{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_60750/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_60750","id":"gutenberg_60750","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/60750","summary":null,"tags":["Biology","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Category: Science - Biology","Future life"],"text":"_DEATH AND RESURRECTION._\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: GUSTAF JOHAN BJ\u00d6RKLUND]\n\n\n\n\n                         Death and Resurrection\n                         FROM THE POINT OF VIEW\n                           OF THE CELL-THEORY\n\n                                   BY\n                            GUSTAF BJ\u00d6RKLUND\n\n                     Translated from the Swedish by\n                               J. E. FRIES\n\n                                 Chicago\n                    THE OPEN COURT PUBLISHING COMPANY\n\n                              LONDON AGENTS\n                 KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TR\u00dcBNER & CO., LTD.\n                                  1910\n\n                              Copyright by\n                      THE OPEN COURT PUBLISHING CO.\n                                  1910\n\n\n\n\nPUBLISHERS\u2019 PREFACE.\n\n\nNever in the history of human thought has the interest in the soul\nand its immortality been greater and keener than now. The leading\ninvestigators of the Society of Psychical Research have taken up the\nproblem of enquiring into the facts of spiritual experiences, telepathy,\nforebodings and kindred phenomena. The result has been rather negative,\nfor, while we have received innumerable single facts, they all suffer\nfrom the common fault that they are too subjective in their nature to\nfurnish a proof that could be objectively valid. Moreover, many reports\ncome from witnesses whose mental constitution is under the suspicion of\nbeing pathological, and so their value is practically null.\n\nOf much greater importance would be an investigation as to the\npossibility of immortality on the basis of scientific data, but, strange\nto say, this method has been almost entirely lost sight of by leaders of\nthe S. P. R. If we could form a definite theory as to the nature of the\nsoul based on exact observation, we would be enabled, first, to explain\nman\u2019s instinctive yearning for immortality; and, secondly, to form a\ndefinite idea of the condition of the soul after death. Thus we could\nexclude all the many mistakes which are now made, and which originate\nthrough an erroneous and partly superstitious notion of the relation of\nthe dead to the living. The result is shown in the reports of the S. P.\nR., abounding in statements of ghost stories, which can be regarded only\nas a continuation of folk-lore. As a matter of fact, the work of the S.\nP. R. has so far provided very little help toward a better comprehension\nof immortality.\n\nAmong the men who have done the work of a sympathetic reconstruction\nof the idea of immortality on the basis of science, there is to be\nmentioned, next to Fechner, Gustave Bj\u00f6rklund, a Swedish scientist who is\nwell known in his own country, but who has been almost entirely ignored\nin other lands. The obvious reason of this is the inaccessibility of his\nwritings, which have not yet been translated into English.\n\nWe do not believe Bj\u00f6rklund\u2019s solution is the right one, but we do\nbelieve that he has made a contribution to the philosophy of religion\nwhich ought not to be ignored. His case is similar to Fechner\u2019s. We have\npublished Fechner\u2019s book _On Life After Death_ and we are glad to present\nthe views of Bj\u00f6rklund on _Death and Resurrection_.\n\nDr. Carus has sketched his views repeatedly in _The Soul of Man_, in\n_Whence and Whither_, and two articles published in _The Monist_, with\nspecial reference to Fechner. They show also why Bj\u00f6rklund\u2019s belief is\nunacceptable.\n\nNevertheless we publish Bj\u00f6rklund\u2019s book because we heartily sympathize\nwith his endeavor to justify those sentiments which instinctively point\nout that death is not a finality, and that the purpose of life is not\nlimited to the span of our days between the cradle and the grave, but\nthat it has a further and fuller significance.\n\nWe hope that Bj\u00f6rklund\u2019s book will be welcomed as the contribution of an\nearnest and prominent scientific thinker on the important question, \u201cIf a\nman die, shall he live again?\u201d\n\n                                                          THE PUBLISHERS.\n\n\n\n\nTRANSLATOR\u2019S PREFACE.\n\n\nJohan Gustaf Bj\u00f6rklund was born the tenth of November, in the year 1846.\nHis parents were farmers in very small circumstances. His father seems\nto have been endowed with a good business head and, ultimately, became\na real estate owner on a small scale, first in one city and then in\nUpsala, the principal university town of Sweden. Poverty was familiar to\nBj\u00f6rklund throughout his life. Doubtless one reason for this was that\nhis consuming interest in sociology and philosophy prevented him from\ntaking those higher examinations, which in Sweden are indispensable for\nobtaining any official position. He studied, however, for several years\nat the University of Upsala, but followed no recognized course, and it\nwas only because of the ardent persuasion of his friends that he took a\ndegree as B. A.\n\nIn 1884, Bj\u00f6rklund moved to Stockholm, where he remained until his death,\nin 1903. At the University of Stockholm, he took the courses in biology\nand natural science, and won for himself the admiration and lasting\nfriendship of many of the professors of that institution. During this\ntime he mainly supported himself by teaching philosophy, and among other\npupils, afterward renowned, was Ellen Key, the well-known Swedish writer\non sociology and the woman question. The most absorbing interests during\nthis period were, however, sociology and the peace movement.\n\nTo broaden his views and study social conditions in general, Bj\u00f6rklund\nundertook several protracted journeys to England, Germany, Belgium, and\nFrance.\n\nFrom 1887, Bj\u00f6rklund began to publish the fruits of his untiring labor.\nHis first work was, \u201cThe Fusion of the Nations.\u201d In that, as in \u201cThe\nAnarchy of Evolution\u201d and \u201cPeace and Disarmament,\u201d Bj\u00f6rklund throws his\noverwhelmingly convincing statistical resources and solid scientific\nlearning in favor of an ultimate universal, but more especially European\nunion of the nations. Toward this goal it is necessary to steer,\naccording to Bj\u00f6rklund, if a general \u201cAnarchy of Evolution\u201d is to be\navoided; for that is the condition that will prevail, if the state\nneglects to carry out an organization of society that shall keep step\nwith the degree of material culture reached. \u201cBecause during the most\nprofound peace, a nation suffers from its own army the same impeding\ninfluences that in time of war is due to the hostile army.\u201d\n\nThe last mentioned book, \u201cPeace and Disarmament,\u201d at once made Bj\u00f6rklund\nfamous. It was translated into French, German, English, Polish, Dutch,\nHungarian and several other languages, and would no doubt have brought\nits author a Nobel prize, had it appeared fifteen years later. Bj\u00f6rklund\nwas now elected an honorary member of the Swedish Peace Society. At\nthe Peace Congress in Bern (1892) his treatise, \u201cThe Armed Peace,\u201d was\ndistributed in English, German and French, and the Italian Society,\n\u201cUnione Operaia Umberto I,\u201d subsequently elected him an honorary member.\n\nIn his later years Bj\u00f6rklund devoted less time to active work in the\nuniversal peace movement. He became more absorbed in scientific research\nand the problems of philosophy. An important impulse to his later\ndevelopment, he received from a book, \u201cSignificance of Segmentation in\nthe Organic World\u201d (Stockholm, 1890). Here he was brought to serious\nconsideration of the nature of the cell and of its place in life. In the\norganization of the cells in a human body Bj\u00f6rklund saw an example of a\nuniversal law, governing all life. With this thought as a starting point,\nhe undertook to investigate the problem, all-important to his philosophy,\nof the awakening of self-consciousness in a cell-organization and the\nrelationship between this newborn ego and the cells themselves, each of\nwhich, to a certain degree, leads an independent life.\n\nThe result of his studies was first made known in 1894 in a treatise,\n\u201cThe Relation Between Soul and Body from a Cytologic Point of View.\u201d In\nthe year 1900, he published the volume herewith presented to the American\npublic, in which he has partly rewritten the former book, and further\nadded his latest conceptions of the nature and evolution of life.\n\nThis work is undoubtedly one of Sweden\u2019s most remarkable and interesting\ncontributions to contemporary philosophy. It is also the last work from\nGustaf Bj\u00f6rklund\u2019s hand. In July, 1903, his earthly existence was\nbrought to an end, and he was \u201cfully translated\u201d to that spiritual world,\nthe existence of which he was so thoroughly convinced.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *\n\nIt is true that the philosophical structure that Bj\u00f6rklund so\nsuccessfully commenced to upbuild is far from complete. But the basis\nhe laid is solid and will serve as a foundation for many temples of the\nfuture, whether they who worship therein believe in Bj\u00f6rklund\u2019s God or\nnot.\n\nThis foundation is the fact overwhelmingly proved by Bj\u00f6rklund, that life\nis not a quality in matter or physical force, but must be of immaterial\norigin and substance. Granting that time as well as space are forms in\nwhich matter and physical force are comprehended by man on his earthly\nstage of consciousness, Bj\u00f6rklund has also demonstrated the immortality\nof life. For if life be a reality, which is not here denied, with no\nroots in matter or physical force, whether these are identical or not,\nthis reality exists outside of the forms, time and space, in which matter\nappears. But whether matter and physical force exist per se, or are\nmere transient phenomena or what their origin and purpose is, these are\nquestions that Bj\u00f6rklund never was granted the time to discuss.\n\nBj\u00f6rklund\u2019s grand conception of the relationship between all living\nbeings and their organic upbuilding of larger conscious units, where\neach individual of higher order is the sum total of all its constituent\nmembers of lower order, is certainly a most helpful and inspiring\naddition to our theory of evolution.\n\nBut the question why an evolution is necessary at all for beings that\nare constituent members in The Perfect Being, is hardly satisfactorily\nanswered by Bj\u00f6rklund. His ingenious explanation, fully presented toward\nthe end of this volume, still leaves us in a dilemma. Bj\u00f6rklund holds\nthat Perfect Love has left it to time-existent beings to become of\nFree Will what they of eternity have been to the All-Spirit; much as a\nchild, unless considered merely a mechanical toy, must of free will, grow\ninto the man that his father preconceived and all the time sees in it.\nBut even so we are left between Scylla and Charybdis, for either this\nevolution has a purpose, which must be reached outside of time\u2014that is,\nit will come to a standstill; an ending in Nirvana\u2014or else evolution\nis everlasting, without final purpose, and its proper name\u2014delusion.\nAgain the time-bound mind meets in this, as well as in every ethical\nor metaphysical problem, if it be pushed to its ultimate consequences,\nthe same conflict or irrationality that is destined to baffle the\nspace-bound man, whether his microscope is restlessly at work to solve\nthe riddle of the divisibility of matter, or his telescope sweeps the\nheavens in a vain search for the utmost star. This irrationality, that\neverywhere surrounds us, is a chasm that only religion can bridge.\nFrom a philosophical point of view, therefore, we must be satisfied if\nour workable hypotheses in philosophy and in natural science do not\ncontradict each other; and Gustaf Bj\u00f6rklund has shown us a road to\nreconciliation between idealism and natural science, that for a long time\nseemed entirely lost in the jungle of the materialism of the last century.\n\n                                                             J. E. FRIES.\n\n    For the biographical data of Bj\u00f6rklund\u2019s life I am indebted\n    to S. A. Fries, D. D., well known in continental theological\n    circles as a scientist of rank and founder of the international\n    Congresses in the interest of the History of Religion. (See\n    Theologische Literatur Kalender 1906; Wer ist\u2019s? 1908.) Dr.\n    Fries, who is one of the leading ministers in Stockholm, has\n    done more in speech and print than anybody else to introduce\n    Bj\u00f6rklund to the reading public.\n\n\n\n\nTABLE OF CONTENTS.\n\n\n                                                                      PAGE.\n\n    OLD CONCEPTIONS OF A FUTURE LIFE                                     1\n\n    MAN\u2019S SPIRITUAL BODY                                                26\n\n    SOURCE OF SPIRITUAL KNOWLEDGE                                       37\n\n    IMPORTANCE OF SPONTANEOUS GENERATION                                51\n\n    MATERIALISTIC DEMONSTRATION OF SPONTANEOUS GENERATION               67\n\n    HOW IS ORGANIC MATTER PRODUCED?                                     87\n\n    ORGANIC MATTER AS A PRODUCT OF ART                                 107\n\n    THE SOUL AND THE CELLS                                             124\n\n    FUNDAMENTAL QUALITIES OF AN ORGANISM                               138\n\n    ORGANIC RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN THE SOUL AND THE CELLS                147\n\n    RESURRECTION                                                       166\n\n    MAN AND INFINITY                                                   174\n\n    RECAPITULATION                                                     188\n\n\n\n\n_DEATH AND RESURRECTION._\n\n\n\n\n    All are but parts of one stupendous whole,\n    Whose body Nature is, and God the soul;\n    ...\n    All Nature is but Art, unknown to thee;\n    All Chance, Direction, which thou canst not see;\n    ...\n    And spite of Pride, in erring Reason\u2019s spite,\n    One truth is clear, Whatever is is Right.\n\n                                    \u2014Alex. Pope.\n                            Essay on Man, Epistle I.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\nOld Conceptions of a Future Life.\n\n\nA consciousness of immortality, sometimes dim and vague, sometimes vivid\nand clear, seems to be characteristic of the human race. However low man\nmay stand he cannot consider death to be the end of his existence. The\nconviction that he is immortal is innate to him. Annihilation is contrary\nto the nature and demands of his spirit. It is true that uncertainty and\ndoubt might arise, but man will never be able wholly to uproot either\nhope or fear as to the possibility of a future life.\n\nExperiencing such feelings and presentiments, man finds himself amidst\na world where death and dissolution everywhere surround him. He sees\nthe objects of his love or fear pass away, and he knows that sooner or\nlater the same fate will befall himself. When he beholds the lifeless\nbody of some near relative, his presentiment of immortality tells him\nthat the selfsame soul that once animated that body is still alive. In\nsuch moments even the man of low cultivation is forced into more or less\nprofound contemplation. The following reflection impresses itself with\nmight and wonder upon him: \u201cI feel convinced that the dead is living, but\nhow can he live without his body and what form does his new life take?\u201d\n\nIn all ages and stages, men have asked the same or similar questions, and\nthey will go on asking them as long as belief in a future life obtains.\n\nBut man does not confine himself to questioning, he wants answers, and\nespecially must this be true where the reply is so intimately connected\nwith himself. And these answers have not been lacking; we find them\nformulated in those opinions and theories respecting a future life which\nthroughout the ages have gradually appeared and prevailed.\n\nThe critically thinking public of the present day takes a decidedly\nskeptical attitude toward all these theories. They assert, and not\nwithout strong arguments, that it is impossible to know anything. But,\nhowever convinced the public may be of the fruitlessness of discussing\nthe topic, no one will succeed in pushing it entirely aside. Time and\nagain the same questions reappear as dark and threatening clouds on the\nhorizon of our consciousness; they occupy our thoughts, take hold upon\nour feelings and color our sentiments. It would undoubtedly be sufficient\nat such moments to have, were it only one fixed point to stand upon; one\nestablished fact to start from and which we could trust would lead our\nthoughts in the right direction. But such a basis to set out from we\nhave not hitherto been able to find. Will this remain the case forever?\nWill science concerning a future life always fail to attain aught but\nnegative results? Let us say at once that humanity will probably be able\nto ascertain as much as it may be necessary or useful for us to know in\nthis world. This hope is founded on our firm belief that at this time a\nbasis such as that above mentioned really exists. Natural science has\nfurnished this basis, though nobody as yet has happened to reflect that\nthe facts upon which this basis rests may have any bearing upon our\nattitude toward a future life, much less give answer to questions such as\nthe following: How, and in what way, is man to pass from this life into\nanother?\n\nIt will be the object of the following pages, then, to develop further\nthe view just intimated.\n\nIn prehistoric times men believed in a close relationship between\nthe soul of the deceased and his body in the grave, and this purely\ninstinctive faith is the more remarkable, as it prevailed during stages\nof civilization when differentiation between spiritual qualities and\nphysical matter was almost unknown.\n\nThe contradistinction between soul and body is certainly a fact, a\ngeneral experience. But neither the individual nor the race realizes\nthis fact suddenly or all at once. The knowledge of the distinction\nbetween the physical and the spiritual sphere, with their different\ncharacteristics and qualities, proceeds step by step, being the result of\nslowly advancing evolution.\n\nThe child and the savage remain unconscious of any discrimination between\nsoul and body, and even for the more cultivated man, the border between\nthe two is vague and undetermined. According to the psychologic order of\nman\u2019s evolution we might therefore expect that the problem as to this\nrelationship would appear at a comparatively late date, and even then be\nof importance only to a reduced number of more cultivated individuals.\nBut, on the contrary, experience shows that this question occupies the\nthoughts of men in very low stages of civilization, and, in fact, that\nit is of the most general interest.\n\nThe reason for this evidently lies in the instinctive belief that\nthe body contains something which is immortal, and which in the life\nhereafter the soul cannot dispense with.\n\nIn its first historic form the question concerning the soul\u2019s relation\nto the body deals with this relation after, not before, the separation\nof the soul and body. This latter problem emerges only in very high\nstages of civilization, and even then is of scientific interest to an\ninsignificant minority only, while the question of our existence after\ndeath is religious in its nature and of interest to all.\n\nIn olden times men were more fully convinced of a continued personal\nexistence after death than civilized mankind seems to be nowadays. The\nsame vivid conviction we find even in our age among people in the natural\nstate. From the prehistoric peoples we have no written communication,\nbut from their graves they speak to the present day intelligibly and\nplainly of their belief in a life to come. Behold the monuments defying\ntime and decay, which these people have erected in memory of their\ndeceased. The sepulchres of the Egyptian kings to this very day arouse\nour amazement and admiration.\n\nWhat was it, then, that induced these peoples of early times to bestow\nsuch extraordinary labor on the places of their last rest? It certainly\nwas their belief that the graves contained not only the lifeless body,\nbut also the living soul. The funeral ceremonies evidently show, as\nFustel de Coulanges says, that when the body was laid in the grave it was\nthought that something yet alive was placed there at the same time. The\nsoul was born simultaneously with the body; death did not separate them;\nthey were both enclosed together in the grave. In olden times people felt\nso fully assured that a man lived in the tomb, that they never failed\nto bury with him the things of which he was thought to be in want. They\npoured wine on the grave in order to quench his thirst; they brought\nfood to his tomb in order to appease his hunger; they killed horses and\nslaves, believing that, if enclosed with the dead, these would serve him\nin his grave as they had served him during his life.\n\nIt was also in this conviction that the positive duty of burying\nthe deceased originated. In order to bring rest to the soul in the\nsubterranean dwelling that fitted its new existence, it was necessary\nthat the body, to which, in some way or another, it still clung, should\nbe covered with earth. The soul, denied a grave, had no dwelling.\nDrifting about, it sought in vain the desired rest after life\u2019s fitful\nstruggle. Without shelter, without offerings or food, it was condemned\nto everlasting wandering. Therefore, because the deceased was unhappy,\nhe became ill-natured. He tormented the living; sent them diseases;\ndestroyed their harvests; haunted them in uncanny visions in order to\nremind them of their duty to bury the body and thereby secure peace for\nhimself.\n\nThe old authors give evidence of the degree to which people were vexed\nby fear that proper ceremonies would not be observed at their burial.\nIt was a constant source of grievous irritation. The fear of death was\nless prevalent than the fear of being left unburied. Naturally so, for it\nwas a question of eternal happiness. It should therefore not surprise us\nso much when we see the Athenians execute generals, who, after a naval\nvictory, had neglected to bury the fallen. These generals, disciples of\nthe philosophers of their time, did not believe that the fate of the soul\nwas dependent on that of the body. They had therefore decided not to\nchallenge the tempest for the empty formality of gathering and burying\nthe fallen. But the masses, even in enlightened Athens, still clung to\nthe old conceptions, and accused the generals of godlessness, sentencing\nthem to death. By their victory they had saved Athens, but by their\nnegligence they had brought perdition upon thousands of souls. \u201cThese\nconceptions,\u201d says Fustel de Coulanges, \u201chave governed man and society\nthrough many generations, and have been the source from which the larger\npart of ancient domestic and public institutions were derived.\u201d\n\nBut this is not all. The primitive ideas, referred to above, obtain\neven today among various nations and tribes all over the earth. From\nthe islands in the Pacific Ocean all the way up to the Polar regions we\nmeet with the same creeds among uncivilized peoples, the same or similar\nmanner of burial as among the ancients.\n\nIf we were going to illustrate this, the Chinese probably would be the\nfirst to attract our attention, not only because of the antiquity of\ntheir civilization, but because of their great numbers. As is well\nknown, a third part of the world\u2019s population is Chinese. Most of\nthe characteristic peculiarities of this enormous community must be\nattributed to their death-cultus.\n\nEvery family in China lives in continuous communication with its\nancestors, upon whom are bestowed offerings of fruit, grain, rice or\nvegetables, according to the products of the soil of their home. The soul\nwill lose none of its qualities through the separation from the body.\nIn company with other souls of their kindred it hovers over the family,\npartakes of their sufferings, rejoices in their happiness. If forgotten,\nit grows melancholy and ill-natured, it complains in doleful voice and\nits moans are ominous. Woe unto him who ignores these obligations. The\nofferings to the souls of his forefathers must not be neglected. Their\nmemory must not be allowed to fade away. But who is going to attend\nto these sacrifices and memorial observances if the family dies out?\nMatrimony, therefore, becomes a sacred duty, the foremost of all duties.\n\nTo the Chinese mind there is no grievance greater, no punishment more\nterrible, than expulsion from the family. What would become of a man\u2019s\nsoul if his nearest of kin would curse his memory? To rid himself of such\na sickening dream he is ready to sacrifice everything, even life itself.