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Chapter XXIII.³On The Objectification Of The Will In Unconscious Nature

That the will which we find within us does not proceed, as philosophy has hitherto assumed, first from knowledge, and indeed is a mere modification of it, thus something secondary, derived, and, like knowledge itself, conditioned by the brain; but that it is the prius of knowledge, the kernel of our nature, and that original force itself which forms and sustains the animal body, in that it carries out both its unconscious and its conscious functions; – this is the first step in the fundamental knowledge of my metaphysics. Paradoxical as it even now seems to many that the will in itself is without knowledge, yet the scholastics in some way already recognised and confessed it; for Jul. Cæs. Vaninus (that well-known sacrifice to fanaticism and priestly fury), who was thoroughly versed in their philosophy, says in his “Amphitheatro,” p. 181: “Voluntas potentia cœca est, ex scholasticorum opinione.” That, further, it is that same will which in the plant forms the bud in order to develop the leaf and the flower out of it; nay, that the regular form of the crystal is only the trace which its momentary effort has left behind, and that in general, as the true and only αυτοματον, in the proper sense of the word, it lies at the foundation of all the forces of unorganised nature, plays, acts, in all their multifarious phenomena, imparts power to their laws, and even in the crudest mass manifests itself as gravity; – this insight is the second step in that fundamental knowledge, and is brought about by further reflection. But it would be the grossest misunderstanding to suppose that this is a mere question of a word to denote an unknown quantity. It is rather the most real of all real knowledge which is here expressed in language. For it is the tracing back of that which is quite inaccessible to our immediate knowledge, and therefore in its essence foreign and unknown to us, which we denote by the words force of nature, to that which is known to us most accurately and intimately, but which is yet only accessible to us in our own being and directly, and must therefore be carried over from this to other phenomena. It is the insight that what is inward and original in all the changes and movements of bodies, however various they may be, is in its nature identical; that yet we have only one opportunity of getting to know it more closely and directly, and that is in the movements of our own body. In consequence of this knowledge we must call it will. It is the insight that that which acts and strives in nature, and exhibits itself in ever more perfect phenomena, when it has worked itself up so far that the light of knowledge falls directly upon it, i. e., when it has attained to the state of self-consciousness – exists as that will, which is what is most intimately known to us, and therefore cannot be further explained by anything else, but rather affords the explanation of all other things. It is accordingly the thing in itself so far as this can ever be reached by knowledge. Consequently it is that which must express itself in some way in everything in the world, for it is the inner nature of the world and the kernel of all phenomena.

As my essay, “Ueber den Willen in der Natur,” specially refers to the subject of this chapter, and also adduces the evidence of unprejudiced empiricists in favour of this important point of my doctrine, I have only to add now to what is said there a few supplementary remarks, which are therefore strung together in a somewhat fragmentary manner.

First, then, with reference to plant life, I draw attention to the remarkable first two chapters of Aristotle's work upon plants. What is most interesting in them, as is so often the case with Aristotle, are the opinions of earlier profound philosophers quoted by him. We see there that Anaxagoras and Empedocles quite rightly taught that plants have the motion of their growth by virtue of their indwelling desires (επιθυμια); nay, that they also attributed to them pleasure and pain, therefore sensation. But Plato only ascribed to them desires, and that on account of their strong appetite for nutrition (cf. Plato in the “Timœus,” p. 403, Bip.) Aristotle, on the other hand, true to his customary method, glides on the surface of things, confines himself to single characteristics and conceptions fixed by current expressions, and asserts that without sensation there can be no desires, and that plants have not sensation. He is, however, in considerable embarrassment, as his confused language shows, till here also, “where fails the comprehension, a word steps promptly in as deputy,” namely, το θρεπτικον, the faculty of nourishing. Plants have this, and thus a part of the so-called soul, according to his favourite division into anima vegetativa, sensitiva, and intellectiva. This, however, is just a scholastic Quidditas, and signifies plantœ nutriuntur quia habent facultatem nutritivam. It is therefore a bad substitute for the more profound research of his predecessors, whom he is criticising. We also see, in the second chapter, that Empedocles even recognised the sexuality of plants; which Aristotle then also finds fault with, and conceals his want of special knowledge behind general propositions, such as this, that plants could not have both sexes combined, for if so they would be more complete than animals. By quite an analogous procedure he displaces the correct astronomical system of the world of the Pythagoreans, and by his absurd fundamental principles, which he specially explains in the books de Cœlo, introduces the system of Ptolemy, whereby mankind was again deprived of an already discovered truth of the greatest importance for almost two thousand years.

