Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 3 "Philosophical Remains" (1883 ed.).djvu/493



1. PHILOSOPHY is of course the subject of which the history of philosophy treats. It is obvious, therefore, that before we can reanimate and verify, as proposed, the philosophical systems of the past, we must, first of all, have formed a distinct idea in regard to what philosophy itself is. It is not by means of a man's ordinary thinking, but by means of his philosophical thinking, that the verification spoken of can be effected. You might carry the old systems home to your ordinary consciousness, you might attempt to infuse your ordinary consciousness into them, you might do this for ever, and you would not obtain one particle of insight either into them or into their grounds. Your popular everyday consciousness will not help you here; you must have established a philosophical consciousness; in other words, you must know what philosophy itself is. When you have a right and clear idea of this, you can then go