The Journal of Speculative Philosophy

../Volume 1

THE JOURNAL

OF

SPECULATIVE PHILOSOPHY.

VOL. I.

EDITED BY WM. T. HARRIS.

ST. LOUIS, MO.: GEORGE KNAPP & CO., PRINTERS AND BINDERS. 1867.

Number 1

Number 2

Page 65

Number 3

Number 4

Page 193

INTRODUCTION TO FICHTE’S SCIENCE OF KNOWLEDGE.

TRANSLATED BY A. E. KROEGER.

[Note.—In presenting this “Introduction” to the readers of the Journal of Speculative Philosophy, we believe we afford them the easiest means of gaining an insight into Fichte’s great work on the Science of Knowledge. The present introduction was written by Fichte in 1797, three years after the first publication of his full system. It is certainly written in a remarkably clear and vigorous style, so as to be likely to arrest the attention even of those who have but little acquaintance with the rudiments of the Science of Philosophy. This led us to give it the preference over other essays, also written by Fichte, as Introductions to his Science of Knowledge. A translation of the Science of Knowledge, by Mr. Kroeger is at present in course of publication in New York. This article is, moreover, interesting as being a more complete unfolding of the doctrine of Plato upon Method, heretofore announced.—Ed.]

PRELIMINARY REMARKS.

De re, quae agitur, petimus, ut homines, eam non opinionem, sed opus esse, cogitent ac pro certo habeant, non sectae nos alicujus, aut placiti, sed ultilitatis et amplitudinis humanae fundamenta moliri. Deinde ut, suis commodis aequi, in commune consulant, et ipsi in partem veniant.—Baco de Verulamio.

The author of the Science of Knowledge was soon convinced, through a slight acquaintance with the philosophical literature since the appearance of Kant’s Critiques, that the object of this great man—to effect a total reform in the study of philosophy, and hence of all science—had resulted in a failure, since not one of his numerous successors appeared to understand what he had really spoken of. The author believed that he had understood the latter; he resolved to devote his life to a representation—totally independent from Kant’s—of that great discovery, and he will not give up this resolve. Whether he will succeed better in making himself understood to his age, time alone can show. At all events, he knows that nothing true and useful, which has once been given to mankind, is lost, though only remote posterity should learn how to use it.

Determined by my academical vocation, I wrote, in the first instance, for my hearers, with whom it was in my power to explain myself in words until I was understood.

This is not the place to testify how much cause I have to be satisfied with my efforts, and to entertain, of some of my students, the best hopes for science. That book of mine has also become known elsewhere, and there are various opinions afloat concerning it amongst the learned. A judgment, which even pretended to bring forth arguments, I have neither read nor heard, except from my students, but I have both heard and read a vast amount of derision, denunciation, and the general assurance that everybody is heartily opposed to this doctrine, and the confession that no one can understand it. As far as the latter is concerned, I will cheerfully assume all the blame, until others shall represent it so as to make it comprehensible, when students will doubtless discover that my representation was not so very bad after all; or I will assume it altogether and unconditionally, if the reader thereby should be encouraged to study the present representation, in which I shall endeavor to be as clear as possible. I shall continue these representations so long as I am convinced that I do not write altogether in vain. But I write in vain when nobody examines my argument.

I still owe my readers the following explanations: I have always said, and say again, that my system is the same as Kant’s. That is to say, it contains the same view of the subject, but is totally independent of Kant’s mode of representation. I have said this, not to cover myself by a great authority, or to support my doctrine except by itself, but in order to say the truth and to be just.

Perhaps it may be proven after twenty years. Kant is as yet a sealed book, and what he has been understood to teach, is exactly what he intended to eradicate.

My writings are neither to explain Kant, nor to be explained by his; they must stand by themselves, and Kant must not be counted in the game at all. My object is—let me say it frankly—not to correct or amplify such philosophical reflections as may be current, be they called anti-Kant or Kant, but to totally eradicate them, and to effect a complete revolution in the mode of thinking regarding these subjects, so that hereafter the Object will be posited and determined by Knowledge (Reason), and not vice versa; and this seriously, not merely in words.

Let no one object: “If this system is true, certain axioms cannot be upheld,” for I do not intend that anything should be upheld which this system refutes.

Again: “I do not understand this book,” is to me a very uninteresting and insignificant confession. No one can and shall understand my writings, without having studied them; for they do not contain a lesson heretofore taught, but something—since Kant has not been understood—altogether new to the age.

