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 Fio. 2.-Inner (mesial) mrface of the Hght hemisphere of the brain (modified 
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 In both cases the shaded area is the motor zone. See i>af;e 47. 
 
ELEMENTS OF PSYCHOLOCT 
 
 BY 
 
 JAMES MARK BALDWIN 
 
 Pi'ofessor-dect in Pnnceton Coaege, Professor in the University of Toronto, 
 Author of " Handbook of Psychology."' 
 
 NEW YORK 
 HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY 
 
 .1893 
 
Copyright, 1893, 
 
 BY 
 
 HENRY HOLT & CO. 
 
 tARYr 
 EDUC. 
 PSYCH. 
 LIBRARY 
 
 
 
 PSYCH. 
 LtBRABY 
 
 THE MKRSUON COMPANY PRBS8, 
 RAHWAY, N. J. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 This book has been prepared in response to a request 
 from a number of teachers of psychology in the universities 
 who suggested that the expense and length of my Hand- 
 hook of Psychology precluded its use as the text in their 
 courses of instruction. I have, accordingly, aimed to make 
 a book which shall present the newest essentials of the 
 science in a single compact volume at reasonable cost. It 
 differs from my larger work mainly in its omissions. I 
 have endeavored, however, to simplify the exposition, 
 throughout, often rewriting whole sections or recasting 
 whole chapters with this in view, and adding more illustra- 
 tive facts and explanations. 
 
 The treatment of the nervous system has been put at the 
 beginning — a pedagogical concession to my critics, to 
 which I ask attention as unanimous as their criticism. In 
 uegard to other alterations — respecting which the critics' 
 opinions have largely neutralized one another — I have 
 depended as before mainly on my own judgment. AVhat 
 these alterations are the book is here to show. I am sorry 
 that the doctrine of " Feeling " has not aroused the ap- 
 proval in its readers tliat the doctrine of "Belief" has. It 
 is stated more clearly in this book ; but it is the same doc- 
 trine, and — may everybody be converted ! Finally, I have 
 added before the first chapter a short glossary of terms 
 likely to embarrass the student at the beginning of his 
 study ; and instead of burdening the pages with references 
 to the authorities, I have given at the outset once for all 
 the oeneral works (Enolish mainlv) in which detailed and 
 
IV PREFACE. 
 
 exhaustive expositions may be found. A reference to the 
 corresponding fuller treatment of my own larger work is 
 given at the beginning of each chapter. 
 
 I may add that I am grateful to all who have done my 
 w^ork the honor of reviewing, teaching, or reading it ; 
 especially to the reviewers. One who is conscious of his 
 own sins feels the more the humanity of the physician who 
 forbears to probe them too deeply. 
 
 J. Mark Baldwin. 
 
 Toronto, January, 1893. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGES 
 
 Glossary of Terms, xv 
 
 References, xvi 
 
 INTRODUCTION. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 NATURE OF PSYCHOLOGY. 
 
 i^ 1. i)e^/^^7^o?^.— Subject-matter of psychology.— Distinc- 
 tion between psychological and physiological facts. — 
 True relation of psychology to physiology, . . 1-5 
 
 § 2. Difficulties and Errors in Psychology.— Use of reflection. 
 —Means of remedying these difficulties : supplemen- 
 tary psychological sources. — External sources, . 5-11 
 
 §3. Unity of Psychological Sources in Consciousness, . . 11 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 PSYCHOLOGICAL METHOD. 
 
 § 1. Principles of Scientific MetluxJ. — In general, . . 12-13 
 § 2. Application of Scientific Method to PsycJiology.— Psycho- 
 logical observation, 13-15 
 
 § 3. Experiment in Psychology. — General conclusion, . . 15-18 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 § 1. Structure of the Nervous System. — Nerve-elements. — 
 Combination of elements into a S3"stem. — The receiv- 
 ing apparatus. — The reacting apparatus. — The regis- 
 tering apparatus, 19-32 
 
 § 2, Functions of the Nervous System. — Fundamental pro- 
 perties of nervous tissue. — Neurility. — Sentience : 
 integration, retention, selection. — Law of nervous 
 dynamogenesis, 32-39 
 
 V 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGES 
 
 § 3. Kindsof Nervous lieactio)!.— Automatic. — Reflex. — Vol- 
 untary. — Negative : inhibition, .... 39-44 
 
 § 4. Principles of Nerwus Action. — Specialization. — Cerebral 
 localization. — Indifference. — Substitution. — Specific 
 connection. — Summation, 44-51 
 
 § 5. Final Statement of Nervous Fimction. — Habit. — Accom- 
 modation, , . . 51 
 
 CHAPTER lY. 
 
 CLASSIFICATION AND DIVISION. 
 
 § 1. Three Great Classes 52-53 
 
 § 2. Unity of the Three Classes in Consciousness, . . 54-55 
 § 3. Division of the Subject, 55 
 
 PART I. 
 
 GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF MIND. 
 
 CHAPTER y. 
 
 CONSCIOUSNESS. 
 
 § 1. Nature of Consciousness, 56-57 
 
 § 2. Area of Consciousness. — Degrees of consciousness. — 
 
 Apperception, 57-60 
 
 § 3. Development of Consciousness, 60-62 
 
 § 4. Nervous Conditions of Consciousness, . . . 62-64 
 
 § 5. Sentience and Sensibility, 64-65 
 
 § 6. Kinds of Consciousness as Dependent on Nervous Func- 
 tion. — Passive consciousness. — Reactive conscious- 
 ness. — Voluntary consciousness. — Fundamental prop- 
 erties of consciousness, 65-70 
 
 § 7. The Nervous System and the Unity of Consciousness, . 70-71 
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ATTENTION. 
 
 § 1. Definition of Attention. — Reflex or involuntary atten- 
 tion. — Voluntary attention, 71-74 
 
 §2. Bearings of Attention in tlie Menial Life. — Relation of 
 attention to sensation. — To movement. — To the intel- 
 lect.— To feeling.— To the bodily functions, . 75-79 
 
 § 3. Educational Bearings of the Doctrine of Attention.— 
 
 Training of the attention. — Habits of attention, . 79-80 
 
C0NTt:NT8. 
 
 PART II. 
 
 INTELLECT. 
 
 CHAPTER YII. 
 
 DIVISION OF THE INTELLECTUAL FUNCTIONS. 
 
 1. The Apperceptive Function, 
 
 2. The national Function, . 
 
 PAGES 
 
 81 
 83 
 
 §6. 
 
 §8. 
 
 THE APPERCEPTIVE FUNCTIOK 
 
 PRESENTATION. 
 
 CHAPTER Vni. 
 
 SENSATION. 
 
 General Nature of Sensation. — Distinction between 
 sensation and impression. — Affective and presenta- 
 tive elements in sensation, 
 
 Characters of Sensation, 
 
 Quality of Sensation. — Relativity of. — Contrast, 
 
 Special Sensations. — Smell, — Taste. — Hearing. — Pre- 
 sentative elements in sensations of sound.— Sight, 
 
 Common Sensations.— Organic . — Cutaneous. — Touch. 
 — Temperature sense. — Muscular sensations. — Kin- 
 aesthetic. — Innervation sensations. — Effort and re- 
 sistance. — Presentative element in muscular sensa- 
 tions. — Nervous sensations. — Physiological basis of 
 common sensations, 
 
 Quantity of Sensation : Psychophysics. — Wobfi's law. 
 — Extensive or massive sensations. 
 
 Duration of Sensation and Tlwught : Psychometry. — 
 Effect of attention upon the duration and quantity- 
 of sensation. — Effect of duration upon the intensity 
 of sensation, 
 
 Tone of Sensation, . . . . . 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 PERCEPTION. 
 
 83-84 
 84-85 
 85-87 
 
 87-93 
 
 Definition of Perception, 
 Analysis of Perception, 
 
 93-103 
 103-106 
 
 106-110 
 110 
 
 111 
 111-113 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 \ 3. Differentiation, 112-113 
 
 5 4. Localization. — The perception of space. — Data for the 
 perception of space. — Synthesis of data ; tactual 
 space, — Visual perception of space. — Presentation 
 of foreign body. — Visual perception of distance. — 
 Localization of sounds in space. — Feeling of equi- 
 librium from the ear. — Ideal product of localiza- 
 tion : idea of space, 113-123 
 
 5 5. Sense-Intuition. — Motor-intuition, .... 123-126 
 \JS^ Reflection or Self -consciousness. — Ideal product of 
 
 reflection ; idea of self, 126-127 
 
 REPRESENTATION. 
 Pernors. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 RETENTION AND REPRODUCTION. 
 
 Memory. — Difference between 
 representation. — Definition of 
 
 General Nature of 
 presentation and 
 memory, 128-134 
 
 Retention. — Theories of retention. — Physiological 
 theory. — Physical basis of memory. — Mental con- 
 ditions of retention, 134-143 
 
 Reproduction. — Its primary condition. — Supplemen- 
 tary condition. — Secondary aids to reproduction. — 
 Power of imaging.— Retention and reproduction as 
 mental growth, . . • , • • • • 143-148 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 RECOGNITION AND LOCALIZATION. 
 
 § 1. Recognition. — Feeling of familiarity. — Distinction be- 
 tween recognition of an object and of an image, . 149-152 
 
 §2. Ideal Product of Recognition : Personal Identity, . 152 
 
 § 3. Localization in Time. — Data for the reconstruction of 
 time. — Intensity as an indication of time. — Move- 
 ments of attention as indicating position in time. — 
 Units of duration.— Perception of time by the ear, 152-159 
 
 § 4. Ideal Product of Temporal Localization : Idea of 
 
 Time, 159 
 
 §5. Kinds of Memory : Local, Logical, .... 159-160 
 
CONTEXTS. 
 
 IX 
 
 COMBINATION. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 ASSOCIATION. 
 
 § 1. General Nature of Association. — Definition. — Ground 
 or reason of association : the preceding idea. — 
 Physiological basis of association, 
 
 § 2. Laics of Association. — Particular or secondary laws. — 
 Association by contrast. — Universal or primary 
 law. — Law of correlation. — Interest as influenc- 
 ing association, 
 
 §3. For^ns of Association . — Complex associations, . 
 
 § 4. Force of Association, 
 
 161-163 
 
 163-171 
 
 171-174 
 
 174 
 
 §1- 
 
 §3. 
 
 §3. 
 §4. 
 
 §5. 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 IMAGINATION. 
 
 Passive Imagination. — Material of the imagination. — 
 Presuppositions : memory and association, . 
 
 Modes of Passive Imagination. — Dissociation. — Com- 
 position. — Fancy. — Relation of fancy to reality, 
 
 Active or Constructive Imagination. — Definition, 
 
 Analysis of Constructive Imagination. — Natural im- 
 pulse or appetence. — Intention. — Selective atten- 
 tion. — Feeling of fitness, 
 
 Kinds of Constructive Imagination. — Scientific imag- 
 ination. — Relation of scientific imagination to 
 reality : Esthetic imagination. — Law of construc- 
 tive imagination : correlation, .... 
 
 Ideal Product of the Imagination : the Infinite, 
 
 175-178 
 
 178-182 
 182 
 
 182-187 
 
 18i 
 
 -191 
 191 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 ILLUSIONS. 
 
 § 1. Nature of Illusion. — General character of illusion. — 
 
 Illusion due to interpretation, .... 192-194 
 
 § 2. Grounds of Illusion. — Similarity of presentations and 
 representations. — Absence of internal stimulus. — 
 Intra-organic stimulus : Mental predisposition to 
 illusion 194-198 
 
 § 3. Kinds of Illusion. — Illusion proper. — Elements of 
 
 reality in illusion proper.— Hallucination, . . 198-201 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGKS 
 
 4. Detection and Rectification of Illusion. — Diminished 
 intensity. — Absence of locality. — Inappropriate 
 escort. — Voluntary control, 201-204 
 
 ELABORATION. 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THOUGH^. 
 
 1. Nature of ThougJit.— General character.— Stages, . 205-206 
 
 2. Conception. — Process of conception. — Abstraction. — 
 
 Generalization. — Products of conception. — Lan- 
 guage in its relation to conception. — The use of 
 images in conception, 206-211 
 
 3. Judgment. — Its nature. — Law of identity. — Unity of 
 
 the judgment. — Parts of the proposition, . . 211-214 
 
 4. Kinds of Judgment. — According to intention. — Ac- 
 
 cording to belief : categorical judgments. — Law of 
 sufficient reason. — Hypothetical judgments, . 214-216 
 
 5. Reasoning. — Deduction : the syllogism. — Conceptual 
 
 interpretation of the syllogism, .... 216-219 
 
 6. Induction. — Relation of induction and deduction, 219 
 
 7. Proof, 219-220 
 
 8. Ideal Product of Thought 220-221 
 
 §1 
 
 PART III. 
 
 FEELING, 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 
 NATURE AND DIVISIONS OF SENSIBTLTY. 
 
 Nature of Sensibility. — Definition. — Most general 
 
 mark of sensibility, 
 
 § 2. Division, 
 
 CHAPTER XVII. 
 
 PLEASURE AND PAIN. 
 
 § 1. Physical Condition^ k)f PimWU aiutTain, 
 § 2. Resulting Conception.— General conclusion on sen- 
 suous pleasure and pain, 
 
 222-224 
 225 
 
 226-233 
 233-236 
 
CONTENTS. XI 
 
 PAGES 
 
 § 3. Primary Ideal Conditions, 236-237 
 
 § 4. Secondary Conditions, 237-239 
 
 § 5, Final Conclusion on Pleasure and Pain, . . - 240 
 
 IDEAL FEELING. 
 CHAPTER XVIII. 
 
 NATTJRE AND DIVISIONS OF IDEAL FEELING. 
 
 § 1. Nature. — Ideal vs. sensuous feelings, . . . 241 
 
 § 2. Division. — Ideal feelings as special and common. — 
 
 Ideal pleasure and pain, 241-242 
 
 COMMON IDEAL FEELING. 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 INTEREST, REALITY, AND BELIEF. 
 
 § 1. General Character of Common Ideal Feeling: Interest. — 
 Conditions of interest. — Interest of discrimination. 
 — Active interest. — Interest of custom or habit. — 
 Definition of interest. — Interest as ideal emotion, 243-249 
 
 § 2. Beality-feeling. — Distinction between belief and real- 
 ity-feeling. — Rise of reality-feeling. — Rise of un- 
 reality-feeling. — Degrees of reality- and unreality- 
 feeling, 249-253 
 
 § 3. Belief. — Doubt. — Development of doubt. — Resolution 
 of doubt. — Nature of belief. — Reaction of belief on 
 reality.— Kinds of belief , 253-257 
 
 § 4. Belief in External Reality. — Its coefficient. — Primacy 
 of muscular sensations. — Criteria of external 
 reality, 257-258 
 
 § 5. Belief in Memory. — Memory-coefficient, — Completed 
 
 criterion of reality, 259-261 
 
 § 6. Belief in Concepts and ThougJit.—Thought-coemciQnt, 261-262 
 
 § 7. Emotional Belief, 262 
 
 § 8. General Conclusion. — Composite realities, — Self the 
 ultimate reality, — Existence, — Relation of belief to 
 will, — Definition of belief, — Interest and belief, 262-265 
 
xii 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 SPECIAL IDEAL FEELINGS. 
 (Sluallt^, or 1kln&0, 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 
 DIVISION : PRESENTATIVE EMOTIONS, 
 
 PAGES 
 
 § 1. Duision. — General nature. — Kinds, .... 266-267 
 
 § 2. Emotions of Activity. — Of adjustment. — Of function, 267 
 
 § 3. Emotions of Content, 268 
 
 §4. Self- Emotions, 269-270 
 
 § 5. Objective Emotions, 270 
 
 § 6. Expressive Emotions. — Emotions of attraction. — Of 
 
 repulsion, 270-273 
 
 § 7. SympatJietic Emotion. — Its nature and development. 
 
 —Social feeling, 273-278 
 
 § 8. Bepresentative Emotions, 278 
 
 §1- 
 §3. 
 §3. 
 
 §4. 
 §5. 
 
 §7. 
 
 CHAPTER XXI. 
 
 EMOTIONS OF RELATION. 
 
 Logical Emotion, 
 
 Conceptual Emotion 
 
 Construction of Ideals.. — Nature of ideals. — Feeling of 
 
 fitness 
 
 Range of Conceptual Feeling, 
 
 Feelings for System. — In science. — In philosophy, 
 Etliicdl Feeling. — Its coefficient. — Moral quality. — 
 
 Moral sympathy. — Moral authority. — Moral ideal. 
 
 — Rules of conduct, 
 
 JEstlietic Feeling. — Lower. — Higher. — Varieties in, . 
 General Table of Feelings, 
 
 279-280 
 
 280-281 
 
 281-284 
 284 
 284 
 
 284-293 
 293-298 
 
 §2. 
 
 CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 QUANTITY AND DURATION OF EMOTION. 
 
 Quantity or Intensity. — Relativity. — Emotional Ex- 
 pression. — Diifusion of emotion. — Passion. — The- 
 ories of emotion. — Reproduction of emotion. — 
 Association and conflict of emotions, 
 
 Duration of Emotion, 
 
 299-306 
 306-307 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 §3. 
 §3. 
 
 §4. 
 
 §5. 
 §6. 
 
 PART IV. 
 
 MOTOR ASPECTS OF SENSUOUS FEELING. 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 THE MOTOR CONSCIOUSNESS. 
 
 PAGES 
 
 . Idea of tJie Motor Consciousness. — Law of mental dy- 
 namogenesis. — Varieties of the motor conscious- 
 ness, 308-309 
 
 Motor Value of tJie Subconscious, .... 309-311 
 Motor Value of Reactive Consciousness. — Elements 
 
 involved, 311-313 
 
 Feeling of Expenditure in Reflex Attention. — Sensorial 
 
 and intellectual attention, 313-314 
 
 Theory of Refl£x Attention, 314-316 
 
 Conclusion on Reflex Attention, .... 316-317 
 
 CHAPTER XXIV. 
 
 STIMULI TO INVOLUNTARY MOVEMENT. 
 
 Notion of Stimulus. — Kinds of motor stimuli. — Extra- 
 organic. — Reflex. — Suggestion as motor stimulus. 
 — Organic stimuli. — Expressive reactions. — Pleas- , 
 ure and pain as stimuli. — Nature of pleasure and 
 pain reactions. — Motor spontaneity, . . . 318-324 
 
 Impulse and Instinct. — Impulse. — Definition. — In- 
 stinct. — Complexity of instinct. — Definition of 
 instinct. — Variability of instinct, . . 324^330 
 
 Affective Nature of all Stimuli to Movement. — Affects. 
 
 —Division of affects, 330-331 
 
 MOTOR ASPECTS OF IDEAL FEELING. 
 CHAPTER XXV. 
 
 STIMULI TO VOLUNTARY MOVEMENT. 
 
 § 1. The Voluntary Motor Consciousness : General Stim- 
 uli. — Interest. — Affects as voluntary stimuli, . 332-334 
 
 § 2. Special Stimulus : Desire. — Impulse in desire. — Desire 
 and its objects. — Rise of desire. — Tone of desire. — 
 Coefficient of desire. — Physical basis of desire, 334-338 
 
 § 3. Motive, ,,....,., 338 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 §3. 
 
 §3. 
 
 §4. 
 
 §5. 
 §6. 
 
 CHAPTER XXVI. 
 
 VOLUNTARY MOVEMENT. 
 
 FAGES 
 
 Feelings of Effort and Consent. — Fiat, psychological 
 and physiological. — Neget, psychological and phys- 
 iological. — Consent. — Summary on muscular effort. 
 — Muscular effort and the attention. — Develop- 
 ment of voluntary movement. — Theory of innerva- 
 tion, 339-346 
 
 CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 VOLITION. 
 
 Purpose : Voluntary Attention as Choice. — Law of 
 motive, — Nature of motives. — Volitional appercep- 
 tion. — Controlling motive. — Deliberation. — Choice. 
 — Potential and final choice. — Feeling of alterna- 
 tives. — Moral choice. — Choice and habit. — Intellec- 
 tual effort, 
 
 Character. — Development of character, through 
 choice, 
 
 Initiation of Motives by Attention, .... 
 
 Freedom of the M7^.—Indeterminism.— External de- 
 terminism. — Immanent determinism. — Freedom as 
 self-expression, — Feeling of freedom — of responsi- 
 bility, 
 
 Effects of Volition. — Expressive effects. — Effects 
 proper.— Physical control.— Mental and moral 
 control, ,,....... 367-371 
 
 Rational Aspects of Volition. — Intuition of power. — 
 
 Intuition of obligation, 371-373 
 
 347-358 
 
 358-361 
 361-363 
 
 363-367 
 
GLOSSARY OF TERMS.' 
 
 Presentation : a mental picture or image, any object of knowledge or thooght. 
 
 Representation : the same when remembered or revived. 
 
 Presentative : having reference to an object of consciousness. 
 
 Idea : a mental state of any kind, considered as subject to reproduction or revival. 
 
 Subjective : belonging to the subject, i. e., to consciousness itself. 
 
 Objective : belonging to things considered as objects of consciousness. 
 
 Empirical : belonging to or derived from the observation of events themselves; de- 
 rived from experience. 
 
 Experiential : the same. 
 
 Empiricism: the doctrine that all knowledge is derived exclusively from experi- 
 ence. 
 
 Intuition : (1) the act of looking at directly, without a medium of any kind ; (2) 
 the information reached by euch an act ; (.3) knowledge is intuitive or 
 rational when it is open to immediate inspection, i. e., needs no proof. 
 
 Rational : applied to knowledge in about the same sense as intuitive, above. 
 
 Intuitionalism : the doctrine that some knowledge is intuitive, i. e., not derived 
 exclusively from experience ; opposed to Empiricism. 
 
 Phenomenon : an event, change, happening, of any kind. 
 
 Synthesis : (1) a union of elements in which these elements are themselves hidden; 
 (2) the process of uniting elements as described. 
 
 Integration : (1) a union of elements in which these elements are still evident ; (2) 
 the process of bringing about such a union of elements. 
 
 Function : (1) an activity, process, or performance (applied to organisms) ; (2) an 
 expression for, or way of stating a thing (mathematical use) ; (3) a regular 
 appearance of, or event in (consciousness : use in psychology). 
 
 Relative : to a degree dependent. 
 
 Absolute : not relative, independent. 
 
 Content : material, or filling. 
 
 Form : that which sets limits to a content ; that which ia filled. 
 
 Postulate: si, presupposition. 
 
 Hypothesis : a postulate put forth to explain a set of observed facts. 
 
 Inductive : resting on observed facts. 
 
 Deductive : guaranteed by a general principle. 
 
 Affective : happening in consciousness but not referring to an object ; opposed to 
 2)resentative. 
 
 Co-efficient : an essential i)eculiarity, or distinguishing mark ; a standard, or 
 normal value. 
 
 Dynamic : progressive, forceful, causal. 
 
 1 The best way for the student to become familiar with the use of these words 
 is simply to neglect this list until he come to the terms one by one in the body of 
 the book. 
 
xvi REFERENCES. 
 
 Genetic ; belonging to the origin or birth. 
 Reaction : response, stimulated discharge. 
 Sensor : stimulating, or contnbuting to, sensation. 
 Motor : stimulating, or contributing to, movement. 
 Afferent : transmitting toward the brain ; sensor ; centripetal. 
 Efferent : transmitting away from the brain ; motor ; centrifugal. 
 Periphery : outside, surface (of the body). 
 Peripheral : belonging to the periphery. 
 
 Central : belonging to, or located in, the nerve centers, or gray matter of the 
 nervous system. 
 
 REFERENCES. 
 
 The student may consult with profit the expositions given, from different points 
 of view, in the following works, where full references to further literature may 
 also be found : 
 
 James, Principles Of Psychology (2 vols., Holt and Macmillan). 
 
 Hbffding, Outlines of Psychology CMacmiUan'). 
 
 Sully, The Human Mind (2 vols., Longmans). 
 
 Ladd, Elements of Physiological Psychology (Scribners). 
 
 Ribot, Germaii Psychology of To-day (Scribners). 
 
 Bain, The Senses and the Intellect (3d ed., Longmans). 
 
 Bain, The Emotions and the Will (3d ed., Longmans). 
 
 Wundt, Grundzuge der Physiologischen Psychologie (2 vole., 3d ed., 
 
 Engelmann, Leipzig). 
 Wundt, Vorlesungen uber die Menschen und Thierseele (2d ed., 
 
 Voes, Leipzig). 
 Volkmann, Lehrhuch der Psychologie (3d ed , Schulze, Cothen). 
 
 References to the author's Handbook of Psychology (2 vols.. Holt and Macmillan) 
 are given at the beginning of the several chapters of this book. 
 
ELEMENTS OF PSYCHOLOGY. 
 
 INTRODUCTION, 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 NATURE OF PSYCHOLOGY. » 
 
 § 1. Definition. 
 
 Subject-matter of Psychology. We may define psy- 
 chology as the science of the phenomena of consciousness, 
 being careful to include consciousness wherever and in 
 whatever stages it be found ; or, if we emphasize, not so 
 much the facts with which we deal, as the mode of our 
 knowledge of these facts as the science of mind as ice know 
 it. 
 
 By " phenomena of consciousness " we mean happenings 
 or events in consciousness, everything that belongs to our 
 minds : sensations, impulses, acts of will, reasoning proc- 
 esses, etc. 
 
 The question of psychology is : " Is there an order of 
 mental facts apart from the phenomena of the physical 
 sciences and especially physiology ? " This question is 
 sometimes answered negatively. Psychology, we are told 
 by the materialists, is properly a branch of physiology : 
 
 ^ Handbook, vol. i. chap. 1. A footnote reference such as this is 
 given at the beginning of each of the following chapters to indicate 
 the fuller treatment of the corresponding topics in my Handbook of 
 Psychology. Full references for further reading are to be found at 
 the end of the several chapters of the Handbook. 
 
2 : NATURE, OF PSYCHOLOGY. 
 
 since physiology, as the' science of tlie functions of the 
 bodily organs — the lungs in respiration, the heart in circu- 
 lation — includes the function of the brain, which is thought. 
 Psychology thus becomes a special chapter in physiology. 
 
 This identification of mental facts with organic and 
 vital facts is wrong. There exists between the two orders 
 of facts a radical opposition in several particulars. 
 
 Distinction between Psychological and Physiological 
 Pacts. The opposition between these two classes of facts 
 takes several distinct phases. 
 
