it is useless as an argument for the existence of the
unknown mind, the assumption of which forms the basis
of that explanation. Again, in the next place,
if it be said that mind is so far an entity sui
generis that it must be either self-existing or
caused by another mind, there is no assignable warrant
for the assertion. And this is the second objection
to the above syllogism; for anything within the whole
range of the possible may, for aught that we can tell,
be competent to produce a self-conscious intelligence.
Thus an objector to the above syllogism need not hold
any theory of things at all; but even as opposed to
the definite theory of materialism, the above syllogism
has not so valid an argumentative basis to stand upon.
We know that what we call matter and force are to
all appearance eternal, while we have no corresponding
evidence of a mind that is even apparently eternal.
Further, within experience mind is invariably associated
with highly differentiated collocations of matter
and distributions of force, and many facts go to prove,
and none to negative, the conclusion that the grade
of intelligence invariably depends upon, or at least
is associated with, a corresponding grade of cerebral
development. There is thus both a qualitative
and a quantitative relation between intelligence and
cerebral organisation. And if it is said that
matter and motion cannot produce consciousness because
it is inconceivable that they should, we have seen
at some length that this is no conclusive consideration
as applied to a subject of a confessedly transcendental
nature, and that in the present case it is particularly
inconclusive, because, as it is speculatively certain
that the substance of mind must be unknowable, it
seems a priori probable that, whatever is the
cause of the unknowable reality, this cause should
be more difficult to render into thought in that relation
than would some other hypothetical substance which
is imagined as more akin to mind. And if it is
said that the more conceivable cause is the
more probable cause, we have seen that it is
in this case impossible to estimate the validity of
the remark. Lastly, the statement that the cause
must contain actually all that its effects can contain,
was seen to be inadmissible in logic and contradicted
by everyday experience; while the argument from the
supposed freedom of the will and the existence of
the moral sense was negatived both deductively by
the theory of evolution, and inductively by the doctrine
of utilitarianism.’ The theory of the freedom
of the will is indeed at this stage of thought utterly
untenable[7]; the evidence is overwhelming that the
moral sense is the result of a purely natural evolution[8],
and this result, arrived at on general grounds, is
confirmed with irresistible force by the account of
our human conscience which is supplied by the theory
of utilitarianism, a theory based on the widest and
most unexceptionable of inductions[9]. ’On
the whole, then, with regard to the argument from
the existence of the human mind, we were compelled
to decide that it is destitute of any assignable weight,
there being nothing more to lead to the conclusion
that our mind has been caused by another mind, than
to the conclusion that it has been caused by anything
else whatsoever.