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MIND AND MOTION AND MONISM

BY THE LATE

GEORGE JOHN ROMANES, M.A., LL.D., F.R.S.

HONORARY FELLOW OF GONVILLE AND CAIUS COLLEGE, CAMBRIDGE

LONDON LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. AND NEW YORK 1895

Oxford

HORACE HART, PRINTER TO THE UNIVERSITY

WORKS BY _GEORGE JOHN ROMANES, M.A., LL.D., F.R.S._

=DARWIN, AND AFTER DARWIN=: an Exposition of the Darwinian Theory,

and a Discussion on Post-Darwinian Questions.

PART I. THE DARWINIAN THEORY. With Portrait of Darwin and 125

Illustrations. _Crown 8vo_, 10s. 6d.

PART II. POST-DARWINIAN QUESTIONS: HEREDITY AND UTILITY. _Crown

8vo_.

=AN EXAMINATION OF WEISMANNISM.= _Crown 8vo_, 6s.

=MIND AND MOTION AND MONISM.= _Crown 8vo_.

=THOUGHTS ON RELIGION=. Edited, with a Preface, by CHARLES GORE,

M.A., Canon of Westminster. _Crown 8vo_, 4s. 6d.

London

LONGMANS, GREEN & CO.

PREFACE

Of the contents of this little volume the section on _Mind and Motion_

which forms, in accordance with a suggestion of the author's, a general

introduction, was delivered at Cambridge as the Rede Lecture in 1885,

and was printed in the _Contemporary Review_ for June in that year. The

chapter on The _World as an Eject_ was published, almost as it now

stands, in the _Contemporary Review_ for July, 1886. A paper on _The

Fallacy of Materialism_, of which Mr. Romanes incorporated the more

important parts in the Essay on Monism, was contributed to the

_Nineteenth Century_ for December, 1882. The rest was left in MS. and

was probably written in 1889 or 1890.

The subjects here discussed frequently occupied Mr. Romanes' keen and

versatile mind. Had not the hand of death fallen upon him while so much

of the ripening grain of his thought still remained to be finally

garnered, some modifications and extensions of the views set forth in

the Essay on Monism would probably have been introduced. Attention may

be drawn, for example, to the sentence on p. 139, italicized by the

author himself, in which it is contended that the will as agent _must be

identified with the principle of Causality_. I have reason to believe

that the chapter on _The World as an Eject_ would, in a final revision

of the Essay as a whole, have been modified so as to lay stress on this

identification of the human will with the principle of Causality in the

world at large--a doctrine the relation of which to the teachings of

Schopenhauer will be evident to students of philosophy.

But the hand of death closed on the thinker ere his thought had received

its full and ultimate expression. When in July, 1893, I received from

Mr. Romanes instructions with regard to the publication of that which

now goes forth to the world in his name, his end seemed very near; and

he said with faltering voice, in tones the pathos of which lingers with

me still, that this and much besides must, he feared, be left

unfinished. He suggested that perhaps I might revise the parts in the

light of the whole. But I have thought it best to leave what he had

written as he wrote it, save for quite unimportant emendations, lest in

revising I should cast over it the shadow of my own opinions.

It only remains to add that the conclusions reached in this Essay should

be studied in connection with the later _Thoughts on Religion_ which

Canon Gore has recently edited.

C. LL. M.

BRISTOL,

_May, 1895._

CONTENTS

PAGE

MIND AND MOTION 1

MONISM 39

INTRODUCTION 41

CHAPTER I. SPIRITUALISM 47

" II. MATERIALISM 55

" III. MONISM 79

" IV. THE WORLD AS AN EJECT 88

" V. THE WILL IN RELATION TO MATERIALISM AND SPIRITUALISM 119

" VI. THE WILL IN RELATION TO MONISM 129

MIND AND MOTION

[REDE LECTURE, 1885.]

The earliest writer who deserves to be called a psychologist is Hobbes;

and if we consider the time when he wrote, we cannot fail to be

surprised at what I may term his prevision of the most important results

which have now been established by science. He was the first clearly to

sound the note which has ever since constituted the bass, or fundamental

tone, of scientific thought. Let us listen to it through the clear

instrumentality of his own language:--

'All the qualities called sensible are, in the object which causeth

them, but so many motions of the matter by which it presseth on our

organs diversely. Neither in us that are pressed are they anything

else but divers motions; for motion produceth nothing but

motion.... The cause of sense is the external body or object, which

presseth the organ proper to each sense, either immediately, as in

taste and touch, or mediately, as in hearing, seeing, and smelling;

which pressure, by the mediation of the nerves, and other strings

and membranes of the body, continued inwards to the brain and

heart, causeth there a resistance, or counter-pressure, or

endeavour.... And because _going_, _speaking_, and the like

voluntary motions, depend always upon a precedent thought of

_whither_, _which way_, and _what_; it is evident that the

imagination [or idea] is the first internal beginning of all

voluntary motion. And although unstudied men do not conceive any

motion at all to be there, where the thing moved is invisible; or

the space it is moved in is, for the shortness of it, insensible;

yet that doth not hinder, but that such motions are. These small

beginnings of motion, within the body of man, before they appear in

walking, speaking, striking, and other visible actions, are

commonly called ENDEAVOUR[1].'

These quotations are sufficient to show that the system of Hobbes was

prophetic of a revelation afterwards declared by two centuries of

scientific research. For they show how plainly he taught that all our

knowledge of the external world is a knowledge of motion; and, again,

that all our acquisitions of knowledge and other acts of mind themselves

imply, as he elsewhere says, some kind of 'motion, agitation, or

alteration, which worketh in the brain.' That he conceived such motion,

agitation, or alteration to be, from its extreme minuteness, 'invisible'

and 'insensible,' or, as we should now say, molecular, is likewise

evident. I can therefore imagine the delight with which he would hear me

speak when I say, that it is no longer a matter of keen-sighted

speculation, but a matter of carefully demonstrated fact, that all our

knowledge of the external world is nothing more than a knowledge of

motion. For all the forms of energy have now been proved to be but modes

of motion; and even matter, if not in its ultimate constitution vortical

motion, at all events is known to us only as changes of motion: all that

we perceive in what we call matter is change in modes of motion. We do

not even know what it is that moves; we only know that when some modes

of motion pass into other modes, we perceive what we understand by

matter. It would take me too long to justify this general statement so

that it should be intelligible to every one; but I am confident that all

persons who understand such subjects will, when they think about it,

accept this general statement as one which is universally true. And, if

so, they will agree with Hobbes that all our knowledge of the external

world is a knowledge of motion.

Now, if it would have been thus a joy to Hobbes to have heard to-day how

thoroughly he has been justified in his views touching the external

world, with no less joy would he have heard that he has been equally

justified in his views touching the internal world. For it has now been

proved, beyond the possibility of dispute, that it is only in virtue of

those invisible movements which he inferred that the nervous system is

enabled to perform its varied functions.

To many among the different kinds of movement going on in the external

world, the animal body is adapted to respond by its own movements as

best suits its own welfare; and the mechanism whereby this is effected

is the neuro-muscular system. Those kinds of movement going on in the

external world which are competent to evoke responsive movements in the

animal body are called by physiologists stimuli. When a stimulus falls

upon the appropriate sensory surface, a wave of molecular movement is

sent up the attached sensory nerve to a nerve-centre, which thereupon

issues another wave of molecular movement down a motor nerve to the

group of muscles over whose action it presides; and when the muscles

receive this wave of nervous influence they contract. This kind of

response to stimuli is purely mechanical, or non-mental, and is

ordinarily termed reflex action. The whole of the spinal cord and lower

part of the brain are made up of nerve-centres of reflex action; and, in

the result, we have a wonderfully perfect machine in the animal body

considered as a whole. For while the various sensory surfaces are

severally adapted to respond to different kinds of external

movement--the eye to light, the ear to sound, and so on--any of these

surfaces may be brought into suitable relation with any of the muscles

of the body by means of the cerebro-spinal nerve-centres and their

intercommunications.

