In other words transcendence of self; and that which

appears at any one moment, is, as such, self-

contradictory. And, from the other side, the less a

character is able, as such, to appear--the less its

necessary manifestation can be narrowed in time or in

space--so much the more is it capable of both expansion

and inner harmony. But these two features, as we saw,

are the marks of reality.

And the second of the mistakes is like the first.

Appearance, once more, is falsely identified with

presentation, as such, to sense; and a wrong conclusion

Is, once more, drawn from this basis. But the error now

proceeds in an opposite direction. Because the highest

principles are, obviously and plainly, not perceptible

by sense, they are taken to inhabit and to have their

being in the world of pure thought. And this other

region, with more or less consistency, is held to

constitute the sole reality. But here, if excluded

wholly from the serial flow of events, this world of

thought is limited externally and is internally

discordant. While, if, further, we attempt to qualify

the universe by our mere ideal abstract, and to attach

this content to the Reality which appears in perception,

the confusion becomes more obvious. Since the sense-

appearance has been given up, as alien to truth, it has

been in consequence set free, and is entirely

Insubordinate. And its concrete character now evidently

determines, and infects from the outside, whatever mere

thought we are endeavouring to predicate of the Real.

But the union in all perception of thought with sense,

the co-presence everywhere in all appearances of fact

with ideality--this is the one foundation of truth. And,

when we add to this the saving distinction that to have

existence need not mean to exist, and that to be

realized in time is not always to be visible by any

sense, we have made ourselves secure against the worst

of errors. From this we are soon led to our principle of

degrees in truth and reality. Our world and our life

need then no longer be made up arbitrarily. They need

not be compounded of the two hemispheres of fact and

fancy. Nor need the Absolute reveal itself

indiscriminately in a chaos where comparison and value

are absent. We can assign a rational meaning to the

distinctions of higher and lower. And

we have grown convinced that, while not to appear is to

be unreal, and while the fuller appearance marks the

fuller reality, our principle, with but so much, is only

half stated. For comparative ability to exist,

individually and as such, within the region of sense, is

a sign everywhere, so far as it goes, of degradation in

the scale of being.

Or, dealing with the question somewhat less

abstractly, we may attempt otherwise to indicate the

true position of temporal existence. This, as we have

seen, is not reality, but it is, on the other hand, in

our experience one essential factor. And to

suppose that mere thought without facts could either be

real, or could reach to truth, is evidently absurd. The

series of events is, without doubt, necessary for our

knowledge, since this series supplies the one

source of all ideal content. We may say, roughly and

with sufficient accuracy, that there is nothing in

thought, whether it be matter or relations, except that

which is derived from perception. And, in the second

place, it is only by starting from the presented basis

that we construct our system of phenomena in space and

time. We certainly perceived (Chapter xviii.) that any

such constructed unity was but relative, imperfect, and

partial. But, none the less, less, a building up of the

sense-world from the ground of actual presentation is a

condition of all our knowledge. It is not true that

everything, even if temporal, has a place in our one

"real" order of space or time. But, indirectly or

directly, every known element must be connected with its

sequence of events, and, at least in some sense, must

show itself even there. The test of truth after all, we

may say, lies in presented fact.

We should here try to avoid a serious mistake.

Without existence we have perceived that thought is

incomplete; but this does not mean that, without

existence, mere thought in itself is complete fully, and

that existence to this super-adds an alien but necessary

completion. For we have found in principle that, if

anything were perfect, it would not gain by an addition

made from the outside. And, here in particular,

thought's first object, in its pursuit of actual fact,

is precisely the enlarging and making harmonious of its

own ideal content. And the reason for this, as soon as

we consider it, is obvious. The dollar, merely thought

of or imagined, is comparatively abstract and void of

properties. But the dollar, verified in space, has got

its place in, and is determined by, an enormous

construction of things. And to suppose that the concrete

context of these relations in no sense qualifies its

inner content, or that this qualification is a matter of

indifference to thought, is quite indefensible.

A mere thought would mean an ideal content held apart

from existence. But (as we have learnt) to hold a

thought is always somehow, even against our will, to

refer it to the Real. Hence our mere idea, now standing

in relation with the Real, is related also to the

phenomenal system of events in time. It is related to

them, but without any connection with the internal order

and arrangements of their system. But this means that

our mere idea is determined by that system entirely from

the outside. And it will therefore itself be permeated

internally, and so destroyed, by the contingency forced

into its content through these chaotic relations.

Considered from this side, a thought, if it actually

were bare, would stand at a level lower than the, so-

called, chance facts of sense. For in the latter we

have, at least, some internal connection with the

context, and already a fixed relation of universals,

however impure.

All reality must be revealed in the world of events;

and that is most real which, within such an order or

orders, finds least foreign to itself. Hence, if other

things remain equal, a definite place in, and connection

with, the temporal system gives increase of reality. For

thus the relations to other elements, which must in any

case determine, determine, at least to some extent,

internally. And thus the imaginary, so far, must be

poorer than the perceptible fact; or, in other words, it

is compulsorily qualified by a wider area of alien and

destructive relations. I have emphasized "if other

things remain equal," for this restriction is important.

There is imagination which is higher, and more true, and

most emphatically more real, than any single fact

of sense. And this brings us back to our old

distinction. Every truth must appear, and must

subordinate existence; but this appearance is not the

same thing as to be present, properly and as such,

within given limits of sense-perception. With the

general principles of science we may perhaps see this at

once. And again, with regard to the necessary

appearances of art or religion, the same conclusion is

evident. The eternal experience, in every case, fails to

enter into the series of space or of time; or it enters

that series improperly, and with a show which in various

ways contradicts its essence. To be nearer the central

heart of things is to dominate the extremities more

widely; but it is not to appear there except

incompletely and partially through a sign, an

unsubstantial and a fugitive mode of expression. Nothing

anywhere, not even the realized and solid moral will,

can either be quite real, as it exists in time, or can

quite appear in its own essential character. But still

the ultimate Reality, where all appearance as such is

merged, is in the end the actual identity of idea and

existence. And, throughout our world, whatever is

individual is more real and true; for it contains within

its own limits a wider region of the Absolute, and it

possesses more intensely the type of self-sufficiency.

Or, to put it otherwise, the interval between such an

element and the Absolute is smaller. We should require

less alteration, less destruction of its own special

nature, in order to make this higher element completely

real.

We may now pass from this general principle to notice

various points of interest, and, in the first place, to

consider some difficulties handed on to this chapter.

The problems of unperceived Nature, of dispositions in

the soul, and the meaning in general of "potential"

existence, require our attention. And I must begin by

calling attention to an error. We have seen

that an idea is more true in proportion as it approaches

Reality. And it approaches Reality in proportion as it

grows internally more complete. And from this we

possibly might conclude that thought, if completed as

such, would itself be real; or that the ideal

conditions, if fully there, would be the same as actual

perfection. But such a conclusion would not hold; for we

have found that mere thought could never, as such, be

completed; and it therefore remains internally