UC-NRLF B M 023 =158 ■>c^: GIFT OF MICHAEL REESE '^rx^' 1^-^ ■ '^Cv:x r\x-^?\ '•"^vV PROFESSOR LADD'S WORKS. PSYCHOLOGY ; Descriptive and Explanatory. A Treatise of the Phenomena, Laws, and Development of Human Mental Life. 8vo, $4.50. INTRODUCTION TO PHILOSOPHY. An Inquiry after a Ra- tional System of Scientific Principles in their Relation to Ultimate Reality. 8vo, $3.00. OUTLINES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY. A Text- book on Mental Science for Academies and Colleges, liljs- trated. 8vo, $2.00. ELEMENTS OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY. A Treatise of the Activities and Nature of the Mind, from the Physical and Experimental Point of View. With numerous illustra- tions. 8vo, $4.50. THE DOCTRINE OF SACRED SCRIPTURE. A Critical. His- torical, and Dogmatic Inquiry into the Origin and Nature of the Old and New Testaments. 2 vols., 8vo, $7.00. THE PRINCIPLES OF CHURCH POLITY. Crown 8vo, $2.50. WHAT IS THE BIBLE? An Inquiry of the Origin and Nature of the Old and New Testaments in the light of Modern Biblical Study. 12mo, $2.00. PSYCHOLOGY Desoriptiye and Explajstatoky A TREATISE OF THE PHENOBIENA, LAWS, AND DEVELOPMENT OF HUMAN MENTAL LIFE GEORGE TRUMBULL LADD PROFESSOR OF PHILOSOPHY IN YALE UNIVERSITY '\i NEW YOEK CHARLES SOIIIBNEK'S 80NS 1894 IfiRARY EDUC. PSYCH. LIBRARY COPYKIUHT, 1^94, BY CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS o^ mow DIRECTORV TU^Q AND BOOKBINDING COMP NEW YORK MY PUPILS FHOM WHOSK (JUKUIES AN'I) OUSEUVATIONS I'.()TH NAIVE ANT) WKLL CONSIDERED I HAVE DEUIVEP MOKE INSIGHT INTO THE NATX'UE OF THE HUMAN MIND THAN FROM HEADING MANY BOOKS THIS VOLUME IS UESPECTFULJA- ANI> AKWECTIONATELY DEDICATED " Greift nur liineiu iii's voUe Mensoheulebeii ! Eiu Jeder lebt. Niclit Vieleu ist's bekaiint, mid wo ilir's paokt, da ist's interressant." —Goethe PREFACE Notwithstanding the fact that several brilliant, learned, and volnmiuoiis works on the science of Psycholog-y liave recently appeared in English, there is not only room, but also a real de- mand, for still other attempts at improved treatment of the same subject. For this science has, during some time past, worthily rivalled and even excelled most other forms of scientific in- quiry, both as respects the quality and number of its devoted workmen, and also as respects the rapidity of its advances and the number and startling character of its discoveries. There are special reasons, moreover, why the field of inquiry into the phenomena of human mental life can never be closed to new- comers, for a hearing of their claims to improved results as com- pared with their predecessors, even for a brief space of time. In psychology the individual point of view and the particular method of investigation and of treatment chosen, as well as the mental characteristics of the investigator, determine the char- acter of the results as in no other one of the sciences. What has just been said should not, however, be understood as a timid apology for appearing at the present moment with another new treatise covering a field of investigation and publi- cation so recently wrought over. The book which is here given to the public x>resents the results, in much condensed form, of many years of observation, reading, and experiment. The few foot-notes and confessedly meagre bibliography at the end of the chapters afford no adequate recognition of the help received from the hundreds, not only of larger works, but also and chiefly of magazine articles and of minor monographs, which have been consulted in its preparation. Every expert student of jisychol- ogy knows that in this latter form of literature (most of which is inaccessible to the general reader, and much of which is not to be found even in oiir largest libraries) the most valuable ma- Vlll PREFACE terial for bis science is to be found. For my riglit to use witli both coutidence and discretion the material derived from mod- ern pliysiolog-ical and experimental psychology, my works pre- viously published (" Elements of Physiolog-ical Psychology " and " Outlines of Physiological Psychology ") may be left to testify. On this point I will only add that the present book contains no little that is new of this sort, drawn both from my private notes and from experimental sources not accessible in published form. As the dedication aims to show, it has been my chief ambition and my constant practice to bring my " sci- ence " of mental phenomena to the testing of actual and con- crete human life. This has been, indeed, a daily and almost hourly pleasure rather than a task ; so that for many of the fol- lowing conclusions I must api^eal, not only to introspective and reflective self -consciousness, and to the mental i^rocesses of pu- pils and colleagues, but also to the mental life of the common people and to the profounder voices of art and of literature. The cry which must be ever ringing in the ears of the genuine ps}'cliologist is this : " Back, from books and laboratories, to actual and concrete human life." Briefly characterized, then, this book designs to give a clear, accurate, and comprehensive picture of the mental life of the individual man ; and also to explain this life as it appears in the light of all the resources of modern psychological science, and with the idea of " developnie?it," as essentially characteristic of this, as it is of all life, constantly kept in mind. "While gratefully acknowledging my indebtedness to each of the large band of predecessors in this our common work — as well to those I have named as to the many more unnamed — I can truthfully acknowledge no special obligations to any individu- als among this number. It will not require a wide acquaintance with psychological literature for the reader to discover that the jioints of view, the order of treatment, the discussion of the par- ticular topics, are all independent and thoroughly the author's own. Indeed, it is my belief that there is not a page, and scarce- ly a line, of tliis treatise which does not show that all its material has been wrought anew into a distinct and characteristic organ- ism of truth. Attention is particularly called, however, to the divisions of the book, which abandon even the appearance of re- PREFACE IX taining the old and vicious theory of faculties ; to the consistent tenure of the view that the formation and development of faculty is itst'lf the chief thing- which scicntitic psychology has to ex- plain ; to the treatment, in particular, of the affective phenomena —the nature, classes, and tone as pleasure-pain, of the feelings, and the growth of the emotions and sentiments ; to the thecny of ])erception and of the nature and growth of knowledge w Inch is advocated ; to the discussions where psychology comes into critical contact with logic; and, above all, to the view taken of the moral sentiments and of the nature and evolution of will. I wish to add a single word to those teachers of psychology who may do me the honor to make use of my book for the in- struction of their classes. The presentation here made is ob- viously not designed merely for use as a text-book. At the same time it is the product of one who has taught a larger number of pupils, and it embodies much experience gained from the work of the class-room. I only express the assured results of this ex- perience when I say that, for persons who have reached the maturity which most students have attained when they begin psychology, " primers," which talk down to them and have ev- erything put into exact verbal form for them conveniently to commit to memorj", are by no means the best and most improv- ing text-books. I am inclined to think that, if it had been my intention to adapt this treatise solely to class-room use, I should not greatly have changed it, either as respects amount and kind of material or the style of its j^resentation. Only it must not be forgotten that, in no other science as in psychology, is it so nec- essary for the teacher really to teach, and not merely to give out tasks and to hear recitations. In this connection I gratefully acknowledge the valuable as- sistance of my colleague, Professor George M. Duncan, who has read the entire volume and has made several helpful sugges- tions, chiefly looking toward increased clearness and consistency of statement ; and, therefore, of course, its better adaptation to the teacher's uses. In many places in this l)Ook I have brought the subject up to the borders — so subtile and almost indistinguishable — where psychology touches the lu'oader, all-embracing domain of phi- X PREFACE losophy. But I believe I have succeeded (altliougli I have no- where decried " metaph\'sics in psychology," or advocated " psychology without a soul ■)) not only in promising- to reserve the philosophical problems for another volume, but in actually keeping m}* promise. Geoege Teumbull Ladd. Yale Uni\'eusity, New Haven, Conn., 1894. TABLE OF CONTENTS INTKODUCTOEY CHAPTER I. PAGE Dkpinition and Probi-em op Psychology, 1-18 CHAPTER II. Method, Sources, and Dn'isiox of Psy'chology, .... 14-2(5 part firet MOST GENERAL FOEMS OF MENTAL LIFE CHAPTER III. Consciousness and Self-Consciousness, 29-48 CHAPTER IV. The So-called "Mental Faculties." 49-60 CHAPTER V. Primary Attention, 61-85 part Sccon^ THE ELEMENTS OF MENTAL LIFE CHAPTER VI. Sens.\tion : Its Nature and Classes, ' . 89-119 CHAPTER VII. Sensation: Its Quality and Quantity 120-140 Xll TABLE OF CONTENTS CHAPTER VIII. PAGE Sensation-Complexes and Local Signs, 141-lGl CHAPTER IX. • Feeling : Its Nature and Classes 162-187 CHAPTER X. Feeling, as Pleasure-Pain, 188-210 CHAPTER XI. Conation and Movement, 211-2;53 CHAPTER XII. The Representative Image oii " Idea," 234-252 CHAPTER XIII The Processes of Ideation, 253-287 CHAPTER XIV. Primary Intellection, 288-313 part ^biib THE DEVELOPMENT OF MENTAL LIFE CHAPTER XV. Perception ijy the Senses, 317-o47 CHAPTER XVI. Perception uy the Senses {Continued), 348-375 CHAPTER XVn. Memory, ^^^^•—-370-407 CHAPTER XVIIL Imagination, 408-427 CHAPTER XIX. Thought and Language, 428-461 TABLE OF CONTENTS Xlll CHAPTER XX. PAOE Reasoning, 462-48(i CHAPTER XXI. Space, Time, and Causation, 487-507 CHAPTER XXII. The Knowledge op Things and the Knowledge of Self, . . 508-533 CHAPTER XXIII. The Emotions and Passions 534-560 CHAPTER XXIV. The Sentiments, 561-589 CHAPTER XXV. Impulse, Instinct, and Desire, 590-608 CHAPTER XXVI. Will and Character, 609-643 CHAPTER XXVII. Types and Principles op Mental Development, .... 644-669 Index, 671-676 PSYCHOLOGY: DESCRIPTIVE AND EXPLANATORY INTRODUCTORY CHAPTER I. DEFINITION AND PKOBLEM OF PSYCHOLOGY The difficulties of defining the science which it is now cus- tomary to call " psj'chology " are, in part, common to all branches of scientific inquiry. In general, satisfactory defini- tion is one of the latest results of the growth of any science ; and since every genuine science is in a constant process of growth, the conception to which its name answers is subject to change in the thought both of the individual student and of the race. The more complete and accurate conception which the definition is designed to embody must be established and de- fended in the course of the detailed investigations. With the understanding, then, that the statement is only jirovisional, we define psychology as the science tvkich describes and explains the phenomena of conscioiisness, as such. This definition, like every other, involves certain assump- tions both of fact and of principle ; it also involves certain subordinate conceptions, some of which require further defini- tion, and some of which, perhaps, cannot be defined. The task of justifying the assumptions, of defining the subordinate terms, and of tracing the vaguer aspects of thought to their ultimate factors, must also be left to the development of the science itself. A few words here, however — even if they must be of a somewhat controversial character — will be helpful, and are indeed necessary. Our definition assumes not only that such a science as psychology is remotely possible, but even that it actually exists. It also assumes that a class of phenomena, called " phenomena of consciousness " (or by other equivalent terms), may be distingiiished from other classes of phenomena 2 DEFINITION AND PROBLEM OF PSYCHOLOGY however closely related, and may be made the data of scientific inquiry. It assumes that these phenomena may be described and so classified ; it also assumes that they may be— however partially — explained. That is to say, the conditions under Avhieh the i3henomena occur, their connection, under laAv, Avith one another as psychic facts and with other non-psychic facts, may be known ; the more complex may be analyzed into the more simple, and the principles of the combination of the simple into the complex may be discovered ; the history of the evolution of these phenomena may be written. All these assumptions have been disputed. The definition, being- jDreliminary, onl}'- settles such dispute for us until, in the course of the unfolding- of the science, the disputed matters can be thoroug-hly discussed. This definition of psycholog-y also refers us, in our inquiry concerning the particular subjects of investig-ation, to the " phe- nomena of consciousness, as such." But what is "conscious- ness " ? and how, without having- this term carefully defined, shall we know Avhat it is of Avhich psycholog-y specifically treats ? Strictly speaking — as we shall soon see — the term " conscious- ness " cannot be defined ; because the conception of conscious- ness cannot be analyzed. The impossibility of performing- such analysis is connected with the most fundamental and ultimate nature of the phenomena of consciousness themselves. And yet every one may know sufficiently well for the purpose of psy- chological study, and, indeed, with a peculiar immediacy and certainty of knowledge, what is meant by a " phenomenon of consciousness, as such." Perceptions — whether full and clear or meagre and obscure, whether coming by the eye or by the hand, and whether of our own bodies or of the remotest star — as peixepfions, or facts of mental life ; thoughts — whether logi- cal or illogical, whether of business or of philosophy, as thoiighis, or facts of mental life ; feelings — ^whether painful or pleasurable, and Avhatever about — as feelings, or facts of mental life ; desires and volitions — whether weak or strong, vague and aimless or definite and purposeful — as desires and voJifions, or facts of men- tal life ; — such are the phenomena of consciousness. I 1. It has been denied that psychology is a science, and this not only by unfriendly critics, who dwell upon its long-continned stage of stagnation, but also by ardent stndents of psychology from its most modern points of view. Snch denial arises either from ignorance concerning the achievements of the last fifty years of psychological research, or from a too narrow con- ception of science in general ; or else it is framed under the influence of some theory as to what kind of science psychology in particular ought to become. It is simple matter of fact that no other form of investigation has, during rSYCIIOLOGY AjST ACKNOWLEDGED SCIENCE 8 the last half century, made greater and swifter advance than psychology ; no other has accumulated a larger collection of available data or done more toward pointing out, both experimentally and speculatively, the regular con- nections between its observed facts. Moreover, we cannot ajjprove of that use of the word " science" which, if consistently carried out, would exclude from this category not only luuuan psychology, but also all the results of research into the principles of politics, economics, philology, into history, ethics, ethnology, and religion. Nor is the difference, as respects certainty, upon matters of fact and matters of so-called law, between those sciences which sometimes arrogate the exclusive use of this proud title and those which are thus arrogantly excluded from claim to the title, by any means so great as is often supposed. Most unseemly of all positions is the refusal of the term " science" to psychology, because it has as yet discovered no law corresponding to the Newtonian principle of gravitation or to the principle of chemical equiva- lents. For who knows, or can rightly assume, that there is in reality any such law to be discovered ; that the infinitely varied and concretely indi- vidualized facts of human mental life are ever really to be explained after the analogy of planets and atoms ? To write voluminous treatises on psychol- ogy as a so-called natural science, and yet deny that there is a science of psychology because the phenomena cannot be reduced to an order like that of certain physical phenomena, is to undermine the results and value of one's work by a premature hypothesis. The definition (and indeed the appearance of this treatise on psychology as well as that of every other similar treatise) assumes that psychology is a science. The assumption can be completely verified only in the course of the investigation itself. § 2. It has also been denied that we can define p.sychology, because we can- not clearly mark oflf its appropriate field. Thus Dr. Ward (art. Psychology, in Encyc. Brit., p. 37) holds that our inability to draw the distinction, at the outset, between internal experience and external expei'ience — to distinguish " what takes place in the mind " from " what takes place without " — makes it impossible to define psychology as we do the sciences of matter. On the contrary, no distinction seems, " at the outset," to be more clearly and promptly made than this by the reflective mind of all mankind.' It is only after the professional stiident has introduced certain metaphysical discus- sions, which ought to Jje left to the later stages of jisychology or to philos- ophy, that this seemingly obvioiis distinction becomes debatable and con- fused. The facU of ordinary human consciousness, faitlifulhi described, are the data to which scientific psi/chology must return again and again, and in b el lalf of the complete explanation of which, it must summon all the resources of modern investigation. The distinction between external facts and facts of consciousness, as actually made by every man, furnishes not only "at the outset," but all the way through, the one peculiar and abiding standpoint of psychology, as descriptive and explanatory science. 1 As Natorp has well said : '■ In all strife (as between Monism and Dualism, etc.) this, at least, remains firmly established : that in consciousness the limits of the psychical and the physical allow of being definitely marked — at any rate, so far as the ' phenomenon' of things is concerned, however the case may stand as regards their ultimate essence." (Einleitung in d. Psychologie, p. 10.) 4 DEFIXITIOX AND PROBLEM OF PSYCHOLOGY It miglit fui'ther be claimed, in agreement with M. Eabier,' that the real difficulty is not so much to find psychological objects for investigation as to find true physical and physiological objects. It would seem, accordingly, that there is danger lest all the other sciences should be submerged in the one iiniversal science, psychology. But why trouble ourselves at present about the possibility of making a distinction so obvious ? Facts of conscious- ness exist in abundance, as the data for psychological investigation ; they are the facts which constitute your experience and mine. But psychology studies these phenomena as such; it investigates the facts in themselves and for themselves. § 3. Various terms have been proposed to express, in the most general way, those data whose descrijition and explanation constitutes the science of psychology. The term "phenomena of conscioiasness " brings psychology into relation to the other sciences, all of which find their sjihere as particular sciences in the descrijition and explanation of some characteristic group of phenomena. The phenomena which furnish the data of psychology are char- acterized by the collective term "of consciousness." "Facts of conscious- ness," " facts of mental life," " mental or psychic facts " are kindred terms. The word " psychoses" has been proposed as a most general designation for all concrete psychic facts. The phrase " states of consciousness " suggests that relative stability and complexity, due to more or less of mental develop- ment, which the immediate data for our psychological investigation in gen- eral have. We may properly consult convenience in giving variety to our discussion by adopting any of these diiferent but almost equally approjiriate terms. It is important to notice also that the definition assumes : not only facts of consciousness exist and, as such, may be made the data of scientific in- vestigation; but, in becoming such data, facts of consciousness are made objects of knoxoledge. The phenomena of psychic life exist, and they may be know7i as facts. These states of consciousness, as they primarily awaken our interest and so form the basis of psychological investigation, are what we are accustomed to call our " knowledge " — whether of our own so-called inner experience or, inferentially, of the inner experience of others. From this conclusion several important results follow, the fuller meaning and effect of which can be seen only later on. Hence the impossibility of ob- serving states of consciousness, after they are converted by deliberate and reflective attention into objects of knowledge, which shall accurately repro- duce states of consciousness not thus fully converted into objects of knowl- edge. And to this fact, namely, that all states of consciousness, in order to liecome data for scientific investigation, must be converted, as it were, into objects of knowing consciousness — do we attribute in large measure what Professor James has referred to as " fallacies of the psycholygist." The definition of psycliolog-y as a " Science " also assumes that some kind of system actually exists among- the occurrences which we call " phenomena of consciousness." The facts upon which, as data, our scientific investigation concentrates itself, have in ' Lef onfl de Philoeophie, I. Psychologie, p. 28, rSYCHOLOGY AS SCIENCE OF MIND 6 reality connections with one another of a reguhir sort ; they have also commou connections of the same sort — it may be — with other groups of facts that, in their turn, furnish data to other [)articular sciences. Otherwise i)sycliic facts could not be stud- ied with even the hope of reducin*;' them to terms of science. For "facts" isolated and unconnected among themselves, cannot become data of science. Now, in the universal estimate, whether popular or scientific, the character of the connection which exists among- jDsychic facts is somewhat peculiar. At the outset of our investigation we wish to assume this connection in a manner as free as possible from all debatable metai:)hysieal tenets. In some manner, however, we are obliged to assume it in order to study ps3-chology at all. For this universal estimate assigns all psychic facts to some psychical individual, some so-called "Mind" or "Self." In- deed, the character of the consciousness from which this esti- mate springs is such that nothing seems more absurd, more inconceivable, than the assumption of psychic facts which be- long to no one. The phenomena of human consciousness, in general, can be observed and studied only on the popular as- sumption that they always appear as phenomena (//' some so- called human being. From this undoubted truth follow several important conclusions. Psychic facts inevitably break up, as it were, into as many groups as there are individual psychical beings. All phenomena of consciousness are facts, either of your mental life, or of mine, or of some other so-called " person," in the popular sense of this word. Moreover, the connection existing among the facts within each one of these subordinate groups is distinctly peculiar — is, indeed, unitiue. This connection may — na}^, must — be thought of in two directions. The phenomena of 7ni/ consciousness belong to me ; the phenomena of your consciousness belong to you ; and so on, through all the infinite number of groups of such phenomena. To say this is to affirm some sort of peculiar con- nection between all the phenomena of one group and whatever is meant by the word " me," and a similar peculiar connection be- tween all the phenomena of another group and whatever is meant by the word " you." Furthermore, the facts of my psychic life, as at present existent and made objects of knowledge for myself or for some other observer, are connected in a peculiar way with the past facts of this same life. The same thing is true of you and of every other psychical individual. We have, then, as- sumed by the A'ery definition of psychology that psychic facts may be studied in their connections, and as belonging to the de- 6 DEFINITION AND PROBLEM OF PSYCHOLOGY velopment of the psychical or mental life of iudividuals. In- deed, it Avould not be improper from this point of view, to define psycholog-y as tlie science of the inciimdual psychical or mental life. But the study of the phenomena of consciousness as they oc- cur in their orderly connection with one another, and so consti- tute the mental life of this or that individual, would not alone give us a science of psychology. The phenomena of my con- sciousness must be investigated, as objects of knowledge, with a view to compare them with the phenomena of your conscious- ness ; and both these, with a view to comparison with as many more similar groups and series of psychic facts as may become objects of knowledge. In other words, psychology compares, generalizes, etc., and strives thus to reach a description and ex- planation of all phenomena of consciousness, as such. It strives to found a science, not simply of my mental life, and of your mental life, but of all mental life. Yet here we must restrict the endeavor of the present treatise. Although data of animal and comparative psychology may be employed, such data will be used only so far as they throw indirect light upon human mental life. It is the psj^chology that makes the facts of liuraan mental life its objects of knowledge, its immediate data of scientific study, which we are about to pursue. § 4. It is not intended to discuss the question whether such a thing is ])ossible as a science of "psychology without a soul," in the sense in which M. Ribot and others would have us pursue such a science. But the meaning of the words " me" and " you " and " him," and the processes by which the conceptions corresponding to these words are formed, it does belong to psychology as descriptive and explanatory science to consider. And if we find any assumption of a so-called "real and unitary being " entering into these complex conceptions, this assumption, too, must be noticed, and, if jios- sible, explained. Such an assumption is itself a psychic fact of grave im- portance in determining the laws and forms of mental life. Nor can we wholly agree with those who regard hypothesis as necessarily useless, or even misleading, for purposes of scientific explanation. On the contrary, we regard this hypothesis as callable of use in such a way as to assist, rather than to hinder, psychological science. At the same time it is projDosed to remain faithful, as far as possible, to the conception of psychology as a sci- ence, and tlierefore to exclude metaphysical discussions regarding the real existence of mind, its unitary being, place in the world of physical things, real connection with the body, its immortality, etc' This exclusion of meta- ' Onr success in carrying out this endeavor will be tested by the method and results of the whole book. We lire hopeful, however, of succeeding better than— for one exiimple among many — Uilff- ding has done, who, after abjuring metaphysics in the form of both materialism and spiritualism, as forming no part of empirical psychology, proceeds at once to a rather long and unsatisfactory argument in Hupi)ort of monism— and this at the very beginning of his treatise (Outlines of Psychol- ogy, chap. i. and ii.). GENERAL AIM OF PSYCHOLOGY 7 physics, however, cannot i)ossil)ly be exteucled sq far as to cover the assump- tions involved in the ordinary language of consciousness. " As of old, I am I, thou art thou " — this is not simply the utterance of poetic fancy; it ex- presses both the universal distinction and the universal process of generaliza- tion and unifying, the metaphysical assumption, on the basis of which alone the very beginnings of psychological science are possible. § 5. Following the derivation of the word {\l/vx''i, " soul," and Xayoi-, " rea- soned account"), it was formerly customary to say, " Psychology is the sci- ence of the soul ; " or (since the word " soul" may be felt to be fraught with religious and tlioological prejudices) "Psychology is the science of the mind." Thus Sully and Hoft'ding have, in this regard, followed the " old psychol- ogy." Nor should we feel any insuperable objections to this definition, if it were certain to be kept in mind, as Lotze says in his " Outlines of Psychol- ogy," always at the beginning to use the designation "soul," or "mind," " with the proviso of future proof." The word " mind," and even the word " soul," we shall feel at liberty to employ from the beginning of our scien- tific investigation onward. But these words will at first mean for us only what everybody means whose mental life has developed sufficiently to make the distinction of vieum and tuum as resjjects facts of consciousness ; and from the standpoint of ordinary adult intelligence, to distinguish " I " and "you" and "he" from one another, and from the things which, when speaking without figure of speech, we call "it." "What is further meant by these and other kindred words it is the task of 'psychology to investigate. The Problem of Ps3"cliolog'y must be understood in accordance with tlie conception of the nature of psycholog-y which we have just accepted. Allowing ourselves a certain kelpful repetition, we may say : The problem of psychology is to describe and explain the phenomena of consciousness — the facts of psychic or mental life, as psychic, and known as psychic, i.e., as objects of knowl- edge. Using a somewhat different form of expression, it may be said : The problem of psychology is to understand the mental life, its phenomena, conditions, and laws. It is science which is aimed at ;— science, as distinguished from popular impression and opinion, or from merely artistic and poetical representation, however interesting and true. Such scientific treatment of psychic facts involves both description and explanation. To at- tempt explanation, Avithout accurate observation and careful de- scription of the facts, is to doom one's self to faulty generaliza- tions. Here, as everywhere, the frequent return from theory and statement of so-called " law " to the face-to-face experience with actual life is essential. The constant cry of the genuine and skilful psychologist is this : " Let us go back now and look the facts in the face." But to rest satisfied with mere descrip- tion is to stop short of science. For purposes of description the delineations of psychic life in which history, literature, and art 8 DEFINITION AND PROBLEM OF PSYCHOLOGY abound are indeed invaluable. But tlie narrative, or the dra- matic and artistic descriijtion of life is, as j^et, only material for science ; the expert and trained psychologist, by use of methods and conclusions belonging to modern psychological research, must explain facts, discover laws, trace the genesis and development of this life, and so construct the science of psychology. The explanations which scientific psychologj'^ offers for the phenomena of consciousness are chiefly of two kinds. These are, first, the analysis of complex states of consciousness into their simxjler factors, or elements, and the discovery of the laws of the combination of these factors ; and, second, the tracing of the genesis and growth of mental life. This second kind of " expla- nation " may, in its turn, be subdivided : (1) The genesis of the individual states of consciousness, as they arise and succeed each other in time, demands explanation. Psychology endeavors to set forth in definite terms on what conditions of physical en- vironment, and under what relations to preceding psychic con- ditions, each state of consciousness occurs. It necessarily re- gards the states of consciousness as associated, and considers all present states as dependent, under law, upon preceding states. But (2) psychology also endeavors to give a systematic exhibition of the general laws which control the evolution of the indi- vidual man's mental life. If we employ these words in a cau- tious, provisional w«y, we may say it investigates " the becoming of the soul," the genesis and growth of mind in individual man. It is obvious, then, that all states of consciousness, regarded as possible objects of knowledge, ofl^er — nay, themselves are — problems for the jisychologist. The crowd staring at a spectacle, the astronomer gazing through the telescope at a star, and the bacteriologist peering at a microbe through his microscope, are in states of so-called perceptive consciousness. But perception, as a state of consciousness — perception as such — is a psycho- logical problem. It is rather a vast and complicated network of problems. The lover of music while listening to the compo- sition of a great master, the admirer of nature in the presence of' Mount Blanc or of Fuji, the unamestlietized suflerer under the surgeon's knife, are in states of feeling consciousness. And feelings, as such, offer many jiroblems to ps^'chology. Each state of consciousness teems with interesting problems. But the one prohlem ove?' all is to understand the real nature of that mental life of which all states of consciousness are memhers and. parts, and the conditions and laws which control its genesis and de- celopment. DIFFERENT VIEWS OF ITS PIIOBLK.M 9 §6. Different statements have been given by diU'ercnt writers to the problem wliich psychology pursues. Thus Beneko holds that it is the busi- ness of the psychologist to give, for every form of manifestation whicli oceuis in the developed, soul, "definite and sliarji demonstration through what pro- cesses, and by combination of what factors, it originates." ' Another writer declares,'' in a more ambitious way, that the one quite definite purpose of a scientific psychology is " the reduction of all the processes of the soul to one simple psycho-2)hysical clement." [But this way of stating the problem of p.sychology plainly implies the very doubtful double hypothesis that all psychic proces.ses may be reduced to one, and that this fundamental process is a so-called "psycho-physical" process.] And Herbart ' conceived the aim of psychology to be the " demonstration of the connection of that which admits of being perceived in consciousness (facts of consciousness), by means of that which does not attain such perception — in accordance with general laws." While the most distinguished modern jisychologist from the Herbartian point of view ■* affirms : ' ' Psychology is that science which has for its problem the explanation of the general classes of p.sychical iihenom- eua, by means both of mental representations as empirically given, and also of the speculative concept of mental representation in general, according to the universal laws of mental life." We consider it much safer and more scientific, however, to conceive of the problem of psychology, when entering upon its pursuit, so as to exclude the admixture of doubtful theories often devised in answer to the problem. ^ 7. Our view of the problem of psychology assumes that a description of the phenomena of consciousness is possible which shall be sufficiently ac- curate and compreheu.sive to serve as a basis for an inductive science. But in order that these phenomena, or facts, may be employed as data for a scientific treatment, they must — as has already been said — become ol)jects of knowledge. Now, it is admitted by all that mental phenomena can become objects of immediate knowledge only by means of so-called introspection or self-consciousness. I can stand, as it were, face to face with the phenomena only of my own mental life, you of yours, and so on. It is moreover implied in this statement of the problem of psychology that psychic facts are, as objects of immediate knowledge, more or less comi)lex ; and, at the same time, that they may be analyzed into their so-called compo- nent factors and the laws of the combination of these factors discovered. As M. Paulhan has said : " Every psychic fact is a system — a synthesis of facts more or less perfectly coordinated." Such a system admits, in the hands of p.sychological science, of being analyzed. Here Helndioltz's analysis of the single note of our ordinary musical experience is often taken as a typical example. The fuller exjilanation and justification of these assumptions, too, must be left to subsequent examination. We are reminded again that our definition is iKvessarily preliminary. But here again, also, we may safely trust, for the present, the universal belief as expressive of universal experience. All ' Pragmatische Psycholog'e, p. 42. Berlin, 1850. 2 Horwicz : Psychologische Analysoii. p. iv. f. Halle, 1872. 3 Psychologic als Wisscuschaft, 1., p. 27. Ki'migsberij, 1S24. * Volkmaim vou Volkinar : Lehrbuch d. Psychologie.l., p. 3-1-. Cothcu, 1884. 10 DEFINITION AND PIIOBLEM OF PSYCHOLOGY believe that, in some sort, one may immediately and certainly know wliat one's own feelings, desires, thoughts, purposes, really are ; and that some of these states, called by a common term, are more complex and highly developed than are others. §8. Finally, it is assumed that the facts of consciousness may be suc- cessfully studied — nay, that they must be so studied, if we are to have any worthy scientific system — in the light of the conception of development. But what develops ? The most obvious answer certainly is : The soul or mind of the individual man develops. In this answer, however, we surely detect metaphysics creeping in, with its subtle and ever-present assumptions. The truth is, in our judgment, that no doctrine of evolution is possible without a host of metaphysical assumptions. Yet all we care to have admitted, at the outset, may be summed up in this statement : The facts of consciousness which " belong " to every psychic individual may be arranged and explained on the hypothesis that the later depend on the earlier, the more complex on the more simple, the particular on those belonging to the species, etc. In brief, it is jiossible to describe, as conforming to certain conceptions of law and order, the history of a human mental life. The true conception of psj^cliolog-y may be furtlier expanded by considering-, briefly, tlie Relations in wliieli this science stands to several other closely allied Forms of human Knowledge. Here it is necessary to notice, especially, only its relation (1) to certain allied particular sciences, and (2) to that form of inquiry and ojiinion which we call philosophy. The really notable thing- about the relation of psycholog-y to the physical sciences in general is that it differs from them l)y dealing: with a quite different order of facts, and that it is the threshold or g-ate of entrance to the study of another main g-roup of sciences — namely, the so-called psychological sciences. It has often been claimed — -and especially of late — that because the phenomena of consciousness are peculiarly related to cer- tain forms of physical development, therefore such phenomena ought to be subjected to treatment similar to that given to these forms of development. It has even been projaosed to make psychology a dependent branch of biology, or to reduce psychology to terms of general nerve-physiology or of cere- bral physiology. But so far as empirical psychology is con- tierned, the data with which it deals stand in no fundamentally different relation to the science of living organisms, or of the nerves and brain, from that in Avhich they stand to physics in the form of optics or of acoustics. Both ])hysies and phj^siol- ogy expound to us certain connections of psychic facts Avith other facts, certain conditions on which phenomena of con- sciousness arise and change. Both are, thereftn-o, to bo onii^loyed in explaining the genesis and growth of mental life. But bio- RKLATION TO PARTICULAR SCIENCES 11 logical facts, as such, and physiolo<;ical facts, as such, are no more like the phenomena of consciousness, as such, than are other physical facts. Nor can biology and physiolog-y put forth any more defensible claim to absorb psychology than can optics and acoustics. The "explanation" of psychic facts by reference to the relations which they sustain io known Inologicid or physiological facts is indeed a most promising and fruitful branch of psychological method ; but this does not in the least diminish the claim of psychology to an independent position among the particular sciences. In one sense of the words, there are no "independent" sciences, because there are no isolated or independent realities. In another sense of the words, psychology is by far the most independent and stable of the sciences. And if all the sciences were ever to be absorbed in any one, psychol- ogy is best fitted to be that universal science. For what are the other sciences but orderly or half-disordered systems of concep- tions ? And are not all conceptions facts of human consciousness ? On the other hand, jisychology is undoubtedly the necessary preliminary discipline, or " propaedeutic," to all the sciences of man. The sciences, of economics, politics, sociology, and even of history, hermeneutics, and aesthetics (so far as we can speak of such sciences), involve the immediate facts and laws of hiiman mental life. The subjects with which these sciences deal can- not be in the highest degree scientifically understood, without a thorough knowledge of psychology, \ 9. We take this occasion to protest eamestly, but briefly and once for all, against the assumption that, because the so-called "old psychology" was for a long time stationary, while modern biological and physiological science have contributed much by way of stimulus, method, and results to psychology, therefore the latter is not to be classed among the sciences, on an equality as respects independence with the others. Nor do we find less unwarrantable the claim that the only fruitful method of studying psychio facts is physiological or biological ; or that the only truly scientific expla- nation of such facts must be sought for in physiological facts. These claims are not, indeed, necessarily connected with the projiosal to study psychology as a '^natural science." If they were so connected, it would be a sufficient reason for denying that psychology is a " natural science." This expressive term simply embodies the obvious tinith that phenomena of consciousness occur in such connections as admit of being examined and partially, at least, reduced to general terms, within the realm of "nature" — in the larger and equally a^ipropriate iise of this word. Moreover, it seems to us a i^rocedure highly prejudicial to the interests of scientific psy- chology when philosophers so thoughtful as Mr. Hodgson, and psycholo- gists so brilliant and suggestive as Prof. James,' virtually assert that there ' See The Priuciples of Psychology, I., chap, i., vi., vii., anA jjassim in both vols. New York, 1S90. Also articles in the Philosophical Review, i., 1, pp. 24-53, and i., 2, pp. 146-153. 12 DEFINITION AND PROBLEM OF PSYCHOLOGY can be no science of psvcliology except a cerebral psychology. At the same time, we have ourselves diligently cultivated, and gratefully acknowl- edge our indebtedness to, that branch of psychological investigation which is called i:)hysiological. The Relations of Psycliolog-y to Philosophy are so close aud peculiar that it is impossible strictly to separate the two, whether iu theory or in actual execution, while treating Avith scientihc system the phenomena of consciousness. As Wundt ^ has well said : the partition of sovereignty between the two is an abstract scheme, which, in the presence of actuality, alw^ays appears un- satisfactory. All the principal problems into which the attempt to explain jjsychic facts leads the investigator, themselves lead to the greater and profounder i^roblems of philosophy. Psychology is then the special x^i'op^edeutic to philosophy. On the other hand, we have already seen how^ difficult it is to keejD even a provisional conception of psychology clear from what some would consider unwarrantable metaphysical assumptions. Phi- losophy, then, in the form of opinions and assumptions, almost necessarily underlies much of our psychological discussion. For example, scientific psychology is forced to recognize a certain conceiDtion to which the word " ego " corresponds, as entangled, so to speak, in the facts of consciousness. It is com- pelled to analyze this conception, and to describe its genesis and growth. But such work is difficult to keep distinct from metaphysical discussion as to the unitary nature and real being of the soul, considered as the trulj^ existent subject (or TrCKjcr) of the states of consciousness. Where, in the pursuit of this problem, does descriptive and explanatory science end and j^hi- losophy begin ? It is not easy to answer. Similar difficulties accompany the thorough discussion of all the important jirob- lems of scientific psycholog}'. In spite, however, of this unavoidable temptation to mingle philosophy and psychologj^ we shall succeed, in the main, in pursuing our chosen Avay by using the methods of empirical science. We shall describe and explain the processes and prod- ucts of mental life ; we shall even recognize the more impor- tant beliefs and assumptions which the jisychic facts actually imply; and then we shall make our bow to metaphysics, and pass b}'^ the discussion of the ultimate import of the facts, and of the validity and ideal value of the beliefs and assumptions implied by the facts. Such discussion belongs more properly to the Philosophy of Mind. ' System der Philo^^OI)hic. pp. 5 and 21 f. RELATION TO PHILOSOPHY 13 ^ 10. The history of psychological science might be freely appealed to, iu order to show how inseparable are the relations between this science and philosophy. The persistent use of the term "mental i^hilosophy," the large amount of mattei* in almost all treatises on psychology which is more properly classed under metaphysics or theory of knowledge, the constant transgression of the resolve not to introduce speculative jihilosophy into the emi>irical iuvo.stigatit>n of phenomena of consciousness (a form of transgression in which tlioso wlio most decry philosophy or metaphysics are often especially guilty) — all these facts are significant of tlie same truth. Tlie distinction between psychology and philosophy as drawn by Profes- sor Seth and Professor Crooiu Robertson is esi^ecially interesting. The former ' explains that psychology regards the fact of intelligence " simply as fact, in which case the evolutions of mind may be traced and reduced to laws in the same way as the phenomena treated by the other sciences (i)sychol- ogy, snus jyJirase)." But "it is witli the ultimate synthesis that philosophy concerns itself ; it has to show that the subject-matter with which we are deal- ing iu detail really is the whole, consisting of articulate members." The lat- ter'-' would have us notice that psychology " is occupied with the natural func- tion of InieUeclion (knowledge as mere subjective function), seeking to dis- cover its laws and distinguishing its various modes. . . . Philosophy, on the other hand, is theory of Knowledge (as that which is known)." It will be noticed that both these authorities are distinguishing the jDsyohology of intellection from the philosophical theory of knowledge. ? 11. The double manner of dealing with the subjects of ethics and logic, which has always prevailed, is another proof of the necessarily in- timate relations between the emjiirical science of psychology and all i^hilo- sophical discipline. As sciences, based upon the facts of consciousness, logic and ethics have no independent standing : they are simply branches or departments of psychology. But with the scientific treatment of logic and ethics, even when the point of view is avowedly empirical, the philosophy of morals (metaphysics of ethics), and the theory of being and theory of knowl- edge {Lor/ik, after the Hegelian pattern), are always nearly certain to be in- termingled in large quantities. We may fitly close this brief discussion of tlie relations of psy- clioloo-y and i)liilosoj)liy by saying-, with a recent German author :" " Psychology as a science has for its object of investig-atiou the psychical phenomena, through -which and in which the collective inner life exhibits itself, but not the being of the soul^x;- se, to which the phenomena point as something over and above themselves." [Besides the books to which referenoe has already been made, the following, among many others, may bo consulted : On the Nature and Scope of Psychology. Sully : The Hu- man Mind, I., chap. i. Baldwin: Handbook of Psychology, I.', chap. i. Rabier (already refeiTed to) : Psychologic, chap. i. and ii. Brentano : Psychologic vom empirischen Stand- ]>nnkte, bk. i., chap, i., and bk. ii., chap. i. Lotze : Metaphysics, bk. iii., chap. i. G. H. Lewes : The Study of Psychology, chap. i. to iii. Especial attention is called to the two monographs of Natorp and Spitta. Ses also Delhneuf : La Psychologic comme Science naturelle. On the relations of Psychology and Philosophy, see the author's Introduction to Philosophy, chap, iv.] ' Art. on Philosophy : Encyc. Br't. i9th ed.). ' Art. on Psychology and Philosophy : Mind, 1883, p. 166. ' Spitta : Einleitung in die Psycholog'c, p. 34. CHAPTEK II. METHOD, SOURCES, AND DIVISION OF PSYCHOLOGY No unnecessary mystery should, certainly, be thrown around the question of Method in Psycholog-y. For in this science, as in every other, the means of investig-ation employed are such as experience has shown to be fruitful, both in ascertaining accu- rately and comprehensively the facts which are to serve as data for the science, and also (and especially) in explaining- their origin and relations. To accomplish its purpose, psychology freely avails itself of all possible means at its disposal. In accordance with our provisional conception of psychology'', we might say, then,^ that all psychological method has these two things in view : 1, to certify the phenomena of consciousness ; and 2, to explain them. There has been almost as much debate over the true method of psychological science as over any of its more doubtful con- clusions. This debate, however, has been largely confined to two questions : first, and especially, the possibility and value of so-called introspection ; and, secondly, the usefulness and extent of experiment in the study of psychic facts. If, then, a reasonable position with reference to these two debated ques- tions can be made clear, little further discussion of psycholog- ical method is necessary. Observation of the phenomena of consciousness, both direct observation and indirect ; analysis of these phenomena, both by consciousness " envisaging " them and reflecting upon them, and also by the use of all possible experi- mental means ; induction of laws, and inferential and sp'eculative construction of the principles which control the genesis and growth of mental life— such is the mixed method which psy- chology more or less successfully employs. In other words, psychological science is (1) observative of facts, (2) analytic, (8) inductive, (4) genetic. Tlie difficulties, dangers, mistakes, and triumphs, of this the true scientific method it shares in common with the whole sisterhood of sciences. It I Comp. Spitta : Einleitnng In die Psychologie, p. 40 f . (zu vergewissern and zu erkldren, the phenomenaj. THE USE OF INTROSPECTION If) has, however, certiiiii special difficulties and dangers as well as certain iieculiar advantages and successes. These are mainly due to the nature of introspection, or reflective consciousness, and also to the fact tliat the sphere is limited within which the defi- nite experimental methods of the allied natural sciences can be successfully used. I 1. Debate as to the propriety of founding a science of the miud upon the " immotliatc awareness" of the individual, resj^ec ting what goes on in his own naental life, is by no means new. As long ago as Aristotle it was held that there can be no "science" of the individual. Since, therefore, intro- spection can never furnish anything beyond what the individual seems to himself to know of his own individual state of consciousness — a particular Ijsychic content of some particitlar psychical being — introspection can never constitute the sole method of mental science. By this method, it is said, we obtain, at best, only the new and fleeting psychic fact that I appear to myself, here and now, to be in such a so-called state of consciousness. Only by mem- ory can I know that I was in another state of consciousness, which may be recognized as similar, and so made the basis of a classification and scientific explanation of even my individual mental life. And as for those psychic facts which belong to other individuals than myself, every one admits that it is impossible to know them by introspection. Such trains of thinking as the foregoing have led certain writers not only to deny the possibility of founding a science of jisychology upon intro- spection only, but also to deny that introspection can render back to us even our own mental states as true objects of knowledge. And so •we are brought to the palpably absurd proposal that we should abandon all effort to certify the facts of consciousness, as facts, by the method of considering what they immediately are in our own mental life. (So, virtually, writers like Comte, Lange, Maudsley, et al.) On the other hand, the majority of even modern treatises on psychology reaflSrm the method of introspection without very clearly fixing its limitations or appreciating its real value. One writer, for example, declares: "The way to jisychology is, first of all, per- ception of a soul by a soul." This percei:)tion is .se^-perception, which is, therefore, the " chief and indispensable method of psychology." ^ 2. The risks, limitations, possibilities, and proper uses of introspection in psychology can only be made known in connection with the development of the science itself. For the discussion of psychological method is compli- cated with the discussion of the nature of consciousness and self-conscious- ness, of attention, of memory, of the genesis and growth of the conception of "self," of time-consciousness, and of many other subjects. It may be premised, however, that many of the difiiculties ordinarily raised are due, largely or wholly, to " fallacies of the psychologist." They cling to what the psychologist thinks ahout the use of introspection ; they do not necessarily belong to the real nature and actual use of introspection. Those writers wlio claim that one can never immediately know what one is now thinking, feeling, and willing, are invariably found to hold conceptions as to the nature of knowledge, as to the nature of that time of which we have experience (the "now" of self-consciousness), and as to the meaning of the word '• imme- 16 METHOD, SOURCES, AND DIVISION OF PSYCHOLOGY diate," etc., wliicli are abstract and remote from the actual life of the mind. That some knowledge — immediate, trustworthy (though not necessarily in- fallible), and capable of being made into data of a science — is attainable re- garding the phenomena of consciousness, forms the presupposition, not only of all study of jisychology, but also of all human intercourse. We begin, therefore, by assuming, in a preliminary way, the general truthfulness of the universal impression concerning the nature and value of introspection as a means (f knowing the phenomena of consciousness. Observation of the phenomena of Consciousness is of two ereneral chisses — direct and indirect. Direct (or immediate) ob- servation is that form or phase of conscious mental life which is called " self -consciousness." When such immediate observation is emploj^ed, with puri^oseful attention, for the ascertainment of the psychic facts actually occurring in any individual mental life, and for the analysis of such facts, it becomes the so-called " introspective " method in psychology. In spite of all objections which may be urged, and of all diffi- culties raised against the use of introspection as scientific meth- od in psychology, the following position may be maintained : Direct observation of psychic facts is able not only to render these facts to us as true objects of hiou'leclge, but also to a certain extent to assist in the analysis of the complex life of adult consciousness into its simpler component elements. Only on the supposition that psychic facts tnay be made immediate objects of knowledge can psychological inquiry be instituted and psychological science enter upon its work. The preliminary but necessary conception of psychology shows that scientific psj^^chological inquiry begins by asking, What are the facts called "phenomena of conscious- ness ? " and that these facts, in so far — and only in so far — as they can become objects of knowledge, furnish the data of the science. But " phenomena of consciousness " are " internal " facts ; the two phrases are intended to mean one and the same thing. These facts, as such (and " as such " they constitute the data of psychology), are, by their very nature, capable of being known only in and through consciousness. All other knowl- edge of them is indirect ; that is, it is through objective signs and by interpretation of such signs. But, here again, what the signs really signify is determined by ncAV facts of conscious- ness, alike capable of being immediately known only by the ob- server of the signs ; and interpretation itself consists of nothing Init certain facts in the conscious life of the interpreter, the nat- Tire of which ho knows ns facts of his own consciousness, and which he believes, suspects, or knows to represent other facts of another individual's consciousness. TIIK USE OF INTKOSPECTION^ 17 Moreover, here, as iu every other form of science, truininj? of the powers of observation is most important in its etit'ct npon the data of tlie science. Here, too, as elsewhere, ditlcrent ob- servers show great ditierences iu natural tastes and ai)titudes, in what we are accustomed to call " natural powers." Some are nnich given to observing- their own mental states ; they do this with an interest which may become almost as purely objective as that of the observer of the amceba through a microscope. Others are always reluctant and generally unskilful iu the observation and description of their own mental life. What is here especially important to notice is this, that much skill and success may be attained by intelligent practice in the analysis of one's own mental states with the instrument of introspection. For not only can one make the mental state in which one here and now is an object of one's knowledge, but one cau also train one's self to note the genesis and growth of mental states ; and by rapidly directing attention to the various phases, aspects, and elements, of the complex and changing mental life, one can recognize in a limited way the various " stuffs," so to speak, out of which the complex wholes are successively comi^ounding themselves under one's eyes. To tell the ordinary observer : " You cannot discern in detail before the mind's eye, your owai mental conditions, and certainh' know ; I here and now think about this, or perceive that complex object of sense, or feel such a manifold pleasure or pain, or form such a complicated pur- pose " — is to tell him, in the interests of psychological theory, what he rightly believes to be contradicted by the frequently recurring experience of life. To tell the trained psj'chologist, who does not accept the fanciful denial by other psychologists of that real activity which we call immediate self- consciousness : " You cannot, by so-called introspection, analj'ze your own states of consciousness," is to declare theoretically im]iossible a scientific feat which he knows himself constantly to be per- forming. Such arguments resemble those by which motion is proved to be impossible, or the antinomies of space and time are established. While admitting the possibility, within certain limitations, of obtaining trustworthy immediate knowledge of psychic facts by the method of introspection, we by no means deny the diffi- citlties and dangers which accompany its siiccessful use. All scientific method in observation needs to be guarded in its em- ployment ; all observation of phenomena is apt to encounter difiiculties and liable to engender mistakes. Prejudice, haste, admixture of undvie inference and expectation as to what will be 2 18 METHOD, SOURCES, AND DIVISION OF PSYCHOLOGY observed, or oug-lit to be observed, and various other sources of corruption and mistake, exist in connection with the inspection of all objects of knowledg-e. Moreover, it must be admitted that psychic facts are peculiarly difficult of direct analysis under observation. For this, four principal reasons may be g-iven : they are subtle and complex in their composition, rapid and difficult to follow in their changes, alterable — swifth- and largely — by the very act of attention which makes them objects of knowledge, and characterized by a high degree of individuality. § 3. It would be difficult to make the absurdity of denying in toio the scientific value of introspection any more obvious than it is the moment we appeal to real life and to individual experience. Without too great risk of tedious repetition, however, it may be said that certain of the most force- ful arguments of those who credit this denial would, if strictly interin-eted, render impossible any immediate and trustworthy knowledge of any kind of facts. For exam^jle, we are told that the mental life is in a constant flux ; and that, therefore, no one phase of that life (no so-called "state of con- sciousness " ) can exist without at once being dissolved in the onflowing cur- rent of this life. Hence, psychic facts, it is claimed, cannot be objects of observation long enough to become objects of knowledge. But the same thing is as certainly true, if not true to the same extent, of objects of ex- ternal observation. When an observer watches an amoeba under the micro- scope, or the image of the S2:)ectrum upon a screen, his mental life is no less truly in a constant flux which carries along with it the object of his ob- servation. Indeed, the only defensible psychological doctrine, as we shall subsequently see, holds that every object (the amoeba or the image of the spectrum) is, as an object, unceasingly constructed, dissolved, and recon- structed anew, by mental activity, during the entire process of observation. The existence of any external object, as an object of immediate knowledge through the senses, is momently dependent ujion the fixation and wander- ing of attention, and upon activities of memory, imagination, and thought. For memory, imagination, and thought are not faculties that can be exer- cised apart from perception through the senses, and apart from self-con- sciousness ; neither can thei-e be any immediate knowledge of objects, whether external or internal, whether by perception or by self-consciousness, which does not involve memory, imagination, and thought. If, then, the dependence of introsijection upon the activity of these other mediate and fallible faculties constitutes a reason why we cannot regard the deliverances of introspective consciousness as gi^•ing immediate and trustworthy knowl- edge of psychic facts, the dependence of all external observation uijou the activity of the same faculties will force us to conclude against the possi- bility of immediate and trustworthy knowledge of any of the data of the physical and natural sciences. § 4. The degree to which the knowledge of complex mental states may be carried by trained introspection cannot, from the very nature of the case, be definitely fixed. The changes which the growth of this power under train- ing brings about are likely to bo plainly remarked by one who has had intel- THE USE OF INTROSPECTION 19 ligent expenence of thorn. For example, let a student of psychology who has a good ear for musical sounds train himself to recognize the overtones in the complex note of ordinary experience ; or lot him analyze, by imme- diate observation, his skin sensations, after ho has been for some weeks ex- l^erimenting after the manner of Guldscheidor and others. It will be true that he has a richer experience of auditory or of skin sensations than ho formerly had ; but especially will it be true (and this is the important point for our ijresent consideration) that ho immediately knows that he has this richer experience, because he can detect more elements in the complex sen- sation-state than was previously jjossiblo. # Daily experience also proves that it is within the i^ower of an observer to make something like an accurate analysis of his own complex mental states by means of introspection. Indeed, all adult minds are constantly doing this very thing. We hear persons describing, in a way which wo have every reason to suppose fairly accurate, how they have felt, and what they have imagined, remembered, or resolved — all in some moment of horror, or of danger, or of joy. To be sure, this " moment " is not the mathematical point which constitutes the atom of time where the single state of conscious- ness can alone find position, according to the fallacious theory of some psychologists. But then there are, in reality, no siich moments in the life of consciousness ; and, of course, there are no simple, analyzable states of consciousness fully occupying such moments. But the discussion of the full bearing of this upon our view of the use of introspection must be postponed imtil later. ^5. The difficulty of introsi^ective analysis of the so-called "feelings" iias been so emphasized by many writers as to amount to a denial of the pos- sibility of any immediate knowledge of our own states of consciousness, when they are i^redominatingly states of feeling. Thus the conclusion is enforced : I can never know precisely how I now feel as a matter of im- mediate cognition of present psychic fact ; I can only have an idea of how I did feel a moment, or an hour, or a day ago. Feeling, then, must be ideated, to be known ; and the particular form of the idea under which alone it can be known is the representative image. In other words, I can have an idea of how Ifelt at some past time ; but I cannot immediately know how I now feel — especially, of course, if my present feeling be a rather intense one. Even so cautious a writer as Dr. Ward maintains : " Feeling as such is, so to put it, matter of being rather than direct knowledge ; and all that we know about it we know from its antecedents or consequences in presen- tation." The number of fallacies involved at every point in this general position will have to be exposed in their appropriate places. They are of the order to which reference has already been made. They come from substituting intellectual abstractions for the wealth in reality of concrete psychic facts. That the four chief difficulties of introspective analysis, as mentioned above, apply with peculiar force to so-called states of feeling, no one would think of disputing. The history of psychological science and the language of art and of common life prove this truth. But that I cannot immediately know that I am this moment angry at such an individual person or act ; or filled with the emotion of love toward such another person or ideal object of con- 20 METHOD, SOURCES, AND DIVISION OF PSYCHOLOGY tcmplatiou ; or in terror at this particular animal or inanimate object — this is something which it requires long dealing with misleading psychological abstractions to believe. On the contrary, it is often in moments of strongest and most richly varied feeling that, above all other moments, we lire most ; and also knoio most immediately and certainly that we live, and what our mental life here and now is. Observation of psychic facts for purposes of a scientific psy- chology^ cannot, however, be confined to the direct or introspec- tive method. For — as has#already been pointed out — this would involve the attempt to build science wholly on the particular, as limited to an individual mental life. In truth, we can neither know others except through self-knowledge, nor know ourselves Avithout comprehension and acute observation of our fellow- men.^ As Gothe has significantly said : " The gaiige that from himself he takes Measures him now too small, and now too great. Only in man, man knows himself." Indirect observation, or the ascertainment and certifying of the phenomena of consciousness through interpretation of the signs which other psychical beings give of their states of conscious- ness, is, therefore, an indispensable method of scientific psychol- ogy. Tavo things must at once be noticed with reference to all use of this method : First, all observable signs of the states of consciousness of other beings than ourselves necessarily consist of physical changes ; such changes are primarily brought about in the physical organism of the conscious beings, and some- times, secondarily, brought about in things dependent for their structure or changes upon the action of this physical organism. Second, all interpretation of such signs must be in terms of the observer's self-consciousness. He must think or imagine how the other individual thinks, feels, wills, etc. The method of indi- rect observation is, then, inevitably connected with, and depend- ent upon, the method of introspection. AYithout this the lament of Tourguenieff is absolutely true : " The soul of another is a darksome forest." Psychological science, if it be nobly and)itious and faithful to its high mission, will regard all forms of the exhibition of human mental life with painstaking, unprejudiced, and loving ■» So the couplet of the German poet runs : " Willst dii dich selbcr erkcnnen, so sich viie die Andcren cs treiben ; Willit du die Anderen verstehn, blick in dein eigencs Hcrz.''' THE VAllIOUS KINDS OF SOURCES 21 inquiry. Every sig-n of sucli life, actually furnished or artisti- cally conceived, becomes for the trained student of psychology an object of interest. He desires to convert the state of con- sciousness which it signifies into an object of (indirect, but veri- fiable) knowledg-e for himself. Hence, all manifestations of psychic facts are -watched for and scrutinized by him -svith sympathetic and yet scientific spirit. Psychological appetite, psychological insight, psychological skill in interpretation, arise and develop in this way. It is not arrogant to claim that the trained psychologist understands not only the child, the idiot, the madman, and the hypnotic subject, but also the artist, the scientist, the statesman, and the thinker, as psj'^chical beings, far better than any of these classes of persons understand each other, or even themselves. I 6. It follows, from the position jnst taken, that, in order to a complete enumeration of the so-called sources of psychology, it would be necessary to classify all the jirincipal forms of the manifestation of human mental life. For this achievement we should not have room, even if it were worth the time which it would necessarily demaud. The one rule for the student of psychol- ogy — a rule which he carries about with him when far away from books or psycho-physical and biological laboratories — is this : Seize upon every mani- festation of the jisychical life, try to make it an object of knowledge, and try to explain it in accord with other facts and known laws of psychical life. From the infant to the adult Kant, from the idiot or madman to Aristotle, from the meanest subject to the statesman or the emjjeror — all things psychi- cal are yours, and are to be converted if possible into integral parts of your IDsychological theory. "We now enumerate, however, several of the more important sources of psychology which are open to indirect observation : (1.) The artistic delineation of life, in every form of such delineation, is a most valuable source of psychology. This includes the drama, poetry, and even the art of the painter, sculptor, and musician ; it especially includes the modern novel, or prose romantic composition. All true art displays in- sight into life. But most artists, and especially most novel writers, are apt to succeed ill when they attempt to enter upon psychological analysis in a scientific way, or even attempt artistically to present the results of such analysis. While, for the trained psychologist, the great artists, even if Tin- conscious of what, from the psychologist's standpoint, they are actually do- ing, are guides of the gi'eatest value. (2.) Social phenomena, and the historical or theoretical discussion of such phenomena, are another source of psychological science. The phenomena of savage life, and of the mental life of distant and strange peoples, have a certain value of their own. The institutions, habits, customs, laws, of dif- ferent tribes and nations manifest their prevalent states of consciousness. Great caution is needed here, and great painstaking really to enter, through the gateways of the phenomena, into the temple of the real mental life. The 22 METHOD, SOURCES, AXD DIVISION OF PSYCHOLOGY so-called " old iDsycliology " suffered from failure to use this source. It was too narrow aud individualistic— a Puritanic psychology, or a Teutonic psy- chology, or a French psychology, or the description of the mental life of the commou-place, middle-class Englishman of the writer's time. (3.) Abnormal aud pathological phenomena are also a helpful source of psychological science. In every science of living beings the normal and sound phenomena, so called, are fully understood only when studied in con- nection with the abnormal aud pathological. Hence the value of studies in insanity, hypnotism, criminology, idiocy, etc., for the science of psychology. (1.) Observation of the phenomena of infant and child life is particularly necessary for the successful use of the genetic method in psychology. Such observation leads, almost directly, to a better analysis of our own adult states of consciousness aud to the detection of hitherto concealed factors within them. Under this same class of sources we may bring so called "comparative IDsychoIogy," or the study of the phenomena and evolution of the conscious life of the lower animals. But here, as well as in the study of infant mental life (and even much more emphatically), all conclusions must be very cai;- tiously and doubtfully drawn. What really psj/c7«'c facts are signified by the external signs, and how far there are any states of adult consciousness which will enable us even to present ourselves with a meagre picture of the states of animal consciousness, as such — about this, it is difficult or impossible to attain certainty. In other words, we can scarcely be sure of our jjower to convert states of animal consciousness into objects of the psychologist's knowledge — even of knowledge as gained by indirect observation aud hypothesis. There can be no doubt, however, that those biologists who attem^jt a science of the mental life of the lower animals need nothing more imperatively than what they customarily lack — namely, a scientific knowledge of human psy- chology. (5. ) Reading is another valuable indirect means of acquiring a knowledge of the phenomena of human mental life. For psychology, like every other science, grows at the hands of many workmen, and there is a " soul of truth " in all views, however distorted or erroneous they may at first aiijjear. Experiment, as a method of observation and analysis of the facts of psychic life, has become in these modern times a most valuable and even indispensable means for constituting- and im- proving- the science of psycholog-y. On the use of experiment in psychology, however, we can sympathize with the extremists of neither extreme. For, on the one hand, it does not seem that experiment is likely to prove capable of coping with some of the most profound and interesting- problems of psychology. On the other hand, it is clear that under the appropriate limitations, experiment may be a valuable aid in disentangling- the factors and tracing the genesis and growth of certain states of con- sciousness, as well as in demonstrating iinder what definite physical and physiological conditions the different states arise, combine, and succeed each other in the entire mental life. To THE USE OF EXPERIMENTATION 23 fear psycho-pliysics and so-called pliysiolog-ical psycliolog-y, or to attempt to substitute psy(dio-pliysical experimentation for all introspective study of mind, for all survey of the creations of art, society, and politics, in the field of mental evolution, and im- all theoretical construction on the basis of leg-itimato metaph3'sical hypothesis, seems to us alike unworthy of the scientific student of mind. It is, of course, neither easy nor safe to fix definite limits within which alone experiment in psychology shall be declared to be possible or capable of yielding assured results. Two jthing-s, however, will always be true of the experimental method in psychology. First : experiment belongs to truly psycho- logical method only so far as it is constantly accompanied and tested by introspective examination of the phenomena of con- sciousness. Secondly : experiment gives us preliminary infor- mation as to the definite physical and physiological conditions under which the psj^chic facts, as such, arise, change, and pass away. But, here again, without introspection and trust in the introspective method, experiment gives us no ps3'chical data or strictly psychological laws. And much of what has been discov- ered in this way belongs to physics and physiology, and not to l^sychology at all. ^ 7. The true impression as to the great value of modern experimental methods in the study of psychic facts can best be gained by some actual acquaintance with laboratory work, or with the literature produced by such work during the last two decades. Here the successes in the field of local- ization of cerebral function, in psycho-physics i^roper, in reaction-time, etc., may properly be instanced. Let any doubter follow the laborious and care- ful researches which have disentangled from confused and complex states of predominating bodily sensations the elements to be assigned respectively to skin, to joints, to muscles, and i")erhaps also to primarily central physio- logical processes. Or, taking up the wonderful new views as to sensation- complexes which originate in irritation of the skin alone, let him inves- tigate experimentally sensations of heat, and sensations of cold, and light- pressure sensations, and dull-contact sensations, and tickle sensations, and motion-sensations, and prickle sensations, and indescribable new sensations — many or all of which are stirred and fused in a single " field of con- sciousness," so called, when any large area of this important sense-organ has its multitudinous points simultaneously excited. ^ 8. We are cautioned against arbitrarily limiting the sphere of experi- mentation in psychology, in view of the attempts now being made to discuss by use of this method the phenomena of so-called "free-will," or of the more complex associations of ideas, etc. Even the ethical, fcsthetical. and religious feelings are, we are told, to be made subjects of experimental observation and analysis ; while, if we are to trust M. Charcot and his 24 METHOD, sourcf:s, and div;sion of psychology scliool, it has been experimentally demonstrated that certain fundamental changes are necessary in our conceptions, not only of mind, but also of the objects with which physics scientifically deals. The psychology of the multitude is also being investigated by the proposed application of simple means of experiment to the great body of the children by the help of all the school-mistresses of the laud. All this is certainly very hopeful and inter- esting. On the other hand, certain barriers, beyond which it will be difficult or impossible for experimentation to pass, may be stated with a reasonable con- fidence. Only the simpler states of consciousness, in res^ject of their sensory and motor factors, readily lend themselves to study by the strictly experi- mental method. The quantity, quality, combination, time-rate, and succes- sion of the elementary processes belonging to the sensory-motor basis of the mental life furnish the subjects which are best (if not exclusively) adapted to this method. How much there is that is beyond its reach, the unprejudiced use of this very method reveals. The truth of our view this entire treatise will make abundantly clear. ^ 9. The experimental method reveals nothing about i^sychic facts, as such, unless the subject of the experiment in some way reveals, in terms of consciousness, what his states of consciousness actually are. The question which the experiment asks the subject to determine always is : "How did you feel, or what did you perceive or think, or what did you will, when such a physical event (known or unknown to him) occurred ? " Thus it is an appeal direct to self-consciousness and memory which experi- mentation always makes. If neither question nor answer makes any refer- ence to states of consciousness, directly known by the subject as such, then the experimental inquiry is not jpsychological at all. The science of psychology, as descriptive and explanatory of states of con- sciousness, undoubtedly consists very largely of knowledge about those physi- cal and physiological conditions — antecedent or concomitant — upon which the states depend. But we have already made our protest against the doctrine that tliese are the only conditions which it behooves psychological science to investigate. To observation, direct aud indirect, and to analysis by intro- spection, reflection, and experiment, we add Induction — as the necessary method of psychological science.' In psychology the function and place of the inductive raiithod does not differ from that maintained by this method in the other particidar sciences. The character of induction and the validity of it as general scien- tific method, it belongs to special treatises on this subject to set 1 Volkinaim dcuics that, properly epeakinfr, induction can be the method of psycholosrical sci- ence (Lehrbuch d. Phycliulo^ic, I., p. G f.). Indeed, lie rejects both the deductive and the indnctive method, and adopts what lie calls the * ' genetic " method as the only true one. His ar>;uinent asrainst many of the faults and failures of the ordinary use of induction in psycholoijy is undoubtedly very forceful. Wliat is called inducfon too often uses unwarrantable abstractions— whether of so-called faculties or psychic factors and processes, such as raw undifferentiated " mind-stunf," or uncon- scious i)sychic atoms and " azKrcfrations," " intetrrations," " re-dintegrations," aud what not — as though they were entities or activities in concrete mental life. NATURE OF THE GENETIC METHOD 2.) fortli. There is little or notliiiif>-, at once special and noteworthy, concerning the application of this method to facts of mental life which it is necessary for us to consider. We beg-in the study of psychology with the general assumption that, by diligence and skill, order may be introduced into what appears at first an indistinguishable mixture, a chaotic mass of psychic facts. Here, as elsewhere — we say hopefully — law must reign : and it is possible for us to find it. We compare psychic facts here with psychic facts there, psychic facts just brought to our knowledge with psychic facts known of yore or of yesterday ; we classify, generalize, frame hypotheses, and test the hypotheses by trying with them better to analyze and to explain new psychic facts. In brief, we construct and verify generalized statements as to the orderly modes of the structure — so to speak — of man's men- tal life. So often as our so-called " laws " are proved to be wrong, inadequate, or defective at any ijoint, we amend, expand, and improve them. And from the simpler and less comprehensive generalizations we strive to rise to those which are more difficult to make and to justify, because they comprehend so many facts and involve so many minor laws. Here, of course, the so-called inductive method implies — strictly speaking — deduction as w^ell as induction, and both analj^sis and synthesis, after the fashion of the science-making mind of man. But over all hovers the conception of Development. We de- sire to treat the mental life as a totality, where, as far as possible, the great principles of its genesis and growth shall be made known. Only thus can each jDarticular f act be better understood, as seen in the light of these principles ; onlj^ thus can each stage of this life be satisfactorily explained in its necessary dependence upon the i^receding stages. The ideal of our science is, to be sure, an exalted one. It may be a long time before it can be real- ized ; it may, indeed, never be realized. But none the less, it is the ideal alone fitted to stimulate, encourage, and guide our scien- tific investigations ; — and not our investif-ations alone, but those of the whole race of men, in so far as they may be made inter- ested in the science of their own mental life. It is in the for- mation of such a comprehensive view of the development of all mental life that the so-called " Genetic Method " is most effect- ively employed. § 10. To endeavor to confine the inductive method in psychology ■within the same details of treatment as those found approjjriate to the physical sci- ences is to render it relatively nnfruitfnl from the very outset. Statistics and the records of lon^^ series of psycho-physical experiment are of undoubted value ; but the collection and criticism of such data is not the only basis for /^ -ITT 26 METHOD, SOURCES, AND DIVISIOIST OF PSYCHOLOGY valid induction in psychology. The rather must all classes of psychic facts, however discovered, have their due place and influence in our induction. In Germany Herbart and his followers have endeavored to use the genetic method for the solution of particuhir psychological problems, as well as for the formation of a complete scientific picture of mental development. In carrying out this endeavor, however, they have avowedly introdixced meta- physical presuppositions which we consider unwarrantable. Volkmann, the ripest product of the Herbartian school, adopts the genetic method, although he claims that " the dialectical history of the development of the spirit is not a history of development at all ; " and that " the so-called stages of this de- velopment are hypostasized abstractions " — a criticism which is, of course, aimed chiefly against Hegel. Beneke was the first in Germany to attempt the genetic method, discarding metaphysical assumptions and building upon a scientific basis. The traditional old-fashioned English ])sychology has con- fined itself largely to analysis. There can be no doubt that the genetic method is destined to achieve some brilliant successes in the near future ; although incessant jjainstaking is necessary to avoid being deceived by misleading fig- ures of speech brought over from the fields of physical science. For example, many of the psychical entities of Mr. Spencer are quite as much " hypos- tasized abstractions " as are those made use of in Hegel's "Phenomenology." The Divisions of the whole fiekl of psychology are generally given as two : Empirical Psychology and Rational Psychology, or the Philosophy of Mind. The field of empirical psychology is customarily divided according to the three so-called Faculties of Intellect, Feeling, and Will. Since we have decided to ex- clude, as far as possible, all problems of so-called rational psy- chology and to treat of mental phenomena in terms of descriptive and explanatory science, and since we regard the customary discussion of the "Faculties" of Mind as defective and unscien- tific, we shall — in accordance with our conception of psychology and for purposes of the highest convenience — divide the entire subject as follows : I., Most General Forms of Mental Life ; II., Elements of Mental Life ; III., Development of Mental Life. The justification of this division must be left to the entire subse- quent treatment of the topics concerned. [Besides the chapters on Method in the various works on psychology, the following, among others, are especially worth noting: J. S. Mill: LoLjic, bk. vi., especially chap, iv. Lewes : Problems of Life and Mind, third series, I., cliap. iv. Volkmann : Lohrbnch, I., pp. .5-84. Brcntano : Psychologie, 1., chap, ii.-iv. Rabior : Let'ons, etc., chap. iv. W^nndt: Physiologische Psychologic (4th ed.), p. 3 f. Bain: Logic, bk. v., chap. v. James: Principles of Psychology, I., chap, i., vi., vii. Sully : The ILinian Mind, I., chap. ii. In- teresting and helpful monographs are Mohr : Grnndlagc d. cminrisohcn Psychologic. Spitta: Einlcitung in d. Psychologie. Natorp : Einleitung in d. Psychologic.] Ipart ffiret MOST GENERAL FORMS OF MENTAL LIFE Ipart first MOST GENERAL FORMS OF MENTAL LIFE CHAPTER III. CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS ^ It should be understood that in psychology anything- like a separate treatment of the principal topics, so that what is said under one head shall not be assumed or repeated under every other head, is quite impossible. The real relation of psychic facts and psychical faculties is such as to forbid that any clear and complete knowledge of those earliest treated should be ob- tained until some knowledge of those whose treatment comes later has been reached. No division of the general field can avoid this difficulty, for it grows out of the essential nature and uniform princi^Dles of the development of all mental life. In the three following chapters the difficulty will be especially obvious, because these chapters treat of those forms, or aspects, which belong to all actual psychic facts ; the discussions brought for- ward in them are, therefore, necessarily connected with each other and also with all the details treated in the two follo^^^ng parts of the book. The term Consciousness has already been used as synony- mous with all truly psychic facts, in so far as such facts can be- come objects of knowledge, and so be considered as data for scientific psychology. This use our preliminary definition of lisychology assumed to be justifiable. But it is necessary that we should now clear up further the conception corresponding to this term, and present some statements as to the conditions of consciousness, the universal structure, so to speak, of all states of consciousness, the " circuit " of consciousness, the " flow "' of consciousness, and other similar topics. The Meaning of the term Consciousness, in its widest and vaguest significance, does not admit — strictly speaking — of being 30 CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS defined. In other words, the marks of the concept of conscious- ness cannot be enumerated without implying-, in each one of them, an understanding- of the fundamental experience to which the concept itself corresponds. Figuratively speaking, con- sciousness may be said to be the one universal solvent, or men- struum, in which the different concrete kinds of psychic acts and facts are contained, whether in concealed or in obvious form. Is there a truly psychical phenomenon, an occurrence of real men- tal life, anywhere : then snch phenomenon is a phenomenon of consciousness, an occurrence in consciousness. On the other hand, consciousness is no existence, or abstract form of mental life, apart from all actual psychic facts. Definition in general — the analysis which makes it possible to fix the meaning of con- cepts, and the synthesis of the results of analysis — is possible only by complex activity of consciousness. The meaning of every concept is all in the states of consciousness, reduced to their lowest terms, which mental gTOwth of the particular con- cept involves. We attempt then to define the simplest of all by the more complex, the most fundamental by the less fundamen- tal, when we attempt to give the meaning of the concept of con- sciousness. We may, however, realize, as it were, what consciousness is by comparing it with the so-called " unconscious." But " the unconscious," considered as the contradictory of consciousness, is synonymous with no psychic state or fact ; or, rather, it is the denial of any truly psychic state or fact : it is the 7?.(9?i-psychical, in the same meaning of the word which makes the " psychical " equivalent to a phenomenon of consciousness. What we are when we are awake, as contrasted with what we are when we sink into a profound and perfectly dreamless sleep, or receive an overpowering blow upon the head — t/iat it is to be conscious. What we are less and less, as we sink gradually down into dreamless sleep,^ or as we swoon slowly away: and what we are more and more, as the noise of the crowd outside tardily arouses us from our after-dinner nap, or as we come out of the midnight darkness of the typhoid-fever crisis — f/xff it is to be- come conscious. Biit, of course, " the unconscious " cannot be thought, since thought itself is only an orderly movement and sequence of states of consciousness. Nor can we define con- sciousness by contrast with the merely neg-ative concept of " the unconscious." In this most general meaning of the word, all phases, fac- tors, and forms, of mental states, or psychic facts — all partial or ' Comp. StrUmpell : Qrundriss d. Psychologie, p. 16 f. USES OF THE WORD "CONSCIOUSNESS" 31 comploto " psychoses " — arc equally to be spoken of as bclonp:- iug- to, and falling- within, the so-called " held of consciousness." The most blinding toothache, as well as the serenest contempla- tion of Deity, the obscurest mass of confused bodily sensations belong-ing to the early days of the infant, as well as the reflective self-analysis of the trained psychologist, is a phenomenon of consciousness. By this use of the word, however, we do not mean either to affirm or to deny the right of reflective science to refer to the being called Mind other activities than those which it may be said to manifest in consciousness. If this right w^ere admitted, it would no longer be improper to speak of '" uncon- scious" mental acts, or "unconscious" states of mind. In other words, the terms "mental acts" and "facts of consciousness" would no longer be throughout strictly convertible. And there are many of our common experiences which induce us to use this kind of instinctive metaphysics. There are also certain undoubted phenomena which scientific psychology can handle more satisfactorily by means of the hypothesis of unconscious mental activities. What, however, is now intended is this : abjuring- metaphysics and attending- only to the primary, attain- able data for a science of psychology, it is a justifiable and nec- essary use of the word consciousness which makes it synonymous with psychic facts in general. Where there is no consciousness, there are no psychic facts as data for psychology ; wherever there is consciousness, there already exist psychic facts demand- ing scientific description and explanation. ; \ 1. The word " consciousness" has been used by different i^svchologists with a somewhat wide range of meanings ; and — as was to be expected— in connection with this varying use there has been no little difference of opin- ion concerning the nature of consciousness. On the one hand, some writers have identified consciousness with self consciousness as the so-called " power by which the soul knows its own acts and states " (so Porter : The Human In- tellect, p. 83) ; or have sjioken of it as an inner '• witness," an " inner illumi- nation," which gives us information about everything in the mind (Cousin : Psychology, chap. x. ; and Hickok : Empirical Psychology, chap, iii., 2). Sir William Hamilton employed it as a collective term for the cognitive aspect, or factors, of all psychical states. On the other hand, many German writers, and recent writers generally, have rightly protested against identify- ing consciousness and self-consciousness ; and also against the fallacy wdiich assumes that an actual self-reference of every psychic fact, or state, to a sub- ject (the Ego) is the necessary accompaniment of the very existence of such fact or state. This protest, when made in a lively way, may take the form of such questions as follow : Are we to believe that every psychic fact, as such, has all this mechanism concealed in its interior, as it were ; this uni- versal double entendre, or two-foldness of fact, as mere fact ? As for me. 32 CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS ordinarily when I hear a sound, the hearing is all there is of it ; I do not, besides, consciously refer it, as something heard by me, to a self as the sub- ject of the state. To say, I hear the sound, or the sound is heard by me, means ordinarily no more than to say, in a perfectly impersonal way : psy- chic fact of hearing has arisen in consciousness. This somewhat too lively form of objection embodies a deserved criti- cism of a widely current psychological fallacy. I may, indeed, subsequently recall any psycliic fact and attribute it to myself, as the state of which I was subject. I may also make this reference simultaneously, or nearly simul- taneously, with the occurrence of such psychic fact. But I do not neces- sarily do this. To say that one can never think of a state of consciousness which is not some one's state of consciousness is, then, obvious enough. To say that / cannot remember a state of isast-consciousness without im- plying that it was my state is scarcely less obvious. But to say that the terms of the very existence of every state of my consciousness are identical with the terms of its being thought about as consciousness, or even with the terms of its being recognized as referable to me, as w?/ consciousness, is not at all obvious. In other words, phenomena of consciousness as such, in this use of the term, do not necessarily involve that reference of state to Self, as its subject or ground, in which the essence of developed self-knowl- edge consists. > But psychic facts, or phenomena of consciousness, in order to serve as data of psychology, must become objects of knowledge. That is to say, the phenomena must not only in fact exist, but they must also be known to exist ; in this respect psychologj'^ does not diifer from every other empirical science. But psychol- ogy is peculiar, and indeed unique, in that the relation between the occurrence of the phenomenon, as fact, and the observation of its occurrence is different from that which accompanies the attempt to acquire data in any other science. Observation is itself a phenomenon of consciousness ; and when this observa- tion is direct, it is separable, neither in reality nor in time, from the phenomenon observed as a fact. This is equally true whether the observation is deliberately conducted for i)urposes of definite self-knowledge, or resembles those faintest glimpses of psychic facts Avhicli most of our ordinary so-called "inner illumination " reveals. In these respects all psycliic facts are alike in the way in which they become immediate objects of knowledge. In these respects the data of scientific psychology are identical with the knowledge which every plain man has of his own mental life. In all cases of immediate knowledge of a phenomenon of con- sciousness, the knowing of the phenomenon as object, and the l>henomenon known as fact, is one state or complex phenome- non of consciousn(>ss. In general, there are not two parallel or rapidly succeeding series, or orders, of phenomena to take ATTENTION NECESSARY TO CONSCIOUSNESS 33 account of ; there is only ouc and the same phenomenon (com- plex and shifting-, although "one and the same"), which, in one aspect, is phenomenon /r^y consciousness, and, in another aspect, is phenomenon of aomv object. Not in the reality of the psychic fact, but by an abstraction to which no reality ever corresponds, two momenia can be distinguished — viz., the existence of the particular content, and its belonging to the collective content of my consciousness. Its existence fur y/ie— this is my conscious- ness of it.' Further light is to be thrown on the nature of consciousness only by anticipating other truths, which will bo fully discussed later on. Among such truths the following are most important : The so-called faculties are all exercised in every state of con- sciousness. To say the same thing in better accord with the fundamental facts of experience : every state of consciousness, or psychic fact, so far as it ever becomes an object of knowledge, is a complex state, a fact with several aspects or sides. It is fact of intellection, fact of feeling, fact of conation ; and yet it is these, without ceasing to be one psychic state or fact, in the life of consciousness. But the most primary form of intellection is discriminating consciousness. In other words, within, and as an integral part of, every jjsychic fact, discriminating mental ac- tivity is involved. We may then say that every phenomenon of consciousness which becomes an object of immediate knowledge, is accompanied by conscious discernment of this phenomenon as such a fact, and no other, in the so-called flowing current of conscious life. Attention is the necessary presupposition and unceasing ac- companiment of all the life of consciousness. As many writers truly and yet figuratively say, attention may be variously " dis- tributed " over the different parts of the area covered by each state of consciousness. It may become directed to the more l)erfect discrimination of this or of that aspect of an}^ complex ]>sj^chic fact ; and as the direction of attention changes, or the in- tensity of attention becomes modified, the complexion of the psychic fact itself changes. Just so far as attention becomes directed to the content of consciousness, to the nature of the psychic fact, as such, and to the relation in which anj-^ particular fact stands to contiguous psychic facts, we have the basis laid for an important modification of the nature of consciousness. In such discriminating activity, and in its accompanying " self-feel- ing," and in accompanying motor activities, the foundations of self-consciousness are laid. In order, however, that self-con- • Comp. Natorp. Einleitung in d. Psychologie. p. C2 f. 34 CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS sciousness, more properly speaking, may be developed, a concept of the J5/^o, or " self," must be formed; and this is dependent upon the development of conceptual knowledge. Discriminating consciousness, or, as it is sometimes called, " perceptive consciousness," is therefore necessary as the ac- comijaniment of all psychic facts, if such facts are to become objects of knowledge, and so furnish data for scientific psychol- ogy. It is this truth which causes the confusion of conscious- ness as mere psychic fact and self -consciousness, and which gives rise to the theory that all conscious experience necessarily in- volves a knowledge of self. In accordance with this distinction, we may now modify our previous more vague conception of consciousness. In so far as consciousness can serve the purposes of self-knowledge it must be defined as synonymous with psychi- cal state, regarded as discriminated, hoioever faintly, in respect of content, and related, however imperfectly, to the stream of mental life. I 2. The difficulties that accompany the effort to tell how I can, in one and the same state of consciousness, not only have intellection, feeling, and will, but also know that I have them, largely arise from that fruitful source of psychological fallacies — the substitution of abstractions for actual experi- ence, of thoughts about what can take place for knowledge of what actually does take jilace. The error is essentially the same, whether the j^ossibility of all real self-consciousness is denied, or the impossibility of any fact of consciousness existing without activity of reflective self-consciousness is affirmed. The truth is that people generally sujiiiose themselves to be capa- ble of recognizing their mental experience as their own, and of attributing it to themselves, with an immediate and indubitable certainty. On the other hand, they do not believe that they always, or customarily, do this. A science true to facts amply justifies both these poj^ular opinions as against the two corresponding forms of the psychologist's theoretical fallacies. I 3. The truth that a measure of self-consciousness is necessary in order that all psychic facts, as such, may become immediate objects of knowledge, gives us the key to that extraordinary divergence of view concerning the nature and value of consciousness which differeni treatises on psychology display. In the liglit of the foregoing truths, we may now profitably refer to the pregnant declarations of several authorities on this subject. Thus one writer' denies that the existence of "ideas" (here nearly or quite synonymous with psychic facts, regarded as discriminated and related to other facts) and consciousness are one and the same thing. There are psychical facts enough which are not perceived. But the same writer holds that to be per- ceived and to arise as an idea in consciousness are not different processes. Unconscious mental processes exist in great variety and abundance, but " unconscious idea" is a contradiction in terms. Another writer,^ after affirm- ' Lipi)R : (Jrunclthatsachen d. Scclenlebcns, p. 20 f. " Brcntauo {Ho gcbrauche ich ihn derm am Liebsten, etc.) : Psychologic, i.. p. 132. DKGRICES OF CONSCIOUSNESS 35 ing a deciiled preference for that use of the word, "consciousness," which identities it with psychical phenomenon or psychical act, goes on to main- tain : Every psychical act is conscious in that, however simple it may be, it has, besides tlie [)rimary object, a secondary, viz., the psychical phenomenon itself. Hence, every psychical act may be considered in four ways : (1) As a mental image of the primary object ; (2) as mental fact in itself ; (3) as cog- nition of itself ; (4) as feeling of itself. Still another writer ' maintains that thinking and consciousness can be separated only ideally — that is, in tliought. There is no thoughtless consciousness ; for consciousness is always thinking consciousness. And yet this writer adds, " Thinking is consciousness brought to an orderly unity." All the foregoing and similar views contain important truths. Their ap- parent contradictions with one another, and their obvious internal confusion, are removed when we remember that, although consciousness may properly be identified with all psychic facts as mere occurrences, psychic facts cannot be known as such, without involving at least inchoate and confused self-con- sciousness. The beginning of self-consciousness is consciousness considered no longer as bare psychic fact, but as discriminating its state and relating this particular state to others in the stream of conscious life. § 4. The course and laws of the development of self-consciousness can be more fully traced only after the phenomena of feeling, x>erception, and con- ceptual knowledge have been further considered. Consciousness — meaning self -consciousness — has always been closely related to perception. Thus we are told : " Consciousness is the condition in which we not only have the content of the idea )p the soul, but also perceive or remark the same." " On the contrary, the necessity of distinguishing between consciousness and self- consciousness is made more clear by reflecting ujion the difference between perceiDtion (by the senses) and self-consciousness. When I am observing an object through a microscope, or a fireman rescuing a woman from the win- dow of a burning building, or am listening to an interesting political dis- course, or to a sonata of Beethoven, I am in a high state of perceptive con- sciousness ; bTit I am little, or not at all, self-conscious. What has been said of discriminating consciousness illustrates, however, the trath of Dr. George's ^ remark : The possibility of self-consciousness de- pends upon the fact that the conscious Ego is, as it were, a "wandering point ;" and that tlms the entire process of perceiving objects is, in the last analysis, closely connected with a process of establishing their place and form in relation to the thinking subject and to one another. As the powers concerned in the perception of objects develop, so— but not in the same or- der or proportion, necessarily— does the so-called faculty of " inner percep- tion," or self-consciousness, develop.* What is meant by a " State of Consciousness " slionld by this time be tolerably clear. The very words imply, what all knowl- ' Ilorwicz : Psycholoirische Analysen, i., P- 1G4 f. 2 Comp. Fortlage : Beitriige zur Psychologie, p. 156. ' Lehrbnch d. Psychologie. p. 402 f. « Comp. Hartsen : Grundziige d. Psychologic, p. 17 f. And Mohr (Grandlagc, etc., p. 43) sayp : " We always connect the concept of perception with the word consciousness." 36 CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS edg"e of mental life progressively illustrates and confirms, viz. : that we are here dealing- with some sort of unity in variety. If there were no real unity implied, and experienced as it is im- plied, we could not speak of a state of consciousness ; and, of course, if we could not speak of one such state, we could not speak of several diflferent states, or comj^are state with state, or trace the genesis of any one state, or group of states, in relation to the entire development of mental life. But if the so-called single states of consciousness were not, in reality, also complex and capable of being" actually known as complex, we could not distinguish one state as different in structure, or tone, from other states, could not classify states, or build up knowledge of the development of self. This unity in variety, which belong-s to all states of conscious- ness as such, is of unique character — and this, whether we lay emphasis on the unity that comprises the variety, or upon the variety comprised in the unity. Both the unity and the variety must be conceived of and described in such a way as fairly to represent the facts, and not to violate or discredit each other. The unity of each state of consciousness Ih such that it in no wise makes impossible a variety of content (and even a variety of self-recognized content) as belonging* to that one state. But the variety also of the content of each state of consciousness is such that it, whether recognized or unrecog-nized, in no wise destroj's or impairs the unity of that particular state. Nor must it be for- gotten that we are here dealing* with an actual concrete unity, such as may be known in experience, and with a similar variety in such unity, and not with the abstract unities of mathema- ticians or psycholog"ists. Certain conceptions of unity and vari- ety may be framed which make it unthinkable that a variety of content should be realizied in one state of one subject — one mind to which the complex state belongs. But a state of consciousness is no such abstract imity devoid of real variety ; nor is it an ab- stract diversity incapable of being: united in a unity. There is no other way to know what sort of a unity in variety every state of consciousness actually is than reflectively to ob- serve some such state of consciousness. In this way it becomes clear that no state of consciousness can be known as single in the sense of being apart from the contiguous stream of mental life. But each state becomes known as one state in so far as dis- criminating consciousness separates it, however vaguely, from this stream ; while the boundaries of separation are fixed only in and during the discriminating- activity itself. Moreover, the dif- ferent elements, factors, phases (the name is not so very impor- \ A STATE OF CONSCIOUSNESS 37 tant here) of the one state exist, as component parts of that one state, only in and during- this same discriminating activity. What and how many these elements are depends — we may say somewhat tiguratively — upon the wandering- of the point of at- tention and its distribution over the entire area, rather than upon the constitution of the state regarded as something made up outside of attentive and discriminating- consciousness. By a " state of consciousness " we mean, then, such portlun of the actual life of co/usciounnesfi an may he, hy dlscrhninathuj activity of consciousness, considered as one, both with respect to its oum so- called constitution, and also with respect to its relation to other states of the same life. I 5. To illustrate further the unity in variety which eveiy state of con- sciousness is, we ruay take an examjile. I am observing a horse, running at full speed ; or I am reading an interesting discussion in a book. A friend interrupts me with the question : What are you thinking about? If I an- swer as fully as possible, I may say in the one case : I am thinking as I ob- serve, — What speed, what grace of motion, what strength ! I am feeling ex- hilaration at the sight of sueh sjieed, grace, strength. I am calculating whether the animal will make the goal by a given time, etc. Or I am think- ing as I read : How true, or what nonsense ! I am feeling repugnance toward the views of the writer, or sympathy with his skill in setting forth the truth. I am anticipating what the next turn to the discussion will probably be. By more careful analysis I may also recognize the truth that I am suffer- ing certain dimly conscious bodily feelings of discomfort from the hardness of the seat, the bad air surrounding me, or the "leavings-over," as it were, of the news received in the morning that one of my investments has failed. But it will be said that the state of consciousness which is thus described in answer to the question is itself not only another, but a quite diflferent state of consciousness from that to which the question referred ; it is indeed only a subsequent state of reflective consciousness by which the earlier state is remembered in an imperfect and jierverted way ; moreover, it is itself not one state, but a succession of states in the unceasing flow of mental life. And all this is, in some important meaning of the words, the truth. Two things must, however, be noted. Such memory-states are themselves true states of consciousness and have the unity in variety which belongs to all states of consciousness. Again, the transition from one state to another, even when the character of the consciousness changes markedly, as — for example — in answer to the above-mentioned questions, is never like a sudden leap from one form of mental life into a totally different form of such life. Fac- tors of intollection, feeling, and conation, are carried over — so to speak — from one state into the next ; these factors, thus carried over, bind the states into the unity of one mental life, while they do not prevent discriminating con- sciousness from considering portions of that life as ideally sejaarable states. ? 6. In this field of reflection, figures of speech are very powerful. With this in mind, we should avoid comparing consciousness to a line, or the diff"erent moments (and states) of cousciou.sness to points in a line. 38 CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS Neither is the comparison of states of consciousness to a compound resulting from a perpetually changing chemical synthesis free from all objection. All states of consciousness— as we shall soon see — actually occupy a somewhat indefinite but appreciable amount of time ; this is true whether the time be measured by objective or by subjective standards. Moreover, the factors, or momenta, which enter into them are not entities that can be analyzed out of them and made to enter into other combinations, as can the atoms or molecules of a jDhysical or chemical synthesis. A series of circles, with widening or contracting areas, made by a curved line that keeps advancing while it constantly returns upon itself, so as to in- clude in each new circle a part of the area belonging to the preceding circle, is a better mathematical figure than that of movement along a line, to illustrate the nature of consciousness. What goes on in the field of a not too rapidly revolving kaleidoscope may also be taken as an illustration. Or if tlie change of states is to be represented by a series like A, B, C, D, . . Z; then, since A — {a, b, c, d, e, etc.), B = (c, d, e, /, g, etc.), C= (e, /, g, h, i, etc.), 2)= {g, h, i,j, k^ etc.), etc., etc. ; the true character of the change is better represented by a steady or somewhat intermittent flow of the follow- ing order : {a, b, c, d, e, etc.) into (c, d, e,f, g, etc.) into (e, /, g, h, i, etc.) into iff) f>f hji ^, etc.), etc., etc. g 7. The qiiestion whether we can properly speak of unconscious factors or modifications of mind, as combining to form states of consciousness, has been much debated. The argument of Leibnitz is well known : "I hear the noise of the sea, but I do not hear the noise of each wave alone ; yet the noise of each wave must produce a mental effect, otherwise the whole to- gether would produce no mental effect." So M. Taiue ' argues with regard to the nature of states of auditory consciousness ; and Sir William Hamilton applies a similar argument to the constitution of the ininiminn visibile. Now that the aggregate effect of a large numblr of minute physiological changes, no one of which alone would occasion a modification of conscious- ness, may be the production of a particular mental state, there can be no doubt. Experiment constantly .shows this effect taking place. We may even be inclined to admit that unconscious but real psychic changes have an influence upon the character of all our states of consciousness. But to re- gard conscious states as comjDounded out of more elementary states of the unconscious, or to argue that because I have a conscious sensation jiro- duced by a certain number or intensity of nervous shocks, therefore I must have a certain, though unconscious, sensation produced by each component nervous shock, is quite unwarrantable.^ § 8. It is, however, equally unwarrantable to press the so-called unity of consciousness so as to deny that each real state of consciousness is complex, or even that this complexity may be recognized by discriminating conscious- ness. Wliile, then, we may say, with Professor James,* " Whatever things are thought in relation are thought from the outset in a unity, in a single pulse of subjectivity, a single psychosis, feeling, or state of mind," we must also note that this very sentence admits that si'vend things may be ' De I'lntclligcnce (4th ed.), I., p. 1T5 f. " See Itabier : Lemons, etc., I., p. 55 f., for a criticism of Tuiue's argument. * Principles of Psychology, I., p. 273. THE CIRCUIT OF CONSCIOUSNESS 39 "thought in relation," and uses the word "feeling "to indicate an important phase of the one state differing from the thought which relates these things. Moreover, we shall see that, instead of the conscious state having from "the outset " all the unity it can attain, it may rather be said to develoi) such unity according as the variety of its content becomes discriminated more clearly. The foregoing- description of states of consciousness, us they become objects of knowledge, and so furnish immediate chita for scientific psychology, justifies us in regarding each such state as equivalent to what may figuratively be called a " Field of Consciousness." Every field of consciousness may then be said to have a certain " circuit," inasmuch as it contains a larger or smaller number of discriminable factors or objects. It may also be said to have a certain " intensity," since we are much more alive psychically at some times than at others ; and also a certain character or " tone," since the nature of the predominating form of mental life difiers in different states of consciousness. For example, in illustration of the last distinction : sometimes the field of consciousness may be characterized as objective, for I am "occupied with," or "absorbed in," the perception of some natural object, as the movement of a frog-preparation under the stimulus of the electrical current, or the curve of reaction-time which is being marked upon a revolving drum. At other times I am " overwhelmed with " physical pain or " drowned in " sor- row, or " all alive with " expectation or joy. In other words, the field of consciousness is chiefly occupied with subjective feeling. Moreover, the difi'erent fields of consciousness, discriminable as such in the flow of mental life, succeed each other with varying degrees of rapidity. No fact is more familiar than this, that sometimes our thoughts come and go with an enjoyable or tan- talizing speed ; while at other times the flow of mental life is sluggish and we have relatively few states of consciousness within a given objective time. Difterent " fields of consciousness " differ, then, as respects (1) extent, or " circuit " ; (2) intensity, or amount of mental life en- tering into them ; (8) speed of movement as measured by the number of recognizably different fields occurring in a definite amount of objective time ; and (4) character, or predominating specific quality. The fuller discussion of each of these topics requires the previous treatment of several allied subjects ; but upon each a few words of detail are now in place. § 9. The accurate experimental measurement of the extejit of the field of consciousness is made difficult by the complication of this problem witli many changing and obscure conditions. Among these the character and 40 CONSCIOUSNESS AXD SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS distribution of the "attention" given to the different factors or objects in the one field is most important. The older form of speculative psjchol- ogj maintained the impossibility of attending to more than one thing at a time, as a deduction from the unity of the soul. Strictly carried out, this theory leads to the conclusion that mental development cannot show itself in consciousness except in the way of increased speed in the succession of mental states. But modern evolutionary psychology recognizes the depend- ence of the field of consciousness, as respects both energy and variety of recognized content, not only upon the age and culture of the individual, but also upon the development of civilization. Here, as everywhere else, it invites us to return from merely speculative deductions to the actual facts of psychical life. The number of successive impressions of sound, for example, which can be so far " grasped together" as to allow clear discernment of the likeness or unlikeuess of that particular field to another field similarly constituted, has been experimentally investigated. ' "When the interval between the suc- cessive imijressions was the most favorable possible (0.2-0.3 sec), without grouping the imjiressions, 16 was found by one experimenter to be the maximum even number, 15 the maximum odd number, which could be united in one field of consciousness. It should be noted, however, that in such experiments attention is uniformly distributed and a certain "sensa- tion-mass," as it were, is the only clearly discerned object of perception, while the individual factors in that mass are but dimly distinguished. Now a distinction must be made between the extent of the field of percep- tive consciousness and the extent of what has been called " apperception " (or dear discriminatio7i of particulars) within that field. And Professor Cat- tell ' has shown that four or five visual impressions exhaust our j^ower of clear discernment. This experimenter tested the " grasp of consciousness " by displaying from 4 to 15 short perpendicular lines for 0.01 sec. Of eight perso)\s experimented with, two could give correctly the number seen up to 6, but none beyond 6 ; three others up to 4 ; and three persons could not be sure of even so many as 4. It is interesting to note how these conclusions agree with those of Hamilton, who affirmed that the field of his visual con- sciousness could embrace 6 or 7 distinct simultaneous impressions. Yet more recent experiments^ show that if more than 5 or 6 (or in " exceptional and star records," 8) tactual impressions occur simultaneously, they can- not be localized in the one field of consciousness ; the surplus number droi> entirely out of the field or fuse in their resultant with other simultaneous impressions. And returning to impressions of sound : our ability to recog- nize a difference of one click does " not extend far beyond groups of 8 or 10 clicks."* The dependence of the extent of the field of consciousness, whether dimly and almost blindly perceptive or clearly a])perceptive, ui^on natural and acquired characteristics — upon heredity, age, training, bodily condition, etc. — may be experimentally confirmed. To this end the various "tests" " By Dietze and otherfi. Sec Ladd : Elements of Physiological Psychology, p. 494 f., and Philo- eoph. Studien, ii., Ileft 3. p. 3C2 f. •I Philos(,,)h. Stiulicn, iii.. Heft 1, pp. 94-127. =• By Dr. Krohn : Journal of Xcrvous and Mental Disease, Murrh, 1S93. * Elinor Studies from the Psychological Laboratory of Clark University, i. DIFFERENT FIFLDS OF CONSCIOUSNESS 4] for school-children and others, with a view to determine how many objectn they can grasp together in one mental activity, so as to remember and de- scribe them, are of scientific as well as practical value. Of value in both directions, and closely connected with the whole development of mental life, as memory, knowledge, and will, is the fact that growth of speed and skill in rational nunital synthesis enlarges the grasp of consciousness. Thus, as experiment sliows, groups of letters are harder to grasp than groups of figures ; only half as many disconnected as connected words can bo united in one field; only one-third as many disconnected letters as letters connected in words. These results are i)artly due to the iutiuence of habit ; but they also indicate llie d&pendence of enlarging perceptive ponei-s upon the Ri/ntliesis of thought. - '"* The actual limitation of the field of consciousness, with respect to extent, is a source both of mental strength and of mental weakness. That we can grasj) together, and yet discriminate so many items in one conscious state, is an exhibition of mental strength. It is even possible to conduct side by side, as it were, two quite distinctly different psychical life-currents, and yet do this in the unity of one consciousness. Many have had an experience like that of David Copperfleld, as he wandered through the streets of Lon- don, stupefied with grief and reflecting upon his grief, and yet all the while noticing the minutest details of the objects surrounding him. Frederick the Great is said to have boasted of his father, Frederick William First, that he died observing himself, in death, as a scientific investigator observes a natural phenomenon. ^ 10. The Herbartian school has doubtless thrown much light on the for- mation of the different fields of consciousness by its theories of the grouping together, under the " eye of consciousness," as it were, of the contempo- raneous "ideas." These ideas this school seems to teach, sometimes form a field of " flat surface," in case none of them attracts attention to itself in higher degree than do the others. But if one or more of the ideas, or groups of ideas, attract more attention than the rest, the so-called field of consciousness exhibits inequality : hills and intervening valleys, or finally, a towering mountain, may occupy nearly the entire field. We object seriously to the Herbartian theory, in that it seems to make entities out of "ideas," to confuse the boundaries between consciousness and the unconscious, and to set up untenable mathematical formulas for the " fusion" and separation of the so-called factors of mental life. But the following truth is illustrated by all our study of psychology : Every state of consciousness, in developed mental life, must be regarded as resulting from an immense number of living factors that form a sort of organic unity. ^ 11. That different " fields of consciousness " differ in amount of jisychic energy, in some recognizable way, is an indubitable fact of exi)erience. Of all of us it is true, our exjierience in consciousness is more vivid, more in- tense, by far, at some times than at others. What is meant by this is par- ticularly clear when we apply such language to our states of feeling. We speak of pains as more or less, and of pleasures as great, moderate, or small. That sensations have quantity, which is indirectly measurable, and how it is that "Fechner's law" attempts to formulate this fact, will be explained in 42 CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS the in'oper place. Ami in spito of all which Lotze aud others have urged to the contrary, we tliiuk the common imj^ression, that "ideas" — meaning by this both memory-images aud images of the imagination — diifer in vividness aud intensity, is scieutiticully justifiable. " Intensity " is, moreover, a word which we find peculiarly appropriate to describe a certain kind of difierence recognized when we compare our desires and states of conative, or striving, consciousuess with one another ; what can be meant by thoughts differing in intensity is, indeed, more difficult to explain. But, jjlainly, those convic- tions, confidences, hopes, fears, expectations, etc., which make so necessary a part of all our states of judgment, differ in intensity. On the basis of such experiences we form the conception of conscious- ness as admitting of an indefinite number of degrees of energy. Between any two states of consciousness, A and C, differing from each other in amount of mental life, we can imagine that another, B, which shall be more intense than A, and less intense than C, may be interj^olated. This jjicture of a con- tinuous lino, measuring the amount of psychic energy displayed in any given field of consciousness, has an indefinite further or upper end ; this end marks the maximum of intensity. How much can I feel, without losing consciousness? How vivid can my memory-image or picture of imagination become as measuring the utmost cajjacity for vividness which my conscious mental life can display in this way ? But at the inferior or downward-dip- ping end, the line of consciousness passes what is called " the threshold of consciousness." In other words, as respects intensity, the different fields of consciousness differ by minute gradations all the way from an indefinite maximum, which varies for the individual and for the nation and for the race, to that lowest degree which can just be distinguished from " the un- conscious." Is, then, the distinction between consciousness and "the unconscious" to be abolished? Aud if this tlistinction be abolished, what becomes of the very basis for the knowledge of truly ^wyc/^/cY// life ? The answer to this inquiry reqiiires a knowledge of developed mental experiences, and even in- volves no small temjitation to resort to metaphysical assumption. But we now need to remember simply : it is not as respects intensity alone that conscious states differ from each other, and that all conscious states differ from " the unconscious ; " but only as objects of discriminating conscious- uess, and therefore as not of too great or of too little intensity, can different fields of consciousness be compared. Further discussion of this toi^ic must be for the present jiostponed. ^ 12. The speerf of the change or succession of different fields of con- sciousness is dependent upon the time which is required to form the single, .so-called, fields ; and this, in turn, depends upon the character of the field formed, and especially upon the amount of discriminating activity in- volved. The same result also depends upon inherited and acquired charac- teristics — temperament, habit, training, bodily and mental condition, etc. A certain amoiuit of time is required to form any field of cnyiscioiisness, t<> " come to consciousness " at all, as we are accustomed to say. This is true whether the particular field be described as the having of a .sensation, tlie perceiving of an object, the remembering of a word, recalling an associated image, framing a thought, exercising a choice, or whatever form of activity be par- TIIK SPEED OF CONSCIOUSNESS 43 ticiilarly characteristic of the "lieUl." There is probably a certain uiuonnt of time which is, for every iudividual, most favorable for the formation of such a state of consciousness as shall bo characterized by the greatest amount of content, vividness of realization, and clearness of discriminating energy. But the more elaborate any field of consciousness is, the more time is required, within given limits and other things being equal, for its forma- tion. Fields of consciousness characterized by discriminating perception ("apperception") require more tiuio for their formation than those which consist more nearly of mere sensation-mass ; those characterized also by choice require yet more time. There is certain evidence from experiments in reaction-time to show that about three-quarters of a second is the average time required for the forma- tion of a not too complex state of fairly clear discriminating perceptive con- sciousness. Years ago (1868) Vierordt concluded that very small intervals of time are regiilarly overestimated and greater ones underestimated. The minimum of error in our sense of time he placed at 1-1.5 sec. Subsequent more careful investigations led others to conclude that our sensitiveness to time intervals is greatest for intervals of 0.7-0.8 sec. Yet more recent and accurate researches have shown how very complicated is even this seemingly simi)le problem ; but they have on the whole tended to confirm this interval as about that of the average most accurate time-sense. It may, then, be taken as a fair measure of the time necessary to come to a state of discrimi- nating consciousness, where the problem before consciousness, as it were, is an ordinarily difficult one. Measuring in the same way, it is found that the period occupied in the development of tlie simpler forms of sensory-motor consciousness is some- what shorter than that given above. In general, simple reaction-time — that is, the period between the action of some form of sensory stimulus upon the organ of sense and the motion of some member of the body to indicate that the resulting state of sensation is recognized as having taken place— is 0.1-0.3 sec. Many variations arise within these limits, depending upon the kind of sensation, the kind of motor reaction, the intensity of the stimulus, the fixation of attention, and various other conditions. For example, Gold- scheider found ' that temperature sensations come to consciousness later than those of contact, that cold is perceived much sooner than heat, and that the difference increases with the distance of the stimulus from the brain, until it may reach as much as 0.5 sec. With feebler degrees of stimulation the time occupied in coming to consciousness increases, while the accuracy of perception decreases (i.e., the average errors and personal errors increase). But if clear discernment of the significance of the sensation-complexes takes place — and this involves, of course, more activity of so-called memory and judgment — still more time is required. Thus Baxt found that if a disk with letters on it be displayed and then quickly followed by disjilaying a bright white disk, when the interval between the two is about 5rr,- the first disk is seen as scarcely a trace of a weak glimmer ; but at 9. Go- interval letters appear in the glimmer, one or two of which can be partially recog- nized at 14.4(r ; four letters can be well recognized at 33.G(j ; and six letters, ' Rcactionszeiten d. Temperatiir-Enii)rin(luiif;en. Berlin. Phyaiolog. Grcsellsch., June, 18S7. - Here and elsewhere o- siguities thousandths of a second. 44 CONSCIOUSNESS AND SKLF-CONSCIOUSNESS at 52.8,r. On the other hand, after much practice and with attention fully on the alert, sensation, perception, and "apperception" seem to fuse into one process — an inluUive leaj) nf discriminating consciousness — in which intelligent choice, even, may have a part. When reasoning from these experiments in reaction-time to determine the real time-rate of the growth of states of consciousness — the period actu- ally occupied in the formation of the field of consciousness — two things must be remembered : First, this objective measurement does not exactly indicate the subjective growth ; since the precise amount of time to be allotted to the physiological processes between the organ of sense and the brain, and between the brain and the muscular reaction, cannot be stated ; nor do we certainly know how strictly parallel in time with the processes in the brain are the changes in consciousness. Again, all experiments of this kind are necessarily somewhat artificial in character, and so must be received with caution in proof of principles of the natural life of mind. The time-rate of the life of consciousness, considered as involving the succession of one field of consciousness by another, is a subject the discus- sion of which is complicated with the development of memory, imagination, judgment, and indeed of the entire mental life. It cannot, therefore, be treated at this stage in our investigation. Certain general truths relating to this subject must, however, be constantly borne in mind : (1) The speed in development and in succession belonging to different series of psychical states is different for different classes of such states. (2) In general, the time-rate of the life of consciousness depends upon a vast and incalculable number of factors ; yet it has its maximum and its minimum. (3) Different persons, under different circumstances, are either " fast," or " moderate," or " slow," in mental movement ; but no one can be more than about so fast, or about so slow, since the time -conditions of all mental life have their lim- its fixed on both sides. The three classes of difference which distinguish all fields of consciousness — Extent, Intensity, and Time-rate — are related to each other in a very interesting but puzzling way. Analogies derived from the physical, or even the purely biological sciences respecting the dependence of one " function " on another, how- ever suggestive of truth thej'^ may be when rightly interpreted, arc likely to be applied to psychical phenomena in a misleading way. In all expenditure of psychical energy, time, intensity, and number of objects over which the aggregate of disposable energy is distributed, are, indeed, related so that they may be conceived of as capable of statement in terms of mathematical formulas. No one can feel or think intensely Avithotit " consuming " more than a certain small amount of time ; but no one can feel or think intensely for more than about so much time. No one can discern clearly any external object, or analyze any of his own mental states, without employing time in some proportion to the com- plexity of the thing to be analyzed and the clearness of the THE UANGE OF CONSCIOUSNESS 45 resiiltin^^ aniilysis. One can g-ivo ifoine iitteiition to several objects in one tield of consciousness through a given amount of time ; but no one can g-ive nearl}' all liis attention to more than one object, and this only for a given length of time. Further- more, if we anticipate the ordinary division of psychical states between the three so-called faculties of mind — intellect, feeling, will — we may go on to say : No one can give himself up to thought largely without keeping clear from intense feeling and strenuous conation ; no one can feel intensely (whether the feel- ing be bodily, testhetical, or religious) without refraining, for the time, from minute analysis, etc. On the basis of such experiences as the foregoing we might proceed to formulate the relations of extent, intensity, and time- rate, as belonging to all fields of consciousness, in imitation of the corresponding procedure of natural science. For example, the intensity of the "fields" varies inversely as their time-rate, within given limits ; in any field the number of the objects to which the energy of discriminating consciousness is distributed varies inversely as the amount of energy distributed to any one, or more, of these objects, etc. Such statements would have a certain value ; they might acquire a considerable amount of pre- cision, especially as applied to certain of the simpler psychical processes, through the work of the psychological laboratory. They are of great practical importance in their bearing upon a wise economy of our psychical energy and resources. But, after all, when we look away to the larger fields of actual human life — and especially to those fields that lie in the higher ranges of such life — we see much which cannot easily be brought under such laboratory formulas. Abnormal or unusual mental states, rare moments in the experience of even men of average ability, the conscious intuitions and divinations of men of genius and of artists, suggest much which refuses to be thus formulated. How shall we measure that growth of mental life which con- sists both in deepening and in broadening, both in intenser feeling and in higher analytic skill, and not less in free and rational choice ? How shall we state, in terms of mere num- ber and quantity, the difference between the " fields of con- sciousness " in the life, on the one hand, of Aristotle and Kant, or of Shakespeare and Gothe, and, on the other hand, of the most degraded Bushman, of the hopeless idiot, or of "■ Peter von Hacklander," the soldier, who could never remem- ber at one time more than two of the three ingredients of gun- powder? ^ • See Lazarus : Das Lcbeii d. Seele, ii., p. 241 f. 46 coiTSCiousisrESS and self-consciousness § 13. Differences in tlie cliaracter of cliflferent fields of consciousness de- pend uijon the particular asjiect, or phase, of psychical energy which is em- phasized in each of them. Thus we speak of ourselves as being, at one time, in a state of thought ; at another time, in a state of feeling ; at still another time, as making a choice, or " jiutting forth " an effort to move a weight or to remember a date. Such characterizations will be at once rec- ognized as corresponding, in a general way, to the ordinary division of the soul into three faculties of cognition, feeling, will. Further subdivisions of more specific character in the fields of consciousness are based ujjon more minute analysis. Thus we s^ieak of ourselves as " buried in" reverie, " plunged in " abstract thought, " lost in " sweet or painful reminiscences ; while at other times our states are described as states of anger, fright, joy, etc. Again, we express the content of consciousness by speaking of our- selves as "swept" with storms of passionate desire, "carried away" by ap- petite, "driven by "impulse; or, yet again, we find ourselves raised to " serene heights " of religious contemplation. It will be shown in due time that all the three so-called fundamental faculties are involved in every field of consciousness, that the distinction between active and passive consciousness is one only of degrees, and that all forms of intellectual life are necessary to every act of knowledge, whether of things by percejDtion or of self by self-consciousness. Meanwhile the following truth of daily experience must be borne in mind : Fields of con- sciousness are known actually to differ in character, inasmuch as discriminating consciousness discerns different degrees of emphasis exhibited at different times u-ith respect to the differing phases or aspects of the one mental life. The Conditions of Consciousness are either physical or psy- chical. But in saying" this we cannot, without metaphysical theory, absorb the one set of conditions in the other, or point out the real nature of the relations existing- between the two sets of conditions. Psychology, as a descriptive and explanatory science, can only examine, in a very imperfect way, this ques- tion : On occasion of what phenomenal antecedents (whether psychical or physical) are definite eifects in consciousness known to follow '? The existence and activity of the human Nervous System is the general physical condition of all those mental states which can become data for psychological science. In the threefold ar- rangement of organs which characterizes this system — (1) end- organs, (2) connecting nerve-tracts, (3) central org-aus- it is the end-organs of sense, and especially the central organs of the cerebral hemispheres, upon whoso activity the states of con- sciousness chiefly depend. Moreover, we g"et sure pi'oof of dis- criminative consciousness only on condition that the brain is supplied Avith properly aerated arterial blood. To stop this supply by cloture of the great arteries extinguishes all observ- PHYSICAL CONDITIONS OF CONSCIOUSNESS 47 able iilionomeiia of consciousness ; psychic facts arc not known to occur until the arterial circulation is re-established. Corrup- tion of this circulation with drui^s or products of diseased tissue alters, more or less promptly and profoundly, the character, ex- tent, intensity, and time-rate of the fields of consciousness. All consciousness apparently involves a certain heig'htening' of mo- lecular activity in the l)rain-ceuters, and the consequent conver- sion of stored energy into kinetic energy — the destruction of tis- sue by the throwing down of molecules from a state of highly elaborate combination with unstable equilibrium to a state of less elaborate combination Avith more stable equilibrium. Thus there seems reason to maintain^ that the physical basis of consciousness is to be thought of as coming under the general biological law : All actioity of tissue is conditioned upon its heinr/ decomposed, and then immediately regenerated hy nourishment. Intensify of co)iscions- ness depends upon intensity of neural function ; the latter depends upon intensity of the loorJc of decomposition, and is inversely as the ease and rapidity with which the inner work of one nerve-element is transmitted to another. \ 14. The science of the phenomena of consciousness, as such, is not dependent upon our being able to decide whether a nervous system, or in- deed any material organism, is an indispensable condition of all conscious- ness. It is only, for example, by remote and complicated jirocesses of inference that we can (doubtfully at best) determine whether the spinal cord of a decapitated frog — or, for that matter, an amceba — is " conscious" or not. And when Professor Huxley and others incline to aflBrni that even our high- est human consciousness is but an " epiphenomenon," rather than an influ- ential fact in the world of reality, they are, at best, announcing a doubtful conclusion in the metaphysics of physics. But whether psychic facts, that can never be known by any discriminating consciousness as facts, occur or not, the conditions and chai-acter of our self-known psychic facts remain the same. And for scientific psychology to speak of the very jihenomena, upon immediate knowledge of which it must rely, as " epiphenomena " (phenomena over and above the only real and scientifically knowable phenomena), is prematurely to abandon the only ground on which this particular science has legitimate work to accomplish. 1 15. The connection of consciousness, or of psychic facts as known, with changes in the circulation of blood in the brain, is exceedingly intimate. But the precise nature of such changes is thus far undetermined. A recent writer, '■ presents reasons for believing that the physical condition of con- sciousness, as distinguished from the unconsciousness of profound slumber, is due to an excess of the pressure of the arterial circulation in the brain over the pressure of the venous circulation in thepm mater. I See Herzen : Die physischen Bedingunpen d. Bewiisetseins. 18SC. = Dr. James Cappie : The Causation of Sleep. Edinburgh, 1882. And Tlie Intracranial Circula- tion, Edinburgh, 1890. V > ■ ^ 48 CONSCIOUSNESS AND SELF-CONSCIOUSNESS Modern physiological psychology emphasizes the wonderfully delicate way in which the whole nervous mass responds to the slightest phases of change in all forms of excitation with accompanying modifications of even the lowest possible phases of conscious mental life. Haller, for example, noticed that the noise from beating a drum increased the flow of blood from au open vein. Mosso observed that the approach of a lamj) toward a patient whose brain was exposed increased the volume of the brain-substance. M. Payot claims to have seen the passage of a cloud over the sun increase the respiratory rhythm and pulse-rate of a sleeping infant. M. Fere found that slight sensations of sound and smell sometimes aflfect a man's dynamometric force. Schiff and Vulj^ian have observed the pupils of the eyes dilate under the influence of various forms of excitement. Experiments in reaction-time show tliat increasing the intensity of conscious states of sensation increases the volume of the blood in the forearm and hand with which the agent is reacting. Furthermore, the intensity and duration of molecular activity and the destruction of tissue in the brain are, in some sort, a measure of the in- tensity and duration of certain states of consciousness. Especially is this obviously true of emotional states. Such states exhaust themselves quickly, and leave an exhausted brain. Experiments seem to prove that those changes of temperature of the brain-mass which may fairly be supposed to indicate molecular activity are greater and more rapid in the development of those tiekls of consciousness which are characterized by strong emotion.' The psychical conditions of consciousness are chiefly those very forms of josychical life which have already been indicated as present in all the various states of consciousness. Especially important among- them is the " wandering- " of discriminating, attentive activity from one object, factor, or phase, to another, within the entire so-called field of consciousness. And if we should say that the existence of a " mind " is the one precondi- tion of all human consciousness we should perhaps be not much more premature in our metaphysics than are those who affirm that the brain is such a necessary precondition. [.\mong the book.s referred to in the notes, Horwicz (especially the sections, Die Hmpfindungen und das Bewnssfcsein, i., Absch. 4; and Organik des Denkcns, ii., Buch 4), Lipp.s (on Die allKcmeinsten Thatsachen, Absch. 2), and Lazarns (iii., ], Der Tact) are most suggestive on the general suliject. See also Wundt : Physiolog. P.sychologie (2d ed), II., iv.. cliap. 1.5. Brentano: ii., chap. 2. Sully : The Human Mind, 1., p. 7'2 f. Ochoro- witz (Redingungen d. Be\vusstwerden.s, 1874) gives a 1)il)liogr;iphy up tn date, fairly full. Since then special monographs by J. C. Fischer, J. b. A. Koch, Schuster, Wahle, and others have appeared.] ' See Experimental Researches on the Temperature of the Head. Proceedings of Royal Soc. London, 1878. And corap. Tanzi : Ceutrl-bl. fur Physiologic, Mai, 1888. CHAPTEK IV. THE SO-CALLED "MENTAL FACULTIES" \ It is pr€>siippose(l, in the very attempt at a science of psychol- og-y, that diliereut states or " fiekis " of consciousness can be surely discriminated as respects their intensity, extent, or num- ber of discernible factors and objects, and characteristic quality. It folloAvs, then, that a scientilic classification of these states may be based u])on their differences as actually known in the life of consciousness. In other words, psychic facts may be compared, " sorted out," and theoretically assigned to classes, on the basis t»f immediate observation. In the very attempt to do this, how- ever, we become aware that there is much which is so peculiar about these facts as to modify our conception of the meaning" and value of our work of classification. For, in the first place, the different factors and characteristics, by recognition of which we classify, have no existence apart from the individual states in which they are observed ; and the states in which the factors and characteristics are discriminated do not exist apart from that conscious mental life which they, taken together, constitute. In the next place, the very tokens hij which we compare and classify the states of consciousness do not exist, either in reality or in the conception we are able to frame of them, apart from the process of observation which notes them. Both these points have already, for the present, been made sufficiently clear. These just-mentioned truths of all mental life are comi^licated with others of which account must be taken before we can under- stand the meaning and value of any classification of mental fac- \\\i\. All (iaHsijicdt'ion of jyHycMc facts as immediately l^nown is iii-tiompan'xed hy a/) iuiplied or express assignment of ihem to the same suhject of ilieiii all. In other words, I can, on the basis of immediate knowledge, only classify my states of consciousness as like or unlike other states of my own ; you can, in the same way, only classify states of yoi/r consciousness as like or unlike other states of your oio?i, etc. Thus all my conceptions of mental faculty are, in the last analysis, derived from experience with my own different modes of behavior as discriminated by my own 4 no THE SO-CALLED "MENTAL FACULTIES" . self-consciousness. To be sure, both 3'ou and I endeavor to improve and enlarge our knowledge of mental faculties in gen- eral by appeal to the widest possible realm of psychic facts. But, after all, this can only be done by a returning appeal to the immediately recognized differences in our own psychical life. By sensation, memory, and intelligence, or by love, hope, and fear, or by desire, striving, and choice, etc., we can only under- stand, in others, the possession and exercise of such so-called " faculties " as we know ourselves to possess and exercise. To speak of mental faculties — their existence, operations, laws, prod- ucts, etc.— is, at bottom, a rather mythological way of saying : I know (by memory and self-consciousness) that my mental life assumes a variety of recurrent forms, more or less like or unlike to each other ; and I know (by inference from observed physical signs) that the mental life of others assumes a similar variety of the same recurrent forms. A semi-mythological way of speaking, similar to that just indicated, is common enough in all forms of science. For man, as a rational and metaphysical being, seems bound to explain the world of his immediate experience by referring it to a world of entities and relations that can never become objects of im- mediate experience. The modern physical sciences can never succeed in freeing themselves from such metaphysics. AVe have already noted the fact that self-consciousness assumes the existence (in some meaning of the word " existence ") of a subject (a self) to which all states of consciousness must be referred. What more natural, and even inevitable, then, than that the vari- ous princii^al modes of the behavior of this subject should be spoken of as its " faculties," " capacities," " functions," " pow- ers." ' The language of common life, in which we always find the embodiment of genuine psychological truth, certainly indi- cates the permissibility of doing this. Suppose, for example, that my present experience claims to represent my exjierience in viewing a beautiful landscape one year ago to-day. I might express this complex psychic fact by saying either: "/distinctly remember that /saw Fuji (or the Matterhorn) at such a time in my life ; " or, " My ineinory informs ine of the fact that I saw, etc." And in the effort to emphasize the i)urely scientific inter- est (the " objectivity," so to speak) which I wish to give to the phenomenon of my memory, as such, I might even resort t(^ some unnatural form of impersonal expression like this : " Psy- chic fact is now occiirring which is recognitive (and so a fact of 1 Thiit even scholastic psychology did not mean by the doctrine of faculties to deny the unity iind indivisibility of the principle of thought, see Ilamiltou : Lectures on Metaphysics, xx. I MEANING OF THE TEllM "FACULTIES" 01 conscious memory) of another psychic fact considered as ante- cedent (fact of perception by the senses)." Now, if we ask our- selves whether tliese throe forms of expression mean essentially the same thing-, we arc letl to make the following distinctions : The first two mean something- different from the last, and the difference is, both for science and for life, of inestimable impor- tance. The first two mean at least thus much, thdt self-conscious discrirnlnatioii lies at the basis of all classijication and explanation of the phenomena of co)isciousness. But does the second of the three modes of expressing the fact of recollection mean anything essentially different from the first ? In answer to this question we must say the difierence is only a matter of possible conven- ience. The second form lays more emphasis on the truth that those psychic facts, which must all be referred to the same sub- ject, differ in kind, and may accordingly be assigned to certain fundamental or derivative classes ; but, in all important respects, the same truth is expressed in the first two forms of statement. By the so-called " faculties " of mind, therefore, scientific psychology can, at most, only mean to indicate the different modes of behavior, or forms of functioning, which discriminating con- sciousness assigns to the one subject of all psychical states. In so far as this word or other cognate terms (such as " capacity," " power," etc.) can be safely used in the clear light of this un- derstanding, we need not greatly ol)ject to them. But they afford no explanation of psychic facts, Avhether in general or in special ; they are rather themselves the result of imperfect classification and confused analysis. Moreover, they lend little help to im- proved classification. On the other hand, their use, however guarded, is likely to occasion the separation in theory of that which is indissolubly and necessarily related in fact, the substi- tution of mere classification for real explanation, and a gener- ally inadequate and misleading account of the development of mental life. At the same time, after uttering proper warnings, the limitations and necessities of psychological language are such that wo are obliged to employ the terms assigned custom- arily to the so-called " faculties." ^1. Tho so-called "old psychology" has been accused, not altogether unjustly, of making an exaggerated and deceptive use of classification in the construction of psychological science. Much of its theory seemed to imply that when we have grouped the different ])sycliic facts and have assigned them to different " faculties," we have satisfied the demands " of science." But what we wish to know is not simply under how many and what different classes the phenomena of conscioiisness may he arranged, but also, and chiefly, how to explain each form of activity, as arising out of other forms, 52 THE SO-CALLED "MENTAL FACULTIES" and as determined by the place which all mental life occupies in the natural environment of that life. In other words, we wish to connect psychic facts with other psychic facts, and with non-mental or physical facts, under uni- form relations, so as to discover the so-called "laws of mental life." On the other hand, it must be admitted that classification, even if the laugnage emjiloyed to designate its results be somewhat misleading, is the necessary beginning of psychological as of every other science. Many of the classifications of the older psychologists are still of great assistance in the study of mental life. Moreover, it is not by any means wholly true that the effort at successful explanation is the mark of the so-called " new psy- chology" alone. Modern research is, however, distinguished: (1) by more careful experimental analysis ; (2) by extending the range of induction to various fields of neglected facts ; (3) by requiring a larger compliance with the principles of all scientific induction ; and, especially, (-i) by making con- stant use of the conception of development. § 2. The history of psychological science shows that modern opposition to the doctrine of "faculties" has developed chiefly along two lines. The first of these is that followed by the anatomical and j)hysiological explanation of mental life. This opposition, in its extreme form, becomes a proposal to institute a " psychology without a soul." On the other hand, Herbart and the followers of the Herbartian movement, while admitting the existence of the soul as a reality and making use of this admission as an eocplanatory prin- ciple of all mental phenomena, reject the entire doctrine of faculties. Her- bart himself did this in the interests both of a metaphysical doctrine of the soul's unity and also of a scientific account of its different functions. All the functions of the soul were reduced by him to one simple type, namely, that of " ideation" (called Vorstelhing, and standing for all intellectual operations, both presentative and representative), in the most general sense of this word. The one thing which the soul does in response to all forms of relation be- tween it and other beings is to put forth " ideas." Feeling and will, so- called, are, according to Herbart, secondary and derived activities of the soul, resulting, in all cases, from the relations developed between the ideat- ing processes. The searching analysis of the Herbartian school, the yet more searching analysis of the sensory-motor activities by exiierimental psychology, the study of psychic facts in the light of the conception of development, and the general effort of science to throw off imnecessary metaphysical assumptions, have combined either to discredit or greatly to modify the earlier doctrine of mental faculties. In what meaning we understand and shall use (if at all) this term, or any kindred term, has already been sufficiently explained. ^ 3. It is sometimes said — and not without a certain show of reason — that just as physical science has the right to talk of different classes of motor facts as thoiigh they were due to different real modes of one force, so psy- chology has the right to use terms which imply that the different psychic facts are due to different real modes of the activity of one force, or being, called " the mind " (or " soul "). But the case of ])hysieal science and that of psychology, though similar in some respects, are by no means the same. For psychology is less helped than is physical science by such semi-mytho- logical language ; on the other hand, it is much nunc likely to be misled or PlIINCIPLKS OF TnP:iK CLASSIFICATION .0:] seriously injured. Whether pliysics, for example, discusses the relations between electrical phenomena and temperature i)henomena in terms of dif- ferent " modes of motion," or as difVercnt " forms of energy," or even speaks of the two as though they were manifestations of ditl'erent " entities," it is always consciously and definitely at work upon one and the same thing. As science it attempts simply to point out and state in mathematical formulas the detiuito relations which exist between observed changes of one sort and observed changes of another sort. In carrying out this attempt it is able to consider apart, as actually separable in their objective presentation, the compared classes of facts. Temperature changes it can measure apart by one set of standards (thermometers, etc.), and electrical changes, apart, by another set of standards (electrometers of one form or another). It can also compare both these classes of facts with other facts of change, by way of observed physical motion, and bring them all under one princii)le — the hy- l^othesis of the conservation and correlation of energy. How the funda- mental nature of psychic facts renders much of this imi)ossible has already been repeatedly exphiined. There can be little doubt that psychology has suffered from the improi:)er use of the doctrine of faculties. It vill be shown later on that this is still esi)ecially true of the entire view taken of the nature of hnoxdedge ; for " knowledge " is almost uniformly assigned, even by the more modern writ- ers on psychology, to the jilace of one of the three elementary and indivisible faculties of mind. Mental faculties are — we are almost uniformly told — knowledge, first, and then feeling and will. But, in fact, knowledge involves a complex and continuous develoiiment of all the faculties ; it is as truly a matter of feeling and will as of intellect. Many other examj^les of the same misleading effect might be taken from the history of psychology.' The first impression when we enter upon the general field of psychic facts, for the purpose of classifying" them, is one of be- wildering variety. Certain main difierenccs in the characteris- tics of the difierent fields of our own consciousness are, indeed, easily made apparent. But of minor differences we find so great and indefinite a number as to seem to bafile all i^reliminary at- tempts at classification. Moreover, in the interests of scientific exactness we at once ask ourselves : What principles of classifi- cation shall Ave adopt ? To this latter question the most obvious answer is that given by the language of common life. This language sets forth, of course, the more strongly marked and unmistakable differences in our different psychic facts. For example, in the entire domain covered by the different fields of sense-consciousness we find that the established classifications de- pend upon the bodily organ whose activity mainly determines the character of the sei:>arable fields. Popular esteem recognizes ' On the defects of the ordinary doctrine of Faculties, see : Lotze : Microcosmns, bk. ii., chap. 2. Lewes : Study of Pttycholojxy, p. 27 f. Wundt : Physiolog. Psychologic, Einl. And, especially Her- bart : Psychologic, Einl. And Beneke : Pragmatische Fsychologie, Einl. and chap. i. 54 THE SO-CALLED "MENTAL FACULTIES" live organs of seuse, aud iive corresponding classes of sensa- tions, or classes of fields of consciousness mainly of a sensuous character. But only a slight examination is required to show, for example, that tastes and smells are blended in most of our knowl- edge of substances taken into the mouth ; indeed, a variety of other sensations — tactual, muscular, of temperature, etc. — blend with all our so-called " taste " of things. Again, if we try to clas- sify sensations of smell, we find ourselves speaking of the smell of a rose, the smell t>/' asaf oetida, the smell o/'this or that substance. But this is not, properly speaking, a classification directly of our psychic states at all, but only of certain objects that are known or inferred to excite in us these differing states of sensation. Indeed, the moment we reflect upon the principle which con- trols the most obvious classifications of even our sense-experi- ence, we begin to doubt whether we have really been compaj-ing at all " the fields of consciousness, as such," in order to discover their likenesses and their differences. The ground of this doubt is laid in the truth that it is the ohjeds known by developed ex- perience through the senses, and the organs known to be instru- mental in acquiring an acquaintance with these objects, which are of first practical interest to us. Our " states, as such," do not concern us until reflective consciousness begins. But when we do turn discriminating- consciousness upon the fields of ex- perience, with the purpose of classifying its phenomena, this doubt immediately arises, and then continues to assume larger and larger dimensions. To choose an example from the fields of consciousness occasioned by irritation of the skin : by placing my hand upon a marble table I know the object to be smooth, cold, hard, flat, etc. All this knowledge I may be said to acquire through " feeling " of the table with my hand. But blue is not so unlike red, nor the smell of the rose so unlike that of asafoet- ida, considered as a phenomenon of consciousness, as is the smooth feeling of the table unlike its cold feeling ; neither is its smooth feeling the same as, or strictly similar to, its hard feeling. Furthermore, red is undoubtedly unlike blue in that it is a differ- ent color ; but it is like blue and unlike the feeling of cold in that red and blue are both sensations of coloi- ; while cold and heat are alike in that both are sensations of temperature. And yet cold and heat are in ps)/c7iical quality so uidike that there is not the slightest difficulty in conceiving of a being that should pass its entire existence miserably cold without so much as having the faintest concejition of the nature of the sensation of warmth. Our doubts and dilHculties are still further increased when we try to consider in what respects our memory-images are like, LIKE AXD UNLIKE PSYCHIC FACTS 55 in what respects unlike, the perceptions from wliich Ave ure ac- customed to say they are " derived ; " again, in what respects our so-called concepts resemble and differ from our memory-ima<^es ; and yet, ag-ain, in what respects thinking is unlike imagining, and imagining is unlike remembering, and so on. In the inter- ests of an enlarged study of mental life, by the improved classi- tication and explanation of all its phenomena, we may go on scientitically to investigate such questions as follows : In what respects is dream-life like and unlike waking life ; the experi- ence of the h^'pnotic subject or of the insane like and unlike that of the normal and sound consciousness ; the animal or the savage or the infant like and unlike the adult and cultured man V It is by no means with the wanton desire to create confusions, for the mere purpose of clearing them up subsequently, that we have raised such inquiries as the foregoing. Such confusions arise the moment we ask a question like the following: In what essential respect as phenomena of consciousness, in what purely internal qualities, do my sensations of blue and red resemble each other ? Indeed, do we not meet with the color- blind who may have one of these classes of color-sensations without the slightest conception of the other ? And if one think it easy to say just how the sensation of cold quoad sensation is worthy to be classed with the sensation of a musical sound, one only needs the effort to describe this internal resemblance to destroy his easy-going contideuce. To i^usii the matter to its extreme, we may say, classification of the psj'chic facts, on the basis of their internal resemblance to each other, their strict likeness as psychic facts, seems to be difficult, if not impossible. This truth is at present admitted by all Avith respect to sensa- tions of smell. But is not the case, we may ask, essentially the same Avith all kinds of sensations, and indeed Avith all kinds of elementary psychic facts ? Three considerations sum up what is necessary to be said upon the classification of mental phenomena at the present l")oint. First : what all the sensations and more primary forms of feeling and desire are like, and what unlike, can only be known by a real experience extending to each one of them. To the totally blind man Ave cannot describe Avhat sensations of color are like by bidding him dwell upon sensations of sound ; and of the deaf man the reverse is true. The man blind to the color red cannot knoAv Avhat red is really like by study of his oavti sensa- tions of blue: the tone-deaf man cannot knoAV Avhat a musical scale is like by being directed to consider his OAvn sensations of noise. We might even say that the man avIio has had experience 56 THE SO-CALLED "MENTAL FACULTIES" of the peculiar quality of the note ct} cannot know in what respect the " sharp " or "flat " of this note is like or unlike the note a} it- self, except by mentally, at least, executing" the required slight chang'e of pitch and marking the modification of his own con- sciousness. Confessedly, no one, by tasting sweet alone, can know the nature of the sour or of the bitter ; nor, by smelling camphor, can one tell how heliotropes smell. The same thing is true of the more elementary forms of feeling. What they are like can be known only by their being felt. ^[T^^econd : We actually classify our states of consciousness by selecting some one or more of their most i^romineut character- istics and roughly comparing them with other states in which the same characteristics have also been prominent. What Ave mean by " same characteristics " here is ordinarily very complex. In the case of color-sensations, for example, we mean that certain muscular and tactual sensations connected with the eyeball are associated with every color, and that every color is localized, as a surface of some object related to other colored surfaces, in the field of the eye. That is to say, color-sensations are all alike in the similarity of their connections with other complex sensory and motor and intellectual states. But in itself considered, if we could so consider it, each color-sensation has its own i^eculiar, indescribable and incommunicable quality. Hence it is that we use, for the classification of the senses, terms taken from tlie symbolism of space relations. Musical tones, again, are consid- ered as like or unlike, not only because of the likeness or unlike- ness of the objects from which they proceed, or because they are all alike received through the ear, biit also because they can be arranged, as near to or remote from each other, along a line called a scale. But this line itself indicates the connection which each tone has established with muscular and tactual sen- sations in the effort to sing it or to image it ; and perhaps also with visual sensations in reading notes. Thus the symbol for likeness and unlikeness of colors is, as we shall see, a triangle with one side incomplete. While for tastes we appeal to con- nected and localized sensations of skin and muscle ; or, for both tastes and smells, to the likeness or unlikeness of the objects habitually associated Avith them. Here again the same thing is true of the elementary forms of feeling. They are classifiable only by appeal to comi)lex associations. But, third : After recognizing the indefinitely great variety of unlike qualities belonging to our more elementarj'' sensations and feelings, Ave are prepared to notice that the case of the other so- called " faculties" is markedly different. Representative images. KNOWLEDGE, FEELING, AND WILL .')? or ideas, dififcr amonj^ tliomselves chiefly as the original seu- satious or feelinijfs from which they are said to be " derived ' were different. Bat (us r(pre.sc/Uatlve images they seem divisible into two classes at most, viz., memory-imag-es and images of the imagination. This distinction may itself be shown to be one largely, if not wholly, of degnies ; so that it would not be mean- ingless to say that all representative images, as such, are alike. But this likeness consists chiefly in the relation which they sustain as " copies " to their so-called " originals." How many kinds of will, properly speaking, can be recognized ? How many kinds of thinking, and how many kinds of desire, as such V Whether the answer to these questions is detinitely certain or not, every one recognizes at once the truth that remembering, imagining, thinking, desiring, and willing have not the same be- wildering and unclassifiable variety, considered as faculty, which sensations and feelings have. AVe are thus led to the dhtbict'ion between the great number of qualitatively tmiike forms of receptivity , as it were, and the relatively few forms of orga^ihing activity dis- played in all mental states. It is imagining, thinking, and volun- tary direction of attention which reduces all this variety to unity, and thus organizes our otherwise disparate and unlike factors of psj'chical life. And this is only saying in another way that psychology recognizes these mental activities as at the basis of all classification, unifying, and organization of what is otherwise discrete. Finally, Ave may inquire as to the meaning and value of the ordinary threefold classification of so-called " mental faculties." There are customarily said to Ije three, and only three, un- derived and irreducible faculties of mind ; these are Knowledge, Feeling, Will. Is this — which is now often called the " ac- cepted " — classification of mental faculty scientifically justifiable ? In answer to this question, it has already been said that "Knowl- edge," in any proper sense of that term, cannot be correlated with feeling and conation as a like elementary and original form of mental life. Much the same thing must be said of Will : it cannot be considered as an elementary and underived form of mental life. Moreover, all question as to the threefold division of the faculties of mind means, for descriptive and explanatory psychological science, just this and nothing more : Does that subject to which self-consciousness assigns the psychic states actually exercise three elementary and underived forms of func- tion i By " elementary " forms of function we mean such as can be said to belong to every most simple psychic state, so far as such state can be made the object of discriminating conscious- 58 THE SO-CALLED " MEXTAL FACULTIES" noss. By " uuderived " forms of fuuction we mean sucli as can- not be described or explained in terms that have the same meaning" when applied to other forms of function. When psy- (•holoy,ical science has reached these elementary and underived functions, its analysis and classification can go no further. The idace to cease attempts at classification has been found. But if the question just raised be properly stated and ex- plained, it must be answered in the affirmative. Every real psy- chic fact is complex to ith an irreduclhle threefold complexity ; it may be said to have three " aspects " : it is fad of intellection, fact of feeling, fact of conation. To use popular languag'e, which must be explained with care in order not to be deceptive : Whenever I know myself as in any state of consciousness, I know myself as perceiving or thinking- something, feeling somehow, and doing somewhat. Whenever I infer any state of consciousness in an- other mind, I believe that other to be perceiving or thinking something, feeling- somehow, and doing somewhat. One of these three " aspects" maybe emphasized, as it were, at the expense of the others ; but no one of the three can be destroyed without destroying the psychic fact itself as an object of discriminating consciousness. Further, neither discriminating self-consciousness nor the highest flight of imagination enables me to do away with the difference between the three "aspects" of the one psychic fact. Each of the three, as such, and psychically considered, is j^ecul- iar in quality, unique, not to be confused with the others, or ex- pressed in terms of the others. Intellection cannot be described in terms of feeling; neither can conation. To know what feeling is, the feeling — and, as we have already seen, the peculiar feeling — must ha fit. The same thing is true of conation. That com- plex states of consciousness, which are predominating!}^ states of feeling, follow in dependence upon other complex states which are predominatingly states of intellection, and that the former are in their turn followed by states of will, is matter of common enough (experience. I learn that my friend is dead : I feel sor- row, and desire to pay respect to his memory ; and I resolve to attend the funeral. Or I hear that a chamber concert of classical music is to be given ; I have feelings of pleasant recollection and anticipation ; and I decide to purchase tickets. Such examples are given to show that knowledge excites feeling, and feeling fur- nishes motive to will. But, in the same abstract way of speak- ing, it is equally trute that will represses or excites feeling, and feeling modifies kjiowledge, etc. The scheme of classification suggested b^^ our discussion will THE THREE-FOLD DIVISION 09 load us to study all the so-called faculties as resulting from the dc- velop7)unt of mental life by the comhmation and elahoration of tlie simpler and more elementary imychical activities. I 4. The threefold division of tlie mental faculties was first established l)y the authority of Kant.' It wus soon widely adopted in Germany, and has, more lately, been prevalent in other lands. The scholastic division into l)o\vors of Understanding and powers of Will was for a considerable time idmost universally adopted by English-speaking psychologists. With the Scottish writers of the old-fashioned realistic school the term employed for classification was " Intellectual and Active Powers." This twofold division was, in part, resi)onsible for the unfortunate separation of psychology and ethics— the "intellectual " powers being treated under the former head, while ethics treated, psychologically, of the so-called "active powers." With the abandonment of the twofold division by this school, the triple di- vision of mental faculties became prevalent in Great Britain. This cliango in opinion was very tardily followed by an enlargement of the sphere of psy- chology iH'oper and a reduction of psychological ethics to its proper jilace as the psychological study of man considered as capable of conduct. Thus the most modern treatises on psychology in English have done, what all German works have for a long time done, viz., have examined, with a view to description and explanation, the phenomena of feeling and will as well as those of intellect. Meantime, the modern biological way of studying psychology has stimulated research into the nature of feeling and conation, especially in those vague and obscure regions which lie around the very roots of mental life. It would scarcely be correct, however, to speak of the triple division of mental faculties as "universally accepted." Indeed, the very emphasis which modern science has laid upon the study of feeling and conation, in their more primitive forms of manifestation, has created a tendency in certain quarters to return to the twofold classification of mental faculty. Thus we are told by one writer: "We recognize only two fundamental classes — activity of thinking and affective movement." Both of these are then subdivided by this writer ; the former into ideation (both presentation and representation) and iudgment, the latter into feeling and willing. It is well known to students of physiological psychology that some of its advo- cates " endeavor experimentally to show that volition is nothing more than intensity of sensation. On the other hand, Wundt would apparently have us regard all mental life as developing from the twofold root of sensation and will.' I 5. Many of those who officially adopt the threefold division of men- tal faculties proceed, in the interest of scientific explanation, to do away with the real and fundamental character of this distinction. Reference has ' Kritik d. L'rtheilskraft. Einl. And sec IlamiUou : Lectures on Metaphysics, xi. and xx., for a history of opinion. . ' Miinsterherg, for example, of whose views later on. 3 physiolorc. Psychologie. In the 2d od.. p. 455, Jjis words are: "Sensation, feelinvs arise only in the purely psychical realm, as modifications of the THE NATURE OF SENSATION 93 strtiiiin of consciousness. Tlioy neither are, nor are like, the stinuili or tlie resulting- nerve-commotions which form the ordi- nary physical pre-contlition of their origin. It is, therefore, not only impertinent but even absurd, from the psychologist's point of view, to speak of sensations as " propagated " from the pe- ri])heral organs to the brain, or as "elaborated" in either the lower or the higher regions of the latter organ. The essential Jiature of sensation is understood only when we make clear to ourselves that it is not a physical or physiological process. Further, sensations are not regarded by psychology as prop- erties or (lualities of extra-mental and extended things. How tliey stand related to objects of i^erception — to sensible, perceived things — it is the business of psychological investig-ation to dis- cover. But, as psychology regards tlieiu, sensations are in, and of, the conscious mental life of the perceiver ; they are not quali- ties of things, regarded as physics and chemistry regard things, in their being as extended and external, or out of the perceiving mind. For this reason it is that psychology has constantly to contend for its points of view, both against those who would identify nervous processes with psychical processes, and also against those who would identify the sense-experience of mind with the properties of extra-mental realities. The psychologi- cal point of view differs both from that of physical science and from that of so-called "common sense." In all conception of the nature of sensation, from the psycho- logical point of view, we are obliged then to make an appeal, either direct or indirect, to c6nsciousness. This appeal takes us 'in two'tlirectioris, according as we emphasize the w^ell-known con- ditions under which dur sense-experience ordinarily. originates ; or, on the,other hand, emphasize the part which such sense-ex- perience plays in the development of knowledge. Proceeding in the former direction we may say:. A sensathm^is tl tat peculiar modification of consciousness luliich is ordinarily developed on occa- sion of the. excitonerit of somh organ of sense hy the actio?i upon it of e-rternal stimidi. And liere,^ what the peculiar modification of consciousness is — the psychic fact, " as such " — can be known only by a direct appeal to consciousness. But if we i)roceed in the direction of the relation which our sense-experience Sustains to our knowledge of things, we may say, sensations are those pecul- iar modifications of our consciousness hy which the nature of sen- sible ohjects is made hioton to us. Subjectively considered, my sensations are m,ine, affections of my mind as truly as are my feelings of grief, desire, weariness, or of patriotism, benevolence, malevolence, and the like. Subjectively considered, their pecul- 94 SENSATION : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES iarity consists in their dependence, as forth-puttings of mind, upon the activity of certain bodily organs ; this view, in its turn, emphasizes the passivity of the sensation-processes. Objectively considered, the sensations are markedly unlike my feelings of grief or of patriotism ; objectively considered, they are poten- tial factors of all presentations of sense— elements of mental life, to be sure, which become objectified, as my feelings and thoughts cannot, in the form of qualities of perceived things. 3 2. No explanation or remonstrance can make the habit of confusing the psycho-physical conditions of sensation with the being or nature of sensation more inappropriate than it appears at first glance. This remark applies in criticism not only to those who, like Claude Bernard and Lewes, speak of the contraction of living tissue as a " sentient " process ; or like Dr. Mauds- ley and Comte identify physiology and psychology throughout ; or, like M. Gerdy define sensation as " the change that takes place in the organ aftected under the influence of an excitation." It applies almost equally to those who, like Mr. Spencer, rely for their explanation and description of the sim- pler recognizable sensations, upon the " aggregation " and "agglomeration" of " nerv6u3 shocks," after the fashion of the combination of material atoms into molecules, etc. It must be distinctly understood that whenever we speak of the "fusion" of sensations in "sensation-complexes," we speak of purely psychical processes, resembling in quality known phases of actual states of consciousness. In other words, the terms are psychological and refer to relations accomplished in the stream of consciousness, and not in the physical substratum by " overlappings " of central nerve-commotions, and the like. Far less reprehensible is the jioint of view taken by writers like Volk- mann. This author (I., I 32) regards sensation as a state developed by the soul (a forth-putting of soul) in reaction upon entering into relation with some form of external being — the so-called stimulus. This conception of sensation assumes, to be sure, the existence of the soul as a real being cap- able of entering upon its own place and doing its own work, as it were, in the world of real beings. On account of its quasi-metaphysical implica- tions wo prefer not to introduce it in discussions that belong to scientific psychology. But in so far as the conception insists upon tlie puvehi psi/- cliicdl nature of sensation, it is indispensable to the point of view demanded by psychological science. We agree with this author in regarding sensation as a mental process, which is not to be identified with the correlated process in the nerve-fibers. And if we raise the question whether it is to be con- sidered as activity or passivity, the answer may be given in either way according to our point of view. Few words are used in a more confused and vacillating manner by jisy- chologists than the word " sensation." The further exj^lanations necessary to define our use, and to make clear the distinction between sensation and sensuous feeling, or between sensation and sensuous cognition, etc., miast await their proper time. § 3. The twofold reference of every sensation — as a state induced in us THE NATURE OF SENSATION 96 by the action of stimuli upon the organs of sense, and also as an item of in- formation concerning the qiiality belonging to the object of sense — must be recognized by all psychological theory. Thus, as Kabier says : ' "It has been customary to understand by sensation the tout ensemble of psychical ])henomena (repi'esentative or aftective, with little or no distinction) which results immediideh/ from an impression made upon the organs of sense." And a German writer," who sets out to establish a new doctrine of mind upon a physiological basis, reminds us that sensation is "no- mere passivity, but a reacting impulse." Still another author,'' after incautiously defining sensa- tion as " the becoming-conscious" of organic impression, goes on to say that this becoming-conscious itself presupposes that the organic impression arouses or solicits the soul to acti\aty. " This arousenient of the Pnyche it is which we designate as sensation." By our recognition of both the passive and the active side of eveiy i^roc- ess of sensation we get a completer view of the nature of all sensation. Every sensatipn is a i^sychieal act, conditioned upon the senses being affect- ed by external stimuli in a particular way. Thus, though we are active in having the sensation, and the sensation is, in its essential nature, a psychical activity, it is also of the nature of an " impression " made upon us through changes in that which is not our activity. This twofold nature — this capac- ity to be regarded either as an impression received from without, or as a peculiar activity arising from within — belongs to all our sense-experience. § 4. It is by no means without significance that sensations have been de- scribed as those peculiar modifications of consciousness which are '^ordi- narily " developed in dependence lapon the excitement of the end-organs of sense by external stimuli. Further detailed investigation shows that the appropriate excitement of the central organs is the real and final physiologi- cal precondition of sensation. For if the sensory tracts h'ing between the organs of sense and the brain are impaired, no psychical impression is made, no psychical activity arises corresponding to the peculiar function of the organs of sense. The excited eye cannot arouse the sensations of color, unless the optic tracts are entire ; the irritated ear causes no sensations of sound, unless the auditory tracts are capable of action. Moreovei\ experi- ments in extirpation upon the brains of the low-er animals, and obsCTvation of the effects of disease in fnan, show that to disturb or to destroy certain cerebral centers is to disturb or to destroy the capacity for certain classes of sensations. Still further the excitement of the brain by internal stimuli — as alcohol, narcotic drugs, etc., or the changed character of the blood through the decomposition-products of fever — results in hallucinations ; but hallucinations are sensation-states having, ' wholly or in part, the "objec- tivity" ordinarily obtained only by irritation of the end-organs of sense by external stimuli. And, finally, in certain dreams and other vivid activity of the image-making faculty, all discernible distinction disappears between sensations peripherally excited and mental images originating in internal stimulation. Indeed, the very boundaries between sense and memory and memory and imagination will be seen to be shifting and stretched over debatable ground. ' Lcf-ons, etc. I. Peychologie, p. 91 f. ' Honvicz : Psychologische Analyeen, i, p. 305 f. 3 Kaulich : Ilandbuch d. Ppychologie, p. 20 f. 96 SENSATION : ITS NATURP: AND CLASSES A preliminary, gross Classification of tlie Sensations may best be made on the basis of the particular org-aus iu whose activity those nerve-processes originate which furnish the ordinary physi- cal conditions of sensation. Hence the i^opular classification leading to the/y'siological function of the truly nervous parts of the pe- ripheral organ — which parts receive the modified stimiTlus and convert it into a nervous process, a nerve-commotion, that origi- nates in the end-organs and is capable of proi:)agation along the nerve-tracts to the central organs ; and (3) the histological structure and peculiar physiological function of the central or- gans, which receive the incoming nerve-processes and pro- CLASSIFICATION OF SENSATIONS 97 fouiulh' modify them, by central processes of elaborating, inhi- bitinu", combining-, adjusting, etc. It is, then, as has alread}' been intimated, to the ditiering processes in the brain that we must look for the ^finai' phj'siological explanation of the difierent kinds of sensation. The psychical causes of the different kinds of sensation are to be found in mental habit, varying distribution of attention, acuteness of the power of discriminating judgment, etc. But below and behind all kinds of explanations stands the unex- plained. In our attempts to give causes for the different kinds of sensations we soon came upon ultimate facts, for which no cause can be given. It is a fact that when certain nerve-proc- esses, the nature of which we can guess at with more or less con- fidence, take place in the brain center X, the sensations S (A), which we call " auditor}'," arise in consciousness and run through a series of changes, such as S (A),^ S (A)- S (A),'' etc. It is also a fact that when other, presumably different, nerve-proc- esses arise in another brain-center y",,tlie totally different sen- sations ^S / F";j, v?hich we call " visual," arise in consciousness and run through a series of changes, such as S (V)a., S ( Vj/3, S ( T ^y, etc. ' But why nerve-processes of the order X, in one cerebral center, should give rise to the kind of sensations, » 8 fA), and its peculiar, series, and nerve-processes of the order Y. in aiiother cerebral center, should give rise to another kind of . sensation, S fVj, and its peculiar series; why also cerebral processes should give rise to psychical processes of sensation, at all — these are questions, about the answer to which we, at present, know nothing whatever ; nor does it seem in the least degree likely that we shall ever know the answers to questions like these.. ^ 5. It should he understood in tliis connection, in a preliminary wav, that the different sensations stand in very different relations to the develoi^- ment of sensati«m^xi:)5H-ience. Iti the origin andgro.wth of this form of mental life*; the tactual and mnscnlar sensations are fundamental and uni- versally present. T^iology is accustomed to refer this fact to the character of the evolution of animal species. And certain it is that some kind of sen- sitive integument responding" to external stimuli (an ectnsarc, or rudimentaiy skin) belongs to the very lowest kinds of animal and psychical life. In that line of development in which man belongs, a muscular system, under the responsive control of will and by its activity completing the trijile action of the reflex mechanism, seems equally indispensable. Presumably, the human embryo begins its conscioiTS life, its first rudimentary organization of sense-experience, upon a basis of tactual and muscular sensations only. That tactual and muscular sensations are evoked by the activity of all the organs of sense, and that they enter, in an important way, into the complex 7 98 SENSATIO;^ : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES resultant of the activity of these organs, will be made i:)erfectlv clear by subsequent discussion of the origin and development of perceptive faculty. g G. In the case of man, and of all highly organized animals, the greater bulk of the end-organs of sense — especially of the. eye and ear — has a me- chanical significance only. That is to say, the sense-organ is chiefly an in- genious contrivance for modifying the external stimulus, and for conveying it to the nerve-elements in such manner as to excite them to their peculiar nervous function. Biologically considered, the end-organs [epidermis and most important parts of the special organs of sense) develoj) from the same embryonic layer ("epiblast") from which come the central organs of the nervous system. With respect to its minute structure and function, every organ of sense may be considered as a sjiecial modification of the sui^erficial cells, adapting them to the diflferent kinds of stimuli. Every such organ, therefore, looks both outward and inward ; it is a "mediator" between the nerve-commotion of the nervous system and the various forms of physical ' energy which are to be adapted so as to excite this system. § 7. It may be assumed that the nerve-tracts, which lie on the way to the higher central organs, do not modify the nature of the nerve-process which gives rise to sensations. But what is called the "localization of cerebral function " has shown that the different areas of the brain have dif- ferent relations to the diflferent kinds of our sensation-experience. For example, the "optic thalami" in the lower regions of the brain, and the "superior occii)ital convolutions" in the cerebral hemispheres, sustain a peculiar relation to the origin and development of visual sensations. Phys- iological science is beginning to connect different portions of the general visual brain-area with particular portions of the retinal field. We know also what regions of the hemispheres— namely, those about the " Fissure of Sylvius " — are chiefly concerned in the elaboration of impressions that give rise to the sensations of hearing. Nay, more, this science differences the psychical functions employed in the utterance or interpretation of thought as expressed in language, and " locates " the areas chiefly concerned in each of these different psychical functions. Sensations of touch, taste, smell, and temperature, are also — though, as yet, with less of certainty and exact- ness — being "localized." This is all to be understood simply as pointing out those particular regions of the brain where the physiological pre-con- ditions or causes of the diflferent sensation-processes are fulfilled. Sensa- tions themselves remain as trialy psychical and distinguishable, in kind, only by a process of pure introspection as they ever were. Meantime, inquiry goes on as to the peculiar nature of those processes in which the " physical basis" of the diflferent kinds of sensation is, as it were, laid. But here the results of experimentation, observation, and application of general biological facts to the particular case of the human brain, have re- sulted in little really scientific information. We know far better than we knew twenty years ago where in the different regions of the brain, some pe- culiar process called a " nerve-commotion " takes place when each of the different main classes of sensations "occupies" the field of consciousness. But wo know sc^arcely any better than we did twenty years ago preciseh/ what takes place in the diflferent brain -areas, and forms the common basis for our sensation-experience. Wo do not know at all in what respect the nerve-proc- SENSATIONS OF SMELL 99 esses corresponding to sensations of color differ from those corresponding to sensations of sound.' g 8. Tlio realm of the unexplained, the realm of mystery consisting in actual and acknowledged fact, spreads widely over this whole subject of in- vestigation. •The reasons why inif centntl nervous system should be excited, through the end-organs of sense, by acoustic waves lying within a certain range, and not by those lying beyond this range, by vibrations of luuiiuiferous ether so many billions to the second, and not by a smaller or greater number of vibrations, by etHuvia of a certain unknown constitution, and not by others of a dirterent constitution, etc., are doubtless to be found in the molecular structure of the nervous organism itself. But why /should resjjond in one instance with the sensation of red, in another with the sensation of yellow, etc. ; or now with a sensation of a\>, and now with a sensation of ctr; or should put forth the sensation called " smell of a rose " when I hold in my hand one flowei", and " smell of a heliotrope " when I approacli another flower — all this must be accepted as inexplicable matter of fact. Nor do the attemjits thus far made to reduce these facts to any system under the terms of " mechanics of the sensations " seem at all likely to succeed.^ Sensations of Smell are those peculiar modifications of con- sciousness which are the characteristic result of exciting- the end- org-ans of the nose. In g-eneral, bodies which excite these sen- sations must give off some form of effluvia or odorous reek. The stimulus of the organs is then applied as it is borne to them in g-aseous form — usually the current of air — and is made with more or less force to pass over them, almost exclusively in the act of inspiration. Smells are g-enerally said to be " unclassifiable " ; that is to say, each smellable object has its own peculiar smell, and consequently we can only describe the smell by reference to the object. We cannot " sort out " smells into classes, as we can colors into red, green, blue, and the like. Recent investigations point in the direction of a possible classification of smells on the basis of the chemical constitution of the objects occasioning- them. It must be remembered, however, that even thus we should not classify the sensations, " as such." No symbolism, such as that of the line, the triangle, etc., is applicable to the sensations of this sense. In all our actual experience, however, the sensations of smell — and especially when they are at all intense — are fused with more or less wide-spreading- tactual, muscular, and organic sensations — the latter often reaching well down the digestive canal. J 9. More precisely the end-organs of smell are certain nervous struct- ures scattered over the mucous membrane in the upper region of the nasal » On all these and other connected subjects, see the author's Elements of Physiological Psy- chology, pp. 1-302. 2 Comp. Medeni's Grundziige einer esacten Psychologie, I., Die Mechanik der Empfindungen. 100 SEISTSATION" : ITS NATURE ATSTD CLASSES cavity (the regio olfactoria). Here the efHuvia contained in the inspired cur- rent of air are forced against the processes of the olfactory cells and start in them the nerve-commotion which is propagated along the olfactory tracts to the appropriate lobes of the brain. That fluids applied immediately to the olfac- tory regions cannot be smelled has been asserted, but is probably not strictly true. Gold fish, it is said, will not touch eggs when saturated with olive-oil or asafoetida.' It is doubtful whether these sensations, jiroper, can be excited by electrical stimulation. Subjective sensations of smell— some- times symptomatic of oncoming insanity — are possible ; and inability to smell may be due either to the condition of the end-orgaa (as in the well- known case of " loss of smell," with a " cold"), or to atrophy of the connect- ing nerves and brain-center.^ Since the interesting discovery of Eomieu, in 1756, that very small bits of cami^hor on the surface of water have a curious rotary motion, the same j)henomenon has been noticed by a number of observers in several hundred odorous substances of either vegetable or animal structure. This, of course, strengthens the belief that the stimulus of smell is thrown off from these substances in the form of invisible and imponderable particles. If pajier be tied in front of the nostrils of dogs, they cannot " track " game or follow their masters by the sense of smell. The difficulty of classifying smells, chemically, is enhanced by the fact that chemists differ much concerning the smell of the same substances. Moreover, only a few of the elements have any characteristic smell ; and, perhaps, not these when in a perfectly pure state. It is said that artificial perfumes are, in general, binary and tertiary compounds, in which the num- ber of the equivalents of hydrogen diminishes in relation to the number of equivalents of carbon.^ Products less rich in hydrogen form an " aromatic series." On the other hand, substances not analogous in chemical composition are sometimes alike in smell. Thus, vapor of arsenic smells like garlic ; and triturated emeralds, rubies, and pearls, give off an odor of violets. In general, this lowest, most animal, least intellectual of the sensations is peciiliarly baffling of all attempts to reduce it to terms of science. In the developed and cultivated human species, smell has come to be, for the most part, of the nature of an fosthetical advantage or affliction, rather than a means of accurate knowledge. But in the lower and less cultivated phases of animal life it, by the prompt and accurate information it furnishes, serves as a most im})ortant factor in the preservation, projiagation, and evolution of the individual and of the species. Our scientific knowleclg-e of Sensations of Taste is somewhat more capable of being- satisfactorily exhibited than that of the ol- factory sensations. The org-an by whose activity these sensa- tions are occasioned is the ton2:ue and — at least in some cases — the anterior portions of the soft palate. In g-eneral, onl}'^ fluid ' See the jTronncls on which Aronsohn disputes tho accepted conclusions of Weber and others. Archiv f. Anat. u. Physiol., 1S8G, pp. 321-57. - See Dr. Donaldson, on the brain of Laura Bridgman, reprinted from the American Journal of Psychology. ^ See M. Henry : Les Odeurs, etc. Paris. 1892. SENSATIONS OF TASTE ■ 101 bodies, or sucli as fire to some deg-ree soluble, excite the end- org-aus of taste. All gustatory sensatious are, ou account of the very organic activity on which they are dependent, connected with sensations of smell, touch, muscular sensations, and organic sensations arising- from irritation of diU'erent depths of the diges- tive canal. The application of the gustatory stimulus is ordinarily made by pressing- it against the end-org-aus, after it has been rendered fluid in the saliva or in some other menstruum. What it is in tastable substances which enables them to excite the different kinds of tastes is quite unknown ; investigation, how- ever, seems to point in the direction of connecting their, gusta- tory character with their chemical constitution. The four principal kinds of taste usually recognized are the sweet, the bitter, the salt, and the sour. To these Wundt would add the alkaline and the metallic. There can be no doubt that all the " tastes " of gustable substances with which our daily ex- perience makes us familiar are compounds ; many of these com- pounds may be regarded as resolvable into these six so-called simple tastes. The peculiar " shading " of sensation which a large number of substances produce, when introduced into the mouth, is due to the smell they excite. Yet we agree with those who deny that all kinds of taste, even after abstracting the sen- sations of smell with which they are fused, can be brought under these six classes. The number of kinds of taste is thus some- what indefinite ; although gustatory sensations lend themselves to classification much better than do the kindred sensations of smell. OO. The special end-organs of taste are certain " gustatory flasks " or " bulbs " contained in pa^iVte that are scattered over the regions already mentioned. 1 Gustable substances when brought near these papillae excite secretion of the glands which serves for continual cleansing of the papillae and for washing away the dissolved substances. The question whetlt^r tastable substances excite the same sensations When applied to diifereut parts of the tongue lias been made a subject of much experiment ; it is a difficult question to answer satisfactorily. Many seem to taste sweet and sour chiefly with the tip of the tongue, bitter and alkaline with its roots." A certain de- rivative of saccharine was found to produce sensations of bitter when applied to the back part of the tongue, and of sweet when applied to the tip and bor- ders of the anterior half.^ 1 The Transactions of the Academy of Sciences at Cracow, 1S88 (see Centralblatt f. Physiol. No. 12) report that a patient, whose whole tousrue had been removed, retained some taste caused by touching the back of the throat or the mucus of the stump. -See. however, Rittmeyer's experiments (Geschmackspriifungen, QOttingen, 1885), which con- cluded that the root loses its perception of taste least readily under drugs, and retains the power to taste bitter best of all. 2 Studies from the Biolosical Laboratory of Johns Hopkins University, June, 1887. 102 SKlsTl-SATION : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES Some experimeuters have claimed that they could taste perfectly dry gases ; or that mechanical excitation by rubbing, pressing, or pricking, excit- ed gustatory sensations. Both claims are doubtful. On the other hand, elec- trical stimulation of the different areas of the tongue does seem to cause sensations of taste. It has been claimed by Haycraft {Brain, July, 1887) that tastable bodies are surrounded by an atmosphere, as it were, of vibrating matter; and that the peculiar character of the sensation aroused depends upon the pitch and complexity of these vibrations. Moreover, all the solu- ble chlorides are said to have a salt-like taste ; and this becomes more saline and develops into a bitter with the higher members of the group. But the carbon compounds have in general an acid taste ; and many sweet sub- stances are alcoholic bodies and contain the radical CH2 OH. Hence we are led to the theory that similar sapid compounds vibrate in similar complex ways, and thus occasion similar sensation-complexes of taste. About all this, however, we are still much in the dark. I 11. It is altogether too customary with psychologists to assume that all sensations of taste may be regarded as resultants of the fusion of a few kinds of sensation of this sense with one another and with the indefinite kinds of sensation belonging under the sense of smell. On the contrary, Horwicz ' holds that a large number of gustatory sensations — for example, like the taste of meat, milk, coffee, etc. — cannot be explained in this way. In this opinion we believe him to be correct, as against the somewhat widely ac- cepted classification of other psychologists. Sensations of Sound are those peculiar modifications of our sense-consciousness wliicli arise when the auditory nerve is irri- tated through acoustic waves striking- upon the ear. This whole organ is composed of three easily distinguishable i^arts, which are called respectively, the outer, the middle, and the inner ear. All of the two former, and -a large part of the latter portions of the auditory organ are serviceable only in a mechanical way. They serve, that is, to transmit the acoustic excitement while re- ducing it from waves in the air, which have a small intensity and a great amplitude, to waves in the fluids of the inner ear, which have a comiDaratively high intensity but exceedingly small am- plitude. The inner ear in which the specific end-organs of sound are situated, is a very minute structure, but even more complicated and wonderful than the eye. Besides those sensa- tions which originate in stimulus from the surrounding air, " entotic " sounds are by no means infrequent. These are due to changes going on within our own body, vibrations from which are propagated to the end-organs of the inner ear, for the most part through the middle ear. Among them may be instanced the sound of the beating of the heart, the crackling noise some- times produced by yawning, the ringing in the ears when we • Ppycbolog'.sche Analysen, iii., p. 94 f. SENSATIONS OF SOUND 103 have taken quinine, the soft murmur of our own respiration, or the low musical tone heard when we press our ting-ers in our ears and set the muscles of the jaws to vibrating intensely. All sounds may be divided into two classes — tones, or musi- cal sounds, and )iolse8. The two are, indeed, apt to be blended in all our ordinary experience with sounds. Few players, if any, on the violin produce a perfectly pure note, free from all admixture of scraping- noise ; and we are all familiar with the fact that the ax " rings " in a semi-musical way, when it strikes the tree, and even the slamming door awakens and absorbs musical tones. The question, whether one part of the inner ear (the " vesti- bule ") is the specific organ of noise, and another part (the " cochlea ") the specific organ of musical tones, was for some timt^. answered affirmatively. And there is much in the structure of the two, especially of the cochlea with its obvious arrange- ments for accurate analysis and for a " scale " of sensations, which favors this view. Since, however, we can g-et musical tones by repeating- noises, — e.g., exploding soap-bubbles of hy- drogen, or forcing a stopper out of lead pipes of different lengths, etc. — some investigators have recently been led to ar- gue that we hear tones and noises with the same organ.^ More- over, a series of short, sharp noises like a watchman's rattle can be made as many as six hundred times a second, without producing- a note, if only all extra accompanying sounds are dampened. The two classes of sounds can thus be made to pass into each other by insensible gradations. The musical sounds of oijr ordinary experience are themselves compound — " sensation-complexes " resulting from a fusion of simple sensations in such a manner as to be indistinguishable without specially trained powers of analysis. They are termed " clangs " by the German psychologists. They have the quality called " pitch," and are capable of being arranged in a scale, according to the character of a so-called " fundamental " tone, the lower (in the scale) and stronger one of the sensations of mu- sical sound which are fused in each particular " clang." They are also said to have " tirSbre," which is the peculiar mixture of quality dependent upon the number, relative intensity, and pitch of simple tones which fuse in the compound tone. It is by its timbre that the note a\ when sounded on the piano, differs from the same note when sounded on the violin or by some human voice. The pitch of tones depends upon the rapidity of the periodic 1 So Exner concluded in 1S7G, and CrTicke has recently confinnod the view. (See Wien. Sitzgsbr., 3d Abth., 1884.) 