Oct. 10, 1884.] 



♦ KNOWLEDGE ♦ 



305 



Mr. S. Thome's letter completely expresses my thoughts and 

 ixperience on this important matter. When we are asleep, in 

 sound, dreamless sleep, conscionaness of soul is gone. Where ? As 

 it often hajjpcus when men are severely injured, they are un- 

 conscious, soulless for periods of weeks and months ; that whole 

 time is a perfect, entire blank to them when consciousneas returns, 

 although all other life functions went on as usual. All this 

 appears to point to tlie same conclusion, that mind and soul are 

 functions of the brain and nerves, which cease with death. 



r. W. H. 



[1442] — Will you allow me to put to Mr. Thorne the common- 

 sense question which must have risen to the lips of hundreds as 

 they read his extraordinary letter in your last issue ? Was the 

 man dead, or was he not ? Mr. Thorne hardly ventures to say he 

 was, but talks about his being "practically" so. The idea that a 

 man really dead could by ordinary methods be brought to life 

 again is so utterly unscientific that f am driven to suppose that 

 llr. Thorne would, if pressed, admit the second alternative. Life 

 was, therefoi'c, merely suspended. If this be so, the case was 

 exactly the same as we find in ordinary unconsciousness, or even 

 in sleep when without dreams. As far as tlie mind is concerned, 

 there is no conceivable difference. And does any reasonable man 

 think of the future state as one which may be visited during a 

 mere temporary suspension of consciousness ? The only future 

 state I ever heard of is one which is entered by the soul when it 

 lias finally and irrevocably quitted the body. 



A classical student, debarred reference to a higher authority, is 

 tempted to point to Socrates, whose strong faith in the hereafter is 

 better evidence than a hundred arguments like Mr. Thome's. But 

 if your correspondent wishes for true science, let him turn to a 

 book to whose high character you, sir, have lately testified most 

 emphatically — I mean Mr. Drummond's " Natural Law in the 

 Spiritual World." He will find there the question dealt with from 

 a strictly scientific standpoint, and if it does not convince him, I 

 think you will have judged him more severely than I should venture 

 to do here. 



I most cordially agree with you, sir, as to the necessity of 

 excluding theology from your pages. But perhaps you will permit 

 iiie to remind your readers of the advantage it gives to the 

 ■' heterodox " side — I object to the term, but use it for shortness' 

 sake. The attack can be made with purely scientific weapons. 

 The full force of the defence can only be felt when arguments are 

 admitted from a wider sphere. If this be remembered, I object to 

 nothing that science has to say. For myself I like to think of 

 theology and science as separated by a very vague dividing line. I 

 liave not "discarded" either of them, and never shall. On the 

 >ontrary, I feel more and more the power of a scientific theology 

 ;iud a theological science. And it was this cause that I was so 

 ■grateful to you for advancing in your review of the book I have 

 referred to. J. H. Mocltox. 



King's College Cambridge, Oct. 3, 1884. 



[1443] — Surely a complete answer to yotir correspondent, Mr. 

 Selwyn Thorne, is to be found in the fact that his " victim " of 

 drowning was not dead. Had he been so he could not have been 

 interviewed as a living man by Mr. Thorne some days after, unless 

 by a miracle. Death is the separation of the sonl from the body, 

 and here it is clear no such separation had taken place. The 

 " victim " could not have been really bereft of breath, although he 

 may have been of motion, and his mental and physical faculties 

 (save that of breathing) totally suspended. But how does this 

 state differ from that of a person in a trance, or even in sleep ? and 

 yet we do nttt expect these on awaking to bring us news of the 

 next world. F. C. N. 



["Keductio ad Absurdum," "W.," "P. J. L.," " Edwd. B. 

 Morton," "T. W.," "Chas. E. Strong," " Naturalist," and many 

 others, substantially reiterate " F. C. N.'s" argument, in language 

 more or less varied. " Naturalist " suggests the fluidity of the 

 blood as a test of vitality, and alleges that if the drowned man's 

 hand had been held so that sunlight or candleUght shone through it, 

 a ruddy glow would have been seen, showing that the blood re- 

 mained fluid in the vessels. — Ed.] 



BRAIN POWER. 



