Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 1 - Institutes of Metaphysic (1875 ed.).djvu/545

RhPROP. X.——————— . The Absolute, as known by us, has been proved to be identical with the existing Absolute, not in all respects accidental as well as essential, but only in all essential respects: in other words, the Absolute in existence cannot be declared to coincide exactly with the Absolute in our cognition, but only with the absolute in all cognition: or to express the restriction differently—The ontology gives out as the existing Absolute the result which is obtained from the study of the necessary laws of knowledge only, and not the result which is obtained from the study of both the necessary and the contingent laws of knowledge, (see Epistemology, Prop. XXII., Obs. 8). An illustration, or concrete example, will enable the reader to understand clearly this somewhat abstract statement.

7. The absolutely Existent which each of us is individually cognisant of, is—himself-apprehending-things-by-the-senses. A man cannot be cognisant of himself merely, or of things merely, or of senses merely. He, therefore, cannot be cognisant of these three as existences, but only as factors or elements of existence; and the only true and absolute existence which he can know is, as has been said, their synthesis—to wit, himself-apprehending-things-by-the-senses. Now the circumstance to be particularly attended to is, that the part of the synthesis here printed in italics is contingent in its character.