Chapter II: The Origin of the Human Soul (2)

Is the human soul equally material in nature, or does it belong to the spiritual category of being? The state of the question has long since been formulated for us by Aristotle: “A further difficulty,” he says, “arises as to whether all attributes of the soul are also shared by that which has the soul or whether any of them are peculiar to the soul itself: a problem which it is imperative, and yet by no means easy, to solve. It would appear that in most cases it neither acts nor is acted upon apart from the body: as, _e.g._, in anger, courage, desire, and sensation in general. Thought, if anything, would seem to be peculiar to the soul. Yet if thought is a sort of imagination, or something not independent of imagination, it will follow that not even thought is independent of the body. If, then, there be any functions or affections of the soul that are peculiar to it, it will be possible for the soul to be separated from the body: if, on the other hand, there is nothing peculiar to it, the soul will not be capable of separate existence.” (“Peri Psyches,” Bk. I, chap. I, 9.) We shall see that the human soul has certain operations which it discharges independently of the intrinsic coägency of the organism, _e.g._, abstract thought (not to be confounded with the concrete imagery of the imagination) and deliberate volition (to be distinguished from the urge of the sensual appetite). Hence, over and above the organic functions, which it discharges in conjunction with the material organism, the human soul has superorganic functions, of which it is itself, in its own right, the exclusive agent and recipient. In other words, it exists _for its own sake_ and not merely to perfect the body.

The Aristotelian argument for the spirituality of the human soul consists in the application of a self-evident principle or axiom to certain facts of internal experience. The axiom in question is the following: “The nature of an agent is revealed by its action”; or, to phrase it somewhat differently: “Every being operates after the same manner that it exists.” The factual data, to which reference is made, are man’s higher psychic functions, in which the soul alone is the active cause and receptive subject, namely: the rational or superorganic functions of thinking and willing. The argument may be formulated thus: Every agent exists after the same manner that it operates. But in rational cognition and volition the soul acts without the co-agency of the material organism. Therefore the human soul can exist without the coexistence of the material organism. But this is tantamount to saying that it is a spiritual reality irreducible to matter and incapable of derivation from matter. For we define that as spiritual, which exists, or is, at least, capable of existing, without matter. Consequently, the human soul is a supermaterial and immortal principle, which does not need the body to maintain itself in existence, and can, on that account, survive the death and dissolution of its material complement, the organism. Such a reality, as we have seen, cannot be a product of evolution, but can only come into existence by way of creation.

The axiom, that activity is the expression or manifestation of the entity which underlies it, needs but little elucidation. In the genesis of human knowledge, the dynamic is prior to both the static and the entitive. We deduce the nature of the cause from the changes or effects that it produces. Action, in short, is the primary datum upon which our knowledge of being rests. It is the spectrum of solar light emitted by them, which enables us to determine the nature of the chemical elements present in the distant Sun. It is the reaction of an unknown compound with a test reagent that furnishes the chemist with a clue to its composition and structure. It is the special type of tissue degeneration caused by the specific toxin engendered by an invisible disease germ that enables the pathologists to identify the latter, etc., etc. So much for the axiom. Regarding the psychological facts, a more lengthy exposition is required. To begin with, there is _prima facie_ evidence against the contention that the higher psychic functions in man are independent of the organism. Injury and degeneration of the cerebral cortex result (very often, at least) in insanity and idiocy. Reason, therefore, is in some way dependent upon the organism. Babies, too, are incapable of rational thought until such a time as the nervous system is fully developed. Obviously, then, rational functions cannot be spiritual, inasmuch as they are not independent of the organism.

This time-honored objection of materialists is based on a misapprehension. It falsely assumes that spirituality excludes _every_ kind of dependence upon a material organism, and that our assertion of the soul’s independence of matter is an unqualified assertion. This, however, is far from being the case. It is only _intrinsic_ (subjective), and not _extrinsic_ (objective), independence of the organism which is here affirmed. An analogy from the sense of sight will serve to make clear the meaning of this distinction. In the act of seeing a tree, for example, our sight is dependent upon a twofold corporeal element, namely, the _eye_ and the _tree_. It is dependent upon the eye as upon a corporeal element intrinsic to the visual sense, the eye being a constituent part of the agent and subject of vision; for it is not the soul alone which sees, but rather the soul-informed retina and neurons of the psycho-organic composite. The eye enters as an essential ingredient into the intimate constitution of the visual sense. It is a _constituent part_ of the _specific cause_ of vision, and it can therefore be said with perfect propriety that the _eye sees_. Such dependence upon a material element is called intrinsic or subjective dependence, and is utterly incompatible with spirituality on the part of that which is thus dependent. But the dependence of sight upon an external corporeal factor, like a tree or any other visible object, is of quite a different nature. Here the corporeal element is outside of the seeing subject and does not enter as an ingredient into the composition of the principal and specific agent of vision. True the tree, which is seen, is coïnstrumental as a provoking stimulus and an objective exemplar, but its concurrence is of an extrinsic nature, not to be confounded with the intrinsic co-agency of the eye in the act of vision. Hence, in no sense whatever can the tree be said to see; for the tree is merely an object, not the principal and specific cause, of vision. When the dependence of an agent upon a corporeal element is of this sort, it is termed extrinsic or objective dependence. Such dependence upon a material element is _perfectly compatible with spirituality_, which does, indeed, exclude all materiality from the specific agent and subject of a psychic act, but does not necessarily exclude materiality from the object contemplated in such an act. Hence the fact that the thinking soul must abstract its rational concepts from the concrete imagery of a cerebral sense, like the imagination, in no wise detracts from its spirituality, because the dependence of abstract thought upon such imagery is objective or extrinsic, and not subjective or intrinsic.

