On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason, and On the Will in Nature · Arthur Schopenhauer
CHAPTER V.
ON THE SECOND CLASS OF OBJECTS FOR THE SUBJECT AND THE FORM OF THE PRINCIPLE OF SUFFICIENT REASON WHICH PREDOMINATES IN IT. § 26. _Explanation of this Class of Objects._ The only essential distinction between the human race and animals, which from time immemorial has been attributed to a special cognitive faculty peculiar to mankind, called _Reason_, is based upon the fact that man owns a class of representations which is not shared by any animal. These are _conceptions_, therefore _abstract_, as opposed to _intuitive_, representations, from which they are nevertheless derived. The immediate consequence of this is, that animals can neither speak nor laugh; but indirectly all those various, important characteristics which distinguish human from animal life are its consequence. For, through the supervention of abstract representation, motivation has now changed its character. Although human actions result with a necessity no less rigorous than that which rules the actions of animals, yet through this new kind of motivation--so far as here it consists in _thoughts_ which render elective decision (_i.e._ a conscious conflict of motives) possible--action with a purpose, with reflection, according to plans and principles, in concert with others, &c. &c., now takes the place of mere impulse given by present, perceptible objects; but by this it gives rise to all that renders human life so rich, so artificial, and so terrible, that man, in this Western Hemisphere, where his skin has become bleached, and where the primitive, true, profound religions of his first home could not follow him, now no longer recognises animals as his brethren, and falsely believes them to differ fundamentally from him, seeking to confirm this illusion by calling them brutes, giving degrading names to the vital functions which they have in common with him, and proclaiming them outlaws; and thus he hardens his heart against that identity of being between them and himself, which is nevertheless constantly obtruding itself upon him.
Still, as we have said, the whole difference lies in this--that, besides the intuitive representations examined in the last chapter, which are shared by animals, other, abstract representations derived from these intuitive ones, are lodged in the human brain, which is chiefly on this account so much larger than that of animals. Representations of this sort have been called _conceptions_,[115] because each comprehends innumerable individual things in, or rather under, itself, and thus forms a complex.[116] We may also define them as _representations drawn from representations_. For, in forming them, the faculty of abstraction decomposes the complete, intuitive representations described in our last chapter into their component parts, in order to think each of these parts separately as the different qualities of, or relations between, things. By this process, however, the representations necessarily forfeit their perceptibility; just as water, when decomposed, ceases to be fluid and visible. For although each quality thus isolated (abstracted) can quite well be _thought_ by itself, it does not at all follow that it can be _perceived_ by itself. We form conceptions by dropping a good deal of what is given us in perception, in order to be able to think the rest by itself. To conceive therefore, is to think less than we perceive.
If, after considering divers objects of perception, we drop something different belonging to each, yet retain what is the same in all, the result will be the _genus_ of that species. The generic conception is accordingly always the conception of every species comprised under it, after deducting all that does not belong to _every_ species. Now, as every possible conception may be thought as a _genus_, a conception is always something general, and as such, not perceptible. Every conception has on this account also its _sphere_, as the sum-total[117] of what may be thought under it. The higher we ascend in abstract thought, the more we deduct, the less therefore remains to be thought. The highest, _i.e._ the most general conceptions, are the emptiest and poorest, and at last become mere husks, such as, for instance, being, essence, thing, becoming, &c. &c.--Of what avail, by the way, can philosophical systems be, which are only spun out of conceptions of this sort and have for their substance mere flimsy husks of thoughts like these? They must of necessity be exceedingly empty, poor, and therefore also dreadfully tiresome. [115] _Begriff_, _comprehensive_ thought, derived from _begreifen_, to comprehend. [Tr.] [116] _Inbegriff_, comprehensive totality. [Tr.] [117] _Inbegriff._
Now as representations, thus sublimated and analysed to form abstract conceptions, have, as we have said, forfeited all perceptibility, they would entirely escape our consciousness, and be of no avail to it for the thinking processes to which they are destined, were they not fixed and retained in our senses by arbitrary signs. These signs are words. In as far as they constitute the contents of dictionaries and therefore of language, words always designate _general_ representations, conceptions, never perceptible objects; whereas a lexicon which enumerates individual things, only contains proper names, not words, and is either a geographical or historical dictionary: that is to say, it enumerates what is separated either by Time or by Space; for, as _my_ readers know, Time and Space are the _principium individuationis_. It is only because animals are limited to intuitive representations and incapable of any abstraction--incapable therefore of forming conceptions--that they are without language, even when they are able to articulate words; whereas they understand proper names. That it is this same defect which excludes them from laughter, I have shown in my theory of the ridiculous.[118] [118] See "Die Welt a. W. u. V." vol. i. sect. 13, and vol. ii. ch. 8.
