72 
order to gain light as to the way in which these complex pulses 
of feeling may be accounted for, we find that complex and 
dissimilar material agencies are produced from various com- 
binations of simple particles, and that in the last analysis the 
so-called simple substances are built up of various combinations 
of one primordial form of matter. This leads us to conclude 
by analogy that “the multitudinous forms of mind known as 
different feelings may be composed of simpler units of feeling, 
and even of units fundamentally of one kind.'” To the objec- 
tion that this would obliterate and set aside the distinction 
between mind and matter, the author replies that, as we know 
nothing of the essence of either it is of little consequence 
whether we define the phenomena of matter in terms of mind 
or the phenomena of mind in terms of matter. Upon this we 
make the single comment that whether this be so or not it is 
of the utmost consequence that that process or operation which 
we usually call knowledge — the process by which science is 
built up and upon the trustworthiness and authority of which 
science depends — should be rightly conceived. If knowledge, 
when rightly interpreted, is resolved into a series of nervous 
shocks to which correspond a series of experiences that are 
felt, we cannot but inquire what meaning or authority is there 
in the shocks and accompanying feelings that are expressed in 
the words, “ I know by analogy or believe that the doctrine 
of evolution is true ; ” or what assurance we have that what 
we call our present conviction on this subject, which we are 
informed is rapidly becoming the accepted creed of the present 
generation, will be retained in the generation that is to come 
after ? 
Our misgivings are increased as we follow Mr. Spencer’s 
analysis of knowledge as experienced in consciousness. “ The 
proximate components of mind,” he tells us, “ are of two 
broadly contrasted kinds — feelings and the relations between 
feelings.” We accept this without either questioning or 
criticism, as being the equivalent of the mind’s conviction that 
Mr. Spencer’s doctrine of evolution is true — i.e., it apprehends 
certain conceptions in certain relations — the conceptions being 
the subject-matter, the relations being the discovered truth or 
probability of this subject-matter. We are almost overjoyed 
by the anticipation that we are to learn at last what he thinks 
of the operations of the higher intellect in discerning relations. 
It is a commonplace with other philosophers, and pre-eminently 
with all modern scientists, that the relations of phenomena are 
all with which science concerns itself ; that the higher intelli- 
gence is employed solely in discovering and comparing them. 
We turn over the leaf with eager if not with agitated curiosity, 
