VII. Modern Man and His World Conception

Du Prel wants to grant this right of investigating the supersensible only to a thinker who seeks the nature of the human soul outside the realm of the senses. What he considers as the chief demand in this direction is the necessity to demonstrate manifestations of the soul that prove the soul is also active when it is not bound to the body. Through the body the soul develops its sensual consciousness. In the phenomena of hypnotism, hypnotic suggestion and somnambulism, it becomes apparent that the soul is active when the sensual consciousness is eliminated. The soul life, therefore, extends further than the realm of consciousness. It is here that du Prel arrives at the diametrically opposite position to those of the characterized philosophers of the all-embracing consciousness who believe that the limits of consciousness define at the same time the entire realm of philosophy. For du Prel, the nature of the soul is to be sought outside the circle of this consciousness. If, according to him, we observe the soul when it is active without the usual means of the senses, we have the proof that it is of a supersensible nature.