INTRODUCTION. xi 



times the record of the difficulty which is still experi- 

 enced in grasping the non-material, since its original 

 meaning, breath, is nothing more than movement of 

 the least tangible form of matter. But this diffi- 

 culty of looking out on spirit as an object, without 

 imagination stepping in to invest it dimly with 

 material form, has its counterpart in the impossi- 

 bility of looking at material phenomena as if from 

 within, without attributing to them a consciousness 

 like our own : and this also has had no trifling 

 effect on the thought of primitive nations. The 

 disadvantage of our position in relation to matter is 

 similar to that which we suffer in respect of spirit ; 

 matter we know only from without, spirit only from 

 within. 



But, further, our consciousness is plainly a mere 

 surface-wave on an inscrutable deep ; and brought 

 to that surface there is perpetual evidence of ef- 

 fort, and thus the known properties of spirit are 

 consciousness and force. On the other hand, the 

 phenomena of matter are confined to movement in 

 space, one particular form of force ; it presents but 

 a finite exhibition of one of the known properties of 

 spirit, while it shows no sign of the other, namely, 

 of consciousness. Therefore, matter gives us no 

 explanation of spirit ; but in the hidden ocean of 

 infinite spirit is locked the secret of matter. 



While, however, matter in its relations to matter 

 presents merely one order of the properties of spirit, 



