But if the problem is complex from the great variety of the various kinds of Success, what shall we say of the disturbance introduced by a new aspect of the matter, which we are now about to allude to! Aye! What indeed! An aspect so widespread in its consequences, so momentous and so fraught with menace to all philosophy, so big with portent, and of such threatening aspect to humanity itself, that we hesitate even to bring it forward![20] _Success is not always Success: Non-success (or Failure) is an aspect of Success, and vice-versâ._ This apparent paradox will be seen to be true on a little consideration. For “Success” in any one case involves the “Failure” or “Non-success” of its opposite or correlative. Thus, if we bet ten pounds with one of our friends our “Success” would be his “Non-success,” and _vice-versâ_, collaterally. Again, if we desire to fail in a matter (_e.g._, any man would hope to fail in being hanged[21]), then to succeed is to fail, and to fail is to succeed, and our successful failure would fail were we to happen upon a disastrous success! And note that the _very same act_, not this, that, or another, but THE VERY SAME, is (according to the way we look at it) a “successful” or an “unsuccessful” act. Success therefore not only _may_ be, but _must_ be Failure, and the two catēgories upon which we had built such high hopes have disappeared for ever! [Sidenote: Solemn considerations consequent upon this] Terrible thought! A thing can be at once itself and not itself--nay its own opposite! The mind reels, and the frail human vision peering over the immense gulf of metaphysical infinity is lost in a cry for mercy and trembles on the threshold of the unseen! What visions of horror and madness may not be reserved for the too daring soul which has presumed to knock at the Doors of Silence! Let us learn from the incomprehensible how small and weak a thing is man! [Sidenote: A more cheerful view] But it would ill-befit the philosopher to abandon his effort because of a kind of a check or two at the start. The great hand of Time shouts ever “onward”; and even if we cannot discover the Absolute in the limits of this essay, we may rise from the ashes of our tears to better and happier things. [Sidenote: The beginning of a Solution] A light seems to dawn on us. We shall not arrive at the full day but we shall see “in a glass darkly” what, in the final end of our development, may perhaps be more clearly revealed to us. It is evident that we have been dealing with a relative. _How_ things so apparently absolute as hanging or betting can be in any true sense relative we cannot tell, because we cannot conceive the majestic whole of which Success and Failure, plus and minus, up and down, yes and no, truth and lies, are but as the glittering facets of a diamond borne upon the finger of some titled and wealthy person.