Page:The World and the Individual, First Series (1899).djvu/466

Rh eral. Thus, in counting, the single numbers refer us, further on in the number-series, for the rest of what the counting process implies. If one merely counts the first ten numbers, there are still other numbers to count. A complete consciousness of the whole meaning of the number-series would complete this process of seeking Another by presenting the whole individual meaning of the number concept in a finished form. We have, so far, altogether postponed the discussion of those difficulties about the quantitative Infinite which the conception of a completed knowledge of numbers seems to involve. We have asserted only that the arithmetical or mathematical Being of the number-series cannot be consistently expressed, either in realistic form or in the form of mere valid possibilities of experience. We have consequently asserted that even the realm of mathematical Being involves facts which only our Fourth Conception can adequately express. In what way the whole experience in question gets realized, we have pointed out only in the general fashion indicated in the foregoing lecture. The whole Being in question, as we have said, must be present to the final consciousness in its complete form, or in such wise that no other, beyond, remains to be sought. So much, then, for the first inadequacy of our finite general ideas.

(2) But our finite passing consciousness is incomplete or inadequate to its own purposes not merely by lack of contents adequate to express its wholeness, but by reason of vagueness with regard to its own momentarily conscious purposes. The principal source of actual