in SCIENCE AND MORALS 137 



the production of such phenomena for their 

 function), even if the spiritualistic hypothesis had 

 any foundation. For nobody hesitates to say that 

 an event A is the cause of an event Z, even if 

 there are as many intermediate terms, known and 

 unknown, in the chain of causation as there are 

 letters between A and Z. The man who pulls 

 the trigger of a loaded pistol placed close to 

 another's head certainly is the cause of that 

 other's death, though, in strictness, he " causes " 

 nothing but the movement of the finger upon the 

 trigger. And, in like manner, the molecular 

 change which is brought about in a certain 

 portion of the cerebral substance by the stimula- 

 tion of a remote part of the body would be 

 properly said to be the cause of the consequent 

 feeling, whatever unknown terms were interposed 

 between the physical agent and the actual psychi- 

 cal product. Therefore, unless Materialism has 

 the monopoly of the right use of language, I see 

 nothing materialistic in the phraseology which I 

 have employed. 



The only remaining justification which Mr. Lilly 

 offers for dubbing me a Materialist, malgrd moi, 

 arises out of a passage which he quotes, in which I 

 say that the progress of science means the exten- 

 sion of the province of what we call matter and 

 force, and the concomitant gradual banishment 

 from all regions of human thought of what we call 

 spirit and spontaneity. I hold that opinion now, 



