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FIRST CLASS OF OBJECTS FOE THE SUBJECT. 103
Kant says, Time cannot be perceived ;
x
therefore no suc
cession of representations can be empirically perceived as
objective : i.e. can be distinguished as changes in pheno
mena from the changes of mere subjective representations.
The causal law, being a rule according to which states
follow one another, is the only means by which the ob
jectivity of a change can be known. Now, the result of
his assertion would be, that no succession in Time could
be perceived by us as objective, excepting that of cause
and effect, and that every other succession of phenomena
we perceive, would only be determined so, and not other
wise, by our own will. In contradiction to all this I must
adduce the fact, that it is quite possible for phenomena to
follow upon one another without following from one another.
Nor is the law of causality by any means prejudiced by
for it remains certain that each change is the effect
this ;
of another change, this being firmly established a priori ;
only each change not only follows upon the single one
which is its cause, but upon all the other changes which
occur simultaneously with that cause, and with which that
cause stands in no causal connection whatever. It is not
perceived by me exactly in the regular order of causal
succession, but in quite a different order, which is, how
ever, no less objective on that account, and which differs
widely from any subjective succession depending on my
caprice, such as, for instance, the pictures of my imagina
tion. The succession, in Time, of events which stand in
no causal connection with each other is precisely what we
call contingency. 1
Just as I am leaving my house, a tile
happens to fall from the roof which strikes me ; now, there
is no causal connection whatever between my going out and
1 In German Zufall, a word derived from the Zusammenfallen (falling
together), Zusammentreffen (meeting together), or coinciding of what is
unconnected, just as TO avpfitfiriKos from avufiaiveiv. (Compare Aris
"
totle, Anal, post.," i. 4.)