I cannot refrain from giving here the saying of an excellent biologist of our own time who fully agrees with my teaching. It is G. R. Treviranus, who, in his work, “Ueber die Erscheinungen und Gesetze des organischen Lebens,” 1832, Bd. 2, Abth. 1, § 49, has said what follows: “A form of life is, however, conceivable in which the effect of the external upon the internal produces merely feelings of desire or dislike. Such is the life of plants. In the higher forms of animal life the external is felt as something objective.” Treviranus speaks here from pure unprejudiced comprehension of nature, and is as little conscious of the metaphysical importance of his words as of the contradictio in adjecto which lies in the conception of something “felt as objective,” a conception which indeed he works out at great length. He does not know that all feeling is essentially subjective, and all that is objective is, on the other hand, perception, and therefore a product of the understanding. Yet this does not detract at all from the truth and importance of what he says.

In fact, in the life of plants the truth that will can exist without knowledge is apparent – one might say palpably recognisable. For here we see a decided effort, determined by wants, modified in various ways, and adapting itself to the difference of the circumstances, yet clearly without knowledge. And just because the plant is without knowledge it bears its organs of generation ostentatiously in view, in perfect innocence; it knows nothing about it. As soon, on the other hand, as in the series of existences knowledge appears the organs of generation are transferred to a hidden part. Man, however, with whom this is again less the case, conceals them intentionally: he is ashamed of them.

Primarily, then, the vital force is identical with the will, but so also are all other forces of nature; though this is less apparent. If, therefore, we find the recognition of a desire, i. e., of a will, as the basis of plant life, expressed at all times, with more or less distinctness of conception, on the other hand, the reference of the forces of unorganised nature to the same foundation is rarer in proportion as their remoteness from our own nature is greater. In fact, the boundary between the organised and the unorganised is the most sharply drawn in the whole of nature, and perhaps the only one that admits of no transgressions; so that natura non facit saltus seems to suffer an exception here. Although certain crystallisations display an external form resembling the vegetable, yet even between the smallest lichen, the lowest fungus, and everything unorganised there remains a fundamental and essential difference. In the unorganised body that which is essential and permanent, thus that upon which its identity and integrity rests, is the material, the matter; what is unessential and changing is, on the other hand, the form. With the organised body the case is exactly reversed; for its life, i. e., its existence as an organised being, simply consists in the constant change of the material, while the form remains permanent. Its being and its identity thus lies in the form alone. Therefore the continuance of the unorganised body depends upon repose and exclusion from external influences: thus alone does it retain its existence; and if this condition is perfect, such a body lasts for ever. The continuance of the organised body, on the contrary, just depends upon continual movement and the constant reception of external influences. As soon as these are wanting and the movement in it stops it is dead, and thereby ceases to be organic, although the trace of the organism that has been still remains for a while. Therefore the talk, which is so much affected in our own day, of the life of what is unorganised, indeed of the globe itself, and that it, and also the planetary system, is an organism, is entirely inadmissible. The predicate life belongs only to what is organised. Every organism, however, is throughout organised, is so in all its parts; and nowhere are these, even in their smallest particles, composed by aggregation of what is unorganised. Thus if the earth were an organism, all mountains and rocks, and the whole interior of their mass, would necessarily be organised, and accordingly really nothing unorganised would exist; and therefore the whole conception of it would be wanting.

On the other hand, that the manifestation of a will is as little bound up with life and organisation as with knowledge, and that therefore the unorganised has also a will, the manifestations of which are all its fundamental qualities, which cannot be further explained, – this is an essential point in my doctrine; although the trace of such a thought is far seldomer found in writers who have preceded me than that of the will in plants, where, however, it is still unconscious.

In the forming of the crystal we see, as it were, a tendency towards an attempt at life, to which, however, it does not attain, because the fluidity of which, like a living thing, it is composed at the moment of that movement is not enclosed in a skin, as is always the case with the latter, and consequently it has neither vessels in which that movement could go on, nor does anything separate it from the external world. Therefore, rigidity at once seizes that momentary movement, of which only the trace remains as the crystal.

The thought that the will, which constitutes the basis of our own nature, is also the same will which shows itself even in the lowest unorganised phenomena, on account of which the conformity to law of both phenomena shows a perfect analogy, lies at the foundation of Goethe's “Wahlverwandtschaften,” as the title indeed indicates, although he himself was unconscious of this.