\nBut only when the body is brought to rest in the family grave can the\nsoul enjoy the care of its kindred. It is obvious, then, that emigration\nis looked upon with great apprehension by the faithful Chinaman. He\nmust either return home during his life or else arrange that his body\nbe brought back if death should overtake him while abroad. We know that\nthe big transoceanic steamship companies faithfully carry out this part\nof their contracts with those of their Chinese passengers who meet with\nunexpected death in America.\n\nSimilar ideas are to be found among the negroes of Africa and Australia,\nand among the Indian tribes of America. These also supply their deceased\nwith such tools and provisions as they are supposed to need in another\nworld.\n\nAmong the Arctic peoples the same customs and usages prevail. When an\nEskimo is about to die, he is dressed in his best clothes and his knees\nare drawn up under him. The grave is lined inside with moss and a skin,\nover which stones and peat are spread. If the dead is a man, his boat,\nweapons and tools are laid beside the grave; if a woman, her knife and\nsewing utensils; if it is a child, the head of a dog is placed on top of\nthe grave, that the soul of the dog may show the helpless child a road to\nthe second life. If a mother dies while nursing a babe, it is, as a rule,\nburied alive with her.\n\nIn a Samoyede grave, Nordenskold found among other things parts of an\niron pot, an ax, a knife, a drill, a bow, a wooden arrow, some copper\nornaments, etc. Even rolls of birch bark were found in the coffin, in\nall probability to be used for making fire in another world. Beside the\ngrave a sleigh was placed upside down, evidently in order to provide\na vehicle for the deceased, and we may assume that reindeers were\nslaughtered at the funeral.\n\nThe essential, fundamental thought in this conception which causes the\nuncultivated peoples in our days to treat their deceased in the same\nway as the ancients did, is the belief that the body contains something\nwhich the soul cannot do without in the future life. Soul and body are\nand remain a unit even beyond the grave. As death means a violent tearing\napart of these two factors, the soul cannot be wholly satisfied without\nits natural relationship to the body.\n\nIt is evident, therefore, that to the ancient world life in the lower\nregions seemed dismal and repulsive. Achilles would rather be a\nday-laborer on earth than king of the hosts in Hades. Life there passed\nin a shadowy inactivity amidst all wealth, a desolate emptiness in all\nsuperfluity, so that the soul could not help but suffer a ceaseless\nregret whether it moved in the halls of Valhalla or in the Elysian\nfields. Glorious meadows, crystal waters, streams of milk and honey,\ncould not obliterate the craving of the soul for its corporeal existence.\nIt returns time and again to the body in the grave to enjoy the\nsacrifices and cares of the surviving.\n\nThis mourning for the body and continuous longing for the sunny life\non earth made death seem something terrible that fretted and tormented\nmen. Was it not natural, then, that the mental disharmony caused by\nthe thought of death, should sooner or later bring about a reaction;\ngive birth to the hope of a reunion of the soul with the body on a\nresurrection day of the dead? At some such conclusion several religions\nhave arrived. We need mention only the Norse sagas, Islam, Parseeism and\nJudaism. A resurrection, everywhere taught in almost identical terms, is\nplaced at the end of the present system of the world in connection with\na cosmic catastrophe out of which new heavens and a new earth with an\nennobled humanity will emerge.\n\nThe bodily resurrection on the day of judgment is a doctrine also in the\nChristian faith, as it is interpreted by the orthodox creeds. But this\ndogma has entirely lost its former authority. It is repeated at each\nChurch burial, but the reading has now become a mere formality. We do not\nbelieve any more in a resurrection in the old sense.\n\nWhat factor in our time has been sufficiently powerful to overturn\nconceptions so deeply rooted in human nature? It is the scientific spirit\nas acknowledged even by faithful theologians. Science has shown that\nman\u2019s body is renewed several times during life and that even the bones,\nplaced in the grave, soon \u201carise\u201d through nature\u2019s forces themselves and\ntake part again in the universal circulation of matter. In face of all\nthe evidence for this truth, it is impossible to believe in the old\ndoctrine of a physical resurrection.\n\nAnother question is, whether this ancient belief could disappear without\nleaving traces in contemporary consciousness. Can man have changed so\nradically in a century, or rather in a few decades, that the conviction\nof the body\u2019s importance to the soul after death will no longer find\nan echo in his religious instincts? By no means. We are the same human\nbeings and have the same human nature as our forefathers. Forms of\nconception may go, but not the instincts to which they once gave a\nsatisfactory expression.\n\nWe may therefore rest assured that the important change of attitude\nin this question forcefully reacts on religious life in our day. The\nreaction does not necessarily mean progress at first. Evolution does not\nfollow a straight line; a step forward is generally immediately followed\nby phenomena in the opposite direction.\n\nThe religious instincts, underlying the conception of the body\u2019s\nimportance to the soul in a future life, must create new expressions, and\nthe logic of the old conceptions themselves indicates what forms they\nwould take.\n\nWhen the belief in a restoration of the union between the two factors\nin a human being was suddenly and almost violently shaken by natural\nscience, there seemed at first no other way out of the difficulty than\nto choose between them and declare either the soul or the body as the\nessential part.\n\nThose who felt inclined toward the former alternative evidently found\nthemselves confined to a one-sided idealism of little vitality, because\nan existence without body seems as shadowy and unsatisfactory to man in\nthe present as in ancient times. An increasing weakening of the intensity\nof religious life would be the natural consequence.\n\nThose again who, because of a more realistic tendency, insisted upon the\nessentiality of our body, were logically driven to a gross materialism.\nIf science had proved that the belief in a bodily resurrection is\nuntenable, why should it not be able to demonstrate that all religious\ndoctrines were delusions? This reasoning seemed to many so natural that\nmany scientific facts contributed evidence in their favor even when these\nfacts pointed entirely in the opposite direction.\n\nThere was, however, no necessity to think and reason as these two main\nschools in our age have done. One might also from the beginning, have\ntaken the same road and arrived at the same conclusion as, for instance,\nGranfelt in his \u201cChristian Dogmatic.\u201d \u201cIt has been demonstrated beyond\ndoubt by natural science,\u201d says this prominent theologian, \u201cthat the\nmatter of a human body is, even here on earth, in continuous circulation,\nso that in the course of a few weeks all atoms of the whole body are\nreplaced by new atoms. The only lasting attribute of the soul during this\nprocess is the spiritual body, which assimilates, typically forms, and\nagain secretes the earthly matter. It must be this spiritual body, then,\nthat constitutes the combining element between man\u2019s earthly body and his\nglorified body in the eternal life.\u201d\n\nChristianity speaks not only of a material resurrection on the day of\njudgment; it also says that man possesses within him a spiritual body,\nwhich after death immediately arises to everlasting life. This latter\nconception is not confined to Christianity. In all religions we find two\ntendencies side by side, the one idealistic and the other more realistic,\nwhich indeed are not really opposed to each other, inasmuch as the belief\nin a spiritual body may be said to constitute the basis even for the\nrealistic conception that places the spirit in co-relation with the body\nin the grave.\n\nThe idealistic tendency may be traced away back even to prehistoric times\nand has generally been connected with some other burial methods, among\nwhich cremation was the most common. The place cremation occupied in\nancient thought and the connection fancied by our forefathers between the\nelements which make up man\u2019s spiritual body, may be gathered from Victor\nRydberg\u2019s researches in Germanic mythology.\n\n\u201cThe popular ecclesiastical dualism of soul and body,\u201d says Rydberg, \u201cwas\nas foreign to the Veda-Aryans as to the heathen Germanic race. According\nto the latter, man consisted of six different elements: First, the\nearthly element of which the visible body is made; second, a vegetative;\nthird, an animal; fourth, the so-called _liten_ (_litr_), an inner body\nshaped after the gods, and invisible to earthly eyes; fifth, the soul;\nsixth, the spirit.\u201d\n\nThe earthly and the vegetative elements were already joined in the trees,\nAsk and Embla, when the gods came and changed them into the first human\npair. Each of the three gods gave them separate gifts. From Lodur they\nreceived _la_, that is the blood, and _laeti_, that is the power of\nintentional movement inherent in the blood, which attributes have been\nconsidered by all peoples as the characteristics that distinguish animal\nfrom vegetable life. Lodur gave them further the god-image, _liter\ngoda_, by the power of which man\u2019s earthly substance receives the form\nin which it appears to the senses. The Germanic race, like the Hellenes\nand the Romans, believed that the gods had human form, so that this form\noriginally belonged to the gods. To the Germanic hierologists and bards\nman was formed _in effigiem deorum_ and possessed in his nature a _liter\ngoda_, a god image in the literal sense of the word.\n\nThis image may for a short time be separated from the other human\nelements, so that a person may assume the appearance of another without\nchanging his spiritual identity.\n\nThe soul, _odr_, is the gift of H\u00f6ner, while the spirit, _\u00f6nd_, is the\ncontribution of Odin.\n\nEarthly death consists in the separation of the higher elements, spirit,\nsoul and _liten_, which form a unity for themselves, from the lower\nelements and a removal of the former to Hades. The lower elements, the\nearthly, the vegetal and the animal, continue in the grave for a longer\nor shorter time to co-operate and form a certain unity, which, from the\nhigher elements, retain something of the living man\u2019s personality and\nqualities. This lower unity is the ghost, the wraith, which usually\nsleeps during the day in the grave, but in the night might wake either\nspontaneously or by other people\u2019s prayers and sorcery. The ghost\npossesses the nature of the deceased; it is good and benevolent, or evil\nand dangerous, according to his disposition. Because animal and vegetal\nelements form part of his nature, he is tormented by a craving for\nnourishment if he wakes from his slumber.\n\nThese conceptions of a dualistic life after death, common among the\nVeda-Aryans, as well as among the heathen Norsemen, were closely allied\nwith the idea of cremation. _Agni_, the god of fire, removed the dead man\nto a better world, while the coarser body, with its faults and defects,\nwas consumed by the flames.\n\nIt was a matter of doubt, however, whether _liten_, the inner body, would\nsuffer injury in the pyre. But this doubt was removed partly by certain\nformulas, believed to be protective; partly by burning a buck together\nwith the body as compensation to the \u201cflesh-eating fire,\u201d the elementary\nAgni (the hymns distinguish between the two), so that he should not\ntouch the subtler body of the corpse. Through the combustion, the lower\nelements were enabled to immediately follow the soul of the deceased,\nand it was thought that two advantages were gained thereby: First, the\nsecond ego of the dead was liberated from its grave-dwelling, which was\nmonstrous if his sleep were disturbed either by craving for nourishment\nor through the acts of Nirrtis and sorcerers; second, the surviving were\nrelieved from their dread of evil ghosts.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\nMan\u2019s Spiritual Body.\n\n\nIf we survey the stages of evolution through which humanity hitherto\nhas passed, we find that all peoples, from prehistoric times up to our\nown days, have believed in a spiritual body which is essential to the\nsoul in a future life. Is humanity then mistaken in this universal\nmanifestation of religious intuition? On this question we need no longer\nremain uncertain, no longer believe; _we know_ that man possesses such\na spiritual body. For many years, even centuries, this has been a fully\ndemonstrated fact, which may be directly observed, and which also has\nbeen the subject of scientific research.\n\nBut what do we mean by spiritual body? The term conveys something of\na dim and vague, and at the same time unmistakable suggestion which\ncharacterizes all we comprehend by our emotional faculties. Spiritual\nbody means what the words say, a spirituality derived from, or belonging\nto, the body. But as no spirituality exists which is not individualized\nor is not a quality of a living being, this spiritual body must be\nidentical with either one single unit or with a multitude of living\nunits. One single unit it cannot be, because this unity would then be\nidentical with the soul, while on the contrary, the spiritual body\nshould be independent, existing _per se_. It remains then a multitude of\nspiritual units, which is precisely what natural science has proved to be\nthe case, _and these units in man\u2019s spiritual body are identical with the\nliving cells_.\n\nBefore the discovery of the cell, our knowledge of the human body was\nconfined to such phenomena as could be observed with the naked eye. The\norganism from that standpoint was necessarily a unit of members and\norgans whose functions, and even coarser anatomic structure, were beyond\nany accurate investigation. The elementary parts of the organic tissues\ncannot, of course, be observed in this stage. They appear first under the\nmicroscope and it is therefore with the discovery of this epoch-making\ninstrument that the science of organisms enters into a new era.\n\nToward the end of the seventeenth century, Malpighi and Grew found\nthat organic tissues, placed under the microscope, did not consist of\nhomogeneous substance as they appear to the naked eye, but of small\nparticles separated from each other, which particles have been called\ncells. But although the cells were discovered, their real importance was\nfar from being understood, or even surmised. This was no doubt the reason\nfor the small interest given to the cell during the eighteenth century,\nand the small progress cytology made during this whole period.\n\nFrom 1670 to 1830, or more than a century and a half, the cell was\nknown mainly as a saccate body, resembling a hollow tube, and became\nthe subject of more or less wild speculations. A wider interest for\nthe substance and nature of the cell was evoked in the beginning of\nthe nineteenth century by the works of Brisseau de Mirbel, Treviranus,\nMoldenhaver and several others. Many different parts began to be\ndistinguished within the cells, such as membrane, protoplasm,\nchlorophyll, etc. These parts were later found to be as many organs in\nthe cell performing different functions, which are at present to some\nextent defined. The cell previously considered as a saccate body proved\nto constitute a being endowed with organs, a living organism.\n\nAccording to modern cytology, the cell is a living individual; an\nelementary organism. Although these beings are so exceedingly minute that\nthe naked eye can observe them only in combinations of thousands and\nmillions, yet each and every one of them not only possesses individual\nlife, but also the organs necessary for sustaining individual existence.\nInnumerable quantities of such tiny beings build up the organisms of\nplants and animals. As human individuals form the building material of\nthe body of a community, so the cells form the building material of the\nbodies of plants and animals. Since the cells bear the same relation to\nplants and animals as human individuals to a community, every plant and\nanimal then may be considered as a community, a cell-state, where the\ncells are the citizens.\n\n_Every organism, therefore, is a community, and vice versa, every\ncommunity is an organism._ So far as we have knowledge of the organisms\nthey are all similar in this respect. Plants and animals are communities\nof individually living cells in the same sense as nations and states\nare communities of human beings. The individuals in these different\ncommunities are of different kinds and degrees of development, but the\ncomposition of the organic edifice is in all essential features exactly\nthe same. The differences are literally only apparent, being due as they\nare to the different aspect they present to our observation.\n\nWhile we at first apprehend animals and plants as units, not seeing\nthe individual cells by which they are composed, we, in the national\norganisms, on the contrary, first perceive the cells themselves\u2014the human\nindividuals\u2014but are unable to grasp the nations as individually living\norganisms. On the one hand we see directly only the social side, on the\nother, only the organic.\n\nIf there are beings observing the human community as we see plants and\nanimals, they would comprehend society as a unit composed of different\ntrades and industries, but not as composed of men, who are the building\nmaterial in these members. If such postulated observers made an invention\ncorresponding to our microscope, they would be surprised to find the\nsocial organism composed of human individuals, which fact would seem just\nas mystical to them as the cells seemed at first to us. So far as we have\nderived from experience a knowledge of organic structure, it reveals\nitself to us as _an individual composed of more primitive and elementary\nindividuals_. These elementary units of lower kind and order might\nconsequently be called a spiritual body in a literal sense.\n\nFrom the point of view of the elementary constituent, each organism is\na community, a unit of similar, independently living, individuals; from\nthe point of view of the organs and of the whole, this community itself\nis a living individual of higher potency and may in its turn enter as an\nelementary organism in a spiritual body of still higher power, and so\non, in a geometric series. Man enters into the social organism, but is\nhimself composed of cell-organisms, which in turn consist of more primary\nunits.\n\nOrganic structure shows everywhere the same general qualities, the same\nfundamental features. Each higher and more complex organism repeats in\na more perfect way and in a higher potency exactly the same general\nforms of organization as its elementary constituents have shown in\ntheir own sphere. Hence the surprising similarity in the structure of\nthe organisms. When we know one we know all. This would, of course,\nbe neither possible nor conceivable if the spiritual bodies, which\nform their corporal structure, did not possess corresponding similar\nfundamental qualities.\n\nIn what relationship do these cells stand to man? Do they enter into his\nbeing as essential or only as incidental constituents? In other words,\ndoes man act as organ for the cells and the cells as organs for man only\nhere in time; or, such existence being for the present postulated, is\ntheir union extended even to a future existence? This question is of\nextraordinary importance because it may entirely change our conception\nof death. With this question settled, we should be in possession of a\nfact from which we could draw reliable conclusions, and this fact is\nbriefly as follows: Within each living being a continuous renovation\ntakes place, a successive replacing of the individuals which belong\nto that being\u2019s spiritual body. Human beings constitute, as already\npointed out, the cells or the spiritual body, in an organism of a higher\norder, viz., of humanity. In this organism, an incessant renewal takes\nplace, as we know, inasmuch as new generations continuously succeed each\nother. The same is the case with man\u2019s own spiritual body. As the human\ngenerations in the social body, so the cell-generations in man\u2019s body\nreplace each other while the man, himself, all the time, remains the\nidentical individual. The same holds good in regard to the cytoplasm,\nor the lower units that build up the cells. Everywhere we meet with the\nsame phenomenon of renewal and everywhere with the same identity of\nthe complex individual. This latter originates, develops, and passes\naway with a lifetime that bears a certain proportion to its complexity.\nWhile man counts his existence and development in years, the evolution\nof society is reckoned in hundreds and thousands of years. The cells\nin their turn have a lifetime measured in days, and the units forming\nthe cytoplasm possess an individual existence perhaps lasting but a few\nminutes or seconds.\n\nThe circulation in the body, therefore, is not confined to the material\nparticles but comprises the spiritual body, the living units, as well.\nNow, the question is: What is the relationship between man living in time\nand these dying and unborn generations of cells, that form his body? Can\nwe show that these living units, this spiritual body, is as necessary for\nman in a future existence as here in time? Then death must evidently be\nsomething else, something infinitely more than we have hitherto imagined\nor surmised. The point is to investigate what is mortal in man and what\nis immortal, and on this problem we will now proceed to concentrate our\nwhole attention.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\nSource of Spiritual Knowledge.\n\n\nThe critically thinking public today might be said to have long ago\nrelinquished the hope of obtaining a sure and decisive answer to the\nquestion, whether there is an existence beyond the grave. Some people\nconfine themselves to a faith founded on a smaller or greater probability\nfor either conception. We want palpable evidence. To many it even appears\nnecessary to have a look behind the veil of visible matter in order to\nsatisfy themselves as to whether anything exists within the void. \u201cNobody\nhas returned to tell us how it is,\u201d we are often reminded, and this\nexpression clearly means that complete certainty requires the testimony\nof eye-witnesses.\n\nSuch a procedure would be at least radical if it were possible. But even\nif it were, should we then be nearer the goal? The whole mode of thinking\nis na\u00efve, but merits attention especially because it demonstrates\nhow uncertain the information would be that we would obtain through\nthis channel. If somebody returned, little or nothing would, in all\nprobability, be gained.\n\nIn the first place how could we know that it was the same person that\nreturned? It would, perhaps, be best if the soul took possession of\nthe same body. The absence would then be comparable to, or essentially\nanalogous with, the condition of the apparently dead. But to begin with,\nwe could, for good reasons, only ascribe a small value to experience\ngained under such conditions, and, further, such an absence would\nevidently mean no real separation of soul and body, no real death, and\ntherefore no real experience of the very thing under consideration.\n\nBut how, and under what conditions, would an event of this kind be\nconceivable?\n\nShould the person in question suddenly disappear from our sight and\nthen just as suddenly reappear among us? Endowed with his present\norgans and senses, which are closely adapted to earthly conditions,\nsuch a person could see and comprehend only such objects as differed\nlittle or non-essentially from those in the world where we now live. He\nwould possibly be able to observe conditions on other planets in the\nuniverse, but he would be utterly unable to comprehend the things of a\nworld abstracted from the limitations of planetary life. If such a world\nexists, and some one of us were suddenly removed to it, such a one,\namidst all glories with seeing eyes, would yet see nothing; with hearing\nears, hear nothing; and with feeling senses, feel nothing. In order to\nsee and grasp what may exist and happen, the observer himself must have\ngone through a corresponding radical change. The conditions for the\nfunctioning of bodily organs do not exist there. He must develop new and\nmore perfect senses; higher, spiritual and bodily faculties which differ\nfrom his present ones as much as the objects of this higher world differ\nfrom the things of earth.\n\nA direct transposition would therefore be without value. In order to make\ninvestigations, a radical metamorphosis is an indispensable condition.\nThe soul must be separated from its earthly clothing and pass through all\nthe transformations which commence with natural death. In order to return\nhere, this person must again go through the same processes in reverse\norder. At his re-birth upon earth he would not, in all probability,\ndiffer from other people. He would know as much or as little as we do.