On analyzing a long, continuous speech made by a man of no education, we find in it an abundance of logical forms, clauses, turns of phrase, distinctions, and subtleties of all sorts, correctly expressed by means of grammatical forms with their inflections and constructions, and even with a frequent use of the _sermo obliquus_, of the different moods, &c. &c., all in conformity with rule, which astonishes us, and in which we are forced to recognise an extensive and perfectly coherent knowledge. Still this knowledge has been acquired on the basis of the perceptible world, the reduction of whose whole essence to abstract conceptions is the fundamental business of the Reason, and can only take place by means of language. In learning the use of language therefore, the whole mechanism of Reason--that is, all that is essential in Logic--is brought to our consciousness. Now this can evidently not take place without considerable mental effort and fixed attention, for which the desire to learn gives children the requisite strength. So long as that desire has before it what is really available and necessary, it is vigorous, and it only appears weak when we try to force upon children that which is not suited to their comprehension. Thus even a coarsely educated child, in learning all the turns and subtleties of language, as well through its own conversation as that of others, accomplishes the development of its Reason, and acquires that really concrete Logic, which consists less in logical rules than in the proper application of them; just as the rules of harmony are learnt by persons of musical talent simply by playing the piano, without reading music or studying thorough-bass.--The deaf and dumb alone are excluded from the above-mentioned logical training through the acquirement of speech; therefore they are almost as unreasonable as animals, when they have not been taught to read by the very artificial means specially adapted for their requirements, which takes the place of the natural schooling of Reason.
This is also what we call _reflection_: a word which, by a figure of speech borrowed from Optics, expresses at once the derivative and the secondary character of this kind of knowledge. Now it is this thinking, this reflection, which gives man that _deliberation_, which is wanting in animals. For, by enabling him to think many things under one conception, but always only the essential part in each of them, it allows him to drop at his pleasure every kind of distinction, consequently even those of Time and of Space, and thus he acquires the power of embracing in thought, not only the past and the future, but also what is absent; while animals are in every respect strictly bound to the present. This deliberative faculty again is really the root of all those theoretical and practical achievements which give man so great a superiority over animals; first and foremost, of his care for the future while taking the past into consideration; then of his premeditated, systematic, methodical procedure in all undertakings, and therefore of the co-operation of many persons towards a common end, and, by this, of law, order, the State, &c. &c.--But it is especially in Science that the use of conceptions is important; for they are, properly speaking, its materials. The aims of all the sciences may, indeed, in the last resort, be reduced to knowledge of the particular through the general; now this is only possible by means of the _dictum de omni et nullo_, and this, again, is only possible through the existence of conceptions. Aristotle therefore says: ἄνευ μὲν γὰρ τῶν καθόλου οὐκ ἔστιν ἐπιστήμην λαβεῖν[119] (_absque universalibus enim non datur scientia_). Conceptions are precisely those _universalia_, whose mode of existence formed the argument of the long controversy between the Realists and Nominalists in the Middle Ages.
