PROFESSOR VIRCHOW AND EVOLUTION. 407 



Four years ago, I wrote thus: ' Do states of con- 

 sciousness enter as links into the chain of antecedence 

 and sequence, which gives rise to bodily actions? Speak- 

 ing for myself, it is certain that I have no power of 

 imagining such states interposed between the molecules 

 of the brain, and influencing the transference of motion 

 among the molecules. The thing " eludes all mental 

 presentation." Hence an iron strength seems to belong 

 to the logic which claims for the brain an automatic 

 action uninfluenced by consciousness. But it is, I be- 

 lieve, admitted by those who hold the automaton theory, 

 that states of consciousness are produced by the motion 

 of the molecules of the brain; and this production of 

 consciousness by molecular motion is to me quite as 

 unpresentable to the mental vision as the production of 

 molecular motion by consciousness. If I reject one re- 

 sult I must reject both. /, however, reject neither, and 

 thus stand in the presence of two Incomprehensibles, 

 instead of one Incomprehensible/ Here I secede from 

 the automaton theory, though maintained by friends 

 who have all my esteem, and fall back upon the avowal 

 which occurs with such wearisome iteration through- 

 out the foregoing pages; namely, my own utter inca- 

 pacity to grasp the problem. 



This avowal is repeated with emphasis in the passage 

 to which Professor Virchow's translator draws attention. 

 What, I there ask, is the causal connection between the 

 objective and the subjective between molecular mo- 

 tions and states of consciousness? My answer is: I do 

 not see the connection, nor am I acquainted with any- 

 body who does. It is no explanation to say that the ob- 

 jective and subjective are two sides of one and the same 

 phenomenon. Why should the phenomenon have two 

 sides? This is the very core of the difficulty. There 

 are plenty of molecular motions which do not exhibit 



