THE UNITY OF IDENTITY AND DIFFERENCE AS THE ...

Only a determinate can determine an indeterminate; sensibility does not
determine, nor does the understanding, for the principle of individuality lies
outside of them. In this principle lies the mystery of the many and the one in an
indivisible connection (Verbindung), which is being, reality, and substance. Our
concepts of this indivisible connection are merely reciprocal concepts
(Wechselbegriffe); unity presupposes universality; universality presupposes
plurality; and plurality presupposes unity. Unity is therefore the beginning and
end of this eternal circle, and is called – individuality, organism, and object =
subjectivity. 234
Here again we can see a host of Hegelian insights, all of which are connected with the
problem of the relation between unity and plurality. Jacobi argues that only a
determinate can determine the indeterminate, and he then goes on to say that neither the
understanding nor sensibility can determine. Presumably, he means that taken in
isolation or as basic, both sensibility and understanding are indeterminate. In isolation
from the articulating activity of the understanding, sensibility presents a pure
undifferentiated manifold, a manifold without distinction. Such an undifferentiated
manifold lacks determination. It is indeterminate. Similarly, pure understanding, in
isolation from the manifold presented in intuition, is a pure unity that doesn’t contain
plurality. As such, it is a simple or pure unity without differentiation or determination. 235
Jacobi argues that only the individual – as the mysterious “indivisible connection”
of the one and the many, as the substance, as the real – only this individual, which is
already determinate, can determine. If there is any determinate reality, Jacobi argues, this
determinate reality must already include the relation, or the indivisible connection,
between unity and plurality (understanding and sensibility, or form and matter). In some
234 Werke, Dritter Band. P. 176. Hegel quotes this passage in Glauben und Wissen. See Hegel’s
Werke 2, pp. 355-6. Hegel largely accepts the statement of the problem, but rejects Jacobi’s mystical and
anti-rationalist solution (or non-solution.)
235 We can state Jacobi’s point in Aristotelian terms as follows: both formless matter and
matterless form are equally inconceivable, since both lack determination. There can be no prime matter,
nor can there be an unmoved mover.
230