INTERLUDE.—THE STORY INTERRUPTED.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
A CHALLENGE.—MY UNBIDDEN GUEST ACCEPTS IT.
The white-haired reader, in whom I had now become deeply interested, no longer an unwelcome stranger, suspended his reading, laid down his manuscript, and looking me in the face, asked:
"Are you a believer?"
"No," I promptly answered.
"What part of the narrative do you question?"
"All of it."
"Have you not already investigated some of the statements I previously made?" he queried.
"Yes," I said; "but you had not then given utterance to such preposterous expressions."
"Is not the truth, the truth?" he answered.
"You ask me to believe impossibilities," I replied.
"Name one."
"You yourself admit," I said warmly, "that you were incredulous, and shook your head when your guide asserted that the bottom of the ocean might be as porous as a sieve, and still hold water. A fountain can not rise above its source."
"It often does, however," he replied.
"I do not believe you," I said boldly. "And, furthermore, I assert that you might as reasonably ask me to believe that I can see my own brain, as to accept your fiction regarding the production of light, miles below the surface of the earth."
"I can make your brain visible to you, and if you dare to accompany me, I will carry you beneath the surface of the earth and prove my other statement," he said. "Come!" He arose and grasped my arm.
I hesitated.
"You confess that you fear the journey."
I made no reply.
"Well, since you fear that method, I am ready to convince you of the facts by any rational course you may select, and if you wish to stake your entire argument on the general statement that a stream of water can not rise above its head, I will accept the challenge; but I insist that you do not divulge the nature of the experiment until, as you are directed, you make public my story."
"Of course a fluid can be pumped up," I sarcastically observed. "However, I promise the secrecy you ask."
"I am speaking seriously," he said, "and I have accepted your challenge; your own eyes shall view the facts, your own hands prepare the conditions necessary. Procure a few pints of sand, and a few pounds of salt; to-morrow evening I will be ready to make the experiment."
"Agreed; if you will induce a stream of water to run up hill, a fountain to rise above its head, I will believe any statement you may henceforth make."
"Be ready, then," he replied, "and procure the materials named." So saying he picked up his hat and abruptly departed.
These substances I purchased the next day, procuring the silver sand from Gordon's pharmacy, corner of Eighth and Western Row, and promptly at the specified time we met in my room.
He came, provided with a cylindrical glass jar about eighteen inches high and two inches in diameter (such as I have since learned is called a hydrometer jar), and a long, slender drawn glass tube, the internal diameter of which was about one-sixteenth of an inch.
"You have deceived me," I said; "I know well enough that capillary attraction will draw a liquid above its surface. You demonstrated that quite recently to my entire satisfaction."
"True, and yet not true of this experiment," he said. "I propose to force water through and out of this tube; capillary attraction will not expel a liquid from a tube if its mouth be above the surface of the supply."
He dipped the tip of a capillary tube into a tumbler of water; the water rose inside the tube about an inch above the surface of the water in the tumbler.
"Capillary attraction can do no more," he said. "Break the tube one-eighth of an inch above the water (far below the present capillary surface), and it will not overflow. The exit of the tube must be lower than the surface of the liquid if circulation ensues."
He broke off a fragment, and the result was as predicted.
Then he poured water into the glass jar to the depth of about six inches, and selecting a piece of very thin muslin, about an inch square, turned it over the end of the glass tube, tied it in position, and dropped that end of the tube into the cylinder.
"The muslin simply prevents the tube from filling with sand," he explained. Then he poured sand into the cylinder until it reached the surface of the water. (See [Figure 23.])
"Your apparatus is simple enough," I remarked, I am afraid with some sarcasm.
"Nature works with exceeding simplicity," he replied; "there is no complex apparatus in her laboratory, and I copy after nature."
Then he dissolved the salt in a portion of water that he drew from the hydrant into my wash bowl, making a strong brine, and stirred sand into the brine to make a thick mush. This mixture of sand and brine he then poured into the cylinder, filling it nearly to the top. (See Figure 23, B. The sand settling soon left a layer of brine above it, as shown by A.) I had previously noticed that the upper end of the glass tube was curved, and my surprise can be imagined when I saw that at once water began to flow through the tube, dropping quite rapidly into the cylinder. The lower end of the curve of the glass tube was fully half an inch above the surface of the liquid in the cylinder.
