EXCURSIONS OF AN EVOLUTIONIST 



Physical phenomena, likewise, in an ultimate 

 analysis, are resolved into simple pulsations or 

 rhythmical movements of ether-atoms ; and the 

 question arises as to the relation between the 

 elementary physical pulsation and the elemen- 

 tary psychical shock. Reasoning most ingen- 

 iously from the essential continuity in Nature 

 which the doctrine of evolution supposes, and 

 recognizing the impossibility of deriving the 

 psychical element from the physical, Clifford 

 reaches the conclusion that " every motion of 

 matter is simultaneous with some ejective fact 

 or event which might be part of a consciousness." 

 This simple ejective fact or event may be re- 

 garded as a molecule, so to speak, of mind-stuff; 

 and we reach the startling conclusion that " the 

 universe consists entirely of mind-stuff. Some 

 of this is woven into the complex form of hu- 

 man minds containing imperfect representations 

 of the mind-stuff outside them, and of them- 

 selves also, as a mirror reflects its own image in 

 another mirror ad infinitum. Such an imperfect 

 representation is called a material universe. It 

 is a picture in a man's mind of the real universe 

 of mind-stuff." 



Clifford recognizes that this doctrine seems to 

 have been independently arrived at by many per- 

 sons, and he instances the statements of Wundt 

 in his " Physiologische Psychologic." The the- 

 ory harmonizes well with that which I have en- 

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