THE LAW OF

VITAL TRANSFUSION

AND THE

PHENOMENON OF
CONSCIOUSNESS

By CHARLES J, REED

STONIENS

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THE LAW OF
VITAL TRANSFUSION

AND THE

PHENOMENON OF
CONSCIOUSNESS

AN ACCOUNT OF THE NECESSITY FOR AND PROBABLE
ORIGIN OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF

SEX

AND OF THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE

CONSCIOUS STATE

IN THE EVOLUTION OF THE ORGANIC WORLD, WITH

A PRELIMINARY STATEMENT OF FUNDAMENTAL

COSMICAL PRINCIPLES

By
CHARLES J. REED

"No event ever happens more than once." — Maxwell.

Occidental Publishing Company
san francisco^ cal.

U. S. A.

Copyright ig2l

By

CHARLES J. REED

/7'^^ y^'

C O N r E N T S

I.

Introduction ......

1

II.

Cosmlcal Principles

5

III.

The Physical Elements ....

8

IV.

Axioms .......

11

V.

Force

11

VI.

The Province of Mathematics . . . .

17

VII.

Bodies

19

VIII.

Living and Lifeless Bodies ....

21

IX.

The Involuntary Vital Function .

27

X.

The Power of Reproduction

29

XI.

Parasitic Reproduction . . .

31

XIL

The Evolution of Sex .....

33

XIII.

34

XIV.

Dissolution

37

XV.

37

XVI.

The Nervous System .....

41

XVII.

Brain Activity and the Conscious State

42

XVIII.

Maintenance of the Conscious State

58

XIX.

64

XX.

The Exodus of the Conscious State

73

/%

^ ' S 9"^^^^

PREFACE

It was intended to add a section on the ahiogenlc evolution of pro-
toplasmic irritability, but the subject is complicated and difficult,
though there appears to be a solution of the problem in endothermic
chemical reaction, which it is hoped may be ready for publication
within another year.

The author acknowledges with pleasure his appreciation of cor-
rections by Dr. Geo. H. Boskowitz of San Francisco.

C. J. Reed.

San Mateo, Cal., Sept. 7, 1921.

ERRORS

Page 2, line 20, "use" should be "used."

Page 17, line 18, from bottom, "cognition" should be "cogi-
tation."

Page 34, line 3, from bottom, "and advantage" should be
"an advantage."

Page 47, h'ne 11, semicolon should be comma.

Page 61, h'ne 8, from bottom, "exhaused" should be "ex-
hausted."

Page 65, last line, last word "maintained" should be "main-
tain."

/ O '^ <'

r OCT161922

THE ^^^.i^/BRAiii^

LAW OF VITAL TRANSFUSION

AND THE

PHENOMENON OF
CONSCIOUSNESS

I.

INTRODUCTION

Two MEN Stand with their faces toward the setting sun. One
has the ordinary power of vision, the other is blind. To the
one there appears a beautiful phenomenon, to the other, nothing.
Both are facing the same juxtaposition of elements, — energy, matter,
space and time, which constitutes the sunset sky. To the one there is
a transfer of external relations through the organs of vision into
correlative internal relations within the brain and the production
within the brain of a cognition or knowledge of the external relations,
which he is able to contemplate. He contemplates with wonder and
admiration this cognition of changing color and form, and he calls it
a beautiful phenomenon. His companion, facing the same juxtapo-
sition of elements, receives no cognition, no knowledge of anything
to admire or contemplate. The phenomenon is, therefore, not the
combination of elements, but the cognition of this combination, the
cognition produced within the brain of the individual through the
organs of vision. To him who has no organs of vision there is no
phenomenon, though the juxtaposition of elements is the same in
both cases.

But if the blind man has only recently become blind and has pre-
viously had the vision of a sunset sky, then the words, "sunset sky,"
if mentioned by his companion, are transferred as an external relation
through the organs of hearing into correlative internal relations
within the brain, and there is then the production of a cognition, not
of the external relations in this case, but a cognition of a previous
cognition, that is, a re-cognition, recollection or memory of the cogni-
tion of a previous juxtaposition of elements of the same general nature,
and he is able to contemplate anew the cognition of a former sunset.

l INTRODUCTION

If, however, this blind man has always been blind, has never had the
cognition of a sunset sky, then there is no avenue through which the
present external relations may transfer correlative internal relations,
and there can be no previous cognitions of vision and, hence, no
re-cognition. Such a person can have no conception of a sunset sky.
So with two persons seated in the auditorium of a grand opera,
one having the ordinary power of hearing, the other being entirely
deaf. There is on the stage another juxtaposition of elements, energy,
matter, space and time. To the person who hears there is a transfer
of external relations through the organs of hearing into correlative
internal relations within the brain and the production within the
brain of a cognition or knowledge of melody, — of external relations,
which may be contemplated. To the other person there is no transfer
of external into correlative internal relations and no sound, no phe-
nomenon.

The word "phenomenon" is usually defined as an appearance, but
it includes anything which appears or becomes known, not only
through vision, but in any way. A thought or any cerebral act or
state capable of cognition, capable of becoming known, is a phe-
nomenon. The word is very often use to designate appearances, visual
or otherwise, which are unusual or not well understood. The word,
phenomenon, may perhaps be applied to a greater variety of subjects
or objects, material and immaterial, than any other word in the lan-
guage. But the ///f«^^ which we call the phenomenon, is not the real phe-
nomenon. The real phenomenon is the cognition of the thing, not the
thing itself — not the juxtaposition of elements. The elements them-
selves cannot reach the brain. Only the transferred relations of the
elements reach the brain, and the brain can take cognizance only of
what reaches it. When we speak of a gorgeously colored sunset sky
as a beautiful phenomenon, we mean the cognition of this juxtaposi-
tion of elements. But we are obliged to use the same word to mean
both the cognition and the cause of the cognition.

We place a telephone to the ear and recognize the voice of a friend,
who is a thousand miles away. Though we have not heard that voice
for years, there is no doubt as to the recognition. We recognize the
voice, yet we do not hear the words spoken by our friend. The words
are spoken in Denver and the voice is recognized in San Francisco,
but the wire connecting these cities carries no sound. That long line
of metal from end to end is as silent as the tomb of Pharaoh, It

INTRODUCTION 6

transmits only impulses of electrical energy. The voice, the words
which are recognized, originate in the brain of the one who hears
in San Francisco. That voice is only a cognition produced in the brain
of the hearer — a cognition of certain relations caused by energy trans-
mitted from Denver to the brain of the hearer in San Francisco. And
this transmission of energy and production of relations in the brain
of the hearer is caused by correlative relations existing at Denver.
The same is true of words spoken in the same room with the hearer,
even spoken directly into the ear.

No external word, no external sound, ever reaches the brain.
There is no external sound. The only sounds ever heard in any
brain are cognitions originating and existing only in the brain — cog-
nitions of internal relations in the brain produced by correlative ex-
ternal relations through energy transmitted to the brain through the
ear and auditory nerve fibers. The ear and the auditory nerve fibers
reaching from it to the brain are the counterpart, mechanically and
functionally, of the telephone and the wire reaching from Denver to
San Francisco.

This is also true of vision. We may truly say that what the eye
sees is not what the eye sees, but what the brain takes cognition of
within itself. All vision is cognition originating and existing only
in the brain, cognition of internal relations produced in the brain by
correlative external relations transmitting energy to the brain through
the visual tract, that is, the eye and optic nerve-fibers. All sensations
are purely physiological phenomena, cognitions produced by external
relations transmitting energy to the brain through sensory tracts.

Our cognitions of the relations of physical elements constitute the
sum of human knowledge. There are undoubtedly many relations and
combinations, of which we have no cognitions, no knowledge. When
some new instrument extends the range of our senses, so that we
become cognizant of these combinations, we call them phenomena.

We appear to have no power of dealing with, of considering, dis-
cussing or even contemplating anything but cognitions. In a physical
sense we may handle portions of the Universe. We may impress upon
portions of the Universe the power of intelligence and will to produce
or prevent changes of condition, but intellectually we are able to deal
only with cognitions of successive states of the Universe or portions
of it, not with the actual physical elements themselves. For example,
through the exercise of intelligence and will we may cause the human

4 INTRODUCTION

hand to manipulate a lever, which, through a suitable mechanism,
will cause a revolving shaft to increase or decrease in its speed or
rate of revolution. But we cannot contemplate either the shaft, its
changes of speed or the mechanism. All we are able to contemplate
is our cognitions of them, not the things themselves.

All cognitions exist in the brain only, but the external objects or
influences which produce cognitions are located at the point of con-
tact or irritation of the nerve with the external influence. For ex-
ample, an injury to the finger, through a nerve-fiber extending from
the point of injury to the brain, causes in the brain the cognition of
the sensation of pain, but the cause of the cognition is located at the
point of injury, the finger, and the brain locates the sensation at that
point. The same is true of all cognitions of external happenings, that
is, all cognitions of sensation. All other cognitions, such as memory,
thought, desire, originate in the brain.

There are, therefore, two distinct kinds or classes of cognitions:
those stimulated or produced by external relations transferred into
correlative internal relations within the brain through the organs of
sense, that is, cognitions originating in energy transmitted by the organs
of sense ; and those stimulated or produced by internal relations already
existing within the brain, which are records of previous cognitions,
that is, cognitions originating in memory. But all cognitions are phe-
nomena of brain activity.

The cognition of a flame of burning gas is an example of a phe-
nomenon, the result of a certain change external to the brain, but
capable of cognition through correlative internal relations produced
in the brain through the organs of sense and only through those
organs. A thought, desire or any cerebral act, state or condition, is a
phenomenon, the result of a certain change within the brain and
capable of cognition without the intervention of organs of sense. The
brain may act, think, or will when all sight, hearing and other sensa-
tion is cut off, provided the brain has previously received and recorded
cognitions of sensation.

Consciousness is the cognition or knowing of existence — the exis-
tence of self and of the Universe. The word, consciousness, defines
not only the cerebral act of self-cognition, but also a cerebral condi-
tion or state, in which the brain has the power of producing other
and different cognitions simultaneously with the cognition of existence.
We shall also frequently refer to consciousness as the conscious state.

COSMICAL PRINCIPLES 3

II.

COSMICAL PRINCIPLES

The physical Universe presents itself to cognition or consciousness as
a continuous succession of conditions produced by change. Change is
everjrwhere and incessant. The sum total of human knowledge is knowl-
edge of continuous change in the present and recollection or memory
of change in the past. All supposed knowledge of the future is not
knowledge. It is only inferential prediction. Because the sun rises
today and rose yesterday, the day before and every past day of our
lives, we infer and believe it will rise tomorrow, but we do not know
and cannot know until tomorrow comes. Our study of the earth,
the sun and the solar and sidereal systems convinces us beyond the
possibility of doubt that the sun will rise tomorrow. But that convic-
tion is not knowledge. It is only inferential prediction.

All that we can possibly know is that which IS and that which
WAS. The future does not yet exist, and it is not possible to know
that which does not exist and has not existed. With the same cer-
tainty that the sun will rise tomorrow we may predict that an eclipse
of the moon will occur on a certain day two thousand years hence.
But we do not absolutely know that the moon or the earth will exist
two thousand years. Yet the conduct of our daily lives, everything
we do of our own volition, is based entirely on inferential prediction
of what will occur — prediction based on what has occurred.

What constitutes change? Change, as it is manifested through the
organs of sense and interpreted by the power of cognition, consists in
a difference between successive states of what we call the universe.

We usually think of change as a change in matter. This is probably
because matter, mass or substance is the vehicle through which sensa-
tion originates, though sensation is not actually produced by matter,
but by energy. A change in matter may be a change in its position,
in its form, in its condition or state, in its motion, in its temperature
or in any of its properties.

Matter may undergo a change in position only by moving from one
position to another. To do this it must acquire motion, must move
through space, and must move during a certain interval of time. No
change occurs instantly and no change in the position of matter can
occur, except by motion in space during time.

6 COSMICAL PRINCIPLES

Matter may undergo a change in form or configuration only when
its parts or some of its parts change position with reference to other
parts. Otherwise we cannot conceive any alteration of form. There-
fore, any change of form in matter can result only from Jiiotion of
matter in space during time.

The various other changes which have been observed in matter,
whether they be change of state, temperature, motion or properties,
have all been extensively investigated, and it has been found that
in every case any change in matter is always the result of the action
upon matter of motion or something equivalent to motion: that this
action always takes place in space and during time. This acting
something , which is equivalent to motion, has been called energy.
All motion of matter is energy and all forms of energy may be
changed into and derived from the motion of matter, and matter in
motion or undergoing any change, is matter acted upon by energy.
This occurs only in space and during time.

Every change is, therefore, A process^ in which energy acts
UPON matter in space during time. The most complicated
change is nothing more and the simplest is nothing less.

Energy^ matter^ space and time, being necessary and sufficient
for every change capable of cognition, constitute the physical elements
of the Universe. The study of these elements and their relations to one
another supplies a rational explanation, or at least affords a means of
finding a rational explanation, for every observed phenomenon.

By a rational explanation is meant an account of the causes and
effects concerned in a fact established or made known through the
organs of sense, an account which involves no contradiction or double
meaning of any of the terms employed and no contradiction of the
observations of normal sense. By an "explanation" we do not mean
an attempt to account for the origin, purpose or destiny of anything,
but merely an attempt to state the relations of all of the causes and
effects. No explanation of anything can do more. We do not even
claim that a rational explanation is necessarily the statement of an
absolute truth. Aw explanation may be entirely rational, as above
defined, and may be entirely satisfactory with reference to and in
accordance with the known facts, and yet, may later be found to be
entirely erroneous. For example, in the Eighteenth Century the
phlogistic theory of matter was entirely rational and stated in a highly
satisfactory manner the relations of causes and eflfects as they were

COSMICAL PRINCIPLES /

then known. But that theory has now been entirely abandoned and
shown to be impossible by the most overwhehning evidence. Never-
theless, in its time it was a rational explanation.

An irrational explanation is an account which involves some con-
tradition, explicit or implied, either of the terms employed or of the
facts established through normal sense.

No rational explanation or account can be given of the origin of
the Universe as such, nor of any part of it, because there can be no
proof or evidence adduced, and, hence, no knowledge in reference to
such questions. All attempts heretofore made to account for the
origin or existence of the Universe involve such contradictions or
ambiguities.

No rational account can be given of any phenomenon without pre-
viously accepting the existence of the physical universe as made known
to consciousness through sense and cognition.

A theory based on a mathematical space of four dimensions, partly
revived from past centuries, has been recently put forward, according
to which there is no space, no time and possibly no energy or matter
in existence, the only existence being "relativity." If we admit the
truth of this theory for the present, in order to avoid wasting time in
its discussion, we are still confronted with the same problem, the
things which most impressively present themselves to consciousness,
energy, matter, space and time. And it is the study of these, whether
they exist or not, that is of interest to humanity.

A rational explanation of the origin of the Universe being impos-
sible, the mind that contemplates such a task is appalled, and a weak,
untrained or insincere mind may be driven into the irrational subter-
fuge of hiding behind the ambiguity of words, in order to avoid
admitting that there is an unknowable.

He who would attain the attainable and know the knowable must
first learn that there is also an unknowable, and must understand
w^hat distinguishes it from the knowable. The knowable is that which
is^ and this includes the record of that which was. Why it is,
WHENCE it is and whither it finally leads are unknowable, because
no evidence in reference to these questions can be adduced. The
knowable is that, in reference to which evidence is possible. The
unknowable is that, in reference to which evidence is impossible. By
evidence we do not mean testi?nony. The testimony or statements of
human beings is legal evidence of a fact, but not scientific evidence.

8 THE PHYSICAL ELEMENTS

Scientific evidence is merely an assemblage of facts. The testimony or
statement of a person, as to the existence of a fact, is sometimes
accepted as scientific evidence, but always subject to verification. To
accept a personal statement without question, as scientific evidence, is
to be guided by authority or superstition, instead of reason.

The existence of the physical elements, energy^ matter^ space
and TIME^ being granted, a rational account of established facts after
thorough investigation is not generally difficult. The proper under-
standing of these elements and their relations to one another, as a
basis for the rational explanation or phenomena, requires that each
element shall be defined in terms which admit of no ambiguity.

III.

THE PHYSICAL ELEMENTS

DEFINITIONS

ENERGY is the physical element of activity or motion.

MATTER is the physical element of ?nass^ passivity or receptivity
of action.

SPACE is the physical element of dimension, relativity of position
or continuity of volume.

TIME OR DURATION is the physical element of relativity of
succession or continuity of being.

Energy and Matter are characterized by 7nobility, mutability and
heterogeneity. They may be moved or transferred, may be altered
in condition, form or state, and they are not uniformly distributed.

That matter may be moved or transferred from one position to
another is one of the most obvious of the facts, which appeal to our
senses or are comprehended by cognition ; that it may undergo changes
of form, state, temperature and properties, and that it is more dense
in certain parts of space than in others, is almost as obvious. That
energy accompanies matter in all of these changes, is not quite as
evident, because the various forms of energy are more elusive than the
forms of matter and do not affect the senses as easily in ways which

THE PHYSICAL ELEMENTS V

we have learned to distinguish and interpret. It will help to a clearer
understanding, if we consider matter or mass merely as a receptacle
for energy, and consider that we know matter only by the manner in
which it is acted upon by energy; that we know energy only by the
manner in which it acts upon matter.