\n\nBut even if we assume the improbable and imagine that this person\nreturned to us with the memory of all he had lived through and that he\ntried to relate his impressions and experiences, such a report would\nbe of no use because it would deal with ideas and conceptions entirely\nincomprehensible to us. The explanation of this is that man is unable to\ncomprehend things and phenomena which have not acted upon his present\norgans. If we take pains to analyze our boldest and most unrealistic\nfancies, we will find that their substance and ingredients are only\ngreatly enlarged or reduced images of an already experienced reality.\nWe have never possessed that man\u2019s higher senses, never experienced\nthe things which those higher faculties are able to grasp, and we are\ntherefore not in a position to form any idea whatever about such a world.\nHis speech would sound like a foreign language that we could not possibly\never learn to understand.\n\nOnly in case the person in question could adapt himself to our present\nway of thinking and understanding, would such a revelation be of any\nimportance. But then again the question arises, what confidence could we\nhave in this man who pretended to possess knowledge about things entirely\nconcealed from us? We have no means of verifying the information thus\nreceived. It must be taken in good faith, and so the gates to doubt would\nagain be thrown open. If someone returned, then, little or nothing would\nbe gained. In this, as in other cases, there is no royal road to truth.\nOnly a painstaking research will lead to the goal, if indeed it can ever\nbe attained.\n\nThe question is, can investigation in this direction accomplish anything?\nIf so, we must at least not entertain or present any unreasonable\ndemands. Such an unreasonable demand would be, for instance, to\nexpect science to explain the concrete forms which life would take\nin a transcendental world. No man ever has or ever will make such\nobservations. It is even questionable whether such knowledge would be\nuseful or beneficial to us if obtained. We have enough to occupy us in\nour daily cares and earthly tasks. A complete knowledge of life in a\nfuture existence would probably disturb and distract us to such a degree\nthat we would lose interest for our present evolution in this existence.\nIt may be sufficient for us to know whether there be another life, and\nif so, whether our dealings and actions in the present life are of\nany importance for that life. It would, no doubt, suffice if we could\nacquire a knowledge with regard to that life corresponding to what we\nknow about those distant worlds in space which we discern with our bodily\neyes and which we further investigate with our astronomical resources.\nThe following conditions must be fulfilled in order to make the cases\nsimilar: First of all, such a transcendental world must exist, and emit\nrays of light. Further, we must be equipped with some special organ, a\nspiritual eye, which we could direct towards it and by which we could\nmake our investigations here on earth. Do we possess such a spiritual\neye? We answer that our conscience, our religious intuition and the\neternal and invariable laws of thinking are just such organs. That an\nideal world exists, radiating a light of its own, we are able to conclude\nfrom perceptions received through our conscience and our religious\nintuition.\n\nOur conscience gives us rigorous directions and commandments, which\nsometimes seem to counteract our earthly happiness and show themselves\ndetrimental to our present success. If our life were confined to this\nworld, the demands of our conscience were not only useless and injurious\nbut also in themselves inexplicable. That man, in his religious\nintuition, also apprehends a reality of a different kind from the\nmaterial one, appears from the fact that all peoples, in all times and\nin all stages of evolution, have possessed a religion, as we now do,\na certain conception of supernatural things. It may be granted that\na great amount of delusion enters into all religions. Nevertheless,\nreligious errors would be inconceivable if man did not apprehend\nsomething supernatural which he wrongly interpreted. Superstition would\nnot exist at all, because, as we have already pointed out, nobody can\nthink, speak or form any idea whatever of things that are entirely beyond\nall experience. To argue with a person about such never-apprehended\nrealities, would be like discussing colors with the blind. But now it is\na fact that apprehensions of immaterial substance are so common to man\u2019s\nconsciousness that if we could find somebody who did not understand what\nwe said and meant in speaking about these things, we should be safe in\nasserting that such a man was not a normal person.\n\nBut if all men have an immaterial experience, why do ideas and opinions\ndiffer so about the same experience, and above all why do some people\neven deny its existence? The explanation of this surprising contradiction\nmay be understood when we consider that man also possesses a special\nfaculty, his reason, which he must likewise employ. With his reason,\nman examines and studies all his experiences and strives to bring them\ninto agreement with the laws of thinking. In other words, he strives to\nsystematize them into a philosophy. But this is a hard and laborious\ntask. It is difficult as it is to arrive at right conclusions in regard\nto the material world to which our senses are responsive. How much more\nmust this be the case in regard to the immaterial world. The evolution\nof our reason, therefore, is a slowly advancing historical process,\npresenting a continuous change in opinions, although, at the same time,\nan inner continuity may be traced, an evolution pointing towards a\ndefinite goal.\n\nThe harmony which man is striving to establish between his reason and\nhis other faculties can obtain only during comparatively short intervals\nof time. Our reason grows in power and keenness; new observations and\ndiscoveries are almost constantly made; old ideas and opinions do\nnot, upon closer investigation, satisfy the more developed demands of\nour thinking; doubts arise, and this is a necessary condition for all\ntheoretical progress. Such a doubt, not of the immaterial experience\nwhich we all have, but of the way in which this experience is to be\nexplained, has been expressed in the theory called materialism, which\nis a widely spread doctrine in our time. Natural science in itself is\nnever materialistic in the sense in which this word is here used, because\nnatural science does not concern itself with anything immaterial. But if\nthis be the case, how is it possible that science can have anything in\ncommon with materialism which, strictly speaking, is a doctrine about\nspiritual things? We answer that life in this world is joined to and\nrevealed through the material world. A more complete knowledge of the\nnature of matter ought, therefore, to bring about a decision by and by\nas to whether the soul is a bodily function or a substance differing\nfrom matter. In other words, natural science must sooner or later arrive\nat a stage when it either verifies materialism or gives us tangible and\nobvious evidence for the truth of idealism. It was to such a point that\nscience arrived in the last century when B\u00fcchner presented his well\nknown \u201cForce and Matter,\u201d in which he endeavors to prove that the soul\nis an attribute of the body, religion, immortality and so on being only\nillusions.\n\nHad natural science then finally found materialism to be the highest\nexpression of truth? In reality this was so far from being the case,\nthat natural science, just at that time, had given entirely new impulses\nto a higher evolution of religious conceptions. How then could B\u00fcchner,\nwith natural science as a basis, deny all religion, and how can\nmaterialism, in our days, live with undiminished force and vitality? No\nother explanation is possible than the one we have already proposed.\nWhen it remained unnoticed that natural science had discovered the\ninner, spiritual body, which is the very kernel of the belief in the\nbody as an eternal part of man\u2019s nature, then materialism was the only\npossible alternative for all those who were convinced that the body\ncontained something imperishable. Materialism, in our days, springs\nfrom the same instinct as the death-cultus in ancient times. It has,\ntherefore, integrally, something correct and true as a basis, which not\nonly explains the rapid and wide expansion of this doctrine, but also\nthe fact that the materialists are continually using data and evidence\nwhich clearly and plainly disprove their own position, although they do\nnot perceive it themselves. As probably no one has treated this theme in\na manner more characteristic of materialism than B\u00fcchner, we will, in\nthe following study, use his work above mentioned, which may be said to\nbe typical for the materialist\u2019s mode of thinking and reasoning. It will\nhere be evident, we hope, that the modern natural science does not limit\nbut, on the contrary, widens the boundaries of existence, as we receive\nfrom precisely this science the palpable demonstration of the thesis that\nall life on this earth has its origin in a higher, immaterial world.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\nImportance of Spontaneous Generation.\n\n\nThe manner in which this problem, from a materialistic point of view,\ncan and must be treated, is not so complicated as we might imagine. The\ncentral thought in all materialistic discussions and investigations may\nbe briefly expressed as follows: Life is a material force and nothing\nelse. If this be true, then of course materialism is the only true\nreligion. Whether God or some other higher being exists, must then become\na question of little or no consequence. Man knows in any case his own\norigin and fate. The fundamental religious doctrines will then read:\nIn matter alone dwell all the forces of nature and spirit; in matter\nalone can these forces appear and reveal themselves; nature knows of no\nsupernatural beginning or continuation; it produces everything; consumes\neverything; is itself beginning and end, cradle and grave; by its own\npower nature produces man, by its own power it receives him back again.\n\nAgainst these and similar statements there would be no objection, if it\ncould be shown that life really has its source in the material world. But\nif it can be demonstrated that life never does, nor ever could by any\npossibility, originate in lifeless matter, then it is evident that we\nmust look for some other source.\n\nLet it be our object, then, fully to investigate this problem.\n\nIf living beings are produced by material forces, experience must verify\nthe fact that matter really creates life of itself. In other words, the\n\u201cto be or not to be\u201d of materialism is identical with the old question\nof _generatio aequivoca_ or _spontanea_, i. e., whether there exists in\nnature a spontaneous or parentless generation of living beings.\n\n_Generatio aequivoca_ covers the entire ground of the materialists. Here\nthe doctrine has not only its principal roots but all of them.\n\nIf the materialists lose this foothold, all their natural science\nresources are emptied at once, so important is _generatio spontanea_ for\nmaterialism. Only under this form and with this substance can natural\nscience have anything in common with materialism, which latter, strictly\nspeaking, is only a religious doctrine, although as such purely negative.\nBut just for this reason science has for centuries labored to decide\nwhether this doctrine is false or true.\n\nThe question is, does or does not this spontaneous generation exist?\nScientific research has, in all times, occupied itself with this question\nin different forms and modes.\n\nThe farther we go back in time the more general we find the opinion that\nlife may arise spontaneously from inorganic matter. That such an idea\nshould prevail, is, of course, easy to understand. Very little was known\nabout the propagation of the lower animals and plants. Especially the\nvery peculiar and complicated development of the parasites and their\npassive migrations were practically unknown.\n\nIt seemed impossible to understand whence these beings had come, so the\nnearest explanation was resorted to, that is to say, that wherever they\nwere found, they had come into existence \u201cof themselves.\u201d Neither was it\nso clearly understood then as now that eggs and seeds are living beings\nas well as the fully developed animals and plants. It was thought that\ngrain must decay in the earth, yea, that this was the necessary condition\nfor the growth of the plant.\n\nThus people had daily before their eyes cases where living beings were\ngenerated by substances that seemed inert and dead.\n\nBut with a better and more complete knowledge of organisms and\nespecially of the extremely complicated mode of propagation\ncharacteristic of insects, doubts as to _generatio spontanea_\nincreasingly arose. It was, however, at a comparatively late time, or in\nthe middle of the seventeenth century, that Harvey formulated his famous\nthesis, \u201c_omne virum ex oro_,\u201d or, as it has been later said, \u201c_omne\nvivum ex vivo_,\u201d which we may translate thus: \u201c_Life implies life; all\nliving beings descend from previous existing parents_,\u201d or negatively,\n\u201c_No living being is generated from lifeless matter_.\u201d Thus, for the\nfirst time, the idea was pronounced by natural science that life is a\nspecific force; an independent principle, that has not its roots in the\nmaterial world.\n\nAs _generatio aequivoca_ leads to materialism, so Harvey\u2019s formula leads\nto pure idealism. That these consequences should have been seen from\nthe beginning, was so much the less to be expected since even today no\nsuch discovery has been made or could have been made, simply because no\nattention has been given to it. Hitherto the only question has been: Is\nHarvey\u2019s formula a fact verified by natural science or not? In this form\nthe battle has raged for over two centuries, often with great vehemence,\nand victory has leaned now to one side, now to the other. Finally, it was\nagreed that parentless generation was not to be found among the higher\nforms of animals and plants which could be observed with the naked eye.\nB\u00fcchner himself says it has not hitherto been discovered that any higher\nor more developed organism may be created by inorganic matter and forces\nalone.\n\n\u201cToday,\u201d he says, \u201cit seems to be a general law of the inorganic world\nthat everything living originates from a parental embryo or else is\ndirectly segregated from the mother-body.\u201d\n\nBut although spontaneous generation of the higher animals and plants\nseemed doubtful even to B\u00fcchner, nothing was at this time settled in\nregard to the origin of the lower organisms. With the discovery of\nthe microscopical organic world, a new field and one more difficult of\naccess was opened for research. It was now the sudden and unexpected\nappearance of bacteria, aspergillus and infusoria in places where their\nprevious existence could not be imagined, that maintained the belief\nin _generatio spontanea_. But by and by we learned to understand the\npropagation and life also of these low organisms, their ability to\nwithstand very high or very low temperatures, and the facility with which\nthey are spread by the air and, above all, their rapid propagation. It\ncommenced to be more and more evident that even in the micro-organic\nworld no parentless generation exists. The investigations by Spallanzani,\nand later by Schultze, Schwann, von Dusch and Schr\u00f6der, were epochal for\nthe establishing of this fact. Their method, however, left some room\nfor criticism which was forcefully pointed out by a great number of\nscientists, especially by the Englishman Needham.\n\nDuring all these disputes Harvey\u2019s formula had, however, won such a\nstability and approbation that B\u00fcchner himself under its pressure\nformulated his position in the following cautious words: \u201cEven if\nrecent scientific researches have more and more limited the ground for\nspontaneous generation, it is nevertheless not improbable _that it even\nnow takes place among the lowest and least developed organisms_.\u201d\n\nIt may willingly be conceded that this assertion was in its time by no\nmeans without foundation. But scarcely could B\u00fcchner or anybody else at\nthat moment imagine how soon the hour of decision would strike. Shortly\nafter 1860 the many centuries old question was finally settled almost\nsimultaneously by Hoffman and Pasteur. Through the latter\u2019s masterly\ninvestigations it was fully demonstrated that parentless generation does\nnot exist in the micro-organic world either. Before Pasteur\u2019s simple and\nclear evidence, opposition was silenced even so far that the question\nhas almost entirely ceased to occupy our attention. _Omne vivum ex vivo_\nappears now to be an unchallenged truth. Life implies life.\n\nBut although science thus rejected _generatio spontanea_, the\nmaterialists nevertheless occupy a very strong position on the selfsame\nfoundation as formerly, and continue the defense apparently not without\nsome success.\n\nIn spite of B\u00fcchner\u2019s real, or perhaps partly pretended, confidence, he\nseems to have had a presentiment of how weak the support of _generatio\nspontanea_ was, and we find him therefore suddenly reasoning as if its\ncause were already lost. Thus he makes the entirely sound remark that\neven if at the present time all animals and plants must have parents,\nyet nothing whatever is thereby demonstrated in regard to the very\nfirst appearance of life in the universe. \u201cIf all organic beings have\nparents, how, then, did the first parents come into existence?\u201d he asks.\n\u201cWhen all outer conditions were favorable, might they not have appeared\nspontaneously, accidentally or necessarily? Or must the first organisms\nhave been created through the intervention of some higher power?\u201d B\u00fcchner\nconcedes that this question is extremely complicated, and at first glance\nmay appear unsolvable without the assumption of some such higher being\nwho of his own will created the first organisms as it pleased him and\nendowed them with the faculty of propagation. \u201cOrthodox scientists point\nwith satisfaction also to this state of affairs,\u201d says B\u00fcchner, \u201cand\nthey remind us at the same time of the artful and complicated structure\nof the world, and warmed by their conviction they see therein the wise\narrangements of a higher, personal creator, who built the world according\nto his personal intentions.\u201d\n\nWe might, according to B\u00fcchner, dismiss these orthodox thinkers with\nthe assumption \u201cthat the first elements endowed with the idea of the\nrace have been present in space from all eternity in formless chaos out\nof which the universe slowly consolidated, and accidentally developed\nafter the formation and cooling of the planet wherever conditions were\nfavorable.\u201d But such fictitious reasonings or pretexts, B\u00fcchner assures\nus, are not necessary. Scientific facts, he says, indicate with great\ndistinctness that the organic beings on our earth owe their generation\nand propagation to the co-operation of physical substances and forces\nalone.\n\nAfter such an introduction we proceed with interest to learn about these\nscientific facts, but how great is our disappointment when we find that\nB\u00fcchner here takes up an entirely different subject, which, if it has any\nconnection with the question at issue, goes to prove just the reverse of\nwhat he intended. The whole long series of facts to which he now points\nis, in a few words, nothing but Darwin\u2019s theory in a paleontological\nlight. What B\u00fcchner shows by numerous examples from fossil deposits, is\nthat higher forms of animals and plants have slowly developed from lower\nforms. But what has this fact to do with _generatio spontanea_? That\nhigher forms have developed from lower forms only confirms the dictum\nthat life implies life; in other words, supports Harvey\u2019s law. But it is\nsomething else that B\u00fcchner should have demonstrated. He should instead\nhave shown us that the first organisms owe their existence to physical\nforces alone. But on this subject he uses only vague expressions, void of\nany real significance, about the slow cooling off of the earth; about the\nlength of the geological periods, and about favorable conditions; but not\na line to explain what this word \u201cfavorable\u201d stands for.\n\nAlthough B\u00fcchner here inadvertently supports something different from\nwhat he intended, his remark nevertheless remains true that the present\nmode of propagation proves nothing in regard to the generation of the\nfirst organisms.\n\nOther scientists have gone further than B\u00fcchner and believed themselves\njustified in extending Harvey\u2019s law to cover not only the present time,\nbut all times. And the problem as to the first organisms has been\nanswered in various ways. Sir William Thomson believes that such might\nhave come to the earth with some meteoric stone, possibly a moss-clad\nfragment, from another planet in the universe that had met with a cosmic\ncatastrophe, and, further, he has even tried to show that this hypothesis\ndoes not involve any physical impossibility.\n\nOpinions seem to be divided, then, as to the validity of Harvey\u2019s law.\nThis again indicates a deficiency in the law itself, and it is true that\nsuch a deficiency really exists. _Harvey\u2019s formula is not a law; it is,\nas yet, only an empirical hypothesis._\n\nIt is true that life presupposes life in all the cases we have been\nable to investigate. These cases are exceedingly numerous because on\nthe disbelief in _generatio spontanea_ rests a whole modern industry,\nthe art of preserving, which in millions of cases daily verifies the\nhypothesis. But our experience, in spite of this, does not reach far. If\nwe continue our observations, who can guarantee that we would not finally\ndiscover that B\u00fcchner, after all, was right, and one single case would\nsuffice. The utmost we can attain by observation is a certain degree of\nprobability, and if we undertook to prove Harvey\u2019s hypothesis to be a law\nin this way, our experiments must be extended _in infinitum_.\n\nIn order to reach certainty only under present conditions, we must study\nthe generation of every now living organism, animals, plants, bacteria\nand the like. If it were found then that all these beings have had\nparents it would still be impossible to draw absolutely sure conclusions\nin regard to previous generations. We should be obliged to extend our\nresearches through antiquity and primeval ages. If then no gap was\nto be found in the series and we perhaps finally traced life back to\nthe \u201cmoss-clad fragment\u201d from another world, we would again face the\nquestion, how the beings on that planet, once in time, had come into\nexistence? Perhaps there the elements and forces of nature were such as\nto create life spontaneously. This question, of course, could not be\ndecided except through continued observations, which would be obliged to\nextend to every point of an infinite universe and back to the dawn of\ntime. First, then, we should know that Harvey\u2019s hypothesis was a law,\nvalid without limitations in the past\u2014but also only in the past\u2014and valid\nwith one single exception, namely, the very first organism, of which we\npresently shall speak. In regard to the law\u2019s validity in the future,\nwe should no doubt possess a knowledge that approached certainty, but\nit could not be called absolutely sure. Because, even granted that no\nliving being hitherto was without parents, it is not logically impossible\nthat sometime in the future, lifeless matter might undertake to create\norganisms. To obtain certainty we must continue our observations until\nthe end of time.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\nThe Materialistic Demonstration of _Generatio Spontanea_.\n\n\nThis whole method is consequently unsatisfactory. With Harvey\u2019s law\nproved in the empirical way, the only way hitherto tried, we are still\nunable to decide how the first organism came into existence, and this\nis probably after all the most important question. Because, as B\u00fcchner\nrightly points out: \u201cIf life has a supernatural beginning, it has also\na supernatural subsequent existence.\u201d Even if we were observing with\nour own eyes the creation of the first organism we would not be able to\nsay whether it were the result of natural or supernatural forces. The\nmoment our study commenced, the mystic act of creation would already\nhave taken place, an act which lies beyond the boundaries of research,\nand which we never shall be able to penetrate, however minute or\ncomprehensive our observations. An entirely different method is here\nnecessary. Our endeavor must be to find the innermost cause of the whole\nseries of generations evolving throughout the ages. In other words, we\nmust derive Harvey\u2019s law from the inner nature of matter itself, show\nthat this matter has such qualities that it cannot, never could, and\nnever will, be able to produce a single living being. Only then shall\nwe have demonstrated that Harvey\u2019s formula is a universal, natural law,\nand then it will be not only our right but our duty to draw its logical\nconsequences.