Fundamental Philosophy, Vol. 1 (of 2)Balmes, Jaime Luciano
Philosophy
Fundamental Philosophy, Vol. 1 (of 2)
Balmes, Jaime Luciano
Philosophy, Spanish
64. We have thought proper briefly to refute Condillac's system, not
on account of its intrinsic importance, or because it was not before
in sufficiently bad repute, but in order to clear the field for higher
and more strictly philosophical discussions. We should not omit to
guard philosophy against the prejudice cast upon it by a system as vain
as it is profitless. All that is most sublime in the science of the
mind disappears with the _statue-man_ and transformed sensations: we
vindicate the rights of human reason by showing that before entering
upon more transcendental questions it is indispensable to discard
Condillac's system; just as it is necessary before making a good road
to clear away the brushwood which obstructs the passage.
65. We come now to the proof that in the human intellectual order, such
as it is in this life, there is no one truth the source of all truths;
because no one truth includes them all.
Truths are of two kinds, real and ideal. We call facts, or whatever
exists, real truths; we call the necessary connection of ideas ideal
truths. A real truth may be expressed by the verb _to be_, taken
substantively, or at least it supposes a proposition in which this verb
has been taken in this sense: an ideal truth is expressed by the same
verb taken copulatively, as signifying the necessary relation of a
predicate with a subject, abstracting it, however, from both. _We are_,
that is, _we exist_, expresses a real truth, a fact. _Whoever thinks
exists_, expresses an ideal truth, for it does not affirm that there is
any one who thinks or exists, but that if there is any one who thinks,
he exists; or, in other words, it affirms a necessary relation between
thought and being. To real truths corresponds the real world, the world
of existences; to ideal truths the logical world, that of possibility.
The verb _to be_, is sometimes taken copulatively, although the
relation expressed by it be not necessary: such is the case with all
contingent propositions, and when the predicate does not belong to
the essence of the subject. Sometimes the necessity is conditional,
that is, it supposes a fact; and then there is no absolute necessity,
since the supposed fact is always contingent. When we speak of ideal
truths, we refer to those that express an absolute necessary relation,
abstracting it from all order of existence; and on the other hand,
we understand by real truths all those that suppose a proposition in
which a fact has been established. To this class belong the truths of
natural science, for they all suppose some fact which is the object of
observation.
66. No real finite truth can be the origin of all others. Truth of
this kind is the expression of a particular contingent fact, and
consequently can neither include other real truths or the world of
existences, nor ideal truths which refer only to necessary relations in
the world of possibility.
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