Part 4

My answer to the above question is as follows: Man is a threefold being, composed of a body material, a body electrical, and a spirit rational and indestructible.

Let the elements of this definition be a little amplified:

1. The material body. This is composed of various metals, earths, carbon, phosphorus, and gases. I need not go into a representation of their multiplied and curious combinations to form the many parts of the body complete. But these are the ultimate elements; and a most superb and wonderful structure they here compose. Yet, notwithstanding all the manifest skillfulness of its contrivance, and the power of its accomplishment, and the niceness and beauty of its execution, it were a useless display if unaccompanied with the invisible agents which compose the two other grand constituents of man, to wit: the body electrical and the spirit, or mind. Without these, it would quickly fall into decay, as we see it when deprived of them, and would be resolved into its original elements again. But to our gross material bodies the Creator has added,

2. The body electrical. By this, I mean that which has commonly been termed "nervous influence," "nervous fluid," "nervo-vital fluid," and "nervo-electric fluid." I object, however, to each and all of these designations. They are too restricted and specific. They all seem to imply that it is an agent or influence which appertains especially to the nervous system; whereas the entire organism is under its pervading force. I do not doubt but its chief action is in and through the nervous system; but it also pervades and, as I think, vitalizes the whole body. The nervous system seems to be created as one principal means for its replenishment, and to serve as the medium of its ministrations to the body at large. I choose to term it electro-vital fluid, or electro-vitality. My reasons for so designating it are the following: (1) It is demonstrably electrical in its nature. (2) It appears to be identified, or at least connected immediately, with the vitalization of the body. (3) I wish, by its name, to distinguish it from mental vitality, or the vitality of spirit. Whether, as a peculiar manifestation of the electric principle, it vitalizes by its own nature and action solely, or whether it be charged with another mysterious element--a life-force--and vitalizes by ministering the latter to the material organism, I will not positively affirm. Whichever it be, the name I assign to it seems sufficiently appropriate. But I strongly incline to the theory that this electro-vital principle does itself, by virtue of its own nature, vitalize the system. In other words, I am disposed to think that God makes it the immediate agent of vitalization; having constituted it the vis vitae of both the animal and the vegetable kingdoms. Nor does this idea, as I conceive, necessarily conflict at all with the doctrine of cell-life, as maintained by the best physiologists of the present day. I also sometimes style this electro-vital element the body electrical, because it is certainly an entity, coextensive with and, in greater or less force, wholly pervading the visible, material body.

At this point I will take the liberty to introduce, although somewhat digressively, a few thoughts on the DISTINCTIONS OF VITALITY OR LIFE.

There are, as I suppose, the following several kinds of life: (1) Spirit life; (2) Moral life; (3) Electric life.

(1.) There is spirit life. And here are to be made several subdivisions.

(a) The life of created immortal spirit. This is a rational, intelligent entity, representing the spirit of man and of unembodied, created intelligences above him. This spirit God created as it pleased him--"in his own likeness"--a living, indestructible essence; and, as I suppose, its essence and its life the same.

(b) The life of created mortal spirit, as the spirit of the beast. Of the intrinsic essence of this spirit, we are also necessarily ignorant. Yet, of its attributes we know that it has consciousness, sensibility, and will. Of its life we know as little as of its essence; both of which, however, as I conjecture, are also one and the same--the spirit substance being itself essentially vital.

(2.) We pass next to moral life. This life is identical with holiness--the very opposite of that defilement that characterizes moral death, which is a state of sin. But let me again subdivide.

(3.) Finally, there is electric or physical life. But here again there are varieties.

But now, to return to the physical or animal life of man--the electro-vital element. While this is in such immediate relation to the visible body on the one hand, it holds, also, on the other hand, an immediate relation to the mental part, both of man and of the other animated beings of earth. It serves to transmit, through the nervous system to the mind, all sensations and impressions from the outer world. It, moreover, receives from the mind the action of its volitions and imaginary conceptions, and conveys through the nerves the impressions or impulsions thus obtained to the various parts of the body, and there secures the fulfillment of the mind's behests. It appears to be only in this way that communication is had between the mind and its outer body. The natures of spirit and of gross matter are so totally unlike, that it seems impracticable for the mind and body to come into immediate mutual relation, or to act reciprocally, without the aid of a medium--ethereal, semi-material and semi-spiritual, such as is the electro-vital fluid. And the Creator has accordingly provided this mysterious, invisible medium between the two, and thus, in a degree, extended man's likeness to himself by making him a trinity in unity.

