Note (return) — Chapter VII

The obvious doctrine of the above quotations is, that we have an immediate knowledge of the "existence of matter" as well as of "the phenomena of matter;" that is, we know "substance" as immediately and directly as we know "qualities." Phenomena are known only as inherent in substance; substance is known only as manifesting its qualities. We never know qualities without knowing substance, and we can never know substance without knowing qualities. Both are known in one concrete act; substance is known quite as much as quality; quality is known no more than substance. That we have a direct, immediate, presentative "face to face" knowledge of matter and mind in every act of consciousness is asserted again and again by Hamilton, in his "Philosophy of Perception." 287 In the course of the discussion he starts the question, "Is the knowledge of mind and matter equally immediate?" His answer to this question may be condensed in the following sentences. In regard to the immediate knowledge of mind there is no difficulty; it is admitted to be direct and immediate. The problem, therefore, exclusively regards the intuitive perception of the qualities of matter. Now, says Hamilton, "if we interrogate consciousness concerning the point in question, the response is categorical and clear. In the simplest act of perception I am conscious of myself as a perceiving subject, and of an external reality as the object perceived; and I am conscious of both existences in the same indivisible amount of intuition." 288 Again he says, "I have frequently asserted that in perception we are conscious of the external object, immediately and in itself." "If, then, the veracity of consciousness be unconditionally admitted--if the intuitive knowledge of matter and mind, and the consequent reality of their antithesis, be taken as truths," the doctrine of Natural Realism is established, and, "without any hypothesis or demonstration, the reality of mind and the reality of matter." 289