SUBSTANCE OR SUBSTANCES—WHICH?
OR,
THE ORIGIN OF LIFE AND MIND.
"Substance is that which is and abides;" "that which subsists of or by itself; that which lies under qualities; that which truly is—or essence." "It is opposed to accident." "In its logical and metaphysical sense it is that nature of a thing which may be conceived to remain when every other nature is removed or abstracted from it; the ultimate point in analyzing the complex idea of any object. Accident denotes all those ideas which the analysis excludes as not belonging to the mere being or nature of the object." It is said that our first idea of substance is, possibly, derived from the consciousness of self, the conviction that, while our sensations, thought and purposes are changing, we continue the same. "We see bodies also remaining the same as to quantity or extension, while their color and figure, their state of motion or rest may be changed." It has also been said that substances are either primary, that is singular, individual substances; or secondary, that is genera, and species of substance.
Substances have been divided into complete and incomplete, finite and infinite. But it is to be remembered that these are merely divisions of being. Substance is properly divided into matter and spirit, or that which is extended and that which thinks.
"The foundation principle of substance is that law of the human mind by which every quality or mode of being is referred to a substance," or the consciousness of a cause for every effect. "In everything which we perceive or can imagine as existing, we distinguish two parts, qualities variable and multiplied; and a being one and identical; and these two are so united in thought that we can not separate them in our intelligence, nor think of qualities without a substance." So it is a self-evident or first truth, that there is a subjective or inner man which thinks, reflects and reasons, for memory recalls to us the many modes of our mind; its many qualities and conditions. What variety of mental conditions have we not experienced? These are all so many evidences of an internal substance that we call spirit. That spirit is to be distinguished from thought as cause is from effect is evident; and also from matter lying in the accident or quality of body, is certain, from the fact of its being subject to such rapid and instantaneous changes of condition. Amidst all the different modes, qualities, or accidents of mind, we believe ourselves to be the same individual being; and this conviction is the result of that law of thought which always associates qualities with things.
In the world around us phenomena, qualities or accidents are continually changing, but we believe that these, all, are produced by causes which remain, as substances, the same. And as we know ourselves to be the causes of our own acts, and to be able to change, within a moment, the modes of our own mind, so we believe the changes of matter, which take place more slowly, to be produced by causes which belong to the substances of matter. And underlying all causes, whether of the qualities of matter or mind, we conceive of one absolute cause, one substance, in itself persistent and upholding all things in nature. This substance we are pleased to call spirit; and this spirit we call God. To deny this is to strike down a grand law of thought, the foundation principle of substance, and make the testimony of our own consciousness A LIE! The inorganic forces, about which "unbelievers" have so much to say are altogether operative in the realm of substance; that is to say, they belong to the invisible. Organic and inorganic are the same as visible and invisible. We know matter by its qualities, and we know mind by its qualities. These two, in qualities or attributes, contrast with each other like life and death. One is extenuated and the other extended; one is invisible the other is visible. Of the existence of these substances and their laws we have evidence in conscious knowledge, in that we know that we have no control over the involuntary or sympathetic nervous system, and have the most perfect control over the voluntary nerves. The forces controlling are as different as these qualities themselves. If man is simply a material organism, why this contrast? We are told that life itself is a group of co-ordinated functions. But what correllates that force?
It is very common for the advocates of the evolution hypothesis to measure the period between this and the origin of life by the phrase, "Millions and millions of years." The only object that such writers have in view in so doing is to bridge the gulf between the assumed origin of life and mind and the evidence necessary to its establishment as a fact in science. They tell us that "life is a property which certain elements of matter exhibit when united in a special form under special conditions." But when we ask them to give us those certain elements of matter, they immediately inform us that "matter has about sixty-three elements; that each element has special properties, and that these elements admit of an infinite variety of combinations, each combination having peculiar properties." This, as a fort, is a stand behind the dark, impenetrable curtain of an infinite variety of combinations. It is just as dark and as destitute of proof as any pope's assumed infallibility.
Mr. Hæckel says: "As a matter of course, to the infinite varieties presented by the organic forms and vital phenomena in the vegetable and animal kingdoms, correspond an equally infinite variety of chemical composition in the protoplasm. The most minute homogeneous constituents of this life substance, the protoplasm molecules, must in their chemical composition present an infinite number of extremely delicate gradations and variations. According to the plastic theory recently advanced (?) the great variety of vital phenomena is the consequence of the infinitely delicate chemical difference in the composition of protoplasm, the sole active life substance." What a multitude of infinities. But then, an infinite number, and an infinite variety of infinitely delicate gradations and variations, with millions and millions of years, do not remove further from sight life in its origin than does the materialistic philosophy of one substance. They constitute the web and filling of the blanket of oblivion used by materialistic doctors to cover up their ignorance of life and its origin. A half dozen "INFINITIES," and "MILLIONS AND MILLIONS OF YEARS!" What! should I care if my ancestors were "tadpoles," when they are HID AWAY IN THE CENTER OF INFINITIES, and laid away back yonder, so far off as "MILLIONS AND MILLIONS OF YEARS?"
When we ask our friends for the proof necessary to establish this speculation as a fact among facts, they find it very convenient to betake themselves to infinities, and millions and millions of years.