104 SENSATION : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES vibrations (the number in a given unit of time) whicli occasions them; or — what is the same thing — upon the length of their acoustic waves. Objectively considered, tones and noises differ in that the former result from a periodic regularity of stimula- tion ; while such periodicity is wanting to the stimulation which occasions sensations of noise. Subjectively considered, the pe- culiar quality of tones is in the pleasant modification of con- sciousness connected with the variations in their pitch and tim- bre. The sub-classes of tones are derived from this quality of timbre which all musical clangs possess ; and it is the posses- sion of this quality which makes it possible to arrange the tones in musical " scales " where each tone has its appropriate place relative to other contiguous or remote tones. But noises, con- sidered apart from the tones which blend with them, lack this IDeculiar pleasant feeling ; cannot be arranged in scales accord- ing to timbre but only according to intensity ; and must be clas- sified, if at all, as " crashing," " crackling," " hissing," or those very disagreeable " beats " which disturb the jaurity of musical tones. g 12. The inner ear, to which the branches of the auditory nerve are dis- tributed and in which the nervous end-organs of hearing are situated, con- sists of two portions (the "cochlea" and the " vestibule," with the latter of which the "semicircular canals" may be considered as one). The gene- ral i^roblem which this organ has to solve may be said to be a " problem in analvsis." In that most complicated portion of the cochlea, called the " organ of Corti," some three thousand fibers are arranged in row's upon a membrane, somewhat like the keys of a i^iano-forte. Now if these are dis- tributed over seven octaves we have about thirty-three for each semitone. Helmholtz, therefore, suggested that these rods are the organs of musical sound. But the "rods of Corti" do not seem well adapted to vibrate; and birds which do not have them, are capable of appreciating mu^^ical tones. Hensen has shown that the membrane (called " basilar ") on which the rods are set is itself graded to pitch ; its individual radii may therefore act like stretched strings to respond to the different tones, from the lowest to the highest. Still more recent investigations ' have led to the view that certain exceedingly minute arches, in the organ of Corti, which at the base of the cochlea are small and little spread, and at the ujiper end are larger and much spread, vibrate to the strings of the membrane, like the sounding- board of a piano to its different strings. What is certain is that the cochlea is equipped with a mechanism for analysis, althoiigh the precise action of this mechanism is not yet perfectly understood. Still further, since we can hear some five hundred or more times in a second (the crackle of electric sparks with an interval of 2 a), an apparatus for promptly "damping" the sound must be provided in the ear. I 13. The sub-classification of musical sounds, or the arrangement of tlie ' See the rcseai-ches of Dr. C. Bruckner, Virchow's Archiv, csiv.. Heft 2. SENSATIONS OF LIGHT AND COLOU 105 great variety of tones disceruibly diflferent as respects quality, requires, of cH)urse, more or less of trained appreciation of ditierences and habitual exer- cise of the power of discrimination u^jon one general form of sense-experi- ence. It is matter of fact, however, that all adults who are not tone-deaf seem to have some power of judging differences of quality in pitch, purely as such. The number of qualitatively unlike sensations of musical sound of which each individual is capable is determined by this power. Such judgment is, without doubt, ordinarily much assisted by an appeal to other sensations— muscular, tactual, even visual — which blend in our sense-ex- perience with sensations of musical sound. We imagine how we should sound the note by lifting up or depressing the larynx and other organs of vocalization. But even Jenny Lind could with difficulty sing in quarter tones ; while ordinary discrimination of kinds of pitch and timbre goes further than this, and the discrimination of trained musicians far exceeds these limits. Here, as in all similar cases, the general principle is : Sensa- tions cannot be discriminated as different which have not been heard as different. The natural way to arrange a so-called "musical scale" is as follows : Given two tones, as m and n, which are separated by a plainly discernible interval (that is, are known to be considerably unlike in kind), one is required to put another tone in between them. Between this newly placed tone — we will say, m or n —and either vi or n, one is now required to place another tone disceruibly different in kind ; and so on until a limit is reached. This natural and inevitable way of arranging our sensations of musical sound may be pictorially represented by diflferent positions, as- signed to the diflferent so-called "notes," along an uninterrupted straight line; or — as in writing music — on and between the "bars" of modern musical symbolism. Unlike our experience with colors, we find in musical sounds only one way of getting at the position of any particular member of the scale ; that is, we must slide along in the one direction of the scale. Whereas there are two ways of going from blue to yellow {i.e., through blue- green and green, or through \dolet, red, and orange), there is only one way of going from a' to a", or from cS to b\> in the same octave. We sjieak then, in some sort according to their very nature, when wg regard our various kinds of sensations of tone as constituting a series, constant and yet indefi- nite, as respects both its upper and its lower limits, and also as resjjects the diflferences discernible by diflferent individuals between the contiguous mem- bers of the series. Sensations of Light and Color are tlie characteristic modifi- cations of consciousness occasioned by stimuk^ting" the expan- sion of the optic nerve within the ball of the eye. The org-an of vision is itself largely a mechanical contrivance adapted to trans- mit and modify the waves of light so that they may serve as proper excitants of the true nervous end-organs of sight. The primary problem for this organ is the formation of an " image " upon the retina. In terms of mechanics, then, we may describe the eye as a water camera oh^cura, with a self-adjusting lens, and a concave, sensitive membrane as a screen on which the image is 106 SENSATION" : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES formed. The formation of the image is accomplished by carry- ing the rays of light reflected from the external object through a series of refracting media and bringing them to a focus on the screen. The rays of light do not, however, immediately excite the fibrils of the optic nerve as these fibrils are spread over the front part of the retina. They pass through the front layers of the retina, and produce upon the back part of this mem- brane certain obscure photo-chemical changes ; it is these photo- chemical changes which are the more immediate excitants of the nervous elements of the organ (the " rods " and " cones," and through them the nerve-cells and nerve-fibers, of the retina). In all ordinary sense-exi^erience with the eye, sensations of light and color are blended together. Or, to speak popularly, every particular color is more or less bright and pure ; and all degrees of brightness and purity have some particular color- tone. Pure grays, or admixtures of white and black that are not colored with any yellow, red, blue, etc., are rarely or never seen in ordinary vision. In order, however, to illustrate the difi^erence between sensations of light and sensations of color, we may pre- pare a series of sense-experiences occasioned by blending differ- ent areas of pure black and pure white on rapidly revolving disks, when looked at in perfectly white light ; or we may try to abstract attention from the brightness of the colors as we focus attention upon the different shades of the same color, or run through in their natural succession the color-tones of the spec- trum. To account for these two different but blended kinds of sensations through the eye we cannot, as in the case of the ear, refer to difierent separable portions of the one organ. Both kinds of sensation originate through excitation of every portion of the retinal area. The attempt has therefore been made to ac- count for this difference in our visual sensations by conjectured differences in the processes in which the two kinds of excitement consist. And since sensations of light vary, in intensity, all the way from black to white through many shades of gray, and from the highest to the lowest degree of brightness which any color can have ; while sensations of color vary in those peculiarities of quality which an inspection of the lines of the spectrum distin- guishes, a difference in the nature of the two processes would seem to bo cleai-ly marked.^ But as to the exact nature of this • On these and other prouncla Wuiult has conohidcd that in every excitation of the retina two different processes are set np— a "chromatic " (which Rives us color-tones) and an "achromatic" (wliich gives us different degrees of brightness and darkness"). The former he would describe as a " multiform photo-chemical process," which changes continuously with the wave-lengths of light ; the latter as a " uniform photo-chemical process," which reaches its maximuni at green and falls pfC toward both ends of the spectrum.— Physiolog. Psychologic (4th ed.), I., p. 529 f. SENSATIONS OF LIGHT AND COLOR 107 diftorcnce we cannot, as yet, be said to have attained scientific kuowledg'e. More detailed attempts to classify sensations of color intro- duce certain very curious relations wliich exist among- them. Every color-sensation, among the many thousand distinguish- able but similar modifications which the stimulation of the ret- ina occasions, appears in . consciousness as an indivisible unity. We cannot analyze the colojr-tones as we can the tones of sound ; even with the assistance of experimental means we cannot always bring- out the various simpler elements which combine to pro- duce them. Yet these peculiar modifications of consciousness, in which the essence of the color-sensations consists, can them- selves be produced by combining different forms of stimulation. All artificial production of colors is dependent on such facts as the following : When the wave-lengths of the two colors mixed vary but slightly (a few billions of oscillations in a second) from each other, the color resulting from the mixture lies between the colors mixed, and may be regarded as a " shade " of one or the other of the two ; and thus by selecting colors that lie apart at different distances along the spectrum, an indefinite number of impressions of color may be obtained. But these mixed impres- sions of color do not all difi'er from each other ; indeed, the as- tonishing and important fact is that they may all be obtained by mixture of a very small number of so-called " fundamental " colors. The theory, propounded by Young and elaborated by Helm- holtz, reduced these fundamental colors to tlivee (green, red or carmine, and blue or indigo-blue) ; it assumed that in every por- tion of the retina there exist three kinds of nervous elements, by simultaneous excitation of which in varying proportions all the phenomena of color-sensations may be explained. More recent investigations have thrown great doubt over this theory ; they have led to the assumption of at least four fundamental colors (green and red, blue and yellow), in addition to white and black, which are also to be considered as genuine color-sensations. But even the assumption of six fundamental colors does not serve to account for all our experience with color-sensations. In our cftbrts to classify our indefinitely numerous color-sen- sations, two other important facts are brought out. First, as has already been indicated, we can pass in either one of two opposite directions by shading the color-tone from one color to another widely different color. For example, if we pass from green through blue to indigo and violet, a tendency to come around to red again is visible when we reach the violet ; but red can alsD be reached by iDroceeding from green through yellow and orange. 108 SENSATION : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES For this reason tlie proper sj'mbolism of color-sensations is not a continuous line like that of musical tones, but a curve which shows a tendency to return upon itself, or a triangle with its base partly, perhaps, invisible. Second, white can be produced by mixing- an indefinite number of pairs of colors which lie at some distance from each other in the spectrum. Colors which, by their admixture, produce white, are called " complementary " to each other. Neither the physiological nor the i^sychological explanation of this form of our sense-experience is clear, but it may be symbolized by the accompanying scheme ' in which each color in either of the two concentric circles corresponds to the complementary circle of the other, and the possibility of move- ment to the same end in the two opposite directions is illustrated. I 14. The parts of the eye which are of most interest to the psychological theory of vision are these three — the retina, the mus- cles which move the eyeballs, and the self- adjusting lens. The sensations occasioned by the activity of the last two are, of course, muscular and tactual. They are qualita- tively of an entirely different order from the sensations of light and color ; and yet in all vision with the adult eye they are co-active with the retinal sensations ; for perception is accomplished onhj as the differ- FiG. 1. ent classes of sensation-series are fused into one continuous sense-experience. In order to understand this fusion it is important to know that the centers of the brain in which the cerebral control of the muscles of the eye is located, are closely connected with those tracts and areas where elaboration of the visual impres- sions takes place. This local connection and simultaneous activity are the physical basis of the psychical fusion which takes place between the light- and color-sensations and the tactual and muscular sensations of the eye. The retina is a wonderful nervous mosaic, having its various elements arranged in some nine or ten layers. In one of these layers a great multi- tude of elongated bodies are arranged side by side, like rows of palisades, with their largest extension in the radial direction. These are called " rods " and " cones," and in the jjlace of clearest vision (the "yellow-spot"), where only cones appear, not less than one million are supposed to be set in a square -j^o inch. The retina of the eye thus appears adapted to an astonish- ingly minute work of analysis, but of a diflferent character from that per- formed by the organ of Corti in the ear. While we are confident that in the excitation of the optic nerve, through the rods and conns, chemical changes in the pigments of the eye, under the action of the light upon them, bear an important i)art, the exact number of " Taken from Wuudt, and see my Elements of PhyBiological P?j-chology. p. 338 f. TTIKOKY OF COLOU-SENSATION 109 those visual substances, and the precise nature of the cliange wrought in them and of the infiucnco they exert upon the nervous elements of the retina, are still matters of doubt. Other forms of stimulation l)esides light (objective) excite sensations of this class. Among them are various mechanical and electrical stimuli, such as any shock to the eye by a blow, moderate pressure on a limited area of the eyeball by the finger-nail or by a blunted stick (the disks of light with darkly colored edges, called pltosplienex), or a weak electrical current sent through tlie eye. Moreover, the changing blood-supply excites the nervous elements of the retina so that they are rarely or never inactive ; and thus the most varied and gorgeous cotoring is often seen with the eyes closed in a darkened room (the so-called "own light," or Eigenlicld, of the retina). I 15. Sensations of color-tone are said to be "pure" or "saturated," wlien they are free from all admixture of other color-tones, Sucli^^re colors can be obtained only by irse of the spectnUn ; and, speaking with the utmost strictness, i)robably not even spectral colors are perfectly pure, since they can be made to appear somewhat brighter by looking at tliem with an eye already fatigued by a complementary color. Some of the colors may be said to be "naturally" more bright than others. On account, j^robably, of some l^eculiarity of the retina, or of inherited faculty of discrimination, the green- yellow of the spectrum makes most impression at any given degree of objec- tive intensity. According to one authority,' crimson light has to have one hundred thousand times more energy than green, in order to give light enough to read by it. It is not quite true to say, as is ordinarily said, that the composite colors of our ordinary experience cannot be analyzed at all by introspective con- sciousness. To be sure, they cannot be analyzed precisely- as nlusical clangs can. But then the analysis performed by the eye is, in general, different from that performed 'by the ear. One can, however, distinguish whether a particular shade of green is hliie-green ov T/ellow-gveen, and joerhaps also re- gard either one of these three colors as giving the fundamental color-lone to the complex color-clang, as it were. It would seem also as though an ob- server who had never before seen orange, would detect both the yello^tand the red in the mixture, as well as the blue and the red which enter into violet. I have never, however, found any one who, prior to experiment, could tell what color will emerge on a rapidly revolving white disk when small sections of black and of orange are intermingled with it (namely, "seal-brown"). And that a mixture of purple and green, or orange and blue, or violet and yellow-green, should result in white, would seem to be quite beyond any power of analytic consciousness to predict. §16. The "Young-Helmholtz theory " of color-sensations is customa- rily spoken of in England and this country as though it were established science. This is, however, by no means true. Among the facts'which mili- tate against it are many like the following : the more nearly we can stimu- late singly the particular elements of the retina, the less "pure" is the sensation we obtain. But this is precisely the opposite of what we should expect from the theory. Moreover, red and green, which are together — ac- cording to the theory — necessary for yellow, appear singly, when seen on ' Professor Langley, see Am. Journal of Science, 3d series, X3:xvi., p. 839. TY 110 SENSATION : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES the periphery of the retina, to be yellow. Nor does it seem as though all the cases of color-blindness could be accounted for by dropping out one kind of nerve-elements, as the theory would have us suppose. Other similar objections may be urged against the theories of investiga- tors, like Hering and Hess, who advocate at least three pairs of fundamental colors and six corresponding i^rocesses. The more investigation into this very interesting subject progresses, however, the more apparent do these three things become : (1) The phenomena of color-sensations, psychologi- cally considered, are extremely complex, and a larger number of j^hysiologi- cal components or processes seems constantly to be demanded for their explanation ; (2) a great variety of individual experiences, and even many idiosyncrasies, have to be admitted ; and (3) any particular sensation is the resultant as respects its quality, of a number of concurrent causes, among which the brain-center (and not the retina alone) and the psychological habits and training (and not the quality of the external stimulus alone) bear an important part. ' The Sensations evoked by stimulating the Skin are varions ; and some of them are, as respects quality, exceedingly obscure in origin and character. There can be no doubt, however, as to the very important part which these sensations bear in the growth of our sense-experience. In this general organ (the sMn or membrane which covers the iDeripheral parts of the body and lines certain internal organs) a variety of specially diiferen- tiated end-organs is found. But although the diiferelit areas of the skin have different degrees of sensitiveness to particular forms of stimulation, and although different minute spots seem to respond to any form of stimulation with only one of the several kinds of skin-sensations, we are as yet unable to assign the different sensations to the different forms of the end-organs. Many of the more vague and obscurq sense-impressions derived through the skin are exceedingly complex. Not only do they result from the fusion of qualitatively different sen- sations, but they also depend for their character upon appre- ciable changes which take place in time. This is true of " sensations of motion," and of sensations like those of " tick- ling," " thrilling," and of other forms of dermal sense-experience which are difficult to describe. Two kinds of sensations are, however, awakened by stimulation of this organ which are of perfectly unique and incomparable quality. These are (1) sen- sations of pressure and (2) sensations of temperature. For al- ' For the more recent elaborate researches into the constitution and explanation of color-sensa- tions see von Krios : Archiv f. Anat. u. Physiol, 1S82, Appendix and 1887. Hering : Sitzfrsbr. d. Wlen. Acad., 1872-74, and Plliiger's Archiv, xlii. and xliii. Wundt : Physiolos;. PsycholoErie (4th cd.), I., 482 f.; and Philosoph. Studien, 1887, i v., Heft .S. Uess : Archiv f. Ophthalmologie, 1890, pp. 1-32. Kirschmaun : Philosoph. Studien, 1892, viii., Heft 2 ; and various articles in these and other similar periodicals. SENSATIONS OF THE SKIN 111 though— as we are accustomed to say — we cau "feel," in the same state of cousciousiiess, the same thiug to be both smooth or roug-h and warm or cold, the sensations, on the basis of which we know the former qualities, as sennatlons, in no respect resemble the sensations on the basis of which we know the latter quali- ties. Moreover, one of the most interesting and important of modern psycho-physical discoveries shows that all the areas of the skin have a larger or smaller number of both " pressure- spots " and " temperature-spots." It also seems probable that the entire nervous mechanism concerned. in touch is more or less distinct from that concerned in temperature. But whetlier the histological and physiological distinction can be clearly estab- lished or not, the psychical distinction between pressure and temperature is jDerfectly clear. While, however, the analysis which discriminating conscious- ness can make divides clearly between sensations of pressure and sensations of temjjerature, within each of these classes -diiier- ences of intensity rather than differences of kind are most easily distinguished. Further analysis does reveal, hoAvever, two wholly different kinds of temperature-sensations — namely, sensations of heat, and sensations of cold. If physics considers " cold " and "heat" as mere matter of "degrees," physiology and psychol- ogy regard them as wholly distinct in kind. Whether the dif- ferent degrees of each of these two temperature-sensations are not also qualitatively unlike may, perhaps, admit, of doubt. In our judgment consciousness gives an affirmative answer to this inquiry. But that ' different light-pressure • sensations ' differ in quality as well as in degree, is a fact of indispensable importance for the entire theory of perception by the senses. g 17. Histology shows that the sensoiy nerves -which are distributed to the skin terminate in one of two ways, either in free end-fibrils or in special structures called "tactile coi-puscles" or "end-bulbs." The different varieties of these structures (" coqiuscles of Pacini," "end-bulbs of Krause," " corpuscles of Wagner ") are essentially alike ; they are capsules of connective tissue surrounding exceedingly minute threads of nervous matter, and are designed to modify and multiply the effect of the stimulus upon the nerves of sense. But since the surface of the skin is sensitive, both to light pressure and to temperature, in areas where, these Corpuscles are not found, they cannot be the sole end-organs of these sensations. The fact that the special end-organs are most constant and numerous in those parts of the body most employed in active discriminating touch seems to in- dicate that they have a special connection with that form of mental function. The evidence that the apparatus in the skin which is concerned in the production of these three kinds of sensation (heat, cold, pressure) differs for each of the three, will be adduced later on. It belongs to physiology, of 112 SENSATIOX : ITS NATURE AXD CLASSES course, to show how far the three travel by diflferent paths along the spinal cord and lower regions of the brain. The general area of the cerebral hemi- spheres concerned in tactile sensibility seems, as we might expect, to " lie about and coincide to some extent " with the areas concerned in motor control of the members of the body. So-called " temperature-centers" in the lower and liigher regions of the brain are being discovered. From the psycholo- gist's point of view such investigations are especially interesting on account of the phenomena of tactile ansesthesia (or loss of sensitiveness to light pressure) and of disturbances of the self-consciousness, through missing or abnormal sensations of the skin. Psychology has to recognize that what I am, as feeling "natural," or " strange," or "quite unlike myself," is to no small extent a question of changes in the sensation -complexes of the skin. So that the fundamental importance, for the entire mental life, of this organ, whose structure, when compared with that of the eye or the ear, seems so simple, and whose intellectual and spiritual uses and abuses are often so little considered, becomes more and more obvious. Sensations of Pressure or light touch are ordinarily excited by contact of the skin with some external object ; although, like all our sensations, they may also be occasioned by intra-organic changes. In passive, but more especiallj" in what is known as " active," touch these sensations are combined with those arising through irritation of the muscles and joints. Sensations of press- ure are apt, like all sensations of this order, to be characterized by a strong tone of feeling. Although, in our adult experience familiarity and the superior interest we take in obtaining a knowledge, by touch, of external objects, make us overlook the minuter distinctions in quality, yet a revival of discriminating attention confirms the demands of the theory of perception ; thus we are able to say that sensations of joressure differ indefi- nitely in quality ; and this happens chiefly on account of the difference in the areas of the skin by whose stimulation they are occasioned. Indeed, exjDeriment shows that clear-cut and defi- nite sensations of pressure are occasioned only hj exciting certain minute areas of the skin — the so-called " pressure-spots." These pressure-spots, although they are found all over the body, are differently distributed in different places ; they also differ in sensitiveness, for some are much more easily excited than others. ^ 18. Most psychologists have distinguished active foucJn from sensations of pressure as differing in kind. But so far as we do not introduce other sensations connected with the onovevient of the organ, the difference is one of degree only. If a fine point of metal, wood, or cork, be moved lightly over the skin, it will awaken definite, and "content-full" sensations of pressure only at certain minute spots in any given area of the skin. "When sensations of this order are awakened by stimulating the intervening spots, they may be described as comparatively dull, indefinable, " content-less." ' > See the article of Goldscheider, Archiv f. Anat. u. Physiol., 1885. SENSATIONS OF TEMPERATUHE 113 The avranpcement of the pressuro-f5pots is in chains, as it were, which ordinarily radiate from a kind of central point, and run in such directions as to form either circular, longitudinal, or pyramidal figures. It need scarcely be said that sjiots of the higher degrees of sensitiveness are more minierons in those areas of the skin which are most discriminating in touch. The accompanying figure shows the arrangement of pressure-spots on the hack and side of the first i)halanx of an index finger. Sensations of Temperature — and this is one of the most astonisliiug- discoveries of mod- ern experimental psycholog}' — have their ori- liin in the irritation of definite spots on the skin. Moreover, the existence of " heat-spots " and " cohl-spots " (or minute localities of the organ that are sensitive to heat and not to fig. 2.— Arrangement of cold, and conversely) seems demonstrable. preFPure-ppotF (Goid- ' 55 T 1 echeider). These " temperature-spots and those of press- ure appear never to be superimposed. The}' are not located alike on the sj^mmetrieal members of the same body, or on the corresponding parts of different individuals. Heat-spots are, on the whole, less abundant than cold-spots; but in parts of the body where the skin is most sensitive to either heat or cold, the correspondiiig class of "spots "is relatively frequent. Dif- ferent spots of both kinds have different degrees of sensitive- ness, according to the amount 5f reaction which they show to a given amount of stimulus. In certain minute areas sensations of temperature are roused only by excessive temperatures. The same object feels only cool to one spot, and ice-cold to another. Apparently, any form of stimulation which excites the nerve- endings in the temperature-spots calls out the appropriate form of sensation — whether it be the electrical current or the temper- ature of a body in contact, or changes going on in the tissue of the skin itself. The exact manner in which changes of temper- ature act upon the thermic apparatus in the organ is not known. The theory of physics, that heat and cold are only relative terms indicative of different degrees of one mode of motion, not only does not explain the physiology and psychology of temperature- sensations, but squarely contradicts the facts to ])e explaijied. Physiologically and psychologically, heat and cold are qualita- tively unlike sensations. With the accompaniment of feeling which they have. hoAvever, they may be traced, through different degrees, down to a so-called " zero-point," or " point of indiffer- ence ; " this means that no temperature-sensation is called out by certain low desrrees of stimulus. 114 SENSATION : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES § 19. Recent investigations ' have found the temperature-spots relatively insensible to pain (a needle can be run into them without being felt), even to the pain of temperature. Mapping out the different areas of the skin shows that the spots generally radiate from centers coincident with the roots of the hairs, where such appendages are found. The lines they form run so as to cross each other and make figures of various shapes— triangles with rounded corners, etc. The accompanying figure shows the arrangement of (.4) the heat-spots and of (B) the cold -spots on a portion of the palm of a left hand. A B Fig. 3. — Arrangement of Temperature-spots. A, Heat-spots, and R, Cold-spots— from the palm of the left hand (Goldscheider). g 20. By the "zero-point" of any part of the skin we understand that degree of objective temperature which may be applied to the part with- out producing any sensation of temperatiire whatever. This is difficult to find, is different for different areas, • and constantly changing. Some observers, following E. H. Weber, have held that all rising of the temper- ature of the skin is felt as heat, and all sinking of its temperature as cold. In evidence such experiments as the following classical one are adduced : If we immerse the hand for some time in water at the temperature of 55" Fahr., and then put it into water of 65° Fahr., the latter will feel warm at first, although it will feel cold to the hand which retains its normal temper- ature of skin. Other investigators hold, with Hering, that it is not the ris- ing or sinking of the temperature of the skin, but the being stimulated by something whose temperature is above or below the present zero-point of the skin, which causes the thermic aj^paratus to react in either direction. Thus they would explain the phenomena of temperature-sensations not only by contact with extra-organic objects, but also by intra-organic changes, sucl as increase and lessening of the interior warmth of the body, etc.^ Here, however, we are met by 'the apparent fact that, in certain cases (of disease, or when a limb is "asleep") sensitiveness to heat can be retained after sensitiveness to cold has been lost. The infinite variety of psychical life, and its physiological conditions, is thus again seen to be much beyond the power of physics to deal with it. Es2:)ecially does it appear that tem- ' Blix, Ooldschcider, Donaldson, et alt. ; and see the author's Elements of Physiological Psy- chology and the citations there, p. .^8 f. 2 A later conjecture is that the nerves of temperature end in different kinds of tissue which have different characteristics of " temperature contraction." Thus, the heat tissues may be actively con- tracting when the cold tissues are either passive or actively expanding, and vice versa. Each of these tissues, moreover, may be conject\ired to have its range of temperature activity ; and each range to be complementary to, and exclusive of, the other. (See art. by Dr. II. Nichols, Philosoph. Rev., July, 1892, p. 427 f.)' THE MUSCULAR SENSATIOJS^S 115 I^erature-sensations, like all classes of psychic facts, are incapable of expla- nation in isolation from the stream of consciousness. They are what they are, only as discriminating attention is applied, and intellectual processes of memory, ideation, contrast, etc., are admitted into our explanation of them. The fate of those Sensations which it is customary to call " Muscular," has been somewhat peculiar. For, on the one hand, some psychologists have considered those modifications of sense- experience which are directly due to changes in the mtiscular tissue as among- the most fundamental and influential of our entire mental life ; but, on the other hand, there are other modern jisycholog-ists who still persist in denying the very existence of muscular sensations. The truth is with neither of these extreme views. Nor does the truth lie between the two extremes. The muscular sensations taJce tJmr place in our mental life as factor's hJended with others i?i the complex resultant of^the activity of all our sense-organs. That there are sensory nerves which stand in the proper his- tological relations with the muscular tissue, to be excited by the change which takes place in this tissue, seems to admit of little doubt. Consciousness gives quite clear testimony to the exist- ence of distinct and peculiar modifications of our sense-experience which can arise only in the activity of the muscles. The evi- dence from pathology points in the same direction ; for it shows that the loss of tactual or joint sensations does not necessarily involve the loss of the sensations ordinarily attributed to the muscles. Experiment, on the whole, confirms the testimony of discriminating introspection, and of pathology. While the theory of perception, especially in the case of the so-called " geometrical " senses of sight and touch, almost imperatively de- mands the admission of this class of sensations. Finally, the most general biological view of the conditions of the develop- ment of all mental life seems to require such a fundamental connection, as it were, of the factors of sensation and motion. Unless we " sense," or — to iise the term of Bain — " feel," our own muscles, it is difficult to explain how we can know ourselves as " bodies," in any intelligible meaning of this word. As to the question, whether there exist sub-classes of muscu- lar sensations, as respects their quality, we find it more difficult to reply. The massiveness, or depth, of our sense-experience undoubtedly varies according to the amount of muscular tissue either actively or passively involved. Here, as elsewhere, in- crease in intensity is interpreted as a spreading, in all directions, of extension. But how far this is due to changes in quality of the muscular sensations themselves rather than to changes in 116 SENSATIOX : ITS NATURE AXD CLASSES the quality of the accompanying- sensations of the skin, is not easy to determine. The iniluence of centrally (or in the brain) originated modifications of consciousness, which blend with those originating in strained muscles and tightened skin, and joints pressed together, and form the exceedingly complex and impor- tant " feeling of effort," must also be admitted. It is a general principle, however, that changes in the quantity of any sensation occasion changes in its quality, and that both kinds of change are inseparably connected with our en.tire process of localizing sensations, w^hether within the body or on its surface. We seem justified, then, in holding to certain rather gross differences in the quality of the muscidar sensations of the larger masses of the body. A much greater power of discrimination, both as respects qual- ity and quantit}^ undoubtedly belongs to the muscles of the eye. The reason why we do not ordinarily notice qualitative differences in our muscular sensations are these three : (1) The differences themselves are gross and less important for nice dis- crimination ; (2) these sensations are ordinarily buried in the purposeful perception of the object, or the doing of the work, on which the muscles are employed ; (3) they are thoroughly fused with general tactual and other specific sensations which are more clearly distinct or obtrusive as respects differences in quality. ^ 21. For a loug time it was disputed wliether sensory nerve-fibrils are so connected with the muscular tissue as that its contraction or compression can irritate them. But Sachs, in 1874, announced the discovery of the apparatus which seemed necessary for specific muscular sensations. More recent investigations have changed his view as respects the jorecise manner in which the last subdivisions of the neives are related to the tissue of the miiscle. Moreover, the comiilex resultant, in consciousness, of the move- ment of the muscles is ordinarily also dependent upon accompanying excita- tion of nerve-endings in the tendons and adjoining membranes covering the bones. But all this does not diminish the evidence in favor of the conclu- sion, that the muscles also contribute to our sense-experience.' ^ 2'2. We may bring out the testimony of analytic introspection to the existence of muscular sensations by various simple experiments. For ex- ample, let one rest as lightly as jiossible the tij) of the index finger against some firm object, and consider only the sensations of light pressure which he localizes there. Then let one slowly increase the pressure until one is press- ing "with all one's might" against the object, meanwhile carefully Avatohing the changes which take place in the stream of consciousness. (1) The skin- sensations will expand over wider and wider areas, change the qnalitios of their mixtui-e and their locality, as they creep up the arm and spread down the sides and back. (2) The sensations of squeezing at the joints will be ' On the entire subject of the mus-cular eensntious, see Bciunis : Les Sensations Intcrncp, chap, viii.— xiv SENSATIONS OF THE JOINTS 117 evoked in the finger, wrist, elbow, auJ shoulder joints. (3) The complex feeling of exerting one's self will grow until one's whole interior strength and very self seems entering into the exertion against the resisting object. But (4) certain sensations, difl'eriug from those attributed to skin or joints, will be discerned, which also spread u^j the arm and down the sides and back, but which seem to lie much deejjer than the skin under which they are localized. Again, every one who has begun gymnastic exercise too sud- denly, or tried to lift unaccustomed weights, knows how peculiar are the sensations evoked which make him (urure of the existence and activity of the deeper lying and hitherto unused muscular tissues. In spite of the fact, moreover, that cutaneous anjesthesia and jiaralysis of muscular sensibility often go together, cases arise where one occurs and the other not. Muscular sensibility is sometimes preserved, as shown in the ability to discriminate weights when the muscles are called into play, after cutaneous sensibility is lost ; and muscular sensibility is sometimes lost when cutaneous sensibility is retained or even increased. M. Beaunis found that a singer could sing almost as accurately as before, when the sensibility of the mucous membrane of the larynx and vocal coids had been destroyed by cocaine. This performer must, then, have guided himself by muscular sensibility. Lussana found a patient, who had lost the skin en- tirely over an area of 10 x 12 ctm., without any inii)airment of the muscular sensibility of the subjacent contractile parts. The use which a satisfactory theory of perception makes of the muscular sensations in acquiring knowledge of the character, position, and movements of our own bodies and of all other bodies which call the muscles into play, will appear later on. Some writers go so far as to maintain that the intimate connection of sensation and motion in the use of the muscles {MiisJcel-Gefuhl) is the one simple element out of which all psychic processes are constituted by rejietition and combination.' Another writer" maintains that, with the entrance into consciousness of every sensation of a special sense, there oc- curs a no less great throng of motor sensations. Thus the nerves of motion lose their one-sided character and indirectly take part in all our sense-con- sciousness as "nerves of an active sense" {Muskelsmnes). Yet another authority * would have us believe that, whenever any sensory impulse stirs the mind to perception, a reaction, consisting of certain involuntary changes, states of tension, and tendencies, takes place. In this way, not only is the organ disposed in a way appropriate to the intuition of the object, but the character of the sense-experience is determined. The pai-t which Sensations of the Joints pLiy in our sense- experience has recently been (sufficiently or even over-much) insisted upon. These portions of the body also are found to have their necessary equipment of nervous apparatus. "With what other forms of sensations (tactual and muscular chiefly) the articular sensations are chiefly connected has already been explained. Their usefulness as sense-elements in the perception > Horwicz : I>83cholog. Analysen, i, p. 202. ^ Fortlage : Beitrage zur Psychologic, p. 235. 3 Esser : Peycbologie, § 11. 118 SENSATION : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES of the position and movements of our own bodies is undoubted; but this is not so to be understood or explained as to sacrilice to them either the muscular or the cutaneous sensations. Skin, muscles, and joints, all three — it is by sensation-complexes aris- ing in them that, without sight, we know how to orient ourselves, whether passively or actively, with reference to the different members of our body, as related to each other and to surround- ing" objects. ^ 23. The osseous extremities, lieriosteum, ligaments, aud synovial mem- branes are rich in nerves ; and special end-organs resembling those of touch ("corpuscles of Pacini") have been found in the neighborhood of all the joints. Goldscheider ' found that, with the hand held fast in a plaster cast, the least angular bending of the finger's first joint could be perceived. But if the joint was rendered antesthetic, then the finger must be bent far more to be perceived than before. Cases have been reported where those suffering with loss of cutaneous sensibility were very sensitive to pressure on the joints ; and ataxic persons have been found who were able to recognize slow movements of the limbs, with short excursions, if the movements were accompanied by pressure on the joints, but otherwise not. Consciousness confirms pathology aud experimentation by calling attention to the different " feelings" which -we localize in the joints, according as they are set tightly together or not, aud are bent more or less strongly and rapidly. It has been the custom of psychologists to recognize so- called " Organic Sensations " as constituting a class by them- selves. There can be no doubt that peculiar forms of sense-expe- rience originate in the condition and changes of the internal organs (heart, viscera, lungs, etc.). These are not, however, to be explained as involving any new kinds of simple sensations. They are rather specific combinations of tlie simple sense-factors already examined, and, especially as characterized by tones of feeling — mostly, if not wholly, disagreeable — due to the charac- ter of the stimulation which excites the sensations. Tempera- ture-sensations and sensations of pressure or of the muscular sense, as well as sensations of motion, are not essentially differ- ent when they originate and " fuse" in consciousness on account of organic changes Ijang deep within the body. The so-called " organic sensations " are therefore more appropriately referred to (so far as is desirable in any brief account of the mental life) in other connections. Substantially the same thing is true of such so-called sensa- tions as Hunger, Thirst, sexual and other Appetite, Nausea, Repletion, and scores of other less well-known but highly com- ' See art. Ueber Ataxic u. Muskclsiuu : Verhandlungeu d. phyaiolog. OcscUsch. Uerliu, Aug.. 188T. CLASSIFICATION OF SENSATIOMS 119 plex and yet comparatively " couteutless " aud obscurely lo- calized sensations.' By introducing different principles of classification, it is, of course, possible to arran<::e the foregoing* kinds of simple sen- sations according to a variety of schemes ; but such schematic arrangement neither increases nor diminishes the number of fundamentally different classes. Thus, if we regard the amount of assistance which, by movement intelligently directed, the organ can give to discriminating consciousness, we may divide into the following three classes: (I.) Sight, (II.) Taste, (III.) Hearing, (Active) Touch, Smell, Temperature, Muscular Sense. Joint-Sensations. (Mere) Pressure. In the first of these classes the moving and active organ large- ly controls the amount and kind of sensation which can be dis- criminated ; in the second it does this to a less degree, and the passive character of the sensations produced becomes more prom- inent ; in the third class the contribution made by controllable activity of the external organ sinks to a minimum or is wholly lost. Our subsequent study of the development of perception by the senses will lead us to emphasize the important difference between those senses which maybe called " geometrical " (pre- eminently the eye, skin, aud muscles) and those which are, at least relatively, if not absolutely, non-geometrical ; while a per- sistent opposition between Sight and Hearing has its basis in the fact that one is preeminently the ^pa(?6^-sense and the other the ti7)ie-se\\iie. [For the physiology of sensation and the sense-organs see, besides the ordinary trea- tises on physiology, Wnndt : Physiolog. Psychologie {4th ed.), I._, chap. vii. Ladd : Ele- ments of Physiological Psychology, i., chap, v., and ii., chaps, iii., iv. And Hermann : Handbuch d. Physiologic, II., 1,2, and III.. 1. 2. Bernstein's Five Senses of Man gives a brief popular treatment. For more advanced aiul detailed study the great monographs of Helmholtz: Physiologische Optik, and Tonempfindimgen. Stumpf : Tonpsychologie. E. Gurney : The Power of Sound. And scores of minor monographs and ai-ticles may be consulted.] ' The reader who desires a detailed description of these sensation-complexes fused with feeling, may consult works like Bain : Senses and Intellect, pp. 104-136, and 240-320. V ^i CHAPTEE VII. SENSATION: ITS QUALITY AND QUANTITY By au act of mental analysis, wliicli all readily learn to per- form, different sense-experiences are known to differ as respects both quality and quantity. Every sim^jler sensation discernibl«i in the general field of sensuous consciousness ajopears capable of being related to others as like or unlike it in kind, and as equal to, or less than, or greater than, others in amount or in- tensity. Indeed, how I feel, and Jiow much I feel, are popularly supposed to be questions, the answers to which are not even necessarily connected. For, as most untrained observers would say : Is not a very sour taste more unlike a bitter taste than is a moderate degree of sourness ? Or : Is not bright red more clearlj- distinguishable from bright yellow, or a loudly sounded a jjl from c, than an exactly like sensation of color or musical tone which has onl}^ a weak intensity ? The distinction between quality and quantity does, indeed, really belong to all our sensations, and is not merely put into them, as it were, by our choosing to regard them in one "as- pect " rather than another. But careful ps3'chological investi- gation shows, what the popular judgment only very imperfectly, or not at all recognizes, namely, the intimate and inseparable dependence of quantity and quality upon each other. Althougli quality and quantity of sensation are not the same, and the ex- perience which enables us to answer the question, "What kind? differs from that which enables ns to answer the question, How much? yet changes in one probably always involve changes in the other. The description of the minuter differences in the quality of sen- sations has comparatively little interest for psychological science. What is desirable to ascertain precisely is rather this : On what conditions, and according to what laws, do the many varieties of sensation arise, endure, and fade away in the stream of conscious mental life ? In other words, we seek to discover the more general principles which explain the various kinds of our sense- experience. So, too, in discussing the quantity of sensation : it DISTINCTION OF QUALITY AND (JUANTITY 121 woiild be tedious and profitless to describe the indefinite gradu- tions in intensity throus'h "vvliicli every kind of sensation may pass, all the way from a maximum down to zero. Here ai^ain we wish rather to know, if jjossible, the general conditions on Avhich, and laws according- to which, sensations gain their diliering degrees of intensity. And, finally — since, as has just been said, changes in quality and changes in quantity are interdej)endent — we wish to ascertain the uniform relations between these two classes of variation. g 1. According to Sully : ' "Quality is clearly distinct from quantity, and may in general be regarded as independent of it. That is to say, we can vary intensity without affecting quality. This would ajjpear to follow from the assumed dissimilarity of the underlying nervous conditions." On the contrary, that would appear to follow from the known connection of both the peripheral and the central nervous conditions which we find to be true by experiment : namely, we cannot vary intensity without affecting quality. But other writers go quite too far in the efibrt to minimize the distinction between intensity and quality. For example, Miinsterberg declares ^ that '•quality and intensity are not two particular jsroijerties of the one sensa- tion, but only the directions in which the one sensation can be comimred with other sensations." Although, however, the two "properties" — quality and intensity — are particular, and although the " one sensation " to which they belong is one sensation, and not two sensations, yet discriminating con- sciousness, by changing the focus of attention, as it were, can regard one of these two properties to the partial or total exclusion of the other. Tims, for example, if I am going toward, or away from, a bell which is being struck periodically, or if I strike with varying degrees of strength the same note on the piano -forte, I am likely to attend only to the changes of intensity. So, too, the familiar objects in my room do not seem to change their color- tone as the intensity of the sun-light which falls upon them changes. On the other hand, if I wish to discriminate nicely the quality of a sensation of musical sound or of color, I have to make jDrovision for a uniform intensity of stimulus to secure an exact comparison. One does not venture to select one's wall-paper without considering the amount of light which is to be reflected from its dilfeient areas ; and, when it is laid, one begins to notice how agreeably or disagreeably different are the ui)per from the lower por- tions of the walls, the corners from the middle surfaces, etc. The violinist who wishes to give the right qualitative effect to his jiart in the quartette knows that he must play neither too loudly nor too softly. 1 2. Strictly speaking, the number of qualities which the sensations of some of the senses may assume is incalculable ; not because, of course, the number is infinite, but because it is indefinite and dei^endent upon a variety of concurrent conditions. For example, the number of color-sensations distinguishable in quality, with all kinds of admixture and all degrees of brightness, has been given at different figures from five thousand to many millions. Hersehel thouglit that the workers on the mosaics of the Vatican ' The Huiuau Mind, I, p. 93. " Beitragc, iii., p. 10. l'2'2 SENSATION : ITS QUALITY AND QUANTITY must have distiuguisbed thirty thousand different colors. Von Kries found himself able to recognize two hundred and thirty spectral tints. The number of recognizable different musical sounds ranges through some eleven octaves, in some portions of which trained ears can distinguish over three thousand notes, where the piano-forte gives only 24. ' When we multiply these numbers by the possible differences in timbre, we find the variety in qualities of sound rising into the thousands. Of smells, as we have already seen, no one knows how many varieties there are ; nor is the number of different possible tastes easy to state. Sensations of touch, we may find our- selves comf)elled to admit, are as many as are the distinguishable areas of the body when subjected to being touched. That all muscular, temperature, and joint sensations are qualitatively alike, it is perhajis easier to persuade one's self. But even here we have seen that a somewhat indefinite variety of quality seems to demand recognition. The Conditions wliicli determine the Quality of Sensations vary, in many particulars, for the different classes of sensations. There are, however, certain general conditions upon which by far the greater number of all our sensations of every sense dejDend for the determination of their quality. The more important of these are the following : In the first place, the Quality of Sensations varies in depend- ence upon the original or acquired Characteristics of the Organ- ism through whose excitement the sensations originate. To know that blind men cannot see, and deaf men cannot hear, needs no appeal to psychological science. It is matter of popular infor- mation also that certain persons are more or less color-blind, others more or less tone-deaf, others more or less defective in power to taste and smell, and still others relatively lacking in nicely graded cutaneous and muscular sensations. More detailed scientific observation and experiment enable us to go beyond all this. The sense-experience of every individual is, so far as rajige of quality in each of the senses is considered, peculiar to that indi- vidual ; taken as a whole, it may be said to be unique. This " individuality " of all sense-experience is, in part at least, determined by the individual characteristics of the different j^arts of the sensorium, especially of the end-organs of sense ; and such organic characteristics may result either from inheritance or from the modifying influences of the dift'eront forms of en- vironment. Less obvious, but not less real, is the dependence of the quality of sensations upon the peculiarities of the central and cerebral mechanism. §3. The temiiorary effect of functional disturbance of the end-organs, by inflammations, congestions, etc., in impairing the number and distinctness • Cattell. in Mind, Jan.. 18S«, p. 43. QUALITY AND OKGANLSM 123 of smells and tastes, needs only to be mentioned. Soaking the end-organs of smell, and drying the end-organs of taste, destroys wholly or partially the qualities peculiar to difterent substances when tested by these organs. Many i)ersons are habitually quite incapable of having olfactory and gusta- tory sensations with the qualities of which others are perfectly familiar. If we might i)ress so far the figure of si)eech, wo should say : they are i)sychi- cally "deaf" or "blind" to the various " tones" and "colors" of things as tasted and smelled. The delicately shaded qualities of dermal sensations " with which some persons respond to stimulus of the skin are a perfectly unknown experience to others. Thus Stumpf tells of a student of music in a German conservatory who could not learn to play correctly on the violin — not because he was deficient in " ear " for tone-colors, but apparently be- cause, through some obscure defect in the end-organs, ho could not evoke the necessary variety of tactual and muscular experience. In sensations of sound there is the widest " range " of characteristic defects or excellences as respects variety of qirality. While Helmholtz, for example, ceased to hear a musical sound below 34 vibrations jier second (about C in the contra-octave), Preyer could hear the octave below. "While most persons failed, in Turnbull's experiments, to hear tones above iV or e' (about twenty thousand vibrations per second), others can hear the octave, above or even higher. Thus, what is heard by one listener as a weak drone is heard by another as a deep bass note ; and what is heard by one as a very higli tone is rather felt by another as piercing pain or arouses no sensation at all. So, too, by natural and acquired differences in " sensitive- ness " to pitch, while some are " tone-deaf " (do not " know one note from another," cannot distinguish semi-tones or even thirds), others can recog- nize one hundred or two hundred distinctions of pitch between the succes- sive tones of the ordinary scale. The interesting phenomena of color-blindness have received much atten- tion of late. Through defective structure of the retina, certain i^ersons are deficient in power to see certain of the many spectral colors. In many cases the defect amounts to a partial or total insensitiveness to the red rays ; these rays are then liable to be confused with dark green or yellow. The spectrum is thus said to be shortened for these sufierers at its red end. Cases of so-called " violet-blindness " have also been reported. In total color-blindness, shades of gray from black to white constitute tlie total sen- suous outfit, as it were, produced by excitations of the retina. The most recent investigations seem to show that — whatever theory of color-blindness we may bo inclined to adopt — the phenomena are much more complicated than has ordinarily been supi^osed. We can scarcely, then, divide all color- blintl persons into two groups only: namely, the "red-blind" and the "violet-blind" or "green-blind."' At least one case of monocular partial color-blindness is on record, whore violet, green, yellow, and all interme- diate colors were wanting, and only red and blue remained.^ An indefinite variety of partial deficiencies must i)robably be recognized. Even so-called " normal " eyes respond to the same objective stimulus with different ' So KOuig and Dieterici ; an opinion which the Am. Journal of Psychology Beeras rather too l)roinpt to declare proven. See February number, p. 311, 1S88. 'See the article of Kirschmann : Philosoph. Studien, viii., Heft 2 (1S92). And comp. a case raported by Vintschgau : Pfluger's Archiv, 1891, p. 431 f. 124 SENSATION: ITS QUALITY AND QUANTITY qualities of sensation, as any observer knows who has tborouglily tested tlio matter. § 4. The effect of practice in increasing the power of making distinctions in quality is, of course, closely connected with the subject now under discus- sion. Sucl^ differences are mainly developed in the cerebral processes by rei)eated action of the stimulus. But the training and modification in minute structure and functions of the end-organs is not to be left entirely out of account. In this connection also should be mentioned the cases of those persons who have a range of qualitatively different sensations quite beyond all or- dinaiT experience. What is called the " Reichenbach" experiment, for ex- ample, appears to show that a halo may be seen above magnets, when the electrical current is passing through them, by a favored few. In the hypnotic state, too, all the variety of olfactory sensations which belongs to some of thie lower orders of animals seems sometimes to be developed in man ; and the subject becomes able to assign to each one of a score of owners, by smell, his peculiar belongings. Cases are also on record of persons who could de- tect the sex, or even the personal idiosyncrasies of others present, by the sense of smell ; by the same sense physicians recognize at a distance small-pox or other diseases. In all these cases perceptive discrimination is of course in- volved ; but the basis for such intellectual activity must be laid in unusual natural wealth of sensations. Wealth of minutely shaded sensuous impressions and trained tact go together. The Quality of Sensations depends, second, upon tlie pai-ticu- lar Part of the external Organ to which the organic stimulus is applied. In the gross, as it were, each entire organ seems to act as a totality in the production of sensation. But more careful analytical investigation shows that this way of stating the case is not satisfactory. No organ can be considered in the gross, and at the same time as afibrding an explanation of the variety of the sensations which its excitement occasions. In truth, evejy cnyan is a composiie of a iKist 7iumber of nerve-elements ,* and this fact corresponds (at least in some general way) to the variety of the scjisuous impressions ichich its excitement occasions. § 5. In the case of smell, experiment has not succeeded in pointing out any changes in quality of sensation, which plainly depend xipon the portion of the olfactor}' membrane excited by the effluvia. Whether this is due to the apparent impossibility of applying the ai)propriate stimulus in a strict- ly limited May, or to the nature of smell as exceptional, we cannot say. As to the fact that variations in the qualities of tastes, tones, touches, tem- peratures (" heat-spots " and ' ' cold-spots "), and nuiscular sensations are con- nected with the part of the organ to which the stimulus is ap]>lied, enougli has already l)een said. The case of sensations of color remains ; and this illustrates the law by a great number of phenomena. For, if we divide th(^ entire field of the retina into three zones — polar, middle, and perii^heral — we iind that the same objective stimulus regularly produces different kinds QUALITY AND ORGANISM 125 of color-sensations according as it falls within one or the other of these three zones. In strict fact, no clearly divided " zones " can be discovered ; l)ut as the stimiilns travels over the retina from center to ijei'iphci-y, it evokes difterent sensations for the diflferent points, provided they are far enough from each other. Thus, at a certain distance from the center, blue and yellow are the only colors seen ; farther away, none at all. Kays which, when falling on the polar zone, make an impression of red, yellow, or green, oil make an imi)ression of yellow a few millimeters from the center of the retina ; and this yellow is tlie paler, tJie greener the im})rcssion on the l)olar zt)ne. One observer ' found that, on movement from center to periphery, red became orange, violet, then blue. Another observer found that only yellow, green, and blue change in saturation, on movement toward the periphery. The ditFerent parts of the retina are also differently sensitive to l)rightness (or light) ; and this sensitiveness is diflferent for different eyes. In general, distinctions of quality fade out or fade into each other — qualities of color-tones become fewer and die out— as the stimirlus travels from center to periphery of the retina. The Quality of Sensation depends, third, upon the Condition of the Organism, as due to previous excitement, at the time when it is stimuhited for the i^roduction of any g'iven sensation. This hiw appears to be true for both the end-organs and the cen- tral organs of sense. It is connected closely with a general psychological principle which we shall find entering profoundly into all the activity and development of mental life. No factor of any complex state and no individual state in the onflowing stream of consciousness can be considered as respects the ques- tion, What is it? in isolation from contemporaneous and im- mediately preceding factors and states. Each factor, each state, is determined to be what it really is, by its relations to the contiguous totality of which it forms a part. This general " principle of relativity " is provided for by the very structure and functions of the organism. Under no ordi- nary circumstances, and scarcely under any circumstances which can be artificially secured, can one element alone of the organism l)e excited. Nearly contiguous elements must be simultaneous- ly excited, alfhough in less degree and in a somewhat differ- ent way. Moreover, every particular excitation breaks in upon the stream of nerve-commotion in which the organism is con- tinually found, only on condition that it shall enter into con- nection and fuse with what it finds already there. This is true even of the most quiescent of the end-organs of sense. The end-organs of every sense are ceaselessly in process of nerve- commotion. But particularly is this true of those central or- ^ See Kirschmann: Ueber die Helligkeitserapflnduug im indirecten Sehcu— Philosoph. Stud., v., Heft 3, pp. 44T-497. And comp. Hess, in Graefe's Archiv f. Ophthalniologie, xxxv.. Heft 4, 1889. 126 SENSATION : ITS QUALITY AND QUANTITY g-ans of the brain that are, without pause day or nio-ht for a single fraction of a second, reverberating-, as it were, to count- less voices which call to them from every part of the i^eriph- ery, and which call back and forth between these centers them- selves. Yet this ceaselessly inter-responsive molecular mechanism is only the physical correlate of the interaction which takes place between the different factors of each mental state and between all the successive states. Psycholog-y has been Avont to recognize this — although only very imperfectly — in the form of a theory of " the association of ideas," or of " the relativity of knowledge." But the principle is absolutely without exception, and applies to the qualities of the sensational factors themselves. To explain fully the qnality of every sensation, ice viust understand, hoth physiologically and psycholoyically , the quality of the imvudi- ately preceding and contemporaneous sensations. I 6. That smells aud tastes, wlieu closely successive, influence each other, eveiy one knows. Indeed, many of the most disagreeable experiences we have with these sensations depend upon this principle. "After-images" of smell and taste (to apply to these senses a mode of speech borrowed from our experience in sight) linger and modify the effects of all forms of stimu- lation in exciting further sensations. Owing to the nature of the organs, different qualities of the sensations of these senses cannot readily be simulta- neously evoked. In the case of two simultaneous odors, the stronger over- whelms the weaker ; but sometimes by absorption, as it were. Certain tastes compensate each other. Briicke held that the sour of the lemon and the sweet of the sugar neutralize each other in the brain. We have already seen how sensations of temperature are often relative to the condition of the organ- ism at the time when the heat-spots or cold-spots are stimulated. How a surface feels as rough or smooth to us depends — at least to some extent — upon the state of the organ when applied, after being engaged in more or less qualitatively different sensations. In the case even of that sense which is most prompt abovit clearing up past impressions and receiving new ones. in a perfectly unprejudiced way — namely, the ear — the sensations fall, as respects quality, under the same principle. Thus, an imperfect consonanct^ which follows a discord is itself more " harmonioiis " than one which is brought into immediate proximity to a perfect consonance. Nor does the sensation which responds to any particular note seem to be precisely the same when we take it, first, as the "sharp" of the note below, and then again as the " flat " of the note above (even on the piauo-forte, where exact accuracy of pitch cannot be secured). § 7. It is in the phenomena of light and color, however, that we obtain the most numerous and striking illustrations of the same principle. The previous condition of the whole retina, and the contemi^oraneous condition of parts of the retina contiguous to those on which the light falls, influence profoundly the character of the sensation produced by any particular form of I QUALITY AND ORGANISM 127 stimulus. The phenomena of "inertia," "exhaustion," and, less purely, of "contrast," fall under this principle. If we close the eyes, after looking intently for a few seconds at a bright object, we find its image remaining for some time, and only slowly fading out of sight. Such an after-image is called "positive," and is said to be due to the inertia of the retinal elements. But if a white positive after-image be watched, it will be seen, by a normal eye, to pass quickly through greenish-blue to indigo-blue and then to violet or rose-color. Such an after-image is called "negative," and is said to be due to exhaustion of the retina. If we look for a long time steadily at a small black square lying on a white sufuce, and then turn the eyes off to a white background, a bright squaic will appear, and then slowly fade away. But if the square looked at be green, then the after-image will be reddish. In general, the color of the image will be the " complementaiy " of the color of the object. These phenomena also are said to be due to exhaustion of the retina. Whatever explanation of them be given, they illustrate the depend- ence of the color-sensations on the previous condition of the organ. g 8. Althoiigli the complete explanation of the phenomena of " contrast " is doubtful, they do undoubtedly fall to a certain extent under this same principle. Such phenomena may be divided into two classes : contrast of brightness, and contrast of color-tone. Every bright object appears brighter with surroundings that are darker than itself, and every dark object appears darker with surroundings brighter than itself. Under this principle of con- trast, phenomena similar to those of complementary colors are obtained. For example, a small square of white on a surface of gi'een, when covered with transparent tissue-paper, appears as red on a surface of whitish hue ; on a red ground it appears as green, on a blue as yellow, and vice versa. That is, each color-sensation tends to modify, in the direction of its own complementary color, the other color-sensation on which it acts. More recent experiments show that even the most saturated color-tones, when seen without any opportimity to compare them with other surrounding colors, lose in a measure their distinctive quality. To account for these and similar interesting phenomena, two theories have been proi:)Osed. The former emphasizes the truth stated as follows by Wundt : "The sensation which arises through the stimulation of any given part of the retina is also a function of the state of other contiguous parts." But by Helmholtz such phenomena are treated as deceptions of judgment, like those to which we are accustomed in our estimates of distances. The former has been called the physiological, the latter the psychological theoiT. "We cannot discuss in detail these theories. Undoubtedly all explanation here must be both physiological and psychological ; and probably, in the physio- logical explanation, both retinal processes and cerebral process are involved. All exi^lanations of the phenomena of contrast, however, illustrate our principle: " Tlie quality of every sensation is dependent upo7i the condition of the organism and of the correlated stream of sense - expei-ience at the time when the effective excitation of the organism takes place. ' ' The phenomena of " contrast " have been much discussed. In addition to references already made, the reader may consult Helmholtz : Physiolog. Optik (2d ed.), p. 560 f. Fick, in Hermann's Handb. d. Physiol., IH.. 1, p. 231 f. Hering : Sitzgsbr. d. Wien. Acad., June, 18T2 and Dec, 1873, and four papers in Pfliiger's Archiv, xl., xli., xliii. Ebbinghaus : Sitzgsbr. d. KOolich. Prenes. Acad., Dec, 1887. Delabarre : Am Journal of Psych., Aug., 1889, p. 636 f. 128 SEINTSATION : ITS QUALITY AND QUAiS'^TITY Fourth : The Quality of Sensations depends upon the varjdng- Qualities of the Stimulus. This follows of necessity from the . nature of the process of perception itself. In the case, particu- larly, of sight and touch, the sensations, " as such," are habituall}'- disregarded, and attention is paid rather to the things knowTi through the changing qualities of sensation. In our experience we attribute our diU'eriug sensations to changes in the tempera- ture, feel, color, and brightness of the things which produce them. To a less degree this is true also of tastes, smells, and sounds. For purposes of psychological science the external stimuli may be divided into two classes — mechanical and chemical. The stimuli of hearing and touch are mechanical ; those of sight, smell, taste, and temperature are ordinarily declared to be chemical. But temperature is doubtful ; and, in all cases, even in touch and hearing, the mechanical application of the stimulus probably produces accompanying chemical changes which affect the character of the excitement produced in the end-organ. It follows from this view that the ]:>ecnJ'iar characteristics of our sense- ej'perience depend upon the differing hinds and amounts of the -molecular changes which irritate the end-organs of sense. ? 9. Little need be added, to what was said in the last chapter, for the further illustration of this point. In the case of sound and sight, however, somewhat more of detail seems desirable. When the periodic vibrations, which act through the outer and middle ears U])on the organ of Corti, reach the number of from about 16 to about 34, they jjroduce in most persons that jieculiar modification of our acoustic consciousness which we call the lowest possible " musical" sound. As the number of vibrations of the stimulus in- creases, the modification of sensuous consciousness changes ; our sensations run through what we call "a scale" of tones (from lower to higher, with a greater or smaller number of members to the scale, according to individual peculiarities and training). At from 20,000 to 40,000 vibrations all sensations of musical sound cease. If now we take a given number of vibrations, as 440 l)er second, in the German musical scale, and observe carefully the jirecise quality of the sensation evoked by it, we may fix one note in our scale (the a' of the musical scale). It will then bo found that for ears which are not tone- deaf and arc even moderately cultivated, the other sensations of musical sound will arrange themselves, with reference to this iixed note and to one another, in a peculiar way. Notes caused by twice the number of vibrations of other notes cause a peculiar, jileasant relation of sensations — similar and yet different — when sounded successively ; they are octaves above, and the octave is the most " perfect harmony," as we say. In general, it will be found that the " clangs " have their jjeculiar tone-color in accordance with the mathematical relations of the partial tones which enter into them. Within any octave in the musical scale the eight different notes stand in the following ratios to each other : B ; ; C la . : 2 15 : ; IG QUALITY AIS'D TIMK 129 Name C:D:E: F:G: A Relation of single vibrations 1 : -, : ^ : ;*, : :j : ^ Kelative number in a unit of time 8 : 9 : 10 : 10 j : 12 : 13^ Thus the timbre of each clang and its place in the "scale" is seen to cloiieud on the form of a complex sound-wave. Moreover, wheu two or more clangs are sounded together, the resulting sensation-complex is either a pleasant or an unpleasant modification of sense-experience, called a " chord " or a " discord." But chords and discords are determined by the mathematical relations in which the sound-waves occasioning the clangs that compose tliem stand to each other. The simpler these relations, the more perfect the consonance : Thus, Octave (1 : 2) ; Twelfth (1 : 3j ; Fifth (2:3); Fourth (3 : 4) ; Sixth (3:5); Major Tliird (4:5); Minor Third (5 : G). In the case of color-sensations, variations in quality run through the tints of the si^ectrum in dependence upon the number of the oscilla- tions of the rays of light which, by falling upon the retina, occasion them. If we use Fraunhofer's lines to mark those portions of the spectrum where its princii^al colors apjjear jjurest to the central portion of the normal eye, and then number the oscillations in billions, we have the following scale : B (450) ; C (472) ; D (526) ; E (589) ; F (G40) ; G (722) ; H (790). That is to say, the rays of light, so far as they affect us at all, up to and somewhat be- yond 450 billions, occasion the various shades of Bed; beyond 470 billions the sensation takes on a yellowish tone (Orange-yellow), and at about 52G billions, becomes what we call Yellow. The yellow grows greenish, and at about 589 billions Green definitely appears ; the green turns bluish, and at G40 billions Blue begins to be seen. From here uj) to about 722 bill- ions the colors between blue and violet are run through; then Violet ap- pears ; and beyond the violet, to some eyes a glimmer of lavender-gray. But in the case of colors, as in the case of sounds, the different shades of color are not sharply separated, but pass gradually into each other ; the Jioio of qualitative differentiation is, however, fai- less smooth and uniform in the case of colors than in that of 7nnsical sounds. Fifth : The Quality of Sensation depends upon the Time dur- ing Avhich the stimulus acts upon the org-anism for the produc- tion of the sensation. In appreciating the bearing of this condi- tion upon our sense-experience, several considerations must be taken into account. The " inertia " of all the end-organs is such that a certain minute time is always required for bringing them, under the action of the stimulus, to their maximum of intensity and definiteness of response. The time consumed by the end-organ of sense does not exactly correspond to that necessary for start- ing and stopping the resulting sensory processes in the brain ; and it is on the basis of the latter, of course, that the different psychological conditions of sense-experience immediately repose. If, now, we turn to the psychical side, we find that no sensation, as such, reaches its maximum of intensity and perfectly, as it were, defines its quality, without lapse of time. We may say 130 SENSATio:^ : its quality and quantity even of dimple sensations : however instantaneously they appear to rise in consciousness^ they are really groivths or developments. And in this brief i^rocess of growth, which all simple sensations un- dergo, they pass through dijfeveni phases. \ 10. The " inertia " of the nervovis mechanism follows as a necessary deduction from its molecular physical constitution. Connected with this jiroperty is what the German investigators have called the '■' Ankliiujea " and '■'■ AlMbigp.n " of nervous excitement. But the inertia of different end-organs of sense is extremely different. Under extraordinary circumstances some five hundred sensations of sound, due to the crackling of an electric spark, and about the same number of sensations of touch, due to contact with the teeth of a revolving wheel, can be kept apart (without " fusing," as we say) in consciousness. The inertia of the end-organs of smell and taste is enor- mously greater than this. The inertia of the organ of color-sensations stands between these extremes ; it is somewhat different, however, for the different colors. Thus Oattell ' found that the length of time necessary to distinguish the color-tones from a shade of gray corresponding in bright- ness, nine out of ten times of trial, was : for red, 1.28 o- ; for orange, 0.87 a ; for green, 1.42 a- ; for blue, 1.21 «■; for violet, 2.32 u. The minimum of all was 0.6 w for orange and yellow; tlie maximum, 2.75 o- for violet. This amount of time, it was held, must represent inertia in the nerve-tracts and in the brain as well as in the retina. \ 11. All know that different smells and tastes require considerable time to define their respective qualities. Of course, in the active and continuous use of the organs of these sensations, what takes place is really a succession of sensuous impressions or states, iu which one qualitative factor rises more and more clearly above the others in discriminating consciousness. The same thing is true when we try to discriminate the full and precise quality of a sensation of touch, or of musical sound, or of color, by dwelling upon it. But over and above all this is the fact proved by experiment, that changes of color-tone take place when the time of the action of the light is reduced to a minimum. Or, in general, we may say that time makes up to some extent for (I'lficiencii in the intensiti/ of the stimulus. All such experience is, of course, connected with the necessity for time in all acts of discriminating judgment, and in the cerebral processes which accompany such acts. Moreover, our self-conscious experience with these sensations is that they do actually grow, in time, into the qualities they really have. The fact that reaction-time is lengthened when we have to recognize, not .simply some sensation, but a sen- sation qualitatively defined as a, rather than b, points to the same truth. And if we are forced to make an exception in the case of rapidly succeeding sen- sations of hearing noises or being touched, we must remember that almost all concrete quality is then lacking to the sensation, and consciousness has sunk to its most purely passive or, as respects quality, least discriminating form of manifestation. Finally, the Qiiality of every Sensation depends n]ion the Intensity of the Stimulus which occasions it, and thus upon the ' Sec Thilosoph. Studien, iii., Heft 1, pp. 94-127. And Brain, viii., pp. 295-312. »# QUALITY AND INTENSITY 131 resulting' amount of nerve-commotion set up in the organism. The etiect of increasing- the stimulus upon the changes of qual- ity in the resulting sensations is, doubtless, connected with the spreading of the nerve-commotion over contiguous minute areas of the nervous apparatus. Brighter lights, louder sounds, stronger tastes, smells, and pressures upon the skin, severer pulls upon the tendons or crowding together of the joints, and more strenuous use of the muscles, all involve a greater exten- sion of excitement within both end-organs and brain. Such spreading of the excited areas mingles new factors with the re- sulting sensations, and so gives to the complex result a different shading of quality, if not markedly new characteristics. It\ (jen- eral, and hi all oar sense-exj)erie7ice, as we are ahle to evoke and observe it, the rale that quality depends on intensity seems to hold true. . \ 12. Even in those cases to which we appeal most confidently for our impression as to the separableness of the quantity from the quality of sensa- tion, the principle that the latter depends upon the former seems to hold true. By changing the intensity of a musical sound, its timbre is — as we have already seen— made to change. Let any one experiment by watching the alteration in the quality of his sense-experience as he sweeps a violin- bow over an open string with varying degrees of pressure. The more nearly " contentless " the sound becomes — for example, a mere noise not loud enough to occasion a decided tone of feeling — the less obvious this principle of dependence becomes. "Intense" sweet or sour, and "strong" bitter or salt, we really different sorts of sensations from those which we characterize by the same nouns when the adjectives " faint " or " moderate " precede them. The same thing seems true also of sensations of temperature and pressure ; although in the case of all these experiences we have no lan- guage with which to mark those delicate shadings of quality which arise when the amounts of stimulus are increased.' Here again, however, it is the case of the so-called " geometrical " senses, and especially of sight, which offers the most obvious application of the prin- ciple, A white of less intensity is not simply less white : it is a shade of gray. And by constantly /liminishing the intensity of the light, we can shade the series through all grades of gray to black, which is certainly not a "less de- gree " of the same quality of sensation as white. Important changes in qual- ity also take place in all the color-tones when the intensity of the light ap- proaches either a maximum or a minimum. On the way to the maximum, red and green pass over into yellow ; and when the maximum is reached all colors cease, and even homogeneous rays appear white. At the minimum intensi- ties of light every color-tone, except pure red of spectral saturation, appears colorless. If we puncture a very fine hole in a piece of paper and look ' M. Bergson maintains (Les Donnees immediates de la Conscience, p. 35) tliat "a heat more intense is really another heat." We call it more intense because we have a thousand times experi- enced the same change when we have approached a source of heat, or when a larger portion of our bodies was impressed with the sensation of temperature. a;? I, r > 132 SE]!TSATION : ITS QUALITY ATSTD QUANTITY througli it at a colored surface some six or seven meters distant, the color of the surface cannot be seen. But by increasing the number of holes at con- tiguous points, so as to allow more light to reach the eye, the color is made to define itself. On the skin it is even difficult to distinguish sensations of temperature from those of light pressure, when the stimulus is in both cases of a very low degree of intensity. It will appear later how influential in forming that field of perception, in which muscles, skin, joints, and tendons, with central feelings of effort, combine, are the variations in quality occasioned by different amounts of the stimulation of these organs. For example, we have a different kind of sense-experience (and not merely viore of the same kind), when a large muscle is acting, from that which belongs to the contraction of a small muscle. By Intensity or Quantity of a Sensation we may be said to mean the psychical energy with which the sensation is realized, as it were — the "degree of its becoming- in consciousness." This characteristic of all sensations obviously implies that they are in some sort measurable; the terms " strong- " and " weak" maj^ be applied to them ; they may be compared and pronounced to be "greater" or "less" one than another. Of this character- istic we are as sure immediately as we can be of any character- istic of our sense-experience ; indeed, the fact enters into all our language and into all those calculations so necessary to the con- tinuous adjustment of conduct to circumstances, in order not only to live wisely, but even to live at all. When, however, we seek to give scientific definiteuess to our experience with the varying amounts of our sensations, we find ourselves involved in many perplexing inquiries. Our ordi- nary comparisons of the sensations belonging to the same sense are extremely indefinite. We classify the degrees of intensity roughly under the above-mentioned and other terms ; but, al- though the minuter changes of degree are easily observable, if we attend to them, we are at a loss to state in strict mathe- matical language the results of our most delicate comparisons. When we come to comi^are sensations of the different senses with respect to intensity, all estimates approach a point where they tend to lose their meaning and to become absurd. For example, who shall say whether this sensation of musical tone is fifteen or sixteen times as great as the i^receding one ; or whether the depth of this shadow surpasses that of the other, in the proportion of ninety-nine to one or of a hundred to one ? Who would venture to pronounce the greenness of the grass precisely one and a half times the olive of the evening sky ; or the smell of the violet in his hand just three-quarters as strong as the flavor of his morning's cup of coffee ? • MEASURABLENESS OF QUANTITY 133 g 13. The discussion of the " measiirableness " of psychoses in general, and so of the ai)i)licability of the " category of quantity " to our mental states, has been brought to a place of great prominence by modern experi- mental lisychology. The attempt has been made, in illustration and defence or in criticism of "Weber's law" (and, indeed, in the entire pursuit of " l^sycho-physical science," strictly so-called) to apply the methods, terms, and formulas of mathematical physics to conscious states,, and to factors of conscious states, as such. Nay, more : sensations and other forms of psy- choses have been spoken of as though they were entities that can have some sort of existence when depressed below a " threshold of consciousness." Units of measurement have also been employed in a way at least to suggest that the investigator conceived of himself as possessed of some unchange- able measuring-stick — itself a quasi-mental entity — which might be applied to these mental entities, and that he could thus establish a mathematics of psychical energy, as such. On the other hand, in strong reaction against such views of the devo- tees of psycho-physics, some modern writers have denied i)i toto that terms of quantity have any applicability to those data with which psychology i^ri- marily deals. Thus one author ' maintains that only by a convenient figure of speech, a fictitious translation of what is really qualUy and changes of qualily, into terms that apply to extension in space, do we speak of our feel- ings and sensations as "more" or "less" and "great" or "little." Thus it is always — this writer holds — a really qualitative progress in our feelings and sensations which we interpret in the sense of a change of size. Neither of these extreme views is, in our judgment, wholly true to the facts of consciousness or to the history of psychological investigation. There is, of course, no such thing possible or even conceivable as a fixed standard, in the sense of some psychical entity or equivalent of such entity, which can be apx^lied for the determination of absolute or relative quantities of psychoses. All that psycho-physics can do is to determine under what con- ditions discriminating consciousness decides that a change in amount of "realized sensation" has taken place. But, on the other hand, the fact that psycho -physics can do even this is based upon au ultimate truth of con- sciousness — namely : different sensations are actually different as respects the way in xchich they answer the question, How much ? And if we are obliged to state our results in terms of "extensive" magnitude, this is only what is true of all our scientific dealings with the category of quantity. But, of course, whatever 'quantity psychoses, "as such," possess is ''intensive " quantity, however obviously we may measure or exj^ress it in terms of the movement of the masses of our own bodies through space. Any Theory of the Quantity of Sensations (in the only way in which such a theory can be framed, or indeed has any mean- ing-) raises chiefl}^ two sets of inqiiiries : (1) to find the quanti- tative limits — the maxima and ininvma — within which sensations of each sense are possible, and the laws of the variation of these limits ; and (2) to determine the law of the relation under which ' M. Bergson : Les Donnees immediates de la Conscience, p. 10 f. 134 sensation: its quality and quantity changes in the intensity of sensations, as estimated in conscious- ness, depend upon changes in the intensity of stimuli. Many difficulties stand in the way of an exact solution of either of these inquiries ; among which the chief are the difficulty of finding a precise standard of measurement (either objective or subjective), the difficulty of applying the stimulus to the organ so as not to introduce confusing concomitant experiences of dif- ferent kinds, and the difficulty of calculating the results so as to do entire justice to the i^roblem which it is attempted to solve, ^ 14. It is only with respect to sensations of pressure and of the niuscn- lar sense (and less easily those of hearing) that we can confidently establish a satisfactory objective standard with which to compare the energies of the' action of different stimuli. The immediate stimulus of sensations of color and light being i^hotochemical, and of largely conjectural nature, and the retina being habitixally under stimulation from its "own light," experi- ments upon the quantity of visual sensations meet with difficulty at the out- set. As to the very nature of the stimulus which acts in the production of sensations of taste, smell, and temperature, we are still too much in the dark to be satisfied with any of the existing forms of experiment. Furthermore, the greater the niimber of experiments in psycho-physics, the more obvious it becomes, how immensely complicated are the conditions tmder which even the simpler estimates of our oicn amounts of sense-exjjerience take jjlace. It is no fixed and simple thing which we are here measuring. That which is meas- ured, and he who measures, is one and the same unceasing current of men- tal life. The thing weighed, and the scales, and the weigher, are all existent only as they are in and of that flowing current. All are different in the case of eacli individual man ; an almost endless variety of factors com- bine, in changing i^roportions, to form every different sensation-state of the same individual. All our sensations, as respects their quantity, fall between certain Limits, the distance of which apart may be said to define the range of Sensation, quantitatively considered. These limits differ for the difi'erent senses, for difterent persons at all times, and for the same person at different times and under difterent circumstances. Within these limits the minuter difterences of intensity, as objectively measured, are discriminated with differ- ing degrees of nicety. That is to say, t/ie numher of sensations which have a recognizable difference as respects quantity, and ivhick can he put in, as it were, between the limits, differs for the different senses, fur different j)Grsons, and for different conditions of crperi- ence. If then li = the range of sensation, S = the sensitive- ness, and C = the cajiacity of each sense (or the amount of C 1 stimulus which it is able to receive) : -^ = i?, where -o- stands for the measure of the sensitiveness. UPPER AND LOWER LIMITS 135 There are two limits of sensation as respects quantity — a " lower " and an " upper ; " these are the sensations correspond- ing" to the least amount (the ininhnum) and to the greatest amount (the inaximutn) of stimulus to which the organism responds. In experimentini;- to tind the lower limit, we may either select any small amount of stimulus somewhat above that needed to produce a sensation, diminish it very gradually, and note the exact point where it ceases to produce sensation at all ; or else we may begin with a stimulus too weak to produce any sensation, and note the exact point at which, on its quantity being very gradually increased, it jiroduces the least observable sensation. In all experiments to determine the lower limit, the almost ceaseless activity of the organs under intraorganic stimuli, and the fluctuations of attention, are the principal diffi- culties in the way of exact results. It is nearly impossible to determine experimentally the upper limit of sensation ; for the highest intensities of stimulation endanger the organ, over- whelm the necessary discriminating attention, and bring in a confusing mixture of widespreading painful feeling. I 15. The facts as to the "lower limit" of sensation — or least amount of stimulus to which a response in sensation is given — are interesting chiefly as showing the marvelloiis delicacy of the neiTOUs mechanism antl the sen- sitiveness of the stream of attentive sense-consciousness to changes in the amounts of any of its factors. Experiment, however, shows chiefly how great* the absolute sensitiveness of discrimination may become under the most favorable circumstances rather than how great it ordinarily is. Earlier results (Aubert and Kammler) made the liglitest weight which produced a sensation of touch to be 0.002 gramme on the forehead and temples, and 0.005-0.015 gramme for the volar side of the fingers. By placing weights on the chest and calculating the energy then necessary to expel the air from the lungs, it has recently been found ' that the coefficient of sensibility for the muscles used in respiration is very low (about 1 : 100) comi^ared with that of the muscles of the limbs Tlnd trunk. A movement of the eyes, ans- wering to a contraction of the inner muscles artiounting to .0000 millimeter, can be detected. The sensitiveness of the skin to changes of temperature under the most favorable circumstances (that is, when the changes lie near- est the zero-point of the skin itself) is scarcely equalled by a good quick- silver thermometer (say i° Fahr. ). It is greatly reduced by both heating and cooling the skin. It varies froin about 0.2° for j^arts of the upper and lower arm, to 1.2° for the middle of the back. The ear is almost incredibly sensitive to acoustic stimulus ; for it has been calculated that mechanical work done upon the ear-drum equal to not more than s\^ billionth kilo- grammeter (the noise made by a cork ball of 1 milligramme weight falling from a height of one millimeter) will occasion, as an extreme mbiivium, a • By Langloia and Richet, in experiments which will be referred to again, a8 having a bearing upon volition. See Rev. Philosoph , 1890, p. 557 f. 136 SEXSATION : ITS QUALITY AND QUANTITY sensation of sound. And in light, jiir of that reflected from white paper under the full moon was given as a lower limit by Aubert. While, if we test the intensity of the mixtures necessary to excite sensations of taste and smell, we find that many persons can detect one part in about 200 of sugar, one in about 2,000 to 8,000 of sours and salts ; and even one part in 392,000 (quinine) or even 1,280,000 (strychnine) of some bitters. A substance called mercaptan has been smelled when mixed in volumetric proportion to air of one to 50,000,000,000 — an absolute amount of about TinruVrruu milli- gramme. As might be exj^ected, extreme instances of defective or of acute senses are revealed by experiment, as well as certain idiosyncrasies of sense. "While the discriminating sense of taste is finer for most substances in women than in men, that of smell is, in general, less fine. It is to this marvellous delicacy of sensation that we must look for . an explanation of the power to acquire that superiority of tact and skill in sense - discrimination of which man is capable. By cultivation and practice the realm of intuitive perception, which takes jjlace without con- scious reason, and is to the knower himself quite inexplicable, is enlarged upon this sensuous basis. Here also it is not unlikely we may exjiect to find, in part at least, an account for those alleged powers of divin- ation and telepathy, which researches in modern hypnotism are bringing to view. The search for some exact Statement of the Relations be- tween estimated intensity of sensations and. changes in the amounts of stimulus as objectively measured, has led to what is known as " Weber's law," or the " law of Fechner." This so- called law may be stated equally well in either one of several different ways : The difference between any two stimuli is ex- perienced as of equal magnitude, in case the mathematical rela- tion of those stimuli remains unaltered ; or, If the intensity of the sensations is to increase by equal absolute magnitudes, then the relative increase of the stimulus must remain constant ; or, The strength of the stimulus must ascend in a geometrical pro- l^ortion, in case the strength of the sensation is to increase in an arithmetical proportion. The proof of Weber's law implies that some standard for exact measurement of the quantity of sensations shall be discovered, and that this standard shall be applicable, not only to sensations of the same sense, but also to sensations of the different senses. Now, that we cannot accurately estimate — in a direct and abso- lute way — the amounts of our sensations, has ah-eady been pointed out. When, however, two sensations of nearly or quite the same quality are brought into proximity in consciousness, we can, under certain circumstances, estimate with great nicety minute differences in the amounts of the two sensations. "The least observable difference " — or smallest amount of change in PROOF FOR WEBER'S LAW 137 the stimulus wliicli will cause a detectable chan^^e in the quan- tity of the resulting- sensation — may then bo used as our stand- ard of measurement. This " least observable difference " is obtainable in several different ways (such as the " method of mean gradations," "method of minimum changes," "method of average error," " method of correct and mistaken cases " ), which cannot be described here.^ By thousands of experiments upon all the different classes of sensations, and under the greatest variety of conditions, the attempt has been made to form a scale of quantitative changes in sensation as dependent upon increas- ing and diminishing the amounts of stimuli. Thus it is hoped to contirm or to correct " Webers law." Among the workers in this line Fechner is most distinguished, and by his name the " law " is also called. § 16. Professor Jastrow * and others Lave pointed out that the value of Weber's law depends chiefly on its furnishing a means for comparing the sensibility of different, otherwise incommensurate, senses. The law can be formulated in a number of different ways, depending ui^on the different methods used in exiDerimentation. For example, as formulated in terms of the method of average error, we may state it in the following way : The probable error in our estimate of the amount of our sensations is unin- fluenced by a change in the absolute size of the stimulus according to which the adjustments are to be made. That is — to give a concrete case— suppose that, in testing weights, the least observable difference (or "threshold") is -/u ; then, if the law be strictly true, it follows that one will not err oftener in judging between 30 oz. and 30.1 oz., or between 30 oz. and 30.5 oz., than between 30 oz. and 31 oz. This is, however, not antecedently probable, and is also found by experiment to be untrue. The law is, therefore, only roughly and approximately correct. § 17. The chief contribution of Fechner to "Weber's law was made by re- gawling the "least observable difference" between the intensities of two sensations as a sort of constant quantity, an invariable " sensation-mass," as it were, which could be applied for the measurement of sensation^, and so for assigning them positions along a scale of quantity. But it must be lui- derstood that nothing either of a ijhysical or of a psychical nature corre- sponding to such a "unit of " sensation-mass " can possibly exist. For exam- ple, if the addition of n to the stimulus S is" the least iwssible amount which will so change the sensation-state x as to cause it to be succeeded by the sensation-state x ' : and the latter is discriminated as just greater in quan- tity than the former (.r ' > .r) : then such facts of experience deserve recog- nition. But it does not follow that we may say .r'— .r, or "least observable difference," = A, and then treat A as tliough it were a sort of ps;(/ch'tcnl entity measuring changes of psychical conditions. For there is really only the sensation-state x ', now present in consciousness, and estimated as just a ' See the author's Elements of Physiological Psychology, p. 364 f., and the works referred to in its notes. ' Am. Journal of Psychology, Feb., ISSS, p. 298 f . 138 SENSATION : ITS QUALITY AND QUANTITY little greater tlian was x an instant since. Or, rather, xcliat really happens in consciousness is the jn'ocess of discriminating a change of amount in one direction or the other. But A is a mere abstraction, a figment of the experi- menter's imagination. In other words, there is no such physical or psychical reality as a " least observable difference" Experimeut confirms wliat ordinary experience makes famil- iar, namely, that tlie consciously estimated amount of our sen- sations varies in dependence upon the increase and diminution of the amount of stimulus applied to the end-organs of sense. But it also establishes the truth that the psychical variations of intensity depend upon a great variety of conditions besides those set up directly in the end-organs by the application of stimulus. So far, however, as we can isolate this one condition, we learn that it is the relative, and not the absolute, amount of the stimu- lus apj)lied to the end-organs which determines the discernible increase or diminution in the amounts of sensation. And here, for several of the senses, at least, when the sensations are of fairly moderate intensity (or, as we should express it more tech- nically, in the " median x^arts " of the scale, and not too near the upper or the lower limit), the law of Weber is approxi- mately correct. That is to say, in order to produce an apprecia- ble change in the intensity of any sensation, we must in general add to or subtract from the stimulus a nearly uniform propor- tion of the amount producing the particular old sensation with which the new one is to be compared. But this rule, even when stated in so loose and indefinite a manner, does not apply to sensations that are either very weak or very strong. Moreover, we find difficulty in establishing it at all for some kinds of sensa- tions, and for all kinds under some circumstances. §18. What is sometimes called the "quotient of sensitiveness"/-) varies for the different kinds of sensation ; and this fact the law of Weber admits and makes use of in its experiments and proofs. Weber himself found that weights which differ as 29 : 30 can be distinguished by the press- ure they cause when laid on the volar side of the last phalanges. If we are permitted to raise and lower them, the quotient of sensitiveness rises to 39 :40. Subsequent observers ' have found that this quotient for estimating weights, instead of remaining constant, as Weber's law would have it, varies from r:f.o foi' weights of 300 grammes to -7^, for weights of 3,000 grammes. The quotient of sensitiveness to pressure has been found by other experi- menters to vary from ,V for weights of 10 grammes to -7V for weights of -400 gi'amnies. Later experiments show that in our comparison of weights which we are i^ermittcd to lift, the speed with which we judge ourselves to ' Comp. G. E. Miiller : Zur Gninclleguns; d. Psychophysik, p. 197. Aud Bieduriuami and Liiwit : Sitzgsbr. d. Wien. Acad., Ixxii., Ueft .S, p. 342 f. PROOF FOIL WEBER'S LAW 130 be raising the weights, in comparison with the effort wo put forth, is a tlc- termiuing element in the experience.' In discrimination of tlie intensity of noises and musical sounds, the so- called law holds only very imperfectly ; for the quotient of sensitiveness varies greatly for different places along the scale. Weber's law is true only approximately for a part of the musical scale. Thus, if we assume a certain convenient measure of intensity of the stimulus as a unit (an extremely weak stimulus near the " threshold "), the quotient of sensitiveness for tones re- mains about the same (ffis — xin) until we have increased the original stimu- lus by multiplying it by ten some five times over ; but then this quotient begins rai)idly to rise, and it finally attains more than twice its former de- gree of sensitiveness (jou). In auditory sensations, too, it is found that the order of succession has something to do with the result ; thus one observer found that, of two successive sounds of equal quantity, the second regularly seems greatest. It is, of course, by experiment with visual sensations that the most numerous attenqits have been made to demonstrate Welder's law. The ex- perience of astronomers, which shows that the magnitudes of the stars are not to be classified by their absolute brightness, had much to do with the earlier discussions of this law. Weber fixed the quotient of sensitiveness to brightness at about jiu. If, for example, we cast a shadow by lighting any opaque object with a candle set at a given distance from it, the difference between the intensity of this shadow and one cast by two candles of the same luminous power is discernible when the second candle is set behind the first at ten times the distance of the first candle from the object. Under the direction of Fechner, experiments were conducted by A. W. Volkmauu and others, which seemed favorable to Weber's law. But subsequent inves- tigations have not shown so favorable a result. The quotient of sensitive- ness has been found to vary from e^v.u for weak intensities of light to Tyfr for stronger intensities. Later observers have confirmed the variable nature of this quotient, and have even seemed to indicate that it is not i^recisely the same for different colors. Indeed, the complicated nature of this apparently simple inqiiiry becomes more apparent. The effect of background is enor- mous ; the extent of lighted surface influences the mind ; the order of the succession of the two l,ights compared has something to do with the solution of every such problem in comparison ; the focusing of the eye is not to be disregarded, nor the reflection of light from surrounding objects, etc. What is true of all these classes of sensations apart is also true of them when combined for the estimate of sizes and distances. Where comparison takes place in connection with a ' ' sort of impressionist reception of the gross sensation without dividing it up in our minds," ^ something like Web- er's law seems to hold true. But i». all compliatied and nice comparisons of quantity, and so in all judgments of size and distance, we tise a numher of dif- ferent data as a basis for the wonderful '^ tact " which it is possible to attain. The detailed description of the attempts made to apply Weber's law to sensations of temperature, taste, and smell would be of little value to an understanding of mental life. From tlie very nature of the organs of these ' G. E Mailer and F. Schumaiiii: Pfliii^ei-'s Archiv. xlv., p. lOS. 2 See Professor Jastrow, in the Ain. Journal of Psychology, Jan., 1S90, p. 44 f . 140 SENSATION : ITS QUALITY AND QUANTITY senses, and of the stimulus which excites them, accurate experimenta- tion is ijeculiarl}' difficult, if not impossible. And it is not to be expected that a so-called law which caimot establish itself firmly on a basis of those sensations where discrimination, in respect to quantitative changes, is high- est, should derive much helj) from those where discrimination is at a mini- mum. The Meaning- of " Weber's law," in so far as we are led to ad- mit its accuracy in furnisliing a summary of the facts of exiieri- ence, may have several interpretations. Its great advocate, Fechner, understands it as a most general psycho-physical prin- ciple ; that is to say, the law — he holds — states the highest and most universal relations which prevail between the physical and the psychical aspects of our compound human life. But a saner view of the facts considers the explanation of this relation between sensation and stimulation as chiefly physiological. In all cases the end-organs profoundly modify the intensities of the stimuli they receive. It is probable that whatever is true as re- spects the " logarithmic " character of the relation holds between the stimulus and the resulting amount of neural excitation. Be- tv/een the neural excitation, after it has reached the brain and been set up there, and the psychical result in sensation, the re- lation is probably one of direct proportion. But, above all, is it necessary to remember that other conditions than mere changes in the objective quantity of the stimulus always determine our estimates of the amounts of resulting sensations ; and, in gen- eral, stiiiiuU and sensations are not connected quantitatively in such a si^aple manner that we can measure one off in terms of the other. Nor do we mean the same thing by terms and standards of quantity when we talk, on the one hand, of intensities of sensa- tions, and, on the other hand, of amounts of physical stimuli. And, finally, when Ave give to Weber's law a jjurely ps3'chologi- cal interpretation, we find it falling under the general princi- ple of all mental life, namely, that every mental state has its value determined by its relation to other contiguous mental states. [The literature called forth by the discussion of Weber's law is very large. Besides the {jreat monof^raphs of Fechner — I3kmente d. Psychophysik (18(;0), In Sachen d. Psycho- physik (1S77), and Revision d. Hauptpunkte d. Psychophysik (ISSri)— and of Qc. E! Mid- ler: Zur Griindlc^^ung d. Psycliophysik — important coiitriliutions have been made, among others, by Wundt: Physiolog. Psychologic, I., chap. viii. Stumjtf : Toiipsychologie, I., i., § 3. Articles in the Philosoph. Studien, by Lorenz, ii., pp. ;)'.)4-474, and (i.^M-Ci.")?. J. Merkel, iv.. pp. 117-1(;0; 2.'jl-:3'.)l, and 541-594; and v., pp. 34.5-r.'on the loccdity of the organ ichere the excitement occasioning that pjartic alar mixtufre orig- inates. The subsequent discussion of perception will show how sen- sation-complexes, by their indefinite variety, afford " signs " to discriminating consciousness by means of which thej^ become assigned, each to its proper locality, in that system which the term " field of perception " represents, \ 1. The whole construction and activity of the nervous mechanism pro- vides, inevitably, for the fusion, from the very beginnings of consciousness, of the different sensation-factors, or so-called simple sensations. Even if the organs of sense were immovable, this would be in no small degree true. In the case of a motionless retina, as we have already seen, the result of the excitement of any group of elements is a modification of consciousness which may assume any one of a number of minuter shadings of color-tone. The anatomical and physiological reason for this is found in the integrity and unity of the organism itself and in the fact that no part of it can per- form its functions in an isolated way. The case of the skin illustrates the same truth even more obviously. Any object laid upon the passive hand, for example, excites an indefinite number of pressure-spots ; and not only this, but temperature-spots, and superficial muscle, and active resistance to this lightest pressure, are likely also to be simultaneously evoked. But, as a matter of fact, from the very beginning of consciousness the organs of sense are not motionless ; on the contrary, they are ceaselessly in motion, whether in an impulsive and reflexive, or in a purposeful and vol- untary way. This fact provides a sort of universal solvent, or menstru- um, as it were, in which the various allied factors of sensation are mixed and fused. jNEotion of the sense-organs induces constant changes in the compound quality of those sensation-com]ilcxos which originate in excite- ment of different considerable areas of the end-organs of sense. Motion is also itself a fact significant of the reaction of jisychic life, in j^rimary acts of volition, ujion the stimulus of the periphery of the body. Apparently also Ave, from the first, sense this activity, at least in some inchoate and ob- scure way. \ 2, Two things should be noted, in addition to what has already been said, regarding sensation-complexes characterized chiefly by sensations of COMPLEXITY OF SENSUOUS QUALITIES 143 taste ami suiel]. First : These sensation-complexes may bo charactevizeil by the rehitivo amounts of either jiassive or active consciousness which enter into them. If, for example, one holds any gustable substance in the mouth and su2)presses all motion of the organs whatever, one has a sort of diffused and dull sensation-complex, which is a compound of gustatory, olfactory, and tactual sensations, with the gustatory sensations mildly predominant. By directing attention to the organ — still, we will supi)osc, Avithout moving it — one can make more prominent either of these kinds of sensation. To a certain extent one can thus analyze the taste of a substance, and determine what kind of aroma or spicy flavor it possesses, or how it feels in the mouth. But if we make this analysis in the more natural way, we begin to move the substance about with the tongue; we press it against the gustatory end- organs and let its effluvia rise to the olfactory organs through the back of the mouth. In doing this we naturally neglect the change in our sensation- comi>lexes which is due to the admixture of active touch ; for it is the taste and flavor of the substance which we wish to exjjlore. Nevertheless, a modi- flcation of our sense-consciousness, due to the introduction of elements of active touch, inevitably takes jilace; things have a difl'erent taste and flavor when tasted actively from that which it is possible to produce by merely passive taste. The sam<^ thing might be shown to be true of smell. Our experience with both classes of sensations is very instructive respecting the value of all seusation-comi^lexes. For example, we may be thinking intent- ly while at table, or reading diligently in a room where a lamp is smoking, or a bunch of violets exhales its odor. The sensuous complexion, agreeable or disagreoablo, of our mental life is kept suppressed by the fixation of at- tention to a given train of ideas. But after more and more strongly assert- ing itself — the sensations struggling, we might say, to raise their heads for clear recognition above the threshold of consciousness — the sensuous basis breaks up into the mental train and wholly destroys it. We begin actively to inquire, by moving the tongue or snuffing with the nostrils, as to what -is this nasty or pleasant taste, this horrible or agreeable smell. In general, tlien, sensation-complexes of smell and taste depend not only i;pon the qualities and intensities of the olfactory and gustatory sensations, but also upon the muscular and tactual factors that enter into them. Even hot lemonade of the same degree of sweetness does not "taste" quite the same as cold. Second : It is through admixture with other sensations that sensations of smell and taste come to attain the massiveness or " exteiisiti/" which we attribute to them. Mixtures of sensation — chiefly taste or smell, and called by one or the other of these names — differ in a very important way when called forth by excitement spread over large^reas of the organ. Here the testimony of consciousness is immediate and conclusive. With one's mouth full of sugar, or one's nostrils full of the odor of heliotrope, one is not af- fected, sense-wise, as one is with a trifle of sweet laid on the tip of the tongue or a suggestion of the flower's presence from a distant bouquet. Nor is this difference fully expressed in terms of varying quality and quan- tity as applied sole!)/ to gustatory or olfactory sensations. On the other hand, such "massiveness" is plainly a derived and secondary characteristic due to the admixture of tactual and muscular elements. We find, then, no ^,...- 144 SEJv^SATION-COMPLEXES AND LOCAL SIGXS occasion to apply extensive magnitude, or bigness, to sensations of taste and smell, "as such;" ^ve cannot even form the faintest conception of ^vllat is meant by such an attemjit. The " bigness" of sweet and sour tastes, or of asafa3tida or sulphuretted-hydrogen smells — this is a term which has no meaning. TV'hen, then. Dr. Ward speaks ' of " extensity," or spatial bigness, as belonging, like quality and intensity, to all kinds of sensations, and Pro- fessor James ^ entertains us by remarking that "the pork tastes more spa- cious than the alum or the jjeisper," and that the odor of vinegar is " less spatially extended" than that of musk, they appeal, indeed, to indubitable experience ; but they do this in support of a theory w^hich is simply incon- ceivable. All our senses are exercised in such connection as to call forth data which serve for making spatial distinctions ; but not all sensations have ^'exten- sity" as sensations. §3. Among all sensations those of hearing are freest from original and- inextricable mixture with other kinds of sense-experience. If we imagine the efi'ect upon consciousness which would come from a perfectly passive re- ception of auditory impressions, we seem to ourselves to have discovered what we are in search of, namely, sensations that, without any influence from blended sensations of another kind, recur in consciousness with varying qualities and intensities. But, however possible it may be to imagine such a "pure" sense-consciousness of tone, all this is veiy dif- ferent from our actual experience with sensations of sound. Not only are all such sensations compounds of noises and tones, but they are also, as act- ually experienced, fused with a variety of sensations of other than the audi- tory kind. In hearing noises of considerable intensity, the vibrations of the masses contiguous to the proper organ of sound are also felt as tactual and muscular sensations. The noise made, for example, by a slamming door or a cannon shot off is not by any means "pure " auditory sensation. If we abstract the sensations caused by the assault of the air-waves on the external membranes, with the actual extension of these sensations over wide areas of the membranes, and the shudder that runs through the entire body — the muscular reverberation, as it were — then the auditory sensation-complex loses its characteristic " massiveness." It is in these very admixtures of tactual and muscular sensations that the so-called massiveness of the sound consists. A person sitting with the back closely pressed against a board that is in contact with a grand organ being played, knows that — to speak accurately — he hears the massive sounds with head and spinal cord and xi- brating molecules through the entire mass of the upjoer trunk. Again, the terms " high " or " low," as aj^plied to the place of notes in the musical scale, really refer to the visual, muscular, and tactiial sensations which fuse with the auditory when we are sounding, imagining, or reading the different notes. As jjia-e sensations of sound, the pitch of notes has nothing to do with high or low. Furthermore, in all active attention to sounds — and soine attention goes with all hearing of sounds — motor adjustment of the organism takes place ; the reflex influence of this, if not also its direct influence, enters as a factor into the resulting sensation-complex. The sound heard when we listen with ' Art. Psychology : Encyc. Brit, (ninth ed.), pp. 4G and 53. 2 PrincipleB of Psychology, II., p. 169 (note). COMPLEXITY OF SENSUOUS QUALITIES 146 strained attention is a different modification of our sense-consciousness from the sound passively heard. It is i)robablo also that obscui'e sensations derived from changes in the fluids of the semi-circular canals, and connected with the localization of sound and with the orienting of ourselves in space, fuse with the other elements to make up that total complex of sensations which we describe as the hearing of some particular sound "over yonder " or " near by." ^4. Sensations of color and light never arise in our adult consciousness as "i^ure " sensations of this particular kind. It is not with the retina alone that we see ; and seeing, even in the simijlest form possible for us, is some- thing much more than merely having sensations of light and color. In those sensation-complexes which we call by the names that mark their prominent characteristic (namely, the color of red, green, blue, etc.), there always blend the resultants of past and concomitant sensation-factors due to move- ment of the lenses and of the entire eyeball. UiJon these concomitant factors the visual sensations are largely, or wholly, dependent for their " massiveness" and '-locality." For example, let us close the eyes, and thus exclude as far as possible the more highly developed "judgments" which enter into the localization of objects and the percejition of their size and spatial qualities when seen with open and moving eyes. A " sensation-mass " of indefinite i^roportious, of somewhat vague localization — " in front of the eyes," as we say — and of varying qualities and intensities of color-tones, sums uj) our dominant sense-exjierience. This sensation-mass is due to the simul- taneous excitement of a vast number of retinal elements through the j^hoto- chemical changes that constantly accompany the circulation in the blood- vessels of the eye. It seems to be simply received upon a motionless eye. It is the very clearest type of a pure, passive, and yet massive and extended sensation-complex. Let us try, however, to look at any particular part of this sensation-mass — we will say at the upper right-hand corner — and we be- come aware that this is accomplished by exceedingly minute movements of the eyes. "\\ e are thus evoking the tactual and muscular sensations which must fuse with those of ga^r and light in order that the latter may appear as belonging to a particular part of the entire mass. And if we wish further to see this sensation-mass' itself move right or left, ni) or down, we miist move the eyes and even the head in th^ approj^riate directions. This means that we really see it move, by means of the tactual and muscular sensations belonging to moving eyes and head and upper trunk. It is probable that the mere focusing of attention upon any color-mass, necessary to bring it into consciousness at all, is accompanied by sensations and memory-images of sensations which belong to, the tactual and the muscular sense. In all ordinary experience with the eyes, however, we have the sensations of color and light unceasingly fusipg with tactual and muscular sensations due to changes in accommodation and to movement of the eyeballs. In- deed, what we call sensations of color and light consist of such complex visual sensations, due to the total activity of the eye, in which color and light are the most prominent factors, and those of touch and muscle are relatively disregarded or sunk out of sight. In other words, we never have sensations of color and light which are not experienced with the eye executing a cei'- tain movement, or after having arrived at a certain j)Osition, or while antici- 10 146 SENSATIO]Sr-COMPLEXES AND LOCAL SIGNS patiDg a certain movement with the intent to explore more carefully some other colored object in another i^osition of the field. Translating all this into subjective terms, it means : all sensations of light and color are experi- enced, not as " -pure" and apart, but as fused until tactual and muscidar sensa- tions, such as belong to unfinished, or just completed, or anticipated movements of the eye. I 5. That the various sensations, due to irritation of the nerves terminat- ing in the skin, muscles, and joints, fuse into a great variety of sensation- complexes, no psychologist can doubt. These specifically different affections of our sense-consciousness habitually and necessarily occur in the same unity of a state of sensation. Moreover, they all make their contribution to the solution of the same problem which is constantly before discriminating consciousness. The very existence and development of mental life depend upon o\ir getting information as to the positions and movements of our. bodily members, relative to each other and to their environment, and as to the qualities and movements of those objects with which these members come in contact. Skin, joints, and muscles are, from the first, and uithoid cessation, forced into the closest copartnership of activity. That particular kind of these closely allied sensations which predomi- nates in the complex result, or which is most closely allied with the practical end aimed at, will give its characteristic tone and name to the total sense- exi^erience. For example, if the predominating sensation be one of tem- jjerature, we disregard the fact that our experience is a comjoound of heat- sensation witli sensations of light jjressure and perhaps muscular sense. But, if it is chiefly one of ligld pressure, we disregard the muscular factors, and speak of the object as "feeling smooth and hard." Or, again, we may note that the object seems "heavy" by attending only to the strain pro- duced in the muscles and joints and overlooking the condition of the skin. In all these sensation-complexes certain characteristic differences between the purely tactual and the purely muscular sensations are of no little account. These differences serve to characterize different groups of our sense-experi- ences, and so to determine the place they have in constructing the " field of perception ; " although both skin-sensations and muscular sensations enter into each group. The skin is passively " affected," for the most part, by having its different areas more or less severely pressed upon. The muscles are " exercised," for the most part, in the movement of the limbs or in the innervation and muscular adjustment of the organs of sense. But the muscles, too, may be passively affected by pressure of heavy masses laid upon the skin. Indeed, it is doubtful whether our muscles can hold them- selves perfectly still when provoked to motion by even a small amount of pressure. On the other hand, when the muscles are active, the skin which is stretched over them, or which is in contact with the object being ox])lored, keeps pace, in some sort, with the flow of muscular sensation. Earely or never do skin and muscles function ajiart ; rarely or never, therefore, does there fail to be a fusion of tactual and miTscular elements in sensation-com- Ijlexes of this class. Nor are sensations of the joints and of temperature likely to be far off from the total sensation-mass. ? 6. In this connection the physiological fact must bo emphasized, that the excitations of the muscles come regularly by centrifugal paths ; while in I DEVELOPMENT OF SENSATION-COMPLEXES 147 the case of the other senses this hapjiens rarely or not at all. Hence muscu- lar sense is i^rceminently the active sense ; and, according as it enters into all the various sensation-complexes, it imparts the quality of activity to them all. It converts seeing into looking, hearing into hearkening, passive into active touch. And yet there is something always vague and contentless about it — something of the nature of indotinite feeling [Ge/iUdarligts), it has been said. Muscular sensation is more obviously connected, and more firmly fused, with sensations of the skin than with those of any other sense. And yet it resembles hearing, in being a kind of interior sense; whereas the skin re- sembles in objectivity the sensations of the retina. Yet, again, muscular sensation is the factor necessary to fuse with sensations of light and color, in order to give them massiveness and spatial extension, as it were. When we allow time for the Development of Sensation-com- plexes, by running- quickly tliroug-li a number of chang-ing- phases, Ave disclose certain classes of our sense-experience which seem to stand midway between sensations and perceptions of sense. These are really instances of that indescribably quick and acute " tact " which belongs to all mental life in the interpretation of the meaning- of changes of sense-consciousness. In the case of the lower animals such tact often takes the form of what we are accustomed to call "instinct." In the case of man it is more likely to mark stages reached only as the result of much experi- ence. But in man's case, too, hereditary tendencies and apti- tudes are of the greatest influence in this sphere. " Natural tact," so-called, or the sensing- of the meaning of sensation- complexes in immediate connection with the having- of the sensation-complexes themselves, is not foreign to the earliest development of human mental life. So far as serves our pres- ent purpose, we shall consider it, chiefly, in these two forms : so-called " sensations of motion " and so-called " sensations of position." Sensations of Motion, so called, are evoked by stimulating closely contiguous nervous elements in the peripheral areas of the retina and of the skin with its accompaniment of muscular and joint sensations. The other senses do not, in themselves, re- spond to stimulus with similar sensation-complexes. That is to say, sensation -complexes of taste, smell, and hearing, without mixture of factors derived from stimulation of tlie connected portions of the skin and muscles, are lacking in the qualities dis- tinctive of so-called "sensations of motion." The psychical characteristics of this class of sensation-complexes are a certain relatively smooth and continuous change in the compound quality of the mixture, whenever the change takes place in a minute portion of time. In other words, sensation-complexes of the eye and of the skin (including muscular and joint activity), ex- 148 SENSATIOT^-COMPLEXIiS AIS-D LOCAL SIGNS perienced as ehanges of conqwund qualliy, are ininiediately and in- stinctively interpreted as " sensations of ^notion." ^ 7. " Sensations of motion " are distinguislied f rom perception of motion, in that the latter requires more of conscious and deliberate discrimination, and of comparison of data, with a view to estimate or judge the i^roper re- lations attributable to the data compared. And yet the difference here is, as elsewhere in all the develo^jment of mind, a difference in the degree of intelligence and purposeful control with which the exercise of essentially the same fundamental faculties takes place. It accords with the very neces- sities of animal life that sensations of motion shall play an important jiart in the preservation and development of the individual and of the species. In the case of all the lower animals, and also in the case of man, so far as his preservation and development depend upon himself, the quick and accurate "interpretation" of these modifications of consciousness is a chief ele- ment in determining the so-called " survival of the fittest." To sense danger and to sense the presence of its prey are indispensable for the ani- mal. But what is dangerous, and what is disagreeable or good for food, moves nearer to or farther from the body, or over its surface (for example, when tasted, smelled, or touched). As a matter of fact, all animals, including man, are in a high degree sensitive to those changes in their sensation-complexes which are significant of motion. In man's case it is a difficult thing to say how much of this sensitiveness, so far as it consists in interpretation of the fact of motion, is i^resent from birth, and how much is acquired. But if we remember that discriminating consciousness belongs to all the earlier ac- tivities, and that no sensation-complexes are had without this activity enter- ing into their very constitution, as it were, we shall conclude that even this seemingly "natural tact," or "knack of interpretation," marks almost from the beginning the unfolding of man's mental life. § 8. The motor sensations of the skin and the sensitiveness of its differ- ent areas may be experimentally tested. In general its discriminative sensi- tiveness to motion is much gi'eater than to mere pressure. Experiment * showed that the motion of a metallic point, travelling at a rate of 2 mm. I^er second, could be discriminated when it had amounted to 0.20 mm. on the forehead, 0.40 on the upper arm, and 0.85 on the back. These dis- tances are much smaller than those necessary for the discrimination of separate pressures. But motion can he produced so slowly as not to be discriminated at all, even when the point has travelled from G ctm. to 12 ctm. This means that unless the change in the sensation-complex is great enough to be discriminated within a given minute portion of time, no sen- sation of motion occurs. For, as we have already said, sensation-complexes must change their compoutul qualitu discernihli/ in order to he interpreted as ^^ sensations of motion " so-called. In accordance with the same principles are the facts that heavier weights seem to move faster than light ones, and that the rate of motion depends upon the number and quality of the pressure- spots in the area of the skin over which the motion occurs : for heavier weights call out other sensations, by deep iircssure, which aid in discrimi- nating the changing sensation-comjilexes ; and the rapidity and amount of > By G. Stanley Hall and Donaldson. See Miud, Oct., 1885, p. G5T f. SENSATIONS OF MOTION 149 change in these sensation-complexes depends upon the character of the pressure-spots simultaneously and successively irritated. Sensations of motion also originate in changes imparted to the compound quality of the sensations, chiefly by the irritation of the joints. In other words, we "sense" motion with our joints, in some degree. Even passive bending of the linger is discriminated, chiefly through joint-sensations, ac- cording to Goldscheider,' when the motion is not more than 0.00° to 1.74°. A swing of the arm, with a minimum velocity of 0.30" to 0.35° in a second of time, is said by the same author to be discriminated as a sensation of motion (chiefly by the shoulder-joint) when it amounts to 0.22'-0.42°. That the active movement of the muscles is accompanied by such a modilication of consciousness as we interpret into sensations of motion has already been aflirmed in our treatment of muscular sensations, as such. We have also seen that the discriminative sensitiveness of different muscles varies very greatly. For example, the difference is enormous between the muscles of the eye and those which control the process of respiration. Modern research has, moreover, rather tended to assign a relatively small part to the muscular elements in our sensations of motion. Some observers, however, have made the bold attempt to resolve all differences in our motor sensation-complexes, even those of a quantitative order, into diflerences of muscular tension. Between the two extremes the truth probably stands. All sensations of motion are by no means to be reduced to muscular elements ; but we do " sense" motion by the changes in our sensation-complexes due to elements contributed by the varying degrees of musicular contraction and tension. And, if need be, we can, with some of the muscles, accomi^lish this with a high degree of discriminative sensitiveness. Visual sensations of motion, with an immovable eye, may be produced either by stimulating contiguous elements of the retina in close succession or by stimulating the same gi-oup of elements with closely successive dif- ferent color-tones. To understand how this takes place, one has only to close one's eyes, and, keeping them motionless, watch the rapid motions which appear in the different portions of the color-mass. The drifting mist of brightly-colored points, or shifting of the color-scene in kaleido- scopic fashion, is not, of course, due to the objective movement of colored objects across the fteld of vision. It is the senshig of motion as interpreta- tive of certain changes fn our sense-experience of the qualities and inten-* sities of color and light. It is the same experience as that which, in a more elaborate and deliberate way, makes us "see" the sleeping cat or child in the picture actually open its eyes when we change, with the right speed, the object as it appears in reflected light (the colors on the front of the paper corresponding to " shut " eyes) to the object as it appears in transmitted light (the colors on the back, and now shining through, corresponding to " open eyes"). But, as has already been indicated, it is doubtful whether we ever do hiive visual sensations without an accompaniment of other elements de- rived from the present or past activity of the muscles which move the organ of vision. It is a moving eye whicli furnishes those peculiar changes of compound quality in its sensation-complexes that serve discriminating con- ' Zeitschrift f. kliu. Medicin, sv., Ileft 1 aud 2 ; aud Verhandlung d. Physiolog. Gesellsch., Berliu, 17 Mai, 18S9. 150 SENSATION-COMPLEXES AND LOCAL SIGNS scioiisness as tlie indictee of motion. A further most interesting confirmation of our view comes oiit incidentally in performing an experiment. Holmgren found that, when we look at very faint and fine points of light with the eyes somewhat elevated, the images seem to move in the direction of muscular exertion (upward) ; that is, sensatio)is of muscular tension may expi-ess them- selves as sensaiioyis of visual motion. §9. Another important fact connected with all sensations of motion must be briefly noticed. Of all sensation-complexes these call forth the most prompt and complex of purposeful movements. This fact, too, is con- nected with the safety and development of the life of the animal. Visual sen- sations of motion attract attention almost irresistibly. They "draw after" themselves the eye. If the character of these sensation-complexes is such as to threaten the eye, it promptly closes. Our extreme sensitiveness to this class of sensations is indicated by the fact that, on the lateral portions * of the retina, two disks, so near as not to be seen as two, can still be seen to move on the slightest motion ; and a row of dots, at a distance in lateral vision too great to have their number distinguished, may be seen to in- crease or diminish by a single dot.' Indeed, while two light-impressions of .045 sec. apart can barely be distinguished, even the direction of the motion of light can be perceived when the difference between the begin- ning and end of the motion is only .014 sec. A similar sensitiveness of the skin to sensations of motion, and a prompt reaction in the form of atten- tion and of motor activity, in the way of retreat or attack, are noticeable. Sensations of Position — those peculiar sensation-complexes which indicate the " place " on the organ where the stimulns is applied, or, in their more elaborate form, signify the relations which the different members of the body sustain to each other and to surrounding objects — are of the greatest interest and importance to the scientific study of mental development. The fundamental fact here is, that the compound quality of certain sensations of the eye and the skin, with their accom2)anying motor activities, is dependent upon local position. To speak popu- larly, the skin " feels " differently, as its different areas are 'pressed with the same degree and kiixd of stimulns ; the eye " feels " differently, at the different angles at which it may be placed — right or left, up or down ; the limbs " feel " differently, according to the different positions which they occupy or reach, whether actively or passively. But in the interests of a more careful analysis psychology inquires (1) What, precisely, are the different factors which enter into and determine the complex character of these " feelings," or " sensations," of position ; and, (2) Is the " tact " which interprets them original or acquired ? The answers which can be given to both these questions are only partial ; the latter of the two can probably never be an- • See an article of Esuer : Uebcr optische Bewegungsempfldungen. Biologisch. Centrlbl., Sept. 15, 1888. SENSATIONS OF POSITION 151 swerecl otherwise than in a somewhat uncertain and theoretical way. It is not until we attempt an exphmation of perception l)y the senses that the bearing of our description of sensation- complexes indicative of " jDosition " can be made clear. But at this stage of the investigation two principles may guide us, as both sound and conclusively jiroved. First : Sensations of posi- tion, instead of being primary and independent, as compared with sensations of motion, are rather secondary and dependent. From the very first, and preceding birth even, the human animal is in ceaseless movement. No stillness, whether of the masses or of the molecules of the nervous system — nerves, end-organs, and central organs — is ever complete. No object stimulates any part of the organs of sense without breaking into a current of consciousness, whose complexion is largely determined by motor elements, or without provoking reaction in the form of changes in the existing motor elements. Without doing this, no object can even come into the " field of consciousness." Sensations of position are dependent njyon sensations of motion, in the order of the mind's normal development. Second : Sensations of position, like sensations of motion, involve at least that low degree of discriminating consciousness which necessarily enters into the exercise of every kind of so- called " tact." To some extent they must be considered as sen- sation-complexes which, on account of diflerences in their com- pound quality, are capable of becoming significant of diflerences that reach beyond themselves. Between them, in their lowest form, and the most intelligent and purposeful discrimination of spatial distinctions and relations, there stands a course of devel- opment. It is a course of development, however, ivhich isp?vvided for, not so much by the native endowment of sensations with " exteusity " or " bigness " (as the writers already referred to would have us suppose), as hy the adivity of discriminating con- sciousness itself, inaccorda7ice with the laws of intellectual life. 1 10. The most impoi-tant thing to notice with regard to all " sensations of position," so-called, is this : we bring them into clear consciousness only by an act of attention. Such an act is certainly demanded in all experi- ments designed to show how accurately one can tell whei-eaboiits, on the retina or on the skin, one is hit by any stimulus, or in just ichat position this or that limb has been passively placed. But the veiy effect of attention is to put into the sensation-comi)lex, so to speak, a certain " motor coloring," which varies, not only according to the degree of attention, but also accord- ing to the character of the local motor organism involved. Changes in the condition of the circulation and in the underlying muscular tension of the areas stimulated are produced by the act of attention itself. It is on this 152 SENSATION-COMPLEXES AND LOCAL SIGNS principle that tlie " stigmatism " of hypnotic subjects and religious devotees IS produced by prolonged attention. In general, ? La Psyrholoffie du Eaisoiuicment, p. 100 f.; and Ait., Fusion dcs Seusatious somblablcp (Rev. I'hilosoph., Sept., 1S80). NATURE OF LOCAL SIGNS 157 an indefinite variety of retinal sensations and tactnal and mnseular sensa- tions canst'd by the moveuuMits of the eye. Thus every possible direction, duration, and amount of discernible motion acquired with the develoimient of discriminating visual consciousness has its peculiar "data" or indictee of " local signs." In the development of vision, the system of local signs, thus evolved by the active movement of the eye, becomes significant of positions for the light- and color-sensations when the eye is at rest. Thus, the focusing of attention upon any minute point, or small group of points, causes to fuse, with the color- and light-sensations belonging to that point or group, the resiidiM, as it were, of all the appropriate local sensations (retinal and mus- cular) which in the previous use of the moving eye have become "signifi- cant " of it rather than of some other ^^oint or group. The delicately varying shades of complex quality have long since dropped out of consciousness be- yond all power of our recall. Much easier would it be for the child to bring up in memory the nice muscular and tactual distinctions by means of which he learned to walk, to talk, etc. ; infinitely easier for the most skilful vio- linist to reproduce in consciousness the discriminated qualities of tactual and muscular sensations in the fingers of the " spacing hand," or in the bow- arm, by which he learned to play true notes in all the different " positions," and with every jiossible shade of timbre and inten5;ity. The more wonderful and complex such ind is, the more completely is it lost beyond all recall.' That quick instinctive synthesis and analysis which results iu the "presentation" of visible surfaces, with their indefinite number of i^arts and iJoints of color and light, is a development of the same tact in connec- tion with a growth of experience through activity of allied senses. And here, once more, we must defer further consideration of the subject until we are ready to study the theory of perception. Reference may properly be made in tliis connection to certain obscure, bnt common, and to other abnormal, phenomena. In " orienting- " our limbs and our entire bodies iu space, we are, undoubtedly, guided by complex forms of sense-experience due to the fusion or mixture of visual, tactual, and muscular sensa- tions, in a way already described. Thus we customarily know where ur are, and where the diflerent parts of our bodies are, and where thhiffs are, with reference to us and to each other. But if any of the well-recognized sensuous data are disturbed or removed, we are wholly' at a loss in our localization or we make unusual mistakes. But other important " sensations of position," whose origin and nature remain obscure, undoubtedly blend with all our sense- experience. Lesions existing in certain organs of the brain, or ' This and all the modem view? conceraineratnre-sensations. Whatever modifications may be found necessary in the detailed results of such experiments, the general fact of the influence of sensallon-comiilexes of one sense over those of another is undoubted. This fact indicates that the con- nections between the brain-centers and processes which correspond to the different senses are not of the nature of fixed and unalterable intellectual relations. And on the psychical side it is the mere fact of constant or vary- ing concurrence in consciousness — of separateness, or of more or less per- fect fusion — which determines the compound quality of all our sensuoiis data. § 17. An instance of abnormal "fusion" or "association " takes place in those not very rare cases of persons that have " color-aiTdition," so-called. In the most marked of these cases the hearing of a particular sound uni- formly and spontaneously provokes the seeing of a particular color, which varies with the sound heard. This fusion of sensations may become so com- plete as to lead the subject in one and the same mental act both to hear and to see the particular vowels when they are pronounced. Thus, in the case of one French family (father, son, and daughter), the vowels a, a, and a pro- voked different shades of yellowish red {brique, nuance de jaune, sainnone) ; e, e, and e, different shades of white [claire, pur, citronne), etc' Joachim Kaff, the musical composer, declared that he saw the sound of the flute, azure blue ; of the hautboy, yellow ; of the cornet, green, etc. Less com- plete fusion, or what we are accustomed to call more or less sei)arable " association," characterizes the experiences of others. In this way differ- ent words, or languages, or shapes, come to have a color value. In some rare cases — even the slightest change in the shading of the sound of the let- ter is seen also as a change in its color-tone. In still other cases, vowels or words, when seen, have particular color- tones always attached inextricably to them. Nor have subjects been wanting who were ready to declare that, to them, the odor of vanilla is light lilac, the odor of vinegar is red, and so on. It is to the same physiological and psy- chical principles as those which are ilhistrated in all fusion of sensation- complexes, and in the formation of local signs, that we are to look for the explanation of such abnormal lihonomena. It is also by an extension of the same principles that, in part at least, the wonderful phenomena of clairvoy- ance, telepathic sensation, illusions, and hallucinations by suggestion, etc., are probably destined to be explained. Here, again, we may declare : It is not the qaalili/, intensitij, and characteristic form of fusion, which belong to the sensuous data, that are unchanr/eabhi fixed either by the iiJiysiological or by the psychological laws of our complex development. 1 Sec T.aurct and Duchaussoy, in Bulletins de Phys. Psych., No. 3, p. 11 f. And on the entire pubjcct, a monograph by Dr. W. O. Krohn : rseudo-Chromesthesia (reprinted from Am. Journal of i'sychology, Oct., 1892), aud the bibliography at the end. SENSATION AND DISCRIMINATION 161 Finally, our description of the elements of sense-experience has already led ns some distance beyond itself. " Discriminating- consciousness," wliicli is the very essence of primary intellection, has been everywhere assumed. And, in a less obvious fashion, the existence of at least a low form of memory has been taken for i^ ranted ; Avhile the feeling aspect and the conative aspect of even our so-called simplest forms of sense-experience has never for a moment been lost wholly out of sight. But we must now turn backward, as it were, and review the path of development in the consideration of these other than the sensation-elements of our mental life, 11 CHAPTER IX. FEELING : ITS NATUEE AND CLASSES The phenomena observed by attending- to that aspect of con- sciousness which is known by the name of " Feeling " liave baffled the student of psychology from the beg-inning- of investi- gation to the present time. The reasons for this fact are, chiefly, the following three : First, the amount of analysis devoted to this aspect of mental life has been too small, whether we regard its relation to the intrinsic difficulty of the subject or to the amount of study bestowed upon other aspects. Then, too, the connection of affective phenomena with hotly debated questions in ethics, aesthetics, and religion may have contributed to in- crease the influence of prejudice in the study of these phenomena. But, second, the nature of language and of the relation it sus- tains to the description and explanation of psychoses is such as relatively to hinder the growth of a science of the human feel- ings. Language is framed, primarily, to convey an accurate knowledge of those objects in whose existence and relation to man his most fundamental as well as most highly intellectual needs make him interested. But language describes and ex- plains the feelings of man only in a secondary, inaccurate, and always figurative way. But the third and chief reason for the unsatisfactory state of the psj^chology of feeling is the very nature, conditions, and laws of the phenomena of feeling itself. As to its nature, feel- ing is relatively indescribable. It may, indeed, be excited or communicated by language, or other conventional and interpret- able signs. But in every case it is, of course, the ideas which are primarily communicated ; and whether the corresponding feelings are excited depends not only upon the communication of ideas, but also upon a variety of secondary considerations connected with the entire affective character of the mental life. Even the failure of language, to Avhich reference was just made, is therefore largely due to the intrinsic difficulty of the subject- matter to be expressed. Moreover, the ideation and memory of one's own states of feeling is extremely uncertain and fluctuat- THE HISTORY OF OPINION 163 ing ; while all know Iioav vain it is to expect one man to imagine precisely how another man feels. Experimental methods vary largely, or even completely fail us here. We cannot readily contrive a mechanism which shall serve to measure the relative magnitudes of the higher and more complex feelings, or to an- alyze them into their simpler component parts. In their own true nature also our feelings are so very evanescent, subtile, changeable, and intricate, that whereas we can, by attention, tell with some commendable approach to accuracy what we see, hear, imagine, or think, we find ourselves i)uzzled precisely to set forth both what we feel, and why we feel as we do feel. Nay, when we attend to what we feel, the very act of attention, in- stead of clearing up and intensifying the " content " of the feel- ing, as it were, takes from it all its rich warm color as feeling ; or else even banishes it quite from the stream of our conscious- ness. Not only the nature, but also the conditions and laws of the phenomena of consciousness in its aspect of feeling are rela- tively obscure. The physiological conditions of some of the stronger forms of emotional consciousness are indeed sufl&ciently evident. But, in general, the caution with which men deal with each other's feelings and the admittedly large incalculable ele- ment which belongs to all attempts to realize the right con- ditions of any particular form of feeling (especially those of the sulitiler and finer sort) show how profound is our ignorance of all that can reasonably be called " law " in this realm. " To minister to a mind diseased " requires more than ordinary bio- logical or medical knowledge. § 1. The history of the psychology of feeling is very instructive on the foregoing points.' The bipartite division of the mental faculties into cog- nition and will, which prevailed from Aristotle down to comparatively recent times, opei-ated to obscure the distinctive character of the affective elements of mental life and to prevent their receiving due scientific attention. Plato's classitication of the feelings, on the principle of their relative dignity and relation to a bodily basis, probably operated in the same direction. The Cartesian philosophy, which regarded ' ' thought " as the essential character- istic of mind, as extension is of matter, kept attention fixed upon the mech- anism of ideation; and the English " associational " and French " sensa- tional" schools absorbed, for these sides ("idea "and "sensation") of many-sided human life, the interests of all investigators. Modern psychol- ogy owes in large measure to Rousseau, the analyst of the heart, with his keen, but morbid interest in his own emotions and sentiments, and to the sentimental movement in literature which followed him, the awakening of ' Brief notices in this line are found in Steinitzer's Die menschlichen unci thicrischen Gemiiths- bewegungen. Muncheu, 1S89. And Juugmauu : Das Gemiith. Freiburg, 18S5. 164 FEELIISTG : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES scientific iuvcstigation in this sphere. Kant's espousal ' of the tripartite division of so-called mental faculty, and the persistence of this division in spite of all attempts by the Herbartian psychology and the philosophy of Schopenhauer to overthrow it, have had a powerful influence on prevalent opinion. But especially is it the effect of biological study, and of the in- creasing influence of the theory of evolution, which has caused due empha- sis to be put upon the scientific investigation of affective phenomena. For these, of all mental phenomena, are not only the most obscure and provok- ing in character, but they are also most permanent and universal. In the possession of certain fundamental api^etites, passions, emotions, and senti- ments, men difl'or far less than in the possession of " ideas" and "thoughts." In respect of the higher realms of isesthetical, intellectual, and religious feel- ing, the conviction of modern lisychological science affirms that an under- standing of the lower, more obscure, more purely sensuous, and yet instinc- tive and fundamental forms of feeling is essential to any satisfactory com- prehension. It is indeed the one touch of feeling-consciousness which "makes the whole world kin." The result of this awakening and spreading interest in the study of liuman feeling, scientifically, has been felt in several ways. Among these the multiplication of special treatises on this branch of psychology, and the enlarged space allotted to it in works which aim to cover the entire ground of mental phenomena, are noteworthy. But the multiplication of artistic and literary products — for example, the Wagnerian music and the modern novel — which are based upon and aim to set forth conclusions in the psy- chology of feeling is scarcely less noteworthy. With all this hopeful en- deavor it will never be possible, however, to reduce to a strictly scientific form the life of sentiment and emotion. It is necessary, in the interests of science, to acknowledge this at the outset, and with the utmost candor. We jjositively must refrain from " completing " our science by impoverishing and belittling the subject of its investigation. The real and essential Nature of Feeling-, as such, cannot be defined ; it cannot even be described in terms that have a mean- ing' corresponding to the psychical state for which they stand A\dthout being- converted back, as it were, into feeling- again. This impossibility of definition, strictly speaking-, follows from the very fact that the aspect of feeling- is primary, fundament- al, irreducible to lower terms, in the mental life. To attempt definition is, therefore, to try to answer some such question as this : In what common characteristic do all the different feeling's peifcctly ag-ree : in what respect are even pleasures and pains alike ? To such a question no other answer is conceivable than this : All feelings, high and low, and even pleasures and pains, are alike in tliis, that they arc forms oifeeUmj, and are not ideas, thoug-hts, volitions, etc. But there is another reason why 1 This is true, although Tetcns, in his Philosoph. Versnche iiber die menschlicho Natiir (Lcipzifr, 1777), had appeared as the defender of the •' faculty of feeling " as au independent power of mind. THE NATURE OF FEELIISTG 165 feeling cannot even — to speak accurately — bo adequately de- scribed. Description is in lan^-uage, but lanq-uag-e itself is the expression of conceptions and tliouii^hts. And the conception of any feeliui? differs toto cxvlo from the feeling itself. Indeed, the last result of the analysis on which modern i^sychology relies, and which we have already intellis-ently adopted, affirms that all psychic facts, and all the psychic life built up by the facts, re- veals three irreducible aspects, of which feeling- is one. It is not so much, then, the business of psychological science to tell just what feeling is, as to investigate the conditions under which the various forms of feeling arise in consciousness and to discover their common characteristics, their relations to other forms of mental life, and the evolution of the more com- plex feelings from the simpler, etc. For to feel is as simple, fundamental, and universal an aspect of all psychic facts, or — if one wishes to use the expression — function or faculty of man, as is discrimination, or sensation, or volition. And feeling cannot have its nature, which is sid generis (the " genus " not being of the same family as knowledge), stated in terms of knowledge : the veri/ life and essence of feeling is in leing felt. It is customary for p)sychologists to express the foregoing truth by asserting that, whereas sensation has a presentative element, and knowledge is objective, feeling is always jourely " subjective." Thus the term feeling, or sensibility, is said by one Avriter^ to " denote the subjective aspect of consciousness anywhere and everywhere." Another author,- speaking in a more carefully qualified way, declares : " Feeling is subjective experience lyar excellence^ But the question at once arises : Is it not just this suhjective aspect with which all psychology deals ? All its phenomena are regarded as subjective ; that is to say, they are regarded as phenomena of consciousness, as such. My sensations are no less of me as their subject ("mine own ") than are my feelings ; and this I quickly discover when I try to communicate about colors with one color-blind, or about tones with one tone-deaf. And what can be for me more truly " subjective " than my castles-in-the-air (when I imagine myself rich and powerful), or those choices for which conscience com- mends or reproaches me ? Such a characterization of the peculiarity of feeling is, therefore, not clear and universal : it contains, however, a valuable truth ; for it serves in a way to mark the difference between feeling and sensation, where, as happens in almost all our conscious life, the two arc blended to- 1 Baklwin: Handbook of Psycholocry, Feeling and Will, p. 135. = Sully: The Uumau Mind, II.. p. 2. 166 FEELIXG : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES getlier in tlie imity of consciousness. My sensations are, in- deed, mine as truly as my feelings are ; both are alike subjective. But my sensations are wliat my feelings are not, and cannot be conceived as being ; tbey also, in the development of percep- tion, become referred, as qualities, to the objects known in sense-experience. Things are green, blue, sweet, sour, hard, soft, warm, cold, etc. ; and, in respect to the " objective " char- acter of some of their qualities, even the most interior parts of my bodj^ are things to me. But when I say my finger aches, as well as when I say that the music makes me sad, the ache and the sadness have no " objective " existence ; they are, in- deed, mine par excellence, as contrasted with all qualities of things which occasion them. Thus we say, by a fiction which all the development of our sense-experience fosters and almost necessitates: the objects with their qualities would be there, as we perceive them, if neither we nor any one else really did per- ceive them ; but how absurd to suppose that the pain or the sadness would be anywhere when our " subjective experience " passed away. Two theories, which regard the " nature of feeling" as second- ary and derivative, have flourished, especially in modern times. One of these is physiological, the other ideational. The physio- logical theory, when extreme, describes feeling as the conscious- ness of certain nervous processes, or relations between nervous processes — a becoming-aware of the condition of the nervous system under the action of varying quantities of stimuli. The ideational theory regards feeling as the consciousness of rela- tions subsisting between the ideas— a becoming-aware of the mutual " hindrance " or " furtherance " which the different idea- tional factors undergo as they rise together above, or work upon each other below, the " threshold of consciousness." Now, in so far especially as feelings are pleasurable or painful, the condi- tion of the nervous system and its relation to the intensities of stimuli which act upon it are, doubtless, of great importance in determining the character of the feelings. So all the character and relations of the different factors ji.nd objects in the stream of conscious ideation and thought influence profoundly our emo- tions and sentiments. But we are not conscious of the fimction- ing of the nervous system ; and if we were, this consciousness wouhl not he feel ill g : it would only be at best our knowledge of hoic the nervons syntem is lehanxg when ice are feeling. The phy- siological theory, therefore, confounds certain possible condi- tions of feeling Avith the nature of feeling itself. And the " idea- tional " theory commits the same mistake in another way. THE NATURE OF FEELING 167 • One other mistaken view of the nature of feeling- is yet more widely current in modern psychology. In its fuller form of de- velopment this view may be stated as follows : All feeling is, essentially considered, pleasure or jiain, in the most extended meaning- of these words. Or — to manufacture a convenient com- pound term — "pleasure-pains" are exhaustive of the entire quality of the feeling--aspect of consciousness; all feeling-s, as feelings, are nothing- but " pleasure-pains." Now — this theory goes on to argue — different pleasures or iiains differ only as re- spects intensity or amount ; therefore they are measurable by a common standard, and, like sensations of the same sense, may be called upon to take their allotted place in a " pleasure-pain " series, a scale properly graded as to intensity. But since feel- ing is essentially either i^leasure or pain, the different so-called " kinds of feeling " have, as feeling, no qualitative difference ; all that which seems to us as ditierence is but due to association with qualitatively different sensations or ideas. Feelings, as be- ing essentially " pleasure-pains," diU'er only in the amounts of the pleasure or jiain which they are ; they cannot, therefore, be dis- tinguished as " kinds " or as having lower and higher degrees of " value " according to an ideal : feelings, as such, can only take their allotted place in a scale graded according to intensity. It would be impossible at this point to indicate the far-reaching (and, as we believe, misleading) effects of this view of the nature of feeling. The different subordinate considerations involved will be discussed in their proper places. But let us here enter against it a most decided protest, not only as wholly inadequate to describe and explain the admitted data of consciousness, but even as contradictory of those data. To us this theory seems " simplicity " itself : but simplicity, in the interests chiefly of biological and experimental psychology, " gone entirely mad." ^ 2. As expressing the correct view of the nature of feeling, we may quote again from Dr. Ward, the declaration : ' "Feeling as such is, so to put it, matter of be'uiff, rather than of direct knowledge." The peculiarly subjective nature of feeling, in the meaning of the word " subjective," already explained, may be enij^hasized in various ways. In our common talk about sense-experi- ence we divide it all into two easily and vividly distinguishable parts. One of these has reference to how " things behave," what qualities they have, or bow they " appear to us." But the other has reference to how "we feel" on occasion of our sensing things, or having them apjjear to us. Hence those sensations which are wont to be had with an accompaniment of markedly pleasurable or painful tones of feeling are themselves called " feelings." Thus we are said to "feel" the cold or heat, whether of our own bodies 1 Art. Psychology— Encyc. Brit., p. 67. Comp. also Hamilton : Lectures on Metaphysics, p. 559 f. leS FZELiyG: IT? yATFEZ A:!fD CLASSES or a£ the objects in ccsitaet with them. We ■" feel " tlie intra-oTganic pres- szctes azhi ZDoreneats *s well as the puBs vhicii we obseureij localize in these csgass. All bodibr pa^"^-? aitd piessmes. as veil as the aesthetical and ethical semdm^enis. are also said to be '" felt." EspecisLUr do we popnlarlT cia^ij ^iiose miiei ard nassive, or mcfl« shadowj psychical states, which depend ■□T>:>n a iar^re number of obscnre and ill-localized orgaiuc eondidoss. araong o^ur " fetlings-" rather than »mtm^ oat spftsations. We " feel " weU ' •' pietij wen ~ or "first-rate 'T, or indisposed, or iD : we feel elated or de- pressed in a r :i7?i«:3l waj, ~ qTieer," "•• not like oorselvc^'' etc. In sTieii -ses cf the term ^ feeling " as the fore^ing, it is to be noted that ordii-aril J we refer to fevchieal states in which taeroaL mnseolar, and tQnperar:ire s-^z-saaoiis are largelr piedcnainaiit. Sensations of smell and taste, wjiici. are e^iifessedlT most subjectrre, as well as sensations of si^t, which are tiDdotibtedly most objectiTe, are rarehr or never spoken of as " feel- ings." In the case of predominatinghr mnscnlar sensations, we talk of onr- seirBS as " feeling ~ sore or wearv. Xow, sinee feeling is preeminently sub- jecsiTe. the qaestion arises why -we do not idraitify it with the most subjectiTe of an OUT sensations — ^witi smell, for g-wtwipW* The answer to the question lies in the fact already ssaied — nsme^, that, while we never for an instant ilrrng of really ecmfaang otir feelings as sabjectrre with sensatioos as objec- trre. soooe of oar sefiisatimis aie in espezienoe inexlzicablr bound np with leelii^s i^ai hare a Strang and ppTsistent tcme of pleasme or pain. Many saeSs and tastes are indeed -rerT disagreeable: but ordinarily we can qiio^ily seforate these soisaticKis froai flie complex of our bodily organism. We can. blow frcan omr nosbdls or walk away frc>m the disagreeable smell ; we can ^nt oni the bad-tastii^ sobstance and hare done with it. In the case of sagM, thse is little or no tanptation to confnaon of language. But onr bodiK satsatiaras of Qts ongasic, tactual, amsmlar. and teDq>eratnre order. with ibmi stpoog ac«3t»^iBnimeai id painfol or pleasurable feelings, we can- ZM34 di^Kkse of so easily. We cannot ejedt them or get away from them. Ther are thot^cse omr /eeHags i^eeminQitlv. Tet th is fact does not vitiate the distinetiksi, which is even mnch more persistent and which lies at the base of all oar mefttal develofMnent, between the feelings as sub- jective and the sesosatians as having objective reference and significa- tioiu Sach psydtologieal troths pot forever to rest all attempts to identi^ the feelifigs with the sestsatioos. It has been argned ^ that, because there are specific nerves whose excitement oeeasi(»s pain and also specific nerve- tzacts and bain-eentas etmeezsed in the transmission of the lesnldBg BS-re-eommotioQS, thg rfc ae pain is as truly a saisation as the sensation of teBBperatnre or ev^i of Ihe color bine. But if we admit this very doabt- tel plnrsiologieal statement, the admission really has not the slightest bear- ing on the p~ychological distinction. To prore the biologist's claims here, and iheB adopt his laogoage, woold only result in another distortion of the ptimaij data of psyehok^^^L It would be another misuse of biology — a fi****^ wlo^ improperly emj^oyed, is as fOTeign to the classification of ■M^tal plienomesa as is the sdenee of astrooomj. What human ocMiscioiB- THE HEEBABTIAX THZOBT 169 ness has " put asnnder," a^ it has sensations and feelings, cannot again be " joined together '' bj biologj. \ 3. Talnable considerations concerning the bodilj and mental cciniitions of the different classes of feelings are aSbrded bj both tne pLjaiological and the ideational theories of feeling-. For this reason both theories hare contrfbnted mnch to the psjehologj of this difficult das-s cf pliaio miec a Bnt both err in their eiclttsiveness ; thej err also in a ftrndanheHtal ■•aj. ■whei; :L -"^ regard feeling as a derired or secondarj form of mental life. la OT-T-:-::ion to this latter error, it has been maintained that, on the con- Tiij. feeling alone is prim or dial in all eonsciotisn«ss. Thns "we find writers. ^ almost all respects so far opj>c«5ed as are Mr. Spencer and Professor James, agreeing in the xise of the "arord " feelings " for all cla-sses of elemen- tarr jisjchic facts. Bnt inasmneh as all psjchic facts, even the most elementaiy, cannot become data of consciousness — much less data of self- knowledge — without attention and discriminating consciousness. Dr. Ward correctly maintains : " The simplest form of peyehical life involves not -Iv a subject feeling, but a sul'ject having qualitatively diistin^uishable ^ resentations which are the occasion of its feeling.'" lAs to how we should jnodify and interp>ret this statement it is not necessary here to add any- thing to what has already been said.) The Herbartian theory of feeling has so much which, in spite of its fun- damental errors, is interesting and helpful in explanation, that it deserves tsief mention here. This theory holds that feelings are not primitiTe states of mind. Painful and pleasurable bodily states are not to be regarded as reelings at all : they are rather sensations. All true feelings depend upon :Lr o'_;.r;.:ter of the ideating activity; in nature they are just this: tiu- - - c-N? of the reciprocal action of the ideas. Or — to follow the expia- - - given by the most finished writer of this school in hi- ^ Treatise -"chology^ "Feeling is to be considered as the ec't- - of the -5 of ideation itself, as distinguished from consciousness oi this or :_-. r articular idea;" and it is conditioned upon some resistance being oS^ere-I to this process. It must at once be admitted that the character of c-r intellectual, sesthetical, and ethical feelings is determined, by the re- Li:::n thev sustain to the different intellecrual processes, both the more funiamental and the more comples. (Here again we may leave the errors CI the Herbartiaa theory to the correction afforded by a study of each particular position involved in the theory.) 1 4. The view which asserts, not only that all feeling is either pleasurable or painftil, but that ■' pleasure- pain '" is all there is — so to speak — of feeling. receives confutation at every point from the data of psychological science. It follows from this theory — among other conclusions — that feelings, as feel- ings, have no ideal value ; they are only mere qvoj^a of pleasure or pain : they cannot be placed in a scale of ideal values, as noble or le&e ; they can only be placed in the scale of " pleasure- pains," as greater or less. But these are subjects the discussion of which belongs later on. It will suffice at 1 VoItniiEa Tsa VoJtniar : LArbaci d. P'srcbooosie, IL. p. 29S f. See tlso XjMcrwsfcr : Bus Gefihlsielwi! Sd ed-\ Lopez, lsS4. Beoete : LMtrbiaei d. P5jTi»oia£ie ii? XjitBirwisseiieeftaifit. ?- 17» i. Drbi : Leir^-nch 6. empinsudi. PsTxrboiogie, p^ 9M f, Ob dK rchgr bxad. flaC fririiiiir; :; pcTOKirdial— Hora-icz : Psydkoiog. AsatrseB. L. p^ 1€& OompL Looe : Mei&iaL P^'c&Qioeie, > 2351 170 FEELING : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES tliis point briefly to point out liow this surprising "fallacy of the psy- chologist" contradicts the plainest dicta of everybody's consciousness. CI.) It has already been shown that even the most primary forms of feel- ing cannot become data of knowledge without being attended to with the exercise of discriminating consciousness. But neilhei', u-hen thns attended to, coidd tlteii be discriminated as different, urdess they were, as forms of feeling- consciousness, really different. We cannot, of course, "classify" the feelings without regarding them as objects of knowledge ; and we must classify on a basis of the relations they sustain to knowing activity : for this is what classi- fication is — namely, discriminated and " sorted out " objects of knowledge. But neither could we classify tliem at all — even thus indirectly, and by ref- erence to the occasions on which they occur, or to the sensations and thoughts they accompany — unless they showed actual qualitative differences, that is, were classifiable as really being like or unlike. (2.) It is plain that, upon a matter of this kind, an appeal to conscious- ness is decisive ; and it alone is decisive. For — as has already been said — the very nature of the feeling itself is in the state of the being of the sub- ject whose the feeling is ; its whole nature is in its being felt. And here no objective reference to aught beyond the feeling, whether to nervous pro- cesses or to processes of ideation considered as occasions of the feeling, has anything to do with the nature of the feeling, as such. To ask one, How do you feel? is not the same thing as to ask one, What are your ideas? or, What is the condition of your nervous system ? In answering the first question, one may indeed tell one's ideas, in order to describe one's feel- ings ; or one may make reference to more or less obscurely localized bodily sensations, using the customary terms in the description of them. Still, only the subject's immediate awareness of his own state of being can answer the question. How do you feel? Now, nothing can possibly be more con- fusing to this supreme arbiter of such a question than to be brought face to face with the "fallacy of the psychologist."' That, for example, my feel- ing of surprise (whether occasioned by a sudden blow on the face, or by the receipt of unexpected news, or by the rise in consciousness of one of those "truths that wake to perish never") does not differ, except as to the amount of pain or pleasure it occasions, from my feeling of expectation (when I am looking forward to a sea-voyage or to meeting a friend), or from my feeling of doubt (when I am considering which candidate to vote for or which side of an opinion in philosophy to espouse), or from my feeling of convic- tion or belief (as it enters into all that knowledge of objects I call " real" ), or from my ethicd and (vslhetical feeling (when I contemplate a moan act, or look upon a good picture, or hear the Andde in Schubert's jiosthumous quartet)— all this is simply intolerable to self-consciousness. (3.) The theory which identifies feeling with " pleasure-pain " through- out is also self-contradictoiy. That pleasure and jiain are distinctly dif- ferent kinds of affective consciousness no one can doubt. Philosophers and psychologists have indeed thought (mistakenly enough) to simplify matters by si^eaking of one of these forms of feeling as " positive " and the other as "negative." It is, of course, possible — theoretically with great exactness, and actually in a somewhat rough way — to shade the different quantities of l)odily pleasures and pains from the very highest to the very lowest degrees FEELING NOT MERE PLEASURE-PAIN 171 of both. Tims we can enact the fiction of a " zei'o-i>oint," or "point of in- difteionco," a place in the scale where the pleasure passes over into pain, or the reverse. But by this tiction neither pleasure nor pain loses its distinct- ive quality. "We n)ay, indeed, be unable to say whether a particular feeling is disagreeable or agreeable ; either form of feeling may be so slight as to be not easily discernible by even the most attentive discriminating conscious- ness. But a slight degree of pleasure is no more like, a slight degree of ])ain than is a greater degree of one like a greater degree of the other. "SVhat our language means is, that both pleasures and pains are recognized as dif- fering in intensity. But something besides mere diflt'erence in intensity is implied in our bringing so distinctly uulike psychic states, as are those of pleasure and those of jiain, together into one class, and then calling them both by the common term "feeling." It is implied, of course, that pleas- ure and pain are certain "kinds" of feeling. In other words, in spite of their opposition, they are classed together as distinctly different sorts of one fundamental form of psychic life. This fundamental form is no other than what we mean by the word " feeling." The whole nature of feeling, then, cannot be described as "pleasure-pain." "What we really mean is: feelings are either pleasurable, or painful, or possibly "neutral." To make our meaning run thus : feelings are naught but " pleasure-pains," when pleasure and pain are recognized as opi:)Osites in kind, is to reason that two distinctly unlike psychic facts may be thrown into one category (and that a most important and fundamental one) without their being in any distinctive respects alike. This is self-contradictory. (■t.) Moreover, the theory which identifies feeling with "pleasure-pain" renders absurd some of the very problems on which it claims to throw light. For example, the question whether there are " neutral " feelings (or feelings that are neither pleasurable nor i^ainful) thus becomes unmeaning. This theory attempts to settle the inquiry as to the existence of neutral feelings in a haiighty aiyrinri fashion, although it claims to speak in the name of so- called inductive psychology. According to this theory there are no such feelings, because there cannot be : since feeling is " pleasure-pain," and nothing else. But the inquiry as to the existence of neutral feelings is plainly an inquiry as to matter of fact. It can be settled only by an appeal to the consciousness of the subjecir whose being the feeling is. And there is absolutely nothing which we know about the nature of feeling, or about the conditions under which the tone of feeling is generally determined as either pleasiirable or painful, Avhich renders it impossible that different indi- viduals may differ here. Indeed, one class of feelings, or one degree of any class, may be "neutral" in the case of some individuals, and not in the case of other individuals ; and feelings that have had one tone of feeling, may, nnder the law of habit, etc., lose this tone and become neutral in the case of any individual. The Couditious of all Feeling, as s^^cll, and the conditions of the different phenomena of feeling- are, like the nature of feeling, peculiarly difficult of determination. The conditions under which the tone of bodily feeling is either pleasurable or painful, and the conditions under which the pain or pleasure increases in in- 172 feeling: its nature and classes tensity, may indeed be experimental!}" investigated. But the more complex, liig-lier, and nobler feelings — even as respects their var^'ing degrees of pains and pleasures— cannot be sub- jected to the researches of the ijsyclio-physical laboratory. Our only means for investigating them involves interiDreting the insignia of feeling as they abound in conduct, literature, art, and in the broad fields of historical and ethnological investigation. But the physiological and psychical conditions under Avhich these feelings arise and develop in consciousness are even more hidden than is the real nature of the feelings themselves. Even in one's own case, one can neither measure, for example, the " pangs of unrequited love," nor the rapture of religious ecstasy, nor the sorrows of remembering the " silent dead." Both the mental preconditions and the bodily mood which determine such forms of feeling are obscure. Weber's law — bad as its failure is esteemed by some to be even in the realm of sensations — has even less application to the higher forms of feeling. General biological considerations, and more particular con- siderations taken from human physiology, enable us to make certain probable conjectures regarding the common physi- ological conditions of all feeling, as such. But here a most not- able and interesting fact meets us at the threshold of our in- vestigations. Neural processes, consummated in the central organs, are (so far as we know) the one phj^siological precon- dition of all states of human consciousness. These processes are immensely complex, and involve countless elements, acting and reacting, as an accompaniment to all our flowing stream of mental life, in manifold forms of chemical, thermic, and other molecular changes. But complex as these processes are, and complicated as are the modes of energy they involve, since they are all " physical changes," they must be supjiosed to be stata- ble in terms of the amount, time-rate, and direction of motion. That is to say : ultimately considered, in the light of physical analysis, all the neural processes underlying the different psychic facts are of one kind. But we have seen that, ultimately con- sidered, in the light of introspective anal3'sis, all the resulting psychic facts have three aspects : they are facts of intellection and conation not only, but also facts of feeling. If we maj'" be pardoned the apparently metai:)h3'sical figure of speech : the psychical being we call mind responds to neural changes, which are essentially of one kind, with a manifestation of its own life, which is essentially threefold in aspect. Or (liscnminating con- sdonsness anah/zi's in a triune way what 2)Sj/eho-p/i>/sics I'cgards as conditioned upon the occurrence of a physical change essentially the CONDITIONS OF ALL FEELING 173 mtne. Yet the unity tliat this threefold aspect of consciousness presents is the hi<4hest of all unities ; it is the unity in variety of consciousness itself. However we may choose to express this fact, we cannot explain it ; we can only acknowledge it as an ultimate fact. None the less, however, do we have good grounds for believ- ing that changes in the amounts, kinds, and tone (as pleasure or pain) of the feelings are dependent upon changes in the neural processes. And what are the most general Physiological Con- ditions of the differences of the Feelings, in these respects, we can conjecture with some show of reason. Different individuals differ more widely and more incalculably as to the particular feeling's evoked, on different particular occasions, than as to the sensations and ideas occasioned by changes in the amounts, kinds, and time-rates of the stimuli which act upon the nervous system. This fact suggests that our feelings are determined by the changeable relations of the neural processes to the constitu- tion, previous habits, and temporary mood, of the nervous sys- tem, and by the relations of each neural process to all the others within the central system, in a more irregular way than are our sensations and our knowledge. Those conditions of the ner- vous processes which depend immediately upon the nature of the stimuli that act upon the end-organs are in general conform- able to law ; they are regular and — as it were — to be depended upon. In correspondence with them is the regularity and de- pendableness of our sensations and of our knowledge by the senses. But over and above the more uniformly recurrent simi- lar elements in all the peripherally originated nervous pro- cesses, there is more or less of a semi-chaotic surplus of nervous action occasioned in the brain-centers. In this " semi-chaotic surplus " — the general character of which depends upon what the whole nervous system was, and is, and has recently been doing, and upon how the various new stimulations, running in to the brain-centers, fit in with all this and with one another — may we find the physiological conditions of the feeling-aspect of consciousness. No wonder, then, that these conditions are so obscure, so indeterminate for different individuals, so change- able in the same individual. At (uiy particular moment the hind and amount of feeling exjyerlcnced has for Its physiological condition the total complex relation in which all the subordinate neural pro- cesses, set up hi/ the stimuli of that moment, stand to one another and to the set, or direction, of pre-existing related 7\eurcd processes. To this truth our language bears witness when we speak of " mood," "disposition," "feeling as though," "feeling like," etc.; as well 174 FEELING : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES as when we consider how large a number, even of our most primary forms of feeling-, are really "feelings of relation" (what one feels " depends " on how one takes it, how one looks at it, etc.). Indeed, it is the changes of our psychic combinations, the movements on the board, which we chiefly feel. Many of the most important common Psychical Conditions of all Feeling are indicated by certain words already emi)loyed to designate its physiological conditions. Among such words, most frequent and suggestive, are " disposition," " temper," " mood," mental " attitude," and the like. What is meant by these words is, in the main, precisely this : a permanent and constitutional, or a temporary and relatively accidental tendency to react upon all forms of stimuli with certain characteristic forms of feeling. Thus, we call one man " haughty " and an- other " reasonable " in disposition, " violent " or " quiet " in tem- per ; and we say of ourselves : To-day I have felt as " happy as a lark," or " as cross as a bear." We expect that the aflective phenomena, the emotional tone of consciousness, Avill correspond to disposition or mood, whatever be the particular sensations, perceptions, or thoughts which furnish the occasions and ac- companiments. Everything looks " yellow " to the man of jaun- diced temper, but " rose-colored " to his more happily constituted neighbor ; while " blue " is the permanent color in which the despondent mood regards every situation and prospect. Even our ethical, oesthetical, x^hHosophical, and religious ideas and judgments are tinged or saturated with our peculiar and charac- teristic kinds and tones of feeling. The most abstract and meta- physical i^essimism or optimism has been declared to be a matter of " temperament " chiefly. Caprice itself is a disposition con- stituted largely of tendencies to certain forms of quickly chang- ing feeling. In general, then, the character and the inagnitude of the feelmg excited depends not so much directly upon the kind and quardity of the excitement applied, as indirectly vpon this through the relation which any particular excitement sustains to the direc- tion and intensity of the general sensibility. Another group of most important psychical conditions of all feeling concerns the distribution of attention. What we feel, and what is the tone of oar feeling (whether pleasurable or painful), depends largely upon the actual matter of fact : the particular sensations, perceptions, ideas, thoughts, nascent or vigorous purposes, ui3on which our attention (wliether voluntary or involuntary) is focused ; and the degree of smoothly running flow, or of interruptions and shocks, to tho current of conscious- ness, with which this attention is distributed. But this, in turn, CONDITIONS OF ALL FEELING 175 depends upon a <2:reat variety of permutations and combinations possible among tlio factors which constitute, at any instant, the condition and the direction of this same current of conscious- ness. Other more particular conditions of the tone of our feelings as " pleasure-pains " will receive consideration later on, g 5. The attempt of biological and physiological science to state accu- rately the physiological conditions of all feeling is, of course, most commend- able. It is only when this attempt results in reducing the whole vast wealth of human affective experience to quanta of pleasure and i^ain, measurable according to Weber's or some other law, and dependent upon intensities of nervous processes, that it merits the distrust and contempt of the -phi- losoijher, the artist, the religious enthusiast, the more genial and compre- hensive psychologist. Our view, which finds the physiological conditions of feeling in the "semi-chaotic surphts"' of nervous processes originated by stimuli, but re- garded as relative to the tendencies of the entire molecular central mechan- ism — though confessedly not capable of direct scientific proof — is a conject- ure borne out by many considerations. Among the most obvious of these is the character of those processes which accompany the rise and develop- ment, the " building up" in consciousness, of all the more intense states of complex feeling. But this will have to be considered in more detail when we treat of the emotions and sentiments. (1.) The character of those bodily feelings which enter so largely into the complex "feeling of self "and into what we call our "temper" or " mood " is explained according to this conjecture. The constitution of the internal organs, and their relation to the cerebro-spinal nervous system, are such that sensation-complexes which can be built up into knowledge by perception are only sparingly derived from these organs. One knows by im- mediate perception very little of the size, shape, temperature, and motion of one's intercostal and visceral extensions and surfaces. And what little one senses here is apt to be submerged under accompanying feelings with a strong tone of pleasure or pain. But from all these organs, through the nerve-plexuses and nerve-tracts of the great sympathetic system, an inde- scribable melange of nerve-commotions is ceaselessly ascending through the cerebro-spinal tracts to the brain. What this melange is at any jjarticular time depends upon what kind of intercostal and visceral organs one has in- herited, or acquired by good or bad habits, or had forced uiDon him by happy or unfortunate accidents or circumstances, or got by the action of the last hour or of yesterday. This melange, however, gives conditions to one's affective disposition, or mood, or temporary impulse, so far as it is a matter of bodily feeling. When this melange corresponds with that to which we are habitually accustomed, we feel " like ourselves ;" when it corresponds to auy one of several familiar characteristic tyjies, we feel in one of our sev- eral "moods;" when it is largely unaccustomed, we feel "qxieer" and "not a bit like ourselves." In all cases it is the "surplus" of perii^her- ally excited nerve-commotions, whose character does not admit of their being organized after the form of excitations derived from the external organs of 176 FEELING : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES sense (" semi-chaotic," as we have called them), which largely determines how wo "feel "at any particular time. Moreover, every such particular melange of nerve-commotions finds the central nervous system, on entering into it, engaged in a jjarticular but highly complicated way. The influence of the bodily feelings upon our total state of feeling is therefore by no means always dominant or complete. Sensations, ideas, purposes, and — as the development of mental life goes on more and more — ideal aims deter- mine how we feel : sometimes, in spite of and in triumph over, our bodily feelings. (2.) Again, from the lower parts of the cerebro-spinal axis (from sjiinal cord and lower brain-centers) a complex crowd of nerve-commotions — part of which arises from the influence of the end-organs of sense directly upon these lower organs and i^art from changes originated within the organs themselves — constantly arises to the higher brain. This crowd of nerve- commotions is ever freighted with a " surplusage " — a " semi-chaotic " quantum, which is not adapted to be elaborated into the sensuous basis of definite perceptions and ideas. This, too, gets expression for itself in the complex life of feeling. Hence those feelings of bodily equipoise which are so helpful to the feeling of mental equilibrium, and which are largely de- pendent upon the activity of the cerebellum and semi-circular canals. Here Ijelong, in large measure at least, the jjliysiological conditions of the feel- ing of repose (a feeling so difficult to realize with a reeling gait or an un- steady head), the feeling of excitement or confusion (when unelaborated sen- sation-complexes are raj^idly hurled, as it were, from the lower cerebral re- gions up to the hemispheres of the brain), the feeling of dubitation or negation (connected by association with the movement of the head). Hence, espe- cially, arise the forms of feeling most inseparably connected with the use of the higher senses. (3.) Indirectly, too, our view throws light ujaon the physiological con- ditions of our feelings of relation. The i^riuciple of relativity has been ap- l^lied by modern psychologists (especially by Mr. SiJencer) to all our states of cognition. But it was proi^ounded with respect to the feelings of pleas- ure and pain even earlier (by Oardanus) than it was formulated as a general psychological principle (by Hobbes). As Hofi"ding truly says : " It makes its appearance here even more plainly than in the i)rovince of cognition." The physiological reason for this is at once obvious when we consider that it is changes in the nervous processes, relative to each other, and to the complex situation in the midst of which they occur, that constitute chiefly the very essential physiological pre-conditions of all feeling as such. We get light upon this truth also by considering what feelings go with smooth and slow changes in the same direction of nerve-excitation ; what with gradual but complete changes in direction ; what with sudden and abrupt changes, etc. Or, again, let it be inquired, " How do I feel when the present total complex of solicitation from all the different stimuli " fits in," or not — as it were— with my disposition, my present mood ; or how toward one ob- ject or form of sensation or ideation which comports, or not, with the others constituting my total environment? Does not every one promptly and keenly feel change in the complex of his nervous excitations (the new sensation, idea, resolve, or feeling) ? Even emiui or monotony depends upon CONDITIONS OF ALL FEELING 177 the sensations or ideas occnniiif? aiul recurring in the stream of conscious- ness so as to make their simihivity i'clt. And does not the character of our feehng depend upon the rchttiou in wliieh the new sensation or idea stands to that current of nervous excitations which supports the states of consciousness when the new factor or object appears? Feelings of surprii^e or shock, of norelti/, oi expectation, ol recognition (pleasurable or painful), of vague (/rertrf, or longing, etc., find their physiological conditions accounted for by application of this principle. In general, no marked and prolonged state of feeling can exist except in dependence upon considerable change in the direction of the excitement of the nervous centers under the intinence of external and inter- nal stimuli. ' (Jr.) Even in the case of those simpler and less intense feelings which are connected in experience with the particular sensation-complexes and ideas, it is probable that this same principle holds true. Each activity of every organ of sense may be said to awaken a " surplus," however small, of nervous excitation which may serve, under the right conditions, lor a feel- ing over and above, and yet connected with, the sensation-complex or idea. Whether such neural surplus awakens conscious feeling, and what feeling it awakens, is relative to (" depends upon") the entire habit, or present mood, etc., of the person concerned. Two men, neither of whom is color-blind, will have the same sensations on looking upon a colored object ; biit who can tell what their feelings will be, even when the object is as near as possi- ble to an object with tixed associations ? Their feeling, on seeing green or orange, '' will depend upon," etc. Two men, neither of whom is tone-deaf, will hear the same notes on listening for the first time to Beethoven's quar- tet in C Sharp Minor (opus 131) ; but who can tell what the feelings of either will be ? This " will depend upon," etc. (5.) The painful feeling which is evoked by too intense excitement of any, even very limited, area of the surface of the skin has also, it is proba- ble, its physiological conditions in confused commotion of the nervous sub- stance, "a troubling more or less profound of the organism." The feelings evoked by sudden and uncertain changes in the application of the stimuli, or by constant slight irritations of the nerves which ser,ve no purpose of clearly organizable sensation-material, are due to the same cause. The jileasant and painful affective phenomena produced by being stroked, rubbed, tickled, passively moved, or other similar forms of stimulation, may be noted in this connection. Every worker in the laboi-atory knows how the same vibrating fork, or finger marking upon a revolving drum, may produce not unpleasant sensations of sound, when attended to as an object which interests lis ; while it will occasion a large amount of latent feeling of irritation when it has . ceased to serve as an instrument of clear knowledge. The "semi-chaotic surplus" of nervous excitement, caused by the riibbing of the clothing, or by the pressure of the chair, is felt as making lis cross or weary, when we have no definite sensations and perceptions arising from these sources. ^ G. At certain epochs in life, changing bodily conditions become the causes of persistent but vague feelings which amount to a "mood " or " dis- position," and which serve to color all the sensations and ideas. This is ' The proposition that it is chayir/ea and not conflitions of the nervons system which are felt is argued at length by Ilorwicz : Psycholog. Analysen, iii., p. 43 f.; Nitsche : Vcrsuch einer einheit lichen Lehrevon den Geflihlen, p. 8 f.; and Paulhan : Les Phenomenes afiectifs, etc., p. G6 f. 13 178 FEELING : ITS NATURE AND CLASSES particularly true of the development and physiological activities connected with sex. Thus attention has been called by many writers ' to the vague feelings of n:(mt, ilisquiet, melancholy, ov ennui — all of them without any clear connection with definite sensations and ideas — which mark the epoch of puberty. But all four of the great periods of life (childhood, youth, mau- liood, and old age) have their characteristic tendencies to particular kinds of feeling, or to particular changes in the life of feeling. And so far as the physiological basis of these characteristics can be traced, it seems to con- form to the principle we are illustrating. The rapid metabolism and circu- lation of the infant, and the sluggish digestion and circulation of old age, modify differently the character of the changes in the excitements of the nervous system by way of what we have called a "semi-chaotic surjjlus " relative to the entire life of this system. I 7. Feelings similar to those called out by way of reaction upon external stimuli accompany the psychical changes. Here we are to recognize the significance of many of our most primary intellectual processes. Mr. Spen- cer is certainly not warranted in resolving the whole of what we call "judg- ment "into a mere "feeling of relation" — itself timeless and yet existing between two psychoses which last through extended time. Nor are the Herbartians warranted in arguing, because feeling is no special idea in con- junction with others, nor an idea in general, therefore it is only the con- sciousness of the " tension " of the process of ideation, considered as a strug- gle between related ideas. But botli Mr. Spencer and the Herbartians are right in calling our attention to the truth that, in general, all the intellectual processes have their characteristic accompaniments of feeling ; and that the character of this feeling depends ;ipon the changing relations between the factors and wholes of our intellectual processes. Onefeeh, as well as knows, the flow of the current of consciousness. Indeed, so true is this that all the different parts of speech, as employed in their changing relations to each other, evoke different shades of feeling more i^romptly and more certain- ly than they evoke different definitely distinguished sensations, ideas, or thoughts. That tlie flow of feeling which accomi>anies all language, and which depends upon the changing sensations, images, and ideas, is even the most primary and permanent thing in mental life, as excited and expressed by language, although — as we have seen — this is not the design or end of language, there are many grounds to argue. Children feel what they read or hear read, or said, with an appropriateness which quite outstrips their powers of understanding. . For exami)le, the feeling of impulse to com- ply may be aroused in them by a certain way of saying the words " Come — do;" the feeling of rejiulsion by a certain way of saying the word "No." Poetry that is far above their childish comprehension, while it presents to them few vague pictorial conceptions, by the ])loasurab]e rhythmic flow of sensations may awaken a high degree of appropriate a'-sthetical and ethical feeling. Music, in the form of the opera or (more especially) the oratorio, makes use of this truth ; for it applies not simjily to childhood, but to the most cultivated minds when they voluntarily abandon themselves to the skilful leader and inspirer of affective consciousness. Witness the complex ' Compare, for example, Esquirol : Maladies meutalcsi, I., p. 553. Gricsin Goldpclieider. See Archiv f. Anat. n. Physiol. (Physiolog. Abth.), 1S85. Snp., p. 87. That specific orrimarily the phenomena of the individual consciousness, as such, must then acknowledge the existence of " naturally " painful sensations and ideas. On the other hand, excitements of feeling, whose intensity reaches beyond the limit of safety to the organs, and whose ethical character is pronounced against by an enlightened con- science, are not infrequently accompanied by a predominating tone of pleasure. That which we discover, by inference from remote and indirect consequences, to be " bad " for the organism or morally indefensible, is by no means necessarily disagreeable. Indeed, complex emotions of every character, unless certain sen- suous factors become too predominating and intense (and this is ordinarily the case only in weak or diseased persons) are, on the whole, pleasurable. The statement is as true, though not in the same way, of anger, resentment, and vengeance, or of pride, ex- cessive self -feeling and self- approbation, as of the finer and 1 Something like this truth is expressed by one writer as follows : In sensation the soul's con- dition changes, and it must sense the changes (" Sie muss empflnden dass sie empfiudet" ). This " self-sensing " of the soul is no longer mere sensation : but it \% fcjeling (" Das Innewerdcn dieses eigenen Seeleuzustandcs ist und heiest Fiihlcn '"). Kucgg : Lehrbuch d. Peychologie, p. 25. EMOTIOi^AL PLEASURE-PAINS 201 more altruistic forms of emotion and sentiment. Hatred and love, the feeling- of self-importance and the feeling- accompany- ing the appreciatio}! of others, are by no means necessaril}' oppo- sites when arranged in the scale of pleasure-pains. Dii!ering degrees of both pleasure and pain may attach them- selves to the ditierent factors which enter into all the more com- plex forms of emotion and sentiment. To state the matter in an abstract way, all elaborate emotions and sentiments generally fur- nish some 7'easons why their tone should he one of pleasure, and, other reasons why their tone should he one of2>ain. They are mixed in tone. But one of these two ojiposite tones is likely to be pre- dominant, and to give the characteristic to the entire complex experience. The two opposite tones, as represented by the fac- tors Avhicli have them, may struggle together, as it were, for supremacy in the total aHective complex ; they may find it im- possible to fuse. The emotion or sentiment then assumes that peculiar condition of vacillation between predominating pleas- ure modified by pain, and predominating pain modified by pleasure, with which all are familiar. This entire "class of expe- riences justifies us in saying— as a general rule, which, however, admits of certain marked exceptions — that excitement of sensi- bility, as such, tends to be pleasurable up to the limit where painful bodily feelings, due to excessive strain or tension, or else disagreeable festhetical or ethical sentiments, are aroused and maintained. In the majority of cases of strong emotions and sentiments of whatever character, the rush and onward sweep of feeling, with its tone of pleasure due to the fact that both cerebral and psychical excitement is at a high pitch of in- tensity, for a time overwhelms all painful factors, whether of a sensuous, nesthetical, or ethical order. The answer to the ques- tion : " Doest thou well to be angry ? " as sincerely given by the subject of the emotion, regularly comes (so long as the anger is in full sweep) : " I do Avell to be angry, even unto death." ?8. "We seem compelled to admit tlie existence of "absolutely" un- pleasant sensations (i.e., sensations that are disagreeable, irrespective of their intensity). This is, at any rate, true, so far as strictly j^sychological analysis and explanation can go. Thus M. Beaunis ' holds that certain odors, savors, sounds, and feelings are, qudlitalively considered, always dis- agreeable. The behavior of infants, on awakening to the life of sensation in its various forms, would seem to indicate this. The liking for bitter tastes. for a considerable number of odors, for discordant and grating sounds, and perhaps for sensations of contact that have become associated in the experi- ence of the race with disgusting or harmful objects — slimy worms, e.g. — if • Les Sensations Internes, p. 202 f . 