Having thus briefly and clearly shown the nullity of the Cosmological Proof, as I had in my second chapter already shown the nullity of the Ontological Proof, the sympathizing reader may perhaps expect me to do the same with respect to the Physico-theological Proof, which is a great deal more plausible. As, however, this belongs by its nature to a different department of philosophy, it would be quite out of place here. I therefore refer him to Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, as well as to his Critique of the Faculty of Judgment, where he treats this subject _ex professo_; I likewise refer him, as a complement to Kant's purely negative procedure, to my own positive one in "The Will in Nature,"[62] a work which, though small in bulk, is rich and weighty in content. As for the indifferent reader, he is free to let this and indeed all my writings pass down unread to his descendants. It matters not to me; for I am here, not for one generation only, but for many. [62] The translation of which follows the Fourfold Root in the present volume. Now, as the law of causality is known to us _à priori_, and is therefore a transcendental law, applicable to every possible experience and consequently without exception, as will be shown in § 21; as moreover it decides, that upon a given, definite, relatively first state, a second equally definite one inevitably ensues by rule, _i.e._, always; the relation between cause and effect is a necessary one, so that the causal law authorizes us to form hypothetical judgments, and thereby shows itself to be a form of the principle of sufficient reason, upon which principle all judgments must be founded and, as will be shown further on, all _necessity_ is based. This form of our principle I call the _principle of the sufficient reason of becoming_, because its application invariably pre-supposes a change, the entering upon a new state: consequently a becoming. One of its essential characteristics is this: that the cause always precedes the effect in Time (compare § 47), and this alone gives us the original criterion by which to distinguish which is cause and which effect, of two states linked together by the causal nexus. Conversely, in some cases, the causal nexus is known to us through former experience; but the rapidity with which the different states follow upon each other is so great, that the order in which this happens escapes our perception. We then conclude with complete certitude from causality to succession: thus, for instance, we infer that the igniting of gunpowder precedes its explosion.[63] [63] Here I refer my readers to "Die Welt als Wills und Vorstellung," vol. ii. chap. 4, p. 41 of the 2nd edition, and p. 45 of the 3rd edition.