Psychologists of the sensationalist school have striven to obscure the fundamental distinction which exists between rational thought and the concomitant cerebral imagery. It is, however, far too manifest to escape attention, as the healthy reaction of the modern school of Würzburg indicates. “It cost me great resolution,” says Dr. F. E. Schultze, a member of this school, “to say, that, on the basis of immediate experiment, appearances and sensible apprehensions are not the only things that can be experienced. But finally I had to resign myself to my fate.” (“Beitrag zur Psychologie des Zeitbewusstseins,” p. 277.)

But thought is not only distinct from imagery, often there is marked contrast between the two, both as regards subjective, and objective, characters. Thus our thought may be perfectly clear, precise, and pertinent, while the accompanying imagery is obscure, fragmentary, and irrelevant. “What enters into consciousness so fragmentarily, so sporadically, so very accidentally as our mental images,” exclaims Karl Bühler (also of Würzburg), “can not be looked upon as the well-knitted, continuous content of our thinking.” (_Archiv. für die ges. Psychol._, 9, 1907, p. 317.) The same contrast exists with respect to their objective characters. Imagination represents by means of one and the same image what reason represents by means of two distinct concepts, _e.g._ an oasis and a mirage; and, _vice versa_, reason represents under the single general concept of a rose objects that imagination is forced to represent by means of two distinct images, _e.g._, a yellow, and a white rose. Imagery depicts only the superficial or exterior properties of an object, whereas thought penetrates beneath the phenomenal surface to interior properties and supersensible relationships. The sensory percept apprehends the existence of a fact, while the rational concept analyzes its nature. Hence sense-perception is concerned with the _reality of existence_, while thought is concerned with the _reality of essence_.

Certain American psychologists employ the term _imageless thought_ to designate abstract concepts. The expression is liable to be misunderstood. It should not be construed as excluding all concomitance and concurrence of sensible imagery, in relation to the process of thought. What is really meant is that sensible appearances do not make up the sum-total of our internal experiences, but that we are also aware of mental acts and states which are not reducible to imagery. In other words, we experience thought; and thought and imagery, though concomitant, are not commensurable. The clarity and coherence of thought does not depend on the clarity or germaneness of the accompanying imagery, nor is it ever adequately translatable into terms of that imagery. Thus the universal triangle of geometry, which is not right, nor oblique, nor isosceles, neither scalene nor equilateral, neither large nor small, neither here nor there, neither now nor then, is not visualizable in terms of concrete imagery, although we are clearly conscious of its significance in geometrical demonstrations. Imagery differs according to the person, one man being a visualist, another an audist, another a tactualist, another a motor-verbalist, etc. But thought is the same in all, and consequently it is thought, and not imagery, which we convey by means of speech. Helen Keller, whose imagery is mainly motor and tactile, can exchange views with an audist or visualist on the subject of geometry, even though the amount of imagery which she has in common with such persons is negligible. “_Eine Bedeutung_,” says Bühler, “_kann man überhaupt nicht vorstellen, sondern nur wissen_,” and Binet, in the last sentence of his “L’Étude expérimentale de l’intelligence,” formulates the following conclusion: “Finally—and this is the main fact, fruitful in consequences for the philosophers—the entire logic of thought escapes our imagery.”

Nevertheless, thought does not originate in the total absence of imagery, but requires a minimal substrate of sensible images, upon which it is objectively, if not subjectively, dependent. The nature of this objective dependence is explained by the Scholastic theory concerning the origin of concepts. According to this theory, the genesis of our general and abstract knowledge is as follows: (1) We begin with sense-perception, say of boats differing in shape, size, color, material, location, etc. (2) Imagination and sense-memory retain the composite and concrete imagery synthesized or integrated from the impressions of the separate external senses and representing the boats in all their factual particularity, individuality, and materiality, as existent here and now, or there and then, as constructed of such and such material (_e.g._, of wood, or steel, or iron, or concrete), as having determinate sizes, shapes, and tonnages, as painted white, or gray, or green, as propelled by oar, or sail, or turbine, etc. (3) Then the _active intellect_ exerts its abstractive influence upon this concrete imagery, accentuating the essential features which are common to all, and suppressing the individuating features which are peculiar to this or that boat, so that the essence of a boat may appear to the _cognitive intellect_ without its concomitant individuation—the essence of a boat being, in this way, isolated from the peculiarities thereof and its various qualities from their subject (representatively, of course, and not physically). (4) The imagery thus predisposed, being no longer immersed in matter, but dematerialized by the dispositive action of the active intellect, becomes coïnstrumental with the latter in producing a determination in the cognitive intellect. (5) Upon receiving this determination, the cognitive intellect, which has hitherto been, as it were, a blank tablet with nothing written upon it, reacts to express the essence or nature of a boat by means of a spiritual representation or concept—the abstractive act of the active intellect is _dispositive_, inasmuch as it _presents_ what is common to all the boats perceived without their differentiating peculiarities; the abstractive act of the cognitive intellect, however, is _cognitive_, inasmuch as it _considers_ the essence of a boat without considering its individuation. Such is the abstractive process by which our general and abstract concepts are formed. From a comparison of two concepts of this sort the process of judgment arises, and from the comparison of two concepts with a third arises the process of mediate inference or reasoning. Volition, too, is consequent upon conception, and hence an act of the will (our rational appetite), such as the desire of sailing in a boat, entails the preëxistence of some conceptual knowledge of the nature of a boat. Volition, therefore, presupposes thought, and thought presupposes imagination, which supplies the sensible imagery that undergoes the aforesaid process of analysis or abstraction. Such imagery, however, is a function of the cerebral cortex, and, for this reason, the normal exercise of the imagination presupposes the cerebral cortex in a normal physiological condition; and anything that disturbs this normal condition of the cortex will directly disturb the imagery of the imagination, and therefore indirectly impede the normal exercise of conceptual thought, which is abstracted from such imagery. Hence it is clear that the activity of both the intellect and the will is objectively dependent upon the organic activity of the imagination, and, in consequence, _indirectly_ dependent upon the physiological condition of the cerebral cortex, which is the organ of the imagination. Since, however, this dependence is objective rather than subjective, it does not, as we have seen, conflict with the spirituality of rational thought.