3. The mind or spirit. This is immeasurably the highest and most important constituent of man. His body material may fall back to dust. His body electrical may be reabsorbed in the great ocean of natural electricity that fills the earth and the heavens. But his mind is immortal. His spirit, made in the divine image, lives and acts, thinks and feels, independently of every other existence save Him from whom its being came. While in connection with its visible body, its good or ill, its bliss or woe, has, indeed, much to do with its bodily state. But, when separated from this body, its high and more independent existence is at once asserted; and then its good or ill are determined by its Author only in accordance with the workings and affections within itself. A spiritual and indestructible being like its Creator, it can never cease to be while he exists.

But our present concern is with the mind in its relation to that electro-vital medium between it and the body, and to the body itself. The mind's influence upon both of these lower parts of the entire man is truly wonderful, although perceptible mostly on the material body. Few persons are aware how much the state of the mind affects the bodily health, although the degree is often very great. Yet this is done by the mind's action, first on the electro-vital functions, and through these, by way of the nerves, upon the bodily tissue. Changes in the mental states will, in this way, frequently produce changed polarization in the physical organs, and thus determine infallibly the matter of health or disease. So, too, the condition of the bodily health will often determine irresistibly the mental state. Whatever bodily changes affect the polarization of the electro-vital medium in any part of the organism, do thereby produce corresponding changes in the mind.

These views of the reciprocal action between mind and body, through the medium of the electro-vital element, may serve to explain those psychological wonders exhibited in the cure of diseases by the imagination, as well as in diseases and even death induced by the imagination. I would much like to unfold and illustrate this bearing of the subject; and, also, in the light of it, to show the philosophy of one mind acting intelligibly on another mind, with, and even without, the aid of the physical organs, as is sometimes seen in the facts of mesmerism. This I have done in my written lectures, for the instruction of classes; but my limits will not admit of it here.

There is another thought which I will offer in this connection. I maintain that all functional action of our bodily organism, ab initio, is conducted by thinking mind, through the medium of organic electricity or the electro-vital fluid. Every organ as a whole, and every life-cell in detail, is charged with this active principle. I believe that every one of then is controlled and guided incessantly in its propagating, organizing and entire functional force by intelligent mind, acting through this wonder-working agent--the electro-vital fluid. In respect to our voluntary exercises, this organic electrical force is made subject to our own mental activities, and executes its office upon the bodily organism mainly through the medium of the nerves. But, as regards all the involuntary functions, I believe that control is exercised directly by the omniscient and all-pervading God, although in accordance with his own established laws.

Once more of the mind let me remark, that consciousness, sensation, and will belong to it alone. The body never thinks nor feels; nor does the organic electricity within it. The popular idea, especially with the less educated masses, is that, if a man burn his finger, it is the finger that smarts. But this can not be true. Pain can exist only where consciousness is. And there is no consciousness in the finger, nor in any material part. Only the mind is conscious of existence, even; and hence only the mind can be conscious of pleasure or pain. If a limb be paralyzed, by interrupting in any way the flow of the electro-vital fluid through its nerves, and thus depriving the mind of its medium of communication with it, you may burn that limb to a crisp and the subject will feel no pain. When you burn your finger or break your arm, you disturb the action of the electro-vitality in the injured part, deranging its poles. This electric agent instantly communicates its disturbance along the nerves to the brain, where it reports to the mind and tells where the disturbance is. The conscious mind takes cognizance of the fact and feels distress.

THE LOWER ANIMALS.

It may, by some, be objected that, if we regard sensation as existing only in the mind, as affirmed above, then we must concede mind to the lower animal tribes, since they are subjects of consciousness, sensation and will, as truly as ourselves. I admit this necessity, and unhesitatingly take the position, as has been already done in the classification of minds, that the lower animals are in fact endowed with a something higher and more spiritual than their material bodies or their animal vitality--something which bears distinguishing characteristics of mind. I would not, however, be understood to say, or to imply, that they possess all the characteristics of our minds, even in a rudimental degree. I do not believe they do. My theory does not accord to them either reason or immortality. Yet, in respect to the latter, my views are less decisive, and my utterances usually more reserved. But I think their minds may, and probably do, perish with their bodies. Nevertheless, the existence of consciousness, sensation and will, in any orders, does evidently presuppose some sort of mental constitution. And such mental structure, in them as well as in us, must be distinct from and superior to the animal vitality--compelling service from the latter, and using it as a medium for communicating with the body, and with the outer world in general.

