Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 1 - Institutes of Metaphysic (1875 ed.).djvu/147

RhPROP. III.———— of a circle cannot be known without the centre being known, and the centre of a circle cannot be known without the circumference being known; yet who ever supposes that the circumference is the centre, or the centre the circumference? In the same way, why should our proposition lead people to infer that that part of the total object of knowledge which is called the subject is that other part of it which is usually called the object, or that that part of it which is usually called the object is that other part of it which is called the subject? One would think that the distinction might be understood and kept clearly in view without running even into the smallest degree of confusion. At any rate, these remarks, taken along with the explanation given in the third paragraph of this article, may be sufficient to obviate the main misconceptions which have prevented our third proposition from occupying its rightful place in speculative science, and have led generally to the adoption of the third counter-proposition.

18. All that this proposition contends for may be expressed very shortly and simply by saying—that it is impossible for a man to consider any of the objects of his consciousness, whatever these may be, as at any time the objects of no consciousness—