Part 18 (2/2)

What we conceive as dependent we conceive as relative; what we conceive, by negation, as independent, we conceive as absolute. Then by further observation and reflection we gradually realize that what we apprehended as independent of certain things is dependent on certain other things; that the same thing may be independent in some respects and dependent in other respects. The rain does not depend on the seed which it causes to germinate, but it does depend on the clouds. The water which turns the turbine does not depend on the turbine, but it does depend on the rain; and the rain depends on the evaporation of the waters of the ocean; and the evaporation on the solar heat; and this again on chemical and physical processes in the sun; and so on, as far as sense experience will carry us: until we realize that everything which falls directly within this sense experience is dependent and therefore relative. Similarly, the accident of quant.i.ty, in virtue of which we p.r.o.nounce one of two bodies to be _larger_ than the other, is something _absolute_ as compared with this _relation_ itself; but as compared with the substance in which it inheres, it is dependent on the latter, or _relative_ to the latter, while the substance is _absolute_, or free from dependence on it. But if substance is absolute as compared with accident, in the sense that substance is not dependent on a subject in which to inhere, but exists _in itself_, it is not absolute in the sense understood by Spinoza, in the sense of existing _of itself_, independently of any efficient cause to account for its origin (64). All the substances in the universe of our direct sense experience are contingent, dependent _ab alio_, and therefore in this sense relative, not absolute.

This is the true sense in which relativity is an essential note of the reality of all the data of the world of our sense experience. They are all contingent, or relative, or conditioned existences. And, as Kant rightly taught, this experience forces us inevitably to think of a Necessary, Absolute, Unconditioned Being, on whom these all depend. But, as can be proved in _Natural Theology_ against Kant, this concept is not a mere regulative idea of the reason, a form of thought whereby we systematize our experience: it is a concept the object of which is not merely a necessity of thought but also an objectively existing reality.(391)

But in the thought of most modern philosophers relativism, or the doctrine that ”we can know only the relative,” is something very different from all this. For positivists, disciples of Auguste Comte (1798-1857), it means that we can know only the phenomena which fall under the notice of our senses, and the laws of resemblance, succession, etc., according to which they occur. All ”theological” quests for supra-mundane causes and reasons of these events, and all ”metaphysical” quests for suprasensible forces, powers, influences, in the events themselves, as explaining or accounting for these latter, are according to this theory necessarily futile: the mind must rest content with a knowledge of the _positive facts_ of sense, and their relations. Relativism is thus another name for Positivism.

For the psychological sensism of English philosophers from Hobbes [1588-1679] and Locke [1632-1704] down to Mill [1806-73] and Bain [1818-1903] relativism means that all conscious cognition-which they tend to reduce to modes and complexes of _sensation_-must be, and can only be, a cognition of the changing, the transitional, the relative.(392) According to an extreme form of this theory the mind can apprehend only relations, but not the terms of any of these relations: it can apprehend nothing as absolute. Moreover the relations which it apprehends it creates itself. Thus all reality is reduced to a system of relations. For Mill the supreme category of real being was _Sensation_: but sensation can be only a feeling of a relation: thus the supreme category of real being would be _Relation_.(393)

But the main current of relativism is that which has issued from Kant's philosophy and worked itself out in various currents such as Spencer's Agnosticism, Hegel's Monism, and Renouvier's Neo-criticism.(394) The mind can know only what is related to it, what is present to it, what is in it; not what is apart from it, distinct from it. The mind cannot know the real nature of the extramental, nor even if there be an extramental real. Subject and object in knowledge are really one: individual minds are only self-conscious phases in the ever-evolving reality of the One Sole Actual Being.

These are but a few of the erroneous currents of modern relativism. A detailed a.n.a.lysis of them belongs to the _Theory of Knowledge_. But it may be pointed out here that they are erroneous because they have distorted and exaggerated certain profound truths concerning the scope and limits of human knowledge.

It is true that we have no positive, proper, intuitive knowledge of the Absolute Being who is the First Cause and Last End of the universe; that all our knowledge of the nature and attributes of the Infinite Being is negative, a.n.a.logical, abstractive. In a certain sense, therefore, He is above the scope of our faculties; He is Incomprehensible. But it is false to say that He is Unknowable; that our knowledge of Him, inadequate and imperfect as it is, is not genuine, real, and instructive, as far as it goes.

