Physiologist needs other evidence. Consciousness.

avoid materialism, if, in examining the connection between the mind and the body, he rejects all evidence beside that which physiology furnishes. He can be saved from this result only by being content with the narrow limits, to which he is shut up, if he confine himself to absolute proof. As we have already seen, the positive knowledge that physiology gives us on this subject is exceedingly narrow. We soon come to the line that divides between the known and the supposed. And if we attempt to go beyond that, our conclusions as to what is probable will quite certainly lead us to the result which I have pointed out. The need, therefore, of the evidence drawn from the other sources that I have mentioned is most palpable. The physiologist must confess himself to be under the necessity of going out of his physiology, in order to learn all that can be learned upon this subject. At the best, there is much mystery in relation to it which we cannot penetrate, with all the light that we can bring to bear upon it. And the mystery is deep indeed, when we call to our aid only the dim light of physiology. It needs some other light to deliver us from the confusion of ideas, into which we are introduced by the analogy existing between the phenomena of life and instinct and intelligence, in relation to their connection with the organization of matter. Let us look then at the evidence which comes from the other two sources, viz., our consciousness, and revelation.

526. Every individual is conscious that, as he feels and thinks and acts, he, that is his mind or spirit, acts upon the structure of his body, and is acted upon by it. It is not a consciousness that he as a material body does all this. He feels that it is a power within that does it, and he instinctively separates in his ideas the power from the different parts of the body, and from the body as a whole. He is conscious too of a responsibility in relation to the thoughts and acts of the spirit within. He has a knowledge of right and wrong, and has self-reproach on doing wrong, and self-approbation on doing right. It is this consciousness of a self-acting immaterial spirit in this material body, that constitutes the basis of all character, and of all the moral relations of man to his fellow man, and to his Maker. Every body acts upon the testimony of this consciousness as being valid and certain testimony. And, however the physiologist may reason about matter and mind, as if the latter were a mere product or endowment of the former, yet as a man, as a member of society, as a subject of government and law, he cannot avoid acting upon the ground, that mind in a certain sense controls matter,

Evidence from consciousness confirmed by Revelation.

and is responsible for its acts independently of the matter with which it is connected.

527. Now the evidence which this consciousness affords us should suffice to keep us from the materialism, into which physiology taken alone would be apt to lead us. It shows us that, although the mind is developed with the material organization, and can act only with it, it is not its mere product, nor one of its endowments. It shows us, on the other hand, that it is in some measure independent of matter, and that its dependence upon it is only a dependence of connection, matter being the instrument of mind, through which it acts on external things, and is acted upon by them. The evidence from this source is of a positive character. We are driven by it to the alternative, of believing that the mind is an immaterial, self-acting agent, in some measure independent of matter, or of harboring the impious and monstrous belief, that the Creator has implanted in the bosom of man a lie, and that he is living a horrible farce, acting in view of moral relations and responsibilities that have no existence.

528. This positive testimony of our consciousness is confirmed by the testimony of revelation. This is not done by any formal array of proof. The existence of the spiritual part of man as a self-acting responsible agent is assumed as a fact that needs no proof. All the statements, and teachings, and appeals of the Bible recognize it as a fact known to the consciousness of every man. The Bible, therefore, may be considered as simply affirming that the testimony of our consciousness on this point is valid testimony. But the Bible goes farther than this. It gives us one great fact of which neither physiology nor our consciousness could assure us. I refer to the mind's immortality. Our consciousness could, it is true, give us presumptive evidence to show that the soul with its high powers and aspirations is to live after the death of the body. But it could furnish us no absolute proof of the fact. And its presumptive evidence would be effectually rebutted by the presumptive evidence from physiology, which, as you have seen, points in another direction. We are so familiar with the mind's immortality as a known fact, and we so uniformly think of it in connection with the death of the body, that we are not aware how absolutely dependent we are upon revelation for all that we know in relation to it. If there were no revelation, and death were to us an unknown event, and we were now for the first time called upon to witness the death of a friend, how little should we know, and how con

Immortality revealed only by revelation.

Who

fused would be our thoughts in relation to the great mystery before us! "What is it?" we should ask. "Is it sleep?" No. We never saw any one sleep thus. What is it? can tell us?" And we should wonderingly watch to see some signs of awakening, not giving up all hope till decay begins its ravages on the loved form before us. Then, as we should from the dictate of nature, consign to the earth the friend who was so recently among us a breathing, moving, speaking man, now a mere mass of decaying matter, we should feel that we bury there not the body only, but all that belonged to that body during life-the whole man. Thought and feeling, as well as life and motion, would appear to us, untaught of God, to be extinguished in the grave. Even if some one should utter all tremblingly the hope, that there might be a subtle spiritual part of our friend, that would some time in some form return again to our society, that hope would at once be crushed by the reflection that whatever it was in our friend that thought and felt, it came into existence with the body, was infantile when the body was, grew with the growth of the body, and strengthened with its strength, and therefore now, so far as we can see, has perished with it. Nature utters no voice to tell us otherwise. She emits no light to illumine the grave. Darkness and silence rest there, till the light of revelation shines upon it, and God proclaims man's immortality.

