30 THE WOELD-ENEEGY 



essential forms positive,, negative and infinite (or abso- 

 lute) under which the primary law of the necessary 

 unity and self-consistency of thought may be presented. 

 But they are equally the laws of things, since the only 

 "things" with which thought can really deal, and hence 

 the only things concerning which affirmations possessing 

 any real significance can be made, are the facts of the 

 world such as they present themselves in consciousness ; 

 that is, in thought. But thus presented in conscious- 

 ness, these facts, so far as they are really facts for the 

 individual, are just the perceptions and conceptions 

 which the individual has formed in his own mind. 



No doubt any given perception has taken place in any 

 given mind only in consequence of certain stimuli which 

 such mind has received from outer "things." But to 

 say this, is only to describe another conception which the 

 individual has formed concerning the conditions under 

 which perceptions and conceptions in general can arise in 

 his mind. That is, while such statement emphasizes 

 the fact, that in one sense, we can never get beyond our 

 own perceptions and conceptions, and that thus all our 

 knowledge seems purely subjective ; yet the very con- 

 sciousness of these subjective states necessarily involves a 

 reference of them to some external exciting cause and 

 thus proves that knowledge is no less objective than sub- 

 jective in its nature. 



It is especially worthy of note in this connection, too, 

 that even in the ordinary use of language it is the sub- 

 jective phase of mental activity that is called thought, 

 while the objective aspects of that activity are denomi- 

 nated "things." And again, this implicit rationality of 

 the ordinary consciousness is developed into more explicit 