Again, a _distinct_ knowledge of any object implies _defining_, _limiting_, _distinguis.h.i.+ng_, _comparing_, _relating_, _judging_; _a.n.a.lysing and synthesizing_. It implies therefore that we apprehend things _in relations_ with other things. But this supposes an antecedent, if indistinct, apprehension of the ”things” themselves. Indeed we cannot help p.r.o.nouncing as simply unintelligible the contention that all knowledge is of relations, and that we can have no knowledge of things as absolute. How could we become aware of relations without being aware of the terms related? Spencer himself admits that the very reasoning whereby we establish the ”relativity of knowledge” leads us inevitably to a.s.sert as necessary the existence of the non-relative, the Absolute:(395) a necessity which Kant also recognizes.

Finally, the fact that reality, in order to be known, must be present to the knowing mind-or, in other words, that knowledge itself is a relation between object and subject-in no way justifies the conclusion that we cannot know the real nature of things as they are in themselves, absolutely, but only our own subjective, mental impressions or representations of the absolute reality, in itself unknowable.(396) The obvious fact that any reality in order to be known must be related to the knowing mind, seems to be regarded by some philosophers as if it were a momentous discovery. Then, conceiving the ”thing-in-itself,” the absolute, as a something standing out of all relation to mind, they declare solemnly that we cannot know the absolute: a declaration which may be interpreted either as a mere truism-that we cannot know a thing without knowing it!-or as a purely gratuitous a.s.sertion, that besides the world of realities which reveal themselves to our minds there is another world of unattained and unattainable ”things-in-themselves” which are as it were the _real_ realities! These philosophers have yet to show that there is anything absurd or impossible in the view that there is simply one world of realities-realities which exist absolutely in themselves apart from our apprehension of them and which in the process of cognition come into relation with our minds.(397) Moreover, if besides this world of known and knowable realities there were such a world of ”transcendental” things-in-themselves as these philosophers discourse of, such a world would have very little concern for us,(398) since by definition and _ex hypothesi_ it would be _for us_ necessarily as if it were not: indeed the hypothesis of such a transcendental world is self-contradictory, for even did it exist we could not think of it.

The process of cognition has indeed its difficulties and mysteries. To examine these, to account for the possibility of truth and error, to a.n.a.lyse the grounds and define the scope and limits of human cert.i.tude, are problems for the _Theory of Knowledge_, on the domain of which we are trenching perhaps too far already in the present context. But at all events to conceive reality as absolute in the sense of being totally unrelated to mind, and then to ask: Is reality so transformed in the very process of cognition that the mind cannot possibly apprehend it or represent it as it really is?-this certainly is to misconceive and mis-state in a hopeless fas.h.i.+on the main problem of Epistemology.

88. a.n.a.lYSIS OF THE CONCEPT OF RELATION.-Relation is one of those ultimate concepts which does not admit of definition proper. And like other ultimate concepts it is familiar to all. Two lines, each measuring a yard, are _equal_ to each other _in length_: _equality_ is a _quant.i.tative_ relation. The number 2 is _half_ of 4, and 4 is _twice_ 2: _half_ and _double_ express each a _quant.i.tative_ relation of _inequality_. If two twin brothers are _like_ each other we have the _qualitative_ relation of _resemblance_ or _similarity_; if a negro and a European are _unlike_ each other we have the _qualitative_ relation of _dissimilarity_. The steam of the locomotive moves the train: a relation of _efficient causality_, of efficient cause to effect. The human eye is adapted to the function of seeing: a relation of _purpose_ or _finality_, of means to end. And so on.

The objective concept of relation thus establishes a _conceptual unity_ between a pair of things in the domain of some other category. Like quant.i.ty, quality, _actio_ and _pa.s.sio_, etc., it is an ultimate mode of reality as apprehended through human experience. But while the reality of the other accident-categories appertains to substances considered absolutely or in isolation from one another, the reality of this category which we call _relation_ appertains indivisibly to two (or more) together, so that when one of these is taken or considered apart from the other (or others) the relation formally disappears. Each of the other (absolute) accidents is formally ”something” (”_aliquid_”; ”t?”), whereas the formal function of _relation_ is to refer something ”to something” else (”_ad aliquid_”; ”p??? t?”). The other accidents formally inhere in a subject, ”habent _esse in_ subjecto”; relation, considered formally as such, does not inhere in a subject, but gives the latter a respect, or bearing, or reference, or ordination, _to_ or _towards_ something else: ”relatio dat subjecto respectum vel _esse ad_ aliquid aliud”. The length of each of two lines is an _absolute_ accident of that line, but the _relation_ of equality or inequality is intelligible only of both together. Destroy one line and the relation is destroyed, though the other line retains its length absolutely and unaltered. And so of the other examples just given.

