Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 3 "Philosophical Remains" (1883 ed.).djvu/143

Rh. But man is not made up of mere impressions—passions, sensations, "states of mind," or whatever they may be. He is not engulfed and borne along in their vortices. There is a point from which he looks down upon them all, and knows himself to be free. He stands within a circle more impregnable than enchanter's ring; a circle which, however much they may assault it, they cannot overpass; and this point or circle of freedom, this true life of humanity, is that which, in the case of each man, is "I."

This view disposes of a question which has been ever regarded as forming the opprobrium of metaphysics. We allude to the problem respecting the mode and nature of the intercourse which takes place between the external universe and man, or, as metaphysicians say, "Mind." This question is now given up, not because it has been solved, not because it is regarded as too contemptible and irrelevant to be entertained by speculative philosophy, but (pro pudor!) because it is considered insoluble, inscrutable, and beyond the limits of the human faculties. Oh, ye metaphysicians! ye blind leaders of the blind! How long will ye be of seeing and understanding that there is no communication at all between man in his true Being and the universe that surrounds him, or that, if there be any, it is the communication of non-communication? Know ye not that ye are what ye are only on account of the antagonism between you and it; that ye perceive things only by resisting their impressions, by denying them, not in