ON THE ESSENCE OF GROUND
correctly classified the causes, both how many they are and of what kind they are. In addition, it is clear that in seeking the causes, either all must be sought thus, or they must be sought in one of these ways.]4 Here we shall have to omit the history of the problem of ground both prior to and after Aristotle. With respect to the way we plan to approach the problem, however, we may recall the following. Through Leibniz we are familiar with the problem of ground in the form of the question concerning the principium rationis sufficientis. The "principle of reason" ["Satz vom Grunde"]5 was treated for the first time in a monograph by Christian A. Crusius in his Philosophical Dissertation concerning the Use and Limits of the Principle of Determinative and Commonly Sufficient Reason (1743),6 and finally by Schopenhauer [23] in his dissertation Concerning the Fourfold Root of the Principle of Sufficient Reason (1813).7 Yet if the problem of ground is in general bound up with the central questions of metaphysics, then it must also be at issue even where it is not dealt with explicitly in its familiar form. Thus Kant apparently showed little interest in the "principle of reason," even though he explicitly discusses it both at the beginning8 and toward the end9 of his philosophizing. And yet it stands at the center of his Critique of Pure Reason.10 Of no lesser significance for the problem are Schelling's Philosophical Investigations concerning the Essence of Human Freedom and Related Matters (1809).11 The very reference to Kant [{GA 9: 126}] and Schelling makes it questionable as to whether the problem of ground is equivalent to that of the "principle of reason" and whether it is even raised at all in that principle. If not, then the problem of ground must first be awakened. This, however, does not exclude the possibility that a discussion of the "principle of reason" might give rise to such an awakening and provide an initial pointer. The exposition of the problem, however, is equivalent to attaining and designating the distinctive domain within which we may treat of the essence of ground without any claim to make visible that essence at a stroke. This domain is shown to be transcendence. This means at the same time that transcendence itself is first determined more originarily and more comprehensively via the problem of ground. Any illumination of essence that is a philosophizing one, i.e., an intrinsically finite endeavor, must also necessarily always testify to that nonessence that drives human knowledge in its entire essence. Accordingly, the structure of what follows is stipulated: I. The [24] Problem of Ground; II. Transcendence as the Domain of the Question concerning the Essence of Ground; III. On the Essence of Ground.
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