When I put it in motion by a resolution, I
move and change something in that world, and my activity flows on over
the whole and produces something new and ever-during which then exists
and needs not to be made anew. This will breaks forth into a material
act, and this act belongs to the world of the senses, and effects, in
that, what it can.
I have not to wait until after I am divorced from the connection
of the earthly world to gain admission into that which is above
the earth. I am and live in it already, far more truly than in the
earthly. Even now it is my only firm standing-ground, and the eternal
life, which I have long since taken possession of, is the only
reason why I am willing still to prolong the earthly. That which
they denominate Heaven lies not beyond the grave. It is already here,
diffused around our Nature, and its light arises in every pure heart.
My will is mine, and it is the only thing that is entirely mine and
depends entirely upon myself. By it I am already a citizen of the
kingdom of liberty and of self-active Reason. My conscience, the tie
by which that world holds me unceasingly and binds me to itself, tells
me at every moment what determination of my will (the only thing
by which, here in the dust, I can lay hold of that kingdom) is most
consonant with its order; and it depends entirely upon myself to give
myself the destination enjoined upon me.
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