Censure without argument tells me simply that my doctrine does not please; and this confession is again very unimportant; for the question is not at all, whether it pleases you or not, but whether it has been proven. In the present sketch I write only for those, in whom there still dwells an inner sense of love for truth; who still value science and conviction, and who are impelled by a lively zeal to seek truth. With those, who, by long spiritual slavery, have lost with the faith in their own conviction their faith in the conviction of others; who consider it folly if anybody attempts to seek truth for himself; who see nothing in science but a comfortable mode of subsistence; who are horrified at every proposition to enlarge its boundaries as involving a new labor, and who consider no means disgraceful by which they can hope to suppress him who makes such a proposition,—with those I have nothing to do.

I should be sorry if they understood me. Hitherto this wish of mine has been realized; and I hope, even now, that these present lines will so confuse them that they can perceive nothing more in them than mere words, while that which represents their mind is torn hither and thither by their ill-concealed rage.

INTRODUCTION.

I. Attend to thyself; turn thine eye away from all that surrounds thee and into thine own inner self! Such is the first task imposed upon the student by Philosophy. We speak of nothing that is without thee, but merely of thyself.

The slightest self-observation must show every one a remarkable difference between the various immediate conditions of his consciousness, which we may also call representations. For some of them appear altogether dependent upon our freedom, and we cannot possibly believe that there is without us anything corresponding to them. Our imagination, our will, appears to us as free. Others, however, we refer to a Truth as their model, which is held to be firmly fixed, independent of us; and in determining such representations, we find ourselves conditioned by the necessity of their harmony with this Truth. In the knowledge of them we do not consider ourselves free, as far as their contents are concerned. In short: while some of our representations are accompanied by the feeling of freedom, others are accompanied by the feeling of necessity.

Reasonably the question cannot arise—why are the representations dependent upon our freedom determined in precisely this manner, and not otherwise? For in supposing them to be dependent upon our freedom, all application of the conception of a ground is rejected; they are thus, because I so fashioned them, and if I had fashioned them differently, they would be otherwise.

But it is certainly a question worthy of reflection—what is the ground of the system of those representations which are accompanied by the feeling of necessity and of that feeling of necessity itself? To answer this question is the object of philosophy; and, in my opinion, nothing is philosophy but the Science which solves this problem. The system of those representations, which are accompanied by the feeling of necessity, is also called Experience—internal as well as external experience. Philosophy, therefore, to say the same thing in other words, has to find the ground of all Experience.

Only three objections can be raised against this. Somebody might deny that representations, accompanied by the feeling of necessity, and referred to a Truth determined without any action of ours, do ever occur in our consciousness. Such a person would either deny his own knowledge, or be altogether differently constructed from other men; in which latter case his denial would be of no concern to us. Or somebody might say: the question is completely unanswerable, we are in irremovable ignorance concerning it, and must remain so. To enter into argument with such a person is altogether superfluous. The best reply he can receive is an actual answer to the question, and then all he can do is to examine our answer, and tell us why and in what matters it does not appear satisfactory to him. Finally, somebody might quarrel about the designation, and assert: “Philosophy is something else than what you have stated above, or at least something else besides.” It might be easily shown to such a one, that scholars have at all times designated exactly what we have just stated to be Philosophy, and that whatever else he might assert to be Philosophy, has already another name, and that if this word signifies anything at all, it must mean exactly this Science. But as we are not inclined to enter upon any dispute about words, we, for our part, have already given up the name of Philosophy, and have called the Science which has the solution of this problem for its object, the Science of Knowledge.

II. Only when speaking of something, which we consider accidental, i.e. which we suppose might also have been otherwise, though it was not determined by freedom, can we ask for its ground; and by this very asking for its ground does it become accidental to the questioner. To find the ground of anything accidental means, to find something else, from the determined ness of which it can be seen why the accidental, amongst the various conditions it might have assumed, assumed precisely the one it did. The ground lies—by the very thinking of a ground—beyond its Grounded, and both are, in so far as they are Ground and Grounded, opposed to each other, related to each other, and thus the latter is explained from the former.

Now Philosophy is to discover the ground of all experience; hence its object lies necessarily beyond all Experience. This sentence applies to all Philosophy, and has been so applied always heretofore, if we except these latter days of Kant’s misconstruers and their facts of consciousness, i.e. of inner experience.

No objection can be raised to this paragraph; for the premise of our conclusion is a mere analysis of the above-stated conception of Philosophy, and from the premise the conclusion is drawn. If somebody should wish to remind us that the conception of a ground must be differently explained, we can, to be sure, not prevent him from forming another conception of it, if he so chooses; but we declare, on the strength of our good right, that we, in the above description of Philosophy, wish to have nothing else understood by that word. Hence, if it is not to be so understood, the possibility of Philosophy, as we have described it, must be altogether denied, and such a denial we have replied to in our first section.

