GIFT OF UfXi &* \u> ~tsti&. *&Tsebicatet> TO THE MEMORY OF MY PARENTS ALEXANDER ALLAN AND JEAN BOWMAN Qft PREFACE THAT our consciousness of space is also our primary, ultimate, and absolute consciousness of Being, is the thesis of the following chapters. It has occupied much of the writer's meditative leisure for many years, and conviction of its truth has deepened the longer it has been pondered. To him it is the Truth, the whole Truth, and the Truth that alone is Whole. Consequently, the aim of the book is to deal not merely with Being and Non- Being, but with Being- Whole ; and therefore, while Ontological in its scope, it may be more correctly characterised as Holo- logico-Ontological. The sketch is thus necessarily, in the nature of things, very imperfect. It is offered as a suggestion, and has no pretence to be exhaustive. The author has not attempted to make the path, but merely to indicate where the path might be made. It was begun in July 1909, and finished in March 1910. But capable and trusted critics who read it in typewriting, were wholly adverse to its publication, though doubtful if they had understood it. The book was then re-written between August 1910 and March 191 1, in order to render it more intelligible, and afterwards sent to a publisher who returned it. It was once more entirely revised and put into its present form under the suspicion that imperfect exposition, and the abstruse nature of the subject which is the besetting difficulty of all philosophical work, were doubtless the hindrance to its acceptance. But after all, it still presents to the author himself a very amateurish aspect, and it must appear far more so to trained philosophical thinkers. He is only confident of having tried his best, in a first venture into the philosophical field, to say plainly what he sees. An apology is due for many repetitions, most of them having vii viii PREFACE been considered essential to an effective advancement of the leading principles discussed. As the standpoint is new, it has been felt that a certain restatement of essential and fundamental facts was here and there legitimate, in order to a clearer apprehension of the particular line of reasoning immediately under treatment. When one contemplates a wide landscape, as a whole, the central features in it are unavoidably repeated in the varying survey, as the point of sight is changed and the perspective refocussed. In presuming, in the course of the work, to differ from great writers and revered authorities, the author trusts that he has done so as grateful pupils sometimes differ from masters and superiors whom they highly esteem. The argument is sustained throughout in the conviction that, in future, Theology, or our highest ' God '-Knowledge, which, fundamentally, is the consummation of all knowledge, must co-ordinate and identify itself with Philosophy, yet upon higher ground than Philosophy has assumed in the past ; and that both so identified must move forward on the foundations of that higher Science which, unlike all that at present falls under that designation, will feel compelled to accept Space- Being as the sole and only possible postulate and idiom-fact of Whole-Reality. ARCHIBALD ALLAN. THE MANSE OF CHANNELKIRK, OXTON, BERWICKSHIRE, SCOTLAND, January 1913. CONTENTS CHAPTER I THE SOUL SECT. PAGE 1. General belief in an Everywhere Being . . . . i 2. The basis of this belief in human personality . . i 3. Study of space is fundamentally the study of personality . . 3 4. Psychology versus Philosophy and Theology ... 4 5. The 'Soul' : ancient and modern speculations regarding . 5 6 Hume on Personal Identity ...... 7 7. Kant's "Ding-an-sich" ..... i 8. Hegel's Being, No f king, and Becoming . . . .12 9. Prof. Pringle-Pattison on "Spirit." Process the ultimate con- sciousness in Hegel and Bergson . . . .16 10. Interactionism : Parallelism : and Epiphenomenalism . . 19 ii The cardinal lack in all theories of the 'Soul' . . .20 12. Symbolism of Plato's "Cave" . . . . .21 CHAPTER II THE ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 13. The Sphinx ........ 24 14. Thought : Experience : Existence ..... 24 15. The standard of truth as to Reality . . . . .25 16." The content of the Fact "I" . . . . .27 17. Psychology and the space-consciousness . . . .29 1 8. Space- Consciousness deepest in all philosophers . . .29 19. Plato- Socrates and Chaos ...... 30 20. Science and the Void ...... 32 x CONTENTS SKCT. PAGE 21. Mathematics and Zero-quantities ..... 34 22. Philosophy and the gravitation to the space-consciousness . 34 23. Theology and the Nothing-consciousness .... 34 24. Kant and the notion of empty space . . . -35 25. Hegel and concrete Being ...... 36 26. Prof. Pringle-Pattison on Spinoza's 'emptiness 3 . . 37 27. Prof. Wm. James on Nothing and Something . . -39 28. The value placed upon the consciousness of Space . . 39 29. All Being stands on Space . . . . . .41 30. Philosophy astray after Hume . . . . .41 3f. Space-consciousness has been excluded from philosophy and psychology ....... 44 32. Test of Truth or Reality . . . . . -45 33. Criteria of Reality according to Prof. F. H. Bradley and Herbert Spencer ........ 46 34. Consciousness of Self as Space the sole test of Reality . .48 35. Degrees of Truth ....... 50 36. Space not Appearance. ' Is ; a consciousness of Whole-Being . 50 37. The space-consciousness sustains the Reality of All that Is. (Sect. 71) 5i CHAPTER III SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 38. What-we-are, Space-Being, Is, Whole-Being . . -55 39. Whole-Being our philosophical start-point . . . .56 40. Difference and Unity : Experience : The Senses and Space . 56 41. Methods adopted by the great philosophers . . .64 42. Space not an ultimate of conception . . . .66 43. Space has no ' Qualities ' .66 44. Hegel's Being and Nothing discussed . 68 45. Human Thought trends towards the space-consciousness . 72 46. Permanence and Impermanence . . . . 73 47. Perception and Conception ... 73 48. Newton's perception of a falling body . 74 49. Space and Object, How realised as Whole . . 76 50. Perception and Sensation . .76 5 i. Concepts, Why limited to Objectivity 78 52. Space as ' Form' to Kant . . 79 53. Space-Being the Fact of Facts for Science 81 CONTENTS xi PACK 54. " Qualities" not necessary in consciousness of Being . . 81 55. Knowledge which is independent of conceptions . . .83 56. Is-Consciousness the true affirmation of Being . .84 CHAPTER IV SPACE AS OMITTED FROM OUR CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 57. Transcendence of Personality ..... 86 58. Fluxional conceptions of God, Universe, and Man . . 86 59. The Unknown ....... 88 60. The Concept, Man ....... 89 61. Error of conceiving Man as Unit- Being . . . .91 62. Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle, and the unitising Concept . . 93 63. Life and Cause ....... 95 64. The fallacy of Division in Being ..... 96 65. ' Spirit ' only rational on the basis of Space-Being . . .96 66. 'God' concept as Unit-Being : its defects . . . .97 67. Conclusion on the concept, Man ..... 100 68. Human mind never satisfied with conceptual knowledge . . 101 69. Space-Being and the Object never divided in Being . .103 70. Two contents of the ' I '-judgment. (Sects. 282, 413) . .103 71. Basis of the certainty of Reality ..... 104 72. Contact ........ 105 73. Absolutising Relativity. (Sect. 124) . . . .106 74. Knowledge as Holological ...... 107 75. Continued Being : why conceptually impossible . . . 108 76. Space as quantified . . . . . . .no 77. Motion conditioned in space-being . . . . . 1 1 1 78. Permeation does not account for creation . . . . 1 1 1 79. Consciousness of Whole-Being absent from ancient and modern philosophy. (Sect, ill) . . . . .112 80. Unit-being: Total-being: Whole-Being . . . 113 81. Bacon and his method ...... 115 82. Fundamental experience of the new-born never transcended . 118 83. Induction as much as Deduction rests on abstraction . .119 84. The concept of Space fallacious in both Descartes and Kant . 120 85. The defective concept of Personality .... 122 xii CONTENTS CHAPTER V SPACE AND CONCEPTUALITY SKCT. PAQK 86. The elimination of the concept . .123 87. The false assumption in conceptualising Absolute Being . 123 88. Physical conditions which forbid a continuum of sensation . 125 89. The basis of the concept. Kant's Space-Form . .127 90. Memory and Identity of Being . .129 91. Consciousness of the closed and wide-open concept. (Sect. 71) 134 92. Mechanism of all determination . 135 93. Analysis and Synthesis ... .141 94. Defect of a synthetical unity. (Sect. 95) . . 142 95. Fichte and the impersonal * Ego J . . M4 96. The conceptualised 'personality' impossible, save as a con- venience . ' . . . .145 97. German Philosophy makes shipwreck on Absolute Unity . 147 98. The concept of Unity and the Christian Religion . .147 99. Profs. J. Ward and E. Caird on Self and Not-Self. (See sect. 269) 148 100. Prof. A. Seth Pringle - Pattison on Self, 'a principle of isolation' . .150 CHAPTER VI DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 101. Differentiation and the uses of Philosophy . . .154 102. Herbert Spencer and differentiation . . . 155 103. His unscientific method ...... 158 104. Prof. Alex. Bain's " double-faced unity " . . . .159 105. Hegel's order of exposition . 160 106. How division, as a concept, is possible .... 160 107. Discreteness and Continuousness . . . . .161 108. The illusion of taking from anything its 'qualities' . . 162 109. Space-Being cannot be conceived as Divided . . . 163 1 10. Space and Time as treated by the Hon. B. Russell . . 164 in. Consciousness of Whole-Being not found in the systems of Kant or Hegel ....... 166 CONTENTS xiii SICT. PAOK 112. \IOLV never connotes whole, but only ' all ' or * every ' . .167 113. Kantian and Hegelian origin of the 'Categories' . . 168 114. * Discrete' and ' Continuity,' as relatives, sublated in our Space- Consciousness . . . . . .168 115. No absolute reality predicable for truths of Mathematics and Mechanics . . . . . . .169 116. Berkeley on Space . .170 1 17. The * Point' of Mathematics and the ' Ion' of Physics fictional . 172 1 1 8. Why we cannot conceive an absolute beginning or ending . 173 119. The mathematical method and the 'Soul ; . . 175 120. The 'Laws of Thought' . . . . . .176 121. Our Ultimate 'law' of Thought in the ' I '-consciousness . 178 122. Certainty of Impersonality, and uncertainty of Personality in Kant ........ 179 123. Both life and death necessary to reveal man . . .180 124. Fallacy of Absolutising the Relative. (Sect. 73) . . .182 125. Its pessimistic effect on Theology, Philosophy, and Science . 183 126. The space-consciousness alone gives satisfaction in Geology, Astronomy, History, and the Drama . . . .184 CHAPTER VII SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 127. Space-being the basal consciousness of our conception of 'God' 186 128. The supreme principle commanding Physics . . .187 129. The tendency in science to unitise the universe . . .188 130. ' Forms of energy ' and Forms of ' personality ' . . .188 131. Ancient conceptions of elemental energy . . . .189 132. Gravitation towards the space-consciousness . . . 189 133. Rest and Motion : the force which sublates all forms of force . 190 134. Consciousness of motion, or process, as experience . . 191 135. Experience of motion and energy transcended in a resultant experience ....... 192 136. Why scientists do not realise Whole-Energy . . 193 137. No consciousness of limitation or qualification in Whole- Energy ...... .194 138. Our consciousness of being whole with Nature . . . 196 xiv CONTENTS SECT. 1>A(;K 139. Consciousness of Matter and Motion sublated in a higher experience of Whole-Being . . 19 140. Heredity and Environment 197 141. All Flows through All . .198 142. Common experience of living and dead . .199 143. No dividing line between what-we-are and the energy of gravita- tion ..... . 200 144. Life conditioned and environed by non-vital elements . . 201 145. Response in Nature . 202 146. Whole-Being believed but not yet rationalised . . 202 147. Scientific Energy and philosophic Thought are one Motion . 203 148. Scientific trend towards unity for the Universe . . .204 149. Indifference of science and philosophy to space-consciousness . 205 150. The necessity of the space-consciousness .... 207 151. Energy as chief characteristic of universal being. What is meant by Whole-Energy. (Sect. 169) . 208 152. Space-Being greater force than Gravitation . .210 153. Meaning of Space- Being as Resisting Force . .211 154. Why we have no consciousness of motion in what-we-are . 211 155. Why we conceive space-being to be 'empty' . .213 156. Will in man as Force . . . . .213 T 57- Whole-Being an inherent consciousness not depending on dis- coveries in Nature . . . . . .214 158. Light and Gravitation . . . . .215 159. Locke on space-resistance . . . . . .215 160. Whole-Inertia . . . . . . .216 161. Whole-Permanence ....... 217 162. Time. . . . . . . .218 163. Something and Nothing negated by our space-consciousness . 219 164. Space-Being the root of deistic attributes .... 219 165. All forces imperfect save that of Space-Being . . . 220 166. Space-Being sustains Cosmic Being .... 222 167. ' God '-conception depends on space-consciousness . . 222 168. Is Energy Self-Directive ? . . . . . . 223 169. Why science never reaches the conception of Whole-Energy as Self-Directive Energy ...... 224 170. Energy as Law ..... . 225 171. Absolute Freedom, and Absolute Limitation sublated in Space- Being ........ 227 CONTENTS xv CHAPTER VIII SPACE AND THE ATTRIBUTES OF GOD. IS. ALMIGHTY. OMNISCIENCE. OMNIPRESENCE. INFINITE. UNITY. VALUE. GOOD. SUBSTANCE. CAUSE. BEAUTY, OR GLORY SECT. PAOB 172. The basis of our conception of 'God.' Is: Almighty: Omni- science : Omnipresence ..... 230 173. Infinity ........ 234 174. The mathematical 'infinite 3 never transcends Unit-being or Quantity. ....... 236 175. The space -consciousness alone gives the true Infinite, tran- scending all Relativity ...... 240 176. Hegel on ' Infinite Thought' ..... 241 177. Unity ........ 244 178. Whole- Value or Worth ...... 247 179. The Good ........ 249 1 80. Substance-Absolute ....... 252 181. Quality and Quantity ...... 253 182. Cause and Effect ....... 257 183. Beauty- Absolute, or 'Glory' ..... 260 184. The Point and Circle as forms of beauty .... 260 185. The function of Art ....... 263 1 86. Space-Beauty ....... 263 187. The eye and space-personality ..... 266 1 88. The Beautifully Good, or Whole-Beauty . . . .266 CHAPTER IX THE SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS THE FUNDAMENTAL ONE IN THE ANCIENT RELIGIONS 189. Religion and Space-Being ...... 272 190. The Three fundamental conceptions in Theology . . 273 191. The ultimate basis of any Religion .... 275 192. Personality and Impersonality sublated in our consciousness of Space-Being . . .275 6 xvi CONTENTS SECT. PAGE 193. The concept 'Personality' in Religion convenient but un- essential ........ 276 194. Tennyson on his 'personality' ..... 277 195. Man interprets 'God' in both terms of Personal and Impersonal 278 196. In the space-consciousness we have the highest guarantee of 'God '-Knowledge ...... 280 197. Faith in acceptance of existence ..... 280 198. Hegel's explanation of the content of the terms * God,' and ' I ' . 281 igSA. Kant's argument on the Existence of a Supreme Being . 283 199. Thinkers such as Carlyle and Newman conceive ultimate Being as ' The Abyss ' . . . . . .288 200. God conceived impersonally by Jesus .... 290 201. Allah-God in Mohammedanism personally conceived . . 290 202. Quismet-God impersonally conceived . . . .291 203. Grecian Religion. Gods personal and impersonal . . 292 204. Pantheism. The Pan-Being never identical with Space-Being 294 205. True and false Pantheism ...... 295 206. Brahmanism and Buddhism ..... 295 207. The God-Consciousness of the Hebrews .... 298 208. Persian view of God ...... 303 CHAPTER X THE CHERUBIM 209. Symbolism of the Cherubim. Early history . . . 305 210 Deistic consciousness of a people mirrored in Sacred Symbols . 306 211. Cherubim the chief symbol in Hebrew worship . . . 307 212. They are conceived with God only and have no reference to man ........ 308 213. They emblemize Formless Being ..... 308 214. Ezekiel's description of the Cherubim .... 309 215. Ezekiel's method compared with that of the Vedanta-Sutras . 311 216. Creation furnishes primal material for a God-Conception . 312 217. The Sky and the Cherubim . . . . .312 218. Sky-space and Absolute-space connoted by Cherubim . . 313 219. The Yahwistic Consciousness of God . . .314 220. Eden as common home of God and Man . . . .315 221. The principal aim of J ... . . 317 222. The consciousness of the Cherubim barrier from Life . . 318 CONTENTS xvii SECT. PAOB 223. The curse on the Ground the principal curse . . .318 224. Sky-Space conceived as Cherubim separating God from Man . 319 225. Hence Tower, Ladder, and burnt-offering to reach God, and the conception of His "coming down" . . . .319 226. The Cherubim the symbol of Death-Zone .... 322 227. The sublation of both Cherubim and God in Whole-Space-Being 323 228. The consciousness at work in the Yahwist account . . 324 229. The consciousness of the Priestly Code .... 324 230. Space-Darkness ....... 326 231. Ark and Temple : Cherubim antecede both in time . . 328 232. "And He drove out the Man" : a world's despair . . 329 233. The Cherub : the Burning Bush : the Child . . . 330 234. Prof. I. Benzinger on the Cherubim . . . 331 235. The Deep, the primal consciousness in the Priestly Code . 332 236. The consciousness of the Fourth Gospel .... 333 237. History does not witness to ultimate truth. (Sects. 450 and 471) 333 238. The space-consciousness in the John Prologue . . . 334 239. Differentiation of the 'Word' and ' God' .... 335 240. The Creation is Begotten not made .... 335 241. Life; with no correlative of Death .... 336 242 Personality of God, Man, and Creation transcended as concepts 336 243. Originless Being without predicates, and equal to Darkness . 337 244. That which does not appear ..... 337 245. Being is primarily Dark-Being ..... 338 246. Personality is begotten of the Impersonal . . . 339 247. The John-Order; of Being ...... 339 248. The importance of the John Prologue .... 341 249. Summary of the Yahwist Consciousness . 342 250. Summary of the Priest's Consciousness .... 342 251. P. does not see Evil as the cause of differentiation . . 343 252. No Cherubim consciousness in the John Prologue . . 344 CHAPTER XI THE SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS OF JESUS 253. The space-consciousness alone can embody our God-con- sciousness ....... 346 254. Personality subsidiary in philosophy, science, and religion . 347 255. The Jesus-Consciousness the largest revelation of the content of the human Consciousness , . . , 348 xviii CONTENTS SECT. PAGB 256. Its independence of all extraneous verification 257. Its unique influence on common thought . . - 349 258. Philosophy has ignored His consciousness . 35 259. Her consequent imperfect interpretation of Consciousness 260. The apparent identity of His and her consciousness . . 35 l 261. Why the Jesus' consciousness persists against all other interpre- tations of consciousness ... . 35 2 262. His consciousness in its great outlines : Personality : Cosmic and Ethical Process . -353 263. Personality as processional both for God-Personality and Man- personality ..... . 354 264. Father-personality not ultimate personality . 355 265. The God-Names of Jesus . . 35 6 266. His personal-God sublated in God-Being impersonal . . 356 267. No division between 'Divine' and 'Human.' Why the God- Name changes ..... . 357 268. Prof. Ed. Caird on "The germ idea of God" . . -359 269. "The root and basis of religion." Self: Not-Self: and God. (Sect. 99) . .361 270. ' God ' never our ultimate consciousness .... 363 271. 'God 'and the 'Unknown'. ... . 364 272. The fallacy in our theory of Knowledge . . . 365 273. Knowledge and Faith ...... 366 274. Whole-Knowledge. (See sect. 172) . . . 366 275. Whole-Purpose .... 367 276. The vastitude of Jesus' consciousness as compared with the greatest ........ 368 277. His consciousness of God and Man vital to all progress . . 369 278. His own consciousness of Himself .... 370 279. Is Jesus nameable ? . . . . . 37 1 280. His consciousness of Man widens to identity with God . . 372 281. All men find themselves in Him ..... 373 282. "I am "and the philosophical "Self". (Sect. 413) . . 374 283. Jesus' vision of the Course of Time .... 375 284. The consciousness that transcends Life and Death . . 380 285. The cloud-sign of Jesus . 381 286. The cloud-consciousness basal in modern Thought . . 382 287. The Fallacy in the heart of modern Philosophy . . . 382 288. Kant and the nothing-consciousness . 383 289. Futility of interpreting 'God' or 'Self save through the con- sciousness of Space-Being ..... 384 290. Jesus' method sublates Personality in Impersonality, and Im- personality in Whole-Being . . . . 385 CONTENTS xix CHAPTER XII THE TRANSCENDENCE OF PERSONALITY SECT. PAOB 291. How we conceive Personality, Hegel's definition . . . 389 V 292. Personality neither free nor isolated, but processional . 391 293. Principal characteristics of personality .... 393 294. Jesus negates all such characteristics .... 393 295- Will 394 296. Procession of will-power ...... 396 297. Substance : indivisibility : singleness : unit-person . . 400 298. Feeling ; thinking : conation : Life .... 401 299. Bishop Westcott on Father and Son as identical in will and action ........ 402 300. Transcendence of personal Life ..... 403 301. Transcendence of the name of the personal Jesus . . 404 302. Transcendence of isolation as personal .... 406 303. Jesus abolishes all concepts of personality in affirming What-He- is as Space-Being ...... 407 304. Buddha's eightfold path a process and negation of personality . 408 305. Jesus and Buddha. (Sect. 470) ..... 409 306. The lack of the category of Life in Eastern and Western philosophy . . . . . . .410 307. The postulate "Spirit" in Jesus' consciousness . . . 412 308. The 'Personality' of Literature and Philosophy is in the "Flow" 413 309. Jesus' concept "Father" includes the Cosmos . . .415 310. The basis of identity of * Nature' and * Father' . . . 416 311. 'Nature' unknown to Jesus. 'Father' alone is His name for the Cosmos ....... 417 312. 'The Father,' for Jesus, not the ultimate concept of personality . . . . . . ,418 313. No Name of God has exhausted the God-consciousness in Man . 419 314. The 'Divine'' is only what we can conceive to be highest and best ... ..... 420 5. Personality, with Jesus, though negated, is still widened upward 420 316. Transcendence of the Father-Personality . . . . 422 317. Unity and Trinity as God-Concepts .... 423 318. God and Nothing . . . . . . 424 319. The spurious dualism of 'God' and 'Nothing' . . . 425 320. Jesus, negating every concept of personality, finds God as Space-Being . . . . . . .426 xx CONTENTS CHAPTER XIII TRANSCENDENCE OF SPIRIT PERSONALITY SECT. PAGE 321. The Father the ultimate conception of Objectivity . . 427 322. The term Life, as relative to Death, cannot give a consciousness of Whole-Being ....... 428 323. Bergson on ' vital impulse ' ..... 428 324. Life and Space as bases of the concepts of ' Father ' and ' Spirit ' 431 325. All personality of Son, Father, and Spirit transcended . .431 326. The ' I am' consciousness not the same as in Exod. iii. . . 433 327. Jesus distinguishes between ' Father ' and ' Spirit ' concepts . 434 328. He has not taught to pray to the Spirit .... 435 329. The Father can be seen but not the Spirit . . . 437 330. The 'Spirit 5 is emphatically 'Holy' in Jesus' words . . 439 331. Each Unit-God-Being is subsumed in Whole-Space-Being . 439 332. The ' Godhead ' of the Creeds ..... 440 333. Unit-Being cannot be predicated of God- Being . . . 440 334. Space-Being the basis of all Jesus ' Knows ' . . 442 335. The policy of heaven ...... 444 336. Content of the 'Spirit' term is " Everywhereness," or Space 445 337. The order of Jesus' Consciousness is Son, Father, and Holy Spirit ........ 446 338. The Holy Ghost as the ultimate source of Life, and Father of Jesus .447 339. The Holy Ghost as conceived by the Early and Medieval Church . . . . . . . 448 340. 'The Spirit' is Jesus' supreme name for God-Being . . 449 341. Time sublated in the Holy Spirit ..... 450 342. Father and Son sublated in the Holy Spirit . . .451 343. Jesus' vision of His Church ...... 452 344. Jesus' conception of Ascending God-Being, and its symbolism . 454 345. Jesus' consciousness common to all . . . .455 346. Our consciousness of Space-Being as of Spirit is the same as " abiding forever " ...... 457 347. Son, Father, and Spirit, as categories of God-Being . . 457 348. The Ancient Consciousness "All Flows" .... 458 349. Where moderns surpass the ancients in this Consciousness . 459 350. The consciousness that all change works for Good-Absolute . 460 351. What Change or Process means in Jesus' Consciousness . . 460 CONTENTS xxi CHAPTER XIV SPACE AS WHOLE-ETHOS SECT. PAGE 352. Jesus' consciousness of the transcendence of Personality . 464 353. A study of His Ethos begins conveniently from Father-Being . 465 354. Jesus finds personality in all things .... 466 355. But in the space-consciousness the concepts personality and impersonality are ineffective ..... 467 356. General tendency to personalise the impersonal : Prayer exemplifies ....... 468 357. Due to our consciousness of space-being same with what-we-are and with all things ...... 469 358. What-Ought is identical with What-Is .... 470 359. Huxley's view of the Cosmic and Ethical process . . 470 360. Nothing in the Cosmos claims to be self-determined . .471 361. But the ideal of Perfection in Man is self-determined . .471 362. Mistake in assuming process to be necessary in order to perfect being ........ 472 363. Ancient view of the Fall from Perfection .... 473 364. The defective data in Prof. Huxley's argument. The fountain- head of self-sacrifice ...... 473 365. Cosmic process and Ethical process in man, identical . . 474 366. Jesus assumes this throughout His teaching . . . 475 367. His method an ever- widening one according to circumstances . 476 368. He includes and absorbs in His Ethic all other standards of conduct ........ 478 369. Degrees of excellence always being transcended . . . 478 370. Excellence of personality merges in higher personality as each personality is transcended ..... 479 371. Common Being the common basis of common excellence in heaven and earth ...... 480 372. This revealed best in The Beatitudes .... 480 373. All relativity absent in such ultimate Ethos . . .481 374. Absolute perfection solely self-affirmed on the basis of what-we- are ........ 481 375. Perfection by "Golden Rule," "New Commandment," or any * Command ' defective ...... 482 376. The "Ten Commandments" ..... 482 377. The " Golden Rule "...... 482 378. The order of superiority in the Ethical content of Jesus' Con- sciousness ....... 483 xxii CONTENTS 8CT. PACK 379. Blessed are the poor in spirit ..... 484 380. Blessed are they that mourn . . . 486 381. Blessed are the meek .... . 488 382. Blessed are they that hunger, etc. . . . 489 383. Blessed are the merciful ... 49 1 384. Blessed are the pure in heart . . . 493 385. Jesus gives supreme place to His Beatitudes . . 494 386. Ethos and Whole-Being ... -495 387. All process a realisation of this consciousness . . 495 388. The process of realising Being as Beatitude is for man by Repentance ....... 495 389. For the Cosmos it is realised by sublating both life and death 496 390. Space-being gives no consciousness of either life or death. It is ........ 497 391. Every concept of change, motion, or process is transcended in our space-consciousness ... . 49& 392. What holds true for the wheat-grain is true for the birth of the 'soul' ........ 499 393. Life which affirms itself as space-being .... 499 394. The Ethos of Jesus founded upon consciousness . . . 500 395. The nexus between Life here and Life beyond Death . . 501 396. The Cosmic process both self-assertive and self-negative . 501 397. The reason for persistence in man of" Immortality of the Soul" 501 398. Being and Beatitude as our Whole-Experience . . . 502 399. The ' New Commandment' ..... 502 400. The Golden Rule and other standards of conduct . . 502 401. Jesus taught nothing not verifiable in human consciousness . 503 402. Kant's Categorical Imperative : its defective basis . . 504 403. Jesus fully exemplifies His own Ethos .... 504 404. Space-consciousness of Being also consciousness of Whole- Beatitude ....... 505 405. Whole-Freedom ....... 505 CHAPTER XV JUDGMENT AND THE SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS 406. The absolute Ethos of Jesus transcends questions of Good and Evil . . . . . . . 507 407. The wheat-grain: the 'born again,' and the Cosmos have the same process in Space-Being ..... 507 CONTENTS xxiii SECT. PAOB 408. Personal illustrations of the Space-consciousness. The Last Supper . ... 509 409. Jesus' aversion to be declared the cause of His miracles . .510 410. Cause cannot be attributed to that which appears . . 511 411. Jesus transcends the relativity of Good and Evil . . . 512 412. Is relativity of Good and Evil absolutely true? . . -513 413. The 'I am j is judgment which yields two contents. (Sects. 70 and 282) ........ 514 414. Relativity of Good and Evil, etc., not absolutely valid . . 515 415. Claim of Self: Justice: Law: based on Relative being . . 516 416. Why the Father-conception must be transcended in Jesus' consciousness of Absolute Perfection .... 517 417. Jesus' view of Being and its characteristics unique . . 518 418. Good and Evil: Righteousness and Sin . . . .519 419. Jesus found Cosmic Good to surpass the highest righteousness of man . . . . . . . .519 420. Goodness on a higher ethical plane than righteousness . . 520 421. Jesus' standard of Absolute Excellence, or Resultant Goodness . 521 422. Jesus negates the ethical judgments of the world . . . 521 423. Hate father, mother, wife, children, brethren, sisters, and one's own life ........ 523 424. The loftiest judgment of the world sustains His negations . 524 425. The space-consciousness alone rationalises His and His Father's negations ........ 524 426. Jesus negates the ethical values placed on Life and Death . 525 427. Jesus disclaims originating His conception of Good. He avows it Cosmic . . . . . .526 428. Jesus unites Goodness and Righteousness : Cosmic Good is Father Righteousness . . . . . .527 429. Why Jesus employs the term " Father " . . . .528 430. The Father Realisation of God never before really known to the world ........ 529 431. Jesus however transcends Father-Goodness in Space-Goodness 530 432. Good or Evil cannot be predicated of God-Being . . 531 433. Jesus as Relative-Good and Whole-Good .... 532 434. The process by which Jesus conceives Absolute Good . . 533 435. The ' I am ' judgment negates all relativity of Good and Evil . 534 436. The origin of Evil as of Good found in human judgment only . 535 437. The * Last Judgment ' . . . . -537 438. The relative judgments of Righteousness and Sin . . 538 439. Judgments of relativities cannot be referred to Absolute Being . 538 440. Jesus the ultimate reference for sin, or for its negation . . 539 xxiv CONTENTS SECT. PAGE 441. The last of all judgment upon the earth .... 539 442. Judgment from the Son transcended in the Father . .541 443. Jesus aims to abolish all judgment-condemnation from the earth, as man has conceived it . . . . .541 444. To do so He makes Himself sole judge of Man, and then as Father judgeth no man ..... 542 445. Justice and Judgment incompatible with Jesus' Absolute Ethos . 542 446. These have been expedients in the history of man . . 543 447. Jesus aims at whole-perfection for the world . . . 543 448. Jesus' vision of Personified Evil fallen as Lightning . . 544 CHAPTER XVI JESUS' CONSCIOUSNESS, I AM 449. Relativity of Sin, and the Sinless consciousness . . . 546 450. Historicity and the ultimate consciousness of Truth. (Sects. 237 and 471) . . -552 451. Bishop Westcott on the * I Am' statements in St John . .554 452. Jesus as Psychologist and Philosopher . . .554 453. The Incarnation . . . . . -555 454. Jesus as ' Human' and 'Divine' . . . . -556 455. ' I Am ' our highest expression of Being .... 557 456. Transcendence of God-terms rational . . . 558 457. The Sinless Consciousness . 558 458. Jesus' leniency with sinners ..... 560 459. 'Who say ye that I am?' ...... 560 460. The Nicene Council . . . . . .561 461. Substance and Unity limitative . . . . .561 462. Being and the ' I am ' statements ..... 562 463. Test of Truth and transcendence of Time . . . 563 464. Jesus' Timeless experience ...... 564 465. Transcendence of Life and Time ..... 564 466. The I-consciousness self-sufficient ..... 565 467. H. Spencer and J. S. Mill on Reality as certified . . .565 468. The apple, the Universe, and the 'I Am' . . . .567 469. "Before Abraham was" . ... 568 * 470. Buddha-Personality. (Sect. 305) . . . . .569 471. History defective for Truth. (Sects. 237 and 450) . . 569 472. Creation and abolition of Sin . . . . .571 473. "Except ye believe That-I -Am" . , f , .571 CONTENTS XXV SECT. 474. ' I Am ' means more than ' 1 exist ' 475. Life and Death necessary to reveal what-man-is 476. Apparent double consciousness in man 477. " Whither I go, ye know the way '' 478. ' I Am ' knows neither Time nor Eternity 479. The Atonement .... 480. The fundamental principle in Atonement . 48 1 . Jesus' final command to the Church 482. Jesus' gift of the Holy Spirit and Pentecost 483. At-one-ment is ontological before ethical . 484. Repentance and the Space-Consciousness 485. " Know Thyself " .... 486. "Power on earth to forgive sins" . 487. " Until seventy times seven " 488. Jesus and Judas .... 489. Highest Good in an Imperial Crime 490. Life not an absolute value . 491. All-Kenosis is All-Pleroma 492. God Immanent or Transcendent . 493. The changing conception of * God ' 494. The noblest endeavour of the human mind 495. The Saviour of the world . PAGE 571 572 574 575 575 577 578 579 580 583 584 585 585 586 586 587 587 588 588 590 59i 591 INDEX 593 SPACE AND PERSONALITY CHAPTER I THE SOUL 1. Deep in the general convictions of men lies the belief that some Great One lives, moves, and has his being in the vast expanse which we call Space. The Greeks designated this Great One by the name of Pan, thus personalising Universal Nature in a fable which, says Bacon, " is perhaps the noblest of antiquity, and pregnant with the mysteries and secrets of nature." The Persians, also, according to Herodotus (i. 131), were accustomed to call "the whole circle of the heavens by the name of Zeus," an expansive personalisation of space which finds a profoundly sympathethic reflection in the experience of those Israelites who, on ascending a mountain with Moses, "saw the God of Israel : and there was under his feet as it were a paved work of sapphire stone, and as it were the very heaven for clearness" (Exod. xxiv. 10). Wherever, indeed, man has found himself, in any time, or in any part of the earth, he has inevitably felt conscious there of some being, personal or impersonal, good or evil, god or demon, in every space around him. Under innumerable desig- nations, this Everywhere-Thing has maintained a power over the awe- felt cognitions of the entire race of mankind. The phenomenon is a very interesting one from the fact that Space and Personality are thus invariably associated together, albeit in the most general way ; and also, that man, wherever in space he may find himself, always finds 'person- ality,' not himself, which he cannot divorce from that space. 2. Whereupon, spontaneously, the question arises as to the i A 2 SPACE AND PERSONALITY basis which must exist in the human mind for such a universally accepted consciousness, and as to the possibility of reaching some rational datum which should co-ordinate Space and Personality in a generalisation of identity, and so justify to our intelligence that strong affirmation of the Omnipresence of God which, as a matter of faith, is asserted by all the great religions. That such a faith exists is attested by all the forms and utterances of devotion, and one somehow instinct- ively leans to the view that whatever is so rooted in faith must surely grow up out of, and blossom under, the fruit-bearing forces of reason. Clearly, if the Deity be everywhere, and Space be also the Everywhere-Thing, then the All of Space and this Deity must have identity at least in extension. But this conclusion, though considerable, is far from what we seek. For this Deity, where reason is concerned, must be looked upon as chiefly an abstraction of the human mind, variable in the thought of every age and of every man ; and as Space is not admitted to have any personality, as we understand that term, such an identity of these great conceptions could not logically, or scien- tifically, give us a satisfactory personal identity. The utmost result we could obtain by such data would be that a personal Deity was Everywhere in an impersonal everywhere space. This of course is the ordinary content of the popular creeds of religion, but on such a basis it does not appear that we could intelligently ascribe personality to either space or the Deity. Some kind of individuation might be construed for either, answering to Fate, Necessity, Chance, and similar entities of the fancy, but both the ancient and the modern consciousness ascribe personality to the Deity at least ; and why worshipping men should find a personal Everywhere-Deity when the Every- where-Thing we call Space is denied personality, and even individuation, seems to be a problem requiring a fuller know- ledge of what personality means for its better elucidation. Personality indeed can only be assured to reason on behalf of anything, through the affirming consciousness of each person, a consciousness in which reason moves and acts, and, con- sequently, before the conception that space is personal can be brought under the categories of reason, it must be shown to be personal in the consciousness of each individual. We see THE SOUL 3 how the conception has persisted in the common consciousness of the race, so as to confirm in the convictions of some of the most advanced nations a consciousness of Deity and Space as constituting One Object of worship ; and if such a conception lies in the racial consciousness, and in the consciousness of peoples, it must necessarily have seat and centrality in the consciousness of the individual. Therefore we seem warranted in enquiring whether or not the identity of Space and Personality be a fact sustained by the concurrent consciousness of every human being. 3. The study of space thus rests ultimately, as indeed do all other studies, on the study of personality. But personality is really the grand enigma, " so difficult is it even for the strongest," as Carlyle says in his " Burns " Essay, " to make this primary attainment, which seems the simplest of all, to read its own consciousness without mistakes ; without errors, involun- tary or wilful." This means that if consciousness is to be made and all authorities are agreed that it must be made the sole authority and foundation of all we are to believe and think, then we have to ask, Among the countless pre- sentations and representations of our personal consciousness, which of them are we to select finally as the Primal, or as the Germans might say, the Ur-consciousness ? Ancients and moderns alike assume that man is 'personal.' But what actually have they concluded the true content of a ' personality ' to be, after a final analysis of that consciousness ? What, in short, are we to consider ourselves conscious of when we say " I " ? The answer is one which psychology should answer. But at no period of the history of psychology have so many different statements of the content of this " I "- consciousness been formulated as in our own and recent generations. Does this " I " give us an affirmation of unity or duality, soul and body, mind and matter, or simply of Soul? And if just Soul, what is its content? Are we to accept the statement that we are conscious of this Soul-content as being ' Spirit,' or an * Ego ' with an unknown somewhat beyond ? What is certain in the assertions of psychology regarding the consciousness of ' personality ' ? Apparently, none whatever. There is abundant introspective analysis by the most approved 4 SPACE AND PERSONALITY scientific methods; every neuk and cranny of the conscious " I " is investigated and pondered, but the delivered judgments on what is found there are varied and conflicting. The majority seem to maintain that the content of this " I " yields incontest- ably a duality of Subject and Object, Thinker and Thing- thought, with the corollaries of ' Mind ' and ' Matter,' and innumerable co-relatives associated with these. But this affirmation never appears to satisfy psychologists themselves, who leave the impression on the anxious reader that Unity and not Duality of content ought to be the final result of their explorations through the " I "-consciousness. They seem to be conscious that such a Unity does really exist, but, so far, the data of discovery at their disposal does not warrant its scientific proclamation. 4. Philosophy, as a consequence, is ever practically at war with Psychology, and Theology more aggressively so, for while the philosopher diligently rears the architectonic structure of his " Unity," and the theologian confidently founds upon his "faith," the psychologist calmly points out to both that they build in vain until all can be verified in the facts of conscious- ness ; and these facts, he firmly maintains in turn, are fixedly dual and only dual in Spirit and Nature, Self and Not-Self, Being and Non-Being, Mind and Matter, and all the relative 'others' of the active Intellect. Accordingly, Unity cannot be psychologically predicated of Being. The same conflicting state of matters prevails with regard to Space. From the days of the early Greek philosophers, the Milesians, down to the latest learned expositor of Mind, the reality or non-reality of space has been the subject of earnest but unsatisfactory debate. This again seems to point to psychological shortcomings, or a psychology, at least, which has neglected to take into its sum of data the whole of the facts which are given us in consciousness. For our consciousness as to the reality of Space is always immeasurably deeper than the reasoned conclusions of systematic psychology. There seem to be voices crying from within us for which no organon exists by which their message may be interpreted through Life and Reason. A comprehensive view, indeed, of the achieved results of psychology and philosophy with regard to what THE SOUL 5 we are to accept as true concerning both Space and Personality, begets in one, at first glance, a conviction that if these results are all that such powerful sciences have to offer to mankind on so great themes, then either Consciousness itself is at fault, and not to be trusted, or else that all the facts which Conscious- ness yields have not been taken up into their expositions. We confess at once that our leanings are towards the latter con- viction, and if it be true, then there exists a genuine necessity, in the interests of the highest things, to seek, however im- perfectly, for another path. No man who professes to have at heart the future well-being of mankind, can contentedly see Religion coldly divided from Philosophy, and both from Science, with the most calamitous results to human society following ultimately, without making some sacrifices towards redemption. And notwithstanding that in every department of human thought and devotion there is groaning and travailing in pain together until now over this intellectual disintegration, it does not appear that despair need be our only portion, for wherever there is Life there is also, as all past history proves, the Light of men. Inevitably, every human life holds in it not merely " birth and death, an infinite ocean," but also " a seizing and giving the fire of Living," and the unrevealed "gleam, the light that never was." In this, as in all mundane experience, the difficulty is not in having a battle to fight, but in wisely accepting a victory already won. For neither Time nor Eternity has required to wait till we should overcome it. 5. Let us then, as far as our necessity compels, examine the net content of that consciousness which we possess when we think or reflect upon our Self, Soul, I, Ego, or Spirit. Every- one has such a possession, and everyone has a certain content of thought regarding it. The philosopher as well as the fool begins with this experience. Consequently, there is little dis- cernible divergence of opinion regarding this fundamental content in the common mind. The vast mass of reflecting people undoubtedly accept to-day the same position which both Socrates and Plato occupied with reference to the individual " Soul." We are to remember, however, that these great minds were bent upon an ethical rather than a"n ontological explana- tion of human existence, and as a consequence, they simply 6 SPACE AND PERSONALITY entertained without any prolonged enquiry the presence of a " soul " in every man as an undisputed fact. There is indeed evidence enough of hesitations on their part as to how this " soul " comes into the body at first, where it goes at death, what may be its highest good, how it best can attain to this chief good, what relation it holds to the body, and such like considerations, but they accept the fact of a true thing called a " soul " as being enclosed for a time within the human frame, in much the same way that we all accept the fact that there is a kernel enclosed within the shell of a nut. They hold, generally, that this " soul " is self-intact, that it can leave the body which defiles it, be ferried over streams in a boat, stand clearly in the presence of its judges, walk about fields, undergo pains, and experience all the changes associated with our mundane existence. They visualise the " soul," in brief, as most people do yet, viz., as something in our body which is concrete and substantial, while being at the same time immaterial, simple, indivisible, incapable of growth or decrease, and free. This popular view of the " soul " was not only held by the ancient philosophers, but was likewise, as the late Prof. W. James has shown in his Psychology, the belief of the Middle Ages, and was further accepted by Hobbes, Descartes, Locke, Leibnitz, Wolf, and Berkeley, and is yet defended by the entire modern dualistic or spiritualistic or common-sense School. A more detailed account will be found in Prof. Bain's Mind and Body^ chap, vii., and in Lotze's Metaphysic^ Book III., chaps, i. and v. And without doubt, for all ordinary purposes of thought and devotion, as well as for the uses of literature, it is quite a convenient and comfortable view. It gives to the introspective gaze a substantial object on which to rest, similar to what is granted to the eye in nature, with a sense of substantial endurance irreducible by death which is pleasing to every one who contemplates that dreaded event. But it is a view which, both to philosophy and to psychology, and still more to science, is impossible and inadmissible. It can only be regarded as an assumption, made in loyalty to ourselves, and as one that satisfies our just curiosity to know what it is that thinks, feels, and wills within us. Philosophy cannot entertain such a con- ception because the absolute unity which is her consuming THE SOUL 7 passion, demands that both * body ' and ' soul ' be sublated in a ' reality ' which must be * beyond the difference ' of all matter and mind. Psychology which makes it her exclusive business to analyse the mental world as science does the realm of matter, confesses bluntly that nothing can be found in man's 'personality' answering to the conception of this popular "soul." There is undoubtedly a true verification of a vast consciousness in us, she maintains, of thinking, feeling, and willing, and even a consciousness of some Thing which can be spoken of as 1 that which ' thinks, and feels, and wills. And we may agree to call this Thing " Soul," spirit, or Self. But we may call it anything, says the late Prof. James, "what you like Ego, Thought, Psychosis, Soul, Intelligence, Consciousness, Mind, Reason, Feeling " (the last of which he himself preferred), but " the only self we know anything positive about is the empirical Me, not the pure I." He avers that " the critic who vouches for that reality " (and he did not doubt its reality), " does so on grounds of faith, for it is not a verifiable phenomenal thing" (Psychology, i. 363). This, of course, is to confess that the matter surpasses the capabilities of his science. He admits this fact. " If," he says, " the passing thought be the directly verifiable existence which no school has hitherto doubted it to be, then that thought is the thinker, and psychology need not look beyond " (Psychology, i. 401). But as every person, not excluding perhaps even psychologists, refuses point blank to regard his thought as himself, the whole matter rests in the unknown as before. HUME. 6. It was Hume, in his Treatise of Human Nature, who first inaugurated a scientific scepticism regarding the popular faith in a " soul " as a concrete consciousness. Doubtless, countless others before his time had favoured the denial of a 'soul' as well as the denial of a * God.' There are always vagrant minds who have as little difficulty in casting off the burdens of faith and reason as other vagrants have in shedding the burdens of civilisation. Hume's task may be regarded as one that had lain heavily on the sensitive minds of our great ones of both East and West. The "Sacred Books of the East" are as full of this inquiry as are the religious books of the West. For the 8 SPACE AND PERSONALITY problem of the " Soul " is a world-problem. And it is common knowledge that both Bacon and Descartes had modified the ' soul '-conception of popular thought before Hume took up the subject. Bacon adopted the ancient view that the ' soul ' is really dual in its composition, there being " the rational soul " which is divine, and given by the breath of God, and the "irrational soul" which we have in common with the brutes, and which is derived from the 'dust.' (See Plato's Phaedrus : Timaeus: and Phaedo, passim; and Tertullian's De Animal) Descartes, who trusted less to theological notions than did Bacon, in considering this particular topic at least, with the firmness begotten of the scientific habit, boldly placed the ' soul ' as the unit-organ in man, in the pineal gland in the back of the brain. But Hume, wisely shaking off both the conventionalities of theology and such Descartean demonstra- tions in psycho-physiology, took the higher and more laborious way of "entering himself," as he expresses it, examining neither bible nor brain but only that conscious Something in man which both have been created to serve. When he had done so, exploring this Platonian cave of all the mysterious forms and motjons^he frankly asserted that he found nothing there ! Like PioTtfiffi when he entered the holy of holies in the temple of the Jews at Jerusalem, he found the arcanum empty ! Hume did find some things there, but he denies that he found what he was assured by all he might expect to find his Soul. " For my part," he declares, " when I enter most intimately into what I call myself, I always stumble on some particular perception or other, of heat or cold, light or shade, love or hatred, pain or pleasure. I never can catch myself at any time without a perception or other, and never can observe anything but the perception." And such a * perception ' could not be accepted by Hume, as his " Soul." And he was doubtful, after his manner, if anyone on trying the experiment, would be more successful. Of such a one he thought, " he may, perhaps, per- ceive something and continu'd, which he calls himself, tho' I am certain there is no such principle in me " (On Personal Identity). Now we should not misunderstand Hume. He is not denying the actual existing thing which we are conscious we are. He is simply affirming that there is nothing in the THE SOUL 9 consciousness of any person which corresponds to the popular soul-idea. And we are safe to say that this psychological diagnosis has been confirmed as thoroughly true by every candid psychologist worthy of the name since Hume's day. All have followed him in courageously abandoning a mentally false position. Hume did not attempt " to rob men of their souls" as it has been phrased, but to rob them of the untrue conception of the Soul which both theologians and philosophers had all along accepted. His reason was a clear one. It is not within the powers of mind to think the kind of soul which our consciousness desiderates. We demand a Continuum for our 'soul/ but Hume proved that before we can have a con- ception of a continuous unchangeable substratum equal to that which is named the ' soul,' we must first have " the continuous existence of the perceptions of our senses." He first postulated in his system that our senses give us " Impressions," and that these " Impressions " in turn give us " Ideas." Consequently, it was impossible to have a continuous idea of the soul, for the reason that we never have a continuous perception or * impres- sion ' of anything. Nevertheless Hume did little in his own day, and less has been done since, perhaps, to shake the marvellous consciousness of unity which all possess as to the real beings we are. We also think that he carried his scepticism beyond its just boundaries when he asserted that " the identity which we ascribe to the mind of man, is only a fictitious one," and that further, " Identity is nothing really belonging to these different perceptions, and uniting them together, but is merely a quality, which we attribute to them, because of the union of their ideas in the imagination, when we reflect upon them." The over- whelming consciousness in all men which maintains the unity of what we call ' soul ' or ' self,' cannot be disposed of in this way. There are facts in that consciousness which were hid from the eyes of Hume. What we have to emphasise here, however, is the fact that the belief of the ages in a 'soul' or 'self was by him keenly questioned and firmly passed from. Hume made a valuable contribution to a great problem, and he did so in the scientific way, for it was genuine experience, and an experience which everyone can verify for himself. 10 SPACE AND PERSONALITY KANT. 7. It was this basis of experience which Kant accepted. But he did not accept Hume's conclusions from the data given in it. Hume did not think he was warranted by the facts of his consciousness in believing that there was an identity existing in him of such sufficient factual unity as to be worthy of being individuated by the term * soul ' or ' self.' In his view, what we do when we think of our ' soul,' is to effect a kind of illusive combination of our perceptions in our imagination and reflec- tion, and then to characterise this union of ideas as our identical self or personality, though in actual fact, there is never more within us except particulars, perceptions (* conceptions,' as we now call them), impressions, ideas, and such like. Thus Hume summed up our knowledge of the ' soul.' Kant received this as a true experience, and assumed that it yielded a true knowledge of the self as far as the ' particulars ' were concerned, but he maintained that such knowledge did not exhaust all we are conscious of in the matter of the ( self.' This 'self or 'soul' was, he declared, a Ding-an-sich, a thing-in- itself, and quite by itself, and completely apart from these 1 particulars.' It lay above and beyond the sphere of ideas. Therefore it could not be known. He remarks, " The internal sense, by means of which the mind contemplates itself or its internal state, gives, indeed, no intuition of the soul as an object." " I have therefore no knowledge of myself as I am, but merely as I appear to myself. The consciousness of self is thus very far from a knowledge of self." " We cognise our own subject only as phenomenon, and not as it is in itself." Kant thus limited all knowledge to the sphere of phenomena, and placed the "Soul" absolutely outside of that sphere. Still, beyond this sphere of the knowable there was that of experi- ence upon which all knowledge is based, and Kant held that we have certain a priori conceptions which in turn are a priori conditions of the possibility of such experience. "The whole aim of the transcendent deductions of all a priori conceptions is to show that these conceptions are a priori conditions of the possibility of all experience." In other words, experience is necessary to knowledge, but there is something necessary to experience. For experience itself is based in the intuitions of THE SOUL 11 space and time which become the ' form ' of all our cognitions, and these ' forms ' in turn rise out of the ' something ' of which we are conscious when we say " I." Beyond the ' forms ' of space and time, however, all is blank. Within that blank dwells the " Soul," the " I," the " Self," but we can only say so by a kind of faith-consciousness, a belief completely void of all cognitional content. It is on the same level as an algebraic x. It is the Unknown, the Noumenon, the Ding-an-Sich. The all- important point remains, however, that although unknown as it is, yet it is, and is in and through all our ' impressions and ideas/ and is what knows and experiences. It is therefore One, and we are always conscious that it is identical with our * self,' or, theologically, our " Soul " (Critique of Pure Reason, passim). Kant in this way restored the " soul " to mankind of which Hume had apparently deprived it, but he also forever rent it from all unity with Nature. Thought and Being could never be One, for this " Soul " of man was alone by itself, a thing-in- itself, and though in thought it was not of thought, but severely by itself, and was the Noumenon. Standing over against it, divided by a great gulf fixed, were Nature, or the Heavens and the Earth, the body itself, and even Thought, Feeling, and Will. These were merely phenomena, and could not be one with the Noumenon. Men were apparently content to have the restora- tion of the ' soul ' on these terms, even although the Universe remained cleft in two. It seemed agreeable that the spiritual and the natural should thus be shown to be perfectly apart and in their own proper places, with ' God ' transcending all things, and not one with anyone or anything, as the Man of Galilee had affirmed. This famous deliverance of Kant, pleasing, profound, and impressive as it proved, wrought disastrous consequences in the end. For it was evident that if the ' soul ' could not be known then neither could * God.' Neither could the origin, or origins of the Cosmos be objects of our cognition. Kant, as a matter of fact, became the unintentional founder of modern Agnosti- cism. He himself indeed was at great pains to show that God could never be known. (See 198 A.) He Who knows every- thing is Himself Unknown a doctrine which has been well- voiced in our time through such writers as Spencer, Huxley, Sir Leslie Stephen, and many others. 12 SPACE AND PERSONALITY HEGEL. 8. And it was in this philosophical condition that Hegel found the Human Mind. For other thinkers who immediately followed Kant altered nothing of Kant's foundations. But with Hegel we enter upon a new field of vision, and other horizons bound the mental world. Hegel accounts for the " soul " by seeking to account for everything. Kant and Hume had dealt with the * particulars ' and ' phenomena ' of our individual con- sciousness. Hegel abandoned this method and sought his data in the absolute. Instead of working from the content of the human consciousness outward to the Absolute, he began his philosophy by sweeping, so to say, all Existence entirely bare of content. With Hegel, not even ' In the beginning ' is spared. What remains is the clearest vision of the absolute IS, or rather, is-ness, as Dr Stirling has it (Secret of Hegel), and this, Hegel names BEING. Then having swept the ALL clean of content, and deprived Being of every predicate, we are necessarily com- pelled to accept this pure Is-ness as ' Nichts ' or Nothing. When we have done so, Hegel then asks us further to consider this Nothing as identical with BEING, for it is. That is to say, " BEING and NOTHING are the same." With Hegel, then, we take up a position which surrounds both Hume's ' particulars ' and Kant's * noumenon ' and ' phenomenon ' in a wider predicate of Being. ' God,' Self, Nature, are submerged, and swallowed up in BEING, and this BEING and what we call NOTHING are identical. The identity of the ALL is complete. The cleft universe of Kant disappears, and his bewildering ' Manifold ' with all its seething categories and interminable relatives and co-relatives ceases from troubling in the grave of all cognition. Hegel plants one foot on * Noumenon ' and the other on ' Phenomenon/ and proclaims every a priori intuition to be no more ! The ALL is ; and it is ONE. If now we should ask, as little confident of this Unity as of Kant's Duality, whence then the differences of things ? are we to be deprived of all difference ? Hegel replies No, for the same Identity always yields us BEING and NOTHING likewise. They are the same, but they yield also difference. And this principle of ' identity in difference, and difference in Identity,' he THE SOUL 13 believed to be the grand potential which was able to solve all the perplexities and mysteries of Existence. For, from this principle, we could easily discern Creation, as it is usually understood, acquiring the necessary potentiality of BECOMING, and from this again as BECOME, we could then see all things, ourselves and the rest, first take adumbration and form, and so become further what they appear to be in our thought and consciousness. What we regret is that Hegel never explained how he procured the motional force which set out from Being and Nothing in its Becoming. We are almost tempted to say that Hegel's method is one not unknown to Algebra. For example, Something assumed to be absolute is unknown, but we want to know it. Let, then, BEING stand for this unknown. 'BEING' is a mere symbol: an x in the problem. Call it ' NOTHING.' These terms are, he asserts, " empty abstractions " (' Seyn und Nichts leere Abstrak- tionem Sind'). He even scorns them in his regal way. But they fulfil the same purpose that.r does in an algebraic problem, viz., they posit that something IS. Now this is an immense gain. Actually, it is everything ; for it is not merely a par- ticular such as ' God,' Soul, Nature, Mind, Universe, or Matter. It includes all these. It is the pure Absolute. But by that fact it cannot be thought by any thinker. For thought must first become conception, and no conception can hold the Absolute, any more than a teacup can hold the ocean. Teacup, conception, and ocean, are all finite and relative things. But IS, is just the same as if we could think NOTHING. That is to say, it is beyond Thought. But if x, which is equal to IS, includes All, then it includes all that has become to our consciousness ; and out of this posited IS, seeing that it is All, must have come ' God,' Soul, Universe, and All. They must have Be-come. From the Absolute they have come into the realm of thought. From BEING and NOTHING, therefore, we have 'Becoming'; or, the Unknown ^r-thing is realised as possessing a content of knowledge for the human mind. " For," says Hegel, " becoming is the first concrete thought, and therefore the first notion : whereas Being and Nought are empty abstractions. The notion of Being there- fore, of which we sometimes speak, must mean Becoming : not the mere point of Being, which is empty Nothing, any more 14 SPACE AND PERSONALITY than Nothing which is empty Being. In Being then we have Nothing, and in Nothing Being : but this Being which does not lose itself in Nothing is Becoming" (Logic, Wallace's Trans., p. 167). But we have not yet reached the full content of the ^r-thing : IS : the Absolute. We only know what BECOMING is. It is "the first concrete thought and therefore the first NOTION." But we cannot say ' first ' to an Absolute. BE-COMING, therefore, must be only the first possible historical thought, and therefore the first possible historical NOTION. But if this 'BE-COMING' is real, then the .r-thing must also be real, for BE-coming has come out of the ^r-thing, the only origin it could have. And now regressing in thought with this fact, BECOMING being concrete thought, and therefore real NOTION, it follows that therefore the ^-thing, which up to this point has been assumed as equal only to the abstractions BEING and NOTHING, may now be considered as an ^r-thing which is equal to real concrete thought, and therefore real concrete NOTION, the real concrete Absolute. And BEING and NOTHING being only abstractions, assumed for purposes of reasoning, may now be cast away, and " Absolute Notion " be substituted instead as the final word on the mystery of the ages. For out of this " Absolute Notion," or as it was preferred later, the " Absolute Spirit," Hegel declared the All to proceed. And so by his method he believed that he had carried out " the unity of knowing and being, and so of a priori and a posteriori, to complete identity," or, had accomplished that Unity of Being which Kant left rent in twain. And accepting Hegel's position as true, Prof. E. Caird is able to say : " It follows that the objective world is and can be nothing but the manifestation of intelligence, or the means whereby it attains the fullest realisation of itself. Thus it is proved that there is a spiritual principle of unity a principle of unity which is renewed in every conscious self underlying all the antagonisms of the world, even its apparent antagonism to spirit itself. For such a self, therefore, there can be no absolute limit, or irreconcilable division, within or with- out" (Hegel, p. 185). But it is just here, in the postulation of an " objective world," where Hegel fails to substantiate his case. His Thought and Notion never give us a certainty in our consciousness that Life THE SOUL 15 and Spirit, with all that the objective world means in our con- sciousness of it, are contained in them. The IS which he posits to begin with, calling it BEING and NOTHING, is never raz/to our consciousness in the same way that we are conscious of our own reality. He calls it " Absolute," but it is a mathematical or logical absolute, an x : and, search as we please, we never find the consciousness of our Self in it. No one finds the conscious- ness in it which enables him to say with every certainty, " This is I ; I am this." It seems to be the old trickery of words. Put Thought to its sports and it will say, "If anything is absolutely everything, then it must necessarily include Nothing as well as Something. Then let Being be this Everything. Therefore Being is equally Nothing as Something. Therefore Being and Nothing are the same, and also Being and Something are the same. Therefore Nothing and Something are the same." But this never settles the question which is always raised by consciousness, viz., What is the " anything " that is absolutely Everything ? Do we find the consciousness of reality, and especially of our own reality, in this " Absolute Notion " in which Hegel subsumes Every- thing? He traces Reality back through the "first concrete thought" BECOMING. That should mean that we are conscious of having Be-come. But no mortal ever yet has been conscious of this process. We are conscious that we are, but we are never conscious of having become, or yet of becoming. We only believe this. If we ever had such a consciousness of becom- ing, Hume's old puzzle that we never know the process from Cause to Effect would be falsified. We are convinced that the 1 BECOMING ' of Hegel is as much an abstraction, an ' empty abstraction/ as are his symbol-words BEING and NOTHING. It is not concrete ; otherwise we should find its concreteness certified by our consciousness of ourselves in which it should take its thought-origin. Consequently, when this 'first concrete thought ' is found to be not concrete, the * Notion ' which he evolves out of his ' BEING ' falls with it. Hegel therefore fails to connect his ' Begriff/ his Absolute Notion, with the ' objective world ' of our consciousness, and fails still more in identifying its reality with the consciousness of reality which everyone has of himself. No more, we think, does he prove, as the Master of Balliol declared, that " there is 16 SPACE AND PERSONALITY a spiritual principle of unity ... in every conscious self, under- lying all the antagonisms of the world," for the term " Spirit," like BEING, NOTHING, and BECOMING, has not the slightest consciousness of reality underlying it in our consciousness of ourselves. Who is conscious of anything in himself that he can name " spirit " ? No one. Hegel assumes the very thing he sets out to prove. We ask, " What am I ? " He says, " Notion." And we have seen that this is reached through the "concrete" BECOMING which is not concrete, but an abstract symbol merely, and gives to no Self a consciousness of reality. But again when we ask, " What is this Notion ? " Hegel answers, " Spirit," without the slightest proof of any kind. Still, con- fident that he must be right, we reflect upon what we are, in order to discover if we possess a real consciousness of this ' spirit ' in us, and we find that it is not there. What we do find is the old crowd of Anschauungen and Vorstellungen^ ' intuitions/ ' perceptions,' and ' ideas/ but not the least verification of a * spirit.' We conclude, therefore, that it is a mere theological importation, and as illusive as Hume's ' self.' We do not doubt the ' principle of unity/ however, for this is given in our consciousness, but its ' spirituality ' is a characterisation which is unwarranted by the facts of consciousness, which anyone can verify for himself. 9. Prof. Seth Pringle-Pattison justly says with regard to this defective point in the Hegelian System, " Hegel speaks in strictness, from beginning to end of his system, neither of the divine Self-consciousness nor of human self-consciousness, but of Self-consciousness in general neither of the divine Spirit nor of human spirits, but simply of ' Spirit.' The process of the world, for example, is viewed as the realisation of spirit or self-conscious intelligence. But spirit is an abstraction ; intelli- gence is an abstraction, only spirits or intelligences &R. real. It is the same even when we come to absolute spirit a case which might seem at first sight to leave no loophole for doubt" . . . " * absolute spirit ' has no more necessary reference to a concrete Subject than the simple 'spirit' or intelligence which preceded it." " If we scrutinise the (Hegelian) system narrowly we find Spirit or the Absolute doing duty at one time for God and at another time for man " . . . " We never have the two together, THE SOUL 17 but sometimes the one and sometimes the other a constant alternation, which really represents two different lines of thought in the system, and two different conclusions to which it leads. But the alternation is so skilfully managed by Hegel himself that it appears to be not alternation but union " {Hegelianism and Personality^ pp. 159, 160, 164). We may then conclude that the net contribution from Hegel, as far as the 'Self or 'Soul' is concerned, is nil. It was so to be expected. For Hegel does not appeal to con- sciousness, the consciousness of each individual man, but to logic ; and the convictions which are generated in us by his reasoning are logical convictions, and have no basis in the testimonies of that ( principal of unity ' which we consciously name our Self. Consequently, on such ground, when there is no deeper assurance given to the Self, the Self is never fundamentally certain of anything, itself included, however ably the reasoning may be perfected. Hegel really left the actual sphere of experience in his search for the ' soul.' He felt what most speculative thinkers have felt since his day, that to find the " Soul " is to find the All. And consequently he brooded over the conception of Universal Existence. A conception of Being consumed him. But he wanted to encompass it by mere Thought-Grip : an instinct which has profoundly sacred antecedents. For both Hindu and Scandinavian long ago visualised Existence as encompassed by Form, in the likeness of a serpent upholding the ALL by grasping its tail in its mouth ! Hegel's originality consists in his conceiving this ALL-enclosing Thing as abstract- ing itself from itself until there is no remainder ; Existence vanishing with it ! Being then Becomes from what is not left I Hegel's conception never transcends Process. No sooner is all abstracted by such consumption, than the ALL which has so regressed upon itself and into itself returns again from itself by Becoming. And Becoming constitutes, he says, the Concrete, and ' the first concrete thought.' His Ultimate consciousness of Being is that of Process ; and regarding this finding we must always emphasise the fact that no testimony of our consciousness ever supports it as an ultimate. Hume was right in this. We never can find in our consciousness any trace of Cause proceeding over into B 18 SPACE AND PERSONALITY Effect. Process of Being is never indeed of consciousness at all, but of inductive thought. It is conception and not Being ; and as Hegel began with it, so he ended in it. Modern thinkers do not rise higher than this conception of Process of Existence. Bergson may be taken as our latest example. Unlike Hegel, however, he finds no need to abstract the ALL before the ALL begins to be. He stands upon scientific postulates only ; and ' absolute origins ' therefore do not come within his purview. He contemplates the ALL-THING as evolv- ing and developing itself by a process which is self-contained and self-determined. If the ALL ever ate itself up, what Science now clearly beholds is the reversal of the process, and the uncoiling of itself out of itself through 'impulses' which are self-subsistent and self-sufficient, and which, in the grand aggregate of its particulars, is to be universalised in terms of Cosmos and Nature ; ourselves, ' souls ' and bodies, being bound up in the universality. Bergson asserts that Evolution is Creative: Process is also Being. And consequently the ALL is still creating itself. Neither God, the Universe, nor man is yet finished ! And again we feel ourselves on sand ; for we have not the faintest testimony in our consciousness that we are under such a process. We have no consciousness, we repeat, of becoming, but only and solely of being what-we-are. Bergson, like Hegel, closes in a concept but not in a consciousness of Being. However, he avoids absolutising his concept in one completed ' Notion,' as Hegel did, and leaves us with an unfinished broadening vista of Being going ever onward yet more to be. ' I ' is assumed to be incompleted ' Am.' Being is also assumed to be absolutely dependent upon this Process ; this 'creative evolution.' And, as a result, Consciousness herself is gravely impeached in respect of her ultimate affirma- tions of Reality or of what Is, and stands condemned at the bar of Scientific Inductive Reason. For Is, nor less nor more, is her fixed and final testimony. So it would seem that we now stand at the highest elevation of philosophical thought just as feebly certain regarding the Personality of man, as when Plato dreamed and Hume doubted. And the ablest minds of our own time are just as discouraging. We have quoted, for America, the late Prof. W. James. For THE SOUL 19 Britain, Prof. F. H. Bradley assures us, after a studious analysis of the Soul-question, universally praised, that, "in whatever way the self is taken it will prove to be Appearance," " appearance and error ; " and he thus concludes " our search has conducted us again not to reality but mere appearance " (Appearance and Reality, pp. 104, 120). 10. Thus baffled to resolve the difficulties of the Soul- problem on a basis of thought, modern students seem disposed to try the category of Life in its explication. Experience, that is to say, which is wider than thought, offers a broader founda- tion for a possible scientific inclusion of both body and soul, of both the " Me " and the " I " consciousness in the unit-presenta- tion of Personality. Hence it is conjectured that light may be found in the theories known as Interactionism, Parallelism, and Epiphenomenalism. The question attacked by all three is the relation of the brain to its thought. And every such theory must confront the further question of the deeply-rooted con- viction of the survival of the ' soul ' after death. The Inter- actionist accepts the fact that mind and brain interact upon each other, but that the connection amounts to nothing more than one between cause and effect, and the unity is merely one of intellect and volition. The Parallelist holds that neither mind nor brain can influence each other. There is only a parallel existence, * yet, on the other hand, they are represented as being so closely related that to every change in the mental series a change in the physical series exactly corresponds.' The Epiphenomenalist sees a causal relation between mind and brain, but avers that causation comes all from the substance of the brain, our conscious states being solely due to the molecular changes in the brain. The 'soul' in such a theory becomes a mere mental shadow. The problem has been still further complicated by the acceptance by some savants of the Telepathic theory, whereby it is said one mind can com- municate thoughts and feelings to another. One body is seen to act upon another body ; why should not mind act upon mind? But assuming that it did, the unit-relation between mind and body is not thereby established. The spheres of body and ' soul ' seem as far apart as ever : like interacting with like but not with unlike. 20 SPACE AND PERSONALITY n. The cardinal lack in all such theories of the Soul, from the earliest times till now, is a common basis for both the * material ' and the ' immaterial ' of which there is a con- sciousness in the identical thinker. And unless this basis exists in fact and not merely as a product of thought, the * soul '-problem must forever remain unsatisfactory to both psychology and science. And as this * soul '-fact is the assumed basis of theology, until such a basis is forthcoming it is clear that the world of knowledge stands broken in fragments, while all the time a consciousness is rampant in every thinking mind that that world is one whole. Our consciousness is constantly at variance with all our theories of being, no matter whether our knowledge is mental, moral, or material. The intense irritability which pervades every sphere of cog- nition follows as a consequence. It does not help us to assume, with some, that personality is a ' development ' (Garvie), with a suggestion that the basis of unity may be found in the principal of Evolution ; nor with others that our personality is not wholly embodied at present, but is being so, Incarnation being suggested as the uniting fact (Lodge); for neither of these suggestions gets rid of the persistent con- sciousness of duality which still abides its assertion. What evolves, and what incarnates, are accompanying interrogations which complain for a fuller answer. Both are mere processes in a Something which proceeds, and which uses either the * material ' or the ' immaterial ' as it willeth, and easily unites, in our consciousness of it, both what we call ' personality ' and 1 impersonality.' What we are really in search of is not mere motions or processes of things, even though these should be gigantic enough to involve the Cosmos. Our anxiety is not to think things together, as if in despair, in order to amend by a force of unity what has been left unfinished in their creation. We want to interpret the conscious Wholeness of Being, whereof no possible part or difference is predicable, in order to realise for the All that indivisibility of Being which is so strongly emphasised in our consciousness of What-we-are, the ' I.' In this * I '-consciousness no possible part or distinc- tion, cleavage, or relativity between its parts, or any necessity to unite such together in a ' unity beyond their difference, 1 is ever predicable; and our consciousness of Absolute Being THE SOUL 21 should harmonise with this consciousness of whole I-Being. Philosophy has permitted herself to be persuaded that Being, in its very nature, is cleft and differenced ; and seems to accept the Real and the Unreal to be as absolute in actual Being as they are in logical differentiation ; and it is this invincible scepticism regarding the true consciousness of Whole-Being which requires to be combated at all hazards. 