Buddhism lays stress everywhere upon the connectiveness of everything with everything; and everything is, at all times, something other than itself. Consciousness (Vinnâna), for instance, is described as "that which enters into the womb, and from which arise name and corporeal form"; yet consciousness and name and corporeal form have no individual existence. "Body, perceptions, and sensations vanish, but not conscience; but consciousness only exists as long as it is connected with name and corporeal form. Consciousness, however, is not essentially different from perceptions and sensations; it is also a Samskâra, and, like all other Samskâras, it is changeable, and without substance."[AJ] [AJ] In the place of a "sphere of being," with its supply of ready-made consciousness for the transmissive process in the brain, as hypothecated by Professor William James in his lecture on _Human Immortality_, I would substitute a formative faculty immanent in the universe, and assume the metamorphosis into consciousness, as we know it, to be a function of the brain. This theory would be quite reconcileable with the physiological view that consciousness is the final phase of the activity of the sensory nerves in the cortex of that organ. Fechner's conception of a psycho-physical threshold would also adapt itself to this theory as well as to the other; the threshold being understood as representing the functional capacity of the brain to extend or limit the scope of consciousness. The ultimate extension of consciousness would result in a return to the elemental informative. In the case of limited extension, consciousness would be carried on as a consciousness-germ, or Skandha, into a new being, on the death of a being. Consciousness has been described as the director of the organs, and, in this sense, vaguely assumes the place of an ego. Consciousness, as a "highly-developed and insubstantial product of the brain," possesses the faculty of acting _in the manner_ of choice; it is derived from conformations, and conformations from ignorance. There is a continuance of soul-forms after the death of an individual--that is, of the impressions caused by the character of an individual. This is the preservation of form by means of Karma (deeds). Obviously these soul-forms cannot continue unless there is an individual to receive the impression. Therefore, when it is said that, immediately upon the death of a sentient being, another sentient being is produced to receive the effects of the deceased's Karma, the statement may have been only intended to imply that for the continuance of soul-forms there must always be sentient beings to receive their impressions.