So much, then, for the machinery of the body. We must now turn to

consider the corporeal seat of the mind, or the only part of the nervous

system wherein the agitation of nervous matter is accompanied with

consciousness. This is composed of a double nerve-centre, which occurs

in all vertebrated animals, and the two parts of which are called the

cerebral hemispheres. In man this double nerve-centre is so large that

it completely fills the arch of the skull, as far down as the level of

the eyebrows. The two hemispheres of which it consists meet face to face

in the middle line of the skull, from the top of the nose backwards.

Each hemisphere is composed of two conspicuously distinct parts, called

respectively the grey matter and the white matter. The grey matter is

external, enveloping the white matter like a skull-cap, and is composed

of an inconceivable number of nerve-cells connected together by

nerve-fibres. It is computed that in a human brain there cannot be less

than a thousand millions of cells, and five thousand millions of fibres.

The white matter is composed only of nerve-fibres, which pass downwards

in great strands of conducting tissue to the lower centres of the brain

and spinal cord. So that the whole constitutes one system, with the grey

matter of the cerebral hemispheres at the apex or crown.

That the grey matter of the cerebral hemispheres is the exclusive seat

of mind is proved in two ways. In the first place, if we look to the

animal kingdom as a whole, we find that, speaking generally, the

intelligence of species varies with the mass of this grey matter. Or, in

other words, we find that the process of mental evolution, on its

physical side, has consisted in the progressive development of this

grey matter superimposed upon the pre-existing nervous machinery, until

it has attained its latest and maximum growth in man.

In the second place, we find that when the grey matter is experimentally

removed from the brain of animals, the animals continue to live; but are

completely deprived of intelligence. All the lower nerve-centres

continue to perform their mechanical adjustments in response to suitable

stimulation; but they are no longer under the government of the mind.

Thus, for instance, when a bird is mutilated in this way, it will

continue to perform all its reflex adjustments--such as sitting on a

perch, using its wings when thrown into the air, and so forth; but it no

longer remembers its nest or its young, and will starve to death in the

midst of its food, unless it be fed artificially.

Again, if the grey matter of only one hemisphere be removed, the mind is

taken away from the corresponding (i. e. the opposite) side of the body,

while it remains intact on the other side. For example, if a dog be

deprived of one hemisphere, the eye which was supplied from it with

nerve-fibres continues able to see, or to transmit impressions to the

lower nerve-centre called the optic ganglion; for this eye will then

mechanically follow the hand waved in front of it. But if the hand

should hold a piece of meat, the dog will show no mental recognition of

the meat, which of course it will immediately seize if exposed to the

view of its other eye. The same thing is found to happen in the case of

birds: on the injured side _sensation_, or the power of responding to a

stimulus, remains intact; while _perception_, or the power of mental

recognition, is destroyed.

This description applies to the grey matter of the cerebral hemispheres

as a whole. But of course the question next arises whether it only acts

as a whole, or whether there is any localization of different

intellectual faculties in different parts of it. Now, in answer to this

question, it has long been known that the faculty of speech is

definitely localized in a part of the grey matter lying just behind the

forehead; for, when this part is injured, a man loses all power of

expressing even the most simple ideas in words, while the ideas

themselves remain as clear as ever. It is remarkable that in each

individual only this part of one hemisphere appears to be used; and

there is some evidence to show that left-handed persons use the opposite

side from right-handed. Moreover, when the side which is habitually in

use is destroyed, the corresponding part of the other hemisphere begins

to learn its work, so that the patient may in time recover his use of

language.

Within the last few years the important discovery has been made, that by

stimulating with electricity the surface of the grey matter of the

hemispheres, muscular movements are evoked; and that certain patches of

the grey matter, when thus stimulated, always throw into action the same

groups of muscles. In other words, there are definite local areas of

grey matter, which, when stimulated, throw into action definite groups

of muscles. The surface of the cerebral hemispheres has now been in

large measure explored and mapped out with reference to these so-called

motor-centres; and thus our knowledge of the neuro-muscular machinery of

the higher animals (including man) has been very greatly furthered. Here

I may observe parenthetically that, as the brain is insentient to

injuries inflicted upon its own substance, none of the experiments to

which I have alluded entail any suffering to the animals experimented

upon; and it is evident that the important information which has thus

been gained could not have been gained by any other method. I may also

observe that as these motor-centres occur in the grey matter of the

hemispheres, a strong probability arises that they are not only the

motor-centres, but also the volitional centres which originate the

intellectual commands for the contraction of this and that group of

muscles. Unfortunately we cannot interrogate an animal whether, when we

stimulate a motor-centre, we arouse in the animal's mind an act of will

to throw the corresponding group of muscles into action; but that these

motor-centres are really centres of volition is pointed to by the fact,

that electrical stimuli have no longer any effect upon them when the

mental faculties of the animal are suspended by anaesthetics, nor in the

case of young animals where the mental faculties have not yet been

sufficiently developed to admit of voluntary co-ordination among the

muscles which are concerned. On the whole, then, it is not improbable

that on stimulating artificially these motor-centres of the brain, a

physiologist is actually playing from without, and at his own pleasure,

upon the volitions of the animal.

Turning, now, from this brief description of the structure and leading

functions of the principal parts of the nervous system, I propose to

consider what we know about the molecular movements which go on in

different parts of this system, and which are concerned in all the

processes of reflex adjustment, sensation, perception, emotion,

instinct, thought, and volition.

First of all, the rate at which these molecular movements travel through

a nerve has been measured, and found to be about 100 feet per second, or

somewhat more than a mile a minute, in the nerves of a frog. In the

nerves of a mammal it is just about twice as fast; so that if London

were connected with New York by means of a mammalian nerve instead of an

electric cable, it would require nearly a whole day for a message to

pass.

Next, the time has also been measured which is required by a

nerve-centre to perform its part in a reflex action, where no thought or

consciousness is involved. This time, in the case of the winking reflex,

and apart from the time required for the passage of the molecular waves

up and down the sensory and motor nerves, is about 1/20 of a second.

Such is the rate at which a nerve-centre conducts its operations when no

consciousness or volition is involved. But when consciousness and

volition are involved, or when the cerebral hemispheres are called into

play, the time required is considerably greater. For the operations on

the part of the hemispheres which are comprised in perceiving a simple

sensation (such as an electrical shock) and the volitional act of

signalling the perception, cannot be performed in less than 1/12 of a

second, which is nearly twice as long as the time required by the lower

nerve-centres for the performance of a reflex action. Other experiments

prove that the more complex an act of perception, the more time is

required for its performance. Thus, when the experiment is made to

consist, not merely in signalling a perception, but in signalling one of

two or more perceptions (such as an electrical shock on one or other of

the two hands, which of five letters is suddenly exposed to view, &c.),

a longer time is required for the more complex process of distinguishing

which of the two or more expected stimuli is perceived, and in

determining which of the appropriate signals to make in response. The

time consumed by the cerebral hemispheres in meeting a 'dilemma' of this

kind is from 1/5 to 1/20 of a second longer than that which they consume

in the case of a simpler perception. Therefore, whenever mental

operations are concerned, a relatively much greater time is required for

a nerve-centre to perform its adjustments than when a merely mechanical

or non-mental response is needed; and the more complex the mental

operation the more time is necessary. Such may be termed the physiology

of deliberation.

So much, then, for the rate at which molecular movements travel through

nerves, and the times which nerve-centres consume in performing their

molecular adjustments. We may next consider the researches which have

been made within the last few months upon the rates of these movements

themselves, or the number of vibrations per second with which the

particles of nervous matter oscillate.

