Interval, during which it has ceased to exist, we have

already enquired.

And under this head of suspension may fall all those

cases, where a psychical association seems to have

become merely physical. In psychology we have

connections, which once certainly or possibly were

conscious, but now, in part or altogether, and either

always or at times, appear to happen without any

psychical links. But, however interesting for

psychology, these cases have little metaphysical importance.

And I will content myself here with repeating our former

warnings. It is, in the first place, not easy to be sure

of our ground, when we wholly exclude an unconscious

process in the soul. But, even when this has been

excluded, and we are left with bare body, the body will

be no more than relatively bare. We shall have reached

something where the soul in question is absent, but

where we cannot say that soul is absent altogether. For

there is no part of Nature, which we can say (Chapter

xxii.) is not directly organic to a soul or souls. And

the merely physical, we saw, is in any case a mere

abstraction. It is set apart from, and still depends on,

the whole of experience.

I will briefly notice another point. It may be

objected that our view implies interference with, or

suspension of, the laws of matter or of mind. And it

will be urged that such interference is wholly

untenable. This objection would rest on a

misunderstanding. Every law which is true is true always

and for ever; but, upon the other hand, every law is

emphatically an abstraction. And hence obviously all

laws are true only in the abstract. Modify the

conditions, add some elements to make the connection

more concrete, and the law is transcended. It

is not interfered with, and it holds, but it does not

hold of this case. It remains perfectly true, but is

inapplicable where the conditions which it supposes are

absent.

I have dwelt at length on the connection of body and

soul, but it presents a series of questions which we

have, even yet, not discussed. I must endeavour to

dispose of these briefly. Can we say that bare soul ever

acts upon body, and can soul exist at all without

matter, and if so, in what sense? In our experience

assuredly bare soul is not found. Its existence there,

and its action, are inseparable from matter; but a

question obviously can be asked with regard to what is

possible. As to this, I would begin by observing that,

if bare soul exists, I hardly see how we could prove its

existence. We have seen (Chapter xxii.) that we can set

no bounds to the variety of bodies. An extended organism

might, none the less, be widely scattered and

discontinuous; and again organisms might be shared

wholly or partially between souls. Further, of whatever

extended material a body is composed, there remains the

question of its possible functions and properties. I

cannot see how, on the one hand, we can fix the limits

of these. But upon the other hand, if we fail to do so,

I do not understand by what process we even begin to

infer the existence of bare soul. And our result so far must be this. We may

agree that soul, acting or existing in separation from

body, is a thing which is possible; but we are still

without the smallest reason, further, for regarding it

as real.

But is such a soul indeed possible? Or let us rather

ask, first, what such a soul would mean. For, if

disconnected from all extension, it might even then not

be naked. One can imagine an arrangement of

secondary qualities, not extended but constant; and this

might accompany psychical life and serve as a body

(p. 268). We have no reason for seriously entertaining

this idea, but, on the other hand, is there any argument

which would prove it impossible? And we may come to the

same conclusion with regard to bare soul. This would

mean a psychical series devoid of every quality that

could serve as an organism. Of course if it were a

"spirit," immaterial and at the same time localized and

extended, it would be inconsistent with itself. But

there is no necessity for our falling into such self-

contradiction. A psychical series without extension or

locality in space, I presume, is conceivable. And this

bare series might, for all we know, normally, or on

occasion, even influence body. Nay, for all that I can

perceive, such a naked soul might do more. Just as we

saw that soul can follow from material conditions, so,