The nature of conceptual thought is such as to exclude the participation of matter as a constituent of its specific agent and receptive subject. The objects of a cerebral sense like the imagination are endowed with extension, color, shape, volume, mass, temperature, and other physical properties, in virtue of which they can set up vibrations in an extended medium or modify an extended organ by immediate physical contact. But, while imagination makes us conscious of objects capable of stimulating extended material organs, the objects, of which we are conscious in abstract thinking, are divested of all the sensible properties, extension, and specific energies, which would enable them to modify a material neuron, or produce a physical impression upon a material receptor of any kind whatever. Between an extended material receptor, like a sense-organ or a cerebral neuron, and the nondimensional, dematerialized object or content of an abstract thought, like science, heroism, or morality, there is no conceivable proportion. How can a material organ be affected by what is supersensible, unextended, imponderable, invisible, intangible, and uncircumscribed by the limitations of space and time? Extended receptors are necessary for picking up the vibrations of a tridimensional medium (like air or ether), and they are, likewise, essential for the reception of impressions produced by surface-contact with an exterior corporeal mass. In short, sensory neurons are needed to receive and transmit inward the quantitative and measurable excitations of the material stimuli of the external world, and central neurons are required as tablets upon which these incoming excitations may imprint _extended neurograms_, that are proportionate in intensity and extensity to the external stimulus apprehended, and that underlie and determine the concrete imagery (of which they are the physical basis). But when it comes to perceiving and representing the _meaning_ of duty, truth, error, cause, effect, psychology, means, end, entity, logarithms, etc., our mind can derive no benefit from the coöperation of a material organ. In such thinking we are conscious of that which could not make an impression nor leave a record upon material receptors like neurons. To employ a material organ for the purpose of perceiving abstract essences and qualities would be as futile and pointless as an attempt to stop a nondimensional, unextended, intangible baseball with a catcher’s glove. Hence the services of material centers and receptors may be dispensed with, so far as rational thought is concerned. Rational thought cannot utilize the intrinsic coägency of the organism, and it is therefore a superorganic or spiritual function.

That conceptual thought is in no wise communicated to the organism, but subjected in the spiritual soul alone, is likewise apparent from the data furnished by introspection. The conceiving mind apprehends even material objects according to an abstract or spiritualized mode of representation. In other words, in conceiving material objects we expurgate them of their materiality and material conditions, endowing them with a dematerialized mode of mental existence which they could never have, if subjected in their own physical matter, or in the organized matter of the cerebral cortex. Thus, in forming our concept of a material object like a boat, we spiritualize the boat by separating (representatively, of course, and not physically) its nature or essence from the determinate matter (_e.g._, wood, or steel) of which it is made, and by divesting it of the material and concrete conditions which define not only its physical existence outside of us, but also its imaginal existence within us as a concrete image in our imagination. In other words, we isolate the type or form of a given object from its material substrate and liberate it from the limiting material and concrete individuation, which confine it to a single material subject and localize it definitely in space and time. Now, it is axiomatic that whatever is received is received according to the nature of the receiver. Water, for example, assumes the form of the receptacle into which it is poured, and a picture painted upon canvas is necessarily extended according to the extension of the canvas. If, therefore, our intellect endows even the material objects, which it perceives, with a dematerialized or spiritualized mode of representation, it follows that the intellect itself is a spiritual power and not an organic sense immersed in concretifying and individualizing matter. Certainly, this ideal or spiritualized mode of existence does not emanate from the material object without nor yet from its vicarious material image in our organic imagination (which, in point of fact, is absolutely impotent to imagine anything except concrete, singular things in all their determinate individuation and quantification). Thought, then, with its _abstract mode of presentation_, cannot, like imagery, be subjected in the animated or soul-informed cortex, but must have the spiritual mind alone as its receptive subject. Our abstract or dematerialized mode of conceiving material objects is a subjective character of thought, proceeding from, and manifesting, the spirituality of the human mind, which represents even material objects in a manner that accords with its own spiritual nature.

