction on which the present investigation is based, let the following remarks be made to- ward its explanation.
Since nothing is prior to, or outside of [ausser], God, he must have the ground of his existence in himself. All philosophies say this; but they | speak of this ground as of a mere concept without making it into something real [reell] and actual [wirklich]. This ground of his existence, which God has in himself, is not God considered abso- lutely, that is, in so far as he exists; for it is only the ground of his ex- istence. It [the ground33] is nature--in God, a being indeed insepara- ble, yet still distinct, from him. This relation can be explained analogically through that of gravity and light in nature. 34 Gravity precedes light as its ever dark ground, which itself is not actu [ac- tual], and flees into the night as the light (that which exists) dawns. Even light does not fully remove the seal under which gravity lies contained. ? Precisely for this reason gravity is neither the pure es- sence nor the actual Being of absolute identity but rather follows
* See this in the Journal for Speculative Physics, vol. II, no. 2, comment to ? 54, further comment to ? 93 and the explanation on p. 114.
? Ibid. , pp. 59, 60.
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only from its own nature* or is absolute identity, namely considered as a particular potency. For, incidentally, that which relative to grav- ity appears as existing also belongs in itself to the ground, and, hence, nature in general is everything that lies beyond the absolute Being of absolute identity. ? Incidentally, as far as this precedence is concerned, it is to be thought neither as precedence according to time nor as priority of being. In the circle out of which everything be- comes, it is no contradiction that that through which the One is gen- erated may itself be in turn begotten by it. Here there is no first and last because all things mutually presuppose each other, no thing is another thing and yet no thing is not without another thing. 35 God has in himself an inner ground of his existence that in this respect pre- cedes him in existence; but, precisely in this way, God is again the prius [what is before] of the ground in so far as the ground, even as such, could not exist if God did not exist actu.
A reflection starting out from things leads to this same distinction. First, the concept of immanence is to be set aside completely in so far as thereby a dead containment of things in God is supposed to be ex- pressed. We recognize rather that the concept of | becoming is the only one appropriate to the nature of things. But they cannot become in God, considered in an absolute manner, since they are different from him toto genere or infinitely, to speak more correctly. In order to be divided from God, they must become in a ground different from God. 36 Since, however, nothing indeed can be outside of God, this contradiction can only be resolved by things having their ground in that which in God himself is not He Himself,? that is, in that which is the ground of his existence. If we want to bring this way of being closer to us in human terms, we can say: it is the yearning the eternal One feels to give birth to itself. 37 The yearning is not the One itself but is after all co-eternal with it. The yearning wants to give birth to God, that is, unfathomable unity, but in this respect there is not yet unity in the yearning itself. Hence, it is, considered for itself, also will; but will in which there is no understanding and, for that reason, also not independent and complete will, since the understanding is really the will in will. Nevertheless it is a will38 of the understanding, namely
* Ibid. , p. 41.
? Ibid. , p. 114.
? In the sense that one says: the logic of the enigma [das Wort des Ra? tsels].
yearning and desire for the latter; not a conscious but a divining will [ahnender Wille] whose divining is the understanding. 39 We are speaking of the essence of yearning, considered in and for itself, that likely must be brought into view, although it has long been repressed by the higher things that have arisen out of it, and although we can- not grasp it by the senses but rather only with the mind and [in] thought. After the eternal act of self-revelation, everything in the world is, as we see it now, rule, order and form; but anarchy still lies in the ground, as if it could break through once again, and nowhere does it appear as if order and form were what is original but rather as if initial anarchy had been brought to order. 40 This is the incompre- hensible base of reality in | things, the indivisible remainder, that which with the greatest exertion cannot be resolved in understand- ing but rather remains eternally in the ground. The understanding is born in the genuine sense from that which is without understanding. Without this preceding darkness creatures have no reality; darkness is their necessary inheritance. 