Now all object is the will so far as it has become idea, and the subject is the necessary correlative of the object. But real objects are in the present only. So nothing but conceptions and fancies are included in the past, while the present is the essential form of the phenomenon of the will, and inseparable from it. The present alone is perpetual and immovable. Life is certain to the will, and the present is certain to life.
Time is like a perpetually revolving globe.
The hemisphere which is sinking is like the past, that which is rising is like the future, while the indivisible point at the top is like a motionless present. Or, time is like a running river, and the present is a rock on which it breaks but which it cannot remove with itself. As life is assured to the will, so is the present the single real form of life. Therefore we are not concerned to investigate the past antecedent to life, nor to speculate on the future subsequent to death. We should simply seek to know the present, that being the sole form in which the will manifests itself.