WHO AM I

morning to find almost ail its treasured store of honey taken from the hive ; nor a water-rat when its nest is flooded, and its yoiing destroyed, by some sudden rise in the river ; nor a spider when your hand, as you pass, utterly rnins its web ; nor the pig finding itself in clover ; nor even the dog leaping to the unexpected, and indeed nntimely, bone. Such incidents at thèse, which are common enough in the lives of the lowlier créatures, are on aU fours with the accidents, surprises, and disasters which form part of the normal circumstance of human life ; but we cannot imagine them asking, " Why does this happen to me ? " It takes a human to make a complaint. One of the sjrmbols in the hall-mark of humanity is a note of interrogation. The f aculty of wonder is a human faculty ; and although the right to complain may exist lower down in the creational scale, the ability to complain issues first in man.

Any satisfactory answer to our question dépends upon two prior questions ; it cannot be answered before them; and when they are answered, the complaint ceases almost automatically. The first of thèse two prior questions is, " Who am I ? " and the second, " What precisely is happening to me ? "

With the former, we hâve already dealt at some length. The plane on which Self-consdousness arises is the plane on which there is distinction and a certain amount of opposition between Self and not-Self. My first knowledge of my