I here present a figure of the apparatus. (Figure 23.)
The strange man, or man image, I do not know which, sat before me, and in silence we watched the steady flow of water, water rising above its surface and flowing into the reservoir from which it was being continually derived.
"Do you give up?" he asked.
"Let me think," I said.
"As you please," he replied.
"How long will this continue?" I inquired.
"Until strong salt water flows from the tube."
Then the old man continued:
"I would suggest that after I depart you repeat these experiments. The observations of those interested in science must be repeated time and again by separate individuals. It is not sufficient that one person should observe a phenomenon; repeated experiments are necessary in order to overcome error of manipulation, and to convince others of their correctness. Not only yourself, but many others, after this manuscript appears, should go through with similar investigations, varied in detail as mind expansion may suggest. This experiment is but the germ of a thought which will be enlarged upon by many minds under other conditions. An event meteorological may occur in the experience of one observer, and never repeat itself. This is possible. The results of such experiments as you are observing, however, must be followed by similar results in the hands of others, and in behalf of science it is necessary that others should be able to verify your experience. In the time to come it will be necessary to support your statements in order to demonstrate that your perceptive faculties are now in a normal condition. Are you sure that your conceptions of these results are justified by normal perception? May you not be in an exalted state of mind that hinders clear perception, and compels you to imagine and accept as fact that which does not exist? Do you see what you think you see? After I am gone, and the influences that my person and mind exert on your own mind have been removed, will these results, as shown by my experiments, follow similar experimental conditions? In the years that are to pass before this paper is to be made public, it will be your duty to verify your present sense faculty. This you must do as opportunities present, and with different devices, so that no question may arise as to what will follow when others repeat our experiments. To-morrow evening I will call again, but remember, you must not tell others of this experiment, nor show the devices to them."
Fig. 23.
A, brine.
B, sand and brine mixed.
C, sand and water.
"I have promised," I answered.
He gathered his manuscript and departed, and I sat in meditation watching the mysterious fountain.
As he had predicted, finally, after a long time, the flow slackened, and by morning, when I arose from my bed, the water had ceased to drip, and then I found it salty to the taste.
The next evening he appeared as usual, and prepared to resume his reading, making no mention of the previous test of my faith. I interrupted him, however, by saying that I had observed that the sand had settled in the cylinder, and that in my opinion his experiment was not true to appearances, but was a deception, since the sand by its greater weight displaced the water, which escaped through the tube, where there was least resistance.
"Ah," he said, "and so you refuse to believe your own eyesight, and are contriving to escape the deserved penalty; I will, however, acquiesce in your outspoken desire for further light, and repeat the experiment without using sand. But I tell you that mother earth, in the phenomena known as artesian wells, uses sand and clay, pools of mineral waters of different gravities, and running streams. The waters beneath the earth are under pressure, induced by such natural causes as I have presented you in miniature, the chief difference being that the supplies of both salt and fresh water are inexhaustible, and by natural combinations similar to what you have seen; the streams within the earth, if a pipe be thrust into them, may rise continuously, eternally, from a reservoir higher than the head. In addition, there are pressures of gases, and solutions of many salts, other than chloride of soda, that tend to favor the phenomenon. You are unduly incredulous, and you ask of me more than your right after staking your faith on an experiment of your own selection. You demand more of me even than nature often accomplishes in earth structure; but to-morrow night I will show you that this seemingly impossible feat is possible."
He then abruptly left the room. The following evening he presented himself with a couple of one-gallon cans, one of them without a bottom. I thought I could detect some impatience of manner as he filled the perfect can (D) with water from the hydrant, and having spread a strip of thin muslin over the mouth of the other can (B), pressed it firmly over the mouth (C) of the can of water, which it fitted tightly, thus connecting them together, the upper (bottomless) can being inverted. Then he made a narrow slit in the center of the muslin with his pen-knife, and through it thrust a glass tube like that of our former experiment. Next he wrapped a string around the open top of the upper can, crossed it over the top, and tied the glass tube to the center of the cross string.
"Simply to hold this tube in position," he explained.
The remainder of the bag of salt left from the experiment of the preceding evening was then dissolved in water, and the brine poured into the upper can, filling it to the top. Then carefully thrusting the glass tube downward, he brought the tip of the curve to within about one-half inch of the surface of the brine, when immediately a rapid flow of liquid exhibited itself. (Figure 24.)
