But the philosophy of the complex vision would indicate that no
amount of piling up of centuries upon centuries could possibly
produce out of "unconscious matter" the perilous and curious "stuff"
which we call "consciousness of life." And we would further reply
to the evolutionists that their initial assumption as to the objective
existence, suspended in a vacuum, of masses of material chemistry
is an assumption which has been abstracted and isolated from the
total volume of those sense-impressions, which are the only actual
reality we know, and which are the impressions made, in human
experience, upon some living personality.
This criticism of the evolutionists' inevitable attack upon us enters
naturally at this point; because, while the average mind is willing
enough to grant some sort of vague omnipresent "will to evolve" to
the primordial "nebula" and even prepared to allow it such obscure
consciousness as is implied in the phrase "life-force" or "élan vital,"
it is startled and shocked to a supreme degree when we assert that
such "nebula," if it existed, was the outward body or form of a
living "soul-monad" possessed, even as human beings are, of every
attribute of the complex vision.
The average mind, in its vague and careless mood, is ready to accept
our contention that some sort of will or reason or consciousness
existed at the beginning of things. It is only when such a mind
comes to realize that what we are predicating is actual personality,
with all the implications of that, that it cries out in protest. The
average mind can swallow our contention that reason and will
existed from the beginning because the average mind has been
penetrated for centuries by vague traditions of an "over-soul" or an
universal "reason" or "will." It is only when in our analysis of the
attributes of personality we come bolt up against the especially
anthropomorphic attribute of "conscience" that it staggers and
gasps.
For the original "stellar gas" to be vaguely animated by some
obscure "élan vital" seemed natural enough; but for it to be the
"body" of some definite living soul seems almost humorous; and for
such a living soul to possess the attribute of "conscience," or the
power of response to the vision of immortals, seems not only
humorous but positively absurd.
The philosophy of the complex vision, however, in its analysis of
the eternal elements of personality is not in the least afraid of
reaching conclusions which appear "absurd" to the average
intelligence. The philosophy of the complex vision accepts the
element of the "absurd" or of the "outrageous" or of the "fantastic"
in its primordial assumptions; for according to its contention this
element of the "apparently impossible" is an essential ingredient in
the whole system of things.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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