12. In glancing thus from our little height across the vast expanse of human speculation regarding the ' Soul/ we confess that Plato's Cave ever haunts us as reflecting its form and symbolism upon every systematic exposition of Being subsequent to his time. Empirical as sense and images of sense can make it, it seems to constitute a home base for all the idealism of the ages. Simple and natural, it yet focusses and attracts that spirit of curiosity which is the fountain of all philosophical enquiry. Limitation of objectivity, conceptual narrowness of materialisation, are given in the Cave itself; epitomising the Cosmos. Within its confines, universal principles which afford basis for all movements of Nature and human nature are active and tragic. These motions, which yet are ' inanimate,' are exhibited in the ' shadows ' on the wall. They also represent those mysterious motions of feeling, thinking, and willing, which are, and are not, what-we-are. Their shapes, being * personal,' arouse our interest, and we marvel at the unit-destiny which each ' person ' shares with the ' burden ' it carries. Existence is here thirled to Duty ; Being and Ethics rise upon our vision. The flames of the * fire ' suggest life and passion. (See Plato's RepiMic, chap, vii.) Plato, following Socrates, and Aristotle following Plato, turn away from the wide grandeur of heaven and earth. Thought, not Nature, is the Cave they enter. The Concept, not the Percept, alone charms them. Form, Matter, Substance, Cause, are conceived to reveal the secrets of Being. So do they limit the entrance to the Cave. So do they compel all the thought - oppressed and weary to pass within its gloomy limitations. The world comes, in its greatest minds, to stare at the * shadows ' that move forever across the wall with their burdens. And the sense of severance, differentiation, and chasm, seems to open appalling suggestions for the being of universal 22 SPACE AND PERSONALITY creation. For by entering the Cave and staring long at the shadows, even the Christian Mind itself, long after Plato, could see nothing but divided ' persons ' for her God, and the 'burdens' of existence awful and terrible. Bacon came, still long after, and thought by reversing the burdened journey of the personal ' shadows ' across the wall, making their burden inductive rather than deductive, to solve the mystery of the Cave. Descartes could not consent to have the Cave itself included in the same unity of existence with the 'persons.* The 'minds' and the 'matters' could not have anything more than approximate unity ! Kant entered the Cave and emphasised all its objectivities, but with his power of penetrat- ing the 'shadows' themselves, and of seeing through the thick darkness, he transcended wall, persons, burdens, shadows, and all, and insisted that Something, an ;r-being, lay unrevealed within and beyond the wall, of which no one had the least possible conception. It was in a space - by - itself. Hegel, uttering his grim ' mehercule,' resolved to unmask the .r-being from its transcendental hiding-place, and therefore smote the walls of the Cave of mystery, and scattered its ruins under the fury of his logical blasts, and so made end of all Appearance, declaring the remaining ' Nothing' and ' Being' to be One ! Thus the progress of the human mind arrived, after long pilgrimage, at the conclusion, " We are such stuff as " Nothing ! And without possessing the smallest sympathy with the great Hegelian contribution, built up on the demolished site of the Platonian Cave, we must venture to think that the world will yet thank him with all its heart for having erased that Cave to its Nothingness. It, and all it stands for, has been the bugbear of all Thought, and has allured the sincerest to miserable impotence, and sloughed eyes that were made for gazing upon the glories of earth and sky, rather than upon ghosts of wretched conceptualities, dead before born. Hegel is the greater philosopher that he accepted this Nothing -conscious- ness as his sole basis of Thought, bursting all walls of objec- tivity. The pity is that he concentrated his mighty intellect upon the 'stuff' rather than upon the "We." For no mortal will ever be able to find himself, i.e., his actual ' I,' as one with Hegel's 'Stuff,' his Nothing- Being, his 'Notion.' His grand work was really in demolishing the objectivity of the THE SOUL 23 Cave, and liberating the mind of the world. The very fecundity of the philosophical maternity, since Hegel fell on sleep, proves the new freedom and the unshackled speculative powers which he emancipated from the thought - thrall of the Greek Past. As we go forward with our argument, we shall have complaints enough against his system, but we trust never to forget that, philosophically, we are as dust beneath his feet, and that, but for Hegel, the resting-place which we believe we have found for ourself in the All that Flows onwards forever, had remained outside of our experience. It is also our profession here, that to the Master of masters alone is due whatever of light and truth we have been able to unfold throughout this imperfect sketch, but, with that sacred name set far apart from every name, our obligations are principally to Hegel and to the able minds who have translated and expounded his philosophy. What Hegel left us, then, for our study of the * Soul/ is that consciousness of Space which the simulacrum of Plato's Cave and all it implies, hid from every eye till he thrust aside its Objectivity absolutely. But this consciousness of Space no philosopher appears to have found of the least consequence to himself; for although Hegel laid it bare, he himself was never tired of deriding it as " abstract," " empty," " non-being," and, practically, a miserable stray * shadow ' from the old Cave walls, and of no use or value in interpreting the mysteries of absolute Being. Consequently the writer is fully aware of the presumption incurred in saying that this same consciousness of Space, when intelligently considered, contains the most important facts for philosophy, science, and religion ; and that it is this wonder of wonders which gives the true key to Being, contemplated as indivisibly whole. CHAPTER II THE ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 13. Here, then, we stand before the Sphinx, Queen-Spirit of Philosophy, with bowed spirit and dumb prayer, imploring for light. Stony and still, only her eyes direct. What seeth She ? Her vision is the Boundless : a clear, unshadowed gaze upon the Utmost from the Inmost : regressively piercing within as progressively flashing without: scanning the inner Self while ranging through the Cosmos everlastingly. True vision must needs include both. For its path is the Absolute ; eye and soul being but temporary mediates. Could we but stand for a brief moment in the line of the lambent stream of living Truth which flows forever from, and through, her stony imperial personality, as she gazes right onwards across desert and dawn, " with calm eternal eyes ! " It were far from vain. But, as from of old, only through sacrifice can we attain. And She cannot accept less than all. We require to give up, to lose ourselves in her, if we would find that her flint is our own flesh, and her personality our own personality, with a common life pulsing through a common heart beneath every Appearance, and Love and Truth exultant together with the joy of the sons of the morning. 14. So did Hume well to intimately enter into himself, or, in Kant's words, " to undertake the most laborious of all tasks that of self-examination." It is the essential act towards formulating an answer to the grand quest of the " I." There is light gleaming on that path which has drawn the impassioned wonder of every age. " Know Thyself," said the wise Voices of the Past, pondering long. And the greatest, perhaps, of the Moderns has re-echoed the emphatic council, " Read conscious- ness without mistakes." So much the Sphinx-Spirit of philo- 24 ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 25 sophy discerns and experiences. It were indeed a consummate experience. And towards a realisation of it, as our sole trust- worthy guide, much encouragement appears to be given to the philosophical tyro by the confluent opinions of the stalwarts in the battle. " If," says J. S. Mill, " all past experience is in favour of a belief, let this be stated and the belief openly rested on that ground." " Existence, on the whole," asserts Prof. F. H. Bradley, " must correspond with our ideas " ; while Prof. H. Jones assures us that " Our thought is essentially connected with reality." " Our thoughts are expressions of the real nature of things, so far as they go." If, then, these things are in accord with Fact, the stupendous Spatiality which we conceive as ' Nature ' which includes, at least, the ALL that our senses give to us cannot be the Illusion which it is sometimes assumed to be. Truth, Reality, must exist for us. "Experience," "Existence," "Thought" ought not they to be true? Thought ! Experience ! Existence ! How profoundly true they seem. But do they determine themselves as perman- ently, absolutely true ? Are they not under the power of ever- lasting flux and change? Thought gravely affirmed by one century becomes the joke of the next : Experience seems a rope half-spun, Life and Death plaiting with the everlasting : and as for Existence, * heaven and earth shall pass away.' All Flows , as the ancients said. If so, then whence, and whither? Thought, Experience, Existence, do not they appear to be but ships on an ocean? The ocean seems to determine them. They but seem to interpret a deeper Deep of Reality. 15. Then, in the words of Prof. Bradley, " Is the standard of our decisions regarding the universe true or false in reality?" A question which is the crux of the whole matter. For nothing under the heavens nor above them can be of the slightest value to us, ultimately, if it lack the assuring power of reality, or Truth. Now, it seems to be a question of interpretation only, for the consciousness of such reality or Truth is in us all. Hence our distress about it. But it appears to be a consciousness unborn. It never comes to the Natural levels. It seems 26 SPACE AND PERSONALITY attested by everything in 'Matter' and by everything in 4 Mind ' ; the heavens declare its glory, and the earth asserts its goodness ; yet, like the dove, it finds no place of permanent abiding, and ever returns to the ark of its wanderings. How do the philosophers interpret this uncertain Certainty ? Bradley affirms that "there is no reality at all anywhere except in appearance, and in our appearance we can discover the main nature of reality." Again, " The reality itself is nothing at all apart from appearances." " Reality appears in its appearances, and they are its revelation, and otherwise they could be nothing whatever" (Appear, and Real., pp. 550-1). Prof. J. Ward asks still more insistently, "Why should appearances not be reality? Nay, what else can they be? How can reality appear, shine forth, and yet remain totally and forever beyond the knowledge of those to whom they appear ? " (Natur, and Agnost., vol. ii., p. 276). Herbert Spencer states it that our standard of the reality of a thing is the inconceivableness of its negative^ and dignifies this dictum with the name of ' Universal Postulate ' (First Prin. of Psych.}. J. S. Mill in controverting it, declared that " the real evidence for the supposition is not the inconceivableness, but the uniformity of experience" And he adds, " Now this which is the substantial and only proof, is directly accessible." But nothing of all this interpretation ever lifts us above Thought and conceptual experience. We conceive we have the Real in the Appearance, and the Appearance in the Real, and we are not able to conceive a thing to be anything other than what it is, and this seems to make up a kind of * uni- formity of experience ' for us. The dove returns with a leaf, but it returns to the old wandering ark. Such thought and experience are themselves in the Flow of the All, and have no common rock of ages. Such conclusions rest on Thought. We want rather to be assured of that by which such Thought is determined. Let us remember that experience is only a totalising expression for Seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, smelling, thinking, feeling, willing, etc. ; for our sensations and representations ; or for all that we mean when we say, each for ourselves, Matter and Mind. But such experience never con- veys the conviction to anyone of its being self-determined, self-directed, and self-sufficient. It has a general air of totality, ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 27 and so of uniformity ' ; but what determines its totality and its uniformity? Hegel comes to our help considerably, though not perfectly to our satisfaction. " This principle of Experience carries with it the unspeakably important condition that, in order to accept and believe any fact, we must be in contact with it, or, in more exact terms, that we must find the fact united and combined with the certainty of ourselves. We must be in touch with our subject-rrratter, whether it be by means of our external senses, or, else by our profounder mind and our intimate self-consciousness" (Logic, Wallace's trans, p. 12). "In order to accept and believe any fact," ... "we must find the fact united and combined with the certainty of ourselves." In short, the witness to the reality of anything is the witness which is based on the certainty given in the consciousness, " I AM." Nothing is so certain to us as ourselves, and this is out - and - out the most assured Truth we possess. It is also, clearly, the quintessence of all our Experience. 16. Let us now ask, Does the consciousness that 'I Am,' equally affirm the truth of the fact that You are? that the Earth is? that the Cosmos is? Can I have the same un- doubtable conviction that you are that which the earth and Cosmos are, as I have of what I myself am ? Actually, before I can have such a certainty, I must be first convinced of what I myself am. Everything seems undecided until this primary fact can be settled. The reality of what-you- are rests on the consciousness of what-I-am myself. It is asserted that we have a real consciousness of ourselves. This is said to be " Self-Consciousness," or, Consciousness of Self. What actual Reality, then, does this ' Self of our ultimate consciousness render to our convictions ? It is called a Fact. What is the content of that Fact ? We have said that our consciousness of ourselves is the quintessence of all our Experience, and by such testimony we all undoubtedly have a certain vague consciousness of the existence of a form of being which we contentedly call our "SELF," or "SOUL." But in reality, and as also a matter of experience which is far less misty and vague, when 28 SPACE AND PERSONALITY we " enter ourselves," and focus our reflective powers of concentrated Attention upon this ' being ' when we seek to analyse and attempt to grasp what this veritable region of our consciousness actually amounts to, with all its fulness of Anschauungen and Vorstellungen^ together with its vast latent potentialities of generating and evolving Religions, Literatures, Arts, Sciences, and Philosophies, we are surprised to find that the ultimate residuum of Being left to us as certified true or real, is not a consciousness of a' Thought, a Feeling, a Will, a Memory, or a Fancy ; is not the ' particulars ' of Hume ; nor the ' Noumenon ' and ' Phenomenon ' of Kant ; nor yet the * Notion ' or ' Spirit ' of Hegel. Neither is it the ' molecule ' of Science, nor its * atom,' nor its * ion,' or ' electron,' or ' electric charge'; nor is it the 'self of philosophy, nor the 'soul' of theology. We have not the faintest experience of such things. What we truly and really experience is a consciousness of SPACE. The Motions we name Feeling, Willing, Thinking, are there, no doubt, in abundance. But beyond all conscious- ness of every motion is the ultimate consciousness of SPACE. Human language, at least, fails to give us any other term by which to denote it. In strict ultimate accuracy, it is impossible otherwise to denote it. For we cannot put it under any category of conscious thought save that of itself, viz., Space. No other term conveys its concreteness and naturalness and absoluteness. If we say, Spirit, Soul, Self, Ego, Substance, Quantity, Quality, Nous, Number, any thing, it is just as vague and unreal as Kant's * Noumenon ' or Hegel's ' Notion.' Not one of them ever comes into our actual experience. There is no satisfactory interpretation, by either, of the genuine consciousness of What-We-Are. No conscious- ness is given of undoubtable Reality. But this consciousness of Space-Being is a veritable experience, and it is always the ultimate consciousness for our Being. What-I-Am, therefore, must necessarily be characterised as Space, if it must be characterised at all, seeing that this category alone exhausts the true consciousness I have of the Reality I am. No other term comes near it in its exhaustive power of interpretation of the conscious ' I.' Affirmatively, then, to the question, What is the most Real in our experiential consciousness of What-we- are ? the answer must be, Space : or, if we express the same, ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 29 thing negatively, we can only say that it is impossible to think differently of What-we-are and Space. 17. We are quite aware that this reading of consciousness may be deemed inconsiderate and unscientific, seeing that it implies a challenge to Psychology, than whose expounders no class of students of the mental realm stands higher in our respect and admiration. But when psychologists, without exception^ give such unmistakable evidence of being themselves uncertain of, and dissatisfied with, their own readings of consciousness, even an amateur research, though based on independent study, cannot be condemned as wholly pre- sumptuous and unreasonable. Besides, if we are wrong in our conclusions as to our ultimate consciousness, here named Space, the entire argument which we have tried to build on it can be easily disproved by a different interpretation of that great fact. For ourselves, meanwhile, " Ich kann nicht anders. Gott helfe mir." 1 8. We shall now endeavour to show that this Space- Consciousness is the deepest consciousness in all the great philosophical writers, some of the accredited representatives of whom we can only quote, and lies at the base of the three great spheres of Human Knowledge embodied in what we designate Religion, Science, and Philosophy, albeit it is universally neglected and discarded as a datum worthy of consideration in the problem of Being. But as the whole of the following chapters are devoted to proving this Space- Consciousness to be the ultimate one in all human thought and consciousness, the present chapter may be regarded as merely outlining our field of investigation. The question under immediate consideration, viz., The Ultimate standard of our decisions regarding the universe, will be treated at its close on the basis of the data which we shall then seem warranted to assume. We state our position, then, as affirming the sole content of the consciousness of what-we-are, in its ultimate expression, as being only nameable as Space. And our first instinct is-, of course, to revolt from such a statement. For Space connotes, to all ordinary Thought, a mere Nothing, a Null, a Zero- 30 SPACE AND PERSONALITY content, a thing of no value, and of no manner of account for anything. And what we believe to be our ' Soul,' of all that we accept and believe, is usually held to be the absolutely opposite and negative of all this. In our experience, What-we- are counts Everything. Most certainly. We do not seek to destroy, but to fulfil. We only endeavour with the poor abilities at our command, to show that we are all still more than we have valued ourselves to be, by the addition of that Space-value which we have regarded as Nothing ! And the consciousness we all have of Space is certainly a consciousness of greater content-value than we ever possess of anything we call something else. In the most general terms, then, we may say that in every department of human thought, there is found a kind of irresistible trend, a sort of gravitation, as true in Thought as in Physics, towards an ultimate consciousness which, with- out exception, is so reduced in content as to be indistinguish- able from the content we name NOTHING. Every fact, every process of reason, when followed to its utmost possibilities, goes home to a postulate of Nothing, or so-called * Emptiness,' in our consciousness of it. * All Flows ' towards this goal. From the earliest hints of ancient thought down to the most modern statement of our mental content, the VOiD-Conscious- ness presents itself to every enquiring mind, and solicits an audience. It arrives first and it waits last, but being the humblest of the humble, being 'Nothing,' it is respectfully denied consideration. The storm of thundering Reason rushes onwards, bearing on high her mightiest, who search the star- ways for the eternal Unity, the unspeakable Absolute, or the awful Ultimate, and seem oblivious that that very eternal 'Void' which gives both thinkers and thoughts a place and possible being, may be the Resultant of all they seek. It is most assuredly of no account in their age-long quest. 19. When, for example, we seek for the ultimate consciousness of such a mind as that of Plato-Socrates, certain Conceptions are set before us, and no mere conception ever satisfies us. These conceptions of this great Greek consciousness, in their ultimate expression, are styled Self-Existent ' Ideas ' or Forms. They antecede, it is believed, the Universe, or the Cosmos. Yet it is ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 31 always notable that in the formation of this Cosmos there are two, and not merely One, creational factors engaged. These Two, are the aforesaid ' Ideas ' and a co-eternal CHAOS. A divine architect then takes these Ideas and fashions the Cosmos according to them, but he has to contend, at the same time, with a pre-existing power called Necessity, which is represented by the irregular motions of the Primitive CHAOS. This Chaos, better understood by the modern mind under its meaning of 1 GAP ' or ' VOID,' is clearly the Space-Consciousness asserting its presence in the Platonian scheme of the ultimation of exist- ence. Nevertheless, although the ' Ideas ' appear meagre, limited, and subordinate in the presence of the vaster CHAOS with its mysterious, irresistible, and irregular motions, Plato ends his quest by exalting the ' Ideas' and ignoring the 'GAP' or VOID in the ultimates of his philosophy. We are left with a treasure of ' IDEAS ' and Motions, that is to say, determined conceptions ; and the true ultimate consciousness, or that of SPACE, is passed by. He seems to have felt that Thought must needs rest its foundations upon Something, and Chaos, being but wide, wasteful Gap, Void, or Nothing, was impossible ! His Timaeus undoubtedly reveals that space was to him the colossal enigma. But it was never more to him than a concep- tion, a 'receptacle' ('UTTO^OXV), a kind of incubator of all things. Yet he in no way regards space as identical with his own being. He rather conceives it as the essence of difference. It was that which made everything far to everything, and itself farthest off to all. That is to say, Plato and the ancient thinkers found it no more easy to ignore the Space-Consciousness than do the moderns. The power of scientific fact presses all thought nearer and nearer to it irresistibly. There is indeed, in our own days, a peculiar yearning desire in all speculative researches to discover that Unity of Being, that absolute, that ultimate of all ultimation, which will necessarily be 'something,' but which must yet on no account have a content of ' substance,' of 'determination,' or the faintest shadow of Objectivity. The very word ' matter ' is abhorred in such speculations. We should naturally conclude at once, then, that this is the Space- Consciousness, not yet perished in its patience, insinuating an 32 SPACE AND PERSONALITY entrance to the convictions of man ; but Space is not Some- thing but ' Nothing,' and the quest is for * something ! ' 20. Scientific thought at the present time almost dispenses with space. The power of thought is concentrated on 'ions,' as of old the ancients concentrated upon ' atoms,' and space is put out of all consideration. Modern Science seems to have put Space outside of the Real. Intent upon ' Process ! Space, which never seems to proceed, is relegated by science to that fairy region of ' form ' which Kant created, and is simply and only nothing ! The abysmal Void was very terrible and awful to the ancient Mind. No fact of scientific reality appeared to approach it in supreme im- pressiveness of being. To Leucippus and Democritus, in the fifth century before Christ, " space was as real as matter," says Prof. Burnet. It was certainly a fact of vast significance afterwards to the philosophical Epicurus, and to the poetical Lucretius. To the moderns this is extinct thought. Yet it is evident to everyone that the film which divides the modern scientific Ultimate from the ancient Ultimate is one of the most diaphanous description. Since Clerk Maxwell's treatment of the ultimate thing as * electric charge/ the imperceptible something-nothing called ( Ether' has come as near to being spelt * Void ' as thought and expression will permit. What we are certainly cognisant of in the trend of scientific investigation, in its present state of advance, is a deliberate approach to the consciousness of Space as the ultimate scientific reality. As a matter of fact, the consciousness of space or void can never be annulled in the scientific mind. This is shown in the way scientific men express their conclusions on ultimate being. For example, the Ether or luminiferous medium has been conceived as absolutely incompressible. But light is propagated through it in waves. And it seems inconceivable that a wave should originate in an incompressible medium. Then we have Lord Kelvin expressing his opinion that it is infinitely improbable that ether should be infinitely incompres- sible. And it is evident that it is consciousness of space or void that compels such a view, as one wholly different from a consciousness of this ether-medium. No doubt, if Maxwell's theory regarding the electric nature of light be correct, vibra- ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 33 tions might be propagated conceivably " apart from any elastic properties that may be assigned to the medium." Yet, even assuming this to be true, so long as the consciousness of substance is present with such theories, the consciousness of space or void beyond it must persist likewise. We can always insist that if the medium is substance, or some thing it must be some where, i.e. in space. As Sir O. Lodge puts it, " No point in space can be thought of ' at which if a man stand it shall be impossible for him to cast a javelin into the beyond.'" An admission, indeed, which surprises us, especially when we have also the confession from the same respected authority that "science knows nothing of ultimate origins." For if this "beyond" of space is an ultimate consciousness of What-Is, we are forced to regard it as the ultimate origin of all that is. Nothing exists independent of this " beyond," and this " beyond " cannot be conceived to have been caused. It is self-determined. If, then, we could conceive an ultimate origin, it would not be so self-determined as this " beyond " is. That it cannot be conceived to have been caused is evident from the fact that if we assume a Cause for it, say, God, then we always have a necessary consciousness of this space ' beyond ' Him, again. And so also for any imaginable Cause. Therefore, no conception of cause, origin, or anything else can transcend our consciousness of this "beyond." That is, we are compelled, whether we wish it or no, to accept this space - consciousness as our ultimate consciousness of What-Is, and as the grand Fons et Origo of all that is; itself the Uncaused. The difficulty lies only in regarding space as Something! Once space is seen to be Being, and of genuine scientific value, and not mere * nothing,' science will find the Perseus she seeks within this ' appearance ' of invisibility. Meantime, Evolution- ary Process shuts out all other considerations, and such as Bergson identifies Reality with developments and duration, with the inference that we still have an unfinished Universe, and a God not yet full-grown ! But all this throws back the enquiry upon the Source of supply for motions and increases, and only the Void, Space, presents itself as the true Ultimate. However, anything but that ! That is' nothing ! ' "It seems impossible," says Prof. Pringle-Pattison, " for the metaphysical C 34 SPACE AND PERSONALITY mind to face the idea of a growth out of nothing, an advance in the content and value of existence by a series of accretions from the void." On the contrary, it is clearly the only possibility open to the human mind, seeing that consciousness denies Process to be ultimate being; denying it in the con- scious ( I,' and ever affirming space-being as beyond all con- ceivable processes, motions, and forces whatsoever. These facts seem fatal to all such theories ; consciousness being universally admitted to be our final arbiter. 21. It is the same in other spheres of research. Mathe- matics, e.g., which is governed by laws of Quantity, seeks her strange triumphs in zero or approximating zero - quantities. Cantor, Dedekind, Russell, and others, are names which vouch for the statement. 22. Philosophy in struggling as she has ever bravely done towards that ultimate goal which only can content the bottom- less longings of her heart, attenuates even attenuation, and refines impressions to ideas, ideas to notions, and notions to A * Notion,' which, like the air-bubble whose sides thin off to vacuity as the water-film gravitates to drops, transcends all transcendence as ' Nothing,' which yet, mark you, is ' Being ' and yet again is No-Being, seeing it is only where Being is to be when it * Becomes ! ' The gravitation towards the Space- Consciousness is on all hands very patent. But Philosophy refuses it as a datum of reason. She loudly affirms a conscious- ness of a 'self,' which is clearly no more than a motion of what-we are, and at bottom constitutes but an Idea, as heartily as any that floated athwart the mighty vision of Plato. We are conscious enough that-we-are, but we are never conscious of this * self by day or night. 23. Needless to say, the Space-Consciousness is a strong one in Theology. We do not require to remind the reader that the consciousness of Everything coming ' out of Nothing ' is one which has played, and yet plays, an influential part in the panorama of the Creeds. Creation, God, Soul ; at bottom, what is each in its content, when traced to the last conscious- ness of it, and named, Nothing, Gap, Void ; or SPIRIT, or ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 35 Pneuma, Psyche, what actual content remains with us save Space ? Are not breath and the wind common figures of speech for them ? We all admit them to be ultimates, but we also all agree that it is absolutely necessary, in interpreting the consciousness we have concerning them, to clothe them and cover them up under space- terms. We do not have a choice in the matter. Our strongest and last consciousness of these revered and holy things, urges a space-content for them with a force that cannot be gainsaid. Indeed, no effort in any nameable realm of mind to think the Ultimate Being, ever shakes off the consciousness of Space. Plato's Ideas and motions of ' chaos ' are inconceivable apart from the background of Room. Can we even hope to regard the scientific atom, electron, or ion, or electric charge, or ether, as our ultimate consciousness of what-is? Have not we all a deeper consciousness of something else behind and beyond them, or it, for which we have no term save space? Every movement of mind, whether it is called scientific, philo- sophic, mathematic, or theologic, is conditioned by this space- consciousness, ultimately. Whatever seems to be the inside content of our thought, a consciousness of space surrounding that content never fails to present itself as we think it. 24. This general view of the space-consciousness receives strong confirmation from philosophical thinkers whose special work brings them directly into conflict with theories of ultimate Being. In discussing the "principles of co-existence," and showing that " it is absolutely necessary that all substances in the world of phenomena " should " stand in a relation of complete community of reciprocal action to each other," we find Kant saying, " My intention here is by no means to combat the notion of empty space, for it may exist where our perceptions cannot exist, inasmuch as they cannot reach thereto, and where, therefore, no empirical perception of co-existence takes place. But in this case it is not an object of possible experience." Kant has a consciousness of " den leeren Raum," 1 empty space,' which yet he avers to be " for all our possible experience no Object " (" er ist aber alsdann fur alle unsere moglich Erfahrung gar kein Object") (K. d. R. V.,Philosophzsche Bibliothek. Band 37, p. 246). He could believe space to be 36 SPACE AND PERSONALITY beyond all Objectivity, and yet not be ultimate being. In actual content of consciousness, Kant does not really include space in his concept of Being. 25. Prof. Wallace, in his valuable Prolegomena to HegePs Logic, and interpreting Hegel's thought, says, " The first part of Logic, the theory of Being, may be called the theory of unsupported and freely-floating Being. We do not mean some- thing which is, but the mere 'is/ the bare fact of Being, with- out any substratum." Here we are to take Being as something not objective in the first part of the " Logic," but still as some- thing which is beyond objectivity. Yet it ' is,' and clearly this is intended to mean that which is the supremely furthest con- sciousness possible to us. Is it possible then to regard it as differing from Kant's ' empty space ' ? It is, we are told, "without any substratum," and yet space is always that per- sistent and irreducible consciousness which is ' substratum ' to all else which we can conceive substrately. We recognise, of course, that this is the consciousness out of which Hegel built his oracle " Being and Nothing are the same," and as he, differing from Kant, would not admit that Space was even ' Form,' and was bound to pass beyond the veriest hint of objectivity, he left himself with no resource save to designate this consciousness as poor and abstract, contemptibly abstract, and, as a category, the nullest of nulls ! Hegel, indeed, has never the least doubt of the presence of this consciousness, but he flatly refuses for it all concrete worth. It is far less, he assumes, than, for example, the zero of mathematics, which necessarily has a concrete value equal to its relative unit, whatever content the unit may be assumed to possess. It is to Hegel ' emptiness ' without relation, having no relation to anything that might be. It cannot be brought under thought, and therefore is not Real, for to Hegel, only the Rational was Real, and only the Real rational. Yet, mirabile dictu, he found this consciousness in himself, and it was his ultimate consciousness, indestructible, irrepressible, deforceable by no force of thinking, and yet was not concrete ! One wonders how he ever obtained a conscious conviction of Being as concrete, independent of this conscious- ness. We shall see that he never in all his system ever reached concrete Being. ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 37 26. The space - consciousness is frequently referred to by Prof. Pringle - Pattison, and we are always more and more surprised that he is contented to leave it outside of the data of his judgments upon Being. As an example of this, he says, "If we could really contemplate existence from the point of view of the Absolute, doubtless the derivation of the finite world might not be so inexplicable ; but we never do reach that specular mount. When we attempt to assume such a standpoint, the result is, as with Spinoza, simply emptiness (our italics). Abstracting from the finite, we have nothing left within our grasp" (Man's Place, etc., p. 126). The professor refuses with Spinoza to regard this consciousness of "simply emptiness" as a consciousness of any value. Yet not a con- sciousness can compare with it, for an instant, for irreducible insistence of itself as what -IS. If the so-called Absolute is ever to be found, which, as being always put in relation to the * finite,' is of course no Absolute, it is here where it must be settled. For nothing so affirmative of absoluteness is ever given us in any other consciousness. It is the Ultimate Consciousness. The professor has this consciousness when he has nothing else left. He is confident that if everything finite were swept away, " we have nothing left within our grasp." And yet, clearly enough, we have this consciousness of nothing left ! It has the full value of be-mg when everything else is swept away. It is concrete when everything else is mere abstraction. This consciousness cannot be abstracted. It is without doubt an unrelated consciousness, but this is just what we expect in a consciousness of Absoluteness. Finity disappears in it beyond the slightest possibility of recall. "Simply Emptiness"; SPACE! Spinoza, and Kant, and Hegel ; each of these great thinkers, whose shoes we are not worthy to unloose, found this consciousness remain indisputably the last consciousness. And each regarded it as no conscious- ness of concrete Being, and as useless for the explication of What-lS. And it is here that we discern that to possess a consciousness and to place a true value upon that consciousness are quite different things. It is, indeed, only a preliminary part of philosophy to lay bare a consciousness. To value it is her true work. For, as Principal John Caird put it, " Philo- sophy, along with other things, comes to an end, in a prin- 38 SPACE AND PERSONALITY ciple which reduces all thought and being to nothingness" (Spinoza, p. 144) (italics ours). There is nothing so true. It must always lead straight to a consciousness of Space. But this is just where true philosophy really begins in the value which is found in this Nothingness. Is it a null, or is it everything ? ' A null,' said Spinoza, Kant, and Hegel. Spinoza had indeed to invent an abstract "sub- stance," Kant an abstract "thing -in -itself," and Hegel an abstract " Becoming," in order to get Something to philosophise with ! This * Something,' again, must be ' assumed} it is yet supposed. "Being," says Prof. James, with all the modern light to guide him, " remains a casual and contingent quantum that is simply found or begged" (italics ours). He then asks, "May it be begged bit by bit, as it adds itself? Or must we beg it only once, by assuming it either to be eternal or to have come in an instant that co-implicated all the rest of time?" (Some Problems of Philosophy, p. 189). Yet it is staggering to an ordinary mind that such ' Something ' should be con- ceived either to come or to ' become,' to be either 'substance' or a 'thing-in-itself,' to be either quality or 'quantum,' to be either first thing or last thing, and yet that the space -thing into which it was to come and without which it could not be conceived to 'come,' should be regarded as of not the least account in the question. Yet Prof. James declares that "the best definition I know (of Reality), is that which the prag- matist rule gives : ' anything is real of which we find ourselves obliged to take account in any way.' " Now, every one of the writers whom we have quoted finds himself obliged to take account of this Nothing, this Space, as his last consciousness of anything ; yet it is not ' real.' It is not ' Being ! ' What is it, then? Can we venture to totally ignore this consciousness? It is certainly the most assertive of all. But as this reality of the existence of the space-conscious- ness as the ultimate consciousness in all men is so vital to our position, we must still give other witnesses to support the statement. "It is constantly forgotten," says Prof. Wm. Knight, " that in this controversy the admission that some kind of being, or substance, must always have existed in the universe, is the common property of all the systems of philosophy. Materialist and idealist, theist and atheist, alike admit it ; but ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 39 its admission is theologically worthless. 'The notion of a God,' says Sir Wm. Hamilton, in his admirable manner, 'is not contained in the notion of a mere first cause, for, in the admission of a first cause, atheist and theist are at one.' So far as this argument can carry us, the being assumed to exist is therefore, a blank essence, a mere zero, an everything-nothing. Nature remains a fathomless abyss, telling us nought of its whence or whither. . . . That something always was, every- one admits. The question between the rival schools is as to what that something was, and is" (Philosophy and Literature ', 174) (our italics). 27. So also once more Prof. Wm. James tells us, in his book quoted above (pp. 40-41), that when confronted with the problem of Being, "philosophy stares but brings no reasoned solution, for from nothing to being there is no logical bridge" "Being in general, or in some shape, always was, and you cannot rightly bring the whole of it into relation with a primordial nonentity. Whether as God or as material atoms, it is itself primal and eternal." And as to when it all began, " since we now witness its end some past moment must have witnessed its beginning. If, however, it had a beginning, when was that, and why ? You are up against the previous nothing, and do not see how it ever passed into being." That is to say, Being and Nothing are two things to James (italics ours). These two able thinkers clearly admit that all men who ponder upon the fact of Being confess it to be a fact. But whenever thought concentrates upon the Fact, it reaches Nothing! This 'Nothing,' then, is of no account! But we cannot begin with nothing, it is assumed. We must have 1 Something,' and from this no-account Nothing to Being "there is no logical bridge." 28. The point here, once more, is the value placed upon this consciousness of Nothing, or Space. Clearly, to Philosophy, this nothing is not Being. It is a Null ; of no value absolutely. Being is Something, It is attested as such by every conscious- ness. But this Nothing is not Something. Yet it attests itself as That-which IS. Prof. James cannot even doubt that one may not have this ' nothing ' to be always " up against." He thinks 40 SPACE AND PERSONALITY that Being must always have had " some shape," but not this * nothing '-shape ! If Being would only come to us in any shape but this ' nothing '-shape, it appears we might accept it as Being - Being cannot be a " primordial nonentity ! " From being regarded as of no account, this Space- Con- sciousness is sometimes treated in a spirit of faint jocularity and mock alarm. " Beyond experience, in short, all is and must be, for us, absolute emptiness, and whatever ' sail-broad vans ' we spread for flight, we drop at once plumb down, like Milton's Satan, in a vast vacuity" (Man's Place, etc., p. 150) (italics ours). Discussing H. Spencer's conception of " Being without any determination," Prof. E. Caird says, "We cannot grasp it as a productive principle which explains difference and at the same time overcomes it. It is the dark in which all colours become grey. When we reach this unity, it only remains for us to lose ourselves in it" (Evol. of Relig., i. 122). And Prof. Wallace wistfully muses on the fact that Philosophy "sometimes craves for utter union in the fullness of Being." But, he says, " Such a fullness is the unspeakable and the vain which we may picture as the apathy of Nirvana, but which is the absorption of Art, Religion, and Philosophy the cease of consciousness and an abyss. We may call it it matters not Being." He cries, " Give us a standing-point, and explanation is simplified." He does not believe a ' standing-point ' can be found in " an abyss," i.e. the consciousness of Space. He says, "the prospect is too horrible to continue further, and face the Gorgon's head in the outer darkness, where man denudes appear- ance in the hope to meet reality" (Proleg. to Hegel's Logic, pp. 157, 464-65) (italics ours). Leucippus was less despairing, we think, and was much nearer the truth. " He held that what is, is no more real than what is not, and that both are alike causes of the things that come into being, for he laid down that the substance of the atoms was compact and full, and he called them what is, while they moved in the void which he called what is not, but affirmed to be just as real as what is " (Bitrnefs Early Greek Philosophy, 2nd ed., p. 384). Now here is a veritable consciousness of space as a ' vast vacuity,' as a ' unity ' in which we may ' lose ourselves,' " an abyss " which " absorbs Art, Religion, and Philosophy," and yet it is accounted as a Gorgon's head and a mock reality ! ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 41 29. Yet to simple thought, all Being must stand upon Space, if it stands anywhere. Is there really any other thing for it to stand upon ? The great Universe seems to sleep in its arms as a child in a cradle. The vast Universe, ourselves and all there is, is in no ways terrified at losing itself in this ' vast vacuity.' It is in actuality the widest word for Home. Why are we to affirm sun, moon, and stars, and all that the force of gravita- tion conjoins, to be Being, while this Space is to be accounted not Being ? Philosophy, it seems, must clutch her * subject ' and ' object ' at all hazards, and contemn the undetermined Abyss, because forsooth it only determines the consciousness of IS which underlies ALL that is, and which cannot by anything be absolutely negated. How often does Prof. E. Caird tell us that Being is that " of which nothing can be said except that it is ? " As if this were the last utterance of our despairs ! As if more can be said of anything ! Is, is surely the first and last affirmation which counts for anyone or anything. Strangely enough, such philosophy is certain that * subject ' and ' object ' are real. Yet, is it not the fact that they are just our infinite botheration because we are never wholly sure that they are ? We think it is their Unity that really Is. Philosophy is being constantly pushed into the " abyss "-consciousness of Space, under the strongest conviction that it IS ; our deepest experi- ence is of this Abyss ; it is the ultimate consciousness which we have of What-we-are ; and yet, it is not permitted to come into our judgment of What-IS ! 30. Perhaps it is too soon yet to assert that the true course of Philosophy, as far as its affirmation of the ultimate fact of consciousness is concerned, went completely astray after Hume's great contribution. He really entered himself, and stated the truth of what he saw. He was conscious, that is, of Motions in himself which we all agree to call Feeling, Will, Thought, or as he put it, ' impressions ' and ' ideas.' That was his experience. It is yet the experience of every man. It is not the whole of our experience ; but Hume was right so far as he saw. It is completely different with Kant and Hegel. They neither saw, nor had the smallest experience of a " thing-in-itself," or of an absolute " Notion." Nor has anyone yet. These were dug 42 SPACE AND PERSONALITY out of fancy and the logical dialectic, and although the systems of logical superstructure built upon them are the pride of European Intellect, Truth is not to be found in their founda- tions ; and already they are becoming only magnificently cultured monuments of historical curiosity. Kant indeed did enter into himself. It is the first step in philosophic endeavour, for an unpsychological philosophy is like a Christmas tree, beautiful and green, perhaps, as other trees, but without roots, and bearing artificial fruit. Kant then found the consciousness of space to be the most irresistibly assertive consciousness of his experience. He found that he could think-out, or away, everything from his consciousness, but he could not perform this feat with his consciousness of space. This was his experience. To negate this consciousness was impossible. Space is the grand perplexity to Kant. He is constantly recurring to it. It is so experientially real, but it is his despair what to do with it. It is emphatically the ' empty sphere ' to him. He freely acknowledges this great conscious- ness. " Beyond the sphere of phenomena, all is (for us) a mere void " (" und der Umfang ausser der Sphare der Erscheinungen ist fur uns leer"). (K. d. R. V., Phenomena und Noumena.} " Mere void " was not Reality to Kant. Space is to him mere ' form/ and of little account. He refuses to regard it as a consciousness of ultimation. That which is ultimate for What-he-Is, is a fanciful Something * in itself beyond space ! Space itself as ' form ' is conceived to ascend out of this Something beyond itself! This Something is assumed to exist where there is no space. His consciousness of Void is his ultimate consciousness, he confesses, but there must be Something beyond it ! This is where Kant's fancy begins to play. He has no experience of this Something beyond space. Not the smallest. Nor has anyone. But we easily see his dilemma. 'Soul' was a real "thing" to Kant. It could never be identified with Void ! And he is determined to preserve this theological " thing " at all costs. Even if it is a mere algebraical x> he will preserve it. So he places it beyond earth, sea, sky, or Matter. He places it beyond space ; in a space-by-itself if anyone cares to try to imagine such a monster. It is to be a Ding-an-Sich I Kant, that is, clean against all rules of reason, imported a ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 43 theological " thing " into the data of his philosophical judg- ments, and as this " thing " is theologically dissociated from even * God/ and certainly from all the Universe, and as he accepted this theological judgment as fact, so he persisted in asserting SOUL and SPACE to be sundered ; and he thereby inevitably rent Thought and Being from each other, and left his Universe cleft in twain. He did this in the teeth of his experience that a consciousness of space was his ultimate con- sciousness, ' wholly empty ' (ganzlich leere), ' a blank conscious- ness ' (ein blosses Bewusstsein). He had no consciousness so terribly in earnest in affirming what-he-was, and none he chose to value less, as of no account. And as Kant mis-read and mis-valued the ultimate con- sciousness of what-he-was, so Hegel mis-read and mis-valued the ultimate consciousness of what-ALL-IS. We have sketchily seen that Hegel is so obsessed with the consciousness of space, as the fundamental consciousness, that he must needs accept it as the TTOU O-TCO of his system of Thought. But so valueless is it to him that he compels himself to believe it to be the most pitiful abstraction of " Being " before he will proceed to risk any dialectic structure upon it worthy of his own and the world's respect. He must needs scorn it even as " utter abstraction, total emptiness the negative of every image, feeling, and definite thought." Yet this Space-consciousness is the true prius of everything that can be thought or said. Its utter elimination of every " image, feeling, and definite thought," is what gives it its abounding value. For as such, it is the Real that supremely negates everything but itself, and thus, through absolute negation, affirms itself as the Everything on which, and out of which, all becomes that IS. Hegel, we are convinced, but saw the ' back-parts ' of this absolute con- sciousness, and failed to include in his synthesis of Being the one fact which had power to give that synthesis validity. This is apparent at once when we ask, Where did Hegel obtain the consciousness that underlies the dictum, " Being and Nothing are the same?" Where, but in himself. It is his ultimate consciousness of What-IS. That is a fact which he did not create. What he did create was the value he put upon it. To him it was " emptiness ; " null ; of no use ! Yet, it was the one consciousness affirmed to him as real, and was the 44 SPACE AND PERSONALITY last one he should have counted abstract. His so-called con- crete " Becoming " was less real by the very fact that it was conditioned both as motion and as substantia in his conscious- ness of this " Emptiness," this Nothing, this Space. Before he could even postulate his BEING, NOTHING, and BECOMING, he had first to postulate Space. For no thought can move, and nothing can be posited, until the consciousness of space is present. Therefore, having despised this Ultimate Consciousness, his " Absolute Notion," however absolute in its Unity it might be, was a being quite apart and distinct from Space, in our con- sciousness of both, and consequently, his Universe was as much cleft in two as was that of Kant. His " Absolute Being" was not sole Being. There were still Space and this Absolute ! And while this remained, not even his herculean powers of dialectic could effect a conjunction of his system and Nature, Life, and assured Reality, as we all think them under these terms. 31. We venture now to conclude that the space-conscious- ness, from first to last, has been excluded from every philosophic synthesis of Absolute Being. Psychology, also, yet debars it from the throne-seat of all we cognise, although it seems to be worth all the other facts known to the human mind, being indeed the fact without which all the rest are crippled and rendered nugatory. All psychologists nevertheless assert that such a consciousness is present in us, albeit some are inclined to maintain with Parmenides that there is no such ' thing ' as space, an assertion which is quite intelligible, seeing that space is never determined as any 'thing 1 to our consciousness. Literature, in general, abounds in affirming the space-conscious- ness, and the popular mind has no question with regard to its reality. Scientists of every name recognise the ' Void ' as a bare fact. All the great Religions have a profound reverence for it. It is vivid and necessary in the cosmogony of Genesis. Job notes it as the * Nothing ' on which the earth is hung, and over which the north is stretched " (xxvi. 7). It is the Ginnunga Gap of the Scandinavians, out of which grew the roots of the Iggdrazil Tree that supported the Universe, as we see it. Is it not, at bottom, the Nirvana of the Hindus ? Hesiod's ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 45 Theogony seems founded on it. His conception of ' Chaos, says Prof. Burnet (E. Gr. Phil., p. 8), " represents a distinct effort to picture the beginning of things. It," Chaos " is not a formless mixture, but rather, as its etymology indicates, the yawning gulf, or gap, where nothing is as yet " (italics ours). That is, ' Chaos ' is a genuine, though fanciful, religious fabri- cation built out of the consciousness of space. And it is evident that, in this universal though unintentional tendency to seek the meaning of Origins in this consciousness, there is an indication that far from being 'empty,' and 'blank,' and ' bare,' and of sheer null-value, it is, in reality, the most supremely full and valuable consciousness possible to us. Kenosis is Pleroma. 32. We now come back to the question of the Test of Truth. What, then, is Real to us ? Many say, " Experience is our true test of what is Real." " Experience," says Prof. Bosanquet, "may be said to begin with the certainty that 'there is Somewhat,' and the postulates of knowledge do but express in abstract form the progressive definition of this 'Somewhat'" (Logic, ii. 206). Now, in this ' Somewhat,' which is said to be ' certain,' we have simply an abstraction. It is a totality which has no connection with our ultimate consciousness of anything, in reality, until we fill the term ' Somewhat ' with our consciousness of Space. For this consciousness is, as we have seen, the sole consciousness which gives absolute certainty of What-lS. All else is mere flux and uncertainty. In actual experience, even the expres- sion 'I AM' when it means "Self" gives only a content of abstraction. It gives nothing certain to knowledge save a vague generality. But when we fill ' I AM ' with a content of Space-Being, then, for the first time in our experience, we have true knowledge, not of an ' I AM,' but of WHAT-WE-ARE. The consciousness of Space and what-we-are is one. We find it impossible to think them differently. For it has been shown that there is no consciousness equal in power of Reality- Conviction to this age-long consciousness of Space, Void, Gap, Nothing; and that this is the ultimate consciousness of what-we-are, as true experience, and consequently, that what-we-are is affirmed whole-being with All-that-IS, 46 SPACE AND PERSONALITY Not every experience, therefore, can yield an absolute certitude of reality. Nothing is ever certified absolutely real till it is certified to Be. And only Space certifies Being. All else that comes into our consciousness points away from itself. All flows, changes, and is impermanent and, consciously, not absolute in itself. Consequently, ' Self-Consciousness/ as it is set forth both in philosophy and psychology, does not give any guarantee of absolute certainty of Reality till this ' Self is conscious of being Space. For example, we have such state- ments as the following, " Self-consciousness is the living experience of unity in diversity." " The fundamental nature of experience may enable us to explain derivatively any spatial feature of experience, but that fundamental nature itself must be learned from experience and simply accepted " (Man's Place, etc., p. 115). " Our own reality, that sense of our life which we at every moment possess, is the ultimate of ultimates for our belief, ' As sure as I live ' " (Prof. James). And so also Hegel's words, already quoted, " in order to accept and believe any fact, we must be in contact with it, ... we must find the fact united and combined with the certainty of ourselves." Now, the very terms employed here are impedimental. " In contact with " fact, is not allowed by science, which denies that anything can be absolutely in contact with any other thing. One thing only comes as near to another as its nature will permit it. " Unity in diversity," consequently conveys only a conception of things rolled up together, but never possibly near enough to be the same being. In the 'unity' so effected we always have the possibility of diversity breaking out again from the ' unity.' But, indeed, the fact that one thing is required to certify another thing, as being, only drives back the question to " Who certifies the certifier ? " " Who or what certifies the fact of being for the 'Self'?" No truth which is absolute in our consciousness of it should require testimony as to its being. It should be self-certified, and thence certify all else that is. The thing that requires to be certified as true and real by some other thing is by that very fact not absolutely true or real. 33. Prof. Bradley's "absolute criterion," viz., "Ultimate reality, is such that it does not contradict itself," runs close to H. Spencer's 'Universal Postulate,' viz., that a thing is only ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 47 certified as real when its negative is inconceivable. Both resolve themselves into a question of the power of Thought. Now, to say always that this is Appearance and that is Reality, assumes that we must forever have the Two things to decide upon, and the one to certify the other to be true. We postulate Reality, and this connotes Appearance or Unreality. But clearly, we could not judge between either unless we possessed a power of thinking which is independent of what is judged. There is evidently a vantage ground which consciousness occupies apart from these judged conclusions. And it must be one in which " Either Or," is an impossible judgment. Otherwise, we could not decide that, when the absolute or ultimate Reality is found, we could not contradict it, or that it did not contradict itself. Now, without the consciousness of space as being what-we-are, this impossibleness of contra- diction is itself impossible. We say ' I Am/ and then assume that we cannot contradict such Reality, or say " Non - being is impossible to me." The whole of this assumption, how- ever, tumbles to the ground whenever we admit that we have not originated, begun, or created ourselves. For as soon as we admit that we are not self-created, then the possibility of being uncreated or unmade, enters our consciousness like- wise. " I am " is then seen to be but a relative consciousness to the consciousness, " I was not," and " I possibly shall not be." We are then as ' Selves ' mere things of flux and change, and our fancied absolute Reality is then chimerical. The many long controversies regarding the annihilation of the ' soul ' at death prove that this consciousness of existence-contradiction is possible. In such case, What-we-are is not certified the impossibility of Not-Being. The conception of Nirvana is, of course, but another form of the same consciousness. On the other hand, when we stand upon the consciousness of our own being as identically our consciousness of space-being, we are no longer bound by the decisions of dialectical tugs-of-war, Negative v. Affirmative ; for then our consciousness of space- being admits of no differentiation absolutely, and therefore of no possible questions as to beginning or ending, making or unmaking. We cannot conceive space to have been created ; to have had beginning ; or to be possible of decreation or ceasing to be. Is, is the sole and only consciousness given. 48 SPACE AND PERSONALITY Spencer's 'postulate' has, of course, its value. It is a forcible enough conviction, and good enough for all common purposes of argument, but it never shows us where the force of affirmation of being arises out of the weakness of thought- negation, and what it is that compels thought to be so negated in its wild career against everything. How does our thought or consciousness derive a new power to assert the strong affirmation of reality just at the very moment when it is dead beat to think more? For it is the same power of thought that must bring back an assurance of our reality which has been reduced to helplessness in a contest of con- ceiving. What is it that reduces thought to complete and ultimate inability, and yet gives it at the same time a power to declare a conviction of reality than which the human bosom holds no greater? In short, does it lie within any concep- tive ' Self to guarantee its own reality, and is this self-created certificate of absolute reality absolutely infallible ? But even if this * criterion ' of reality could guarantee the absolute reality of the self, for itself, could our con- sciousness of our self also guarantee the absolute reality of everything else that seems so real to us? Prof. Bradley has at great length proved that we do not necessarily have a consciousness of reality in the mere consciousness of ' Self,' as we at present understand ' Self.' The reason is that when- ever we are conscious of this self as an 'object' of thought and consciousness, we at once bring it under the same category of uncertainties and conditioned things as all other objects of the mind. It thereby enters the everlasting ' flow ' of all instabilities, and then a consciousness of * Self is entirely void of any absolute reality. 34. For reality, we must first find the consciousness which does not permit the possibility of " either or," ' I am,' ' I was not/ * I may not be,' " this is reality that is unreal." Now, all these relativities are wiped out absolutely in the consciousness of Space. We can say absolute and relative, self and not- self, one and many, mind and matter, reality and appearance, truth and falsehood, and many more, but we cannot say Space and Unspace. And the consciousness of Space alone gives this absolute self-affirmation of Being. // certifies itself ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 49 as Being) independent of any testimony from any Other. " Even if I bear witness of myself, my witness is true," was also the consciousness of" I am" in the Master (John viii. 14). And it is because we have no other consciousness of what-we-are than that of Space, that we also have the same self-affirmation of absolute being, and that we have the same consciousness of whole or unrelated being when we say ' I.' But only as space- being can we say ' I have always been, and I shall always be.' The consciousness of self-affirmation and the self-affirmation of Space^ is one consciousness of Whole-Being in which there is no possible consciousness of part or parts. We cannot say " Space was created," or " Space shall end." We always finish such efforts by finding ourselves and space same-being, or Whole. Is, therefore, is the sole possible consciousness of Space. It is affirmed with all negation negated, absolutely. It also renders it impossible to predicate of what-we-are as either past, present, or future, for these predicates cannot be applied to space. It is a timeless consciousness. Moreover, we cannot affirm point or part as possible in this space-consciousness, for points, parts, seconds, minutes, hours, exist because we have first assumed ourselves as beings apart from space, and so of such division as being absolutely real in its own nature. At first sight, this does not seem to be any other than Spencer's " Inconceivableness of the negative," and Bradley's " Reality does not contradict itself." There is all the difference, we think, between reality and abstraction. The ' inconceiv- ableness of the negative' of what? What reality does not contradict itself? Neither Spencer nor Bradley gives us a con- crete case. There is only the utterance of a consciousness that has not reached solid ground. The defect underlying the criteria of reality given by Spencer and Bradley is analogous to the defect which underlies the assertion of Spinoza's " Substance.". He said this ' substance ' was " That which is in itself and is conceived through itself" : a consciousness which unites what-Is with what-is-conceived, or Being and Thought, but which also unites them in abstraction and not in anything which affirms its own concrete reality absolutely. Now, this consciousness of ' Substance,' of uncon- tradictable ' Reality,' and of what cannot conceivably be negatived, ought to be as much a substance, a reality, and D 50 SPACE AND PERSONALITY an unnegatable fact to our Senses as to our Thought. And it is this demand of our nature for what we would affirm to be absolutely Real, that is abundantly supplied by our consciousness of Space-Being. It is as real to sense as to thought. Our whole nature finds itself taking space into its accounts, and pre-supposing such being in every thought, feeling, and conation, and assenting to its fulness of con- tent in the ultimate consciousness of what-we-are. This also is vouched as being our completest experience ( 40). As experience, indeed, it far surpasses the ' experience ' of Hume or Kant, or of J. S. Mill, for it includes an experience which must have anteceded Time, even as it is an experience which rises above the possibilities of the Future, and assumes an independence of futurity. For Space has no Past, no future, and knows no change. 35. From this position it must be evident also that, until we accept what-we-are as Space -affirmed Being, we shall always have a blurred vista of the so-called " degrees of Truth." For in all else save the Space-Consciousness, absolute truth does not exist. We first see things to be true and then detect them to be false, ultimately, in an everlasting kaleido- scopic vision. But for the Space-Consciousness, the false and true, devil and God, would persist in an eternal relativity which it would be impossible to annihilate. It would also be impossible for anyone to conceive that it had ever been different in the past, or would be different in the future. The conception of Whole-Being (which is much more than Unit- Being) would be also impossible. But there are no possible degrees of Truth in our consciousness of Space. It is truth Absolute, or, as we prefer it, Whole. And we also find that the same consciousness holds good for what-we-are. What-we-are conscious of being is never truer at one time than it is at all times. It does not grow, fill-out, thin-away, become dim, or shrink. There is no change in it, in short. It is always what-we-are. And certifying what-we-are as being, we inevit- ably certify what-we-are as Space. Any other judgment rests upon uncertified conceptions. 36. The consciousness of space, also, obliterates all the ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 51 provoking 'difference' that persists between Reality and Appearance. Space never appears. We are only conscious of its absolute or whole Reality. It never comes into the crowd of ' phenomena.' We do not see space, though it is the first condition of all our seeing. And so likewise with all our senses. Space is not Appearance. It is impossible to bring it under that category. Hence all relativity between Reality and Appearance disappears. And it is the consciousness of man as being Space that makes it impossible for him to regard himself as an 'object' or an 'appearance.' In the sure consciousness of his ultimate being as space, man can affirm truly beyond all possible contradiction, " I do not appear," " I am not Appearance." It is here also where his consciousness of Absoluteness is found without its ' relativity.' He is never conscious of being in ' The Flow ' of the All, nor as having been Caused. For Space has no Relative Being ' over against it.' It gives Isness to all that is. And if man had never found this consciousness of Absoluteness or Wholeness in his own being, he never could have even conceived it for anyone or any- thing else. We then have but a Whole consciousness of IS for our- selves, (i) Of Reality, which is without any possible conscious- ness of being Unreal ; and (2) of affirmation of being, which is without any possible consciousness of negation. For our consciousness of space neither allows us to say, " It appears," nor " It is not." And if we could not apply this consciousness first to ourselves we could never apply it to anything. Self- affirmation and self-existence are, on this basis of Being, perfectly rational and intelligible for ourselves. For we have not the remotest consciousness of being sustained in Being, but as simply self-existing Is, in the same way that we conceive space as self-existing. What-we-are always yields the same consciousness which Space does (using dual terms for exposi- tory purposes). 37. It follows that the further we carry our thinking from the space-consciousness, the more completely must we deter- mine our conclusions in falsities. Every conception of an 'object' is, for this reason, untrue to the extent that space is shut out from our judgment of it as 'object.' When we 52 SPACE AND PERSONALITY contemplate an object, say, a tree, we have to shut out Space, as a consciousness, before we can objectify it as being a tree. As soon as we admit space into our judgment of the tree ; that is, discern what-is among what-appears, then the 'tree' is no longer in existence. Only Space Is. And the test of the truth of this judgment is found in reversing the process. If we try to reduce Space as the thing possible of change, in order that the 'tree' may stand ultimately as the Absolutely Real, we find our attempt foolish. And any object whatever would be found to change in contrast to the absolute unchangeableness of Space. Space does not " Flow." But all else does. Prof. James, delivering himself on this crucial point, says, " The whole distinction of real and unreal ; the whole psychology of belief, disbelief, and doubt, is thus grounded on two mental facts (i) That we are liable to think differently of the same. And (2) that when we have done so, we can choose which way of thinking to adhere to, and which to disregard " (Psych, ii. 290). Now, we can not think differently of Space. And this fact settles both of the Professor's criteria of belief, disbelief, and doubt. And our consciousness of being space also explains why it is that, as he says, "that sense of our life which we at every moment possess, * As sure as I exist,' is likewise our uttermost warrant for the being of all other things " (ii. 297). In as far as we are conscious of Space-Being as being the fundamental being for all that is, we must affirm the reality of all that is. And it is in this way that we are able to affirm all that is, to be as real as we are conscious of being ourselves. It is the consciousness that all being, our own being included, is, at bottom, Space-Being. And in such a consciousness, concrete and natural beyond every experience of the concrete and natural, we have a true assurance of Whole-Being, but never a vestige of a consciousness of diversity in Being. Such a con- sciousness never gives us an experience of having been diverse and then united, or of having been united under conditions of possible diversity again. What-we-are is whole with all that is. We obtain, then, from this consciousness a far fuller content of * Self than is possible to the ' Self of philosophical systems. Indeed, what we have always to remember now is that when we are conscious of what-we-are, we are never conscious of an 'object,' a Thing, or a Something in space. We are never ULTIMATE CONSCIOUSNESS OF WHAT-WE-ARE 53 conscious of being cut off from space, but only of being space. Our ultimate of ultimate experiences is an experience of space, and not of a ' Self.' The 'self of philosophical systems, and of consciousness as explained by psychology, and as the ultimate content of thought, is a mere abstraction and spectrality, and cannot be certified as real on any basis of rationality. The philosophical 'self must be now looked upon as the mystical ' thing-in-itself ' for which Kant built a magical temple, in the innermost shrine of which he set up this ^r-Idol, rearing the pillars 'noumenon' and 'phenomenon/ like Boaz and Jachin, before its enchanted portals. But, again, we call attention to the fact of our loathing to accept this position, because of the imaginary zero-ness of the Space-Being. We assert our consciousness of what-we-are as space-being, and that all motions of consciousness and thought, such as feeling, willing, seeing, hearing, etc., are conditioned ultimately in our space-being, and then we are condemned as taking away everything from our Self. We only leave us Nothing ! It is the very opposite of this. We are showing the true value to be placed on this space-consciousness as not null - being but Whole - Being, and to give what-we-are that Immortality of which we cannot think differently, nor choose of it what to accept and what to throw away. Our consciousness of ' Nothingness ' is never a consciousness of the Unreal, although this is sometimes maintained. For example, Prof. F. H. Bradley in explaining his view of the 1 Absolute,' says, " A thing is real when, and in so far as, its opposite is impossible. But in the end its opposite is impos- sible because, and in so far as, the thing is real. . . . Now, in the case of such truth as we have called Absolute, the field of possibility is exhausted. Reality is there, and the opposite of Reality is not privation but absolute nothingness." " The field of possibility is exhausted," it is believed, when we are left with the consciousness of " absolute nothingness," which is declared to be " the opposite of reality." Yet this consciousness of " absolute nothingness " is just the conscious- ness, the only consciousness, which we always, without exception, find it impossible to negate, deny, or reduce. We are conscious of this * nothingness ' when we are conscious of nothing else ! Whatever we think, cogitate, remember, pre- 54 SPACE AND PERSONALITY vizualise, or admit within consciousness, this consciousness of space is always there before them, underlying, surrounding, and conditioning them, while itself cannot be conceived as condi- tioned. This is the Reality that has no possible c opposite.' ' Privation ' is a characteristic of everything called ' real ' save this Reality. It can have no relative * Unreal.' It always remains, as we must say ad nauseam^ as the ultimate consciousness of what -we -are, the sole consciousness we possess of IS, the real, the true, the unchangeable, the per- manently immovable. How, may we respectfully ask, did Prof. Bradley come to have such a consciousness of " absolute nothingness?" Where, but in the consciousness of himself? It is not found in the heavens nor on the earth, nor in anything phenomenal or cosmical. It is this consciousness of "absolute nothingness," indeed, which resists everything, and which is the root consciousness, as we shall try to show, of all we conceive to resist, and is thereby our root consciousness of Almightiness itself. It is, as a consequence, the absolute Everything in its " absolute nothingness," the Absolute Affirmation, the true categorical imperative of Being. It is this "absolute nothingness," this field of all possibilities, which we believe that the Sphinx-Spirit of philosophy, knowing no despair, joyfully contemplates. Enthroned on her ever- lasting seat, hers is the Space- Vision. These forms of Earth and Time, of Flesh and Stone, profit but ' a little while.' All Flows. The heavens and the earth pass away. For so (if we may be permitted the usual personal terms) the Eternal, in His endless Kenosis, empties Himself, and reveals thereby His in- exhaustible fulness, His Space-Being, the more. CHAPTER III SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 38. We may now be permitted to outline in brief the con- clusions which the facts of our argument seem to warrant us in offering. I. Our consciousness of what-we-are, and our consciousness of space, is an identical consciousness of Whole-Being. II. We cannot, therefore, think differently of what-we-are than of what-space-is. III. This whole-consciousness of space, and of what-we-are, gives only the simple consciousness, IS. IV. In this simple consciousness, IS, every consciousness of Reality, or Truth Absolute, as well as of all relativity, absolutely, is composed and concreted. W r e may call it the supreme idiom of Space-Being. V. Therefore no consciousness of absolute reality or Truth, nor any consciousness in which qualification is affirmed, is possible except in, by, or through the consciousness of space. VI. Therefore every conception or perception which is detached from this space-consciousness, and held in the mind as something independent of space, will by that fact be limited, i.e. Objectified, and will be true or real as such only in as far as the consciousness of space is retained in the qualifications of its objectivity. VII. Consequently the nearer, or the more absolutely, a conception or perception identifies itself with, or exhausts its objectivity in, the space-consciousness, which admits of no difference, relation, or qualifica- tion, the nearer will it approximate to Whole-Being in our consciousness of it. 55 56 SPACE AND PERSONALITY 39. If this view is tolerated meanwhile in the interests of clear reasoning, it will be evident to the reader that we take up the problem of philosophy by asserting its highest fact, Consciousness of Whole-Being, in which there is yet no vestige of parts, instead of consciousness of relativity, qualification, part, or object. Consequently, neither the Ptolemaic nor the Copernican standpoint of thought can avail us, seeing that all conceptions of centre and circumference are absent in our con- sciousness of Whole-Being. The grand aim of philosophical endeavour, ancient and modern, has hitherto been directed towards Unity, Absolute Unity, from an assumed unques- tioned and unquestionable reality of relativity, difference, parts, phenomena, or appearances. Moreover, the fact of the latter has been held as axiomatic, universally received, and set forth as a principle of the foremost credibility, while the former has been throughout menaced with interrogations, and for the most part timidly put forward even by its devotees, as at least a " presupposition " in the cognition of Being. To struggle for this Absolute Unity under all risks has been deemed peremptory in the sacred cause of the pro- foundest demands of our religious instincts. The great minds of both East and West, pagan or Christian, have felt the power of this obligation. Surely, it has been said, Creation must have come forth from One Cause, One Will, One Person ; or, at least, One Being must have directed the All of things by One Might towards One End. In such vastitude of undoubted Difference, is not such Unity presupposed in Being? So have brave and loyal thinkers soliloquised, as feeling borne down in a battle. Nevertheless, such musings and pleadings all through long centuries of beetle-browed con- templation, have never evoked such certainty of this Unity, so presupposed, as men have found in that Difference which is so tough in its * antagonisms ' to be ' overcome.' 