Fig. 24.
A, surface of brine.
B, upper can filled with brine.
C, necks of cans telescoped.
D, lower can full of water.
"It rises above its source without sand," he observed.
"I can not deny the fact," I replied, "and furthermore I am determined that I shall not question any subsequent statement that you may make." We sat in silence for some time, and the water ran continuously through the tube. I was becoming alarmed, afraid of my occult guest, who accepted my self-selected challenges, and worked out his results so rapidly; he seemed to be more than human.
"I am a mortal, but a resident of a higher plane than you," he replied, divining my thoughts. "Is not this experiment a natural one?"
"Yes," I said.
"Did not Shakspeare write, 'There are more things in heaven and earth, Horatio, than are dreamt of in your philosophy'?"
"Yes," I said.
And my guest continued:
"He might have added, 'and always will be'."
"Scientific men will explain this phenomenon," I suggested.
"Yes, when they observe the facts," he replied, "it is very simple. They can now tell, as I have before remarked, how Columbus stood the egg on end; however, given the problem before Columbus expounded it, they would probably have wandered as far from the true solution as the mountain with its edgewise layers of stone is from the disconnected artesian wells on a distant sea coast where the underground fresh and salt water in overlying currents and layers clash together. The explanation, of course, is simple. The brine is of greater specific gravity than the pure water; the pressure of the heavier fluid forces the lighter up in the tube. This action continues until, as you will see by this experiment, in the gradual diffusion of brine and pure water the salt is disseminated equally throughout the vessels, and the specific gravity of the mixed liquid becomes the same throughout, when the flow will cease. However, in the earth, where supplies are inexhaustible, the fountain flows unceasingly."
CHAPTER XXIX.
BEWARE OF BIOLOGY, THE SCIENCE OF THE LIFE OF MAN.[6]
(The old man relates a story as an object lesson.)
[6] The reader is invited to skip this chapter of horrors.—J. U. L.
"But you have not lived up to the promise; you have evaded part of the bargain," I continued. "While you have certainly performed some curious experiments in physics which seem to be unique, yet, I am only an amateur in science, and your hydrostatic illustrations may be repetitions of investigations already recorded, that have escaped the attention of the scientific gentlemen to whom I have hitherto applied."
"Man's mind is a creature of doubts and questions," he observed. "Answer one query, and others rise. His inner self is never satisfied, and you are not to blame for wishing for a sign, as all self-conscious conditions of your former existence compel. Now that I have brushed aside the more prominent questionings, you insist upon those omitted, and appeal to me to"—he hesitated.
"To what?" I asked, curious to see if he had intuitively grasped my unspoken sentence.
"To exhibit to you your own brain," he replied.
"That is it exactly," I said; "you promised it, and you shall be held strictly to your bargain. You agreed to show me my own brain, and it seems evident that you have purposely evaded the promise."
"That I have made the promise and deferred its completion can not be denied, but not by reason of an inability to fulfill the contract. I will admit that I purposely deferred the exhibition, hoping on your own account that you would forget the hasty promise. You would better release me from the promise; you do not know what you ask."
"I believe that I ask more than you can perform," I answered, "and that you know it."
"Let me give you a history," he said, "and then perhaps you will relent. Listen. A man once became involved in the study of anatomy. It led him to destruction. He commenced the study in order to learn a profession; he hoped to become a physician. Materia medica, pharmacy, chemistry, enticed him at first, but after a time presented no charms. He was a dull student in much that men usually consider essential to the practice of medicine. He was not fitted to be a physician. Gradually he became absorbed in two branches, physiology and anatomy. Within his mental self a latent something developed that neither himself nor his friends had suspected. This was an increasing desire for knowledge concerning the human body. The insatiable craving for anatomy grew upon him, and as it did so other sections of medicine were neglected. Gradually he lost sight of his professional object; he dropped chemistry, materia medica, pharmacy, and at last, morbidly lived only in the aforenamed two branches.