If, by means of a suitable apparatus, a muscle is made to record its own

contraction, we find that during all the time it is in contraction, it

is under-going a vibratory movement at the rate of about nine pulsations

per second. What is the meaning of this movement? The meaning is that

the act of will in the brain, which serves as a stimulus to the

contraction of the muscle, is accompanied by a vibratory movement in the

grey matter of the brain; that this movement is going on at the rate of

nine pulsations per second; and that the muscle is giving a separate or

distinct contraction in response to every one of these nervous

pulsations. That such is the true explanation of the rhythm in the

muscle is proved by the fact that if, instead of contracting a muscle by

an act of the will, it be contracted by means of a rapid series of

electrical shocks playing upon its attached nerve, the record then

furnished shows a similar trembling going on in the muscle as in the

previous case; but the tremors of contraction are now no longer at the

rate of nine per second: they correspond beat for beat with the

interruptions of the electrical current. That is to say, the muscle is

responding separately to every separate stimulus which it receives

through the nerve; and further experiment shows that it is able thus to

keep time with the separate shocks, even though these be made to follow

one another so rapidly as 1,000 per second. Therefore we can have no

doubt that the slow rhythm of nine per second under the influence of

volitional stimulation, represents the rate at which the muscle is

receiving so many separate impulses from the brain: the muscle is

keeping time with the molecular vibrations going on in the cerebral

hemispheres at the rate of nine beats per second. Careful tracings show

that this rate cannot be increased by increasing the strength of the

volitional stimulus; but some individuals--and those usually who are of

quickest intelligence--display a somewhat quicker rate of rhythm, which

may be as high as eleven per second. Moreover, it is found that by

stimulating with strychnine any of the centres of reflex action, pretty

nearly the same rate of rhythm is exhibited by the muscles thus thrown

into contraction; so that all the nerve-cells in the body are thus shown

to have in their vibrations pretty nearly the same period, and not to be

able to vibrate with any other. For no matter how rapidly the electrical

shocks are allowed to play upon the grey matter of the cerebral

hemispheres, as distinguished from the nerve-trunks proceeding from them

to the muscles, the muscles always show the same rhythm of about nine

beats per second: the nerve-cells, unlike the nerve-fibres, refuse to

keep time with the electric shocks, and will only respond to them by

vibrating at their own intrinsic rate of nine beats per second.

Thus much, then, for the rate of molecular vibration which goes on in

nerve-centres. But the rate of such vibration which goes on in sensory

and motor nerves may be very much more rapid. For while a nerve-centre

is only able to _originate_ a vibration at the rate of about nine beats

per second, a motor-nerve, as we have already seen, is able to

_transmit_ a vibration of at least 1,000 beats per second; and a sensory

nerve which at the surface of its expansion is able to respond

differently to differences of musical pitch, of temperature, and even of

colour, is probably able to vibrate very much more rapidly even than

this. We are not, indeed, entitled to conclude that the nerves of

special sense vibrate in actual unison, or synchronize, with these

external sources of stimulation; but we are, I think, bound to conclude

that they must vibrate in some numerical proportion to them (else we

should not perceive objective differences in sound, temperature, or

colour); and even this implies that they are probably able to vibrate at

some enormous rate.

With further reference to these molecular movements in sensory nerves,

the following important observation has been made--viz. that there is a

constant ratio between the amount of agitation produced in a sensory

nerve, and the intensity of the corresponding sensation. This ratio is

not a direct one. As Fechner states it, 'Sensation varies, not as the

stimulus, but as the logarithm of the stimulus.' Thus, for instance, if

1,000 candles are all throwing their light upon the same screen, we

should require ten more candles to be added before our eyes could

perceive any difference in the amount of illumination. But if we begin

with only 100 candles shining upon the screen, we should perceive an

increase in the illumination by adding a single candle. And what is true

of sight is equally true of all the other senses: if any stimulus is

increased, the smallest increase of sensation first occurs when the

stimulus rises one per cent, above its original intensity. Such being

the law on the side of sensation, suppose that we place upon the optic

nerve of an animal the wires proceeding from a delicate galvanometer, we

find that every time we stimulate the eye with light, the needle of the

galvanometer moves, showing electrical changes going on in the nerve,

caused by the molecular agitations. Now these electrical changes are

found to vary in intensity with the intensity of the light used as a

stimulus, and they do so very nearly in accordance with the law of

sensation just mentioned. So we say that in sensation the cerebral

hemispheres are, as it were, acting the part of galvanometers in

appreciating the amount of molecular change which is going on in sensory

nerves; and that they record their readings in the mind as faithfully as

a galvanometer records its readings on the dial.

* * * * *

Hitherto we have been considering certain features in the physiology of

nervous action, so far as this can be appreciated by means of

physiological instruments. But we have just seen that the cerebral

hemispheres may themselves be regarded as such instruments, which record

in our minds their readings of changes going on in our nerves. Hence,

when other physiological instruments fail us, we may gain much

additional insight touching the movements of nervous matter by attending

to the thoughts and feelings of our own minds; for these are so many

indices of what is going on in the cerebral hemispheres. I therefore

propose next to contemplate the mind, considered thus as a physiological

instrument.

The same scientific instinct which led Hobbes so truly to anticipate the

progress of physiology, led him not less truly to anticipate the

progress of psychology. For just as he was the first to enunciate the

fundamental principle of nerve-action in the vibration of molecules, so

was he likewise the first to enunciate the fundamental principle of

psychology in the association of ideas. And the great advance of

knowledge which has been made since his day with respect to both these

principles, entitles us to be much more confident than even he was that

they are in some way intimately united. Moreover, the manner in which

they are so united we have begun clearly to understand. For we know from

our study of nerve-action in general, that when once a wave of invisible

or molecular movement passes through any line of nerve-structure, it

leaves behind it a change in the structure such that it is afterwards

more easy for a similar wave, when started from the same point, to

pursue the same course. Or, to adopt a simile from Hobbes, just as water

upon a table flows most readily in the lines which have been wetted by a

previous flow, so the invisible waves of nerve-action pass most readily

in the lines of a previous passage. This is the reason why in any

exercise requiring muscular co-ordination, or dexterity, 'practice makes

perfect:' the nerve-centres concerned learn to perform their work by

frequently repeating it, because in this way the needful lines of

wave-movement in the structure of the nerve-centre are rendered more and

more permeable by use. Now we have seen that in the nerve-centres called

the cerebral hemispheres, wave-movement of this kind is accompanied with

feeling. Changes of consciousness follow step by step these waves of

movement in the brain, and therefore when on two successive occasions

the waves of movement pursue the same pathway in the brain, they are

attended with a succession of the same ideas in the mind. Thus we see

that the tendency of ideas to _re_cur in the same order as that in

which they have previously _oc_curred, is merely an obverse expression

of the fact that lines of wave-movement in the brain become more and

more permeable by use. So it comes that a child can learn its lessons by

frequently repeating them; so it is that all our knowledge is

accumulated; and so it is that all our thinking is conducted.

A wholly new field of inquiry is thus opened up. By using our own

consciousness as a physiological instrument of the greatest delicacy, we

are able to learn a great deal about the dynamics of brain-action

concerning which we should otherwise remain in total ignorance. But the

field of inquiry thus opened up is too large for me to enter upon

to-day. I will therefore merely observe, in general terms, that although

we are still very far from understanding the operations of the brain in

thought, there can be no longer any question that in these operations of

the brain we have what I may term the objective machinery of thought.

'Not every thought to every thought succeeds indifferently,' said

Hobbes. Starting from this fact, modern physiology has clearly shown why

it is a fact; and looking to the astonishing rate at which the science

of physiology is now advancing, I think we may fairly expect that within

a time less remote than the two centuries which now separate us from

Hobbes, the course of ideas in a given train of thought will admit of

having its footsteps tracked in the corresponding pathways of the brain.

