The quality of sensation is in all cases merely empirical, and cannot
be represented à priori (for example, colours, taste, etc.). But the
real—that which corresponds to sensation—in opposition to negation = 0,
only represents something the conception of which in itself contains a
being (ein seyn), and signifies nothing but the synthesis in an
empirical consciousness. That is to say, the empirical consciousness in
the internal sense can be raised from 0 to every higher degree, so that
the very same extensive quantity of intuition, an illuminated surface,
for example, excites as great a sensation as an aggregate of many other
surfaces less illuminated. We can therefore make complete abstraction
of the extensive quantity of a phenomenon, and represent to ourselves
in the mere sensation in a certain momentum, a synthesis of homogeneous
ascension from 0 up to the given empirical consciousness, All
sensations therefore as such are given only à posteriori, but this
property thereof, namely, that they have a degree, can be known à
priori. It is worthy of remark, that in respect to quantities in
general, we can cognize à priori only a single quality, namely,
continuity; but in respect to all quality (the real in phenomena), we
cannot cognize à priori anything more than the intensive quantity
thereof, namely, that they have a degree. All else is left to
experience.
3. ANALOGIES OF EXPERIENCE.
The principle of these is: Experience is possible only through the
representation of a necessary connection of Perceptions.
PROOF.