Читать книгу Fundamental Philosophy - Jaime Luciano Balmes - Страница 38

Table of Contents

337. In concluding this book, I wish to give a summary of my views on certainty, wherein I shall show the connection between the doctrines exposed in the different chapters.

When philosophy meets a necessary fact its duty is to accept it. Such a fact is certainty. To dispute its existence, is to dispute the splendor of the sun at mid-day. Mankind are certain of many things; philosophers, skeptics not excluded, are equally so. Absolute skepticism is impossible.

Setting aside the question of certainty, philosophy is free from extravagance, and is established in the domain of reason; it can there examine how we acquire certainty, and upon what it is based.

The human race is endowed with certainty as a quality annexed to life, a spontaneous result of the development of the soul's faculties. Certainty is natural; consequently it precedes all philosophy, and is independent of the opinions of men. For the same reason the question of certainty, although important to the knowledge of the laws to which our mind is subject, is, and always will be, unproductive of practical results. It is a dividing line fixed by reason lest at any time something should descend from the realm of abstraction prejudicial to society or individuals. Thus from its first investigations, philosophy forms a kind of alliance with good sense; they mutually promise never to be hostile to each other.

When we examine the foundations of certainty a question arises upon the first principle of human cognitions: does it exist, and what is it?

This question may have a double meaning. It may either mean a primitive truth containing all others, as the seed does plants and fruits; or simply a resting-point. The former gives rise to the question of transcendental science; the latter is the cause of the disputes in the schools on the preference of different truths in relation to the dignity of first principle.

If truth exists, there must be means of knowing it, hence the question of the value of criteria.

There is in the order of being one truth, the origin of all truths, God, who is also in the absolute intellectual order the origin of all truths. In the human intellectual order there is no one truth, the origin of all others; neither is there in the real, nor in the ideal order. The philosophy of the me can be of no account in establishing transcendental science. The doctrine of absolute identity is an absurdity; besides, it explains nothing.

The problem of representation is here proposed. The representation may be of identity, causality, or ideality. The last is founded on the preceding, but is distinct from it.

Besides the problem of representation we examined that of immediate intelligibility, a difficult problem, but one of the greatest importance to a perfect knowledge of the world of intelligences.

The disputes on the value of different principles, as to which has the right to be called fundamental, originate in a confusion of ideas. We attempt to compare things of very diverse orders, whereas this is impossible. Descartes' principle is the enunciation of a simple fact of consciousness; that of contradiction, an objective truth, the indispensable condition of every cognition: that of the Cartesians is the expression of a law of our mind. The three, each in its own way and sphere, are necessary; no one of them is totally independent of the others; the ruin of any one destroys our intelligence.

We have various criteria; but they may all be reduced to three: consciousness, or internal sense, evidence, and intellectual instinct, or common sense. Consciousness embraces all facts intimately present to our soul as purely subjective; evidence extends to all objective truths, upon which our reason is exercised; intellectual instinct is the natural inclination to assent in cases which lie without the domain of consciousness and evidence.

The intellectual instinct obliges us to give an objective value to ideas; in this case it mingles with the truths of evidence, and is, in ordinary language, confounded with evidence.

When the intellectual instinct operates upon non-evident objects and inclines us to assent, it is called common sense.

Consciousness and the intellectual instinct constitute the other criteria.

The criterion of evidence includes two things: the appearance of ideas, which belongs to consciousness; the objective value, existing or possible, which belongs to the intellectual instinct.

The testimony of the senses also has two parts: sensation as purely subjective, and this pertains to consciousness; and the belief in the objectiveness of sensations, and this pertains to the intellectual instinct.

The testimony of human authority is composed of that of the senses, which place us in relation with our fellow-men, and that of the intellectual instinct, which induces us to believe them.

Not everything is susceptible of proof; but every criterion stands the test of reason. The criterion of consciousness is a primitive fact of our nature; in that of evidence we discover the indispensable condition of the existence of reason itself; in that of the intellectual instinct by which we make our ideas objective, is found a law of our nature likewise indispensable to the very existence of reason; in that of common sense, properly so called, is the instinctive assent to truths, which, when examined, are seen to be perfectly reasonable; in that of the senses, and in that of human authority, we discover the same thing as in the other cases of common sense, which is a means of satisfying the necessities of sensation, intellectual, and moral life.

The criteria do not conflict with, but mutually aid and confirm each other. Neither is reason at war with nature, nor nature with reason; both are necessary to us; both direct us with certainty, although they are both liable to err, since they belong to a limited and very feeble being.

338. The philosophy which considers man only under a single aspect is incomplete, and in danger of becoming false. So far as certainty is concerned, we must bear in mind this last observation: to become excessively exclusive is to place one's self on the brink of error. We may analyze if we will the sources of truth; but we must not lose sight of their connection when examining them separately. To begin by conceiving a system, and then making everything conform to its demands, is to place truth in the bed of Procrustes. Unity is a great good; but we must be satisfied with the measure imposed upon us by nature. We must seek truth by human means, and in proportion to our capacity. The faculties of our soul are subject to certain laws, which we cannot abstract.

