< The Evolution Theory Considered in its Relation to Theosophy (continued from page 7-22) >
taking into account the life-principle. This principle, whether it be the all-pervading Divine energy, as the Pantheists hold, or something separate and distinct from God, is “as full, as perfect, in a hair as heart,” and therefore would seem to have no attribute exactly equivalent to human consciousness. That attribute, so far as we know, inheres only in an organised form, and apart from an organised form of some sort we cannot conceive of it.
There are many theories about the soul which lie outside of the scope of the present inquiry, and are entirely based on metaphysical or theological speculation. Some of these, however, may be mentioned incidentally; and I shall first allude to the old belief that the soul after death sleeps until the resurrection of the body. This belief indicates the difficulty felt in conceiving of the soul’s active existence apart from the body. It is, perhaps, less difficult to conceive of it as unconsciously existent, and thus the dogma has found acceptance. Another belief is that the soul is a distinct entity, sent to inhabit the body, as a tenant inhabits a leasehold messuage. This idea finds expression in the literature of many countries, in times near and remote, and may be regarded as a pre-scientific theory, based on a partial and incomplete view of nature, like many other poetic images handed down to us from the past.
The body has been likened to “an earthly house,” “a tabernacle,” “a temple,” for the soul to dwell in; thus conveying, together with a partial truth, the impression of a disconnected origin. I do not contend that it is false metaphor, but only an imperfect one; and I shall refer to this again when I come to state the view which I wish to submit in contradistinction to it.
The defect in the old systems of psychology appears to me to lie in their ignoring the idea of growth and development, which is as patent and obvious in regard to the soul as in regard to the body; and if this is found to be true as regards the individual soul, it will also, I believe, prove to be equally true in a wider sense. Darwin says—“In the distant future I see open fields for far more important researches. Psychology will be based on a new foundation, that of the necessary acquirement of each mental power and capacity by gradation?'
To return to the current theologic ideas of the soul inhabiting the body, of its being a separate creation, and of its sleeping for a time after the dissolution of its “earthly house,” I affirm them to be all incomplete explanations, or else pure assumptions outside the pale of psychological science. If we inquire whence comes this undefined tenant of the body, we are asked to accept as an axiom, what should only be a hoped-for conclusion to the argument, viz., that it is something which will survive
“Unhurt amidst the war of elements, |
Is this something our ordinary consciousness? No, because that appertains always to a body. Is it the life principle? No, because it would be merely playing with words to say that the life principle will continue to live.
Next to the theologic idea of the soul, we come to some philosophic speculations, amongst which I will only briefly notice that of transmigration. The chief feature of this belief is the notion that the soul goes through many metamorphoses, and is incarnated many times, until purified of its earthly passions and desires. In considering this hypothesis, we first note that it contains the idea of growth and development, and in so far harmonises with the analogies which we see around us in nature. But what is it based on? Not certainly upon our ordinary consciousness, to which in fact it is entirely opposed. We have no recollection of any former life. It must be supposed, therefore, that each incarnation of the soul is a kind of sleep; that the soul is
and that the experience of earthly life, on the awakening of the soul after death, is remembered as a kind of dream. To my mind, this militates against the usefulness of the process. But what grounds are there for believing that such a process takes place? I know of only two—and no doubt, if wrong, I shall be corrected—these are (1) the teachings of spirits; (2) “those shadowy recollections” of another state of existence, which Wordsworth has described as
As regards the former and the latter, I will only say that in both cases the raison d'etre of the belief may be real, while the belief itself is not formally accurate. In a recent number of The Spiritualist, Mr. Alfred Russel Wallace has expounded a theory on this subject which contains valuable suggestions. To my mind, the theory of reincarnation, as propounded by Allan Kardec, presents these difficulties:—
(1.) It is opposed to the ordinary consciousness.
(2.) It necessitates the belief that souls have come from other planets, to keep pace with the multiplication of bodies in this.
(3.) It makes the belief in a double consciousness necessary.
I maintain also that some facts of psychology are opposed to it. For instance, when a spirit controls the body of an infant (as in the case of Mr. Jencken’s baby, and the alleged reincarnations of Buddha, related by Madame Blavatsky), is it not to all intents and purposes in the position of a spirit permanently reincarnated? Ought it not, therefore, by the Spiritist theory, to forget its past knowledge and career, and begin its education afresh by learning to spell? Instead of this we find intelligent messages written and ideas conveyed as from a fully matured mind, using the child’s body as a piece of mechanism.
To pass on to some other theories. It is held by the Materialists that “soul” is not a thing at all, but only an abstraction. We knowthis to be untrue as regards the psychical entity we are discussing. This view can only apply (if at all) to the theologic definition of soul.
