Appearance and reality : a metaphysical essay / F.H. Bradley.

  • F. H. Bradley
Date:
1893
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Appearance and reality : a metaphysical essay / F.H. Bradley. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    principles. And this is so plain that I must excuse myself from dwelling on the point. To say the reality is such that our knowledge cannot reach it, is a claim to know reality ; to urge that our know- ledge is of a kind which must fail to transcend appearance, itself implies that transcendence. Tor, if we had no idea of a beyond, we should assuredly not know how to talk about failure or success. An the test, by which we distinguish them, must ob- viously be some acquaintance with the nature of the goal Nay, the would-be sceptic, who presses on us the contradictions of our thoughts, himself asserts dogmatically. For these contradictions might be ultimate and absolute truth, if the nature of the reality were not known to be otherwise. But this introduction is not the place to discuss a class of objections which are themselves, however unwill- ingly, metaphysical views, and which a little acquaint- ance with the subject commonly serves to dispel. So far as is necessary, they will be dealt with in their proper place ; and I will therefore pass to t e second main argument against metaphysics. (b) It would be idle to deny that this possesses great force. “ Metaphysical knowledge,’ it insists, “ may be possible theoretically, and even actual, it you please, to a certain degree ; but, for all^that, it is practically no knowledge worth the name. An this objection may be rested on.various grounds, will state some of these, and will make the answers which appear to me to be sufficient. The first reason for refusing to enter on our field is an appeal to the confusion and barrenness which prevail there. “ The same problems,” we hear it often, “ the same disputes, the same sheer failure. Why not abandon it and come out ? Is there nothing else more worth your labour . ° ^ ^1S shall reply more fully soon, but will at present deny entirely that the problems have not altered. I ie assertion is about as true and about as false as woulc
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