One of the most constant laws of our being is the necessity of a simultaneous exercise of our faculties, not only in order to become certain of truth, but even to discover it. Man joins the greatest multiplicity with simplicity: his soul is one, is endowed with various faculties, and united to a body of such variety and complication as to be called with much reason a little world. His faculties are in intimate and mutual relation; they exert a continuous influence upon each other. To isolate them is to mutilate, and sometimes to extinguish them. This remark is important, for it indicates the radical vice of all exclusive philosophy.

If a man have no sensations, his understanding has no materials, nor has it that stimulus, without which it remains dormant. When God united our soul and body, it was that one might aid the other; wherefore he established that admirable correspondence between the impressions of the body and the affections of the soul, which, therefore, needs the body as a medium, as an instrument, whether the action of the body upon it be supposed to be a true action, or only a simple occasion of causality of a higher order.

If a man, having no sensations, were to think, he would only think as a pure spirit; he would not be in relation with the external world, nor would he be a man in the sense in which we use this word. In such a case the body is superfluous, and there is no reason why it should be united to the soul.

If we admit sensations, and abstract reason, man is converted into a brute. He feels, but does not think: he experiences impressions, but does not combine them, for he is incapable of reflecting. Every thing succeeds in him as a series of necessary, isolated phenomena, which indicate nothing, lead to nothing, and are nothing but affections of a particular being who does not comprehend them, nor render to himself an account of them. It is even difficult to say of what kind are his relations with the external world. Arguing from appearances and analogy, it is probable that brutes also make their sensations objective; but ordinarily, their objectiveness differs from ours. Let us take sleep for example. If brutes sleep, and they probably do sleep, as certain appearances seem to indicate, it would not be strange should they not distinguish as we do between waking and sleeping.

This supposes some reflection upon acts, some comparison between the order and constancy of some, and the disorder and inconstancy of others; a reflection which man makes even in infancy, and continues to make all his life without adverting to it. When we awake from a deep sleep, we sometimes remain for several moments in doubt if we are asleep or awake: this doubt alone supposes a comparative reflection of the two states. What do we do in order to resolve this doubt? We examine the place where we are; and the fact that we are abed, in the silence and darkness of night, indicates that the previous vision had no connection with our situation, and therefore that we were asleep. Without this reflection, the sensations of sleeping and waking would be connected, and all confounded in one and the same class.

The instinct conceded to brutes, but denied to men, shows that reason was given to us in order to appreciate sensations.

There are, then, in man no criteria of truth absolutely isolated. They are all in relation with each other, they mutually affirm and complete each other; for we must note that those truths, of which all men are certain, do in some sense rest upon all the criteria.

Sensations instinctively lead us to believe in the existence of an external world; and if this belief be submitted to the examination of reason, it confirms the same truth, resting upon the general ideas of cause and effect. The pure understanding knows certain principles, and assents to them as to necessary truths. The senses, if these principles be submitted to their experience, confirm them as much as their own perfection, or that of the instruments which they use, permit. "All the radii of a circle are equal." This is a necessary truth. The senses perceive no perfect circle, but they see that the more perfect the instrument is with which they construct it, so much more nearly equal are the radii. "There is no change without a cause to produce it." The senses cannot prove the proposition in all its universality, for they are by nature limited to a determinate number of particular cases; but, so far as their experience goes, they discover the order of such a dependence in the succession of phenomena.

The senses mutually aid each other. The sensation of one sense is compared with those of the others, when there arises a doubt as to its correspondence with its object. We seem to hear the whistling of the wind; but our hearing has more than once deceived us: to make sure of the truth we look at trees or other objects. We see a figure, but there is not light sufficient to distinguish it from a shadow, we approach and touch it.

The intellectual and moral faculties also exercise a salutary influence upon each other. Ideas rectify sentiments, and sentiments ideas. The value of the ideas of one order is verified by those of another order; and the same with sentiments. Pity for one suffering punishment inspires the pardon of all criminals; the indignation inspired at seeing the victims of crime, induces to the application of punishment; both sentiments involve something that is good; but the one would engender impunity, the other cruelty; it is to temper them that the ideas of justice exist. But this justice in its turn might pronounce excessively absolute sentences; justice is one, and the circumstances of peoples very different. Justice only considers the culpability, and consequently pronounces such sentences. A sentence may not be proper; for here come in other moral ideas of a distinct order, the amendment of the guilty joined with reparation made to the injured party; ideas also of public convenience which are not repugnant to sound morals, and which may direct their application.

Complete truth, like perfect good, exists only with harmony. This is a necessary law, and to it man is subject. Since we do not intuitively see the infinite truth in which all truths are one, and all good is one; and as we are in relation with a world of finite, and consequently multiple beings, we need different powers to place us in contact, so to speak, with this variety of truths and finite goods; but as they, in their turn, spring from one same principle, and are directed to one same end, they are submitted to harmony, which is the unity of multiplicity.

