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of the motor nerves to the muscles. Moreover, these most 
remarkable soul-cells of the brain perform further that most of 
all remarkable and mysterious work which we in one word designate 
as zmagination (vorstellung). These it is that in the higher animals, 
as in man, bring about the most elaborate of all soul-activities, 
those of thought and comprehension, of reason and consciousness. 
Whilst we here touch upon the highest limits and the noblest 
function of the soul-life—reason and consciousness, we desire how- 
ever to add the remark, that we are certainly as yet entirely in 
ignorance of the real nature of this mysterious work of the cells, 
but nevertheless we are in a position, by the aid of comparative 
psychology and the zstory of development, to throw considerable 
light upon it. For, first of all, we see by the comparative study of 
souls in animals, a long gradation of development, on which all 
conceivable degrees of reason and consciousness are represented, 
from the quite irrational to the most rational animal—from sponges 
and polypes, to dogs and elephants. Secondly, we see in every 
child, as in every higher animal, that reason and consciousness are 
not yet present at birth, but are slowly and gradually developed. 
Thirdly, and lastly, we even accept it as true that no sharp line of 
demarcation exists between conscious and unconscious soul-activity 
any more than between intelligent and unintelligent thought (?), 
that rather these contrasts often touch one another without any 
fixed limits and pass one into the other. 
This dark question of consciousness, as is well known, plays quite 
a chief part in the psychological battles of the day. The famous 
physiologist, Du Bois-Reymond, in his “ignorabimus” discourse at 
the Leipsic Scientific Meeting has declared consciousness to be an 
entirely insoluble problem—a limit of scientific knowledge which 
the human mind will never overstep, even by the most extensive 
development, Many others regard consciousness as an exclusive 
prerogative of man, which is entirely wanting to all the animals. 
This last view will certainly be shared by no one who has attentively 
and carefully observed the conscious and reflective actions of dogs 
and horses, of bees and ants, and other intelligent animals. But 
even the former view is untenable; for careful self-observation 
