112 Transactions.— Miscellaneous. 
the other, sometimes to the extent of half a second; while in instrumental 
reading, one often reads a minute or two different from the other, and in 
order to overcome the inexactitude or deficiency of sense or feeling in this 
respect, the mental power of men,—i.e., reason,—has again to be had 
recourse to; wherein minute calculations, abstract of feeling, are made to 
reconcile the observations of different persons,—in other words personal 
equation has to be ascertained by man’s ethereal or mental attributes, and 
allowed for, in all investigations which approach higher science or rigid 
truthfulness. ¢ 
As synchronism between feelings and events is a radical element of Mr. 
Frankland’s theory of Existence, I will be excused in dilating on it some- 
what prolixly; and, in doing so, may bring to notice the very unequal 
manners and different times in which separate men’s feelings are 
affected by influences and objects. Thus rhetoric makes one laugh, 
another cry, another sorrowful, and another angry; and, while the feelings 
of none are affected exactly alike, neither is the time of affection one and 
the same. Some being notoriously slow and obtuse in impression, others 
easily and rapidly moved. Some are case-hardened to any appeal ; others, 
the contrary. Hence, as between one man and another, feelings and events 
are anything but in synchronism. Now as on this doctrine Mr. Frankland 
founds his ultimate theory,—to wit, that there is only one Existence, 
therefore, to his showing, non-synchronism indicates two more, or many 
existences ; this is obvious as between man and man, or as between 
multitudes of men, 
Again, in each individual we have seen that neither is there synchronism 
in regard to “ motions of matter,” or events ‘“‘ among elements of feeling,” 
hence, by the same rule we are bound to conclude, that in each individual 
there is more than one Existence. 
And when we consider the widely-distinct essentials appertaining to 
man’s position in creation,—that is in the lower attribute, “ feeling,” 
always erring or inaccurate, and, as between the several senses, discordant ; 
in the higher attribute, « reason,” capable of accuracy, truth, and con- 
cordance; the one feeding on the apparent, the other on the intangible ; 
the one on the objective, the other on the invisible; the one on the relative, 
the other on the abstract; the one on the material, the other on the ethereal ; 
the one contracted, the other boundless ; we are led up to the doctrine of 
two Existences,—the one fleshly, revealed through our feelings, the other 
mental, revealed through our reason: the one Existence of matter finite, 
the other Existence of spirit Eternal. 
