MIND AND BRAIN.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 3171, 27 August 1881, Page 4

MIND AND BRAIN.

Aristotle regarded the heart as the seat of the ' rational soul.' The brain was looked upon by the prince of philosopbevs as a fomparatively useless organ, whose only function was to cool the heart. According to the latest opinion of scientific authorities, the functions of the mind are performed in the rim of gray matter of which the outermost layer of the brain consists. There sensation ends and thought begins. There are the 'end-stations' where the messages from the ortside world aro delivered, and where volitions originate. But though anatomists have succeeded in following the trail thus far, and have, so to speak, OOrnered tho mind and driven it into close quarters, they seem as far as ever from seeing the mind itself or from learning what it is. Mental science is as distinct from physical science to-day as it ever was. The nerves are excited by motions. These motions are delivered to the brain, .nd there become transformed into things as different from the motions in which they originate as light is from darkness. The nerve of the eye when excited causes the sensation of light. This excitation may be produced by undulations of the luminiferous either, by electricity, by congestion, or by a blow on the head ;in every case the message along the nerve is, in the brain, translated into the uensation of sound. But these various sensations are altogether different from the physical excitements producing them. So also are the thoughts and volitions radically different from the sensations.