EVOLUTION THE MASTER-KEY 



it is a thousand times more evident that mind is 

 potential in life. 1 To dispute this is to deny the 

 existence of consciousness in a dog. The evolu- 

 tionist is therefore impelled to believe shall I 

 say ? that mind is potential in matter. I adopt that 

 form of words for the moment, but not without 

 future criticism. The student knows that the mi- 

 croscopic cell, a minute speck of matter, that is to 

 become a man, has in it the promise and the germ 

 of mind. If this be questioned for man, it will not 

 be questioned for a dog; and the substitution 

 does not affect the argument. Must we then draw 

 the inference that the elements of mind are pres- 

 ent in those chemical elements carbon, oxygen, 

 hydrogen, nitrogen, sulphur, phosphorus, sodium, 

 potassium, chlorine that are found in the brain 

 of a dog? Not only must we do so, but we must 

 go further, since we know that each of these " ele- 

 ments," and every other, is built out of one in- 

 variable unit, the electron ; and we must therefore 

 assert, in still more definite terms than those al- 

 ready employed, that mind is potential in the 

 unit of matter, the electron itself. 



Here the critic who attaches importance to 

 names will certainly say that this is to assert the 

 doctrine of materialism, previously repudiated in 

 these pages. "Why do you not," he may say, 



1 ' ' Life is a continuous adjustment of inner relations to outer 

 relations, and mind emerges from it as fast as the adjustment 

 becomes more extended, more involved, and more complete." 

 Autobiography, I., 471. 



174 



