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nized it as a being. Now, it cannot be a being, except on condition of having an active subsistent principle [by the principle of substance: see below, §§ 93-97]. Man, therefore, discovers, in this activity, being, or substance, the active principle, sentient, intelligent, and unifying—a principle perfectly one and simple, but furnished with a triple act. On reaching this stage of the process, man has found himself; so far, however, without being aware of it. In fact, he does not yet know that that being, that substance, which he has discovered, is himself. He has not yet formed the consciousness of himself; he is not yet able to pronounce the monosyllable I. How is he to take this further step? we ask again. In what way shall he give himself this new mode of existence and life? How shall it happen that he will not only live, but will begin to know that he lives, to live for himself? A single step more, and he will arrive at that too. Having found that single principle which feels, understands, and reasons, he will only have to re-think the manner in which he found this single principle. When he contemplated the unifying or reasoning activity in being, and saw it therein, he performed a new act, in which he perceived the reasoning activity. Now, in that first moment in which a man observes that the act which perceives the reasoning activity is not something different from the reasoning activity itself, but an activity identical with it, in the same moment he has perceived himself, and can pronounce I. In truth, I expresses identity between the reasoning principle and the principle which pronounces it by saying I; that is, he who pronounces I, in articulating this monosyllable, testifies that he is conscious that there is an activity, and that this activity is the same that speaks, that announces itself, that is conscious of itself. He who pronounces I, therefore, must have reflected upon his own activity, and have found that what reflected on its own activity was not a different principle from that on which it reflected. All that now remains to be explained is the manner in which a man is able to recognize that the reflecting and speaking activity is the same as the perceiving and reasoning. This identity of principles in the

different reflections arises from the inner feeling, that is, from the feeling which man has of his own universal activity, wherein are virtually contained and identified all partial activities, and wherein it is felt that that act which gives rise to perception and reasoning is nothing other than an act, a partial application, of that first fundamental activity, from which likewise proceeds reflection upon that which is perceived and reasoned about, upon perceptions, upon reasonings, upon the reflections themselves, and that this activity is the very one which speaks and posits itself by saying I. Thus is generated the Ego. Hence we see clearly that there are―(1) a subject merely sensitive, which neither sees nor understands itself; (2) an intellective subject, even before this subject understands itself; (3) a human, that is, a sensitive-intellective subject, anterior to its consciousness of itself; and (4) we see that, when the human subject, through diverse internal operations, succeeds in gaining a consciousness of itself, it then becomes an Ego" (Anthropology, §§ 805–810).

82.

would be

compare

beings their together, make not

if it had

universal

being, being, by

means of

knows the

It is true that, after we have perceived both Reflection the corporeal world and ourselves, we may reflect unable to upon these two perceptions, compare the object perceived of the one with that of the other, and mark relations. This comparison we could not unless we had in our minds universal the measure of all beings. When we refer real, which it particular, limited being to the essence of being, mode and its ground and principle, we understand that the of its former is not a complete realization of the latter; in those and when we refer other real, particular, limited beings to the same essence, we are able to see they whether they are, or are not, realizations having belong or the same mode and quantity as the preceding.

quantity

realization

beings,

and,

hence, if

not to the

same

species.

Principle of the discernibility of individuals.

Origin of the ideas of numbers.

If, when we refer a second being to the essence
of being, we see that it is a realization having the
same mode and quantity as the first, we call it a
being of the same species. Although it may be
in all respects like the preceding, we may yet be
able to see that it is a different individual, from
the fact that it is the object of a second perception
contemporaneous with the first. And this is the
principle of the discernibility of individuals.
the second being were the object of the same
identical perception as the first, they would not
be two individuals, but one.

If

Rosmini carefully distinguishes between the individual and the idea of the individual; but he seems to find no principle that satisfactorily explains individuation. He says, "The true individual occurs only in the order of real being, and the principle of individuation is simply the reality of being" (Anthropology, § 785. Cf. under § 84).

83.

We know, then, the number of contemporaneous perceptions, when the individual beings are exactly the same in all other respects—a supposition logically possible. The reason of which is that, in this case, we are able to refer two or more individuals at once to universal being, by the light of which we are able to see that the realization of two is more than the realization of one. Thus arise the ideas of numbers. Afterwards, of course, comes abstraction (reflected attention limited to certain observable elements of being), and gives us pure numbers.

84.

of mode of

constitutes

of species;

in quantity

constitutes

If, however, two perceived beings are recog- Difference nized as different, not only because they are per- realization ceived by different contemporaneous perceptions, difference but also because they differ in the mode or quan- difference tity of their realization, then they are recognized or actuality as different in species, or, if their species is the c accidental same, as different in some accidental attribute. The difference in mode of realization constitutes the difference of species; the difference in the quantity, or even of the actuality, is the cause of accidental differences.

This doctrine will hardly be accepted by those who believe that species are due to quantitative differences of constituent parts, and that accidental differences may, by being perpetuated till they become sufficiently great, constitute qualitative or specific differences. Sulphuric anhydride has qualities very different from those of sulphide dioxide, and yet the ground of the difference between the two is purely a matter of quantity (SO,; SO2). Here is involved the whole question of the Origin of Species.

In regard to specification, Rosmini lays down the following principles :

"(1) Pure reality, without determination, is an abstract concept, which marks neither being, nor substance, nor accident, nor principle, nor term, nor quality, nor quantity, but merely a mode of being. If we descend from this most abstract concept to one less abstract, but still abstract, and consider that reality which is the extended term of feeling, it will take the name of matter. Matter, considered thus, without any further determinations, is unlimited, or, more correctly, indefinite, and, therefore, still devoid of quantity.

"(2) Nothing real can exist indeterminate. . . .

differences.

(3) Reality is of two kinds, principle and term. To the term reality belongs matter; . . . to the principle reality, the spirit, that is, the sensitive principle, the intellective principle, and the rational.

"(4) Hence four kinds of forms:

"A. The form which determines and individuates matter (first kind of form). This form produces dimensive quantity, figure and number of material individuals—parts.

"B. The materiated form which determines and individuates the sensitive principle (second kind of form). Formed matter. . . may exist in three states-continuity pure and simple, continuity with internal movements, and continuity with internal harmonic movements. These three states of formed matter give occasion to three varieties of the same species, that is, the species of sensitive individuals.

"C. The form which determines and individuates the intellective principle-object being (third kind of form, pure objective).

"D. The form which determines the rational principle -object-subject being (fourth kind of form, objective, with determinations coming from the subject).

"(5) Finally, we may gather from what has been said"A. That the multitude of real, corporeal, animal and human individuals is due to the division of matter, which division is a consequence of its peculiar form.

"B. That the multiplication of species is due to the various nature of the terms. In other words, as soon as a term, ontologically considered, is so limited that it excludes another and another excludes it, so that between the two there is no gradation, but entire separation, so entire as to make necessary the use of a different idea in order to be thought, then this term excites in the principle a feeling likewise exclusive, which is not a matter of degree, but altogether a different feeling, in which difference consists, as we have seen, ontological limitation. Why a term renders itself thus exclusive; how being is susceptible of such determination; how many such ontological limitations there may be ;-all these are questions . . . whose

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