Chapter IV.
The Cartesian philosophy is said to commence by inculcating a species of wide and deep-searching scepticism; and its fundamental and favourite tenet is that cogito ergo sum, which is now so universally decried. But abandoning altogether its written dogmas and formulas, let us only return upon them after we have looked forth for ourselves into the realities of things.
When a man sees and thinks a mountain, it is obvious that his thought does not create the mountain. Here, then, the thought and the reality are not identical; nor does the one grow out of the other. The two can be separated, and, in point of fact, stand apart, and are quite distinct. In this case, then, it requires some degree of faith to believe that the notion and the reality correspond. It is evident that there is a sort of flaw between them which nothing but the cement of Faith can solder; a gap which no scientific ingenuity has ever been able to bridge;—in short, that here there is a chink in the armour of reason which scepticism may take advantage of, if it chooses; for the reality of the mountain being independent of the notion of the mountain—the notion may also be independent of the reality, and, for anything that can be shown to the contrary, may have been induced by some other cause. In short, the notion, even when the mountain appears present before us, may possibly exist without any corresponding reality, for it clearly does not create that reality.
In looking out, then, for a sure and certain foundation for science, we must not build upon any tenet in which a distinction between our thought and its corresponding reality is set forth (as, for example, upon any proposition expressing the real existence of an external world), for here scepticism might assail us—possibly with success; but we must seek for some subject of experience, between the notion of which and the reality of which there is no flaw, distinction, or interval whatsoever. We must seek for some instance in which the thought of a certain reality actually creates that reality; and if we can find such an instance, we shall then possess an inconcussum quid which will resist for ever all the assaults of scepticism.
But no instance of this kind is to be found, as we have seen, by attaching our thoughts to the objects of the universe around us. Our thinking them does not make them realities. If they are realities, they are not so in consequence of our thoughts; and if they are not realities, unreal they will remain in spite of our thoughts. Let us turn from the universe, then, and look to ourselves. "I." Now here is an instance in which there is no distinction or sundering between the notion and the reality. The two are coincident and identical—or rather, we should say, the one (that is, the notion "I ") creates and enforces the other (that is, the reality "I "); or, at any rate, this appears to be the best way of logically exhibiting the two. Between the notion and the reality in this case scepticism can find no conceivable entrance for the minutest point of its spear. Let any man consult his own experience whether, the notion "I" being given, the reality "I" must not also necessarily be present; and also whether, the reality being present, the notion must not also accompany it. Let him try to destroy or maintain the one without also destroying or maintaining the other, and see whether he can succeed. Succeed he easily may in the case of any other notion and reality. The word mountain, for instance, denotes both a notion and a reality. But the notion may exist perfectly well without the reality, and the reality without the notion. The notion "I," however, cannot exist without the reality "I," and the reality cannot exist without the notion I," as any one may satisfy himself by the slightest reflection.
Here, then, we have found the instance we were seeking for. What is the notion "I"? It is consciousness or the notion of self. What is the reality "I?" It is simply "I." Connect the two together in a genesis which makes the one arise out of the other, and you have the famous fundamental position of the Cartesian philosophy, cogito ergo sum—a formula which is worthy of respect, for this reason, if for no other, that by it
