To such a tremulous wisp constantly re-forming itself on the
stream, to a single sharp impression, with a sense in it, a relic more or
less fleeting, of such moments gone by, what is real in our life fines
itself down. It is with this movement, with the passage and dissolution
of impressions, images, sensations, that analysis leaves off--that
continual vanishing away, that strange, perpetual weaving and unweaving
of ourselves.
Philosophiren, says Novalis, ist dephlegmatisiren vivificiren. The
service of philosophy, of speculative culture, towards the human spirit
is to rouse, to startle it into sharp and eager observation. Every moment
some form grows perfect in hand or face; some tone on the hills or the
sea is choicer than the rest; some mood of passion or insight or
intellectual excitement is irresistibly real and attractive for us,--for
that moment only. Not the fruit of experience, but experience itself, is
the end. A counted number of pulses only is given to us of a variegated,
dramatic life.
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