108 PBOF. FEEEIEE ON KNOWING AND BEING. 



Institutes, it is affirmed that, along with whatever any intelligence 

 knows, it must have some cognisance of itself. This is made the basis 

 of our Author's Epistemology, and it is in this proposition that his 

 answer to the question, "What is knowledge, is embodied. He fancies 

 that by indicating the Ego as an object known in all cognition, he has 

 set before us " the common point in which all our cognitions unite 

 " and agree." " The Ego," he says, " is this feature, point or element ; 

 " it is the common centre which is at all times known, and in which 

 " all our cognitions, however diverse they may be in other respects, 

 " are known as uniting and agreeing ; and besides the Ego or one's self, 

 " there is no other identical quality in our cognitions." But is it not 

 plain that the Professor is here labouring under a delusion ? To say, 

 that, along with whatever any intelligence knows, it knows itself, is 

 not informing us what knowledge is. Mr. Eerrier may have sue 

 ceeded in pointing out an object which is apprehended in every cog- 

 nitive act ; but this is not tantamount to pointing out an element 

 common to all cognition: it is not designating the many varieties of 

 knowledge by one notion : it is saying nothing about knowledge, but 

 only something about its object. Our author has lost himself, there- 

 fore, at the very outset of his course ; and has failed to secure the 

 basis indispensable for the structure which he proposes to erect. 



The force of these strictures will be still more apparent, if, admit- 

 ing Professor Ferrier's starting position, that the Ego must know it- 

 self in all cognition, and accepting this as an explanation of what 

 knowledge is, we proceed to examine the conclusion deduced. He 

 argues that because an intelligence must, along with whatever it cog- 

 nizes, have some cognizance of itself, the object (properly so called) 

 — the perfect object — of cognition, is not self simply, nor the thing 

 or thought simply which inordinary thinking is viewed as the object ; 

 but that it is self-cum-alio — self plus the object (popularly so called) 

 — that, in short, it is Mind-in-union-with-Somewhat, or the synthesis 

 of subject and object. Now is such an inference legitimate ? As- 

 suredly not. At least the conclusion cannot be deduced from the 

 premises by a purely logical process. For what is there, as far as has 

 yet been shewn, to hinder a person who admits that the Ego is known 

 in all cognition, from holding that a knowledge of self may accompany 

 a knowledge of whatever things or thoughts the mind apprehends ; 

 yet not so as that self, and the thing or thought apprehended along 

 with it, form by their synthesis a single object of cognition, but so as 

 that self forms one complete object of cognition, and the thing 

 or thought apprehended along with it forms another complete 

 object of cognition ? There is no absurdity, as far as the form of 



