202 ETHICAL ASPECTS OF EVOLUTION 



immortal ; one burdens and impedes the other ; they are 

 not only distinct, but enemies. The Stoic classed the body 

 with possessions, honours, offices ; and distinguished it from 

 the understanding and the will, the desires and the aversions, 

 as being something independent of ourselves. 1 



It would be beside our purpose to inquire which of these 

 views is correct. That there should have been any question 

 to decide is due to the fact that the bodily states hold 

 a peculiar position as mediators between the external world 

 and the thinking and feeling subject. They are the necessary 

 channel through which the whole of our knowledge of external 

 nature must flow, and may be regarded as subjective in 

 relation to our knowledge, and objective in relation to the 

 thing known. The body is directly identified with the 

 self only as far as it is the instrument of sense perception. 

 But one part of the body may be perceived by another part ; 

 the eye may look at the hand ; in this case the hand as seen 

 belongs pro tanto to the not-self ; the eye, as instrument 

 of perception, to the self. 2 What concerns us here is, first, 

 that all our knowledge of the parts of the body is derived 

 from them when they are dealt with as objects. Of the eye, 

 for instance, merely as an instrument of perception, we 

 know nothing, until it has been perceived in others, or 

 in a looking-glass, or manipulated by ourselves. And, 

 secondly, that, as objects, they resemble the objects of 

 thought which we attribute to external nature in the points 

 in which those differ from the objectified attributes of self. 

 That is to say, they are patent to the observation of outsiders ; 

 they may be examined under a microscope ; they have 

 definite spatial and temporal relations ; and, when any 

 difference of opinion arises as to their exact nature, it can 

 be settled by experiment and measurement. When, therefore, 

 in this essay, we distinguish between subject and object, 

 they will be included under the latter term. 



In coming to this decision it is nevertheless necessary 

 to remember that, not only in the whole body of living 



1 Epictetus, Manual, I. 1. 



2 Stout, Manual, 321. 