 I. Relation to Movement. The organic functions are 
 simply movements of the organs of the body, that is, 
 movements of matter in space. The functions of diges- 
 tion and circulation are the physical activity of their 
 respective organs, and the science of such functions is 
 nothing more than the complete knowledge of these 
 movements. With thought or feeling the case is very 
 different. Without doubt thought has some of its con- 
 ditions in the brain, and yet we cannot say that thought is 
 movement. The most that can be said, by the most ad- 
 vanced materialism, is that thought is an effect or result of 
 cerebral movement. Let the movement be what it may 
 and let the mental fact be what it may, there is nothing in 
 common between them. Something must be added to 
 movement to give feeling. The fullest know^ledge of the 
 brain would not lead us to suspect the existence of such a 
 thing as thought if we did not know it already in con- 
 sciousness. If an animal for example, says M. Rabier, ex- 
 perienced sensations quite different from any we know, the 
 most exact knowledge of what takes place in the brain of 
 the animal would throw no light upon their nature ; just 
 as full knowledge of the auditory and visual apparatus 
 gives no idea of sound or color to the man born deaf or 
 blind. 
 
 For this reason, we cannot speak of thought as occupy- 
 ing space or as having exact locality. All such forms of 
 
SUBJECT-MATTER. 3 
 
 expression will be seen, upon examination, to refer properly 
 to the physiological accompaniment of thought. For ex- 
 ample, we speak of the localization of speech in Broca's con- 
 volution ; but it is the brain modification which accom- 
 panies speech that is there located. Suppose all our words 
 were impressed upon the brain, making it, as some seem 
 to consider it, a kind of magazine of photographic plates, 
 still the great mental essential, consciousness, might be 
 wanting. 
 
 II. Relation to measurement: mental facts, unlike 
 physical facts, cannot be directly measured. For the meas- 
 urement of external magnitudes extension affords us at 
 once definite and constant standards ; but for states of con- 
 sciousness we have no such exact means of procedure. The 
 fact that mental events are subjective in their nature makes 
 them liable to all the uncertainties of subjective estimation. 
 This difficulty is further enhanced by the consideration 
 that the mental fact is always associated with a physical 
 fact, and it is impossible to isolate the former. Tliis is 
 seen in both the cases in which physical measurements seem 
 to be most successful : in the measurement of the duration 
 of mental acts and of the quantity or intensity of sensa- 
 tions. In the former case we proceed upon the supposi- 
 tion that time standards can be employed for mind as 
 space standards for body : but the time occupied by the 
 cerebral event is so interwoven with that of the mental 
 that it has proved impossible to separate them. 
 
 III. Mental states are distinguished from physical states 
 in the means through which they are knoicn. As modifi- 
 cations of matter, ph^'sical facts are known through the 
 senses. Bodily functions are thus laid open to the gaze of 
 the physician and the anatomist. The brain itself may be 
 observed in its activities after the operation of trepanning. 
 But mental states escape all such observation. They are 
 known, on the contrary, in an immediate way through the 
 consciousness of the individual. And while we are able to 
 
4 NATURE OF PSYCHOLOGY. 
 
 observe and analyze the physical processes of others, our 
 immediate knowledge of mind is limited to ourselves. 
 
 IV. TTie most essential characteristic of mental states is 
 their subjective nature; what we may call their inner as- 
 X)ect, in the phraseology of late science. By this is meant 
 that relation to a self or subject that makes them what the}^ 
 are in distinction from outer phenomena, which, as far as we 
 know, have an existence apart from such a reference. This 
 distinction is admitted even by those who reduce the two 
 classes of phenomena ultimately to a single i^rinciple. 
 This fact of a self affected becomes in developed mental 
 states a matter of reflection and differentiation from the 
 not-self ; a distinction arising, as will appear, within the 
 inner aspect, and impossible without such a subjective 
 beginning. 
 
 V. The method of mental activity is quite distinct from 
 that of the physical forces. As we proceed we shall find a 
 constantly recurring fact of mental sj^ntbesis whereb}'', b}" 
 conscious mental activity, states of consciousness are 
 gathered and unified in new products themselves appar- 
 ently simple and original. In the physical world we find 
 no such unifying force as that known in psychology as the 
 activity of apperception.* 
 
 True Relation of Psychology to Physiology. These two 
 orders of facts lead us to two distinct sciences — equall}^ 
 sciences of fact or natural sciences. Psychology cannot be a 
 chapter of physiology, because the methods and results of 
 physiology do not reach nor involve mental data. One is 
 a subjective science and the other is an objective science, 
 and the difference is strictly experiential. 
 
 The absolute separation of psychology from physiology, 
 however, in point of matter, does not imply their independ- 
 ence of each other in point of fact. They are united in 
 fact by a bond which finds analogy only in that which 
 unites the science of the inorganic, chemistry, with that of 
 life^ biology. Life introduces a new series of phenomena 
 ' 'i'reatcd below, 
 
DIFFICULTIES AXD ERRORS. 5 
 
 into nature, but the morphological changes it produces are 
 accomplished only through the processes of inorganic 
 or chemical change. So psychologv, while introducing a 
 new order of phenomena, proceeds immediately upon the 
 data of physiological change. The connection of the two 
 is as real as their separation. The physiologist often 
 finds the causes of organic modification (facial expression) 
 in the movements of the mind, and the psychologist 
 likewise finds causes for mental modification (sensation) in 
 states and functions of the body. 
 
 § 2. Difficulties and Errors ix Psychology. 
 
 It has already been said that consciousness is the one 
 characteristic of what we denominate mental. The diffi- 
 culties and errors, therefore, that arise in psychology must 
 be difficulties and errors either in the reports or in the in- 
 terpretation of consciousness. There can be no doubt that 
 there are such difficulties and errors, for otherwise the 
 science would be much more developed than it is. They 
 cannot arise in the actual reports of consciousness, for by 
 its intimate nature as immediate feeling of inner states it 
 reveals what actually is and happens. Considered, then, as 
 arising from the interpretation or mental building up of 
 the data of consciousness, several kinds of error may be 
 pointed out. 
 
 I. Difficulty of distinguishing Consciousness from 
 Association and Inference. The primitive data of con- 
 sciousness are no longer presented simply in adult life, but 
 carry with them a mass of complex and derived material. 
 "Hardly has consciousness spoken," says Mill, " when its 
 testimony is buried under a mountain of acquired notions." 
 The fact that there is a higher and lower in the mental 
 life — a development from first things — is sufficient to show 
 the reason of this confusion. For example, we shall find 
 in studying sense-perception that the localization of things 
 in space, which seems to be an immediate act of conscious' 
 
6 natuhb of psychology. 
 
 ness, is really due to a very complicated construction from 
 data of sensation, and the general process of memory 
 carries with it an instinctive belief in the reality of our 
 images, due largely to association, which leads us often into 
 illusion. So marked do these difficulties and confusions 
 become in the higher processes that some additional safe- 
 guard must be resorted to : some method of reducing com- 
 plex mental states to the simple data of consciousness. 
 This resort is found in Conscious Heflection. 
 
 Use of Reflection. Even though the necessity spoken 
 of did not exist, still simple consciousness, however clear, 
 would not be sufficient for science. Consciousness is 
 knowledge of present states, new and revived, and gives us 
 only a play of present conditions. The scientific observa- 
 tion of mind demands more than this. It demands the 
 turning back of the powers of thought and reason upon our 
 immediate knowledge for its examination, testing, system- 
 atization. Simple observation does not suffice for the 
 science of physics, nor will it, for the same reason, for the 
 science of psychology. 
 
 By reflection, therefore, consciousness itself becomes a 
 matter of consciousness. To observe consciousness I must 
 stand aside, so to speak, apart from myself and report what 
 takes place in myself. If it is attention which I wish to 
 observe, I must attend to the act of attention, in order to 
 describe it. There is in such reflection a species of sec- 
 ondary or subordinate consciousness, from the ground of 
 which we look in upon our primary self. This apparent 
 doubleness, or the effort to place ourselves beyond the range 
 of our own states in reflection, leads to new sources of diffi- 
 culty. 
 
 II. Disturbing Effects of Reflection. Reflection, con- 
 sidered as the turning in of the mental processes upon 
 themselves, necessarilj^, by a great law of attention, exerts 
 a disturbing influence. All our mental states are rendered 
 more intense by the attention:^ consequently as soon as the 
 ' Treated below. 
 
SUPPLEMEXTARY SOURCES. 7 
 
 state observed comes within the range of fruitful observa- 
 tion, it is changed, both in its own integrity and in its rel- 
 ative importance in the mental life. A pain attended to, 
 for the express purpose of estimating its intensity, becomes 
 more intense. Operations, also, which demand close appli- 
 cation or successive mental efforts, are completely suspend- 
 ed by reflection. A difiicult logical problem or musical 
 performance becomes more difficult or impossible of accom- 
 plishment when, by reflection, we note the stages of the 
 process. Mental effectiveness seems to require a single di- 
 rection of consciousness. On the other hand, also, certain 
 states of mind make reflection impossible, their temporary 
 importance in consciousness being overpowering : such as 
 strong fear, anger, and the emotions generally. But psy- 
 chology, as a science, cannot dispense with the complete 
 knowledge of such states, since they are sometimes most 
 important and enlightening. Indeed aggravated states, 
 especially when they become manifestations of mental dis- 
 ease, generally cast most light on the normal processes from 
 which they arise. 
 
 Means of Remedying these Difaculties: Supplemen- 
 tary Psychological Sources. In view of these limitations, 
 the psychologist is thrown back upon any other means he 
 may command to correct, complement, and enlarge the 
 scope of reflection. In general these supplementary^ sources 
 of information are internal and external. 
 
 I. Internal Source : Memory. The errors of internal re- 
 flection which arise from the deranging effects of attention 
 may be remedied in large part by memory. Mental states 
 which cannot be madetlie object of immediate examination 
 in the present, may be recalled from the past and held before 
 the attention as reproduced images. The facility with 
 which the mind does this is quite remarkable. Frequently 
 an experience which is obscure or meaningless, an unknown 
 sound, an unrecognized face, a vision, is thus recalled and 
 given a rational explanation. The psychologist often 
 
8 NATURE OF PSYCHOLOGY. 
 
 catches liiraself just emerging from a state before almost 
 unconscious, which, being brought back in vivid detail, is 
 of especial value and frnitfulness for his psychological 
 theory. 
 
 This fact of memory is further strengthened by the 
 phenomenon of after images or after sensations — traces left 
 in the mental life after the actual stimuli have ceased to 
 act. Of these we shall speak more in detail. There is a 
 vibratory persistence in the nervous organism which tends 
 to continue the central process and its accompanying 
 mental state. And the same residuum or after-effect is 
 also j^robably a mental necessity, since time is needed for 
 the shifting movements of attention in its transition to new 
 experiences ; during this period there is notliing to drive 
 the former experience from consciousness, and it persists a 
 noticeable time. 
 
 II. External Sources. If it is impossible to deny the 
 utility of inner observation, it is almost equally" dangerous to 
 depend upon it exclusively. Failure to resort unceasingly 
 and repeatedly to external observation at every stage of 
 our stud}^ leads to tlie most chimerical subjective systems 
 and the most one-sided views of life. So evident is this 
 that, even when most strongly emphasizing the inner 
 source of data, psychologists have found it necessary to la}^ 
 hold upon whatever certified records of others' experiences 
 in health or disease they found available, and held them 
 up as valuable. Among these external sources we may 
 enumerate the following, to which it will be necessary 
 from time to time to refer : 
 
 1. JRace Psychology. This is, in the first place, the 
 study of mind in its social characteristics, and in its prod- 
 ucts in society, the state, religions, customs, and institu- 
 tions. It accepts all the results of anthropology and views 
 them as tlie manifestations of the mind. It examines 
 ancient philosophies, cults, and civilizations ; literatures, 
 history, laws, mythologies, traditions, the sources from 
 
EXTERNAL SOURCES. 9 
 
 whicli tlie human mind has drawn its culture in all ages. 
 It values the reports of travelers in respect to savages, 
 lieathen, and degenerate races ; the conditions of social 
 life everywhere. For in all these manifestations of the 
 life of the human mind, we have direct information respect- 
 ing its nature and capacities. 
 
 2. Animal or Comparative Psychology. - As might be 
 expected, the study of animals is of extreme importance 
 for our science ; for animals show^ striking evidences of 
 the i^lienomena of consciousness both in its lower and in 
 many of its higher forms. It is perhaps destined, judg- 
 ing from the contributions it has already made to some 
 departments of research, to throw as much light upon 
 human psychology as comparative anatomy has upon 
 human physiology. As is tlie case with many physical 
 functions, so certain intellectual states are seen in animals 
 in a less developed and complex state, or in a more sharp- 
 ened and predominant state, than in man ; and thus the 
 necessit}^ for a genetic study of tliese states is met to a 
 greater or less degree. Instinct, for example, attains its 
 most perfect form in animals, memory is often remarkably 
 developed, and certain of their senses show a degree of 
 acuteness which we would never expect the corresponding 
 human senses to possess. And the study of animals for 
 psychological purposes is not limited to observation of 
 their habits, productive as such observation is ; but the 
 physiological method is capable of much more extended 
 use than in experiment upon man. Condemned animals 
 may be directly used for purposes of neurological research 
 under conditions which rule out all pain to the creatures. 
 The variety of problems which may thus be reached is 
 limited only by our ability to state them and our ingenuity 
 in planning the experiments. 
 
 3. Infant Psychology. The importance of the early 
 study of mind is to be equally insisted upon. By it mental 
 facts are reached, as far as ihej ever can be, at their origin 
 
10 NATURE OF PSYCHOLOGY. 
 
 and in their simplest form. It is more important to know 
 what mind is than what it becomes. The child serves to 
 correct the reports of adult life by opening up object les- 
 sons in the growth of mind. At the outset the child mind 
 is lower than the highest animal mind, since, while its 
 human possibilities have not emerged, its instinctive equip- 
 ment is not as'varied as that of animals ; but in its rapid 
 development it exhibits the unfoldings of organic mental 
 growth in correspondence with the growth of the bodily 
 system, an advantage found in none of the other fields of 
 observation.* 
 
 4. Abnormal Psychology. As in the former sources of 
 information we deal with mind in health here we come 
 to consider it in disease : that is, Ave look to all abnormal 
 or diseased conditions of the mental life for light upon 
 its nature and upon its legitimate operations. It includes 
 all cases of variation from the normal and healthy activity 
 of conscious mind : sleep-walking, dreams, insanity in 
 its multiplied forms, loss of memory, loss of speech, 
 hypnotism, idiocy, hallucination, disturbances of conscious- 
 ness generally. All these variations aiford — as such varia- 
 tions in any science afford — instructive views into the 
 working of mind in its most intimate character. And the 
 reason for this is plain. Such cases offer immediate occa- 
 sion for the application of the logical method of difference^ 
 which consists in removing part of a cause or effect and 
 observing tlie consequent variations in the corresponding 
 effect or cause. This procedure enables us to attach an 
 effect to its true cause. One most general result of the 
 study of mental disease, for example, is this, that we have 
 learned to seek its cause in diseased conditions of the body, 
 rather than in obscure mental movements or supernatural 
 influences. It has been well said that a man deprived of 
 one of his senses from birth is a subject especially prepared 
 
 ' On the problem and method of Infant Psychology, see my article 
 in Science, December 26, 1890. 
 
UNITY OF SOXTRCES. 11 
 
 by nature for the application of tlie method of difference. 
 The science of mental disease and its cure is called Psy- 
 chiatry. 
 
 § 3. UxiTY OF Psychological Sources in Consciousness. 
 From tlie external standpoint, psychology stands upon 
 a level with the other sciences of observation ; but by the 
 addition of inner experience it attains a unity they do not 
 possess. The medium of all observation of nature, con- 
 sciousness, which does not enter as part of the material of 
 other sciences but often acts as a hindering cause, here 
 serves within the circle of the science itself a useful and 
 important role. The interpretation of facts, called in 
 science the " personal equation," is in psychology an act of 
 essential value, since data for psj^chology can be explained 
 only from the point of view of mind. In short, external 
 observation, which is necessarily of the physical, and of 
 the mental only through the physical, must be translated 
 into the forms of our own inner life. The ultimate basis, 
 tlierefore, of psychological interpretation and construction 
 is the mental experience of the individual, in so far as it is 
 normal and typical. 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 PSYCHOLOGICAL METHOD. » 
 
 § 1. Principles of Scientific Method. 
 
 In G-eneral. The question of method is an important pre- 
 liminary to all scientific work. It involves the two great 
 questions, first, what is the destination, and second, what is 
 the road to the destination. In the preceding chapter, in the 
 consideration of the subject-matter of psycliology, the for- 
 mer has been considered. It remains to inquire into the 
 latter ; through what means or by what kind of procedure 
 shall we investigate tlie matter before us in order to reach 
 the most general and exhaustive results ? 
 
 This problem is practically solved for us in the method 
 of the objective sciences. For if, as has been said, psychol- 
 ogy is a science of fact, as they are, and proceeds by the 
 observation of a given class of facts, as they do, then the 
 tried method of procedure which they employ will be most 
 productive here. 
 
 True scientific method includes the three following 
 processes, the first two of which belong more properly to 
 Induction.^ First, Observation y by which is meant the 
 widest possible appeal to fact, by way of an actual under- 
 standing of the cases in hand. It must be extended 
 to include all reliable testimony. The . broad defining 
 marks of the material treated of become thus apparent and 
 great classes are reached. This constitutes natural history, 
 rather than natural science ; it describes the subject-matter 
 but does not explain it. Second, Experiment; which consists 
 
 ' Handbook, vol. i. chap. ii. 
 
 2 On Induction and Deduction see the chapter on Thought, 
 
 J3 
 
OBSERVATIOX, 13 
 
 in the varying of the conditions under which the facts 
 are observed. It leads to the discovery of essential reasons 
 or causes. It proceeds by certain subordinate methods or 
 canons of its own, called since Mill " canons of induction." 
 The product of experimental research is the Hypothesis 
 or Empirical Law : a more or less probable conjecture, 
 based upon the results of experimentation, as to the true 
 cause operating in the case in hand. This is, in so far, 
 no longer a description merelj^, but an explanation. Third, 
 Deduction / which is the final stage in scientific method. 
 By it the general principle set forth in the hypothesis is 
 made applicable to successive individual cases, and by a 
 new appeal to experience the truth of this application is 
 made sure. Each such successful application tends to 
 establisli tlie hypothesis more firml}^ until it reaches the 
 rank of a principle or Law of Nature. 
 
 § 2. Application of Scientific Method to 
 Psychology. 
 
 The application to psychology of the principles of method 
 just mentioned is, in the main, clear : yet many questions 
 of lively debate arise in consistently carrying them out. 
 The two great spheres of their operation are the two sources 
 of psychological data, internal and external. 
 
 Psychological Observation. I. Internal. As a means of 
 access to the phenomena of mind we find available three 
 distinct phases of inner observation. In the first place, the 
 simple fact of Consciousness, that inner aspect which makes 
 mental facts what they are, in its primitive form, is at once 
 awareness of the states of self. However vague and in- 
 definite this primitive awareness is at first, it is still a 
 beginning. There is no experience in conscious life 
 which leaves absolutely no trace of itself. Once it is 
 an experience, a modification of subjectivity ; then it may 
 become the object of the developed act of inner obser- 
 vation. The first fleeting sensations of the child, when 
 
14 PSYCHOLOGICAL METHOD. 
 
 there is no subject or object, no store of memory images, no 
 idea of self, exhibit in isolation the kind of primitive con- 
 sciousness that lies at the basis of all knowledge of self. In 
 adult life these experiences are assimilated to the developed 
 forms of intellect and their separate meaning is lost. But 
 in this category are included the vast number of first experi- 
 ences as they pass steadily on in time, something every 
 moment ; and all the information we glean from them before 
 we recall, examine, and reflect upon them. Second, the 
 state of mind called Primary -memory : the lingering in 
 consciousness of an event just after the event itself is 
 gone. The immediate past hangs around us as a line of 
 trailing cloud on the horizon of consciousness. So speedy 
 and involuntary^ is this presence of the shortly-past that it 
 is sometimes considered the first stage of our inner observa- 
 tion ; yet this cannot be held in the sense of denying the 
 immediate awareness of the primitive consciousness. For 
 example a loud noise, or a spoken word, may be unintelli- 
 gible until its quick recall enables us to recognize it. We 
 have had, in these cases, the " immediate awareness " of 
 the first event, but the examination of the after-image 
 which it leaves adds much to the scientific value of the 
 experience. Third, we reach Reflection, or conscious 
 observation. By reflection is meant the inspection of 
 the events of the inner world as distinct objects of our 
 knowledge. It is the highest form of internal observation. 
 Thus, by reflection, inner happenings are built up into 
 hypotheses concerning the nature and processes of the men- 
 tal life. This constitutes the point of departure for the 
 second stage in the finished scheme of method. 
 
 II. External Observation. By the method of external 
 observation we approach the various external sources of 
 psychological data mentioned in the last chapter. The 
 closed nature of the individual consciousness makes it im- 
 possible that the consciousness of others should be reached 
 except through the interpreted meaning of external signs. 
 
EXPERIMENT. 15 
 
 All the products of human genius and culture become thus 
 the objects of observation, with a view to bringing the de- 
 tached parts of truth thus discovered into liarmony with 
 our individual experience. So, also, the observation of 
 children and animals brings its rich contribution. 
 
 By simple observation, however, in psychology, as 
 is the case in the material sciences, we do not reach 
 below the surface. Many claim that this is all that we 
 can do, and that a description of mental facts is the true 
 aim of the science. Yet, as rare as true description is 
 in this field, and as broad a field for analysis as simple ob- 
 servation affords, we find ourselves asking : Is there no 
 means of breaking up the complex groups of mental 
 states, of detaching individual mental movements from the 
 enormous mass of interwoven threads which our adult 
 thought presents? In short, is there no field for experi- 
 ment, either internal or external, in psychology? We 
 answer, as recent research is answering, that there is — 
 but with important conditions and qualifications. 
 
 § 3. Experiment ix Psychology. 
 The need of experiment in psychology is exceedingly 
 great. When we remember that, in the search for causes in 
 the natural world, tlie difficulties are vastl}'- enhanced by 
 the fact tliat single causes are never found at work alone, 
 and tliat it is the function of experiment so to eliminate 
 elements in a causal complex, that isolated agencies may be 
 observed at work ; and when we further reflect that no 
 single function of mind is ever found operating alone, but 
 that all accompany and modify each — the inadequacy of 
 simple observation in this field becomes apparent. A 
 sense stimulation, for example, may arouse an intellectual 
 train, an emotional outburst, a course of action ; are all 
 these the effects of a single cause ? A course of action, 
 conversely, may result from an emotion, a thought, a 
 pjemory, an association, a sensation, an inspiration ; cau 
 
16 PSYCHOLOGICAL METHOD. 
 
 the simple description of the resulting action indicate 
 which is its cause ? Antecedents and consequents are 
 thrown into the mental life in inextricable confusion. Ex- 
 ternal or bodily causes — ^an odor, a spoken word, a pain, an 
 internal organic movement — may start a train. This train 
 may be hindered or advanced by a thousand considerations 
 or emotions ; other bodily or mental causes may modify it. 
 And all together make up the cause or complex antecedent 
 state ; while vague analogies of thought and feeling, such 
 as temperament, heredity, education, make variations 
 between individuals, and the present condition of the 
 brain and nerve centers makes variations in the same in- 
 dividual. How can we single out the cause, in this net- 
 work, by observation ? It is as vain as to discover the 
 cause of a conflagration from examining the blaze ; was it a 
 match, lightning, friction, chemical composition ? Only 
 one step can determine : the reconstruction, under artificial 
 circumstances, of the conditions, and the endeavor to 
 exhibit a single isolated cause. This is experiment. We 
 may look at the case, as before, from the points of view of 
 the internal and external approach to mind. 
 
 I. Internal Experiment. The range of internal experi- 
 ment is very contracted, from the fact that it is hard to 
 induce artificial states of mind entirely from within. Yet 
 we can often suggest things to ourselves that change the 
 course of our thought and give us a plainly isolated effect. 
 We can force ourselves into lines of thought or emotion 
 by holding given images fixedly before the mind — such as 
 a shocking murder or the death of a close friend — and 
 watch the result in the flow of emotion. On a larger scale 
 one can subject himself to a series of intellectual influences 
 and note the change it works in his habits of thought and 
 feeling. The actor has thus constantly to experiment with 
 his emotional states, cultivating those which adequately 
 portray the character he represents. All such intentional 
 manipulation of consciousness, however, demands a high 
 
EX PER I ME XT. 17 
 
 degree of mental control and concentration, great delicacy 
 of observation and fidelity of description, to be of use for 
 the general science. 
 
 Experiment of this kind, however, is more effective upon 
 others than upon ourselves. Tiie whole possibility of sug- 
 gestion to others is here open to our touch, and we may 
 play upon their emotions, hopes, ambitions, plans, ideas, as 
 upon the keyboard of an instrument. AVe are all more or 
 less skilled in such experiment ; we suit our advice to 
 the man — offering a money inducement to one, a posi- 
 tion of honor to another. So educational methods proceed 
 upon experimental know^ledge of others : the awarding of 
 prizes, the use of object lessons, appeals to individual man- 
 liness, corporeal punishment ; indeed all discrimination in 
 the treatment of children proceeds upon such experimental 
 knowledge. In the hypnotic state and in infant life ' an 
 unlimited range of suggestion is open to the investigator, 
 and in sleep the same kind of influence is possible though 
 to a much more limited degree. 
 
 II. External Experiment. The possibility of finding 
 that a bodih^ or external cause has been the determining 
 factor in a mental result, opens up to our view the sphere 
 of external experiment. We are at once led to see that 
 a series of experiments upon the body may be devised, 
 and the results ascertained which follow in the conscious 
 life ; that is, reversing the relation of cause and effect 
 which ordinarily obtains, we may consider bodily modifica- 
 tions cause and their accompanying mental modifications 
 effects ; thus isolating mental facts through artificial and 
 single physiological stimuli. 
 
 That such a procedure is justified is seen from the fact 
 that our daily lives are full of inferences of this kind. 
 The connection between the physical and the mental is so 
 close and unquestioned that we never fail to take it into 
 
 ' See my article " Suggestion in Infancy," in Science, February 37, 
 1891. 
 
18 PSYCHOLOGICAL METHOD. 
 
 account. Many states of mind are treated as arising di- 
 rectly from states of the body. The whole treatment of 
 mental disease proceeds upon this basis ; and sensations, 
 the material of knowledge, are known to arise from direct 
 sense-stimulation. The effects of alcoholic stimulants 
 upon the mind are plain. The elevation, however, of this 
 rough sense of connection between mind and body into a 
 law of scientific method is only now getting general recog- 
 nition. Its results constitute what is called " physiologi- 
 cal psychology." 
 
 General Conclusion. We are thus led to the following 
 general conclusion as to the nature and method of psycho- 
 logical inquiry : There is, first of all, in consciousness a 
 kind of activity which affords at once the necessity and 
 the justification of a higher science, inductive, internal, 
 descriptive, and analytic ; that its method is that of direct 
 observation ; and that, inasmuch as the phenomena of 
 which it is cognizant are purely mental, it must precede 
 and embrace those branches of the science which deal wdth 
 the phenomena of body. Second, these mental phenomena 
 sustain an universal and uniform connection with the bodily 
 organism through which physiological experiment becomes 
 possible, carrying with it a twofold utility : the causal 
 analysis of phenomena and the confirmation of their em- 
 pirical generalizations. And third, the science can never 
 reach completion, or its laws attain their widest generality, 
 until all mental facts are interpreted in the light of this 
 connection with body or shown to be independent of it. 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM.^ 
 § 1. Its Structure. 
 