A more tenable theory, not on the face of it opposed to any known facts, is that soul has, in its first beginnings, been evolved from matter. This theory may be held in two forms, either that the soul is evolved in the case of each individual from the action of vital processes taking place after birth, or that it has been first evolved at some past time in the history of the race, and then transmitted like the physical organism. A lady, who has been all her life a highly-gifted seeress, writes to me: —‘‘I believe in evolution from G-od, but not from mud. The evolution from spirit finds its ultimatum in matter in which it works for a time, but where are we to look for the ultimatum of mud? Not in spirit, surely?” This is the dilemma of those who contend for only one existence—either spirit evolved from matter, or matter from spirit. Let the metaphysicians choose whichever they like best. Certainly, if we I conceive of God as spirit, matter must have proceeded from Him, and we have here the idea of matter evolved from spirit. On the other hand, if we regard the physical or phenomenal procession of events, we find matter tending constantly towards higher modes of existence, and this gives us the idea of spirit being evolved from matter.
Thus it depends entirely on the point of departure we take, whether we call the processes of nature evolution or involution. In the line of argument which I am asking you to follow, we are not concerned with either horn of the dilemma, because we do not assume that there is only one existence, matter or spirit, but we confine ourselves to concrete ideas, soul and body. We may trace the evolutions of both, and, so far as the eye of science can follow, their lines are parallel to one another, but never intersecting or meeting.
I will endeavour now to lay before you as briefly as possible my view of how the theory of evolution bears upon psychology. lie turning to our facts for a moment, we know that the soul is the seat of consciousness, and not the body, and when it is withdrawn the body dies. We cannot but believe that the living substance is the mould on which the grosser material is cast.
If, then, the theory of evolution be true at all, it is true of the soul in a fuller sense than of the body. I cannot understand the affirmation that the physical body, which is merely the shell, is evolved from lower types, and that the soul has a different origin; for, as in the history of the individual we can trace the gradual unfolding of the powers from infancy up to manhood, so in the history of the race we can follow the development of all the more complex faculties from their earliest beginnings through a long chain of slight variations. In the Genesisof Species, by Mivart, it is contended that while man is physically descended from some lower species, his moral powers cannot have been so derived, because there is not in the lower aimals “any trace of actions stimulating morality which are not explicable by the fear of punishment, by the hope of pleasure, or by personal affection.”
The question is, whether savages have any moral ideas which are not explicable in the same manner. To maintain the affirmative, it will be necessary to show that they have some absolute intuition of right and wrong. I am not going over this old battle-ground, but whichever conclusion is accepted as to the origin of the moral sense in man, will also, I believe, be found to apply to the brute conscience. Whatever it is which makes a dog or a man hesitate betwixt a higher and a lower impulse, this is conscience, and there is not, to my mind, much more difference in the expression of this sense between a civilized man and a savage, than between the latter and a civilised dog.
This brings me to some very serious difficulties, and if anything my argument leads me to advance should go beyond the bounds of legitimate speculation, I have no doubt the cause of truth will benefit in the end by the correction it will receive from you, in the discussion which is to follow.
If soul is an organic entity which has been derived from other organic entities of a lower type, it is highly probable that animals and even vegetables have some kind of soul. This belief is tenable on several grounds. Many Spiritualists in the present day believe even that the souls of animals will live again. We have some cases of the ghosts of dogs appearing. Mr. Maitland states, in England and Islam, that in a moment of lucidity he saw the soul of a tree. The power in some animals of reproducing amputated members, has been adduced as proof of a spiritual body, as tending to show how material substances mould themselves upon pre-existing spiritual forms. I might cite more instances, but must pass on to the consideration of how the belief that all living things have souls affects the question of the immortality of the human soul.
The thought of the countless myriads of forms which there must be peopling the spiritual world is no real difficulty, if we think of it in connection with some facts in the material universe. Number has no relation to infinity. If we reflect upon the number of highly organised forms, the mortal remains of which are preserved in a lump of chalk or coral, it may aid us to find space in our imagination for their souls. But it is not necessary to believe that all souls live for ever.
The fact, however, that a future existence is denied to the souls of the lower animal creation according to my theory, must throw some doubt on the alleged necessary immortality of the human soul. It is quite possible to conceive of this life as the embryonic stage of the soul’s existence, to regard death as the birth of the soul into its real world, to suppose that it will run through a given period of growth and development in the spiritual world, and then be dissolved and go to form the pabulum of other and higher spiritual forms—thus completing the analogy with the processes observed in the material world. This theory, I say, is quite thinkable, as also the Buddhist theory of ultimate absorption into the Deity.
If we consider that our individuality is only made conscious by that which differentiates us from our surroundings, we come near to believing that conscious individuality will end as soon as we are in perfect harmony with the divine will. If we can imagine a state in which two beings were in absolute and perfect sympathy with each other and their surroundings, it would be no mere figure to say that they were one. Swedenborg held the belief that societies are formed in the next world by the law of affinity, in which the wills of individual members are expressed as it were synchronously and in the same act, their thoughts, perceptions, and acts being as those of one intelligence. I am ignorant of the views of the Theosophists on this matter, but I hope we shall hear something of them to-night.
Before concluding my remarks on the connection between psychology and evolution, I would refer to the New Testament teachings about the soul. Every Spiritualist must regard them, and especially the words of Christ Himself, as a high (if not the highest) authority which can be <... continues on page 7-24 >