The ability or power to discriminate is not yet consciousness; for unto this a reflexion upon the object discriminated is necessary.
The Infusoria, Polypi, and Acalephæ, simply feel that something else is there, but they are so completely imprisoned in this feeling that they are unable to submit the same to an internal process of comparison.
3587. By reason of this inability to compare their own feelings, not a trace is left unto them of internal change; so that these creatures are truly devoid of memory or recollection.
The Infusoria have only sensation, nothing else; they are therefore in ceaseless motion. They are actually capable of nothing but moving and eating. Of all other spiritual functions they are utterly devoid.
3588. Their spiritual life is in some degree a mesmeric condition. Destitute of the senses of seeing, hearing, smelling and tasting, they feel every thing, or, properly speaking, perform all these functions at one and the same time, and by one organ, the visceral mass. By mesmerism they find their food, perceive the light, and become transparent unto themselves, just as they are really in a physical point of view. For they are only viscera or visceral nerves.
Development of the Mind.
3589. The mind, just as the body, must be developed out of these animals. The human body has been formed by an extreme separation of the neuro-protoplasmic or mucous mass. So must the human mind be a separation, a memberment of infusorial sensation.
3590. The highest mind is an anatomized or dismembered mesmerism, each member whereof has been constituted independent in itself.
The skeleton of this dissected mind, when scientifically represented, would be the science of the mind, i. e. Philosophy, properly so called.
Pneumato-philosophy is the likeness of Physio-philosophy. For spirit is only the tension of nature, and nature only the spirit set in motion.