134 UNIVERSAL EVOLUTION 



been in perpetual process of integration, and dissipa- 

 tion. This means, that "substance," a term applied 

 indiscriminately to matter in all forms, is a combina- 

 tion of matter and motion. It is in constant change, 

 and when we say that it always follows the line of 

 least resistance, we mean that it is moving from a 

 location, where it is, to another, where it is not, and 

 that this results in what is a change of form, more 

 adapted than the preceding one. This change is some- 

 times said to produce an equilibrium. This it does not 

 do, except in the sense of more or less persistence. 

 Substance is not long persistent in any one form. 



But, in fact, there is no equilibrium, except in the 

 homogeneity of a nebula, where all the particles, in 

 theory, are equally distributed, and of this we can 

 have, with our limited senses, no conception. The line, 

 that matter and motion, always take, in making and 

 unmaking the forms of things, is the line of least 

 resistance. The line of least resistance, in the psychi- 

 cal device of man, is the tendency of "mind" always 

 to maintain the life of the organism, and perpetuate it 

 by heredity. This is done by sensations taking the 

 paths marked out for them in the nervous tissue. 

 Otherwise, its correspondence with objective environ- 

 ment would soon be severed, and all life would soon 

 end. 



The process called reason is modified very largely 

 by the simple emotions of fear, anger, the affections, 

 the sexual emotion, and sense of possession ; and by the 

 multitudinous combinations of these in complex, and 

 secondary emotions, which existed in the organism 

 long before reason was developed. The common 

 necessity of sustentation of the body, and defense of 

 life, nearly always determines the final channels of 



