ng--lies undoubtedly in this impression of
unfathomable duality. It cannot be regarded as a reconciliation
between love and malice merely to recognize that love and malice
are not independent "forces," such as can be compared to chemical
"forces," but are states of the soul.

It is true that they both exist within the soul, just as the soul
exists within time and space; but since the soul is unfathomable these
two conditions of the soul are also unfathomable. The struggle
upon which the universe depends is a struggle which goes on
within the circle of personality; but since personality is
unthinkable without this struggle, it may truly be said that the
existence of personality "depends" upon the existence of this
struggle. When we speak of pain and pleasure as if they were
independent entities we are forgetting that it is merely as "states of
the soul" that pain and pleasure exist. When we speak of love and
malice as independent entities we are forgetting that it is merely as
"states of the soul" that love and malice exist. Love and malice,
the life-force and the death-force, these are merely abstractions
when separated from the soul which is their arena.

It is certainly not in harmony with the revelation of the complex
vision to seek to imagine some vague "beginning of things"; when
some inscrutable chemical or spiritual "energy," called "life,"
rushed into objective existence and proceeded to create living
personalities through which it might be able to function.

The revelation of the complex vision is a revelation of a world
made up of unfathomable personalities. Of this world, of these
unfathomable personalities, we are unable to postulate any
"beginning." They have always existed. They seem likely to
remain always in existence. Our knowledge stops at that point;
because our knowledge is the knowledge of personality. The
revelation of the complex vision is constantly warning us against
any tendency to evade the whole question of the original mystery
by the use of meaningless abstractions.

The word "energy" is such an abstraction. So also is the word
"movement." So also are those logical formulae of the pure reason,
such as the "a priori unity of apperception" and the "absolute
spirit." Apart from personality, apart from the complex vision of
the individual soul, there is no such thing as "energy" or
"movement" or "transcendental unity" or "absolute spirit." In
the same way we are compelled to recognize that