Aristotle, however, went too far in thinking that no reflection is possible without pictures of the imagination. Nevertheless, what he says on this point,[122] οὐδέποτε νοεῖ ἄνευ φαντάσματος ἡ ψυχή (_anima sine phantasmate nunquam intelligit_),[123] and ὅταν θεωρῇ, ἀνάγκη ἅμα φάντασμά τι θεωρεῖν (_qui contemplatur, necesse est, una cum phantasmate contempletur_),[124] and again, νοεῖν οὐκ ἔστι ἄνευ φαντάσματος (_fieri non potest, ut sine phantasmate quidquam intelligatur_),[125]--made a strong impression upon the thinkers of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, who therefore frequently and emphatically repeat what he says. Pico della Mirandola,[126] for instance, says: _Necesse est, eum, qui ratiocinatur et intelligit, phantasmata speculari_;--Melanchthon[127] says: _Oportet intelligentem phantasmata speculari_;--and Jord. Brunus[128] says, _dicit Aristoteles: oportet scire volentem, phantasmata speculari_. Pomponatius[129] expresses himself in the same sense.--On the whole, all that can be affirmed is, that every true and primary notion, every genuine philosophic theorem even, must have some sort of intuitive view for its innermost kernel or root. This, though something momentary[130] and single, subsequently imparts life and spirit to the whole analysis, however exhaustive it may be,--just as one drop of the right reagent suffices to tinge a whole solution with the colour of the precipitate which it causes. When an analysis has a kernel of this sort, it is like a bank note issued by a firm which has ready money wherewith to back it; whereas every other analysis proceeding from mere combinations of abstract conceptions, resembles a bank note which is issued by a firm which has nothing but other paper obligations to back it with. All mere rational talk thus renders the result of given conceptions clearer, but does not, strictly speaking, bring anything new to light. It might therefore be left to each individual to do himself, instead of filling whole volumes every day.
Judgments, whose truth becomes evident through the four well-known laws of thinking, must likewise be regarded as based upon other judgments; for these four laws are themselves precisely judgments, from which follows the truth of those other judgments. For instance, the judgment: "A triangle is a space enclosed within three lines," has for its last reason the Principle of Identity, that is to say, the thought expressed by that principle. The judgment, "No body is without extension," has for its last reason the Principle of Contradiction. This again, "Every judgment is either true or untrue," has for its last reason the Principle of the Excluded Middle; and finally, "No one can admit anything to be true without knowing why," has for its last reason the Principle of Sufficient Reason of Knowing. In the general employment of our Reason, we do not, it is true, before admitting them to be true, reduce judgments which follow from the four laws of thinking to their last reasons, as premisses; for most men are even ignorant of the very existence of these abstract laws. The dependence of such judgments upon them, as their premisses, is however no more diminished by this, than the dependence of the first judgment upon the second, as its premiss, is diminished by the fact, that it is not at all necessary for the principle, "all bodies incline towards the centre of the earth," to be present in the consciousness of any one who says, "this body will fall if its support is removed." That in Logic, therefore, _intrinsic truth_ should hitherto have been attributed to all judgments founded exclusively on the four laws of thinking: that is to say, that these judgments should have been pronounced _directly true_, and that this _intrinsic logical truth_ should have been distinguished from _extrinsic logical truth_, as attributed to all judgments which have another judgment for their reason, I cannot approve. Every truth is the reference of a judgment to something _outside_ of it, and the term _intrinsic truth_ is a contradiction.
It is by means of a kind of reflection which I am inclined to call Reason's self-examination, that we know that these judgments express the conditions of all thinking, and therefore have these conditions for their reason. For, by the fruitlessness of its endeavours to think in opposition to these laws, our Reason acknowledges them to be the conditions of all possible thinking: we then find out, that it is just as impossible to think in opposition to them, as it is to move the members of our body in a contrary direction to their joints. If it were possible for the subject to know itself, these laws would be known to us _immediately_, and we should not need to try experiments with them on objects, _i.e._ representations. In this respect it is just the same with the reasons of judgments which have transcendental truth; for they do not either come into our consciousness immediately, but only in _concreto_, by means of objects, _i.e._ of representations.