202 FEELING, AS PLEASDEE-PAIN attained at all, must be cultivated under the influence of favorable associa- tion. That many of the most primitive forms of those feelings which have been called ' ' feelings of relation " are disagreeable, irrespective of intensity, has already been pointed out. ^ 9. In spite of the phenomena of " naturally " disagreeable feelings of a sensational or ideational stamp, we may maintain the general but not uni- versal principle that excitement of sensibility, as such, is agreeable. The distinction between the opjDOsite classes of intellectual, sestlietical, and ethi- cal feelings is not closely connected, even in the most primary and elemental forms of the arousement of sensibility, with the pleasure-pain series. A careful analysis of any of the leading forms of emotion will show the truth of this statement. Anger, for example, is, in a large majority of instances, per se, a pleasurable emotion. It is only when the factors of i^ainful feeling, arising from intense bodily excitement or introduced on grounds of habitu- ally observed aesthetical or ethical considerations, become obtrusive as factors that the complex emotion changes tone and becomes disagreeable to the subject of it. Most men who have not " weak " hearts or " tender " con- sciences (and most men are not afflicted or endowed with these hindrances to pleasure) enjoy being angry. When the emotion has subsided, the arouse- ment of sensibility in connection with reflection upon the past emotion — its cesthetical and ethical character, its consequences, etc. — is quite another affair. Even in the midst of the passion, the painful feeling of constriction about the heart, of laboring resi^iration, of the dangerous rush of blood to the head, may modify the whole emotion, or change it to the opposite tone of pain. Even in the midst of it the "voice of conscience," or the feeling of " good taste " ^as we say — may give a more or less disagreeable tinge to our indulgence of this passion. But generally there can be little doubt, for the time being, the emotion of anger is, on the whole, a somewhat highly agreeable emotion. In the so-called " natural" man — that is, the man previous to the modi- fication of his conduct and feelings under the influence of ideal aims — the jjassion of vengeance, whether as exercised in the pursuit or in the punish- ment of the object toward which it is directed, is a pleasurable feeling. The savage or the child cliases his enemy in flight, and thrusts him through with a sjiear or beats him with a stick, in a sort of ecstasy of joy. The con- flicting emotions, with their characteristic pleasure-pains, which are called forth in all kinds of struggle and contest (on the field of battle, in the prize- ring, etc.), are, on the whole, predominatingly agreeable. Both victor and vanquished, as a rule, share in the pleasurable excitemeut of feeling which the struggle involves : the former has added to this the pleasures of sujierior strength and skill belonging to his triumph ; even the latter, so long as the contest lasts, is probably in a predominating state of hajipiness. It is only when the emotional phases of feeling are past, and the influence of the more reflective phases, together with the revulsions of feeling ordinarily involved in them, become i)rovalent, that consciousness is suff'used with a decidedly painful tone of feeling. Connected with this principle is the ex^ilanation of many of those more startling exhibitions of cruelty which the history of crime, and even careful RHYTHM AND REPETITION 203 observation of the daily couJuct of children and of " iinidealized " human life generally, so abundantly reveal. The Indian who eujoijs the torture of his captive enemy, the ''moral monster " who is jnoud to have "laughed with glee " at the pains of his innocent victim, the child who takes what we are accustomed to regard as a " strange delight " in pulling off the wings of insects or in pinching the tail of a pet animal, are alike " natural " and " un- natural " in such behavior. Their actions may indeed be influenced by a variety of motives and accomi^anied by a variety of more or less conflicting emotions. The total result of the fusion will be different in different cases. But at the base of all these cases lies the principle that, in strung excitement of feeling of every kind, while the emotional stage endures, the normal to7ieis one of pleasure in the excitement. So far forth Aristotle's concei^tion — " The feeling of pleasure is linked with every natural and normal activity of mental life " — is an understatement of the truth. Even in the case of bodily pleas- ure-pains, it generally implies the sesthetical development of the adult to find: " A surfeit of the sweetest things The deepest loathing to the stomach brings." All feelings, as such, but especially as " Pleasure-pains," are subject to tlie laws of Khythm and Kepetition. The ground for both of these laws is found in the most fundamental conditions of the life and activity of the nervous system itself. AVe have already seen that pleasurable and painful feelings depend largely upon those changes of vital condition and action which take place in the nervous end-organs as related to intensities of stimuli, but, more especially, in the cerebral organs which re- ceive and modify the nerve-commotions excited by these stimuli. Both repetition and rhythm have much to do with such vital condition and action. The energy of the nervous system is limited : it is exhausted by too frequent demands made upon it, especially to energize in the same way within the same nervous centers ; it is somewhat rhjH^hmically repaired, and then again exhausted. The intermittent character of the simplest and most primary pleasures and pains is apparent in the behavior of the infant ; it is illustrated by our experience throughout all adult life. Connected with this we find the tendency to pass quickly, and perhaps with an uncontrollable impulse, from one form of emotion to its opposite. " That extremes meet," says Hotfding, " is nowhere better exemplified than in the life of feeling, where the sharpest and most important contrasts are indigenous." In spite of the tendency of so-called " disposition " and of habit, to give steadiness to the life of emotion and sentiment, and in spite of all the equipment and skill which the most highly elaborate civilization and the most careful education provide, pleasure and pain continue to characterize all human life as the accompani- 204 FEELllSTG, AS PLEASURE-PAIN ments of the most various forms of feeling-. The " laughter amid tears," which Homer describes in Andromache, becomes more descriptive of all comialex affective phenomena as the develop- ment of the individual and of the race g-ocs on. Simple, unmixed, and frequently repeated similar pleasures or pains belong- to the relatively naive and childish stages of evolution. How all modern art, especially music and the drama, illustrates this truth, will appear more clearly later on. In its effect upon the life of mind, considered as so-called intellect and will, repetition seems subject to laws which admit of a tolerably definite determination. In reaction-time, as in- fluenced by fatigue and by habit, we have means for examining experimentally, within certain limits, this effect. The effect of repetition upon our elementary bodily pleasures and pains may be examined in the same way; but the examination does not yield equally satisfactory results. In trying to deal with the in- fluence of repetition upon all the higher and more complex forms of feeling, we speedily become lost in the intricacies of our prob- lem. Here each individual aiipears to be a law to himself. In general, however, the effect of repetition upon feeling differs, in important particulars, from its effect upon intellection and volition. "Mind" and "will" — in the narrower meanings of these terms — can be trained, by being made to repeat the func- tions belonging to them as faculties, in an orderly and calculable way. Feeling also is subject to control and modification through its dependence upon the functions of intellection and volition. But the immediate effect of repetition upon affective phenomena is by no means calculable. Such a difterence is partly due to the diftering effect of attention in the two classes of cases. By repeated discriminating attention our sensations and ideas, as respects their objective reference, are made clearer and stronger ; fatigue l)ecomes less, and the chances of a revulsion, or breaking away from habit, are diminished. But such attention itself tends to destroy, or greatly to modify, many of our most characteristic feelings with their tone of pleasure or of pain. The exhausting character of the emotions, as such, also influences the eftect of repetition ; a frequent indulgence, or a second indulgence com- ing too soon after a first indulgence of any passion or sentiment, is apt to have a painful tone ; it is apt also to be followed by re- vulsion to an op]iosite phase of the affective life. The necessity of reckoning with this freaky and changeful cliaracter of the feelings occasions much uncertainty and dilHcidty for education, for economic and social measures, and for all our dealings with one another and with ourselves as i^sychical beings. AVere it OSCILLATION OF FEELING 205 not ioY fee/i/iff, we could talk more confidently of " laws " of all psycliical life ; we could judge more exactly when similar states of such life would recur, and what would be the gross effect of repeating" similar forms of stimuli, and of securing recurrent like conditions of environment. ^ 10. Oscillation between bodily pleasures and i^ains, obscurely connected with i;nlocalized and uninterpreted sensations, is probably characteristic of the earliest psychical life of the infant. The affective element or aspect of consciousness (the "state of being" in which the subject t.s) undoubtedly is at first far more absorbing of psychic energy, as it were, than the intel- lectually discriminated objective aspect (the sensation which the subject has). Judging by all the signs, the two tones of pleasure and pain belong to the earliest experience in every case. In being born, and bathed, and subjected to all the first assaults of nature upon its various end-organs of sense, as well as in learning to digest its food, to use its limbs, to gratify or express its wants, etc., the child is kept alternating between pleasure and pain. It is, indeed, out of these primitive pleasure-pains, by influence from associated sensations and ideas, that the later more complex life of feeling- is developed. [For example, anger develops through aversion to objects which are connected with painful sensations ; affection for the nurse or mother is cradled in the pleasure due to warmth of the protecting arms or to the softness of the cheek or breast while held in contact. Impulses and desires are evolved in variety as the associations of pleasure-pains with dif- forent activities and ends become differentiated.] Feelings are not only recurrent, like all other psychic phenomena, be- cause they occur in time-form ; but they are also esi^ecially subject to jDecuIiar forms of rhythmic change. In the case of those "mixed " feelings, where agreeable and disagreeable factors are both present, the action of discriminat- ing attention may result in an oscillation between pleasure and pain. This experience is had in an interesting way when we are trying to determine whether we like a certain sensation-comiDlex of color, taste, smell, sound, etc., or not. Feelings of comfort or discomfort often recur in a somewhat rhythmic way ; or feeling may alternate between its two opposite tones in dependence on recurrent sensations or ideas. This is particularly marked in respect of some of the various forms of vital feeling. The periodic vital action of the nerves also manifests itself in periodic changes in the intensity of feeling. None of our pleasure-pains remain at a perfectly uniform ten- sion, as it were. They rise and fall in a more or less rhythmic way, with (at least) what has been called " an irregular periodicity." This alternate swing of the pendulum may carry the tone of affective consciousness back and forth over the lino of indifference ; feeling is then agreeable in one instant and disagreeable the next. The relative cessation of severe pains may be felt as pleasiu-e in a state where, by still longer contimiance, the same bodily or psychic processes become again the occasion of pain. One may even be pleased with one's toothache just now, if it is much less acute than it was an instant ago ; but to have it continue without further change would be not only uninteresting and monotonous, but unbearable pain. 206 FEELING, AS PLEASURE-PAIN More interesting still, i^sycliologically considered, are those alternations of feeling in which the passage is made from one complex sentiment or emotion, with its characteristic tone of i:>leasure or pain, to the so-called opposite sentiment or emotion. The liability to this in many forms of strong feeling is recognized both in polite literature and in popular maxims. Hence the exhortations of poets and moralists not to love too violently, lest hate or at least distaste should follow ; not to hope beyond measure, if we would not fall over into dread or despair ; not to enjoy anything in excess, unless we are willing to find it jDarticularly loathsome thereby ; not to revere and admire immoderately, for fear of coming unjustly to contemn and despise. In this respect all exijerience teaches us how much more stead- fast and trustworthy (calculable) are some disijositions than others. Yet the general and time-honored impression, that no one can " sustain " any one form of emotion or sentiment without risking a movement toward its opposite, is founded upon a vast amount of experience. The physiological basis for this kind of alternation in the life of feeling is obscure. Only in a very limited way can we claim that the nervous system is " rested " after exhaustion by one emotion with excitement in the ojjposite way ; for ap- parently all strong emotions alike involve an exhausting excitement of the same nervous centers. It may be said, however, that this general condition of great excitability, this hyper-agitation of the neural elements, which strong feeling requires, is a preparation for its own continuance. Any small change in the character of the stimulus finds the whole body of neural material in an explosive condition. But here the psychological explana- tion is much more obvious and satisfactory. The love of variety, the dislike of monotony (and so the pleasure which new emotional excitement of any kind tends to produce), the influence of intellectual, jesthetical, and ethical considerations (which are either designedly or unexi^ectedly evoked to " turn the tide," as we say), account for much of our experience here. But, after all, it seems necessary to admit a sort of unexplained and "natural" tendency of all forms of feeling, especially when somewhat strongly aroused, to i^ass over into their opposite. The principle of " rhythmic movement " is, then, one of a \evj extended although somewhat uncertain application. I 11. Besides the naturally rhythmic character of the occurrence of all feelings, with their tone of pleasure or pain, it should be noted that certain characteristic pleasures belong to the consciousness of rhythm itself. Periodically recurrent agreeable sensations and ideas have their pleasurable tone heightened by the feeling of their periodicity ; slight pains, and even to some extent pains of great intensity, are made less disagreeable if they are felt rhythmically. Such pleasures of rhythm are particularly noticeable in the exercise of the muscles and in the excitement of skin-sensations — with the quickening of circulation, and the grasji, loosening, and renewed grasp of attention \\\^o\\ the sensations and ideas occasioned by these bodily proc- esses. The pleasures of dancing, marching, swaying the body or moving any of its members rhythmically to and fro, are largely of this order. Tlie sing- ing of children as they trip along, the periodic musical grunting of sailors as they lift anchor, the mark-time of the coolies, or the pleasant wailing of the workmen as they drive piles, or handle timbers, in Japan, not only serve to guide the rhythm of movement and lighten the burden of the individual. EFFECT OF REPETITION 207 but also to express the satisfaction which the rhythmic movement itself oc- casions. The pains of muscular fatigue, abraded skin, and wearied organs of sense are lightened or even submerged by these pleasures of rhythm. The agreeable feelings produced by hearing the reading of poetry or the in- toning of services in unknown languages, or by periodically recurrent natural sounds (that, taken singly, are not interesting), belong in the same class. Every listener feels the pleasure with which the periodic recurrence of the air is welcomed in certain species of musical comiDositiou. Akin to this is the agreeable feeling with which we regard regularly recurring figures in orna- mentation as the eye meets them when sweeping over its easier lines of movement. Not even the pleasures of novelty, or the pains of monotony, can make us unaware of something not wholly to be approved of, when one or more unrhythmic numbers intervene in our rhythmic series. In the higher realms of ideation and of sesthetical approbation other considerations sup- press, in large measure, these jDotent pleasures of rhythm ; yet even in these realms their presence and power can generally be detected by a little careful analysis. " How sour sweet music is, When time is broke, and no proportion kept." ^ 12. It has already been said that the effect of repetUlon upon feeling, and upon its tone of pleasure or pain, does not follow the same laws as those which express our experience in the realm of cognition and will. Indeed, the very nature of our feelings as pleasure-pains is such that the iise of the •word " law " can be allowed only cum grano sails for the individual cases. Experiment in the psychological laboratory shows, for example, that while accommodation of the eye for perception from short to long distances im- proves qiiickly by practice, and retains through a long series of exiieiiments the benefits of practice (in spite of increasing pain), the accompanying pain- ful feeling caused by the repetition may grow in intensity until it becomes unbearable. Hypnotic subjects can rejieat the volitions necessary to keep an arm rigidly held out for an incredibly long time : not because they have more muscular strength or so-called strength of will than normal persons, but because they do not feel the resulting pains. In general, the somewhat rapid repetition of bodily pains of moderate intensity causes a cumulative effect in unbearable anguish, rather than a softening of their intensity under the law of habit. This is doubtless due to the spreading of that "confu- sion " of the neural activities, over wider areas and with a growing intensity, in which the painful character of the physiological condition consists. Repeated iiloasurable sensations of a low degree of intensity often accu- mulate an agreeable tone by the repetition itself. In the j^leasures of being gently stroked, of having the hair combed, of being soothed with humming bees or murmuring waters, of rolling sweet morsels under the tongue, or of being fanned with cooling breezes, this princijile of "summation" of feel- ing cooperates with that of rhythmic movement. But " jerky, irregular suc- cessions " of weak and otherwise pleasant stimuli are very disagreeable. On the other hand, feelings which have a strong tone of pleasure or pain are usually dulled by frequent repetition. Pleasurable feelings may thus be- come less and less pleasurable ; and bodily and mental acti\'ities of an intense 208 FEELING, AS PLEASURE-PAIN character, which when occasionally exercised are highly jileasurable, may on repetition become painful. It is one of the recognized safeguards and reliefs of snft'ering humanity that the sensibility is dulled, and the subject rendered less impressible by the frequent recurrence of strong bodily or mental pains. This principle, which is sometimes spoken of as the " decay of feeling," un- der the influence of " accommodation " and habit is, however, far less sim- ple and universal in its aijplication than is generally supposed. It is doubt- less based upon two physiological laws : (1) severe j^ain exhausts or devital- izes the nerve-centers and renders them less capable of strong reactions ; (2) the nervous elements and the entire nervous system adjust or " accommo- date " themselves to habitual forms of excitation, however j^ainful and in- jurious such forms may be. But these very physiological laws recall our attention to the basic fact that ' ' feeling " expresses the most individual es- sence of the neural and psychical life. It is / — without any objective refer- ence whatever — wlio suffer and enjoy; my pleasures and my pains express for the time being, what state I am in. In accordance with what has just been said, the effect of repetition upon feeling varies greatly in different persons, according to temperament, habits, and ideal aims. With some persons the same repeated sensations or ideas are, on account of the repetition, disagreeable, because they awaken feelings of monotony and painful craving of change; while new sensations and ideas (even those that, in themselves, are somewhat intensely disagreeable) because they are new, are invested with interest and felt as a jDleasurable change. With others, however, nothing is more disagreeable than to be compelled to see, hear, smell, taste, touch, or think about anything which is not already quite familiar. The pleasure-pains of such are eminently conservative. Their pleasures are the mild jileasures bred of familiarity ; their jiains are chiefly the negative pains of " missing " some sensation or idea from their daily round. If others agree with Charles Lamb in highly estimating the pleasures of first landing in a foreign country, they are more than content with the pleasures of always abiding in the ancestral home. To all music- lovers, in certain moods "the fascinating minor moiiotonous themes of the West Indian strains," which Gottschalk used to play, are more agreeable than are more varied themes. It is only in the case of the more ideal feelings, the i)leasure-]iains of our higher intellectual, sesthetical, and ethical life, that the effect of repetition can be reckoned with somewhat accurately. It is here that we can most confidently employ repetition for the training of the affective field of con- sciousness. In repeating the more mild and complex pleasures of this kind we are more sure to acquire a "taste" for them. And hero taste once acquired may develop into an absorbing passion, whose very nature is such that it permanently conti'ols the entire disijosition and conduct, and makes possible the welcome of frequently repeated affective phenomena of a high degree of intensity. The reverse of this process is that progressive triumph over the deterrent and enslaving power of pain which is brought about by the pursuit of ideal aims. All our Feelin^-s, with tlieir tone of pleasure or pain, come under the two principles of Diffusion and Association. The DIFFUSION AND ASSOCIATION 209 pliysiological preconditions of feeling arc such that they tend to ditiuse themselves more and more widely, as the stimulation which occasions them is continued. Every state of predoininat- hujly pleasurcibU or pah^ful eviotion tends to involve the tchole area of the brain, and to influence a larger 7iujnber of the outlying organs througli the sup?'C7ne control which this central organ has over (dl the bodily functions. Even our intellectual and volitional processes are "felt" as having" a reactionary influence on the organs of sense, and on those internal organs whose condition and functions determine so largely the basis of bodily feeling, of disposition, mood, etc. In order to describe and explain the influence of " association " (in the more precise use of the word) upon feeling, it is first neces- sary to consider how, and how far, aflective phenomena admit of being ideated ; and w'hat are the connections maintained between these x>lienomena and those of cognition and volition. This subject will be examined later on. But we now employ the term " association " in a vaguer, less correct, and yet indispen- sable way. Many of our apparently most fundamental pleasure- pains have become connected with sensations and ideas by proc- esses of " fusion " or primary association. The connection has indeed become lost out of consciousness ; it was, nevertheless, however " natural " it now appears, originally established by some particular associative activity. Thus, not a few tastes, smells, sounds, and skin-sensations, are immediately felt as pleasurable or painful, with various degrees of intensity (either lower or higher), because of some forgotten experience. The in- fant's taste for sweet, for example, may be largely acquired by connection with the mixed pleasures of being nursed on milk of a delicately saccharine flavor. We find certain simple curves and figures pleasant, or ugly, without recognition of the fact that this is due to the slightly agreeable or disagreeable muscu- lar sensations evolved by mastering them with a moving point of regard. Long before we are capable of making our owti pleasure-pains data of self-knowledge, these processes of difiu- sion and fusion have operated to complicate even the more primitive forms of conscious affective phenomena. ? 13. The amount of wide-spveading feeling which some sensations of a low degree of intensity occasion is out of all proportion to their immediate excitatoiy effect. The nausea which follows certain slight disagreeable tastes and smells, the general depression which small disappointments or re- buttals often occasion, the effect on the whole tone of our experience wrought by aromatic flavors or by stimiilation from ammonia or eau de cologne, the con-\Tilsious of mirth caused by tickling or by small bits of 14 210 FEELITTG, AS PLEASURE-PAIlSr grotesque imagery, etc., arc instances of this truth. Such effects are cTouot- less due to what Mr. Sully ' has called " organic consensus." But this phrase only exijresses the general fact that the entire nervous mechanism acts as a unity of molecular mechanisms ; it cannot suffer neural commotion in one part without being affected throughout. To this vague general state- ment it must be added that, since a " semi-chaotic surj^lusage " of neural excitation is characteristic of feeling, the rapid and wide diffusion of this kind of excitation is a resulting characteristic. A little pain or pleasure felt, " disturbs " the neural mechanism in a more expansive way than a large amount of sensation or ideation with no marked characteristic tone of feel- ing. Strong emotions and passions, where the whole organism is robust and healthy, may even exercise a purgative and sanitary influence. Vigorous Martin Luther tells us of the i^hysical benefit he received from sometimes "getting mad " to the very core of his being. The passions of love, ambition, devotion to art, etc. , not infrequently raise to a higher condition of function all the neural and psychic energies of the man who yields to them. § 14. "We have already had occasion to note how the simpler factors of psychic states become fused and modified by the development of function, in the case of the " sensation-complexes." This fusion and absorption of the single factors into one complex resultant lies far below all "association of ideas " properly so called. It is indeed, an important basis of all intellect- ual development ; inasmuch as assimilation and discrimination must go hand in hand in the evolution of mental life. Popular language notes the application of this jirinciple to feeling when it tells of " being attracted " or " repelled " without knowing why ; of " some-how-or-other " liking this and disliking that. The i^erson who, on first trial, pronounces against the taste of olives, may have to be told that perhaps this is because they "suggest" the taste of leather. All colors, when iminfluenced by association and con- trast, are probably to be regarded as i^leasant, if not too intense ; b;it to most persons certain colors seem " naturally " disagreeable. The use of tlie word " association " indicates liow far from what is truly simi^le and iDrimitive in the life of feeling* we have already departed. TVe must therefore now turn to the consider- ation of other elementary forms of mental processes in order that we may understand the higher forms of affective phenomena. [Among the recent general works on psychology accessible in English, the treatment of feeling is most satisfactory in the following three : Hoft'ding, pp. 2:il-;i07. Sully : The Human Mind, II., pp. 1-171. Baldwin: Feeling and Will, pp. 8U-379. For the psychol- ogy of bodily pleasures and pains — see Bain: The Emotions and Will, pp. l-fiS. Spencer: Principles of Psychology, I., § 123 f., and Marshall, articles in Mind, Ixiii. and Ixiv. Spe- cial monographs of value are Beaunis : Les Sensations internes. Bouillicr : Du Plaisir et de la Douleur. Kiirncr : Das Kfirperliche Gof iihl. Kiilpc : Zur Thcorie d. sinnlichen Gefiihle. Horwicz: Zur Natnrgeschichte d. Gofiihle. Braubach : Psychologic d. Gefiihlcs. Von Ehrenfels: Fiihlen n. Wollen. Nichols: The Origin of Pleasure and Pain. Paulhan : Lea Ph(''n()menes aflVctifs, etc. Jnngniann : Das Gcmiith, etc. Nitsche : Vcrsuch einer einheitlichen Lehre von d. Gefiihlen (especially comjiact and sngijcstive). Steinitzer : Gemiithsbcwegungen. Lctourneau : Physiologic dcs Passions. Lchmaun : Die Haupt- gesetze d. menschl. Gefiihlslcbens.] ' The Human Mind, II., p. 3C f. CHAPTER XI. CONATION AND MOVEMENT There is obvious need of a M-ord which shall stand for that third aspect of, or factor in, all psychic facts which is neither sensation or ideation with their objective reference, nor feeling regarded as passive condition of being. This need is not satis- factorily met by the word "Will." For, first, this term is sur- rounded by ethical and theological prejudices from which it is difficult to free it; accordingly it is ill adapted to designate such a primitive psychical phenomenon. But, second, in reality the will is a development conditioned u^oon a course of varied experiences. For these reasons we have already chosen the word " conation," to correlate with sensation and feeling, in the most fundamental use of the latter terms. Here again that must be said of conation, as such, which has been found to be true of sensation and feeling. Conation, con- sidered as simply this and nothing more (without reference to the guidance of discriminative consciousness for the reception or rejection of some objective element and without motif from the spur of feeling (or coloring from its tone) is an abstraction of psychological science. Consciousness gives no experience of simple unmixed conation. ) Closely connected with this similarity of the three fundamental forms of all psychic life, an important contrast emerges to view when we compare conation with sensa- tion and feeling. We have been led to distinguish Jcinds of sensation and feeling ; but psychic facts, so long as they are considered simply in their conative aspect, have only one kind. The most radical distinction which can be made among dif- ferent primary conations applies rather to the connected phe- nomena of presentation and feeling than to the conations them- selves. The differences belong only to the occasions on which, or the circumstances under which, the different conative phe- nomena manifest themselves. As such, there is only one sort of conation. The psychology of conation, considered as a primitive proc- 212 CONATION AND MOVEMENT ess iu mental life, is, therefore, of necessity, very meagre. Here science can do little more than to notice the universal psychic fact, conjecture its physiological conditions, and point out its place and connections in the scheme of fundamental motor ac- tivities. It is only when intelligent grasp and afiective appre- ciation of ideal aims (in the most general meaning of the word " ideal ") have developed, that psychology can return to the conative aspect of all. josychic facts and establish a doctrine of the development of will and character. None the less is it true, however, that the presence of the aspect, or factor, of " conation " must be recognized in all psychic facts, and iu all development of psychic faculty. To be the subject of any iDsychosis is always — to speak roughly — to be doing something. Every sensation and idea, every phase of changeful feeling may be said (with no immeaning figure of speech) to furnish the soul with a challenge to arouse itself and " act out its own nature," " or express its will." Nay, more : so far as we can obtain evidence concerning the very beginnings of mental life, coetaneous with the first having of sensations and the most primitive experience of being affected with pleasurable or painful feeling, spontaneity of active consciousness, psychical doing and striving, may be discerned. Speaking broadlj^ and using terms whose meaning and justification will be considered later on, we may say :(We never know nor feel, that we do not also will. I Conation (or volition) enters into all perception, memory, imagination, thought. No state of suffering or happi- ness is so passive or so " overwhelming " that it is not, bj' the conative activity which accompanies all conscious life, accepted or striven against, and thus modified by that spontaneity of action which belongs to the nature of the subject of this life. Conation is uniformly connected with two most important classes of effects : These are (1) the movements of the bodily members ; and (2) the determination of the direction and amomit of attention — the fixation and distribution of psychic energy iu the so-called field of consciousness. To test these statements, let one ask one's self this question : Besides " having " a great va- -I'iety of sensations and ideas, and " being affected " with manifold changing feeling — What can I do ? The naive answer to this question will be found to resolve itself into claims corresponding to such statements as follows : " I can make certain bodily move- ments as I vMl ; " and, " I can attend, within certain limits, to v;liat I will." Scientific psychology refines, explains, and circumscril^es these statements by analyzing the psychic facts to which they appeal, and by specifying the organic conditions ATTENTION AS CONATION 213 on the basis of which these facts occur ; but the import of the statemeuts remaius essentially unchanged under all scientific examination. Bodily movement and the fixation and distribution of atten- tion, however, are themselves most closely interrelated and mu- tually dependent. This important truth is not sufficiently recog- nized in au}^ merely popular estimate. Indeed, if we include, on the motor side, all so-called " automatic " excitation of the cere- bral motor elements, and all inchoate movements and tendencies to movement, or conditions of " tension " and " strain " in the external motor apparatus, it may be claimed that attention and movement are probably always correlated. It has already been found that acts of primary attention are strictly correlated with initation of the striated muscle-fiber ; and hence the claim of some writers, already referred to : Attention " acts only upon muscles and throvigh muscles " (see p. 67 f .). Let but attention be directed toward any sensation or sensuous object, and at once the organ through which the object of sense is presented, or the area of the organ which receives the sensory stimulation, is thrown into a changed motor condition. Probabh^ also mental images cannot be attended to without the realization of changes both in the correlated cerebral centers and in the corresponding external organs. Again, the direction of attention to any par- ticular part of the motor apparatus, or even to the mental image representative of any iDarticular movement as p)ossible to be exe- cuted by any part, immediately tends to realize itself in corre- sponding actual movement. On the other hand, all forms of or- ganic movement, whether of the bodily members as masses or in the form of molecular changes in the so-called motor areas of the cerebrum, tend to excite and to fix attention. Moreover, ^11 primary attention,) regarded as spontaneous psychic activity, however occasioned or influenced,ljnay be said to have its conative side) Indeed, thus regarded, attention is preeminently conative — an elementary, and yet true "act of will." In other vroYds,\.aitent{on regarded as active consciousness implies conation f) and i?iasinuch as primary attention helongs to every field of consciousness, and attention is a most general form of all mental life, conation, as the activity of attention, helongs to every ^ psychosis. To this conative aspect of all mental life corresponds all centrally originated and centrally modified or directed move- ment of the bodily organs. Thus the early development of Avill is primarily conditioned upon the increasingly complicated and purposeful fixation and distribution of attention with its corre- lated movement of the bodily organs. 214 CONATION AND MOVEMENT ^ 1. The employment of the word " conation " as the correlate of sensa- tion and feeling in the triple division of elementary psychic functions is not without objections. Like every other term it is liable to be misunderstood, or, if clearly understood, it may be misapplied or its appropriateness alto- gether denied. We choose to accept it and limit its use on account of the necessities of the case. The psychological distinction between intelligent and so-called blind " appetencies " or iisychic forthjouttings (op«'^eis-) is as old as Aristotle. The recognition of "exertive or couative powers," as corre- sponding to fundamental distinctions that jjertain to all psychic facts, we have already seen was promulgated by Kant. The English ethical writer, Cudworth, in " A Treatise on Free Will," speaks of the " hegemonic of the soul" as acquiring more and more power over the feelings by "conatives and endeavors." Hamilton,' after discussing and rejecting various other terms, adopts the word "conation" as covering both desires and volitions. The use of the term here adopted is both more wide and general in one di- rection, and more restricted in other directions, than either of the foregoing uses. " Desires " are complex psychical phenomena, implying at least an obscure presentation of something desirable to be had, and especially the arousement of feeling in one direction and in an "influential " way. Desires are therefore more predominatingly presentative and affective than are merely conative ijhenomena. And although we undoubtedly designate by "volitions" (as distinguished from mere "wishes" or " desires "), those jjsychoses in which the conative element is predominant, unless we exclude from this term its implication of the conception and selection of an end, it is wider in some directions and narrower in others than the term conation. (The term " active consciousness " has been suggested as the equivalent of conation considered as the third of the three fundamental and coordinate modes of mental life.j Thus Sully" says : " The most obvious common characteristic in this variety of actions or conative jn'ocesses is, as already suggested, that peculiar element which is best marked off as active conscious- ness." This phrase, indeed, suggests a most important truth respecting the conative aspect of all mental life. This truth is that of the fundamental, irreducible, and indefinable fact of conscious psychic activity itself. The phrase seems, however, to introduce a distinction between actions and motor activity which is somewhat cohfusiug and diflicult to keej^ in mind. Even the most passive form of suffering which I " undergo " is an action, a mode of the behavior of the psychical subject of states. But besides its passive aspect — its being a state which I undergo — the conative aspect of all suffering is emphasized when I consider that it is / which undergo this suffering — by "bracing up" against it, or resisting it, or by patiently or imi:)atiently enduring it, or by striving to free myself from it, by withdraw- ing the body from the painful irritation or distracting attention from the pain. As Hoffding has said : " We speak of volition whenever we are conscious of activity, and are not merely receptive. But .... we never are purely receptive." Another writer ^ has proposed an analysis of " motor consciousness " as the starting point for the discussion of Will. But, strictly speaking, motor ' Lectures on Metaphysics, p. 12T f. ^ The Humau >Iind, U., p. 173. 3 Baldwin : Feeling and Will, p. 2S0 f CONATION AS PSYCHIC FACT 215 consciousness is tingoJ through and through with sensations of motion and bodily feelings ; it is by no means pure conative consciousness, although it properly implies a dominant element of such consciousness. The vrord '"impulse" (Irieb) might be substituted for conation (it would be jn-ef- erable as the less technical word), were it not needed to designate certain more complex mental states, akin to desire, which emphasize other factors than the strictly conative. g 2. The psychological equivalent of the term " conation" can only be rec- ognized ; it cannot be defined or reduced to anything simpler by no matter how subtle and searching analysis. Reflective consciousness can be best as- ^sted to the act of recognition by describing what is not meant by conation, as we have chosen to employ this term. Therefore, first, no unconscious 2)rocess of bodily or mental life is here designated. We must be warned, then, against both the metaphysical and the biological or physiological use of the terms " conation," "impulse," "volition," "will." Concerning the question whether Will is indeed the ground of the world, its real being (so Schopenhauer), or the core of human i:)ersonality (as " the heart of the heart" — so the theologian Miiller), scientific psychology does not in- quire. Neither does it, so long as it avoids metaphysical implications, ask whether a psychical principle, like the faculty of willing, can stand in re- lations of a vein causa to physiological processes in the brain or elsewhere. It simply finds conative consciousness given as an undoubted factor in determining the amount and direction of attention, the control of the mental train, and of the movements of the bodily organism. As j^sycJiological sci- ence our investigation accepts this ordering of phenomena ; it is no less fundamental and conclusive than are those data upon which physics strives to establish the principles of the conservation and correlation of energy. Moreover, all the information which cerebral physiology can furnish regard- ing the processes that accompany or — if one please — underlie conation, voli- tion, striving, etc., consists only of conjectural preconditions for this i^ri- mary and indubitable psychological fact. [We turn aside barely an instant to affirm that the more acute and prolonged metaphysical analysis becomes the more clear is the conviction that the most highly developed notions of "Reality," "Cause," and " Energy " (" conserved " and " correlated "), with- in the physical realm, are themselves dependent upon this veiy datum of conation, or active consciousness, belonging primarily to man's mental life. These notions cannot consistently, therefore, in the name of so-called physi- cal science deny the existence and validity of the psychological fact on which they all repose.] But, second (and positively), <^j conation we cto mean to designate a primary and indubitable datum of consciousness./ To repeat the truth .which came before us while studying the nature of attention : — All psychic life manifests itself to the snhject of that life as bein^, in one of its fundamental * aspects, its own spontaneous activiti/. All complex lisychic facts are fully described only when we add to the phrases — I have siach sensations, and rec- ognize such objects, and feel affected so and so — this other equally i)erti- nent and necessary declaration : / now act in this or that way. Prior to the debate which Materialism and Determinism excite, and equally indisinitable in whichever way this debate may be decided, is our immediate recognition •it 216 CONATION AND MOVEMENT of tliis datum of self-activity. Conscious activity-, as tinged by tlie feeling of being resisted, is called " striving." Conative consciousness is, therefore, at the same time spontaneity of activity, and consciousness of activity. This is equally true whether the striving, as regarded from the point of view of the l^ractical ends aimed at, be successful or not. "Hold still!" the mother says to the child, or the surgeon to the patient writhing under pain. " I am trying to," is the reply ; and it matters not whether the phrase appended be — " but I cannot," or " and I will." § 3. Like all other fundamental forms of i^sychical life, conation dif- fers in the degree of its manifestation within wide ranges of magnitude, and in dependence upon constitution, temjDerament, mood, habit, cultiire, etci It is partly this variation to which we refer when we speak of men of " weak wills" and "strong wills," "steady purposes" and "fickleness of jmr- pose," etc. It is the amount and persistency or changeableness in time of conation which forms the basis for the different " kinds " of will so called — in so far as classification has to do at all with the conative asjiect of con- sciousness itself. Otherwise the development of will and the formation of character dei^ends upon the knowledge attained as to diiiereut ends, and as to the means of reaching them, and upon the kind and amount of feeling aroused by contemi^lation of these ends. While here, as in every domain of mental life, the great princiijle of habit takes an unceasing and conspicuous ^he Pliysiolog-ical Conditions of Conation, so far as science can disentaug-le them, seem to lie in that " automatic " molecular activity which belongs to every living- cell, but peculiarl}^ to the central nervous masses.; The sentence which we have already quoted from physiology concerning- the amoeba — it "has a will of its own " — indicates that certain molecular changes in the lowest living forms appear to have an altogether mysterious internal origin. It is indeed difficult to make sure that any par- ticular form of internal commotion does not arise through irri- tation of the surface by stimuli belonging to the environment. To prove a negative here is always difficult. Some writers on physiology strive to explain all the movements, not only of the simpler amoeboid bodies but even of the most complex organ- isms, as falling somehow under the term " reHex." But he who has watched even an amoeba under the microscope, and noted the unexpected, inexplicable, " self-originated " character of much of its motor activity, will probably be gravely dissatisfied with such easy-going explanations. The more careful and unprej- udiced our study of the behavior of micro-organisms becomes the more difficult do we find it to bring all the phenomena of their movements under terms of a molecular mechanism that is excited to re-act solely by the application of stimuli to its pe- riphery. As the student of i)hysiology rises higher in the scale of life, he finds the number and complication of the phenomena -*: PHYSIOLOGICAL CONDITIONS OF CONATION 217 that baffle explanation by way of merely reflex-motor hypoth- eses greatly increased. According" to a general biological law, the constitution and functions of the higher nervous centers become more important and determinative for the whole realm of bodily and of psychic life, as we ascend the animal series. At the head of this series stands man. The supreme nervous centers of man arc at the same time most intricately organized as physical structures, and also, relatively, most influential for the control of all the physi- cal and mental development of the animal.X Accordingly, the "automatic" (or centrally originated) functions of the human brain are far more comprehensive and controlling) than are the automatic activities of any other nervous mechanism. J In other words, what the h'ain of a human being is, and Avhai; it does of itself — so to speak — has far more influence in determining the character and the development of the entire life of the individual, lan in the case of any other animal. "'Ifp'ife not wil^ perfect certainty but with a high degree of pi'cJibabilitJ^that we are able to say: "automatic" {or centrally or'uJ^ited^i),t^llvqas activity is the peculiar phynical correlate of active consciousness , of-'dhe conative element h^ilLpsychic lif<^ The en- larged amount of this form of neural activity in man's brain cor- responds, on the physical side, to his superior intelligent control over his own bodily and mental evolution. The " automatically " acting brain and the " autonomous " (or self-active and controll- ing) mind may be said to be correlated. How, exactly, we shall express the terms of this correlation — whether as reciprocal cause and effect, or as two "aspects" of one entity, metaphysics must inquire, and determine, if it can. But scientific psychology simply recognizes the nervous "automatism " of the brain as ap- parently the indispensable physical condition of that conative element which consciousness recognizes as present in all psychic facts. On the one hand, scientific physiology vaguely accounts for this automatism by speaking of the constitution and vital functions of the brain, the changing character of the blood supply, the influence (perchance) of mind over body, etc. (Dn the other hand, scientific psychology recognizes the presence of conation as an unexplained psychic fact — itself needed to ex- plain the possibility and the character of all truly human psychical development.) 1 4. By " reflex " changes physiology understands those which are brought about in the striated muscles, vaso-motor apparatus, etc., by ap- plying stimuli to the periphery, and having the nerve-commotions thus in- duced pass, by the afferent nerve-tracts, to the central organs ; whence they 218 CONATION AND MOVEMENT are tlien "reflected" backward by efferent nerve-tracts, to the periphery again. But, especially in the case of the more highly organized animals, this so-called " reflection " always depends for its character upon the structure and condition of the central organs themselves. However, in a large class of such changes the reflex process takes i^lace with the regularity of a ma- chine ; its kind and amount are determined by the kind and amount of the stimulation, by the place of the application, etc. On the contrary, by "au- tomatic " changes are meant those induced by nerve-commotions, which originate in the central organs themselves, and then jaass down the efferent nerve-tracts. The excitement of the central organs may be conjecturally as- cribed to any one of several causes ; all that is necessary, in order to justify our speaking of it as "automatic," is that the kind and quantity of nerve- commotion started should be determined by conditions lying within the central organs. In all the vertebrate animals, including man, the spinal cord is the type of complicated reflexes. This fact may be determined experimentally by severing the cord from the brain in the case of the lower animals, and then observing what functions this disconnected cord can perform. Esj)ecially in man's case, is it found that the control of the cord, and of the functions of the lower parts of the brain, depends upon the higher cerebral centers. Within these centers the automatic activities arise which so largely de- termine what shall be done by the lower and inferior portions of the neiTous system, and so by the entire body. But, further, modern experimental physiology has discovered that certain particular areas of the cerebral hemispheres are related in a special way to the particular classes of sensations, and to the complicated and purposeful movements of certain parts of the body. Thus it has shown that deflnite and intelligent conation requires the integrity of these areas. It has, however, discovered no one area, or center, which sustains a special and unique rela- tion to all conation, as such. ("We seem warranted, then, in saying that there is no special organ of will ; but that wlieiiever conation exists in consciousness then, at the particular cerebral area corresponding to the definite characters of the conation (the movement of a particular jjart of the body, or the focusing of attention in a given direction, etc.), ^^ automatic" nervous action is taking place. ) I 5. Regarded objectively — that is, as mere movement without any i^sychi- cal antecedent or equivalent — these "automatic" (or centrally originated) changes of the bodily members are only analogous to so-called acts of will. They require time for the elaboration (analogue of " decision") of the proc- ess which results in movement ; the nature of the movement, and even the question whether there will be movement at all (analogue of " choice "), is always relatively uncertain. For example, it can be predicted how, and how nnich, the decapitated " frog-preparation" will move the limbs under differ- ent stimulations of acid or of the electrical current.' Leave to the frog its medulla oblongata and optic lobes, and it will croak, when stroked, with the regularity of a music-box ; it will also perform, in the most orthodox fashion, many remarkable feats of co-ordinating the muscles. But one can never tell ' For a statement and discussion of the laws of such " reflexes," see the author's Elements of Physiological Psychology, Poi-t i., chapter iv. PSYCHOLOGICAL EXPRESSION FOR CONATION 219 whether the full-brainecl frog will leap or croak in response to stimulation ; ami if it leaps at all, one is in even more doubt as to the direction and amount of its movement. If the legs of the normal animal be dipped in dilute acid, the brain and the cord will be longer (more " deliberate ") about removing them than will the cord alone. Thus also the pigeon, whose cere- bral hemisi)heres have been removed, differs from the normal bird no less in respect to the amount of "spontaneity" which its movements show than in respect to deficient sensations and intelligence. In general, one can predict far better what molecular nervous mechanisms that are largely or purely re- flex, that have no "will" or "pleasure," will do; but when, or how, the su- perior central organs will act automatically, will will, or will please to do — this is quite another matter. For although the language just employed is figurative and the facts described are, perhaps, not psychological phenomena at all, it correctly expresses our statements concerning the real, but as yet quite inexplicable, physiological basis of conation. (Jrhe fully developed Psychological Expression for Conation is, then, as follows : I act and I know that I act4-this as truly as I see, or hear, or feel pleasure or i^ain, and know that I have the sensation, or am subject to the pleasure or jDain. For 2)Sj/chol- ogy, active consciousness, is identical with consciousness of activity. Hence the motto : " In "Willing, we work, but "Wishes play zviih us." Indeed, if any statement, based upon purely psy- chological grounds and having to do with the description and explanation of facts of consciousness, as such, can be depended upon, it is that which affirms the continual presence of conation as consciousness of activity. Indeed, here we reach the most fundamental of all psj'chic phenomena. Whatever the sensation may he, among the great variety of all possible sensations, and lohether the dominant tone of the infantile conscioxisness he for the moment pleasurable or pain fid, (conscious striving enters into all the most priraary psychical states.^ Now, since " automatism " appears to be the peculiar physio- logical condition of this spontaneity of psychical activity, (it is sometimes proposed to consider conation, or active consciousness, as the consciousness of the automatic (or centrally initiated) nervous processes of the brain. / But furthermore, these processes result in the "innervation" of the organs of sense in connection with the fixation of attention, of the muscles of the body that, by contraction and relaxation, carry the limbs through space. Centrally originated jjrocesses, which flow down the outgoing nerve-tracts and " innervate " (and so induce motion in) the pe- ripheral parts, are called " motor " processes ; and the cerebral areas where these motor processes are set up are also called " motor." Hence the much debated question whether the con- 220 COl^ATION AND MOVEMENT scioiisness of activity is a consciousness of " motor " processes of " innervation " in the centers of the brain. Our position toward this much debated question requires mention of the following three points : (1) jTo speak as though any form of mental life were a "consciousness of" a nervous process, whether centrally or peripherally originated, is to use a misleading figure of speech.] It can scarcely be too often re- peated : the nervous processes are regarded by psychology only as tlie physical preconditions of those facts with which it properly deals ; the latter are the facts of consciousness, as such. The question, therefore, requires to be restated, as follows : JDoes the character of consciousness depend at all ujjon the automatic cerebral processes ?fand, if we answer this question affirmatively — Is not conation, or the consciousness of activity (the " doing " aspect of all psychoses) chietly correlated with these i^eculiar processes ? Now, both these questions may, with good show of reasons, be answered affirmatively, (2) 'The " feeling of effort, V or the consciousness of exerting ourselves in the " accomplish- ment of something," as this feeling exists in all our developed mental life, is exceedingly complex/ It doubtless contains a large admixture from peripheral sources. The sensations of ten- sion, .strain, and motion, which blend with all our active con- sciousness, give to it an emotional character. They make our movements, and our attempts at movement, inferesfhig ; because they are tinged with pleasure-pains of various kinds. Their im- portance in the development of will, of conduct, and of character, is very great, and will be considered later on. But (3) our entire active consciousness, our awareness that we are doing something, is_?wy^jwholly a compound of sensations originating in the con- dition of the external organs. In other words, in all motor con- sciousness there is a conscious conative element lohicli is the correlate of the automatic motor nervous 2yrocesses that innei'vatc the organs of sense and of 7notio?i. Closely connected with the iiosition just taken is another of equal psychological importance. In the momentary flow of con- sciousness, and in the larger history of psychical development, conation is indissolubly linked Avith motor changes. All my ex- perience, so long as I consider it from the psychological point of view, affirms : — I will ; and innervation of the organs of sense or of motion follows, hecanse I will. Or — to state the case as is fitting at the present stage of our discussion^^r?<^'?'/^'<3 consciousness, with its dominant of conation, is regnlarhj foUoiced hy modif cations of sensation and feeliruf ^ and upon the basis of such constantly recurring experience all the intelligent development of mental CONATION AS DETERMINATIVE 221 life is based. Conation, as distinsruished from sensation and feeling", is then a determining' factor wliicli must constantly be reckoned with in the description and explanation of psychic phe- nomena. [This position is forever true in scientific psychology', whatever the metaphysics of physics and physiology, on the one hand, or of theology, on the other hand, may theoretically con- clude as to the meaning and propriety of the word " cause " when applied to relations between body and mind.] I Conation as a determining factor, wdiether with reference to the fixation and distribution of attention or to the movement of the larger masses of the body, operates in two directions. It determines positively or it determines negatively. It controls both by incitement and by inhibition, f Thus, in the develop- ment of purposeful volition, and in the choice of ideal ends, it comes about that I will either to attend or not to attend, either to move or not to move. I, moreover, consciously select, as it were, and innervate the difterent organs of sense and groups of muscles connected with the various movable members of the bod}'. As the different mental images, ideas, and conceptions free themselves more and more from their more obvious sensu- ous bases, and the aesthetical and ethical feelings develop, I may also subject the entire mental train and bodily conduct to remote and deliberately chosen ends. § 6. It is doubtful whether there are any experimental means of deciding beyond question how far our so-called "feeling of efltbrt " is determined by centrally initiated and outgoing motor processes. The negative answer to the question is given by writers like Ferrier, James, Miinsterberg, G. E. Midler, and others ; the affirmative is maintained by Bain, Wundt, Beaunis, Preyer, and many more.' We have already ranged ourselves with the latter authorities. Following are, in part, the proofs of this view : (1) From the earliest dawn of consciousness to the highest point of mental develoioment no piireJi/ " reflex" and no j^iireh/ " automatic " nervous processes take place in the brain. These two — i.e., the processes i^erijiherally excited and des- tined to return upon the external organs after having passed through the central organs, and the processes set uii in the latter organs themselves as tlie result of intra-organic stimulation — are ceaselessly conjoined. Exj^eri- ment can never disentangle them. No brain ever reacts on sensory im- ' This inquiry hag been conducted with an enersry and warmth somewhat proportionate to its importance. It will be seen, on a little reflection, how really great this importance is for those who hold to the strictest interpretation of the theory of correlate processes in brain and mind. The af- firmative answer seems to snch to contradict the attempt of those who give the negative answer, viz., the attempt to reduce everj-thing in the psychical life to a sensuous and, as it were, passive basis. The works just referred to are chiefly the following : Ferrier : The Functions of the Brain (Isted.), chap. ix. James : Feeling of Effort. Miinsteiberir : Die Willcnshandlung, pp. 62 and 67 ff. Miiller : Pttucer's Archiv, xlv. (18S9). p. SO f. Bain : The Senses and the Intellect, p. .59 f., and The Emotions and the Will, p. 303 f. Wundt : Physiolog. Psychologic, U., p. 463. Beaunis : Les Sen- sations internes, chap. si. Preyer : Mind of the -Child, I , p. 201 f. Bastian : Rev. Philosoph., 1S92. 222 CONATIOX AND MOVEMENT pulses irrespective of its own vital constitution and intraorganic condition. This is the same thing as saying that all reflexes which pass through the brain involve automatic elements. The latter, the self-originated elements, are the more imi^ortant the more complex the brain is and the more highly developed it becomes. (2) Automatic activities, having a varied motor outcome, undoubtedly take place in the central organs, especially of all the more highly organized animals. In proof, Bain has emphasized (pertinently, if iinduly) the vast amount of random activity, the ceaseless moving of limbs — kicking, striking out, contortion, squirming, etc. — of the newly born child. We cannot, indeed, separate these movements from the excitations of sense which are storming every area of its body. But Preyer IDoints out that even the embryonic child frequently moves under circum- stances such as that no possible sensory impulses would seem to account for it. Other important biological facts do not accord with the theory which holds that all movement originates in sensory impulses. (3) The attempt strictly to mark off from one another the sensory and the motor elements in the brain is not successful. But this very fact tends to establish the proi^osition that those centrally originated changes which stand just antecedent to the down-going nervous imjiulses, by which the end-or- gans are innervated, have their characteristic effect upon consciousness. It is to them that we look for the conative elements of consciousness, the awareness of that activity which, in expei-ience, is followed by motor effects. To suppose that such johysiological and cerebral " innervation "-processes have no correlate in consciousness is to go contrary to all that we know con- cerning the physiological conditions of all consciousness. (4) Various ex- perimental proofs exist of the view that active consciousness (improperly called " sensations of innervation ") dejoends upon those centrally initiated neiwous processes which are connected with the motor innervation of the end organs. On the whole, the evidence seems conclusive, although there is no single item which may not be disputed. Among favorable facts, the following are important : {a) The whole complex feeling of effort does not appear to run parallel in intensity with the actual movement accom- plished by contracting any of the muscles ; and this indicates an element in this feeling which is of purely central origin, (b) Subjects afflicted with peripheral paralysis still have the feeling of effort in s;ich manner as to imply that it is partially of central origin, (c) The extreme rapidity with which some minute voluntary adjustments, like those of the larynx, have to be performed seems to indicate that " the outgoing currents must be measured out in advance of our feeling of these effects." ' (r/) The dimin- ished eflSciency of our muscles when we are fatigued by rejieated volitions seems to be due rather to cerebral exhaustion than to exhaustion of the muscles, (e) In judging of the difference between movements willed and those actually executed we seem, in some mysterious way, to be dependent on our estimate of the " impulse to action" even more than upon our esti- mate of the actual movements of the active organ. (/) Another observer * finds evidence of the truth of this view in the "discovery that right- handedness develops in infancy only under conditions of muscular effort." ' On this point see A. D. Waller : Brain, 1S91, pp. 189-249. - Baldwin : eee Science, svl., 1890, pp. 247 and 302. CONATION AS DETERMINATIVE 223 Tliis fact must be duo to tlio cliikTs vaguo consciousnoss, centrally origi- iiivtod, of greater motor readiness, or " higher i:)ressure " toward outward dis- charge, in the use of the right arm than of the left. "We conclude, then, that while our knowledge of the amount and direction of the motor effect is mainly due to sensation-complexes which originate in the condition of the external organs, wo have also a consciousness of self- activity whose physiological correlate is the central process of innervation. In the somewhat figurative language of M. Fouill'de,' " the feeling of cere- bral discharge" is an element of prime importance in " the appreciation of energy deployed." But confessedly we localize the movement resulting and judge its extent and direction largely through sensations of muscles, joints, and skin. ?i 7. From the psychological point of view' (as distinguished from the doubtful metaphysical or physiological points of view) active consciousness, or conation, is a factor e.rpevienced as determining changes in the imme- diately following psychic facts. The order of the psychic facts, of the changes as they appear in consciousness, docs not, however, inform us accu- rately as to the order of the physiological processes. Thits, in the rapid per- formance of all impulsive and habitiial movements a large part of what goes on is purely reflex, or unconscious automatic, physiological processes. This part has, that is to say, no discernil)le representative in consciousness. It is done /or the psychic life by a physical automaton rather than in or by the psychic life. When this automaton once becomes trained under conscious psychical influences, it joerforms many highly complicated and purposeful motor changes, without "troubling" the flow of consciousness to pay atten- tion to them. At any time, however, these motor changes may break over into the flowing stream of consciousness and strongly affect its entire char- acter as respects sensation, feeling, and conation. Thus one winds one's watch unconsciously, biitis awakened to the fact that one is winding it by the unpleasant sensations and efforts which follow the attempt to go on turning the key after the watch is wound up ; or one takes unconsciously from one's pocket a bunch of keys and " finds one's self," with a feeling of sur- prise and confusion, trying to open the door of the study with the key belonging to a box in the safety- deposit ; then one recalls that one was thinking about money matters, and not about studies, as one approached the door. Complicated unconscious or so-called subconscious movements, in the greatest variety, take an important part in the development of organic life. But their existence and influence do not abate one whit the certainty or force of the other conviction : conatimi, as a datum of consciousness, deter- mines for our suhsequeni conscious ea-perienco the color and direction of the cur- rent of eonsciottsness. § 8. The effect of conation in the fixation and distribution of attention has already been remarked. Experiment confirms the popular persuasion that active consciousness not only determines the speed, ener^, rhythm, and sweep of our muscular contractions, and so the complexity and form of the resulting movements, but also is able within certain limits to suppress or inhibit the movements which would otherwise be called forth by external • Rev. Philosoph., Dec, IS89, p. 576 f. r 224 CONATION^ AND MOVEMENT or iuternal stimuli. Thus Briicke has shown that we can, by striving against it, lessen the effect of the direct stimulation of a muscle by electricity. Eichhorst has called attention to the fact that the trembling of palsy can partially be supju-essed at will ; another experimenter has shown that the reflex stimulation of the eyelids with vapor of ammonia can be voluntarily inhibited. Scores of similar experiences might be j^ointed out. The mechanism of inhibition is exceedingly obscure ; but the most re- cent researches seem to show that it does not differ essentially from that employed in the positive innervation of the muscles by active consciousness. The reaction-time of inhibition, after brief practice, does not differ from that of direct impulse.' When the tension and amjalitude of the muscular excursion are varied, the cliange in inhibition-time follows closely upon the change in impulse-time. The attempt has been made to account for the in- hibition of muscular contraction as due to the contraction of " antagonistic muscles." But conation has the same inhibitory jjower over muscles that have no antagonistic muscles. It seems fair to infer then, that the in- fluence of conation over movement may, in the two forms of impulse and in- hibition, originate in the same psycho-physical centers and follow the same paths outward. Tlie masseter muscle, the muscle used in the accommo- dation of the eye, and the muscles controlled by the facial nerve, are instances of so-called " autonomous " muscles. This latter group has the most direct anatomical connection with the higher motor centers — the centers in which resides the supreme power of autonomous innervation. And what a servant of a unlUng soul are the muscles controlled by the facial nerve ; and how by striving for and against the expression of consciousness through these muscles, does the psychic life manifest itself ! iThe earliest manifestations of mental life, as a blending of sensation, feeling, and conation, are seen in certain Classes of Movements. The principles on which the bodily movements are classified, are necessarily somewhat indefinite.^ This grows, in part, out of the fact that either sensation, or feeling-, or cona- tion may be prominent in the total state of consciousness which is connected with the use of the different muscles. Hence to in- trospective analysis the psychical origin of the movement seems in general to be in the more obtrusive of these psychical factors. Thus one may move any limb, or the whole bodj^, because one sees, or hears, or touches some object — and this without feeling or conation being prominent. But, again, sensations of a rela- tively weak intensity, if connected with pleasurable or painful feeling, may give rise to relatively strong movements, which have the end of retaining an attractive, or removing a repulsive, mental excitant. And, in not a few cases, complicated and strong bodily movements follow immediately upon intense feel- ing, when no intelligent apprehension of any end to be attained ' Seo for these and other facts the exceedingly interesting article of J. Orschansky, Archiv f. Anat. u. Physiol. Psycholog., Abth., 1889. CLASSES OF MOVEMENTS 225 by movement is present in consciousness. Yet apfain, not a few movements originate, especially in the earlier and relatively un- organized stages of mental life, when no sensation, idea, or feel- ing is to be detected in the tield of consciousness, to which the exciting cause of the movement can be ascribed ; and yet the movements cannot be classed among purely physiological re- flexes, because the excitant of them is to be found in a dominant -condition of consciousness. Here conation, in the sense in which we are using the word, may be said to originate movement. Mere I'^Dclncal fuiihpuiilng — as it were, blind and unconscious of an end, and not eiiected by any discernible form of sensation or feeling — is often the antecedent of random changes in the posi- tion of the limbs, of quiverings and rollings of the internal or- gans, tensions and strains of the aimlessly innervated organs of sense. We anticipate what will appear more clearly after subsequent discussion in saying, that representative images, or '#. ideas," may also serve as the dominant excitants of bodily movements. It is this, indeed, which makes possible the development, as a living imity, of the continuous stream of consciousness and of the re- ciprocal changes of bodily organs in their changing relations to consciousness and to the external environment. jAs conation be- comes more purposeful, the resulting bodily habits become more adjusted to " ideal " ends. ^ Hence the dependence of volition, choice, and so-called " free " will, upon memory and imagination.^ Thus conduct is made to correspond to ideas — in the broader sense of the latter word. One general psycho-physical principle of great import must be accepted in this connection. All forms of sensory, emotional, and ideational cerebral excitement tend constantly to " overfloio " the cente?'s and areas in loJiich they originaie, to flow doicn the motor tracts, and then to set in Tnovement the different connected parts of the eyiernal motor apparat^is. Where the cerebral excitement is not intense and is definitely located — as in the case of great num- bers of the sensations, representative images, and conations — I the cerebral motor discharge is limited to single muscles or to I coordinated groups of muscles. But the summation of repeated excitations of a small intensity, and single excitements of an originally high degree of intensity, tend not only, of course, to i diffuse the cerebral nerve-commotions over larger and larger areas of the central organ itself, but to overflow down an increas- ; ing number of the motor tracts, ^ence the well-known fact that any strong mental excitement— whether of the predominatingly sensory, emotional, or conative type — throws into action a large 15 226 CONATION AND MOVEMENT portion of tlie motor apparatus, unless tliis tendency to move- ment be suppressed. And liere again, the partial or complete suppression, or inhibition, may arise, apparently, in several different ways. To express the matter popularly we may say : one intense sensation, or vivid mental image, or strong feeling, or earnest striving, may be prevented from finding expression in movement by another intense sensation, or vivid mental image, etc. The general theory of the relation of psychical excitements to bodily movements, when worked out in detail with a careful regard to the facts, shows us that jthe ordinary distinctions as to the classes of movements are only relative. / In general, the " co-respondent," or correlate, of mental excitement is bodily movement ; when the psychical life is stirring, in whatsoever de- gree or manner, a corresponding effect may be expected in the physical motor apparatus. This all comes about naturally and necessarily, on account of the nature of the brain and periphe- ral nervous system, and of its relation to psychical states. Hence movements which are the same, externally considered, may origi- nate in any one of several different ways ; and any movement may belong at one time to one of the princixaal classes of move- ment and, at another time, to another one. jHence the very same movement, externally considered, may run through two or three different psychical phases before it ceases as movement. [ This explains, also, the difficulty, and even impossibility, of telling to which one of the classes exclusively any particular movement is to be assigned./ Thus some muscular action may begin as an unconscious reflex and be finished as a voluntary and purpose- ful movement; or it may begin as " sensory -motor," or "ideo- motor," and end by dropping down into the condition of an almost purely unconscious reflex. And, finally, from neglect of taking all this sufficiently into account many foolish disputes, or gravely erroneous psycho-physical theories, having a bearing on ethics and religion, have arisen. In the case of semi-conscious, or of awakening and undevel- oped mental life (infants, or hypnotic subjects, or instances of acquired " tact " ), we have no safe means for dividing the bodily movements into clearly separable classes. .Indeed, the great majority of adult movements — perhaps we might even venture to say, all such movements— ^must be considered as mixed cases:/ that is to say, all the different main classes of movements are covered, or at least touched, by each particular case of conscious and purposeful movement. With the foregoing cautious in mind, the following may be CLASSES OF MOVEMENTS 227 g-ivcn as the principal classes of movements * dependent upon the relation in which the movements stand to the dominant aspect, or factors, of the exciting" psycho-physical life : (1) Ran- dom automatic movements, by which are to be understood such movements as originate chiefly in conation (" blind will "), with- out definite influence from any particular form of sensation, idea, or feeling. (2) Seiisory-motor movements are those whose chief psychical excitant consists in some form of sensation. [" Con- bvhus reflexes " is a term sometimes given to this class of move- ments, to sig-nify that the sensory excitation in which the move- ment chiefly originates does not result in a purely physiological reflex, but provokes an effect in consciousness. Purely uncon- scious reflexes (merely physiological reflexes, although some- times called " sensory-motor ") do not interest psychology other- wise than indirectly. Through their connection, under the law of habit, with various forms of conscious movement, they are, however, of the greatest interest to psychology. Since by " sen- sation " we are pledged^ understand a factor in consciousness, wo employ the term "^nsory-motor " for these conscious re- flexes.] (3) ^^ ^stlieticoftriotor'' is a term j)roi30sed (tentatively) for those movements which have their chief psychical excitants in affective consciousness, in feelings, as having — ordinarily if not always — a tone of jileasure or pain. By different combinations, as it were, of the three foregoing grounds of classification, we are led to distinguish (4) hiipulsive and (5) instinctive m.o\em.e\iiii. By "impulsive movements" we understand those in which conation excites and determines move- ment in connection with sensation and feeling, but without de- liberation or intelligent appreciation of an end. And by " in- stinctive movements " we understand the same kind of move- ments as those just called impulsive, whenever the sensations, feelings, and resulting movements are related to an end con- nected w^th the preservation and propagation of the species, and presumably developed upon a basis of inherited tendencies. (6) iTdco-viotor movements are excited, chiefly, by the presence of an idea in consciousness.) But inasmuch as no idea, or con- ception, is a perfectly colorless affair, devoid of all " attach- ment" of feeling and so unfit to act as a so-called "motive," all ideo-motor movements are also a^sthetico-motor. Finally, as pos- sibly (or probably) involving the comliination of conscioiis fac- tors emphasized by each one of the first three forms of move- ' Horwicz rightly classifies the bodily movements only after remarking that a strict division cannot be maintained. Psycholog. Analysen, comp. i., p. 7 f. and 81 f. See also, Lotzc ; Mcdicin. Psychologic, p. 287. 228 CONATION AND MOVEMENT ment (and, therefore, often discussed as either impulsive or in- stinctive), another class (7) called iiiiitatiae movements must be recog-nized. This class comprises those, as a rule, somewhat complex co-ordinated and expressive contractions of the muscles that are called out, in one individual, by the presentation of the movements resulting- from conscious ideas and feelings in another individual, without, however, awakening the ideas and feelings themselves, or the conscious purj^ose to express them. In infants, smile answers " in imitation " of smile, frown of frown, grimace of grimace, etc. But here, and even in the case of many similar movements in adults, it is difficult to tell how much of the result is to be ascribed to the faint startings of inchoate ideas and feelings that express themselves in sym^ja- tlietic forms of movement, how much to sub-conscious but complicated generic and inherited reflexes, and how much to in- voluntary but conscious conation finding its way along the well- worn channels of motor discharge. ^'^ § 9. Few truths in psychology are more frequently recognized than the effect of mental excitement in the production of bodily movements. The infant comes into the world and spends his early waking hours in almost ceaseless movement — crying, cooing, kicking, thrusting out with his fists, wriggling, squirming, rolling his eyes and head, etc. This activity is natu- rally regarded as due to overflowing vitality and sensitive response to various forms of stimuli. To the observer it seems to proclaim : " I am here, not simply to see and hear, to feel and think, but to do something. I must leavu to mould and to make, must be prepared for action, not only by getting ac- quainted with my bodily members, but also by getting them in hand." As the physiologist would express his side of the truth : " The whole brain is made up of structures that subserve sensory-motor processes, and into such processes all its functions may be resolved " (Hughlings Jackson). " Every structure of the brain concerned with sensation proper is connected directly or indirectly with a part concerned with motion " (Gowers). Thus the ceaseless bodily movement of the child is the correlate of its psychical ex- citability ; its mobility and sensitivity correspond in the development of psychical life. What is true of the infant is true of those adult individuals and of those races which have most, in this respect, of infantile character- istics. But since conation expresses itself in inhiliition as well as in im- pulsive movement, and since training of will and cliaracter involve not fol- lowing impulses quite as much as the positive following of selected ideas, the suppression of the "natural " tendencies to movement is a necessary part of the formation of safe and intelligent motor habits. Even hero, however, what we call "suppression " is accomplished with difficulty and pain, and it is rather apparent than real. If mental excitement is itself allowed to rise, it inevitably expresses itself in tensions and strains, in irregular or spas- modic action of internal organs, and in the pull of the antagonistic muscles, etc. ; it is chiefly the more obvious and massive muscular contractions which are really sui)pressed. SENSATION AS " DYNAMOGENETIC " 229 The general fact jnsfc indicated has been called a " law of mental dyna- mogeuesis," and has been stated by one writer ' in the following terms : " Every slate of couHciousriess tends to realize itself in an appropriate muscular movement ; " by another author '^ it has been illustrated, in an interesting way, in an entire monograph. "Active consciousness" and "motor con- sciousness " — in the wider meanings of these two terms — are thus found constantly to intermingle and to develop in mutual dependence. I 10. The iiist movements of the child which, physiologically considered, are of central origin and, psychologically considered, are chiefly ascribed to conation, have been called " impulsive " or " instinctive," etc. "Random automatic " seems, however, a more appropriate term. As Preyer has said, such movements should not be called instinctive, " because they have no aim." Among them this author would place the movements of the human embryo in the womb, the child's beating of itself with its own hands, its rolling "aimlessly hither and thither when fast asleep," etc. That such movements as the latter are, in part, mere jjhysiological reflexes, and, in part, conscious sensory-motor reflexes, we have already seen reason to be- lieve. But the early "protrudings of lips," the "asymmetrical grimaces," "abductions, addiictions, and rotations" of the arms, "crowiugs and similar exercises of voice," which the infant, when awake, so abundantly displays, are probably largely due to conation — blind psychical strivings. Something akin to and yet the reverse of this occurs not infrequently in adult conscious- ness in the case of those random automatic ideation-processes, those unac- countable and p^irposeless forthputtiugs of ideas, which occur in times of unregulated mental excitement. I 11. Every sensation maybe said to have a " dynamogenetic " value and influence, in proportion to its intensity as well as to the way in which it fits in with the entire content of consciousness. If a person is engaged in exerting pressure with a maximum of energy, any form of perijiheral exci- tation may affect the potential of energy. That sensations generally excite movement of the organs connected with the origin and exploration of the sensations themselves is a fact confirmed by abundant experience. Every smell is a challenge to sniff in or blow out the air of the nasal passages ; eveiT taste provokes the tonp:ue to move ; every sound incites us to inner- vate the organ of hearing and turn the head in its direction. And let but the finger casually light upon some object, it can scarcely refrain from press- ing the object, tracing its outlines, and determining by motion its compo- sition. While, conversely, if any object light upon or move over some area of the skin, the sensation it produces elicits all the motor activities con- nected with the management of that particular area. And that the eyes shall— "impulsively," as we say — focus upon and follow any bright and moving object is a sort of primary datum. The hypothesis that all our movements are determined by sense-stimuli was maintained for the develop- ment of visual consciousness, as an inference from the mechanical view of nature before the investigations of modern psychology. John Toland main- tains it in his Letters to Sophie Charlotte, Queen of Prussia. \ 12. The influence of feeling, in the form of interest and pleasure-pain, upon the motor organism is almost too obvious to need mention. Through > Baldwin : Feeling and Will, p. 281. " Fere : Sensation et Mouvement. 230 CONATIOiS^ AXD MOVEMENT this influence desires and volitions develop in relation to each other. But the primary relation is antecedent to all conscious desires and volitions. The sentient animal immediately and necessarily moves under the influence of pleasure or pain. These forms of i^sychical life set the entire motor ap- paratus in a state of activity, and thus profoundly modify the so-called motor consciousness. Thus men go into convulsions over strong pains, or weak pains repeated and summated, as it were ; they leap and dance with ra"-e or joy. The depressing forms of feeling, the loss of interest and low- toned monotonous grief, occasion the relaxation and depressed tone of cer- tain groups of muscles ; and so the afiiicted ones sink their heads upon their breasts, let arms and legs lie flabby, and fall " all in a heap." Chil- dren and hypnotic subjects furnish marked examples of this influence of feeling over the motor apparatus and the motor consciousness. Every large insane asylum contains markworthy instances of the same psychological truth. I 13. Few words have been used more indefinitely than the words " im- pulse " and "instinct." The consideration of their full legitimate meaning must be reserved until later on. Obviously, almost all of those movements which merit the names " impulsive " or "instinctive," arise from genuine psychic states having the threefold aspect of sensation, feeling, and cona- tion. Thus the infant sees the bright candle or fire, feels a vague drawing toward it in the form of awakened interest, and " impulsively" grasps after it. Or it hears a sound, is attracted by it, and "instinctively" turns its head in the direction of the sound. In many, and in perhaps the larger number of such cases, however, the intervening factors are eliminated, and the sensations causing the movement fuse with the sensations caused by the accomplishment of the movement. To this complex of sensations, the feeling of pleasure or of pain and the feeling of effort, or of activity, become attached. We agree with those authors who hold that a distinction between " the impulsive" and "the instinctive" should be observed, even when these terms are applied to primary classes of movement. The impulsive move- ments are more individual, the instinctive more common and generic. In- stinctive movements are, therefore, more definite and uniform ; they are correlated with statical, or constantly recurring, stimuli in the environment ; they are ordinarily more complex and wonderful when compared with all discoverable influences from external stimuli ; and they plainly have for their end the relations of the individual to the species. Instinctive move- ments of various kinds are, indeed, performed by the human physical and psychical mechanism ; but in man's case they are relatively less numerous and important and far less astonishing than in the case of many of the lower animals. Human embryos, human infants even, can do nothing comparable to the larva of the stag-beetle that digs for itself a suitahle (!) cavity, on oc- casion of its passing into the chry.salis state ; or comparable to the worker- bees which are said to construct cells " usually for just the number of eggs the queen will lay." I 14. Even the ' ' idea " of movement tends to realize itself in actual movement ; while the relation of the mental imago of any particular move- ment to the corresponding actual movement is such that the latter, in a voluu- INFLUENCE OF SUGGESTION 231 tary way, is uot possible without the former. Tho attempt has been made to show that, in individuals and in races, the energy of momentary effort is re- lated to the habitual exercise of intellectual functions." In general, negroes are said to have less power of grasj) to exert pressure than have white men ; intelligent persons more power than persons of low intellect, and so on. It is even claimed that " momentary exercise of intelligence provokes a momen- tary exaggeration of the energy of voluntary movements." However all this may be, everybody knows that to " think of " doing anything creates its own tendency to actualization in doing. To think of jumping from a bridge, or tower, or bank, is too strong a temptation for some persons safely to try to re- sist it. One cannot well hold the ' ' idea " of kicking, striking, eating, singing, dancing, fencing, etc., without starting motor tendencies in these particular directions. Indeed, in a large class of our most complicated motor activities, the movement follows upon the idea with little or no conscious intervention of feelings of interest or sign of jmrposeful conation. Thus I have the idea of consulting a particular book in my library to verify a reference (such a page), and at once I rise from my chair and go through the exceed- ingly complex evolution of movements necessary to realize my idea. Yet in such a case as this it might also be said: "I desired to consult the book and therefore I did thus and so ; " or, " I willed to consult the book, and therefore I did thus and so." It is chiefly under this head that certain movements must be classed which have been, of late, investigated in connection with hypnotic phenom- ena. These movements are said to be caused by "suggestion." It is im- possible to describe confidently the entire complex psychic state which, in infancy or in the hypnotic subject, corresponds to the term "mental sugges- tion." But after the stage of mental development has been reached in which genuine "ideo-motor" influences can work, it is to these chiefly that we must look for an account of some of the most startling of the phenomena of suggestion. Every sensation-complex awaked by excitement of any part of the periphery, every word of command, or of warning, or of information, immediately awakens its appropriate " escort of ideas," and these suggest and effectuate the appropriate movements. Suggest to the hypnotic sub- ject that he is drinking ink instead of water, and he begins to gag and to spew appropriately ; or that he is drinking lemonade instead of vinegar, and he smiles and smacks his lips with pleasure. Put into his mind the idea that his hands are bloody, and his face will express disgust and horror ; while his monotonous energy in washing them will rival that of the somnambulist. Lady Macbeth. We shall soon see, however, that suggestion is a term which may be employed to cover a large portion of the mechanism of our entire life of ideation and movement. I 15. The imitative movements of early childhood have a complex but not easily ascertainable psychical origin. Here, too, doubtless much must be ascribed to unconscious and conscious reflexes— much, doubtless, but by no means all. Somewhere from the foui-th to the seventh month clearly imitative movements may be observed in the child. Preyer tells us " that at the end of the fifteenth week, he obseiTed an infant "making attempts ' See Fere, Sensation et Mouvement, p. 76. " The Mind of the Child, I., p. 283. 232 CONATION AND MOVEMENT to purse the lips when I did it close in front of him." Later the same child develoi^ed, in response to the excitement of seeing and hearing the same thing in others, those expressive movements of the limbs, head, face, and vocal organs, with which all observers are familiar. Nod before the infant and it nods ; protrude the tongue, and the corresponding movement may be accomplished by it ; beckon or point, and it will successfully iindertake the same. Let an adult cough or cry, a sheep bleat or a dog bark, and the young human animal will try its motor apparatus to produce a correspond- ing sound — often with wonderful success the first time, and while yet at an age of low intelligence. Indeed, almost any motor habits may be success- fully cultivated under this i^rinciple of imitation. Idiots are often most excellent imitators ; and Darwin tells us, in his account of the Fuegians, how imitation prevails among savages and certain animals. Hypnotic sub- jects can be made to perform a wide range of movements in the same way. It is not, however, among childreu, idiots, and savages alone that imita- tive movements abound. In watching those fencing, dancing, acting a part — movements in any way under the influence of common sympathetic feelings -—the tendency to imitate the same movements ourselves is often difficult to resist. We smile at other's smiling, if there be no reason to the contrary ; and sounds of weeping, or of that " woe" to which Thackeray makes refer- ence in his essay on crossing the English Channel, are apt to elicit like motor activities in us. In all these cases the amount and kind of con- scious feeling and ideation which are awaked in the jDrocess of imitation depend upon the character and stage of the individual's develo]3ment. But certain feelings and ideas are connected with what is inherited and instinctive with the entire human race. For it is human to grasp and to fight, to smile and to cry, to pout and nod and purse the mouth, etc. I 16. The development of motor consciousness and of movements of the bodily organism, under all these different classes, is necessarily conducted with constant reference to certain principles. Among them the following may be noted here : (1) the principle of interference. Certain muscles and coordinated groujos of muscles cannot possibly be moved simultaneously. Sensations, feeling, ideas, that express themselves by excitement of "an- tagonistic " movements cannot, therefore, simultaneously realize themselves. When then they occur in rapid succession, or in confused conflict in the field of consciousness, they necessarily " interfere " with each other's appro- priate expressions in movements. The face of an hypnotic subject may be made, it is said, to express i^leasure on one side and pain on the other, at the same time ; and all men may weep and laugh by turns, and with no long interval between. But at the same instant one cannot abduct and adduct the same limb, or rotate it in opposite directions ; few can rival the hypnotic^ subject to whom reference was just made. (2) The principle of fatigue effects the cessation of movements, after they have been long continued, or intensely executed ; it ojiorates also to select those which shall be triumphant in the momentary struggle for existence. Especially is this so when we consider that pain accompanies fatigue. He who tries the trick of seeing how long he can hold his arm straight out, •' decides " at the end of a few minutes, that although ho could energize longer the appropriate muscles, he prefers to stop the pain and let tlie arm PRINCIPLES OF MOVEMENT 233 fall. lu numerous much more subtle ways the principle determines what movements shall be " preferred " to others. In general, movements of the body, like ninning waters, select the channels that involve least resistance. And (3) the universal psycho-physical principle of habit prevails in the en- tire realm of movement. By volition, for definite ends, we can indeed "break the cake of custom " and mould it anew ; but even this takes place only under the principle of habit. It is evident tli.at, in speakinpc of conation and movement as we have done in this chapter, and especially in referring to the vast realm of ideo-motor and imitative movements, we have somewhat anticipated the treatment of subjects which are to follow. But this was inevitable. And it is to the nature of the representative image and its i)lace among the elements, as well as its part in the development of mental life, that we must now turn in order afterward to show how sensation, feeling, and cona- tion combine to make such development possible. [In connection with the works already quoted in this chapter and in the chapter on Attention, and in addition to the cliaptcrs on "Will" in the general treatises on Psychol- ogy (of which James, II., xxvi.; HiifTding, vii., A and B; and Baldwin, II., xii.-xv., are among the best), the student of this subject should familiarize himself with the phenom- ena of purely physiological and automatic reactions and of reaction-time. For the former subject consult any of the standard jihysiologies, and the author's Elements of Physio- logical Psychology, i., chaps, iv. and vii. , and ii., chaps, i., ii., ix., and x. Wundt : Physio- log. Psychologic {3d ed.), I., Absch. i., chaps. 4 and .5, and II., Absch. v. For the latter, the same works ; Ladd : op. cit., ii., chap. viii. Wundt : II., Absch. iv.; and the collateral literature referred to in these treatises. Among the monographs treating of primary Co- nation and Will are the following : Spitta : Die Willensbestimmungen, etc. Chmielowski : Die organischen Bestimmungen d. Entstehung d. Wille. Mach.: Grundlinien d. Lehre von d. Bewegungsempfindungen. Schneider : Der menschliche Wille, i.-x. Preyer : The Mind of the Child, L, Second Part. Miinsterberg : Die Willenshandlung. O. Kiilpe : Die Lehre von Willen, etc. Philosoph. Stud., v., pp. 179 ff. and 381 fF. Fe'rc : Sensation et Mouvement. Of value are also works on Physiognomy such as Warner, Physical Ex- pression, and Lowenfeld, Physiognomik and Mimik.] CHAPTER XII. THE EEPEESENTATIVE IMAGE OR "IDEA" It was formerly one of the commonplaces of psychology to point out the dependence of all our mental development upon the faculty of memory. And, indeed, it is self-evident that only as i3sychical states may be consciously connected tog-ether can the subject of the states come to know anything either about himself or about things. Modern psychology has been wont, on the other hand, to deny that memory should be spoken of as a " faculty " at all ; it has rather emphasized the continuity of psychical life as a mere mechanism of sensations and of images representative of past sensations. In what sense memory is a faculty, and in what relation it stands to the development of all faculty, will be considered later on. Our present task is scientif- ically to describe the nature, conditions, and relation to its so- called " original," of that elementary form of psychosis which is emphasized in memory. For lack of a better term, we shall use, indifferently, for this elementary psychosis, the words " mental image " and " idea." ^ Our study of this psychic element, in a fundamental way, will enable us subsequently to see how far all exercise and development of mental faculty depends upon the nature and laws of the recurrence, fusion, and reciprocal in- liuence of ideas. In other words, in all perception and self-con- sciousness, in all complex forms of emotion, desire, and volition, as well as in memory and imagination, strictly so called, idea- tion, or mental-imaging, plays an important part. We must " ideate " in order to know, to feel, to will ; vnfhont mental images, or ideas, the organization and continuity in development of mental life is absolutely impossible. Here, however, a caution is needed, even at the risk of seem- ingly needless repetition. Wo do not cspoiise that theory of mental life which accounts for it all as the result of " fusions " and " conflicts " of ideas ; or as the resultant of " aggregations " •Sir William Hamilton says of the word "idea:" "In England Locke may be said to have been the first wlio naturalized the term in its Cartesian universality. When, in common lansuasre, employed by Milton and Drydcn, after Descartes, as before him by Sidney, Spenser, Shakespeare, Hooker, etc., the meaning is Platonic." NATUKE OF THE MENTAL IMAGE 235 and " agglomeratious " of seusatious and fainter images of sen- sations. We are as far from agreeing with Herbart as wo are from accepting the theories of Mr. Spencer on these points. It has already been sufficiently explained what is meant by an " element " of mental life, by the " fusion " of such elements, and by their " reciprocal influence." Simple unconnected mental im- ages of sensations, feelings, or conations, no more exist in con- sciousness, as it offers its phenomena to our scientific study, than do such sensations, feelings, conations themselves. And ideation-processes are no more " factors " or " elements " of complex psychoses, in the sense of being distinct entities (like tlie atoms and molecules of physical masses) than are any other of the fundamental psychical processes. But the introspective and experimental analysis of modern psychology cannot be abandoned, because, in spite of repeated explanations, some readers will probably persist in misunderstanding our neces- sarily ligurative terms. The Nature of the " mental Image," or " idea," can best be understood by carefully studying what takes place in conscious- ness as any parti-cular one of the more simple psychoses loses its vivid and realistic character — as it " fades away " (so we are pertinently accustomed to say) in, and then from consciousness. For this purpose either one of the three fundamental forms of mental life may be emphasized. Thus we may speak of the mental image of a sensation, the mental image of a feeling, the mental image of a conation, or act of will. The conditions un- der which these different elementary processes are allowed to fade away, and so pass into the idea corresponding to each (to " ideate " themselves, as it were) may be almost indefinitely varied. Thus the basis of a somewhat accurate scientific treat- ment of the nature and conditions of ideation in general may be laid. These earliest " residua," or first-occurring traces in con- sciousness of the actual processes of sensation, feeling, or cona- tion, may be called " primary images," or " after-images," corre- sponding to the processes they more or less ideally represent. They might also be called " ideas of first intention." In all study of the nature of the mental image the effect of attention is most important. If we persistently attend to the sensation, feeling, or conation, it fades away and passes through the different recognizable stages of ideation much more gradu- ally, as a rule, than it otherwise would. But if we let it " slip away," whether voluntarily or involuntarily, or if some sensation, feeling, or impulse occurs to interrupt the original impression, then this impression generally seems not to undergo the stage 236 THE REPRESENTATIVE IMAGE OR " IDEA " of the after-image or primary idea. Speaking in vulgar but expressive fashion, one may declare : All idea of what I was just seeing, feeling, doing, is " driven out " of my head — this, when the interruption of my psychosis was esj)ecially abrui^t, because of the intense or interesting character of the new psychosis. But now the absorbing practical question may arise : Can I recall the sensation, feeling, volition, of the moment ago ? This question may take either one of several suggestive forms. For example : Have I any " idea," or can I " call up " any idea, of my just previous mental state ? or. What vjas it I was thinking about, or doing, an instant ago ? or, Will the idea of that ever arise again in my mind? Let it be supposed, however, that this effort at recollection is successful ; and that we then turn our attention to the psychosis in which it results. And now the form of our representative consciousness will probably be found to differ, in several respects, from that of the so-called after- image, or idea of first intention. Figuratively speaking still, it may be said to have less intensity as an element of the complex mental state, less life-likeness, less " sensuous " character, as it were. If now, once more, a considerable period has elapsed since the experience of the sensation, feeling, or volition, whose image we desire to recall, such image, on appearance, wdll prob- ably have lost still further in the same qualities of intensity, life-likeness, etc., as compared both wdth the original experience and also with its memory-image, while as yet this image was fresh. It appears, then, that the immediately discernible nature of our ideas differs considerably, in dependence upon two very important sets of considerations. These are, first, certain rela- tions of likeness, or unlikeness, to the so-called "originals," whose representatives they are said to be ; and, second, upon the amount of time which has elapsed between the original psychosis and the occurrence in consciousness of these rej^re- sentatives. Hero, however, an important further distinction must be made. In this chapter we are to speak of the relation of ideas, as repre- sentative ("images o/*," etc.), to their original sensations, feel- ings, and volitions ; and also of the effect which the lapse of time appears to have upon this relation, and so upon the nature of the ideas ; but the discussion of these subjects is only preparatory to treating of the " consciousness of relation " and the " con- sciousness of tim(\" These more complex forms of conscious- ness involve a high degree of development of several so-called THE AFTKK-IMAGES OF SENSATIONS 237 faculties — of intellect, self-consciousuess, and of voluntary and leco^nitive reminiscence. The mechanism of ideation must be understood, however, in order to understand all these faculties, and indeed the possibilit}' of any continuity or continuous de- velopment of the iDsychical life. § 1. Certain fundamental truths may be learned even from the terms emi)loyed to express our simplest experiences in the way of ideation. The noun imago in Latin might be api^lied to a "mask," an "apparition," a '' ghost" or "phantom," and hence a something which is recognizably lUce, l)ut really is not, something else. The adjective "representative" only adds emphasis, therefore, to a notion contained in the noun itself. The word " image" is obviously intended chiefly for, and is primarily applicable to, our visudl experience. We see images, and think of, or remember, the objects which they represent. But in psychological language, however rough the terminology may seem, it is as necessary and aiipropriate to inquire con- cerning the possibility and nature of " images " of the skin, muscles, ear, tongue, etc., as of the eye. Strong objections may be made to the use of the word "idea" as the equivalent of the term representative image. Aiid in the history of psychological and iihilosophieal language few words have had a greater variety of meanings or more varied and mischievous abuse than this word. Etymologically it is the equivalent in Greek (a'Soy) of the Latin species. For whatever other uses than this the English word idea may be demanded, it can scarcely be spared from this use. By an idea, then, we shall now understand a representative image in general, whether it be a memory-image or an image of the imagination. In this way an entire, much-needed set of psychological terms can be consistently employed ; such as "ideation," to "ideate," etc. The I'elations of the idea to the concept and the difference in different ideas considered as elements of memory, or of imagination, or even of perception and thought, will be discussed later on. The words image and idea suggest that the psychical jirocesses and products to which they correspond are both like and unlike the originals which they are said to represent. This fact is jiopularly expressed by saying that the former is the " image of," or " idea of," the latter ; or that every correct image, or true idea, is like that which it represents. But, on the other hand, it is assumed that images, or ideas of sensations, feelings, cona- tions, are not really (that is, they are in some resi^ects, at least, unlike) the sensations, feelings, conations, which they represent. Thus the uelations between the objects of memory, imagination, or thought, and those of j^er- ception and self-consciousness, although far more complex than this lan- guage indicates, depend, in part, upon the relations of likeness and unlike- ness between the " simple ideas " and their so-called " originals." I 2. The sensations of all the different senses have their correspond- ing after-images. This fact has already been explained, esi^ecially in the case of the eye, as dejiendent uj^on physiological conditions (p. 127). Any excitement of the organism, whether peripheral or central, lasts for a time after the stimulus has been removed ; the state of excitement reverberates in the central organ after the end-organ has quieted down. But for jjurposes of present experiment let one study the fading away in consciousness of any 238 THE KEPEESENTATIYE IMAGE OE " IDEA " sensation, while attention is directed strictly to the changes of quality, in- tensity, etc., whicli thus take place. For example, let one fixate the retinal image of a caudle, or a colored spot, and then close the eyes and note what follows. The immediate after-image is as clearly a sensation (as respects intensity, life-likeness, and objective reference) as was the original experi- ence. For this reason the term " aher-se)isations " has been — not improjierly — proposed for these phenomena. But soon, and usually in an intermittent way, this after-image, with its strongly sensuous coloring, disappears ; and it is found impossible, even with persistent striving, to make it reappear in precisely the same form. We may either be compelled to content ourselves with stating in language what sort of a sensation was formerly had ; or we may be able to reproduce in the concrete form of an image, but with fainter intensity and less of sensuous life-likeness, the representative of the actual sensation. These two forms of reproduction should be carefully distin- guished ; it is of the latter only we are treating at the present time. It is the latter only that can be called a " copy," or representative, of the original simple imj)ression, in any true meaning of the words. "What is true of after-images and ideas of first intention, resulting from visual impressions, is also true, though less obviously, of the im- pressions of the other senses. Tastes often linger in the mouth, and smells in the nostrils, so that we are scarcely able to tell — it is said — whether we " really do " taste and smell, or only "imagine" that we taste and smell. Sensations of sound leave after-images that ordinarily dis- appear more promptly. But even in their case the distinction between "sensing" and "imaging" sounds cannot always be drawn with cer- tainty. For example, the violinist may make us hear the dying-away of the note in a diminuendo passage by the trick of continuing to draw his bow over the string without actually touching it. Here the fainter and fainter auditory sensation is replaced by the image without our being able to detect the transition between the two. Intense sensations of pressure, by careful attention, may have their after-images delayed for a time, and seem to fade away somewhat after the manner of visual after-images. In the case of sen- sations of temperature, our uncertainty about the character of the objective stimulus makes it always difficult to distinguish between sensations and images of sensations. The laboratory trick already referred to (p. 76), shows that the imaging of a low intensity of the sensation of heat may easily be mistaken for the sensation itself. § 3. The effect of time upon the fading away of the primary image may be made the subject of experimental investigation. In fact, there are scores of sensations, feelings, and volitions, whose after-images fade quickly out of consciousness, perhaps never to recur ; but which are capable of being de- tected if we only search for them in time. For example, let one who is absorbed in reading, reflection, or conversation, be questioned : What were you just doing ? or. What was I just doing ? or. What just happened in the room ? (supposing such jierson has been twirling his moustache ; or you have reached over the table for a pen ; or the clock has struck) ; and if the question follows within 2 to 10 sec, of the event, it can be answered cor- rectly. If, however, the question comes later than this, the primary image will have faded beyond recall. Thus Weber found that the primary mem- THE FADING OF MENTAL IMAGES 239 ory-imago of weights sank rapidly the first 10 sec; and Lehmann found that 11 sliiido of gray coiihl bo recognized with certainty only as long as the interval did not exceed 60 sec. Another observer ' placed the greatest accu- racy for memory of the pitch of tones (corresi)onding, presumably, to the most vivid and life-like condition of the primary image) after an interval of about ten seconds from the sensation. From this point the curve of accu- racy of the imago fell off i^retty regularly until the interval reached between 10 and 20 sec. ; then it ceased to fall oft", and still further beyond fell oil" again more rapidl}^ with increasing time. Another observer," by studying the eiitect of time on his memory of series of " nonsense syllables," learned by heart, found that the process of forgetting, for longer intervals, is rapid at tirst and then slower. After one hour half the original amount of work must be done in order to reloarn the same series ; after eight hours, ^ of the same work. But even after twenty-four hours the memory-image retained i its strength ; after six days, i ; after thirty days, i. This ob- server inferred this law for the fading of the memory-image : "The ratio of what is retained to what is forgotten is inversely as the logarithm of the time." On the other hand, in certain cases the memory-image, with all the intensity and sensuous life-likeness belonging to its most ' ' primary " charac- ter, lingers for a long time, or persistently reappears in consciousness. Mi- croscopists, after prolonged work with the microscope, sometimes find that the images of the objects seen in its focus live for hours, or even days, in the "fundus of the eye." Musicians often hear the sounds made by their pupils for hours after each lesson. Dr. Moos tells of a patient whose acous- tic images persisted with the intensity of sensations for fifteen days after a musical smnce. After working for days together on brain preparations with fine gauze over them, M. Baillarger would all at once see the gauze cover- ing other objects in the field of perception. Another worker in science, when promenading the streets of Paris, frequently saw the images of the preparations with which he had been busy projected on surrounding ob- jects. ^ 4. A study of the reverse relation between sensations and their images seems to lead us to the same general truth. Starting from the sensation we may trace its fading into the more and more "ideal" form of the primary or secondary mental image. But starting from the " purest " of mental images we may, by increase of intensity and life-likeness, render it indistin- guishable from the sensation. Thus the different degrees of temporaiy or persistent hallucination originate. In sleej) and in hyimotic conditions the mental image regularly has the sensuous and objective character of the orig- inal from which it is said to be derived. In dreams, it is true that our mental imagery often takes its rise from exaggeration and misinterpretation of actual sensations. Thus one dreamer " imagined" the torture of a stake driven through his foot by burglars, because he " sensed " a feather between his toes ; another imagined that the horse of the diligence in which he was travelling had fallen and lay panting, because he was himself enduring, in sleep, the disagreeable sensations of asthma. But even such phenomena ' H. K. Wolfe : Ueber das Tongediichtniss. Philosoph. Studien, iii., Heft 4. 2 Ebbinghaus : Ueber das Gediichtnies, p. 85 f. Leipzig, 1885. 240 THE REPRESENTATIVE IMAGE OR " IDEA " as these show how evanescent is the distinction between the sensation and its idea. Again, it has been pointed out ' that different i^ersons liave different degrees of success in the imaging of different classes of sensations. Some are more successful than others with auditory sensations, some with tactile and muscular sensations ; most are most successful with visual sensations. Defects corresponding to the different characteristic excellences are fre- quent enough. Thus one man finds it nearly impossible to visualize dis- tinctly the face of an absent friend ; while a melody to which he has listened the evening before will be sounding in his brain the live-long day. Another can see before him the vivid pictures of those long dead ; but, to save his life, could scarcely recall the tune he has just heard sung or played. Stumpf tells of a young aspirant to learn the violin who was unable to play correctly, not because — as was at first supposed — he had ' ' no ear " for pitch, but because he had no ideas of the tactual and musciilar order, so as to control accurately his fingers in spacing, or the movements of his bow- arm. It is only in some minds that sweet smells and tastes linger. Some, however, quickly pass from the idea of certain smells or tastes, suggested by the bare mention of the substances which occasion them, into a condition of nausea and vomiting, or of pleasantly quickened vitality — so effectively life-like are their mental images of these sensations. In the case of certain individuals and in certain abnoi'mal states of brain and mind, ideas have all the intensity, life-likeness, and objectivity of powerful sensations themselves. Some have the power, at will, so to create the image of a remembered object of sight as to present it to themselves with the clearness of outline, strength of coloring, and covering power of actual percepts. These rare cases are similar to what is more frequent among hypnotic subjects. Every student of insanity knows how "fixed ideas " tend to objectify themselves until they become indistinguishable by the subject of them from the most undeniable i:)erceptions. Angelic or de- moniac voices, at first fitfully imagined, come to be persistently heard ad- dressing the ear ; forms of ideal origin, and, at first, of occasional aijpearanee, at last accompany the willing or unwilling vision everywhere. Hallucina- tions of smell and taste, but above all of the skin and internal organs, are closely connected with various forms of insanity. In all these matters the range of experience is very great ; and an almost unbroken continuity of cases, with slight variations in degree for each form of sensation and idea- tion, can be made out. The dulness and slowness of some persons, of even a good degree of intelligence, in the process of image-making, is astonish- ing. But some, like the man of whom Bonnet tells us, see jDcople, birds, carriages, houses, etc., without external cause ; and there is the well-known case of Gothe, who, when he closed his eyes and bent his head, could plainly see a flower, with other flowers growing out of it, as long as he chose. The religious ecstatic — like Benvenuto Cellini, who saw, in answer to prayer, the disk of the sun in his subterranean prison, and the artistic devotee — like the English painter who painted portraits from sitters jilaced by his imagination in the chairs before him, or the immortal but deaf Beet- hoven, wlio constructed by ideation the harmonies he heard, are examples ' Especially by Gallon in his Inquiry into Uuman Faculty, and by many other investigators. PHYSIOLOGICAL CONDITIONS OF IDEATION 241 of this i")ower. But between them and the jworest adopt at image-making lie all degrees of efficiency. Wo conclude, then, that although sensations and their representative images, as such, do not differ simj)!!/ in seiisuous intensity, they do dfferonly in degree of the same essential characteristics. What, besides intensity, such characteristics are, will soon be made apparent. Things perceived and things remembered or imagined undoubtedly differ in an indefinite number of ways ; and yet these greater and more complex dif- ferences arc largely based upon the primary differences between sensations and ideas. The Physiological Conditions of the occurrence and recur- rence of mental Images are to be found in certain general bio- logical laws, as well as also in specific qualities of the nervous substance of the cerebral centers. Indeed, the molecular changes of even non-living bodies, in certain instances, seem to furnish an analogy to these physiological changes. For in non-living bodies systems of molecules may receive a certain " set " which determines the nature of their entire future behavior toward each other ; and by repeated actions of a certain kind they, apiDarently, acquire so-called " tendencies " to similar actions in the future. But this imperfect analogy of a physical sort only in a small degree accounts for what has sometimes been called the " mem- ory " of living tissues. Here the fundamental laws of metabolism (or change of the substance entering into any living structure, as old particles are excreted and new ones absorbed), of cell- propagation, of nutrition, and growth, must be taken into ac- count. The preservation and development of the life of every organ, and so of every complex organism with its numerous in- teracting organs, involve these laws ; they may even be extended to the individual cell. In general, then, the pli5"siology of living bodies provides that there shall be continuity in development ; that in all present changes the past stages of development and the i^revious forms of functioning shall be taken into the account. In a word, every living structure carries in itself, in some sort, the history of what has happened to it up to the present time, and of all that it has done under the influence of the different forms of stimuli which have acted upon it. The more complex the structure is, and the more varied its experience in the past has been, the more of developed capacity it possesses to meet the varied de- mauds for further activities. But the more of solidarity it has attained, and the more its activities have been directed into, and repeated in, certain definite lines, the stronger is its ten- dency to react, whenever new similar stimulation occurs, in the customary ways. Speaking figuratively : It " remembers " wlmt 242 THE KEPRESENTATIVE IMAGE OR " IDEA " it has done ; habit rules ; it does each time what it remembers as "ris'ht " to do. Every portiou of the nervous system falls under the physio- lo^-ical laws which give conditions to this so-called " organic memory." This is true of the ganglionic nerve-centers scattered throuo-hout the internal cavities of the trunk, of the nervous portions of the end-organs (such as the retina of the eye), of the spinal cord with its various centers for the performance of com- plicated reflex activities, and of the lower organs of the brain. But it is pre-eminently true of the cerebral hemispheres, where the so-called " psychic " nerve-cells and nerve-fibers are found. This structure is, of all molecular structures, by far the most complicated and sensitive. But the life of every brain has a history ; the history of every brain is a different history, and every brain carries its history w^ritten within itself. Since, then, it falls under the principles of habit, growth, tendency, etc., this collection of psychic nerve-cells and nerve-fibers has, in the highest degree, all the characteristics of the so-called or- ganic memory. And it is these characteristics which furnish the physiological conditions of the occurrence and the recur- rence of the mental image. ^ 5. The practice of photography depends upon the fact that a plate of dry collodion, after being exjoosed for an instant to the sun's rays, retains for weeks in the darkness the effects of the indescribably delicate changes which it then underwent. Every impression taken from it is an expres- sion of this truth ; only thus does the impression become the image of the object photographed. A French writer' has shown that "latent im- ages" may be "to some extent garnered uid in a sheet of paper," kept there for a long time, and then revealed at the call of certain reagents. Even a good old Cremona violin has the history of its past, in the form of an " in- organic memory," stored up in the molecular alterations of its woody fiber. When touched again it reproduces the tones it has been trained to produce. These inorganic tendencies of a molecular kind, however, only faintly foreshadow the organic ; it is in the nervons system that all this effect of habitual forms of activity becomes most pronounced. The nerve-cells, like all cells, have the power of nourishing themselves and of propagating their kind. The nutrition brought to them by the blood is used for tlie enlarge- ment of the cell, under the jmuciple that each cell builds itself in accord- ance with the molecular character it has already attained. Each cell also may be held to propagate itself under the laws of heredity. But at the same time its internal molecular alteration and the activity of the connected cells are mutually interdependent. Thus what is called the " organic mem- ory" — or tendency to reaction and further development according to cer- tain lines dependent upon past action and past development— is gained for iNiep?e de Saint-Victor: Compt. rend, de I'Academie des Sciences, xlv., p. Sll ; and xhi., p. 448. CORTICAL CENTERS IN IDEATION 243 each jjortion of the nervous system. Retention and reproduction on the physical side, or as physiological conditions not only of the occurrence and recurrence, but also of the association, of mental images, are thus provided for.' The foregoing considerations apply to the spinal cord and to the lower parts of the brain. Both experiment and observation show that these ner- vous structures possess at birth certain aptitudes and tendencies connected with the habits, physiological and p.sychical, of race, breed, parentage, etc. But those organs, whether in the case of the new-born puppy or of the new-born infant, cannot at first do some things which they can learn to do ;— using still the same convenient figure of speech, they need to acquire, and can acquire, an organic memory on the basis of the experience of the in- dividual. As we have elsewhere observed: "Each element of the nervous system, especially in the more significant of its central organs, may be con- sidered as a minute area intersected by an indefinite number of cui-ves of diflerent directions and orders ; thus a molecular commotion in any such area may, according to its character and point of greatest intensity, run out into the system "along any one of these many curves." In every such small fragment "the whole curve slumbers." But pre-eminently true is all this of the nervous elements of the cerebral centers, where the so-called psychic nerve-cells are. Of the efiect of stimulation uiDon them one writer" affirms that these cells never return after their excitation to their original condition. Such a cell " has been modified in a permanent manner by the act of stimu- lation ; and this modification can be effiiced only by the death of the cell. Each excitation has, so to speak, created a new cell different from flie first." The recurrence of any memory-image is, therefore, significant of the con- tinuance of the effects of previous reactions to stimulation, in the shajie of a tendency of the same nervous substance to react in ways similar to those in which it has formerly acted. But no nervous element, and especially no so-called psychic nervous element, acts apart from the action of others. Hence the mechnnism of representative images, as they occur and recur in con- neclion icith each other, has its physiological conditions in certain ^^ dynamical associations" amongst tlie ^^ psychic'''' nervous elements. And the spontaneous recurrence of some of these images ratlier than others, as started by this or that external or internal stimulation, dej^ends upon the character, number, and strength, of the ' ' dynamical associations " which make up the " organic memory," so called, of the nervous organism concerned in the whole process of ideation. \ 6. It is assumed that the cortical centers concerned in sensation and in idea- tion are the same, for the same objects at least; and this assumption is con- firmed by all which we know of the i)hysiology of the brain. It must be remembered, however, that since neither sensations nor ideas occur in isola- tion, in both processes — however simple we may try to make our exi)eri- mental tests — considerable areas of the nervous substance are always involved. It has been claimed by some writers of late that "sensation and idea depend upon different cortical elements ;" and the term " memory-cell " ' See the Vortrag of E. IleriBg, Ueber das Gcdachtniss als eine allgemeine Function d. orga- nisirten Materie. Wicn, 1S76. Compare Ribot, Diseases of Memory. ■^ Richet : Les Origines et les Modalites de la MSmoire, Rev. Philosoph., June, 1S86. 244 THE REPRESENTATIVE IMAGE OR " IDEA " has been invented as a title for sncli elements as are concerned in reproduc- tion solely. But even the experiments with animals upon which these claims rely, jirove, rather, in so far as they can be relied upon at all, the very opposite of the claims. For the dog which is affected with "psychical blindness," or " psychical deafness," as a result of the removal of certain parts of the cerebral substance, has lost p.s_yc7«'caZ character alike from both forms of conscious moditication. Its sensation-complexes, or rather j^erceptions, are as much modified, or lost, as are its corresijonding ideas. "We conclude, then, that every orgaii, and eveiy element of every organ, falls under the same biologi- cal laws. Every organ, and every element of every organ — so far as we can appropriately use such a term for a physical mechanism — has its own or- ganic memoiy. And the sum-total of these modifications and dynamical associations, which have resulted from the past experience of the system of central organs, constitutes the system of physiological conditions in which our psychical processes of ideation have their i:)hysical basis. We now resume discussion of the Nature of the Representative Image as related to its " original," with new light derived from our conclusions respecting the physiological conditions of both these forms of psychical life. The cerebral processes which un- derlie sensation are like those which underlie image-making, in that similar changes in the same connected groups of nervous ele- ments form the iDhysical basis for both kinds of psychosis. But they ase unlike, in that the peripherally initiated processes predominate in sensation ; and in image-making, the centralh' initiated processes i^redominate. This difference, or unlikeuess, however, is not absolute. Between the " purest " sensation and the " purest " idea of that sensation an unbroken chain of psj'cho- physical jDrocesses may intervene to bridge over this difference. By increasing the intensity of revived central processes, more or less of hallucination may take i:»lace ; and, finalW, the mental image may become so like the sensations which it represents as to be with difficulty, or not at all, distinguished from them. A thorough re-examination of the data of consciousness now contirms the suggestions derived from the most probable results of physiological psychology. In consciousness the mental image is known to be more or less like and unlike its sensation- original, as resiDccts : (1) intensity ; (2) life-likeness, or fuluess of sensuous content ; and so (3) objective characteristics. In saying this it is assumed that mental images have different de- grees of intensity, corresponding more or less nearly to the inten- sity, as sensational, of the originals Avliieh they represent. It is also assumed tliat ideas are not merely fainter copies of sensa- tions, but that qualitative as well as quantitative differences may be recognized when we compare the two. On the whole matter, then, we tind consciousness agreeing in some sort with, and yet. SENSUOUS VIVACITY OF THE IMAGE 245 iu some sort, differing from both tlie extreme views taught by- opposing schools of psychologists. Some writers assert that the only difference between sensations and their representative im- ages is a difference iu intensity or vivacity. With Hume aud the earlier English psychologists, generally, an " idea " is a " fainter cop}^ " of its sensation. Bain' also seems to deny all qualitative difference between the sensation and its memory- image. But other writers affirm that the difference between the sensation and the idea is " above all a qualitative difference ; " and even derry all intensity, and so all possibility of difference in intensity, as characteristic of different ideas. As says Ziehen : ^ " The sensual vivacity characteristic of every sensation does not belong at all to the idea, not even in a diminished intensity." Both these extreme views are equally correct in what they affirm, and wrong in what they deny. For the differences and likenesses of sensations and ideas, as factors of conscious life, concern both the intensity and the com^ilex quality of the two. Our consciousness proves that we immediately recognize a vast amount of difference in the intensity of our different ideas. Let any good visualizer, for example, undertake to revive some particularly vivid and recent visual sensation-complexes, such as a new color, a bright scene, an impressive face. By persist- ent attention the complex memory of the percept may be made to grow not only in fulness of content, but also in intensity; the particular visual elements vnay be made to improve until the bright color, or the lineaments of the face, are see7i — in " the mind's eye " — anew. Thus, too, one who is successful in audi- tory image-making may find no great difficulty in causing to sound clearly in "the mind's ear "the cheerful chirrup of the wooden clogs on the concrete pavement of the station, or the sil- ver-toned booming of the temple bells, in Japan ; the weird minor strains of the venders of goods uijon the streets in Mexico; the sounds of the ship in a storm, during a recent passage of the At- lantic, etc. Few are so fortunate as not frequently to recall with a cruel sensuous vividness their skin-sensations in the last fit of ague, or the feeling of the dentist's instruments when the teeth were recently plugged? A striking but common fact affords indubitable evidence in the same line. On trying to re- call any particular sensuous experience one often finds one's self baffled, J(^.s^ hecause the ideas lack for a time this character- istic of intensity which is fairly representative of the intensit}^ of their sensation-originals. Then one knows perfectly well what ' The Senses and the Intellect, pp. 338 f. and 462 f. 2 Introduction to Physiological Psychology, p, 152, 246 THE KEPRESENTATIVE IMAGE OR " IDEA " it is oue wishes vividly to recall ; it is, for example, tlie face of a frieud, A. B,, or an air in the opera, M., or the " feel " of a par- ticular texture of cloth or metal ; but one cannot image what one wishes. But all at once there starts out in consciousness a vivid picture of the sight, the sound, the " feel," one seeks. Our con- ception, as a thought, is no richer in content than it was a moment before ; but we see, hear, or feel the concrete thing we sought, be- cause our mental imaging has gained the requisite intensity. In comparing sensations and ideas as respects " life-likeness" it is necessary to remember that neither sensations aior ideas are ever exiDerienced in so-called " purity " or isolation. The sensa- tions we have, and therefore, of course, the sensations we recall in the form of rei3resentative images, always have a varied rich- ness of sensuous content. It is in the possession of this that their " life " consists. The " life-likeness " of the idea is therefore dependent itpon its 2^ossessing a corresponding richness of content / and that idea is the most " life-like" representative of any sensation- experience which most nearly reproduces the compound character- istics of its original. If, for example, I wish to have a life-like mental picture of any particular smell or taste, I can attain this only by reproducing, as far as possible, all the elements which entered into the original sensation-complex. For this purpose I imagine myself tasting or sniffing at the object anew ; I roll the imaginary morsel again upon my tongue, or take imaginary whiffs of it into my nostrils. If I wish a life-like visual image, I imagine myself looking at the object again, tracing its outline with a moving eye, or actively comparing its color with its back- ground, or with other similar or contrasted colors. The new life- growth, in order to be like the old life-growth, must possess the same concrete fulness of life. Closely connected with the requirement just mentioned is another. All our sensation-complexes have an " attachment " of feeling which is likely, if not certain, to be of a pleasurable or painful tone. Now it is our interesting sensations which are most likely to recur, in the. form of mental images, within the stream of conscious life. But unless the mental images have some attachment of feeling corresponding to that of their origi- nals, they are lacking in one of the most essential features of life-likeness. Ideas are, indeed — other things being equal — like sensations according t(> the amount of similar feeling vhieJi accomimnics them. But, further, we have seen that in all psychi- cal development sensory processes are linked in with motor processes. " Sensory-motor " is the compound term which de- scribes the entire experience resulting from the stimulation of the LIFE-LIKENESS OF THE IMAGE 247 orgrans of sensG. Now, therefore, the complete life-likeuess — the total sensuous life of like character— of every idea is dependent upon its being- connected with motor activities similar to those with Avhich the original sensation-experience was connected. Only as the idea secures the appropriate motor reaction can it at- tain the fulness of life which belonged to the original experience which it represents. The character of their dependence on will is, therefore, an important ditforence between sensations and ideas. And it is chietly the difference between the sensuous richness of content, with its accompaniment of feeling and volun- tary or involuntary motor reaction, which our sensations have, and the relative meagreness in these respects of most of our ideas, which makes the " objectivity " of the former so much su- perior to that of the latter. In all ordinary experience, mental images are far less intense in quantity, less varied and rich in qualitative distinctions, of less pronounced tone of feeling, and inferior in motor result, as compared with the sensations which they represent. Therefore, though our ideas are like our sensa- tions, they are also rather unlike them ; w^e have no difficulty in distinguishing- the two. Thus the world of sensuous reality is not confused with the occurrence and recurrence of ideas. But in all these respects ideas may so approach sensations as that the distinctions fade away, and finally cease altogether to be iDossible. I 7. It is customary for those who deny tliafc ideas have intensity to use language like that of Lotze : " The idea of the brightest radiance does not shine, that of the intensest noise does not sound, that of the greatest torture produces no pain," etc.^ Thus a recent author (Ziehen) declares: "The ideas of the slightest rustling and of the loudest thunder exhibit no differ- ence in intensity whatever. . . . The idea of the sun has nothing of the brightness or splendor of colors which characterize the real sun," etc. Now we might go on to say, in our eagerness to distinguish sensations and ideas —the "idea" of green is not green, the "idea" of blue is not blue, etc.; but from the psychological point of view nothing could well be more mis- leading than all this. It is perfectly true that I can think of the sun or of the thunder or can say over these words (" sun" or "thunder") with the most perfect attention to what I am saying, and then can think of a can- dle or a whisper, and can say over the words " candle " or "whisper," with- out noticing any diminution in the intensity of my visual or auditory ideas. But this simply proves that I can think about thunder and whispers, or the sun and a candle, without having any mental images at all which concretely represent the sensations I have when I actually hear thunder or whispering, or when I actually see the sun or a candle. Probably, also, I never have any auditory image which rivals in intensity the sensations of the thunder ; nor can I, without the meditation and abnormal nervous condition of a Eenve- nuto Cellini, ideate so intensely as to have the vision in midnight darkness 1 Outlines of Psychology, p. 2S. Compare Microcosmus, I., p. 203 f. 248 THE REPRESENTATIVE IMAGE OU "IDEa" of a mid-day sun. But all tbis has no bearing. wbatever on the question whether concrete representative images (and not "thoughts about " sensa- tions) differ in intensity or not. Let anyone who doubts ask himself in what respect his enforced audi- tory reproduction of the shrieks and groans he heard in the railroad acci- dent of yesterday differs from his memory of the sounds of an hour ago ; or, why it is that, after a long sea-voyage, he is compelled to antagonize the lingering motor images of the sea by sights which he knows to be really of the land. The trifiiug involved in some of the objections, like those of Lotzo and Ziehen, may be set aside by reminding ourselves that, strictly speaking, the sensation of bright green is no more a bright green sensation, than the faint idea of bright green is a faint green idea. \ 8. There is truth in the view of Volkmanu ' and the other Herbartians who maintain that "sensation and reproduction are only changing jiredi-. cates of the same psychical events, designations of different periods in the history of the same mental process {Vorsiellung)." Thus it is argued that by sensation we mean the " presentation " from its first development to its first obscuration; hj reproduction, the "presentation" from its return into consciousness till its subsequent obscuration. But — so these writers go on to say — reproduction leaves the quality of the "presentation" unchanged. Its weakened quantity is, however, so characteristic that, if we compare the reproduced idea with present sensations, we have no difficulty, as a rule, in distinguishing the former from the latter. On the contrary, we hold, while admitting the characteristic difference in intensity, that reproduced ideas differ from their originals, and from each other, in respect also of the fulness with which all the allied elements are reproduced. It is largely this diff"erence which gives them more or less of " life-likeness," of vraisemhkince, of correspondence to the concrete and rich sensuousness of their originals. Ideas are ordinarily more schematic, more in bare outline, as it were, more meagre of content, than are the sensation-complexes which they represent. But the diff"erence between sensation and idea is also largely one of rela- tion to feeling and volition, with the accompaniment of motor activity. It is the "tone" of the sensation, consisting in the excitement of feeling as dependent upon the excitement of the bodily organism, which gives life-like- ness to the sensation ; its representative image must have likeness of tone in order to be a life-like idea. And here the ineptness of Lotze's saying, that " the idea of the greatest torture produces no pain " becomes ajiparent. If by the idea of a painful sensation we mean simply the idea of a sensation, thought of as having been painful, or if we mean the thought about certain circumstances in which painful sensations are alleged to have occurred, etc. — then Lotze's statement is true. But the representative image of a painfiil sensation, imaged as painful, is nothing but the image of a particular sensa- tion reproduced with a much weakened but genuine accompaniment of char- acteristic painful feeling. And the world is full of men and women who cannot see sights, or hoar sounds, or read words, or think thoughts, that remind them of their past painful sensations, without having the old pains reproduced as a fitting accompaniment of the revival of the ideas. § 9. Connected with the life-likeness of the idea and with its relation to ' Lehrbuch d. Psychologic, I., p. 459 f. LIFE-LIKENESS OF THE IMAGE 249 the sensory-motor characteristic of its original, is its usually unstable and irregular existence. The excitement which external stimuli furnish to the end-organs of sense is comiiaratively steady ; it can be relied upon not to change, or to change, if at all, in calculable ways. The muscular sensations excited in connection with ideational attention differ from those accompany- ing sensational attention. In ideation generally our localization is vague, as the mental field of vision, or of touch, or of sound, is itself vague, indef- inite, and litfully changeful in outline. All these differences correspond to the diminished objectivity of ideas ; they secure the possibility that we shall not always be imaging things and occurrences in such way as to mis- take them for real things and occurrences of sense. Thus the memory- images which arise when the after-sensations have faded away, although localized in some definite region of external space, do not ordinarily move, with movement of the eyes, as these after-sensations themselves do. But true percepts, being dependent for their fixed position on the external ori- gin of the stimulus which acts upon the end-organs of sense, remain motion- less when our eyes move. Moreover, visual jjercepts are doubled by press- ing on the eyeball, and they have covering power ; but after-images and ideas differ ordinarily from percepts in both these respects. ^ 10. Strictly speaking, however, the conscious difference between sen- sations and ideas consists more in a distinction of total state (state of iiercejj- tion as compared with state of memory or state of imagination) than of mere sensation-process and ideation-i^rocess. And so Dr. Ward ' is right in main- taining that we cannot have a reproduced image of a simjile visual or tactual sensation {e.g., red) ; but can only have an image of something seen or felt, (some red thing or red form). In other words, we ideate iiercepts and not unlocalized sensations or abstract and disconnected movements. We represent the Avhole sensation-process, in which peripherally excited elements chiefly preponderated, by a process in which similar, centrally excited elements chiefly preponderate. Hence a complex relation of both likeness and uu- likeness is possible between our sensation-experiences and our ideas ; and in this relation ideo-motor elements bear an important part. For the con- nection between reproduced image and movement is similar to that between sensation and movement. In the case of ideation, however, the movement is usually relatively inchoate and feeble, and therefore only imperfectly representative of the movement involved in all percejjtion.^ §11. The life-likeness of the ideas of different sensations, as dej^endent upon the character of the sensations reproduced, and upon lapse of time, differs very greatly. In general, mental images of muscular sensations dis- a})pear abruptly from consciousness — like the loss of the memory of a ' Article in the Encyc. Brit, on Psychology, p. 57. " Fechner holds (Elemente der Psychophysik, ii., p. 469 f.) that memory-images arise (1) in company with the feeling of a less or greater dccrree of spontaneity ; (2) at a still longer time after the sensuous impressions h:ive passed away; and i3i can, in part involuntarily by association of ideas, and in part voluntarily, be called forth or dismissed and altered. But "after-sensations" occur II) in company with a feeling of receptivity ; (2) immediately after the sensuous impressions ; and (3) independently of will and association of ideas. These distinctions, however, are all matters of degree and serve to put an indefinite number of experiences — "after-sensations," primary mem- ory-images, more or less intense and life-like ideas— in between the sensation and its most Idealized representative. Another writer considers it a matter of universal consent that it is the feeling "des lebendigen oder organischen Ergriffenseins," through which the weakest sensation is dis- tinguished from the strongest recollection.— Horwicz. Tsycholog. Analysen, i.. p. 298 ; comp. p. 311. 250 THE REPKESENTATIVE IMAGE OR " IDEA " name. And yet by their jireseuce iu all our ideas of the spatial qualities, relations, and changes in space, of material bodies, they are of the utmost imijortance to the acquirement of experience and to the conduct of life. Sometimes, unbidden — like the forgotten name— they present themselves in a very lively way to our observation ; in which case they are less serviceable than when less life-like. Sensations of smell and taste, on the contrary, naturally pass more slowly through the fading processes — after-sensations, primary memory-images, etc. — but are equally difficult of revival ; Avhen, however, they actually reappear, they are apt to be exceedingly life-like. The representative images of sound and sight, in all ordinary cases, admit regularly and uniformly of more nicely graded degrees of intensity, life-like- ness, etc., and so of more definite resemblance to the originals from which they spring. Finally, in the case of all forms of the reproduction of sensa- tion-experience, the constitution, habits, and psycho -physical condition of the individual are of the greatest account. Thus far only tliose forms of the representative image which are referred to sensations as their so-called originals have been considered. This restriction was justifiable, because it is only the ideas of sensations which lend themselves readil}^ to the most elementary discussion of the subject. If, however, we consider how our psychologically truthful popular language ex- presses experience, we learn that memory is by no means con- fined to sensations, or even to the perception of things. One can remember to-day what it was that one remembered, imagined, thought, and did yesterday, or the day, or year, before. One can imagine another person (real or imaginary) remembering, ^ imagining, thinking, and doing, in an indefinite variety of ways. Moreover, it is not merely intellectual states and activities which may become objects of memorj' or of imagination, but also states of feeling and will. Indeed, a very large part of the interests, the benefits, and the dangers, of both memory and imagination consists in reproducing or artistically constructing pictures of how we ourselves and others \\i\,\e felt and cJiosen, under all manner of actual or imaginary circumstances. The question, therefore, at once i:)resents itself as to how far we may extend our views of the nature, and relations to its original, of the representative image, so as to cover other than sensuous forms of mental life. That memories, imaginations, thoughts, and all other similar psychical processes, should be capable of reproduction in the form of mental images, can occasion no surprise. For these processes themselves are, in their native and original character, chiefly ideation-processes. How the " idea of an idea " can arise in consciousness it is not difficult to see, the moment we admit the continuity of the stream of consciousness, under the general laws of reproduction. As respects intensity, life-likeness, con- MENTAL IMAGE OF A FEELING 251 nection with motor activities, aucl so " objective reference," one idea is more like another idea than it is like its own sensuous original. One idea may then fitly represent another idea, on account of this essential similarity of nature. In fact, it is upon the basis of this possibility that any present process of ideation may represent so faithfully a similar past process of ideation iu ourselves, or a similar imaginary process of ideation in another consciousness — more faithfully , indeed, than any idea can represent a sensation. When, however, we consider the question, Can there be a true representative image of a feeling ; and, if so, in what respect can such idea be like a feeling? we find ourselves upon ver3^ dilterent ground. For if feeling is fundamentally different in kind from sensation and ideation, how can an idea re]3resent a feeling ? What sort of a psychosis could possibly be meant by " the idea of a feeling ? " since — as we have already seen — the essential nature of feeling is not representable ; since feeling, as such, has its nature in heing felt. It would seem, then, that when men speak of remembering their feelings, or of imagining how others feel, they are using language in that figurative fashion which requires further analysis before it can be adopted by psychological science. It is not difficult, however, to discover the real meaning of these figures of speech. For as the psy- chology of feeling has plainly showed, feeling is to be regarded as a universal attachment of sensation, and, indeed, of all the most primary intellectual processes. If it is an " attachment" of the sensation or the idea, then we may conclude (and this is certainly no unmeaning play upon words), it may be "detached" from the reproduction, as idea, of its original sen- sation or idea. Thus, as one's ideas of the painful sensations one experienced in the hands of the dentist yesterday are much fainter and less life-like than were the sensations themselves, so the attachment of painful feeling may largely, or wholly, have disappeared. Thus ideas of exceedingly painful sensations or ideas, may themselves be notably pleasant ideas. But on the other hand, if one's ideas of past painful sensations become very vivid, and so tend to assume the characteristics of hallucinations, the old accompaniments of painful feeling are revived together with the sensations. And, indeed, the general rule is that percepts and ideas which were originally painful are reproduced as painful ideas. Thus we constantly hear it said, — in truth, life is largely made up of such experiences — " I can never see, or hear, or remember, or think of this or that, without great sadness, feeling of regret, or shame," etc. The psychological 252 THE REPRESENTATIVE IMAGE OR " IDEA " truth here ackuowleclg'ed is, that, although feelings, as such, can- not be ideated (and to speak of an idea of pain or pleasure, the memory of a sorrow or joy, is a figure of speech), whenever past experiences of sensatio7i or ideation which Itad a strong tone of feeling are reprrodaced, some, accompaniment of similar feeling ma]f he expected. This new feeling, as feeling, may be more or less like, or quite unlike, the old feeling. Only new similar feelings can represent past feelings, and, strictly speaking, an "idea o/"a feeling " is an impossible psychosis. In somewhat the same Avay do we find ourselves obliged to hold that, strictly speaking, an idea of a volition, or conative psychosis, is impossible. Here, however, there is this difference to be observed. There really exist, in the wealth of actual men- tal life, various kinds of feeling, as such ; and these various kinds of feeling may become variously attached to sensations and ideas and to the changes of sensation- and ideation-processes. But there is only one kind of conation. Our purposes and choices must then be remembered, and those of others imagined, by re- producing the various sensuous and ideational factors of the complex i^urposes, the occasions, antecedents, results, etc., of the choices. In doing this the present conative life is occupied in the direction of attention, in the control of the train of ideas, in the expressive and supporting motor accompaniments. We do not will that very same thing ourselves, in order to remember or imagine another's past, or hypothetical act of will. Nor, in strict truth, can one conation or volition represent another. But choices and purposes and habits of will resemble each other, or difier from each other, according as the ideas, feelings, and motor results belonging to the complex psychosis are like or unlike in the different cases. \ 12. Only a modicum of careful attention to experience is necessary to ascertain what is meant by an idea, or mental picture of a feeling. The dif- ficulty usually experienced has been greatly increased by loose and indefiuite uses of the word " idea," and by attempts to account for all the laws which control the succession of states in the stream of consciousness, under terms of the so-called "association oiideas." But we shall find that the succes- sion of states in the development of mental life is far more than a recur- rence of ideas under the much debated laws of association. In actual mental development emotions stir up emotions and occasion choices ; and choices react on emotions — both, in ways that are only imperfectly, or not at all, accounted for by theories of the association of ideas. [References to books treating of the topics of this chapter will be found at the close of the next chapter.] CHAPTER XIII. THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION It has just been said that the composite structure of the dif- ferent liekls of consciousness, and the order of tiieir succes- sion, can be only very imperfectly explained by the laws of the so-called " association of ideas," For no field of consciousness is a mere composite of ideas ; and other influences than those which belong- to processes of ideation determine the order of our mental states. Nevertheless the general conditions under which ideas recur undoubtedly have a most important bearing- on the entire study of mental life. Although, then, the development of mind is not wholly a matter of the mechanism of ideas, and even involuntary memory and imagination are not explained satisfactorily without admitting far more than is thus provided for ; yet without an understanding of this mechanism neither memory nor imagination nor thought can be explained. It is proper, therefore, to treat of the recurrence of ideas as among the elementary processes of mental life. In the discussion of this subject it is more than ordinarily necessary to make intelligent use of figurative language. The very word association (as well as the word idea) belongs to this kind of language. This word implies that different ideas, existing apart like real things or persons, do join themselves, or do get joined, in societies or bonds — thus " as.sociati/ig" each with the other in mutual relations of influence, and of possible concord or discord. In speaking of the " spontaneity " of ideas, of their " fusion " and " attraction " or " exclusion " of each other, of " composite " mental images, and of the process of " freeing " the ideas, etc., the legitimate services of our figures of speech seem to be pressed beyond all scientific, not to say reasonable, bounds. Yet these terms, or others likewise figurative, must be employed, unless we are prepared to resort to almost unending periphrases in the description and explanation of the real facts of mental life. The entire treatment of this subject requires that two truths, already amply illustrated, should be kept constantly in mind. 254 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION" First : the circuit of every field of consciousness is, hy the very nature of mental life, a limited affair. Whether we consider the number of discernible objects within the grasp of clear discrimi- nating- consciousness, or the number of iDsychical factors which analysis shows to have had an influence in determining any par- ticular field, our sum-total is always far from being infinite. Only a few objects fall, as constituting any one field of con- sciousness, within our most expansive mental grasp, even in our best estate of psychical energy. A large number of influential factors may, indeed, be suspected as co-operating to determine the complex character of some one state of consciousness ; and experimental analysis may enable us to verify our suspicion as undoubted fact. For example, how many reciprocally modifying sensations, feelings, and ideas conspire to produce, in these modern times, that ennui which afflicts so many minds! And yet if by " factors " of psychoses any thing is meant of which psychology can take account (if we do not enter the region of conjectural ideas, struggling with, or furthering the interests of each other, below "the threshold of consciousness" — the Hades or Limbo of dead psychoses), the number of such factors in any state of consciousness is necessarily limited. But, second, the principle of relativity, in an active and effec- tive fashion, applies to all the ohjects i/i any one field of conscious- ness, to all the factors in any one mental state. We have seen this to be true, even with respect to sensations, whose quan- tity, quality, and laws of combination into complex psychoses, with their accompaniments of feeling and conation, are deter- mined so largely by external stimuli. How much more is the same thing certain to be true of processes of ideation, with their relatively low degree of stability, and relatively high degree of independence of orderly and calculable influences from the world of things. It is " the lunatic, the lover, and the poet," of whom one of the greatest of psychological artists tells us, the\" " are of imagination all compact." The principle of relativity is, therefore, illustrated in a peculiar way by the modifying in- fluence which i3artial ideation-processes have upon each other in the formation of any complex idea. It follows from the foregoing two principles that every state of consciousness may be regarded as a sort of " resultant " in- cluding a certain number of partial processes of ideation or image-making, whose total character is determined by the recip- rocal influence of these same partial processes. But since ideas are, in general, more meagre and schematic (less " life- like " and full of content) than their originals, the construction ALLEGED INTERACTION OF IDEAS 255 of any complex mcutul picture occurs in consciousness, part after part as it were. For example, to ideate — that is, either to recall in memory or to construct by imagination — any very complex sensation-experience, like a perception of the front of St. Peter's at Home, or of St. Paul's in London, one has to call up fragment by fragment, as it were, a whole which was originally given with a wonderful comparative instantaneousness. Thus one may spend an hour by one's tireside piecing together (or letting suggest each other), the ideas that represent the whole of an almost momentary experience of a year ago. It is such ex- periences as these, falling under the two princijiles just an- nounced, that have led certain psychologists unduly to emi3hasize the general facts concerned in the " fusion " and " sequence " of ideas, and their reciprocal influence in " attracting," " suggest- ing," and " excluding " each other. I 1. The Herbartiau psycliologv, after iDrofoumlly influencing the entire modern science of mind, and making important contributions to that science, has lately fallen into disrei:)ute. It has even become fashionable with those whose own views and methods owe a great debt to this same realistic move- ment, to si:)eak of it as " exploded psychology," " glib Herbartiau jargon," "hideously fabulous performances," and the like. And indeed its preten- tious mathematics of ideas, regarded as entities existing and influencing each other both out of consciousness and in consciousness, its effort to ac- count for the whole of mental life in terms of a theory of ideation, and its in- ordinate use of metaphysics in empirical science, are to be condemned. At the same time many of its suggestions and alleged laws throw a flood of light upon experience ; and this is particularly true of the subject we arc now about to discuss. Interpreting figures of speech in accordance with real psychological facts, we can approve of the greater part of what the most learned of the modern disciples of Herbart ' teaches respecting the " action and reaction of ideas." By this phrase, however, we must understand partial psychical processes of ideation (representative imaging), and tendencies to such processes , conibining to form a complex "feld of consciousness," in accordance xcith the laws of conscious mental life. With this understanding the jirincipal truths to be considered are as follows : The i^oint of starting is the question — Given a mnltiplicity of simidtaneoHS ideas, what will happen in the mental life? That siich a multijilicity should exist is not incompatible with the simplicity of the soul ; for the latter does not require that a midtipliciti/ of ideas should not exist, but that how many soever the ideas which do exist, they should not exist as disparate and without influencing each other. Now observation shows that the circle on which we can concentrate attention is a limited one, and that the very concentration of attention on one, or on a few of these ideas, involves the admitted existence of their multiplicity. This limited nature of consciousness involves the fusion of contemporaneous ideas into one state of 1 Volkmanu von Volkmar : Lehrbuch d. Psychologic, I. p. 338 f. 256 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION consciousness. Three cases of sucli fusion are possible ; and, indeed, act- ually arise : (1) Simultaneous like ideas fuse in one, in the sense that con- current i)artial processes of ideating flow together into one act which is directed toward the realization of like quality in a unit-state of conscious- ness ; (2) simultaneous heterogeneous ideas fuse into one collective idea, in which the disparate qualities are actualized through a compound activity of ideating ; (3) simultaneous opposed ideas inhibit each other, and then fuse ; that is, they exclude from realization so much of the jirocess of ideating them as prevents a unifying act, and then unite the rest into a collective mental state. Another recent writer > exi?resses his view of the fundamental facts which enter into the difTerent complex processes of ideating, in the following way : Every psychosis falls under two great jsrincii^les. These are : (1) the law of systematic association, namely, the existing psychosis tends to excite and associate with itself the elements which can unite with it for a common end ; (2) the law of inhibition, namely, every psychosis tends to hinder the pro- duction and development, or to cause the disapi^earauce of, the elements which cannot be united with it for a common end. The " tendency to sys- tematic association " is the property of all the psychic elements. This is equivalent to saying that what is already systematized in the mind tends to acquire a more complete organization. § 2. It is plain that the general tendency to reproduction of mental states, which rests on a basis of fundamental psycho-physical facts, and the universally limited nature of the field of consciousness, together make neces- sary a selection of objects in every complex field, and of factors in every com- 2)lex state. But the very word " selection " imi^lies the partial or total ex- clusion (or "inhibition," as the Herbartian terminology runs) of .some, and the adoption of others. Those reproductive tendencies which actually de- termine every complex state, and thus get recognition in consciousness, necessarily "fuse;" that is, the total character of every psychosis is the result of a spontaneous selective p)')'Ocess, under the laws of that tniity of consciousness which the very terms '■'■state " or '■'■ fiekV^ of consciousness signify. lu the case of sensations we have already seen that those of smell and taste, or of tactual and muscular sort, for example, so fuse as to bring about one compound sen- sation-experience. In yet far more complicated and subtle ways do like ideas fuse in a compound ideation-exioerience. Here the analogy of a composite photograph, which is the resultant of the images of a number of individuals but does not fully represent any one, has been emjiloyed.- The mental equivalent of this is the so-called "collective mental image" (Gesammthild). Of perception as a preparation for such mental seeing, a Ger- man writer ^ declares, in a perhaps somewhat exaggerated way : ' ' However much it may appear simple, it is, in fact, a thousand-fold, and more than a thousand-fold composite act — which exhibits itself as simple only because its factors are absolutely homogeneous, and by a thousand-fold repeated compensatory processes are most intimately /((.se^/." § 3. But seemingly very heterogeneous mental images may become con- > M. Paulhan : L' Activity mentale et les ISlfiments de I'fisprit, p. 17 f. 9 Delbanif :Le Soinmcil, p. 19S. s Beueke : Pragmatische Psychologle, p. 162. FUSION OF MENTAL IMAGES 257 nected together so as simultaneously to be reproduced in the unity of one field of consciousness. As experience grows, moi'e and more complex ten- dencies to reijroductive reaction become formed ; and a system of such ten- dencies — a " system of dove-tailing dispositions," it has figuratively been called — is formed in this way. But the possible oddities and whimsicalities of the mechanical fusion of ideas are almost limitless. Thus we read of one learned man who, when a boy, in order to lose no time, had practised com- mitting books to memory while on the full run. Years afterward the sight of a book mastered in that way brought up the recollection of its contents fused with the flitting images of the palisades and hedges by which ho had run while reading it for the first time. Another, who in his youth had worked as an ajiprentice for a hatter, could never look on black wainscoting (like that of the room in which he had worked) without the collective hetero- geneous mental picture of all former sensations and feelings — smell of var- nish, etc. — being reproduced. Conversely, at the smell of varnish, all the composite picture of his old disagreeable life regularly arose into conscious- ness. The learned Jew Maimon is said always to have accompanied any very strenuous mental effort — for example, in studying Euler's mathematical works — with " Talmudic intoning and movement of the body," because he originally mastered the writings of the synagogue in that way. In the case of us all, every comjjlex idea is the resultant of an indefinite number of "traces," or stronger tendencies to rej^roduce in the unity of one act, those experiences which have involved originally separate activities, but have by the very conditions of experience been compelled to combine. Life is full of such compulsions. Thus some are unable to image the smell of the heliotrope without seeing an imaginary heliotroj^e at the same time ; or to image the sound of a file or the look of a surgeon's probe, except as these images are fused with those of certain cutaneous and muscular sensa- tions. To speak of such a close and inseparable connection of partial rep- resentative images as due to " recall," or " suggestion," of one by the other, is in many cases scarcely less inai3propria.te than to say that the sensations of temperature "suggest" those of jn-essure, as I lay my hand on a cool marble slab. When, for example, a child begins to whine on being threat- ened with the summons of the doctor, the case is not so much to be ex- plained under the principle of suggestion, properly so called, as under that of fusion of originally heterogeneous elements into a composite idea. To say that the word doctor "calls up" the idea of a man with saddle- bags, and this "suggests" the occasion of some jDrevious sight of such an apparition, and this "suggests" the medicine he gave, and this "recalls" a nasty taste, etc., seems an altogether lumbering way of describing such a reaction of infantile mental life to certain stimuli of sound. The rather is it true that the child's very idea of a doctor is that of a particular nasty- tasting-medicine-man, with the saddle-bags, etc. And this idea, being re- produced in consciousness, may then well suggest the previous experiences which have given birth to it ; or it may lead on to the thought of the coming deprivation of privileges which are conjectured as a result. In fact, every complex idea, whether it originate as a dominating state of consciousness by its own spontaneity or by suggestion of other ideas or percepts, is — whenever it originates and every time it occurs — a new mental 17 258 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATIOX grotcth. That wliicli lias become a unity, by a process of so-called fusiou, unfolds itself as a unity after the fashion of those flowers which Oriental magicians are said to make grow, almost instantaneously, to full perfection from an infolded bud. § 4. That the limitations of every field of consciousness, taken in con- nection with its unity, result in jihenomena which may figuratively be de- scribed as a " conflict " and " inhibition " of ideas, there is abundant expe- rience to prove. We may even, not improperly, speak of a " struggle for existence " among the different conscious tendencies to ideation ; and thus employ a by no means unintelligible figure of speech. It is only when the attempt is made to extend speculation into the realm of the unconscious (to the ideas below the threshold) and to insist upon a formulated system of psychical mathematics and mechanics respecting the relations of the ideas, that psychological science interposes its veto. To solve sums in the in- hibitory value and eflSciency of ideas, there are no means at hand. And, indeed, as to the final explanation why some ideas triumph in the so-called struggle and survive, we are even more in the dark than is modern biology about some of its analogous problems. Various phenomena indicate that impressions of one sense may have a certain advantage over those of the other senses, and so recur more prompt- ly and surely as ideas in the field of consciousness.' With men generally sight is thus a. x>referred sense. In the case, then, of any complex sensation- experiences the visual factors, and those other factors which, for one reason or another, fuse most perfectly with the visual, may be said to have the best chances for reproduction in the contest for the field of consciousness. But we have seen that different persons differ greatly with respect to the terms (visualizing, auditory or tactual imaging, etc.) in which they preferably re- produce past impressions. The complex idea of a certain opus of Haydn, for example, differs greatly for the musician thoroughly familiar with tliat particular opus (having i)erformed it over and over again), for the musician partially familiar with it, and for the non-musical person who has heard it once or twice. In the first case, clear and life-like auditory images, fused with fainter tactual and muscular images (the violinist or singer), will in- hibit all others ; in the second case, fainter and more doubtful auditoiy images, fused with visual images of the notes, etc., may inhibit the others; while in the third case visual images of the concert room, attendant friend, when the piece was heard played, will probably wholly possess the field of consciousness. To such differences all men confess when they remark how much easier for them it is to frame an idea, or to recall an idea, of somethings rather than others; how hard or impossible, on the contrary, it is to make some of their ideas correspond fully to those of other people, or even to the facts as they know them to be. Such language implies that each complex idea is a living creation into which different possible elements enter, with more or less of readiness and reciiu'ocal influence, every time the process of ideation is performed. What the struggle and inhibition of partial ideas means in relation to the completed complex jirocess of ideation, we may understand in a very lively way by dwelling upon certain common experiences. Suppose, for ex- ' Compare Lapps, Grundtatsachen dea Seelenlebene, i., p, 160 £. S1'0^•TANE0L■S liKrUODUCTlOX 259 ample, one is trying to recall the face of a person whom one knows well. Fragmentary images, as it were (what his nose is like, his eyes are like, his month, the color of his hair, etc.), kcej:) " bobbing up" in the mental field of vision, only to get rejected as false to his likeness ; or to be accejited as pro- visional and capable of fusion with the other elements when the comi^leted jDicture arrives. All at once, it may be, out starts in good and vivid form the entire idea for which we have sought. Or, again, some one feature may be from the beginning distinctly enough ideated to hold its place as a sort of nucleus, to which the others may rally ; or, as a sentinel to admit or to ban all claimants to the field. In a still more lively way may we learn to know what the " reciprocal limitation " of ideas is, by making the attempt to ideate red while pronouncing the word blue ; or, to form an auditory image of the note a-=, while reading on the score bb ; or to put the idea of the disa- greeable Mr. X. into the pleasant memory -i^icture of the time we met the agreeable Mrs. Y. 5^ 5. In every comi^lex mental state that is chiefly characterized by idea- tion the principles both of fusion and of inhibition combine to j^i'oduce the result. That is to say, each idea expresses a number of tendencies to repro- ductive enei-gy "solidified" — if we may so saj—for the time being under the limited and yet unifying activity of that particular moment of psychical life. In this result some tendencies take a leading and jiredominating part ; others get relatively suppressed. That is, the processes of fusion and inhibition go on simultaneously, and determine the complex result. The decision of the question as to what reproductive tendencies will prevail, what not, may be said to involve the entire past history of this same psychical life. Here (1) attention, and the considerations (intensity, interest, etc.) already dis- cussed, which have to do with the distribution of attention, play an impor- tant part. (2) Eepetition, resulting in establishing habit and disposition to renewed similar ideation must also be taken largely into the account. But the full discussion of even this more i^rimary form of the organization of mental life implies a knowledge of other elementary processes of that life, which are to be considered later on. The very nature of ideas, both as respects the physiological conditions of their occurrence and the character of their appear- ance in consciousness sugg-ests that they have the Quality of " Spontaneity." That impressions, especially those which were originally intense and interesting, and which have had im- portant connections with our entire mental life, should qxmtxtne- oiisly recur as ideas is precisely what we should antecedently expect. Yet many p.sychologists deny spontaneous reproductive mental activity. AYe agree with others, however, in recognizing two kinds of reproduction : (1) immediate and direct, and (2) me- diate and indirect. In immediate reproduction the process of ideation is accounted for by the simi^le fact that it resembles a previous process of ideation or a previous sensuous impression ; and so needs no accounting for except the " tendency " or " dis- position " left by the previous activity. Negatively stated, the 260 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION idea does not owe its appearance to association with another idea, whenever spontaneous or immediate reproduction takes phice. But in mediate reproduction the cause of the partic- uhxr process of ideation is assigned to some just previous as- sociated process of ideation. The idea is then said to be repro- duced " mediatelj' " or " indirectly " — that is, through some other idea. Negatively stated, it does not owe its appearance simply to the tendency left by the original activity, but also to some connected or associated reproductive activity. A qualified affirmative is the correct answer to the question : Is immediate or Spontaneous Reproduction possible ? None of our ideas occur out of the stream of consciousness, and so out of association with that stream ; they contribute character to it : they are also determined largely in their own character by the fact that they are parts of one mental life. Physiologically speaking", each particular centrally initiated reproductive i^ro- cess in the brain is connected both with coincident peripherally excited processes, and Mdth other centrally initiated processes recently develojDed in associated centers. Speaking- from the point of view of consciousness, all our ideas repose upon, and are pervaded by, a certain sensuous basis, with which, and with im- mediately antecedent ideas, they may be said to be associated. On the other hand, the mere reproductive spontaneity of the cerebral process — ^the explosion of cerebral energy under the incitement of local internal stimulus, in accustomed forms of kinesis — may be the most important part of the entire brain state. And not a few of our ideas simply arise in consciousness, without its be- ing at all in our power to detect any idea by which thej' were suggested or mediatel}^ reproduced. It is customary with those who deny spontaneity of ideation to call attention to our forgetfulness of what goes on in conscious- ness, and to the multiplicity and subtlety of the associations which exist among the ideas. But this does not constitute a suf- ficient reply to the facts brought forward by those who advocate immediate, direct, and spontaneous reproduction. Moreover, it is quite jjossible to reverse the whole manner of ap^Droach to the subject, and to make immediate reproduction the basis of all reproduction, to explain, that is, all association of ideas as resulting from spontaneity of ideas. When the plain facts of consciousness are considered without professional prejudice, they certainly confirm the view which regards many of our ideas as springing- up into consciousness out of the unconscious (the psychologically inexplicable), rather than as being induced to appear by suggestion, or influence, from contiguous ideas. In SPONTANEOUS KEPRODUCTION 261 conditions of low psychic euergry (as, for example, when wo are day-dreaming-, in the mutterings of low delirium, or on just waking- from sleep) and in conditions when the stream of con- scious ideation is unusually rapid (in rapid composition or artis- tic production, in the whirl of high delirium or excited hours of insomnia), the spontaneous g-eneration of ideas seems especially favored. Of course, by this it is not meant to uphold the cause- lessness of the origin of any of our ideas. But to deny that ran- dom forthputtings of ideation, not to be explained as follo^ving- any order of association or suggestion whatever, are possible, in any conditions of consciousness, is to render the mechanism of ideas more rigid and narrow than that of any other form of life. It is also to contradict not only the exxjerience of those who have sometimes, like Philo Jud The Human Mind, I., p. 295. For the opposite view pee Volkmann : Lehrbnch d. Psychologie. I., p. 410 f., and a very interesting monograph, Ueber Phantasie-Vorstellungen, by Anton Oelzelt- Newin. Graz, 1889. 262 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION gest any other than the now dominant ideas. The lover needs no sugges- tion to think of his mistress ; although, as a matter of fact, everything does suggest her. But the patent truth is rather that her image tends to exclude all other disconnected ideas. So the central image of the dead child, and its escort of other allied images, with the tones of feeling indissolubly at- tached, for the time being "take possession" of the mother's mind. In all such cases our general feeling, even when we are not actively engaged with the dominant idea, is that of keeping it constantly repressed, only with the greatest difficulty. There it is — just in the background, scarcely below the threshold of consciousness, and ready to stej) out, or rise up, the instant we relax our restraining hand. It "will not down," for any long time. And thus men, as is so suggestively said, strive so to occupy attention as to " keep out " certain thoughts; or "drive them away;" or else they try to "drown them" in some form of oblivion artificially secured. It is this ex- perience which induces us to speak of a sort of " tension," or " strain," caus- ing a disposition to ideate in a certain way. Again it sometimes hai^pens (usually in conditions of abnormal cerebral excitement) that our ideas "go wild" — as we are wont to say. In the most provoking or amusing manner the psycho-physical mechanism then proceeds to throw up into consciousness all manner of rubbish from the cellars and garrets of our past mental life. Order or relation between the different ideas there is apparently none. Nor does a true theory of ideation require that there really should be - connection or association established between the contiguous members of our ideating under such circumstances. Such a general condition is probably better explained by referring it to the removal of the ordinary inhibiting influences.' Hence arises a random, "fancy-free," play or turmoil — sometimes a genuine hurly-burly, or rout — of ideas. When this takes place, surely enough no one can tell "which way " the ideas "will jump." And yet snatches of the ordinary laws of fusion and association ap- pear, according as connection is established between several of the successive members of this mad frolic of reproductive energy. [All of which the ' ' Her- bartian jargon " would, with a measurable truthfulness, represent as follows : " When an idea rising into consciousness finds another idea qualitatively like itself also appearing there, it fuses with the latter in the degree of its con- stant similarity as well as of its variable height, and thus gains additional strength against every inhibiting influence that threatens it."] In the case of " fixed ideas," such as those to which persons of abnormal or insane mental condition are liable, the persistent recurrence of similar ideation-processes is surely not to be accounted for as the result of sugges- tion or association of ideas. The principle hero applicable more nearly re- sembles that implied in the spontaneity of ideas. We are not, indeed, to re- gard this principle after the analogy of a sort of physical inertia, or bare per- sistence, of the ideas ; it is rather to be regarded as the result of a continued disposition or tendency, a statical mode of the exhibition of the soul's life. Many of the ])henomena of dream-life may also best be explained by the principle of the sj^ontaneity of ideas. It is the stern limitation and regular control of the ideas by percepts furnished from without, and by the necessi- ' In which Striimpell suggeBts (Psychologic, p. 49 f.) are to be found the reasons for the freistei- gende Voretellungen. ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS 2G3 ties of adapting the mental train and bodily movements, as an organized whole, to the securing of certain ends, which i)revails in our waking life. These things inhibit the great multitude of the otherwise si)ontaneously re- curring ideas. But in dream-life the pressure both from without and from within is withdrawn. Then innumerable forgotten and concealed tendencies to ideate, at random as it were, become substituted in part for the so-called laws of association. Impressions that are very powerful for our waking life may theu have no preference over those that are weakest or most deeply hid- den in the lowest strata of mental life. Thus quick and varietl metamorphosis belongs to dreams. Neither the dreams as finished wholes, nor the parts that enter into any one dream — it not infreciuently hajipens — can be said to sug- gest each other. Anything may happen in a dream — rather than that which would most naturally be suggested by what has happened just previously. To affirm that we are here dealing with laws of association instead of looking upon biological processes, which lie below those very laws, is to reverse the true scientific account of the facts. It is just by association, as directed to recognized ends, that this medley of psycho-physical vitality is reduced, and kept reduced to order. But in much of our dream-life we are looking on the naked, disassociated, biological simplicity of the soul. Some theory of tlie " Association," or " Sufj-gestiou," of Ideas is, however, made necessary by the way in which different pro- cesses of ideation, and states or fiekls of consciousness as de- termined by these processes, stand rehited to each other in time. The phrase " association of " is fitted to mark the bare fact that complex ideas, which had a more or less independent origin, are in the habit of recurring in reg-ular sequences (in pairs, or threes, or series of larger number). Hence a sort of Bund, or affiliated union, is fig-uratively declared to have been established between the ideas ; and the individual ideas form members of this Bund. The word " suggestion," however, is customarily followed with the preposition " by ; " one idea is said to be " suggested hy " another. Thus we represent our ex- perience in terms indicative of our conviction that in the on- flowing but closely connected stream of consciousness a causal influence is exerted between the processes of ideation Upon this way of looking at the relations existing between different processes of ideation several remarks are in place just here. Whether, in general, one mental state can projierly be said to cause another ; and, in special, Avhether the production of one idea is really to be attributed to the occurrence of a pre- ceding idea — these are questions of metaphysics with w^hich empirical psychology need not deal. In a statement, however, which aims to cover the facts of so-called association of ideas, and to explain them by pointing out the regular forms of their recurrence, the folloAving truths must be borne in mind. Move- 264 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION ment, or succession of states, in time is of the very essence of mental life. Movement of the ideas, involving their constant rising- and sinking in consciousness, is of the very essence of the process of ideation. For no more than a limited number of ideas, however relatively simple and partial, can exist in any one field of consciousness; and — "Time is on the wing," The relations between the complex states of ideation (memory or imagination) become, as a matter of course, more complicated and difficult to trace when we consider them in the succession of time. Far more complex conditions enter into the determina- tion of the question, what ideas shall follow each other (be sug- gested by each other, associated with each other) than into the determination of the question, what partial ideas shall fuse with each other. Another truth concerns the very limited nature of the appli- cation of the so-called laws of the association of ideas to the entire mental life. It is our total states or fields of conscious- ness which follow each other in the succession of time. "When we describe and explain them — what they are, their genesis and development, and the order and laws of their arising — we have done all that descriptive science can do to set forth tlie nature of the mind. But mental states are always something far more than ideas ; and the conditions of their genesis and succes- sion are by no means wholly to be ascribed to so-called as- sociation of ideas. Mental states are states of knowledge, feel- ing, will — all three in each state ; and their succession in time involves — or rather, it is — the entire knowable being and history of mind. Nevertheless, just as the idea is a most important factor in every form of mental life, and the process of ideation an in- dispensable condition of all mental development, so the laws of the association of ideas are indispensable to a scientific account of the successive phenomena of mental life. Two general facts give great importance to the study of this subject : (1) The suc- cession of ideas is relatively "free.'' We cannot predict on grounds of our own mental habit, or determine largely by choice, what we shall see, hear, feel, etc., when the organs of sense-perception are in their customary normal relations to the object. Perception is hound to things and to the order of their occurrence. And with bodily pleasure - pains it is much the same way. But the succession of our ideas is obviously much more a matter of our own mental' nature and of our choice. This is true even of memory ; it appears pre-eminently true of imagi- nation. In fancy, above all, are we " free." But (2) the succes- THE SUCCESSION OF IMPRESSIONS 205 sion of ideas is uot ordinarily free in the sense that our jn-esent ideas are not dependent for the determination of their character upon ideas immediately or more remotely i^receding. Ideas ordinarily arise in consciousness, in tlie succession of time, in pairs, g-roups of three or more, or longer series. Moreover, we are aware of a sort of transition, that partakes of the nature of compulsion, between them. If I have the idea A, then I may expect to have the idea JJ ; but if I have the idea J/, then I may expect to have the idea ^.V, etc. Now this formula — if yi,tlien B; if 31, then N, etc., is precisely the formula which necessarily suggests a connection between A and I>, and between 3/ and JV, etc. Indeed, since there is no absolute gap, or break in the continviity of the stream of consciousness, we may thus be said (especially in certain instances Avhere the succession of the com- plex fields of consciousness is rather slow in time-rate) to wit- ness the merging of one idea into another, associated ivith it, or suggested hi/ it. While the second of the above-mentioned two classes of facts is emphasized by the term association of ideas, the freeing of ideas is quite as important in the development of the life of ideation, and in the influence of ideation upon the develoiiment of all mental life. Any theory of the association of ideas raises the general question : "What conditions belonging to antecedent processes of ideation determine the succession in time of the subsequent processes of ideation? More popularly: Why do our ideas follow one order rather than another in the stream of our con- scious life ? To this question one equally general answer may confidently be given : When conditions similar to those belonging to the antecedent processes recur, then the succession of the sub- sequent ideation-processes will be similar to that of the antecedent processes. In other words, those ideas follow any given idea which, rather than other ideas, come under previously established connections between the psychical states which they represent. JVbt only single im2')ressions, hut successions of iinpressions, tend to he reproduced in a manner similar to the original ivip?'essions ; and the reproduction of the time-order is apart of the general disposition to reproduce. But experience develops an increasing variety of connections in time for similar ideas ; and in the actual order of any particular case of reproduction, only one of these many possible connections can be actualized. Figuratively speaking, a conflict of tenden- cies to reproduce in different pairs, groups, series, may be said now to arise. The acknowledged reproductive process, the idea which really " succeeds " in the succession of ideas, will be the t 266 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION oue which has had the strongest connections established with the producing- process. What are the " strongest " connections will depend in every case upon a variety of considerations, of which the more important will subsequently be pointed out. It is scarcely an exaggferation to say that every particular case of succession, or association, of ideas involves the whole of the pre- viously existing mental life — and this often in a very baffling way. If, however, we express in one jDrinciple the general facts empha- sized by reproduction of ideas in the succession of time, we may say that it is " contiguity " in consciousness which forms the fundamental explanation for all association of ideas. But such contiguity — whether temporal or spatial — must be conceived of as purely josychical ; the associated ideas reap^^ear as contiguous states of consciousness (are associated), because they represent processes that icere, with varying degrees of intensity, contiguous states of consciousness. Developing mental life is far more than a mere mechanism of ideas ; and even what is ordinarily embraced under the laws of the association of ideas will finally be seen to be inadequate to explain the jihenomena without the conception of a yet more fundamental teleological principle. § 8. The attempt to account for all mental phenomena and for mental development in terms of the mechanism of ideation has repeatedly been made by the reigning schools of psychology. The elaborate theory of re- ciprocal "furtherance" and "hindering" of ideas, not only in consciousness, but also "below the threshold" of consciousness, which the Herbartiau theory proj^osed, would seem to have done all that was possible in this direction. The attempt failed in Germany ; its failure has thrown discredit upon much that is exceedingly valuable and suggestive for the understand- ing of mental phenomena. Something similar may be said of the English " associational school," even when its theory is combined with innumer- able data and figurative terms (used, for the most pai't, with misleading literalness) drawn from biological evolution — as, for example, by Mr. Spencer. Failure will undoubtedly come also to the present revival of the attempt in Germany (by Ziehen and others), upon an experimental basis. For mental life is far more than, and far different from, a succession, chiefly, of associated ideas. On this point ordinary experience, and the language in which all men express experience, may be — at least in a preliminary way — considei'ed as decisive. For example, one's working life for any single day consists of successions of states which depend largely upon one's dispo- sition (well or ill, bright or dull, pensive, gloomy, or joyful), environment (at home, in the study, on the street, etc.), and especially one's plan for the day (writing, lecturing, holiday, etc.). To reduce the total explanation of all this to association of ideas, and to deny the power of choice to interrupt the mechanism, as well as to overlook the inexplicable sijoutaneous "tele- DISCERNMENT THROUGH SUGGESTION 2G7 ology " of much of our ideation, is to constnact and spread a bed quite too narrow for the mental manhood to stretch itself upon. g 9. Little need be added to what has already been said resi)ectiug the physiological conditions of the succession of associated ideas. That associ- ation requires time, and that this time is psycho-physical, and indicates the spreading of the initial cerebral processes over more and more of the con- nected areas, is abundantly shown by experiments in reaction-time. Ex- periment also shows that the more weak ami the more complex the associa- tions are, the more the psycho-physical time necessary to make them is prolonged. Among the most favorable cases are those in which some defi- nite memory-image is called ui> by a presentation of sense, such as a picture seen or a word spoken. Here the time required for ' ' simple-discernment " — of the meaning of a word, for example, through suggestion — was found to vary from 57 a- to 177 a- ; but if further association was required an average of some 727 a- elapsed before the associated idea arose, under the most favor- able circumstances, to consciousness. Such association-time is still further greatly prolonged in certain cases where the result, when it comes, may be looked upon as odd or unexpected ; or where a pause seems to have taken place through hesitation between several ideas simultaneously suggested. Thus the total time required in reacting on associating from "gold" to "silver" required only 402 or ; from "clear" to " dark, " 507(t ; and from " north " to " south," 502 a. But to associate " art " with " aesthetic activity " required 1,899 o- ; and to judge that "fame" is a "form of the ascrip- tion of praise," 2,023 a-.' [It should be noted that we are in these latter cases dealing with the associations of words and phrases as dependent upon the development of conceptual knowledge.] Other experiments ^ re- sulted in giving the time necessary to translate images into one's vernacular as about 477 (t-545 a ; but into a foreign language, as about 649 <7-694 a. Translating cmd naming short familiar words was found to require 199 a- 258 a- more time than merely naming ; and associating the land in which a city is situated with the name of the city, or the time of the year in which a month occurs with the name of the month, requires from f- to ^ sec. of psy- cho-physical time, when all factors are well known. The changes in reaction-time due to association, taken in connection with what has previously been said respecting the physiological conditions of all reproduction would seem to warrant some such statement as the fol- lowing, quoted from Professor James :^ "The amount of activity at any given point in the brain cortex is the sum of the tendency of all other points to discharge into it — such tendencies being proportionate (1) to the number of times the excitement of each other j^oint may have coexisted with that of the point in question ; (2) to the intensity of such excitement ; and (3) to the absence of any rival locality or process functionally disconnected with the first point, into which the discharges might be diverted." It must be confessed, however, that all this is highly conjectural, and, at best, only expresses a possible formula for the merely physiological conditions of the associational elements of mental life. > See the experiments of Trautscholdt, in Philosoph. Studien, i., Heft 2, p. 213-250. 2 Compare Philosoph. Stndien, iv.. Heft 2, p. 241 f. = Popular Science Monthly, March, 1880. 268 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION Fui'ther evidence ' as to the physiological conditions of association may be derived from cases where the range, speed, and accuracy of association are affected by cerebral lesions, or by changes in the arterial circulation of the brain. Association-time in melancholia and dementia is regularly greatly lengthened ; in mania, on the contrary, it is often much reduced. In such cases the more purely automatic functions of association (the " mechanism of ideas ") suffer less than the intellectual and voluntary processes. In cases of aphasia also (or loss of power to use and understand sjDoken or written words, due to lesions in the brain), the association-tracts connecting the different brain-areas being imi^aired, the mechanism of association is dis- turbed. § 10. That contiguity in consciousness, as just explained, is the funda- mental principle of the reproduction of associated ideas in time seems to follow from the very nature of reproduction in general. That is to say, all merely mechanical reproduction falls under the principle of contiguity. It belongs to the development of this principle to show how the so-called laws of association by similarity or contrast, coincidence in sjjace or time, etc., are all of them only special cases under it. So far as our physiological knowledge bears upon the psychology of association, it is entirely in favor of the supreme and exclusive value of this principle. If we limit the statement to the physical basis of the mechanical association of ideas, we may then safely agree with Fouillee when he affirms: "Contiguity in time links things only by means of a contiguity of extension in the brain." To this may be added the obvious truth that it is intelligence which takes note of "similarity;" and thus, in the j)sychological realm, i.e., in conscious- ness, association by similarity is a consequence of association by contiguity.^ Under the figure of speech involved in the word contiguity, however, we understand a psychological principle, a general form of the occurrence, in relation to each other, of mental processes, oi psychical facts as such. And here we come upon a yet more general fact or law, behind and beneath which psychological science is quite powerless to go. All psychical proc- esses which originally occur in close (or contiguous) relations of time become so vitally bound or associated together that they tend to recur in relations of time like the original relations. Strictly speaking, this princi- ple is not due to the ideas themselves or to the compelling force of time ; nor is it to be ascribed to influences extraneous to the mental life. On the contrary : Association by contiguity is the one principle which underlies and makes possible any continuous development of mental life whatever ; — but only so far as the so-called viechanism of association is concerned. ' A most fruitful means of studying- the application of the \_ principle of " coutig-uity " to the Reproduction of Associated j Ideas is afforded by the recurrence of the ideas in x^airs, groups, i or series. The range of the application of the principle in this; form is very g-reat. Even in the reproduction of complex ideas; ' See the careful and interesting experiments of Marie Walitzky on patients in an asj-hiin for thcj insane, Revnc Philofoph., Bee, 1889. ' See also Rabii-r (PFyclioloKle, p. 190 f.) who maintains that contiguity is the one law of thei association of ideas ; and compare M. Brochard, La Loi dtJ Siinilarite, liev. Philosoph., ix., p. 257 i, I ASSOCIATION BY CONTIGUITY 269 whose elements are onl}' partially " fused," numerous cases occur that come under this rule. Thus the entire group of related pai"tial imag-es may not appear within the easy, or even within the utmost possible sfrasp of one Held of consciousness. As therefore the ditierent members of the group succeed each other, and so constitute different states of ideation, the}' fall under this principle of association by contiguity. And, indeed, »io tixed line can be drawn between the principle of " fusion " and that of " association " by contiguity. The complex image representative of an absent face or of a scene of years ago, for example, may under one condition of body, or in the case of one person, spring forth complete into the unity of conscious life ; at another time, or in the case of another i)erson, it may be re- produced bit by bit, as it were — one bit suggesting another with which it had become associated by contiguity in consciousness. Subsequent study of the development of perception will show how both fusion of ideas and association of ideas b}' contiguity are necessary to all knowledge of sensible objects. All earhf training and decelopnient of inental faculty requires the repeated production (as respects both the original impressions and also the representative images of those impressions) of similar psy- chical j^rocesses in similar sequence of time. It is upon the basis of such associations, acquired under the principle of contiguity, that all freedom of thought, imagination, and action takes place. Without having our ideas hound into pairs, groups, and series, in the succession of time, we should not be set free to think, imagine or act. The very basis of experience and intelli- gfenee requires that a psychical automatism should be perfected through association of ideas under the principle of contiguity. Observation of the nature of all mental development shoAvs the important influence of the mechanical reproduction of ideas in the original order of succession in time. It is through this influence and by means of what it achieves for us, that we walk, talk, sing, use the senses in perception, " conduct trains " of im- agination, memory, or thought, and indeed " lead " all our daily lives. It is largely through differences in the character of this complex mechanism of association that different individuals are unlike. These differences characterize the essential nature of the mind's life. Innumerable long series of representative images thus tend to run themselves off, in a fixed order of time, if only the series is started, either at its beginning or with some other member of the whole. Snatches of series — ideas bound together in pairs and in small groups, because they have occurred together as contiguous members of longer series, are CAL^fO^^^^- 270 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION perpetually rising up into consciousness. Every sound (much more every word) lieard, every sight seen, smell or taste experi- enced, every feeling of muscle or skin, is liable to suggest sev- eral such " seried " ideas. And every idea in each of these sug- gested series will probably, in its turn, start a new pair, group, or longer series, of other associated ideas. Most of these shorter or longer series prove, on closer examination, to be more or less familiar, not only as respects their content as individuals, but also as respects the order of their succession. This is because similar ideas have frequently had a similar order of succession in our past experience. The simpler cases of associated ideas, as reproduced in their original order of succession, by no means, however, include all applications of the general principle. Two important subordi- nate principles must also be considered : (1) Ideas associated in series under the principle of contiguity come to have a recip- rocal influence in reproductive activity. The tendency to repro- duction is, of course, greater in the original order of the series, and between the most nearly contiguous members in the forward direction of the series ; and this tendency is also, of course, increased by repetition, within the limits of fatigue, distaste, overstrain, etc. But the tendency to reproduce each other also exists within certain not easily assignable limits, between mem- bers not immediately contiguous and in other directions and sequences than those of the original lines. Hence, any series may become variously broken up ; and, by an extension of the principle of contiguity, any member may come to recall any other, with which it was not originally closely associated and in a different order from the original sequence. What particular member of the series recalls what other will depend, in each particular case of associated revival, upon a variety of influ- ences, such as original or acquired intensity of the members concerned, repetition, disposition, environment, interest, and planful movement of the mental life at the time of recall, etc. (2) Ideas associated in series under the principle of contiguity suffer a process which may figuratively be described as that of " condensation." Certain members of the total original sequence tend to become obscured, or altogether to drop out of the col- lective train of associated ideas. In all cases of great familiar- ity with any series the mind hastens forward, as it were, to the end ; for it is to the end of the series, rather than to its individ- ual intervening members, that our chief interest is regularly attached. In the case of any long series of reproduced associated \ ideas, the emphasis of interest and reproductive energy rises i ASSOCIATION BY CONTIGUITY 271 and fulls iu a sort of rhythmic way. Thus, sojnc of the memhers of any aeries come to daiid as rcpreHentat'ive ideas, not only for their oicn oriijinals, hut also for several of the contiguous members of the original series / ajid tJiese contiguous memhers take the subordinate part of faint (someichat parasitical) '^fringes" of ideation for the emphasized ideas. Series of considerable length, origin all}^ are thus condensed into comparatively few members ; or even into a rapid ideation-process that seems almost to fall within a single grasp of consciousness, and so is entitled to be considered as only one exceedingly complex idea. Here we are jilainly deal- ing with phenomena, on a larger scale, which closely resemble those already treated under the so - called fusion of partial ideas. For here again the essential condition of all mental de- velopment is that the mental life shall not be obliged to repeat itself in detail ; we must be allowed to cut out the unessential members of the reproduced flowing stream of consciousness, and let one stand for many as their " representative," so to speak. But these rej^resentative ideas of the larger order themselves attain a modified character through this very process ; otherwise they could not be representative of a number of ideas in a series. For example, the train of ideas started in the consciousness of a musician by the first chords of a symphony, or of a mathemati- cian by the first words or symbols of a complex formula, may represent the entire sequence of chords, or words and symbols, in a manner at once more rich in meaning and more condensed in number of separable members.