Note (return) — Chapter X

Every successful inquiry as to the reality and validity of human knowledge must commence by clearly determining, by rigid analysis, what are the actual phenomena presented in consciousness, what are the powers or faculties supposed by these phenomena, and what reliance are we to place upon the testimony of these faculties? And, especially, if it be asserted that there is a science of absolute Reality, of ultimate and essential Being, then the most important and vital question is, By what power do we cognize real Being? through what faculty do we obtain the knowledge of that which absolutely is? If by sensation we only obtain the knowledge of the fleeting and the transitory, "the becoming" how do we attain to the knowledge of the unchangeable and permanent, "the Being?" Have we a faculty of universal, necessary, and eternal principles? Have we a faculty, an interior eye which beholds "the intelligible," ideal, spiritual world, as the eye of sense beholds the visible or "sensible world?" 521