faultiness in our apprehension
of it--the doctrine, in short, of what is termed "the subjectivity of
knowledge." That is a consideration, indeed, [138] which lies as an
element of weakness, like some admitted fault or flaw, at the very
foundation of every philosophical account of the universe; which
confronts all philosophies at their starting, but with which none have
really dealt conclusively, some perhaps not quite sincerely; which
those who are not philosophers dissipate by "common," but
unphilosophical, sense, or by religious faith. The peculiar strength
of Marius was, to have apprehended this weakness on the threshold of
human knowledge, in the whole range of its consequences. Our knowledge
is limited to what we feel, he reflected: we need no proof that we
feel. But can we be sure that things are at all like our feelings?
Mere peculiarities in the instruments of our cognition, like the little
knots and waves on the surface of a mirror, may distort the matter they
seem but to represent. Of other people we cannot truly know even the
feelings, nor how far they would indicate the same modifications, each
one of a personality really unique, in using the same terms as
ourselves; that "common experience," which is sometimes proposed as a
satisfactory basis of certainty, being after all only a fixity of
language. But our own impressions!--The light and heat of that blue
veil over our heads, the heavens spread out, perhaps not like a curtain
over anything!--How reassuring, after so long a debate about the rival
criteria of truth, to fall back upon direct sensation, to limit one's
[139] aspirations after knowledge to that! In an age still materially
so brilliant, so expert in the artistic handling of material things,
with sensible capacities still in undiminished vigour, with the whole
world of classic art and poetry outspread before it, and where there
was more than eye or ear could well take in--how natural the
determination to rely exclusively upon the phenomena of the senses,
which certainly never deceive us about themselves, about which alone we
can never deceive ourselves!

And so the abstract apprehension that the little point of this present
moment alone really is, between a past which has just ceased to be and
a future which may never come, became practical with Marius, under the
form of a resolve, as far as possible, to exclude regret and desire,
and yield himself to the improvement of the present with an