41 God alone--as the one who exists-- dwells in pure light since he alone is begotten from himself. The arro- gance of man rises up [stra? ubt sich] against this origin from the ground and even seeks moral reasons against it. Nevertheless we would know of nothing that could drive man more to strive for the light with all of his strength than the consciousness of the deep night from which he has been lifted into existence. The effeminate lamenta- tions that what is without understanding is thus made the root of understanding, the night into the beginning of light, indeed rest in part on a misunderstanding of the matter (since one does not grasp how, from this point of view, the conceptual priority of understanding and essence can nevertheless be maintained), yet do express the true system of today's philosophers who happily want to make fumum ex fulgore [smoke from lightning]42 for which, however, even the most violent Fichtean impetuosity is not sufficient. 43 All birth is birth from darkness into light; the seed kernel must be sunk into the earth and die in darkness so that the more beautiful shape of light may lift and unfold itself in the radiance of the sun. 44 Man is formed in the maternal body; and only from the obscurity of that which is with- out understanding (from feeling, yearning, the sovereign [herrlich] mother of knowledge) grow luminous thoughts. Thus we must ima- gine the original yearning as it directs itself to the understanding, though still not recognizing it, just as we in our yearning seek out
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unknown and nameless good, and as it moves, divining itself, like a wave-wound, whirling sea, akin to Plato's matter, following dark, un- certain law, incapable of constructing for itself anything enduring. 45 But, corresponding to the yearning, which as the still dark ground is the first stirring of divine existence, an inner, reflexive representation is generated in God himself through which, since it can have no other
object but God, God sees himself | in an exact image of himself. This representation is the first in which God, considered as absolute, is re- alized [verwirklicht], although only in himself; this representation is with God in the beginning and is the God who was begotten in God himself. This representation is at the same time the understanding-- the Word--of this yearning* and the eternal spirit which, perceiving the word within itself and at the same time the infinite yearning, and impelled by the love that it itself is, proclaims the word so that the understanding and yearning together now become a freely creating and all-powerful will and build in the initial anarchy of nature as in its own element or instrument. 46 The first effect of the understanding in nature is the division of forces, since only thus can the understanding unfold the unity that is unconsciously but necessarily immanent in nature as in a seed, just as in man the light enters into the dark yearn- ing to create something so that in the chaotic jumble of thoughts, all hanging together, but each hindering the other from emerging, thoughts divide themselves from each other, and now the unity hid- den in the ground and containing all raises itself up; or as in the plant the dark bond of gravity dissolves only in relation to the unfolding and expansion of forces, and as the unity hidden in divided material is developed. Because, namely, this being (of primordial nature) is nothing else than the eternal ground for the existence of God, it must contain within itself, although locked up, the essence of God as a re- splendent glimpse of life in the darkness of the depths. 47 However, yearning aroused by the understanding strives from now on to retain
* This is the only correct dualism, namely that which at the same time per- mits a unity. The above discussion concerned the modified dualism, whereby the evil principle is not coordinated with, but subordinated to, the good principle. It is hardly to be feared that someone will confuse the relationship put forward here with that dualism in which the subordinate is always an essentially evil principle and, precisely for that reason, in re- spect of its origin in God remains completely incomprehensible.
the glimpse of life seized within itself and to close itself up in itself so that a ground may always remain. Since, therefore, the understand- ing, or the light placed in primordial nature, arouses the yearning that is striving back into itself to divide the forces (for the surrender of darkness), while emphasizing precisely in this division the unity closed up within the divided elements--the hidden glimpse of light-- something comprehensible and individuated first emerges in this manner and, indeed, not through external representation but rather | through genuine impression [Ein-Bildung], since that which arises in nature is impressed [hineingebildet] into her or, still more correctly, through awakening, since the understanding brings to the fore the unity or idea hidden in the divided ground. 48 The forces split up (but not fully dispersed) in this division are the material from which the body is subsequently configured; the vital bond which arises in divi- sion--thus from the depths of the natural ground, as the center of forces--however, is the soul. Because the original understanding raises the soul up as something inner [als Inneres] out of a ground that is independent of it, the soul thereby remains independent of the original understanding as a particular and self-sufficient being.
