# Philosophical Works of the Late James Frederick Ferrier/Institutes of Metaphysic (1875)/Section 1/Proposition 21

The Institutes of Metaphysic, Philosophical Works of the Late James Frederick Ferrier (1875 ed., Vol. 1). (E. L. Lushington, & A. Grant, Eds.) Edinburgh: William Blackwood and Sons. pp. 373-383.
PROPOSITION XXI.
WHAT THE ABSOLUTE IN COGNITION IS.
DEMONSTRATION.
This synthesis, thus variously expressed, is the known absolute, because it, and it alone, can be known out of relation, or without any correlative being necessarily known along with it.
OBSERVATIONS AND EXPLANATIONS.
Comment on demonstration of Prop. XXI.1. This demonstration might have been drawn out at greater length. Object + subject was shown in Prop. III. to be the minimum scibile per se—that is, the least that can be known by itself, or in an isolated state, or out of relation to anything else, (see Prop. Ill., and in particular Obs. 6); and hence, inasmuch as whatever can be known in an isolated state, or without any correlative, is the known absolute (by Def.), it follows that object + subject is, and must be, the known absolute, and that nothing but this synthesis can be the known absolute, because nothing but this is, or can be, known without any correlative being known along with it. The short demonstration given is, however, quite sufficient for its purpose.
Twenty-first counter proposition.2. Twenty-first Counter-proposition.—"Object-plus-subject, &c.,—this synthesis, thus variously expressed, is not the absolute in cognition; it cannot be known out of relation, or without any correlative being known along with it; because our faculties are not adequate to the comprehension of the absolute, but only to the comprehension of the relative."
3. Much controversy has been expended on the ​Fruitlessness of the controversy respecting the Absolute and the Relative. The philosophical temper.question concerning the Absolute and the Relative,—the one party espousing virtually, although expressing themselves in no very clear or explicit terms, Propositions XX. and XXI.,—the other party advocating the opinions set forth in the corresponding counter-propositions. The one party ranks under the banner of metaphysics,—the other under the standard of psychology. The controversy, however, has been altogether fruitless on both sides. The absolutists have defined nothing, and have proved nothing, and their positions, however true, have been generally unintelligible. The relationists, too, have merely declaimed and asserted, without advancing either definitions or demonstrations, and hence the controversy has terminated—as all such controversies must—in a mere hubbub of words, by which nothing is settled, and from which the student of philosophy can derive neither insight, nor edification, nor that satisfaction of mind which always arises when we understand a philosophical doctrine, whether we agree with it or not. This, indeed, is all that metaphysical teaching ought to aim at,—to make people understand its positions. To make these positions convincing is a point of vastly inferior importance, and one which may very well be left to take its chance. Our psychologists, however, rather labour at the establishment of some hazy sort of belief in their own dogmas, than at the diffusion of universal light ​on all the grounds, and processes, and movements, and results of sheer speculative contemplation. It appears to the writer of these remarks, that no advantage to the intellect of man, but, on the contrary, very great detriment, must ensue from following such a sectarian course. What philosophy is called upon to exhibit is not what any individual may choose or wish to think, but what thinking itself thinks, whenever it is permitted to go forth free, unimpeded, and uninterfered with, guided by no law except the determination to go whithersoever its own current may carry it, and to see the end,—turning up, with unswerving ploughshare, whatever it may encounter in its onward course, trying all things by the test of a remorseless logic, and scanning with indifference the havoc it may work among the edifices of established opinion, or the treasures it may bring to light among the solitary haunts of disregarded truth. If this catholic temper cannot be reached, it may, at any rate, be approximated; and therefore, to furnish insight much rather than to produce conviction, is the object which these Institutes have in view, the assurance being felt that where insight is obtained, conviction will in all likelihood follow; and that conviction not founded on insight is worse than unprofitable; whereas philosophical insight, even when not succeeded by philosophical belief, can never fail to ​expand and clarify the faculties, both moral and intellectual.
The cause of confusion in this controversy.4. As has been said, the want of an exact definition of the Absolute has rendered all the controversies on this topic resultless and unmeaning,—and has prevented any intelligible doctrine of the Absolute from obtaining a footing in philosophy, notwithstanding the exertions which have been put forth in its support by the metaphysicians of Germany. Another circumstance by which the confusion has been considerably aggravated is this, that neither party has distinctly stated whether the Absolute, about which they were fighting, was attainable as a product of common knowledge, or as an elaboration of scientific reflection: in other words, whether it was the possession of all men, or the property of the few who were philosophers. The opponents of the doctrine have usually supposed that the subject in dispute was of the latter character, and accordingly they have taunted their adversaries with laying claim to a knowledge which was not shared in by the community at large, and which, at any rate, could be realised only through a long meditative probation, and by dint of strenuous speculative efforts; and their adversaries have been at no pains to undeceive them. Hence the altercation has run into a very complicated form of ​confusion, from neither party knowing, or at least explaining, whether absolute cognition was the result of ordinary or of scientific thinking.
All men are equally cognisant of the absolute.5. The truth is, that all men are equally cognisant of the absolute. Those who disavow this knowledge do, and must, entertain it, just as much as those who lay claim to it. No effort is required to get hold of it. Every man who is cognisant of himself together with the things which come before him, has a knowledge of the absolute; because he apprehends this synthesis as detached and rounded off, and not in necessary association with anything else. It is true that our cognitions are linked together by such inveterate ties of association that it may be difficult, in point of fact, to obtain an absolutely isolated apprehension of oneself and any particular thing. But this is a question which is to be determined by reason, and not by experience. The laws of association are arbitrary and contingent, and their operation must at present be discounted. The question is, What is all that is strictly necessary to constitute a case of absolute and isolated cognition? and the answer is, "Me plus a grain of sand or less," even although, in point of fact, I should not be able to apprehend a grain of sand without taking cognisance, at the same time, of a whole sea-shore. The accidental enlargement of the objective element has no effect in essentially ​augmenting the absolute in cognition.—(See Prop. III. Obs. 8.)
