FOOTNOTES:

The essential law of nature is relatively easy to formulate, as it is comprised in the very definition of law. It simply consists in the sentence: uniformity under similar conditions. We might also say: a constant relation between two or several phenomena, which can also be expressed in a more abstract way by declaring that the law of nature rests on the combination of two notions, identity and constancy.

On the other hand, the laws of our psychical activity partly correspond to the same tendencies, and it would be easy to demonstrate that the microcosm of our thoughts is governed by laws which are also an expression of these two combined notions of constancy and identity. It is, above all, in the working of the intellectual machine, the best known and the most clearly analysed up till now, that we see the application of this mental law which resembles, as we say, on certain sides, the physical law: and the best we can do for our demonstration will doubtless be to dissect our reasoning powers. Reason, a process essential to thought in action, is developedin accordance with a law which resembles in the most curious manner a physical law. It resembles it enough to imitate it, to conform to it, and, so to speak, to mould itself on it.

Now, the reason does not follow the caprices of thought, it is subject to rules; it results from the properties of the images, those properties which we have above referred to, the material character of which we have recognised, and which are two in number—similarity and contiguity, as they are termed in the jargon of the schools. They are properties which have for their aim to bring things together, to unite, and to synthetise. They are unceasingly at work, and so apparent in their labour that they have long been known. We know, since the time of Aristotle, that two facts perceived at the same time reproduce themselves together in the memory—this is the law of contiguity; and that two facts perceived separately, but which are similar, are brought together in our mind—this is the law of similarity.

Now, similarity and contiguity form by combination the essential part of all kinds of reasoning, and this reasoning, thus understood, works in a fashion which much resembles (we shall see exactly in what degree) a physical law. I wish to show this in a few words. What renders my demonstration difficult and perhaps obscure is, that we shallbe obliged to bring together rather unexpectedly categories of phenomena which are generally considered separate.

The distinctive attribute of the reason consists, as I have said, in the setting to work of these two elementary properties, similarity and contiguity. It consists, in fact, in extending continuity by similarity; in endowing with identical properties and similar accompaniments things which resemble each other; in other words, it consists in impliedly asserting that the moment two things are identical in one point they are so for all the rest. This will be fairly well understood by imagining what takes place when mental images having the above-mentioned properties meet. Suppose that B is associated with C, and that A resembles B. In consequence of their resemblance the passing from A to B is easy; and then B suggesting C by contiguity, it happens that this C is connected with A connected, though, in reality, they have never been tried together. I say they are associated on the basis of their relation to B, which is the rallying point. It is thus that, on seeing a piece of red-hot iron (A), I conclude it is hot (C), because I recollect distinctly or unconsciously another piece of red-hot iron (B), of which I once experienced the heat. It is this recollection B which logicians, in their analysis of logical, verbal, and formal argument, call themiddle term. Our representation of the process of reasoning is not special to argument. It also expresses the process of invention, and every kind of progress from the known to the unknown. It is an activity which creates relations, which assembles and binds together, and the connections made between different representations are due to their partial identities, which act as solder to two pieces of metal.

It will now be understood that these relations between the images curiously resemble the external order of things, the order of our sensations, the order of nature, the physical law. This is because this physical law also has the same character and expresses itself similarly. We might say "all things which resemble each other have the same properties," or "all things alike on one point resemble each other on all other points." But immediately we do so, the difference between the physical and the mental law becomes apparent. The formula we have given is only true on condition that many restrictions and distinctions are made.

The process of nature is so to do that thesamephenomenon always unfolds itself in the same order. But this process is not always comprehended in real life, for it is hidden from our eyes by the manifold combinations of chance; in the reality that we perceive there is a crowd of phenomenawhich resemble each other but are not really the same. There are a number of phenomena which co-exist or follow each other without this order of co-existence or succession being necessary or constant. In other words, there are resemblances which are the marks of something, as a logician would say, and others which are not the marks of anything; there are relations of time and space which are the expression of a law; there are some which are accidental, and may possibly never be reproduced.

It would be a wonderful advantage if every scientific specialist would make out a list of the non-significant properties that he recognises in matter. The chemist, for example, would show us that specific weight has hardly any value in diagnosis, that the crystalline form of a salt is often not its own, that its colour especially is almost negligible because an immense number of crystals are white or colourless, that precipitation by a given substance does not ordinarily suffice to characterise a body, and so on. The botanist, on his part, would show us that, in determining plants, absolute dimension is less important than proportion, colour less important than form, certain structures of organs less important than others. The pathologist would teach us that most pathological symptoms have but a trivial value; the cries, the enervation, the agitationof a patient, even the delirium which so affects the bystanders, are less characteristic of fever than the rate of his pulse, and the latter less than the temperature of the armpit or the dryness of the tongue, &c. At every moment the study of science reveals resemblances of facts and contiguities of facts which must be neglected for the sake of others. And if we pass from this profound knowledge of the objects to the empirical knowledge, to the external perception of bodies, it is in immense number that one espies around one traps laid by nature. The sound we hear resembles several others, all produced by different causes; many of our visual sensations likewise lend themselves to the most varied interpretations; by the side of the efficient cause of an event we find a thousand entangled contingencies which appear so important that to disentangle them we are as much perplexed as the savage, who, unable to discriminate between causes and coincidences, returns to drink at the well which has cured him, carefully keeping to the same hour, the same gestures, and the same finery.

The reason of this is that the faculty of similarity and the faculty of contiguity do not give the distinction, necessary as it is, between resemblances and co-existences which are significant and those which are not. The causal nexus between two phenomena is not perceived assomething apart andsui generis; it is not even perceived at all. We perceive only their relation in time and space, and it is our mind which raises a succession to the height of a causal connection, by intercalating between cause and effect something of what we ourselves feel when we voluntarily order the execution of a movement. This is not the place to inquire what are the experimental conditions in which we subject phenomena to this anthropomorphic transformation; it will suffice for us to repeat here that, in perception, a chance relation between phenomena impresses us in the same way as when it is the expression of a law.

Our intellectual machine sometimes works in accord with the external law and at others makes mistakes and goes the wrong way. Then we are obliged to correct it, and to try a better adjustment, either by profounder experimenting with nature (methods of concordance, discordance, variations, &c.), or by a comparison of different judgments and arguments made into a synthesis; and this collaboration of several concordant activities ends in a conclusion which can never represent the truth, but only the probable truth. The study of the laws of the mind shows us too clearly, in fact, their fluidity with regard to the laws of nature for us not to accept probabilism. There exists no certitude—only veryvaried degrees of probability. Daily practice contents itself with a very low degree of probability; judicial logic demands a rather higher one, especially when it is a question of depriving one of our fellow-creatures of liberty or life. Science claims one higher still. But there is never anything but differences of degrees in probability and conjecture.