40. Candidly, however, could any other result be expected from systems of thought which maintained that such fact of difference was as absolutely real as this presupposed Unity? We venture to say that the true gravity of the profoundest demands of human nature has not been comprehensively grasped so long as such Difference and such Unity are calmly SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 57 accepted as both invincible in their truth of Being, and together constituting the very ne plus ultra of all cogitation. This con- viction that Difference is an eternal fact, cleaving absolutely the spheres of science, philosophy, and religion, far as eye can see or thought can wing her flight, is primarily sunk in the founda- tions of such systems as indispensable to any superstructure whatsoever, and then surprise is expressed when this Difference still abides every assault from the attacking Unity which is brought face to face with it in logical combat ! Is it not rather to be expected that our deepest religious instincts will demand something more stable than a predaceous Unity which, like Jonah's fish, at one time swallows up all ' differences ' in the shape of raging gods, men, and natural forces, and at another vomits them all forth again as striken cities, pitying heavens, and petulant prophets ? Our religious instincts surely demand that this Unity shall be so overwhelmingly All-that-Is, as to create the conviction in men that any existential Difference is wholly inconceivable. The ' Pre-supposition,' in short, to meet the gravity of the case fully and effectively, must, in both the old and modern meanings of the term, prevent everything else. Difference and Division, for the ALL of Being, in our fundamental conscious- ness of it, should be an impossible consciousness. To be level with the religious consciousness of the world which through long centuries has slowly risen above the differences and divisions of deities, and grasped once for all the consciousness of One God, the philosophical vision should see Being whole, as Sophocles saw life, and assert Difference and Division, as absolutes, to be unthinkable. But this means a deeper basis for thought in the conscious- ness of what-we-are. "The unity beyond the difference," of modern philosophy, her "Absolute Unity," her "Self," are merely devout guesses, and give nothing concrete to thought as absolute guarantee of Reality. We are never sure that this Unity will not again diverge from its united state and plunge us into its former Duality, Plurality, Division, and differentiated Totality. We must first find the consciousness which cannot by any possibility suggest even a hint of difference or division, which negates all negation by a fact which is independent of our thinking it, which denies to even the "Self" an absolute 58 SPACE AND PERSONALITY difference of itself from anything that IS, and which gives such a conviction of Whole-Being as renders a conception of division between what-we-are and the All-that-is to be utterly impossible in any experience. And this conscious- ness, we maintain, is to be found in the consciousness of Space- Being. For the wide realms of philosophic thought which are defined by the terms Monism and Pluralism, which again connote mind and matter, thoughts and things, concepts and percepts, idea and sensation, idealist and empiricist, or statist and fluxite, are plainly defective in their scope and pro- fundity to cope with the actual consciousness which we all have of What-lS. Monism always ends by sealing us up in an abstract UNIT-Being which becomes as obnoxious and irritable as Pluralism, which riots in an everlasting lust of Separables. Both fail to reach that common concrete basis for Being, which is ever wider than mere Unity, and far more than that Unity when it is divided out into its inconceivable Pluralities. Each fails in Scope. Each also fails to do justice to that common consciousness which both confess. For the Monist in struggling to generalise All into ONE-ness, really confesses that somehow Division exists ; and, on the other side, in insisting that the All develops into Difference and Isolation, the consciousness of original ONE-ness is admitted by the Pluralist. The one con- ception inevitably involves the other in its affirmations. For if we think ONE it implies a judgment closed, as if our thought should complete a circle, going all round Being to verify its being solely and only ONE. But the space consciousness at once asserts that such a ONE does not include Space-Being itself, and hence the consciousness of more than ONE enters, and the how - much - more is just the Plurality that taunts Monism. In short, there can be no satisfaction given to our consciousness of Being until both predicates, UNITY and PLURALITY, are rendered impossible in the problem. Now, neither Monism nor Pluralism ever brings our con- sciousness of Space-BElNG inside of its system. It is left severely apart. Yet it is just this consciousness which we require in order to abolish the necessity of choosing on which predicate we shall lay down our life in the BEING-PROBLEM. For, in the first place, we obtain from it our primal want CONCRETENESS. SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 59 Nothing is so profoundly asserted to BE as Space-Being. And it has no affirmation of mere Unity or Plurality. For we never can enclose it in a judgment of ONE-ness, as if we held it in our thought as a marble is held in the hand. We never can get all round about Space to verify that it is just its lonely Self. And similarly, for Pluralism, as we never can find hole or gap, crack or rent, in space, its divisibleness is inconceivable. Space admits of no point being placed in it, seeing that before the point can exist space must be there to receive it. No line can be drawn upon Space, therefore, for even ' distance ' is objective and imaginary space between two imaginary points which are never quite fixed except in a concept. Newton, in his formula of gravitation, squares such "distance." The consciousness of Space is purely and solely, IS. Therefore no predicate of UNITY or Plurality ever covers it, and WHOLE-BEING seems the most approximate term fitting the consciousness we all have of it, in which, however, there is no consciousness of parts, and no edges or verges absolutely. We never can think the outside of Space. We never can think any side for space, for it never presents a surface. Neither has it any inside. It is WHOLE- BEING. And this is the exact consciousness which each of us has for what-he-lS. When we say, I, we have no con- sciousness of being outside ourselves or inside, for there is no surface or edge or verge. We are. And this gives the identical consciousness which Space gives, viz., IS : WHOLE- BEING. Grasping, then, this consciousness as the only absolutely true consciousness, we find that neither Monism nor Pluralism replies to the consciousness of What-we-are in its own idiom. The "Self" of philosophy and the "Universe" of science reveal much, and we are grateful for all they have revealed ; but when we ask for the value of Space they are dumb. It is obtained only in the I-Being which utters the " I am " which space utters, in that idiom which is their exclusive language, and one which only what-we-are interprets wholly. As we listen to both, IS, as our consciousness, remains the common voice. Our position, consequently, implies an extension of method. The appeal is to Experience. But the Experience of our appeal is not limited to the sphere of the phenomenal, the sensational, the conditioned, but extends to that experience 60 SPACE AND PERSONALITY which equates with our ultimate consciousness of what-we-are. Our appeal is to Experience Whole. But in order to be Whole-Experience both senses and sensation must identify their truth with the consciousness of what-we-are. Our method begins therefore with space-being as consciously what-we-are, and seeks to show that every experi- ence possible to sense and sensation assumes and maintains the prius of that consciousness. This is contrary, it appears, to some respected students of the mind. " Space is a construction," says Prof. C. Read (Metaphysics of Nature, p. 179, 1st ed.), "or rather a mental organic growth, to which other experiences, tactile and visual, contribute." Dr S. H. Hodgson tells us that " If we had not the senses of sight and touch we should be without any cognition of space" (Time and Space, p. 66). "There is good reason to think," Prof. J. Sully avers (The Human Mind, vol. i., p. 243), "that each sense develops, to some extent at least, its own spatial consciousness apart from other senses." And with reference to sensation, Prof. James Ward says, " The first condition of spatial experience seems to lie in what has been noted above as the extensity of sensation " (Encyc. Brit., " Psychology "). This extensity of sensation, called ' massive- ness ' by Dr Bain, he illustrates by comparing " the ache of a big bruise and the ache of a little one." This characteristic or quality of ' extensity' he affirms to be " an essential element in our perception of space," though he cautions us that there are other elements in such perception. Now, with every sensation we ever experience, no matter how derived, there is an unfailing experience not only of its own ' extensity/ area, spread, or space, but also of ' extensity ' area, spread, or space beyond that ' extensity.' It may be a sensation of motion, pain, pleasure, or any other, but the experiential consciousness given, with its limited area, is never separate from, but always whole with, our experiential con- sciousness of unlimited sensationless area or space, beyond such sensation. How then do we come by this conscious experience of limitless area or space ? Is it through some limitless sensa- tion? Everyone has an experience of boundless space in his consciousness. What sense, then, or sensation, contributed, developed, or conditioned its presence in our consciousness? Does not this suggest that no sensation is ever the ' first SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 61 condition of spatial experience ? ' No doubt, such a sensation might be the ' first condition ' of an experience of directed attention to our consciousness of space, but it seems to us that no sensation creates or conditions such a consciousness of spatiality, 'extensity,' area, or spread of itself. There is certainly focus and concentration upon the objective area in which the ache or bruise ' extends/ but without a previous experience of space no such consciousness of extended objective sensation could be possible. And no matter where the sensation should be located, the same experience of space-consciousness, unlimitedly beyond its ' extensity,' would arise. The space-consciousness is far deeper seated than sensation. In truth, we conceive sensations as we conceive all else objectively, but we are only conscious of space identically with the consciousness of what-we-are. We have no concept or percept, conception or perception of what- we-are ; we are only conscious we are ; and this is exactly how we are conscious of space. And it is for this reason that we have no consciousness of mass, form, ' extensity,' or measure- ment in either what-we-are or in space ; for the ' space,' which has ' dimensions,' is, as we shall try to show, on all fours with the 'self of philosophy and the ' soul ' of theology, and must be characterised as a pure creation of the conceptual judgment, entirely disowned by both senses and consciousness. It would indeed be a mistake to suppose that our senses yield only the limited materials of 'objects' and 'objectivity' to our concepts. They truly give all the materials from which ' objects ' and ' objectivities ' are conceptualised, but concepts are not the work of our senses but only of our judgment. Every conception of mass, form, c extensity,' or measurement, is due solely to our judgment, and never exhausts, the unlimited fulness of the content of the senses. For unlimited space is always attested by every sense. No doubt our senses seem to suggest mass, form, etc., by the very nature of limitation with which they are credited, for they are never credited with mediating anything else than objects and 'objectivities.' Considered as such, seeing, hear- ing, smelling, touching, and tasting, have a certain order and decreasing range of area. Seeing ranges over the 'objective' heavenly spaces, hearing only through the 'objective' atmo- spheric space, smelling over a small area of that atmosphere, 62 SPACE AND PERSONALITY touching has a still narrower 'objective/ and tasting least of all, though some have attributed touch to all the senses But although so apparently limited in their perceptive power, not one of them fails to mediate that perception (we cannot find a better term) in which the boundless objectlessness of space is mediated to our consciousness. Although space is not seen objectively, yet the eye-capacity not only deals with objects, or what we call mass, form, measurement, etc., but also with space as we experience that consciousness through all our senses. The capacity of the eye in perceiving a hill, e.g., is not exhausted by perception of mass, form, ' extensity,' etc. Why then do we see no mass, form, etc., in space, and ascribe only * objects ' to the eye-capacity ? The eye is as faithful in the one case as in the other, although with space the eye is dealing with the boundless, formless, measureless. The reason seems to us to be as follows. The perception, which is given whole by the eye space, hill, and all is arbitrarily cut into by the judgment, which selects only the ' qualities ' which go to make the concepts mass, form, measurements, etc., and then declares these finally to be conceptually a hill, an 'object,' while the quality-less, boundless, inconceptual space is declared conceptually to be nothing ! But such choice of judgment and such arbitrary creation of such concepts, have not the remotest support in our consciousness of reality. The very fact that we characterise the limitless portion of the eye-message as ' nothing ' is proof that it is of our experience, and that experience is not realised as whole without it. And what has been said of the eye, applies also to the ear. Sound is not more affirmed in our experience of per- ceptions and sensations than is Silence, which is always bound- less. The ear mediates both to our experience. And the mediation of silence is the mediation of the formless, measure- less, limitless, or, the experience of space. Our consciousness of space is never less, indeed, than the necessary antecedent of both, in which both find their functions not divided but whole. It is totally different, of course, when each has been arbitrarily created into separate concepts of sound and silence by our judgment. We then affirm sound to have * extensity,' ' massiveness,' and to be, while silence is nothing ! Similarly we might reason with reference to the other SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 63 senses. But it is evident that we are here dealing with a consciousness which is not mediated through any sense or sensation as a mere sequent consciousness to their functioning, but one which is iheflrius and primal condition of our possessing a consciousness of sense or sensation at all. This is the more evident when we remember that all consciousness is itself Motion, and pre-supposes thereby the being of space as the essential basis of any consciousness. All consciousness of sensations, senses, perceptions, or conceptions, must therefore follow our consciousness of space-being, though the latter may fitly enough be our latest realisation in knowledge historically. This conclusion is also strengthened by the fact that neither sense nor sensation, percept nor concept, ever affirms absolute reality for themselves or for all they function ; whereas this is the special idiomatic affirmation of space-being both for itself and for all else (speaking in divisive terms for expository purposes). Therefore, it is really this space-consciousness which gives ' first conditions ' to all our senses and sensations, perceptions and conceptions, and must have been the true generating power in their evolution and development. The lense of the eye no more affirms reality of anything than does the lense of the telescope, nor yet does the ear any more than the ear-horn. It is only in as far as a consciousness of space is mediated by either, whole with all their ' objects,' that we are able to affirm reality, or being, to all they mediate, for this is their condition and guarantee of reality in our consciousness of them. Neither does any sense profess to create forms, or measure- ments. To the eye the sun, or star, may seem far nearer and smaller than it actually counts by our measurements. Sounds are similarly inaccurately measured, and so with the other senses. This character, indeed, has stigmatised the senses as ( deceptive.' It is rather we who do not accept the whole fulness of data they bring, and distort by a limiting judgment, or conception, their absolute truth. No sense actually forms or measures. Its first and only business is always unfailingly to yield an absolute wholeness of perceptive reality : space-being ; the formless and limitless. We can then, if we so judge, cut up this fulness into * concepts ' of ' objects ' and set each in its place in the granary of our ' Knowledge.' But if they after- 64 SPACE AND PERSONALITY wards grow stale and unsatisfactory, we ought not to blame either sense or sensation for such inadequacy. But here it may be said that this measureless is the true measure of all things, as ' God ' is said to be. And such a conception of the measureless comes in with the fallacious concept of ' God/ in this case. For this concept, being of Unit-Being, is created and based not upon our consciousness of reality, but on an arbitrarily chosen and limited standard of 'one.' In conceiving measure, we arbitrarily select a part, a mere point it may be, out of the material which the senses give to our perceptions, and then we create that part into an arbitrary standard of measure, calling it One. We then build our measurements of ' objects ' upon that conceptual basis, and necessarily discover that what is, as mediated by the eye, and what is, as moulded into our concepts from limited material, do not coincide in truth. The eye (as all our senses) gives the measureless, boundless space-being; but on the basis of our conceptual standards, even * God ' is not the measureless, or the boundless, seeing that such a deistic concept -is not Whole, by the fact of its being merely a measure of One. We say, e.g. t God and Space : units both. Our so-called concepts and percepts of 'space' might be explained analogous to such ' extensities ' of unit-objects. Measurement and form are due to judgment, the concept creator, but never to any sense ; and rightly enough the eye never sees the ' units ' of our concepts and percepts which we define as ' distance,' ' space-of-three dimensions,' * mass ' etc., for neither of these ' objects ' is real being, but only conceptual being, the creation of our judgment from material whose extent is bound- less, but which boundlessness is ignored in the data of such concepts. Our senses are no parties to the creation of limited * objects ' and the ' objectivity ' of our conceptions. They sustain the truth of our fundamental experience of whole-reality, and this experience of whole-reality far transcends our ordinary experience of conceptual ' objects ' and ' objectivities.' 41. The philosophical method adopted by modern thinkers may be generalised as one of Decreation. Descartes called it Doubting. He doubted everything possible to be doubted, both within the sphere of Thought and of Things. He found SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 65 the systems of antiquity and of Scholasticism wholly unaccept- able and incredible. He resolved therefore to shred them to their foundations, and on the basis of what he found undoubt- able, or indestructible, to build his own structure of Universal Truth. He dissolved therefore ' Mind ' and ' Matter,' or all that was known, and all that was experienced, and pronounced them illusion and imperfection. But he could not doubt the Doubter! For the process was of course one of Thinking, and necessarily he must end by thinking Himself. He could not admit himself under the Doubt-process. This was therefore his Rock of Ages. Cogito : ergo sum. " I think, therefore I am." But clearly Descartes could only reach in this way a thought-born product. Reality was not connected with his ( I am ' in .any sense. His ' I am thinking, therefore I am,' still confined him within his process, which, as his steed, could not ride with him beyond itself. But the true consciousness of what-we-are gives no such consciousness of motions or of Being as based on Thought. And just as the scientist can never get outside of * Matter ' by a process of decreating its structure into infinitesimal fractions, or ions, so neither could Descartes get outside of 'Mind' by separating it into so many nullities. In order to do so, we must get hold of that consciousness of Being which yields no consciousness absolutely of either ' matter,' ' mind,' or ' motions,' viz., the Space-Being consciousness : Is. Kant, similarly, put the first obstacle in his own path to Truth-Universal when he said, " Space and Time are only forms of sensible intuition, and hence are only conditions of the existence of things as phaenomena" (Kritik, d. r. V. pref., sec. ed.). Space conditioned! By what? Decreate every- thing ; and then try to decreate Space ! The reverse was the truth. It is the space-consciousness which qualifies all that is, but nothing either in Thought or Thing ever qualifies Space. It is the unqualifiable Reality. So it likewise befell Hegel. Descartes said, Doubt ; Kant said, Criticise ; Hegel said, Abstract. Decreation by thought- process in order to reach a permanent basis on which to create. This was the method and aim of each. And neither ever reached this basis. For in the end of their efforts, the Ultimate E 66 SPACE AND PERSONALITY Reality of knowledge is placed by Descartes in an Infinite Substance, by Kant in an unknown .r-thing, and by Hegel in an abstract Being and Nothing, culminating in Notion, neither of which ultimates has the remotest support in our conscious- ness of what-we-are. We never get beyond Thought-Process and concepts with either of these great and revered Thinkers. Spinoza's 'Living Substance' stands in the same category. The horseman never goes further than his horse can carry him. 42. Now, our consciousness of Space is that it hides under nothing, and requires no such processes to manifest it. It is certainly not an ultimate of conception. It conditions all pro- cesses but is not conditioned. We do not conceive it, and we do not perceive it. For percepts and concepts are not even possible as processes of sensation or thought except as being conditioned by the Space - consciousness. For our consciousness of Space yields no predicates either for what- we-are or for the ALL-that-Is. It is simply an is-consciousness. And this is our common experience without exception, absol- utely. It gives nothing to sight, hearing, smelling, touching, or tasting. It tells us nothing of hard, soft, dark, light, coloured, numbered, outlined, or formed. It gives no hint of being either Mind or Matter. It yields nothing to these conceptions of our intelligence. Nothing in any Sensation ever reveals it. We have neither * Impression' nor * Idea' of space. And these are statements which are all equally applicable to our consciousness of what-we-are. What-we-are generalises certain processes of thought and names it " Mind," but is not itself conscious of ^ing Mind. What-we-are generalises certain qualities and calls it "Matter," but is not itself conscious of being Matter. And Herbert Spencer was quite right when he said that we think of Mind in terms of Matter and Matter in terms of Mind, but do not express thereby the consciousness of what-we-are, or of what-is. This to him was an Unknown, the position generally professed by all Empiricists. And, as a consequence, no process of Decreation, Criticism, Abstraction, nor any conceivable process of Thought is necessary to our consciousness of Reality. The space-consciousness is given before a consciousness of motion, or process, is conceiv- able. If we had no latent consciousness of Being, independent SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 67 of all thought, thought would never move. Consequently, the space-consciousness is never under the "laws of thought," nor the " laws of association," nor, indeed, any law. For Law is process of Thought massed into a concept. Nor can we compare what-we-are or what-lS to anything. Neither (speak- ing always in dual terms, for the sake of exposition) has space likeness nor unlikeness to anything. Space cannot be objectified as " over against " some Subject, nor yet subjectified as " over against" some Object. It is neither subject nor object, but conditions every percept and concept of such. We find it impossible to say of space, ' It is this or that.' Our conscious- ness, as we must repeat, is simply, IS. It admits neither the predicate UNITY, as if some sundered thing had been united, nor of DIFFERENCE, as if it had been formerly one and sundered. There is no place in it for Belief, Disbelief, or Doubt. It is neither He, She, nor It, for it is not under limitations, and, necessarily, it is the basis which is common to both .conceptions of ' Personality ' and 'Impersonality/ and sublates these relatives. It knows nothing whatever of Relation- ships, or Relatives, in the logical sense, and, consequently, the entire family of logical relatives, such as subject and object, one and many, finite and infinite, absolute and relative, being and non-being, are never found in it. Space Is. It has no other possible category for the human mind, if category it can be called, seeing that IS swallows up all categories ; and when we say ' I AM,' we must understand ourselves to have /r^-said ' Space.' For in our consciousness of ' Space/ our consciousness of ' I AM ' is sublated, in as far as we conceive the * I ' to be one ; personal ; a ' self/ or limited. Thus our consciousness of Space gives neither possibilities of 'subject' nor 'predicate.' Individuality, Individuation, and every pre- dicate implying universality, qualification, quantification, or any relation whatsoever, sinks into this consciousness of Whole- Being, IS. 43. Space has no 'qualities.' But it does not thereby 'cease to be/ as Hegel has decreed it. It only escapes from ordinary conceptuality. He says, " Quality is, in the first case, the character identical with being : so identical, that a thing ceases to be what it is, if it loses its quality " (Logic, Wallace's Trans., 68 SPACE AND PERSONALITY par. 85, p. 157). The German seems even more emphatic. " Etwas ist durch seine Qualitat das, was es ist, und indem es seine Qualitat verliert, so hort es damit an, das zu seyn, was es ist." He repeats this conclusion. " A Something is what it is in virtue of its quality, and losing its quality it ceases to be what it is" (ibid., p. 171). 44. We know nothing more important in Hegel than this conception. For it is the one conception which seems to determine his conception of BEING, and also his conception of NOTHING. What has no quality has, to Hegel, no BEING, and what is swept clean and pure of quality is also NOTHING. It is not BEING. Space, which has no quality absolutely is there- fore never included in his consciousness of BEING. Therefore, also BEING and NOTHING are separate conceptions, and it is because of the different mode in which he conceives each that, notwithstanding all his titanic efforts, he is never able to conceive them 'the same.' Two professed concepts, indeed, never can be conceived as the same concept. By the construc- tion of a concept it is impossible. He seems to have accepted the position of the ancients with regard to BEING and NOTHING, the WORLD and the VOID. " Where nothing was as yet," did not mean space-being to them. It meant only the lack of all predicable things. ' Nothing ' was what was relative to ' things ' that were, of which they were able to predicate quality, quantity, measure, number, colour, etc. The ancients could not predicate BEING of this lack. In the same way, Hegel's BEING possesses quality, quantity, etc., and when all these are lacking it is to him NON-BEING. He calls this NON-BEING, NOTHING ; blank, ' utter emptiness.' All his reasoning leaves it outside of itself. It is not data of judgment to Hegel on which to rationalise BEING. The two concepts, therefore, BEING and NOTHING, are true relatives, they have a different content, and are fundamentally distinguished. Dr H. Stirling says, " We feel that though each term formulises the absolute blank, and the absolutely same blank, there is somehow and somewhere a difference between them. They point to and designate the absolutely same thought, yet still a distinction is felt to exist between them " (Secret^ i. 49). Same and Not-Same ! Absolute uncertainty of SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 69 Reality is the basal result of Hegel's philosophy. They are never the ' SAME.' What we actually get from his 'Nothing' or Non-Being, is a zero-content, exactly equal to the lack of that ' BEING' which, through the abstraction of its Quality, Quantity, etc., has been 'taken away.' Although he asserts the contrary {Secret of Hegel, i. 321, Remark I.), his pretended Absolute NOTHING, which is unthinkable and inconceivable, is exactly a concept of NO thing. It is, like the numerical zero, never quantity-less, although zero-quantity. It is not absolute nothing, for it has always the lack-quantity equal to the number one to which it stands related, and counts positively for the lack of that quantity. Even when we simply say, " NOT," as he advises, without reference to anything, we cannot rid it from quality-in-itself. For example, he says it makes little difference whether we put Non-Being for Nothing, " for in non-being the reference to Being is implied ; both Being and the Negation of Being are enunciated in One, Nothing, as it is in Becoming." Non-Being, by reference to itself, is. It is also One with Being. Hence, this is not the Negation which Hegel wants. He asks us to realise the Negation which is in his consciousness by not referring it to Being, or by simply saying " NOT." Then we have his " Nothing." But this " NOT " is, of course, pure sound, and has neither consciousness nor thought behind it. In the very fact that we think it, and say it, it is referable to ourselves, that is, to Being. He tries to substantiate his fundamentals by asking us to do' the impossible. This " NOT " has no response in Nature, in anyone, nor in Hegel himself. Its place is in a dictionary. Hegel, consequently, is never able to free his BEING and NOTHING from NUMBER. Neither he nor we can conceive either less than UNIT-BEING, even when we assume that they are the SAME. And they are only productive of a series, endless as he supposes, of Unit-beings. Even his Absolute BEGRIFF, his NOTION, never rises beyond the mathematical consciousness, for his BECOMING is also Unit-Quantity, though presented as a TOTAL. He denies that his NOTHING is just the lack of all quality, that is, a zero-thought; but it is proved in the fact of his assertion that this NOTHING can ' Become,' or move into BEING, and be BEING. It is thereby self-determined 70 SPACE AND PERSONALITY in motion. Now, the space-consciousness always renders it impossible to utter the term NOTHING except as NO Thing, or Zero-Being, the lack relative to Unit-Being. It is likewise just as impossible to say of two ultimate concepts, that they are Same-Being, except on the basis of both as space-being. Then, the true predicate is not ' Same ' Being but ' Whole-Being.' It was inevitable that Hegel should fail to clear his concepts, BEING and NOTHING, from either Number or Motion when he refused to include Space as a datum of his judgment. For it is solely in the consciousness of Space that we can obtain absolute freedom from number and motion. And, denying this position, neither of his concepts can shred itself from unit-being, for though they are married together they are never truly either one or the ' same? That his concept of NOTHING, for example, has only unit-form in his thought, is evident from his treatment of it. He asserts at one time that " Nothing is, for it is in its nature the same as Being," then he veers round to say that " Nothing shows itself in combination, or, if you will, contact, with a Being ; " then again, " Nothing is only absence of Being," and speaks further of " the transition of Being and Nothing into one another." Then he gives us this simplification. " But nothing is no beginning, or there is no beginning in nothing : for a beginning includes in it a Being, but nothing contains no Being. Nothing is only Nothing" (italics ours). It is clear that Hegel is merely playing with forms of logical thought, and makes no reference to any reality. An absolute nothing cannot be thought at all, for it must be thought of relative to the thinker who thinks it, and who is. His method of effecting these severely antithetic and synthetic wonders is, he tells us, by DIALECTIC. This is important, for we are here referring once more to Hegel to show that modern philosophy in its greatest exponent is merely thought-created, without the least reference to fact of nature in its highest expression of Space-Being, and thereby makes the false assumption that thought, or more correctly, con- ceptive thought, is the supreme Fact of our consciousness of BEING. If it were, we should be able to think Space, and give quality and quantity to it, as Hegel has done with his BEING and NOTHING and BECOMING. This cannot be done, however, and Thought being also but MOTION, Space-Being is never SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 71 sublated under it. Space-Being conditions Thought. And that we are always within the conditions of Thought in the Hegelian System of Philosophy, is clear when he says, " We call Dialectic the higher rational movement, in which such seemingly absolutely separated things pass over into one another through themselves through that which they are and the presupposition sub- lates itself" (our italics). And what we have said regarding his BEING and NOTHING as merely Unit-Being, never outside the arithmetical sphere, is supported by his words, " It is the dialectic immanent nature of Being and Nothing themselves to manifest their unity (Becoming) as their truth" {Secret of Hegel \ i. 348-353). " The truth of Being and of Nothing is accordingly the unity of the two: and this unity is Becoming" (Logic, p. 163, 88). And Unity of Being is never near a conception of Whole-Being, which is impossible to any thought or con- sciousness save as given by Space-Reality. Logic always requires an objective form of thought, but the space-conscious- ness is given absolutely devoid of form. This is proved in our " I " consciousness. We must assert, therefore, that we all have a genuine consciousness of Being, Reality, What-we-are, without the remotest need of either Quality or Quantity to authenticate it to us as Being. Our consciousness of What-we-are, Reality, Absolute Being is never less than IS, Space-Being, within which all thought lives, moves, and has its being, and in which all its motions are finally subsumed. Hegel did not really advance far beyond Bacon in this respect. But Bacon specified his necessary Quality as FORM. He says, " The form of any nature is such that, when it is assigned, the particular nature infallibly follows. It is, there- fore, always present when that nature is present, and universally attests such presence, and is adherent in the whole of it. The same form is of such a character, that if it be removed the particular nature infallibly vanishes " (Nov. Organum, Bk. 2, aphor. 4). From which it is evident that Space-Being was not included in Bacon's conception of ' Nature.' And it is this omission which gives him his conception of that Being into which something "infallibly vanishes." That is to say, all Bacon's thought, like all others, invariably drifts towards the consciousness of space. 72 SPACE AND PERSONALITY 45. We seem now to have before us the grand trend, or gravitation of Human Thought, as the highest and the greatest experience it in their search for Reality in the fundamental knowledge of Being. The trend is steadfastly towards the consciousness of Space-Being. Descartes, Spinoza, Kant, and Hegel, are our pre-eminent modern examples. These minds may be taken as our data for the judgment that all Thought, as intelligent process, moves out of a consciousness of Space- Being in its incidence of cognition ; meets with no higher basis of Reality in its uses of Percepts and Concepts ; finds all cognition which is drawn through such uses, unstable and limited ; finds, in short, that ALL FLOWS, and never discovers the absolute knowledge desired till rest is found permanently in the same consciousness of Space-Being which is identical with the consciousness of the * I '-Being. And in this con- sciousness there is no realisation of quality, quantity, motion, form, nor substance, neither in the consciousness of the space- being ' within ' us, nor in the ALL of space-being ' without ' us. Number and Motion are also impossible to this consciousness. The area of Being, therefore, if we are permitted to .call it so for purposes of reasoning, which is involved in Motion, Process, Becoming, is bounded before and after by a conscious- ness of Space-Being in which no such qualities are predicable. That is to say, the forms of thought, and the limiting processes we term Perception and Conception, utterly fall short in the presence of this consciousness. But although this is the case, we do not think there is any pressing necessity to characterise this limitless consciousness by such objective terms as Descartes' Infinite Substance, Spinoza's God-Substance, Kant's Thing-in- itself, Hegel's Absolute Notion or Spirit, or Fichte's Moral Order, for everyone of these is fatally qualified by connota- tions of matter, number, motion, etc., and never brings us any nearer to the goal of our desire. Neither is it incumbent upon us to stigmatise it, with the Empiricists, as " The Unknown," for in the case of Absolute Being, if we know it to be unknown, it still comes within the sphere of knowledge. With the veritable data given us in our consciousness of what-we-are, we can truly call it space-being, what-lS. And nothing greater, fuller, truer, or more absolutely real, can be affirmed of any consciousness of Being. No philosopher has found in any SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 73 of his ' Being ' terms a consciousness of Absolute Permanence so invincibly expressed as the term Space affords. We have, then, Absolute Permanence in what-we-are ; absolute permanence in all that IS ; and Existence vibrating between, in its myriad-fold periodicities, the greatest being not the Gravitation of Matter, but the pulsating Mind throughout the Universe and known to us as Cosmic History, of which Human History is a fragment. As the motion of the blood between the fixtures of life and death, the vibrations of the string between its static nodules, so Existence seems to spread out in its multiplicity of Forms, Matters, Substances, and Causes, Colours, Numbers, Modes, and Relations, between the permanences of Whole-Being apprehensible through our consciousness of what-we-are and Space Absolute, which yet the idiom of Space-Being vouches as also what-we-are. 46. It is impossible to think Space-Being impermanent. Yet all else that we think is branded with instability. Why is it that we are never satisfied with the Object as we see it, hear it, touch it, taste it, smell it ? It is because nothing it ever gives us in our perceptions, nor anything it reveals to us in our conceptions of its qualities, quantities, and relations generally, stands on the same level of absolute verity of Being as we are conscious of for ourselves. And when we ask the Object what really it IS, unfailingly it answers our question by referring itself to our consciousness of Space. Not to form, substance, or any quality or quantity, but inevitably to Space- Being. It refers us, that is, to the same consciousness for its own reality as we are referred to by our own consciousness for what-we-are. And when this consciousness is admitted, all doubt of the stability of Being vanishes. 47. It is sometimes asserted that all our knowledge is due to that process called perception, through which our senses and sensations deliver a content from which what-we-are moulds a Concept, or generalised Idea. But the Concept seems to be as unsatisfactory in its pretensions of infallibility as any other conscious motion of our being. This has been felt by Idealists and Empiricists alike. The Ultimate Being styled Infinite Substance, God-Substance, Thing-in-itself, Absolute Notion, 74 SPACE AND PERSONALITY is placed by idealists, as James points out, beyond the spheres of perception and conception. Similarly, the " Unknown " of the Empiricists is neither perceived nor yet is it conceiv- able. What is the hint given in this stress of philosophic necessity? Neither of these ' Beings ' has the smallest support in our consciousness that it Is. They are purely Guess-Beings. But why place them in a realm-by-itself, outside of all percepts and concepts ? It is the pressure of the space-consciousness that compels such processes. For if Thought will not take the natural path towards the Real, in that Space which is never absent from either percept or concept, there is no other alternative but to seek refuge in the imaginary. But we need not decry either percept or concept. What we require, however, is a consciousness of Being in which both motions are subsumed, or identified. This is found in the Recept of the I-consciousness. What-we-are both perceives and conceives and receives. But imperfection moves with both our perceptions and conceptions. For the Absolute Reality is always more than these motions can overtake. Dr Bain, in his ' Mind and Body,' describes this separation of the 'powers of the Intellect,' into the "three facts called (i) Dis- crimination, or consciousness of Difference ; (2) Similarity, or consciousness of Agreement ; and (3) Retentiveness, or the power of Memory or Acquisition." He says these three functions "are the Intellect, the whole Intellect, and nothing but the Intellect " (p. 83). " Conceptual Knowledge," says James, " is forever inadequate to the fulness of the reality to be known." Only the Receiver is conscious of being whole with Reality Absolute. And while neither Percept nor Concept fully declare that Reality which is given in our * I '-consciousness, they are its handmaidens and cease not to lead every thought and con- sciousness towards it. How ample is the percept, we say ; how narrow the concept built out of its content ! For no concept ever really embraces all the content which the percept yields to it. It is the continual approximation of the concept to the amplitude of the percept that may be said to mark the " progress of Mind," and especially of the scientific mind. 48. How often, for example, had men perceived the falling body before Newton. Their percept of this fact was as ample SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 75 as was his. But what was it in the percept that everyone left out of the concept of the falling body? It was the earth. Their concept of a falling body confined itself to the body alone, and did not include the earth as necessary in such a concept. Newton alone included the earth-part of the percept in his concept, and so made an advance in science. No dis- covery is ever made otherwise. The percept, without fail, yielded as much content of material to the men of the first century as it does to those of our own. But the latter have included more of its content in their concepts, and widened thereby the bounds of knowledge. The " Evolution " generalisa- tion is another conspicuous example. But if we were to ask, why does Newton's generalisation of Gravitation fail to give us a final consciousness of Absolute Being, but only a concept of limited motion among limited bodies, the reply would be that he also left out part of the content of his percept when he closed the concept of his great law. That part of his percept was Space. Yet it was in the data of his percept, as it is in every percept. Now only Space taken into the content of our concept can yield the fullest realisation of Absolute Being possible to any concept. And when this is done, the concept, indeed, finds then the task beyond itself. For the inclusion of the space-data in any concept always rends it, and then it only points beyond to that consciousness which in its plenitude says ' I AM.' For in the ' I AM ' consciousness even the concept of Motion given in the Law of Gravitation is transcended, and both percept of space and concept of space, blend in a receptive identical conscious- ness of Whole-Being. This was impossible to Newton with the meagre part of the conceptive space which as * distance,' he selected for his generalisation. His ' distance '-space is of course made up of the imaginary ' points ' which it is supposed can be placed in Space, but is only an imaginary line as limited as the masses between which it is said to lie. Such a line has mathematical quantity ; it is made less or more; and, as such, has nothing to do with the consciousness of Space proper and Real. " The square of their distance" is squaring a * space ' which, limited strictly to two masses, has no affinity to the Space of Whole-Being. It is clearly objective, and has its ' qualities ' derived from the two masses which it divides. 76 SPACE AND PERSONALITY Yet Whole-Space is always given in the data of our percepts. But to connect in an identity any Object of our percepts with this Space has always appeared as preposterous as an identity of Mind and Matter, or of Spirit and Body. Yet ' difference,' however apparently wide, should not be taken as absolutely real. Every advance of modern scientific research has converged nearer to identity of all the powers of nature which formerly seemed invincibly divided. They all pass into each other. And in time when science admits Space to be the most scientific fact there is to consider, then the basis of all these powers, matters and motions, forces and energies, will be found whole^ and every extreme subsumed in it. 49. No doubt, from the Object of our perception to the percept-less Space the extreme seems to be unbridgable. But the mystery is that we are never conscious of any incongruity between the two, nor are we ever surprised to find them always present together in our percept or presentation. But our usual course is to put the Object into our concept, or representation, and ignore the space present in the percept. But suppose that our percept should on some ridiculous occasion fail to include space along with the Object. What would happen then ? Could we form any concept, representation, or ideation from such a percept? It would be quite impossible. There would be no Object possible for the percept. Form, and Size, and Substance, and colour, etc., would disappear. The condition of their being objective would perish. That is, both percept and concept, presentation and representation would lapse together. This would be the real condition which is falsely assumed to exist when " qualities are taken away." From which data it is possible to say that it is first our consciousness of space-being which renders perceptual and conceptual being possible to our consciousness. There must, therefore, be an underlying identity between our consciousness of the Object and Space- Being, and we shall see that it is found in the consciousness of ourselves as being whole-with-space. 50. There is a tendency in psychology to narrow the percept to the sphere of sensation, and then to limit sensation to an area from which thinking and conation are shut out. A kind SPACE AND OBJKCTIV1TY 77 of division of labour is established between all the various 1 faculties,' as they used to be called, and the human conscious- ness takes on the semblance of a great place of business in which every 'faculty' is assigned its own individual duties There is really no such division. E.g., the perception of the eye gives an object to the sensation, from which material we say a concept is formed, and we then talk of having an ' idea ' of the object. Eye, ear, touch, taste, smell, give such presenta- tions to sensation, and through sensation to our concepts. But a sensation arises out of the motions of life, a pain or pleasure, and the nerves act as the bearers of sensation independent of our ordinary sense-instruments, eye, ear, tongue, nose, skin- contact. Something touches from within instead of from without, and perceptibility of the sensation leads to the formation of a concept as to whereabout the pain or pleasure has location. But the concept still marks a certain division between what-we-are as receiver of such material from percept and sensation, and the use which is made of it in concept formation. There is motion of sensation and thinking by some * I '-Being which seems apart from both spheres of motion. And yet there is clearly a common basis of intimacy for this I-Being and these motions. For the ' I '-Being makes the concepts, or thoughts, which are built out of the material of the percepts and sensations, and at will actually objectifies them. A percept of the concept is then carried on within the inner sphere of thought and consciousness. Every concept being a generalisation of the material which percepts have conveyed, the generalisation itself, as we have seen in the 'distance' between two masses, becomes as distinct an object of a higher perception as any object given to the ordinary sense -instruments. And it is for this reason, of course, that we have philosophy enlarging upon the Subject and Object, the Thinker and the Thought, and stamping division into Being because it is apparently ineradicable from our motions of Per- ception and Conception. Both such 'Subject' and 'Thinker* are really concepts made perceptive. Kant's vision of his ' Thing-in-itself ' all alone in a space-by-itself was as distinctly a percept as is our common observation of a landscape or of a tree. It was the same with Hegel. His " Absolute Notion " is a generalisation, a concept, which just because it is general- 78 SPACE AND PERSONALITY ised as ONE, UNIT-BEING, is objectified. And consequently Hegel, finding the inability of generalising What-/^-was inside of that Object and Duality of Being, rampant as it was in his consciousness, as it also was in that of Kant, adopts the plan of making the Subject ' strike round ' into the Object, and ' enter into itself,' and 'become itself!' And when we agree with his efforts and accept this amalgamation of percept and concept, thought and thinker, our disappointment is great when we discover that the Subject-Object is, after all, just another generalised concept, which the ' I '-Being would be blind indeed not to perceive as a very much objectified thing. And thus it is evident that even if we could unitise subject and object in this artificial way, such f/^zV-Being would never give us the conscious- ness of what-we-are as being it. 51. Why, then, cannot such percepts and concepts bear us further in the problem of Being? The reason is that the concept, the generalisation represented to our ' I '-Being, never includes within itself all the material which the percept gives to consciousness. No concept ever includes Whole-Space within itself. It includes only the qualities, quantities, etc., which are necessary to objectivity. The selection is the cause of objec- tivity. But Whole-Space is always in the consciousness which is allied with perception. And it is this fact in the percept which proves its illimitability in this respect. Now it is the concept which limits by a judgment a portion of the content of the percept, and generalises it, calling it T-his or That, Man, World, Cosmos, God, Cause, Effect, etc. And in proportion to the material contained in the percept which is used by the concept, so will the generalised 'Idea' be. A stone, for example, gives different concepts to a boy, a geologist, a lapidary, a naturalist, or a chemical analyst. Why should there be any difference of concept ? The difference is caused by the material selected out of the perception of the stone which each uses for his adjudged concept. Each concept again might be a kind of generalisation of accumulated generalisa- tions, all affording material together for a wider concept. For the boy, his concept of the stone would probably be formed out of the perceptual content, Form, Matter, Size, and in all likeli- hood, Weight ; but weight is itself a generalised concept from SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 79 the material of other perceptions. For the geologist, the con- cept 'Stone' would include all the qualities and quantities of the boy's percepts, but it would include also Time. And this Time-concept of itself is a generalised concept which involves motion, etc., a quality which the boy would not put into his concept of the stone. To the chemical analyst, again, a great many other qualities would be employed in formulating his concept, such as coherence, cohesion of atoms, gases, etc., most of which would be drawn from percepts which involve long experimental perception for themselves. All of these concepts, however, would involve Number, Matter, Form, etc., although each of these qualities, again, would vary indefinitely in the concept of each observer of the same stone. But not one of their concepts would pass beyond Objectivity. The stone as an object to the boy would remain an object to everyone of these persons. The same would fall to be said of the scientific philosopher who might subject the stone to the utmost tests of theoretical mathematical analysis. None of them would pass the bounds of Objectivity. And the reason of this would be found in the fact that not one of them had included in his conceptual generalisation that data of Whole-Space which would inevitably be found unused in each consciousness of all the qualities and quantities perceived by each. Each would only include in his concept that portion of space which has been generalised as possessing three dimensions, the point, line, and surface-space, which can be squared and cubed, etc., but which is as distinctly itself an object conceptualised from 'qualities' as the others are. 52. This latter is the 'space' which Kant declared to be " nothing else than the form of all phenomena of the external sense, that is, the subjective condition of the sensibility, under which alone external intuition is possible." Kant's "Space" was as truly objectified as was Newton's ' distance between two masses.' No matter although he declares that it is given a priori, or before we can have any experience of concept or percept. He is never able to substantiate this, for, as we think it, his Space has number, for it is not Time, and therefore it is qualified, and as such it is conceptual. Kant's 'Space' and Whole-Space are not identical in any way. 80 SPACE AND PERSONALITY But those who accept Kant's view of Space are necessarily unable to grasp the consciousness of whole-space. For Whole- Space cannot be conceived or perceived. And when it is found impossible to have such conditions for thought, or when it is clear that no possible percept or concept can be formed of Space so as to generalise it, then it is denied having existence at all. But it is only discerned through the ' I '-Being as identical-being, and concept and percept are sublated in the I-Consciousness which we have of What-we-are, is. For the same reason, when no percept nor concept is possible for the object, when, disburdened of all its 'qualities/ it enters space-being, then it is said not to be. That is, when the Kantian 1 space ' disappears with the object, of which it is the 'form' and all percept and concept is impossible, Whole-Space is assumed as Null, and the object which enters into it as also null ! But this only illustrates, once more, that Being is such that every name, or generalisation by which it may be named, is untrue, in the absolute, until it is named Space-Being, for by this idiom alone does it make itself named in all that is perceived and conceived as Being. Every object when analysed to its utmost capacity, never gives less than a residuum of space-being, as being what-zV-is, ultimately. The formless, matterless, number- less, causeless, timeless, etc., is always our final consciousness of any object, even as it is of What-we-are ourselves. But we are not to suppose that such an 'object' is not fundamentally space until it is so generalised with Whole- Being. On the contrary, the fact that our ultimate consciousness of the object is Space, is proof that its objectivity is only what -it -is put under such limitations by our arbitrary conceptions. It is due to our concept alone that it is numbered, formed, mattered, timed, and divided from Whole- Being. Our percept protests constantly that such is not the whole truth of the object, seeing that Whole-Being-Space is always omitted in the concept of the object, and is never put among the data on which it is judged to be. And in this connection we also find our true consciousness of Absolute Substance for the object, to be Space. Similarly Cause, which seems so inherent in our concept of an object, is found to be Whole-Space ; our true consciousness of un- caused Cause. SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 81 53. We may venture now to say that so far as Science has yet advanced, it is evident to everyone interested that, inten- tionally or unintentionally, the discarding of division between THIS and THAT, in the universe of things, is her destiny. Her attention is principally focussed upon infinitesimal quantities ; and she is daily expectant of laying bare that ' matterless ' and almost imaginary object of her speculations, ETHER, which in its way comes near to our consciousness of space- being. The face of Science is turned to look, with the Sphinx, endlessly onward into the DEEP. She is even prophetic of bringing under her knowledge the exiguous being of Life. There is a distinct trend towards realising the consciousness of space-being as scientific fact. It is indeed the fact of all facts for Science, as it is for both Religion and Philosophy. For it is the fact which alone can harmonise What-we-are with .Whole-Being, and fill up the * gaps ' which our small general- ising concepts have dug between Body, Mind, and * Spirit,' and created thereby the isolations of Science, Philosophy, and Theology. 54. Our * percepts,' then, are in no wise blamable. They give us indeed those 'qualities' without which it is asserted Being cannot be, but they also without fail bring us that which is wholly quality-less and quantity-less, and it is this simple consciousness which affirms Being for ourselves, as for all, and without which Being is falsely apprehended. In order, there- fore, to possess a consciousness of Absolute or Whole-Being, as it IS, it is never the so-called ' qualities ' which are necessary. They only form a part of what is necessary. The consciousness of space is necessary, and when we include this consciousness we include all that IS, 'qualities,' 'quantities,' atid the rest. To take away from a ' thing ' its matter, substance, form, and cause, is never to reduce it to Non-Being. It 'infallibly vanishes,' no doubt, as Bacon said, but only much as the water-drop vanishes into its constituent gases, or as "matter" into 'electric charges' ; but Non-Being is an impossible consciousness for What-lS, and when all these ' qualities ' are taken away, the ' thing ' as we term it, simply equates or identifies itself with Space-Being, or takes place with that Being which we refuse to it in our concepts. We are willing to say it is, when it is Water, and F 82 SPACE AND PERSONALITY we style it Being-Thing when it takes another form of H 2 O, and when it goes still nearer the space-being we may believe it to be, but when it shreds all its * qualities ' and gets beyond percept and concept, we falsely determine that it is Not. In reality, the 'thing' is simply doing, in such a case, what man has always done for himself, viz., verifying its being in a consciousness which affirms Being Absolute, or rather, Being- Whole, a verification which is impossible until Space-Being is accepted with our so-called 'quality' and 'quantity' as What-IS. Let us notice now this process of negating what Kant called "the categories of the understanding." As a matter of common experience, if it were not for our consciousness of space, we could never find it possible to conceive of a * quality,' or a 'quantity,' being taken away or negated. When we perform this thaumaturgic operation, where do we send them ? Where, but into our space-consciousness? Then we take it upon us to call this ' negation ' Non-Being, Nothing ! What we actually do is to put consciousness of space-being in the place of the concept negated ; our wide-open unclosed judgment, IS, in place of the concept which is closed and judged as qualified being ; the unlimited for the limited. Then, because we cannot find any quality, quantity, or relation in this whole-open judgment of space-being, we affirm that the qualified ' thing ' has ' ceased to be ' ! On the contrary, its affirmation of absolute being has now reached its highest expression, passing beyond every concept of generality into that which is Whole-with what-we-are. And in this fact we find once more that the is-consciousness is really the dynamic affirmation in every concept which is built out of the material of percepts, and is the consciousness which, despite of all suggestions of limitation for that material, gives us that consciousness of reality which is so insistent in us for everything that is. We are well aware that the ' things ' which pass away are composed of qualities, quantities, and relations, but beneath every such testimony there is a deeper affirmation which becomes the stronger for the iS-ness of the qualified 'thing' the nearer it approaches the state of quality- ness, quantity^riess, and relationless-ness. In short, the affirma- tion of space-being, IS, does not limit itself to the motions of SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 83 our concepts, wider or narrower in their generality, but emphasises everything to be absolute and whole, as well as what we call related and qualified. Nothing is lost in this consciousness. 55. This is the same fact which Science reiterates in her statement of the ' conservation of energy/ a doctrine which has a wider application than Science yet recognises. She also, like the theologian and the philosopher, will not accept Being beyond the limitation of her concepts. ' No conception, no knowledge/ is the postulate, and, consequently, science breaks up her perceptive material into concepts of molecules, atoms and ions, and still more general concepts of matter and motion, energy and inertia ; theologians into ultimate concepts of God, Cosmos, Man ; and philosophy into Self and Not-Self. Each follows the same process, viz., decreation of former concepts ; rearrangement of more material brought in from our percepts ; and finally new generalisations of other concepts. Yet not one of these so-called final concepts or generalised ideas, gives the slightest assurance of absolute permanence. The Process of decreation has not been guaranteed to have ceased its work. No such guarantee is possible, either, until the is-consciousness comes in to negate it absolutely, and this always means the entrance of the consciousness of Space-Being, I-Being. All concepts, then, like the widening curve towards the straight, leave all limitation behind them, and take on infinity, asserting the illimitable. For in the is-consciousness of Space-Being the I-Being decreation is impossible, d\ process is inconceivable, and generalisation cannot be done. We have, however, a genuine knowledge independent of a concept. Or, to put it differently, all percepts and concepts then close together in that Recept which yet owns no quality, quantity, nor relation. Bacon, in this consciousness of the Receiver, would find no 1 Form/ and would conclude that Being had thereby ' infallibly vanished ' ; Hegel would assert that it had ' ceased to be/ in spite of the fact that neither could possibly think less than space - being with his every thought a fact which is proved by the truth that when everything has seemed to vanish and cease to be, scientists must still call it 'energy/ philosophers ' Notion/ and theologians ' spirit.' The is-con- 84 SPACE AND PERSONALITY sciousness abides, and defies all negation. It is Whole-Con^ servation affirmed. 56. Therefore, this IS-consciousness is the true affirmation of Being; and that affirmation of Being, which is conditioned in quality, quantity, and relation, is only conditionally true. And, therefore, in the construction of the Being-Concept we must begin with the Whole and not with the part, with Space - Being and not with that being which is qualified and conditioned. The error lies in the start. Descartes, as it were, said, " Let us doubt everything till we reach the Undoubtable " ; Kant, " Let us criticise till we reach what is beyond all criticism " ; and Hegel, " Let us abstract everything till there is nothing more to abstract " ; but each began by admitting that there was Something to doubt, to criticise, and to abstract. What happened then, was, in the case of Descartes, to get rid of all perceptive material till he reached the One, i.e. himself, who got rid of it ; in the case of Kant, to criticise every concept out of existence with not even one left to contain the ' I ' of himself, which he thought must necessarily be Unknown thereby ; and in the case of Hegel, to abstract not only Descartes' ' I am thinking,' but Kant's ' I,' without a predicate save * Unknown,' and then to affirm what was not left to be abstract BEING. Each carried the decreeing process of Being, or Something, further than the other, and yet each ended by still affirming the Something ! How could they do otherwise? They never could free themselves from their own postulate, " Something IS." They each proved, nevertheless, that, independent of every concept, generalisation, or Idea-ing, we still have a consciousness, and, therefore, a knowledge^ of Being. They proved unintentionally that know- ledge does not begin nor does it end with concepts. On the contrary, it is when all concepts have faded away into the consciousness of Space-Being, that we know Reality, What- we-are, and All-that-lS. We reach the consciousness of BEING, which admits of neither doubting, criticising, nor abstracting. And it is because that ordinary people z^doubtingly, ^critically, and z^zabstractingly accept Whole-Space-Being as well as all that is qualified, quantified, and related by it, or, rather accept that Whole-Being which is given in the percepts as well as in the parts conceptualised, that they possess that affirmation of SPACE AND OBJECTIVITY 85 the REALITY of all and everything which the doubting, the critical, and the abstracting find it so difficult to apprehend. The latter always want to apprehend REALITY through concepts, generalisations, and unified judgments; to call it This ; and the former accept the consciousness of BEING which ever transcends these "categories of the understanding." And in this Space-Consciousness All Nature reposes, as affirmatively real as the 'I am ' of man. That is, Reality does not rest in Thought-Concepts, nor in processes of Thought which are conditioned by concepts of the Understanding, nor in Objectivity which creates a ' Cogito,' an '!=*,' or an abstract 1 Being-Nothing,' but in that consciousness which is not of a ' Self but of What-we-are as Whole-Space-Being. CHAPTER IV SPACE AS OMITTED FROM OUR CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 57. This view of Being evidently involves the transcendence of Personality. Personality is a generalisation of all the qualities, quantities, and relations which have been assumed to belong to man, and as it is such a concept, by the nature of a concept it is decreatable. For every generalisation which man has formed is open to be broken up, changed, or abandoned. Hence the confidence of scientific research to carry every generalisation which sums up our human knowledge to wider bounds and ampler realisations. We see this conviction to lie at the foundation of all research. The concept, God, for example, is a generalisation formed from the qualities, quanti- ties, and relations which men agree to ascribe to Deity because they do not know any other to whom they can belong. These are almightiness, eternalness, unchangeableness, wisdom, justice, purity, etc., without which qualities, it is believed, there could be no knowledge nor consciousness of Deity, and without which, indeed, Deity would ' cease to be ' even though the personality which man conceives for himself should be ascribed to Deity also. 58. Similarly, the Universe must possess, it is believed, the qualities of matter and energy, for without these it would ' infallibly vanish ' ; and so likewise man himself must retain certain qualities in order to be conscious that he Is. Yet none of the qualities, out of which, and with which, we build up the concepts, God, Universe, or Man, ever professes to guarantee itself as permanently stable. No such quality ever affirms itself unconditionally to Be. ' With the result, that the concepts which are based on and built out of such evanescent material, neces- SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 87 sarily possess the same character of instability and unreliableness. No concept, therefore, of God, Universe, or Man, either formu- lated in the great past or the present, ever yields to mankind a consciousness of absolutely permanent and undecreatable Reality. It is impossible, so long as these concepts are dependent for their very nature and construction, upon material which openly proclaims itself ' passing away/ or fluxional. It is this fact which explains why, in every epoch of the world's history, a different concept of deity has been found to command the worship of man, and why man has an ever varying concept of his universe, and also why he is never absolutely certain whether life, soul, mind, or spirit, are veritable 'qualities' or ' quantities ' belonging to his Being ; and why, as a consequence, he has been compelled to leave them in vague opinion, belief, and conjecture, curtained always in haze and sorrow. And it is just because such a man-generalisation is dependent on such qualities and quantities that he is never absolutely assured what he is, or what he is to be, if these can be * removed ' from him, or caused to ' infallibly vanish.' Must he, in such circumstances, " cease to be ? " It is in such a bog of unreliable convictions that the consciousness of space-being constantly rears our rock of ages. To know Being, it is not necessary to have any quality to be a mediate. We have a positive knowledge of what-we-are independent of all the 'categories of the understanding.' No doubt, we find much that is to be known of ourselves through mediating qualities of form, substance, cause, and matter, colour, shape, size, weight, etc., inclusive of all the qualities of what we term ' life,' and all the qualities of what we define as ' mind,' but we also rise beyond such mediated knowledge, and every mediating quality of ourselves, to knowledge which gives no quality, absolutely, in the knowledge of What-we-are, save Is, or Space-Being. We rise to knowledge, that is, which cannot be generalised in any concept, and is therefore not decreatable by any solvent of thought. And it is just because everyone possesses this highest consciousness and knowledge of What- he-is, that he speaks freely and confidently of his 'life, 5 his ' soul/ his 'spirit,' although he has not the slightest conscious- ness of any quality by which they are conceived or perceived, or by which they exist, or are known to him. It is the Space- 88 SPACE AND PERSONALITY Being consciousness which alone speaks to him in its own idiom (using dual terms for conceptual exposition), and to which What-he-is responds in joyful trust. Life, Soul, Spirit, are terms which sum for him that positive knowledge of what- he-is, which he obtains primarily in his qualityless, quantityless, and predicateless * I '-am space-being. 59. But according to Kant, and many others who have followed him, this was not to know. It was only to know The Unknown. Now, no man has a right to affirm anything as unknown till he has exhausted the reservoir of facts which percept, concept, and recept place at his disposal. And con- sciousness of what-man-is, is a fact which never has been exhausted by the modern agnostics from Kant downwards. It has been read " with mistakes." The scientists who are as loud as the philosophers in proclaiming the Unknown, have also failed to include the highest fact of the universe in their generalisations. They have never, as we must always insist, included the fact of Space-Being in the data of their judgments of what-is. They seem also to have felt justified in not includ- ing Space-Being within their data of judgment in this respect, just because that no percept nor concept could be formed concerning it. For Space-Being is not a generalisation although it is judgment. It is the I-consciousness of whole-being, and is that which renders it possible to form judgments or concepts. But this is not the Unknown. It is that which forms the basis of all that we know. Not to know what-we-are in its ultimate of ultimate consciousness of Space-Being, is not to know at all, save through the broken and blurred mediates of percepts and concepts by which we only know imperfectly the All that is in the Flow. For the ultimate consciousness of what-we-are is whole-knowledge ; and no knowledge that man is conscious of possessing ever transcends it, whether that knowledge is generalised as Man, Universe, or God. For each of these concepts, from the fact that it is a concept, is a closed judgment of Unit-Being ; it is in a class of One ; and therefore, limited, and not whole ; and it gives no consciousness of permanent stability of knowledge equal to that consciousness which we have of what-we-are ; " I." We have indeed no consciousness of Space-Being as either SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 89 known or unknown. We have only the simple consciousness of Is, and this is the same consciousness we have of what-we-are. Consequently, it includes all we know through the predicates of our knowledge, and also all we predicate as unknown as relative to what we know. But it is beyond the sphere of such rela- tions. Known and Unknown are subsumed in it. When we say " I know that what-I-am is unknown," we prove that the relations of knowledge and ignorance are surpassed, for such a consciousness gives simply Is. And the same statement applies to our concepts God and Universe. We have, however, for all three concepts, Man, God, and Universe, an ultimate consciousness which yields only the Space-Being consciousness as the basis of each concept, or thought-born object, and, in this common consciousness, each generalisation dissolves itself into the Is-Being, which is whole-being and owns no such parts as are known to us conceptually as God, Universe, and Man. In other words, the concepts of personality and individuality are sub- sumed in the consciousness of Whole-Being, idiomised as Space-Being. 