EEAL PERSONALITY OR TRANSCENDENTAL EGO. 



159 



a verity as plus, but to loose thinkers a mere negation is nothing 

 and does not matter, and it is a grave matter to think that evil does 

 not matter. The negation of good has very practical results. 



Author's Eeply. 



In preparing this paper I was fully aware that the subject was 

 not an easy one to deal with, it was not one that could be 

 approached with a light heart, but it was for me a labour of love, 

 and I had therefore no fear that an earnest attempt to elucidate 

 such a subject, one perhaps more suitable for meditation than for 

 discussion, would not be appreciated, and I have not been dis- 

 appointed. From numerous communications I have since received 

 from Clergymen, Laymen, Scientists and Writers of note on Trans- 

 cendental subjects, it is clear that I was fully justified in thinking 

 that the subject would have an intense interest for many and widely 

 diverse classes of thinking people. It remains now for me only to 

 reply to those particular communications which have been printed, 

 and, at the outset, I can candidly say that no remarks therein have 

 given me the slightest inducement to alter a single sentence of my 

 paper. 



I am not familiar with the writings of Christian Science, but if 

 they have recognized, as Canon Girdlestone seems to state, that the 

 Invisible and not the Visible is the real, they have got hold of one 

 piece of Knowledge, at all events, which it would be well for some 

 others to acquire. I think it a pity, in dealing with these subjects, 

 that the truth of any argument should be stated to depend upon 

 whether it " stands the test of Scripture." An example of the 

 unfortunate result of insisting on such a test is seen when a little 

 later on Canon Girdlestone makes the definite statement that the 

 Brain is "the nursery of the Soul and of character." Now the 

 brain is never mentioned in Scripture, neither in the Old nor New 

 Testament ; thoughts and emotions are attributed to quite different 

 organs of the body, namely the reins or kidneys, the heart, the loins 

 and even the bowels. 



I am sorry I cannot also agree with his statement that the brain 

 is the condition of Physical life ; I certainly never suggested, as he 

 seems to think, that the brain was the cause of life ; he is evidently 

 confounding Physical life with the Physical Ego. The very existence 

 of our Physical Ego, namely, the manifestation of the Transcendental 



