philosophy, from which it is distinguished merely by the character of its specification: in everything else it may be considered as the highest power in the ideal world."[25] To the three powers of the real and ideal world correspond in a rising scale the three ideas of Truth, Goodness and Beauty. Beauty is neither the mere universal (truth), nor mere reality (action), but the perfect interpenetration of both: "beauty exists when the particular (the real) is so adequate to its concept that the latter, as infinite, enters the finite and presents itself to our contemplation in concrete form. With the appearance of the concept, the real becomes truly similar and equal to the idea, wherein the universal and the particular find their absolute identity. Without ceasing to be rational, the rational becomes at the same time apparent and sensible."[26] But as above the three powers is poised God, their point of union, so Philosophy stands supreme over the three ideas; concerning itself not with truth or morality or even beauty alone, but with that which belongs to all the three in common, deduced from one common source. If philosophy assumes the character of science and truth, while yet remaining superior to truth, this is made possible by the fact that science and truth are its formal determination; "philosophy is science in the sense that truth, goodness and beauty, _i.e._ science, virtue and art, interpenetrate each other; therefore it is also not science but is that which is common to science, virtue and art." This interpenetration distinguishes philosophy from all other sciences; for instance, if mathematics can dispense with morality and beauty, philosophy cannot do so.[27] [Sidenote: _Ideas and the gods. Art and mythology._]