of personality is inadequate even when applied to man, for it is not true that man is merely a person. The first consciousness of exclusive or adverse relations to others must be supplemented by the conception of man as essentially spirit, that is, as a being whose true self is found in what is not self. Man is therefore not adequately conceived as an exclusive self, but only as a self whose true nature is to transcend his exclusiveness and to find himself in what seems at first to be opposed to him. In other words, man is essentially self-separative: he must go out of his apparently self-centred life in order to find himself in a truer and richer life. This conception of a opposing subject must be applied to the Absolute. The Absolute is not an abstract Person, but a Spirit, i.e., a being whose essential nature consists in opposing to itself beings in unity with whom it realizes itself. This conception of a self-alienating or self-distinguishing subject is the fundamental idea which is expressed in an inadequate way in the doctrine of the Trinity. We can conceive nothing higher than a self-conscious subject, who, in the infinite fullness of his nature, exhibits his perfection in beings who realize themselves in identification with Him. What Schiller expresses in a figurative way seems to me to be the necessary result of philosophy:
- “Freundlos war der grosse Weltenmeister,
- Fühlte Mangel, darum schuf er Geister,
- Sel’ge Spiegel seiner Seligkeit.
- Fand das höchste Wesen schon kein Gleiches,
- Aus dem Kelch des ganzen Wesenreiches
- Schäumt ihm die Unendlichkeit.”
John Watson.
- University of Queen’s College.