This, then, is the definition of psychology that we propose. It studies a certain number of laws which we term mental, in opposition to those of external nature, from which they differ, but which, properly speaking, do not deserve the qualification of mental, since they are—or at least the best known of them are—laws of the images, and the images are material elements. Although it may seem absolutely paradoxical, psychology is a science of matter—the science of a part of matter which has the property of preadaptation.

FOOTNOTES:[33]Lange,Histoire du Matérialisme, II., 2me. partie, chap. iii.[34]Let us remark, in passing, how badly nature has organised the system of communication between thinking beings. In what we experience we have nothing in common with our fellows; each one experiences his own sensations and not those of others. The only meeting point of different minds is found in the inaccessible domain of thenoumena.[35]E. Rabier,Leçons de Philosophie, "Psychologie," p. 33.[36]This seems to have been the opinion of Democritus. The modern doctrine of radiation from the human body, if established, would go nearly as far as the supposition in the text. Up till now, however, it lacks confirmation.—Ed.[37]I am compelled, much against my will, to use throughout this passage an equivocal expression, that of "mental law," or law of consciousness, or psychological law. I indicate by this the laws of contiguity and of similarity; as they result from the properties of the images, and as these are of a material nature, they are really physical and material laws like those of external nature. But how can all these laws be called physical laws without running the risk of confusing them one with the other?[38]Finalityseems to be here used in the sense of the doctrine which regards perfection as the final cause of existence.—Ed.[39]See a very interesting article byE. Goblot, "La Finalité sans Intelligence,"Revue de Métaphysique, July 1900.

[33]Lange,Histoire du Matérialisme, II., 2me. partie, chap. iii.

[33]Lange,Histoire du Matérialisme, II., 2me. partie, chap. iii.

[34]Let us remark, in passing, how badly nature has organised the system of communication between thinking beings. In what we experience we have nothing in common with our fellows; each one experiences his own sensations and not those of others. The only meeting point of different minds is found in the inaccessible domain of thenoumena.

[34]Let us remark, in passing, how badly nature has organised the system of communication between thinking beings. In what we experience we have nothing in common with our fellows; each one experiences his own sensations and not those of others. The only meeting point of different minds is found in the inaccessible domain of thenoumena.

[35]E. Rabier,Leçons de Philosophie, "Psychologie," p. 33.

[35]E. Rabier,Leçons de Philosophie, "Psychologie," p. 33.

[36]This seems to have been the opinion of Democritus. The modern doctrine of radiation from the human body, if established, would go nearly as far as the supposition in the text. Up till now, however, it lacks confirmation.—Ed.

[36]This seems to have been the opinion of Democritus. The modern doctrine of radiation from the human body, if established, would go nearly as far as the supposition in the text. Up till now, however, it lacks confirmation.—Ed.

[37]I am compelled, much against my will, to use throughout this passage an equivocal expression, that of "mental law," or law of consciousness, or psychological law. I indicate by this the laws of contiguity and of similarity; as they result from the properties of the images, and as these are of a material nature, they are really physical and material laws like those of external nature. But how can all these laws be called physical laws without running the risk of confusing them one with the other?

[37]I am compelled, much against my will, to use throughout this passage an equivocal expression, that of "mental law," or law of consciousness, or psychological law. I indicate by this the laws of contiguity and of similarity; as they result from the properties of the images, and as these are of a material nature, they are really physical and material laws like those of external nature. But how can all these laws be called physical laws without running the risk of confusing them one with the other?

[38]Finalityseems to be here used in the sense of the doctrine which regards perfection as the final cause of existence.—Ed.

[38]Finalityseems to be here used in the sense of the doctrine which regards perfection as the final cause of existence.—Ed.

[39]See a very interesting article byE. Goblot, "La Finalité sans Intelligence,"Revue de Métaphysique, July 1900.

[39]See a very interesting article byE. Goblot, "La Finalité sans Intelligence,"Revue de Métaphysique, July 1900.

The problem of the union of the mind and the body is not one of those which present themselves in pure speculation; it has its roots in experimental facts, and is forced upon us by the necessity of explaining observations such as those we are about to quote.

The force of our consciousness, the correctness of our judgments, our tempers and our characters, the state of health of our minds, and also their troubles, their weaknesses, and even their existence, are all in a state of strict dependence on the condition of our bodies, more precisely with that of our nervous systems, or, more precisely still, with the state of those three pounds of proteid substance which each of us has at the back of his forehead, and which are called our brains. This is daily demonstrated by thousands upon thousands of observations.

The question is to know how this union of the body with the consciousness is to be explained, it being assumed that the two terms of this union present a great difference in their nature. Theeasier it seems to demonstrate that this union exists, the more difficult it appears to explain how it is realised; and the proof of this difficulty is the number of divergent interpretations given to it. Were it a simple question of fact, the perpetual discussions and controversies upon it would not arise.

Many problems here present themselves. The first is that of the genesis or origin of the consciousness. It has to be explained how a psychical phenomenon can appear in the midst of material ones. In general, one begins by supposing that the material phenomena are produced first; they consist, for instance, in the working of the nervous centres. All this is physical or chemical, and therefore material. Then at a given moment, after this mechanical process, a quite different phenomenon emerges. This is thought, consciousness, emotion. Then comes the question whether this production of thought in the midst of physical phenomena is capable of explanation, and how thought is connected with its physical antecedents. What is the nature of the link between them? Is it a relation of cause to effect, of genesis? or a coincidence? or the interaction of two distinct forces? Is this relation constant or necessary? Can the mind enjoy an existence independent of the brain? Can it survive the death of the brain?

The second question is that of knowing what is the rôle, the utility, and the efficacity of the psychical phenomenon. Once formed, this phenomenon evolves in a certain direction and assumes to us who have consciousness of it a very great importance. What is its action on the material phenomena of the brain which surround it? Does it develop according to laws of its own, which have no relation to the laws of brain action? Does it exercise any action on these intra-cerebral functions? Does it exercise any action on the centrifugal currents which go to the motor nerves? Is it capable of exciting a movement? or is it deprived of all power of creating effect?

We will briefly examine the principal solutions which the imagination of mankind has found for these very difficult problems. Some of the best known of these solutions bear the names of spiritualism, materialism, parallelism, and monism. We will speak of these and of some others also.

