The Philosophy of Evolution. 353 



rose hangs to the flower. Both are a sort of exhalation. 

 And the changes in that brain, under various environments, 

 embody the whole immense variety of modern knowledge, 

 whose works in the world are but a magnified magic-lantern 

 picture of slight alterations of grey brain-matter within. 

 The solidity and certainty with which this various knowl- 

 edge verifies itself in practice gives the strongest possible 

 proof of the correctness of the premises from which it all 

 springs, viz., that units of consciousness are more properly 

 estimated when regarded under their corrected form as 

 units of force, than under their primary form of units of 

 feeling. 



Perhaps both of these units may be best harmonized in 

 one unity as forms of motion, as most ably set forth by 

 Mr. Eaymond S. Perrin in his book on " The Religion of 

 Philosophy." Mi\ Perrin's criticism of Mr. Spencer's posi- 

 tion seems to have striking validity, and to demolish the 

 necessity for supposing some " Unknowable Eeality " back 

 of all knowledge, on which Mr. Spencer so stoutly insists. 

 Motion, as the dynamical aspect of matter, seems to furnish 

 all the materials necessary to compose the universe. Matter 

 in motion becomes the fountain of all things, and thought 

 is but brain in motion, as life is but atoms in motion, and 

 knowledge is simply an active participation in the infinite 

 motion of the universe. 



But if one be inclined to insist upon the testimony of 

 his own individual consciousness, and to posit mind as im- 

 material because he feels it to be so, we can only bring to 

 bear against him the fact that in so doing he plants himself 

 upon one single experience — his own — against all the 

 rest of his knowledge, which is that of observation criti- 

 cised in detail by all that others know, and the whole course 

 of nature in its daily movement. It takes but a moment's 

 reflection to see that this last accumulation of testimony 

 affords a basis for certainty of a universal character, such 

 as never can be afforded by the weak testimony of our 

 single consciousness, which is and must always remain 

 isolated and alone to each one of us. It was dependence upon 

 this which led the world of men in a fire-fly dance after 

 phantoms through ages, and still leads most tribes. It is 

 this which gives us a Chinese civilization in one place and 

 a Hindoo in another, and Feejis in a third. It is this which 

 gives us ten thousand sects and cranks of every hue. But 