Space and Time are characterized by negativity, that is, by in-
activity, impassivity , immobility, im?nutability, homogeneity and rela-
tivity. Neither space nor time is capable of acting or being acted
upon. Neither space nor time can be conceived to be moved, nor can
either space or time be conceived to undergo any alteration of con-
dition, form or state. One portion of space or time cannot be con-
ceived to differ in density or quality from another portion.

Energy is characterized by the qualities of activity; matter, by the
qualities of passivity; space and time, by the qualities of inactivity
and impassivity.

The extent of space is infinite in every direction. We cannot con-
ceive any limit to space in any direction. That is, we cannot conceive
a place beyond which and in which there is no space.

Time or duration is of infinite extent in one direction or concep-
tion only, the past. In other directions or conceptions it has no dimen-
sion. This one dimension abruptly ends with and is always limited
by the present. We know time or duration only by its single property
or quality of uniform, continuous increment at the present.

The extent of matter may be infinite, but it may also be only
finite. The farthest star or nebula visible to the telescopic eye is prob-
ably not the most remote body in the Universe, but it is the remotest
of which we have any positive knowledge. We believe it is highly
probable that there are other more remote bodies, but that belief is
only inferential. If that belief is a mistake; if there is no other body
beyond the range of the telescope — beyond the range of our present
knowledge — then there is a limit to the quantity of matter. But this
we do not know and are not likely to ever know. We do know, how-
ever, that either of these alternatives is conceivable. It is conceivable
that there may be nothing but space beyond the visible Universe,
but it is not credible. Therefore, we must leave unsettled the question
as to whether matter is of finite or of infinite extent.

As to the extent of energy we have no more positive knowledge
than as to the extent of matter. Energy is known only by its action
upon and association with matter in space during time. Matter is

10 THE PHYSICAL ELEMENTS

known only by the various ways in which it is acted upon by energy.
We cannot conceive energy as acting upon or moving itself. We can-
not conceive energy as acting upon or moving either space or time.
Therefore, energy can be conceived as acting only in connection with
matter. If matter be of only finite extent, then energy is also probably
of only finite extent, since energy can be conceived to exist only in
association with matter. We shall see later that the total energy of
the Universe may be considered as the total separation of particles of
matter from a single mathematical point, which must be the center
of gravity of the Universe. That matter might exist unassociated with
energy is a possible conception. We may conceive of a single, isolated
particle of matter existing in space without attraction, without
motion, without heat, without any form of energy. But the existence
of two or more particles of matter in separated positions in space dur-
ing time implies the possibility of these particles moving toward each
other through space, which means the power of producing motion of
matter in space during time, which is energy.

Matter, energy and space are the three physical elements, which
may be considered as having a persistent existence or entity; a being
of persistent, unaltered quantity existing through successive states of
duration. Time, as a physical element, is not an entity and has not
at any instant a being of unaltered quantity. The only conception we
can have of time is that of uniform and continuous increment or
growth. It is more like a quality or property asserted of the Universe
as a whole, the quality of relativity of succession.

By the cognition of successive states of the Universe or portions of
it, that is, by the cognition of changes, we become aware of the
increment or growth of time, and this is the only property through
which it is known. By arbitrarily assuming the similarity of certain
successive events we obtain a unit of measurement for the growth of
time. It is usual to assume that the successive vibrations of a pendu-
lum of fixed length vibrating on a line fixed with reference to the
earth, are similar events and that they measure equal increments of
time.

AXIOMS — FORCE 1 1

IV.
AXIOMS

1. When there is no evidence that an event has occurred, the
presumption that it has not occurred is w^arranted.

2. The simultaneous occurrence of several events is not evidence
that one of the events causes or is caused by another. Otherwise each
event must necessarily cause and be caused by all of the others.

3. When there is no evidence of the existence of a thing, the pre-
sumption that it does not exist is warranted.

V.

FORCE

All bodies at all times are in certain conditions of stress or tension,
in virtue of which they tend to undergo change. For example, all
bodies with which we are acquainted tend to move toward the
earth's center. We say they exert a pressure, stress or weight in that
direction. This effort we call the attraction of gravity. All such
efforts are called forces^ whether they are efforts of attraction, re-
pulsion, stress, tension or pressure of any kind. All forces are merely
the efforts or tendencies of energy and matter to undergo transforma-
tion or change, and they are all generated by the action of energy
on matter in space during time.

Energy and matter are the only physical elements subject to effort
or force. This is in virtue of their mobility, mutability and hetero-
geneity and in virtue of the activity of energy and the passivity of
matter. Space and time, on account of their inactivity, impassivity,
immobility, immutability and homogeneity, cannot be subject to any
effort or any kind of transformation.

The force of gravitation may be taken as an illustration of the
general nature of forces. The force or attraction of gravity is the
effort of all bodies to move toward the earth's center. We commonly
think of the force of gravitation as extending equally in all directions

12 FORCE

from the center of a body, such as the center of the earth or the
center of an atom. While this statement may be actually true in a
particular case, it is not a correct statement of a general truth. It
is hardly possible that it could be true in any particular case and
could only be true when there is a distribution of matter equally in
all directions. Such a condition is difficult to conceive.

We have no evidence whatever of the existence of any force of
gravitation extending from the earth's center or from any other point
in space, except in lines extending to particles of matter. In other
words, gravitation is an attractive force or effort exerted only be-
tween portions of matter and not radiating uniformly through space.
A correct statement of the principle of gravitation would be that it
is an attractive effort between particles of matter, the intensity of
which is independent of direction in space and dependent only upon
masses and distances. It is evident that no force could be dependent
upon direction in space. Otherwise, space could not be homogeneous.

The gravitational effort of any body or system of particles toward
any external particle or system is the same as though its particles were
all concentrated at a single point called its center of gravity. It is
evident that there can be no gravitational or other attractive effort
between two or more centers of gravity located at the same point,
as, for example, between the centers of concentric spheres. Between
such centers we have no evidence of the existence of any attraction
of gravitation.

Let us assume two such concentric spheres to be, one the earth, and
the other a small sphere of metal having the same density as the earth
and located at the earth's center. Let us assume further that the
earth, or the central portion of it, is a sphere of liquid, in which the
smaller sphere of metal is free to move without frictional resistance.
In this concentric position the sphere of metal has no weight, no effort
of motion, no pressure. It is not affected by any attraction of gravity
or any force or stress and it cannot of itself originate any motion.
Let us now apply to this sphere of metal a certain quantity of energy
of motion from an external source by causing a second sphere moving
in space to impinge against it with a certain velocity. The center of
the sphere of metal now begins to move away from the center of the
earth with a certain velocity and with a certain quantity of acquired
energy of motion, energy acquired from the external source, the im-
pinging sphere. Simultaneously this motion of separation of the metal

FORCE 13

sphere from the earth's center generates an opposing effort, which is
exerted against the motion of the metal sphere, tending to make it
fall back again to the earth's center. That is, the act of separation
generates a gravitational attraction between the center of the earth and
the center of the sphere. This generated gravitational attraction,
acting between the center of the metal sphere and the earth, retards
and finally overcomes the motion of separation, thereby converting
the energy of motion completely into potential energy of separation
or energy of position. The position of the metal sphere with ref-
erence to the earth's center becomes stationary, but the generated
gravitational attraction continues to act, and after an infinitesimal
interval of rest the sphere begins to move back again toward the
earth's center. The energy of position is now changing back into
energy of motion as the sphere again approaches the earth's center.
The gravitational effort continues to act while the sphere is moving
— though with diminishing intensity — and this continuous action
causes a continuous increase or acceleration in the velocity. When
the metal sphere, through this acquired energy of motion, again
reaches the earth's center, it no longer has any energy of position and
there is no longer any gravitational attraction between the sphere
and the earth's center. But in losing its energy of position the sphere
has acquired again the equivalent in energy of motion, and has ac-
quired a velocity and an energy of motion exactly equal to that
originally imparted to it from the external source.

If we now leave these bodies to themselves, this cycle of changes
will be repeated an indefinite number of times, that is, will become
periodic, the metal sphere swinging back and forth through the
earth's center like a pendulum. In all of these changes the total
quantity of matter remains unchanged and the total quantity of
energy remains unchanged and equal to the energy of motion orig-
inally imparted to the metal sphere from the external source. But
the gravitational attraction is continually changing in intensity, in-
creasing periodically from zero and again diminishing to zero. And
it is evident that this varying force, passing alternately into and out
of existence, is not a being of persistent, unaltered quantity, and is
not a physical element, but merely the effort of energy and matter to
undergo change — an effort generated by energy acting on matter in
space during time, and depending upon the quantity of separation
produced.

14 FORCE

If in the above illustration we assume the earth to have an interior,
spherical, concentric, vacuous cavity, instead of being filled with solid,
liquid, or gaseous matter, the changes would be somewhat different.
In that case the metal sphere within the hollow cavity, whether lo-
cated at the center or elsewhere, would not be acted upon by any
gravitational effort. If under these conditions the metal sphere,
located at the center of the cavity, were to receive motion from an
external impinging body, it would, as before, move away from the
center with a velocity corresponding to its acquired energy. But in
this case it would generate no gravitational effort and would have no
tendency to return to the earth's center. Its velocity, instead of being
retarded by a gravitational effort or attraction, would remain uniform
until it reached the interior surface or wall of the cavity. Let us
assume further that this interior surface is the surface of a solid
having perfect elasticity. On striking this wall the metal sphere
immediately begins to compress the elastic body and simultaneously
begins to generate a retarding effort, rapidly reducing the velocity of
the sphere to zero and changing all of its energy of motion into
energy of position, or potential energy, by displacing the particles of
the elastic wall. The elastic force or effort thus generated continues
to act on the metal sphere and causes it now after an infiniteisimal
period of rest to move in the opposite direction toward the earth's
center. When the potential energy stored in the elastic wall has all
been re-imparted to the sphere as it leaves the elastic body, the sphere
will have acquired a velocity in the opposite direction toward the
center equal to its former velocity away from the center. It will then
continue to move with this uniform velocity back through the earth's
center and to the opposite side of the cavity, from which it will
again rebound with the same velocity, and indefinitely continue to
make equal periodic vibrations across the empty cavity. But the
character of its motion and the changes of energy will, as above ex-
plained, be entirely different from those of the previous case. In the
latter case gravitation is in no way involved at any time. The metal
sphere, while moving across this cavity with uniform velocity, is in
exactly the same condition as though it were moving in infinite space
in which there was no other particle of matter and no attraction of
gravitation. The reason for this is that, in moving across this empty
space with uniform velocity, the metal sphere is neither receiving,
giving up, nor transforming any energy. That is, external energy is

FORCE 15

not acting on the sphere during its motion across the empty cavity, its
motion being due entirely to its acquired kinetic energy and not to
the continuous application of energy. A body moving with vuiiform
velocity in empty space would require no additional energy to keep
it moving. In this illustration it will be noted that the earth has
no center of gravity with reference to the metal sphere, because the
metal sphere is not an external particle or system. This illustration
would be strictly correct, if the earth were perfectly spherical and
the shell of uniform thickness and density, but not otherwise.

The force exerted by a compressed mass of gas or a compressed
spring is of similar nature, though governed by different laws of
variation. All forces may be shown to be merely the effort of energy
and matter to undergo change, and may be shown to be produced by
energy acting on matter in space during time.

We may, therefore, define force as the effort of matter to return to
a condition, from which it has been displaced by the action of energy
in space during time. It is not our purpose to go deeply into the
details of physical forces, and the above is given only for the purpose
of illustrating the general nature of force and making clear the dif-
ference between force and a physical element. We may speak of the
laws of gravitation as immutable laws, meaning the laws governing
the variation and the results of gravity, but it would be very erron-
eous to consider gravitation itself, or any force, immutable.

If all matter were concentrated at a single point in space without
heat, there could be no energy, no attraction, no force ; and the present
total separation of the material particles of the Universe may be
taken as a measure of the total existing energy.

Gravitation is not to be considered as an attraction existing as
such and radiating into space, but only as the effort of particles of
matter to return to a single mathematical point, from which they
have all been displaced by energy.

If all matter could be conceived to condense to a single mathe-
matical point, which occupies no space and again to evolve from that
point, energy must be considered to simultaneously condense and
evolve in causing that change. After such condensation and prior to
the re-evolution neither matter nor energy could exist.

It is the heterogeneity of matter and energy and the changes they
undergo, which makes possible the cognition of the relation of a pre-
ceding to a succeeding event or state and, hence, makes possible the

16 FORCE

cognition of duration. Therefore, if we could conceive matter to
condense to a mathematical point occupying no space, not only matter,
but also energy and time, or the succession of events, must simul-
taneously cease to exist. But our only cognition of the relativity of
position or space is of that M^hich exists between portions of matter
or portions of energy. Hence, space would also simultaneously cease
to exist. In other words, with the condensation of matter to a
mathematical point, the Universe would cease to exist, and with the
evolution of matter from a mathematical point, the Universe would
necessarily come into existence. But these imaginary speculations are
based on the hypothesis of conditions which we cannot conceive. Yet,
many of our fundamental empirical chemical and physical laws are
based on the conjecture that all gaseous matter by reduction of tem-
perature condenses toward a mathematical point, which is reached by
extrapolation at a temperature of 273 degrees below zero. Centigrade.

There is another viewpoint of force and energy which must not
be overlooked. Every change, every transformation of energy and
matter results from an effort or force and results in the exhaustion
of the effort and the generation of another effort. It might be pos-
sible to change our fundamental conceptions and assumptions entirely
and build a new system of physical science on these facts. We might
assume that force or effort is the physical element, instead of energy;
that in every change force is converted from one form of effort into
another and that energy passes into and out of existence, instead of
force.

For example, a body resting on an elevated support has potential
energy. It also has an effort to move toward the earth's center. Its
potential energy is due to that effort, which has been generated by
lifting the body into its elevated position against that effort. When
we remove the support, the body moves under the influence of the
effort and loses its potential energy, but simultaneously acquires
kinetic energy. Instead of saying it acquires kinetic energy, we might
say it acquires an effort to continue its downward motion and that
its energy disappears. As the body moves downward and reaches
the center of the earth, it loses all of its potential energy and all of its
effort in that direction. But it has now acquired an effort to con-
tinue in motion. And it is not easy to distinguish between kinetic
energy and the effort of a moving body to continue in motion. Either
of these expressions would be a definition of the other. Nor is it easy

THE PROVINCE OF MATHEMATICS 17

to distinguish between potential energy and the effort of a body to
move toward the earth's center.

If we interrupt the motion of a body at any point by interposing
an elastic body in its path, the effort to continue in motion will be
overcome by compressing the elastic body. This compression gen-
erates an effort to move in the opposite direction. In this way we
might trace the loss of one effort into the generating of a succeeding
effort. In each case there is also a disappearance of a portion of
energy and the generation of another portion.

VI.
THE PROVINCE OF MATHEMATICS

Mathematics is the science of quantity or number — the measuring
stick of the Universe. It provides methods of measuring the physical
elements, the various forms of force and all elemental and dynamic
relations. It comprises sj^stems of rules and formulae deduced by the
cerebral act of cognition or reason from fundamental assumptions in
reference to space and time, particularly space.

No physical element, however, in either its properties or its essen-
tial nature, is in any way dependent upon or connected with mathe-
matics or any mathematical formula or deduction.

There is no lirhit to the possible number of deducible mathematical
formulae. It is, therefore, not surprising that out of this infinite
number some have been found which approximately, or even perfectly,
express elemental relations. These coincidences, when they are found,
are always useful and convenient in supplying easily remembered and
easily handled statements of the particular relations and in aiding the
discovery of additional relations. But these coincidences, however
useful and important they may be, afford no grounds for the assump-
tion that there is any connection, even in the remotest degree, between
any elemental or dynamic relation and any mathematical formula:
or that our cognitions of an element or an elemental relation are
either correct or incorrect on account of conformity or non-conformity
with any mathematical deduction. A physical element of the Universe

18 THE PROVINCE OF MATHEMATICS

could not be in any way dependent upon or connected with the product
of a cerebral act. For example, it would be a most unwarranted pro-
ceeding to assume or to state that space or time or energy or matter
does not exist, merely because a certain mathematical deduction ex-
presses such a relation. Could anything be more ridiculous than a
statement that the existence or non-existence of infinite space depends
upon whether a certain mathematical expression has a plus or a
minus sign ?

We have cognitions that energy, matter, space and time all exist
as parts of the Universe. These cognitions come from the elements
themselves and cannot be eliminated by mathematical deduction.

In very recent times those who take great delight in pure mathe-
matical abstraction have unduly magnified the relative importance of
mathematics and have come to the belief that, where there is a dis-
crepancy between an elemental relation and some approximately cor-
rect mathematical expression of the relation, the elemental relation
must be bent or distorted by additional hypotheses and assumptions to
make it conform exactly to that mathematical expression. In this man-
ner the measuring stick has assumed an attitude of greater importance
than the thing it is to measure. For example, the mathematician has
recently invaded the chemical laboratory and is trying to supplant the
analytical balance by the mathematical formula. The purpose of the
mathematical chemist is not to find a mathematical expression for
chemical facts established by the balance, or to establish new chemical
facts, but to find a chemical relation which will closely correspond to
some assumed mathematical expression, and then, by innumerable
auxiliary assumptions, try to bend other chemical relations into con-
formity with the same expression, even ignoring important and well
established facts. And it is conceivable that, by making a sufficiently
great number of assumptions, all chemical relations might be made
to conform approximately to any mathematical expression. But it
is not clear that this would materially extend the range of chemical
knowledge.

