Back of
all this apparatus is the real Knower who makes use of it.
Science tells us that of all the five senses, that of Touch or Feeling was
the original--the fundamental sense. All the rest are held to be but
modifications of, and specialized forms of, this original sense of
feeling. I am telling you this not merely in the way of interesting and
instructive scientific information, but also because an understanding of
this fact will enable you to more clearly comprehend that which I shall
have to say to you about the higher faculties or senses.
Many of the very lowly and simple forms of animal life have this one sense
only, and that but poorly developed. The elementary life form "feels" the
touch of its food, or of other objects which may touch it. The plants also
have something akin to this sense, which in some cases, like that of the
Sensitive Plant, for instance, is quite well developed. Long before the
sense of sight, or the sensitiveness to light appeared in animal-life, we
find evidences of taste, and something like rudimentary hearing or
sensitiveness to sounds. Smell gradually developed from the sense of
taste, with which even now it is closely connected. In some forms of lower
animal life the sense of smell is much more highly developed than in
mankind.
Pages:
14
15
16
17
18
19
20
21
22
23
24
25
26
27
28
29
30
31
32
33
34
35
36
37
38