How he accounts for its
origin in the places whence the meteors came, he does not say. Yet Sir
William Thomson believes in Creative Power; and in a subsequent page, we
shall quote his explicit repudiation of the atheistic element in the
Darwinian theory.
Strauss quotes Dubois-Reymond, a distinguished naturalist, as teaching
that the first of these great problems, viz. the origin of life, admits
of explanation on scientific (i. e., in his sense, materialistic)
principles; and even the third, viz. the origin of reason; but the
second, or the origin of consciousness, he says, "is perfectly
inscrutable." Dubois-Reymond holds that "the most accurate knowledge of
the essential organism reveals to us only matter in motion; but between
this material movement and my feeling pain or pleasure, experiencing a
sweet taste, seeing red, with the conclusion 'therefore I exist,' there
is a profound gulf; and it 'remains utterly and forever inconceivable
why to a number of atoms of carbon, hydrogen, etc., it should not be a
matter of indifference how they lie or how they move; nor, can we in any
wise tell how consciousness should result from their concurrent action.'
Whether," adds Strauss, "these _Verba Magistri_ are indeed the last word
on the subject, time only can tell."[57] But if it is inconceivable, not
to say absurd, that sense-consciousness should consist in the motion of
molecules of matter, or be a function of such molecules, it can hardly
be less absurd to account for thought, conscience, and religious
feeling and belief on any such hypothesis.
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