THE VEGETABLE KINGDOM.

As to the vegetable kingdom, there is here, so far as we can discover, only a duality of principle, viz: the material body and a modified phase of electro-vitality. These component parts appear to sustain to each other, in the vegetable, relations quite analogous to those of the corresponding parts in the animal. But here the mental part is wanting; and consequently there is no consciousness, sensation, nor will; and the electro-vital action is guided in its elaborate and beautiful operations for the forming and developing of the plant, and in all its vital functions, by the all-pervading mind of God.

NATURAL POLARIZATION OF MAN'S PHYSICAL ORGANISM.

The electro-vital fluid, in the animal economy, is subject to the same principles of polarization as the magnetic current from the artificial machine, or the magnetism of the bar-magnet. In the material organism of man, the great nerve-centers--the brain, the spinal cord, and the ganglions--appear to act the part of fixed magnets, charged with the electro-vital fluid. Indeed, there is much reason to believe that this fluid is elaborated within these nerve-centers--more especially within the brain--from the inorganic electricity of the outer world, which is supplied through the lungs in respiration, and conducted thence to these laboratories by a remarkably interesting process--a process which I have not room here to describe, but which I have drawn out in detail in a manuscript lecture on the circulation of the blood, for my classes, and which may some day see the light. These nerve-centers, viewed as magnets of electro-vitality, require to be regarded as having each a positive nucleus in the interior, on which are ranged the negative ends of the currents which go out from this positive nucleus in every direction to the surface of the medullary organ--so radiating, as it were, from center to periphery. And the nerve-lines and ramifications which issue from these great nerve-centers are polarized evidently in the same way--the electro-vital fluid being disposed with its negative ends to the positive surfaces of the nerve-centers, and its positive or plus ends to the "vital organs," and especially to the surfaces of the organism as a whole. There are many other polarizations in the human system, subordinate to those mentioned above; but I have no room to speak of them in detail.

ELECTRICAL CLASSIFICATION OF DISEASES.

There are two, and only two, primary classes of disease--those in which the electro-vital force is abnormally positive, and those where it is preternaturally negative. The former class comprises every variety and phase of hypersthenia, and the latter, every sort and degree of anaesthesia, or rather, of azooedynamia. Inflammation may be taken as a general representative of the positive or hypersthenic class--those forms of disease in which there is too much electro-vitality, or in which the vital force may be said to be too active. Paralysis may stand as a general representative of the negative or azooedynamic class--those in which the vital action is too low or weak.

PHILOSOPHY OF DISEASE AND CURE.

In every part of the animal economy, polar derangements in the electro-vital principle are liable to occur. These derangements are always the real foundation of disease. They may be occasioned by a thousand agencies, which act as the procuring cause of disease; but the proximate and sustaining cause is polar disturbance--derangement of the electro-vital poles. Parts which, in health, are relatively positive, may become negative, and that which should be negative may become positive. Or again, a part, naturally positive to its counterpart, may become excessively so, and that which should be relatively negative may become negative to a morbid degree.

To correct these polar disturbances and restore the normal polarization, is to cure the complaint. This is, under the treatment of most physicians, often accomplished by the use of medicines, and by mechanical or surgical agency. We accomplish it by the proper application of the poles of our electrical apparatus. In cases where there is virus to be destroyed, or abnormal growths to be removed, we also secure the chemical action appropriate to these ends by the proper selection of our current. It often happens that mechanical or surgical action is demanded. In many such cases, we do not profess to secure normal polarization and consequent cure by means of electricity alone. Yet, in a large proportion of the cases where mechanical or surgical agency is usually thought to be indispensable, we are able to cure by electric action only, since by it we can exert very considerable mechanical force at will; and can also, in many instances, attain much more happily, by means of electricity, the very ends or the best ends which would be aimed at by skillful surgical operations.