It is easy to see that, in the resistance of the yearning that is neces- sary for any complete birth, the innermost bond of forces loosens it- self only in a gradually occurring unfolding; and at each point of divi- sion of forces a new being emerges from nature whose soul must be that much more complete the more it contains divided what is not di- vided in other things. 49 To show how each succeeding process ap- proaches closer to the essence of nature, until the innermost center appears in the highest division of forces, is the task of a comprehen- sive philosophy of nature. For the current purpose only the following is essential. Each being having emerged in nature according to the manner indicated has a dual principle in itself which, however, is ba- sically but one and the same considered from both possible sides. The first principle is that through which things are separated from God or through which they exist in the mere ground; since, however, an original unity indeed occurs between what is in the ground and what is prefigured in the understanding, and the process of creation involves only an inner transmutation or transfiguration of the initial principle of darkness into the light (because the understanding or the light placed in nature genuinely seeks in the ground only the light that is related to it and turned inward), the--by its nature--dark principle
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is exactly what is transfigured in the light, and both are, though only to a certain point, | one in each natural being. The principle, to the extent that it comes from the ground and is dark, is the self-will of creatures which, however, to the extent that it has not yet been raised to (does not grasp) complete unity with the light (as principle of understanding), is pure craving or desire, that is, blind will. The understanding as universal will stands against this self-will of crea- tures, using and subordinating the latter to itself as a mere instru- ment. But, if through advancing mutation and division of all forces, the deepest and most inner point of initial darkness in a being is fi- nally transfigured wholly into the light, then the will of this same being is indeed, to the extent it is individual, also a truly particular will, yet, in itself or as the centrum of all other particular wills, one with the primal will or the understanding, so that now from both a single whole comes into being. This raising of the deepest centrum into light occurs in none of the creatures visible to us other than man. In man there is the whole power of the dark principle and at the same time the whole strength of the light. In him there is the deepest abyss and the loftiest sky or both centra. The human will is the seed--hidden in eternal yearning--of the God who is present still in the ground only; it is the divine panorama of life, locked up within the depths, which God beheld as he fashioned the will to nature. In him (in man) alone God loved the world, and precisely this likeness of God was possessed by yearning in the centrum as it came into op- position with the light. Because he emerges from the Ground (is creaturely), man has in relation to God a relatively independent prin- ciple in himself; but because precisely this principle--without it ceasing for that reason to be dark in accordance with its ground--is transfigured in light, there arises in him something higher, spirit. For the eternal spirit proclaims unity or the word into nature. The pro- claimed (real) word, however, is only in the unity of light and dark- ness (vowel and consonant). 50 Now both principles are indeed in all things, yet they are without complete consonance [Konsonanz] due to the deficiency of that which has been raised out of the ground. Only in man, therefore, | is the word fully proclaimed which in all other things is held back and incomplete. But spirit, that is, God as existing actu, reveals itself in the proclaimed word. In so far as the soul is now the living identity of both principles, it is spirit; and spirit is in God. Were now the identity of both principles in the spirit of
man exactly as indissoluble as in God, then there would be no dis- tinction, that is, God as spirit would not be revealed. The same unity that is inseverable in God must therefore be severable in man--and this is the possibility of good and evil. 51
We say expressly: the possibility of evil. And we are seeking at the moment to make intelligible only the severability of the principles. The reality of evil is the object of a whole other investigation. The principle raised up from the ground of nature whereby man is separ- ated from God is the selfhood in him which, however, through its unity with the ideal principle, becomes spirit. Selfhood as such is spirit; or man is spirit as a selfish [selbstisch], particular being (separ- ated from God)--precisely this connection constitutes personality. Since selfhood is spirit, however, it is at the same time raised from the creaturely into what is above the creaturely; it is will that beholds it- self in complete freedom, being no longer an instrument of the pro- ductive [schaffenden] universal will in nature, but rather above and outside of all nature. Spirit is above the light as in nature it raises it- self above the unity of the light and the dark principle. Since it is spirit, selfhood is therefore free from both principles. Now selfhood or self-will is, however, only spirit and thus free or above nature by virtue of the fact that it is actually transformed in the primal will (the light) so that it (as self-will) indeed remains in the ground (because there must always be a ground)--just as in a transparent body the matter which has been raised to identity with the light does not for that reason cease being matter (the dark principle)--yet, it does so merely as a carrier and, as it were, receptacle of the higher principle of light. Since, however, selfhood has spirit (because this reigns over light and darkness)--if it is in fact not the spirit | of eternal love-- selfhood can separate itself from the light; or self-will can strive to be as a particular will that which it only is through identity with the uni- versal will; to be that which it only is, in so far as it remains in the cen- trum (just as the calm will in the quiet ground of nature is universal will precisely because it remains in the ground), also on the periph- ery; or as created being (for the will of creatures is admittedly out- side of the ground, but it is then also mere particular will, not free but bound). For this reason there thus emerges in the will of man a separ- ation of selfhood having become animated by spirit (since spirit is above the light) from the light, that is, a dissolution of the principles which are indissoluble in God. If, to the contrary, the self-will of man
