BEING, THE OBJECT OF THE UNDERSTANDING, IS NOT THE POSSIBLE, INASMUCH AS POSSIBLE.
22. One very important point concerning the idea of being remains to be illustrated, and that is, whether this idea has possible or real being for its object. The scholastics taught that the object of the understanding was being; nor were they altogether without reason in so doing, since one of the things we conceive of with the greatest distinctness, and which is found to be the most fundamental in all our ideas, is the idea of being, containing as it does in a certain manner all other ideas. But as being is distinguished into actual and possible, a difficulty occurs as to which of these categories the idea of being, the chief object of our understanding, is applicable to.
23. The Abbate Rosmini, in hisNuovo Saggio sull' origine delle idee, pretends that the form and the light of our understanding, and the origin of all our ideas, consists in the idea, not of real, but of possible being. "The simple idea of being," he says, "is not the perception of any existing thing, but the intuition of some possible thing; it is no more than the idea of the possibility of the thing."[20]
I very much doubt the truth of this; and there seems also to be some confusion of ideas here. He ought to have defined possibility itself for us, before making the idea of it enter into that of being. I will myself give a definition of it, and this may serve greatly to facilitate the understanding of the whole matter.
24. What is possibility? The idea of possibility, abstracted from its classifications, offers us a general idea of the non-repugnance, or non-exclusion, of two things with respect to each other; just as the idea of impossibility presents us such a repugnance or exclusion. A triangle cannot be a circle. A triangle may be equilateral. In the former case we affirm the repugnance of the ideas of the triangle and of the circle: in the latter, the non-repugnance of a triangle having its three sides equal. It may be said that in these cases there is no question of the existence of the triangle or of the circle; and that the possibility or impossibility is referred to the repugnance of their essences, abstracted from their existence or non-existence, although ideal impossibility draws along with it real impossibility.
25. Since, whenever impossibility is asserted, repugnance also, is asserted, and there can be no repugnance of a thing with itself, it follows that impossibility is only possible when two or more ideas are compared. On the other hand, when there is no repugnance there is possibility; then, no simple idea, of itself alone, can offer to us an impossible object. The object, therefore, of every simple idea is always possible, that is, is not repugnant.
26. Those things only are intrinsically impossible which involve the being and the not-being of the same thing; wherefore they are styled contradictory. When an absurdity of this nature is presented to us, we at once recollect the principle of contradiction, and say, this cannot be, "since it would be and would not be at the same time." Why is a circular triangle impossible? Because it would be and it would not be a triangle at one and the same time.
The idea of not-being does then enter into that of impossibility: without it, there can be no exclusion of being, and consequently, neither contradiction nor impossibility.
27. Possibility may be understood in two ways: I., inasmuch as it expresses only simple non-repugnance; and then what does not exist, is not only possible when it does not involve any contradiction, but also, the existing, the actual; II., inasmuch as it expresses non-repugnance, united to the idea of not being realized; and then it is only applicable to non-existing things. The possible taken in the former sense, is opposed to the impossible; in the latter, it is opposed to the existing; it involves, however, the condition of non-repugnance. In the former case we have possibility simply so called; in the second, pure possibility.
From these remarks we conclude that the idea of possibility adds something to that of being, that is, non-repugnance, non-exclusion; and if there be question of pure possibility, the non-existence of the possible being is likewise added.
28. When the understanding perceives being in itself, it cannot distinguish whether there is or is not repugnance; this is only discoverable by comparison; for the idea of being, in itself simple, does not include comparable terms. The idea of being can encounter no repugnance if it be not applied to some determinate thing, to an essence in which contradictory conditions are imagined, as may be verified by seeking to apply being to a circular triangle.
29. So far is the idea of being in itself from being susceptible of abstraction from the idea of existence, that it is rather the idea itself of existence. When we conceive of being, in all its abstractness, we conceive of nothing else than of existence; these two words denote one and the same idea.
30. We can, in determinate things, conceive of the essence without existence; thus also we can very easily consider all imaginable geometrical figures and examine their properties and relations, abstracted from their existence or non-existence; but the idea of being, as something absolutely indeterminate, if it be abstracted from existence, is also abstracted from itself, is annihilated.
I should be much obliged to any one who would tell me to what the idea of being in general corresponds, abstracted from existence. If, after abstracting all determination, we also abstract being itself, what remains? Some one may answer, there remains a thing which may be. What doesa thingmean? In case we abstract every thing determinate,thingcan only signify a being; we should have a thing which may be, and this is equivalent to a being which may be. This is very well: but when we speak of a being which may be, is there only a question of an impure possibility? then we do not abstract existence, and the conditions of the supposition are not kept. Is there question of pure possibility? then existence is denied, and the proposition is equivalent to this: a being which is not, but which involves no repugnance. Let us examine the meaning of this expression: "a being which is not." What does the subject, a being, mean? a thing, or rather, that which is. What does a thing mean? a being: then abstraction is made from every thing determinate. Therefore, either the subject of the proposition means nothing, or the proposition is absurd, since it is equivalent to this, a thing which is, which is not, but which involves no repugnance.
31. The origin of the equivocation we combat consists in applying to the idea itself of being that which belongs only to things that are something determinate, conceivable without existence. Pure being, in all its abstractness, is inconceivable without actual being, it is existence itself.
32. Nor does pure possibility mean any thing except in order to existence. What is possible being if it cannot be realized, cannot exist? The idea of being is therefore independent of the idea of possibility; and the latter is only applicable in relation to the former.
33. The idea, then, of being is the very idea of existence, of realization. If we conceive of pure being, without mixture or modification, and subsisting in itself, we conceive of the infinite, we conceive of God: but if we consider the idea of being as participated in a contingent manner, by application to finite things, we then conceive of their actuality or realization.
34. When we apply the idea of being to things, we have no intention of applying to them that of possibility, but that of reality. If we say the desk is, we affirm of the subject desk the predicate contained in the idea of being: and still we do not mean to say that the desk is possible, but that it really exists.
35. Nevertheless, the idea of being excludes that of not-being, in such a way that if the idea of being were only of the possible, it would not exclude that of not-being, since the purely possible even includes not-being; possibility, therefore, does not enter into the sole idea of being; and this idea expresses simply existence, reality.