\n\nIs it possible to show that matter possesses such qualities? In regard\nto the matter of which our earth is composed we are at least able to\nclosely investigate its qualities. But our earth is only an insignificant\npoint in the universe and we must search the entire cosmos. Is not this\nimpossible? We answer that in many ways, especially through the spectral\nanalysis, we already know that nature\u2019s elements everywhere are the\nsame and that they everywhere have the same qualities. If Harvey\u2019s law\ncan be deduced from the matter we are able to investigate, we have at\nthe same time shown its validity for the whole of the universe without\nlimitations as to time and space; because then we may apply in regard to\norganic substance B\u00fcchner\u2019s true remark as to the products of nature in\ntimes past. \u201cThe natural forces,\u201d he says, \u201cthat governed the universe\nformerly are the same as those whose results we now witness every day\nand moment. Earth\u2019s past time is to our thought nothing but an unrolling\nof its present. The geologists, guided by their knowledge of nature and\nits present laws, have been able with increasing accuracy to trace back\nevolution to the most distant ages. Meanwhile it has been established\nthat everywhere and during all time only those elements and forces have\nbeen active which surround us today. Nowhere has a point been found where\nresearch had to be thrown overboard and an interference of unknown forces\nsubstituted; and nowhere and never will this happen. Everywhere the same\nlaws were in force and the same matter was found. Historical research has\ndemonstrated that past and present are subject to the same evolution,\nrest on the same basis.\u201d And different it could not be, reasons B\u00fcchner,\nsince life knows no exceptions, does not shirk any inorganic forces, but\nis itself only the result of the activity of these forces.\n\nTo obtain a definite understanding of the origin of life it is therefore\nsufficient to examine the origin of organic matter in our days, and\nfor such an analysis there is at least no lack of material. Wherever a\ntree or a grass blade grows or a seed sprouts there dead substance is\ntransformed into living; wherever an animal or a plant is decaying,\nthere organic matter is again turned into inorganic.\n\nThe result obtained through such investigations already made, stood\nin direct opposition to the immediate observations. Although Harvey\u2019s\nformula finally was accepted, it was nevertheless taught _that no\nspecific life-force exists_.\n\nThis contradiction was never fully understood or emphasized during the\nlast century, and the reason was that the materialistic tendency was\nso predominant that nobody noticed that the question of life-force is\nthe innermost main point, around which not only _generatio spontanea_\nand _omne vivum ex vivo_, but also their consequences, materialism and\nidealism, are centered.\n\nBut in order to deny life-force as an independent principle, some\nscientific facts to build upon were necessary and these were not lacking.\n\nBefore we state these facts we will in a few words describe the\nhistorical situation.\n\nAccording to the previously prevailing vitalistic doctrine a specific\nlife-force existed, present and active in all organic processes. The\nconceptions in regard to these processes were, however, very dim, and the\nreason was that the problem of combustion had not yet been solved.\n\nThis problem may be said to be the very key to the chemical explanation\nof an organism. The ancient mystery of fire was first solved by Lavoisier\nafter Scheele and Priestly had discovered oxygen. The solution of this\ncomplicated question not only became the starting point for a new and\nrapid evolution of chemistry, it also almost immediately threw a clear\nlight on the innermost recesses of the organism.\n\nThe elementary constituents of the organism and their origin were known\nbefore, and it now became also possible to explain the great store of\nenergy that the living being possesses. To assume a specific life-force\nseemed superfluous. Life-force, from having been the indispensable\nexplanation of organic phenomena, commenced more and more to be regarded\nas a \u201cback-way for ignorance,\u201d one \u201cof those many side doors that dull\nheads employ when they find it too laborious to think about something\nthat they do not understand.\u201d\n\nIt was natural that the materialists would eagerly embrace these ideas.\nFrom the few words with which B\u00fcchner introduces his chapter about\nlife-force, we obtain a clear insight into the opinions that are held on\nthis subject in the world of natural science. \u201cThe mystic notions,\u201d says\nB\u00fcchner, \u201cthat have confused the philosophy of science were invented by\na time possessing but a slight knowledge of nature. To these notions,\nwhich have been thrown overboard by a later exact scientific research,\nbelongs first of all the so-called life-force. Scarcely has there ever\nexisted an hypothesis more detrimental to the cause of science than this\nsingular organic force presented in contradistinction to the inorganic\nforces, gravity, affinity, light, electricity, magnetism, etc. If science\nwere forced to acknowledge such an hypothesis, all we have said about\nthe immutability of the natural laws and of the mechanical order of the\nuniverse would collapse, and we would be forced to admit that a higher\nhand interferes in the course of nature, dictating exceptional laws that\ndefy all calculations. A break would be found in the natural structure\nof the world, science would despair, and all physical and psychical\nresearch cease. Fortunately science has not been obliged to yield to\nthe irrational pressure of the dynamists, but, on the contrary, has won\neverywhere a splendid victory; it has lately gathered such a mass of\nself-evident facts to its support that life-force nowadays wanders an\nempty shadow along the boundaries of natural science. All those who have\nmade a closer study of any of the branches of science that deal at all\nwith the organic world, agree, almost to a man, in the condemnation of\nlife-force, and the very word is so detested by science that it is always\npurposely avoided.\u201d\n\nWe may now let B\u00fcchner present the real, scientific evidence why\nlife-force must be charged to the ignorance of a time when knowledge of\nnature was but slight. In this way the reader will perhaps obtain a more\ndirect and at the same time an historic view of the materialistic mode of\nthinking.\n\nAbove all, says B\u00fcchner, it is the province of chemistry to show that the\nelements of matter are everywhere the same in the inorganic as well as\nin the organic world, and that life substance is unable to present one\nsingle atom not found in inorganic nature and therefore not partaking in\nthe general flux (_Stoffwechsel_) of matter. Chemistry has decomposed\norganic bodies into their elements exactly as it did before with the\ninorganic.\n\nAll known inorganic forces act identically with respect to _living_ as\nto _dead_ nature. We have seen that forces are nothing but qualities\nand motions of the smallest particles of matter, the atoms, with which\nthese forces are invariably and inseparably conjoined. An atom therefore\nunder all circumstances can only perform the same work, develop the same\nforces, produce the same effects, whether it belongs for the moment to\nan organic or to an inorganic composition. Respiration, digestion, the\nprocess of growing and segregation are all chemical reactions. Oxygen,\nhydrogen, carbon and nitrogen are composed and decomposed within the\norganic body in accordance with the same laws that govern them outside.\n\nWe have also learned more perfectly how nourishment is transformed into\norganic tissues, and we know that through different channels it leaves\nthe body in precisely the same quantity as it entered, partly unmodified\nand partly in other forms and compositions. No one atom has meanwhile\nbeen lost or become another. Digestion is a purely chemical process. The\nstomach of an animal may well be compared to a chemical retort, where the\nsubstances there mixed are decomposed and composed exactly according to\nthe general laws of chemical affinity.\n\nThese facts, which may be multiplied _ad infinitum_, enable us to\nunderstand that the difference between organic and inorganic is\nnon-essential, and that therefore every living being may be considered a\nchemical laboratory, whence we arrive at the following result:\n\n_Because daily experience teaches us that all organisms consist of the\nsame atoms as does inorganic nature, although in different compositions,\ntherefore no specific organic force, no life-force, can exist. This\nlatter is not a principle, but a result._ When organic substance\nassimilates inorganic and brings it into its own characteristic\ncondition, this is not done through a specific force, but through a kind\nof infection, whereby the molecular conditions in the organic substance\nare transferred to the inorganic.\n\nBut not only does organic matter consist of the same elements that\nare to be found in inorganic nature, but the organism as a whole is\nnothing but a bodily mechanism not differing from other machines except\nin its more complicated construction. Water, says B\u00fcchner, which must\nbe considered as the foremost and most important part in all organic\nbeings, and without which all animal and plant life were impossible,\nwater penetrates, flows and sinks according to the laws of gravity, not\ndiffering by the breadth of a hair in its action within and without the\norganism. The circulation of the blood is as mechanical as we could\nwish, and the anatomic contrivance that causes it bears a surprising\nlikeness to mechanical apparatus made by man\u2019s hand. The heart is\nprovided with valves just as a steam engine; the valve movements produce\naudible sounds. The rise of the blood from the lower parts of the body\nto the heart against gravity can only be made possible by a mechanical\narrangement. The bowels convey their content mechanically; mechanically\nthe muscle movements take place, and mechanical motility characterizes\nmen and animals. The human eye obeys the same laws as a camera obscura\nand the ear catches the sound waves in same way as does any other vault,\nand so on.\n\nScience, therefore, entertains no doubt that the living organism is a\nmachine as well as the steam engine, i. e., a system where chemical\naffinity produces heat, electricity and muscular energy.\n\nNow, are these facts, pointed out by B\u00fcchner, true and correct?\nUndoubtedly they are in all essential respects eternal truths, and we\nmay add that they are just as important foundations for idealism as\nthe materialists have claimed them to be for their opinion. But before\nwe take up this subject let us see how the materialists derive their\nphilosophy from the facts mentioned.\n\nThere are many other objects in this world, of which we might almost\nverbally repeat what B\u00fcchner says about organic matter; for instance,\nwindows, doors, locks, bricks, houses, etc. In these objects also there\nis not one atom to be found which was not present in the raw material\nof which they were made. But does the raw material itself produce these\nthings? So B\u00fcchner reasons. He says: \u201c_Because all organic matter\nconsists of inorganic raw material, therefore the raw material, itself,\nhas made the organic matter. Because the organism is essentially like a\nsteam engine, the building material itself has made the organism._\u201d\n\nThis headlong way of reasoning and concluding is not characteristic of\nB\u00fcchner alone, but applies equally to the whole materialistic school\nduring the past century.\n\nWe have not said that inorganic raw material is unable to produce\norganic substance spontaneously, which substance later upbuilds the\norganism, but for the present this remains an open question to which\nas yet the materialists have not given an answer. But before we enter\nthe discussion of this extremely important question, we will in this\nconnection mention another discovery of natural science which seems\nexactly to support the materialistic trend of thought, a fact, therefore,\nthat crowns, so to speak, their whole philosophy.\n\nUp to the year 1828 it was thought that organic substance could be\ncreated only by the force of life. But W\u00f6hler unexpectedly succeeded in\nproducing organic compositions from inorganic substances, a discovery\nwhich was followed by a series of others in the same direction. It is\nwith evident satisfaction that B\u00fcchner calls our attention to these facts.\n\nIn order to show the necessity for assuming a life-force, he says, people\nhave reminded the chemists that they are unable to produce organic\ncompositions, that is, the peculiar grouping of the elements into those\nternary and quaternary compounds which owe their existence to an organic\nbeing, endowed with life and life-force, and they have added the amusing\nremark that the chemists must produce living beings in their retorts\u2014make\nmen\u2014if there be no life-force and if life be only the result of chemical\nprocesses. The chemists have not been at a loss for an answer. They have\nmade dextrose, several organic acids and bases, and recently they have\nalso succeeded in producing _hydrates of carbon_. Evolution has proceeded\nrapidly in this direction, and today alcohol and precious perfumes are\nmade from coal, candles from slate, Berlin blue, taurin and innumerable\nother bodies\u2014formerly believed to be exclusively of animal or plant\norigin\u2014from the simple material that inorganic nature offers us.\n\nThe materialists have a custom of not considering themselves under\nobligation to do more than point to some scientific facts, without\ninvestigating whether these facts support their speculations or not.\nFaithful to this custom, B\u00fcchner stops just where his own researches\nshould have commenced. B\u00fcchner has not written a textbook on physics or\nchemistry. He has undertaken the extremely serious task of investigating\nwhether modern natural science has produced results which show that\nnothing but matter and its forces, and consequently no soul, no eternal\nlife, etc., exist. Our first demand of such an analysis would be, to\nput it moderately, that the facts cited really prove what they are put\nforward to prove. But to this demand neither B\u00fcchner nor his followers\npay any attention. B\u00fcchner might, for instance, in regard to the facts\nlast mentioned, have taken the following questions as the starting point\nfor his investigations:\n\nIt is true that the chemists have produced artificially certain organic\ncompounds of inorganic elements, and they will probably go much further\nin this direction. But is this really something to be wondered at, when\nall organic substance is composed of inorganic elements which, wherever\nthey exist, possess the same qualities? The question is how this organic\nsubstance is formed. Does it appear spontaneously in the chemist\u2019s\nlaboratory while he himself stands idle, observing the phenomenon, or\nmust he interfere, guide and plan the activity of the chemical forces\nin order to obtain these artificial compounds? Why should not something\nsimilar take place in the laboratory of inorganic nature? There is, as\nfar as our experience goes, no organic substance to be found due to the\nspontaneous action of known natural laws. What is the reason of this? How\nis organic matter formed in nature? And, further, is there no difference\nbetween the organic matter produced by the chemists and that present in\n_living_ nature? And if this difference proves to be that the former is\n_not_ organized while the latter always is, why cannot the chemists\nproduce organized matter?\n\nIf B\u00fcchner had proposed these or similar questions and taken time to\nthink them over, he would have obtained a different result, but instead\nhe breaks off his argumentation just where it should have commenced.\n\nConsequently the fault in the materialists\u2019 process of thinking does not\nlie in the facts used as foundation for their argument. The premises and\nthe beginning are correct. Just because organic matter consists of the\nsame elements as inorganic, just for this reason natural science can\ndecide whether the physical laws are able spontaneously to produce such\nmatter and such machines. The materialists have stopped after providing\nthe introduction; the continuation and the end are lacking. They have\noverlooked the whole series of scientific facts that stand in necessary\ncorrelation to the starting point. We have therefore only to resume the\ninterrupted demonstration and will then endeavor to make the latter part\nas simple and comprehensible as B\u00fcchner made the former.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\nHow Is Organic Matter Produced?\n\n\nThe essential in matter is force. Strictly speaking, we comprehend\nnothing but forces. Every body manifests itself as resistance necessary\nto overcome if we wish to remove it from its place.\n\nWhat remains of the body if we think of it as deprived of this counter\nforce? At least nothing remains that we can touch or by which we may\nobtain palpable evidence of its existence. Neither does there remain\nanything that we can see, as seeing depends upon resistance to light,\nreflection of the ether-waves. If the mountain exerted no resistance we\nwould pass through it without feeling or seeing anything whatever.\n\nTrue, there is perhaps matter\u2014for instance, the ether\u2014which we neither\nsee nor feel, but which still exists. This matter is then qualified\nby some other form of energy by which it manifests itself. Thus we\ncomprehend ether as light, heat and colors, all forces, as well as\ngravity, electricity, etc.\n\nAlready from these suggestions it is evident that force is the only\nsubstantial thing in the material world. Without force, matter is nothing\nthat may be comprehended either by the senses or by the reason. What\nwe call matter is nothing but different kinds of energy.[1] We have\nspace-occupying energy, chemical, electrical, mechanical forms of energy,\nand so forth.\n\nHow are these forms of energy related to each other? Between forms so\ndifferent as tones and light, colors and mechanical work, there is at\nleast no connection apparent to external observation.\n\nFor a long time it was also believed that no such relation existed. It\nwas only after 1840 that several scientists made the startling discovery\nalmost simultaneously that physical forces may be transformed one into\nanother. It proved possible to transform a certain quantity of heat into\nan equal quantity of mechanical energy, which again might be turned into\nequivalent quantities of electricity, light, chemical energy, etc. It was\nfurther found that these processes might be undertaken in the reverse\norder, so that the original form of energy could be restored in unchanged\nquantity and with unmodified qualities. Nothing was lost and nothing was\nadded.\n\nRecent science is founded entirely on these facts, which later\ngenerations probably will consider as the greatest of all the discoveries\nof the last century.\n\nThis law of the permanence and the mutability of force is of immediate\nimportance to materialism. As long as it was thought that the forces\nof nature were separate and different from each other, it was easy to\nimagine that the more inaccessible or mystic forms stood nearer life,\nyea, were life itself. The absurdity of such an idea is now obvious,\nsince it has been shown that the physical forces may be transformed\ninto one another and therefore are not intrinsically separate, but\nfundamentally the same force, acting differently under different\nconditions. Now, if life were a form of material energy, any form\nof physical force might be transformed into life and consciousness,\ninto spiritual and moral forces. Life and consciousness might then be\nartificially produced, and we would rack our brains in order to find the\nmechanical equivalent of the intellect, try to measure it in amperes\nand volts, etc. But nothing of this kind is done, simply because it is\nimpossible, as presently we shall see. _Life cannot be transformed into\nany form of material energy, and, vice versa, no form of material energy\ncan be transformed into life._ Life and physical force are, as to nature\nand substance, essentially different principles.\n\nAlthough the law just referred to about the permanence and the mutability\nof physical forces thus seems rather to disprove materialism, it was\nnot for this reason chiefly that we have related it. Our purpose is to\nfind a basis in this fact from which the fundamental contrariety between\norganic and inorganic matter most easily may be explained, and thereafter\nto enter into this differentiation just as far as is necessary to decide\nthe main point as to whether one form of matter can spontaneously produce\nanother.\n\nWe recollect that the materialists endeavored to make the difference\nbetween organic and inorganic compounds as slight as possible. The former\nconsisted of exactly the same elements as the latter and these elements\nhad exactly the same qualities in one compound as in another.\n\nHowever true this may be, is not meat nevertheless something different\nfrom limestone, although limestone may easily be found that contains\nnearly all the elements present in the meat? In starch, sugar, fat, etc.,\nprecisely the same elements enter as in water and carbonic acid, but no\nmaterialist denies that there are important differences between these two\ngroups of substances.\n\nWhat is it, then, that essentially separates the two classes of matter\n(nothing but the most essential factors concerns us here)? If we ask\nthis question of chemistry, we are answered that this quality is\ncombustibility. Organic matter is combustible; inorganic is not.\n\nBut why should organic matter be combustible? Because fuel is as\nnecessary to the organism as to the steam engine. To both their physical\nsource of power is heat, and even the engine receives it through the\ncombustion of organic substances. All the fuel that is generally used is\nof organic origin, although we seldom think of this fact.\n\nBut why can we not fire an engine with inorganic products? Because these\ncannot burn, and the reason again is, that they are already burned. If\nthis be true, they must once have been fuel themselves, must once have\nbeen in a burning state. How do we know this? Because the inorganic world\nconsists almost entirely of chemical compounds that are only formed by\ncombustion, when this word is used in its widest sense.\n\nIf these suggestions are correct, organic matter is to inorganic as fuel\nto the products of combustion. In the inorganic world the latter have\nbeen transformed to fuel which in a renewed combustion reproduces the\nsame products as those of which it once was formed.\n\nIf this be the case our problem may be thus formulated: Can inorganic\nproducts of combustion again form combustibles spontaneously? Can\ncarbonic acid or water through the _spontaneous activity of physical\nforces_ be transformed into sugar, starch, fat, etc.?\n\nIn order to decide if this be possible we must first know what combustion\nis, and we will therefore briefly explain what this term means.\n\nCombustion is a chemical process, it is said, and this definition may be\ntrue, although it may also be misleading. In daily speech combustion is\ngenerally identified with the phenomena of light and the generation of\nheat, which we immediately observe, but chemical processes can neither be\nseen nor felt, because they take place in the inner world of matter which\nhitherto has proved inaccessible to human observation. Yea, chemical\nprocesses are so foreign to the experiences of our senses that chemistry,\nthe science of these processes, is entirely founded on the deductions of\nour reason. The premises that our reason uses for its conclusions belong\nto the physical world which is the outer side of matter that faces us.\nThe phenomena that accompany combustion belong to this world and are,\ntherefore, strictly speaking, not chemical but physical phenomena.\n\nBut even if these phenomena of light and heat, of which the latter\nespecially interests us here, belong to the world comprehensible to our\nsenses, they must nevertheless be intimately connected with the inner\nchemical process because heat is developed in nearly every chemical\nreaction. Heat is not created from nothing; there must be a cause for\nthis force, and the cause cannot be anything but the chemical energy\nwhich in the chemical process is transformed into heat. In few words:\nWhat we generally term combustion cannot be identical with the actual\nchemical process. The light and the heat must, on the contrary, be\nconsidered as the external results of the chemical process, its physical\neffect.\n\nBy a close study of this physical effect we have also been able to\nexplain what happens within matter itself. As it is necessary to\nunderstand this in order to comprehend how heat is developed, we will\nendeavor shortly to outline the present scientific conception of the\nchemical process called combustion.\n\nFrom the qualities of matter we have concluded that the bodies we see are\ncomposed of extremely tiny particles called molecules, which, however,\nare so small that with our optical resources we never shall be able to\nobserve them. Even the smallest particle of dust visible to the eye must\nbe considered as containing an enormous number of them. With molecules,\nhowever, we have not reached the limit of the divisibility of matter.