60. To emphasise this conclusion, let us take the concept man, in its evolution and development of generalisation, and then we shall realise better how inefficient the concept is in interpreting, or exhausting, the whole-fact which is given in our conscious ' I.' Head, body, limbs, and all we perceive of blood, brain, breath, are conceptualised, or generalised under the terms, matter, substance, form, and cause, as Aristotle taught, just as a house, a tree, or any object whatsoever is. But we do not thereby exhaust all the facts which lie in the concept man. For neither of these generalities explains feeling, thinking, willing, remembering, attention, or all we sum up in conation. Under the term mind we generalise the latter facts even as under body we usually generalise the former set of human facts. But Life is not yet brought under these generalisations of mind and body. Now, we neither perceive nor conceive Life. Yet men venture to say that it is neither mind nor body. Passing then beyond the possibilities of a concept, Life cannot be generalised on a basis of our knowledge of what-we-are. We only have various percepts and concepts of matter, substance, size, etc., just as we have for any body, stone, tree, or man, etc. ; 90 SPACE AND PERSONALITY but to these we have added, for Life, the important percept of Motion. We perceive motion in the protoplasmic cell, and continuation of motion in our percepts and concepts of its expansion of body, form, substance, etc., which we then generalise as Growth and Change, under which come all the motions of assimilation, reproduction, decay, and death, or the reversal of the motions of growth, assimilation, reproduction, etc., culminating in motions of disintegration, dissolution, etc. Life is that term of generalisation of motions which are gathered out of our various percepts of them and by it bound together ; and it is one which really comprehends both known and unknown. It is a generalisation which transcends the true concept of ordinary judgments, and is judged to be, by a judgment which rests in our consciousness of what-we-are, and not in that knowledge which is derived from qualities or quantities. That is to say, Life is as ' unknown ' as what-we-are. But we have not yet exhausted the generalisation, Man. For an animal has Life. And all that we have said ascends no higher than the generalisation, Animal. Now, all men confess their animality. But the lowest savage asserts himself to be more than the Being which he generalises as Beast, a term under which all that lives in sea, on earth, or in air, may be classed. Why? Because even the savage, or man in his aboriginal developments, has perceptions and conceptions of man which he never obtains regarding the Beast, and conse- quently he is compelled to form other concepts of man than those which he conceives for the beast. The animal erects no altars to unknown beings. All that broad and overflowing sphere of human experience which is ruled by religious emotion and devotion cannot be generalised within the concept Animal. There is a profounder consciousness of Being manifested by Man than we can perceive in the motions and behaviour of the Beast. As this distinctive feature of human nature has been observed from of old, and as it is the inherent prerogative of man to name all things, to put his percepts of things into synthetic unity and definition, it has been his wont from time immemorial to characterise man as possessing a 'soul' or 1 spirit' which distinguished him from the Beast which had none. So insistent is this consciousness in man, and so clamant SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 91 always for his recognition that, notwithstanding that no quality or quantity can be perceived in man on which such a concept of ' soul ' or ' spirit ' can be founded, every theologian and philo- sopher who has endeavoured to systematise our knowledge of man has been compelled by the necessity and peremptoriness of his subject to insert that fact in his account. We discern the perceptual material out of which the synthetic unity of Body is built, and we likewise perceive the qualities and quantities out of which the generalisation of Mind is constructed, and we partly perceive those qualities and quantities out of which we form the concept Life, but the generalisation ' Spirit ' exists in our consciousness independent of either the one or the other. We have seen that such thinkers as Hume, Kant, and Hegel, acknowledge the fact of it, and they fully realise that something in their Being as Man is not accounted for by all they can include within percepts and concepts, sensations and ideas, and we see the same state of matters existing from the earliest religious writers downwards, and from the time of the first philosophers until the above mentioned. And one and all do a marvellous thing, for they synthesise this ' part ' of our Being under the concept * soul ' or ' spirit ' without the least shred of material gathered from percept, sensation, or idea. While Hume confesses that he never can ' find himself,' he is yet conscious that he Is, and because Kant cannot find himself within space or time he calls himself ^r-thing, Unknown ; and Hegel, seeing that the predicate which can fit man in this respect must also define man's ' God/ boldly names it " Spirit " as equating with his absolute ' Notion.' He instinctively felt that no man would accept this ' Notion ' either as himself or as his * God,' owing to its narrow connotations and associations of instability, and so made the leap across the ' unknown ' gulf, and named it by the more respectable term ' Spirit ' I 61. The fatal assumption that man can be conceptualised in Unit-Being, and fixed down as One, with a defining term of generalisation attached to him, lay at the base of all their reasoning, and corrupted that truth which the facts of the Being of Man declared. Hegel widened his ' Notion ' doubtless to embrace Man, God, and Universe, as One, but his Being was still One, and objective, and consequently proved that the fact 92 SPACE AND PERSONALITY of Space had not been included in his synthesis of Being. If he had included this fact of facts within the data of his judgment of Being, he would have found it impossible to generalise Being under any term except the Is, or Space-Idiom. Kant fatally limited space to the perception of the object, making space subordinate to the object as its servile ' form/ although he invariably ' perceived ' space in every perception, or in what- ever he perceived. His limitation of space was false to his percept, for every percept we experience gives no limits to space. The object is undoubtedly perceived under a consciousness of limitation, necessitated by its objectivity being based in qualities and quantities which always connote limitation ; but distinct and inseparably allied to the object, the percept gives also Space, and gives it to our concepts as Being, and Being with no limitation in its connotations. And it is this space-being which is given to Man's knowledge of himself, in all he perceives of himself as Body, Mind, or Life, but which he never includes in his judgment of What-he-Is, and which is never accounted for by either the concept Body, Mind, or Life. These he has counted Being, but Space he has never counted as Being. And as this consciousness of space-being is the sole consciousness which rids us of the limitations of concepts, generalisations, and all quality and quantity, absolutely, so it is the consciousness which frees our judgment of what-we-are from the restrictive bonds of objective or Unit-Being, and rationalises Man as foing even when Body, Mind, and Life pass onward on their fluxional way forever. He is conscious of being when they are not in his consciousness of being. He has a consciousness of being more than that Life which he has striven to put into his concepts. For even his concept of Life, great and venerable ,as it is, is a mere relative to his other concept of Death, and is therefore limited by that relative concept, and is never true to that consciousness of illimitability which persists in his consciousness of what-he-is. The term Life, in short, notwith- standing the modern emphasis laid upon that category, is useless as a concept by which to interpret to the full all that man is conscious of being. For in his consciousness of space- being, as we have seen, man rises above consciousness of Death. It is not possible to conceive Death as coming within the being of Space. And it is this consciousness of himself as space- SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 93 being that, against the sneers and learned scepticism of long ages, has enabled him to uphold himself as Being-everlasting ; eternal-being ; the Is-Being which knows neither Life nor Death, and which is not in the Flow. Moreover, it is this consciousness which bursts all concepts of personality and individuality which he has formed for himself, his 'God,' and the creatures of his knowledge. For the concept, Personality, as it stands in all human language, is /;z#-Being, dependent upon that quality and quantity which are supposed to be absolutely essential to being, and to our knowledge of it. It therefore comes far short of the consciousness which man has regarding What-he-Is. 62. It is the omission of the consciousness of Space, as Being, from the concept which we form of any 'object' which, since the days of Plato and Aristotle, has prevented the philo- sophical judgment from reaching the consciousness of Whole- Being, and has inevitably compelled all thought to accept difference and division of Being as fixed within its very nature. Socrates distrusted Nature, and turned away from it as from a maelstrom of changing phenomena upon which nothing could be built of ultimate thought. The concept seemed always to give more promise of scientific stability. His pupil Plato emphasised this break with Nature. The concept appeared to be immeasurably superior as a basis of reality for the ethical foundations in which he was chiefly interested. For him, every perceived object was fluctuating, but the concepts, e.g., of Justice, courage, temperance, etc., were apparenty fixed and constant as cognitions. The concepts seemed better to serve the end of Good, which was the grand desire of attainment. And Aristotle completed what Socrates and Plato had initiated and matured. The concept was then standardised, and regarded as the true basis of Knowledge. Aristotle held that any object was explained by the root -concepts of Form, Matter, Substance, and Cause, concepts which some reduce again to the essential t\vo, Form and Cause, and this explanation of the conceptual object was accepted by the thinking world. Aristotle became " master of those who know." (See Dr Zeller's Socrates, p. 48.) But the consciousness of Space-Being was thus omitted from the judgment of such concepts, and consequently the 94 SPACE AND PERSONALITY ' object ' was only partially explained. Are we to be told that Aristotle had no consciousness of Space when he perceived an 'object'? If he had, can we assume that he found any 'object' in his perception totally independent of Space? We must assume the very contrary, viz., that with every 'object* he necessarily ' perceived ' or had a consciousness of Space. No object which is given by any sense exhausts absolutely all that that sense gives in giving that object to perception. The eve > e -g-> always sees more than the object it sees, be the object anything whatsoever. But he disregarded that part of his perception wholly. He saw in the ' object/ Form. But if he had had no consciousness of Space could he have found it possible to even obtain a concept of Form ? He saw in the ' object,' Matter, and Substance. But take away, or try to imagine no space, and what becomes of these concepts? Are they possible ? Again, he saw Cause in his perception of the 'object.' But this was impossible. He only assumed Cause as necessary to the presence of the 'object,' as an ' effect ' in reality. The ' Cause ' was actually a concept based on his deeper consciousness of Being of which he took no account. However, it is clear that an ' object ' is never explained by these concepts, for the simple reason that neither Form, Matter, Substance, nor Cause, can become concepts until Space is present in our consciousness to make their existence possible to thought. Space is inconceivably absent from the perception of any ' object,' and must therefore by that necessary fact, be accounted as essential to any cognition of that ' object.' We cannot separate space from the ' object ' in our perception, and we ought not to divide it from the object in our concepts. If we do, we despoil the ' object ' of its principal content, for under no possible condition of existence does it omit this statement of Space. It testifies to Form and Cause because, first and foremost, it testifies to Space. And as we could form no conception of the being of the ' object ' without the concepts Form and Cause, it follows that these being essentially dependent upon our consciousness of Space along with our consciousness of these categories, the consciousness of Space given in the perception of the ' object ' is the sole and necessary basis of any cognition of its Being. And with the admission of Space-Being to our judgment of an ' object,' all such concepts SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 95 as Form, Matter, Substance, Colour, Size, Weight, etc., are obliterated as essentials. We are left only with Cause. 63. For if the 'object' indicates Life, then neither Form, Matter, nor Substance, is possible as a concept of the ' object.' These concepts require to be based upon the fact of Life beyond them, and consequently, Cause is lifted far above their plane of necessity. Without Life, the ' object ' could not be conceived to have Form, or Matter. Take away Life, for example, from our knowledge of the Tree, and Form and Substance are seen to be dependent for existence on this prior concept of Life. But Life is in-concept-ible, or incon- ceivable, and if our knowledge of the Tree-Object is to stand upon Form and Substance and Matter, solely, no concept of the actual Tree-Object is possible. Our true knowledge of the Tree-Object really rests with the concept Life, a concept wholly imaginary. If then, we had not Space-Being still unaccounted for, as Being beyond even Life, the Tree-Object could not be said to be under any category of knowledge. It would be Inconceivable and Unknown. But the Tree-Object testifies of this Space-Being as essential and inseparable from its presence in our eye or thought, and until we can also abolish this space-being from any connection with the Tree-Object, we must accept the fact of it as That which, after all, explains the Tree-Object. It explains, that is, its Cause. Form, Sub- stance, Matter, and Life, are all seen to be caused. They have no testimony in our consciousness of them, as being uncaused causes of the Tree-Object. But this is what we do have in admitting Space-Being as datum of our cognition of it All other categories bound up in our knowledge of the Tree-Object admit themselves to be expressions for ' effects,' but in no wise ' causes ' or ' Cause- Absolute.' Space-Being, so inseparable from our perception of the Tree-Object, alone stands in our con- sciousness as Uncaused. For we have just seen that such a concept as ' God ' is itself in the Flow of changing things, and gives no consciousness of Unchangeability apart from our consciousness of Space-Being, a statement which we hope to render clearer in our consideration below of Space as Whole- Energy. Finally, if this reasoning holds true for all inanimate and animate ' Objects,' it also holds true for what we designate 96 SPACE AND PERSONALITY as ' Spirit! For we have exactly the same consciousness of ' Spirit,' when it denotes what-we-are, that we have of Space- Being. 64. We may now affirm that the separation of the concept from the space-content which is always given in the percept- content of anything, lies at the very root of the great fallacy of Division in Being as its ultimate characteristic ; and that to Plato and Aristotle must be traced its fatal introduction into the sciences of Epistemology and Ontology. They no doubt carried it little further than its practical limits. But its influence on Modern Philosophy, in its Absolute aspirations, has been pro- found and disastrous. For in its absolute detachment as The Idea; as summing up The All of Being; as Itself its own Subject-Object ; as embracing all categories and all possible characteristics of Being within its self-affirmed Unity ; or as what Aristotle saw afar off as vor\icrea>9, its influence upon every species of speculative as well as practical thought has been baleful and bad. Unity became the grand fetish of all Thought henceforward ; and as a consequence, the necessary limitations of every concept, that of the Most High not excepted, followed with the inexorable certainty of ( Fate.' " The purpose of philosophy has always been the intellectual ascertainment of the Idea ; and everything deserving the name of philosophy has constantly been based on the consciousness of an absolute unity where the understanding sees and accepts only separation" (Wallace's Logic of Hegel^ p. 354). Nature was also completely severed from the thinking Mind, although all the material of every concept of the mind is necessarily supplied by Nature. Now, true Unity is a pure dream on such conditions, for no matter how great Unity may be con- ceptualised, Space-Being is inevitably found surrounding and conditioning such Unity, and is never whole with it. 65. We say then that the fact of ' Spirit,' or the I-conscious- ness which man so defines, is thus only rational on the natural basis of Space-Being, for which no limit is conceivable. Man cannot conceive himself to be different from space-being", in which consciousness personality itself, as a concept, dissolves; For our consciousness of space-being sublates in itself both the SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 9? Personal and the Impersonal. Whole-Being knows neither the personal nor the impersonal as different unit-beings? What man has to realise in the space-consciousness of himself is that, if he will put himself under a concept of personality, he must do the same for Space, and, if he must assert space to be impersonal, he must accept the same definition for What-he-is. For, in his I-consciousness, such terms of personality and impersonality are neither affirmed nor denied. They are simply transcended in the common consciousness of Space-I- Being, which, both for Knowledge and Consciousness, speaks solely in the idiom of Is. And as for the motions of man's ' spirit,' it is evident that his tendency or ' instinct ' to adore the invisible and the unknown, is a tendency or ' instinct ' which is rational and in entire harmony with his deepest consciousness of What-he-Is. He rises above the consciousness of all creatures in that he acknowledges Being which is neither seen, heard, touched, tasted, nor smelled, which is not felt, nor thought, seeing it cannot be put into a concept, nor connoted in any sense, yet which he sees in all that he sees, and hears in all that is heard, and which he names as nameless, ' God.' And clearly, this is the consciousness which lies at the root of that consciousness of Being which is said to be Everywhere. It is this space-being, illimitably everywhere in the data of our percepts of which man is conscious as being inseparable from himself, and which he sets before himself as Being whom he calls the Most High. But for space-being in our percepts ' Spirit '-Being would have no existence in our religious convictions, and but for man's con- sciousness that he is whole with space-being, such an attribute of everywhereness could never be realised by him in any way. For all that man has attributed to his ' God ' is to be found in himself. 66. We can safely say such things, because man has never given to his ' God ' that amplitude of Being which is to be found in his consciousness of Space-Being. He has always persisted in putting ' God ' into a concept of personality even as himself, and construing Him as Unit -Being, and therefore limited. With the sole exception of Jesus, no man has construed ' God ' by the space idiom. He alone founded G 98 SPACE AND PERSONALITY Being on the consciousness of Space-Being, His own ' I- Am ' consciousness. Professor J. Ward, in his notes to his Aberdeen Gifford Lectures, says " there is still much to do in differentiating the conception of God, to which experience directly leads, from the conception of the Absolute which belongs entirely to philosophical speculation," and he thinks that "this will be the problem of the twentieth century." Prof. E. Caird also has said, " Human development will belie all its past history, if the new light upon man's relations to the world and to his fellowmen, which science is every day bringing to us, does not give occasion to a new evolution or interpretation of the idea of God " (Ev. of Relig., i., 138). This is proof enough that in the modern conceptions of ' God/ none is equal to the general con- sciousness of Being which man is conscious of for himself. For it is the consciousness in man that he himself has realised a higher affirmation of Being for himself than he can find in the concept ' God ' of his day, that inevitably urges him to decreate that concept and place another in its throne-seat. The conception of * God ' as defined in the great creeds of the past, is thus felt by the ablest thinkers of our time, to be completely unsatis- factory. The voice of science proclaims against it, the murmur- ings of philosophy affirm its inadequacy, and the unrest in all the spheres of theology, regarding this highest concept of the Church, point only to one result, viz., a consciousness of the present concept * God ' as untrue to our deepest consciousness of What-Is, and consequently the necessity that exists to develop that realisation of* God '-Being which will harmonise more fully with our consciousness of What-we-are. Support to this view is found in such writers as the late Prof. W. James. He finds it possible to speculate as to which was first, God or Nothing ! He runs on in these words, " Whether the original nothing burst into God and vanished, as night vanishes in day, while God thereupon became the creative principle of all lesser beings, or whether all things have foisted or shaped themselves imperceptibly into existence, the same amount of existence has in the end to be assumed and begged by the philosopher" (Some Problems, p. 44). "If being gradually grew, its quantity was of course not always the same, and may not be the same hereafter. To most philosophers SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 99 this view has seemed absurd, neither God nor primordial matter, nor energy being supposed to admit of increase or decrease. The orthodox opinion is that the quantity of reality must at all costs be conserved, and the waxing and waning of our phenomenal experiences must be treated as surface appearances which leave the deeps untouched " (Ibid. p. 45). Like all thinkers, Prof. James cannot get away from " Original Nothing," and, as we see, he puts it forward as a possible theory of Being that this "Nothing" might have been the volcanic Gap out of which ' God ' issued to be the creative principle of our Cosmos and all it holds ! So invincibly persistent is the Space-consciousness over the minds of men, and so determined is every thinker to thrust it from him as being Being at all. If Prof. James had had the faintest dis- cernment that Space might really be Being, would he have talked so randomly about an " amount of existence " being assumed and begged by philosophers in order to give them as much material as make a concept of a Beginning from ? " Quantity of Reality ! " What quantity ever yet vouched for Reality ? Absolutely none. Every quantity must, for its own reality, refer itself to the " deeps " which have really been left untouched by philosophers. With the result that, in these days, neither what we name * God,' Soul, Life, or Spirit, nor what we name as Body, nor what we call Mind, is ever freed from the haunting qualities of Instability and Unreality. And it never can be otherwise so long as we persist in conceiving Being to be necessarily based in qualities which thought has conceptually created, and which can be removed, taken away, or lost. ' God,' as a term for Being, must be lifted above the region of limited concepts, as if He were a masculine One among many Others, and shown to be dependent for its very existence on that consciousness of Space-Being which is the true womb of every attribute of Godhead as well as for What-we-are, and for what All Is. We cannot think differently of God and Space, any more than we can think differently of Space and What-we-are. If ' God ' burst first from ' Nothing/ then this * Nothing ' is true God. And it is only the arbitrarily postulated concept of personality for ' God ' which hinders us from accepting this Nothing -consciousness, or Space-Being, as the highest and best attested consciousness for God-Being. 100 SPACE AND PERSONALITY We shall see that it is our * Nothing,' or Space-Consciousness which ultimately furnishes the human mind with every attribute of Deity which, conceptually, is worshipped and adored as 'God.' 67. We conclude then this sketch of the development of the concept Man, with the statement that until that concept rises beyond, and above, all qualities and quantities into the Being-consciousness, and realises itself as being space-being, man himself is never satisfied that it interprets What-he-Is. Wherever he begins with himself in what-he-is of Body, of Mind, or of Life ; however he may analyse and synthesise the qualities and quantities which he discerns as the material of these concepts, or judgments of his being ; he finds it impossible to circumscribe himself within these concepts, for a higher judgment of What-he-is lies beyond them in his consciousness of What-he-is, and ever supersedes the lower judgments, and carries him beyond all qualities and quantities and relations to still higher being in which he finds himself more than they are. None of these are What-he-is, nor can he conceptualise what-he-is, and ultimately he cannot restrain the fulness of his being within that knowledge which is based on quality and quantity and relation, and is generalised into concepts of this and that ; and it is then he knoivs beyond all his knowledge that he is unrestrictedly whole-being with Space-Being. This is the secret of his ' finding himself in all that is,' as the modern philosophical phrase has it. For it is not that his thought ever goes away from him to meet the objects, and then comes back to him with the knowledge of what that object may be. On the contrary, he always finds himself there before his thought. The movements of his thought only meet the objects of creation because his being is there first. And every percept and concept and recept of his thoughts suggests this fact to the utmost. He synthesises all the qualities and quantities and relations of body, but the Space-Being is never absent from these. He simply leaves out the Space-Being consciousness when he generalises the concept Body. That is, he makes deliberate choice of the material out of which he forms that con- cept, and expels he must expel the consciousness of Space- Being from it. And it is the same with every concept he SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPt : JktpMNT:5: \fa' forms regarding Mind, and Life, and Spirit. He finds his Being, asserted by his deepest consciousness, to be beyond all these conceptual Unit-Beings. And from each concept in turn, he is always compelled to omit the Space-Being conscious- ness from his judgment-of-what-he-is, before he can form such a concept. And it is in this limitation of his every concept that he is also aware of a beyond or something still unknown. When he admits the Space-Consciousness into his concept, all limitation of knowledge is transcended in the Is-conscious- ness. That is to say, as soon as he admits this cousciousness, he finds he still Is, in the same judgment with his judgment of what-space-Is. No verge nor edge, boundary nor line can be found between Space-Being and What-he-is. And he discovers that his thought, far as it reaches through the vasti- tude of Being, of which the Cosmos must be a fragment, never outruns his being, or What-he-is, any more than the motions of gravitation in its universal motions ever outruns Space-Being. Every motion in Body, in Brain, in Mind, in Life, in ' Spirit/ exists because it is based in Being which is ever more than its motions, and is not merely endless and boundless, not merely universal and united with all and every being, but is Whole-with Space-Being. And however man may conceptualise certain qualities and quantities together, and define them as One Being, ' God ' (and we see this process followed from of old in all systems of religion, the Christian religion not excepted), it is vain to think that such conceptualised Deities can long afford that inmost satisfaction which is found alone in the realisation of the deepest consciousness of Being. Such Deities endure but for time, times, and half-times. They are simply * Gods '-with- us but not of us. 68. These facts of our Being might indeed find many corroborative lines of reasoning to sustain them, if an enquiring attention were devoted to that purpose. It would be found, for example, that the human mind never has been contented with all it has conceptually known of Being. The general world turns its eyes to the sun, moon, and stars, but desires still further to see beyond, and beyond them. The science of astronomy is thus created. The whole field of human know- ledge might be exhausted in the same way, and the same 1G2 SPACE AND PERSONALITY search and research beyond all that is known would be found at work to discover still more. Whence then this confidence that still further being lies beyond all we know ? Whence the confidence that we are able to know it when it is brought within the compass of the senses? Whence the conviction of this evidence of all our senses being outrun by our inner consciousness of Being? It is surely because with all that is known and discovered, we never are conscious of what-we-are as being out-classed and out-distanced. On the contrary, we always are conscious of being far more than all the being which is known and laid bare to our thoughts. And never, till we reach Space-Being, level for what-we-are, would we find this consciousness abated. Then, indeed, instead of finding Space a mere * Nothing,' we should be conscious of Whole-Being, and know then the vastitude of that knowledge which lies in What- we-are, and which we and all are ever voicing in the conscious I, the common voice of common Being. We cannot therefore affirm Space-Being to be something quite apart by itself into which the Universe and all its vast contents are deposited by some interested Person who is outside of it a Person who is supposed somehow to exist space-less ! We have no consciousness of such an Order of Being. If we did, we should be bound in reason, to regard the space in which this Person placed His Cosmos, as greater, or at least, as great as He was Himself. If He lived spaceless, then He would be limited by the space-being which He was not. He would be quite a finite person. But nothing in Nature or conscious- ness sustains such conceptions of Space. When ' God ' is so conceived as independent of Space, the conceptions of both ' God ' and ' Space/ are creatures of logical travail, and have nothing answering to them in Reality. The true consciousness of Space subsumes all conceptions whatsoever, that of ' God ' as a conception not excepted. For it is the primal and essential consciousness for all we perceive and conceive and receive ; for all we know and feel, for our seeing, hearing, touching, tasting, smelling, feeling, thinking, conating ; for all we experience ; or in one word, for What-we-are. It is Whole-Being, * God ' included. If we might venture the expression, the all and every of our perceptions and conceptions, together with all of which we are conscious as formless, substanceless, matterless, causeless, SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 103 quality-less, and relationless, compose Space. But space is not thereby objective in our consciousness of it. For no such Object could be conceived till it were also first conceived as surrounded by space. 69. Neither can we regard Space and the Object to be divided in Being from each other, as if Space were mere form and the object were alone true being. For if we regard the object in every possible way, it will always be seen to be space, fundamentally. It is, no doubt, popular conception to conceive that no space is ' inside ' the object, but is excluded from the 'matter' of the object. This of course is the very kernel of defect in the concept of any object. Space is supposed to be shut out from the object which we conceive to be existing independently of Space. It is the analysis of all the qualities and quantities and relations of the object, into their formless- ness, their qualitylessness, etc., which proves the superficiality of such a conception for Space and the Object. They are never divided in the Percept, and we should never divide them in our Concept. All our sensations deliver their truth whole, but our thoughts only unify parts of such whole truth, or Reality. It is the limit begotten of all motion and memory, as compared with the Being in which they move. On the other hand, we are not to rush to the conclusion that any limit of our conceptions is strictly real absolutely. This is the fault of our lesser judgments of Being. All motions are really moving within motions, as the wave-motion moves within that of the tide, and the tide within that of gravitation, and gravitation within that of Space-Being. Similarly, the thought-motions, as we shall see, move within the Life-motions, the Life-motions within the motions of What-we- are, in which all motion is composed as whole with the energy which affirms Is, of itself, or Space-Being. But all such motions are not separate but whole. It is the judgment ratified in our concept which is defective for each, and thus again objectifies the motions themselves. 70. By ' lesser judgments ' we must be understood to mean all judgments of objectivity. These are ever capable of recon- struction and change. But this is not so with the ultimate judgment ( I.' No data can arise to compel us to change or 104 SPACE AND PERSONALITY reconstruct that judgment, if the space-consciousness lias been included within it. If, however, the consciousness of space-being has not been included within it, the ' I '-Being of such judgment is one of objectivity, and is capable of change. It is such imperfect judgments which give us the philosophically abstract 'objects' "Ego," "Self," "Mine," "Stream of consciousness," and many others, all of which are limited ' I '-beings, and in no sense impervious to a new reconstruction under a new judgment. When we admit space-being into our consciousness of what-we- are, the judgment of our ' I '-Being is whole with all Being, and cannot be reduced by further judgment. It is not then within a concept of judgment at all. It is simply a consciousness of Is, which conditions both the contents and motions of every judgment absolutely, in its transcendence of Change.- 71. The whole question of the certainty of Reality, therefore, resolves itself into this Is-consciousness which is independent of all processes, motions, objectivity, and even personality, as that concept is usually held. We have seen that universally and in every department of human thought, ultimate certainty of being is ever sought for under the compulsions of an irresistible trend of mind towards the entire negation of objectivity, that is, towards the Space-consciousness. Only a temporary certainty is found in Quantity. All experience, ancient and modern, affirms of the Quantitative that it Flows, or passes away. Everything which can be objectified declares itself to have no continuance of being forever. And similarly, no quality, or character, which can be predicated of any being remains absolutely valid, even when that quality is necessary to the concept of Deity. Forms, Substances, Matters, Motions, and all that is predicable as relative, are all kaleidoscopic and impermanent. Instinctively, every sincere endeavour to find absolute Reality as also absolutely certified in and to our consciousness, frees itself from both quantity and quality, and from every relation without exception, and seeks satisfaction in the quantityless, the qualityless, and the relationless Is-con- sciousness. Whole-Being, or Space-Being, is not therefore a conception in the ordinary acceptation of that term. It is that concept vvhich has become recept in the identical consciousness of SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 105 What-we-are. It is the judgment which is not closed in limita- tion, but whole-open with consciousness itself. For when we say, ' I/ we do not necessarily say, ' One' It is a consciousness of simple, open Being ; Space-open ; Is. The natural deduction from such a consciousness, moreover, is that all that is in the Universe, is space to all that is in it. All goes through all, in all possible ways. Nothing can be conceived to be absolutely or forever isolated from another. Everything in the vastitude of what we call "Nature" has its existentiality common with everything. They must be named with Space-Being. In reality, there is no possible objectivity, as that conception is understood in the human mind ; no division ; no apartness ; no unit or unity conceivable in the common existentiality of Whole-Being as it is affirmed in our consciousness of What-we-are. 72. For although Science maintains that nothing in the universe comes into actual contact with anything else, and only approximates to a touching, this statement is only true when the conscious basis of Being is not in question, or when the space-being of our final consciousness of Being is not included within the data of the contactual problem. It is a judgment of Being which can only be proved valid when it is also shown that the whole content of our percept of the meeting of two objects is enclosed and fully stated in our concept of contactuality. Two atoms cannot be conceived to be in actual contact any more than two worlds, until we include that Space-Being which is given in our percept of them within the concept which we construct regarding their being. The two atoms have no common basis of being till this Space-Being of our percepts is admitted into our judgment of What-they-are. As a matter of fact, each atom is usually generalised, conceptu- ally, entirely apart from that space-being which our percepts of its quality assert as existentially whole with it ; and there- fore, with such data of judgment, it is impossible to conceive the two as in contact. But when we realise the limitation of the concept in so far as the Space-consciousness has been omitted in such judgment, and then include this space-con- sciousness within our judgment of the two atoms, it will be found that it is still impossible to conceive them in contact, 106 SPACE AND PERSONALITY for the reason that the two can only then be conceived as Whole with space. Space-Being, as the ultimate fact in all we think regarding any object, names its being above all the qualities of the object, and simply testifies Is regarding it. And this is true concerning all objects, generalisations, or concepts. It is a matter of some regret that Hegel permitted himself to sneer at this consciousness as being "the night in which all cows are black," not discerning that it was the consciousness in which the 'cows,' the 'night,' his 'self,' and his 'absolute Notion,' were subsumed in Whole-Being. The scientific concept of the impossibility of two objects being in actual contact absolutely, is really due to the fact that Science does not recognise the principal fact, in her percepts of these objects, which would enable her to make that same statement with a wholly different meaning. And it is clear that the same reasoning applies to the impossibility of conceiving two conceptualises as ' subject ' and ' object,' in actual contact, and likewise the concepts of ' mind ' and ' matter,' ' atom ' and ' space,' where ' space ' means ' distance.' The realm of theology is filled with the same ' objects ' of conceptually ; and the severance of ' soul ' and ' body,' ' faith ' and ' reason,' ' law ' and ' gospel,' ' God ' and the ' universe,' etc., etc., is only possible on the same grounds. 73. But it must not be supposed that we are asking mankind to lay this age-long habit of concept- making aside, or, in other words, to abandon that mode of thought which creates all Relativity, differentiation, division, personality; the sphere, that is, which is governed by " the categories of the under- standing." We are not attempting such a foolish task. But we are contending for the abandonment, by every serious thinker, of that habit of thought by which this sphere of the Relative is affirmed as existentially true. We are protesting against absolutising the Relative (if we must so express it), as real in our consciousness of Being. And the great shadow of doubt and suspicion which has lain, through all time, across this absolutising of Relativity as true absolutely, seems to justify us in doing so. We do not deny the partial truth of the relative, the object ; but we affirm that it never gives the SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 107 truth of Being. All relatives are true as relatives in as far as they include any portion of the space-fact within their conceptuality. And just as it is impossible to perceive or to conceive anything without in some way enclosing space in such judgment, so is it impossible for any concept so formed to be absolutely false. But when the Relative, the Concept, the Objective, is taken to be absolute in its affirmation of the reality or truth of its being, that is, when Quality or Quantity is asserted to be essential to Being, then we humbly demur. By the nature of the human mind, Truth is based in our consciousness. And it is our contention here that the whole sphere of Relativity has never stood rooted in our Ultimate consciousness of Being. Every judgment on Being which creates an Object, a related thing, a differentiation, or as Spinoza would say, a Determination, is ever subordinate to a judgment which, from the ' I ' - consciousness, affirms such determination to be the unthinkable. This is our experience. Summarily, no thought is ever absolutely true to the full truth of Being till such thought is wide-open-whole with the Is-consciousness. And when it is so, it is then Thought which is not depending upon the material of Quality and Quantity for its motions. The energy of such thought is the energy of Whole-Being and equates with the energy which affirms 'I.' 74. Knowledge therefore cannot be confined entirely to the technical sphere of the Epistemological. The Ontological, or rather, the Holological, is its home. For * Being,' as the object of the science of Ontology, is also sometimes objectified, and is thus made relative, as we have seen, in terms of Being and Non-Being. The entire realm of Philosophy is thereby lowered beneath itself. Perhaps, however, this has been inevitable. For the Is-consciousness has urged the thoughts of men beyond the narrow concepts of c Being ' which they have generalised ; refusing conceptual immortality ; and they have been compelled under the stress of the Is-consciousness to abandon all such concepts and venture forward beyond them. But when the final consciousness of Reality, idiomised as Space- Being, was put outside the motions of Thought, and judgments based on quality, etc., were preferred as the deepest testimony of consciousness to Being, then there was no other resource 108 SPACE AND PERSONALITY but to view the Space-Being as Non-Being, and Being as determined relative to it. Inevitably, also, every man could find his Thought in such philosophical systems which were so based in the concepts, Being and Non-Being, but he could never find himself. Such concepts have no absolutely real reference to concrete Being ; Whole-Being ; seeing that they do not accept into themselves the only absolutely real Being idiomised as Space-Being. 75. It is doubtless the same mistake of absolutising the Relative which has played such havoc in all efforts to obtain a true consciousness of absolutely Continued Being. Mathema- ticians seem to boast themselves of having accomplished the feat. The Arithmetical Continuum, it is affirmed, is a fact. Number has yielded a result which consciousness itself has shrunk back from helpless ! Now, by the nature of a concept, which has its physical conditions governed by the vibrations of the whole Cosmos, and built out of qualities which science cannot discover to be even in contact with each other, an Existential Continuum would seem in such circumstances to be the impossible. Hume thought that we could not have a perfect continuum of Thought for the reason that we never have a perfect continuum of impressions through our senses. And this can be verified in a simple way. If, for example, we pass the eye along a plane surface ever so slowly, we are never able to effect a consciously perfect con- tinuum of vision. The path of vision, strive as we like, is broken up into points. And no other sense does better than the eye in this respect. The hiatus is of course immeasurably small, but the fact remains that we never can assure ourselves that vision, in the case of the eye, is absolutely continuous. The reason seems to be that vision, as indeed every sense, is under the domination of both what we call Life and Thought. Thought is under the domination of the brain, and the brain, is in turn, determined in its motions by the pulses of the blood. And as the blood pulses act in continuous variability, and as the movement of vision is affected at any moment by the trans- mission of nervous energy, the influx and efflux of blood in the brain, the respiration of the breath, and other minor influences, it is evident that there are data for believing that, eye and SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT- JUDGMENTS 109 thought being so conditioned, the normal and only result for concepts of the mind will be one of limitation, point-to-point differentiation, discontinuity, or what we define as Objectivity. We are not conscious of thinking two or three thoughts simultaneously, but one after another, just as we find in all vibrations or pulses. We know that in consciousness itself there is an energy or emphasis which is not equal over the whole field of it, to which we give the name of Attention, Concentration, and other synonymous terms. But we must remember that that focal centre of energy in consciousness never can be got to stay fixed in the same static place. It is perpetually moving. And hence the difficulty we experience to fix our thought upon anything for any length of time without fatigue, the expenditure of energy being noticeable. " Every conscious state," says Prof. Alex. Bain, "is accompanied with a diffused wave of effects, muscular and organic, which is stronger according as the feeling is more intense " (Senses and Intellect, p. 277). But the point to be noticed here is that these gaps between our vision-points as the eye is moved onwards, are points of space-consciousness. The percept gives to the eye and brain that gap-material from which a thought or concept of space alone can be formed. In another sense, the points are uncon- scious points, as far as the object gazed upon is concerned. That is to say, in looking at any object whatsoever, while the percept seems to give a continuous * object,' the concepts of it are broken up into points of consciousness and unconsciousness of that object, although the speed of sequence is so great as to be generally unnoticed. All thought, or process of judgment, must be conditioned in the same way. And this seems to be one reason why it is impossible to have absolute continuity of conception on a basis of the "categories of the understanding." It is certainly the case that when we conceive an ' object,' we are entirely unconscious of Space in the actual determination of the concept of the object. And contrariwise, when we have Space filling all our conscious- ness, we are, for the instant, completely unconscious of the object. It is this fact that makes it possible for anyone to have the consciousness that ' heaven and earth shall pass away.' But this is only saying once more that all concepts involved in 110 SPACE AND PERSONALITY objectivity are decreatable, and that our fundamental con- sciousness which cannot be subjected to that process is that of Space. And it is this consciousness alone which gives us our veritable and undoubted consciousness of absolute continuity and durance of Being. Our Experience is thus always more than Thought, Con- cept, Idea, or Notion. All that is involved in conceptual objectivity is less real and continuous being than is Space- Being. We identify what-we-are to be continuous being in our space-consciousness, but we never can reach a consciousness of continuity in any other * being.' Hence it follows that but for our consciousness of Space we should never have any conscious- ness of what-we-are save one of point-to-point being, differ- entiated, and divided. We should have a new consciousness of what-we-are with every new concept, and the continuity of the * I ' being would be unthinkable. 76. Therefore, concept of quantity being the foundation of every arithmetical concept, it is clear that, unless Space is taken as the quantity, no consciousness of continuity for any other quantity is thinkable. That space is believed to be quantified in every concept, is of course the reason why we have objec- tivity at all. It is the space which can be squared, or cubed, increased or decreased, and is the basis of the Euclidean Point, Line, and Surface, each of which though unreal, gives for the time being a consciousness of reality, just because there is a consciousness of this space accompanying them. And as far as point-being of this nature goes, there is always a consciousness of continuity within the bounds of the concept of 'the point \ whether it be conceived as a pin-point, a world-point, or a Cosmos-point; that is, whether such total-point is infinitesimal or ' infinite ' ; but such space-point has always its conscious limits, and in the end it is declared objective, and seen to be space ' materialised ' by conceptuality, and in no wise our true Space-Being. It is logical or terminable space : concept-created. It is that space we enclose within our concept of the sea-line, or the sky curve, or between any two points, such as the two masses in Newton's gravitation formula. No absolute continuity of existential being is ever given in it. For when our true consciousness of Space is brought into the data of our judgment of such objects, no SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT- JUDGMENTS 111 concept of unity or totality is then possible. For neither quantity nor quality is found in that consciousness. Nevertheless, the Arithmeticians are not the only thinkers who believe that a consciousness of existential continuity of being can be given by our concepts. We have seen that philosophers may be obsessed with the same conviction. Differences are concussed into unities ; subject and object are caused to unite as one-being under thought compressions some- how. The phrase " Stream of thought," appears to convey a true consciousness of continuity, as also does that ' Self which ' returns upon itself,' or " strikes round into itself." It does not do so actually. It is analogous only to the break in the flash of petrol in the carburettor : the apparently perfect continuous " stream " of thought impresses itself upon the reflection as truly real, and then we hear of the * Notion, 1 in its absoluteness, as containing the ALL of Being within its womb. We never escape from unity or totality, in such a view, and the consciousness of Space beyond such totality is not included within such a concept. There is the usual differentiation between Being and Non-Being, or discontinuity of Being. 77. In fact, if concepts are conditioned for their existence in motion of Thought, then continuity, as a concept, should be, owing to that fact, impossible of affirmation in the sphere of objectivity. For Motion cannot be conceived except as conditioned in space. The consciousness of space is ante- cedent to the consciousness of motion. The space-conscious- ness therefore antecedes the thought-motions. But the same difficulty occurs between conceiving continuity for our Thought as for our vision. Every idea or concept stands apart by itself, and in passing from one to another we are as conscious of a gap, or hiatus in continuity of thought-motion as we are of a gap or hiatus in continuity of seeing. Concept is not continuous because percept is not continuous. 78. Bergson has indeed made something of the fact that mental states permeate one another. Continuity is thereby insinuated. But Hegel implied this fact when he said " Being and Nothing are the same." What neither Bergson nor Hegel gives us is the data for obliterating each one state, and 112 SPACE AND PERSONALITY making out of their debris one whole mental state as the result of such permeation. One wave-motion permeates another wave-motion, and the universe as well as the human mind is seething full of such permeations, but what we wish to know is if the fact of permeation accounts for creation, and why and where each wave-motion gives up its individual energy in becoming continuous energy with all energy. Bergson's permeation of mental states helps nothing. He gives no data for the sublation of each single process into one process continuous for each. It is not indeed process that can give us the data we want, for all process confesses itself limited and conditioned in space-being, and is itself far short of ultimation. No motion therefore is conceivable as absolutely continuous. We simply pass our concepts from point to point in space so exceedingly swift as to engender a generalised conception of continuity. ' Cause ' becomes c effect ' we say, but we are never conscious of the continuous motion through which the one becomes the other. It is because by the nature of our concepts, space being omitted from them, no consciousness of common existentiality is conceivable for them. Unity is all that can be predicated of each concept, and Totality ; but whole-being is inconceivable except on the basis of the Space-consciousness. And when this is given, all the categories of the understanding vanish, and every motion of thought is sublated in it, 79. Now, as we presume to think, it is just this consciousness of Whole- Being which we always find absent from the systems of both ancient and modern philosophy, and the absence of it seems to us to be the chief reason why disconnection, division, differ- entiation, and isolation prevail so grievously throughout all the domains of Thought. The concept has been deemed to be perfect as an interpretive instrument of Being, and Unity of Being to be the ultimate truth in that interpretation. The " Unity of Subject and Object " has been the goal aimed at, and when this Unity has been declared perfect, it has been supposed that "the riddle of the universe" was answered. Whereas the consciousness of Man has always demurred to this Unity of Being as declaring the truth of his existentiality to be common with All-Being. No concept of his Thought, SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 113 however, was capable of giving him anything else, seeing that in wielding the power of this concept he neglected the full truth of his percepts, and thrust from his judgment of Being that presentation of Nature which alone could enable him to find himself not merely one with some other, but whole with all that affirms Being. 80. Unity never yields a consciousness of Whole-Being. The apparent satisfaction which such a consciousness gives to our Thought is always unsatisfactory to our ultimate conscious- ness of What-w r e-are. And perhaps but for the magnificent genius with which Hegel enforced the concept of Unity of Being upon the world, as the ultimate truth of Being, the masters in Israel would have found, ere now, that higher interpretation of Being in the consciousness of the Man of Galilee, from which Hegel, Kant, and Hume have turned away. For it is abundantly revealed by Him. No Teacher of men has so exposed the poverty of the concept, and has so exalted the fulness of the percept ; has proved how little of the truth of all we see, hear, touch, taste, and smell, finds sanctuary in the inmost convictions of humanity, and how small a portion of the ways of civilisation, so grounded in the human concepts, ever harmonises with those ultimate affirmations of our Being which we call, in the aggregate, Religion. What avails it that there is always 'a unity beyond every difference,' if such a unity still discovers itself, to all eternity, to be differentiated once more from something else not included within itself? We never obtain more by this concatenation of conceptual unities than the arithmetical series of numbers which runs out to ' infinity.' Our percepts still affirm that there is being presented within every one of them which is never embraced within the bounds of such conceptual unities. For so long as Space-Being is omitted from our concepts of Unit-Being, there will be abundance of expansive consciousness in which such Unities may extend their differentiating and uniting for ever. It may indeed be true what Prof. Wallace has said, in interpreting the philosophical system of Hegel, that u Thought (the Idea), as has been more than once pointed out, is the principle of unification or unification itself: it is organisation H 114 SPACE AND PERSONALITY plus the consciousness of organisation : it is the unifier, the unity, and the unified subject as well as object, and eternal copula of both" (Proleg. p. 324), but we search in vain for our con- sciousness of Whole-Being in this so-called Unity. If there were given us here, even an ultimate consciousness of Some- thing which was One existentially, after this process of uniting, that is, a perfect continuum of Being, we should be convinced that the wholeness of the Unity was, at least, fairly adequate to what we seek. But even this wholeness is never given in such a Unity. Every one of these terms, ' unifier,' ' unity,' 'unified,' 'copula,' involves the concept as well as the conscious- ness of coming-together, which again involves the consciousness of space for the movement of coming-together, and indisputably it is this consciousness of space, and not the fixed-up Unity which is our ultimate consciousness at last. But in actual fact, it is never shown how the concept of existential identity of subject and object is effected among, and out of, all these uniting concepts ; nor how a separate copula is created for their union in our consciousness. The Subject, the Object, and the Copula, are never existentially united into an identical Being or Thing, perfectly continuous in its being. They are only tied together in a total. The three are one, in a concept of three, but never in a concept of Being. In the nature of the concept it could not be otherwise. The consciousness of Whole-Being, without the slightest hint of parts in it, is completely impossible for these three concepts. We require the data of that Being which has been omitted from the content of each concept before true unity can also be true to our consciousness of Unit-Being. We require the space-consciousness for the process of their uniting, and it is never brought into the judgment which asserts Unit-Being as so effected, and as a consequence, we have only a pseudo- unity. Neither is the ' Self,' looking on at this unifying process ever sublated with either the united Three-Thing, X or with space-being. Therefore, the Unity so effected is never absolute under any circumstances, nor is it ever verified as such in our consciousness of it. The ' Thing ' so united is a mere object, and both * Self and Space-Being are consciously apart from it in the data of our judging it to be Unity. In other words, instead of a consciousness of Whole-Being, we retain SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 115 only one of relation and relativity. And this will be found to hold true of all the 'antagonisms' and 'differences' which are declared to be existentially united, as well as of the new Unity which is said to lie ' beyond them.' They are no more than Totals in their unity, consciously finite, and they never include either what-we-are, or space-being, within their Total- Being. Now, it is our commonest experience that when we look on any object whatsoever, a house, a desk, a tree, a finger, a star, a horizon, the sky, a man, anything, there is given us an undoubted consciousness of Unit-Being for that object. But in every case without exception, there is always accompany- ing that consciousness of objective unit-being, an inseparable consciousness that the object itself is not the Whole of that Being of which we have consciousness. And universally, no object coming within the scope of either sense or concept fills completely our consciousness of Being, or What-is. It is never a consciousness of Whole-Being. Therefore, it is never responsive to our deepest consciousness of Reality, or Truth. 8 1. Our consciousness of a part, or division in Being, is therefore due to the fact that we never bring such object, part-being, or unit-being, into our consciousness of Whole- Being. If we did, we should not be able to conceive it as an object, a part, or a unit. It is we who, arbitrarily, and deliberately judge, or make a concept of, an object by omitting from our data of judgment that experience of Whole-Being given in our consciousness of Space, which, on our admitting it to such judgment, inevitably renders conceptual objectivity impossible and untrue. Bacon believed that, by rigidly con- fining our experience to " things themselves," we could abolish error forever ; but it is clear that, until he rose above the consciousness of there being any actual ' thing,' he could never reach Absolute Reality. The grand error is in accepting the reality of the object, the part-being, or unit-being, as determined in the very essence and nature of Being, as much as the ' Unity beyond the difference.' It is for this reason that both the deductive system of the ancients and the inductive system of the moderns have equally failed to realise for the human mind a consciousness of Absolute 116 SPACE AND PERSONALITY Reality, resting on a fact which both sense and thought agree to be true. The same unresting dissatisfaction and irritability prevails to-day throughout the whole modern world of Thought as obtained in the days of Bacon and Descartes. The deductive process of reasoning was found by these giant minds to be fruitless of those highest results which the foregoing ages had hoped to realise by it. Greek Philosophy was characterised by Bacon as 'puerile'; 'lifeless'; of little use; non-progressive; and merely repetitive. He turned away from it " to begin the work anew, and raise or rebuild the sciences, arts, and all human knowledge, from a firm and solid basis." And his practice of this resolution earned for him the proud title of * Father of modern science.' We do not require to emphasise in any way here the enormous value which the Baconian method of pursuing the path to reality has had for the world. What we want to do, however, is to point out the fact, which is too evident to all thinking people in our time, that in as far as the Inductive method professed to lead the human mind to Ultimate Reality or Truth, it has fallen as short as did the method of Deduction which Bacon scorned. " A firm and solid basis," is undoubtedly what the pro- foundest yearnings of the ' I AM ' crave. The world will never find satisfaction under the sun until this is realised. The cry for it has gone up to heaven since the world began. Great men have earned their proud place in the admiration and worship of mankind because they convinced their fellows that they had led them to it. And it is only true to say that One alone has stood rock-fast amidst the floods of criticism, doubt, suspicion, and examination, which have tested these pretensions. For He alone arose above Process. The rest of our noble great ones failed to ascend above the All that was in Flow. From the beginning of the world until this day, He alone discovered the " firm and solid basis " above the sphere of Change. Plato, for example, felt Bacon's yearning for such a basis. Who has not felt it? And instinctively he sought for the Primal Thing. The universe stood before his rapt vision. Its grandeur and vastitude flowed onwards in its majesty like music. Order and beauty were everywhere. Thought was impressed upon every motion. Surely, he conceived, thought, ideas ) must be the Primal Being. The Idea directs all under SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT- JUDGMENTS 117 man, it must also surely guide all things in the universe. Moreover, to make anything, man must first possess an idea of what he would make. It must be that Ideas were the Primal Basis of Being. A Personal Being who thought these Ideas must also exist. So has Man mused since the ages began. And on the basis of the fact of Ideas, as primal rock, Plato built up his system of philosophy. That is to say, from these primal 'Ideas' he deduced the Cosmos. By an easy generalisation, Deity was placed over the universe, and was seen to direct all things from His heavenly throne. Clothed in other or Hebraic attributes, the Christian Church accepted this Deity, along with the method of understanding His handiwork given by Plato, and the Aristo- telian system of Logic which confirmed it all. And thus, generally speaking, it remained till Bacon's advent. Plato's basis rose no higher than Thought : Process of mind : an ever-varying basis. All the deductions made by later philosophers and logicians reposed on no better foundation than he knew. They were supposed to embrace Nature, but Nature actually lay outside of them, and the abstractions of human thought alone dominated the world. Through Greek Philosophy nature was lost to man. Bacon declared that we must throw away these abstractions and return to 'things themselves.' We must begin anew, and from what the ' things ' revealed of themselves, realise the Truth there was. He was undoubtedly wise in his method. The ' Thing ' tells its own Quality ; it characterises itself, and as such we know it. And we know it truly. It is scientific knowledge, resting on a firm basis of fact. And by following this simple and commonsense method, the knowledge of men has advanced in storms since his time. Truth has widened with the suns. Yet we have still to ask, Has this Inductive method led to Ultimate Reality? Has it brought more satisfaction to the thinking race than the deductive process of Plato-Aristotle? Has anyone the least confidence that Ultimate Truth can be realised by these methods ? Does not the * thing ' but reveal its Quality ? And does not such Quality change and flow and give no firm and solid basis? Process is vain. We see the proof of this more clearly in the experience of Descartes. He also examined the c thing.' He examined himself. He likewise 118 SPACE AND PERSONALITY had a vision of the universe, and saw the basis of it all to rest on Thought. Cogito : ergo sum. The sanction of Being was proved by thought. So also Hegel. His whole system is based on this principle. And the principle amounts to a disease in human intelligence at the present time. Process creates, it is said! We think 'things' together! 82. Bacon made a false beginning in his assumption that our senses are fallacious, and that our " first notices of things " are erroneous. Our c first notices of things' had to be corrected, he declared, by a stricter examination. He stated this axiomati- cally, as if it had no exception. This was the rift within the lute. The exception was the important point. For there is in the very first ' notice ' of a new-born child, That which no after examination, or ( notice' ever surpasses in fact of truth. It is the experience of Space-Being. Truth, in its Whole-Being grandeur , is the first experience of every ' thing ' and of every person. We never lack this experience though we ignore it. And it is this consciousness which was as certainly given to the experience of the ancient philosophers as it was factual for Bacon himself. And it was that conscious fact for which neither the one nor the other had the smallest use. It is a fact of the first importance, surely, that we are all intensely conscious of Being, that is, of Space, which is not revealed by either a process of Deduction or Induction, for the simple reason that it has no quality, quantity, nor relation, and no * thing '-ness to be tested for its truth ? It gives no consciousness of Change. It does not Flow. It is indeed the "firm and solid basis" by which all comparisons of firmness and solidity are made. It is our conscious basis of absolute Solidity. It never requires to be corrected by further tests and examinations. The mind of man is always satisfied with Space-Being. No murmur has ever risen from the depths of the human heart, that bottomless pit of complaints, regarding the disappointments of Space-Being. The reason for this seems to be that we have the same experience of space-being as we have for what-we-are ourselves. We are conscious of be-ing, but we are not conscious of being ' things,' or of possessing quality, quantity, or relations which change. The conscious ' I,' at its deepest, is identical with our conscious- ness of Space-Being. SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT- JUDGMENTS 119 This fact ought to have been taken into account by the philosophical discernment For no motion, or consciousness of motion, but unfailingly yields also a consciousness of Space, as its primal condition of moving. This space-consciousness was present in Plato, as in Bacon and Descartes. Motion of Idea ; process of thought ; changing judgment ; were surely intensely intimative and informative of space-being. It is to this space-being which Motion of judgment, process of Idea, and all methods of ( thinking,' testing, judging, are constantly witnessing and pointing. The process may be deductive or inductive ; it may be from the Primal Principle to the smallest particular ' thing,' or from the qualified and quantified ' Thing ' up to the widest generalised Principle ; it may be a combination of these motions of mind ; it may be any conceivable process of mind ; yet there will always remain the fact that such process never yields any other result than insolidity, and Changing- Being. The Ultimate Reality lies above all this, in that conscious Space-Being which is ever consciously Whole-Being with what-we-are. 83. But Induction, contrary to Bacon's belief, really starts from the abstract as much as Deduction. It starts from the 'thing' itself. For this very 'thing,' no matter what we call it, is a concept of the mind. It has been formed out of material given to mind by the senses. And it would not have been possible to characterise it as ' thing/ if the consciousness of Space-Being had not first been abstracted from that material. To call it * thing,' then, in such a case, is to name an abstraction of thought, or a production of the conceptual judgment, which is false to the whole truth given in the perceptual material of the senses. The senses were not fallacious, as Bacon believed ; there is never any fallacy given by our senses. But there is fallacy often to a riotous degree in the concepts of our judgments formed from the content our senses bring. The scientific mind trusts itself loyally enough to the services of the senses, and discerns constancy in the Universe, but is often painfully compelled to alter her conceptual judgments with regard to what these judgments have omitted from the abundant content which the senses deliver. There is no assured consciousness of Reality, therefore, to 120 SPACE AND PERSONALITY be had either from the process of Deduction or Induction. They only yield a result more or less abstract and unstable in basis. The same falls to be said of all Logic. The conscious- ness of the Space-Being alone gives the royal assurance of absolute Reality. And it is the omission of it from the fundamentals of thought and reason, which, we think, is responsible for the instability of all intellectual confidence in our time, and for that thought-sickness which fevers the pulses of the world. What is ever lacking is the ' firm and solid basis' which we all desire for our consciousness of " Spirit," that grand and imposing fact which no examination of the ' thing ' ever reveals in the very least ; which draws its power of truth from beyond all consciousness of All that Flows ; and which keeps its throne-seat in the convictions of man independent of either the methods of deduction or induction. And although it has been put forcibly under metaphors of motion, such as breath and wind y the metaphors are more the creation of the fallacious concepts of the mind than interpretive of the consciousness of unchanging reality which the ' I '-Being, or Space-Being, stead- fastly maintains. It was quite gratuitous on the part of our world minds to assume that it was not our nearest reality, but one far away ; in order to reach which, they had to undertake a sore process of doubting, criticising, and abstracting. It is our Nearest. We cannot think differently of this Reality and ourselves. It is so near that we must think space-being if we think ourselves. But men have for this reason declared that it is not real, and only we ourselves are real. " Descartes," says Prof. J. P. Mahafify, " reasoned : space is real : but if not material, it is a non ens: therefore it is material. Kant also reasoned : space is real ; but viewed as a material datum, it is non ens ; therefore it is not a material datum, but the pure form of intuition" (Descartes, p. 210). The reality of space, to both thinkers, was intensely real. But, to Descartes, this meant material reality, without which there could not be Being at all. Kant did not quite place the whole stress of Being on material- ity, but in that case if space was not material, it must be ( spiritual.' And as this was inadmissible, space must be neither, and only &form for our ideas of both matter and spirit. 84. Now, neither Descartes nor Kant had the slightest foot- SPACE AS OMITTED FROM CONCEPT-JUDGMENTS 121 hold for such conclusions. Descartes had no quality, quantity, nor relation given him in his consciousness of space on which to base his conclusion, ' Space is material/ and just as little had Kant for his concept ' Space is form.' These conclusions are pure guesses. There is not a shred of fact to base them on. But Descartes was baffled to know how there could be Being without ' matter,' and Kant and Bacon were just as obsessed with the conviction that Reality must have Form. A moment's consideration, quite free from all theological prejudices, would have shown them that they never had any other data of consciousness for the reality of themselves than they had for Space. And whatever judgment they passed on their own Reality, they were bound, in loyalty to facts, to pass on the reality of space, a fact wfcose reality somehow they did not doubt ! This view of themselves, on the same basis of reality as space, was of course the punctum stans for Being which they were not prepared to take. Space must at all costs be severed from the beings of Man, God, and the Universe. Better to count it Nothing ! Space must be put outside of Being ! Bacon as well as Plato believed, without the least item of fact, that he was one reality and space another. Each held by the absolute truth of objectivity. This is the conviction of all ancient and modern philosophers, notwithstanding, as we see, that they possessed a consciousness of the reality of space. Differentia- tion, as a consequence, was assumed to be m the very structure of Being. The latent consciousness of Whole-Being is still with them, of course, and they never can rid themselves of its insistent arguments, but as space was always left out of their concepts, or judgments of Being, no such Wholeness could be realised. It is the urgements of this Whole-Being consciousness which lie, all the same, at the very heart of every effort to effect ' Unity ' beyond all the sad ' Difference ' which is first so gratuitously admitted. As if mere Unity of Being were of the least consequence, in interpreting Reality ! The assumption that man was one being, and space another and non-being ; and, certainly, not common being with man, was the grand error. For if consciousness is to be our supreme test, tlicn it must be affirmed tJiat no man is ever, or can be ever, conscious of the dividing line between wliat-Jie-is and space. We 122 SPACE AND PERSONALITY cannot by any possibility, as we must always reiterate, judge ourselves to be different being from space-being. Conse- quently, Objectivity stands on no absolute basis of reality. 85. It must now be evident to the reader, that it is the age- long conception of human Personality which has been the grand deflecting power at work in biassing the human mind towards a false judgment of universal or whole-being. Man has assumed the isolated oneness and apartness of his being, from every other being, to be the sine qua non of all judgments. The high question of discussion, therefore, hinges upon the proposition Is man's conception of Personality true or untrue? Man has judged his person to be himself, to be all of himself, and no other than himself. His conception of * God/ and the ' Uni- verse,' his conceptions of his ethical relations to God and man, have been built upon this fundamental axiom of reality. Heathen or Christian, religious or irreligious, fool or philo- sopher, male or female, each has accepted this concept of personality as the absolute Truth, and all being as other or objective to it. It will be our endeavour to show that it is a concept which is not sustained by the common consciousness of man at its deepest, and that it is not the ultimate consciousness of Being in either ourselves or Him whom we humbly seek to follow as Lord and Master. We shall try to show that the conception of personality, in the sense in which it is understood in all Literatures, is invariably transcended by one which is peculiar to His own teaching, a conception of personality, indeed, which is dissolved or sublated in His ultimate conscious- ness of Whole-Being-God, to Whom He ever professes to be ascending. And it will be found that it is the Space-Being which He always makes His basis of all ultimate statements of personality -, whether such ' personality ' connotes ' Humanity ' or ' Divinity.' Neither ' Nature,' nor ' God,' nor ' man,' is ever excluded from His statements of What- He- Is. Each is always included, rather ; and in the resultant, or whole consciousness of Being, He affirms freely of all that is, "It is /." In other words, Objectivity vanishes in His consciousness of Whole- Being. CHAPTER V PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 86. The transcendence of personality means the necessary elimination of the concept or conception of personality from our consciousness, together with the qualities, or characteristics, from which that concept is formed. We are asserting that the concept of personality, as it is customarily created from the characteristics of unit-being, with its attendant attributes of unit-will, unit-origin of thought and feeling, independent action, independent experience, etc., is inconsistent with our deepest consciousness of what-we-are, and therefore is a concept which cannot retain the highest place in our judgment of what-we-are. Every concept of the intellect is a judgment framed from and upon the material which sense and sensibility contribute, and, as we have tried to show, carries in itself the potentiality of its own decreation, when a higher judgment transcends that judg- ment which brought it into being. But, as our concept of personality determines all other concepts which we employ in interpreting Being, it follows that the transcendence of the concept of personality is the transcendence of conception itself. But this again is to abolish Logic in its lofty pretensions of apprehending absolute Reality. In doing so, however, there being no longer any concept by which thought can anchor herself, we have the impression of stepping outside of Being into Nothing ! But it is quite the reverse of this result. We rise above all lesser judgments, of which ' objects,' either indi- vidual or personal, are the products, and, with the space- consciousness, enter the true consciousness of what-we-are as horizonless reality absolute. 87. High Philosophy has deemed it her principal ideal to 124 SPACE AND PERSONALITY reverse this process of Mind. In grappling with the problem of Being she has unwittingly postulated the conceptual judg- ment as the essential core and centre of her work. In every great system of philosophy, therefore, we always, without exception, either begin or end with a conceptity which graves the impression upon us of its being the last laborious con- centrated effort of the philosopher's wholly combined powers of intellect. We define it as a conceptity, which has only a thought-, or abstract-content, in contradistinction to the true concept which always has a content of sense, or much-at- once-ness of sensation. Hegel well designated his central conceptity, BegrifT. The * Monad ' of Leibniz, the 'Substance' of Spinoza, the Unknown '^--thing-in-itself ' of Kant, the ' Ideas ' of Plato, and all the central concepts, or conceptities, that dominate the philosophical realm, give the same condensed evidence of a final hydraulic-like pressure of the logical energies. Each great mind, in its titanic ambition, is revealed thereby as attempting to buckle-round the Cosmos ; the All of Being ; God, Universe, and Man ; one strong conceptual band, the extremes of which each seals close in one grand logical judgment. Each be-grips^ or tries to be-grip, Being in his concept, and, in doing so, ruins it into false limitations. Such laborious effort flows from the prior conviction that Absolute Being can be put inside of a conceptual judgment. There is also the still prior conviction governing all such philosophy that thereby a comforting Unity will be achieved absolutely. And such a conceptual Unity has been supposed as we have said, to be able to yield a grand and final solution of the ' riddle of the universe ' ! And so it would, clearly, if Being, or What-we-are, were capable of being clenched in a logical concept. The path to absolute reality is rather by way of the primal space - experience of the child, and the full - open surrenders of sensation-given love, than through the hydraulic forces of the logical press in its creation of conceptities. Nature must be heard in a deeper idiom than speaks through the reeds and chords of the grinding conceptual organ. So natural should we be in such contemplations as to lose ourselves in the consciousness of What- Is. Even the concept of personality should be regarded as the egg-shell from which what-we-are PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUAL1TY 125 escapes. But this, of course, means the abandonment of our joy and conceit of thinking, in which we pass from concept to con- cept, as bees do from flower to flower, drinking the perceptual content of each as we vigorously accumulate erudite stores of object -knowledge. The space -consciousness rather calls us to a boundless empyrean, to commune in common whole-being with true, invisible, illimitable, conceptless Being, and to leave far behind us all the so-called ultimate concepts of God, Universe, and Man, with which we are so familiar. All the concept-belts in which we buckle Absolute Being must them- selves be burst, and Thought permitted to take her instinctive ascent into the space-consciousness, clear out of her cognitional restrictions, even as the drowning man instinctively seeks the upper surface of the water, ascending into the " wide air." It is the strictly drawn limitations of the concept-judgments of the ultimates of theology, philosophy, and science, which have inevitably sundered each from each, and until these are dissolved in a limitless consciousness of being, natural for each, the severance will remain irremediable. For the concept-judgment is a conscious closing and opening of Thought, a grasping together of sense-material mediated through sensibility ; and, as such, its own fundamental char- acteristic is Motion. It always connotes Space-Being as the prior basis of its very existence. But no concept grasps Space-Being within itself; and consequently, we never realise Space-Being as limited, or qualified in any way. An operation of thought, whose products depend upon process or motion, cannot therefore cope with our consciousness of Ultimate Being. For we must always keep before us the fact that the conceptual " space of three dimensions " is really objective, and is true quantity. It can be squared, cubed, etc., like any other quantity numerically treated, and consequently has no- thing to do with real Space-Being. 