Before beginning our critical statement, let us recall some of the results of our previous analyses which here intrude themselves, to use the ambitious language of Kant, as the prolegomena to every future solution which claims the title of science. In fact, we are now no longer at the outset of our investigation. We have had to acknowledge the exactness of certain facts, and we are bound to admit their consequences.Notably, the definition of psychical phenomena at which we arrived, not without some trouble, will henceforth play a rather large part in our discussion. It will force us to question a great metaphysical principle which, up till now, has been almost universally considered as governing the problem of the union of the mind with the body.

This principle bears the name of theaxiom of heterogeneity, or the principle ofpsycho-physical dualism. No philosopher has more clearly formulated it, and more logically deduced its consequences, than Flournoy. This author has written a little pamphlet calledMétaphysique et Psychologie, wherein he briefly sets forth all the known systems of metaphysics by reducing them to the so-called principle of heterogeneity; after this, the same principle enables him to "execute" them. He formulates it in the following terms: "body and mind, consciousness and the molecular cerebral movement of the brain, the psychical fact and the physical fact, although simultaneous, are heterogeneous, unconnected, irreducible, and obstinately two."[41]The same author adds: "this is evident of itself, and axiomatic. Every physical, chemical, or physiological event, in the last resort, simply consists, according to science, in a more or less rapid displacement of a certainnumber of material elements, in a change of their mutual distances or of their modes of grouping. Now, what can there be in common, I ask you, what analogy can you see, between this drawing together or moving apart of material masses in space, and the fact of having a feeling of joy, the recollection of an absent friend, the perception of a gas jet, a desire, or of an act of volition of any kind?" And further on: "All that we can say to connect two events so absolutely dissimilar is, that they take placeat the same time.... This does not mean that we wish to reduce them to unity, or to join them together by the link of causality ... it is impossible to conceive any real connection, any internal relation between these two unconnected things."

Let us not hesitate to denounce as false this proposition which is presented to us as an axiom. On looking closely into it, we shall perceive that the principle of heterogeneity does not contain the consequences it is sought to ascribe to it. It seems to me it should be split up into two propositions of very unequal value: 1, the mind and body are heterogeneous; 2, by virtue of this heterogeneity it is not possible to understand any direct relation between the two.

Now, if the first proposition is absolutely correct, in the sense that consciousness and matter are heterogeneous, the second proposition seems to usdirectly contrary to the facts, which show us that the phenomena of consciousness are incomplete phenomena. The consciousness is not sufficient for itself; as we have said, it cannot exist by itself. This again, if you like, is an axiom, or rather it is a fact shown by observation and confirmed by reflection. Mind and matter brought down to the essential, to the consciousness and its object, form a natural whole, and the difficulty does not consist in uniting but in separating them. Consider the following fact: "I experience a sensation, and I have consciousness of it." This is the coupling of two things—a sensation and a cognition.

The two elements, if we insist upon it, are heterogeneous, and they differ qualitatively; but notwithstanding the existing prejudice by reason of which no direct relation, no commerce, can be admitted between heterogeneous facts, the alliance of the consciousness and the sensation is the natural and primitive fact. They can only be separated by analysis, and a scrupulous mind might even ask whether one has the right to separate them. I have a sensation, and I have consciousness of it. If not two facts, they are one and the same. Now, sensation is matter and my consciousness is mind. If I am judging an assortment of stuffs, this assortment, or the sensation I have of them, is a particle of matter, a material state, and my judgment on this sensation is the psychicalphenomenon. We can neither believe, nor desire, nor do any act of our intelligence without realising this welding together of mind and matter. They are as inseparable as motion and the object that moves; and this comparison, though far-fetched, is really very convenient. Motion cannot exist without a mobile object; and an object, on the other hand, can exist without movement. In the same way, sensation may exist without the consciousness; but the converse proposition, consciousness without sensation, without an object, an empty consciousness or a "pure thought," cannot be understood.

Let us mark clearly how this union is put forward by us. We describe it after nature. It is observation which reveals to us the union and the fusion of the two terms into one. Or, rather, we do not even perceive their union until the moment when, by a process of analysis, we succeed in convincing ourselves that that which we at first considered single is really double, or, if you like, can be made into two by the reason, without being so in reality. Thus it happens that we bring this big problem in metaphysics on to the field of observation.

Our solution vaguely resembles that which has sometimes been presented under the ancient name ofphysical influx, or under the more modern name ofinter-actionism. There are many authorswho maintain that the soul can act directly on the body and modify it, and this is what is called inter-actionism. Thereby is understood, if I mistake not, an action from cause to effect, produced between two terms which enjoy a certain independence with regard to each other. This interpretation is indubitably close to ours, though not to be confused with it. My personal interpretation sets aside the idea of all independence of the mind, since it attributes to the mind an incomplete and, as it were, a virtual existence.

If we had to seek paternity for ideas I would much rather turn to Aristotle. It was not without some surprise that I was able to convince myself that the above theory of the relations between the soul and the body is to be found almost in its entirety in the great philosopher. It is true that it is mixed up with many accessory ideas which are out of date and which we now reject; but the essential of the theory is there very clearly formulated, and that is the important point. A few details on this subject will not be out of place. I give them, not from the original source, which I am not erudite enough to consult direct, but from the learned treatise which Bain has published on the psychology of Aristotle, as an appendix to his work on the Senses and the Intelligence.

The whole metaphysics of Aristotle is dominated by the distinction between form and matter. Thisdistinction is borrowed from the most familiar fact in the sensible world—the form of solid objects. We may name a substance without troubling ourselves as to the form it possesses, and we may name the form without regard to the substance that it clothes. But this distinction is a purely abstract one, for there can be no real separation of form from matter, no form without matter, and no matter without form. The two terms are correlative; each one implies the other, and neither can be realised or actualised without the other. Every individual substance can be considered from a triple point of view: 1st, form; 2nd, matter; and 3rd, the compound or aggregate of form and matter, the inseparableEns, which transports us out of the domain of logic and abstraction into that of reality.

Aristotle recognises between these two logical correlatives a difference in rank. Form is superior, nobler, the higher in dignity, nearer to the perfect entity; matter is inferior, more modest, more distant from perfection. On account of its hierarchical inferiority, matter is often presented as the second, orcorrelatum, and form as the first, orrelatum. This difference in rank is so strongly marked, that these two correlations are likewise conceived in a different form—that of the potential and the actual. Matter is the potential, imperfect, roughly outlined element which isnot yet actual, and may perhaps never become so. Form is the actual, the energy, the entelechy which actualises the potential and determines the final compound.