\nThey may themselves be divided by chemical forces into smaller material\nunits called atoms, and these latter are therefore the building stones\nof which matter is ultimately composed. Now neither the atoms within the\nmolecule, nor the molecules within the visible body, are packed closely\ntogether. They are separated by comparatively great spaces. But if these\nbuilding stones are separated from each other we might expect that they\nwould behave like the grains in a sand heap.\n\nHow can material bodies then be solid, hard, tough, etc.? The reason is\nthat the spacing in question is regulated by other forces of essentially\ndifferent kind. We have attracting as well as repelling forces, such as\ntend to increase as well as to reduce the distances between the particles.\n\nWe shall first consider the attracting forces, and these are called\ncohesion and adhesion when exerted between molecules. The mutual\nattraction between the atoms within the molecules has been named affinity\nor chemical energy.\n\nTurning again to the form of energy acting in the opposite direction,\nwe find just the force we are in search of\u2014heat, which is the physical\nsource of energy of all living beings.\n\nThat heat increases the distances between molecules is already evident\nfrom the fact that all bodies increase in volume when heated, a process\nwhich may be continued by further supply of heat until the solid becomes\na fluid, and the fluid a gas.\n\nIn solid bodies the attracting forces have predominance. The molecules\nare arranged with definite spacing and in definite positions so that\nthe body assumes a certain external shape. If such a body is exposed to\nheat the molecules are removed from each other and the cohesion becomes\ncorrespondingly feebler. Finally a point is reached when the molecules\nare so far unfettered that they are at liberty to move with respect to\neach other. The solid has then become a fluid and may through continued\nheating enter the gaseous state. The cohesion is then entirely conquered\nso that the molecules move freely in all directions independent of each\nother.\n\nSimilarly, heat influences the atoms of which the molecules are\ncomposed. Even chemical attraction gives way to heat so that all bodies\nat sufficient temperature are decomposed into free atoms or elementary\nconstituents.\n\nWe have seen that heat performs mechanical work in so far as it separates\nmasses from each other. But heat not only performs this work but is the\nwork itself, or is identical with the movement of these particles.\n\nConsequently a certain quantity of mechanical work is equivalent to a\ncertain quantity of heat and _vice versa_, and it is this transformation\nfrom one form of energy into another that takes place during a chemical\nreaction. The mechanical energy of the atoms is here converted into heat\nwhich may again be used for the other forms of mechanical activity.\nThrough the chemical reaction that heat is regained which previously was\nutilized in separating the atoms or sustaining their movement, and this\nexplains why heat is developed in chemical processes. If this development\nof heat is increased to a certain point, or, which is the same, if the\nreaction takes place with greater violence, the common phenomena of\nfire and light appear. But even without these, every chemical process\nmay be called combustion in a wider sense, that is, if we consider the\nproduction of heat as the characteristic external effect of the chemical\nforce.\n\nAt sufficiently high temperature, then, all matter must be in an\nincandescent gaseous state, and _vice versa_ at a low temperature it is a\nsolid mass.\n\nWith these short notes we have also outlined the history of our own\nearth. The same gaseous state in which our sun is at present belonged\nonce to the earth according to science of today. During enormous periods\nof time the incandescent matter of the earth radiated light and heat\ninto the cold universe. Finally so much heat was lost that chemical\nattraction could assert itself. Regarded as a sun, the earth was then\ndying and it entered upon the chemical era. During this state the\nelements combined with each other according to general chemical laws into\nsuch compounds as were the necessary outcome of their atomic weights,\nvalence, and positive or negative qualities. In this connection it is\nsufficient to point out that these processes must go on incessantly until\ncompounds have been formed in which the chemical forces have reached\nequilibrium and rest. In the case of our planet these products formed the\nsolid crust of the earth, the primeval rock, the mineral world, further\nwater and finally air, the oxygen and nitrogen of which may be considered\nas remains of the elements. Furthermore, according to a law known to\nscience as that \u201cof the least resistance,\u201d chemical reactions proceed\nfrom compounds which have more energy to such as have less, wherefore it\nfollows that each product was as poor in energy as the conditions at the\ntime permitted.\n\nIf we now especially give our attention to the combustion taking place\nin chemical processes, this era may also be called the period of\ncombustion or the general world-fire, names which are exact even if we\nuse combustion in the common, limited sense of oxidation. Oxygen is\nconsidered to constitute about one-half of the solid crust of the earth,\nand when to this quantitative preponderance is added its extraordinarily\nstrong affinity to other elements, these must with necessity burn into\noxides just as has been the case.\n\nIt is therefore with the products of combustion, that is to say, the\nashes and the remains from a general colossal world-fire, that the earth\nenters its planetary state, at which stage it becomes suitable for the\ncreation and evolution of living beings. It is from burnt substances that\nthe organisms must form the combustible matter that constitutes their\nmaterial clothing. How can this be done? In the only possible way; that\nis, by again decomposing the products of combustion into their elements\nand bringing them into such combinations that a new combustion may take\nplace. Are the products of combustion able to perform this transformation\nspontaneously? They have just lost the fund of energy that could have\nmade them combustible and this lost heat must again be stored up and\ntherefore taken from some other source, as no heat can be created from\nnothing.\n\nWhen the chemical forces had once reached equilibrium and rest, the earth\nmight then be compared to an immense corpse thrown into space and which\nmust remain in the same state eternally, or until it met with a cosmic\ncatastrophe. Not the slightest movement or variation could now take place\nspontaneously on its surface. If a change happened it must have had its\ncause in another source of power, and two such sources existed. One\nwas the earth\u2019s own internal heat, and the other the sun, and we must\ntherefore consider if either of these, or both together could produce\ncombustible organic substance.\n\nIn regard first to the earth\u2019s internal heat we might immediately\neliminate this source of energy, as it has no direct connection whatever\nwith the origin of organic matter, an assertion so commonly agreed upon\nthat we need not dwell further upon it.\n\nInfinitely more important is the sun, which has been and is the cause of\nmost of the changes taking place on the earth\u2019s surface after its cooling\noff. The sun causes the circulation of the air and water and thereby the\nwhole series of disintegration and decay, the history of which is written\nwith indelible letters in our geological sediments and formations. These\nformations tell us that new oceans and continents, new minerals and rocks\nhave successively been formed, but nowhere that organic substances were\never built up spontaneously under the sun\u2019s influence. The processes of\ndecay, on the contrary, proceed in the entirely opposite direction.\n\nThrough them nothing is formed but compounds poorer in energy than\nbefore. In decaying, the products of combustion absorb, if possible, more\noxygen, become more burnt or oxidized, so that this whole process may be\ncalled an after-burning, a more thorough combustion of the remnants from\nthe first general world-fire.\n\nThe spontaneous activity of nature\u2019s forces, then, go in a direction just\nopposite to the one necessary for the production of organic substances.\nAnd anything else was not to be expected. The products of combustion\nresemble fallen weights, slack bow-strings, water below the fall, etc.,\nwhereas combustible organic matter might be compared to lifted weights,\nset bow-strings, water above the fall, etc. If matter has once fallen\nfrom a higher to a lower level of energy it can never spontaneously\nreturn, especially as it has just lost the necessary store of energy.\nAs impossible as it is for the swift current to turn its course, or for\nthe fallen weight to lift itself or for the discharged bow-string to\nset itself again, so impossible is it for the products of combustion\nspontaneously to turn into combustible substances.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\nOrganic Matter as a Product of Art.\n\n\nFrom the previous chapter we now draw the extremely important conclusion\nthat all organic matter is a _product of art_, that is, a product which\nthe forces of nature cannot produce. Spontaneously these forces only\ncreate natural products. Products of art belong to an entirely different\ncategory; they owe their existence to a foreign interference in the\nnatural order of the world and have a cause that does not fall within\nthe limits of a mere mechanical causality. But before we discuss this\nsubject, let us first thoroughly understand what we mean by saying that\norganic matter is a product of art.\n\nMaterialists have shown that the organism closely resembles a steam\nengine, but they have neglected to point out that the similarity extends\nalso to the mode in which they are produced. Everybody is probably\nconvinced that the forces of nature have never made and never will make a\nsteam engine. If the same might be said in regard to the machines which\nwe call organisms, then materialism would be disproved. But why, to begin\nwith, cannot the forces of nature build steam engines? We must be able to\npresent the reasons for this statement.\n\nIf we first consider the building material, we find this in the factories\nin the form of plates, bars and ingots of iron, copper, lead, tin, etc.\nWhere do these metals come from? Nowhere in nature is such material\nfound.[2]\n\nHumanity had inhabited the earth thousands of years without having an\nidea of the existence of such substances as iron, copper, lead, etc. The\nmetals are chemical ingredients in our minerals and from these minerals\nthey are extracted by complicated, artificial processes. The ore is often\nlifted out of the depths of the mountains; it goes through a series of\ntreatments which the forces of nature cannot spontaneously undertake. We\nwill here give only a moment\u2019s attention to the process of reduction, or\nthe separation of the metal from its natural compounds. This, as we know,\nis done in our blast furnaces, where the iron is reduced through the\npresence of coal and other suitable substances in certain proportions.\nIf we now remember that the heat in our furnaces often reaches about\n2000\u00b0 Centigrade we see at once that the sun may shine on our mountains\nthroughout eternity without ever producing the temperature necessary for\nthe reduction.\n\nBut the engine is not yet completed. The plates must be first rolled and\nshaped, the ingots must be melted and cast into frames, shafts, bearings,\netc.; in short, the raw material must be formed into all those numerous\nparts of which the machine is composed. The engine is from beginning to\nend a product of art.\n\nThere is especially one circumstance pertaining to all these\ntransformations that merits a closer attention. If we remember that all\nthe material used in a product of art is taken from nature, and besides\nthat, all the processes in making and shaping the raw material are\ncarried out through the employment of natural laws, we might still ask\nthe question, why physical forces should not enter spontaneously into\nthe necessary artificial combinations for producing this result. Until\nwe have pointed out the quality in matter which prevents this, we have\nnot completely demonstrated the inability of natural forces to build an\nengine spontaneously.\n\nThis quality has been named _vis inertiae_, the inertia of matter, one\nof the most important natural laws that exist. What does this law teach\nus? It says that matter cannot itself change its condition. If a body is\nin motion it can never come to rest unless another force at least equal\nto the primary opposes the motion. If it be at rest, it cannot impart\nmotion unto itself; energy, applied from without, is necessary. Inertia\nkeeps the earth moving around the sun; a stone thrown into the air would\nproceed everlastingly with its initial velocity if the attraction of the\nearth did not interfere.\n\nBecause of this quality, then, matter remains in its natural equilibrium.\nAn engine would never be built because the ore would stay in the\nmountains and the metals forever remain in their compounds. Every product\nof art requires a foreign interference in the material world; matter,\nin consequence of its inertia, presents a determined and often very\nenergetic resistance to such an intervention.\n\nExactly the same reasons that prevent natural forces from building a\nsteam engine, cause also their inability to produce an organism, and this\nin a much higher degree because the organism is in a still fuller sense\na product of art. The organic building material, instead of being plates\nand ingots of iron, copper, lead, etc., consists of carbon, hydrogen,\nsulphur, phosphorus, chlorin, potassium, sodium, magnesia, etc., or both\nmetals and metalloids of which the former, on account of their negative,\nand the latter because of their positive qualities cannot exist in a\nfree state. From the minerals found in nature these substances must be\nextracted for organic purposes. The elements are different, but otherwise\nwe may verbally repeat in regard to organic substance what has been\npreviously said about the steam engine.\n\nIt is the creation of organic matter by art that the materialists have\nneglected to take into account. Therefore they look upon the organism\njust as a new race, suddenly succeeding humanity, would view our steam\nengines. These machines would certainly appear very mysterious to the\nearth\u2019s new inhabitants. But a growing civilization would undoubtedly\ndiscover that all the material used in the engine is taken from ores\nto be found in nature. If now somebody would draw the conclusion that\nthese ores themselves had made the engine he would reason as do the\nmaterialists today in regard to the organism. The parallel does not halt\nin any respect, but it is sufficient in this connection to call attention\nonly to one or two of the more important components of the organism.\n\nOrganic matter, or combustible substance, consists of carbon and hydrogen\nwhich in an organism are comparable to the iron in a steam engine. But\nnowhere in nature is free hydrogen or free inorganic carbon to be found.\nThe carbon was burned to carbonic acid in earth\u2019s first combustion, and\nsimilarly the hydrogen was burned to water long before the conditions\nfor organic life existed on the earth.\n\nFrom these original products of combustion, burnable organic matter is\nformed by decomposition of carbonic acid and water into their elements,\ncarbon and hydrogen, and by their subsequent combination through feebler\nchemical forces into sugar, starch, etc., which substances through a new\ncombustion are again turned into carbonic acid and water. The natural\nforces cannot spontaneously undertake these transformations that only\ntake place because of artificial arrangements. The processes of nature go\nin the entirely opposite direction, as we have seen.\n\nAs a matter of fact, the reduction of carbonic acid and water is done\nthrough the direct assistance of living beings. From the sun they take\ntheir power. But how ineffective the sun would be, left to itself,\nis seen already by the fact that carbonic acid is disintegrated at a\ntemperature of 1300\u00b0 C. and water only at 1500\u00b0. Products of art must be\nresorted to, and we know that by lenses, burning mirrors, photographic\ncameras and the like the sun may be forced to accomplish results that\notherwise would be impossible. Such artificial apparatus, then, must be\nthe chlorophyll granules in the cells. More strikingly yet, these organs\nof the cell may be compared to our blast-furnaces, as it is just in the\nchlorophyll granules that the reduction of carbonic acid and water,\naccording to science, takes place. If these artificial devices, invented\nand constructed by the lower living units that constitute the cell, did\nnot exist, the sun might shine throughout eternity on water and carbonic\nacid without producing organic building material.\n\nThis material is and must be the product of art. If the forces of\ninorganic nature spontaneously produced sugar, starch, etc., these\nsubstances must have the same quality as our rocks, minerals, etc., of\nbeing products of combustion, which in such a supposed case, perhaps,\nwould be made burnable if transformed into water and carbonic acid. We\nwould obtain a creation turned upside down and analogous to a world where\nthe bodies we now use as weights would remain unsupported at certain\ndistances from our earth. If we were to use such a body as a weight in a\nclock, we would have to wind it down instead of up.\n\nBecause organic compounds are products of art, living beings find\nthemselves obliged to direct the physical forces to destroy these\ncompounds or restore them to their inorganic state more speedily than\nthese forces would have done if left unaided. The processes of decay,\nperformed by micro-organisms, are as necessary in the economy of life as\nthe reverse processes. Otherwise the earth would soon be so covered by\ncorpses that life must cease simply for lack of inorganic raw material.\nIt is true that we might imagine living beings as adapting their\norganization to this condition and for some time directly utilizing the\naccumulated stores of organic matter; but such periodical interruptions\nand changes would disturb the continuity of life\u2019s evolution. To avoid\nthis, there is no way open to restore equilibrium except the one in which\nit is now done.\n\nNo effect, whatever its nature, can exist without cause; and further,\nevery effect must have a sufficient cause. If, therefore, we have\nestablished that natural forces can no more produce organisms than\nsteam engines, we have also proved that these things would never have\ncome into existence if the organic forces had been left to themselves.\nNeither organisms nor engines would exist, because they have no cause\nin the material world. The products of art are due not only to other\ncauses, but the relationship between cause and effect is also different\nwith them from what it is with the products of nature. Every product of\nnature has its cause in a previous condition of matter. The cause goes\nbefore and the effect comes after in time. The connection between cause\nand effect is so intimate and complete with regard to natural products,\nthat we may trace the series of occurrences backward and forward in time\nwithout other limitations than those imposed by a deficient knowledge of\nthe qualities of matter. Such a connection between cause and effect has\nbeen termed mechanical causality, which reigns without exception in the\nmaterial world.\n\nOf entirely different kind and nature is the series of causes pertaining\nto the production of objects of art. In their capacity of purpose they\nare themselves the physical cause of all the work that precedes their\nbirth. When the product of art is finally ready, the effect has then gone\nbefore the cause. Such a connection is called teleological causality in\ncontradistinction to the mechanical one, where the cause always precedes\nthe effect.\n\nBut although the product of art is the nearest cause of its own\nproduction, it is not the primary one; it is itself the result, not of a\ncause to be found in the material world, but of a _foreign_ interference\nin the mechanical causality, and points therefore to a supernatural\nground which, by a closer investigation, will be found identical with a\nliving will. The will feels the want of other things than those which\nnatural forces can spontaneously produce. Natural products act as\nincentives on the will, spur it to break through mechanical causality\nso that physical laws by a judicious guidance may be forced to produce\nartificial products that better satisfy the desires of the will. If\nnatural laws could comprehend and judge these things, they would consider\nthem all as miracles, whereas, from the point of view of the will, they\nare so much the more natural as they are exact expressions of the needs\nand desires of the will.\n\nBut not only the order of cause and effect, even the tie between the two\nis entirely different in teleological causality from that in mechanical.\nWhile the natural product is an effect that cannot fail to appear, the\nproduct of art, on the contrary, is an effect that primarily never\ncould be expected, because it has no cause in the material world; but\nfurther, if it is forthcoming, the tie between cause and effect is so\nloose that such a product may be left and will remain in any stage of its\nproduction. It may be just commenced, half ready, or nearly completed;\nbe better or worse, be a failure, and so on, whereas the natural product\nsprings forth of physical necessity from its cause and never can be\ndifferent from what it is.\n\nWills and physical forces then stand against each other as two\nfundamentally and radically different causes. A will may neglect to\ndo what it ought to, may be idle, industrious, undecided; a physical\nforce cannot leave undone what it has to do, can never be called idle,\nindustrious or undecided.\n\nThat man is able to produce objects of art we have sufficient evidence in\nmaterial invention, from the simple stone-ax up to the most complicated\nmachines. But if man can create products of art he must himself be a\nsupernatural cause, as natural products produce nothing but their own\nkind. And not only he but also the beings that build up his organism must\nbe supernatural causes, as we have seen that all organic matter _ipso\nfacto_ are products of art.\n\nIn all these different forms and species of products of art we possess,\ntherefore, boundless masses of obvious and visible evidence that life\nis not a quality of matter. In order to break through the mechanical\ncausality and introduce into the material world effects which never could\nbe spontaneously forthcoming, life must have a supernatural origin, must\nbe a principle independent of matter.\n\nBy resuming the demonstration that the materialists had broken off, we\narrive therefore at the same conclusion that natural science had already\ndrawn before from external observation, and with which the question of\nthe nature of life-force is inseparably connected. The qualities of\nmatter itself demonstrate clearly that spontaneous generation never has\nbeen, is not and never will be possible, and the tremendous labor spent\nduring centuries to prove this by external observation seems almost a\nwaste of time. We might as well pick out a table full of stones and sit\ndown expecting some of them to undertake a flight around the room, as to\nexpect living substance to come forth spontaneously from dead matter.\nThe intrinsic qualities of matter tell us that only hope for the former\noccurrence can warrant faith in the latter.\n\nWe thus consider it demonstrated that Harvey\u2019s formula is a universal\nnatural law and we may now draw its logical consequences: _Life is not a\nmaterial force; no living being can therefore arise from dead matter;\nall life has a supernatural origin in a higher immaterial world_.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\nThe Soul and the Cells.\n\n\nLiving beings are alive because the very substance in them is living.\nLife belongs to this substance exactly as materiality belongs to matter.\nAs living substance can exist only in the form of living individuals, all\nliving beings fall outside the limitations of time and possess individual\nimmortality without exception. _The cell, therefore, is as immortal as\nman._ But if this is the case, the fact that the duration of the earthly\nlife of man is different from that of the cell must now at last appear\nin its full significance. During man\u2019s life a series of cell-generations\nhave lived, acted and disappeared, although the phenomenon here, as in\nthe body of society, passes comparatively unnoticed because the cell\nis invisible to the naked eye. Of course we observe a daily growth\nof nails, hair and of the whole outer skin. This outer layer consists\nexclusively of dead cells, which daily scale off by the millions through\nwear, washing or otherwise, and are replaced by other dying cells from\nthe inner living tissues. The same process of dying and renewal takes\nplace in the organs of the cell. As man\u2019s lifetime often depends on the\ntrade he has chosen, so it is with the cells in his organism. Those\nthat perform heavy work, as for instance glandular cells, often die in\nthe moment their mission is filled. This process commences even in the\nindividual\u2019s embryonic state. With lower animals, whose generation takes\nplace outside the mother-body, we can often observe with the naked eye\nhow whole organs normally die and disappear.