88. We have referred in previous pages to the fact that our senses do not yield us a continuum of sensation. Sensation is constantly broken up into ' points ' of consciousness and unconsciousness, as to the object, although this is not generally apparent owing to the extreme rapidity of the changes from one experience to the other. We always seem to have an 126 SPACE AND PERSONALITY existential continuum of seeing, of hearing, etc., while the actual experience is one of punctured sensation, much as we seem to have a continuum of sound through the pierced card- board of the pianola. Vibration-frequency enters into the conditions of the light by which we see, and the air by which we hear, and finds its counterpart, if we may call it so, in the vibrations of nerve-energy, and the pulses of the blood. Both from without and from within, the brain-energies are governed and conditioned in their thought-creations and motions, in feeling-and-willing-experiences, by physical con- ditions which render an existential continuum of either thought or sensation an impossibility, from an absolute point of view. Every sensation, and every concept moulded from its content, is created out of conscious and unconscious material. But this sphere of our experience without and within, which is so vibratory between the conscious and the unconscious, so intense with light and dark, motion and cessation of motion, gives at the same time, an irreducible consciousness of space-being as environing all we experience. Is it Darwin who speaks somewhere of pulse in the blood as being a reminiscent survival of the sea-tide influence, in that stage of existence when all earth-life was sea-life ? Perhaps such a suggestion requires to be extended far beyond sea- influences, to embrace the universe in its scope, for pulse, vibration, wave-motion, limited outline, objectivity, sweeps all Being as it is conceived, and the ebb and flow in our veins, in our heart-beats, in our conscious-unconscious thinking, in sleep- ing and waking, in living and dying, in the rise and fall of worlds from nebula to extinction, is but a part of that stupendous system of Being which the Space-consciousness alone gives to us as Whole. Now, in the very fact of our being conscious of Motion, as a quality or characteristic of anything, we have a clear proof of its being conditioned being. It is this consciousness which is so deeply planted in the convictions of all ages that All Flows, and that therefore, there is " no abiding." Man has never been able to comfort himself with this evanescent quality of Being. And if this conception of Being were absolutely true to the nature of Being, it might well be said of the foundations of all things that they are built in sorrow. PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 127 But of course the conception of Staticity of all things would just as fully prove the conditional nature of Being. Both Motion and Inertia are relative terms in a consciousness of Space which identifies both in Whole-ness, a statement which we hope to make clearer below in the chapter on Space as Whole-Force or Energy. It is found impossible to have a concept of anything, in short, without having also a concept relative to it, except that whole-concept which is identical with our consciousness of Space. The Motional is inconceivable as motion without a relative consciousness of the Inert, and vice versa. The strings of a violin seem only to vibrate between the nut and the bridge, but there is just as much vibration at the nodules of vibration as between them. And similarly, all motions in heaven and in earth have a corresponding inertia accompanying them in our consciousness of either. Each con- tains the potentiality of the other. It is only when we lay aside the concept of either motion or of inertia that we find in the consciousness of Space that Whole-Being of both which is more than they. Space gives no consciousness of either our conceptual motion or inertia^ but only of Whole-Being, Is. And here again, we recognise the consciousness of what-we-are ourselves. 89. The conceptual power within us which judges, dis- criminates^ or distinguishes, is, in this way, seen to be always a mark of conditionality of Being. We never can attain to absolute Being by its instrumentality. And the reason for this seems still more apparent when we examine, even in an amateur manner, what we may call the mechanism of the concept. And Kant's diagnosis of it comes to our help in this place. He brings the 'concept' and Space as it were face to face, and marks their behaviour. He says, " Man kann sich niemals eine Vorstellung davon machen, dass kein Raum sei, ob man sich gleich ganz wohl denken kann, dass keine Gegenstande darin angetroffen werden." " One is never able to conceive in one's self an idea of no-space, although one may quite well think that no object is present (or, met with) therein." In one's self, space must be thought whatever is thought. But such a concept, Kant thinks, may have nothing else in it. And this exactly corresponds to our ultimate conception of our eye- or outer- 128 SPACE AND PERSONALITY vision. Let heaven and earth as objects pass away, and still we should have a space-content in our consciousness. Both outer and inner vision, in the ultimate content of them, yield us an unfailing experience of what we may venture to term, Space-Spread or extension. Although no object were to meet the eye, we should always have a consciousness of seeing near or far. That is to say, we should always have space-objectivity or a spread of space for the eye. And this is the same experi- ence which we obtain for our inmost vision. But what Kant does not notice is its mobility. This space-content of our consciousness is contractile or expansive. It has Form. It has motion. We can contract it to a point, the Euclidean Point, or we can widen it until the spread of space-content enlarges to a ' horizon' that widens to the universe, and ' elanguesces ' into the Space-Being. We have certain effects of intension and exten- sion brought about by thought-movement and thought-energy. It is of course the motions of life that we mark behind it all. And, in such movements of this space-content, motion is yet more pronounced in the fact of our consciousness of sensation of mental propulsion, wave-like expanding every way. The latter is a genuine sensation of enlargement of thought-energy. But, as with our outward vision, when no object comes into ken, objectivity still persists with a space-content, horizoned and limited, so also is it with our experience of the inner vision. In it there is 'no object' save space. As Kant says, we meet with no ' object ' in our consciousness of this space-spread, but the space-spread itself is distinctly objective. It has also mobility, as we have said, and we venture to say, colour. This is the well-known ' space ' which Kant discusses in his " Critique of pure Reason," and which he has rightly defined to have ' Form ' (K. d. r. V., Von dcui Raume t par. 2). It is the same form of ' space ' between two masses which we call * distance,' to which we have already referred. But we must not mistake it for the consciousness of that Space which gives neither form, colour, motion, nor any quality absolutely. Under the domination of what is known as Attention, which is simply the space-spread in activity under the life-energies, our thought- energies can make such objective space into space-distances, space-points, and space-horizons, and space of "dimensions." But the Space of our ultimate consciousness gives no conscious- PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 129 ness of either quality or quantity. It is only when we have swept Quality and Quantity from all conscious concepts that we realise the true Is-consciousness, changeless, formless, and substanceless. But this space-spread in our consciousness seems to be the primal mould of mind from which all our concepts emerge. Thoughts, ideas, every species of objectivity, continually change and flow in ceaseless fluidity, but this space-spread as their form abides in itself. It is always objective. But we should find it hard to say, in all its motions, when it was ever any object save space. Even in its objectivity it is nothing but space. We have also true sensations in its motions ; motions which seem to harden into all our thought-forms, concepts, and conceptities. This motion of the space-spread of our consciousness has centrality in it, too. We could never conceive a 'point' if it had not this quality. And this form, in expansion, passes into the formless. We should never have a consciousness of formless- ness otherwise. The concept enlarges or gives itself up into the absolute space-consciousness. And in this wide-open consciousness we realise whole-being, or what-we-are. And it is because of this complete sacrifice of the form of conceptity that we have a consciousness of ' Nothing/ We cannot then be-grip anything. And then, because no concept is possible, we take it upon us to affirm the absence of Being ! For instance, gazing outwardly into space, we discern no 'object' save space, and then we assume that we see ' nothing.' Yet we have a concept of space in the sky-boundaries which is purely the product of the inner motions of the space-spread. So likewise, when we cannot think or conceptualise any 'object' within our space-consciousness, we think or conceptualise space- distance, space-object, space-form. And Kant called it also seeing ' nothing.' It was mere ' form ' for all our concepts of thoughts and things. But he was in error in supposing that this space-spread was our true space of the wide-open conscious- ness, which he elsewhere described as " all-embracing space." 90. Now, for all our sensations, as well as for our cognitions, this consciousness, we maintain, is an identical consciousness for their c form.' At the base, so to speak, of each sensation, there is no consciousness of an object which might connote substance, I 130 SPACE AND PERSONALITY or matter, but there is a. consciousness of ' form.' And its content cannot be distinguished from space. Sounds, sights, smells, flavours, sensations of touch, and all our sensations with- out exception, have this point-and-spread space-consciousness as their original ' form.' So closely is sensation allied in it with all our ' ideas ' that the remembering of the idea is to experience sensation with it. The entire system of the senses of our external experience is faithfully reproduced in our inner ex- perience. And it is always reproduced through this mechanism of the space-spread in which we can find 'no object.' This space-spread is the womb of all * form.' It is the transforming medium which from the bulk of our sensations engenders or moulds our concepts. For there is always a sensation of energy in its motions. It seems also to be the selective and directive energy which transforms the mass, or as Prof. James calls it, the 'much-at-once' of our sensations, into the art-forms which are the pride of our civilisation. No matter what the sensa- tion may arise from, originally ; no matter what special sense may be its medium, this energy governing our space-spread consciousness moulds it as it pleases. For example, a scene of interest is given to the eye, but in different minds, by the medium of the space-spread, the scene is transformed from sensation into varying vivid ideas, conceptualised into sensuous images ; tonal form ; or forms of colour. Sensation in the first would probably be transformed into poetry, in the second into musiC) and in the third into painting. All three would be transformed and transmuted sensation, and all three would be cast first as sensation into this mould-form of our space- spread consciousness, to emerge through it into the concept- forms of art. Yet the sensation, whether it were originated by sight, sound, or smell, etc., would be seized by this energy, and the sensation would be re-experienced in what we call ' Memory ' with all the truth of the first sensation, although the sight were internal and the sound and smell were the same. All 'memory' or recalling, may indeed be said to be the re-seeing, re-hearing, or re-smelling, re-touching, and re-tasting, or generally, re-sensing what has been previously known to us through Feeling, somewhat similar to repeating music an octave higher. No doubt, it appears strange to speak of an internal sound, smell, taste, etc., but undoubtedly PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 131 with the remembering of the 'object' seen, heard, smelt, touched, or tasted, the former sensations are reproduced, or re-formed in the space-spread of our consciousness. However, in such a case, the order of Memory seems to be reversed. Before we have a concept of anything, originally, we must have through sense the ' much-at-once ' sensation, and then from such bulk of confused sensation our concept selects its content. The concept thus follows the sensation in the order of experience. A pain, e.g., is experienced, and then from its bulk, concepts of intensity, locality, duration, etc., are moulded in the space - spread consciousness. They receive form. We then speak of knowing the pain. The sensation is transformed into unit-knowledge as the gases hydrogen and oxygen are transformed into unit- water. But, in remembering, the order is reversed. We first recall the knowledge-form and then the sensation-form fitting it is experienced. And as no concept ever stands quite isolated from ail other concepts, one concept links up with another, and the second concept may be the one that really calls-up the sensation corresponding to the first experience, a process which goes by the name of the Association of ideas. The entire sphere of Memory is strictly confined to the sphere of our conceptions. The content of memory is one which has all been defined before in conceptional forms of the space-spread. When we remember a thing, it is by the original space-spread form of conception that it is recalled. For example, we can never remember anything which has never been put into concept form. We do not remember ' God/ but only certain feelings and deistic conceptions which we have formerly experienced in connection with that term. We do not remember space-being but only certain conceptions concerning space -being which we have previously formed. Therefore, also, we have no consciousness of remembering what-we-are. The formless, matterless, time- less, quality-less content of consciousness, such as we have in the true ' I '-consciousness, is never within the sphere of Memory. It is this that explains why we have difficulty in remembering anything when most of the elements are awanting by which we formed the original concept of it. People meet after long years and cannot recall either face or name. The elements out of which the former concepts of each other were 132 SPACE AND PERSONALITY formed are nearly all absent, and consequently memory fails. Let but the former material be restored out of which conceptions were framed, and then memory acts. And universally, where conception is originally dim, blurred, and imperfect, memory will be feeble, and where the concept is clear, sharp, and stable, memory will be strong. But, no concept, no memory. c Personal identity ' has often been based upon the so-called remembrance of ourselves as being the same person who did certain things at some past time. But we have not the slightest recollection of what-we-are in the past, but only of certain conceptions connected with what-we-are. We only remember our conceptual experience of the past. And such remembering is always a present experience. The concepts formed at such a time in our experience are brought forth from our conscious- ness, like writing out of sympathetic ink. But we do not go back thereby into a ' past '-#. All the concepts formed yesterday are sympathetically present to-day in our con- sciousness, and we have a present experience, not of p&st-being but of concepts. And through these concepts we reconstruct our experience. But as we never have a concept or concep- tion of what-we-are, we cannot remember or reconstruct it. Hence, we cannot identify what-we-are through remembrance. It is the fixed and rigid nature of the concept which also gives rise to the identity of objects which have changed their entire contents. A concept of a ship is formed out of the material of perception such as hull, sails, masts, etc., and so long as each of these is renewed, the concept 'ship' is never changed. For the identity of the ship does not depend upon one thing but of all as conceived together. It is a unit-concept of composite material, and the concept is never broken until the change is so great as to annul hull, masts, sails, etc., each of which is a separate concept and exists independent of the concept ship, and may be changed without affecting the wider one which includes all. Similarly, we have a totalised concept of our experience, as it has been conceptualised, but never of what-we-are. Our 'identity' of being, or indivisibility of being, transcends the uses of memory and its conceptual mechanism, and is based in our ultimate consciousness of what-we-are as space-being, of which neither unity, divisibility, nor temporality can be predicated. PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 133 In original experience, then, the order is, first sensation then concept ; but in remembering, the order is, first concept and then sensation. And we should notice one difference in the results of the reversed process. Memory never gives us the same vivid and intense realisation of the sensation through the re-transformed concept as we experience in the original sensation before it is transformed into a concept. And the reason partly seems to be that we never wholly bind up in our concepts the entire content of the sensation, just as we never have a sensation equal to all that sense gives, and consequently, in re-transforming the concept back into sensa- tion, the ' form ' of the sensation is never so full as it was in its original ' form.' The fact, in its general aspect, is expressed by saying that we never really exhaust all that is to be conceived, or known, of the experience in its original ' form.' The Concept is never equal to cope with the full reality of the Percept. And this is the reason for the limitations of all our knowledge, seeing that it is based upon such imperfect concepts. But the fulness of sensation itself is also limited, although always embracing a far wider area of consciousness than our concepts do. For in the fact that both are qualified in ' form ' in our space-spread, and that a consciousness of energy and motion accompany them, we have a consciousness of limita- tion for both. That is, we have a consciousness of what- we-are as being more than either sensation or conception reveals. We have a consciousness of being beyond ' form,' in what-we-are. Such sensation-energy, and concept-energy are conscious qualities which move within Being which is consciously not either. We all have a consciousness of retain- ing, or storing up in what-we-are such concepts and sensations. As Dr Bain puts it, we have " the power of continuing in the mind impressions that are no longer stimulated by the original agent, and of recalling them at aftertimes by purely mental forces " (italics ours). Memory is thus a nexus between Sensation and Thought, or between Sensation and Concept. Every concept is built by what-we-are out of the material which sensation yields. We have first percept, then recept of the material of the percept, then concept constructed from what has been received 134 SPACE AND PERSONALITY through sense and sensibility. Through remembering, then, we reverse this process. We first have a conscious Concept, then what was received into that concept from sensibility and sense by Perception ; or, first, the concept, then the sensation ; or, again, Memory consciously binds together Thought and Feeling. Now, in this relationship of Concept to Sensation, and of both to the space-form, which in its original form has no content save 'space/ and in our consciousness that neither is what-we-are, we have the consciousness of Being which comes neither into the * form * of concept nor of sensation but which retains both in its uses. It is a consciousness which connotes neither form, energy, nor motion, nor any quality absolutely. It is the wide-open consciousness of what-we-are, and connotes only Is. By the one we have a consciousness of all objects, individuals, personalities, and relativity, and by the other we have a consciousness that all such are Whole- Being in Space-Being. But if possible, we should not suppose that concept, sensa- tion, and what-we-are, are each distinct ' things.' For every feeling has imaging in it, or thought, and all thinking involves will, and all three are but conceptual ' forms ' of that internal 1 much-at once' which we again name ' Ego,' Psychosis, Self, etc. It is the arbitrary closing and opening of the space- form of all our conceptual judgments which accounts for such apparent distinctions. But again, without this space-form nothing would appear. It is on account of the enclosure of a certain amount of the percept carried through our sensations into the concept, and so fixed by judgment that we can find it possible to say " I see it." Before the space-form moulds this enclosed content of concept, all is dim, vague, and ' blank ' being. The contractile energy of the space-form controlled by vitality, shuts in itself a certain content of the sensation, and then we say " It appears to me." Our consciousness of the relativity of Appearance and Reality arises from this fact. The relativity is itself only an appearance, and such consciousness of it is always sublated in the higher consciousness of what-we-are, in which no ' form ' is possible. 91. The Retention of our sensations and concepts in the PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 135 whole-receptive ' I ' seems to be due to the fact that they recede into the wide-open, formless, qualityless consciousness of what- we-are, and may be evoked or reproduced from the Being-we- are once more, through the same space-form into which they at first became known to us as sensations and concepts. Only a portion of all that constitutes light appears as light, just as all that constitutes sound is only heard in part-form. The pencil of light that comes into sensation and concept, as well as the vibrations of sound, do not account for all that these vibrations tell of Being. They only tell us of Light and Sound as they are limited in our sensations and concepts. In the same way, What-we-are is not all accounted for by what Appears. What- we-are is also that which never appears. It is that also which retains what disappears. As we have tried to show, it is quality-less as well as quality-full. It is formless as well as form. There is a wide-open, limitless, unclosed consciousness of what-we-are, as well as a space-form, or closed conscious- ness of what we are. There is a difference of content, that is, in the wide-open, true space-being, Is, ' I/ and the closed conceptual judgment, ' I am this man,' ' Ego,' ' Self,' etc. And it seems to be from the former state of what-we-are that ' Memory ' draws all the material which is known as cognised experience. 92. This space-form, or conscious spread of space, is there- fore our primary consciousness of Quality and Quantity. Without it we could not have them. It is the mechanism of all Determination, and Spinoza clearly discerned this to be the form of Negation. " Omnis determinatio est negatio," was his famous aphorism. And negation is simply 'drawing the line.' For what is determined, or judged as something, negates, or draws the line between or around that something and the other thing which it is not. But negate as we please, there is always the conscious sowe-ness that is never determined, and we are constantly trying to negate away the things which we have actually determined to be, in order to lay hold of this some-ness which as being is not yet determined. Hence the perpetual search into the Unknown for this undetermined Something which so persistently affirms that it Is. Our speculative attitude of mind, that is, in the mechanism of our researches, 136 SPACE AND PERSONALITY is persistently to negate away into nothing, the everything which we have already determined to exist, in order finally and absolutely to determine this unknown Something which we are conscious Is but is not yet determined ! This is the perpetual process in philosophical investigations which is so well known to moderns as " finding the Unity beyond the Difference " a process which may be an endless pursuit. For the unity has always a difference beyond it again ad infinitum. We actually believe that we can determine this Something within the form of our conceptual mechanism of negations ! We try to conceptualise Space-Being, or determine it by negating it ! This is the false foundation on which we build our science, our philosophy, and our theology. We seek for Form ; whereas the Truth is only found, as we want it, in the Formless. Now, as a matter of fact, truth in this way, is affirmed by us to be only in the determined, the conceptual, or the Appearance which we know ; and not in the undetermined, the inconceivable, the Real which we know not. We confine ourselves to believe to be true only all that comes within the sweep of our space-form, the spread-of- space which closes-in on our concept -judgments, but we cannot accept truth which is negated to be outside our concepts, and of which we are only conscious as Space-Being, What-we- are, Is. There is reason for assuming that all animal cogitation does not go beyond this stage of strict conceptuality. Man and animal, in this respect, seem to have the same order of thought, viz., perception, reception, conception ; but man has long ' irrationally ' transcended this limit of order upon which all his knowledge is based. He has found that this order must be surpassed if the claims of his ultimate consciousness are to be satisfied. Therefore in his urgent higher needs, he has gone beyond the concept stage and its restrictions, and laid hold of truth by instruments which he designates ' Faith ' c Intuition,' and such like, and which, though convenient, seldom yield to such truth a genuine certainty. They grope to seize by hands that which no hands can seize. They try to begrip by concep- tions that which no conception can grasp save when conception is full-open with consciousness, and identical with it. The senses give us * presentations,' and these again are ' represented ' in this space-form, or space-horizonal form of PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 137 our concepts, and thus from the vastitude of the inexhaustible reservoir of Whole-Space-Being we be-grip portions which are made so in the motions of our concepts, and for a little while we hold them true and real as they so appear to us, and then the forms in which they are so cast must be re -cast, and re-formed according to the same mechanism of mind, and what we have so objectified as 'self,' 'ion,' 'world,' 'nature,' 'God,' ' Universe,' ' Man,' or ' Thing ' of any name, ' elanguesces ' under the space-form motions ; and then its change proves its utter negation from our convictions of truth. It is really the force behind this process of concept-mechanism which from time to time, as the centuries wend onwards, bursts the old wineskins of the Categories and the Creeds, and for a time seems to consume all our revered formulae of Faith and Practice. It is the force of the higher ' I Am ' of our deepest consciousness which is at work in and under such movements, and all such movements are undoubtedly more essential to what-we-are than is the rising and setting sun. For in reposing absolute confi- dence in Being which is only Being determined by our concept- mechanism, we have to be retaught, often in sorrow, that it is not by unchangeably focussing our consciousness upon an ' Object,' however great, nor upon a ' Person/ however Excellent, that we best interpret the full God-Consciousness within us, but only in wisely acknowledging the space-form tent of thought which is temporarily spread for us in the wilderness, but which is forever to be enlarged and widened inimitably through every 'form' of possible objectivity till every shred of objectivity is surrendered, and until such space- forms stand level with the consciousness of formless Space- Whole-Being And it humbly seems to us that this is the process which, like subterranean energy, underlies Universal History. Life is but a principal current in the vast tidal movement^ and is itself confessedly subject to change. And if this statement is admitted to be true, then we must regard it just as futile to build any system of philosophical thought upon that basis, even though it may be scientifically accredited, as to found upon the last residual concept or 'Notion' which is proved able to survive the solvents of logical decreation. But there is no doubt about the attractions which the 138 SPACE AND PERSONALITY postulate of Life creates for the speculative intellect. It is believed to be concrete, universally experienced, and scientifi- cally approved as demonstrable fact The power which this postulate sways over all human convictions, and the grand value which is placed upon it by every living thing, cannot be ques- tioned. It is indeed a vast and profound experience, and one that extends far beyond that of man. We can hardly imagine a more transcendent state of Being for even the solemn conceptions, God, Universe, Nature, World, Man, than that of Life. ' Can even God/ we muse, * be greater than the Living One?' Life as a basis of Being seems to exhaust completely all experience as it thrills through the domains of sense, sensation, thought, and consciousness. Perhaps, we should have been compelled to accept this Life postulate as the ultimate of Being if it had been possible to keep apart from it the consciousness of Death. But this is also experience. Life is not Death, and Death is not Life ; and with such data merely, it is sheer impossible to rise above that field of Being in which they hold universal sway. Each is but a limited concept of our space-spread consciousness. If, for example, we daringly speculate on Being beyond or after this Life-and-Death field of experience, we find as a result that every conception or judgment we form simply repeats, perhaps with more expansiveness, those conceptions and judgments which we form concerning Life-and-Death experi- ence here. We never can realise a state of Being in which Life and Death are impossibilities, and absolute unknowns and inconceivables. The utmost we can do is to add a vague * eternal ' to each, only intensifying the duality. Yet, marvellous enough, this is the state of Being; Unrelated Being; com- pletely transcending correlated Being of Life and Death ; which human consciousness, at its deepest, has insisted upon as only real and true, ever since the human being evolved and developed to its present level of consciousness. And it is clear that man has never realised its full truth and reality just because he has never taken the only way of doing so, viz., by admitting his consciousness of space to be his primal conscious- ness of Being. Instead of doing so, he has steadfastly kept space-being from the data of his judgment as to the reality and truth of What-Is, PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 139 1 Somehow/ he muses, ' Matter, Mind, Life, should constitute the absolute basis of Being, but in no wise Space.' And this he has affirmed even when each in turn, and all coupled together have been systematised, accepted, and finalised, and still found wanting ! For with such categories his consciousness and his concept of Being have never identified themselves in a wide- open, limitless judgment of Whole-Being equal to that which is given in his consciousness of ' I.' And until this is done, his experience is not exhausted of what-he-is. But as soon as this ' I '-consciousness of Being is realised as true space-consciousness of Being, human consciousness of Reality at once transcends all possible judgments or conceptions of Unit-Beings, Life and Death, for the simple reason that it is impossible to judge or con- ceive or imagine Space-Being to be either one or changing ; to be either living or dead. In this consciousness of Being, the con- cepts Life and Death vanish. So also all assumptions fade away which insist that processes of abstraction or decreation are essential to manifest Reality, or necessary to the creation and evolution of Being. Process on such assumptions becomes preposterous, for, if Space neither lives nor dies, no more does it proceed. We have no experience, and no consciousness of such processes. On the contrary, with the space-consciousness as consciousness of what-we-are, we rise above the Life-and-Death field of conceptual-Being here, and enter the realisation of that relation- less Whole-Being which, out of the depths of humanity, has murmured its complaint through all time against the so-called 'Absolutes' of logical judgments, protesting itself independent of Life, as man has conceived it, and wholly impossible to Death. The consciousness of space-being then is a consciousness of Being in which Life and Death are inconceivable, transcending not only such relativity, but all relativity absolutely (as we hope to show more fully below), and so transcending all relativity for the simple reason that Space-Being has no conceivable Other. This also is exhaustive of Whole-Experience. And thus we seem to grasp better how and why it is that concepts and judgments which are framed on all that our senses are said to bring to us, or on all that we conceive of * phenomena,' and on all that we totalise as ' God/ Universe, Nature, Man, Life, and Death, constitute but imperfect, limited, and meagrely 140 SPACE AND PERSONALITY relative ' realities,' far below the boundless, relationless Being which is affirmed and attested in our conscious ' I.' We also approach closer to the Why and the Wherefore of that tremendous insistence through all time and thought, of the immovable permanence of Being ; the inflexible stability and uniformity of Nature; the Immortality of man; the ever- assured Hope, irrepressible by the potent conceptions of Death, Hell, and Sin, of Bliss unspeakable beyond all sorrow ; of Perfection above age-long bestiality and degradation ; and of Beatific Existence more exalted than prophet, poet, or seer has said or sung. Is it not here, too, that we discern the limited falsity of the term ' Being ' when it merely connotes the total ALL, which comprehends ' God/ universe, Nature, Man, with all their processes of Thought, Life, and Death, while omitting Space- Being from such a Total? For, even assuming that all lives; eternally lives ; we never yet escape from the limiting duality of Life-Being and Space-Being. Consequently, the postulate of ' Life' is as useless as 'Thought,' 'Matter,' ' Mind,' or * Substance ' as an ultimate of Being and Experience ; seeing it is inseparable from motion and process in generation, growth, and decay ; all which are necessarily conditioned in our consciousness of space- being as primal and antecedent to them. Moreover, how could we explain rationally, save by our consciousness of space-being, that marvellous conviction in mankind through all ages that when deprived of eyes man will yet see ; of ears he will hear ; of brain and nerves he will think and feel and will ; of all qualities and quantities on which his existence and life depend he will still be ; and be well? When deprived of all and everything which he is now conscious of possessing, man is yet confident in his consciousness of what- he-is, that he will possess far more, and be more than he now is, even when body and life, and heaven and earth pass away. ' Spirit' being as abstract and unscientific as all other terms for what-we-are, our consciousness of space-being alone accounts rationally, concretely, and scientifically, for such a profound anomaly. Most certainly, ' Life ' as a postulate, seems totally inadequate to it. Consequently, at such a point of view, we appear to under- stand more clearly why civilisation, which rests on the ideals which Life creates and embodies, is always, at crucial periods, PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUAL1TY HI compelled to root out her old foundation-stones and rebuild her fabric anew. Every Creed becomes untrue, and every Category defective. Civilisation does not build on Whole-Being as her fundamental consciousness. She accepts the part-being of our human concepts as alone truth, and the Nothing-Consciousness is nothing to her. Take one great instance. Christendom took over the objective God-Being of the Hebrew conception, and neglected the Whole-God-Being of the conception of her Master, and as a result, all conceptions within her theological repertory are never other than fluxional and evanescent. The Man of Galilee accepted His own ' I Am ' consciousness as sufficient for His consciousness of God, totally sundering Himself from the Hebraic consciousness of God-Being which was derived from ' things ' outside of that consciousness, and the Church in pre- ferring the latter has never yet come into her full inheritance. In the same scope of thought, it must be regarded as a calamity that Philosophy should have turned away from the great consciousness of Whole-Being, which is so persistently asserted in the human being, in order to partition out Whole-Being into a This and That, Finite and Infinite, Phenomenon and Noumenon, Being and Nothing, Known and Unknown, Mind and Matter, etc., always contented if she could tie the ' differ- ences 'into a mathematical knot-being of Unit-Being! What really does it avail that we adorn such a Unit-Being with such respectable titles as * Notion ' or * Spirit,' when neither ' Notion ' nor ' Spirit ' will consent to be Space-Being. And as we are far more intensely conscious of Space-Being as Real than we are of such ' Notion ' or ' Spirit,' does not the duality stand as sullen, as dogged, and as determined to be duality as ever it has done? This conceptual ' Notion ' or ' Spirit,' forsooth, asks us to consider itself as something far other than space, and as independent Being from Space-Being ; and this space-spread realisation we are supposed to accept as the proudest product of human reason ! 93. However, with such facts as given, we also better under- stand that when such partition of Being was deemed to be the essential process of the true realisation of Being, and the closed space-spread or space-form of our consciousness was accepted as our ultimate consciousness, it was inevitable that 142 SPACE AND PERSONALITY the human mind should invent the logical instruments of relativity known as Analysis and Synthesis. The conceptual realm being accepted as apprehending all Being, and Being as capable of being constricted to a conceptity, the Centre and Circumference of that realm through all its varieties of nomen- clature conditioned every system of philosophy. The Centre became Monistical and the Circumference was believed to be identical with Whole-Being. Hence such absolute products as unit-being, self-being, thought-being, notion-being, ^-isolations beyond being, and the general constriction of the logical foetus. Hence also the efforts to reduce the ALL to the EVERY, and the EVERY to EACH, and the minimum of the EACH to TWO, and the TWO to a SAME. Thought wandered between this Point- Thing as centre and the Circumference of ALL which was supposed to ' become ' of itself out of it. The consciousness of space-being which washes out both limitations did not count. A synthetic judgment a priori, was held to exhaust the bottom- less content of our consciousness of Whole-Being ! As if all synthesis were not excluded from such a consciousness as being superfluous. For in such a consciousness there is never any hint of distinctions, or of any necessity to synthetically bind together that which never has been analysed asunder. Yet it is said that the perfect scientific method is, first, to collect your * manifold ' of facts, and then, secondly, to synthesise or generalise from these the grand primal principle which commands * Unity ' from the * Manifold.' Philosophy is assumed to be a science. Therefore, let her from the collocation of facts of sensation, and thought; of feeling, thinking, and conation ; analyse and synthesise from these the ' personality,' the 'self,' just as similarly, from the facts of the cosmos, let her evolve * God ! ' 94. The supposition underlying such a process is that Reality is originally hidden, and that it must be tunnelled out from beneath its mountain by the analytical machine, and then from its piecemeal condition sewed up into a synthetical Form, named Unity, a ready-made pattern for which we all possess a priori ! It is never guessed that Reality, as we have it in our consciousness of Space-Being, is the simplest and most patent of all truths, or facts; being Fact itself; without which neither PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 143 the process of analysis nor that of synthesis could move. So real, indeed, is the consciousness of this Fact that we could not, though we tried our very utmost, feel, think, or conate anything, as real, apart from it. For it is the consciousness which dissolves the conceptual bands of every generalisation, though that generalisation should be even the law of gravitation, and widens all into Whole-Being, beyond the narrow processes of either analysis or synthesis. When we say * I,' are we in the least conscious of being capable of being analysed into * elements ' of any kind, and then synthesised once more into a Unity? But if such instruments of logic were essential to the elucidation of Reality, would they not be at home in their operations upon the ' I ' ? The genuine consciousness of the * I ' is, of course, one that places Being above centres and circumferences, analysis and synthesis, and every operation of logic absolutely. It is indeed amazing to see such age-long persistence on the part of our great thinkers to affirm Unit-Being, Individua- tion, and personal-being, as absolutely apart-being from every other being, all put into a Unit-Receptacle, the Universe, as marbles are put into a bag; such Universe itself having been built up by a Creator outside of it, where was no space, out of certain irreducible 'elements,' the material for which that Creator is supposed to have had in His possession a priori ! Would not the analogy of the Leaf serve us much better, if we required it ? For here we have the * isolated unit-being ' of our concepts, and the whole-being of our deeper consciousness, both frankly affirmed. Where the error creeps in is in assuming the isolation of the leaf to be absolutely affirmed. It is merely isolated-being, an individual, when we regard it conceptually as completely independent of the branch. When we regard it as being which involves, in its own, twig, branch, trunk, tree, earth, air, sky, space, we discern also the reality of its truth of Whole-Being as well as its truth of apparent part-being. And personality, either for man or God, is susceptible to the same considerations. The disastrous confusion which this absolutisation of Unity of Being has wrought in conceptions of personality is perhaps principally due to Kant. His magnificent genius reared an authority for what he asserted, too respectable to be controverted. 144 SPACE AND PERSONALITY And he declares again and again that his primal apperception of himself is one which yields only a representation of Unity. He is One. He is One all by himself. So terribly isolated is his Self that he never can come near enough to it to even think it, or know it. It is mere Unit-Being, an unknown ^r-thing. This was of course, the result of closing his conceptual mechanism of the space-spread, his space-form, to an in- finitesimal Euclidean point-thing. It is the power by which we create our concept of the Unit. But Kant never was able to show how he, as One, was also whole-being with everything that was Many, nor how the concept of Unit-being escaped from the possibilities which condition all Units, of being halved, quartered, etc., and so made subject to all the processes of numeration. His limitations are staring, in his view that it is always a case of having a possible consciousness of ourselves because we have first a possible consciousness of synthetically judging ourselves as One, independent of any help from what we have experienced. It is a judgment from before experience, or a priori. He actually believed also that the uses of space and time were exhausted when they enabled us to effect a possibility of synthesising the self as Unit-Being! 95. Now, it is never enough that we should reach an assur- ance in consciousness of personal one-ness for ourselves, for such a concept never permits a departure from itself. It is always impossible to find the path out of such a closed con- ceptual judgment to a wider one which includes every personal unit-being in common whole-being. Fichte felt this limitation, and thereupon enlarged his ' Ego ' to a concept of universal activity which was the unconditioned basis of all representation, although not personal. But this ' Ego ' could never connote more than limited truth of its reality seeing that our ultimate consciousness of it was only motion, abstract motion, without any quantity of being underlying it. The consciousness which is given in the ' I ' must not only yield unlimited reality for what-we-are ; we must be assured through the same consciousness that such reality is unlimited and absolute for all being, other- wise our practical and rational life will drift apart from each other. For we all act on the consciousness of all things being as real in their being as we are ourselves. Through the ' I ' PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 145 consciousness of reality we must find for all things an assurance of reality so indisputable that, were we to try, we should find it impossible, absolutely, to predicate of any other being any reality which was other than that reality which we realise in the ' I.' The consciousness summed up in ' I/ is not a matter that concerns merely a one-self particularly. It is the sole consciousness which we have for What-Is absolutely. We interpret through it all that we are conscious of for anything. And if we find the * I ' a limited reality, we must expect to find no other for any other being. It should also harmonise such reality as mucli through sense as through understanding. It ought to appeal to our consciousness of the reality of 'matter' as much as to the consciousness of reality of ' mind.' It should be as ' natural ' as * spiritual.' And it is the consciousness of the ' I ' as Space-Being, unlimitedly true for all that Is, which alone meets these demands. That is to say, the ' I ' consciousness, as a pure matter of common experience, proves itself to be space- whole in that it never connotes a consciousness in itself of movement of synthesis as necessary to a consciousness of one- ness of being, nor yet a consciousness of movement of analysis as necessary to a consciousness of difference from other beings. The * I ' consciousness is absolutely independent of such thought- motions to think itself to be itself or to think itself away from other selves. In other words, it is never found under the limitations of conceptually. We think ' I ' as we think Space- Being. As a matter of common fact, no person is, has been, or ever shall be, conscious of having been synthetically united out of a ' manifold ' as one being, and so united from before his experi- ence. The Kantian 'self of synthetical unity, a priori, is a logical ghost, a mere conceptity, created in the space-spread of the conceptual judgments. 96. Personality, in this way, is seen as a concept to stand upon false foundations. We are assumed to be Othered by the eternal nature of Being, separated-out, analysed, detached ; and everlastingly to be so. If the conception of the Communion of the Saints, or the Communion of all with the ALL, is to be rationalised at all, on such a basis, it must be as mere Com- munication but not Communion. All such communications, K 146 SPACE AND PERSONALITY too, must be conceived as made across the hard-cut frontiers of our ' personalities.' All being, in short, is thereby put under the tyranny of analysis and synthesis, two motions of the logical demiurgus, and Existence is to be conceived as poised upon the precise points of these analytic and synthetic forks. When it is said, for example, " I think you," there is a synthetic judgment implied for ' you,' as unified from the ' others,' which again, analytically, are judged to be not 'you.' When again it is said, " I think," there is a new synthetic judgment implied in the unification of motions which analytically are judged to be different from the " I." When it is said, " I am," there is a synthetic judgment stated regarding an objective 'Self 'which is yet analytically different from the subjective 'Self who thinks it. And when the philosopher of Konigsberg declared the subjective Self to be Noumenon and the objective Self to be Phenomenon, Analysis and Synthesis, like Castor and Pollux, were set in the high firmament of Philosophy, brother-gods in a deistic unity of the logical Gemini. But Hegel, in turn, was unsatisfied with this dual enthronement, and in his Apocalypse beheld Analysis and Synthesis to contend mightily, until each returned into the Other, and was not, and yet was ; ' Is ' othering ' Not ' ; and finally both issuing forth as new Being ; One forever ; ' Becoming ' ! This Unit-Thing, this personality, may shine alone as a star, but it shines in a wondrous darkness of space-consciousness which is of more interest than itself. We could have no better proof of the inefficiency of such a conception of personality than this fact. For we are very conscious of the limits of such personality, and we are not conscious of the limitations of the space-being. Suppose this brilliant ' personal '-thing to be ' God,' in all its grandeur of sublime Unity. Could we accept it as ' God ' ? We could almost answer for the world that when ' God ' is called this Unity, He will no longer be ' God.' For here is limit, and number, and quality, and relation, and Deity plunged into the abyss of the Flow ; a mere travesty of Deity. And we may say both for ourselves and this ' God,' that, if a possible consciousness of What-we-are is to depend upon the possible consciousness of synthetically judging our- selves as One, a priori, neither ' personality ' will long survive the conceptual begrip which must strangle each. PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 147 97. We are convinced that this was the hidden rock on which German Philosophy made shipwreck. It assumed and maintained that Absolute, or Whole-Being can be consummated in Unity, and stamped this impress upon all concepts of 'personality.' Both Kant and Hegel missed the fact, or mis- read it, in their consciousness of Being, viz., That there is no hint in it, absolutely, of any possibility of its being circumscribed as One. There is only and solely a consciousness of Whole- Being. No verge, edge, division, line, or determination, can be found between what-we-are and anything whatsoever, speaking differentially for purposes of exposition. Unity of Being gives always frontiers, seeing it is a concept of one-ness, but frontiers for what-we-are is the inconceivable. As we must tiresomely reiterate, the consciousness of what-we-are gives us simply the x same result which we invariably find in our consciousness of space-being. And this consciousness is as natural in our sense-data as it is in any of our experience. It is the true natural basis for our conceptions of Nature and the Natural. In it we are not othered away from the universe, from ' God,' from Space, or from Time. This consciousness of what-we-are springs from a consciousness that has never endured a hint of difference, determination, duality, or negation, in itself. In the presence of such a consciousness, we cannot find it possible to speak of 'the identity of personality,' the * identity of Being and Nothing,' or ' the synthetical unity of consciousness.' The finding of Hume was the last truth uttered on such Being. " Identity," he said, " is nothing really belonging to these different percep- tions, and uniting them together, but is merely a quality, which we attribute to them, because of the union of the ideas in the imagination." No unity could be found there as fact of One. Hume saw clearly and truly the processes of * ideas and impressions,' but he rightly did not see the One-ness. This vision of Unity of Being was the fatal mistake of German Philosophy. 98. As a consequence, philosophical and theological thinking has been retrogressive rather than progressive ever since. On the highest ground, with such conceptual apparatus, could it have been possible to understand on a rational basis, such 148 SPACE AND PERSONALITY words as, " He that receiveth you receiveth me, and he that receiveth me, receiveth not me, but Him that sent me"? or that wonderful class of statements which perplex^many in read- ing the John Gospel, " Abide in me and I in you," " I and the Father are one," " I in them and Thou in me " ; " That they may all be one," and many others, where One-ness seems to be of one personality, of two personalities, or of many personalities ? Such statements clearly shatter all that One-ness for personality which has dominated both theology and philosophy so long. And while, of course, this view of personality still accepts One-ness so far, even when it is compounded of two, or many ' personalities/ it will be shown in later chapters that in the Master's consciousness of What-He-Was, even this One-ness of personality is completely transcended by that of Whole-Being. Indeed His use of the conceptual One-ness for What-He-Was seems to have been a temporary convenience for thought- purposes, so long as men persisted in holding One-ness of being for their own being. He used, that is, as was His wont, their concept-forms for His truth, in order that, as old wineskins, they might be burst by it. This filling up of old concepts with newer and far wider truth-meaning, is of course a common- place in theological hermeneutics. What is wanted now is to carry it out to the fulness of the extent of the Master's use ; and it is just this expansion of interpretation which the Christian Intellect has never yet quite undertaken. 99. Even the most superficial view of personality, as that concept is constantly used by the Master, reveals a tendency in His teaching to widen it upward and outward till like a dissolving cloud it breaks into wide-open space-being ; whereas a similar glance at that concept, as taken over from German Philosophy, by the modern mind, shows just as decided a trend towards a severely contracted unit-being from which all inclusion of Other-Being is rejected. Ex pede Herculem. Let the following few instances serve for illustration of the last statement. Prof. James Ward says (Hib. Jour. No. 13, p. 87), " It is as self-conscious that I know myself as a feeling and acting subject to whom objects appear. It is only as 1 am here that I am aware of them as there. I am not self-conscious in vacuo^ PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 149 but only as confronted by a not-self, and I am never self- conscious save as I am conscious of this duality." In this statement of what-we-are almost every term used involves a consciousness of space-being which yet is never acknowledged to be other than mere vacancy or zero-being, of no value to thought. 'Self and 'Not-self are judged to be, but the space in which we are conscious they must be is judged as non-being. But this space-consciousness is absolutely necessary to the beings ' self and 'not-self For 'feeling and acting' imply motion, and motion compels a consciousness of space. The same necessity is patent behind the expression " subject to whom objects appear," " I am here . . . aware of them there." Now assuming these ' beings ' to be realities, the whole question of what they are remains unexplained and unexhausted of the data which consciousness supplies, till it is shown how we can have a consciousness of this and that, subject and object, here and there, independent of any consciousness of space. For the very certainty that such beings exist, with ' self on one side and ' not-self on the other, cannot be affirmed till we first postulate space. Perhaps it is because this space-being is inconceivable, and cannot be limited by a concept, that he accounts it non-being ; mere vacancy ; zero-being. But non-conceptuality does not guarantee non-Reality. If indeed the space-consciousness is so absolutely essential to the affirmation of the being of 'self and 'not-self/ then the being of space is far more authentically real than either the 'self or the 'not-self The 'self and 'not-self,' indeed, are unreal by comparison ; for being concepts, ideas, judgments, they are abstractions, and are under the limitations of motion, number, form, and change, which our consciousness of space never is. And thus we come round again to the fact that our consciousness of space, not being an abstraction, is our sole consciousness of reality, or Being. " While self-consciousness is in one way the very simplest thing we know," says Prof. Ed. Caird, "the very type of simplicity and transparent self -identity , and we could scarcely find any better word to express clearness of evidence than to say, ' This is as certain and evident to me as that I am I,' yet in this apparently simple unity, the diversity of all the mighty world is mirrored. In the consciousness of self we have subject 150 SPACE AND PERSONALITY and object as essentially diverse, and yet essentially identical, and every movement of the life of a self-conscious being is a movement out into what seems an irreconcilable difference, and back into unity again. The theoretical and practical life of this apparently simple unit is one in which it continually goes out of itself to that which is most opposed to it, yet in all its travels it never meets with any thing from which it cannot return to itself, it never wanders so far that it is not with a moment's self-reflection at home. And all that it finds in its wanderings it can make part of itself, and weave into the web of its own life" (Evol. of Relig. i. 174) (italics ours). A masterful self-centred Self! It meets with everything save that space-being in which it wanders far and near. It is conscious of itself and of all that space-being conditions, but has no consciousness of kin-being with space-being. It has not the remotest connection with space-being. Now, if we were compelled to be very serious over such a consciousness of our unit-self, we should be astonished that, being so keenly conscious of this wandering self, and of its marvellous possible changes, we yet were absolutely devoid of any consciousness of space-being for this self. But we are convinced that this self is no more than a mathematically quantified unit-thing, fresh from the logical moulds, and that no mortal man has ever had such a consciousness of what-he-is. We are convinced that if a man is conscious of anything at all, he has no consciousness so immeasurably real as his consciousness of space. The reality of this unit-self is of the most doubtful kind. It is wholly mechanical and artificial, and its motions and relations qualify it as limited on every side, and as such it could not well be removed further from our consciousness of Space-Being, of whose reality the human mind is not capable of doubting. Our consciousness of space-being is the consciousness that gives any reality ; and it has nothing to say regarding this * self.' 100. An example from a thinker of an opposite school gives also the same testimony to what-we-are as unit-thing, strictly isolated, and one all by its self. Prof. Pringle Pattison, in his stimulating monograph Hegelianism and Personality^ p. 228, says " But though the self is thus, in knowledge, a principle of unification^ it is, in existence or metaphysically, a principle of PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 151 isolation" " There is no deliverance of consciousness which is more unequivocal than that which testifies to this independence and exclusiveness. I have a centre of my own a will of my own which no one shares with me or can share a centre which I maintain even in my dealings with God Himself. For it is eminently false to say that I put off, or can put off, my personality here " (our italics). The numeral qualification of what-we-are is refreshingly stated and leaves us in no doubt as to the able writer's view. Man is One, and only One. And being so, he must necessarily conceive all other beings through the same unit-concept. The consciousness of what-we-are governs every conception of any- thing. ' God ' is, consequently, a numerical Unit also. " The religious consciousness lends no countenance whatever to the representation of the human soul as a mere mode or efflux of the divine. On the contrary, only in a person, in a relatively independent or self-centred being, is religious approach to God possible." It is calmly assumed that this Self and the God- self are sundered Beings. The full logical process which is based on this false assumption is seen in the inevitable con- clusion which is found on p. 227. " For though selfhood, as was seen in the earlier lectures, involves a duality in unity, and is describable as subject-object, it is none the less true that each Self is a unique existence, which is perfectly impervious, if I may so speak, to other selves impervious in a fashion of which the impenetrability of matter is a faint analogue. The self, accordingly, resists invasion : in its character of self it refuses to admit another self within itself, and thus be made, as it were, a mere retainer of something else. The unity of things (which is not denied) cannot be properly expressed by making it depend upon a unity of the Self in all thinkers : for the very characteristic of a self is this exclusiveness. So far from being a principle of union in the sense desired, the self is in truth the very apex of separation and differentiation " (italics ours). Both the Hegelian and the Anti-Hegelian thus place Being within their concept of Unity ; and consequently this Self-apart from God-apart ; and both, as parted from all other beings, is the net result. But, we respectfully ask, how could any other product be evolved from minds whose fundamental conviction is that Being, or Reality, is " essentially diverse," and yet again, 152 SPACE AND PERSONALITY " essentially identical " ? The diversity and unity are admitted to be necessities in the very structure of Reality. The Self, in such a case, both for Hegelian and Anti- Hegelian, has no alternative but accept itself as conscious of ' parts ' in itself, and as capable of making-up itself out of all it meets with, in its wanderings to and from itself. Is any man ever conscious of what-he-is being composite in this way, or being sundered apart from everything, God included, as described ? Is our ultimate consciousness of what-we-are necessarily dual-and-one at the same time ? Is Difference as ultimately predicable for Reality as Unity? Is it absolutely necessary that Reality should be qualified numerically, and Self thereby be Number One, while God is also another Number? Is What-we-are qualifiable by any concept? Can either Hegelian or Anti- Hegelian describe What-we-are save in terms of Space- Being ? Against such we humbly venture to maintain that we have no true consciousness of either this 'Self or this 'God.' To put either the one or the other under numerical qualifications is to put each Unit-Being outside of our consciousness of Reality, concerning which we have no consciousness of Unity but only of Whole-Being. It is clear, however, that the space- consciousness, never having been admitted as giving a consciousness of Being at all, but only of Nothing, a negligible null of no account for any purpose, the concept which yields Something objectively to the judgment of what-we-are is the only other alternative, and this can only yield a numerical result. Hence the swarm of ^-things, " Egos," " Notions," inclusive and exclusive ' entities ' of varied nomenclature ; not one of them of the slightest use in the explication of the philosophical problem. They are logical creatures of the pure Melchizedek race, without father or mother, unnatural, and only invented in stress of certain interests. Both such ' Selfs ' and such ' Gods ' are under the " laws of thought," and consequently we are compelled to submit to see each being unit-shaped, discrete, ' principles of isolation,' determined, and limited. Yet, strange enough, we are unable to even conceive them as separate beings before we include our space-form within the judgment which proclaims them excluded from each other. Our deepest experience is actually not of these ' Selfs ' and PERSONALITY AND CONCEPTUALITY 153 c Gods,' but of Space-Being which as Whole-Being includes their objectivity in its Being. But apart from these defective conceptions of what-we-are, we admit gladly the interpretation of that consciousness which associates ' imperviousness,' ' impenetrability/ and * uninvad- ableness/ with Being. This is the true consciousness of Space- Being. But these qualities are impossible in a consciousness of Beings which are liable to be either divided or united according as we think. These ' persons ' fall asunder before we are near enough to invade them. The basis of Being which is so Whole that invasion is inconceivable for it, is not to be found in such convertible subject-objects, but solely in our consciousness of what-we-are, that is, in the consciousness of Space-Being. And we shall try to show in Chapter VII. that every conscious- ness of resistance which we possess, finds its home ultimately in that consciousness of Resultant Resistance which only the Space - Consciousness affords. And in the fact that such a consciousness of Absolute or Resultant Resistance is to be found in both what-we-are and in Space-Being, using dual terms conventionally, we shall claim to find another proof that what-we-are and what we call Space are not separated * isolations,' but Whole-Being. CHAPTER VI DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 101. In previous chapters, we have been led to contemplate our subject as it bears upon the formation, or modelling of thought-things, concepts, unit-beings, personalities, or, generally, Objects, out of the incohesive chaos of supposed disintegrated Being. In the present one we attempt to consider briefly the field of Being from the standpoint of this supposed disintegra- tion, Division, Otherness, or, Relativity, as it is absolutised in human convictions, and note the consequent despair which prevails in the philosophical realm because the high ideal of all philosophy, viz., Being subsumed in a concept of Absolute Unity, is constantly forfalted. We view the gulf from the other side of the chasm. It is evident, so far, that no matter how securely the supposed unity of Being may be be-gripped in logical instru- ments, such "unity beyond the difference" never for one moment eradicates the persistent difference which always treacherously nestles underneath the foundations of every possible 'unity.' The synthetical Hercules still wears the poisoned shirt of differentiation which by and by turns the personal-unity into many-wandering dust. There is never an unnegatable consciousness of Whole-Being in such a ' unity.' There is only an eternally vacillating " To be or not to be." And, as a consequence, " the peace that passeth all understand- ing," can obtain no lodgment in the troubled spheres of Reason. The plane of philosophy thus falls far below the elevations of religion, and its affirmations of truth are timid and hesi- tating as compared with those of theology or science. And thereby the uses of the speculative powers for the highest purposes of the human race, sink under suspicion. And then, 154 DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 155 as a natural result, the Church, the University, and the Parliament, disallow her place in sacred devotions, education, and the social and political development of the human race. That which the noblest and best feel ought to be a foremost force in furthering the loftiest ideals of man, is confessed by them to be a burden and a discouraging drag upon both the intellectual and spiritual energies of the world. 102. Perhaps, it is in Herbert Spencer's philosophical system that we find the best illustrations of that complete helplessness and hopelessness to which modern speculative thought has been reduced in the omission of the Space-Being consciousness from the data of its judgments. The intense delight which one experiences in watching this giant overthrow every logic-mailed adversary who comes in his way, is fully balanced by the melancholy which settles over one's thoughts as his every victory closes not in triumph but in despair. For he is not bent simply on slaying logic-mailed warriors. He is out to seek for Something which he confesses cannot be found, but for which, all the same, he must make incessant search. He suffers from the disease of differentiation and explores tombs. He is the ( self,' alas, which is doomed not only to wander in and out of itself, but never really to be at home with itself. He is sure he should be able to meet himself, but, somehow, this is the self which is forever lost. In other words, he is seeking for the unity of Mind and Matter. And after long, careful, and bitter quest, it is thus he mourns : " We think of Mind in terms of Matter : we think of Matter in terms of Mind. We find the value of x in terms of y : then we find the value of y in terms of x: and so on we may continue forever without coming nearer to a solution. The antithesis of subject and object, never to be transcended while consciousness lasts, renders impossible all knowledge of the Ultimate Reality in which subject and object are united. And this brings us to the true conclusion implied throughout the foregoing pages the conclusion that it is one and the same Ultimate Reality which is manifested to us subjectively and objectively" (Principles of Psychology, i. 627) (italics ours). The song of the terrible one is brought low. Yet mark the fine gleam of fixed light in the intense darkness. He has a 156 SPACE AND PERSONALITY sure consciousness that there is an Ultimate Reality. It may be protean in its scaly shapes of x and y, mind and matter, subject and object ; nevertheless, Something Is of which these seem to be the " constituent functions." Yet he declares this Reality to be Unknown ! And this assertion is made in the very face of his statement that it Is ! Where did this conscious- ness and knowledge of the certainty of an Ultimate Reality emerge from, save out of the consciousness of himself? Its very unknownness, that is, its impossibility of being subsumed ' under the categories of the understanding ' ; its defiance to be classed under x or y, matter or mind, object or subject, yet its unconquerable affirmation of Is, ought surely to have taught him that he had a consciousness of Being which positively refused to be put under the harrows of either Synthesis or Analysis, convertible at will from duality into unity, or from unity to duality. Is it not this consciousness of Being, Is, to which these must ever come for certification of their pretended separate existence? For the unity does not, at any time, assert the independent existence of the duality, nor does the duality certify the independent existence of the unity ; they are here or there in a consciousness which is ever independent of their motions. This consciousness of Being cannot indeed be known in the sense that an 'object' is known, for it has no outlines of limitation for our understandings ; but neither x nor y, neither mind nor matter, neither subject nor object could be known without it, in these intellectual forms. It is a conscious- ness in which these have outline and limitation, as worlds, suns, and stars seem to have their outline and limitation in Space- Being. This consciousness of Ultimate Reality is present in the philosopher because it is present in every man, and in the motions of the consciousness of all that has consciousness. But if Hegel may be called Embodied Synthesis, so Herbert Spencer might well stand for Incarnate Analysis. Dogged is the Unity, and as dogged is the Duality. " No effort of imagination," he confidently asserts (Prin. of Psych, i., 626), "enables us to think of a shock, however minute, except as undergone by an entity. We are compelled therefore to postulate a substance of Mind that is affected, before we can think of its affections. But we can form no notion of a substance of mind absolutely divested of attributes connoted DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 157 by the word substance, and all such attributes are abstracted from our experience of material phenomena. Expel from tJie conception of Mind every one of these attributes by which we distinguish an external something from an external nothing and the conception of Mind becomes nothing" (italics ours). Could the argument be bettered in any way, with the data he uses? It is not new, of course. As already quoted, Hegel said, " A Something is what it is in virtue of its quality, and losing its quality it ceases to be what it is." Yet, logically, Hegel ought to have said, "A Something is what it is in virtue of its quality, and, losing its quality, it is othered into its nothing." For every something, when considered conceptually, has as truly the quality of nothing in its Is-ness as it has the quality that makes it something. The something may go out of knowledge but never out of Being. But to be othered into nothing, was for Hegel, and for Herbert Spencer, to be othered into a contemptible abstraction, a nullity, for which philosophy had no use till it could again be moved out of abstract nothing into a motion of ' Becoming,' and qualified. In such a case, in abstracting the " attributes connoted by the word substance," call it either ' Mind ' or ' Matter,' most certainly " the conception becomes nothing." " We can form no notion " of it. It passes beyond conceptual understanding. Yet it is still Being-con- sciousness. But this Nothing-consciousness is nothing more to Spencer. It is cast out from his data of judgments upon Mind and Matter. Yet he but confirms our tedious contention that this Nothing-consciousness, this consciousness of gap, void, space, give it any null-name conceivable, which conditions the very existence of our conceptions or notions of Mind and Matter, abides as the paramount and final consciousness. It is ever the consciousness we all have beyond all objectivity. It is the consciousness which steadfastly environs our consciousness of every Something, and without which no Something, either as One or as Many, could be conceived as such. And it is never less than the consciousness of ourselves, that, viz., for which ' Mind ' or * Matter,' or both concussed into a so-called unity, are terms of impertinence. It is in short, the space-conscious- ness which sublates all 'minds' and 'matters,' every objective x and y y and all relativities absolutely, leaving only a consciousness of Whole-Being possible in it. 158 SPACE AND PERSONALITY 103. This so-called scientific method of seeking a permanent substance in its impermanent 'qualities' must be characterised as unsatisfactory. The very fact that these 'qualities' always give way before our quest for permanence, and clear the path for a final space-result to which they ever point as ultimate for each, shows that there is a consciousness which always remains unfulfilled till the fact of space is accepted as the reality which, from certain of its motions, we call * something,' and by whose lack we realise ' nothing.' The same defective method would compel us to deduce that, when we take away the motions which we call generation, growth, assimilation, reproduction, and such like, the fact of Life should cease to be. Now, the point to notice is that there is a consciousness in us that does not accept any or all of these motions as absolutely accounting for Life. And the same consciousness refuses to accept the so-called ' qualities ' of anything as absolutely exhausting all that that thing is, in being. These " qualities " which in their total we name Something, and in their zero-sum we stigmatise as Nothing, never justify us in affirming that the Being so presented under these conditions is, or is not ; or rather, is, and then has ' ceased to be.' There is a distinct consciousness that, absolutely, no ' quality ' can give the origin of any thing, and cannot be the basis of our judgment of its cessation of being. But ^vhere do we put these qualities when we ' take them away'? Do we do anything else than simply turn our 'blind spot ' to them, and shut them out of our conceptive judgment of the Something ? And do we suppose that by shutting out every known quality of the ' something ' that we make it cease to be in the same ratio that we make it impossible to be known ? We may depend upon it that this process may lead us to an exhausted capacity for analysing the something, but all the more it accumulates, on the other side, a synthesis which reveals, if not the Something then the 'self which is so exhausted. And when the same process has been done for the ' self as for the Something, the consciousness of equal being for both is testified in the common consciousness of space which remains for either. And this space-consciousness, given for either, also testifies to Whole-Being in which every synthesis for each is sublated. In other words, there is a consciousness DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 159 of Being indestructibly present in us for what-we-are, as for every ' Something,' which is ever untouched by any synthetic or analytic process of our reasoning powers. And this is the consciousness of Permanent Being which is always the or\efac( which Science never uses, and never reaches, but only accounts a null of no value absolutely, and contemptuously pities as ' The Void.' Nevertheless, we shall affirm that the true basis for our consciousness of Substantia is Space, and not the imaginary 'substances' and 'somethings' which a spurious scientific method has invented out of the certainty of uncertain 1 qualities ' for both ' Mind ' and ' Matter.' 104. How stale, flat, and unprofitable, this kind of specu- lative reasoning proves to be, may be gathered from the sum- mation of its results for the human intellect given by Dr Bain. He confidently says : " The arguments for the two sub- stances have, we believe, now entirely lost their validity : they are no longer compatible with ascertained science and clear thinking. The one substance, with two sets of proper- ties, two sides, the physical and the mental, a double-faced unity ', would appear to comply with all the exigencies of the case. We are to deal with this, as in the language of the Athanasian Creed, not confounding the persons nor dividing the substance. The mind is destined to be a double study to conjoin the mental philosopher with the physical philosopher : and the momentary glimpse of Aristotle is at last converted into a clear and steady vision." (Mind and Body, p. 196.) The reverential residuum of their logically sculptured "Person" and "Substance," bequeathed to us by devoted Early Christians and honoured Earlier Pagans, is thus tied-up into an "Ultimate Reality" by Herbert Spencer, designated Unity with a double-face of subjectivity and objectivity by Bain, and thrown to our Space-Consciousness as complying "with all the exigencies of the case!" And we are left to muse upon the possible ' qualities ' of that mysterious " one substance ! " The postulation of 'substance of mind,' implies a postula- tion of qualities by which this ' substance ' is cognised, and these Qualities being forever liable to be 'taken away/ this ' substance ' is consequently menaced by non-entity, or ' ceasing 160 SPACE AND PERSONALITY to be ! ' There does not seem to be much satisfaction in such reasoning. We all have a consciousness of what-we-are as unceasingly permanent, but if it is ever at the mercy of ' qualities ' which may fly away at any moment, whence is the consciousness of permanent being derived ? Does not this point to a defective knowledge of the 'qualities' included in what- we-are ? 105. Hegel has, in his order of thought, placed Quality before Quantity. This is the natural way, and if Quantity can only be known by its qualities, it is the one way for correct understanding of Quantity. But the postulation of either quality or quantity, assumed as necessary divisions in our consciousness of Being, seems to us to work the same havoc in that consciousness as the postulation of the necessary ' Unity ' and the * Difference.' Hegel has divided the scheme of his Logic into Three Parts, viz., Being, Essence, Notion and Idea. Being again he divides into the three grades, Quality, Quantity, and Measure. These again are treated as if decidedly apart from each other. A ' transition,' for instance, has to be made from Quality to Quantity (Logic, Wallace's, 98, 2). 1 06. Now it is evident that but for the power to divide, the human thought could not possibly grasp such an arrangement of Being. It is the unquestioned assumption that what-we-are is divided-being from Space-Being which is the prolific source of all the divisions, antagonisms, and relativities of philosophy, ancient or modern. We have then to ask, first, how is division possible ? We speak of the qualities of something, and of the something itself as distinct from these qualities. And as this question of the possibility of division touches the more important one of our consciousness of Whole-Being, it is clear that before we can rest in the consciousness of Whole-Being as unnegatable, we must first show that, all division of Being, though common enough to conceptual Thought, is unthinkable for our ultimate consciousness of Being. (See 64.) Division is not thinkable except as conditioned by the prior consciousness of Space. Let the reader try to think of two things, two qualities, two quantities, or two anything, without a consciousness of space between them, and then say if they are DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 161 divided. Before division is possible as a motion of thought, or presented to thought, space must be a consciousness. But this consciousness of space is never accepted by Hegel as the principal datum in our judgment of division. He accepts that there is a transition from Quality to Quantity. But that the space - consciousness must necessarily be present before such division or transition can be effected for our understanding, he does not accept. He does not bring the space-consciousness into the data of his judgment of these cogni- tions. His aim is of course always to assert that they are divided, and that their division can be * overcome ' by a victorious Unity. " The fact is," he says, " quantity just means quality superseded and absorbed : and it is by the dialectic of quality here examined that this supersession is effected " (Logic, p. 184). It is by "dialectic" that unity, one- ness, somewhat, is effected. And space as a consciousness is of no account ! It is a nullity in the data of reasoning ! 