529. I have thus spoken of the three sources of evidence in regard to the connection of the mind and the body, and have indicated the character of the evidence furnished by each. I have shown particularly that if the attention be confined to that which is furnished by physiology, the mind is apt to be led into materialism. But the attention should not thus be confined. All the three kinds of evidence should be employed and should be brought to bear upon each other. If this be done, the discrepancies in the evidence from physiology are cleared up by the evidence afforded by consciousness and revelation, and we see the true value and bearing of the fact, that the specific mental difference between man and animals is not attended with a corresponding structural difference. Though this fact operates merely as conflicting evidence, when taken simply in connection with the rest of the facts developed by physiology; when, we come on the other hand, to take the whole range of evidence from the three sources spoken of, it is exceedingly satisfactory as concurring with the testimony of consciousness and revelation. At the same time, those physiological phenomena, which taken

Evidence from consciousness and Revelation positive.

by themselves seem to show so strongly that the mind is wholly dependent upon organization, are so interpreted by the evidence from the other sources, that the dependence is seen to be for the most part a dependence of connection only, the brain being the instrument of the mind.

530. The evidence from consciousness and revelation is of the most positive character, and cannot be set aside by evidence from any other source. Other evidence may serve to interpret it, but cannot nullify it. The attempt is sometimes made to set it aside by urging the presumptive evidence of physiology, as if it were absolute proof. But most physiologists engage in no such futile and unchristian efforts, but give due weight to the testimony of consciousness and revelation in all their investigations of the mysterious connection of the mind and the body. The influence of Carpenter, an English physiologist, whose works are more extensively used by students than those of any other physiologist, is especially to be commended in this respect. And although skepticism occasionally utters its plausible falsities, deceiving the superficial and the speculative, we have no fears from present indications that the votaries of physiological science will, as a body, be arrayed in opposition to Christianity.

CHAPTER XVIII.

DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MAN AND THE INFERIOR ANIMALS.

531. I HAVE already treated somewhat of the differences between man and the inferior animals in different parts of this book, and especially in the preceding chapter. But it has been done only incidentally, and the subject demands at our hands a more thorough and systematic investigation. This I propose to do in the present chapter.

532. Lord Mon boddo maintained that man is only an improvement on the monkey, occurring as a result from the general tendency to advancement claimed to exist in nature. He seemed to think that man bore a relation to the monkey somewhat like

Lord Monboddo. Nature of instinct a mystery.

that which the frog bears to the tadpole, as described in § 167, and that as the tadpole becomes the frog, so the race of man was produced by a change at some remote period of the creation, of the monkey into a man. This ridiculous notion of the erudite but fanciful Scotch philosopher is really but another phase of the more recent theory of gradation, or development, as it is sometimes called, which in different forms is now advocated by so many European philosophers. And, although few, comparatively, adopt this theory definitely and fully, there is quite a disposition among many to obliterate the distinctions by. which the Creator has in so marked a manner separated man from the inferior animals. It is well, therefore, that we should have a clear idea of these distinctions.

533. It is often very loosely said that while man is governed by reason, instinct rules in the animal.* If it be meant by this that, as a general rule, reason predominates in man, while instinct does so in animals, the statement is a correct one. But if it be meant that animals are wholly governed by instinct, and that man is distinguished from them as a reasoning animal, it is not correct. For some animals do reason, that is, if making inferences be considered as reasoning. In tracing out the differences between man and animals I shall not attempt to show what the nature of instinct is. This is a great mystery, and all attempts to solve it have utterly failed. I shall content myself, therefore, with pointing out some of the differences between in stinct and reason. In doing this it is not always easy to say just where the one begins and the other ends, so intimately are their phenomena often mingled together.

534. The actions of instinct are more unaccountable than

those of reason. In the operations of reason we see something of the processes by which results are reached. But it is not so with instinct. For example, as a man travels over an unexplored country, we can understand by what means he obtains a knowledge of the country, in order to guide him on his journey. The processes of his reasoning in regard to this we can comprehend. But when an insect travels with unerring certainty to its place of destination without any guide marks that we can

* Some explanation may be well here in relation to the different uses made of the word animal in different connections. Here it is used in contra distinction to man. So it is used in the expression, man and animals. But as man is in certain senses an animal, whenever we wish to recognize this fact we speak of other animals as the inferior animals. And thus in regard to animals, we speak of their higher and lower orders, the higher of course being those that approximate nearest to man.