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remains as central will in the ground so that the divine relation of the principles persists (as, namely, the will in the centrum of nature never elevates itself over the light but remains under the latter as a base in the ground), and if, instead of the spirit of dissension that wants to sep- arate the particular from the general principle, the spirit of love pre- vails in it, then the will is in divine form [Art] and order. But that pre- cisely this elevation of self-will is evil is clarified by the following. The will that steps out from its being beyond nature [das U? bernatu? rliche], in order as general will to make itself at once particular and creaturely, strives to reverse the relation of the principles, to elevate the ground over the cause, to use the spirit that it obtained only for the sake of the centrum outside the centrum and against creatures; from this re- sults collapse [Zerru? ttung] within the will itself and outside it. The human will is to be regarded as a bond of living forces; now, as long as it remains in unity with the universal will, these same forces exist in divine measure and balance. But no sooner than self-will itself moves from the centrum as its place, so does the bond of forces as well; in its stead rules a mere particular will that can no longer bring the forces to unity among themselves as the original will could and, thus, must strive to put together or form its own peculiar life from the forces that have moved apart from one another, an indignant host of desires and appetites (since each | individual force is also a craving and appe- tite), this being possible in so far as the first bond of forces, the first ground of nature itself, persists even in evil. But since there can in- deed be no true life like that which could exist only in the original re- lation, a life emerges which, though individual, is, however, false, a life of mendacity, a growth of restlessness and decay. The most fitting comparison here is offered by disease which, as the disorder having arisen in nature through the misuse of freedom, is the true counter- part of evil or sin. Universal disease never exists without the hidden forces of the ground having broken out [sich auftun]: it emerges when the irritable principle, which is supposed to rule as the innermost bond of forces in the quiet of the depths, activates [aktuiert] itself; or when aroused Archaeus leaves his peaceful dwelling in the centrum and steps into his surroundings. 52 Just as, by contrast, all original heal- ing consists in the reconstruction of the relation of the periphery to the centrum, and the transition from disease to health can in fact only occur through its opposite, namely through restoration of the separate and individual life into the being's inner glimpse of light, from which
restoration division [Krisis] once again proceeds. Even particular dis- ease emerges only because that which has its freedom or life only so that it may remain in the whole strives to be for itself. As disease is ad- mittedly nothing having inherent being [nichts Wesenhaftes], really only an apparent picture of life and merely a meteoric appearance of it--an oscillation between Being and non-Being--yet announces itself nevertheless as something very real to feeling, so it is with evil.
In more recent times Franz Baader especially has emphasized this concept of evil, the only correct one, according to which evil resides in a positive perversion or reversal of the principles, and has ex- plained this through profound analogies, in particular, that of dis- ease. * | All other explanations of evil leave the understanding and moral consciousness equally unsatisfied. They all rest fundamentally on the annihilation of evil as a positive opposite and on the reduction
* In the treatise, "On the Assertion that There Can Be No Wicked Use of Rea- son," in the Morgenblatt, 1807, No. 197, and in "On | Solids and Liquids," in the Annuals of Medicine as Science, vol. III, No. 2. Let the relevant comment at the end of this latter treatise, at p. 203, be set out here for comparison and further explanation: "Here common fire (as wild, consuming, painful heat) provides instructive clarification [Aufschluss] as opposed to the so- called organic, beneficial heat of life; since in the latter fire and water come together in a (growing) ground or conjunction while in the former they dis- perse in discord. Now, neither fire nor water existed as such, however, i. e. as separate spheres in the organic process, rather the former existed as centrum (mysterium), the latter openly or as periphery in it, and precisely the unlocking, raising, igniting of the first together with the closing up of the second gave disease and death. Thus, in general, I-hood, individuality is now admittedly the basis, foundation or natural centrum of any creature's life; but as soon as it ceases to be the serving centrum and enters as ruling into the periphery, it burns in I-hood as the selfish and egotistical rage (of enflamed I-hood) of Tantalus. From ? now comes ? --that is: in one single place of the planetary system this dark centrum of nature is closed up, latent, and for that very reason serves as a carrier of light for the entry of the higher system (illumination or revelation of the ideal). For that very reason this place is thus the open point (sun--heart--eye) in the system and, if the dark centrum of nature were also to raise or open it- self there, then the light point would eo ipso close itself up, light would be- come darkness in the system or the sun would be extinguished! "
