Page:Occult Japan - Lovell.djvu/375

Rh point possible, the suggestion of the operator, and turned into the desired channel, it traverses a path whose resistance is much above the normal. Instead, therefore, of gliding rapidly along, it soon expends itself in overcoming the friction it meets, causing in the process a glow of the successive cells which we call consciousness. The current tends, of course, to make the molecules of the cells vibrate as they did before rather than in some perfectly new combination, but it finds unwonted difficulty in making them vibrate at all. The result is that the old combination of cell action is resurrected with accompaniment of consciousness; that is, we have an idea where before we had only its latent possibility. Whether this be the revival of a lapsed memory, or the evoking of an actual bit of brand-new consciousness, is mere question of degree. The greater the resistance, short of stopping the current, the greater the current's, so to speak, creative power.

That this is due to the increased resistance, and not to an hypothetically increased current, is further evident on considering the alternative. For if the current were greater