Relation, then, considered formally as such, is not an absolute accident inhering in a subject, but is a reference of this subject to some other thing, this latter being called the _term_ of the relation. Hence relation is described by the scholastics as the _ordination or respect or reference of one thing to another_: _ordo vel respectus vel habitudo unius ad aliud_. The relation of a subject to something else as term is formally not anything absolute, ”_aliquid_” in that subject, but merely refers this subject to something else as term, ”_ad aliquid_”. Hence Aristotle's designation of relation as ”p??? t?,” ”_ad aliquid_,” ”to or towards something”. ”We conceive as relations [p??? t?],” he says, ”those things whose very ent.i.ty itself we regard as being somehow _of_ other things or _to_ another thing.”(399)

To const.i.tute a relation of whatsoever kind, three elements or factors are essential: the _two extremes_ of the relation, viz. the _subject_ of the relation and the _term_ to which the subject is referred, and what is called the _foundation_, or basis, or ground, or reason, of the relation (_fundamentum_ relationis). This latter is the cause or reason on account of which the subject bears the relation to its term. It is always something absolute, in the extremes of the relation. Hence it follows that we may regard any relation in two ways, either _formally_ as the actual bond or link of connexion between the extremes, or _fundamentally_, _i.e._ as in its cause or foundation in these extremes. This is expressed technically by distinguis.h.i.+ng between the relation _secundum esse in_ and _secundum esse ad_, _i.e._ between the absolute ent.i.ty of its foundation in the subject and the purely relative ent.i.ty in which the relation itself formally consists. Needless to say, the latter, whatever it is, does not add any _absolute ent.i.ty_ to that of either extreme. But in what does this relative ent.i.ty itself consist? Before attempting an answer to this question we must endeavour to distinguish, in the next section (89), between _purely logical_ relations and relations which are in some true sense _real_. Here we may note certain corollaries from the concept of relation as just a.n.a.lysed.

Realities of which the objective concept of relation is verified derive from this latter certain _properties_ or special characteristics. The _first_ of these is _reciprocity_: two related extremes are as such intelligible only in reference to each other: father to son, half to double, like to like, etc., and _vice versa_: _Correlativa se invicem connotant_. The _second_ is that things related to one another are collateral or concomitant in _nature_: _Correlativa sunt simul natura_: neither related extreme is as such naturally prior to the other. This is to be understood of the relation only in its _formal_ aspect, not fundamentally. Fundamentally or _materialiter_, the cause for instance is _naturally prior_ to its effect. The _third_ is that related things are concomitant _logically_, or in the order of knowledge: _Correlativa sunt simul cognitione_: a reality can be known and defined as relative to another reality only by the simultaneous cognition of both extremes of the relation.

89. LOGICAL RELATIONS.-Logical relations are _those which are created by our own thought, and which can have no being other than the being which they have in and for our thought_. That there are such relations, which are the exclusive product of our thought-activity, is universally admitted. The mind can reflect on its own direct concepts; it can compare and co-ordinate and subordinate them among themselves; it thus forms ideas of relations between those concepts, ideas which the scholastics call _reflex_ or _logical_ ideas, or ”_secundae intentiones mentis_”. These relations are _entia rationis_, purely logical relations. Such, for instance, are the relations of _genus_ to _species_, of predicate to subject, the relations described in Logic as the _praedicabilia_. Moreover we can compare our direct universal concepts with the individual realities they represent, and see that this feature or mode of _universality_ in the concept, its ”_intentio universalitatis_” is a _logical relation_ of the concept to the reality which it represents: a logical relation, inasmuch as its _subject_ (the concept) and its _foundation_ (the _abstractness_ of the concept) are in themselves pure products of our thought-activity.

Furthermore, we are forced by the imperfection of the thought-processes whereby we apprehend reality-conception of _abstract_ ideas, _limitation_ of concepts in extension and intension, _affirmation_ and _negation_, etc.-to apprehend _conceptual_ limitations, negations, comparisons, etc., in a word, all _logical ent.i.ties_, as if they were _realities_, or after the manner of realities, _i.e._ to conceive what is really ”nothing” as if it were really ”something,” to conceive the _non-ens_ as if it were an _ens_, to conceive it _per modum entis_ (3). And when we compare these logical ent.i.ties with one another, or with real ent.i.ties, the relations thus established by our thought are all _logical relations_. Finally, it follows from this same imperfection in our human modes of thought that we sometimes understand things only by attributing to these certain logical relations, _i.e._ relations which affect not the reality of these things, their _esse reale_, but only the mode of their presence in our minds, their _esse ideale_ (4).