^ It is even now evident that this condensation of series of representative images, together with the closely connected process of freeing all the images from the necessity o4 recur- rence in just such, and no other, fixed order, is indispensable to conception and to thought. Indeed, we shall soon see that in the process of mental elaboration, reproductive images and conceptions can be separated from .each other by no hard and fixed lines. I 11. All the principal features of association by contigiiitv, as applied to reproduced series, may be illustrated by any number of familiar experiences. For example, we tend most strongly to recall, and actually do most easily and frequently recall, the alphabet of our own language, in the sequence in which we have learned it. Mention of any particular letter [K, for example) immediately summons the idea of the next following (L) ; groups like L, M, X, run oflf with peculiar smoothness. For, again, these three letters prob- ably belong to the several subordinate series within the entire series which 1 For a very interesting and suggestive, though somewhat fanciful development of this subject, Verdichtung der Vorstellungen, see Lazarus, Leben d. Seele, it., pp. 229 If. 272 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION are bound together with peculiar intimacy of association {A, B, C; and X, Y, Z, and other like groups). Moreover, it will probably be found more difficult to move in idea from L to K than from L to 3f; and yet any letter recalls its contiguous neighbors in the backward order more readily than the very remote members of the series recall each other in either direction, unless, indeed, some other association has been established between a pair or group of siich remote members. Still further, it will be found that, in rapid reproduction of the series, the mind seems to take long leaps, as it were, and to come down upon some of the members with peculiar emphasis (a matter due, perhaps, to muscular and respiratory rhythm connected with both the learning and the reproduction of the series). Finally, from A to Z, or from A to fi, may come to stand for the entire series, with only a vague imaging and feeling of any content between the two ends; or A-B-G, etc., may fuse into one idea, with a sort of added flourish of imaging and feeling to signify the addition of a long tail to this head of our series ; and so [A, B, C) become representative of the whole alphabet. Further illustration may be taken from the way in which jieople gener- ally recall tunes. The unfortunate amateur who has " started " one, and got switched off on to another by reason of similarity in a pair or gi'oup of following notes belonging to the two tunes, can scarcely ever recover him- self without going back to the beginning and starting over. The danger of repeating the mistake recurs whenever the place where the two series of associated notes coincide is reached. So closely bound together in the forward direction are the members of even a simple musical series, that it may well be doubted whether any musician can sing " Old Hundred " — for example— from memory backward correctly on the first trial ; although the tune produced in this way is perhaps better music than when produced in the original order, § 12. Exi^eriment tends further to confirm the principle of contiguity as applied to series of ideas. Ebbinghaus, in learning series of non-sense syllables, found evidence that even the remoter (not immediately contiguous) members of a series strengthen each other. Thus, any series once learned and then forgotten could be relearned with a saving of effort amounting to 33.3 per cent, for the next contiguous members ; but on skipijing one syl- lable, the saving was still 10.8 per cent.; and on skipi^ing two, three, or four syllables, it still remained 7.0, 5,8, and 3.3 per cent., respectively. This saving can only be due, it would seem, to association of members in the in- verse proportion of their original distance from one another. We have already seen how the grasp of consciousness includes a much larger number of objects if they may be connected together into wholes an- swering to some idea. Thus Cattell found that three times as many letters connected into words as disconnected letters could be comprehended in one field of consciousness. It falls under the principle of association by contiguity in consciousness that the revival of impressions originally thus "ideally" connected is so much easier and more comj^lete. Thus Ebbing- haus found that it reqiaired only one-tenth as many rej^etitions to learn the same number of syllables when making sense as compared with non-sense syllables. The nonsense of the nursery rhymes which so please and stick in the memories of children, as well as that which " now and then " delights CONDENSATION OF SERIES 273 " the best of men," is very far indeed from being «on-senso. It is also per- tinent to notice that the number of objects which can bo grasped together in the contiguity of one perceptive consciousness is about the same as that easily roi)roduced in the form of associated ideas under the principle of con- tiguity. Ebbinghaus also found that one reading would sullico for an ac- curate reproduction of a series of from six to eight members ; while thirty readings were necessary for sixteen syllables. From many such experiments with series of non-sense syllables the law was formulated : " Presentations once aroused in consciousness, simultaneously or in immediate succession, reproduce each other ; and more easily, in the direction of the original suc- cession, and with greater certainty, the oftener they have been together." § 13. The ofl'ect of the process described as " condensation " upon the character of any series of associated ideas is obvious enough. There are few, if any, of our adult experiences, where one idea is said to suggest another, in which this effect is not prominent. The first step toward this effect consists in bringing the originally remoter members of the series into closer contiguity, and thus binding them together for future recurrence as closely associated ideas. Thus if the original series be indicated by ^, B, C, D, etc., and B, C, be much condensed, or altogether dropped out, then .1 and D are brought into such contiguity in consciousness as forever after to become associated ideas. When any series of mental images, such as that belonging to a familiar stretch of natural scenery, or to a passage from an author, a proverb, a salutation, an announcement, or a musical aria, is started, at once the reproductive activity overleaps the members that orig- inally intervened, and suggests those that for some reason have become most representative of the entire series. In these cases, try as we may to proceed in regular reproductive order over the entire series, we cannot avoid these leaps. Imagination and memory thus find themselves under the influence of tendencies which enable them the better to act as substitutes for (to represent) the fulness of content and speed of movement which the presentations of sense and of self-consciousness enjoy. g 14. Here, again, we come upon those secret processes of change in re- productive energy that make thought and language possible. The "con- densation" and "freeing" of associated ideas is necessary in order that words may have their pregnancy of representative meaning. This is illus- trated in a very instructive way by the formation of compound terms to stand for the representative activity belonging to condensed series. The more naive and unscientific the work of compounding, the more instructive its result. Thus modern Japanese has one word composed of the first char- acters in the names of its three principal cities (Kyoto, Osaka, and Tokyo); the idea associated with this word stands for the resultant of repeated con- tiguity in consciousness of these three associated individuals, with the added importance which the fact of their association brings. For, as has already been said, the ideas brought into closer contiguity, and associated by this process of so-called condensation, are not themselves unaltered by the association. They are rich with the fragments of the content of the vanishing members of the series ; their life is the fuller, because into it has passed a part of the life of the defunct connected branches of the family they represent. It is largely in this respect that men differ as to their so- 18 Im 1^ 274 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION called ideas — from those who can condense into one reproductive process the nutriment derived from years of growth — to those who, like the soldier already referred to, cannot think at one time of more than two of the three ingredients of gunpowder. The association of series of re^sresentative images with series of motor tendencies is, doubtless, of great importance in furthering and modifying the entire reproductive process. In such cases as the foregoing, a partially reflex and ijartially voluntary accompaniment of speech is, in the case of adults, usually to be detected. Association by contiguity in consciousness, then, in the largest meaning of the term, includes this accompaniment. The great, and even indispensable assistance which "motor-consciousness" renders, is hinted at by the experience of Miinsterberg, ' who found he could reproduce in order a series of seven to ten letters, exposed 1 sec, with almost no errors, in case he could concentrate his mind on holding on to one letter until the next came ; but if he was occupied so as to be deprived of the motor accompaniment of speech, mistakes in the order of the series greatly increased. § 15. It is by no means our ideas alone which suffer this treatment called a process of fusion and condensation. The affective accompani- ments of our ideas share in the same process. Thus, by the image-mak- ing activity, feelings which have repeatedly followed certain sensations, jier- ceptions, or thoughts, become so attached to the itleas of such sensations. Ijerceptions, or thoughts, as promptly to arise in connection with them. A vivid memory-image of how a certain experience of my own once felt, or a vivid imagination of how some other being is now feeling, is immediately followed by that same feeling in the present conscious life. Thus we not only liave an idea of how our friend feels in the dentist's chair under the file ; but we may actually feel the filing in our own teeth. Meyer's story of the man who, on crushing the finger of one of his own children in the door, " felt a violent pain in the corresponding finger of his own body," which lasted three days, is only a somewhat extreme illustration of this.- The large province of "suggested" pleasures and pains is to be explored in the light of this principle. Among" the more widely recog"iiized " Laws of Association,"' so-called (besides the subdivision of the principle of contiguity into Time and Space), association by Similarity and by Contrast have stood first ; then follow such forms of sng-gestion as Cause and Effect, Means and End, Sign and Thing signified. The three laws of the first rank — contiguity in time and space, resem-' blance, and contrariety — were enumerated by Aristotle ; and, coming down at once to Hume, we find him omitting contrariety and adding cause and effect. It is si/nilarift/, however, which has either contested, or shared, with contiguity the honor of being the irreducible principle under which all suggestion of ideas l)y one another must fall. And, indeed, many modern > Die AsBoc'.af.on successiven Vorstellungen, Zeitsch, f. Psycho'.ogie, i.. Ileft 2 (1890). 9 Untersuchnngen Ober die Physiologic d. Nervenfaeer, p. 233. DIFFERENT VIEWS OF ASSOCIATION 275 psychologists still persist in speaking- as thoug-li, siuce ideas do (in some wholly mystical and inexplicable way) influence each other causally, this principle — " like ])roduces like " — must be acknowledg-ed as the one fundamental law of ideating- mind. We have already seen that, in general, only in a lignrative way can ideas be said to reproduce each other. The truth which really answers to this figure of speech is found in the ultimate fact that the psycho-i^hysical condition of reproduction, and the actual reproductive or ideating processes themselves, show rea- sons for assuming certain tendencies, or dispositions growing out of past activities. What takes place in consciousness, as associated ideas are reproduced, is to be explained by what has previously taken place. Further, what has previously taken place may be summed up in the one principle — of the influence upon each other of contiguous psychoses. But the question now arises, whether all cases of so-called association of ideas, that are explicable at all, can be explained in this Avay ? In other words, is the i^rinciple of association of ideas under the influence of contiguity in consciousness the sole discoverable psycho- logical principle % To this question we give an affirmative an- swer — limiting both question and answer, however, by our pre- vious use of terms. Most cases of the alcove-mentioned laws are so readily re- ducible to association by i^revious contiguity in consciousness, that they need little examination in detail. Cases of alleged as- sociation by contrast sometimes occasion more difficulty. Few modern writers on psychology, however, maintain with Aris- totle and Hume that " contrariety " is an independent principle of the association of ideas. Moreover, contrast is so closely con- nected with resemblance or similarity as an associating princi- ple, that the claim of the former to be an independent prin- ciple cannot stand, if the claim of the latter falls. We may then bring the principle of contiguity in consciousness to its final testing, by the inquiry whether it will account for all cases , of alleged association by similarity. But here we must be on our guard against two fruitful sources of confusion of thought. (1) The term " similarity " is after all only a relative term. If on the one hand, and strictly speaking, it may be said that no two presentations or ideas can ever be precisely the same, it may also be said, on the other hand, that lew presentations come into contiguity in consciousness without observed points of simi- larit}^ and few ideas of such presentations follow in the mental train that may not possibly develop points of similarit3^ Now, the advocates of similarity as an ultimate principle of the asso- 276 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION ciation of ideas invariably hypostasize the idea: tliey speak — that is to say — of ideas as entities capable of showing statical points of likeness and unlikeness. But for ideas considered as capable of influencing or suggesting each other, a psychology true to the facts obliges us to substitute ideating-processes. This alleged law of association then becomes the statement that every ideating process, as an individual process, tends to pro- duce next following it a similar ideating process — irrespective of any previous activity connecting the two, or of any conscious end to be reached in making the connection. But such a state- ment is not borne out by the facts ; moreover, it is utterly in- conceivable how such a general fact should be considered as a law of the mind's reproditctive ^wocedure at all. For (2) the whole theory of association hy similarity rests upon a confusion between those laws which regulate disc7'iminaiing con- sciousness in acquiring the original presentations and those other latvs which regulate the mechanism of reproduced associated ideas. That so-called ideas get associated under the law of similarity by conscious discrimination, and so, having been bound together by contiguity in consciousness, recur as originally bound — this is one thing ; but that ideas, on recurring, tend to suggest other similar ideas, irrespective of their having ever been thus actively associated by discriminating consciousness — this is quite another thing. Association by similarity is indeed one of the most ex- tended and fundamental of all the laws of primary intellection. We have already seen that all consciousness, that attention even in its primary forms, and that the formation of sensation-com- plexes and the having of definite or vaguer states of feeling, as well as the formation of complex ideas by so-called fusion, all involve the discrimination of like and unlike, and the assimila- tion of that which is like. Now, it is in the contiguity of this primary discriminating consciousness that like gets associated with like, and pari passu, in some sort, becomes separated from the unlike. It is this procedure, as it grows more and more com- plex, purposeful, and truly intellectual, which prepares the sim- ilar and contrasted ideas, as it were, to suggest (or associate with) each other. But this, instead of being something different from the princii)le of association by contiguity in consciousness, is precisely the same thing as this principle itself. If now we unite the foregoing two sets of considerations, we see how much that is true belongs to the explanation of associa- tion by similarity. The " similar" and the "contrasted," in idea, differ for different persons almost beyond all assignable bounds. Men in general do not notice, with any high degree of discrirai- CONTIGUITY IN TIME AND SPACE 277 nation, likenesses and uulikcnesses that have no teleological signilicance for their daily lives. The multitude, for example, cannot even tell you what color the g-rass is " like," or the bricks of a particular building- in a street they have daily passed, etc. Propose the question as to which of the parental families any child is " like," in the presence of a half dozen relatives, and note how unlike their ideas of " likeness " are ! Or listen, with the same intent, to a half-score of gazers at the summer evening- clouds, and hear them tell what human or animal forms are suggested as " similar " to the outlines in these vaporous types. Nothing- which is snggested as like to the suggesting idea, when one sort of mood or plan creates a disposition to regard all ideas in a certain way, is really like that which is sugg-ested during another mood' or ruling- plan. But all suggestions, regarded as falling under the mechanism of ideas, are alike significant of a tendency to reproduce in such pairs, groups, or series, as have been, somehow and at some time, produced before. I IG. The ordinary cases of association by contiguity in space or time, easily fall under the same general law. Things that are together in space, or events actually contiguous in time, never become associated, unless they are mentally united, or known as contiguous. In every complex act of percep- tion, apperceiviug consciousness is, by the very nature of its activity, en- gaged in associating the different objects perceived. To the association of the idea of any of the parts with the whole, or of the whole with any one or more of its parts, the same truth applies. The very act of knowing whole and parts together is a process of uniting, under the principle of contiguity in consciousness, those presentations which, when they recur as ideas, sug- gest each other because they have already been associated. Cases of means and ends, causes and effects, signs and things signified, as they suggest each other in pairs or groups, and in whatever order, come under the same princi- ple. Thus the sight of a poker near the open fire suggests, even in our friend's house, the poking of the fire ; or, if no fire is lit, the propriety of having one lighted. Here the "original" has been a somewhat extended series, stretching between the poker seen and the fire poked ; but by a process of easy condensation, poker and fire have become so associated that sugges- tion works immediately in either way. It is by similar repeated series of impressions— presentations of sense and ideas— that oiled rags lying in a heap, or unignited matches on the floor, are associated " at a leap " with the building already on fire, and the accompanying feeling of alarm and indigna- tion. All our interpretation of every kind of sign— whether visible, tangible, or that obscure " feeling in the bones," which the superstitious regard— is suggested under the same principle. [Here comes in the so-called theory of the relations between Lautbild, Schriftbild, and VorsteUimg.] It originally required a long series of questionings and inferences, or mistaken guesses, to establish contiguity in consciousness between that particular look of our friend's eye, or the set of his jaw, or the play around his mouth, and his U 278 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION mental state thus signified. But the intervening links have long since dropped out of memory ; and we now have a clear idea of what he thinks and feels by a sure spring from the delicate standing-ground of our immedi- ate perception of the changes of his countenance. g 17. It seems strange to find even so acute an analyst of mental proc- esses as Lipps,' for exami:)le, affirming that "the idea or sensation a pro- duces the idea b with an energy whicli is proportioned to the degree of their sm//«r//y " rather than "proportioned to "the character of the connection previously established between the ideating processes indicated by a and b, respectively. Then follows the misleading figure of speech about the " sup- port " which similar ideas give to each other, etc. Even Hoffding- vent- ures to affirm that, "so far from association by similarity being resolvable into association by contiguity, every association by contiguity, on the con- trary, presupposes an association by similarity, or at least an immediate recognition." But this, as we have already pointed out, is, to confound the laws which regulate the binding together of the elements and objects into the unity of one field of discriminating consciousness, and the laws which regulate the succession of associated ideas ; moreover, such a statement uses the words " similarity " and " contiguity " in a way not warranted as applied to ideas. The important distinction we are advocating will perhaps best be made clear by an example or two. Wherever an alleged association by similarity has previously taken place, especially if it has repeatedly taken place and so become an habitual association, the principle of contiguity in consciousness plainly applies. But let us take the very case selected by Hoffding as an example of association by similarity, " the innermost germ of all association of ideas." I see an apple on the table before me, and qviiekly find myself thinking of Adam and Eve. Undoubtedly this is, as Hofi'ding says, because I have — perhaps so quickly that I do not remember or am " hardly conscious of it " — first thought of the apple on the tree of knowledge. But this is not, as Hoffding assumes, because the aj^ple on the table, being in idea similar to the apple in the Garden of Eden, has siaggested the latter, and so has suggested the unhappy first pair connected therewith. On the contrary, the connec- tion between the perceived aj^ple (i.e., certain sensation-complexes, with ideas, feelings, and motor accomjjaniments) has been by long ago repeated mental activities established with the idea and name of "apple." And this idea and name have frequently been contiguous in consciousness with the idea and name of the apple-bearing tree of knowledge, with Eden, and with Adam and Eve. Indeed, " apple " and " Adam and Eve," in the case of many minds, furnish an instance of one of those many associated couples of ideas where the series has suffered condensation ; and thus two originally remote members have coalesced, as it were. In the same way is to be ex- plained the other exami^lo of the same author, where a vivid memory-image of a Swiss mountain view was aroused by the " roscmblanco " of "heavy hanks of clouds in the horizon." Here, too, the perceived outline of such forms as the clouds fiirnished had been previously connected in ajiporcoiv- ing consciousness with the mountain forms. And indeed, Hoffding, after aflfirming that similarity (that is, as a law of association of ideas) lies at the • Sec his Griindtatsaclien d. Scclcnlebens, pp. 102 If. » Outlines of Psychology, p. 157. PARTICULAR CASES OF ASSOCIATION 279 root of contiguity, and yet claiming independent value for contiguity, pro- ceeds to maintain that the " two laws may bo brought under one and the same fundamental law." This law he awkwardly calls the "law of total- ity ; " while rightly holding that it is furnished by the " synthetic activity of consciousness." Now, it is this same law which we have called "the principle of association by previous contiguity in consciousness," and which we affirm to be the one psychological principle underlying all the mechan- ism of successive associated ideas. Each particular Case of Association constitutes a special prol)lt'm to be solved under the g-eneral laws of the mind's re- productive activity. Since all the terms in which these laws are stated are tig-urative, the so-called " laws " must themselves be taken somewhat loosely, in accordance with the facts of mental life. Strictly speaking-, no complex idea is the same as, or ex- actly similar to, any previous presentation of sense or of self- consciousness ; neither is any idea exactly similar to what we are pleased (very inaccurately) to call the " same " idea. On the contrary every new reproductive process is also a new men- tal creation — the origin of which, as a whole, and of all the dis- cernible elements of which, depends upon many influences. Of these influences the more important and determinative can some- times be observed or conjectured Avith a high degree of cer- tainty. But at other times the origin of a complex idea may be quite hidden among the deepest secrets of the forgotten i^ast of the mental life. Under the g-eneral principle, however, the causes which determine each particular case of a reproduced associated idea are : (1) the conditions under which the original presenta- tion occurred ; (2) the history of the mental life, as bearing- on this particular idea, from the time of the presentation to the time of reproduction ; and (3) the conditions under which the process of reproduction occurs. But who does not at once see that we have here involved all the past history and habit of the ideating- subject ? ^ In other words, the answer to the question, v^hy I have just noio this particular idea rather than some other, may have to he sought at the very roots and all along the growth of my entire mental life. Following- are the principal groups of influences which may be seen to enter, with more or less force, into the solution of each case of the reproduction of associated ideas. ? 18. In any attempt at complete explanation of a case of association we are obliged, not only to go back of the present state of conscious ideation and exjDlain this by previous states ; but even to go back of all states of cou- ' For experimental proof of snch a statement, pee Scripture : Ueber d. aseociativen Verlanf d. VoreteUungen. Compare, especially, the declaration, p. 87 f. 280 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION sciousuess and explain (^) by an assumed "nature," or "constitution," of the mind. In this way we take note of the common and apparently well- grounded impression, that not all the diflerences in men resi^ecting their ten- dencies to associate ideas in a j^articular way are acquired. Such tendencies as may be called "natural" are, however, undoubtedly connected with dif- ferences in the intensity and variety of the original presentations, and with the distribution of attention in connection with discriminating consciousness, etc. But here we reach the bounds where empirical science must stop. This general but vague concei^tion of original diflerences in men, as furnish- ing conditions to the associated j^rocesses of ideation, is capable of subdivi- sion, as it were. Hence association of ideas may be said to depend (Z>) on temjierament, race, sex, etc. Indeed, the speed and character of the indi- vidual's train of ideas are distinguishing marks of the acknowledged differ- ent kinds of temperament. Terms of temperament (sanguine, sentimental, phlegmatic, etc.) seem not inappropriate to diflerent races of men ; and strong reasons exist for admitting that there is much truth in the popular impression of a characteristic difference in the way in which the memory and imagination of men and of women "work" — as we are wont to say. Time of life is also a potent influence in determining the mechanism of associated ideas. The vague longings and sentiments which spring ui> at puberty, the consolidated practical issues of middle life, the tendency to remoter remin- iscences which old age develops, are connected with and express this influ- ence. For (C) the transient or permanent influence of bodily conditions and of the corresponding mental moods is very marked over the association of ideas. Psych o-iahysical depression constitutes a strong tendency to revive certain classes of ideas to the exclusion of others. On the other hand, we think of gay things exclusively, or most readily, when ?re are gay. All the imagery of Milton's L'Allegro and II Penseroso, for examjjle, from the "tripping" on "light phantastic toe" of the one to the "dim religious light " of the other, is ordered and suggested according to an appropriate prevalent mental mood. The three foregoing classes of conditions— it will be noticed — do not con- tradict the principle of contiguity in consciousness, but rather afford reasons for the preference of one association over another, when both of two possible associations might have had an equally strong connection established in previous experience. One follows rather than the other, because it fits in better with the present general character of the stream of mental life. But (D) what may figuratively be described as the strength and enduring quality of each original presentative state, has its influence on the future association of ideas. Here again the influences which determine strength and endurance are manifold ; they are in the main such, however, as have already been con- sidered in connection with primary attention and with the intensity and life- likeness of mental images. Many strange experiences occur under this principle. Trivialties not infrequently get themselves connected Avith the original leading presentations in such a way as to be forever indissolubly associated. In general, however, the more intense, complete, aiul interest- ing is any complex as.sociation as established in the presentative act, the more do all the factors and objects thus associated tend to revive each other, under tlie general principle of contiguity in consciousness. It is [E) THE "freeing" of IDEAS 281 the next preceding state of consciousness wbicli, as a rule, has most obvious influence in determining what the jaarticular associated idea shall be. In- deed, the meagre, old-fashioned form of the theory of association laid almost the entire stress of intlueuco upon this immediate connection. We have seen that this account is too meagre to be satisfactory. At the same time, the con- siderations summed up in the principle of contiguity chiefly ai)ply to the two states thus most immediately associated in the succession of time. (F) Reji- etition and Habit are of the very highest imjjortance in the explanation of the mechanism of ideation, as well as in the explanation of all our mental life, with its voluntary or involuntary and unconscious motor accompani- ments. Finally, we are obviously about to overstep the boundaries of a mechani- cal theory of the ideation-processes, when we notice (G) the great influence of feeling, desire, and volition on the association of ideas. Feeling, in the form of permanent or transient " mood," or " disposition," has been seen to be an important determiner of the succession of associated ideas. The influence of desire and volition has also been recognized, while considering how discriminating consciousness, as a selective and assimilative process, actually accomplishes the association of various factors and objects within the unity of the field of consciousness. We shall subsequently see that, in all association of ideas in developed mental life, there is a possibility of planfnl choice, with ends of one kind or another in view, taking part in, or assuming a large control over the succession of revived images. Thus, what is customarily called the association of ideas comes to be something far more than an imalterable activity in combination on the part of a merely re- productive mechanism, strictly predetermined for each new case by what has taken place in the past. Voluntary memoiy and free artistic imagination are seen to be possible ; and the automatism of ideation, like the motor automa- ton which the bodily members constitute, becomes not simply the master, but also in some sort the servant of chosen and ideal ends. In preparation for that service which the processes of idea- tion render to the development of mental life, changes in the character and connections of the associations take place which may figuratively l)e described as the "Freeing" of the Ideas. To understand this, what has already been discovered respect- ing the nature of the representative images, as well as respect- ing the character of our experience in reproducing series of ideas, must be recalled. Diftercnt so-called ideas differ, wdien compared with their originals and with one another, in rwspect of intensity, life-likeness, etc. This capacity for difference fits the reprodiiced ideas for service in two opposite directions : (1) The more intense and life-like any representative image is, the better fitted it is to represent just that particular presentation or previous idea, like which it is, in all the fulness of the life belonging to both ; and the less fit it is to represent any other of the many particular exjoeriences of mental life. On the cou- 282 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATIOIS'- traiy, (2) the paler, less full in content, less life-like any idea is, the more it is lacking in fitness to represent any one particular Dresentation ; but the better fitted it is to represent any one of a number of more remotely and slightly similar representations. Now, this more extensively representative, or sketchy and out- line character of some ideas is essential to the development of mental life ; for it enables the " same " idea (or rather similar ideation-process) to represent a number of different (and actu- ally very dissimilar) presentations. It renders the idea " generi- cally " representative. The capacity for generic representation may be said to be due to the more or less " schematic " character of the representative image. Here it is important to notice the eflfect of repetition of simi- lar psychic activities, whether in the form of i^resentations of sense and self-consciousness, or in the form of ideas. Repeti- tion may tend to modify the processes of ideation in either one of two opposite directions. What we frequently perceive — if this be done with interested attention directed to the mastery of details — is likely to be reproduced with fulness of content and in intimate association with a great variety of presentations and ideas of other objects. But what we frequently perceive — if this be done with no attentive interest in details — may become capable of reproduction only in scant outline by an effort, and with some special suggestion to set the mental train in that par- ticular direction. To illustrate both classes of effects — many men who can with difficulty reproduce the arrangement of their own breakfast-tables, or the patterns of the dresses now worn by the members of their own family, recall in a vivid and detailed fashion the aspect of the table at some banquet of a year ago, or the gown of some lady met with on only a single occasion. From the clear and full perception of objects to the most "abstract" ideas, so called, of those same objects, there is a gradual diminution in the number of discernible elements, and so in the reciprocal influence of the elements upon the entire field of consciousness. The more elements partially or wholly sui)[)ressed, as it were, the " paler " and more " abstract " the resulting ideas become. Not only is it true, as one wi'iter ^ has dindared, that the strengthening of ideas by repeated production must be harmonized with the fact of the weariness produced by all exercise of mental force, and that one may re]ir()duce an unclearly apprehended idea a thousand times without making it any clearer; but it is also true that, by repetition, the many weaker accompaninKnits of the few central features of the idea ' Benekc : Pragiuatische Psychologic, p. 00 f. FORMATION OF ABSTRACT IDEAS 283 may be wholly lost, and that the idea is by frequent repetition rendered more abstract, meagre, and schematic. This is, how- ever, the very process which is necessary to set it "free" from its tixed association with only one original, and thus render it " at liberty " to represent equally well any one of a number of orig-iuals. Tlic less llfe-Ul'e any idea is, as compared with any one oi'iylnal presentatice object, the more service it can do in represent- Iny an entire class of ohjects. The recurrence of the more highly schematized representa- tive images in a variety of different series operates still further to set them free from fixed and definite limitations. That which, by its concrete and rich life-likeness is capable of repre- senting only one object, is comparatively infrequently sug- gested to my mind; conversely, when it occurs in conscious- ness, it suggests comparatively few associated ideas. But experience, to begin with, is not fixed. Series of sensations and feelings and presentations of sense do not perpetually recur in the same order. However hard we labor to master any particu- lar series, it rarely fails to get broken up again by repeated blows from changing experiences. Similar perceptions succeed each other, now in one order and now in another ; disposition, bodily condition, transient mood, as well as environment, are constantly changing. To use Mr. Bagehot's expression — the " cake of custom " is perpetually being made and broken, only to be made over in a different way and then broken again. Series of presentations and series of ideas representative of presentations cross and recross each other in bewildering com- plexity. Thus an increasing variety of more or less flexible as- sociations, among more and more highly schematic ideas, is made possible. This entire complex process, which we have figuratively described as that of " freeing the ideas," may, there- fore, be said to have two connected phases: (1) The individual complex ideas (or ideating-processes) by losing more and more of those factors which were fixed by particular previous experi- ences become capable of representing (are " set free " to repre- sent) a larger number of presentations that are similar only in a few characteristics ; and (2) these same ideas, by losing the fixity of position which they had in only a small number of defi- nite series, become capable of association (are " set free " to associate) with a large number of ideas to form new combina- tions and series. Thus a comparatively strict mechanical asso- ciation and a relatively free and artistic combination of ideas are both made possible. And both are necessary for the devel- opment of mental life. 234 THE PKOCESSES OF IDEATION § 19. No necessity ' is move imperative for the first steps in the develop- ment of mental faculty than this progressive schematizing of the representa- tive image. In general it may be said that "getting ahead " with our ideas at all requires that we should not stop long over each one. Most of them must be touched lightly and let go ; they must not be dwelt upon ; for the life of conduct and thought, with its end to be reached, requires us to move on. Few, then, of the factors which have fused into the most life-like form of the rej^resentative image can ordinarily be made the subject of detailed reproduction. Thus is made possible all that use of external symbolism, of whatever sort, which suggests and suj^ports the rapidly moving but thin and meagre members of the train of associated ideas. The rude drawings of primitive peoples, the origins of the difierent alphabets, the accompani- ments of grunting and gesturing with which speech is often helped out, the use of signs in mathematics, illustrate this same psychological princii)le. Indeed the origin and use of language cannot be understood at all without bearing this principle constantly in mind. On the one hand, a single word dwelt upon may suggest a group or series of connected ideas — all, i)erhaps, of a concrete, intense, and life-like character. But, on the other hand, whole sentences or paragraphs, in rapid speaking or reading, may have for their mental correlates, as suggested by the words, only a small number of highly abstract ideas. Indeed, if we consider, what that is truly psychical gener- ally answers to long series of symbols — verbal or otherwise — we shall be con- vinced that in rehearsing many such long series only faint traces of idea- tion stand here and there for a word, or for an entire phrase. If one arrives ab the other side of the stream in safety, one does not notice or remember how each floating block of ice felt, as it was touched lightly with the toes- one's eyes and interests being set on that other side. The changes from presentations to ideas, and so on to so-called concep- tions, may be said largely to consist in the more and more complete " free- ing" of the mental states ("presentations," "ideas" or "representative images," and "conceptions"; from the limitations of fixed concrete accom- paniments. In the case of some of the senses, however, this jn-ocess of free- ing never takes place to any considerable extent. One can easily rejn-esent to one's self, in terms of si[/ht, what corresponds to the idea or the concept of a heliotroi^e or a Japanese lily, but what real psychical j^rocess can be meant by speaking of the " concept " of the smell of either of these flowers ? What, again, can be meant by a concept corresponding to the ijeculiar timbre of a single note {e.g., a') on a cornet, or a flute, etc. ? Some persons can un- doubtedly ideate somewhat vividly in resjjonse to the demand made upon them to reproduce the smell of the heliotrope, etc., or the timbre of the note a'. But the timbre of any note — to select this as an example of many similar experiences — is different according as it is sounded by cornet, flute, violin, etc. The most life-like idea of any note is then probably more abstract than the most life-like representation of the smell of the heliotrope. In both these cases, however, the state of consciousness actually arising in answer to a call for some " idea " of the smell of a ])articular flower, or some " idea " of the timbre of a note, etc., would probably bear scarcely any traces of revived images of the particular sensations required. It is really in terms of sight ■ On thie necessity sec George, Psychologie, p. 222 f. SERIES OF "FKEED" IDEAS 285 and motor experience, faintly and " abstractly " reproduced, that most jier- sons construct their so-called "concept" of smells, sounds, and tastes. In general, then, the more " abstract " and " conceptual" the ideas become, the moi-e do thei/ consist of highly schematized reproductions of presentations in terms nf the more intellectual a)id objective of the senses — that is, of sight and touch, in the most comprehensive meaning of the latter word. The dilference between the definite and life-like but fixed ideas, and the l>aler, more abstract, and free ideas, may be illustrated by the well-knowii case of the somnambulistic abbe." We are told that this man composed sermons during his long-continued states of natural hypnosis, or somnambu- lism. But one day, when a sheet of white jmiier was i)laced over the sheet of writing he had just finished, he obviously reproduced upon the blank page all the mental images belonging to the sheet below ; for he read the latter correctly and made erasures and corrections (on the blank page) which coincided exactly with the text. Compare this life-like rejiroduction of associated ideas with the few and meagre abstract ideas which would be awakened in his hearers when the abbe came to read his sermon before them ! Again, a correspondent of Galton,* the Eev. George Henslow, on shutting his eyes could see a series of visual images, vivid and concrete, unfolding themselves before him, as a passive spectator, so to speak : for example, a bow — an arrow — hands drawing the bow — a cloud of arrows — fall- ing stars — flakes of snow — ground covered with snow, etc. Comjiare this form of ideation with that which the reproductive energy of our minds pro- duces as we rapidly read the account of this man's exi^evience. How life- like, biit limited, the one associated series ; how abstract, but free in a.ssoci- ation, the other ! ^ 20. The process of fixing and then freeing the ideas, in associated groups or longer series, is well illustrated by the experience of the average learner of the art of playing the piano. It is usually very difficult at first to establish a firm association between the two complex series of jisychical pro- cesses required for "putting together " the two hands. The iJractice of the jiarticular exercise with which this is in the first instance accomjilished has for its result a firm welding of the particular score in the treble c/e/" with the particular score iu the accompanying base clef. This firmly welded com- plex of two associated series, once made with no little pains, becomes in turn difficult to break. Indeed, ia the case of those who learn only a little of the art, it is apt to remain throughout with an astonishing amount of tenacious adherence between its fixed ideas. But the practice of different exercises — the second, after the first has been mastered, etc. — results in repeating the same notes in slightly changed combinations ; the series of the treble clef is in each case somewhat different, as is also that of the base clef. The com- plex of the two associated series now accomplished is a step in freeing the ideas (auditory, visual, tactual, muscular) concerned in the entire process of learning to play. And finally, iu the trained pianist, so " free " have all these ideas become that any possible combination is instantly brought about by a bai'e suggestion ; so " condensed" is the series of psychical acts now answer- ing to the musical symbols that a mere glance at the notes carries with it the > See Binet : La Pgycholosrie dn Raisonnement. p. 150. " Comp. Paulhan : I'Activite mentale, etc., p. 430 f. ^^ X!>" 286 THE PROCESSES OF IDEATION rush of motor and aflfective accompaniments, with the palest and most ab- stract of ideation-processes. And in musical improvisation or composition, the free-mounting ideas, in response to a chosen end or to a flood of not easily expressible feeling, show how the mechanism of association has been made the servant, and not the master, of the feeling and willing soul. In all such experiences we have the principle illustrated that tlie power of any fixed association seems, by frequent repetition, to rise to a certain degree of in- tensity ; but from this point on, by repetition, the opposite result may be made the more possible ; for the many concrete points of association become weaker and ireaker and at last disappear. ' In connection with this principle, the repe- tition of similar presentations of sense or self-consciousness, in a great variety of different connections — pairs, gi'oups, and longer series — favors and accomplishes the progressive freeing of the ideas. Mecliauical as the elementary process of ideation uncloubtedlj' seems to be, clear traces appear in it of that which promises to overstep the bounds of mere mechanism. The whole histor\' of mental evolution depends upon the progressive organization of the elements of mental life under laws or orderly forms of be- havior, in accordance with the ends of mental life. Even in the earlier processes of ideation the beginnings of organization are laid. But the very word " organization " (as well as the word " development ") is meaningless without the idea of a plan. The association of ideas, as one of the most fundamental conditions of all mental organization, shows tokens of being " planful," even from the dawn of mental life. In this regard mental phenomena resemble all classes of biological phenomena. All living beings, from the very beginning of their observable existence, organize themselves according to a plan. This fact cannot be denied, no matter how much our obvious ignorance as to the explanations of the fact may be increased or diminished by the progress of biological science. A study of the life of the human embr\'o shoAvs a most marvellous series of changes, the more immediate conditions of which we can only very imperfectly set forth, pro- ceeding, however, according to a recognizal)le plan. The phoiful nature of this self-organization is the one obvious, the indisput- able thing ; the exact character and amount of the influence from onvironiiiont is much the more doubtful and disputable. Thus, also, the mental life, from its very beginnings makes evident that its development is fjomrf to he according to a plan. Tracing each stage and step of that development, and reviewing its whole course from a point of view selected where the entire course may be regarded as complete, we see that it has heen according to a plan. ' Conip. Mohr : Griiiicllage d. Empirischcn Psychologic, p. 8C f. PLAN IN IDEATION 287 111 attempting a scientific account of the mental life psycliol- og-y is justitied in laying* emphasis, at first, uijon the iiassive, and, as it were, exteruallj' determined side of the total develop- ment. This side is proi)erly emphasized in any theory of the so-called association of ideas. Tims we may speak as though ideas were somehow forced into association by the play of the environment upon consciousness, through the sensations ; and as though, a mechanism of associated ideas being thus externally fixed, this mechanism remained the controlling, or even the only, thing to be considered in all subsequent development. But it must also not be forgotten that from the beginning, and even in the formation of associations, the other sides of the complex of consciousness must be taken into the account. It must not be forgotten that feeling and conation — the interest that goes with pleasure-pains, the varied aftective impulses, the influence of selective attention, and the adaptation of motor consciousness to i^ractical ends — are taking their share in the organization of mental life. Nor do these activities stand apart from the form- ing and develoi3ment of the mechanism of association. This mechanism, then, is itself made planfnl, so as to exjiress the entire nature of the developing mind. Such a fundamental tele- ology of mental activity as a principle controlling the ver3^ ele- ments of mental life, has been elaborately discussed by a recent writer on the psychology of association (M. Paulhan, in L Act'i- viU mentale et les Eliments de I'Ji'sprit). We agree with this au- thor in recognizing the increasingly planful and " systematic "" character of the processes of associated ideation. AVe shall as- sume and explain this character in all our subsequent discussion of the development of mental life. To us, as to him, the sentence stands approved : " The mind in itself appears as being essen- tially a synthetic activity ;"..." the principal law is a law of finality." But none the less shall Ave constantly keep before us the mechanism of association as explicable by the principles discussed in this and the jireceding chapters. [The literature bearing; on the nature and association of representative images, or "ideas." is well-nigh limitless. In modern psychology, tlie Herbartians in Germany and the members of the Associational School in Great IJritain, as well as the critics of both, have been especially productive of treatises upon this subject. Indeed, l)y both classes of writers this subject has largely absorbed their entire interest in mental phenomena. Referring tlie reader, in a general way, to these treatises, we mention, following, a few of the more suggestive recent monographs : Hering : Ueber das Gedaelitniss, etc. J. Huber : Ueber das Gedachtniss. Faulk: Das Gediichtniss. Forcl : Das Gediichtniss u. seine Abnor- mitiiten. Uphues : Ueber die Errinnerung. Ebbinghaus : Ueber das Gedachtniss. Nichols: Memory. Strieker : Studien iiber d. Association d. Vorstellungen. Gratacap : Theorie de la Memoire. Ribot : Diseases of Memory. Ferri : La Psychologic de TAssociation. Script- ure : Ueber d. associativen Verlauf d. Vorstellungen : and Vorstellnng u. Gefiihl. Oclzelt- Newin : Ueber Phantasie-Vorstellungen. Blawsky : Die Vorstellungen, etc. Bastian : Die Vorstellungen von d. Seele. Binet : La Psychologic du Raisonnement. Also an ar- ticle of Bain, Mind, xii., p. 354 f ] CHAPTEE XIV. PEIMARY INTELLECTION Frequent use lias already been made, in a great variety of connections, of the term " discriminating- consciousness." In- deed, it has seemed necessary to assume the presence and in- fluence of such mental activity in treating- of all the different elements of mental life ; so far as both these elements and the laws of their combination can become data for psychological science at all. For no science can, of course, be acquired without conscious discrimination ; and, in the confessedly loose way in which we have been using- the word, discrimination is the es- sential thing in all those processes of observation, inference, and experimental proof, upon which science reposes. But it is the science of this very psychical activity, as such activity underlies all science, which psycholog-y aims to investigate. Indeed, from one point of view, the subject of this chapter would more prop- erly be classed under the most general forms of mental life rather than among" the elements of mental life. Two important considerations follow from this view of the mental activity to which the title of the chapter is appropriate. First : Primary Intellection is not so much a faculty— in the sense of being a form of mental life separable, at least by a pro- cess of abstraction, from other most closely allied forms ; it is rather that very activity which furnishes conditions to the for- mation of every psychosis as related to others in the stream of consciousness ; it is the process of elaboration indisiDcnsable for the formation of all faculty. Perception, memory, imagination, and all the complex forms of feeling, desire, and will, as truly as Avhat we call thought (proper) and reasoning, involve, and as faculties are developed in dependence Tipon, "intellection" as a primary mental activity. For discriminating consciousness is the necessary accompaniment of all psychoses, so far as they can become objects of knowledge ; and primary intellection works at the very roots of psychical life and i)sychical devel- opment. Eegarded as activity (and so, pre-eminently it must be regarded), it is that form of psychic energizing which ac- ACTIVITY IX ALL CONSCIOUSNESS 289 complislics the elaboration of all materials, the organization of all processes and forces, the development of the total life of mind. Second : From this same point of view no state of con- sciousness, reg-arded as an object of kuowleds"e (or datniii for science), can be completely described by enumerating- its " con- tents " simply, and as thoug-li they were mere forms of pas- sivity. For every psychosis, however elementary and simple such psychosis may seem to be, v'.y something- more than the sum of the so-called elements comprising it — for example, such a complex of sensations, such feelings, so much conation, as content, etc. Every s^tatc of consciousness is not only ccqmhle of he- ing regarded on the side of passive content of consciousness ; it must also he regarded on the side of active " discrimijiatiyig conscious- nessy ^ 1. To illustrate the relation of primary intellectual activity to the en- tire development of mental life, it is in point briefly to review what has al- ready been seen to be true of all the forms and elements of such life. In treating of consciousness it appeared (p. 34) that what we mean by this term can serve the purposes of knowledge only so far as every state of con- sciousness is regarded as capable of being difia-iminaled with resj^ect to content, and so of being related to the stream of mental life. To speak of "state of consciousness," "circuit of consciousness," etc., is aljsnrd, if this discriminating activity be excluded. So, too, it was found {y>. 51) that the very term "faculties of the mind" implies different forms of function- ing which consciousness discriminates while assigning them all to the one subject of psychical states. In treating of attention and discrimination we often seemed to be regarding one and the same psychical process from dif- ferent points of view. Although this conclusion would not be quite waiTant- ed, the effect of attention on discrimination, and the reverse influence of discrimination in directing selective attention, were made obvious enoiigh (see p. 75 f). So, too, did all the treatment of the quantity and quality of the sensations of the different senses imply the activity of discriminating con- sciousness. For quantities and qualities of sensations can be called like or unlike, and can be said to vary in accordance with Weber's, or some other law, only as they are made objects of intellection by the subject of the sensations. Moreover, it w'as shown that discernible difierences for each person, whether as respects quantity or quality, are determined not so mark-- ediy by variations in the external stimulus, as by the attitude of the dis- criminating subject toward the induced tendency to changes in the resulting states of consciousness. In treating of the phenomena of feeling, also,, some authors were found who hold that all qualitative difforencos are only differences in the discriminati^d content of the sensations or ideas which the feelings accompany. In maintaining the reality of affective qualitative dif- ferences we did not for a moment deny that discernment of these differences, as an act of primary intellection, is implied in all consciousness of such differences. And, finally, it would plainly bo quite imjiossible, and even absurd, to speak of known relations of resemblance and difference between 19 290 PRIMARY INTELLECTION representative images and their originals (i.e., more or less of intensity, life- likeness, objective reference, etc.) without implying primary intellection as the necessary accompaniment of all the reprodnctive pi'ocesses. We may refer, then, to discriminating consciousness as pi'esent in, and necessary to, all the elementary processes of mental life. It is most closely related, however, to the concentration and distribution of attention — in the manner already partially explained. In gathering together, and more clear- ly stating and expanding, what has already been implied concerning the function of primary intellection in the most elementary mental processes, we are also preparing the way for a descrii^tive science of the development of mind. § 2. The attempt is again being made (as it was formerly made, especially by the avowed followers of Locke in France), to reduce all conscious life to varying content of consciousness ; and then to reduce all content of con- sciousness to sensations and ideas or revived images of sensations. This modern effort at a j^sychology which shall discharge all its obligations when it has investigated the " what-sort " and the " how-much," of present sen- suous impressions and fainter images of past impressions, claims to speak in the name of experiment and induction from facts. But in its more mod- ern form it is as certainly doomed to failure as was the earlier effort ; and this rather the more, because the modern science reveals such a vast wealth of psychic facts on which valid inductions must be based. For neither the single state of consciousness, so far as we can catch and separate it from the stream of conscious life, nor the stream of consciousness in which every such state occurs, can be fully described if it be regarded merely as respects its "content" in the narrow meaning of this word. There is indeed a mean- ing of the words in which it may be said that all which is knowable of the nature and development of mental life is to be found in " the con- tent of consciousness." But this meaning must be large enough to admit the undoubted fact that self-activity and awareness of such activity are of the very essence of every content of consciousness. For the whole of con- sciousness is never mere passive object ; but conscioiasuess as active and dis- criminating, consciousness as intellection directed in connection with cona- tive and selective attention, is just as truly consciousness. The observing activity itself (with all that is implied in it) is just as necessary to the sum total of all that the conscious mental life really is, as is the object observed and then regarded as content of any jiarticular determinable part of that life. Doubtless we are in some sort using terms which may prove misleading, when we speak of intellectual activity by way of comparison, analysis, assim- ilation, and, finally judgment, as though all this implied a power separable from the definite and concrete contents of consciousness and " presiding over" them. But the most ordinary experience fairly compels us to think of ourselves as reacting upon the mechanism of our own sensations, feelings, and ideas in the form of a relating and determining activity. In tlie higher stages of mental development all language is constructed and all action shaped as Uiomjli this were so. In those higher stages, so far as the nafve and unprejudiced deliverances of consciousness itself are trusted, everybody knows that this is so. That is to say, every developed mind niYSIOLOGICAL CONDITIONS OF INTELLECTION 291 knows that the whole of its consciousness is not faithfully described in terms that leave out the reactive and relating spontaneity of intellect, which is of the very essence of mind in any proper meaning of the word. In criticism of the i^oimlar figures of speech it scarcely need be said that consciousness regarded See Asel Oehrn'B Inaugural Dissertation, Experimentelle Studien zur Indlvidualpeychologie. Dorpat, 1889. CONSCIOUSNESS OF RESEMBLANCE 293 to 64 repetitions were sometimes required. Yet, as has been said already, discrimination or i)rimary intellection itself is a unique form of psychical actifity ; it is implied in the develoiJment of all the faculties, and, as such, is something over and above the varying qualities and intensities of sensa- tions and feeling, with their kinds and amounts of correlated physiologi- cal conditions in the form of conjectural brain-processes. On attempting further Analysis of the activity called dis- criminating- consciousness, or Primary Intellection, several " mo- ments," or possible aspects, of it are discovered which must be taken into the account. In its rudimentary and primitive form all intellection is, indeed, essentially one active process ; and this, its essential nature, we have attempted somewhat loosely to indicate by the word " discrimination." But, on the other hand, several processes are involved in the simplest act of discrimina- tion ; or, rather, we may look on this activity as comprising- within itself several partial processes. Of these the most sig- nificant and clearly fundamental, perhaps, is the consciousness of HesemUance. By these words (" consciousness of resemblance," or of likeness) a transaction in the mental life is indicated that is itself totally incapable of further analj'sis, or even of descrip- tion. It is itself, indeed, the very precondition and the constant accompaniment of all analysis ; and the term description has no meaning without both implying and appealing to this conscious activity. If, however, we choose to change our terms, we may say — the hnmediaie aicareness of resernhlance is the frst, and it is the constant, form of intellection necessary for all elaboration of experience, for the most inchoate organization of mental life. Nor need we be disturbed because we have reached here a limit to all our work of analysis. It should never be forgotten that the "resemblance," or " like- ness," of which psychology speaks, is to be considered from the psycho! ogical point of view ; this point of view regards only the phenomena of consciousness, as such. Besemblances of things, regarded as objectively determined by processes of experiment and inference, are all — psychologically considered — reducible to resembling psychoses or states of consciousness. Psycho- logicalh^ considered, that is like which seems to be like ; in other words, it is the immediate awareness of resemblance which constitutes the very nature of this unique form of psychical activity. Even where the objects which appear to be like are exceedingly complex, and therefore have many more or less prominent points of unlikeness, and where the awareness of their resemblance is reached only after complicated processes of com- parison and reasoning, the essential nature of this psychical 294 PRIMARY INTELLECTION activity is unchanged. It follows from this that I may be con- scious of resemblance where another is conscious of difterence ; and that presentations, which at one time awaken in me the consciousness of resemblance, may at another time awaken in me the consciousness of difference. So far as the psychological point of view is strictly maintained, things are xohat they seem — to each and every subject of conscious states, and in every state of consciousness which presents, remembers, imagines, or thinks them. In this same connection it should also be noted that the having of like states, or factors of states, whether within the circuit of one consciousness, or in close succession, does not in itself at all explain the immediate awareness of their likeness. Consciousnesses that resemble each other cannot — simply hy heing compounded or brought into juxtaposition, as it were — account for the consciousness of resemblance. On the contrary, the declaration that the consciousnesses do resemble each other has no mean- ing or validity, unless we introduce some consciousness of resemblance belonging to some subject who is actually active in regarding the resembling consciousnesses in an objective way. For the consciousness of resemblance is always something over and above the resembling factors or states of consciousness : not " over and above," however, as separable from the factors or states ; but as an active process necessary to be recognized in order that we may understand how such factors or states come to be regarded as resembling, by the very consciousness whose they are. It is the more necessary to insist upon this, because not a little psychological theory has gone upon the absurd assumption that the consciousness of resemblance has been accounted for, whenever an account has been taken of the pres- ence of resembling factors or states of consciousness. To adult consciousness resemblance seems to imply Differ- ence as equally primary ; and the discernment of unlikeness would therefore seem to be implicated in the discernment of like- ness. The very words " likeness " and " ?^?dikeness " appear as correlative terms. And if he could have no discernment to whom nothing were like anything else ; he would be equally hicking in the fundamental requisites of discernment, to whom nothing were unlike something else. Do not the physical sci- ences continually point out that every object is, in some res])ects, like every other, while no two objects are precisely alike ? There is important truth for psychology in this somewhat finical way of stating the conclusions of the physical sciences. The con- scionsness 0/ difference is indeed i7idispensable to the development of CONSCIOUSNESS OF DIFFERENCE 296 intellectual facility, io the organization oftnental life. And in fact, consciousuess of resemblance and consciousness of difference go band in band, and usually pari passu. Tlie latter, too, is a necessary process at tlie very beginning's of intellection, an im- portant "moment" in all, even tlie simplest, completed discrim- ination. Nor can anj- possible manipulation of unlike psycboses, or factors of psycboses, by placing- tbem side by side or causing tliem rapidly to follow eacli otber, account for tbe consciousness of ditference,^tbe immediate awareness tliat tbe factors, or states, are unlike. At tbe same time, tbe consciousness of resemblance and tbe consciousness of difference do not stand in precisely tbe same relati/ of feeling stimulates the intellectual cotisciottsness of resemblance. In awakening the beginnings of such primary intellection, nothing is more effective, for ' Principles of Psychology, I., Part ii., chap. 2. 298 PKIMAEY INTELLECTION example, than to direct the attention upon a rhythmically recurring series of pleasant sensations. The croouings of the nurse, the rocking in arms, the repeated strokings of the skin, the movements to and fro of any bright object, the successive efforts at swallowing food or grasping with the hand, etc., are all means of starting and developing the consciousness of resem- blance. These operate, of course, prior to any consciousness of time, or of self ; and prior to any knowledge of things. They are rather the rudimen- tary experiences, out of which, in part, all such higher forms of conscious- ness must develop. Over and over again the similar recurs in conscious- ness, at a time when clear cognition of complex similars is impossible ; and accompanying jjleasure-pains allure or compel the child to pay attention and to learn to discriminate. On the other hand, any considerable abrupt change in the content of the stream of consciousness, especially when accompanied by a shock of surprised or painful feeling, stimulates and directs the consciousness of difference. Indeed, it may be said that the entire environment of the infant, however carefully guarded he may be, is calculated to make him mind the differences really belonging to what, without this special process of "minding," would be considered the same. His mother's breast, or his cup of milk, may any day excite, only afterward to disappoint, his pleased recognition of the familiar object. The bitter taste designed to wean him from the one, or the lack of the customary amount of sugar in the other, emphasizes the dawning con- sciousness of difference. Herein are laid the very foundations of many of the most bitter as well as some of the sweetest of life's experiences — summed up in the pertinent warning that " things are not what they seem." The smoothly running current of consciousness, which keeps repeating a largely similar content, is not adapted to train man in the discernment of differences. But nature and our fellows provide an abundance of obstacles to perturb and check the running of that stream. The small boy who is not greeted with quite the familiar complex of sensations, when he reviews his hoard of candy or of coins, is at once strongly inclined to regard this present content of consciousness with a "critic's eye." It is his interest in the size of the hoard, and in the meaning for his affective consciousness which its size has, that sets discriminating consciousness more thoroughly at work to determine a problem in differences. That complex activity which we call "comparison," and which ends in judgment, is frequently introduced with the i)eculiar pause in the flow of discriminating consciousness with its accompanying tone of feeling, which we characterize as doubt. In the case of the aforesaid small boy, if the amount abstracted from his hoard were too small for immediate and confident awareness of difference, such a feeling of doubt would be certain to emerge. And nothing could be more favorable to induce an unusual activity of the relating activity, as dependent upon both consciousness of resemblance and consciousness of difference. I G. Discriminating consciousness applies itself to the content of con- sciousness — to sen.sation.s, feelings, and ideas — as respects both their quan- tity and tlieir quality. It is itself a consciousness of resemblances and of differences, both as respects the kinds and the intensities of the states of consciousness or of the factors of such states. This is true both of sensa- NATURE OF TUE PRIMUM COGNITUM 299 tions and of those diflFerent ideation-processes which represent their so-called originals with various degrees of intensity and life-likeness. The foundation for our perception of motion was seen to be laid in the changing, as respects intensity and local coloring, of certain sensation-complexes. In considering the primary intellectual activities we are in danger both of over-estimating and of under-estimating the amount of truly intellectual work involved. Conscious detailed discrimination of various possible points of re- semblance and difference is by no means necessarily implied in the prom^jt recognition of even minute variations of quantity and quality. Such recog- nition often proves quite unable to account for itself when asked to disclose the data on which it has taken place. Hence the tendency (already referred to) to speak of such intellection as the " sensing " or " feeling " of likeness- es or unlikenesses. The astonishing discrimination of children and of the lower animals is to be accounted for in this way. Thus the crow, of which Romanes— borrowing the statement of Leroy — tells, which was not de- ceived into being shot until five or six men (of whom all but one came out) were sent into the watch-house, neither "counted" as the latter writer sup- poses, nor had" ideas of »«7»6er," as the former writer affirms; it simiDly made, under influence from interest, one of those vague quantitative dis- criminations to which we are now referring. Binet's experiments j^rove that a child of from four to six years old will discern promptly the difference be- tween a group of 14, 15, or 16 and one of 18 objects, of the same size ; and will even discriminate between 17 and 18 objects correctly, eight times out of nine trials ; while as yet it cannot count beyond three, and pronounces 10 large objects " more " than 18 small ones. And Preyer has shown that one may train one's self to discriminate accurately up to 20, or even 30, objects, when exposed to view far too briefly to count them, or to bring them under any definite idea of " number." ' In the promjjt discernment of qualitative resemblances and differences, also, a very low grade of intellect will often display wonderful results. With these facts (we repeat again) the mysteries of instinct, tact, and what is called " genius," are connected. But on the other hand, to deny totally the intellectual character of these activities, and to resolve the iDhenomena into " feelings " interpolated between sensations, or into self-discriminating sensations, or into passive association of ideas, is equally unwarrantable. The attempt to describe the character of the object earliest known {the 2)?'hnu?)i cognitum), and of the i:»rocesses of knowledge which result in this object as their product, has taxed the ingenu- ity of psychologists to its utmost limits. The data for giving such a description with much confidence probably do not exist ; and, if we follow the exigencies of theory, we cannot avoid tak- ing the standpoint of adult developed consciousness from which to view the very beginnings of all conscious knowledge. Thus, with respect to the special question : Which precedes in the cog- nition of objects — the consciousness of resemblance, or the con- ' Sitzgabr. d. Gesells. f. Medicin u. NaturwisseiiBchaft, 29 Juli, 1881. 300 PRIMARY INTELLECTION sciousness of difference, assimilation or differentiation, synthesis or analysis ? It Avould seem tliat objects cannot be known as like, without differencing- them from each other as different " like " individuals, and from other objects, in some respects, at least unlike to them. But then, on the other hand, how can objects be discerned as unlike, unless some previous experience, in the form of consciousness of resemblance and assimilative activity, has given a standard from Avhich they may be recognized as " differ- ing," or departing ? Plainly, these two legs on which the early intellect moves cannot get, either one, far in advance of the other. And yet, if we are to speak of the logically, and possibly the chronologically, prior form of discriminating consciousness, we must assign that rank to the vague and inchoate conscious- ness of resemblance. At any rate, it would seem evident that the consciousness of difference, and the resulting act of difiereu- tiatioQ, implies the higher form of intellectual activit3^ Several important considerations are involved in the forego- ing view of primary intellection. And, first, those psychical processes which were described as primary attention and as ideation, are necessary to all developed activity of discriminat- ing consciousness. The immediate awareness of resemblances and differences accompanies and depends upon that constant focusing and redistribution of i^sychic energy which constitutes the very essence of primary attention. If the attention is of the so-called involuntary or forced order, then we may say that the factors of the state, or the total complex states, of consciousness The Human Mind, I. p. 184. 20 i 30t5 PRIMARY INTELLECTION of both analysis and synthesis— of a more and more elementary sort, down to the obscure beginnings of all intellectual life. Some sort of Eudimentary Judgment is involved in the earlier and most primary intellectual processes. It has been customary for writers on logic to describe judgment as the process of unit- ing two concepts as subject and predicate of a proposition, affirmatively or negatively. We shall subsequently see that, however true this may seem to be of certain logical and formal acts of thought, in the development of mental life the procedure of the mind is actually the reverse of this. For, the essence of thinking is judging ; it is thinking that converts representative images into concepts ; and concepts have their very psychical being in the processes of judgment which construct them. Fur- thermore, whole groups and series of judgments seem condensed, as it were, into many of our more complicated acts of perception. Seeing, hearing, tasting, touching, and even smelling, as result- ing in knowledge, involve a sort of inference. What isjudcjed, or inferred, as smelled, seen, heard, tasted, touched, is by far the larger part of these so-called immediate and intuitional processes of sense-perception. The character of those acts of judgment and reasoning which enter into our so-called " immediate " knowledge, can be dis- cussed only later on. At present the following three points should be emphasized : (1) There is no marked break in the continuity of intellectual development. Judgment never appears as an act which springs forth at once, full-armed, from the brain or the mind — without preparation or warning, and as a complete departure from the old life of merely passive association of mental images or recep- tivity of sensations. Rudimentary intellection develops from the first— we assert the truth again — in dependence upon attention and ideation. And judgment becomes more and more evidently a conscious process of clearly discriminating activity in relat- ing the different contents of consciousness, along a smooth and continuous course of development. (2) But, on the other hand, true judgment can never be developed out of mere fusion or mere association of sensations and ideas. It is, as a form of intellectual life, a unique reaction upon the content of conscious- ness — a consciousness of relation as something over and above the mere leh)r/-relatcd,iis this latter fact applies to the succession of contents in the stream of consciousness. (3) Considered as a conscious act, all synthesis or analysis established between two factors, or states of consciousness, involves a species of rudimen- RUDIMENTARY JUDGMENT 307 tary judgment. The rather may it be claimed that the actual synthesis which attentive discriminating consciousness estab- lislics between the different contents of consciousness, considered primarily as like or unlike, is rudimentary judgment. Such a synthesizing activity is in its very essence, a judging activity ; and out of it all the subsequent life of judgment is to be devel- oped. In other words, t/ie conscious affirmafio7i of relations of re- semblance or difference hetween the contents of consciousness is the primitive form of judgment. Such judgment, therefore, enters into all comparison with its processes of analysis and syn- thesis. It is implied in all assimilation and differentiation, so soon as these two terois are employed to denote truly psychical and intellectual processes. Such judgment is, moreover, the form of mental relating activity which, as it accompanies and gives conditions to all elaboration of mental life and is itself modified in the course of this elaboration, accounts for all con- ception, logical judgment, and reasoning — in fine, for all that we comprise under the words "thinking" and "thought." § 11. The nature of primary intellection, as involving the judging ac- tivity of mind, can perhaps best be made clear by reference to the views of a number of writers on psychology. It will be noticed that the following admit the truthfulness of the views just expressed, while expressing their own views in a variety of ways. Thus Dr. Ward ' follows Lotze - in holding that, while only two things can be judged or synthesized at once, since only one movement of attentive discriminating consciousness is possible at a time, the two impressions do not judge or synthesize themselves. The im- pressions are rather to be regarded as " stimuli " to the act of judging. In this way these writers emphasize the tnith that intellection is a synthetic activity — dejoendent upon attention and associated ideation, and yet some- thing over and above ideation sui generis, and incomparable to any merely passive relations, externally brought about, between the contents of the stream of consciousness. Hence Lotze s^Deaks of judging as " a second and higher consciousness," " a new manifestation of psychic energy." Another authority,^ in expressive but figurative language, calls judgment *' a non- suiting of the fusion of two ideas which is necessary in order to raise the fusion, as such, into the position of an object of consciousness." That is to say, in judging, the two elements about to be related miist bo considered as tiro — and not already indistinguishably fused into one idea — and must also, by the act of judging, be consciously brought together and united under some terra of relation (primarily, of resemblance or difference). Still another author,* while holding that judgment is not an accidental fact but > Article on Psychology, Encyc. Brit., p. 75 f. » Outlines of Psychology, p. 40 f .; Microcosmns, I., p. 220 f. 3 Volkmann : Lehrbnch d. Psychologic, H., p. 263. * Binet : Psychologie du Raisonnement, p. 9G f . ; 129 f . 308 PKIMAKY INTELLECTION a constant process of our mental life, finds the essence of judgment in the "law of fusion." It enters into all perception of objects. "This assim- ilation of two impressions is the biological property from which reasoning is derived." But in correction of this vague way of speaking, as though mere fusion of impressions accounted for judgment as an intellectual ac- tivity, it may be noticed that this author only aims to account for " the meclianism of reasoning ;" the judging activity i/se//" implies something more than the existence of the mechanism, acting under the laws of associated reproduction. For here — to borrow an expressive figure of speech — we must recognize not only the existence of the ideas that become " cemented " together, but the " cejue^ii" that accomplishes this new (and intellectual) form of union {der Kitt zwischen den Vorstellungen ') ; this " cement " is no other than that attentive, comparative, and synthetic activity which we call primary intellection. In the contraiy direction, certain authors have doubtless so insisted upon this intellectual and active side of all judgment in distinction from the relatively passive flow of associated ideas, as to require of the beginnings of intellectual life a work, the ability to perform which is itself the result of development. Thus we find one writer ^ maintaining that in every true judg- ment subject and i^redicate must be distinguished ; each of the two must be especially thought ; and the subject must be mentally rej^resented as the fixed point to which the predicate refers. And even M. Paulhan ^ maintains that judgment requires the separation of psychic elements, which have, in fact, fused together (as in naming things, and mistaking of words, by chil- dren), and their recombination under rational forms. Judgment, beholds, is therefore " the act by which an abstract element of a complex idea is re- attached to a new system of elements." The logical bond between the two states whose synthesis constitutes the judgment is " the aptitude of these two states for co-ordinating themselves in view of a common end." Now in so far as M. Paulhan's statements concern the mechanism of ideas, or the char- acter of the two states which get co-ordinated, they aftbrd no full explanation of the activity of co-ordinating (the synthesizing itself). But the description given by both these authors of the nature of the primitive intellectual proc- ess of judging is overdrawn. It is enough to say that if so much were re- quired of the beginnings of all judgment, we could never learn to judge. For "distinguishing subject and predicate," and '• thinkitig " the two, and " separating psychic elements," and co-ordinating them " in view of an end " — all these are elaborate intellectual processes dependent upon a preceding training in primary activities of judging, as the essentials of this process have already been described. ? 12. Peculiar forms of feeling are the distinctive accompaniment of all intellectual activity, even in the most primary acts of judging. Such are the more obscure forms of those same aff"ective accompaniments of judgment with which developed self-consciousness makes us familiar. Among thom are (1) a feeling of mental tension which may take the form of expectation, ' See Fortlatrc : Psychologie, p. 174 ; and compare Brentano (Psychologic, p. 266 f.; 296 f.) who maintains tliat in every act of conscionBness— however simple it may be, as, for example, the men- tal representation of a tone— a judgment is included. "^ Ballauf : Eleincntc d. Pi^ychologie, p. 114 f. ' L'ActivitC" mentale et lee i;it'ment8 de I'Esprit, p. 109 f. RUDIMENTARY TIME-CONSCIOUSNESS 309 or of vacillation, or of doubt, etc. Tins feeling may be regarded as directed either forward from the idea A to the idea Ji, or backward from the idea B to the idea A. For judging, even in its most jjrimitive form, resembles the attempt to solve a liroblem : Is ^, which is fading from the central point, the focus of attention in the field of consciousness, like or unlike 7>, wliich is just now occupying this central point ? Or the order of the problem may be reversed ; and with the feelings which belong to the pause preceding the act of intellectual synthesis all are familiar. But (2) a vague feeling, corresponding to what we recognize as " conviction " — a feeling intrinsi- cally appropriate to the ajffrmaiion of resemblance or difference — may also be supposed to set its seal upon the acts of primary intellection. Indeed, so intrinsically apj^ropriate and essential is this jseculiar feeling that at least one very acute psychologist ' has been led to define judgment as " ideating with the consciousness of actuality." By the " consciousness of actuality " is here meant the consciousness that a laarticular way of ideating is necessary, " mtrst be," or " ought to be." This, then, would amount to a sort of indirect feeling of the validity of the laws of intellectual life. But here again such modifications of feeling as belong with developed thinking faculty must be distinguished from such as are the conjectural but natural accompaniment of primary intellection. [It may be noted in i)assing that the first class of feelings belong rather to the analytic aspect of the relating activity, and the second to its synthetic asjiect ; the first are, then, rather preparatory to pronouncing judgment ; but the second are the affective ac- companiment of the actual pronouncing of judgment.] ^ 13. Let us state the results of our inquiry into the nature of primaiT intellection in the following way : I may regard any stream of consciousness with respect to its contiguous members, or any field of consciousness with respect to its numerous factors or objects, as simply capable of having its contents described. The contents are, for example, certain sensations, feel- ings, ideas, conations — A, B, C, D, etc. As a matter of fact, objectively regarded, these sensations, feelings, ideas, conations, are related in certain ways ; they are more or less like or unlike each other. But now let the question be raised : What new factors, or shadings of old factors, enter into this complex of consciousness as soon as we introduce the conception of in- tellectual activity in the forai of a judgment made by the subject of these sensations, feelings, ideas, and conations ? Why, then, a relating activity must be recognized ; an active consciousness of resemblance and of difference — resulting, by processes of assimilation and differentiation, in a new and in- tellectual ordering of the sensations and ideas, stirred and accompanied by peculiar feelings, and dependent upon the voluntary focusing and redistri- bution of attention ; and finally, the establishment of laws of rational con- nection between mental states, which give a new definitive flow to subse- quent mental life. Once more, rudimentary and developing- Time-consciousness is assumed as a condition, result, and accompaniment of all acts of g-enuine primary intellection. Witli the metaphysics of time — ^the validity of this conception as applied to reality, etc. — de- » Lipps : Grundtatsachen d. Seelenlebens, p. 396 f. 310 PRIMAEY INTELLECTION scriptive and explanatory psycliolog-y does not have to deal. Moreover, in its efforts to trace the genesis and evolution of time- consciousness science finds itself limited at certain points ; at last we have to acknowledge that we have reached one of those ultimate facts of all mental life beyond or behind which it is impossible for science to explore. Such facts we call laws of all mental development. Thus we may say that to become conscious of time as the universal form of all ^jsychoses belongs to the very nature of the mind. Indeed, only as an immediate awareness of our states as enduring and as succeeding each other (" in time,'' so we popularly say) is recognized, can we provide for any in- tellectual development. On the other hand, intellectual activity is necessary for developing this peculiar consciousness. In other words, comparison, analysis, synthesis, judgment, must co-operate and develop together with " time-consciousness " for the completer elaboration of mental life. Scientific psychology can, however, trace certain conditions under which time-consciousness arises and undergoes the various stages of its develoj^ment ; but in doing this two classes of fal- lacies and their resulting extremes of ojiinion must be avoided. (1) The consciousness of time, in the abstract, cannot be de- rived merely from single or repeated observations of the fact that the states of consciousness actually do endure and succeed each other " in time." Enduring and succeeding conscious states, in themselves considered, afford us 710 full explanation of the conscioits- ness of time-relations as aj>plical>le to those states. Sensations, feel- ings, " moments " of conation, might come and go forever, with- out, by the mere fact of their coming and going, accounting for or arousing the consciousness of time. This consciousness is a new and unique reaction of the subject of all the states of con- sciousness ; it implies the active and immediate relating work of mind, according to the laws of its own life. And Sull}' ^ is quite right when he accuses English psychologists generally of having too naively held that the cognition of time is to be ex- plained as " an immediate apprehension of a certain aspect or certain relations of our experience — that is, our enduring and succeeding states." We repeat, the consciousness itself is a new form of intellectual reaction. Nor can the conception of abstract time be abstracted from enduring or succeeding states of con- sciousness as such ; it can only be abstracted from the conscious activities which relate these states, as enduring and succeeding, in time. (2) On the other hand, the consciousness of time does not ' The nuinan Mind, I., p. 329. CONSTRUCTION OF TIME-CONSCIOUSNESS 311 spring- up iu the mind, as a mere form of mental life (an a priori empty frame work of experience), independent for its origin and development of the actual experience of concrete states of con- sciousness and of the conscious comparison of one state with another. In some sort it is t7ice that every intellect constructs its own tlnie-consciousness. It is by conscious processes of compar- ison, under the excitement of feeling, that the temporal frame- work of experience is itself erected. Moreover, this time-consci- ousness is capable of development. It begins in the obscure, uncertain, and fitful recognition of relations among" the factors and " moments " of experience ; it grows with g-rowing intellect- ual life, as both itself affecting, and affected by, all other intel- lectual development ; it attains only such degree of development, with regard to clearness and accuracy, as belongs to the char- acteristics of the individual assisted by the means acquired by the race for the measurement and recording of experience, in time. In all this i^rocess of development the actually enduring and succeeding- states, with those modifications of consciousness which are dependent upon the time of their endurance and the rate of their succession, are material, as it were, furnished for the constructive and relating- activity of mind. § 14. The development of the consciousness of time is connected, of course, with the development of all the faculties so called. For example, memory, in its complete form as recognitive, implies the ability to place the thing remembered in a particular j)osition in that succession of events which constitutes the stream of consciousness ascribed to self. Thus recognitive memory and developed time-consciousness are interdeiDcndent. In doing this we also judge ; we lay down propositions as to " the time " when the remembered event occurred. Imagination, too, is required in order to frame and apply those ideal standards by which the times and seasons of all the events in our past experience, or in our dreams and anticipations of the future, are arranged and displayed. Every form of intellectual faculty, however primitive, depends u^jon the rudimentai-y consciousness of time. In elucidating the nature of such rudi- mentaiy consciousness the following jooints must be chiefly borne in mind : (1) The beginnings of time-consciousness imply that all the contents of consciousness, to be related in time, are somewhat prolonged processes ' rather than instantaneous or non-enduring events. All sensations, feelings, conditions — however simple or complex — all psychoses or states of conscious- ness are processes. Psychologically considered, there is no such thing as a " mathematical point of time " — no time that is not enduring time. It " takes time " to come to consciousness, and time that endures less than so much time is an unreality, is no time at all for consciousness. " • Compare Nichols : American .Journal of Psychology, iii., p. 453 f. ; iv. , p. 60 f. ' Professor James's term. " the specious present "—to designate this actual " time-grasp " of con- sciousness — seems particularly unfortunate. It is just this " present " which is real ; the mathemat- ical present, the instant that is gone before it can be seized, is " specious " and unreal. 312 PRIMARY INTELLECTION (2) The consciousness of time, wlietlier of the endurance of a state or of the successiou of states, is itself a process. As says Sully, laertiueutly : " The secondary consciousness is not, strictly speaking, an instantaneous act, but is itself a process in time. In other words, the cognition of time is only pos- sible through and by means of a time- experience." (3) The foundation of a consciousness of time implies the direction of attention to a certain aspect or quality (if the word be not inapt) of a psy- chosis, or a certain relation of two succeeding psychoses. It is this aspect or quality (?) which we call the endurance, it is this relation which we call the succession — of jasychoses, in time. (4) Ditferences in the proper qualities and the affective accompaniments of single states, and of succeeding states, actually depend upon the time of their endurance or upon the rate and order of their succession. Pains and pleasures that endure, however alike in other respects, are not the same pains or pleasures with those more fleeting. Perceptions and ideas are marked off from each other in consciousness by the amount of the quality (?) of steadiness which they possess, or by the time-rate of that stream of suc- cessive states in which they have their part. (5) The discernment of that attribiite or relation of our psychoses which we call " their being in time," is stimulated and assisted by the affective or emotional character of certain of these psychoses. In adult developed con- sciousness such an effect of feeling on judgment is very familiar. Inter- ested attention, whether forced or voluntary, with its pleasure-pains, deter- mines the " seeming " endurance and time-rate of our states of consciousness. The more comiilex feelings of expectation, hopeful or fearful, of tedium and ennui, of mental tension, of longing for change or affectionate lingering over the fading memoiy-images of past states, etc., are powerful stimulants and guides of our time-consciousness. These are themselves, of course, forms of feeling which depend upon a certain develoijment of time-consciousness. But corresponding rudimentary forms of feeling may properly be assumed to accomjjany and influence the most rudimentary apprehension of our own states as having the attribute of time. The behavior of children and of the lower animals confirms this assumption. The infant whose present content of consciousness may be described as made up of unpleasant impressions of growing vividness, and fading memory-images of pleasant impressions (as, for example, when its nursing-bottle is rudely pulled from its mouth) is in a condition favorable to the mental seizure of a primitive time-relation. All consciousness of difference in quality is, in fact, an actual process of devel- opment, closely akin to the consciousness of succession. The same infant, hungry and waiting to feel the soothing of its well-warmed and well- sweetened draught, is being disciplined not only in patience but also in the perception of time. To endure quickens the cognition of dxrafion in time. But, chiefly, does the experience with rhythmically recurrent similar sensations, and the agreeable feelings of interest, expectation, and famili- arity which accompany the sensations, favor the apprehension of succession in time. To swing a bright ball before the infant's eyes, to croon tunes in its ear, to rock it in a cradle, or sway it in the arms, is to train not only the consciousness of resemblance (as wo have already seen) but also the con- sciousness of time. And when we note " the fragment of the childish hymn DIFFERENTIATION IN TIME-CONSCIOUSNESS 313 with whicli ho sings and croons himself to sleep," under influence from the instinct of imitation, and with the help of associated ideation, we are witnesses of the beginnings of self-cnlture in the apprehension of primaiy relations of time. (G) In all mental activity directed toward the construction of timc-con- sciousuess the entire mechanism of i)rimary intellection is called into play. So far as we are able to say, the consciousness of succession of like states is here most primary. "Again," "again," and "yet again" — the "same," is the voice with which nature gives her first lessons in time to her children. And "now" — behold! — the "unlike;" "going" and "yet going" and " now gone" — somewhat thus may we suppose the heading of her second lesson to be. " Wait " and " yet wait ; " it is "not yet," but it is " coming," defines what she would next have her jiupils apprehend. But while we are able thus far to detect the secrets of her elementary forms of discipline, we must not forget that the nature of her pupil is the thing whicli both she and we have chiefly to take into account. For the consciousness of time is itself, like every form of consciousness, a process ; but its peculiarity is, that it is a unique form of intellectual reaction resulting in the apprehension of all the con- tents of consciousness as processes, enduring and succeeding each other " in time." What is the meaning of this phrase, "in time," we shall discover more clearly later on. "We have now completed the survey of those most primary and yet ever present forms of consciousness to which was given the title of " elements of mental life." Strictly speaking-, they are all only partial aspects, as it were, of every true and com- plete psychosis — processes constituent and determinative of every so-called field of consciousness. Detailed as our descrip- tion has been, it has only faintly represented the intricacy and many-sidedness of psychical activity as it is realized in every one of our mental states. For that which nature brings to pass, at once in all its infinite variety, as a unique totality, science slowly follows after, in its attempt faithfully to represent and to explain. We now turn our attention to the combinations of these elementary processes, in increasing- complexity, as the formation of faculty takes place, and the attainment of " mind " (in the full meaning- of the word) is secured. That is, we now consider the further development of mental life. [Besides the references in the notes of this chapter, few can be made to works throw- ing additional light upon the phenomena of " primary intellection." Of course, parts of all the more vital and truly psychological works on Logic, and the chapters on Judgment and Thought, in all the principal psychological treatises, may be consulted with profit. Especially would we refer to the chapters on " Conception " and "Discrimination and Com- parison," in James : The Principles of Psychology, I., xii. and xiii. Consult also, Wnndt : Logik, I. , pt. i. , chap. ii. ( Jeorge : Lchrbuch d. Psychologic, p. 3.51 f . ; p. 490 f . Waitz : Lehrbnch, etc. , p. .508 f. Binet : La Psychologic du Raisonnement. Preyer : The Devel- opment of the Intellect. Striimpell : Crundriss d. Logik. Spencer : Principles of Psy- chology, II., chap. viii. Ward: Art. Psychology, Encyc. Brit., p. 75 f. Horwicz : Psy- chologische Analysen, ii., Bucb, i. Lipps : Grundtatsachen d. Seelenlebens, chap, xx.] part ^birb THE DEVELOPMENT OF MENTAL LIFE part ZTbirb THE DEVELOPMENT OF MENTAL LIFE CHAPTEK XV. PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES Attention has already frequently been directed to the im- portant truth, that the so-called " faculties of mind " — or forms of psychical activity in which adult experience consists — are developed only in dependence upon the combined effect of all the elementary processes. The different faculties, however, involve these elementary processes in different ways and in dif- ferent deg-rees ; it is this fact, indeed, which makes it possible to speak of them as different faculties. For example, without per- ception and self-consciousness, memory and imagination are im- possible ; and yet not more impossible than are the former faculties without the latter. For if I could not remember and imagine, I could perceive nothing, nor could I be conscious of Self. Yet again, intellect, in the form of judgment and reason- ing, depends upon all four of the above-mentioned faculties ; while they, in their turn, depend for their development upon it. How, then, it may be asked, shall we distinguish the differ- ent faculties, if they all result from combination of the same ele- mentary processes and all involve one another in this compli- cated way ? The answer to this question has already been indi- cated : the different faculties differ in the forms and amounts of the elementary processes which, in some form and to some ex- tent, enter into them all. Each faculty, so to speak, emphasizes one principal kind of these processes. For example, my perceiv- ing a ten-dollar gold piece in my pocket differs from my imagin- ing one to be there ; the difference is not, however, simply because my perception is all sensation and motion without ideation and my imagination devoid of all sensory-motor elements. Again, my being angry at the sight of the man who has insulted me 318 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES differs from my perception of his face, from my memory of the insult, and my imagination of its meaning and result ; but this difference is not because the emotion, as such, is devoid of coloring- from sensory and ideating activity, or because the intellectual acts have no -affective accomjjaniment peculiar to them. But percej)tion differs from memory, and memory and perception differ from emotion, because each emphasizes some of the elementary processes, previously developed, to the rela- tive exclusion or depression of the others. And, in reality, ecenj complex state of adult consciousness — that is, every exercise of developed faculty — is what it is, just because of where it puts the emphasis upon the tnany elements uihich enter i?ito it. Sense-Perception (as the very term indicates) is a complex form of mental life in which emphasis is laid upon the combined results of processes of sensation. The obvious truth about per- ception looked upon as psychical activity, is that the senses are actively concerned. We perceive things, their qualities and relations, through the eye, the hand, the ear, etc. Perception, looked upon as a product or accomplished result, gives us the sensumis qualities and relations of our own bodies and of other things. But should we attempt to account for perception solely as an affair of complex combination of sensation-elements, we should find our attempt unsuccessful. For although sense-per- ception is chiefly an affair of the senses, a resultant of sensation - complexes that have entered into higher and yet higher forms of fusion and complication, it is by no means simply this. As we shall see more and more clearly in the course of our studj' of the development of this faculty, all the other primary processes of mind are involved in the full account of it. And now it will clear up the entire field lying just before us if we consider what data for our explanation of the development of the faculty of sense-perception are already in hand. These may be enumerated as follows : (1) Complex forms of sensation, due to different admixtures of qualitatively and quantitatively like or unlike simple sensations, and varying in a discernible way according to the locality of the organism Avhose nervous elements are stimulated simultaneously or in close succession ("sensation-complexes" serviceable as "local signs") ; (2) Eep- resentative images, with varying degrees of intensity and " life- likeness," which, on due excitement being furnished, tend to recur in consciousness, to " fuse " witli the sensation-complexes and with one another, and to follow the sensation-complexes and one another, under the laws of association ; (3) Feelings, or MEANING OF THE WORD PERC1':PTI0N 319 affective accompaniments of the combined sensation-complexes and ideas, "which depend in part upon the character and succes- sion of the hitter and by their variations in " interest," tone of " pleasure-pain," expectation, -etc., corresj^ond to the changes that g-o on in sensuous things ; (4) Attention, with its " wander- ing point of regard," actively or passively directed and focused in the complex field of perceptive consciousness — especially as influenced by the aforesaid feelings of interest, expectation, etc.; (5) Discriminating consciousness (beginning as the " immediate awareness " of resemblance and difierence), assimilating, differ- entiating, analyzing, synthesizing, judging ; and so progres- sively elaborating the content of consciousness (not as some- thing apart from that content— in the full meaning of the word — but as a relating activity in and through the content of con- sciousness) into higher and higher intellectual forms. With the preceding five sets of considerations in hand the formation of sense-perceptions (or " presentations of sense," for we shall use these two terms interchangeably) and the develoj?- ment of the knowledge of sensuous things, offers a series of problems, each with its peculiar data as it were, to be solved by the mind. On the other hand, what Ave call " Mind " is itself developed in and through the actual activity employed in the soliTtion of these problems. It is the purpose of the following two chapters to sketch the principal features of _ this develop- ment. This sketch constantly assumes a reference to the ele- mentary psychical processes already described in detail. ? 1. The word "perception " has been variously employed, as tlie history of psychological science shows.' The earlier writers made that vague and general use of the term which still jn-evails in popular language — as when we say: " I perceive your meaning; " or." I now perceive the truth about the matter," etc. Most recent writers, however, restrict the word to the imme- diate knowledge of external objects by the senses. This at once introduces the question: How do sensations and perceptions diflfer? The answer to this question is not only, in some large degree, a test of any author's entire theory of sense-perception ; it is also, not infrequently, an indication of the position which he feels himself compelled to assume toward a number of important philosophical inquiries. A view somewhat widely prevalent of late holds that sensations and perceptions differ only in respect of their com- plexity.* But strictly speaking, no statement could bo more inadequate and ' Compare HamiltoTi : Metaphysics, Lectures xxi.-xxiv. 2 Even Wundt, whose whole theory of the nature and development of mental life would seem opposed to the theories ordinarily connected with this statement, is found claiminsx that Vorstelhm- qen differ from Em]ifindun'>'ocesses of con- scious mental life are concerned in Perception ; but the other processes are to be regarded as excited, directed, and determined, rcitJi respect to the completed state of consciousness, chiefly by those peculiar modifications of consciousness xchich ice have hitherto described as sensations. words. (Sec Physiolog. Psychologie (Third ed.), I., p. 2S9 f., and II., p. 1 f.) The lanfjuagre of the fouvtb and last edition (I., p. 181 £.). however, implies a view very closely resembling ours. ' Psychologie du Raisonnement, p. 10 f. " De rinlelli Zcitschrift t. Psychologic u. Physiologic d. Slnnesorgane, i., Heft 2, 1890. I PERCEPTIONS OF TOUCH 333 more, we can more or less definitely localize and iDerceivo the character of the changes that go on in some of the internal cav- ities of our body. Everything-, however, which we know about the beginnings and development of sense-experience convinces us that this immediate awareness of locality did not always exist. Indeed we have already adopted the view that not only is the entire field of touch the result of a constructive development, but also that without discriminating consciousness attendant upon those local signs which vary with active and passive movement, the sensatiou-comi^lexes of the skin would acquire no extensity. It is necessary, then, to show briefly how, on the basis of data and activities already described, the "localization" (in the Avidest meaning of this word) of our bodily surfaces and members is developed by this sense. But another class of perceptions by the skin, muscles, and joints demands an account of their development at the hands of the student of psychology. These perceptions constitute much of our complex knowledge of the qualities and spatial relations of other bodies than our own, of things outside of us. Bodies that can be laid, or pressed, against our skin become known as extended, with a rather vague delimitation, to touch. But if we can trace out their outlines with a slowly moving finger or hand, and with careful attention, the delimitation becomes much more clear and accurate. By pulling at or piishing against things we perceive them as external, as solid, heavy, and as fixed or movable. Again, it is by touch and its accompaniment of vary- ing muscular and joint sensations that we determine the texture and constitution of other bodies — whether they are soft or hard, smooth or rough, fluid or viscous, or firm at the surface, warm or cold, moist or dry, etc. Now, neither with respect to their habitual activity, nor with respect to the resulting perceptions of tangible qualities and relations, can these two classes of touch-experience be consid- ered as independent. By the active exercise of any member of our own body, as an organ of touch, upon some other part of the same body (notably of the hand upon any of the surfaces within its reach), we gain the perception of the diftercnt areas of this body, as rough or smooth, moist or dry, hard or soft, and as external to each other, and, in some sort, to the stream of our con- scious life. By touch the body thus becomes a system of things, external and extended, to itself : one part is given to another, as " out " and " spread-out," in the same manner as that in which other bodies than our oaaii are perceived. On the other hand, really external things that are closely connected with the sur- 334 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES faces of the skin (like our liair or our clothing), or with the movements of muscles and joints (like our fork or walking-stick), may themselves serve to expand the limits of our own bodies, on whose surface the different i^ressures, and in whose members the different movements and positions, are " localized." Thus things become perceived as parts of our own body ; and instead of ap- pearing as out and spread-out to us, they serve as organs by which we perceive the being out and spread-out of other things. It will be convenient, however, for purposes of analysis and de- scription, to consider each of these two interdependent classes of perceptions somewhat se^oarately. The " unnaturalness " of this treatment is like that which accompanies all scientific attempts to explain in detail the manifold cotemporaneous forms of the procedure of mind. One other truth which follows from the preceding should also not be forgotten. The develo]3ment of perception by touch proceeds, like all other mental development, from the relatively simple, and yet vague and obscure, to the relatively complex, definite, and clear. Perception, as distin- guished from any of the elementary processes which it involves, results whenever, by combination of two or more spatial series of sensation-complexes, with their accompaniment of associ- ated images, feelings, and conative reactions, objects extended and external are presented — however simply, vaguely, and ob- scurely — in consciousness. By practice with such combinations and their ideational, affective, and conative accompaniments, the definite and clear construction of complex objects is developed. Some of the more important points won in this process of "local- ization " by touch will now be briefly discussed. \ 6. The earliest knowledge of our own bodies by toucli is probably a vague percei^tiou (" vague," that is, because its delimitation is not fixed but fluctuating, and not marked out in details by analytic attention but " in the mass," as it were) of those members that move most frequently, in the most varied manner, and with the most marked tone of accompanying feeling. As rivals of these for early recognition are those portions of the body most frequently pressed upon or moved over, with a marked tone of accompany- ing feeling. Such members of the body as have both these advantages would surely emerge first " in the struggle for existence," as perceived parts of the body. Thus, crude perceptions of the arms and legs, of the abdo- men and back and face (especially about the mouth) probably constitute the total touch- and muscle-percept of its own body, for the child. The near- est representation of this, which is possible for our developed conscious- ness of body, may be obtained as follows : Lot one close one's eyes and abstract attention from all knowledge of one's body in terms of sight. And now let one inquire, What is my body as a whole, and what are its different members, to me, in terms of skin, muscle, and joints ? The answer which b TACTUAL PICTURE OF THE BODY 335 our "immediate awareness " gives to the first jiart of this question is sur- prisingly meagre. Except as I am able to visualize my body, it is largely gone out of cousciousuess, as a totality of members. I can, however, by di- recting attention to its better known areas perceive them as extended and solid. Thus " perceived," the right leg, for example, is a somewhat massive system of sensation-complexes of pressure localized where this member comes in contact with the chair, and with the other leg (over which it is lying), combined with less vivid sensations of tactual, joint, and muscular kind much less perfectly localized, together with dimly revived ideas of similar sensations, vague feelings of uneasiness or pleasurable excitement, and a conscious tendency to innervate the muscles, and iierhajis to mOve the organ, as attention is directed thereto. Excluding sight and all reference to visual things in surrounding space, and even to other members of tlie body, this is all that the leg is consciously perceived by me to be. SuiDpose, however, it is required to verify, clear iip, and complete my percejition of this bodily member. Let it then be moved, with attention directed to what takes place. Still better, let it be not only moved, but also pressed or struck against some resisting object. At once my perception of it changes in the direction desired. It now lives as a perceived ohject in every part of its length; it exists for me as viy limb, u-hich I am conscious of in a uriy quite impossible before motion begun. This same process of obtaining a perception of their tangible extension and "reality" may now be applied to other bodily members — to arm, to back, to abdomen, etc. To secure vividness, and the utmost possible com- pleteness for parts like the last-mentioned two, it will be necessary to press against some object (the back against the chair), or to induce some move- ment of, or over, the bodily mass (as when one perceives the abdomen by attending to it when breathing, or when it is pressed by a moving hand). But after one has thus exhausted one's " immediate awareness," in terms of touch, of the bodily members separately, the perception of the entire body in these same terms requires a rapid transition of attention from one mem- ber to another, with a large amount of ideation and vague couative accom- paniment. In attempting this it is almost impossible not to resort to trans- lation into terms of sight. How strange the picture of "the body" which would result should an artist present to the eye the exact equivalent of the most perfect intuitions of only skin, muscle, and joints ! I 7. The explanation of the earlier acquirement of this class of per- ceptions is now not difficult, so far as explanation is possible at all. The first movements of the infant's bodily members have already been shown to be reflex and automatic-nervous ; tliey involve neither perception of them- selves nor of an end to be reached by the movement. They are not by con- sciousness, but for consciousness. On every occurrence of movement in any member, however, two or more spatial series of sensation-complexes are necessarily run through. These being woven in and out, as it were, fur- nish data of sense for perceptive consciousness in its progressive achieve- ment of localization. Thus the arm cannot be moved, either reflexly or automatically, without producing changes in the sensation-complexes of skin, muscle, and joint. As this member [A) moves from Xto F, the three spatial series (s — skin ; m — muscle ; j = joint) simultaneously run through 336 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES changes of sensation-complexes that may be indicated by (s, s\ s", s', etc.), {m, m\ m\ m\ etc.), and [j, f, f, f, etc.). By repetition, with its necessary accompaniment of association of the ideas constituting a series, by condensa- tion of series, with affective accompaniment in the form of expectation, sur- prise, etc. primary intellection being always present— every position occu- l)ied in this arc through which the arm is moving becomes marked off, or characterized. Thus we have one position = ^ (s'' + m- +/), fused with primary images (of .s' and s + "*' andm + j ^ andj/') fading out of conscious- ness, and reviving images, with stirring feeling of expectation con-espond- ing to (.s' 4- m^ + f, etc.). What is true of this arc from A' to Fis true of every other arc through which the same limb moves. This " mass " of sen- sation-complexes, fused with ideation-products, and accompanied by appro- priate affective and conative elements, is the arm of the infant (with some elements changing and some remaining similar for every position and move- ment) as defined in terms of touch. And as with the arm so with all the other movable members. By practice in discrimination, and not always gradually, but with sudden leaps that are stimulated by some important practical end or sharp excitement of feeling, the different movable members of the body assume their place in a system. It has already been shown that this system of tactile experiences is comparatively vague and broken for adult consciousness. How much more so for the dawning intelligence of the infant ! I 8. But — as we have already seen — the perception of the positions of the movable members of the body develops in dependence upon our experi- ence with them as in motion. Two important differences in these two kinds of perception should, however, be noticed here. (1) When any limb is at rest it must be either held in position by the muscles, or supported in jjosi- tion by something else— either by some external thing or by some other por- tion of the body. In either of these three cases abundant data are furnished for perceptive discrimination. In the first case, siich data consist chiefly in the increased intensity and changed quality of the joint and muscular sensa- tions, together with that feeling of being drawn upon for energy, and strained, which is, probably, partly of intra-cerebral origin. In the second case, the more passive sensations of jaressure take a comiiaratively prominent part ; and the position of the limb is discriminated rather througli the lo- calization of these sensations. The third case differs from the second in that here another mass of sensation-complexes of tlie skin (due to pressure upon some area of our own body by our own limb) may aid in the discrimi- nation of the limb's position. This the seusalion-elements for the ^'perception o/j)osilion " are marked off from those of motion. But further, (2) in our perception of the position of the movable mem- bers of the body we ordinarily make a much more extended demand upon memory. That is to say, it is the ideas .suggested by the actual sensations now experienced which more largely doterniino our perception. This state- ment, too, is capable of making an ai)peal to adult conscioiisness. Indeed, in all cases of attempted localization of a limb at rest, it is difficult to resist the tendency at once to draw an ideal visual picture of the limb, as suggested by the present meagre data of sensations. If wo try to perceive the posi- tion of one of our own limbs while at rest, in pure terms of touch, we find FINER DISCKIMIXATIONS OF LOCALITY 337 ourselves iraagiuing how it would "feel" to trace out tlie limb witli tbo Land, or to move it from its i^resent position to another in surround- ing space. That is to say : otw hnmcdiale airareness of the jwsition of our vwvdhle members is largely a system of associated ideas due to previous viove- me)its. I 9. The finer discriminations of locality upon the surface of the skin are the subsoipient achievement of discriminating consciousness operating with data already recognized and described. For the upper and lower arm, for the hand, and for each of the fingers and phalanges of each finger, considered as movable members of the body, the same general principles apply. But the most highly developed form of localization by touch results in the pos- sible discrimination, by what appears to be an "immediate awareness," of minute areas of the skin — their extent and relative place in the superficial system of pressure-sensations. This development, just because it is " high," is a late and supreme achievement of tactile consciousness. If it is true that the infant cannot for some time locate his pain in his toe (or, to use Professor James's expression, "place his toe in the joain"), a fortiori is it true that he cannot tell precisely where, in his toe or other member, he is pricked with a pin or pressed with the nurse's finger. Nor is this inability due to the fact that he has not as yet developed so detailed a geography of his own superfi- cial areas. The rather is this lack itself due to the necessity that the infant should learn to make, and actually make, repeatedly, the finer qualitative dis- tinctions. When, then, we are pointed to the promptness and accuracy with which adults can tell what part of the skin is hit, jiricked, or pressed, etc., as a proof of native power to perceive "extensity" and spatial relation, the index is not directed toward the required mark. The very thing to ask is, how this promjit localization has come about. The earlier perception of the areas of skin as under pressure is in " gross mass " as it were ; it is confined to such areas as are most frequently excited in a massive way with a strong affective accompaniment. Its own lips, mouth, and cheeks, as interested and engaged in nursing and in being fondled ; its abdomen as pressed by its clothing or by the hands of the person dressing it ; its limbs as grasped and held to move it or to restrain its movement, etc. — these are the tactual body of the young child. In breaking up this "gross mass" of sensation-complexes, mainly of pressure as characterized by a strong tone of feeling, into finer and finer dis- criminated areas, sensations of motion precede sensations of position in respect of effectiveness. As Professor James has well said,' "in the edu- cation of spatial discrimination (of the areas of the skin) the motions of im- pressions across sensory surfaces must have been the principal agent." The smaller areas and spots of the body's surface, when simply pressed upon or hit, are located because the sensation-complexes thus called forth are asso- ciated with ideas of sensations of motion previously excited. In general, it is the discriminable difference beticeen two most nearly alike sensation-complexes de- rived by motion over the skin n-hich sets the extreme limit to our tactile perception. In further illustration of this fact is the experiment which shows that, if one of the two points of a pair of compasses be prepared so that it can be given a rotary motion, suddenly rotating it will almost always make the » The Principles of Psychology, II., p. 1T5. 22 33S PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES points seem as two, when just previously and at rest they have been felt as only one impression.' Here, of course, the larinciple is i^recisely the same whether the object moves over the surface of the skin, or the skin moves un- der the object. Changes in the sensations of pressure, without associated images of motor sensations, seem never alone to afford the data for locat- ing minute areas of the skin (comp. p. 147 f.). § 10. Another most important means for locating the minuter sensation- areas of the skin is customarily too much overlooked. In the case of all stimulation of definite pressure-spots — esiDccially, of course, where the stim- ulation is intense and accompanied by pleasure or pain — there is an immedi- ate tendency toward definite and appropriate motor reaction. If, for ex- ample, one is stung by an insect on some particular sjjot, one immediately starts, withdraws, if possible, the area attacked, and j^erhaps reaches out a hand to remove the irritation. Even in the case of the gentlest stimulation, if we wish definitely to locate its point of application we are prone to make an inchoate movement with some movable member which serves, on a basis of past experience, as an index to that point. The opposite of this is that vague "feeling about" for the precise spot affected, which children exhibit, and in which adults are often engaged, especially if the sjiot be one with which they are not previously well acquainted. Now instead of its being true that this motor reaction gives evidence of definite localization already accomplished without it, the rather is it true that the conative impulses and motor sensations, with their associated ideas and feelings, are a i^rime means in accomplishing such localization. It should again be observed that all ideas of whereabouts our skin is pressed or hit are ordinarily given in terms of the visual picture of our body, by a process of translating sensation- complexes of skin, muscle, etc., into associated perceptions of sight. If, then, we remove all influence from actual movements, or attempts to move, and all assistance from associated visual percepts, what remains by way of direct perception, in terms of pressure -sensations, of the minute areas of our skin, is relatively meagre and vague. ^ 11. The orienting of our entire bodies, and of their grosser masses in'th reference to one another, in "surrounding space" requires a jvevious construc- tion of space and spatial relations, ivhich, in the case of all not horn blind, is chiejiij the work of the eye. But how is the direction of objects, and the position of our bodies with reference to them, both wliile we are at rest and while in motion, obtained with the eyes closed ? Plainly the data for so- called "static " and those for " dynamic" perceptions and illusions differ to a considerable extent. Three sets of considerations are, however, of princijjal value in both conditions. Perception of the position and motion of our bodies depends upon (1) muscular and joint and cutaneous sensations — in- cluding general sensibility appreciating the gravitation of fluitis and of inter- nal organs of the body ; (2) sensations coming from the muscles of the closed eyes, es^jecially when the eyes are turned in their sockets from the primary l)osition, or the head is twisted to one side ; (3) sensations due to variations in the pressure of the endolymj:)!! in the jxassages of the car, due to the posi- tion and motion of the head on its varying axes. [It will then be observed that, as a man's head is ''perceived" by himself to be localized, so, chiefly, ' Sec James : Ibid., II., p. 170 (,uote). I QUALITIES OF OBJECTS BY TOUCH 339 are be and all things else located with reference to each other. But with the head " turned," all else gets awry.] Already, however, we have repeatedly been compelled to assume some Perception of different pai'ts of the Body, as objects separable from each other, or of onr entire body, as one object separable from others, in space. This form of percejition implies that not only " localization " bnt " projection " and "objective " cognition is to a certain extent advanced. We are really turning- back in time, then, when we consider how the perception of the spatial qualities and relations of bodies outside our own body is gained by exercise of the organs of skin, joint, and muscle. But here again other bodies are, at first, somewhat vaguely set off from pur own body by combination of spatial series of sensa- tions, in which sensations of motion take a most conspicuous pai-t. These other bodies are also primarily known "in the mass," as it were ; rej)eated acts of discrimination, on the basis of repeated revivals of associated mental images, and of affective and conative accompaniments, with increasing minuteness of analysis and power of grasp in synthesis, are necessary to com- plete such cognition. The ultimate reasons for this process of setting off other bodies from our own body ( " localizing " some experiences and " projecting " others), so far as such reasons lie in the realm of sensation at all, consist of discriminated differ- ences between different spatial series. But to this statement must be added that (1) some spatial series combine as data for perception of an object with a marked accompaniment of feel- ing, are vividly colored with pleasure-pains, while others are comparatively toneless as respects feeling; and that (2) some spatial series are connected with our conation and conscious- ness of self-activity in such a way as to seem dependent upon volition, as other spatial series are not. Thus are the data furnished for that process of " diremption " (or the dividing of all our conscious experiences into two great classes), which cul- minates in the intellectual cognition of the bodily " self " and of a world of " things " as set over against the self. It is manifestly by use of the skin, muscles, and joints, to- gether with vaguer and more interior sensation-complexes, that we gain our immediate awareness of certain qualities of ex- ternal bodies. In respect to some of these qualities of bodies, touch (in the broader meaning of the word) gives us our leading, or our only direct means of perception. In respect to other of these qualities, touch and the other organs of sense named co-operate with the eye, while being led by it with its finer and 340 PEKCEPTION BY THE SENSES p-romptcr powers of discrimination. Among the former class are the solidity (or sense-realltii) of bodies, their weight, inertia, impenetrability, and the structure of their surfaces, as smooth or rough, and of their substance, as hard or soft, tough or fran- gible, elastic or inelastic, etc. To the latter class belong the extension-qualities of external bodies ; and these, as including their outline, form, size, and distance from each other in space. It is not the business of psychology to consider these qualities from the point of view of the physics of masses or of molecules ; but from the point of view of the mental activity which con- structs them in terms of space-intuition. And even from this point of view we can give only a brief statement of a few of the most important particulars. ^ 12. Undoubtedly the infant perceives external objects (tliougii in the same vague and incomplete way as that in which it localizes its own body ily areas) before it has made any detailed conquest, by percejstion, of its own body. This process of discrimination is made jTOssible, and indeed com- pelled, by his exi^erience with his own sensations, feelings, and conations^ given the power of the mind to form space-intuitions at all. Such a jsrocess is helped on, in special, every time a moving member of his own body encounters resistance from some outside body ; every time also any external body is moved over the surface of his own body, or so brought into contact with it as to excite strong sensations of pressure and temperature, and is then removed. These are the very conditions which we have seen to be favorable to "differentiation " (p. 297 f.). For example, let us suppose that the arm is moving through a certain arc, from X to Y. Then A in motion = (.s, s\ s\ s% etc.), {m, m\ 7)t^ m', etc.), {j,f, f,j,^ etc.), (compare p. 335 f.). But now, let this series be interrupted at a certain point [s^ + vi^ + f), and another wholly different series, tinged by strong feelings of effort and pain, take its place. This new series consists of such skin sensations as are produced by striking or pressing against some external object, of muscles brought to arrest, of joints compressed, etc. Furthermore, it is not in the nature of the young animal thus to be resisted in motion without reacting in the form of increased conation. Pushed against, he pushes back ; and the combined spatial series undergoes further change through feelings of strain and effort having both a peripheral and a central origin. It will finally appear that all our so-called immediate knowledge of things depends largely upon the vivid aroiisement of our feelings with their pleasi(7'e-pains, and upon our oivn forth-pidti)igs of will. All those classes of elements are involved in the most primitive differentiation of my body from other bodies. For (1) spatial series of sensation-complexes and systems of spatial scries, which are habitually accompanied by feelings of pleasure or pain, are local- ized as parts of our body ; and other series and systems, not thus ac- companied by feeling, are i^rojected as external objects. (2) Spatial series, and systems of spatial series that are dependently connected with our voli- tions are perceived as movable members of our body ; and other series and I QUALITIES OF OBJECTS BY TOUCH 341 systems, not thus dependent, arc perceived as bodies sei)arato from our own, and as opposed to the movement of our body aud its members. Moreover, when the child is grijiped by the mother or nurse, and the motion of its limbs iu necessary reaction ujjon this stimulus is impeded ; when it is thrust into the bath or hold'down by its own weight against the bed ; when it is bound tight in swaddling bands and then these bands are removed ; even when a fly or a droj) of water lights upon some area of its skin, and then, after failing to disappear in answer to its unguided move- ments to remove it, finally goes away " of itself; " in all such experiences, similar data for making the necessary distinction between " my body " and "other bodies" are furnished. In the same direction does its taking of food with the bulk of appliances in the mouth and the movable bolus, or swallow, ojjerate. While it is constantly giving itself lessons in making the distinction between its body and other things, by striking itself with its own fists, kicking itself with its own legs, etc. Thus it is at one time hit in two places (two separable aud painful sensation-complexes arise si- multaneously, as when it strikes its own forehead with its own hand) ; it is thus induced to distinguish two parts of its own body, one of which may be an external object to the other. At another time, however, similar vivid sensations arise from a blow given by some external object, and only one impression lingers in consciousness ; thus the removal of the object giving the blow is now no longer connected with the same motor consciousness. § 13. Such vague differentiation, chiefly by means of affective and cona- tive accompaniments, is made far more clear and jsrecise by the detailed exploration of active touch. And here the hand and fingers are the chief organs of perception. As they move, even when unguided by definite pur- pose, over the other surfaces of the body, two distinguishable series of tactual and muscular sensations result. One of these series represents "touching" something "with the hand;" the other represents "being touched " by something ; together, they represent " touching myself with my own hand." But when the object explored by active touch is another body than my own, only one of these series is jn-esent as referable to any bodily area. This series, now present, is also changed in character and de- limited by an object ready to resist my active touch, but without the passive sensations of being elsewhere touched. [Let anyone bring out this differ- ence in sense-experience by iixnning his finger slowly over any area of his own body, and then comparing his sensations thus derived with those that are produced by exploring the smooth surface of the table with the same finger.] Here again the great influence, and the imperative necessity, of evoking sensations of motion in order to nice discrimination of extended areas, becomes apparent. One authority ' has rightly argued that little or no perception of the extended surface of objects can be gained by pressing them against the skin : the blind, he claims, never proceed to measure sur- faces this way, but only by running the finger along the boundary lines. It is true that by such sensation-complexes as are evoked merely by pressure, an adult is capable, as Weber showed, of distinguishing the circular form of a tube li Parisian line in diameter on the tongue, and 3| inches on the skin of the abdomen. Granting that this is to be spoken of as proof that an im- » M. Ch. Dnnan : Revne PhDosophique, 188S. 342 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES mediate awareness of the form of objects may be gained by pressing tliem against the skin, there can be no doubt that our perceiition is, in fact, ordi- narily not so gained. It is by " handling " itself and other objects, under influence from changing affective and motor accompaniments, that the child actually develops the perception of the spatial differences and of the limits in the extension of things. In these cases, as in all others, the ultimate limits of discrimination are set by the discriminable sensation-complexes ; and among them all, chiefly by those of motion implying perceptive use of hand and Angers. And to those who have exiDerience of sight the merely tactual extension of an external object is but a fragmentary and sorry space-intu- ition of that object. § 14. The truthfulness, in the main, of the foregoing representations may be partially demonstrated by appeals to developed experience. To illustrate how the stream of consciousness may be changed all the way from a delicate perception, by means of pressure sensations, to an intense and massive " real- ization " of the existence of an external object, let the following simple experiments be performed. First : repeat the experiment already referred to (p. 116 f. ) by closing the eyes, placing the tip of the finger lightly against some solid object, and considering alternately the localized sensation of pressure as such, and the perception of the external thing as something pressed against. Then gradually increase the pressure until your whole being seems to be engaged in exertion resisted by this thing. At every stage it will be possible, either to regard chiefly the localized series of sensation- complexes belonging to your own bodily members, or the objectified series of sensation-complexes constituting the thing at the end of your finger. But, as feeling and active motor consciousness become more and more intense, the i^erception of body other than your own will become more difficult. Second, draw your finger gently over a knife-blade or j^ress it lightly against the knife's point. You may thus either perceive the quality of the edge or point, as sharp or dull, sharp or blunt, etc. ; or you may perceive the afifec- tion of your own finger as being rubbed or isricked, with an accompaniment of slightly painful feeling. Let now, however, the pressure be increased, and the finger cut or pricked, and perceptive attention is quite compelled to neglect the other body, and to concentrate itself ujion the jiainful sensations localized in your body. Again, contrast the "cool" mental condition, the nicely discriminating "objective" consciousness, which maintains itself as — with eyes closed — we carefully feel out the details and mentally construct the touch-picture of some comi)lex tangible thing, with that state of pleasur- able or painful awareness of the depths of our own bodily being, as it were, and that warm conviction of the envisaged reality of other bodily being, which wrestlers or contestants in a game of foot-ball have. ^ 15. The su2)erficial qualities of other bodies are al.so perceived l)y toucli, chiefly through the activity of the movable members of our own body. Thus bodies are known as "rough "or " smooth " by the successive sensation- complexes ]iroduced as the hand moves over them. In the one case (percep- tion of roughness) muscular sensations, etc., indicative of motion of the hand, are successively fused with disagreeable and dissimilar pressure-sensations ; in tlie other case (pcn-cejition of smoothness) witli those which are agree- able and similar, as respects intensity and compound quality. The percep- QUALITIES OF OBJECTS BY TOUCH 343 tion of " hardness " aud "softness" requires the empbasis of muscular and tactual sensations that are develoijed as the moving member is more or less resisted, and brought to a standstill, in its attempt to move. If this percep- tion is extended far enough to determine the moldableness, lander active touch, of the entire mass of the body perceived, the body, rather than sim- ply its surface, is said to be hard or soft. Thus the series of sensation-com- plexes, and of fused images, with their aft'octive andconative accompaniments, are markedly diil'erent when we are handling a piece of metal and a mass of putty. Temperature-sensations in such cases often play an important part.' They assist, for example, in forming our perception of surfaces as moist or dry ; aud even, it seems i^robable, in all cases where different degrees of " friction " and " sticktion " are involved. We can scarcely move the skin over roughish surfaces without producing slight excitations of the tempera- ture spots. Wunderli showed that the sensations produced by lightly touch- ing the skin with cotton, and slightly warming it by approaching a heated surface, through a square oi^ening in a iiiece of pajier, may be mistaken for each other. And if Weber observed that cold bodies resting on the skin often appear heavier, and warm, lighter, than they really are ; and another experimenter (Szabadfoldi) showed that small wooden disks heated to 122° Fahr., often feel heavier than larger ones not so warm, the contradictory re- sults combine in demonstrating the influence of temperature-sensations on the formation of perceptions of touch. The exceeding smoothness of pol- ished marble appears also to be somewhat dependent upon its being felt cold to touch. When we are not able actively to combine and unlock the different spa- tial series (tactual, muscular, and temj^erature) by moving the more deli- cately perceptive organs of touch over the surfaces of other bodies, we get only a relatively incomplete and inaccurate jjeVception of the qualities of these bodies by having them moved over the siirfaces of our own body. Here the variations in the sensation-complexes i^roduced are exceedingly delicate and promptly ap])reciated, but they excite an interest, not in that other body, but in our ovn body as being touched. Hence such sensations of motion serve the purposes of localization rather than of perception of an external and extended object. It is extremely unnatural and correspondingly diffi- cult to perceive the surfaces of things by having them moved over the sur- faces of the skin. Yet in this way j^crception of the smooth aud the rough, the moist and the sticky, the dry and the superficially hard, etc., may be obtained. In all such cases, however, the data of sensations and representa- tive images, and the nature of the psychical activities involved, have already been sufficiently explained. I 16. In the perception of those qualities which chiefly make things "solid "and " real " to us, the massive muscular and joint sensations are particularly emphasized. But these are habitually called out only as we exert ourselves against external bodies, with a view either to move them or to prevent ourselves from being moved by them. In this exertion of ourselves — and the more, the greater such exertion is — the so-called " feel- ing of effort," or "feeling of innervation," or "active motor consciousness," is involved. Moreover, such exertion is accompanied by a condition of the ' Compare Funke, in Hennann's Handbuch d. Physiologie, IH., 2, p. 320 f. 344 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES organs of toucli (the muscles and joints especially, but also the skin) which results in throwing in upon the brain a great variety of the most volumi- nous sensation-complexes arising in these organs. When we are exerting our- selves, the muscles are contracted strongly ; the joints are set together ; the skin is stretched tense over the muscles " bellied out." Other less definitely localizable muscular and tactual sensations are occasioned by the changed character of the respiration and circulation, by the condition of epiglottis, of the jaws, and even of the facial muscles, etc. Such changes in the periph- eral organs of sense cannot take place, however, without the production of more or less of that "chaotic overplus" (see -p. 175 f.) of cerebral excite- ment in which the physiological basis of our bodily feelings consists. It follows, then, that our perception of bodies as solid and externally real is laro-ely dependent upon the affective and conative coloring of the stream of consciousness which accompanies certain of our muscular, joint, and tactual series of sensation-complexes. Anticipating what is progressively becom- ing clearer : we know bodies really to he, and to be really "out" of us, only as xoefeel strongly and tvill intensely. In other words— to return to our present point of view — we perceive other bodies as having weight, inertia, etc., by com- paring together spatial series of sensation-complexes that are, chiefly, wide-spread- ing and strong muscular and joint sensations, fused with intense consciousness of effort {or conative activity) and affective modifications due to superinduced strain of the organs of touch. The experiences of the infant, already referred to, constitute its early training in perception of the solidity of other bodies than its own. Refer- ence has also been made to adult experiences illustrating the same considera- tions. In understanding further the origin and development of such imme- diate awareness of the qualities of other bodies, the following three points must be considered : (1) The p)erception of the solidity of external objects cannot be gained without experience of motion actual and resisted by means of the solid masses of our own body. For, this perception involves a combination of pei'cei^tion of extension in the third dimension with perception of weight and inertia. But exten- sion in the third dimension cannot be given in terms of touch — simply by moving other bodies over the surfaces of our own body. It implies move- ment of the movable members of our body in a way to call out spatial series of sensations which differ from those called out by motion in the other two dimensions. Of the marked difference which exists among the sensation- complexes belonging to the three dimensions, anyone may convince himself who will compare his experience, in terms of touch, when moving a leg or arm forward and backward with that had when moving the same limb side- ways. All this, doubtless, is at first exceedingly vague ; and, indeed, it re- mains very vague, because of our irresistible tendency to translate move- ments in the third dimension into terms of sight. The possibility of making this discrimination is implied in the i)ercoption, by touch, of the extension in three directions of other bodies. But this third dimension, like the other two, would not be " filled up " with an external body unless we had percep- tion of weight and inertia. This perception is gained by having our move- ments raoi-e or less resisted, with all the experience which such resistance involves. Thus, if we find that our attempts to move in all possible combi- QUALITIES OF OBJECTS BY TOUCH 345 nations of the throe dimensions of extension are resisted, we i)erceive an extended and solid body other than our own. And this body may be soft or hard, fluid or viscous or solid (in the narrower meaning) according to the way that it (especially at its surfaces) resists our attempted movements. (2) The compardtive perception of solid bodies depends upon our estimate of the various factors which enter into our perception, in general, of the solidity of bodies. And here emphasis may be laid upon that one of these several classes of factors which, for any reason, attracts attentive discriminating con- sciousness to itself. But, ordinarily, bodies are perceived as more or less extended in all directions by a tactful interpretation of the combined re- sultant of several series of these factors. Those psychologists are wrong, then, who deny the influence and value of any of these several series of useful factors. By muscles, joints, skin, feelings of efibrt, and affective results, all taken together, we perceive the extended being of other bodies than our own. And, as we shall subsequently see, errors and illusions of sense arise when the attention is actually caught by one set of considerations and induced to give it undue influence. On the other hand, we can get along fairly well if we have to dispense, wholly or partially, with some of our customary data of perception. The primary question, however, is not W'hat we can do, when we are compelled by being put in artificial conditions ; but what we do actually accomplish in perception, with all the means ordinarily at our disposal. Thus Goldscheider and James are right enough in emi3hasizing the value of joint- sensations (the latest " fad " in experimental i^sychology on this subject) ; since with anfesthetic skin, or susjiended, or fixed in a i)laster cast, the joints of leg and finger can appreciate motion. But they are wrong in minimizing or denying altogether the value of those sensations of skin and muscle, on which other investigators show by experiment that i^art of the burden of discriminating consciousness should be laid. Especially important in comparative perception of the weight of bodies is the way in which our previous estimate of the amount of resistance to be expected is met by the amount of resistance actually ofi'ered when the at- tempt at movement begins. Bodies that move easier than we expected ap- pear lighter than they are ; bodies that move only after more than the ex- pected resistance appear heavier than they are.' Our mental image of the speed with which bodies yield to our resistance also determines the percep- . tion of their inertia and weight. Moreover, phenomena similar to those of complementary color-sensations are to be observed in the case of our i^ercep- tion of weight. Lotze remarked that, after standing for a long time with weights in both hands and then laying them down, we seem to be rising or drawing our arms uji toward our breasts. This jihenomenon, like those of contrast generally, is probably of central origin. In fine, all our experience illustrates the fact that every individual case of perception of this order is the solution of a complex problem in the interpretation, on the basis of past experiences, of a great variety of data having both a peripheral and a central origin. According as, not only the data of series of spatial sensations vary, but also of associated ideas, and affective and conative accompaniments, will perception in its various forms take place. (3) Our perceptions of the different properties of bodies, in terms of touch, 1 See article by Miiller and Schumann, Pfliiger's Archiv, slv., p. 3T f. 346 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES dejyends solely on the differences in the mode of the fusion, and extension in series, of the different ps>/chicnl factors tvhich enter into our x>ercei-)tion of exter- nal body in general. Thus the differences in the weight and the inertia of bodies, as directly perceived, depend upon the differences in the complex states of consciousness called forth when we attemjit to move them, either away from the earth (lift them) or before, or behind our own body (that is, jmsh or pull them). Their differences in shaj^e depend upon the suc- cession of conscious states, in terms of touch, which we get when we move over their surfaces, and yet find ourselves constantly resisted in the effort to move in directions other than those not " occupied " by the body. "Shape" and "solidity," then, imply each other to touch; but one jirop- erty lays emphasis on certain phases, the other on different jDhases, of the complex experience of active touch. So, all the way along the development of perceiDtion by touch, discrimination and iuteri^retation of the elements compounded in the stream of consciousness is necessary. I 17. The so-called perception which we have of the properties and re- lations of bodies that are not immediately in contact with our organs of touch is indirect ; it is of the nature of knowledge by inference and asso- ciation rather than an immediate awareness of these properties. Here, knowledge is first gained by the eye (in ways to be explained in the next chapter), and is then translated into terms of touch on the basis of previous- ly associated and inferred ideas. Thus our perceptive consciousness, when we are looking at a mountain we are about to climb, at an object marking the distance to which we wish to throw a stone or a ball, at the height of the wall or fence over which we wish to jiimp, at the size of some weight of known substance which we projpose to lift, etc., is strongly tinged with faint tactual, muscular, and joint sensations, feelings of strain and effort, and revived images of similar sensations. These are all stimulated, as it were, by the localized sensations of color and light. In fact, it is difficult for us to j)crceive any distinct object, as having spatial qualities and relations that are known immediately to active touch and to muscular effort, without responding to the challenge which it affords to conceive of it as being brought into the sphere of our motor consciousness. Thus the eye, if we would vividly realize the world of space-intuitions which it presents, fur- nishes invitations that rarely or never fail to meet response. Vision invites us to rehearse how we should feel, if we went " there," and handled " those " objects, and mastered the now merely seen, in terms of our own bodily ac- tion. In this living "motor consciousness," which nevrt- forsakes us, the whole world of external objects has its life. "\Vo can scarcely see the stars "as distant" without conceiving of ourselves as flying thither on wings ; that is, we translate the visual stars into terms of motor consciousness. The "bulk" of those worlds and the mighty " forces " of nature are no reality — are mere pale abstractions — unless we think of the immense sensations of strain and feelings of effort that would be called forth in the consciousness of one who should attemi^t to lift or to push them, to hold them back or to make a stand against their motion. It is the more necessary to insist upon this leadership of motor consciousness in our knowledge of external objects as solid and real, because we are about to insist, equally strenuously, upon the leadership of the eye in many forms of space-intuition. RELATIONS OF SIGHT AND TOUCH 347 In marking- tlie transition between the two g-eometrical senses we may again observe : How meagre and fragmentary is tlie picture which we can frame, whetlier of our own body or of other bodies, in terms of skin, muscles, and joints, etc. ! Our more distinctively motor consciousness of extended and external objects is indeed Avarm and life-like ; it is always able to appeal to our ati'ections and to o\ir will, in a very direct way. But con- sidered as independent of sight it is, for those who have sight, almost inconceivably narrow and incomplete. For the blind, the larger i^art of our world of external and extended objects is a " solemn silence ; " and most of the rest of their world is a "wandering of noises." Even the pictures they form of their own bodies, and of other bodies in contact with theirs, are, as respects their spatial properties and relations, almost totally diiierent from ours. [Besides the references already made in the notes, the particnlar sections of the larger and more modern treatises on psychology (respecting perception in general and perception '• by toncli ") should he consulted. Of all in English, that of Frofesst)r James (The Prin- ciples of Psychology, II., pp. 70-0-4) is by far the best. For emphasis, however, on cer- tain points he has relatively neglected, see Bain : The Senses and the Intellect, pp. 59-100, 1.59-190, 3(50-488. Wundt : Grundziige d. Physiolog. Psychologic, II., pp. 1— Jl. Spencer: Principles of Psychology, II., vi., chap. 13; and Sully: The Human Mind, I., pp. 204- 23.5. Monographs containing much of interest are those of Max Dessoir : Ueber d. Haut- sinn. Ferii : Sensation et Mouvement. Stumpf : Raumvorstellung. Hoppe : Schein- Bewegungen. Abbott : Sight and Touch. Drossbach : Objecte d. sinnlichen Wahrneh- mung. Stout: Miad, xv,, p. o3 f. Uphues: Wahrnehmung u. Empfindung.] CHAPTER XVI. PEECEPTION BY THE SENSES {Continued) The world of external and extended objects, wliicli stands (apparently " ready-made ") before our open and attentive eyes, is a most marvellous achievement of the perceptive faculties. With such obvious instantaneousness and clearness of outline and of relations do these objects often appear, that it is natural to regard vision as resembling- the impression passively received by a photog-rapher's plate rather than as the result of mental activity. Even in those cases where vision is attained only after purposeful effort and an appreciable time, it is ordinarily the objects in which we are interested rather than in the i^art we take in perceiving- them. But psycholog-y, true to its scientific work of explaining states of consciousness as such, requires an account of the genesis and development of this marvellous men- tal faculty. For Perceptions of Sight are undoubtedly the re- sults of development. It is a "far cry," indeed, from having sensations of color and light, vaguely big or voluminous, to per- ceiving the spatial qualities and relations of things with a prac- tically instantaneous activity of the eye ; and the question, By what means, stages, processes, and mental activity does the con- struction and elaboration of a " field of vision " take place 1 is one of the most difficult and profound of all the questions which psychology undertakes to investigate. Many of the subordinate questions concerned in our theory of the Development of Vision never have been, and probably never can be, satisfactorily answered. So far, however', as the brief , answer which will now be given is concerned, most of its data have already been considered in detail. A brief enumeration of them is in jilace here. (1) There are several " spatial series " of sensations belonging to the activity of the organs of vision which, liy their fusion in manifold ways, furnish an exceedingly complex and delicate system of discriminable " local signs." (2) There are representative images of these sensation-complexes which become associated with one another and with the sensations, or by the process of " condensation " of series become indistin- THE "data" of visual PERCEPTION 349 guishably fused iu the total psycliosis. (3) There is a con- stantly developing- power of disciiniiuating consciousness, con- sidered as involving- assimilation, diti'erentiation, and all the processes of i^rimary intellection. (4) There is ever-present at- tention, in its most jirimary and then more developed forms, with its constant changes of focus and process of redistribution — hnally becoming a consciously selective, purposeful, and ex- j)loring director of the activity of the eye. (5) There are faint accompaniments of affective and conative origin — far fainter, however, as a rule, than those belonging to perceptions of touch — which tinge these visual jjsychoses and g-ive to them " life " and " reality." (6) There is constant association with the syn- chronously developing field of touch, with its perception of spatial properties and relations by skin, muscles, and joints ; and there is a subtile process of " interpretation " of one in terms of the other constantly taking place. It is only by constant reference to the foregoing truths (al- ready established) that we can explain — so far as explanation is possible at all — the development of visual perception. In the case of vision — even more, if possible, than in the case of the other geometrical sense — genuine explanation comes to an end in the presence of the admission that somehow, and at some time, the fused sensation-complexes and representative images produced by activity of the eye appear as " presentations of sense." The resultant of sensations and of other mental factors appears as "objects" endowed (we are forced to say, by the native power, or according to the natural laws, of mental life) with spatial properties, standing in spatial relations. I 1. The "data" of visual perception in the form of discriminable varia- tions belonging to the sensational elements are at least as nnmerous as the following : (a) Sensation-complexes of light and color, of vaiying qualities and intensities, due to simultaneous excitement of contiguous nervous elements of the retina ; (b) sensation-complexes of tactual and muscular order, due to movement of the eyeball in its socket ; (c) other sensation-complexes due to accommodation of the eye for near distances. As already said, these combine with {d) associated images of past sensations of all three kinds- suggesting each other and suggested by the sensations themselves; and with (e) faint accompaniments of conative and affective consciousness, making the visual object to be presented as the resultant, in part, of feeling and will. But (a) and [b) may be regarded as the chief sensation-elements determinative of the extensity of the visual object in its most primary pre- sentative form. I 2. The more developed perception, by vision, of the spatial properties of bodies as extended iu three dimensions, and of their relations in the third dimension, involves a variety of secondary factors which will be 350 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES noticed in their proiiev place. In all vision the fact that we have two eyes, which, however, act as one organ, is most important. An account of the construction of the field of vision involves three stages, which, for pur- poses of convenient presentation of theory may be successively considered. These are (1) the conditions which determine the formation of a retinal image with the eyes at rest ; (2) the single eye in motion and the influence of its movement ; (3) the conditions furnished by the existence and relations of the two eyes exercising their functions in common. It should be borne in mind, however, that this order does not follow the natural development. Prom the first both eyes are actually exercising their functions in common. And the vision of objects, extended and external, with one eye at rest, in- stead of being the simplest, easiest, and earliest form of vision, is its latest, most difficult, and — considering the amount of associated ideation and so- called *• instinctive inference" necessary — most complex form. A yet more highly developed knowledge of things, by vision, involves the use of the eyes with movements of the head around its axis, and of the entire body. For much of what we call "seeing" things is actually accomplished by interpretation of muscular sensations, localizable in the neck and upper part of the trunk. Here also assistance is derived from the fluids in the semicircular canals, which we have found to influence the orienting of ourselves in space, and of all other objects as related to our- selves. Indeed, we see all things in surrounding space according to our perception of our own position with reference to the earth ; and this percep- tion is primarily a matter, not so much of sight as of skin, muscles, joints, and interorganic sensibility. Hence everything " looks " very differ- ent when we stand on our heads ; or when we regard the field of vision with our head between our legs, or even with our head twisted to one side. Moreover, perceptions of sight proper are constantly interpreted in terms of touch ; they even have elements from perception by touch inextricably fused with the truly \'isual elements. Certain properties of bodies— such as their smoothness or roughness, softness or hardness, etc. — are known to sight, only as inferred from previous association with touch. It will appear, however, that vision of the third dimension by the eye is possible ; and that we develop an ' ' immediate perceptive consciousness " of the ex- tension and relation of bodies in this third dimension. Here, again, visual perception of this dimension is a quite different consciousness from tactual l^erception of the same dimension. But a translation of one into terms of the other is constantly taking place ; and this makes possible a more com- plete and useful knowledge of the spatial properties and spatial relations of visual objects. Sight differs markedly from touch in that the knowledge of our own body by sight comes in precisely the same way as the knowledge of other bodies. That is, by skin, muscles, and joints, I become immediately aware of my body as being " locally " affected ; but the expanses of the active retina or the sockets of the eyeball are not perceived by sight. By sight, on the contrary, I know the different areas of the body which can be brought into the field of vision, in precisely the same way as that in which I know all other objects in that field. My body is externally perceived by sight ; interiorly so, as my sentient organism (as myself), by touch. This fact taken in con- I rEUCEPTIOX BY SIGHT AN ACTIVITY 351 nection with the faint character of the conative and afl'ective accompani- ments of vision, gives to sight its more purely intellectual and cool objective character. This fact also makes it impossible to draw, in the case of sight, the same distinction between " localization " of the bodily areas and " jiro- jectiou," so called, of the external and extended object. From the first, and continuously, the extended visual object {quoad object) is projected as exter- nal to the organ of sense. Even in the simplest and most naive possible form of adult vision, the object appears to arise immediately in consciousness as an extended and external mass of light- and color-sensations. In other words, all bodies are perceived by the eyes as colored surfaces in three dimensions. In this perceptive process we are customarily unconscious of the passage of time while the presen- tation of sense is being- constructed; unconscious also of activity either in the wa}^ of controlling the focusing and distribution of attention, with motionless eyes, or of moving the eyes over the object in exploration of its different minuter areas. We seem to ourselves to be passive, like an extremely sensitive photographic jdate on which a comj^lete impression of the object is made by instantaneous exposure to the object. More analytic observa- tion shows us, however, that the accuracy and range of our visual perception of objects does depend upon time ; and that, as a matter of fact, we cannot see an object — especially if it is at all complex — without constructing it with a wandering point of regard and a moving organ of vision. Visual j)ercep(iG?i is, then, lihe every form ofmentcd life, a 2)rocess in time and requiring men- tal activity. This complex process involves all the elementary forms of mental life ; it includes, of course, attention, ideation, and motor consciousness as dependent upon conation. Suppose, however, we make the eflfort to exclude all influence from present motion, and from past experience ; and thus reduce the field of vision to its lowest terms. We open one eye, and try to keep this perfectly fixed. Yet even now, with a practical instan- taneousness, we behold the objects set — themselves extended in three dimensions — in spatial relations to us and to each other. This monocular field of vision is reduced in area however ; the images in it are perhaps less clear and stereoscopic. This prac- tical loss of area, clearness, and apparent solidity, is duo to the inactivity of the other and closed eye. "What it is which this other eye still contributes to the total field of vision we can partially discover by directing attention to its side of the field. There we shall find a dim color-mass, located beyond the nose, and perhaps blending with its rather obscure outline into the more " objective " field of the open eye. Now, however extreme 352 PEECEPTIO]!^ BY THE SENSES our " nativism," we cannot appeal to consciousness in proof that this motionless monocular Held is independent of preceding experience with two moving- eyes. For what we see, even in this way, is not mere extensit}'^ or voluminousness of color- masses ; it is familiar objects, like trees, hills, men, horses, build- ings, with all the spatial qualities and relations — only somewhat less clear and stereoscopic — that belong to vision with two mov- ing eyes. Such seeing of objects is undoubtedly the achieve- ment of mind in a course of development ; it implies volition, memory, imagination, and intellection, practised upon these same objects over and over again. Therefore we cannot understand this motionless monocular field, except by reference to what has been previously gained of perceptive faculty by the use of two eyes in motion. Once more let us try to exclude from our problem all that is confessedly the result of experience. We now close both eyes and keep them motionless ; again the vagiie light- and color- mass with its three-dimensioned extension and indefinite out- line appears in the guise of an external visual object. Or — in obedience to the request of some ardent nativist — we " lie on our back on a hill " and let " the empty abyss of blue fill the whole visual field," or look from its top with " inverted head " at the uttermost horizon and notice the " startling increase in the perspective." We then raise anew our question : Whence comes this " immediate awareness " of the " voluminousness," in all three dimensions, of our sensation-complexes of light and color? To this question, so far as an answer seems possible, the following must be replied : All visital jyercepfion, even the most primitive, requires the fusion of sensation-complexes of light and color, which are discriminahle as " local signs of the retina,'' with other sensations and images ofsensatio7is, of a tactual and i7ius- cular ordtr, due to motion of the eye. \ 3. In support of the foregoing conclusion reference should be made to what has aheady been said of the primary nature of seiisations of motion, and the derivative character of sensations of position, as implying previous experience with sensations of motion. The existence of both a system of retinal signs, which makes possible a nicety of local discrimination by vision surpassing the finest tactual and muscular work, and ahn of constant aid in the construction of the visual object by use of the motor apparatus of the eye, must be again admitted (see p. 153 f.). On the one hand, wo have seen that the structiire and use of the retinal areas show such a system of local signs to exist. But, on the other hand. the use and development of this system is from the first accomi)anied with motion of the visual organs. Preyer ' and others have observed infants ' The Mind of the Child, Part I., p. 43. i INFLUENCE OF SENSATIONS OF MOTION 353 moving tlie eyes so as better to fixate an object ■whicli was first seen indi- rectly, as early as within a fortnight (eleventh day) after birth. It cannot properly be said either that the primitive bigness of the object belongs wholly to the muscular sensations and then gets associated with the retinal signs (so Miinsterberg and others) ; or that this bigness belongs wholly to the retinal image, regardless of muscular sensations, and then is only "measured otf " by changes in the intensity of muscular sensations (so James). We must rather say that, from the first appearance of a visual object, its exten- sion is perceived in dependence upon both the characte?' of the retinal signs excited and the sensations of motion, or images of jjast movements, fused icith these retinal signs. g 4. In spite of our best efforts it is difficult to hold the organs of vision motionless. Some slight, inchoate but largely inhibited movement gener- ally accompanies all direction of the attention to any particular part of the field of vision. This is so when we attempt to fixate any particular area, or single sjjeck of color or light in the retinal field, with both eyes closed. When only one eye is closed, the attention cannot be fixed upon the color- mass which represents the field of the closed eye, without turning thither- ward the open eye. Where sensations of motion arising from actual move- ment are suppressed, sensations of strain or tension may take their place. Thus — to recur to facts already treated — Holmgren's ' exi^eriments showed that in looking fixedly at very faint and fine points of light, the image seems to move constantly upward, if the eyes are somewhat elevated. That is, the sensation of continued tension expresses itself as a sensation of continued motion, in the direction of the muscular exertion. Moreover, there appears to be a pretty constant relation between the special sensibility of the eye as the organ of vision and the general sensibility of its integuments. Troubles in the latter, due to cerebral lesion, are accompanied by troubles of vision, such as (not simply achromatopsy) concentric or lateral retrenchments of the visual field. The condition of the cornea and of the conjunctiva is also sometimes found to be concerned in hysterical hemiansosthesia. All this shows that space-intidtion by the eye is profoundly influenced by the tactual sensations connected with its motion. What would become of the "bigness" of visual objects if either the system of local signs and the spatial series of sensations connected there- with, or the movement of the whole organ and the spatial series of muscular and also of tactual sensations connected therewith, were removed? To this question we reply: Such "bigness" would never appear. In other words, the most primitive construction of a visual object requires experi- ence with all these sense-data. As soon as we admit the Influence of Sensations of Motion upon Visual Perception of the relative magnitudes and distances of objects — these objects being- already perceived as extended and external — the problems connected with the development of vision become comparatively easy of solution. The entire struct- ure of the organ of vision designs it for motion. Indeed, with- 1 Comp. Am. Jounial of Psychology, iii., p. 206. 23 I' 354 PERCEPTIO?^ BY THE SENSES out motion the eye is not an organ oi perception, in any intelli- gible meaning of tliis word. On only one small portion of the retina is it possible to form a clear and distinct image of any external object. But diiierent objects actually stand in different relations to this central portion of the retina ; and these relations vary, as the objects move or as the organ moves. Only by motion of the eye, then, can the organ be applied to the object. Only in the same way, if the object is at all complex and " vo- luminous," can the different parts of the perceptive process so be united in one field of consciousness as to constitute a single joerceived object. If the eye could not move with great rapid- itj" and be accompanied by discriminating, ideating, and s^^n- thesizing activity of consciousness, there could be no field of vision corresponding in extent to the number of objects, or parts of objects, perceived as a related totality. Moreover, it is only in terms of the magnitude and duration of the sensations evoked by motion that objects of any considerable size can be compared with each other, and thus their relative size and their relations in space be determined. Distances, in all of the three dimensions, are measured with a moving eye. In this measuring activity by motion of the eye two classes of movement are possible. These are (1) movements of the eye- ball, under the pull of one or more of its three pairs of muscles : and (2) movements of the lens and connected structures in ac- commodation, or in focusing for near distances. The former of these movements result in changing the series of both mus- cular and connected tactual sensations ; the latter (although the mechanism of accommodation is still somewhat obscure) jn-ob- ably have the same result. In all this Y)avi of the perceptive process it is the course of the wandering of the point of regard over the outline of the object which determines the character of the result. And here the general principle (namely, that which controls in visual perception as dependent upon motion of the eye) may be stated as follows : Every field of vision, and everi/ object seen in that field, depends for its spatial qualities upon the changes jyroduced in the muscidar and tactual sensation-comptlexes hy successive changes in the "point of regard." 1 5. "When the image of any object falls upon a small spot in the physi- ological center of the retina (the /or^a centmlis) it is clear; but objects seen in "indirect vision," or whose images fall ontsido of this spot, are not so clearly perceived. Hence we have a natural and almost in-esistible ten- dency to bring the image of any object wliich we wish to see clearly, to this ]ioint and to fixate it there. Without conscious desire or volition this ten- dency operates in the case of any bright object whose image falls upon the INFLUENCE OF SENSATIONS OF MOTION 355 retina, even of the very young child. That point in the object to which the center of the retinal area of clearest vision corresponds is called " the jwint of regard " (sometimes, "fixation-point"). The movement and fixation of the point of regard is accomplished by three pairs of muscles for each eye- ball ; and thus this point may be moved on different axes of rotation about a " center of rotation " (really an iuteraxial space located some 13 to 14 mm. behind the cornea). Thus, also, the " line of vision " (a line drawn from the center of rotation to the point of regard) can be changed for each eye ; and the "i^lane of vision" (or plane passing through the lines of vision of both eyes) can be shifted in various ways, starting from the "primary iiosition" — head erect and line of regard directed toward the distant horizon. A va- riety of movements may be accomplished, and sets of positions successively assumed, by rotating the eye upon its axis, with or without combination of lateral and vertical displacements. In this way the practice of the moving eye, begun in the automatic effort to fixate the point of regard, results in establishing systems of sensations of motion and sensations of position, which serve to orient it, for every possible line of regard, by reference to a constant standard. It is by comparison of sensations of motion. and sensations of strain with one another, for all varieties of motions and positions and as fused with varying sensation-complexes of color and light, that we "size" the outlines of our various objects of visual i^erception.' Here again, however, we must recall the fact that the eye, like the skin, is especially sensitive to sensations of motion. By movement over the stationary retina the variously colored local signs are played upon. Hence, part of the data by which a moving eye appreciates a linear magnitude more exactly than does a fixated eye (as Miinsterberg and others have shown, in fact), may be due to the service which movement renders in bringing into greater distinctness in conscious- ness these same variously colored local signs. Nor is it strange that the more practised the eye has grown, the less able is it to separate data which have become so inextricably fused into forms of objective knowledge. ^ 6. Only those objects which are seen by direct vision— that is, whose images lie in the line of regard when the eye is in its primary position- appear in their actual place. All other objects and their outlines appear out of their actual place. To test this, take a sheet of white jiaper with a black dot in its center, fixate this dot steadily with one eye only ; and then straight slits of paper lying outside of the two meridians will appear bent. Both arms of a rectangular cross will, under the same circumstances as the straight slits, appear distorted. And in general all lines lying outside the vertical and horizontal meridians of the retina, in order to be seen straight, must be really bent ; and all really straight lines in such positions are seen bent. /;; is; bj/ a mental tranapoaition, based upon our experience with movhig eyes and thus enabling us to use the sense-data as corrected by associated images of previous sensations, that the spatial relations outside of the images on the meridians of the primary position are seen at all. ? 7. " There can be no doubt," says Helmholtz," " that anyone who has much observed his own changes of accommodation and knows the muscular 1 Here compare Miinsterberg : BeitrSge, etc., Heft, 2 ; and Professor James's note and admis- sions. The Principles of Psychology, 11., p. 200 f. " Physiologische Optik, p. 633. 356 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES feeling of the effort belonging to them, is in a condition to tell whether, when he lixates an object or an optical image, he is accommodating for a great or a small distance." Donders showed that si:)ectacles of moderate convexity magnify not chiefly because they enlarge the retinal image, but because they relax the muscle of accommodation. This produces muscular sensations which compel us to place the object further off, and since its retinal image is not diminished, its perceived size is much increased. When the muscles of accommodation are j^aralyzed by atropine, we have to make the same strain to accommodate which would be necessary, in the normal condition of these muscles, for a much nearer object. Hence the size of the retinal image not being enlarged in proportion to the nearness of the muscular exertion, the object may seem much diminished in size. Wuudt, while experimenting to determine the value of muscular sensa- tions of accommodation on the perception of visual distance (with which, of course, is connected the size of the object) found that relative position could be determined in this way with considerable accuracy — especially if the strain of accommodation was increased by approaching the object quite near to the eye. Helraholtz found the value of this datum for clear visual per- ception somewhat different for different colors. It may be said with confi- dence, then, that changes in the sensation-complexes produced by movement in accommodating for nearer distances have a considerable, but a somewhat fluctuating and uncertain influence, upon the perception of the spatial quali- ties and spatial relations of visual objects. The fact that tivo eyes, with their two sets of motions and of changes in the resulting- series of retinal images, are orclinaril}" concerned in the visual perception of objects, must now be con- sidered. Each eye is a complete optical instrument, with its own point, line, and plane of regard, and its movements of rotation, torsion, and accommodation. The two eyes are then never mere optical duplicates. Psychologically expressed, this means that two systems of spatial series — fusing, uncoupling, fusing again — enter into the determination of the object of visual perception. And, yet again, the two eyes are, in some important sort, one organ. The main result of this twofold nature of the one organ is to emphasize the third dimension of our visual space-intui- tions. It is chiefly by data thus afforded that we become imme- diately aware of objects which, to sight, are both single ami solid ; and of a field of vision in which such objects are set at different distances from each other. In other words, the data afforded by two eyes in motion are the chief mot if x for stereosco- pic vision. Such data of Binocular Vision, in order to account for their origin and influence, require two sets of considerations : (1) "Wlien both eyes are motionless, the images formed upon their retinas are symmetrical, or capable of exact-superposition, only under very limited conditions as respects the jiosition of the eyes. (2) When both eyes, are in movement, changes i:i the rela- DEVELOPMENT OF STEKEOSCOPIC VISION 357 tions of their imuo-cs constantly t.-iko place, which corresi^ond to all the positions reached alon^- the arc of motion. Of course, also, sensations of position and sensations of motion, of a muscu- lar and tactual kind, as well as suggested images of such sensa- tions, belong to every i^ossible combination, in use, of the two eyes. We see, therefore, that very complicated motifs — or systems of changing sensation-complexes fused with and suggesting mental images — are at the disposal of discriminating conscious- ness in every case of perception with two eyes. Hence the deli- cacy and accuracy of the tact which it is possible to acquire in this way. Hence also the difticulties, the errors, and illusions of various kinds which belong to visual percejition. In fine : stereo- scopic vision is developed , principally on a basis of variations in the sensation-complexes, concomitant and closely successive, due to the stimxdation of the different retinal areas of the two eyes C local signs" of the retinas), comhined with variations in inuscidar and tactual sensations due to their simultaneous movement — each with its own axes of rotation, point of regard, etc. The very use of the two eyes, in ceaseless motion, as one organ, provides for the necessary repetition of the requisite spatial series of sensations, in every possible order, for their fusion into connected systems of sensations, and for the revival of appropriate representative images, under all possible conditions of motion and position. 1 8. Those authorities are plainly in the wrong who (the prevalent theory in Great Britain since Berkeley) maintain the impossibility of "seeing" the third dimension of bodies, and therefore the necessity of translating all visual signs of this dimension into terms of touch. We just as truly be- come immediately aware of the solidity of bodies, and of their relations of distance, by the eyes, as by the skin, muscles, and joints. In other words, stereoscopic vision is vision, uud is 7iot mere i7iterprekition of visual symbols in terms of touch. It has already T)een shown that, if we wish vividly to realize any visual object as solid or distant in space, wo are apt to resort to the help of touch ; we think into it how it would feel in case Ave could grasp it or push against it, or what our muscular and tactual exjierience would have to be in order to make what is over " there" to be " here," or " nearer " here, etc. Thus the "bigness" of the visualized tree is perceived more vividly through images of sensations connected with the purposed effort to throw the arms around it. The distance of the house or hill is realized better when I mingle with the activity of the eyes the revival of certain muscular sensations connected with walking, climbing, throwing a stone, etc. Nor would wo deny that Inchoate motor consciousness, belonging properly to touch, and faint suggestions of previous tactile and muscular experiences, blend with most of our jierceptive knowledge of things through our eyes. On the other hand, the translation of touch-experience into terms of sight, with respect to all three of the so-called dimensions of space, is a more con- 358 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES stant habit, a more imperative necessity. Various proofs of this might be added to those already given in the last chapter. For example, if we with the eyes closed, sufler our limbs or our entire body jjassively to be moved, and then attempt to i^erccive the i^osition in which we are thus i^laced, the almost irresistible tendency is to imagine how we should "look" to ourselves, if we were only to open our eyes. Again, in moving about in a dark room with which, and its objects, we are familiar, we guide ourselves .chiefly by memory of sjiace-pictures in terms of sight ; that is, we recall and imagine how the objects have already been seen to stand related. The pru- dent man, who is mindful of a possible fire in the night, does not put out the gas in the room of his hotel until he has impressed upon himself the visual relations of all the principal objects (furniture, gas-jet, windows, door, staircase, or fire-escape) to his position in bed. The theory of those who pvxsh their "touch-philosophy" of perception to such an extreme is not more untenable than it is unnecessary. "We know' that we do, by use of the eyes with their develoijed activity, become im- mediately aware of all the spatial properties and relations of bodies. And scientific study of visual development itself reveals the fact that the means of such perceptive knowledge are very abundant. Indeed, it is just this possession of delicately shaded local signs, connected with the comj^lex ner- vous structure of the organ of vision, and its rapid and equally delicately shaded motor activity, which fits the field of vision to be pre-eminently the field which yields the richest harvest of space-intuitions. § 9. We seem to be prevented, however, from saying that stereoscopic vision is absolutely dependent, for its very existence, on two eyes in motion. A field of vision lighted by an electric flash, too briefly for any movement of the eyes, is still seen stereoscopically ; and the same thing is true of the field seen with only one eye, whether at rest or in motion. In both these cases, however, much of the result is doubtless due to the influence of sug- gestion, operating to revive in consciousness the perceptive data which were originally due to the activity of both eyes in motion. One-eyed per- sons are still capable of stereoscopic vision ; the possibilty of this must be ascribed to sensations of accommodation, in a measure, but chiefly to certain "secondary helps" which will be described later. In all cases, however, stereoscopic and perspective vision with one eye is comimratively obscure, imperfect, and inaccurate. And the question being, not so much how can some such vision arise in abnormal cases, but how does such vision actually reach its normal high development, we miist answer by referring to the effect upon consciousness of the activity of two moving eyeballs, operating as one organ of vision. § 10. The wonderful influence of the two unlike images of every object seen in binocular vision, in producing stereoscopic and perspective vision of that object, can be made apparent in manifold ways. If the two retinas were exactly symmetrical, if the physiological center of each were its true mathematical center, and if they both stood in precisely the same relation to • Here we agree with Professor James as against Lipps and others, who maintain that percep- tion of distance by the eye is " logically inii)ossible." " No arguments in the world can prove a feeling which actuully exists to he lmposKil)lc." (The Principles of Psycliology, I., p. 221. note.) When, however, JnnioH apiK'nls to su(;h •' feeling " to decide a sc-icntiflc question concerning the conditions and order of development, the appeal loses all scieutiflc value. THE INFLUENCE OF TWO IMAGES 359 the object (as tliev would, for example, when superimposed), then for every point in the object the corresijouding point of one retina would be identical with the corresponding point in the other retina. Neither of these three conditions, however, is fulfilled. What takes place is as follows ; certain points in the two retinas become accustomed to act together ; the two images on these two points correspond suflScieutly to be seen as a single image ; the points (i)hysio]ogically speaking) " cover " each other, and are referred to one and the same point in the object. Psychologically speaking, this means that tlie sensation-complexes called out by stimulating simultaneously cer- tain two areas of the two retinas, whether in motion or at rest (and so as sen- sations of motion or sensations of position), are not discriminated ; they are therefore not ditferently localized in consciousness. Now, every visual object may of course be regarded as a system of points with a system of minute retinal images corresjiondiug to them. When the system of minute retinal images of any object, which is formed on one retina, corresponds sufficiently nearly with the system formed on the other retina, that object is seen single and solid. But when tliese two systems do not so corresjjoud, the object may be seen double. In the well-known ex- lieriment Avhen we hold a finger up against the sky, and look at the sky beyond it, we see two transparent images of a finger instead of one solid finger. By mechanical pressure on one eyeball, or by an act of will, we may "uncouple" the images of any object; in which case it at once becomes double and loses its solidity. W^e can even slip one set of images of an en- tire section of some regular small pattern (as of carpet, or wall-paper, or wire-grating) by its proper " double," and then unite it with the double of another section into a solid object. Moreover, it is obvious that the relations of the two images of any object cannot remain unchanged when the eyes move out of their primary position. In any other position than the primary one, only a few of the points of the object can correspond, on the two retinas, sufficiently to be customarily seen as single. If the other ipoints were not relatively overlooked or interpreted in view of knowledge previously acquired, then the greater part of every object would be seen double. The fact that double perception does not ordina- rily take place, shows that all vision involves the selection and emphasis of some sensation-elements ; the relative disregard or exclusion of other sensation-data ; and the interpretation of the ichole in terms of previous experience as detei'viined hy habit, jyractice, interest in the nature of the object, expectation, etc. ^ 11. Binocular movement of the eyes may be (1) parallel, where they turn equally in the same direction ; or (2) converging, where they rotate on the axe's in opposite directions. Now, since divergence of the eyes is ordi- narily imijossible, there are three conjunctions of movement possible under different circumstances ; these are right and left together, up and down to- gether, or converging symmetrically or asymmetrically. These movements result in imparting a great variety of " local coloring," in the form of sensa- tions of motion, of strain, and of position, to the space-consciousness when both eyes are used.' Constant changes of accommodation, and coupling and uncoupling of the double images, accompany this motor activity. ' The sum of all those points of any object which are seen single while the point of regard re- mains unchanged, is called the " horopter.'' A great amount of experiment, calculation, and dis- 360 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES That stereoscopic and perspective vision actually results from sucli ac- iiviti/, with all the wealth of "data " which it aflfords, we have abundant ex- perimental proof. In our ordinary vision of objects of any size, we may readily become conscious of the fact that we are actually engaged in sweeping over the field of vision with a moving point of regard. Even when we suppose ourselves to be looking at a single point, with a j^erfectly fixed regard, we are really making rapid excursions in one direction and another, around this point. Now, since the right eye always sees the object a little further around on its right side, and the left eye on its left side, every small portion of a solid object (provided it lies a little way out of the point of regard) consists of two sets of minute curves that are partial images of its lines, and are different for each eye. The act of perception consists, in part, in distin- guishing, uniting, interpreting, with a moving organ of vision, these sys- tems of partial images. How marvellous is the effect of uniting two such systems of lines in pro- ducing stereoscoi^ic vision, the use of the stereoscope clearly shows. By its aid two systems of lines on a flat surface which, when uncombined, suggest solidity and persj^ective only somewhat doubtfully, become immediately en- dowed with persjiicuous spatial properties and relations. All forms of ob- jects clearly i:)erceived in these dimensions — spheres, cubes, indescribably complex geometrical solids — are created by the eyes instantly, in this way. Thus we can be made to look into a funnel, or to perceive its small end turned toward us, or to behold starting into reality lenses convex, concave, and concavo-convex. By uniting a right-eyed image of some cube in out- line, which is white, with a left-eyed image of the same cube in black, we can gaze into the transparent depths of a crystal, whose size and shape the artist has determined at will. For, in perfecting the sketchy "sensation-stuff"" for perspective vision, the artist has only done in a simple way, what nature has constantly done, in more comiilex forms, with all things visual. In either case, it is not merely sensing, but also ideating, discriminating mental life, which synthetically constructs the object of perception . I 12. In all visual iDcrceptiou of the size and distance of objects with two moving eyes, the influence of both retinal signs and muscular sensa- tions must therefore be admitted. The particular degree of acumen which such perception can attain varies greatly, according to the different positions of the eyes and of the object, the amount of light, practice, expectation, in- terest, etc. Different experimenters have found the proportional difference, whicb was " the least observable for them," varying under different circum- stances from iV to aV, and even more. Points vertically distant 20 mm. are ordinarily estimated as equally far away with those 25 mm. in the horizontal direction. Helmholtz found that, under the most favorable circumstances, a distance corresponding to a variation of 0.00-14: mm. in thei^ositiou of the ret- cussion, has been directed toward determining the exact nature of the horopter. It has been found to be a line, a plane, a circle, a se.-ies of disconnected points. And no wonder. For the horopter is never an optical, matlietnatical, or pt/relij physiological affair ; it is alicai/s and only a psycholog- ical affair. It therefore differs for di If crent individuals, and for the same individual under differ- ent conditions of habit, interest, etc. In ocher words, there are as many horopters as there arc psycholoirically different individuals, as respects structure, function, and actual practice indiscrimi- nation, etc. (See however, Meissner, Beitriige zur Physiologic d. Sehorgaus ; and Archives des Sciences, III., p. 100. Le Conte, Sight, p. 204. Mrs. Ladd-Frauklin, Am. Joiirnal of Psychology, November, 1887. SECONDARY HELPS TO VISION 361 inal image could be detected ; Weber, on the other hand, that the muscular sense of the eye coiikl recognize the displacement of the most sensitive spot of the retina by not more than zh of a Parisian line. With power to com- bine these two so nicely discrimiuable sets of data, the extraordinary space- intuiting faculty of vision is developed. Besides the foresoin,? " data " of the more primary order, others of a more Secondary Nature must be considered. When the amount of influence allowed to the latter becomes prominent, and especially if doubt and delay accompany the perceptive act, the vision is often said to be a matter of " judgment " rather than of immediate perception. But " intellection," as discriminat- ing- consciousness, exercising- a certain psychological judgment, has been seen to be necessary for all development of perception. That apparent immediate awareness of the spatial properties and relations of things which is due to their chang-ing- aspects, is largely accomplished by use of these secondary helps. The greater necessity for such helps, in our perception of remote ob- jects by vision, is due to the fact that all the otlier data — muscu- lar and tactual sensations of accommodation and convergence, and even difference of relations between the images of the two retinas — are here relatively weak. It is by these helps that the field of vision acquires that varied artistic quality which belongs to it ; the objects in it become i^arts of a picture, and the whole is capable of being- perceived as a rich, pictorial scene. It is by appeal to these secondary helps, in large measure, that various arts, such as painting-, frescoing, and even, in a more limited way, etching- and engraving-, are enabled to represent the world of stereoscopic and perspective vision. Thus the life of vision be- comes, not simply one of a practical sort, but also a life of beauty and of joy in beauty. Sight is the one sense which is both intel- lectual and oesthetical in the highest degree. On the one side its rival is touch, which is, however, relatively lacking in all power to give refined and sustained enjovment ; on the other is hear- ing, which, since music and language answer to it, is capable of high sesthetical satisfaction, but is relatively incapable of giving- a perceptive acquaintance with the world of objects. I 13. Among the more obvious secondai-y helps to stereoscopic and per- spective vision are the following : (1) The course of the limiting lines of the object, which determine its dis- tance and form as lying in the third dimension. Here the bottom lines of the distant object are very important ; if they are covered or confused, its distance, size, and shape become uncertain to the eye. Lines that cover other lines are, of course, seen nearer ; to be behind something else, and to be further away, is one and the same. Hence, when the outlines of any ob- :362 pEKCEPTio:?