236 PRESENT-DAY RATIONALISM 



The reasoning is always automatic and connected 

 with concrete matters, which suggest to the nervous 

 system or the brain or protoplasm generally what should 

 be done, and the protoplasm in every case does it accord- 

 ingly. 



Similarly nine-tenths of man's reasoning is of the same 

 kind, and is known as " common-sense " when external 

 objects and circumstances suggest to the brain a course 

 of action which it follows at once. He does many 

 reasonable acts from morning till night, as already ex- 

 plained, but none of them make any special call upon 

 his volition. His will, however, is always ready to 

 respond, if there is any occasion for choosing between 

 two courses of action, which may involve or require some 

 abstract motives wherewith to decide upon the most 

 desirable. 



The question arises, Does this inherent property of 

 reason, seen in all organic beings and in the very cells of 

 which they are built up — not to add the inherent power 

 the nucleus possesses to build up different forms in re- 

 sponse to new conditions of life, the basis of evolution — 

 indicate Mind though " the reasonable acts " be them- 

 selves automatically done (whether consciously or uncon- 

 sciously) ? 



One writer I have quoted would ask after the manner 

 of Philip, " Show us your God ? " Of course, this is im- 

 possible ; but may we not say in the words of Sir Oliver 

 Lodge : " Look for the action of the Ueity, if at all, then 

 always ; not in the past alone, not only in the future, but 

 equally in the present. If His action is not visible now, 

 it never will be, and never has been visible." • 



If Paley's watch did not require a visible watchmaker 



' Hibbert Journal, i., p. 214. 



