For all unity must be spiritual in nature and
origin; and what is the aim of all investigation of Nature but to find
science therein? For that wherein there is no Understanding cannot
be the object of Understanding; the Unknowing cannot be known. The
science by which Nature works is not, however, like human science,
connected with reflection upon itself; in it, the conception is not
separate from the act, nor the design from the execution. Therefore,
rude matter strives, as it were, blindly, after regular shape,
and unknowingly assumes pure stereometric forms, which belong,
nevertheless, to the realm of ideas, and are something spiritual in
the material.
The sublimest arithmetic and geometry are innate in the stars, and
unconsciously displayed by them in their motions. More distinctly, but
still beyond their grasp, the living cognition appears in animals;
and thus we see them, though wandering about without reflection, bring
about innumerable results far more excellent than themselves: the bird
that, intoxicated with music, transcends itself in soul-like tones;
the little artistic creature, that, without practise or instruction,
accomplishes light works of architecture; but all directed by an
overpowering spirit, that lightens in them already with single flashes
of knowledge, but as yet appears nowhere as the full sun, as in Man.
This formative science in Nature and Art is the link that connects
idea and form, body and soul.
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