From this it follows that, although, empirically, the change from the point of view of science to that of morality is a transition to a different order of facts, yet the passage may be possible transcendentally through self-consciousness. For in self-consciousness we reach the element of identity between knowledge and action. It is, therefore, of importance to understand the nature of this self-conscious activity in relation to knowledge and to action. If the fundamental characteristic of knowledge is the bringing into relation to consciousness, then all conscious action has this characteristic; for it determines self towards some particular line of activity--that is to say, towards an object or end which is thereby related to consciousness. Action therefore, we may say, is knowledge. And in the same way, on the other hand, since the relating to consciousness which constitutes knowledge can only be regarded as originated by the subject, it follows, conversely, that knowledge is action.[285] "We act," says Spinoza, "only in so far as we know or understand." Action is but one aspect or manifestation of that which, in another aspect or manifestation, is knowledge. But the aspect of self-consciousness we call knowledge and that we call action are different from one another. In the former the relating to consciousness in the definite forms of thought and perception is the prominent thing. In the latter it is the realising energy of the self-conscious subject. The ordinary distinction between knowledge and action is therefore correct, if not pushed to the extent of making an absolute separation between them: in the former we idealise the real, in the latter we realise the ideal. But they are at one in this, that both involve self-conscious activity. [Sidenote: (_b_) as determining the character of the ethical end,]