Is it possible that in some sense, instead of reducing each branch of Science to its lowest terms, we shall have to read it in the light of its highest factors, and "take it up" into the Science above—that we shall have to take up the mechanical sciences into the physical, the physical into the vital, the vital into the social and ethical, and so forth, before we can understand them? Is it possible that the phenomena of Chemistry only find their due place and importance in their relation to living beings and processes; that the phenomena of vitality and the laws of Biology and Zoology—Evolution included—can only be "explained" by their dependence on self-hood—both in plants and animals; that Political Economy and the Social Sciences (which deal with men as individual selves) must, to be understood aright, be studied in the light of those great ethical principles and enthusiasms, which to a certain extent override the individual self; and that, finally, Ethics or the study of moral problems is only comprehensible when the student has become aware of a region beyond Ethics, into which questions of morality and immorality, of right and wrong, do not and cannot enter?
Of this reversal of the ordinary scientific method Ruskin has given a great and signal instance in his treatment of Political Economy; it remains, perhaps, for others to follow his example in the other branches of Science.[31]
With regard to the absolute datum question we have seen that Science has two alternatives before it—either to be merely intellectual and to seek for its start-point in some quite external (and imaginary) thing like the Atom, or to be divine and to seek for its absolute in the innermost recesses of humanity. We have two similar alternatives in the doctrine of Evolution, which looks either to one end of the scale or the other for its interpretation—either to the amoeba or to the man—to something it knows next to nothing of, or to that which it knows most of. Goethe, when gazing at a fan-palm at Padua, conceived the idea of leaf-metamorphosis, which he afterwards enunciated in the now accepted doctrine that all parts of a plant—seed-vessel, pistil, stamens, petals, sepals, stalk, etc.—may be regarded as modifications of a leaf or leaves. In this view the distinctions between the parts are effaced, and we have only one part instead of many—but the question is "what is that part?" It is of course arbitrary to call it a leaf, for since it is continually varying it is at one time a leaf, and at another a stalk, and then a petal or a sepal, and so forth. What then is it? For the moment we are baffled.
So with the doctrine of Evolution as applied to the whole organic kingdom up to man. Like the doctrine of leaf-metamorphosis it obliterates distinctions. Geoffroy St. Hilaire proposed to show the French Academy that a Cephalopod could be assimilated to a Vertebrate by supposing the latter bent backwards and walking on its hands and feet. There is a continuous variation from the mollusc to the man—all the lines of distinction run and waver—classes and species cease to exist—and Science, instead of many, sees only one thing. What then is that one thing? Is it a mollusc, or is it a man, or what is it? Are we to say that man may be looked upon as a variation of a mollusc or an amoeba, or that the amoeba may be looked on as a variation of man? Here are two directions of thought; which shall we choose? But the plain truth is, the Intellect can give no satisfactory answer. Whichever, or whatever, it chooses, the choice is quite arbitrary—just as much so as the choice of the "leaf" in the other case. There is no answer to be given. And thus it is that the appearance of the doctrine of Evolution is the signal of the destruction of Science (in the ordinary acceptation of the word). For Evolution is the successive obliteration of the arbitrary distinctions and landmarks which by their existence constitute Science, and as soon as Evolution covers the whole ground of Nature inorganic and organic (as before long it will do)—the whole of Nature runs and wavers before the eye of Science, the latter recognises that its distinctions are arbitrary, and turns upon and destroys itself. This has happened before, I believe—ages back in the history of the human race—and probably will happen again.
The only conceivable answer to the question, "What is that which is now a mollusc and now a man and now an inorganic atom?"[32] is given by man himself—and his answer is, I fear, not "scientific." It is "I Am." "I am that which varies." And the force of his answer depends on what he means by the word "I." And so also the only conceivable answer to the absolute datum question is to be found in the meaning of the word "I"—in the deepening back of consciousness itself. Man is the measure of all things. If we are to use Science as a minister to the most external part of man—to provide him with cheap boots and shoes, etc.—then we do right to seek our absolute datum in his external part, and to take his foot as our first measure. We found a science on feet and pounds, and it serves its purpose well enough. But if we want to find a garment for his inner being—or, rather, one that shall fit the whole man—to wear which will be a delight to him and, as it were, a very interpretation of himself—it seems obvious that we must not take our measure from outside, but from his very most central principle. The whole question is, whether there is any absolute datum in this direction or not. There have been men through all ages of history (and from before) who have declared that there is. They have perhaps been conscious of it in themselves. On the other hand there have been men who, starting from their feet, declared that consciousness itself was a mere incident of the human machine—as the whistle of the engine—and thus the matter stands. On the whole, at the present day, the feet have it, and (notwithstanding their variety in size and boot-induced conformation) are generally accepted as the best absolute datum available.