These few definitions will make clear the singularly ingenious idea of Aristotle on the nature of the body, the soul, and of their union. The body is matter which is only intelligible as thecorrelatumof form; it can neither exist by itself nor be known by itself—that is to say, when considered outside this relation. The soul is form, the actual. By uniting with the body it constitutes the living subject. The soul is therelatum, and is unintelligible and void of sense without itscorrelatum. "The soul," says Aristotle, "is not a variety of body, but it could not exist without a body: the soul is not a body, but something which belongs or is relative to a body." The animated subject is a form plunged and engaged in matter, and all its actions and passions are so likewise. Each has its formal side which concerns the soul, and its material side which concerns the body. The emotion which belongs to the animated subject or aggregate of soul and body is a complex fact having two aspects logically distinguishable from each other, each of which is correlative to the other and implies it. It is thus not only with our passions, but also with our perceptions, our imaginations, reminiscences,reasonings, and efforts of attention to learn. Intelligence, like emotion, is a phenomenon not simply of the corporeal organism nor of the Νους only, but of the commonalty or association of which they are members, and when the intelligence weakens it is not because the Νους is altered, but because the association is destroyed by the ruin of the corporeal organism.

These few notes, which I have taken in their integrity from Bain's text, allow us thoroughly to comprehend the thought of Aristotle, and it seems to me that the Greek philosopher, by making of the soul and body two correlative terms, has formed a comparison of great exactness. I also much admire his idea according to which it is through the union of the body and soul that the whole, which till then was only possible, goes forth from the domain of logic and becomes actual. The soul actualises the body, and becomes, as he said, its entelechy.

These views are too close to those I have myself just set forth for it to be necessary to dwell on their resemblance. The latter would become still stronger if we separated from the thought of Aristotle a few developments which are not essential, though he allowed them great importance: I refer to the continual comparison he makes with the form and matter of corporeal objects. Happy though it may be, this comparison is buta metaphor which perhaps facilitates the understanding of Aristotle's idea, but is not essential to his theory. For my part, I attach far greater importance to the character ofrelatum, andcorrelatumascribed to the two terms mind and matter, and to the actualisation[42]produced by their union.

Let me add another point of comparison. Aristotle's theory recalls in a striking manner that of Kant on thea prioriforms of thought. The form of thought, or the category, is nothing without the matter of cognition, and the latter is nothing without the application of form. "Thoughts without content given by sensation are empty; intuitions without concept furnished by the understanding are blind." There is nothing astonishing in finding here the same illustration, since there is throughout a question of describing the same phenomenon,—the relation of mind to matter.

There remains to us to review the principal types of metaphysical systems. We shall discuss these by taking as our guide the principle we have just evolved, and which may be thus formulated:The phenomena of consciousness constitute an incomplete mode of existence.

FOOTNOTES:[40]See[Note 1]onp. 3.[41]For reference, see[Note 18]onp. 73. —Ed.[42]i.e.rendering actual.—Ed.

[40]See[Note 1]onp. 3.

[40]See[Note 1]onp. 3.

[41]For reference, see[Note 18]onp. 73. —Ed.

[41]For reference, see[Note 18]onp. 73. —Ed.

[42]i.e.rendering actual.—Ed.

[42]i.e.rendering actual.—Ed.

Flournoy has somewhere written that the chief interest of the systems of metaphysics lies less in the intellectual constructions they raise than in the aspirations of the mind and of the heart to which they correspond. Without taking literally this terribly sceptical opinion, it would be highly useful to begin the study of any metaphysical system by the psychology of its author. The value of each system would be better understood, and their reasons would be comprehended.

This book is too short to permit us to enter into such biographical details. I am obliged to take the metaphysical systemsen bloc, as if they were anonymous works, and to efface all the shades, occasionally so curious, that the thought of each author has introduced into them. Yet, however brief our statement, it seems indispensable toindicate clearly the physical or moral idea concealed within each system.

It is known that spiritualism is a doctrine which has for its chief aim the raising of the dignity of man, by recognising in him faculties superior to the properties of matter. We constantly meet, in spiritualism, with the notion of superior and inferior, understood not only in an intellectual sense but also in the sense of moral worth.

It will also be remarked, as a consequence of the above principle, that a spiritualist does not confine himself to discussing the ideas of his habitual adversary, the materialist; he finds them not only false, but dangerous, and is indignant with them; some persons even ingenuously acknowledge that they hold firmly to certain principles because they fear to be converted to materialism. I can also discern in this system a very natural horror of death, which inspires in so many people, of whom I am one, both hatred and disgust. The spiritualist revolts against the prospect of a definitive annihilation of thought, and the system he adopts is largely explained as an effort towards immortality.

This effort has led to the theory of two substances, the soul and the body, which are represented as being as thoroughly separated as possible. The soul has not its origin in the body, and it derives none of its properties from its fellow; it is a substance created in complete independence relatively to the body; the soul, in its essence, has nothing in common with matter. The essence of the soul, said Descartes, is thought; the essence of the body is extent. It follows from this that the soul, in its determinations and actions, is liberated from the laws and necessities of the corporeal nature; it is a free power, a power of indetermination, capable of choice, capable of introducing new, unforeseen, and unforeseeable actions, and on this point opposes itself to corporeal phenomena, which are all subject to a determinism so rigorous that any event could be foreseen if its antecedents were known. Another consequence of spiritualism is the admission of the immortality of the soul, which, being widely distinct from the body, is not affected by its dissolution; it is, on the contrary, liberated, since death cuts the link which binds them together.

But there is a link, and the explanation of this link brings with it the ruin of the whole system. One is forced to admit that this principle of the separation of body and soul is liable, in fact, to many exceptions. Even if they are two isolated powers, the necessities of life oblige them to enter continually into communication with each other.In the case of perceptions, it is the body which acts on the soul and imparts sensations to it; in movements, it is the soul, on the contrary, which acts on the body, to make it execute its desires and its will.

Spiritualists must acknowledge that they are at some trouble to explain this traffic between the two substances; for, with their respect for the principle of heterogeneity mentioned above, they do not manage to conceive how that contact of the physical and the mental can be made which is constantly necessary in the life of relation. By what means, have they long asked themselves, can that which is only extent act on that which is only thought? How can we represent to ourselves thislocalunion of matter with an immaterial principle, which, by its essence, does not exist in space? The two substances have been so completely separated, to insure the liberty of the soul and its superiority over the body, that it has become impossible to bring them together. The scission has been too complete. They cannot be sewn together again.

Such are the principal objections raised against spiritualism. These objections are derived from points of view which are not ours, and we have therefore no need to estimate their value.