Mechanics and astronomy specially show us how this will conducts itself so far as it appears at the lowest grade of its manifestation merely as gravity, rigidity, and inertia. Hydraulics shows us the same thing where rigidity is wanting and the fluid material is now unrestrainedly surrendered to its predominating passion, gravity. In this sense hydraulics may be conceived as a characteristic sketch of water, for it presents to us the manifestations of will to which water is moved by gravity; these always correspond exactly to the external influences, for in the case of all non-individual existences there is no particular character in addition to the general one; thus they can easily be referred to fixed characteristics, which are called laws, and which are learned by experience of water. These laws accurately inform us how water will conduct itself under all different circumstances, on account of its gravity, the unconditioned mobility of its parts, and its want of elasticity. Hydrostatics teaches how it is brought to rest through gravity; hydrodynamics, how it is set in motion; and the latter has also to take account of hindrances which adhesion opposes to the will of water: the two together constitute hydraulics. In the same way Chemistry teaches us how the will conducts itself when the inner qualities of materials obtain free play by being brought into a fluid state, and there appears that wonderful attraction and repulsion, separating and combining, leaving go of one to seize upon another, from which every precipitation originates, and the whole of which is denoted by “elective affinity” (an expression which is entirely borrowed from the conscious will). But Anatomy and Physiology allow us to see how the will conducts itself in order to bring about the phenomenon of life and sustain it for a while. Finally, the poet shows us how the will conducts itself under the influence of motives and reflection. He exhibits it therefore for the most part in the most perfect of its manifestations, in rational beings, whose character is individual, and whose conduct and suffering he brings before us in the Drama, the Epic, the Romance, &c. The more correctly, the more strictly according to the laws of nature his characters are there presented, the greater is his fame; hence Shakespeare stands at the top. The point of view which is here taken up corresponds at bottom to the spirit in which Goethe followed and loved the natural sciences, although he was not conscious of the matter in the abstract. Nay more, this not only appears from his writings, but is also known to me from his personal utterances.

If we consider the will, where no one denies it, in conscious beings, we find everywhere, as its fundamental effort, the self-preservation of every being: omnis natura vult esse conservatrix sui. But all manifestations of this fundamental effort may constantly be traced back to a seeking or pursuit and a shunning or fleeing from, according to the occasion. Now this also may be shown even at the lowest grades of nature, that is, of the objectification of the will, where the bodies still act only as bodies in general, thus are the subject-matter of mechanics, and are considered only with reference to the manifestations of impenetrability, cohesion, rigidity, elasticity, and gravity. Here also the seeking shows itself as gravitation, and the shunning as the receiving of motion; and the movableness of bodies by pressure or impact, which constitutes the basis of mechanics, is at bottom a manifestation of the effort after self-preservation, which dwells in them also. For, since as bodies they are impenetrable, this is the sole means of preserving their cohesion, thus their continuance at any time. The body which is impelled or exposed to pressure would be crushed to pieces by the impelling or pressing body if it did not withdraw itself from its power by flight, in order to preserve its cohesion; and when flight is impossible for it this actually happens. Indeed, one may regard elastic bodies as the more courageous, which seek to repel the enemy, or at least to prevent him from pursuing further. Thus in the one secret which (besides gravity) is left by mechanics otherwise so clear, in the communicability of motion, we see a manifestation of the fundamental effort of the will in all its phenomena, the effort after self-preservation, which shows itself even at the lowest grades as that which is essential.

In unorganised nature the will objectifies itself primarily in the universal forces, and only by means of these in the phenomena of the particular things which are called forth by causes. In § 26 of the first volume I have fully explained the relation between cause, force of nature, and will as thing in itself. One sees from that explanation that metaphysics never interrupts the course of physics, but only takes up the thread where physics leaves it, at the original forces in which all causal explanation has its limits. Only here does the metaphysical explanation from the will as the thing in itself begin. In the case of every physical phenomenon, of every change of material things, its cause is primarily to be looked for; and this cause is just such a particular change which has appeared immediately before it. Then, however, the original force of nature is to be sought by virtue of which this cause was capable of acting. And first of all the will is to be recognised as the inner nature of this force in opposition to its manifestation. Yet the will shows itself just as directly in the fall of a stone as in the action of the man; the difference is only that its particular manifestation is in the one case called forth by a motive, in the other by a mechanically acting cause, for example, the taking away of what supported the stone; yet in both cases with equal necessity; and that in the one case it depends upon an individual character, in the other upon an universal force of nature. This identity of what is fundamentally essential is even made palpable to the senses. If, for instance, we carefully observe a body which has lost its equilibrium, and on account of its special form rolls back and forward for a long time till it finds its centre of gravity again, a certain appearance of life forces itself upon us, and we directly feel that something analogous to the foundation of life is also active here. This is certainly the universal force of nature, which, however, in itself identical with the will, becomes here, as it were, the soul of a very brief quasi life. Thus what is identical in the two extremes of the manifestation of the will makes itself faintly known here even to direct perception, in that this raises a feeling in us that here also something entirely original, such as we only know in the acts of our own will, directly succeeded in manifesting itself.