BODIES 19

VII.
BODIES

We seldom have occasion to deal with or even contemplate the
Universe as a whole. We deal with certain definite and more or less
isolated portions of it, either separately or in conjunction with one
another. These definite portions we call bodies.

A body is generally spoken of as "a portion of matter," but this
definition is not sufficient for our purpose. For our purpose the term,
body, includes, not only the matter or mass, but the energy acting
upon it, the space it occupies and the time of its existence as a
definite body. A body is, therefore, a portion of the Universe consist-
ing of a portion of matter acted upon by a portion of energy, occupying
a portion of space and maintaining certain conditions and under-
going certain changes of condition during a certain interval of time.

The properties of a body depend upon the relations between the
matter-constituent, energy-constituent, space-constituent and time-
constituent, of which it is composed. For the purpose of illustration
let us consider briefly a few examples of different kinds of bodies, and
the changes which may convert them into other bodies.

Example 1, a piece of sulphur. In its liberation of heat or absorp-
tion of heat in undergoing combination or changing state a piece of
sulphur presents the qualities of activity, motion or energy. In its
aggregation of minute particles or atoms always attracted toward the
center of the earth it presents the qualities of passivity, mass or
matter.

Example 2, an incandescent lamp filament. The carbon or tungsten
filament in the globe of an incandescent lamp is a body, which, during
a certain time, may have the properties of a cold,, non-luminous solid.
If, during a subsequent time, an electric current of a certain strength
should pass through the filament, it would acquire the properties of
a heated and luminous solid. It would become a different body,
though the matter-constituent remains the same. The energy-constitu-
ent, the space-constituent and the time-constituent have changed.
The body could not be luminous and non-luminous at the same time
and it could not be in the same condition with and without the
energy of the electric current. The space it occupies while the electric
current is passing is different from the space it occupies when no
current is passing.

20 BODIES

Example 3, an electro-magnet. An electro-magnet is a body com-
monly comprising an iron cylinder surrounded by an insulated copper
wire, through which an electric current is passing. It has certain
properties, one of which is the power of attracting iron. If we inter-
rupt the electric current, it is no longer an electro-magnet, and does
not attract iron, though it is still a body and still has the same
matter-constituent. It is now, however, an entirely different body and
has different properties, because its matter-constituent is now, at a
different time, acted upon by a different energy-constituent. Chang-
ing either the matter-constituent or the energy-constituent of a
body changes the body and alters its properties, but changing only the
space-constituent may or may not change the properties. We may
change the space-constituent of a body by moving it horizontally in a
straight line without altering its properties, but if we change the
space-constituent of a rock by reducing it to powder or breaking it
into fragments, we alter its properties. A change in the time-
constituent alone cannot alter the properties of a body. That is, con-
tinuity of being cannot of itself produce any other change in a body.

Example 4, a pound of ice, water or steam. The same portion of
matter may exist successively in a pound of ice, a pound of water and
a pound of steam, all three of which are different bodies, though they
are identical in their matter-constituent. They differ greatly in the
amount of energy they contain, in the volume of space they occupy
and in the time of their existence. The same matter-constituent or
the same energy-constituent, could not at the same time be in the
ice, water and steam.

We are accustomed to consider a body merely as a portion of
matter, because the matter-constituent is most easily perceptible, but
it is evident that the properties of all bodies depend as much upon
the energy-constituent as upon the matter-constituent.

Example 5, a living animal or plant. A living animal is a body
in which we find the most complex and unstable relations between the
matter-constituent and the energy-constituent. So unstable are these
relations in this class of bodies, that continuous transformation, with
continuous liberation and dissipation of energy is the most essential and
one of the distinguishing properties of living animals. A living plant
is also a body, in which the relations between the matter-constituent
and the energy-constituent are complex and unstable, but much less
so than in animals.

LIVING AND LIFELESS BODIES 21

VIII.

LIVING AND LIFELESS BODIES

For our present purpose it will be necessary to distinguish clearly
between two classes of bodies, living and lifeless. When we speak of
"h'ving matter" we mean the matter-constituent of a living body. If
we use the term, matter, in the sense of matter-constituent, we may
also correctly speak of "organic matter," meaning the matter-
constituent of certain bodies, which had their origin in previous living
bodies. We must not, however, confuse the term, organic, with the
term, living. A body may be organic and at the same time lifeless,
but could not be living and inorganic, though it possessed no organs.

LIFELESS BODIES

Lifeless bodies are distinguished by the following properties:

1. A tendency to acquire and finally maintain homogeneity of
structure.

2. A tendency to acquire and finally to maintain homogeneity of
chemical composition.

3. A tendency to acquire and finally maintain simple and perma-
nent relations between the matter-constituent and the energy-con-
stituent.

LIVING BODIES

Living bodies are distinguished by the following properties:

1. Complex and temporary relations between the matter-constit-
uent and the energy-constituent.

2. Heterogeneity and complexity of structure and composition.

3. Always containing a large percentage of water and of carbon
as necessary components.

4. Existing only within a small range of temperatures.

5. Existing only as solid bodies containing liquids, the solid por-
tions always originating in the liquid.

6. Possessing the involuntary vital function of automatic
growth, generation or propagation, or the power of changing and
incorporating external bodies into the living body itself and building
up complex and unstable compounds from simpler and more perma-
nent bodies.

22 LIVING AND LIFELESS BODIES

7. Continuous chemical reaction accompanied by absorption and
dissipation of energy.

8. Continuous change of both matter-constituent and energy-
constituent.

9. Dissolution, or the spontaneous, unavoidable breaking-up and
destruction of the individual body after a certain period of activity.

In addition to the above-named characteristics, which may be con-
sidered universal, there are certain other characteristics, which belong
exclusively to some living bodies, but are not known to exist in all
living bodies. Among these may be mentioned — -

1. A circulating or moving liquid within the body, which is
propelled through the body and acts as a carrier or means of trans-
portation of material.

2. Retention during life and transmission to offspring of an indi-
vidual or specific personality, which persists through complete changes
of the energy-, matter-, time-, and space-constituents.

3. The power of originating and controlling motion and changes
of motion.

4. Individual generation, propagation or reproduction of isolated
masses of a specific and determinate form, which, under uniform
conditions, is persistent through successive generations.

5. The PHENOMENON OF CONSCIOUSNESS or knowledge of the
existence of self and of the Universe.

Living bodies may be classified in various ways, depending on the
purpose under consideration. But no system of classification enables
us to absolutely define the distinguishing characteristics in such a way
as to include every species and variety. The usual method of classifi-
cation is to divide living bodies into two general classes, animal and
vegetable ; but there are species which possess some of the characters
of both and not all of the characters of either.

The simplest and lowest form of living body is the amoeba, which
is merely a membranous cell or sack containing living, formless fluid.
It has more of the characteristics of animal than of vegetable life,
yet is lower and simpler in the scale or organic structure than vege-
table structures. It has the powers of locomotion and "irritability."
Most plants have the power of slight movement, but not locomotion,
being generally rooted in a fixed position. Animals, as a rule, have the
power of free locomotion. In the case of the amoeba the organic
structure consists of only a single cell or sack filled with protoplasm.

LIVING AND LIFELESS BODIES 23

In all living bodies more highly organized than the protozoa the
organic structure or body consists of a multiplicity of cells, forming
one or more tissues or cellular fabrics containing a fluid plasma. The
cells constitute retaining walls for the liquid. The liquid always
contains albuminoids, a material capable of undergoing a spontaneous
chemical change and hardening into additional retaining wall. This
cell-wall or membrane, composed of hardened material from the
liquid itself, in animal structures is fibrin, in vegetable structures,
cellulose. This hardening or solidifying of liquid material is the
origin of all organic structures without exception. In the liquid state
any kind of material may be transported to a great height by capillary
attraction through a porous or cellular body to any position, where it
may be needed to form or extend the solid structure.

When a living, growing cell, through this process of hardening
of material contained in the liquid, attains a certain growth or age,
a partition forms across the interior of the cell, producing two cells,
each containing the liquid. A repetition and continuation of this
process produces a cellular tissue or solid structure built up of a
multiplicity of cells, all filled with the liquid. The membranous
walls of these cells are permeable to the liquid or to certain con-
stituents of the liquid. If the wall is permeable to the entire liquid,
the resulting structure will be uniform and composed of similar
cells. But if the walls of certain cells, such as the outside layer, be-
come subject to an additional hardening process, they may become
less permeable to certain constituents of the liquid. This would re-
sult in a different liquid in these cells and the development of a dif-
ferent kind of cell-wall and the formation of a different kind of
tissue..

An organic cellular structure produced by the multiplication of
similar cells through partition is uniform as to kind and quality.

When a semi-permeable cell-wall allows certain constituents only
of the contained liquid to pass out, these constituents form on the
opposite side of the cell-wall and in the adjacent cell a different
liquid, which produces a cellular tissue different from the first, caus-
ing the growth of two different kinds of tissue in contact. By this
and similar processes we may account for all of the various kinds of
tissues found in the bodies of animals. In vegetable structures there
are only a comparatively few different kinds of tissues formed in a
single body. One of the reasons for this is that the liquid or blood

24 LIVING AND LIFELESS BODIES

in vegetable organisms is comparatively simple, and cannot differen-
tiate by diffusion through semi-permeable walls into a great number
of different kinds of liquids. But these vegetable tissues, though few
in number, may grow to enormous size, often extending hundreds
of feet in height.

The solution or blood is always derived from without by absorp-
tion through the cellular walls at available points and is then trans-
ported throughout the system. The same is true also of all animals.
The constituents of the blood are always obtained by absorption in
the liquid state through the membranous wall of a cell. The food of
animals is in most cases placed in an internal cavity called the alimen-
tary canal, where the useful portion is converted into a solution.
Various constituents of this solution are absorbed in different parts of
the apparatus and are then transported in liquid form to wherever
needed.

All of these changes and processes take place in accordance with
the well established laws of chemistry and physics, and when we
shall find the cause which produces the automatic division and mul-
tiplication of the organic cell and the cause of the automatic harden-
ing of the liquid constituents into the solid membrane, we shall be
very near to the key which unlocks the "mystery of life."

When a living body ceases to live it tends to disintegrate. The
complex structure tends to break up into simpler and smaller portions.
The complex and unstable chemical compounds break up into simpler
and more permanent compounds. This process goes on until all struc-
tures and compounds have become so simple that there is no further
tendency to change and the permanent stage of lifeless bodies is
reached.

Every living body is a machine working on purely mechanical prin-
ciples, generally built up of various, and usually numerous, organs
or instruments, each performing its own special function for the use
and support of all of the others, each depending more or less upon
all of the others. The entire mechanism works continuously, auto-
matically and independent of any external power, but either contin-
uously or at intervals receives matter and energy from external
sources and converts them into growth and renewal parts of its own
mechanism.

Every living body develops either from a single protoplasmic cell
or from a portion of a pre-existing living body by a process of auto-

LIVING AND LIFELESS BODIES 25

matic growth, division and differentiation, thereby building up com-
plicated chemical compounds and organic tissues in accordance with
its own needs. These processes take place and the produced organs
function without the exercise or necessity of any guiding intelligence,
will or conscious act. On the contrary, the phenomena of intelligence,
will and consciousness, instead of being the cause of these processes
and organic developments, are always the result or product of the
organic processes.

A living body may cease to live and live again after a period of
lifelessness, provided we speak of the body in the two cases only in
the sense of approximate identity.

All living bodies during the period of life are continuously and
rapidly changing progressively toward death, and in passing from
infancy to old age and decrepitude generally undergo an entire re-
placement of their energy-, matter-, time-, and space-constituents, ac-
companied by a succession of alterations, which destroy all resemblance
between the earlier and later stages. Yet each body retains or inherits
during all of these changes a continuity of properties, which enables
us to identify it as the same individual, though not the same body,
in all of its stages.

A living body with its complicated system of organs is also prop-
erly called an organic body. It is also spoken of as organic imme-
diately after death ensues and before disintegration has occurred,
though disintegration may be arrested for an indefinite period.

The study of living bodies has resulted in the generalization that
the highest order of development corresponds with the greatest
variety and complication of interdependent organs.

Every living body, before it approaches the end of its period of
activity, or life, tends to transmit a reduplication of its own body as
it existed in infancy. The seed of every plant or tree, the egg of
every animal, contains a reduplication of the previous form, either
developed or having the potentiality of development. This reproduc-
tion is merely the transmission of the involuntary vital function from
an old matter-constituent and -an old energy-constituent to a new
matter-constituent and a new energy-constituent.

In sharp contrast with and distinction from all of this the lifeless
body has none of the above-mentioned properties. Instead of the
tendency toward continuous alteration in the building up of a hetero-
geneous system of tissues and organs, composed of complex and un-

26 LIVING AND LIFELESS BODIES

Stable compounds, and instead of the continuous replacement of the
matter- and the energy-constituents, the lifeless body tends to acquire,
and having acquired, tends to maintain permanent simplicity and
homogeneity of structure and composition, devoid of tissues, organs
and multiform dissimilar parts.

In the crystal of rock, of sulphur or of diamond; in the cube,
the block or the sheet of ordinary metal, we find no differentiation
of parts. Each molecule of the mass, as far as we are able to dis-
tinguish, is like every other molecule in the mass. The density, hard-
ness and other properties show uniformity and permanence. The
trunk or leaves of a dead tree and the remains of a dead animal are
examples of lifeless bodies which have not acquired the stage of per-
manence, simplicity and homogeneity. But lifless bodies of this type,
which originate in previous living bodies, tend to disintegrate at once
and become resolved into other bodies of simple, homogeneous and
permanent properties.

All living bodies and all lifeless bodies which are the remains of
immediately preceding living bodies, are made up of chemical com-
pounds of oxygen, hydrogen, carbon, sulphur, nitrogen, phosphorus,
calcium and a few other elements. These compounds are of complex
composition and molecular structure.

They consist chiefly of starch, sugar, cellulose, albumen and fibrin,
the latter two being of variable and extremely complex composition.

Fibrin may be considered as solidified albumen and albumen, as
liquefied fibrin, there being no clearly marked distinction between
them in chemical composition. Muscle, which constitutes a large
part of the bodies of animals, is chiefly fibrin. The mere mixture
of two different albumens, both having the same chemical composi-
tion, will often precipitate a coagulum of solid albumen, which also
has the same composition. This peculiar property of the albumens may
be a very important factor in the formation of fibrinous structures.
For example, if two different albumens, located on opposite sides of
a protoplasmic cell, should pass by diffusion through the cell-wall
and come in contact along a central or other interior plane of the
cell, there could be formed along that plane a solid albuminous or
fibrinous wall or partition extending across the cell and dividing it
into two cells.

The venom of the rattlesnake is an albumen having the same com-
position as the albumen in the human blood, and the venomous char-

THE INVOLUNTARY VITAL FUNCTION 27

acter of this deadly poison depends upon the fact that, when it is
injected into the blood, it causes the albumen of the blood to coagulate
or solidify.

The protoplasmic cell has the power of converting carbon dioxide
and water into the above-mentioned and various other carbo-hydrates.
This is a process of storing up energy in the form of chemical poten-
tial energy and takes place only through the absorption of energy
from without. It takes place in the protoplasmic cell by absorbing
energy in the form of heat and light, and particularly in the presence
of certain substances, such as chlorophyll.

IX.
THE INVOLUNTARY VITAL FUNCTION

The involuntary vital function may be defined as the power which
keeps in operation continuously from birth until death the processes
of growth and multiplication of the plasmatic cells, that is, the growth
of cellular structures and tissues; maintains the circulation of the
plasmatic fluid or blood; causes the solution and assimilation of
foreign material and its conversion into necessary, complex organic
chemical compounds. This power is contemporaneous with the life
of the body, is inherited from the parent and transmitted to the
offspring without interruption. It is in no way dependent upon,
connected with or governed by either volition or any kind of cogni-
tion or conscious state.

Life may, therefore, be defined as the period of activity of the in-
voluntary vital fmiction.

But the involuntary vital function may also exist in potentiality
and not in activity. The seed of a plant may exist for ages in abso-
lutely lifeless inactivity, undergoing no change in its matter- or energy-
constituents. But whenever the seed is subjected to the proper en-
vironment, this potentiality changes to activity and the body begins
to live and thenceforth to undergo the continuous changes of all
living bodies. Under certain conditions the activity or life may be
interrupted and the potentiality restored, provided disintegration does
not begin.

28 THE INVOLUNTARY VITAL FUNCTION

The involuntary vital function is in activity during the develop-
ment of a seed in the flower of a plant. When the seed has fully
developed the vital activity within it ceases. The seed dries out, be-
comes lifeless and is cast off, carrying with it only the potentiality of
coming into life again.