 The fact that body and mind are connected so closely, 
 and that true psycliological method must proceed upon 
 this connection, makes some preliminary knowledge neces- 
 sary of the nervous system and its functions. 
 
 Nerve-elements. As far as our knowledge goes, Ave 
 are able to make a twofold distinction among the elements 
 called nervous, nerve-fibers and nerve-cells. As to what 
 these are, the general meaning ordinarily attached to the 
 words expresses about the amount of knowledge physiol- 
 ogists possess. That is, a nerve-fiber is a thread-like con- 
 nection between different muscular and cellular masses. A 
 greater or smaller number of these white thread-like fibers 
 may unite together to constitute a " nerve," which connects 
 an organ (muscle, gland, etc.) with a greater or smaller 
 mass of cells. The cells, on the other hand, are micro- 
 scopic elements shaped like a flask or long-necked squash. 
 One of the necks — for there may be more than one — seems 
 to be prolonged into the fiber, and is called the axis-cylia- 
 der process of the cell. Both cells and nerves have nuclei, 
 small dark points which are surrounded b}^ protoplasm. 
 The nerves are also cut up at intervals by nodes resem- 
 bling the divisions in a length of corn-stalk. See Figs. 1 
 and 2. 
 
 Some cells, however, are found without such connections, 
 as far as microscopic analysis is able to go. And in many 
 cases no direct continuity of structure has been discovered 
 ' Handbook, vol. ii. chap. i. 
 
 19 
 
20 
 
 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 between cells and fibers which are supposed to unite in a 
 common function. In these cases the fiber divides into 
 numerous ramifications, presenting the appearance of a tree 
 with its top branches turned toward the cell. See Fig. 4. 
 
 Fig. 1.— From apiece >f spinal cord. tI and5. gaiiglion-colls ; at Z>, axis-cylinder; 
 j9, protoplasmic process ; C, neuroglia-cells. (After Raavier, from Edinger, 
 Am. Ed.) 
 
 The cells are largely gathered in masses or "centers," 
 toward which fibers from different regions or organs con- 
 verge and apparently lose themselves. What is usuall}'^ 
 called the brain is a series of such centers, varying in size 
 and complexity from the cerebral cortex or rind, down- 
 wai'd into the sinnal cord. In the centers the cells are 
 
NERVE ELEMEXrs. 
 
 21 
 
 separated by a substance called neuroglia 
 (see Fig. 1), wliicli may be simply a form 
 of connective tissue not itself nervous — 
 tjie opinion of the majority of neurologists 
 — or a third nervous element whose func- 
 tion is bound up with that of the cells — a 
 view supported by some later research. 
 
 Combination of Nerve-el6ments in a 
 System. The elements spoken of some- 
 what artificially as cells and fibers have no 
 functional existence apart from each other 
 and from the living organism as a whole. 
 Viewed as a whole, as receiving, register- 
 ing, and reacting upon stimuli, they con- 
 stitute the nervous system. As a system, 
 the nervous apparatus is essential to the 
 life of a higher organism and partakes 
 with it of a great differentiation of parts. 
 Wliat we call organs or members of the 
 body have a unity of their own struc- 
 turally; but their functional activity is 
 one witlr the general life-process of the 
 whole. So the organs or members of the 
 nervous system have a corresponding 
 structural differentiation. Whether the 
 three general functions of the system 
 spoken of above, receiving, registering, 
 and reacting upon stimuli, are in any 
 way adequate as a functional conception 
 or not, they will at any rate serve to guide 
 us in describing the three great parts or 
 divisions of the nerve-apparatus. We 
 will accordingly say a word about these 
 three divisions in order. 
 
 The Receiving or Sensor Appara- 
 tus. By this is meant that part of the 
 
 
 Fig. 2.— Nerve fibers, 
 (af rcr Schvvalbe). a. 
 Axis cylinder ; $, 
 slieathof Schwann ; 
 n. nnciens ; p, pran- 
 nlar substance atthe 
 poles of thenucleus; 
 r, Ranvicr's nodes, 
 where the mednllary 
 sheath is interrnpt- 
 ed and the axis-cyl- 
 inder appears. 
 
22 THE XEBYOrS SYSTEM. 
 
 nervous system which is normally concerned with- stim- 
 uli from without. We say normally concerned, since 
 there is reason to believe that all nerve-tissue has the 
 receiving proj^erty. But we find a great sj'stem of fibrous 
 pathways arranged for the evident purpose of propagat- 
 ing disturbances from the periphery of the body, and 
 from various organs, to the higher ceuters. Further, these 
 fibrous pathways may have special receiving organs ex- 
 posed to the peculiar stimulus which we call psychologi- 
 cally the stimulus to a particular sensation ; such special 
 organs being peculiar to the special senses, as the eye for 
 sight, ear for hearing, etc. Accordingly, the receiving 
 apparatus includes two distinct elements, the senso7' coiirse 
 and the end-organ. The latter (say the eye) i-eceives some 
 form of excitation (light), and the former (optic nerve) 
 propagates it to the brain. 
 
 The existence of sensor courses which have no end- 
 organs is sufiicient to show that the latter is not a neces- 
 sary part of the system, except when the sj^stem is highly 
 differentiated. A sensor nerve may be stimulated mechan- 
 ically by a blow, by a touch upon an exposed point, etc., 
 even in the case of the nerves of special sense ; they then 
 report the sensations ordinarily secured through their end- 
 organs.^ 
 
 The nerves of special sense show no structural peculiari- 
 ties except the possession of the end-organ. By nerves of 
 special sense are meant those which report sensations rec- 
 ognized and classed as having distinct psychological qual- 
 ity. Tliat is, we find special end -organs for each of the 
 seven classes of sensations discussed below, the muscles 
 being considered end-organs of the muscular sense. 
 
 Besides these, there is a mass of nerve-courses which 
 report less distinctly differentiated and localized stimuli, 
 the purest and most general psychological condition that 
 
 * For example, sparks of light which result from a blow on the 
 optic nerve or from mechanical irritation of a blind eye. 
 
THE SENSOn APPAnATUS. 
 
 23 
 
 they induce being pleasure and pain. Tliese are called 
 general as o23posed to the special courses, and constitute 
 the physiological basis of the general sensihility. 
 
 As to distribution, the sensor apparatus is coincident 
 in extent with the body itself. The orgaws of general sen- 
 
 FiG. 3.— The spinal cord and nerve-roote. A, a small portion of the cord seen from 
 the ventral side ; B, the same seen laterally; C, a cross-section of the cord; D, 
 the two roots of a spinal nerve; l,anterior(ventral) fissure: 2, posterior (dorsal) 
 fissure; 3, surface groove along the line of attachment of the anterior nerve- 
 roots: 4, line of origin of the posterior roots; 5, anterior root filament of a 
 spinal nerve ; 6, posterior root filament; 6', ganglion of the posterior root; 7. 7, 
 the first two divisions of the nerve-trunk after its formation by the union of the 
 two roots. 
 
 sibilitj'' are distributed throughout in the form of very fine 
 fibrils ; these fibrils being gathered into l)undles and these 
 again into larger bundles or nerves as they approach the 
 central course, the spinal cord. AYith these are the nerves 
 of touch and muscular movement, also of general distribu- 
 tion, the whole being consolidated into two columns which 
 form part of the white matter of the spinal cord. The pos- 
 terior or dorsal portion of the cord (the portion farther 
 hack — ?(/> in animals) is called the sensor portion (pos- 
 
24 THE XEnrors SYSTEM. 
 
 tero- median columns). After gathering up tlie representa- 
 tive fibers from all the successive nerves of sense wliicli run 
 into the spinal cord, these tracts terminate in the upper 
 enlargement of the cord (medulla); but further pathways 
 lead up to the highest center, the cortex of the brain — and 
 this is the essential point. For the location of these tracts 
 in the cord, see Fig. 3. 
 
 Another tract (the cerebellar) is also supposed to carry 
 incoming impulses upward ; it arises from cells distributed 
 along the cord and passes continuously to the cerebellum 
 (little brain). As the cerebellum is also in direct connection 
 with the hemispheres, another upward path is thus estab- 
 lished. Foster further suj^poses that incoming impulses 
 may travel by the gray matter of the cord (see below), or 
 by portions of the gray matter with the longitudinal fibers 
 which connect different segments of the cord together.^ 
 
 Upon the endings of the sensor courses recent research 
 has thrown some light. Peripherally, the sensor fibers 
 end in the tree-like ramifications spoken of above. Going 
 inward, such a fiber reaches first a cell in the spinal gan- 
 glion, then penetrates the posterior horn of the cord, and 
 terminates in the gray matter of the cord in the " tree 
 structure " again. Here its influence seems to be trans- 
 mitted to a sensory cell from which a fiber proceeds up the 
 posterior column to the cerebral cortex as described, end- 
 ing as before in the " tree structure." See Fig. 4. 
 
 The arrangemetit of the apparatus of the special senses 
 is more special, indicating to a degree the order of devel- 
 opment of their several functions. The muscular sense 
 extends to all the muscles ; touch and temperature to the 
 peripher}^, the end-organs residing largely in the skin."^ 
 
 ^ Text-hook of Physiology , ^i\i ed., pt. lii. p. 1104. Cf. his whole 
 discussion, ibid. § 9. 
 
 '■^ And in the mucous membrane of the mouth and pharynx, which 
 constitutes with the skin the derivatives of the epiblastic layer of the 
 embryo. 
 
THE MOTOn APPARATCS. 25 
 
 Tbe other special senses, siglit, lieariiig, taste, and smell, 
 have each a particular locality; but they are grouped 
 together, and their nerves, by reason of their special and 
 closer connection with the central ;iervous masses in the 
 skull, are called cranial nerves. 
 
 The Reacting or Motor Apparatus The analogy be- 
 tween tlie receiving and the reacting apparatus is so close 
 
 Fig. 4.— Transverse section of spinal cord, showing anterior (17) and posterior 
 horn«, sense organ (skin, 2), muscle (23), brain cortex (12), and spinal ganglion, 
 (3). Sensory path— 2. 5, 3, 4.6, 7, 8, 9, 9i, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14. Volnntary motor 
 path— 15, 16. 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23. Reflex path -2, 5, M, 4, 6, 7, 8, 9, 20, 21, 22. 
 23. Note the " tree-structure " nerve endings. (After Waldeyer.) 
 
 tliat they may be taken up together ; more especially as 
 the purest type of reaction, as will appear below, assumes 
 that there is no break of continuity between them. The 
 nature of the reaction itself is a point of function and is 
 reserved ; the apparatus is what asks attention now. 
 
 In the reaction we find another system of nerves, the 
 motor courses^ quite indistinguishable from the sensor 
 
26 THE KEnVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 courses, except in their localities and their endings. They 
 are also alike among themselves as regards their end-organ, 
 the muscles.^ They issue directly from the bodj^ of the 
 muscles and converge to the spinal cord, of which they 
 constitute roughly the anterior (front) or ventral portion 
 — the so-called pyramidal tracts. The essential facts, 
 again, are the continuity of structure throughout and the 
 universal distribution of the motor courses to the muscular 
 tissue. The distribution, however, does not secure equall}^ 
 ready reaction of all the muscles ; indeed, some of the 
 muscles are either entirely outside the range of voluntary 
 control, or are brought within only by much exertion. 
 
 As to their endings the motor courses exhibit more sim- 
 plicity. They arise directly from cells in the cortex, and 
 have their first ending in the *' tree-structure " in the ante- 
 rior horns of the spinal gray matter. There the *' influence " 
 is taken up by the spinal motor cell, and from it is trans- 
 mitted direct to the muscle by means of a nerve with the 
 "tree-structure" ending. See Fig. 4. 
 
 At the upper end of the spinal cord there is an enlarge- 
 ment, the medulla oblongata^ in which occurs a rearrange- 
 ment of all the courses and their distribution to the various 
 masses of the brain. Above the medulla again we find 
 other white fibrous bodies — which need not be enumerated — 
 serving two evident purposes ; ^. e.^ they gather together 
 fibers which minister to the same function, and distribute 
 these fibers to the cellular bodies at which such functions 
 have their brain-seat. In these higher white masses, motor 
 and sensor courses are inextricably interwoven ; and in 
 only a few cases has research succeeded in establishing 
 pathwa3^s up or down. Without giving details, we may 
 say that the following points are quite definite : 
 
 1. Sensor tracts pass from all parts of the periphery of 
 the body up through the dorsal column of the spinal cord, 
 
 ' The secretive and vaso-motor connections are, for our present 
 purpose, neglected. 
 
SEXSOR AXT) MOTOJl TRACTS. 27 
 
 cross (decussate) in part in the medulla, and reach the sur- 
 face of the opposite hemisphere of the brain (largely the 
 rear and nether portion). 
 
 2. Motor tracts pass from all parts of the periphery up 
 through the ventral column of the spinal cord, cross in part 
 
 Fig. 5.— Scheme of pyracnidal tracts, p^,])"^,])^. Periphery of body; n\n^,v^, 
 spinal nuclei of oriijin ; Pi/S, lateral pyramidal tract; Pt/V. anterior pyrauiuhil 
 tract ; ca, anterior commissure of spinal cord ; DP, decussation of pyramids ; 
 F;/. pyramids; Pp, pes pedunculi cerebri ; Ci, internal capsule ; Po, pons : 7ifw, 
 nuclei pontis ; cb, cerebellum; />•», periphery supplied by cranial nerves; n*, 
 nucleus of origin of a cranial nerve ; C to 6'^, cortex cerebri. (Obersleiner.) 
 
 in the medulla, and reach the opposite hemisphere in the 
 motor zone (area on both sides the fissure* of Rolando, 
 including the paracentral lobule *). Tliese courses are 
 called the pyramidal tracts, from the pyramid form in 
 
 * See below, § 4, I, and Frontispiece. 
 
28 
 
 Tiihj xERVovs srsTEyf. 
 
 wliicli they are buuclied on the ventral side of the medulla. 
 See Figs. 5 and 6. 
 
 3. Association tracts develop, in the course of the life of 
 the individual, to connect all parts of the cortex of the 
 
 Cortex of the brain 
 
 Fig. C— Diagram of innervation of a muscle. (After Edinger, Am. EdO 
 
 brain with one another. They are almost, if not quite, 
 absent at birth. In the words of Edinger : "They extend 
 everyvvdiere from convolution to convolution, connecting 
 parts which lie near eacli other as well as those which are 
 w idely separated. They are developed when two different 
 regions of tlie cortex are associated in a common action." * 
 See Fig. 7. 
 
 ' Stntctvre of the Central Nervous System, p. 69. 
 
ASSOCIATION r It ACTS. 
 
 29 
 
 Under the same head may be included also the fibers 
 which connect the two hemispheres with each other, 
 
 Fig. 
 
 -Diagrammatic representation of a part of the association fibers of one 
 hemisphere. (After Edinger, Am. Ed.^ 
 
 making of them a single organ in relation to the lower 
 parts of the system. Such connections are found in two 
 great bundles called the corpus callosum, which is the floor 
 
 Fig. 8,— Frontal section of tlie course of the corpus callosum and the anterior 
 commissure, (After Edinger, Am. Ed.) 
 
30 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 of the great longitudinal fissure which separates the hemi- 
 spheres from above; and in the anterior commissure below. 
 Both are shown in the accompanying figure (8). 
 
 The Registering Apparatus. Under this term we in- 
 clude the more or less complex chain of cellular elements 
 which constitutes/ the center receiving and reacting. The 
 word registering emphasizes again the integration or 
 development side of the nerve-process. In its most gen- 
 eral or schematic outline, the system is made up of two 
 similar nerve-courses brought into organic connection at 
 their upper end by this cellular series. It may be repre- 
 
 M_ 
 
 \ 
 
 s 
 
 Fig. 9. 
 
 sented to the eye in the following simple way : M being 
 the motor course, S the sensor course, and C the central 
 elements: the whole constitutes the elementary weryows arc 
 (Fig. 9). 
 
 Our knowledge of the central elements is exceedingly 
 vague, both as regards structure and function. As to 
 structure, the most exact thing that we can say is that 
 the center is cellular and probably in all cases complex. 
 Its complexity is indeed so striking and elaborate that it is 
 this feature that tends to obscure all others and render re- 
 search fruitless. A general distinction is made by physi- 
 ologists between the simple arc and the complex mass of 
 many arcs with their accompanying highly integrated 
 center ; but the simple arc is a pure abstraction. Indeed its 
 very conception is dependent upon the results of an analysis 
 of the centers which has never been made. In reality it is 
 probable that the simplest nerve-reaction of which we have 
 any knowledge involves a cellular mass and a nunaber of 
 
ITS STRUCTURE. 
 
 31 
 
 I 
 
 alternative motor and sensor tracts. Such a relatively 
 simple system is found in the ascidians, which have only a 
 single ganglion with sensor and motor filaments. See 
 Fig. 10. 
 
 In distribution, the central masses again illustrate the 
 hierarchical arrangement due to development. The sim- 
 plest of such arcs are at the points of union of nerve- 
 courses, points where the motor and the 
 sensor find an interchange of energies, 
 or a distribution so uninvolved as to 
 follow from the nature of the nervous 
 integration it represents, without appeal 
 to a higher and more complex center. 
 Such comparatively simple points are 
 called ganglia. For example, the 
 nerves which enter the spinal cord on 
 eitlier side at intervals throughout its 
 wdiole extent divide a short distance 
 from the cord, and send branches 
 called motor and sensory roots, respec- 
 tively, into the cord. Just above the 
 point of division, on the sensory root, 
 we find a sicelling or lump, a ganglion. 
 thought, represents a junction, to use a railroad figure, for 
 the transfer of passengers and the interchange of tele- 
 graphic messages.^ See Fig. 3 above. 
 
 The spinal cord is made up of a series of segments, to- 
 gether forming a column in the center of which is a con- 
 tinuous mass of gray (cellular) matter. This gray column 
 gives off the spinal nerves from its two posterior and two 
 anterior horns (see Fig. 3) ; the nerves thus given off, right 
 aud left at the same level, meet just below tlie enlargement 
 or ganglion outside the cord. Above the spinal cord the 
 gray matter is enormously increased, as w-e should expect 
 
 1 On the fuuctions of the ganglia ami centers generally, see below, 
 p. 3a f. 
 
 Fig. 10.— Nervous eys- 
 tem of an Aecidian 
 (Carpenter), a, the 
 mouth ; b, the vent ; 
 c, the ganglion ; d, 
 muscular sac. 
 
 The ganglion, it is 
 
32 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 from the increase in the fibrous pathways ah-eady de- 
 scribed. Thus a number of bodies are formed in three con- 
 nected systems :^ first, the most central gray matter, serv- 
 ing to connect the spinal column with the higlier centers, 
 and giving the cells from which arise the cranial nerves ; 
 second, the tegmental system, including all tlie masses 
 which lie in the interior of tlie brain (the most important 
 being the striate bodies and the optic thalan%i)\ and third, 
 the surface masses, the cerebrum, which has its gray mat- 
 ter arranged in layers, giving the cortex or rind, and the 
 cerebellum ox little brain, a similar mass behind and beneath 
 the cerebrum with a similar cortex of its own. For present 
 purposes the essential points again to be noted in this 
 connection are, first, what we have called the hierarchical 
 cliaracter of the series, tlie unbroken advance in structural 
 complexity ; and second, the continuity of connection and 
 influence through it all. 
 
 § 2. Flnctions op the Nervous System. 
 
 Fundamental Properties of Nervous Tissue. Experi- 
 mental research upon living nerve-tissue has issued in a 
 conception of protoplasm which includes two functional 
 elements. At the first glance, nerve substance exhibits 
 the property called in general scientific nomenclature 
 irritability. This property is by no means confined to 
 developed nerve-elements ; it is exhibited by all living 
 animal tissue, by forms of organism in which a nervous 
 system is entirel}'' wanting. In some forms of vegetable 
 life, as the sensitive plant, the same property is presented. 
 In the case of nervous irritability, however, whenever the 
 substance assumes the complexity of a system, we are led 
 to view it under two distinct functional rubrics. Recalling 
 a former division, we find the receiving and the reacting 
 
 ^ Following Foster, Text-hook of Physiology, pt, ill. pp. 977-998. 
 For details and diagrams see any of the Physiologies ; Ladd's small 
 Outlines of Physiological Psychology is convenieut for reference. 
 
ITS FUNCTIONS. 33 
 
 apparatus to be appropriate to the same function, that of 
 propagation, transmission, or conduction ; and the central 
 arc, the registering apparatus, suggests a function of inte- 
 gration. Assuming the results of later exposition, these 
 two functions may be called, respectively, Neurility and 
 Sentience. 
 
 Let us consider, for example, the central arc A, of Fig. 9, 
 above, to be the center or nucleus of a protoplasmic mass, 
 and the two lines M and S to be two radii from the center 
 to the outer surface. If, then, the mass be stimulated at 
 the outer end of S, and this be followed by the withdrawal 
 of the point stimulated, we have a phenomenon of irrita- 
 bilit^^ But we may suppose S to be a line of conduction 
 of the excitation to A, and M the line of reverse conduction 
 or reaction which results in the contraction ; both of these 
 fall under the conception of Neurility. The process by 
 which they are held together at the exchange-bureau 
 A, so to speak, is Sentience. This rough conception may 
 be made more distinct as the two processes are taken up 
 singly. 
 
 1. Neurility. Under the head of neurility we are intro- 
 duced to a class of phenomena which have striking analo- 
 gies in physical science. The conception or phenomenon 
 of conduction is familiar in what we know of light, sound, 
 and heat propagation ; but the special analogy which at 
 once suggests itself is electric conduction along a metallic 
 wire. Setting aside as a matter of speculation the hy- 
 pothesis that neural force is identical with electricity, 
 we may still find in the analogy much help to a clear con- 
 ception of nervous conduction. 
 
 Indeed the theory of nervous action most current among 
 authorities — as w^ell as in the popular mind — finds its 
 general exposition in terms of the analogy with electric 
 action. On this theory, the nerve-courses are simply and 
 only conductive tracts, as the electric wire in a telegraph 
 system ; the centers, on the contrary, are the generators of 
 
34 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 "nervous force." At the center we have, therefore, a 
 storage-battery from whicli force is drawn off along'^the 
 motor courses upon the occasion of the arrival of a stimulus 
 from the sensor course. The centers, on this theory, are 
 the essential nervous agents, or producers, and the courses 
 are brought into operation onl}^ as they are charged from 
 the central battery or pile. Neurility, therefore, is simply 
 the molecular state which constitutes a course a good 
 nervous conductor. 
 
 This theory is objected to both on theoretical grounds 
 and from experiment. It makes the distinction between 
 courses and centers too absolute and mechanical. Accord- 
 ing to it, any distinct djmamic property is taken from the 
 nerve-tracts ; while experiments show that the elementary 
 portions of both sensor and motor nerves have a life and 
 function of their own. The eye when removed from its 
 socket, thus losing all connection with a center or ganglion, 
 still shows sensitiveness to light, and has a motor reaction 
 in the contraction or expansion of the iris. Pfliiger main- 
 tains that there is an increase in intensity in the nervous dis- 
 turbance as it traverses the motor nerve, and Richet thinks 
 a similar increase in the sensor nerves probable. The ordi- 
 nary phenomenon called knee-jerk is thought by some to 
 take place without appeal to a nervous center. 
 
 Accordingly, another theory is advanced which seems 
 more philosophical to the present writer, so far as he ven- 
 tures to have an opinion on a matter so purely physiological. 
 This second conception of the nervous system makes it a 
 living organism instinct with nervous force or neural prop- 
 erties throughout. This system is in a state of unstable 
 equilibrium and constant change, due to stimuli through 
 sense-organs and to spontaneous central discharge. Dis- 
 turbances tend to equalize themselves everywhere in the 
 system by a species of centrifugal and centripetal tension, 
 which, through its greater or less effectiveness in this direc- 
 tion or that, upon this course or that, results in conduction 
 
- SENTIENCE. 35 
 
 or iieurility. Differentiation, tlierefore, in tlie system, is 
 primarily structural differentiation, due to tlie adaptation 
 of the life-process to changing conditions in the environ- 
 ment. 
 
 The " dynamic" conception, as the latter may be called, 
 is supported by a class of facts which show a ready and 
 facile influence throughout the system, difficult to account 
 for if the parts between whicii the transfer occurs are 
 functionally distinct ; such general transfer affords the so- 
 called law of diffusion. For example, a simple sensory 
 stimulus may, Avhen intense, or when the system is excited 
 from disease, lead to general irritation and diffusive dis- 
 charge. On the other hand, a reflex having its center in a 
 particular spinal ganglion may be partially stopped by a 
 sensory excitation from another part of the body. Cases 
 of association between sounds and colors,^ and phenomena 
 of contrast* generally, show sucli dynamic connections be- 
 tween disparate sense-regions. Urban tschitsch found that 
 the perception of color was im[)roved when a tuning-fork 
 was made to vibrate near tlie ear. 
 
 However it may be explained, nervous conduction is of 
 fundamental importance for the theory of sensibility. And 
 for practical purposes the wave or current theory serves, 
 as in electricity, all ordinary requirements. The nervous 
 wave, therefore, is called centripetal or afferent when mov- 
 ing toward the center, and centrifugal or efferent when 
 moving toward the periphery. The rate of transmission 
 differs somewhat in the two directions, being about 120 
 feet per second for sensor and 110 feet for motor impulses. 
 Transmission through the spinal cord takes place consider- 
 ably more slowly. 
 
