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and as physical facts we will recognize them; let philosophy declare what the common consciousness can verify, and its statements shall be accepted as at least of equal value and validity with those which creep into the mind through the eye and the ear; but let neither form of investigation bring alleged facts from a region which it itself puts beyond the entire range of our critical faculties. Consciousness presents a distinct and independent field. On it no purely physical inquiry can enter, and in it philosophy can lie intrenched beyond the power of any form of ignorant or jealous scepticism. The students of Positive Philosophy, ready to desecrate this sanctuary of our spiritual nature, will, like the blind men of Sodom, weary themselves in vain to find the door.

Mental science will also be aided, by this divorce of the unknown from the known, the conjectural from the established, in bringing its own doctrines to a more decided test; and in expelling some of those dogmas, which, unintelligible, yet possible to a bold and blind faith, have hovered about it, and given it a superstitious, visionary, and unphilosophical appearance. Of this nature is the assertion, that one may sin below consciousness, or the belief that sin is transmitted from parent to child. If all the acts and states of mind are conscious ones, then, of course, all moral phenomena must transpire in the light.

We are ready to accept and consider any well-established dependencies between mind and matter, but many of the theories on this subject transcend by almost their entire breadth all known facts, and bring no light to what they discuss. We are now prepared to receive physical phenomena as expressed in physical terms; mental phenomena as stated in mental terms; and any relations that can be established between the two. Our philosophy is thus on the ground of experience. Data of which our experience takes