Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 1 - Institutes of Metaphysic (1875 ed.).djvu/500

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per se is neither that which we know (Prop. IV. Epistemology) nor that which we are ignorant of (Prop. V. Agnoiology). But Absolute Existence is either that which we know or that which we are ignorant of (Prop. V. Ontology). Therefore Absolute Existence is not matter per se; in other words, mere material things have no true and independent Being.

Or again—Matter per se is the contradictory, inasmuch as it is necessarily unknowable by all intelligence (Prop. IV. Epistemology). But Absolute Existence is not the contradictory (Prop. III. Ontology). It may possibly be known. Therefore Absolute Existence is not matter per se, &c.