第 28 页

of other substances, would utterly do away with the only condition

of the empirical unity of time; and in that case phenomena would

relate to two different times, in which, side by side, existence would

pass; which is absurd. For there is only one time in which all

different times must be placed, not as coexistent, but as successive.

Accordingly, permanence is a necessary condition under which alone

phenomena, as things or objects, are determinable in a possible

experience. But as regards the empirical criterion of this necessary

permanence, and with it of the substantiality of phenomena, we shall

find sufficient opportunity to speak in the sequel.

B. SECOND ANALOGY.

Principle of the Succession of Time According

to the Law of Causality.

All changes take place according to the law of the

connection of Cause and Effect.

PROOF.

(That all phenomena in the succession of time are only changes, that

is, a successive being and non-being of the determinations of

substance, which is permanent; consequently that a being of

substance itself which follows on the non-being thereof, or a

non-being of substance which follows on the being thereof, in other

words, that the origin or extinction of substance itself, is

impossible- all this has been fully established in treating of the

foregoing principle. This principle might have been expressed as

follows: "All alteration (succession) of phenomena is merely

change"; for the changes of substance are not origin or extinction,

because the conception of change presupposes the same subject as

existing with two opposite determinations, and consequently as

permanent. After this premonition, we shall proceed to the proof.)

I perceive that phenomena succeed one another, that is to say, a

state of things exists at one time, the opposite of which existed in a

former state. In this case, then, I really connect together two

perceptions in time. Now connection is not an operation of mere

sense and intuition, but is the product of a synthetical faculty of

imagination, which determines the internal sense in respect of a

relation of time. But imagination can connect these two states in

two ways, so that either the one or the other may antecede in time;

for time in itself cannot be an object of perception, and what in an

object precedes and what follows cannot be empirically determined in

relation to it. I am only conscious, then, that my imagination

places one state before and the other after; not that the one state

antecedes the other in the object. In other words, the objective

relation of the successive phenomena remains quite undetermined by

means of mere perception. Now in order that this relation may be

cognized as determined, the relation between the two states must be so

cogitated that it is thereby determined as necessary, which of them

must be placed before and which after, and not conversely. But the

conception which carries with it a necessity of synthetical unity, can

be none other than a pure conception of the understanding which does

not lie in mere perception; and in this case it is the conception of

"the relation of cause and effect," the former of which determines the

latter in time, as its necessary consequence, and not as something

which might possibly antecede (or which might in some cases not be

perceived to follow). It follows that it is only because we subject

the sequence of phenomena, and consequently all change, to the law

of causality, that experience itself, that is, empirical cognition

of phenomena, becomes possible; and consequently, that phenomena

themselves, as objects of experience, are possible only by virtue of

this law.

Our apprehension of the manifold of phenomena is always

successive. The representations of parts succeed one another.

Whether they succeed one another in the object also, is a second point

for reflection, which was not contained in the former. Now we may

certainly give the name of object to everything, even to every

representation, so far as we are conscious thereof; but what this word

may mean in the case of phenomena, not merely in so far as they (as

representations) are objects, but only in so far as they indicate an

object, is a question requiring deeper consideration. In so far as

they, regarded merely as representations, are at the same time objects

of consciousness, they are not to be distinguished from

apprehension, that is, reception into the synthesis of imagination,

and we must therefore say: "The manifold of phenomena is always

produced successively in the mind." If phenomena were things in

themselves, no man would be able to conjecture from the succession

of our representations how this manifold is connected in the object;

for we have to do only with our representations. How things may be

in themselves, without regard to the representations through which

they affect us, is utterly beyond the sphere of our cognition. Now

although phenomena are not things in themselves, and are

nevertheless the only thing given to us to be cognized, it is my

duty to show what sort of connection in time belongs to the manifold

in phenomena themselves, while the representation of this manifold

in apprehension is always successive. For example, the apprehension of

the manifold in the phenomenon of a house which stands before me, is

successive. Now comes the question whether the manifold of this

house is in itself successive- which no one will be at all willing

to grant. But, so soon as I raise my conception of an object to the

transcendental signification thereof, I find that the house is not a

thing in itself, but only a phenomenon, that is, a representation, the

transcendental object of which remains utterly unknown. What then am I

to understand by the question: "How can the manifold be connected in

the phenomenon itself- not considered as a thing in itself, but merely

as a phenomenon?" Here that which lies in my successive apprehension

is regarded as representation, whilst the phenomenon which is given

me, notwithstanding that it is nothing more than a complex of these

representations, is regarded as the object thereof, with which my

conception, drawn from the representations of apprehension, must

harmonize. It is very soon seen that, as accordance of the cognition

with its object constitutes truth, the question now before us can only

relate to the formal conditions of empirical truth; and that the

phenomenon, in opposition to the representations of apprehension,

can only be distinguished therefrom as the object of them, if it is

subject to a rule which distinguishes it from every other

apprehension, and which renders necessary a mode of connection of

the manifold. That in the phenomenon which contains the condition of

this necessary rule of apprehension, is the object.