A reminder. 6. The reader need scarcely be reminded, that no grain of sand by itself, no, nor a universe of grains of sand by themselves, will constitute the absolute in cognition. Pile Pelion on Ossa, and the result will be mere relative knowledge, when these are considered in relation to their complementary factor, the ego; out of this relation they are the purely contradictory. Neither will the ego, by itself—that is, with no thought or thing present to it—constitute the absolute in cognition; because it can be known only along with its correlative factor, some thought or some thing. But the synthesis of the two factors must constitute the absolute in cognition; because this can be known out of all relation, or absolved and emancipated from every correlative.
Confusion might have been obviated had it been shown that all men are equally cognisant of the absolute.7. It is thus obvious that there is a known absolute; that it is the spontaneous growth of ordinary thinking, and not the product of philosophical excogitation; that it is the inalienable possession of all intelligent beings, and not the peculiar property of a few speculative theorists. Had this been made clear at the outset, the controversy on this topic might have been relieved from one great source of embarrassment and confusion.
​The difficulty is, not to know it, but to know that we know it.8. No effort, then, is required to compass the known absolute; but some effort is required to know that we are compassing it. This is a case in which the student of philosophy is not called upon to do something, but simply to know that he is already doing it. In our ordinary moods, we always mistake the relative for the absolute, and suppose, for example, that the trees which we are looking at are known absolutely, or out of relation to ourselves. Then, again, when misled by psychology, we are extremely apt to mistake the absolute for the relative, and to suppose that the trees and ourselves together are known merely relatively. After the numerous explanations, however, which have been given, it is conceived that the reader should now have no difficulty in understanding that what he apprehends is always the synthesis of himself and things (object-plus-subject), and that this is the absolute in his cognition, because he knows it without necessarily knowing anything else at the same time.
Refutation of the relationist doctrine.9. The causes which have misled the upholders of a merely relative cognition are not difficult to assign. They saw that material, or other, objects could be known only in relation to the ego; and also that the ego could be known only in relation to some thing or thought; and hence they concluded that our knowledge both of ourselves and ​things was wholly relative. And so it is, when looked at in that way. Each term can be known only in relation to the other term. But why cannot both of the terms be looked at together. Why can the completed relation not be taken into account? The relationists have neglected that consideration. In point of fact, the two terms are always looked at and apprehended together. And it is a sufficient refutation of the relationist doctrine to ask—what is this total synthesis known in relation to? If our knowledge of it is a relative knowledge, we must know it in relation to something. What is that something—what is the correlative of this completed synthesis? Psychology can give no answer—can point out no correlative. Hence this synthesis is the known Absolute. It stands disengaged or absolved in thought from all connection with anything else. When psychology can point out the correlative factor of this entire and isolated synthesis, she may then maintain with some show of reason that our knowledge is wholly relative; but until she can do this, she must vail her flag before the standard of the absolutists.
Kant on the Absolute.10. Kant was of opinion that he had hit upon a notable refutation of the doctrine of the Absolute when he declared, that, "whatever we know must be known in conformity to the constitution of our faculties of cognition." Of course, it must. And ​must not everything which any intelligence knows be known on the same terms—be known in conformity to the constitution of its cognitive faculties? and must not every intelligence know itself along with all that it knows? And hence must not every intelligence, when it apprehends this synthesis (whatever the character of the particular element may be), apprehend that which is absolute, inasmuch as it must apprehend that which has no necessary correlative? Kant seems to have thought that although we could not know material things absolutely or out of relation to our faculties, other intelligences might possess this capacity, and might be competent to know them absolutely, or as they existed out of relation to their cognitive endowments—a supposition which carries a contradiction on the very face of it. If "the Absolute" can be known only when it is known out of relation to the faculties of all intelligence, it is obvious that there can be no cognisance of it in any quarter—not even on the part of Omniscience. Kant's refusal to generalise, or lay down as applicable to all intelligence, the law that our intellect can know things only as it is competent to know them, is one of the strangest cases of obstinacy to be found in the history of speculative opinion. Can any intellect, actual or possible, know things except as it is able to know them?
​The relation of non-contradictories and the relation of contradictories.11. The relations of which we usually speak, and which come before us in physical science, and in ordinary life, are relations between non-contradictories. Thus, for example, the relation which subsists between an acid and an alkali, between a father and a son, between the earth and the moon, are relations of non-contradictories, because each of these things is conceivable out of as well as in relation to the other. But the relationship of subject and object—of me and things, or thoughts, is a relationship of contradictories, because each term can be conceived only in relation to the other. A thing or thought with no "me" known or thought of in connection with it, is an expression of nonsense; and "me," with no thing or thought present to me, is equally an expression of nonsense. The known Absolute is thus a synthesis of two contradictories, and not of two non-contradictories. This should be particularly borne in mind. Psychology never gets beyond the position that the synthesis of subject plus object is the union of two non-contradictories, and thus sticks at the pons asinorum of speculation which demands, as the condition of all further progress and enlightenment, an insight into the truth that the fusion of two contradictories—that is, of two elements which are necessarily unknowable singulatim—is the genesis of absolute cognition.