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PHYSICAL ASTEONOMY. 319
for then indeed we fall into an irremovable error. Then,
as I have already said, we maintain the view, that motion
has two radically different primary principles with a solid
partition-wall between them : i.e. movement by means of
causes, and movement by means of the will. The first of
these must then remain for ever incomprehensible as to its
innermost essence, because, after all its explanations, there
is still left that unknown x which contains the more, the
higher the object under consideration stands in the scale of
beings ; while the second, movement by the will, presents
itself as entirely disconnected from the principle of
causality; as without reason; as freedom in individual
actions : in other words, as completely opposed to Nature
and utterly unexplainable. On the other hand, if the
above-mentioned union of our external and internal know
ledge has once been accomplished at the point where both
meet, we then recognise two identities in spite of all
accidental differences. That is to say, we recognise the
identity of causality with itself on every degree of the
scale of beings, and the identity of the x, which at
first was unknown (i.e. of physical forces and vital phe
nomena), with the will which is within us. We recognise,
I say, firstly the essential identity of causality under
the various forms it is forced to assume on the different
degrees of the scale, as it may manifest itself, now as a
mechanical, chemical, or physical cause, now as a stimulus,
and again as a perceptible or an abstract motive : we
know it to be one and the same, not only when a pro
pelling body loses as much movement as it imparts by im
pact, but also when in the combats of thought against
thought, the victorious one, as the more powerful motive,
sets Man in motion, a motion which follows with no less
necessity than that of the ball which is struck. Where we
ourselves are the things set in motion, where therefore the
kernel of the process is well and intimately known to us,