107. It is this unquestioned acceptance of the necessary reality of discreteness for Being that seems to us to vitiate the whole question which he discusses. But Thought for Hegel was assumed as the Absolute, and because that neither division nor continuation, discreteness nor continuousness could be eliminated from his "dialectic" of Being, he was perforce driven to admit the necessary presence of both " qualities " in our consciousness of Being. " Quantity," he maintains, " is Continuous as well as Discrete. Each of these two elements involves the other also, and hence there is no such thing as a merely Continuous or a merely Discrete quantity " (Logic, ioo). As we have already said, this strikes at the very root of all possibility of our consciousness of Whole-Being as real, and simply gives us a tied-up unit of quantity and quality ; a total which may at any moment be divided again into its ' elements.' We do not wonder that it should be so, when its sole guarantee of unity is the uncertain 'dialectic' of the logical process. Supposing this Quality were personal to ourselves, and our self this Quantity, he./ are we to be certain of the two 'elements' remaining one united self? Let us remember that Hegel is explaining how Being, from being One, becomes qualified as L 162 SPACE AND PERSONALITY Many, differentiating itself through quality and quantity. But this process is never rational until we can reverse it, and show how every quantity and quality becomes One. And to be absolute as a process , it must apply to ourselves. It therefore assumes that we are conscious that when we say ' I/ we are likewise conscious of Unit-Being which is made-up of qualities which have been absorbed by the I-Quantity, and which in turn he avers is both ' discrete and continuous.' Is anyone ever conscious of being so tied-up into a unity of this kind ? Have we a consciousness of Quantity in our I-consciousness ? What 'Quality' does it give except what Space gives? It may be safely said that no one, in the consciousness of what-he-is, ever has a consciousness of being " two elements " tied-up in such a unity. 108. In counting up 'qualities' of any existing thing, it is innocently assumed that we can ' take them away,' one by one, as if each were a distinct ' being ' by itself. This illusion is due to our substituting the wide-open consciousness of space-being for the ' quality '-being which we think we have ' taken away.' We then as innocently judge that so far as such ' quality '- being is ' taken away ' the existing ' quantity ' does not exist. That is, so far, such quantity is null. In reality, we have only proved that we can not remove our consciousness of Space- Being, and that whatever we may ' take away,' we only thereby accentuate and reveal the space-being for which all such quantities and qualities exist. Now, every 'thing 1 that we can think or imagine can be conceived as a ' quality ' of being. We ourselves can be con- ceived as 'qualities' of Supreme Being, and conceived as revealing such Supreme Being. And if ' qualities ' can be ' absorbed ' and ' superseded ' by quantities, then we have to admit that each 'self,' as only a 'quality' of Supreme Being, may be absorbed and superseded into the Supreme Quantity. But such a conception of Supreme Quantity never shows how we are to conceive such " two elements " as existentially Whole- Being after the process of absorption. Under such conditions, even Unit-Being is scarcely conceivable, except it be counted as a mere tied-up Total-Being. Certainly, Space-Being is never counted into such a Unit-Being. We should always have DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 163 Supreme Being and Space-Being, and the latter as condition- ing the former. Which is absurd. It is clear that the assumption of 'quality' as detachable from an existing thing, is due to the invulnerable consciousness in all of us, that nothing is Fixed Being except Space-Being, and that everything we can conceive and name Quality, Quantity, Substance, Existence, Personality or Impersonality, has no permanence in itself, save as it reveals Space- Being by its disappearance. When we have taken them all away, we find that they are not distinct one from another, but Whole-Being in our consciousness of Space. Both discreteness and con- tinuousness are themselves shown to be null-relations, and Space-Being the true Permanence. The Space-Consciousness cannot indeed be divided by any possible process of ' dialectic.' It is therefore a consciousness in which all Qualities and Quantities and Relations are sub- sumed. They are conveniences of thought from which Space, as a consciousness, is temporarily shut out, and their ' differences ' are but conceptual and logical and in no sense existential. 109. The impossibility of conceiving Space to be divided 'is, of course, the basis of the limitless wide-open conception of Whole- Being ( 106). Without this fact, as absolute, we could have only conceptions of two things, and consequently, only limited conceptions of ' united ' things and ' totalled ' things. And it is here that we can test the question as to space being conceivable as discrete or divisible. To conceive space as divisible, we must first assume that each man has a consciousness of himself as being divided from space. But this is impossible, as no one ever has such a consciousness. We are never related to space. If we had such a consciousness, we would also have a consciousness of space-verge or space-surface as dividing space from us. But Space never gives us, even remotely, a consciousness of surface. Only ' objects ' i.e. conceptual creations, give such points, lines, and surfaces. We only suppose that we are dividing space when we are merely carrying a point into many * places,' and then naming it * line ' and ' surface,' while space, as a conscious- ness, is really shut out from such concept things, and the point assumed to be the only reality for the time being. In the 164 SPACE AND PERSONALITY consciousness of ourselves, we are never 'point-beings.' In the consciousness of what-we-are, there is no line or surface, no division or separation from anything. We have no consciousness of any part in the ' I/ as being related to Space through division or difference. Space never begins for what- we-are, nor does what-we-are begin or end for Space. Space, as what-we-are, is the only possible consciousness. no. It is the assumption that what-we-are is completely apart from space-being, or that Space is not being at all in the sense that what-we-are is being, that creates the illusion of Space and Time as being infinite in extent and infinitely divisible. Take the following illustration given by the Hon. B. Russell : " If we travel along a straight line in either direction, it is difficult to believe that we shall finally reach a last point, beyond which there is nothing, not even empty space. Similarly, if in imagination we travel backwards or forwards in time, it is difficult to believe that we shall reach a first or last time, with not even empty time beyond it. Thus space and time appear to be infinite in extent. " Again, if we take any two points on a line, it seems evident that there must be other points between them, however small the distance between them may be : every distance can be halved, and the halves can be halved again, and so on ad infinitum. In time, similarly, however little time may elapse between two moments, it seems evident that there will be other moments between them. Thus space and time appear to be infinitely divisible" (Problems of Philosophy, p. 227). Here we have to imagine that space is being which we can travel over or along. We and space are different beings. Now, until this assumption can be established as fact, all such reasoning is fighting the wind. In imagination this "We" and this " Space " are different objects. And in the very fact that each is objectified, to start with, there is proof that neither being can be even imagined to be infinite. It is the impossible. The travelling might go on till doomsday, and like the progress of a cheese-mite round the cheese, there might be an endlessness in the journey but there could be no infinity. For infinity is not based on motion in our consciousness ; nor is it dependent on our ability to place { points ' in space, a feat which we shall DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 165 immediately try to prove to be impossible. But as Time is inconceivable, apart from motion, and no division can take place in it apart from 'points,' if what-we-are is whole-being with space, the supposed motions and points are only the products of our imagined isolation from space, and the action of our concept-making space-spread ( 89). In any case, the argument is useless until what-we-are and space -being are proved to be two separate beings, and no consciousness of this fact is possible. Our consciousness to the contrary is over- whelming. We cannot divide space from what-we-are. We repeat that the supposition that we can do so is the initial error in the assumed divisibility of space. But let us now for argument's sake, grant that we really are apart from space as what-we-are. Let us suppose that we are divided in being. We want then to realise what it is that divides us from space. Something must be conceived as dividing us. The consciousness of division is otherwise impossible. We assume that we have a distinct consciousness of what-we-are, and also of space as not what-we-are. Then we ask, What are we conscious of as the third thing that lies between these two beings, by which they are divided? Is there any thing conceivable? Suppose we call it anything, earth, air, atom, ether? But these are dependent upon their ' qualities ' for their being, and when their qualities are ' taken away,' what is left to divide anything ? " They cease to be," says Hegel. What else then can be put in their place as the absolutely dividing thing? Only Space. We have a consciousness of Space. But cannot this also be abolished ? It cannot. Why ? It owns no ' qualities? This is the simple reason. Neither therefore canast it possess 1 Quantities,' for Quantity we are told is but qualities absorbed and superseded. But without a consciousness of quantity we cannot have a consciousness of division ! Now, the conception of space dividing us from space may easily become absurd. For this would mean that there were two spaces, each a distinct being from the other, the one dividing and the other divided from what-we-are. Each would be a unit-space. But again, no unit is even conceivable until we assume space to surround it. Number One could not be conceived unless as in a locus of space. We find it impossible 166 SPACE AND PERSONALITY to form any conception of One till space is present to give it its limitations of One. Hence if we suppose space to divide us from space, we require new spaces for each of these two spaces, and so on ad infinitum. Such ' separate spaces ' are mere conceptual creations ; the chips of mere logic-chopping ; and we never have a consciousness of such spaces, or of such spaces dividing us existentially from space, or of space as having any divisions at all. Our ultimate consciousness is always of being space. And consequently, we never can think differently of the space that is assumed to divide and the space from which we are divided. We are tempted to think that the absurdity attains to the character of humour when the Hon. B. Russell gravely discusses " public space " and " private space " (Problems of Philosophy ', p. 46) with such an air of their actuality as to lead us to believe that such concept-creatures might experience taxation or imprisonment ! in. As a matter of fact, as said above in Chapter IV. neither in Kant nor in Hegel do we find any evidence of the consciousness of Whole-Being. Neither is it to be found in ancient thought. No modern ever mentions it. Such a postulate is unknown in their systems of 'categories' and 'dialectic.' The word, or its equivalents, is abundantly used, but the meaning is without exception, Unity, Universality, Singleness, One, Total, or All, every one of which connotes two or more things united, unified, totalised, or collected. Discrete- ness is in the heart of every such consciousness, and no dialectic can convert it into one of Wholeness, with no possible con- sciousness of discreteness bound up with it. And for the same reason, we cannot have " an infinite collection," as Cantor and his followers suppose. Such is only conceivable as a Total, which again is Unit-being, and therefore conditioned finitely in space-being. It is never Whole without parts; whole beyond all possibility of conceiving a part in it. And it is so because the self-postulating consciousness of Space is never taken into the data of the judgment of the true infinite Is. For example, Kant says, " Every limited part of space presented to intuition, is a whole, the parts of which are always spaces." But this "whole" is clearly 'unity' in content, and "whole" is inapplicable to such a consciousness. "The notion of the DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 167 whole is to contain parts," says Hegel. Both philosophers assume as indisputably axiomatic that Unit-Being is the per -ultimate consciousness of being, and that "whole" is synonymous with " Total." For if every " whole " must have parts, no unit-being can be conceived as not potentially partable. It is the same story of the molecule being partable into atoms, and the whole atom being again partable into ions, and the ion as once more partable into some dim 'electric charge ' which has nothing to part ! But this is not philosophy. It is a game of beggar-my-neighbour. 112. Whether we call this "whole" 'total' or 'all/ it makes little difference in actual consciousness of the content of such " whole." It is the common play upon the term ' Pan ' (TTCLV) as ' all ' or ' every/ ' universal ' or ' particular.' No content of ' pan ' ever gives a consciousness of Whole-Being. For ' pan ' does not inclose space in the content of our consciousness of it. Every meaning of * pan ' is connotive of objectivity, whereas Whole-Being is neither ' subjective ' nor ' objective.' Hegel's ' Notion,' e.g. t is simply totalised out of * Being ' and ' Nothing,' and carries its potential discreteness in its own nature. It has no content of Wholeness in our consciousness of it. If it were absolutely true, we should have no alternative but to predicate discreteness of the ' I ' of our consciousness like- wise, and regard it as a composite of unknown 'parts,' a * total,' or ' all ' of ' units,' which might again be partable to infinity. Moreover, we cannot have units, totals, or 'collec- tions' without connotations of quantity, and quantity is not found in our consciousness of space-being. Therefore, any Total is consciously apart from space-being, and therefore never infinite. The I-consciousness, the what-we-are, is not totalised or made-up out of anything, and gives no discreteness under any process of dialectic. The consciousness of it is one of Whole- Being, unpartable, and without possibility of being conceived as a mere number one, a Unity, a Total, being concretely based in our space-consciousness, the ultimate consciousness of Is. Even the term ' simple ' as applied to what-we-are has the defect of implying that it is a Something qualified which cannot be further reduced to a lower qualifiable element. 168 SPACE AND PERSONALITY 113. It is of course easy for us now to discern where both philosophers were hampered by the very barriers which they themselves reared. These barriers were the 'categories of thought/ one or many, which they accepted as indisputable. In the ultimate consciousness of both thinkers, Unity was accepted as the last thing to be said upon Being. They differed only in the Origin of this category. Kant found the origin of unity in the unity of the self-consciousness. This 'thing-in-itself determined all other conceptions of 'things.' It made it impossible for Kant to conceive that any ' thing,' even * God,' or the 'universe,' could be more than a Unit-Being. Hegel took Kant's ' unit-thing-in-itself,' and also the every other 'unit-self-thing' conceivable within the bounds of Being; tied them up into a universal One, or Total-of-ALL, and called it " Notion," seeing it was Thought-of-all-Thought. Neither philosopher ever arose above the domain of Mathematics. With One they began, and with One they ended. The fatal assump- tion of both was that ' Self* is a Unit ( 61). Their methods, however, were different in utilising this conception. Kant, as it were, systematised from the basis of his supposed single-self ' thing/ and from this origin developed his series of ' unit-things ' to an infinite, or nth-being, which on the side of phenomena might be called ' Cosmos/ and on the side of noumena might be named ' God.' Hegel established first his nth-being and then saw all the " Becoming " ' things ' evolve, or seriate out of it. Fundamentally, each philosopher had but Unit-Being as the rock of his system. And this category never rises clear of the limits of mathematics. 114. The term 'Being/ therefore, is of little use to us if we first limit it with the attributes of ' Discrete ' and ' Continuity.' Is alone can be predicated of Being if it is to interpret the consciousness which is always ultimate in us. Space-being, as what-we-are, neither yields a consciousness of discreteness nor of continuousness. And having no limiting verges as unit- being, it is not conceivable as having a potentiality of continua- tion in it. Continuation cannot continue before space is assumed for continuation, and we cannot find in our consciousness of what-we-are, or of anything else, a limitation, or a verge-line which possibly might be continued. And until we have such DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 169 a consciousness of limitation, the conception of continuation is impossible ( 75). 115. We are aware that in arguing in this way, we cut away the ground of all absolute reality from the sciences of Mathe- matics and Mechanics. As these move wholly within the sphere of the quantitative, the objective, and the discrete, the denial of the absolute reality of objectivity as of the nature of Being leaves them no locus. We first abolish the necessity of the unit, the ' self,' the ' ion/ the discrete, in our consciousness of Being, as well as the conception of its necessary continuation ; and as a consequence the fundamental point or unit-objective which is necessary to Mathematics, is disallowed also as existent in absolute Reality. All sciences which deal with 'Quantity' must be included in the same consciousness of ultimate unreality. Their permanence is not absolutely assured, just because they are determined as founded on the conception of Quantity. For Quantity being determined to thought through Quality alone, and Quality being conceived as in peril of being * taken away,' all Quantity must be held to be in peril of ' ceasing to be ' also. The ' Quantity,' therefore, which is essentially basal for such sciences, gives no conscious- ness of reality, of permanence, or of absolute Being. The so-called satisfactory "certainty" which is assumed so often for the mathematical sciences, is one based solely on the questionable certainty of the Object, considered as Being. That is to say, they have no deeper foundation in our consciousness than the point-and-Space-Spread, or Space-Form of our consciousness. And this consciousness of space-spread, objective as it is with its qualities of * extensity ' and ' massive- ness,' has, undoubtedly, as Prof. Stout puts it, " relational character, as it is initially apprehended." As already said, it is only the " space " of Kant's consciousness, in which no * objects ' may be met with, but which itself is always an object, having ' form,' mobility, focality, contractility, ' stream '-like phenomena, and, as we think, colour. Kant was perfectly correct in attri- buting 'form* to this 'space,' but the very fact that he could find it possible to so categorise it by any term save that of itself, proved that it was not the very ultimate consciousness we possess of Space. 170 SPACE AND PERSONALITY It is the stupendous power of contractility which resides in it that gives us the ' point which has no magnitude ' which Mathematicians revere as the Demiurgus which creates their universe of existence ; just as it is its motional capacity, almost beyond realisation, of expansion which renders to the children of imagination their ideals and generalisations of sublimity, boundlessness, everlastingness, vastitudes of time and eternity. All nears and fars, depths and heights, broads and narrows, are dependent upon these contractile and expansive ' qualities ' of this space-spread of our consciousness. We contract to the infinitesimal, and again expand to the universal, and with a facility of speed and ease analogous to lightning or the action of gravitation force. It also fills itself with light and dark at will. But it is always objective, for it is in perpetual motion, and consequently mediates through this fact, our deepest consciousness of ultimate Space beyond it. Looking down a tunnel, for example, although no ' object ' is to be met with in it, yet under the contractile power of this space-form, the darkness itself thickens into an 'object,' and our consciousness realises it as an object. The same thing occurs in brilliant light. A blazing noon reduces the distance, the near and far of our sky, as does midnight, and ' extensity ' means no more than a moving space-spread or sky-surface, upon which both thought and eye rest, confessing limitations. The infinitesimal ' point ' which stands for a null-quantity or an 1 ion,' in mathematics or physics, is the limit on the one side, and the Universe the limit on the other. For working pur- poses of thought, at least, these are the ordinary bounds, but, of course, when we 'take away' the qualities of these limits, we enter upon the true consciousness of space, and all thought then falls into the bosom of Whole-Being with that consciousness. What should principally be noted is that the limitations pro- duced by the space-spread of our concepts are never limitations of what-we-are ( 89). 116. There is no doubt in our mind that this space-spread of consciousness was mistaken by Berkeley for Space itself. He thereupon asserted that all space was relational, and nothing else. Hence he found space-distance to be relational, confusing distance-conception with space-Being. He believed that he DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 171 could conceptualise Space-Being. As a matter of fact we can always predicate near or far, broad or narrow, or objectivity of distance the motion of lightning which leaves an outline upon the retina of the eye and in the thought, being an example ; but we can predicate nothing of our ultimate consciousness of space save Is. A space-spread-object, a distance-object, a 1 near ' or ' far ' is objectified to eye and mind, and we are for the time, perfectly conscious of its relativity to the true Space from which it is assumed to be divided, but our consciousness of this space-spread-object and of that space which Kant characterised as " all-embracing," and Newton as " the sensorium of God," admit of no possible identification. The one is a logical or thought-object, qualified and quantified, as bounded by two points, which are assumed, while the other is existentially undetermined with the consciousness of ourselves. Abbott, we think, has put this point very clearly. " We cannot imagine," he says (Sight and Touch, p. 176. 29), "either distance or magnitude except as something seen" and again, " if distance be recollected as an object of vision, it must have been originally so" (our italics). The very fact that such distances can be treated as an arithmetical unit, and squared, cubed, and treated as all abstract concepts are treated, is proof that they have no truth in them of the wide-open consciousness of Space- Being. Or in other words, Objects may have true 'dimensions' even when emptied of all content except this space-spread content, this distance-content. But the fact that such dimen- sions are recalled and remembered again in our consciousness as things outlined and limited, proves in itself their conceptual origin and the deeper presence of that consciousness of whole- space which is essential to these conditions ( 90). The root of all duality seems to lie originally in this imaging, or objectifying of * spaces,' and then attributing to them an isolated independence of being, equal to that of space-wholeness. The latter is then assumed, like them, to be capable of being conceived. Space-wholeness is thus conceived to be relative to that which conceives it. And by reflection, this objectifies the ' soul ' also. Space is then asserted to be one thing, and the 'soul' another. And under the powerful intellect of a Kant this ' soul ' comes to be reckoned as an Ultimate-in-itself } 172 SPACE AND PERSONALITY and space as an Ultimate Other-in-itself. Philosophy then accepts as indisputable these Twin - Ultimates as Self and Not-Self, or Man and Nature, the duality of which must not be even doubted, the logicians undertaking to prove that S can never be P, and that consequently, such duality and difference are absolute and eternal ! 117. The discreteness therefore which the 'point' of mathematics and the 'ion' of physics determine for these special sciences can only be regarded as limitedly true, true only as far as the ' point ' and ' ion ' are true. It is the assumption that the ' point ' or unit-being can be found existentially in our ultimate consciousness of Whole-Being that has led to the mistake of conceiving a ' thing ' to be in space or out of space. The gravity of the mistake, however, does not refer itself to any particular science. It is when we have this point, or unit of the space-spread of our con- scious motions, hypostatised as ' personality ' for man and God, that the error becomes serious. Our thought apes then to objectify and measure Whole-Being. In the consciousness of the All, Is, Space, Whole-Being, such ' point ' or ' unit ' vanishes. It is neither in space nor out of it. It has ceased to be with the space-spread conscious- ness which has merged in the consciousness of ultimate Being. All its ' qualities,' that is, have been * taken away.' For consider what it means to assume a ' point ' in space. Let it be the most infinitesimal * point ' or * unit.' Let it be a zero-point : a nothing-quantity : any null-object We place it then in space. This implies that it never was in space before. Where could it be ? But even if we allow that such a point veritably exists, have we not always to allow first that space pre-exists it? Can we think differently? But for argument's sake, suppose we could think differently, what would this allowance amount to? It would mean that we were thinking the point and space to be distinct from each other. Space would be one object and this 'point' another. This would imply that space had form, surface, extensity, and be itself surrounded by space ! It would otherwise be inconceivable as having form. And this objectified space would require a new space to surround the space so objectified, and the point would also DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 173 require a separate space for itself, seeing that it was discrete from the space aforesaid ! Which is absurd. 1 1 8. All our conceptions of point-things such as * beginnings ' and * endings,' are consequently * images ' and simply products of our space-spread. It is the latent consciousness of being unable to plant a real point in Space-Being that gives everyone the conviction of the impossibility of conceiving an absolute beginning for Time, Creation, Man, Life, or anything. We never come to any point in Space-Being. And as we always have a true consciousness of its Being, or Reality, the absolute impossibility of finding a point, edge, verge, or surface in its Being, renders all start-places, beginnings, or endings vain and unreal. Being is always found Whole. And in this fact we have another proof that if our conception of the mathematical One, or Unit, had been absolutely true, to find a beginning for the Universe, for Time, for Universal History, for Man, for what-we-are, for anything, would have been the easiest thing in the world. The entire contents of Universal History, and Time itself, as we hypostatise it, are therefore based upon imaginary or imaged point-beings, so be-gripped and formed objectively in our space-spread, and have no actual existence in the sense of the reality of what-we-are. For we have no consciousness at all of Time, or processes of time, in our consciousness of what- we-are. We cannot put a point, edge, verge, beginning, ending, process, or line, in the ' I.' It is alone in our consciousness of the space-spread that we can find such ' qualities and quantities.' Historians and mathematicians assume without the faintest fact to support them that, absolutely, we, in being, are isolated from Space-Being. A point-and-line-difference is thus created and made, and then we all imagine ourselves, and all we call historical, to really begin from some fixed point or place in space, and as we all can repeat or 'represent' this point- and-line-difference endlessly, one concept following another unceasingly, the conception of Duration becomes in turn hypostatised from such data, and then absolutised to be as real as what-we-are. It is the other way round. It is the consciousness of what-we-are which makes it possible to hypostatise such a concept. But in the concept of Duration we can discern the potential in every concept which leads 174 SPACE AND PERSONALITY it, free of all its limitations in the space-spread, out into the wide-open limitless consciousness of Space-Being which is equal with our consciousness of what-we-are. For it is always possible for every limited concept to ' elanguesce ' into wide- open Space-Being consciousness, just as it is possible for the consciousness of Space-Being, or what-we-are to be be- gripped by our space-spread motion of mind and narrowed conceptually down into all forms of objectivity. When this latter limitation is made, we then assume absolute detachment of being; look forth from our isolated being upon Other-Being; and think and speak on that basis of actual past-being and future-being as stretching independently of what-we-are behind and before our present point-being. We even institute com- parisons with the beings we have been and the beings we are now, and image 'beings' which we may yet be. It is all the outcome of putting point-beings into Space-Being, and then hypostatising such images as if they were absolutely as real and actual as they are conceptual. And the same thing falls to be said of whatever we " postulate," or make by a " Let there be," or generalise as a " Law." Therefore nothing save a spectral point or unit-thing, a focality of our space-spread, can be placed in space. Therefore nothing limited can be assumed to be so placed in space. Or, universally, every object which is held to be real and absolutely discrete, and determined absolutely apart from space, is unreal and illusory. But this means also that when we think space in any way whatever, we can only think Whole-Being which has in itself no hint of parts or discreteness. The actual ' point ' of mathematics is a contracted image of the space-spread of our consciousness, and may seem to be at one time infinitesimally small and at another infinitely great. It may take a form of bulk, or again of mere massless linearity ; it may indeed be any possible form; for this space-spread of our consciousness is the Ur-Form of all the forms of our conscious thought. And just because it is Form, with only a possible ultimate content of space, it is not the very ultimate Space- Consciousness in which there is no possible hint of either discreteness or continuation of Being. It was because Kant objectified Space and Time as discrete from the " I," which was again held to be itself discrete from either, DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 175 that all these ' objects ' have been regarded mathematically as separate point-beings, to the ruin of all consciousness of Whole-Being, though all assume to be capable of a further point-unity ' beyond their difference ' when put under the Hegelian * dialectic.' It is for this reason that Whole-Being, as a true consciousness in all men, lies untouched in modern philosophy, and while it does, philosophy must remain barren. For it is the sole consciousness which man finds absolutely necessary to fulfil his ideals of existential communion, or of all in all. And when in this sphere of thought, modern mathe- maticians declare that Continuity has no essential reference to space (B. Russell's Princ. of Maths., i. 259), we decidedly agree with them, for when space-being as a datum of judg- ment is never admitted into mathematical principles to begin with, it cannot have much to do with them in any part of their functions. Both concepts of the Point as discrete, and Continuation as succession of points, are created in judgments from which Space as absolute Fact is cast out. For both Point and Continuation are quantitative, and determined as quantities, and, according to Hegel, really qualities absorbed ; and being quantities with constituent qualities essentially flux- ional, it is impossible that any reference to space should be found in them, for we never find either quantity or quality in our space-consciousness. It is only indeed as we have said when quality cannot be found in our consciousness that we have our fullest experience of Space-Being. The ultimate consciousness of Being is consequently at variance with that profession of quantitative being which Mathematics would fain assert to be absolute. And no amount of " number continums," and " new infinities," will ever reduce the antagonism between them. We only obtain other and more complicated forms of the problems with which we are made familiar in the existence of irrationals, surds, infinite series, and that class of puzzles of which squaring the circle may be taken as typical. 119. But it is the mathematical method, we are afraid, which has governed all past determinations of the human 'soul. 1 Man postulated his ' soul ' to be One. Nature, the Cosmos, or the Universe, was another One. This * point ' in space having 176 SPACE AND PERSONALITY been axiomatically fixed, any regressive thought into ' person- ality ' only brought forth a unit-point. Both the mathematical point-being and the theological ' soul-person,' were determined in the same way. The ' soul ' existed exactly as the Euclidean 1 point ' did, having position but no magnitude. Thus the only logical conclusion was that maintained by Kant, viz., that this 1 soul' '-unit had no place. It was not to be found in space! It was a "thing-in-itself" And when this deduction had been made, the Other, or ' God,' followed the same logical course. Man, Nature, and God, were discrete, determined, Point-Beings, having nothing to do with our consciousness of Space ! Con- tinuity of Being was a dream. Each was one, and consequently it did not seem so surprising that 'God' Himself should be regarded as Three ! For once put consciousness of Being under the mathematical moulds, and nothing can escape from dis- creteness. And we may now venture to say that until Being is held to be more than absolute Unity, no satisfactory conscious- ness of either ' God ' or human " Personality " can be possible. 1 20. Mathematics no doubt has felt secure in such unit- making methods. She assumed that she was acting strictly in accordance with the " laws of thought." And we might bow to her authority, as backed by such laws, if we were perfectly certain that the " laws of thought " were themselves capable of dealing with the question of the ' soul.' But these ' laws ' cannot help us in this solemn matter. They always assume the discrete to begin with, and consequently never rise above Objectivity, first and last. For example, the " law of identity," which is sometimes put in the form " Whatever is, is," provokes the constant question, " What has been identified " ? Identity assumes a prior duality for its very existence. But it is easy to see that, in the term " Whatever," or any of its equivalents, the conditional and objective are first postulated, and then the absolute " is " is asserted of the " whatever-thing " ! Discreteness is postulated in " whatever," and then absolute affirmation is asserted of that discreteness ! But a thing, A, cannot be defined absolutely unless it is space-being. For the thing A, like any 'thing' whatsoever, must always refer itself to some- thing beyond itself for Is-ness, or being, and therefore the Is- afrirmation does not belong to it in any sense, but to that some- DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 177 thing beyond it. And alone of this something, which we call space, is it inconceivably impossible to give any other predicate than Is. We cannot say of it, "Whatever," for such a term at once separates it from ourselves, of which we have not the smallest consciousness If we say " We are," we have said, "space is." A consciousness of Whole-Being alone is given. Difference is affirmed away. For Space does not begin where we end. Consequently it is always impossible to conceive it to be related. The " law of contradiction " as well as the " law of excluded middle," is also supposed to have in it a necessary force under which our judgments are compelled to take up a determined position as to the being or non-being of a thing. But clearly such laws begin in objectivity and end there. The " thing" must first be. But what guarantees its being ? And why is it menaced with non-being? In such a case, it is conditioned by some Reality of which it cannot be affirmed that its non-being is possible. There is a consciousness here beyond our conscious- ness of relative being and non-being, in which an affirmation of Is is alone possible. ' Either Or,' is not a possible conscious- ness of this Reality. Such " laws of thought " do not therefore run in this consciousness. And this consciousness is alone that of Space-Being. This consciousness of space rises above these " laws of thought," and cannot be brought within them under any possibility. On the contrary, it is this consciousness which conditions and gives force to all these "laws," and enables us to conceive any thing as possible of * being ' or of ' non-being.' The { laws of thought ' therefore, when they assume to absolutise Being on the one hand and Non-Being on the other, become pretentious and untrustworthy. Being and Non-Being are not permanent divisions in What- Is. They are mere thought-creations, concepts of our space-spread, and have no authentication in our consciousness of What-Is. Our conscious- ness, in its ultimate testimony, is not of divided being but of Whole-Being, with no vestige of a possible part, division, or rupture in it. The thing A is thus never equal to itself A, except when A is assumed to be an absolutely isolated thing. But this is impossible. We have always a consciousness that disputes such M 178 SPACE AND PERSONALITY an assumption. For being the thing A, it is limited, determined, and One, and so related to the Other one. It is a mere mathematical ' point,' in short, and at bottom is no more than a contractility of the space-spread of our consciousness. And even if it be infinitesimally small or infinitely great, it is still a thing A, and so determined in its being by Whole-Being which gives neither a consciousness of the infinitesimal nor of the infinite, as necessary qualifications of Is-Being. Our ultimate consciousness of Being negates, or affirms away, the division put between Infinite and Finite, the A and Non-A, the equal and inequal, and takes away every compulsion in thought to think this and that, either or, one and other, and leaves but a whole affirmation of Whole-Being as the postulate out of which every relative, or so-called relative, postulate is begotten. Every ' law of thought,' therefore, falls under this consciousness and is sustained by it in as far as it is. 121. But we might ask here by what 'law' is it that we are forced to take our consciousness of ourselves as the ultimate ( law ' of Thought? What compels us to make consciousness our highest appeal in thinking any thing? We postulate, for example, being and non-being, cause and effect, one and many, self and non-self, noumenon and phenomenon, personality and impersonality, and many more dualities, and we are never satisfied that such correlatives are absolutely and necessarily true. For we never know or have consciousness where being and non-being divide, where cause is not effect, and effect is not cause, any more than we know where thought is not feeling, and feeling not willing. Can any man undertake to tell himself where exactly his ' Self is partitioned off from everything else in the Universe ? And when we are confronted by such facts, are we not led directly to a consciousness of Whole-Being in us, in which all these dualities are abolished as unrealities? We always feel that we must go further than these relatives for the true consciousness of what-we-are. They are false relative- absolutes. It is not necessary to account them as absolute in Being. We crave an appeal beyond these, but we never crave an appeal beyond this consciousness of Whole-Being which is always more than a mere identity or unity of being-things. // is then that we exhaust the consciousness of what-we-are and find DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 179 it whole- with-space ; and it is this consciousness which also gives absolute repose to every ' law ' or motion of thought. And it is to be observed that if such dualities were eternally permanent in the very essence of What- Is, and each self were absolutely isolated from every other self, and all were but relative to all, then our ideas, concepts, notions, and such like, would necessarily originate in each self. They would also stay forever with us, if every self were absolutely isolated from every other. But we have no such consciousness of originating ideas, or cognitions generally, ab initio. And it is impossible to retain a cognition absolutely. If it does not escape by the word, it will leave us by the life, and percolate through the blood and growth. Cognitions may arise in us, but they do not originate with us absolutely. And if Life is behind Thought, then the laws of Life must govern the 'laws of Thought,' and our consciousness be one of ever-ascending order of Being; culminating in Whole-Being ; level with the conscious- ness which we all have of ourselves and of Space as undivided Being. 122. And this view of consciousness, it is evident, compels an abolition of the necessary fixtures or laws of thought, with which we are so obsessed under the terms, among others, of Personal and Impersonal. Such divisions of Being must be regarded as untrue to our highest consciousness of Being. To be faithful to this highest consciousness, we must regard the modern and ancient postulations regarding personality as imperfect and wholly inadequate. In modern philosophy, indeed, Impersonality is a more rationalised concept than Personality. We only believe personality, but we are rationally sure of Impersonality as a Fact! Since the days of Hume and Kant, the entire sphere of sensation and thought has been a sphere of impersonality. We all have said, " This sensation : this idea : this thought : this passion : this memory : this imagination ; is not I. I think such thought ; I feel such sensation ; I recall this memory." The entire sphere of thinking, feeling, and conation, is impersonal, seeing that it is not to be identified with what thinks, feels, and wills. Kant placed the * Person ' far apart from this sphere of being, in a place-in-itself. It was beyond space 180 SPACE AND PERSONALITY and time. It was not to be found within the world-realm at all. We could not know it. We could only, that is to say, know the impersonal, for neither God nor man could come into the horizons of our thoughts. Both personalities of God and Man were ;tr-things, unknowns, and actually believed to dwell in a place where no space was ! The cleavage of Being into personal and impersonal he believed to be essential and necessary by the very nature of Being, with the further separating fact added to such a fundamental one that, while the impersonal was undoubted, credible, and cognizable, the person who felt so certain and knew so clearly of this impersonal had no eyes for itself, and never could have more than a dark blind faith in its own existence. The great Universe held no Person in it, for this vision of personality declared that both for God and Man, personality must be wholly outside of it. And yet there are wise and good thinkers who still beseech us all to " return to Kant " ! 123. Man is embodied life and death, and demands both life and death to ' reveal ' him ; and knowledge of him should reveal more than the impersonal corpse-side of him. And if the spheres of the physical, the sensational, and the mental are all dead and impersonal now, it should not be omitted by philo- sophy that, in such a case, these spheres must have once been both living and personal. How else are they known as dead and impersonal ? Or was death, or the impersonal, the primal fount of Being, with life and personality coming in as after- thoughts ? May not death and impersonality also wind it all up at last in that case ? And in such questionings is it not always clear that the everlasting see-saw upon the One and Other, Personal and Impersonal, Life and Death, is a method of reasoning which calls for a deeper fathoming of consciousness to annihilate it root and branch as inefficient and unhelpful ? We want a consciousness which shall negate all relativity, and assure us that Being is Whole and in no wise cleft in twain. For as soon as we fix it in our convictions as axiomatic, that we, as assumed persons^ must necessarily be absolutely apart from space, which is also assumed to be undoubtedly impersonal, it follows inevitably that we build upon cleavage-absolute as essentially a necessary postulate in conceiving Being, or What- Is. DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 181 But it is clear enough that, when once we do thus admit any cleavage in Being as essential and necessary, and even declare that it is impossible to think otherwise, interpreting Mind in terms of Matter and Matter in terms of Mind, Subject by Object, and Object by Subject, then philosophy sinks into a vassalage of cleavage-consciousness by which she is ruled with a rod of iron throughout all her domain of the cognitional, the sensational, and the volitional. Verily, she shall by no means come out thence, till she have paid the last farthing. It is the calmly assumed conviction, entirely gratuitous, that our consciousness of space yields also a consciousness of /^/personality, that lays the foundations of all the rents and seams so apparent in the robes of Theology, Philosophy, and Science. And from the purely Christian standpoint, the matter becomes far more serious, for such an assumption completely falsifies the consciousness which is associated with the doctrine of Jesus of Nazareth a consciousness in which sea, wind, stone, tree, mountain, and the very corpse, palpitate with personality which is as much authenticated to them by Him as is that of man. As a matter of experience, we have no more a consciousness of ourselves as object, thing, person, in the space-consciousness of ourselves, than we have of object, thing, impersonal, in the spatial consciousness of the All. The true Reality is not covered by these terms, but is Whole, and we, as only conscious of being space, find ourselves as true and real through the interpretation of that consciousness. In such a consciousness, and in no other, can we be guaranteed Absolute Reality, and ourselves to be as incapable of negation as of isolation. And our conclusion here must be that every particular determination, whether it is named One or Other, Unity or Difference, Subject or Object, Mind or Matter, Personal or Impersonal, is untrue when so determined as absolute and necessary in such determination ; and that it could in no wise be conceivable as such, except through a certain detachment of thought from the space-consciousness, after the manner of logic and mathematics, and then as hypostatised as real in this par- ticular determination by an arbitrary judgment which contains no consciousness of space in its data. It is the entire omission of the space-consciousness in all our judgments of relativities that 182 SPACE AND PERSONALITY renders possible every conception of negation and isolation. It is also this omission which seems to give invulnerable validity to the motions of mentality which we designate Synthesis and Analysis. They move in space-consciousness which they ignore, and vaunt themselves regal when they are actually menials. For neither process can give a consciousness of reality to their products. Neither the analytical Self and Not-Self nor the synthetic * God ' yields the slightest consciousness of that reality which is so rampant in our consciousness of space. They are seen but as limited objects, or object-subjects, moving about mechanically in a space-being which is immeasurably vaster than they are in our consciousness. Consequently, although their reality may be acceptable to the popular mind, and have many uses for thought and devotion, the fallacy of the fatal omission of the space-datum stands revealed sooner or later in the irritations of thinking men who can neither find in such a 1 God 'that Wholeness, nor in such a "Self" that immortality, which their deeper consciousness ever seeks. And the case of Humanity becomes pitiable in the extreme when it is proved that we have no warrant whatever that such ' subjects ' and ' objects ' shall not one day vanish from our knowledge and faith both, leaving not a rack behind. They are not rooted, that is, in our consciousness of Reality. Wherefore, it seems to be anchoring Existence in a bog to attempt to make even the " unity of the personality," and the " identity of the personality," into an absolutely individual unity, and an absolutely individual identity ; or, universally, to attribute absoluteness in any sense to either subjectivity or objectivity. Whole-Being is the only consciousness that we dare to admit into that judgment which gives us ourselves as Realities, and gives it on the natural basis of space-being. 124. Absolutising the Relative: affirming the necessary con- sciousness of difference in our consciousness of Is ; this is the fatal admission of modern and ancient philosophy. Hence the perpetuity of schism between Creed and Category, and between Category and the mystical "synthetical unity of the manifold in intuitions, as given a priori" and the hopeless war urged against the innumerable yet unconquerable Differences whose antagonism flauntingly refuses to be ' overcome,' seeing DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 183 that the very heart of the citadel of Consciousness has been first surrendered to them. Hence also the cold mathematical point-beings, logic-shaped, which we name Self, Not-Self, God ; and the chilled emotions which we experience in contemplating them. A ' great gulf fixed ' lies between each, which, though it is admittedly real in its uses of division, is regarded as utterly useless for an affirmation of Whole-Being. The divided ' things ' are held to be real, but not this gulf which divides them ! It is of no account ! " That which drew from out the boundless deep " is alone of interest : the ' boundless deep ' itself is a trifle ! 125. Is it surprising then that neither Theology, Philosophy, nor Science, gives much happiness to Humanity ? Is it possible that either should do so while maintaining and asserting so vigorously those assumptions and postulates which our deepest consciousness constantly contradicts ? Are not we compelled to say that, in comparison with this profound consciousness of Whole-Being so persistently voiced through deeps of deeps, these statements of isolated ' Self,' 'Not-Self,' and 'God,' are fictions ? All without and within (speaking in common dual terms for expository purposes) cries out against them. For Happiness of Being should dwell with Knowledge of Being, and every genuine consciousness of 'Self and 'God' inspire us with rapture. But we employ our knowledge to cut us off from Reality, and debar ourselves from that Existential Communion in Whole-Being which is itself Absolute Beatitude. The trend of our deepest impulses is towards the Blissful. For it is toward the deeper revelation of what we name as Self, Nature, Cosmos, God. Our increasing knowledge of Being should increase our joy instead of widening our despair. And joy of the highest can only be realised in a consciousness that gives All to All to the fullest extent of Being. Is it not this consciousness that gives the poet his power over the mind when he shows us the isolated products of theology, philosophy, and science, whole-fused in the indivisible flame of his passion ? Is not Plato the philosopher indivisible from the poet Plato when he speaks to us of the Over-Soul ? Dante finds Hell, Purgatory, and Paradise, undivided in his deepest consciousness of Being. He is conscious of horizons in himself which easily circumscribe these fields of thought. And again these horizons melt away 184 SPACE AND PERSONALITY in his consciousness of himself in the spatial vastitudes of What-Is. The true greatness of our Great Souls is in their mediation of Whole-Being to our contemplations. We do not rejoice in being isolated from anything. Shakespeare has no difficulty in finding "tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything." So Shelley can interpret the Undivided in " the desire of the moth for the star, the night for the morrow, the devotion to something afar from the sphere of our sorrow." It is the late Theodore Watts that says, " In the Great Drama, in Agamemnon, in Othello, in Hamlet, in Macbeth, there is an imagination at work whose laws are inexorable, are inevitable, as the laws by the operation of which the planets move round the sun." The miserable boundaries of the theological, the philosophical, and the scientific, are likewise washed out in such a passionate con- sciousness of Whole-Being as Wordsworth describes, " Far and wide the clouds were touched, And in their silent faces could he read Unutterable love. Sound needed none, Nor any voice of joy ; his spirit drank The spectacle : sensation, soul, and form, All melted into him ; they swallowed up His animal being ; in them did he live, And by them did he live ; they were his Jife. In such access of mind, in such high hour Of visitation from the living God, Thought was not ; in enjoyment it expired. No thanks he breathed, he proffered no request ; Rapt into still communion that transcends The imperfect offices of prayer and praise, His mind was a thanksgiving to the power That made him ; it was blessedness and love ! " (Excursion^ bk. i.) 126. But every generalisation of thought, no matter how we may name it as ' Ology ' or ' Ism,' when it comes to take the world in its arms, always lays it in the cradle of the space- consciousness for its final rest. Geology, for example, spreads out the * particulars ' of its earth-formations and rock-strata before our eyes, and being assured of their scientific fixity of tenure, we enter upon residence, as it were, only to find that we are lodged on the ribs of an aeroplane which lifts us far back DIFFERENTIATION AND WHOLE-BEING 185 into boundless Time and the vergeless beginning of worlds. Thence imagination, having no choice, must needs sweep into fathomless deeps, of which Space is always the sole as well as the ultimate consciousness in us of Eternal Reality, when we have left Time itself and all its fretful worlds far behind us. And what does Astronomy actually mean to the human spirit? Is it merely a display of stupendous superhuman jugglery with innumerable world-balls for the bewildering motions? What really is the fundamental fascination of Astronomy? Is it merely the definable pleasure we derive from contemplating immense bodies in incomprehensible move- ment, and controlled by inexhaustible forces? These vast 1 matters ' and * energies ' are without doubt, sources of astonish- ment enough. But how feeble would be their effect upon either thought or imagination were it not for the consciousness of unspeakable Space which alone confers upon them their being as well as spectacular greatness. It is really our space- consciousness that robes these objects of astronomical con- templation in awe and splendour. So also we scan the great centuries of History, not to count merely these conceptual bars of our terrene cage as we grope backwards the abysm of time, but to catch still further glimpses of a far-flowing tide of ocean that rolls forever through and beyond these centenial arches of life, out unto infinite space, in which we ourselves, worlds, time, and all, repose as upon a Bosom. We have mentioned the Drama. But what gives the Grand Drama its power over our hearts ? Is it the few figures in the foreground and their spluttering passions evaporating in our ears ? Is it not rather the mystery enveloping them, the deep marginless Mind which makes them transparencies of its own voiceless feelings, and gives to each brief ' personality ' its shell-like resonance of a never-ending threnody? The deeps are ever calling to the deeps. For their communion is existential and whole ; not for meeting and parting ; and this is the consciousness of a Deep, environing all ; itself the All ; for which there is no form so true as the consciousness of what-we-are, nor any term save Space. CHAPTER VII SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 1 27. We have tried in the foregoing chapters to sketch the main outlines of consciousness and the conditions of thought ; and ventured to show why philosophical contemplation has so long striven to realise the dream of Absolute Unity of Being ; why it has never been attained satisfactorily ; why it is that Differentiation of Being is as rampant in speculative reasoning to-day as in the past ; why it must remain so until the fundamental fact of consciousness is admitted into all concept-judgments ; and why ' personality ' as qualifying human determinations of ' God ' and * Man,' cannot now be accepted as a final interpretation of our consciousness of What-Is. We now attempt to show that the great attributes of Being, whose combination and universalisation in personal - form constitute our concept of ' God,' never realise our basal consciousness of The Highest till we ground them, one and all, on the space-being of our consciousness. Space-Being as Whole-Force, therefore, or the attribute of Almightiness, which theologians construe for the concept of Deity; or Whole-Energy, as scientists would view it, perhaps, is the theme of this chapter, because, generally, this conception of Power, Might, or Eternal Force, seems always, in all ages and among all peoples, to have been first and fundamental in the contents of that conceptual Form which mankind has raised up for itself, and held in awe as The Most Holy. The chapter which immediately follows will give a brief consideration of the principal attributes of Deity which appear to us to be subordinate to that of Almightiness, with no pretension, however, of exhausting the list, but rather of seeking to establish each chief deistical attribute as true for SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 187 itself only in our consciousness of Space-Being, and to show that all other attributes collocated in the notion of ' God ' are impossible for their purpose except when interpreted through that consciousness. We thus seek to interpret our deepest consciousness of most holy Being on the basis of the most fundamental consciousness which we have of Nature. But we must enter a caveat. Huxley once wrote, " In itself it is of little moment whether we express the phaenomena of matter in terms of spirit, or the phaenomena of spirit, in terms of matter." . . . " But with a view to the progress of science, the materialistic terminology is in every way to be preferred." We are indeed seeking to interpret Being through 'materialistic terminology,' but only as sublating both terms of ' matter ' and ' spirit ' in a wider space-idiom which expresses the profoundest consciousness of man as Whole and not merely as One with his consciousness of the Universe. 128. Nature, or, when viewed as uniform, the Universe ; or as universally systemised Order, the Cosmos ; has been accepted to be Matter and Motion, when these terms are used in their most general aspect, and as the categories under which human thought struggles to express the highest scientific Totality. The term ' motion ' may be considered as fairly clear, but 'matter' as used for this Totality, must not be assumed as connoting ' substance/ but only * Form of Energy.' The term 1 substance ' may be said to have fallen into desuetude for the purposes of science. And this fact somewhat complicates the difficulty of forming a conception of Totality for the Universe. For as the human mind cannot conceive of motion as existent, independent of something that moves, and when the term ' substance ' is scientifically impossible as a content for ( matter,' then the term ' matter,' under compulsion of our consciousness of Totality, must necessarily be reduced quantitatively to an ultimate degree of attenuation if we are to get 'matter' and ' motion ' conceivable as One. For we do not require to say that the reduction of ' objects ' and ' particulars ' in the Universe to Unity is as strenuous a tendency in the scientific world as it is in that of philosophy or theology. L. Poincare refers to " the desire of nearly all physicists to arrive at some sort of 188 SPACE AND PERSONALITY unity in Nature," and says, " In spite of the repeated failures which have followed the numerous attempts of past times, the idea has not been abandoned of one day conquering the supreme principle which must command the whole of physics." (New Physics, pp. 63, 323.) 129. We note, then, once more, the synthetic tendency which seems to be ineradicable from the human mind. Both ancient and modern scientists have been obsessed with this desire to unitise the universe. And the same difficulty of absolutising the relative has presented itself to them in Motion and What- Moves as we have seen to hamper philosophers in Subject and Object, Quality and Quantity, and such like. And the same refusal of the space-consciousness, as giving not merely the unity sought for, but a consciousness of Whole-Being, has been universally practised by scientists. They have assiduously separated the self from their atoms and electrons, and their electrons from the 'gap,' or space, not discerning that the personal Curtius, as of old in the Roman Forum, must first leap into the gulf before the gulf can be made to close in whole- world-being. It is of little use to cry for unity. No unity is possible except through the * person,' and when that is seen to be unthinkably separate from the gulf, the gulf closes not in mere unity, but in whole-being. And as we have tried to show, all search for an Ultimate in Being, leads straight to this Gulf-consciousness for the personality. 130. From the earliest times, speculation among savage peoples as to the difference between a living and a dead body, a waking or a sleeping, has always found a certain satisfaction in conceptions which approximated nearer and nearer to those of space. The living thing goes away at death and returns an apparition, or an airy, shadowy form in dreams, or as a visible though intangible ghost. These are conceived as vapour-forms, films of man-outline, shadow-shapes, objects as impalpable as space. The thinkers cannot think them comfortably save as space-things. Such terms as ' forms of energy,' * matter with no content of substance,' would embody the conception of the departed personality for these savage peoples as well as these phrases suit the scientific conception of ' matter ' at the present SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 189 day. The dream and the vision give the same consciousness of Matter and Motion, for the * person,' as the analytic dream and vision of the scientist give for the Universe. But while both are compelled under the necessities of thought to think under the same forms, and to stand on the same brink of the same space-gulf, neither will accept the gulf as of the same being as himself, and thus the unity of living and dead, thing and thinker, remain* inevitably impossible. 131. The same tendency is evident on the higher levels of cultured reflection, and the same refusal is also proved. Most of the early Greek philosophers who carried their speculations beyond the human being to the universal Cosmos, sought for the primal elements of all things through a process of reasoning which decreased in its content of the material, and approached more and more towards a simple statement of space-being. Earth was seen to give origin to all that lived on it, but earth seemed too coarse and inert to explain the mysterious vital powers of man and beast, and Water was adopted as the more superior element of common origins. But Water was found to be conquerable by Fire, which seemed to leap up independently of water and evaporate it. Fire seemed to be the more invincible element. Yet Fire itself was noted as vanishing in air, which appeared to devour it, and Air was likewise exalted to the ultimate place of origination of being, until even this spatiality failed to yield that satisfaction which the inquiring mind craved in a universal fountain-element of unit-being. A fifth Essence, the Quintessence, was then conceived as the ultimate source of all things in earth and heaven, and this was called * Ether,' a term which still keeps its ground in treatises of modern speculative science. 132. And thus the trend is clear, in both savage and civilised speculations, regarding the things that are, as being one irresistibly pressed towards a space-consciousness which both refuse to admit into the data of their judgments of the origin of personal and impersonal being. Yet we do not think we state the matter too strongly when we say that no power seems greater over the motions of human thought than this trend of gravitation towards the space-consciousness. Of all the forces 190 SPACE AND PERSONALITY of which we are conscious none is so universally insistent and compelling. When every ' law of thought ' has exhausted its force over our consciousness, this space-gravitation abides their attack and overcomes them. Motions of earth, water, fire, air, life, thought, of which we are conscious, are all sublated and reduced in the consciousness of space. And if 'Ether* is not another term for space, then it cannot be conceived except as Something in space, with infinite potential of motion in it also. It is guessed by scientists to be immovable ; and if so, then it cannot be Something, for only the space-consciousness yields such a conception. Something cannot be thought save as under limitations, and determinations, and therefore with a conscious- ness of space surrounding it and determining it. And in thinking Ether as something, and as the home of energy, we inevitably attribute motion to it in our consciousness of energy. The moment we attribute objectivity to anything, as we have seen, we place it directly among the All that Flows. But the very fact that Ether is conceived as one thing, and the thinking person an Other, is sufficient to reduce both to mere objects with no possible chance of their unity being effected. 133. Now, it is only in the consciousness of what-we-are, i.e. Space-Being, that we cannot find a consciousness of either Rest or Motion. Say ' I/ and you realise but a consciousness which transcends every such relativity. This statement becomes emphatically self-evident when we remember that a conception of rest or motion is only possible to the human mind when Being is previously assumed to be broken up essentially into unit-things. This is indeed the pre-supposition of all relativity. On such an assumption, we conceive one thing to be at rest relative to some other thing in motion, and vice versa. A consciousness of Whole-Being transcends all such relativity absolutely. And it is this consciousness which is paramount in our ' I '-consciousness. We have not the remotest consciousness of what-we-are as resting amid other things in motion, for we have no consciousness at all of what-we-are as a thing, or unit- being. Neither have we the faintest consciousness of what-we- are as being a thing in motion amidst othered things at rest. We no doubt form ordinary conceptions of our thought as moving, and our body as suffering, growing, dying, etc., relative SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 191 to what-we-are, supposed at rest ; but this is possible again when we assume that what-we-are is a thing detached from thought and body. When we realise that both thought and body, Mind and Matter, are, at bottom, space-being, we cannot even conceive them to be othered from what-we-are, and in such a consciousness what-we-are is in relation to nothing absolutely. That is, we have but the consciousness of Whole- Being. In this wider experience, then, all relativity, as well as every conception of rest or motion is sublated and transcended. It follows, therefore, that the conception of the ' I '-thing in motion being impossible for what-we-are, so likewise is the conception of Change. And it is on this ground that we realise our consciousness of Unchangeableness as a true consciousness ( 161, 162). It is the consciousness of what-we-are. It is also the consciousness which space-being yields. Space cannot be conceived to be either at rest or in motion. For the * I '-, and for Space-Being alike (speaking in dual terms for expository purposes), the consciousness of Whole-Being is alone possible. And in this way we also realise that the powers by which we formulate every conception of force or energy are themselves de-forced and transcended by a conscious force of Whole- Energy. Similarly, we have not the shred of a consciousness of ' matter,' or ' substance,' in the " I "-consciousness, any more than of its being a thing. And here again the same conscious- ness is given by space. As we must reiterate, we cannot think differently of ourselves and space. And therefore we never can attribute either quantity or quality, matter or motion, to what- we-are. That is to say, there is a force in us which sublates all other 'forms' of force. In other words, every conception of force or energy which we entertain is governed, subordinated, and transcended by the force or energy of space-being which is our experience of what-we-are. 134. Strictly, it cannot be said that we have a true consciousness of a Thing, or of a Thought, but only of motions which we agree to understand as a Thing or a Thought. In the same way, we have only a consciousness of motions which we understand to be " Life." We say that we are conscious of Thinking, and of Living, but these motions have no actual 192 SPACE AND PERSONALITY determined and defined basis in our consciousness of them. Yet, as Prof. J. Ward points out, we obtain a certain identity of things dual in the fact of thought and life being sublated in the one concept of experience (Nat, and Agnost., ii. 112). A certain resolution of objectivity in a synthesis of subjectivity is effected. But this unity is clearly not an absolute one ; it is not an experience of Whole-Being, as he himself indicates, for he affirms that Experience is " in the concrete, a process, and not a product" (ibid., ii. 130). And being a 'process,' we get no more than a motion-concept out of such data, even as Thinking and Living also give in our consciousness of them. 135. But surely we must pass beyond the relativity of motion- concepts for our ultimate consciousness of force, or energy. Our conception of Experience must first be placed beyond that of process, and regarded in its widest range as all-we-^r^ inclusive of ali-we/*. It is surely necessary to terminate our con- ception of Experience, not merely in a category of process, but in one which is permanently existential ; as transcending relative connotations of motion and rest; and certified to our consciousness as such beyond all doubt. Thought-consciousness and Life-consciousness must be sublated in an Existential- consciousness ; or, our consciousness of Motion, and Energy as implied in that motion, must transcend all conceptions of objective motion and objective energy if we would reach a true consciousness of Energy as resultant for the Being of our Experience. For example, we have conceptions of energy as in process and energy as resultant, or static, but we have not in such conceptions an Energy which is independent of the conditions of such process and such staticity. They are still under Change, whether Energy is termed Will or Gravity, and we require a consciousness of Energy which sublates both motions of Thought and Life without impairing Energy as existential in Being. And in the deepest conscious " I," all process, or motion, of Thought or of Life, as experience, comes home to a resultant experience of Energy, wherein is no consciousness of motion nor of staticity for ourselves. Just as we retain a consciousness of Being for ourselves without the least shred of a consciousness of our being ' Matter ' or ' Substance,' or even SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 193 some Thing, so we retain a consciousness of Energy as resultant in our Being without any consciousness of objective process active or passive. That is to say, we have a distinct conscious- ness of Energised Being as totalising our experience of what- \\e-are, without the slightest consciousness in us of experiencing either ' Matter ' or * Motion ' as qualifying that consciousness of Being. But clearly this is the fundamental " I "-consciousness which is purely our consciousness of No-thing or Space-Being. For every vestige of either ' Matter ' or ' Motion ' as objective is absent from it. And it is our Experience. It is also impossible to think differently of this experience and our experience of Space. Or, generally, our consciousness of our personal experience becomes whole with our consciousness tot* impersonal* space-being. 136. Physicists, we are told, find their ultimate universal fact of Being, to be, thus far in their researches, Motion-sans- Substance. They do not apparently find it possible to be conscious of Space as Being. It is left out of their data of consciousness. And this fact seems to us to be fatal to the Highest Science. For strictly, there is no further ultimate fact than Space. They only use the conceptual * space/ which can be qualified, quantified, related, squared, cubed, etc., but they ignore the conceptless space. Hence they never realise our consciousness of Whole-Force, nor that of Whole-Being. Science is confined to cosmical conceptions only. But if scientists could find it possible to include Space in their facts as Being, they could not fail to reach that fact of Energy-sans- Matter for which such terms as 'Ether,' 'perfect fluid,' 'hydro- kinetic' and such like are unsatisfactory substitutes. They cannot deny, at least, that there is a fact ever urgent in con- sciousness which constantly allures them further, a conscious- ness which will likely do so for ever, until they have exhausted the whole content of their consciousness of What-is. They cannot deny either, that this fact is outside of all scientific concepts of What-is. They would otherwise be able to objectify and define it. And if Space be not this fact of What- is, why is it so tremendously affirmative of Being beyond every thing that we can conceive or be conscious of? Why cannot we think differently of even what-we-are and this fact ? The scientific and philosophic quest is identical in this N 194 SPACE AND PERSONALITY respect. Each, however, holds to quality, quantity, and relations of these, as Being, and Space-Being as Non-Being. This consciousness of Space-Being, so essential to all 'essentials,' comes to its own and its own receives it not. When the concept of Universal Energy is generalised by science, the space-fact, as we have said, is outside of it. Yet, undoubtedly, the space-fact alone supplies it, and more. Say * space/ and then try to deny that you have said, ' Is ' ! But 'Is* is the force of forces. It underlies and conditions every consciousness of energy we possess. Without it neither conception nor consciousness of Energy would be possible. And it is the same for the conscious ' I.' If I am conscious, ' Is ' is the consciousness under-lying that fact. The conscious- ness of the universe and of what-we-are rests in this identical consciousness of space-being : Is. And it is Energy Absolute, or Whole, because nothing negates it or others it ; and it negates all else, in affirming What-Is. Moreover, nothing qualifies it. There is only a consciousness of Energy- Whole. We have no consciousness that such Energy may move here or there under a greater compelling energy. Is-energy is whole. Therefore, every consciousness of energy which is not that of Is-energy is one based only on our changing concepts of knowing and believing, all of which are subsidiary to the ultimate consciousness of Space-Being. 137. We require to familiarise ourselves with this position from different view-points. But as a general statement we venture to say that it is not necessary to be conscious of either ' matter ' or ' motion ' in order to have a consciousness of Force or Energy as Whole. For neither matter nor motion is a necessary constituent of this consciousness. On the contrary, our consciousness of each of these constituents as conditioned in the space-consciousness, is sublated in our consciousness of w^/?-energy. For it is whole. For example, although when we say " I," we are conscious of neither matter nor motion in this consciousness of what-we-are, and still retain a distinct and irreducible consciousness of energy, it is also a conscious energy to which we can affix no conscious limits. For although we may be conscious of limits to any energy to which our earthly conditions restrict our 'matter' and 'motions' of body SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 195 or brain, this does not touch our consciousness of ultimate energy in the least, for it is the energy which is always felt as independent of these limitations, and which men have in all ages associated with their consciousness of 'spirit' or 'soul.' Its limitations have been steadily, nay, fiercely denied in the asserted consciousness of ' immortality.' That is, our conscious- ness of this Energy is whole as to its impossibility of permanent change of Being. It is also whole as to its impossibility of dissipation. In other words, it is in the space or I -conscious- ness that we have the final affirmation of the conservation of energy as an Ultimate. In our every experiment of its examination, this affirmation is always maintained. The consciousness of its being whole is also confirmed in that it is incapable of transformation. Now, science never gets beyond the conception of * energy in transformation,' and conservation of that energy in its transformations. Whole-energy is indeed an impossible consciousness with the present data assumed in scientific judgments. Limited 'objects' are assumed, from whose edges of being energy is declared to pass unchanged into other ' objects,' across their edges of limited being, and this process, it is assumed, may continue forever through an infinite number of limited ' objects.' But the consciousness of space, which even the scientific mind cannot ignore for the postulation of locus for all these ' objects ' and ' changes,' is thrust forth from the data of all scientific judgments on energy, and consequently, whole-energy, as a fact of our consciousness of the universe and of ourselves, is an impossible term. Energy is only seen transformed from one limited form to another, uncreated and indestructible, yet the space in which it is conditioned for these changes is disregarded in the problem ! When we test, then, such a consciousness by the experiment and observation of our I-consciousness, we find there (i), a consciousness cf energy, equal to Is, independent of any concept or consciousness of matter or motion, and (2), a consciousness of the impossibility of its transformation from \vhat-we-are to anything beyond us, for the reason that we have not the slightest consciousness of any limit as to where what-we-are begins or ends in Being. Our consciousness of what-we-are as space-being refuses such limitations. Hence we have no consciousness of a transformation of that energy 196 SPACE AND PERSONALITY which equates with what-we-are, but only one as of persisting energy, whole against every force which we associate with either life or death, time or eternity. 