EiCHMOND. — Eeply to Mr, FranklancVs paper on " Mind-Stuf." 219 



consequent. Our knowledge is limited to the fact that the phenomena 

 always follow one another in the same order. The phenomenal philosophy 

 disclaims cognition of producing causes. Its so-called causes are merely 

 invariable antecedents destitute of originating power. It is needless to 

 enforce this doctrine upon minds trained in the philosophy of Hume, the 

 two Mills, Auguste Comte, Bain, and Herbert Spencer. A philosophy 

 which limits knowledge to phenomena, cannot consistently admit any 

 other opinion. But I am not employing their doctrine as a mere argumen- 

 turn ad hominem. In the field of Physics, it is, I believe, an absolute truth. 



In the case we have to consider, one of the two co-ordinated series of 

 events is physical, and the other mental ; one is within, the other beyond, 

 the sphere of consciousness. Does this make it easier to supply a connec- 

 tion between them ? It may be argued that the sense of spontaneity, or 

 mental initiative, in the case of a train of thought voluntarily entered upon, 

 entitles us to regard the " noumena " as underlying the " phenomena." 

 That important inferences may be founded upon this sense of a mental 

 initiative I certainly hold, but not the inference which Mr. Frankland 

 suggests to us. His term "underlying" is somewhat equivocal. I do not 

 think it can be understood in any way which will justify his doctrine of 

 "Mind-Stuff." If, by the use of the term "underlying," it is meant to 

 affirm that we are conscious that the mental processes cause the material — 

 cause i.e. in the sense of producing them — I reply that we have no such 

 consciousness. The cerebral phenomena are outside the field of conscious- 

 ness ; the mental outside the field of bodily vision. How shall we connect 

 experiences which belong to different spheres and are made known by 

 faculties of different order ? We can do no more than note down the 

 siiccession in time of each series, and mark their correspondence. Our 

 experience, just as in the case of two parallel series of physical events, 

 does not entitle us to affirm more than the invariable concomitance of the 

 corresponding terms in the two series. The fact that the mental phe- 

 nomena occur within the sphere of consciousness is no help to us. We 

 cannot annex to them, still less identify with them, the series of physical 

 manifestations. The changes in the nervous matter are wholly involuntary, 

 have only recently been ascertained to exist, and remain to this hour un- 

 known to and unsuspected by the mass of mankind. Psychology ignores 

 them; and could we, as suggested, by some mechanical expedient be 

 witnesses of their occurrence in our own frames, we should look upon them 

 as something extraneous to ourselves. Their association with our mental 

 constitution would make no difference in this respect. 



A similar question has been much debated in a case in which there is 

 greater reason for believing that we are conscious of Mind in action upon 



