THE RELATIONS OF MINDS TO OTHER THINGS. 215 



ciple. Ficlite calls it the inner body, Uliici likens it to a 

 fluid of non-molecular composition. These theories remind 

 us of the ' theosophic ' doctrines of the present day, and 

 carry us back to times when the soul as vehicle of con- 

 sciousness was not discriminated, as it now is, from the 

 vital principle presiding over the formation of the body. 

 Plato gave head, breast, and abdomen to the immortal rea- 

 son, the courage, and the ajDpetites, as their seats respec- 

 tively. Aristotle argues that the heart is the sole seat 

 Elsewhere we find the blood, the brain, the lungs, the liver 

 the kidneys even, in turn assigned as seat of the Avhole or 

 part of the soul,* 



The truth is that if the thinking j^rinciple is extended we 

 neither know its form nor its seat ; whilst if unextended, it 

 is absurd to speak of its having any space-relations at all. 

 SiDace-relatious we shall see hereafter to be sensible things. 

 The only objects that can have mutual relations of position 

 are objects that are perceived coexisting in the same felt 

 space. A thing not perceived at all, such as the inextended 

 soul must be, cannot coexist with any perceived objects in 

 this way. No lines can be felt stretching from it to the 

 other objects. It can form no terminus to any sjDace-inter- 

 val. It can therefore in no intelligible sense enjoy position. 

 Its relations cannot be spatial, but must be exclusively 

 cognitive or dynamic, as we have seen. So far as they are 

 dynamic, to talk of the soul being ' present ' is only a figure 

 of speech. Hamilton's doctrine that the soul is present to 

 the whole body is at any rate false : for cognitively its pres- 

 ence extends far beyond the body, and dynamically it does 

 not extend beyond the brain, f 



* For a very good condensed history of the various opinions, see W. 

 Volkmann von Volkmar, Lehrbuch d. Psychologie, § 16, Anm. Complete 

 references to Sir W. Hamilton are given in J. E. Walter, Perception of 

 Space and Matter, pp. 65-6. 



f Most contemporary writers ignore the question of the soul's seat. 

 Lotze is the only one who seems to have been much concerned about it, 

 and his views have varied. Cf. Medicinische Psychol., § 10. Microcos- 

 mus, bk. HI. ch. 2. Metaphysic, bk. in. ch. 5. Outlines of Psychol.. 

 part II. ch. 3. See also G. T. Fechner, Psychophysik, chap, xxxvii. 