Living fishes have been subjected to the extreme cold of liquid
air until they were frozen into solid, crystalline masses as lifeless and
permanent as any crystal of rock. In this condition they might have
remained for centuries, absolutely lifeless, yet retaining the poten-
tiality of the involuntary vital function. When these fishes were
subjected to the proper temperature and environment, this poten-
tiality assumed a new activity and a new life began, which could not
be distinguished from the former life. This was possible only because
in the processes of freezing and thawing there were no destructive
changes in the body, and in the frozen state there was no change in
either the matter- or the energy-constituent of the body, and because
the involuntary vital function and its potentiality are in no way
dependent upon the time-constituent or the space-constituent.

A kidney, one of the vital animal organs, was removed from the
living body of a dog and preserved from decomposition for the period
of a week or more in an absolutely lifeless condition, there being no
activity of the vital function. After this period of lifelessness the
kidney was replaced in the body of the living dog and a new life
was brought into it, the dog having later lived for several years after
the removal of the other kidney. There are many instances of dis-
membered parts of a living body having been restored to vital activity
after becoming lifeless. All of these facts show beyond question that
a living body may become lifeless and live again.

THE POWER OF REPRODUCTION 29

X.

THE POWER OF REPRODUCTION

The power of reproduction is the power of extending and trans-
ferring the involuntary vital function or living condition. When a
protoplasmic cell enlarges and finally divides into two cells by the
formation of an internal wall or partition, each of the cells thus
formed inherits the involuntary vital function of the original single
cell, and in this manner the vital function is extended to an entire
tissue or structure as it is built up by this multiplication of cells.
This is reproduction by extension or growth and is the fundamental
method of extending and transmitting the vital function or life.

When a seed or egg, containing a potential living body, is cast off
from a pre-existing living body and becomes a separate individual, the
potentiality of the vital function is already contained within the sepa-
rated individual, it having been derived before separation from the
original or parent living body through adhering tissues, which have
been brought in contact, but have not actually united and are always
separable again along the cleavage surface of adhesion. This is repro-
duction by transplantation and transfusion.

There are at least these two kinds of reproduction, the continuous,
or reproduction by extension of the individual, and the parasitic, or
reproduction by the formation of new and separable individuals
through the development of a transplanted cell or tissue, which
derives the alimentation of development from the pre-developed indi-
vidual, upon which it is transplanted as a parasite, by the transfusion
of nutriment through the surfaces of the adhering membranes, along
which it again finally separates.

In the growth of the stem or branch of a tree we have an example
of reproduction by extension, and in the production of a seed, egg
or living-born animal we have an example of reproduction by trans-
plantation and transfusion. In the former case the reproduced or
extended growth continues to form a part of the original and never
becomes detached, though the original may die away at the old end,
while at the new end the growth and extension continue. Or the
body of the plant may be accidentally divided into parts, each part
becoming a separate individual. In this reproduction by extension the
involuntary vital function is transmitted without interruption to an

30 THE POWER OF REPRODUCTION

additional portian of the same tissue, which does not leave the parent
body.

In reproduction by transplantation and transfusion, as that of a
seed, egg or living-born animal, the involuntary vital function, with
its individual and specific or racial tendencies is transferred from one
living tissue by transfusion to an adhering cell or tissue transplanted
upon it from another living individual of the same or nearly similar
species, or from a different part of the same individual, the trans-
planted cell or tissue deriving its subsequent alimentation, growth
and development from this transfused nutrition, at the same time
maintaining its separate identity and finally separating as a separate
individual.

The transplantation of a living cell or portion of tissue from a
separate source or individual into contact with a second living tissue,
and its attachment by adhesion and nourishment as a parasite, instead
of its formation from the original tissue by division, are necessary,
in order to enable the new individual, after a certain growth and
development, to become detached. In this case the involuntary vital
function is maintained in the transplanted cell through the mem-
branous walls of the adhering cells or tissues.

Continuously growing tissue may be separated or divided into parts
by an external or accidental means, as occurs when the branch of a
tree is cut into pieces and the parts thus formed continue to grow
as separate individuals by the continuous growth of tissue.

This division of the body into separate parts, each of which de-
velopes into a separate individual, is the method of reproduction
among some of the lower organisms, such as protozoa, worms, polyps
and many plants. It is evident, however, that this method could not
obtain in any complex organism, which in the adult state has interde-
pendent parts or organs. The division of such a body would destroy
the organism.

PARASITIC REPRODUCTION 31

XL
PARASITIC REPRODUCTION

The evolution of the organic world in its present condition had
its origin in a very simple biological law. The writer does not know
or believe that this law has heretofore been recognized, but the proof
of its existence is ample. We shall for convenience call it the law of
vital transfusion or the law of parasitic reproduction. It may be
stated as follows:

WHEN THE NORMAL SURFACE OF THE MEMBRANOUS WALL OF A
LIVING TISSUE OR CELL^ PERMEABLE TO THE PLASMA AND IN A
MOIST OR MUCOUS CONDITION^ IS TRANSPLANTED INTO CONTACT
WITH THE NORMAL SURFACE OF THE SIMILAR WALL OF A SIMILAR
OR NEARLY SIMILAR PRE-DEVELOPED LIVING BODY, THE TRANS-
PLANTED BODY OR CELL DEVELOPS AS A PARASITE BY NUTRITION
TRANSFUSED TO IT FROM THE PRE-DEVELOPED BODY THROUGH THE
ADHERING MEMBRANES, AT THE SAME TIME MAINTAINING ITS SEP-
ARATE INDIVIDUALITY AND FINALLY SEPARATING AGAIN AS A DEVEL-
OPED, SELF-SUSTAINING, INDEPENDENT INDIVIDUAL BY CLEAVAGE
ALONG THIS SURFACE OF ADHESION OR TRANSPLANTATION.

Without the aid of this simple and apparently universal biological
law the only method of reproduction would be that of continuous
growth. The only method of separation of the offspring would be
by division of the original growing body or parent into a multi-
plicity of similar separable parts, each having the potentiality of indi-
vidual development. This would necessitate a continual degradation
of the original parent body to the undeveloped condition of the ollF-
spring. There could be no distinction between the adult and the
infantile development, as each would alternately change into the
other.

If separate organs with special or centralized functions are to
exist in the individual offspring, the adult or developed parent having
similar organs cannot be divided into parts, each of which is a de-
veloped offspring. In order that the adult may divide into a number
of separate individual offspring, the adult itself must consist merely
of a multiplicity or aggregation of such individual offspring. There-
fore, the parent cannot be more highly organized or developed than
the offspring.

32 PARASITIC REPRODUCTION

This method of reproduction by division of the parent could be
effective, as already stated, only in the lower forms of living bodies,
such as protozoa, plants, worms and polyps, in which there is no
marked centralizatin of function or highly dififerentiated organic
structure.

Even if it were possible for a highly organized offspring to de-
velop by continuous growth out of continuous tissue as a part of the
parent, there could be no sharp line of distinction between the old
and the new growth, and there would be no method of severing
the connection between the offspring and the adult without severing
and destroying vital organs, such as veins and arteries, and there
would be no agency to perform the separation, which would not be
automatic.

For example, the parasitic offspring of every mammalian, until it
is set free, is nourished, not by the blood which circulates through
the vascular system of the parent, but by its own blood circulating
through its own vascular system. The vascular system of the offspring
receives nutrition and purification from the vascular system of the
parent by transfusion through adhering membranes belonging to the
two systems. After the offspring is set free the membranes, being
of no further use, separate automatically and that belonging to the
offspring dies and breaks away without injury to either parent or
offspring. But if the vascular system of the offspring formed an
integral part of tlje vascular system of the parent, the severing and
breaking away of the developed offspring, even if there were any
means of accomplishing it, would be disastrous, if not fatal, to both
parent and offspring.

The reproduction and development of a highly organized living
body, capable of later independent separation, must be by this para-
sitic transfusion of nourishment through adhering membranes. This
requires the transplantation of a living cell or tissue into adhering
membranous contact with the membranous tissue of a pre-developed
living body capable of supplying the parasitic offspring with prepared
nutrition in liquid form by transfusion through the pores of adhering
membranes.

THE EVOLUTION OF SEX 33

XII.
THE EVOLUTION OF SEX

The necessity for the transplanted living cell, having a membranous
external wall permeable to the plasma and in a moist or mucous con-
dition, made necessary the EVOLUTION OF SEX in nearly all
species of animals and plants. There arose the necessity for two
different kinds of individuals or SEXES in each species, one adapted
to supply the living transplanted cell or tissue, the other adapted to
receive, nourish and develop it by transfusion to a self-sustaining
condition and finally set it free by recoiling from it along the ad-
hering surface of transplantation.

Even in organisms whose simplicity of structure admits of propa-
gation by extension and division of the parent body, the method of
transfusion often has great advantages. Nearly all plants are fixed in
position, and if their only method of reproduction were by continuous
growth, the separation into individual parts, though possible would
be a very difficult process and would seriously interfere with any
wide distribution. But reproduction by the parasitic development of
seeds, which generally have some means of transportation, enables a
single plant to send out thousands of highly-developed offspring ca-
pable of making long journeys and withstanding very adverse condi-
tions.

Most plants, on account of their fixed position, are hermaphroditic,
that is, contain both the transplanting and receiving organs in the
same individual, while in most animals these organs develop in sepa-
rate sexual individuals. In animals the various emotional cognitions
called instinct, love and passion are all contributory instrumentalities,
which have evolved as adjuncts in the development of the transplanta-
tion process. And it is possible, if not probable, that this is the
ultimate purpose of all cognitions, all consciousness.

The immobility of most plants necessitates, not only the her-
maphroditic proximity of the transplanting and receiving organs, but
also the development of gorgeous forms and colors in the corolla and
adjacent parts and the production of nectareous and fragrant liquids
to attract and induce flying insects to flutter within and scatter the
fecundating cells from the anthers over the stigmatic surface. The
form of the flower is generally bell-shaped, ear-shaped, or of a more

34 THE EVOLUTION OF THE POWER OF COGNITION

or less hollow, conical form with internal folds and projections,
adapted to cause eddying air currents to perform the same function.
In the indian corn the tassel, comprising a cluster of anthers which
supply the fecundating cells, is situated at the top of the stalk high
above the stigmatic surface terminating the "silk," and, therefore,
does not need a color, form or substance attractive to insects. Gravity
and the winds are ample agencies to effect the transplantation. In
the Carboniferous Age there were exceedingly few flying insects and,
consequently, no flowering plants, the luxuriant vegetation consisting
entirely of cryptogams and conifers.

In the great majority of all plants the agencies of transplantation
are purely mechanical, are performed by an external agent and are
aided by the hermaphroditic proximity of the stationary organs. The
stamens and pistils, or transplanting and receiving organs, are merely
modified leaves growing at the end of a branch of arrested develop-
ment and are in the closest proximity allowed by the plant growth
and structure.

In marked contrast with plants, most animals have perfect freedom
of locomotion and the power of originating motion within themselves,
a power possessed even by the protozoa.

XIII.

THE EVOLUTION OF THE POWER OF
COGNITION

Considering now only the more highly organized classes of animals,
having interdependent, special organs, in comparison with what may
be called the hermaphroditic vegetable world, we find that with this
freedom of locomotion comes the simultaneous development of other
requirements and tendencies. With freedom of locomotion of the
individuals of each sex the hermaphroditic arrangement of both organs
in fixed proximity was not a necessity nor even and advantage and,
therefore, did not develop in the animal kingdom. With freedom of
locomotion in the individuals the assistance of insects and air currents

THE EVOLUTION OF THE POWER OF COGNITION 35

was neither necessary nor sufficient to accomplish the transplantation
of the parasitic cell.

But without these agencies what other agent is to bring about the
transplantation? Evidently if the cell is not to be carried by an
external agent, the organs themselves must perform the transplanta-
tion, either by actual contact or by proxy. But what is there to
induce the opposite sexes to approach each other to perform this
function? They have freedom of locomotion, but so far no agency to
cause them to approach. With no impelling force to make them ap-
proach, the natural tendency of all individuals would be, as soon 'as
they are set free, to separate from each other as far as possible, in
order that each individual may have as large a territory as possible
for food finding. Evidently this arrangement could not develop
under the laws of organic evolution without the simultaneous develop-
ment of some other agency or power of causing the opposite sexes
to approach. Any such power or agency, even if it existed, could not
operate to bring the opposite sexes together, unless the individuals of
each sex could knoiu or recognize the individuals of the opposite sex.

This necessitates that with the development of individual freedom
of locomotion there must also be a simultaneous development or evolu-
tion of the power of cognition. First of all there must have been the
cognition of self, or the consciousness of existence of self, and then
the consciousness of the existence of relations external to self. It was
merely a development or evolution of the irritability or sensory power
known to exist in protoplasm itself — a special development not neces-
sary or useful in general to plants, though in many plants there is a
development along similar lines.

For example, in the Orchis Family, comprising about 6000 species,
there is the development of a power remarkably analogous to that
of cognition, a cognition exactly in this line of sexual selection.*

But the cognition of self and of external relations and the knowl-
edge of the existence of the opposite sex is not enough to cause the
sexes to approach and accomplish the transplantation. There must be
an impelling impulse. There must be still another kind of cognition,
that of sexual desire, which in animals we call instinct and in man,
passion or love.

From this point it is easy to see how the laws of organic evolution
have developed this power of protoplasmic irritability into the various
other powers of cognition, of emotion and sensation simultaneously

36 THE EVOLUTION OF THE POWER OF COGNITION

with the development of the special organs of sense — all contributory
directly or indirectly to the one ultimate purpose of the transplanta-
tion of a living, membranous cell into parasitic contact with the mem-
branous wall of a nourishing, pre-developed living body of the same
or of a nearly similar species.

This hypothesis of the process of generation or origin of conscious-
ness depends only on the assumption of protoplasmic irritability.
While protoplasmic irritability itself has not yet been accounted for,
its existence is as well established as the existence of matter or any
physical element. This may not be the process, M^hich actually oc-
curred in the organic evolution of the phenomenon of consciousness,
but it is a process which would rationally account for the facts on
the assumption stated.

The process of transplantation and transfusion must not be con-
founded with that of organic grafting, which is an entirely different
process, operates in a very different manner and produces very dif-
ferent results. In order to make this distinction clear, we may state
the law of organic grafting as follows :

WHEN THE FRESHLY SEVERED EDGE OF A LIVING TISSUE^ SUFFUSED
WITH PLASMA, IS BROUGHT IN CONTACT WITH THE SIMILAR EDGE
OF THE SAME OR OF A SIMILAR OR NEARLY SIMILAR LIVING TISSUE,
ONE OR BOTH HAVING A SOURCE OF SUPPLY OF NOURISHING PLASMA,
THE JOINED EDGES UNITE AND FORM A SINGLE, INSEPARABLE TISSUE,
OBLITERATING THE SURFACES OF JUNCTURE AND LEAVING NO SUR-
FACE OF CLEAVAGE ALONG WHICH THERE MIGHT BE A FUTURE
SEPARATION.

* To be convinced of this one needs only to read the classical researches of
Charles Darwin on the "Fertilization of Orchids by Insects." In this remark-
able family of plants the transplanting cells form a mucous bundle in the
shape of a baseball club, the smaller end of which grasps the proboscis of an
insect when it is thrust into the flower and maintains its hold on the proboscis
until the insect transports it into the second flower. While it is being trans-
ported from the first to the second flower the "pollinium" or ball club alters
its oivn form by bending at a proper angle to strike the stigma when the
proboscis is thrust into the second flower. On striking the stigma and com-
pleting the transplantation, the pollinium releases its hold on the insect's
proboscis.

DISSOLUTION — CONSCIOUSNESS 37

XIV,
DISSOLUTION

One of the essential characteristics of the protoplasmic cell during
its period of growth is the flexibility of its walls. When it becomes
imbedded in and forms a part of a tissue, its flexibility diminishes
along with its activity and utility. These walls are originally formed
from material in the plasma or blood by a process of hardening, by
which albumen is converted into fibrin and starch and sugar are con-
verted into cellulose. As age increases the cell walls and the tissues
composed of them, by this hardening process, as well as by the depo-
sition and accumulation of foreign matter, lose their flexibility and
usefulness. The involuntary vital function is retarded and finally
ceases. This ends the life of the body and it begins to undergo disin-
tegration. This dissolution or death occurs to every living body in the
manner above mentioned, unless it is previously caused by accident
or disease.

XV.

CONSCIOUSNESS

The phenomenon of consciousness has already been defined as the
cognition or knowledge of the existence of self and of the Universe.
The word also defines, as previously stated, a certain state or condi-
tion of the brain, in which the brain has this power of cognition of
self-existence and of other simultaneous cognitions. This phenomenon
occurs only as a property of certain living bodies and is present in
them only during certain intervals of time. It is not essential to
life and is probably not present at any time in certain species. In
most species of plants we have no positive evidence that the con-
scious state ever exists.

There are at least two different kinds of cognition or knowledge:
1. Cognitions of external relations, that is, things external to
the brain, or sensation. This kind of knowledge comes from correla-
tive internal relations produced in the brain by external relations

38 CONSCIOUSNESS

through the organs of sense. These correlative internal relations are
interpreted by the brain as cognitions of the external relations.

