The World as Will and Idea, Vol. I — Arthur Schopenhauer, trans. Haldane & Kemp

* It is shown in the Appendix space/’ for motion consists simply that matter and substance are one. in the union of space and time.

This shows the j^round of the ^ Not, as Kant holds, from the Kantian explanation of matter, that knowledge of time, as will be exit is that which ib movable in plained in the Appendix.

THE WORLD AS IDEA.

*3 from time by quality (accidents), without which it never exists, and which is plainly always causality, action upon other matter, and therefore change (a time concept). The law of this action, however, always depends upon space and time together, and only thus obtains meaning. The regulative function of causality is confined entirely to the determination of what must occupy this time and this i^ace. The fact that we know a priori the unalterable characteristics of matter, depends upon this derivation of its essential nature from tlie forms of our knowledge of which we are conscious a priori. These unalterable characteristics are space-occupation, i.e., impenetrability, i.e., causal action, consequently, extension, infinite divisibility, persistence, i.e., indestructihility, and lastly mobility : weight, on the other hand, notwithstanding its universality, must be attributed to a posterioi'i knowledge, although Kant, in his “ Metaphysical Introduction to Natural Philosophy,” p. 71 (p. 372 of Rosenkranz’s edition), treats it as knowable a priori.

But as tlie object in general is only for the subject, as its idea, so every special class of ideas is only for an equally special quality in the subject, which is called a faculty of perception. This subjective correlative of time and space in themselvei~as empty forms, has been liamed by Kant pure sensibility ; and we may retain this expressibh, as .Kana was the first to treat of the subject, though it is not exact, for sensibility presupposes matter. TEe subjective correlative of matter or of causation, for these two are the same, is understanding, which is nothing more than this. To know causality is its one function, its only power ; and it is a great one, embracing much, of manifold application, yet of unmistakable identity in all its manifestations. Conversely all causation, that is to say, all matter, or the whole of reality, is only for the understanding, through the understanding, and~m the understanding. The first, simplest, and ever-present example of understanding is the perception of the actual

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THE WORLD AS IDEA.

world. This is throughout knowledge of the cause from tEe*^^ect, and therefore all perception is intellectual. The understanding could never arrive at this perception, however, if some effect did not become known immediately, and thus serve as a starting-point. But this is the affection of the animal body. So far, then, the animal body is the immediate object of the subject ; the perception of all other objects becomes possible through it.

The changes which every animal body experiences, are immediately known, that is, felt; and as these effects are at once referred to their causes, the perception of the latter as objects arises. This relation is no conclusion in abstract conceptions ; it does not arise iioin reflection, nor is it arbitrary, but immediate, necessary, and certain.

It is the method of knowing of the pure understanding, without which there could be no perception ; there would only remain a dull plant-like consciousness of the changes of the immediate object, which would succeed each other in an utterly unmeaning way, except in so far as they might have a meaning for the will either as pain or pleasure.

But as with the rising of the sun the visible world appears, so at one stroke, the understanding, by means of its one simple function, changes the dull, meaningless sensation into perception. What the eyeTlHe^af, or the hand feels, Jls not , percept^^ it merely its data.

By the understanding passing from the effect to the cause, the world first appears as perception extended in space, varying in respect of form, persistent tlirbugh all time in respect of matter ; for the understandingjinites space and time in the idea of matter, that is, causal action. As the world as idea exists only through the understanding, so also it exists only for the understanding.

In the first chapter of my essay on Light and Colour,*’ I have already explained how the understanding constructs perceptions out of the dataS^pplied by the senses ; how by comparison of the impressions which the various senses receive from the object, a child