THEIR MEANINGS. 463 



nature may be such that no efforts of our thought can ever 

 understand them. 



For (i) if by necessity we mean logical necessity, a 

 necessity such as that with which the conclusions follow 

 from their premisses, then we do not find it in nature. 

 That necessity exists in thought alone and does not ex- 

 tend to perception. We cannot demonstrate that one fact 

 is logically involved in another, and so generate an inde- 

 finite series of facts from our initial basis. A fact in the 

 sensible world can never be more than a fact, and qua fact 

 is never necessary, z>., never dependent on a previous fact. 

 The categorical judgment is that which comes nearest to 

 the sensible fact, and is most successful in concealing the 

 logical necessity which is inherent in all thought, and yet 

 the apodictic judgment ranks higher in the realm of 

 thought. For whenever a mere statement of fact is 

 doubted, we proceed to give reasons why it must necessarily 

 be so {cp. ch. iii. § 15). 



(2) If, again, we mean by necessity the power of pre- 

 dicting or calculating events, we imply something so dif- 

 ferent from the ordinary associations of necessity as to be 

 terribly confusing. There is much conduct representing 

 the highest and freest action which is eminently calculable, 

 much conduct which is as remote as possible from freedom, 

 which is quite incalculable. Is it not a paradoxical result 

 of this use of necessity to assert that the deliberate exe- 

 cution of a well-considered purpose is unfree and necessary 

 action, while the maniac impulses of insanity are free.^ 

 And yet the former is calculable and the latter are 

 incalculable. 



(3) Ifweareto mean anything definite by the use of 

 necessity in connection with causation, we must imply 

 something analogous to the feeling of compulsion which 

 we experience when we use the word " must." If necessity 

 does not imply a reference to our feeling of compulsion, 

 it either means nothing, or two very different things, and 

 the question of the relations of free-will and necessity can- 

 not be profitably discussed. If, on the other hand, neces- 

 sity is taken in this sense, it becomes evident that hotit 

 freedom and necessity apply primarily to the will. 



§ 7. Both freedom and necessity are psychological modes 



