Philosophy of Botany. 285 



1 am that I am." (The translation from the Hebrew as " I 

 am" is not correct. It is meant: "The essence I am "— " I 

 am the true essence of things.") The oldest of the Brahmanic 

 sacred books, " The Upanishads," records a similar short sen- 

 tence, which expresses the deepest meaning of their religious 

 ideas : *" Tat tuam asi "— " Thy own self is the divinity." The 

 philosophies, both of Greece and of India, started before the 

 •days of Homer or Solomon from a common point — namely, 

 from the .conviction that our ordinary knowledge, depending 

 upon the report of the senses, is uncertain and deceitful. Our 

 knowledge according to Hindoo philosophers depends on two 

 authorities — namely, sensual perception and deduction. 



An infinite intelligence does not depend on our mind proc- 

 esses, on induction and deduction; it is the power of intui- 

 tion, and its effect is causation. 



I think it is not an illegitimate analogy to compare the func- 

 tions of the brain with the respiratory process of the lungs. 

 "It calls for an uninterrupted vital process to maintain the 

 blood corpuscles in a state of receptivity for the process of 

 oxidation, on which depends the whole process of renewal 

 .and elimination. We know, on the other hand, that electric 

 currents of measurable intensities are constantly generated in 

 the whole nervous system, perhaps thereby producing the con- 

 dition of maturity for the intussusception of the cosmic mind 

 force manifesting itself as consciousness. The limitation of 

 .all individualized substances and the delineation of all forms in 

 the organic and inorganic world and the persistence of inherit- 

 ance of specific properties or qualities belong in the category 

 ■of this mind force. 



It pictures the flowery congelation of the watery vapor on 

 the freezing window pane, prescribes the angles and corners 

 -of the forming crystal. 



It may affect protoplasm in inconceivable paths to some 

 kind of sensation in the plant, to emotion in the lower animals, 

 .and ultimately guide the intricate process of reasoning and 

 "light up to the highest spheres of our ideal aspirations. It 

 :stands in the same relation to the whole of the cosmos as self- 

 consciousness does to plain consciousness, representing divine 

 •omniscience. 



