Sophereus. In speaking of the human mind and its incapacity to rest satisfied with what science can discover of immediate physical agencies in the production of phenomena, I have not overlooked the fact that the idea of a Creator has been dogmatically inculcated as a matter of belief. But I form my conception of the construction of the human mind from the operations of my own mind. I have not trained myself into any mode of reasoning. I have somehow been so placed in this world that, as I have frequently told you and as I am perfectly conscious, I am uninfluenced by any early teaching, and can judge for myself of the force of evidence. When I say, therefore, that the human intellect is so constituted that it is obliged to regard mind as the source of power, I exclude all teaching but the teaching of experience. There can not be two courses of reasoning that are alike correct. If you uncover a portion of the earth's surface, and find there structures, implements, and various objects which you are convinced that the forces of nature did not produce, you must conclude that they were the productions of mind availing itself of the capabilities of matter to be molded and arranged by the force of an intelligent will. You do not see that mind, you do not see the work in progress, but you are irresistibly led to the conclusion that there was a mind which produced what you have found. You can not reason on the phenomena at all, without having the conviction forced upon you that the ultimate cause was an intelligent being. You can not explain the phenomena without this conclusion. How, then, can you explain the more various and extraordinary phenomena of nature without attributing their production to mind? You have no more direct evidence that the Pyramids of Egypt, or an obelisk which has lain buried in the earth for thousands of years, were made by human hands, than you have for believing that an animal organism, or the solar system, was planned and executed by an intelligent being. In both cases, you have only indirect evidence; but in both cases that evidence addresses itself to your intellect upon the same principles of belief. In the case of the pyramid or the obelisk, you refer the construction to mind, because you see that mind alone could have been the real cause of its existence. In the case of the animal organism, or the mechanism of the heavenly bodies, you are obliged to reason in the same way. Hence I say that our minds are so constituted that there is but one method of correct reasoning, whether the phenomena are those which can be attributed only to human intellect, or are those which must be attributed to superhuman power and intelligence. Hence, too, I speak of a moral purpose as indicated by the phenomena. The pyramid and the obelisk were built with a moral purpose. The animal organism and all that follows from it, the structure of the solar system and all that follows from it, were made to be what they are with a moral purpose. When you ask me for the evidence of this purpose, I point to the fact that the phenomenal causes, as you denominate the mere physical agencies employed in the production of certain objects, were incapable of any volitional action, and that without volition the connection between the physical agencies and their effects could not have been established. The stone and the chisel were the immediate physical agencies which produced the obelisk. But who selected the stone and wielded the chisel? And who designed the moral uses of the obelisk? Procreation, by the sexual union, is the immediate physical cause of the existence of an individual animal. But who designed its structure, appointed for it a law of its being, and established the physical agencies which brought the individual into existence and the moral consequences that those agencies produce?
Kosmicos. We are no nearer to an agreement than we have been in our former discussions. And the reason is that you do not perceive the mission and the method of science. Science undertakes to discover those causes of phenomena which can be verified by experience; so that we can truly say that our knowledge has been advanced, and that we really do know something of the things which we talk about. This is the domain of science. Its conclusions do not extend into the region of that which is unknown and unknowable. Inasmuch as its conclusions are strictly positive, because they are demonstrated by experience, they negative, as matter of knowledge, anything beyond. You may speculate about what lies beyond, but you have no reason for saying that you know anything about it; whereas men who reason as you do, and yet who do not accept dogmas simply as matters of faith, are constantly trying to persuade themselves that they know something about that of which they have no means of knowledge. If you accept that something as a matter of faith, because you are satisfied with the evidence which establishes, or is supposed to establish, a divine revelation, you have a ground for belief with which science does not undertake to interfere. But you have no ground for maintaining that, from the phenomena of nature alone, you can derive any knowledge beyond that which you can demonstrate as a scientific fact.
Sophereus. I accept your definition of the aims and methods of science. But what I find fault with is the assumption that we are not entitled to say that we know or believe a thing which can not be demonstrated as a scientific fact, when we are all the time grounding such knowledge or belief upon reasoning that convinces us of the truth and reality of other things which in like manner are not demonstrable as scientific facts. You may say that this is not the knowledge which we derive from scientific facts, and therefore it is not to be dignified by the name of knowledge. But we are always acting and must act upon proofs which are not scientific demonstrations; and whether we call this knowledge, or call it belief, we govern our lives according to it. We accept the proof that a buried city was the habitation and work of intelligent human beings, because we know that the forces of nature, not guided and applied by intelligent wills, never constructed a city. We accept the proof that men are just, merciful, courageous, truthful, or the reverse of all this, because their actions prove it, although we can not look into their hearts. What does all the estimate of the characters of men rest upon, but upon their actions? And is not this entitled to be ranked as knowledge of the characters of individual men?
Kosmicos. We must each retain his conclusions. Let our next discussion relate to the origin of the human mind, and then we shall see whether you will be able to resist the origin which evolution assigns to it.
Sophereus. I shall be glad to meet you again.
[CHAPTER XI.]
Origin of the human mind—Mr. Spencer's theory of the composition of mind—His system of morality.
According to their appointment, our two disputants have met to discuss the origin of mind.