2. Cognitions of internal relations: of those relations already
existing in the brain and not caused by energy transmitted to the
brain and not requiring the aid of sensory tracts or other transmitting
organs, but originating entirely in the brain itself, e. g., meiuory.

Sensation, or knowledge of external relations, is the fundamental
cognition — the foundation on which all other cognitions are built.
Without the cognitions of sensation there could be no previous cogni-
tion and, therefore, no recollection of a previous cognition. Without
sensation and recollection there could be no reason, contemplation,
thought or emotion.

There are at least seven different kinds of sensation : sight, hearing,
taste, smell, touch, temperature and pressure. It is difficult to conceive
of a conscious state existing in any body, which has not experienced
any of these sensations.

Cognitions of internal relations. These are numerous and we shall
.not attempt to even mention them all. They may, however, be grouped
into three distinct classes, memory, reason and emotion.

Memory, or re-cognition, is the cognition of previous cognitions
and results from brain activity stimulated or excited by the record
in the brain of previous cognitions.

Reason, or the cognition of abstract relations, is the same as thought
or contemplation, and includes the cerebral acts of judgment, decision,
imagination, deduction, the cognition of future possibilities and many
other cognitions — all the result of brain activity stimulated by cogi-
tation or the process called thinking. It is difficult to state clearly
the exact origin of these cognitions and of the brain activity which
produces them. To the author they appear to result from brain
activity, in which the principal brain stimulus is memory, not of a
single, but of numerous previous cognitions, aided generally, but not
always, by present sensations.

Emotion is cognition of the same general character as reason and
appears to originate in the same kind of brain stimuli and brain
activity, yet, instead of being characterized by the qualities of reason
or thought, emotion seems more exactly to lack these qualities.

Among the principal emotions we may mention: desire, will, im-
pulse, love, hate, rage, sexual passion, sympathy, wonder, admiration,
fear, courage, grief, joy, hope and despair.

CONSCIOUSNESS 39

These various cognitions or varieties of knowledge, are physio-
logical phenomena resulting from cerebral acts — brain activities. They
are commonly called "mental" acts or phenomena or activities of the
"mind." We are purposely avoiding in this connection the use of
the word, rnindj because it appears to be unintelligible. Whatever
the mind may be, it is not the brain, and cognitions are undoubtedly
either the acts or phenomena resulting from acts of the brain, or of the
brain in conjunction with other parts of the living body. There is
no doubt that cognitions depend entirely upon the operations of the
living body and that they have never been found outside of or apart
from the living body. They have never been found except in connec-
tion with the activities of a living brain or nervous system. Cogni-
tions are, therefore, as far as we have any evidence in relation to the
subject, the result of brain and nervous activity and of nothing else.
They are merely physiological phenomena accompanying certain
states and conditions of the brain and nervous system of a living
body.

The writer confesses that he does not know the meaning of the
words, mind, soul, spirit and faculty, as commonly used in connection
with the phenomenon of cognition, knowledge or consciousness.

We quote the following definitions, which have been given by
recognized and celebrated "mental" experts:

Mind. The intellectual or rational faculty in man : the understand-
ing; the power that conceives, judges or reasons; also the entire
spiritual nature; the soul; that in man which thinks, remembers,
reasons, wills, perceives, feels, desires; also memory, remembrance,
recollection. These definitions are both material and immaterial,
especially immaterial.

Faculty. Ability to act or perform ; capactiy ; especially, an original
mental power or capacity for the well-known classes of mental
activity; psychical or soul capacity; capacity for any of the leading
kinds of soul capacity, as knowledge, feeling, volition; intellectual
endowment or gift.

Soul. The spiritual, rational and immortal part of man which
enables him to think, and which renders him a subject of moral gov-
ernment; the seat of life, the sensitive affections and phantasy, ex-
clusive of the voluntary and rational powers; in distinction from
mind, the moral and intellectual part of man's nature-; the seat of
feeling in distinction from intellect; the intellect only; the under-

40 CONSCIOUSNESS

Standing; the seat of knowledge, as distinguished from feeling; a
pure or disembodied spirit.

Spirit. A disembodied soul ; the intellectual, immaterial and im-
mortal part of man; the soul, in distinction from the body in which
it resides; the human soul after it has left the body; life, or living
substance, considered independently of corporeal existence; an intelli-
gence conceived of apart from any physical organization or embodi-
ment; vital essence, force or energy, as distinct from matter.

It appears from this jumble of the imaginary, hypothetical and con-
crete that the mind is the soul ; that it is energy, force and matter
and at the same time not matter; that the soul is the disembodied
spirit; that the spirit is the disembodied soul while residing in the
body and after leaving the body; that all of these are life, or living
substance, considered independently of corporeal existence; that they
are all intelligence apart from and in conjunction with physical em-
bodiment ; that they are the vital essence ; that they are also the
brain or thinking part of man: the seat of sensation, life and cogni-
tion and the cognitions themselves; that they are knowledge and the
seat of knowledge; and that part of man which is immortal.

From these definitions the words defined appear to have no definite
meaning and to be expressions denoting the ignorance of one groping
in the dark and trying to define what is imagined but not understood
— a futile attempt with verbal contradictions to ascribe an immortal
personality to an evanescent physiological phenomenon. In defining
that which does not exist, it is necessary to create the thing by defini-
tion. To define anything as "that part of man which is immortal"
is to define it from imagination, because, if any part of man is im-
mortal, it is not possible for us to know it, or to know any of its
powers, properties or attributes.

All of these definitions are attempts to define the phenomenon of
consciousness and to make of it something more than what it is, the
cerebral act and power of cognition.

THE NERVOUS SYSTEM 41

XVI.
THE NERVOUS SYSTEM

Among the various organs comprising certain living bodies there is
one of great Importance called the Nervous System. The entire
phenomenon of consciousness, as far as we have any evidence, is a
function of the nervous system.

The nervous system in most animals comprises nerves and nerve
centers, the former made up of elongated bundles of nerve fibers or
rods. Nerves extending from one part of the living body to another
act as canals or channels, to transport from one part of the body to
another, a certain form of energy, causing certain relations existing
at one end to produce correlative relations at the other end. In
nearly all bodies having a nervous system the nerves extend from
various parts of the body to one or more points of concentration or
ganglia — nerve centers. When there is only one main ganglion, it
is called the brain, w^hich is the organ of congnition. In vertebrates
the organ of cognition is a part of the brain called the cerebrum.

The only living bodies which possess a distinct nervous system are
animals, though certain vegetable organisms possess tissues, which un-
questionably have the power of transporting a form of energy similar
in function to the nervous energy of animals.

In all higher types of animals, especially vertebrates, the nerves
all radiate from a single ganglion or brain, which, however, in all
vertebrates except in a few species, is divided into two bi-laterally
symmetrical hemispheres. The hemispheres are inter-dependent and,
acting conjunctively, control the entire nervous system. In many
animals of lower classes, instead of a brain controlling the entire
nervous system, there is a series of ganglia or nerve centers, distributed
with more or less uniformity through the body, each having indepen-
dent or nearly independent control of a certain portion of the body.
These ganglia are generally connected together by nerves into a
chain or system.

The nervous system of a vertebrate animal may be accurately com-
pared with the telephone sj^stem of a city or country. In this nervous
system a single nerve fibre, or nerve wire, extends from each point of
origin of sensation to the brain, as in the telephone system each wire
extends from a transmitter, or point of origin of words, to the central

42 BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE

/

Station, which constitutes the ganglion or brain of the telephone sys-
tem. Each telephone wire transmits a certain form of energy in
impulses of varying length and intensity from the transmitter to the
distant receiver, producing in the receiver vibrations correlative with
vibrations in the transmitter, the vibrations in the transmitter for-
warding the energy impulses along the wire. So also each nerve
fiber or nerve wire transports a certain form of energy in impulses
of varying length and intensity from the transmitter, or point where
sensation originates, that is, from the point of contact of the nerve
with the external relations, to the brain, which corresponds to the
telephone receiver. In the telephone system the wires are grouped to-
gether into bundles called cables. In the nervous system the fibers
are grouped together in bundles called nerves. In the telephone
system the form of energy transmitted is electrical energy. In the
■nervous system the form of energy transmitted is not known, because
we have not yet been able to isolate it from this particular use or to
identify it and study it in other relations. It may also be electrical
energy, but we have not yet the means of knowing. The fact that
electrical energy has been artificially applied to nerve fibres after
death of the body and has produced temporary life in those nerves
would indicate the possibility that this nerve energy may be electrical-
energy and that a nerve fiber acts as an electrical conductor. This
hypothesis is further substantiated by the experiments of DuBois-
Reymond, in which the nerves and muscles of frogs acted as sources
of electromotive force with results as high as 0.075 volt. But until
the electrical or other nature of this form of energy is more clearly
established, it will be convenient to call it nerve energy.

XVII.

BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS
STATE

The word, consciousness, defines a certain phenomenon of certain
living bodies only. We have defined it as knowledge or cognition of
the existence of self. Cognition is a more general term than con-
sciousness, designating a class of phenomena to which consciousness

BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE 43

belongs. Cognition is knowledge of the existence of the Universe in
general. Consciousness, or cognition of self, is, therefore, a kind of
cognition, and is necessarily either the first or one of the earliest of
cognitions.

We have no evidence that cognition of any kind ever precedes
sensation. By sensation we mean the cognition of the transferring
of external relations into correlative internal relations within the
brain. The mechanism and seat of cognition in higher animals is
the brain, but the entire system of nerves is a necessary auxiliary
apparatus, because without the nerves no external relations could
reach the brain to cause cognitions.

The phenomenon of cognition results from the fulfilment of cer-
tain conditions. The brain must be excited or stimulated to a certain
kind of activity. A certain kind of transformation and dissipation
of energy must take place in the brain as long as any kind of cog-
nition continues. This transformation and dissipation of energy is
always accompanied by a corresponding alteration of the brain tissue
itself. The exact character of the alteration of tissue depends upon
the cognition which produces or accompanies it, and the alteration
when produced constitutes a more or less perfect and persistent
record of the cognition itself.

We know from experience of only two kinds of brain-stimuli or
causes of cognition:

1. Internal relations of matter, energy, space and time produced
in the brain through the avenues of sensation by correlative external
relations.

2. Internal relations of matter, energy, space and time produced
in the brain by the alterations of brain tissue caused by previous cog-
nitions.

There seems to be no power in the brain to originate cognitions
until after it has been excited by external relations through sense.
We have no evidence to show that any living body ever possessed
either cognition or consciousness without previously or at the same
time experiencing sensation. We have much evidence tending to
show that a being incapable of experiencing sensation is also inca-
pable of cognition or consciousness. In support of these statements
we may adduce the following facts :

1. An infant in the womb and immediately after delivery there-
from is always without consciousness or cognition.

44 BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE

2. The cognition "of a child developing from infancy are never in
advance of the sensations it has experienced.

3. Cognition grows with and is limited by sensation.

4. Without vision or tactile sense there could be no knowledge of
form, no knowledge of material limits, no definition within the
Universe, no knowledge of space.

5. Without vision, tactile, olfactory, auditory or gustatory sense
and without the power of recognizing temperature or stress, no
known phenomenon would be capable of cognition.

6. Without these avenues of sensation there could be no knowl-
edge of a past experience, no memory, no knowledge of the relation
of a preceding to a succeeding instant or event and, therefore, no
knowledge of duration, no knowledge of change in matter or energy
— no knowledge of the Universe.

Consciousness is not essential to the existence of any organic or
living body; but living bodies are the only ones capable of con-
sciousness. It is probable, however, that some degree of consciousness
is possessed at times by the lowest animal and by some vegetable or-
ganisms. The sunflower, turning its broad face to the rising sun, the
Venus's flytrap, devouring its victim, the diurnal opening and closing
of many flowers and leaves all present in different degrees the phe-
nomena of cognition and consciousness, though there is in these lower
forms an entire absence of anything resembling nerves.

That the phenomenon of consciousness exists in all animals having
organs of cognitionj that is, organs of special sense, such as hearing,
sight, smell, taste, touch, there cannot be any question. Otherwise
these organs could be of no use and could never have developed.
But the evidence that they are used is the same as the evidence of the
use of such organs by human beings.

Can there be any doubt that the eyes of a dog enable him to see,
that his ears enable him to hear, that his nerves of taste and smell
are used in the same manner as those of a human being? Is there
any doubt that a dog would howl with pain, if his foot or tongue
were to come in contact with boiling water? If not, then there can
be no doubt that the dog has cognitions of external relations which
are of the same nature as those experienced by human beings. Do not
dogs, elephants and other animals prove by their actions that they
have memory? If so, they must have cognitions of previous cogni-
tions. Many acts of animals, such as the opening of a door by lifting

BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE 45

a latch, show conclusively that their power of deduction or reason is
of the same order and nature as that of human beings. Furthermore,
the general anatomical structure of the organs and the functions of
the organs in all vertebrates from apes to alligators and fishes, in-
cluding the brain and entire nervous system, is the same as that of
man, differing from man only in the minor details of adaptation to
environment.

The belief that animals, even the higher vertebrates, have no con-
sciousness of existence has been especially promulgated by the
idealists, that is, egotists, the idealist being one who believes that he is
the only person and the only thing which exists, and that he himself
exists only in his "mind." What his mirid is he steadfastly refrains
from disclosing.

Consciousness, instead of being essential to living bodies, is never
even persistent in any living body. It is invariably an intermittent
or periodic phenomenon and any tendency toward persistence is
generally, if not always, detrimental or destructive to the organism.
The average period of consciousness of living animals is about twelve
hours, followed normally by an equal period of oblivion, that is, a
period in which there is no consciousness or cognition. These periods
correspond regularly to a semi-rotational period of the earth. The
period of oblivion, or sleep, corresponds in the case of most animals
with the semi-rotational period of darkness and low temperature. The
probable reason for this correspondence is the fact that during the
period of darkness the avenues of visual sensation would be compara-
tively useless, if that were the period of activity. The operation of the
organic law of the survival of those best suited to their environment,
has produced races and types of organisms whose requirements in
periods of activity and oblivion correspond with earthly conditions.

To this law of intermittent consciousness and oblivion there seems
to be no exception among animals, except that the period of oblivion
may in some cases be prolonged, either naturally or accdientally, for
several days or even months, and in exceptional cases for years, with-
out detriment to the organism. But the period of normal conscious-
ness cannot in any case be prolonged to any great extent without
producing disastrous effects.

It appears that consciousness, instead of being essential to life, is
a phenomenon accompanying only a most destructive or disintegrating
condition of the organism. In other words, consciousness is mani-

46 BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE

fested in a living body only when it is in that condition which nor-
mally tends most rapidly toward death.

During the period of oblivion or "sleep" there can, of course, be
no consciousness. That is, there can be no unconscious conscious state.
This period of oblivion is the period in which the exhausted brain,
the organ of consciousness, rests and undergoes repair.

Dreams, or abnormal conscious states, are usually spoken of as
occurring during sleep, but such a statement is obviously incorrect.
Dreams are abnormal conscious states occurring at intervals between
periods of oblivion, or periods of oblivion and normal consciousness,
not during oblivion. It is evident that no conscious state, however
imperfect or abnormal, can be oblivion. Experience has taught every-
one to distinguish between oblivion and any variety of conscious state.

There is no evidence that the normal conscious state ever has a con-
tinuous existence of more than a few hours. The idea of conscious-
ness, as a being of continuous existence, as a soul or mind, extending
through periods of unconsciousness and returning conscious states, is
entirely hypothetical and unsupported by facts. All established facts
can be more easily accounted for without than with this hypothesis.
An unconscious conscious state is merely a contradiction of terms. We
have no evidence that consciousness is anything more than a phenom-
enon, which accompanies certain juxtapositions of energy, matter,
space and time, like the phenomenon of the rising sun or the vanish-
ing twilight.

When consciousness reappears in a living body after a period of
oblivion, it is not a continuation of the previous conscious state, but,
like the succeeding day on which it appears, is only the recurrence of
a similar phenomenon. At the end of a day we never speak of the
day as going to sleep, and we never think of the day as re-awakening
on the morrow, but we always consider that tomorrow will be an-
other day. And so we must correctly consider successive conscious
states, not as re-awakenings of a previous conscious state after periods
of oblivion, but as entirely new, successive 'conscious states, each exist-
ing for a certain period, then passing out of existence into oblivion.

The notion has gained general currency, and has come down from
the remotest antiquity, that the return of consciousness to a living
body after sleep or anaesthesia is the awakening of something which
maintained a continuous existence in an unconscious state — that con-
sciousness becomes unconscious, yet continues to exist.

BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE 47

We take the ground that no evidence in support of this view can
be adduced. The brain, and the bi'ain only, continues to exist during
successive conscious and unconscious states, but the separate conscious
and unconscious states have no continuous existence. We might with
equal reason say that successive waves which roll upon the sea-shore
are but successive awakenings of some persistent being, which pre-
serves a continuous existence. Two successive waves washing the
same shore may appear exactly alike. Two successive sunbeams shin-
ing through a window on successive days may appear to be the same.
Two successive flames on the same gas-burner may appear to be the
same flame. They are not only not the same; but they have nothing
in common, except that they are in the same position. They have the
same space-constituent, but entirely different matter-, energy- and time-
constituents. Two successive conscious states with an intervening
period of oblivion may appear to be exactly alike — and may be alike,
though they are not the same.