 2. Sentience. From the interpretation of results, and 
 from ph}''siological analogies, some general statements may 
 be made concerning the processes at the centers, and these 
 general statements are valuable for psycholog}^ ; but they 
 
 ^ See below. ' Below, chap. viii. i^ o, 
 
36 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 do not pretend to throw any light upon the genesis or 
 nature of nervous force. 
 
 a. Integration. Of these general statements, the first 
 concerns what has already been called the integrating 
 function of nerve centers. By this is meant the building 
 up of a center to greater complexity of structure through 
 new stimulations. It takes place by reason of the ex- 
 treme plasticity of the nervous elements in taking on ar- 
 rangements suited to more habitual and, at the same time, 
 more complex reactions. The center becomes the theater 
 of multiple and conflicting stimulations ; its reaction is the 
 outcome of a warfare of interests, and the pathway of dis- 
 charge is a line of conduction most favorable to future sim- 
 ilar outbursts. A center gains by such complex activities 
 in two ways : first, its habitual reactions become a rock- 
 bed or layer of elements, so to speak, of fixed function is- 
 suing in established paths of least resistance ; and second, 
 the center grows, gaining new and more mobile elements, 
 and responding by more complex and difficult move- 
 ments. For example, the center for the movements of the 
 hands is educated, from the early painful lessons of the 
 baby's finger movements to the delicate and rapid touch of 
 the skillful musician. Not only has the center become 
 fixed and automatic for movements at first painfully learned, 
 but it lias become educated by learning, so that it acquires 
 new combinations more easily. This twofold growth 
 becomes the basis of the division of the sentient apparatus 
 into centers and ganglia. The " rock-bed " elements, so- 
 called, fall into fixed ganglionic connections, and the new 
 and free cells take up the higher function, only in their 
 turn to become " fixed " by habit and to give place to yat 
 other and more complex combinations. This integrating 
 process is what gives the hierarchical order to the system, 
 and throws its law of development into fine relief. In- 
 tegration, therefore, represents a structural change in the 
 direction both of simplicity and of complexity : of siui- 
 
SENTIENCE. 37 
 
 plicity, because it gives ease and rapidity to habitual 
 movements ; of complexity, because it brings into play 
 new elements which must be assimilated to the unity of 
 the center. 
 
 h. Retention. The conception of integration necessarily 
 includes that of the permanence of the modification on 
 Avhich it depends. If reactions are integrated in such a 
 way as to secure the upbuilding of the sjstem and its more 
 perfect adaptation, then we must suppose that each reaction 
 works a minute structural change in the organism. So 
 much is included in the conception of integration. And 
 from the ph^^siological side tiiis would seem to be suffi- 
 cient. Retention, as a physiological principle, may, there- 
 fore, be called growth in functional complexity ; while the 
 term integration refers rather to growth in structural 
 complexity. 
 
 Accordingly, the conception of nervous retention runs 
 somewhat like this : Nervous retention is a state of dynamic 
 tension or tendency due to former nervous discharges in the 
 same direction ; the two essential points, again, being the 
 dynamic or tension aspect of nerve-action in general, and 
 the particularization of this tension along a given path 
 determined by previous like discharges. 
 
 c. Selection. A third fact of sentience may be called 
 selection. It denotes the undoubted property of the living 
 nervous system of reacting within limits of greater or less 
 adaptation. It shows p?*6/t?re/iC6 for certain stimuli above 
 others, if the word preference can be shorn of all its refer- 
 ence to conscious choice. A system will react on a stim- 
 ulus at one time which it will refuse under other circum- 
 stances ; or it will distinguish between stimuli exacth' 
 alike, as far as human sensibility for differences can deter- 
 mine. The brainless carp will distinguisli food with some 
 degree of precision, and experiments by Pfluger and Goltz 
 on brainless frogs show that they adapt their muscular 
 reactions to varied positions of the limbs which could not 
 
S8 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 have been experienced before in tlie life of the creatures. 
 Schrader has also reported many similar cases of apparent 
 preference and choice in brainless pigeons. 
 
 Such instances seem to show a selective function in nerve- 
 reactions of the purest type, i. e., those simply ganglionic, 
 Avhere the effects of consciousness are either quite wanting 
 or reduced to a minimum in intensit}^ The explanation is 
 perhaps to be found in the peculiar delicacy of the receiv- 
 ing apparatus. To say that a brainless animal selects when 
 we are unable to point out differences, is only to say that 
 more debased currency will pass for gold with us than with 
 it. Instead of selecting between two stimuli, therefore, it 
 has had only one, and has responded to it ; the other being 
 mistakenly considered by us as fitted to excite it. Does 
 the nervous S3^stem select from a multitude of similar 
 touches ? The magnet selects from a multitude of similar 
 filings ; and the explanation seems to be the same. Neither 
 the touches nor the filings are similar, after all. 
 
 Another explanation of selection must be mentioned, 
 however, both because it is held and because it affords a 
 philosophical and quite plausible hypothesis ; it is possible 
 that our subsequent discussions will bring us into accord 
 with it. It holds that sentience involves eonsciousness, 
 that nervous action is always conscious (not self-conscious) 
 action, and that a fundamental mark of consciousness is 
 preferential selection or choice. On this theory, therefore, 
 all such cases are instances of real selection, due to the 
 presence of consciousness. The explanation given to nerv- 
 ous selection has psj^chological significance, since, accord- 
 ing as it is explained, it may or may not give us data for 
 our theory of voluntary choice. 
 
 Law of Nervous Dynamogenesis. Sentience, in view 
 of what has been said, is a general word for the rise and 
 distribution of nervous force. The receiving and reacting 
 functions are both essential, the one necessarily giving rise 
 to the other ; there is no incoming nervous process, there- 
 
A UTOMA TIC RE A CTIOK. 3 9 
 
 fore, that does not tend to liberate energy on the outgoing 
 courses. Eoery stimulus has a ilynaniogenic or motor 
 force — may accordingly pass as a statement of the law in 
 its individual bearing, the only bearing which is available 
 as having a psychological analogy. 
 
 § 3. Kinds of Nervous Reaction. 
 
 The twofold growth of the nervous system spoken of 
 under integration gives us data for a distinction among 
 different reactions. Integration involves, on one side, a 
 downward or "ganglionic" growth, represented in func- 
 tion by the more unconscious and unintended reactions of 
 the muscular system ; aiid, on the other side, an upward 
 or " central " growth, represented by the more difficult 
 muscular performances, in which attention and effort are 
 called out. These two laws of growth act together, and in 
 the result, in our motor experience, we find every degree 
 of nervous facility or the contrary. Three stages of such 
 growth, from down up, so to speak, are usually distinguished. 
 
 1. Automatic Heaction.— By the automatic in nerve- 
 function is meant tlieself acting, i. «., those reactions which 
 find their stimulus in the living conditions of the physical 
 organism itself. Certain organic processes are neces- 
 sary^ to the life of the individual and the race — circula- 
 tion, respiration, digestion, etc. The dependence of 
 these essential functions upon external stimuli of time and 
 place would give an accidental and varied character to 
 these reactions which would subserve death rather than 
 life. Accordingly^ the automatic centers represent the 
 most consolidated and fixed portions of the nervous system, 
 at the same time they are complex and elaborate. These 
 functions may or may not be conscious, their most health- 
 ful activitv beinof sfenerallv most free from conscious over- 
 sight. AVith very rare exceptions, also, they cannot be 
 modified by the will or brought under voluntaiy control. 
 
40 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 2. Keflex Reactions. A iiervous circuit is reflex wlien 
 its motor reaction upon a particular kind of stimulus is 
 single, definite, constant, and does not involve volition in 
 its execution. In more general terms, a reaction is reflex 
 wlienever we are certain beforehand that it will take the 
 form of a particular well-defined muscular movement, and 
 will do its work without any interference or mandate from 
 ourselves. We are disposed to stand apart and attribute 
 the reaction to the organism or to the external stimulus. 
 For example, if a ball suddenly approach my ej^e, incloses, 
 or if it strike sharply upon my knee, my foot flies up ; we 
 do not say I close my eye or raise my foot. Or we go 
 further out still and say the man who threw the ball made 
 my eye close or my foot fly up — so thoroughh^ do we dis- 
 tinguish this class of reactions in consciousness from those 
 which we attribute to our own agency. 
 
 In its physiological character, this kind of reaction 
 represents a less organized and consolidated system of 
 elements than the automatic. A reflex reaction is gener- 
 ally conscious in its operation, and always so in its com- 
 pleted results. Its center, also, is not cut off functionally 
 from the higher centers of the brain, which exercise a con- 
 trolling influence. Yet we know that this connection is 
 not an essential one to the reaction itself, since after the 
 removal of the cerebrum and with it all active conscious- 
 ness (certainly ; perhaps all consciousness), the reaction 
 still takes place. Each of the segments of the spinal cord 
 has its own reactions apart from its brain-connection. 
 Indeed, reflex reactions are most perfect and pure when 
 consciousness in the form of attention is not directed to 
 the movements. These facts tend to throw reflexes 
 rather on the side of the " downward " growth spoken of, 
 and assimilate them to automatic reactions. The phe- 
 nomena presented by the reactions of a brainless frog 
 illustrate pure reflexes very clearly. 
 
 The downward growth appears from the fact that many 
 
REFLEX RE AC ri OK. 41 
 
 of our reflexes are acquired from habit and repetition. 
 Motor processes at first difficult and simple are welded to- 
 getlier in complex masses, and the whole becomes spon- 
 taneous and reflex. The case is cited of a musician who 
 was seized witli an epileptic attack in the midst of an 
 orchestral performance, and continued to play the measure 
 quite correctly wdiile in a state of apparently complete un- 
 consciousness. This is only an exaggerated case of our 
 common experience in walking, writing, etc. Just as a 
 number of single experiences of movement become merged 
 in a single idea of the whole, and the impulse to begin the 
 combination is sufficient to secure the performance of all 
 the details, so single nervous reactions become integrated 
 in a compound reflex. 
 
 This consideration leads to a further distinction between 
 more or less organized reflexes ; namely, between what are 
 called secondary-automatic reactions and reflexes proper. 
 In the case of our movements in walking, for example, the 
 successive reactions are not sufficiently organized to belong 
 properly to a single stimulus — sa}^ the original idea of our 
 destination, or the sensation of our first footfall upon the 
 pavement ; but the steps in succession are probably ex- 
 cited by the successive afferent impressions of the steps 
 accomplished. Each step stimulates the next, etc. That 
 tliere is no voluntary stimulation after the first is seen in 
 cases of reverie or absent-mindedness, when we go along 
 accustomed paths and find ourselves where we least in- 
 tended to " bring up." The distinction, therefore, is 
 merely one in degree of integration. If the centers are 
 sufficiently organized "downward" to carr}^ out the en- 
 tire chain of movements when once begun, we have a pure 
 reflex ; if new sensory stimulation is necessary at each 
 stage in the series, the reaction is secondary-automatic. 
 
 3. Voluntary Reaction. A third great class of nervous 
 reactions is called voluntary. By voluntary reactions are 
 meant such motor effects as follow upon the conscious will 
 
42 Tim NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 to move. Tiiey cover the whole class of intended move- 
 ments and those brought about by greater or less effort. 
 Voluntary movements show variation in several distinct 
 particulars ; such as strength, continuance, rapidity, and 
 direction. 
 
 The voluntary reaction undoubtedly represents the 
 highest stage of development of nerve-tissue as respects 
 coraplexit}^, or the lowest stage as respects consolida- 
 tion and fixedness. It is the polar opposite of the purely 
 automatic function. The nervous elements are in a state 
 of extreme mobility and instability. The connections 
 through its mass are infinite in number and complexity, 
 and numberless alternative courses are accordingly open 
 to the motor outburst of a sense-stimulation. Considering 
 the state of the cerebral center dynamically, we may say 
 that its potential energy is constantly seeking discharge, 
 and that this discharge in one course rather than another — 
 the course pictured and designed in consciousness — repre- 
 sents the line of tension which is chosen. 
 
 The last expression, though ps3^chological, is necessary 
 to express the physiological fact which distinguishes such 
 reactions. The stimulus is in all voluntary reactions a 
 central one, and a conscious pictured one ; this much at 
 least. If we admit that no discharge from the centers can 
 take place without a previous liberation of tension, then we 
 may divide such liberations from tension into two classes : 
 that which is brought about b}^ an incoming current, and 
 that which is brouglit about by an earlier cerebral dis- 
 charge. The former is a reflex reaction, the latter may be 
 a voluntary reaction. One at least of the conditions of 
 voluntary action is fulfilled, the physiological condition. 
 Whether this is sufficient in all cases, or in any case, to ac. 
 count for the action, it is our subsequent task to deter- 
 mine. 
 
 4. Negative Reaction or Inhibition. Under the name 
 of inhibition, or arrest, a class of phenomena is included 
 
INHIBITION. 43 
 
 which are, as far as our know ledge goes, peculiar to nervous 
 activities. Every positive reaction is accompanied by a re- 
 verse wave, an arrest, so to speak, of its full effects. It is 
 analogous to a negative force acting to counteract and neu- 
 tralize the outgoing discharge. It seems to take place in 
 the center. The effective force of a reaction, therefore, is 
 always less b}^ the amount of nervous arrest. This neutral- 
 izing factor has been measured in certain conditions of 
 nerve-reaction. 
 
 The kind of reaction showing least arrest is the reflex ; 
 and, in general, the more consolidated a nerve-track or 
 center, the less exhibition do we discover of the reverse 
 wave. On the other hand, inhibition is at its maximum 
 in reactions which involve centers of most complex activity. 
 The phenomena of voluntary control — inhibition by the 
 Avill — are in evidence here, however w^e may construe the 
 will. For it should be remembered that w^e must find a 
 mechanical basis for muscular control, even though we 
 advocate a directive and selective function of will. 
 
 Hence we may say that inhibition is a concomitant of 
 instability and complexity of nervous tissue ; and it be- 
 longs on the side of the *' upw^ard " growth of the system. 
 
 This general view is sustained by the fact now estab- 
 lished that each segmental reflex in the spinal cord is sub- 
 ject to inhibition from the higher segments, and in turn 
 inhibits those lower down. The reflexes of a frog's legs 
 immersed in dilute acid are more rapid and violent after 
 the hemispheres have been removed — showing the normal 
 inhibitive function of the cortex ; and the reflexes of a 
 lizard's tail have been shown to increase in vigor as the seg- 
 ments of the spinal cord are successivel}^ removed. The 
 same lack of inhibition appears in the greater automatism, 
 suggestibilit}^, and wayward impulsiveness of certain 
 forms of insanit3^ The same truth is made plain from the 
 fact that lesions of the motor zone of the cortex in man 
 produce greater motor disturbances than in animals, and 
 
44 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 greater in the dog than in tlie rabbit ; the inference being 
 that the snbcortical centers are more independent, less in- 
 hibited, as we go lower down in the scale of animal organ- 
 ization. 
 
 § 4. Corollaries : So-called " Principles op 
 Nervous Action." 
 
 The foregoing discussion has brought us to a position 
 from which to estimate the current " principles of nervous 
 action." That they are corollaries deducible from the 
 more particular truths already cited is in itself proof 
 of the truth of the conception sketched in the foregoing 
 pages. These " principles " may be spoken of in their logi- 
 cal order. 
 
 I. Principle of Specialization of Function. Accord- 
 ing to this principle, different regions of the nervous sys- 
 tem are concerned with different and exclusive functions. 
 Most important consequences flow from this principle in 
 the sphere of brain physiology and anatomy. And in the 
 local divisions of the cerebral surface we find facts 
 highly important to our own science. 
 
 Pacts of Specialization. A general fact or two may be 
 mentioned in view of subsequent points of discussion. In 
 the two halves or hemispheres of the brain we are led to 
 recognize a twofold or duplicate organ, analogous, to the 
 doubleness of the eyes while performing together a single 
 function. In regard to the function of the brain as a whole, 
 we may say that in the main it is performed equally well 
 by either hemisphere alone. If one hemisphere be entirely 
 removed or destroyed, there is no perceptible impairment 
 of the mind, at least in its great apperceptive activities. 
 The hemispheres are moreover capable of separate activities 
 at the same time ; the movements of organs on the right 
 side of the body which are governed by the motor area in 
 the left hemisphere, may be different from simultaneous 
 movements on the left side governed by the motor area in 
 
SPECIA LIZA TIOK 45 
 
 the right heniispliere. Again, there are certain functions 
 Avhich are presided over by one of the hemispheres exchi- 
 sively, the other having no part in them : the motor speech- 
 center is in the left hemisphere for right-lianded persons, 
 and it is probable that there is a corresponding functional 
 development for the delicate movements of one hand only, 
 as in writing, etc. Accordingly, instead of considering 
 the brain as two duplicate organs, either of which might be 
 educated to perform all the cerebral offices, we have to con- 
 sider it as a double organ whose functions are partly separate 
 and partly conjoint. That is, the facts point to the con- 
 clusion that {a) there is a class of functions over which the 
 hemispheres have conjoint dominion : functions which they 
 may perform together and which either may perform alone, 
 and functions which the}' must perform together and can- 
 not perform alone ; and {b) there are functions which are 
 peculiar to each alone : which one must perform alone, and 
 in which the other has no share. 
 
 The great divisions of function may be stated in general 
 terms under three heads in accordance with the facts now 
 presented. 
 
 1. PureljM-eflex functions are presided over by the spinal 
 cord and lower centers. 
 
 2. The automatic functions proceed out from the 
 "central" and "tegmental" systems of centers. 
 
 3. Sensation and voluntary movement have their seat in 
 man in the cortex of the brain. 
 
 If 1 atid 2 be considered together as giving only one 
 degree of complexity, and 3 be added as giving another 
 decree, we may show their relation by Fig. 11, in which 
 the circuit s, c, mt, represents all reactions not voluntary, 
 and s, c, sp, mp^ e, mt, those which are voluntar3\ 
 
 For convenience in later discussion, the higher reaction 
 may be taken alone and simplified, as in Fig. 12, called 
 the " motor square " ; in which we have the three elements 
 jis before (.*?/>, mp, mt) with an added element (>/?<'), i. 6"., 
 
46 
 
 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 the consciousness of movement accomplished (represented 
 by the dotted line mc in Fig. 11), the lower centers (c) 
 being here left out of account. 
 
 The degree to which the cortex serves the purposes of 
 mind above the bare reception of present stimuli and 
 mechanical reaction upon them, is seen in tlie behavior of 
 animals deprived of the cortex. Frogs and pigeons have 
 been fully tested in view of this question. It is found, in 
 
 mjp 
 
 sense organ 
 
 mt 
 muscla 
 
 Fig. 11. 
 
 Fig. 12. 
 
 s, c, mt = Reflex circuit (1 and 2 of text). 
 
 s, c, sp, mp, c, mt = Voluntary circuit (3 of text). 
 
 brief, that the life and reactions of the creature are unim- 
 paired as far as the immediate environment is concerned : 
 it lives, breathes, flies, sees, eats, carries out reactions of 
 response to direct stimulation. But it fails to respond to 
 remote stimuli ; the reactions are for the most part unin- 
 fluenced either by the past or the future. The creature 
 lacks spontaneity. Memory has disappeared ; so have 
 generalization and purpose. Tiie creature has sensations, 
 but not jjerceptions, as far as a line can be drawn between 
 tliese states. It fails to recognize and it fails to attend. It 
 
CEREBRAL LOCALIZATIOX. 47 
 
 is plain, then, that such a hemisphereless creature lacks 
 largely the co-ordinating, retaining, relating, or, as it is called 
 below, the apperceiving, function. It illustrates wluit, on 
 Hume's theory of knowledge, ought to be the condition of 
 us all. Tlie terras psycA/c-blindness, ^:>sycA/c'-deaf ness, etc., 
 are given to this condition, in which there is no physical 
 blindness, etc., but in which sensations have lost their 
 mental meaning. 
 
 As for particular reactions, however, the greatest differ- 
 ence is found in different animals. In dogs and birds many 
 functions are performed by tlie lower centers which are 
 presided over by the hemispheres exclusively in monkeys 
 and in man. This illustrates what has been observed 
 above, i. e., that reactions at one time reasonable and intel- 
 ligent may become nervous and mechanical : and this con- 
 sideration, based upon extended experimental proof, leads 
 us to recognize, below, the great elasticity of the system as 
 regards specialization. When these maimed animals are 
 kept alive, their condition improves, and they begin to get 
 something of their intelligence back again. 
 
 Cerebral Localization.* The question as to whether 
 there are local areas in the cortex or gray matter of the 
 brain which are especially active in the exercise of the 
 sense and motor activities, is of great importance for 
 general psj'^chology. Experiments have been very conflict- 
 ing in their results, but it is now generally admitted that 
 there are a limited number of w^ell ascertained areas. The 
 motor functions are grouped around the fissure of Rolando, 
 extending roughly from the vertex of the skull downward 
 and forward in a line which passes slightly in front of the 
 orifice of the ear. The centers for the leg, arm, and face 
 are in the order named, proceeding downward. The special 
 muscular groups involved in the finer movements of these 
 organs are distributed on both sides of the Rolandic fissure. 
 Movements of speech have their center for right-handed 
 persons in the third frontal gyre of the left hemisphere, 
 ' Cf . figures opposite the title-page, 
 
48 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 The sensory area comprehends the region lying back of 
 and beneath the motor zone ; the fissure of Sylvius being a 
 rough horizontal boundary between tlie motor and sensory 
 areas. Of the special senses, sight is located in the occip- 
 ital lobe, including the so-called angular gyre at the upper 
 end of the Sylvian fissure. The centers for hearing, taste, 
 and smell lie, less exactly, in the temporo-sphenoidal lobe, 
 the horizontal area below the fissure of Sylvius. 
 
 In man the destruction of the frontal lobes seems to 
 bring about a higlier kind of " psj^chic blindness" : a loss 
 of voluntary attention, co-ordination, and thought. The 
 liypothesis is widely current that these lobes are the final 
 center of convergence for the connections between the 
 sensory and motor centers of the brain. Tlie loss of con- 
 nection between this seat and any other area cuts the latter 
 with its store of memories off from its full role in the 
 mental life. For example, speech may be impaired by the 
 loss of any one of three functions located in different areas, 
 ^. e., word-seeing, word-hearing, and Avord-uttering. 
 
 II. Principle of Indifference of Function. The prin- 
 ciple of indifference includes the class of facts which show 
 that the nerve-courses are not the agents of different or 
 specific forces, but parts of a common svsteni and agents 
 of a common life. As a matter of fact, we find that differ- 
 ent courses can be made to perform each other's function. 
 If a piece of sensor nerve be joined to a cut end of a motor 
 nerve and grow in place, it will conduct the motor impulse 
 continuously with the motor piece. Tlie contrary is also 
 true. Tiie range of such experiments is very limited, since 
 it is impossible to exchange the end-connections of nerves 
 either centrally or peripherally ; but the facts at hand 
 establish conclusively the princij)le of indifference as re- 
 gards the sensor and motor nerve-tracts. In its applica- 
 tion to the centers the same principle has a different name, 
 since it takes a somewhat different form of manifestation, 
 i, e.y the principle of subsfitntiofi. 
 
PRTNCIPLE OF SUBSTITUTIOX. 49 
 
 III. Principle of Substitution. The question here is 
 tliis : Can the nerve-centers be made to take up each 
 other's function ? Researclies in cerebral localization, 
 chiefly upon animals, tend to show that such a substitution 
 of function is possible, at least to a limited degree. The 
 removal of a cortical center, which occasions loss of one 
 of the special senses, say sight, or the loss of control over 
 a certain muscular area, seems to be made good by the as- 
 sumption of the deranged function by a contiguous, or, at 
 least, a connected center. At any rate the animal recovers, 
 if kept alive a sufticiently long period. The word " seems" 
 is used advisedly, for it is still uncertain whether the loss 
 of such a function is due to the destruction of the entire 
 apparatus normally reacting to this function, or to its par- 
 tial loss, the remaining elements being temporarily in- 
 hibited by so-called " physiological shock," or, in the case 
 of electrical stimulation, by diffusion of the current. The 
 latter is known to be the case in many of the experiments 
 on brain-tissue, especially when the surgical method is 
 employed without the extremest care. This latter view is 
 also supported by the remarkable fact that in the monkey 
 and man these substitutions are exceedingly rare ; a result 
 v:e would expect on the shock theory, considering the 
 higher degree of delicacy and differentiation attained by 
 the system in these higher organisms. Yet in the case of 
 rabbits and dogs, such substitution of function, notably 
 of the sight-function, is probably established on a firm 
 basis. 
 
 IV. Principle of Specific Connection. The limits which 
 the growth of the organistn sets to the substitution of 
 functions find their expression in what is called " specific 
 connection" through the system. By this principle is 
 meant, in general, two things : First, that nerve-courses 
 are specific only according as they have certain well- 
 defined connections at center or periphery. These con- 
 nections keep the courses to an invariable function. The 
 
50 THE NERVOUS SYSTEM. 
 
 optic nerve has a specific connection with the retina and 
 with the optic center in the brain ; the auditory nerve 
 with the ear and the center for hearing ; and so on. In 
 this case, it is the end-organ or the center which is specific, 
 not the nerve- tract. And second, it means that nerve- 
 centers are specific according as their connections necessi- 
 tate their reacting to a specific stimulus. The optic center 
 has specific connections with the retina through the optic 
 nerve ; tlie center for sounds with the ear, through the 
 auditory nerve, and so on. Now there are as many of 
 these specific connections as there are kinds of stimuli 
 issuing in motor reactions. Consequently, the only specific 
 things after all are the stimulus and the movement. 
 
 V. Principle of Summation of Stimuli. If the stimu- 
 lus more than overcomes the arrest in a given case, there is 
 loft over, so to speak, a surplus of positive energy, or posi- 
 tive " molecular work." This positive molecular work is 
 work of reaction, or exhaustion of the system ; negative 
 work being inhibitory or conserving. This surplus repre- 
 sents, therefore, a disposition favorable to a second stimu- 
 lus of the same kind. We have, therefore, here a certain 
 summation of stimuli in cases of recurring excitations of 
 the same character. After moving the thumbs in a certain 
 rotatory manner a certain number of times, we say they 
 are " ready " for that movement ; they have taken on a 
 disposition to react to the same stimulus again. This union 
 of former stimuli with later in the nervous center, giving 
 an easier and smoother reaction, is the phenomenon of sum- 
 mation. Its most remarkable exhibition is seen in cases 
 in which the earlier stimulus is not sufficient to overcome 
 the arrest or inertia of the center, and does not give a re- 
 action at all ; so a weak electrical stimulus : even here we 
 find the center so " prepared " by this insufticient stimulus 
 that it responds when that identical stimulus is repeated a 
 sufficient number of times. The most favorable interval 
 between such shocks is about .001 second. The successive 
 
HABIT AND ACCOMMODATION. 51 
 
 blows of a toothed wheel upon a metallic tongue give an 
 audible sound when a single such blow is inaudible. 
 
 The different senses vary very much in the interval of 
 time between successive stimulations necessar\^ to prevent 
 summation or fusion ; the finger discriminates 1000 touches 
 per second ; an interval of .005 second is sufficient to keep 
 sharp sounds apart ; electric shocks on the forehead fuse 
 if more than 60 occur per second. With sensations of 
 sight, the fusion occurs across a greater interval, say .05 
 second, by reason of the persistence of optical after-images. 
 
 § 5. FiffAL Statement of Nervous Function. 
 
 We are now in a position to give the general conception 
 of nervous function in broadest statement ; a statement the 
 accepted terms of which have great psychological signifi- 
 cance. All the phenomena of consolidation or " down- 
 ward growtli," on the one hand, illustrate what is known 
 as the law of Habit; all the phenomena of specialization, 
 or " upward growth," illustrate the law of Accommodation. 
 
 Law of Habit. Ph\^siologically, habit means readiness 
 for function, produced by previous exercise of the function. 
 Anatomically, it means tiie arrangement of elements more 
 suitably for a function, in consequence of former modifi- 
 cations of arrangement through that function. Psycho- 
 logically, it means loss of oversight, diffusion of attention, 
 subsiding consciousness. 
 