From our point of view, the spiritualist conception has chosen an excellent starting point. Byestablishing the consciousness and the object of cognition as two autonomous powers, neither of which is the slave of the other, spiritualism has arrived at an opinion of irreproachable exactness; it is indeed thus that the relations of these two terms must be stated; each has the same importance and the right to the same autonomy.[44]

Yet, spiritualism has not rested there, and, by a lamentable exaggeration, it has thought that the consciousness, which it calls the soul, could exercise its functions in complete independence of the object of cognition, which it calls matter. There is the error. It consists in misunderstanding the incomplete and, as it were, virtual existence of the consciousness. This refutation is enough as regards spiritualism. Nothing more need be added.

Idealism is an exceedingly complex system, varying much with varying authors, very polymorphous, and consequently very difficult to discuss.

The ancient hylozoism, the monadism of Leibnitz, and the recent panpsychism of M. Strong are only different forms of the same doctrine.

Like spiritualism, with which it is connected by many ties, idealism is a philosophy which expresses some disdain for matter, but the thoughts which have sought to shelter themselves under this philosophy are so varied that it would be perilous to try to define them briefly.

There can be discussed in idealism a certain number of affirmations which form the basis of the system. None of these affirmations is, strictly speaking, demonstrated or demonstrable; but they offer very different degrees of probability, and it is for this reason that we shall notice them.

Amongst these affirmations there are some that we have already met with in our study of the definition of sensation; others will be newer to us.

1. Here is one which seems to arise directly from the facts, and appears for a long time to have constituted an impregnable position for idealists. It may be expressed in three words:esse est percipi.

Starting with the observation that every time we bear witness to the existence of the external world, it is because we perceive it, idealists admit that the existence of this external world shares exactly the lot of our perception, and that like it it is discontinuous and intermittent. When we close our eyes, it ceases to exist, like a torch which is extinguished, and lights up again when we openthem. We have already discussed this proposition, and have shown that it contains nothing imperative; and we may very well decline to subscribe to it.

2. There follows a second proposition, barely distinct from the previous one. There should be nothing else in objects but that which we perceive, and that of which we have consciousness should be, in the fullest possible acceptation of the words, the measure of what is. Consequently there should be no need to seek, under the object perceived, another and larger reality, a source from which might flow wider knowledge than that we at present possess. This is as disputable as the preceding affirmation, and for the same reasons.

3. The third proposition is the heart of the idealist thesis. It is sometimes presented as a deduction from the foregoing, but it is nevertheless thoroughly distinct from it, and the preceding affirmations might legitimately be accepted and this new one rejected. This proposition may be expressed thus:Everything that is perceived is psychical.

It is not only idealists who subscribe to this opinion, however, and we have seen, when dealing with the definition of matter, that it is widely spread. We understand by it that the objects we perceive exist in the consciousness, are of theconsciousness, and are constituted by ideas; the whole world is nothing but idea and representation; and, since our mind is taken to be of a psychical nature, the result is that everything, absolutely everything, the person who knows and the thing known, are all psychical. This is panpsychism. Flournoy, on this point, says, with a charm coloured by irony: "We henceforth experience a sweet family feeling, we find ourselves, so to speak,at homein the midst of this universe ..."[45]We have demonstrated above that the unity here attained is purely verbal, since we cannot succeed in suppressing the essential differences of things.

4. Now comes an affirmation on the genesis of things. After having admitted that the object is an idea of the mind, one of its manifestations, or one of its moods, the idealists go so far as to say that the consciousness is the generating power of ideas, and, consequently, the generating cause of the universe. It is thought which creates the world. That is the final conclusion.

I indicated, beforehand, in the chapters on the definition of sensation and on the distinction between the consciousness and the object, the reasons which lead me to reject the premises of idealism. It will be sufficient to offer here acriticism on its last conclusion: "It is the mind that creates the world."

This thesis strikes at the duality—consciousness and object; it gives the supremacy to the consciousness by making of the object an effect or property of the former. We can object that this genesis cannot be clearly represented, and that for the very simple reason that it is impossible to clearly accept "mind" as a separate entity and distinct from matter. It is easy to affirm this separation, thanks to the psittacism of the words, which are here used like counterfeit coin, but we cannot represent it to ourselves, for it corresponds to nothing. The consciousness constitutes all that is mental in the world; nothing else can be described as mental. Now this consciousness only exists as an act; it is, in other terms, an incomplete form of existence, which does not exist apart from its object, of which the true name is matter. It is therefore very difficult to understand this affirmation, "It is the mind that creates the world," since to be able to do so, we should have to imagine a consciousness without an object.

Moreover, should we even succeed in doing so, we should be none the more disposed, on that account, to give assent to this proposition. Consciousness and matter represent to us the most different and antithetical terms of the whole of theknowable. Were the hypothesis to be advanced that one of these elements is capable of engendering the other, we should immediately have to ask ourselves why this generating power and this pre-eminence should be attributed to one rather than to the other element. Who can claim that one solution is more clear, more reasonable, or more probable than the other?

One of the great advantages of the history of philosophy here asserts itself. This history shows us that different minds when reflecting on the same problems have come to conceive solutions which have appeared to them clear, and consequently were possible; now, as these solutions are often contradictory, nothing shows better than their collation the distance between possibility and fact. Thus the materialists, who, like the idealists, have put forward a genetic theory of the mind, have conceived mind as produced by matter;—a conception diametrically opposed to that of the idealists. It may be said that these two conceptions, opposed in sense, annul each other, and that each of these two philosophical systems has rendered us service by demonstrating the error of the opposing system.

FOOTNOTES:[43]It is, perhaps, needless to point out that by "spiritualism" M. Binet does not mean the doctrine of the spirit-rappers, whom he, like other scientific writers, designates as "spiritists," but the creed of all those who believe in disembodied spirits or existences.—Ed.[44]I do not insist on the difference between my conception and the spiritualistic conception; my distinction between consciousness and matter does not correspond, it is evident, to that of "facts of consciousness" and "physical facts" which spiritualism sets up.[45]Archives de Psychologie, vol. iv. No. 14, Nov. 1904, p. 132 (article on Panpsychism).

[43]It is, perhaps, needless to point out that by "spiritualism" M. Binet does not mean the doctrine of the spirit-rappers, whom he, like other scientific writers, designates as "spiritists," but the creed of all those who believe in disembodied spirits or existences.—Ed.

[43]It is, perhaps, needless to point out that by "spiritualism" M. Binet does not mean the doctrine of the spirit-rappers, whom he, like other scientific writers, designates as "spiritists," but the creed of all those who believe in disembodied spirits or existences.—Ed.

[44]I do not insist on the difference between my conception and the spiritualistic conception; my distinction between consciousness and matter does not correspond, it is evident, to that of "facts of consciousness" and "physical facts" which spiritualism sets up.