But it is not only in the process of abstraction, but also in that of _reflection_, that rational thought manifests its superorganic or spiritual character. The human mind knows that it knows and understands that it understands, thinks of its own thoughts and of itself as the agent and subject of its thinking. It is conscious of its own conscious acts, that is to say, it reflects upon itself and its own acts, becoming an object to itself. The thinking ego becomes an object of observation on the part of the thinking ego, which acquires self-knowledge by this process of reflective thought. In introspection, that which observes is identical with that which is observed. Now such a capacity of self-observation cannot reside in matter, cannot be spatially commensurate with a material organ nor inseparably attached thereto. It is possible only to an immaterial or spiritual principle, devoid of mass and extension, and not subject to the law of the impenetrability of matter. In virtue of the law of impenetrability, no two material particles, no two bodies, no two integral parts of the same body, can occupy one and the same place. One part of a body can, indeed, act on another part extrinsic to itself; but one and the same part or particle cannot act upon itself. To become at once observed and observer, a material organ would have to split itself in two, so that the part watched could be distinct from, and spatially external to, the part watching. The power of perfect reflection, therefore, must reside in the spiritual soul, and cannot be bound to, and coëxtensive with, a material organ. Only in this supposition can there be a return of the subject upon and into itself, only in this supposition can there be that identification of observed and observer implied by the process of reflection. H. Gründer, in his “Psychology without a Soul,” gives a graphic _reductio ad absurdum_ of the contrary assumption: “A fairy tale,” he says, “tells of a knight who was beheaded by his victorious foe. But, strange to relate, the vanquished knight rose to his feet, seized his severed head and bore it off, as in triumph. The most remarkable part, however, of the story is that with a last effort of gallantry he took his own head, and—kissed its brow. The climax of this fairy tale is no more absurd than the assumption that a material organ can know itself and philosophize on itself. Only if we admit with the scholastics a simple soul intrinsically independent of any bodily organism, can we explain the possibility of perfect psychological reflexion.” (_Cf._ pp. 193, 194.)

For the rest the impossibility of introspection on the part of a material organ is so evident that the materialists themselves freely concede it, and being unwilling to admit the spirituality of the human intellect, they are forced to resort to the disingenuous expedient of denying the _fact_ of reflection on the part of the human mind. “It is obvious,” says Auguste Comte, “that by an invincible necessity the human mind can observe directly all phenomena except its own. We understand that a man can observe himself as a moral agent, because in that case he can watch himself under the action of the passions which animate him, precisely because the organs that are the seat of those passions are distinct from those that are destined for the functions of observation.... But it is manifestly impossible to observe intellectual phenomena whilst they are being produced. The individual thinking cannot divide himself in two, so that one half may think and the other watch the process. Since the organ observing and the one to be observed are identical, there can be no self-observation.” (“Cours de philosophie positive,” lière leçon.) But an argument is of no avail against a fact, and, as a matter of fact, we do reflect. It is by introspection or reflective thought that we discriminate between our present and our past thoughts, and become conscious of our own consciousness. Our intellect even reflects upon its own act of reflection, and so on indefinitely, so that, unless we are prepared to accept the absurd alternative of an infinite series of thinkers, we have no choice but to identify the subject knowing with the subject known. That our intellect is conscious of its own operations and attentive to its own thoughts, is an evident fact of internal experience, and it is preposterous to tilt against facts by means of syllogisms. When Zeno concocted his aprioristic “proof” of the impossibility of translatory movement, his sophism was refuted by the simple process of walking—_solvitur ambulando_. In like manner, the Comtean sophism concerning the impossibility of reflection is refuted by the simple act of mental reflection—_solvitur reflectendo_. For the rest, we readily concede Comte’s contention that an organ is incapable of reflection or self-observation, but we deny his tacit assumption that our cognitive powers are _all_ of the organic type. Our intellect, which attends to its own phenomena, thinks of its own thought and reasons upon its own reasoning, cannot be bound to, or coextensive with, a material organ, but must be free from any corporeal organ and rooted in a spiritual principle. In a word, reflective thought is a superorganic function expressing the spiritual nature of the human mind.

Another proof of the superorganic nature of the human intellect as compared with sentiency, both exterior and interior, is one adduced by Aristotle himself: “But that the impassivity of the sense,” he says, “is different from that of intellect is clear if we look at the sense organs and at sense. The sense loses its power to perceive, if the sensible object has been too intense; thus it cannot hear sound after very loud noises, and after too powerful colors or odors it can neither see nor smell. But the intellect, when it has been thinking on an object of intense thought, is not less, but even more, able to think of inferior objects. For sense-perception is not independent of the body, whereas the intellect is.” (“Peri Psyches,” Bk. III, Ch. iv, 5.)

This temporary incapacitation of the senses consequent upon powerful stimulation is a common experience embalmed in such popular expressions as “a deafening noise,” “a blinding flash,” “a dazzling light,” “a numbing pain,” etc. Weber’s law of the differential threshold tells us that the intensity of sensation does not increase in the same proportion as that of the stimulus. On the contrary, the more intense the previous stimulus has been, the greater must be the increment added to the subsequent stimulus before it can produce a perceptible increase in the intensity of sensation. In short, stimulation of the senses temporarily decreases their sensitivity with reference to supervening stimuli. The reason for this momentary loss of the power to react normally is evidently due to the organic nature of the senses. Their activity entails a definite and rigidly proportionate process of destructive metabolism in their bodily substrate, the organism. In other words, the exercise of sense-perception involves a commensurate process of decomposition in the neural tissue, which must afterwards be compensated by a corresponding assimilation of nutrient material, before the sense can again react with its pristine vigor. This process of recuperation requires time and temporarily inhibits the reactive power of the sense in question, the duration of this repair work being determined by the amount of neural decomposition caused by the reaction of the sense to the previous stimulus. When, therefore, a weaker stimulus supervenes in immediate succession to a stronger one, the sense is incapable of perceiving it. All organic activity, in short, such as sense-perception and imagination, is rigidly regulated by the metabolic law of waste and repair.