Be this, however, as it may, even now we know enough to say that,

whether or not these footsteps will ever admit of being thus tracked in

detail, they are all certainly present in the cerebral structures of

each one of us. What we know on the side of mind as logical sequence, is

on the side of the nervous system nothing more than a passage of nervous

energy through one series of cells and fibres rather than through

another: what we recognize as truth is merely the fact of the brain

vibrating in tune with Nature.

* * * * *

Such being the intimate relation between nerve-action and mind-action,

it has become the scientifically orthodox teaching that the two stand to

one another in the relation of cause to effect. One of the most

distinguished of my predecessors in this place, the President of the

Royal Society, has said in one of the most celebrated of his

lectures:--'We have as much reason for regarding the mode of motion of

the nervous system as the cause of the state of consciousness, as we

have for regarding any event as the cause of another.' And, by way of

perfectly logical deduction from this statement, Professor Huxley argues

that thought and feeling have nothing whatever to do with determining

action: they are merely the bye-products of cerebration, or, as he

expresses it, the indices of changes which are going on in the brain.

Under this view we are all what he terms conscious automata, or machines

which happen, as it were by chance, to be conscious of some of their own

movements. But the consciousness is altogether adventitious, and bears

the same ineffectual relation to the activity of the brain as a

steam-whistle bears to the activity of a locomotive, or the striking of

a clock to the time-keeping adjustments of the clock-work. Here, again,

we meet with an echo of Hobbes, who opens his work on the Commonwealth

with these words:--

'Nature, the art whereby God hath made and governs the world, is by

the _art_ of man, as in many other things, in this also imitated,

that it can make an artificial animal. For seeing life is but a

motion of limbs, the beginning whereof is in the principal part

within; why may we not say, that all _automata_ (engines that move

themselves by springs and wheels as doth a watch), have an

artificial life? For what is the _heart_, but a _spring_; and the

_nerves_, but so many _strings_; and the _joints_, but so many

_wheels_, giving motion to the whole body, such as was intended by

the artificer[2]?'

Now, this theory of conscious automatism is not merely a legitimate

outcome of the theory that nervous changes are the causes of mental

changes, but it is logically the only possible outcome. Nor do I see any

way in which this theory can be fought on grounds of physiology. If we

persist in regarding the association between brain and thought

exclusively from a physiological point of view, we must of necessity be

materialists. Further, so far as we are physiologists our materialism

can do us no harm. On the contrary, it is to us of the utmost service,

as at once the simplest physiological explanation of facts already

known, and the best working hypothesis to guide us in our further

researches. But it does not follow from this that the theory of

materialism is true. The bells of St. Mary's over the way always ring

for a quarter of an hour before the University sermon; yet the ringing

of the bells is not the cause of the sermon, although, as long as the

association remains constant, there would be no harm in assuming, for

any practical purposes, that it is so. But just as we should be wrong in

concluding, if we did not happen to know so much about the matter as we

do, that the University sermon is produced by the vibration of bells in

the tower of St. Mary's Church, so we may be similarly wrong if we were

definitely to conclude that the sermon is produced by the vibration of a

number of little nerve-cells in the brain of the preacher.

Now, if time permitted, and if I supposed that you would all care to go

with me into matters of some abstruseness, I could certainly prove that

whatever the connexion between body and mind may be, we have the best

possible reasons for concluding that it is not a causal connexion. These

reasons are, of course, extra-physiological; but they are not on this

account less conclusive. Within the limits of a lecture, however, I can

only undertake to give an outline sketch of what I take to be the

overwhelming argument against materialism.

We have first the general fact that all our knowledge of motion, and so

of matter, is merely a knowledge of the modifications of mind. That is

to say, all our knowledge of the external world--including the knowledge

of our own brains--is merely a knowledge of our own mental states. Let

it be observed that we do not even require to go so far as the

irrefutable position of Berkeley, that the existence of an external

world without the medium of mind, or of being without knowing, is

inconceivable. It is enough to take our stand on a lower level of

abstraction, and to say that whether or not an external world can exist

apart from mind in any absolute or inconceivable sense, at any rate it

cannot do so _for us_. We cannot think any of the facts of external

nature without presupposing the existence of a mind which thinks them;

and therefore, so far at least as we are concerned, mind is necessarily

prior to everything else. It is for us the only mode of existence which

is real in its own right; and to it, as to a standard, all other modes

of existence which may be _in_ferred must be _re_ferred. Therefore, if

we say that mind is a function of motion, we are only saying, in

somewhat confused terminology, that mind is a function of itself.

Such, then, I take to be a general refutation of materialism. To use but

a mild epithet, we must conclude that the theory is unphilosophical,

seeing that it assumes one thing to be produced by another thing, in

spite of an obvious demonstration that the alleged effect is necessarily

prior to its cause. Such, I say, is a general refutation of

materialism. But this is far from being all. 'Motion,' says Hobbes,

'produceth nothing but motion;' and yet he immediately proceeds to

assume that in the case of the brain it produces, not only motion, but

mind. He was perfectly right in saying that with respect to its

movements the animal body resembles an engine or a watch; and if he had

been acquainted with the products of higher evolution in watch-making,

he might with full propriety have argued, for instance, that in the

compensating balance, whereby a watch adjusts its own movements in

adaptation to external changes of temperature, a watch is exhibiting the

mechanical aspect of volition. And, similarly, it is perhaps possible to

conceive that the principles of mechanism might be more and more

extended in their effects, until, in so marvellously perfected a

structure as the human brain, all the voluntary movements of the body

might be originated in the same mechanical manner as are the

compensating movements of a watch; for this, indeed, as we have seen, is

no more than happens in the case of all the nerve-centres other than the

cerebral hemispheres. If this were so, motion would be producing nothing

but motion, and upon the subject of brain-action there would be nothing

further to say. Without consciousness I should be delivering this

lecture; without consciousness you would be hearing it; and all the busy

brains in this University would be conducting their researches, or

preparing for their examinations, mindlessly. Strange as such a state

of things might be, still motion would be producing nothing but motion;

and, therefore, if there were any mind to contemplate the facts, it

would encounter no philosophical paradox: it would merely have to

conclude that such were the astonishing possibilities of mechanism. But,

as the facts actually stand, we find that this is not the case. We find,

indeed, that up to a certain level of complexity mechanism alone is able

to perform all the compensations or adjustments which are performed by

the animal body; but we also find that beyond this level such

compensations or adjustments are never performed without the

intervention of consciousness. Therefore, the theory of automatism has

to meet the unanswerable question--How is it that in the machinery of

the brain motion produces this something which is not motion? Science

has now definitely proved the correlation of all the forces; and this

means that if any kind of motion could produce anything else that is not

motion, it would be producing that which science would be bound to

regard as in the strictest sense of the word a miracle. Therefore, if we

are to take our stand upon science--and this is what materialism

professes to do--we are logically bound to conclude, not merely that the

evidence of causation from body to mind is not so cogent as that of

causation in any other case, but that in this particular case causation

may be proved, again in the strictest sense of the term, a physical

impossibility.

