Charles Carroll Everett

“ Reality, however, has been found by us to be equivalent to activity. This lack of reality is, therefore, a lack of activity. Passivity, then, must be shown to be related to activity. By this, is meant not the passivity of one object that is related to the activity of another; but the passivity of any one object as related to its own activity. For this relation, some common term is needed between the two. This term is found in the idea of activity itself. Passivity must be regarded as activity, but as a lower grade of activity. A lack is nothing in itself. ”

“ The Independent Activity upon which the Material is dependent, is, as we have seen, the imagination which creates these elements. The Independent Activity upon which the Form of the Relation depends, is the consciousness, which is led by the presence of the one element to the thought of the other, and which thus discerns the nature and the necessity of their mutual dependence. In other words, in every act of the productive imagination, may be found two elements. ”

“ It may now be well to translate the terms of this antinomy into the language of our common life, and thus to show that they involve no merely seeming difficulty artfully conjured up by a process of dialectics in order that it may be removed by another process, but a difficulty that we must all feel to be involved in every act of consciousness. I find myself in a world of objects, by many of which I am affected. ”

“ The contradictions that we have been considering seem, when we examine them, to render any advance impossible. The I can posit no passivity in itself without positing activity in the Not-me, and no activity in the Not-me without positing passivity in the Me. It can posit neither without the other. It can posit neither absolutely—that is, independently of the other. It thus can posit neither first. It can begin nowhere in its process of positing. Thus it can posit nothing. This is, however, in direct contradiction with our fundamental proposition, and would destroy the unity of consciousness. ”

“ We have thus found a new Category, which, like that of Causality, is contained under the general Category of Relation;—that is, like Causality, it is a special form of Relation. It is the Relation of Substantiality.
So far as the I is regarded as containing all the spheres of reality, or all the forms of activity which belong to it, it is Substance. So far as it may be regarded as occupying only a portion of the fulness which belongs to it, one element only being present, all others being excluded, we find what is known as Accident. Thought is an accident of the I considered as substance. ”

“ In other words, we are perfectly free to think or not, perfectly free to exercise this creative power or not; but if we choose to make use of the power which we have, the results must depend upon the fixed nature of this power itself. This may seem contrary to our experience, according to which the world, whether real or phenomenal, is a fixed fact for us, and not at all dependent upon our volition. Fichte would seem, however, elsewhere to refer the exercise of this freedom to a point anterior to our life of conscious experience ”

“ The state of things here contemplated may be illustrated by the consciousness that we have in a dream. Indeed, the thought of the dream must be, all along, our standard, for we have not as yet found any ground of difference between our waking state and a dream. In a dream the objects of consciousness are confessedly the creation of the I, yet even in the dream the I feels itself limited by them. ”

“ We have thus reached a result which may occasion some difficulty. We have found that neither the Ale nor the Not-me has any meaning apart from the other. Each exists only through, and in relation to, the other. On the other hand, they are mutually exclusive. How shall this mutual exclusiveness be reconciled with this mutual dependence? The two must meet in our consciousness, or else we can have no recognition of either. How can they thus meet, when each, by its very nature, excludes the other? The solution of this difficulty Fichte finds in the idea of limit or boundary. ”

“ If the outer has no effect upon the inner, if the thing and the mind both go on their independent way, where is the need of introducing this elaborate machinery, the movements of which correspond with the inner changes that are wholly independent of them? If you convince me that the vision that I seem to have of a man, is an optical delusion, where is the need of supposing a real man to be doing what my vision seems to represent? ”

“ Fichte bases his discussion of the matter upon the thought of what he calls the sum of reality. [2] Reality is neither an infinite nor an indefinite amount. Reality, as it exists for any one individual, is the entire content of his consciousness—the object which stands over against the subject. If we could conceive of self-consciousness, without any object save the Me, the distinction between subject and object would still exist. ”

“ Substance has no meaning except in relation to accidents. No accidents, no substance; no substance, no accidents. It is the accidents, taken collectively, that give us substance. A + B is the substance, of which A and B are the accidents. Determinability is the substance, of which determinations are the accidents.
Let us now apply this illustration to the special object of our study. Let A represent the act of the I in positing the Me, which, as such, has no existence except as thus posited. Let B represent the act of the I in positing the Not-me. ”

“ Qualitative Idealism is as unable to explain the facts of the case as Qualitative Realism. Why should the I thus limit itself? Why should the I mistake its own creation for something foreign to itself? ”

“ But, further, the idea of self-positing and that of activity are one and the same, for this self-positing is the original and fundamental form of activity. Thus reality is active, and whatever is active is real. Activity and reality are one and the same thing. ”

“ We must seek some mark by which we may distinguish the positive from the negative; by which, thus, we may absolutely distinguish reality from that which is opposed to it. The source of all reality is the I. With this, whatever reality we can recognize is given. The very idea of reality is given by it. ”

“ It meets the demand of the realist without accepting the reason upon which he bases these demands. It accepts the assumption of the idealist, while retaining the machinery of an outward world, which is no longer needed. ”

“ We find a contradiction; we introduce some middle term by which the contradiction may be solved. When we have done this, we find that the first difficulty was removed only that a new one may be introduced. The chasm may be a little narrower, but it still exists. So far as the I is limited by the Not-me, it is finite. In itself, however, considered as pure activity, it is infinite. We have, then, to reconcile the contradiction between the infinite and the finite. ”

“ We may, perhaps, illustrate the relation as viewed by Fichte, though very imperfectly, by what sometimes occurs during sleep. The sleeper is partly aroused by some sound or touch, and forthwith creates a world of dreams. ”

“ A + B is always determined either by A or B. When the iron is at rest we have A + B determined by A. When it is in motion we have A + B determined by B. The nature of iron, then, is found to consist in this determinability. This determinability is what we express by the word Substance. If we had only A—in other words, if things were absolutely persistent and unchangeable, manifesting always precisely the same attributes—we should have no idea of substance. ”

“ Thus reality, or, what is the same thing, activity, must be cancelled in it. Therefore, the opposite of activity must be posited in it. But the opposite of activity is passivity. Passivity is absolute negation, and is thus distinguished from mere relative negation. If, when the I is in the condition of passivity, the absolute sum of reality is to be preserved, a like grade of activity must necessarily be transferred to the Not-me. ”