With the intellect, however, the case is quite different. The intellect is neither debilitated nor stupefied by the discovery of truths that are exceptionally profound, or unusually abstruse, or strikingly evident; nor is it temporarily incapacitated thereby from understanding simpler, easier, or less evident truths. On the contrary, the more comprehensive, the more penetrating, the more perspicuous, the more sublime our intellectual vision is, so much the more is our intellect invigorated and enthused in its pursuit of truth, and its knowledge of the highest truths renders it not less, but more, apt for the understanding of simple and ordinary truths. Obviously, then, the intellect is not bound to a corruptible organ like the senses, but has for its subject a spiritual principle that is intrinsically independent of the organism.

In opposition to this contention, it may be urged that a prolonged exercise of intellectual activity results in the condition commonly known as brain-fag. But this fatigue of the brain is not, as a matter of fact, the _direct_ effect of intellectual activity; rather it is the direct effect of the activity of the imagination, and only _indirectly_ the effect of intellectual thought. The intellect, as we have seen, requires a constant flow of associated and aptly coördinated imagery as the substrate of its contemplation. Now, the imagination, which supplies this imagery, is a cerebral sense, whose activity is directly proportionate to, and commensurate with, the metabolic processes at work in the cortical cells. Its exercise is directly dependent upon the energy released by the decomposition of the cerebral substance. Prolonged activity of the imagination, therefore, involves the destruction of a considerable amount of the cortical substance, and results in temporary incapacitation or paralysis of the imagination, which must then be compensated by a process of repair in the cortical neurons, before the imagination can resume its normal mode of functioning. Brain-fag, then, is due to the activity of the imagination rather than that of the intellect. That such is the case appears from the fact that after the initial exertion, which results from the imagination being forced to assemble an appropriate and systematized display of illustrative imagery as subject-matter for the contemplation of the intellect, the latter is henceforth enabled to proceed with ease along the path of a given science, its further progress being smooth and unhampered. Once the preliminary work imposed upon the imagination is finished, the sense of effort ceases and intellectual investigation and study may subsequently reach the highest degrees of concentration and intensity, without involving corresponding degrees of fatigue or depression on the part of the cerebral imagination, just as, conversely speaking, the activity of the cerebral imagination may reach degrees of intensity extreme enough to induce brain-fag in psychic operations wherein the concomitant intellectual activity is reduced to a minimum, _e. g._, in the task of memorizing a poem, or recitation. Here, in the all but complete absence of intellectual activity, the same fatigue results as that induced by a prolonged period of analytic study or investigation, in which imaginative activity and rational thinking are concomitant. The point to be noted, in this latter case, is that the intellect does not show the same dependence upon the physiological vicissitudes as the imagination. The imagery of our imagination, being rigidly correlated with the metabolic processes of waste and repair at work in the cerebral cortex, manifests correspondingly variable degrees of intensity and integrity, but the intensity of thought is not dependent upon this alternation of excitation and inhibition in the cortex. Hence, while the concomitant imagery is fitful, sporadic, and fragmentary, intellectual thought itself is steady, lucid, and continuous. The intensity of thought does not vary with the fluctuations of neural metabolism, and may reach a maximum without involving corresponding fatigue in the brain. The brain-fag, therefore, which results from study does not correspond to the height of our intellectual vision, but is due to the intensity of the concomitant imaginative process.

The intellect, therefore, is not subject to the metabolic laws which rigidly regulate organic functions like sense-perception and imagination. Man’s capacity for logical thought is frequently unaffected by the decline of the organism which sets in after maturity. All organic functions, however, such as sight, hearing, sense-memory, are impaired in exact proportion to the deterioration of the organism, which is the inevitable sequel of old age. The intellectual powers, on the contrary, remain unimpaired, so long as the cortex is sound enough to furnish the required minimum of imagery, upon which intellectual activity is objectively dependent. There are, in fact, many cases on record where men have remained perfectly sane and rational, despite the fact that notable portions of the cerebral cortex had been destroyed by accident or disease (_e. g._, tumors). Intellectual thought, therefore, is a superorganic function, having its source in a spiritual principle and not in a corruptible organ.

Such is the spiritualism of Aristotle. That this conception differs profoundly from the ultraspiritualism of Descartes, it is scarcely necessary to remark. The position assumed by the latter was always untenable, but it is now, more than ever, indefensible in the face of that overwhelming avalanche of facts whereby modern physiological psychology demonstrates the close interdependence and correlation existent between psychic and organic states. Such facts are exploited by materialists as arguments against spiritualism, though it is evident that they have force only against Cartesian spiritualism, and are bereft of all relevance with respect to Aristotelian spiritualism, which they leave utterly intact and unscathed. In the latter system, sense-perception, imagination, and emotion are acknowledged to be directly dependent on the organism. Again, spiritual functions like thinking and willing are regarded as objectively or extrinsically dependent upon the imagination, which, in turn, is directly dependent on a material organ, namely: the brain. Hence even the rational operations of the mind are indirectly dependent upon the cerebral cortex. The spiritualism of Aristotle, therefore, by reason of its doctrine concerning the direct dependence of the lower, and the indirect dependence of the higher, psychic functions upon the material organism, is able to absorb into its own system all the supposedly hostile facts amassed by Materialism, thereby rendering them futile and inconsequential as arguments against the spirituality of the human soul. In confronting this philosophy, the materialistic scientist finds himself disarmed and impotent, and it is not to be wondered at, that, after indulging in certain abusive epithets and a few cant phrases, such as “metaphysics” or “medieval” (invaluable words!), he prudently retires from the lists without venturing to so much as break a lance in defense of his favorite dogma, that nothing is spiritual, because all is matter. In this predicament, the Cartesian caricature proves a boon to the materialist, as furnishing him with the adversary he prefers, a man of straw, and enabling him to demonstrate his paltry tin-sword prowess. Of a truth, Descartes performed an inestimable service for these modern “assassins of the soul,” when he relieved them of the necessity of crossing swords with the hylomorphic dualism of Aristotle by the substitution of a far less formidable antagonist, namely, the psychophysical dualism of mind and matter.

