What is man? Positive science, on the basis of all its experiments and experiments, cannot solve this great riddle of philosophy. It can speak only of bones and sinews, of muscles and nerves, i.e., in the direction of a philosophical question it can consider man only as prey for graveworms. For now it is so arranged that even psychology itself, within the limits of the method of natural science, does not consider itself entitled to speak to man about the spirit; Because none of the scientists has yet managed to hook the soul on the edge of a knife and put it in the retort of a chemist. Consequently, the burning questions of what man should desire in the name of his humanity, and how he should live according to the truth of his humanity, cannot even be raised within the limits of positive science; because within these limits only animality is known, and serious people are not supposed to talk about humanity, according to all the data of modern science. And yet, serious people have always talked about the ultimate questions of thought and life, raised and solved these questions, and actively created philosophy as a special science about man.

We offer an experience of introduction to this science in the following pages. In this introduction we shall try to define and elucidate both the real conditions of education and the objective significance of the undoubtedly great riddle which man constantly asks himself about himself by all the facts of his life.

I. Consciousness and Thought

1. Consciousness as a universal form of expression of the spirit.

Any psychic phenomenon can exist only under the form of consciousness, and the whole world of psychic reality is only the world of consciousness. It is true that in psychological science there has long been a very widespread opinion that unconscious psychic phenomena develop side by side with the phenomena of consciousness, and consequently that the whole sphere of the psyche must necessarily be wider than the special sphere of the conscious. But this opinion is the product of pure misunderstanding. It has arisen and exists as a necessary scientific assumption by means of which the phenomena of consciousness can be explained more or less satisfactorily, on the one hand, and, on the other, the process of consciousness itself. Yet this satisfactoriness is purely illusory, because in reality the division of psychic reality into two different spheres necessarily led and will only lead to very gross naïveté. Within metaphysical psychology, for example, all unconscious psychologists are forced to imagine the soul in the form of a dark closet or cellar, on the threshold of which a lamp of consciousness is placed. The fire of this lamp perfectly illuminates everything that descends into or out of the cellar, and leaves in perfect darkness everything that is inside it. Such a view, of course, has the irreplaceable convenience of being able to lull man with an imaginary explanation of the incomprehensible psychic phenomena of forgetfulness and reproduction: everything that has been put into the cellar of the soul has been forgotten, and everything that has been taken out of it for use has been reproduced. But this is not an explanation, but only the lulling of thought with the empty phantom of explanation, and for this reason it is precisely for anyone who has no special need of such lulling that it is necessary to renounce such a view.

Within the framework of physiological psychology, the most decisive rejection of metaphysical fantasy is indeed declared. But in relation to the question with which we are interested, this fantasy is not in the least destroyed here, but is only replaced by a special physiological fantasy, and, as a consequence, the old content is presented to us only in a new form. The role of a dark closet or cellar here is played by the nervous system in general and the brain par excellence[22]. Of course, in this conception physiologists avoid the comical explanations of the metaphysicians, because by the name of unconscious psychic phenomena they actually mean the physiological precedents and correlates of the phenomena of consciousness. But on the other hand, they come across another major misunderstanding. For if the physiological precedents and correlates of the phenomena of consciousness can be regarded as psychic phenomena, then any distinction between the psychic and the physiological must inevitably disappear, and therefore the term psychic is at least quite superfluous. Then it is true that impressions and judgments, all the processes and products of thought, are realized and preserved as simple states or combinations of various states of the brain-substance, but at the same time it turns out that the real difference does not really exist between the psychic and the physiological, but only between the conscious and the unconscious. Consequently, if the term "psychic" is to have any meaning, it can have it only in relation to the phenomena of consciousness, and therefore, from the point of view of physiological psychology, the realm of the psychic must be entirely covered by the realm of the conscious. The movement of the brain substance, so long as it is not marked by the phenomenon of consciousness, is only the movement of matter, and not an impression or judgment, like any physiological process in general, so long as it is not marked by the phenomenon of consciousness, it is only a physiological process, and not a psychic one. Consequently, only that which exists under the form of consciousness belongs to the psyche, and there are no unconscious phenomena in it, and there cannot be, unless the states of the brain are taken for such phenomena. But in asserting this proposition, we actually rely on the testimony of consciousness itself and do not take into account those conditions and circumstances with the occurrence of which the process of consciousness apparently ceases and no phenomena occur. Such, for example, are the cases of fainting or deep sleep without dreams. In fact, we do not take all these cases into account, because we take it for granted that the absence of consciousness in them is not a fact in fact (for in that case it would be a fact of consciousness, which is absurd), but only a deduction from the fact, or an explanation of the fact that we do not remember any phenomena of consciousness during these states. In relation to this fact, with special caution, one can confine oneself to a simple assertion of it, and leave the question of the presence or absence of the phenomena of consciousness completely open. Of course, we can go beyond a simple statement and try to find out the reason for the fact – why exactly do we not remember anything? In answer to this question, the assumption of unconsciousness arises, i.e. the absence of memory is explained by the absence of phenomena of consciousness: we do not remember anything, because there is nothing to remember. But the same question can be solved in a completely different way. It can be assumed that the process of consciousness does not cease in any case, but only its phenomena, with the cessation of some and with the onset of other conditions, in the absence of any connection with phenomena under these new conditions, are not repeated. It goes without saying that this explanation is just as much a hypothesis as the first explanation, and yet there is a fundamental difference between these hypotheses. When it is said that the absence of memory of certain mental states is determined by the absence of consciousness in these states, it is evident that a proposition is expressed which not only has no fact, but in its very essence can be explained, and cannot have any justification for itself, i.e., this hypothesis must remain a pure hypothesis for all eternity. When, however, it is admitted that the absence of memory of certain phenomena of consciousness is determined by the absence of connection between these phenomena and the phenomena of consciousness under other conditions, then in this case a proposition is expressed which has some and even very weighty grounds for itself, and from the strength of these reasons acquires a very considerable degree of probability. After all, the psychic processes of dreams are remembered very rarely by the vast majority of people. Most often it happens that a person remembers only the fact of the dream, but not the content. But it also happens that a person does not remember at all either the content or the fact of the dream itself; so that when he awoke he was quite sure that he had slept a deep sleep without any dreams. And yet, in the course of the day, his thoughts sometimes take such a direction that he suddenly has an unexpected memory of having dreamed, and with more or less rapidity the whole process of dreaming is reproduced. This reproduction is always determined by the identity in the content of the past dream with certain elements in the content of the present consciousness, so that if these elements had not appeared, the fiction of a dream without dreams would certainly have remained in the position of reality. Obviously, the absence of memory of the phenomena of consciousness cannot serve as proof of the absence of the phenomena themselves. Such a proof would be no higher than the hypnotist's manifestly incorrect assertion that during his hypnosis he did not live a conscious life at all. He has lived this life, but he does not remember anything about it. And this is completely understandable. The universal conditions for the reproduction of psychic phenomena are determined by the universal laws of association, and if there is no connection between the past phenomena of consciousness and its present states, then these past phenomena cannot be repeated in consciousness. In other words, I do not remember the phenomena of consciousness during my deep sleep or fainting, for the same reason that at any given moment I am unconscious of the thousands of states of consciousness which I have experienced during the day, and still less during my whole life. Many of these states, of course, existed only for one moment and then did not recur and perhaps will never be repeated, but nevertheless they existed, even though I never remembered what this state was.

