LIFE: ITS ORIGIN AND NATURE 45 
discussion was stimulated at the time by the 
publication of this book, and others of a sim¬ 
ilar character, dealing with the relationship 
between mind and matter. 
There can be no doubt that the majority of 
the bodily activities can be accounted for on 
purely physical and chemical lines, and there 
are many scientists today who contend that 
every activity of the body can thus be account¬ 
ed for. The body and its activities are regard¬ 
ed as a physico-chemical mechanism. On this 
view, the activities of mind and consciousness 
are the products of brain-action, in the same 
way that other activities of the body result 
from the functioning of certain specific organs 
and their activities. This is the materialistic 
conception. 
The body is certainly composed of matter and 
energy. Is there anything further? Huxley, 
in one of his celebrated Essays, said that it 
was obvious to him that there vxis some “third 
thing”—namely, consciousness. Is this “third 
thing” altogether separate from the other two, 
or is it merely a resultant of special nervous 
energies? 
This question of the inter-relationship of mat¬ 
ter, life, and mind is an extremely interesting 
one. All energy, in itself, is more or less blind 
in its action, but when it is acting toward a spe¬ 
cific end, it seems that a certain amount of 
“direction” is necessarily called into play. Sir 
Oliver Lodge has contended that the import¬ 
ant and distinguishing characteristic of life is 
its ability thus to govern or direct energy— 
which in turn controls matter. He contends 
