as it were, the character of external objects.  But we know not “as it were.”  Away with such shuffling phraseology.  There is nothing either of reference, or of inference, or of quasi-truthfulness in our apprehension of the material universe.  It is ours with a certainty which laughs to scorn all the deductions of logic, and all the props of hypothesis.  What we wish to know is, how our subjective affections can be, not as it were, but in God’s truth, and in the strict, literal, earnest, and unambiguous sense of the words, real independent, objective existences.  This is what the cosmothetical idealist never can explain, and never attempts to explain.

4.  We now come to the answer which the reader, who has followed us thus far, will be prepared to find us putting forward as by far the most important of any, and as containing in fact the very kernel of the solution.  A fourth man will say—­“If the whole sphere of sense could only be withdrawn inwards—­could be made to fall somewhere within itself—­then the whole difficulty would disappear, and the problem would be solved at once.  The sensations which existed previous to this retraction or withdrawal, would then, of necessity, fall without the sphere of sense, ( see our second diagram;) and in doing so, they would necessarily assume a totally different aspect from that of sensations.  They would be real independent objects:  and (what is the important part of the demonstration) they would acquire this status without overstepping by a hair’s-breadth the primary limits of the sphere.  Were such phraseology allowable, we should say that the sphere has understepped itself, and in doing so, has left its former contents high and dry, and stamped with all the marks which can characterize objective existences.”

Now the reader will please to remark, that we are very far from desiring him to accept this last solution at our bidding.  Our method, we trust, is any thing but dogmatical.  We merely say, that if this can be shown to be the case, then the demonstration which we are in the course of unfolding, will hardly fail to recommend itself to his acceptance.  Whether or not it is the case, can only be established by an appeal to our experience.

We ask, then—­does experience inform us, or does she not, that the sphere of sense falls within, and very considerably within, itself?  But here it will be asked—­what meaning do we attach to the expression, that sense falls within its own sphere?  These words, then, we must first of all explain.  Every thing which is apprehended as a sensation—­such as colour, figure, hardness, and so forth—­falls within the sentient sphere.  To be a sensation, and to fall within the sphere of sense, are identical and convertible terms.  When, therefore, it is asked—­does the sphere of sense ever fall within itself? this is equivalent to asking—­do the senses themselves ever become sensations?  Is that which apprehends sensations