138. We can thus conceive Nature as whole-with-ourselves in a consciousness of Being which is independent of our con- ceptions of either quantity or quality, motion or matter. And this conception of Nature permits us also to entertain a rational basis for the subordinate conceptions that not only does ' All Flow' but that All flows through-and-throughout All. Com- munion and not merely Communication is the experience of all with all, on an existential basis of Whole-Being. For our consciousness of absolute Resultant- or Whole-Force equates with our consciousness of Whole-Being, and it is impossible to have a consciousness of What-we-are without simultaneously having a consciousness of energy equal to that given in our consciousness of Is. 139. Both our conceptions of ' Motion ' and of ' What-moves ' are thus swallowed up in a wider consciousness of experience of Whole-Being. This means also that an experience may not be necessarily confined to one person, but be common to all 'persons' and 'objects' embraced in this Whole-Being. The simplest example of this fact is perhaps the case of the child which, in its origin^ has an unconscious experience which is whole with the conscious experience of the parent. This experience is based in an identical existence in which one blood and one life act as mediating processes in whole-being. Every leaf in the tree has also this experience common to all the leaves and the tree itself. But clearly this common experience may be traced to its widest extent, until all Nature may be conceived as having a common experience with all its subordinate ' particulars.' And when our conception rises to this height, then we have but to realise that all Nature, or All that is All, has a common experience as conditioned in Space, in order to have a conception of an Experience which is as whole as Being itself is whole. That is, the " process " which we conceive as motional-experience becomes sublated with our consciousness of existential Whole-Being whenever we introduce space into our judgment of either. The space-consciousness SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 197 yields a resultant consciousness not only of what-we-are but of what the All is in the experience of itself; and our experience of ourselves is common to Whole-Being as the Is-, or Space-Being. 140. This view of Whole-Experience as culminating in our consciousness of Space-Being is, in a sense, admitted by scientists. But they limit its extent under the terms of Heredity and Environment. They postulate, as real, an isolated nucleus of being, and an environment to that nucleus which is also isolated from the nucleus, although asserted to be absolutely essential to it. And both concepts are limited once more by Time, and in neither fact is the consciousness of space-being admitted. But if we trace back Heredity to its remotest origin, that origin cannot be defined till it enters our consciousness of space-being ; and Environment of Being is only a contracted concept of that Being which never authenticates such a contraction. Taking Heredity in the widest possible aspect as an influence exerted upon a being before it becomes being, in the sense of personality or individuality ; then nothing can be affirmed as the ultimate influence upon Being of any name save space-being, and in the same way, the ultimate environment so essential to the existence of any being, is space-being. Both limitations of backward moving time and surrounding space- environment are only identified together in our consciousness of Whole-Experience of Whole-space-being. And if. Herbert Spencer's statement holds true that " whatever amount of power an organism expends in any shape is the correlate and equivalent of a power that was taken into it from without " (Princ. of BioL, p. 57), then no being can possibly be isolated existentially from any other, and all Being is a common field for every force, and this conception of being cannot be rationalised save as ultimately Space-whole-being. Nothing in nature or human nature can be rationally conceived, that is, to be absolutely new being, whose essential elements never were extant before, and this is just another way of saying that no one has the faintest consciousness of ever having begun quite new, or of having had absolute origin independent of all other being. Heredity goes back ultimately into Space-being 198 SPACE AND PERSONALITY as certainly as does Environment, and we have not the least authority to limit these influences except as forces which are identically Whole in our consciousness of Space-Being, or What-we-are. Our ultimate inheritance, as our ultimate environment, is subsumed in our consciousness as Space-being. 141. It is in this space-category that the through-and- throughoutness of Being, or the All as flowing through All, is rationalised. There is a path through All which all things know, because space is a a fundamental experience for all. Indeed this through-and-throughoutness is impressing its acceptance upon all thinking people in our day, and, as a consequence, the barriers between ' mind ' and ' matter,' ' personality ' and ' impersonality,' as absolutised dualities, are being gradually broken down. For it has become familiar knowledge that innumerable expressions of nature-force pass through-and-throughout the human system, and their sphere is confessedly not confined absolutely to our bodies. The passage of solar radio-activities, electric currents, movements of atoms, molecules and ions, are assumed by all intelligent people to find free course through-and-throughout the human system, entering and passing out of it in such a way, and with such boundless freedom, as to indicate a common basis in Nature and in man for the path of these forces. If there had been any considerable doubt about this absolute freedom which all things assume for themselves, the discovery of radium would have gone far to dispel it. The analysis of the spectrum of light has revealed a common physical basis for sun, moon, earth, stars, and nebulae. Biology has broken down the fixed barriers that used to keep one species apart from the other, and has proved that the protoplasmic cell of the plant, the fish, the bird, the animal, and the man is the same ; and as all * mind ' and all ' matter,' as well as all ' life ' and all ' thought ' are unthinkable except as movements, and are all resolvable ultimately into the Whole of space-energy, or energy of which space alone can be conceived as the ultimate affirmation, it is easy to see how reasonable Wimdt's statement becomes when he says, " From the standpoint of observation, we must regard it as a highly probable hypothesis that the beginnings of the mental life date from as far back as the beginnings of life at SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 199 large. The question of the origin of mental development thus resolves itself into the question of the origin of life " (Princs. of Physiological PsychoL, p. 31). "From the simplest to the most complex cases," says Herbert Spencer, " physical principle and psychical manifestation agree." 142. Every force in the universe, indeed, seems to find its way homewards through man, and through all of man, as it does through all else, even as the wireless message finds no more obstruction in the person than in the pole. Man cannot be shown to be in any part of him cut off or isolated from the rest of the Universe of Nature, except as we arbitrarily create divisions in being for thought-purposes. Life and death do not appear to offer new conditions of movements of force, but are themselves to be regarded as simple movements of force or energy. At least many movements of energy pass through the living and the dead at the same depth of consciousness in each. The living and the dead have a common experience in this respect, and such experience must be held again as common to the All of Nature. Experience, that is, is not fragmentary but whole. It may be said, of course, that these currential influences are strictly confined to the air and ether spheres, and that Matter is alone affected by them, but not Mind. But this is an assumption that is becoming less and less tenable as knowledge advances. The meagrest experience of every one is that, when we are cold, a source of warmth will not only comfort the body but cheer the mind. The heat motions do not, as some seem to imply, lodge themselves among nerve tissue, and brain, and stay there, debarred from all contact with 'mind' or 'soul.' These motions may not always be motions that give the sensation of heat, and we may not be able to define them at every part of their course as //^Amotions, but our common experience is that they pass through the man, all of the man, stirring his feelings, brightening his eyes, putting cheer into his voice, and gladness into his heart, and accelerating his mental motions in such a way as to justify us in affirming that their circuit is not limited to ' matter ' but includes * mind ' as well. Moreover, when we observe the same forms of energy to reflect and react upon others in the sense that is called * social,' we are inclined to believe that these 200 SPACE AND PERSONALITY motions of what we call heat have a clear path through both personal and impersonal parts of man's being. And as they come to him out of the universe, so they pass through-and- throughout him into the vast reservoir of the Universe once more. The motions as vibrations seem to be the same throughout, though changed in our consciousness of sensation and thought, will and action, which they incite in their course. But no motion indeed has ever been proved to come to an absolute end. It is transformed, transfused, translated, and what not, but it is inconceivable as annihilated. Only in the space-consciousness, in which no consciousness of quantity or quality can be discovered, can we realise this annihilation. And we have just tried to show that when we receive Space into our data of judgment, we obtain the true conscious resultant of both Matter and Motion in one consciousness of Whole-Being. 143. The irrationality of conceiving ourselves to be absolutely cut asunder as separate Selves from every other Self and Thing, apart from Nature, and apart from even God, is more and more apparent as an order of Being which is out of harmony with all our ordinary conceptions of existence. For example, the force or Energy which we name Gravitation exerts a power over every molecule, atom, and infinitesimal ion or electron of our being. Can any one even imagine the dividing line that resists the invasion of the self by this force which transfuses all Nature? At what part of the self-we-are does this force stay its action and recoil back from its impervious frontiers ? We cannot tell where body and soul begin and end, where pain and pleasure are divided, where knowledge and ignorance are separated, where life and death meet and part in our constitu- tion, and can we venture to say that we are conscious that this force or energy does not pervade the whole Self, 'mind' and ' matter ' of it, and yet pervades all other regions enveloped by the space-consciousness ? " We have every reason for believ- ing," says Dr Bain, " that there is, in company with all our mental processes, an unbroken material succession. From the ingress of a sensation, to the outgoing responses in action, the mental succession is not for an instant dissevered from a physical succession." ..." The only tenable supposition is, SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 201 that mental and physical proceed together, as undivided twins " (Mind and Body, p. 131). And referring to the structure of the brain, Prof. D. Ferrier says, " Aphasia being essentially due to the destruction, temporary or permanent, of the centres of excitation and organic registration of acts of articulation, is a significant proof of the fact that there is no break between the physiological and psychological functions of the brain, and that the objective and subjective are not separated from each other by an unbridgeable gulf" (Functions of the Brain, p. 280, Ed. 1876). 144. Again, it is common knowledge that life itself is indivisibly associated with elements which are all counted non-vital. From certain combinations of oxygen, nitrogen, hydrogen, and carbon, which are perfectly ' lifeless,' we obtain, according to Huxley, carbonic acid, water, and ammonia. " The existence of the matter of life depends on the pre- existence of" these compounds. But when these are brought together under conditions, "they give rise to the still more complex body, protoplasm, and this protoplasm exhibits the phaenomena of life" (Lay Sermons, p. 135). Here is involution upon involution of * lifeless ' matter, yet from which life arises, and without which life could not arise in the protoplasmic cell, in order to become plant, fish, bird, animal, and man, and we are called upon to assume that while all these elements and forms are operated upon through, and by, the universal forces of the Cosmos, and are necessary to the life which arises from them as a living ' self/ the self so evolved from these cosmical elements, and without which it could not be a self at all, at once thrusts itself clear of them, as well as apart from the entire universe, and stands forth an absolutely independent, uninvadable, impervious, isolated Self! This would indeed invest the Self with a power of wrenching itself apart from the Cosmos far greater than those cosmical powers to which the very existence of the Self is due. And if we are to accept that what-we-are resists all these influences which move in all other parts of the Cosmos freely, and thrusts them from itself as the rock thrusts back the wave, how then are we to account for the consciousness of giving and receiving sympathy, love, enmity, and all the varieties of 202 SPACE AND PERSONALITY passion generally ? Do all these motions go on outside of the bounded impenetrabilities of what-we-are? Does it not become more and more improbable that absolute isolation should have been decreed as the solitary lot of ourselves in a Cosmos where all else mingles in common existence with all else? 145. For the same hint is given in the remarkable fact that we always find response in universal nature for our thought- motions and emotions. A ray of sunshine breaks forth out of a gloomy day and falls upon an eye as dark with sorrow. A perceptible influence is transmitted to nerves and brain, emotion is quickened, and light radiates what-we-are as distinctly as it has radiated eye, nerve, and brain. It may not be named as light in the brain, but it is just as impossible to call it light in space. The actual fact remains that this motion which is named light in the eye produces as true light in the ' mind ' as it does in the eye. The influence of this vibrating energy does not stay in our ' matter,' and neither does it remain in our ' mind.' No influence, energy, force, or motion of any kind seems to be impeded in its free passage from space to space (speaking dually), from space to person, or from person once more to space. But this is simply to say that space is through-and- throughout the person as well as the im-person, and that while All flows, All flows through All. Strictly, if all flows, it must flow through all. And manifestly, without the space-conscious- ness this conception is impossible. Thought so gravitates to this space-consciousness, as we have hinted, that it is impossible to conclude otherwise than that all motion is conditioned by space and is therefore limited, although space itself gives no consciousness to us of limitation. All flows in space-being as all of which we are conscious flows in what-we-are. 146. This view of Being as whole need not be too much dwelt upon, perhaps, as the difficulty before every one is not so much to create a belief in it as to rationalise the fact of the belief which already exists. Most people are aware that our ablest intellects are all moving to-day in this direction, and that broad glades are being made through untrodden land by psychical SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 203 research, and that branch of study known since Fechner's day as Psychical Physiology. The mental phenomenon of the association of ideas led to the belief that no idea ever exists independently by itself, but occupies a common basis of existence with other ideas, and as the content of every idea has always a material basis of fact, and would have no existence in our minds apart from this basis, it has been believed that/a^ and idea had a common basis of existence. Certainly, nothing has been found in consciousness to make these convictions impossible. It is all the other way. The trend of consciousness is towards confirmation of these convictions. Our very consciousness of living has for its content the fact of our own lives, where neither concept of idea nor of life can exist the one apart from the other. Our lives are again based in precedent life, and all life is seen to be conditioned and environed by non-vital elements, and these once more in ' matter ' which scientists reduce easily to motions, and these in turn, to mere forms of energy, * electric charges ' in a diaphanous Ether-Something, out of which all 'matter' is eliminated absolutely. That is, the march of facts and ideas constantly converges towards a Unity or Total, where fact and idea are concussed into Being. And unless we also take, at this point, the consciousness of space into our judgment of Being, Being remains, as with Hegel and Kant, a mere Unit or Total, and never by any possibility can give us a consciousness of Being as Whole with no conceivable part in it. It is in the space-consciousness alone that material fact and immaterial idea are sublated, confessing that they never were, and never could be, separated entities but only Whole- Being. 147. In discussing Being as a Whole, therefore, we must be understood to be discussing it as it can be thought, and as it is possible to find it reflected in our consciousness. The Scientist is not able to think it except as " Form of Energy," " Electric Charge," " Ether." Philosophers cannot think it except as Thought. But both Scientist and Philosopher never eliminate from their terms the consciousness of Motion. Try to think of scientific Energy or Thought, and then say if you have no consciousness of Motion in either. It cannot be done. It can only be found when we say * I,' for this does not flow. But 204 SPACE AND PERSONALITY if Motion cannot be eliminated from the conception of the Universe, then neither can we eliminate Motion from our consciousness of it as something moved. We always go round in a circle of thought and consciousness. And clearly, this Something is the centre of such a consciousness, and we who think it are the Go-rounds. The fact of Ether never gives us even a perfect synthesis for either the what-we-are or for the Universe which we try to think on such a basis. Being never becomes even a Total, far less Whole. It is vain to satisfy ourselves that this result is a true Unity. It is simply two things tied together with a name, as mass and motion are tied together by the name Energy. But the conception of existential one-ness is never found in such a consciousness. It is really existentially dual in the facts of being mass and motion. 148. The desire for the unity of the Universe, as we have hinted, is as strong among scientists as it is among philo- sophers. And in all their theories of 'Ions' and 'Ether' we must not regard them as seeking to coerce their facts to their notions of unity. Quite the opposite. Every fact of science is slowly pressing scientists towards a realisation of that unity which seems to lie as an anticipation in their minds. The 'perfect fluid' which Lord Kelvin desiderated, is an instance that scientists are on the outlook for something that will serve as a Newton's apple to lead them to the larger truth which urges birth from their instincts of faith. This in itself is perhaps the most profound scientific fact of to-day. For it proves that there is a consciousness of the existence of a basis for a far wider form of Science than is commonly known by that term. So far, indeed, have scientists already gone in this direction that such as Sir Oliver Lodge can say, " The region of true religion and the region of a completer Science are one" (Hib. Journ., No. 2, p. 227). But here Sir Oliver indulges in a guess, for if there is oneness of regions of religion and science, it must be a oneness based in a scientific fact, and if this fact were known to him, we are sure he would be the first to declare it. And yet, our consciousness never ceases to point to that fact y a fact, however, which lifts our consciousness above mere unity. The scientific mind, we seem to think, is simply, in our own times, passing through the same experience which the philo- SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 205 sophical and theological minds respectively experienced in bygone days, and each has been forced independently towards the same exiguous goal along the same dematerialising way. Theology in the far past, eliminated all matter out of her categories in order to reach the ultimate unity in the more rarified term, Spirit: a term that represents the most matter- less concept of energy possible, while Philosophy, as we have seen, in order to realise the ultimate of ultimates, also emptied every category of substance out of Being till ' mere Being/ Is, Nothing, alone remained, which yet was of null-value to her. Being as a category was subjected to still further exhaustion till Hegel could assure all men that it was a mere abstraction, and was not even Nothing ! The same desperate ultimation of the infinitely exiguous is clearly apparent in the efforts of our foremost scientists to think matter which is immaterial, and to found Nature upon a non-substrate substance ! What is plain to us, in even the sketchiest survey of these three great move- ments of the Human Mind, is the fact that everything seems to be ' in the way ' of their realising the grand ultimation of their consciousness until the consciousness of Space is realised by each. Space is the force of forces, the energy of energies, which with hands of nothingness draws all thought and con- sciousness to itself. It is impossible for the human intellect to conceive a concept of almightiness more ultimate than is affirmed by this space-consciousness. Theology, philosophy, and science are clearly being irresistibly swept under it. There can be no doubt that the logical result of all this elimination of 'substance' and 'matter'; this attenuation of thought to the utmost exiguity of its concept ; this concentra- tion upon and co-ordination of Nothing, is simply the realisation of something for which it is not possible to invent a term that will give it a place in our minds save that of space. We are forced to affirm, by the nature of the facts before us, that it is the space-consciousness, and the space-consciousness alone, which, in all three departments of thought, is pressing ever for ultimate recognition as common datum of Reality for these so-called separate sciences. 149. Science, however, has preferred to seek an ultimate Cause (or rather, unity, for 'cause,' like 'substance,' has also 206 SPACE AND PERSONALITY been frowned upon by scientists) in the Unknown, in the theological ' God] and in the philosophical Hegelian * Notion! Space, as we must repeat, has been a non-entity in the problem, a mere ' pure and transparent ' consciousness, as Prof. E. Caird would have said, or, in other words, a negligible quantity ! Science indifferently styles it " the Void," and there the matter ends. Now, can science afford to ignore any fact in Nature? For space seems to be considered a fact by scientists. Sir Oliver Lodge, for example, when arguing for " foundations " in science and religion, and twitting, in his free manner, the religious men for their fears and timidity when science pulls the " artificial props and pillars " from beneath the structures they have reared, consoles them again by pointing out that suspen- sion in air is not to be despised as a " foundation," instancing the fact that the earth itself " floats securely in the emptiness of space " (Man and the Universe, p. 54). Space evidently exists to Sir Oliver Lodge, but does not possess the value of Being. This seems to be the meaning of " empty." Space is, and yet is valueless, for it is " empty" ! But why should a scientist stigmatise space as "empty" when, by all tests of thought and consciousness which we possess, it is staringly full to a sense of wholeness which nothing else transcends ? And why should the insinuation of weakness be also made by science in regard to space when, again, by every known test, it is strong beyond all realisation as a " foundation " for everything ? Earth is strong, air is strong, ether is assumed to be strong, but what then is the function of space when these ' particulars/ and millions and myriads of others, are all " founded " on it ? Be it known that we feel timid enough in venturing into this scientific arena, but it humbly appears to our unscientific mind, beyond the least shadow of a doubt, that Space is the POWER that ultimately sustains this incomprehensibly awful Universe. And if this is not sheer nonsense, but fact, then one should expect that scientists, of all men, ought to be the first to trace all their ' matters ' and * motions ' to that Source, and find in it not only an earth-power, an ether-power, a gravitation-power, but indivisible, Whole-power ; the Grand Potential Resultant. For if this stupendous Universe ; this Nature-Thing, to name which all terms fail us ; if this ALL-BEING can float so serenely and so SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 207 securely in the bosom of this power, then this is the only true Power, and we shall seek in vain for any other. It is certainly beyond all dispute that when we seek for some basis or founda- tion for the weight of this vast Universe, considered merely as Mass, we are always utterly compelled to base it on Space. It is impossible to think otherwise and remain in harmony with our ultimate consciousness of What- Is. And it is a question of what we are able to think in harmony with such consciousness. But as Pascal more than hinted long ago, no consciousness of power equals that consciousness of power which we have for ourselves. Inversely, it may assume a conscious- ness of weakness, or lack of power, but this is truly the obverse consciousness of the same fact. And it is a scientific fact that every power in the universe is measured for each person by this consciousness of self-power. The greatness of the gravita- tion power, for example, is measured ' materially ' by each of us, by our consciousness of lack of such ' material ' power in our person as compared with it on a physical basis. But when we say " I," we have the same consciousness as when we say "space," for in this conscious ' I,' we have no consciousness of either * matters ' or ' motions/ and yet, as Pascal averred, we have a consciousness of greater power than is given by the material Universe. That is, we still have the equal consciousness of the power which sustains the Universe the space-consciousness. It is therefore in our consciousness of what-we-are that we obtain our deepest realisation of Force or Energy. 150. It humbly appears to one who is deeply grateful to such as Sir Oliver Lodge for any scientific knowledge he possesses, that Science must sooner or later be compelled to accept space as What-Is into the data of its problems, and accept it as the absolute datum. Why indeed should there be such unconscious scepticism all round with reference to the space-consciousness ? Is it not more and more evident that we must still seek beyond 'atoms' and 'ions' these scientific fairy folk for the ultimate scientific fact? Masses, large or small ; Forces, local or universal, are plainly inadequate to the problem which they are called upon to explain. Dumbly, they ever point away from themselves. And always one fact remains, viz., this consciousness of space beyond them, and of 208 SPACE AND PERSONALITY space as our ultimate consciousness of What-Is absolutely. Let us subdue, if we please, every concept or percept of substance or matter, and divide and attenuate atoms and electrons beyond all subdivisions, the fact is unconquerable that we cannot eliminate the consciousness of space from the ultimate consciousness of either the universe or ourselves. Neither does it help us to reduce the universe and ourselves to a single term of Energy, for if this is to mean anything at all to our minds it must also pre-suppose space for its action and existence. 151. Force, doubtless, or as it is preferred, Energy, is acknowledged by all thinking people to be one of the best known characteristics of universal being. Every force or energy is also conceived as either resisting or resisted by another force or energy. Scientists assume that we can know force or energy only by the fact of resistance. And this assumption seems to be proved through the entire sphere of objectivity at least. But what does it mean to resist anything? Speaking generally, it means to overcome a force by another force. Universally, it is observed that one force meets another, or what is understood to be another, force, and if greater, it overcomes its fellow-force, and reduces it. But just as in tracing back Life, Thought, Substance, Matter, and Consciousness itself, to an Ultimate, we never reach an absolute conception for either, so likewise in tracing Energy up to its ultimate, we never reach, apart from the space- consciousness, an absolute conception of force or energy. The greatest conceivable force, that of gravitation, is always con- ceivable as capable of reduction by a still greater force. For we always have a consciousness of that in which it is conditioned. And so on, to endless cogitation. What, then, we have to look for, in endeavouring to think Whole-Energy, in harmony with our ultimate consciousness of it, is a force, or energy unconditioned, a force of which universal consciousness and experience would be able to assure us could not possibly be conceived as reducible by any other force or energy ; a force, indeed, beside which it would be impossible for the human mind to imagine an Other. That SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 209 is to say, we must look for absolutely Resultant Force or Energy : not merely Unit-Power, but Whole-Energy. This consciousness, in short, must not give us a mere combination of all possible energies tied-up into a grand Totality, but Energy so consciously Whole as to exclude all conception of division from it absolutely. However, it is clear that in discovering this force, it could not possibly be known to us as force, for thereby it would be proved objective and a related thing to what it forced. Whole-Force can only be known as Is ; as Be-ing ; and, as we tried to show, this is the expression which space always yields to our consciousness of it. And whereas we have in our consciousness of space a consciousness of resistance to thought in its efforts to annihilate it, Thought itself is shown to be conditioned motion in us, and subsidiary to the consciousness which we have of what-we-are. And again, because we are conscious of Thought as conditioned motion in us, there is revealed a consciousness of What-we-are as sublating all motions what- soever, yet as not destroying but as establishing an ultimate consciousness of Energy in what-we-are. And the same thing falling to be affirmed of What-we-are as ' substance ' or ' matter/ it follows that while all conceptions of ourselves as * substance ' are completely sublated in the consciousness of ourselves, the consciousness of Substantia, Is, is not destroyed but established the more for what-we-are. And Mass and Motion being the two constituents in our conception of Force or Energy, and these being sublated in the consciousness of ourselves, this same consciousness of what-we-are yields only a consciousness of Whole-Energy, Zte- ing- Power. It is now evident that whether or not we allow Space to exist as a scientific fact, we cannot annihilate the consciousness of it from what-we-are. This consciousness completely com- mands all others, and all others are subordinate to it. It has this sovereign Force in it. But every conception of Energy or Force which science can produce betrays a dependence far below this sovereignty. For example, can any scientist conceive anything, or anything in motion, as existing space- less? Is it imaginable by any power we possess? But what conclusion does this fact compel, if it be not that Space, or our consciousness of Space, conditions all other con- O 210 SPACE AND PERSONALITY sciousness of anything existing, or of anything existing in motion ? 152. No more can Space be conceived as subject to any Force or Energy known to science. Suppose we test this statement by confronting the two together, viz., our con- sciousness of space and our consciousness of the greatest Energy known to Science. Can we conceive space as being subject to even the sublime Energy or Force of Gravitation ? Does the Force of Gravitation say to Space, "Thus far, but no further"? Are we conscious of this as fact? Is not our consciousness all to the contrary ? Is it not our consciousness that Space says this limiting word to all the forces and energies of science, even to the highest Energy of Gravitation ? What we are conscious of, therefore, as Space, must be con- ceived as that Force, or Energy ', which no Force can resist or overcome. It is consequently the Resultant Force or Energy of all conceivable forces universally : Absolute Power : Whole- Energy. It is at least impossible to affirm any conclusion upon Energy or Force to be otherwise. If we are granted so much, we may now consider some points that seem to fall under this general statement. Every force known to the human mind points to space as to its superior, and its superior by the difference of 'finite' and ' infinite.' For every force, even gravitation force, being, in our consciousness of it, cognisable as a force, it is also in our consciousness cognisable as finite. For every force is cognisable only through and by the categories of thought which are themselves finite. That is to say, the force that is known as a force is only so known by means of categories which do not and cannot connote a consciousness of the Absolute or Whole. But science depends on such categories as Matter, Body, Substance, Mass, Motion, Acceleration, etc., for her conceptions of forces and energies. If these are wiped out of existence, science cannot have a consciousness of Energy or Force. If these are wiped out of existence, science declares that all that is left is space ; ' empty space ' ! And science never dreams of associating Energy or Force with such a con- ception. Neither would Philosophy. Neither would Theology. But the fact remains that when all these categories are wiped out SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 211 of being, this space-being abides and cannot be wiped out. Is remains with us for this space-being. It resists all our efforts to wipe it out of being. It resists also all our efforts to put limits to its being. We cannot finitise it under any circum- stances of thought and consciousness. All other categories are swallowed up in it, finity along with the rest. It is, therefore, once more, Whole-Force. And it is just because that it is Whole-Force that it cannot be idea-ed, or cognised as a Force, for to do so would be to find it finite, conceptual, and not Whole. It is therefore true, infinite Force, and the difference between all other forces known to science and this Space-Force, is the difference of ' finite ' and ' infinite ' in our consciousness of them. 153. We have just said that this Space-Force resists, but of course the language is due to the necessities of exposition. Whole-Force is not conceivable as resisting, seeing it is the sole Force, Is. And we may now notice that what-we-are yields always this identical consciousness. As what-we-are, we are not conscious of resisting, or called upon to resist. We are. And in harmony with our consciousness of space, the consciousness of what-we-are never gives us the smallest content of a force, or an energy. Nothing is given us in our I-consciousness save one of Is ; Being. We are never conscious, for example, that our forces of will, thought, attention, recollec- tion, are the I, or what-we-are. We always distinguish. We say ' my will,' ' my thought,' ' my memory.' We cannot say, ' Attention is I,' ' Will is I,' * Thought is I.' For a consciousness of finity and limitation is always given in such forces of will, thought, attention. The ' I ' can wipe them out, as it pleases, and put them under subjection. We are conscious that they are finite forces moving in what we-are, but we are also conscious that they cannot wipe tis out of being. There is that in us which Is, so profound in its strength as to make it impossible for us to have a consciousness of resisting at all the greatest forces of which we are conscious, although we actually do resist them. 154. That is to say, there is in all of us a consciousness of Being which no motion or process affects in the slightest, just 212 SPACE AND PERSONALITY as we all have a consciousness of what-we-are which is never affected by our willing, feeling, conation, or any possible motion or process of mind. It is this consciousness in which all motion is conditioned, transcended, and sublated. And this fact of consciousness seems to explain why we have no consciousness of the ' I '-Being, or what-we-are, as being under any power, force, or energy in any respect. Our bodies are under force, our minds steadily trend to the space-consciousness if we think at all ; but no motion is discoverable in our I- consciousness. And if what-we-are had not been space-being, it seems that we must have had a consciousness in our ' 1 '-being of energy trending towards Being also, of which we could have thought differently than of what-we-are. It is because what-we-are is whole with space-being that we have the same consciousness in what-we-are of immateriality and immovableness as we have for space-being. We are not conscious that what-we-are is under gravitation energy, or under any energy absolutely, and this is the identical conscious- ness which we have of space-being. But yet our consciousness of affirmative being is as deep for the one as for the other. That is, we are conscious enough of Is-Energy in space-being, for nothing gives such an irresistible consciousness that it Is, and we have the same for what-we-are (speaking in dual terms for convenience) ; and as we are not conscious at all that either is under any power, force, or energy, absolutely, it follows that this consciousness of Space-Being and I-Being is one not only of whole-being but of whole-energy ; Resultant-Force absolute. Hence it is that the more closely we realise a full and true consciousness of the " I," the more impossible is it to realise a consciousness of force or energy in what-we-are, as science understands a force. We obtain ^simply a consciousness of whole-force ; of absolutely resultant energy ; but unknowable as such under the scientific categories of energy. What we do find is that all conceptions of force or energy, as science understands these terms, are more and more eliminated, and that what remains is simply consciousness of Being ; Is ; without any other content ; and, clearly, this is consciousness only and solely of pure Space-Being. We then cannot conceive the " I," or what-we-are, to be any thing otfier than the thing SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 213 we conceive space to be. Wholeness of Space-Being is the sole consciousness given us. 155. But we have to complain once more that it is always this consciousness which is put into the 'blind spot' of our vision, and if we are religious we name it ' Spirit,' if philo- sophical, ' Absolute Notion,' and if scientific, ' The Void.' The real meaning asserted by such terms is also never so much one of Power as of loss of consciousness of Substance, Matter, and Energy. ' Emptiness' is the predominant consciousness in them. We find that we cannot think what-we-are as solid, fluid, or gaseous, or even as ether. But there is never a doubt about the power of Is, Being, that is given us in it. From the scientific point of view it is only conceivable as 'empty,' and * scientifically,' no doubt, it is ' empty.' But it is evident that from the point of view of the higher coming Science, we must regard what-we-are as ' empty ' in the same sense as we consider Space as 'empty.' And, undoubtedly, the power of what-we-are and of Space is so great in this ' emptiness,' as to be unthinkably different in our consciousness of either. Such a power, force, or energy, call it what we may, is never measurable by the common tests of scientific forces or powers. Yet all our conceptions of power or force are completely dwarfed in its presence, and we can only assert for it, in what-we-are, as we have affirmed for our consciousness of space, viz., that all other forces are superseded by it with that difference which is usually put between ' finite ' and ' infinite.' It is conceived as 'Empty' necessarily, because no concept can grasp it by quality, quantity, or relation. It is solely perceptual with Is-being. 156. Has anyone, for example, ever doubted the stupendous force that is revealed in that phase of the Is-power which we designate as Will in what-we-are ? Has not all civilisation risen by the force of this will, and is it not yet sustained and progressively accelerated forward by the same force? Is it not the most powerful of all our civilising forces? Has the Universe ever given to it its verges of incapacity ? Is it not yet an increasing force? Man is "a being unable to be coerced by the whole force of the universe, against his will," 214 SPACE AND PERSONALITY to quote Sir Oliver Lodge once more. And Prof. Percy Gardner avers that " in the last result the forces of which the human universe is made up are the wills of human beings and the Divine Will which stands over against them and yet works within them" (Hib. Jour., 35. 491). But this same human 1 will ' is but a finite expression of that whole force or energy that lies behind it in the " I," so whole in itself as to give no consciousness of force or energy as science counts force. So that, if we choose to say that ' mind ' is greater than ' matter,' we must also conceive will in mind to be greater than any force in the cosmos, and greater because, in our consciousness of it, it is nearer to pure identity with space being, or what-we-are. We are all no doubt conscious that it is what-we-are that forces, energises, or wills, and we trace without hesitation all our physical, intellectual, moral, and spiritual energies home to this whole " I " ; but when all energy within us is summed up in Will, and Will becomes for the " I " what Gravitation is to the Universe, the greatest energy conceivable, and when again we seek to find a force which being greater overcomes it and so reveals Will as force, then there is nothing given us save the consciousness of what-we-are, in which we find no consciousness of force at all, but only a consciousness of Is, Being, Space. The "I," or what-we-are, becomes the whole-energy, or Resultant-Force of all our internal energies, of which Will is realised as the strongest representative. And it is proved to be an absolute resultant in that, as space-consciousness, no limit can be assigned to its force or energy. Or, putting it the other way, this Energy which conditions Will and every named energy within us, this " I," is not itself found to be conditioned, and so it enters our consciousness with Space as Whole being : Is. 157. The ordinary presupposition that "all hangs together," that each and all are somehow not only related but existentially and eternally related, is one that breaks in upon all thinking minds. Every discovery in nature reinforces it. The grandeur of the gravitation theory consists in its certifying this presupposition almost absolutely. And the very fact that its affirmation is not absolute, proves that our consciousness of Whole-Being is not created by any knowledge which man derives from any discovery SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 215 in nature, but is inherently in him before its partial corroboration by the Cosmos. It is still further proved by the fact that he is yet in search of some theory of Being to satisfy the presupposi- tion of Whole-Being which the gravitation theory cannot meet. His convictions of Being are wider than the Cosmos has yet realised for him in his experience of its discovered facts of existence. And these convictions will be found to be at the back of every discovery which has been effected in Nature, even as they are the basis of every advance in philosophy and theology. There is a force in our consciousness which frets against every fact of knowledge which asserts less than Whole-Being. And it is in this force that we obtain every consciousness of force we possess. 158. And in this connection it is worthy of notice that as the greatest known force approaches nearer and nearer to Whole-Force, it is less and less discernible as force. Light, for example, is discernible as travelling at a certain rate usually estimated at 186,000 miles per sec., whereas the force of Gravitation can only be surmised with effort as acting instan- taneously throughout the Universe, some supposing that it does travel at a rate 100,000,000 times faster than light, while others maintain that " no experiment has succeeded in demonstrating that its propagation is not instantaneous " (Poincare). The doubtful state of our knowledge of it does not permit us to assert that it is Whole- Force absolutely. Indeed, just because we assert it to be a force we cannot say it is Whole-Force ; but it is evident that the slightest step further beyond the concep- tion of such a force in motion, compels us to stand simply upon our consciousness of Space, the one consciousness in which we have no consciousness of motion or force, as science speaks, yet the one consciousness also which is possible to us as condition- ing gravitation-force in motion. And assuming that we do take this step, then we should no more have a consciousness of the force of Gravitation, but only of Is-Being, the basal con- sciousness we have for every force, as well as for its Resultant. In such a case, our consciousness of space as Whole-Force would be the same as for what-we-are : Is. 159. Locke's assertion that space has no resistance, is thus 216 SPACE AND PERSONALITY not sustained. There is nothing that can be conceived which carries in the conception of it such an absolute consciousness of whole-energy or resistance as does the consciousness of space. But necessarily, by our capacity to conceive, our common working conceptions of resistance imply no forces save spent forces, or forces that have been overcome by greater forces. But for the fact that we are conscious of their having been resisted, we should never be able to conceive them as forces at all. The Unknowable-Force, Whole-Force, is force or energy which is impossible of being revealed to us through resistance. It is Force which conditions all forces known to science, either as for the Universe or for what-we-are, and, therefore, is our most utter consciousness of Force Almighty. It is impossible for us to have a consciousness of Force-Almighty transcending this Space-Force. And we must note that it is undoubtedly here, in this great consciousness, that, in this Space-Fact, Science gives to Theology the primal attribute of her concep- tion of Deity, as that conception has been developed in history. 1 60. It must be obvious now that this consciousness of whole-energy modifies every conception associated in science with forces or energies. For example, seeing that it is impossible to conceive this whole-force as a force, and that it yields but a true consciousness, for ourselves and the universe, of space ; Is ; it thereby annuls all categories of motional energy in our consciousness of Being, and gives only a consciousness of Absolute Inertia. A conception of inertia is given us in every conscious con- ception of Body, Substance, Matter, but it is not given absolutely. It is only relative to what forces, that is, the moving force for which the inert thing waits. But as Whole- Force is a consciousness solely based in our consciousness of space, and wholly independent of such categories as Mass, Motion, Substance, Work, Matter, Body, etc., under which science conceives force or energy, the scientific conception of inertia falls to be modified also. Our consciousness of Whole-Energy is our consciousness of Is. Taken to the highest extent of our consciousness, this Is yields but a consciousness of Whole- Inertia. Inevitably. Let us set before us any 'thing.' Then, let us deprive it of its scientific Body, mass, force, etc., it SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 217 remains inert under its deprivations, always relatively inert to the force which deprives it of its quantities and qualities, until, the consciousness being also with us that nothing can be absolutely annihilated, it enters our consciousness as Space ; Is ; where we have neither consciousness of force nor of non-force, but simply one of Whole-Being. The 'thing' is then as completely under our consciousness of whole-inertia as it is under that of whole-energy. The consciousness of the thing as Space sublates its relative categories of energy and inertia in one consciousness of Being. That is to say, when we assert of a thing that it is absolutely inert, we also imply that it is absolutely blank of power to be itself. It must wait upon an Other. But our consciousness of Space is that it has no possible Other. Therefore it is impossible to assume that it waits for any other. Therefore nothing can possibly change it, or move it. Therefore it permits a consciousness of being Whole- inert-being, having no possible relation to an Other-Being to force it. 161. This result, however, is most valuable because it leads us to the consciousness which we all have of Whole-Permanence. Kant notes that in all ages every kind of living man " assumed the permanence of a substratum amidst all the changes of phenomena." This must be regarded as a most important confession. And it leads us to ask why such a consciousness should force itself upon everyone in every age, and in every experience. For if "All Flows" ; if no one has as yet dis- covered anything permanent, absolutely, how does this con- sciousness of absolute permanence persist amid every consciousness we have of unceasing change? We do not find this 'permanent substratum ' in the ultimate ' ions ' of science ; we do not find it in the ' God ' of theology, for no conception has changed oftener in human experience ; and it is not to be found in the ' Notion ' of philosophy, seeing that we are never assured that this compounded thing may not forsake its Totality and fall once more into its constituent factors. Besides, no conception of ' substance/ ' ion/ ' prothyl ' (Haeckel), * ether/ atom, etc., ever yields this consciousness of permanence absolute. Every conception of substance implies conscious change and motion, or the possibility of these. There is, at most, a relative 218 SPACE AND PERSONALITY permanence given in the fact of relative inertia. But until we include the consciousness of Space in our data of judgment, we cannot have a consciousness of Permanence Absolute, with no possibility of change to be found in it. But our consciousness of space gives us this consciousness of Whole-Permanence to the uttermost. We have a true consciousness that Space cannot, and does not, wait upon an Other. We also have a true consciousness that it cannot be changed by any force greater than itself. We likewise have an unalterable consciousness that Space-Is, and that this Is-Being persists immovably under every consciousness of all that Flows, and such a consciousness of Almightiness and Unchangeableness, or of Whole-Energy and Whole-Inertia, necessarily forces us to a consciousness of Whole-Permanence. And it is given easily without the necessity of assuming " the permanence of a substratum " con- ceivable as some ' Substance.' For we always have this consciousness of whole-permanence for What-z^^-are ; wholeness which yet has no hint in it of parts as its constituent factors. Space alone, then, as a consciousness, must be regarded as that which yields this consciousness of Whole-Permanence to every man, fool or philosopher, because he also has the consciousness of himself as Space. And we have tried to point out that this it is which also gives us that consciousness of the imperviousness and impenetrableness of the ' I ' which negates every assertion of parts or possibility of parts in our personality (see 100). And this consciousness of Whole- Resistance, or of Being which has no greater kind of Being behind it, is again accompanied by the consciousness of its Boundlessness. Nothing can be conceived as passing outside of space. Our consciousness of space resists every attempt on our part to place anything where space is not. For as soon as we say ' where ' we say * space.' 162. Every conception of change, therefore, is conditioned in the far deeper consciousness of space-permanence, and is sublated by that consciousness. And it is under this conscious- ness of Whole-Permanence that all motions and changes by which we note Time are created. Without this consciousness of Whole-Permanence, motion or change would find no ultimate reference except to some other motion or change, and such SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 219 references would never pass beyond the conceptions of some ' substratum ' which was moved or changed by some force beyond itself. In the consciousness of ourselves, this conscious- ness of change is given in our motions of thought. Without thought it would be impossible to cognise motion or change in ourselves. But thought always yields a consciousness of sequence and time, relative to a far deeper consciousness of what-we-are, in which we cannot find either Time or Change. Therefore we cannot, as Kant attempted, place our consciousness of Time on the same level of our consciousness of Space, as if they were twin-consciousnesses arising out of some ' substratum ' which was different from either. 163. Moreover, we see now how impossible it is to fix down Something and Nothing as the necessary and permanent 1 factors ' in our thought of Being. The usual content of Something is, ultimately, Quality and Quantity, and the usual content of ' Nothing ' is the complete absence of Quality and Quantity. In the case of the latter, Hegel maintained that Being ceased ! This again is the ' Nothing ' out of which it was supposed Creation was created and made " in the beginning." On the contrary, both ' Something ' and ' Nothing,' as these have been conceived in content of meaning, are both negated in the consciousness of Space-Being. When all consciousness of ' Qualities ' and ' Quantities ' has ceased, the Is-consciousness still abides, independent of their presence or absence. Something gives a consciousness that it is, but Nothing also gives this same consciousness that it is, and while each may have a different content for thought, each has the same value in fo-ing. 164. It is clear then that the space-consciousness, as one of Whole-Permanence and Unchangeableness (the supposed meaning of Yakwe, Enc. Bib., p. 3322), is the root consciousness for the theological " Same to-day, yesterday, and forever," for the philosophical " Negative which negates all negation in an absolute affirmative," and for the assumed " Uniformity of Nature," upon which all science is postulated. This last, the Uniformity of Nature, were indeed an impossible consciousness unless we had a fixed consciousness of the uniformity of Nature along with ourselves ; and such a consciousness, at bottom, 220 SPACE AND PERSONALITY means a uniform consciousness of space-being for both. It is also clear that in this identical consciousness of space-being all their differences are sublated in Whole-Consciousness of Being which, notwithstanding their varying conceptions of it, has no hint in it of necessary and permanent parts and divisions. 165. Our realisation or experience of Force or Energy, as we have hinted in 160, must now surpass the conception of force or energy with which Science makes us familiar. Strictly, the conception of Energy which we obtain from Science is one of dying force ; energy open to be overcome ; energy fading from its height of power ; and its point of view is never one that shows us Energy increasing from less to more but as from more to less. By the very assumption that Force equals Mass multiplied by its acceleration, such Force is held in the grip of finite conditions, and cannot rise to a conception of itself as independent of either conceptions of corporeity or its movements. Such a Force or Energy is cut off from any common basis which the " Unity of the Universe " might demand for energy of * Matter ' and energy of ' Mind.' The law of Gravitation, for example, which binds the worlds together is not supposed to have the slightest connection with the laws of thought or Moral Law. These are all indeed ' forms of Energy,' and acknowledged to be such by the coercive forces which they wield experientially over the world of men, but no common basis is conceivable for them except in such vague and indefinite ideas as ' uniformity of nature,' ' God,' ' Notion,' ' Fate,' ' Necessity,' ' Destiny,' ' Chance,' and such like, every one of which finds not the least recognition, in our consciousness, of being as real as we are ourselves. We have a consciousness of Energy in our I-consciousness compared with which the Energy or Force which Science equates with Mass, multiplied by its acceleration, is a mere bagatelle, even when that Mass is the total Universe, and its Motion is immeasurable, and unimaginable. It is this consciousness in us that calmly says, " Heaven and Earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away." And what both philosophers and theologians have to assert and affirm with all their strength, and not merely to assume timidly, is that the Energy or Force of the scientists is not Force at all, but Force or Energy passing SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 221 into weakness, as streams that die in the ocean, or as meteors dissipating themselves in combustion. The consciousness of Energy which has an infinite crescendo towards Whole-Energy, and not that consciousness of Energy which gives only an infinite diminuendo of weakness to our conceptions, is the true interpreter of our I-consciousness, and consequently also the real interpreter of what Energy should mean ultimately both for the Universe and ourselves. And this consciousness is one fully sustained by our common experience. Matters, Masses, Motions, great or small, are all Flowing, Fleeting away, coming from ' somewhere ' and going to ' somewhere/ and confessing as they come and go that eternal abiding is not in themselves. Self-determined, self- regulated, self-subsistent, not one of them has the least intention of professing. Nay, we know them to be so weak by the consciousness of power which we are conscious we possess, and which not one of their forces can measure or overcome. It is the ever-widening experience of man that the feeblest of his forces is on a level with their highest scientific force, and that in him resides such Force as subdues all of their powers and energies to his commonest services. But while we speak in this way, as of divisions of forces, there is really no consciousness in man that difference or division exists between the forces which science interprets and that which with crescendo-force stands up in him unsubduably to say " I." On the contrary, every power in Nature is with increasing distinctness seeking to declare itself as identical in nature and process with that Energy which is revealed in man by his I-consciousness. The centuries are steadily lessening the width of gulf which man's ignorance of his own ' personality ' has cleft between them. And more and more as universal force is brought under the light of whole-force, as man is conscious of it in his conscious- ness of himself, will the fact be made apparent that our fundamental consciousness of Energy, Force, Power, Might, is not based in the ' Matters ' and ' Motions ' of Science at all, but in that consciousness of Whole-Being which is as interpretable by the term ' Space ' as it is by that of " I." Shall we be tolerated then by the tired reader, when we once again require to say that it is the space-consciousness alone, of all we are conscious, that resists Thought ? Did not 222 SPACE AND PERSONALITY Kant tell us of this immense fact, yet only to push it aside, and discuss Existence independently of it ? Space abides the struggle of the Thought-forces, he was sure, although they may retaliate by contemptuously stigmatising it as " Empty"! 1 66. Are we not called upon to be bolder in these days and to maintain that nothing gives us a realisation of strength equal to space? Even the strongest thing seems willow- weak by comparison. It is indeed to compare * finite ' with ' infinite ' Force. For in space, the stupendous thing we contemplate as the total Universe rests itself and is upheld, as the sleeping child rests in and is upheld by the arms of the Mother. In what, save Space, can it conceivably rest? Have we any alternative conception ? Here are myriad ' Matters ' and 1 Motions,' not one of which we are able to conceive as inde- pendent of the Space in which each moves, nor capable of existence at all save as Space conditions each, and yet we boldly stigmatise Space as ' empty,' and refuse it a place in our data of judging Existence, either considered as a 'particular' or as a ' Total.' How blasphemous we must seem, then, when in the profound consciousness of this space-being, we attempt to show that out of it comes our true conception of what Personality itself means, either when we name it * Man ' or ' God,' and that our conception of Almighty Power is solely given us by the consciousness we have of it. When we contemplate, as we are able, in our ignorance and un- worthiness, mountain and earth and sea ; the great earth itself as a tiny spot in a stupendous system of mighty worlds ; and these all as bound by one vast Force of gravitation to other stupendous systems of worlds ; and then try to compass in imagination the vastitude of the immeasurable and incom- prehensible ALL in whose sphere Whole-Power moves and works, then it is that the infinite series of forces known of Science, each carrying its delegated burden of existence, is seen to converge and co-ordinate upon the Whole Majestic Power we feebly name Space the grand resultant Force of every force known to or conceivable by us. 167. Nothing truly that the human being can contemplate, save space, gives such an appalling and awful sense of eternal SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 223 strength. One can imagine surely that Kant's wonderment over the starry worlds without him and the Moral Law within, might have received a considerable increase of emotion if he had included space in the scope of his vision of the Universe (last section of Kritik der praktischen Vernunff). For Space, in our consciousness, is the unique or sublime con- sciousness. And its sublimity is only partially felt when, each for himself, we bring into touch with it any the highest conception of anything we account high or great. For all that is ; the infinitesimally little as the infinitely great ; moving through birth and death, time and eternity, as we usually conceive these ; is, to us, in its being and place, because the space-consciousness gives to it and to each that thinks it, a common consciousness of Being. The grandeur of the term ' GOD ' is itself only possible of adequate apprehension when we interpret it through the space - consciousness. And we shall see that our Lord gave to this God-term its highest content and interpretation through this consciousness alone. Is it not ordinary experimental knowledge that we can always cover the conception ' GOD ' with that of Space, but can in no-wise cover the term ' SPACE ' with that of ' God ' ? The conception of ' Godl as we can think it, must ever depend for its fulness on the consciousness which we all have of space. For we conceive Him as a * Person,' and a Person must be limited by space. And it is similar with all our conceptions. If we objectify them, if we name them Universe, Nature, Person, Law, Man, God, Heaven, Earth, etc., we condition, circumscribe, limit, and space-surround them, and leave ourselves simply the Space- Presence as the sublation in our consciousness of the Whole, of which these are but imperfect representations. 1 68. If the reader has followed us thus far, it should not be difficult now to estimate the argument that no force can direct itself. No force of which science is cognizant gives any answer to the question why it should take one direction in preference to any other. It is not self-determined. The motions of the Universe are observed to be constant and universal, and the * universality of the laws of the universe,' by which these motions are defined, have been accepted by science as indisputable. " Force produces motion," has also 224 SPACE AND PERSONALITY been so accepted. But what is not accepted is that the motion is determined by the force. For it cannot be shown that any force directs itself. " The simple truth is," says Croll, in his * What determines Molecular Force/ " in attempting to account for the determination of motion by referring it to a force, we are attempting an absolute impossibility." Now, we have seen that our consciousness of even the force of gravitation is a consciousness of a force which claims no Wholeness of Being for itself, and is a consciousness in which this great force is seen as sublated by a consciousness of Force which does claim to be Whole-Force, and that this consciousness of Whole-Force is our immediate consciousness of Space, the immediate consciousness of ourselves. There- fore, by the absolute force of this consciousness, we are shut up to the attribution of sole direction of all forces of the Universe to this Whole-Power, just as we are shut up to the attribution of sole direction of our bodily, mental, and moral forces to the I-Force of which we have only a space-consciousness. 169. When, therefore, scientists seek through each force- physical, chemical, molecular, atomic, electronic, or however it may be termed for the directing force of that force, or for the influencing power which can be construed as its directive power, they are doing something very similar to that which is done by the investigators of Mind when they try to find in sensation, thought, or will, the 'Self which determines these. Neither scientist nor psychologist, in such procedure, ever rises above the * Flow ' of the All, or the consciousness of Motion. Now, we must first reach a consciousness which has no hint of either Motion or Matter in it, that is, the space-consciousness, before we can sublate all motions as conditioned in it, and therefore all forces which such motions connote. No motion and no force, not even the highest scientific force of gravitation, ever gives us a consciousness of self-determined being. The thing we con- ceive to exist, always reveals more than we can conceive to be itself; and always as determined by an Other; and, in the final consciousness of Being, this Other is Space. Now, this consciousness alone gives wholeness to our consciousness of Being, and as Being which is self-determined. Therefore SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 225 whatever we conceive to exist must be conceived as determined by this space-consciousness, that is, as what we conceive it to be of ' motion ' and ' force.' For everything traces its being to this Being, and to be nothing apart from this Being. Therefore, the conclusion is obvious. If any thing is, its being is Wif-being ; 'sent' being; and given-being is determined- being, and all determined-being is undoubtedly directed-being. Therefore, every conception of a thing as subsumed in Whole- Being connotes necessarily whole-direction by the same. Intention, purpose, will, motions, forces, powers, influences, of every conceivable name, must therefore be regarded as the fragmentary conceptions of our thought from whose data of judgments of such things, the conscious datum of space-being which gives Whole-Being, has been forcibly thrust out. Just as we are not able to realise that thought, feeling, or will, can be directed save as by I-, or space-being, so likewise we are unable to conceive that any ' motion ' or * force ' in heaven or in earth, can receive direction save as from Whole-Being ; Is : Space- Being. 170. In this connection we may now briefly consider Force under the predicate of Law, with special reference to Moral Law. Physical law, mental law, moral law, all laws or motions of being, must now be regarded as under the sublation of Space or Whole-Law. And this is the conception of Law which at the same time we cannot conceive to be possible of resistance or of contradiction, or of being disobeyed. As a matter of fact, nothing in the Universe can ever find a way by which space can be disobeyed. Space cannot be sinned against. That is to say, Ought-to-be cannot rise higher as commanding something beneath itself. Ought-to-Be and Being are a Whole conscious- ness. Or, stating it differently, the 'law' we are conscious of, as having been sinned against, continually refers itself for its power to some higher power. Its rewards or punishments are not in its own hands, but are given by a higher power according to the report which such Maw' makes regarding those who obey or disobey. Clearly, then, such ' law ' is limited, and it is due to the fact of its limitation that it is possible to obey or disobey it. Whole-Law by the fact of its not being limited, rises above the sphere where obedience and disobedience are P 226 SPACE AND PERSONALITY possible, and where Is and Ought-to-be are but Whole- consciousness of space-being. And every known 'law/ as a conscious form of Force, thus becomes sublated in our conscious- ness of Whole-Force. Or, all consciousness of direction, which necessarily means limited ' law '-direction, or direction by limited ' law ' or force, becomes sublated in our consciousness of Whole- Direction, Whole-Law, Whole-Force, or Whole-Being. There- fore, as we shall try to show more fully below, when we truly stand in the space-consciousness we have not the slightest consciousness of being either ' good ' or ' bad,' ' righteous ' or ' sinful.' Our consciousness of what we ought-to-be is sublated in our consciousness of Be-ing, i.e. the fulness of the conscious- ness Is, beyond which no consciousness of being is possible. The I-Am consciousness is then whole, unlimited, knows no ' law,' and cannot be characterised further by any additional predicates. And clearly, it is on the basis of this consciousness that the true absolute forgiveness of sins is possible. In this con- sciousness of what -we -are, our sins are not merely 'passed over,' ' covered ' up, hidden, obliviated, ' paid for.' For such conceptions imply transactions between Two. Two Beings make ' arrangements, as it were. But the space-consciousness of what-we-are makes such conceptions impossible. Being in it is whole. And the I-consciousness, being space-consciousness, rises into whole-being where all differences are sublated for even our thought, and sin becomes an impossible conception. It cannot exist in this consciousness. Hence the truth, " Except ye believe that I-Am, ye shall die in your sins." In some way, by one path or other, if we cannot reach a consciousness where sin-difference is sublated, and where the very conception of sin, wrong, imperfection, or sense of law-broken, is impossible to us, we must inevitably suffer the conception of death under the consciousness of a menacing Ought-to-be. The Master rose into the I-consciousness, and there found no consciousness of ' sin,' nor any ' law '-limitations, all of which were transcended in His consciousness of Whole- God-Being. And this is the force of forces underlying all His teaching, as we shall try to show below, concerning Whole-Being, or, ' God,' as Unresisting- Being, Being who has not, and never has had, anything against any one. * He ' and ' We ' are ' He ' and ' We ' no more. There SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 227 is only Whole-Being. All conceptual ' direction ' also dis- appears in its limitations of being, and has no longer a place in our consciousness. But our conception of a Law involves our freedom to obey it, and also the possession of power, or energy, to fulfil its commands. We have seen that our idea of energy arises from a consciousness of resistance, and the idea of resistance to arise from a consciousness of being free to put forth energy. If we did not act we would never know resistance, and if we had no consciousness of freedom, we would never act at all But this only carries the problem further back to the question, How comes our idea of freedom ? And we reply that Space- Being, while it clearly yields our consciousness of Whole-Energy even as our I-consciousness yields our consciousness of conative force, yields likewise our consciousness of Whole- Freedom. On no other basis is it possible to interpret that absolute freedom of which we are all conscious. If we suppose, for example, that man is not conscious of Whole-Being, but only of divided being, then he never can be free from the possibilities of the other. He may have freedom under conditions ', but not the absolute freedom of which he is conscious. And to have such a consciousness, it must be assumed that he is conscious of not being othered absolutely. But in his consciousness of space-being he is assured of whole-being and consequently also of absolute, or whole-freedom. Choice, as an experience, does not therefore arise into experience with our consciousness of what -we -are, but only with the imperfect consciousness of what-we-are as othered- being ; one ; and personal. We have no choice, e.g., as to whether or not we shall develop from the protoplasmic cell, whether or not we shall take that form at all, or whether or not we shall be beings. We have not the refusal of being. Choice does not exist, because neither at that stage nor at present, have we the remotest consciousness of being one- or unit-being, and othered by Being not us. We are not there- fore under force to be, although 'force' arises conceptually out of our being. Our consciousness is purely ' I ' : Is ; with no consciousness of ' force ' except of Energy Whole. 171. No consciousness of obstruction, or impeding force, is 228 SPACE AND PERSONALITY to be found in this consciousness. The space-consciousness alone gives the highest consciousness of Freedom. Whole-being is not Othered, that is, by any driving Necessity. And this is the consciousness of Freedom which man has always possessed. It is the basal consciousness which begets all other forms of freedom familiar to us as social, civic, religious, or otherwise. Man himself is free from the otherness of any being in that he is conscious of Whole- or Space-being. He is Bemg-Yrze, and has not merely freedom conferred upon him under " laws." Why then, it may be asked, arises the consciousness of limitation ? Because, we answer, the Space-consciousness gives as full freedom for a consciousness of Limit as of the Unlimit. Space-Being is the limit. We are conscious of space as limit. We have no consciousness of desiring or needing freedom beyond space. There is nothing in the conscious being of man that desires more for itself, in the absolute fulness of his desires, than what his space -being receives in be'mg space. In his space-being his freedom is whole, and his consciousness of his limit is reached in the consciousness that it is whole. Our limit lies in the absolute fulness of our being ; but, as space- being, this consciousness subsumes both relatives, limit and unlimit, in one of wholeness. It is in this view that we are able to understand how every- thing in the realm of Nature only realises its true nature in the consciousness of being space. For space is basal for every conception of " Nature" It is also in this view that we under- stand how everything in the universe is under the consciousness of a possible freedom of transformation into all else that is possible. All freely goes through all ; all possible changes are possible for all. The space-consciousness, being basal for all being, renders this consciousness necessary. Being is Whole. But we must abide in space. We have no consciousness of being, except space -being. We must abide as space. Hence it is that we cannot conceive a force, a will, or a motion, even when we put these into the high concept-form of ' God,' as being independent of space. Every consciousness, as every conception, is conditioned in our consciousness of space-being. And it is for this reason that we always have a consciousness of boundless^ absolute freedom, at the same time that we have a consciousness of absolute limitation of liberty. It must also be apparent that SPACE AS WHOLE-ENERGY 229 the much-debated antithesis between Freedom and Necessity exists only far below and outside of our space-consciousness. When indeed the space-consciousness is accepted into the problem, every antithesis vanishes, and reason comes to her own. CHAPTER VIII SPACE AND THE ATTRIBUTES OF DEITY. IS. ALMIGHTY. OMNISCIENCE. OMNIPRESENCE. INFINITE. UNITY. VALUE. GOOD. SUBSTANCE. CAUSE. BEAUTY, OR GLORY. 