To adduce only one other consideration. Apart from all that I have said,

is it not in itself a strikingly suggestive fact that consciousness

only, yet always, appears upon the scene when the adjustive actions of

any animal body rise above the certain level of intricacy to which I

have alluded? Surely this large and general fact points with

irresistible force to the conclusion, that in the performance of these

more complex adjustments, consciousness--or the power of feeling and the

power of willing--is of some _use_. Assuredly on the principles of

evolution, which materialists at all events cannot afford to disregard,

it would be a wholly anomalous fact that so wide and important a class

of faculties as those of mind should have become developed in constantly

ascending degrees throughout the animal kingdom, if they were entirely

without use to animals. And, be it observed, this consideration holds

good whatever views we may happen to entertain upon the special theory

of natural selection. For the consideration stands upon the general fact

that all the organs and functions of animals are of use to animals: we

never meet, on any large or general scale, with organs and functions

which are wholly adventitious. Is it to be supposed that this general

principle fails just where its presence is most required, and that the

highest functions of the highest organs of the highest animals stand out

of analogy with all other functions in being themselves functionless? To

this question I, for one, can only answer, and answer unequivocally,

No. As a rational being who waits to take a wider view of the facts than

that which is open to the one line of research pursued by the

physiologist, I am forced to conclude that not without a reason does

mind exist in the frame of things; and that apart from the activity of

mind, whereby motion is related to that which is not motion, this planet

could never have held the wonderful being, who in multiplying has

replenished the earth and subdued it--holding dominion over the fish of

the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that

moveth.

What, then, shall we say touching this mysterious union of mind and

motion? Having found it physically impossible that there should be a

causal connexion proceeding from motion to mind, shall we try to reverse

the terms, and suppose a causal connexion proceeding from mind to

motion? This is the oldest and still the most popular theory--the theory

of spiritualism. And, no doubt, in one important respect it is less

unphilosophical than the opposite theory of materialism. For

spiritualism supposes the causation to proceed from that which is the

source of our idea of causality--the mind: not from that into which this

idea has been read--the brain. Therefore, if causation were to be

accepted as a possibility either way, it would be less unreasonable to

suppose mental changes the causes of material changes than _vice versa_;

for we should then at least be starting from the basis of immediate

knowledge, instead of from the reflection of that knowledge in what we

call the external world. Seeing that the external world is known to us

only as motion, it is logically impossible for the mind to infer its own

causation from the external world; for this would be to infer that it is

an effect of motion, which would be the same as saying that it is an

effect of its own knowledge; and this would be absurd. But, on the other

hand, it is not thus logically impossible for the mind to infer that it

may be the cause of some of its own knowledge, or, in other words, that

it may have in some measure the power of producing what it knows as

motion. And when the mind does infer this, no logic on earth is able to

touch the inference; the position of pure idealism is beyond the reach

of argument. Nevertheless, it is opposed to the whole momentum of

science. For if mind is supposed, on no matter how small a scale, to be

a cause of motion, the fundamental axiom of science is impugned. This

fundamental axiom is that energy can neither be created nor

destroyed--that just as motion can produce nothing but motion, so,

conversely, motion can be produced by nothing but motion. Regarded,

therefore, from the stand-point of physical science, the theory of

spiritualism is in precisely the same case as the theory of materialism:

that is to say, if the supposed causation takes place, it can only be

supposed to do so by way of miracle.

And this is a conclusion which the more clear-sighted of the idealists

have expressly recognized. That subtle and most entertaining thinker,

for example, the late Professor Green of Oxford, has said that the

self-conscious volition of man 'does not consist in a series of natural

events, ... is not natural in the ordinary sense of that term; not

natural at any rate in any sense in which naturalness would imply its

determination by antecedent events, or by conditions of which it is not

itself the source.'

Thus the theory of spiritualism, although not directly refutable by any

process of logic, is certainly enfeebled by its collision with the

instincts of physical science. In necessarily holding the facts of

consciousness and volition super-natural, extra-natural, or non-natural,

the theory is opposed to the principle of continuity.

Spiritualism being thus unsatisfactory, and materialism impossible, is

there yet any third hypothesis in which we may hope to find intellectual

rest? In my opinion there is. If we unite in a higher synthesis the

elements both of spiritualism and of materialism, we obtain a product

which satisfies every fact of feeling on the one hand, and of

observation on the other. The manner in which this synthesis may be

effected is perfectly simple. We have only to suppose that the

antithesis between mind and motion--subject and object--is itself

phenomenal or apparent: not absolute or real. We have only to suppose

that the seeming duality is relative to our modes of apprehension; and,

therefore, that any change taking place in the mind, and any

corresponding change taking place in the brain, are really not two

changes, but one change. When a violin is played upon we hear a musical

sound, and at the same time we see a vibration of the strings.

Relatively to our consciousness, therefore, we have here two sets of

changes, which appear to be very different in kind; yet we know that in

an absolute sense they are one and the same: we know that the diversity

in consciousness is created only by the difference in our modes of

perceiving the same event--whether we see or whether we hear the

vibration of the strings. Similarly, we may suppose that a vibration of

nerve-strings and a process of thought are really one and the same

event, which is dual or diverse only in relation to our modes of

perceiving it.

The great advantage of this theory is that it supposes only one stream

of causation, in which both mind and motion are simultaneously

concerned. The theory, therefore, escapes all the difficulties and

contradictions with which both spiritualism and materialism are beset.

Thus, motion is supposed to be producing nothing but motion;

mind-changes nothing but mind-changes: both producing both

simultaneously, neither could be what it is without the other, because

without the other neither could be the cause which in fact it is.

Impossible, therefore, is the supposition of the materialist that

consciousness is adventitious, or that in the absence of mind changes

of brain could be what they are; for it belongs to the very causation of

these changes that they should have a mental side. The use of mind to

animals is thus rendered apparent; for intelligent volition is thus

shown to be a true cause of adjustive movement, in that the cerebration

which it involves could not otherwise be possible: the causation would

not otherwise be complete.

A simple illustration may serve at once to render this doctrine more

easily intelligible, and to show that, if accepted, the doctrine, as it

appears to me, terminates the otherwise interminable controversy on the

freedom of the will.

In an Edison lamp the light which is emitted from the burner may be said

indifferently to be caused by the number of vibrations per second going

on in the carbon, or by the temperature of the carbon; for this rate of

vibration could not take place in the carbon without constituting that

degree of temperature which affects our eyes as luminous. Similarly, a

train of thought may be said indifferently to be caused by brain-action

or by mind-action; for, _ex hypothesi_, the one could not take place

without the other. Now, when we contemplate the phenomena of volition by

themselves, it is as though we were contemplating the phenomena of light

by themselves: volition is produced by mind in brain, just as light is

produced by temperature in carbon. And just as we may correctly speak of

light as the cause, say, of a photograph, so we may correctly speak of

volition as the cause of bodily movement. That particular kind of

physical activity which takes place in the carbon could not take place

without the light which causes a photograph; and, similarly, that

particular kind of physical activity which takes place in the brain

could not take place without the volition which causes a bodily

movement. So that volition is as truly a cause of bodily movement as is

the physical activity of the brain; seeing that, in an absolute sense,

the cause is one and the same. But if we once clearly perceive that what

in a relative sense we know as volition is, in a similar sense, the

cause of bodily movement, we terminate the question touching the freedom

of the will. For this question in its last resort--and apart from the

ambiguity which has been thrown around it by some of our

metaphysicians--is merely the question whether the will is to be

regarded as a cause of Nature. And the theory which we have now before

us sanctions the doctrine that it may be so regarded, if only we

remember that its causal activity depends upon its identity with the

obverse aspect known as cerebration, without which identity in apparent

duality neither volition nor cerebration could be the cause which in

fact they are. It thus becomes a mere matter of phraseology whether we

speak of the will determining, or being determined by, changes going on

in the external world; just as it is but a matter of phraseology whether

we speak of temperature determining, or being determined by, molecular

vibration. All the requirements alike of the free-will and of the

bond-will hypotheses are thus satisfied by a synthesis which comprises

them both. On the one hand, it would be as impossible for an

_un_conscious automaton to do the work or to perform the adjustments of

a conscious agent, as it would be for an Edison lamp to give out light

and cause a photograph when not heated by an electric current. On the

other hand, it would be as impossible for the will to originate bodily

movement without the occurrence of a strictly physical process of

cerebration, as it would be for light to shine in an Edison lamp which

had been deprived of its carbon-burner.