We may attain to an intuitive knowledge of the existence and activity of the will in unorganised nature in quite a different and a sublime manner if we study the problem of the three heavenly bodies, and thus learn more accurately and specially the course of the moon round the earth. By the different combinations which the constant change of the position of these three heavenly bodies towards each other introduces, the course of the moon is now accelerated; now retarded, now it approaches the earth, and again recedes from it; and this again takes place differently in the perihelion of the earth from in its aphelion, all of which together introduces such irregularity into the moon's course that it really obtains a capricious appearance; for, indeed, Kepler's third law is no longer constantly valid, but in equal times it describes unequal areas. The consideration of this course is a small and separate chapter of celestial mechanics, which is distinguished in a sublime manner from terrestrial mechanics by the absence of all impact and pressure, thus of the vis a tergo which appears to us so intelligible, and indeed of the actually completed case, for besides vis inertiœ it knows no other moving and directing force, except only gravitation, that longing for union which proceeds from the very inner nature of bodies. If now we construct for ourselves in imagination the working of this given case in detail, we recognise distinctly and directly in the moving force here that which is given to us in self-consciousness as will. For the alterations in the course of the earth and the moon, according as one of them is by its position more or less exposed to the influence of the sun, are evidently analogous to the influence of newly appearing motives upon our wills, and to the modifications of our action which result.

The following is an illustrative example of another kind. Liebig (Chemie in Anwendung auf Agrikultur, p. 501), says: “If we bring moist copper into air which contains carbonic acid, the affinity of the metal for the oxygen of the air will be increased by the contact with this acid to such a degree that the two will combine with each other; its surface will be coated with green carbonic oxide of copper. But now two bodies which have the capacity of combining, the moment they meet assume opposite electrical conditions. Therefore if we touch the copper with iron, by producing a special electrical state, the capacity of the copper to enter into combination with the oxygen is destroyed; even under the above conditions it remains bright.” The fact is well known and of technical use. I quote it in order to say that here the will of the copper, laid claim to and occupied by the electrical opposition to iron, leaves unused the opportunity which presents itself for its chemical affinity for oxygen and carbonic acid. Accordingly it conducts itself exactly as the will in a man who omits an action which he would otherwise feel himself moved to in order to perform another to which a stronger motive urges him.

I have shown in the first volume that the forces of nature lie outside the chain of causes and effects, because they constitute their accompanying condition, their metaphysical foundation, and therefore prove themselves to be eternal and omnipresent, i. e., independent of time and space. Even in the uncontested truth that what is essential to a cause as such consists in this, that it will produce the same effect at any future time as it does now, it is already involved that something lies in the cause which is independent of the course of time, i. e., is outside of all time; this is the force of nature which manifests itself in it. One can even convince oneself to a certain extent empirically and as a matter of fact of the ideality of this form of our perception by fixing one's eyes upon the powerlessness of time as opposed to natural forces. If, for example, a rotatory motion is imparted to a planet by some external cause, if no new cause enters to stop it, this motion will endure for ever. This could not be so if time were something in itself and had an objective, real existence; for then it would necessarily also produce some effect. Thus we see here, on the one hand, the forces of nature, which manifest themselves in that rotation, and, if it is once begun, carry it on for ever without becoming weary or dying out, prove themselves to be eternal or timeless, and consequently absolutely real and existing in themselves; and, on the other hand, time as something which consists only in the manner in which we apprehend that phenomenon, since it exerts no power and no influence upon the phenomenon itself; for what does not act is not.

