24 THE ORIGIN OF HUMAN REASON. 



" reason " to processes of " inference." According to 

 views which are really traditional, the word " reason " 

 should denote and include all intellectual perception, 

 whether it be direct and intuitive, or indirect and in- 

 ferential. Under neither head are to be included, as we 

 shall endeavour hereinafter to point out, the sensuous 

 perceptions and merely practical inferences of animals. 

 Mr. Romanes fails filtogether to distinguish between 

 those mere associations of feelings and emotions in 

 animals which may produce an unconscious ex- 

 pectant feeling of sensations to come,* occasioned by 

 some feelings already excited (the practical inference f 

 of animals), and true inference. He confounds % them 

 both together under the denomination, " reason properly 

 so called'' 



Mr. Romanes makes a very grave mistake when he 

 tells us, on the same page, that human immortality can 

 only have become known to us by " revelation." We 

 do not, of course, affirm that man's immortality is 

 directly to be perceived as being a necessary truth like 

 the principle of contradiction or the law of causation ; 

 but we confidently affirm that a scientific analysis of 

 our being, with a consequent perception of the nature 

 of the human soul, make its indestructibility (without a 

 miracle) a reasonable inference.§ When, further, we 

 reflect on God's existence and nature, together with our 

 own ethical perceptions and our observation of the facts 

 of history, this inference becomes raised to the level of 

 certainty, quite apart from revelation. The value of 



* See " On Truth," p. 195. f Ibid., p. 345- 



J p. 12. § See " On Truth," pp. 388, 487. 



