THE RATIONALE OF PHILOSOPHICAL THOUGHT. 779 



Astro-physics; and the mechanical theory of heat, the 

 electro-magnetic theory of light, and the discovery of 

 radium added many new chapters to the science of the 

 Heavens. And we may confidently look forward to a con- 

 tinual extension of the science of the physical firmament, 

 to new and quite unexpected discoveries, be it through 

 direct observation or, what is perhaps more likely, 

 through theory and calculation verified by subsequent 

 observation. What still may appear as the limitless 

 void of the dark blue Heavens will, we are sure, reveal 

 to the searching eye and the thinking mind of star- 

 gazers new worlds and new phenomena, and to this 

 progress of science it appears impossible to assign any 

 limit. 



Let us now, for a moment, look upon the field of 

 consciousness of any individual mind as, in the years of 

 infancy and childhood, it rises out of the chaotic state 

 of what we may term mere feeling or awareness and 

 acquires the marks of order and arrangement through 

 definite sensations, through emotions and desires. Let 

 us, in fact, picture to ourselves the first stages in the 

 development of the adult mind in possession of a clear 

 view which may be compared to that which characterised 

 the glance of the first observant and thinking star-gazers. 

 Like them, the young mind will fasten upon the recur- 

 rent complex of sensations which it is taught to consider 

 as the outer world, as distinguished from the background 

 of consciousness in which this is embedded or has its 

 seat, as the constellations of the stars have their seat 

 in the firmament of the Heavens. We may now, in 

 fact, speak of the firmament of the soul. How the 