"His first visit to the dissecting room was disagreeable. The odor of putrid flesh, the sight of the mutilated bodies repulsed him. When first his hand, warm in life, touched the clammy flesh of a corpse, he shuddered. Then when his fingers came in contact with the viscera of a cadaver, that of a little child, he cried out in horror. The demonstrator of anatomy urged him on; he finally was induced to dissect part of the infant. The reflex action on his sensitive mind first stunned, and then warped his senses. His companions had to lead him from the room. 'Wash it off, wash it off,' he repeated, trying to throw his hand from his person. 'Horrid, horrible, unclean. The child is yet before me,' he insisted. Then he went into a fever and raved. 'Some mother will meet me on the street and curse me,' he cried. "That hand is red with the blood of my darling; it has desecrated the innocent dead, and mutilated that which is most precious to a mother." Take the hand away, wash it,' he shouted. 'The mother curses me; she demands retribution. Better that a man be dead than cursed by a mother whose child has been desecrated.' So the unfortunate being raved, dreaming all manner of horrid imaginings. But at last he recovered, a different man. He returned voluntarily to the dissecting-room, and wrapped himself in the uncouth work. Nothing in connection with corpse-mutilation was now offensive or unclean. He threw aside his other studies, he became a slave possessed of one idea. He scarcely took time to dine respectably; indeed, he often ate his lunch in the dissecting-room. The blood of a child was again and again on his fingers; it mattered not, he did not take the trouble to wash it off. 'The liver of man is not more sacred than the liver of a hog,' he argued; 'the flesh of a man is the same as other forms of animal food. When a person dies the vital heat escapes, consciousness is dissipated, and the cold, rigid remains are only animal. Consciousness and life are all that is of man—one is force, the other matter; when man dies both perish and are dissipated.' His friends perceived his fondness for dissection, and argued with him again, endeavoring now to overcome his infatuation; he repelled them. 'I learned in my vision,' he said, referring to his fever, 'that Pope was right in saying that the "proper study of mankind is man"; I care nothing for your priestly superstitions concerning the dead. These fables are the invention of designing churchmen who live on the superstitions of the ignorant. I am an infidel, and believe in no spirit intangible; that which can be seen, felt, and weighed is, all else is not. Life is simply a sensation. All beyond is chimerical, less than fantastic, believed in only by dupes and weak-minded, credulous tools of knaves, or creatures of blind superstition.' He carried the finely articulated, bleached skull of a cadaver to his room, and placed it beside a marble statue that was a valued heirloom, the model of Venus of Milo. 'Both are lime compounds,' he cynically observed, 'neither is better than the other.' His friends protested. 'Your superstitious education is at fault,' he answered; 'you mentally clothe one of these objects in a quality it does not deserve, and the thought creates a pleasant emotion. The other, equally as pure, reminds you of the grave that you fear, and you shudder. These mental pulsations are artificial, both being either survivals of superstition, or creations of your own mind. The lime in the skull is now as inanimate as that of the statue; neither object is responsible for its form, neither is unclean. To me, the delicate configuration, the exact articulation, the perfect adaptation for the office it originally filled, makes each bone of this skull a thing of beauty, an object of admiration. As a whole, it gives me pleasure to think of this wonderful, exquisitely arranged piece of mechanism. The statue you admire is in every respect outrivaled by the skull, and I have placed the two together because it pleases me to demonstrate that man's most artistic creation is far inferior to material man. Throw aside your sentimental prejudices, and join with me in the admiration of this thing of beauty;' and he toyed with the skull as if it were a work of art. So he argued, and arguing passed from bone to bone, and from organ to organ. He filled his room with abnormal fragments of the human body, and surrounded himself with jars of preserved anatomical specimens. His friends fled in disgust, and he smiled, glad to be alone with his ghastly subjects. He was infatuated in one of the alcoves of science."
The old man paused.
"Shall I proceed?" he asked.
"Yes," I said, but involuntarily moved my chair back, for I began again to be afraid of the speaker.
"At last this scientific man had mastered all that was known concerning physiology and anatomy. He learned by heart the wording of great volumes devoted to these subjects. The human frame became to him as an open book. He knew the articulation of every muscle, could name a bone from a mere fragment. The microscope ceased to be an object of interest, the secrets of pathology and physiology had been mastered. Then, unconsciously, he was infected by another tendency; a new thought was destined to dominate his brain. 'What is it that animates this frame? What lies inside to give it life?' He became enthused again: 'The dead body, to which I have given my time, is not the conscious part of man,' he said to himself; 'I must find this thing of life within; I have been only a butcher of the dead. My knowledge is superficial.'"