Both the physical and the conscious identity of every living body
is continually changing from day to day, from hour to hour and from
second to second. The conscious condition at any instant depends
entirely upon the physiological condition. Consciousness accompanies
only certain particular conditions of the living body. Destroy the body
or the conditions and the conscious state is destroyed ; vary the con-
ditions and the conscious state varies with them. With physiological
fatigue consciousness is at a low condition. With physiological vigor
consciousness is most active. A person retiring after a hard day's
labor says "I feel nearly dead," or rising with the morning sun, says
"I feel like a new man." Yet he tries to persuade himself that his
identity has preserved a continuous existence — that his conscious state
was temporarily in an unconscious state.

Is it not more reasonable to say that a new conscious state and a
new cognition come with the return of activity to the brain? The
previous conscious state and the previous cognition ceased with the
cessation of the necessary kind of brain activity. When the brain-
tissue again acquires the necessary kind of activity and begins again
to dissipate accumulated energy in the required manner, we have no
reason to believe that it acquires the same activity which it previously
exercised, but only an activity similar to that which ceased. We have
no reason to suppose that brain activity in itself has a continuous ex-
istence with intermittent periods of inactivity. How can activity be

48 BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE

inactivity? We have likewise no reason to believe in the continuous
existence of either cognition or consciousness, since they are phe-
nomena of brain activity only.

It is an established and self-evident principle that no event can
happen more than once. There cannot possibly be a continuation of
a phenomenon after it has ceased to exist. Any phenomenon, after
ceasing to exist, may be succeeded by a similar or nearly similar phe-
nomenon, but never can be succeeded by itself.

The fire that burns in a locomotive today and is extinguished at
night, is not the same fire that yesterday energized the same loco-
motive, driving it through the same course, over the same track,
though both fires perform the same duties and appear to be identical.
There has been an interruption, a time between them when no fire
existed. The phenomenon which we call fire is persistent through
a certain interval of time, but its matter-, energy-, space- and time-
constituents are continuously changing. The phenomenon, fire, is
persistent as long as the proper conditions obtain, but it is not the
same fire in its constituents during any two successive instants. One
of the conditions necessary for the existence of fire is the continuous
maintenance of a certain minimum temperature. Reduce the tempera-
ture below this minimum and the fire, the phenomenon, ceases to
exist. While the phenomenon of fire continues to exist the relation
between the matter- and the energy-constituents is continuously chang-
ing. When the phenomenon ceases the relation between the matter-
constituent and the energy-constituent becomes permanent. If, after
a certain interval of permanent condition, the temperature be again
raised above the critical minimum, the phenomenon of fire is again
produced, but not the same phenomenon, not the same fire which
previously existed, only a similar fire.

So, likewise, the phenomenon of consciousness which accompanies
a certain organism today, and which is really a species of fire, is not
the same phenomenon which accompanied the same organism yester-
day and passed out of existence, but is only a similar phenomenon.

The brain tissue, containing and constituting the record of experi-
ences, changes but little from day to day. Consequently, each daily
succeeding conscious state differs very little from the preceding,
and inherits or possesses nearly all of the facts of consciousness
possessed by the preceding, is at all times an exact reflection of the

BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE 49

record, which exists at the time on the brain tissue, whatever may
have been the preceding periods of oblivion or consciousness.

It may be sophistically argued that consciousness has a continuous
existence, because the record on the brain tissue is continuous. But
the record on the brain tissue is not consciousness. Consciousness is
a kind of cognition. A convolution of brain tissue, constituting a
record, may be capable of exciting brain activity and producing a
certain cognition, but it is not the cognition itself. It is easy to
confuse the conception of a phenomenon with that of the physical
elements which produce the phenomenon. The printed record of a
word in a book is not the word itself. The word is a sound or a
combination of sounds. The printed record is only a body capable of
producing in the brain, through the organs of vision, a certain cog-
nition, which may cause, through the organs of speech, the produc-
tion of a certain word corresponding to or correlative with the
printed record. Similarly, the brain tissue record of a previous con-
scious state is not of itself a conscious state, but merely a body capa-
ble, through internal relations, without the intervention of organs of
sense, of producing or exciting a certain cognition similar to a pre-
ceding cognition which produced the record. But when cognition
ceases, consciousness, which is only a variety of cognition, must also
cease, and cognition of all kinds must cease when brain activity ceases.

All brain activity requires the continuous expenditure or transfor-
mation of energy of a certain form. As the store of this form of
energy runs low or becomes exhaused, its consumption will stop;
cognition will cease; consciousness will cease, though the brain itself
may lemain substantially unchanged. It is further quite evident that
when the brain is destroyed there can be no brain activity, no cogni-
tion, no consciousness. Every phenomenon is the result of certain
necessary conditions. If one of the necessary conditions is lacking,
the phenomenon cannot exist. In this case the transformation or
dissipation of a particular form of energy by a particular form and
kind of body is an essential condition for the existence of cognition.

The purely hypothetical notion of the continuous existence of a
soul, mind or individual mentality was probably born of the desire
to live indefinitely. On this theory there was no escape from the con-
clusion that consciousness must exist in an unconscious state. What-
ever theories may be entertained in regard to the existence of a
soul or mind, as a thing apart from the conscious state, we leave to

CM •7'\
CD

CO

'-SmI brain activity and the conscious state

metaphysician, since it is not subject to physical laws, methods
^j proofs. Consciousness, however, is a truly physical and physio-
logical phenomenon, the existence of which is placed beyond doubt,
■ and it should be investigated by physical methods.

The belief in the continuous existence of consciousness, that is, the
existence of unconscious consciousness, and the existence of "spirits,"
or consciousness apart from any living body, has probably been greatly
enhanced and propagated by the vulgar interpretation of the phe-
nomena of dreams and aberations. Upon the hypothesis that conscious-
ness is an entity, soul or spirit, having a continuous and indefinite
existence independent of a living body, dreams, cerebral aberations,
sleep, anaesthesia and death are entirely unaccountable by any rational
process. Upon the hypothesis that consciousness is a phenomenon
accompanying only certain conditions of matter, energy, space and
time, the accounting for all cerebral manifestations comes within
the range of possibility, if not probability.

A dream is a phenomenon of the same order as consciousness. It
is a kind of consciousness. It is produced under conditions similar to,
but not identical with, those which produce ordinary or normal con-
sciousness. In the dream there is cognition, brain activity and the
dissipation of nerve energy. There is re-cognition and memory. As
there is brain activity, there must be alteration of the brain tissue.
There is, therefore, a recording of the phenomenon or dream itself
similar to the record of all other conscious states. Consequently, a
dream is remembered as a past experience.

The brain activity of a dream, however, is different from the
normal brain activity, and the dream is a conscious state excited and
maintained while the avenues of sensation are inactive or only partly
active. The normal or ordinary conscious state is produced by brain
activity while the avenues of sensation are open and active. In the
dream the stimulus of brain activity must be entirely or chiefly from
within the brain, because there is no normal, voluntary communi-
cation through the organs of sense with outer existence. Such a
conscious state must be chiefly the product of past and recorded ex-
periences only, or of past experiences juxtaposed upon the imperfect
cognitions produced through partly active sensory tracts; but not
necessarily or likely of complete or chronologically arranged or rela-
tively connected experiences. They may be fragmentary and jumbled
together haphazard, or may follow an orderly chronological sequence.

BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE 51

depending upon the cause and nature of the stimulus of brain activity,
and also to a great extent upon the condition and cerebral idiosyn-
crasies of the individual.

These abnormal brain activities produce cognitions which are
merely the haphazard combinations of the most easily available brain
records, and the recollection of these cognitions afterward appears
grotesque to the normal consciousness.

The writer once dreamed of being introduced to "Mr. Glass,"
who was entirely nude and whose flesh was transparent. Otherwise
he appeared to be an ordinary, living, moving and speaking human
being. It is not difficult to understand how this monstrous cognition
was produced by abnormal brain activity from the most ordinary of
previous cognitions. One of the commonest cognitions is that of the
living human form. Another very common cognition is that of glass.
The abnormal brain activity, lasting probably only a fraction of a
second, worked only on the then most available of previous cognitions,
selecting and utilizing only certain prominent characters in each and
combining them. In that way the transparency only of the glass was
combined with the form only of the human body, the inflexibility
of the glass and the opacity of the human body being ignored. In
the production of this cognition the abnormal brain activity might
also have utilized the record of a cognition occurring twenty-five years
before, when the writer had the experience of seeing and minutely
examining the bones of his own hand by the transformed Roentgen
rays of Edison's fluoroscope.

That a dream may also be a combination of cognitions of memory
and cognitions of present external relations, that is, of sensations, is
shown by the following experience:

A person was awakened from a dream by repeated calling, each
successive call being louder than the preceding. Each call was heard,
recognized and answered in the dream, but was not answered in
fact. The final call awakened the dreamer and was heard both in
the dream and after awakening. The cognitions of the repeated calls
must, therefore, have been a part of the dream. These cognitions were
caused by external relations through the organs of hearing. From
this it follows that dreams are produced at least partly by external
relations through sensory organs by involuntary action.

The following quotation from a current daily paper shows another
variety of conscious state:

52 BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE

"H. H. R. , a swimming instructor, arose from bed early to-
day, walked to a front second-story window of his home and dived
through the glass to the street below. When revived at the hospital
he said his last previous recollection was of dreaming he was about
to break the world's high-diving record. Attending surgeons said he
was not seriously hurt."

This was evidently not a case of somnambulism or sleep-walking,
but dream-walking, the subject being in a dream and acting in ac-
cordance with that abnormal conscious state and under the influence
of an abnormal volition. But there is a difference between this ab-
normal volition and an involuntary action. Permanent or persistent
dream-walking is a dangerous form of insanity, causing the subject to
commit various acts of violence and unreason while really dreaming
that he is doing something else or that his acts are necessary or right-
ful. In many cases of this kind the subject has an uncontrollable de-
sire to jump or dive from high places.

An apparently similar, but really very different case was witnessed
by the writer. A young lady riding at night on an open street car,
having seats extending across from one side of the car to the other,
arose from her seat and walked to the opposite side of the car as it
approached the street on which she lived. She stepped down on the
"running-board," facing forward, as would a person accustomed to
alighting from a moving car, and stepped off to the ground. Her
manner impressed the writer to a very unusual degree as that of an
expert in alighting from moving cars until her foot touched the
ground, when she instantly fell forward upon her face. The car was
still going about ten miles per hour. It was then found that her act
was entirely somnambulistic. She was asleep and entirely unconscious,
entirely oblivious, until awakened by striking the ground. Being ob-
livious at the time of the action, it is evident that the act was invol-
untary. At the same time, it appears to have been caused by a
transfer of external relations into correlative internal relations, which,
without producing a cognition, caused the involuntary action. Other-
wise why did this act occur at the place where she was accustomed to
get off the car?

There is another explanation of this act, which involves less diffi-
culty. The young lady might have been awake and recognized the
approach to her street, and might then have fallen asleep. In that
case her act was that of ordinary somnambulism. It is not an un-

BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE 53

common occurrence for a person riding in a vehicle to sleep and
awaken many times in a minute.

The so-called "mesmeric" state is also probably a variety of dream-
acting.

There are well' authenticated cases of what is called "dual person-
ality," in which the individual, after years of ordinary life, suddenly
loses the entire brain-record and the past life becomes a blank. A
new brain-record is then produced, the subject living as another indi-
vidual for years. Then this second brain-record may be wiped out
and the former record may re-appear. The two records may alter-
nately or periodically appear, disappear and re-apper. Some of these
cases are also called aphasia. In some cases the two personalities
may be of entirely different and opposite natures, such as is illus-
trated in the fictitious case of "Dr. Jeckyll and Mr. Hyde." Sometimes
the alternations occur periodically with almost clock-like regu-
larity, especially in certain types of insanity.

There are those who never dream and do not know what a dream
is like.

During health there is probably always a small supply of energy
stored up and ready at any time for instant use, whenever brain
activity may be aroused or stimulated : whenever the organism is
awakened from sleep. It is always the physical organism or body that
sleeps and rests while it is again being rejuvenated. It is like a loco-
motive at rest, whose fire has been extinguished while coal is being
loaded into the bunker, but whose boiler remains hot with a small
supply of steam and is capable of liberating energy and producing
activity at any instant.

During sleep and also during dreams the avenues of sensation are
inactive or nearly inactive and external relations cannot be transferred
into normal correlative internal relations in the brain. Therefore,
there can be no correct cognitions or knowledge of external relations
under these conditions. Nevertheless, brain activity and conscious
states may be stimulated by certain physiological conditions indepen-
dent of sensation and while these avenues are inactive, such as lack
of sufficient oxygen or the presence of a poison in the blood. But the
only cognitions possible with inactive sensory tracts are cognitions of
the record on the brain tissue itself and those produced by the brain
activities stimulated by that record.

While there can be no conscious state without physiological activity

54 BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE

and brain activity, there may be physiological and brain activity vi^ith-
out consciousness. During all sleep of the normal organism there is no
consciousness, but there is always physiological activity. There are
the involuntary organs, such as the heart and lungs of vertebrates,
which remain active at all times during the life of the body. This
action we have already described as the involuntary vital function.
These involuntary organs act independently of conscious states, nor-
mal or abnormal.

Only a small part of our knowledge is from actual cognitions of
external relations. A large part of it is inferential. No individual
has actual knowledge of the existence of any conscious being except
himself. He has cognitions of other living bodies which cognitions
come through the various organs of sense. These bodies seem to
be similar to his own in form, appearance, powers, attributes and
purposes. From these circumstances he infers that these other living
bodies are similar to himself and are characterized by conscious states
similar to his own. But he does not knoiu that there is one other indi-
vidual having such a conscious state. This is proved by the fact that
somnambulists, who are entirely unconscious of their own existence,
may walk the streets and not be recognized by us as in any respect
different from other persons truly conscious. The writer has known
persons intoxicated by alcoholic beverages, who conversed with almost
ordinary intelligence and wath apparent consciousness of all surround-
ings and who were able to make their way home at night, passing
dangerous places in safety, yet were during all of the time entirely un-
conscious and on the following day had no recollection of what oc-
curred after a certain moment when the intoxication became complete.
Yet on first meeting such a person, though he is entirely unconscious,
we have as much reason from his conversation to believe that he is
a conscious individual, similar to ourselves, as we ever have to believe
that there is in existence any other conscious being besides our indi-
vidual self.

There are others having abnormal conscious states, which are desig-
nated as various forms of insanity. Some of these are continuous
dreamers: some are in a condition of permanent sleep or oblivion:
some live in alternate periods of oblivion and abnormal conscious
state. There are also, not only abnormal conscious states, but ab-
normal oblivious states, such as the intoxicated condition mentioned
above, in which the individual, while actually unconscious, appears to

BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE 55

be conscious. These abnormal oblivious states are also varieties of
permanent insanity.

The various forms of insanity, or abnormal conscious states, are
generally, but not always, recognized by the very fact that they are
not similar to ourselves. That is why we call them abnormal.

We do not mean that all abnormal conscious states are the cog-
nitions of a diseased brain, though the cognitions of a diseased brain
are generally abnormal. By abnormal conscious states we mean those
in which the brain activity is not complete, whether the incomplete-
ness is due to cerebral defects or merely to temporary conditions or
environment.

In many living animals we recognize evidences of conscious states
very similar to our own. In other animals we see evidences of con-
scious states very different from and inferior to our own. And there
are still others, in which the evidence points to the existence of con-
scious states so low as to be recognizable only with difficulty.

It is not possible for us to know of a previous conscious state which
left no record or memory. Therefore, as far as we can have any
actual knowledge, the somnambulist, having no memory of his acts,
could not have been in a conscious state, but in a state of oblivion.

A dream is an abnormal state produced by some disturbance, either
external or internal, which excites activity in a part of the brain, pro-
ducing imperfect or abnormal cognitions, but not sufficiently strong
to excite those centers which control the avenues of sensation and they
remain inactive or partly inactive. If the disturbance is very slight,
there is only a slight and momentary activity, and there may be only
a single past experience, or fragment of an experience, reflected from
the cerebral record back upon itself, making an additional, but more
or less imperfect, record of the same experience. On the other hand,
a sudden and very violent disturbance, such as the report of a gun
or a flash of lightning, would excite the most violent activity, causing
the entire cerebrum to respond with a sudden vibration of every cell,
compelling the cognition thus suddenly evoked to reflect and again
record substantially the entire record of a past life in an instant, and
before the involuntary or unconscious control of the sensory tracts can
be displaced by the voluntary or conscious action, that is, before the
entire nervous system can be awakened to acquire a new, normal
conscious state.

Thus we may account for those peculiar dreams, in which the

56 BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE

subject, during a severe cerebral struggle, such as a death struggle, or
upon a sudden awakening from sleep or from drowning, seems to
see his entire life passing instantly before him — seems to live all of
the years of his life over again in a fraction of a second of actual
time. And it is not improbable that the brain, in its final struggle
with dissolution, may, as a rule, if it has not previously undergone
serious impairment, reproduce substantially the entire record, and that
the final conscious state may be a momentary review of all previous
states.

