74 Transactions. — Miscellaneous. 



second view is the correct one ; but, inasmuch as we can 

 neither prove nor disprove it, and as I think the balance of 

 probabihties hes in another direction, I shall pass it by; only 

 it ought to be always kept in mind as a conceivable solution 

 of the question. 



I shall deal with the other two aspects of the case together, 

 and consider how far our present knowledge enables us to 

 form an opinion upon their accuracy or otherwise. 



The first bond between the animal and the human being, 

 mentally speaking, which arrests our attention is the posses- 

 sion by every animal, as by every human being, of a separate 

 personality. We are so accustomed to take this separate 

 personality for granted — at all events, as regards the higher 

 animals — that we overlook the full significance of the fact. 

 Moreover, while we may readily concede that the higher 

 animals possess independent personalities, we may find it 

 harder to believe that more lowly creatures, like, say, the 

 medusa, are equally distinct personalities. Yet one simple 

 consideration will prove such to be the case. All animals, 

 however lowly in organization, possess consciousness. The 

 possession of consciousness is the essential distinction between 

 an animal and a plant. The latter is endowed with excitabih- 

 ties, and may even be said to possess discrimination, since it 

 is able to select from the soil material which will serve for its 

 nourishment and to reject that which will be injurious to it or 

 useless for its support ; but it does not possess consciousness. 

 Now, what is consciousness ? It is a revelation to something 

 which in man is called by metaphysicians the ego, or self. 

 What the ego is we do not know ; but we do know that, so far 

 as man is concerned, the ego of each individual being is distinct 

 from the ego of every other, and is capable of cognizing. Con- 

 sciousness, too, is not identical with mental operations, which 

 may go on in our minds without our being conscious of them. 

 It is, so to speak, an event, a manifestation of mental opera- 

 tions to the ego, and it is only to the ego that consciousness 

 appeals. Here, however, I am getting into intricate paths, 

 and shall go no farther. My argument is, shortly, that, inas- 

 much as all animals are gifted with consciousness, else they 

 would not be animals, they must also possess an ego, because, 

 while we can imagine an ego existing without consciousness, 

 we cannot imagine consciousness without an ego. 



Palaeontology teaches us that the earliest forms of life 

 were of a simple character, and that, speaking generally, the 

 organization of the animal kingdom has increased in com- 

 plexity from the time when living creatures first appeared upon 

 the earth up to the present day, when it has attained a more 

 varied and complex development than at any previous epoch. 

 We cannot, however, point to any particular form of animal 



