Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 3 "Philosophical Remains" (1883 ed.).djvu/193

Rh But if it were given and derived as well as sensation, it would not be the entire opposite of sensation. It would agree with sensation in this, that both of them would be given. But it agrees with the sensation in nothing. It is thoroughly opposed to it. It is pure action, while the sensation is pure passion. The sensation is passive, and is opposed to consciousness because it is derivative. Consciousness is action, and is opposed to sensation because it is not derivative. If consciousness were a given state it would not be action at all; it would be nothing but passion. It would be merely one passion contending with another passion. But it is impossible to conceive any passion or given state of Being without some positive character besides its antagonist character. But this act of negation has no positive character, has no character at all except of this antagonist description. Besides, it is opposed to every passion. If consciousness coexist with any passion, we have seen that it displaces it to a certain degree. Therefore, if consciousness were itself a passive or derivative state it would be suicidal, it would prevent itself from coming into manifestation. But passing by this reductio ad absurdum, we maintain that consciousness meets the given, the derivative in man, at every point, that it only manifests itself by doing so; and therefore we must conclude that it is not itself derivative, but is an absolutely original act; or, in other words, an act of perfect freedom.

Let us here note, in a very few words, the conclusions we have got to. At our first step we noticed