In endeavouring, for instance, to conceive a change without a preceding cause, or a passing into or out of being of Matter, we become aware that it is impossible; moreover we recognise this impossibility to be an objective one, although its root lies in our intellect: for we could not otherwise bring it to consciousness in a subjective way. There is, on the whole, a strong likeness and connection between transcendental and metalogical truths, which shows that they spring from a common root. In this chapter we see the Principle of Sufficient Reason chiefly as metalogical truth, whereas in the last it appeared as transcendental truth and in the next one it will again be seen as transcendental truth under another form. In the present treatise I am taking special pains, precisely on this account, to establish the Principle of Sufficient Reason as a judgment having a fourfold reason; by which I do not mean four different reasons leading contingently to the same judgment, but one reason presenting itself under a fourfold aspect: and this is what I call its Fourfold Root. The other three metalogical truths so strongly resemble one another, that in considering them one is almost necessarily induced to search for their common expression, as I have done in the Ninth Chapter of the Second Volume of my chief work. On the other hand, they differ considerably from the Principle of Sufficient Reason. If we were to seek an analogue for the three other metalogical truths among transcendental truths, the one I should choose would be this: Substance, I mean Matter, is permanent.
Our professional philosophers could not, however, take this into account; their policy required the sacrifice, and in such cases the cry is: "Move on, truth; for we have higher, well-defined aims in view! Make way for us, truth, _in majorem Dei gloriam_, as thou hast long ago learnt to do! Is it thou who givest fees and pensions? Move on, truth, move on; betake thyself to merit and crouch in the corner!" The fact was, they wanted Reason's place and name for a faculty of their own creation and fabrication, or to speak more correctly and honestly, for a completely fictitious faculty, destined to help them out of the straits to which Kant had reduced them; a faculty for direct, metaphysical knowledge: that is to say, one which transcends all possible experience, is able to grasp the world of things in themselves and their relations, and is therefore, before all, consciousness of God (_Gottesbewusstsein_): that is, it knows God the Lord immediately, construes _à priori_ the way in which he has created the Universe, or, should this sound too trivial, the way in which he has produced it out of himself, or to a certain degree generated it by some more or less necessary vital process, or again--as the most convenient proceeding, however comical it may appear--simply "dismissed" it, according to the custom of sovereigns at the end of an audience, and left it to get upon its legs by itself and walk away wherever it liked. Nothing less than the impudence of a scribbler of nonsense like Hegel, could, it is true, be found to venture upon this last step.
Yet it is tom-foolery like this which, largely amplified, has filled hundreds of volumes for the last fifty years under the name of cognitions of Reason (_Vernunfterkenntnisse_), and forms the argument of so many works called philosophical by their authors, and scientific by others--one would think ironically--this expression being even repeated to satiety. _Reason_, to which all this wisdom is falsely and audaciously imputed, is pronounced to be a "supersensuous faculty," or a faculty "for ideas;" in short, an oracular power lying within us, designed directly for Metaphysics. During the last half-century, however, there has been considerable discrepancy of opinion among the adepts as to the way in which all these supersensuous wonders are perceived. According to the most audacious, Reason has a direct intuition of the Absolute, or even _ad libitum_ of the Infinite and of its evolutions towards the Finite. Others, somewhat less bold, opine that its mode of receiving this information partakes rather of audition than of vision; since it does not exactly see, but merely _hears_ (_vernimmt_), what is going on in "cloud-cuckoo-land" (νεφελοκοκκυγία), and then honestly transmits what it has thus received to the Understanding, to be worked up into text-books.
According to a pun of Jacobi's, even the German name for Reason, "_Vernunft_," is derived from this pretended "_Vernehmen_;" whereas it evidently comes from that "_Vernehmen_" which is conveyed by language and conditioned by Reason, and by which the distinct perception of words and their meaning is designated, as opposed to mere sensuous hearing which animals have also. This miserable _jeu de mots_ nevertheless continues, after half a century, to find favour; it passes for a serious thought, nay even for a proof, and has been repeated over and over again. The most modest among the adepts again assert, that Reason neither sees nor hears, therefore it receives neither a vision nor a report of all these wonders, and has a mere vague _Ahndung_, or misgiving of them; but then they drop the _d_, by which the word (_Ahnung_) acquires a peculiar touch of silliness, which, backed up as it is by the sheepish look of the apostle for the time being of this wisdom, cannot fail to gain it entrance. My readers know that I only admit the word _idea_ in its primitive, that is Platonic, sense, and that I have treated this point at length and exhaustively in the Third Book of my chief work. The French and English, on the other hand, certainly attach a very commonplace, but quite clear and definite meaning to the word _idée_, or _idea_; whereas the Germans lose their heads as soon as they hear the word _Ideen_;[136] all presence of mind abandons them, and they feel as if they were about to ascend in a balloon. Here therefore was a field of action for our adepts in intellectual intuition; so the most impudent of them, the notorious _charlatan_ Hegel, without more ado, called his theory of the universe and of all things "_Die Idee_," and in this of course all thought that they had something to lay hold of.