The proofs advanced, in the previous pages, for the spirituality of the human soul are based upon the superorganic function of rational thought. A parallel series of arguments can be drawn from the superorganic function of rational volition. The cognitive intellect has for its necessary sequel the appetitive will, which may be defined as spiritual tendency inclining us toward that which the intellect apprehends as good. The objects of such volition are frequently abstract and immaterial ideals transcendent to the sphere of concrete and material goods, _e. g._, virtue, glory, religion, etc. The will of man, moreover, is free, in the sense that it can choose among various motives, and is not compelled to follow the line of least resistance, as is the electric current when passing through a shunt of steel and copper wire. Like the self-knowing intellect, the self-determining will is capable of reflective action, that is, it can will to will. Having its own actions within its own control, it is itself the principal cause of its own decisions, and thus becomes responsible for its conduct, wherever its choice has been conscious and deliberate. External actions, which escape the control of the will, and even internal actions of the will itself, which are indeliberate, are not free and do not entail responsibility. Our courts of law and our whole legal system rests on the recognition of man’s full responsibility for his deliberate voluntary acts. The distinction between premeditated murder, which is punished, and unpremeditated homicide, which is not, is purely moral, and not physical, depending for its validity upon the fact of human freedom. It is this exemption from physical determinism, that makes man a moral agent, subject to duties, amenable to moral suasion, and capable of merit or demerit. Finally, the will of man is insatiable, invincible, and inexhaustible. The aspirations of the will are boundless, whereas our animal appetites are easily cloyed by gratification. There is no freezing point for human courage. The animal or sensual appetites wear out and decline with old age, but virtue and will-power do not necessarily diminish with the gradual deterioration of the material organism. Willing, therefore, is a superorganic or spiritual function. Activity which is bound to a material organ cannot tend towards supersensible ideals, cannot escape physical determinism, cannot achieve the reflective feat of spurring itself to action, cannot avoid exhaustion, cannot elude rigid regulation by the laws of organic metabolism. For this reason, the brute, whose psychic functions are of the organic type exclusively, is destitute of freedom, morality, and responsibility. Deliberate volition, therefore, like conceptual thought, has its source and subject in man’s spiritual soul, and is not a function of the material organism.[12]

[12] To develop the argument drawn from rational volition
for the spirituality of the human soul would carry us too
far afield. Those who wish to pursue the subject further
may consult Chapter VIII of Gründer’s monograph entitled
“Psychology without a Soul,” also his monograph on “Free Will.”

G. H. Parker of Harvard, though admitting the fact of human
freedom, tries to explain it away in terms of materialism. The
following is the description which he gives of his theory: “It
is a materialist view which, however, recognizes in certain
types of organized matter a degree of free action consistent
with human behavior and the resultant responsibility.”
(_Science_, June 13, 1924, p. 520.) Freedom, in other words,
“emerges” from matter having a peculiar “type of organization.”

This view must be interpreted in the light of the philosophy
of “Emergent Evolution,” which Parker holds in common with C.
Lloyd Morgan and R. W. Sellars. The philosophy in question
recognizes in nature an ascending scale of more and more
complexly organized units, starting with protons and electrons,
at the bottom, and culminating in the human organism, at the
top. At each higher level of this cosmic scale we find higher
units formed by coalescence of the simpler units of a lower
level. These higher units, however, are _something more_ than
a mere summation of the lower units; for, in addition to
_additive_ properties that can be predicted from a knowledge
of the components, they exhibit genuinely _new_ properties
which, not being mere sums of the properties of the component
units, are unpredictable on that basis. Given, for example, the
weight of two volumes of hydrogen and one volume of oxygen, we
could predict an _additive_ property such as the _weight_ of
the compound, _i.e._ the water, formed by their combination.
Other properties, of the compound, however, such as liquidity,
are not foreshadowed by the properties of the component
gases. Similarly, the weight of carbon disulphid (CS₂) is
an additive function of the combining weights of sulphur and
carbon, but the other properties of this mobile liquid are
not predictable on the basis of the properties of sulphur and
carbon. Hence _two_ kinds of properties are distinguished: (1)
_additive_ (quantitative) properties called _resultants_, which
are predictable; (2) _specificative_ (qualitative) properties
called _emergents_, which are unprecedented and unpredictable.
Freedom and intelligence, accordingly, are pronounced to be
_emergents_ of matter organized to that degree of complexity
which we find in man.

This dualism of resultance and emergence is merely a new
verbal vesture for the hylomorphic dualism of Aristotle. The
_additive_ properties (_resultants_) are based on _matter_,
which is the principle of _continuity_. The _specificative_
(constituitive or qualitative) properties called emergents
are rooted in _entelechy_ (form), which is the principle of
_novelty_. In fact, entelechy (form) itself is _an emergent of
matter_ just as the specificative properties are _emergents_
of matter, with the sole difference that _entelechy_ is
_the primary emergent_ of matter, whereas the specificative
or qualitative properties are _secondary emergents_. For
in Aristotelian philosophy, entelechy is not, as it is in
Neo-vitalism, “an alien principle inserted into matter”
abruptly and capriciously “at the level of life,” but a
_primary emergent_ and _constituent_ of matter both living
and non-living. In fine, entelechy is an _emergent_ of matter
in all the units of nature from the simplest atom to the
most complex plant or animal organism. The only entelechy,
which is not an _emergent_, but an _insert_ into matter, is
the _spiritual human soul_. Neither the human soul nor the
_superorganic_ functions rooted in it, namely, abstraction,
reflection, and election, are _emergents_. Here we have
_novelty without continuity_, and therefore not _emergence_
(eduction), but _insertion_ (infusion).