\n\nIf the cells as well as men are immortal beings, the question naturally\narises: what becomes of these incessantly dying cell generations? The\nanswer must necessarily be apparent if we can show, First, _that the tie\nbetween the soul and the cells is indissoluble so that man\u2019s organism, i.\ne., his spiritual body, consists of the same cell-individuals in a future\nlife as here in time_; Second, _that the cells at the same time are\nself-existent and so independent of the soul, that in a future existence\nalso, as here in time, they can and must build up man\u2019s organism\nindependently_.\n\nIn such case no reason can be advanced that would prevent the dying\ncell-generations from immediately arising to a new and higher evolution,\nwhich, as we will endeavor to prove, must be identical with the\nupbuilding of the higher, transfigured body which man shall possess in a\nfuture life. This form of resurrection must be common to all organisms\nbecause they are all built according to the same general plan and are\nconsequently subject to the same general process of evolution. Men are\nthemselves the cells in another higher organism, humanity, which entity\ncannot rise to a richer life in another world otherwise than through its\nupbuilding by the dying human generations under the new conditions that\nexist over there.\n\nAs a preliminary experiment in order to find out if the soul is\nindispensable to the life of the organism, or if the cells possibly\nmight do without the soul, we may appropriately remove the latter from\nan organism and thus directly observe the importance of the soul for the\ncells.\n\nBut how can this be done, or at least, how may we deprive the organism\nof all influence from the soul? The physiologists have proved the\npossibility of such an experiment. It is fully established that the soul\ncommunicates with the body through the brain proper, or the cerebrum,\nand experience shows that this important organ may be removed and yet\nthe body continue to live. We will here give briefly the results of such\nexperiments made with animals.\n\nIf the brain be removed from a dove or a hen, the bird often recovers\nfrom the radical operation and may remain alive for months and even\nyears. But the dove has become an entirely different being. Immobile she\nsits on the same place. If she were not heard to breathe she might be\ntaken for a stuffed bird. She lacks ability to judge her position and\nresembles a living machine that breathes, and swallows the food brought\ninto her bill. The higher qualities of the dove are entirely lost. She\nshows no signs of fear and is incapable of initiative. She remains\nsitting in the same place and will not even fly down from small heights.\nIf thrown into the air, she flies until her wings are tired or until she\nstrikes an obstacle that she makes no effort to avoid. From the first\nday she must be fed artificially, but she digests her food as usual. The\nheart, the circulation of the blood, the respiration, in short, all the\nvegetative functions of life continue regularly. Such a state has been\ncharacterized by Flourens as a continuous sleep without dreams.\n\nThe same observations have been made with regard to dogs that have been\ndeprived of a large part of the brain.\n\nWith lowered head and dead eyes, such a dog moves about indifferent to\neverything taking place around him. He shows no signs of fear, envy or\njoy. Neither threats nor friendly speech impress him. He never partakes\nin the barking of other dogs and is, as a rule, mute. Only should he be\nhungry he might set up a howl. Although indifferent to the strongest\nlight or sound, he is not entirely blind or deaf. At the stronger sounds\nhe might move his head slightly. All higher life is lost, but he digests\nhis food and all vegetative functions continue _just as_ regularly as if\nhe were in normal condition.\n\nObservation of the effect of certain accidents and diseases intimates\nthat man forms no exception but that the same results would probably be\nobtained from similar experiments with him. Though such experiments are\nout of the question, we can, however, in many different ways ascertain\nthat the soul of man is also inactive in the vegetative functions of his\norganism. In earliest childhood this is perfectly evident. To possess\na soul that has no functions is, as far as the result is concerned,\nidentical with possessing no soul.\n\nIf we observe a child during the very earliest period of its life we\nwill find that it behaves essentially just as the animals referred to\nabove. Even the child remains in the position it is given and is unable\nto comprehend what happens around him. The child would likewise starve to\ndeath unless food were brought to his mouth, but he swallows and digests\nthe nourishment normally. The movements of the heart, the circulation of\nthe blood and respiration all take place as normally as with the fully\ndeveloped man during sleep when his soul also ceases to function.\n\nThe fact that the vegetative processes of the organism are not governed\nand controlled by the soul may be observed by anyone also during his\nconscious state. In regard to respiration we may repress it only for a\nfew minutes. A command is soon given by certain cells in the central\nnerve-system which _against_ the soul\u2019s will brings the organ in question\ninto action. Experience tells us that strong agitations generally disturb\nthe vegetative processes. Sudden fear, for instance, accelerates the\nheart\u2019s motion. Therefore these processes take place more evenly with\nanimals deprived of their brain just because disturbing influences from\nthe soul are then impossible.\n\nThus it is certain beyond doubt that the cells not only execute but\nregulate and control through the central nerve-system a multitude of\nfunctions in which the soul does not take part. But just as certain it\nis that there are many functions which the cells could not perform\nwithout the co-operation of the soul. Vision, hearing, smelling, tasting\nand feeling would be entirely meaningless to the cells without the aid\nof the soul. The same is the case in a high degree with the motions of\nthe body which also require such a higher guidance. The dove could fly,\nthe dog walk, and so forth, but the motions were relatively purposeless.\nThe predetermined plan was lacking. The cells could assimilate the food,\nwhen brought into the body, but they could not search it in nature. Such\naction requires a power of combination that exceeds their measure of\nintelligence.\n\nWe see consequently that the cells may do without the soul in such\nfunctions as are not related to the exterior world comprehensible\nthrough our senses. Here they need the guidance of a higher, more\ndeveloped intelligence. In the outside world with its more complicated\nrelations, the soul is to the cells very nearly what we mean by the word\n_Providence_. The soul performs, in the interest of the cells, such a\nhigher, regulating and guiding function.\n\nThe organism, then, is divided into two sections, separated by a sharply\ndefined boundary. As independent and autocratic as the cells are in one\nof them, is the soul in the other. This bisection in two widely separated\nspheres is in itself remarkable, but may be explained, if we remember\nthat the organism is an individual composed of lower individuals. As\ndifferent as these classes of individuals are in their nature and\nfaculties, equally incongruous are also the realms in which they dwell.\nThe cells move in the atomic and molecular world. To them the molecules\nand atoms appear with a clearness comparable to the plainness with which\nthe exterior world reveals itself to us. It is natural then that the\ncells attend to the vegetative functions of the organism which just fall\nwithin their sphere of life, a sphere of which the soul can obtain\nknowledge only indirectly by way of deductions. Equally obvious it is\nthat only the soul can employ the organs of the body, the functions of\nwhich fall within the visible world.\n\nWe have now endeavored to obtain an understanding of the importance of\nthe soul to the cells by depriving the latter of the direct influence\nof the former. This resulted from the removal of the brain, the organ\nby which the soul more directly expresses itself. But the soul is not\nactually removed from the body. It still remains in the whole cell-mass.\nThe brain itself consists of cells, in which the soul is not present\nexcept as in all the other cells. The difference is only that the\nbrain-cells are developed for the functions of thought, whereas the cells\nin the other organs are intended for their specific purposes. In order to\nremove the soul from the body we must remove the life from every cell.\nThe soul, as we intend to show, is inseparably connected with every\nparticular cell-individual. But in order to understand how the cells may\nbe at once independent of, and yet intimately united with the soul, we\nmust first know what an organism really is. Its nature and fundamental\nidea is the only thing that can explain this remarkable relationship. But\nit is just here as to the essential qualities of an organism that the\nconceptions are generally very dim and vague.\n\nCommonly the organism is thought of as a very complicated mechanism whose\nmembers and organs mutually depend upon each other. The organism is what\nthe word implies, a tool. But every tool is intended for somebody\u2019s\nuse. Who this one is, is not said, simply because it is considered\nself-evident. If it be a human organism, it is obviously the man who uses\nit; if it be an animal organism, it is the animal, and so on. That this\nis a truth, cannot be denied; but still it expresses only half the truth\nand scarcely that. Every organic body is used directly by the individuals\nthat form its building material. The human organism is a society of\ncells, and it is these latter that first of all use the body\u2019s organs for\ntheir purposes. But so dominating are the old ideas about the body, that\neven the cytologists themselves have not been able to shake them off. The\ncells are continually studied from man\u2019s point of view, but _what man may\nbe from the cell\u2019s point of view is never thought of_.\n\nWe do not hereby deny all justification to the old conception. The body\nis also an organ for the soul. The latter, as experience shows, uses\nthe body for its own specific purposes. But this takes place only to\na somewhat limited extent. The incomparably larger part of the soul\u2019s\nwork, cares, and endeavors, is devoted to finding means to satisfy bodily\nwants. But so far as the soul provides for the necessities of the body,\nit acts as organ for the cells. When man believes that he is running his\nown errands, he is in reality carrying out the missions of those beings\nthat compose his body. These latter demand for their purposes, if not\nall, yet at least the largest part of all the work the soul performs in\nthis world.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX.\n\nThe Fundamental Qualities of an Organism.\n\n\nIn order to illustrate the fundamental characteristics of an organic\nstructure in general, we will begin with comparing it with what it most\nresembles, namely, a complicated mechanism. The likeness is so striking\nthat the very dissimilarities become instructive.\n\nFirst of all we notice the parts of which the machine is composed.\nWhat these parts are to the machine the members and organs are to the\norganism. Every part, like every organ, has a certain duty to perform\nwhich it incessantly repeats. The work of the machine is divided among\nthe parts as that of the organism among the organs. As the organ, so the\npart of the machine can do its share only when in right position and in\nright order.\n\nThe most obvious similarities are now exhausted. The parts of the machine\nare actuated by external, but the organs by internal, forces. The\norganism is a living machine. No organism, whether organic or mechanic,\nlabors for its own sake. Every such apparatus exists for somebody\u2019s\nuse. But while those that employ a machine stand in outer relation to\nthe same, those who utilize an organism are beings that themselves\nconstitute the organic machine-parts. These are not composed of dead\natoms, but of living individuals. The organism is a society which puts\nthe organic machinery into service. It is the social tie that connects\nthe individuals which otherwise would be a multitude of isolated beings.\n\nIn all organisms there are as many organs as actual wants among the\nindividuals that compose it. Because these individuals are kindred, they\nhave common needs and are therefore able to use the same organ. Every\nparticular individual requires the assistance of all the organs and must\ntherefore stand in such relation to them all that he can utilize the work\nof any one. But he himself enters as a working member only in one organ,\nwhose work is the only one he can immediately press into his service,\nand even this only in certain cases. All other organs stand in more or\nless distant relation to him. How, then, will he be able to utilize them?\nOnly so that the organs make themselves present in his own organ, and,\nso to speak, reach him their different products. Like every citizen in a\ncommunity, each organ ought to have a system of circulation throughout\nall the other organs to transfer the results of its work where it is\nneeded. If, however, each organ were provided with such a distribution\nagency this would be an extravagance inconsistent with the concentration\nof forces that the very idea of an organism implies. Instead of many such\nsystems we find therefore in every organism but one, whose sole purpose\nis to circulate the products of the various organs, and thus, so to\nspeak, make each organ represented in every part of the whole community.\nWe find that every organic building is constructed in this way to suit\nthe individuals that form its building-material, and so of course it must\nbe, since it was built for that purpose by the same individuals.\n\nThe consequence is that the degree of development an organism possesses\nis closely related to the state of evolution reached by the individuals\nwhich constitute it. The more perfected the organism, the higher and more\ndeveloped also are the necessities it is able to satisfy.\n\nThe way in which independent living beings build such an organic\nmachine may be defined as \u201cdivision of labor.\u201d Every organism is a\nunion, founded on the division of labor, between a multitude of kindred\nindividuals which thus combine their isolated forces. But a large mass\nof individuals cannot merge at once into an all-embracing entity. This\nresult can only be reached by a series of higher and lower intermediary\nunits, each defined by its particular share of the total labor.\n\nA closer study of the organisms will show that they all without exception\nare composed in this way.\n\nThe cells in any organism in nature combine into higher and higher units\nas follows:\n\nThe primary unions of the cells are the tissues, where all the cells\nperform the same function in the same way. Of these tissues is formed\nthe nearest higher unit, the organ. As the tissue was a union of cells,\nthe organ is a union of tissues. Then we have a system of organs. To\neach such higher system a more comprehensive function is assigned. By\ndistributing the total labor among the different systems these merge into\nthe organism which unites the whole cell-mass into one well-organized\ncommunity of working cell-individuals.\n\nHuman society is similarly composed. The difference is only that in\none case the citizens are cells, and in the other they are men. Of an\norganism in nature we only see the members and organs, but not the cells;\nin human society, on the other hand, we only observe the cells or the\nhuman individual, but not the body of society. The cells combine into a\nsolid body; humanity is spread over a surface. Human individuals, because\nof their greater perfection, move in space more freely and independently\nof each other than do the cells in their realm. These and other\ndifferences do not, however, disturb the general organic structure. This\nhas everywhere the same fundamental qualities. Society is essentially\nonly a vastly enlarged copy of the same model that man traces in his own\nbodily organism.\n\nThrough a similar division of labor the work of the community is split\ninto trades, corresponding to the tissues in the natural organism. As the\ncells in one tissue, so the men in one trade are incessantly occupied\nwith the same work. Out of several trades are formed the social organs. A\nsocial organ consequently is a certain community or district performing a\ncertain part of an industry. This has been called \u201cterritorial division\nof labor.\u201d Several such communities make up an organ-system or an\nindustry. A few such larger units merge into the single unit, the entire\nmass of human individuals as a whole.\n\nThe cells of the individuals in an organism are consequently at once\nbuilding-material and builders, and in their latter capacity are endowed\nwith wants and aspirations that with natural necessity force them to\norganization without conscious plan or purpose. Necessity is the teacher\nthat tells them how to organize. Some speak of a social instinct that\nman does or should possess; but its existence has never been shown.\nOn the contrary, it is only by those needs that can only be satisfied\nby a community that men are driven to unite socially. Similarly with\nthe cells. Only by building up an organism are they able to satisfy\ntheir common wants. What society is to human individuals, the natural\norganism is to the cells. No trade or industry can be found in the state\nthat does not serve to provide for some common want of the people, and\nno tissue nor organ exists in the natural organism but for satisfying\ncollective needs of the cells. These collective needs are at the same\ntime the higher needs of the individuals. The organism provides the\npower that the isolated individual does not possess. Organization allows\nthat specializing of effort which so essentially contributes to the\nproductivity of labor. The more limited the operations each individual\nhas to perform, the more rapidly and perfectly are they done.\n\nAlthough the cell lives in a world inaccessible to our immediate\ncomprehension, we still possess means to ascertain that it has the same\nfundamental qualities as man. We observe manifestations of life in the\ncell corresponding to those of sensitivity, feeling and will-power in\nman. The cell\u2019s comprehending faculty has been termed irritability and\nits power of action spontaneity. From certain physiological phenomena the\nconclusion has also been drawn that the cell likewise possesses memory.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X.\n\nThe Organic Relationship Between the Soul and the Cells.\n\n\nHitherto only little study has been given to the spiritual qualities\nof the cells, and such investigations must always meet with certain\ninsurmountable difficulties. The reason is that we only judge others by\nourselves and we are therefore unable to understand the spiritual life of\nany being that is not one of our kin.\n\nIf a being stands higher or lower than ourselves its spiritual\nexperiences, if not entirely different from ours, are at least limited\nand modified by the being\u2019s own power of comprehension. If, however,\nthese beings show manifestations of life that we understand, we must\nconclude that their spiritual or mental life is correspondingly active.\n\nSuch a position we occupy with regard to the beings called cells. From\nthe result of their activities we conclude that they, like men, are\nendowed with aspirations capable of the highest conceivable evolution.\nWhat economic necessities are to man, the arterial blood is to the cell.\nThe blood is an artificial product which nature no more gives to the\ncell than it gives clothes, food, houses and the like to man. Nature\nprovides the raw material and cell and man alike must learn how to adapt\nit for the necessities of life. This operation, however, involves great\ndifficulties. All such artificial products stand in inverse proportion\nto the power of the individual. The more perfect they are the more\nimpossible it is for the individual to produce them. Only as citizens in\na community, that is, through organization, are the individuals able to\nproduce such products as exceed their isolated forces.\n\nAlthough we cannot comprehend the inner life of the cell, nor the world\nin which it dwells, we are able to judge, from the wonderful perfectness\nof the organisms built by cells, that they have reached in their world\nand measured by their power a higher state of development than man. It\nis not only possible but highly probable that the human individuals will\nsometime build an organism of the same perfectness, but as yet they have\nnot done so. The cells have long ago passed the stage of organization\nthat characterizes human society at present.\n\nFrom the fact that the first purpose of every organic structure is to\nserve the individuals of which it is composed, it follows that nobody,\nexcept these same individuals, can build the organism in question.\nIndependently the cells build the human body here in time and they must\ndo the same in the future life. The organism cannot exist in other\nsurroundings than those for which its organs are adapted. But this\nadaptation can only be effected by the individuals that form the building\nmaterial of the organs, because the organs just express their relations\nto the world in which they exist. Thus it follows of necessity that man\u2019s\nresurrection or transition from one world to another must be identical\nwith the dying cells\u2019 upbuilding of that organism which man shall possess\nin a future life. Any other form of resurrection is neither possible nor\nconceivable. It is further confirmed by the relation that exists between\nthe soul and the cells. This relationship, as we intend to show, is such\nthat the soul receives its entire individuality, all its forces and\nfaculties, from the cell-organism, the previous resurrection of which\ntherefore is an indispensable condition for man\u2019s own rise to another\nlife.\n\nIf the mass of a body is living the body itself is alive. The whole\nreceives its qualities from its elementary components. The organism\nitself is a living being. From the point of view of the building material\nthe organism is a society composed of independently living individuals;\nfrom the point of view of the whole again it is a living individual of\nhigher order than the individuals that form its social side. Man is a\ncell in the social body, but is himself composed of lower individuals,\nwhich again consist of more primary units.\n\nMan, considered as being possessed of a body, _is an individual composed\nof lower individuals_.\n\nWe now ask the question: What is the relation between the higher\nindividual and the lower ones? This is only another and more exact form\nof the question: What is the relation between the soul and the body?\nBecause, what is the body and what is the soul? The body is the sum of\nthe lower individuals, or, in other words, it is the organized mass of\ncells. The soul, as the feeling, thinking and willing principle, is the\nreal spiritual unity in this mass, or just what we denote by the word\nman, or the higher individual. To ask, what is the relationship between\nthe higher individual and its lower constituents is therefore the same\nas to ask, what is the relation between the soul and the cells? Take away\nthe latter, and there is nothing left of the body. The cells mean here\neverything, and it is to them consequently that the soul can be thought\nto stand in relation.\n\nFormerly the problem was to explain how soul and body as two\nsubstantially different entities were related to each other. They had\nthen nothing in common, nothing to encourage an interaction. If now\nthe relation holds between the soul and the cells we have at least\ncommensurable quantities to deal with.\n\nSo far all is well. But now other difficulties arise. We can and must\nask, how an interaction is possible between the soul and the cells even\nif they are formally, according to their inner nature, kindred beings? In\nother respects they are not so separated and different that a spiritual\nintercourse is inconceivable. As inaccessible as is the inner life of\nthe cell to man, so incontiguous is the spiritual life of man to the\ncell. These beings are so widely separated that they cannot possibly\ncommunicate directly with each other, and yet in order to establish a\nmental or spiritual interrelationship, such communication is just what is\nnecessary.