Still, if we inquire into the nature of these _ideas_ for which Reason is pronounced to be the faculty, without letting ourselves be put out of countenance, the explanation usually given is an empty, high-flown, confused verbiage, in set periods of such length, that if the reader does not fall asleep before he has half read it, he will find himself bewildered rather than enlightened at the end; nay, he may even have a suspicion that these ideas are very like chimæras. Meanwhile, should anyone show a desire to know more about this sort of ideas, he will have all kinds of things served up to him. Now it will be the chief subjects of the theses of Scholasticism--I allude here to the representations of God, of an immortal Soul, of a real, objectively existent World and its laws--which Kant himself has unfortunately called Ideas of Reason, erroneously and unjustifiably, as I have shown in my Critique of his philosophy, yet merely with a view to proving the utter impossibility of demonstrating them and their want of all theoretical authority.
Then again it will be, as a variation, only God, Freedom, and Immortality; at other times it will be the Absolute, whose acquaintance we have already made in § 20, as the Cosmological Proof, forced to travel incognito; or the Infinite as opposed to the Finite; for, on the whole, the German reader is disposed to content himself with such empty talk as this, without perceiving that the only clear thought he can get out of it is, 'that which has an end' and 'that which has none.' 'The Good, the True, and the Beautiful,' moreover, stand high in favour with the sentimental and tender-hearted as pretended _ideas_, though they are really only three very wide and abstract conceptions, because they are extracted from a multitude of things and relations; wherefore, like many other such _abstracta_, they are exceedingly empty. As regards their contents, I have shown above (§ 29) that Truth is a quality belonging exclusively to judgments: that is, a logical quality; and as to the other two _abstracta_, I refer my readers partly to § 65 of the first volume, partly to the entire Third Book of my chief work. If, nevertheless, a very solemn and mysterious air is assumed and the eyebrows are raised up to the wig whenever these three meagre _abstracta_ are mentioned, young people may easily be induced to believe that something peculiar and inexpressible lies behind them, which entitles them to be called _ideas_, and harnessed to the triumphal car of this would-be metaphysical Reason.
Thus all that is _material_ in our knowledge: that is to say, all that cannot be reduced to subjective _form_, to individual mode of activity, to functions of our intellect,--its whole _material_ therefore,--comes from outside; that is, in the last resort, from the objective perception of the corporeal world, which has its origin in sensation. Now it is this intuitive and, so far as material content is concerned, empirical knowledge, which _Reason_--_real_ Reason--works up into conceptions, which it fixes sensuously by means of words; these conceptions then supply the materials for its endless combinations through judgments and conclusions, which constitute the weft of our thought-world. _Reason_ therefore has absolutely no _material_, but merely a _formal_, content, and this is the object-matter of Logic, which consequently contains only forms and rules for thinking operations. In reflecting, Reason is absolutely forced to take its material contents from outside, _i.e._, from the intuitive representations which the Understanding has created. Its functions are exercised on them, first of all, in forming _conceptions_, by dropping some of the various qualities of things while retaining others, which are then connected together to a conception. Representations, however, forfeit their capacity for being intuitively perceived by this process, while they become easier to deal with, as has already been shown. It is therefore in this, and in this alone, that the efficiency of Reason consists; whereas it can never supply _material content from its own resources_.--It has nothing but forms: its nature is feminine; it only conceives, but does not generate. It is not by mere chance that the Reason is feminine in all Latin, as well as Teutonic, languages; whereas the Understanding is invariably masculine.
Ideas discussed in this chapter
Text from Project Gutenberg, public domain in the United States.