|
With this system there is duality, or rather plurality, not only in the acts, but even in the me itself; because this me is an act, and acts follow like a series of fluxions developed to infinity. Thus, far from saving the unity and identity of subject and object, plurality and multiplicity are estab lished in the subject itself; and the unity of consciousness itself, in danger of being broken by the cavils of philoso phers, is forced to take refuge in the obscurity of invincible nature. 97 We have thus incontestably proved that there is in us a duality of subject and object, that without it knowledge is inconceivable, and that representation itself is a contra diction unless in one sense or another we admit things really distinct in the recesses of intelligence. We beg to observe that we have a sublime type of this distinction in the august mystery of the Trinity, the fundamental dogma of our holy religion, covered, indeed, with an impenetrable veil, but which sends forth light to illustrate the profound- est questions of philosophy. 98 The upholders of universal identity, besides contra dicting a primitive and fundamental fact of consciousness, signally fail in their efforts to explain by it either the origin of intellectual representation or its conformity to its object. prev next |