第 25 节
作者:桃桃逃      更新:2022-08-21 16:33      字数:9315
  。。。 The organic structures; and the evidence they afford of mutual adaptation;
  belong to a higher province; the province of animated nature。 But even without
  taking into consideration the possible blemish which the study of animated nature
  and of the other teleological aspects of existing things may contract from the
  pettiness of the final causes; and from puerile instances of them and their
  bearings; merely animated nature is; at the best; incapable of supplying the
  material for a truthful expression to the idea to God。 God is more than life: he is
  Spirit。 And therefore if the thought of the Absolute takes a starting…point for its
  rise; and desires to take the nearest; the most true and adequate starting…point will
  be found in the nature of spirit alone。
  § 51
  The other way of unification by which to realise the Ideal of Reason is to set out
  from the abstractum of Thought and seek to characterise it: for which purpose
  Being is the only available term。 This is the method of the Ontological proof。 The
  opposition; here presented from a merely subjective point of view; lies between
  Thought and Being; whereas in the first way of junction; being is common to the
  two sides of the antithesis; and the contrast lies only between its individualisation
  and universality。 Understanding meets this second way with what is implicitly the
  same objection as it made to the first。 It denied that the empirical involves the
  universal; so it denies that the universal involves the specialisation; which
  specialisation in this instance is being。 In other words it says: Being cannot be
  deduced from the notion by any analysis。
  The uniformly favourable reception and acceptance which attended Kant's
  criticism of the Ontological proof was undoubtedly due to the illustration which he
  made use of。 To explain the difference between thought and being; he took the
  instance of a hundred sovereigns; which; for anything it matters to the notion; are
  the same hundred whether they are real or only possible; though the difference of
  the two cases is very perceptible in their effect on a man's purse。 Nothing can be
  more obvious than that anything we only think or conceive is not on that account
  actual; that mental representation; and even notional comprehension; always falls
  short of being。 Still it may not unfairly be styled a barbarism in language; when
  the name of notion is given to things like a hundred sovereigns。 And; putting that
  mistake aside; those who perpetually urge against the philosophic Idea the
  difference between Being and Thought might have admitted that philosophers
  were not wholly ignorant of the fact。 Can there be any proposition more trite than
  this ? But after all; it is well to remember; when we speak of God; that we have
  an object of another kind than any hundred sovereigns; and unlike any one
  particular notion; representation; or however else it may be styled。 It is in fact this
  and this alone which marks everything finite: its being in time and space is
  discrepant from its notion。 God; on the contrary; expressly has to be what can
  only be 'thought as existing'; his notion involves being。 It is this unity of the notion
  and being that constitutes the notion of God。
  If this were all; we should have only a formal expression of the divine nature
  which would not really go beyond a statement of the nature of the notion itself。
  And that the notion; in its most abstract terms; involves being is plain。 For the
  notion; whatever other determination it may receive; is at least reference back on
  itself; which results by abolishing the intermediation; and thus is immediate。 And
  what is that reference to self; but being? Certainly it would be strange if the
  notion; the very inmost of mind; if even the 'Ego'; or above all the concrete
  totality we call God; were not rich enough to include so poor a category as being;
  the very poorest and most abstract of all。 For; if we look at the thought it holds;
  nothing can be more insignificant than being。 And yet there may be something still
  more insignificant than being that which at first sight is perhaps supposed to be;
  an external and sensible existence; like that of the paper lying before me。
  However; in this matter; nobody proposes to speak of the sensible existence of a
  limited and perishable thing。 Besides; the petty stricture of the Kritik that 'thought
  and being are different' can at most molest the path of the human mind from the
  thought of God to the certainty that he is: it cannot take it away。 It is this process
  of transition; depending on the absolute inseparability of the thought of God from
  his being; for which its proper authority has been revindicated in the theory of
  faith or immediate knowledge — whereof hereafter。
  § 52
  In this way thought; at its highest pitch; has to go outside for any
  determinateness; and although it is continually termed Reason; is out…and…out
  abstract thinking。 And the result of all is that Reason supplies nothing beyond the
  formal unity required to simplify and systematise experiences; it is a canon; not
  an organon; of truth; and can furnish only a criticism of knowledge; not a
  doctrine of the infinite。 In its final analysis this criticism is summed up in the
  assertion that in strictness thought is only the indeterminate unity and the action
  of this indeterminate unity。
  §52n
  Kant undoubtedly held reason to be the faculty of the unconditioned but if reason be reduced to
  abstract identity only; it by implication renounces its unconditionality and is in reality no better than
  empty understanding。 For reason is unconditioned only in so far as its character and quality are not
  due to an extraneous and foreign content; only in so far as it is self…characterising; and thus; in
  point of content; is its own master。 Kant; however; expressly explains that the action of reason
  consists solely in applying the categories to systematise the matter given by perception; i。e。 to
  place it in an outside order; under the guidance of the principle of non…contradiction。
  § 53
  (b) The Practical Reason is understood by Kant to mean a thinking Will; i。e。 a
  Will that determines itself on universal principles。 Its office is to give objective;
  imperative laws of freedom laws; that is; which state what ought to happen。 The
  warrant for thus assuming thought to be an activity which makes itself felt
  objectively; that is; to be really a Reason; is the alleged possibility of proving
  practical freedom by experience; that is; of showing it in the phenomenon of
  selfconsciousness。 This experience in consciousness is at once met by all that the
  Necessitarian produces from contrary experience; particularly by the sceptical
  induction (employed among others by Hume) from the endless diversity of what
  men regard as right and duty i。e。 from the diversity apparent in those professedly
  objective laws of freedom。
  § 54
  What; then; is to serve as the law which the Practical Reason embraces and
  obeys; and as the criterion in its act of selfdetermination? There is no rule at hand
  but the same abstract identity of understanding as before: there must be no
  contradiction in the act of self… determination。 Hence the Practical Reason never
  shakes off the formalism which is represented as the climax of the Theoretical
  Reason。
  But this Practical Reason does not confine the universal principle of the Good to
  its own inward regulation: it first becomes practical; in the true sense of the
  word; when it insists on the Good being manifested in the world with an outward
  objectivity; and requires that the thought shall be objective throughout; and not
  merely subjective。 We shall speak of this postulate of the Practical Reason
  afterwards。
  §54n
  The free self…determination which Kant denied to the speculative; he has expressly vindicated for
  the practical reason。 To many minds this particular aspect of the Kantian philosophy made it
  welcome; and that for good reasons。 To estimate rightly what we owe to Kant in the matter; we
  ought to set before our minds the form of practical philosophy and in particular of 'moral
  philosophy' which prevailed in his time。 It may be generally described as a system of
  Eudaemonism; which; when asked what man's chief end ought to be; replied Happiness。 And by
  happiness Eudaemonism understood the satisfaction of the private appetites; wishes; and wants of
  the man: thus raising the contingent and particular into a principle for the will and its actualisation。
  To this Eudaemonism; which was destitute of stability and consistency; and which left the 'door
  and gate' wide open for every whim and caprice; Kant opposed the practical reason; and thus
  emphasised the need for a principle of will which should be universal and lay the same obligation
  on all。 The theoretical reason; as has been made evident in the preceding paragraphs; is identified
  by Kant with the negative faculty of the infinite; and as it has no positive content of its own; it is
  restricted