THE OBJECT OF KNOWLEDGE. 373 verse of conceptual realisation. Thus autonomous thought presents itself to our contemplation as a sphere of complete world-inclusion. The fundamental impediment, however, to the acceptance of such conceptual comprehension as paramount reality, lies in our natural and irrepressible belief that it is through the senses and not through thought that the real world becomes present to us. We are quite certain that the transitory play of sensible occurrence means, in all earnest, our realisation of the veritable world of efficient actuality. We are unmis- takably aware that our perceptions signify definite figura- tions of foreign influences. But the great philosophical difficulty in the way of such a naturalistic view of reality obtrudes itself in the indis- putable fact that the entire object of sense, as realised by us, is throughout the product of powers inherent in ourselves. The object, whether principally perceived or principally con- ceived, is altogether made up by the perceiving and conceiv- ing faculties of our own being. Xow the real question is : Whether thought-realisation is in itself in spite of sense-presentation the objective world, the real object to be known, the butt and termination of our cognitive exertion ; or whether it merely symbolises a system of reality or object of knowledge signalised through the senses, and constituting our veritable field of desirable activity. If our percepts and concepts have indeed relation to a sphere of externality beyond the senses, which renders them true or objectively valid, then it is certain that this can be only accomplished by a pre-established correspondence, through which our sensorial affections, specifically aroused by those external influences, become signs of their existence and charac- teristics. There can be no doubt, that the thought of an indi- vidual mind, not identical with objective being, can signify existences and occurrences extraneous to its own self only by means of naturally or supernaturally pre-established concord- ances. The numerous philosophical efforts, aiming in some way or other to assimilate the realising mental phenomena with the nature of the foreign or objective powers thereby realised, must for ever remain futile ; for mental phenomena are specific intra-organic functions only awakened by foreign influences. And it is clear that such intrinsically awakened manifestations, consisting wholly in the play of specifically organised energies, cannot possibly bear any resemblance to the awakening influences. Any kind of Realism, thinking to grasp within the sphere of mental manifestation the veritable 26