172. The root-consciousness out of which the Thought of Man has evolved and developed his great conceptions of Deity, past and present, is unquestionably the Is-Consciousness. Neces- sarily so, for no conception of ' God,' as Being, ever transcends our consciousness of Is-Being in value. To Be y is the ultimate statement which can possibly be made of even ( God.' And it is this consciousness which we also possess for what-we-are. Therefore, it follows that not even our consciousness of ' God ' transcends the value of Being of which we are conscious. Fundamentally, we cannot think differently of ' God '-Being and of what-we-are. That is to say, our consciousness of God- Being and of what-we-are is, so far, an identical consciousness of same-being. It is for this reason that God-being and what-we- are can then be conceived as one-being, or God-Man-being. But when we realise that this identical consciousness of same- being is identically one of space- being, then the same consciousness realises God-Being, Man-Being, and All-Being, as not only same-being, and Unit-being, but Whole-Being. Is- Being is thus realised also as Whole-Value. Similarly, all conceptual ' attributes ' of Being which have been ascribed to God-Being spring from the Is-Consciousness ; the consciousness of what-we-are. No doubt, it seems at first almost blasphemous to say that the ' attribute ' of Almightiness strictly belongs to what-we-are. But we are never conscious, and the world in its long history never has been conscious, of a greater power than is given in the consciousness of the SPACE AND THE ATTRIBUTES OF DEITY 231 Space- 1 consciousness. There is no power in Nature, as we have tried to show in the previous chapter, which transcends the power of which we are conscious in being space-being. And as this power is Whole-Power, it is impossible for the human mind to conceive a greater. Therefore, for all our conceptions (and we must remember that even ' God ' is but a conception in all Religions), this consciousness of Space-Being is fundamental for the ' attribute ' of Almightiness. The reason, perhaps, why we despair of claiming this and similar deistic ' attributes ' for ourselves, is found in making our narrow conceptions of all we have realised of Being to be the complete measurement of our consciousness of what-we-are. We must put this method completely aside. For our conscious- ness of what-we-are has never yet been wholly realised through any conception of our knowledge. For example, no conception of the tree-being ever transcends our consciousness of the seed -being from which it is realised. The being of the tree simply unfolds to sense and understanding somewhat of seed- being, but nothing the tree ever realises can transcend the Is-Being given in our consciousness of what-it-is as space-being. So also the original Nebula of the Solar System knew itself to be, and infinitely more to be, than any of its evolved and developed parts of Sun and Planets have ever realised of Being through our conceptions of them. On the contrary, we are only slowly realising through our blurred and imperfect conceptions somewhat of the Being which our consciousness assures us lay in the original Nebula. So also when Jesus said " It is finished," He expressed a conscious knowledge of His being and work which never can be surpassed by the actual historical development of Christianity through all time as a realised product. In like manner it appears to be the acme of absurdity to say that in our consciousness of what-we-are as space-being, we already know more infinitely than we can ever possibly know through the instruments of conceptuality. It is true, however, that in our consciousness of Is-Being as Whole-Being we have knowledge which never can be surpassed or transcended by any knowledge which we may yet realise by our c categories of the understanding.' Omniscience, therefore, as an 'attribute' of Being, cannot now be viewed as merely an attribute of a 232 SPACE AND PERSONALITY Unit- Being whose limitless conceptual knowledge might be compared with the fractional knowledge of other unit-beings. To be conscious of what-we-are as space-being must be regarded as knowledge which sublates and transcends all conceptually absolutely. No realisation of what-we-are, of what ' God ' is, or of what the Universe is, can possibly add to the knowledge-worth which is given in that consciousness. In reality, we are always conscious that each conception of our knowledge of these ' beings ' is constantly rebuked and corrected by this consciousness of Space- Being. And in the same plane of reasoning, it must be evident that this consciousness of what-we-are, as space-being, compels us also to give a far wider and far fuller meaning to the term Omnipresence than as connoting merely an intimate contactual presence of an All- Thing or Person, with every other thing or person, which is, or is yet to be, held as existentially isolated from Itself. There cannot now, with such a consciousness, be any conception of Otherness in such presential Being. Our true consciousness is of Whole-Being. Here, There, and Where, are terms inapplicable. They become subsumed in our con- sciousness of Whole-Being-Space. These terms are only conceivable as true when we first affirm our conceptions of being to be as absolute as our consciousness of Being, that is, of Space-Being. But lest, in so reasoning, we should offend traditionary religious susceptibilities, and lest it should be said that we are abolishing ( God,' we must remind the reader that we are only dealing here with the imperfect conceptions of ' God/ and trying to correct by higher truth the ' attributes ' upon which such imperfect conceptions have been built. For if by the term ' God ' we mean Highest Being, then no conception can be adequate to express it, and a final interpretation of it can only be made through our ultimate consciousness of Is-Being ; that is, through our consciousness of what-we-are, as Space-Being- Whole. And we do not think that we assume any method contrary to this highest consciousness. For it is the reader's own experience that he never has a consciousness of any bounds to Is-Being, i.e., to his I-consciousness. His I-conscious- ness ever stands above all he knows, or is capable of knowing, as its test of reality, and final guarantor of truth. He is never SPACE AND THE ATTRIBUTES OF DEITY 233 conscious of any bounds to his knowledge, therefore, of vvhat- he-is; Is-Being; which is connotative of All -knowledge. It is a consciousness indeed which, as a matter of experience, expresses itself in a boundless desire to realise more and more knowledge of What- Is. We have not the remotest consciousness tJiat our capacity for knowledge may come to an end. But this is really a consciousness that all knowledge lies within our grasp, though we may not, unto the ages of the ages, ever realise it absolutely in our conceptual limitations of knowledge. It is the boundless Space-Being which we are that so speaks. We are therefore only trying to remove ' God ' from the limits of logical conceptions, concepts, and conceptities all of them children of our space-spread ( 89) to a truer consciousness of Being worthier of our reverence, and more in harmony with the consciousness we have of what-we-are. And we shall hope to show that this was the grand work of the Great Master Himself. Otherwise men could never have been able to realise that a man like themselves was ' equal with God,' and ' was God,' and who, having nothing, could yet affirm, "All things have been delivered unto me of my Father." Surely the potentiality of omniscience is plainly assumed in such expressions, " There is nothing covered up, that shall not be revealed ; and hid, that shall not be known " ; "I know whence I came and whither I go " ; " He shall guide you into all the truth." With but the 'attributes' of a man he also claims the 'attributes' of God; and there is a basal consciousness of Being in Him which enables Him to do so in the purest forms of rationality. Omniscience never transcends Is-Being as we are conscious of it. " I am " is self-predicative, the superlative characteristic of the Jesus-Consciousness, and is therefore omniscient of what-Is. The ' I am ' consciousness is the guarantee that omniscience is real, rational, and experiential. Moreover, the claim He makes for Himself He also makes for all men. e'mg. 250 SPACE AND PERSONALITY The consciousness of space-being and our consciousness of its whole-worth, or infinite value, is therefore the foundation of every Ethic. Every standard of Perfection of Being, or Conduct, must conform ultimately to this consciousness of Space-Goodness. For no judgment of man concerning perfec- tion can transcend it. Every worth or Good in Nature, as well as every Good in man or in * God,' as we are able to think these concepts, is relative and secondary to this absolute Good of Space. And as we know Good and Evil as relatives, it follows that the consciousness of this Absolute Value, or Good, is more than what we can conceive as Good. It is the absolute basis upon which, and with reference to which, our finite and relative conceptions of Good and Evil are formed. An absolute Good cannot be compared, for example, with an absolute Evil, in this sense, for this would mean that we might have two absolutes. Therefore, the Good of Being is beyond characterisation as either Good or Evil, even as Space is. It is only conceivable as Absolute Beatitude. No fault can be found in the Universe because no fault can be found in its Ultimate Being, i.e. Space. All ' relationship ' lies far below this level of Being, and conse- quently, all conceptions also of Good and Evil, Sin and Right- eousness. This is the consciousness of Being in which such ethical concepts are sublated and disappear. It is also this consciousness of Being that determines what the absolute Ought in Life and Character really means. There lies in the being of everything, an absolute standard of Value for itself, which consciously or unconsciously fixes the varying ideals of character and conduct as through the evolution of the ages that standard dawns upon the discerning minds of all. And that standard necessarily lies in the Absolute Being, the Space-Being, or IS. To a man, certainly, there can never be a higher conception of Goodness than is given in Being itself, as we have just shown in the Value he gives it. To Be, sums up and swallows up our every conception of Good. Conversely every conception other than this one must be, by comparison, more or less definable ethically as ( Evil.' There is truly no good but whole-Good. The supreme value therefore being one identical with supreme-being, or our supreme consciousness of being, the self-we-are, or Space-Being, it follows that our consciousness of SPACE AND THE ATTRIBUTES OF DEITY 251 the greatest ' Evil ' will always refer itself to this standard of Good. The abstraction, or withdrawal of Being, or what amounts in our consciousness to an abstraction of Being, that is DEATH, will consequently always seem to us as the greatest Evil. Hell, Devil, Satan, Wrath of God, are all terms which fundamentally denote deprivation of Being. For life denoting existence is construed as deprivation of being when it passes through the experience of death. But as there is always in man a consciousness of space-existence, or existence-absolute, he is never permitted to conceive the death of the body here as final, and so he projects his consciousness of evil in this world into the world ' beyond.' "Death eternal" therefore is his supreme conception of Evil. At bottom, it is a consciousness negatively expressed of how supremely valuable Being is, and how awful anything approaching to deprivation of it would mean. And from this conception it is a natural deduction that as long as men do not conceive their being to be identical with Space- Being, this fear must abide as a power over them. When we realise that the consciousness of our being space, carries in it the ultimate consciousness of deathlessness, as well as of absolute perfection, seeing that only in the space-consciousness is the sinless, deathless consciousness possible, all fear of absolute annihilation, and of eternal continuance of evil, will vanish. For we can conceive change, decay, death, as overwhelming all things, but we cannot conceive this of Space. Space does not die, nor can be conceived as possible of death, dissolution, or change. So likewise Space is the absolutely Sinless realm. And it is this consciousness of absolute purity of Space that always determines, at bottom, our consciousness of the absolute rectitude of what we call Nature. For Space is the ultimate of Nature-Being. When space-being is not included in our judgments of Nature, nature falls under the same baneful relativities of ' good ' and ' evil ' as man himself, and it becomes then impossible to predicate absolute rectitude of anything. Theology having been, hitherto, based upon the objectified * God,' and not upon the consciousness of ' God ' given us through Space-Being, every consciousness in man regarding his relation to his God has, as a consequence, been overshadowed and finitised. God is conceived as One, and man as quite an Other one. God is localised as a resident in some far-off realm, as a 252 SPACE AND PERSONALITY King or Judge, or Law-giver ; and deemed to be in perpetual strife re-adjusting all that His creatures are or have been perpetually putting wrong. Relationship also is never perfect between them, because the Being of Him and them is never conceived as identical. Show men that, according to the deepest testimony of their consciousness of themselves, they have common Being with all that Is, and the conception of an absolute relationship, perfect and indisruptible, arising out of that testimony, must follow. This result, however, can only be attained by an interpretation of both the Beings of ' God ' and Man through the Space-consciousness. The objectified ' God ' of Theology will then pass from our consciousness, and the true * God ' will then be seen to be the nearest of all to us, to be far from the function of judgment, for Space does not judge, and to be all that Space Is, Almighty, Infinite, Real, True, and Good absolutely. And we hope to be able to show below that the unique consciousness of Jesus moves upon this basis, and alone explains his unique conception of Personality, 'human' and ' divine,' and every predicate which He employs with regard to both. Substance. I So. In such a view, it will be also perfectly rational now to bring into our categories those of * Substance ' and ' Cause ' which have been slowly eliminated lately from thinking minds. To us this fact is only another proof of the tremendous force that resides in the Space-Consciousness when in order to realise itself in the human thought, it must necessarily thrust out of the human intellect every category which seems to oppose it. This is freely acknowledged by thinkers who are compelled by their fundamental postulates to renounce ' Substance ' and 1 Cause ' from their data. " So strong is the sense of the reality of consciousness, and so persistent the influence of the ghost- theory in determining the way in which its reality shall be conceived, that in every age some of the greatest philosophers have striven to establish or re-establish the position that consciousness, thought, or the Ego is a substance " {Metaphysics of Nature, Prof. Carveth-Read, p. 219). That is to say, What-we-are seems the most substance-full SPACE AND THE ATTRIBUTES OF DEITY 253 consciousness we possess, and if substance is to be found any- where it ought to be What-we-are. But we cannot have a consciousness of any quality or quantity in What-we-are in order to conceive it as Substance, and hence the difficulty of affixing the category of substance to What-we-are. " When we speak of substance" says Prof. W. Wallace (Kant, p. 175), "we wean only what persists or abides in time, and we contrast the permanent with the changes of its phases. But the substance is not a separate thing over and above its modes or manifestations. It is simply that change or alteration cannot be understood except in reference to something permanent. It is easy then to say that substance is a fiction of thought : Kant's reply to that charge is, that to treat successive sensations as having one source common to them (what we must constantly do in our experience), implies, as a ground of its possibility, an identity or persistency in the consciousness which serves as the common vehicle of the successive feelings. Unless tJiought supplied this persistent, permanent background, it would be impossible for us to realise the relations in time known as succession and simultaneity" (italics ours). Here 'sensations' are traced to a 'common source,' and this implies an ' identity or persistency in the consciousness,' and our Thought is the creator of this ' identity ' ! We have no doubt about the ' persistency ' in our consciousness, but we have never a consciousness of our Thought as creating or supplying anything. Thought, as motion, is itself supplied and created. Our consciousness of this ' persistency ' lies far deeper than Thought, and is only found in our consciousness of Space- Being. 1 8 1. As we have seen ( 106), Quality is supposed to reveal Quantity, and Quantity is believed to rest upon the deeper category of Substance, taking Substance to have the content which Spinoza assumed for it. Now, no quality, " mode, or mani- festation," ever gives a consciousness of substance for itself, and consequently it never leads us to an actual substance. What we usually do is to assume that such and such a quality, mode, or manifestation, is associated with such and such a substance, and that this substance really exists. It is pure supposition. The quality, etc., never connects itself with the real Substance. As 254 SPACE AND PERSONALITY soon as we test the quality, and compel it to yield up the Sub- stance which it pretends to reveal, it immediately disappears. No ' object ' is left ; and then it is said, " It has ceased to be." In reality, we have then got to the true basis of the ' Object's ' Is-ness. Something still Is, although the quality, mode, or manifestation has failed to remain with it. And to know this Something, it was expedient that the quality should 'go away.' If we were just to the facts of this consciousness, we should realise that the quality, etc., in going away, was, ipso facto, revealing its real Substance, viz., Space-Being. There is indeed an absolute necessity that all qualities and quantities should go away, or vanish, if Reality, Substance, is to stand forth clear in our consciousness of it. That which we-are is never so consciously all that we mean by Reality, Substance, or Being, as when it is impossible for us to put a finger or a thought upon one of its 'qualities.' And it is just here where we find the reason for our consciousness of the indestructibleness of Substance, even when all its qualities are ' taken away.' What- it-is, is really Space-Substance ; what-we-are. And as a con- sequence we can no more conceive our own annihilation than of anything that exists. We are compelled to consider space- being as ultimate, or rather, w/z Light itself, but only in Space. After descanting on the " effects of calm and luminous distance" on the mind of the spectator, as perhaps " the most singular and memorable of which he has been conscious" he says " It is not then by noble form, it is not by positive- ness of hue, it is not by intensity of light (for the sun at noon- day is effectless upon the feelings), that this strange distant space possesses its attractive power. But there is one that it has, or suggests, which no other object of sight suggests in equal degree, and that is, Infinity. It is of all visible things the least material, the least finite, the farthest withdrawn from the earth prison-house, the most typical of the nature of God, the most suggestive of the glory of His dwelling place" (Mod. Paint., Part iii. sec. i. c.v. 5) (italics ours). 1 86. In this passage, it is apparent that every term fails the great Art Critic to express what he wants to say about Space. 264 SPACE AND PERSONALITY For space is not visible nor material, nor finite, nor withdrawn from the earth, nor a type of anything, although it does give the ' most suggestive ' suggestion * of the Glory ' of the Highest. It is likewise not to be expressed as * Infinite,' as that which is merely relative to the ' Finite ' of the Schools. Neither is it ' space- distance I which we have seen to be objective and finite enough, although he oddly calls it ' distant space ! ' Whole-Being is evidently what Ruskin means. And as such, there is indeed no Beauty to be compared to the beauty of Space. It is the charm within and behind and beyond all form and colour, and it is this because it best reveals the Self to itself, through all the powers of itself. What-we-are finds in Space-being, and only in Space-being, the most complete reflection of its own space- loveliness, the glory of Being independent of Objectivity. It is a common experience, felt by everyone, that something attracts one towards masses, forms, lines, curved or straight ; to gradations, proportions ; symmetrical material of every shape ; colours of all variety and tone. But the beauty of such is but borrowed. Absolutely, it stands before us always in the unmediated Space-being we pass by unheeded. Landscapes, seascapes, rock-scenery, stone-structure, the human form, or any form, all and every ' object ' which we call beautiful, is so because of what it has taken from Space. In our usual limited way of judging, we place the emphasis of beauty on the Object. Art is usually satisfied with this accomplishment. It really belongs to that Space-being without which the Object could neither be, nor appear. The Object, in every case, both as Form and as Colour, but mediates the beauty of space to us, or raises us to realise ourselves in Whole -Being -Beauty. And only when we realise Reality can we realise Whole-Beauty : Glory Absolute. But in actual fact, no artist need ever hope to draw space, or give Space through art-forms. As Ruskin hints, it can, at most, be a suggestion. It is not possible to press the most meagre point of space-being within the limits of art. This is the reason why nearly all artists come short in even suggesting the space-mystery and beauty of the eye. Straight line of eyelash is blended with the curved lines of the eye itself, and both with the delicately graded colour of the iris. But there is a line-less, colourless space given in the pupil, SPACE AN 7 D THE ATTRIBUTES OF DEITY 265 which is the despair of all artists, and which the sculptor is most fortunate to be able to intimate or suggest by an efficient curve and hollow space. It is where the infinite mystery of the space-being is seen as identical with space, the purely absolute beautiful, seeing that no mediating 'matter' comes between the spectator and itself. If it were possible to see space, this is where we should see it. And when rightly seen, then the infinite, the divine, the personally divine, rises likewise upon the vision. The eye gives an infinite regression of space- being, 'within' or 'without,' and the eternal is unmistakable. So the ancient Israelites saw their 'God' in the clear space of the sky, just as Byron also truly described the same wonder in his lines "The blue sky So cloudless, clear, and purely beautiful, That God alone was to be seen in heaven." It is indeed where the space-consciousness is most emphatic that Beauty, the ' multitude in unity ' of the Roman school, the ' Glory of the Lord,' of the Hebrews, is most confessed. The sea, the towering mountain, the vastitude of plain, the panoramic masses of cloud, each in its objective sphere is sublimely beautiful. But such beauty is not due to each because it is sea, or mountain, or plain, or cloud, but because of the space-quantity (if we dare to put it under such a false term) which each heaps upon the mind, and which gives the inspiration of ' glory ' that we feel. Literature, of course, teems with this expression of space-beauty. And although students of philosophy miss this note in their great science, we must not forget that behind the categories Substance, Cause, Infinity, One, and many others, there lie hidden wonder and glory and mystery unspeakable. Philosophy simply ignores, in the data of her judgments of such categories, the one datum which is essential to the revelation of their glory. For when we admit the space-consciousness into our judgment of such categories, they live and move, and are no longer mechanical and dead. Nature, Motion, Force, Thought, Person, and such like, lose their isolated repulsiveness, and become robed in the splendour and sublimity of Whole-Space-Being, Whole- Harmony, the prius of all Art absolutely. 266 SPACE AND PERSONALITY 1 87. Having referred to the hopelessness of Art to express the eye-space, or space associated with any form or colour, we may notice nevertheless the overwhelming power in the eye to attract the artist. It is instinctively felt that in the eye the ' spirit ' conceals itself. It is the chief exponent of objective 1 personality.' Than the eye, nothing in the human frame affirms so profoundly the something we generalise as 'personality.' The limbs, the body, the head, the features, one by one, are all passed by when we seek for the person. Everything else may yield an individuality, an object; there may be thought, will, and feeling, manifested, and all the impersonal elements be present ; matter and motion, just as we have in animals ; but we are only satisfied when we gaze upon the space- presence which is revealed, not in the lines and curves and colours of eye-lash, eye-brow, eye-lid, and cornea, but in the sky-filled pupil, the space-thing, and when we find that, we find also what satisfies us in ' personality.' We are then conscious, that is, that we see a person. The power of the eye in all animals, as well as in man, need not be emphasised. Life and Space blend together in the Motions of the eye, as they never are blended in any other sense or feature, and yield an identity upon which personality can be based in our thought and consciousness of it. Life indeed must be a motion of space, for, without Space, Life were not. It is in the eye, and nowhere else, that we find both as an identical and personal power. This seems important, for it appears to establish a distinct connection between the pupil-space of the eye and the vaster eye-space of the sky. It seems to explain why men have always been able to discern a Personality in the Sky-Space. It is the eye of Nature, and just as human personality is most strongly revealed in the eye-space, so it has been natural for men to conceive Personality for Nature in the sky-space also. The space-consciousness is the basis of both conceptions of personality, particular or universal. 1 88. But the beautiful, we need not say, passes beyond the aesthetic and blends itself with the Ethical. To KO\OV means good as well as fair. When Jesus said, "Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works," He SPACE AND THE ATTRIBUTES OF DEITY 267 appealed to the beautiful as much as to the good. Men see beauty in a good work. " She hath wrought a good work on me," characterised the work to be as beautiful as it was good. And, in general, all through His frequent use of the word Kalos, the Master, whose aesthetic taste must have been of the most exquisite delicacy, weaves the beautiful with the good inseparably. It lay immediately in His consciousness and doctrine to do so, for the highest expression of the beautifully good is Self-sacrifice^ and He Himself is by this standard adjudged the most sublimely beautiful of all that is beautiful. As a matter of fact, and, we may say, of necessity also, the Artists have instinctively seen the highest beauty here, and the greatest of them have exhausted their genius in interpreting it to the ear and eye. It may be said that two branches of Art, viz. Painting and Music, revel in the field of beauty which Jesus unveiled for them. Our art galleries and masterpieces of music are witnesses. Neither should modern art be blamed if it seem to wait behind the art of Greece, and come short of her victories. The task set before the modern artist is higher than the Greek knew, in the highest plane of beauty, and the lowly consciousness of the modern that he never can achieve his ideal, is itself a deeper beauty than that which governed the Grecian conceit of being equal to portraying all he discerned. But this leads us to ask, Why do men see beauty y the highest beauty, in Self-negation, Self-sacrifice, and devotion unto death ? It seems strange that the grandeur of existence should consist in negating the very thing which has taken millions of years to evolve and develop. But it is this principle of Self- denial even unto death, which exalts and ' glorifies ' all the saviours, the martyrs, the philanthropists, the patriots, and, noblest of all, the Mothers of the world. He who has given himself most completely to the Other, whether that Other be an individual, a nation, a race, or a world, will be extolled by all men as not only good, but beautifully good. Art will ever labour to exhibit such Life-sacrifice in the most beautiful forms and in the fairest colours expressive of such a consciousness in all. And it is here that we learn that true beauty must be lived before it can be limned. The highest aesthetic sense is " that unspeakable Beauty which in its highest clearness is Religion," 268 SPACE AND PERSONALITY as Carlyle says that which evokes from itself such self-negation, " doing good deeds, not dreaming them the whole day long," singing and painting in blood, and not in tone-signs and pigments. It is this truth and sense of the highest beauty which lies at the root of all the Master's desires to be ' glorified ' with The Father, and of His associating this fulness of ' glory ' with ' finishing ' His work. For the very Name of Father connotes self-sacrifice in giving life-being to the other, and its equation with ' Cosmos/ or ' Nature/ must be regarded as the ultimate conception of all self-sacrifice, seeing that all that exists objectively is given through Him. To be glorified, or made beautiful with the beauty of the Father, was therefore to finish His work in the grand self-sacrificing way of the Father : the All-Giver of All. But in the chapters following we shall endeavour to show that the conception of ' Father/ in the consciousness of Jesus was not interpretative of His ultimate consciousness of Being, but only of His ultimate consciousness of Objectivity, and that such term never subsumes within itself the consciousness of Space, but only that of the objective Cosmos, or ' Nature.' The Father-term which stands based in that of ' Life/ while it represents self-sacrifice in giving its own life to all that lives, is itself negated by a higher power of Being which lies beyond and above Life. It is this power in man which directs the " laying down " of Life, preferring death to Life. And so all that underlies the Father-term, that is, Heaven and Earth, or all Objectivity, " passes away," but this power abides. When all Relation, Quality, and Quantity are no more, that which has given heaven and earth to be, remains permanent Being. And the highest self-sacrifice is found in this Power which gives up all that is summed in the terms Cosmos, Nature, Life, Father, out of its own Being, and so is All in All. But, clearly, this negating power beyond all Life, is not conceivable to us save as Space-Being. It is the same consciousness which man has when he freely denies Life, negates himself to Nothingness, and is beautified with Space-Beauty. And it is because Highest Being so sacrifices, so 'empties' itself, and is, to our consciousness, Space, that all similar sacrifice of self, and negation of relation, quality, and quantity, in man, is not only SPACE AND THE ATTRIBUTES OF DEITY 269 highest good, but also highest " glory," or Whole-Beauty. All 1 attributes ' of Deity are thus harmonised in Space- Being, which likewise becomes our absolute consciousness of * God-Being.' The question then arises, Why do not men yet see a Person- ality or obtain a consciousness of personality, in the sky- expanse? We answer, For the same reason that men are coming slowly to see no ' soul ' or * spirit ' through the human eye. When the sky came under the analysis of astronomical criticism, innumerable objects were found there, but no Person. The astronomer, like all others, sees the * object ' but not the Space-Being. And similarly with the eye, the various items of its physical structure are set in the vision of Science, and its space-power is annihilated. We shall have it asserted by-and- by that the consciousness of personality given in the human eye-space is illusive, and misleading ; and that, like the sky, it has nothing more behind it than what death is pleased to leave ; and that, in short, there is no such thing as personality in existence. Perhaps this conclusion will be justifiable, too, for it is the only logical ending of all thinking that casts out space from its data of judgments. Man, in such circumstances, cannot help seeing blind. Even * God,' when viewed as such an 'object,' can have no personality attributed to Him equal to that of which we are ourselves conscious. But when space is taken as the basal consciousness of our own personality, there will be little difficulty in finding Personality, or All-we-are, in our every consciousness of Space-Being. For there must be few people, surely, who have not verified in their own individual experience the power of the space-consciousness which is mediated through the eye. If we are attentive enough to our consciousness when we have before us an unusually clear space, no matter where, we shall always feel the subtle affirmation of personality in it, which was so strongly realised by the ancients. It is this that affects us so profoundly in crossing vast plains, wide seas, descending deep valleys, threading broad forests, or standing on mountain peaks. The same consciousness overpowers us that impresses the mind so permanently in the space of the eye. There is no form : there is no speech nor language : their voice is not heard : but there is a consciousness as of something that lived, that thought, that brooded over, and around, and within 270 SPACE AND PERSONALITY us, and entered into vital communion with us personally. It is in such moments that we are truly revealed to ourselves, and realise that we are far more than our conceptions of personality are able to measure or define. Our actual experience is of personality transcended. We realise, then, space-being, within which such motions as feeling, thought, and conation, as we understand these, are ecstacised beyond their common uses, and we experience the exaltation of Being's "consummation and the poet's dream." With Plato and Elijah, we stand in the Cave where the mysteries of personality are revealed amidst flame and shadow, rushing wind and rending rock. There is never any doubt in such experiences about per- sonality anywhere. It is all-personal. Moreover, in such an experience all the senses are transcended, and we see the unseen, hear the everlasting silences, and touch the intangible. Life and all its connotations are also sublated, for death in such a consciousness is the inconceivable, and all conscious- ness of time is blotted out. It is true experience of Space- Being, and what-we-are does not so much then require to respond to Another as to acknowledge itself. Every response is soliloquy. We enter into high communion, but not with an Other. We only learn what-we-are, and have always been, and realise that our deepest ignorance is uttered when we say " I Am." We also realise that every object only fulfils itself when it lays itself down in this consciousness of Nothingness, and in its own extinction realises its own Reality. When unit-being consents to be shred of every quality and every quantity and all con- scious relationship, when all form and colour resolve into space- being, then the true divine Being dawns upon the ' soul/ and the ' glory of the Lord ' is revealed. The Unit fades into Whole- Being, and the determined conception forsakes its assumed absoluteness and draws back into boundless consciousness. Therefore, the open sky affirms personality to-day just as decidedly as it ever did of yore, and just as clearly as does the eye when we gaze upon each other. But we must not seek a " Self" or a "Soul" thereafter the similitude of the philosophical 'self or the theological ' soul,' which are supposed to lie behind the eye. If we conceive such a form of personality to exist either in sky or eye, we can only create disappointments for ourselves. SPACE AND THE ATTRIBUTES OF DEITY 271 Deity, without or within, dwelleth not in temples made with hands, nor is even defined in thought and fancy, percept or concept, but is itself the dwelling for all, as whole space-being. And we should perhaps note also, that it is in the eye-space alone that all nature is most fully represented, in its manifesta- tions of light and darkness, day and night. There is revealing and concealing in eye and sky, and perpetual identity of common being. The highest light lies in tha eye but also the darkest darkness, while personality declares itself where there is no form and no colour given, but only a space-consciousness. So men of old were able to discern that Space-Being identified itself with eternal light as well as with eternal darkness, and out of the Deep, the Darkness, or rather That which doth not appear, beheld not only Light arise, but all Creation, and ' God ' Himself. And, undoubtedly, What the light and darkness of the eye-space reveals and conceals in the eye, is not other than That which the ancient Israelites discerned and adored in the vastitude of the azure expanse, " as it were the very heaven for clearness " (Exod. xxiv. 10). CHAPTER IX THE SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS FUNDAMENTAL IN RELIGION 189. In this argument, we take for granted that man must always interpret both himself and the universe through whatever degree of consciousness he may have of them. It is by the content which our consciousness furnishes, throughout its wide experiential range, that we must determine every result in religion as well as in science and philosophy. This appears to be the unanimous judgment of all accepted authorities. If we are granted this position, our field of view is clear, and con- veniently circumscribed. It certainly seems to nucleate a subject which has of all subjects the most far-reaching ramifica- tions. It seems to place us also where our universe of thought is seen moving through its nebulous stage, anterior to its plane- tary divisions ; and the mother-matter of all our Isms and Ologies is discerned so far in its evolutionary process. This nucleation of our thought appears to us to be necessary. For just as Yggdrasil, the Tree of Life, which embraced in itself all existence, sent its three roots down into the one reservoir of being, so do our three great divisions, Philosophy, Science, and Religion, descend together into the common gulf of conscious- ness to find there that existential identity of common being which in their after development and extension seem so strained and sundered by the conceptual motions of Thought and Reason. All history, indeed, illustrates this principle of radical development from the point of origination. The most complex and involved mercantile institutions of modern commerce have all sprung from the primitive methods of aboriginal barter in the simplest necessaries of life. The sceptre which symbolises to-day the highest forms of cultured government is but the golden image of the potent ancestral cudgel. The vast and 272 SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS FUNDAMENTAL IN RELIGION 273 varied collections of Art in our National Galleries have all grown out of savage imitative decoration and ornament, just as the magnificent monuments of Architecture are all evolutionary expansions of those ideas which are based upon the barbarous homes of the early peoples ; the cave, it is said, expanding to the pyramid, the tent to the pagoda, the wooden hut to the Grecian temple, and the bower in the forest to the arch, which is the leading feature of all Gothic structures. So the diversified panorama of ' religions ' which, in its historical aspect, is seen moving through the long vista of past centuries, widening and diversifying as it wends onwards through Time, visibly world- wide in our own day, is at the same time discernible as a move- ment whose beginnings and increase, whose inception and power, can be focussed within the scope of the sphere which we characterise as the human consciousness. Does not the scientist find an epitome of the Universe in his atom ? A globe, let it be as huge as imagination can make it, rests conceivably upon a very small point of surface, and similarly, a Religion, though comparable to a solar system or a universe, rests solely, as a conception, upon one principle, the principle, viz., of Relation. Man exists ; he is ; but he is conscious of existing related to all else that exists. And every religion, at its foundation, is con- ceived as relationship. Even in the most highly developed forms of it, expanding to the great aggregates which dominate history, and known to us as Buddhism, or Mohammedanism, or Christianity, this root-principle of relationship determines, as a consciousness, all else that we find within them. All nature- worship, fetish-worship, sun- and moon-worship ; every kind of worship ; on through the worship of the ' super-natural ' ; rising higher and wider in its developments to the Being who is visualised as seated on a great Throne ruling heaven and earth all are governed by one simple principle which commands each of them root and branch, viz., The relationship which consciously exists between the worshipper and the Something, or Someone, who is worshipped. This fact remains unchanged throughout the thousand-and-one modifications by which one ' religion ' becomes differentiated from another. 190. As far then as this extent of his consciousness carries him, man realises his entire Theology, or God-knowledge, to be S 274 SPACE AND PERSONALITY summed up in three conceptions: (I.) The Self; (II.) The Something not himself; and (III.) The relationship existing between these Two. But his consciousness of either of these fundamental factors has never in the past attained to finality of experience, and consequently the conceptions of ' Self,' of the 1 Not-Self/ and of the relationship between them have under- gone innumerable permutations and combinations. A final consciousness of the Self and the Not-Self, which it will be impossible to change, that is, one which will give existential identity to both, will be alone able to give finality to the con- ception of their relatedness. For this Relationship is not to be regarded as a true existentiality on the same level of reality with the Self and Not-Self. Both philosophy and science have shown us that all such relationship considered as a tertium quid, or third thing, has no other than a logical status of being, much as we express the existence of potential in physics, and entropy with reference to heat. It is always determined by the concep- tions which stand above it, viz., of the ' Self and the ' Not-Self.' But relationship cannot be ignored, although it may be regarded as a pure convenience of the understanding, for the all-im- portant fact of Ethics, which deals with the conduct and character of human Life, rests upon it, and is evolved from it. Religion, strictly, is first a matter of Existence before it is one of Relationship, but the consciousness of man with regard to Who he is, and Who his God is, has never been a final consciousness, and consequently the content of his consciousness with regard to this Relationship between them has ever been changing, ebbing and flowing like a tide, and subject to every contingency of race, tribe, land, and all those influences that govern generally the development of things not yet perfect. Therefore when we say that all Religion is Relationship, we must be taken to mean that particular Religion which has been interpreted through the human understanding from an existen- tial basis in consciousness, but which has not yet been fully exhausted by the understanding. For the full content of the human consciousness of Existence is never absolutely exhausted by any religion which has sought to interpret Existence through the medium of Mind. Even the greatest religions are but 1 broken lights ' of that which Is, and of that which lies in what- we-are, and consequently they are under perpetual necessity to SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS FUNDAMENTAL IN RELIGION 275 be re-interpreted from the existential basis of What-Is, and What-man-is, by the new life, the new knowledge, and deeper instincts which awaken with the new centuries. The foundation of Religion, therefore, consists of what man is conscious he Is as an existence extending far beyond his conceptual knowledge, and beyond his ordinary degree of con- sciousness, and over which he has no absolute control, seeing he did not originate it, and cannot absolutely annihilate it. He kills the body ; he changes his mind ; but he can neither kill nor change what-he-Is. The forms of existence alter: heaven and earth pass away : but what they are remains. And Space, as we have tried to show, and our space-being, alone fully exhaust our consciousness of that which Is. 191. For, indeed, when we have completely annihilated Yggdrasil, our Tree of Life; when the All it means of Exist- ence has been torn up out of its deep of darkness, when we have extinguished branches, trunk, roots, and all its objectivity, we cannot annihilate nor in any wise obliterate the Ginnunga Gap ; the eternal Deep out of which it grows. The indestruc- tible Space it was, and out of which it arose in the consciousness of our Scandinavian forbears, still remains to-day, as yesterday, and forever. And this, for our consciousness, is the final con- sciousness of what Being Is, even as it is the final and identical consciousness of what-we-are. Man is therefore compelled to interpret the All as well as himself by this final consciousness in himself of what-he-is; that is, by and through the consciousness of his space-being. When he does so, the tacit differences which he assumes for ' Self and 1 Not-Self vanish away. He passes beyond them and finds What-he-is to be Space-Being, eternal deep of eternal Deep. These concepts or conceptions of ' Self and ' Not-Self he finds to be but films of judgment, ever-changing, and ever-created and decreated, like mists in morning air, and in no wise exhaustively interpretive of what-Is. 192. Personality and Impersonality, therefore, we may or may not predicate of whole space. But the same alternative applies to what-we-are. Again, if we predicate anything of what-we-are as what Is, we must necessarily predicate the 276 SPACE AND PERSONALITY same of absolute Space. For, thus far, the consciousness of impersonality, in what-we-are, is as deep as that of personality. And the personal is no fuller a consciousness in us than is that of the impersonal. It is the assumption that we have a more exhaustive consciousness of the one than of the other, that has led, we think, to the endless and fruitless attempts to objectify, or to define what the ' Self actually is. Kant, as we have seen, narrows down the consciousness of personality until he contracts it beyond further contraction. It becomes really the impersonal least a man is. Prof. James, on the other extreme, enlarges it from mere ' nothing ' to be all that a man owns, and calls his, or "Mine." But some, like Jesus, have a consciousness that all that is, is His ! Kant called his extreme, x, and James might just as conveniently have called his extreme, y, for what both really give us in their analysis of consciousness, is an objectified, impersonal thing^ or thought-form, which no one is ever likely to accept as what-he-is. 193. It humbly seems to us, then, that the narrow conception of ' personality ' which broadens through all religion and philosophy must be abandoned. It is only real in the sense that the edge of a horizon is real, or as the curve of the sky has actuality. All these boundaries exist merely in our arbitrary thought or judgment of them, and commensurate with that degree of conception which we have been able to attain regarding them. Nothing exists, in reality, or on the level of its being, with the burden of such limitations laid upon it. The seven colours in the spectrum of sunlight, for example, have no such numerical boundaries in actuality, and we cannot tell where red goes into orange, or orange into yellow, nor at last where violet is lost in colourlessness. So likewise we cannot tell where sensation becomes thought, nor thought will ; where pain goes into pleasure and pleasure into pain, nor where body joins with mind, nor mind with 'soul/ nor ' soul ' with space. We do not ignore, of course, the utility of such discrimina- tions, for we cannot do without steps in the thought-ladder though the ladder itself is whole ; and so long as we understand what 'personality' stands for in religion and philosophy, the use of the conception and term may be gratefully accepted. But SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS FUNDAMENTAL IN RELIGION 277 when it assumes to connote veritable and terrible * isolations ' of actual existence, and is held as defining something absolutely apart, even from ' God,' both in the Creeds and in the Categories, then its utility must be stamped as futility, and this help to knowledge condemned as a help to confusion. " That nature and man are in some way continuous, that man is what he is only in virtue of his ontological relation to the world, that apart from it he can have neither being nor meaning, neither a moral nor a natural life, cannot now be questioned" (Prof. Sir H. Jones, Hib. Jour., No. 2, p. 248). Both ' personality ' and ' impersonality ' should simply be taken for what they are in reality, viz., mere mental products of the imperfect yet increasingly perfecting consciousness, and which find yet a deeper identity in the space-consciousness. How otherwise can we rationalise the Communion we all have one with another as social beings, and all with Nature and the Universe? It is the consciousness of what-we-are that gives us the true and only scientific basis for the fact of society with man, and worship of " God." For all such relatedness to that which we usually assume to be the Other, call it specifically Man, Universe, or God, first finds its origin in the communion which the ' personal ' and the * impersonal ' obtain within our space-being. What-we-are communes with itself. What-we-are is not, and never can be, an ear without a voice in it, nor a voice without an ear to listen. 194. In the space-being, the process of personalising and impersonalising continues like the rising and falling wave, and it has its first true consciousness of relatedness to the All, by virtue of this existential communion established within its own being. Tennyson has left an account of a concrete experience of this phase of what-we-are. He says : " A kind of waking trance I have frequently had, quite up from boyhood, when I have been all alone. This has generally come upon me through repeating my own name two or three times to myself silently, till all at once, as it were out of the intensity of the consciousness of individuality, the individuality itself seemed to dissolve and fade away into boundless being, and this not a confused state, but the clearest of the clearest, the surest of the surest, the weirdest of the weirdest, utterly beyond words, 278 SPACE AND PERSONALITY where death was an almost laughable impossibility, the loss of personality (if so it were) seeming no extinction but the only true life" (Tennyson, A Memoir , i. 320). " The clearest of the clearest " is the same space-consciousness which Shakespeare notes when he describes man as " most ignorant of what he's most assured, his glassy essence" Few notable writers but refer to this experience in the consciousness of the c mighty ones.' But they also declare their ignorance to speak of it. The reason is quite apparent. They have no category of knowledge under which they might sublate it to the understanding. The only category possible to it is that of space, and this category has steadily been ignored. It is nevertheless a true experience of an existence which has been stigmatised as ' impersonal ' because man has never taught himself to regard himself as identified in his being with what Is Space-Being. Hence, although he acknowledges the experience, he upholds the impossibility of its interpretation. Yet if any one will go over the items of thought in which Tennyson expresses his experience, he will see at once that Space as a consciousness is the one word that interprets it all to the full. " Individuality" dissolves into " boundless being " : " Not a confused state," for space cannot be conceived as dis- ordered, and nothing else gives such a consciousness of " clearest," " surest," " weirdest," and of being so " utterly beyond words." Death as " almost an impossibility" can only be said of space, for space thrusts out all death, root and branch, and is the deathless thing. Death cannot be even named with space. It is out of our space-consciousness that we have dug the attribute of deathlessness which we bestow upon 'God.' So also the poet felt that " the loss of personality seemed no extinction but the only true life." The fact is, that until we lose our ' per- sonality,' as we understand that word as yet, we cannot realise the " true life." " Die to live." Our highest gain is in entering what has been always termed the ' impersonal.' And the highest gift of death, we do not doubt, is this deliverance from distracted isolations and differences of Being. There is the highest authority, as we shall try to show, for this statement. 195. We have deemed it necessary to return to this question of personality in order to have the consciousness of the ' personal ' SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS FUNDAMENTAL IN RELIGION 279 and the ' impersonal ' clearly before us. Otherwise, we should not be able to understand why it is that man universally, in his profoundest realisation of religion, has invariably interpreted tJie content of his deepest consciousness that, viz., which gives him the Absolute Thing he calls his ' God' in terms of both the Personal and the Impersonal. His experience is thereby one of light and dark, mind and matter, eternity and time. For, like absolute space, he, as space -being, is existentially ever beyond these ' particulars,' and has such Reality as cannot be subsumed under any term which connotes less than space- being. But given the term Space-Being to include and make whole both the ' personal ' and the ' impersonal,' and prove that both are true predicates in the experience of man, as conscious of himself as of space, and it will be possible to predicate ' personality ' and ' impersonality ' of Matter and Force as well as of man. Without this position, it is not possible to name a ' God ' who shall be as true for Science and Philosophy as He is for Religion. We always limit our God-Idea when we interpret it through our consciousness of personality alone. He really is as much ' impersonal ' as * personal/ as we at present define these terms. Now, this is the true end of all right knowledge, and to assume that this is impossible of attainment, is to affirm that these three great departments of human experience have no common foundation in either man or the universe. It assumes also that ' God ' has only taken up his residence in one sphere of existence, and has limited the sphere of His revealing. Prof. Fraser has put his finger on this difficulty. In his able monograph on Berkeley (p. 15 1) he says : " But a grave difficulty lay in his (Berkeley's) way. It is one apt to perplex those who meditate deeply in philosophical theology, though I am not sure that Berkeley yet saw, or ever fully saw, its magnitude. It had been seen by Spinoza : it was afterwards seen, from very different points, by Hume and by Kant. It rises in the form of questions like these. Is the name ' God,' after all, more intelligible than the unperceived and unperceiving ' matter ' and * force ' that Berkeley had dislodged on account of their unintelligibleness? If the one can be resolved into the residual, must not the other ? We cannot see or touch unper- 280 SPACE AND PERSONALITY ceived matter, but have we evidence, in sense or otherwise, for the invisible omnipresent God ? " 196. This goes to the heart of most of our modern problems of existence. The strong undaunted spirits have boldly said, " God cannot be known." Theology has almost confessed her assent to this statement, but has condoled herself with the fact that He can be believed. She has taken refuge in Faith. But this is only satisfactory for a brief space, for what is it that must at last guarantee the truth of our faith or belief? Is it not the same consciousness that guarantees the fact of reality ? our own reality ? any reality ? And no other fact of consciousness is so affirmed as that of space, as being our final consciousness of the real. But this is the sphere of thought for Science, for Philosophy, as well as for Religion. Here where we find the best guarantee for truly knowing ourselves, we also find the best guarantee for a true knowledge of God. Knowledge is no more religious than it is scientific. Like Faith, it belongs to the Real, whatever name may be given to that fact. " We cannot blink the fact that there is existence," says Dr J. H. Stirling (Secret of Hegel, ii. 81), "and that man's life has been to understand it." It is this possibility of understanding it which surely makes life so precious. This belief gives soul to all knowledge. We are, is asserted by both faith and know- ledge. The initial motion of consciousness is one of reception. Necessarily so, for Want is the prime passion of creation, and all things from the dawn of being wait to receive duration of being, and this attitude cannot be described as other than one of Faith. 197. This faith is not, of course, the religious faith of the Creeds. It is the faith which precedes not only Thought, but consciousness. It is the faith which directs the child's lip to the breast, the rootlets of the tree to the stream, the motions of the protoplasmic cell in its path towards consciousness and correct development, and every element in existence to adjust itself to all the laws of that existence bestowed on it But this is also knowledge, and both faith and knowledge are thus seen to be as much conditioned in the impersonal as in the personal. For example, one experience happens to all, ' impersonal ' or ' personal,' SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS FUNDAMENTAL IN RELIGION 281 matter or mind. This experience is the acceptance of Being by all. The being has yet to be discovered, either in the organic or inorganic world, which, on entering existence, refuses to accept it. This faith is the Fount of all other forms of faith. Without exception, every existing thing enters the gates of Being with limitless acceptance of it. The joy of the sons of the morn- ing is not a rhetorical phrase. It is a scientific fact. Even when the fulness of a cup of bitterness has been drunk through eighty years, as in man's case, we have no genuine evidence that any one desires to be unmade, remade, or recreated into another form of being ; to be something other than what- we-are ; and this fact steadily points to a true fundamental consciousness of our being what-Is; or complete and whole in Being. No faith in anything ever transcends this confidence in what-we-are ; no faith in anything in the world, in Nature, in the Universe. Our Faith, or confidence in Space, alone equals it, for in this we have the fullest guarantee of Reality not only for 1 self but for the All of existence. 198. Our faith in and knowledge of anything, therefore, cannot exceed our faith in, and our knowledge of, Space. And it is interesting to note that when such a profound thinker as Hegel seeks in his Philosophy of Religion to set before his mind, and before the minds of his readers, a worthy Theophany, or God-Image, he is compelled of necessity to employ language which has only space-content. That is, he describes God in the language of ' Impersonality '-sans-substance. " Scientifically considered," he says (vol. i., pp. 90-94) (Spier's trans.), " God is at first a general, abstract name, which as yet has not come to have any true value." " Everything depends upon what has entered consciousness." " This beginning is an object for us or content in us ; we have this object, and thus the question immediately arises, Who are we ? ' We,' ' I,' the spirit is itself something very concrete, manifold. I have perceptions. I am, I see, hear, etc., all this I am, this feeling, this seeing. Thus the more precise meaning of this question is, which of these forms of consciousness determines the shape in which this content (' God ') exists for our minds ? Is it found in idea, will, imagination, or feeling? What is the place where this 282 SPACE AND PERSONALITY content, this object, has its home ? Which of all these supplies the basis of this mental possession ? " " If we think of the current answers in regard to this, we find it said that God is in us in so far as we believe, feel, form ideas, know. These forms, faculties, aspects of ourselves namely, feeling, faith, ordinary conception are to be more particularly considered further on, and especially in relation to this point." " To begin with, we shall keep to what we have actually before us, this One, Universal, this Fulness, which is this ever unchangeable transparent etherial element" (p. 94) (italics ours). After diligently searching for a basis of thought on which to found his God-conception, Hegel is compelled to begin by describing our consciousness of God, in its content, as " this ever unchangeable transparent etherial element." No words could express our consciousness of space, the ' impersonal ' thing, in fitter terms. What he wants to express is, of course, Being; but he also finds that no conceivable category of mind can give this fact of consciousness a more perfect body to Thought and Knowledge than the category of Space, " the ever unchangeable etherial element." The reader should note also that God is one, to Hegel ; a Universal ; which never connotes Whole-Being. But this identical content of consciousness Hegel also finds for the " I " as well as for " God." " What I have in my con- sciousness is for me. '/' is the vacuum or receptacle for anything and everything" " Every man is a whole world of conceptions that lie buried in the night of the ' Ego' " " The ' Ego ' is the . . . the universality which includes in it every- thing. ... In the * Ego ' we have thought before us in its utter purity" (Logic, Wallace, 2nd ed., p. 48). We find the same testimony everywhere in Prof. E. Caird's writings. He says of the Consciousness of the Self: "A world in itself, con- taining and resolving in the transparent simplicity or unity of its ' glassy essence' all the differences, etc., . . . the simple and transparent unity of self-consciousness" . . . which, he repeats, " returns into transparent unity with itself." Or again, " when he (man) shuts himself up within his own soul, he finds there nothing but emptiness and vanity" . . . "The intense sense of personality . . . has disturbed man's consciousness of unity with the world, and thrown him back upon himself, only to awake in him a painful sense of emptiness and weakness" SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS FUNDAMENTAL IN RELIGION 283 . . . (Hegel, pp. 145, 149, 182, 205). He also gibes at Herbert Spencer in that he "lets every distinction of the finite, even the last distinction of self and not-self, drop away, and rests in the emptiness of the infinite, as if it alone were the reality of all realities" (Evol. of Relig., i. p. 147) (italics ours). I98A. In the history of the development of human concep- tions of ' God ' there is nothing perhaps so interesting nor so pathetic as the effort which the highest minds have made to conceive ' God ' as objective, and the utter defeat which has befallen that attempt through the opposing consciousness in man which, as consciousness of Whole-Being, transcends all conceptions of limited being absolutely. We know no better illustration of this baffled endeavour than that which Kant affords us in his well-known argument concerning the Existence of a Supreme Being. At the outset he rightly mistrusts the capacity of the concept to hold and uphold such an affirmation, and yet he feels that there is a pressing need " to form some presupposition (vorauszusetzen) that shall serve the under- standing as a proper basis for the complete determination of its conceptions " ; but he makes his task impossible from the beginning by assuming that such consciousness of Supreme Being can be a " complete determination " in any one (K. d. r. V., Philosophische Bibliothek, Band 37, p. 506 f.). He seems to realise this, too, for he says that in reasoning towards Supreme Being we " do not begin from conceptions, but from common experience," and we require "a basis in actual existence." Moreover, this basis must " rest upon the immovable rock of the absolutely necessary" (des Absolutnothwendigen). But still he declares that even "this foundation is itself un- worthy of trust, if it leave under and above it empty space (leerer Raum) ; if it do not fill all ; ... if it be not, in one word, infinite in its reality" (Critique of Pure Reason, p. 359 f., Bonn's Edition, for convenience). Now, how did Kant come to have the knowledge of what an Absolute Necessity should be, and whence his consciousness that to be itself it must first fill all "empty space"? Why does the space - consciousness obtrude into so much of his work ? Is it not plain that his consciousness of space is the fullest affirmation of Being which he possesses ? The " absol- 284 SPACE AND PERSONALITY utely necessary " must be equal to filling this " empty space " ! If it does, then he thinks it might be a basis for a " complete determination" of conceptual Being Supreme. Observe, he must have ' God ' one thing and space another. Space is also empty : it is not Being. Kant, however, as the world knows, was never satisfied that Supreme Being was to be completely determined in that way. And therefore his conviction remained, viz., that, as man never can find this 'absolutely necessary* rock, " human reason begins by persuading itself of the existence of some necessary being ! " (" Zuerst iiberzeugt sie sich vom Dasein irgend eines nothwendigen Wesens.") Theology, or God - Knowledge, is based for him on an indefinite " persuasion " ! The whole long course of the endeavour of the human mind to "find out the Almighty" proves the very opposite. For it is the primary and ineradi- cable consciousness of Supreme Being in man which has forced the thought of the human race into the innumerable conceptions of c God ' which all past history discloses. No conception of ' God ' has satisfied the human mind, just because our inmost consciousness of Supreme Being has never been exhausted in any such ' complete determinations.' We always find " empty space " ' under and above ' all such ' God '-con- ceptions, for such conceptions merely determine Unit-Being, and we have no consciousness of Supreme Being as One any more than we have of space as One. Kant's true consciousness of the " absolutely necessary " was, in short, his consciousness of " empty space," which he put aside as of no use. This comes out clearly enough in the eloquent passage which all but concludes his weary dis- sertation " Of the impossibility of a cosmological proof of the existence of God." He says (Bonn's Ed., p. 306) : " Unconditioned necessity \ which, as the ultimate support and stay of all existing things, is an indispensable requirement of the mind, is an abyss on the verge of which human reason trembles in dismay (italics ours). Even the idea of eternity, terrible and sublime as it is, as depicted by Haller, does not produce upon the mental vision such a feeling of awe and terror ; for, although it measures the duration of things, it does not support them. We cannot bear, nor can we rid ourselves of the thought, that a being, which we regard as SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS FUNDAMENTAL IN RELIGION 285 the greatest of all possible existences, should say to himself: I am from eternity to eternity ; beside me there is nothing, except that which exists by my will ; but whence then am I ? (Kant's italics). Here all sinks away from under us, and the greatest, as the smallest, perfection, hovers without stay or footing in presence of the speculative reason, which finds it as easy to part with the one as with the other " (italics ours). The * Abyss ' ; Abgrund ; Space ; opens upon his vision, vast, awful, and unspeakable ; overshadowing even his con- ception of eternity ; and, though he hesitates, he sees no way but to bring his Supreme Being, " Unconditioned necessity," "ultimate support and stay of all things," into it, and make Him utter solemn ignorance regarding His own Being, just as poor mortals do, Creator of All though He is ! Kant must have his dual-being ; and he does not see with all he sees, that the real, true, and invulnerable the unconditioned, the absolutely necessary, self-subsistent Being is not this philo- sophising number One; this limited, despairing, wondering Thing; but the "Abyss," the "Abgrund" itself. And it is never merely One, nor Supreme, but Whole-Being, having no possible Other ; and it is not to be put into a conception at all, save as such conception is absolutely and wide -openly identical with our consciousness of Space. Faint glimmerings of this fact seem to break upon him, for, at last, he is forced to admit that any such " ideal of the Supreme Being" is always necessarily conceived "similar with our notion of space" (italics ours). "These remarks," he goes on to say (p. 380), "will have made it evident to the reader that the ideal of the Supreme Being, far from being an enouncement of the existence of a being, in itself necessary, is nothing more than a regulative principle of reason, requiring us to regard all connection existing between phaenomena as if it had its origin from an all-sufficient cause, and basing upon this the rule of a systematic and necessary unity in the explanation of phaenomena. We cannot, at the same time, avoid regarding, by a transcendental subreptio, this formal principle as constitutive, and hypostatising this unity. " Precisely similar is the case with our notion of space. Space is the primal condition of all forms, which are properly just so many different limitations of it; and thus, although it is 286 SPACE AND PERSONALITY merely a principle of sensibility, we cannot help regarding it as an absolutely necessary and s elf-sub sistent thing as an object given a priori in itself (italics ours). In the same way, it is quite natural that, as the systematic unity of nature cannot be established as a principle for the empirical employment of reason, unless it is based upon the idea of an ens realissimum, as the supreme cause, we should regard this idea as a real object, and this object, in its character of supreme condition, as absolutely necessary, and that in this way a regulative should be transformed into a constitutive principle. This inter- change becomes evident when I regard this supreme being, which, relatively to the world, was absolutely (unconditionally) necessary, as a thing per se. In this case, I find it impossible to represent this necessity in or by any conception, and it exists merely, in my own mind, as the formal condition of thought, but not as a material and hypostatic condition of existence" (Kant's italics). His argument closes in confusion. He cannot put space into a * conception/ yet it is consciously in his mind, but he is sure that it can only be there as a ' form ' ; yet again he cannot help ' hypostatising this unity,' and regarding the ' thing/ ' this idea, as a real object/ and as ' an absolutely necessary and self-subsistent thing/ even when he is com- pelled to commit philosophical theft (subreptio) to do so. Poor Reason is so subjected to such straits. But, finally, we are left with the two facts, i. The * Ideal of the Supreme Being/ and 2. Space. The former must be, he insists, "un- conditioned necessity," " the absolutely necessary," and a full- upness equal to space ! But when we accept these facts and go to the root of the matter ; when we take our stand on a "basis of common experience," and of "actual exist- ence/' which of these two, we ask ourselves, obtains the better affirmation of being from our bottom consciousness? For it is to consciousness that we must come for our decision. Where do we obtain a common experience of an 'actual existence/ an 'idea as real object/ which answers to his "Supreme Being" or to any conception of such? Do we find it in Nature, in History, in Man, in human Consciousness? Is it not absolutely affirmed that no such unified being which is necessarily unconditioned and self-subsistent is ever found SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS FUNDAMENTAL IN RELIGION 287 in these regions ? We may fearlessly assert that the universe does not yield anything like it, if we exclude our consciousness of space from that conception. But it is wholly different with our consciousness of space. That remains when every vestige of a concept of ' God ' and of 'supreme beings' innumerable, rise* awful and effulgent upon the horizon of Time, fill? the noonday of all human interests, and passc,evanescent from sight as the centuries roll onwards. Der Abgrund ; the Abyss ; Space, persists in our consciousness beyond even the idea of Eternity, as Kant confesses. Does not he himself affirm that " space is the primal condition of all forms, and that ' all forms/ " i.e. all Phenomena, " are properly just so many different limitations of it?" Yet space is not being to Kant ! It is a consciousness of no account or value to him in that problem ! He gratuitously calls it ' thing/ 1 object/ ' idea/ ' principle of sensibility ' ; but no mortal ever has such a consciousness of space. The ' Abgrund ' abides as the primary, ultimate and absolute consciousness of Being, simply because such a consciousness is the primary, ultimate and absolute consciousness we all have of what-we-are. And it is this last-named fact which, as ' common experience/ enables us to find in the * Abyss/ so terrible and awful, that * actual existence ' and that guarantee of Fulness of Being which leaves neither ' under ' nor * above ' of empty space surrounding it. This is the desiderated " something, the non-existence of which is impossible " (p. 364), for which he so anxiously seeks. But why is it so terrible and awful to Kant ? It is because he believed space not to be personal, nor of the stuff of his own being. He himself was being ! He had no doubt of that. But Space was not being ! And his ' God ' must be of the same stuff as himself. Therefore Space, ' God/ and himself, were not in the same plane of ' existence ' ! Yet, as we see, this ' empty space ' is ever his uttermost consciousness of what Is, ' under and above ' his ' thing-in-itself/ his * Supreme Being/ and * all forms ' of the great universe absolutely. Schlegel has told us in his History of Literature that " Kant's greatest merit consists in having established the point that Reason of itself is void and empty, valid only in its application to Experience, and what is within her province ; 288 SPACE AND PERSONALITY and that hence it is not fitted to conduct to a knowledge of God or of divine things." This is just our contention. There is never any doubt about the capacity of Reason to lead to ' God,' or to ' divine things/ if the way of Reason is not first unwarrantably blocked by fallacious 'pre- supposi- tions' which have not the slightest basis in consciousness. Our consciousness of Space is absolutely necessary; it is impossible to conceive as non-existent; it is unconditionally necessary, and cannot be conceived to be conditioned by any- thing. If Reason wants any other material for the creation of ' God,' then doubtless she will find her hands empty enough. But if she takes the true consciousness of our experience as her material, then she will not have far to seek for either ' God ' or a boundless gratification of her thirst for things 'divine.' The fault lies with the imperfect judgment which persists in 'completely determining' and enclosing 'God' and ' divine things ' in limited conceptions which never exhaust the capacity of reason. Reason and Consciousness steadily point one way, and conceptual judgment decides for another. And only when judgment decides * God ' as she decides her own ' I Am,' will existence and actuality find Reason happy in that sole consciousness of Reality which is also conscious- ness of Space. Then also will be realised that conscious- ness of Being which Kant diagnosed as leaving " no room for a Why" (keinen Platz zum Warum). For in our con- sciousness of space-being no room is possible for such an interrogation, seeing that our consciousness of what- we - are leaves no division between space-being and what-we-are, whereby we can objectify space by questioning its Reality. We who question and the questioned are consciously Whole-Being. 199. Our great thinkers have really no alternative. They must go back upon this space-consciousness as the only one which is absolutely affirmative, and therefore the sole idiom by which to express the Being of either God or man. " God," says Hegel, " as pure Reality in all Reality, or as sum of all Realities, is the same formlessness and matterlessness as the empty absolute in which all is one" (Secret of Hegel^ i. 364) (italics ours). Newman makes Gerontius, in his high- strung consciousness of death, depict himself as dropping " from SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS FUNDAMENTAL IN RELIGION 289 out this universal frame, Into that shapeless, scopeless, blank abyss, That utter nothingness, of which I came" . . . " Down, down forever I was falling through The solid framework of created things, And needs must sink and sink Into the vast abyss." " Thus, like some wild-flaming, wild-thundering train of Heaven's Artillery," exclaims Carlyle, "does this mysterious Mankind thunder and flame, in long-drawn, quick-succeeding grandeur, through the unknown Deep" (Sartor, 184). " And if the Wine you drink, the Lip you press, End in the Nothing all Things end in Yes Then fancy while Thou art, Thou art but what Thou shalt be Nothing Thou shalt not be less." (Rubdiydt of Omar Khayyam. Stanza 47.) The ultimate consciousness is this space-consciousness, and while it is the last to be known historically, it is the precon- dition of all knowing. We begin all our knowledge under the governance of this consciousness just as without it we should neither see, hear, nor have any use of the senses. But the point we wish to emphasise in this tedious recapitu- lation is the fact that our genuine knowledge of * God ' as well as of ourselves is fundamentally, once and for aye, knowledge of ' Impersonality/ as that term is usually understood, and that its true idiom is that of the consciousness of Space. The true " vanity of the creature " lies in the ever-defeated endeavour to give to ' God ' a body of * Personality ' in its own likeness and in its own image. Hence the ceaseless travail to transform an existential consciousness of Space into an objectified Thing, a Person, quite apart and isolated from the ' Self.' Hence the ceaseless oscillatory processes between the God-High and the God-Low, the Sky-God and the Deep-God, the personal and impersonal, the Immanent and Transcendent, the Man-God and Spirit-God. For although one term may be employed, such as God, Being, Spirit, Absolute, Unknown, the actual content of it, to consciousness, is indeterminately ' personal ' or ' impersonal.' These names, in strict reality, are mere rendable veils stretched over a background which when penetrated yields only the realisation of space. Fundamentally, as every one T 290 SPACE AND PERSONALITY discerns, they do not connote personality, as that term is under- stood ; but there is never any doubt about the agonising efforts on the part of worshipping man to make them so. 200. As a matter of history, the realms of religious literature, covering all nations, all ages, and tabulated in all forms of human articulation and expression, are seen to be strewn like the stars of heaven with 'Gods' who have all at one period been ' personal ' Gods, but have once more passed into ' impersonalities.' Both ' forms ' lay in the human consciousness, and the Space-Being, beyond both, and the basis of both, sought through them to give That to human knowledge which cannot yet be all included within any concept of thought. This oscillation of the human soul between the personal- and the im- personal-God still survives in every religion. We shall try to show in our concluding chapters, that in its deepest deep, the 'Impersonal' God is the true God of the consciousness of the Man of Galilee, although, of course, the ' Personal ' Father- Form of God occupies the foreground of His Doctrine. In the brief illustrative examples which we select from the religions of the world, given below, both ' forms ' of the God-consciousness are self-evident facts. Mohammedanism. 201. For example, in the consciousness which lies bare before us in the Mohammedan religion, and made audible in the Koran, the God 'Allah' is an undoubted object for the Human worshipper. But no fair-minded judge would say that this object was more personal than impersonal. As a matter of fact, the personality of Allah is far dimmer by comparison than such an one as the Hebrew ' Yahwe,' for we never hear his own voice, but only the voice of his prophet Mohammed. Neither is he ever seen by man. He does not " come down," among his people, nor " appear " unto them in any shape. He is completely impersonal to the senses, and only personal to Faith. " God is great," is the consciousness that stands out most vividly in the religious consciousness of Mohammed, and it is evident that the actual content of the term ' God ' connotes no more than is given in the term ' Power.' This stern attribute, however, is modified SPACE-CONSCIOUSNESS FUNDAMENTAL IN RELIGION 291 by the other attributes ' Merciful ' and ' Compassionate/ which are constantly assigned to him, and suggest the personal, but nothing whatever of the humanly personal. All the attributes of the Mohammedan ' God ' do not surpass in any way the connotations of the poets when they attribute power, mercy, and compassion to Nature. It is simply a personification of the Universe. To Mohammed, Allah is a divine thing, but far removed from Man by nature. Allah and man have no common nature by the fact that Allah cannot be a father. No man is therefore His son, or child. And it is this great fact of God-Fatherhood in the Christian Religion which all good Mohammedans loathe ; and it is the principal barrier, perhaps, in the way of the conversion of Islam to Christianity. It is a " monstrous thing." The Koran is clear and explicit with regard to the abominable doctrine of God's Incarnation. " It becomes not the Merciful to take to himself a son. There is none in the heavens or the earth but comes to the Merciful as a servant." " They say : The Merciful has taken to himself a son ! ye have brought forth a monstrous thing." (Koran, Chaps. 17, 19, 21, in each of which the same thing is affirmed.) As a consequence, we cannot associate anything human with this ' God.' His attributes only give a consciousness of a Being made in the similitude of the' angels,' whose principal attributes are intelligence and power (Ps. ciii. 20). But Allah is con- sciously personal to the faith of his devotees, for they pray to him, and prayer is a true test of a consciousness of personality, although a personality always " afar off." 202. Nevertheless, alongside of this consciously personal ' God ' there still abides a deeper and far older consciousness of an Impersonal Power which the Mohammedan expresses by the name ' Quismeh ' or * Quismet.' It is a Fate-Consciousness which no religion in any age has ever eradicated from the human soul. For it is the profoundest consciousness of