III. The finite intelligence has nothing beyond experience; experience contains the whole substance of its thinking. The philosopher stands necessarily under the same conditions, and hence it seems impossible that he can elevate himself beyond experience.

But he can abstract; i.e. he can separate by the freedom of thinking what in experience is united. In Experience, the Thing—that which is to be determined in itself independent of our freedom, and in accordance with which our knowledge is to shape itself—and the Intelligence—which is to obtain a knowledge of it—are inseparably united. The philosopher may abstract from both, and if he does, he has abstracted from Experience, and elevated himself above it. If he abstracts from the first, he retains an intelligence in itself, i.e. abstracted from its relation to experience; if he abstract from the latter, he retains the Thing in itself, i.e. abstracted from the fact that it occurs in experience; and thus retains the Intelligence in itself, or the “Thing in itself,” as the explanatory ground of Experience. The former mode of proceeding is called Idealism, the latter Dogmatism.

Only these two philosophical systems—and of that these remarks should convince everybody—are possible. According to the first system the representations, which are accompanied by the feeling of necessity, are productions of the Intelligence, which must be presupposed in their explanation; according to the latter system they are the productions of a thing in itself which must be presupposed to explain them. If anybody desired to deny this, he would have to prove that there is still another way to go beyond experience than the one by means of abstraction, or that the consciousness of experience contains more than the two components just mentioned.

Now in regard to the first, it will appear below, it is true, that what we have here called Intelligence does, indeed, occur in consciousness under another name, and hence is not altogether produced by abstraction; but it will at the same time be shown that the consciousness of it is conditioned by an abstraction, which, however, occurs naturally to mankind.

We do not at all deny that it is possible to compose a whole system from fragments of these incongruous systems, and that this illogical labor has often been undertaken; but we do deny that more than these two systems are possible in a logical course of proceeding.

IV. Between the object—(we shall call the explanatory ground of experience, which a philosophy asserts, the object of that philosophy, since it appears to be only through and for such philosophy)—between the object of Idealism and that of Dogmatism there is a remarkable distinction in regard to their relation to consciousness generally. All whereof I am conscious is called object of consciousness. There are three ways in which the object I can be related to consciousness. Either it appears to have been produced by the representation, or as existing without any action of ours; and in the latter case, as either also determined in regard to its qualitativeness, or as existing merely in regard to its existence, while determinable in regard to its qualitativeness by the free intelligence.

The first relation applies merely to an imaginary object; the second merely to an object of Experience; the third applies only to an object, which we shall at once proceed to describe.

I can determine myself by freedom to think, for instance, the Thing in itself of the Dogmatists. Now if I am to abstract from the thought and look simply upon myself, I myself become the object of a particular representation. That I appear to myself as determined in precisely this manner, and none other, e.g. as thinking, and as thinking of all possible thoughts—precisely this Thing in itself, is to depend exclusively upon my own freedom of self-determination; I have made myself such a particular object out of my own free will. I have not made myself; on the contrary, I am forced to think myself in advance as determinable through this self-determination. Hence I am myself my own object, the determinateness of which, under certain conditions, depends altogether upon the intelligence, but the existence of which must always be presupposed. Now this very “I” is the object of Idealism. The object of this system does not occur actually as something real in consciousness, not as a Thing in itself—for then Idealism would cease to be what it is, and become Dogmatism—but as “I” in itself; not as an object of Experience—for it is not determined, but is exclusively determinable through my freedom, and without this determination it would be nothing, and is really not at all—but as something beyond all Experience.

The object of Dogmatism, on the contrary, belongs to the objects of the first class, which are produced solely by free Thinking. The Thing in itself is a mere invention, and has no reality at all. It does not occur in Experience, for the system of Experience is nothing else than Thinking accompanied by the feeling of necessity, and can not even be said to be anything else by the dogmatist, who, like every philosopher, has to explain its cause. True the dogmatist wants to obtain reality for it through the necessity of thinking it as a ground of all experience, and would succeed, if he could prove that experience can be, and can be explained only by means of it. But this is the very thing in dispute, and he cannot presuppose what must first be proven.

Hence the object of Idealism has this advantage over the object of Dogmatism, that it is not to be deduced as the explanatory ground of experience—which would be a contradiction, and change this system itself into a part of experience—but that it is, nevertheless, to be pointed out as a part of consciousness; whereas, the object of Dogmatism can pass for nothing but a mere invention, which obtains validity only through the success of the system.

