rejected. And, of course, the relations of these essences—the one to the other, and each to the phenomena which in some way seem its adjectives—take us back to those difficulties which proved too hard for us. But I presume that the reality of the laws must be denied, or denied, that is, not quite, but with a reservation. The laws are hypothetical; they are in themselves but possibilities, and actual only when found in real presentation. Apart from this, and as mere laws, they are connections between terms which do not exist; and, if so, as connections, they are not strictly anything actual. In short, just as the elements were nothing outside of presentation, so again, outside of presentation, the laws really are nothing. And in presentation then—what is either side, the elements or the laws, but an unreal and quite indefensible thought? It seems that we can say of them only that we do not know what they are; and all that we can be certain of is this, that they are not what we know, namely, given phenomena.
And here we may end. The view has started with mere presentation. It, of course, is forced to transcend this, and it has done so ignorantly and blindly. A little criticism has driven it back, and has left it with a universe, which must either be distinctions within one presentation, or else mere nonsense. And then these distinctions themselves are quite indefensible. If you admit them, you have to deal with the metaphysical problem of the Many in One; and you cannot admit them, because clearly they are not given and presented, but at least more or less made. And what it must come to is that Phenomenalism ends in this dilemma. It must either keep to the moment’s presentation, and must leave there the presented entirely as it is given—and, if so, then surely there could be no more science; or it must “become transcendent” (as the phrase goes), and launch out into a sea of
