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What one ought to do reveals one's personal essence more centrally than what one can do; one has one's Oughts in a different way than one's possibilities. The core thesis is that the metaphor of a center of the "I" has philosophical merit. This center may not be confused with the transcendental I or the I-pole. "Existenz" is the innermost center of the "myself's" being-in-the-world or "personification." It comes forth especially in what Jaspers termed limit-situations, like death, suffering, guilt, the struggle to communicate, and chance. These situations determine the human person in a uniquely necessary way: they are ineluctable and they are what each must come to terms with to be awakened to this centermost sense of oneself. Existenz, in facing limit-situations comes forth facing its ownmost destiny and what is of unconditional importance. What is of unconditional importance is also connected to the Ought of one's personal ideal when it appears as uniquely necessary. The sense of necessity that awakens with Existenz and the Ought of one's personal ideal is enriched when we turn to the phenomenon of conscience. Conscience is the witness of one's fidelity or infidelity in the present agency to the personal essence one has constituted through her position-taking acts. It, as a kind of "gathering act," is one's witness to oneself at a distance. That to which witness is borne is one's center, one's Existenz, which is called upon to keep faith with one's constituted personal essence. Although no one may say "I am pure," to say that moral agency properly therefore is "unconscious" is an error. The theme of "Daimon" in Plato and Rosenzweig as well as Nussbaum's discussion of Proustian-Stoic "cataleptic impression." offer illuminating parallel meditations of the self's illumination as Existenz.

DOI: 10.1007/978-1-4020-9178-0_3

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