More on the Difference between Actor and Patient

We conceive of a difference between what happens to a person and what a person does, the two directions or moments of action, which in relation defines the person’s personal direction, as it were. Yet, despite our conceptual division of the activity, between actor and person, there remains an actual unity of action or locus of effect within the person, who is at once actor and a patient. That is to say that the human being is a dynamic subject or active person in which the two modes or moments of activity, action and reaction, occur and are experienced. Although the person may be subject to an external action, there would arise no perception of the difference between external or internal without its internal effect. Therefore we give primacy to the activity within the person regardless of its apparent source, for its ultimate source, as far as we are concerned, is within. In any case, the subject is given priority over objective circumstances for the sake of personal dignity. A certain degree of superiority or arrogance must be assumed by the person in order to exercise some control over her circumstances and hence survive. Given the fact that she is not strictly governed by instinct, hence is not for the most part an animated machine, she must stand up and place her head in the heavens in order to successfully proceed with her projects. Otherwise it is a matter of indifference whether the objective sphere, which the idealists think is illusory, is derived from the subjective ideality, which they believe is reality; or vice versa. In reality they are one, and it is our dichotomy that is illusory but necessary to achieve our end as human beings or persons.