present in sense as consciousness, and the reason whose unity guides
the understanding in its work of separation. Thus the several modes of
cognition do not stand for independent fundamental faculties, but for
connected modifications of one fundamental power which work together and
mutually imply one another. The position that an intellectual function of
attention and discrimination is active in sensuous perception, is a view
entirely foreign to mediaeval modes of thought; for the Scholastics were
accustomed to make sharp divisions between the cognitive faculties, on the
principle that particulars are felt through sense and universals thought
through the understanding. The idea on which Nicolas bases his argument for
immortality has also an entirely modern sound: viz., that space and time
are products of the understanding, and, therefore, can have no power over
the spirit which produces them; for the author is higher and mightier than
the product.

The confession that all our knowledge is conjecture does not simply mean
that absolute and exact truth remains concealed from us; but is intended at
the same time to encourage us to draw as near as possible to the eternal
verity by ever truer conjectures. There are degrees of truth, and our
surmises are neither absolutely true nor entirely false. Conjecture becomes
error only when, forgetting the inadequacy of human knowledge, we rest
content with it as a final solution; the Socratic maxim, "I know that I
am ignorant," should not lead to despairing resignation but to courageous
further inquiry. The duty of speculation is to penetrate deeper and deeper
into the secrets of the divine, even though the ultimate revelation will
not be given us until the hereafter. The fittest instrument of speculation
is furnished by mathematics, in its conception of the infinite and the
wonders of numerical relations: as on the infinite sphere center and
circumference coincide, so God's essence is exalted above all opposites;
and as the other numbers are unfolded from the unit, so the finite proceeds