THE PRBLVL MIND 



of a drop of water into two drops or the union of 

 two drops into one by chemical changes inside them 

 involves the same forces that cell-division involves, 

 and cell-division is a no more mysterious process. 

 Life is nothing but chemistry and physics; mind, 

 soul, consciousness, only a sequence of chemical 

 and physical changes in the brain-substance. But 

 what about the living brain-substance? Do these 

 same changes beget mind or soul when controlled 

 in the laboratory? Does the compound in your 

 retort think, and speculate about itself? Is there not 

 something in living beings that science does not take 

 account of? 



Mankind has long believed in a spiritual order of 

 reality, and in so doing it is only affirming the reality 

 of that which distinguishes it from stocks and stones. 

 The psychic world is as much a matter of fact to us 

 as is the world of matter and energy; because the 

 first fact is consciousness of self, it is that which rec- 

 ognizes the world of matter and energy. The I is the 

 pillar that upholds the very heavens ; it is the veri- 

 table creator of the world and of all the gods that ride 

 over it. But to what extent, if any, it is independ- 

 ent of matter and energy, or has been in the past, or 

 may be in the future, is a question. (How contra- 

 dictory all these questions are! The only realities 

 to us are our varying states of consciousness. To 

 the dead in their graves there is no death; death is 

 real only to the living.) 



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