\n\nThe soul and the cells must have something in common that is of a purely\nspiritual nature. As the spiritual always is a comprehending substance\nwith nothing but comprehensions as its content, the something common to\nboth must consequently have the form of common comprehensions. Not all\ncomprehensions, however, incite to activity and a smaller number yet call\nforth a co-operation of independently living individuals. But, obviously,\nthe perceptions that concern us now must be of the latter kind. The\ncomprehensions in general that induce a being to activity we call wants\nor appetites. In its desires a being conceives its own ego in want of\none thing or other. The feeling of discomfort, accompanying the want,\nnaturally causes the endeavor to satisfy the want through a corresponding\neffort. The incitement to activity then is purely spiritual. Are the\nsoul of man and the cells subject to such common needs, requiring\ntheir co-operation? If so, at least their wants or appetites cannot be\nwholly congruous. Such are only to be found in entirely similar beings.\nBut different wants are satisfied in different ways; each requires a\ncarefully adapted form of activity. All direct, immediate co-operation\nof the soul and the cells is therefore impossible. Only man with man, or\ncell with cell, can co-operate in the primary sense of the word.\n\nBut an indirect working alliance is not yet precluded. Though themselves\ndifferent, the two beings may comprehend wants identical in substance,\nbut not in form. The formal discrepancy would require not only different\nmodes of satisfying the need, but also different kinds of activity;\nbut the common substance might yet under certain conditions so unite\nand interlink the different labors, that the result would show a mutual\nco-operation.\n\nWe shall presently see that the soul and the cells are so united with\neach other that _the connecting link is the organism per se_. From the\npoint of view of the cells the organism, with its different members and\norgans, was nothing but the collective expressions of individual wants.\nNow man comprehends as his needs only the wants of the organs; in other\nwords, the collective wants of the cells are the individual wants of the\nsoul. Experience teaches us that the soul has no direct comprehension\nof the cells, but only of their organic unions. To prove this it may be\nsufficient to point out that before the discovery of the microscope, man\nknew absolutely nothing of the existence of these beings, much less that\nthey were the all-governing forces in his own body. But also in other\nways we may ascertain that the comprehending power of the soul does not\nreach beyond the organs. This is apparent from the different significance\nthe physiological processes have for the soul and for the cells. If we\nconsider the most important of them all, our nutrition, and ask ourselves\nfor whom the nourishment is really intended, we find that it is for the\ncells and for the cells alone.\n\nThe food benefits the soul only if it is utilized by the cells. But the\nnourishment that the soul craves does not satisfy the cells. Hunger and\nsatisfaction are not even simultaneous in both, at least not as regards\nthe same food. As a rule, the soul comprehends hunger when the cells are\nsatisfied and _vice versa_. The soul\u2019s hunger ceases the moment suitable\nfood in sufficient quantity is introduced in the stomach. But this does\nnot help the cells. Because, if the food remained in the stomach, to the\nsatisfaction of the soul, the cells would soon die of starvation. The\nnourishment in the stomach is of the same importance to the cells as the\nprovisions stored in the warehouse of the community are to the human\nindividuals. These also would die from hunger if they let the victuals\nremain in the stores. The people must undertake to distribute, prepare\nand consume the food. Similarly the cells would starve to death unless\nthey prepared the food in their common storage to suit their wants. The\nnourishment must be transformed into blood through the whole complicated\nprocess we call digestion. When this is done, the cells are able to\nsatisfy their craving, and simultaneously a new hunger-feeling arises in\nthe soul. Although it is the _same food_ that satisfies both parties,\nit is the same food administered in different forms, at a different\ntime, and in a different mode. We are concerned with dissimilar beings\npossessed of wants at once different and yet most intimately associated.\n\nThe connection is not difficult to understand. When the soul comprehends\nthe need of the stomach, it is the collective want of the cells that\ncomes to expression as the individual want of the soul. The different\nneeds receive in different form an identical substance and this fact is\nobviously the connecting link between the soul and the cells. We might\nwithout difficulty carry out the same reasoning in regard to respiration\nand all the other physiological processes of the body.\n\nFrom what we have said it is evident that the soul and the cells employ\nthe body differently; but for the sake of clearness this ought perhaps\nto be further accentuated. The difference may be thus expressed: The\nsoul acts with the members and organs of the body as units, whereas the\ncells perform the work of the organs as individuals. It would be easy\nto explain what this implies if we could point to similar conditions\nin human society. But no exactly similar institutions exist there, at\nleast not to the same extent. They would exist if the ideal socialistic\nstate was realized. The cells in their sphere have carried through a\ncommunism of the most rigid form. Their social organs then do not work at\nthe cell-individual\u2019s own initiative, but only upon the command of the\ncentral power and under its guidance and control. But even in the present\norganization of mankind, we find a few organs which offer a suggestive\ncomparison. Especially is this the case with the defensive organ of\nsociety, the standing army, which is entirely under the control of the\ncentral power and acts only upon its command and under its control.\n\nAs to its composition the army is a mass of independently living\nindividuals, co-operating so as to form an organic whole. All the work\nthis unit performs is done by the thousands of soldiers of which it is\ncomposed. If the government decides to use this organ, that is if it\ndeclares war, we know that it leads, arranges and controls the army as\none unit. It is not concerned with the soldiers as individuals, but only\nas organized masses.\n\nExactly analogous is the relation between the soul and the organs,\ncomposed of cells, in man\u2019s organism. Here also the cell-individuals\nperform the work of the different organs. The soul is not concerned\nwith the cells as individuals. It governs, guides and superintends the\nmovements of the members as elements; that is, commands the cells as\norganic masses.\n\nWe now consider the following facts established. The soul and the cells\nare different beings with different wants. They do not feel or comprehend\nin the same way and can therefore not have immediate perceptions of\neach other. However true this is on one side it is on the other just\nas certain that they are so intimately connected as to form the same\norganism through the medium of which they feel their mutual wants and\ntherefore must have some comprehension of each other. This strange and,\nas it may seem, contradictory relation depends on the fact that the union\nbetween the soul and the cells does not extend to their whole entity.\nWe have seen that the soul comprehended only the collective not the\nindividual wants of the cells. Within certain defined limits therefore\nthey have a common substance that causes their marvelous co-operation\nthrough the body.\n\nTo understand and explain this co\u00f6peration we must make clear how the\nsoul and the cells in their _innermost_ nature are united. And we shall\nlearn this by going to the bottom of the meaning of the expression that a\ncommon substance so governs their relationship that the collective wants\nof the cells become the individual wants of the soul.\n\nHow then are the soul and the cells intrinsically connected?\n\nThe answer may be derived in two ways. We might take both the subjective\nand the objective side of the wants as our point of view. If we first\nconsider the subjective side the relationship between the soul and the\ncells may be stated as follows:\n\nWe have previously pointed out that in its wants a living being perceives\nits own ego as related to something else. This is an axiom that needs no\ndemonstration. If now the soul comprehends the collective wants of the\ncells as its own, this can only mean that the soul comprehends that part\nof the cells\u2019 inner nature which expresses itself as their collective\nwants, as a part of its own ego. Again the cells within the same limits\non their part comprehend the soul\u2019s inner nature as belonging to their\nown individuality. The connection within these limits is so intimate that\nthey cannot comprehend themselves without at the same time comprehending\neach other. The soul must consequently perceive the body as its own body\nbecause the same wants that cause the cells to upbuild the soul also\nbelong to the soul\u2019s own entity. On the other hand the soul in conceiving\nitself cannot comprehend the cells as such because the identity is not\nextended to their whole individuality.\n\nWhen a being conceives the wants of somebody else as its own wants it\nis at the same time directly influenced by the other. Thus the soul\nand the cells act upon each other throughout the body. A will of the\nsoul takes with natural necessity the form of a common impulse upon the\ncells bringing them into action in the will\u2019s direction. If the soul,\nfor instance, wishes to move an arm or a hand, a collective want is\nsimultaneously created in the cells that form the organ in question to\nexecute that movement.\n\nWe arrive at the same result by considering the fact that the different\nwants of the soul and of the cells are identical in substance. The\nsame substance cannot enter into and define different beings unless\nthey themselves enter in and define each other. As now both parties\ncomprehend wants identical in substance, the soul must necessarily belong\nto the cells so that it is the ground for their collective wants. But\nthese wants were the cell-individual\u2019s higher wants, manifested in the\norganization of the body. The soul therefore is potentially present in\nthe cells in the form of their higher wants and is consequently developed\nalong with the upbuilding of the body. Only when this is ready is the\nsoul\u2019s entity developed. The soul must then comprehend the organism as\nits particular body when conscious of its own ego, but the cells do not\nenter into the soul\u2019s entity as individuals and are therefore not present\nas such in man\u2019s consciousness.\n\nFor this organic co-operation the soul and the cells need no language, no\nsigns to communicate with each other. It is not even necessary that they\nare aware of each other\u2019s existence. It is sufficient that each party\ncomprehends its own wants and acts for their satisfaction according\nto its own nature. If they do this their co-operation through the body\nreceives a simple and at the same time complete explanation.\n\nBut however natural this interaction is, it is nevertheless a wonder\nabove all wonders. The world that exists to the soul does not exist to\nthe cells, and _vice versa_. They have an entirely different conception\nof the realm in which they live. They have different apprehensions,\nfeelings and wants and perform accordingly different functions. But\nin spite of this they are, as we have seen, within certain limits so\nintimately connected that these different comprehensions and labors are\ninterlinked with each other, regulating each other as accurately as the\nwheels in a clock.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI.\n\nResurrection.\n\n\nFrom the relationship existing between the soul and the cells it appears\nthat the former cannot live a life independent of the latter. The soul\nreceives its entire individuality, all its qualities, forces, and\nfaculties, through the organism built by the cells, which therefore\nmust exist before the soul can exist as the real unity in the organism.\nThis does not mean that the soul is an empty form void of independent\nsubstance. Even before the cells have combined into an organic unit the\nsoul is potentially present in them in the form of the wants that force\nthem to upbuild the organism, and this organism is that of the soul, not\nthat of the cells, of which each possesses its individual organism.\n\nBut if the soul is potentially present in the cells it is only through\nthem that it can arise to a higher life. We have already shown in another\nconnection that a direct transposition would be useless and meaningless.\nEndowed with his present organs adapted to earthly conditions, a man\nsuddenly translated into the glories of a higher world would with\nseeing eyes yet see nothing, with hearing ears hear nothing and with\nfeeling senses would feel nothing. To comprehend what there exists and\nhappens, man\u2019s own organism must have undergone a corresponding radical\ntransformation. He must have new, more perfect senses, higher spiritual\nand bodily faculties, differing from his present as far as the objects in\nthis higher world differ from those on earth. This transfigured body can\nonly be organized by the same beings that built it here in time. The soul\nis inseparably united with these beings and is where they are.\n\nHere in time man commences with a cell and with a cell he must begin\nin a future life. This first cell with which man enters his next\nform of existence cannot logically be any other than the first dying\ncell-individual. As no atom, so no elementary unit of the living\nspiritual body is annihilated. Viewed from our present existence death\ncannot mean anything to the departed cell-generations but the cessation\nof life and activity in the world responsive to our senses. In reality\nthey rise to a higher evolution under different conditions and this\nevolution must be identical with the upbuilding of the glorified body man\nshall possess in a future life.\n\nThis form of death and resurrection, natural because it is founded on\nthe idea and nature of the organism, is common to all living beings and\nmust so be, as they are all built according to the same general plan and\ntherefore essentially subject to the same evolutionary processes. The\nbirth and death of the lower individuals in whole generations is known\nto be a universal phenomenon in every organism and we will now endeavor\nshortly to explain this process.\n\nIf the soul enters as a real part in every individual cell, it does not\nbelong differently to the first generation than to the last or to the\nwhole series of intermediary generations. But here in time man lives only\nin the generation existing at the present moment. The generations that\nin the past successively formed the spiritual substance of his body have\nalready gone out of time and those that are coming have not yet made\ntheir entrance. Man\u2019s entity is thus split or distributed upon a series\nof successively existing moments, each of which contains only a certain\nlimited part of the organism, and the latter has therefore in reality a\nfar broader extent than is seen at present.\n\nBut time confines and restricts man not only in this, but in all\nrespects. To take another example, we know that man possesses a multitude\nof different faculties and talents. But in time he cannot utilize them\nall. As a member of society he devotes himself to a certain trade or\nprofession. Now there are thousands of different possible activities and\ntherefore thousands of different talents that every man might develop\nbut never can, simply for lack of time. Time is not even sufficient to\nfully develop one human talent in one definite direction. Man has at\nhis disposal only the present moment, and in each moment he can only\nthink one thought, perform one act, satisfy one need. It is said that\nman should develop all his faculties _evenly_, but so long as he lives\nin time this is an impossibility. As a matter of fact man can only live\nthis life piecemeal, and in this time-existence proper we have the\nexplanation of the fact that man distributes his body over a series of\ncell-generations.\n\nThe law of the indestructibility of matter and energy is valid also in\nthe ideal world and this necessarily since it is a demand of thought\nitself.[3] Applied to spiritual substance, which can exist only in\nthe form of living individuals, the law may be expressed, \u201cAll living\nbeings are immortal.\u201d If therefore the cell-generations that in the\npast composed man\u2019s organism can no more be annihilated than the future\ngenerations can be created from nothing, this implies that man has an\nindividual existence not only after but _before_ his entrance into this\nworld. If such be the case we must be able to derive and explain our\nearthly life from this pre-existence. Can it now be shown that man\u2019s\nconditions in his pre-existence are such that he needs and must go\nthrough an evolution in time? In that case history may perhaps give\nus a hint how to answer the question, or would this pre-existence be\nan entirely new thought? By no means. Pre-existence is and must be a\nfundamental idea in all religions because they all suppose that man\nemanated from God through an original act of creation. That the Christian\nreligion especially has this basic idea Victor Rydberg has fully\ndemonstrated in a treatise entitled \u201cMan\u2019s Pre-existence.\u201d\n\nBut although we may say that all religions teach a pre-existence we\ndo not mean that this idea has been or even could have been rightly\nunderstood. We might expect just the contrary, as pre-existence is\nconnected with the common conception that man\u2019s soul as well as the\nmaterial world was once created in time, in which case pre-existence can\nonly mean an existence extending very far back in time. There was a time\nwhen God existed but not man, which latter, as being created, must have\nan _existence separate from God_ even if he may in other respects be\ncalled His image.\n\nThis form of belief in pre-existence shows the same shortcomings and is\nsubject to the same objections as the whole orthodox theory of creation.\nAs we can and must ask how a perfect God could create an imperfect,\nthat is, an evolutionary world, we might also ask, why was man created\nwith the necessity for an evolution in time when he never could develop\nanything but what God had implanted potentially in his being? Instead\nof explaining evolution this theory only makes it so much the more\nmysterious.\n\nBesides this conception, however, the religious intuition has surmised\nthat the connection between God and man is profoundly deeper and more\nintimate. Man does _not_ have an existence separate from God. This\nintuitive thought, intensified in highly religious souls, has led them to\npreach, _that man possesses a life in God; is part of His own being, is a\nliving member in His perfect organism_. If this be true, why, again, must\nman go through an evolution? Is he not as unchangeable as God Himself?\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII.\n\nMan and Infinity.\n\n\nIt is the perennial honor of Sweden\u2019s greatest philosopher, Christofer\nJacob Bostr\u00f6m, to have satisfactorily explained the extremely difficult\nand complicated question with which our last chapter concluded. He has\nshown that man, exactly on the supposition that he is an eternal part\nof God\u2019s being, requires and must go through an evolution in time.\nAccording to Bostr\u00f6m, religious intuition has found the truth that man\nis an eternal idea in God, a living member in His organism. But Bostr\u00f6m\nhas also understood and considered the difference implied in thinking\nof man as a member in God\u2019s organism and in thinking of this member as\nliving its independent life. In the former case man possesses the same\nqualities as God; in the latter, these qualities with corresponding\nlimitations.\n\nFor an illustration of how all limited beings are incorporated in an\nabsolute personality, Bostr\u00f6m likes to fall back on the numerical system.\nSpiritual beings form a series, as it were, of lower and higher entities,\nwhere the latter contain the former pretty much as higher numbers\ncontain the smaller. Bostr\u00f6m distinguishes between positive and negative\nattributes, and means by the former those attributes without which the\nbeing cannot be thought, and which it therefore in one sense contains.\nSo for instance in the number ten, all the previous numbers are positive\nattributes because ten cannot be thought without them, which, however,\ndoes not imply identity with either of the lower numbers. On the other\nhand all the following numbers are negative attributes to the number ten\nbecause this may well be thought without them. It contains them only if\nit is considered as one point in the numerical system, in which case it\nhas them all as attributes. Thus, still referring to the number ten, this\nmay be considered complete within itself without considering the higher\nnumbers, whereas if we wish to comprehend it fully we must see it as a\nlink in the numerical system. Ten would not be the half of twenty without\nthe latter, and so on. The existence of the higher is after all required\nfor that of the lower as fully as the existence of the lower is necessary\nto that of the higher.\n\nBecause each entity is higher according as it has a larger number of the\nrest as its positive and a smaller number as its negative attributes, it\nfollows that the highest entity, or Deity, has no negative attributes but\nonly positive ones, which of course is the true meaning of the expression\nthat God is the most perfect being.\n\nAs a lower being is more perfectly defined when considered included in a\nhigher, this fact must be the reason why all finite, rational beings in\ntheir evolution try to assert themselves in the higher beings, up to the\nhighest, by whom they finally obtain their full scope and in whom only\nthey live their complete life.\n\nBut if Bostr\u00f6m had lived to study the modern cytology he would have found\na more adequate comparison within man\u2019s organism, and one that perhaps\nin several respects would have modified his conception of the world of\ndivine ideas.\n\nGod is related to man as man is, not to the cell, but to the lower units\nof which the cell is composed. Between God and man there is at least one\nother organism that we know of, namely humanity. But if we overlook this\nand for simplicity\u2019s sake imagine the relationship as that of man to cell\nit should be evident from what has been previously said that man is and\nmust be something else to God than he is to himself.\n\nTo God he is what the cell is to man, a living part in His organism, and\nin this capacity he possesses all the perfect qualities of that organism.\nLiving his independent life, man is in the same position as the cell\nin his own being, when the cell is thought of as living the life it is\nconfined to by its less perfect organism.\n\nAlthough limited to that life the cell may literally be said to be man\u2019s\nimage\u2014but an image of a very singular kind. The cell does not reproduce\nman\u2019s traits as does a photograph or a statue, but within its lower realm\nit mirrors the fundamental qualities of the original on a very reduced\nscale.\n\nThese limitations can not be conceived by the cell as such because\nthey are natural to it and belong to its entity. The cell is and must\nfeel itself as perfect in its realm as man in his. Only if the cell\ncould compare its conditions with man\u2019s, these limitations would be\napparent to it, and such a comparison the cell really undertakes within\ncertain limits. Into each feeling of want enters a comparison between\nthe possessed and the desired. In the higher wants, then, that drive\nthe cells to upbuild man\u2019s organism we have a manifestation of such a\ncomparing power of the cell. Experience shows that the cell may live\nin a veritable natural state, but it is also, because of the presence\nof the soul in its innermost being, capable of a high culture for the\ndevelopment of which it receives constant impulses and stimulations from\nthe soul.\n\nIn the same sense man may be said to be the image of God. Living in the\nworld and the natural state, to which he is confined by his relatively\nimperfect organism, man has the qualities of God with corresponding\nlimitations. But even in this state he feels the spirit of God present\nin him because he is an original part of God\u2019s own organism. In his\nconscience and in his religious feeling man not only comprehends\ndistinctly the presence of God in his inner being but constantly\nreceives also impulses, incitements and inspirations to develop that\nperfect life and heavenly kingdom, of which he is called by his high\norigin and divine birth to become a citizen.\n\nWhat the conscience and the religious feelings are to the will, the\nlogical laws of thinking are to the reason, and in the latter, man finds\nGod as immediately present as in the former. Indeed, logical laws are the\nform in which God himself exists.\n\nBecause of God\u2019s presence in the eternal laws of our thinking, man is\nable to appraise himself and his condition with an absolute measure, and\ncan in this way obtain a certain knowledge of God\u2019s world and of his\nperfect qualities. He has only to abstract all wants and limitations\nfrom such qualities as have a positive content, because lack of want is\nperfectness. We shall now undertake such a valuation with respect to\nman\u2019s need of evolution here in time, which quality, as all the others,\ncan be explained and understood only through its connection with the\ncorresponding quality in the absolute being.