The World as Will and Idea — Schopenhauer — John Shaqi
The World as Will and Idea
Schopenhauer · German
from experience, and the reality of experience is then made to rest upon
it. Thus both of these views are open to the correction, firstly, that
object and idea are the same; secondly, that the true being of the object
of perception is its action, that the reality of the thing consists in
this, and the demand for an existence of the object outside the idea of
the subject, and also for an essence of the actual thing different from
its action, has absolutely no meaning, and is a contradiction: and that
the knowledge of the nature of the effect of any perceived object,
exhausts such an object itself, so far as it is object, _i.e._, idea, for
beyond this there is nothing more to be known. So far then, the perceived
world in space and time, which makes itself known as causation alone, is
entirely real, and is throughout simply what it appears to be, and it
appears wholly and without reserve as idea, bound together according to
the law of causality. This is its empirical reality. On the other hand,
all causality is in the understanding alone, and for the understanding.
The whole actual, that is, active world is determined as such through the
understanding, and apart from it is nothing. This, however, is not the
only reason for altogether denying such a reality of the outer world as is
taught by the dogmatist, who explains its reality as its independence of
the subject. We also deny it, because no object apart from a subject can
be conceived without contradiction. The whole world of objects is and
remains idea, and therefore wholly and for ever determined by the subject;
that is to say, it has transcendental ideality. But it is not therefore
illusion or mere appearance; it presents itself as that which it is, idea,
and indeed as a series of ideas of which the common bond is the principle
of sufficient reason. It is according to its inmost meaning quite
comprehensible to the healthy understanding, and speaks a language quite
intelligible to it. To dispute about its reality can only occur to a mind
perverted by over-subtilty, and such discussion always arises from a false
application of the principle of sufficient reason, which binds all ideas
together of whatever kind they may be, but by no means connects them with
the subject, nor yet with a something which is neither subject nor object,
but only the ground of the object; an absurdity, for only objects can be
and always are the ground of objects. If we examine more closely the
source of this question as to the reality of the outer world, we find that
besides the false application of the principle of sufficient reason
generally to what lies beyond its province, a special confusion of its
forms is also involved; for that form which it has only in reference to
concepts or abstract ideas, is applied to perceived ideas, real objects;
and a ground of knowing is demanded of objects, whereas they can have
nothing but a ground of being. Among the abstract ideas, the concepts