This we have said merely to promote a clearer insight into the distinction between the two systems, but not to draw from it conclusions against the latter system. That the object of every philosophy, as explanatory ground of Experience, must lie beyond all experience, is required by the very nature of philosophy, and is far from being derogatory to a system. But we have as yet discovered no reasons why that object should also occur in a particular manner within consciousness.

If anybody should not be able to convince himself of the truth of what we have just said, this would not make his conviction of the truth of the whole system an impossibility, since what we have just said was only intended as a passing remark. Still in conformity to our plan we will also here take possible objections into consideration. Somebody might deny the asserted immediate self-consciousness in a free act of the mind. Such a one we should refer to the conditions stated above. This self-consciousness does not obtrude itself upon us, and comes not of its own accord; it is necessary first to act free and next to abstract from the object, and attend to one’s self. Nobody can be forced to do this and though he may say he has done it, it is impossible to say whether he has done it correctly. In one word, this consciousness cannot be proven to any one, but everybody must freely produce it within himself. Against the second assertion, that the “Thing in itself” is a mere invention, an objection could only be raised, because it were misunderstood.

V. Neither of these two systems can directly refute the other; for their dispute is a dispute about the first principle: each, system if you only admit its first axiom—proves the other one wrong, each denies all to the opposite and these two systems have no point in common from which they might bring about a mutual understanding and reconciliation. Though they may agree on the words of a sentence, they will surely attach a different meaning to the words.

(Hence the reason why Kant has not been understood and why the Science of Knowledge can find no friends. The systems of Kant and of the Science of Knowledge are idealistic—not in the general indefinite, but in the just described definite sense of the word; but the modern philosophers are all of them dogmatists, and are firmly resolved to remain so. Kant was merely tolerated, because it was possible to make a dogmatist out of him; but the Science of Knowledge, which cannot be thus construed, is insupportable to these wise men. The rapid extension of Kant’s philosophy—when it was thus misunderstood—is not a proof of the profundity, but rather of the shallowness of the age. For in this shape it is the most wonderful abortion ever created by human imagination, and it does little honor to its defenders that they do not perceive this. It can also be shown that this philosophy was accepted so greedily only because people thought it would put a stop to all serious speculation, and continue the era of shallow Empiricism.)

First. Idealism cannot refute Dogmatism. True, the former system has the advantage, as we have already said, of being enabled to point out its explanatory ground of all experience—the free acting intelligence—as a fact of consciousness. This fact the dogmatist must also admit, for otherwise he would render himself incapable of maintaining the argument with his opponent; but he at the same time by a correct conclusion from his principle, changes this explanatory ground into a deception and appearance, and thus renders it incapable of being the explanatory ground of anything else since it cannot maintain its own existence in its own philosophy. According to the Dogmatist, all phenomena of our consciousness are productions of a Thing in itself, even our pretended determinations by freedom, and the belief that we are free. This belief is produced by the effect of the Thing upon ourselves, and the determinations, which we deduced from freedom, are also produced by it. The only difference is, that we are not aware of it in these cases, and hence ascribe it to no cause, i.e. to our freedom. Every logical dogmatist is necessarily a Fatalist; he does not deny the fact of consciousness, that we consider ourselves free—for this would be against reason;—but he proves from his principle that this is a false view. He denies the independence of the Ego, which is the basis of the Idealist, in toto, makes it merely a production of the Thing, an accidence of the World; and hence the logical dogmatist is necessarily also materialist. He can only be refuted from the postulate of the freedom and independence of the Ego; but this is precisely what he denies. Neither can the dogmatist refute the Idealist.

The principle of the former, the Thing in itself, is nothing and has no reality, as its defenders themselves must admit, except that which it is to receive from the fact that experience can be explained only by it. But this proof the Idealist annihilates by explaining experience in another manner, hence by denying precisely what dogmatism assumes. Thus the Thing in itself becomes a complete Chimera; there is no farther reason why it should be assumed; and with it the whole edifice of dogmatism tumbles down.

From what we have just stated, is moreover evident the complete irreconcilabilty of both systems; since the results of the one destroy those of the other. Wherever their union has been attempted the members would not fit together, and somewhere an immense gulf appeared which could not be spanned.

If any one were to deny this he would have to prove the possibility of such a union—of a union which consists in an everlasting composition of Matter and Spirit, or, which is the same, of Necessity and Liberty.

Now since, as far as we can see at present, both systems appear to have the same speculative value, but since both cannot stand together, nor yet either convince the other, it occurs as a very interesting question: What can possibly tempt persons who comprehend this—and to comprehend it is so very easy a matter—to prefer the one over the other; and why skepticism, as the total renunciation of an answer to this problem, does not become universal?

