II. Persistence of force requires an unrestorable equilibrium; in moving to restore one equilibrium, it must destroy another—its equivalent. III. But this contradicts the above developed conception of force as follows: (_a_) Since force results from destroyed equilibrium, it follows (_b_) that it requires as much force to destroy the equilibrium as is developed in the restoring of it (and this notion is the basis of the correlation theory). But (_c_) if the first equilibrium (already destroyed) can only be restored by the destroying of another equal to the same, it has already formed an equilibrium with the second, and the occasion of the motion is removed. If two forces are equal and opposed, which will give way? By this dialectic consideration of force, we learn the insufficiency of the theory of correlation as the ultimate truth. Instead of being “the sole truth, which transcends experience by underlying it” (p. 258), we are obliged to confess that this “persistence of force” rests on the category of causality; its thin disguise consists in the substitution of other words for the metaphysical expression, “Every effect must be equal to its cause.” And this, when tortured in the crucible, confesses that the only efficient cause is “_causi sui_;” hence the effect is equal to its cause, because it is the cause. And the correlation theory results in showing that force cannot be, unless self-originated. That self-determination is the inevitable result, no matter what hypothesis be assumed, is also evident. Taking all counter-hypotheses and generalizing them, we have this analysis: I. Any and every being is determined from without through another. (This theorem includes all anti-self-determination doctrines.) II. It results from this that any and every being is dependent upon another and is a finite one; it cannot be isolated without destroying it. Hence it results that every being is an element of a whole that includes _it_ as a subordinate moment. III. Dependent being, as a subordinate element, cannot be said to support any thing attached to it, for its own support is not in itself but in another, namely, the whole that includes it. From this it results that no dependent being can depend upon another dependent being, but rather upon the including whole. The including whole is therefore not a dependent; since it is for itself, and each element is determined through it, and for it, it may be called the _negative_ unity (or the unity which negates the independence of the elements). _Remark._—A chain of dependent beings collapses into one dependent being. Dependence is not converted into independence by simple multiplication. All dependence is thus an element of an independent whole.