His long finger touched Hale’s arm. “You, I, yonder mosquito on your sleeve, even one of the germs that is causing my malaria, all being individual living things, are the ultimate units of what I shall personify as the Mind. When I say you I do not speak of that mound of flesh in which you exist, and which can be reduced to the same familiar basic elements and compounds as make up inorganic structures; I speak of your mind, your consciousness—for that is the real you. Are you following me?”
“Perfectly, Sir Basil.” Hale reached for another drink. “But do you mean to say that you and I are no more than a mosquito, a malaria protozoan, or even one of those trees in the jungle?”
Sir Basil’s dry skin slipped back into a long smile. “Startling, isn’t it? You, I, and all other living organisms are nothing but matter, energy and consciousness. You and I have a larger share of consciousness, because our organic structure permits the mind-electrons greater freedom over the matter than composes our bodies. We are more acutely aware of the universe about us, have a greater facility for enjoyment and suffering, a more intricate brain and nervous system. Yet when our bodies die and our consciousness is released, the mind-electrons enslaved by our atoms go back to the elemental Whole. This holds good for the protozoan, the tree, the man—for all things that live.”
Hale was drinking again. “You mean, Sir Basil, that there is a sort of war waged against what you personify as the Mind by matter; that matter is constantly seeking to enslave mind-electrons, so that it may become an organism which, for awhile, may enjoy what we call life?”
Sir Basil pushed back his tufted hair and looked happy. “Yes! And it’s Nature’s supreme blunder! In the end, the Mind always conquers and gains its release, yet the eternal chain of enslavement goes on and on, and will continue to go on as long as there is a living organism in the world to bind mind to matter.”
Hale was excited now, as much from the fiery intoxicant as from the scientist’s weird revelation. “I get you,” he said, rather inelegantly for a professor. “You mean that if every living thing in the world should pass out, every man, every plant, every animal, even down to microscopic infusoria, the Mind would collect all its electrons, and through some more jealous law of, er, cohesion hold these electrons inviolate from matter and energy?”
“Right! And again, as in the beginning, the Mind would rule supreme. By what I have proved, you and I and all other creatures that now have life may, as separate unfleshed electrons, enjoy eternal consciousness as a part of the Mind.” A new passion leaped to his dark eyes. “When I have finished my mission, no more need we be slaves of the dust, subject to all the frightful sufferings of this dunghill of flesh.”
He brought his fist down upon his skinny leg with a resounding blow.