The dispute between the Idealist and the Dogmatist is, in reality, the question, whether the independence of the Ego is to be sacrificed to that of the Thing, or vice versa? What, then, is it which induces sensible men to decide in favor of the one or the other?

The philosopher discovers from this point of view—in which he must necessarily place himself, if he wants to pass for a philosopher, and which in the progress of Thinking, every man necessarily occupies sooner or later,—nothing farther than that he is forced to represent to himself both: that he is free, and that there are determined things outside of him. But it is impossible for man to stop at this thought; the thought of a representation is but a half a thought, a broken off fragment of a thought; something must be thought and added to it, as corresponding with the representation independent of it. In other words: the representation cannot exist alone by itself, it is only something in connection with something else, and in itself it is nothing. This necessity of thinking it is, which forces one from that point of view to the question: What is the ground of the representations? or, which is exactly the same, What is that which corresponds to them?

Now the representation of the independence of the Ego and that of the Thing can very well exist together but not the independence itself of both. Only one can be the first, the beginning the independent; the second by the very fact of being the second, becomes necessarily dependent upon the first, with which it is to be connected—now which of the two is to be made the first? Reason furnishes no ground for a decision; since the question concerns not the connecting of one link with another, but the commencement of the first link, which as an absolute first act is altogether conditional upon the freedom of Thinking. Hence the decision is arbitrary; and since this arbitrariness is nevertheless to have a cause, the decision is dependent upon inclination and interest. The last ground, therefore, of the difference between the Dogmatist and the Idealist is the difference of their interest.

The highest interest, and hence the ground of all other interest, is that which we feel for ourselves. Thus with the Philosopher. Not to lose his Self in his argumentation, but to retain and assert it, this is the interest which unconsciously guides all his Thinking. Now, there are two grades of mankind; and in the progress of our race, before the last grade has been universally attained, two chief kinds of men. The one kind is composed of those who have not yet elevated themselves to the full feeling of their freedom and absolute independence, who are merely conscious of themselves in the representation of outward things. These men have only a desultory consciousness, linked together with the outward objects, and put together out of their manifoldness. They receive a picture of their Self only from the Things, as from a mirror; for their own sake they cannot renounce their faith in the independence of those things, since they exist only together with these things. Whatever they are they have become through the outer World. Whosoever is only a production of the Things will never view himself in any other manner; and he is perfectly correct, so long as he speaks merely for himself and for those like him. The principle of the dogmatist is: Faith in the things, for their own sake; hence, mediated Faith in their own desultory self, as simply the result of the Things.

But whosoever becomes conscious of his self-existence and independence from all outward things—and this men can only become by making something of themselves, through their own Self, independently of all outward things—needs no longer the Things as supports of his Self, and cannot use them, because they annihilate his independence and turn it into an empty appearance. The Ego which he possesses, and which interests him, destroys that Faith in the Things; he believes in his independence, from inclination, and [seizes] it with affection. His Faith in himself is immediate.

From this interest the various passions are explicable, which mix generally with the defence of these philosophical systems. The dogmatist is in danger of losing his Self when his system is attacked; and yet he is not armed against this attack, because there is something within him which takes part with the aggressor; hence, he defends himself with bitterness and heat. The idealist, on the contrary, cannot well refrain from looking down upon his opponent with a certain carelessness, since the latter can tell him nothing which he has not known long ago and has cast away as useless. The dogmatist gets angry, misconstrues, and would persecute, if he had the power; the idealist is cold and in danger of ridiculing his antagonist.

Hence, what philosophy a man chooses depends entirely upon what kind of man he is; for a philosophical system is not a piece of dead household furniture, which you may use or not use, but is animated by the soul of the man who has it. Men of a naturally weak-minded character, or who have become weak-minded and crooked through intellectual slavery, scholarly luxury and vanity, will never elevate themselves to idealism.

You can show the dogmatist the insufficiency and inconsequence of his system, of which we shall speak directly; you can confuse and terrify him from all sides; but you cannot convince him, because he is unable to listen to and examine with calmness what he cannot tolerate. If Idealism should prove to be the only real Philosophy, it will also appear that a man must be born a philosopher, be educated to be one, and educate himself to be one; but that no human art (no external force) can make a philosopher out of him. Hence, this Science expects few proselytes from men who have already formed their character; if our Philosophy has any hopes at all, it entertains them rather from the young generation, the natural vigor of which has not yet been submerged in the weak-mindedness of the age.