EDITOR'S TABLE. 



269 



basis in science than his " atheism " ; 

 whether either of them finds any 

 warrant in our knowledge of Nature ; 

 whether both may not be equally 

 outside its limits. Most modern 

 thinkers and writers on the prin- 

 ciples of science agree in the decla- 

 ration that the mind of man has not 

 yet attained to knowledge of causes; 

 that it has done no more than to 

 discover a little of the order of 

 Nature. 



While we may, if we choose, call 

 the series of events which make iip 

 this order a series of effects, nothing 

 seems more certain than that we 

 have not yet succeeded in passing 

 over from them to any reality behind 

 them ; that the reason why they oc- 

 cur in one order rather than another 

 is a problem which is as yet abso- 

 lutely unsolved. 



Romanes quotes, with approval 

 which all must share, Tyndall's dec- 

 laration that " the passage from the 

 physics of the brain to the corre- 

 sponding facts of consciousness is 

 unthinkable. Granted that a defi- 

 nite thought and a definite molecu- 

 lar action in the brain occur simul- 

 taneously, we do not possess the in- 

 tellectual organ, nor apparently any 

 rudiments of the organ, which would 

 enable us to pass, by a process of rea- 

 soning, from the one phenomenon 

 to the other. They appear together, 

 but we do not know why." So far 

 as our present knowledge of the 

 powers of the human mind goes, we 

 must agree with Romanes that Tyn- 

 dall's assertion is most unquestiona- 

 bly true. Whether or not it is the 

 whole truth is a different question, 

 and we must ask whether we are any 

 more able to pass from one physical 

 event to another physical event, or 

 from one mental event to another 

 mental event, than we are able to 

 pass from a physical to a mental 

 event. Can we say of any of them 

 anything more than that " they ap- 



pear together, bvit that we do not 

 know why " ? 



Romanes tells us that our ques- 

 tions about the nature of the relation 

 between material changes and men- 

 tal changes admit of only seven pos- 

 sible answers, all of which he enu- 

 merates, and four of which we quote: 



I. The mental changes may cause 

 the material changes (spiritualism). 



II. The material changes may cause 

 the mental changes (materialism). 



III. There may be no causation 

 either way, because the association 

 may be only a phenomenal associa- 

 tion — the two apparently diverse 

 classes of phenomena being really 

 one and the same (monism). VII. 

 Whether or not there be any causa- 

 tion either way, the association may 

 be one which is necessai'ily beyond 

 the power of the human mind to ex- 

 plain. 



The aim of Romanes's book is 

 to show that six of these seven hy- 

 potheses are untenable, and that, 

 since only seven are possible, the 

 seventh, No. Ill, must be the truth ; 

 although it is clear that, if the human 

 mind has as yet discovered nothing 

 but the order of Nature, and has 

 not attained to knowledge of causes, 

 there must be still another point of 

 view. We may declare that we know 

 nothing whatever about the matter ; 

 not even enough to warrant the as- 

 sertion that it is necessarily beyond 

 the power of the human mind to ex- 

 plain. Romanes holds that this way 

 of looking at the subject does not de- 

 serve to be regarded as an hypothesis 

 at all; but while it may not be an 

 hypothesis, it may nevertheless be 

 that still more stubborn thing, a fact. 

 Those who agree that it is a fact 

 will feel no more vital interest in 

 Romanes's monism than in material- 

 ism or idealism or spiritualism, for 

 they will perceive that all these at- 

 tempts to reach reality by means of 

 our present knowledge of Nature 



