V
And so next I ask the formal question: In the realistic world whose Being is thus defined, could there exist Many different beings? And if they existed, in what relation to one another would they stand? Or again, could a realistic world contain only One sole Being, to the exclusion of many beings?
These questions at once raise another question, viz., What are we now to mean by the term “One real Being,” and what by the term “Many real Beings”? Some realistic systems have answered this question by saying at once that by calling a real Being One, we mean that this being is perfectly simple, having no parts or passions, no internal variety of nature, no complexity about it. This is what Herbart declares about each one of the many real beings of which his world is composed. A realist of Herbart’s type would insist that wherever there is real variety, there must be many real beings, so that to assert that there is only one reality in the world, would be to assert that all variety is illusory. Since Herbart holds that variety is real, he has to say that the world consists of many different beings, while each separate being for him is absolutely simple.
The arguments used for such views by realists like Herbart need not here concern us. In this general examination of Realism we may avoid altogether that issue, and may leave it a wholly open question, by arbitrarily defining the sort of difference between two beings which, if it were certainly known to be present, would be great enough to suffice to assure us that these beings were