In his “Emergent Evolution,” 1923, Lloyd Morgan lays it down
as axiomatic that _emergence involves continuity_—“There
may often be resultants,” he says, “without emergence; but
there are no emergents that do not involve resultant effects
also. Resultants give quantitative continuity which underlies
new constitutive steps in emergence.” (_Op. cit._, p. 5.)
Now our proofs for human spirituality consist precisely in
the _complete exclusion of quantitative continuity_ between
_organic_ functions (_e. g._ sensation) and _superorganic_
functions (_e. g._ conceptual thought and free volition).
Hence, by the very axiom which Morgan himself formulates,
the human soul and its _superorganic functions_ are excluded
from the category of material _emergents_. If there can be no
emergence without quantitative continuity, then the human soul
is not an _emergent from_, but an _insert into_, matter. _Free
choice_, too, it is needless to say, is not an _emergent of
matter_, but an _expression of the supermaterial nature of the
human soul_. So much for the new-old dualism of emergence and
resultance.

Two additional facts may be cited as bringing into strong relief the basic contrast existing between the higher or rational, and the lower or animal psychosis in man. The first is the occurrence of irreconcilable opposition or conflict. The imagination, for example, antagonizes the intellect by visualizing as an extended speck of chalk or charcoal the mathematical point, which the intellect conceives as destitute of extension and every other property except position. Similarly, the effort of our rational will to be faithful to duty and to uphold ideals is antagonized by the sensual impulses of the animal appetite, which seek immediate gratification at the expense of remote considerations that are higher. Such antagonism is incompatible with any identification of the warring factors, that is, of our rational, with our sentient, functions; for, wherever opposition is in evidence, there _a fortiori_ a real distinction must be recognized. The understanding and the will, therefore, differ radically from sense and sensual appetite. The second significant fact is the domination exerted by reason and will over the cognitive and appetitive functions of the organic or sentient order. Our intellect criticizes, evaluates and corrects the data of sense-perception, it discriminates between objective percepts and illusions and hallucinations, it distinguishes dreams from realities, it associates and dissociates imagery for purposes of comparison, contrast, illustration, or analysis. Moreover, it not only shows its superiority to sense by supervising, revising, and appraising the data of sentient experience, but it manifests its discontent at the inaccuracy and limitation of sense by the invention and use of instrumentation (_e. g._ ear trumpets, spectacles, microscopes, telescopes, spectroscopes, polariscopes, periscopes, etc.) to remedy the defects or increase the range of sense-perception, etc. This phenomenon is without parallel among brute animals, and is a patent manifestation of the superiority of human psychology. In like manner, the will demonstrates its preeminence over the organic or animal appetite, by exerting supreme control over the passions and impulses of our lower nature. In fact, it is able to bridle and repress the impulses of sensuality even in the immediate presence of sensible stimuli that would irresistibly determine the brute to a gratification of its animal lusts; and it can force the struggling and reluctant flesh to undergo a crucifixion for supersensible motives that make no appeal to the beast. The understanding and the will, therefore, are essentially superior to the organic psychosis that they control, namely, the sentient consciousness and sensual appetite, which we share in common with the brute, but which, in the latter, give no evidence whatever of rational or moral control.

§ 4. Darwinian Anthropomorphism

The spiritual mind of man represents an eminence to which evolving matter can never attain. This, then, is the hill that must needs be laid low, if the path of Darwinian materialism is to be a smooth one. There is, therefore, nothing very surprising in the fact that Darwin and his followers, from Huxley down to Robinson, have done all in their power to obscure and belittle the psychological differences between man and the brute. The objective of their strategy is twofold, namely, the _brutalization of man_ and its converse, the _humanization of the brute_. The ascent will be easier to imagine, if man can be depressed, and the brute raised, to levels that are not far apart. To this end, the Darwinian zealots have, on the one hand, spared no pains to minimize the superiority and dignity of human reason by the dissemination of sensistic associationism, psychophysical parallelism, and various other forms of “psychology without a soul”; and they have striven, on the other hand, to exalt to the utmost the psychic powers of the brute by means of a crude and credulous anthropomorphism, which, for all its scientific pretensions, is quite indistinguishable from the naïveté of the author of “Black Beauty”[13] and the sentimentality of S. P. C. A. fanatics, vegetarians, anti-vivisectionists, etc. The first of these tendencies we have already discussed, the second remains to be considered.

[13] Title of a horse’s autobiography by Anna Sewall, the
horse’s _alter ego_.

When it comes to anthropomorphizing the brute, Darwin has not been outdistanced by the most reckless of his disciples. Three entire chapters of the “Descent of Man” are filled with this “vulgar psychology” (as Wundt so aptly styles it). It is the sum and substance of the entire fabric of argumentation, which he erects in support of his thesis that “the difference in mind between man and the higher animals is certainly one of degree and not of kind.” (_Cf._ _op. cit._, chs. III-V.) Haeckel, Huxley, and Clifford attained to equal proficiency in the sport. Subsequent philosophers parroted their bold metaphors and smart aphorisms, and the game went on merrily till the close of the century. Then a badly needed reaction set in under the auspices of Wundt, Lloyd Morgan, and Thorndike, who insisted on abandoning this naïve impressionism in favor of more critical methods.

