REALITY 153 



renewed, nor the physical energy at its command, 

 which is derived entirely from the inanimate world, 

 but is the personality resident in the body and in 

 control of it. There is no other interpretation of the 

 difference between a man alive one moment and dead 

 the next, which, in spite of the great advances in the 

 interpretation of the mechanism of life made by 

 biology, altogether eludes apprehension in terms 

 of the other fundamental conceptions to which 

 our inquiries into ourselves and our environment 

 have led. 



In science we regard that which is indestructible 

 as having real existence. In philosophy and religion 

 that which has a real existence has been from time 

 immemorial regarded as immortal, and it seems to be 

 truly in accordance with the laws of thought, which 

 in science has led to some of the grandest and most 

 fruitful generalisations, to find the idea of personal 

 immortality running like a thread through religious 

 beliefs, even down to the most primitive. I make no 

 pretence to using, in their correct technical philo- 

 sophical meaning, such terms as consciousness, 

 personality and spirit. All I am concerned, for my 

 argument, to state is that in passing from the 

 phenomena of the inanimate world to those of life in 

 general we have to admit at least one fundamental 

 conception which cannot be connected with the 

 conceptions of the inanimate world, and which it 

 now seems most unlikely ever will be. 



I have already warned you that from physical 

 premises it is not possible or easy to proceed very 

 far, and I make no pretence of discussing whether 

 the personality, conscience and soul of a man is or is 

 not, without any entirely new fundamental conception, 

 capable of being regarded as the further development 

 of the simple consciousness, or awareness, of its 

 existence as a separate creature, possessed by the 