 Law of Accommodatioii. Physiologically and anatomi- 
 cally, accommodation means the breaking up of a habit, 
 the widening of the organic for the reception or accom- 
 modation of a new condition. Psychologically, it means 
 reviving consciousness, concentration of attention, volun- 
 tary control — the mental state which has its most general 
 expression in what we know as Interest.^ In habit and 
 interest we find the psychological poles corresponding to 
 the lowest and the highest in the activities t)l" the nervous 
 system. 
 
 ' See (lie discussion of " Interest " below, chap. xix. § 1 
 
CHAPTER ly. 
 
 CLASSIFICATION AND DIVISION. » 
 § 1. Three Great Classes. 
 
 Besides their common characteristic, consciousness, 
 mental facts have special cliaracteristics which distinguish 
 them from one another and by which they may be divided 
 into great classes. The necessity of this classification is 
 seen in the great multiplicity and variety of these facts. 
 In the beginning of every science, the statement is neces- 
 sary of the natural knowledge of resemblances and differ- 
 ences, which we may use as a starting-point for investiga- 
 tion. In this classification two great dangers are to be 
 avoided. First, many psychologists, neglecting real re- 
 semblances, have made too many divisions or faculties, in 
 a measure dividing the mind into independent princi- 
 palities and losing sight of the unity of nature which under- 
 lies all phenomena of mind. Again, others go to the other 
 extreme in excessive opposition to the " faculty theory," 
 especially in recent years, and fail to recognize essential 
 differences in mental states. 
 
 In the main, however, it is agreed that there are three 
 great classes of facts in the mental life, however strongly 
 the attempt to reduce tliem further may be urged. These 
 three classes express t'le residt of three distinct functions 
 of the mind : Intellect^ Feelmg, and Will. They may be 
 called : 1st, Presentative, or intellectual states ; 2d, Affect- 
 ive, or states of feeling ; and 3d, Volitional, or states of 
 will. These great departments of mental fact are shown 
 
 ' llamlbook, vol. i. cliap. iii 
 
THREE (iUEAT CLASSES. 53 
 
 in the very distinct propositions, "I feel somehow," "I 
 know somethinor " " I do soniethino-." ^ 
 
 The grounds of this classification are found m immediate 
 consciousness, and it can find its justification only in an 
 appeal to direct experience. The presentative states have 
 as their common characteristic their reference to a t/iinr/ or 
 object. Knowledge is a function of mind only as there is 
 something to be known, and in the higher forms of its 
 operation its states are taken to re-present or signify ob- 
 jects. In its earliest beginnings also, in sensation, the 
 objective bearing of knowledge, as affording us a reference 
 away from ourselves to a something which is presented to 
 consciousness, 'is its distinguislung feature. 
 
 The affective states, on the contrary, as states of feeling, 
 lack this element of objectivity ; that is, they are states in 
 which consciousness is itself affected primarily (pain, fear). 
 They may be entirely lacking in the presentative or 
 knowledge element, or the two may be combined in 
 any degree of connection. They extend from the simplest 
 bodily feelings to the highest emotions, and include 
 impulses, temperaments, and i>ersonal tendencies of all 
 kinds. 
 
 In strong contrast to these well-marked divisions the 
 third class, volitional states, stand out in consciousness 
 distinguished by a characteristic foreign to the other two, 
 the sense of effort or c.vertion. It takes the forms of 
 mental attention, choice, and resolution. 
 
 The other orders of mental facts may or may not exhibit 
 this will-element. I ma}^ be passively affected by pain or 
 emotion, or I may be conscious of a free pla}^ of presenta- 
 tions with no effort of nw own to control or direct them. 
 This last phase, therefore, may be set apart as a third class, 
 and as representing a third function. 
 
 MVard, Eiicyc. Britannica, art. "Psychology." 
 
54 CLASSIFICATION AND DIVISION. 
 
 § 2. tJxiTY OF THE Three Classes in 
 
 COXSCIOUSXESS. 
 
 With tlie distinction of the three classes of mental fact 
 and the three functions they represent clearly brouglit 
 out, it must still b^ remembered that the latter are merely 
 functions. They are not three psychological lives which 
 lie parallel with one another. They are a single life. 
 Their unity in a single principle may be seen under several 
 aspects. 
 
 I. T/iey have unity of end. They are functions of a 
 common mental organism and minister to its development. 
 The unity of the body is realized in the unity of the func- 
 tions of the different organs. The end of all is the con- 
 servation and development of the whole. So the intel- 
 lectual functions are one, in their tendency to preserve the 
 independence of the self and accomplish its destiny. "By 
 intelligence we conceive the end of conduct, b}'' sensibility 
 we are excited to produce it, and by will we govern these 
 impulses in the light of reason and assure the victory of 
 the best. Without intelligence, man is blind ; without 
 feeling, he is inert ; without will, he is a slave." ^ 
 
 II. 2'hey are one in their collective activity. Each 
 seems to depend on the others in an essential way. At- 
 tention is necessary to all thought, and feeling is often 
 necessarj'^ to direct or is effectual in preventing the direc- 
 tion of the attention. In its reflex activity, attention 
 seems to be a representative or relating function, but it 
 has the fundamental quality of will in its active exercise 
 as mental effort. A volition, as has been said, proceeds 
 upon ideas and appetences to such an extent that one 
 school of psj^chologists reduce will to the conflict of ideas 
 and another make it a conflict of feelings. Feeling also 
 involves images or ideas, through memory or imagination, 
 or arises from association, and all of these are representa- 
 
 ' Rabier, loc. cit., Compare throughout this section. 
 
DIVISION. 56 
 
 tive. And it seems possible, sometimes, to originate the 
 train from whicli feeling arises by a powerful act of will. 
 
 III. They find their formal unity in consciousness. The 
 completed view of the mind ends, as it began, with con- 
 sciousness, a^ the necessary background and formal unity 
 of the whole. Consciousness bespeaks the unit being, the 
 subject of this threefold activity, and in its healthfulness 
 or derangement, under normal stimulation of this threefold 
 order, the proper balance and end of the whole is accom- 
 plished. 
 
 § 3. Division of the Subject. 
 
 In view of the above classification, the subject-matter of 
 psychology falls into convenient parts for treatment. In 
 addition to the three great classes of facts spoken of, the 
 form or mark which is common to them all, consciousness, 
 must be considered. There are, accordingly, the following 
 four great divisions : 
 
 Part I. General Characteristics of Mind. 
 
 Part II. Intellect. 
 
 Part III. Feeling. 
 
 Part IV. Will. 
 
PART I. 
 GENERAL CHARACTERISTICS OF MIND, 
 
 CHAPTER y. 
 
 CONSCIOUSNESS.' 
 
 In the foregoing chapters the term consciousness has been 
 used without explanation. Familiarity with it in the gen- 
 eral significance it bears in ordinary discourse has been 
 assumed. It is necessar^^, however, at the outset, to inquire 
 more fully into its nature and position in the science. 
 
 § 1. Nature of Consciousness. 
 
 Definition. Disregarding less important varieties, we 
 may say that two general views of the nature of conscious- 
 ness prevail among psychologists. On the one liand, it is 
 held that consciousness is itself a capacity, function, or 
 faculty of mind, an inner sense for the perception of the 
 mind and its states, as sight and hearing are outer senses 
 for the perception of body. This view rests upon the fact 
 of reflection, the developed means of observation of inner 
 states, which has, in common with sense-perception, the 
 relation of subject and object within itself ; but not upon 
 the original awareness which we have of our first experi- 
 ences. This latter bears no analogy whatever to external 
 perception; This doctrine of consciousness makes it not 
 essential, but accidental, to mind, an added thing, whii-.h 
 may be wanting, as external senses, memor}?-, imagination, 
 may be wanting ; and admits the supposition of uncon- 
 scious mind. 
 
 ^Handbook, vol. i. chap, iv, and vol. ii. chap. ii. 
 5C 
 
ITS AUEA. 57 
 
 The opposing view is this, that consciousness is the com- 
 mon and necessary form of all mental states ; without it 
 mind is not and cannot be. It is the point of division and 
 differentiation between mind and not-mind. 
 
 From the empirical point of view we may make the fol- 
 lowing observations : 
 
 1. Consciousness is not a power or energy of mind. It 
 does not involve the conscious effort of attention. In a 
 state of reminiscence, of reverie, the states of mind are un- 
 controlled, and come and go with no let or hindrance from 
 the mind. We are then fully conscious of this play of 
 states, but of no exercise of mental effort accompan^^ing it. 
 
 2. Consciousness is not an organ of the mind, to be used 
 b}^ the inner subject in perceiving his states. It is not an 
 inner sense, since it accompanies tliC exercise of all the 
 senses and is necessary to tlieir function. The senses have 
 specific physical basis also, wliile consciousness depends 
 upon the liealth}^ and normal activity of the sensorium as a 
 whole. Consciousness is, therefore, the 0)ie conditioii and 
 abiding characteristic of mental states} 
 
 § 2. Area of Coxsciousxess. 
 
 The area of consciousness is the sum of the presentations 
 at any time in consciousness, whether tliey be distinct or 
 vague. Experiments show tliat twelve to fifteen strokes of 
 a pendulum can be held in consciousness at once Avithout 
 counting or grouping. If they be grouped by fives, as 
 mau}^ as forty ma}^ be retained. The most favorable inter- 
 val between them is .2 to .3 second. Consciousness may 
 be likened to the visual field in which objects are scattered, 
 those being most clearly seen which are in the line of direct 
 vision or center of the field, and those which lie near the 
 circumference most indistinct. Between these limits there 
 are all degrees of distinctness. So ideas are distinct or 
 
 'On the theory of ''Unconscious Mind" see my Handbook of 
 Psycliology , vol. i. chap. iv. § 3. 
 
^8 CONSCIOnSNESS. 
 
 vague in consciousness according as they are in the line of 
 mental vision, or attention. The idea attended to is most 
 distinct, those connected closel}^ with it in any way less so, 
 and those which are accidentally present and quite unob- 
 served actively, least so. According as they lie in one or 
 other locality of this general distribution, consciousness of 
 them is said to have different degrees or forms. 
 
 Degrees of Consciousness. These may be illustrated 
 by an example. As I write, the noise of my pen is almost 
 unnoticed. If continued some time, it is no longer noticed 
 and is said to be subconscious. If the pen is a poor one, 
 and scratches more as used, I continue to write, though 
 
 1. The Unconscious (physiological). 
 
 2. The Subconscious. ) 
 
 3. Diffused Consciousness. ) '^^^^^^* 
 f Reactive Con- 
 
 4. Active Consciousness ! sciousness. 
 or Attention. j Voluntary Con- 
 
 [ sciousness. 
 
 5. Apperception. 
 
 Fig. 13.— Graphic Representation of Area of Consciousness, after Analogy 
 with Vision. 
 
 conscious of the disturbing noise, but give it no attention. 
 It is then said to be in a state of diffused consciousness. 
 Thus a thousand things around us — the table, chair, books 
 — are present to our minds, but we are passive in regard to 
 them. If now my attention is drawn involuntarily to mj^ 
 pen we have reactive consciousness, or reflex attention,' and 
 if I voluntarily examine the point in order to remedy it, 
 there is an active puiting forth of myself mentally; there 
 arises active consciousness or voluntary attention. Tlie 
 state of things in which the attention is concentrated upon 
 an image is apperception. Further, all the lower condi- 
 tions, in which there is no attention, either voluntary or 
 involuntary, may be designated in common as passive con- 
 sciousness. See Fig. 13. 
 
APPERCEPTION. 59 
 
 It is well to note the play of ideas through all these 
 forms of transition, from the dark region of subconscious- 
 ness to the brilliant focus of attention. Images pass 
 both ways constantl}^, acting varyingly upon one another 
 and making up the w^onderful kaleidoscope of the inner 
 life. 
 
 Apperception. Apperception characterizes the changes 
 which take place in active consciousness. By it is 
 meant the synthesis in consciousness by which mental data 
 of any kind (sensations^ percepts, concepts^ are constructed 
 into higher forms of relation and the perception of things 
 which are related becomes the perception of the relation of 
 things. ' " Tlie two presentations a and ^," says Lotze/ 
 " constitute siniplj- occasions Avhereby the reaction of a 
 spiritual activity is aroused, through which new presenta- 
 tions — such as similarity, identity, contrast, arise — presen- 
 tations which w^ould not be possible without the exercise of 
 this new spiritual activity." The relation of percepts is 
 not the same as the perception of relation. Apperception 
 is the comprehensive "power of discovering relations"; 
 but is not limited to the operations of reasoning. It is the 
 essential fact, as shall appear in all the stages of mental 
 generalization. 
 
 This use of the word apperception to express the broadest 
 act of mental relation is of great importance and value. 
 The treatment of the very distinct and familiar act of 
 mind in attention, of grasping details and relating them to 
 one another in a new mental product, has heretofore been 
 confined to its special operations — as perception, concep- 
 tion, judgment — to each of which a different name was 
 given. The term apperception singles out that act of 
 mind which is common to them all — the relating activity 
 of attention — and thus, by its general application, em- 
 phasizes the unity of the intellectual function as a whole. 
 In general, we may say, whenever by an act of attention 
 ' Outline of Psychology, § 23. 
 
60 C0X8CI0 U8NE88. 
 
 mental data are unified into a related whote, this is an act 
 of apperception. 
 
 § 3. Development of Coxsciousxess. 
 
 The beginnings of consciousness are enveloped in great 
 obscurity. Shortly after birth a child begins to show 
 signs of memory and of the power of connecting impres- 
 sions. But both the memor^^ and power of association 
 are very weak and depend upon intense degrees of excita- 
 tion, as a very bright light or a very loud noise. Wlien 
 the child is several months old, a familiar person is for- 
 gotten after a week's absence. Gradually attention is dis- 
 covered, at first vague and discontinuous, and after a few 
 weeks becoming more persistent and intelligent. This is 
 shown earliest for sight and touch, the two senses which 
 discover space relations. It is probable that the earliest 
 consciousness is a mass of touch and muscular sensations 
 experienced in part before birth, and that it is only as the 
 special senses become adapted to their living environment 
 and sensitive to their peculiar forms of excitation, that the 
 general organic condition is broken up and the kinds of 
 sensation differentiated. This process of differentiation of 
 the sensations of touch and muscular sense gives us very 
 early the form of our own body and the locality of its 
 l^arts, and this serves as point of departure for the placing 
 of external objects. The movements of the body contrib- 
 ute largely to the apprehension of the dimensions, forms 
 and areas of things in space. The movements of the body 
 are at first random and without control, arising from nervous 
 discharge under conditions of physical discomfort. 
 
 The child then passes through a stage of development in 
 which its movements are largely adaptations of the organ- 
 ism to outside stimulations. After the sixth or seventh 
 month imitation of others' movements becomes its prevailing 
 reaction. In "persistent imitation" — the trj^-try- again, 
 experience — we have the first voluntary efforts of the 
 
ITS DEVELOPMENT. 61 
 
 child.' These effort-movements gradually take on a positive 
 character, but even after two or three years it is difficult for 
 the child to execute any given combination of movements. 
 This fact of control of the bod}^ seems to be the first be- 
 ginning of the exercise of will. It involves a subjective 
 reference more distinct and peculiar to itself than any of 
 the purely affective sensations, and leads on to the notion 
 of the Zand so to 56{/*-consciousness. 
 
 The development of consciousness is largely dependent 
 upon the development of the physical organism. The 
 senses must be awake to their functions before the mind 
 can exhibit its functions. Not till the eyes are open and 
 in proper movement can the impressions of that sense be- 
 gin to play their very great role in the forms of external 
 perception. So also must the centers become accustomed 
 to their reactions. If we liken the elective activities of 
 the developed nervous system to lines of least resistance, 
 we may say that, for the very young child, such organic 
 pathways are largely wanting and they must be established 
 and maintained by actual exercise. These early physical 
 modifications becoming more and more definite and multi- 
 plied, the more complex forms of mental function are made 
 possible. Like other organs of the body, also, the brain 
 grows in size and complexity. It attains its largest size 
 probably much before the maturity of manhood ; but its 
 structural development, which consists in the differentia- 
 tion of parts for special functions and the establishment of 
 various connections throughout its bulk, is then but well 
 begun. The basal ganglia seem to develop their activities 
 earlier than the cerebral hemispheres. This is to be ex- 
 pected, since they are connected with the organic and 
 essential processes of the body. 
 
 • On the development of the child's active life see my articles, "Sug- 
 gestion in Infancy," " Infants' Movements," " Origin of Volition in 
 Childhood," in Science, February 27, 1891, Januarys, 1892, and No- 
 vcniber 18, 1892. 
 
62 CONSCIOUSNESS. 
 
 The relative value of different images in the early stages 
 of mental growth is illustrated by the following experi- 
 ment ^ made by the writer upon a girl six and one-half 
 months old. The child's nurse, who had been with her for 
 five months, was absent for three weeks, and on her re- 
 turn was not recognized by her face alone, nor by her 
 voice 'alone (spoken words), but was fully recognized by 
 sight (face) and sound (nursery rhyme) images together. 
 
 § 4. Nervous Conditions of Consciousness. 
 
 General Conditions. There are two great theories of the 
 physical basis of consciousness : the first, represented by 
 Mr. Lewes,'* holds that the nerve-process, considered in 
 its most general form as irritability, is everywhere con- 
 scious. On this view, each nervous center, each so-called 
 arc, has its own consciousness, and the ordinary conscious- 
 ness of the individual is only the outcome of many lower 
 consciousnesses that we all possess. The brain-conscious- 
 ness is the only one we are conscious of, so to speak ; but 
 there is consciousness in the spinal cord and in ganglia 
 wherever we find them. The other theory, or class of 
 theories, holds that a given degree of development is 
 necessary before consciousness is found at all. In the 
 development of the system, therefore, consciousness 
 appears only at a certain stage of integration or " upw^ard 
 growth." This theory is generally accepted, though for 
 purposes of division rather than from positive argument. 
 In the nature of the case, it is impossible to disprove con- 
 sciousness in lower centers. 
 
 It also seems true that our personal consciousness repre- 
 sents a condition of slow, difficult, and impeded — conse- 
 quently of highly developed and well balanced — integra- 
 tion. The smoothest reflexes are not conscious ; the hard- 
 
 1 See Science, May 2, 1890. 
 
 *Hekl also by Bain {Emotions and Will, Appendix A), and in a 
 inodKk'd form by Wundt. 
 
ITS CONDITIOXS. 63 
 
 fought decisions are most conscious. It seems likely, 
 therefore, that some degree of inhibition is necessary in the 
 nervous basis — at any rate for vivid consciousness. 
 
 On the other hand, there are considerations which are 
 giving more prominence to the view of Mr. Lewes at pres- 
 ent. They tend to show that our distinctions are arbitrar^'^, 
 and open the door at least for presumptive evidence that 
 consciousness is coextensive with nervous reactions. 
 Among these considerations are recent proofs of so- 
 called multiple personalities which may be induced in 
 the same nervous organism in the hypnotic state.* The 
 explanation is at least a tempting one, that, the higher 
 centers being inhibited, their conscious content is wanting, 
 and the lower centers supply experience which was before 
 outside the conscious area. Again, in the scale of animal 
 organisms, it is difficult to draw a line denoting the point 
 of nervous complexity below which there is no conscious- 
 ness. The fact of a possible substitution of function be- 
 tween the brain and spinal ganglia spoken of above, would 
 indicate a possible common element of consciousness. 
 
 Particular Conditions. A further question arises as to 
 the immediate conditions of consciousness in the nervous 
 centers. Given a nervous organism capable of conscious- 
 ness, on what particular state or aspect of it does the con- 
 tinuous presence of consciousness depend ? Here, again, 
 recent views are little more than guesses. The view 
 supported by Herzen seems to have most evidence, i. e., 
 that consciousness arises from the breaking down or ex- 
 penditure of tlie cellular structure in the centers. This 
 is concluded from the fact that the attention, a state of 
 concentration and expenditure, is the state of most vivid 
 consciousness ; that consciousness is most vague and indis- 
 tinct wlien no brain-work is being done, as in cases of 
 dolcefar niente or diffused attention ; that unconsciousness 
 is most nearly reached in sleep and analogous states when 
 ' Pierre Janet, A"f"i/o/fisiue Psychologique. 
 
64 ., CONSCIOUSJVESS. 
 
 the brain processes have largely subsided from the lack 
 of sensory stimuli or motor impulses. The chemical re- 
 sults of active thought, increased heat, and organic waste 
 deposits in the brain would indicate chemical work and 
 disintegration. 
 
 It is also true tliat consciousness depends upon the nor- 
 mal condition of the mechanism as a whole. Any failure 
 in the blood supply (anaemia) leads to faintness and faint- 
 ing, and the same result often follow^s from congestion of 
 blood in the brain (hyperaemia). In general we may say 
 that the healthful activity of the brain, in its normal 
 physiological relations, gives clear consciousness. It should 
 be borne in mind, also, that all hypotheses as to the condi- 
 tions in which it arises shed no light on w^hat conscious- 
 ness is. On this point even the biologist Schneider is clear. 
 
 § 5. Sentience and Sensibility. 
 
 It has become apparent that nervous activity, considered 
 for itself alone, does not bring us into the range of psj^cho- 
 logical science. However we may decide the inquiry as 
 to whether such activity is ever entirely free from con- 
 sciousness, it is yet true that it may be quite outside of what 
 is called the individual's consciousness. IVie man is not 
 conscious after the guillotine has done its work, however 
 active the nervous reflexes of his limbs may be, and how- 
 ever firmly wc may believe that his spinal ganglia have an 
 " inner aspect." In other words, the greater part of our 
 ordinary nervous reactions are not above the threshold of 
 our conscious lives. So we reach a distinction between 
 sentience as a nervous property and sentience as a con- 
 scious phenomenon, between sentience and sensibility.^ 
 Sensibility is synonymous with the usual consciousness of 
 
 ' Lewes uses the two terms io senses precisely the reverse of this, 
 Physiml Basis of iUnd, p. 323 ; i. e., to him sensibility is the ner- 
 vous property everywhere ; so also Sergi, PsycJiologie PhysioUh 
 (jiquc, p. 13. 
 
KFXnS OF COJYSCIOUSWESS. 65 
 
 the individual's experience, and sentience is tlie nervous 
 function which, as far as we know, may yet be accompanied 
 by consciousness or inner aspect in general. 
 
 For a working test of the limits of sensibility we may 
 say that there is no sensibility (1) where there is no brain ; 
 (2) where there is no trace left in memory ; (3) whore 
 there is no expressive or adaptive motor reaction. Yet in 
 all of tliesy cases sentience ma}^ be present, as the sensitive 
 plant seems clearly to show. 
 
 The transition from simple sentience to the full con- 
 sciousness is through subconscious modifications. On the 
 side of the nervous system they indicate a stimulus and reac- 
 tion too faint to reach into the sensibility. Yet they in- 
 fluence the conscious life and give it direction and inten- 
 sity ; a fact seen again on the physical side under the 
 principle of summation of stimuli. 
 
 § 6. Kinds of Consciousxess as Dependent on 
 Xervous Complexity. 
 
 1. Passive Consciousness. Subconscious sensibility 
 tends to secure recognition in the mental life as what is 
 called jyassive consciousness, to distinguish it from the 
 active forms which involve more or less attention. The 
 writer often finds that he can start counting the strokes of 
 a clock after the clock has struck several times, naming 
 the correct number of each stroke to the end, although he 
 was not aware of the strokes before he began to count. 
 This illustrates the subconscious. In most cases passive 
 consciousness is, by its very nature, undetected, and it ex- 
 ists as a normal state apart from active consciousness only 
 in lower forms of organic life or in very young children. 
 In adult life we catch it most nearly when just beginning 
 to recover from a swoon ; the sounds around us are heard, 
 but have no meaning, relation, or escort. Of this state 
 abstracted from the condition of our usual self-conscious- 
 pess, we may make the following remarks : 1. It is a state 
 
QQ CONSCIOUSNESS. 
 
 of pure sensibilit}^ or simple awareness. 2. It carries no 
 reference to an external object or to the body, that is, no 
 such reference inside the inner aspect. 3. It has no refer- 
 ence to self as an object of inner apprehension, no volun- 
 tary effort known as " my effort." 4. It has no relational 
 or apperceptive quality. It is not knowledge, but pure 
 feeling. It is the hypothetical affective state in all its 
 purity. 
 
 The possibility of turning attention to a dim presenta- 
 tion and making it vivid, shows that the cerebral basis of 
 these lower forms of human consciousness is not one of 
 separateness from the highest centers, but of community 
 with them ; indeed a nervous discharge already in volun- 
 tary operation may be diverted into a subconscious reac- 
 tion without the attention. The physiological basis of 
 passive consciousness, then, is a state of temporary loss of 
 tension in a brain-area which shares in the highest integra- 
 tion and instability. 
 
 2. Reactive Consciousness. By reactive consciousness 
 is meant tlie state commonly designated as involuntary 
 attention. In passive consciousness only the reception of 
 stimuli is a matter of sensibility ; here consciousness seems 
 to attach also to the responsive member of the nervous arc. 
 There is as truly a reaction in consciousness as there is 
 in the nervous system. We may accordingly analyze this 
 form of consciousness for purposes of treatment into three 
 elements, corresponding to the three elements of the nerv- 
 ous arc. First, the receiving consciousness, the stimulus — 
 say a loud, unexpected sound ; second, the attention invol- 
 untarily drawn, the registering element, as appears below ; 
 and third, the muscular reaction following upon the sound 
 — say flight from fancied danger. The analogy, accord- 
 ingly, between the typical brain process and the typical 
 mental process finds here its most general force and de- 
 mands the most careful treatment. Questions of the most 
 radical philosophical importance begin here, 
 
REACTIVE CONSCIOUSNESS. 67 
 
 Characteristics of the Reactive Consciousness. In gen- 
 eral, this form of consciousness is distinguished by a feel- 
 ing of expenditure. Attention alwaj^s means expenditure 
 even when quite invohmtary. Any further designation 
 would onl}^ becloud a sensation which everyone can point 
 out clearly enough in his own experience — the sense of 
 being caught and carried away mentally. 
 
 Again, the reactive consciousness has an additional ele- 
 ment which we call the sensation oi fatifjue.^ This sensa- 
 tion is distinct from that of expenditure, and arises only 
 after prolonged attention or in conditions of antecedent 
 nervous exhaustion. As to what this feeling is, again no 
 further descrij^tion is necessary now. 
 
