of Edinburgh, Session 1869 - 70 . 
149 
of this opinion have, in common with the physiologists, a belief in 
a future life, and follow two methods of inquiry as to that truth of 
religion, viz., the confirmcttio veri and the inquisitio veri. The 
spiritualists (so-called) have adopted the latter or scientific method, 
the orthodox philosophers the former. To this end they state 
certain propositions as unquestionable. Firstly, that every man 
assuredly believes he is a mental unity, one, or Ego; secondly, that 
“ our thinking Ego . . . is essentially the same thing at every 
period of its existence,”—I quote Sir William Hamilton, vol. i. 
p. 374; and, thirdly, that the evidence upon which these assumed 
beliefs are founded is sufficient, being that of consciousness itself. 
In other words, I feel assured that I am one and the same person 
that I ever was, and therefore I am one and the same. Is this 
evidence sufficient ? Can we rely absolutely and without need of 
verification upon the veracity of consciousness manifested as belief? 
To answer this question clearly, it is necessary to understand how 
beliefs arise and are modified. Now, since according to the funda¬ 
mental fact that every state of consciousness coincides with corres¬ 
ponding molecular change in brain-tissue, w r e conclude that all 
beliefs, being states of consciousness, must be coincident with such 
changes. Is this conclusion true in fact ? First, as to the Ego. A 
man, like other mammals, is one in body—a corporeal unity—in 
accordance with the fundamental biological law of organisation ad 
hoc. The belief that he is one, or Ego, bodily, is founded upon his 
knowledge of this fact. The belief that he is a mental unity, or a 
thinking Ego, correlates, as I shall shortly show, the unity of cere¬ 
bral function manifested in the various states of consciousness of 
the man at any given moment. But the belief that this Ego, 
whether corporeal or mental, is essentially the same thing at every 
successive period of a man’s existence, includes wholly different 
phenomena, since it refers to past time, and consequently implies a 
reminiscence of what it was at some moment of past time, or in 
past time generally. Now, reminiscence is proveably dependent 
upon a recording vital process, whereby we are enabled to know in 
time present by virtue of the so-called association of ideas—what we 
were, and thought and did in past time. If there be no record or 
memory, or if there be a record, but no association of ideas so as to 
induce reminiscence, then there is no knowledge of past mental 
VOL. VII. 
u 
