284 UNIVERSAL EVOLUTION 



law. The idea, that any psychical phenomena, al- 

 though so faint as to be called subconscious, and there- 

 fore very obscure, can have a doubtful thither side 

 opening into a supernatural realm, is a surrender of 

 the postulate of "the universal reign of natural law, in 

 all phenomena. 



All real progress in human affairs is a natural pro- 

 cess of reasoning, by which one is converted to a new 

 belief, from a former abnormal one. Eeasoning is the 

 fusing of images naturally made upon the brain, 

 whether real,- or hallucinative. Whatever appears 

 other than natural in the psychic process, can be par- 

 alleled by the mystery once surrounding certain physi- 

 cal phenomena, whose natural cause is now well under- 

 stood. Since modern psychologists have written upon 

 these subjects, all thinkers have modified their views 

 of them. "Faculties" have given place to "brain 

 function." "Mind" and "soul" have been renamed 

 "consciousness." "Reason," "Memory," "Imagina- 

 tion," "Will," are presentations, or images fusing with 

 immediate sensations, forming physiologically, those 

 psychological effects named perceptions, conceptions, 

 and ideas. Some psychologists are substituting "im- 

 mediate experience" for the term "consciousness." 

 "The self" is no longer an entity that thinks. "I 

 think." as a phrase, is imperceptibly fading into the 

 more logical, and rational, "it thinks." being the 

 reactions of the brain structure, to sensations and 

 images. We recognize, not by intuition, but by the 

 physiological exercise of the old-fashioned senses of 

 touch, sight, hearing, taste and smell. Our instincts 

 are inherited automatic reflexes of nerve structure. 

 In short, all former so-called mental acts are the reac- 

 tions of the brain centers to sensations, by which, such 



