THE BELFAST ADDRESS. 163 



which ' prepare objects ' for the ' percipient power ' ex- 

 actly as the eye does. The eye itself is no more per- 

 cipient than the glass; is quite as much the instru- 

 ment of the true self, and also as foreign to the true 

 self, as the glass is. ' And if we see with our eyes only 

 in the same manner as we do with glasses, the like may 

 justly be concluded from analogy of all our senses.' 



Lucretius, as you are aware, reached a precisely 

 opposite conclusion: and it certainly would be interest- 

 ing, if not profitable, to us all, to hear what he would 

 or could urge in opposition to the reasoning of the 

 Bishop. As a brief discussion of the point will enable 

 us to see the bearings of an important question, I will 

 here permit a disciple of Lucretius to try the strength 

 of the Bishop's condition, and then allow the Bishop to 

 retaliate, with the view of rolling back, if he can, the 

 difficulty upon Lucretius. 



The argument might proceed in this fashion: 

 ' Subjected to the test of mental presentation (Vor- 

 stellung), your views, most honoured prelate, would 

 offer to many minds a great, if not an insuperable, 

 difficulty. You speak of " living powers," " perci- 

 pient or perceiving powers," and " ourselves; " but 

 can you form a mental picture of any of these, apart 

 from the organism through which it is supposed to act? 

 Test yourself honestly, and see whether you possess 

 any faculty that would enable you to form such a con- 

 ception. The true self has a local habitation in each 

 of us; thus localised, must it not possess a form? If 

 so, what form? Have you ever for a moment realised 

 it? When a leg is amputated the body is divided into 

 two parts; is the true self in both of them or in one? 

 Thomas Aquinas might say in both; but not you, for 

 you appeal to the consciousness associated with one of 

 the two parts, to prove that the other is foreign matter. 



