 Every concept, in so far as it is merely thinkable, has something that pleases the soul, that occupies its activity, and is thus cognized by it with satisfaction and approval….where the soul finds more satisfaction in one concept than in another, more agreeable occupation, then can it prefer the former to the latter. In this comparison and in the preference that we give to an object consists the essence of the beautiful and the ugly, the good and the evil, the perfect and the imperfect. What we cognize as the best in this comparison works on our faculty of desire and stimulates it, where it finds no resistance, to activity. This is the side on which the faculty of approval touches demand or desire. (Morgenstunden, Lesson VII, pp. 72–3)