Under the foot régime the universe is generally conceived of as a medley of objects and forces, more or less orderly and distinct from man, in the midst of which man is placed—the purpose and tendency of his life being "adaptation to his environment." To understand this we may imagine Mrs. Brown in the middle of Oxford Street. 'Buses and cabs are running in different directions, carts and drays are rattling on all sides of her. This is her environment, and she has to adapt herself to it. She has to learn the laws of the vehicles and their movements, to stand on this side or on that, to run here and stop there, conceivably to jump into one at a favourable moment, to make use of the law of its movement, and so get carried to her destination as comfortably as may be. A long course of this sort of thing "adapts" Mrs. Brown considerably, and she becomes more active, both in mind and body, than before. That is all very well. But Mrs. Brown has a destination. (Indeed how would she ever have got into the middle of Oxford Street at all, if she had not had one? and if she did get there with no destination at all, but merely to skip about, would there be any Mrs. Brown left in a short time?) The question is, "What is the destination of Man?"
About this last question unfortunately we hear little. The theory is (I hope I am not doing it injustice) that by studying your environment sufficiently you will find out—that is, that by investigating Astronomy, Biology, Physics, Ethics, etc., you will discover the destiny of man. But this seems to me the same as saying that by studying the laws of cabs and 'buses sufficiently you will find out where you are going to. These are ways and means. Study them by all means, that is right enough; but do not think they will tell you where to go. You have to use them, not they you.
In order therefore for the environment to act, there must be a destination. This I suppose is expressed in the biological dictum, "organism is made by function as well as environment." What then is the function of Man? And here we come back again to the meaning of the word "I."
Nothwithstanding then the prevalence of the foot régime, and that the heathen so furiously rage together in their belief in it, let us suggest that there is in man a divine consciousness as well as a foot-consciousness. For, as we saw that the sense of taste may pass from being a mere local thing on the tip of the tongue to pervading and becoming synonymous with the health of the whole body; or as the blue of the sky may be to one person a mere superficial impression of colour, and to another the inspiration of a poem or picture, and to a third—as to the "god-intoxicated" Arab of the desert—a living presence like the ancient Dyaus or Zeus; so may not the whole of human consciousness gradually lift itself from a mere local and temporary consciousness to a divine and universal? There is in every man a local consciousness connected with his quite external body; that we know. Are there not also in every man the makings of a universal consciousness? That there are in us phases of consciousness which transcend the limit of the bodily senses, is a matter of daily experience; that we perceive and know things which are not conveyed to us by our bodily eyes or heard by our bodily ears, is certain; that there rise in us waves of consciousness from those around us, from the people, the race, to which we belong, is also certain; may there not then be in us the makings of a perception and knowledge which shall not be relative to this body which is here and now, but which shall be good for all time and everywhere? Does there not exist, in truth, as we have already hinted—an inner Illumination—of which what we call light in the outer world is the partial expression and manifestation—by which we can ultimately see things, as they are, beholding all creation, the animals, the angels, the plants, the figures of our friends and all the ranks and races of human kind, in their true being and order—not by any local act of perception but by a cosmical intuition and presence, identifying ourselves with what we see? Does there not exist a perfected sense of Hearing—as of the morning-stars singing together—an understanding of the words that are spoken all through the universe, the hidden meaning of all things, the word which is creation itself—a profound and far pervading sense, of which our ordinary sense of sound is only the first novitiate and initiation? Do we not become aware of an inner sense of Health and of Holiness—the translation and final outcome of the external sense of taste—which has power to determine for us absolutely and without any ado, without argument and without denial, what is good and appropriate to be done or suffered in every case that can arise?