^ by the senses ject admit of more than one interpretatiou, the whole spatial structure of the object may be changed at will, or according to the way in which it catches the eye and fixates the original point of regard. Thus, the well- known example is explained of the outline figure which can be perceived as a staircase, either when seen as an ascending flight of steps or as looked at from underneath. So the same outline may be perceived, sometimes as convex and sometimes as concave, etc. [It is instructive in these cases to notice how the character of the perception changes — somewhat rhythmically — in dependence on the motifs as determined by the point of the object fix- ated, by the change of the attention and of the point of regard, etc. J (2) Mathemntical perspective, or the size of the angle of vision which is covered by near and far objects, respectively, is another important secon- dary help. In this way objects of known size are seen at the distance necessary to give them their apparent size. The nearer together the rails of the parallel track appear, the more distant they appear. In general, ob- jects covering a large visual angle appear large, and those having a small visual angle appear small. But the influence of this principle is greatly limited. If the table, when looked at along its length, appeared to us under the influence chiefly of mathematical perspective, it would have to seem either far narrower or far more distant than it does. In general, the ap- parent size of objects does not decrease nearly as rapidly as their visual angles do.' (3) "Atmosphere,''^ and (4) the size and the direction of the shadou-s influ- ence our stereoscopic and perspective vision. Things are seen nearer in a clear atmosphere, more distant in an atmosphere less clear. Painters i:)leas- antly deceive us in this way, by use of aerial persijective, into i^erceiving their mountains far oft' and yet huge ; and travellers in Colorado are unpleas- antly deceived in their perception of the distance of the mountain's side on which they jiurpose a luncheon within a few hours from starting their climb. By arranging lights and shadows the spatial properties and relations of ob- jects can be changed in a startling way. Intaglios can be converted into medallions or bas-reliefs, and the reverse. A medallion placed near a window, but shielded from its direct light, and lighted from the other side by reflec- tion from a mirror, has its relief reversed. We all know how far oft", and changed every way, the objects of the landscajie begin to look when the shadows "begin to lengthen." (5) 'Bwi environment o-nd comparative vision are often of predominating influence. It is useless for us to insist to our- selves upon our judgment that the actor who comes down the mountain's side as a giant, and dwindles so as to look almost dwarfish when he approaches the front of the stage, cannot really be as he appears ; v,e see him as he is to sight, in the changing environment ; he can be seen no smaller, as long as he covers so much of such a distant mountain, etc. Tlie considerations just offered bring- us again face to face with the truth that it is not in sensations alone that developed visual perceiition consists. Our ideas, feel'nu/s, and volitions tal'e part in deterniining Jioio we sJiall see the spatial qualities and rela- ■ See Martins : Philosoph. Studien, v., Heft 4, p. 601 f. INFLUENCE OF FEELING AND WILL 363 tions of any (ihject. lu the very earliest processes concerned in the devehjpment of space- intuitions by the eye, idcatin<^-, affec- tive, and conative factors are always present. Or — to say the same truth in more popular phrase — within given limits, we see what we think or imagine ought to be seen ; what we are expect- ing, desiring, or fearing to see ; and what we by an act of will determine to see. This truth, in the more obvious forms of its illustration, is virtually acknowledged by every intelligent ob- server of human conduct ; it is consecrated by tlie structure and usages of language, by the experience of men in courts of law, by books of narrative, by common conversation, and in all forms of artistic endeavor. The same i3rincii)le belongs to all percep- tions — but pre-eminently to vision ; because developed vision is the pre-eminent form of perception. Vision, therefore, illus- trates more clearly .and more variously than any other sense all the psychological principles of perceptive activity in general. AVe all know that he who is bidden to hear a certain sound, to search his bodily surfaces or internal organs for a certain symj)- tom, to taste and find a certain flavor or a certain smell, or to look and see a certain sight, is thus rendered far likelier actually to perceive what he is induced to seek. In highly wrought states of feeling and imagination, we hesitate about trusting the most vivid deliverances of the senses as corresponding to objective reality. The motto applies to visual perception as well as to internal vision : " None are so blind as those who will not see." That which is popularly recognized in these inaccurate ways as distinctive of certain acts of perceptive knowledge— namely, that its immediate awareness is not uninfluenced by imagi- nation, memory, feeling, and will— the scientific study of its de- velopment illustrates as belonging, in scores of delicate, un- recognized ways, to all visual perception. Indeed, one of the essential results of this development consists in the relative increase of ideation and intellection, as compared with the pure- ly sensational elements. As one learns to " mind " things visual, one's vision becomes more " mindful." The attention of psychol- ogists is now engaged in investigating the amazing power of so- called suggestion to induce or compel definite percej^tions in certain subjects of the hypnotic state. Various forms of men- tal alienation also are fovmd to be most intimately connected with corresponding hallucinations of sense. Disorded imagina- tion and disordered sensibility, whether the disorder be induced by the word of the experimenter or by cerebral disease, alike re- sult in temporary or permanent change in the character of the patient's perceptions. If the disorder express itself chiefly in 364 PEECEPTION BY THE SENSES cliaug-es of the perception of toiicli, then the consciousness of personality may be affected ; but if the changes be chietiy in the realm of sight, then the objective world is likely to become an altered reality. In many cases the only way to reach the hallucination seems to lie through the patient's will. In the wider meaning of that much-abused word, all visual perception, true or false, our daily sights of the most practical and ordinary kind, as well as the wildest hallucinations of the hypnotic dream- er or of the inmate of the madhouse — involve " suggestion." Without snggestioii (hronght about through the effect of the sensa- tions in stirring up the ideas, as we may figuratively say) no per- ception can take place. \ 14. On the one liand, within certain limits we see ivhat we imagine or know to be true of the sjDatial properties and relations of visual objects. On the other hand, we are not infrequently compelled to see (that is, by filling out the sense- data with representative images) what we know (that is, infer on grounds lying outside of the perceived object itself) cannot be true. It has already been shown how the visual character of some objects depends upon the way in which imagination, starting from some one of several pos- sible groups of sense-data, fills in the details. In rather rapid vision, even of not very complex objects, different persons see different things ; — and this, not only because they seize by attention different i)oints of view, but also because the excited sensations themselves arouse and fuse immediately with different mental images. Here the physiological priucijile involves the ex- tension of the cerebral excitement over a variety of previously associated areas and tracts of the organ. The psychological principle is that just stated — namely, all perception is the resultant of mental suggestion — a mat- ter of the reproduction of associated ideation-processes. In cases where the sensuous data do not promptly and strongly suggest some definite asso- ciation of ideas, a struggle between two possible interi^retations may take place. In such cases, for an instant, we cannot " imagine " what we ought to see. At other times the object constructed in the first instant may bo differently reconstnicted later, as the analytic and synthetic activity of the eye is further carried on. In such cases, we find that what we first " imag- ined" we saw changes quickly into what we now " know " we see. The use of optical instruments which furnish bewildering sense-data (such as the pseudoscojoe, lelestereoscojje, etc.) causes an inability to imagine what we ought to see. Thus the spatial properties and relations of visual objects may lose their fixed value ; because the mind cannot definitely fill in the sensuous data with the correct representative images. We then only partially, and in a vacillating and amazed way, perceive the object. In the suggested perceptions of hypnotic subjects the influence of idea- tion, and its relation to the peripherally excited sensation-complexes, are shown in a very instructive waj'. Such subjects seize on any sensuous data in the field of vision, and employ them as a nucleus about which to gather the sngg(^stod ideas. Thus a visual object possessed of such reality as to cover all objects behind it so that they cannot be seen, may be con- THE EB'FECT OF FEELING 365 structed out of exceedingly meagre sensuous material. The sensation- stuflf of such an object is indeed meagre ; but nevertheless it sometimes exerts a controlling influence over the perception. Thus Binet ' tells of a hypnotic patient who, having had suggested the hallucination of a jjortrait to be projected on a sheet of paper on which a hat had been drawn, per- ceived the suggested portrait wearing the hat which had really been drawn. The same patient, however, could not perceive an animal designed on a sheet where the hallucination of a man was to be projected. Thus, also, a suggested female figure, on a ground where a l)attle scene had been sketched, was per- ceived with the "epaulets" of an officer converted into her " inoiiticnle." A man seated in a chair being suggested, the hallucination was perceived with portions of a bird, W'hich had been drawn on the back ground, "synthe- sized " with it as the required chair. It is scarcely necessary to do more than to refer to the instructive fact that every form of pictorial art operates to induce the desired perception, by af- fording data of sense which suggest the revival and fusion with such data of familiar representative images. Art always issues a call to jDercejition through imagination. And when surrounding sensuous impressions, if left to them- selves, would operate to bind and hinder the imagination, we withdraw at- tention from them, or we cut them off by jihysical means (as when we look at a painting through a tube) from their otherwise legitimate influence. ^ 15. The effect of feeling, in its various forms, upun visual 2ierception is both direct and indirect. Its indirect effect is attained largely through the relation which interest sustains to attention. Those sensuous data of an ob- ject which, for any reason, excite an interest— other things being at all equal — attract attention to themselves. And, indeed, we can scarcely attend to any visual object sufficiently to start an inchoate perception of its more ob%dous spatial properties and I'elatious without having some form of interest awakened. Now, then, if we jiroceed to carry out further the perceptive proc- ess, and thus to develop a clear and detailed perception of the object, these particular sensuous data are likely to be determinative of the activities of ideation which are evoked to fuse with them. Thus, as we well know, dif- ferent persons, with a different interest in the same object, will i^erceive it diflferently ; this is because the more jirominent points of regard, and the order of the wandering of the point of regard, and so the sensation-complexes induced, and so the mental images suggested, are all determined by the ef- fect of interest on attention. Hence the difficulty of getting uninterested and untrained observers to perceive, even in the most rudimentary sensuous way, certain aspects of an object ; they cannot complete perception because the sensuous data suggest to them nothing connected with past visual ex- perience. But the influence of feeling upon perception is also more direct. Percep- tion, under the pressure of intense feeling is ordinarily more hurried ; it is therefore less a matter of clearly discriminated sensation-complexes and more a matter of suggested ideas which fuse with the relatively meagre sensuous factors. The character of the suggested ideas itself depends upon the char- acter of the feeling with which the perceptive act is accomplished. Hence — as has already been said— we tend to perceive what we expect to perceive, 1 Revue Philosophique, 1890, ii., p. 142 f. 366 PERCEPTIOX BY THE SENSES whether with a feeling of pleasurable anticipation, or of dread, or of anger, etc. The passenger, while waiting at a railway station, perceives nearly every sound as the noise of the expected train ; the angry man is almost sure to hear the expected insulting word from his enemy ; the lover does not fail to be "immediately aware" of that which he desires or dreads in the voice and gesture of his mistress. In spite of the relatively cool and intellectual nature of vision, feeling determines largely what ideas shall be so suggested as to fuse with the visual sensations and thus to constitute the character of the visual perception as such and no other. The objective and purely sen- suous resemblance of an approaching face need not be great in order to insure its being perceived as an exjDected friend. Every inquirer into the origin of visions of ghosts and of "materialized " spirits knows how scanty a sensuous framework is necessary when feeling spurs imagination to construct the fiU- ing-in of the framework. And often, when by reasoning we have compelled ourselves to revise our perception and to look again in cooler blood, we can no longer perceive in the object even a remote resemblance to that at sight of which our blood was, but a moment ago, near curdling. ^ 16. Through selective attention does conative impulse, especially when it develops into intelligent volition, greatly influence visual perception. By an act of will the microscopist can exclude the influence of images formed upon one of his retinas and perceive only those objects that are constructed by ac- tivity of the other eye. It would seem that, in many cases, the fixation of attention alone can I'ender the object clearer, and so in a secondary way change its location and bring it apparently nearer to the eye without change of focus or convergence. By act of will, under certain circumstances, the double images can be either perceived or not perceived. Where a conflict of colors or of outlines arises in the effort to unite two sets of images stereo- scopically, it is sometimes jwssible to decide the conflict by a volition. Thus, if a card be prepared with two right-hand images of blue and two left-hand images of red, and then the four stereoscopically united, in some cases the volition of the perceiver decides which color shall be perceived ; or whether the two shall mix in a binoculai-*image of reddish-blue or of violet.' In all construction of the outlines and relative position of a visual object with a moving point of regard, the part which conation takes in perception is more obvious. As the primary forms of conation, or of forced and " uni- motived " impulse, are succeeded by intelligent and selective acts of volition, the part of so-called "will" in the perceptive jirocess becomes increasingly prominent. We have seen that, in perceptions of touch, sensations of re- sistance, and feelings of effort furnish, as it were, the very kernel of our immediate awareness of material bodies (comp. p. 340 f.). This is due, not solely to the abrupt and involuntary limitation of our sensations of move- ment through space, when we come into contact with an external body, but also to the active effort which we make to overcome resistance.'' Now it is the relative lack of these sensations and feelings in their most vivid form, and of the connected " jileasure-pains," which makes visual objects in general lacking in tangible, irresistible reality. But even here the lack is not com- plete. When movements of the eyes are made with tired or lamed miiscles, ' Compare lIoriuK : Pliyniolofr. Ojit.ik, in Hermann's Ilaudb. d. Physiologic III., 1, p. 591 f. a Cuiupure Buuuuiu : Lch JSuui^utionB iutcrueo, p. 122. VISUAL PERCEPTION AS A PROBLEM 367 the size of the peiceiveil object is increased. When the function of one of the muscles (for example, the e.itei-nus rectus) is impaired, objects seen by the eye moving in its shortened circuit are often located where they would have been if the same intensity of the sensation of resistance had been necessary to bring them to this position with a normal function of the mus- cles. Thus a patient with paralysis which i)reveuts turning the eye more than 20°, will locate an object actually lying only 20" from the median plane much further to one side. As to the feeling of self-activity (or of effort cen- trally initiated) bearing any part in the perception of a visual body, there is ground for disp;ite; and the question is difficult to settle on purely experi- mental grounds, so delicate and changeable are these factors in all our ex- perience with the eyes. All our ju'evious investigations would lead us to suppose, however, that in all sensations of motion with the eye, conative con- sciousness bears at least an obscure part ; and hence that the complete sen- sations of position involve traces of influence from the inhibited impulses of will.' For the eye, as for the skin, muscles, and joints, the statement of Naville is true: " Will is the condition of our idea of (i body." In a yet more general and impressive way is it true that our will largely determines our perception. It is the " purj^ose " of the man, esjiecially when such purpose has become organized into habitual forms of attention and motor activity, which limits or expands, to a large extent, every field of vision. Thus, as Schopenhauer says : "The traveller in anxiety and haste will see the Rhine and its banks only as a line, and the bridges over it only as lines cutting it. In the mind of the man who is filled with his own aims the whole world only appears as does a beautiful landsCcipe on the meagre plan of a battle-field." Evert/ Act of Visual Perception nncty tlierefore he considered as a Prohlem, ike solution of ichic/t, is attained (with a greater or less degree of speed, amounting ordinarily to a practical instantane- ousness) o)i the basis of certain data, hy a constructive and interpre- tative mental activity that has been developed through experience. This view accords witli all onr language, with the facts of adult self-consciousness, and with all the scientific information which study and experiment can gather. It is not without sig-nificance that we use the Avord " j)erception " to indicate all kinds of " im- mediate awareness " of objects as having a meaning, as embody- ing ideas to our minds. AVhatever we can bring Avithin the unifying grasp of interpretative consciousness, that we may be said "to perceive." Undoubtedly our ordinary adult conscious- ness, when perceiving objects by the eye, favors the view that a certain content is being passively impressed upon conscious- ness ; and that memory, imagination, feeling, and will, have little or nothing to do with the result. As one writer has said : " The external thing is our creation, but we become its slaves. The product of our ideation becomes the cause of the ideating 1 To this extent we are inclined to modify the view taken in the Elements of Physioloprical Psy- chology, and recognize the value of the evidence brought forward by Wuudt, Loeb, and others. 868 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES IDrocess itself." On the other hand, we can more or less dis- tinctly bring- out in adult consciousness the active side of mental life in constructing- the object of visual sense. We can even "hark back" in consciousness and discover what sensations or ideas have influenced us to perceive them in this particular rather than some other waj'. That visual jjerception is a prob- lem admitting and requiring solution in a very variable way, is a thesis which all our past investigations tend to establish. A Summary of the Principles which control each particular act of perception with the eye, considered as the " Solution of a Problem," includes the following- : (1) The color of the visual object in binocular vision depends upon the combined action of the two retinal images, each of which has its color determined by all the influences that co-oper- ate in the production of the various qualities of light- and color- sensations (see pp. 122 ff.). Ordinarily these sensuous factors are so nearly alike for every corresponding part of the two retinas that they fuse perfectly, and the object is seen as one colored and extended thing. If, however— as sometimes happens — the two color masses are so unlike as not to fuse, color-wise, then either (a) the more intense of the two triumphs and sup- presses the weaker ; or (b) some combination into a difierent color takes place according to the laws regulating color quality ; or (c), in rare cases memory and imagination operate to reproduce what experience suggests ought to be, or even an act of will directing attention may decide between the two. (2) The size, shape, and locality of the visual object, whether regarded as a whole with reference to its parts or as one object among other objects (with background, environment, etc.), de- pends chiefly (a) upon the variations in the intensity and local coloring of the sensations of motion and the sensations of posi- tion which are evoked by moving the point of regard rapidly over its outline, its surfaces, and its surroundings. But {b) all that we intend by sensations of motion, to some extent, and all that we intend by sensations of position, to a very large extent, involves " suggestion " of traces of past experience in the form of revived images of motor-consciousness. But (r) the diversi- fying of the local signs of the retina, which such movement of the point of i-egard accomplishes, co-operates witli the changes in the muscular and tactual sensations to complete the percep- tion of the extension of the object, (d) The influence of environ- ment, as eliciting the relating activity of mind, the more purely intellectual factor, is very great iu all cases of measuring and constructing the visual object. SUMMARY OF TRINCIPLES 369 (3) In visual perception of the spatial properties and rela- tions of near objects, some influence must be allowed from (a) ac- commodation as an aid in solving- the comi:)lex problem. Bnt such perception is largely due to {h) the influence of the two retinal images, of their relations to each other, of the sugges- tions arising from each, and to the possibility of varying these relations by motion of the two eyes according* to the laws of the movement of each, respectively. (4) In visual perception of the spatial properties and rela- tions of remote objects the various secondary helps become more influential in solving an increasingly complex prolilem. Among such secondary helps that one will lead in bringing about the solution which is most impressive, either (a) on ac- count of its sensuous intensity ; or {b) on account of the tenacity and breadth of its suggestiveness ; or (c) on account of sorne emotional or other ground of preference. (5) In all visual x^erception where sensations of motion, or revived and suggested images of such sensations, are as much as possible excluded, the solution of the i^roblem of vision be- comes more vacillating and uncertain. The truth of this is particularly seen when we remember that even attention itself seems to involve some modification of motor consciousness ; at- tention itself affords evidence of some inchoate attempt to move, with at least a dim feeling of effort and sensations of fusion, strain, etc. On the other hand, the perception of color-masses with motionless organs, and with attention as much as possible not fixated, is so vague and " unobjcctive " as scarcely to merit the name perception. Whatever immediate awareness of local- ized and projected color-masses, bearing spatial relations to each other, seems to come through inattentive and motionless visual organs may be assumed to be due to the effect of sensation-com- plexes, discriminable by their local signs of the retina, suggest- ing the images of sensaticms of motion and position with which they have been, by frequent repetition, habitually fused. Act- ual fixation of attention and movement of the point of regard seems necessar}" to convert these related color-masses into a clearly perceived object, or group of objects. (6) In all forms of the solution of the problem of visual per- ception — in (2)-(5) as well as in (1) — not only the purely sensu- ous factors of a peripheral origin, but also the so-called faculties of memory, imagination, feeling, and volition, bear an important part. If the condition of the organism and of " apperceiving " consciousness is, so to speak, normal, and if the sensations aris- ing from purely peripheral excitement of the organ are suffi- 24 370 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES cieutlj' intense and multiform ; tlien tlie percipient will construct the visual object with the same color and spatial properties and relations as those which are attributed to the same object by other percipients. In other words, under ordinary circumstances the man of normal org-ans will see things as others see them. But with altered conditions of the org-anism, or of apperceiving consciousness, or when the sensuous factors are few and weak ; then perception becomes more a matter of individual peculiari- ties. That is to say, under such circumstances, what every man sees will depend upon what sort of a percipient he is — upon his memory, imagination, feeling, or will. For every case of percep- iion affords a 7iew p>rohlem to consciousness ; and precisely how that 2mrticular 2')rohhm ivill he solved depends iqyon a great variety of co?isiderations. In this meaning of the words — Every man must see with his own eyes ; no man has the gift always to see things as others see them. Finally, the foregoing theory offers the only satisfactory^ basis for an account of the origin and character of the different Il- lusions and Hallucinations of Perception. The process of per- ception proceeds according to the same principles, whether the product of perception be correct or illusory and false. To main- tain, then — as is so often done — that it is not the senses but the intellect which deceives us, implies a complete misunder- standing both of the facts and of the correct theory. Except as intellect enters into the process, the senses, so called, give us no presentation of sense, no " object," whether true or false. For all that work of the senses which ends in perception in- volves interpretation. It would be more correct, then, to say with Lotze : " The whole of our apprehension of the world by the senses is one great and prolonged deception," than to say with Professor James that the fallacy " is not fallacy of the senses proper." Neither is Binet right when he affirms that what is fallaciously inferred is " always an object of some other sense than the ' this. ' " How can such statements ap- ply, for example, to the case when I cover a red square with a square of white tissue-paper and then see it green ; or when I la}^ two cards, red and green, one a little in advance of the other upon a table, and then by superimposing the reflected image of one upon the other, see the fusion as a grayish card. The gen- eral truth is, we repeat : All perception is inter2yretation ; and from partial or mistaken interpretation all degrees and I'inds of ilia - is-ions and Jadlucinations residt. Nor can any fixed line be drawn between illusions and hallucinations any more than between the different degrees of both. For if we define an hallucination as ILLUSIONS AND IIALLUCHSTATIONS 371 a "false perception resulting" from no objective stimulus at all," we still lind various degrees of vividness and objective reality imparted to the object with a minimum of traceable peripheral stimulus ; and it is ordinaril}^ quite impossible to be sure that no peripheral stimulus is involved in what appear to be the purest forms of hallucination. If further, we distinguish " objective stimulus " from peripheral stimulus, then we must say of the for- mer that it has absolutely nothing to do wdth perception, whether true, illusor}', or hallucinatory. Between normal perception and illusion, between illusion and the most incorrigible hallucination, there is no break in principle. Hence the value of all such cases, so far as we are able to explain them, in the establishing of a correct theory of the nature of perception in general. All the foregoing six princii^les admit of almost indefinite illustration by difierent cases of illusion and hallucination — but especially of the sense of sight. 1 17. Our perception of the color of visual objects, especially in cases of certain illusory eflects when the mind is called upon to combine stereoscopi- cally two differently colored images, is sometimes difficult to exj^lain satis- factorily. The explanation of certain phenomena would seem to require ref- erence to obscure processes in the cerebral centers, where the sensuous impressions from the two eyes come together and "struggle" or "fuse."' According to some authorities, if a white stripe be placed upon a black sur- face and divided into two images, the right image formed by looking through blue glass and the left by looking through gray glass — then the right image will be seen blue, but the left will be seen yellow. The exi^criment with cards just referred to is said to have been performed with hypnotic hallucinations. If the contours of the images of two differently colored objects run on the ret- ina so as to cross only at one place, then sometimes one color and sometimes the other will prevail at the jilace of crossing. This is called the " strife of contours." The peculiar perception of luminosity is regularly due to a rapid alternation between the effect of the black images of one eye's field and the white images of the corresponding field of the other eye. It is of the natiare of an illusion of sense ; it may bo produced by stereoscopic combina- tion of a white with a black surface — the two having a similar contour. When two series of ontlinos, projDerly arranged, — one series with white and the other with black surfaces— are stereoscopically seen, we have the illusion of a transparent solid (see p. 360). In all these and similar cases, the physi- ological explanation, like that for the mixture of sour and sweet tastes in the lemonade, is cerebral ; that is, the relations of conflict and triumph, or of fusion, are established in the brain. The psychological ])rinciples which con- trol the solution of such problems in the perception of color are those already enunciated in (1) ; either as (a) or {b) or (c) (p. 368). § 18. (a) Distance, whether known by previous experience or assumed ; (b) apparent magnitude, as determined by the size of the visual angle which the retinal images cover ; and (c) real magnitude, or the known size of the 372 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES object as related to certain fixed standards of measurement based on general- izations of both sight and touch — are all connected as factors entering into problems of the percejition of the size, shape, and locality of visual objects. But the least observable difference between apparent magnitude and real ma"-nitude has a different absolute value for different distances and different real magnitudes. It increases with the distance somewhat constantly, but verv slowly. It increases with the real magnitude, but not always in a per- fectly calculable way. Hence arise many of the illusions of sense. The size, for example, of the sun or moon is jDerceived very differently by different persons, according to where {hese bodies are located in distance ; to some these bodies are no larger than an orange, to others larger than a cart-wheel. The height of a building or of distant mountains is perceived illusorily in dependence upon our assumption that the figure standing on its top is a man, when it really is a child, or a child when it really is a man, etc. When we are compelled to locate the setting sun or rising moon far back of the distant trees, its perceived size may be greatly enlarged. Since intensity of sensation is a measure of extensity of superficies or of distance, many illusions arise from misinterpretation of the import of felt intensity. Keference has already been made (p. 366 f.) to the false localiza- tion due to tired or lamed muscles of the eye. Illusions like the following owe their origin — in part, at least — to this principle. Vertical distances are usually perceived as larger than equal horizontal distances. Thus, when trying to draw a cross with equal limbs we are apt to get the vertical dimen- sions too small. Exactly equal squares apjiear higher than their breadth. By inverting the forms S and 8 the difference in the two halves, which has been minimized in their ordinary positions, now becomes magnified. "When the distance between two points becomes measureable by a line which the eye sweeps between them, this distance is perceived larger. Squares inter- sected with lines appear enlarged in the direction in which they are repeat- edly intersected ; right angles that are divided into a number of smaller angles are perceived larger than such angles enclosing vacant space. Com- bining this principle with the tendency to perceive all linos as extending in the direction in which we sweep them with the greatest ease with continuity of movement, we account for other very startling optical illusions. Among these are the illusions jiroduced by drawing series of lines so as to meet, or to cross, at either acute or obtuse angles, a pair of parallel lines.' Another interesting class of illusions seems to depend mainly iipon the principle that, in measuring magnitudes and distances with the eye, our standard is regularly adjusted to the environment. Thus the perceived .size of any object is relative to the known or assumed size of its background and its surroundings. If attention be directed upon the objects to be perceived "by themselves" — as it were — the environment is "suggested ;" and then the principle is: " The more contracted the suggested environment of the simce-dimension in question, the smaller will the object appear ; and r/ce veTsa."^ Hence the limbs of an obtuse angle are perceived longer than ' Compare on this Bubject the author's Elements of Physiological Psychology, p. 456 f, Wuiuli : Physiolog. Psychologic 11., p. 124 f. ; and James : The Principles of Psychology, II., p. 247 ' Compare an article by Mtiller-Lyer : Optische Urtheils-tauschungeu. Du Bois-ReymoiuVs Archiv, Supplement, 1889. SEEING SINGLE AND DOUBLE 373 those of an acute angle of equal length. Again, if we draw a pair of obtuse angles and connect their apexes by a straight line, the line connecting the ob- tuse angles will bo perceived longer than an ecjual line connecting two acute angles, iirovidcd the angles are directed toward the connecting line ; but if they are directed air//rom the line then the reverse is true ; and the con- trast is strongest when both considerations are combined. [Here it seems probable that the tendency of the eye to sweci) onward, unless checked, and to measure its sweep, is of great influence over the resulting pcrceijtion.] Thus also the sides of a triangle seem smaller than the equal sides of a square ; the sides of a square than the equal sides of a pentagon, hexagon, etc. Further ; in jjerceiving the contours of somewhat comidex figures, the different parts are perceived relative to each other. If then a section of the contour of any figure is left out, the whole contour may aj^pear changed ; and if the small side of one of two equal figures is placed oi^i^osite the large side of the other, the entire first figure is i^erceived smaller. ^ 19. The question is often raised as to how vision of a aingle object is explicable when it is performed with two eyes, each having its own system of retinal images, etc. It should by this time appear that such a question involves the most profound ignorance concerning the fundamental principles of the psychology of perception. For it is just this habitual fusion of the two systems of sensation-complexes, with their corresponding revived mental images, in which complete stereoscopic and perspective vision of all objects, as single, chiefly consists. And when illusions and hallucinations of this kind occur, and objects really single are seen double, or objects really double are seen single, the psychological data and the principles of mental activity are in no respects changed. On the contrary, it is the acquired fidelity of conscious- ness to fact and to law which produces these illusions ; since the object is always a moital construction, the solution by discriminating and interj)retive conscious)iess of a problem projiosed in terms of sensation and representative images. When, then, the two systems of sensation-complexes are so different that the motifs (whether of memory and imagination, working on a basis of past exi:)erience, or even of volition) are inadequate to make them fuse, two objects rather than one m.ust be perceived. This is, of course, the explanation of the instance taken from touch — as old as Aristotle. Cross two fingers and roll a pea or other small object between them ; and it will appear double. Thus in the case of the eye, if the indicice requiring two objects differently local- ized are presented, and cannot be overcome, then two objects will be per- ceived. But here, as already shown, some variation of result is admissible, for which imagination and volition, rather than mere sensations, are re- sponsible. I 20. No class of optical illusions is more instructive, as respects the theory of perception, than illusions of motion. The number of such illusions is legion. If the proper oscillations of the sensory impulses — from rolling eyeballs, swaying of the tiny currents in the semicircular canals, or more massive but not less obscure and unlocalizable sensations due to changes in the fluids and solids of the body — are produced, then the whole world of ob- jects must be perceived as in movement. Hence the illusions which giddi- ness and whirling produce. Professor James alleges that in deaf mutes (whose semicircular canals must often be disorganized) " there very fre- 374 PERCEPTION BY THE SENSES quently exists uo snsceistibility to giddiness or wliirliug." Optical vertigo, from cerebral disease or intoxication, produces these illusions. Similar illusions occur through the temporary continuance of the sensation-com- plexes, signifying movement, after the moving object is no longer in the field of vision ; and this may result in the illusory perception of movement in the opjiosite direction. The diminished size of objects when seen from the windows of a rapidly moving train has been explained by Helmholtz, ' as follows : In ordinary perception, when we are moving forward, all objects appear gliding backward ; and the nearer they are, the more rapid is their flight. But in this case, the extraordinarily rapid flight is interpreted as significant of nearness. Now, again, the nearer an object is, with a given size of retinal image, the smaller is its size perceived to be. In this com- plex way, on the basis of a vast amount of experience, do we present our- selves, at once and irresistibly, with a field of objects of diminished size as seen from the windows of a swiftly moving train. § 21. It is customary to speak of the illusory character of those represen- tations of things which Art furnishes to the eye ; and even to complain of the senses for being " deceived " in so cheap and easy a fashion. There is a cer- tain truth in this manner of speaking. The more important and fundamen- tal truth for jisychology is, however, of quite another sort. It is mathemat- ical optics and mathematical perspective which, while it has an abstract and intellectual truthfulness, is to actual perceptive knowledge quite false and misleading. On the contrary, it is art lohicli presents to the eye the objects as they really are ; and hence all its jaleasant and truthful illusions. It is matJi- emathics which is unreal and deceitful when brought to the test of actual per- ception. For the mind, in ordinary perception, is an artist and not a math- ematician ; its optics and perspective are not mathematical but belong to the constructive realm of imagination, operating uj^on and interiJreting sensuous data. To perception, things are, not what they are figured out to be, but what they apjiear to be. The instantaneous photograph of a running horse, for example, is a disagreeable travesty of what actually takes place when we perceive the horse in motion. This is just because the jjliotograph leaves out so much of what recognition and imagination put into every perceptive reality. It is scarcely more like an actually perceived horse in motion than is the man seen, when by looking through a telescope we place him on his head with his legs going through a series of ungainly, jerky, and widely ex- tended movements in space, like the actual man. Nor is it with reference to the comparatively rare perception of art-objects that the value of suggestion and imagination is greatest. Without sugges- tion and imagination no perception of objects could be correct — outside of the fixated point of regard and its most immediate neighborhood. Without imagination, constructive and corrective, no symmetrical ligures could be l^erceived ; no solid visual objects could be seen ; no field of vision could be- come a field of consciousness. For the paradox is true : if mental activity in the perception of objects were required to be mathematically correct, then no such thing as correct i)orccption of objects could take i^lace at all. Thus, in- stead of all objects in indirect vision being perceived distorted, as mathe- matical optics must consider them, they regularly appear in the place which ' Physiologische Optik (let ed.). p. 365. PERCEPTION OF ART-OBJECTS 375 they woukl assiimo if their retinal images wore transijosed to the point of re- gard and to its surrounding i)oiuts. And when the head and body move with the eyes, we have in ordinary circumstances so correct a knowledge of the value of the resulting muscular and tactual sensations (sensations of the position of the head and trunk) that we can still solve the problem of visual perception without great embarrassment, and with a fair amount of correct- ness. But here again, the illusions of sense which arise when we misreckon the general relation of the field of vision to surrounding space only further illustrate the same psychological principles. The foregoing brief account of the Development of the differ- ent chxsses of Perception by no means gives a full exi^lanation of how we come to the knowledge of things — not even of their spatial properties and spatial relations. It could not do this, were it indetinitely extended in the same directions. In order to understand " knowledge " as of things, and " things " as known both by perceiDtion and by inference from perception, other im- portant mental processes and aspects of mental processes must be taken into the account. We shall, therefore, return to this subject at a later stage in our discussion of the development of mental life. [Besides the treatment given to visual perception in works discussing the general theory of perception — already referred to — the number of monographs dwelling wholly, or chiefly, on " vision " is very great. Among such monographs the following may be men- tioned : Cornelius : Die Theorie des Sehens. Panum : Physiolog. Untersuchungen iiber d. Sehen mit zwei Augen. Visclier : Ueber d. optische Formgcf iihl. Xagel : Das Sehen mit zwei Augen ; and Der Farbensinn. Ueberhorst : Die Entsiehung d. Gesichtswahr- nehmung. Bohmer : Sinneswahmehmung. Stumpf : Raumvorstelhingen. A. N. Volk- mann : Untersuchungen im Gebiet d. Optik. T. K. Abbott : Sight and Touch. Le Conte: Sight. Aubert : Grundziiged. physiolog. Optik; but, above all, Helmlioltz ; Phys- iolog. Optik (a new edition of which is slowly appearing). In Engli.sh, the discussion has been general rather than minutely scientific, and, of course, connected usually with the attack or defense of Berkeley's Essay towards a New Theory of Vision. Of those who have taken part in this discussion during the last fifty years, the following names de- serve special mention : Bailey, J. S. ilill. Bain, Spencer, Eraser, Sully, and Ward. For the most recent information, resort must be had to the later articles in magazines — far too numerous for our meagre bibliography to mention in detail. ] CHAPTER XVII. MEMORY From tlie primary reproductive process, with its general re- sult of bringing- into consciousness associated mental images, a number of so-called " faculties " have their development. The three faculties of memory, imagination, and thought, in so far as they are reproductive (and all are to a large extent, reproductive) have thus a common root in the fundamental life of represen- tation, as that life has already been explained. It remains now to show how, by combination in different forms with the other developing processes of the same mental life, these three allied faculties are actually developed. That there can be no imagi- nation without memory, and no thinking without remembering and imagining, is obvious enough. On the other hand, we un- doubtedly seem to ourselves differently employed when we are trying to remember something, and then again to imagine how something looks about which we have heard. None the less sure are men generally that thinking differs in some marked re- spects from both remembering and imagining. To be sure, one might say with almost equal appropriateness, on trying to solve some theoretical or practical problem ; I am trying to think, or I am trying to imagine, how this is, or would best be. And yet the more intelligent use of the word " thought " in preference to the word " imagination," seems to pledge us to the serious pursuit of our end according to logical laws or to forms corre- sponding with our experience of i^erceptive reality. Once more — and proceeding-, as it were, in the reverse order of consideration — unless one imagines and thinks, one cannot remember, with a true and full recognition, any complex event of past experience. Now as to what these three interrelated faculties have in com- mon, enough has already been said. The common factor is the representative image, with its different degrees of intensity and life-likeness ; the common processes are those of the reproduction, under the general laws of all reproduction, of the associated ideas. Hence all these three faculties are distinguished as re- liresentative ; they are not faculties of jDresentative psychoses. MEMOKY, IMAGINATION, AND THOUGHT 377 as are sense-perception and self-consciousness. That is to say they are not mainly so ; for we have jnstseen that sense-iiercep- tion itself involves memory and imagination, and even primary intellection. Memory, intaf/inah'on, thought, as predoimnatimjly representative, alike depend upon the fundamental faculty of ideation — in the wider meaning of the latter word. In this sense they are dijferent developments of one and the same form of mental life. It is by no means easy to tell what fixed characteristic differences separate these three representative faculties from one another. Indeed, separate exhibitions of any one of our faculties are not to be found in the actual life of adult con- sciousness. AYe must be content to show how, by combination with the higher develoi^ments of other equally fundamental proc- esses, these different forms of reproductive mental life are themselves developed into the three faculties of memory, imag- ination, aiid thought. And here it must be noted that it is not purposeful volition w^hicli initiates the characteristic differences. The most elaborate acts of voluntary remembering- are no more like acts of imagination or trains of thought than are the forced occurrences of memory-images. On iflie contrary, the more intel- ligent, purposeful, and well controlled one's memory is, the more are pure acts of imagination and thought excluded. Something similar is true of imagination and thought. The would-be artist or inventor cannot, of course, succeed without constantly exer- cising his faculties of memory and thought. But what he wishes especially to have happen to him is something beyond mere re- membering and thinking ; something which he is powerless to impart directly to imagination by willing, but .which comes to imagination as its own jjeculiar quickening and uplift, only if he voluntarily excludes an excess of mere thinking and mere remem- bering. The case of the man who is " bent on thought " is not different. The more self-controlled and purposeful his thinking becomes, the less is it like mere remembering or imagining. It is not by addition of will, therefore, that the differences in these faculties are emphasized or immediately developed. As a basis for the more detailed treatment of memory, imagi- nation, and thought, the following brief statement of their differences is helpful : In brief, then, (1) " Memory " differs from imagination and thought with respect chiefly, to the character- istic of conscious " recognition." In memory, the representative object is known as representative ; and this knowledge, as recog- nitive, developes almost ^>«r?! passu with two cognate forms of consciousness. These are the consciousness of time and the 378 MEMORY consciousness of self. For truly speaking-, every object wliicli is remembered, and not merely imagined or tliouglit, is recognized as representative of a past presentative exiaerience, and of my past experience. Without the development of the consciousness of time and the consciousness of self, no development of memory — in the full meaning of that word as genuine mental faculty — can therefore take place. In (2) " Imagination," on the other hand, just so far as the reproductive activity is imaginative, recognition (in the above-mentioned use of the word) is suppressed. The representative object may be, in fact, only the more or less exact reproduction of an actual presentative experience in my past ; but if it is to be considered as an object of imagination rather than of memory, it must not be consciously known as such reproduc- tion. In other words, the object of imagination appears in con- sciousness as " freed "' from those bonds of recog'nized relation to my past which the object of memory always has. In connec- tion with this characteristic difference, another most important and suggestive difference arises. All my memories, as such, are of what — as I am wont vaguely or more clearly to believe — really happened. " My i^ast " can never be represented in any other way, whether we call' the precise form of representation memory, imagination, or thought, than as consisting of real occurrences at some time presentatively known to me. I may, indeed, imagine or think it to have been different from what I distinctly remem- ber it to have been. But doing this results in my presenting myself with a picture which, by its very nature, is put in contrast with the actuality of my past. If anything be3"ond the liyiits of the present field of consciousness attaches to itself the conviction or belief of reality, it is just this — namely, my past as given to me in fully developed recognitive memory. On the contrary, the objects of my imagination, whether this form of reproduc- tive activity be the so-called " passive " or the so-called " active," do not have the same conviction or belief (resting on the ground that they are recognized as belonging to my past) attaching it- self to them. How (3) "Thought" is characteristically different from imag- ination cannot be satisfactorily explained in a few sentences. Its close resemblance to, and dependence upon, imagination is recognized in all our use of language. Indeed, much confusion has always arisen in psychological discussion on account of the very natural use of the word "idea" for both the concrete sensu- ous image and the concept or product of thought. On the other hand, as respects the " reality " of its objects — assumed, inferred, or somehow believed in— thought is more closely allied with, MEMORY, IMAGINATION, AND THOUGHT 379 and dependent upon, memory than upon imagination. The follow- ing* three particulars, however, summarize those most important diti'erences, which will be more fully expLiined later on : {a) In trains of thought, as distinguished from series of associated representative images, the individual factors, or " moments," of the train, are diiierent. This difference may be summed up in an indefinite way by saying that the ideas which succeed each other, when we are distinctly thinkimf (not merely imagining) are more abstract, more " freed " from their concrete manifold- ness, more schematic as it were (see p. 284 f.). This difference is indeed a matter of degrees, and no fixed line between the representative image and the concept which will stand the test of actual psychical life can be drawn. For that reason we can- not definitely say where imaging leaves off* and thinking and conception begin. {Jj) The relations between the different con- tiguous factors in trains of thinking, when compared with series of associated ideas, are seen to have a different origin and char- acter. Here the fundamental distinction seems to be that, whereas in mere imagination no consciousness of relation (whether of similarity, or difference, sequence, simultaneity, cause, etc.) is necessary, in thinking, such consciousness of relation is implied, either as actually accompanying the succession of psy- choses or as due to previously formed habits of conscious activity in relating. In a preliminary way we may say that thinking is ," so far as reproductive memory goes, over the entire series of means. Thus Egger ' pertinently calls attention to the fact that wo have no "memory " of the sensations of touch and muscular ' 111 hie Dc la Parole iuterieiire. INFLUENCE OF "ATMOSPHERE" 393 movement that belong to the vocalizing organs in speaking words ; while we have a clear memory of words or sounds ; and this is plainly because the direction of attention to the practical end — the word-sounds as vehicles of thought — has suppressed those sensations which were merely means to the end. In the same way it is the score which absorbs the attention of the accomplished musician who is playing at sight ; thus certain black lines and dots excite the right motor activities in spite of a complete hq^se from recollection of the acquired memory-images of tactual and muscular sensa- tions. But who has not seen the nervous soloist — for example, on 'cello or violin — while the orchestra is playing the prelude to his accompaniment, practising mentally, in the way of reviving the images of the sensations be- longing to a particularly difiicult passage in the solo? § 11. Finally, atmosphere is a most important factor in determining the character of the reproductive processes in developed memory. With a par- donable extension of this term we may say that such " atmosphere " is of two kinds — (1) internal and (2) external. That is to say, the character of the reproduction at any particular time is largely decided by the mood and environment of that very same time. For memory is not uuartistic ; but, the rather does it, to a certain extent, follow the same rules as imagination and thought in its efforts to produce harmony and symmetry of total ettect. The " systematic association," to which M. Paulhan reduces all the laws of the reproductive activity, is not governed by practical ends alone. It is in some sort as an artist that every man remembers what he remembers ; and the influence upon the processes of ideation, in general, which comes from the underlying tone of feeling has already (p. 280 f.) been explained, both physiologically and psychologically. Everybody knows that in our sad moods we remember our sad experiences, and in glad moods our glad experi- ences, etc. Or if we follow the law of contrast, it is as sad pleasures, or as glad sadness, that we recall the ojoposite of our present mood. • For — " Each sutstance of a grief hatli twenty shadows, Which show like grief itself, but are not so" — and the same thing is true of all our experiences with a decided affective tone. This artistic harmony between memory and presentative consciousness we, on the whole, prefer (as we are compelled, in the main, to exjDerience it) to the distraction and pain which any habitual discord between present mood and reminiscences of the past would occasion. In the same way we cannot be surrounded by any kind of iH-edominating atmosphere without its effect on oxir reproductive energies being most marked. Here reminiscence is compelled to conform to environment. Thus a return to a foreign country in which we have once learned its language stimulates the memory of that almost forgotten language by means of the general correspondence of environment. Nor is this contraiy to, but con- firmatory of, the experience of Sully,' who on a first visit to Norway found himself constantly reproducing Italian words. For here the generally for- eign atmosi^here, with its whole "peculiar complex of feelings," stimulated the memory of that particular foreign language which had been previously > The Human Mind, I., p. 344 (note). 394 MEMORY learned iu a foreign (and so similar) atmosijliere. In a foreign atmosphere, foreign language and foreign customs are alone consistent with the interests of artistic unity. The word " Recollection " is well adapted to emphasize the dependence of the character of the reproductive activity — its time-rate, direction, and completeness as respects the vividness and life-likeness of representative consciousness — upon volition. For the act of will seems to convert the otherwise passive and mechanical process of the arising in consciousness of memory- images, under the laws of association, into a delinitely jDurpose- ful and spiritual activity. That there is a certain amount of psychological truth in such distinctions, experience, language, and practice all abundantly confirm. At the same time, in the more general but not less appropriate use of the words mem- ory and will, such changes in the character of the reproduc- tive activity are not abrupt as respects development, or lacking in an almost infinite number of degrees. These two faculties (memory and will) develop in mutual interdependence, if not with equal step ; and even in the most highly developed exer- cise of the reproductive activity the amount of the influence from conscious volition varies greatly. On the other hand, all the differences above-mentioned (time-rate, direction, and complete- ness) are illustrated in the different cases of so-called passive reproduction — for example, in dreaming and hypnotic states, in reverie and dreamy contemplation, when we let our thoughts run back over the past as " they will ; " and even in the highest moments of artistic energy. It cannot be denied, however, that the self-conscious purposeful volition to reproduce, in a definite way, changes greatly all these characteristics of the reproduc- tive factor in memory. Within certain limits, and at some times more than others, we can remember what we will. The peculiar feature of this kind of memory is, that voluntary attention, consid- ered as a selective and distrihutive energy worhincj toward an end consciously conceived of, controls the time-rate, oi'der, and complete- ness of the reproductive processes in the inte?'ests of that end. The very word interest recalls our thought to the intimate relation which exists between the more complex forms of feeling and the active, voluntary type of memory (" recollection proper "). § 12. All highly psychological languages have recognized the distinction between active and merely passive repi-odnction. For example, W'e find in Plato, and still more in Aristotle, the distinction between dviifivrjais and ^ivffUT] ; in Latin between remmiscor and memini ; in modern German between Erinn&i'ung and G'eddchtniss ; in French between souvenir and mivioirc. The ACTIVE AND PASSIVE REPRODUCTION 395 proposal of Hamilton to use the word " lemiuiscence " for active reproduc- tions seems to reverse the customary English usage. But, in fact, this dis- tinction — though valid and important — has many degrees which shade into each other ; and neither jjurely active nor merely jmssive reproduction is often, if at all, accomplished in developed mental life. Hence the vacillat- ing use of all the terms just mentioned ; hence also the thought concealed in reflexive verbs for the act of memory [sick erinnern, se souvenir, etc.). While we cannot appeal to detiuite acts of recollection as instances of a voluntary activity freed from all bonds of the association of ideas, nor regard, on the other hand, the adult mind as ever long^holly passive in reproduc- tion, we can observe certain distinctive features of recollection, considered as active and voluntary reproduction. (1) In recollection some end is con- ceived of as being served by the reproductive process. This end may be either the recall of some memory- picture as a sort of end in itself ; or the reproduction of the memory-picture as a means to some other end. Thus we "recollect" the past when we sit down of an evening to "talk over old times ; " but the witness in a lawsuit may be stimulated to recollection in order to win his case or to get rid of a teasing lawyer. But this setting of the end of recollection before the mind itself involves memory. Thus it may be said that, in order to recollect, we must remember what we are called upon to recollect. (2) The essential thing about recollection, then, is the rendering, by an activity of will, what Sully ' has called " a vague sub- conscious mode of rej^resentation," a sort of dim presentiment, into a com- plete recognitive memory. The word re-collect (to bring together into a whole again) signifies just this. Hence the significance and importance of ' ' clews " in all acts of recollection. We figuratively represent ourselves as trying to ' ' get hold " of the memory-image ; we then consciously make use of it as a sort of handle, or token, for the rediscovery of the whole experience. Thus, in the eflfort to recollect, we find ourselves voluntarily fixating by attention the principal— though still inchoate and dim— features of the pres- ent reproductive consciousness. This process of fixating alters the time-rate with which the fixated elements pass through the field of consciousness, in two ways : they may either be slightly detained in consciousness; or, they may be recalled in so continuous a succession as partly to sei-ve the pur- pose of a constant detention. Now (3) if the fixation of discriminating attention on the so-called " clew '' does not result in a satisfactory revival of the ideas associated with this clew, so as to form an act of recognitive memory adapted to our recognized end, attention is voluntarily redistributed, as it were. Other features of the dim presentiment are selected, fixated, and the results of suggestion as proceeding from these new centers, are watched. Again (4,) we may allow the more passive reproductive processes which are started by any one of the chosen clews, to run on for a time, in the hope that they will yet lead to efiective clews ; or that (as so often happens) all at once the reconstructed memory will be started in full and vital experience by the reawakening touch of some suggestion. We may even, for the time, voluntarily inhibit the active process of recollection, in the expectation (based upon much ex]ieri- ence) that, if we will let ' ' alone " the reproductive processes, they will by J The Human Mind, I., p. 347. 396 MEMORY and by do for us what we find ourselves unable to force them to do. We have, then, an acute consciousness of " being on the watch" for some portion of the desired reminiscence ; or — sometimes for days and even weeks — we experience a recurrent and subacute consciousness of something wanting to make our mental harmony complete. (5) The character and amount of the psycho-physical and psychical activity corresponding to the conception of recollection profoundly modifies the entire current of conscious mental life. It is not the will alone which comes thus to be emphasized. In "trying to remember" (or voluntarily recollecting) we become "thoughtful," "care- ful ; " we are under a sense of strain, a burden of obligation to perform a certain difficult mental function, as it were. Severe bodily and mental pains may result from the difiiculty, or increased inability of recollection ; and even peculiar reproaches of a quasi -ethical sort. g 13. Nothing of any scientific value respecting the cerebral processes in- volved in recollection, as active reproduction, can be added to what has al- ready been said.' We have here to consider a certain jDeculiar mixture of those processes which are the ishysiological conditions of associated idea- tion with other processes which are the physiological conditions of will, as the activity of selective, fixated, and purposeful attention. This mixture of cerebral processes, therefore, necessarily involves the intense activity, with a practical simultaneousness, of wide-spreading connected areas of the brain. Especially is this true when — as is the case with all adult recollection — word- memory is involved. We are much tried in trying hard to remember ; for the whole cerebral substance is being set into a high degree of exhausting activity. Hence the familiar pains and weariness, sometimes amounting to a feeling of anguish and confusion, as though brain and mind were giving way completely, which the suspense or failure of recollection occasions. Hence also the dependence of recollection, far more than merely passive re- production, upon the integrity and healthy functional condition of the cere- bral tissues. ^ 14. In occasioning, directing, and determining the result of this " hunt " for particular objects among the stores of memory, the effect of feeling is very marked. A lack of the feeling of interest renders it as truly difficult to recollect as to commit to memory for future recollection. On the other hand, in certain states of affective quickening all a man's stores of memory seem to be lilaced at the command of his will for the end held in view. In certain great historical speeches (like that of Huss before the Council of Constance) this influence of feeling on recollection is grandly illustrated. Every speaker who prepares himself beforehand and then ceases to consider further what he will recall, reckons ui)on the aid which the feelings of the occasion will give to his will to reproduce. Indeed, between wisJihig to recollect and willing to recollect the line is by no means easy to be drawn. But feeling of too violent and emotional a character, as well as indiflference and lethargy, changes the time-rate, the direction, and the completeness, of voluntary reproduction. In this connection we may remark the effect upon recollection which fol- lows from the determination not to recollect (to forget, to "keep out of I Compare, however, Muudsley : Mental Physiology, p. 159 f.; aud James : The Principlce of Pny- chology. I., p. 683 f. TlIK ACTIVITY OF RECOGNITION 397 mind") what is repulsive to some forms of feeling. This inhibilion of recul- lectioii is the very opposite of the ordinary and uncontrolled result upon our memory of whatever strongly excites feeling ; the result is a sort of attrac- tion to recall, often amounting almost to a strange fascination. Few, indeed, are they who have not suflered much from being obliged to remember what they would gladly have forgotten — even the more bound to the recognitive recall on account of the association of strong and repulsive feeling therewith. On the other hand, men of will and of trained minds can refuse attention to those objects which they choose thus to keep below the threshold of con- sciousness ; in this way by control of memoiy they establish habits of con- venient forgetting. We are told of Kant that, being much grieved over the loss of his old servant, he wrote in his journal: "Remember to forget Lampe." The Mental Activity wliicli chiefly distinguishes the faculty of memoiy from all other most closely allied forms of facult}^ is Eecognition. By this word it is meant that, in a complete act of developed memory the present psychosis is consciously related to the p>ast of my experience as rep)resentative of that past. As has been said, recog-uitive reproduction therefore involves the conscious- ness of time and the consciousness of self ; and these forms of consciousness develop, in mutual dependence, with the develop- ment of memor3\ Recognition is also plainly dependent upon, and necessary to, the development of all intellectual activity ; in- deed, as the very word xe-cognition signifies, such recoU'ection appears in consciousness as pre-eminently intellectual* activity. Memory is, then, in some sort, a growth from that primary intel- lection in which the consciousness of similarity and of difference, and the processes of assimilation and differentiation, are imi:>lied. But recognition cannot be explained as a simple development of any one of these forms of consciousness, so called. To remember, with recognition, is not simj^ly to have the consciousness of time — however highly developed — or the consciousness of self, or the consciousness of similarity and difference. Neither is recogni- tive memory to be explained as a comijound of all these forms of conscious mental life. The rather is it a form of mental re- action sid generis, which, while depending upon conditions of re- tention and reproduction of ideas, under the laws of association, and involving the development of various other allied forms of consciousness, has still a unique character that transcends the conditions on which it reposes. The degree of recognition which belongs to different acts of memory varies greatly ; for the faculty of recognitive memory is subject to the laws of development, in the history of mental life. For example, I may be said recognitively to remember an object, an event, or a state of my own thought or feeling, which 398 MEMORY I am only able in a somewhat vacillating and doubtful way to refer to " some time or other " in my past. Here the factor of recognition is at its lowest degree, as it were. So, also, in the rapid recall of series of past experiences, of each one of which we have a perfectly clear retentive memory ; we actually often get over the ground of memory by merely touching, recognitively, each member of the series, and letting it go immediately. In- deed, if the process of recollection is very rapid, we may be said rather to recognize the series as a whole, while reproducing its members seriatim, with scant recognition given to each one. This is the meaning of the prelude with which it is customary to begin tales about ourselves : " Once upon a time I was," etc. ; or, "It is just a year ago to-day that such a thing happened to me," etc. That the memory of childhood is relatively in small degree ■' recognitive," in the higher meaning of this word, there can be no doubt. Children generally retain and reproduce the more vivid and lasting impressions made upon them in such manner as to suggest the predominance of the mechanism of association, with little or no clear consciousness of time, or of self, or of the relation consciously established between the present experience and the past experience of which it is known to be representa- tive. Hence, in part, that unrecognized mingling of imagina- tion with memory which is distinctive of the childish reproduc- tive activity. Children are not as yet " selves " to themselves ; they have no remembered past existence which is believed to be- long to the world of reality, and to separate them as individuals from other individuals in this real world. In using the words " belief " and " reality " we suggest topics that, so far as descrip- tive psychology considers them at all, can only be undertaken later on. But we may notice here the true statement of Dr. Ward : ^ "It is plainly absurd to make the difference depend upon the presence of belief in memory and expectation, and on its absence in mere imagination ; for the belief itself depends upon the difference instead of constituting it." Still is it also true that " belief " constitutes memory only in so far as memory is recognitive — is cognition, or Jc)nnvlc has well said : '• No memory is involved in the mere fact of recurrence. ... A farther condition is required, . . . that con- dition is that the fact imaged be e.rpressli/ referred to the jiast, thought as in the past. . , . But even this would not be memory. Memoiy requires more than mere dating of a fact in the past. It must be dated in mj/ past." When, therefore, there comes into the stream of my consciousness a state of which I may say, I now know, because I remember, that on such a day of the past (of July, '92) /climbed, in company with A, B, etc., Asama-yama, and looked into the crater, etc., then a kind of intellectiial acti%-ity has been per- formed, whose factors and as^iects cannot even be conceived of, much less definitely and scientifically established, as having physiological processes with similar categories. § 16. The presence of conscious recognition, with its accompanying feel- ing of familiarity, etc., in both jierception and memory, brings these two ' The Principles of Psycholoav, I., p- 649 f. A similar attitude toward all the profundity of psy- chical life implied in the higher intellectual activities, and the impossibility of correlating these ac- tivities with definite cerebral processes, is implied in such passages as are to be found, I., pp. 147 (note), 158, 161 f.. 181, 297, 331, 578 (note), 581. and 591 (see especially what is said of the conscious- ness of " similarity," in the last passage). With all this it is difficult to reconcile the obvious mean- ing of the remarks on p. 687 f. 400 MEMORY faculties yet more closely into relation. Indeed, tliere are certain mental acts which seem assignable to either of these two kinds of faculty with almost equal proi^riety. Such are those two classes of " redintegrating activities " where — it has been said — " mental evolution is but slightly advanced and where frequent repetition in varying and irrelevant circum- stances has produced a blurred and neutral zone." Hence in childhood, where recognitive memory is little developed, neither jierception, nor expec- tation, nor thought, is definite and clear. And as development goes on, a larger part of what was formerly brought into consciousness as something definitely rememhered and somehow connected with our past, becomes merged in that general stock of knowledge which is only most vaguely recognized as having to do with the past at all, because it is our acquired knowledge. For example, we may say, with about equal propriety, either that we " perceive" the meaning of certain words or that we "remember" their meaning. Acts of conscious reproduction which terminate in some at least weak form of recognitive memory must be distinguished from those which do not so terminate. For example, sujipose that the Latin word anima is seen by a person who years ago learned its meaning and how to decline it. The order of ideas evoked in consciousness may, very likely, run as follows : " Soul " (or "breath"), "first declension," "feminine gender," " genitive in cp," etc. Afterward any one of a great variety of thoughts may be suggested, such as of the grammar in which, school at which, teacher under whom, or date when, etc., this linguistic lore was gained. Thus the meaning of the word anima, for a person who is still obliged to translate the Latin and yet has no difficulty in recognizing the meaning, is properly spoken of as per- ceived rather than as remembered. That is to say, recognition is so fused with the completed exercise of perceptive functions that the letters of anima cannot be perceived without its meaning in English — we will say — being " ap- perceived." What immediately follows of grammatical ' ' lingo " is, however, probably to be regarded as a case of reproduction of a series of associated ideas (see p. 268 f.), with scarcely a trace of conscious recognitive memory. And thus much of the whole process, although it smacks of what psychology calls retention, reproduction, and assimilation, cannot j^roperly be spoken of as memory, in the sense in which we are now using this word. Popu- larly, however, we should imdoubtedly say : "You remember how to decline anima, I see." When, however, the suggested ideas of "grammar," "school," " teacher," and "date," follow in consciousness, the truly recog- nitive feature of memory — the higher intellectual function — becomes more emphasized ; and now we may describe the stream of consciousness more truly by saying that images of how 1 learned to decline anima, in that gram- mar, at that school, under that teacher, at about that date, are flitting through the mind. But this constitutes true reminiscence ; it is (at least, to some de- gree) recngnitire memory. For we have here, however fitfully and faintly, all the necessary features of such memory ; that is, the present ideating proc- esses are consciously known as representative of what happened in the ])aH that is my jiast. The correct descriptive and explanatory science of memory will, there- fore, avoid both of two extremes. It will admit, on the one hand, that many degrees of the recognitive activity, with all that is implied in it, belong to KNOWLEDGE AND RECOGNITION 401 different acts of memory ; but it will, on the other hand, refuse to reduce this unique intellectual and reflexive function of mind to the terms of a psy- cho-physical mechanism. In some sort, I trcmscend (he present and connect it, hy a true spirituid siinthesia, into a knoicn realiti/, with the jjctst, in every act of developed recoffuitlve memorif. I 17. The relation of recognitive memory to all knowledge, and to those convictions concerning reality which enter into all knowledge, is now to some extent a^Dpareut. It is such memory which makes rational expectation possible ; and as well all reasoning with respect to the future — all rational looking forward, and all projection of remembered trains of ideation into an imagined as distinguished from a remembered time. While, then, the con- scioiisness of time is necessary to the develojiment of memory, the develop- ment of memory is also necessary to the develojjed idea of time, as i^resent, past, and future — and all these with reference, always and only, to my now conscious self. To say this is not to reason in a circle ; it is simply to ac- knowledge that interdependence of relations between all of the activities, phases, and stages of mental life, which all mental development shows. Not only is recognitive memory necessarily related to all knowledge, and to all development of knowledge, but such memory is knowledge, of what really happened in my past. To the extent to which I really remember, to that extent I know ; and as long as I do not doubt my memory, I do not doubt that I know and what I know. For belief in the trustworthiness of memory is, as we have already seen, something that belongs to its essential characteristics as recognitive. To attempt, then, to verify the trustworthi- ness of memory in general is to attempt something quite absurd. There is no joossible guarantee of memory which resides, as it were, outside of memoiy. There is no con-ective of one's own poor memory but a better memory; either one's own, or that of some other person who has had a similar i:)resen- tative knowledge. Whatever appeal we make for the correction or improve- ment of memory we are in nowise getting around, or beneath, or above, the " authority" of memory and the " belief " which we have in its deliver- ances. In fact, on that authority ami belief hang the perfection of our pre- sentative knowledge and all the grounds of inferential knowledge ; and so, of course, all that can be said or conjectured about the i^sycho-phys- ical processes of reproduction, the cases of diseased memory, of double consciousness, etc. Unless the essential soundness of one's own memory be preserved, the very appeal to others to correct it becomes ineffective and even impossible. ^ 18. Yet here again we come face to face with the important, the almost omnipresent, principle of continuity. For a comparison of different acts of memoiy shows an almost indefinite number of degrees of correctness, and of assurance of correctness, belonging to them. There are disappointed ex- pectations based upon mistaken memory, conflict of testimony as to the same things differently remembered by different memories, acquired knowl- edge of the influence of i)rejudice, interest, etc., over the deliverances of memory ; and there are changes of memory produced, by further reflection, or due to sudden inbursts of clearer recognitive recollection, etc. But especially does experience force upon us a certain submission of particular memories to the memory of generalized principles ; as when we conclude 26 /C^ ft 402 MEMORY that we must be mistaken in our recollection of an alleged fact, "because" of something else which we remember as necessarily following from a rule of conduct, or a law of nature. Thus we argue with ourselves, or hear oth- ers dispitting : You mu^t be wrong "because" it could not have happened as it is remembered. Not even in these last cases, however, are we actually setting up an authority over that of memory in general. What is called "verifying " or " correcting " memoiy takes place in the following way : Doubt is thrown upon a memory-jjicture, either because of its own faint and vacillating character, or because it is ojjposed by some other memory, either of fact or of principle. A check to the smooth flow of the current of memory-images takes jjlace, which is accompanied by a peculiar painful feeling of mixed joerplexity, anxiety, and desire. The "clarifying" of the complex memory-picture thus becomes a problem, whose affective ac- comi;)animents aflford a strong motif for its solution. Attentive and voluntary discrimination is excited and guided by the motif, and the processes of con- scious purposeful recollection proceed in the manner already described. The result of these processes is either confirmatory of, or corrective of, memory, according as the final memory-picture is developed in consistency with the principal traits it possessed in its first form, or for one or more of those traits others come to be substituted. But no ground for belief in memory that underlies or overtops all memory can possibly be reached by such processes of recollection. Neithei', in the last analysis, can we make the validating of memory depend ujDon comparison. The stream of con- sciousness flows on without ceasing ; the present is not the past ; the claim of the present psychosis to represent the past accurately can never be taken back to that past and compared with it. If we look at a flower and then close our eyes, or turn our back upon it, even for only that moment which is necessary to extinguish perceptive knowledge ; or if we hear a strain of music and then wait only long enough for it to die away in our ears ; and if then — being in doubt whether we remember correctly that flower or that strain of music — we resort again to the same percept for confirmation of memory ; in all such cases ?re only confirm memory by other inemory, with an indestructible confidence in good memory as the very basis of the correctness of all developed nets of comparison. The distinction of Kinds of Memory is of little value for psy- chological science ; it is, however, illustrative of principles al- ready established, and useful in suggesting- rules for the cultiva- tion of good memory. Kinds of memory may be distinguished according to two principles of division : First, the relative amounts of faculty which are habitual with different individuals, or which enter into diffcn-ent acts of memory. Here the nature of the distinction is itself relative. Among such kinds are the tenacious and the spontaneous memory ; the poor and the pro- digious memory ; the perfect and the imperfect act of memory ; natural or logical and accidental or artificial memory ; voluntary and involuntary memory, etc. The second principle has refer- ence to the nature of the objects most spontaneously, tena- THE KINDS OF MEMORY 403 ciously, and perfectly remembered. Here, of course, the division into kinds of memory is only limited by the number of kinds of objects ^vllicl^ may be retained and reproduced in memory. This distinction also is merely relative. All kinds of memory alike fall under the conditions of retention and the laws of repro- duction, as already described. A few words with reference to selected examples of several kinds will therefore suffice. ^ 19. The word " tenacious," as apjilied to memory has reference to the amount of forgetting, in comparison with actual or jiossible recollecting, which experience enables us roughly to measure. The very nature of con- sciousness, with its limitations of field, attention, etc., and the very nature of all memory, have been shown to involve forgetting as truly as recollect- ing. With all men by far the larger portion of the past (not only the years of early childhood, but also the details of almost every day's experience) is never actually recalled. But the amount actually reproduced in conscious- ness differs very greatly with different individuals ; hence the merely relative use of the word tenacious to signify that some minds hold on to their past better than others. A "spontaneous" memoiy is one that reproduces, what it reproduces at all, on relatively little excitement from suggestion, as we might say, and generally with ease and marked rapidity in the sequence of the ideation - processes. While tenacious memory may be trusted to "hold on " to the ideas , however sluggishly and reluctantly it, at times, re- produces them, spontaneous memory is prompt, and, for the time being, generous " in delivery." These two kinds of memory may, or may not, co- exist in the same person or in the same individual act of memory. A " poor " memory is relatively lacking in both tenacity and spontaneity ; and a remark- able or " prodigious " memory would seem to require excellence in capacity both to retain and promptly to reproduce. Instances of the prodigies performed by spontaneous memoi-y are numer- ous enough. Besides the frequently cited case of the servant who, on being seized with a fever, talked in Latin, Greek, and Hebrew, what she years l^reviously had merely heard recited without understanding a word, the butcher of Bicetre might fitly be mentioned as an example ; for this man, during his paroxysms of madness recited entire jiassages from the tragedy of " Phedre ; " but on recovery he failed to recollect a single verse. Nor would it seem out of place to speak of trained spontaneity, like that of the juggler Houdin, who, after a few minutes spent in the library of a certain gentleman, astonished him by repeating " right off" the titles of his books ; or like that of the painter who rein-oduced from memory the altar-piece of Rubens, at Cologne, when it had been carried away by the French, and did it so cor- rectly that careful comparison was necessary to distinguish between the original and the copy. Of men of truly prodigious memories, especially in certain kinds of objects — implying both tenacity and spontaneity extending to a wonderfully large number of presentation-experiences — history furnishes noteworthy examples. In the highest rank stand those who, like Scaliger, Niebuhr, and Pascal, combined the highest qualities of mind with the high- est development of various kinds of memory. Of Pascal we are told by 404 MEMORY Locke ' that " be forgot nothing of what he had done, read, or thought in any part of his rational age " — a pardonable exaggeration of the truth in view of the really prodigious character of the gi-eat man's memory. Brandis declares that Kiebuhr's memory was " equally retentive of perceptions and thoughts, of views and feelings, of sights and sounds." On a lower plane stand those generals who, like Cyrus, are reported to have known by name every soldier in their armies ; or those statesmen who, like Themistocles (said to have known the 20,000 citizens of Athens), never forget the names of their constituency. Lower still must we place the mathematical memory of the mere calculators, or the musical memory of Blind Tom, et al. Thus we learn with astonishment the feats of memory of one Magliabechi, who, although brought up in ignorance and learning to read late, in his capacity as librarian proved himself able to repeat word for word an entire book after having once read it ; or of Zacharias Dase, for whom a few glances at a row of 188 figures proved enough, so that he could repeat them, infal- libly, forward and backward, and give the i)laee of each jiarticular figure in the series.'- These performances testify to the incredible delicacy and tenac- ity of the cerebral mechanism of reproduction, and the possibilities of future reproduction that lie in its unimpaired structure. Such words as "iserfect" and "imperfect," when applied to memory in general, or to particular acts of memory, are plainly relative. They refer to the completeness of details with which the original presentation is repro- duced in consciousness. Thus we are reminded of the varying degrees of life-likeness belonging to the representative image. But in developed memory the accurate placing of the image in the series of my past experi- ences, the dating of it with exactness, is characteristic of perfect memory. Natural and artificial, logical and accidental, voluntary and involuntaiy acts of memory have reference chiefly to the amounts of the intellectual and voluntary factors which enter into these acts. Habit and training are here chiefly determinative. In logical memory such relations as cause and effect, premise and conclusion, si:)ecies and subsumed individual, are emphasized. But that " local memory " which enables one to recall the exact word or sentence, by means of its place on the page, may be called extrinsic and ac- cidental. g 20. Marked instances of the memory of names, figures, musical sounds, etc., have already been brought forward. Nothing is more common than to hear a person saying : " My memory for faces is fairly good, but fearfully poor for names '' (or dates, or abstract principles, etc.). In truth, every form of sense-perception may be said to constitute a kind of memory. Here the great differences which exist have undoubtedly an anatomical and physi- ological basis ; and this we recognize when we speak of a " good ear " for music, a " good eye " for form and color, etc. In the language of Volk- matin : " There are as many kinds of memory as there are kinds of mental re])iesentations. . . . A memory is everywhere ; the memory is no- where." Or, to use the head-line of Sully: '' Memmy, a Chmti'r of ^f>>m- ories." This truth jM-eijares the way for those differences which different ' The editor of Bohn's edition of Locke's " Essay " jastly criticises the accuracy of this statement (eee note, I., p. 2f>S). For examples of remarkable memories, see Ilamilton : Lectures on Metaphys- ics, p. 42.'> f. ; and nciickc : I'raL'matische Psycholojzie, i., p. 190 f. " See Kaulich : Uandbuch d. Psychologic, p. 83 f. (and notes). THE ART OF liEMEMBEKING 405 persons exhibit in respect of the kind of objects which they remember best. The genera] fact also corresponds to the physiological theory of the cere- bral conditions of memoiy. Thus in develoi)ed form we have the memoiy of the artist, the memory of the man of science, the memory of the j^hilos- opher, the memory of the practical man, etc. The memory of the great thinker or scholar is chiotiy a word-memory. In general, also, the different forms of sense-perception are memorized with different degrees of clearness and completeness by different individuals. (Here compare what has already been said concerning the sensations and their images, p. 240 f.) Valid and useful Maxims for the Art of Remembering- folloAv from the laws of retention and reproduction, as already dis- cussed. Such maxims ma}^ be divided into three classes, ac- cording- as they have reference to : (1) Those general condi- tions of sound brain and sound mind on which the entire structure of the faculty, as it were, depends ; (2) the condi- tions, especially governing the fixation and distribution of at- tention, of the original exiierience which it is designed to remember ; (3) the nature and variety of the connections be- tween the particular memorj' and the entire structure of asso- ciated mental life. Under the first class fall exhortations to keep the brain tissue sound and well nourished with properly aerated blood ; to avoid excessive drains u]ion the elasticity of the cerebral centers, etc. Among the qualifications of mental sanity affecting the quality of memory, the $'w«^i-ethical are not the least important ; such as not to allow interest to falsify and cloud memory, habitually to refuse to be overhasty in con- clusion of memory, etc. But both the bodily and the mental conditions under which the presentation is "committed" to memory must also be carefully guarded. Thus the effort to learn when- suffering from cerebral fatigue or exhaustion is to be avoided. To control attention — with fixation, distribution, repe- tition, all directed to the desired end, and interest awakened and made to lend vividness to the impression — is the principal maxim falling under tho second class. Closely connected are the maxims which require that advantage be taken of the laws of association in the cultivation of memory ; for these laws are the "natural" modes of the recun-ence of the ideas under the princiiiles of contiguity, similarity, contrast, etc. Mnemonics, or " artificial " memory, then, furnishes safe maxims only so far as it follows these laws ; that is, ceases to be artificial and be- comes natural. But relatively non-rational or accidental associa- tions are natural in the earlier stages of the development of memory ; and, indeed, for such subjects, in all stages, as do not lend themselves readily to the higher forms of association. 406 MEMORY ^ 21. The early plasticity of the brain is such that the stores of new and more easily dissociable impressions should be accumulated before the end of the period of puberty. The more methodical arrangement and con- solidation of these stores follows, in the form of memory of related things and memory of words. In middle life new acquisitions are relatively di- minished, and the elaboration of experience into a more highly intellectual form, or the use of the past for the attainment of practical ends, predominates. These rougiily marked periods need to be remembered in the application of means to the culture of memory. In all these regards, however, individuals differ widely ; while some show an almost perennial youth in acquisition, without corresponding childishness in thought, others early display the senile inability further to stock memory with new ideas, or "to break the cake of custom" when it is no more than half-baked in the oven of ex- perience. I 22. All helps to memory which cannot justify themselves by direct appeal to the natural life of the mind are likely to be injurious rather than helpful, however much they may temporarily seem to assist the " dead-lift" of petty but convenient memories. The founding of good, useful, and rational memory requires not only the firm holding in connection of the ideas, but also the ability to release them from their former connections and to unite them in new and higher combinations. Hence the pupil who has learned only in sight of the whip or of the promised reward, as well as the memorizer who has practised some cunning system of mnemonics, may share the fate of the " good man " who has done right only to secure happiness and escape ijunishment. Persons thus trained are apt to be powerless to effect new and higher associations. Even the great philosopher Kant is said to have been quite put "out of mind" by the loss of a button from the coat of a hearer on which, as he lectured, he had been accustomed to concen- trate his attention. In the definite and petty associations with numbers, letters, geometrical figures, etc., which most systems of mnemonics recom- mend, the danger of establishing a sort of slavery of the rccognitive processes is by no means small. In all self-training of memory the limitations which belong to every individual should always be kept in mind. Much may be done to im- ])rove any one's memory, but we cannot all become Scaligers, or Pascals, or Niebuhrs in this regard. Neither should all aim to rival the inferior prodigies in the line of mathematical or musical memory, in memory for names, dates, etc. With a fairly serviceable and reasonable memory which is fitted to the particular purpose of one's calling and work, one may well be satisfied ; and this is to be gained by judicious mental culture all around rather than by practising any special system of mnemonic gymnastics. ^ 23. Several important maxims, which are of especial sei-vice to the teacher of young children, may be derived from the experimental data obtained by Ebbinghaus and others. (1) Do not undertake too long tasks of memorizing, in one effort, as it wore. It has already boon shown (p. ()7 f.) that the time and expenditure of nervous and psychical energy — beyond a certain limit, which is difTerent for different persons, but generally not hard to find— increase far more rapidly than does the length of the task. (2) Find at least some meaning in what you attempt to learn, so that it may bo MEMORY AS FACULTY 407 associated witli the rest of experience in an intelligible way. (Comp. p. 272 f.) (3) Eepeat with rixed attention until the object is *' fastened" in memory (see p. 2SC) ; or, if this cannot bo done without excessive expenditure of energy and time, repeat as frecjuently as possible the first attemi^ts at memorizing. For forgetting is rapid at first and slower afterward ; and es- tablished recognitive memory — other things being at all equal — makes, for its firm establishment, a large demand upon both time and energy. [Thus Eb- binghixns found that even 10 repetitions would often not secure recognition of his series of non-sense syllables the next day ; sometimes 53-61 repetitions were necessary.] (-i) Bear always in mind that really good memory can- not be secured without cultivation of the powers of percej^tion and reason- ing. Nor can the conscience and the heart (the ethical and general affec- tive accompaniments and factors of knowledge) be left out of the account. For, although memory often seems to be a sort of special and isolated piece of j)sycho-physical mechanism, if the factdty is to be developed as a fountain of knowledge, we must reckon roitli the tvhole man — brain and mind — as the subject who remembers. [In addition to works cited at the end of Chapter XIIL, and in this and preceding chapters, the following, on Memory, may be consulted : Articles in the Am. Journal of Psychology, ii., 1-3, by W. H. Burnham. Dugald Stewart : Philosophy of the Human Mind, I., chap. vi. Sully: The Human Mind, II. , Appendix D. Taine : JDe I'lntelligence, ii. , 1-2. Among the many treatises on the cultivation of Memory the following, especially the first, perhai)s, deserve mention : M. L. Holbroolc : How to Strengthen the Memory. Pick : Memory and a Rational Means of Improving it. Kay : Memory, What it is and How to Improve it. W. L. Evans : Memory Training.] I CHAPTEE XVni. IMAGINATION As compared with memory that development of reproductive faculty which we call Imag-ination stands jjartly on a hig-her, and partly on a lower, intellectual plane. On the one hand, the psycho-physical mechanism may bring into the stream of consciousness an elaborate train of representative images, if they are not to be placed in my past by recognitive recollection, with but very little development of intelligence. It is'chiefly as acting- in this way that we strive to picture to ourselves the mental life of children and of the lower animals ; it is some- what thus that certain philosophical tenets represent the life of the " world-soul." And it is this kind of life which, for the most part, we live in dreams, where the representative images are g-enerally of a highly schematic and vague character, and very little definitely recognized, in the stricter meaning of this term. In reverie and day-dreaming, memory and imagination g-o hand in hand, and both may lack the chief characteristics of higher intelligence. But on the other hand, it is by imagination that the inventor, the artist, or the poet (and even more, the man of pure science or of philosophy) transcends all the memories of his own past, and even, in the case of g-enius, of the jiast of the entire race ; while, as Schopenhauer says, the man without im- agination is related to him avIio has much of the highest de- velopment of this faculty, "as the mussel fastened to its rock, that must wait for what chance may bring it, is related to the animal that moves freely or even has wings." In somewhat the same manner must we compare the imag-ina- tion, as respects its place in the development of mental life, with the faculty of thinking-. For here again we must place imagina- tion below the power of forming- conceptions and of making in- ferences, if by imagination we mean to indicate most of our m(n-e- ly reproductive image-making faculty. On the other hand, the dependence of thinking, in all its higher functions, upon the de- veloped and trained power of imagination is undoubted. There is much also to make us sympathize with those who regard the IMAGINATION CONSIDERED AS FACULTY 409 so-called "intuitions" of the artist, or the man of sc-ienco and philosophy, as standing- higher in the scale of intelligence than the "thoughts" of the same man — so far as by this latter term we designate i)sychoses different from the intuitions. It is im- agination largely that makes what Balzac calls the " specialist," and declares to be necessarily the loftiest expression of man — the link Avliich connects the visible to the superior world. He acts, he sees, he feels, through his " Inner Being." For, how- ever much of offensive mysticism may cling- to such talk as this, scientific psychology has still to remember that the facts of the creative and artistic life of man exist ; and since they exist, they are not to be denied description and explanation, however stubborn they may prove themselves in the face of all petti- ness from mathematical, or cerebral, or experimental science so called. But, in truth, imagination and intellect should not be re- g-arded as distinct faculties properly opposed. They must co- operate and interpenetrate each other most profoundly ; although different sexes, ages, and individuals show these two sides of elaborating and reflecting- consciousness in different proportions. Thus, some psychologists treat them as two directions in the de- velopment of the sej)arating- and combining activity of mind. Imag-ination, by more searching- separation, gets at the interior content of the individual ; thought, by manifold combinations of another kind, forms laws and principles, and opens up the so- called universal.^ What is chiefly to be noticed, however, is that the merely reproductive forms of imagination closely resemble memory, with a low degree of recognitive energy ; while the creative forms of imagination rather resemble that rapid and lofty thinking which leaps to conclusions with an immediacy and certainty comparable to the intuitive processes of percep- tion. Both these two extremes, however, are connected by an indefinite number of intervening links. And in all imagination, memory and thinking are necessarily involved. § 1. It is scarcely worth while to enter into the controversy as to whether imagination shall be called a " facnlty " or not. The Herbartians and the physiologists here again agree in denying such a title to this form of mental life. According to Volkmann, properly speaking, imagination is only a term for the energy residing in the ideas themselves, and is therefore different ac- cording to the differences of the ideas. Each idea has its memory, and every movement of the collective consciousness has its power of imagination. Ac- cording to the physiologists the highest flights of creative genius are fully accounted for as reproduced cerebral activities formerly excited by external ' Sec George : Psychologic, p. 2C4 f. 410 IMAGINATION stimulus, plus tlio epiplienomenou of consciousness. So far as merely re- productive imagination is concerned there is truth in the claim that it is not so much a faculty as a particular case under the association of ideas. It is in connection with the correlated develoiiment of intellect and will that the faculty of imagination develoj^s ; or rather, that the primary processes of ideation devdop into the faculty of imagination.' § 2. Nothing additional remains to be said respecting the physiological conditions of reproductive imagination. In such cases as are more dis- tinctively creative, we have indeed little but our ignorance to display. To a certain extent modern science confirms the vague impressions which, in all ages, have connected that constitution of the brain which is favorable to un- usual creative and artistic imagination with tendencies to vagaries in so- caJled " practical judgment." The " great imagination, proper to madness," is supposed to mark the genius — in military affairs and in invention, but es- pecially in poetry and other forms of art. That such unusual development of faculty implies an intense and widely extended use of the associated cerebral areas is beyond doubt, but we know nothing of the precise differ- ences (chemical, thermic, neural), between those processes which are corre- lated with creative imagination and those which are correlated with other allied forms of the life of representation. Only since in the higher work of imagination the reproductive aspect is less prominent, and the more purely creative is more prominent from the point of view of consciousness, we may conjecture that the cerebral difference consists chiefly in the relative amount of neural "automatism." But the most highly "creative" genius in respect of imagination creates only as he also reproduces ; and hence has perceived and remembered. Especially must we insist upon the prominence of motor consciousness in the neural conditions of productive imagination. This involves something more than the mere starting of processes in the brain as the physical basis of this exercise of mental faculty ; it involves profound changes produced in the peripheral motor organism as the result and as the concomitant and in- dispensable support of imagination. There are few things on which Kant insists with more of true psychological insight than ujion this ; in order to know a straight line, for example (as a priori, we may say) one must imagine it; in order to imagine it, one must draw it. Now "drawing" apparently involves motor activity — either actiial or regarded as " traces " of' past activity in the form of images of past strains, tensions, or move- ments. Further, in the act of imagining words, Strieker ^ has proposed to test the dependence of imagination on motor consciousness in the follow- ing way : Open the mouth and then try to imagine a word in which labials or dentals are prominent (as, e.g., "bubble" or "toddle"). The profound effect of imagination upon the entire secretory and vaso-motor system is also emphasized by modern experiments in hypnotism. By suggestion swell- ings can be produced or made to disap])ear, secretions excited or repressed, and even, in relatively rare cases, burn-brands and stigmata, etc., can be pro- duced. Every intelligent i:)hysician knows the close relation between imag- ination and the sanitary condition of the peripheral organs. The whole • Conipnru Rnliicr : Lcooim, etc., I., I'sycholofric, pp. 174 f., and 209 f. 'In his Studieu ilbcr die SprucUvoristelluugeu, aud Studien iiber die Bewegungsvorstellungen. I DIVISION INTO REPKODUCTIVE AND rilODUCTIVP: 411 theory of ideo-motor effect ou the skin and muscles, so necessary to the art of the actor, reposes upon the same basis of truth. Lichtenborg highly praised Garrick as an actor by declaring that he (by gift of vivid imagina- tion) " appeared to be present in all the muscles of his body." The rise of feeling from the fg,inter forms in which imagination first excites it, to the highest jntch of emotional grandeur, is possible only on the same basis. The complete physiologicdl anidilions of productive hnagimition seem to involve both centrcdh/ initiated ideation-facloi'S and motor factors, both centrally and pei-iph- erully reproduced. The most important psychological Division of the Imagina- tion is into Reproductive and Productive (or Creative). This distinction, however — like the others — is one of degrees onl}'. As the type of the more purely rei^roductive form of imagina- tion we may instance our di'eams, or those phantasms which chase each other through consciousness when w6 are about fall- ing asleep ; or again, when we are lying awake and (excitedlj^ or placidly) watching ourselves make pictures as it were. Here, however, the truly creative character of the work involved is often wonderful. In the wildest of our dreams the spontaneity of fancy may be most apparent ; and there are few dreams where the whole pageantry does not show the soul of the dreamer to be an artist that makes much of a small amount of sensation-'' stuff,'' by helping it out with large drafts upon the image-making fac- ulty. On the other hand, it is customary to deny that the most supreme efforts of imagination can result in truly creating anything. Here, however, Ave miist distinguish carefully our use of w^ords. No object can, of course, be constituted by activity of representation which may not be analyzed into factors that have previously been, by discriminating consciousness, known as factors of presentation-experience. For so-called creative im- agination, however, the factors themselves are re-creations — ex- isting only while the mind creates them ; and as respects the limits of combination, none can be assigned except those fur- nished by the most fundamental principles of all intellectual life. Within these expansive limitations the imagination creates (more divinely because consciously, and because more freely ac- cording to ideals) the world of both material and psychical sort with which it presents itself, and which it presents also to the apprehension of other minds. It is, as Professor Everett ' has said, " the x^ower of mental vision, a i^ower which creates that which it beholds." Reproductive Imagination develops in constant dependence upon the two closely allied forms of the general representative 1 Poetry, Comedy, and Duty, p. 1. 412 , IMAGINATION faculty ; these are memory and thought. Its character is de- fined by the return of the ideas in consciousness as themselves changed by the elaboration of experience. This change takes place chielly in two directions : (1) The ideas are " freed " from those connections of place and time in mj' past which char- acterize the objects of recognitive memory. This form of imag- ination may then be considered as a sort of memory ; that is to say, a complex idea which results from many impressions, arises without recognition of it as representative of any one of them, and without my dating of it as belonging to my past. Hence we speak of places and friends as we see them in dreams, or call them up in reverie, as either memory-images or as pict- ures of the imagination. (2) The* concrete complexity, the rich- ness and the vividness of the objects of reproductive imagination depend upon the total character of the mental development. Thus the growth of even the lower forms of fancy requires keen and analytic perception of those objects which are to be re^3ro- duced by act of fancy ; it also requires the retentive memory, which holds in store the single features and the totals of the re- produced objects. ' ^ 3. The ordinary psycliological account of dreams ascribes them almost wholly to the reprodnction of mental images under the laws of associa- tion. No doubt reproductive imagination, so called, plays a large rule in the drama of dream-life. But the writer of this treatise knows from a care- ful examination of experience that in his own case more or less of sen- sation-material is woven into nearly all his dreams. Indeed, a scientific analysis of most dreams, wherever the data are sufficient, shows traces of peripherally excited factors entering into the composition of the dream. These psychoses are, then, more like real '■'fancy sketches," made by the mind to account for its experiences, than pure histories of what has occurred under the laws of suggestion. The "stuff" of which dreams are made is really meagre ; the tale woven ahout it by the imagination may be absurdly dispro- portionate. Such were the cases of the dreamer that explained to himself a straw between his toes with a dream about robbers who ended their assault by impaling him through the foot ; or of the man who in sleep was forced into a mask of ])itc!h which was then torn away with the skin of his lips— and all duo to his being tickled about those organs with a feather ; or of the asth- matic sleeper who projected his own distress for breath into the horse of the diligence that, in his dream, was carrying him over the Alps, and, having fallen down, lay panting and dying before his eyes. Thus, interesting arwl yet nonsensical i)ages of print may bo read off in sleep — ajiparently from a book, but really from meaningless dots in the retinal field of vision.' Now it is plain that we may speak of such work as this, either as belong- ing to memory, or to reproductive imagination, or to creative imagination; ' See tlic iirtidc by the author iu Miiid. New Scries, vol. i., p. 299 f. AS CREATIVE IN DREAMS AND INSANITY 413 accoiiling to our chosen point of view. But certainly the fancy of thousands ni dreamers nightly constructs tales quite as worthy of the title " creative," and quite as ingenious, as the greater number of the current novels. In this same connection may be mentioned the work done by the imagination of the insane ; for example, the case of the Russian Nihil^t, long imprisoned, for wliom his creaking slippers, as he paced his prison-cell, became " the haunt- ing voices of damned fiends." On a still lower plane, psychologically, stand those instances of reproduc- tive imagination where the members of the series are bound together into scarcely a semblance of dramatic unity. This is a form of development closely connected with that spontaneity of the image-making processes to wlTich attention has already been directed. Here, as in dreams, an increased rapidity of metamorphosis takes thei)lace of artistic combination. A certain creation takes place ; but chaos is the result rather than a dramatic unity. Thus Grinthuisen tells us how he once dreamed that he was riding a horse, when immediately the horse became a buck, the buck' became a calf, the calf a cat, the cat a beautiful maiden, and she, an old woman. The tree on which the cat climbed became a church, and this a garden ; the playing of -the organ in the church changed into the mewling of the cat and this into a song from the maiden, etc. Such " rout " of the imagination, or running riot of fancy, cjiaracterizes certain well-known forms of insanity. In some such cases, if the insane person is artistically inclined, or artistically trained, the product of the imagination may take on a vaguely suggestive and ex- ceedingly weird character. Such are the songs sung, the pictures drawn, the poems and speeches composed in madhouses. Nor have instances been wanting where ai\tists of alleged, or even of great real, merit have — espe- cially, perhaps, in their later compositions, when unchecked tendencies to idiosyncrasies of fancy had developed — gone " half-mad," as it were, in their works of art. Indeed, certain jjassages in the greatest dramatists and mu- sicians acquire the effect they have over our imagination by their suggestions of the author's fancy as having broken free from all laws of association, as well as all forms of reality. The capers of the clown, the carnival, the pan- tomime, etc., certainly do not excite what George Eliot has called " the ex- quisite laughter that comes from a gratification of the reasoning faculty ; " but they at least spring from, and appeal to, one genuine side of imagina- tive faculty ; they thus enable a good wit to " turn diseases to commodity." §4. Fortunately, however, most of the acti\'ity of human imagination more obviously bows to some form of the laws of association, as dependent upon iierception, memory, and thought. Thus, in some sort, by being less spontaneous and productive, the fancy is more tame and serviceable. Such is the imagination of the average, steady-going man in his waking life. Indeed, the character of its working determines, to a considerable extent, the difference between waking life and dream life. For, as we have already seen, imagination enters into all perception of things ; as we shall soon see, it largely constructs the world as known to science ; while the world in which all pure mathematics revels is its creature pai' excellence. But in all these cases imagination creates by reproducing under the limitations of memory as dependent upon past exj^erience, and of thought as directed by the unchanging forms of intellectual development. With the average 414 IMAGINATION man, in all matters, and with the highest sound imaginations in many matters, these limitations are narrowly drawn. They forbid the man of common-sense, for example, to imagine that water can burn ; as they are said to have forbidden the king of Siam to imagine that it could become solid enough for elephaj^s to walk ui^on. They forbid one to imagine that yonder object is a man, if one jjerceives it more than about six feet high and cannot account for the perception as illusory. They forbid some per- sons to imagine that a railroad train will ever run more than eighty miles an hour ; and others, who can imagine this, that we shall ever really cross the Atlantic in flying-machines. All of us feel bound not to keep trying to imagine the body A as passing from x to 1/ without touching successively every point along the line x y ; biit not bound to stop trying to imagine how atoms look and how luminiferous ether moves in the form of light- waves. It was the same kind of " common-sense " limitations of imagination which first led Mr. Spencer to posit the impossibility of "conceiving" of the Absolute ; and upon such limitations, in no small degree, are the celebrated cosmological antinomies of Kant based, in a wholly mistaken Avay. But the large amount of more truly creative imagination, hand in hand with thought, which modifies the development of the reproductive faculty of image-making, keej^s pushing these limitations aside and moving beyond them. Or rather, the imagination itself lifts up and places further away the limitations, as it transcends them by its creative acts. How this is done we must now proceed to consider. Genuine Productive or Creative Imagination, in the liig-lier meaning- of the words, involves much more than mere combi- nation into new forms of the factors and objects of past expe- riences. Conscious selective activity must be directed upon these factors and objects with a view to the realization of an ideal ; but in saying this, it is implied again that the high- est exercises of so - called imagination require a correspond- ing development of the allied faculties of perception, mem- ory, thought, and choice. Every ideal is itself a creation of the imagination (and herein the " newness " of the object is found) ; it may seem to spring from the first almost complete, as it were, into the consciousness ; but it is more likely to be the result of a growth, and its very comjilexity in unity is significant of an intelligent recognition given to the necessity of choice amoiu/ many factors and many objects of past experience. Creative ivuKjination is, then, cdways teleologlcal ; it is consiructive acconUnff to a plan. Such a complex mental performance involves (1) re- membered experience in the form of past presentations of sense and of self-consciousness ; (2) analysis, by discriminating con- sciousness, of these presentation-exi)eriences ; (3) desire to com- l)ino the factors, discovered by analysis, into new prodiicts — and this often accompanied by dissatisfaction with the imperfections of past presentations ; (4) some, at least dim, mental picture of a I LIMITS OF ITS PRODUCTIVITY 415 new unity to be effected by the combination, as its end (some semblance of an " ideal "—that is to say — held before the mind). The interests served by creative imaefination arc exceeding-ly various, as respects the character of its ideals, the amount of conscious attention given to selection of means, and the amount of feeling- involved, etc. They range all the way from a cook's construction of a new ragout or a new dressing- for salad to the activity of the astronomer Avho rounds out the solar sj'stem by inserting the as yet unseen planet, or who traverses the space beyond the remotest discoverable star to form a picture of the universe. Strictly speaking, it is only by x>roductive imagi- Vnation that we can complete at all the otherwise fragmentary ex- perience of sense and self-consciousness. By it one puts one's self the other side of the tree yonder, and so completes a jiicture of the object as having a far side as well as a near side. Only by it does one enter the arena of past histories, understand and enjoy biog-raphies, comprehend and sympathize with one's fellow-men. Thus the child learns to play his part upon life's stage by practising, in anticipation, Avith an almost limitless variety of imagined circumstances. Thus, too, does the artist enter into the very heart of nature and intuit the beauty and the meaning which utterly escape all scientific analysis. Or, like the musician who saw " all heaven opened and the great God sitting on his throne," the believer in the tenets of religion transcends, by use of this faculty, the bounds of memor}'^ and of syllogistic reasoning. ? 5. Detailed statements are scarcely needed respecting the question how far imagination can be truly " creative." Nor is it likely tliat snch statements can he scientifically made and defended. On the one hand, fixed lines cannot be drawn in definition of the limits within which new coml)iiiations can take ])lace. The limHs of the combinations i)ossil)le are very variously fixed — (1) by the ends sought through the act of imagina- tion ; (2) by the skill in analytic observation and synthetic power l)elong- ing to the individual ; and (3) by the insuperable laws, the ultimate forms of the development of all mental life. Thus the limitations set by the ends which the man of science or the inventor recognizes dififer greatly from those to which art subjects itself ; and each form of art acknowledges, at least in some indefinite fashion, its own jieculiar limitations (as respects material in which the idea of the imagination must be realized, method of procedure, etc.). Prose imaginative literature, for exam])le, recognizes some vague distinction between the novel and the I'omance ; the dilTerent forms of musical composition (oratorio, symphony, etc.,) observe other lim- itations. Again, it only needs saying to be credited that different individ- uals are differently limited in respect of this so-called creative faculty, according to the original constitution of their minds, their training, and 416 IMAGINATIOlSr their jiast experience. But in attempting to deal ■with all this ^ve are obliged to content ourselves with vague talk about those mysteries that lie back of, and beneath, the life of consciousness ; while, on the other hand, the history of human imagination is full of the most astonishing surprises, of facts of sudden and single displays of jiroductive energy that quite baffle all attempts at explanation from heredity, environment, and suggestion. Over all, however — serene and undisturbed, and eternal, as it were — preside the laws of mental development. For by this figure of speech we, in our ignorance, record the simple truth that space, time, and causation are forms of the activity of creative imagination, as well as of the most servile co2:)ying in memory, or of the most careful scientific devotion to the facts and laws of the real world. On the other hand, it is ordinarily said (and to this we have already, p. 410 f. given a qualified assent) that no " perfectly new " creation is possible for the most active imagination. " The greatest imaginative genius," says Sully,' " would strive in vain to picture a wholly new color." But here much depends on what we are to understand by " wholly new." For the number of new colors employed in manufacture and the arts (now as compared with those of ancient Greece) has become enormously increased ; nor do those who use their picturing faculty much in this way have great difficulty in constructing a fancy image of one of these colors when guided by the memory-images of other known colors. The process by which this is accom- plished may be described somewhat as follows : Take A and B and put them together in such and such proportions to imagine C ; or B is just about midway between A and G ; or B is a little "off" from A or C. But limits of the productive imagination, as respects the construction of new " shades," " tints," and " colors," are not even thus easy to fix. Probably many per- sons, if they had never seen orange, could easily imagine it, on being told that it may be produced by a mixture of red and yellow. But the author has never yet met with any one who could, previous to the experimental demon- stration, imagine what color (seal-brown) black with admixture of a little white and a little orange will produce. In all imagination of wholly new creations the mind taTces its point of starling from one or more memory-images ; and then, by j)rocesses of combina- tion or differentiation, it pictures the newly created object. But the different degrees of fusion and intimate association which the processes of ideation have already reached furnish all kinds and degrees of limitations for the imagination of the individual. Thus no color can bo imagined excejit as colored extension ; no degree of smoothness or roughness, except as smooth or rough surface, etc. I 6. It is customary to notice the dependence of imagination upon intel- lect, but the real truth of this i-elation has already been partially explained in a much more profound way. If by " intellect" we mean developed activ- ities of thought and reasoning, as connected Avith the use of language, then sncli faculty may properly bo said to be necessary to the development of the highest ])rodnctivo imagination. The i^rofounder truth is tliis : both thought and imagination develop out of, and in dependence ui)on, proc- esses of ideation co-ordinated with processes of primary intellection — or ' The Uuman Mind, I., p. 3C5. k DEPENDENCE UPON INTELLECT 417 tliscriminating, assimilating, and differentiating conscioiisness. Especially important, however, is the dependence of imagination on intellective preseu- tation-exiierience, on perception as an achievement of both image-making and thinking faculty. Such j^erception is as necessary to the man of imag- ination as to the man of science ; but difTerent aspects of the object are caught in the two cases, and the end sought in the new combination is also diti'erent. The imagination of th(^ inventor and of the artist mnst both be stimulated and fed by discriminating perception ; but in the case of a painter, his eye seizes ujton the form and coloring of perceived objects in such an analytic way, and so fixes it in memory, that it may serve as ma- terial for his art in the future. The same thing is true of the musician, whose perception is the most "interior" of all artists. Apropos of this it may be noted that certain Japanese kakemonos represent their old-time musicians as wandering, with their simple musical instruments, in the soli- tary places of nature to catch the various notes which she emits. And be- cause the musical art of this people never got beyond the lower imitative stage, it is confessedly inferior to that of European peoples ; for imagination does not lose, but rather gains, in intellectiial quality when it passes beyond the reproductive stage and constructs an ideal by fashioning over the ele- ments of a past perceptive experience. § 7. The origin of all great creations of imagination is necessarily more or less enveloped in mystery. Especially is this true when we see them manifesting a relative independence of the development of what we call the "thinking faculty." In reflecting upon certain phenomena of nat- ure, of the lower animals, and of the lesthetical j^roducts of human activity, one is led to refer much to the unconscious, or to so-galled instinctive as distinguished from intellective and voluntary activity. But psychology, as the description and explanation of the phenomena of human conscious- ness, can only recognize in silence the so-called unconscious creative imag- ination of nature. The theory of instinct, whether in man or in the lower animals, is not much clearer ; and, as has just been said, we are forced to admit that psychological science cannot wholly explain the origin of certain products of creative imagination. Certainly they, not infrequently, arise in such way as to give countenance to the word "divine ;" and this word is, psychologically considered, far more clear and intelligible than is the word unconscious. Hence we have no fault to find — except to say that, of course, such phrases are not scientific— with Mozart's father, who desig- nated as "a gift of God" the imagination of his son, when at first sight he played the grand organ, treading its pedals aright ; or with Kepler's claim that, in imagining the laws of motion he " read the thoughts of God" after Him. Scientific psvchology is warranted, however, in insisting upon the truth that, as a rule, the growth of the products of creative imagination under the laws of association of ideas, and of intellectual progress, can be definitely traced. This is true for the individual ; and it is also true for the race. Thus, if we are permitted to analyze the creations of the imagination (even those of the greatest genius), and are furnished with data for tracing the history of the author's mental development, we can largely explain the result in accordance with psychological laws. For the works of the great 27 \^ 418 IMAGINATION masters are understood in the liglit of their note-books, sketch-books, dia- ries, or thoir biographies, their acquaintance with the ■works of others, their natural environment, teachers, etc. Only in all such explanation we are finally brought, as we are by all our attempts at explanation, face to face with the unexplained. § 8. The dependence of imagination on feeling and will is also obvious. Even more sj^eedy, sure, and vivid are the stirrings of the aflfective accom- paniment for this form of faculty than for percei^tion or thought. To create well one must enter by feeling into the most interior life of that which one creates. This is true even of so-called cool scientific imagination. The astronomer, in observing or in calculating from data of observation, puts feeling as far as jjossible to one side. But in order really to imagine the enormous velocities of the immense masses through illimitable space, or the incalculable thermic energy of the central mass of the solar system, he must rise to the occasion on wings that take notice of their own flight. The in- fluence of this affective accompaniment is felt in the time-rate of the imagi- nation ; it is beneficially quickened or perturbed, according as the feeling is excessive antl inaj^propriate, or not. Conversely, it is by appeal to the imag- ination that feeling is aroused and guided. In fact, mere perception (if indeed we can speak in this connection of jierceiitiou without imagination) has comparatively little effect on feeling. Thus the author of ' ' Masks or Faces ? " has shown that most great actors, not only by imagination put themselves in the place of the characters they represent, but also actually feel the appropriate affective accompaniments of those characters.' In ordi- nary affairs also, sympathetic feeling and a sort of " imaginative contagion" go hand in hand ; individuals and groups of persons, when moving together for a common end, must be awakened and carried forward both on the side of emotion and on the side of imagination. But cultivation of will is also indispensably connected with the develop- ment of productive imagination. Indeed it is the relation to the volitions which mainly determines the difference between the so-called receptive and the creative exercise of imagination. In the more purely reproductive forms of this faculty we seem to ourselves to let our fancy " nin ; " our imaginings are left to " take care of themselves." In certain less purely reproductive activities — as, for exami^le, in listening to a jioem being read, or to a drama being acted — we are called upon to create for ourselves ; but we create as directed by the jjurposeful imaginings of another. In these cases even, it is left for us to decide whether we icill construct the meaning of the poem, or the setting of the drama, in this jmrticular way or in some other. Thus the higher forms of art are pre-eminently suggeatire ; they invite all be- holders to an act of imagination ; but they leave each beholder some choice as to what he will imagine. The secret of the beauty of the best Japanese art is that it appeals to the fancy in this way ; its weakness, however, is often apparent in the form of a certain excessive vagueness, a lack of intellect- ual vigor, and a tendency to excessive sentimentalism. In similar manner Wordsworth's "feelings," that lie so "doei^" and yet are excited by the "meanest flower that blows," are left to be rendered into almost anything of a definite sort that any reader may choose to imagine. This defect we express ' See a work by this title on tlie Psychology of Acting, by William Archer. I I DEl'KXDEXCE 0:S FIOKLING AND WILL 419 by saying "one does not know what to imagine." In the liigliest products of creative imagination, however, developed intellect and imagination both excite and guide the choice of an ideal, and of means carefully selected for its realization. The case of works of art is often presented as though lofty and pregnant imagination coukl be divorced from, or were even opposite to, the choices and stresses of volition and the conative onsets which we ascribe to will. But this is not so. In creative imagination of the highest order the man must will what he imagines, or no real creation takes j^lace. Gautier says of Balzac that he did not " copy " the two or three thousand types which play a more or less important role in his " hiiman comedy ; " he lived them ideally. " He wore their clothes, contracted their habits, moved in their surroundings, was themselves — during the necessary time." For the freedom of the artist, and of the appreciative beholder of the work of art, is not independent of his choice ; and this choice extends both to the factors and to their ideal mode of synthesis. I 9. But the work of creative imagination is by no means confined to gen- ius, or to artists, or to persons of marked talent in their line. What is called the "real world" of daily experience is far more largely, than is at first sup- posed, the construction of the productive image-making faculty. The ideal world which this faculty mingles with the daily life of the average man is an inexpressible solace to the soul. For without his dream of some kind no man could well bear to exist. Thus we read of a certain house-servant who had cherished an ardent but never-realized desire to become a soldier ; during the day the poor wretch cleaned boots, but by night he dreamed himself a major and in command of a regiment. In somewhat similar fashion children amuse themselves with play ; the lover enjoys the iM'esence of his absent mis- tress ; the mother fondly dwells over the virtues and iwospects of her far- away child ; or the business man sustains and stimulates himself with the prospects of what he shall gain and be when "his ship comes in." On the other hand, all manner of depressing, fearful, and corrupting superstitions are baleful fruits of the productive imagination. Under its influence the same child who has played merrily by day covers his head beneath the bedclothes by night, or sits shivering in the dark room to which he has been consigned for punishment. If we are to believe Bourget— and many in- stances support the conclusion— it is with youth especially that the " frenzied power of imagination turns to torture." But savage peoples generally, and the more ignorant in all countries, produce by diligent exercise of this faculty a world of weird and horrid shapes and events that gain easily the belief iu their reality which attaches itself to all objects of vivid constructive mental activity. And here the popular and the artistic uses of the imagination blend indistinguishably in their results ; for varied " folk-lore," ballads, fairy tales, and fables thus emerge and become parts of literature. With men, gener- ally, it is the creative imagination which adds so vastly to the significance of death — something far beyond that instinctive repulsion to the threat of dissolution which the higher of the animals are supposed to show. It is not this pleasure- and pain-giving work of productive imagination, however, which we have here chiefly in mind. The rather is it the extension of that profound truth which we have already seen illustrated in many ways ; perception itself involves idealization ; the percept is largely the creation of 420 IMAGINATIOlSr the image-making activity of mind. In saying this we do not reject the dis- tinction between what we know to be real and what we know to be the result merely of productive imagination. On the contrary, it is only by develop- ment of the imagination, under proper discipline, that the way is prepared for establishing such distinctions in a valid manner. As Gutlie said : " Im- agination is the preparatory school of thought." For the child, the savage, the half-tutored man, the total world in which he lives is a very mixed affair, created scarcely less by his fancy than by solid jDcrceptive and inferential knowledge. And for us all, however highly developed, the boundaries be- tween the real and the ideal, between what we can say we know on iiTe- proachable grounds of experience and what we imagine, are never irremovably fixed. The distinction of Kinds of Imag-ination is somewhat impor- tant for understanding- the psychology of this facility. For pro- ductive imagination has many ends to serve, and these ends must be served in somewhat markedly diflerent ways ; while the pur- pose of memory is substantially one throughout. The impor- tance of this consideration is enhanced also by the fact that, both in the scientific and in the popular estimate, the province of this form of mental function has been far too narrowly conceived. The kinds of imagination may be distinguished according to the subjects to which its productive activity is applied. Such a division, though made on indirect lines, is a real classification, because the real differences in the exercise of the faculty are so largely determined by differences in its subject-matter and its chosen end. Thus we derive (1) practical imagination ; (2) scien- tific imagination ; (3) artistic or festhetical imagination ; and (4) ethical and religious imagination. The foregoing distinctions in kind, although well founded, are relative and not mutually exclusive. For example, the im- agination of the inventor or the artist must partake of scientific quality ; nor can the discoverer of nature's wide-reaching laws dispense with mental activity resembling that which furnishes conditions for the highest art-work. Again, the sesthetical uses of imagination are most closely akin to the ethical and the re- ligious, as the history of art and religion would confirm the analysis of i^sychology in showing. Yet further, since both the practical and the ethical concern the one sphere of conduct, it is evident that th(^se two kinds are closely allied. In a word, the one creative human mind develops a variety of ideals that have respect to different forms of its interest and its activities, and by discriminating intelligence and selective attention, with choice, sets itself to the approximate realization of these ideal ends. Hence imagination is in some sort an undorhnng and unifying mental activity that overleaps those barriers of space AS DISTINGUISHED FROM FANCY 421 autl time wliicli reality respects, and thus binds the data of im- mediate experience into an ideal whole, in preparation for the supreme synthesis of the reasoning- faculty. And if intellect chastens imagination with reg-ard for fact and law, imagination outstrips intellect, since it is a pioneer and exciter of revolt ag-ainst what is merely " conformable to past experience ; " and with it the intellect cannot dispense. The ordinary distinction between Fancy and Imag-ination is fairly well taken ; but it introduces a subdivision which properly belong-s under the sesthetical imagination, and which is some- what vague, and at best only a matter of degrees. For these very reasons imagination is a much broader term than fancy. To apply the words "i)ractical" and "scientific" to the term fancy would seem to be inappropriate ; and it is only with some show of contempt that one would speak of the ethical and religious imag-ination as identical with a similar w'ork of fancy. But certain art-work, which is the construction of the imag-e-making faculty as related to the excitement of a3sthetical feeling — may properly be spoken of as belonging under the rubric — " the fanciful." With this understanding even, we should hesitate as to where to classify many a?sthetical compositions ; for they might equally well be spoken of as belonging to fancy or to imagination. But, in general, fancy is distinguished from imagination (1) by having less regard for the probable as de- termined by known facts and laws ; (2) by being less likely to be connected with practical interests other than that of mere amusement (fancy may be " tickled," imagination must be " awakened " and " fed ") ; (3) by being less bound by considera- tions of method in the attainment of its lower and more imme- diate end ; (4) and consequently, by being narrower in the range of subjects to which it can be applied ; (5) by serving more tem- porary issues, but tiring and disgusting if the attempt be made to render it an object of enduring or frequent intuition ; and (6) when successful, by ministering to a lower form of sesthetical feeling. ? 10. It is a truism to say that without jvactical imagination no occupation can successfully be carried on. By imagination the end to be attained, how- ever lowly and immediate, is held before the mind and thus the nature of the practice determined ; thus also are the separate transactions modified according to the relation which they are found to sustain as means to this end. For as Schiller says in his " Song of the Bell : " "It is just this whicli manhood graces, And 'tis for tliis his mind should stand, That in his hoart he ever traces What he coustructs with his own hand." 422 IMAGINATION The savage who shai^es to its more perfect iisds liis bow and qniver of arrows ; the boy who, on beginning geometry, takes chalk and string in hand with the purpose both to realize and to perfect his inchoate idea of a circle or an ellipse ; the mother who by anticipatory act of imagination for- tifies her courage and resists the oncoming pains of maternity ; or the patient who collapses at the bare sight of the dentist's easy-chair — all of us, in every deed of all our work-a-day living, illustrate the uses of the practical imagination. The entire world of experience is liable to be lived over in three different ways — once in imagination that jDrojects and anticipates as here and now present what is really yonder and in the future ; once in what we call actual and living experience, the immediate awareness of per- ception and self-consciousness ; and yet once more in memory. Those of the race, however unknown to history, who do the really fine and great things of a so-called practical kind, must have unusual endow- ment, good training, and active functioning of the productive imagination. Without this great practical enterprises cannot be jDlanned or carried to any measure of success. As a modern writer on this subject has truly said : •' Imagination is the creative origin of what is fine, not in art and song alone but also in all forms of action, in campaigns, civil triumphs, material con- quests." Certain men of genius, or of high order of talents in practical achievements may indeed be lacking in certain kinds of productive imagi- nation ; they may be relatively poor in strictly scientific, or a3sthetical, or ethical and religious imagination. But they cannot be lacking in that crea- tive activity of the representative faculty which sets before the mind ideals of what is new and larger than the measure of past experience. So they who plan great business enterprises, or political and military campaigns, as well as they who plan dramas and musical compositions, must have minds of large capacity for some kind of productive imagination. And perhaps as many have failed miserably in such manner of enterprises through lack of expansive faculty, as on account of excess in devising generous plans for the attainment of high ends, without sufficiently careful calculation respecting materials and means of realization. ^ 11. To listen to the claims of certain modern advocates of the triumphs of science, one would suppose that all which is covered by this title must be founded on the most exact and carefully limited perception, with an ex- tension only along strictly guarded lines of mathematical demonstration or reasoning, capable of being experimentally tested. But the truth is that what is called "science" is — all of it — very largely the work of constructive imagination ; scarcely less largely so than is the work of the aitist in words, or tones, or colors. Indeed, there are many artistic delineations of life (some of Shakespeare's plays, for example, or not a few modern novels) which wo may know, by a careful comparison, to be more nearly true rep- resentatives of reality than — in all probability — certain current scientific theories would prove to be, if only wo could ever kiwro how correctly the latter do represent reality. As Professor C. C. Everett has said : " The the- ory of evolution, whether it be true or false, is as truly a creation of the mind as the fables of iEsop, where the monkey and the fox talk together. The fable may be more fanciful, the theory may be more imaginative." Let what is called the "body" of any of the physical sciences be ex- THE SCIENTIFIC IMAGHSTATION 423 amined in detail wlu-n testing the statement just made. But, in the first place, let it be remembered that what is said to be observed is, in truth, very largely constructed by the imagination. No one accustomed to the use of the higher powers of the microscope can for a moment doubt this, as respects what is seen lander its lenses. Indeed, ichdt is seen depends, not so much upon the \n\Y6 sense-data as upon interi)retation — upon the reading into these data of the appropriate mental images. For example, in nerve-histol- ogy the cuts of the ordinary text-books picture imagined characters, the exact likeness of which no one can find in actual uorve-preiiarations. No one can find anything in i^articular in these preparations Avho is not him- self prepared by constructive imagination to i:)icture what he is to find. And the history of the growth of this science is full of illustrations of the truth that different observers noi infrequently do find what they imagine they shall find. What is true in high degree of this most difficult science of ob- servation is true— although in less degree — of all similar sciences. The de- mands made upon the mind by these sciences corresj^ond with the method of training which they furnish to the mind. As a recent writer has said of geology, it trains the mind in " the method by which theoretical order is made out of the interminable confusion and complexity of natural things." What is true of the observational basis of modern science is pre-eminently true of its theoretical development. For modern science is not more dis- tinguished for its widely extended and carefully guarded observation than for its subtile and stupendous theories. But every theory is the product, of necessity and by virtue of its very nature as theory, of the construc- tive imagination. It is a synthesis exijlanatory of facts hy reference to cin ideal principle. And what a marvellous complex equipment of entities and laws is that with which the devotee of the natural sciences finds himself pos- sessed whenever he resorts to this treasure-house of the i^icture-making faculty ! Here are beings and modes of behavior, not only unlike anything that comes within the sphere of perceptive reality, but even combining within themselves the idealized potencies of most contradictory real qual- ities. Such are the luminiferous ether, the electricity that is a physical entity, perchance, without having mass, the atoms that are too large to be imagined as mere points, and yet not large enough to be imagined in terms of sensuous imagination, whether of sight or touch. The changes which are ceaselessly going on in these beings, and which theoretically underlie and accoiint for all jihysical change, make the most exhausting demands upon constructive imagination, if we are to have any idea whatever as to what these beings are really about. Especially do biological and geological science, with their theory of evolution, require from this faculty an exercise, stretching through countless eras of time, and picturing processes in the wombs and brains of extinct animals, and in the capillary vessels of plants, etc., that no eye has ever seen or ever could have seen. And we refrain from speaking in this connection of those immeasurable " gaps " and " miss- ing links," and "sudden Icajis," and infinitesimally small " variations," on which imagination must draw ad lihifum, if any satisfactory theory of evolu- tion is to be set up and maintained. These large drafts upon the human faculty for making i)ictures of the ideal are not here spoken of with the intention to reproach modern 424 IMAGIlSrATION physical science for excessive imagination. Far from this ; but, on the con- traiy, our intention is to show that science, too, is artistic, and that her art is born of the same jiarentage with that of the poet and the dramatist. Only the important difference concerns the principles which regulate imagi- nation in the two cases, and the character of the ends which are to be served. It is, moreover, a significant fact in history that many of the most important discoveries in mathematics and the natural sciences have been due to the constructive imagination of poets and philosophers. But has not Mr. Tyudall ' himself declared that, when ' ' nourished by knowledge patiently won, and bounded and conditioned by operant reason, imagination becomes the mightiest instrument of the physical discoverer ? " ^ 12. It is universally acknowledged that artistic and sesthetical excel- lence depends upon the activity of creative imagination. The connection of such activity with the excitement of feeling has already been remarked ; it will be still better understood after our subsequent discussion of the nature and kinds of ajsthetical sentiments. Since the one end of all jesthetical imagination is to express and appeal to aesthetical feeling, the limitations of the different kinds of sesthetical imagination are set by differences in the means necessary to reach this end. Here, however, fancy, in its more un- governed and grotesque forms, may combine the results of past visualizings into new constructions that regard only the limitations of space-form, while quite overstepping all the boundaries of material reality. Such are the " castles in the air," or " the houses that crown the top of Jack's bean-stalk." In the realization of this work of imagination the more particular limitations are further determined by the character of the material employed ; this is also, of course, closely connected with the character of the end to be reached. By these forms of art not too complex ideas may be presented in pictorial form. " Pictures and statues are the books of the peojjle," said St. Augustine. In music notes of different timbre are combined in a rhythmic way by the constructive faculty. Here, however, the peculiarly "interior" qiiality of the material has a i^rofound effect upon the work of the creative imagination. The painter, architect, or sculptor can project his visualizings into objective space, as it were, and look upon them as something separable from the activity of his own which creates them. For this it is not necessary that he should wait until the mental images have been set on canvas, or into wood or marble. But the musician, while composing, hears only the harmonies he creates, and creates them only as he hears them reverberating within the concert-chamber of his own brain. Thus we read of Mozart that the airs he wrote or played imjiromptu were only a part of those which the divine faculty played for him to hear ; and that he could not well avoid listening to what was going on in his ears, or stop it sounding until it had been cast forth upon paper. All this corresponds exactly with the nature of the sen- sations and perceptions of sound. Further limitations are set to the imag- ination in music by the laws of consonance and dissonance. As to tlie growth of this form of aisthetical imagination the history of music is most instructive. Enlarged scope was given to this faculty when the discovery was made that two or more arias could bo simultaneously sung, if only their • The Scientific Use of the Imagination, p. 6. IN MUSIC AND POETRY 425 successive notes stood in certain relations, without a disagreeable effect from dissonance. But only when the modern harmony siicceeded counterpoint, was the wide world of musical glories opened before the creative imagination ; and with the increased number and power of the musical instruments at command the artist in tones is, of all others, most gloriously free. Yet there is no more affecting tribute to the incredible achievements of the masters of this form of constructive faculty than to compare the works of Beethoven or Haydn, as rendered by modern instrumentation, with the feeble sensuous result which must have been produced by the instruments on which these masters composed them. It was surely what imagination wrought, and not what the senses received, that carried the tokens of such grandeur ! It is in poetry, however, that the constructive imagination attains its lof- tiest exercise ; for here it is more completely joined with the higher intel- lectual processes of thinking, and it emi^loys language as the vehicle of ex- pression and means of appeal to other minds. Here, then, its creative work consists in combining conceptions into such pictorial forms as lend them- selves to intuition of their meaning with an accompaniment of appropri- ate sesthetical feeling. Thus in poetry the whole soul expresses itself, as it were, through the channels of constructive image-making faculty. On account of the nature of the material employed (conception and its embodi- ment in words), poetic creations must be more " thoughtful " than is the case with the other arts — j^ainting standing next in this regard, and music farthest away. Unless imagination is clarified by thought, its highest crea- tive work in poetry is impossible. As Joubert has said : " The true poet has a mind full of very clear images, while ours is only filled with confused descriptions." But all the unfathomable mystery of life may be clearly imaged by poetry, as well as its recognizable aspects and more undoubted teachings, with a fulness and variety more nearly corresjjonding to reality than is the case with other arts. Hence, with the proper limitations, it is not wholly improjper to say : " The imagination is in a si^ecial sense the poetic faculty." It belongs to a more special psychology to discuss the mental origin and significance of all those various forms of pictorial representation which poetry (and, indeed, in a more limited way, all the other arts) employs. But the connection of the work of constructive imagination with percei)tion should be again noticed here. It is not i^rimarily the association of ideas by similarity and contrast which accounts psychologically for tropes, similes, and the various figures of speech which poets employ ; it is rather primarily the activity of lively fancy or vivid imagination in connection with percep- tion. The determining experience is, for the poet this — that he sees and hears something more than, and different from, the ordinary observer in the presentations of sense and of self-consciousness. It is the idea as intuited in the perception rather than as suggested by another idea which he catches as others do not. It is the fundamental difference in his perceptive in- terests and experiences which furnishes him with his jjeculiar eqiiipment of associated ideas for the use of constructive imagination. In general, scsthet- ical imagination feeds upon what it finds, by inttiitiou of the ideal, as pres- ent in the concrete and individual experience — the presentation of sense or self-consciousness. 426 IMAGINATION ? 13. Finally, ethics and religion are quite impossible without a lofty and expansive use of imagination. It is requisite — as will be shown more clearly later on — to the exercise and development of conscience that some ideal of conduct and character should be framed. This is true of the very begin- nings of what is truly ethical, and of the lower grades of its development. Until the distinction is made, however dimly, between what is and that which ought to be, the sphere of ethics has not been experimentally entered upon. But "that which ought to be," as distinguished from that which only has been or is now, must be constructed by image-making faculty. And if we will reflect, we shall find that all conduct, as distinguished from mere action, implies the work of mentally constructing standards, ideals, and new combinations of means to be employed in the attainment of ends (what " I ought to do," or " ought to have done," under a given set of circumstances, in order to gain this, and to be that, etc.). The word " right," in its genuine ethical meaning, stands for some sort of an ideal ; and all ideals are the construc- tion of imagination, suffused with feeling and guided by reasoning faculty. If what has just been said is true for the very beginnings of ethical life, it is, of course, pre-eminently true for the men of genius or unusual talents in this line of life. It has been said that "imagination has impelled even the saints and the martyrs of humanity." Leaving out the word " even " and changing the word " impelled " (for it is feeling that impels), we may at once admit that moral heroism is impossible without the power to construct high moral ideals. Indeed, the man who seems to be a hero in the matter of courage, fidelity, or self-sacrifice, but who does the deed by habit merely, or by stress of will, without any mental picture of its significance as related to some ideal, is no real hero at all. It is as true of ethical as of sesthetical imagination that it is essentially an idealizing process. That the alleged entities and principles recognized by religious faith and worship are dependent upon constructive imagination no one will be found to deny. This is i3erhaps no more true, although more obvious, than the de- pendence of scientific theory upon the same faculty. In any intelligent use of words like "the Infinite," "the Absolute," or of terms designating the predicates and attribirtes and activities of Deity — such as his eternity, om- nipotence, unity, and even his wisdom and truth, etc. — the combined ener- gizing of imagination and thought, in a very high degree of the exercise of both these facilities, is necessarily implied. But the religious imagination is in many respects more closely allied with the aisthetical than with the scientific ; while, of course, its connection with ethical imagination is so close and important that it is in fact difficult to separate between the two. Ethical and religious imagination, however, is more nearly allied to the scientific than to the rosthetical, in at least one important respect ; it makes an appeal to observation and to inference, in the world of reality, for a sup- port to its ideal creations. This — as has already beeu said — is one reason why fancy, as distinguished from imagination, is tolerable and even pleas- ing in art ; but is not so in science, conduct, and religion. The Development (and cultivation) of Imag-ination is an im- portant ])art of psycliolopfical praxis. Its g-eneral rules, how- ever, follow pretty plainly from the laws of the reproductive DEVELOPMENT OF IMAGINATION" 427 activity as tliey have already been discussed. But since the cult- ure should always be special, all the most api)roi)riate maxims depend u^jon tlu^ conditions of the different kinds of imagina- tion. The scientitic imagination, as cultivated in a way special to its kind, will, of itself, scarcely be favorable to the development of the aisthetical or the ethico-relig-ious imagination. It will even need much tempering- in order to be most serviceable in so- called " practical life." On the other hand, a high order of les- thetical imag-ination is attainable with little or no ability to form an adequate conception of that world of atoms and forces and physical laws in which science revels. While that men who con- fess no difficulty in picturing- the nature and the behavior of lu- miniferous ether, and of other imag-inary physical entities, flhd themselves quite unable to imagine the entities of religion, there is no lack of examples to show. In fine, the very nature of imag- ination makes an " all-around " cultivation of it, to a high degTce of attainment, very difficult, if not impossible, to achieve. [In addition to the works already cited, end of Chapter XIII., compare the following : Addison : Spectator, Nos. 411-419. Leigh Hunt : Imagination and Fancy. Joly : L'lmag- ination. Maass : Versuch iiber d. Einbildungskraft. Frohschammor : Die Phantasie als (irnndprincip d. Welti)rocesses. Oclzelt-Newin : Uebcr Phanta'iie - Vor.^itellungen. Ra- bier : Lec'Ons de Philosophic, I., chaps, xvii., xviii. Fricdrich : Die Entstehnng d. Wahn- sinnes. Cohen : Die dichteri.sche Pliantasie. Schniidkunz : Analytisclie iind synthetische Phantasie. Lowenfeld : Physiognoniik nnd Alimik. Siebeck ; Das Wesen d. Ksthetischen Anschauung. Hecker : Die Physiologic und P.sychologie d. Lachens und d. Komischen. Du Prel : Psychologie der Lyrik.] k CHAPTER XIX. THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE On beg-innirig the discussions of the two following- chapters, it is desirable to distinguish the psychological from the logical point of view. Without unwarrantably disparaging- the science called " formal logic," it only accords with fact to say that most treatises which bear this title make upon the unprejudiced reader either the impression of being- commonplace or the impression of being- remote from, and even unfaithful to, any psychical real- ity. It is customary to answer objections arising- from the latter im^Dression by saying that logic deals with the universal laws, or abstract and contentless forms, of the intellect. This answer, however, only affords a partial justification. It is undoubtedly an advantag-e tb have the more obvious intellectual connections, which come to maintain themselves between the successive psy- choses in the stream of consciousness, stated in the form of ab- stract and universally valid formulas. At the same time, the too wide separation of log-ic during- these hundreds of years from its psychological basis has exercised an unfortunate influence upon the science ; and it is hard to show that it has any right to ex- istence as thus separated. From the time of its founding- by Aristotle until almost the present day, the so-called " science of thought" has undergone little or no development. But when it received its shaping at the hands of that great master it could not derive its full legitimate benefit from a knowledge of the actual phenomena of concrete mental life ; for no science of psychology (since Aristotle's De Anhna sustains no such relation to all sub- sequent treatises on the soul as his logic sustains to all subse- quent treatment of the laws of thought) existed at that time on which logic could base itself, or with which, as both sciences be- gan to develop, it could keep pace. From its very nature, how- ever, formal logic can never be anything but a subordinate branch of j)sycliology ; its sole jjrovince is to state — for pur- l)oses of convenience, it may be in symbolical manner — what are the forms which the psychoses assume, what are their implica- tions, and what are the laws of their sequence, as by activity of PSYCHOLOGY AND LOGIC 429 the relating faculty the development of knowledge goes on. But this is essentially what the psychology of thought and of reason- ing also attempts. And the fact that logic aims to make its con- clusions more indubitable, its statements of the general forms and laws of tlic intellect more universal, by al)stracting from all concrete content, is of relatively little importance. Among the most genuinely interesting questions concerning the phenomena of mind are such as follow : "What is the real nature of those mental processes for which both psychology and logic emjoloy the terms " conception," " judgment," " reasoning " (inductive and deductive) ? A\liat laws must these processes observe in order to contain the truth, and mentally represent, in a valid way, what we call reality? and. How may the sphere of I'noidedge, as distinguished from the regions of conjecture, opinion, and mere belief, be enlarged ? But the complete answer to these questions takes us beyond the bounds of the descriptive science of psychol- ogy, even if we include in it the subjects usualh* treated under formal logic and logical praxis. Indeed these questions suggest much that lies in that department of philosophj^ which we call Noetics, or theory of knowledge. Two differences, however, exist between the more distinc- tively logical and the more distinctively psychoh gical treatment of the processes and laws of thought. (1) Psychology treats, primarily, of the actual x>rocesses of mental life to which the names conception, judgment, reasoning, etc., apply. It regards this mental life as being what it actually is — a ceaseless succession of processes, a stream of conscious- ness in which different states and fields of consciousness follow each other without any possibility of pause. It is the nature of these processes and the actual forms of their sequence — the life of relating consciousness, which, like all mental life, moves on while it relates, and analyzes and synthesizes its own content as the successive "moments" of that content occur — which psychol- ogy tries to describe and explain. Logic, on the contrary, enacts the fiction of a so - called product of thought, which can, by abstraction, be considered as separable from the living process and as capable of thus being subjected to analysis in order to determine its nature. Thus logic treats concepts as products, differing in respect of "content" and "extent;" judgment and the syllogism, too, are regarded by this science as com- pleted resultants of operative faculty— psychical entities, as it were, which can be analyzed into formulated arrangements of the aforesaid concepts. And so we are told how judgments are " formed " by combining concepts ; and syllogisms and trains 430 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE of reasoning b}' combining- judgments. In all this tlie real truth which psychology emphasizes is too often overlooked or sup- pressed by logic. Concepts, j)udgiae)its, and trains of reasoning are themselves, in actuality, only established fovnis of the movenient of tnental life; and — to employ a suggestive figure of speech — it is the " morphology " ^ of intellectual growth which both logic and psychology aim to discover. (2) The treatment of thought-processes by psychology, as compared with logic, differs furthermore in that the former con- stantly considers these processes as related to all the other men- tal iDrocesses in the total development of mental life. But logic speaks of " pure " thought and its laws, etc. Now there is no 2)ure thought in reality ; and the attempt to work out a sci- ence of such thought, independently of actual concrete thought- experience, is less successful, b}' far, than is the attempt to form a i3ure science of geometrical form and of number. For example, we cannot begin to understand the concept without constant reference to the representative image ; or abstraction, without introducing the theory of attention ; or comparison, without im- plying a true psychological science of perception and memory. Without further reference to formal logic, and its successes or failures, from the point of view of psychological science, we may now define our purpose in the next two chapters as fol- lows : We are going to trace the development of that faculty which is called " the Intellect," or the faculty of thought. For, in the broader meaning of the word it is thought which consti- tutes the essence of intellect ; or rather, thinking is the distinc- tive function whose development conditions the formation and growth of intellectual faculty as such. But in doing this we shall build upon the basis already laid. Intellect proper — that mental functioning which is called conception, judgment, and reasoning — is a complex growth. It is dependent, like all faculty, in this sense of the word, upon other allied forms of mental life and upon their development. Its dependence upon the processes of ideation is especially close. Indeed, all develop- ment of thought really is conditioned iqxm — we might say without impropriety, consists in — the changes that lal'e place in the ideas and in the laws of their sequence, as the activity of ^^i^ifnary intel- lection becomes more dominant under the guidance of a choice of certain ends ofhioioledge to he reached. § 1. Since the devcloiiment of intellect proper, or the faculty of thought and reasoning, involves the preparatory growth, as it were, of all the element- > Thus BoBnnquct gives to his excellent work the title, Logic, or the Morphology of Knowl- edge. IMAGINATION AND THOUGHT 431 ury processes of mental life, a consideration of this develoi:)mcnt makes it necessary briefly to summarize our previous conclusions so far as they bear ui")on the topic. We have seen how, in the form of representative images, our past iirosentation-expcriencps are reproduced iu consciousness. "When thus reproduced they exhibit ditlerent degrees of intensity, life-likeness, and objective resemblance to the originals from which they are said to be derived. They also become related in various ways under the so-called laws of the association of ideas ; or they are spontaneously reproduced according to the occasions furnished by our psycho-physical condition, our mental mood, and the various characteristics of the ideation -processes, original or acquired by repetition, etc. All such spontaneous or associated reproduction, how- ever, is accompanied by certain intellectual activities which are the primary and indispensable conditions of mental development. The consciousness of resemblance and the consciousness of difference accompany the recurrence of like and unlike ideas. By processes which lie at the roots of intellectual life, and to which the name of " primary intellection" has been given, con- scious assimilation and differentiation, and inchoate acts of analysis and syn- tliesis take place. In all this, some at least rudimentary and primitive ac- tivity of judging is involved ; and the dawnings of a consciousness of time are not far removed. In all this, conative activity, as displayed in the focus- ing and redistribution of attention, is also present, and the various forms of feeling, the affective accompaniments of all intellectual life, constantly exert an influence over the intellectual development. When, then, we come to consider the case of adult and developed joerception, memory and imagi- nation, we find that thinking and reasoning have already- contributed to the formation of these faculties, in a very profound and coniprehensive way. It is by conscious comparing, relating, analyzing of the wholes given to the senses or to self-conscioiisness as objects, and by synthesis of the recognized elements of past experience into new combinations, that we learn — so to speak — to perceive, to remember, and to imagine. § 2. It is not strange, then (to recur to a subject already touched upon, p. 408 f.), that certain psychologists deny the j^ossibility of distinguishing be- tween imagination and thought. Thus one author ' holds that when the ideas owe to chance circumstances the conditions which control their coming into relations, we call the process " imagination ; " but when they owe these con- ditions to their own constitution, as fixing the terms of their association, we call the process "thinking." There is, therefore, no line to be drawn be- tween the two processes ; they merge into each other by imperceptible de- grees. So far as the foregoing statement involves the notion of ideas as entities influencing each other, we have already repeatedly rejected it. Ac- cording to Dr. Ward,''^ however, " for psychologists who do not cut the knot, . . . it is confessedly a hard matter to explain the relation of the two " (here siteaking of so-called sense and intellect). "Thinking may be broadly described as solving a problem — finding an A A' that is D. In so doing we start from a comparatively fixed central idea or intuition and work along the several diverging lines of ideas associated with it — hence far the ajitest, and, in fact, the oldest, description of thought is that it is discursive." Still 1 BallanfE : Die Elemente d. Psychologrie, p. 94. * Article Psychology, Encyc. Brit., p. 75. 432 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE another writer ' goes so far as to say — and not without warrant — that iJiinkiiif/ first begins at the point where the exploring movement of touch takes the place of planless reflex movement. The same writer holds that all the psy- chical processes become what they are only by thinking. In this way only does movement become voluntary movement, and sensation develop into mental presentation of an object, or into desire to attain an end. And the " stutT" (or problems) of thinking is no less than all those related elements of the psychic life to which attention directs itself. Once more, we are told - by another authority that " the first apprehension of a form, the primary re- lating of points and lines to one another, pi'esupposes the activity of intel- lect; since consciousness, supported by the movements of the bodily organ- ism, passes from point to point and connects them together," etc. Thinking is, then, one with consciousness in general ; and if we distinguish these at all, we distinguish them as a development and a result. " Becoming con- scious " (as we developed adults do) " is a process of thinking." In discussing- the Nature of Thinking- it must then be ad- mitted that the exact line where it emerg-es in distinctness from the other allied forms of mental life cannot be drawn with con- fidence. But, on the other hand, not to distinguish thought and reasoning- from perception and memory, as well as imagination, would be more indefensible, psychologically, than to attempt to draw the line too rigidly. In fact, the distinguishing- character- istics of thinking faculty — like those of all faculty — are the result of development. It is what we hecome capable of doing- through activity of so-called Intellect, which marks off this power of mind from the other cognate powers. And on this point, in ad- dition to what has already been said (p. 376 f.), we note the fol- lowing : (1) In thinking, the process of conscious Comparison is rela- tively developed and emphasized. In thinking, we " dwell upon " (and in thinking hard, we attentively " mind " or " pore over ") the likenesses and unlikenesses of the objects that occupy the fields of consciousness. Thus we say to ourselves or to one another, observe tko^ighffully, or remember thonghtfully ; we even exhort the too fanciful man to regulate his imagination by thought. Hence thought is relating, and intellect has several times been called by us the " relating faculty." The more we think the more we compare — A with B and both with C or D ; and thus, the more we bring out the consciousness of their re- semblances and differences in preparation to unite the like and separate off the unlike. Illustrations of this emphatic feature of all thought may be taken from acts, either of perception or of memory, or of constructive imagination. For example, let it be ' Ilonvicz : Psycholopische Analysen, il., p. 5 f. ■J George : Psychologie, pp. 2T0 f. aud 302 f. THE NATURE OF THINKING 433 supposed that oue is staudiiig- before a complex building', or holding- in the hand a new flower, and thoughtfully observing it. Then attentive comparison of part with part is going on ; and of this whole with other similar or dissimilar wholes. All such acts of comparison are expressible in judgments of comparison : " This cathedral is larger than the one at X\ is more purely Gothic ; has two or more steeples or towers ; is built of such material ; so many windows here ; mullions orna- mented so," etc. Or again: "This flower is blue, variegated with yelloAv ; stamens so many ; pistils so many ; leaves oblate ; name A ; class J"'' etc. So also in thoughtful memory one is comparing part with part of the memory-picture, and asking one's self : " Was the object or the event really like this pre- cisely, or somewhat unlike ? was the exact date of my seeing it, or of its occurrence, this or some other date ? " By em- phasizing conscious comparison we are said to " think out " the same result which, from another point of view, we ascribe to con- structive imagination. And as we think we ask ourselves, is this or that combination best adapted to the end desired — most con- formable to the accejDted rules of literary or musical compo- sition, etc. ? Nor is it only in such elaborate instances of " thoughtful " perception, " thoughtful " memor}', and " thought- ful " imagination that we convert the total state of conscious- ness into one of a distinctively intellectual order, by voluntarily emphasizing the act of comparison. Essentially the same thing happens in observing, planning, projecting, anticipating the most trifling matters whenever — as we so siguiticantly say — we have time and inclination to think. (2) Let us now examine what further takes place in all genu- ine thinking. The "condensation " of the results of comparison takes place. The changes in the processes of ideation already described as " freeing " of the ideas and " condensation " of sequent imag'es (p. 285 f.) are preparatory for similar changes in the process of thought ; and similar clianges are furthered by all thinking. Kepeated acts of attentive comparison of the like quality in difi'erent objects result in the immediate recognition of similar quality in newly perceived objects as the same — as the qualit}' which no longer excites discriminating consciousness to a separate act of comparison, as it were. An act of conscious Identification is now possible. Thus discrete individual experi- ences are apprehended as having something in common, when they are experienced in connection with other qualities, whether of X, or Y, or Z. Each concrete similar now becomes entitled to one name A {the so-called color, " red " or " blue ; " the exten- 28 /... ■. 484 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE sive motor activity of eye or liand, called "large" or "small;" the taste, called " sweet " or " sovir; " the sound, as of a " cornet," or of a " violin "). So also by repeated thoug-litful observa- tion (with comparison emphasized, and memory and imagina- tion called upon to yield their stores of like or unlike objects) any new object, similar to the known cathedral or the flower, may be identified as embodying- the condensed results of many intellectual acts. Each building or flower in sufficiently large measure similar, is then at once apprehended as the " now well- known " If (a cathedral), or N (a flower of a particular kind). The complexly similar is identified as the same — whether it be experienced in connection with the space- and time-relations of X, or of Y, or of Z. Thus the idea which we have of the quality A, or of the building M, or of the flower N, is still further " freed," or made abstract by the condensation of the thinking process upon it. When tlie individiiaUy similar hecomes the universally identical, it is, as it were, made ready for hmnediate application to all sufficiently similar objects of experience in time to come. Tb thought, every A, or M, or iV— however different to sense or to memory — is made part of one experience. This jirocess of obliterating all consideration of the particular mental existence of ideas, and of binding them together by judgments of compa- rison into forms capable of symbolic and secondary employment results in changing the merely representative image into the " conception " — the product, the sign, the convej^er, the starter, and the guide of thought. (3) With this emphasis upon the act of conscious compa- rison, and its resulting establishment of resemblances and diftcr- ences, another characteristic of thought is closely connected. The objects of our presentation-exjDerience thus become united under those relations of resemblance which attentive comparison has emphasized. Something similar happens, of course, with the ideas representative of the same presentation-experience. It is on this account that some authors have spoken of thinking as a new combination of presentations according to their " objec- tive " connection ; and others have spoken of it as " the uniting and separating of ideas solely according to the nature of their content." By thinking, what is numerous and discrete in ex- perience is organized into systematic relations. " Thought is the ordering of the manifold into a unity." Nor is the fact simply that, by thinking, the manifold and diverse materials get ordered and arranged into unities of one kind or anotlior ; but it is also true that we, in tlius ordering and arranging them, be- come conscious of the relations which bind them together into PARTIAL PROCESSES IN ALL THOUGHT 435 tlicsG unities. This is that hig-her synthetic act of intellect Avhich makes Generalization and Classification possible. (4) In order that the results of the activity of intellect in comparison, identification, and synthesis may bo conserved, and that the psychoses which it makes possible may be used for the preservation and extension of knowledg'e, some further concrete means of " storing-," as it were, these results is necessary. Such means, we have already seen, is found in certain concurrent modi- fications of motor consciousness — in the symbols of the unifyin.g activity itself. More particularly in the case of man it is the vjord, the modification of the org-ans of expression (vocal or tactile) which can appeal to ear or eye, and so serve the purpose demanded. The discussion of the nature of thought is, therefore, inseparably connected with the discussion of the office and de- velopment of languag-e. For Naming- and thinking- are closely correlated. In these four conscious activities — Comparison, Identification, Generalization, and Naming- — we find the entire essential nature of Thought. Whenever the stream of consciousness shows tokens of these activities we may speak of intellect proper as at work ; whatever conscious being has actually performed these activities has learned distinctively to think. I 3. The conditions of successful comparison, and the degrees of com- parison wliicli enter into all truly intellectual acts, are various. The con- ditions may be classed as either objective or subjective,' according as they are connected with the nature of the objects as presentations, or with the nature of the individual mind. This distinction, however — psychologically speaking — only considers the same processes in consciousness from two dif- ferent points of view. For example, a certain moderate intensity of any sensation or feeling, and a certain degree of vividness to any idea, is more favorable to comparison than a very high or very faint degree of intensity. But the subjective conditions of [n) attention, {h) i^rc-existing sensibility, either natural or acquired, and (c) mental preparation intlucing adjustment, have an influence upon all acts of comparison as respects the intensity of men- tal impressions comjiared. So that for certain persons, or in certain condi- tions of body and mind for all persons, the intellectual "arousement " may be such as to make the nicest discriminations possible with either unusually faint or unusually intense impressions. In studying the quality and quan- tity of sensations it was found what discriminations are possible, when thought has i)cnetrated sensation, when the conscious relating activity has been trained on a good natural basis to a high degree of discrimination (see chapters VII. and VIII. ) . Much depends also, of course, upon the particular features of any two complex objects which are selected for comparison, and upon the favorable » Comp. Sully : The Human Mind, 1., p. 399 f. 436 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE or unfavorable relation into which we are able to bring them for purposes of comparison. In reality no so-called " same " qualities of two objects can be said beforehand to be precisely the same ; they are only so nearly the same, so similar, that I do not distinguish the difference — perhajis because I cannot, or because I do not care to, or perhaps because it would defeat the purpose of my thinking if I discriminated too closely. But to another per- son what I consider the " same " may seem different, and so the result of his relating activity may express itself in a different judgment, in assigning the objects to another class, and in designating them by another name. Or, with another purpose in view, I may myself find the common features of the two objects no longer sufficiently similar to think them together as though they were the same. Furthermore, the indefinite complexity of all real ob- jects makes it possible to compare any two, as respects a number of similar features (quality, quantity, or complexity of sensation-content, extension in space, duration in time, origin, use, class, history of growth, etc.). In some cases (as in that of two lines having the same direction and lying side by side) proximity is favorable to comparison ; in other cases (as in that of the pitch of two notes of different timbre— violin and piano-forte in tuning, e.g. — or two weights lifted with two hands) succession is more favorable to exact comparison. Not infrequently, moreover, one quality suppresses an- other and makes its exact shading or its intensity difficult to distinguish ; such is the influence of the hue of any color on its apparent saturation, or the influence of the interval of tones upon their pitch. ^ 4. The various processes which logicians emphasize in their account of the formation of concepts and of the pronouncing of judgments have all been provided for in what was said above. For example (a) abstraciion is defined as the " withdrawal " of the attention, in an act of comparison, from some of the many elements, parts, or properties of a complex object, and its concen- tration iTpon the elements, parts, or properties made the subject of compari- son ; more frequently, but less properly, in logic, the term is employed in a figurative way to signify the " withdrawal" from the concrete whole of that element or property on which attention is concentrated, (i) Anahisis is the taking apart by thought - separation of that which is actually conjoined into a concrete whole. This term, then, regards the same act of comparison from a somewhat different point of view. Successive acts of abstraction are, however, necessary to the completion of analysis ; and analytic wandering of the attention is necessary to the completion of the act of abstraction. Ab- straction and analysis, taken together, signify that the object which is given as a relatively undiscriminated totality is by thinking activity to be organ- ized into the growing system of exiierience. (?) Geiieralizat!n)i. is a term em- jiloyed to denote that the modified idea which results from thinking has somehow become capable of being applied, with equal proi)i'iety, to a num- ber of sufficiently similar objects. It has acquired a certain generality of applicability. But inasmuch as all objects to which it may bo applied are in this way made capable of being regarded as falling " objectively " together into a class, the process of thus grasping them together in thought is called (d) claasijicafio)). Generalization and classification are plainly one essen- tially identical mental act regarded from two points of view ; and the word which emphasizes the " unifying" character of thought— the newly construe- THE STAGES OF THOUGHT 437 tive stage of intellectual development thus reached by the relating activity — is (e) st/)>thesis. This last terra is, o£ course, highly figurative. That it is not to be interpreted as indicating the existence of entities, either below con- sciousness or in consciousness, as fixed and separable products of mental life, which are then " put together " ah extra, as it were, has already been ex- plained repeatedly. But that thinking actually binds together the different elementary processes, with their objects, into higher and yet higher unities, there can be no doubt. (/) jVami?ig—a term taken from that form of sym- bol which is distinctive of human thinking — or "denomination," is the proc- ess which fixes and makes subject to recall for further use the results of both the comparative and the constructive aspect of intellectual life. It is customary to distinguish three kinds, or stag-es, in the process of thinking ; and these are called Conception, Judgment, and Reasoning. From a slightly different point of view it may be said that the relating activity results in three classes of prod- ucts — the conceist, the judgment, and the argument. But con- cerning "products" of thought, as distinguished from processes of thinking, and tendencies and habits resulting in processes, it has already been declared that scientific psychology cannot speak. Conception, judgment, and reasoning must then all be regarded as actual forms of jysychoses hi the fioimng stream of co)isciousness ; the rather do we designate by these words certain successions of psychoses which derive their characteristics from the nature of their sequence, and of the laws (orfxedfoi^nis) which are shown hy the states of consciousness in this sequence. These three kinds, or stages, are not, however, alike well fitted to reveal to us, on being examined, the essential nature of the thinking process itself ; for this purpose the process called judgment is far supe- rior to the other two. In the formation and expression of judg- ments the whole essence of the thinking process is involved. To think is to judge ; and to use language as the vehicle and expres- sion of thought is to iironounce — whether in one word, or in many words — a judgment. Conception and reasoning, so far as they are distinctive of intellectual faculty, are not essentially different from judgment ; but both are reducible to the activity of judg- ing. For to form a conception is to judge ; and to use or unfold a conception is also to judge. Without the actual process of judgment the so-called " concept," in distinction from the repre- sentative image, has no psychic existence ; the very word is it- self an abstraction which needs an actual process of imagination, accompanied by judgment and supported b}^ languag'e, in order to give to it any meaning at all. And reasoniiig (whether induc- tive or deductive, demonstrative as in mathematics, or probable as in economics) has its whole nature explained when we have 438 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE shown according- to what laws the different judg-ments, whose se- quence is the actual process of reasoning, follow each other in consciousness. A modern writer on logic ' has declared : " Judgment is co- extensive with affirmation and denial, or, which is the same thing, with truth and falsehood ; " and ag-ain : " Thus truth and falsehood are coextensive with judgment, and dei3end on the fact which is its primary condition ; the fact that a thing- may have an ideal relation to reality over and above its own particular existence, so that its existence, though in itself real and actual, is empty and valueless in the absence of the further reality that such a relation demands." The fuller estimate of this declaration cannot be made until the nature of knowledge has been considered as the hig-hest and most complex activity of mind, involving- the disciplined and experienced activity, in harmony, of all the various so-called faculties. But two remarks may fitly empha- size, in this connection, the relation of judgment to all think- ing, and of thinking to knowledge. (1) In all mature perce^jtion objective judgment is involved. Such judgment has been called "l^erceptive judgment " — the result of " minding " the particular object in its relation to other objects. Perception, therefore, af- firms, as the result of an intellectual process, the " objective ref- erence of an idea " as chai'acterizing some reality given in sense- perception, but through it related to other reality — to reality as a whole. My j^erceptive judgment ends in my affirming such or such a thing- as belonging to the world of my experience. (2) All so-called conceptions and reasonings have so much reality, and no more, as is possessed by the judgments which enter into them. Their entire truth or falsity is the truth of the affirma- tions or denials of the processes of judging- which thej'^ embody or call forth. As " pure " conceptions or " pure " reasoning-s they may be regarded apart from the perceptive jiidg-ments which formed them, but thus regarded they have no "truth" or " falsity " in any other than the logical meaning: of these terms. ^ 5. Our ordinary but most significant language clearly shows that wo identify thinking and judging as though the latter contained the essentials of the former. To ask, What do you think ahoxd this or that ? What do you think of him or her ? What do you think the object here, or yonder, to he ? — is the same thing as to evoke the judgment of another. Suppose that no doubt arises in the mind of either questioner or one questioned ; then the judgment made (proposition, or Satz) calls for no defence by way of alleging grounds. But if doubt arises, then the jiidgmont must pause until by infer- ence, or consideration of a series of related judgments, such doubt can be ' Bosanquet : Logic. I., p. 72 f. NATURE OF THE CONCEPT 439 removed. "Against any donht," it has been well said, "judgment main- tains itself as an inference." Td decide ui)on one's own " thonglits " is to settle npon certain judgments which one is ready to adopt as one's own and to defend against doubt. The same truth is further shown when it is considered that, in all cases of the comparison of two or more complex objects, whether with respect to cue or more qualities, the result of comparison presents itself as a problem to be solved by pronouncement of a judgment. For example : Do you think these two colors or tones, A and H, to be the same ; or do you think A brighter in color, or higher in pitch, than 5.'' Any thoughtful answer re- quires comparison, identification under the results of past experience, and a judgment. This has been called by Sully ' the " discriminative i)roblem," if the detection of difference is called for ; but the " assimilative problem," if one is required to select the similar in two objects. For our present pur- Ijoses such a distinction is unimportant. Thus the experimenter in psychol- ogy who gives to his reacting agent the problem to put one shade of gray exactly midway between two others, who solicits the child to distinguish blue and green, or who tries the ignorant savage to see whether he can count beyond the fingers upon his two hands, evokes a judgment. " Mind what you are about and think " — we say under such circumstances ; and then your judgment (or finished thoiight — your "mind" upon that problem) will be correct. When Hegel, somewhat perversely, declares that to affirm "a carriage is passing the house " is not a judgment unless there is a ques- tion, e. g., " whether it is a carriage or a cart," he bears witness to the truth we are illustrating. For in truth to hear either a carriage or a cart pass- ing outside involves the results of innumerable previous perceptive judg- ments, based upon complex acts of comparison ; it is itself (whether true or false, whether called in doubt or not) a perceptive judgment of a high degree of complexity. But if the question arises as to the meaning of this particular succession of sounds — "/s it a carter a carriage?" then inter- vening judgments must be called forth in consciousness that may serve as grounds on which to base a final affirmation (or judgment). In both these cases, and in all cases where we think as distinguished from merely having a suc- cession of images succeed each other that may &e regarded as severed from thought, judgment is the activity essential to our bringing the case under the thought- faculty. The true Nature of the Concept is now clear as seen in the light of what lias been said concerning- the complex mental proc- esses which construct it. Both Imagination and Intellect, with memory exercised in the selection of certain elements of the ob- jects of presentation to the exclusion of others, are necessary for those complex processes which result in what logic calls the for- mation of a concept. To use the more suggestive and vital lan- guage of psychology, the process of conception is a %inio7i of the re- productive function of consciofis7iess rvith the thinMng function — the essence of the latter heinxj the act of judging. The representative » The Human Mind, I., p. 404 £. 440 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE image is thus converted into a concept (the idea becomes gener- alized and takes on the characteristics of a so-called " general notion ") as the result of an activity of thinking the relations in which it stands to other mental images or objects of presenta- tion-experience. This " intellectualizing " of the idea is brought about by means of the judgments whose common subject the idea is. The effect of repeated acts of judging, all of which end in the identification of the similar as the same, and in the attribu- tion of a class-name to all concrete examples of this similar, is the conversion of the images into a concept. Or rather — since we wish to escape as much as possible from the logician's falla- cious way of regarding his terms as standing for products in- stead of living processes or movements of mental life — the de- velopment of thought reacts uj)on the reproductive activity ; the mental states lose their concrete and life-like resemblance to particular originals which they reproduce ; the consciousness of the more universal relations in which the particular ideas stand to each other becomes more prominent ; the mental synthesis, which every complex field of consciousness actually is, now becomes more determined by the character of these general rela- tions ; and, finally, the symbol of this result of accomplishing an intellectual combination — namely, the Word — stands as the one individual and concrete remainder of the multitude of visual, tactual, auditory, and other images. Every concept is declared by logic to be of " the general " or " the universal ; " and thus markedly to differ from the repre- sentative image which is confessedly concrete and individual. It would seem, then, that some mark of such universality must be found in the actual process of conception, if the declaration of logic be in any sense true to the facts of mental life. But how can a process in consciousness which is always some particular movement of imagination and thought in some one stream of conscious mental life merit a claim to universality^ ? For is it not always I, or you, or he, or some individual, avIio thinks, when the sequence of psychoses is strongly intellectual and conceptual, as truly as when this sequence is one of memories or of acts of pict- ure-making ? How, then, is my process of conception, psycholog- ically and concretely considered, any more " universal " than my process of remembering or thinking? As a preliminary answer it may be affirmed: The psychological universality of the process of conception consists in the consciousness that we are mcntiilly representing as "belonging together," as "really related," wlnit is given in sense and imagination as manifold; that we arc mentally representing as id(nitical what is experi- THE CLASSIFICATION OF CONCEPTS 441 enced in presentation as various, in respect of i^lace and time and other contents, without this variety being- itself brought into consciousness. Hence it has been claimed that the conscious- ness of an identical reaction upon different presentations of sense or of self-consciousness lies underneath, as it were, all processes of conception.' What has just been said of the difference between conception, as an intellectual process, and the merely reproductive character of the mental image, requires further elucidation. The process of conception may be concretely reg^arded from two points of view : (1) It may be regarded as ierminatbvj in the bestowal of a naiiie, which is said to fix the result of this intellectual synthesis when completed, and to render it i^ossible of easy and accurate recall. AVheu an act of comparison has resulted in the mental grasping together of two or more similars as the same (the in- tellectual activity of " identification " which brings into an ideal unity the manifold of sense), and a symbol has been attached to the new mental totality, the conception is completed. But (2) the process of conception may also be regarded as starting from the name, and then proceeding to realize itself in such sequent states of consciousness as result from an effort to think out the meaning of the name. Postponing the further discussion of the intimate relations between the process of conception and that thinking which gives meaning to words, we may for the present regard the two as identical. And, in general, we have no other way to call up for introspection the actual form of intellectiial life for which the term conception stands, than to think what the names of the objects conceived mean to us. We are forming a concept (or rather, performing an act of conception) when we are learning the meaning of any name — not, indeed, as a com- mitting of words to memory, but as an activity of ideating and judging consciousness combined. And when we attend to what in our conscious experience actually interprets any name, we find ourselves exercising the same activity' of ideation and judg- ment combined. The Classification of Concepts into Kinds depends upon the various jjossible modifications and combinations of the activities already described. In the use of various concepts, it is the amount of condensation which takes place that chiefly deter- mines the character of this use. In rapid and highh' developed thinking the "name-image " bears within itself all, of a concrete nature, which is necessary to the conceptual process. Thus the purpose which " the word " serves is similar to that served by the ' See Strumpell : Grnndriss d. Psychologic, p. 255 f . 442 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE X aud y of the luatliematiciau in the rapid handling of mathe- matical problems. A vague consciousness of ability, as it were, to stop and " think out " the meaning of the name, accompanies its use ; such consciousness may be described as " conceptual consciousness " — a ^melange resulting from the faint revival of the traces of repeated acts of comparison, identification, and generalization, together with the feelings of familiarity and of a tendency to ideate and to judge only in certain definite direc- tions. Indeed, in rapid thinking — where the so-called concep- tions follow each other in the stream of consciousness, borne along, as it were, by the succession of names — several words, or groups of words, may be summarized in one faint and sketchy act of conception. This resembles the grasp of the mathema- tician upon some familiar grouping of his symbols, e.g. {x' + "l.t'ij + y-), as one symbol. On the other hand, if any name be dwelt upon — with a view to think out its meaning completely (or "realize" it — i.e., convert the sj^mbol into an actual process of conception), we find ourselves engaged in that same complex activity of ideation and judgment, in which it has alread}' been declared that the very nature, pyschologically considered, of conception consists. I 6. Few subjects in psychology have been more discussed, and yet more unsatisfactorily treated than the nature of the concept. Three views have been historically distinguished: these are the "realist," the "nominalist," and the "conceptualist." But seldom or never do the advocates of any one of the three fail either curtly to admit from the rival theories certain claims injurious to the integrity of their own view ; or else to hold their own view in such shape as to contradict the plainest facts of experience.' The view of the realist, in so far as it is metaphysical and concerns the relation in which the psychic pi'ocess or act of conception stands to extra-mental reality, does not concern us here. But both realists and conceptualists, on the one hand, and nominalists on the other hand, habitually misrepresent the actual psy- chological state of the case. The same thing is true of much of the current argument as to the possibility or impossibility of abstract ideas. On this latter subject we find Berkeley, in his Introduction to " The Principles of Human Knowledge," maintaining: "I can imagine a' man with two heads, or the upper parts of a man joined to the body of a horse. I can consider the hand, the eye, the nose, each by itself abstracted or separated from the rest of the body ; but then whatever hand or eye I imagine, must have some particular sliape and colour. . . . But I deny that I can ab- stract from one another, or conceive separately, those qualities which it is im- ])ossibh> should exist so separated ; or that I can frame a general notion, by abstracting from ])articulars in the manner aforesaid." It has frequently been pointed out that elsewhere Berkeley, in a measure, contradicts the dec- ' For a brief Sketch of Theories as to the nature of the concept, sec Porter, The Human In- tellect, p. 403 ff. REALISM AND NOMINALISM 443 laration of the passage just quoteil, for be says: "A man may consider a rigure merely as triangular, without attending to the particular qualities of the angles or relations of the sides," etc. But surely a figure "merely as triangular " cannot possibly exist as " separated " from " particular qualities " of angles and sides. As to what can really be done in the way of thus idea- ting, we need only refer to the entire theory of ideation as already established. Now, the word "idea," as here employed by Berkeley, plainly stands for the result of an attempt to visualize, as directed by selective attention, certain l)ast experiences of visual in-esentations ; and this result we have found to vary greatly in respect to ^y«rts<-"abstractness," according to the sketchy or schematic character of the constructive activity of imagination thus employed. But this activity itself varies according also to the end held in view by the act of image-making. Ovw present question, it wall be remembered, concerns the effect upon "ideas" (in Berkeley's sense of the word) of those processes of thinking which end in the formation of a concept, with a name to fix it for future use. Again, John Stuart Mill,' in his excessive nominalism, claims that when- ever the name of a class is used intelligently, the mind must have before it some individual object either perceived or remembored. Instead of the term "abstract notion," or "concept," Mill would use the term dass-name. But surely every name, as such, is only so much sound ; and what psychology wishes to know is this : (1) What mental processes are those which make the use of class-names possible? and, further, (2) What mental jsrocesses are evoked by the use of class-names ? The answer to both these questions is one and the same ; it has been given in our previous descrii^tion of the com- plex i^rocess called conception. On the other hand, it is the fashion of the conceptualist to argue as though some actual state of consciousness were pos- sible, in which a notion, as a sort of statical product, devoid of all imme- diate influence from concrete processes of ideation, and at least logically sejiaralile from the act of naming, could be found. But when we search consciousness with the vivid light of introspection turned on, we do not find any such notion, or thought-product, actually existing there. g 7. The proper w-ay, therefore, to realize the time nature of conception is to notice what follows in consciousness upon the presentation of the name of a class. Thus let the experiment be tried by pronouncing a class-name be- fore a gi"0up of persons who are in an attitude of expectant attention as to some siich name, but do not know what iiarticular name to expect. It will be found that every successful attempt to " conceive" the meaning of such word, consists of a longer or shorter conscious series of more or less abstract images interspersed with judgments pronounced to one's self in language and " explicating " the meaning of the word. For example, let the word " lion " be the one selected for the experiment. Some hearers will immedi- ately visiialize the picture seen in a book in childhood, or revive the memoiy- image of the animal as seen in a menagerie ; or more slowly reconstruct the detailed images of shaggy mane, a lashing tail, a pair of glaring eyes set in a hairy animal countenance, etc. ; and simultaneously they will say to them- selves — "this is a lion," a " lion's mane," etc. Others will make more prominent in the process of conception that part which the proposition > Logic, B. I., ii. ; and Examination of Sir William Ilainiltou's Philosophy, chap. xvii. 444 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE expressed in language bears ; these will — with little or extremely schematic and vague ideation — exclaim inwardly: "An animal," "fierce" and •' strong ; " " it lives in Africa," or " in a jungle ; " "a quadruped," " a car- nivorous mammal of the genus Leo" etc. The process of sensuous ideation thus evoked by the class-name may vary all the way from that which the writer once heard described as an involuntary shudder running through the frame — a young woman's "idea of a lion" — to the completest visual scheme of the animal in the appropriate environment of forest or Jungle. The more distinctively judging activity evoked in the same way, may be alike variable iu completeness. And, indeed, in each individual response to any call for conception, the entire past experience of jjerception, memory, imagination, and thought, as embodied in a single word's import, may be involved. Nor will the result differ in principle, if the class-name selected for exjieriment correspond to some conception not capable of the same kind of realization — for example, the conception of "virtue," or of a "state," or of the "bino- mial theorem," or of the " Cartesian philosophy," or of Deity Himself. When, however, the demand to follow iu thought is made in such a way as to allow no time for the detailed conceptual process to develop it- self — as is the case iu all listening to speech, or in reading while talking to one's self — only a relatively small number of the symbols used have any marked individual influence on consciousness. The gross number of them, however, calls up a certain complex process which partially explicates them in the gross, as it were ; a great many of the individual symbols contribute little or nothing to the total result in conception, but only vaguely determine the affective " fringes " of the stream of consciousness ; and relatively few are either so dwelt upon in thought as to draw prolonged attention to them- selves, or are stored as mere symbols in memory to be recalled for future ap- plication. Great, indeed, and even marvellous, is the power of condensation which the word possesses ! It may be thoughtlessly spoken, but it is itself the epitome of all thought. "We call that complex mentality which it repre- sents in the past, and which it may evoke at any time in the future, by the term "conception." \ 8. The terms employed by logic to designate the different character- istics, potencies, and results of the process of conception, so far as they rep- resent anything psychologically real, all have their meaning explained by the foregoing remarks. Thus concepts are commonly said to be collections or syntheses of (a) " marks" or " attributes." That is to say, the thought- processes which end in the imparting of meaning to a name, have mov(Hl along the line of various properties belonging in common to many individual objects, and the mind has recognized that the name includes the synthesis, in all these objects, of these same properties. The properties are thus rec- ognized as mnrkhirf the concci)t. (/;) Concepts are also said to have " con- tent," or " intension," and "extension." By the former term we understand the number of marks grasped together in the synthesis ; by the latter, the number of objects to which we know, or surmise, that the class-name, with its concept, may properly be applied. Thus the intension or content of gera- nium is greater than that of i)lant ; for the concei)tion of it includes more of recognized marks. ]Jut the extension of geranium is less tlian that of plant; for there are fewer objects tn which the name geranium will upiily than (lie THE NATURE OF JUDGMENT 445 name islaiit. lutension and extension of concepts are often said to vary in- versely ; the more marks a concept embraces, the fewer objects fall under it, and the more objects a concept embraces, the more slender the knowledge wliich it conveys of any of these objects. But this is true only in a limited way, and when we allow of a selection and arrangement of marks with the de- sign to illustrate this very rule.' In fact, the number of objects belonging under any concept is, in most cases, unknown ; and the number of marks which may be, or should be, grasped together under any concept as its con- tent, and to which the same name may be given, is variable and subject to development, in the individual and in the race, (c) The potencies, or "powers," of a concept are ordinarily said to be three — Definition, which expounds the marks and so represents the nature or specific character of the concept ; Division, which enumerates the individuals or sub-classes included under it; Denomination, which affixes and interprets the verbal signs, so that they may be correctly applied. Into the details of all this, liowever, logic and grammar, rather than psychology, are interested to go. The Nature of Judgment is further understood when we con- sider how the process which is called conception, and which terminates when the name is, to some extent at least, " thought- fully ■" emj)lo3^ed, modifies subsequent thinking itself. It has been shown that the very essence of thinking is in judgment, and without judgment representative images cannot be convert- ed into conceptions. But those condensed results of thought- processes which the class-names represent, may themselves be further combined by higher forms of intellectual synthesis. The more primary activities of intellect become, as it were, points of departure and stepping-stones for the further elaboration, the more complex unification, of knowledge. Secondary or logical judgments are thus formed by the intellectual synthesis of con- ceptions. It was seen that, in the explication of the meaning of words, each individual passes a series of judgments which state the results of previous intellectual processes that have been operative upon material of presentation. Thus the conception which unfolds the name " lion " is for one person " a fierce and strong animal, living in African jungles ; " while for another, it is a " carnivorous mammal of the genus Leo'' But to think and say that a lion is an " animal " fierce and strong, or a " mammal " with the attribute " carnivorous," is to pronounce a complex judg- ment ; and each term in this judgment is itself entitled to be con- sidered as corresponding to a conception which, in turn, needs to be explicated in other judgments. While, then, it is true (as said in treating of primary intellec- tion) that judgment is involved in the earliest conscious discrim- » See this ancient etatement of inverse ratio between Extension and Intension, which is adopted by Jevons, criticised by Bosanquet, Logic, 1., p. 53 f. 446 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE iuation ; true also (as lias just been said) that judgment isneces- saiy both to complete and to explicate any conception ; it is also true that judgment (of this secondary and more elaborate char- acter) ma}' be a conscious synthesis of conceptions.^ Such judg- ment consists of a bringing into relations in consciousness of the condensed results of previous judgments already equipped with names. In order to understand this further development of thinking, we must now briefly consider (1) the Act of synthe- sis, and (2) the Forms of synthesis, in so-called " logical judg- ment." (1) In judgments like those which have just been cited, the proposition states no newly acquired knowledge. The explica- tion of the result of thinking, as condensed in the conception with its name, represents only that series of judg-ments which is already implicit in the same conception. Because I know, or have already judged, a lion to be an " animal," a " carnivorous mammal," etc., I unfold my conception by repeating these judg- ments. The synthesis which such judgments involve has there- fore pvevkmsly been established. But suppose the case where some largel}'^, or j^artially, ??e?/,' object is brought before the mind, whether in the form of a perception, or of an image of construc- tive imagination as guided by description (oral or written). There is then presented to the mind a problem which may be stated in the question, " What — is — it ? " (this X^. In answer to this question the demand is made for judgments that shall be statable in propositions, and shall end in a single judgment — namely, " It is ^," or " It is B^' a new conception with another name. The qualities of the new object, not simply as perceived, but as conceived or named, are thus mentally united in a new combination and a new name. The essence of the logical judg- ment is, therefore, a juncture accomplished hetween conceptions or '^condensed'''' resxdts of past acts of judgment rchich are already familiar to ^is and have previously heen fixed l>y names. The fact that the time occupied by any one field of conscious- ness is never infinitesimally small — that the real present is never a mathematical point, but is always an extension in time of a more or less manifold content of consciousness, is necessarily concerned in the process of judgment. Logical judgments, con- sidered as syntheses of so-called conceptions made in propo- sitional forms, could never take place if such were not the nature of our time-consciousness. Such judgments are certainly (they are even pre-eminently) time-occupying processes in the stream of 1 As payc Snlly (The nnman Mind, I., p. 434 f., note) : "The expression is one of great ambi- guity, and consequently not easily susceptible of exact deflnition." FORMS OF SYNTHESIS IN JUDGMENT 447 consciousness. Here the sequence of words in every proposition is representative of a sequence in the conscious processes them- selves. Both introspection and experiments in reaction-time (see p. 302 f.) demonstrate that this is so. If the " moment " rep- resented by the subject-conception coincided perfectly v/ith the " moment" represented by the predicate-conception, then there could be no judgment ; for judging- is a process in time. The proposition ^1 is B requires some separation in the conscious- ness of A and of // But if what is represented by A were passed entirely out of consciousness before what is represented by B appears in consciousness, then, too, there could be no judgment. For every judgment is a uniting process. Both the morphology of the conception and the morphology of the logi- cal judgment require us therefore to regard the corresponding- processes as mental growths. The growth of the logical judg- ment is, however, much less instantaneous, much more explicit, as it were, under the eye of the conscious subject. Figura- tively speaking, we may say that the synthesis of judgtnent is ac- complished hy a flow, in determinate direction, of the stream of con- sciousness, intelligently uniting two successive waves of this streunt so that they heJong together under the laws ivhich govern the ichole. (2) The forms of synthesis in logical judgment are limited by the number of those fundamental relations under which the terms of the judgment are capable of being synthesized. It be- longs to logic to classify the so-called " predicaments," and to philosophy to discuss the " categories," rather than to descrip- tive psychology. By simple inspection of the different states of intellectual consciousness, however, we may note the following : {a) Synthesis under terms of resemhlance or difference. In judgments of this class we unite or refuse to unite two concep- tions as embodied in language, because comparison shows to us either a sufficient or an insufficient amount of likeness. Some points of likeness must serve, however, as points of starting if we are to make serious work of any attempt, even to bring tAvo conceptions together into a judgment. To judge, for example, that " an asymptote is not in the key of A minor " would be to " play the fool " with intellect rather than to use it. But points of observed, or known, or conjectured likeness or unlikeness are constantly changing as the work of intellect gains in elaboration ; therefore judgments of this sort constantly change — and this, without necessarily implying change in knowledge of the truth, but only change in point of view or in the end to be served by judgment. Again, judgments respecting resemblance and differ- ence may have to do either with quality or quantity. In the 448 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE latter case what is affirmed is likeness or imlikeness of amount — Avhetlier expressed arithmetically in numbers or g-eometrically in respect of space-extension. Identity, as affirmed of qualities and objects, and equality, as affirmed of quantities — psychologi- cally considered — belong under this form of judgment. When it is said this quality (color red, pitch a |, feel of roughness, sentiment of kindness, or characteristic of a memory-image) is identical with the other, it is meant that the two are indistin- guishably alike. But when it is said this object (ball, man, star, etc.) is the same as that I remember to have perceived previous- ly, the judgment, besides affirming likeness, affirms also some- tliing metaphysical — a continuity of real existence, to which ref- erence must be made in other connections. (b) In certain judgments we synthesize conceptions under consciously recognized relations of time and space. For exam- ple, one event is declared to have followed another or to have preceded it ; or two events are judged simultaneously. Objects of sense-presentation, or their representative images, maj^ be united in acts of judgment under all the different relations which belong to extension in space. A is judged to be " be- low," " above," " inside of," " to the right " (or left) of B, etc. But in all such judgments there is involved not only a develoi3- ment of the conceptions of the events and objects thus related, as having temporal and spatial properties (enduring in time and extended in space) ; but also, of course, a development of time- consciousness and of space-consciousness by the same intellect- ual activities. Further light will therefore be thrown upon these judgments later on. (c) Very early in the development of intellectual life appears an important but much neglected form of judgment, which at- tributes action to an agent. When, in the consciousness of the infant, the proposition, " The milk is hot," expresses a true judgment as distinguished from a mere association of represen- tative images, it is this form which it assumes. Such a proposi- tion does not so much mean, " That-thiug-there-whose-name-is- milk has the quality of hotness," as " Tliat -milk-there burns (or will l)uru) me." In fact, from the very beginnings of intellect onward, the judgment — " This or that person or thing is doing this or that " (behaving in a certain way, or affecting somehow another i)orson or thing), may be said to be the predominating form of judgment. It is to this form that attention is attracted most strongly ; and around its truth or falsehood our interests cluster most thickly. This fact is the analogue, in the higher regions of mental life, of the fundamental psycho-physical fact JUDGMENTS OF PERCEPTION 440 that sensations of motion are relatively effective, even with low degrees of intensity (see p. 148 f.)