Thoughts on Causality. 



243 



exist ; and their parallelism may result from a common 

 relation to some higher cause. The improvement of the 

 tactual sense in the ascending series of animal forms, pro- 

 ceeds pari passu with improving intelligence ; and Mr. 

 Spencer has assumed, accordingly, that intelligence is de- 

 veloped by improved tactual organs. Now, there is much 

 better reason for affirming that improved intelligence causes 

 improved organs ; for it is obvious, from considerations 

 already presented, that external conditions are not causes 

 at all, but at best, only conditions ; and still less could they 

 become the cause of a result qualitatively diverse ; while 

 intelligence, as we are conscious, is gifted with the power 

 of causation. But, in truth, neither is the cause of the 

 other ; though superior intelligence is the condition of im- 

 proved coordinate faculties in the organism which is its 

 instrument. The whole catalogue of needs and accom- 

 panying instruments for their gratification belongs to this 

 category ; as well as the parallel phenomena of mind and 

 brain, from which Dr. Carpenter has illogically generalized 

 his strange doctrine of " unconscious cerebration," while 

 others have been led to conceive of thought as a " secretion 

 of the brain." 



The assignment of an uncertified antecedent for cause, is 

 but one degree worse than the assignment of an inadequate 

 cause. As no stream can flow higher than its source, so 

 no cause can produce an effect greater than itself. This 

 recognized necessity of things is disregarded in that phase 

 of the derivative theory which contemplates organic traits 

 augmented by inheritance. Inheritance transmits what it 

 receives — no more. If, in the course of generations, a 

 character become more and more developed, we discover 

 the action of a constant force, loading more and more into 

 the vehicle of inheritance. 



We must now endeavor to approach more closely to the 

 real objective ground of phenomena. We have assumed 

 that an external world is a reality. We all know that its 