In most cases a dream is the cognition of a confused and jumbled
succession of past experiences, irregular, fragmentary and discontin-
uous. This is because brain activity is normal only when the centers
controlling the avenues of sensation are all active and under voluntary
control.

Under normal conditions all of the nerve centers are aroused to
normal activity by any disturbance with about equal facility, thus
evoking a normal conscious state, instead of a dream or abnormal
conscious state.

Certain drugs, such as morphine, have the power of keeping the
sensory tracts inactive and at the same time stimulating the other
centers to activity. This causes a prolonged dream, in which the
brain record is worked over and over and built up into the most
extravagant, grotesque, fascinating and indescribable cognitions. This
reckless expenditure of nerve energy entailed by the "opium habit"
has a tendency toward obliterating the brain record and rendering
it indistinct.

We have referred above to the fact that the period of oblivion or
sleep in living bodies may in some cases be extended for months or
years without apparent detriment to the living organism. This is
well illustrated in the "hibernation" of many animals, in which the
animal remains dormant or sleeping during a season of weeks or
months. In some of these cases the circulation of blood continues
and the involuntary system remains active. That is, the animal
continues to live, using up the store of energy laid in as a supply
during a season of activity and feeding. At the end of this period
of oblivion and involuntary activity the supply of energy — fat — has
become exhausted and the animal comes out of oblivion in a lean and
hungry condition. This is what occurs in "warm-blooded" hiberna-
tors, such as hibernating rodents. In other cases, such as reptiles and

BRAIN ACTIVITY AND THE CONSCIOUS STATE 57

fishes, the blood may actually cease to flow and become frozen
solid, so that there is not only oblivion or unconsciousness, but in-
activity of the involuntary and all other organs, that is, actual death.
This is also true of many, perhaps most, vegetable organisms. Al-
though there is in these cases actual death, there is not necessarily
any destruction of the organism, and under other and proper con-
ditions and proper stimulation new life — but not a reawakening of the
old — may come again into the organism.

Living bodies may be divided into two general classes, warm-
blooded and cold-blooded. The former have nerves of temperature,
are able to recognize differences of temperature and are in a normal
condition only when the blood or circulating fluid is at a certain
temperature or within a certain narrow range of temperatures. Any
increase in temperature above the normal produces a diseased condi-
tion called fever, and any reduction below the normal produces a dis-
eased condition called chill.

When in this warm-blooded class the temperature of the blood
is increased above or reduced below certain limits, chemical or other
changes take place, which produce death and at the same time de-
stroy the organism in such a way that neither consciousness nor life
may be again regenerated.

Cold-blooded organisms, including all plants, are those whose blood
normally takes the temperature of the surrounding medium. They
do not appear to be able to distinguish differences in temperature
within certain wide limits, and in most cases suffer no abnormal
result or disintegration when the temperature is reduced even below
the freezing point of water. Fishes, reptiles and plants are notable
examples of this class. The bodies of these animals, as previously
stated, are frequently frozen solid, become unconscious, motionless
and lifeless: may even be placed in liquid air and their temperature
reduced four hundred degrees below zero, becoming as brittle as
glass or any inanimate rock. Yet these frozen bodies may again be
thawed out and a new life^not the old life — may be brought into
them Tjy a revival of the involuntary vital function.

And in this frozen, lifeless state, in which there is no change, no
waste or transformation of energy or matter, they might remain
through countless eons, having a veritable immortality in the flesh,
and yet return again to new life in a new epoch, when the involun-
tary vital function returns to activity. There are probably at the

58 MAINTENANCE OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE

present time thousands of such immortal bodies in the frozen Arctic
and Antarctic fields of ice, destined possibly, to return in another
geologic age. But this immortality is in and of the flesh alone. In
these frozen, lifeless bodies there is no more consciousness, no more
brain or nerve activity or vital function than in a crystal of marble or
quartz. The same is equally true of a grain of wheat or corn. Its
involuntary vital function has ceased and it might lie in lifeless
immortality of the body while nations and dynasties come into and
go out of existence, then finally, with a renewed activity of the vital
function, spring triumphant into life and clothe the earth with the
verdure of its offspring.

XVIII.

MAINTENANCE OF THE CONSCIOUS
STATE

We have already compared the working of the brain and nervous
system to that of a telephone system, in which the various parts or
organs of the nervous system are structurally and functionally similar
to corresponding parts or organs of the telephone system. We have
seen that the ultimate purpose of each is the transmission of relations
existing at one position in space into correlative relations at another
position in space. We have seen that the means or instrument in
this transmission is in both cases impulses of energy.

In the telephone system the form of the energy transmitted is
electrical energy. In the nervous system, for lack of more definite
information of its nature, we have described the form of energy trans-
mitted as nervous energy.

The assumption that the nervous system acts in a manner similar
to that of a telephone system and that there is a transmission of
nervous energy along the nerve fibers similar to the transmission of
impulses or waves of electrical energy in the telephone system, is,
of course, hypothetical. But the hypothesis seems to be warranted and
the explanation afforded by it appears to be more in accordance with
all of the facts than any other hypothesis heretofore advanced. Never-
theless, our acceptance of the theory is only tentative.

MAINTENANCE OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE 59

The operation of the telephone system depends, not only upon its
mechanical integrity, but to a much greater degree upon the supply
of electrical energy. The mechanical equipment of a telephone system
may be faulty and in places or parts defective, yet, the general system
or part of it may be operative, if there is the proper supply of electrical
energy. But vuhen the battery is exhausted or the dynamo, if one is
used, becomes inactive and the supply of electrical energy is cut off,
the entire system necessarily ceases to operate. Every transmitter,
rceiver and wire is dead, and can be again brought into operative or
living condition only by a revival of the energy supply.

The same statement is entirely applicable to the nervous system.
One or more branches of the nervous system, such as the nerves of
an arm or leg, may be cut off, and yet, the balance of the system may
be perfectly operative, provided there is a continuous supply of
nervous energy.

We come now to an important difference between the two systems.
In the telephone system there is no difficulty in maintaining a con-
tinuous supply of electrical energy, whether the source of that energy
be a dynamo, primary battery or an accumulator. It is not difficult
to so arrange the mechanical details that, whatever may happen in
the ordinary course of events, there will be no interruption in the
supply of electrical energy. This is due in part to the use of duplicate
apparatus, always ready to take the place of any part which may give
out, and also to the use of practically unlimited sources of energy. In
practice telephone systems operate for months and years without in-
terruption.

But in the nervous system of an animal or in man the conditions
and the results are entirely different. In the first place there is no
duplication of the mechanism which supplies the energy or any part
of it. When an essential part of it gives out or becomes exhausted,
the system must stop. There is also no inexhaustible supply of energy.

The original source of nervous energy is material supplied by the
food. This material enters the blood as a solution and is conveyed by
circulation to the brain and other parts of the nervous system. The
immediate source of the energy is derived from this material in the
blood. Exactly what the substance is, what compound or compounds,
by undergoing chemical change, liberate this form of energy, we do
not know. We do know in general that the ultimate chemical changes

60 MAINTENANCE OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE

are catabolic, that is, they are changes of oxidation, or "destructive
metabolism," and finally result in the degradation of chemical energy
into heat of low degree. But in the transformations which occur, a
small portion of the energy passes through the form of nervous energy
and becomes available for the operation of the nervous system, just
as a portion of the energy of the food ingredients is transformed into
muscular energy and becomes available for the operation of the mus-
cular system.

We do not know, however, that the chemical compounds or blood
constituents, which produce nervous energy are the same as those
which produce muscular and other forms of energy.

We have no evidence that there is any storage or accumulation of
nervous energy in the brain or any part of the animal mechanism.
The continuity of the conscious state depends upon the continuity of
the circulation. A stoppage of the circulation causes an instantaneous
extinction of the conscious state.

The particular ingredients of the blood which are necessary to
supply nervous energy do not appear to be contained in the food-
solutions as they are absorbed into the vascular system from the ali-
mentary canal. These food-solutions consist chiefly of water, albumens,
sugars, acids and salts. But in the form and condition in which they
are absorbed they appear to supply no nervous energy. The partak-
ing of food appears to have little or no direct effect on the power
of maintaining the conscious state, though it generally shows an im-
mediate or rapid effect in reviving muscular energy. The taking of
food seems generally to weaken, rather than strengthen, the power
of maintaining the conscious state. A person is more likely to feel
"sleepy" after eating than before. The exhaustion of the power of
cognition and the power of maintaining the conscious state is not
prevented by the absorption of nourishment, however frequent or
complete the absorption may be. Without the supply of original food-
solutions neither the conscious state nor the vital function can be
long maintained. But even with this supply in unlimited quantity the
conscious state cannot be maintained continuously for any long period
of time.

These facts show that the material which directly supplies the
nervous energy is not contained in the original food-solution, but is
derived from some other direct source. This direct source is in all
probability chemical compounds formed from the ingredients of the

MAINTENANCE OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE 61

food-solutions by organic processes, which take place under special
conditions in certain special organs. The special organs are probably
the pituitary and the pineal glandular bodies. These bodies are located
in the center of the cerebrum and in close proximity and anatomical
connection with the inner terminals of the nerves of cognition or
special sense. It is also possible, but not probable, that other glands
may have some function in this connection.

We could hardly expect the original ingredients of the food-
solutions to be capable of liberating nervous energy. A process of
that kind would, in fact, almost involve a chemical impossibility.

The importance of the truth of this statement justifies a detailed
account of the reasons on which it is based.

It may be stated as a universal principle, that chemical energy,
which is a form of static or potential energy, cannot be transformed
into any other form, either static or kinetic, without a simultaneous
chemical change. Consequently, the chemical change corresponding to
any transformation of the chemical energy must occur at the place
where the transformation occurs.

Except in cases of dissociation, or splitting up of compounds,
which almost always absorb, instead of liberating energy, chemical
reactions do not occur without the mutual interaction of at least
two or more chemical reagents.

Under all living physiological conditions the physical conditions
of temperature, pressure and presence of moisture, are the same
in the brain as in the other parts of the body, and it is these physical
conditions which determine whether a chemical reaction will take
place. Therefore, if the reagents required in the reactions which
liberate nervous energy existed as original ingredients in the food-
solutions, as they are absorbed from the alimentary canal into the
vascular system, these reactions would take place immediately upon
absorption, or even in the alimentary canal before absorption. One
or both of the necessary reagents would be exhaused before being able
to reach the brain. The nervous energy would be produced and lost
in transit and not in the brain, where it could be used, or it might
not be produced at all.

The conclusion, therefore, seems inevitable that there must be not
less than two separate chemical reagents, which directly unite to
evolve nervous energy; that they must be separately produced by
separate organs; that these reagents, after being formed, must be

62 MAINTENANCE OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE

separately delivered and brought into reacting contact within the
cerebrum and in contact with the cerebral tissue which makes use
of the nervous energy.

Hence, we are almost driven to accept the pituitary and pineal
glandular bodies as the separate organs, which separately produce the
two necessary reagents, they being the only glandular bodies whose
position would enable them to perform this function. This hypothesis
is substantially supported by the position of these organs in the center
of the cerebrum and their anatomical structure and connection with
the sensory tracts. The fact that these organs are exceedingly small,
weighing only a few grains, is more in favor of the hypothesis than
against it, because the actual quantity of energy involved and needed
in brain operation, as compared with that involved in muscular opera-
tions, is exceedingly minute. The actual quantity of nervous energy
required to maintain the conscious state in a human being for a period
of twelve hours, if expressed as mechanical energy, would probably
be less, possibly very much less, than the millionth part of a horse-
power minute.

It is on these grounds that we base the hypothesis that these two
small cerebral glandular organs are the factories which produce the
chemical reagents whose combination is necessary to evolve the nervous
energy which gives to the cerebrum its power of cognition, its power
of maintaining the conscious state, its power of using the nervous
system as a means of communication for obtaining cognitions or
knowledge of external relations, and all of its powers of cogitation,
cognition and re-cognition of internal relations. These are the prin-
cipal, if not the only functions of the cerebrum.

To those who have not given the subject special attention the ques-
tion naturally arises. Why does not this same argument apply to the
development of muscular energy as well as nervous energy, and why
are separate chemical reagents not necessary for the production of
muscular energy? If so, whence come these separate reagents and
how are they separately delivered to all parts of the body where
muscular nergy is liberated? The same argument does apply with
exactly the same force, and we have in the operation of the muscular
and circulatory systems a most complete and convincing answer to
all of these questions. One of the two necessary chemical reagents for
the development of muscular energy is oxyhaemoglobin, which is pro-
duced in the lungs through the absorption of oxygen by haemoglobin.

MAINTENANCE OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE 63

a certain protied blood-solution contained in transporting receptacles,
the red corpuscles of the blood. These corpuscles containing the
oxyhaemoglobin are carried by the circulating blood to every part of
the body and supply every part of every muscle. In the chemical
reaction liberating muscular energy the oxygen is delivered by the
haemoglobin and reacts with the second chemical reagent, consisting
of albuminous and fibrinous compounds, of w^hich the muscle is con-
structed. These compounds are also transported to all parts of the
body by the blood in the form of solutions, but during transportation
they do not come in contact wath the oxyhaemoglobin. The de-
oxidized haemoglobin returns to the lungs for another supply of
oxygen. It is difficult to conceive a more perfect arrangement for
producing and separately transporting two necessary chemical reagents
to a body requiring them separately delivered to all of its parts. The
flowing stream of one reagent transports the receptacles containing
the other reagent, both traveling side by side to every part of the
body without touching each other. Then the emptied receptacles, the
corpuscles, pick up a part of the refuse, in the form of carbon dioxide,
and carry it back to the lungs, from which it is expelled by the
respiratory system. All of these transfers of material, the transfer
of the oxygen from the air in the lungs to the corpuscles, from the
corpulscles to the combining reagent, the transfer of the carbon
dioxide to the corpuscles and from the corpuscles to the air-space in
the lungs, are accomplished by transfusion through semi-permeable,
membranous walls — the transfusion of gases and liquids containing
gases in solution. Other products of the reaction which produces
muscular energy — products in liquid form — are carried as solution
by the stream of blood to the kidneys and other excretory organs,
where they also are separated by transfusion through semi-permeable
membranous walls from the blood solution and rejected.

Returning now from our digression to the pituitary and pineal
organs, these bodies, like many other parts of the living body, like all
parts, except the involuntary organs, are unable to operate contin-
uously. The involuntary vital organs, heart, lungs, etc., apparently
never tire of their work; never need a period of idleness, in which
to recuperate. But this is not true of voluntary organs, processes and
functions. It is not true of the power of cognition, of the power of
maintaining the conscious state. It is not true of the cerebrum as a
voluntary organ.

64 THE GENESIS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE

When the power of cognition has been in continuous operation for
a period of from twelve to twenty hours it becomes exhausted, ac-
quires an uncontrollable, involuntary desire to stop, to pass out of
existence, and it always does pass out of existence. There seems to be
no power that can prevent it. The conscious state may occasionally
by extreme stimulation, especially where there is a vigorous physical
constitution, be prolonged for a few hours, but finally and in a com-
paratively short time it always stops. But the brain and body con-
tinue to live, now in a condition of oblivion or sleep, there being no
knowledge of existence. The involuntary vital function now assumes
entire control of the body and sets in operation under involuntary
action all processes of rejuvenation and repair in all organs, including
the organs which produce the nervous-energy reagents, whether those
organs are the pituitary and pineal bodies or not.

Fortunately the involuntary vital function does not surrender its
control spontaneously to the voluntary power as soon as the process
of repair has made some pi'ogress, but continues its hold on the system
vmtil the rejuvenation has been completed, and even longer, unless a
conscious state is previously aroused or stimulated into existence by
an exciting cause.

XIX.

THE GENESIS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE

When after exhaustion the process of regeneration of the physical
system or body and brain has been thoroughly or nearly completed,
the brain is again in a condition in which it is able to maintain a
conscious state, but there is now no conscious state to maintain. The
brain still sleeps, if the surrounding space is dark and still and free
from all causes of sensation. The brain has the power of cognition,
but there is no cognition. Why does the brain continue to sleep after
the regenerative processes have been completed? If the brain now
has the power of cognition, why is there no cognition?

There can, of course, be no cognition if there is nothing to take
cognition of. If there is no light, no wave of visual energy to be
transferred, there can be no transference into a correlative internal

THE GENESIS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE 65

visual relation and no cognition of vision. If there is no atmospheric
vibration, no external wave of auditory energy, there can be no
transfer into a correlative internal auditory relation and no cognition
of hearing. If there is no external contact with the nerves of touch,
there can be no transfer to the brain of a correlative internal relation
and no cognition of touch. If the external temperature is the same
as the internal, there can be no cognition of an external relation of
temperature, no sensation of heat or cold. If there is no external
stimulus to affect the olfactory or gustatory nerves, there can be
no corresponding transfer into correlative internal relations of, and
no cognition of, smell or taste. If there are no external relations of
any kind to be transferred to the brain, there can be no correlative
internal relations of any kind produced in the brain and, therefore,
no cognitions of external relations, no sensations. Hence, the brain
must remain inactive, asleep and without cognition, except such cogni-
tions as may originate within the brain.