 Moreover, on the muscular side we find two different 
 classes of effects : the reactive effects peculiar to the par- 
 ticular stimulus, and besides these the peculiar muscular 
 accompaniments of attention itself. The latter are con- 
 stant, and the former vary with the stimulus. For ex- 
 ample, a student hears his name called suddenly and 
 loudly. The particular reaction habitual to such a stimulus 
 is a speech reaction — the response. Hullo ! or Yes ! But, 
 before speaking, he finds he has turned his attention — 
 probably his head — to the source of the sound, and by so 
 doing has brought into play a different set of nerves and 
 muscles. Now, of these two reactions it is the speech- 
 reaction which answers in consciousness to the motor side 
 of the nervous arc, stimulated by the sound, and it is only 
 this that we can say follows the attention without finding 
 ourselves on debatable ground. The attentive movements 
 seem to belong peculiarly to the attention itself, and so fall 
 under the central element in the typical reaction. 
 
 Consequently, in the motor phenomena of the reactive 
 
 consciousness, there are two very distinct elements which 
 
 subsequent discussion must not confuse : the motor effects 
 
 of the stimulus which is attended to, and the motor accoiij- 
 
 ' piscussed below, cliaj). xxiii. § 4, 
 
68 
 
 CONSCIOUSNESS. 
 
 paiiiraents of the attention itself. This may be seen in 
 Fig. 14, in which a new^ element (cc = co-ordinating 
 center) is added as the central process of attention. A new 
 motor process {mp') is stimulated, and this produces new- 
 muscular movements {mt'). The ordinary reaction also 
 takes place (mp, mt ; in this case, speech) following from 
 the ordinary stimulus (sp ; in this case, sound). The 
 
 > w/j 
 
 Fig. 14. 
 
 Fig. 15. 
 
 sp, mp, mt = Motor reaction. 
 
 sp, cc, mj/, mt' = Motor accompaniments of the attention. 
 
 matter is again simplified in the " motor square " diagram. 
 Fig. 15. 
 
 3. Voluntary Consciousness. Voluntary consciousness 
 may be characterized b}^ several new affective elements — 
 new modifications of sensibility. Without anticipating 
 later analysis, we may say that it exhibits, first, deliberation. 
 By this is meant, in general, a doubleness of sensibility, a 
 consciousness of being drawn apart, or of inward conflict — 
 to limit the case to the feeling aspect, apart from the play 
 of ideas involved. This feeling of deliberation leads on 
 to another element of sensibility, namely, the feeling of 
 ' Cf. Fii?s. 11 and 12, above. 
 
VOLXTNTARY COXSCIOU^^XESS. 60 
 
 decision or consent ; in wliicli the doubleness spoken of is 
 resolved in a pleasant unity of consciousness again. And 
 further, we find another possible element, apparently distinct 
 from the preceding, the feeling of effort. In this sensation 
 there is an active identification of ourselves with the reac- 
 tion decided upon ; a conscious putting forth of ourselves 
 to reinforce our decision. An^^ analysis of volition must, 
 at least, take account of these three distinguishable aspects 
 of sensibilit3\^ 
 
 Xow it is in the selective and inhibitive functions of the 
 nervous system that the physical basis of the voluntary 
 consciousness is to be found. As far as such selection and 
 inhibition are conscious at all, they have probably the 
 nervous essentials of volition. Of the three sensible ele- 
 ments involved, the first and second have clear physiologi- 
 cal analogies. Deliberation in consciousness is analogous 
 to dynamic complexity and instability in the brain-centers ; 
 there is such a thing as temporary balance in the nervous 
 S3^stem, and it suggests itself at once as the physical counter- 
 2)art of mental hesitation. Inhibition also, as far as our 
 physiological knowledge goes, seems to have full conscious 
 value here. Decision, as following upon deliberation, is 
 again analogous to the state of central readiness for the 
 discharge of nervous force, when the equilibrium is destroyed 
 and the motor outburst only waits for the requisite stimulus 
 to take its outward course. 
 
 With effort, however, the case is on the surface different. 
 There is no evident nervous function corresponding to this 
 state of sensibility ; that is, no function not already sup- 
 plied with its conscious analog3^ The question of such an 
 analogy or ph^^sical basis of effort, therefore, comes finally 
 to wait upon ^ more thoroughgoing mental analysis of this 
 sensation. If effort be reduced to expenditure, and expendi- 
 ture to incoming sensations from the muscles, then there is 
 
 ^ For detailed consideration of these three features of voluntary con- 
 sciousness, see below, chap, xxvi, and xxvii. § 1. 
 
10 C0NSGl0TfSmS8. 
 
 no need for such an analogy ; but if effort resist further 
 anal}^sis, then physiology is as yet at fault. 
 
 Fundamental Properties of Consciousness. The gen- 
 eral fact is evident, in view of all that has been said, 
 that different events in consciousness are of different 
 value, come in with a different introduction, have different 
 qualities wliich mark each as itself and not another ; in 
 short, that consciousness has a fundamental property of 
 discrhnination : and further, it is clear that under these 
 differences in its events consciousuess acts differentl}^ 
 courting some changes and avoiding others, reacting so 
 on one stimulus and thus on another — the further funda- 
 mental property of selection. We have found, also, that 
 consciousness has degrees of excitement,^ intensity, coloring, 
 of its own according as this event happens in it or that. 
 These properties are evidently tl)e basis of the threefold 
 division of conscious states already pointed out : Intellect 
 (discrimination), feeling (degree of excitement) and will 
 (selection). 
 
 § 7. The Nervous System and the Unity of 
 Consciousness. 
 
 The functional unity of the nervous system has already 
 received sufficient emphasis. The conception advocated in 
 the preceding pages is a dynamic conception. The parts 
 of the system have meaning only as they are related to 
 each other in a system whose activity as a whole gives 
 value to the activity of the parts in the general life-process. 
 We have not many nervous systems, but one ; the laws of 
 its growth are not many, but one ; its function is one, its 
 teleological end is one. 
 
 So consciousness has not many forms, pfssive, reactive, 
 sensory, motor, voluntary, inhibitive. These are all partial 
 aspects of a single unitary presence. There is no sensor 
 
 ' On the relation of this property to pleasure and pain, see chap. xvi. 
 
nNlTT OF CONSCIOUSNESS. Tl 
 
 plienomenon but lias its dj^namic or reactive side. There 
 is no motor phenomenon in consciousness, but it springs 
 from antecedents of sensibility. There is no voluntary 
 phenomenon, but it rests on both. Consciousness, there- 
 fore, is one as the nervous process is one.* 
 
 ' See a statement and criticism of the theory which accounts for 
 mental unity by the organic unity of the nervous system, in my 
 Handbook of Psychology , vol, ii. chap. ii. § 6. 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 ATTENTION.! 
 § 1. Definition of Attention. 
 
 In the consideration of consciousness, a difference was 
 found in its general aspect according as a number of pres- 
 entations were loosely scattered about its field or as some 
 one held the mind directed to itself. Consciousness is thus 
 passive or active. Active consciousness is in general atten- 
 tion. It is the focusing of the mind upon a presenta- 
 tion. It is in all cases a conscious act. What goes on in 
 the relating of this presentation to others, in their combi- 
 nation, dissolution, arrangement, is due to the activity of 
 apperception, which is, in a large measure, subconscious ; 
 but the attention which makes the activity of appei-ception 
 possible is a matter of immediate consciousness. 
 
 Reflex or Involuntary Attention.^ Upon observation 
 of ourselves, we find that attention may be stimulated 
 either from some foreign and unexpected source or from 
 the will. A loud noise, a violent contact, a disagreeable 
 odor, at once attract the attention without our volition or 
 even against it. This is reflex or involuntary attention. 
 In the normal state of the consciousness, attention is con- 
 stantly open to appeals of this kind. Minds with little 
 power of will live under control of such external excita- 
 tion. The attention is drawn hither and thither in rapid 
 transition with no fixed concentration upon any sensation 
 or idea. In such minds, as we shall see later, the functions 
 of apperception are disturbed, and its products instable. 
 
 ^ Handbook, vol. 1. chap. v. 
 
 '•^ On involuntary attention considered as reactive consciousness, see 
 above, chap. v. § 6. 
 
 73 
 
REFLEX ATTENTION. ^3 
 
 This state of inability to liokl tlie attention against otlier 
 solicitations is called distraction : the attention is, as it 
 were, drawn apart in its efforts at adaptation to different 
 conditions. 
 
 A case of what may be called chronic involuntary atten- 
 tion is found in the insistent idea. It very frequently 
 occurs in normal life that a single idea, either by reason of 
 a strong association or of a feeling, or because of previous 
 attention, or even in consequence of the very effort of the 
 will to banish it from consciousness, remains before the 
 mind and holds the attention. This is called an insistent 
 or, in its more intense forms, fixed idea. It is generally 
 removed by a change of scene, companions, and surround- 
 ings, the old association being broken or new ideas claiming 
 the attention. As an idea becomes fixed or imperative, it 
 gathers round it other ideas in growing associations and 
 connections, which soon give a morbid tone to the entire 
 mental life. This is the beginning frequently of mono- 
 manias and permanent delusions,' which become chronic in 
 insanity. Frequently also, it is supposed, the primary 
 tendency to some form of nerve disturbance or brain dis- 
 ease, due to heredity, gives occasion and strength to such 
 derangement.^ 
 
 The mechanical nature of involuntary attention and 
 its intimate relation to all phj^sical and mental states is 
 seen in the acts of a patient in a state of hypnotic hallucina- 
 tion. Here it seems that the element of will is entirelj^ 
 eliminated. The patient has apparently no control over 
 either body or mind, and many suggestions either physi- 
 cal or mental from the hypnotizer are immediately realized 
 in action. It seems only necessary'- that the attention 
 should be secured, to start the entire train of apperceptive 
 processes Avith the physical changes which are associated 
 
 ' See case described by Cowles, Amer. Jour, of Psycli., February, 
 1888. 
 ' See further statement below, chap. xiv. 
 
74 ATTENTION. 
 
 with them ; or a physical attitude or movement may be 
 forced upon the patient, only to be followed by all the 
 emotional and intellectual states it suggests. In these 
 states the intellectual life seems quite normal and the emo- 
 tions are very excitable and facile in their play ; but all in- 
 ner control is lost. Action results with complete necessity. 
 The important fact in this form of hypnotism then seems 
 to be the fixing of an idea till it becomes imperative, with 
 the general subjective state unchanged by the substitution 
 of ideas which it brings about. 
 
 Voluntary Attention.^ In strong opposition to this is 
 voluntary attention or attention proper. It may be de- 
 iined as a state of active co7isciousness due to voluntary 
 inental exertion or effort. Here a distinctly new element 
 enters into consciousness, mental effort. In voluntary at- 
 tention we find the first exhibition of will. It is the be- 
 ginning of all control over the mental life. A thousand 
 things may appeal to me for consideration and I may re- 
 fuse them my attention. I may give myself to a train of 
 thought and be substantially unconscious of sounds, sights, 
 contacts which would ordinarily excite my attention. It 
 is thus in the familiar condition of abstraction or ahsent- 
 mindedness. This peculiar outgoing of the self is the 
 something we call consent, in the mental life. From it 
 we largely arrive at consciousness of self, by a reference of 
 what we do, to ourselves as doing it. 
 
 The frequent or prolonged exercise of attention to the 
 same presentation or idea tends to bring It involuntarily 
 before the mind. Its repetition in varied circumstances 
 establishes various associations by which it may be revived. 
 Insistent and fixed ideas usually become so from volun- 
 tary thought upon them — from what we call "brood- 
 ing " over a subject. Thus the line between reflex and 
 voluntary attention is changed and much that was before 
 a matter of choice becomes automatic and necessary. 
 ' See also the discussion below, chap, xxvii. 
 
BEAmXGS OF ATTEXTIOX 75 
 
 § 2. Bearings of Attention in the Mental Life. 
 
 In its relation to the great classes of mental facts, the at- 
 tention is of the first importance. In general it may l)e 
 said that attentw?i intensifies a me?ital state. It may be 
 considered more particularly and in detail. 
 
 I. Relation of Attention to Sensation. There is a 
 twofold or reactive relation between attention and sensa- 
 tion. On the one hand, increased hitensity of sensation 
 draios the attention. The change in intensity of the sensa- 
 tion is a direct stimulus to the attention, and the attention 
 in this case is reflex. On the other hand, attention directed 
 to a se)isatio?i increases its intensity. We have already 
 seen that many sensations may lie in consciousness almost 
 unfelt, while the attention is otherwise occupied. It is 
 only necessary to direct the attention to them to give them 
 their full force. But more than this, the attention may 
 give them increased and very acute intensity. By fixing 
 the attention upon bruises and burns, we increase the pain 
 they give us. Hence the efforts we make to divert a sick 
 man's attention from the seat of his disease, hy fixing his 
 attention on some new artificial sensation, or by interest- 
 ing him in another topic of conversation. Hot cloths 
 relieve headache, by producing a counter-irritation. This 
 effect of the attention is especially great in nervous dis- 
 eases. Paralj^sis has been cured or driven from limb to 
 limb in hj^pnotic patients by a mere suggestion, which so 
 completely occupied the attention as to induce belief in the 
 effect. So insomnia and sometimes dyspepsia and other 
 diseases xn^j be cured. 
 
 Attention has an influence also upon the time occupied 
 by a sensation. Experiments show tliat a certain time is 
 necessary for tlie feeling of an excitation from any of the 
 sense organs and the reaction in the movement of the organ. 
 This time is greatly reduced when the excitation is expected.' 
 
 ^ For details, see section on Psychometry, chap. viii. § 7. 
 
76 ATTENTION. 
 
 A certain time seems to be necessary for the adjustment of 
 the attention to the nature and source of tiie stimuhis, and 
 this is reduced wlien tlie idea is j^resent beforehand and 
 the attention is already partially adjusted. 
 
 II. Relation of Attention to Movement. The move- 
 ment of the members of the body is very closely con- 
 nected with corresponding ideas. No voluntary movement 
 takes place without its idea in the mind : and often the 
 idea produces the movement without any voluntary im- 
 pulse or even contrary to it.' The imitative faculty of 
 children shows this tendency to carry out all movements 
 thought of. We often find ourselves following the move- 
 ments of the hands or lips of a speaker with slight move- 
 ments of our own. It is probable that no word comes into 
 tlie mind without its partial formation by the vocal organs, 
 as is seen in the movements of the lips b}^ many in reading 
 to themselves and in our thinking aloud. No doubt the 
 pliysical association involved plays a great role in all such 
 cases. The thought of a movement has preceded and led 
 to the movement so often, that there is a positive tendency, 
 at the nervous centers, to the discharge of the energy 
 necessary to the accomplisliment of the act, along the 
 proper courses. An interesting illustration has recently 
 come to light in the cases of loss of the power of speech 
 simply from brain injury in the centers for writing the 
 words. 
 
 This tendency to movement is greatly increased by the 
 exercise of attention. The attention tends to bring the 
 idea more distinctly before the mind and thus removes all 
 competing ideas which should incite to different move- 
 ments. This is especially the case when the attention 
 dwells upon the organ or on the thought of movement. 
 There is then a twofold effect due to the attention. It 
 
 ^ Fere claims that every sensory excitation at first induces an aug- 
 mentation of motive force which is measurable on the dynamometer : 
 see law of " mental dj^namogenesis " below, chap, xxiii. § 1. 
 
ATTENTIOX AXD MOVEMEyr. 11 
 
 tends to develop latent sensations, as we saw above, in 
 the organ, and these sensations lead to movement for their 
 relief or continuance ; or it produces movement by the 
 distinct purpose to perfonn an act thought of. For 
 example, if the picture is vividh^ presented of a workman 
 who has his thumb crushed by a hammer, we make instinc- 
 tive movements to protect the thumbs, b}" folding them in 
 the hands. 
 
 The facts of hypnotic suggestion already spoken of 
 show the automatic connection between an idea strongly 
 attended to and its physical performance. The absence of 
 will does not interfere with the performance of the action, 
 but only with the power to prevent or direct it. The con- 
 sciousness is so contracted in this state that each idea in 
 turn is held in the focus of attention. 
 
 III. Relation of Attention to the Intellect. Attention, 
 either voluntary or reflex, is directly involved in the opera- 
 tions of the intellectual function. In general, it may be 
 said that attention increases the vividness of presentative 
 states and thus renders more definite and lasting the apper- 
 ceptive activities of synthesis, aualj'sis, relation, as seen 
 in niemor}^, association, judgment, and reasoning. It is 
 necessary, first, to tlie retention of images. The capacity 
 to retain mental pictures depends upon the intensity of the 
 original presentation, and the clearness of its relations ; 
 and this intensity and clearness are enhanced by the atten- 
 tion. The supply of materials which we have for use in 
 the higher forms of thought depends at once upon our 
 attentiveness to what passes before us in our everyday 
 life. When we w ish to retain any event, we press it upon 
 the attention and note its surroundings. Second, attention 
 increases the intensity of the reproduced image in the same 
 way. If w^e recall the face of a friend, it is, at first, dim and 
 indistinct, but by holding it closely before us and scrutiniz- 
 ing it, we can bring it clearly out in more detail. Tlie 
 attention shifts rapidly from point to point upon the 
 
78 ATTENTION. 
 
 image. Third, the duration or time of all mental states, as 
 of simple sensation, is made shorter by attention, as is seen 
 in experiments on the association of ideas and estimation 
 of differences. 
 
 IV. Relation of Attention to Peeling. Attention lias 
 the same intensifying influence upon the affective states 
 in general as upon sensation. Emotion is heightened when 
 the attention is directed to it. Hope, joy, fear, anger, grow 
 very greatly in intensity when thought of, and as quickly 
 die down when dismissed from the attention. With tlie 
 higher emotions it is very difficult to control tlie attention, 
 so tlioroughly do they usurp the field of consciousness. So, 
 also, pleasure and pain, called the hedonic tone of feeling, 
 are increased by being attended to and diminished when 
 the attention is withdrawn. 
 
 The especial relation existing between the attention and 
 the feeling of interest^ has often been remarked by psychol- 
 ogists. This feeling of interest is often akin to that of 
 personal advantage or individual preference, which we find 
 playing an important part in the flow of our associated 
 ideas. It gives a spontaneousness and ease to the attention 
 which renders the latter more effective and less wearisome 
 to the inner life. Attention to that whicli interests us does 
 not demand the same outgo of mental effort. 
 
 V. Relation of Attention to the Bodily Functions. 
 Attention long directed tends to derange the automatic 
 functions of the body. The automatic functions are those 
 which go on unconsciously to ourselves. The action of 
 the heart is accelerated by being closely attended to. 
 The digestive apparatus may be deranged by being 
 watched, and so also may the breatliing process. Atten- 
 tion is also accompanied by certain attitudes of the body, 
 such as turning the head or eye in a given direction, bend- 
 ing forward, frowning, and other muscular contractions. 
 A feeling of tension is felt also in the end organ. This 
 
 *Se^ discussion of "Interest," below, chap. xix. ^1. 
 
ATTENTION IN EDUCATION. 79 
 
 tends to show that it is the motor elements of the brain 
 which are involved in attention, while the effect it works 
 upon sensation shows a sensory modification following 
 upon the other. 
 
 § 3. Educational Bearings of the Doctrine of 
 Attention/ 
 
 Training of the Attention. The considerations already 
 advanced tend to show the importance of the attention 
 in education. The secret of the case rests upon making 
 attention completely voluntary. Strength of thought 
 depends very largely upon the voluntary control or 
 concentration of attention, in such a way as to prevent 
 distraction from accidental and unexpected influences. 
 This training of the attention should begin at the earliest 
 possible period. The child should be taught to observe 
 continuously some thing that interests him, and encour- 
 aged to ask questions about objects and their relations. 
 In very early life these things should be left to his own 
 selection, until the laws of apperceptive synthesis are 
 developed, that is, until he learns somewhat to connect 
 things and events and see their bearings. Otherwise the 
 forcing of the will may interfere with the development of 
 the emotions, which are then the controlling factor. But 
 as soon as practicable, the teacher should attract and hold 
 the child's attention, at first to pleasant things and after- 
 ward to indifferent things. Great care should be exercised 
 in the general surroundings. All distractions, such as 
 open windows, pet animals, pla3^things, should be guarded 
 against : they practically call upon the child to attend to 
 several things at once. Care should be taken also not to 
 fatigue the attention. The periods of study had better be 
 too short than too long ; for if the child growls tired, the 
 effort becomes painful and the subject distasteful. Fre- 
 quent recesses should be given and recitations should not 
 'See also Sully, Outlines of PsycJtology, p. 103. 
 
80 ATTENTION. 
 
 be longer than fifteen to twenty mimites, for children 
 under twelve to fourteen j^ears of age. The child's inter- 
 est should never be allowed to flag. 
 
 Habits of Attention. In this way regular habits of at- 
 tention may be formed very early, which have the same 
 force in life as all other habits. Attention tlius becomes 
 application^ which is voluntary and agreeable : and with 
 this basis the student has no trouble in devoting himself 
 to subjects of thought for longer periods. 
 
 A caution is perhaj^s in order, as to sameness in the 
 kinds of instruction given in early life. It is not Avell 
 that the same general cast of thought should engage too 
 much of the early attention of the student. It gives a 
 bent to all his subsequent development. John Stuart Mill 
 is a good example of this. It is especially dangerous 
 when it involves the emotional side of our nature. Reli- 
 gious teachers use this fact not only properly to instruct in 
 morality and religion, but also to excite early prejudices 
 and repulsions which can never be shaken off. Nurses 
 often give children associations of fear which persist 
 through life. This is the origin, frequently, of the insist- 
 ent ideas spoken of, which intrude themselves upon us 
 and make many of us to a degree hobbyists and mono- 
 maniacs. 
 
 Attention Necessary to Apperception. As will appear 
 later, it is only in and through the attention that the 
 apperceptive function of mind comes into play. In its 
 discriminating, selecting, and relating results, the concen- 
 trated attention is called apperception ; but the active 
 process which produces these results is the attention. At- 
 tention and apperception seem to be the subjective and 
 presentational sides respectively of the same mental fact. 
 
PART IL 
 INTELLECT. 
 
 CHAPTER Aai. 
 
 DIVISION OF THE INTELLECTUAL FUNCTION.i 
 
 The Intellect is the instrument of knowledge. Using 
 the word " function " simply to mean " aspect," or " ex- 
 hibition," we may say that Intellect has two functions : 
 
 I. The Apperceptive Function, which in turn com- 
 prises : 
 
 1. Presentation or Acquisitio?i, being 
 
 a. Sensation ; 
 
 b. Perception. 
 
 2. liejwesentation, being 
 
 a. Conservation or Memory ; 
 
 b. Combination ; 
 
 c. Elaboration. 
 
 II. The Rational Function. • 
 
 § 1. Demarkatiox of the Functions. 
 
 I. The Apperceptive Function. Under this function 
 are included all those changes in the presented content of 
 consciousness which take place under the form of apper- 
 ception ; those which owe their product to the concentra- 
 tion "^ of attention. 
 
 The function of Presentation or Acquisition is that by 
 which the material of knowledge is gained. It covers the 
 
 ' Handbook, vol. i. chap. vi. 
 * See the defiuition of apperception, above p. 59. 
 81 
 
82 DIVISION OF INTELLECT. 
 
 two sources of our knowledge in experience, Sense-percep- 
 tion and Self -consciousness. 
 
 The function of Representation, as the word implies, is 
 that by which the material acquired in presentation is re- 
 tained, reproduced, and intelligently used in the processes 
 of mind. Its operations are considered under three great 
 heads : a. Conservation or Memory, w^hich includes the 
 Retention, Reproduction, Recognition, and liocalization in 
 time, of Representations ; h. Combination, which is the 
 disposition of reproduced states in the new forms of the 
 Imagination, the law of its disposition being Association ; 
 c. Elaboration, which is tbe function of intellect proper, 
 constituting the operations of Thought. Under it we find 
 again three mental stages. Conception, Judgment, Reason- 
 ing. 
 
 II. The Rational Function. In this aspect we view 
 consciousness not as content, but as form or mold for the 
 material of knowledge. All the foregoing operations, both 
 presentative and representative, are subject to a law of 
 universal validity, the law of Identity or Non-contradiction. 
 And the intelligence w^hen exercised upon things in general 
 is governed by tlie principle of Sufficient Reason. As 
 judgments these principles are also synthetic, but they 
 seem to carry their own universal validity as matters of 
 self-veflection, and not to be given in the content of 
 apperception. These with other principles of the same 
 nature, as causation, right and wrong, run through all 
 knowledge and constitute the Reason. 
 
THE APPERCEPTIVE FUNCTION. 
 PRESENT A TION. 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 SENSATION. > 
 § 1. General Nature of Sensation. 
 
 Sensations are the primary eveuts of the mental life. 
 The\^ are so called because they arise through the senses. 
 AYe use the word in its usual sense, as meaning the great 
 body of ps^'chological phenomena, both affective and 
 presentative, which result witldn the mind immediately 
 from impressions upon the senses. The experiences of 
 moisture and resistance which follow from contact with a 
 piece of iron, and the pain felt in case it is hot, are equally 
 sensations. 
 
 Distinction between Sensation and Impression. Sen- 
 sation being thus defined, it must be carefully distinguished 
 from the physical phenomenon which precedes or accom- 
 panies it. The impression is the modification of the organ, 
 especially of the nerves and nervous centers, which arises 
 from an external stimulus ; as the vibration of ether or air. 
 The nature of the different sense impressions is not well 
 understood ; but in each case they are some form of move- 
 ment. They have all the characteristics of physical phe- 
 nomena : they can be located, measured, apprehended by 
 the senses. Sensations, on the other hand, cannot be com- 
 pared M'ith movement of any kind. The difference between 
 
 ' lliti,,Vi,H,k of Pf<y<'hoh(jy, vol. 1. chap. vii. and vol, ii. chap, iv, 
 
 83 
 
84 SENSATION. 
 
 them is plainly seen in tlie fact that an impression may take 
 place without any sensation. The impression may be too 
 feeble, or too prolonged; or too often repeated, as the irri- 
 tation of our clothing, to which we are habituated ; or the 
 attention may be occupied, so that the impression does not 
 produce its usual sensation. 
 
 Affective and Presentative Elements in Sensation. 
 In most sensations tliere is a distinct knowledge element 
 over and above the intensive subjective state, which con- 
 stitutes the sensation proper. There is an element of 
 knowledge of things without us or of our own bodies. 
 This is the presentative ov perception element in sensation. 
 There are great diiferences in sensations in this respect. 
 
 The affective or feeling quality, on the other hand, 
 comes out most strongly in cases of massive or voluminous 
 stimulation : here presented relations are at a minimum 
 and sensibility is at a maximum. When one plunges into a 
 very hot bath, the feeling experienced is so overwhelming 
 that the knowledge that it is a hot bath, and that it is I 
 myself who am taking the bath, occupies a very slight de- 
 gree of consciousness. We can imagine the diffused wave 
 of feeling that sweeps over the jelly-fish when an unwary 
 insect settles on its exposed surface. In a case of severe 
 toothache, also, what we really have predominating in con- 
 sciousness is not knowledge, but feeling. As an immediate 
 state of consciousness, we do not know that we have a 
 toothache, wQfeel it. Hamilton announced the law, already 
 anticipated by Kant, that the two elements vary in inverse 
 ratio — which is true only in a very rough way. The relation 
 of the two elements in the different senses is spoken of in 
 what follows. 
 
