We reserve a fuller explanation of this for another chapter, merely making the following observation on it at present.
The principle of polarity is only valid when it can be conceived in one and the same thing, where the positive and its opposite the negative completely destroy each other.

In a battle both sides strive to conquer; that is true polarity, for the victory of the one side destroys that of the other.

But when we speak of two different things which have a common relation external to themselves, then it is not the things but their relations which have the polarity.
16.

ATTACK AND DEFENCE ARE THINGS DIFFERING IN KIND AND OF UNEQUAL FORCE.

POLARITY IS, THEREFORE, NOT APPLICABLE TO THEM.
If there was only one form of War, to wit, the attack of the enemy, therefore no defence; or, in other words, if the attack was distinguished from the defence merely by the positive motive, which the one has and the other has not, but the methods of each were precisely one and the same: then in this sort of fight every advantage gained on the one side would be a corresponding disadvantage on the other, and true polarity would exist.
But action in War is divided into two forms, attack and defence, which, as we shall hereafter explain more particularly, are very different and of unequal strength.