But if there be no external disturbance to cause a cognition of
external relations, what could start the cognition of internal relations
or brain records? If such internal relations or brain records could
start cognitions at one time w^ithout external assistance or stimuli,
why not at another time? And why should internal relations, brain
records, alone start cognitions at any time? There must always be
some kind of stimulus to start any kind of brain activity in an inactive,
sleeping brain. Otherwise there would be no reason for brain activity
to begin at any particular time. We cannot suppose, we cannot con-
ceive, that time alone, the mere continuity of being, can act as the
cause of any change in matter or energy. The hibernating rodent
continues to sleep for weeks and months and until there comes a
stimulus to an awakenig. This stimulus comes regularly with the
season of food supply. It may come in the form of an exhaustion of
the animal's supply of fat, of sustaining nourishment. This exhaus-
tion produces a physiological disturbance — probably the sensation of
hunger, which notifies the sleeping brain that it is time to awaken.

Under the conditions assumed above, with no eiifective external
relations, no correlative internal relations, there would be no reason,
no discoverable cause for the genesis of a conscious state at any time,
and our only logical conclusion is that under such conditions there
would never be generated another conscious state; that the physical
body would continue to sleep as long as these conditions maintained.

66 THE GENESIS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE

We are now confronted with the question of the genesis of the
conscious state. How, when and why does it originate? Is the con-
scious state a voluntary or an involuntary phenomenon? Is the cere-
bral act of cognition voluntary or involuntary? Is the production of
the cerebral condition, in which the brain has the power of cognition,
a voluntary or an involuntary act? If these acts are voluntary,
whence arisis the volition? Volition itself is a cerebral act, a kind of
cognition. If the cerebrum is in oblivion, it has no conscious state
and, hence, no volition. Therefore, the genesis of a conscious state
must be an involuntary cerebral act. We have already seen that
neither the brain record alone nor any existing internal relations of
the cerebrum at a particular time or at any time, by voluntary or
involuntary action, could generate or bring into activity a power of
cognition without a stimulus to brain activity. How, then, does it
originate ?

We have defined the life of a body as the period of activity of
the involuntary vital function. Therefore, there is at all times during
the life of the body the involuntary action of the involuntary vital
organs. During the periods of oblivion this involuntary action also
absolutely controls the entire system, including even the organs which,
during the conscious state, are under the control of volition. The
sensory fibers must, therefore, along with all other organs, be subject
during oblivion to involuntary action. Of this we have ample evidence
in the reflex actions, in which the stimulus of external relations,
through the sensory and motor fibers, the spinal cord, the medulla
and cerebellum, without any cerebral act or knowledge, causes mus-
cular movement and recoil of the part affected from the contact. The
nerve fibers, therefore, both motor and sensory, have the involuntary
power of transmitting impulses of energy, but these impulses cannot
enter the cerebrum during oblivion. They may knock at the door,
but are refused admission while the cerebrum is resting and reju-
venating. But these knockings would of themselves constitute a
stimulus to brain activity, and would, if strong enough, cause the
door to open and cause the generation of a conscious state.

These involuntary knockings at the door of the cerebrum may
occur at any time and would occur whenever there is the stimulus of
external relations. And in these involuntary knockings we have,
therefore, an ample potential cause for the genesis of conscious states.

But if the cerebrum is not completely or sufficiently rejuvenated

THE GENESIS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE 67

when these knockings come, it will resist their untimely intrusion,
will resist throwing off the oblivious state. The knocking must be
repeated, continued and must perhaps become louder, more intense.
Finally the cerebrum yields and throws off oblivion, perhaps slug-
gishly, reluctantly, at first, with a successive, instead of a simultaneous
awakening of the various sensory powers.. This would cause an initial
brain activity, which would be incomplete and abnormal. That is,
a momentary dream, an imperfect cognition built largely on the easily
available internal relations, brain records, is likely to precede a full
awakening to normal conscious activity.

Thus we find that the natural awakening after full and complete
rejuvenation of the physical system is generally dreamless, rapid and
complete, while an awakening by external disturbance of an incom-
pleted oblivion is very often the culmination of a dream. The dream,
in such cases, is probably of very short duration, though it may seem
to cover a long period. This momentary dream is really only the
initial stage, the incomplete and abnormal stage, of the conscious state
which is sluggishly coming into existence and changing from involun-
tary to voluntary control the muscular, nerve and brain activities.

It follows, therefore, that a conscious state will come into existence
as soon as the power of cognition has been completely restored to the
cerebrum, because there will always be at least one external relation
in transferrable contact with a sensory tract, which is a brain stimulus
sufficient to generate a conscious state. That external relation will
be the contact of the body with the support on which it necessarily
reposes.

There must be first the power of cognition and the power of trans-
mission, then the exciting cause or stimulus, before there can be the
generation of a conscious state.

When, after a suitable period of sleep, the cerebrum has again
acquired the power of cognition and the power of maintaining the
conscious state, it may, nevertheless, and often does, remain asleep
for a considerable time, if the surrounding conditions are favorable —
if the external relations are those of darkness, quietness and absence
of any condition sufficiently stimulating to the sensory terminals. But
even under these conditions the necessary contact of the body with
the support on which it reposes becomes irksome and irritating to
the nerves of touch. There is then an external relation, which is
transferred by involuntary nerve transmission into a brain stimulus

68 THE GENESIS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE

and a resulting cognition and conscious state.

A ray of light, the song of a bird, the odor of food or a change of
temperature will similarly, under these conditions, become an external
relation involuntarily transferable into an internal brain stimulus and
cause the so-called awakening, that is, the genesis of a conscious state.

If these are the conditions necessary for the generation of a normal
conscious state, what are the conditions necessary for the generation
of an abnormal conscious state, as, for example, a dream? In this
case there must also be the power of cognition, but the cognition is
of a different kind. While there is, even in a dream or other abnormal
conscious state, a knowledge of the existence of self, it is a very dif-
ferent kind of knowledge from that of the ordinary normal conscious
state.

In these abnormal conscious states there are generally lacking most
of the prominent features of the normal. There is generally a lack
of definition. The space relations and time relations seem to be of
no importance. It may seem as easy to step across the sea as over
a door-step. It may appear to take only a few seconds to pass from
infancy to old age. The chronological sequence of events seems gen-
erally of little or no importance. There generally appear to be few
if any of the cognitions which we have described as reason and
emotion. The power of logical deduction is absent. There is generally
little or no fear of death or injury. Frequently there is the sensation
of falling from a great height or being subject to other perilous con-
ditions with no injurious results. Perhaps the most notable character-
istic of these abnormal cognitions. is that they are almost always false
and contrary to or at least different from the actual simultaneous
external relations.

What, then, are the conditions which determine the genesis of an
abnormal, instead of a normal, power of cognition?

Let us suppose that we are led into a room darkened, so that no
ray of light enters. We come in contact with an object which seems
to be a smooth ball about ten inches in diameter lying in a shallow
cavity in the floor. We try to lift it and find it is very heavy and
hot, so heavy that we can move it only very slightly. By pushing and
lifting we cannot get it out of the cavity. It rolls back in spite of our
utmost efforts. From its hard, polished surface, small size and great
weight we infer that it is a sphere of exceedingly heavy metal — ■
probably yellow gold. It emits no odor, imparts no taste, but is so hot

THE GENESIS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE 69

that we can endure hand contact with it only a short time. Our
cognitions of it come through the sensations of touch, pressure and
temperature combined with several re-cognitions. From the sensations
of weight and limited size comes the suggested re-cognition of a heavy
metal and a solid sphere, also the re-cognition of the particular metal,
gold ; from gold, the re-cognition of yellow color. Hence, the cogni-
tion of this sphere, formed in this darkened room, is that of a solid,
heated sphere of polished, yellow gold.

We now open the window and illuminate the room. Instantly we
experience an entirely different cognition. We now find that the
heavy, heated ball of solid, polished, opaque, yellow gold is only a
transparent, hollow sphere of glass, weighing possibly three pounds,
attached on the under side to a powerful spring, which allows it to
be slightly moved, but not moved out of the shallow cavity in the
floor. It is maintained at a high temperature by an internal electric
heater connected to wires, which also pass out below.

This hypothetical illustration shows how erroneous a cognition may
be, which comes through one, or even three, kinds of sensation,
though the brain is in its normal conscious activity. Why did these
three perfectly normal sensations of touch, temperature and weight
cause this false cognition of a solid, heated sphere of polished, yellow
gold ? If we had never seen, never lifted, never felt of yellow, pol-
ished gold ; if M^e had never felt or seen a spherical or a heated body,
would the sensations in thise case have caused the same cognition?
Undoubtedly not. The cognition was very erroneous, but was, never-
theless, produced by correct sensations of present external relations
combined with correct re-cognitions of past experiences and occurred
during a perfectly normal conscious state. The past experiences, or at
least some of them, were past cognitions of the various properties of
gold, cognitions of the form of a sphere, of polished metal, of yellow
color and of the sensations produced by high temperature and weight
or pressure. These re-cognitions could have come only from the
cerebral record, which could consist only of alterations of brain tissue
caused by previous cognitions.

What was the result of this combination of correct sensations with
correct re-cognitions ? The result was a profoundly erroneous cognition
— an abnormal cognition. It was an abnormal cognition of the same
nature as a dream, but it occurred during a perfectly normal conscious
state. And why did this abnormal cognition occur during a normal

70 THE GENESIS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE

conscious state? It occurred because a single avenue of sensation,
vision, was closed, because an important cognition or knowledge of
the external relations in this case could come only through that
avenue. This abnormal cognition was formed from re-cognitions of
past events, instead of knowledge of present external relations. Yet,
it was undoubtedly the correct, but incomplete, sensations of present
external relations, which stimulated the irrelevant re-cognitions into
cerebral activity in building up this false, abnormal cognition.

And is this not the key to the genesis of both normal and abnormal
conscious states? The normal conscious state is the product of com-
plete voluntary sensation, when all sensory powers are working to-
gether, combined with activity of the cerebrum in a normal, reju-
venated condition, capable of properly and simultaneously combining,
in chronological order and correct relationship, the re-cognitions of
past experiences with the cognitions of present external relations.
The abnormal cognitions and conscious states are the defective product
of imperfect sensations combined haphazard with re-cognitions of an
exhausted or only partly active brain— a brain incapable of co-
ordinating past and present relations; incapable of concentrating
brain and nerve activity upon a multiplicity of simultaneous external
relations and internal re-cognitions.

In the normal activity the sensory tracts are all simultaneously
stimulated, guided and controlled by volition. In the abnormal activity
the sensory tracts are partly or wholly controlled by the involuntary
vital function and are inactive, except through accidental and gen-
erally excessive stimulation. The actual transmission of nervous-
energy impulses by sensory nerve fibers is always involuntary. We
cannot by volition prevent the sensory nerves from transmitting the
impulses caused by external relations. For example, we cannot by
volition prevent hearing a sound. But these actions may be guided,
stimulated and concentrated by volition. If there are several simul-
taneous sound relations in progress in a room occupied by a listener,
he may by volition concentrate upon the sound from one source, as
the voice of one person among many, and not even hear the others.
This is what we mean by voluntary control of the organs of sense.
There may be many objects in a field of view, but the eye may by
volition be directed to only one small object, the others not even
being seen.

But there are also conditions under which the sensory nerves do

THE GENESIS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE 71

not appear to transmit external relations, even involuntarily, or, if the
transmission occurs, it is entirely without effect. For example, sound
relations, though very intense and in close proximity to a sleeper, may
be entirely unheard.

These considerations lead us to several important conclusions:

1. That in abnormal conscious states the control of the sensory
tracts is involuntary.

2. That in normal states the control of the sensory tracts is
chiefly voluntary, but there is always a certain amount of involuntary
action.

3. That there may, therefore, be both voluntary and involuntary
action at the same time.

4. That there is the possibility of the simultaneous existence in
the same individual of an abnormal and a normal conscious state.

5. That the simultaneous existence of the normal and abnormal
conscious states, would be most likely to occur, if ever, at the instant
when the sensory tracts change from voluntary to involuntary or
from involuntary to voluntary action.

When external relations, transmitted by involuntary sensory
action, knock for admittance at the door of the sleeping cerebrum and
generate a normal brain activity, there may already have been in
existence an abnormal conscious state — a dream, caused, either by a
previous unsuccessful effort at normal brain stimulation, or by some
other cause, and maintained by involuntary control.

In that case there would probably exist for a brief interval, while
the change from involuntary to voluntary control is taking place, both
the abnormal and the normal conscious states, and both would ex-
perience the cognition of the same transmitted external relations, the
two conscious states lapping over each other at the end of the abnor-
mal and beginning of the normal.

This would account satisfactorily for the fact frequently reported
that, at the instant of a sudden awakening from a dream by a sudden
noise or shock, the noise is heard or the shock is felt, both in the dream
as it ends and in the normal conscious state at the instant of its
beginning. Both conscious states would be in existence during at
least a part of the interval covered by the disturbance.

The sound of the sudden closing of a door has caused a dream, in
which were reproduced in chronological order the details of events
covering a period of years. The slamming of the door, which caused

72 THE GENESIS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE

this dream, was heard in the dream as the report of a gun, which
was the final cognition of the dream on the awakening of the sleeper.
The same sound was also heard after the dream was over and the
sleeper awakened, not as the report of a gun, but as the slamming
of the door. The hands of a clock were observed to be in the same
position after the awakening as that occupied before the beginning of
the sleep, showing that the entire dream and the awakening occupied
only a fraction of a minute and possibly only a fraction of a second.
The cerebral operation in this case may be described as follows:
The external relation was an intense atmospheric vibration pro-
duced by the door striking its frame. This imparted a strong energy
impulse to the auditory nerve. This impulse was transmitted by in-
voluntary action to the cerebrum, where it knocked for admission,
stimulating the cerebrum to conscious activity — two kinds of activity :

1. The involuntary act of re-cognition was instantly produced
from the ever-present, ever-available cerebral record, and this re-
cognition was combined with a cognition of the involuntarily trans-
mitted impulses of the single external relation, that of sound. This
single sensation of intense sound, being unassociated with any other
simultaneous sensations of external relations, becomes associated with
the record of any past cognition of an intense sound, such as the
report of a gun, or whatever similar record might be most available.
The result is an involuntary, abnormal cognition of a brain record
involving the report of a gun.

2. While this involuntary action is going on and producing an
abnormal conscious state, the same impulse of transmitted energy,
knocking at the door of the cerebrum, which in this case was in an
exhausted condition, sluggishly stimulates voluntary activity of all
sensory organs and a normal cognition of the external relation of
sound.

Thus we have the two simultaneous cognitions and conscious states
originating in the same external relation and in the same auditory
impulse. One of these cognitions and conscious states was abnormal
and entirely under involuntary control, coming into existence and
going out again in the fraction of a second, while the control is
changing from involuntary to voluntary. The other cognition and
conscious state was normal and permanent, but was sluggishly
aroused to the necessary complete voluntary activity of all organs
of sense.

THE EXODUS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE 73

XX.

THE EXODUS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE

That conscious states have come into existence and that they con-
tinue to come into existence, does not appear to be doubted by any
great number of people. The manner of, and reasons for, their
genesis we have attempted to show. Our final question is as to their
exodus. How and why does the conscious state, after coming into
existence, pass out of existence? The almost universal belief of man-
kind is that it never passes out of existence ; that it becomes uncon-
scious, but still continues to exist and, therefore, that conscious states
and unconscious conscious states are forever multiplying in number.

The easiest solution to this problem would be to join the great
majority and admit that the conscious state never passes out of ex-
istence, but that is not our solution.

Whenever certain conditions are necessary for the existence or
maintenance of anything, the failure of those conditions ends the
existence. To admit otherwise is to admit that what is necessary is
not necessary, and that what is, is not.

We have seen that the conscious state occurs in the presence of a
certain kind of brain or nerve activity and in the presence of the
dissipation of a certain form of energy. No evidence has ever been
adduced tending to show that a conscious state ever existed otherwise.
There has been much testimony as to its otherwise existence, but
testimony is evidence to the one who testifies, to the one who believes
and to no one else. A person might testify that he had witnessed
battles waged between human beings on the surface of the moon or
Mars. That testimony might be evidence to the testifier and the
credulous believer, but to no one else. Aside from this inadmissible
kind of evidence none has ever been produced as to the existence of
a conscious state outside of a living, active brain.

There being no evidence of the existence of a conscious state outside
of a living body, the conclusion is warranted that there is none.

We have already shown that the genesis and maintenance of the
conscious state is dependent upon the existence and continuance of cer-
tain conditions, the operation of the involuntary vital function. There-
fore, when the involuntary vital function ceases to operate, any
existing conscious state must cease to exist.

74 THE EXODUS OF THE CONSCIOUS STATE

We have defined consciousness as knowledge of the existence of
self and of the Universe. We have found that it exists only in con-
nection with brain or nerve activity. Hence, when these activities
cease, conscious states will cease.

The phenomenon of water boiling in a kettle on a hot stove de-
pends upon a supply of heat to the water from an external source.
Whenever the supply of heat is withdrawn, the boiling ceases auto-
matically. No external agency is required to stop the operation of
boiling.

In the same way conscious states cease automatically when there
is no longer a supply of what is necessary to maintain them,