CAN SEVERAL BEINGS SHARE ONE SPIRIT ? 423 



realized (ch. viii. § 18). We admitted further, in § 9 

 of this chapter, that the indistinctness of individu- 

 ahty, especially in the lower organisms, was a 

 serious obstacle to the attribution of immortality to 

 them. Hence the question presents itself whether a 

 single Ego corresponds to each ^2^(2;5"^-individual, or 

 whether several phenomenal organisms may not 

 be the concurrent manifestations of the same 

 Ego? 



The answer given to this question is not of course 

 a matter affecting ultimate metaphysical principles, 

 and it would be quite admissible to answer it by a 

 7ion liquet from a scientific point of view, but it yet 

 seems preferable on cesthetic groimds to deny that in 

 beings with a scarcely developed consciousness an 

 ultimate spirit need correspond to each phenomenal 

 ^^/^j/- individual. And the analogy of the "secondary 

 selves" within ourselves (cp, ch. viii. § 18) will enable 

 us to understand how several relatively-separate 

 streams of consciousness can co-exist within the 

 same entity, and how unsafe it is to argue from 

 temporary exclusiveness to ultimate distinctness. 

 We may hold, then, that the individual cells of a 

 tree or the individual polypes of a zoophyte are the 

 "secondary selves" of the lower organisms; nor 

 need the fact that they possess distinct physical 

 organizations and are under the proper conditions 

 capable of spatially separate existence, perplex us 

 when we reflect that Space was not found on 

 analysis to be an ultimate reality (ch. ix. § 10). 



It is more interestinof to consider to what extent 

 this equivalence of a plurality of phenomenal exist- 

 ence to a single ultimate existence may be traced 

 in human beings. That it affords a plausible ex- 

 planation of the perplexing phenomena of multiplex 