[44]I do not insist on the difference between my conception and the spiritualistic conception; my distinction between consciousness and matter does not correspond, it is evident, to that of "facts of consciousness" and "physical facts" which spiritualism sets up.

[45]Archives de Psychologie, vol. iv. No. 14, Nov. 1904, p. 132 (article on Panpsychism).

[45]Archives de Psychologie, vol. iv. No. 14, Nov. 1904, p. 132 (article on Panpsychism).

Materialism is a very ancient doctrine. It is even the most ancient of all, which simply proves that amongst the different explanations given of our double physico-mental nature, this doctrine is the easiest to understand. The origin of materialism is to be found in the beliefs of savage tribes, and is again found, very clearly defined, in the philosophy of those ancient Greeks who philosophized before Plato and Aristotle. A still stranger fact is that the thoughts of a great number of the Fathers of the Church inclined towards the philosophy of matter. Then, in the course of its evolution, there occurred a moment of eclipse, and materialism ceased to attract attention till the contemporary period in which we assist at its re-birth, Nowadays, it constitutes a powerful doctrine, the more so that it has surreptitiously crept into the thoughts of many learned men without their being clearly conscious of it. There are many physicists and physiologists who thinkand speak as materialists, though they have made up their minds to remain on the battle-ground of observed facts and have a holy horror of metaphysics. In a certain sense, it may be said that materialism is the metaphysics of those who refuse to be metaphysicians.

It is very evident that in the course of its long history, materialism has often changed its skin. Like all knowledge, it has been subject to the law of progress; and, certainly, it would not have been of a nature to satisfy the intellectual wants of contemporary scholars, had it not stripped itself of the rude form under which it first manifested itself in the mind of primitive man. Yet what has enabled the doctrine to keep its unity through all its changes is that it manifests a deeply human tendency to cling by preference to everything visible and tangible.

Whatever strikes the eyes, or can be felt by the hand, seems to us in the highest degree endowed with reality or existence. It is only much later, after an effort of refined thought, that we come to recognise an existence in everything that can be perceived in any way whatever, even in an idea. It is still later that we understand that existence is not only that which is perceived but also that which is linked logically with the rest of our knowledge. A good deal of progress has been necessary to reach this point.

As I have not the slightest intention of giving even an abridged history of materialism, let us come at once to the present day, and endeavour to say in what consists the scientific form this doctrine has assumed. Its fundamental basis has not changed. It still rests on our tendency to give chief importance to what can be seen and touched; and it is an effect of the hegemony of three of our senses, the visual, the tactile, and the muscular.

The extraordinary development of the physical sciences has no doubt given an enormous encouragement to materialism, and it may be said that in the philosophy of nature it occupies a principal place, and that it is there in its own domain and unassailable.

It has become the expression of the idea that everything that can be explained scientifically, everything susceptible of being measured, is a material phenomenon. It is the representation of the material explanation pushed to its last limits, and all experiments, all calculations, all inductions resting on the grand principle of the conservation of matter and energy plead in its favour.

We will examine with some precision how far such a doctrine solves the problem of the existence of the intellectual functions.

The doctrine has understood this connection asbeing purely material, and has sought its image in other phenomena which are entirely so. Thus, it has borrowed from physiology the principle of its explanation, it has transported into the domain of thought the idea of function, and it has supposed that the soul is to the body in the relation of function to organ. Intelligence would thus be a cerebral function. To explain intelligence, materialists link it with matter, turn it into a property of matter, and compare it to a movement of matter, and sometimes even to a secretion. So Karl Vogt, the illustrious Genevan naturalist, one day declared, to the great scandal of every one, that the brain secretes the thought as the kidney does urine. This bold comparison seemed shocking, puerile, and false, for a secretion is a material thing while thought is not. Karl Vogt also employed another comparison: the brain produces the thought as the muscle produces movement, and it at once seems less offensive to compare the thought to a movement than to compare it to a liquid secretion. At the present day, an illustration still more vague would be used, such as that of a transformation of energy: chemical energy disengaged by the nerve centres would be thus looked upon as transformed into psychical energy.

However, it matters little what metaphors are applied to for help in explaining the passage fromthe physical to the mental. What characterises materialist philosophy is its belief in the possibility of such a passage, and its considering it as the genesis of thought. "One calls materialist," says Renouvier, with great exactness, "every philosophy which defines thought as the product of a compound whose elements do not imply thought." A sweeping formula which allows us to foresee all the future avatars of the materialist doctrine, and to class them beforehand in the same category.

The criticisms which have been directed against materialism are all, or nearly all, variations of the principle of heterogeneity. We will not dwell long on this, but simply recollect that, according to this principle, it is impossible to attribute to the brain the capacity of generating consciousness. Physical force can indeed generate physical force under the same or a different form, and it thus produces all the effects which are determined by the laws of nature. But it is impossible to comprehend how physical force can enrich itself at a given moment by a conscious force. Physical force is reduced to movements of bodies and to displacements of atoms; how could a change of position in any inert objects give rise to a judgment, a reasoning, or any phenomenon of the consciousness? It is further said: this idea of function, which materialistshere introduce to render more comprehensible the passage from a material body to a spiritual action, contains only an empty explanation, for the function is not essentially distinct by its nature from the organ; it is simply "the organ in activity," it adds to the organ taken in a state of repose but one change, viz. activity, that is to say movement, and, consequently, the function of an organ is material by the same right as the organ. When a muscle contracts, this contraction, which is the proper function of the muscular fibre, consists in a condensation of the muscular protoplasm, and this condensation is a material fact. When a gland enters into activity, a certain quantity of liquid flows into the channels of the gland, and this liquid is caused by a physical and chemical modification of the cellular protoplasm; it is a melting, or a liquefaction, which likewise is material. The function of the nerve cell is to produce movement, or to preserve it, or to direct it; ii is material like the cells. There is therefore nothing in all those functional phenomena which might lead us to understand how a material cause should be capable of engendering a conscious effect.

It seems that all materialists have acknowledged that here is the vulnerable point in their theory, for it is the principle of heterogeneity which they have especially combated. But their defence iswanting in frankness, and principally consists in subterfuges.

In brief, it affirms that we are surrounded with mystery, that we are not sufficiently learned to have the right to impose limits to the power of matter, and to say to it: "Thou shalt not produce this phenomenon." A materialist theologian declares that he sees no impossibility in stones thinking and arguing, if God, in His infinite power, has decided to unite thought with brute matter. This argument is not really serious; it demands the intervention of so powerful aDeus ex machina, that it can be applied equally to all problems; to solve all is to solve none.

