Making of man : a study in evolution / by Sir Oliver Lodge.

  • Oliver Lodge
Date:
1924
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Making of man : a study in evolution / by Sir Oliver Lodge. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    23/194 (page 19)
    evanescent? We do not know the nature of Life and Mind. We see life arriving, we know not whence; and soon departing, we know not whither. Are we to assume that that is the whole of existence, as far as the individual is concerned; or is it but an episode in a far more permanent scheme? In the physical universe we know that things never start into existence or cease to be; save in the sense that an aggregate or a crowd assembles and then disperses. The crowd has no individual existence; and as a crowd it can come to an end. But that is not so with fundamental existences. They alter, they change, they manifest them¬ selves in different ways; and they may even cease to manifest themselves and may vanish from obvious ken; as when a cloud evapor¬ ates, or when a sound or other form of energy dies away. We know that really it has not ceased to be; it has only changed its form. Some things there are which have a beginning, but, to all appearance, need have no end. A poem, or drama, or great work of art, has an immortality of this sort, though its initial material representation may have a very transient life. Whether, for instance, the original manuscript of