14 AN INTRODUCTION TO SCIENCE 



although he has learnt something of the ways in which life 

 manifests itself, and can formulate an excellent definition of 

 the means by which life maintains itself, he is farther off 

 than ever from finding a form of words which will define 

 what life is. 



The psychologist, beginning with the study of the structure 

 of the nervous system, passes on to the consideration of its 

 modes of action, modifies the conditions under which it acts 

 in every way which his ingenuity can devise, and patiently 

 measures every measurable reaction-time ; yet at the end of 

 his work he exclaims, "But this is only reflex action. It 

 was consciousness that I set out to investigate. All the 

 researches which I have been carrying out serve merely to 

 throw light upon the physiology of the nervous system. 

 They teach me nothing about the working of the mind. 

 Truly I have found out a good deal about the apparatus 

 which the mind employs, but I know as little about the mind 

 itself as when I started." And when his four-year-old 

 daughter, kissing him good-night, asks, "Daddy, where do 

 I go to when I go to sleep ? Do I go away from myself and 

 come back again in the morning?" he answers humbly, "I 

 do not know." 



The candid recognition of the limitations of science can 

 do no harm. Even within the proper sphere of science there 

 is a level beyond which thought finds no foothold in experi- 

 ence, and there is another sphere, the sphere of conscious- 

 ness, or the world of spirit in the sense in which St. Paul 

 uses the term spirit, the " active reason " or intelligent soul 

 of Aristotle for which science has no passport. The 

 methods of science may be used in investigating the phe- 

 nomena of consciousness, but the use of her methods does 

 not entitle science to claim the results. Even the use of 

 scientific terms in describing spiritual phenomena introduces 

 a grave risk of misunderstanding. Consciousness cannot 

 perceive things outside itself. The phenomena of which it 

 takes cognizance are its own varying states of exaltation and 