Modern materialists rightly do not bring God into the question. Their mode of argument takes another form; but it remains to be seen if, at bottom, it is not the same as the other. It simply consists in affirming that up till now we know certain properties of matter only, but that science every day discovers new ones; that matter is a reservoir of unknown forces, and that it is not impossible that the origin of psychical forces may yet be discovered in matter. This idea is clearly hinted at by Littré. The physicist Tyndall gave it a definite formula when he uttered at the Belfast Congress this phrase so often quoted: "If I look back on the limits of experimental science, I can discern in the bosom of that matter (which,in our ignorance, while at the same time professing our respect for its Creator, we have, till now, treated with opprobrium) the promise and the power of all forms and qualities of life."

The opponents of the doctrine have not ceased to answer that the matter of to-morrow, like the matter of to-day, can generate none but material effects, and that a difficulty is not solved by putting off its solution to some indefinite date in our scientific evolution: and it certainly seems that the counter-stroke is decisive, if we admit the principle of heterogeneity with its natural consequence.

We will now criticise the above doctrine by making use of the ideas I have above enunciated. The criticism we have to apply to materialism is not the same as that just summarised. The axis of the discussion changes its position.

In the first place, I reproach materialism with presenting itself as a theory of the generation of the consciousness by the object. We have already reproached idealism with putting itself forward as a theory of the generation of the object by the consciousness. The error of the two systems is produced in a converse direction, but is of the same gravity. The consciousness and its object, we say yet again, constitute the widest division it is possible to effect in the domain of cognition; it is quite as illegitimate to reduce the first term to the secondas to reduce the second to the first. To reduce one to the other, by way of affiliation or otherwise, there must first be discovered, then, an identity of nature which does not exist.

In the second place, when one examines closely the explanation materialism has imagined in order to derive thought from an action of matter, it is seen that this representation is rendered completely impossible by all we know of the nature of thought. For the materialist to suppose for one moment that thought is a cerebral function, he must evidently make an illusion for himself as to what thought is, and must juggle with concepts. Perhaps, could we penetrate into his own inmost thought, we should discover that at the moment he supposes a mere cell can manufacture the phenomena of consciousness, some vague image suggests itself to him whereby he identifies these phenomena with a light and subtle principle escaping from the nerve cell, something which resembles an electriceffluve, or a will-of-the-wisp, or the flame from a punch-bowl.[46]

I cannot, of course, tell whether my supposition is correct. But what I assert, with the calmnessof perfect certitude, is that the materialist has not taken the pains to analyse attentively what he calls the phenomenon of consciousness. Had he made this analysis and kept the elements in his mind, he would have seen that it is almost impossible to hook in any way a phenomenon of consciousness on to a material molecule.

In fact, also, to take this into account, we will not remain within the vagueness of the concept, but will take a particular example to argue upon, viz. that of an external perception. I open my window on a fine day, and I see before me a sunny plain, with, as far as the eye can reach, houses amongst the trees, and again more houses, the most distant of which are outlined against my far-off horizon. This is my mental phenomenon. And while I am at my window, my eyes fixed on the view, the anatomist declares that, starting from my retina, molecular vibrations travel along the optic nerve, cross each other at the chiasma, enter into the fascia, pass through the internal capsule and reach the hemispheres, or rather the occipital regions, of the brain, where, for the moment, we agree to localise the centre of projection of the visual sensations. This is my physical phenomenon. It now becomes the question of passing from this physical phenomena to the mental one. And here we are stopped by a really formidable difficulty.

My mental phenomenon is not entirely mental, as is usually supposed from the deceitful brevity of the phrase. It is in great part physical, for it can be decomposed into two elements, a consciousness and its object; and this object of the consciousness, this group of little houses I see in the plain, belongs to sensation—that is to say, to something physical—or, in other words, to matter.

Let us examine in its turn the physical process which is supposed to be discovered in my nervous centres while I am in course of contemplating the landscape. This pretended physical process itself, quite as much as my conscious perception of the landscape, is a physico-psychical phenomenon; for my cerebral movements are perceived, hypothetically at least, by an observer. This is a perception, consequently it can be decomposed into two things, a consciousness and its object. As a further consequence, when we wish, by a metaphysical effort, to attach the consciousness to a material state of the brain and to establish a link between the two events, it will be found that we wrongly hook one physico-mental phenomenon on to another.

But, evidently, this objection is not a refutation. We may if we choose suppose that the so-called cerebral process is capable of subsisting at moments when no one perceives it, and that it exists of itself, is sufficient for itself, and is entirelyphysical. But can we subject the mental process of perception to the same purification? Can we separate these two elements, the consciousness and its object, retain the element consciousness and reject the element object, which is physical, thus constituting a phenomenon entirely mental, which might then be possibly placed beside the entirely physical phenomenon, so as to study their relation to each other? This is quite impossible, and the impossibility is double, for it existsde factoandde jure.

De jure, because we have already established that a consciousness empty and without object cannot be conceived.De facto, because the existence of the object that consciousness carries with it is very embarrassing for the materialist; for this object is material, and as real and material as the fibres and cells of the brain. It might, indeed, be supposed that by transformation or otherwise there goes forth from the cerebral convolution a purely psychical phenomenon resembling a wave. But how can we conceive the transformation of this convolution into a semi-material phenomenon? How can we comprehend that there should issue from this convolution the material object of a perception—for example, a plain dotted with houses?

An English histologist remarked one day, with some eloquence, how little the most minute studyof the brain aided us to understand thought. He was thus answering Auguste Comte, who, in a moment of aberration, claimed that psychology, in order to become a science, ought to reject the testimony of the consciousness, and to use exclusively as its means of study the histology of the nerve centres and the measurement of the cranium. Our histologist, who had passed part of his life examining, under the microscope, fragments of cerebral matter, in following the forms of the cells, the course of the fibres, and the grouping and distribution of the fascia, made the following remark: "It is the fact that the study, however patient, minute, and thorough it might be, of this nerve-skein can never enable us to know what a state of consciousness is, if we do not know it otherwise; for never across the field of the microscope is there seen to pass a memory, an emotion, or an act of volition." And, he added, "he who confines himself to peering into these material structures remains as ignorant of the phenomena of the mind as the London cabman who, for ever travelling through the streets of the great city, is ignorant of what is said and what is going on in the interior of the houses." This picturesque comparison, the truth of which has never been questioned, is based on this supposition, that the psychical act is entirely immaterial and invisible, and therefore escapes the piercing eye of themicroscope. But a deeper analysis of the mind shows how little exact is this assertion. From the moment each psychical act implies a material object, we can ask ourselves two things: (1) Why is it that the anatomist does not discover these material objects in the interior of the brain? We ought to see them, for they are material, and therefore visible. We ought to see them with their aspect and colour, or be able to explain why they are not seen. In general, all that is described to us in the brain is the molecular vibrations. But we are not conscious of them. Where, then, is that of which we are conscious? (2) It should next be explained to us by what elaboration, transmutation, or metamorphosis a molecular disturbance, which is material, can transform itself into the objects which are equally material.

