184 LIFE IN NATURE. 



before his eyes, he would consciously perceive, not 

 several appearances of one book or chair, but so 

 many distinct things, realities, existences practically 

 to him, because filling all his faculties, and exhausting 

 the scope of his (maimed and mutilated) powers. 



Let us observe well the point here : the deficiency 

 of a faculty which belongs to our nature would 

 elevate what are in truth mere appearances into a 

 felt reality; would give them, to our feeling, a 

 fictitious existence which they do not possess. On 

 the other hand, the imparting to such a person (so 

 feeling mere appearances to be realities) the use of 

 his full powers the giving back to him the sense 

 of touch would reduce these appearances again, in 

 respect to his feeling, to their right position. From 

 their false reality they would sink back into the mere 

 appearances they are. And this by no loss, but 

 simply by a gain to him. 



Thus we see how the absence of a faculty is 

 adapted to give us a feeling of reality in respect to 

 that which does not exist : in the case supposed, it 

 would make that seem real which is but appearance. 

 The same fact is presented to us in another form in 



