obviously untrue. Hence, knowledge is not mere sensation,
and, therefore, not merely a modification of the substance
of mind. If we ask wherein knowledge differs from sensa-
tion, the most simple reply is, that knowledge always has
an object, whereas sensation, in so far, at least, as it is a
modification of the substance of mind or a mental state,
never has an object. To speak of the object of a modifica-
tion or of a state would be a patent absurdity. Nothing is
known until it is made an object, that is, until it ceases to
be a modification and state of the subject, and becomes a
permanent something altogether independent of subjective
states. If this be the case, there is no reason why the
mind should not make itself, with or without its modi-
fications, an object to itself, and, abstracting from these
modifications, if need be, think its substance unmodified.
But, after this operation was performed, how would the
substance of mind, being without modifications and there-
fore without distinguishing marks, differ from any other
substance? What would it be more than simple being, the
element which every object of thought must have in order
to be thought? But surely we know what being is. If we
did not, we should not know anything, for nothing is
known except as being. We could not even put the
question, What is being? without already knowing what
it was.
The question implies that we desire an answer in
terms of being. It thus appears that we know what
substance unmodified is, and since we know the modi-
fications that distinguish the substance of mind, we know
even its specific substance. What we do not know is, how
these modifications are connected, how substance comes
to be modified in this particular way. But there is no
apparent reason why we should not discover this, and
therefore no ground for dogmatic agnosticism with refer-
ence to spiritual entities.

We can

not per

ceive sen

89.

We saw ($74) that in all our sensations of body there are three activities: first, the activity

pure, but

modifica

ourselves.

which modifies us; second, our modification; and, sations third, ourselves who are modified. The first of only as these activities is the object of our perception of tions of body; the third, the object of our perception of ourselves it remains for us to consider the second, our own modification, or sensation itself. The sensation or modification of ourselves is certainly what stimulates our intellectual attention to perceive bodies and ourselves. But our sensation is not the body which produces it, neither is it we ourselves. What is it, then? Do we perceive it? If we consider its nature, we see clearly that it is a passive act of our feeling, and that we ourselves are a feeling susceptible of various modifications. We see, moreover, that this modification of the wefeeling is produced by the action of an external agent. But all this knowledge concerning sensation we now have through reflection. Does it, therefore, fall within perception? Here again we must appeal to fact, so that we may not be misled by capricious theories, and put a false construction on the nature of things. Now, the fact tells that that reflection does not and cannot fall under perception alone. And, indeed, what is perception but the affirmation of a real being? Now, is sensation by itself a real being? Of course not. It is only a certain passive actuality or quality of a being. Hence, on the occasion of sensations, we never perceive the sensation alone. We always perceive ourselves who are beings, and it is only as united to us that sensation is perceived as a modification of ourselves.

Does perception take place directly or through reasoning?

90.

This enables us to solve the somewhat difficult question so often put by philosophers: Does the perception of beings take place directly or through the medium of reasoning? Our reply is that it takes place directly, by means of a simple judgment, and without any reasoning. We add, however, that this judgment is followed by reflection, which breaks it up into a process of reasoning. This reasoning, although the product of the reflection itself, and entirely distinct from perception, leaves upon us the impression that a secret process of reasoning has taken place in the act of perception itself, although it really has not.

This is easily explained. Perception is a synthetic judgment of objectivity, made by nature, and does not therefore, as such, enter into consciousness. The becoming conscious (das Bewusstwerden), the cognition, is the analysis of the judgment made by reflection. Things are really presented to the intelligence as objects, that is, as feelings already combined with being, or, which is the same thing, inhering in substance. What the intelligence does is to analyze these compounds, separating substance, which is the same for all things, from the sensible modifications which alone constitute real differences. Every act of cognition, therefore, is a separation of substance and accident. Judgment gives us cognition; reflection, recognition, in both senses of that term. When I reflect upon a cognitive judgment pronounced spontaneously, I cognize, in a new and indirect way, what I had previously cognized directly, and I also acknowledge my previous cognition as mine.

91.

which re

translates

The process by which reflection translates Process by our perception of ourselves is the following:- flection When the human spirit receives a sensation, it the perimmediately perceives that there is a reality. But ception of reality is always an entity which must belong to a being. Now, the mere reality of sensation is not itself a being. Therefore, if this reality, which must pertain to a being, is not itself a being, there must exist a being to which it belongs and whose actuality it is. Therefore a being subsists. Such is the reasoning that seems to take place in every perception. Properly speaking, however, this reasoning is the work of reflection, which insinuates itself unawares into perception. In fact, perception is the affirmation of a being. Therefore, there is no perception until the spirit How has said to itself that there is a being-has pro- this nounced the last proposition in the above process belongs to of reasoning: A being subsists. The other pro- per positions, therefore, are prior to perception. But before perception there is no process of reasoning, since human thought regarding reality begins with perception. Hence the process in question does not properly belong to perception, but is the work of reflection. How, then, does perception take place? Blindly?

"I am a being that thinks itself, therefore I am a substance. The substance of the Ego is a feeling, because the Ego feels. I always feel myself the same in all the various operations which I perform; and when I am per

much of

reflection

percep

tion?

forming no operation, I feel myself still, because I live, and feel that I live, essentially. This Ego is, therefore, a fundamental feeling. because all other sensations are based on it. It requires no other sensations; it is per se; we never can be without ourselves; all sensations require an essential feeling, because all possible sensations are but modifications of us. With the feeling Ego, therefore, we feel a being, a substance, a subject (that is, a living sentient principle). In this way, if we think this feeling, we perceive a substance. It is, therefore, a substance that we perceive immediately, and this substance is ourselves" (New Essay, vol. iii. §§ 1195, 1196).

Perception does not take place blindly.

92.

Of course not. On the contrary, it takes place in full light. As soon as we feel ourselves modified, we pronounce the existence of ourselves, because we pronounce nothing else than the existence of a being. When we have a sensation, the first thing we see is the being in which the sensation inheres, the being modified. Before we perceive being, sensation is but a feeling. Given this feeling, we directly affirm the principle of it. This principle is inseparable from it, so inseparable, indeed, that the feeling cannot be known, just as it cannot exist, without it, that is, without the being in which it is. Feeling, therefore, incites us to affirm not only the feeling itself, but also the being in which it inheres, and, hence, to perceive the being and the feeling in the being simultaneously.

Rosmini holds that the sensations do not excite the intelligence directly; but that, when a need is created in