156 OF MIND. 



matter takes up an abnormal proportion of nutrient mate- 

 rial, are readily explained, as are also those cases in which 

 impaired intellectual action follows as a consequence of 

 the disease. Where the morbid change has proceeded to a 

 considerable extent, there may be permanent impairment, 

 while in cases where only slight change has occurred, 

 only temporary derangement may result. 



Of the Nature of Will, and of the Life of Germinal 

 Matter taking part in Mental' Operations. Many considera- 

 tions lead me to conclude that will, so far from being a 

 result of certain chemical changes induced in matter, should 

 rather be regarded as the power which influences the material 

 particles and causes them to move and take up new positions. 

 It seems to me that this power is of the same order as that 

 which induces the movements in germinal matter, and which 

 I have ventured to call vital power. I conceive that the 

 change in form of the germinal matter is a consequence of 

 some influence exerted upon the particles immediately pre- 

 ceding their movement. This active cause, the nature of 

 which we know nothing, and which gives rise, we know not 

 how, to material changes which, in the case of some of the 

 lower forms of living matter, can be seen distinctly, con- 

 stitutes the vital power of the germinal matter. This is, as 

 it were, the starting point of all those complex phenomena 

 which occur whenever a voluntary, act is performed, and, as 

 regards the material changes in the germinal matter con- 

 cerned in mental operations, is the mind. The germinal or 

 living matter may be said to be the domicile of the ego; 

 but so rough are our methods of investigation that when 

 we commence to search for the ego we destroy its habitation, 

 and the ego escapes whither we cannot follow it. The par- 



