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tal to our purposes. And finally, even when we have recognized reality
as spirit, the imperfection of our present knowledge leaves a large num-
ber of its qualities apparently contingent and irrational. Thus every case
in which we have established a personal relation must be surrounded by
large numbers of others in which we have not done so. And as all reality
is inter-connected, the establishment and maintenance of this relation
must be connected with, and dependent on, the imperfect relations into
which we come with the surrounding reality. And, again, the same inter-
connection brings it about that the harmony with any one object can
Studies in Hegelian Cosmology/241
never be perfect, till the harmony with all other objects is so. Thus our
relations with any one object could never be completely absorbed in
love leaving no knowledge and volition untranscended until the same
result was universally attained.
But there is no reason why it should not be attained completely, if
attained universally. It is entitled to stand by itself, for it is, as we have
seen, self-contained. It does not require a reference to some correlative
and opposed activity to make its own nature intelligible, and it does not
require any recognition of the possibility of discord. It is the simple and
absolute expression of harmony, and, when once the harmony of the
whole universe has become explicit, it is capable of expressing the mean-
ing of the whole universe.
305. Before this ideal could be attained, it is clear that sense-pre-
sentation, as a method of obtaining our knowledge of the object, would
have to cease. For sense-presentation can only give us consciousness of
reality under the form of matter, and in doing this, it clearly falls short
of the perfect harmony, since it presents reality in an imperfect and
inadequate form.
There seems no reason why the fact of sense-presentation should be
regarded as essential to consciousness. Our senses may be indispens-
able to knowledge while much of the reality, of which we desire to be
informed, still takes the shape of matter, and the rest is only known to us
in so far as it acts through material bodies. But it seems quite possible
that the necessity, to which spirits are at present subject, of communi-
cating with one another through matter, only exists because the matter
happens to be in the way. In that case, when the whole universe is viewed
as spirit, so that nothing relatively alien could come between one indi-
vidual and another, the connection between spirits might be very possi-
bly direct.
306. Another characteristic of a perfect manifestation of the Abso-
lute is that it must be timeless. In this, again, I can see no difficulty. If,
in love, we are able to come into contact with the object as it really is,
we shall find no disconnected manifold. The object is, of course, not a
mere blank unity. It is a unity which manifests itself in multiplicity. But
the multiplicity only exists in so far as it is contained in the unity. And,
since the object has thus a real unity of its own, it might be possible to
apprehend the whole of it at once, and not to require that successive
apprehension, which the synthesis of a manifold, originally given as
unconnected, would always require.
242/John McTaggart Ellis McTaggart
It is true, of course, that we cannot conceive the Absolute as con-
nection with a single other person, but rather, directly or indirectly, with
all others. But we must remember, again, that all reality must be con-
ceived as in perfect unity, and, therefore, individuals must be conceived
as forming, not a mere aggregate or mechanical system, but a whole
which only differs from an organism in being a closer and more vital
unity than any organism can be. The various individuals, then, must be
conceived as forming a differentiated and multiplex whole, but by no
means as an unconnected manifold. It might therefore be practicable to
dispense with successive acts of apprehension in contemplating the com-
plete whole of the universe, as much as in contemplating the relative
whole of a single individual. And in that case there would be no reason
why the highest form of spirit should not be free from succession, and
from time.
I should be inclined to say, personally, that, even at present, the idea
of timeless emotion is one degree less unintelligible than that of timeless
knowledge and volition that the most intense emotion has some power
of making time seem, if not unreal, at any rate excessively unimportant,
which does not belong to any other form of mental activity. But this is a
matter of introspection which every person must decide for himself.
How such great and fundamental changes are to be made how
knowledge and volition are to pass into love, and a life in time into
timelessness may well perplex us. Even if we see the necessity of the
transition, the manner in which it is to be effected would remain myste-
rious. But all such transitions, we may reflect, must necessarily appear
mysterious till they have taken place. The transition is from two rela-
tively abstract ideas to a more comprehensive idea which synthesises
them. Till the synthesis has taken place, the abstractions have not yet
lost the false appearance of substantiality and independence which they
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