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

has irrefutably proved to us that experience in general proceeds from two elements, the forms of knowledge and the inner nature of things, and that these two may be distinguished in experience from each other, as that of which we are conscious a priori and that which is added a posteriori, it is possible, at least in general, to say, what in the given experience, which is primarily merely phenomenal, belongs to the form of this phenomenon, conditioned by the intellect, and what, after deducting this, remains over for the thing in itself.

And although no one can discern the thing in itself through the veil of the forms of perception, on the other hand every one carries it in himself, indeed is it himself; therefore in self-consciousness it must be in some way accessible to him, even though only conditionally.

Thus the bridge by which metaphysics passes beyond experience is nothing else than that analysis of experience into phenomenon and thing in itself in which I have placed Kant's greatest merit. For it contains the proof of a kernel of the phenomenon different from the phenomenon itself.

This can indeed never be entirely separated from the phenomenon and regarded in itself as an ens extramundanum, but is always known only in its relations to and connections with the phenomenon itself. But the interpretation and explanation of the latter, in relation to the former, which is its inner kernel, is capable of affording us information with regard to it which does not otherwise come into consciousness.

In this sense, then, metaphysics goes beyond the phenomenon, i.e., nature, to that which is concealed in or behind it (to fiera to <f>vai/cov), always regarding it, however, merely as that which manifests itself in the phenomenon, not as independent of all phenomenal appearance ; it therefore remains immanent, and does not become transcendent.

For it never disengages itself entirely from experience, but remains merely its interpretation and explanation, since it never speaks of the thing in itself otherwise than in its relation to the phenomenon. This 2at least is the sense in which I, with reference throughout to the limitations of human knowledge proved by Kant, have attempted to solve the problem of metaphysics. Therefore his Prolegomena to future metaphysics will be valid and suitable for mine also. Accordingly it never really goes beyond experience, but only discloses the true understanding of the world which lies before it in experience.

It is neither, according to the definition of metaphysics which even Kant repeats, a science of mere conceptions, nor is it a system of deductions from a priori principles, the uselessness of which for the end of metaphysics has been shown by Kant.

But it is rational knowledge, drawn from perception of the external actual world and the information which the most intimate fact of self-consciousness affords us concerning it, deposited in distinct conceptions. It is accordingly the science of experience ; but its subject and its source is not particular experiences, but the totality of all experience.

I completely accept Kant's doctrine that the world of experience is merely phenomenal, and that the a priori knowledge is valid only in relation to phenomena ; but I add that just as phenomenal appearance, it is the manifestation of that which appears, and with him I call this the thing in itself.

This must therefore express its nature and character in the world of experience, and consequently it must be possible to interpret these from this world, and indeed from the matter, not the mere form, of experience. Accordingly philosophy is nothing but the correct and universal understanding of experience itself, the true exposition of its meaning and content.

To this the metaphysical, i.e., that which is merely clothed in the phenomenon and veiled in its forms, is that which is related to it as thought to words. Such a deciphering of the world with reference to that which manifests itself in it must receive its confirmation from itself, through the agreement with each other in which it places the very diverse phenomena of the world, and which without it we do not perceive. If we find a 3document the alphabet of which is unknown, we endeavour to make it out until we hit upon an hypothesis as to the significance of the letters in accordance with which they make up comprehensible words and connected sentences.

Then, however, there remains no doubt as to the correctness of the deciphering, because it is not possible that the agreement and connection in which all the letters of that writing are placed by this explanation is merely accidental, and that by attributing quite a different value to the letters we could also recognise words and sentences in this arrangement of them.

In the same way the deciphering of the world must completely prove itself from itself. It must throw equal light upon all the phenomena of the world, and also bring the most heterogeneous into agreement, so that the contradiction between those which are most in contrast may be abolished. This proof from itself is . the mark of genuineness.

For every false deciphering, even if it is suitable for some phenomena, will conflict all the more glaringly with the rest So, for example, the optimism of Leibnitz conflicts with the palpable misery of existence ; the doctrine of Spinoza, that the world is the only possible and absolutely necessary substance, is incompatible with our wonder at its existence and nature ; the Wolfian doctrine, that man obtains his Eanstentia and Essentia from a will foreign to himself, is contradicted by our moral responsibility for the actions which proceed with strict necessity from these, in conflict with the motives ; the oft-repeated doctrine of the progressive development of man to an ever higher perfection, or in general of any kind of becoming by means of the process of the world, is opposed to the a priori knowledge that at any point of time an infinite time has already run its course, and consequently all that is supposed to come with time would necessarily have already existed ; and in this way an interminable list might be given of the contradictions of dogmatic assumptions with the given reality of things. On the other hand, I must deny that any doc392 FIRST BOOK. CHAPTER XVII.