It may be said of this theory that it is highly speculative, not

verifiable by any possible experiment, and therefore at best is but a

mere guess. All which is, no doubt, perfectly true; but, on the other

hand, we must remember that this theory comes to us as the only one

which is logically possible, and at the same time competent to satisfy

the facts alike of the outer and of the inner world. It is a speculation

in the sense of not being verifiable by experiment; but it has much more

value than ordinarily attaches to an unverifiable speculation, in that

there is really no alternative hypothesis to be considered: if we choose

to call it a guess, we must at the same time remember it is a guess

where it does not appear that any other is open. Once more to quote

Hobbes, who, as we have seen, was himself a remarkable instance of what

he here says: 'The best prophet naturally is the best guesser; and the

best guesser, he that is most versed and studied in the matters he

guesses at.' In this case, therefore, the best prophet is not the

physiologist, whose guess ends in materialism; nor the purely mental

philosopher, whose guess ends in spiritualism; but rather the man who,

being 'versed and studied' in all the facts appertaining to both sides

of the matter, ends in the only alternative guess which remains open.

And if that most troublesome individual, the 'plain man' of Locke,

should say it seems at least opposed to common sense to suppose that

there is anything in a burning candle or a rolling billiard-ball

substantially the same as mind, the answer is that if he could look into

my brain at this moment he would see nothing there but motion of

molecules, or motion of masses; and apart from the accident of my being

able to tell him so, his 'common sense' could never have divined that

these motions in my brain are concerned in the genesis of my spoken

thoughts.

* * * * *

It is obvious that from this hypothesis as to the substantial identity

of mind and motion, two important questions arise; and I feel that some

reference to these questions is in present circumstances forced upon me,

because they have both been considered in precisely the same connexion

by one of the most powerful intellects that was ever sent out into the

world by this University. I mean the late Professor Clifford. As my

intimate and valued friend, I desire to mention his name in this place

with all the affection, as well as with all the admiration, to which I

well know it is so fully entitled; and if I appear to mention him only

in order to disagree with him, this is only because I know equally well

that in his large and magnanimous thought differences of philosophical

opinion were never felt to weaken the bonds of friendship.

In his well-known lecture on Body and Mind, Professor Clifford adopted

the hypothesis of identity which we are now considering, and from it was

led to the conclusion that if in the case of cerebral processes motion

is one with mind, the same must be true of motion wherever it occurs;

or, as he expressed it subsequently, the whole universe must be made of

mind-stuff. But in his view, although matter in motion presents what may

be termed the raw material of mind, it is only in the highly elaborated

constitution of the human brain that this raw material is sufficiently

wrought up to yield a self-conscious personality. Hence the dissolution

of a human brain implies the dissolution of a human mind; and hence also

the universe, although entirely composed of mind-stuff, is itself

mindless. Now, all I have to say about these two deductions is

this--they do not necessarily follow from the theory which is before us.

In holding that the mind of man perishes with his body, and that above

the mind of man there is no other, Clifford may have been right, or may

have been wrong. I am not here to discuss at length any questions of

such supreme importance. But I feel that I am here to insist upon the

one point which is immediately connected with my subject; and this is,

that whether or not Clifford was right in his conclusions, these

conclusions certainly did not follow by way of any logical sequence from

his premises. Because within the limits of human experience mind is only

known as associated with brain, it clearly does not follow that mind

cannot exist in any other mode. It does not even follow that any

probability upon this matter can be thus established. The basis of

analogy on which Clifford sought to rear an inference of cosmical

extent, was restricted to the one instance of mind as known upon one

planet; and, therefore, it is hard to imagine a more precarious use of

that precarious method which is called by logicians simple enumeration.

Indeed, even for what it is worth, the inference may be pointed with

quite as much effect in precisely the opposite direction. For we have

seen how little it is that we understand of the one mode in which we

certainly know that mind does exist; and if from this little we feel

impelled to conclude that there is a mode of mind which is not

restricted to brain, but co-extensive with motion, is consubstantial and

co-eternal with all that was, and is, and is to come; have we not at

least a suggestion, that high as the heavens are above the earth, so

high above our thoughts may be the thoughts of such a mind as this? I

offer no opinion upon the question whether the general order of Nature

does not require some one explanatory cause; nor upon the question

whether the mind of man itself does not point to something kindred in

the self-existing origin of things. I am not concerned to argue any

point upon which I feel that opinions may legitimately differ. I am only

concerned to show that, in so far as any deductions can be drawn from

the theory which is before us, they make at least as much against as in

favour of the cosmical conclusions arrived at by Clifford.

On February 17, in the year 1600, when the streets of Rome were thronged

with pilgrims from all the quarters of Christendom, while no less than

fifty cardinals were congregated for the Jubilee; into the densely

crowded Campo di Fiori a man was led to the stake, where, 'silent and

self-sustained,' before the eyes of all nations, he perished in the

flames. That death was the death of a martyr: it was met voluntarily in

attestation of truth. But most noble of all the noble army to which he

belonged, the name of that man is written large in history, as the name

of one who had fortitude to die, not in the cause of religious belief,

but in that of scientific conviction. For why did Bruno suffer? He

suffered, as we all know, because he refused to recant his persuasion of

the truth of the Copernican theory. Why, then, do I adduce the name of

Bruno at the close of this lecture? I do so because, as far as I have

been able to ascertain, he was the first clearly to enunciate the

monistic theory of things to which the consideration of my subject has

conducted us. This theory--or that as to the substantial identity of

mind and motion--was afterwards espoused, in different guises, by sundry

other writers; but to Bruno belongs the merit of its original

publication, and it was partly for his adherence to this publication

that he died. To this day Bruno is ordinarily termed a pantheist, and

his theory, which in the light of much fuller knowledge I am advocating,

Pantheism. I do not care to consider a difference of terms, where the

only distinction resides in so unintelligible an idea as that of the

creation of substance. It is more to the purpose to observe that in the

mind of its first originator--and this a mind which was sufficiently

clear in its thought to die for its perception of astronomical

truth--the theory of Pantheism was but a sublime extension of the then

contracted views of Theism. And I think that we of to-day, when we look

to the teaching of this martyr of science, will find that in his theory

alone do we meet with what I may term a philosophically adequate

conception of Deity. If the advance of natural science is now steadily

leading us to the conclusion that there is no motion without mind, must

we not see how the independent conclusion of mental science is thus

independently confirmed--the conclusion, I mean, that there is no being

without knowing? To me, at least, it does appear that the time has come

when we may begin, as it were in a dawning light, to see that the study

of Nature and the study of Mind are meeting upon this greatest of

possible truths. And if this is the case--if there is no motion without

mind, no being without knowing--shall we infer, with Clifford, that

universal being is mindless, or answer with a dogmatic negative that

most stupendous of questions--Is there knowledge with the Most High? If

there is no motion without mind, no being without knowing, may we not

rather infer, with Bruno, that it is in the medium of mind, and in the

medium of knowledge, we live, and move, and have our being?

This, I think, is the direction in which the inference points, if we are

careful to set the logical conditions with complete impartiality. But

the ulterior question remains, whether, so far as science is concerned,

it is here possible to point any inference at all: the whole orbit of

human knowledge may be too narrow to afford a parallax for measurements

so vast. Yet even here, if it be true that the voice of science must

thus of necessity speak the language of agnosticism, at least let us see

to it that the language is pure; let us not tolerate any barbarisms

introduced from the side of aggressive dogma. So shall we find that this

new grammar of thought does not admit of any constructions radically

opposed to more venerable ways of thinking; even if we do not find that

the often-quoted words of its earliest formulator apply with special

force to its latest dialects--that if a little knowledge of physiology

and a little knowledge of psychology dispose men to atheism, a deeper

knowledge of both, and, still more, a deeper thought upon their

relations to one another, will lead men back to some form of religion,

which, if it be more vague, may also be more worthy than that of earlier

days.

