GABRIEL MARCEL

Creative
Fidelity
Translated and introduced
by Robert Rosthal

CROSSROAD· NEW YORK

mean that there is between the existence of Caesar and my exis- thereby ascribe to the soul of which it is the instrument, as it were,
tence, i.e. my psycho-physical presence to myself, an objectively those potentialities which the body ordinarily realizes; thus the soul
determinable temporal continuity; this presence is the datum to is converted into a body and the same regress will now occur ill
which I relate the infinite variety of anything I can think of as connection with the soul.
existing; any existent can be related to this datum and cannot be It should be possible to show that this conclusion is valid for any
thought of apart from this relation except by abstraction." 1 objective relation which is alleged to hold between myself and my
Furthermore, the chain of spatial, temporal, and spatio-temporal body, what I call myself being construed in this context as the
relations can be compressed by the imagination to the point where ignotum quid to which my body as mine, is purportedly bound.
the existent that is thought becomes co-present with me. The mag- Reflection discloses that any kind of communication between my-
netic field in which these various chains are distributed with self and my body is inconceivable.
respect to my present existence, is what I shall call the existential To silence or eliminate questions such as these, which are in-
orbit. herently insoluble, couldn't one execute a logical coup de force by
Thus however odd or contradictory the characteristics of this priv- asserting that the alleged dualism between myself and my body
ileged existent turn out to be, they will necessarily be found in any does not exist and that I really am my body?
other existence we can conceive of. It must be observed, however, Here, however, we must exercise caution. Does I and my body
--and this will become clearer in what follows-that existence, mean: I am identical with my body? Can this identity be main-
strictly speaking, is not conceivable; what is incorrectly called con- tained in the light of reflection? Clearly not. The alleged identity is
ception in this context is really an imaginative and sympathetic ex- absurd; it is possible to affirm it only if the I is first implicitly denied,
tension of a datum, partly opaque to itself, which is the basis of all thereby becoming the materialist assertion: my body is myself,
only my body exists. But this assertion is absurd. For it is a

r
experience.
My body. What exactly is the meaning and value of the posses- property of my body that it does not and 'cannot exist alone. Can
sive index? We will find insoluble difficulties no matter what way we, then, find haven in the concept of a world of bodies? What,
we try to explain it. Should I maintain, for example, as I have been however, confers unity on such a world? Furthermore, in a purely
tempted to do many times before, that my body is my instrument? objective world, what becomes of the principle of intimacy (my
If so, we must start by examining the instrumental relation. It body) around which the existential orbit is created?
seems plain that any instrument is a means of extending, develop- In asserting "I am my body" one is actually making a negative
ing, or strengthening an original power possessed by the person judgment: "It is neither true nor meaningful to assert that I aIIl
who uses it; this holds for a knife as much as for a lens. These other than my body"; more precisely, "It is meaningless to assert
powers or aptitudes are active properties of an organic body. If I that I am a certain thing bound in some manner to a certain other
consider my body from the outside, I can evidently think of it as a thing which is or would be my body." We cannot assert any truths
mechanism or as an instrument. But we are now examining the about the relation R between an unknown X and my body, which
nature of my body insofar as it is mine. This body (Hoc corpus not means that the relation cannot be thought.
illud) , this instrumentalist, can I construe it as itself an instrument We should understand clearly what these remarks entail. They
-and if so, of what? It is clear that there is the danger of an infinite do not imply agnosticism; we cannot find refuge in the convenient
regress; if the instrumentalist is itself an instrument, of what is it idea that the relation is not knowable for me but that it would be
the instrument, etc.? If I think of my body as an instrument, I for a mind more richly endowed than mine; for it is the very idea
20 eRE A T I V E F IDE LIT Y 21 Incarnate being
of such a relation that is incapable of formulation. Hence we are affirm the independence of the world from me, its radical in-
led to a definition of incarnate being, interpreting the word "being," difference to my destiny, to my goals; the more, too, this world,
here in its verb rather than substantive form. proclaimed as the only real one, is converted into an illusory
T~ be incarnated is to appear to oneself as body, as this partic- spectacle, a great documentary film presented for my curiosity,
ular body, without being identified with it nor dist~nguished f~om but ultimately abolished simply because it disregards me. I mean
it-identification and distinction being correlative operations that the universe tends to be annihilated in the measure that it
which are significant only in the realm of objects. overwhelms me-a fact forgotten whenever the attempt is made to
What clearly emerges from the foregoing reflections is the f~ct crush man under the weight of any data of astronomical propor-
that there is no distinct haven to which I can repair either outsIde tions.
of or within my body. Disincarnation is not practically possible What this amounts to is that the act of trying to break the nexus
uniting me to the universe, because of a fear of anthropocentrism,
and is precluded by my very structure. .
However, there is a counterpart to the above whIch should be nexus of my presence to the world, my body being this nexus
manifested, is a purely abstract act. I grant that this remark will
emphasized. .
If I abstract from the index characterizing my body-msofar cause some serious misunderstanding. I am not postulating any
as .it is mine-if I construe it as one body among an unlimited kind of dependence of the universe on me; this would be a relapse
number of other such bodies, I will be forced to treat it as an object, to an extreme subjectivism. What I am asserting, first of all, is the
as exhibiting the fundamental properties of objectivity. It th~n primacy of the existential over the ideal, with the added proviso J.
becomes an object of scientific knowledge; it becomes problem~tlc, that the existential must inevitably be related to incarnate being, V
so to speak, but only on condition that I consider ~t as not-rom:; i.e. to the fact of being in the wor~is expression whIch was not
and this detachment which is essentially illusory, IS the very baSIS part of the philosophical vocabulary, at least not before Heidegger,
of all cognition. As knowing subject, I re-establish or claim to re- adequately renders something which, it is now understood, must
establish that dualism between my body and me, that interval be construed as a participation not as a relation or communication.
which we have learned, is inconceivable from an existential point The term "participation", which I constantly used between the
of vie~. A subject of this kind can be established only .i~ existenc.e years 1910-1914 with a meaning altogether different from the
is first renounced; it is, it can be said, only on condItion that It meaning conferred on it by Plato, reappears in the philosophy of
considers itself not to be. This paradox is fundamental for the Mr. Lavelle, and in some respects is similar to my own use of the
object, for I can really think about the object only if I.acknowledge term. The difficult task I gave myself then, was to determine the
that I do not count for it, that it does not take me mto account. possibility of thinking that participation without denaturing it, i.e.
This is the only valid response-and it is de~i~iv~tha~ can be without converting it into an objective relation. Doubtless there is
made to the annoying question asked by empmcal Idealism; can little worth saving in these exploratory writings which have never
objects continue to exist when I no longe~ .perceive them? the been published and probably never will. But it should be said
truth is that they are objects only on that condItion. that my main views have not changed even if the terminology has.
However, by an anomaly which disappears when it is r~flected If the foregoing comments are consolidated and an attempt
on, the more I emphasize the objectivity of things, thus cuttmg the made to clarify what may be called with Jaspers, my fundamental
umbilical cord which binds them to existence and to what has situation, the results are the following:
been termed my psycho-organic presence to myself, the more I First, it must be observed that this situation, because it is