\n\nIt is as natural to God to be without an origin and an evolution as it is\nto man to have them, and we might therefore ask how man in this respect\ncan have anything in common with God, a condition which, as we remember,\nwas indispensable for any comparison whatever. To make this point clear\nwe may express ourselves in a more familiar way. We might speak of time\nand existence in time, instead of origin and evolution, as the latter are\nonly forms of time.\n\nIs there then a moment in time that has a corresponding meaning for God\nand the limitations of which we must abstract in order to understand\nGod\u2019s quality of being eternal? It is by analyzing the relation between\ntime and eternity that we hope to receive an answer to the question why\nman must undergo an evolution in time.\n\nThe most conspicuous want in all that exists in time is its lack of\nduration; everything has a beginning and an end. With this lack of\nduration a corresponding lack of reality follows. The real is real, only\nas long as it lasts or only in the present moment. Everything past has\nceased to exist and is therefore no longer real, and the future is unreal\nbecause it has not entered the present.\n\nThe real in time is identical with the present, which therefore must be\nthe moment most like eternity and the limitations of which we have to\nremove.\n\nFirst of all, the present in time suffers the want of ceasing and\nsinking back into the past, into unreality. We can overcome this only\nby raising everything past from its grave, so to speak, and drawing it\nsimultaneously into the present. To the eternally present, nothing past,\nending or ceasing can exist.\n\nOn the other hand the present in time suffers the same want in the\nopposite direction, inasmuch as everything future is excluded therefrom\nand this future growing reality must therefore be drawn into the eternal.\nNeither past nor future can exist to God; He lives life undividedly,\nwithout limitations, and needs not, as man, plot out his existence in a\nseries of moments. Eternity then is not identical with unending time; it\nis a different form of existence, related to time as the perfect to the\nimperfect.\n\nDifficult as it is to explain what eternity implies as the perfect form\nof existence, it is no less difficult to comprehend the infinite wealth\nof content that such a form includes. We will therefore give a few brief\nsuggestions in this direction.\n\nHow poor in content is everything present to man, and likewise how\ndefective and unsatisfactory is his whole life here in time. As a matter\nof fact we can in each moment only think one thought, perform one act,\nsatisfy one want. We read a book and we are only conscious of one line\nor one sentence at a time. We listen to a musical creation or admire\nan exhibition of art, and we only hear a few harmonies, or see a few\ndetails of one picture, more distinctly at the time, and so on. How much\nricher would not our life be if we could think the book from beginning\nto end at once, hear the harmony of the entire oratorio, now focus the\nbeauties in smallest details of the whole picture-gallery to one point.\nIt even dazzles our spiritual eye if we enlarge the range of such a rich\nintuition to encompass not only our nearest environments but our whole\nearth or possibly our entire solar system, and yet we have only taken one\nstep on a road that has no end. Our solar system is only an insignificant\npoint among those innumerable worlds that form the Milky Way, beyond\nwhich the astronomers surmise the existence of other hosts of stars\nwithout limit. If we now could share in life at every point in this\ninfinity of worlds, would then our conception of the content of eternity\nbe exact? By no means. We must include in this present moment everything\nthat has happened on these worlds since the dawn of time and similarly\nall that will occur in the millenniums to come. Is the eternal measure\nnow full and overflowing? By no means. Above us and below us there are\nbeings to whom other universes exist as infinite in all directions as\nour own. All these infinities of infinities must be drawn into eternity,\nbut then, surely, the measure must be full. By no means. We have all\nthis time moved within the realm of phenomena, that is to say, in the\nfinite world; all this is only a faint shadow of the wealth that eternity\ncontains. God lives in a light that no man hath seen nor yet can see.\n\nIn this light, in this perfectness, man is a part of the divine entity.\nThis life in God\u2019s eternal consciousness is man\u2019s primary and original\nexistence. Only in a secondary meaning is he a self-existent personality\nand is then no more identical with God than the cell is with man.\n\nMan as an entity for himself must have the natural limitations of the\npart. Conceived by God man is eternal in the divine sense, but conceived\nby himself man\u2019s eternal life is clothed in the limitations we call time.\nThe eternal is a constant present without beginning or end, without\npast or future. What is present to man must suffer these limitations;\nin other words, man must be born, must go through an evolution, or what\nis the same, become to himself what he has been eternally to God. In\nthis respect man\u2019s relation to God may be compared to the relation of a\nnewborn child to its earthly father. To him the nature and scope of the\nchild is perfectly clear, but the child is unconscious of it and must\nawaken to an understanding thereof, that is to say, must become to itself\nwhat it already is to its father.\n\nLiving beings form a continuous series in the absolute organism. This\nseries is such that the higher beings form the conditions and supports\nof the lower. This connection must be entirely reversed during evolution\nitself, which naturally proceeds from the lower to the higher. In time\ntherefore the generation and development of the lower beings must precede\nthat of the higher. We have also seen that the evolution of the former\nis identical with the upbuilding of the organisms of the latter, and\nwe understand now that the whole process _must_ essentially follow the\ncourse which, as we have previously shown, it does in fact, actually take.\n\nIt is further the inherent idea of time that man\u2019s eternal entity\ncannot appear whole and undivided. He must plot it out along a series\nof successive moments which make room for only one cell-generation at a\ntime. As the cell\u2019s entity again has a less comprehensive content than\nman\u2019s, its lifetime must be correspondingly shorter.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII.\n\nRecapitulation.\n\n\nThe theory we have here advanced may naturally seem startling; for what\ncould be more foreign to common conceptions than the assertion that\nscience today gives us full evidence of a death and a resurrection that\ncommence during our life in time? Considering this, it may be appropriate\nto recapitulate the salient points in our line of thought.\n\nFrom prehistoric times up to our own days all people at all stages of\nevolution have to a man been convinced that the body in some way and in\nsome form contains an imperishable and essential part which man cannot\ndo without in a future life. With this intuitive and purely instinctive\nfaith as a basis, the steps in the following historical evolution become\nfully natural and logical consequences.\n\nIt is not to be wondered at that this eternal part should at first sight\nbe considered identical with the material body. Therefore it was also\nnatural that a cult of the dead would be the stage where all people\nbegin. Man sees however that death as a matter of fact separates the\nimmortal soul from that body which the soul cannot dispense with. The\nseparation cannot be complete because the ties cannot be severed. The\nsoul then is attached to the body even after death. Consequently it must\nbe the duty of the surviving to provide the body of the deceased with a\ndwelling as good and suitable as possible and also with the provisions\nthat the body needs.\n\nA man could not, however, find such a condition satisfactory for any\nlength of time, and the thought of death gnaws and torments him. Shall\nthe soul never regain possession of the body without which even the\nglories of heaven are pale and shadowy? The doctrine of the bodily\nresurrection on the day of judgment must be the next great progress in\nour philosophy of life.\n\nBut unusually gifted persons, bent towards idealism, had already felt\ninstinctively that it was not the exterior, material covering that was\nindispensable to the soul. Man possessed also another, a spiritual body\nwhich the soul could immediately transfer to another life. We gain a\nglimpse of the vividness of this intuition in large groups of men, when\nwe remember that the survivors even sought to annihilate the material\nbody by the flames of the pyre in order to liberate the deceased from\nhis earthly ties. The great masses of the population could not rise to\nthis ideal conception, and we therefore find the two fundamental ideas\nprevailing side by side.\n\nHere the two first epochs in man\u2019s history end. They show us the intimate\nconnection between religious conceptions and man\u2019s understanding of the\nexterior world in which he lives and acts. The following stage commences\nlogically with the great advancement of the natural sciences. Chemistry\npartly lifts the veil that hides the innermost nature of matter, and at\nthe dawn of the new science the old ideas concerning the nature of the\nbody disappear like the shadows of night at the rising of the sun.\n\nA bodily resurrection on doomsday is impossible because every dead body\nsooner or later arises and takes part in the circulation of matter, so\nthat on the day of judgment it might be found that the same materials had\nentered over and over again into the composition of a variety of human\nbodies. It is also a fact that man changes his material clothing several\ntimes even during his earthly life. But the belief in the essential value\nof the body is too deeply rooted to give away entirely and so we meet it\nagain in the modern materialism which perhaps may be said to emphasize\nthe significance of the body even more than the cult of the dead did in\nancient time.\n\nBut while materialism claims as its own the consequences of the\nrevolutionary work of chemistry, biology lays the firm foundation for a\nnew and higher development of religious conceptions. Biology discovers\nand proves the existence of that spiritual body which humanity has\nsurmised since prehistoric times. It is to this extraordinarily important\nfact that we desired to call attention. We have endeavored to draw its\nconsequences only as regards the cell-generations which successively\nrise and die in the human body as in human society. Now when it can be\nshown that these dying generations are eternal and imperishable parts\nof man\u2019s own nature, the conception of death and resurrection we have\nhere advanced must be the only possible one. The hitherto common ideas\nregarding the translation of man to another world have upon closer study\nbeen found as na\u00efve as they are unnatural, because any such direct\ntransposition of man\u2019s entity is impossible and unthinkable.\n\nBut however simple and scientifically natural the theory here proposed,\nit could not have appeared at a much earlier date. It requires not only\nthe results of modern cytology but also the widening of the idea of\nimmortality which natural science suggests and overwhelmingly proves. It\npresupposes also the law of evolution we have endeavored to make clear,\nnamely, that beings endowed with common wants and existing in similar\nsurroundings and conditions cannot develop, except by the upbuilding of\nan organism, and thus entering as organic members in an individual of\nhigher order than themselves. From these premises we might have deduced\nour theory of death and resurrection and yet the whole process would\nstill have seemed mysterious and inexplicable but for the work of our\ngreat predecessor, _Christofer Jacob Bostr\u00f6m_, that Plato of the North,\nso often misunderstood by his contemporaries, or at least more known on\naccount of certain possible deficiencies in his system than because of\nits imperishable merits.\n\nIdealism and materialism have hitherto stood as two absolutely\nincompatible contrasts and the fierce battle that continuously rages,\neven in our days, between the two world-conceptions can, according to\ncommon notions, only be brought to an end through the complete defeat\nof one of the parties. We have endeavored to show that both these\nphilosophies have common deficiencies, but that each of them possesses\nan essential part of truth. We cannot deny idealism the merit of having\nlooked far deeper into the nature of things and phenomena. While\nadmitting this we cannot be blind to the fact that this philosophy\nhas left at least one fact of nearly overwhelming importance totally\nunexplained. If it be true that the soul is the essential part of\nman and is that to which alone immortality is granted, how then shall\nwe account for the fact that the soul\u2019s evolution, properly the one\nprincipal object of man, must stand aside for the body to such an extent\nthat the body utilizes, if not all yet at least the largest part of man\u2019s\ntime and energy? To materialism this reply is given, but then again this\nphilosophy has been unable to answer all those questions which idealism\nalone could satisfactorily explain.\n\nNow at last we understand the reason for these contradictions. The\ntwo world-conceptions suffer the same essential deficiency of having\noverlooked the fact that the body contains a spiritual organism, of the\nsame importance to man\u2019s future life as to his present. In the theory\nhere proposed materialism in a purified form melts into idealism,\nwhich latter thus receives the supplement it hitherto has lacked as a\nuniversal, satisfactory world-explanation. We have barely outlined this\nnew, organic idealism and have treated it somewhat more extensively\nonly with reference to death and resurrection. But also on this point\nour work, as all human effort, is only piecemeal labor. As soon as we\nhave advanced one step, other entirely new questions arise. We already\ndiscern boundless expanses of problems in the same direction and shall\nhere point out one example. The organic changes, characterizing old\nage and preceding the so-called natural death, are comparatively well\nstudied and known. But in spite of this, natural science is unable to\ntell us the underlying cause in the inner nature of the organism, and\nit is even admitted that we know no reason why the process should not\nfollow an entirely opposite course. From our point of view man has an\nindividual content larger than that included in the successive moments of\ntime, and death should normally enter with the translation of the last\ncell-generation. It is true that as civilization advances man\u2019s lifetime\nis constantly increasing, so that we may look forward to a time when\nmost men will die a natural death. But if we meet a premature death, as\nis now generally the case, can this, and other disturbing interruptions\nin the natural process, afterwards be repaired? Let us hope that this is\npossible, but a decisive answer we cannot give. Our conviction is that\nGod does not interfere to help man either in the transition itself or\nin a future life in any other way than he does here in time. Certainly\nthe clerical orthodoxy has rightly understood the divine guidance\nin its teaching of God\u2019s general providence, comprising the whole\ncreation, His special providence in regard to mankind, and His most\nparticular providence, limited to the faithful; that is, to those that\nlet themselves be governed by the divine will. Critical experience has\nnever discovered any exterior, occasional interference, which moreover\nis utterly impossible. God is present and active in the eternal and\nunchangeable laws of nature and spirit. Sin and punishment, virtue and\nreward, are connected with each other as reason and conclusion, cause\nand effect. Man is himself the cause of his acts and they bring their\ninevitable consequences. The man therefore who consciously and purposely\ndistorts his own natural evolution or that of others stands before\nhimself and before his fellow men burdened with a terrible responsibility.\n\n\n\n\nFOOTNOTES\n\n\n[1] The latest researches in regard to the newly discovered corpuscles\nshow that these \u201cbodies\u201d have a mass proportional to the square of their\nvelocity, thus forcing us to conclude that they at rest have no mass.\nPerhaps, therefore, the ancient dualistic world of matter and force\nis merging into a larger unity where life directs force to serve its\nspecific purposes.\u2014Translator\u2019s note.\n\n[2] Chemists understand that the so-called native iron, found, for\ninstance, in Greenland, forms no real exception more than the chemical\nreactions that absorb heat form exceptions to the general law that\nchemical processes set heat free, because if the necessary simultaneous\nreactions are taken into account, all the reactions as a whole show a\nsurplus of heat.\u2014Translator\u2019s note.\n\n[3] Bj\u00f6rklund might here properly have referred to his previous\ndemonstration of the fact that life has no roots in time, consequently is\nindependent of this principle\u2014i. e., immortal.\u2014Translator\u2019s note.\n\n\n\n\nINDEX\n\n\n    Absolute organism, the, 187.\n\n    Achilles, 14.\n\n    Activity, incitement to, 154.\n\n    Adaptation, 149.\n\n    Affinity, 97.\n\n    Agni, the elementary, 24.\n\n    Annihilation contrary to nature, 1, 168.\n\n    Army organization, 159f.\n\n    Art and organic matter, 107, 111, 119f.\n\n    Ask and Embla, 21.\n\n    Athens, 9.\n\n\n    Bacteria, 57.\n\n    Belief in future life, 2.\n\n    Biology and the spiritual body, 192.\n\n    Bj\u00f6rklund, Johan Gustaf, VII.\n\n    Body, importance of the, 18.\n\n    Bostr\u00f6m, Christofer Jacob, 174, 194.\n\n    Burial ceremonies, 9, 20.\n\n    B\u00fcchner, 48f, 56, 62, 69, 73, 75, 83.\n\n\n    Causality, 118, 119.\n\n    Cause, sufficient, 117.\n\n    Cells, living units, 27, 29;\n      man, a community of, 30;\n      a system of, 142.\n\n    Chemical reactions, 76, 82.\n\n    Chinese civilization, 10;\n      death-cultus, 11.\n\n    Chlorophyll, 115.\n\n    Christianity, 16, 20.\n\n    Church burial, 16.\n\n    Circulation, blood, 78.\n\n    Civilization, antiquity of Chinese, 10.\n\n    Cohesion, 97.\n\n    Conscience, 44.\n\n    Consciousness, 45.\n\n    Combustion, 92, 94ff.\n\n    Communism, cell, 159.\n\n    Co\u00f6peration, innermost, 161.\n\n    Corporeal existence, soul\u2019s craving for, 15.\n\n    Cosmic catastrophe, a, 103.\n\n    Creation, orthodox theory of, 67, 173.\n\n    Cremation, 21, 24.\n\n    Customs, grave, 13.\n\n    Coulanges, Fustel de, 7, 10.\n\n    Cytology, 28, 29, 177, 193.\n\n\n    Darwin\u2019s theory, 62.\n\n    Death, and dissolution, 1;\n      in mid-ocean, 12.\n\n    Death-cultus, 11, 49, 189, 192.\n\n    Decay, 105, 116.\n\n    Deity, 176.\n\n    Dextrose, 82.\n\n    \u201cDivision of labor,\u201d organic, 141.\n\n    Dogma, 16, 51.\n\n    Doomsday, 191.\n\n    Dove, 128.\n\n    Dualism, ecclesiastical, 21, 88.\n\n    Dusch, von, 57.\n\n    Duty of matrimony in China, 12.\n\n    Dying and renewal, process of, 125.\n\n\n    Earth, history of our, 100.\n\n    Ego, perceived as relation, the, 162f.\n\n    Elysian fields, 15.\n\n    Energy of a living being, the, 72.\n\n    Entity, the soul\u2019s, 164;\n      man\u2019s, 169;\n      the divine, 185.\n\n    Equivalents of energy, 89.\n\n    Eskimo, the, 13.\n\n    Eternal, the, 181, 185f.\n\n    Eternity, 183.\n\n    Ether, 89.\n\n    Evolution, 17, 26.\n\n    Existence beyond the grave, 37.\n\n    Experience, daily, 77.\n\n\n    Faith, founded on probability, 37.\n\n    Fear, effect of, 131.\n\n    Fechner, Gustav, V.\n\n    Flourens, 129.\n\n    Folk-lore, IV.\n\n    Food, 156.\n\n    Forces, inorganic, 74;\n      as qualities, 76;\n      and resistance, 87.\n\n    Forms of energy, 88.\n\n    Foundation fact, Bj\u00f6rklund\u2019s, XII.\n\n    Fries, S. A. D. D., VII.\n\n    Fuel, organic, 93.\n\n    Function, bodily, 48.\n\n    Funeral ceremonies, 7.\n\n    Furnace heat and the sun, 109.\n\n    Future life, modern attitude toward, 4.\n\n\n    Geology, 62, 69.\n\n    Ghosts, 25.\n\n    God, image of, 22;\n      presence of, in logical laws, 180.\n\n    Granfelt, 19.\n\n    Grave, communications from the, 7;\n      in China, 12.\n\n    Grew, 28.\n\n\n    Harvey\u2019s formula, 55f, 58, 62ff, 67, 122.\n\n    Heat, equivalents of, 98f.\n\n    Historical process, the, 46, 70, 188f.\n\n    Hierologists, Germanic, 22.\n\n    Hoffman, 58.\n\n    H\u00f6ner, 22.\n\n    Humanity, a higher organism, 126;\n      the link between God and man, 177.\n\n    Hunger, 156.\n\n    Hydrates of carbon, 82.\n\n\n    Idea, man, God\u2019s eternal, 174.\n\n    Idealism, 18, 194.\n\n    Image of God, the soul an, 172f, 179.\n\n    Immaterial experience, 45, 50.\n\n    Immortality, instinctive, 1, 2;\n      of the cell, 124.\n\n    Incentives, 119.\n\n    Indestructibility of matter and energy, 170.\n\n    Indian tribes, 13.\n\n    Industry, a common need of, 145.\n\n    Inertia, 111.\n\n    Instinct, faith and, 4, 6;\n      social, 144.\n\n    Intellect, mechanical equivalent of, 90.\n\n    Intelligence and the soul, 132.\n\n    Intuition, 26, 44, 173f.\n\n    Islam, 15.\n\n\n    Judaism, 15.\n\n    Jungle of materialism, the, XV.\n\n\n    Key, Ellen, VIII.\n\n\n    Laboratory results, 83, 84.\n\n    Language, cell, 164.\n\n    Lavoisier, 72.\n\n    Life-force, so-called, 71, 73, 121.\n\n    Life, supernatural origin of, 123.\n\n    Logical laws the form in which God exists, 180.\n\n    Limitations, man\u2019s, 178.\n\n    Lodur, 21.\n\n\n    Machine, the living, 79, 139.\n\n    Malpighi, 28.\n\n    Man, a social organism of cells, 32;\n      responsibility of, 198.\n\n    Material, organic, 112f.\n\n    Materialism, 19, 49, 85.\n\n    Matrimony in China, 11.\n\n    Matter, 47, 68, 88, 96, 118.\n\n    Mechanical toy, man not a, XIV.\n\n    Mechanism of the organism, 138.\n\n    Memory, 146.\n\n    Metamorphosis, 40.\n\n    Micro-organic world, the, 58.\n\n    Mid-ocean, death in, 12.\n\n    Microscope, the, 28, 155.\n\n    Mirbel, Brisseau de, 29.\n\n    Mind, time-bound and space-bound, XIV.\n\n    Moldenhaver, 29.\n\n    Molecules, 96.\n\n    \u201cMoss-clad fragment,\u201d the, 65.\n\n    Motility, mechanical, 79.\n\n    Mutability, 91.\n\n    Mythology, Germanic, 21.\n\n\n    Nations as organisms, 31.\n\n    Natural science, 48, 191.\n\n    Nirvana, XIV.\n\n    Nobel prize, the, X.\n\n    Negroes, immortality ideas among, 12.\n\n    Nordenskold, 13.\n\n    Norse sagas, 15.\n\n\n    Odin, 22.\n\n    _Omne vivum ex vivo_, 59.\n\n    Organic structure, 33, 83, 84.\n\n    Origin of life, the, 70.\n\n    Oxygen, 102.\n\n\n    Pacific Ocean, 10.\n\n    Parasites, 54.\n\n    Parseeism, 15.\n\n    Pasteur, 58.\n\n    Permanence, law of, 89, 91.\n\n    Personal existence after death, 6.\n\n    Philosophy of science, the, 73.\n\n    Polar regions, 10.\n\n    Pre-existence, 171.\n\n    Prehistoric beliefs, 4, 188.\n\n    Present, the eternally, 182.\n\n    Presentiment, 2.\n\n    Priestley, 72.\n\n    Primitive ideas of immortality, 10.\n\n    Principles of life and physical force, 90, 91, 121.\n\n    Propagation, 54, 55, 61.\n\n    Providence, 133, 197.\n\n    Psychical Research, society for, III.\n\n    Psychologic order of evolution, 5.\n\n    Purpose, organic, 149.\n\n    Pyre, the funeral, 190.\n\n\n    Reasoning, headlong, 20.\n\n    Re-birth, 40.\n\n    Recapitulation, 188.\n\n    Religious instincts, 17.\n\n    Resurrection, 15f, 150, 166, 190.\n\n    Rydberg, Victor, 21, 172.\n\n\n    Sagas, 15.\n\n    Samoyede grave, a, 13.\n\n    Scheele, 72.\n\n    Schr\u00f6der, 57.\n\n    Schultze, 57.\n\n    Schwann, 57.\n\n    Science and resurrection, 16, 20, 74.\n\n    Scylla and Charybdis of science, the, XIV.\n\n    Sin, 198.\n\n    Skeptical attitude, modern, 3f.\n\n    Society, human, 32, 143, 158.\n\n    Solar system, the, 184.\n\n    Sorcerers, 25.\n\n    Soul, future life of the, 8, 14;\n      physiologists and the, 127;\n      functions of the, 130, 134;\n      a spiritual principle, 151.\n\n    Spallanzani, 57.\n\n    Spiritual body, a, 19f, 22, 26, 34f, 190, 195;\n      vision, 43;\n      interaction, 152;\n      beings, 175.\n\n    Spontaneous generation, 51, 52, 59, 105, 122.\n\n    Substance, living, 124;\n      comprehending, 153.\n\n    Sun, importance of the, 104.\n\n    Supernatural forces, 45, 67.\n\n    Steam engine, art and the, 108, 110.\n\n    Swedish Peace Society, X.\n\n\n    Teleological causality, 118.\n\n    Telepathy, III.\n\n    Thomson, Sir William, 63.\n\n    Time, a form of existence, 181.\n\n    Tissues, the, 142.\n\n    Tomb, life in the, 7.\n\n    Tool, the organism a, 135.\n\n    Transcendental world, a, 42.\n\n    Treviranus, 29.\n\n\n    Units, organic, 151.\n\n    Unity of the organism, 166f.\n\n    Upsala, VII.\n\n\n    Veda Aryans, 21, 23f.\n\n    Virtue, 198.\n\n    _Vis inertia_, 110f.\n\n    Vitalistic doctrine, 72.\n\n\n    Will incentive, 119.\n\n    W\u00f6hler, 81.","title":"Death and resurrection from the point of view of the cell-theory","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":33133}