Let us now proceed to our task. That something happens, that is to

say, that something or some state exists which before was not,

cannot be empirically perceived, unless a phenomenon precedes, which

does not contain in itself this state. For a reality which should

follow upon a void time, in other words, a beginning, which no state

of things precedes, can just as little be apprehended as the void time

itself. Every apprehension of an event is therefore a perception which

follows upon another perception. But as this is the case with all

synthesis of apprehension, as I have shown above in the example of a

house, my apprehension of an event is not yet sufficiently

distinguished from other apprehensions. But I remark also that if in a

phenomenon which contains an occurrence, I call the antecedent state

of my perception, A, and the following state, B, the perception B

can only follow A in apprehension, and the perception A cannot

follow B, but only precede it. For example, I see a ship float down

the stream of a river. My perception of its place lower down follows

upon my perception of its place higher up the course of the river, and

it is impossible that, in the apprehension of this phenomenon, the

vessel should be perceived first below and afterwards higher up the

stream. Here, therefore, the order in the sequence of perceptions in

apprehension is determined; and by this order apprehension is

regulated. In the former example, my perceptions in the apprehension

of a house might begin at the roof and end at the foundation, or

vice versa; or I might apprehend the manifold in this empirical

intuition, by going from left to right, and from right to left.

Accordingly, in the series of these perceptions, there was no

determined order, which necessitated my beginning at a certain

point, in order empirically to connect the manifold. But this rule

is always to be met with in the perception of that which happens,

and it makes the order of the successive perceptions in the

apprehension of such a phenomenon necessary.

I must, therefore, in the present case, deduce the subjective

sequence of apprehension from the objective sequence of phenomena, for

otherwise the former is quite undetermined, and one phenomenon is

not distinguishable from another. The former alone proves nothing as

to the connection of the manifold in an object, for it is quite

arbitrary. The latter must consist in the order of the manifold in a

phenomenon, according to which order the apprehension of one thing

(that which happens) follows that of another thing (which precedes),

in conformity with a rule. In this way alone can I be authorized to

say of the phenomenon itself, and not merely of my own apprehension,

that a certain order or sequence is to be found therein. That is, in

other words, I cannot arrange my apprehension otherwise than in this

order.

In conformity with this rule, then, it is necessary that in that

which antecedes an event there be found the condition of a rule,

according to which in this event follows always and necessarily; but I

cannot reverse this and go back from the event, and determine (by

apprehension) that which antecedes it. For no phenomenon goes back

from the succeeding point of time to the preceding point, although

it does certainly relate to a preceding point of time; from a given

time, on the other hand, there is always a necessary progression to

the determined succeeding time. Therefore, because there certainly

is something that follows, I must of necessity connect it with

something else, which antecedes, and upon which it follows, in

conformity with a rule, that is necessarily, so that the event, as

conditioned, affords certain indication of a condition, and this

condition determines the event.

Let us suppose that nothing precedes an event, upon which this event

must follow in conformity with a rule. All sequence of perception

would then exist only in apprehension, that is to say, would be merely

subjective, and it could not thereby be objectively determined what

thing ought to precede, and what ought to follow in perception. In

such a case, we should have nothing but a play of representations,

which would possess no application to any object. That is to say, it

would not be possible through perception to distinguish one phenomenon

from another, as regards relations of time; because the succession

in the act of apprehension would always be of the same sort, and

therefore there would be nothing in the phenomenon to determine the

succession, and to render a certain sequence objectively necessary.

And, in this case, I cannot say that two states in a phenomenon follow

one upon the other, but only that one apprehension follows upon

another. But this is merely subjective, and does not determine an

object, and consequently cannot be held to be cognition of an

object- not even in the phenomenal world.

Accordingly, when we know in experience that something happens, we

always presuppose that something precedes, whereupon it follows in

conformity with a rule. For otherwise I could not say of the object

that it follows; because the mere succession in my apprehension, if it

be not determined by a rule in relation to something preceding, does

not authorize succession in the object. Only, therefore, in

reference to a rule, according to which phenomena are determined in

their sequence, that is, as they happen, by the preceding state, can I

make my subjective synthesis (of apprehension) objective, and it is

only under this presupposition that even the experience of an event is

possible.

No doubt it appears as if this were in thorough contradiction to all

the notions which people have hitherto entertained in regard to the

procedure of the human understanding. According to these opinions,

it is by means of the perception and comparison of similar

consequences following upon certain antecedent phenomena that the

understanding is led to the discovery of a rule, according to which

certain events always follow certain phenomena, and it is only by this

process that we attain to the conception of cause. Upon such a

basis, it is clear that this conception must be merely empirical,

and the rule which it furnishes us with- "Everything that happens must

have a cause"- would be just as contingent as experience itself. The

universality and necessity of the rule or law would be perfectly

spurious attributes of it. Indeed, it could not possess universal

validity, inasmuch as it would not in this case be a priori, but

founded on deduction. But the same is the case with this law as with

other pure a priori representations (e.g., space and time), which we

can draw in perfect clearness and completeness from experience, only

because we had already placed them therein, and by that means, and

by that alone, had rendered experience possible. Indeed, the logical

clearness of this representation of a rule, determining the series

of events, is possible only when we have made use thereof in

experience. Nevertheless, the recognition of this rule, as a condition

of the synthetical unity of phenomena in time, was the ground of

experience itself and consequently preceded it a priori.