In his “Vorlesungen über die Menschen und Tierseele” (cf. 2nd ed., p. 370), Wundt proclaims his rupture with the impressionistic school in the following terms: “The one great defect of this popular psychology is that it does not take mental processes for what they show themselves to be to a direct and unprejudiced view, but imports into them the reflections of the observer about them. The necessary consequence for animal psychology is that the mental actions of animals, from the lowest to the highest, are interpreted as acts of the understanding. If any vital manifestation of the organism is capable of possible derivation from a series of reflections and inferences, that is taken as sufficient proof that these reflections and inferences actually led up to it. And, indeed, in the absence of a careful analysis of our subjective perceptions we can hardly avoid this conclusion. Logical reflection is the logical process most familiar to us, because we discover its presence when we think about any object whatsoever. So that for popular psychology mental life in general is dissolved in the medium of logical reflection. The question whether there are not perhaps other mental processes of a simpler nature is not asked at all, for the one reason that whenever self-observation is required, it discovers this reflective process in the human consciousness. The same idea is applied to feelings, impulses, and voluntary actions which are regarded, if not as acts of intelligence, still as effective states which belong to the intellectual sphere.

“This mistake, then, springs from ignorance of exact psychological methods. It is unfortunately rendered worse by the inclination of animal psychologists to see the intellectual achievements of animals in the most brilliant light.... Unbridled by scientific criticism the imagination of the observer ascribes phænomena in perfectly good faith to motives which are entirely of its own invention. The facts reported may be wholly true; the interpretation of the psychologist, innocently woven in with his account of them, puts them from first to last in a totally wrong light. You will find a proof of this on nearly every page of the works on animal psychology.” (English Translation by Creighton & Titchener, p. 341.)

Wundt’s warning against taking at their face value popular, or even so-called scientific, accounts of wonderful feats performed by animals is very salutary. The danger of subjective humanization of bestial conduct is always imminent. We are unavoidably obliged to employ the analogy of our own animal nature and sentient consciousness as our principal clue to an understanding of brute psychology, but we must beware of pressing this analogy based on our own consciousness to the uncritical extreme of interpreting in terms of our highest psychic operations animal behavior that, in itself, admits of a far simpler explanation. According to the principle of the minimum, it is unscientific to assume in a given agent the presence of anything that is not rigidly required for the explanation of its observed phenomena. We must refrain, therefore, from reading into the consciousness of an animal what is not really there. We must abstain from transporting our own viewpoint and personality into a brute, by imagining, with Darwin, that we discern a “sense of humor,” or a “high degree of self-complacency” in some pet animal, like a dog. In general, we can rest assured that animals are quite innocent of the motivation we ascribe to them. All their manifestations of the psychic order are adequately explicable in terms of sensory experience, associative memory, instinct, and the various automatisms of their innate and conditioned reflexes. There is no ground whatever for supposing the brute to possess the superorganic power of understanding commonly known as _intelligence_.

Etymologically speaking, the abstract term “intelligence,” together with the corresponding concrete term “intellect,” is derived from the Latin: _intus-legere_, signifying to “read within,” the fitness of the term being based upon the fact that the intellect can penetrate beneath the outer appearances of things to _inner_ aspects and relations, which are hidden from the senses. In its proper and most general usage, intelligence denotes a cognoscitive power of abstraction and generalization, which, by means of conceptual comparison, discovers the supersensible relationships existent between the realities conceived, in such wise as to apprehend substances beneath phenomena, causes behind effects, and remote ends beyond proximate means.

Certain animal psychologists, however, refuse to reserve the prerogative of intelligence for man. Bouvier’s “La Vie Psychique des Insectes” (1918), for example, contains the following statement: “Choice of a remarkably intellectual nature, is even more noticeable in the instinctive manifestations of individual memory. The animal, endowed with well-developed senses and nervous system, not only reacts to new necessities by new acts, but associates the stored up impressions of new sensations and thereby appropriately directs its further activities. Thus, by an intelligent process, new habits are established, which by heredity become part of the patrimony of instinct, modifying the latter and constituting elements essential to its evolution. Of these instincts acquired through an intelligent apprenticeship Forel was led to say that they are reasoning made automatic, and it is to them particularly that we may apply the idea of certain biologists that instincts are habits which have become hereditary and automatic.” (Smithson. Inst. Rpt. for 1918, p. 454.)

It is extremely doubtful, however, whether Bouvier is here using the term intelligence in its proper sense. Indeed, his words convey the impression that what he means by intelligence is an _ability to profit by experience_. Now, ability to profit by experience may, under one set of circumstances, involve the power of logical reflection and inference, while, under another set of circumstances, it may imply nothing more than the power of associative memory. In the latter case, the facts are explicable without any recourse to psychic powers of a superorganic nature, and, in point of fact, it often happens that the very zoöpsychologists, who insist on attributing this sort of “intelligence” to brutes, are most emphatic in denying that brutes are endowed with _reason_. In any case, it is unfortunate that the word intelligence is now used in two entirely different senses. This new and improper sense, being unrelated to the etymology, and out of harmony with the accepted use of the term, serves only to engender a confusion of ideas. It should be suppressed, in order to avoid misunderstandings.