APOLOGY FOR THE BELFAST ADDRESS 235 



the Vedic doctrine of the absorption of the individual 

 into the universal soul. Plotinus taught the devout how 

 to pass into a condition of ecstasy. Porphyry complains 

 of having been only once united to God in eighty-six 

 years, while his master Plotinus had been so united six 

 times in sixty years.' A friend who knew Wordsworth 

 informs me that the poet, in some of his moods, was ac- 

 customed to seize hold of an external object to assure 

 himself of his own bodily existence. As states of con- 

 sciousness such phenomena have an undisputed reality, 

 and a substantial identity; but they are connected with 

 the most heterogeneous objective conceptions. The sub- 

 jective experiences are similar, because of the similarity 

 of the underlying organizations. 



But for those who wish to look beyond the practical 

 facts, there will always remain ample room for specula- 

 tion. Take the argument of the Lucretian introduced in 

 the Belfast Address. As far as I am aware, not one of 

 my assailants has attempted to answer it. Some of them, 

 indeed, rejoice over the ability displayed by Bishop But- 

 ler in rolling back the difficulty on his opponent; and 

 they even imagine that it is the Bishop's own argument 

 that is there employed. But the raising of a new diffi- 

 culty does not abolish — does not even lessen — the old one, 

 and the argument of the Lucretian remains untouched by 

 anything the Bishop has said or can say. 



And here it may be permitted me to add a word to an 

 Important controversy now going on: and which turns on 



' I recommend to the reader's particular attention Dr. Draper's important 

 •work entitled, "History of the Conflict between "Religion and Science" (Messrs. 

 a S. King & Co.). 



