Page:The Philosophy of Creation.djvu/187

 ism, and it is the Inmost that acts upon it. Again in reasoning about consciousness of self, he says, "If, then, the object perceived is self, what is the subject that perceives? or if it is the true self that thinks, what other self can it be that is thought of?" In endeavoring to answer the question, this sad but familiar conclusion ensues. "Clearly, a true cognition of self implies a state in which the knowing and the known are one—in which subject and object are identified; and this Mr. Mansel rightly holds to be the annihilation of both. So that the personality of which each is conscious, and of which the existence is a fact beyond all others the most certain, is yet a thing which can not truly be known at all; knowledge of it is forbidden by the very nature of thought." Having levelled all things to the plane of matter, and consequently not recognizing the discrete degrees in the human constitution and the phenomenon of existence through their reciprocal action, Spencer arrives at this conclusion. It well confirms what has been said, that without a knowledge of the discrete degrees in creation nothing of causes can be comprehended. The existence of the Inmost distinctly above the mind, and first receiving