Again the old man hesitated and looked at me inquiringly.
"Shall I proceed?" he repeated.
I was possessed by horror, but yet fascinated, and answered determinedly: "Go on."
"Beware," he added, "beware of the Science of Life."
Pleadingly he looked at me.
He continued:
"With the cunning of a madman, this person of profound learning, led from the innocence of ignorance to the heartlessness of advanced biological science, secretly planned to seek the vital forces. 'I must begin with a child, for the life essence shows its first manifestations in children,' he reasoned. He moved to an unfrequented locality, discharged his servants, and notified his former friends that visitors were unwelcome. He had determined that no interruption to his work should occur. This course was unnecessary, however, for now he had neither friends nor visitors. He employed carpenters and artisans, and perfected a series of mechanical tables, beautiful examples of automatic mechanism. From the inner room of that house no cry could be heard by persons outside....
[It will be seen, by referring to the epilogue, that Mr. Drury agreed to mutilate part of the book. This I have gladly done, excising the heart-rending passages that follow. To use the words of Prof. Venable, they do not "comport with the general delicacy of the book."—J. U. L.]
"Hold, old man, cease," I cried aghast; "I have had enough of this. You trifle with me, demon; I have not asked for nightmare stories, heart-curdling accounts of maniacal investigators, who madly pursue their revolting calling, and discredit the name of science."
"You asked to see your own brain," he replied.
"And have been given a terrible story instead," I retorted.
"So men perverted, misconstruing the aim of science, answer the cry of humanity," he said. "One by one the cherished treasures of Christianity have been stolen from the faithful. What, to the mother, can replace the babe that has been lost?"
"The next world," I answered, "offers a comfort."
"Bah," he said; "does not another searcher in that same science field tell the mother that there is no personal hereafter, that she will never see her babe again? One man of science steals the body, another man of science takes away the soul, the third annihilates heaven; they go like pestilence and famine, hand in hand, subsisting on all that craving humanity considers sacred, and offering no tangible return beyond a materialistic present. This same science that seems to be doing so much for humanity will continue to elevate so-called material civilization until, as the yeast ferment is smothered in its own excretion, so will science-thought create conditions to blot itself from existence, and destroy the civilization it creates. Science is heartless, notwithstanding the personal purity of the majority of her helpless votaries. She is a thief, not of ordinary riches, but of treasures that can not be replaced. Before science provings the love of a mother perishes, the hope of immortality is annihilated. Beware of materialism, the end of the science of man. Beware of the beginning of biological inquiry, for he who commences, can not foresee the termination. I say to you in candor, no man ever engaged in the part of science lore that questions the life essence, realizing the possible end of his investigations. The insidious servant becomes a tyrannical master; the housebreaker is innocent, the horse thief guiltless in comparison. Science thought begins in the brain of man; science provings end all things with the end of the material brain of man. Beware of your own brain."
"RISING ABRUPTLY, HE GRASPED MY HAND."
"I have no fear," I replied, "that I will ever be led to disturb the creeds of the faithful, and I will not be diverted. I demand to see my brain."
"Your demand shall now be fulfilled; you have been warned of the return that may follow the commencement of this study; you force the issue; my responsibility ceases. No man of science realized the end when he began to investigate his throbbing brain, and the end of the fabric that science is weaving for man rests in the hidden future. The story I have related is a true one, as thousands of faithful men who unconsciously have been led into infidelity have experienced; and as the faithful followers of sacred teachings can also perceive, who recognize that their religion and the hope of heaven is slipping away beneath the steady inroad of the heartless materialistic investigator, who clothes himself in the garb of science."
Rising abruptly from his chair, he grasped my hand. "You shall see your brain, man; come."
CHAPTER XXX.
LOOKING BACKWARD.—THE LIVING BRAIN.
The old man accompanied his word "come," as I have said, by rising from his chair, and then with a display of strength quite out of proportion to his age, he grasped my wrist and drew me toward the door. Realizing at once that he intended I should accompany him into the night, I protested, saying that I was quite unprepared.
"My hat, at least," I insisted, as he made no recognition of my first demur.
"Your hat is on your head," he replied.