- Out of this common root, in connection with the preceding forms, develop those judgments which may properly be called most " metaphysical " in their intent. Such are judgments of attribute affirmed or denied of a substance, judgments of cause and effect, and judgments of design adapted to an end. Even those judgments which are sometimes called " judgments of sub- ordination," and in which species is brought under genus, and parts under the whole (whether with the scientific end of classi- fication, or with the .lesthetical end of a pleasing proportion), are largely dependent upon the development of this form of think- ing. For every intellect knows itself as only active, as ever doing something, as ever effecting some change ; and every in- tellect is necessarily (not that of the child or savage more truly than that of the man of science or the philosopher) anthropo- morphic. The intellect can. understand the icorld only af> a system of related heings ivhich are ever—each one — doing something and having something done to them,. I 9. That judgment in this biglier and secondary form enters into all perception, as soon as we learn the nature and the names of things, is not difficult to prove. Suppose, for example, that one sees not the familiar lion, tiger, or ox, but (for the first time and without knowing its name) a jaguar or a yak. On "minding" the former attentively— that is, on bringing its various perceptible characteristics under various conceptions already ac- quired — one judges that it is like the tiger, but is not the tiger — at any rate, as already known. It is whitish on the under side of the belly, but not so extensively as the tiger ; it is of brownish-yellow above and striped faintly along the sides, but lacks the plainly marked black bars of the tiger and its bright orange-yellow ground. The results of such elaborate comparing ac- tivity may then be summed up in judgments answering the question, "A^Tiat-is-it?" For example : This striped-moving-thiug is an animal, is a quadruped ; it is carnivorous and belongs to the genus felis, etc. And, finally, this carnivorous, felino animal, with all these ob^•ious characteristics of coior and form, is named a " jaguar." Or, again, this other animal (the yak) is like, but is not, the ox, as already known. But it is a ruminant mam- mal of bovine tribe ; and its name (the word which will fix and hereafter hold the final synthesis of many judgments in a single judgment) is the "yak" or " grunting ox of Tartary." Now all three stages of judging ac- tivity are apt to be implied in such elaborate processes of perception, or series of perceptive processes as the foregoing, namely — the primary intel- lective acts of comparison, the acts explicating a little way, at least, the meaning of conceptions ali-eady formed, and the secondary judgments syn- thesizing old conceptions into new combinations. In such instances as the preceding, the perceiving intellect would undoiibtedly indicate and support its synthesizing activity by propositions like the following : The animal is 29 450 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE particolored ; it is striped on the sides and wliite beneatli ; it has carnivo- rous teeth and claws ; its general aspect is feline, etc. At once and by imme- diate percei^tion, we might say, this object is known as " animal ; " pres- ently, and with few and easy intervening judgments, it is known as colored, shaped, and striped, so and so ; still later, and as the result of more thought- ful inspection, it is known as carnivorous and feline, and as differing in cer- tain particulars from the tiger ; and, finally, it is known as that carnivorous- mammal, etc., called a " jaguar." Now it is plainly the j^resence of a large amount of this definite and namable (or, if one please, " talkable ") judg- ment that distinguishes such intellectual activity in the complex perception of new objects from the " intellection " that all discriminating consciousness, however meagre and vague, can claim to show. ^ 10. It is through such synthesis, by judgment, of conceptions already formed, into new conceptions, and then, of these into still higher and more complex forms, that scientific knowledge is gained. By judging, then, the bod}- of knowledge, both perceptive and inferential, undergoes a growth. In or- der more fully to understand this matter, however, we must subsequently discuss the nature of inference or reasoning, and the nature of knowledge. The analytic judgments which explicate the conception are understood to tell what we have already learned as true concerning the nature of the ob- jects to which the name of the class may be applied. But it is the synthesis of conceptions into new forms of combination by which knowledge grows. ^ 11. The meanings of the terms applied by logic to the different parts of the judgment, and to the kinds and potencies of judgments are all to be understood in the light of the foregoing remarks. (a) There are three terms in the proposition, and these are subject, pred- icate, and copula. The "subject" is the term for that conception from which the synthesis in judging takes its point of starting ; it is that of which the other conception is affirmed or denied. The "predicate" is the term for that conception which, following later in the stream of con- sciousness, is united by the synthesis of judgment with the subject. The "copula" is the term which signifies the act of synthesis itself.' In the actual use of language, as the expression and support of thought, and as well in the actual corresjjonding process of judging, the order of the terms is not fixed. In such cases of perceptive judgment as were mentioned above, it is the predicate, or property predicated, from which the repeated syntheses, for the most part, take their start. " What-is-it ?" — this animal which looks like a tiger, but is not. " Striped," is it ; •' carnivorous," is it ; "feline," is it ; and " jaguar" is its name ; such is the order, it is proba- ble, in which the successive conscious syntheses really occur. [b] The divisions, or kinds, of judgment may be determined either by the character of the relation established between the conceptions, or by the completeness (extension) with which wo intend that the conceptions shall be understood. Under the first principle of division w'e have judgments of "quality and com])arison," judgments of " quantity and proportion," judg- ments called "categorical," "hypothetical," and " disjunctive." Only the ' Says Bosanquet (Logic, I., p. S3) : " The copula, which in judgment is merely the reference that marks predication, and has no separate conteut, becomes in the proposition an isolated part of speech." THE KINDS OF JUDGMENT 451 last of these divisions needs a remark or two. A categorical judgment (^1 is />) is said to " affirm that one conception docs or does not belong to another ; " or "to affirm the predicate of the subject unconditionally;" or perhaps, better still, to " assert an actual fact absolutely." However we may choose to express the relation, it is plain that all "grounds" on which the judg- ment has been based, and all doubt over its modifying conditions are sui)posed to be left out of the proposition expressing the judgment. The hyi)othetical judgment (if ^4 is B, then C is IJ) implies, on the contrary, a distinct reference to grounds, or a doubt as to conditions, or as to validity of the alleged case, etc. (Hence the form of the hypothetical judgment may also be : If A is, B is ; or if A is B, then it is b.) But all reference to, or acquaintance with, the ground of our judgment is a matter of degrees ; and so is doubt and its expression. Hence attention has often been called to the fact that the real meaning of our judgments may frequently be stated in either the categorical or the hypothetical proposition. For examijle, sup- pose it has rained recently and the question arises, "Is the grass wet?" (and so, do I need rubbers, or not ?). Then the judgment uniformly oc- curring to the mind may be stated, either in the awkward way : * ' Grass rained-on is grass wet ; " or, " If this grass has been rained on, then this grass is wet." Both these judgments involve reference to " grounds " of inference and to an act of reasoning from them ; but one is categorical in form, and the other hypothetical. By affirmative and negative judgments alike tee recognize the true syn- thetical nature of all judgment. For by " negation " we do not mean the same mental jirocess as that called " affirmation of difference." The negative judgment signifies the settlement of a doubt by a positive affirmation — a synthesis of conceptions, as truly as does the so-called affirmative judgment. The synthesis brings A and B together under the relation of difference ; the negative proposition asserts the exclusion of B from A. As a writer of logic has truly said : " In fact. Negation is simply the logical conscious ex- l^ression of difference." "What logicians call the " extension " of the conceptions used in the diflferent judgments also may serve to classify the kinds of judgment. Hence the division into "Particular" (sometimes called "Singular") and " Universal ; " or as combined with the principle of affirmation and denial, the forms of judgment may be arranged as follows : All X is Y ; contradicted by Some X is not Y. No Xis Y ; " " Some X is F. [But for other details of these divisions reference must be made to treatises on logic] (c) By the " potencies " of judgments we mean what logicians have been accustomed to call " modality." This distinction has reference to the degree of certainty with which the judgment is made and maintained, " as being the mode, or measure, in which the mind holds it to be true." But like all questions of "degi-ee," this question cannot be answered in terms of precise formulas ; and, indeed, as a psychological inquiry it has rather to do with the manner in which different amounts of conviction, or belief, enter into the growth and structure of our entii'e system of knowledge so called. 452 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE g 12. The manner in which the time-e\em.ent of consciousness is related to the character of the judgment as a real act of synthesis, has been the subject of much debate. How— it is sometimes asked — can judgment take place, if the predicate-conception in the mental j^rocess must really follow the subject-conception, as the predicate term in the proposition certainly follows the subject-term? But how, on the other hand, it is also asked, can two conceptions co-exist in consciousness ; and if they did co-exist, how could they be kept apart so as to form a true judgment ? To these questions the only correct psychological answer emphasizes the undoubted fact that all judgment is itself a process — a peculiar character and ordering of the flow- ing stream of consciousness. This process is sometimes accomplished so rapidly that it resembles rather a sudden spring — a " leap to judgment." Sometimes, however, judgment takes place so slowly that we can discern the inner nature of that evolution of content, with its accompanying emphasis of assent, in which the process of judging consists. The "growth of con- tent," according to certain morphological laws, is characteristic of the nature of the process of judging. Suppose, for example, that one is reading a certain description of any complex object and deciding, or making up one's mind, as to what it is. The series of judgments in which this decision will ter- minate itself consists of changes from one content of consciousness to another, with a constant accompaniment of conscious emphasis laid upon the relations between these changing contents. One judges this animal called a " yak " in the book one is reading to be " ruminant," " bovine," etc., as the different particular conceptions awakened by the description are followed by the vaguer and more highly universalized conception for which these names are already the familiar terms. In general, then, we emphasize anew this conclusion : What logic calls " judgment " is nothing other than the process itself of judging. We continue to speak as (hough there existed some timeless mental 2)''od>ict to be called " a judgment," because we can repeat (he process (in however sketchy a manner, and by way of bare indication) through ■which our knowledge of objects orig- inated ; and in the process itself ice may distinguish the so-called conceptions that have fused in (he judgmen(, in order to observe their immediate subsequent fusion. For this process of judging, like all mental processes, is necessarily " in time." The Relation of Lang-uaq-e to Tliou^^lit fnrnislies a theme ^ which may be approached from several points of view ; promi- nent among- tliese are the philological, the philosophical, and the psycliolog-ical. It is, of course, the truth discovered from the last of those throe points of view which jirimarily concerns us here. The general dependence of both spoken and written languag-e upon the development of human faculty so called, and the important part which languag'e itself plays in this develop- ment, are beyond doubt. But languag-e is not the product of ' TliiK discussion is introduced here rather than after the third stajro of thinking — namely, rca- eonins— in order to bring it into closer relation with the formation and expression of conceptions or general notione. EPILATION OF LANGUAGE AND THOUGHT 453 any one faculty ; nor is it a divine g-ift or a discovery which appeals to one faculty alone. So far as its origin and develop- ment can be explained, they are dependent upon the combined and harmonious action and evolution of various forms of mental life. In tine, it is scarcely too much to say that human languag-e is the product of the entire manhood of man ; and that, con- versely, the assertion, preservation, and development of his human nature is largely involved in the use and growth of language. It is, however, the intellect with its function of thought which feels the need of language peculiarly, so to speak, and this in various ways, to which reference will be made later on. It has therefore been customary to narrow the discussion of the rela- tions between language and psychic life to the case of words and thoughts, considered as conceptions or " general notions." The psychological problem may then be stated in the following way : How far are general notions dependent upon words for their formation and expression ? Connected with this i^roblem are such subordinate inquiries as, Can any of the lower animals form general notions ? To what states of consciousness do the common symbols employed by certain of the animals corre- spond ? — and other similar inquiries. Such inquiries deal largely with matters of biology and comparative psychology ; thej' therefore take us over very uncertain ground. All investigation of the consciousness of the lower animals, of its points of resem- blance to, and difierence from, our own, must ahvays remain comparatively obscure. But especially with reference to such a question as the relation of thought to language, the uncertain- ties of comparative psychology are greatly increased by the dif- ficulty of answering the similar question on the ground of human psychology. And until some definite views are attained by the scientific psychology of man, there is only confusion instead of clearer light to be gained by arguing from the other animals to the case of man. Any inquiry into the general relation between thought and language depends, of course, upon the character of the phenom- ena to which we restrict our terms. Now the view already taken of the nature of thought compels us to recognize the important truth that language, as the vehicle of thought, must be favorably related both to the reproductive image-making part of thought, and also to that process of judgment, based upon comjoarison and ending in conception, which constitutes the more properly intellectual part of thought. The term " language " itself is, however, capable of a variety of meanings. By language may be understood any modification of the motor organism which is 454 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE adapted to serve as a "sign" or " symbol" of some correspond- ing- state of consciousness. But unless different states of con- sciousness, and the different objects perceived or remembered or imagined in them, were so similar in the different cases, not only of the same individual's psychic life, but also of different individuals of the same species, that their differences could be disregarded, it would not be possible to " signify " them by means of any commmi symbol. Similar moditications of the motor organism do, however, naturally go with similar states of consciousness; indeed, we have repeatedly found reason for supposing that processes of sensation, ideation, feeling, or in- tellection, cannot be realized without involving corresponding modifications of consciousness on the side of action, and of the motor organism. Language may then, in some sort, be said to be employed whenever the modifications of the motor organism evoked become of so fixed and general a character as to serve the i^urposes of recognition of similar past experiences — whether to the individual whose organism is moved, or to others. In man's case, for obvious reasons, such purposes are ordinarily served only through two of the senses — hearing and sight. Thus the customary "sign," or "symbol," makes an appeal for recognition to the ear, or to the eye, as something heard or seen. But for many of the animals such appeal, if made at all, is made chiefly or wholly to the sense of touch ; and this is eminently possible, though not convenient, in the case of man. Just as the transitions from the less to the more abstract ideas, and from the lower to the higher forms of thinking, are gradual and subjected to the laws of development, so is it with the transition from the foregoing use of language to that which is more peculiarly characteristic of human reason so called. Hence we discover certain stages of the evolution of both thought and language, in their intimate natural relation with different individuals and different races. But even if more com- plete data for tracing the history of the subject in every human soul and in the entire race of men were available, the same dif- ficulty would probably be fovmd in drawing exact lines of demar- cation. It may fairly be said, however, that in the iim'rower use of the term, language begins iclienever modijicat'ions of the motor organism become generally accepted (or " conventional ") as signs for the recognition of similar experiences (objects, or actions, or re- lations — whether of sense-perception or of self-consciousness) rt.s the same. But now the special relation of language to thought and its product — the so-called general notion — is at once ap- parent. As one peculiar excellence of man's mental evolution NO "faculty" of language 455 consists iu the extent (as respects both refinement and corapre- liensiveuess) to wliicli the thinking- processes are carried, so the peculiar corresjionding- excellence which makes lang-uage pos- sible for him consists iu the superior development of the vocal and auditory organs. In this system of vocal and auditory or- gans the central nervous apparatus connected Avitli the elaborate equipment of end-organs must, of course, be included. Man's language is pre-eminently one of words ; and " the word," pri- maril}^ is something spoken to be heard. But the limitations which time and sjDace set to the functions of hearing favor a sub- sequent appeal to the eye for recognition of that form of the sign and vehicle of thought which constitutes the w?iften or printed word. Since, however, the principal relations of spoken words to processes of conceptual judgment cover all the more important relations of language and thought, we shall confine ourselves to this aspect of the inquiry. I 13. Phrenology, pliilology, and psychology have wasted no little time in discussion of the " faculty of language." But modern cerebral physiology and experimental, as well as introspective, psychology make jilain the ab- surdity of even talking about the existence of such a faculty. The early observers ' of the jDhenomena of aphasia (or those disturbances of the func- tions employed in speaking or writing articulate language tliat are due to cerebral lesions) did indeed speak of " a faculty of speech ; " they attemjoted to localize this faculty in circumscribed areas of the cerebral convolutions. It is now known beyond dispute, however, tliat human speech involves, in a complicated and large way, a very considerable part, if not the whole, of the iiemispheres of the brain.' The four principal recognized types of aphasia — namely, (1) motor, or inability to utter sounds with meaning ; (2) agraphia, or inability to write signs that have meaning ; (3) word-deafness, or inabil- ity to appreciate the meaning of spoken words ; and (4) word-blindness, or inability to read signs, by the eye, that have meaning — doubtless involve specially localized forms of the general diiiiculty. But they all also involve impairments of the complex activities in particular directions of expression; as, for example, hearing worch, seeing rrords, moving the vocal organs to utter u-07-ds, etc. The importance of the integrity of the association-tracts between the so-called cerebral centers, and of the soundness of the whole brain, as connected with general intellectual functions, are further made apparent by the same scientific researches. The old phrenological view, which advocated a special " bump" of language corresponding to a fictitious " facility " of language, has thus been rendered completely untenable. What the physiology of the brain suggests, the study of the psychology of speech confirms. Those refinements of the iierceptions of the eye and ear, of which man alone is capable, are necessary to his use of written and ' For example, Broca : Snr le Siege de la Faculte du Langage articul^, etc. (18G1). ' Compare the author's Elements of Physiological Psychology, p. 291 If., and the works cited there ; also articles by Drs. Mills and Starr, Brain, 1S89. 456 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE spoken language. In the opinion of Lotze,' defects in these directions wouhi alone prevent the lower animals (for example, birds that can imitate some of our words) from developing speech : " (1st) Defective sense of hear- ing ; and (2d) want of an organically constituted harmony between the mental images of sound and the muscular movements that are requisite for the production of sounds." Man's superiority with respect to those sensa- tions and images of sensations which are necessary to the use of language, constitutes, then, a part of his faculty of language. But particularly would a lack of imagination and recognitive memory, in its higher form, be unfa- vorable to the origin and development of speech. It is, however, as has al- ready been indicated, the superiority of man's intellect, as judging and reason- ing faculty, which both requires language in the form of " movable types" and also makes it possible. All the principal forms of mental life on its sides of sensation, imagination, and intellection, are therefore concerned in the states of consciousness correlated with speech. ^ 14. The i^sychological origin of language is not to be found in our need to express the results of so-called abstract thinking alone. The rather is the more primary source of language, in the broader of its meanings, to be found in the affective consciousness. Here, in the realm of feeling, lie the springs of that necessity for, and tendency toward, expression which all the higher animals so f)lainly exhibit. In many of their i^articular forms of ex- pression the relation between feeling and its sign is immediate and organic. In this relation are fixed the roots of " natural language " so called. This will appear more clearly when we come to discuss the nature of the emo- tions. But, in general, that semi-chaotic surplus of cerebral excitement in which the physiological basis of feeling was held to consist naturally overflows, in man's case, in the various forms of vocalization. Thus it has been claimed that the point of starting for human speech is to be found in the greater impi'essibility of man in his wild state to all manner of sensa- tions with their strong affective accomiianiments (some of -which may be unknown to us).^ Man's easy and appropriate " gesture " under the influence of any strong feeling is to open his month and emit some correspondingly modulated sound. " Speaking is the instinct of man ; man builds speech, as the bird its nest." But such instinctive sound [Laid) is not as yet a "Word" {Wort). On the basis of such rich utterances of expressive sound as man's varied life of sensation, motion, and feeling- makes pos- sible, Lang-uag-o as the Vehicle of Thoug-ht is constructed. Here a mere reference to the real nature of tlie thoug-ht-processes will suffice to furnisli the key to a true explanation. The sound be- comes a word, the unorg-anized variety of natural vocal sj-mbols becomes a system of words — a languag-e — by modifications re- ceived through the activities of ideation and judgment. These are the activities, however, in which thought consists. The goal reached in this way is the formation and expression of so-called ' MicrocoBniTis, i., p. fiOO f. '■' Coiiip. Volkmauii : Lehrbiuh d. Psychologic, I., p. 332 f. DEVELOPMENT OF LANGUAGE 457 conceptions, or g-eneral notions. Thus arises the change from natural sounds to speech as the expression and vehicle of concep- tions. In all development of language the relation of the utterance to the image in its various stages ^ of abstraction is most im- portant. When the representative images of those experiences which have previoiisly excited expressive sounds recur in con- sciousness, their former emotional accompaniments are, of course, largely wanting. The sounds themselves — Avhen repro- duced as mental images of sounds — lose their former connection with the feelings that called them forth ; they thus become bet- ter adapted for the conveyance or translation, not of feelings in connection with presentations simply, but rather of ideas. And as the process of abstraction modifies the ideas, and they become " freed " from the concrete and vivid details of their more orig- inal character, the vocal symbols become, on their part, adapted to represent the changed character of the ideas. But speech as the correlate of genuine or conceptual thinking (the word as the support and vehicle of the general notion) is achieved only vjhen the sounds acquire recognition as conventional ''^ inovaMe types^ In achieving this not only a very close relation, but even a pretty strict interdependence, between conceptions and words, betw^een language and thought proper, must undoubtedly be rec- ognized. This mutual dependence, however, is itself due to the fact that, for the great majority of men, oral expression of con- ceptions has become the established form of svmbolism. For deaf-mutes, of course, some other established conventional forms of motor activity, which may act as movable types, are neces- sary. AVhat is necessary in all cases, for any considerable de- velopment of conceptual thinking, is the use of some form of motor activity wdiich may serve the purpose of a system of such movable types. In all cases where the intellectual processes issue in the for- mation of a genuine conception, it is the giving of a name which, on the one hand, so fixes for the individual using it the mental act of synthesis as to make its results capable of recall, and, on the other hand, serves as the means of awakening corresponding intellectual jirocesses in others. But this is the same thing as to say : the name is the support and the vehicle of the conceiytion. If we raise the question as to how the name thus operates, we can answer it psychologically only by rehearsing the same men- " Here etapres cannot be distinctly marked off so as to form classes of ideas. Striimpell, how- ever enumerates four grades of ideation: (1) Gesammtvorstellung ; (2) Allgemeinvorstellu7ierformanccs of many children surpass almost immeasurably anything that the most intelligent animals can do. For example, M. Taiue tells of an infant of eighteen months who had played hide and seek with her mother, calling out, " Coucou;" and who had also been told when her food was too hot, or the sun was very warm, or the candle too near, etc., " Qa b7'ule.'" On first seeing the setting sun suddenly disappear behind a hill, she cried out, " A Vide coj(cou." Here finished acts of conceptual thinking supported and expressed by language are indubitable. " That-which-burns " is one conception ; " that-which-suddenly-disappears," as one who calls out in playing hideand-seek, is another conception ; the two are ;ii)ited in a judgment applying to an entirely new and unexpected event. Yet more did the sage little boy of whom M. Perez tells, and who remarked of certain in- sects : " Generally " (iV. /?., the word) — " generally, but not always those ■ Mental Evolution in Animals : comp. Mental Evolution in Man, especially cliaps. iii.-is. DIFFERENCE IX LANGUAGES 459 insects light on the leaves," surpass in conception and thought, toto cwlo, the most wonderful performances of all tho animals.' g IG. The amount of thought proper implied in any particular word, or system of words, varies indetinitely with different individuals and races of men. Indeed, this is a matter which involves both inclination and ability. Lazarus - has acutely remarked upon the gi-eat difference of individual men, in their inclination to form genuine concepts ; and he declares of such a con- cept as that corresponding — for example — to the word " Bible," that while " the whole is thought as a kind of collective thought-content," it has "hovering" and " flitting "around it, as it were, a throng of vaguely ideated particulars. Experiment with groups of persons, having in view to bring out the different conscious processes evoked by the same word, shows re- markable differences in this regard (comp. p. 443 f.). It is matter of common observation that some persons are far more thoughtful than others in the use and appreciation of words ; still others excel in the vivid imaginative con- tent evoked and expressed by tho language they employ. The same differ- ences characterize races of men and stages in the development of language. Of Hebrew and the Shemitic languages generally, the qualities of seusuous- ness and concrete imaginativeness, as distinguished from conceptual excel- lence, may be affirmed. Hence the predominance of the verb and of verbal elements gives a pervasive vitality to all their sentences. Anger, for exam- jjle, is "hard-breathing," "tumult of boiling," "noise of breaking," "trem- bling," etc. The " substance " of anything is its " bone." As Renan says : " This primitive union of sensation and idea is always preserved." It has, furthermore, been jjointed out by students of language that races backward in intellectual development show a corresponding deficiency in general names. Thus among the North American Indians a term sufficiently general to denote a species like the oak-tree is seldom found ; and the Tasmanians are said to call the quality of "hardness,"' " like-a-stone," and a tall thing or man is declared to have " long-legs." On the contrary, the child, in using names already prepared for him by the development of the comm:inity often aijjslies the general term inappropriately to some object which needs a more particular denomination. Thus he may use the words " papa " or " mama " as names for the male or female sex, respectively. Essentially the same de- ficiency in the attainments of conceptual thinking and a correspondingly un- develoi^ed use of language are testified to in all such cases. For the culture of the relating activity generally requires both the noticing and marking, by names, of the more minute and comi^lex distinctions of objects, and also the grasping together under general notions, and their names, of larger and larger groups of objects. Here, again, reasoning, as the yet more highly elaborate form of thought, needs to be considered. This toijic follows pres- ently. I 17. "With most men at all times, and with all men frequently, words largely take the place of actual thought-processes. Thus the succession of symbols does something more than to aid thinking ; it becomes an almost or quite complete substitute for thinking. How this can be, has already been ' Comp. Prof. James's stories and Ms acute analysis of them. The Principles of Psychology, II., p. 349 f = Das Leben d. Seele. iii., p. 234. 460 THOUGHT AND LANGUAGE explained in treating of the fusion and condensation of tne processes of conception and judgment. It would doubtless be an exaggeration to affirm that the whole of any one's life may be condensed into a properly empha- sized word ; yet the exaggeration would carry with it a certain important truth. What one talks over with one's self, together with the way one says it to one's self, furnishes excellent indictee of the results of j^ast thinking- processes, with their habitual affective accompaniments. For the inner word is not mere talk ; the rather does it embody and convey to the talker himself the resultant of much previous combined activity of presentation, memory, imagination, conception, and will. Hence we find men using " pet" phrases that are indicative of judgments formed, and feelings felt, habitually and long ago. Moreover, the standard arrangements and collocations of words are determinative of the thoughts of the man who accepts and uses them. They represent results of previous conceptual thinking on the part of the race, structurally established and organically propagated, as it were. So that the individual who uses, for example, the classic Greek or the modern German or English language, is compelled, in some sort to "think up" to the language he uses. And yet, as for thinking his way into a thorough and intelligently appreciative use — this is what exceedingly few heirs to so rich an inheritance of racial conquests are capable of doing, or indeed make any effort to do. ^ 18. The difficult question as to how ".roots " originate is philological rather than i^sychological. It may be said, however, that the psycho-jahys- ical and intellectual equipment of man, is quite adequate to this work. That such sounds do originate in the bare effort to fix and communicate the re- sults of conception, experience abundantly proves. Why they are, individ- ually, just so shaped as they are — that is, the jiarticular psychological history of ttie origin of each word — can by no means always be given. Thxis a child of less than five years of age was heard to ask her mother : "Why do you spranhen your eyes so ? " This term appeared as a pure invention to desig- nate a peculiar complex movement of the organs of vision. In similar manner have many of the roots of the existing languages been invented. I 19. The relation of language to judgment needs no separate treatment from our present point of view ; for the gi'ammatical form of the judgment is not important in determining its j^sychological import as a synthesis of conceptions. Genuine judgments — especially those of perception — may in- deed be expressed in single words. Such grammatical " fusion " of subject, copula, and predicate, in one word, is psychologically significant. It indi- cates the truth, anew, that all thinking is essentially one in kind ; and that the process of judging is the essential process of that one kind. For ex- ample, if one of several jiersons all alike interested in the day's weather utter the word, ' ' Rain ! " then according to his intonation he will be understood as judging — " The rain is falling yonder ; " or "The rain will surely soon fall here ; " or " I fear it may probably or possibly rain," etc. The " leaj) " of the mind to judgment may be embodied and expressed in a single sound ; and not only so, but also the grounds on which, as a species of reasoning, this leap supports itself. [On Conception and Judgment consult : Ward : art. Psychology in Encyc. Brit. Ham- ilton : Metaphysics, lect. xxxiv. Taine : De rintelligence. Rabicr : Le(;^ons, etc., I., Psy- ' W0KK8 ON CONCEPTION AND JUDGMENT 4G1 chologie, p. o'J'.t f. Lipps : Gruntltatsjichen d. Soelenlebcns, chap. xx. George : Lehrbiicli d. I'sychologie, p. 4(i3 1:. Waitz : Lehrl)iicli d. Psychologic, SS •if^, -i'J- Lazarua : Loben d. yeele, iii., I (^JJi r 'I'uci). Volkinann : Lcliibuch d. Psycliologie, II., p. 'HI f. ; and various works on Logic of winch the following arc especially worthy of mention : Bosaiiqnet, the entire vol. I. Venn: Eniiiirical Logic, chaps, i.-x. Lotze : Logic, i., 1, and Microcosnius, Book v., i). Sigwait : Logik, §,^ 40-44 and 'i.o-'ib. Bradley: Principles of Logic, I. Ueber- weg : iSystem of Logic, i. ami iv. Trendelenburg: Logische Untersuchungen, S 15. Wundt : Logik, 1., ii. On the Relation of Language to Thought, see Whitney : Language and the Study of Language. Steinthal : Abriss d. yjjrachwissenschaft. Sayce : Intro- duction to the Science of Language. Fr. Midler : Grundriss d. Sprachwissenschaft. Prayer : The Mind of the Child. Perez : First Three Years of Childhood, pp. 2\Hi-2(A.] CHAPTEE XX. EEASONING That some sort of Inference, or Drawing of Conclusions from signs which serve as "reasons" for them, enters largely into experience, we have already found abundant occasion to know. Such an effect follows, as a matter of course, from the unity in essential characteristics of the various stages of the thought- processes. The statement is further verified by the facts of analysis — even as they are expressed in the language of daily life. In any case of perception where doubt arises, or even where the bare chance for " reasonable " doubt may be surmised, we stand ready to answer the question, " Why ? " or " On what grounds ? " But this fact distinctly shows that the perception itself involves a sort of reasoning process. For example, I sum up the results of a perfectly clear and completed act of sensuous presentation, in the affirmation : " I heard the fire-bell strike fifty-four just now." Such an affirmation ordinarily would not be called in question, but accepted as a matter of so-called " im- mediate knowledge." Suppose, however, that my conclusion from this perception is announced in the following terms : " There is a fire near the corner of A and B Streets." Then plainlj^ the question is most pertinent, if not even demanded : " How do you know that there is a fire in that place ? " To this question the answer, of course, would be : " By the list of fire-stations, which has the No. 54 opposite the words ' corner of A and B Sts.' " But here certainly is a case of reasoning ; since the tu\i judgments, " The fire-bell strikes 54," and " The striking of 54 by the fire- bell means fire near the corner of A and B Sts.," have contributed together to the third judgment : " There is now a fire near the corner," etc. Suppose, however, that we return to the original perception and, for some reason or other, call upon it to give an account of itself. This so-called information, " I heard the fire-bell strike fifty -four just now," itself results from a series of acts of perception which may reasonably be regarded as afi'ording the INFERENCE IN PERCEPTION 463 (/round for the concliuling' judg^mcnt. Of this " concluding- " {N.B. the significance of the word) judgment, such questions as foUow ma}'' be asked : How do you know that the sounds you just heard were those of the fire-bell (of a Jk'U at all, and of ihafire- bell in particular) ? and, How do you know that the number fifty- four, and not some other number, was struck ? To the first question the obvious answer is : Because I am already familiar with the intensity, timbre, and direction of sounds that have previously, on good grouiuh, been ascribed to the fire-bell as their cause ; now, these present sounds are like those ; therefore, etc. To the second question the obvious answer is : Because I counted the number of strokes, "five," then experienced a longer pause of the sounds, and then again counted the number of strokes, " four ; " and this series of sounds, nine in number, and so arranged as respects interval, I am already familiar with as " signifying " 54. But here again it is plain that both the main kinds of rea- soning — deduction and induction — are, in some sort, involved in the series of thoughts by which this concluding- judgment is reached. Indeed, any logician might draw out such an experi- ence into a very pretty exhibition of his pet syllogistic formulas. For example : All sounds which have the comjilex characteristics of intensity, timbre, direction, = {i + f + d), are sounds of the fire-bell {All S = {i + t + d) is F. B.). This particular case {C) of a series of sounds which I just heard had these complex characteristics {This {s^ . s' . s^ . s* . ff' s^ . s- . 6-'' . s*) is a case of repeated {i -b t + d) or S). Therefore this case is that of the fire-bell {C is F. B.). Such reasoning by deduction, however, involves an act of counting, and all counting is a sort of induc- tion by simple enumeration. Plainly, however, so clear and undoubted a perception as that of the striking of the fire-bell nine times would not ordinar- ily be considered a case of complex deductive and inductive reasoning. Plainly, too, the reason for the failure to recognize the original logical j)rocesses really involved in this act of per- ception is to be found in the speed and ease which previous experience has imparted to them. Here again, then, is an ex- ample of essentially the same kind of fusion and condensation of the results of past thinking as that A\-ith which the doctrine of conception and judgment has already made us familiar. But what is necessar}'^ in order to distinguish genuine logical reason- ing from such so-called " instinctive " or " imconscious " rea- soning ? It is chiefly necessary that the intellect should, as it were, become conscious of itself. The thinking subject reaches genuine logical inference lahenever tivo Judgments are related in such 464 REASONING 'maimer that one is made the ''reason'' or "ground'' of the other, lo'dh a consciousness of the 7'elation thus estahUshed between them. \ 1. How the presence of question or doubt emphasizes the fact that rea- soning enters into our jjerception by the senses, may be illustrated by innu- merable experiences. It appeared in the j^revious chapter that the affirma- tion, "I hear a carriage," does really express a judgment of perception, even if there be no question as to whether it may not be a cart rather than a car- riage which I hear (see p. 439). It may now be said that, in case of such question or doubt arising, the judgment which solves the doubt or answers the question, is capable of being regarded as a conclusion based on grounds. The same mental attitude occurs whenever we jjaiise, as it were, in the i^res- ence of any series of sensation-comi^lexes and "make up our mind "as to what is the meaning of it all. For example : Is this noise the ticking of the watch under my pillow, or the click of my heart-valves ; is it the sing- ing of a cricket on the window-sill, or the ringing produced by cerebral excitement in my ears? Indeed, in all cases of the perception of unfamiliar I objects, the activity which prepares for the final synthesis of naming, is a conclu- sion reached by reasoning. Thus the natives of the Pacific Islands reasoned their way to the conclusion that the goats which Captain Cook brought to them were "horned hogs ; " and that the horse was a " large dog." As such they perceived them. Thus, too, every student of the varied forms of plant and animal life carries about with him, in his perceptive brain and mind, as it were, a system of well-reasoned conclusions, condensed into familiar names of species, genera, etc. Whenever he perceives any new and un- familiar sort of plant or animal, by a series of intellectual processes involv- ing more or less of genuine ratiocination, he ' ' concludes " them under some already established sjiecies, or under another species which he has the honor of being first to name. > Not only in perception, but also in memory, do we reason ourselves ' into the clearness of reproductive ideation, and into the accompanying con- viction that recognition brings. Here, too, numberless questionings and doubts arise — either as between the memories of different persons or in the mind of the individual, as to which one of several complex representative images shall receive the seal of conviction. Was it yesterday, or the day before, on which we met A ; and was it at the place X,ov at the place V, that we met him ? All such questions of correct recognitive memory require an ap- peal to thought in the form of more or less elabm'ate ratiocination. Nothing is, indeed, more familiar than the effect of supporting memory by an appeal to other memory as its ground. But where such an appeal is consciously made, it involves processes of genuine logical thinking that proceed from premises to conclusion. And by condensation of these processes the con- clusions of similar jmst processes enter into what appears under the guise of our most immediate knowledge. Nor is the same use of elaborate argument wholly lacking in supf)ort of the work of constructive imagination. " When I have saved enough money, then and therefore shall I buy me a new gown and take great pleasure therein," — reasoned the imaginative milk- maid. The highest flight of the most purely "creative" artistic imagina- tion requires for its success that it shall alight frequently upon the stepping- AMONG THE LOWER ANIMALS 465 stones of a " therefore" or a "because." Indeed, it is characteristic of the highest forms of imagination that they are, in some large degree, distinctly reasonable; whilo the chief office of scienlitic and philosophic imagination is to devise grounds and middle terms, in order that the " leap " to hypothe- sis may not be beyond the realm of the provable. In this connection Ave may refer to Schopenhauer's view, that the syllogism is chiefly /e//. I 2. Nevertheless, the character of that kind of reasoning which stands in the same relation to our more purely perceptive experience as that in which our logical judgment stands to the same experience, is itself distinctly logi- cal. As such judgment involves a conscious synthesis, or bringing into re- ( lation of conceptions (themselves the embodied and named resultants of other more primary intellectual processes) ; so does genuine logical reasoningj involve the conscious establishment of a recognized relation between log iced judg* ments. Thus, in order to reason, in the higher meaning of the word, I must be aware that my concluding judgment "depends on " other judgment as its reason or ground. Hence all reasoning implies a development of self- 1 conscious mental life — all around, as it were. The foregoing distinction throws needed light upon the question as to how far the lower animals are capable of acts of genuine reasoning. There can be no doubt that many of their performances simulate highly elabo- rate forms of ratiocination. But even the mechanism of the insectivorous orchids, or the spinal cord of a decapitated frog does this ; and the world of the lower forms of life, of the infusoria, etc., is full of specious acts of rea- soning.' Indeed, the entire field of animal instinct and of human tact is extremely difficult to mark off from that which gives obvious tokens of in- tellectual processes resembling those of perceptive inference. Many of the more intelligent animals, within limits not easy to assign, shrewdly vary the means at their disposal in adaptation to ends that seem to offer new problems for solution. These animals are plainly capable of recognitive perception and of intelligent expectation of results that the human intellect would infer as sure to follow from familiar causes. It is true, as Leibnitz says, that " in a new juncture which appears similar to the preceding, they ex- pect anew what they found conjoined with it before, as if things were linked together in fact because their images are in memory." But this is the very thing, as Leibnitz himself goes on to say, which reason itself counsels men to do. It is the shock of surprise at being disappointed in expectation which awakens both man and brute to a process of inquiry and of reasoning. Whether, however, even the most intelligent of the lower animals ever reasons — in the meaning of drawing a conclusion from grounds with a consciousness of the nature of this peculiar connection thus established by the relating activity — is quite another question. For example, and to imt the case concretely : Does the learned dog which, when it wishes to induce its master to go out for a walk, brings the umbrella, if it is raining, but brings the cane if it is fair, have in the* stream of its consciousness any ex- perience coiTesponding to this language: "The i;mbrella is the proper thing because it is raining ; " or, "since it is fair, therefore only the cane will be needed?" We shall perhaps never be able to answer such questions as the foregoing ' SeeBinet: The Psychic Life of Micro-o- ganisms.- 30 '?" r 466 REASONING with a comi^lete confidence. But a negative answer seems mucli tlie more probable, so far as any answer at all is justifiable. For conceptual thinking and its correlated develoi^ment of language are necessary for the processes of logical inference ; and these appear to be quite beyond the intellect of the lower animals. Here, to multiply instances of the most wonderful in- telligence only increases our scejiticism. For examj^le, the spider of which Mr. Romanes, borrowing the instance from Mr. Larkin, tells us,' and which employed an ingenious and elaborate system of guy-rojies and haulings to raise a fly that was too heavy for a dead-lift, acted like an intelligent human being well versed in mechanical engineering. But to believe that the spider icent tlirougli conscious 'processes like those of a mechanical engineer in solving a similar problem, taxes our credulity quite too severely. In general, be- yond a certain limit, the more the deed seems to require of genuine logical inference, the less inclined we are to admit that there is really any sucli in- ference. Tlie trouble, for the cautious psychologist, with the most startling instances of reasoning on the jiart of the lower animals, is that they prove altogether too much (if anything to the point) to be trusted at all. § 3. The next important consideration bearing on the psychology of reasoning may be introduced by citing from several authors. One writer ^ affirms that every conclusion is, psychologically considei'ed, a judgment which takes place " through a mean," united with "a consciousness of this mediation." Hence the concluding judgment necessarily falls into two di- visions ; for sometimes the concluding proposition is developed only by op- position, although in such a way as to show that it was mentally accepted before the premises for it were sought. Another writer^ regards " the con- clusion " as the result of a delayed (or, for a time, inhibited) fusion of two judgments. The psychological reason why the judgments do not fuse at once is this : the middle conception which appears in the two premises can be, logically, only a single conception (otherwise the conclusion woiild l)e incorrect) ; but the total psychical picture in one of the premises is different from that in the other premise. A delay is therefore necessary until the con- sciousness of that "oneness," which is in "the two," can be developed. For example, suppose the conclusion to be reached is in answer to the prob- lem, whether the crocodile is a mammal or not. But I now learn that the crocodile is "a cold-blooded animal," and I also remember that all mam- mals are " warm-blooded animals ; " the conclusion therefore follows, that the crocodile is not a mammal. [The principle is the same, although the con- clusion is in this case negative. One psychical picture is that of " warm- blooded mammal," the other is that of " not-warm-blooded crocodile ; " and the middle conception is "warm-blooded." Now the fusion of the two judgments, delayed at first in order that inspection of the common contents of the two may take place, ends in a permanent inhibition of the fusion of the conceptions crocodile and mammal.] Again, still a third author^ de- ' Mental EvoluHon in Man, p. C2 ; and comp. Science, No. 58. " Volkmann, Li-hrbuch d. Psychologic, II.. p 2S9. Volkmann not only affirms that the tMhiimcnw is the natural and ordiuarj' form of conclusion ; but th.it, however logic may prefer the "flrst flv'iire." thinking bft to itself naturally takes the logically horrible " fourth figure " as its accustomed form. 3 Ballauf, Klcmentc d. Psychologic, p. 135. * Bluet, Psychologie du liuisouucmeut, pp. 136 f., 141 f. AS CONSCIOUSNESS OF llELATION 467 dares that " to reason is to establish new associations after tlie pattern of associations ah'oady made ; " or, more completely : " Reasoning is the establisliniont of an association between two states of consciousness, by means of an intermediate state of consciousness which resembles the first state, which is associated with the second, and which, on fusing with the first, associates it with the second." In the line of the last remark is the declaration of Boole, that "reasoning is the elimination of the middle term, in a system that has three terms." The essential truth of all the foregoing ways of viewing the nature of the process of logical inference, is better stated in the terms we have already employed. But there is one essential point which these authors emphasize, that has thus far been only imiilied in our discussion. The question now arises, if all logical conclusion involves tlie relating- of judgments loith a consciousness of their relation, and if the essence of this relation is such that one of the judg- ments shall "follow from," or " depend upon," other judgment as having in the latter its reason or ground ; AVhat is meant by this very relation ? What is it to be the " Reason " from which a conclusion follows ; or the " Ground " on which it depends ? On referring to the views cited in the last article, they are all found to emphasize the " middle term." Indeed, these authors speak as though the use of a middle term were the essential thing in reasoning. To draw a conclusion — they seem to imply — is to effect a synthesis between one conception, on which attention is fastened as the subject {8^, and a second con- ception concerning which the question may be raised, whether it shall be attributed to, or predicated (i^) of this subject, thronrih a third conception as means (J/). That is to say, — S is concluded to be P, or /^is concluded to belong to S, etc., through M. This relation, thus mediated, may be stated in any one of several ways : 8 is (or is not) P, hecause it is (or is not) M ; or, If /iS'is 31, then it is also P{\\\\y ? hecause J/ is P) ; or J/ is /■'and S is 3f, therefore S is /*— the last being the regular syllogistic form of the First Figure, as recognized by logicians. But all these ways of stating this relation seem alike to imply a problem or question — namely. Whether 7* does, or docs not, belong to S — which is solved by our finding some M that can, as it were, mediate between 8 and P. Thus, as the result of one's reason- ing which concludes with the affirmation or denial of a relation of synthesis, of some sort, between 8 and P, one knows 8 the better through M; for the latter has served as a medium, or " middle term," in the solution of the problem. Thus far we have only been stating a fact : the reason or ground of every con- clusion resides in the premises (judgment or judgments from which 4C8 KEASONIISTG one concludes) only as these 2^remiscs coiiiain some mediating con- ception. Bnt the mere statement of this fact does not answer the question as to what it is to be a reason or ground. When, then, psychology simply talks about " middle terms," as though they contained the secret of that procedure of intellect in which log- ical reasoning consists, it is quite too easily satisfied with the vague and empty terminology of formal logic. Logical reasoning has been seen to require the use of a middle term, with a consciousness of the relations existing between this middle term and both the subject and the predicate of the con- clusion. Thus reasoning does with judgments, what judgment does with conceiDtions. Mere judgment implies the synthesis of conceptions under conscious terms of relation. But every act of logical reasoning, when we bring its process out into full con- sciousness, implies a synthesis of judgments {i.e., a considera- tion of judgments apart, as it were, a discovery of the possibility of their results being condensed into one judgment ; and an actual juncture accomplished between them, through something belonging to both in common). This " something common " is obviously the conception which serves as the middle term. So far, however, as the essential psychological characteristics of the intellectual process of ratiocination are concerned, it is the words with wdiicli the conclusion is drawn (the " illative " terms rather than the middle term) that most clearly reveal the truth. These are the words " because," " therefore," and the like. It is in the import of these words that psychology takes most inter- est. The moment this important fact is recognized, it becomes evident that genuine reasoning implies something psycholog- ically new, as it were, of the greatest importance in the develoi)- ment of mental life. For, all that acquired knowledge — es- pecially of things remote in time or space — which we call science, as distinguished from mere opinion or A'ague belief, is dependent upon reasoning for its acquirement. Whatever the lower animals do, or do not, have in common with man, whether by way of actual attainment or in the form of capacity for attain- ment, they certainly have achieved no development of science. So far, then, as intellect proper is the necessary precondition of scientific development, it is this power of drawing, examining, and testing, defending and extending, or rejecting, logical con- clusions, which differences man from all the lower animals. But the very words " because," " therefore," and the like, themselves have no content except that which is acquired in the course of experience by processes of conception, judgment, etc. This is, of course, as true of these words as it is true of all words. MEANING OF ILLATIVE TERMS 469 It is even pre-emiuently true of such words as these, because of their hii^lil}^ abstract character and consequently late intelligent use. Indeed, the concoi)tions wliicli answer to these words are never very clearly formed by the great majority of mankind. Most men do not clearly know, and cannot at all tell, what they mean when they affirm that one thing is so, hecause another is so ; or when they parade a " therefore " in proof of some judgment at which they have — perhaps incontinently — arrived. These words must then be received by descriptive psychology as significant of a natural law of the intellect— as expressing- a form of the ac- tion and development of man as a so-called " reasoning " or " log"ical " animal. The nature of this action and development signified by the words will be further explained, as itself a phe- nomenon of conscious mental life, later on.^ But for the fuller understanding of this subject, psychology must refer to jihiloso- pliy in its branches of metaphysics and theory of knowledge. Certain remarks on the more obvious aspects of that bond between different judgments, which is effected by the middle term and which is essentially expressed in the terms called " illa- tive," are in place here : (1) These terms imply that objects of ex- perience are actually related in a great variety of directions, and under several main classes of relations. Objects are known as related directly, and in ways which perception can easily dis- cover ; but they are also known as related in more complicated and obscure ways ; they are known as related throKglt each other in an indefinite and incalculable number of directions. (2) Knowledge itself, so far as its entire inferential branch is chiefly concerned, consists in the apprehension of relations. Nothing can be known as unrelated ; and, as has been habitually declared by psycholog-ists, " to know is to relate." [This is, however, as we shall see subsequently, far from being all that knowledge is.] (3) A sort of instinctive impulse of the intellectual order, and a dim apprehension of the great supreme fact of the case, are im- plied in that natural and habitual mode of movement which in- tellect shows, as soon as the faculty of reasoning develops. Keasoning implies that, somehow, things generally are united into a system ; and that this system is such as to make it possible for thought to reach from object to object, and from event to event, and to bind all the individuals into higher and yet higher unities. As to the ultimate origin and extra-mental validity of this presupposition of the logical process of reasoning, and even as to its justification and application in the lines of the differ- 1 That ip, in the latter part of this cliapter, in the two following chapters, and by way of indirect reference, in the last chapter of the book. 470 REASONING eut so-called sciences or systems of knowledge, tlie science of psychology does not inquire. But j)sycliology must, at least, note this implication as a fact underlying the rise and develoj)- ment of all conscious processes of ratiocination. (4) It is also implied that a diiference exists between correct reasoning and incorrect and iuA' alid reasoning ; and that this difference depends upon the success or failure of the relating faculties to correspond to the actual relations of existing objects. Here again we un- cover metaphysical questions that concern the origin and nature of that conviction which belongs to the use of the intellect in the elaboration of experience. § 4. It is scarcely necessary to point out in detail tlie dependence of logical conclusion upon the development of all the other so-called faculties of mind. As reasoning enters into all highly analytic and conceptual per- ception, so it, in turn, depends for its development upon such acts of percep- tion having been already performed. Every complex object of perception is capable of being ihoughtfulli) regarded from any one of innumerable points of view. Thus the mastery of any object requires us continually to be de- vising middle terms, through which we may reason our way into relating it to other items of our experience. For example, on first seeing a jaguar, we conclude from its general appearance (stripes on the back and sides with whitish belly, etc.) that it is "some sort of a tiger; " or, being more ex- pert in zoology, from its serrate teeth that it is "carnivorous," etc. But this very object of perception subsequently becomes a suggester and source of middle terms through which to bring into relation with past experience other new objects of perception. Plainly, moreover, this ju-ocess of drawing conclusions through middle terms requires advanced development of the image-making faculty, in the form both of memory and of imagination. He who has no stores of recoguitive memory has no source of middle terms through which to reach conclusions ; to conclude that the jaguar is a carnivor- ous animal one must remember that *' serrate teeth" are the mark of such an animal. And the history of the mental processes of every boy who toils over the solution of a mathematical jjroblem, illustrates what the entire history of mathematics shows — namely, the place of imagination in demonstrative rea- soning. Not only must imagination work constructively, to hold the problem clearly before the mind, and so to set forth the end or goal of the process of ratiocination ; it must also work inventively, to devise the various connec- tions of lines, etc., which may serve as middle terms in the train of reasoning. "The geometer's sagacity," says Professor James, "lies in the invention of the new lines." Nor is a high degree of developed volition unnecessary to the drawing of conclusions. For although, in inductive reasoning especially, the hypothesis or theory which includes the explanation of the individual experiences may seem to thrust itself involuntarily before the mind, will is indispensable, with its trained exercise, to hold attention upon the goal, to make selections among the media that memory and imagination suggest, and to direct along chosen lines the entire so-called " train of thought." \ 5. The truth that the conclusion of a process of reasoning presents KINDS OF REASONING 471 itself as a problem for solution, or as a Jouht to bo set at rest, is closely con- nected with the teleologicitl character of all reasoning. In general, we reason " in order" to discover whether, or not, some relation which is not immedi- ately obvious may bo established, defended, and confirmed, or rejected. This general purpose divides itself into as many particular puqioses as there are problems to be solved, or doubts to be set at rest. And these dei^end, for every man, upon his past experience and upon his hopes, fears, and prac- tical interests. For each individual his i)articular end, or goal, in reason- ing will be to know, or to defend, or to reject, some particular proposition which seems to him important or interesting. Thus we are all constantly asking ourselves, with respect to things which do not work as we wish them to, or which do not turn out as we expect tliom to : What is the matter? Why not ? and, Why this way rather than that ? All such questions, how- ever, call for reasons, for processes of conclusion based on grounds and reached through middle terms. If one's shoes will not draw on as usual, one inquires and concludes as to the reason ; just as Leverrier concluded from the disturbed movements of Uranus to the then unknown planet Nep- tune as their cause. It is then the solution of the 2'>vohlem whether such a particvlar predicate shall, or sliall not, be adopted in our coiicluding jndgmeid, which is sought in all acts of reasoning. In this end to be readied lies the supreme purpose of the logical processes. "Psychologically, as a rule," says Professor James,' " P overshadows the process from the start. We are seeking P, or something like P," . . . And " if P have any value or importance for us, M was a very good character for our sagacity to pounce upon and abstract. If, on the contrary, P were of no importance, some other cliaracter than M would have been a better essence for us to conceive of ^by." The different Kinds of Reasoning- wliicli logic recognizes all re- ceive tlieir psychological explanation nnder the principles which have been enunciated. The essence of all logical conclusion being the connection of one judgment with other judgment as its reason or ground, the difterent orders of relation under which this syn- thesis takes place furnish the different principal kinds of reason- ing. These orders of relation have already been noticed in treating of the characteristics of conceptions and the resulting kinds of judgment. If the propositions employed in the reason- ing concern relations of resemhlance, or (Uffvrence, then the act of inference moves along the line, so to speak, of like or unlike characteristics. The general principle may then be said to be : objects which are known to have one or more characteristics in common with a third class of objects, may imth reason be con- cluded to have, in common with each other, a sufficient number of characteristics to be classed together. If 8 and P are both like M, then they are like each otlier, and deserve the same name. But of two objects, one of which is known to have character- » The Principles of rsycliology, U., p. 338. 472 REASONING istics in common with, and the other to have characteristics dif- ferent from, some third other, there is reason to afl&rm that they should not be chissed together ; and such objects should have diflereut names. Further, inasmuch as all objects of sense-perception necessa- rily exist in relations of space and thiie, and since all events in the stream of consciousness and in the world of external changes stand in relations of time, propositions affirming or denying particular spatial or temporal relations, may afford grounds for conclu- sions. The principle here is that of " the apprehension of con- nections in space and time." Objects considered as idealized, may be made the subjects of reasoning under the general rela- tion of space. Thus, the different geometrical forms — triangle, square, etc. — may be considered as related by resemblance and difference into classes (right-angled triangle, obtuse-angled tri- angle, etc.). What is concluded, with good reason, to be true of one triangle is attributed to all similar figures. But so far as objects of sense-perception and of self-consciousness are con- sidered as coming under pure relations of space and time, they admit of another kind of inference. Hence that peculiar form of demonstrative reasoning which is possible in mathematics alone. The character of such reasoning is due to the relations in which the objects reasoned about stand both to the imagina- tion and to the intellect. The elementary objects of mathema- [tical reasoning are constructions of the imagination on a basis of the abstracting and comparing activity of thought. They can, therefore, as pure, abstract ideas, be inspected and intuited, so as to make the whole nature of their forms and relations clearly evident ; and middle terms can be devised, such that the steps of inference shall admit of relatively small chance for any omission or mistake. In such " chains " of ratiocination, each particular judgment affirms some relation of quantity between different extensions of space or different numbers ; S and P are thus dis- covered to he quanta cdively related in a particidar way throucjh If, ichich is some third magnitude comparcd)h to both. It is under the form of judgment which attributes action to an agent (see p. 448 f.) that inferences in the line of cause and effect originate and develop. In essentially the same form do we find the intellect of man concluding M^ith respect to interacting forces and laws. For the conception of force is inse]iarable psy- chologically — at least in its origin — from the consciousness of conative activity. The conception of law, too, is ]n-imnrily that of the mode of the b(>havior of some agent. lender these two relations (" force " and " law "), which are so subtly intermingled FIGURES OF THE SYLLOGISM 473 both in reality and in mental apprehension, a wide field of con- clusions, otherwise closed even to the mind's entrance, is mas- tered. For who does not see that those words so glibly nscd by physical science, have reference to presuppositions that quite outstrij) the data hitherto discovered in our description and ex- planation of the phenomena of consciousness. Postponing,'- further treatment of these abstract conceptions, Ave now notice them only as conditioning- certain kinds of inference. When- ever one sees certain si^ns of force (movements, chang-es), one immediately concludes the existence of an ag-ent with the force necessary to i^roduce them ; when one believes in, or knows, the presence of an ag-ent with the necessary force, then one con- cludes that signs of the agent's force have manifested, or will manifest, themselves. In this way every perceived change (or effect) P is inferred to he due to ike action of some agent S ; for the reason that M, ichich is the known common sign of S, is connected with P ; therefore P — the cause of which affords the ijroblem to the mind — is a case to he attributed to iS. ^ 6. The distinction of logic between an enthi/meme, or single sentence connecting the concluding judgment with its ground by the words " there- fore," or " because" (for example, "the President is fallible, because he is a man ") and a complete si/llogism, is not important for the psychology of reasoning. The enthymeme has been defined,' as " an argument in the form in which it would naturally occur in thought or speech." This is true, be- cause this form puts the predicate into connection with the subject as a jn'ob- lem which has been solved by the discovery of a reason ; thus, S is, P because it is 3L Nor are the distinctions of the three ff/urc-a of tlie syllogism psy- chologically important. For the procedure of the intellect is substantially the same whether we say : I. II. III. il/isP Pis M Mis P S is M S is M M is S \-SisP .-SisP -.Sis P. In each of these cases, it is alike implied that there is something in the syntheses of the two judgments already incorporated into experience (a syn- thesis established between .V and P, and another established between S and M), which affords "a ground " for a new synthesis; and this something is the relation they both sustain to a third common something (to the middle term M). Nor is the nature of the binding intellectual act cliangod when the compound synthesis is thrown into the terms of an hypothesis ; thus — if M is P and S is 3f, then S is P. Various statements have been adopted by logicians to set forth the so- called ' ' law of the syllogism," the nature of the bond which makes the con- 3 Thomson : Outline of the Laws of Thought, p. 240. 474 REASONING elusion valid. According to Aristotle this law is the dictum de omni et nullo; " "Whatever is affirmed or denied of a class distributively, may be affirmed or denied of any i^art of that class," But according to Kant, who wishes to emphasize the intension of the conceptions in the judgment, the law is rather to be stated : Xota notce est nota rei ipsiiis ; while Leibnitz, apparently em- phasizing the extension of the judgments, would state the law thus : Con- tentum contenti est contentum continentis. Of these three forms of statement, that of Kant is by far the most suggestive. For at least, that kind of reason- ing whicli moves along the line of resemblances and dilierences may be said to fall under the principle : the "mark of a mark is the mark of the thing itself." For example, suppose the question to arise, whether the jaguar is a carnivorous or a graminivorous animal ; or whether the lady's-slipijer is an orchid, or not. Now, the mark of the jaguar is to have serrate teeth, and the mark of the carnivorous animals is to have the same kind of teeth. Again, to have its stamens and pistils united in a single column, with the petals ranged irregularly around, is one mark of the lady's-slipj^er ; and to have small, round tubers is another mark ; but both these are marks of the orchid fam- ily, therefore the lady's-slipper should be classed as an orchid. In similar way, it should be noticed, is scientific recognition customarily established ; and this, sometimes through a series of middle terms, or marks of marks, many of which are exceedingly difficult of observation. Scientific differ- entiation also consists in a yet more difficult and precious woik of reasoning along such lines. Shall nerve-commotion, for example, be classed with that form of motion to whicli we ascribe the name electricity ? Thousands of experiments and scores of carefully conducted chains of ratiocination have attempted to answer this inquiry ; and even thus we have only partially suc- ceeded in making the requisite distinctions. ^7. The peculiarity of mathematical reasoni»j^ depends upon the natirre of those processes by which conceptions of abstract spatial qualities and relations, together with conceptions of number and of relations of numbej", are formed. These processes, like all those which result in the formation of j so-called " conceiDtions," are the achievement of imagination and intellect, I working in conjunction.' For example, the formation of the concejition of a "straight line" begins by some such exhortation to imagination as the fol- lowing : Select any two points (a and b), and let some point move between the two in such way that, starting from one of the two as its ])oint of de- l)arture, the moving point shall go, witliout deviation, toward the other as its goal. Or, as Kant was fond of saying : If you would know what a straight line is (its " conception "), you must draw it, or construct it by imag- ination. Meanwhile, the exhortation to intellect is: attend only to the direction of the movement, as defined by the points a and b, and form an abstract idea of this limitation of " direction," irrespective of what is moving and of the particular point of departure or of cessation of movement. In similar manner, by a more complex act of synthesis, in which both imagina- tion and intellect take part, the conception of a triangle may be formed. But the formation of this conception requires counting up to the number of three, and the synthesis of so many straight lines, having similar relations to each other (" forming angles," that is to say), into a unity. Now, it is by > Comp. Porter : The Human Intellect, p. 45G f. ^'ATUUE OF MATHEMATICAL REASONING 475 straight Hues drawn in all directions, and by triangles of all i^ossible sizes and shapes — both emiiloyed as " middle terms " — that the conclusions of mathe- matical reasoning, in the geometrical branch of it, are chiefly reached. For all amounts of direction - extension are measurable and comparable only by means of lines ; and all superficial extension is measurable by means of the simplest form of enclosed sui^erficies, which is the triangle. In the arithmetical branch of mathematical reasoning, however, the jjrimary con- ceptions are those of number ; and these conceptions arc formed by "count- ing." The act of counting involves both imagination and intellect proper in a developed form ; since this act is really a series of acts, or a iirocess, which results in a judgment terminating the series by forming some concei^tion of number to wiiich a particular name (as "five" or "seven") is given. All mathematical processes of this order are therefore reducible to the two forms of " counting on " and "counting off;" and mathematical reasoning in this form is a series of judgments of relative magnitude, mediated by a number of middle terms. [Thus, the answer to an arithmetical jjroblem is : So many lbs., or .?, or per cent. ; if certain given conditions are to be ful- filled. And in algebra ; a; = so much, and y — so much, more or less than x, etc.] In the early stages of mathematical reasoning the perception of concrete objects is indispensable to the formation of conceptions, and to the drawing of conclusions. The child learns to know what a straight line is, only by seeing a line that does not markedly deviate from a direct coui'se between the two points which terminate it, and then comparing such a line with one that plainly does not follow a direct course, but is curved or bent. Yet even thus the imagination of the child, according to the dictum of Kant, miist construct the line — as a resultant of conij^arison upon a basis of rejieated acts of perception — in order to recognize its straightness, as such. So, too, are grains of corn, marbles, or the balls of an abacus, useful perceptions in en- couraging and developing the primary concejitions of number and of nu- merical relations. It accords with known psychological laws that, just in jaro- portion as such aids are habitually employed, mathematical conclusion loses its true intellectual or logical character, and becomes a matter of perception and ideation according to the laws of association. For examjile, the trades- man of Japan will calculate prices, by means of his soroban, with almost in- credible rapidity and with a high degree of accuracy ; but he knows little or nothing of mentcd arithmetic. Very simple acts of genuine mathematical reasoning are quite beyond him : he is a perce2)tive, ideating, calculating machine, and not a reasoner respecting relations in space and time. ^ 8. An elaborate employment of reasoning faculty is undoubtedly neces- sary in order to form the conception of " causation ; " and a yet higher de- velopment is marked by the attainment of clearly detined notions resjiecting the meaning of such terms as "agent," "self-activity," "doing," and the like. But, on the other hand, one principal form of logical conclusion is itself developed along the line of this conception. This is simply a case of the intellect following the laws of its own evolution without any correspond- ing development of the consciousness of the existence and significance of those same laws. For in every form of mental life, we do, without knowing what we do. Very early in his mental growth the child begins to explain to 476 REASONING liimself the more noteworthy events in his experience by attributing them to the doings of things or persons, not hithertq associated with precisely these same events. Such intellectual activity constitutes a beginning of ratioci- nation along the line of causal ivjiuence. It is at first and usually, connected with events which are interesting and strange ; for such events both excite and demand an explanation. In other words, every such event may be said to oiTer a new problem to the intellect for its solution. This problem is not, however, statable in the terms : ' ' What is it ? " but is rather to be expressed in the question: "What person or thing did this?" It is essentially the same general problem with which all human science chiefly occupies itself — namely, " What are the causes of this event (the forces operative, and the laws under which they operate) ? " It is chiefly by this kind of ratiocination that we transcend the limits of the present and bring its experiences into j^ermanent and rational connec- tions with what is remote in space and time. Thus the present becomes re- lated to the past, not merely by way of recognitive memory under the laws of association, but as finding in that past the reason, or ground, why the present is as it is rather than otherwise ; ichat is present in time is explained bi/ ichat icas jjast in time. Similarly, too, is the event present in space explained by some agent, invisible on account of its remoteness, or on account of its being by nature not adaj^ted to aiDjireciation by the senses. For it is the same intel- lect behaving in essentially the same way, which puts spiritual " powers" in the air, sprites and fairies in the green wood, introduces ghosts or other " telepathic " influences to account for changes whose causes arc not sen- suously manifest, and which theorizes as to " lumiuiferous ether," " atomic entities" with a variety of " natures," etc. All such beings are alike " con- cluded to ; " because neither perception nor memory alone enables us to ex- plain the present happenings by agents whose connection with these hajjpen- iugs is matter of presentative experience. Very early, also, does the expectation of the child take on an intellectual character. It ceases to be merely an attitude of mind which results from unreasoned past association : it becomes more or less of an expectation that attempts to base itself upon grounds and to depend upon justifiable conclu- sions — an expectation that knows ichy it exists in this particular form rather than in some other. Doubtlsss the early conclusions of human mental life are not genuine logical conclusions: they are "conclusions" only falsely so- called. The child that refuses his milk or his bath when he sees vajior aris- ing from the cup or the tub, is by no means necessarily drawing a logical conclusion. He may simply be the subject of inhibition from a suggested idea. What stimulates and guides the development of rational expectation with reference to the future is chiefly the occurrence of interesting and im- portant exceptions. As said Leibnitz : "Reason alone is capable of establish- ing sure rules, and of su^jplying what is lacking to those which are not sure, by inserting their exceptions." He has a wise and doveloi)ed intellect who can say : "Generally, but not always" (comp. p. 458 f. ). The movement of mind in this kind of reasoning may be illusti\ated by the following example. A child of the author's acquaintance, having seen his toy-balloon sail away skyward, after a malicious boy had secretly severed the string, was asked what had become of it : he rei:)lied that " God had DICTA -OF KANT AND ARISTOTLE 477 ciuiicd it off." Here was undoubtedly a case of genuine logical reasoning. The event was strange, and the interest awakened by it great. If the balloon had fallen to the ground, after the customary fashion of things, no conclu- sion would probably have been suggested to the boy's mind. But so inter- esting an exception to ordinary exj^erience constituted a special problem in causation ; and the agent suggested to serve as cause was, of course, that one whose powers and doings had previously been connected with events sky- ward. g 9. No psychological interest attaches itself to the attempt to throw the foregoing kind of reasoning into the form of a syllogism of the " First " (or of any other) " Figure." We should only indulge in i^rofitless quibbling by saying : Major premise, — All cases of mysterious events, having to do with the sky are cases of divine action ; Minor premise, — This is a case, etc. ; Conclusion, — Therefore, etc. For such a syllogism would not represent the actual movement of the child's mind. Better adapted for this jmrpose would perhaps be some such syllogism as the following : All events that challenge explanation, as exceptions to ordinary experience, require some special agent to account for them ; this is such an event ; and therefore, etc. The mental representation of tlie special agent in this jiarticular event may then be left wholly to association. Such a fictitious major premise is itself, however, nothing more than a statement of that law of the intellect which has been recognized as at the roots of all reasoning, and as the origin of our conception of causation itself. 1 10. While all three kinds of reasoning fall under one essential princijjle of all reasoning, and while they are all necessarily combined in the develop- ment of knowledge, they stand in somewhat different relations to the several branches of the growth of knowledge. (1) It is pre-eminently by conclusions throiigh mediated comparison of the marks of objects (Kant's dictum, NoUi notce est nota rei Ipsius, or Aristotle's dictum de omni et nidlo — according as intension or extension of the conceptions is regarded) that our knowledge of the essential qualities, or traits, of things is attained, and that classification and definition are advanced. But all concejitions are growths, not only for the individual but also for the race; and consequently all definition and' classification are subject to change as knowledge grows. Indeed, diiferent gi'oupings of so called "marks" may, with equal propriety, be adopted, ac- cording as the point of view changes and the end to V)e reached varies on the part of the conceiving mind. Nor can either the individual or the whole body of expert iuqiiirers ever be sure that all the essentials in any concep- tion have been comprehended in the definition. In this respect the logical distinction between simple and complex conceptions is only relative. It is, however, by conclusions drawn under the principle of " a mediated likeness or unlikeness of marks," that conceptions and the dependent work of defini- tion and classification grow. (2) In all forms of applied physical science, as well as in pure mathe- matics, calculation by means of arithmetical and geometrical conceptions takes a most important part. Even psychology has, especially recently, been much urged to employ this form of reasoning. In a guarded way, and esjie- cially in the region of so-called "psycho-physics," this science has already made profitable use of the mathematical method. A largely, or purely, 478 -REASOXING mathematical psychology, or logic, has been attempted ; but the result of this attempt seems to us as worse than a doubtful success. Nor can we think that the biological and social sciences will ever derive their conclusions cliiefly in this kind of reasoning. On the other hand, mathematical reason- ing legitimately enters into our jirocesses of argument about all things and all events that are measurable ; and measurable, to some extent, are all things and all events that belong to time and space. (3) The knowledge that grows by the third kind of inference is, as has already been implied, the knowledge of causes, of real forces, and of laws. Here, since forces are measurable and comparable in terms of time and space, and since the formulas which state the uniform modes of their action are called laws, mathematical reasoning is also necessarily employed. Processes of logical reasoning are also distinguislied as Induc- tive and Deductive. The puzzles suggested by writers on logic concerning the nature of both of these kinds of reasoning have ■ been neither few nor slight. In fact, however, no actual process of inference consists of one of these " kinds " to the exclusion of the other. On the conti'ary, hidudion and deduction are, j)syclio- logically considered, in principle essentially the same ; hoth alihe consist in reaching one judgment as a conclusion, on the basis of other judgment as its reason or ground. It is ordinarily said (and with a certain degree of truth), however, that in " induction " a general principle is concluded from particular instances ; but in " deduction " a particular case is concluded under a general prin- ciple. Or to say the same thing in another way — in induction we reason that because it is so in one or more cases of our ex- perience, therefore it is so in all similar cases of experience (has been so, and will be so — generally or universally). But in de- duction we have already attained the knowledge of the general or universal principle applicable to similar cases ; the problem of this particular case comes before us ; and we solve it by re- membering, assuming, or showing that it comes under the al- ready known principle. In induction, then, we conclude that A is B, because we have observed that a and «' and «- (all essentially alike and caioable of being grouped under ^1) are B. In deduc- tion we know, or assume as known, that ^1 is B, and conclude that «' (which we have never met with before) is B. " Inference on Grounds " is, therefore, characteristic of both induction and deduction. As a suggestive writer ' on this subject — although from the logical rather than the psychological point of view — has declared : " The distinction . . . eiToneously described as the distinction between Induction and Deduction is chiefly a distinction of aspects, largely based on a confused ' Bosanquct : Logic, H., p. US. GROWTH OF KNOWLEDGE BY INFEIIKNCE 479 idea of Induction, but 3'ct in some degree justified." Further on, the same writer : " AVe may take Induction as Inference viewed from the side of the difreronces, Deduction as Inference viewed from the side of the universal." The correct distinction is, however, better brought out from the psychological point of view by saying that, in induction, we start from observed like- nesses and unlikenesses in individual cases (analysis being pri- marily involved) and solve our problem by concluding that the reason is to be found in some general or universal relation among" the individuals. But in deduction we start rather with an assumed solution of the problem offered in the individual case, and prove by inference the correctness or falsity of our assump- tion by relating- the case to some generalization regarded as already established. The need of hypothesis in both so-called kinds of reasoning-, as well as their common use of inference in all its essential psychological traits, confirms tlu^ truth of their essential similarity. In both induction and deduction alike, the intellect displays the law of its own life and movement — namely, the tendency to leap from observation of the particular, and from the problem which observation proposes, to the apprehension of the universal ; then to inhibit itself by regarding the differences Avliich other observation reveals ; and then, finally, to organize and to validate experience by concluding all its items under some improved form of the universal. ^ 11. Much subtile discussion lias been indulged in by treatises on logic over the question, How can knowledge grow by inference at all? This question may be asked with reference to induction so called, as well as with reference to deduction in syllogistic form ; although in the latter case it is more easily comprehensible and more impressive. For example, it may be said : Unless I know absolutely that all J/ is P, how can I infer with confi- dence that, because 8, in particular, is 3/, therefore S is P ? Again, how am I thus absolutely to know that all lit /.s P, unless I have observed, or learned from those who have observed, that each particular case of M {m and m', etc., up to m") is P. But if I already know P to be true of every case of M, then I know it of S, and do not need to " prove " it ; indeed. How could I prove it if my major premise were not first established ? How, then, — it is asked, in general — can deduction increase knowledge? Or, turning to the argument by induction, it may be said that reasoning can never prove the universal jn-oposition : All M is P. For one can never bo sure that one has observed all cases which properly fall under ]\[ (all the possible series, m, to', m", etc.). Therefore all one is entitled to say is : Evei-y m which I have observed J/aa been P. But how can this serve, of itself, as " proof " of my conclusion that all M is (has been, and will be) P? ^lust it not be admitted, then, either that sure proof is impossible, or else that it is of no use? 4S0 EEASONIISTG The answer to such logical puzzles as the foregoing is, from the point of view of psychology, not difficult to find. Briefly stated, we are led by such imzzles simply to admit : None of our inferential knowledge — our judgments concluded on other judgment as ground — is absolutely certain. "Guess- ing," or hypothesis, enters into all such knowledge. It is true we can never conclude willi absolute certainty that all M is P ; or that every other particu- lar case of il/ which we shall meet will also be P. In every act of induction, if such act is genuine induction and not mere enumeration and summation of memory -images, as it were, a hypothesis is introduced. And, in fact, science, and even ordinary experience, is constantly engaged in finding out that all M is not P ; for science and experience grow quite as much by correcting mistakes and by making exceptions to rules as by so-called "establishing" of general or universal principles. Indeed, we saw (p. 466 f.) that all reason- ing itself implies the change and growth of our conceptions. So cdso in every act of deduction — no matter how firmly established the major premise may seem to be — there is a concealed hypothesis. Exceptions viay occur ; eveiy new case, however obviously it seems at first to come under the general prin- ciple, viay prove an exception ; we may find in this particular case of appar- ent "/S' is M" a reason for the modification of the premise " All J/ is P." The remarks just made might be illustrated by the entire history of the development of knowledge in the individual and in the race. Properly speaking, all conclusions are only m,ore or less highly probable hypotheses, accord- ing as they stand related to the entire organism of experience, under the laics of intellectual life. For example, no principle of physics is better established than that of gravitation, so called ; popularly expressed, with reference to the earth, all bodies heavier than the atmosphere, if left unsuiiported, fall toward the earth's center. But here, on the one hand, we have certain al- leged cases of " levitation," and, on the other hand, the inquiry of astron- omy as to whether all the stars do actually come under this principle. Again, few propositions could be confirmed by a greater array of evidence, or are of greater practical as well as scientific import than this : " The men- tal states of man are communicable only by means of bodily changes in one individual which act as signs that effect the well-known forms of sense-con- sciousness in other individuals." But here again we have alleged facts and elaborate theories of " telepathy" and "rapport" struggling for scientific recognition and boldly inviting scientific inquiry ; we have also certain cu- rious phenomena of common psychical impulses, or vague forms of ideation, simultaneously affecting large numbers of people. Such merely possible ex- ceptions may not furnish sufficient evidence for the reconstruction of ac- cepted principles ; they may not jiroperly induce every candid man to con- sider the possibility of such reconstruction. Yet ho who remembers how tlio sagacious Kant considered it an "ajviori principle" that no material l)ody can influence another without contact, or who is familiar with the dif- ficulty which all the most cherished universal propositions in science have had in establishing themselves, will recognize the truth of our contention. g 12. No rules applicable in all cases can be given for the justification logi- cally {i.e., in view of the principle of sufficient reason) of the act of induc- tion. A single significant experience may justify the universal proi^ositiou : " All il/is P" or "No il/is P " — in the form of an hypothesis, to be more or THE METHODS OF INDUCTIOX 481 less coniitlently accoptod, while waiting for other cases of M. The tendency of intellect in this regard is similar to the tendency of image-making faculty under the inincijilo of association. The child who has been burned by its steaming cnp of milk, or stung by an insect, or bitten by a snapinug dog, not only experiences the inhibiting image of associated i)ain, on encounter- ing again a similar object ; but — if any genuine work of inference is done — it also concludes that all similar objects ought, for good and sufficient rea- sons, to be avoided. And not a few important scientific discoveries have been made on a basis of no more significant inductive inference. It is, in- deed by emphasizing as clews those likenesses and uulikenesses which have been just observed for the first time, or which to the ordinary observer seem to need no explanation, that superior sagacity manifests itself. § 13. But guesses, or hypotheses, require confirmation, or they cannot safely be accepted as grounds for other conclusions. The various so-called " experimental tests " which science emphasizes are simply refinements — made possible largely by special equipment of instruments — of the methods employed by every intellect to render its reasons, or grounds for being in- fluenced, sufficient. The word "sufficient" must here be understood as suggesting the satisfaction which the mind feels in becoming aware of the relations that bind its experience into the higher forms of unity. These tests are summarized in the so-called rules or " methods of induction." Of such the following three are ordinarily recognized : (1) The method of agi'ee- ment ; (2) the method of difference ; (3) the method of concomitant variation. It has already been shown that the combined use of both the first two methods is made in all complicated inference. Objects or events that are observed, or otherwise known, to have like qualities or conditions, are inferred to belong to the same classes, or to be due to the presence of the same agencies, or causes. But, in so far as objects or events differ in im- portant ways, they must, as effects, be assigned to difierent classes and agencies, or causes ; and, as causes, they must give rise to difi'erent eflfects. Or, if we can measure the concomitant variations in difi'erent objects and events, and if we discover that their variations have proportional intensities, then again we may infer a connection in respect of classes or causes. Thus, the gardener concludes : " Because my apple-tree declines in vigor as the ' scale ' spreads over its bark, therefore the spreading of this pest is the cause of the tree's declining in vigor." I 14. The foregoing discussion throws light on the relations which the process of reasoning brings about between the particular and the universal. In their interest in the purity of logical formulas the older logicians empha- sized the necessary connection of particular cases with general principles as giving cogency to the syllogism. Thus I infer and surely know that the man ^1 D will die (is mortal) because "all men are mortal." This " Figure " of the syllogism — to which many writers on logic would reduce all the other Figures — represents a sort of universal law as ruling over and compelling the particular to fall under it and obey it. But mere law is impotent, mere form can do nothing. Neither the real cause for particular occurrences, nor the reason for the content of the conception answering to an individual object, can be found in the universal. On the contrary, the real reason for every law is the behavior and the nature of individual beings. They dictate 31 482 REASONING the law ; and it does not compel tliem — except as we choose to use an inter- esting but misleading figure of speech. John Stuart Mill,' in opposition to the older logicians, emphasized the movement of thought from particulars to particulars, in all forms of natural deductive inference. Of the proposi- tion that " the Duke of Wellington " is mortal this author truly says — " it is evidently an inference ; it is got at as a conclusion from something else ; but do we in reality conclude it from the proposition, All men are mortal ? I answer, no." Further on he adds : " When, therefore, we conclude from the death of John and Thomas, and every other person we ever heard of in whose case the exjjeriment had been fairly tried, that the Duke of Welling- ton is mortal like the rest ; we may, indeed, pass through the generalization. All men are mortal, as an intermediate stage ; but it is not in the latter half of the process, the descent from all men to the Duke of Wellington, that the inference resides. The inference is finished when we have asserted that all men are mortal. What remains to be performed afterward is merely deciphering our own notes." Neither of the foregoing views implies the true and complete statement of the psychological nature of inference. For if the " inference is finished " by reaching the proposition that all men are mortal, then we have already generalized ; we have already somehow passed from the particular to the general. When, then, the question arises, whether the Duke of Wellington too, has died or will die (instead of proving immortal), our confidence that, in this case, too, death is the fate of the particular man, rests upon the ground that he is a man ; and so cannot be exempted from that which belongs to all men. Actually, then, the intellect does leap from the partic- ular to the universal, and so, hypothetically at first, extend its knowledge ; actually, also, it does conclude from its acquired knowledge of the universal, as to what will prove true of the particular. Induction and deduction plainly combine in this compound process of inference. As Bosanquet - has said : "The verification of hypothesis has been considered, from Bacon down- ward, as an integral part of scientific induction. And nothing can be more deductive than the connection of an hypothesis with the consequences by which it is verified." Such a description answers not to scientific proced- ure alone ; it is rather the universal form of the movement of intellect in all its work of organizing, by lyrocesses of ratiocination, the individual experiences which constitute the stream of consciousness. Two Universal Principles are cnstomarilj^ affirmed by losfic to preside over tlie entire life of tlie intellect. These are called the Principle of Identity and the Principle of Sufficient Reason. As a complement, or the other side, of the former principh> is the Princii:)le of Contradiction. In its bare form, and abstractly' stated, the principle of identity is made to affirm : " ^ is JL." In its complem(>ntary form, then, the principle may be stated : " A is not both A and not-A," or, if by B we mean not- A, then : No A is B. These so-called principles cannot be conceived of as re- ' Syptem of Logic (sevcuth ed.). Book II., Chap, i., § 3. " Logic, II., p. 119. THE PllIXCIPLE OF IDENTITY 483 suiting- from observation or arg-umont ; they are rather taken for granted in all arg-ument. The Law of Contradiction has been said to " supply something without which the Law of Identitj' is not logically complete nor didinctiy intelligible." Both taken together, however, furnish no real or concrete truth. For there is no reality known, or that may be conceived of, which can be substituted for ^1, with the understanding- that such reality is absolutely unchanging, or that its conception is not subject to the principle of growth, "^'hat, then, is meant by such a so- called " principle " of thought ? The principle of identity has 7io meaning except as understood in its ax)plication to judgment; and through judgment to that connection of judgments which we call reasoning. Thus under- stood, it simply binds to consistency all the way through the very sj'uthesis in Avhich judgment and reasoning consist. In the same judgment (and all truth is conceivable and aliirmable only in the form of judgment) the conception answering to the sub- ject (that which "we mean " by S) and the conception answering to the i^redicate (that Avhich " we mean " by P), as well as the re- lation affirmed by the synthesis itself (that which " we mean" by the copula), must remain unchanged. S is S ; P /* P ; the rela- tion expressed by the copula is that self-same relation ; neither must be changed without changing all. More abstractly still, when you jiidge, yow judge ; you cannot posit and negate, affirm and deny, at one and the same time. And this comes prett}^ near to saying simply that the intellect has judgment for its function, and that judgment is what it is — namely, the establishing of a relation, by an act of synthesis, between S and P. I 15. The absurdity of trving io i^rore the principle of iclentity is obvious enough. We may iutleed amuse ourselves in somewhat the followiug way : Let us suppose that we try to argue, either for or against the principle as stated in its abstract form. Thus : The principle of identity must be true ; for the A which stands iu the place of the subject is, by hypothesis. A, and the A which stands in the place of the predicate is also A ; and, furthei-, the judgment itself is but a statement of the hypothesis that the A of the sub- ject h the same as the A of the predicate. Or, again, if the princijile of identity be not true, then we cannot be sure that the .1 of the subject is in- deed A, which is absurd ; the same thing is true of the predicate, and so on. But who does not see that h\ all this juggling with mere abstractions we as- sume, at every step, the very princii)le itself ? On the contrary, the changing character of all conceptions, and therefore of the truer and more comprehensive meanings of words, forbids us to sub- stitute any definite and fixed conceptions for either the .4 of the subject or the A of the i:)redicate, in the formula announcing the principle of identity. We may not affirm, for example, that the conception, or the reality, which 484 REASONING answers to the term "man," or "atom," or to any other terms, is to remain forever self-same. The generic man rrtaj/ develop so as not to be mortal; the atom maij be itself shown to be a subject of evolution ; at least, it is the forces and laws of reality and not the abstract logical principle of identity, which provides that no such change shall at any moment take place. The law of Excluded Middle, which Aristotle expressed by saying, " Be- tween the assertions of a logical contradiction there is no middle," is a sort of dependent abstraction based upon the acceptance of the two foregoing principles. " A^ is either B or not-7?," is the bare logical formula for ex- jjressing the law. This so-called law applies to all strict denial ; and all strict denial would be not only practically impossible but logically inconceiv- able, were not the principle of identity and its complementary principle as- sumed to be true and necessary. But what j^articular statements may be strictly denied, and on what principles we may separate the objects of ex- perience into mutually exclusive classes, or assign changes to mutually exclusive causes, only experience can say ; and the evolution of experience itself constantly gives the lie to many of our strictest denials. The principle of Sufficient Reason is — as we have already seen — the one princi^^le which is distinctive of, and which gives bind- ing force to, all kinds of inference. It cannot, therefore, itself be proved by inference ; the rather is it itself abstracted from that very form of the life of intellect which we call " inference." That is to say, the ultimate fact revealed by our scientific exam- ination of those phenomena of consciousness, called processes of reasoning-, when regarded in their order and connection, is this, — that so, and no otherwise, do they always occur. It is im- possible, however, to frame a formula for this principle like that which logic employs for the principles of identity, contra- diction, and excluded middle. Nor does the jDrinciple of suffi- cient reason itself give us the least information respecting Avhat, in particular, is the " sufficient reason " of what — or as to the connections that may be established by a " because," or a "therefore," between any j^articular S and any particular /*. Moreover, if we emphasize the word ''sufficient,'' and then inquire as to what in our actual mental life corresponds to this word, we find that no definite answer can be given, either bef(n*e experi- ence or upon the grounds of realized experience. Sufficient — for Avhat ? Now the amount and kind of reason which is sufficient always depends upon a variety of considerations ; such as the character of the ol)jects or events we are reasoning about, the end (either practical or theoretical) which the reasoning has in view, the opportunities for investigation which the accumulated stores of the experience of the individual and the race affi^rd, and even the subjective interests and habits of the reasoner, etc. In the THE TKINCIPLE OF SUFFICIENT REASON 485 stricter sense of the word, sufficient reason belongs only to demonstrative reasoning- in matlieniatics. As to what is meant by " reason " — whether sufficient or insuf- ficient — we shall further inquire in discussing the origin and development of the conception of causation. Three things, however, may i3roperly be noted by a psychological treatise, at the present point : (1) 13y the principle of sufficient reason is obviously meant the natural tendency of man, as a developing intellect, satisfactorily to explain his ex2)erience. This is really, then, not an abstract i^rinciple at all, as is the principle of identity ; it is rather, iirimarily considered, an exhortation aris- ing from the depths of our intellectual life. (2) All the explana- tion, which intellect demands and pursues in the interests of its own self-satisfaction, involves the relating of one object to another, of one event to another, etc. Everything is explained hy heing brought into connection with something else. We under- stand S, only when we bring it into connection, by an act of judg- ment, with P; and since such relating can be direct only to a very limited extent, we explain S in relation to P through M. Thus S, 2r, and P, all explain each other ; they are all appre- hended as belonging to one world of connected objects and events. For (3) the helief that such a world exists, and that we may know it as it exists, not only by becoming immediately aware of it in perception and self-consciousness, but also by processes of ratiocination, lies, like a sleeping postulate, beneath all the activity of mind according to the so-called principle of sufficient reason. It belongs, however, to philosophy to explicate and defend this postulate. I 16. The exposition of the principle of sufficient reason by logicians has often been almost as unwarrantable as the use made of the allied law of causation in debates over free will, miracles, etc., by students of natural science and by theologians. This so-called " law of causation " is only the objectification, as it were, of the principle of sufficient reason. Its meaning, in general, is to assert our confidence that things are really connected as we find ourselves having reason to know, or believe, that they are. The iise of the adjective " sufficient," as attached to the noun "reason," is sug- gestive ; but is psychologically of no importance. It could strictly apply only to those products of our actual thinking which fnlly meet the ideal de- mands of logic ; but this all products of thinking that relate to actual things and events fail to do. The entire phrase, then, should be held to be sig- nificant of that perpetual develo]>nient of the life of intellect which results in giving a higher unity to knowledge ; a more complex and well-principled organization to experience ; a more comprehensive grasp on the world of known objects and events, as a system of beings with so-called " natures," acting under law, and possessing "forces" and "powers;" a wider theo- 486 REASONING vetieal and yet logically defensible outlook over the invisible realms of dis- tant times and spaces, and of entities that cannot be made the objects of perceptive experience. Thus our ' ' reasons " become more nearly ideally " sufficient," according as the development of intellect itself, on the part of the individual and of the race, goes on. I 17. It is interesting to note again the intimate connection between the development of intellect and the development of feeling and will. Appre- hension of the true being of things not Infrequently comes more through our sesthetical, or sensitive and practical, natures than through our logical. To know things, we must, in some sort, live our way into them. In matters of the so-called practical life we find this illustrated in the action and influ- ence of what is called " tact." In matters of sesthetical and even of scientific and ijhilosophical import, we find it further enforced by manifestations of what is denominated "intuition" or "insight." Here the most well- reasoned answers as to what and why often seem to be more than matched by the intellectually obscure but more feeling-full and rapid apprehensions of truth. The affective side of human nature, of course, influences the logical processes very strongly at their origin, and indeed all the way through. This will appear more clearly on consideration of the effect of intellectual interest, of unrest and dissatisfaction with ignorance, of pure and strong desire for knowledge for its own sake. Thus, inference is not only spurred to a quick, decisive bound, but somehow — it would almost seem — guided so as to light upon the right spot. In conclusion, every inductive proc- ess, too, originates largely in a sort of blind groping about after all pos- sible movements of thought which may furnish the satisfaction of desire. He who does not want to reason is little likely to reach any conclusion ; on the other hand, our conclusions are generally — as everybody knows — more likely to be the ones which we as reasoners want. Such a feeling of want also re- minds us of the mental movement necessary to satisfy it ; and, as that move- ment follows, we have the germinal form of conclusion in the narrower sense (the deductive syllogism). Nor is it unwarrantable to affirm that the devel- opment of will, as a sort of outcome from desire, is indispensable to the higher forms of ratiocination. There is truth, then, in the declarations of Gothe's "Faust:" "All comes at last to feeling," and "What you don't feel you'll never catch;" although this tnith should not lead lis "to despise intelligence and science, the highest powers accorded unto man." [Besides the works referred to at the close of the last chapter, the following may be consulted: Spencer: Principles of Psychology, II., p. 86 f. Mill: Logic, Books ii., iii. James : The Principles of Psychology, II., chap. xxii. Carpenter : Mental Physiology, i., chap. 6; ii., chap. 12 f.] CHAPTER XXI. SPACE, TIME, AND CAUSATION The peculiarity of the rehition which certain of our concep- tions sustain to our entire mental life is made obvious only by a process of reflective thinking'. So subtile and intricate is the development of this life, and so late the awakening- of critical interest in its fundamental laws, that it is not strange to find different students holding widely different opinions as to the origin and significance of such conceptions. While, of course, it is true of tliese conceptions, above all others, that their more precise content represents, in the case of different individuals, widely different degrees in the development of thinking faculty. Conceptions of the kind to which reference has just been made have received a great variety of names at the hands of different writers in the history of psychology and philosophy.' Among these the term " categories " (or " i^redicaments " resulting from the processes of thinking and naming) is as old as Aristotle. The full treatment of the categories, as related to the processes and the results of knowledge in a large and ultimate way, be- longs to the philosophical theory of knowledge ; but regarded as forms of real being, the categories are of metaphysical import. It is enough for scientific psychology to note their existence, as it were, and to describe such of the mental processes resulting in these conceptions as are most directly involved in the history of mental development. It has just been said that the conceptions which are called the " categories " have peculiar relations to our entire mental life. As respects their strictly psychological origin and char- acter, however, there is little apparent reason to speak of them as " peculiar." In one passage of his writings Aristotle enu- merates the following ten : Substance, quantity, quality, relation, place, time, situation, possession, action, and suffering ; he ap- pears to have regarded them as applying both to things and to words. But considered as an actual mental process there is no > For a list of these terms see Hamilton : Lectures on Metaphysics, xxxviii. ; and Reid's Works, note A, § v., p. 755 f. 48S SPACE, TIME, AND CAUSATION oue of these ten whose origin and development does not conform to the descriptions ah-eady given of the elaboration of exi^erience through thought-faculty. Of the three categories whose names stand at the head of this chapter, for example, we may unhesitat- ingly declare that the actual mental processes answering to the names are performed in essentially the same way as are those through which we pass in forming all our other conceptions. When I think of space, or of time, or of causation, I have no peculiar experience (no so-called " intuition," or immediate ra- tional awareness or insight into the nature of things) answer- ing to these words. So far as descriptive psychology goes, these conceptions arise and develop in essentially the same manner as do all other conceptions. Even from the predominatingly psychological point of view, however, there is something peculiar about the relation in which all the true categories stand to the development of mental life. This psychological peculiarity consists chiefly of the follow- ing three characteristics : (1) Regarded as thought - products these conceptions are capable of reaching a high degree of ab- straction ; and of being illustrated, as it were, by a correspond- ingly great variety of widely different acts of the image-making faculty. For example, as the result of a series of judgments based upon experiences with extended objects of perception one may reach the bare thought of the " possibility of extension in general ; " and may give to this abstraction the name of " space." On the other hand, in " realizing " to one's self what one means by space, one may employ a variety of images of past or pos- sible extensions and movements of objects ; and may say to one's self, " That is what I understand by space." On comparing such a compound act of thinking and imaging as this with the act which is performed in connection with words denominating' classes of objects — such as " man," " mammal," or even " soul " and "thing"— we cannot fail to note the differences between the two. (2) Connected with this peculiarity is the content-less character of the categories. These conceptions, in their most abstract form, have no variety of marks which the synthesis of judgment grasps together in giving import to the name. It has been said^ " the act of apprehension produces no content of idea- tion which is not already contained in the content of the being that is ideated." For examiilo, if I conceive of space as " pure mental form," or as the " possibility of indefinite extension in gen- eral," etc., my act of conception does not enable me to add any- thing to the actual content of my perception, or of my imagina- ' So Beneke : Pragmatische Psychologie, il . p. 175. NATURE OF THE "CATEGORIES" 489 tion, or of my couccption of any particular thing: that is actually extended. (3) The existence of these conceptions, when con- sidered merely from the psycholog-ical i>oint of view, compels us to admit : We are able not only to think about all manner of ob- jects, and put the results of thinking- into the perception, memory, and imagination of all manner of objects ; but we are also able to think about the ultimate forms of thought itself. We can, by thinking, form conceptions of the processes of perception, mem- ory', imagination, and conception — as secondary and hig-hcr prod- ucts, as it were, of intellectual life. In some sort, then, the cat- egories are realized as thinking that has for its objects the very processes of perceiving-, remembering, imagining-, and thinking-, themselves. To sum up these characteristics : By "categories" i:>syclwlog- ically considered (that is, regarded as phenomena of conscious- ness), 2ce mean those hkihly ahstract concejitions tchich the mind frames hy refiection upon its own most general modes of behavior. They are our own notions, resulting from co-operation of imagi- nation and judgment, concerning the ultimate and unanalyzable forms of our own existence and development. In so far as our notions are correctly formed, and so are supposed to represent the ultimate facts of mental life, the categories maj^ be said to he the ultimate forms of mental existence and development. ? 1. The doctrine of the categories has been much ilebatecl, not only in treatises on philosoijhy and logic (where such debate more properly be- longs) but also in writings on i^sychology. The term most popular in Great Britain and America for this class of conceptions has been, perhaps, the term " intuitions." But such a term is particularly inajipropriate for this class of conceptions. To " intuit " is to see jaresentatively, face to face, as it were ; and " the intuitions" should refer only to such classes of objects as admit of being envisaged, or known with that immediate awareness of cognition which presentative experiences, whether of sense or of self-consciousness, alone have. Now I can thus (" intuitively") know an extended thing by sight, or by touch ; I may even regard myself as, in a peculiar manner, standing face to face with the memory-picture or with the object constructed by imagina- tion — although psychological classification regards such objects as belonging to the representative rather than the presentative gi-oup. Pre-eminently true is it also that I, and no other, have a face-to-face knowledge of my own men- tal states as such — of my pleasures and pains, my desires and purposes, etc. But the knowledge signified by such abstract terms as space, time, causa- tion, and the other categories, is the furthest jwssible removed from any similar envisogement or intuitive cognition by the mind. Indeed, it woitld be more correct to say that every one has many intuitions of spaces, times, and causes; and then by a process of generalization and reasoning reaches the ability to give some sort of meaning to the words "space," " time," and " causation." But the really con*ect thing is to say that, in the processes of 490 SPACE, TIME, AND CAUSATION perception by the senses and of self-consciousness, I intuit, or envisage, extended things and events enduring in the world or as states of my own mind, and relations between things which I exjilain causally. g 2. Because the intellectual develoijment on which they depend is capa- ble of being carried to a greater or less extent, and to a far greater extent in the case of some individuals than others, the conceptions answering to the term the categories are very different in different cases. In no other con- ceptions are the effects more clearly seen of original or acquired skill, of the amount of attention given to the subject ; and even of age, sex, habitual modes of the activity of the senses, imagination, etc. There is undoubted truth, from the psychological point of view, in the statement that space is not, and never can become, to one born blind, what it is to all who have normal vision. Says Lotze ' in sjieaking of the sexes : " Analytic reflection upon their own movements is so little familiar to them that one may affirm, without fear of being very far wrong, that such expressions as, to the right, to the left, aci'oss, reverse, express, in the language of women, not any mathe- matical relations, but certain particular feelings which one has when in working one makes movements in these directions." What is true of the subordinate determinations of sj^atial properties and relations, is even more true of that mental determination which corresponds to the sum-total, as it were, of such i^roperties and relations. Different individual conceptions of space are far more variable than the conceptions of such sjiatial relations as, "to the right," " to the left," etc. What is true of space is just as true of time and causation. The child's conception of time, or that of the savage, differs most markedly from the astronomer's or the philosopher's. But the astronomer and the philosopher do not, actually, conceive of time in the same way. Whence, then, it may be asked, do these concejitious derive their peca/- mr character — that character which entitles them to be called categories? Psychologically considered, the peculiar character of the categories consists chiefly in the three points just mentioned, and by referring to such differ- ences in the processes by which these conceptions are formed we may under- stand the meaning of the customary tests of a category, namely— (1) origi- nality, (2) universality, (3) necessity. These processes, indeed, give token of no new faculty {e.g., so-called reason as the " faculty of intuition"). These processes are rather the application of all the mental faculties to the very conditions of experience itself, with a view intelligently to conceive of such conditions. If, then, the inquiry be raised, why does not the dog — that most intelligent of the lower animals — give evidence of a knowledge of the cate- gories ; why does not it show tokens of having intuitions of space, time, and causation, as original, universal, and necessary cognitions? The answer is not to be found in the animal's lack of some one faculty, considered as a sort of storehouse of the categories. The answer rather is, that the dog is, apjiarontly, quite incapable of performing a considerable number of those intellectual processes which are indispensable to self-understanding. It be- longs to man only to learn to understand his own understanding. The dog cannot reflectively consider the meaning, or reason its way into conclusions as to the laws, of its own mental life. For this it has neither the necessary ' Microcosmus, II., p. 47. NATURE OF THE CATEGORIES 4'Jl imagination nor i-ccognitivo (self-conscious) memory, nor power of sustained thinking and drawing conclusions. Apjiurently, also, the lower animals Lave no intellectual interests or other forms of feeling, and no will to pursue trains of reflective analysis directed ui)on their own mental processes. Nor have wo reason to suppose that they are metaphysical as man is ; and so ca- pable of developing a "reasoned belief " in reality as cognizable and repre- sentable by their own mental i)rocesses. The categories are said to be " original," therefore, because they mark the last results of analytic and reflective thinking in preparation for the process of conception ; no more lies beyond for thought in that particular direction from which we may derive and by which we may exj^lain the nature of sjiace, time, causation, and of the other categories. They are "universal," because all mental processes in the case of all men seem to follow the forms of ex- istence and development summarized in the category itself. They are " necessary," both because they are original and universal, and also because we experience an irremovable limit when we seek to determine our own forms of conception in contradictory directions. All these tests, however, — and especially the latter two — are liable to be misunderstood and misap- plied. For example, it may be said that all men do, and must, perceive and imagine sensuous objects as extended in space, auel so that space may be, and must be, conceived of as the abstract possibility of the existence of extended objects. But that atoms do and must exist as extended in space ; or that there is any extra-mental existence, ready-made, and spread out in three dimensions, which corresponds to tlie conception of sjjace ; or that the conception of space implies any such entity or form of real existence — all these are propositions which cannot be loaded upon psychology as though they were defensible by its scientific study of the phenomena of con- sciousness as such. A fortiori, do similar remarks apply to the category of causation. § 3. A full discussion of the categories would, of course, include others besides those mentioned particularly in this chapter, some of w^hich will be referred to later on. But it is not our intention anywhere to attempt such a discussion. It will be seen, however, that the preceding remarks apply to them all, in so far as they are regarded from the psychological point of view. The so-called logical categories of "being," "relation," etc., for example, have plainly the nature belonging to all this class of conceptions. Intellect- ually considered they are of the most highly abstract order ; but considered as capable of concrete illustration, they admit of the activity of the image- making faculty in an infinitely variable way. Every thing and every thought is, and is related to some other thing and thought. Therefore my concep- tions of being and of relation are peculiarly content-less. And if I ask myself, whence do these conceptions come ? the answer must be, I have been using thought reflectively, with a view to discover its own most fun- damental forms of movement. My intellect has become, so to sj^eak, very highly self-conscious, and has framed a conception of its own ultimate and most unanalyzable modes of behavior. And with the mysterious metaphys- ical faith which belongs to all its operations, it regards these categories, or universal and necessary predicaments, as the ultimate and necessary forms of reality. (( tJtil"^ * 492 SPACE, TIME, AND CAUSATION The psycholog-ical discussion of Space considered as a cate- gory requires little in addition to what has already been said. In our study of the development of perception by the senses it was seen (p. 321 f.) that the XDroblem of lasychology concerns the stages by which, and the conditions on which, the various sen- sation-complexes become organized through intellectual activity into extended objects. It was then said that "for psychology empty space is itself only an abstraction, dependent upon a devel- oped activity of the memory, imagination, and judgment, in con- nection with presentations of sense already acquired." The nature of this development of memor}^, imagination, and judgment has now been considered in detail, and its results have been noted in the largely changed character of the mental processes, the formation of faculty, the elaboration of experience, the construc- tion of science, and indeed in the constituting of self-conscious mind itself. On the subject of space, then, it onl}' remains to trace briefly certain main features in this process of so-called abstraction. It will thus be seen how developing intellect, on the basis of a growing experience with presentations of sense, draws conclusions as to the peculiar nature of the conception answering to this word. \ 4. We resume the discussion substantially at the point at which it was left by Chapters XV. and XVI. Two classes of perceptions, or rather two highly elaborate systems of perceptions, originally belonging to ditferent classes — the visual and the tactual — are now regarded as attained in their development, which is parallel in time ; they sui3j)lement, assist, support, and correct each other. They are so mutually related and developed as that each is readily translatable, within given limits, into terms of the other. They are synthesized (on what condition and under what laws we shall see better later on) in our knowledge of ' ' things ; " but by that same activity of intellect which resulted in this synthesis, we can discriminate again the thing seen from the thing touched. Vague notions of direction, primarily assignable to the or- gans of hearing and smell, as the art of localizing the sensations of these senses is developed in dependence upon experience with sight and touch, gradually become more definite. In this way the general conception of space, as distinguished frovi the sensuous intuition of extended objects, is developed. " Empty," for the sense-organs of nose and ear, is all the space between the object which emits the odor or the sound and our own bodies. Indeed, since the greater number of our experiences with sounds and odors are not accompanied by visual or tactual presentations of the objects which occasion them, the experiences themselves seem to originate out of wholly empty space. As the air above us is empty to touch but not to sight, or the in- terior of our own bodies is empty to sight but not to touch, so is all space empty to smell and to hearing as such. Thus the blind person who should be at the same time deaf and deprived of smell, would necessarily be in- creasingly limited in bis means for forming any conception of "empty DEVELOPMENT OF SPACE-CONCEPTIONS 493 space." To snch a one the world would i)rol)ably have to be conceived of as solid and constricted in area, in a way quite inconceivable by us. But what would empty space be to one— if only such a being could live and de- velop at all — who was deprived of all means of moving his own body, or any of its members, and so of conceiving the existence of emjity space on the basis of the tactual and muscular exiJerience thus gained ! ^ 5. The princiiial conceptions of spatial properties and spatial relations are gained, in the normal and more complete way, by conclusions from ex- jDerieuces with both sight and touch. This statement is true especially, how- ever, of the more purely intellectual elements of the conceptions of this class. On the other hand, the more j^urely image-making work which enters into all such conceijtions may be taken by one person chiefly from one of these forms of sensuous experience, by another person chiefly from some other form of experience. Suppose, for example, we ask. What is, considered psychologically, — that is, as actual mental performance — my conception of such spatial relations as "above," "below," " to the right," "to the left?" It will be found that the more abstract and free from dei^endence on concrete processes of image-making these conceptions have become, the more have the sensuous peculiarities of either of the two leading senses been left out, as it were. To one person, " above " is a certain direction in which the eyes move — this, as the sensuous basis for generalization. When we see one thing above another, then we always perform this complex act of vision by movement of the eyes in one (upward) direction. Our conception, then, may become merely that of a movement with the eyes executed in a certain di- rection — the particular character of the objects seen, as related, by this movement, being abstracted, that is, not being considered. But with another person a certain direction in which the arms are moved may have been the chief sensuous basis of the generalization. If, however, the conception answering to the word "above" is made yet more highly abstract, the particular organ moved in the direction indicated by the word may, in turn, be disregarded. And now the conception of this particular si^atial relation becomes the conception of a relation as indicated by a certain di- rection of movement merely ; and for realizing concretely this conception one may execute or imagine the movement with either eye or hand, as one chooses. In similar manner are our conceptions of certain other sjjatial relations attained. If, however, the conception to be found is like that indicated by the words — "to the right," or "to the left," etc. — movements of the head and trunk, together with reference to the position of hands or arms, are fittest to serve as the sensuous data for generalization ; and faintly executed or imagined movements of the same corai^lex character would probably furnish the needed concrete and lifelike realization of the concep- tion. But the relation of all this process of abstraction to imagination, to the intellect, and to language, is jn-ecisely the same as that which we find in all our thinking.' ' ConsidtT ho-w our pro^rrcssive construction of the conceptions of space, as applied to the body and through it to external thinirs, depend upon what Hiickel and others have called its obvious "isomeric structure." Its parts have " Spiefrelverhaltniss." N. B, the horizons of the different senses differ— touch corresponding chiefly to the dimension of right and left, and sight to those of before and behind. The former horizon has two equal halves ; the latter has two unlike halves which are related as light to darkness, etc. 494 SPACE, TIME, AND CAUSATION I 6. The more elaborate so-called scientific conceptions answering to all possible sjiatial properties and relations are also formed in the manner already essentially explained. Space for the astronomer and for the child is the same ready-made spread-out extension, which might he perceived \x\. all its three dimensions by the senses, and is imagined as a sort of entity having limitless expanse : that is to say, it is the space of sense-presentations and of sensuous imagination. Much less elementary and naive is the sj^ace concep- tion of the philosopher or the psychologist. But through the use of mathe- matics and the peculiar form of ratiocination which it encourages and em- ploys, the scientific conceptions of spatial jjroperties and spatial relations are extended vastly beyond the range of the popular conceptions. Thus it is a higher than the ordinary form of abstraction which resiilts in the formation of those conceptions that geometry employs. The necessity for some special form of language in order to the successful accomplishment of such high tasks of intellect and imagination is met by the i^eculiar symbolism of mathematics. By the exj^ert use of this symbolism whole groups of spatial properties and relations are summarized under a single sign ; and in most reasoning about space-relations the mind really substitutes the mechanical relating of such signs for processes of ratiocination regarded as dealing with objects derived from real experiences of a sensuous oi'igin. But every call to " realize " the meaning of the signs makes it evident that the conceptual processes of which the man of science is capable are essentially the same as those of his fellow who has had no scientific training. I 7. The process of "emptying" space of its concrete filling with ex- tended objects has already been seen to differ with the different senses. The one common experience which most fosters, and indeed compels, this intellectual process is the experience of moving the body about freely, and of assuming different relations in extension to other bodies. This experi- ence is, however, constantly assisted by another, which has substantially the same effect, namely, the experience of seeing and touching, in similar spa- tial relations to the same bodies, any number of different movable bodies. For example, the room is empty, when I can move about in it freely ; and all those extensions are empty, however comi)letely filled in the visual field they may be, through which I or any of my bodily members, or any thing, can be made to move freely. Even if I strike against a chair or table I can myself move it " out of the way ; " and I can see or imagine its place in the system of related objects which the room contains, taken at another time by some other object. Now from the concrete fact nf occupancy by particular fac- tually discernible objects which the spaces have, I may withdraw attention ; thus I may form the conception of the mere possibility, as such, of being occu- pied by some object. Or again I may make a sujoreme generalization, as it were; I may form the conception of the mere possibility of indefn'ile exten- sion and possible orcitpa/icy in every direction. Finally, I may employ the combined activity of constructive imagination in its most highly idealizing form, and of intellect, in order to conceive, as we say, of "pure and indefi- nite space." Such intellectual activity results in a concluding judgment which summarizes a vast amount of thinking in answer to the question, What is Space? But in the effort definitely to realize the meaning of this judgment, one may summon repeatedly to new exertions the image-making DEVELOPMENT OF THE CONCEPTION OF TIME 495 faculty. One may imagine one's self where the remotest fixed star is, anJ more space lies beyond. One may imagine one's self in that beyond ; and there is still more, farther beyond. It was just said that, " tinally," we attain this conception of pure and in- finite space as the result of intellect and imagination dealing with sensu- ous data. These are not, however, final words about space. We have as yet reached only what Hegel was fond of calling the " fignrate conception," an- swering to the term "category." We may then raise again the question, What in space ; what is it renlbf? We may employ in the supreme critical manner all our rational faculties to penetrate the mysteries of the being of the world and of our own mental life ; we may answer : Space is but the form of our own perception and imagination, regarded as intellectual ; space is the way of the human intellect in perceiving and conceiving things. Or we may affirm that space is some kind of extra-mental entity ; and then proceed to discuss the question as to what kind of entity this so-called " space "can l^ossibly be. But in even raising these inquiries we have already again jiassed over from the psychological domain into that of jihilosophy. The mental procedure employed in the development of the conception of Time differs in no essential respects from that em- l^loyed in the development of space-conceptions. There are, how- ever, two subordinate and yet important points of difference : (1) The sensuous data, on the basis of which the mind operates in the development of its conceptions of temporal properties and relations differ in kind from those on which reposes the concep- tion of space. Hearing, rather than touch or sig-ht, has already been declared to be pre-eminently the time-sense. Yet all our sensuous experiences are events ; and all events, as we sig-nifi- cantl}^ say, take place " in time." But, for the reason just men- tioned, (2) the rang-e of the applicability of the category of time is greater than that of space. Phenomena of consciousness, as such, are not extended ; they have not spatial properties and spatial relations. But all changes, whether regarded objec- tively, as changes in the properties and relations of things, or regarded subjectively, under the head of phenomena of con- sciousness, as such, have ^;';;2(?-properties and if//??t'-relations. It has already been suggested that the one property — " time- wise," as it were — which all events are recognized as possessing, is duration. All events endure in greater or less degree ; they are, therefore, measurable as respects their particular degree of duration, when compared with some common standard. The one relation — " time-wise " — of all events is succession. Here, as in the case of space, the development of the more abstract form of conceptions takes place as the result of the combined activity of imagination and intellect upon a basis of presentative experi- ence. Here, also, the presentative experience itself is a mixture 496 SPACE, TIME, AND CAUSATIOIS' of dim perception and obscure but stimulating affective phe- nomena. The general character of the stream of consciousness must, furthermore, be considered as giving conditions to the devel- opment of the conception of time. It is for this very reason that our different states or iields of consciousness are thought of as existing in time-relations, and so as constituting what we figuratively call " a stream." But this stream of conscious- ness, as recognitive memory and intellect develop), becomes more and more a self-cognizing experience — a stream of self- conscious existence, in which all the different parts are not simply actually related in time, but are actually related with an accompanying consciousness of their relation by the subject of all the states which constitute the stream. Moreover, the very character of the stream of consciousness is such as fre- quently to set into bold relief the experiences that are favor- able to the growth of the conception of time. For this stream is always, and necessarily, both discrete and continuous. Its varying content, its flow as a stream, is such as, at one instant, to emphasize the discreteness of different states and their time- relation to each other ; and, at another instant, to emphasize rather the smooth continuous flow, or steady intense pressure, of single states. And here the manner of focusing and redis- tributing attention is all-important. For, as Dr. Ward says,' " attention does not move by hops from one definite spot to an- other, but by alternate diffusion and concentration, like the foot of a snail, which never leaves the surface it is traversing. . . . Thus our perception of a period of time is not comparable to so many terms in a series of finite units, any more than it is to a series of infinitesimals." Some forms of the movement of attention, however, are more favorable to the conception of single events as enduring " throvf/h time," and others are more favorable to the con- ception of the different relations of different events, " in time." Three conceptions of the time-relations of all events may be enumerated ; these are present, past, and future. It is measure- ment and the development of the mathematical use of imagina- tion and intellect directed to the duration of events, which re- sults in the formation of such concei:>tions as longer and shorter, or the definitely so long, in time. The formation of these con- ceptions, and their higher development, as well as the formation of the most abstract conceptions of so-called " empty " time, are all explained iinder psychological principles with which we are already familiar. ' Art. Psychology, Encyc. Brit., p. GC ; conip. Spencer, Psychology, I., p. 403. THE CONCEPTION OF EMPTY TIME 497 ^ 8. The discussion left off at the close of chapter XIV. may be contin- ued by assuming the existence of what is there called a " rudimentary time- consciousness." It is by the same combination of imaging and thinking, in wliich every conceptual process consists, tliat the vague consciousness of a "still-there" is converted into the conception of " the jiresent ;" the con- sciousness of the "now-going" or "just gone," into the concciition of " the past ; " and the consciousness of the " not-yet-there," with its affective accompaniment of expectation or dread, into the conception of " the future." In the earliest development, however, no definite concei^tion of either pres- ent, past, or future, in general ; and no conception of time, at large and equipped, as it were, with its three qualities, is presupposed. In the ordi- nary waking life of any child, the succession of presentations of sense, mingled witli memory-images and with i^rocesses of constructive imagination anticipatory of coming events, flows on at a tolerably uniform rate of suc- cession. Such a complex field of consciousness, then, really contains past, present, and future within itself. But at one time the child so buries itself in the content of some single experience — of peculiar interest, and without marked reference beyond itself — that the preaent is brought to a " sharper point," • as it were, than is customary. At another time, what was just now a presentation of sense, with all its accompaniments of feeling, is chiefly noted as it fades away and becomes 2x1st before the mind's attentive eye. At still another time, the prominent object in the stream of consciousness is the vivid image of what is neither now presentation of sense, nor memory of what has already been ; but is rather the expected or dreaded to be — the future hovering near. But all these forms of experience, however they may receive for a brief time the emphasis of concentrated attention, themselves pass away and dissolve in the relations which bind them as individuals to the contiguous moments of the onflowing stream of couscioiisness. They are themselves fitted, then, to be regarded as enduring psychical events that stand in the relations of present, past, or future to other psychical events. Moreover, as respects their contents simph/, all manner of events may stand in relations which, as respects time-consciousness, are to the intellect the same. At one time it is a i^resentatiou of sense that is present ; at another it is an idea that is present, and sensuous objects are only remembered or an- ticipated. Again, it is feeling that is remembered or anticipated ; or yet again, conation, with its stress of effort, is the present dominant mental fact. Furthermore, certain prevalent states of consciousness, or objects of sense attracting attention, may remain unchanged while the subordinate j^sychic elements or environing objects change in succession. Here the duration of the former class of psychoses constitutes a sort of background on which the succession of the latter records itself. For examj^le : one is thinking continuously of home, while riding in a railway train with the sensuous " fringes of consciousness " fleeting and changing at every second. Or again, one is sitting by the sea and gazing fixedly at the same picture of nature ; but meantime the images come and go as one recalls the past, or builds in anticipation a future cottage on this very spot. Such experiences afford stimulus and material for the intellectual task of framing the conceptions I Zugespitzt, as Ilerbart wonid gay: though such a thing as a "point" in the stream of con- sciousness is a pure abstraction— no reality. 33 498 SPACE, TIME, AND CAUSATION of relations in time. " The before" and " the after," "the long" and " the short," in time are thus conceived of and understood. g 9. The development of time-conceptions cannot proceed far, however, without the assistance of language in summarizing and supporting the activ- ity of intellect and imagination. Recognized objective standards for the measurement of time must also be introduced. " You have already had that l^leasure once to-day;" "you did that same naughty thing yesterday;" " that happened when you were very young " — by such complex judgments do mothers train the time- consciousness of their offspring. Even more ef- fectively is the childish appreciation of intervals and relations of time cul- tivated, when they are given "just so-much-time" to play, to pay a visit, to be shut up in the closet, etc. Nature marks off for all, in common ways, how they shall frame certain conceptions of time. Nevertheless, a day or a night is far from being the same thing for the inhabitant of the equatorial and the polar zones ; and savages have conceptions of time-relations yet cruder than those of relations of space. In biief, all conceptions of the relations of time imply developed activity of imagination and intellect ; this development rests on a self-recognized continuity of consciousness in contrast to changeable objects of j^articular experiences ; and this recognition is bound to memory, which combines " the before " and " the after " with one another, since, in reproducing what was earlier, it holds the consciousness fast to some objectivity or other. Thus, it may be said, that the mind first ijerceives time, then constructs and rules time; and then, as loe shall ^)rese?i;!/j/ see, projects time as an entity and all-ruler of itself.^ Or, as has been well said, the succession of states in the flowing stream of consciousness is first dimly aj^preheuded as a time ; then conceived of as my time, or the time of my experiences ; then, finally, it becomes time in general, from whose necessary form not even the Divine Being can escape. I 10. This last advance in the process of abstraction takes place in the following way. It is far more true of time than of space, that the conception of it as "empty" is a pure fiction. Some space is indeed empty to one form of sense-presentation, which is full to another form of sense-presenta- tion ; but the conception of empty time has no ground in any correspond- ing experience. For — we repeat again — all events are time-enduring ; all experiences, whether of sense-presentation, or imagination, or memory, or thought, are processes in time. The consciousness of these processes is a process in time ; the time-consciousness, however far developed as concep- tion, is itself a process in time. Our conception of empty time is not, then, precisely the correlative of our conception of empty siiace. We have certain experiences, however, where a moderate monotony and todiousness charac- terizes the subjective series ; while some objective standard marks off into regular divisions the time during which the series lasts. At the end of such a period we may sum up the whole experience as so much time (measured by some objective standard) during which ire have thought and felt little or nothing — time, that is, which we cannot remember to have been filled with any ]iarticnlar content of experience. Thus we wake from the dull day- dreaming, from the condition of dolce far niente, from the prolonged loaf- ' Comp. George, Peychologie, p. 283. THE CONCKPTION OF INFINITE TIME 49d ing by the sca-shoro, with the exclamation : " How much more time than I thought (than seems conteut-f ul) has gone ! " The same mental represen- tation is heightened when, on waking after a good night's rest, we perceive by objective signs how much time has lapsed, but can supjily no content from the stores of memory with which to occupy it. A yet higher degree of developed imagination enables us to project into the future the picture of time running on and on, as wo say — so many myriads of years ; and yet we, perhaps, as a stream of consciousness not filling it up with experi- ences like those remembered from our i:)ast. In this way a vague conception of mere time, of time that is simply time, and content-less, may be framed. It is, of course, a psychological fiction, and the very reverse of the psycho- logical reality, to regard such empty time as though it were either the actual or the logical />ri«s of our time-experience. The actual mental process which answers to the words "infinite time," is a still more abstract and purely negative form of concei:)tion. For here the thought-element of the process consists in judging that vo end is to be predicated of this time ; while the element of imagination consists in repeat- edly ideating some — as objectively measured — immense stretch of time ; and then another, and yet another, and so on. The resulting conception (?) of infinite time is a final return to negative judgment, with vague aflfective accompaniments of exhaustion, impoteney, and, perhaps, also incomprehen- sible sublimity, etc. Indeed, what is called the coucejition of the " infinite," whether as applied to space or to time, is very largely a semi-;esthetical feeling, or vague sentiment, as it were. ^ 11. It is scarcely necessary to observe again the very powerful influence which feeling has over all our conceptions of time. How time " gallops with the thief to the gallows," and "stays still "with the lawyer during vacation, poets and philosophers have not been the only ones to notice. Science even is obliged to recognize the influence of feeling on all its most carefully guarded estimates of time. Indeed, without the means of check- ing and limiting these eflfects by increased accuracy in the application of objective standards, such a thing as modern science could scarcely exist at all. In dependence npon conceptions of space and time, certain other subordinate conceptions undergo a corresponding- devel- opment. Most important among these are the conceptions of Motion and Number. Both these conceptions involve both space and time. Sensations and primary perceptions of motion are among the earliest products of the activity of the psycho- physical organism ; without them it is not simply true that in- tellectual advance is impossible ; it is rather true that existence itself is impossible. But for the development of the more defi- nite and complex conceptions of motion — of the direction, amount, and time-rate of change of place — both space-conscious- ness and time-consciousness must advance with nearly equal step. Number, again, is a conception which requires for its de- velopment the higher activities of both imagination and intellect ; 500 SPACE, TIME, AND CAUSATION and of these faculties as dealing with both space-relations and time-relations. The one essential process here is — as we have alread}" remarked (p. 475) — counting-. What is counted, however, must be regarded as separable, discrete, in space and time. One thing is in this place, and the second thing is contiguous to it in space ; and so on. Or, this event happens at this moment of time, and the other and second event at another moment of time ; and so on. Memory and imagination must bind together every spatial series and every temporal series ; and both these faculties act in time. ^ 12. According to the veiy interesting view of Trendelenburg,' motion is a sort of common vehicle for all our conceptions of space and time. There is a certain truth in this view. On the other hand, it is also time that the conception of motion itself implies a certain development of the conceptions of both space and time. ' ' Direction " of motion is conceived of only as a generalization from our experiences of bodies changing their spatial relations to other bodies, in the succession of time. All our conceptions of the rela- tive amounts of motion — and this includes all our standards for measure- ment of physical changes, and all our objective standards for measuring psychical events — depend on conceptions of both space and time. With this is, of course, connected the question of time-rate. In considering the develoj^ment of genuine conceptions of number, as distinguished from sensuous and intuitive estimates of gross amount (see p. 299), it is interesting to notice how the mind proceeds.- As we measure, we count. In the simpler forms of measurement, we lay down a rule, repeatedly, beside the thing to be measured ; or we pace it off; or we ajiply our fingers or fore-arms to it, or mark it off with the eye. Every time we rej^eat the application of the standard of measurement, we note down (either mentally, or with chalk or pencil) a imit ; and then we synthesize, and judge " so many " to be the result. In each of these processes, some development of both classes of conceptions, those of spatial properties and relations, and those of duration and succession in time, are plainly involved. It has long been customary for psj^chology and philosophy to treat the Conception of Causation as though it were a simple and unanalyzable conception, like the conception of time or of space — a " category," in the sense in which they are categories. The bearing of this mistake upon one's theory of knowledge and iipon one's i^hilosophy of ethics docs not, of course, concern ' Loffische Unterpuchungen, I., chaps, v. and viii. " Thin distinction tnay be illustrated by the way in which adult experience often vacillates be- tween more or less vuKue impressions of number and definite acts of countin<:. For example, the clock has struck four times, and 1 have heard but have not counted. The terminal condition of con- sciousness fliffcrs, in case the clock has struck only once, from that induced by two strokes, or by ten strokes, of the same clock. By immediate though trained self-consciousness I can analyze this terminal stiito. and then know hoxc man;/ times the clock has struck. Or, suppose I have kept count of the strokes ; here the process is plain. Or both : suppose I began to count— say " four,"' with the impression, derived from my complex of sonnd-conscioosuess, that the clock had already struck three times, etc. CONCRETE VIEW OF CAUSATION 501 US here. But its refutation ou psycholog-ical grounds is in- dubitable. Let it be borne in mind, however, that the psycho- logical question is not. What is it to be a cause ? or, Are things really causally related ? but rather, AVhat are the actual proc- esses in consciousness which answer to the so-called conception of cause ; and how^ do we decelop this conception ? Now, the conception which answers to the term causation is, on analysis, actually found to be a very complex conception. Causation is, psychologically considered, not so much a single category as it is significant of conclusions that involve the foundation and mental grouping together of a number of con- ceptions, each one of which is often, separately considered, called a category. By this it is not meant simply that differ- ent minds concretely realize this concei^tion in widely different ways, as is the case with the conceptions of space and time. On the contrary, so far as image-making activity enters into the conception of causation, the form of such activity is pretty strictly alike for all individuals. And this common form of im- aging the so-called category of cause is instructive, as respects the nature and origin of the conception itself. Now, what we do all actually experience in trying to get a " life-like idea " of the meaning of our judgment — "A is the cause of B," is Die process of mentally representing our own experience, xohenemv self-conscious conation, ivith its feeling of effort, is followed hy ohserced changes in our presentations of sense, in a regular icay. That is to say, it is consciousness of the sequence of willing, saturated — as it is — with its accompanying sensations and feelings of both jDcriph- eral and central origin, which is evoked by the wish to realize the meaning of the word " cause." And, in truth, no other w^ay can be found of accomplishing the wish to make life-like this particular idea. On the contrary, we have already remarked in what a variety of waj's the relations of space may be imaged. But, if the imaginative and sensuous basis of the conception of causation is comparatively simple and uniform, its more purely intellectual elements are exceedingly complex. To test this, suppose we endeavor to express in separate judgments the conception we have formed of causation, as such. If causation were a genuine category, as space and time are categories, this would be impossible. Of space and time we cannot say I judge that "to be space " or " to be time," is — etc. ; that is to say, we can neither describe nor define space and time bj^ other notions. But we may say (whether perfectly correctly or not, we do not now inquire), I judge that, " to be a cause," is for one being to act in such a way as that a change in some other being follows. 502 SPACE, TIME, AND CAUSATION the latter occurring' in dependence upon the former for its ex- planation or gTOund. But what a nest of complex conceiitions is involved in such a judgment as this ! Some of them, at least, are much more nearly fundamental and simple than is the concep- tion of cause. For example, the conceptions of Being, Action, Relation, Time, and Reason or Ground, are all plainly involved in the foregoing- judgment. Others, such as Unity, Identity, and even contiguity in space, and priority in time, seem also to be involved. But, as Dr. Ward ^ has correctly maintained : " Action is a simpler notion than causation and inexplicable by it." Now, of course, action, without a being that acts, is an absurdity. Being, too, then, would seem a simpler notion than causation. Moreover, Relation (whether causal, or merely in space or in time) is also a simpler notion than that of causation. Nor will it do to say that the notion of " standing in the relation of Reason or Ground " is identical with that very simple and unanalyzable notion of causation which we seek ; for we have already seen that this notion is itself abstracted from the form of intellectual movement in all ratiocination. Moreover it applies to relations between conclusions and their major and minor premises, where- as the relation of causation applies to changes in real beings. The notions of ground, and dependence on ground, are then also simpler and more fundamental than the conception of cau- sation. The fact is that, in trying to account for the origin and devel- opment of the so-called category of causation we have to draw, as it were, upon all the areas of experience. The conception arises and develops as the resultant of all our efforts to explain experience. The only thing distinctively categorical (that is, origi- nal, universal, and necessary) about the conception of causation is Just this 7iatlve and essential impulse of intellect to eo'plain. Explain ! and yet further explain ! — this is, indeed, the law of our develop- ment as reasoning beings. It is our experience with ourselves as active and passive, an experience that is most immediate and most interesting, which offers itself as an analogy fit for all explanation. When we act, by way of conscious conation and muscular effort, then changed presentations of sense follow ; and vice versa, when certain presentations of sense indicative of cer- tain relations of other beings to us occur, then %oe suffer certain conspicuous changes in the content of consciousness. It is the projection 3 ; by Sully, iii., pp. 1 and 1()7. On the psychological development of Cau- sation, see especially the article of Ward, already referred to, Encyc. Brit., xx., p. 82 f. Hoffding : Psychology, v., 4. Porter: The Human Intellect, p. 5(59 f. Venn: Empirical Logic, chap. ii. Further philosophical discussion of these topics has an almost unlimited bibliography. ] 1 Comp. Lipps, Gnmdtatsachen d. Seelenlebens, p. 433. CHAPTER XXII. THE KNOWLEDGE OP THINGS AND THE KNOWLEDGE OF SELF The complex resultant, as it were, of all forms of mental de- velopment, considered cliiefly on tlie side of intellection and logical conclusion, is called " Cog-nition " or " Knowledge." But knowledge may be regarded, from tlie psj^cliological point of view, as either a process or a product. Wlien, however, we speak of knowledge as " product," we enact a fiction in speech with which we have already become sufficiently familiar. What is really only a process is described as a mental entity. Since we may condense into an almost instantaneous process, into a brief moment of thoughtful perception or familiar conclusion, stated in a verbal proposition, the results of long processes of ob- servation, inquiry, and reasoning, we may call such a condensed process the product of knowledge. It is only as a complex psy- chosis, a state of consciousness resultant from the combined activity of various developed so-called faculties, however, that scientific psychology studies the phenomena of cognition. We are forced to recognize, at the outset, the fact that all our psychological inquiry, as thus far conducted, has assumed the existence and the validity of knowledge. We have been building up a science of psychology on the basis of an assumed knowledge of certain facts and laws. But the present object of special psychological investigation is knowledge itself ; we now seek to know what knowledge is. As says Professor James : ' " The relation of knowing is the most mysterious thing in the world. . . . Knowledge becomes for him (the psychologist) an ultimate relation that must be admitted, whether it be ex- plained or not, just like difference or resemblance, which no one seeks to explain." We may partially agree with some sucli statement as the foregoing ; but we cannot sym]iatliize with an>' effort to discharge psychology from the obligation to treat those psychoses, or complex mental ])rocesses, which deserv(> the name of knowledge, just as all other psychoses are to be ' The Principles of Psychology, I., p. 21G. COGNITIVE STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS 509 treated. This treatment involves the analysis of knowledge into its more elementary processes, and the tracing- of its gene- sis and development under the general conditions of all mental life. Two important general considerations — almost uniformly overlooked b^* psychologists — concern the scientific description of cognitive states of consciousness : (1) They are reached as the result of a course of development. From the psychological point of view knowledge is a developy/ient. It has a growth and a descriptive history of such growth. Such a statement applies, not simply or chiefly to the evolution of the higher stages or more elaborate forms of knowledge, but to all knowledge and to the very faculty of knowledge as such. Human mental life does not begin with knowledge ; it not only grows in knowl- edge, when knowledge is once attained, but it grows into knowl- edge only when certain conditions are fulfilled. The stages and conditions of this development may be made the subjects of scientific investigation. (2) This particular deceJop>me7it, which we call " knowledge" involves all the activities of the mind. It involves them all, in a develoj^ed form of exercise, and in a cer- tain natural harmony of their coetaneous action. To be sure, the terms we employ lay emphasis chiefly on one of the three fundamental aspects of mental life, to the relative exclusion of the other two ; on that account it is quite too frequently as- sumed that feeling and willing are not necessary and integral processes in knowledge, but that knowledge is an afi'air of intellect alone. This, however, is not true. Were man not a being of so peculiar aftective and conative consciousness, and were not the so-called faculties of feeling and willing devel- oped in some sort ^>(^ Comp. BallauflE : Elemente d. Peychologie, p. 189 f. THE BELIEF IX REALITY 513 plienomena—tLinking-, feeling, or Avilling- — to Avliicli it belongs. To si)eak of it as d thought, a feeling, d volition, would seem to imply the possibility of comparing it with other particular thoughts, feelings, or volitions. And yet it is necessary for psychology to recognize its presence, while to philosophy it af- fords problems for seemingly endless debate. We shall speak of this form of mental procedure as a Belief in Reality ; and shall regard it as more nearly akin to feeling than to either thinking or willing. There can be no doubt of the fact that knowledge involves belief in reality ; and it is just this which chiedy distinguishes knowledge from mere imagining, remembering, or thinking, as such. "When we hioio any object, it is not merely as " object " for the knowing process, but as a " being " existing in some state, that we know it. When the belief or conviction attaching itself, as it were, to the reality of the being becomes sufficiently clear and strong, then one may say : I know the object ; and may say this with an emphasis bearing some proportion to the strength of the belief. If, then, it were our purpose to treat of knowledge philosophically, we might go on to show how Knowledge and Being are necessary correlates ; and to examine critically the nature of knowledge and the conception of reality in order to discover how each implies and validates the other. But the merel}^ j^sychological treatment of knowledge leads us to note how knowledge differs from all other more partial and individual psychical processes, in that it not only involves them all, but also involves this fundamental belief in reality'. The specific character of this belief, in. contrast with other beliefs, may be brought out by calling it " metaphysical." And since it is not a particular acquired belief, but belongs to the very nat- ure of knowledge, as such, it may be called " rational " and in- stinctive. In brief, then, vAtliout litis 7'ational and yet instiiic- tive (f) metaphysical belief, psychological analysis shoics that I'noicledge is irnpossihle ; but the nature of that belief which is necessary to all cognition, will be better understood in the light of the following propositions : (1) All intense and vivid experiences tend to evoke and con- firm the belief in reality which characterizes knowledge.^ As such belief itself grows clear and strong, the mind passes over, as it were, from states of opinion {mere " belief," in the more popular meaning of the word) or thinking, into states of knowl- edge. Whatever we sense, imagine, think, or even — within cer- tain limits — feel, or will, intensely, in the reality of that do we 1 On this point corap. James : The Principles of Psychology, 11., p. 293 f. 33 514 THE KNOWLEDGE OF THINGS AND OF SELF tend to believe. (2) This metapliysical belief is called into consciousness as the result, particularly, of inquiry or doubt. But the denial of the real existence of any object, imagined or thought, implies knowledge and its characteristic belief as truly as affirmation does. This form of mentality might then be called a " belief i?i respect of reality," rather than a " belief i?i reality." (3) If we speak of this belief as " instinctive " (with a confessedly loose use of that word), it is with the intention to note the following- facts : (a) The belief appears in the develop- ment of mental life unaccompanied by any intelligent recogni- tion of its own existence or of the end it serves ; {h) it belongs to the psychical species, man, as necessarily entering into all his hioicing functions ; {c) it cannot be explained as the result of the development of the individual, but is rather necessary to be assumed as itself affording, in part, the explanation of the de- velopment of all knowledge. When, on the other hand, this belief is spoken of as " rational," it is meant to emphasize the peculiar connection which it sustains to all the higher develojD- ment of cognition in man. (4) Inasmuch as knowledge is the resultant of all the funda- mental psychical activities of man — a matter of feeling and will as well as of intellection — it is not strange that the belief which helps to constitute knowledge should itself be regarded as a forthputting of intellect or of will, as well as an affair of feeling. And, indeed, belief in reality takes hold on all the psychical nature of man. What is believed to be real (and so said to be known) is, indeed, mainly a matter of intellection ; but it is also a matter of both feeling and will. In respect of all the higher intellectual, a3sthetical, ethical, and religious realities, feeling and choice largely determine knowledge through the depend- ence of this belief upon them. Yet we have spoken of this belief as feeling, not because it is a special form of affective phenomena, but because, as " conviction " — having that warmth of coloring which the word implies — it ma}' be regarded as a sort of universal affective accompaniment of the inteUcctual and vol- tmtary aspects of all knowledge. Finally (5), this belief in reality attaches itself in different degrees, as it were, to the different acts of knowledge and to the different objects of knowledge. All inferential knowledge involves faith in the thinking faculty itself — the indestructible self-confidence of reason. But in all immediate knowledge— whether of perception by the senses or of self-consciousness — this belief cannot be said itself to rest on grounds. It is an ultimate, unanalyzablo, inexplicable fact — it- self the guarantee of all such knowledge as does rest on grounds. THE BELIEF IX IIKALITY 515 In maintaining that a metaphysical faith lies at the basin of all the existence and development of human knowledge, we only state afacfds seie/itifc ps//ch(jl()gyf/ids it, and is obliged to leave, it for pidlosopliy — if possible — to cplain. I 5. As Sully ' lias said : " Psychology requires a single term to denote all varieties of assurance fi'om mere conjecture up to reasoned certainty, and the word belief, in English psychology at least, has come to be used in this sense." The use of this word, then, is not pecidiar to our view of the nature of knowledge. But it may be asked, "Is not knowledge, when attained, exclusive of mere belief ; " and, " Do we not opi^ose knowledge to belief, rather than recognize belief as necessary to knowledge ? " Such inferences or objects of imagination as do not indubitably connect themselves with our acts of knowledge may indeed be popularly spoken of as " believed " rather than "known." But that "belief in respect of the reality "of the object — whether this object be perceived, imagined, or thought — is necessary to knowledge, all our ordinary language also makes clear. In common speech, knoidedje is cliaracterized by an immediate c07iviction tcith respect to real beings and their relations to each other. The dependence of knowledge on intensity and vividness of experience, and the tendency to believe in the reality of all objects which are presented or inferred with intensity and vividness, may be illustrated variously. Thus, if men are in doubt as to what the " real " sense-qualities of objects are, their actual color, feel, taste, smell, etc., they demand that they shall be affected by these objects with unmistakable sensations of the required order. On the contrary, what they cannot recall in the form of a "life-like" memory- image, that they are in doubt about, as to whether they know it by memory as it really was. The difficulty of producing at will a life-like iniaginaiy picture of any alleged entity, or relation, always stands in the way of our at- taining a so-called knowledge of such being or relation. This result applies even to hypothetical entities like atoms, or luminiferous ether, and to such spatial relations of atoms as the chemistry of the atomic constitution of bodies, or the physiology of the " iDsychic nerve-cells," invites us to imagine. But whatever imagination brings into consciousness in a vivid and life-like way, that all men are inclined to believe to be real, and to affirm knowledge of, in a convincing way. Not only are illusions and hallucina- tions occasioned in tliis way ; but knowledge, with its belief in respect of reality, is determined in this way. The same truth is further illustrated by the physical and mental empha- sis given to propositions that put our knowledge into the form of language. Note with what bodily warmth men " lay it down" that the truth is thus and so. What //l»07/-— especially if it is questioned by another, or if it has been gained by myself after inquiry and doiiht— that I assert vifh emphasis. Gest- ures even are psychologically significant here ; when telling what they know, men commonly bring down the fist upon the table, or stamp the foot upon the ground, or pounce upon the very words of their proposition. And upon what particular part of the proposition do they lay the emphasis expressive of that » The Human Mind, I., p. 4S3. 516 THE KNOWLEDGE OF THINGS AND OF SELF belief wliich is an integral part of knowledge? Upon the copula ("It /s a jaguar and not a tiger ") if it be a question of afHrmative or negative judg- ment ; but upon the noun ("it's ajagunr and not a tiger") if it be a ques- tion of giving a correct name ; and upon the adjective or the preposition, if it be a question of an actual quality or a real relation. But all such empha- sis, wherever placed, shows how belief, as a sort of " feeling allied to the emotions," must accompany thought in order, by thinking, to attain knowl- edge. Nor can it be maintained that in science and jjliilosophy " jjure thought" is responsible for knowledge to the exclusion of all belief. The man of science and the philosopher, as truly as the jjolitician, the artist, or the woman, has to unite the warm conviction of reality with his ratiocination in order to beget the product of knowledge. Witness the heat of assertion with which contested propositions are made, or the fine scorn shoWn when, in the name of " exact " knowledge, he " coolly " (?) refuses to discuss so self- evident a matter. g 6, Psychologists have too often confused inquiry as to the nature of that belief which is necessary to knowledge, with inquiry as to its gen- eral dependence upon the varying kinds and intensities of the three funda- mental forms of psychoses. S^^ch belief has its intellectual conditions and its voluntary conditions ; it is also undoubtedly greatly influenced by various feelings, as, for example, by our fears, and hoiies, our expectations, interests, desires, and prejudices. But it by no means follows that the be- lief itself is a " compound of three factors — intellectual representation, feel- ing, and active impulse."' '■'■\ feel perfectly sure" is, in popular speech, strictly equivalent to the declaration, " I ktioio" whenever the alleged knowl- edge can be thought of as called in question or subjected to doubt. Hume, Bagehot, and — in a somewhat vacillating way — James, and others, have as- signed this belief to the life of feeling. " In its inner nature," says the last of these three, " belief, or the sense of reality, is a sort of feeling more allied to the emotions than to anything else." Mr. Bagehot, indeed, speaks of the " emotion of conviction" as equivalent to this belief. Other writers call our attention to the dependence of such belief on imagination. The belief is conditioned upon imagination, but it is not an act of imagination. The pain which Balzac, when a boy, could produce in any jjart of his own body through which he pictured himself as thrusting his penknife, was no less real because it owed its origin to an act of imagination. Belief in respect of reality is favored by intense and life-like imagination, and such belief is necessary to knowledge ; but the belief, as such, is rather of the nature of feeling than of either thought or imagination. The principal Kinds of Knowledge may be distinguished by adopting- either one of two points of view: we may consider either (1) the processes of consciousness, through which knowl- edge is chiefly attained ; or (2) the classes of objects known in and l)y the processes. Thus knowledge is either Immediate or Inferential : or else it is the knowledge of Things or the knowl- edge of Self. The former division lays emphasis on the ques- > So Solly : The Homau Mind, I., p. 485. IMMEDIATE AND INFERENTIAL KNOWLEDGE 517 tion, How do I know ? the latter, on the question, What do I know ? But on subdividing" immediate knowledge into Percep- tion and Self-consciousness, both principles of division are recognized ; for perception may be understood as the immediate knowledge of things, and self-consciousness is the immediate knowledge of self. Immediate knowledge and inferential knowledge differ, as forms of knowledge, in an important way ; because they lay em- phasis upon the ijredoniinance of ditierent activities of the mind. In the former that " envisagement," or awareness of the object face to face, as it were, Avhich developed consciousness attains, is the characteristic of knowledge. In the latter it is the faculty of thought, or especially the logical drawing of conclusions, Avhich bring-s about the state of conviction when knowledge is attained. But there is no perception so immediate that the act is not a process in time ; or so much of a complete " envisagement " that judgment does not enter into it. On the other hand, the most complicated and length}^ processes of reasoning cannot result in k'tiowledye, however logically conducted they may be, unless they start from immediate perception and self-consciousness, and sup- port themselves at every stei? on such immediacy, with the con- viction of reality obtaining all the way through. In imme- diate knowledge, the object is present as some Thing known, or as some state of the Self known ; in inferential knowledge the existence of some object is concluded (known by the process of logical thinking) as having its " ground " or " reason " in other inferential knowledge ; or — finally — in immediate knowledge. The sphere of immediate knowledge is thus covered by what we envisage in sense - perception or in self - consciousness ; the sphere of inferential knowledge includes all that, concerning the being and relations of things and minds, which Ave can connect, under the principle of sufficient reason, with any immediate knowledge. I 7. The more special psychology of these two kiiuls of knowledge has ah-eady been treated at considerable length ; but the relation to them both of that " belief in respect of reality " which enters into all knowledge de- serves some further notice at this point. Plainly, our "metaphysical" be- lief does not stand in precisely the same relation to inferential knowledge and to immediate knowledge. With respect to the beings and relations which I know infcrentially, an appeal to reasons is always considered jus- tifiable. For example, I am always liable to be asked : How do you know that the medulla oblongata is the reflex and automatic center connected with the vaso-motor and resi)iratory functions ; or that the region about the fis- sure of Eolaudo is the sensory-motor cerebral region for the control of the 618 THE KNOWLEDGE OF THINGS AND OF SELF upi^er and lower limbs ? Or again : How do you Tcnow that it rained last night ; or that it is colder to-day than it was a year ago ; or that an attempt has been made to assassinate the Czar of Russia ? In all such cases a ques- tion recognizes the fundamental fact that it is necessary to the very life of the intellect for conviction to justify itself by giving the grounds on which it rests. But the grounds on which the conviction rests are reason- able only if they are such grounds as justify the conclusion when logically considered. Otherwise one must say : I feel pretty sure, or very sure, but I do not positively know ; and this is equivalent to saying, I cannot validate the concluding proposition as inferential knowledge. We do, indeed, argue such questions as this: "Is yonder form that of a child or a man?" or, " Was it our friend X, or the newly arrived stranger Y, who passed us on the street just now? " Suppose, however, that in the course of any argument the facts of im- mediate knowledge are found to be the same in the minds of both parties to the dispute, while one holds that these facts constitute " a sufficient reason " for a certain conclusion, but the other draws an opposite conclusion. Then the meaning of the question. How do you hww? is changed. Each party to the dispute begins to suspect the other's "conviction " of being " irrational," of reposing on no "sufficient grounds ; " or of being feigned, or prejudiced, in fact. Claims may, indeed, be set up to hiow things, which are only inferen- tially known in the ordinary working of human minds, by some mysterious so-called "tact," "intuition," or "insight." Such claims are even now being extended over the vague and doubtful realm of clairvoyance, telepathy, etc. On the other hand, we meet to-day everywhere with the psychologically inter- esting phenomenon of distrust of all alleged knowledge, accompanied by the greatest confidence in the power of the intellect to criticise negatively its own operations. Thus men abound who, like the Count Kostia whom Cher- buliez depicts, " expend much logic to demonstrate that there is no such thing as logic, either in nature or in man" — sceptics that " pass their lives reasoning against reason." The psychological lesson from all this is to the effect that so-called knowledge from inference is a matter of infinitely varied degrees and shades ; and that it is subjectively dependent upon the amount and charac- ter of the belief in reality which enters into it. Xot by bare ratiocination but by the manifold life of Jcnowledge do ice reach into and lyrogressively conq"f.r the actual world of beings and events. Let us suppose, however, that inquiry regarding the reality of some object of immediate sense-iiercejition has been reduced to its ultimate terms ('•ultimate," that is, psychologically consid- ered). For example, let the question whether yonder form is that of a man or a child, be narrowed down to this : IToin do I know that the object which I, distinctly and persistently, now perceive thus and so, is really as I perceive it ? Doubtless, in any such case of dispute we should, if possible, appeal to the bystanders. If common consent wore on our side, we should feel the conviction that our knowledge was immediate and indubitable, in a degree confirmed. This appeal itself would, however, at most establish by infer- ence what appeared to us to be more certain than anything that inference could establish. But here, what has been sliown to be true with respect to the amount of judgment, and even of condensed syllogistic reasoning, which DISTINCTION BETWEEN SELF AND THINGS 519 enters iuto our complex developed acts of iierception, must be recalled. In the last resort, however, we may describe our experience in some such terms as follow : "At any rate, so I here and now see, or feel, this object to be. However all tlie rest of the world may know it, and whether they know it at all or not, I now certainly know it to be, for me, thus and so." We should then seem to ourselves to have reached an ultimately certain knowl- edge. In general, the belief in the reality of the object ^^ immediateh/''' knoini is an irresistible conviction, resting on no grounds oidside of itself ; it is itsef MicrocosmuB, I,, p. 250. .026 THE KNOWLEDGE OF TIIIXGS AND OF SELF resisting" things, etc. ; but it excludes from this Ego (as non-Ego) everything which does not feel with it, and follow its movable- ness, and manifest itself, as it were, as organically connected with it.' The individual acts of discrimination between the bodily self and the other body, that is not-self, now themselves become the objects of memory, imagination, and generalization. Thus a conception of ihe Self, that is w^yself, is framed by processes of thinking, and to it a name — the name that distinguishes me from other bodies — is given. In such a process of determining the earliest concei^tion of the Self, with its name, the inter- course of the individual with others of his race is peculiarly important. The child does not name himself ; he is given a name, and thus more perfectly defined, as an object, to himself, in a manner corresponding to that of all other things by their names. As related to, and yet contrasted with, other selves — that is, bodies that are like his own to external perception but are not interiorly felt, as it were — the early concei^tions of self become further developed. But at this stage, and even far ear- lier, another modified conception of the Ego shows signs of being in process of formation. I 13. It is not, of course, solely upon tlie marked and abrupt changes of states from general objective to general subjective tone of consciousness that the earliest conception of Self as sentient and movable body is based. In this work of " bipartition " the total melange of bodily feelings — or sensa- tions that are ill localized, confused, and mixed — takes an important part (comp. p. 334 f.). These form a sort of background or i^latform of conscious- ness on which the particular objects of sense-presentation define themselves. Nor is it in the earlier stages alone of the development of self-knowledge that the somewhat vagi;e conception of ourselves as a remembered and familiar comi)lex of bodily feelings is prominent. With the child who has attained any vivid notion of his self-hood, it is the feeling, moving body that rejire- sents " the self ;" and his most abstract conception of his own being does not got far beyond vague generalizations, warm with emotion, upon the basis of bodily experiences. If this earliest form of representation of the Ego could speak, and could use the abstract language of philosophy, it would an- nounce itself thus: " What is here and nou^ that aml."^ In this regard the child would agree with the philosopher whenever the latter tries to realize his highest conception of the self. But with the child, " What-is- here-and-now " — " that-which-am-I " — is chiefly what it can put its hand upon, of its own body ; or what it fools within its own thoracic or abdominal cavities. The author once pressed a bright little girl of five years old to toll him what she meant by the " I " tliat "loved papa; " in the last analysis tlie solution of the puzzle was announced in the following sentence : " Oh, ' Comp. George : Lehrbucli d. Psychologie, p. 229 f. *C'oinp. Uorwicz : Pnycholopisclic Aualyscii, ii., p. 144. THE CONCEPTION OF SELF 627 now I know ; it is my arms, because I ling liim with thorn ; and my lijis, be- cause I kiss liim witli them." But do wo not find the Apostle shrinking back from the vague and shadowy conception of an " iinclothed " (ov dis- embodied) iv/o.^ Indeed the literature of many ])eoples — as, for examjile, of the ancient Hebrews — raises the question whether they had, in general, reached the conception of a soul as sei)arable from the sentient bodily or- ganism. In this discussion certain cases of mental aberration and so called double consciousness are of no little significance. The beginnings of similar ab- normal conditions are laid in the experience of all of us whenever we are called upon to say : " I feel queer to-day ; " or, "I do not feel a bit like myself to-day," etc. Here, plainly, the Self that "feels queer," or "feels unlike " the remembered self, is the sentient bodily organism ; and it is im- plied that a certain standard of bodily feelings, derived by memory and thought from past exj^erience, is to be recognized as constituting the "nor- mal self." The inmate of the mad-house who believes himself to have been " changed," and to have become another than his former self, often bases this insane belief largely upon marked changes in the dominating mixture of bodily feelings. Or if such changes are distinguishable only in certain jjarts of the body, Jie may be, to his own jvulgment, the same self, but his head has been changed for that of some animal ; his abdomen has been converted into glass, or some like change in some other bodily member has taken place. Few intellects, if any, could bear the strain of a marked and continued aberration of those bodily feelings most intimately connected with the self ; judgment is almost sure, sooner or later, to follow their guid- ance, and — as we so significantly say — " the mind gives way." Psychology could easily arrange a continuous series of cases from those slight and easily corrected hallucinations of self which all experience, through the temporary but involuntary hallucinations of sleep, to the most persistent and extreme insane disturbances of self-conscioirsness. In all such cases, however, it should not be forgotten that there is a rery great difference between a certain metamorphosis of personalitif and a complete perversion or suppression of so- called natural self -consciousness. The former is common enough ; the latter involves the loss of all mind, properly so called. For, as Eichet has said : " In experiments in hypnotic suggestion we can abolish and metamorjihose the personality of the subject without thereby sui^iiressing his Ego ; and this proves that the two things are distinct." In fact, all activity of imagination, in constructing experience for ourselves or in acting the part of others, ac- complishes this metamorphosis to a greater or less extent. But, as says another author : ' "The formation of an Ego, as the center and subject of all psychic phenomena, is not a conventional affair ; it is a natural phenom- enon which is realized in the case of all men." The Conception of Self develops further in two directions which arc, to a certain extent, mutnally helpful and interdepen- dent, and yet are also, in certain other respects, partiallj^ indepen- dent and even opposed. One of these is an increasing complexity 1 Binet, Psychologie du Raieonnement, p. 1C2. 528 THE KNOWLEDGE OF THINGS AND OF SELF of the conception considered as involving a variety of external and relatively adventitious particulars ; the other is an increasing abstractness of the conception, considered as a mere, or " pure," Subject of all the states of consciousness. With the multitude of men the knowledge of self is chiefly a matter of the descriptive history of their present and jjast environment, as it were, re- garded as somehow absorbed into, or helping to constitute, the familiar and recognizable picture answering to the words — " I myself." Hence, in part, the origin of that psychologically in- teresting sense of importance which becomes attached to one's name, ancestry, date and place of birth, residence and relatives, business and recreations, etc. — all of which fill in the otherwise bare conception of taho, and tvhaf manner of one, I am. Let but these things be dropped out of memory beyond the possibility of recall (as happens in cases of general paralysis, for example, or of extreme dotage), and self-consciousness relapses into an infantile, an almost animal, stage. It is, therefore, difficult or impossible to separate, in the conception of Self, that which we have had experience of as our environment from that which we have become in the midst, and so largely through the influence of, this same environment. In connection with this more external development of self- knowledge the conception of Self as the permanent Subject of psychical States is in process of formation. The whole course of definitively intellectual growth renders the bodily feelings less pre-eminent, not to say overpowering, as an essential con- dition of such growth. The j^rocesses of ideation, of thought, and of the more complex and refined forms of feeling, do not ad- mit of definite localization, or even of that obscure attribution to the bodily self which the intra-organic sensibilities require. Yet all these so-called intellectual activities not only have their objective reference but also their aspect of feeling ; they are felt thoughts, etc. On the other hand, it belongs to the very nature of knowledge, as a development attained by intellectual life, to involve the belief in reality. A " Thing " as known is not a mere bundle of sensations, images, and inferences ; it is a be- ing to which attributes are ascribed. Every one's primary bod- ily self therefore becomes self-known as such a " Thing-being," the subject of passive and active experiences of a peculiar kind. But consciously discriminated processes of ideation, thought, and non-sensuous feelings, can no more float mid-air, as mere ob- jective pictures, than can the coarser and more sensuous bodily self-feelings. It is natural and inevitable, then, that the intellect should form the conception of a Self, which is a real being, a THE SENTIENT BODILY SELF 529 subject also of all such iion-l)0(lily states. This is rendered ijos. sible by the same kind of abstraction, freeing? of ideas, compar- ison, thinkiu.c:, and naming, which renders possible the knowl- edg"e of things. Such consciousness, in the form of a concei^tion of being- a " mind," or " soul " — a real subject of psychical iiroc- esses — is at first vague and titful ; nor does it ever imply any special faculty for its attainment. It is, however, a necessary development, to some extent, of all human intellectual life. § 14. From the very first the more interior sense-consciousness of the bodily self is accompanied, and supported or corrected, by external percej^- tion, memoiy, and thought, with reference to the character and history of such self. The child forms a picture by perception of himself, as the eye and the hand exjjlore one member after another; and as the whole visible body appears in a mirror, or is known by synthesis of all the appropriate skin- and muscle-sensations. Marked and abrupt changes in this picture by external perception produce a shock to, and sometimes an important modi- fication of, the consciousness of self. Even adults say, after a severe ill- ness : " Why, how changed I am," with more or less of a feeling of disturb- ance to their conception of personality. Those proud of their personal beauty, when it is lost, often show a profoundly modified self-consciousness. But even more influential, perhaps, is tlie jihysical and social environment. Those who travel for the first time in Oriental countries are often somewhat more than merely amazed at the external diflferences of custom and scenery. They seem to need to pinch themselves to make sure they are not dreaming ; they recount their own names and histories in order to "realize" who they are. Indeed, ignorant and easily unbalanced persons may suffer a nearly total change in their prevalent mode of self-consciousness by being suddenly transferred to totally changed surroundings. Thus Delbojuf ' tells the story of the cobbler of Liege, who, having been captured by the monks of a mon- astery near which he had lain down in a drunken fit, awoke to find himself bathed, shaved, afflicted with tonsure, clothed in monk's garb, couched in a cell, and surrounded by "the brethren," who i:)resented their compliments and asked eagerly as to his health. After struggling with the confusion thus produced in his conception of himself, the poor wretch finally said : " Go to the foot of the bridge and see if Gilles the cobbler is in his shop ; if he is not, I am he ; but if he is, may the devil get me if I know who I am." This same psychological truth Shakespeare illustrates in his " Tam- ing of the Shrew," by the confusion of self-knowledge which he rein-esents as wrought, through total change of circumstance, in Christopher Sly. An important part of that which is originally external, but becomes an almost essential part of the Self— especially in the case of minds of a low order of intellectual development — is the Jiaine. For " the name is not worn as a dress," said Gothe, "but grows on to us layer upon layer, like our skin." Hence men of savage tiibes fear to have their names tampered with, as they also fear to have their pictures taken ; for somewhat important belonging to the ego resides in the name. Volkmann ' has remarked that 1 Le Sommeil et les Reves, p. 8C f. ' Lehrbuch d. Psychologic, 11., p. 171 f . 