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of evil to the so-called malum metaphysicum [metaphysical evil] or the negating concept of the imperfection of creatures. It was impos- sible, says Leibniz, that God conferred on man all perfections without making man himself into God. The same is valid for created beings in general; for that reason various degrees of perfection and all manner of limitation pertaining to them had to occur. If one asks from whence comes evil, the answer is: from the ideal nature of creatures to the ex- tent that it depends on the eternal truths that are contained in the di- vine understanding, but not on the will of God. The region of the di- vine truths is the ideal cause of good and evil and must be posited in place of the | matter of the ancients. * Yet, there are, he says in an- other spot, two principles, both however in God; these are the under- standing and will. The understanding yields the principle of evil, al- though it does not thereby become evil itself, for it represents natures as they are in accordance with the eternal truths: it contains in itself the ground that permits evil, but the will alone is directed to- ward the good. ? God did not bring about this sole possibility since the understanding cannot be its own cause. ? ,53 If this differentiation of the understanding and will as two principles in God, whereby the first possibility of evil is made independent of the divine will, accords with the richness of this man's way of thinking, and if even the idea of understanding (of divine wisdom) as something in which God is pas- sive rather than active alludes to something more profound, evil nonetheless--as can be derived from any purely ideal ground-- amounts once again to something merely passive, to limitation, lack, deprivation, concepts that are in complete conflict with the actual na- ture of evil. For the simple reflection that only man, the most com- plete of all visible creatures, is capable of evil, shows already that the ground of evil could not in any way lie in lack or deprivation. The devil, according to the Christian point of view, was not the most lim- ited creature, but rather the least limited one. ? ,54 Imperfection in the general | metaphysical sense is not the common character of evil, since evil often shows itself united with an excellence of individual
* Tentam. Theod. Opp. T. I, p. 136.
? Ibid. , p. 240.
? Ibid. , p. 387.
? In this connection it is remarkable that it was not first the scholastics but
already several among the earlier fathers of the church, most notably, St.
forces, which far more rarely accompanies the good. The ground of evil must lie, therefore, not only in something generally positive but rather in that which is most positive in what nature contains, as is ac- tually the case in our view, since it lies in the revealed centrum or pri- mal will of the first ground. Leibniz tries in every way to make com- prehensible how evil could arise from natural deficiency. The will, he says, strives for the good in general and must demand perfection whose highest measure is God; if the will remains entangled in sen- sual lust to the detriment of higher goods, precisely this deficiency of further striving is the privation in which evil consists. Otherwise, he thinks, evil requires a special principle as little as do cold or dark- ness. What is affirmative in evil comes to it only as accompaniment like force and causal efficacy come to cold: freezing water bursts the strongest containing vessel, and yet cold really consists in the reduc- tion of movement. * Because, however, deprivation in itself is abso- lutely nothing and, in order to be noticeable, needs something posi- tive in which it appears, the difficulty arises as to how to explain the positive that nevertheless must be assumed to exist in evil. Since Leibniz can derive the latter only from God, he sees himself com- pelled to make God the cause of the material aspect of sin and to as- cribe only the formal aspect of sin to the original limitation of crea- tures. He seeks to explain this relation through the concept of the natural inertia of matter discovered by Kepler. He says that this is the complete picture of an original limitation in creatures (which pre- cedes all action). If two different objects of unequal mass are set in | motion at unequal speeds by the same impetus, the ground for slow- ness of movement in one lies not in the impetus but in the tendency to inertia innate to, and characteristic of, matter, that is, in the inner
Augustine, who posited evil as mere privation. Especially noteworthy is the passage in contr. Jul. L. I, C. III:
Quaerunt ex nobis, unde sit malum? Respondemus ex bono, sed non summo, ex bonis igitur orta sunt mala. Mala enim omnia participant ex bono, merum enim et ex omni parte tali dari repugnat. --Haud vero difficulter omnia expe- diet, qui conceptum mali semel recte formaverit, eumque semper defectum ali- quem involvere attenderit, perfectionem autem omnimodum incommunicabili- ter possidere Deum; neque magis possibile | esse, creaturam illimitatam adeoque independentem creari, quam creari alium Deum.
* Tentam. Theod. P. 242.
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limitation or imperfection of matter. *,55 But, in this regard, it is to be noted that inertia itself cannot be thought of as a mere deprivation, but actually as something positive, namely as expression of the inter- nal selfhood of the body, the force whereby it seeks to assert its inde- pendence. We do not deny that metaphysical finitude can be made comprehensible in this way, but we deny that finitude for itself is evil.