CHAP. II.] FIRST TRUTHS. 53 



We may here a second time insist upon the validity of 

 our intuitions as the properties of space and number, that 

 they are truths to which no possible exception can ever 

 exist at any time or in any placo ; even Omnipotence itself 

 being unable to make two right lines inclose a space, or the 

 cube of 3 to be other than 27. But consequences follow 

 which are yet more important. To anticipate what will be 

 treated of later, it may be even now affirmed that the 

 element of moral worth which our intellect declares to 

 attach to certain actions under certain conditions, is justified 

 by our recognition of necessary truth and our perception of 

 it as universally and necessarily valid an objective truth, 

 not a mere subjective impression. Thus that faculty of cog 

 nizing objective truth which is called the intellect, informs 

 us not only of the existence of a persistent self, the Ego, but 

 also of a persistent not-self, the non-Ego ; of objective rela 

 tions in the order of intellectual truths and of objective rela 

 tions in the order of mural worth. All these intuitions and 

 cognitions hang together as necessarily connected. To inva 

 lidate one is to invalidate all. To assert one is, virtually, 

 to assert all. They cannot be denie 1 without falling into 

 scepticism which invalidates its very self by its own doubt as 

 to the existence of the doubter who doubts it. To conclude, 

 men have absolute certainty of the very highest degree as to 

 their own existence ; and yet this certainty cannot be logi 

 cally asserted without implying the existence of a whole 

 sphere of objective truths which the intellect has the 

 faculty of perceiving by the very light by which those truths 

 manifest themselves to the intellect. 



These views being accepted, we cease to be confined within 

 a narrow sphere of mere subjective feelings, with our highest 

 intellectual efforts resulting in a mere recognition of our 

 &quot; Nescience.&quot; On the contrary, the nobility of man s intel 

 lectual nature reappears more distinctly and grandly than 

 before its temporary eclipse occasioned by self-refuting 

 doubts and a shallow psychological analysis. The intellect is, 

 indeed, still seen to be limited to be capable, in its present 