'It is a beauteous evening, calm and free;

The holy time is quiet as a nun,

Breathless with adoration; the broad sun

Is sinking down in its tranquillity;

The gentleness of heaven is on the sea:

Listen! the mighty being is awake,

And doth with his eternal motion make

A sound like thunder, everlastingly.'

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 1: _Leviathan_, pt. i. chaps, i. and vi.]

[Footnote 2: _Leviathan_, Introduction.]

MONISM

'Das Ich ist nicht aus Leib und Seele zusammengesetzt, sondern es

ist eine bestimmte Entwicklungsstufe des Wesens, das von

verschiedenem Standpunkt betrachtet in koerperliches und geistiges

Dasein auseinanderfaellt.'--Wundt, _Vorlesungen ueber die

Menschen-und Thierseele_, i. 293.

INTRODUCTION.

In no respect has the progress of physical science exercised a more

profound influence upon philosophical thought than it has by proving an

apparently quantitative relation between material changes and mental

changes. It has always been known that there is qualitative relation.

Even long before mankind suspected that the brain was in any way

connected with thought, it was well understood that alcohol and other

poisons exercised their sundry influences on the mind in virtue of

influences which they exercised upon the body; and even the lowest

savages must always have been aware that a blow on the head is followed

by insensibility. But it was not until the rise of Physiology that this

qualitative relation between corporeal changes and mental changes was

gradually found to be a quantitative one--or that every particular

change of mind had an exact and invariable counterpart in some

particular change of body. It is needless for me to detail the

successive steps in the long course of physiological discovery whereby

this great fact has been established; it is enough to say that the fact

_is_ established to the satisfaction of every physiologist.

Now, when once the relation between material changes and mental changes

has been thus recognized as quantitative--or, which is the same thing,

when once the association has been recognized as both invariable and

exact--there arises the question as to how this relation is to be

explained. Formally considered--or considered as a matter of logical

statement irrespective of the relative probabilities which they may

present, either to the minds of different individuals or to the general

intelligence of the race--it appears to me that the possible hypotheses

are here seven in number.

I. The mental changes may cause the material changes.

II. The material changes may cause the mental changes.

III. There may be no causation either way, because the association

may be only a phenomenal association--the two apparently diverse

classes of phenomena being really one and the same.

IV. There may be no causation either way, because the association

may be due to a harmony pre-established by a superior mind.

V. There may be no causation either way, because the association

may always be due to chance.

VI. There may be no causation either way, because the material

order may not have any real existence at all, being merely an ideal

creation of the mental order.

VII. Whether or not there be any causation either way, the

association may be one which it is necessarily beyond the power of

the human mind to explain.

So far as I can see, this list of possible answers to the question

before us is exhaustive. I will next show why, in my opinion, the last

four of them may be excluded _in limine_.

The suggestion of pre-established harmony (IV) merely postpones the

question: it _assumes_ a higher _mind_ as adjusting correspondencies

between known minds and animal bodies with respect to the activities of

each; and, therefore, it either leaves untouched the ultimate question

concerning the relation of mind (as such) to matter, or else it answers

this question in terms of spiritualism (I).

The suggestion of chance (V) is effectually excluded by the doctrine of

chances: even in any one individual mind, the association between mental

changes and material changes is much too intimate, constant, and

detailed to admit of any one reasonably supposing that it can be due

only to chance.

The suggestion of pure idealism (VI) ultimately implies that the

thinking Ego is itself the sole existence--a position which cannot,

indeed, be turned by any assault of logic; but one which is

nevertheless too obviously opposed to common sense to admit of any

serious defence; its immunity from direct attack arises only from the

gratuitous nature of its challenge to prove a negative (namely, that the

thinking Ego is _not_ the sole existence), and this a negative which is

necessarily beyond the region of proof.

Lastly, the suggestion that the problem is necessarily insoluble (VII)

does not deserve to be regarded as an hypothesis at all; for to suppose

that the problem is necessarily insoluble is merely to exclude the

supposition of there being any hypothesis available.

In view of these several considerations, it appears to me that, although

in a formal sense we may say there are altogether seven possible answers

to the question before us, in reality, or for the purposes of practical

discussion, there are nowadays but three--namely those which head the

above list, and which I will now proceed to consider.

I have named these three hypotheses in the order of their appearance

during the history of philosophical thought. The earliest is the

spiritualistic. As far back as we can trace the conceptions of primitive

man, we meet with an unquestioning belief that it is his spirit which

_animates_ his body; and, starting from this belief as explanatory of

the movements of his own body, he readily attributes movements elsewhere

to analogous agencies--the theory of _animism_ in Nature thus becoming

the universal theory in all early stages of culture. It also appears to

be the theory most natural to our own children during the early years of

their dawning intelligence, and would doubtless continue through life in

the case of every individual human being, were he not subsequently

instructed in the reasons which have led to its rejection by many other

members of his race. These reasons, as already observed, have been

furnished in their entirety only within comparatively recent times; not

until Physiology was able to prove how intimate is the association

between cerebral processes and mental processes did it become possible

for materialism to turn the tables upon spiritualism, by simply

inverting the hypothesis. Lastly, although the theory of Monism (III)

may be traced back at least as far as the pantheistic thought of

Buddhism, it there had reference to theology as distinguished from

psychology. And even as presented in the writings of Bruno, Spinoza, and

other so-called monists prior to the present century, the hypothesis

necessarily lacked completeness on account of the absence of knowledge

afterwards supplied by physiology. For Monism, in the sense of this term

as I shall use it, may be metaphorically regarded as the child of the

two pre-existing theories, Spiritualism and Materialism. The birth of

this child was necessarily impossible before both its parents had

reached mature age. On the one hand it was necessary that the theory of

Spiritualism should have outgrown its infancy as Animism, its childhood

as Polytheism, before it entered upon its youth as Monotheism--or before

it was able to supply material for the conception of Monism as a theory

of cosmical extent. On the other hand, Materialism required to grow into

the fullness of manhood, under the nursing influence of Science, before

it was possible to engender this new-born offspring; for this offspring

is new-born. The theory of Monism, as we are about to consider it, is a

creature of our own generation; and it is only as such that I desire to

call attention to the child. In order, however, to do this, I must

follow the example of biographers in general, and begin by giving a

brief sketch of both the parents.

CHAPTER I.

SPIRITUALISM.

In proceeding to consider the opposite theories of Spiritualism and

Materialism, it is before all else desirable to be perfectly clear upon

the point of theory whereby they are essentially distinguished. This

point is that which is raised by the question whether mind is the cause

or the effect of motion. Both theories are dualistic, and therefore

agree in holding that there is causation as between mind and motion:

they differ only in their teaching as to the direction in which the

causation proceeds. Of course, out of this fundamental difference there

arise many secondary differences. The most important of these secondary

differences has reference to the nature of the eternal or self-existing

substance. Both theories agree that there is such a substance; but on

the question whether this substance be mental or material, the two

theories give contradictory answers, and logically so. For, if mind as

we directly know it (namely, in ourselves) is taken to be a cause of

motion, within our experience mind is accredited with priority; and

hence the inference that elsewhere, or universally, mind is prior to

motion. Furthermore, as motion cannot take place without something which

moves, this something is likewise supposed to have been the result of

mind: hence the doctrine of the creation by mind both of matter and of

energy. On the other hand, the theory of materialism, by refusing to

assign priority to mind as known directly in ourselves, naturally

concludes that mind is elsewhere, or universally, the result of matter

in motion--in other words, that matter in motion is the eternal or

self-existing substance, and, as such, the cause of mind wherever mind

occurs.