In view of the distinction between logical relations and those we shall presently describe as real relations, and especially in view of the prevalent tendency in modern philosophy to regard all relations as merely logical, it would be desirable to cla.s.sify logical relations and to indicate the ways in which they are created by, or result from, our thought-processes. We know of no more satisfactory a.n.a.lysis than that accomplished by St. Thomas Aquinas in various parts of his many monumental and enduring works. In his _Commentaries on the Sentences_(400) he enumerates four ways in which logical relations arise from our thought-processes. In his _Quaestiones Disputatae_(401) he reduces these to two: some logical relations, he says, are invented by the intellect reflecting on its own concepts and are attributed to these concepts; others arise from the fact that the intellect can understand things only by relating, grouping, cla.s.sifying them, only by introducing among them an _arrangement_ or _system of relations_ through which alone it can understand them, relations which it could only erroneously ascribe to these things as they really exist, since they are only projected, as it were, into these things by the mind. Thus, though it consciously thinks of these things as so related, it deliberately abstains from a.s.serting that these relations really affect the things themselves. Now the mistake of all those philosophers, whether ancient, medieval or modern, who deny that any relations are real, seems to be that they carry this abstention too far. They contend that all relations are simply read into the reality by our thought; that none are in the reality in any true sense independently of our thought. They thus exaggerate the role of thought as a _const.i.tutive_ factor of known or experienced reality; and they often do so to such a degree that according to their philosophy human thought not merely _discovers_ or _knows_ reality but practically _const.i.tutes_ or _creates_ it: or at all events to such a degree that cognition would be mainly a process whereby reality is a.s.similated to mind and not rather a process whereby mind is a.s.similated to reality. Against all such idealist tendencies in philosophy we a.s.sert that not all relations are logical, that there are some relations which are not mere products of thought, but which are themselves real.

90. REAL RELATIONS; THEIR EXISTENCE VINDICATED.-A real relation is _one which is not a mere product of thought, but which obtains between real things independently of our thought_. For a real relation there must be (_a_) a _real_, individual _subject_; (_b_) a _real foundation_; and (_c_) a _real_, individual _term_, really distinct from the subject. If the subject of the relation, or its foundation, be not real, but a mere _ens rationis_, obviously the relation cannot be more than logical. If, moreover, the term be not a really distinct ent.i.ty from the subject, then the relation can be nothing more than a mental comparison of some thing with itself, either under the same aspect or under mentally distinct aspects. A relation is real in the fullest sense when the extremes are _mutually_ related in virtue of a foundation really existing in both.

Hence St Thomas' definition of a real relation as a _connexion between some two things in virtue of something really found in both_: _habitudo inter aliqua duo secundum aliquid realiter conveniens utrique_.(402)

Now the question: Are there in the real world, among the things which make up the universe of our experience, relations which are not merely logical, which are not a mere product of our thought?-can admit of only one reasonable answer. That there are relations which are in some true sense real and independent of our thought-activity must be apparent to everyone whose mental outlook on things has not been warped by the specious sophistries of some form or other of Subjective Idealism. For _ex professo_ refutations of Idealist theories the student must consult treatises on the _Theory of Knowledge_. A few considerations on the present point will be sufficiently convincing here.

First, then, let us appeal to the familiar examples mentioned above. Are not two lines, each a yard long, _really equal_ in length, whether we know it or not? Is not a line a yard long _really greater than_ another line a foot in length, whether we know it or not? Surely our thought does not _create_ but _discovers_ the equality or inequality. The twin brothers _really resemble_ each other, even when no one is thinking of this resemblance; the resemblance is there whether anyone adverts to it or not.

The motion of the train _really depends_ on the force of the steam; it is not our thought that produces this relation of dependence. The eye is _really_ so constructed as to perceive light, and the light is really such by nature as to arouse the sensation of vision; surely it is not our thought that produces this relation of mutual adaptation in these realities. Such relations are, therefore, in some true sense real and independent of our thought: unless indeed we are prepared to say with idealists that the lines, the brothers, the train, the steam, the eye, and the light-in a word, that not merely relations, but all accidents and substances, all realities-are mere products of thought, ideas, states of consciousness.

Again, _order_ is but a system of relations of co-ordination and subordination between really distinct things. But there is real order in the universe. And therefore there are real relations in the universe.

There is real order in the universe: In the physical universe do we not experience a real subordination of effects to causes, a real adaptation of means to ends? And in the moral universe is not this still more apparent?

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