SECOND CONFLICT OF TRANSCENDENTAL IDEAS.
Thesis.
Every composite substance in the world consists of simple parts; and
there exists nothing that is not either itself simple, or composed
of simple parts.
PROOF.
For, grant that composite substances do not consist of
simple parts;
in this case, if all combination or composition were annihilated in
thought, no composite part, and (as, by the supposition, there do
not exist simple parts) no simple part would exist. Consequently, no
substance; consequently, nothing would exist. Either, then, it is
impossible to annihilate composition in thought; or, after such
annihilation, there must remain something that subsists without
composition, that is, something that is simple. But in the former case
the composite could not itself consist of substances, because with
substances composition is merely a contingent relation, apart from
which they must still exist as self—subsistent beings. Now, as this
case contradicts the supposition, the second must contain the truth—
that the substantial composite in the world consists of simple parts.
It follows, as an immediate inference, that the things in the
world are all, without exception, simple beings— that composition is
merely an external condition pertaining to them— and that, although we
never can separate and isolate the elementary substances from the
state of composition, reason must cogitate these as the primary
subjects of all composition,
and consequently, as prior thereto— and
as simple substances.
Antithesis.
No composite thing in the world consists of simple parts; and
there does not exist in the world any simple substance.
PROOF.
Let it be supposed that a composite thing (as substance) consists of
simple parts. Inasmuch
as all external relation, consequently all
composition of substances, is possible only in space; the space,
occupied by that which is composite, must consist of the same number
of parts as is contained in the composite. But space does not
consist of simple parts, but of spaces. Therefore, every part of the
composite must occupy a space. But the absolutely primary parts of
what is composite are simple. It follows that what is simple
occupies a space. Now, as everything real that occupies a space,
contains a manifold the parts of which are external to each other, and
is consequently composite— and a real composite, not of accidents (for
these cannot exist external to each other apart from substance), but
of substances— it follows that the simple must be a substantial
composite, which is self—contradictory.
The second proposition of the antithesis— that there exists in the
world nothing that is simple— is here equivalent to the following: The
existence of the absolutely simple cannot be demonstrated from any
experience or perception either external or internal; and the
absolutely simple is a mere idea, the objective reality of which
cannot be demonstrated
in any possible experience; it is consequently,
in the exposition of phenomena, without application and object. For,
let us take for granted that an object may be found in experience
for this transcendental idea; the empirical intuition of such an
object must then be recognized to contain absolutely no manifold
with its parts external to each other, and connected into unity.
Now, as we cannot reason from the non—consciousness of such a manifold
to the impossibility of its existence in the intuition of an object,
and as the proof of this impossibility is necessary for the
establishment and proof of absolute simplicity; it follows that this
simplicity cannot be inferred from any perception whatever. As,
therefore, an absolutely simple object cannot be given in any
experience, and the world of sense must be considered as the sum total
of all possible experiences: nothing simple exists in the world.
This second proposition in the antithesis has a more extended aim
than the first. The first merely banishes the simple from the
intuition of the composite; while the second drives it entirely out of
nature. Hence we were unable to demonstrate it from the
conception
of a given object of external intuition (of the composite), but we
were obliged to prove it from the relation of a given object to a
possible experience in general.