I may observe, in passing, that although this cosmical deduction from

the theory of materialism is, as I have said, natural, it is not (as is

the case with the corresponding deduction from the theory of

spiritualism) inevitable. For it is logically possible that even though

all known minds be the results of matter in motion, matter in motion may

nevertheless itself be the result of an unknown mind. This, indeed, is

the position virtually adopted by Locke in his celebrated controversy

with the Bishop of Worcester. Having been taken to task by this divine

for the materialistic tendency of his writings, Locke defends himself by

denying the necessary character of the deduction which we are now

considering. For example, he insists, 'I see no contradiction in it that

the first eternal thinking being should, if he pleased, give to certain

systems of created senseless matter, put together as he thinks fit, some

degrees of sense, perception, and thought: though, as I think, I have

proved (lib. IV, ch. 10 and 14 &c.), it is no less than a contradiction

to suppose matter (which is evidently in its own nature void of sense

and thought) should be that eternal first thinking being.' Under this

view, it will be observed, mind is supposed to have the ultimate

priority, and thus to have been the original or creating cause of matter

in motion, which, in turn, becomes the cause (or, at least, the

conditional condition) of mind of a lower order. This view, however,

need not detain us, inasmuch as it can only be held by those who, on

grounds independent of philosophical thinking, already believe in mind

as the First Cause or Eternal Being: this belief granted, there is, of

course, an end of any question as between Spiritualism and Materialism.

I have, therefore, only mentioned this possible phase of spiritualistic

theory, in order to show that the theory of Materialism as applied to a

human being does not _necessarily_ involve an extension of that theory

to the cosmos. But I hold this distinction as of no practical value: it

merely indicates a logical possibility which no one would be likely to

entertain except on grounds independent of those upon which the

philosophical dispute between Spiritualism and Materialism must be

confined.

Of more practical importance is the remark already made, namely, that

the fundamental or diagnostic distinction between these two species of

theory consists _only_ in the views which they severally take on the

question of causality. This remark is of practical importance, because

in the debate between spiritualists and materialists it is often lost

sight of: nay, in some cases, it is even expressly ignored. Obviously,

when it is either intentionally or unintentionally disregarded, the

debate ceases to be directed to the question under discussion, and may

then wander aimlessly over the whole field of collateral speculation.

Throughout the present essay, therefore, the discussion will be

restricted to the only topic which we have to discuss--namely, whether

mind is the cause of motion, motion the cause of mind, or neither the

cause of the other.

The view to be first considered--namely, that mind is the cause of

motion--obviously has one great advantage over the opposite view: it

supposes the causality to proceed from that which is the source of our

idea of causality (the mind); not from that into which this idea has

been read by the mind. Hence, it is so far less difficult to imagine

that mental changes are the cause of bodily changes than _vice versa_;

for upon this hypothesis we are starting at least from the substance of

immediate knowledge, and not from the reflection of that knowledge in

what we call the external world.

On the other hand, the theory of Spiritualism labours under certain

speculative difficulties which appear to me overwhelming. The most

formidable of these difficulties arises from the inevitable collision of

the theory with the scientific doctrine of the conservation of energy.

Whether or not we adopt the view that all causation of a physical kind

is ultimately an expression of the fact that matter and energy are

indestructible[3], it is equally certain that this indestructibility is

a necessary condition to the occurrence of causation as natural.

Therefore, if the mind of man is capable of breaking in as an

independent cause upon the otherwise uniform system of natural

causation, the only way in which it could do so would be by either

destroying or creating certain _quanta_ of either matter or energy or

both. But to suppose the mind capable of doing any of these things would

be to suppose that the mind is a cause in some other sense than a

physical or a natural cause; it would be to suppose that the mind is a

super-natural cause, or, more plainly, that all mental activity, so far

as it is an efficient cause of bodily movement, is of the nature of a

miracle.

This conclusion, which appears to me unavoidably implicated in the

spiritualistic hypothesis, is not merely improbable _per se_, but admits

of being shown virtually impossible if we proceed to consider the

consequences to which it necessarily leads. A sportsman, for example,

pulls the trigger of a gun, thereby initiating a long train of physical

causes, which we may take up at the point where the powder is

discharged, the shot propelled, and the bird dropped. Here the man's

volition is supposed to have broken in upon the otherwise continuous

stream of physical causes--first by modifying the molecular movements of

his brain, so as to produce the particular co-ordination of

neuro-muscular movement required to take accurate aim and to fire at the

right moment; next by converting a quantity of gunpowder into gas,

propelling a quantity of lead through the air; and finally, by killing a

bird. Now, without tracing the matter further than this, let us consider

how enormous a change the will of the man has introduced, even by so

trivial an exercise of its activity. No doubt the first change in the

material world was exceedingly slight: the molecular movement in the

cortex of his brain was probably not more than might be dynamically

represented by some small fraction of a foot-pound. But so intricate is

the _nexus_ of physical causality throughout the whole domain of Nature,

that the intervention of even so minute a disturbance _ab extra_ is

obviously bound to continue to assert an influence of ever-widening

extent as well as of everlasting duration. The heat generated by the

explosion of the powder, the changed disposition of the shot, the death

of the bird--leading to innumerable physical changes as to stoppage of

many mechanical processes previously going on in the bird's body, loss

of animal heat, &c., and also to innumerable vital changes, leading to

a stoppage of all the mechanical changes which the bird would have

helped to condition had it lived to die some other death, to propagate

its kind, and thus indirectly condition an incalculable number of future

changes that would have been brought about by the ever increasing number

of its descendants--these and an indefinite number of other physical

changes must all be held to have followed as a direct consequence of the

man's volition thus suddenly breaking in as an independent cause upon

the otherwise uniform course of Nature. Now, I say that, apart from some

system of pre-established harmony, it appears simply inconceivable that

the order of Nature could be maintained at all, if it were thus liable

to be interfered with at any moment in any number of points. And if the

spiritualist takes refuge in the further hypothesis of a pre-established

harmony between acts of human (not to add brute) volition and causes of

a natural kind, we have only to observe that he thus lands himself in a

speculative position which is practically identical with that occupied

by the materialist. For the only difference between the two positions

then is that the necessity which the materialist takes to be imposed on

human volition by the system of natural causation, is now taken by the

spiritualist to be equally imposed by a super-natural volition. The

necessity which binds the human volition must be equally rigid in

either case; and therefore it can make no practical difference whether

the source of it be regarded as natural or super-natural, material or

mental: so that a man be fated to will only in certain ways--and this

with all the rigour which belongs to causation as physical--it is

scarcely worth while to dispute whether the predestination is of God or

of Nature. There can be no question, however, that in this matter the

possibility which I have supposed to be suggested by the spiritualist is

more far-fetched than that which obviously lies to the hand of the

materialist; and, moreover, that it too plainly wears the appearance of

a desperate device to save a hollow theory.

It remains to add that this great difficulty against the spiritualistic

theory has been revealed in all its force only during the present

generation. Since the days of fetishism, indeed, the difficulty has

always been an increasing one--growing with the growth of the perception

of uniformity on the one hand, and of mechanical as distinguished from

volitional agency on the other. But it was not until the correlation of

all the physical forces had been proved by actual experiment, and the

scientific doctrine of the conservation of energy became as a

consequence firmly established, that the difficulty in question assumed

the importance of a logical barrier to the theory of mental changes

acting as efficient causes of material changes.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 3: In the opinion of some modern writers the indestructibility

of matter and the conservation of energy are alone sufficient to explain

all the facts of natural causation. 'For,' it is urged, 'if in any case

similar antecedents did not determine similar consequents, on one or

other of these occasions some _quantum_ of force, or of matter, or of

both, must have disappeared--or, which is the same thing, the law of

causation cannot have been constant.' In a future chapter I shall have

to recur to this view. Meanwhile I have only to observe that whether or

not the law of causation is nothing more than a re-statement of the fact

that matter and energy are indestructible, it is equally true that this

fact is at least a necessary _condition_ to the operation of that law.]