s Space, Matter, and Force
eternal and the causes of all phenomena. This, he says, assumes the idea
of self-existence, which is unthinkable. The second theory he makes
equivalent to Pantheism. "The precipitation of vapor," he says, "into
cloud, aids us in forming a symbolic conception of a self-evolved
universe;" but, he adds, "really to conceive self-creation, is to
conceive potential existence passing into actual existence by some
inherent necessity, which we cannot do." (p. 32). The Theistic theory,
he says, is equally untenable. "Whoever agrees that the atheistic
hypothesis is untenable because it involves the impossible idea of
self-existence, must perforce admit that the theistic hypothesis is
untenable if it contains the same impossible idea." (p. 38). The origin
of the universe is, therefore, a fact which cannot be explained. It must
have had a cause; and all we know is that its cause is unknowable and
inscrutable.

When we turn to nature the result is the same. Everything is
inscrutable. All we know is that there are certain appearances, and that
where there is appearance there must be something that appears. But what
that something is, what is the noumenon which underlies the phenomenon,
it is impossible for us to know. In nature we find two orders of
phenomena, or appearances; the one objective or external, the other
subjective in our consciousness. There are an Ego and a non-Ego, a
subject and object. These are not identical. "It is," he says,
"rigorously impossible to conceive that our knowledge is a knowledge of
appearances only, without at the same time conceiving a reality of which
they are appearances, for appearance without reality is unthinkable."
(p. 88). So far we can go. There is a reality which is the cause of
phenomena. Further than that, in that direction, our ignorance is
profound. He proves that space cannot be an entity, an attribute, or a
category of thought, or a nonentity. The same is true of time, of
motion, of matter, of electricity, light, magnetism, etc., etc. They all
resolve themselves into appearances produced by an unknown cause.

As the question, What is matter? is a crucial one, he dwells upon it in
various parts of his writings. Newton's theory of ultimate atoms;
Leibnitz's doctrine of monads; and the dynamic theory of Boscovich,
which makes matter mere centres of force, are all dismissed as
unthinkable. It is not very clear in what sense that word is to be
taken. Sometimes it