268 MENTAL. CONSTITUTION OF ANIMALS. 



What has chiefly tended to take mind, in the eyes of 

 learned and unlearned, out of the range of nature, is its 

 apparently irregular and wayward character. How dif- 

 confessedly received from God the power of experiencing, in con- 

 sequence of impressions from the earlier modifications of matter, 

 certain consciousnesses called sensations of the same ? Is not, 

 therefore, the wonder of matter also receiving the consciousnesses 

 of other matter called ideas of the mind a wonder more flowing 

 out of and in analogy with all former wonders, than would be, on 

 the contrary, the wonder of this faculty of the mind not flowing 

 out of any faculties of matter ? Is it not a wonder which, so far 

 front destroying our hopes of immortality, can establish that doc- 

 trine on a train of inferences and inductions more firmly estab 

 lished and more connected with each other than the former belief 

 can be, as soon as we have proved that matter is not perishable, 

 but is only liable to successive combinations and decombinations f 



" Can we look further back one way into the first origin of mat- 

 ter than we can look forward the other way into the last develop- 

 ments of mind ? Can we say that God has not in matter itself laid 

 the seeds of every faculty of mind, rather than that he has made 

 the first principle- of mind entirely distinct from that of matter 7 

 Cannot the first cause of all we see and know have fraught matter 

 itself, from its very beginning, with all the attributes necessary to 

 develop into mind, as well as he can have from the first made the 

 attributes of mind wholly different from those of matter, only in 

 order afterwards, by an imperceptible and incomprehensible link, 

 to join the other two together? 



" * * [Thedecombination of the matter on which mind rests] 

 is this a reason why mind must be annihilated ? Is the temporary 

 reverting of the mind and of the sense out of which that mind de- 

 velops, to their original component elements, a reason for think- 

 ing that they cannot again at another later period, and in another 

 higher globe, be again recombined, and with more splendor than 

 before? * * The New Testament does not after death here pro- 

 mise us a soul hereafter unconnected with matter, and which has 

 no connection with our present mind — a soul independent of time 

 and space. That is a fanciful idea, not founded on its expressions, 

 when taken in their just and real meaning. On the contrary, it 

 promises us a mind like the present, founded on time and space ; 

 since it is, like the present, to hold a certain situation in time, and 

 a certain locality in space. But it promises a mind situated in por- 

 tions of time and of space different from the present, a mind composed 

 of elements of matter more extended, more perfect, and more glo- 

 rious : a mind which, formed of materials supplied by different 

 globes, is consequently able to see further into the past, and to 

 think further into the future, than any mind here existing : a mind 

 which, from the partial and uneven combination incidental to it 

 on this globe, will be exempt from the changes for evil, to which, 

 on the present globe, mind as well as matter is liable, and will only 

 thenceforth experience the changes for the better which matter 

 more justly poised, will alone continue to experience : a mind 

 which, no longer fearing the death, the total decomposition, to 

 which it is subject on this globe, will thenceforth continue last and 

 immortal."— Hope, on the Origin and Prospects of Mar 1831. 