[1444] — I send you a suggestion, which you may not think alto- 

 gether unworthy of your consideration. May not great mental 

 power arise from the harmony that exists between the several parts 

 of, rather than from the size and weight of, the brain ? Phrenolo- 

 gists assign different functions to different parts of the brain. Let 

 7 represent the maximum development of any of the parts of the 



brain. Would not a man, all the parts of whose brain marked 5, 

 produce greater effect, be a greater genius, in fact, than the 

 man whose brain had 3 parts each equal to 7, but all the 

 rest varying from 1 to 4 ? If there is any truth in my sug- 

 gestion, then a woman's brain, though lighter than that 

 of a man, might, under proper cultivation, owing to the 

 greater harmony of its parts, produce as high intellectual effects 

 as those now produced by men. Up to this time men have 

 shown their superiority in every department of mental effort. The 

 best poem, the best statue, the best picture, the best history, the 

 best musical composition, the best of every mental production, has 

 come from the brain of a man. But woman has not had the same 

 care bestowed upon the development of her brain as man has had. 

 What public school or college in olden time was ever endowed for 

 her benefit ? There may be in woman's brain such potential 

 powers that, hereafter, she may produce, alternately with man — 

 when, through several generations, she has received the instruction 

 that man has received — the best of every mental work. May it 

 not be the haraiony of the parts and not the size of the brain that 

 produces intellectual greatness f W. H. Jones. 



THE INFLUENCE OF MOONLIGHT. 



[1445] — A friend of mine, who has resided many years in China, 

 told me the other day, as an article of his belief, that sleeping in 

 the moonlight in the tropics is most dangerous, as it leads to blind- 

 ness or to the face being " drawn " permanently into strange 

 shapes. He also added that mackerel, among other food, becomes 

 perfectly putrid in one night if exposed to the moonlight. He 

 believed this entirely! and added that a friend of his had his face 

 permanently disfigured by so sleeping on the deck of a ship. To 

 me the statement was as novel as it was amusing ; but I did not 

 care to combat it, as I was without information on the subject. 

 Moreover, I saw plainly that any attempt to shake his faith would 

 be useless. But I since find that the idea is generally known, and 

 often believed in ; and therefore ask you whether you could devote 

 a short article to exposing the origin of the myth, for apparently 

 there must be some accidents or incidents that have given rise and 

 a colourable support to the theory. If you do not think it of snfla- 

 cient importance or interest for an article, perhaps you would 

 kindly say where I shall find any reference to the matter. 



Littleton Hay. 



Balhousie, Southbrook-road, Lee, Kent, 

 Sept. 14, 1884. 



[The idea that moonlight causes putrefaction is as old as Pliny 

 and Plutarch ; and is, as our correspondent asserts, very common 

 in tropical climates. My own impression is that the evil effects 

 attributed to moonlight have their origin in exposure to the clear 

 sky, under which radiation takes place rapidly, and dew is 

 copiously deposited. Moisture in conjunction with heat is a most 

 fertile agent in decomposition, and I suspect that the mackerel 

 would go bad just as rapidly on a clear starlight night as they 

 would when the moon is above the horizon. There may, however, 

 be some other explanation of the effects produced on the human 

 system, and I insert Mr. Hay's letter in the hope of eliciting it. 

 —Ed.] 



FERTILIZATION OF BEANS. 

 [1«6]— " Bean " is a very indefinite word. Will '• E. W." kindly 

 inform me on what particular sort — French bean, scarlet runner, 

 broad bean, &c. — his observations have been made, and I will do 

 my best to investigate the matter. But it will want another season 

 now, in all probability. Gkaxt Allen. 



HARE-LIP. 

 [1447] — To what is a hare-lip a reversion ? and in what degree 

 is it hereditary ? E. W. A. 



TEA AND COFFEE. 



[1448]— Mr. Carus-Wilson's letter with this heading in year 

 number for September 19 is doubtless valuable as giving his own 

 experience, and detecting a source of evil not yet acknowledged 

 by public opinion. 



Let me say, in support of this view, that twice in my life it has 

 happened that neither tea nor coffee passed my lips during a space 

 of several months, and upon my resumption of tea, though I had 

 made it weak, and drank it early in the afternoon, I was kept awake 

 for several hours at night. 



But before we can accept Mr. Carns-Wilson's theorem as proved, 

 he ought to tell us how his tea was made. I mean, what length 

 of time usitally elapsed between the boiling water meeting the tea- 

 leaves and the pouring out from the teapot into his cup ? I have 



