posing it given to me then, I having it already? If, then, I suppose this power given to "me" before it is exerted, I suppose it given to that which does not as yet exist to receive it; and if I suppose it given to me after it is exerted, after I have become "I," I make myself the receiver of a very superfluous and unnecessary gift.
But suppose it should be said that this power, though not, properly speaking, given to "me," is yet given to that particular Being which afterwards, in consequence of exercising it, becomes "I," then we answer, that in this case it is altogether a mistake to suppose that this particular Being exercises the power. The power is, truly speaking, exercised by the Being which infused it, and which itself here becomes "I;" while the particular Being supposed to become "I" in consequence of the endowment, remains precisely what it was, and does not, by any conceivability, become "I." One Being may, indeed, divide and sunder another Being from other objects; but this does not make the latter Being "I." In order to become "I" it must sunder itself from other things by its own act. Finally, this act of negation, or, in other words, consciousness, is either derived or underived. If it is derived, then it is the consciousness of the Being from whom it is derived, and not mine. But I am supposing it, and it is admitted to be, mine, and not another Being's, therefore it must be underived; that is to say, self-originated and free.