339. With these doctrines we believe philosophy without skepticism to be possible. Examination is not excluded; on the contrary, it is extended and completed. This method has another advantage; it does not make philosophy extravagant, and philosophers exceptional. Philosophy cannot be so generalized as to become popular; human nature is opposed to this; but there is not on the other hand any necessity of condemning it to a misanthropic isolation by force of extravagant professions. In such a case philosophy degenerates into philosophism. Exposition of facts, conscientious examination, clear language; such we conceive sound philosophy to be. This does not require it to cease to be profound, unless by profoundness be meant darkness. The rays of the sun light up the remotest depths of space.

340. I am aware that some philosophers of our age think otherwise, that they deem it necessary, when they examine the fundamental questions of philosophy, to shake the foundations of the world; and yet I have never been able to persuade myself that it was necessary to destroy in order to examine, or that in order to become philosophers we ought to become madmen. We may render the unreasonableness and extravagance of these masters of humanity sensible by an allegory, although the simplicity of my language may somewhat mortify their philosophical profoundness. The reader needs some solace and rest, now that he has followed me through such abstruse treatises, which all the power of the writer does not suffice to illustrate, and still less to render attractive.

A noble, rich, and numerous family preserves in magnificent archives the records of its nobility, alliances, and possessions. Some of these documents are hardly legible, either on account of the handwriting, their great antiquity, or the wear and tear of years. There is also a suspicion that many of these documents are apocryphal; although it is certain that many must be authentic, since the nobility and other rights of the family, so universally recognized, must be founded on some of them, and it is known that no other exists. Such is the state of things. Some curious person enters the archives, and casting a glance upon the shelves, recesses, and drawers, says: "This is all confusion; to distinguish what is authentic from the apocryphal, and put all in good order, we must light a fire at the four corners of the archives, and then examine the ashes."

What shall we think of such a proceeding? This curious person is the philosopher who, to distinguish the true and the false in our cognitions, begins by denying all truth, all certainty, all reason.

We may be told that there is no question of denying, but of doubting; but whoever doubts all truth, destroys it; whoever doubts all certainty denies it; whoever doubts all reason annihilates it. Prudence and common sense in small things are based upon the same principles as wisdom in great things. Let us go on with our allegory, and see what common sense would indicate ought to be done in this case.

To take an inventory of whatever now exists, without forgetting any thing, however contemptible it may appear; to make such temporary classifications as are deemed most proper to facilitate the examination, reserving the final classification to the close; to note carefully dates, characters, references, and thus to distinguish priority and posteriority; to see if there may be found some primitive documents, referring to others anterior, which certify the origin of the family; to establish clear rules for the distinguishing that which is primitive from what is only secondary; and not to insist on referring all documents to one alone, exacting a unity which, perhaps, they have not; for it may have happened that there were several primitive and mutually independent documents. It would even be advisable in distinguishing the authentic from the apocryphal not to burn any thing, for the apocryphal sometimes aids in the interpretation of what is authentic, and it may be desirable to ascertain who were the falsifiers, and what their motives. Moreover, who knows but what he judges a document to be apocryphal, which seems to him so to be solely because he does not understand it? Care, then, is to be taken to make a due separation, and if the apocryphal is of no use in establishing titles, or in defending them, it may serve for the history of the archives, which is no trifling reason for distinguishing the apocryphal from the authentic.

The human mind does not examine itself until well developed; then, at the first glance, it sees in itself a connection of sensations, ideas, judgments, and affections of a thousand kinds, the whole interwoven in an inextricable manner. To increase the complication, it is not alone, but in intimate relation with its like, in mutual communication of sensations, ideas, and sentiments; and all in their turn in contact with, and under the influence of, dissimilar beings of amazing variety, the union of which forms the universe. Shall it begin by throwing it all down? Shall it reduce all to ashes, and hope to rise like the phenix from the pyre? Shall it arbitrarily invent a fact, a principle, and say: "I must have a resting-point, I will take this, and upon it I will found science!" Shall we, before examining, before analyzing, say: "all this is one; there is nothing if there be not absolute unity; in it I place myself, and all that I do not see from my point of view I reject?" No! what we have to do, is first to ascertain what is in our mind, and then to examine, classify it, and give to it its true value; not commence by mad and impotent efforts against nature, but to lend an attentive ear to her inspirations.

There is no philosophy without a philosopher; no reason without a rational being; the existence of the subject is then a necessary supposition. No reason is possible if the contradiction of being and not-being be possible; all reason, then, supposes the principle of contradiction to be true. When we examine reason it is reason that examines; it needs rules, light; all examination, then, supposes this light, the evidence and the legitimacy of its criterion. Man does not make himself, he finds himself already made; it is not he who imposes the conditions of his being; he finds them already imposed. These conditions are the laws of his being, and why contend against them? "Besides factitious prejudices," says Schelling, "man has others primordial, placed in him not by education, but by nature herself, which in all men hold the place of principles of cognition, and are a shoal to the free-thinker." For my own part I do not seek to be more than all men; if I cannot be a philosopher without ceasing to be a man, I renounce philosophy and adhere to humanity.