This was true, although I am sure the hat had been previously hung on a rack in a distant part of the room, and I am equally certain that neither my companion nor myself had touched it. Leaving me no time for reflection, he opened the door, and drew me through the hall-way and into the gloom. As though perfectly familiar with the city, he guided me from my cozy home, on the retired side street in which I resided, eastwardly into the busy thoroughfare, Western Row. Our course led us down towards the river, past Ninth, Eighth, Seventh Streets. Now and then a pedestrian stopped to gaze in surprise at the unique spectacle, the old man leading the young one, but none made any attempt to molest us. We passed on in silence, out of the busy part of the thoroughfare and into the shady part of the city, into the darkness below Fifth Street. Here the residences were poorer, and tenement-houses and factories began to appear. We were now in a quarter of the city into which strangers seldom, if ever, penetrated after night, and in which I would not have cared to be found unprotected at any time after sunset, much less in such questionable company. I protested against the indiscretion; my leader made no reply, but drew me on past the flickering gas lights that now and then appeared at the intersection of Third, Pearl, Second, and Water Streets, until at last we stood, in darkness, on the bank of the Ohio River.
Strange, the ferry-boat at that time of night only made a trip every thirty minutes, and yet it was at the landing as though by appointment. Fear began to possess me, and as my thoughts recur to that evening, I can not understand how it was that I allowed myself to be drawn without cry or resistance from my secure home to the Ohio River, in such companionship. I can account for the adventure only by the fact that I had deliberately challenged my companion to make the test he was fulfilling, and that an innate consciousness of pride and justice compelled me to permit him to employ his own methods. We crossed the river without speaking, and rapidly ascending the levee we took our course up Main Street into Covington. Still in the lead, my aged guide, without hesitation, went onward to the intersection of Main and Pike Streets; thence he turned to the right, and following the latter thoroughfare we passed the old tannery, that I recalled as a familiar landmark, and then started up the hill. Onward we strode, past a hotel named "Niemeyer's," and soon were in the open country on the Lexington Pike, treading through the mud, diagonally up the hill back of Covington. Then, at a sharp curve in the road where it rounded the point of the hill, we left the highway, and struck down the hillside into a ravine that bounded the lower side of the avenue. We had long since left the city lamps and sidewalks behind us, and now, when we left the roadway, were on the muddy pike at a considerable elevation upon the hillside and, looking backward, I beheld innumerable lights throughout the cities of Cincinnati, Covington, and the village of Newport, sparkling away in the distance behind and below us.
"Come," my companion said again, as I hesitated, repeating the only word he had uttered since telling his horrible story, "Come!"
Down the hill into the valley we plunged, and at last he opened the door of an isolated log cabin, which we entered. He lighted a candle that he drew from his pocket, and together we stood facing each other.
"Be seated," he said dryly.
And then I observed that the cold excuse for furniture in that desolate room consisted of a single rude, hand-made chair with corn-shuck bottom. However, I did not need a second invitation, but sank exhausted and disconsolate upon the welcome object.
My companion lost no time, but struck at once into the subject that concerned us, arguing as follows:
"One of the troubles with humanity is that of changing a thought from the old to a new channel; to grasp at one effort an entirely new idea is an impossibility. Men follow men in trains of thought expression, as in bodily form generations of men follow generations. A child born with three legs is a freak of nature, a monstrosity, yet it sometimes appears. A man possessed of a new idea is an anomaly, a something that may not be impossible, but which has never appeared. It is almost as difficult to conceive of a new idea as it is to create out of nothing a new material or an element. Neither thoughts nor things can be invented, both must be evolved out of a preëxisting something which it necessarily resembles. Every advanced idea that appears in the brain of man is the result of a suggestion from without. Men have gone on and on ceaselessly, with their minds bent in one direction, ever looking outwardly, never inwardly. It has not occurred to them to question at all in the direction of backward sight. Mind has been enabled to read the impressions that are made in and on the substance of brain convolutions, but at the same time has been and is insensible to the existence of the convolutions themselves. It is as though we could read the letters of the manuscript that bears them without having conceived of a necessity for the existence of a printed surface, such as paper or anything outside the letters. Had anatomists never dissected a brain, the human family would to-day live in absolute ignorance of the nature of the substance that lies within the skull. Did you ever stop to think that the mind can not now bring to the senses the configuration, or nature, of the substance in which mind exists? Its own house is unknown. This is in consequence of the fact that physical existence has always depended upon the study of external surroundings, and consequently the power of internal sight lies undeveloped. It has never been deemed necessary for man to attempt to view the internal construction of his body, and hence the sense of feeling only advises him of that which lies within his own self. This sense is abstract, not descriptive. Normal organs have no sensible existence. Thus an abnormal condition of an organ creates the sensation of pain or pleasure, but discloses nothing concerning the appearance or construction of the organ affected. The perfect liver is as vacancy. The normal brain never throbs and aches. The quiescent arm presents no evidence to the mind concerning its shape, size, or color. Man can not count his fingers unless some outside object touches them, or they press successively against each other, or he perceives them by sight. The brain of man, the seat of knowledge, in which mind centers, is not perceptible through the senses. Does it not seem irrational, however, to believe that mind itself is not aware, or could not be made cognizant, of the nature of its material surroundings?"
