in the preceding analysis, could never take place otherwise. Kant is therefore obliged to leave the genesis of empirical perception unexplained. With him it is a mere matter of the senses, given as it were in a miraculous way: that is, it coincides with sensation. I should very much like my reflective readers to refer to the passages I have indicated in Kant's work, in order to convince themselves of the far greater accuracy of my view of the whole process and connection. Kant's extremely erroneous view has held its ground till now in philosophical literature, simply because no one ventured to attack it; therefore I have found it necessary to clear the way in order to throw light upon the mechanism of our knowledge. [92] Kant, "Krit. d. r. V." 1st edition, p. 367 _sqq._ (English translation by M. Müller, p. 318 _sqq._) [93] Kant, "Krit. d. r. Vern." 1st edition, p. 371. (English translation, by M. Müller, p. 322.) [94] Kant, "Krit. d. r. Vern." 1st edition, p. 372. (English translation, p. 323.) Kant's fundamental idealistic position loses nothing whatever, nay, it even gains by this rectification of mine, in as far as, with me, the necessity of the causal law is absorbed and extinguished in empirical perception as its product and cannot therefore be invoked in behalf of an entirely transcendent question as to the thing in itself. On referring to my theory above concerning empirical perception, we find that its first datum, sensation, is absolutely subjective, being a process within the organism, because it takes place beneath the skin. Locke has completely and exhaustively proved, that the feelings of our senses, even admitting them to be roused by external causes, cannot have any resemblance whatever to the qualities of those causes. Sugar, for instance, bears no resemblance at all to sweetness, nor a rose to redness. But that they should need an external cause at all, is based upon a law whose origin lies demonstrably within us, in our brain; therefore this necessity is not less subjective than the sensations themselves. Nay, even _Time_--that primary condition of every possible _change_, therefore also of the change which first permits the application of the causal law--and not less _Space_--which alone renders the externalisation of causes possible, after which they present themselves to us as objects--even Time and Space, we say, are subjective forms of the intellect, as Kant has conclusively proved. Accordingly we find all the elements of empirical perception lying within us, and nothing contained in them which can give us reliable indications as to anything differing absolutely from ourselves, anything in itself.--But this is not all. What we think under the conception _matter_, is the residue which remains over after bodies have been divested of their shape and of all their specific qualities: a residue, which precisely on that account must be identical in all bodies.