 § 2. Characters of Sensation. 
 
 All sensations have certain general characters, which 
 may be subjected to investigation, These characters are 
 four in number, 
 
ITS CHARACTERS. 85 
 
 I. Quality : that propert}^ by wliich sensations are dis- 
 tinguished as coming from different senses, such as color, 
 sound, taste. 
 
 II. Quantity: meaning intensity or mass of sensation. 
 Investigations in intensity constitute PsychopJiysics. 
 
 III. Duration: the time occupied by the sense function 
 with its accompanying physical and volitional processes. 
 Investigations in this field constitute Psychometry. 
 
 IV. Tone:^ the pleasure or pain which accompanies all 
 sensation. These characters are considered in order. 
 
 § 3. Quality of Sensation. 
 
 There is much uncertainty as to the proper classification 
 of sensations. It ai)pears very easy to discover at once 
 what is immediately given as a pure and simple sensation. 
 But it is not so. At tlie age of maturity, when one is able 
 to make an analytical study of his states, he finds them no 
 longer in that pure and primitive state which he would 
 wish. Tiiey have undergone a twofold alteration. In the 
 first place, all our senses act together, and different sensa- 
 tions, by virtue of the laws of association, are experienced as 
 one. And further, by virtue of the same laws, intellectual 
 elements are superposed upon our sensations, making them 
 much more complex. These associations become, after 
 time has made them habitual, almost indissoluble. So that 
 it is very difticult to isolate the different sensations from 
 one another, or the great body of sensitive data from the 
 contributions of reason and experience. 
 
 Relativity of Sense-qualities: Contrast. Further, we 
 find a series of phenomena wliich sliow that there is no 
 fixed typical sensation of each quality ; but that all deter- 
 minations of quality are to a degree relative distinctions 
 among many " moments " in consciousness. This principle 
 of " relativit}^ " is illustrated by tlio so-called phenomena of 
 
 ' This word is used throughout for the expression " liedonic tone." 
 
86 SENSATION. 
 
 contrast. The general statement of fact is this : Any 
 sensation (color, sound, taste) wliich occurs after or with 
 other sensations (colors, etc.) is different from what it 
 would have been if the otlier sensations had not been 
 present, or if the other sensations had themselves been 
 different ; the variation, however, is within the same sense- 
 quality. 
 
 In the domain of the special senses, such effects of one 
 sense-quality upon another may be subjected to experi- 
 mental determination by psycho-physical methods. The 
 phenomena of color-contrast are the richest and best under- 
 stood class of facts. In general, color-contrast means that 
 when part of the retina is stimulated to react to a partic- 
 ular color, there is a tetidency of other portions to react to 
 the complementary color. For example, the so-called 
 "Meyer's experiment " may be cited : put a scrap of gray 
 paper on a colored (red) background, and spread over the 
 whole a sheet of white tissue ; ' the gray scrap will now 
 tend to assume the color complementary to the background 
 (green). Recent researcli has developed a number of in- 
 teresting optical phenomena of this class. Stumpf has 
 discovered that the pitch of a note is modified by the 
 occurrence of another note of a different pitch, in such a 
 way that the interval between tliem is lessened. Striking 
 contrasts are also easily demonstrated in color, light, and 
 tone intensities. Contrasts of temperature are also easily 
 brought about. Cold water feels colder if the hand is just 
 from warm water. Differences in temperature of the two 
 hands lead to exas^orerated differences of sensation when 
 they are plunged together into two vessels of water of the 
 same temperature. Contrast is called simultaneous or suc- 
 cessive according as the rival sensational qualities occur 
 together or in succession. 
 
 ' The white sheet over the whole is necessary to obscure distinct 
 lines of separation between the colors beneath : if such distinct 
 boundary lines are exposed, the contrast plienomcna disappear. 
 
SENSE-QUALITIES. 87 
 
 Two theories of sensational contrast have been advocated, 
 one called the "psychological," according to which such 
 contrasts are due to judgment or synthesis, the actual 
 sensations themselves having fixed and unaltered qualities. 
 This has been held by Helmholtz, and has been used to 
 support the theory that there may be "unconscious judg- 
 ments." The other, the " pliysiological theory," holds that 
 contrast-effects are due to complex conditions of stimula- 
 tion. The different color-stimuli, for example, are not 
 reported separately to consciousness ; but only their united 
 effect is operative in the optical center. Consequenth% 
 what we have is a case of summation or fusion of 
 stimuli, not of comparison and judgment of sensational 
 atoms. This latter theory is now completely victorious, 
 principally through the brilliant experimental work of 
 Hering. 
 
 Conclusion on Sense-qualities. It seems reasonably 
 safe to conclude that there are well specialized nervous 
 functions which correspond to the great differences of 
 quality in sensations : this- is shown by the fact that the 
 differences are stable ; that the senses are largeh" inde- 
 pendent of one another in their activity ; that each such 
 function has normal minimum and maximum activities 
 which give original degrees of intensity in consciousness. 
 But within these limitations both qualities and intensities 
 are subject to the law of relativity as well by reason of 
 nervous summation as of mental synthesis.* 
 
 § 4. Special Sexsatioxs. 
 
 Smell. The complication of data spoken of may be 
 illustrated in the sense of smell. The pure sensation 
 cannot be Isolated : it involves both intellectual data and 
 
 ' See the "Relation of Sensation to Knowledge," in my Hand- 
 hook of PsycJiology, vol. ii. chap. iv. § 1, where the presentative or 
 knowledge element in sensations is shown to be due to an early 
 apperceptive synthesis. 
 
88 SENSATION. 
 
 a mullitude of other sensations. Among the acquired 
 notions which a given odor involves, is the representation 
 of tlie object from which the odor proceeds, an association 
 extremely serviceable to man and animals in finding and 
 testing food ; the more or less exact notion of the direction 
 and distance of the object ; and finally, the idea of the 
 organ of the body which is affected. The localization of 
 smell in the nostrils is very vague and gives us little 
 knowledge. On the other hand the concomitant sensations 
 with which this sense is connected are very numerous and 
 complicated. First, there are organic and vital sensations 
 arising from the digestive and respiratory tracts. We 
 distinguish between appetitive odors and nauseating odors. 
 The odor of meat excites the appetite of carnivorous ani- 
 mals, and that of a full pantry moves our own. And in 
 relation to respiration, odors are fresh, as that of Cologne 
 water, which excites a feeling of freedom in breathing ; or 
 suffocating, as that of a long shut up house, which seems 
 to hinder respiration. Second, we find sensations of taste 
 always associated with those of smell. The organs of taste 
 and smell seem to act in sympathj^ We speak of delicious 
 odors as giving us a taste of the object beforehand. Third, 
 sensations of touch are associated with smell in the mucous 
 lining of the nostril, as in impressions which involve a 
 tickling sensation. Fourth, there are also muscular sen- 
 sations arising from the movement of the nostrils in 
 breathing in odorous vapors. Fifth, to these we add sensa- 
 tions of temperature, heat and cold. The odor of camphor 
 seems cold and that of alcohol warm. 
 
 It has been found impossible to isolate pure sensations 
 of smell for classification or description. The most we can 
 do is to throw them into general classes, as aromatic, 
 fragrant, pungent, which are not at all exhaustive. This 
 applies in a measure also to the other sensations, though in 
 a less degree in the higher senses — sight, touch, and sound. 
 
 Taste. Taste is involved in the same obscuritv. AVe 
 
TASTK. 89 
 
 only know that it lias its organ in elements on the surface 
 of the tongue, called gustatory bulbs or flasks, which com- 
 municate with the sensorium by the lingual and glossal 
 nerves. The intimate connection with smell is seen in the 
 fact that the impairment of smell by disease or cold in- 
 jures the power of taste. Tastes are infinite in their variety 
 and cannot be classified. Certain classes of tastes are well 
 discriminated in experience, such as sweet, bitter, sour ; but 
 they are very few compared with the vast number which 
 remain uudescribed. 'J'he presentative element in sensa- 
 tions of taste is very slight. We have an indefinite feeling 
 of the locality of the sensation, but this arises, in the main, 
 from feelings of touch upon foreign substances in the 
 moutli, and from the muscular movement of the organs 
 involved in eating or drinking. No knowledge of the 
 object affecting us is given immediatel}^ in either taste or 
 smell, since the stimulating agent is in gaseous or soluble 
 form. 
 
 Hearing: Presentative Elements. Sensations of sound 
 have a specific quality wliich is known through the ear.^ 
 The psychological value of these sensations consists in the 
 fact that they occur purely in time and have no spatial 
 qualit\'. A series of sounds is the type of pure temporal 
 succession. 
 
 The three most presentative classes of sensations, we have 
 said above, are those of sound, sight, and touch. In the 
 case of sounds we find peculiar properties upon which 
 exact methods of research may be brought to bear. 
 These properties, however, are presentative only in as far 
 as they sustain relations of time. Like other sensations, 
 sounds may be distinguished in hitensity in an exact way. 
 This intensit}^ depends upon the amplitude of the vibrations 
 of the sonorous bod^^. Further, they are distinguished in 
 their timbre, which depends uj^on the addition to the vibra- 
 
 ' For the mechanism of hearing, see Bernstein, Five Senses of 
 Man. 
 
90 BEKSAT102T. 
 
 tioiis, which produce the fundamental tone, of other vibra* 
 tions twice, three times, ... as rapid. This difference in 
 timbre ^ives its characteristic sound to each different mate- 
 rial, as metallic, vegetable, and thus corresponds to the 
 difference in kind of odors and tastes. But the special 
 peculiarity of sounds in this particular is found in what is 
 called tone as distinguislied from noise. Tliis quality of 
 the tone or note is pitch or height, depends upon regular 
 periodical vibrations, and varies with their number. There 
 is nothing corresponding to this in smell or taste. We 
 cannot make up a scale or gamut of tastes as we can of 
 notes. Upon this peculiarity of sound, having its basis of 
 sensation probably in the fibers of Corti in the cochlea of 
 tlie ear, or in tlie fibers of the basilar membrane to which 
 they are attaclied, tlie whole science of music is built up. 
 Tiiere is probably, in the inner ear, a series of vibrating 
 elements which correspond, though more minutely, to the 
 intervals of the musical scale. The perception of distance 
 and direction by the ear is largely acquired by association. 
 
 Sensations of sound are singularly free from the disturb- 
 ing influence of other sensations, and for this reason they 
 are directly accessible to experimental researches of all 
 kinds. We shall find this the case in speaking of the other 
 characters of sensation. 
 
 Sight.' Sight is perhaps the most presentative sense. 
 It is the medium of much direct knowledge of the external 
 world. Its affective qualities consist in the pure intensity of 
 the liorht sensation — as the liojht of one candle or of two — 
 and in the distinct order of sensations known as color. Tlie 
 sensations of color arise from the varjdng rates of vibration 
 of particles of luminous ether. These different rapidities 
 give an ascending scale through the seven colors of the 
 rainbow, from the red to the violet, similar to the scale in 
 sound sensations, though not as extended or exact. The 
 
 ' For the mechanism and general facts of sight see Bernstein, 
 loc. cit., and Le Conte, Sight. 
 
SIGHT. 91 
 
 colors sliade off into one another witli no regular law of 
 cliange. Sensations of color have intensity, saturation, and 
 tonality. The intensity", says Helmholtz, depends upon 
 the quantity of light. Saturation is the relative purity of 
 a color. Degrees of saturation are known as shades, as 
 pink in its relation to scarlet. Tonality is the quality of 
 the color as determined by its position in the scale of the 
 spectrum, as blue, green, yellow. 
 
 The spatial form of the objects of sight is one of the 
 most interesting of its presentative properties. This will 
 be discussed in the section on space-perception.* The fact 
 that there are two eyes contributes to this result, especially 
 in the perception of the third dimension. It is difficult to 
 isolate pure sensations of sight from the muscular and 
 tactual sensations which are always, in actual life, associated 
 with them, and it is probable, as will appear later, that 
 these — especially the muscular sensations — are also con- 
 cerned in the formation of the notion of space. 
 
 In regard to the process of the perception of color through 
 the eye, two principal theories have been advanced, assum- 
 ing that the retina is distinctively the locus of this process. 
 We find, in tlie retina, distinctly differentiated and minute 
 nervous elements called rods and cones which, it is thought, 
 react locally, thus making possible the picture of the object 
 seen. But as to the color sense proper, the case is more 
 uncertain. According to the Young-Helmholtz theory 
 there are three different kinds of nerve fiber, each of which 
 reacts to one of the three fundamental colors, red, green, 
 and violet ; the other colors are complex and result from 
 their combined action. This theory w^as, until recentl}", 
 very generally accepted. Among other objections to it, it 
 is urged that the microscope reveals no such differentiation 
 of fiber, and the smallest sensation w^hich can be perceived 
 by the eye is of white light, which involves all these ele- 
 ments. The other theory is that of E. Hering, who supposes 
 that there are two elements or substances each capable of 
 J Cluip. ix. § 4. 
 
S^ SEXSATIOX 
 
 two different reactions, thus giving four fundamental colors, 
 red, green, blue, and j^ellow. This theory, however, has also 
 grave difficulties to face. Yellow can be produced by color- 
 combination. Neither theory explains color-blindness. 
 
 Tlie phenomena of color-blhidness ^ support the general 
 view of the differentiation of structure or function in the 
 nerve elements of the retina. This istlie inability of about 
 one person in twenty to distinguish certain colors. Blind- 
 ness for red is most common. It is thought tliat all cases 
 can be reduced to blindness either for red or green ; though 
 there are cases in which only different degrees of gray are 
 distinguislied. To the latter all objects seen are like the 
 photographs of the same objects. Different regions of tlie 
 retina have different degrees of sensibility to color ; this 
 sensibility growing less as we go outward from the central 
 part. The outer rim of the retina is normally insensitive 
 for red, but reacts for the otlier colors. This show^s that 
 there are special elements which react only to red. 
 
 A further phenomenon, that of after-images, is especially 
 noticeable and important in sight. After-images are the 
 persistence of sensations after their peculiar stimuli have 
 ceased to act. Look at a bright window and then close the 
 ej^es, and the after-image is seen. This is called a positive 
 after-image, and is due to the dying out of the nervous 
 process. Further, if the bright object be colored its after- 
 image plays between that color and its complementary (the 
 color needed to make white in composition with it). This 
 appearance of the complementary color involves additional 
 elements to those originally stimulated and this latter fact 
 makes it a negative after-image. It is due to the exhaustion 
 of the nervous elements involved in the original color, by 
 which white light is broken up and only the complementary 
 elements act. This persistence of sensation in the organism 
 is important as explaining compound and intense forms 
 of excitation. As Fechner has pointed out, the after-image 
 
 ' See " Report on Colour Vision," Proc. Roy. Soc, 1892, No. 311. 
 
COMMOX SEX^ATIOX. 93 
 
 has only two dimensions, and thus differs both from the 
 actual percept and from its revived image. 
 
 § 5. CoMMOx Sexsatiox. 
 
 Divisions in Common Sensation. Such a division is 
 based upon the physiological differences to which we would 
 expect some conscious counterpart. The great organic 
 processes of the body go on under the lead and control of 
 automatic nerve-reactions ; a bod}' of nerves are dele- 
 gated to this post of function ; there are accordingly or- 
 ganic sensations^ the subjective indications of organic 
 health or disease. Again, the periphery of the body is 
 supplied with a mass of fibrils of incalculable delicacy and 
 number which have no representation in the list of special 
 sensations ; accordingly a great variety of more or less 
 distinct forms of sensibility seem to originate in the skin and 
 are called cutaneous sensations. Further, consciousness of 
 movement, the so-called motor consciousness, is found on 
 examination not to be simj^le. It involves an exceedingly 
 complex nervous apparatus, both central and superficial ; 
 and all the forms of sensibility which pertain to muscular 
 movement ma\^ be designated by the general name muscular 
 sensations. And, finall}^, the nervous elements are them- 
 selves endowed with sensibility. Besides reporting the 
 forms of stimulation which reach the organs with which 
 they stand in immediate connection, the nerves report a 
 variety of conditions to which they are themselves directly 
 sensitive. All such modifications of sensibility may be 
 called nervous sensations. 
 
 Organic or Systemic Sensations. There are through- 
 out the body various organic sensations which are quite in- 
 ternal and only indefinitely localized. Such are the visceral 
 sensations, respiratory sensations, feelings of bodily comfort 
 or discomfort in general. Their most marked characteristic 
 is their tone value, the high degree of pleasure or pain whicji 
 they contain, These sensations, however vague and geu 
 
94 SENSATION. 
 
 eral, are of great importance to the mental life. They are 
 tlie background of our emotional condition — since they in- 
 dicate an elevated or depressed condition of bodily vitality 
 — and give general cast to our state of mind. The dyspep- 
 tic soon becomes unreasonable and gloomy, and biliousness 
 interferes with the normal activity of the mind. The gen- 
 eral condition of the sensorium as a whole is often a de- 
 termining factor in thought and conduct. It is notice- 
 able that changes in climate and weather have a great 
 influence upon these organic feelings, largely 'through 
 the elevation or depression of the respiratory function. 
 More particular sensations of this class are the organic 
 needs — hunger, thirst, air, sleep, exercise, etc., and those 
 connected with the circulation of the blood, such as con- 
 gestion, throbbing, faintness, etc. 
 
 Cutaneous Sensations. In connection with the skin an 
 enormous variety of feelings are reported in consciousness. 
 Of these, three general classes lay claim to special end ap- 
 paratus, sensations of touch, temperature, and pressure. 
 Besides these, the more definite sensations having their 
 stimulation in the skin are those of itching, scratching, 
 flesh-crawling, tickling, and feelings of the sharp, blunt, 
 hard, soft, rough, smooth, coarse, sticky, damp, dr^^, oily, 
 etc. Nothing more can be said of most of these forms 
 of sensibility. They are present in greater or less intensity 
 and delicacy wherever the skin is normal. 
 
 Touch. Sensations of touch constitute the basis of a 
 variety of states which we distinguish ordinarily as quali- 
 tatively different. An element of touch enters into sensa- 
 tions of muscular movement, both from external contact 
 and from the rubbing of the inner parts against one 
 another. Besides, we distinguish sensations of the rough, 
 smooth, coarse, polished, damp, and sticky ; but phj^siol- 
 ogists have shown that they are not special sensations, as 
 Reid believed, but modifications of touch, combined with 
 feelings of pressure. The importance of touchj as being 
 
TOUCH. 95 
 
 capable of so many modifications, as having its end organs 
 over all parts of the body, and as acting in conjunction 
 with other sensations in their peculiar organs, is seen to be 
 very great. 
 
 The presentative quality of touch, considered quite 
 alone, is space, as it is built up from the recognition of the 
 locality of the parts of our own body/ 
 
 The nerve elements of touch, as well as those of pressure, 
 are clearly defined. They are corpuscles situated in the skin, 
 which communicate directly with the great sensor nerves 
 by ramifying fibrils. These corpuscles are distributed in 
 varying number in different parts of the skin. The experi- 
 ments of E. A. Weber showing this are celebrated. He 
 employed dividers opened at varying degrees, the minimum 
 distance felt between the points being the diameter of the 
 smallest "sensation-circle." The tip of the tongue and the 
 red of the lips have great delicacy of touch ; while the 
 back of the neck is very insensible. The circles, however, 
 are not the smallest units of tactual sensation and must 
 contain many nerve elements ; for it has been shown that 
 there are distinct and very minute pressure spots within 
 these circles. The same is seen in the marvelous capacity 
 of both these senses to become more delicate with exercise. 
 In the hypnotic state, also, delicacy of discrimination by 
 touch is greatly exaggerated. 
 
 From the universal presence of touch and its immediate 
 reference to the external world, it is of great importance in 
 cases of appeal from the other senses, and in cases of hal- 
 lucination. When in doubt about the objects of vision or 
 sound, we feel after them with the hand. For this reason 
 touch is called the " controlling " sense. 
 
 Temperature Sense. The last of the senses, in order of 
 discovery, is the temperature sense. Like touch, it is a 
 universal sense and has its end apparatus in the skin. Mi- 
 nute points called "temperature spots," which react, some 
 for heat and others for cold, are scattered over the skin in 
 * See chap. ix. § 4, 
 
96 SENSATION. 
 
 varying degrees of nearness to one another. They have 
 been plotted on the backs and palms of the hands and on 
 tlie arms. Of the different nerve terminations in the skin 
 — elements of Krause, Paccini, and Meissner — it is impos- 
 sible to tell whicli belong to touch and which to tempera- 
 ture. The varying number of these spots in different local- 
 ities and the consequent variations in delicacy of perception 
 of heat and cold, make quantitative measurements for this 
 sense very difficult. Tliese sensations liave a very slight pre- 
 sentative element in their vague reference to bodily locality.' 
 
 Muscular Sense. The earliest of the senses in its devel- 
 opment is the muscular sense. By it is meant feelings of 
 the activity of the muscles of the body as concerned in 
 movement. As to the existence of such a class of sensa- 
 tions, as seen in lifting, pushing, straining, and in the 
 weariness tliat follows muscular exertion, there is no doubt. 
 Many psychologists, however, attempt to resolve them into 
 sensations of touch, or consider them as an "assemblage 
 of sensations of different categories." The former, how- 
 ever, cannot be held, since such sensations remain after 
 complete destruction of the sensibility of the skin in cases 
 of anaesthesia of the limbs. Beaunis finds that a singer 
 retains control over the vocal chords after their sensitive- 
 ness to touch has been destroyed by cocaine. Clinical 
 cases show the same for the limbs. This indicates that the 
 skin is not the exclusive organ of muscular sensations. 
 But, further than tliis, the muscular sensations have char- 
 acteristics peculiar to themselves. 
 
 Analysis of Muscular Sensation. 1. Kincesthetlc Sen- 
 sations. Suppose for clearness, in the first instance, a case 
 of mechanical movement. My right arm is lifted swiftly 
 by a friend, my own attitude being that of entire passivity 
 and non-resistance, and when level with the shoulder the 
 elbow, wrist, and fingers are in succession flexed. What 
 do I feel ? 
 
 ' On the temperature sense see Donaldson in Mind, x. p. 399 
 
MUSCULAR 8EXSE. 97 
 
 In the first place, I liave certain particular feelings from 
 the skin: the feeling of passage through the air, due 
 mainly to a lowering of temperature, and the feeling of 
 stretching where the skin is tightly drawn. The flexing 
 of the finger backward brings out this feeling of cuticular 
 strain. I also experience sensations of touch if the skin 
 breaks contact or comes into contact with any external 
 body, as the clothing of the arm. In the second place, 
 I have certain particular feelings from the ;>z?^c<fc7es, which 
 are clear enough to be easily distinguished : the feeling 
 of contraction in the muscle itself, and feelings oi pressure 
 of the parts of the organs against one another, or of a 
 muscle against an obstruction. 
 
 Besides these particular and more or less clearly localized 
 feelings, there seems to be a sense of whereness or massice 
 locality of the limb, as a whole, in reference to the body. 
 This feeling appears to be made up of elements of tension 
 or strain in the bod}' of the muscle, and of similar strain in 
 the ligaments, tendons, and especially in \\\Qi joints. In the 
 case supposed, this last feeling is plainly localized in the 
 shoulder and elbow joints. To these must be added the 
 sensations of muscular fatigue, now demonstrated by Mag- 
 giora and Mosso, which follow the prolonged use of the 
 same muscles. 
 
 Taken together these more or less distinct kinds of 
 feeling are known as sensations of movement. The ex- 
 pression is so ambiguous, however, having been applied by 
 some writer, perhaps, to each of the subordinate feelings 
 in turn, that a better name for the class is at hand in the 
 Greek equivalent kincesthetic sensatio?is. The further 
 point of interest in them is that the nervous process which 
 reports them to consciousness is plainly a sensor or cffferent 
 process. 
 
 Kinaesthetic Sensations as Immediate or Remote. The 
 sensations of movement heretofore described have their 
 stimuli in the organ itself which makes the movement. 
 
98 SENSATION. 
 
 Such feelings are immediate. On the contrary, such move- 
 ments may themselves serve to stimulate one or other of 
 the special senses, giving a new class of sensations which 
 report tlie movement. Such movement- reporting sensa- 
 tions from other senses are remote kinaesthetic. For ex- 
 ample, when I move my arm with my eyes shut and in 
 the presence of noises which prevent my hearing the rustle 
 of my clothing, etc., my sensations of movement are im- 
 mediate. I now open my eyes and see the arm move and 
 listen attentively and hear it : the optical and auditory 
 sensations now added to my consciousness are remote 
 kinaesthetic feelings. It is important to note that our 
 feelings of movement are perhaps never free from these 
 contributions from remote sources. They almost always 
 enter in a complete statement of the case. 
 
 The nervous arrangement which underlies this confluence 
 of immediate and remote sensations is only another illus- 
 tration of the dynamic unity of the brain as a whole. The 
 centers for sight and for arm movements, for example, or 
 those of hearing and of vocal movements, have connecting 
 pathways between them. The activity of one center stim- 
 ulates the other directly, and both discharge into the motor 
 course with which one is immediately and the other re- 
 motely connected.^ On the other hand, instead of rein- 
 forcing a discharge, a remote sensation or memory may 
 inhibit it altogether. These two influences from the same 
 remote center are illustrated in the fact that in reaching 
 for objects the eye estimates the distance, and leads to our 
 putting forth more effort to stretch across it as the object 
 is further removed ; but when a certain distance is reached 
 
 ' This is clearly illustrated by cases in wliich patients are unable to 
 move their limbs as long as their eyes are closed, but can do so when 
 they see their limbs. This means that the direct channel into the limb 
 center is blocked, but the indirect channel through the visual center 
 is still open. Writers who do not accept sensations of central inner- 
 vation hold that all voluntary movements are stimulated by kinaes- 
 thetic feelings either immediate or remote. 
 
MUSCULAR SENSATIONS. 99 
 
 tlie same kind of estimation by the ej-es leads us to give up 
 the effort altogether. In one case the optical sensations re- 
 enforce the stimuli to movement, and in the other they 
 inhibit the movement. 
 
 Furthermore, what is true of sensations in general as re- 
 gards their possible reproduction or memorj- is true of 
 these states of the sensibility. The special basis of mem- 
 ory will be seen to be identical with tlie nervous con- 
 ditions of the original experience. It follows, therefore, 
 tliat tlie brain centers w^liich receive and register these 
 kingesthetic feelings are also the seat of kinaesthetic mem- 
 ories. From tlie nervous point of view, any form of stim- 
 ulus which excites the kinaesthetic center or centers may 
 bring up images of movement, and may, through these 
 images, serve to start a brain process which issues in a 
 series of real movements. What we may call the motor 
 or stimulus value of these sensations is accordingly pre- 
 served in a Aveaker degree in the motor or stimulus value 
 of their memories, both immediate and remote. 
 
