COSMIC PHILOSOPHY 



real existence is mind with its sequent conscious 

 states. But Fichte differed from Berkeley in 

 his explanation of the sequence of our states of 

 consciousness. Fichte held that this sequence 

 is determined by itself — that it depends upon 

 the internal constitution of the mind. Or, in 

 other words, he maintained that the subject 

 creates the object. From this doctrine have lin- 

 eally descended all the vagaries of modern Ger- 

 man idealism — vagaries of method as well as 

 vagaries of doctrine, as any one may see who, 

 after some famlHarlty with scientific methods, 

 looks over the so-called " Nature-philosophy " 

 of Schelling and Oken. Its extreme corollaries 

 have been stated by Hegel, who, if I do not 

 misinterpret him, regards the universe as nothing 

 but the self-determined sequence of states of 

 consciousness of an Absolute Intelligence, of 

 which our individual intelligences are partial 

 manifestations. Manifestly we have here arrived 

 at logical suicide. We begin, with Kant, by say- 

 ing that we have no knowledge of the objective 

 order of things ; we continue, with Fichte, by 

 saying that there Is no objective order, save 

 that which the mind creates for itself; and we 

 end, with Hegel, by Identifying the objective 

 order with the subjective, and maintaining that 

 whatever is true of the latter is true also of the 

 former. In saying this, we virtually maintain 

 that the possibilities of thought are not only 



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