COSMIC PHILOSOPHY 



organic existence. But as soon as we regard 

 things dynamically, as forever changing, we are 

 taught that the gulf has been for the most part 

 estabhshed during an epoch at the very begin- 

 ning of which we were zoologically the same 

 that we now are. 



The next step in our argument will be facili- 

 tated by an inquiry into the common characteris- 

 tic of the various intellectual differences between 

 the civilized and the primitive man which we 

 have above enumerated. The nature of this 

 characteristic was hinted at when we were discuss- 

 ing the improvidence of the barbarian. It was 

 observed that the power of distinctly imagining 

 objective relations not present to sense is the 

 most fundamental of the many intellectual dif- 

 ferences between the civilized man and the bar- 

 barian. Making this statement somewhat wider, 

 we may now safely assert that the entire intel- 

 lectual superiority of the civilized man over the 

 savage, or of the modern man over the prime- 

 val man, is summed up in his superior power 

 of representing that which is not present to the 

 senses. For it is not only in what we call pro- 

 vidence that this superiority of representation 

 shows itself, but also in all those combinations of 

 present with past impressions which accompany 

 the extension of the correspondence in space 

 and time, and its increase in heterogeneity, de- 

 finiteness, and coherence. It is his ability to 

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