"I must confess that I have not given the subject a thought," I replied.
"As I predicted," he said. "It is a step toward a new idea, and simple as it seems, now that the subject has been suggested, you must agree that thousands of intelligent men have not been able to formulate the thought. The idea had never occurred to them. Even after our previous conversation concerning the possibility of showing you your own brain, you were powerless and could not conceive of the train of thought which I started, and along which I shall now further direct your senses."
"The eye is so constituted that light produces an impression on a nervous film in the rear of that organ, this film is named the retina, the impression being carried backward therefrom through a magma of nerve fibers (the optic nerve), and reaching the brain, is recorded on that organ and thus affects the mind. Is it not rational to suppose it possible for this sequence to be reversed? In other words, if the order were reversed could not the same set of nerves carry an impression from behind to the retina, and picture thereon an image of the object which lies anterior thereto, to be again, by reflex action, carried back to the brain, thus bringing the brain substance itself to the view of the mind, and thus impress the senses? To recapitulate: If the nerve sensation, or force expression, should travel from thebrain to the retina, instead of from an outward object, it will on the reverse of the retina produce the image of that which lies behind, and then if the optic nerve carry the image back to the brain, the mind will bring to the senses the appearance of the image depicted thereon."
"FACING THE OPEN WINDOW HE TURNED THE PUPILS OF HIS EYES UPWARD."
"This is my first consideration of the subject," I replied.
"Exactly," he said; "you have passed through life looking at outside objects, and have been heedlessly ignorant of your own brain. You have never made an exclamation of surprise at the statement that you really see a star that exists in the depths of space millions of miles beyond our solar system, and yet you became incredulous and scornful when it was suggested that I could show you how you could see the configuration of your brain, an object with which the organ of sight is nearly in contact. How inconsistent."
"The chain of reasoning is certainly novel, and yet I can not think of a mode by which I can reverse my method of sight and look backward," I now respectfully answered.
"It is very simple; all that is required is a counter excitation of the nerve, and we have with us to-night what any person who cares to consider the subject can employ at any time, and thus behold an outline of a part of his own brain. I will give you the lesson."
Placing himself before the sashless window of the cabin, which opening appeared as a black space pictured against the night, the sage took the candle in his right hand, holding it so that the flame was just below the tip of the nose, and about six inches from his face. Then facing the open window he turned the pupils of his eyes upward, seeming to fix his gaze on the upper part of the open window space, and then he slowly moved the candle transversely, backward and forward, across, in front of his face, keeping it in such position that the flickering flame made a parallel line with his eyes, and as just remarked, about six inches from his face, and just below the tip of his nose. Speaking deliberately, he said:
"Now, were I you, this movement would produce a counter irritation of the retina; a rhythm of the optic nerve would follow, a reflex action of the brain accompanying, and now a figure of part of the brain that rests against the skull in the back of my head would be pictured on the retina. I would see it plainly, apparently pictured or thrown across the open space before me."
"Incredible!" I replied.
"Try for yourself," quietly said my guide.
