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258 THE WILL IN NATURE.
side, but from the inside ;
out the punctum
saliens l
and next we endeavour to point
of the world-egg. The physico-
theological thought, that Nature must have been regu
lated and fashioned by an intellect, however well it may
suit the untutored mind, is nevertheless fundamentally
wrong. For the intellect is only known to us in animal
nature, consequently as an absolutely secondary and
subordinate principle in the world, a product of the latest
it can never therefore have been the condition of
origin ;
the existence of that world. 2 Now the will on the contrary,
being that which fills every thing and manifests itself
immediately in each thus showing each thing to be its
phenomenon appears everywhere as that which is primary.
It is just for this reason, that the explanation of all teleo-
logical facts is to be found in the will of the being itself in
which they are observed.
Besides, the Physico -theological Proof may be simply
invalidated by the empirical observation, that works pro
duced by animal instinct, such as the spider s web, the bee s
honeycomb and its cells, the white ant s constructions, &c,
&c., are throughout constituted as if they were the result
of an intentional conception, of a wide-reaching providence
and of rational deliberation; whereas they are evidently
the work of a blind impulse, i.e. of a will not guided by
knowledge. From this it follows, that the conclusion from
such and such a nature to such and such a mode of coming
into being, has not the same certainty as the conclusion
from a consequent to its reason, which is in all cases a
sure one. I have devoted the twenty- seventh chapter of the
second volume of my chief work to a detailed consideration
1 The point at which the life -spark is kindled. [Tr.]
8 Nor can a mundus tntelligibilis precede a mundus sensibilis; since it
receives its material from the latter alone. It is not an intellect which
has brought forth Nature j it is, on the contrary, Nature which has
brought forth the intellect. [Add. to 3rd ed.