This is the criticism we have to address to materialism. Until proof to the contrary, I hold it to be irrefutable.

For this exposition to follow the logical order of ideas, the discussion on materialism should be immediately succeeded by that on parallelism. These two doctrines are near akin; they resemble each other as the second edition of a book, revised and corrected, resembles the first. Parallelismis the materialist doctrine of those forewarned folk, who have perceived the errors committed and endeavour to avoid them, while cherishing all that can be saved of the condemned doctrine. That which philosophers criticised in materialism was the misunderstanding of the principle of heterogeneity. The parallelists have seen this mistake, and have taken steps to respect this principle: we shall see in what way. They are especially prudent, and they excel in avoiding being compromised. They put forth their hypothesis as a provisional one, and they vaunt its convenience. It is, say they, a practical method of avoiding many difficulties; it becomes for philosophers an equivalent of that phrase which so many timorous ministers repeat: "Above all, no scrapes!"

Let us study the exact point on which parallelism has amended materialism. We have seen that every materialist doctrine is the expression of this idea, that physical phenomena are the only ones that are determined, measurable, explicable, and scientific. This idea does wonders in the natural sciences, but is at fault when, from the physical, we pass into the moral world, and we have seen how the materialistic doctrine fails when it endeavours to attach the physical to the mental. There are then two great difficulties which the materialistic explanation findsbefore it; one is a difficulty of mechanism and the other of genesis. By connecting the mind with the brain, like a function to its organ, this doctrine seeks to solve these two problems, and with what little success we have seen.

Parallelism, has tried to avoid these two problems; not only does it not solve them, but it arranges so as not to propound them. The expedient adopted consists in avoiding the meeting of the physical and the mental; instead of placing them end to end and welding one to the other, they are placed in parallel fashion side by side. To explain their correlation, which so many observations vaguely demonstrate, the following hypothesis is advanced. Physical and psychical life form two parallel currents, which never mingle their waters; to every state of definite consciousness there corresponds the counterpart of an equally definite state of the nerve centres; the fact of consciousness has its antecedents and its consequences in the consciousness; and the physical fact equally takes its place in a chain of physical facts. The two series are thus evolved, and correspond strictly to each other according to a necessary law; so that the scholar who was perfectly instructed, and to whom one of these states was presented, could describe its fellow. But never does any of the terms of one series influence the terms of the other.

Observation and the testimony of the consciousness seem to attest this dual progress; but they are, according to the parallelist hypothesis, illusions. When I move my arm by a voluntary act, it is not my will,quaact of consciousness, which determines the movement of the arm—for this is a material fact. The movement is produced by the coming into play of groups of muscles. Each muscle, composed of a semi-fluid substance, being excited, contracts in the direction of its greatest length. The excitant of the muscles is also a material fact, a material influx which starts from the motor cells of the encephalon, and of which we know the course down through the pyramidal fascium, the anterior roots of the spinal cord, and the nerves of the periphery to its termination in the motor plates of the muscles. It is this excitement which is the physical, direct, and veritable cause of voluntary movements. And it is the same with all acts and signs, all expressions of our conscious states; the trembling of fear, the redness of anger, the movements of walking, down to the words we utter—all these are physical effects produced by physical processes, which act physically, and of which the mental counterpart has in itself no effective action.

Let it be understood that I am here pointing out one of the forms, and that the most usual, of the parallelist theory. Each author varies itaccording to his fancy; some widen the correspondence between the physical and the moral, others prefer to narrow it. At one time a vague relation is supposed which is only true on a large scale, and is a union rather than an equivalence. At another, it is an exact counterpart, a complete duplicate in which the smallest physical event corresponds to a mental one.

In one of the forms of this theory that has been recently invented, parallelists have gone so far as to assert that there exists no real cohesion in the mental chain, and that no mental phenomenon can have the property of provoking another mental phenomenon by an act of true causality. It is within the nervous tissue, they say, that the nexus of psychic states should be enclosed. These should succeed in time without being directly connected with one another; they should succeed because the physical basis of them is excited in succession. Some of them would be like an air on the piano: the notes follow each other and arrange themselves into melodies, not by any affinity proper to themselves, but because the keys of the instrument are struck in the required order.

I said a little while ago that parallelism was a perfected materialism. The reason of this will be understood. It is a doctrine which preserves the determinism of physical facts while avoiding the compromising of itself in the difficult explanationof the connection between the soul and the body. It remains scientific without raising a metaphysical heresy.

Bain is one of those who have most clearly expressed, not only the advantages, but also the aspirations of this theory (Mind and Body, p. 130):—

"We have every reason for believing," he says, "that there is in company with all our mental processes,an unbroken material succession. From the ingress of a sensation, to the outgoing responses in action, the mental succession is not for an instant dissevered from a physical succession. A new prospect bursts upon the view; there is mental result of sensation, emotion, thought—terminating in outward displays of speech or gesture. Parallel to this mental series is the physical series of facts, the successive agitation of the physical organs, called the eye, the retina, the optic nerve, optic centres, cerebral hemispheres, outgoing nerves, muscles, &c. While we go the round of the mental circle of sensation, emotion, and thought, there is an unbroken physical circle of effects. It would be incompatible with everything we know of the cerebral action, to suppose that the physical chain ends abruptly in a physical void, occupied by an immaterial substance; which immaterial substance, after working alone, imparts its results to theother edge of the physical break, and determines the active response—two shores of the material with an intervening ocean of the immaterial. There is, in fact, no rupture of nervous continuity. The only tenable supposition is, that mental and physical proceed together, as undivided twins."

On reading this passage it is easy to see the idea which forms the basis of the doctrine. It is, as I have already said, the fetichism of mechanics: parallelism takes its inspiration from this quite as directly as does materialism, but with more skill, inasmuch as it avoids the most dangerous question, that of the interaction of physics and morals, and replaces it by an hypothesis much resembling Leibnitz's hypothesis of the pre-established harmony, On the other hand, a second merit of this prudent doctrine is the avoiding the question of genesis. It does not seek for the origin of thought, but places this last in a relation of parallelism with the manifestations of matter; and in the same way that parallel lines prolongedad infinitumnever meet, so the partisans of this doctrine announce their resolution not to inquire how the actual state of things has been formed, nor how it will end if, for example, one of the terms should disappear by the death of the bodily organism.


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