Placing myself in the position designated, I repeated the maneuver, when slowly a shadowy something seemed to be evolved out of the blank space before me. It seemed to be as a gray veil, or like a corrugated sheet as thin as gauze, which as I gazed upon it and discovered its outline, became more apparent and real. Soon the convolutions assumed a more decided form, the gray matter was visible, filled with venations, first gray and then red, and as I became familiar with the sight, suddenly the convolutions of a brain in all its exactness, with a network of red blood venations, burst into existence.[7]
[7]This experiment is not claimed as original. See Purkinje's Beiträge zur Kenntniss des Sehens in subjectiver Hinsicht (Prague, 1823 and 1825), whose conclusions to the effect that the shadow of the retina is seen, I-Am-The-Man ignores.—J. U. L.
"A BRAIN, A LIVING BRAIN, MY OWN BRAIN."
I beheld a brain, a brain, a living brain, my own brain, and as an uncanny sensation possessed me I shudderingly stopped the motion of the candle, and in an instant the shadowy figure disappeared.
"Have I won the wager?"
"Yes," I answered.
"Then," said my companion, "make no further investigations in this direction."
"But I wish to verify the experiment," I replied. "Although it is not a pleasant test, I can not withstand the temptation to repeat it."
And again I moved the candle backward and forward, when the figure of my brain sprung at once into existence.
"It is more vivid," I said; "I see it plainer, and more quickly than before."
"Beware of the science of man, I repeat," he replied; "now, before you are deep in the toils, and can not foresee the end, beware of the science of human biology. Remember the story recently related, that of the physician who was led to destruction by the alluring voice."
I made no reply, but stood with my face fixed, slowly moving the candle backward and forward, gazing intently into the depths of my own brain.
After a time the old man removed the candle from my hand, and said: "Do you accept the fact? Have I demonstrated the truth of the assertion?"
"Yes," I replied; "but tell me further, now that you have excited my interest, have I seen and learned all that man can discover in this direction?"
"No; you have seen but a small portion of the brain convolutions, only those that lie directly back of the optic nerve. By systematic research, under proper conditions, every part of the living brain may become as plainly pictured as that which you have seen."
"And is that all that could be learned?" I asked.
"No," he continued. "Further development may enable men to picture the figures engraved on the convolutions, and at last to read the thoughts that are engraved within the brains of others, and thus through material investigation the observer will perceive the recorded thought of another person. An instrument capable of searching and illuminating the retina could be easily affixed to the eye of a criminal, after which, if the mind of the person operated upon were stimulated by the suggestion of an occurrence either remote or recent, the mind facility would excite the brain, produce the record, and spread the circumstances as a picture before the observer. The brain would tell its own story, and the investigator could read the truth as recorded in the brain of the other man. A criminal subjected to such an examination could not tell an untruth, or equivocate; his very brain would present itself to the observer."
"And you make this assertion, and then ask me to go no further into the subject?"
"Yes; decidedly yes."
"Tell me, then, could you not have performed this experiment in my room, or in the dark cellar of my house?"
"Any one can repeat it with a candle in any room not otherwise lighted, by looking at a blackboard, a blank wall, or black space," he said.
I was indignant.
"Why have you treated me so inhumanly? Was there a necessity for this journey, these mysterious movements, this physical exertion? Look at the mud with which I am covered, and consider the return trip which yet lies before me, and which must prove even more exhausting?"
"Ah," he said, "you overdraw. The lesson has been easily acquired. Science is not an easy road to travel. Those who propose to profit thereby must work circuitously, soil their hands and person, meet discouragements, and must expect hardships, reverses, abuse, and discomfort. Do not complain, but thank me for giving you the lesson without other tribulations that might have accompanied it. Besides, there was another object in my journey, an object that I have quietly accomplished, and which you may never know. Come, we must return."
He extinguished the light of the candle, and we departed together, trudging back through the mud and the night.[8]
[8]We must acquiesce in the explanation given for this seemingly uncalled-for journey, and yet feel that it was unnecessarily exacting.
Of that wearisome return trip I have nothing to say beyond the fact that before reaching home my companion disappeared in the darkness of a side street, and that the Cathedral chimes were playing for three o'clock a.m., as I passed the corner of Eighth Street and Western Row.
The next evening my visitor appeared as usual, and realizing his complete victory, he made no reference to the occurrences of the previous night. In his usual calm and deliberate manner he produced the roll of manuscript saying benignantly, and in a gentle tone:
"Do you recollect where I left off reading?"
"You had reached that point in your narrative," I answered, "at which your guide had replaced the boat on the surface of the lake."
And the mysterious being resumed his reading.