Sc/ENTiriC LECTUnKS. 205 



t;iin fuel, and the fuel heiiii;: given, no more action can take place than 

 ])el()no;s to that fuel. Tlie cheniieal action goes before and ev(jlvesthe 

 licat, tlie heat evolves a certain amount of steam, tlu' steam lends a 

 certain force to tlie ])iston, and tliat force goes directly to tlie hd)or 

 that is in liand. Here tlie force is always realized, and just behind 

 the effect, going into the effect, fbit in the case of s}»oiitaneity, the 

 law of the mind, the case is entirely reversed. T start a proposition 

 in Euclid, there is no chemical force or jthysical f tree of any sort that 

 is bound to carry my thoughts just so far into that proposition. I 

 s]->ontaneously consider it. I, hy virtue of my mental power, see into 

 it, or l)_y virtue of my mental weal<ness, fail to see into it. J>ut the 

 whole action is s])ontaneous. and there is nothing behind the mind, 

 pnshing the mind up into the inquiry a definite distance, there is no 

 given amount of force. It cannot l)e said that I can think u]) to that 

 exact point, oi' that I can feel np to my feelings in a definite degree, 

 and no further. 



Mental science thus lays down a donble division between its own 

 impiiries and tliose of natural science. The ficts of the latter are 

 found in s})ace, and are subject to the law of cause and effect. Tliose 

 of the foi-mer are found exclusive!}' in consciousness, and are subject 

 to the law of spontanity. That consciousness is a regulative idea, 

 defining a class of facts, seems to us very plain. Compare it with 

 time. Time is the condition of an event, not a portion of the event; 

 something without which the event cannot be. Consciousness is the 

 inseparable conditiiui of a thought, a feeling, a volition; something 

 without which these are unintelligible. If we try to regard con- 

 sciousness as itseif an art. a portion of the complex art of knowing, 

 we are at once involved in confusion. Suppose every art of knowl- 

 edge, as that by which I perceive the audience, to be double made up 

 of an art of ]>ercei)tion, and one by which the mind recognizes this as 

 its own. If a first art cannot, in its very putting forth, be imme- 

 diately known by the mind, how can a second art '^ This would seem 

 to require another to i-each and a]>preliend it, and this a f )urtli, and 

 the f )urtli a iii'lh. Thus if the mind cannot know directly, know its 

 own art fjr what it is, it cannot know at ;ill ; or if the mind does not 

 know in this direct way the second ai-t, why may it not the fii'st, and 

 thus dispense altogether Avith the second. If this view be true, and 

 consciousness is a cliaracteristi<t idea, there immediately follows there- 

 from the perfectly distinct character of physicail and mental facts. 