34 V 530 THE KNOWLEDGE OF THINGS AND OF SELF certain savage tribes change the name of a sick cliild ; and that calling an intelligent animal persistently by one name would seem to tend toward an obscure development of self-consciousness. Literature and daily observa- tions are full of illustrations of the effects also upon self-consciousness of changes in physical and social surroundings. Indeed, how could it be otherwise ; for what I know myself to be is largely summed up in my knowl- edge of my life-history, and this is no real affair except as it has had a con- tinuously traceable environment. When the man proud of bis ancestry first learns that he is illegitimate, or the rich man fails in business and moves into a mean house and takes rnp a wholly different employment, or the triisted bank-officer finds himself in the felon's cell, or the father recently sur- rounded by a family is bereft and lonely, the changes induced in the con- sciousness and estimate of self are apt to be most profound. On the other hand, it is just those whose consciousness and estimate of self have been most directed toward the reality and worth of the higher mental life who are least affected by sudden and great changes in external surroundings. I 15. The act of so constituting the total process of consciousness as that this process shall be both considered as an object of consciousness (a s/af<-) and also referred to the subject of consciousness as its action or suffering (m>/ state), offers a perpetual imzzle to psychology. The facts must not be denied or overlooked, whether the puzzle itself can be solved or not. When any act of so-called self-consciousness is expressed by saying, "I am im- mediately aware (/ hioir) that I am i^erceiving, remembering, thinking, or purposing," it is not meant simply to affirm the existence of a state of perceiving, etc.; it is meant also to affirm the attribution of this state (or rather process of consciousness) to a subject, whose it is. Developed self- consciousness further implies the conviction, that the subject (Did the object are re- lated as a being is related to one of its many states. Psychology even of the most barely descriptive sort, and however careful to avoid metaphysics or theory of knowledge (not to say so-called "psychology without a soul") cannot overlook the significance of this fact of self-consciousness, as such. We have, however, already sufficiently located the points of inexplicable mys- tery ; they all belong to the nature of knowledge and of its development ; the mystery of self-consciousness is only the mystery of knowledge, which is essentially the same whether its object be so-called "things" or the so- called " self." The more interior development of self-consciousness scarcely needs to be traced with great detail. The processes of ideation, as differenced bv discriminating consciousness, are themselves made objects of abstraction and generalization, and given a name ; they thus serve as the basis for the con- ception of " that-which-ideates " — of " myself as having the ideas." This in- volves the focusing of attention upon these processes, the formation of an abstract idea of what they are, the distinguishing of each particular recur- rent process as the same in character but differing as to place in the time- series. This also implies that belief which makes it impossible for us to re- gard our psychoses as objects of knowledge uncorrelated with that being whoso states they are. The fact, however, that — as in cases of liallncina- lion and dream-life — cei'tain proces.ses of ideation may be assigned, not to self as my states, but to things as their states, and the fact that ideation enters THE THINKING AND AVILLING SELF 531 into all sense-perception, prove that the question wlietber any particular object of knowledge shall appear, as of things, or of self, is one which the mind must learn to decide. For it is, so to speak, the way in which the particular presentations in the stream of consciousness fuse with the total character of the stream that determines whether they shall be known as external objects or as states of the so-called self. It is, hoii-erer, as a thinking and willing being that I Anew myself as most clearly and utimislakably differenced from, all external tilings. My images of things, though mental, are etfective in consciousness for determining atten- tion externally, according as they are concretely life-like or not. But the l^aler, more abstract, more truly conceptual, the content of consciousness be- comes, the less possible is it to regard the state of consciousness as other than my own activity, the mode of my thinking self. The mind that feels itself thinking, knows itself to be, and to be active, in its thoughts. We may, indeed, objectify our thoughts, and say, with the Idealist, " There is nothing real but thought ; " but we cannot attach any meaning to such a declaration without understanding it also to affirm the reality of the thinker whose are the thoughts. And, while it is true that acts of conation which result in intense bodily reactions tend to emphasize the bodily self, it is also true that such complex deeds of will as choice, planning, and conducting trains of thought, cannot be ascribed to any other subject than this most interior Self. It is as self-active and as aware of this activity — in the mean- ing of these words already sufficiently explained — that this most interior Self is most immediately known. On the basis of these experiences there is formed a concei)tion of "Myself "as controlling, mastering, and under- standing both myself and external things. Further, the influence of conscience, and of all the josthetical and relig- ious sentiments is important in developing the consciousness of self. The child knows itself in a new and intellectually quickening way when the sense of responsibility is once thoroughly aroused. Indeed, it is largely because man is trained to feel that consequences dejiend upon, not only what he does but also upon what he even thinks and feels, that his knowl- edge of Self far surpasses the bounds within which the self-consciousness of the animals is limited. Nay, more, it is this etliical self-consciousness which largely constitutes his claim to be the only truly .se//"-conscious of the animals. To be ashamed of one's self, grieved at one's self, stirred by the sense of one's duty, or one's improved or lost opportunity — in brief, to have the " feeling of the ought" and the feelings of moral approbation and dis- approbation — is to have one's eyes opened widely to the reality and signifi- cance of being a " Self." Finally, it is by complex synthesis of jnclg-raents, based on manifold experiences converging- to one conception — the result- ant of many acts of memory, imagination, reasoning, and nam- ing — that the Knowledge of the Self as a Unitary Being is at- tained. The self that I thus come to know is regarded as the one subject of all the states of consciousness ; whether they be states of knowledge, of feeling, or of willing, and whether they 532 THE KNOWLEDGE OF THINGS AND OF SELF be known prcsentatively, as here and now, objects of self- con- sciousness, or remembered or imag-ined as states of the past, oi conjectured as possible states to be existent in future time. 1 thus become known to myself as both real and logical subject of all the states in the ceaselessly flowing- stream of consciousness. This is the final and supreme achievement of self-knowledge. But this knowledge can never, of course, be other than itself a process of conscious mental life, attained as the result of a de- velopment. In one and the same act the mind mahes itself the object of its self-knowledge and believes in the real being of that rohich it creates as its own object ; and then it passes into other states of knowledge that dissolve this unique creation by turning the attention to external things. It belongs especially to the theory of knowledge and to the philosophy of the mind to discuss the nature and validity of this kuoAvledge of Self as one real being — the subject of all the different states, the subject of a life-history and of a course of development. Psychology can only x^resent this knowledge as being itself the comi3lex resultant of all those activities which enter into the development of knowledge. Such a self-con- sciousness, however, includes far more than what we are imme- diately aware of ourselves as being ; it is highly abstract and theoretical, so to speak ; it is conceptual, as expressive of many trains of reasoning. The foundation on which it rests is the total experience of mind with itself. The fundamental fact here is, as Dr. Ward has said,^ a " certain objective continuum forming the background or basis to the relatively distinct presentations that are elaborated out of it." AVhat, we may ask, actually takes place when I try to become conscious of myself as one really existent being 1 I may come to such self-consciousness in one of two principal ways ; but in either case I must think; T must by judgment relate, or ascribe, somewhat to that which I call mys(>lf. In the most nearly " im- mediate " acts of developed self-knowledge I find myself en- deavoring to grasp together, in an act of judgment, a certain dark and confused complex of ideas and feelings, with points perhaps of more definite lucid mental representation ; and mean- while thinking the projiosition that tJiey are mine. But what is this " we," whose are the ideas and feelings that constitute the present content of consciousness ? The answer to this question can be given only by another similar act of self-knowhnlge. Or again tlu^ (juestion, What am I to mj'solf, as one real be- ing distinguished from all other beings? — may be answered in a ' Article Psychology, Encyc. Brit., p. 42. THE UNITY OF SELF 533 more objective and historical fashion. I may emphasize in my thiiikiu^ir, not only the conviction that I am noio one feeling, thinkin<2f, willing-, being, but that I Jiace hem one and the same, since I began to be at all. Here, of course, I rely upon memory to inform me as to what I " have been," psychically, in the past. I know myself as one and the same to myself, because I can trace in memory something like the continuity of a life-history. Such self-knowledge, it has truly been said, may be at once the richest and the poorest of all forms of conceptual knowledge — including, as it docs, in its varieties, the peculiarities of race, temperament, constitution, social position, and the retreating or advancing bodily basis, differences in stages of intellectual de- velopment, and various other like considerations. I 16. Few subjects in psychology have been treated in more unsatisfactoi-y fashion than the nature of self-consciousness and of the developed form of self-knowledge which results in the view that the soul is an entity separable from the body.' On the one baud, we are told that " the unity of the Ego, in both its earlier and its later condition, is no other than that of a river in which one wave follows another and mirrors its motion." The attempt has even been made to resolve the entire conception chiefly into tactual and muscular sensations obscurely localized in the region of the head, etc. ! On the other hand, it may be claimed that all "self-consciousness is the recog- nition of one's own essence as that of a really existent and independently acting force." The psychology which underlies the current systems of so- called "natural theology" would make the self-identity, spirituality, and real unity of the soul matters of immediate and indubitable " envisage- ment " by eveiy human being. How far from the truth of psychological fact, in both directions, are these two classes of extreme views, Ave hope our previous discussion has made sufficiently evident. There can be no doubt, on the one hand, that every human being both knows and thinks of himself as something quite difi"erent from a mere flowing stream of consciousness, or a succession of states, "some of which mirror other previous states," etc. So shabby a psychological theory needs only to be taken into the presence of any sturdy child's consciousness in order to be driven out of the field. On the other hand, not the most highly sublimated philosophic self-con- sciousness can find within itself all that the current theology has tried to vin- dicate, without argument, by its misleading appeals to self-consciousness. [On the psychology of Belief and Knowledge, the following works may be consulted : James: The Principles of Psychology, II., xxi. Bain : The Emotions and the Will, p. 2(lf. ,215f. Ward: Article Psychology, Encyc. Brit. SuU}- : Illusions ; and The Human Mind, I., p. 4So f. Taine: De LTntelligence, I., ii., chap. i. Lotze : Microcosmus, I., p. (>40 f. HiiftVling : Outlines of Psychology, V. D. Hamilton : Lectures on Logic, xxvii. Volkmaun: Lehrhuch d. Psychologie, II., § IO.t f. . and 11 7 f. Horwicz : Psychologische Analysen, ii., 1 (Was ist Dcnken V). Lipps : Grundtatsachcn d. Seelcnlebens, Abschnitt, iv. On Self-consciousness, besides the references at the end of Chap. III., see also the fol- lowing : Geors;e : Lehrbuch d. Psychologic, p. 400 f . Fortlage : Beitriige zur Psychologic, p. 15() f. DelbcEuf: P.sychologie comme Science naturelle, p. 12 f. Paulhan : L'Activite' mentale. p. 2'.t~ f. Rabier : Ps^xhologie, p. 52 f. Lazarus: Das Leben d. Seele, ii., p. 41 f. Tiberghien: Science de I'Ame, Introduction. Herbart: Psychologic, I., p. 1 TO f.j ' Comp. Volkmann : Lehrbuch d. Psychol(%ie, H., p. ICS f. CHAPTEE XXIII. THE EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS We turn now from the development of the predominatingly- intellectual side of mental life to consider the origin and growth of faculties belonging to the affective aspect of consciousness. In general, however, the formation of the more complex forms of feeling implies all that has hitherto been discovered respect- ing the growth of knowledge. Indeed the dej^endence of the higher emotions and sentiments ui3on the intellectual processes of memory, imagination, and thinking, is obvious and imme- diate. For while it is true that the simpler and more primitive forms of feeling do not necessarily occur " in view of " any ob- ject, the same thing is not true of the more developed forms. Of them one must doubtless say — at least, as a rule — " I feel thus and so because I perceive, remember, imagine, or think, thus and so." But even in the case of these emotions and senti- ments, any excessive increase in intensity or massiveness, so to speak, tends to extinguish the intellectual aspect of conscious- ness altogether. Thus the exceedingly angry or terror-stricken man, or the lover of art all absorbed in the flow of his own affective life, may almost completely cease to have "objective" consciousness. It is — as we have seen — for valid physiological and psychological reasons that the intense and full-flowing stream of conscious feeling tends to break over into the inde- terminate field of the so-called "unconscious." Thus the "self is lost " through excessive indulgence in the most subjective of its own faculties. The bewildering complexity of the feelings, and the difti- culty (or even imiDOssibility) of classifying them satisfactorily'-, has already been suflicieutly noticed (see p. 179). It adds little or nothing of value to the science of the affective i)lH'nomona of consciousness to treat with prolixity and fidelitj^ to details all the different emotions, passions, and sentiments. No classifica- tion here — not even the broad one we have adopted — is a matter of hard and fixed lines. Snhstantially ihe same mefiial state, so far as distinctions of affeciire qualify are concerned, may he ccdled DEVELOPMENT OF THE FEELINGS 535 diraply a feeling, or an emotion, or a j^ctf^sion, or a sentiment. Moreover, tlio subdivisions between individual forms of feeling- grouped under these classes are difficult to establish in definite fashion. For example, the distinction between certain forms of agreeable feeling- and a'sthetical sentiment, or between certain aesthetical sentiments and allied ethical sentiments, or between sentiments which may properly be called intellectual and cer- tain so-called "feelings of self," is scarcely a fast and unalterable distinction. But the main purpose of psychological science is, not to divide and subdivide the feelings, but to show on what conditions, and by what stages, the life of feeling develojjs as an integral part of man's entire mental development. In treating of the Development of Feeling and the Formation of the Emotions and Sentiments, four thing-s (four " variables ") have chiefly to be taken into the account. These are (1) the varying intensities of the primitive forms of feeling as they are combined in the emotions and sentiments. All feeling, like all sensation (and, as we have already seen — p. 195 — in partial de- pendence upon varying intensity of sensation), is capable of being varied in quantity. This is most obviously true of those feelings which are distinctly pleasurable or painful. There are no mental phenomena, as such, whose changes in intensity we observe with more interest and more assurance of a correct, estimate than our own pleasures and pains. But feelings, even considered apart from their pleasure pain characteristic, seem to vary in amount ; for example, one is more or less sur- ])rised, expectant, fearful, etc. But (2) in connection with, and largely in dependence u])on, their variation in intensity, the difterent forms of feeling are all more or less modified by what we may call their " bodily resonance." The explanation of this characteristic belongs to the essential doctrine of the emotions and passions ; it will therefore come later on. It is enough to say now that as our feelings change in character, and especially as they rise and fall in intensity, resulting changes of a physical sort occur in almost the entire bodily organism. These physio- logical changes themselves react upon consciousness and further modify its feeling-content. Thus we may say with no unmean- ing figure of speech, that every feeling — when it reaches a cer- tain grade of intensity—" resounds," with its influence, through the various systems of organs (vasomotor, respiratory, muscular, and tactual, digestive as well as cerebro-spinal) to the remotest parts of the body. But now, in turn, this very "bodily reso- nance " is itself, 7iot only or chiefly hioicn as a certain objective conditiou of the body, hvt also felt as a modification of the feel- 53G THE EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS ing- which produced it. And, filially, each particular form of feeling-, simpler or more complex, has its own particular set of "resonances" which it produces; each form, therefore, feels in a way peculiar to itself (that is, as a natural and normal support and streng-thener) the reactionary effect of these resonances. (3) The dependence of feeling- on ideation and thought is such as to cause new varieties of feeling- to emerge in consciousness as certain ideas, or forms of imagination and judgment, are at- tained. This intimate relation between the kinds of complex af- fective phenomena and the course of the ideas operates in two directions. On the one hand, some emotions and sentiments seem, by their very nature, to be connected in origin with cer- tain unique forms of ideation. ' Such a relation may be said to exist, for example, between the idea of the " right " and the feel- ing of obligation, the idea of " beauty " and all truly lesthetical sentiment, the conception of " truth " in abstract form and that passionate devotion to it which some men exhibit. On the other hand, modifications in intensity of the processes of ideation, and the new and higher combinations of these processes, react upon^ the feeling-s to such an extent as to produce differences in kind. |\ When the intensity of any form of feeling is much increased, something like the effect which we have already noticed in the case of the sensory-motor mechanism takes place in the trains of associated ideas. Imagination and thought are modified — quickened, impeded, or disturbed — ^by a rise in quantity of feel- ing, and this modification of the intellectual processes in turn reacts upon the feeling. It may even change its character so as to make it seem a new kind. Obviously, emotions and senti- ments like jjatriotism, enthusiasm for humanity, love for any form of scientific pursuit, are dependent for their very existence ujoon a complex ideational and conceptual development. Yet again (4), increase in complexity of the elements whicli enter into the higher manifestations of feeling- itself necessarily results in producing- new kinds of feelings. By combination of the more elementary affective phenomena an almost indefinite variety of emotions and sentiments results. Here, as in all cases of truly mental synthesis, the elements lose their distinctive and recognizable characteristics in consciousness as they merf^e in the total stream of conscious life. Thus many so-called " con- flicts of feeling," or " states of divided feeling," become some- thing more than a rapid ]iassage from one form of elementary emotion to another contradic^tory form. The feeling- of the con- flict, the fe(>liiig of being- divided (or, as we say, "torn" with feeling, or " drawn " in two directions) is itself a new form of af- I I GIIOWTII BY COMPLEXITY 537 fective phenomenon. It is also a form of emotion or sentiment that admits of various subdivisions — for exam])le, aecordiii*^- to the character of the feelings between which the conflict takes place (love and hatred, grief and joy, anger and sympathy, etc.). Besides such marked cases of complexity, in the form of conflict, it should be borne in mind that almost all mental states which are marked by strong feeling in the case of developed minds are mixed feelings. Indeed, it might almost be said that all the so- called higher sentiments and emotions are somewhat indefinitely " mixed." I 1. The foregoing remarks emphasize the reasons, already considered, for the difficulty of classifying satisfactorily the aflfective phenomena of hu- man consciousness. "What ai)plies to the elementary and simpler forms of such phenomena applies a fortiori to those later developed and more com- plex. Indeed, certain emotions and sentiments, reckoned typical of human- ity in the higher stages of civilization and culture, do not show themselves at all, or show themselves only very faintly and unsteadily, in the lower stages of civilization ; or, even in the case of many individuals in the most civilized communities. For example, how comparatively few ever feel what ethics calls "general benevolence," or the unselfish "sense of justice," or the pure "love of God." So, too, multitudes never have exj^erience of paternal or maternal affection, of the love of home, of jDatriotism, or of real intellectual curiosity, or of ajsthetical admiration. When we speak of men " without conscience," we are not so far from a truthful description of num- bers in all classes of society. Two extreme courses in treating the psychology of the emotions and sen- timents seem to us almost equally disappointing. On the one hand, a de- tailed descriptive history and minute classification of these phenomena — liketliat, for example, of Professor Bain, has little scientific interest or value. On the other hand, the attempt to deduce all forms of feeling (as Mr. Sjjen- cer does), in a semi-biological fashion, from pleasurable and painful sensa- tion, appears far too narrow to cover the whole wide actual realm. The four above-mentioned classes of influences which chiefly effect the develop- ment of the higher forms of feeling should be constantly kept in mind. Thus Ave may ask four questions concerning all emotions and sentiments : (1) What particular forms of elementary feeling have been here combined ? (2) With what intensity have they severally ojierated to produce the given quantity of emotional excitement ? (3) What has been the modifying influ- ence of the induced " bodily resonance ? " And (4) what the influence from the initiating of changes in the character of the mental train ? For every actual emotion or sentiment has its own characteristic complexity, intensity, bodily resonance, and ideational background, as it were. These differ greatly in every individual, and in dependence upon age, sex, temiierament, dis- position, and stage of culture. ? 2. It follows from the foregoing points of view that any of the element- ary forms of feeling may unite with others into a new variety of the more complex foriiis. Accordingly, the so-called " same " emotions and senti- 538 TUE EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS ments are really raucli more variable in individual cases than are those per- ceptions or thoughts which bear a common name. Auger, for example, in two men of diti'ereut disjjosition and culture may be a quite ditiereut form of feeling — in one, a blinding animal emotion ; in the other, a fine, strong sentiment of i:)ersonal worthiness, and of the value of justice. The jealousy of the woman is in marked respects unlike that of the other sex ; and one woman differs from another woman in respect of her jealousy. Thus also each of those forms of feeling which we speak of as belonging to human nat- ure in general, under the influence of intellectual development and of grow- ing self-control, may gradually become a more and more refined form of sen- timent. For all that is highest and holiest in art, morals, and religion, has its roots in what belongs to our common human nature. And in resi^ect of his feeling, man shows his far-reachiug superiority to the lower animals not so much by the manifestation in early life of wholly new unanimal forms, as by his capacity for development under the discipline of life. This truth we shall now illustrate by several particular cases. A. Anger, as an impulsive and animal form of feeling, appears early and uniformly, though with different degrees of intensity and promptness, in the life of the child. It appears as independent of, and antecedent to, any i^er- ceptions, ideas, or thoughts, which could give to it a reason or a ground. Moreover, it is a form of feeling which manifests itself most widely in nearly all degrees and kinds of animal development; and it has obvious and impor- tant relations to the maintenance of life and to the propagation of the spe- cies under the laws of all such development. The signs of this feeling may be readily provoked in the case of the average infant by firmly grasping and holding one of the movable members of his body, or by causing him any sudden, strong, and not overpoweringly painful sensation. The traces of such lower animal form of the feeling belong to most, if not to all, human beings, no matter how refined or self-controlled they become. Few do not feel anger when their bodily freedom is impinged upon in a sudden and ir- rational manner — when, forexamj^le, the too effusive friendly slap is received upon the shoulder, as well as when the foot is struck against a wayside stone, or the servant lets the door slam in the ear. Simple colors— like crimson, green, or orange — may excite it, through very obscure processes of association. But as intellectual development proceeds, this emotion be- comes attached, habitually, as it were, to certain perceptions, imaginations, or thoughts. And so we hear men naively saying, " I can never see that man, without getting mad at him ; " or, " I cannot tolerate the thought of it with- out anger." Further refined, however, this root of animal passion bears fruit in that just feeling of indignation at moral evil without which no real ethical development is possible, and which often burns most hotly in the truest and sturdiest representatives of moral culture and moral progress. B. Fear, also, is an animal form of feeling that is equally universal, sig- nificant of heredity, and important in biological evolution. In the case of the child, as in the case of other animals, its earliest manifestations do not de- pend upon any clear ideation or thought, much less upon rational experience of the dangerous qualities of the dreaded object. Indeed, loud sensations of sound — such as thunder, for example — cause some children to cry out with a qHiili/j/ of tone which is indicative of fear rather than of bodily pain or of ANGER, FEAK, GRIEF, AND JOY 539 anger. Sigismuud tells of a little girl who showed fear of cats (congenital ?) as early as the fourteenth week of life. Champneys observed a boy of about nine mouths old opening his eyes wide and beginning to cry, apparently with fear, at an unusual noise in a distant part of the room. At the same age Preyer observed his own child drawing back from fear, and crying, when a dog barked at the nurse who carried him on her arm.' Fear at be- ing put, for the first time, in the sea, fear of persons in black, fear of masked faces, are early exhibited in many children. Intellectual develoi)ment, however, in this case, as in that of anger, finally attaches the emotion to those objects which experience shows to be causative of pain or harm ; or which imagination pictures in a way likely to be thus active, or thought con- cludes must bo so. Vague and undefined fears, however, belong to all stages of life and culture ; and productive and semi-festhetical imagination is far more iufluontial here than in the case of auger. It is not alone in the experience of children or savages that imagination largely increases the sphere filled with objects of dread. From the w^retched and depressing ter- rors of the worst superstitions — whether they concern ghosts and hobgoblins or the beings created by the lowest forms of religious credulity — we ascend in unbroken continuity of intellectual and ethical develoi:)meut to that fear of the consequences of our own wrong-doing which is necessary to a high morality, or that " fear of God" which is the " beginning of wisdom." In all stages alike, the natural emotion is softened into a sentiment, or elevated to a rational feeling, by activity of imagination and thought. C. In Grief and Joy we have other forms of feeling, of which very young children, and even animals, show marked signs, and which, nevertheless, are more dependent than anger or fear upon perception and ideation for their ori- gin as well as development. Some semblance of a feeling of grief, however, l^ossibly precedes all intellectual apprehension of a reason for this feeling. At any rate, children of a certain temperament, on being subjected to those painful repressions of their bodily organism which ordinarily call forth signs of anger or fear in other children, cry out with a quality of tone that seems to indicate this emotion. The cry of pain, the cry of auger, the cry of ter- ror, and the cry of grief, have each its peculiar quality. To snatch from the hand of a child some bauble that gives it pleasure will often elicit a grieved cry and expression of countenance. Animals and very young children some- times evince remarkable signs of this emotion on missing companions that have died or been removed— even to the extent of pining away under it. Doubtless in many of these cases there is present a large admixture of other feelings— such as vague sense of restlessness and discomfort at changed sur- roundings, feeling of the disturbance of customary objects of perception and trains of mental images, etc. But genuine grief can scarcely be entirely ruled out of our account. This emotion is not, however, so fundamental and universal as are anger and fear ; neither is it so likely to arise in a inirely unintellectual way. Once originated, few other emotions are more distinctive of one's entire development of ideation and thinking than the kind and intensity of one's griefs. In respect of one's moral nature, what one grieves at in one's self or in others is a clear indication of its general quality. » See The Miud of the Child, Senses and Intellect, p. 164 f . 540 THE EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS Joy, as an emotion, is distinguished from mere jjleasure somewhat as grief is distinguished from mere pain. Neither the simpler forms of pleas- ure, which are the affective accompaniments of simple sensations, nor the (juiet massive i)leasures, that are produced by favorable bodily conditions (feelings of comfort, etc.) or by quiet, low-toned mental activity (feelings ac- companying reverie, etc.), seem to deserve this name. Intensely pleasure- able states which have their basis in the feeling of presentations of sense that strongly excite memory and imagination, or of anticipated presentations of sense, with the well-known agreeable somatic reaction, are most proi^erly called " emotions of joy." Here again we find the early, radical, and more Ijurely instinctive exhibition of the emotion in the barking and springing with which the dog greets the sight of his master taking down his gun, or the glad cry of the infant at the sight of his nursing-bottle or his favorite toy. D. A sort of animal Astonishment, or wonder, is closely connected with fear and grief. Yet there is an emotion corresponding to this word, which appears very early and is an almost wholly unintellectual feeling, that is neither fear nor grief. Preyer,' indeed, speaks of it too loosely when he de- clares it to be " essentially different from surprise." The latter we have al- ready treated (p. 176 f.) as a primitive form of feeling called out by any new sensation, especially if it be sudden and somewhat intense. But new im- pressions of any kind may create siirprise ; for this feeling is ofihe change in the sensuous or ideational cui-rent of consciousness. The character of our feeling, whether we call it surprise or astonishment, is modified as we increase its intensity or connect it more closely with a recognized intellect- ual basis, and get the full expression of the resulting bodily resonance. AVhen some wholly strange presentation of sense suddenly occurs, and the intensity^of the resulting feeling becomes so great as j^artially and tempo- rarily to paralyze certain muscles and to overpower discriminating attention, we get, in its purest form, the phenomenon of astonishment. In a milder form we see the same emotion exhibited in the wide-open eyes and gaping mouth of the ignorant adult M'hen viewing some spectacle. But in its more refined form of " intellectual wonder " it resembles the emotion or sentiment which develops from a somewhat different root — that is to say — E. Curiosity, which, even as a semi-intellectual affair, belongs to the lower animals and to very young children generally. Doubtless we should exaggerate, if we asci'ibed solely or chiefly to curiosity, or to desire to ana- lyze and investigate, the eagerness with which the infant boy tears in pieces his toys, or the sniffings of the dog at every new object he encounters. A certain almost purely reflex or automatic physiological restlessness and pleasure in activity of any sort lie much at the base of such actions in young animals. Let us, for example, present any bright and tinkling thing before the eyes of an infant. It will not long satisfy \\\m.for ns to shake the bauble about for his amusement ; the child will soon stretch out his hand and un- dertake to perform for himself, to his more lasting delight, a similar action. But when this " motor " familiarity is obtained with the new object, what more remains ? Now it is not improbable that, from the very first, some vague form of semi-intellectual curiosity is mingled with the activity of the 1 The Mind of the Child, Senses and Intellect, p. 172 f. CURIOSITY, JEALOUSY, AND SYMPATHY 541 chilcl. And how shall wo surely distinguish between this mid intellectual restlessness ? For it must not be forgotten that the ceaseless craving for activity of the young animal is itself by no means a purely muscular or phys- iological allair. The rather is it partly a i)sychical restlessness, an instinc- tive reaching out for the i)leasure of i)sychical activity. But such iwychical activity is, from its very nature, analytic and explanatory. The tendency to ideate and to think, passing with redistributed attention from one object to another, and pleasure in the exercise of this tendency, may be said to ante- date any definite " intellectual curiosity." Yet this mental condition is very nearly akin to intellectual curiosity. To this must soon be added an oxi^erience of certain i)ractical benefits arising from the exercise of the psychical powers in the mastery of new ob- jects. A more truly intellectual curiosity is thus awakened in necessary and close connection with the pursuit of practical ends. This efTect transforms the almost animal p.sychical restlessness into an important sentiment, and by increasing its intensity it may be made to acquire emotional characteris- tics—as we shall see later on. F. The case of Jealousy further illustrates the correct theory of the tle- velopment of the kinds of higher feeling. In this case, however, there would seem to be no possibility of arousing even the most primitive form of the feeling without a basis in some development of the life of presentation and ideation. Many of the lower animals and very young children, indeed, show marked signs of jealousy — as anyone knows who has watched the be- havior of a favored dog when his master is petting another animal (dog, or cat, or even human child, it may be). But here the intellect is not inactive ; the feeling is not blind, but rests on recognized grounds, such as the per- ception or imagination of other objects in certain suggestive relations to each other. Jealousy is, however, a natural form of feeling that cannot be resolved into any other, or accounted for simply as a modification of pleas- ure-pain produced by presentation and ideation in a secondary way. In the history of animal species it may well enough have been, and to a certain large extent still is, a necessary factor in their preservation and develop- ment. As a manifestation of instinctive feeling in human otl'spring it works in the direction of limiting the cherishing parental attention; and in the mind of the female it serves as the warning and corrective of the male dis- position to transgress the bounds of the family in the bestowment of care and affection upon the other sex. Eefined and controlled, it develops into a noble ethical or resthetical sentiment which .serves as the safeguard of most important interests ; and in the sphere of religion, what would become of the world if all the souls " jealous for God " were i-emoved from it? G. The feeling of animal Sympdtln/ is, in some respects, the opposite of the feeling of animal jealousy. In its most jn-imitive form it appears as a kind of instinctive outgoing of emotion which is excited by the signs of emotion in other beings, especially of tho.se belonging to the same species. There is very likely something farther down than, and back of, even this — of which, however, it is difficult for psychology to give an account. At any rate, waves of impulsive action that seem to have their cause in the rise (all at once and with scarcely discernible means of intercommunication) of wide- spreading common feeling, welling up out of the unconscious above the Cahfo 642 THE EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS threshold of consciousuess, are not uncommon phenomena among the lower animals. And in man's case, all our most subtle analysis does not always serve to discover why whole communities have been simultaneously swayed with common emotions. But however this may be, the "principle of imita- tion " is obviously very powerful in the excitement and development of sym- pathetic feeling. We have already seen (p. 231 f.) how primitive and universal this principle is in the sphere of bodily movements. But it was then re- marked that the movements, which originate imitatively, are difficult to sejoarate from the existence, at least in vague and inchoate form, of the ideas and feelings which the movements express. Sign and psychosis — that is, movement significant, and ideation and feeling signified— are not loosely correlated ; from the first, they are almost like two sides of one and the- same mental reality. It appears, then, that what is called " animal symj^athy" is scarcely to be spoken of as a form of natural feeling. The rather is it a sort of general in- stinctive tendency to " harmonize " consciousness, as it were. All the fore- going si^ecial forms of feeling — anger, fear, grief, curiosity, and the like — are so much a matter of human nature, on its affective side, that they exist as feeling, and develop in dependence on ideation, in the most jDrimitive stages of mental life. Thus groups of children are altogether likely to get angry together, to fear, to grieve, to wonder, in company. The more dis- tinct craving for symjsathetic feeling from one's fellows is a later manifesta- tion of mind. It is ditiicult to say whether or not it precedes experience of the soothing nature of pity and of its caressing manifestations, as they, to a certain small extent at least, belong to the earliest environment of the hu- man infant. No doubt the more intelligent and principled forms of symjDa- thetic feeling are dependent upon finding out the truth that — " Fellowship in woe doth woe assuage. As palmers' chat makes short their pilgrimage." The development of this manifestation of human emotional life, however, belongs especially to the class of ethical and jiesthetical sentiments. ^3. It should further be noted of all these forms of feeling that, in ac- tual adult experience, they are seldom experienced excej^t as compoimded, as it were, according to certain relations existing between them. Certain kinds of fear, for examj^le, cannot exist without a mingling of the emotion of anger ; and the same thing is tnie of some states which we call grief. While jealousy — as we might expect from its higher ideational character — rarely fails to be a compound, in the case of the adult, of anger and grief, and perhaps also fear. T7iis union of emotions is so intimate that it is vot to he described as a succession of different ei7iotions simph/, but ratlier as a fusion of different primitive emotions in one complex affective condition. The Difference between the Emotions (or Passions) and the Sentiments is not fixed ; it is rather a variable resultant from the four conditions, already maintained, which enter into all de- velopment of the hi<^her and more complex feelings. In sfeneral, great intensity and consequent strong " bodily resonance " are DIFFERENCE OF EMOTIONS AND SENTIMENTS 543 characteristic of the emotions and passions. A nuuh lower in- tensity, and a far Lu\q-t>r admixture of infiiience from ideal con- siderations, are t-liaracteristic of the sentiments. It follows also, from the increased presence of the developed life of imag^ination and thon.ij;-ht in the sentimental forms of feelinp:, that their com- plexity is nsnally g-reatcr than that of the emotions. But there is prohably no form of sentiment — not even the most ideal, whether in the class of the ethical, or the assthetical, or the re- lig-ious feeling's — which is not ting-ed with some discernible form of the same so-called bodily resonance which is so mncli more obvions in the coarser emotional states. On the other hand, if we increase the intensity of any of the most ideal sentiments, they at once show tendencies to assume an emotional phase. With enough of intensity and reactionary feeling from the in- duced bodily condition, all S(^ntiments become indistinguishable from those states which Ave do not hesitate also to call emotions. Moreover —as has already been made quite obvious — any typical form of human feeling may be, at one time, exhibited as an emo- tion, at another time as a sentiment ; and individuals of different temperaments and different culture have essentially the same primitive feelings in the form of either emotions or sentiments. ^ 4. The truth may be illustrated by considering, in its changing phases, any one of the tyi^ical forms of feeling enumerated in § 2. Indeed, the hints there given as to the course of development followed by all the composite feelings, enforce the same truth. But to take another illustration, let ns consider the mother's feeling of affection for her child. "Within a few min- utes even, this feeling may pass from a mild and half-conscious atrection to a pronouncedly sentimental stage, as she thinks of his promise intellectually or of his return of her aifection for him ; or as she imagines the time when her hopes regarding his future will bo realized. But instantly, the sight of danger to him, or the news of harm to him, may cause the feeling of love to mingle with fear and grief, and stir it up to all the intensity and "so- matic reaction " necessary for a highly emotional phase. With respect to all this, the very words " emotion " (suggestive of feeling as furnishing force, acting dynamically), and "sentiment" (suggestive of thinking sensibility), are significant. That animal wonder, or curiosity, also, which we have seen to be capable of development into a refined sentiment, only needs the addi- tion of unwonted intensity and of its result upon the bodily organism, to as- sume an emotional form. Thus we read of that queen of Prussia who met death with joyful readiness, rather than fear, because she should soon " know the truth of the things about which the philosopher Leibnitz could not tell her." Closely connected with the feeling of curiosity is the feeling of pleasure which comes from discovery — whether of some simple fact new to us, or of some important principle new to the race; and this, again, is akin to the pleasure of the highest productive energy. This feeling, too, may take the form of that lofty sentiment which led Niebuhr to compare 544 THE EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS his joy at contemplating one of his own finished works to the divine joy in the completion of an act of creation. But of Gay-Lussac, the French chem- ist, we read that, on making an imi)ortant discovery, he threw down the utensils and danced about his laboratory with the pleasurable emotion which this discovery gave him. Indeed, it would not be easy to mention a single one of the more simple and primitive forms of feeling which may not develop after either the emo- tional or the sentimental type. Thus the milder forms of expectation, in view of the more remote realization of ideals, may not improperly be spoken of as sentiments ; but when expectation is intense and connected with the bodily condition which jsrecedes the gratification of some appetite or desire, it is often of a highly emotional character. Doubt also is capable of being more or less distinctively either emotional or sentimental. Even the feeling of excitement itself is markedly different when it originates in the quickened character of the more purely mental train, without sufficient intensity to arouse a strong bodily resonance. While vague animal craving contains with- in itself the possibilities of being developed either into the mixed emotion that rests so largely upon sensuous conditions at the great climacterics of life, or into the sentimental longings which, in more refined natures, characterize the same periods. The feeling of monotony, in the intenser forms belong- ing to coarse natures, causes strong somatic reactions and is itself made thereby more emotional ; but it is the highly intellectual, as a rule, who feel most of the yet keener miseries of the sentiment of ennui. For, in truth, every kind of feeling falls under the same principles of development which we are illustrating. The characteristic Nature and uniform Course of the Devel- opment of the Emotions is, then, tolerably plain — whether as re- spects their physiological basis or their description and explana- tion as states of consciousness. Since all forms of feeling-, when intensified so as themselves to feel, as it were, in a secondary way, the bodily resonance they occasion, become emotional, the development of each kind of emotion, as well as the development of the entire life of emotions, requires us to consider the so- matic influences that are distinctive of them all. The general physiological theory of all affective phenomena thus connects itself at once with wlrat has already been said concerning the physiological basis of the entire life; of feeling. Accordingly, the description of the physiological conditions of any developed state of decided emotional character may be given as follows : The growth in intensity of the original feeling causes, and is cor- related with, the increased intensity and Avider spreading of cen- tral nerve-commotion. This largo amount of centrally initiated nerve-commotion itself overflows and passes down the nerve- tracts which connect the brain, centrifugally, with the internal and external organs of the body. These organs are thus put into a changed condition of tension or relaxation (as in the case of SOMATIC BASIS OF EMOTIONS 645 tlio muscles), of quickened or slower activity (as in the case of the heart, the lungs, the vessels of venous and arterial circulation, the secretory vessels, etc.), of temperature, and of various obscure and ill-localizable forms of sensuous irritation. This chang-ed condition of the peripherally-lying organs now, in turn, reacts upon the central organ which initiated them ; and further in- tense and wide-spreading nerve-commotion, having an external origin, is occasioned in the brain — to mingle with, and supple- ment and modify, the original centrally initiatcul nerve-commo- tion. Thus an emotion, physiologically described, may be con- sidered as a sort of nerve-storm which gathers intensity, at first, in some comparatively limited region of the brain, but quickly spreads from storm-center to storm-center, as it were ; which sweeps down the different paths of exit upon the lower centers and upon the different systems of muscles, upon the vascular and secretive and respiratory systems ; and then, from all these pe- ripheral parts, return currents sweep backward further to disturb the centers that lie within the brain. Psychologically considered — that is, as a rising and predom- inating condition of consciousness, or succession of affective states — an emotion has ordinarily the following history : Some form of feeling arises as the affective accompaniment of a cer- tain presentation, memory, imagination, or thought. For certain reasons, connected with the disposition, mood, or more definite past experience of the individual mind, the object which excites affective consciousness is fixated by attention, and associated with trains of mental images that tend to intensify it. But as the feeling increases in intensity it changes in mixed quality ; for we begin, although perhaps without recognition of the fact, to feel our own contracting or relaxing muscles, the quickening or slowing of our heart-action, the rhythmic movement of the res- piratory apparatus, the various visceral stirrings, manifold and not easily describable skin-sensations, and indeed all the obscure as well as more obvious workings of the expressive results, within the bodily organs, of the feeling itself. Thus, psychologically considered, all the Emotions are seen to have certain common characteristics ; these may be summed up as their general " emo- tional " character or tone — an wiportcmt jmrt of tvhich is cmistitut- ed hj tJiat confenf of the affective consciousness in/iich dejxmds upon intense and icideh/ dijjtased cerehral agitation, whether centrally ini- tiated or due to the secondary effects of^^ hodiJy resonance^ The complete explanation of the differences in the content of affective consciousness corresponding to the different so-called emotions — anger, grief, fear, joy, and the like — is to be found, 35 546 THE EMOTIOXS AND PASSIONS both in that original difference wliicli the initial feelings bear, and also in the secondary and induced differences due to the dif- ferent complex characters of the bodily resonance. When one is very angry at an act of injustice or an insult, one is plainly in a different state of mind from that which we characterize as great fear — whether of a personal attack or of the expected loss of a beloved friend. Yet, these two emotions may fuse pretty comjaletely in one condition of mind ; and, even as consid- ered apavt, they have marked common characteristics. Their differences, however, may be even more marked ; and in the case of contrasted emotions — such as grief and joy, or hope and de- spair, or love and hatred— the unlikeness is the obvious and im- pressive thing. In explaining all such differences, psychology can neither attribute it entirely to somatic reaction, nor leave such bodily influences out of its account. Certain characteristic differences in the somatic reaction serve, although in a somewhat indefinite way, to classify the emotions. The pleasurable emotions differ in general from the unpleasant, as follows : ^ In the former all the superficial ves- sels of the body (vaso-motor, secretory, etc.) tend to dilate, the muscles (voluntary and involuntary, and especially the respira- tory) are more intensely innervated, more highly " toned," the visceral stirrings are indicative of increased molecular activit}^ — more alive, as it were — and the extent of the heart-movement is increased. But in many unpleasant emotions the opposite of all this takes place : the superficial vessels are constricted, the innervation of the muscles is disturbed and loses tone, the vaso-motor system within the body also becomes " atonic," and the extent of the heart-movement is diminished. This account of the origin, in part, of the difference among emotions, as regards their tone of jjleasure or of pain, agrees also with what has al- ready been urged respecting the physiological basis of all feel- ing and of pleasure-pain in general (comp. p. 173 f.). Like every other such account, however, it is only partial ; it must be in- finitely varied and modified in its applicability to individuals ; it is in every case itself dependent upon other physiological and psychological laws. 2 5. In ortlor to nndfti-stand the part which the "bodily resonance," or " somatic reaction," plays in the cliaracteristic content of all tlie emotions, it is necessary apjain to refer to the immediate effect of increasing the intett- aitif of the initial feeling. This efifect is, of course, connected with the whole doctrine of the focusing and redistribution of attention. Our feol- 1 Comp. Lehmann, Die Ilauptgesetze d. menschlichea Oef aiils'.eben. Uebersetzt von F. Ben- dixen, p. 110 f. SOMATIC 15ASIS OF EMOTION'S 547 ings are — it has been shown ah-eacly — interesting ; and thoy determine largely the presentations of sense, or the images, or thoughts, which get su- perior recognition in the stream of consciousness, and, as wo say, "fix the mind" upon themselves. But attention is, jjhysiologically considered, dis- tinctively a cerebral process ; it implies increased circulation and molecular activity in somewhat definitely localized regions of the brain. On the other hand, the very direction of attention to the initial feeling tends to intensify it. " Do not mind the insult if you do not wish to get more mad over it." *' Do not tJiink of the lost object or opportunity, if you would keep down your grief," etc. — so do we bear witness to the intensifying influence upon the feeling of the attention it commands. Again, as the intensity of the affec- tive accompaniment of my perceptions, imaginations, and thoughts, increases, I am inclined more and moi'e to say : " How can I help thinking of that which I so intensely feel ? " All this is .significant of the fact that the feeling is "working itself up" into the emotional stage. No considerable intensity of cerebral and concomitant psychical excite- ment can exist, however, without quickly and profoundly influencing the pe- ripheral parts of the body — tlie different systems of organs, both external and internal. This is a jisycho-physical necessity of the first rank ; it is due to the very structure and functions of the nervous .system, and to the natu- ral relations which this system sustains to the states of consciousness. This fact is the general exjilanation of that marked effect whicli all highly emo- tional states have upon the heart and bowels and respiratory apparatus es- })ecially, but also upon the muscles of the trunk, head, and different main external members of the body. Such connection is consecrated by, and even inseparably embodied in, all our language. Hence arises the tendency to locate the emotions in these parts of the bodily organism rather than in the brain. Shemitic jieoples particularly emphasize the viscera and their behavior and condition as indicative of character. The "soft" heart and the " hard" heart, the "good " heart and the " bad " heart, and all the lan- guage of poetry and of common life are in evidence liere. The swelling of pride makes men carry the " head high " and step with a strutting gait — this when it is coarsely emotional ; but when of a more sentimental order, the same feeling retreats within, as it were, and both occasions and feels far less of purely somatic reaction. We note as strongly confirmatory of the same view, such common experi- ences as the following : We all tend toward the emotional condition of con- sciousness whenever any rise in the intensity of the total conscious state suddenly occurs. In general, tlie saying is justified, that from mere feeling to emotion is a " leap." This leap may be produced by a quick and decided rise in the sensational content of consciousness, even when such content has little or no meaning ; as in the case of the leap to anger, or fear, or wonder, which loud noises and bright flashes of light and strong skin-sensations occasion. It may also be produced by that rapid rise in the feeling of effort which takes place when, the motor apparatus being duly set to pro- duce a given result, we find ourselves unexpectedly resisted. Most men are strongly tempted to get angry at the resistance of the inert object which excites such a sudden rise of feeling. Jars and shocks of every kind tend to throw us into the emotional condition of consciousness. By recurring here 548 THE EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS to Weber's law, which shows us that the felt intensity of the feeling de- pends \iY)ou the siiddenness in the change, we find a partial explanation of all such phenomena. ^ 6. The marked effect of assuming the conditions of body expressive of the various emotions, upon the heightening and perpetuation of the emotion itself, is in plain confirmation of psycliological theory. If one begins to feel angry, one may diminish or intensify one's feeling and so keep it below or raise it above the emotional stage, according as one represses, or indulges it, in respect of a very considerable amount of bodily resonance. This principle can primarily apply, of course, only to such forms of somatic re- action as are voluntarily controlled. Here, too, much allowance m^^st be made for individual disposition and development, and even for marked idiosyncrasies. Some persons can shed tears almost, if not quite, at will, and with as little emotion as that which some others feel in moving their ears. Cases are not wanting of those who can directly control the heart- movement, without experiencing either preceding or subsequent emotion ; and of those who, with no emotional excitement, can ' ' contract the facial muscles in any mimetic combination ' " Naturally, however, and in far the greater number of cases, mimicry of the bodily conditions expressive of any emotion is impossible without corresponding effect u^Don the affective con- tent of consciousness. In proof of this, the experience of the average man or woman may be confidently evoked, as well as that of the psychological experts — among whom Fechner,- for example, testifies that for the grave l^rofessor even, "to go tripping and mincing after the fashion of a young woman puts one, so to speak, in a feminine frame of mind." Here again the testimony of the most celebrated actors as to the bodily effects of their acting highly emotional parts, is instructive.^ "Playing with the brain," says Miss Murray, "is far less fatiguing than playing with the heart." Act- ing with emotion, as we have seen, is working intensely with both brain (Vid heart. The view, however, which reduces the entire character of the various emotions, as affective phenomena, to mixtures of bodily sensation, and thus maintains that our bodily changes constitute all there is of any emotion, not only inadequately represents the facts of consciousness, but contradicts the correct theory of feeling from the very beginning all the way through. I 7. The details of the different physiological changes connected with the different emotions, and of the related science of physiognomy, do not affect the general theory of the emotions ; nor can we do more at present than briefly illustrate this theory. In severe emotional auger, for example, the disturbance of the muscular system is especially marked. Certain mus- cles, such as those which clench the fists, set the jaws, brace the lower limbs, etc., become intensely innervated. The rhythm of respiration, the muscular quality of the action of tlie diaphragm and epiglottis, and of the muscles that effect ebullition of the chest and dilatation of tlio nostrils, are ])rofoundly modified. Especially marked also is the eflect upou the action of the heart and upon all the connected vaso-motor apparatus. But there ■ Sec the experionco of Professor Sikorsky, of Kieff. Ncurologisches Centralblntt, 1S87, cited and commented upon by I'rcjfcssor James, The Principles of Psychology, II., p. 4G5 f. - \'orschiile A. Aesthelik, j). lol'i. 3 See William Archer: Masks or Faces ? p. 129. h SOMATIC BASIS OF EMOTIONS 549 is pale anger as well as flushed anger ; ami with inanv persons the trembling of the lips is more observable than the setting together of the teeth ; the tottering than the bracing of the lower limbs. Much depends not only upon the physical condition of the patient, but also upon the kind of emotion — whether hatred or fear or grief, etc.— which is mingled with the anger. The intense emotion of hatred ' partakes of all the prominent bodily rever- berations of anger ; it is indeed in this regard almost indistinguishable from it. In emotional hatred we have to notice the grinding teeth, threatening or defensive gestures and jDOses of the tense muscles, the contracted or wide- open conditions of the eyes, the convulsions of the lips, vocal organs, and facial muscles. In both anger and hatred the feeling (/ tiie abdominal dis- turbances as a general coloring of conscioiisness rather than as localized bodily sensations, and of the changed conditions of the capillary circulation in the skin (" goose-flesh," creepings, and changes in temx^erature-sensa- tions) are prominent features of the emotion. The emotion of fear - when sudden and overpowering, has certain charac- teristics of an organic sort in common with anger and hatred. In other characteristics its somatic tinge is the opposite, as it were. Here a tem- porary paralysis of the muscles, rendering them either immovably rigid or trembling under iusufficient cerebral control, is distinctive. Thus the badly frightened man "stands like a statue, motionless and breathless, or crouches down as if instinctively to escape observation." His heart beats wildly or faintly, and pallor of skin, with cold perspiration, become notice- able. Indeed, this effect upon the exudations of the skin is one of the most distinctive characteristics of the somatic reactions of this emotion. Inside the mouth the membrane is dry through imperfect action of the salivary glands ; and this, with the trembling of the muscles used in vocalization, accounts for the husky and indistinct voice of the "terror-stricken." Indeed, the voice sometimes refuses at all to obey the will {vox faucihus haesit). But grief, when strong and sudden, and accompanied by sobbing and con- vulsive respiration, is, in respect of its bodily resonance, somewhat like a mixture of auger and fear. If long continued, it bears the marks of that generally flaccid condition of the muscles and anaemic condition of the blood-vessels which is characteristic of the painful emotions. The bent neck, the relaxed cheeks and jaws, the collapse of fiber around the shoul- ders, the hanging arms and dragging legs, the slowed respiration and heart- beat, indicate the one ; and the pallor and shrunken expression of the skin and chilly sensations, indicate the other, of these efl'ects. But the opposite of all this is the bodily condition which results from, and resounds in, the emotion of joy. Yet either of these opposite emotions may stimulate the lachrymal glands to weeping and disturb the peristaltic movements of the intestines. I 8. It would be a mistake, however, to consider that these grosser forms of the more animal emotions alone fall under the influence of what we have called a characteristic bodily resonance. Unmanifested emotions of anger, hatred, love, joy, grief, wonder, and the like, often burn much the longer and oven more intensely. Indeed, to give expression to these ' Comp. Mautegazza : La Physionomie et rExpression des Sentiments, p. 140. 2 See Dan\in : Origin of the Emotions, p. 290 f. 550 THE EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS emotions — " to out -with them," as tlie saying is — frequently results in greatly diminishing their inward intensity. "SViiat the great poet said of anger is true of them all ; they are " like a full, hot horse, who being allowed his way, self-mettle tires him." This experience is partly explained by the fact that in their highly emotional form all the feelings run, as it were, a sort of livviied jjhi/siological career. The storm rises in certain centers, breaks over into others, culminates, and subsides again. If it is not allowed to do this, through restraint from some other feeling (as where fear inhibits anger) or from some ideal consideration (such as notions of propriety, of self-resi)ecting conduct, or of duty), the feeling may maintain a longer and higher stadium of interior intensity. In such cases, however, the in- fluence of certain somatic reactions is no less truly recognizable. The man who nurses but does not display his anger, grief, fear, hatred, feeling of joyful triumph or of gratified pride, or even of restless curiosity, keeps it warm and lively by means of much concealed activity of the muscular, cir- culatory, digestive, and vaso-motor systems. An interesting illustration of this truth is to be found in the reciprocal influence of mind and body for the support of the emotion of chagrin. This emotion is of all perhaps the most indefinable with respect to its bodily characteristics, the most con- cealed and inexpressive by way of obvious conditions of the organism. Yet its somatic reaction resembles a kind of slow-burning grief in the effect produced upon the muscular and respiratory systems ; and the conjecture that the emotion actually jjoisons the arterial circulation and feeds itself upon its own poisoned blood, is not altogether without proof. ^ 9. Finally, we note how the continued reduction of intensity, as such an effect is brought about in the individual or in the race by the develop- ment of varied ideal and ethical and religious considerations, tends to trans- fer them from the emotional into the sentimental stage. The aesthetically pleasing result of all this is the substitution, for rankly i:)hysical emotions, of the more delicately constituted corresjionding sentiments. But when suppression of conscious life on the side of the more comjilex feelings takes place, the result is both aesthetically and ethically unpleasant. It must indeed be admitted that human feeling is not now so bodily strong and coarse in many communities as it was among our savage ancestors ; or — to quote from a modern novelist — as in " the days before the habit of taking long views had reduced the emotions to a monotonous average ; " but it must also be remembered that this does not necessarily signify the slowly approaching death of all feeling. Some are skilfully refining their emotions into intellectual, aisthetical, and ethical sentiments; while others arc grow- ing less human by a selfish reduction of the life of feeling to an imjn-oper subserviency. Yet the blood of the race is still red and warm, and there are indications that the shallows of dilettanteism among the so-called ujiiJer classes may ere long be submerged in the strongly and swiftly flowing emo- tional currents of the popular life. All considerable increase in the Intensity of Feeling- tends also to clianf^re profoundly the character of the train of asso- ciated Ideas and Thonshts. In tnrn, the changed character of EFFECT UPON IDEATION AND THOUGHT 551 the conscious intellection may be io\t as intensification or modification of the rising- emotion itself. Hero we recur to what was formerly said about so-called " feelings of relation " (p. 186 f.). In dependence upon the time-rate of the mental train we experience feelings of excitement or tedium, etc.; in de- pendence upon changes in the complex quality of our i^ercep- tions, imag'inations, and thoug-hts, we experience feeling's like those of novelty, or monotony, bewilderment, or pleased recog- nition, etc. But as the storm of emotional excitement rises and swells, the time-rate of the ideas and thoughts is necessa- rily altered ; clear perception becomes difficult or impossible, and likewise clear detiuition of our imag-ining-s and reasonings. " Hasty " feeling and " deliberate " reflection, " heated " emo- tions and "cool" thoughts, cannot swim together in the same portion of the stream of conscious life. This incompatibility is, indeed, not strict; and the limits of it vary greatly with diiferent individual cases and persons. There is no doubt on the whole, however, concerning the marked disturbing effect of greatly increased intensity of feeling upon the intellective side of consciousness. But the very feeling which prodtices the dis- turbance of ideation and thought is destined in turn to feel this disturhance. This form of secondary reaction may be consid- ered, physiologically, as resulting from the centrally initiated nervous agitations which, while they jiroceed from braih-center to brain-center, effect changes simultaneously in the physical basis of both feeling and intellection. Or — to refer again to the general physiological theory of feeling (p. 193 f.) — the " semi-chaotic surplus " of cerebral nerve-commotion rises to such an extent as relatively and temporarily to overpower those more orderly and law-abiding neural processes on which clear ideation and thinking depend. Ordinary experience affords plentiful illustration of this result as a purely ps^^chological phenomenon, a process in consciousness, as such. Any rising flood of emotional excitement, as all well know, upsets our or- derly trains of mental images and, especially, oiir power care- fully to draw logical conclusions on clearly recognized grounds. But this very " upsetting," if it cannot be reduced or controlled, not only adds to the initial emotional excitement, but may greatly change its character while increasing it. Thus extreme anger, or grief, or hatred, or fear, or love, may all tend to come together, as it were, in an unspecialized emotional condition ; somewhat as all color-tones, when made more and more intense, tend to become whitish and merge in one tone-less visual sensa- tion. 552 tup: emotions and passions § 10. The effect upon the accompanying feelings of changing in an iin- accustometl way the time-rate or qualitative relations of our ideas may be tested by another class of experiences. Let it be assumed, in some particu- lar instance, that this effect is not initiated by an increased intensity of feel- ing itself ; that one's perceptions or thoughts are not disturbed by anger, fear, or joy, originally, but by the way in which the perceptions or thoughts are themselves introduced into the stream of consciousness. Such an effect may occur when we are looking at a too rapidly moving series of objects in which we are interested, and of which we wish to obtain adequate percep- tions ; or when we are attentively listening to one sijeaking too rapidly ; or are forced to hurry through an important book ; or are attempting, as spec- tators, to watch the flitting j^hantasmagoria of our own half-waking, half- dreaming consciousness. In all such cases, we soon begin to feel a sort of tension toward an emotional tone of the entire conscious life. The feeling of the " hurly-burly," that is, tends to become an emotion which is a mixt- ure of the feelings of excitement, vague dread, half-indignation at our thoughts for tricking us so, etc. Yet again, when the bodily sensations are markedly strange and unaccustomed, either as respects their intrinsic qual- ity, or their relative intensity, or their order of arrangement, it is not easy — for most men it is impossible — to avoid being thrown by this experience into an emotional state of mind. Of this those know, alas ! only too well who are accustomed to all those "strange sensations about the head which belong to certain conditions of nervous exhaustion ; or who possess that wretched "inner eye," to watch the vital processes of digestion, whicli characterizes dyspeptics. , The effect upon the emotions of certain drugs is largely indirect in this way. They upset the trains of associated ideas, hurry them up or slow them down, and introduce unwonted fanciful forms into them in ways which neither memory nor reason can trace ; and, there- fore, in this secondary way (in part, at least), they produce melancholia, maniacal joy, or the emotions of enormous pride or of exultation in the ex- pansion of one's spatial and temporal universe. The reactionary effect upon the emotion of these changes in the intel- lective aspect of consciousness which it has itself produced, is only a special case under the general principle : tlie comi-)lex life of feeling depends for its cltaractej' upon the development of ideation and tliought. § 11. It is evident that we have, in every case of emotional excitement, one of those exceedingly complicated problems which require for their com- plete answer a knowledge of the mental history and constitution of the in- dividual whose case it is. In every case, however, the general conditions of consciousness — its limits, circuit, and complexify in Tinity (com]). Cliap. III.), are faithfully observed. As the relative amount of feeling of whicli differ- ent persons are capable varies not less than their capacity for imagination and thought, so does the amount which they citn " stand," as it were, without greatly disturbing imagination and thought. Indeed, with every jierson a certain excitement of feeling is favorable to quickened and heightened memory, to productive image-making, and to ratiocination. But here the range of individual differences is very great. For with some a slight emo- tional intensity speedily produces confusion of thought, loss of memory, in- terruption of the train of ideas. In respect of such marked effect of feeling \ k COMPLEXITY OF THE EMOTIONS 553 on intellection, there is also a groat difference between the cliflforent kinds of emotions. The " expansive " emotions — such us pride, self-satisfaction, moderate excitement at the novelty of one's situation, love of approbation, and expectation of applause — most frec^uently, when kept within certain in- deiiuite limits, are favorable to increased and more efl'ective intellectual ac- tivity. AVhile other emotions, such as shame, fear, self-distrust or self- loathing, monotony, and ennui, depress and limit this activity. Here again the place for individual idiosyncrasies is indefinitely large. A small trace of shame or anxiety, or even of pride and love of approbation, will upset some persons more than a relatively large amount of fear or auger. The latter emotion (anger), indeed, operates very differently, in different cases, in its eti'ect upon the intellectual powers. Some men are at their very best intellectually when they are very mad. This fact doubtless rests largely upon a i)hysiological basis ; it requires for its realization a sound heart and lungs, in order to meet the demands which the emotion makes upon these or- gans for rapidly increasing action. It is also significant, perhaps, of general robustness of character. Here again we may refer to Dr. Martin Luther's praises of the excellent effects, in his oAvn case, of occasional strong out- bursts of this passion. And Balzac makes Louis Lambert say : " Anger, like all our passionate expressions, is a current of human force acting elec- trically. . . . Do we not meet with men who, by such a discharge of their volition, reduce and refine the sentiments of the masses?" On the other hand, all the faculties of other men shrivel under the influence of anger ; with them it shows itself as a depressing and contracting emotion. Accord- ing to the author just quoted : " Passions are either defects or virtues in the highest power." Considerations like the foregoing are of great importance, not only for tlie understanding of psychology as a science, but also for the correct appre- ciation and intelligent control of our fellow-men. For, as the very word sig- nifies, it is the "emotions" that move; and yet so varied and comiilicated are the kinds and directions of movement thus jiroduced, that no generaliza- tion of high import and wide-reaching ajiplication can ever be attained. The foresroiufi: considerations fitly introduce us again to the Complexity of the Emotions, considered as highly developed forms of feeling. The increased complexity of feeling in de- pendence upon the increasing complexity of the intellectual life is to be understood only in connection with the entire history of intellectual development. Hence new kinds of emotion arise as the general evolution of our conscious life goes on. Even in those cases where a rapid transition takes place from one form of intense feeling to another, or where " conflict of emotions" occurs, the resulting state may be recognized as a really new kind of emotion. A modern writer ' on the i^sychology of feeling confirms his view of the relativity of all f -eliug by the following common- 1 noifding. Outlines of Psychology, p. 279, 554 THE EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS place remark : " In some cases wonder turns to fear, disappoint- ment, and contempt, or to joy, love, and veneration, according to the nature of that Avhicli has excited wonder." For this reason Descartes and Malebranche " permitted wonder to head the series as presupposition for every one of them." But this author considers it more natural to class wonder (as Bain also does) among- the " emotions of relativity." To this view we have agreed. What needs now to be noticed in addition is this : as " wonder turns to fear, to disappointment and contempt, or to jo}^, love, and veneration," its own character as wonder becomes profoundly modified. Thns Inj fusion of different emotions, in the very lyrocess of " turning" or transition, new complex, emotional states a7'lse. Different kinds of wonder — fearful, contemptuous, joyful, loving, venerating — are thus produced, to the indefinite enrichment and furthering of the development of the life of feeling. Were there no kinds of wonder beyond nearly blank, almost undifferentiated, half-animal wonder, or wonder mixed with fear and contempt ; with what fitting emotion should man greet the rising conception of Infinite love or moral laower? The insufiicient reason which led some earlier writers to "permit wonder to head the series " would apply, Avith almost equal cogency, to every important form of natural feeling. Each such feeling may be placed at the head of a series, under which may be ranged all the principal modifications of the dom- inant emotion by admixture of other more or less strongly toned emotions. Thus love may head one list, and grief another, and joy a third, and fear and hope still others. As Professor James has truly said : ^ " There is no limit to the number of possible different emotions which may exist . . . Any classification of the emotions is seen to be as true and natural as any other, if it only serves some purpose." In pursuance of our present purpose we might then classify love — for example — as timid love, disap- pointed and grieved love, contemptuous love, joyful love, vener- ating love, etc. Or, beginning rather with grief, wo might jjer- mit it to head another series. Nor would the limits of possible complexity be reached when we had made all imaginable dual comljinations ; for experience shows us states of emotion where three or even more characteristic tones of emotion seem fused into an " emotional consonance " or " dissonance," as it were. Especially interesting in this connection are those conflicts of emotion with which all highly dev(>lo]iod emotional natures make the student of life familiar. In all of them the affective ' Theco ptfitcniptits are. in tlie main, true, altlioutih the reaBoiis with which the author enforces them are, in our ju(lt,'inci)t, inadciiuate. Tliu Principles of Psychology, U., p. 4H. CONFLICT OF THE EMOTIONS 655 side of consciousness is uot properly descfibed as simply a change from a thin but intense stream of one kind of feelin<4- to a similar stream of another kind ; the rather is the Avhole land- scape of the soul like that we see in nature when lights and shadows, spots of cloud and storm and spots of sunshine;, form a ming'led whoh;. The held of ali"ectiv(; consciousness is almost always a chiaru-oscuro. The emotion that comes from having- tli(; heart torn between the call of duty and the pleadings of natural ati'ection, for example, or between love of the object and hatred of his conduct, or l)etween pity for weakness and contempt for yielding- to it — all this is what makes the tragedy of life, actual or artistic, so profound and so captivating of our earnest attention. This it is which the g-reat works of art — like Antigone, Hamlet, and Lear — put upon the stage. Here we may fitly refer to that tendency of the mind to rebound from one form of emo- tion quickly to its opposite, to which frequent reference has al- ready been made. In this respect, however, dispositions difier markedly ; and different individuals can be understood as re- spects their emotional development only when we also take into account all the connected development of memory, imagination, thought, and will. The physiological reason for this is doubt- less to be found in that general condition of cerebral agitation and extra-cerebral overflow, that loosening of circumscribed cen- ters and opening up of nerve-tracts, Avhicli all intensifying of feeling- involves. ^ 12. The inadequacy of the theory of feeling which denies that affective states, as such, differ qualitatively, and accounts for all the complex forms of emotion as only " ideationally " different, is again apparent. According to Volkmann ' we cannot speak of a recijirocal influence of the feelings as such. The influence of feelings on each other — he holds— is only ai)2iarent ; synchronous feelings inhibit each other because the circles of ideas in which they have their rise inhibit each other ; while, for a corresponding reason in the relations of the ideas, the accompanying feelings support and further each other. All this, however, neglects the fundamental character of the affective phenomena of mental life. It is doubtless true that one often passes from joy to grief, or undergoes a struggle between the two emotions, because, for example, pleasant news is succeeded by sad news, or the total event under contemplation is partly pleasant and jiartly sad. But it is also true that emotion itself not infrequently seems to take the lead ; all at once we are sad without clearly knowing the reason why, and then matters which, but an hour ago, seemed joyful now seem rather fitted to support and in- crease our tendency to grief. As to the I'elation between the increasing complexity of our life of ideation and thought, on the one hand, and the development of the higher feelings, on the other hand, there is much to 1 Lehrbuch d. Psychologic, II., p. 339 f. 556 THE EMOTIONS AKD PASSIONS warrant the view of Horwicz : ' In the more primitive forms thiiikiug quite passes into, and fuses with, feeliug ; thiukiug is thus rather a conse- quence than an antecedent of feeliug; but this relation changes with devel- opment ; thinking becomes emancipated from its connection with the lower forms of feeling. But in the case of the higher feelings again, thinking may be largely dominated by them. In whatever way, however, we rejiresent the relation between our ideas and our emotions, it is certain that a recii^i'ocal determining influence must be acknowledged in the case of all the more highly developed experience. Indeed, if this were not so, it is impossible to see how human life could really develop and become so largely composed of emotions. § 13. Further light is thrown upon the principles which regulate the in- creasing complexity of the emotions by considering that some of them de- pend upon organic and mental conditions, or ujjon relations, which can only be furnished when certain periods of development are reached. This is trae in a peculiar way of those somewhat highly specialized and yet complex emotions which belong to the climacterics of human life. Under this class those emotions which belong particularly to puberty have already been not- iced. These are a confused and changeful mixture of ill-localized, vague, bodily sensations, of mental unrest and undefined longings, of feelings of mixed attraction and shyness in the presence of the opposite sex, etc. Again the peculiar emotions of the parent toward the child, of the lover toward his mistress, of the husband and wife, or of long-tried and intellect- ually well-mated friends, are, of course, dependent on the necessary rela- tions being realized. But when these feelings do arise, it is shallowness it- self to explain them as though they followed definitely pre-established rela- tions of sensations, ideas, or purposes. The leajj of the jDareutal heart toward the child at the sound of its first cry is something that lies too deep for ac- counting by sums in ideation ; and so does the emotion of the youth who falls in love at first sight, or the outgoing of a friend's afi'ection toward his friend. ^ 14. Contrast and abrupt change in the emotions contribute new ele- ments to the complex character of the resulting forms of emotional excite- ment. The joy of the mother is somewhat different because " she re- membereth (as 'no more,' as a thing of the past) the anguish." When "remedies are past, the griefs are ended" — not, indeed, utterly ceased as griefs, but changed into a less militant kind of emotion. That which actual change accomplishes so vividly, memory and imagination can accomplish in scarcely less effective form. To reflect upon escape from danger or sorrow adds to present joy a differently toned joy, a pleasurable feeling of security or of gratitude or of relief. Thus the emotions that are contrasted in real nature may indirectly either increase or diminish each other. " For if of joy. being altogether wanting, It doth remember me the more of sorrow ; Or if of grief, being altogether liad. It adds more sorrow to my want of joy. " Hence that " extraordinary state " which, in the Phaedo, is referred to as "an vinaccustomed mixture of delight and sorrow;" hence that "secret ' rsychologische Analysen, ii., Zwcite II:i]ftc, p. 178 f. TELEOLOGY OF THE EMOTIONS 557 l)lGasiiio " which Schopenhauer affirms is the conipanion of a certain form of grief — that "which the most melancholy of all writers called the 'joy of grief.' " The treatment of the Teleolo^^y of the more complex and de- veloped Emotions, like that of feelinq- g-enerally as pleasure- pain, has been attempted from the points of view held by com- parative and evolutionary psychology. The scientific success of this treatment, however, as explaining the ditierentiation of the emotions, cannot be called great. In general the following two principles apjily to some forms of emotional excitement : (1) The motor reactions called forth as a part of the bodily resonance are adapted for the defence and preservation of the subject of the emotion ; and (2) by the application of the jn-inciples of imi- tation and sympathy, these same or other reactions operate for the defence and preservation of a multitude of the same species. Tims the immediate result of anger, or hatred, is to put the in- dividual into the best muscular, vaso-motor, and respiratory condition for defence or attack ; the spreading sympathetically of the same emotions rallies the siirrounding individuals of the same species to united energies in the same directions. Fear, also, tends to check the uncautious advance into danger and to set up, before thought can have time to draw conclusions, the movements in retreat. In how large a wa}' the development of intellectual wonder is serviceable to the individual and to the race, we shall see more clearly when w^e have considered its sen- timental form. Moderate emotions of joy are directly sanitary for the individual ; and, by contagion, when we see their expres- sion in others, we are helped scarcely less than when made sub- jects of the emotion at first instance. Even grief — though more indirectly through exercise of memory and imagination upon the consequences of conduct — may prove serviceable in a bio- logical way. We cannot believe, however, that such restricted teleology of the emotions is, on the whole, very satisfactory. Taking all the facts of experience into the account, it is doubtful whether the emotions are, on the whole, " life-saving " and " growth-pro- moting " functions of body and mind — in the merelv biological meaning of the words " life " and " growth." In the excessively intense form in which they all tend to recur, unless checked by the forces of an ideational and ethical development, the emo- tions expend life and hinder growth. AVe liav(i seen that, phys- iologically considered, they are all significant of an " overplus," which quickly becomes an " overflow," of cerebral disturbance. Both the " sthenic " (or intensely innervating) and the " as- 558 THE EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS thenic " (or depressin"-) emotions tend to destroy the mecliau- ism ; " the sthenic kill by apoplexy, the asthenic by laming: the heart." ^ But human life and human development, in the wider and higher meaning" of those words, would be infinitely less rich and interesting- were it not for so varied and mighty emotions and passions, with all the part they have j)layed in history, art, and religion. In a grander significance than biology or comparative psycholog-y can properly recognize, the afi'ective forces have been " serviceable " to the race. If the final purpose of life were merely to conserve and propagate itself, there Avould seem to be as little use for so many and strong emotions as for so much and such qualitatively varied pain. At this point, psychology is compelled to hand over to ethical philosophy rather than to biology the larger i^roblems started by the study of human feeling. Here we find, on one side, the conclusion expressed by Matthew Arnold, as follows : " Fulness of life and power of feeling, ye Are for the happy, for the souls at ease, Who dwell on a firm basis of content." But, on the other side, the rational faith of Browning- : " Put pain from out the world, what room were left For thanks to God, for love to man ? " § 15. The lower teleological significance of anger is perhaps most obvious. Of the serviceable results of this emotion Darwin affirms :^ "The excited brain gives strength to the muscles, and, at the same time, energy to the will. The body is commonly held erect, ready for instant action. . . Such gestures as the raising of the arms, with the fists clenched, as if to strike the offender, are common." Similarly, Darwin would account for the " uufieshing" of the teeth, in the snarl or sneer of anger, as a survival of the habit of getting these organs ready for attack ; although the closing of the mouth "with firmness, showing fixed determination" is considered to be a sign of the serviceable character of the bodily movements connected with the kindred emotion of hatred. The interesting versatility of biological psychology is illustrated further in the view of Mr. Spencer that the disten- tion of the nostrils in anger was caused by the mouth of " our ancestors " being filled with " a part of an antagonist's body," and the angry frown by its utility iii keeping the sun out of the eyes when engaged in mortal com- bat. But tlio obvious physiological reason tliat, with mouth closed and res- piration (juickened, the nostrils must dilate, would seem to be sullicient ; and Professor Mosso properly objects that the dilatation of the pupils of the ' Comp. Wundt : Phyeiolog. Psychologie, II., p. 400 f. ' Tlic Expression of the Emotious, p. 240 f. NATURE OF THE PASSIONS .559 eyes, which accompanies frowning, is unfavorable for distinct vision. Tlie latter authority also correctly remarks that the graver " the peril becomes, the more do the reactions which are i^ositively harmful to the animal prevail in number and in efficacy." But all this is only one of innumerable in- stances where biological and evolutionary i)sychology becomes self-contra- dictory, or at least iiuite inadocpiato, in its attempt to explain the whole round of man's psychical phenomena.' The Distinction between the Passions and the Emotions is not snch as to require a separate treatment of the former. Emotions which have by freciuent repetition Ixn-ome habitual, and are, as it were, backed up l)y Avill, may be called " i)assions." Connected with this diti'eronce of the two is the diil'erent relation to imagination and to thoug-ht. On these intellectual ojierations the so-called passions may be said to feed, and so to attain the lif J and heat which give them a persistency not to be found in the distinctively emotional states. On the other hand, the most deeply seated and intense forms of the life of feeling' — the " rul- ing" passions," as we are wont so expressively to denominate them — tinge the entire character of our mental images and of our habitual conclusions. Thus the passio)iate jealousy of the king" in the Winter's Tale makes him perceive, imagine, and in- fer, the infidelity of the reallj^ faultless Hermione ; while the emotion of jealousy in Othello sweeps away reason and hurries the will on to the murderous deed. It is for this reason chiefly that, as HolTdiug says, ~ "Rejietition has a difierent effect upon emotion and upon passion ; it weakens the one, and feeds the other." The brooding, reflective character of passion makes it, as it were, press more indelil)ly into the soul certain ideas and judgments ; while emotion tends for the time being toAvard the obliteration of all ideation and reasoning. The storm of emo- tion clears up and cools off the psychical atmosphere ; it leaves the nervous system and mind alike relaxed. But passion burns with the steady heat of a tropical summer. Nevertheless, i^assion is ever ready — especiall}^ in some nat- ures — to take upon itself emotional characteristics, and so to flame up and vent itself in gfreatly increased psycho-physical disturb- ance ; just as even perpetually active volcanoes may have their periods of enormously increased eniptive energ"y. And, indeed, the distinction between the passions and the emotions, like the distinction between the emotions and the sentiments (and even more obviously), is only a relative one. A certain contimiity of nature riais throur/k the entire series of develojwients, as respects > On this subject see James, The P*rincip'.e8 of Psychology, 11., p. 477 f. » Outlines of Psychology, p, 283. i")60 THE EMOTIONS AND PASSIONS both intensity and complex qualities, of which the life of feeling is capahle. g 16. The popular use of the Wo words, "emotion " and " passion" does not observe any fixed distinction. The etymology of the two suggests, of course, that the side of " suffering," on the part of the subject of the aff'ec- tive state, is emphasized by the latter of these terms {Leidenscliafl, in Ger- man). It was Kant who described the psychological distinction in the fol- lowing language : "Emotion takes effect as a flood which bursts its dam, passion as a stream which wears for itself an ever-deepening channel. . . Emotion is like a fit of intoxication, which is slejDt oflf ; passion as a mad- ness, brooding over one idea, which sinks in ever deeper." In accordance with this distinction is the undoubted fact that men who are known to have strong passions, do not lose thereby our intellectual and moral respect; while emotional men are inevitably regarded as weak, however praiseworthy the individual character of their emotions may be. Yet, as we have already seen, and shall see further in considering the character of the sentiments, the most refined forms of feeling all have their emotional intensities and stages. Life and character are enriched by the occasional exi^erience of them in their highest intensities. For example, he who has never "al- lowed himself" to be swept away tii? to the heights of musical feeling, by some such gathering and bursting storm of musical sensations as the Pil- giim Chorus in Wagner's Tannhauser, is the poorer for lack of having been subjugated by the strength of emotive excitement. [Besides the works cited at the close of Chapter X., the following may be consulted : .lames : The Principles of Psycholoiry, II. , xxv. Darwin : Expression of the Emotions. Lange : translation by H. Knrella, Ueber Gemiithsbewegnngen. Maass : Vcrsuch iiber d. (ief iihle ; and Versnche iiber d. Leidenschaften. Mantegazza: La Phj-sionomic et I'Expres- aion des Sentiments. Warner : Physical Expression. Bell : Anatomy of Expression. Leh- mann, translation by Bendixen, Die Hauptgesetze d. menschlichen Gefiihlsleben. Sully : Sensation and Intuition, chap, ii.] CHAPTER XXIV. THE SENTIMENTS As the complex life of liuiuau feelinp: develops in more obvi- ous dependence upon the contemporaneous development of im- agination and thought, new kinds of feelings are manifested for ■which we have cliosen the term "sentiments." The nature of the sentiments, as distinguished from the emotions, has already- been described in a negative way ; the former lack that marked intensity and consequently large admixture of secondary feeling due to bodily resonance which characterize the latter. Posi- tively, then, we may now say, the sentiments are the most ideal and spiritual of all the forms of developed feeling. In apply- ing the word " ideal " to the sentiments we should understand that these affective phenomena are the farthest possible distant from such relatively simple and content-less feelings as man has in common with the lower animals. The sentiments are feelings full, so to speak, of ideas ; some of them may even be said to be feelings that arise only in the presence of " ideals," — or of those complex constructions of imagination and thought which the developed mind holds before itself as types or patterns of what is not, but what ought to be. The possession of sentiments implies then — whether their moral quality be considered good, bad, or indifferent — a comparatively refined and highly cultured stage of ideation and reasoning. But by calling the sentiments " spiritual " forms of feeling we mean to emphasize in a positive way the very thing which we emphasize negatively when we assert that they are not, like the emotions, obviously built upon a basis of somatic reactions. They are, of all our affective phe- nomena, most obviously ascribed purely to a highly generalized and abstract conception of the lujo, considered as freed from all dependence upon the bodily organism. Here, however, the conclusion made necessary by our entire doctrine of the nature of feeling must not be abandoned. All this is only relative. The sentiments reveal their kinship with the primitive forms of feeling and with their twin sisters, the emo- tions. It is only in respect of degree that they have this ideal 36 562 THE SENTIMENTS and spiritual character ; tliej', as truly as all tlie coarser feelings, may become opposed to, or bereft of, reason ; they, too, have un- derneath them, not only a centrally initiated nervous process but a sensuous coloring- derived from the concomitant condition of the peripheral and intra-organic vessels and tissues. The main Classes of the Sentiments have already been stated to be the following three : the Intellectual, the ^Esthetical, and the Ethical. ^ 1. The somatic basis of those pesthetical and ethical feelings which we call " warm " and " glowing " is, of course, easiest to describe. The sug- gestion that this subject should receive a detailed investigation is one which the experimental str;dy of iisychology has only just begun to regard. If a col- lection and satisfactory exposition of the facts were at present attainable (as it certainly is not), we shouki still in so general a treatise as ours not be able to consider them. The following illustrations of the true position must suf- fice. It may, in the first place, be argued that since all the sentiments, when greatly increased in the intensity of their characteristic complexes of feeling, tend to become emotional ; and since, when they do become thus emotional, they plainly show the influence (in common with the coarser emotions) of the bodily reactions belonging to them ; therefore, they all, even in their most ideal and spiritual forms of manifestation, are, to some ex- tent, colored by the same bodily reactions. Such a general argument must be held to be sound and defensible. In connection with that principle of continuity which relates the sentiments to the emotions, we infer the fusion of this bodily and sensuous coloring with certain psychoses among the so- called sentiments, in which direct analysis may not be able to find it. Illustration may begin by considering those sesthetical and ethical feel- ings which we have in view of objects called "sublime." Here the very word sublime is significant of our contention. That is suhlime which is lifted up on high ; and that is sublime to me, to which I am conscious, in some way, of being drawn or lifted up, or allured to make the eflfort of lift- ing myself up. Such an experience cannot, however, be had with any warmth of feeling — that is, there can be no actual psychosis corresponding to the sentiment of the sublime — without the appropriate psycho-physical activity. This activity includes the lifting-up of the eyes, the upheaving of the chest, the deeper inspiration, the quickened circulation, the tendency to widen the extent of the heart-movement, etc., which are characteristic of the gentler " sthenic " forms of feeling. The eflfort to repress this mild and massive bodily resonance, as well as the eifort to become distinctly conscious of it in an analytic way, tends at once to diminish this characteristic form of feeling. But its presence is undoubtedly felt in all exiiorience with this sentiment. Moreover, the diflferent shadings of the sentiment are, to a large extent, obtained only by difterentiations in the characteristic tone of the bodily resonance. For example, a highly refined religious veneration or awe is closely akin to the sesthetical sentiment of the stiblime. Here wo have introduced an element of that mild and massive shrinking, or with- drawal, of vital outgoing which characterizes the somatic reactions of every BODILY BASIS OF THE SENTIMENTS 563 form of tlie feeling of fear (a mixture, therefore, of the expansive and re- tractive organic conditions). Those u>sthetical sentiments which arc apiiealoil to by art in the forms of comedy and tragedy are, of coiirso, incapabk^ of realization without the aj^propriate bodily resonance. Laughter, or even the tendency to laugh, is im2)ossible as a form of conscious feeling, without admixture of felt physio- logical jjrocesses of laughter or tendency to laughter. This is probably true even of that " exquisite laughter that comes from a gratification of the rea- soning faculty" — already referred to — where the merriment is most interior, brain-like as it were, and unexpressed as far as visible tokens go. Here, as in the case of the sublime, the tone of the sentiment may be altered by ad- mixture of slight amounts of other kinds of refined feeling, with their char- acteristic mild forms of bodily resonance. There is just a tinge, at least, of anger, or contempt in the sentiment of satire ; and of sympathy, or grief, in the most cultivated forms of humor. While the sentiments which enter into the higher kinds of tragedy, whether as necessary for its artistic produc- tion, or dramatic representation, or sympathetic aiipreciation, make acknowl- edged drafts upon the bodily organism for their exjirossion and support. It is a most interesting psycho-physical question, how much, and Avhat, are the necessary somatic reactions that characterize the moral sentiments. Doubtless, what we call " conscience " is in different men a very different affair — characterized much more by unemotional judgment in some cases, and by unreasoning emotion, or unemotional and unreasoning impulsive "will-work," in still other cases. In all cases, doubtless, also, conscience is a very comjilex development. But even its most characteristic and uni- versal form of sentiment— the feeling of obligation, the feeling of "the ought " — does not seem to be free from somatic influences. The jiale and completely intellectualized concept of obligation, could such a form of men- tal life be realized, might have its bodily basis chiefly in the motor accom- paniment of language; but the actual concrete feeling, " I oiigJit," consti- tutes a sentiment of obligation, or of being bound, in jiart, just because it is the feeling of the motor impulse to inhibit or to innervate the muscular ap- jiaratus necessary to some action to which the feeling has reference. I feel "I must not sjieak," " I mnsf vol strike," " I mxst not go," or the opposite — and all this is, undoubtedly, ordinarily warmed up in consciousness by the appropriate secondary bodily resonances. The various special forms of feeling which are customarily classified as ethical sentiments, might be examined in detail from the same general point of view. The affection of love in the complex form in which it develops between parent and offspring, illustrates well an entire class of sentiments. Such sentiment is originally produced, and nurtured in all its earlier stages, in obvious dependence upon, and connection with, numerous bodily influ- ences. It is scarcely necessary to say that this is so in the case of the senti- mental affection which exists, where the emotional or iiassionate stages are wanting, between persons of different sex. It is the case of the higher intellectual feelings which seems to offer the most nearly i^erfect exemption from all traces of bodily resonance. That these feelings, however, are capable of assuming the character of disturbing emotions, or more slowly and yet intensely burning passions, we have already 564 THE SENTIMENTS seen to be true. The general argument, as derived from the very nature of the life of feeling and from the laws of its development, applies, therefore, to them also. A careful attention to the coloring of our consciousness Avhen these feelings predominate helps, though jDerhaps only in an imperfect way, to illustrate the principle. Certainly the feeling with which I confi- dently draw a conclusion differs from that which forms the aiiective ac- companiment of a flash of insight. And both these sentiments differ from that which marks the dubitating or doubtfully accomjilished process of inference. Ahiiost as certainly, a part of these differences is of the nature of a felt bodily reaction. The firm mouth and decisive gesturing, the start of surprise or the exclamation of joy at discovery, the drooping or shaking of the head, etc., which sometimes actually express such forms of intellectual feeling, respectively, are not without great significance. Without directly :'-eturning to this somatic aspect of even the most ideal and si^iritual of the sentiments, we shall find the correct view suggested constantly as we continue the treatment of them in detail. The more properly Intellectual Sentiments may be, somewhat roughly, divided, into two general classes. These are either (1) such as serve to give impulse and guidance to the intellectual processes ; or (2) such as seem simply to accompany these proc- esses without acting upon them in a marked way either to excite or to inhibit tliem. Yet some of the latter of these two classes also are probably not without a certain practical benefit in the logical processes which they accompany. The developed sentiment of " intellectual curiosity ; " the semi-ethical esti- mate, as somewhat of great worth in itself, which comes to be attached in certain minds to the truth as such (the " feeling of the value of truth " — for its own sake) ; the feelings of affection and loyalty to science in general, or to their particular depart- ment of scientific research, which many devotees evince ; the sentiment of " acquisitiveness " as directed toward stores of knowledge, and the pleasant feeling of attainment and jDosses- sion that accompany knowledge ; the feeling of certainty or "conviction," without which there woiild seem to be insufficient ground for the distinction between what is merely /ory^rtZ^y t'or- rect and what is, as we say, really true — all these may be men- tioned as intellectual sentiments belonging to the first class. These sentiments are of very diffiu'ciit degrees of complexity ; they develo]o at difi^erent stages in the general advance of in- tellectual life ; and they have not all, by any means, the same fundamental character and value as affective accomi^animents of intellectual growth. For example, a purely sentimental feeling toward a fictitious creature of imagination called " science," or a secretive and miser-like eagerness to acquire and hoard facts, are affective phenomena which, although implying an extremely I THE INTELLECTUAL SENTIMENTS 565 complex ideational and logical development, are almost patho- logical in character. On the contrar}^, intellectual curiosity, and that feeling of conviction which attaches itself to the per- ceptive and ratiociuative products of intellect, are rather of the nature of universal human sentiments. While a high estimate of the value of truth, as such and for its own sake, may jiroperly be held to mark an exalted standard of attainment in ethical, even more surely than in merely intellectual, development. It would be quite impossible to enumerate, with confidence that no omissions were being made, the intellectual sentiments of the second class. Indeed, the rather might we claim that probably every new shade of discriminable logical processes has its corresponding shade of feeling accompanying and spe- cially belonging to it. Here we go back again, as it Avero, to first principles in the development of mental life. We have seen that discriminating consciousness belongs to all conscious- ness, so far as consciousness contains data for knowledge of its own processes ; and that, therefore, the most primary intellec- tion is relating faculty. But all activity of relating faculty, we have also seen, has its accompaniment of feelings of relation. Personifjdng, and speaking in a figurative way, it may be said that the mind feels itself as it conducts all the logical processes. This is true of even the simplest processes of recognizing simi- larities, contrasts, etc.; as well as of those coupling and uncoup- ling processes which go on, in the most primitive forms of af- firmation and negation, between the ideas. All the jwcesses of perception, memory, imagination, and tJiinl-ing, therefore, Jiace their peculiar affective accompaniments ; for feeling, in an all-around and pervasive way, is no less variable and fertile in productivity of various species, than is intellect, in the widest meaning of the latter term. The feelings which characterize the intellectual processes, like all other forms of feeling, have their tone of either pleas- ure or pain. From this point of view, they may be divided into joleasant and painful intellectual sentiments. However, when this tone becomes obtrusive, its very existence detracts from the sentimental character of the feeling. For example, the struggle to accomplish an act of recognitive memory, or to find a middle term in an argument, or to recognize a relation, or to under- stand a principle, may become predominatingly painful. Sus- pense or confusion of memory, and of the processes of reasoning, may be felt as a painful emotion. But even where the feeling of the logical activities does not reach this emotional stage, it still has its mildly unpleasant or pleasant tone. Such tone may 566 THE SENTIMENTS often be regarded as approbating- or disapproving, furthering or clieckiug and inhibiting, the intellectual processes. When " one feels" dissatisfied with the correctness or completeness of an act of voluntary and recognitive memory, " one knows " that one has not remembered correctly and completely ; and this dissat- isfaction is itself a sort of craving further to correct and com- plete the act of memory. Thus, also, there accompanies our clearly conscious logical processes a feeling of their conclusive- ness or inconclusiveness, which either makes us rest satisfied in the conclusion or desire to revise it. Indeed, to sophisticate that feeling, or to disregard it, is closely akin to the moral fault of lying. For the whole mind's vital seizure of a truth us proved, as folloiving rightfully from grourids, is i?i part a matter of pleasatit sentiment. In general, we can quote approvingly the writer ^ who declares: "A man without any feeling would certainly have no intellect as well." " And in a sound nature doubt, as a rule, appears at the right time, i.e., always when the ground for it exists, and never without ground. This depends on susceptibility for the feeling of actuality and the feeling of truth." § 2. The refined sentiment of eixriosity, as we have ah'eacly seen, has its origin in a certain ahnost animal restlessness and tendency to satisfy craving with activity. This original feeling develops, however, into something much more complex and intellectually nobler. Such is the desire of hioirl- edge, either — as we are wont to say — for its own sake, or for the sake of the many immediate and collateral benefits which belong to knowledge. In order to this, a growing experience with knowledge is, as it were, essen- tial. To produce this sentimental feeling toward knowledge, it is therefore necessary that one should know what it is to know — that is, should reflect upon the accompaniments and results of knowledge, as such. Now, such ex- l^erience is gained and such reflection stimulated, to a certain extent, for every- one in a perfectly natural and necessary way. But the more direct pleas- ures of knowledge are twofold — the pleasures of search and the pleasures of attainment and possession. That restless activity of all the powers, to which references have repeatedly been made, is itself callable of being felt in the process in a more or less pleasurable way. To this j^leasure of activity is added the pleasure of satisfaction which follows the successful use of all the powers; the latter is a sort of aff'ective "well-done, thou good and faithful servant," pronounced tipon the self, and blended with the pleasant feeling of being discharged from obligation and eased of the demand for work. About this nucleus also clusters tlio memory of the joys of discovery and of experiencing the dawning upon the intellectual horizon of strange and novel facts and truths. The experience of the more indirect benefits of knowledge complicates and strengthens further the same sentiment. Among such benefits are the ' llartscn : Grundziige d. Psychologic, pp. 19 f., 170 f. THE DESIRE OF KNOAVLi;D(iE 567 influence and power which are associated witli knowledge. To tell what ?re know, but is uukuown by others, or even to think of ourselves as holding truth in possession which wo can communicate at any time, begets pleas- ant feeling. To this may be added the benevolent desire to do good with our knowledge, either in a limited way to a few individuals or to the entire race as a contributor to its beneficent and growing stock of knowledge. In connection with this complex accretion or development of feeling as the affective accompaniment of knowledge, the conception of knowledge it- self expands, becomes more general and more abstract. By knowledge one comes to understand something " universal," something grand and in- conceivably vast in extent, of which one's own actual knowing processes are only a poor and very partial representative. Even the most intense and narrow specialist finds quite impracticable the task of making his own the entire realm of knowledge that belongs to his chosen specialty. But other equally incommensurable specialties are known by him to exist. And be- yond the aggregate of them all — the total sum of acquired human knowl- edge — lie the imagined immensities of space, as it were, to be yet explored and brought within ken, and then — the greater more, yet beyond. Thus do imagination and thinking succeed in refining the conception of knowl- edge so that it may, as an object of sentiment, absorb the devotion of those who worship their own conception. What a mingling of manifold senti- ments is thus rei^resented by the so-called " pure " desire or love of knowl- edge. ^ 3. The desire of knowledge, and the love of it, need but little further work of imagination to develop a mixed and rather morbid form of sentiment somewhat characteristic of modern times. Let us suppose the personifica- tion of an admirable system of generalizations to become more complete. We have now framed a coucei^tion (really of an exceedingly vague and ab- stract order) which appears worthy of the i:)assionate devotion of any intel- lect that has no feeling for concrete jaersonal interests — for the actual fears, loves, hopes, and faiths of humanity — but only for its own most perfect work. This abstract conception, thus clothed with flesh and blood and made into a lovely and attractive mistress, shall be called "Science;" and over oppo- site to it stands its worshipping devotee (Empedocles) — " A living man no more ; Nothing but a devoiiring flame of thought, but a naked, eternally restless mind ! " Perhaps fortunately, however, the intense and somewhat sordid interest of the ago in the merely jiractical benefits of scientific inquiiy counteracts largely this overwrought sentiment. § 4. The intellectual sentiments depend upon imagination for the con- struction of their ideals. Although, therefore, we speak of them as intel- lectual or logical, they are none the less ajsthetical in character. Es- sentially considered, the feeling of desire for scientific achievement, of admiration for such achievement, of love and devotion toward it, are akin to those which are felt by the artist and the lover of art. With a somewhat different shading of the various forms of feeling which fuse in the comjilex state, the resulting sentiment becomes qtiasi-moral in its character. If what is known, whether by perception or self-consciousness or inference, is thrown into the form of a proposition, this proposition is called a truth. Al)out the conception which answers to this word ("truth") there develops a com- 568 THE SENTIMENTS plex form of sentiment, wliicli includes the feeling of " worth," or " value." This feeling of worth is itself one that has been framed in a very subtle way as the result of manifold experiences ; it is very diflferent in the case of dif- ferent minds ; and in many minds it never reaches more than a low stage of development. Yet the environment, and the natural reaction of feeling upon environment, enforces in mankind generally some " sentiment of the worth of truth." No indiWdual^much more no community — can exist aud de- velop long without some such sentiment. In the very highest form of its development, this feeling joins with the feelings of refined wonder, admira- tion, aud love, to constitute an aifectional attitude of mind toward what, as the result of much correlative work of imagination and thinking, we are pleased to call ^'tlie truth." This attitude of mind is, then, a sort of su- jiremely complex intellectual, sesthetical, and ethical sentiment. It fur- nishes imi^ulse and guidance to the noblest and choicest minds. It is so con- nected with their precious and undying faith that, as says Lotze,' "it must be even as Ave were taught by the feeling that animated our dreams — it must be that that which is worthy is that which truly is." I 5. Among those more complex forms of the intellectual feelings of re- lation which serve as guides, in some measure, to the logical processes themselves, stands the so-called "feeling of fitness."-' This term, like several others we have just been using, apjilies to sentiments that have an sesthetical and moral, as well as more purely intellectual, aspect. As the life of knowledge develops, its very development largely consists in an increas- ing solidarity to all the tendencies, to all the expectancies, to all the actual forms of mental procedure. Every new perception, that is to say, depends — as respects the speed with which it is accomplished, the complex character it bears as a perception, the kind of feelings which accompany it, and the motor activities it calls forth — upon the entire acquired character of the mind. In a word, every man must say of himself : " I perceive ichat I per- ceive, etc., because it is / that perceive it." Of course, this same thing is even much more obviously true of all that is remembered, imagined, and thought. In general, each new object is presented to consciousness under the principles of the continuity and relativity of all mental life. Each new object is a challenge to the mind : " Look at me in the light of past exjieri- ence and decide : Do Ifit that past experience?" In fact, any theory of knowledge shows that we can never get behind the fact of knowledge itself ; there is, in the last contest of truth with error, no test but the fitness or un- fitness of each object or proposition with the sum-total of experience. But the fitness or unfitness of any new experience is a matter that always arouses feeling. The mind cannot work as a jrare, " cold, logical engine." As a matter of fact, moreover, it is probably feeling, far more and far oftener than any reality or even any suspicion of strict logical C07icl>(sireness, that settles for the time being what the truth shall be held to he. If one feels that it is all right when one sees (has sensations intorpretable as) a white- sheeted form standing in one's room on waking suddenly at midnight, then one does not inquire how it is fitting that one should i)crceive (actually in- terpret) that form. If ono feels the shock of something unharmonious with one's system of moral and religious convictions, on listening to a certain ' Microcosmus, 11., p. 311. » Comp. Baldwin : FoeliuK aud Will, p. 202 f. THE ^STIIETICAL SENTIMENTS 569 proposition, then one instantly rejects or cautiously considers the shocking proposition. Further analysis of the affective attitude of mind toward the character of its own intellectual i)rocesses would show that this attitude may involve con- tributions from nearly or quite all of those simpler feelings of relation to which reference was formerly made (p. 186 f.). Thus the complex sentiment of fitness implies the fusion or struggle of feelings of surprise, exjiectatiou, recognition (with feelings of similarity and ditlerence), etc. With these ele- ments, more or less intense feelings of anger, hatred, fear, love, admiration, and other cpiasi-resthetical and ethical emotions may be mingled. The en- tire complex of feeling may then be spoken of as " the way the man Uikes " any particular proposition; or the "way in which ii finds him." Practi- cally, the affective attitude thus determines very largely what every man ac- tually comes to accept for false or for true. Particularly is this apt to be so in matters of aesthetics, ethics, and religion, where feelings of fitness or unfitness are at once most subtle and complex, and also most influential and least subject to influence from ratiocination. As compared with the forms of feeling- we have just been ex- amining-, the ^sthetical Sentiments are, at once, both more sen- suous and more objective. It is the blending- of the two sets of characteristics denoted by these words (sensuous and objective) which enables us to describe these sentiments as peculiar affec- tive conditions of consciousness. "Whenever we are caught and held, as it were, in a contemplative attitude of mind before cer- tain objects, we experience a unique form of agreeable feeling Avhicli may be called " the feeling- of the beautiful." Its con- trasted, or opposite, form of sentiment is evoked in " the feeling- of the ugly " (or aesthetically unpleasing). Four things will, in general, be noted as true with respect to the origin and nature of the ffisthetical sentiments considered as actual and concrete states of consciousness in the individual. It is only "as such," that psychology considers these sentiments ; or even raises any of the various problems connected with the understanding and practice of the various arts, or of the real nature of beautiful objects. The consideration of such problems, and even their very definition as problems, belongs to the philosophy of sestl^etics. Of nesthetical consciousness, as such, the following- is in g-eneral true : (1) The object Avliich excites the feeling of the beautiful is always some construction implying a refined and developed activity of imagi- nation. This object may indeed be an object of perception ; as in all cases where the sentiment is evoked by some natural thing-, by beautiful scenery, by a picture or other work of art, or by some heroic or benevolent deed of which we are witnesses. Or, again, it ma}'^ be some product of the constructive imag-e-making facultj^ ; as where one admires one's own castle-in-the-air, or 570 THE SENTIMENTS ideal landscape, or ideal hero. But in botli classes of cases, im- agination is the dominating- intellectual activity, whose appro- priate accompanying- sentiment is the feeling of the beautiful. This fact both warrants and explains the statements that, on the one hand, the artist is characterized by the quality and amount of his imagination ; and that, on the other hand, no person lack- ing in imagination can aesthetically appreciate an artistic com- position. In brief, even where Iperceice immediately the beauti- ful in nature, or in art, or in conduct, it is only as I, by activity of imagination, construct the object which I thus perceive. Nevertheless, (2) the contemplative attitude of mind before the object is characteristic of sesthetical consciousness. This atti- tude is distinguished in important particulars from both the practical and the discursive. For example, when I regard any presentation of sense, or work of my own memory or imagina- tion, as answering the question, What am I to do with it ? I may be said to maintain toward the object a practical attitude. In this attitude I see that the street-car, which I wish to take, is coming around the corner of the street ; or I hear the clatter of its bell behind me. But if any object chiefly reminds me of some truth, or illustrates some principle, or suggests a train of rea- soning, I may be said to regard it in a discursive attitude of mind. Neither of these attitudes, however, is primarily condu- cive to oesthetical consciousness ; but just the contrary. If I take either of these attitudes toward any object, I have to re- turn to the contemplative attitude before lean regard the object as beautiful or ugly. Only in this contemplative attitude can I be caught, so to speak, on the side of sesthetical sentiment ; only thus can I consider its challenge : Am I, or am I not to you something beautiful ? (3) The feeling of the beautiful (or its opposite) is indeed an agreeable (or disagreeable) form of feeling ; but it does not seem to be (at least, in all its more complex and highly devel- oped forms) simply the feeling of the agreeable (or of the disa- greeable). On the contrary, so soon as we begin merely to con- sider the agreeableness of the object — that is, its power to produce in us pleasant feelings — or turn our attention upon our own agreeable state of consciousness, our strictly a^sthetical con- sciousness becomes modified. We may now judge the object to be agreeable to us, and may argue that it should bo agreeable to others ; but tliis is not the same thing as having the ff^cliiig of the beautiful in contemplation of the object. For tliis and otlicr reasons we come to hold, with respect to festlietical conscious- ness, that (4) it is dependent, for its highest development, upon SENSUOUS ELEMENTS OF AKT 571 tlio idoaliziiif;- tendency, and npou the i^ower to form " ideals." This tendency is itself, in a measure, the expression of a sort of craving- after that which transcends the limits of actual experi- ence : it bears witness, in its higher manifestations, to the insa- tiable thirst for what is perfect, the aspiration after the more be- yond, as it were. This power is only the expression of the fact that imagination and thought, with respect to the products which result from their combined activity, never cease to grow, never reach any recognized barriers beyond which the possibil- ity of pushing- their work forward is not, at least, conceivable. Thus the liighest, richest, and jna^est activity 0/ intellection {which is not mainly the drawing of conclusions hut rather the const 7' action of ideals) has for its ajfccticc accompanhnent tlie highest, richest, and purest of the sentiments— a. remark which is true of the psychical processes connected with the ethical as well as the a3sthetical ideals. I 6. It is difFiciilt, or impossible, to draw a liue just where the sensia- ously agreeable passes over into the .t'sthetically pleasing. But on the in- tellectual side of this new kind of consciousness, which is characterized by genuine isesthetical sentiment, there can be uo doubt of the important work done by the constructive imagination. Development of imagination is nec- essai-y to sentiment of the beautiful ; the higher and more refined the activ- ity of imagination, the more purely sosthetical does the side of feeling be- come. Therefore it has been held by some writers that, even in the case of all i^erception of beautiful objects, (1) the jjleasure attaches itself to the form and not to the material of sensation ; (2) the object must be recognized by the mind as implying relations ; (3) there must bo some series, or com- posite, of agreeable objects.' Now, it is by activity of imagination alone that "form" is imparted to, or recognized in, the sensuous materials ; and it is imagination and thinking that give the recognized " serial " and " com- posite " character which the beautiful object has. For example, while a single tone sounded by a pure voice might be sensuously agreeable, an aria or harmony (a series or comjiosite of tones) would be necessary to arouse festhetical feeling. So, also, might any single color to a healthy eye, if pre- sented in moderate intensity, be sensuously agreeable ; but only arrange- ments of colors could be in good or bad assthetical taste. Such statomouts as the foregoing must be accepted as emphasizing an important truth concerning the nature of jcsthetical consciousness. On the other hand, the case of the sosthetical sentiments is like that of every other complex development in the life and growth of human feeling. "We can never lay our finger on the precise spot where the new manifestation of fac- ulty, resulting from fusion of simpler elements, first begins to be in accord- ance with the laws of the mind's life. For example, no musical clang is heard as a i^oor and tliin simple tone ; it is itself a harmony of fundamental tones and over-tones, althougli the consciousness cannot analyze it (see J Compare, for example, Mich : Grundriss d. Seeleulebens, p. 63 f. 572 THE SENTIMENTS p. 103 f.) ; and, besides, it appears in tlie stream of consciousness as one of a series of sounds— a sweet something emerging in relation to things either less sweet or positively harsh. Thus there is probably awakened in the in- fant's mind a genuine but only crude and inchoate testhetical consciousness by croning tunes over it in rhythmic fashion, or by rhythmically swaying it back and forth. What is true of iesthetically pleasing perceptions of hear- ing is even more true of the similar perceptions of sight. It is largely because sensations of smell, of taste, and of the skin, do not lend themselves readily as raw "stuff" for imagination to use in creating harmonious series and composite objects, that little or no aesthetical senti- ment attaches itself directly to them. No wonder, then, that it is vulgar to speak of odors, savors, and agreeable sensations of the skin, as " beautiful." It is chiefly, if not wholly, in an indirect way— that is, by association with beautiful visible objects— that odorous, gustable, and tangible things are called beautiful. In this way, however, certain odors and flavors may attain a considerable degree of a^sthetical value. Indeed, when thus sublimated and associated by the work of ideation, there is something about the intrin- sic character of delicate odors which feeds the sentiments in a marvellous way. How powerful they are as factors in association we have already seen (p. 257). Nor are there lacking persons so constituted that Paradise, and its opposite, could scarcely be more forcibly represented in any other way than as places impregnated with agreeable or disagreeable smells. Others would sympathize with that traveller in the Pyrenees who, on drinking cool, fresh milk there, " experienced a series of feelings which the Avord agreeaUe is insufficient to designate." ' " Even the feelings of the lower senses," says Professor James, " may have this secondary escort, due to the arousing of associational trains which reverberate." But such experience shows that the work of imagination is ever the main intellective suj^port of traly aesthetical sentiment. It is not necessary to exhibit the truth in detail for all the more complex and higher forms of festhetical feeling. The theory of poetiy and the prac- tices of the poets, as well as common experience with poetry in the attempt to appreciate and enjoy it, show the supreme need of activity of imagination. And this is true of every other form of art. Indeed, from the purely psy- chological point of view, we seem justified in saying that beautiful objects do not exist, as benidlfid, for anyone who cannot or does not actually con- struct them by an act of imagination. I 7. This so " contemplative " attitude, which we find ourselves obliged to take toward objects that excite the feeling of the beaiitiful, is one of the most interesting and marvellous of psychological phenomena. In its initiation it resembles the state of consciousness described as surprise or wonder. But it is soon found to be something far more complex than either surprise or wonder. It is not, however, by any means the attitude of merely intellectual curiosity or interest. In fact, so far as these intellectual quali- fications are prominent, the fcsthetical character of the state is diminished or lost. Various experiences, otherwise commonplace, are significant of this : (1) We find that we must have time in order to develop genuine a3s- ' M. Guyau, as quoted (by Pnulhan from Les Problcmes de I'Aesthfetique coutemporaine) by James : The Principles of Psychology, II., p. 409. NATURE OF ^STIIETICAL FEELING 073 thetical sontimont. Ono can bo Inirried, or snatclietT awav violently, into a state of sensuous pleasure or pain ; but the feelin}^ of the beautiful, or its opposite, develops relatively slowly. Connected with this is (2) the fact that, as Sully has said,' icsthetical feelings are expansive or susceijtible of jn-olon- gatiou. It is true that when they are highly emotional, or are accompanied witli considerable excitement through the effort of the mind to keep a rajDid pace in its analysis and appreciation of novelties, they may become weari- some and exhausting. But in their delicate, sentimental form they imply that more passive and yet intelligent attitude before the object, which is sometimes called "intuition." This attitude has the accompaniment of a slowly spreading and prolonged pleasurable sentiment. For (3) while anal- ysis of the object may be involved in the arousing and cultivation of aisthet- ical sentiment, just so far as such analysis is made with enough etlbrt to attract attention to itself, it detracts from the possibility of acsthetical enjoyment. This fact Schoijenhauer emphasized in exaggerated fashion, as follows : "Pure contemplation, sinking one's self in perception, losing one's self in the object, forgetting all individuality, surrendering that kind of knowledge which follows the principle of sufHcient reason, and comi)rehends only relations. '' Hence {i) arise the bodily attitudes which men naturally assume when they are in the act of contemplating beautiful visual objects, or are hearing fine mxisic ; hence also the intolerable irritation which comes fi'om unfitting sensuous iuterrujjtions (trivial conversation, laughter, platitudes of the " guide," beating time at a concert with a fan or with the foot, etc.), or even from the proposal to argue the case. In the same way (5) must we ac- count for the fact that explanation and argument are not directly productive of festhetical feeling. I may feign the sentiment of the beautiful, because I think it the apjirojiriate thing to have this sentiment ; and to a certain ex- tent, undoubtedly, the sentiment s^n-ings up and thrives as a social and sym- pathetic feeling. But in its genuine form it exists only as these lU'eiiarations and excitements lead to the right contemplative attitude before the beauti- ful object. § 8. The statement that a3sthetical feeling, whether agreeable or disagree- able, is not merely the feeling of the agreeable or disagreeable, does not con- flict with the previous statement that all the sentiments involve elements due to the character of the bodily reactions. Sensuous i^leasures are afforded by nature and by every form of art. Since it is with the eye or the ear that the principal classes of beautiful objects are intuited, the laws of the i^leasurable activity of these organs must be regarded in awakening the sentiment of the beautiful. Hence a possible science called "physiological {esthetics." For example, a work of architecture, in order to awaken a^sthetical enjoy- ment, must not have its main lines swept in directions unnatural and painful to the moving eye ; — such as from lower riglit-hand, to upper left-hand, cor- ner, or the reverse. Moreover, optical illusions — like that which makes a straight window-sash, when set in a bowed front, appear crushed in — must be avoided. Indirect associational results, siich as the feeling of insecurity which is produced by seemingly insufficient support to any jmrt of the structure, are especially powerful. On the other hand, it is the testimony of all the most intelligent lovers > The Human Mind, 11., p. 137. 574 THE SENTIMENTS of the beautiful, that the " pleasure -pain " qualifications of sesthetical senti- ment are not the whole of their afi'ective experience. The rather is there something about this kind of feeling which fits it to be the accompaniment of a universalizing and idealizing activity of the mind. Its non-sensnous character is the important thing about it. As we have already said, consider- ation of one's own state as agreeable, or of the utility of the object as capable of producing that state, detracts from the lesthetical purity of the sentiment. Connected with this is the significant natural feeling — the beautiful object ought to he admired ; and that, by everybody. Hence, while men deem it absurd to dispute about lower forms of " taste " which concern only what is sensuously agreeable or disagreeable, they dispute most earnestly (however vainly) about " taste " in matters of the beautiful and the ugly. To genu- inely sesthetical matters the motto De gustibus nan disputandmn, distinctly does not apply. I 9. The dependence of sesthetical feeling upon the tendencies of human nature to construct ideals, and upon the developing faculty of constructing ideals, accounts for many of its peculiarities. Herein is found the chief cause of man's sesthetical superiority to the other animals. Comparative jisychology, indeed, leaves us, even more than upon most imijortant mat- ters, almost completely in the dark as to the real nature of the so-called " sesthetical consciousness " of the lower animals. So far as can be discov- ered, however, the lower animals have no genuinely cpsthetical feeling.' Those manifestations which are sometimes interpreted as signs of such feel- ing ai^pear rather to result from either unconscious and merely organic im- pulse, or from selective seiisiio^is excitement of a pleasurable or painful kind. In almost, if not quite, all stages of human development, however, the adult human being does exhibit plain signs of a genuine sesthetical feeling. The theory of evolution, to be sure, correctly points out that in its lower stages assthotical sentiment is largely mixed with feelings of pride, of self-esteem, with love of being made an object of admiration or of fear ; and with other special forms of emotion. But " primitive man" even — so far as we know anything whatever about him, apparently had also an unanimal and genuinely sesthetical consciousness. In food, drink, clothing, and sexual intercourse, the human animal tends to be ceremonial and, at least, rudely artistic ; and this he does with some consciousness of the ideal worth belonging to "the form " in which things present themselves, or are done. The picture of man pleasing himself with the rude musical instrument, or the twang of his bow- string, or patiently adorning his weapons and utensils without obvious thought of anything beyond his satisfaction in the object thus shaped, is just as old and authentic as any picture of man that evolution can exhibit. But this distinctively human feeling is plainly, in large measure, due to the high and unapproachable degree of activity which imagination and the power of abstraction have attained in man. And the same consideration shows us why the sesthetical sentiments vary so greatly in dilTerent ages, stages of general cultui-e, and in different individuals. In no respect do races and individuals differ more than in respect of the jirecise form which they give to their ideals. Indeed, " precise " and permanent form is incon- ' Coinp. Parker, The Spirit of Beauty, for a brief discussion, both scientlflc aud resthetical, of this question. KINDS OF THE BEAUTIFUL 575 sistciit with the very natui'c of an ideal. Honco the vaco and the individual are found admiring at one tinus what tlioy i)rononnco far from admirable at another time ; hence, too, they are scarcely to be permanently satisfied with any real object. For the limits of imagination and abstraction can never be regarded as flxed. ^ 10. The influence of association in the production of pcsthetical senti- ment requires no special detailed psychological treatment ; fortius influence falls under the same principles as those which have already been snflllciently expounded. It should be noted, however, that the place Avhore association begins, and the exact amount of it, cannot easily be ascertained. For exam- ple, even in experimenting with simple geometrical forms, or with combina- tions of colors, or by sounding two or throe notes in succession and with .some variety of intervals, the distinction between what is " naturally" mo.st pleasing aesthetically, and what is so "on account of association," can seldom be made with perfect confidence. In general, however, the element of asso- ciation is least prominent in music and in its ajsthctical enjoyment ; the reason for this is obvious : musical sounds, of all forms of artistic imjires- sion, embody most of \mvQ feeling, and least of ideation and thought. It belongs to fcsthetics rather than to psychology to .show that all the more complex beautiful objects arouse the higher forms of a^sthetical senti- ment, in their contemi)lation, because they are associated with some ideal already formed in conscious life. This is as true of the beautiful in nature as it is of the beautiful in art. For this reason the jesthetical apjireciation of nature has been develojjed in association with the religious feeling. In many cases the two are indistinguishably blended. The more indei^eudent development of sentiment toward the beautiful in nature, as such, is largely a modern affair. It is a mistake, however, to say that "the feeling for nature's wild solitudes is hardly older than Kousseau." ' The Japanese, at any rate, have exhibited it for centuries in their principal characters and works of art. Nor do we believe it correct to say, that the ancients wholly lacked it. Yet even in its so-called independent modern form it is semi- religious, as it were. "Wo view nature's scenes and movements as products, and admire the creative and expressive spirit behind,'' whenever we contem- plate nature in the jcsthetical attitude. The reco.sfnized Kinds of the Beautiful, and the psychologi- cal theory of the arts which produce beautiful objects, depend upon the possible variations in oesthetical psychoses. And these variations of consciousness depend upon the combinations of the sensuous, the ideal, and the aftcctive elements Avliich enter into consciousness. Here, as in all the phenomena of the life of feel- insT, satisfactory classification is difficult or impossible. As re- spects sensuous data, the two main classes of beautiful objects are, objects beautiful to si^-ht and objects beautiful to hearing-. The subdivisions of the former depend upon the kind of material presented to the eye, or upon the purpose which determines its ' So Sully, The Uumau Miud, II., p. 144. 576 THE SENTIMEISTTS fi)nn of arrang-ement. Natural scenery, landscape-gardening-, architecture, sculpture, and painting belong to this class of beau- tiful objects. But to the second class belong music and poetry. These all, however, differ in respect of the kind and amount of sesthetical feeling which they induce ; and this, not onh' b\' the character of their sensuous elements, but also by the kind and amount of associated ideas which they express. On the one hand, we find a warmth of sentiment awakened by painting which architecture and sculpture cannot arouse ; on the other, we find a wealth of intelligent and more definite sentiment stirred by poetry which music, with its unparalleled power to sweep the soul along in the currents of pure but indefinite feel- ing, cannot possibly attain. In dependence upon such variable sensuous and ideal fac- tors, the different main kinds of aesthetical sentiment are de- veloped. These, however, may almost be said to shade into each other, as the point of view changes from which any beautiful object is regarded. At two apparent extremes stand, for ex- ample, the feeling of the sublime and the sesthetical appreciation of the pretty, of the petite, etc. ; or yet again, the joyous sj'm- pathetic sentiment with which Ave greet the free luxury of wild nature, and the more subdued approbation accorded to what is most obviously neat, orderly, and conformable to recognized law. Here we note — in illustration of recognized psychological principles — the heightening of sesthetical pleasure which comes from the feelings of relief, noveltj^ change, etc., when we pass from one of these extremes of aesthetical consciousness to the other, as it Avere. Thus the delicate beauty of the i3etals of a flower, or of an insect's wing, may be the more enjoyed in con- trast with the feeling of sublimity produced by sight of the stormy sea; or the sight of a beautiful human figure in the "abandon" of unthinking freedom may be the more grateful after admiring the precise working of some well-constructed piece of mechanism in metal. § 11. It is i^lain that the words " beautiful" and "ugly" have just boou used with a more vague and extended significance than is ordinary. This, however, seems necessary. By the phrase " feeling of the heantiful," or agreoal)le jcsthetical sentiment, and by the adjective " beautiful " as ap]ilied to such a great variety of objects with difTerent and even conflicting char- acteristics, we intend to express precisely tliat which is common to an entire class of uniqiie ex])eriences, and therefore cannot be otherwise described. For example, I contemplate the starry heavens or an heroic deed of self-sac- rifico done in obedience to duty, and I call both "grand" or "sublime." Then I see a tiny flower or a pattern wrought on a cloisonnd vase, or a w FEELING OF THE LUDICROUS 577 nicely oxccuteil conitosr, aiul declare each of these to bo "pretty." Or I watch a yacht iu full sail, or a gayly dancing child, or listen to a scherzo or a waltz of a musical master, and exclaim: How "charming!" These three kinds of experience are undoubtedly widely difTerent states of con- sciousness ; just as the objects are very unlike, which evoke them. Yet such psychoses are all a^sthetical sentiments, and the objects are all beautiful. This is because they all belong to the class of those U7iique, complex, a7id agreeable feelings which arise on contemplation of any concrete representaticm of an ideal form of life. Psychological analysis discloses the more important of those fusions of the simjjlcr forms of feeling which result in the princijial types of lestheti- cal consciousness. For example, wo have already seen that the sentiment of sublimity includes a certain modification of sensuous feeling connected with the large and exiiansivouse of the bodily organs in contemplation of an object. It is also characteristic of this sentiment that, in it, attention is not definitely fixed ; the jDrocesses of ideation and thought are vague and result in no definite image or conclusion ; and the suggestions and associations are of a mysterious, unknown more beyond, of the unlimited, as it were. All this is true of both the " dynamical sublime" and the "mathematical sub- lime" (to refer to Kant's distinction) ; it is also true whether the " dynami- cal sublime " is presented in the form of phy.sical, or of intellectual, or of moral, power. Hence that admixture of fear, or of awe, which has always been recognized as entering into this sentiment. Hence also the conflicting sense of the admirable greatness of sojne power, and of the littleness of our ntni power — by accentuation of either of which a tinge of more or less of the pleasurable or painful is given to the sentiment. On the other hand, in exiieriencing the sentiment of the pretty or the petite, the bodily reactions are far less massive and swelling, as it were ; at- tention is concentrated upon a certain harmony of relations confined with- in a small sjjace ; and the resulting feeling has perhaps a slight admixture of the pleasurable sense of superiority — not without res^ject, however, for what obeys law, if even on so small a scale and in so otherwise trivial parti- culars. Again, we call that graceful or charming, whose appreciated ease of movement and abundance of life leaves nothing to be desired in these diiec- tions, but the rather relieves us from the feeling, how diflScult and painful a thing it often is even to live and to move at all. Such indications as the foregoing are confessedly meagre ; but we be- lieve them to be based upon true psychological principles which may be applied to the understanding of the complex nature of the various forms of sesthetical consciousness. Out of this root might grow a safe psychological discussion of the principles which should govern all the arts; and of the general characteristics which all beautiful objects must possess. But these things are foreign to the purpose of a treatise on descriptive psychology. Some reasonable doubt may be raised whether the Feeling of the Ludicrous, in the widest meaning- of this term, properl}^ be- longs with the a^sthetical sentiments. " Here, it is evident " — as says Sully — "we have to do with a feeling of a lower level." But although this is true of most kinds of laughter, and of the 37 578 THE SENTIMENTS objects and events which excite hiughter, the developed feeling of the ludicrous is a very complex and truly human sentiment. The physiological origin of mere laughter is found in the over- flowing effect of any strong emotional excitement. Actual laughter may occur as the expression of various forms of feeling. As, however, its excitement comes more under the influence of imagination and volition, the resulting forms of sentiment are ex- ceedingl}^ difficult of analysis. There are, moreover, several forms of the feeling of the ludi- crous which show the admixture, in varying degrees, of different allied feelings. Among such allied feelings are anger and ha- tred, scorn and despite, the proud feeling of superiority, selfish pleasure at seeing others degraded or shown to be inferior to ourselves, and even the seemingly antagonistic feelings of pity, grief, and sympathy. By such various forms of fusion arise those complex states of consciousness which answer the challenge to appreciate wit, sarcasm, satire, humor, and the like. As to what it is in certain objects or happenings which excites the various forms of the feeling of the ludicrous, there has been almost end- less debate. It would seem evident that there must be in the objects some variety comparable to that of the sentiments with which the mind responds. Perhaps no other one characteristic fits so many cases as that which has been called " the incongru- ous." That is to sa}^, in order to excite the feeling of the ludic- rous, there must be perceived, concretely represented (and gen- erally breaking in upon consciousness as an agreeable surprise), some incongruity — some setting at nought, by the object or event, of what might rationally be expected. If the exhibition of this result arouses strong feelings of pain, either directly, or indi- rectly by sympathy ; then the latter overwhelm the feeling of the ludicrous. But if our feeling toward the object is one of anger, or of scorn, then pleasure may be awakened by the pain which the object of the sarcasm or satire endures. ? 12. Of the several kinds of langhtor only two or three demand atten- tion here. Of these one of the simplest and most primitive is the laiighter of plav — sportive laughter. Such laughter, even with a certain " roguish " tinge, belongs to very young children. Preyor' observed it as early as the end of the second year. When the feeling of jilayfulness becomes refined and developed, it expresses itself in various artistic ways which may call out sympathetic sentiments in response. For example, there are coriain scJ/ei-sos of Bcetlioven which add the feeling of playfulness to their musical charm ; or which, the rather, are the more charming because this feeling fuses with the other feelings which they awaken. The sentiment with which a culti- » The Mind of the Child, p. 299. The Senses and the Will. THE ETHICAL SENTIMENTS 579 vatecl man watches the play of cliiUlien, or of other young animals, is truly jesthetical. It probably has nothing to parallel it in tlie consciousness of the lower animals. The laughter of the savage as ho triumphs over his enemy, and thrusts him through with his spear, is indicative of a crude form of the same emotion as that which, when intellectually (though not always ethically) refined, responds with the " l)iting " sarcasm or the "stinging" jest. But merriment over what we call " wit " has less of the so-called malevolent ele- ment in it ; and the feeling of admiration or surprise at tlie intellectual dis- play — the wit that is shown in this way — further modifies the feeling of the ludicrous. Although the distinction is not sanctioned by uniform usage, and (like all distinctions in this realm of conscious life) is not always to be made with perfect confidence, yet the sentiment called "humor "may be said to involve more or less of benevolent and kindly feeling. It is there- fore the feeling of the ludicrous shaded in the opjiosite direction from that induced by sarcasm and satire. Its refinement and api)lication to the wide realm of human exjierienco is, in general, characteristic of a high degree of intellectual and moral development. Tlie Sentiments customarily called Ethical (or Moral) are of two classes ; either, first, such as are in themselves distinctly- unique and original forms of moral consciousness ; or, second, such as, althoug-h not themselves— properly speaking-— etliical in character, are the springs, or motives, of that conduct to which the distinctly ethical feelings attach themselves. The second of these classes of feeling includes the natural emotions of anger, fear, shame, curiosity ; but especially of hatred, sym- pathy, and the various forms of the affection of love. All psy- chological discussion of the truly " moral feelings " should, then, begin with the forms belonging to the first class ; they are in- deed, as we have already said, the unique, and only distinctively moral, sentiments. They may be said to consist of two pairs of opposites. These are, (1) the feeling of obligation— the feeling for which we use such terms as "I oiight," "he ought," ''one ought," etc., or the opposite feeling,"! OTight not," "he ought not," etc. Closely connected with and akin to this feeling of ob- ligation, but not the same in its coloring and import, is, (2) the feeling of moral approbation, or its opposite, the feeling of moral disapprobation. This latter sentiment we express by saying my conscience " commends," or " condemns," me (or him) for having done so ; or, in case the feeling rises to a sutHcient height of en- ergy, we may experience a sort of exulting over one class of deeds, and regret, or remorse, or indignation, or repulsion, over another class of deeds. For the actual origin in consciousness of these sentiments, we note the following conditions as necessary : (1) The feeling of obligation arises only in view of some deed, or course of con- o80 THE SENTIMENTS duct, which is conceived as possible of either voluntary accept- ance or rejection. It is, in its very nature, a feel'mg of being ohUgated to do something, or not to do something /—although " do- ing " may, in this case, include also choosing to do, or trying to do, as we are accustomed to say. If any form of perceiving, imao-ining, or thinking, is held np before us and we feel, I ought to perceive, imagine, or think in that way ; it is always implied that such activity (of perceiving, imagining, or think- ing) is possible as a deed of will. Hence (2) the development of intellect and will is necessarily involved in the very rise and growth of the moral sentiment of obligation. The development of intellect must, at least, have proceeded far enough to include the capacity of holding up in imagination the deed, or course of conduct, of anticipating an end to be realized thereby, and of concluding — however impulsively and illogically — as to results which Avill follow, //the will be thus and so. Such development of intellect is, in connection with the facts and laws of conation, equivalent to a development of will (this we shall make clear later on). (3) The feeling of moral obligation is, therefore, necessarily correlated with judgment. But there is no i^eculiar class of psy- choses to be denominated " moral judgments," as such. Judg- ment as to vjhat I ought, or he ought, or one ought, under any given circumstances, is acquired under the same conditions as those which belong to the formation of all judgment. There is therefore no special faculty of" conscience" as a matter of 2)ronounc- ing Judgments merely. The whole complex of intellectual experi- ence, and the whole trend of intellectual development determine what every individual will, in fact, judge to be "right" ("that which ought to be done "). In this interdependent development of intellect and feeling, within the sphere of conduct, the follow- ing relations are uniformly sustained : at first, environment, ed- ucation, instruction, arouse the feeling of obligation in connec- tion with certain forms of conduct. Consequences, observation of ciistom, explicit exliortation, and following reward or punish- ment, excite the sentiment of the *' ought to," in view of some conduct, and of the " ought not to," in view of other conduct. Thus habits are formed and the moral sentiment determined in definite directions. But as intellectual development goes on, men have more varied experiences and — so we expressively say — " think more and more for themselves." And thus this senti- ment comes to be hold in suspense, or to fluctuate, or to form itself at last only doul)tfully, as wc question what is right, or wrong, under siich and such circumstances. In these respects FEELING OF THE OUGHT 081 the development of moiiil sentiment both resembles and differs from that of a^sthetical sentiiuent. The two are alike as respects the interdependence of feelinj*- and intellect ; but in matters of morals judgment takes the lead, and men feel they ought to do that which they can n^asonably conclude to be right ; wJiereas in art, even the most cultivated consciousness is rather apt to judge an object beautiful only because it powerfully arouses aesthetical sentiment. Reasons for this difference undoubtedly lie largely in the very conditions of human development. Commonly ac- cepted standards of judgment iiiud be evolved in matters of moral conduct, or Society could not advance at all or even exist. But the same thing is not so true of Art. (■i) The sentiment of moral approbation or disapprobation follows the contemplation of some deed or course of conduct, as an accomplished fact, and as respects its moral character ; and this sentiment is not the same as that of obligation, although dependent upon it. Here the connection between judgment and moral feeling is indissoluble, is of the very nature of moral reason. What I judge right, that I feel I ought to do ; and what I ought to do, if regarded as done, that I must approbate. On the contrary, what I judge wrong, that I feel I ought not to do ; and what I ought not to do, if regarded as done, that I must morally disapprove. From the point of view of individual consciousness and its phenomena considered as such, the ought-feel- ing and the feeling of moral approhation are attached, without any intervening proczss of ratiocination, to a so-called moral judgment ; but in making up the judgment, any amount of reasoning is ad- missible, for it is an affair of evidence, more or less. Nevertheless, a curious and interesting reversal of this process is customary enough, is indeed essential to practical morality. For, in ethics as in art, men incline to judge, and actually do judge, that to be rationally correct which they sentimentally approbate. This is, however, only a special instance under the general influence of feeling over intellect. Tlie specialty consists in this, that in con- duct, which is the sphere of morals, the very conditions of life and growth force upon us certain standards to which a regular reaction of feeling has become attached, without the reasons for the standard being apparent or even attainable. But, finally, (5) the eihical sentiments are as original and incap- able of derivation from other fmns of feeling as are any of the higher and more complex processes of consciousness. Nay, more, these two fundamental forms of moral feeling are unique. "Why they arise in the individual, and why they have that nature and connection with each other, and with the development of Intel- 582 THE SENTIMENTS lect, which they actually have — these are questions which psy- chology cannot answer. Whether anthropology, or any other form of science, or philosophical speculation, can answer these questions, it does not belong to our purpose to inquire. As psy- chologists Ave can only recognize the fundamental psychical facts. ^ 13. The detailed descriptiou of the outfit which human nature de- velops with reference to right and wrong conduct, in the distinctively ethi- cal meaning of these words, belongs to psychological ethics. The really distinctive features of this outfit are, however, very laigely the very forms of sentiment which have just been described. In all other respects the so-called moral nature of man, psychologically considered, requires here no special treatment. Mention must be made, however, of one conception which de- rives its unique character from its connection with these distinctive forms of feeling ; this is, of course, the conception of " the right." What, then, is the actual process in consciousness answering to this conception ; and what is the characteristic development of experience out of which it has its rise? The answer to these questions requires mention of a distinction which has rightly been widely emphasized — the distinction, namely, between the " sub- jectively right " and the " objectively right." In the customary order of de- velopment the individual man's conception of the right is generalized from Ms presentative experience with those forms of conduct which have habitu- ally been connected with the moral sentiments. In the case of morally well- bred children, the ethical consciousness arises and expands in something like the following way : The parent, or the nurse, or the teacher, deliber- ately and habitually connects with certain "doings " the arousement of the ought-feeling and the feeling of apiirobation ; with certain other forms of conduct, in the same way, is connected the opposite forms of these ethical sentiments. With all persons, including those not thus well-bred, the so- cial and even the physical environment tends to establish a similar connec- tion. But this connection implies, in its very possibility, the beginning of a so-called " moral nature " for the child. All its pleasure-pains may thus come to have for it a quasi-moral import. On the basis of this experience with its own states of affective consciousness, considered as connected with deeds of its own will and voluntary courses of conduct, the intellect of the child generalizes. Here, however, as in the formation of all judg- ments, the greater part of the conclusions — such as this is right and that is wrong — are accepted as already formed from those older than itself. The "freeing" of the idea of the right from its concrete and sensuous clothing, as it were, results in the formation of a more and more abstract system of moral principles. Such are statements like the following : "Truth-telling is right and lying is wrong;" "honesty is right and steal- ing is wrong ; " " kindness is right and cruelty is wrong," etc. The further theoretical amplification, as it Avere, of the conceptions cor- responding to the words "right" and " wrong" comes only when the effort is made to tell ii'lii) we thus judge — on what grounds the aflirmation, and its attaclimont of sentiments, reposes. Hence arises much debate as to what is right, what wrong — in tlio objective sense ; that is to say, what conduct is adapted to realize, and what not to realize but to thwart, certain ends of ORIGIN OF ETHICAL FEELING 583 conduct wliicl), as we say, " onglit to l)o realized." But all this, of course, iuvulves the further abstraction of our coucei)tions und their detachment from the more individual forms of experience. Yet even here, if Ike word ''ought" retains any semblance of a ijenuinely moral sicjnijicanee, it correspoitds to the awakening of tlie same nnique form of sentiment. The sentiment it- self is, however, found attaching itself more and more to some form of an ideal. And here we return again to the dependence of the ethical feelings upon imagination and intellect for their development. Here also we note once more, from another point of view, the difference between the aisthet- ieal and the ethical sentiments ; there are many kinds of the former, to re- spond to many kinds of the beautiful ; but there is only one species of the ought-feeling— forever essentially the same for the child and the adult, for the savage and the man of culture. But, again, there is the greatest variety in the kinds of conduct which call forth this unique feeling ; and this vari- ety is largely due to the working of well-known jmnciples of evolution. § 14. AVhether evolution in the race can do anything whatever toward ac- counting for these unique moral sentiments is a doubtful matter. We do not believe that it can ; we do not believe that it even makes any approach in the right direction toward rendering such a satisfactory account. But the (piestion is, of course, a psychological question only so far as the develop- ment of the individual is concerned ; and, psychologically considered, we have already sjiokeu of the feeling of the ought as incomjjarable and unicjue. This we believe to be true in such a way as to make it impossible to re- gard the feeling as a result of evolution, in the case of the individual. Nor do we find any sure traces of distinctively moral feeling among the lower animals. The nearest analogue to it is doubtless the animal emotion of shame. The latter is closely akin to a mild form of fear, and the signs of the two are not infrequently confounded. It can scarcely be denied that some of the lower animals — as, for example, the dog especially — exhibit signs of shame after having done certain deeds, or having failed in certain endeavors. So does a defeated football team ; or a school-boy returning with torn clothes from his half - holiday. But even if we admit that the consciousness of the canine retriever, which has failed to bring back his bird, or that of the jjoodle which has torn the forbidden cushion where he has been lying, exactly parallels human consciousness in similar circum- stances, it does not follow that either animal or man is here experiencing a genuine moral sentiment. For sliame is no more than are other natural emo- tions, of necessity, a moral feeling. la order to become moral, the feeling must he converted into shame for having done vhat one consciously feels one ought not {in the ethical meaning of the word " ought ") to have done. Thus even moral shame only im])lies in an indirect way the ought-feeling; it is directly more like the feeling of moral disa])probation. But since 7?iora/ dis- approbation cannot exist without implying the ought-feeling ; and since shame very frequently does not imply the ought-feeling, we may well doubt whether genuine moral sentiment of any kind can be said to develoj) out of the feeling of shame. And what is undoubted, from whatever point of view we regard the matter, is this : whenever and however genuine moral sentiment arises in consciottsness, its characteristics entitle it to be set apart as a class by itself, to be considered quite unique. r)84 THE SENTIMENTS The Division of the Ethical Feeling-s into " egoistic," or self- ish, and " altruistic," or social, is not based upon distinctively ethical grounds. For, properly speaking, neither of these classes of the emotions is, as such, entitled to be called moral ; moreover, the distinction is, psychologically, of doubtful value. And 3"et it is frequently i^roposed to test entire systems of morals by this somewhat inept distinction. Several of the emo- tions, which are ordinarily classed as egoistic, are also, as a rule, very powerfully altruistic ; some of them are the very emotions on whose existence society is largely based and by which it is guarded and developed. On the other hand, the most clear- ly altruistic emotions, as such, may be given a decidedly ego- istic turn — may even be most selfishly exercised and cultivated. Moreover, there is no emotion of either kind which may not bo either exercised or inhibited under the influence of genuinely moral sentiments. Neither is there one, the experience of which, in respect of its intensity, occasion, object, etc., may not be the fitting subject of a genuine moral approbation or disapprobation. When, then, morality is spoken of as " essentially a social feel- ing," the statement may be correct, or only partially true, or quite erroneous, according to the interpretation given to it. And when feelings of kindness, sympathy, and various forms of affection, are demonstrated or assumed among the lower ani- mals, no inference can be drawn as to their possession of genu- ine moral sentiment. The ought-feeling and the feeling of moral approbation or disapprobation always, of course, have reference to something definite and concrete. As has already been said, it is some par- ticular deed of will, or course of conduct, whose obligation is felt and for which the approving or disapproving sentiment is experienced. Such deed of will, or course of conduct, ordinarily concerns some other being than ourselves, who is, like ourselves, a moral and self-conscious or, at any rate, a sentient being. It may be possible to show that rational right conduct could not exist except under conditions of a social community ; and that, indeed, the very words right and wrong have no rational mean- ing without implying consequences of conduct affecting the happiness, or other form of the well-being, of such community. But these conclusions are not to be derived directly from tlie very nature of ethical consciousness, as such ; they belong, thnt is to say, to ethics as philosophy rather than to psycliology. As a psychological fact one may just as fitly consider the ethical sentiments connected with one's getting angry when one has struck one's foot against a stone, or with indulging in inordinate EGOISTIC AND ALTRUISTIC SENTIMENTS 585 l)iit unmanifestecl self-esteem, as tho most obviously social feel- iui^s of sympathy and love for humanity. Nor cloos tlio imi)c)r- tant truth that the peculiar forms of excitement which ethical sentiment sustains, and the connected judgments as to what it is right to do, have resulted in tlie course of evolution from the ap- proving- and disapproving- action of the social community, allect the statements already made. Among the so-called egoistic and altruistic feelings, however, there are certain which are powerful adjuncts to the development of genuine moral sentiment. Such are the egoistic feeling-s of pride, fear of the evil opinion of others, and love of ai)proba- tion, or desire to hear ourselves praised and to stand avcjII in the sight of our fellows. Such, especially, are sympathy and all the ditierent forms of love .as dependent upon varying relations with all manner of other beings. Upon these feelings themselves — on condition that they, too, may be represented to the mind as deeds of Avill or species of conduct — we find ourselves pronoun- cing moral judgment. This is because these feelings are natu- rally, and by virtue of the very character of our moral training: and moral development, so closely connected with the true moral sentiments — with the ought-feeling and the feeling of moral ap- probation or disapprobation. All education, whether adminis- tered by social environment or by individuals with a conscious purpose, appeals to pride, fear of opinion, desire of approbation, sympathy, and varied aiiection, for the arousing and culture of g-enuine moral feeling and mural conduct. Thus the conviction that one ought to feel in certain ways — both as respects self-feel- ing- and also as respects feeling for others — becomes a part of the very life of affective consciousness. I 15. Even among flio lower animals the distinction between egoistic and altruistic emotions is inexact and unethical. Fear, anger, hatred, jwide, etc., are all often as truly altruistic as egoistic. No fiercer and more courageous exhibitions of anger and hatred can possibly be called out in wild beasts, and in many domestic animals, than those which are connected with the love and protection of their offspring. Very young children will often fly at one who seems to attack a jiarout or a nurse, even more jiromptly and vehemently than when the attack is made upon themselves. Nor is tliis true of the lower forms of these emotions alone. Who would venture to consider " ego- istic " (in any defensible meaning of the term) the burning passion of the parent against one wlio has wrought the moral riiin of a child ; or the phil- anthropist's hatred of the oppressors of the poor and friendless ? The same thing is true of fear. Even jealousy and pride, which seem in their very nature to be most purely selfish, have their altruistic aspects and uses. The pride we take in the honors and successes of a relative or friend is far more closely allied to sympathy and love than it is to any form of self-interested 586 THE SENTIMENTS affection. And that the most intense jealousy is often born of affection, eveiyone knows. In general, those forms of " eudaimouism " which over- look this class of facts are, of all ethical theories, most uupsychological. In concrete fact, all men feel and think far less with direct reference to self than is ordinarily stiyposed. This is true of the morally bad even ; because the most corrupted human nature is still human, and has the many-sided af- fectional outfit which belongs to man. On the other hand, not only the earlier and undeveloped forms of so-called altruistic feeling, but also the apparently most refined and highly develoi^ed, are often, from the ethical point of view, thoroughly selfish. This is true of both the "ingredients of social feeling" which a recent writer ' has distin- guished ; namely, "feeling of Attachment" and " feeling of Sympathy." The former is in many animals and young children a characteristic reaction on be- ing fondled or caressed ; and so, is as purely egoistic as the reaction of anger on being hurt or spurned. The attachment of the mother also is (as physicians are accustomed to notice the fact), in part, a chai'acteristic reaction after the l)aius of childbirth have subsided. All forms of concrete and definite human attachment' — as, for example, that of members of the same family, or tribe, that of lovers, that of friends, etc. — have their egoistic as well as their altruis- tic aspects. This remains true, no matter how diligently cultivated and highly refined they may become, through being suffused, as it were, with moral sen- timent, and controlled in the light of moral judgment. For they are cer- tainly mistaken who imply that the individual can ever free, from admix- ture of self-feeling and self-reference, any of the most altruistic sentiments. I 16. Undoubtedly sympathy, when develoj^ed in connection with the ought-feeling and with the faculty of judging as to couseqiaences of con- duct, comes most near to being a so-called " pure " social feeling. Un- doubtedly also, it is the spring of a large part of that conduct which culti- vated moral sentiment approbates, and which intelligent ethical theory discovers to be most productive of enlarged well-being. But sympathy, a.s truly as any of the most egoistic feelings, is in its beginning and early de- velopment an instinctive, emotive, and ?ion-moral affiiir. In the case of the human offspring it is likely that, even before birth, the foetus is so much a part of the maternal organism as to share in " the intra-organic sympathy or consensus."'- A certain mutuality of interests, by way of likings and dislik- ings, fears, hopes, hatreds, and loves, is provided for in the very relation of parent and offspring. This "uterine " sympathy— like the mutual fondness which is one of its manifestations— is quickened and cultivated by the ear- lier relations of the family life. In every closely compacted family organi- zation there are seen strong tendencies to develop common forms of emo- tional excitement. Indeed, so all-inclusive are these mixed altruistic and egoistic tendencies, and so deeply laid are the foundations of this instinctive sympathy that, probably, the anger and quarrelling between members of the same family operates, as a rule, rather to strengthen than to destroy them. Indifference toirard our fellow -men, and especialli/ toirard (hose among them, most int'imaleh/ ccmnected with onrselres in a social way, is, jisi/cholofficatly considered, the most " inhuman " of all feelings, • Sully: The Human Miud. TI., p. 103 f. ^Coinp. IIolTdiii^. Outliuesi of Psychology, p. 24T. DEVELOPMENT OF SYMPATHY 687 This crudest form of sympathy, like the most refined and truly ethical, extends to every kind of feeliug which men have in common. Sympathetic anger, dislike, or antipathy, is as natural and as truly of the essence of sympathy (indeed, in its way often as " moral ") as is sympathetic affection or grief. It is the possibility of this which makes all forms of common emo- tion often so genuinely altruistic in their expression and tendencies. It is certainly not true from the psychological point of view, nor do we consid- er it true from the point of view of sound ethical theory, that — as Adam Smith ' remarks — resentment is not a tit subject for sympathy. It is true, however, that the diflferent kinds of sympathetic feeling diflfer very greatly with respect to the way in which they are realized ; and that this diflbrence extends to the ease and satisfaction with which we experience them, and to the couuectiou which it is possible to establish between them and testhetical and ethical sentiment. In all these respects, however, the sympathies of ditferent races and dill'erent individuals show that infinite variety which be- longs to the entire life of feeling. For example, a Japanese audience at a theatre will display the most lively sympath}- with the exhibition of fidelity to his liege lord (the daimi/d) on the part of a servant, no matter with what other unseemly and immoral emotions this sentiment of fidelity may be mixed. But iu the most refined circles of Western civilization it is diflicult to excite sympathy with a crying infant or an angry child. Nor are there many who have attained enough rational self-control not to feel strongly the truth of the observation of a modern story-writer : " It's provoking to have an object of pity balk ! " "While certain exhibitions of feeling — for the most part of the slowly moving, " sputtering " kind, like fretfulnoss, sulkiness, envy, etc. — are peculiarly rei)ulsive to symjiathy. On the contrary, others have a well-known contagious character ; such as anger, fear, sorrow, and the feeling of the ludicrous. The account of this contagious character can be giveu by evolutionary science, in only a veiy partial way.- Indeed, in the development of feeling generally, about the last word which psychology can utter is often equivalent to saying: Men behave in this way, because "it is their nature to." I 17. The development of sympathy into genuinely altruistic and ethical sentiment (ethical, by connection established between it and the ought- feeling) is dependent upon the gi-owth of intellectual life. We have seen that it is an only half-intellectual principle of imitation which largely con- trols the earliest manifestations of sympathy. But with the growth of imag- ination the ability is acquired to enter, ideationally, into the exiierience of others, and so consciously to " feel with" them in a highly complicated way. With the growth of thought and the resulting power to discern conse- quences, comes the ability to estimate the grounds on which the feelings of others repose, and to bring them to standards such as are employed in estimating our own affective phenomena. Thus we find ourselves speaking of our sympathies as extending to the thoughts and purposes of others. We enter approbatingly, or disapprovingly, into their opinions and plans. This shows, of course, that logical conclusions and truly ethical sentiments are being aroused with reference to another consciousness— representatively I Moral Sentiments, Sec. ii. , chap. iii. - Here 'Mr. Spencer's arguments are, as so often, rather too highly fanciful. Principles of Psy- chology, II., §503f. 588 THE SENTIMENTS repeated iu our own conscious experience. Hence one must have certain qualities which make a good actor in order to be a moral man of wide sympa- thies. Suppose now that the development and retinement of this intellect- ual basis of sympathy is gained ; suppose that, in connection therewith, the feeling of affection is so expanded as to take in an enlarging variety of object's, and so cultivated as to respond both sensitively and intelligently to all the demands made upon it ; and suppose, finally, that the true moral sentiments (the " ought-feeling" and the feeling of moral approbation and disapprobation) become attached in a special way to the working of the altruistic side of feeling;— we have then the conditions fulfilled for the very highest development of sympathy. The crude natural and many-sided tendency to feel with others, however they may feel and irrespective of the consequences of such instinctive common feeling, has developed into in- telligent "benevolence," or the "enthusiasm of humanity." Many objects this side, as it were, of that abstract conception which corresponds to the word "humanity" may catch up and confine the out- goings of morally consecrated sympathy. These are as numerous as the innumerable "causes" which enlist— especially in these latter days— the sympathies of men. Here naturally it is the sufferings, oppressions, and pains, rather than the joys and successes, of our fellows which chiefly arouse this class of sentiments. In all possible phases of this kind of sympathetic feeling, the sentiment itself retains an egoistic (but not, necessarily, ethically selfish) aspect ; and the intellectual development of the individual, as related to the qunliiies of the object tchich calls the sentiment forth, determines the differ- entiation of the comi^lex elements of the sentiment. For what we call sym- pathy, or benevolence, in its highly develojied form, is no simple affair ; it is scarcely less complex than the sum-total of character. We might almost say that a man is (morally) what his sympathies are ; but what his sym- pathies are depends no less upon his intellectual than u^jon his afi'ective development. Both in nature and in development, an intimate Relation exists between the ^sthetical and the Ethical Sentiments. Both are dependent for their lusrher forms upon the faculty of ideal- izing* — that is, of transcending actual presentative experience by an activity of imagination which constructs objects in attempted correspondence with the conception of "what ought to be" rather than "what is." The spur to this activity lies in the affective side of human nature : the precise form of the object can never be fixed and defined ; for the feeling is of such nature as never to be permanently satisfied, and the development oi imagination itself serves only to set the end for realization yet further away. Both forms of sentiment, therefore, contain kin- dred elements of dissatisfaction with all imperfection, or lack of ideality ; and of satisfaction with whatever answers to the changing and rising conception of the ideal. But, though simi- lar in important respects, they are not the same. iEstlietical r.ELATIOX OF THE ^ESTHETICAL AND ETHICAL 589 sentiment is experienced rather in contemplating" an object as representing- some nearer or more remote approach to certain aspects of an ideal life ; ethical sentiment is experienced as a binding command to a certain form of action. Yet again, when we contemplate such conduct as ethical sentiment approves — surveying it objectively, as it were — our complex feeling is very largely one of festhetical admiration. On the other hand, when we contemplate the beautiful object as itself the result of a pos- sible action on the part of some moral being, our complex feeling is largely one of ethical approbation. For both the beautiful and the dutiful are " good ; " and that things " ought to be " beautiful and conduct " ought to be " dutiful, is the persuasion to Mhich the highest development of both classes of sentiment leads us all. ? 18. The deeper connection between sostbetical and ethical feeling is here simjily noted in jiassing, as it were — noted, as a significant but psycho- logically inexplicable fact. How the connection arises and is strengthened in the development of the race, it belongs to the anthropological and evolu- tionary study of man to jioint out. The real connection of the beautiful and the morally good in objects and, finally, in the very nature of the world, it belongs to philosophy to investigate. But even descriptive and exiilanatory ])sychology cannot omit to notice the sesthetical and ethical faiths and hopes of humanity — as phenomena of consciousness. The Sentiments called Religious are as unmistakable a mani- festation of the developed life of consciousness, as are any forms of sentiment. They require, however, no separate treatment at the hands of scientific psychology. In general they comprise such kinds of feeling as arise and unfold themselves in connec- tion with the work of imagination and intellect in constructing- certain classes of objects and relations. More definitely, they are the feelings of need, fear, trust, admiration, submission, hope, love, etc., that develop from the vaguest and most instinct- ive forms of affective disturbance to the loftiest sentiments, as the intellective activities present the mind with various concep- tions of God and of his relations to the world of things and of minds. [On the psvchologj- of the Sentiments comp. Spencer : Principles of Psj-chology, II., ^ oO?> f. Grant Allen : Physiological /Esthetics. Horwicz : Ps}'cholofpsche Analysen, iii., p. 122 f. Fechner : Vorsehule d. Aestlietik. Leslie Stephen : Science of Ethics, chap, viii. Guyau : Problemes de r.Esthetique contemporaine. Lotzo : Outlines of ..Esthetics. Sullj- : Pessimism, -chap. xi. Hecker : Phj'siologie n. Psychologic d. Lachens. Duboo : Psychologie d. Liebe ; and other works cited at the close of chapters x. and xxiii.] CHAPTEE XXV. IMPULSE, INSTINCT, AND DESIEE (Certain complex processes in consciousness seem to stand midway, as it -were, between the emotions and the self-conscious choices. ) Perhaps it would be more correct to say that, in the continuity of the stream of mental life, jpsychoses arise in which feeling" appears about to break over into purposeful activity for the pursuit of some recoi^nized end-)-with various degrees of the blending or dominance, in fusion, of the affective and conative elements. In all conscious states of this class, however, the end toward which the feeling- is excited and the j)urposeful volition directed, must be presented in idea by an activity of intellect. They all, therefore, have the threefold complexity which be- longs to the development, in g-eneral, of conscious faculty ; but their distinctive feature is that forth-putting of mental life in definite directions, which originates in some form of craving and which issues in some form of willing. In the broad but strictly etymological meaning of the word, these processes em- phasize the ap2)etitive nature of mind. It follows from the very nature of all " appetitive " states of consciousness, that they are as numerous in kind as are the forms of affective excitement in which they take their rise ; and these latter cannot be strictly limited, because the development of experience, considered as involving feeling with its interests and tones of "pleasure-pain," has an indefinite variet5^ lAll appetitive states have this in common, however, that thoy tend to set agoing the motor organisml They belong to man as made for action, as equipped and comi^elled to do for himself — to strive for and to obtain, to pursue and seize and moiild, to sat- isfy his wants, and to multiply and intensify them by repeated temporary satisfactions. Moreover, since g-rowth of experience consists quite as much in learning the proper inhibitions to mo- tion, as in learning- the proper movements to satisfy natural wants, these appetitive states are further em]>hasized as standing between feeling and will ; or rather, again, they must be re- g-arded as resulting from a variety of fusions of feeling and Avill. APPETITIVE STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS 591 Thus that is characteristic of much of this development which Dr. Ward ^ remarks of so-caUed desire : " AVhen tlie new idea does not lead off the pent-up stn^am of action by opening- out fresh channels, when, instead of this, it is one that keeps them intent upon itself in an attitude comparable to expectation, then we have desire." Various terms — all of them characterized by more or less of indetinitencss — have been employed to describe these appetitive states of consciousness ; prominent among them are the follow- ing" three — impulse, instinct, and desire. Of the use of these terms, the following- remarks are pertinent : (1) In no case does psycholog-y intend by these words the /unconscious or merely re- fleY and automatic combinations of the motor organism. The terms " impulsive " and " instinctive " may doubtless be applied with propriety to the whole list of such cond)inations. But such a use is not psychological, for psychology is the science of the phenomena of consciousness, as such. From its point of view, the most elaborate, as well as the most simple, impulsive or instinctive movements of the organism have an interest only as they affect, or are affected by, the i^rocessos in consciousness. (2) /impulse, instinct, and desire, considered as psychoses, are terms that may be applied almost interchangeably to explain a great variety of motor phenomena. / And yet these three words, when more carefully considered, seem adapted to emphasize /somewhat different /aspects of the respective psychoses for which they stand. § 1. We have already, in treatiiij? of conation and connected forms of movement (chapter xi.), remarked upon the use of such words as " impul- sive " and "instinctive." When applied to the lower animals and to chil- dren, they are well adapted for a loose and popular usage. We note with astonishment the complicated series, and even systems, of purposeful move- ments which some of the animals — for exami)le, the insects, and certain of the mammals — perform ; but our astonishment is scarcely greater than our uncertainty as to how far any conscious ideas, feelings, and volitions, are con- cerned in these movements. Without knowledge that is unattainable respect- ing data of consciousness, we add nothing new to the external facts when we ascribe such movements to imjiulse, or to instinct ; we only summarize them. Thus and so the movements occur — (ta thnuglt consciously initiated and con- trolled ; and yet we are unable to say that they are really thus initiated and controlled. In the case of the human offspring, however, our right theoret- ically to describe the states of consciousness corresponding to the words impulse and instinct is much more clear. This right is derived directly from adult experience, and also indirectly from the necessities of the theory of psychological development. For there is a large part of our most com- ' Article Psychology. Encyc. Brit., p. 74. 592 IMPULSE, INSTIT^CT, AND DESIRE plicated adult motor activity which takes place in channels established, un- der the principle of habit, by previous experience, where the corresi^onding processes of conscious ideation, feeling, and volition, are very slight and ob- scure. In transferring the scientific description and explanation of such processes to the child, we musi do the best we can by way of allowing for the vast difference between the complexity of even the most meagre adult consciousness and the relative simplicity and undeveloped character of the child's consciousness. But only so far as we are permitted to make this transference can we explain the childish consciousness at all or understand how it can gi'ow into an adult consciousness. ^ 2. It will be our purpose in this chapter briefly to characterize the de- velopment of the more complex condition of mental life described by the terms at its head. As has already been said, these terms refer to certain different aspects of conscious conditions that are largely alike : the differ- ence is chiefly due to the differing degrees and combinations in which idea- tion, feeling, and volition fuse in them ; while the essential likeness is summed up in the statement that they are all expressive of "appetencies" of the mind. For example, the bird may be said to mate or to build its nest either as the result of im^Dulse, or instinctively, or as stimulated by some vague form of desire. And we may account for human beings doing similar things by referring to a number of natural appetencies, which might be called either impulses, or instincts, or desires. We might explain the bird's beginning to fly and the child's trying to walk in the same way. In case we use the word "impulse," however — whether for the callow bird or for the callow youth — we emphasize rather the force of that craving in which the series of complicated movements take their rise. But craving, in this mean- ing, is a sort of resultant of feeling and conation — the latter being con- sidered as a condition of tension that is aboiit to break over into movement. If, however, we chose the word " instinct " we look on the same movements as having a somewhat different origin. (Here compare what was said as to the difference between impulsive and instinctive movements, p. 230 f.) We now call attention rather to the recognized ideal end of the movements, and lay em- phasis on the activity of representation — or that which takes the place of rep- resentation — in connection with the purposeful character of the resulting vo- litions. But by " desire" we understand a feeling-tendency toward conation with a definite object in view. So that, while desire emj^jhasizes the affect- ive aspect of the a^jpetency, it is also significant of a generally higher grade of mental development. Indeed, we might even hesitate to speak of the lower animals as having desires comparable to those of man. At the same time, if we admit mental representation of the end, and of the means neces- sary to attain it, as essential to an explanation of animal instincts, many .such instincts would imply a degree of intelligence far in advance of that needed to account for most human desires. By Impulse, tlien — as we here emj)loy the word — we under- stand a conation, initiated and fused with a feeliuf/ of cravimj, i?i niew of some ohject of sensc-pcrception or of imagination, with a ten- dency to dlscharpe in a complicated form of jyiiiposefid ynovemenis. We are here dealing- with an appetitive condition of conscious- DEVELOPMENT OF IMPULSE 593 ness, in which emphasis is laid upon the heing driven or urged to volitions that have ivfoivneo to an object as an end. In this mean- ins- of the word, the impulses themselves imply, as the pre-condi- tion of their experience, a certain previous development. This de- velopment, however, may be of a very rudimentary sort. It may imply simply enough of numtal faculty to recognize an object as related to our pleasure-pains, and to fc(»l attracted or repelled by it. ' Such feeling of attraction or repulsion then immediately tends to put into action the appropriate motor organism. But the impulses themselves develop under the influence of tlu^ com- plex results of their own operation, as it were. The very move- ments of the organism which they " impulsively " bring- about have further consequences in consciousness, with respect to the changes in its objects, but more especially in respect to the changes of its feeling-tone. Any object which attracts becomes connected with our pleasures or our pains ; in the former case, it acquires added attractiveness, and in the future excites a stronger impulse toward itself ; in the latter case, it becomes re- pulsive, and in the future excites impulsive movements away from itself. /The general Development of Impulse is subject to tw^o sets of considerationsfwhich have, in some respects, directly oppos- ing results ; thus the compound resultant in development de- pends upon the action and reaction of the two. /1^'irst, the imx3ulses themselves become more numerous and more compli- cated as intellectual development proceeds,/ and as experience becomes more full of content and more complex. We are accus- tomed to think of the child as pre-eminently the creature of impulse. This is true, however, only as indicative of his lack of deliberate and intelligent action in comparison with the large sphere covered by impulsive action. But the impulses of the adult are really far more numerous and complex than are those of the child. It follows from this that there is with the adult far greater opportunity for conflict of impulses. It is the net result of experience — other things being equal— that all human beings are attracted and repelled in a great variety of directions : and especially is it a mark of the process of development that strife arises between the so-called " higher " and the so-called " lower " impulses. But, second, the many conditions of development se- cure two results which modify this endless splitting-^up, as it were, of impulses, (l/ Certain im]mlses become habitually/ ac- cepted as exciters and controllers of the spheres of action belong-- ing- to them. This operates, of course, in the direction of the consolidation of impulsive movements. Various forms of accus- 38 594 IMPULSE, INSTINCT, AND DESIRE tomed stimuli — ^perceptions of one sort or another, or imag-iued and anticipated pleasures and pains — come to be regularly re- sponded to with the appropriate courses of conduct. At the same time (2) deliberation and the rational regard for conse- quences conduce to the control, by more remote ends, of the ap- petencies of the mind. Thus some of them become suppressed, and others encouraged in a guarded Avay, with reference to the life of ideation or even to the realization of accepted ideals. This effect, too, tends in the direction of increased solidarit}" of the mental development so far as it is concerned with the men- tal appetencies. It is by the combined result of these two sets of considera- tions — the one tending to increased differentiation as new expe- riences with objects are found to be pleasurable or jjainfid, and the other tending to solidarity as some impulses are left un- checked to control the movements, and others are themselves brought under control, or even eliminated, for ideal ends — that the development of a mental life characterized by varied im- pulses, and yet having some unity of habits and of conscious purposes, is made possible. As to the Classification of the Impulses,/psychology can do little-^as has already been said. There are as many impulses in all as are the various attitudes of felt attraction or repulsion before the different objects j^resented or represented in con- sciousness. Those of the lower order include all the various forms of relief for uneasiness, and of satisfaction for craving, which the discharge of the bodily functions occasions. Hence the so-called " Appetites " may be considered as impulses : since, in their unsophisticated condition, as it Avere. they are states of consciousness corresponding to the definition given above. Im- pulses are also connected with all the stronger natural emo- tions ; since all these emotions involve some form of craving which tends to break over into a suitable motor discharge. Tlie same thing majj- be said even of the jesthetical and ethical senti- ments, although of these — and especially of the former — the re- mark is much less obviously true. The logical feelings undoubt- edly operate impulsively, as has already to some extent been pointed out. § 3. Tliat otav impulses liave their roots in conative fortli-piittiug ooiiploil with the feeling of craving, and tending to break over into purposeful move- ments, is implietl in the various terms emj^loyed to designate them. They are called " inclinations" {Xek/img or Hang), '* strivings" {Slreben), or con- scious " tendencies" or " states of tension ; " whatever is done impulsively appears of the nature of a leaj) from an idea seizcnl with feeling to a conation i PRIMARY IMPULSIVE MOVEMENTS 595 suffused with feeling. There is something like being driven, when acting "from imimlse," as we say [Trieh). All these phrases consider the relation between the resulting movement and the condition of consciousness, as though the latter were a sort of vis a tergo. But on considering the same relation from the reverse point of view, wo may speak of the object as at- tractive or repulsive, and so as accounting for the state of consciousness and for the purposeful movements alike. Psychologically considered, how'ever, it is those changes of feeling as pleasure-pain, which result from our chang- ing relations to the object, that constitute its attractive or repulsive charac- ter. From whichever point of view we regard the relation between mental condition as appetitive and the resulting movements as affecting both our- selves and the object imiiulsively aimed at, it is the "drive" of the mixed condition of feeling and conation which we have in mind. § 4. /The vise and development of the impulses, as we are now using the term, im]ilies all that was previously said (see p. 218 f.) regarding the simplest stages of conation, and even a multitude of merely physiological (reflex or automatic) activities as lying back of these elementary psychoses. Thus we may conceive of ourselves as tracing the growth of the more complex im- pulses out of blind unconscious reflex or automatic movements. Even here, however, some feeling and ideation and consciousness of self-effort are very likely involved. /The soliciting and guiding influence of pleasure and the inhibiting and guiding influence of pain, are all-important in the formation of comi)lex impulses./ The child kicks, strikes, bites, clutches with its hands, performs the various functions of voluntary bodily easement, makes its first efforts at creeping and v.-alking, responds with the more complex imitative movements, etc., etc. — impulsively. So, also, very largely, does the trained athlete x^lay ball or perform upon parallel bars, the boxer box, and the fencer thrust and j^arry ; so also does the expert in mental arith- metic, or the pliysician, artful but not scientific in diagnosis, seize and fol- low the mental clue in impulsive fashion. In similar' fashion do men and women fall in love and pursue the object of their passion ; heroes aglow with excitement hew their way or lead their troops in b'attle • business men buy and sell stocks, or gamblers bet at cards. That is to say, in, all these cases we have complex and purposeful movements following upon the " drive " toward a desired object which arises in a mixed condition of crav- ing and conation ; and what is noticeably left out of our account of the ac- tion — because it is really wanting in the conscioi;s conditions — is a clear mental representation -of an end to be reached by adapted and selected means, and the choices adopting the end and selecting the means. /Most important of all in the development of the inijmlses is the securing by experience of the right inliibitions or checks to the appetencies./ The animal, the child, the insane and diseased will, and the subject of hyp- notic suggestion, are all lacking in a sufficient reserve of inhibitory influ- ences. Physiologically expressed, we may say that the "stock of reserve braMrpower '' belonging to the higher and more purely psychic centers is sm4li in these cases ; the discharges from the lower centers are too jirompt and explosive, as it were. Psychologically regarded, we notice in such per- sons a lack of reserve in expressive action and in movements designed to sat- isfy some form of craving — a lack of "self-control." The dipsomaniac (who 696 IMrULSE, INSTINCT, AND DESIPwE drinks impnlsively), the kleptomaniac (who steals iminilsively), the plano- inaniac (who wanders oii' impulsively), the erotomaniac (who gratifies sexual appetite impulsively), are all examples of the victims of unchecked impulses. In all such cases, craving i:)asses rapidly from excited feeling over into the stress of initial conation ; and conation at once breaks over into motor effects. It is for reasons which lie in the very nature of these appetencies that, by " development " of the impulses, we understand almost wholly ilieir cidlure by inhibition. Inhibition is, however, only a part of the real development, as well as of the highest development, of the impulsive or appetitive condi- tions of mind. For, as has already been indicated,/in all complex forms of movement the best practical results require that cultivated impulses should take the initiative and should keep the lead./ Eeasoning, or drawing con- clusions from consciously accepted grounds, is quite too slow even to con- serve our safety, much less to attain the rewards of skill and art. Neither is the result of impulse always, by any means, inferior to that attained by ratiocination. I 5, The three forms of appetite popularly recognized— for food, for drink, and the appetite of sex — may properly be considered among the de- veloped impulses ; the two former are, even in man's case, comparatively direct in their working and simple in character ; the latter is much more complex. The new-born child, when first offered food, probably obtains it by sucking as an almost purely physiological reflex. It is by experience in being fed that a truly psychical ajjpetency arises. The acquired infantile appetite consists of a mixture of uneasy bodily sensations that are ill-local- ized, of more definite psychical desire for an object already experienced as pleasure-giving, with revived mental images of manifold comfortable sen- sations of warmth, fulness of the stomach, etc.; and especially of the cona- tive tension that is ready to break over into the actual complex of sucking movements. But what we call the " appetite for food " in adult life is a much more complex affair. Indeed, in the case of many persons who have scarcely known real keen hunger, it is largely an ideal affxir ; it is a half-in- tellectual and relatively faint desire to realize certain definite satisfactions once experienced. It is an appetite for breakfast, or for luncheon, or for dinner ; for this or that kind or combination of food. It is even often a mixture of anticipated sympathetic feelings of an associative sort. On the other hand, this appetite in the case of those adults who do know what hun- ger is, and are habitually ill-fed, is even more unlike the appetite of infancy. What is called the " appetite of sex " is often s^ioken of as though it were a very simple and direct aifair. On the contrary, this so-called appetite is a very variable and always rather complex mixture of sensation, ideation, feeling, and will. Even before the appetency assumes the more definite form which belongs to the age of jmberty, it seems to be latent in that dif- ference of conscioiisness with which children regard those of tlie opposite sex. Doubtless it is difficult hero to tell how much is duo to associations es- tablished by education, and how much is rather a matter " of nature," as wo should say. In its beginnings it is often, almost as much a matter of feeling gentle repulsions, or " shyness," as of vague attractions — miuglings of curiosity, desire of approbation, and undefined cravings. In many cases the same conflict between feelings of attraction and feelings of repulsion RELATION OF IMl'ULSE AND EMOTION 597 characterizes sexual appetite even after the characteristic bodily sensations become more iiromiueut. Wo have ah-cnuly referred to the fact that the age of puberty is itself marked by a wonderful develoi)ment of obscure but jiowerful feelings of craving. It is at once the imi^ulsive and the sentimental age. And what we call "sexual feeling," as though it were a definite thing instead of being a complex mixture, enters into all the rela- tions and intercourse which exist between persons of ojiposite sexes. Sel- dom or never docs it sink so low in human consciousness as to be for a long?) time that relatively simple bodily impulse, or craving, which man shares in common with the other animals. The rather does it ordinarily associate with itself a variety of related feelings ; and, in connection with this varied affective excitement, the increased activity of imagination is to be noted.' Indeed, the appetency may be so refined as to assume largely the character- istics of sentiment ; though not without that longing for certain relations to the object (that is, the object is never regarded in a merely contemplative way) which belongs to the condition as appetitive. Thus Plato was able to define Eros as the instinct for the ideal — the excitant of impulsive move- ments toward objects held up by imagination. § 6. The peculiar character of impulse is further seen when we consider that almost all the emotions have specially correlated impulses to which they give i-ise. This is due to the fact that impulse is, in its very nature, feeling blended with initial conation, on the way to imrposeful movements. Thus the impulse of auger is to strike, or kick, or resist ; the impulse of hatred or revenge is to injure the object of the feeling, though in a more jjlauful way, since hatred and revenge are passions or cherished emotions ; the impulse of fear is to run away or to take an attitude of defence rather than of attack, as in the case of anger ; the impulse of love is to fondle, defend, and to em- brace, etc. Even such feelings as curiosity, doubt, and belief, if they reach an emotional stage, manifest appropriate connected impulses. Thus we feel " impelled" to look "jiryingly" at the object which excites curiosity, "sus- piciously " at that which excites doubt, " confidingly " at that to which be- lief attaches itself. This " looking " impulse is significant of that mi.xture of craving and conation which belongs to all the conditions of miiul which have the characteristics of appetency. And here we return to the general and most important psychological tnith (comp. pp. 211-216), that man is made for action, and that every mental excitement of whatever sort is of the nature of an impelling force upon the motor organism. Even in those more re- strained and hidden conditions of mind which only develojied experience makes possible the same thing is true. For to restrain is the correlative of a condition of tension ; and interior tension is so connected with movement of some kind as to find a natural mode of outflow and relief only in breaking over into movement. Few words have been employed with more/indefiniteuess; and with a larg-er amount of ig-norance, than the word /Instinct/ In 1 Thus on the one side we flnd Bain saying (The Emotions and the Will. p. 126 f.) : " Love is com- pleted and satisfied with an embrace. . . . our love-pleasures be;:in and end in sensual con- tact." Bnt as Oabanis observes f Rappo-ts du Physique et du Moral de I'nomme) : " J'ai vn nom- bre dc foi? la plus urposeful uses of mechanism. By the word " Desire " wo understand certain appetitive con- ditions of consciousness in which the blended feeling and conation ("craving-" or "long-ing- for") is directed ioward some ohject men- t(dly presented or represented, of whose " p>leasnre-})ain'''' characteris- tics we have had p)revions experience. In'o-eueral, then, the desires include certain more definitely developed forms of appetency. 1 See the extended list of James : The Principles of Psycholopy, IT., p. 403 f. 2 The ambisruous meaning of the German word 7'r!>?<»'— impulses or instincts indilTcrenfly— favors the loosest possible classification of the animal api)etencies. Thus we find one ^\T;tcr vFiirt- lasre : System d. Psycholoirie, I., p. 309 f.) classintr the vegetative physiolosrical functions amonir ihc Triehe. Another (Siinthis : Zur Psycholoirie d. menschlichcn Triebe. p. 2 f.) would rodncc them all to three classes— those of Rcinu, those of Function, those of Life. But this makes the word cover the " natural" activity of all the senses, and even " nutrition " as well as " love of independence." etc. Surely such a " muddled list "—to borrow Professor James' expression— has to value in psy- cho'ogy. 602 IMPULSE, INSTINCT, AND DESIRE They involve a more intelligent and contemplative attitude toward the objoct than do the imi)ulscs or the instincts ; although, like the latter, all desires are forms of craving and initial cona- tion (or will in a state of tension) ready to break over into pur- poseful movements. It is not strange, therefore, that such questions as the following have been debated among psychol- ogists : /Is desire to be classified as feeling or will ; or is it, be- ing neither, to be erected to the position of a fourth, independent form of consciousness ?/ Is the conscious representation of pleas- ure (or— in the case of an object of aversion — of pain), as con- nected with the object, necessary to desire ? Such inquiries are best answered as a result of our further consideration of this complex phenomenon. The Nature of Desire must be understood (1) as growing, in part, out of the dependence of feeling and willing on the Avork of imagination and intellect. Ileal desires — as distinguished from impulsive and instinctive appetencies — do not originate until intellect has so far developed as to make a presentative and representative knowledge of objects j)ossible {ignoti nulla cupido). Hence desire has rightly been called by one author ' a "subjective-objective phenomenon" — that is to say, a phenom- enon in which subjective feeling is directed outward toward an object. Still further, the object which excites desire must be contemplated as standing in some relation toward ourselves. Yet again, the more definite, strong, and persistent desires require that the object should be held before the mind as both related to feeling, with its tone of pleasure-pain, and also to will. as, at least, a possible object of attainment. In this respect the contemplation of objects which excite desire difi'ers markedly from that attitude in which we find genuine aesthetical sentiment awakened. The nature of desire requires also that we should consider (2) its relation to feeling. AVithout excitement of feeling there is no desire, and yet desire is not mere feeling/ Different kinds of feeling, however, stand in dift'erent relations to desire, yin general, the massive, low-toned pleasurable feelings are freest from admixture of desire./ The emotions, with their natural im- liulsive character, as intellectual development goes on, tend to feed the desires increasingly ; indetnl, there are certain states of mind which might be called, almost indifi'erently, either " pas- sions " or " desires." On the other hand, there are massive, low- toned conditions of pain — vague or more solid miseries endured passively under the law of habit, or because we have no " idea " ' VolkuKimi : Loliibuc-li d. Psycholog'.e, IT., p. 399. THE NATURE OF DESIUE 603 they can be helped — which ^-o ulinost totally free fn)iii desiit'. Bcsich's, as Dr. Ward has said : ' " Instaiu-es are by iio means Avautiii*;- of very imperious desires accompanied by the clear knowledg-e that their g-ratificatiou will be positively distaste- ful." /let, doubtless, the general rule is that v,o desire those experiences with which remembered or antici[)ated pleasure (in- chiding- relief from pain) is connected /aud w-e feel aversion toward those experiences with which remembered or anticipated pain is connected. But (3)/desire is, of all conditions of con- sciousness, most nearly coiitinuous with, most closelj* cojiiiate to, what Ave call '" willinj^./ It is confessedly only a step from " I want badly " to " I w'ill have." And in the case of intense desires habituallj^ gratified, it is difficult to draw the line pre- cisely where this step between want and will takes place. /Hence that consciousness of striving, of stress, and of eft'ort, which belongs to all strong and well-marked desire^ " I want," "I will to have," "I strive to get" — these follow one another in their natural order, unless inhibited. It is this absence of the self-conscious active element, of the initial and as yet restrained volition, which chiefly distinguishes much of our admiring and regretting from our desires and our aversions. In desire, as such, there is a ibjnamic element which does not - belong to feeling, as such. How desire diflers from volition and choice — the genuine and completed *' deed of will " — we shall see later on. J ^ 10. There are few subordinate subjects in i^sychology wliicli have been more vaguely and unsatisfactorily treated than this — the nature of desire. It will be of service to illustrate and enforce the right view, which regards desire as a peculiar complex development resulting from the combined ac- tivity of ideation, of feeling with its experience of its own tone of pleasure or pain, and of conation— as given above—by citations from a few authors. Herbart' and his followers regard the desires as forms of the striving of the soul after the appearance in consciousness (the " realization ") of certain ideas. So Yolkniann* considers desire as the becoming conscious of the ef- fort {(lea Strehenx) toward, or against, some idea. This fanciful definition implies the truth that desire is a condition of consciousness in which knowl- edge of some object, as possibly or actually related to our pleasures or pains, gives rise to a feeling of longing and effort, indicative of combined affective and conative activity. Apin-oaching the matter still from the same point of view, we may go on to show how desires vary in content, strength, and rhythm ; and how they accord or conflict with each other, as the presence of the objects in consciousness varies, or our knowledge of the actual and possible relations in which they stand to the ego undergoes change. ' Article Psycho'ogy, Encyc. Brit., p. T4. ' Psychologle als Wissenschaft, I., p. 149. » Lehrbuch d. Psychologie, EL., p. 397 f. 604 IMPULSE, INSTINCT, AND DESIUE Another autlior,' while showing that Bfcry desire has three elements — a sensational, a reiwcsentative, a dynamic — adds, in somewhat sentimental fashion, that all desire springs from love — arising at the point where the emotion, passing beyond its actual object, aspires to have a more conaplete possession of it. Joy, which is desire in possession of its object, differs from pleasure — the former being a passion, and the latter a sensation or emotion. Thus we have emphasized the affective side of desire, as inii>ulsive feeling. Yet another writer,'' after remarking that the feelings form the foundation of the desires, that rarely does any feeling exist long in a man without pro- ducing one or more desires, and that there is perhaps no desire which does not have its root in some feeling, goes on to say : " A desire is a force." "A desire in any being is a striving of that being either to attain some feel- ing of pleasure or to be relieved from some feeling of pain." These words emphasize the impelling or conative and stressful nature of the feeling-fac- tor in all desire. Hence the proposal to call Hie desires "active feelings." But, finally, we find many authorities regarding the desires as almost if not quite purely, exhibitions of wiil. Effort, one such writer^ holds, is the jieculiar kernel of the ego and of its activity. *' We designate an effort as ef- fort after an a (i.e., some jDarticular desire), when we know that the effort attains its end in the actualization of an a. We call it our effort after an a so much the sooner, the more comprehensive the iDsychical effort which at- tains its end in the actualization of an a." I 11. Two arguments may be adduced against the dependence of desire ■upon definite mental representation of an object as related to the self in a way to excite interest. First, it may be claimed that children exhibit plain signs of this affection before intellect is suificiently developed to furnish the knowledge which such a theory of the nature of desire requires ; second, it may be said that all adults at some time, and adults of a certain temperament habitually, have states of intense craving which are not fixed by any definite process of ideation. The facts involved in both these objections must be admitted. But as to the first objection, it may be replied that, while such unintellectual appetencies must be admitted to exist in infancy, it is just the growth of experience as affecting mental representation which makes the difference between blind impulse and genuine desire. The child im- pulsively reaches for the fire, and after experience of its effects shrinks from it with aversion ; but after, and on account of, his experience he reaches, with desire, for his nursing-bottle. So that, even in the case of the earliest and intellectually most -undeveloped desires, there is truth in the view which regards them as " powers of memory," or as "inner powers of appre- hension " determined " feeling-wise."