assumes
in vanquishing and overcoming the practical reason (or instinct, to
use the common word). It appears to him as an imperative command, an
_ought_. It so appears to him, I say; in other words, that is the
shape which it takes for the theoretical reason which renders
all things into objects and ideas. But in so far as the better
consciousness desires to vanquish and overcome the theoretical reason,
it takes no shape at all; on the simple ground that, as it comes
into play, the theoretical reason is suppressed and becomes the mere
servant of the better consciousness. That is why genius can never give
any account of its own works.

In the morality of action, the legal principle that both sides are to
be heard must not be allowed to apply; in other words, the claims of
self and the senses must not be urged. Nay, on the contrary, as soon
as the pure will has found expression, the case is closed; _nec
audienda altera pars_.

The lower animals are not endowed with moral freedom. Probably this is
not because they show no trace of the better consciousness which in us
is manifested as morality, or nothing analogous to it; for, if that
were so, the lower animals, which are in so many respects like
ourselves in outward appearance that we regard man as a species of
animal, would possess some _raison d'etre_ entirely different from our
own, and actually be, in their essential and inmost nature, something
quite other than ourselves. This is a contention which is obviously
refuted by the thoroughly malignant and inherently vicious character
of certain animals, such as the crocodile, the hyaena, the scorpion,
the snake, and the gentle, affectionate and contented character of
others, such as the dog. Here, as in the case of men, the character,
as it is manifested, must rest upon something that is above and beyond
time. For, as Jacob Boehme says,[1] _there is a power in every animal
which is indestructible, and the spirit of the world draws it into
itself, against the final separation at the Last Judgment_. Therefore
we cannot call the lower animals free, and the reason why we cannot
do so is that they are wanting in a faculty which is profoundly
subordinate to the better consciousness in its highest phase, I mean
reason. Reason is the faculty of supreme comprehension, the idea of
totality. How reason manifests itself in the theoretical sphere Kant
has shown, and it does the same in the practical: it makes us capable
of observing