Of course, in this case it is perhaps possible to attach special importance to the difference between the concepts of many and nothing, but in fact this distinction cannot have any meaning at all here. If a person necessarily remembers many phenomena of yesterday and the previous day, then this circumstance is entirely determined by the unity of the objective conditions of life, or more precisely and most closely, by the unity of the situation. Today he looks at the same things, walks through the same rooms, talks to the same faces, as he did yesterday and the day before. Consequently, the mass of impressions is inevitably repeated in him and inevitably connects the present moments of his life with the same previous moments; whereas for states of deep sleep or fainting in ordinary life there is no likeness, and consequently there is no condition for the reproduction of the phenomena of mental life in such states.

Таким образом, принятию гипотезы непрерывного сознания могут мешать собственно не какие-нибудь научные соображения, а только одно обстоятельство, что она объясняет известные факты душевной жизни не с точки зрения привычного, традиционно схоластического взгляда на сознание и память. По этому взгляду, как известно, сознание есть своего рода широкое поле, в пределах которого достаточно места для многих и притом самых разнообразных состояний. Следовательно, ничто не мешает быть в нем и таким состояниям, которые были определены для него не наличными условиями. Резонность такого следствия будто бы вполне подтверждается фактом памяти, потому что память определяется как сила или способность души задерживать и хранить в себе все элементы и продукты ее деятельности; так что в душевной жизни ничто бесследно не исчезает, и при некоторых благоприятных условиях все может быть снова вызвано в поле сознания[26]. – Это, конечно, совершенно справедливо, что бесследно ничто не исчезает, но все-таки ничто и не сохраняется. Всякое душевное явление оставляет свой след, но только этот след не есть темная копия данного явления или мертвый символ в каком-нибудь тайнике души, а живое определение психического развития; потому что он сказывается только в складе душевной жизни, в ее характере, направлении и силе. Содержание при этом исчезает все целиком, – нигде не задерживается и не сохраняется, а потому никогда и не воспроизводится, а только повторяется в сознании, т.е. в каждом известном случае творится вновь[27]. Для психолога, который не допускает безусловного разграничения психических функций по особым силам души, принять это положение не только не трудно, но даже и необходимо. Ведь о пережитых чувствованиях и желаниях он никогда не говорит, что они сохраняются в душе и по временам ею воспроизводятся, а так прямо и говорит, что они исчезают совершенно и в каждом данном случае создаются вновь. Следовательно, исключение делается в пользу одной только умственной деятельности, и мифической кладовой снабжается один только ум. Но если бы мы на минуту устранили всякие мифологические объяснения и стали бы держаться одних только фактов, то несомненно признали бы, что богатство развитого ума заключается вовсе не в том, что он в каждое данное время фактически владеет огромным запасом своих продуктов, а лишь в том, что он в каждое данное время может владеть таким запасом, потому что каждое данное явление он последовательно, в силу разнообразных ассоциаций, может связать с целой массой пережитых им явлений и установить между ними такие отношения, которые для бедно жившего ума окажутся совершенно непонятными и даже прямо немыслимыми. Следовательно, работа ума не есть работа какого-то смотрителя кладовой, а работа – чисто творческая; и так как весь процесс этой работы имеет свое реальное основание в моментах развития ума, то целая масса положений ума необходимо и должна утверждаться, как бывшая в нем. Вот это именно утверждение и есть то, что называется памятью. Следовательно, память говорит не о том, что нечто сохраняется в уме, а лишь о том, что нечто было в нем[28].

2.

Сознание как творческий процесс формации психических явлений.

Такое понимание психической действительности – не как области, из идеального центра которой усматривается положение и взаимоотношение различных фактов сознания, а как непрерывного процесса, все звенья которого самим же духом и создаются, существенно изменяет традиционное учение о сознании и определяет основания для нового взгляда как на значение сознания в душевной жизни, так и на весь сложный процесс этой жизни.