the eternal.

In the construction of the real series Schelling proceeds still more
schematically and analogically than in the _Naturphilosophie_ of the first
period, the contents of which are here essentially reproduced. With this is
closely connected his endeavor, in correspondence with the principles of
the theory of identity, to show in every phenomenon the operation of
all three moments of the absolute. In each natural product all three
"potencies" or stages, gravity A(^1), light A(^2), and organization A(^3),
are present, only in subordination to one of their number. Since the third
potency is never lacking, all is organic; that which appears to us as
inorganic matter is only the residuum left over from organization,
that which could become neither plant nor animal. New here is the
cohesion-series of Steffens (the phenomenon of magnetism), in which
nitrogen forms the south pole, carbon the north pole, and iron the point of
indifference, while oxygen, hydrogen, and water represent the east pole,
west pole, and indifference point in electrical polarity. In the organic
world plants represent the carbon pole, animals the nitrogen pole; the
former is the north pole, the latter the south. Moreover, the points of
indifference reappear: the plant corresponds to water, the animal to iron.
Schelling was far outdone in fantastic analogies of this kind by his
pupils, especially by Oken, who in his _Sketch of the Philosophy of
Nature_, 1805, compares the sense of hearing, for example, to the parabola,
to a metal, to a bone, to the bird, to the mouse, and to the horse. As
nature was the imaging of the infinite (unity or essence) into the finite
(plurality or form), so spirit is the taking up of the finite into the
infinite. In the spiritual realm also all three divine original potencies
are every, where active, though in such a way that one is dominant. In
intuition (sensation, consciousness, intuition, each in turn thrice
divided) the infinite and the eternal are subordinated to the finite; in
thought or understanding (concept, judgment, inference, each in three
kinds) the finite and the eternal are subordinated to the infinite; in
reason (which comprehends all under the form of the absolute) the finite
and the infinite are subordinated to the eternal. Intuition is finite
cognition, thought infinite cognition, reason eternal cognition. The forms
of the understanding do not suffice for the knowledge of reason; common
logic with