* Nor do the states, or temperaments, which might be called " intellectually impulsive," disprove the view wo have taken of the nature of desire. On the contraiy, they confirm it. Here rests the psychological account of that general restlessness, and fleeting, manifold, but vague desire — that feeling of, and yet striving against, the iu- ' Kabior, I^c-ons. etc. Ppycholofrie, pp. 149 f.. 4S3 f. This author seems to acce])t Spinoza's view that tlie one principle of all the personal inclinations is the love of beinj^, or the effort to con- tinue in bcinir. '' Hartsen. (irundziipe d. Psycholof;ie, pp. 112 f., ITT. 3 Iyii)pH, (JruiKhatsachen d. Seelen'.ebens, p. 602. * Comp. IJcneke, Pragnuitische Psychologic, i., p. 200 ; 278 f. DESIRE AND MENTAL KEPIIESENTATION 605 tolerable oppression of onmii — which is the fatilt, charm, danger, and se- cret, of the most brilliant intellectual, aisthotical, and ethical life. For the ceaseless entertainment by inuijj;ination of various ideals operates upon a sensitive mind to j'roduco something like the same vagueness of craving and impulsiveness of will (here, however, directed into certain channels of attention to objects of thought and to speech about themj which character- izes infantile desire. In this regard Madame do Stael, for exami)lo, and the yoimg child, may be said to be alike in the indefinite character of their desires. ^ 12. The question whether we can have desire without consciously rep- resenting to ourselves the attainment of pleasure as resulting from some- Ijossible relation to the object (its possession, use, affection, etc.), has been much debated. On this question we find two extreme views, one of which • asserts that what we desire is the pleasure or the relief from pain (which is only a form of j^leasure) ; the other of which holds that the object oi desire need ?/o< be represented as " good " at all, or even that the idea may pass into volition without any connection by way of pleasurable or i)ainful feel- ing. Such truth as these bald forms of statement have can be apprehended only as we remember how complex and variable are the elements and forms of desire ; and also how the desires are liable to modification under the laws which control all mental develoj^ment. We have seen that/the very meaning of desire, as the most intellectual form of appetency, implies that what is desired has already been exjierienced as a goodV But intense desire is itself a painful state of mental tension ; when prolonged, it may become an intolerable condition, relief from which, even if such relief is accom- panied by sorrow and i>ain, may be of all things most to be desired. Thus we find persons afflicted with morbid and insane desires doing deeds which — say they — " we had to do ; " but to which in themselves they feel an in- tense aversion. Moreover, the immense and overpowering influence of habit , must not be neglected. Certain desires grow " imperious " by being in-/ dulged. By habit also the memory or anticipation of pleasure or of pain becomes so attached to the object that it. irrespective of any conscious rep- resentation of its possible relation to the self, becomes attractive or repul- sive. Still further must there be acknowledged the existence of morbid and " unnatural " appetencies or desires. Some of these have their roots in con- cealed diseases of the organism, some in irrational curiosity, some in the binding power of strange associations ; and some originate we know not why or whence. On account of the connection between desire and " deeds of will" we find in such desires the "causes" (rather than the "reasons") of many grotesque actions and terrible crimes. ^ 13. Desires range themselves either in series upon the same side as in-\ volving and furthering each other's ends, or on opposite sides, as iucompat- / ible. Hence the possibility of desiring, on "some account" and as means to a desired end, what in itself is an ol)ject of aversion. Thus the lazy boy desires to get his hated lessons, because ho desires the promised half-holi- day or has a strong aversion to the punishment which follows failure. In the complex life which all men live, almost all their desires are conditional —another proof that, while impulse is blind, and instinct only seems to sec the end, desire is more dependent than either of the other conditions of ap- petency upon imagination and thought. Hence also, liveliness of imagina- G06 IMPULSE, IlSrSTINCT, AND DESIRE tion and conseqiientiality of thinking are necessary to give strength and guidance to desire. He who cannot steadily hold an end in mind, and think out the consequences of conduct, is likely to be fickle in his desires. In that conflict of desires which necessarily takes place — since most " goods " are incompatible with each other and experience makes us know this to be so— one desire may overcome the other and lead on to its own ap- propriate deed of will ; or the two may hold each other in check and pre- vent the satisfaction of either, while dividing the appetitive states between themselves, as it were. Or, again, both may subside into quiescence, or yield the stream of consciousness to some new desire stronger than either of the two. Habitually triumphant desires may become dominant and even monstrous passions ; and this no matter how " noble " they in themselves are. Thus we read of one Montelli,' whose desire for knowledge had grown to such proportions that he led the sordid life of an intellectual miser, and died a most learned and yet useless wretch. g 14. Finally, the nature of desire is shown by a consideration of that complementary condition of consciousness which we call " satisfaction." Feelings, ideas, and volitions as such, do not imply either dissatisfaction or satisfaction. But we have seen thatywill desire is essentially, as respects its emotional element, a condition of craving or dissatisfaction/ The attain- ment of that which is desired is followed by an unique form of " easement," — the pleasurable state of satisfaction. The principal part of satisfaction seems to be negative and reactionary, as it were. The particular form of complex and painful craving which characterized the desire, as well as that conative condition which has been recognized as the "effort " belonging to desire, are now at an end. In most cases, indeed, these are succeeded by a condition of pleasant relaxation from strain, or of massive comfortable feel- ing, or of positive happiness amounting to joy in possession and use of the desired object. In cases of satisfied desire, where the cessation of the de- sire is followed by jjains of body, thouglit, or conscience, the unique pleas- urable character of the satisfaction, in itself considered, is no less certain. The man who with a weak organism, a sensitive imagination, or a tender ethical sentiment, has gained his desire, is no less satisfied of that particular form of painful craving, because he has replaced its pains by yet keener and more lasting ones. In general, the pure and complete satisfaction of the desires becomes more difficult and rare, with the increase of intellectual, resthetical, and ethical development. As a rule, the richer the life of the mind becomes, the more imperfect are its satisfactions. In compensation for this, however, we are to consider the lessening, under control and the formation of habits, of the painful intensity of unsatisfied desires, and the increased amount of mild •and complex satisfactions which the very multiplication of the forms of de- sire makes possible. If we were to beo-in our attempt at stating- the Kinds of De sire by an analysis of the conscious life of different individuals, wo should have to say thatxhere are as many desires, for eacli individual, as there are kinds of objects which he has found pro- ' See Bcnuuis : Les Sensations Internee, p. 57. THE CLAS8ES OF DESIIIES 607 dnctive of {i^ood. On the otlicr hand, the nnmifohl aversions of the individual /are determined by liis experience with the pain- [)roducin^- qujuity of different presentativc and representative objects. Nor shouhl we thus exhaust tin; list i)ossibl(; ; for there exist also ctu'tain abnormal or i)atholof^ical desires, and other desires which persist in spite of the experience that their satisfaction is accompanied or followed by painful feeling". In tine, t\ien,/\w, very individuality of every individual consists larg't>ly in just this — the character and number of his dominant or subordinate desires/^ Of course, we may generalize and clas- sify according to the origin of the craving and the character of its corresponding satisfaction. "We thus arrive at this division of the desires : (1) Sensuous desires, or those which arise out of bodily cravings and find their satisfaction in the possession and use of some physical object ; (2) Intellectual desires, or the crav- ings that arise from the constitution of the mental faculties and find their satisfaction in mental exercises, or states, regarded as objects or ends to be attained ; (3) Sentimental desires, or those which arise in the contemplation of some form of the beautiful (;estlietical), or of the morally good in conduct or character (ethical). To these might be added (4) a fourth class of desires to which we have already given the title, pathological. The foregoing classification, like all attempts at classification, only serves to make more obvious the shifting and complex nat- ure of all the principal forms of desire as they are actuall}^ ex- perienced by the developed human consciousness. I 15. For example, the " desire of wealth" may he a mixture of the sen- suous, intellectual, and sentimental, combined in varying proportions — as we should doubtless discover if we could get at the full conscious content of this desire in the minds of those who have it most powerfully. In many cases the descriptions would emphasize the sensuous satisfactions whicli M'ealth secures, in others the possbssion and use of wealth as a means for the satisfaction of intellectual, or resthetical, or even ethical desires; while in still other cases this desire seems to be a sort of restless craving for the in- tellectual and practical excitement connected with the jiursuit of wealth, or has taken a really pathological character and become a " craze " after an ob- ject which the jiursuer himself knows will give more jiain than pleasure in its possession. Somewhat similarly complex are the so-called desires foi' " fame" and "power," etc. But the desire with which w^e regard our vari- ous objects of personal affection is most obviously a compound of all the principal classes of normal desire. Particularly true is this of the desire that enters into the more refined forms of love between the sexes. Finally, we note that the complex, higher forms of appetency . cause us to take a significant and comprehensive survey of the 608 IMPULSE, IXSTINCT, AND DESIRE mental life, both iu the backward and also in the forward direc- ' tion. For desires derive all their wealth of content from the various developments of memory, imagination, and thought ; while they imply every possible form of feeling-, with its charac- teristic tones of pleasure or of pain. Their development is, therefore, to be understood in the light of all that has thus far been said reg-arding the development of the intellective and af- fective aspects of consciousness. But just as plainly do they point forward to the development of that other aspect of mental life which we are now to consider — the unifjdng of the phenom- ena in the " willing-" mind. [On Impulse and Instinct, comp. James: The Principles of Psj'chology, II., xxiv. (Ihadbourne : Instinct in Animals and Mpn. Lindsay : Mind in Lower Animals. Ro- manes ; Mental Evolution in Animals. Lloyd Mori;an : Animal Life and Intelligence. Schneider : Der Thierische Wille ; and Der Menschliche Wille. Spencer : Principles of Psychology, II. , p. 4o3 f. Miinsterberg : Willenshandlung, p. 92 f. San this : Zur Psy- chologie d. menschlichen Triebe. Grube : Triebleben d. Seele. Preyer : Mind of the Child, I., xi. Perez: L'Education des le Berceau, iv., 5. Beaunis : Les Sensations In- ternes, ii.-vi. and xvi. On Desire, besides the sections devoted to this topic in other works on psychology and ethics, see especially, Sidgwick : The Methods of Ethics, iv. L. Stephen : Science of Ethics, ii. Waitz : Lehrbuch d. Psychologie, § 40. And Volk- mann : Lehrbuch d. Psychologie, II., p. o9T f. ] • CHAPTEE XXVI. WILL AND CHAEAOT'EK .* The mental phenomena which it is ctistomary to group to- gether under the term " the Will," are of all perhaps the most subtle and comiDlex. The reason for this fact is chiefly found, however, in the relations sustained to each othev-by the three classes of factors (intellective, affective, conative) -which enter into all mental states. As the development of mental life pro- ceeds, the work of perception, . ideation, and thought becomes increasingly elaborate ; while the varietj^ of emotions and senti- ments grows .to be correspondingly great. Now, v:iU is a word traditionally used to express the sum-total of all our perform- ances — whether in the form of physical movement or of more jourely intellectual, pesthetical, and ethical pursuits, under the "' guidance " — as we say of reason, and because of the " motives " furnished by our various emotions, sentiments, and desires. Thus " willing " ( VToUen) comes to be almost coextensive in our thought, with that entire sj)here of " acting " {Handcln), and even of " doing " {Thun), which .we call our otmi. In this same way are Ave led to apply to human beings, with comparative rareness, the distinction between action and conduct ; the rather are men in- clined to regard each other as somehow responsible for all that they do, unless the doing is known to be in no respect under the control of the voluntary motor apparatus. Even the per- ceiving, imagining, thinking, and believing of others are chiefly considered by us as matters of conduct ; and thus we hear it poj^ularly said : — He cnight to be able to see this; and ought to know that ; and even, It is irrong for him to think in that way, or to believe in tlie other way, etc. Such language, and the im- pressions and expapiiMi^ oAii^iich it is based, however crude and psychologically unsatisfactory, are exceedingly significant ; for they show how strong the tendency is to regard a man's will as extending over all hi^actions, and to identify with the sphere of "Will the whole of what we call character. On the other hand, the real psychological kernel of this so complex group of phenomena, in so far as they belong distinc- >^ 610 AVILL AND CHARACTER tively to "will,'' seems remarkabl}^ simple. It is, indeed, so simi^le as to defy analysis, for the very opposite reason from that which makes aualj'sis so difficult in the sphere of the feel- ings. In treating- of the primitive character of conation it was said (p. 211 f.) that psychic facts, considered simply in this as^iect, "have only one kind." "As such, there is one and only one sort of conation." We shall not really depart from this position now as we resume the discussion of the development of mental life, considered chiefly in its conative asjiect. We shall indeed speak of volitions, choices, purposes, and plans ; but all these process- es in consciousness must be considered as modifications of the intellectual content and affective condition under which one and essentially the same phenomenon of conation takes place. When then we speak of the development of the will, our reference is really to the progressive acquirement of those com- jDlex intellectual and emotional conditions under which the cona- tive activity of the individual takes place. Development of will is development of knowledge as to ends to be chosen and real- ized, and as to means for the realization of the chosen ends ; de- veloj)ment of feeling in the formation of emotions, sentiments, and desires ; development of skill in the use of the motor mech- anism, whether external and obvious, as in the movements of the limbs, or internal and concealed, as in the mechanism con- nected with the fixation and re-distribution of attention, and the control of the mental train. But the repeated activities of cona- tion — like all the phenomena of mental life, and especially so, because we may regard this law as having its seat, so to speak, in the will — fall under the law of habit. In the development of intellect, of feeling, and of motor manifestation of conscious processes, the conative factor appears ever present ; it also r<7>- pears, at least, as a determining fact. Thus — to speak popularly — if it be true that I am always dependent upon ideas of ends and of means and upon motives of emotion and desire for what I will ; it is also true that what ideas get accepted as my ends, and my means for attaining the ends, and what motives become most powerful vntli «2e, depends upon what "I will." For the present, this popular way of representing the apparent truth may be taken to mean that the whole mind — intellect, feeling, and conation — develops together. But in what sense there can be a develop- ment of will considered as abstracted from all development of intellect and feeling, it is impossible to say. This, however, need give us no anxiety ; for the difficulty arises from that ab- stract way of speaking of the faculties as though they were entities, or at least modes of being or behavior, separable from MEANING OF THE TEKM "WILL" 611 each other. The siiniilo truth witli wliit-h we arc now concerned is this — in the course of their development, and as dependent upon the growing- life of memory, imagination, thought, and feeling, men come to be able to make choices, to select ends and means, to shape conduct, and to form far-reaching purposes and plans. " To will " {in the highest sense of the word) is then the result of a decdopnient ; it is something which no one can do at the heginning of mental life, hit n'hich all men learn to do in the course of its un- folding. To exercise " free will " — in anj'^ conceivable meaning of this term— is not a birth-right ; it is rather an achievement which diflferent individuals make in greatly differing degi*ees. But willing, as conscious self-activity, does not manifest itself as early and as persistently as sensation or feeling ; and in the de- veloped consciousness, that which we mean to indicate when we say " I will " is a unique phenomenon. It is not to be confounded with emotion, affection, or desire ; much less is it mere conscious- ness of movement following upon sensation, ideation, or thought. 1 1. Savs Hofftling ' pertinently : " As in Greek niytliology Eros was made one of the oldest and at the same time one of the youngest of the gods, so in psychology the will may, according to the point of view, be represented as the most jjrimitive or as the most complex and derivative of mental prod- ucts." The failure to observe and give due weight to this truth has re- sulted in much confusion on the part of writers on psychology and ethics. The primitive root of will in conation — that which in respect of the third aspect of all conscious psychic facts makes conduct, as distinguished from mere action, possible — has already been discussed (Chap. XI.) ; it has also been seen how conation stands related to movement and motor conscious- ness, and to the fixation and distribution of attention in the different fields of consciousness. All our conclusions upon these jioints must now be re- called and understood anew in relation to the development of so-called " Will." Fin-thermore, the entire nature of the life of intellect and feeling, and the tj-end and laws of the development of that life, must be borne in mind and ajiplied to the understanding of volitions, choices, resolutions, planning, etc. In the intellective aspect the important thing to notice in reference to a correct psychological theory of will is its increasing " teleological " signifi- cance, as belonging to the very life of memory, imagination, and thought. As intellect develops, more and more remote and comprehensive ends are set before the mind, and a wider and more precise knowledge of moans adapted for the realization of these ends is acquired. Memory, imagination, thought — all necessarily take part in this increased recognition of the teleo- logical idea, this conscious awareness and pursuit of ends by use of means. Indeed, each act of recognitive memory, of productive imagination, of logi- cal conclusion on recognized grounds, is in itself an act of obedience to the principle of final cause. Even in those cases where, luider the beneficent > Outlines of Psychology, p. 308. 612 WILL AND CHARACTER eflfect of another principle (wliich we may call, somewhat vaguely, the " j)rin- ciple of habit ") these activities, having been frequently performed with more or less recognition of some end in view, come to resemble instinctive per- formances, their teleological import as affecting the development of mental life is only the moi-e ajiparent. What is true of the intellectual faculties is true of feeling as well. The unfornied life of feeling consists of relatively few and simple affective states (connected chiefly with bodily sensations and appetencies) which furnish blind and unchecked stimuli to the movements of the bodily organism. As this life develops in dependence upon the development of the life of per- ception and ideation, the variety of feelings, and of their consequent con- flicting emotive discharges, is gi'eatly increased. And if some infliience from the principle of teleology were not exercisetl in the realm of emotions, con- tinued development, and even continued existence, would be psychologically impossible. As, however, the feeling-impulses become desires, and some of the desires are weakened or eliminated by being habitually inhibited, while others grow into either deep-seated passions, or elevated sentiments, or into disi3ositions and tendencies and habits, by freqiiently " having their own way," the organization of the life of feeling goes on. And here that very dependence of complex affective states upon intellect, which contributes to their variety, also makes it certain that they, too, will shape themselves ac- cording to some system of means and ends. This is true even when the ends are no other than the satisfaction of the momentarily stronger desires or of the more permanent passions. Now, it is into this self-forming system of means and ends, as securing the organization of the life of intellect and feeling that — we may figuratively say — Will enters ; nay, within it is the willing mind, regarded as definitely adapting the ends, selecting the means, checking or indulging the ai^peten- cies; and planning, resolving, controlling, as resjiects the entire trend and issue of the course of development. And if we are reminded that such lan- guage is figurative and encourages a psychologically false division into facul- ties, we admit the partial justice of the accusation. Btit we repeat that the other style of speaking, which represents the phenomena of "willing" as only the resultant of a superiority in strength of two contending muscular sen- sations, or of two desires, is equally figurative. We are obliged by the very nature of our science, which describes the phenomena of consciousness as such, to reaffirm the reality of conation as an irresolvable factor in all psy- chic states ; and to maintain the perfectly unique character of that which we know takes place when we use intelligently the words, "I will" In view of the prevalence of the teleological principle in mental life there is certainly ground for asserting with M. Pattlhan : " Every idea, . . . eveiy senti- ment, in brief, every psychic system tends to complete itself by volitions and motor phenomena ; eveiy system has its own will." ' But the essence of what we call preC'minently "(he will "involves "a sort of trial of psychic sys- tems" — each tending to impose itself upon all the others, to the end of completing itself, and of the conscious adoj^tion of one of these systems to the exclusion of the others. All the way through, then, the complex jihe- nomena involved show their conformity to the idea of final purpose. " Will- ' Comp. L'Activit6 Mentale, p. 69 f . .] NATURE OF THE VOLITION G13 ing," in all its developed manifestations, implies knowledge and feeling with refer- ence to means and ends. By the word " Volition " we understand a defimte conatlve ac- tivity conscioudy directed toward the realization of a mentally rep- resented e?id, preceded or accompanied by t/te condition of desire, and usually accompanied or followed hy the feeling of effort. A volition is then a complex activity in which conation is emphasized as central and determinative, but as dependent upon intellect for its direction and upon feeling- for its so-called " motive " or im- pulse. In considering- the nature and development of the voli- tions we enter the sphere of conduct ; and every single volition may be called " a deed of will." In actual exi)erience, here as everywhere else, the principle of continuity is maintained. Looking- at this exercise of so-called faculty, we cannot draw the line precisely through the place where it emerges in obvious dis- tinction from previous involuntary conative acts ; nor can we, in the case of individual volitions, always say — just here, and no- where else, in the swift-Howing stream of consciousness did im- pulse or desire, wishing and craving, give way to a genuine deed of will. In fact, most of our volitions How forth so silently and smoothly, as it were, from the very interior of the self, that we have to turn to those rarer and relatively extreme cases, where the Avill asserts itself more definitely and even violently, as it were, in order to understand its distinctive character. In two respects, however, all volitions are distinguished from viere co- native activity ; for they imply mental representation of an end to be realized, and excitement of at least some faint form of desire. There are, moreover, several respects in which different forms of volition differ greatly ; and these differences, bj'^ the many combinations of which they admit, result in coloring our deeds of will so strongly that they scarcely all seem alike fit to be brought under the same term. Among these differences the following- are most important : (1) The end toward which voli- tion is directed may be conceived with more or less distinctness ; or it may be more or less familiar or strange ; or it may be in its nature more or less remote and difficult of realization. Thus the character of the intellectual activity connected with the presenta- tion or representation of that which is willed profoundly modifies the complex nature of the volition itself. The character of every volition depends on the content of what is willed. It is one thing for the child voluntarily to stretch out its hands to the nurse or to the toy, and another thing for the man of science to decide upon the course of experimentation which has just flashed into 614 WILL AND CHARACTER his mind as a means proper to a remoter end in the discovery of some ulterior scientific truth. But (2) two or more ends may be presented to the mind in quick succession, both of which cannot be willed, because they are presumably or certainly incompatible ; and in connection with their mental presentment conflicting- desires may be excited. Here — whereas in the preceding case we may suppose the voli- tion to be " unimotived," since only one end, and that a desired one, is presented — there is need for choice. And choice itself may be either between two or more ends, or it may be choice between acting and not acting. In all cases, however, volitions which are choices have a somewhat distinctly different character from unimotived volitions. Yet again (3) the amount of the desire excited varies greatly in different cases of volition ; and so does the character of de- sire, whether it be sensuous, or intellectual, or sentimental, or pathological. The various amounts and kinds of desire w'hich form the so-called motives for our volitions, greatly influence the coloring taken by the deed of will itself as it emerges in consciousness. Sometimes the volition is pale and nerveless, as it were ; because desire has been faint, or having at first been strong, has finally suff'ered a collapse. Sometimes it is blood- red, because stained with the streams that have poured out from the vital centers of appetite and passion. In connection with the two just foregoing differences occurs another — namely, (4) the amount and character of i:)receding " deliberation." It is this, indeed, which emphasizes our most genuine and unmistak- able deeds of will. But deliheration. is, in truth, itself a sort of mixture of intellect and inhibitory volition. We speak here not simply of the influence which this mental process of weighing ends and of comparing means and consequences, has upon the question, which one of two or more possible volitions our choice shall be : wo speak also of the fact that the psychological char- acter of the choice is itself greatly dependent upon the amount and kind of the preceding deliberation ; the resulting deed of will has a different tone, according as it has, or has not, been preceded by deliberation. Eeckless will, hasty will, excited will, cool Avill, rational will, reluctant will, exhausted and breath- less will, etc., are among the many ])()pular ways of expressing these differences. Volitions differ, moreover, (5) as to the relations in which they stand toward the psycho-physical ai)paratus for control of the organism. Hero one chief distinction is between {a) volitions of inhibition and {h) volitions of positive innervation ; or between CONDITIONS OF DEVELOPED WILL 615 those "which arc adapted to check the impulse to act in a certain way, and those which are adapted to produce, as we say (and are actually, in the order of nature, followed by), a certain deter- minate^ form of action. In connection with these distinctions we experience the intiuence, upon the entire state of volition, of all the various modiiications of the feeling of effort, whose nature and oriq-in have already been discussed (p. 221 f.)- Both volitions of inhibition and volitions of jiositive innervation have their characteristic feelings of effort. In the one case, this feeling may be described as that of offering resistance to the tension connected with every form of appetency or desire ; in the other case, it is rather described as that of overcoming resistance. Figuratively speaking, in the one case " I will " not to let, at once, impulse, appetite, desire, have its own way with me and bring on its appropriate form of action ; in the other case, " I will " that, in spite of certain resistance from impulse, appetite, desire (and these may take the form of disinclination to do any- thing), a certain form of action shall take i)lace. Here it is customary to speak of the longer or shorter period of struggle which blends with, or follows, the more purely interior deed of will, as a nisas added to the volition. This nisus itself, how- ever, is necessarily " backed up," as it were, b}^ a repetition or prolongation of the volition. All these elements, in their com- plex resultant, enter into the conditions of willing, as we are now using the term. But other volitions of both classes (wheth- er of inhibition or of positive innervation), instead of being marked by more or less intense feelings of effort, are character- ized in precisely the opposite way. They are marked by a wonderfully grateful sense of relief. The will to " let go," " to surrender the struggle," "to yield to desire," etc., are voli- tions of this sort. So also, in cases where deliberation has been long and painful, the making of the choice is characterized by the very opposite of the feeling of effort. Even where the task set by the volition is in itself a severe one, whether of obvious bodily movements or of the control of attention and the train of ideas, it seems lightened as it is voluntarily assumed — so con- spicuous is the feeling of relief accompanying and folloAving the resolution of the nisus and the perfecting of the deed of will. \ 2. The developed form of Will, to which M'e give the name volition (proper), differs from mere conation or primitive attention, by being con- sciously determined according to some recognized "content." It is will ifliich knows what it wants. Such an act of will was recognized by ns long ago when, in the chapter on this subject (p. 61 f.), we spoke of vohintai-y at- tention as a " purposeful volition ; " and yet again when, in a later chapter, 616 WILL AND CHARACTER we sjjoke of ideo-motor and voluntary movements as developed forms of co- nation. Here the distinctness with which the content of the conative activity is presented in consciousness admits of an indefinite number of degrees ; and these degrees separate the most blindly impulsive from the most intelli- V:»,__gent of our conations. This relation of volition to intellectual content is ob- served when men try — as they habitually do — to excuse themselves from the charge, both of ignorance and of immorality, by saying : "I did not think what I was doing." On the other hand, they excuse themselves from the charge of immorality, but not of ignoi-ance, by alleging : "I did not know what I was about." In the one case, the volition closely resembles a mere impulse ; in the other, it has the character rather of a volition j^roper, but of one determined on insuflScient grounds. A child who did not remember the unpleasant consequences which followed previous impulsive states of fear, or anger, or desire, and so did not recognize, on its renewed presentation in consciousness, the character of any particular action or course of conduct, would remain incapable of volition. It would continue to run away, to strike, to bite, to reach out its hand for the candle — impuhivehf ; it would not inhibit these movements by a genuine deed of will. The dependence of volition proper upon the recognition of objects as ends, and upon the mental representation of the consequences of previous impulsive acts, is further illustrated by the pause which often occurs when unfamiliar objects are presented. This pause is indicative of the question — What to will. The sensuous attractiveness or aversion awakened toward the object is, of it- self, sufficient to occasion impulsive movement ; b^^t the demand to act in view of an intellectual determination, to know beforehand what we are going to do and what consequences we are to experience as the result of our doing, is necessary to a genuine voluntary movement. Shall I eat this strange kind of food ? or drink this unfamiliar form of drink ? or trust myself to this unaccustomed vehicle [kago or sampan) ? — such are some of the inquiries be- fore which hungry, and thirsty, and huri'ying travellers have to form voli- tions when in foreign lands. All these variations in the character of our volitions, as dependent upon intellectual attitude toward the ends jiroposed, are, of course, connected with variations in stress of desire, in amount of deliberation, etc. Volitions are also characteristically different for different persons. Some wills are rapid and impulsive in movement ; others are equally rapid in movement but clear and strong in intelligence. So the individual volitions may at certain times be characterized by a comprehensive and firm mental grasp, al- though the necessity for making up one's mind at once bo imperative. For example, let a horse be running away in a crowded street, or a child fall overboard from a ferry-boat, and one looker-on will stand " will-less " be- cause intellectually stupefied, another will rush to action blindly, while still another will choose the best means of action Avith a coolness of judgment that furthers instead of hindering promptness of movement. ^ 3. The dei^endonce of the character of volition upon the amount and character of desire, and upon the relation whicli the will — so to speak — as-- sumes to the desire, is most marked and influential. In tliis respect men of different temperaments and habits of action differ greatly ; so also do dif- ferent volitions in the voluntary life of all individuals. Some men of little EFFECT OF DELIBERATION ON WILL 617 passion or excitement from any form of feeling, habitually exhibit great energy and tirrauess in volition. Hero again, " the Will " may bo intellectual and directed by a clear mental grasp upou ends ; or it may seem to be more largely blind, mere couative energy, a relatively unthinking and unemo- tional forth-initting of volition, but with marvellous strength and tenacity. Men of the latter class often acquire a reputation for " strong -will " (more correctly, obstinate will). Even in cases of equally intense emotional influ- ence immediately preceding the volition, great differences ajipear in the way in which this atfective influence gets taken up into the volition, or adopted by the will. Frequently the experience occurs which is described as being " swept away " by desire, and so willing the thing wanted because one can scarcely, or not at all, help doing so. At other times desire or passion is itself voluntarily espoused and made an adopted child of the will. Then " I will" means not simply that desire, although resisted, has at last got its own way ; but rather that desire, even perhaps after being brooded over and resisted, /.s 7iow itself inirt of wJiat I will. Such phenomena occur not only in cases where the deed of will is one that needs for itself the continual influence of passion to hold it firm and strong, but also in cases where this deed, under the influence of some ulterior consideration, is itself directed toward doing a certain action with the accompaniment of a certain frame of mind. The frame of mind is then willed as a part of the complex action. So fanatics and reformers often act with a voluntary passion. Indeed, as Balzac pertinently says: "Fanat- icism, and all other sentiments, are living forces. These forces become in certain beings rivers of Will, which gather up and carry away everything." So also is the steady glow which many of our afi'octions display, due to the manner in which we will that attention shall be given to them, and that they shall be motifs which lead to, and suffuse, our actions, or indeed our entire life of conduct. For example, this voluntaiy adoption of i)assion and desire, so that the character of the adopting volition is itself modified, is distinctive of the mental attitude of the lover to his mistress, of the patriot to his coun- try, of the student to his pursuits, and of all passionate devotees to any per- son or cause. It is as tnie in its way that there are voluntary passions (states of emotion and desire which are willed) as that there are so-called voluntary acts which are little more than unwilled resultants of passionate feeling. And, indeed, generally, there are many degrees of the mixture of emotive and volitional elements which we characterize by such words as volition, choice, and puri^ose. For, it cannot be said too often : In every developed " deed of roill " the whole man acts ; and there is no such thing as a " loilling" to do which is not a complex resultant of all these fundamental forms of so-called f acidly. I 4. That what is called " deliberation " is a most important modifier of the character of our volitions, is a truth assumed by all naive as well as elab- orate ethical theories, and illustrated by the language and practice of men on every hand. This truth is evident at once on considering the influence from the lapse of time over both the intellectual and the affective antecedents of volition. If volition is to be intelligently directed toward an end that is at all complex or remote, and especially in case both end and means for its attainment are unfamiliar, the process called "making up one's mind" as G18 WILL AND CHARACTER to what to do cannot take place without deliberation. The study of mental development shows us how the infant's instinctive pause of surprise and hesitation before the unfamiliar becomes, as the intellect develops, the deliberate inhibition of action and the weighing of considerations [libero ; I weigh in a libra, or pair of scales) that bear upon intelligent action. As has been said, not only is the volition thus determined as to what it shall be, but its very character as an act of will is thus changed. In this way voli- tion itself becomes the conscious adoption of an end. In the most highly developed cases, then, the " I will " takes place only after memory, imagina- tion, and thought have been employed to set forth in consciousness the value — sensuous, sesthetical, or ethical — of the end to be willed ; and per- haps (in cases where choice is made between this and some other end) to estimate carefully its place in the "psychic systems" which are nearly si- multaneously bidding for supremacy in the allegiance of the soul. At the same time, the effect of deliberation upon affective consciousness is even more obvious. It takes time for one to think what one is about to do, and to make up one's mind what to do under all the circumstances. But during this time the play of feeling goes ceaselessly on ; and how it goes on, in any case of deliberate volition, is a matter characterized by all the uncertainty which belongs to affective phenomena generally. For the love or the aver- sion with which the end was regarded at the beginning of deliberation may cool off or be pacified. Indifference may take its place ; or some rival desire may spring uj) and eclipse it. Or, on the contrary, what was originally faint desire or latent passion may become a burning flame. Thus, we know that, if we can succeed in saying to ourselves or to one another: " Hold on " — " You may wish, and desire, and crave, but do not will just now " — it can- not be confidently predicted what the state of "motive" will be that imme- diately antedates the final deed of will. The more fierce and intensely sen- suous are the desires thus held in check while we deliberate, the more uncertain in many cases is it, whether they will keep hot until the volition be formed. Nor is this effect of deliberation manifest simply in determining what the volition will be ; the imlition to do the same thing, ivhich is issued after de- liberation, is not psi/cliologicaVy the same. Most important of all, however, is it to note the part which the will itself plays in every process of so-called deliberation. Such a process is, of its very nature, preeminently a volition ; the rather is it a more or less syste- matic series of volitions under the headship of a controlling act of will. The will to deliberate — the volition which answers the call to " hold on," to check the immediate procedure from representative idea, or emotive con- dition, to a deed of positive adoption of the end — is as thoroughly charac- teristic of a highly developed faculty of conation as any mental activity can possibly be. And during the entire process of deliberation — whether it last but for a minute, or, at fi-equontly renewed and prolonged intervals, for a year — volitions are constantly to be recognized as determining the resultant content of consciousness. When I deliberate, I will to attend now to this consideration and now to that, to encourage this desire at the expense of that so-called higher sentiment ; or to repress the other sensuous appoteiu'v by entertaining an ethical feeling — and so on, throughout. Psycliologicallji considered, it is no less true that I will the influential ideas, feelings, and desires UNIQUE CHAKACTER OF VOLITION Gll> than that the ideas and feelings and desires influence the final ^'^ I will." Nothing can well be more shallow ami misleading, in description and expla- nation of the facts of consciousness, as such, than to regard deliberation as a mere struggle for supremacy in consciousness of ideas and feelings and desires that strictly determine will. [But to this point we shall refer again later on.] I 5. Little can be added to what has already been said regarding the phys- iology of volition, considered as conation (p. 21(5 f.) or attention (p. 05 f.), regarding the psycho-physical mechanism of movement and its inhibition (p. 228 f.), or regarding the nature and origin of that " feeling of effort " (p. 221 f.) which has so conspicuously to do with all deeds of will. In all developed volitions the physiological basis of the entire mental condition includes both such centrally initiated and such i)eripherally originated nerve-commotions as answer to the intellective, and affective, as well as to the purely conative, factors of the complex mental state. Volitions, even physiologicuUy consid- ered, are not comparable to simple sensations or feelings, whether of the muscu- lar or of any oilier sort. On the contrary, there is ample reason to suppose that the whole round of cerebral centers is hard at work when we are de- liberately (that is, with intelligent selective attention under the influence of motives) " making up " our minds. The exhaustion and psycho-physical collapse which frequently follows choice, in the case of prolonged mental struggle and alternation of conflicting desires, is significant enough. Into no other form of psychoses does a man " put more of himself," and suffer more for it, than into such complex activities as lead up to, and terminate in, deeds of will. At the same time tlie distinct and unique experience which consummates the process of deliberation, and although temporarily terminating the con- flict of motives so called, often begins another process of endeavor to " carry out one's will," is quite unmistakable. To say with a recent writer : ' "The act of will, even in its highest forms, admits of explanation as a motor pro- cess by means of the customary presupjiositions of natural science without the assistance of an immaterial principle " — is a theoretical statement which we believe to be contradicted by a fair and comprehensive interpretation of all the facts of psycho-ijhysics. But to say also, as the same writer does, that "between the mental imago of the effect and its perce2)tion — i.e., be- tween the peripherally excited sensation of motion and the previously re- produced memory-image of the same — there is absolutely nothing of a psychical character;" and so to conclude that Will is nothing but "a sensation-complex bound to the sensory-motor centers of the brain ; " or, "Will is a general term which serves the purpose of ethical considerations, but has absolutely nothing corresponding thereto in inner experience ; " — all this is flatly to deny the plainest facts of consciousness which, as such, it is the very business of psychology to describe and to explain. For the distinctive and well-recognized feature of difference, when we compare the most i^rimitivo forms of impulse with the higher develoi?- ments of will, is just this — Between idea and motion something does intervene which is unique in psychical character, viz., that ivhich ice express by the words "I WiLIi." ' Miinsterbcrg, Die Willenshandhing, eee pp. 101, 118, 122, etc. 620 WILL AND CHARACTER ^ 6. Those who would reduce the characteristics of volitions proper, or deeds of will, to the "feeling of effort" do not sufficiently consider the great variety of phases, so to speak, which this feeling exhibits in connection with equally unmistakable voluntary processes. As the distinctions just made remind us, we sometimes find ourselves willing with all our might to restrain ourselves from actually doing that which we desire to do, and should have done impulsively, if we had not willed to deliberate, or to resist desire. At other times we seem to ourselves engaged in overcoming some resistance to the movement of the bodily organs, or to the direction of attention upon the mental train toward the end desired. Such resistance may arise from what is called sluggishness of body or of mind ; or it may come from the apparently inherent difficulty of the action willed. Thus we express a fre- quent jjaiuful experience by saying, "I can't bring myself to do this" (to spring out of bed when the hour for rising strikes ; to take the cold jjlunge ; to have the aching tooth drawn ; to work out the required problem ; to write the promised article ; to engage in conversation with a notable bore). At another time — the next day, or perhaps no later than just as the words of despair have escaped our lips — we find that our will has rallied, and that the difficulties have disappeared or are being overcome. But if in a large number of cases volition seems to brace us up' against the " temptation " of desii-e, and, at the same time, to increase the feeling of effort by intensifying and prolonging the inhibition of action toward a certain end, or by engaging us in the pursuit of a certain end ; in another large number of cases volition is signalized by relief from the feeling of effort. This is true — as has been said — when we voluntarily " let go " instead of continuing to " hold on ; " or when we solve the doubt whether we can do a certain thing by actually starting the mech- anism of motion or of attention in the jirocess of doing it ; or when, again, we settle the conflict of motives by making a choice. Apparently the physiological condition of this sense of relief which accompanies many volitions is the breaking forth of nerve-commotions from the "occupied" cerebral centers into the appropriate motor-tracts. But much of the relief — whether considered physiologically or from the point of view of conscious- ness — is due to the changed condition of feeling which results from the voli- tion. For, confessedly, the strain of excited emotion and passion, esi^ecially of the " conflicting " sort, is always great. And much of the "burden" under which we feel ourselves to be when " weighing " motives is caused by our being necessarily more or less " subject " to the power of motives. Here, again, reference might be made with profit to the theory of the cerebral and psycho-physical nature of the intenser forms of feeling (comp. p. 173 f. ) . Other l^art of the sense of relief is doubtless caused by the privilege which volition often brings of ceasing from the tension of attention. The more deliberate is any deed of will — the interests involved being supposed to be equal — the greater is the required attention ; and voluntary attention has been seen to be an exhausting activity. I 7. Finally, the reactionary effect of volition upon the various intellec- tive processes, and its fusion with them in the total process which may properly bo called the process of "willing," should be kept in mind. All the intellectual faculties, whose development has thus far been traced, are, in EFFECT OF VOLITION ON INTELLECT G21 their higlier exercise, themselves vohintary. That is to sav, we iierceive, within certain not easily assignable limits, what ive vill to perceive ; we re- member what u-e will io remember, and think and conclude as we determine by volition the content and direction of our thought. The effect of voluntaiy attention, as a consciously directed focusing and distributing of psychic energy over the successive fields of consciousness, upon (or rather within) all these forms of intellectual faculty, has already been noted in detail. So important is this ettect that some psychologists stand ready to write down the equation : Volition = Attention, in the most fundamental and compre- hensive meaning of both words. A brief summary of a related view has been made as follows : ' There exists, besides mere content of mental representa- tion, a subjective personal activity. This is proved, in the first place, by the efiiect of apperception (or selective, attentive i^erceiition) on the mental image in elevating it to the point of fixation, and in reinforcing its intensity there. "We have a measure for this increase of intensity in the case of those images which we voluntarily evoke in memory, and upon which we direct attention. The consciousness of this process considered as an effort of attention, and of the feelings of tension which accompany it, receives the name of " T\'ill " — just as soon as we take into consideration the external actions which result from it. Not only in perception and memory does volition exercise a determining influence over the resulting mental condition ; in affirmative and negative judgment, also, the will expresses itself in a peculiarly impressive way. In- deed, the essence of these two kinds of judgment may be said to lie in the Jirit and yieget of the voluntary mind. When volition is comj^leted, the language in which it expresses itself is the affirmative judgment — with an emphasis: "I will this," or the negative judgment : " I will not that." No matter how purely logical our thinking may seem to us to be, or how color- less, disj^assionate, and strictly consequential oiir conclusions, certainly in all judgments relating to matters of conduct, and probably also in all scien- tific judgments as well, we will to judge what we think it fit to judge. That is to say, the more deliberate our consideration of the grounds on which the concluding thoiight must be seen to rejiose, the more deliberate our weigh- ing of evidence, the more does the final act of "drawing " the conclusion es- cai^e the nature of a blind impulsive leaji and assume the character of a deed of will. So also do men accept or reject those judgments, to which they are solicited or from which they are repelled by ethical sentiment, in the form of a volitional activity. Tlmf; nil the faculties are tcelded together in their higher manifestaiiona and developments ; thus what we will is not onhf depend- ent on what ue think, and what ice icill on what we icish, but also what we think 071 what we wish and will. For the development of that so-called faculty to which we ascribe the origin of conduct is — we rejieat — a most complex affair ; and its deeds, the so-called volitions, imply the fusion of all the various fundamental processes of mind in the relations acquired by experience. It is, however, the wonderful mental phenomenon (or rather complex of mental processes) which is called Choice, that most I » Comp. Dwelshauvere, Psychologie de I'Apperception, p. 129 f.— an attempt to summarize the theory of Wundt. 622 WILL AND CHARACTER exhibits the many-sided nature of the developed Will. In order to determine most satisfactorily the " moments " which enter into this phenomenon, we must analyze our protracted condition of mind when we are most plainly and elaboratel}', as it were, making- a choice. Here i^hysiological theory and experimental data are of little assistance. For almost no knowledge of facts exists on which to base such a theory ; and experiments have a direct bearing- only on those relatively simple cases of reaction- time which show that, instead of really " choosing- " — in the most peculiar meaning- of that word — the subject of the experiments is only reacting impulsively under the influence of habitu- ally associated mental images. The psychological basis for a discussion of the questions in debate between the advocates of determinism and free will has not yet been laid in experiment ; it jDrobably never will be laid, to any satisfactory extent, in work done in iih3'^siological or psycho-physical laboratories. The com- plex phenomena, or series of phenomena, which we call making- a choice must be taken as they are given — actual data of con- sciousness, as such. And instead of minimizing them, and ex- plaining them away, they are to be described, as they actually occur in the mental life, by scientific psychology ; to philosophy it must be left to reconcile tjiem with any proposed statement of a so-called " law of causation." In the most elaborate and prolonged processes of " making a choice," the following stages, or "moments," may be discovered: (1) Mental representation of two or more ends regarded as de- pendent upon our action, and — usually also — of the more or less detailed courses of conduct which are regarded as means to the attainment of these ends. But since detailed mental represen- tation of several ends and of their appropriate means cannot, on account of the limitations of consciousness, be simultaneous, it must take place by a sort of alternate dwelling upon, first one and then another of these ends. (2) Excitement of sensibility in the form of some desire or sentiment which implies appreciation of the value of the ends, and which constitutes the " motives," or affective " reasons," Avhy either one should be chosen rather than the others. But the very nature of (1) and (2), as occurring under the most general conditions of mental life, implies (3) — delibera- tion, involving the estimating of the relative values of the ends, and of the risks and difficulties of their attainment, together with the excitement of a conflict of desires. [Here, however, the volitional character of the deliberation itself, with its involved regulation of the ideas by voluntary attention and its possible suppression of, or allowance of, or adoption of, certain motives, THE PROCESSES IN CHOICE 623 must not bo forq-otton.] But into the midst of this jn-ocess of deliberatiou there either breaks as a sort of surprise, or follows as its rational conclusion, (4) decision — or the appropriation to self of one end, and its system of means, to the exclusion of others (that psychical process which coiresponds to tlie words " I will," as terminating deliberation ; selective volition or choice, peculiarly so designated — what is ordinarily called " fiat of will"). It is this number (4) which is often called ////; choice; although this word is more i>roperly used for the complex pro- cess of choosing, or making a choice, since the final decision may often be of itself considered, a unimotived volition, or even almost a blindly impulsive act. Then follows, both in the order of necessary sequence and in the order of time, (5) that more distinctly colored consciousness of doing something — "letting go," or "gripping on," with the api>aratus of muscular motion and attention (Avhat is sometimes called "executive volition," or the carrying-out of the decision). While, however, these several stages or "moments" may l)e recognized in certain most elaborate deeds of will as the faculty of choosing, they are customarily more or less " huddled to- gether," or even fused, in choices so called. Almost constantly in our daily lives alternative courses of action leading to difierent ends are presented before us for our choice between them. In many of these cases the mind is helped to an almost immediate and yet intelligent and genuine decision by previous experience. Is it a choice between going and not-going, between going to the place a or to the place h, between employing our time in the work 7)1 oi' spending it in the recreation n, between believing the report brought us, or the opinion expressed by x or by y ? — it is already known, on familiar grounds, which part of each alterna- tive to clioose. Indeed, in many cases so-called choices are scarce- ly such to any aiopreciable degree ; they are rather almost entire- ly the exjjression of conscious but instinctive or impulsive cona- tive acts. For in its development Will — like all the so-called faculties or forms of mental life — comes under the principle of habit : or rather, as we have already said, here is the very seat and stronghold of the principle of habit itself. In this " huddling together," or partial fusion, of the pro- cesses involved in choice, any one of the five "moments" may suffer more or less, both as respects the degree in which it is awakened and also as respects the time which it absorbs. Here, of course, degree of intensity and length of persistency in consciousness are intimately connected ; although they may vary either directly, or inversely, or in other unpredictable 624 WILL A^D CHARACTER waj'^s. Thus mental representation of the ends, between which choice is to be made, may be clear and comprehensive from the very beginning- of the process of making the choice ; and in this case deliberation consists in estimating the affective values of the two, or in being swayed by alternating waves of desire that move in different directions. In other cases, however, the very pause before decision and the entire process of deliberation may be due to the fact that a demand is made to know more definitely " what we are going into," before making a decision ; and now when knowledge is gained, the decision follows as a matter of course. In still other cases the excitement of sensibil- ity and the motivation which desire furnishes, make compara- tively little show in the complex process of choice. This may happen either through lack of intensity to the feeling, or because the time through which deliberation ranges is too short for desire — to speak figuratively— to get a firm hold on will. For there is such a thing even as very deliberate, intelligent, and yet unfeel- ing, choice. Yet again, the " strong desire eclipses the aim," and shortens up the entire process of deliberation, bringing it to a decision before either knowledge of ends and consequences, or higher sentiments, have had a chance greatly to influence the process. In calling attention to these differences the same truths appear as those which characterize the nature of all volition ; but the peculiarity of choice consists in just this preparatory vacillation of attention between ends, and in the corresponding shorter or longer, fainter or more intense, conflict of affective states. It is the Decision or " cutting -sliort" of the process of deliberation, in which will expresses itself as tlie faculty distinctive in cdl maJcing of choices. But will also expresses itself — so we have repeatedly been compelled to notice — in the jirocess of deliberation all through. Yet the decision is the very acme of the activity of will, the triumph of developed conation over sensation, feeling, and desire, with their impulsive and instinctive powers. This central activity of Will is also called "determination " or "reso- lution ; " and by these words it is indicated that the period of vacillation of intellect between ends, and of desires considered as appetencies prophetic of possible volitions, is terminated ; that which was a question, a problem, is now settled or resolved. In its own nature, however, considered as isolated by a fictitious analysis from the complex presiding intellective and affective processes, decision does not differ from volition in general. Not infrequently decisions, following upon long and painstaking de- liberation, are made in an impulsive, and almost or quite invol- ATTEMPTS TO EXPLAIN CHOICE 025 uutary, way. The intellectual, sesthetical, and ethical quality of the decision depends, then — psycholog-ically considered — upon the character of the intellective and affective processes in the midst of which it is set. This is only to say that intelligent, admirable, and morally rig-ht decisions must be made in view of consciously represented ends, and as motived by correct lesthet- ical and ethical sentiments. I 8. The varions attempts of physiological and experimental psychology to sophisticate the facts of consciousness instead of faithfully describing and cautiously explaining them, are nowhere else more unbecoming than in tlie phenomena of choice. There are, indeed, certain reasonable conjectures as to the probable condition of the brain while the psychical i)henomenon of making a choice is going on. In general, this may be described as a state of tension in which alternating depression and heightening of nerve-com- motion takes place in the various cerebral centers that have control of the mechanism of motion and of the innervation of the sense-organs. This state of tension comes to an end when, with the decision, some definite direction is given to the neural excitement and it is "drawn off," or discharged, into tlie connected nerve-tracts. In this way the feeling of effort, the feeling of ex- haustion and strain, the feeling of relief, etc., which accompany the dif- ferent phases of deliberate choice, are explained jihysiologically as having both a central and a peripheral origin. But all this is far enough from ex- plaining, and farther yet from explaining aa-ay, the more important psychi- cal processes which enter into this unique act of will. There are such mental activities as we can exiiress in no other 1Tt'iT^lai!,o.»tUan some such as the following : / " hold on " before deciding ; / voluntarily&mi^ider and esti- mate the value of the ends jiroposed ; / su])press this desire, and encourage or adopt another, or decide by a preliminary volition to be guicTcd by sucli an aBsthetical or ethical sentiment ; and, finally, /decide for this f^id and its involved course of action, rather than that. When, then, a writer — like M. Luys ' for example — asserts that all this psychical process is illusory, and that the object chosen is " only forced on us by the cunning conjurer, the brain," because " the cell-territory where that object resides has been pre- viously set vibrating in the brain," he is not explaining but rather contra- dicting the facts of consciousness, as such, on the basis of a purely mythi- cal physiology of tlie cerel)val centers. And in no sjihere of so-called science is unadulterated myth-making more easy, fascinating, and yet dangerousV than in cerebral pliysiology. ' Little better — if, indeed, tliey are at all an improvement — are the conclu- sions of Miinstevberg and others, as placed upon an alleged basis of exjieri- mental psychology (p. 619). Experiments in reaction-time, have, indeed, established, with a fair amount of conclusiveness, an answer to this question : " About how long does it take, under given circumstances, to set free a vol- untary impulse?" The first experimenter (Bonders) answered this question with the number 36 a. Later exiieriments (by Merkel) made the time re- quired to "set free " the cerebral processes involved in a very simple choice be- ' The Brain and its Functions, p. 254 f. 40 626 WILL AND CHARACTER tween two possible coiirses of action (e.g., to react with one finger rather than another) vary from 24 a to 155 o-. To choose one of the ten fingers with which to react, required "will-time" of 298-448 a. As might be expected, it was fonnd that by establishing fixed associations between certain percep- tions and their assigned modes of reaction, the will-time could be greatly redxiced or even wholly eliminated. The data brought out by still subse- quent experiments in "question-answer" associations have already been men- tioned (p. 303). By all this elaborate experimentation, however, nothing has been shown that changes our estimate of the unique psychical character of choice as a conscious activity, nothing that was not perfectly familiar before ; namely, that delibei'ation takes time, and the more of it, the more time ; that actions which, to begin with, require time for choice may be- come, by even a little practice, almost or quite impulsive ; that there are many questions of apparent choice, about w'hich our minds are already made up, or which we answer impulsively, etc. But, here again, to explain, or to exi^lain away, the complex and subtile psychoses that are emphasized by these highest transactions of developed Will, in the name of such ex- perimental psychology, is a quite unwarrantable j^rocedure. Indeed, it can scarcely be too emphatically said : There is not a fact knoim to ph/siological w experimental paycliolngif that makes avy less unique, mysterioits, and impres- sive, but necessary, that assumption of inexp)licable spontaneity, of self- activity determinatire of follomng psychoses and bodily movements tchich belongs to the conscious7iess of viaking a deliberate choice. ^ 9. The complexity and length of the mental jDrocesses involved in all genuine choices may be said to be invariably ' ' fore-shortened " in our mem- ory of the choices themselves. In all cases of elaborate choice it is the deci- sio)i, and not the preceding deliberation, which is of chief i^sychological and jiractical interest. And, indeed, how the decision was reached may be be- yond the possibility of recall ; may even never have come, with any approach to entirety, into consciousness so as to fix itself in memory. Moreover, the entire development of mental life requires that a large number of our choices, while retaining their character as choices, shall be made either as guided by established principles of action or by that quick leap to judgment which we call intuition or tact. It is in this way indeed, that many of the most notable and heroic choices are made — whether the life of the individual or the history of the race be considered. For example, it is sufficient to note how the swimmer proceeds who makes it his choice to attempt the rescue of a drowning jierson ; how he selects the means of assisting himself that are at hand, or can be ordered, and the manner of handling his biirden in the water, and of reaching shore or the ship's side again ; or how the locomotive engineer, on seeing an obstruction on the track, chooses whether to shut off, or to let on more steam, and chooses the time to jump through the cab's win- dow, etc. All such deeds of will, although the time of deliberation, with its mingling of voluntary attention, of ratiocination, and ferment of affective in- fluences, is short, cannot properly be called impiilsive or instinctive ; they are rather genuine choices. The wonderful mingling of grasp upon the situ- ation, pressure of feeling, and promptness of decision, which characterizes them, properly excites both a?sthetical admiration and moral approbation. And men who can habituallv choose in this wav are often not onlv " men of CKUTAIN FALSE ASSUMPTIOXS 027 decision," but men of that clearness of intelligence and strength of feeling which is as far as possible removed from rashness or the relatively unintel- ligent and ?io?j-moral character of merely impulsive action. While, on the one hand, the word choice should not be limited to those deeds of will where i)rolonged deliberation over two possible ends precedes, on the other hand, it should, of course, include the unimportant as well as the most significant deeds of will. Choice is something con- stantly going on in the development of mental life. Figuratively speaking, we may say that the path to be followed in this development is, at every mo- ment, an ©lien question. So far as either observation of others or of our own self-consciousness gives us the data, we are compelled to affirm : In every stream of consciousness, which we call a " mind," there is constantly an unsolved problem occurring. The decision or resolution, which is the essentially conative act — this alone actually solves each such problem. That is to say, there is an almost ceaseless mental representation of two or more possible courses, with their ai)iuopriate affective accompaniments — of an a or b or c, as possible of realization by the ego ; either a or b or c must be realized ; it is antecedently much more 2yrobable that a will be real- ized (or that b will be, etc.) ; but onl)/ the decision decides, only the resolu- tion resolves the problem. When attention is called to this aspect of all mental development, as dependent upon choice, it only sets forth the most obvious of facts — however the metaphysics of physics or of psychology may be disposed to regard the ultimate significance of the facts. Scientific psy- chology cannot give a faithful picture of soul-life, and of its development, without emphasizing this unique phenomenon, or rather comjilex of phe- nomena, called " making a choice." ^ 10. Although, then, it does not belong to psychology, as we are pursu- ing it, to refute, or even to consider the arguments of determinism, or the theory of a complete causal connection, whether between the decision and the desire, or between the psychical j^rocess of choice and the i^hysiology of the cerebral centers, a protest may properly be entered against the way in which the deterministic arguments are customarily presented. In this mat- ter there are few more unpardonable "sinners" than Hoffding ' has— in his generally fair and always interesting book— allowed himself to become, "Psychology," says this author, "like every other science, must be deter- ministic ; that is to say, it must start from the assumption that the causal law holds good even in the life of the will, just as this law is assumed to be valid for the remaining life and for material nature." Such an assertion as this may properly be met with the flattest kind of denial. Psychology has absolutely no right to make any such assumption. Psychology must first of all faithfully describe, and then, as far as possible, explain (and never ex- plain away) the facts of consciousness, as such. Among these facts it finds the complex phenomenon of choice. And this phenomenon certainly does not look like a phenomenon to be explained off-hand a.s it were, by assuming that the causal law is valid for it throughout ; "just as this law is assumed to be valid for material nature." On the contrary, no one can deny that choice " looks like " a phenomenon the very opposite of such a natural jihenome- non. To test this let any one, in an unprejudiced way, consider, what goes ' Outlines of Psychology, p. 345 f. 628 WILL AND CHARACTER on in his own consciousness wlien a choice is being made. Let him particu- larly mark the fact that every rise and fall of the ideas of the ends, and every increase and decrease in the so-called influence of the motives, is itself a matter largely dependent upon the same apparent spontaneity of conation ; while the decision, as such, is a sort of ai^otheosis of such apparent sponta- neity. Let him remember that the primary obligation of psychology is to remain true to the facts of consciousness, as such ; and then he may feel the more confident that psychology, instead of ' ' assuming " determinism to be true, must turn the question of its truth or falsehood over to j^hilosophy. But even this it will do icith a strong inclination against the deterininist'ic doc- trine, an inclination legitimately based upon the indubitable character in con- sciousness of the plienomenon we call " making a choice." By such words as " Plan " and " Purpose " certain activities of Will are emphasized, that are of even more comprehensive and indirect relations to conduct than are so-called choices. And by the terms " self-control " and " courses of conduct," the relation of subordination is indicated in which many individual volitions, whether unimotived or g-enuine choices, stand to these plans and purposes. Properly speaking, every genuine volition and — even more ohviously — every choice, is planfi/l or 2)ar2)oseful. In its very nat- ure, as has already been shown (p. 618 f.), the deed of will deter- mines or organizes, in the direction of a certain end, a system of psychic activities, intellective, affective, and motor. But deeds of will admit of being- arranged in a series of hierarchies, as it were. Some of them rule only momentarily and by way of lim- ited monarchy over the psychic train and the motor conscious- ness. Others of them extend their influence over years of time, or even over the whole of life and its complex of experiences ; and this tlie}^ do in a more or less nearly absolute 'svny. In such cases there is ahvays left abundant room for that elasticitj' and apparent spontaneity of the individual choices to Avhich refer- ence has just been made. For even when the stream of con- sciousness is intelligently and voluntarily directed toward a cer- tain goal, or deliberately turned aside by a well-calculated curve, there is the same possibility of either a or b or c being- the subordinate end, or the means, chosen at every minute sub- division of that curve. Plans and purposes — considered as formed by difterent wills, or by the same will under different conditions, or at diflerent stages of mental development — differ in the following among other particulars : (1) Both the end proposed, and the means necessary to its realization, may be more or less comprehensive in themselves, and clearly and st(>adily held before the mind by mental representation. (2) Steadiness or firmness of will (" tlie very backbone of what we call will " — Sully), or its opposite, is Tin: FOKMATIOX OF A PLAN G29 characteristic of plans and purposes more obviously than of volitions or choices. (3) These comi)rehensivc deeds of will are reciprocally^ related to the control of the "Self" — the intellect, feelings, and habits of action. In other Avords, Avhat we call con- duct is determined by plans ; and jDlans are themselves modified or even determined by experiencing^'- the n'sults of conduct. (4) In this way a man's plans — as respects the ends i)ursued, the means employed, the relation of thouj^ht and feeliiif:;- and will to them, — are indicative of, and co-extensive with, his character. When it is said of a man, " he clianges his purposes frequently and causelessly ; " or, " he has no fixed plans ; " or, " he liv(!s ac- cording- to such a plan"— it is iinderstood as defining- what sort of a man he is. The formation and adoption of plans is a matter of choice — the former having, how^ever, the characteristics rather of delib- eration and the latter of decision ; yet in both f(n-mation and adoption the act of will is obviously involved. Here the deter- mination of will is much more interior than w here the exjiression of volition and choice in external action is immediate. In all forming- of plans, " I will " to think out the probable conse- quences of my future bodily movements or of other forms of my " doing ; " to elaborate certain ideas of ends to be reached and of means to be employed ; to anticipate feeling-s of one kind or another, on my own part and on the part of others, etc. That is, in brief, by a choice that is overruling I voluntarily direct attention into certain channels of cognitive memory, j^roduc- tive imagination, and logical conclusion. Such a deed of will undoubtedly results in innervating certain cerebral centers rather than others, and, to a certain extent, their connected organs of sense ; but it is inhibitory of, rather than productive of, obvious bodily movements. So also in the deed of will which adopts the plan I do not necessarily set agoing by my fiat of will any easily marked train of associated bodily movements. Some plan has, indeed, been adopted by the choice, but its ex- ecution may not begin immediately ; it may not even be con- templated for a considerable time to come. Thus the entire observable motor result of a most comprehensive plan being decided upon, may be only the saying to one's self (probably, if under the breath, yet still with an internal emphasis) : " Yes, so I inlll do," — that is, when the time comes, and as often as it comes, again and again, for the contemplated series of actions. But tills " wdll " is not merely the future tense of "to be ; " it signifies a highly organized volition, a choice of a plan which henceforth stands to the ego in a peculiar relation. 630 WILL AND CHARACTER § 11. The i^lanful, i^urposeful, character of all volitions and choices— in the most general meaning of the words " plan" and " purpose " — has already been noted in cousideiing the conscious teleology which belongs to devel- oped will. For example, if I choose to draw a circle rather than a triangle, or to run a line from A to B rather than from A to C, in the attempt to solve a geometrical jDroblem, my choice operates as a controlling plan over the succeeding movements. So also, if I choose to walk to the station by the way of the post-office rather than to take the street-car there from the next corner ; or choose to eat an apple rather than a peach, from the dish of fruit offered to me. Even those simiDle uniraotived volitions, which approach the character of the more purely impulsive or instinctive activities, in so far as they are genuine volitions at all, may be said to involve the formation of a plan. Choice of a plan, indeed, may be said to be involved, as a sequence, in certain uuimotived volitions. For not infrequently the one thing willed, as the only end before the mind, may be accomplished in either one of sev- eral ways. Thus a skilled fencer who has willed to attack his opponent at what he knows to be his only weak point, and under the influence of this volition is watching his opportunity, may with incredible speed, and yet with conscious intelligent choice, select the particular form of giving his thrust — some new trick he has recently learned. In the more restricted use which is here made of the words jDlan and purpose, however, emphasis is laid upon the more deliberate and com- prehensive choices whose execution is reserved for the future. Into such a supreme manifestation of will all the highest develoi^ment of the entire mental life may enter, as making contributions to its character. To plan, to purpose, in this meaning of the words, is to exercise all the faculties of developed manhood, under the control of will. Yet this, like all t)ther complex manifestations of those faculties, is also matter of degrees. We should not, therefore, by any means confine our estimate of such products of will to those who can say with the Paracelsus of Browning : "I have subdued my life to the one purpose X ' Whereto I ordained it ; " f or, again : " I have made my life consist of one idea," however grand the idea and noble the sentiment belonging to the plan. The lower order of savages, and the average man of the civilized community, do indeed suffer themselves to be swayed by internal passions and external circumstances rather than " subdue " their lives to any " one purpose." And yet there is another side to all this. They, too, as sharers in the possibilities of human development, habitually take large sections, as it were, of their own lives into their own keeping ; they "ordain " them to some one purpose (though it may be no nobler imrjtose than to take vengeance on an enemy, to excel in trajiping game, or in outdressing and outranking others, or in "bulling" or "bearing" the market) ; and they subdue ideas and feelings and minor volitions to this one puri)o.se. They thus rise above the lower animals and show the leading characteristics of a distinctively human de- PLAXNING AND MOTOIl MKCIIANISM Cuil voloi^mcnt, bj* the kind aud amount of imagination, thought, and fcfling, which they rally under the deed of will, in the formation, adoption, and execution, of some jjlau. ^ 12. As to the execution of i)lans, it should bo noticed that this, as a rixle, takes i)laco in i)art by means of impulsive and habitual, or i)erhaps purely reflex activity ; aud in part as a matter of consciously ordered con- duct according to the plan already formed. This is true, however compre- hensive the plan may be. If it be only to draw a certain line or figure, oi' to go in a certain direction ; or if it be one of tho.se plans to which the whole life is "ordained" and ''subdued" — the unconscious and the con.scious together share the responsibility for the execution of the plan. For example, let us analyze all that the savage does in execution of his purpose to hit with his poisoned arrow just that imrticular man among the opiDOsite hosts of the enemy whom he has selected for this imrpose ; the series of transactions, from the picking out of the arrow to the lifting of the fingers to let it fly, will involve the whole realm of unconscious reflex and automatic activities, as well as the conscious guidance, by sight, touch, and muscular sense, of the conduct — rallied and "backed up" continuously by resolution of will. In every man's daily life of work, or play, most of what he does is in like man- ner capable of being considered as, to a large extent, the execution of i)lans formed previously — it may be, long before. For what I have already willed shall be the ends of my conduct steadies^and determines what I think, feel, and will, hour by hour — sometimes cufitrolling in a largely or wholly latent way, and sometimes tinging the memal life through and through with con- scious resolution. Thus the workman works, the artist sings or paints or composes, the scholar studies and lectures, the soldier marches and fights and bivouacs, the lawyer pleads, the minister preaches, the lover pursues his suit, and the mother manages her household ; thus also, in large measure, does the pleasure-seeker amuse himself, the criminal commit crime ; and only the hopeless idiot manifests no manner of " will to live " in some defi- nite and chosen, rather than some other way. . And when we think out the import of what has just been said, we obtain additional reasons for rec- ogiiiz'ing the very important distinction between 'wishes, or cravings, or desires, and planfnl deeds of will. I 13. The interior and unexi^ressed character of one's Will in the for- mation aud adoption of plans has a marked influence over the psycho-phys- ical and muscular mechanism. In doing iilanful work I seem to concentrate all my voluntary attention on what goes on within myself : nay, more — upon tcddng charge of what goes on within myself. I n-iJl bend consciousness to my will ; I roill make my imagination and my thought put into shape for me some end, together with the means for its realization, which I may adopt for my own. Physiologically considered, these states show a susjiension of the more obvious motor accom])animents of volition. And so we read : " Sits fi.red in thought the mighty Stagirite." Tluis our attention is'called to the fact that in jilanning men are a]it to inhibit external movements ; as thought deepens, if they have been walking, they not infrequently stop and stand still while they plan. Not only the muscles but also the external sense-oi'- gans cease to be innervated. While thus engaged in planning we neither see, nor hear, nor feel ; distinct and most irritating emotions are apt to fol- 032 WILL AND CHARACTER low on our being aroused from tins condition by demands to turn our atten- tion outward again. Yet even in the most extreme cases we are not warranted in assuming that all motor accompaniment of volition is suspended. On the contrary, the true exi^ressive motor accompaniment of the higher activities of imagination and thought is tlien likely to be particularly emphasized. The state of con- scious and detailed planning is one in which we are " reasoning with " ourselves and "talking to" ourselves ; and the language employed is not only in its character but also in the manner of its interior utterance, colored strongly with the currents of conscious thought and feeling. When, moreover, we are adopting a plan, we are inclined actually to bring down our list, or to set our foot hard upon the ground — thus giving expression to a finished com- Ijrehensive resolution. All these and other evidences indicate that the inti- mate connection between conation and motor consciousness, and between jjsychoses of a markedly volitional order and the tensions and movements of the muscular mechanism, is by no means broken in the case of the higher manifestations of planful will. All the foregoing statements hold of those purposes which control the trains of thought, or the arrangement of our ideas, in the search after truth or in the production of works of art. Here the quest for mental images and logical conclusions, or for the happy and fit exj^ression of them — the right word or phrase, the suggestive turn, the apt metaphor, etc. — is taken in hand, as it were, by the will. But the execution of any such plan is always very largely a matter of the unconscious or largely impulsive Avorking of the psy- cho-physical mechanism. This is felt to be true by the subject of the willing, himself. Hence we hear much in all such cases of the influence of sugges- tion, of flashes of imagination and leaps of logic — all of which seem like contributions from the unconscious to the execution of the conscious plan. On the other hand, those who have not these helps cannot by willing, how- ever persistently and intensely, obtain either the material or the arrange- ment necessary for such a j^lan. In illustration we may recall the humorous picture in one of Fritz Eeuter's novels, of the worthy dame who undertook to write jaoetry as a mere " deed of will : " " Here I sit and sweat, and bring nothing to pass." It is further interesting to notice how certain plans — such as those which the general actually follows in an engagement, or the musician in improvis- ing or composing, or the orator in speaking impromptu, or the thinker while pursuing and yet guiding his own thoughts — are progressively formed, adopted, and realized. Here general ideas, quite vague as to outlines and details, may be consciously adopted by the will; and the planfnl character of the resulting activity is itself a sort of growth in which all the factors of unconscious and conscious life ai'e combined. So splendid and unexpected are sometimes the results thus realized that an impression is made as of an- other Will, and another thinking, feeling Mind, than our own, welling up in the stream of o;ir conscious existence. I Wo have already, in ])art, passed in review those phenomena of consciousness in which the disputed question of the Freedom of Will has its rise. It has also been declared that this ques- QUESTION OF FREEDOM STATED 633 tion, for its profouiuler and tiuiil cousidcriitiou, must bo Imnded over from jisycholo^y to philosophy. More precisely, it is the relations iu Avhich the conclusions drawn hoin the mental phe- nomena stand to the so-called law of causation that need ad- justment by the more ultimate reflective treatment which phi- losophy gives. But while descriptive and explanatory psychology cannot perform the ofhce of philosophy, on the other hand, a crude metaphysics cannot properly embody itself in some uncrit- ical statement of the law of causation, and then in the name of this " law," explain away the phenomena of consciousness. Moreover, psychologically considered, the law of causation itself arises from the projection of the principle of sufficient reason upon the world of things — the demand which the intellect makes upon itself to keep on trying to explain. If this were the place it could be shown that most of the arguments for what is custom- arilj' called Determinism arise from unwarrantable ways of stat- ing and applying this so-called law of causation ; it could also be shown that most of the objections to a full recognition of the obvious meaning of phenomenal free-will arise in the same way. In a work on descriptive psychology, however, it is in place only to attempt these two things : (1) To state those more obvi- ous aspects of volitional conditions and acts which constitute the consciousness of " being free " in the widest sense of these words ; and (2) to make such inferences as seem to arise directly from the facts, withovit entering upon the attempt to estimate man's place in nature, or the propriety of applying to conscious- ness the law of causation, or the relations of bod}' and mind ; or to answer other ulterior questions of a similar kind. But two or three preliminary remarks are important ; ami these remarks must constantly be borne in mind. First, the phrase " freedom of will " is an abstract term, to use which in its customary mean- ing is contrary to the spirit of all our previous psychological discussion. The term in itself seems to imply that some separ- able entity, or at least separable faculty, called " "Will," exists, and that to it alone the quality, or predicate, of " being free " applies. But to put the question with the concreteness which scientific psychology demands and which corresponds to actual experience, it is this : Do /avUI freely ? and, "U'hat do I mean by the word freedof/i as applied to myself when I will f And here at once we see that the entire course of our previous exam- ination provides a partial answer. My willing, like all my action, nay — like my being a Self at all, is a development. I come, then, to will freely, only under certain conditions and as a result of development. And further what I mean by willing freely is (A) 634 WILL AND CHARACTER that I am not compelled by any force, external to consciousness, to the deed of will ; on the contrary, it is my deed of will. I have— as is ordinarily said — " freedom from compulsion." But plainly I mean something- more than this when I affirm all that I know and believe when I say : I will. I mean to express {B) the conviction that no condition of consciousness — no idea, or emo- tion, or desire — regarded as external to the deed of wdll, comjDels me to will. This amounts to saying that men generally do not make the assumption which Hoffding-, as already quoted (p. 627), says the ^Dsychologist must make — namely, that " the causal law holds good for the will as for material nature." On the contrary, the general conviction is that the deed is entitled to be called my " will " — whatever may be my desire, or wish, or thought — be- cause it is 7iot connected with any other event in consciousness, as iDhysical science assumes events in material nature to be con- nected. And history further shows us that the naive assump- tion attributes free will to nature rather than causal law, as modern science assumes it to exist for material nature, to hu- man free will. But, second, no deed of will, however free it may be con- ceived of as being-, is an isolated or unrelated psychosis. Every deed of will has content ; it is will — to some particular end. It is g-enerally, if not always, motived by some excitement of feeling, some interest in some good to be gained. If we rec- ognize as genuine deeds of will at all those random, automatic, and unimotived psychical forthputtiugs, which appear to arise in consciousness, they are of all others least worthy to be called free. And to tr}^ even to frame the conception of myself as will- ing freely, without also willing intelligently and feelinglj^ is to try to think of myself as a machine and not as a free will. Moreover, the very thing that the development of mental life most demands is the possibility of adopting, by acts of will, progressively higher and more comprehensive ends, and nobler and purer sentiments. Yet, again, no " consciousness of freedom " in the sense of an immediate awareness that the law of causation does not apply to so-called deeds of will is, of course, possible. To substantiate a claim to such consciousness of freedom, one must first formu- late the universal conscioiisness corresponding to the law of causation ; and this is something for which an appeal to imme- diate consciousness is utterly inadequate. It has already been said, however, that fJie conviction '^ I freely iciW'' is equivalent to aired or lost. Here all our habitual expressions and formulas of judgment are sig- nificant of an opposite tone of thought, feeling, and conviction, as respects the nature of our own consciousness. We now say : "It was not (either wholly, or at all) ;»?/ fault " (" The woman . . . tempted me and I did eat "—where the external deed is acknowledged, but not as arising wholly from free will), or " I can not, or could not, do otherwise ; " — a form of excuse which covers all degrees of the invasion of will, so to speak, by different forms of external compulsion, and by strong, impulsively acting emotion, or "overpowering passion," from within. All such phrases are, however, am- biguous in meaning and relative in application to the great variety of con- ditions under which the intellective, affective, and truly conative, aspects of consciousness get recognition. Indeed, these same phrases are used to ex- press the most deliberate and firm resolutions of will, in view of high ideals, and backed by the most worthy of josthetical sentiments (As, for exami)le : " God help me ; I cannot do otherwise "). Similar phases of consciousness in willing are illustrated by various classes of abnormal phenomena : Such are the cases of persistent hallucina- tions and ideea fixes, where the perceptions and imaginations are recognized as " too strong" to be corrected or inhibited and controlled by voluntary at- tention and ratiocination. Whenever this impoteney of will is habitual and is presumed to rest upon a basis of physical and organic derangement, it may be called a " disease of will." The opium-eater and user of other drugs to excess, the kleptomaniac or victim of other intense passions or desires, the subject of the hypnotic trance, the morbidly nerveless and doless, are suffer- G38 WILL AND CHARACTER ers from pathological conditions of will. So far, however, as jisychologT is concerned, all such phenomena, instead of justifying the denial of the con- tent and import of the consciousness of freedom, only serve by contrast to make plainer its unique and unmistakable character. ? 15. The more immediate inferences from our study of the lohenomena of develoi^ed will are not particularly difficult to make. The " will-asjject " of all mental life and mental development brings us face to face with the most mysterious and interior nature of the so-called Self. In some sort "I" and "my will " stand related as so-called Ego and no other so-called faculty (than will) stand related. It is here, and not through the enforced synthe- sis of sensations and their representative images under the laws of associa- tion, that the deepest root for the unity of mental life and mental develop- ment is found. Descriptive and eorplanatory psychology thus brings ns to the place tchere we have to acknowledge that, not something external to consciousness, but something manifesting itself in consciousness, contains the secret of the kind of life the phenomena are, of the course of the development ivliich actually takes place. Considered on its every side — passive and active, intellective or affec- tive or conative— we call this something, "the Mind," or "the Soul." But considered on its seemingly self-active side — considered as shaping itself to chosen ends, controlling its own manifestation and marking out the course of its own development — we call this something, "the Will." Were there not this side of mental life and of mental development, the stream of con- sciousness would be fit to be regarded as forever definitely marked out by its surrounding banks. But this side, so palpably real and so obviously unfit to be explained in such external fashion, compels us to take another view of mental life and of mental development. It compels us to recognize a unique and self-active being as — within limits, to be sure, and often indeed narrow limits — interiorly determining, in a quite inexplicable way, its own course. We say " inexplicable " way — that is, so far as scientific psychology is con- cerned ; it is for philosophy to say how far this self-determining activity is ultimately explicable, not to say permissible to reflective thought. It would be easy enough, but would take us too far one side, to show how this unique consciousness of freedom is most intimately related to all men- tal development. On it very largely depends the development of the knowl- edge of Self, and indeed of the knowledge of Things. All high sesthetical and ethical development is connected therewith. And, indeed, the infer- ential and scientific knowledge of the world as concatenated phenomena, expressive of " forces," and " potencies," and " natures " of various kinds, is largely dei^endent upon this same consciousness of freedom. vi The word Character — althoug^h somewhat loosely used — has two tolerably well-marked meauing-s, one wider and one nar- rower. In the wider meaning- of the word we understand by the character of any individual the whole complex of his mental ac- tivities, and indeed passivities, as compared with some recog- nized standard. When charactcn-izing: the individual in this way we have to say what amounts and kinds of sensations, perceptions, acts of imag-ination and thought, what feelings and desires, MEANING OF TIIK TEUM ClIA K ACTKi: 030 choices, i)uriH)ses, aud plans, aiid especially liahitnal modes of external behavior, serve to mark ofi'this individual from others by application of some measure common to all. In such a nieanin<>- of the word, one's character is equivalent to one's individual- it}' — the Avliole that one is, as a distinct member of the species man. We shall have something- to say of certain points involved in this use of the word — under such heads as " temperament," " disposition " " habit," etc. — in the following chapter. In the narrower and more precise meaning of th(! Avord, however, (Character i^ preeminently a matter of the A\'ill, and of its ciis- tomary modes of behavior, and of its development. Thus " my character" is for every man what " I am" — not as formed at the beginning" according to the mould of an inherited nature, nor as merely passively shaped by an environment. Character im- plies, to be sure, being " stamped " (Greek x'^P'^'^'^'iP = mark, or stamp) ; and without the formation of fixed habits, of modes of behavior that admit of being characterized, or stamped as be- longing to a certain kind, no character is possible of attainment. Nevertheless the word implies such stamping as the agent is thought chiefly to give himself ; and the habits which enter into our character are regarded not so much as having and holding us in certain directions of conduct, but rather as expressing those lines of conduct in which we make ourselves to go, or hold ourselves against the motives to forsake them for other paths. Formation of Character in this sense of the words implies the self-formed habit of Will. It is above all the stamp which the agent gives himself by habitually choosing and holding to certain ends ; and then by bringing " to heel " all the content of consciousness, an^ all the service of the psycho-physical mechan- ism, in the progressive realization of the chosen ends. Or to carry the distin«*ion further ; so far as I have, or am, a certain culture or disposition, this has been formed ./br me, by the neces- sary reaction of consciousness upon the excitements to which my organism has been siibjccted by its (environment, in the larger sense of the latter word. But so far as I have, or am, a certain character, this is to be regarded as progressively formed both for myself and hy myself ; from the points of view of imputabil- ity, or responsibility, it coin prises so much of what I am as I have contributed, and am therefore liolden for. Two modifying remarks, however, immediately suggest them- selves : (1) It is never practically possible to make a satisfactory separation between what belongs, and what does not belong, to character, in this narrower meaning of the word. Upon the at- 640 "WILL AND CHAEACTEE tempt at such separation, systems in ethics, dogmas in theology, and even principles and laws in social and political life, have staked their right to existence ; and have been obliged, when leaning hard upon the distinction, to fall. For the impossibility of practically carrying out this distinction depends upon the en- tire nature of psychical being and psychical development. From the start, our nature is far too complex, and our development too subtly continuous, to allow of such an attempt being successful. (2) But no less the theoretical recognition of the distinction obliges us at once to emphasize the immense complexity of character, in even this narrower meaning of the word. For will itself has already been seen to involve in its development the most complex related activity of all the other faculties. Will in itself, bare will, cannot develop, cannot see to do any particular thing, cannot estimate or feel the value of any particular deed or course of conduct, cannot choose any definite end in preference to another end. So that, character as willed cannot be esti- mated or characterized, without taking knowledge and feeling, as well as conation, into the account. Self-formed character, then, involves all the shaping which I have given to my own in- tellectual and emotional life. Nay : especially does it involve and depend ux^on the principles intelligently accepted, and the emotions and sentiments selected and controlled — the chosen ends and motives — according to which I habitually act. In say- ing this it is implied, on the one hand, that blind will is no Will (psychologically speaking, whatever may be philosophically true) ; and also, on the other hand, that ends mentally repre- sented and motives consciously felt, must he loilled and followed as principles, in order thd they may enter into character — in the more precise meaning of the latter word. Character is then, in both meanings of the word, a sort of resultant of two different (and almost opposed) sides of mental life and of mental development. It results — so far as science can observe it— //>>//« a yninrjling of self-determination (mysterious, in- explicable, lying at the very base of psychical existeice, and really serving as the point of origin for all our conceptions and convictions respecting '" force," " influence," " causal efficiency," etc.) and, psychic reaction predetermined and necessitated hy eninron- ment. Here, in the term " environment " we must include for the present, all physiological preconditions and accompaniments of consciou-sness. And when we try, as it were, to absorb either one of these sides wholly in the other, we only succeed in con tradicting the facts of con.sciousness, as such, in the interests of a theory which ends in unmeaning verbiage. 1 1 TEMPERAMENT AND CIIAIlACTEIt 041 g 16. The conception of character as including the whole (but only it) to which the activity and effect of willing may be thought of as extended, is very old, very natural, and very persistent. It has, therefore, an important psycho- logical significance. The word, when thus used, fixes in a vague way — and only in a vague way can we use words here — the limits of conduct, of respon- sibility, of merit and blame, and even largely of a^-sthetical admiration or distaste. We do indeed extend these limits in our language as expressive of judgment and feeling, so as to comjjrehend a much wider realm under even vaguer words, such as " nature," " temperament," and the like. The de- terministic theory, in its attempt to be strictly scientific, is actually com- pelled to resort to an explanation which is no explanation; it exi)lains (!) by virtually asserting that souls, like atoms and other things, behave as they do behave, because "it is their nature to." But here, as so frequently else- where, the popular language is refreshingly naive, to be sure, but truer to life and nearer to the heart of the case, than that of a pseudo-science. It would be quite impossible even to refer to all of the many ways in which such testimony is given. But to select a few examples ; we find that, to a large extent, crude peoples, and, to some extent, all peoples, estimate by quite different standards the deeds ascribed to insanity, inspiration, demoniac jjossession, and even to genius, and those deeds which are imputed, as freely willed, to the Ego of the doer. The indwelling god, or diemon, or genius, is admired or deprecated in the one case ; the agent himself is held responsi- ble in the other case. Yet even in the former case it is considered that one may consent or resist, to some extent at least (and yet again. Who can successfully resist Divinity?), such originally foreign influences. But the degi'ee of successful consent or resistance depends upon, and in the future further determines, the character. vThe obvious disposition at jiresent to make public penalties independent of motive and of any debate concerning freedom of w ill, and all the increased subtleties of modern i^sychological and ethical j^hilosophy, do not essenti- ally alter this distinction. The distinction will continue to be made, be- cause it belongs to the very depths of our conscious mental experience. In fact the increase of jisychological knowledge chiefly sei-ves to complicate the problems, rather than to solve them, much less to show that they may, with safety, be curtly dismissed. Not only experts, but even ignoiant jury- men, are called upon to distinguish nice shades of imputability, and to ap- l^ortion the rewards and punishments that character merits. The strange phenomena of hypnotism and the investigations into the causes of crime, into the constitution of the so-called criminal classes, and into morbid con- ditions of will, keep this distinction ever before us ; while all investigation shows how much more complicated the entire .subject is than had formerly been supposed. Meanwhile our daily practice is full of enlightenment. Thus we say of ourselves : " I cannot (easily, or at all) acquire that type of good character ; my tcmi^erament is so unfortunate." Or, again : "There is no merit in my being good in this way, it is so natural for me." But on the other hand, we add to our sesthetical repulsion the genuine ethical feeling of horror, when we conceive of monstrous and "unnatural" conduct as be- ing accepted, or as not being — at least tentatively — inhibited, by a deed of will. With such crude, but most significant exercise of judgment, more or 41 Y ^'. 642 WILL AND CHAEACTER less jH'ejudiced by emotional impulses, we send some to the prison or the "•allows, and let others go scot-free ; and vibrate our criminal classes be- tween the hospital, or the insane asylum, and the jail. The constant, psy- cholo"icallv significant thing is, not that our judgment is so necessarily faulty, but that we venture— nay, that we feel i^ositively impelled — to set ourselves up, as gods, over ourselves and over our fellow-men. But such procedure necessarily results from the development of experience in the lines of consciousness of freedom, conception of character as imputable, and ethical sentiment. § 17. We shall subsequently see that the principle of habit is regnant in every form of mental life. Yet in the case of will we do not say "reg- nant over," with the same meaning of the words. Settled character (^6os) is indeed, according to the Stoic conception, " always to tvill the same and nil the same." But it has also been truly said that the "character is a habitus, not which has the Ego, but which the Ego is." Thus regarded, the self-determination of the will, as character, may be sj^oken of as ruling over the individual volitions and bringing them, under law, into right relations toward the adopted ends. So do these individual volitions themselves be- come both exj)ressive of, and tributary toward, the continuous development of character. But since these individual volitions all have reference to ends, either near or remote, and all are connected with the eneitement of the af- fections, jiassions, desires, and sentiments, we can comprehend the possibility of the entire mental life being organized in accordance with certain chosen practical principles. Once more : Among these practical principles there are — as we have seen (p. 579 f.) — certain ones which are presented and backed up with a peculiar feeling of obligation. Ethical judgments become commands— presenting themselves to the will as maxims requiring allegiance, bidding or forbidding how one oi([/hi to choose (or shall, yet freely, will). The wider import and completer justification of this unique experience of a command arising with- in that has reference to a felt obligation, and to a freely rendered consent, does not concern us at this time. We only notice that Schopenhauer's dic- tum — to say " ought to will" is no better than to say " wooden iron " — flies squarely in the face of the facts of consciousness, as siich. And wo may as well remark here in general that any philosophical theory which maintains a similar attitude toward the descriptive science of psychology is doomed to failure in its efforts to explain the world aright. Indeed, it is eminently true of all ethical maxims, that the maxims themselves, in order to be really maxims must present themselves in this very way — namely, as defining what ought to be willed. As practical they must be wrought into life, must become jjart of the history ' of life. It is ()l)vions that, in onr description and explanation of the dovohipiiKMit of faculty, we have now come to that which is both last and hi^licst and also most fundamental. With the phenom- ena of developed Will we reac^h airaiu the limits of scientific ' Comp. Volkiniiiin : Lolirbuch rt. Psychologic, U., p. 4C5 f. I DEVELOPMENT OF CIIAltACTER Q4M study. The problems raised must be handed over to ethics aud to philosophy. [Most of the works to which we care to refer have already been mentioned at the close of Chapters V., XI., and XXV. In addition, however, the following may be consulted : Caltoii: Inciuirics into Human Faculty. Paulhan ; L' Activity .Mentale, etc. Fouillee : La Libcrte et le Dotcrminismo. (JarnitT : Traitc dcs Facult('.s do TAnic. Wiesc : Die Bildung d. Willins. (Juyau : Kducation and Heredity. Martin : L'lCducation du Carac- t're. Van Velzeu : Ueber d. Geisterfrcilu it. Heblei : Klementc eincr philosoph. Frei- hoitslehre. Schellwien : Dcr Wille die (juelle d. Hewusst.seius ; and the many other writings on Ethics and special treatises on the Will, its Freedom, the Law of Causality, etc.J CHAPTEK XXVII. TYPES AND PKINCIPLES OF MENTAL DE\^LOPMENT The phenomena of mental life, whether considered as con- sisting of the most elementary psychical processes, or of the de- veloped activities ascribed to various forms of so-called faculty, admit of an indefinite variability ; and the courses in develop- ment followed b}^ this life are correspondingly varied. It is this fact which imparts to every human being his psychological in- dividuality ; it is this which makes the life-history of every in- dividual something distinctly peculiar to himself. And yet, as we have assumed from the start, mental phenomena admit of be- ing classified, described in general terms, and, to some extent at least, formulated under general relations called laws ; otherwise there could be no science of jjsychology. We have now, however, briefly to consider a class of subjects which lie somewhat aside from our previous inquiries, in two diflerent directions. Certain individuals, as well as certain states of consciousness, jiresent themselves with marked characteristics 1 amounting to idiosjmcrasies. Such individuals are called oddi- ties, monstrosities, geniuses, or what not in the line of extreme variability from the recognized types. As examples we may note ^ the musical or mathematical prodigies, the young who show un- accountable tendencies to strange crimes, or the men and women of such unexampled natui'al gifts or peerless attainments and character, that they seem set apart from the rest of their kind. ,. Moreover, states of consciousness occasionally arise that ap- || pear to differ so completely from those of our nearly universal ' experience as to throw doubt over the conclusions which psychol- ogy has, in the past, felt warranted in basing upon such experi- \ ence. Here our attention may be called to the phenomena of " double consciousness," in their relation to our conception of the nature of the Ego, of the authority of self-consciousness, and of the identity and reality of tin; Self. Alike troublesome to a normal psychology are many of the strange phenomena of hyp- nosis, with all the alleged facts of telepathy, claii-voyance, and the like. In this direction of psychological investigation it GENERAL DOCTUIXK OF TYPES 645 would bo quite impossible for us to g'o with any tlioroug'huesK in the present treatise. To pass such subjects by we believe to be far more safe and scientific than to assume knowledge where kuowledg-e is lackin<^ ; or even to amuse our readers with a chapter or two of doubtful yet fascinating- conjectures. A word or two, however, at this point (see § 1) will not be out of ]»Iace. But in another direction of supplementary discussion we pro- l)ose to e^o somewhat farther. This direction may be described as the semi- anthropological and historical. Between infinite in- dividuality and the most general doctrine of faculties there lie certain considerations which help us to grouii together manj' in- dividuals, while not altering our general iisychological doctrine in order to suit our grouping. It is simple matter of fact that some individuals are, from the beginning of mental life, more like other individuals of a second group than any of either group are like still a third possible group. A is more like B than either B or O is like I) ; and yet both B and C are more like D than I) is like JT. Thus we may arrive at the justifiable though confessedly rather vague conception of " ft/jyes " of human nature, to which larger or smaller numbers of individuals more or less conform. Nor does this conception altogether lose its value when the undoubted fact is pointed out that between all remote t3'pes lie interrelated types, less dissimilar ; or even that, in each group, the individuals may be arranged so as to form a continu- ous line connecting this particular group with one on either side. Still further in somewhat similar direction lies the conception of general principles applying to all mental development, and to all the faculties considered as being interrelated modes of the behavior of the mind. It is to selected ones of these types and principles that we purpose to devote this concluding chapter of oiir psychological treatise. ^ 1. It is a hopeful indication of the increasing interest in psychological investigation that so many Imnilreds of treatises are being wi-itten npon all sorts of obscure, abnormal, and pathological psychoses. The candid and sober student of psychology will never regret this interest ; much less will he fear or oppose it. At the same time, in our approach to such subjects of investigation we must preserve carefully, and even sacredly, the scientific spirit and the scientific method of investigation. And if, on the one hand, these teach us not to pronounce prematurely against the possibility of what is strange and unusual, what does not accord with accepted theory, it must never be forgotten, on the other hand, that science cannot relax its grasp upon even its seeming possessions, in order to clutch at vagaries or grope after ghosts. On the contrary, the true scientific procedure is from the known, or the apparently known, to the stiange and startling. We can 646 TYPK^! AXD PRINCIPLES OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT never rightfully be asked to accept new theories, or even alleged new facts if they are particularly difficult to establish as facts, without being permitted to raise the previous question as to how they will fit in with the whole established structure of our recognized experience. On this entire subject we will attempt nothing more than to indicate our conviction. This conviction is, however, born of investigation without con- scious prejudice, and borne out, we believe, by the signs of the times and by the tendencies of modern psychological research. The exj^lanalion of new mysteries (in telepathy, clairvoyance, double consciousness, etc.) is all to he sought and found by following clews which psychology already has in its hand. In fact, there are no mysteries so profound and ultimately unassailable as those of ordinaiy experience. The direction in which to look for the under- standing of novelties is that of an extension of those principles with which we are already familiar. While it is true that there is far more in man, as body and mind, than we yet know, or perhaps even imagine ; it is also true that in all the most abnormal and pathological conditions, as well as in the case of all the extremes of idiosyncrasy, the nervous system, the laws and history of mental development, and the relations of mind and body, I'emain essentially the same. For examj^le, there is no perceptible break, or im- portant gap, in the line that may be drawn from that " dramatic sundering " of the Ego into two or more centers of representation, of itself to itself, in which young children find much of the zest of their early plays, and which we all experience so frequently (in dreams, by day or by night, or every time, urged on by conscience, we sit down to ' ' have it out with ourselves ") and the wildest vagaries of "double consciousness," or the most per- plexing tricks played with one another by Ego and alter Ego. So, too, to take another example : physiological and experimental psychology are constantly throwing new light upon the incredible sensitiveness, in certain states, of the nervous mechanism, and upon the almost limitless application of the jn-inciples of "tact," "suggestion," and " habit," within the whole realm of the so-called unconscious or dimly conscious. Comparative psy- chology is constantly adding new wonders regarding the achievements of so-called instinct in the lower animals ; heljjed on by the higher jjowers of the microscope, it is advancing in the attempt to fathom the ' ' psychic life of micro-organisms." It is thus extending the conception of some psychic and teleological principle — call it " Soul," or what one will — downward and outward. And the reign of mere physical exjilanation seems about to be followed by one in which Psyche shall again somehow be acknowledged as supreme. If this is vague and figurative language — as indeed it is — it is not so hopelessly vague and purely figurative as that which explains apparently mental phenomena in terms of physical tendencies, strains, and entities. And the lesson for both physical and psychological science is essentially the same. No wholly new view of the nature of mind, and of its relations to body, or of the meaning and value of the facts of consciousness, can possi- bly arise out of hypnotism. No wholly new ethics can be adopted as the re- sult of the attempts at a so-called science of criminology. Hypnotism will be explained by new combinations and further extensions of the factors and laws of normal mental life ; and the criminal will be found to be not so much a " type " a.s simj^ly a man essentially like unto his fellows. NATURE OF TEMPERAMENT 647 Tlio various groupiug-s of iiulividuals (or " types " of beiiij,' and development) which we shall now briefly consider follow these four combinations of marks : Temperament, Sex, Ag-c, and Race. llc<^ardin^ certain aggreg-ates of characteristic qualities we may therefore sjieak of the " sanguine " or " choleric," of the " masculine " or " feminine," of the " infantile " or " senile," of the Oriental or Anglo-Saxon type of mind. It must be confessed, however, that the data on which these classi- fications are based are, to a large extent, luicertain and, to some extent, extra-psychological. Hence the considerable admixture of vague popular impression which characterizes most treat- ments of the doctrine of temperament, sex, and race ; and, if we try to escape from this vagueness and become more definite, we are caug-ht by the tendency to substitute uncertain infer- ences from physical measurements and from statistics for le- g^itimate conclusions based on known facts of consciousness. However, this line of studies has a certain value for scientific psychology. The doctrine of Temperament is very old, persistent, and widely spread. Bij a temperainent we understand any marked type of mental constitution and development due to inherited cJiarac- teristics of the hodily oryanisrn. These two principal points are therefore emphasized by all correct use of the word. The ag- gregate of characteristic psychical qualities thus indicated is re- garded (1) as x^eculiarly dependent upon the bodily basis, and (2) as a matter of original constitiition or heredity. Neverthe- less, on both these points our information is far from being sat- isfactory ; and the various theories of temperament have conse- quently differed greatly in the accounts they have given of its physical and inherited origin. It may be said, liowever, that, in spite of all disagreement in details, both the foregoing jooints may be accepted. With respect to the first, modern research has justly led us to regard the constitution of the nervous sys- tem as containing, in a general way, our account of the charac- teristic differences of temperament. But inasmuch as this sj'^s- tem cannot be separated from the other systems of bodily organs, although it is the central city and the crowned ruler for them all, the constitution of the vaso-motor, of the digestive, and of the muscular organs, has indirectly to do with the determining of every man's temperament. AVithin the nervous mechanism itself it is the constitution of the end-organs of sense and of the central organs which is of prime influence. These may be said to differ " naturally " in respect of their absolute and relative sensitiveness to normal stimuli, the rapidity and duration of re- G48 TYPES a:sd pkii^ciples of mental development spouse which they give to the various degrees of such stimuli, :iud the rehitive facilit}^ with which certain combiuatious, rather than others, are made within the central nervous system. But the blood is the internal stimulus both of the end-organs (in the case of the eigenllcht of the retina, certain temperature and other skin sensations, etc.) and of the central organs ; and the consti- tution of the sanguineous currents determines the character of this stimulation. This constitution is itself, in turn, determined largely by the character of the digestive processes and their prod- ;icts. Moreover, by these processes and products the nervous system is directly and profoundlj^ afiectod throughout the entire areas of the thoracic and abdominal cavities. Looking further outward, we observe the significant connection of the muscles with the nervous system. This connection works both ways ; the muscles excite to activity the cerebral centers ; and these centers themselves are largely impotent, with respect even to the knowledge of self and of things, except as they excite and con- trol the muscles. In this complicated fashion, then, both di- rectly and indirectl}^, is the bodily and constitutional basis of temperament to be considered. ' Our second consideration (temperament is original and hered- itary) introduces yet new and more profound complications. It requires us to distinguish temperament from character in the more precise meaning of the latter word. Men's characters change ; or, rather, men change their characters. But men's temperaments do not materially change ; at least, they do not pass from one type to another, as the man of bad character he- comes %-ood, or y/ce ' y6;',s«. So we are accustomed to think and say. At the same time it is necessary here to recall Avhat has al- ready been said as to the impossibility of our distinguishing be- tween the two great classes of factors which cociperate in all mental development. Temperament may, indeed, safely be said to be prominent at the beginning and from the beginning ; whereas character comes to view later and in a much more unpre- dictable way, if indeed we regard it as a possible principle for scientific classification at all. On the other hand, character often so " overlays " temperament as to seem to alter it totally. Temperament itself is so subject to the influence of environment as to seem to change from one type to another under its influence. In sitite of these admissions the j^n'siTasion remains tolerably firm : there are certain original and iidierited types, or aggregates of characteristic cpialities, which tend strongly to remain, and generally do remain, ess(nitially unchanged throughout the men- tal life of the individual. So that even where what we call char- I KINDS OF TEMPERAMliNT G49 ucter overlays temperament, it only occrlai/s it ; that is to say, the characteristic typical teudeucies to certain ways of reactiuf^ on stimuli, and of combining- the effects of previous reactions, re- main unchanged. Svlf-dvlo'iii'inatioii as reK2^ech character is I'nn- ited by that deterin'mation of self which reposes upon a/i inherited phijsical constitution. As to the Kinds of Temperament which must be recog-nized there has been much dispute ; there has been also some varia- tion in the employment of terms to designate the chosen kinds. Singularly enough, however, the number four has largely pre- vailed ; and this indicates that certain grounds for its preference really exist. Adopting it, we mention the following different temperamental types : (1) The sanguine ; (2) the sentimental (so Lotze usually called the " melancholic ") ; (3) the choleric ; and (4) the phlegmatic. Individuals markedly distinguishable ac- cording to either one of these four types can, without much dif- ficulty, be selected from among any large number, whatever be their sex, age, or race. Such individuals are also to be found in all grades of society and with all degrees and kinds of culture. It is not, however, an altogether fanciful conjecture which con- nects in g-eneral certain of these temperaments with one of the two sexes, with the four principal ages of life, and with certain races as compared with other races. But, in general, races that are low in the scale of development show all the characteristic four temperaments in a less marked way ; while the conditions of a higher civilization allow of the expression, and perhaps also of the rise, of temperament in a more intense form. And, finally, most individuals, even in the most highly civiliz#i com- munities, show more or less mixture of the different types. Even those who are called " moody " may have as the peculiarity of their constitution that they pass from one type to another in a largely incalculable way ; although just this is one chief char- acteristic of the sentimental temperament. ? 2. The various words in use to characterize the clifTerent temperaments are highly instructive. Tliey sliow the jjersistcnt and wide-sijroad impres- sion that the lines are laid down, within which the development of the indi- vidual takes place, bv some form of physical influence that operates Tipon the original "make-up" of the individual. When men believed in astrology they found in the determining power of the planets a reason why some were '• Jovial." others " Saturnine," and still others "Mercurial," in temperament. When they more justly recognized the intlnence of the circulatory and di- gestive systems over everyone's "temjier" of mind, they came to speak of the "sanguine" (or " full-bloodod") man, of the "choleric" (or "full of bile ") man, of the melancholic (or " full of black bile ") man, and of the 650 TYPES AXD PRINCIPLES OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT phlegmatic (or " full-plilegmecl ") man. Thus, in Shakespeare's "King John " we read : •' Or if that surly spirit, melancholy, Had baked thy blood and made it heavy, thick, which Else, runs tickling up and down the veins." As to telluric influences, however indirect, upon the constitution and func- tions of the nervous mechanism, we have to-day little more positive infor- mation than had the men of j^revious generations. Increase of knowledge here is mostly in the line of surrendering the pretence of knowledge ; and no doctx'ine as to the exact nature of the physical basis of temperament can even now be laid down. But, as has been said, the general view is credibly established, that the constitution of the nervous system of different individ- uals differs as respects its susceptibility to the different forms of external and internal stimuli, and as to its tendencies to combine these primary forms of reaction in various ways. If now we think out in detail the possibilities involved in the foregoing differences, we shall see how temperaments may come to exist. For the different possible reactions of the nervous mechanism may differ (1) as re- spects the kind of reaction ; (2) as respects the measure of sensitiveness shown ; (3) as respects duration at the time, and conservative power as lay- ing the basis of cerebral habit ; (4) as respects the rapidity of reproduc- tion ; (5) as respects completeness of reproduction ; (6) as respects the ra- pidity of combination ; (7) as respects the kinds of combination most favored; but especially (8) as respects the characteristic accompaniments of feeling. And here we may refer again to what was said respecting the very nature of feeling and of its cerebral basis (see jd. 173 f.). ^ 3. Although no agreement exists as to the principles of division, or as to the fundamental nature of the physical basis of temperaments, almost all writers acknowledge essentially the same four. A modern writer,' approach- ing the subject from the scientific point of view, by crossing two i)rinciples of division, derives the following scheme : Stronq. Weak. Quick Choleric. Sanguine. Slow Melancholic. Phlegmatic. Thus choleric and melancholic j^ersons are inclined to strong affections, and sanguine and phlegmatic persons to weak affections ; but the choleric and sanguine are quick, while the melancholic and phlegmatic are slow. It does not seem, however, that the phlegmatic, though slow, are necessarily w-eak. By substituting the terra " sentimental " for melancholic, Lotze breaks ui) this system, but makes it more difficult to distinguish between the sentimen- tal and the sanguine. In a somewhat indefinite way we may declare that a certain type of ]ior- sons is characterized by lively and varied excitability and rapid cliaiigo, without depth and stability ; and these may be called sanguine. Another type is scarcely less quick, though less varied in reactions; while the reac- ' Wundt : Physiologische Peychologie (secoud ed.), II., p. 345 f. PECULIARITIES OF SEX Of) I tions are more enduring, piissioiKite, ami dotcM-niinod, and the conduct as well as states of consciousness less subject to cliange. This type we may call choleric. Still others are characteristically sluggish in all their psychical changes and in respect of the movements which both condition and express such changes. They are the opposite of lively and versatile, though they may be either tenacious or lacking in what we call will. To such the name oi lildcffimttic is assigned. This leaves a fourth not easily descril)able type. It may be called the poetic or artistic temperament. But then poets and artists share, with all men, in all kinds of temperament. Nevertheless, there; may be said to be a distinctively poe/Zc', or — to use Lotze's Mord — a "senti- mental" temperament. This type is described as characterized by "special receptivity for the feeling of the value of all possible relations," although inditTerent toward bare matter of fact.' Persons of this tyi)0 are lively in imagination, susceptible to delicate sense-impi-essions, moody in feeling, uncertain in conduct. I 4. Even so modern a writer as Wundt agrees with the jiroposal to ap- ply the conception of temperament to orders, families, and species of ani- mals, as well as to man. The classification of tyi)es is thus mixed up with con- siderations of age and sex and race. For youth may undoubtedly be said to be more " naturally " sanguine or sentimental ; maturity more choleric ; and old age more phlegmatic. The sentimental temperament is also character- istically more feminine than masculine ; the choleric is more masculine than feminine. As to the j^recise temperamental distinctions which are em- phasized by the different principal races, there is abundant room for debate ; just as there is no agreement yet reached by anthropologists concerning the division of mankind among these races, and scarcely more agreement in the estimate which natives have put upon them by foreigners, or jiut iipon them- selves when comparing themselves with foreigners. Marked instances of aggregates of characteristic qualities, which seem to be the same for a rec- ognized type of temperament and for a certain race — considered as respects the average individual of the race — may perhaps be given with confidence, when we call the French sanguine, the Germans phlegmatic, the Englisli a mixture of phlegmatic and choleric, the Japanese sentimental. This would seem to accord fairly well with the remark that the choleric and phlegmatic are temperaments of action ; while the sanguine and sentimental are tem- peraments of feeling. But both sexes and all races show examples of every form of distinct temperament, as well as of every shade of mixture possible among all four. The psychological Peculiarities which distinguish the two Sexes are scarcely less a matter of debate than are those which serve to difference the four temperaments. Yet the student of literature and history, as well as the acute observer of life from the points of vicAV belonging to physiology and psychology, can scarcely doubt the general justness of that popular opinion which considers the markedly feminine as differing from the ' Lotze's doctrine of temperament may be found, Microcosmus, n., p. 24 f.; Medicin. Ppychol- ogie, p. 560 f.; Outlinee of Psychology, p. 137. t;r)2 TYPES ATs^D PRINCIPLES OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT markedly masculine tj'pe. How does the average adult woman differ from the average adult man ? is a question to which an al- most endless variety of answers might be given. But that there is a difference, is almost universallj' assumed ; and this — we be- lieve — ujDon sufficient, though vague, evidence. Of course, the question is still further complicated when the attempt is made to tell how much of this difference is matter of relatively unchange- able sexual constitution, and how much is due to variable phys- ical, social, and educational differences, i^eculiar to each sex. The prevalent — but we believe, foolish and vain — proposal to train aAvaj" all these differences, or to change them by changing the environment, is always ready with its apjjeal to the force of heredity and the force of education, whenever it suits its pur- pose to lay the principal stress upon either so-called " force." As to fundamental physical differences of sex there is much, of course, which is obvious enough, and which can in some sort be estimated and measured. Of such physical characteristics some are more nearly constant, others are periodic, and still others are epochal. But modern histological and phj'siological research is constantly bringing to light the minuter, and yet even more pervasive and potential, differences. It would seem as though the investigation, when approached from this point of view, must result in the persuasion that, not only in respect of gross mass and characteristic organs as a totality" do males and females differ ; but that the sexual difference extends to every de- tail of the nervous system, to the constitution of the blood, to the habits of metabolism, etc. But even then, it is so mingled with other differences in types of temperament, kinds of charac- ter, habits formed under the influence of environment and bj^ ed- ucation, as to show itself persistently, and on the average, and to the ordinary observer, only in its broadest outlines. It is to be hoped, and perhaps it is very reasonably to be expected, that more detailed observations of the phenomena of child-life, of the changes (both physical and ]-»sychical) which occur at the great climacterics, and more critical study of litera- ture, with the problems of psychology in view, will give us, fi- nally, a scientific psychology of sex. Meanwhile, we are obliged to content ourselves with such rather indefinite generalizations as everyone supposes himself able to make equally well with the most thoroughly trained psychologists. Moreover, just at present (in this country especially) the statufi of woman is so uncertain and the discussion of the so-called " woman question " committed to such hands, that it is difficult to get even the barest physiological data regarded without prejudice ; and yet I PHYSICAL DIFFEIiENCKS OF SKX Ooli more difficult to secure fairness and caudor for their thorough scientific discussion. We shall do little more in this place than to record our conviction that the; sexual tlill'crences, on the i)sy- chological side, are as minute, jx'rvasive, and influential as on the anatomical and physiolog-ical side. AVhile it is true that men and women are, in respect of all psychical faculties and kinds of psychoses both equally human ; it is also true that the char- acteristically feminine is throughout different from the charac- teristically masculine, and that thene differences shade the entire mental life and development of the two sexes from the moment of birth (and even long- before birth) to the moment of dissolu- tion. § 5. Besides the more obvious organic and functional diftorences of the adult man and woman, the two sexes show an average dift'erence from birth in height, weight (especially as connected with muscular development), physical energy, relative proportion and growth of organs, and frequency of pulse and respiration. Among the difterent races, and under the diflferent conditions of nutrition, care, etc., the average length and weight of infants difters greatly. But everywhere the average length and weight of the female is somewhat less than that of the male. At maturity these differ- ences are yet more marked. In Brussels, for example, the average length of the male infant compared with the female at birth, was as 19j to 19J ; the weight as 7.05 lbs. to 6.-i2 lbs. The curve of the growth of the two differs, though scarcely perceptibly, up to four or five years ; while at puberty the difference becomes much more marked. The relative iiroportion of the bodily members, and even of the different parts of the same bodily mem- bers, differs for the two sexes. The relative length of the arms and legs in the male is greater ; the center of gravity is higher, the step is longer. He is obviously built to his advantage in swift, strong, agile movements. He breathes more deeply (and this, as a matter of physiological need) ; he requires and consumes more air, water, and food. The average pulse of the female is quicker in about the same projjortion as that in which her height is less. Her blood is less in quantity, of lighter specific gravity, and con- tains fewer red corpuscles. Physiologically, she is more inclined to be hypersosthetic, to become subject to crami)ing and spasmodic action of the muscles, to sudden and incalculable secretions, to wide-spreading and cha- otic neural excitements. It is in respect, however, of the nervous and muscular systems that the differences which are most important as laying the basis for psychological types emerge. The average weight of the brain of the two sexes differs about as 1,424 for the male to 1,272 for the female. There seems reason to believe that the cerebral differences extend much more widely than is sufficient to cover gi'oss mass. The claim seems justifiable that differences in the development of the cerebral convolutions may be distinguished from the eighth month, or even earlier, onward.' The male develojis not only ' See J. Minfrazzini, Moleschott's Untersch. XIU. vi., p. 498 f., reviewed in Centralblatt f. Physiol., No. 5, 1883. 654 TYPES AND PllINCIPLES OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT au absolutely greater cerebral surface, but also a relatively greater growth of the jjarts lying in front of the central fissure as compared with those lying behind it. Into the profound and all-pervasive effect of those physiological func- tions of sex which connect directly and indirectly with the cerebro-spinal uervous system, in its relation to the sympathetic system, it is not necessaiy to enter. We have already abundantly showed how the sensations and feel- ings which originate in this way alter the whole stream of consciousness. They extend their influence even to the conceptions we have of Self and to the knowledge we have of Things. It might seem fanciful to assert that things are known as felt to woman, rather than as thought by man ; but such a statement would by no means be wholly devoid of support from the facts. I G. All our study hitherto has led us to emphasize greatly the influence upon mental development of the constitution and functions of the muscular system. This influence is extended variously, but chiefly in two directions. The condition and action of all the muscles stand in reciprocal relations to the senses, and to the feelings which form the necessary afiective accom- paniment of the senses. Furthermore, the striated (or so-called "volun- tary ") muscles are the organs of the will. In this complicated sensory- motor apparatus all the most primary foundations of the intellectual life are laid. Figuratively speaking, discriminating consciousness, as the essential function of intellect, moves about among this original chaos of sensory- motor factors, and with a constant focusing and redistribiition of attention, l^rogressively organizes it into intelligible forms. Moreover, as the very l^recondition and also as the effect of development, the conscious control of the sensory-motor organism in the behalf of recognized ends progressively takes place. Here again, the reactionary effect of voluntary control of the muscles upon the characteristic sensations and feelings is undoubtedly very great. All this is only one particular necessary result of the constant inter- dependence of knowledge, feeling, and will, in the entire development of soul-life. Since judgment and decision are necessarily involved in the mental activities belonging to sensation and motion, how can it be otherwise than that the feminine and masculine types of intellect differ? This differ- ence probably reaches all the way up from the superior "feeling-deftness" of feminine manifestation, as comj^ared with the superior tactual discrimina- tion and muscular precision of man, to those abstract conceptions of space in which Lotze supposes a distinctly feminine type may be discovered (see p. 490). ^ 7. There is jirobably good ground for the popular impression that men and women dilfer most, upou the average, in respect of their feelings, and in resiiect of their ways of looking at things, events, and conduct, as in- fluenced by the feelings. This distinction of types also — it is probable — reaches through the entire area of mental life and its development. Such a distinction seems to be much more radical and far-reaching than are those distinctions upon which the temperanKmts are based. Therefore none of the temperaments, when superimposed, destroys the more fundamental type cliaracterizing the sex. The sanguine woman differs from the sanguine man — this is as true as that the choleric woman is more masculine than the average woman, and the sentimental man more feminine than the aver- CHARACTERISTICS OF AGE AXD RACE G5o age man. In this sexnal distinction all kinds of feelings ajipear to share — notably the iutra-organic and sensuous, but also the intellectual, sosthetical, and religious. Space is lacking— even were this treatise the fit occasion — for discussing how men and women differ as regards the so-called "higher faculties." We cannot forbear remarking, however, that any such discussion involves some sort of agreement as to what faculties are liiylier, and what particular forms of the functioning of any faculty arc entitled to this same term. If the exer- cise of the faculties in the pursuit of knowledge of fact and law is highest, then we have to inquire why women have hitherto done so little relatively for science and philosophy. But if the intuitions and sentiments which enter into artistic achievement are highest ; then we have to inquire why they have not accomplished more in art— especially, for example, in music, where their opportunity has been so great for generations. If ethical feeling and con- duct are highest ; then we have to inquire where justice and magnanimity stand in the scale of virtues — and so on, somewhat indefinitely. Mani- festly, these questions extend beyond the legitimate sphere of descrij^tive psychology, although they cannot be answered without a constant ajjpeal to psychology. Those psycholog-ical types tliat are characteristic of Apre and Race can receive only the briefest mention by us. As to the en- tire group of inquiries involved in the psychology of the diflerent races, we have onl}^ scant trustworthy information. The objec- tive determinations which anthropologry proposes — with its meas- urement of skulls, its study of habits of buildint;;-, of implements, etc., its division of ages — li'avc any value only as it is possible to give them an accepted psychological interpretation. Without the scientific knowledge of the facts of consciousness, as such, these data, which are at best othj tokens, cannot do service even as tokens of anything of a psychological sort. To interpret the anthropological data a scientific knowledge of human conscious- ness, as a unique life-development, is presupposed. Without this knowledge such data may mislead to almost any conceiv- able extent ; with this knowledge they may be interpreted so as to show what almost infinite varietj'- subsists under the one hu- man type of mental life ; and they may also, of course, expand our notions of this one type as well as of the relations sustained to it by the principal subordinate types. As respects the infiuence of Age upon the aggregate of psychological characteristics, the most of what we should wish to say has already been said. For we have traced the general course of the development of mental life, the formation of faculty, the growth of knowledge, the progressive self-deter- mination of character, the increasing teleology of mental activ- ity. This course of development is continuous. Nevertheless, 656 TYPES AND I'lIlNClPLES OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT the begiuiiiugs of it iu infancy and childhood have a peculiar in- terest and value ; but they are also peculiarly difficult to trace. Out of the unconscious, somehow, does the conscious seem to come ; the organization of mentality out of the confused and cha- otic material of sensation and representation. Science can never put its finger on any definite moment and say, respecting the truly psychological : " Now it is, for the first time, there ! " Psychological investigation — no matter hoAV, or how faithfully, conducted — cannot describe the mode in which elementary facul- ties come to be, without implying that they have already begun to do their work. But then this is not a disadvantage (if it be, indeed, a disadvantage at all) peculiar to psj'chology. Every physical science has to assume much more than this ; it has cer- tainly to assume formed conscious faculty as already at work ; its universal formula is : In the heginn'mg ivas Hind, already equipped to see and hear and reraemljer and imagine and think. In spite of the principle of continuity, hoAvever, the influence of age may be broadly distinguished as productive of psycho- logical types. We have already seen how certain temperaments are distinctive of, or correspond to, the several main divisions of age. We have also seen how consciousness is profoundly af- fected, especially on the side of feeling, at certain epochs in the physical life. And the study of the correlative development of the phj^sical basis and of the changing character of the psychoses is a most helpful adjunct to the psychologist. § 8. We must not be understood as depreciating the study of racial psv- cliology, or the influence of anthropology upon iDsychology. On the con- trary, the spirit of the narrowness of the old-fashioned introspective psy- chology is exorcised by the wider observation of the ty^^ical forms of mental development which the races show ; and to the trained psychologist much truth concerning the nature of mind may be gained by the skilful interpre- tation of anthropological data. At the same time it remains forever true that minil can be interpreted only in terms of conscioioiness ; and that the true interpretation of all antltropological data can be gained onh/ l>i/ pror/ressire ptn/- chological science. Anthropology, so-called, will always remain dependent upon psychology for assured knowledge as to the mental life of man. 2 y. The psychology of infancy and childhood is becoming an increas- ingly important and promising branch of the science. The attempts to carry our knowledge back into the life of the embryo are not without a cer- tain value ; although here, inasmuch as psychology must found itself upon facts of consciousness, as such, we can scarcely attain scientific certainty. It is a reasonable conjecti;re that sensations of pressure, and motion, and. perhaps also, of temperature, arise l)efore birth. Some authors ' would liave us suppose that tlie foetus may have ocular sensations due to pressure on > See BeauniB : Les Sensations internes, p. 218 f. and 2S0 f. Preyer : Jlind of tlie Child, I. p. 2") f. PRINCIPLES OF ALL MENTAL LIFE 057 the eyeball and resembling pliosphcnos, and even gustatory sensations oc- casioned by swallowing certain surrounding fluids. , It is said that with in- fants born prematurely, their movements seem to indicate that they taste the sugar or quinine put into their mouths ; and that certain odors are appre- ciated as disagreeable sensations. All newly born infants are deaf, since the middle-ear is filled at birth with a gelatinous mass of embryonic connective tissue. Some obseiTers think that the eyes of the infant — during its first days seldom oi^en for any length of time — move with associated and coordinated movements ; others think not. No conscious acts of will are ajiparent in such movement until much later. Most important are the facts that the reflex irritability of the infant's skin is so inferior to that of the adult, and only approaches it after experiencing the effects of constant cultivation ; and also that the entire muscular apparatus is relatively undeveloped. The significant thing is, that nature seems to have prepared the newly born infant with a relatively large development of brain and of the more si^ecial organs of sense — made ready for the beginnings of sensory-motor experience— but not with experience al- ready gained in correspondence to its merely physical evolution. It has for a long- time been charg-ed against psychology that it is unable to exhibit any system of General Laws or Principles comparable to those which constitute the body of the more ad- vanced physical sciences. Or, more definitely still, it is alleged that the stud}^ expended upon the phenomena of human con- sciousness, from Aristotle to the present time, has not succeed- ed in formulating a single precise statement, like that Avhich I3hysics can give for the gravitation of masses or chemistry for the " equivalences " of the atoms. In some sort, the student of psy- chology is obliged to confess that the charge is true. Nor does it seem to be much less true in view of the attempts of Herbart ' and others to give a mathematical foundation to psycholog-ical principles. To be sure, the modern form of psycho-physics is making a brave and partially successful effort to measure differ- ent forms of mental jirocesses, and to state in precise formulas the results of its measurements. But we still find psychologists themselves confessing, explaining, and complaining-, in view of the abs(uice of universally recognized and definitely statable laws in the science of psychology. And here, at the close of our treatise, we may return to the inquiry with which it began. What wonder then that we are asked whether it is right to consider or denominate ps3-chology as science at all ? And if it be not by this time a " science," what claim can we substantiate why we should pursue it longer in the hope of attaining scientific knowledge? Psychology • The work of this anther bore the title. Psychologic als Wissenschaft, neu gegriindet anf Er- fabrung, Metapbysik, und Mathematik. (1S24). 42 t>58 TYPES AND PKINCIPLES OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT might indeed, turn the question with most invincible force against many of those who ask it ; it might, in turn, ask what sort of physical science can be built up securely on perception, inference, and imagination, helped out and expressed by words and figures, if we can have no knowledge respecting the nat- ure and valid use of perceiving, inferring, and image-making faculty itself, and respecting the relations in which the symbols of all science stand to the only immediately given data, the " states of consciousness, as such ? " The better way, however, is that milder form of answer which we have already given. There is science wherever there are ascertainable facts that may be described and explained in their relations to one another and to other classes of facts. And who will venture to affirm that the facts of consciousness, considered as such, do actually relate themselves to one another, or to facts of " brain-states," or to what-not other kinds of facts, in invariable forms of sequence, as the facts of physics and chemistry stand related to each other ? There appear, however, to be certain generalizations pos- sible of a higher order than any which we have yet attempted. There are, it would seem, certain principles which belong to all development of the mental life of man ; and every state of con- sciousness, and every form of so-called faculty in every stage of its formation, appears to conform to these principles. They cannot, indeed, be thrown into the terms of mathematical formu- las. To attempt this would be not to increase real science, but only to put forward the pretence of science. We must, there- fore, be content to state these principles in the somewhat vague general way which becomes their nature ; and we distinguish the following four : The principle of Continuity ; the principle of Relativity ; the principle of Solidarity ; and the principle of Teleological Import. \ 10. In what sense we consider psycliology a science lias already been, not only defined, but also illustrated by the entire course of our investigation ; in what sense also the term " natural science " may be applied to the results of psychological investigation. The ascertainable conditions of the phenom- ena of consciousness are such as to place them, through the nervous sys- tem with its end-organs of sense, and its central organs as dependent ujion blood-suiii^ly, in connection with "nature" at large. In the other direction, as it wore, l)y the expression which these same phenomena get through re- sulting changes of the motor system, they are further placed in connection with this same nature at large. At the same time, the assumption that the only real correlates, or causes, or knowablo conditions of the phenomena of consciousness are brain-states, and that ])syeliology is not a science until it has ascertained a system of " blank unmediated correspondences " between conscious ])henomena and conjectural brain-states, wo consider quite unwar- THE PKINCirLE OF CONTINUITY 659 rantable. Nor do we sj'mpathize in the least with a confession of weakness —for example— because " psychology is still in the condition of chemistry before Lavoisier ; " ' nor look forward with the expectation that soon some Lavoisier will arise to rescue it from its i)resent depressed condition. On the contrary, all such comparisons between the two classes of sciences as re- spects their aims and their possibilities, seem to us inept and misleading. By the Principle of Continuity we understand that, when the mental life is regarded as a whole, no breaks or sudden leaps are found, whether as between its factors and faculties, or as hctween the different successive states and stages of its develojMnent. Stated more positively :— the very distinctions, by making- which the factors are differenced and the so-called faculties defined, in the real life of the mind shade into each other; and the evi- dences of growth and progress which mark the different parts of the life of consciousness, in each period of growth and each deg-ree of progress, are such as connect the whole into one proc- ess of becoming-. In a word, the very nature of the mind, so far as science can observe it, is seen in this unbroken vital flow. Its being- is in being just such an uninterrupted stream of psy- chic life. The principle of continuity, thus vaguel}'^ expressed, applies to all the fundamental factors as well as to the formed faculties of mental life. These factors may indeed be distinguished ; and the science of psychology partly consists in making the neces- sary distinctions. By the very word "faculties" we mean to recognize the different modes of the behavior of mind, or the distinctly unlike forms of mental activity and mental life. At the same time it is true that the most clearly distinguishable of factors admit of being continuously connected by nearly, or quite, indistinguishable links ; and the most unlike of so-called faculties involve, in the combination (so to speak) which they represent, the same fundamental processes. Thus we may pro- ceed from one facult}' to another, softening down or obliterating differences by interpolating modifications of both, which tend to bring the apparently most violent oppositions into closer prox- imity. Moreover, every stage of mental evolution requires that it should be connected by some clear recognitions, or other dis- tinguishable traces, in consciousness itself, with the jireceding stages, in order that the entire evolution may deserve the title of a mental evolution at all. It is — in part, but in part only — this principle of continuity which gives its unique character to what we can observe of men- ' Comp. Professor James and President Schurman in the Philosophical Review, March and May, 1892. 060 TYPES AND PRINCIPLES OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT tal development. In all forms of organic physical evolution (plants, and animals, and even, of course, the body and brain of man) the factors and stages of the evolution have some exist- ence and value considered hi themselves, as it were. But the case of mental development is not so. Its very nature as men- tal, we repeat, consists largely in this continuity which allows no factor, or faculty, or stage, to be considered as having any be- ing in itself. Each factor, faculty, and stage exists for con- sciousness as in and of its own continuously flowing life-move- ment. ? 11. To illustrate the principle of continuity as respects tlie factors, or more primary processes, of mental life, it is scarcely necessary to do more than refer to the entire treatment in Parts I. and II. We found, indeed, that the different sensations cannot be considered as evolutions of one primitive form, as the psychical correlate of the simple nervous shock. But we found also that this infinite variety of given sensations is capable of being, in the case of several of the senses, arranged in so-called " scales," where shades of quality and degrees of intensity merge in each other, so that the dis- tinctions are not absolute. Thus of colors and musical sounds and sensations of pressure, we may form such a continuous series. Moreover, we found that, in actual experience, some of the more primary forms of sensation ap- pear from the first as inextricably — so far as consciousness is concerned — woven together ; so that, for example, the lines between tastes and smells, between tactual sensations and muscular sensations, and even between tactual and muscular sensations, on the one hand, and sensations of color and light, on the other hand, seem obliterated. Thus what are joopularly known as the senses are found to be complexes of different theoretically, but not actually, distinguishable sensation-elements. Advancing further, the re- lation of the representative image to its sensation-original was investigated. And here it was found that between any s (the indubitably se«sa;/on-oi'iginal) and its i (the recognizably mo^^e-representative), all degrees of "lifelike- ness" may be interpolated. In other words, sensations and their represent- ative images may be considered as arranged in a continuous scale. With even less difficulty is the continuity recognized which maintains itself be- tween the image and the concept. Turning to the aspect of feeling we meet at once with the apparently irreconcilable opposition between pleasure and pain. Yet even here a scale of degrees, with possible neutral feelings lying between the faintest mem- bers of the two opposed parties, and especially the undoubted presence in con- sciousness of mixed feelings, of some of which we can scarcely say wliether they are more like pleasures or jmins, help to soften the opposition. More- over, one reason for the difficulty experienced in trying to distinguish the more jn-imary kinds of feeling was found in the fact, that many of them shade into one another by such imperceptible degrees. Of conation, we seemed to dis- cover that its continuity is temjioral, and in the line of the perpetuation of habit, rather than in the possibility of having its diflferent exhibitions arranged in scales of carefully shaded quality. THE PIIIXCIPLE OF RELATIVITY 661 ? 12. But iloes not the existence, from the beginning to the end of men- tal development, of the three forms, or aspects, of psychic facts — intellec- tive, alfoctive, conative — limit, in an important way, this jirinciple of con- tinuity ? Yes, undoubtedly ; but only in some respects. These three forms of psychical existence are indeed irreducible ; feelings cannot be derived from sensations or mental images, and conations are specifically unlike feel- ings or acts of knowledge, as such. The rather have we seen that every psy- chosis may be regarded in each of these three aspects ; and that all actual experience is a complex in which knowledge, feeling, and will, are involved. Yet the facts that each state of consciousness is a living unity, as it were, capable of being regarded upon these different sides, and that all the acts of developed mind do thus reveal themselves as really intellective, affective, and conative, are illustrations of this very principle of continuity as lying at the base of mental development. Moreover, in that manifold complication of factors which psychological analysis discloses, we come upon states of con.sciousness about the classification of which we may well be in doubt. Of such states some seem to lie midway between intellection and feeling, others midway between feeling and will. For example, vague intra-organio sensations are not improperly called " bodily feelings ; " and desires and wishes often seem almost indistinguishable from deeds of will. The ambig- uous use of the word " feeling " emphasizes the former class of facts; the twofold division of human faculties, which actually includes wishes and vo- litions under the same general category, emphasizes the latter class of facts. It only remains to notice that the entire theory of the nature and devel- opment of mental faculty, illustrates and enforces this same principle of continuity. What we have experience of with ourselves, what wo know our- selves psychically to be, and to be doing, is not described fitly in terras of some single function, or individual activity among the classical number of so-called mental faculties. What we find ourselves to be doing is a marvel- lous and indescribable fulness of active life ; a continuum, for the total ex- pression of which the meagre separateness of processes and faculties seems a totally insuflScient account. Closely connected with the foroiroing principle — and, indeed, in such a way that the two are interdependent — is the Principle of Relativity. The statement of this principle with which we must be content is perhaps vag-uer than that which has been g-iven to the principle of continuity. The word " relativity " has been used by various writers, both in psycholog-y and in other forms of science or in philosophy, to cover a g-reat variety of conceptions. And doiibtloss the so-called " law of relativity," in almost all of its many forms of statement, has been too fre- quently pushed to such an extreme as to involve an error, or even an absurdity. Yet we have no other term which so well ex- presses a principle that seems to apply to an almost indefinite- ly great number of psychological facts and subordinate laws. By the principle of relativity, as we understand it — negatively 662 TYPES AND PRINCIPLES OF 31EXTAL DEVEL0P3IENT stated — it is denied that any ps3'chic factor, or complex psycho- sis, can exist without having- its own definite quality, quantity, tone of feeling-, value in combination, and influence upon simul- taneous or successive factors and psychoses, determined by the relaiiofi in which it stands to other factors and psychoses in the entire mental life. Or — stated positiveh' — everi/ indicidual el^i- ment, or state, or form, of uoental life is iciiai it is only as relative to otJter tUrivtids, states, arul forms of the same mental life. The foregoing statement is, as has already been said, con- fessedly va^e ; yet it seems to group and hold together a vast number of very impressive facts that are fundamental in all mental development. It is not here given as a deduction from a metaphysical proposition like that of Lotze : '" To be = to be re- lated." It is rather made as an induction from the descriptive history of mental life. It does not mean simply that conscious- ness is subject to change ; or even that a " field of consciousness unaltered by change " would be a blank — that is, no conscious- ness at all rHobbes). Much less does it mean that every con- scious presentation "is essentially nothing but " a transition or diflference (compare Bain). Xor is it limited to the formula that " our sensations afford no absolute but only a relative measure of external impressions " (TV'undt).^ The first of these three state- ments is much broader, and the latter two are much more special and narrow, than the principle as we understand it. In a more concrete form the principle may be explained thus : Do I in- quire as to any mental state, or as to any factor in any mental state (fixing my attention upon the content of consciousness, so far as possible, in its entirety, or isolating by analytic attention some aspect or factor of the whole) : ^Tiat is it — as respects quality, quantity, tone of feeling, etc.? Then the answer must be, this individual state, or factor, is what it is in dependence on its relations to other mental life of the same subject of all states. Putting the two foregoing principles together, we may say, t}ie true picture of mental life is that of a continuum of interde- pendent psych^jses ; or — if we may be so far metaphysical — de- scriptive ijsychology ends in adopting the conception of a heing with a unique unity of nature and an equally unique history of dei'dfip- ment. \ 13. The psychological doctrines usually inclnded under the term " Law of Relativity " are .summarized and criticised by Dr. Ward ' under three heads : (1) Hobbes's celebrated dictum, that " to have the same thought or feeling always and not to think or feel at all are identical " ' In the flrpt edition of his Pliypiologische Psychologie, p. 43L ' Article Peychologr, Encyc. Brit., p. 49 f. THE PIMNCIPLE OF RELATIVITY 663 {Idem semper sentire et -non ^entire nd idem recidunt), is said, when made to api)ly to tlie wliolo field of consciousness, to "become at once true and trite." But surely the truth, that change is a necessary condition of all con- sciousness, however "trite," can scarcely be too constantly kept in view by the psychologist. Nor do we consider that the "constant impressions," sometimes called " fixed ideas," which occasionally seize upon and dominate the entire consciousness, " coloring or bewildering everything," afford any real exceptions to the principle. The questions for investigation concern the time-rate, character, and laws of this change ; and on all these qiiestioDs we have already sufliciontly shown the evidence and expressed an opinion. (2) If we are to understand Bain, when he declares, " All feeling is two-sided. . . . The state we have passed to is our explicit consciousness ; the state we have passed /ro7?i is our implicit consciousness, etc.," as holding that "all presentations are bid differences," then we must dissent from the view, as does Dr. Ward. Surely, however, the latter misstates his own cause when he declares : " But in passing from the scent of a rose to the sound of a gong or a sting from a bee, we have no such means of bringing the two into relation." Now, in case of so abrupt a transition in the content and feeling- tone of two successive mental states, the law of relativity would — as we un- derstand it — not be violated, but the more amply illustrated. The amount of our absorption in the scent of the rose would influence the redistribution of attention to the sound of the gong, and even to the sting of the bee ; the degree of jaain which the succeeding sensations of sound or smarting gave would be enhanced by the preceding pleasure ; the control of the motor results of the new sensation would be determined by the perceptions, etc., into which this sensation abruptly broke ; and so on, and so on. Indeed, extreme as the statement might seem, the total content of consciousness of any man, even when stung by a bee, is what it is, only as determined by the character of the stream of consciousness, by the entire psychic life, into which this particular content falls. (3) The criticism which Dr. Ward gives to the formulation of the law of relativity by Wundt, as well as the formula itself, need not concern us here. So far as either affects the principle of relativity, they have already been sufficiently considered in the discussion of Weber's law, of the nature of discriminating consciousness, of color and other contrast, etc. '■ It is impossible," says a modern writer on psychology, " to resolve consciousness into a series of simple and self-existent sensations, absolutely independent of one another."' ' The same author applies a similar "law of relativity " to the feelings and to the will. We intend so to extend and to state the principle as to cover every factor and state of consciousness ; but to do this, without denying a real and positive content to consciousness, and without affirming that the " mutual relations of impressions are everything." On the one hand, it is not time that " we cannot have a presentation X, but only the presentation of the difference between Y and Z ; " but, on the other hand, it is tiaie that every presentation X, or Y, or Z, is just such rather than X', or F', or Z', in dependence upon the relations it sustains to the whole alphabet of the mental experience. I 14. Properly understood, the principle of the relativity of psychical ' HOffding : Outlines of Psychology, p. 114. (564 TYPES AND PKINCIPLES OF MENTAL DEVELOP.MENT phenomena admits of almost unlimited illustration. We have seen that the principle applies to the quantities and qualities of all manner of sensations, to the sensation-complexes resulting from their mixture, and to the per- ceptions which arise in the development of intellect under the influence of sensuous excitations. As respects quantity of sensations, although Weber's law cannot be proved to have the exactness and universality of application which has sometimes been claimed, yet the facts which it generalizes all show that the question, " how much " any sensation is, in the estimate of consciousness, depends upon the relation in which it stands to i:)revious sen- sation-experience — especially, of course, to that most immediately anteced- ent. It is true, as Dr. Ward has said, that "a letter-sorter who identifies an ounce or two ounces with remarkable exactness identifies each for itself and not the first as half the second." But it is also true that this identifica- tion is itself a complex psychical act of sensation and intellection which, as respects every factor of it as well as considered in its entirety, falls under the principle of relativity. Change the relation in which this experience of sensuous quanta and qualia stands to i:)revious experience — for example, by fatigue of the arm, or distraction of the attention, or requiring jiist previous the lifting of heavy weights, etc. — and the total experience itself becomes different. We have also seen that the very nature of all our more complex feelings and deeds of will is such as to indicate the importance of the relations they sustain to sensation, to imagination, and to thinking, as the accompaniment and habitual sequents of the same. But we should scarcely do otherwise than repeat the whole story of the analysis, already made, of the elements and of the progressively complex developments of mental life, if we endeavored fully to illustrate the principle of relativity. The word " faculty," indeed, represents an abstraction ; but the facts of mental life and mental develoji- ment which justify the abstraction are themselves all explicable only as standing in relation to each other. Each psychic reality — the actual state of consciousness — has its characteristics defined only while it exists as a complex of related factors, and as being itself a "moment" related to the onflowing stream of consciousness. [To use rather high and dry metaphysi- cal language (and this, on account of its impressiveness) : — What the indi- vidual phenomenon of consciousness is "in itself" can be understood scien- tifically only as this "in-itself-being " is seen to be related to all the " other-being " of the same so-called Self.] By tlie Principle of Solidarity we intend to emphasize all that is acconi})lished in mental develo]iment,nnder the foresfoin.cf two principles, by the working" of habit, in the widest possible mean- ing of this latter word. The mental life in its development is a whole in which the continuity and relation of all the different factors, aspects, states, and staj2fes, mnst be reoosfnized. But more than this — to speak with no unmeaning- figure of speech — the effect of every partial or eonqdcte worl'lng of the xtsycMc mech- anism is felt upon tJie weal or the woe of the ichole de celopvient ; and this development necessarily tends toward some kind of uniji- THE PRIXCIPLE OF SOLIDAIIITY 665 cdtion of 7'esulf. To say this is scarcely more than to call atten- tion to the truth that in psychology we are dealing with " bio- logical " i)henoinena ; the being, called Mind, whose history is the subject of our study, is a IJfe. Furthermore, it is of all known forms of life incomparably the most complex, the most full, at first, of iindefined possibilities. In the study of mental develo]nnent we recognize the gi'eat l)lasticity, both organic and also strictlj^ psychical, of the begin- nings ; but we recognize also that the lines along which the de- velopment proceeds become, although perhaps more numerous even than the early promise warranted us in expecting, yet con- stantly more legibly and rigidly drawn. For the term " habit " seems to apply to the development of every mental faculty ; and the influence of what we call habit is felt in every mental act. We have thus to recognize habits of sensation and habits of feeling, and as well, haliits of reproductive image-making and habits of conscious discrimination ; while the all-powerful move- ment of attention, with its constant focusing and redistributing of psychic energy, falls under the law of habit. Of course, then, all the complex developed faculties of perception, imagination, thought, emotion, and desire, are understood to exemplify the same law. "While the very seats of passive and active voluntarj- habit are thought to be in the association of ideas and in deeds of will resulting in conduct, of the real origin and nature of this universal dominion of habit we can — to speak the truth — give little or no account ; or rather, all our attempted account- ing for it is, at last, only a restatement of the facts. This is true whether we vaguely talk of mental tendencies and aptitudes as siibconscious qualifications of an entity called mind ; or yet more vaguely talk of tendencies, and strains, and potencies as belong- ing to the substance (the protoplasm, or " psychic " nerve-cells) of the brain. The principal classes of facts which state, without accounting for, the law of habit are the following : (1) Every form of psy- cho-physical or more piirely psychical activit}' — the more simple and fundamental as well as the more complex and highly devel- oped — having once occurred is more likely to occur ngain. The degree of likelihood of the recurrence of any particular activity can be only doubtfully measured according to the frequency of its repetition, its relation to other habitual forms of action, its fitness in the sj'stem of the prevalent " disposition," etc., etc. (2) Habitual forms of activity — that is, tlios(^ actually repeated with frequency — are regularly (but not always) characterized (a) by a lack of painful feelings of difficulty or by positive feelings 666 TYPES AND PRINCIPLES OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT of ease. They emerge in tlie stream of consciousness witlioiit agitating- its current. Some liabits, however, like the habitual indulgence of certain emotions and passions, are of their very nature frequently recurring agitations of this current, (b) Di- minishing of conscious attention, and of the hesitation and du- bitation, which such attention often occasions, characterizes in general our habitual forms of mental activity. But here we may also speak, with equal correctness, of the habit of con- scious attention, habit of hesitation, habit of giving one's self the pause before decision or action, (c) Prompt and accurate move- ment in general belongs to all those forms of habitual activity which allow of expression in movement. This promptness is connected with the lapsing of the necessity to think how to act, or even to call up in consciousness any mental image of the movement as it is to be accomplished, (d) In cases where the degree of almost or quite complete unconsciousness does not characterize the preparation and execution of an habitual act, the psychical series which leads up to and issues in the act is ordinarily much condensed. (3) An important feature of all habits is determined by the relation in which they stand to that side of consciousness which we have called the AVill, as developed, self-determining conation. A look at this feature seems to justify again the division of our habits into two classes — namely, the habits vie have (as adopted, so to speak, by act of will) and the habits which have us (sub- jected to themselves, as it were). Yet this division is by no means fixed and absolute, as we have already had abundant oc- casion to remark. Finally, the bearing of this universal law of habit on the sol- idarity of mental development is now obvious. Habit is in itself a partial reduction to order of the group of phenomena within which it "holds," or "reigns," as we expressively say. But, further, as certain individual psycho-physical and practical activities cannot take place simultaneously, on account of their opposed character or on account of the limitations of conscious- ness, so is it with habits of activity. Interferences of habit must be settled by domination of the stronger, by " survival of the fit- test ; " or the decision between the contestants must be made by conscious deeds of will, persistently ]>ut forth for an end, and on(> habit thus enforced and furthered to the diminishing of the other ; or perhaps a new habit persistently formed. Thus in the devel- opment of mental life a sort of liierarchy of habits is necessarily formed. Whether those voluntarily adopted in view of some sies- thetical or ethical ideal, and enforced by sentiment, or those THE ORGANIC BASIS OF IIA15IT G67 more passively oxperiouced as arisino: out of the senses and emo- tions, regularly prevail ; in any event, a sort of unitij of iiieniul life must resnlt from tlw irork'ni[f if t/ii.s 2^rina'ple. Here, as everywhere in the realm of vital i)henomena, more than a certain amount of confusion and uncci'tainty is intolerable. The princi- ple of solidarity must prevail. ^ 15. The biological and oi-ganic basis of habit lias alreailv been illus- trated in treating of the cerebral conditions of the reproductive imagina- tion (p. 241 f.). Eveiytliing about the infant indicates a mobile, flexible, changeable condition of the bodily organs ; and an especially massive de- veloi)ment of the cerebral nervous system with plastic and mouldable tissue in great abundance as compared with any uses to wliich such tissue has al- ready been put. The metabolic activities of the infant are mucli more pro- nounced than are those cf the adult. Its rapid heart-beat, frequent respira- tion, higher temiierature, large relative size of the heart and organs of sense, are indications pointing in the same direction. At the other extreme, stands the much diminished metabolism, the hardened tissue with its loss of plasticity and aeqtiired tendencies to function only in definite ways, which are characteristic of old age. That infancy and youth are formative periods, that habits of all sorts are tlien in the process of forming, but that new ways of living and acting cannot easily be assumed or reasonably expected in later life, and that every adnlt is a being of formed habits (oven if it be the one hal)it of fickleness and incalculable conduct which is chiefly characteristic) — to .say all this is to spe.ak trutli so trite that it scarcely wins attention. To illustrate this truth completely, and especially to enforce it as bearing on conduct and character, would carry us again over the entire areas already traversed. ^ 16. We shall therefore make no further attempt to enforce this uni- versally admitted law of habit. It is enough to say that it is found jireva- lent everywhere ; and that everything which is done by every human being, who has well entered on a course of development, illustrates the law. The way we walk and stand and sit and tallc and write and eat and work and play ; and as well the way we perceive, wliether with or without carefnl at- tention, and the way we imagine and think and feol and desire — all come under the dominion of habit. Nor do we fail to illustrate this principle as truly when choosing, with much high thought and painstaking emotion, our profession in life or our religion, as whenhalf-consciously winding our watch in mid-day because we are clianging our clothing at an unaccustomed liour, or standing and wondering in the etlbrt to unlock some door with the wrong key, becaiise this one of our bunch of keys has been habitually connected with trains of thought such as we are now following. The degrees of unconscious skill acquired, the amount of conscious at- tention still required, the duration and strength of the power, of the habit, the I'ange of activities covered by it, the relation in which it stands to the comjilex activities of knowledge, feeling, and willing, vary indefinitely with different persons and diflerent classes of habits. Thus we find the juggler Houdin testifying that after thirty years of cessation from practice, though he had " scarcely once touched the balls during that period, he could still 668 TYPES AND PRINCIPLES OF MENTAL DEVELOPMENT manage to read with ease while keeping three balls in the air at once." ' On the other hand, we encounter frequent instances where some supreme choice, as in certain cases of moral reform* or of religious conversion, seems to reverse with a single shock the habitual currents of thought, feeling, and will, as they have been flowing for many years. And yet even in the man- ner of this reversal, as has already been said, the general principle of habit vindicates itself. It is "with no view to provoke metaphysical or theological discussion that we call attention to the fact of the Teleological Import of all mental development. No science of the life of the mind is possible without recognizing- the presence of final piir- pose in the collocation and arrangement Avliich the phenomena come to have, as the stream of consciousness flows on. It may be that in saying this we are only enunciating what is the self- conscious and intellectual way of the developed mind for regard- ing its own development — the wa}^ the Self, as it were, seems to itself. The ultimate nature and ground of the seeming does not now concern us. What does concern us is that, Avherever the phenomena of consciousness become objects of knowledge, and so the beginnings of a science of mental life are made possible, there these phenomena appear ordering themselves so as to at- tain practical ends. Activity fo some purpose is the ruling prin- ciple of mental develox>ment. The self-conscious, intelligent, adoption of a plan, and selection of means for its pursuit, is distinctive of the acme of man's development. The more com- prehensive this plan, and the wiser the selection of means, the higher is the standing of the individual in the scale of intel- lectual development. But ends suggested by festhetical and ethical sentiment seem adapted to control large spheres of hu- man activity ; and the latter especially, from the very nature of the mandate with which it sanctions the end that promises its owai satisfaction, has at least a sort of phenomenal supremacy. But meanwhile the principles of continuity, of relativity, and of conscious and unconscious habit, forbid that any consciously ac- cepted end should be isolated, as it were, from the entire life both bodily and psychical. And when we regard the working of all of those principles, in every detail of mental development, avo l)ecome aware that the import of final puri)ose in the mental life extends far beyond the conscious adoption of ends on our own part. In other words, the stream of consciousness ai>pears not so much as a current flowing we know not whence ncn- whither ; but rather as a current designed from the beginning, both as re- ' AutobioRraphy as cited by Carpenter : Mental Plij'siology, p. 217 f.; andJmnes : The Principles of Psychology, L, p. 117. TELEOLOGY OF MENTAL LIFE CGi) spocts its observable surface and its hidden depths — partly self- ilirec'ted aud partly impelled by hidden forces — to the lit per- formance of a certain work. 13nt what that work most fit is, if any snch there be, scientific psyclndog-y does not investi<^ate. In fine, a combination of all these principles, as they appear in their actual operation, secures for every so-called stream of consciousness that continuity, related action, solidarity of char- acter, and that intelli<;'ible import as judged by the light of ends and ideals, which are necessary to the history of what Ave call a Soul, or a Mind. INDEX Abstraction, process of, in ideation, 282 f. After-images, I'M ; as distinguished from ideas, 3o7 f. Allen, Grant, on conditions of pleasure-pain, 11)2. Analysis, process of, in all intellection, 3',):i f. Anger, as pleasure-pain, 201 ; as an emotion, 5;vS, 548, 553. Appetites, the, 59G f. Archer, William, on psychology of acting, 418, 548 {uute). Aristotle, on the feeling of pleasure, 203 ; laws of as.5ociation, 274 f. ; dictum of, 474 ; categories of, 487 f. Arnold, Mattliew, on feeling, 558. Aronsohn, on sensations of smell, 100 {)ioie). Art, sensory illusions in, 374 f.; dependence of, on creative imagination, 415 f., 419 f. , 424 ; cognitions of, 512 ; the emotions in, 548, 555. Assimilation, as intellectual process, 303 f. Association, of primary feelings, 20'.) f. ; of ideas, 263 f., 2(58 ; contiguity, as the law of, 2()8 f. ; subordinate laws of, 274 f. ; special cases of, 279 ; in the synthesis of memory, 393. Associational School, the English, 103 f., 26(5. Attention, as belonging to all consciousness, 33, 61 f. , 04 ; and primary, 61 f. ; ))hysio- logical conditions of, 65 ; distribution of, 69 f. ; rise and fall of, 71 f. ; rhythm in, 72 f. ; relation of, to intellect, 75 f.; as ad- justment, 77 f. ; relation of, to feeling, 78 f.; and to conation, 83 f., 213 £, 366 ; as a " deed of will," 84 ; effect of, in perception, 366 f . ; and in memory, 394 f . B.VGEnoT, on emotion of conviction, 516. Bain, on neutral feelings, 189 ; conditions of pleasure-pain, 192 ; on the emotions, 554, 597 (note) ; on principle of relativity, 663 f. Baldwin, on nature of feeling, 165 (riote) ; motor consciousness, 214 ; and feeling of effort, 222 f. ; on reproduction, 3S2 ; on feeling of ritness, 568 {note). Balzac, imagination of, 419 ; on anger, 553. Baxt, on speed of consciousness, 43 f. Beauni.s, on reaetion-time, 08 ; on muscular sensibility, 117 ; conditions of pleasure- pains, 19o, 201 f. Beautiful, the, feeling of, 569 f. ; kinds of, 575 f . Belief, as entering into cognition, 512 f. , 517 f. Beneke, on problem of psychology, 9 ; his method, 26. Bergson, on intensity of sensation, 131 (notr). Berkeley, his theory of vision, 357 f. ; on ab- stract ideas, 442 f. Binet, on muscular effects of attention, 73 ; psychic life of micro-organisms, 84 ; on Weber's experiment, 15() ; discernment of amount by children, 299 ; on nature of perception, 320; on memory, 380; and the conception of Self, 527 {note'). Bliss, on cliauges of attention, 73 (note). Blix, on sensations of j)ain, 190 (?iote). Body, tactual picture of the, 325 f . ; orient- ing of, 33S ; developed i)en'ej)tiou of, 339. Bosancpiet, on conception, 445; nature of the copula, 450 (nutt) ; and of reasoning, 482. Bouillier, on retention of ideas, 383 f. Bourget, on youthful imagination, 419. Brain, as involved in attention, 67 f. ; pro- cesses of, in sensation, 98 f. ; and in feel- ing, 175 f. ; aiul conation, 217 f . ; as sen- sory-motor, 22S ; in intellection, 291 f. Brentano, on nature of consciousness, 34 {note) ; and judgment, 308 (note). Brillat-Savarin, on perceptions of taste, 329 (note). Browning, on teleologv of pain, 558. Briickner, on organ of hearing, 104 (note). Byasson, on waste of brain-tissue, 68. Cabanis, on sexual emotion, 597 (note). Canals, the .semi-rireular, use in perception ,~ of position, 158 ; and of sound, 331 f. ; in ^ illusions of giddiness, 37;i f. Caj)pie, Dr., on causation of sleep, 47 (note). Categories, the, nature of, 487 f . , 490 f . ; doc- trine of, 409 f. Cattell, on grasp of consciousness, 40, 272 ; distinction of color-tones, 130. Cause, the conception of, 475 f. , 500 f., 505 f. ; law of causation, 503 f. Character, meanings of word, 638 f. ; forma- tion of, 639; conception of, (i41 f. Choice, phenomena of, 621 f. ; factors in, 622 f. Classification, 434 f. (and see Thought and Reasoning). Cognition, as consciousness of resemblance and difference, 296 f. Color, sensations of, 105 f. ; theories of, 106 f. ; complementary, 108 f. ; pure or satu- rated, 109. Color-audition, 1.59 f. Color-blindness, 123 f. 672 INDEX Comparison, as intellectual, 302 £., 304 ; es- | sential to thinking, 432 f., 435 f. ; condi- tions of, 435 f. Conation, as related to attention, 83 f . ; as primary datum of consciousness, 211 f. ; ' relation of, to movement, 212 f. ; physio- logical conditions of, 2lGf. ; psychological expression of, 219 f. ; influence of, in per- , ception, 340 f. , 3G7 f. Conception, nature of, 437 f., 443 f. ; as de- pendent on ideation, 339 f. ; kinds of, 441 f. Consciousness, definition of, 2, 29 f.; as ob- ject of knowledge, 4 f., 32 f.. 523 f. ; prob- lem of, 1(5 f. ; observation of, direct, 16 f. ; various uses of the word, 31 f. ; attention necessary to, 33 f., (54 f. ; as discriminat- ing, 34 f . ; state of, 35 f . ; unity in variety of, 37 f. ; fields of, 39 f., 41 f. ; circuit of, 40 f., 254 ; speed of, 42 f. ; character of, 46, 523 f. ; physical conditions of, 46 f . ; as cjiiphcjioyaoLon, 47 ; as conative and active, 214, 290 f . ; limitations of, 258 f . ; of similarity, 293 f. ; of difference, 294 f. ; of self-activity in willing, 635 f. Contiguity, as the law of the association of ideas, 268 1, 275 f. ; in space and time, 277 f. Continuity, principle of, 659 f . Corti, organ of, 104. Cudworth, on nature of will, 214. Curiosity, as an emotion, 540 f . ; as a senti- ment of intellect, 566 f . Darwin, on physiology of the emotions, 558 f . Deduction, nature of, 478 f . (see also Reason- ing). Delage, on sensations of position, 158 (note). DelbcEuf, on memorv in dreams, 386 ; and the conception of Self, 529. Desires, the, nature of, (501 f. ; development of, ()05 f. ; kinds of, 606 f. Dietze, on grasp of consciousness, 40 (note). Differentiation, as intellectual process, 303 f., 447 f. ; judgments of, 447 f. Discrimination, as belonging to all conscious- ness, 34 £., 172 f., 288 f. ; as applied to several objects, 40 f. , 7(5, 299; dependent on attention, 75 f. ; threshold of, 137 f. ; of skin-sensations, 152 f. ; of vi.sual areas, 153 f. ; as consciousness of difference, 294 f . Dittes, on memory, 380 (note). Donaldson, on brain-centers of smell, 100 {7iole). Donders, on effect of accommodation, 356 ; and will reaction-time, 625. Doubt, relation of, to clear memory, 402. Dreams, 412 f. (and passun under Ideas, Ideation, Imagination, and Memory). Dunan, on skin-perceptions, 341 (note). Dwelshauer, on nature of attention, 66 f. (yiote). Ear, as organ of sound, 103, 135 f. ; struct- ure of the inner, 103 f. ; sensitiveness of, 135 f. Ebbinghans, on rhvthm of attention, 72 f. ; laws of reproduction, 272, 273, 292, 406 f. Egger, on memory of sensations, 392 f. Ego (see Self). Eifjenlicht^ of retina, 109. Emotions, the development of, .534 f., .537 f., 544 f. ; bodily basis of, .535 f., 546 f. ; the ''mixed," 536 f., 5.')4 ; how different from sentiments, 542 f. ; effect of, on ideation, 550 f. ; teleology of, 557 f. Empiricists, the, 325 f. End-organs, of smell. 99 f. ; of taste, 101 f. ; of sound, 104 f. ; of light and color, 108 f. ; of the skin, 111 1. ; of the muscles, 116 f. Enthymeme, nature of, 466 f. (and note), 473. Everett, Professor, on creative imagination, 411, 422. Exuer, on sensations of sound, 103 (note). Eye, structure of, 108 f., 154; sensations of, 109 f., 3.54 f. ; sensations of position of, 1.53 f. , 354 f. ; activity of, in vision, 354 f. Faculties, the mental, meaning of term, 49 f., 317 f. ; previous doctrine of, 51 f. ; variety of, 53 f. ; three-fold classification of, 57 f., 59 f. ; development of, 317 f. Fancy, distinguished from imagination, 421 f. Fear, as an emotion, 538 f. , 549. Fechner, law of, 136 f. ; on nature of mem- ory-images, 249 (note) ; and of the emo- tions, 548. Feeling, nature of, 19 f., 162 f. ; relation to attention, 78 f. ; history of psvchologv of, 163 f. ; kin-rls of, 167 f., 182 f. ; quantity of, 1(59 f., 193 ; conditions of , 171 f. :_^phy- sical basis of, 173 f. ; of Self, 175 f. ; so-called " common feeling," 185 f. ; time- rate of, 186 f., 203 f., 205; as pleasure- pain, 188 f. ; rhythm of, 203 f. ; diffusion of, 209 f. ; association of, 209 f. ; relation of, to knowledge, 511 f . ; the asthetical, 572 f. ; the ethical, .579 f. ; of the ought, .580 f. ; of approbation, 581 f. Feeling of effort, nature of, 221 f. Feelings, the, classification of, 179 f. ; the sensuous, 183 f., 197 f. ; of relation, 199 f. ; effect of, in perception, 365 f. Fere, on dynamometric force, 48, 2'2^>, 231 . Fortlage, on sensory-motor experience, 117 (note) ; and synthesis in judgment, 308. Fouillee, on feeling of energ}-, 223 ; on prin- ciple of contiguity, 268. Freedom of the will, 632 f. ; consciousness of, 636 f . Galton, on reproduction of ideas, 285. Gellc, on perceptions of sound, 331 (note^. Generalization, 433 f. (and see Thought and Reasoning). George, on self-consciousness, 35 ; nature of time, 498 (note). Gerdy, on nature of sensation, 94. Gothe, on self-knowledge, 20, 572; sensu- ous feelings, 185 ; on the influence of names, .529 ; on instinct, .599. Goldscheider, on speed of temperature-sen- sations, 43 ; on joint-sensations, 118 ; feel- ings of pain, 190 (note). Gowcrs, on brain as sensory-motor, 228. Grief, as an emotion, 539. Grinthuisen, on imagination in dreams, 413. Guyau, on assthetical sentiment, 572 (note'). INDKX ot:} H vcKEL, on construction of space-concep- tions, 4'.l3 {note). Ilalluoiiiationis, of perception, S70 f. ilHinilton, Sir VV^illiiim, on niitiiro of con- sciousness, ill ; ju";i>!> of consciousnc.>is, 40; use of word conation, 214 ; and word idea, 2o4 (note). Hartsen, on nature of conscionsness, MS (note); and sentiment of trutli, 5(>(; (note). Havcraft, character of tastable substances, ib-i. Hearing, perceptions of, 330 f. Hpj^cI, on nature of judgment, 4',')'.). Hclmholtz, on vacillation of attention, 71 f. ; on mechanism of sound, K'4 ; theory of colors, 107 f. ; limits of pitch, r.':{; on contrast, 127; sensations of accommoda- tion, oOO f . Hcnsen, on organ of sound, 104. Herhart, on problem of psychology. '.• ; his method, ~(» ; on tlie mental faculties, 52 ; theory of feeling, Kl'.t; on reaction of ideiis, 25.5 f. ; nature of tlesire, 60o. Hering, on temperature-sensations, 114; phj'siologicai conditions of memory, 24o. Hodgson, on nature of psychology, 1 1 f. lloffding, on changes of feeling, ^>o; cona- tion as active, 214; laws of association, 27S ; on the emotions, 554 f. ; and the nature of will, (111 f., (i27. Hofi'raann, E. T. A., on musical feeling, 185 I folmgren, on retinal images, 353. Hf, 356 f. ; spontaneity of, 251) f. ; association of. 2(53 f.,275 f. ; the "freeing" of, 264 f., 281 f. ; series of, 265 f. ; furtherance Jind hindering of, 2()() f. ; condensation of se- ries of, 270 f . ; formation of the ' ' abstract," 282 f., 442 f. Id^-ation, process of, 258 f ., 273 f . ; associa- tion in, 2(i3 £., 268 f. ; connection of lan- guage with, 273 f., 275 f. ; teleology of, 286 f. ; necessary to perception, 322 f. Identity, principle of, 482 f. Illusions, of perception, IJiO f. ; of motion, :i73 f. Image, the mental, nature of, 3:!5 f. , 244 f.; meaning of term, 2:]~ ; the after-image, 237 f.; fading of the, .238 f. , 250; spontane- ous recurrence of, 25lt f. , 413; rendering schematic of, 282 f. Imagination, effect of, on s';>,ht, 34 f. Intellection, nature of the primary, 28S f., 431 ; physiological conditions of, 291 f. ; analysis of, 29; i ; as consciousness of re- semblance aniotr). James, Professor William, on consciousness, o8 f. : on adjustment of attention, 7S ; on " extensity " of sensations. 144; theory of perception, 154, 320, 325 f. . 337; ou feeling of eflbrt, 221 f. (and i note) ; physiological conditions of re- ! production, 267 ; on time-consciousness, i 311 {notf) ; on memory, 399 {note) ; on reasoning, 470 f. ; and knowledge, 508, 519 ()iotf) ; on the emotions, ,554 f. Janet, M. Paul, on nature of memory, 389. Jastrow, on Weber's law, 137 ; on dreams of the blind, 3.S4 {note). Jealousy, as an emotion, 541. I Jevons, on extension and intension of con- cepts, 445. Joints, sensations of, 117 f. Joulxrt, on poetic imagination, 425. Joy, as an emotion, 5:)9 f. Judgment, nature of rudimentary, 306 f., 437 f. ; and of the logical, 437 f., 445 f. ; as I related to reasoning, 438 f.. 445 f., 4Ci3 f. ; I and involving synthesis, 446 f.; forms of, 447 f. ; potencies of, 453 f. Kant, on chvssification of faculty. .59; im- I agination in mathematics, 410, 474 ; logi- I cal (lift/iin of, 474; on distinction of emo- tions and passions, 560 ; and feeling of the I sublime, 577. I Kaulech, on nature of sensation, 95 (note). Knowledge, through rccognitive memory, 401 ; tlirougli reasoning from groumls, I 4()7 f., 479 f., 518 f.; growth of, 479 f.. .508, 516 f. ; nature of, as a development, 508 f., .518 f. ; influence of feeling in, 511, ,567; I kinds of, 516 f. ; the immediate, 517 f.; of i things, 519 f. ; and of Self, .520 f. ; desire I of, .567 f. Krohn, Dr , on grasp of tactual conscious- ne-s, 40 („<-te\ Kusamaul, on fading of memorj^-image, 3S.5. I Lanoe, on rhythm of attention, 72 (and 1 7iote). " - , \^\\''y^'^''^Y (;74 INDKX liangle.v, on energy of light-waves, 109 {noir). Language, depenilent on ideation, 273, 277 ; relation of. to thought, 379 f., 4-2« f., 452 f.. 450 f. ; and to memory, 3SS, o90 f. , 400 f . ; origin of, 455 f. Lazarus, on formation of concepts, 459. Le Coutc, on sight, 154 (7wtc). Lehmann, on fading of memory -image, 239. Leibnitz, on reasoning among animals, 465 ; logical dictum of, 474 ; on reason in man, 470. Life, the mental, mo.st general forms of, 29 f ., 0.5 f . ; elements of. 91 f., ol7 f . ; develop- ment of, 317 f., 007 f. Light, sensations of. 105 f., 109 f., 138 f.; j)henomena of contrast in, 127 ; quotient of sensitiveness to, loVt. Lipps, on association of ideas, 27S ; on be- lief, in cognition, 519 {note). Local Signs, as sensation-complexes, 141 f. ; existence and use of, 1.54 f . ; of the skin, 1.55 f. ; of the eye, 1.5(; f., 348 f., 352 f., Lotze's theory of, 1.57 (and note). Localization, of cerebral function, in sensa- tion, 98 ; of sensation-complexes, 144 f ., 322 f. ; the finer, by touch, 337 f . Logic, relation of, to psychology, 428 f ., 4.50 Number, formation of concept of, 499 f f . ; psychological meaning of its terms, 450 f . Lombard, on effects of fatigue, 74 (note). Lotze, theory of local signs, 1.57 (ond note) ; on nature of feeling, 189, 192, 197 ; inten- sity of ideas, 247 f. ; on nature of judg- ment, 307 ; origin of language, 4.50 ; on space-perception of women, 490 ; on tem perament, (m1 . Ludicrous, feeling of the, .577 f . lated to conation, 212 ; as reflex, 217 f. : ati automatic in conation, 217 ; kinds of, 224 f . ; impulsive and instinctive, ::30 f . ; of eyes in vision, 3.54 f. ; illusions of, 373 f . ; as a category, 499 f. MuUer-Lyer, on visual illusions, 372 f. (note). Miinsterberg, on qualitj' of sensation, 121 ; reproduction of ideas, 274, 391 ; perce})- tions of sound, 331 f . ; and of sight, 3.55 ; on nature of will, 019, 025 f. Muscles, sensations of, 115 f . ; relation of the striated, to attention, 213 f . ; of the eye, ia vision, 3.54 f. Music, sensations in. 103 f., 128 f. ; scale in, 128 f. ; feelings excited by, 170, 18.5, 198 ; office of imagination in, 424 f . Nativists, the, 325 f. Natorp, on jisychology, .3 (note) ; nature of consciousness, 33 (note). Naville, on will. 307. Nervous System, as condition of conscious- ness. 40 f . ; integrity of, in attention, tu f. ; as related to fusion of sensations, 142 f. Nichols, on nature of pam, 114 (note). Ob.iect. formation of the external, 321 f. Orschansky, on feeling of effort, 224 (note). Pain, jihysical conditions of, 177, 190, 193 f. ; relation of, to intensity of sensation, 194 f . Passions, the. development of, .535 f . ; as >\ distinguished from emotions, 5.59 f . Panlhan, on nature of psychic facts. 9 ; Mantegazza, on expression of the emo- tions, .549 (note). Martius, Gotz, on reaction and attention, 73 (note). Maudsley. on nature of psychology, 15. Measurement, in psycholosj', 39 f ., 133 ; of quantit}^ of sensations, 131 f. ; of distance, by the eye, 371 f . Medem, on psychology as exact science, 99 (vote). Memory, phj'siological conditions of, 242 f ., 384 f . ; images of, 249 f . ; as faculty, 377 ^. ; as recognitive. 377 f., 397 f '. 401 ; as reten- tive. 38.) f . ; in perception, :!85 f . ; of words, 390 f., 400; cultivation of, 402 f., 405 ; kinds of, 402 f. ^Merkel, on reaction with choice, 625. Method, in jisycliology, its kinds, 14 f.; in- Physiognomy, 548 f. teleology in ideation, 287, 393 ; and the nat- ure of judgment, 3C8 ; on systematic le- production, 393 ; and nature of will, 012. Payot, on conditions of pleasure-pain, 192. Perception bv the Senses, basis of, 144 f . ; nature of, 318 f., :-,W f., 308 f ., 419 f. ; use of the word, 319 f.; problem of, 321 f. : theory of, 325 f.. 308 f. ; as intuition of space. 333 f. ; of sulidity of bodies, 344 f. ; data of visual. o4S f.. 302 f. ; influence of feeling in. 304 f. ; as the solution of a prob- lem. 307 f. , 388 f. ; principles of, 308 f.; illusions in, K70 f. ; dependent on memory, 388 f . ; and in;agination, 419 f. Perspective, niatheniatical and psj'cholog- ical, 301 f. Pliilosoiihy, relations of. to psychology, 12. trospcctive, 15 f., 18 f. ; indirect observa- tion, 20 f. ; experimental. 22 f. ; the induc- tive. 24 f. ; the genetic, 25 f . iliddle Term, the, use of, in reasoning, 407. Mill. .lanics, on neutral feelings, 189. Mill, .1. S., on nature of abstract ideas, 443 ; and of reasoning. 482. Mind, laws of the development of, 644 f., t>57 f., 608 f. (see also Self , And Life, the Mental). .\rijiii„nm visihlle, 38, 153 f. MncmonicB, 405 f. Mohr, nature of consciousness, 3.5 (note,). Mosso, on physiology of the emotions, 538 f. Motion, as necessaiv to perception, 142 f . ; sensations of, 147 f., 340 f., 352 f. ; us re- Fleasure, contlitions of. 190 f. ; nature of. 1".H f. ; relation of. to intensity of sensa- tion. 194 t. : of rhythm. 20(5 f . " Pleasure-pains, as belonging to feeling. 107, 177 f.. 188 f.. 200 f. ; as dependent on in- tensity. 194 f. ; as absolute. 201 f. ; oscilla- tions of, 205 f. ; office of, in perception. 340 f. Porter, on nature of consciousness, 31. Presentations of Sense, origin and dcvelop- m.nt of. 321 f., ::27 f., 334 f.. 340 f. ; through smell and taste, 327 f. ; of sound. 330 f. ; of sight. 34S f. ; influence of iii<>- tion upon. 3.53 f. ; the illusory. 370. Pressure, sensations of, 111 f . loS f. ; quo- tient of sensitiveness of, 138 £. INDEX C76 Preyer, on random automatic movements, ~29 ; and imitative movements, 'S.'A f. ; on discernment of ditVerence, '-i'M ; j)ercep- tionsof sounds, •'>'-'>'l ; and of siglit, o'yi i. ; on idea of cause, 505 f. Priinuin coij/iituin, tlie, ;i09 f. Psycliolo^y, dcHuition of, 1 f . ; as science, 2 f., 11 f., 15 f. ; sphere of, :5 f. ; problem of, T f. ; relations of, 10 f. ; to philosophy, I'J ; metliod in, 14 f.. 24 f. ; data of, 10 L ; sources of, 21 f. ; experiment in, 22 f. ; divisions of, 20. Psyc/iosis, meaning of term, 4. Rauikk, on psychology, 4 ; on nature of sen- sation, ',15 ; i)rinciple of contiguity, 2(58 (iio/t) ; on desire, 004 (note). Reaction-time, as influenced by attention, ()S, 72 f., ;{',(l ; in fading of memory-image, 2o'.) ; in discernment, 3(37, 293, 391 ; and in choice, 025 f. Reasoning, nature of, 4M7 f. , 402 f. ; related to conception, 4:iS f., 4(>4 f. ; among the lower animals, 405 f. ; as solution of a problem, 407 f. ; kinds of, 471 f. ; the mathematical, 474 ; inductive and deduc- tive, 478 f. ; underlying principles of, 4S2 f. ; influence of feeling on, 4^0. Recognition, as essential U> memory, 377 f., ' 381 f., 397 f. Recollection, 394 f. (and see Reproduction i and Memor3'). i Relativity, principle of organic, 125 f . ; as j applied to circuit of consciousness, 254 ; as I belonging to all mental life, 001 f. , Representation, nature of image in, 235 f. ; spontaneous reproduction in, 200 f., 400 f. ; . the laws of, 2(!S, 274 f ; series of ideas in, 271 f. ; similarity and contrast in, 274 f. ; general faculty of, 370 f. , 41 9 f. ; Reproduction, spontaneous, 300 f., 285 f. ; i physiological conditions of, 307 f., 381 f., | 3S7 f ; of ideas in series, 270 f. , 285 f. ; | relation of, to language, 373, 3S8, 400 ; in ; all memory, 381, 3S7 f. ; laws of, 3S4 f. ] Retina, structure of, 108 f. ; inertia of, | 130 f. ; use in vision, 354 f. ! Ribot, on nature of psychology, ; on atten- tion, 75, 81 ; and fixed ideas, SI (iii>t<-). Richot, on conception of Self, 527. Right, nature of the conception of, 582 f . Rittmeyer, on perceptions of taste, 101 j (ni)tt'), j Robertson, Professor Croom, on philosophy and psychology, 13. Romanes, on power of animals to count. 299 ; ' and on their language, 458 ; and reasoning, 400. Romicn, on sensations of smell, 100. Rouws«i)u, influence of, on psychology of feel- ing, 103 f. ' ..^uegg, on conditions of feeling, 200 (note). Sachs, on norvc-cndings in muscles, 110, Santlus, on the impulse^, 001 (//o^^). Schilfer, K. L., on perceptions of sound, 332. -■ I Schiff, on physiology of pain, 191 . Schopenhauer, on madness and memory, | 392 ; on imagination, 408 ; and ffisthetical ' feeling, 573. I Science, influence of feelings in, 199 f., 511 (and nolc)\ reasoning in, 474 f., 478 f,; cognitions of, 511 f. Scottish School, their theory of perception, Scripture, on association of ideas, 279 {nolt). Self, bodily feeling of, 175 f., 525 f. ; cogni- tion of, 521 f, , 525 f.; formation of the concepti<)n of, 527 f., 531 f. ; as unitary being, .531 f . ; as "pure" bein^, 533. Self-coiiBciousness, distinguished from con- sciousness, 29 f., 530 f.; as feeling, 175 f., 530 f.; development of, 531, 535 f.; stages of, 525 f. Sensation, nature of, 89 f., 92 f. , 143 f.; the so-called "simple," 91 f . ; mechanism of, 97 f.; quality of, 130 f., 124 f.; modify hig conditions of, 123 f. ; quantity of, 131 f. ; limits of, 134 f.; " dynamogenetic " value of, 329. Sensation-complexes, 141 f.; extensity of, 143 f., 322; development of, 147 f. ; sjia- cial series of, 322 f. Sensations, the, cla.sscs of, 90 f., 119, 1.59 1; of smell, 99 f.; of taste, 100 f.; of souikI, 103 f., 128 f.; light and color, 105 f., 145 f.; of the skin, 110 f., 152 f. ; of temfx-ra- ture. 111 f. ; of j)ressure. 111 f., 152 f . ; mu.scnlar, 115 f, , 145 f. ; of the joints, 117 f. ; the organic, 118 f.; number of, 131 f. ; as basis of perception, 141 f. ; mas- .siveiiess of, 143 f., 352 f. ; so-called "pure," 145 f. ; of motion, 147 f., 334 f. , 340 f., 352; of position, 150 f., 1.57 f,, 334 f.; fusion of, 1.53 f. Senses, the, <.)0 f., 119. 159 f.; the "geomet- rical," 131, 322 f,, 347. Sentiments, the, formation of, 535 f., 542 f., 561 f.; how diflercnt from emotions, 542 f., 501 f . ; classes of, 502 ; bodily basis of, 503 f.; the intellectual, 504 f.; relation of, to imagination, 507 f. ; the Ksthetical, .5f, 102 f. ; character of the musical, 1031, 129; entotic, 102 f., 330; varying condi- tions of, 12;? f. Space, formation of conception of, 321 f., 487 f., 492 f. ; perceptions of, by touch, 332 f.; and by sight, 348 1, 3.50 1; us a. category, 487 ; known as " empty," 492 f. Spencer, Herbert, on nature of sensation, 94 ; view of feeling, 170, 297, 538 ; and of association, 300 ; of discrimination as feeling, 397 ; on nature of perce{)tion, 320 ; physiology of the emotions, .558 1 Sufficient Reason, principle of, 4821, 484 1, .500 f . 676 INDEX Strieker, on imagination and motor con- sciousness, 4U'. Striimpell, on processes of ideation, 262 (note); and nature of conception, 440 f. ; on grades of ideation. 457 (note). Stump f, on attention, 17, 81 ; theorj' of per- ception. 154. Sujjgestion, of ideas, 263, 410 f. ; effect of, in (iiscernment, 2t)7 ; and on sight, 364 f. Sully, on attention, 77, 8U ; quality and (juaiicity in sensation, 121 ; on conation, :.'14 ; on spontaneous reproduction, 261 ; on assimilation, oU4, oU5 ; consciousness of time, 312; on nature of perception, 320, i;2i' ; on recollection, 395; and creative imagination, 41(5; on rational belief, 515; on ajsthetical feeling, 573 ; and feeling of the ludicrous, 577 f. Syllogism, nature of, 467 f., 473 f. ; figures "of, 473 f., 477 ; law of, 473 f. Sympathy, as an emotion, 541 f. ; the senti- ment of, 580 f. Tact, nature of, 521 f. Taine, on niiuunui/i nudibile, 38 ; and nat- ure of perception, 320. Taste, sensations of; 100 f. ; end-organs of, 101 f . ; kinds of, 101 f . ; perceptions of, 327 f . Teleology, in processes of ideation. 286 f. ; and creative imagination, 415 f. ; of the emotions, 557 f. ; of all mental life, 66S f. Temperament, effect of, on association, 280 ; doctrine of, 647 f. ; kinds of, 640 f. Temperature, sensations of. 111 f., 113 f. Thomson, on nature of the enthymeme, 473 (note). Thought, as representative faculty, 377 f., 433 f. ; but not mere imagination, 378 f., 415 f. ; relation of language to, 379 f., 452 f . ; psychological nature of, 428 f . , 431 f. , 435 f., 467 f. Time, formation of conception of, 495 f. ; known as " empty," 497 f . ; as a category, 408 f. Time-consciousness, nature of. 309 f., 497 f. ; development of, 312 f. , 495 f. Tones, nature of, 103; pitch of, 103 f., 123 f. ; deafness to, 123. Touch, sensations of, 112 f . ; formation of the field of. 323 f . ; 322 f. ; .space-percep- tions by, 332 f . ; connection of, with sight, 3.58 f. Trendelenburg, on motion as a category, 500. TurnbuU, experiments in sound, 123. Tyiii' .'•', y M-^ m yv m ■ I •li im >j' i ■/j f •