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MARTIN MOORS reason. Consequently, such a science (i.e., metaphysics) will demonstrate but does not prove (erweisen). To “prove” anything, according to its positivity, takes place only on the condition which states that being is prius to essence. With its critical overtone, Kant’s transcendental logic can certainly serve as an introduction or—as he calls it—a preparation (CrpR B 26), or propaedeutics (CrpR B 25). But it can merely be an introduction with a negative utility, namely as “purification of our reason” (CrpR B 25) or for the sake of “supplying the touchstone of the worth or worthlessness of all cognitions a priori” (CrpR B 26). Transcendental logic in its critical, i.e., preparatory, signification may promise “a future metaphysics” and ultimately prepare for a “practico-dogmatic metaphysics of freedom,”** but it remains entangled within the negativity of mere thought. Hence, it can be considered as one of the showpieces of negative philosophy. Schelling’s Introduction also “prepares” and “purifies” and “supplies a touchstone of the worth or worthlessness of all cognitions a priori” but it does so toto caelo differently from Kant’s. In our interpretation, Schelling’s Introduction that precedes his philosophy of Revelation by providing a grounding of positive philosophy is truly an initiation. Indeed, Schelling’s a priori brings forward a prius of which, per posterius, one can comprehend scientifically “the real God, the actual chain of events, and a free relationship of God to the world.”** Preparing the philosopher’s mind to such a comprehension of the real, fulfils the task (Aufgabe)* of an initiation. A philosophy of revelation which must come forward as a real science about the real becomes prepared for this task by an introduction which initiates. Differentiating negative from positive philosophy, and faced with the task of identifying a grounding for the latter, Schelling’s Introduction also purifies (but without rejecting) the universal possibility (being as the immediate content of reason) of its antecedent logical preformation.* It even supplies the touchstone of the worth or worthlessness of bringing the said task to completion. For Schelling, there is no other touchstone for philosophy (which must be a real science) for assessing worth or worthlessness than what he calls “the maxime cognoscendum, that which is most worthy of knowing [...] that which is known in the purest knowing [...] that which is the most, indeed, that which is alone worthy of existence.”*”’ ®® See his so-called Fortschritte essay: What Real Progress has Metaphysics Made in Germany since the Time of Leibniz and Wolff? (1793/1804) in The Cambridge Edition ofthe Works of Immanuel Kant, general editors: Paul Guyer and Allen W. Wood, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press. The English translation of the Fortschritte essay is included in the volume Theoretical Philosophy after 1781, edited by Henry Allison and Peter Heath, translated by Gary Hatfield, Michael Friedman, Henry Allison, Peter Heath, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2002, 349-424. In Ak. 20, 259-351, see especially 293-296. 54 Grounding, Lecture VII (SW II/3, 132). 35 Grounding, Lecture V (SW I1/3, 93). 36 See Grounding, Lecture VIII (SW II/3, 148). 57 Grounding, Lecture VIII (SW 11/3, 149). + 230 ¢ Daréczi-Sepsi-Vassänyi_Initiation_155x240.indb 230 6 2020.06.15. 11:04:22