We have a natural inclination whenever it is possible to explain every natural phenomenon mechanically; doubtless because mechanics calls in the assistance of the fewest original, and hence inexplicable, forces, and, on the other hand, contains much that can be known a priori, and therefore depends upon the forms of our own intellect, which as such carries with it the highest degree of comprehensibility and clearness. However, in the “Metaphysical First Principles of Natural Science” Kant has referred mechanical activity itself to a dynamical activity. On the other hand, the application of mechanical explanatory hypotheses, beyond what is demonstrably mechanical, to which, for example, Acoustics also belongs, is entirely unjustified, and I will never believe that even the simplest chemical combination or the difference of the three states of aggregation will ever admit of mechanical explanation, much less the properties of light, of heat, and electricity. These will always admit only of a dynamical explanation, i. e., one which explains the phenomenon from original forces which are entirely different from those of impact, pressure, weight, &c., and are therefore of a higher kind, i. e., are more distinct objectifications of that will which obtains visible form in all things. I am of opinion that light is neither an emanation nor a vibration; both views are akin to that which explains transparency from pores and the evident falseness of which is proved by the fact that light is subject to no mechanical laws. In order to obtain direct conviction of this one only requires to watch the effects of a storm of wind, which bends, upsets, and scatters everything, but during which a ray of light shooting down from a break in the clouds is entirely undisturbed and steadier than a rock, so that with great directness it imparts to us the knowledge that it belongs to another order of things than the mechanical: it stands there unmoved like a ghost. Those constructions of light from molecules and atoms which have originated with the French are indeed a revolting absurdity. An article by Ampère, who is otherwise so acute, upon light and heat, which is to be found in the April number of the “Annales de chimie et physique,” of 1835, may be considered as a flagrant expression of this, and indeed of the whole of atomism in general. There the solid, the fluid, and the elastic consist of the same atoms, and all differences arise solely from their aggregation; nay, it is said that space indeed is infinitely divisible, but not matter; because, if the division has been carried as far as the atoms, the further division must fall in the spaces between the atoms! Light and heat, then, are here vibrations of the atoms; and sound, on the other hand, is a vibration of the molecules composed of the atoms. In truth, however, these atoms are a fixed idea of the French savants, and therefore they just speak of them as if they had seen them. Otherwise one would necessarily marvel that such a matter-of-fact nation as the French can hold so firmly to a completely transcendent hypothesis, which is quite beyond the possibility of experience, and confidently build upon it up to the sky. This is just a consequence of the backward state of the metaphysics they shun so much, which is poorly represented by M. Cousin, who, with all good will, is shallow and very scantily endowed with judgment. At bottom they are still Lockeians, owing to the earlier influence of Condillac. Therefore for them the thing in itself is really matter, from the fundamental properties of which, such as impenetrability, form, hardness, and the other primary qualities, everything in the world must be ultimately explicable. They will not let themselves be talked out of this, and their tacit assumption is that matter can only be moved by mechanical forces. In Germany Kant's teaching has prevented the continuance of the absurdities of the atomistic and purely mechanical physics for any length of time; although at the present moment these views prevail here also, which is a consequence of the shallowness, crudeness, and folly introduced by Hegel. However, it cannot be denied that not only the evidently porous nature of natural bodies, but also two special doctrines of modern physics, apparently render assistance to the atomic nuisance. These are, Hauz's Crystallography, which traces every crystal back to its kernel form, which is an ultimate form, though only relatively indivisible; and Berzelius's doctrine of chemical atoms, which are yet mere expressions for combining proportions, thus only arithmetical quantities, and at bottom nothing more than counters. On the other hand, Kant's thesis in the second antinomy in defence of atoms, which is certainly only set up for dialectical purposes, is a mere sophism, as I have proved in my criticism of his philosophy, and our understanding itself by no means leads us necessarily to the assumption of atoms. For just as little as I am obliged to think that the slow but constant and uniform motion of a body before my eyes is composed of innumerable motions which are absolutely quick, but broken and interrupted by just as many absolutely short moments of rest, but, on the contrary, know very well that the stone that has been thrown flies more slowly than the projected bullet, yet never pauses for an instant on the way, so little am I obliged to think of the mass of a body as consisting of atoms and the spaces between them, i. e., of absolute density and absolute vacuity; but I comprehend those two phenomena without difficulty as constant continua, one of which uniformly fills time and the other space. But just as the one motion may yet be quicker than another, i. e., in an equal time can pass through more space, so also one body may have a greater specific gravity than another, i. e., in equal space may contain more matter: in both cases the difference depends upon the intensity of the acting force; for Kant (following Priestley) has quite correctly reduced matter to forces. But even if the analogy here set up should not be admitted as valid, and it should be insisted upon that the difference of specific gravity can only have its ground in porosity, even this assumption would always lead, not to atoms, but only to a perfectly dense matter, unequally distributed among different bodies; a matter which would certainly be no longer compressible, when no pores ran through it, but yet, like the space which it fills, would always remain infinitely divisible. For the fact that it would have no pores by no means involves that no possible force could do away with the continuity of its spatial parts. For to say that everywhere this is only possible by extending the already existing intervals is a purely arbitrary assertion.

The assumption of atoms rests upon the two phenomena which have been touched upon, the difference of the specific gravity of bodies and that of their compressibility, for both are conveniently explained by the assumption of atoms. But then both must also always be present in like measure, which is by no means the case. For, for example, water has a far lower specific gravity than all metals properly so called. It must thus have fewer atoms and greater interstices between them, and consequently be very compressible: but it is almost entirely incompressible.