 2. Feelings of Innervation. Continuing the analysis of 
 the muscular consciousness as it arises from a particular 
 movement, and passing from mechanical to voluntary 
 movement, several more vague and indefinable elements 
 may be pointed out. First, there seems to be a conscious- 
 ness of the state of the motor apparatus as a whole, as 
 capable or incapable of the movement in question. It is 
 felt in the system as a disposition or indisposition for ac- 
 tion. Considered as a state of readiness or the contrar3', 
 it may be called feeling of motor potential. It seems to be 
 plain in the different consciousness we have of the power 
 of the right and left arms respectively. 
 
 Fatigue takes on a peculiar character also when the 
 fatiguing movement is voluntary ; at least such movement 
 is more fatiguing than mechanical movements. No doubt 
 in the case of voluntary movement more nervous energy is 
 employed. And it seems equally clear that in the two 
 
100 SENSATION. 
 
 kinds of movement the kinsestlietic feelings remain about 
 the same. If these points are true we must hold either 
 that all fatigue is nervous, or that there are two kinds of 
 fatigue — muscular and nervous. Tiiis last hypothesis is 
 proved b}'- the experiments of Mosso and Waller, and also 
 gathers support from the feeling of intellectual fatigue 
 spoken of above, which would have less of the muscular 
 and more of the nervous element.' 
 
 Effort and Resistance. There are accordingly two dis- 
 tinct elements involved in voluntary movements of the 
 muscles : first, 2i feeling of effort^ and second, 2i feeling of 
 resistance. The feeling of effort arises from the condition 
 of the nervous centers, and is called ^\'!^o feeling of innerva- 
 tion. The feeling of resistance, on the other hand, seems 
 to have its seat in the muscle affected, being kinmsthetic. 
 The latter is felt as opposition to muscular movement. 
 Both of these seem to be involved in muscular sensations, 
 though either may be present without the other. In cases 
 of paralysis and muscular anaesthesia, there is the feeling 
 of effort with no corresponding muscular movement ; and, 
 on the other hand, if the hand or arm be contracted by 
 galvanism, in contact with a solid body, we have the feel- 
 ing of resistance or pressure without that of effort. The 
 clear distinction between the two classes of sensations is 
 seen in a case reported by Demeaux'^ of a woman who had 
 lost all muscular sensibility, both deep and superficial, and 
 while the power of voluntary movement remained, was yet 
 ignorant of the actual movement, and the position of the 
 limbs. The sense of effort remained, but the sense of re- 
 sistance was gone. The feeling of effort accompanies the 
 exercise of will in the adult consciousness ; but in child 
 life it has its counterpart probably in a sensation of out- 
 
 ^ Mosso proves that botli are present after hard intellectual work. 
 Cf. Waller's able article, " The Sense of Effort," in Brain, 1891, 
 p. 179. 
 
 ? Brain, March, 1887, p. 11, 
 
MVSCTLAU SEXSATIOSS. IQl 
 
 ward nervous pressure, as soon as tlie limbs aie inoved and 
 encounter resistance ; and the idea of self as active probably 
 develops out of sensations of the kind. Around thera the 
 beginnings of attention arise. Feelings of resistance also 
 arise equally early in child experience and are exceedingly 
 important as giving the first knowledge of the external 
 world/ We are conscious of opposing force, and thus 
 arrive at the first condition of matter. It is well to repeat 
 that it is through muscular sensations, with the attention 
 and will which they involve, that we come to have the idea 
 both of mental and of physical force. ^ 
 
 Presentative Element In Muscular Sensations. Com- 
 bined with touch, the muscular sense affords us knowledge 
 of extension and force. Sensations of contact, as will be 
 seen below, repeated on successive portions of the skin or 
 by the same portion on different parts of the object, present 
 data for the projection of a flat surface. It is by pressure 
 added to these sensations that we come to apprehend depth. 
 It is sufficient to remark this here, reserving its further dis- 
 cussion for the section on the perception of space. Mr. 
 Spencer, speaking of the sensation of resistance as involv- 
 ing that of effort, says : " This sensation is at the bottom 
 of our conception of the material universe, for extension is 
 (as apprehended) only a combination of resistances ; move- 
 ment is the generalization of a certain order of resistances ; 
 and resistance is also the substance of force." ^ 
 
 Taken alone the muscular sensations give us little knowl- 
 edge. We know from them the location and movements 
 of larger or smaller masses of the body ; but even this 
 knowledge is very vague, since without touch and sight 
 
 ^ Ou the importance of feelings of resistance see Spencer, Psycliol- 
 ogy, ii. chap. xvii. 
 
 * For greater detail on the mechanism of the muscular sense see 
 my Handbook of Psychology, vol. i. chap. vii. § o, with the references 
 also at the end of vol. ii. chap. iv. 
 
 '^ Loc. cit. 
 
10-2 SENSATION. 
 
 tliesG movements cannot be well co-ordinatetl, nor their 
 amounts estimated. 
 
 Nervous Sensations. Under this heading we have to 
 consider the forms of sensibilitj^ shown by the nerves them- 
 selves ; they are in so far strongly contrasted with the 
 foregoing classes, since in the case of the* organic, cutaneous, 
 and muscular feelings, the nerve conducts the sensation 
 from some other organ or part of the body. 
 
 In the first place, the nerves are capable of the most 
 acute pain. And nervous pain seems to have a more posi- 
 tive and, in consequence, more agonizing character than 
 pain from other kinds of tissue. A variety of feelings arise 
 also from a nerve when it is subjected to pressure. If a 
 small band of rubber be stretched around the upper arm, 
 these sensations are brought into consciousness : namely, a 
 tingling in the extremities, the peculiar sense of a limb's 
 being " asleep,'''' and finally numbness. The same class of 
 sensations follow from the mechanical stimulus of the nerve 
 trunks in the stumps of amputated limbs. Another series 
 of sensations depend upon the condition of the nervous sys- 
 tem as a whole. Among them may be mentioned nervous 
 shock, exaltation, and depression. Then there are states of 
 nervous hypergesthesia, or restlessness, so-called " nervous- 
 ness." Other conditions bring on feelings of alarm, dan- 
 ger, and anxiet}^ 
 
 Further, electrical stimulation of the nerves causes an- 
 other series of feelings, wliat we may call electrical sensa- 
 tions: peculiar tingling in tlie organ, a JcnocTcing sensation, 
 or longitudinal feeling of collision, such as tlie sensation 
 in the elbows when a mild electrical stimulation passes 
 through the arms. Further, electrical stimuli are capable 
 of rapid summation, and give rise to the most excruciating 
 pains. 
 
 Physiological Proof of Distinct Common Sensations. 
 That these general divisions of common sensibility have, 
 at least in part, a physiological differentiation is shown by 
 
WEBER S LAW. 103 
 
 the possibility of tlestroj'ing certain of them without im- 
 pairing otiiers. Under progressive an:eniia, or loss of 
 blood, they are lost in the order named — those named sub- 
 sequently t> any ])articular one remaining intact when that 
 one and those named before it are destroyed — namely, 
 delicacy or co-ordination of movement, delicacy of touch, 
 pain, voluntary movement, electric feelings, muscular irri- 
 tability. 
 
 From this general survey of sensation, in respect to 
 quality, the distinction between affective and presentative 
 elements in sensation is more clear. In each sense when 
 the affective element is strong the presentative is faint. 
 When a very bright light strikes the eye it produces a 
 strong affective sensation, but vision is indistinct. On the 
 contrary, when we read printed words they represent 
 thought, but are onh^ slightly affective. The case is the 
 same with sound and touch. 
 
 § 6. Quantity of Sensation : Psychophysics. 
 
 Weber's Law. By quantity is meant intensity or mass. 
 Until quite recently it was considered impossible to meas- 
 ure intensities in sensation, from the fact that they are 
 subjective entirely and we have no abiding internal meas- 
 ure to which to refer them. Tliis difficulty has been par- 
 tially overcome b}'^ establishing an external unit of meas- 
 urement, and comparing sensations through it with one 
 another. A relative measurement is in this way attained. 
 Tliis external standard is the quantity of stimulus agreed 
 upon as producing a unit of sensation. The external ex- 
 citation thus becomes the means of approach to the 
 measurement of the internal fact. For example, if the 
 sensation given by the weight of one gram on the back of 
 the hand be taken as the unit of sensation for pressure, 
 other sensations can be compared with it, in relation to 
 
 ' The student may profitably consult Ribot's exposition of this 
 topic, German Psycliology of To-day, p. 134 ff. 
 
104 SE]\^SATTO]\''. 
 
 their respective excitations, Tliis procedure has actually 
 been carried out in those of tlie senses most accessible to 
 experiment and the following law formulated, known as 
 Weber's laio : In order that any sensatio?i may increase 
 hy quantities always equal, the excitation must be increased 
 by a constant fraction of the excitation itself ; or, the ex- 
 citation must groio in geometrical jjrogression (1, 2, 4, 8) 
 in order that the sensation grow in arithmetical progres- 
 sion (1, 2, 3, 4)/ or yet again, the sensation varies as tlie 
 logarithm of the excitation.^ 
 
 Besides its application to the regular sense perceptions, 
 Weber's law applies, with the same limitations, to the esti- 
 mation of linear distance and to the judgment of the flight 
 of small portions of time. In order that I may judge a line 
 twice as long as another it must be really more than twice 
 
 ' Fechner. In arriving at this law it was necessary to show that the 
 sinallest perceptible difference between two sensations of the same sense 
 requires a constant fractional increase of the smaller excitation. This 
 has been shown with reasonable exactness for moderate degrees of in- 
 tensity of sensations of sight (ylff), touch (i), and sound 0. In deal- 
 ing with high intensities the proper working of the organ is deranged 
 and the results vitiated ; as with very bright lights. In the case of 
 taste and smell the difficulties of isolating the sensation and measuring 
 the amount of the stimulus have been almost insurmountable. Three 
 distinct methods of arriving at the smallest perceptible difference of 
 sensation are employed, all of which depend upon the subjective 
 estimate of the person experimented with as to the equality of two 
 stimuli, such as weights or lights. (See Ladd, loc. cit., p. 364.) 
 
 The scale of sensation values has its zero or vanishing point at the 
 smallest perceptible sensation for each of the senses. Hence the neces- 
 sity of instituting another series of experiments on all the senses to 
 discover this value. The point at which a growing excitation first 
 begins to be felt as a sensation is called the threshold value of the 
 excitation and the sensation is said to be at the threshold. This 
 point varies very greatly according to the conditions of the senses 
 as to exhaustion, and the state of the mind, as preoccupied or 
 attentive. 
 
 Upon these two classes of data, smallest perceptible difference of 
 sansations and smallest perceptible sensation, the logarithmic law of 
 
r 
 
 EXTEKSITT OF SENSATION. 105 
 
 as long ; and in estimating five seconds I make the time 
 too sliort by about one-fourth/ 
 
 The interpretation of Weber's law has occasioned much 
 discussion. How are we to construe the fact that the sen- 
 sation, which must be considered as effect, does not increase 
 proportionally to the stimulus, which is cause ? The 
 answer probably is that the disproportion is due to the loss 
 of excitation energy in the phj'siological processes involved, 
 the processes of transmission by the nerves and of central 
 stimulation. This makes the central process the cause of 
 the sensation, instead of the peripheral process, and the 
 law of causation liolds. 
 
 Extensive or Massive Sensations. The quantity of 
 sensation, considered as intensity or ititensive masSy is to be 
 distinguished from its quantity considered as extensity or 
 extensive massive^iess. If I paste one postage stamp on my 
 hand and then another beside it, tlie sensation is increased 
 in the second case in extensive massiveness, but not in 
 intensity. This distinction in quantity is possible only 
 when there are coexistent sensations of the same sense 
 wliicli do not coalesce to produce a higlier intensity. It 
 seems to depend upon an extensive organ of stimulation, 
 skin, retina, which is stimulated over a more or less ex- 
 tended area. It is experienced in putting the hand in 
 
 Fechner is based. Assuming that the differences of sensation to he 
 barely perceived are infinitesimal quantities, and that the difference 
 in the excitation is also Infinitely small, as compared with the whole 
 stimulus, we ma}\ by the calculus, equate differentials and write 
 (making ds Increment of sensation, de increment of excitation, and k 
 the proportional constant) 
 
 d8 = k^, 
 
 e 
 whence, by integration, 8 = k log e ; 
 
 or, the sensation varies as the logarithm of the excitation. The 
 threshold value then being given, the scale is built up. 
 
 ' This can be readily shown by counting seconds with the eyes on 
 the second-hand of a watch, and then attempting to repeat it with the 
 eyes closed. Below one second the time is judged too long. 
 
106 SENSAriOK. 
 
 water, or in hearing, at the same time, a continued musical 
 note and a harsh noise. The difference between the two 
 kinds of increase in sensation is distinct enough to require 
 separate mention. That it is found equally in connection 
 with some of the non-spatial senses,^ however, seems to be 
 sufficient proof that it is not an immediate datum of space- 
 knowledge, rs some would have it. It is probable that 
 distinctions of extensity are as fundamental as those of 
 intensity, and that they represent one of tlie first reactions 
 of consciousness upon a nervous arrangement which has 
 been perfected through former race development and in- 
 heritance. 
 
 § 7. Duration of Sensation and Thought : 
 psyciiometry. 
 
 Since the discoveries of Helmholtz and others, as to the 
 velocity of nerve transmission, it has become possible to 
 arrive at a determination of the time necessary for differ- 
 ent sensations and for some of the simpler apperceptive 
 processes. 
 
 I. Beginning with simple sensation the case is briefly 
 this : let the skin of a man in normal conditions be pricked 
 and let him speak as soon as the pain is felt, or let a word 
 be spoken and let the subject press a button as soon as he 
 hears it. The period that elapses between the two events, 
 in any such experiment arranged for two senses, is called 
 the simple reaction time and varies from i to ^ second, ac- 
 cording to the individual and according to the conditions 
 of the experiment. 
 
 Upon consideration, it is readily seen that thi« period 
 may be divided into three parts : first, the stimulation of 
 the sense organ and sensor nerve transmission to the brain 
 center ; second, the mental process of sensation, discrimi- 
 nation, and volition, etc. ; and third, motor transmission 
 and stimulation of the organ moved. Now since the veloc- 
 ' Stumpf finds original exteusity in sound-tones. 
 
ITS DURATION. 107 
 
 ity in both the motor and sensor nerves is known, we reach 
 by subtraction the time of tlie mental act. Instruments 
 are used by means of which differences to the ten-thou- 
 sandth of a second are noted. By this analysis of the 
 simple reaction time we arrive at two general principles : 
 
 a. The simplest mental act occupies an appreciable period 
 of time. 
 
 h. The purely physiological or transmission time is less 
 than half of the entire reaction.^ Consequently the time 
 taken up by the sensation and motor impulse varies slightly 
 either way from ^^ second. Tliis cannot be called purely 
 mental time, however, for the central physical change goes 
 on at the same time. 
 
 An easy way to get an approximate value for the simple 
 reaction is to request a class of students to stand in line, 
 each grasping hands in turn with his neighbor. When the 
 Hue is complete let an outsider give a signal "now" at 
 a given position of the second-hand of his watch. At the 
 signal the student first in line presses the hand of the next, 
 and so on, as rapidly as possible, down the line, the last stu- 
 dent calling " now " the instant his hand is pressed. At this 
 second " now " the outsider again notes his watch. Now 
 if the entire number of seconds elapsed be divided by the 
 number in line plus two (the outsider reacts twice), the re- 
 sult will be the reaction time for one student. 
 
 II. Passing from sensation to the reproduction of ideas 
 as memory pictures, it is concluded from experiments con- 
 ducted similarly : 
 
 a. The time occupied in the reproduction of a state of 
 consciousness is longer than the time of its production. 
 
 b. The time of reproduction depends inversely upon tlie 
 degree of attention given (l) to the original sensation, (2) 
 to the reproduction. 
 
 ^ This was conjectured by Darwin from the fact that we wink the 
 eyes without having a change of sensation from light to darkness — 
 Zodnomia. 1. p. 24. 
 
108 sensation: 
 
 III. A tliird operation on wliich many experiments have 
 been made is that of distinction or discrimination. To ex- 
 periment upon sigljt, let two colored lights be shown, the 
 subject understanding that he is to react by speaking or 
 pressing a button only when he sees the color agreed upon 
 beforehand. This involves first a comparison and then a 
 judgment, with volition. The entire time is found to be 
 about i to J second. Bj^ an easy process the purely physio- 
 logical time is eliminated, and the duration of the mental 
 act is found to be -^^ second (Kries) to J^- second (Wundt). 
 The discrimination is easier when the sensation is of hio^li 
 intensity ; and since, in all reactions, the signal must be 
 discriminated from other sensations in consciousness, we 
 have the principle that loithin certain limits the duration 
 varies iiwersely as the strength of the stimulus. 
 
 IV. Experiment has rendered service, also, in defining 
 and confirming the laws of association. The time of a 
 simple association is found to be f second to -| second. 
 Repetition greatly shortens the time by strengthening 
 the association. 
 
 V. A fifth class of experiments relates to the logical 
 judgment of subordination, ^. e.,from genus to species. It 
 is found that the time is longest when the subject is abstract 
 and the predicate a more general notion (man is intelli- 
 gent), shortest when the subject is concrete and the predi- 
 cate a less general notion (the house is red). The average 
 of a great number of experiments gives the time about one 
 second Thic is important as illustrating the growth of the 
 general and abstract notion from the concrete, and indicates 
 that the order of instruction of children should be the same. 
 
 It should be said that these results, which are not in- 
 tended here to be exhaustive, are true only in an 
 average sense and under normal conditions ; and further, 
 that they represent only a single tj^pe of our everyday 
 mental processes, that of more or less concentrated at- 
 tention and expectation. The fact that the subject of the 
 
EFFECTS OF ATTENTION. 109 
 
 experiment must take part in tlie arrangements and concert 
 his actions with those of others makes it impossible to obtain 
 results without the attention. In life, however, most of our 
 actions are not foreseen, and our attention is drawn to sen- 
 sations by their occurrence, not beforehand. The degree of 
 attention, however, may be somewhat varied and the results 
 noted. The boilily states also greatly influence the duration 
 of mental acts. Fatigue and other unusual physical con- 
 ditions tend to lengthen the reaction time. The senses 
 with which the most exact results have been obtained are 
 sight, hearing, and touch, the most presentative senses : 
 with taste and smell the mechanical difficulties are very 
 great. In dreams, the ascertained durations do not seem 
 to hold, since the flow of presentations then takes on, in 
 many cases, enormous rapidity.' 
 
 Effect of Attention upon the Duration and Quantity of 
 Sensation. We have already noted the general law that 
 attention increases the intensity of sensations. It is at 
 once seen that this principle interferes with the application 
 of Weber's law, since a given stimulus is felt more strongly 
 if attended to than otherwise : so that in comparing sensa- 
 tions by their excitations it is necessary to keep the atten- 
 tion constant in the two cases. The effects of attention 
 upon the duration of sensations is even more marked. In 
 general, attention dlmuiishes the time necessary for the re- 
 action. The shortest times are obtained by concentrating 
 the attention. To such an extent may this give rise to ex- 
 pectation of the excitation that it is sometimes anticipated, 
 the reaction of the hand, for example, being given before 
 the signal is made. In the hypnotic state, where the at- 
 tention is strongly fixed, the time is shortened. This con- 
 
 ' For attempts to determine the perception, apperception, and will 
 time separately, see references given by Ladd, Elements of Physi- 
 ological Psychology, chap. viii. Otlier accessible resumes are Ribot, 
 German Psyclwlogy of To-day, p. 250 ff., and Jastrow, Time Relations 
 of Mental PJienomena. 
 
110 SENSATION. 
 
 centration is especially necessary at first, before the mus- 
 cular reaction becomes automatic, for practice shortens the 
 reaction time. 
 
 Further, according as the attention is given to the ex- 
 pected stimulus (touch, sound, etc.) or to the reacting organ 
 (finger, in pressing a button, etc.), we have important vari- 
 ations in the time. In the former case the reaction is called 
 sensory, in the latter case motor. In the " sensory " form 
 of reaction the time is about one-half longer than in the 
 "motor" form. 
 
 Effect of Duration upon the Intensity of Sensation. 
 Within short periods the intensity of a sensation is di- 
 minished if its stimulus be continued. This arises from 
 the accommodation of the organ to the stimulus. It ap- 
 plies especially to slight pleasurable or painful stimuli. 
 Long continued stimulation, however, from exhaustion 
 of the organ, becomes increasingly intense and painful ; 
 and sensations at first pleasurable become painful under 
 this condition. 
 
 § 8. Tone of Sexsatiox. 
 
 By the " hedonic tone " of sensation is meant the feeling 
 of pleasure or pain w^hich accompanies it. It represents 
 somewhat in all sensations, and in the higher senses almost 
 entirely, the affective element. Pleasure and pain are only 
 and wholly affective. Our whole sensational experience is 
 accompanied by pleasure and pain and so has tone.* 
 
 * For detailed treatment see below, chap. xvii. 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 PERCEPTION. 
 § 1. Definition of Perception. 
 
 The theory of perception is perhaps the most important 
 as well as the most difficult problem of psychology. The 
 interpretation of the higher processes of mind rests upon it 
 and it underlies the body of our general philosophy. The 
 great philosophies of the world take their rise from initial 
 differences in the method of construing perception. Leav- 
 ing the general problems of the theory of knowledge to 
 metaphysics, we have to do only with the process of percep- 
 tion, considered as an operation of mind in attaining knowl- 
 edge of the external world. That is, we have to answer 
 the simple question, " How do we arrive at the knowledge 
 of individual objects localized in space and time ? " In 
 view of the terms of this question and of the analysis 
 which follows, we may define perception in a general way. 
 
 Perception is the apperceptive or synthetic process of mind 
 ichereby the data of sensation take on the forms of represen- 
 tation in space and time : or, considered more with reference 
 to things external to us, it is the process of the construction 
 of our representation of the external world. 
 
 § 2. Analysis of Perception. 
 
 A little reflection leads to the conclusion that our percep- 
 tion of the external world is a matter of mental construc- 
 tion. All advance into the region of mind must be through 
 mental states. The characteristic of mind is consciousness, 
 and nothing can enter the domain of mind except through 
 the mediation of consciousness. This is seen in the fact 
 that our images play in consciousness in such a way as 
 
 111 
 
112 PERCEPTION. 
 
 sometimes to deceive us in regard to the external world. 
 When the eye is deranged the mind is deceived in regard 
 to colors and distances. When we have a cold our taste is 
 impaired. When the hand is amputated irritation of the 
 nerve ends is still localized in the hand. This amounts to 
 saying that the mental picture which in every case is nec- 
 essary to tlie perception of the object, is impaired or dissi- 
 pated. The nervous system also intervenes between the 
 mind and the world, and the proper activity of mind in 
 representation depends upon the normal functioning of this 
 system. This fact, that the mind deals with its images 
 primarily and with external realities only through these 
 images, is best seen when we consider that all mental states 
 are modifications of consciousness itself, and that the per- 
 ception of the external world, however real that world be, 
 with its conditions of space and time, is possible only by 
 some process of mind whereby these conditions can be 
 mentally reconstructed and the intensive data of experience 
 cast in the forms of this reconstruction. 
 
 It is the business of a theory of perception also to tell 
 how we come to have the presentative or knowledge ele- 
 ment pointed out in sensation. Space, time, force, etc., were 
 recognized as such elements ; in perception we find the 
 process by which sensations come to take on these forms. 
 
 The construction of the representation of the external 
 world has three stages which we may call, respectively, 
 Differentiation, Localization, and Sense- Intuition. 
 
 § 3. Differentiation. 
 
 The beginning of all life experience is probably, as has 
 been already said, a state of general undifferentiated feel- 
 ing. This state of things has been described briefly in the 
 section on the growth of consciousness. There are, at this 
 beginning of sensation, no distinct forms for the different 
 senses, no notion of externality, no perception either of 
 one's own body or of tilings. It is easy to imagine one's 
 
LOCALIZATION. 113 
 
 self in that condition. All plu^sical feeling is then vague, 
 like the internal sensations which we cannot localize nor 
 trace to their causes. It is probable that the muscular sense, 
 with touch, constitutes almost the whole of this experience. 
 The earliest transition from this state of general sensation 
 is also probably due to touch and the muscular sense, 
 tlirough differences of intensity in feelings of resistance, 
 and through the sense of locality in the body. The special 
 oi-gans of the other senses are more complex and must, be 
 adapted to their function of reporting impressions from 
 without. Yet no step toward a real differentiation of sensa- 
 tions can take place till a reaction of consciousness is possible 
 in the shape of attention. As has been seen, definite sensa- 
 tions as such are not distinguished without attention. At 
 first this attention is reflex. But by it the unordered 
 and chaotic mass of sensation, which is thrown ujjon the 
 helpless individual, is divided, and distinguished. As this 
 differentiation proceeds, each sense becomes a distinct 
 source of affective experience, somewhat in the following 
 order of development : muscular sense, touch, temperature, 
 light, sound, taste, smell, color. The mere fact of differen- 
 tiation, however, can gi\ e us no sense of difference between 
 our own body and a foreign body. This distinction can 
 arise only after we begin to localize our states ; and even 
 then all these states are located first in the bodily organs. 
 
 § 4. Localization. 
 
 Another aspect of the synthesis w^hich is called perception 
 is localization. By this is meant the mental reference of 
 sensations to a locality in space. " Things," as we perceive 
 them, are always in space. Here is a new idea or form, of 
 w^hich, in the purely intensive character that sensation at 
 first presents, we find no intimation. Whence does it arise, 
 and to what factor in the perceiving process is it due ? 
 This is the question of the origin of the idea of space : 
 one of the problems most discussed in general philosophy, 
 
114 PERCEPTION. 
 
 and one to which contemporary psychology is full}^ alive. 
 With the farther metaphysical question, What is space ? 
 we are not concerned. 
 
 The Perception of Space. It is generally agreed by 
 psychologists that our first experiences of space are con- 
 nected with the muscular and touch sensations of our own 
 body. As has been said, the sensory content, before all 
 differentiation, is largely muscular. The beginnings of 
 differentiation seem at once to implicate the extensive or 
 massive quality of sensation. There is a vague feeling of 
 whereness in this early muscular sensation, and it becomes 
 more definite as the extensive or spread-out sensations from 
 the skin become broken up in localities. But at this begin- 
 ning of space experience the question confronts us : How 
 can excitations of the skin and muscles, which are trans- 
 mitted in the form of molecular action through the nerve 
 substance, and which have thereby lost their local coloring, 
 report their locality to the subject ? and further, how, if 
 they preserve this local coloring in such a way as to present 
 specific differences of motion at tlie central bureau, can 
 these differences be reported to the mind, which is a con- 
 scious presence, not itself spread out in space ? 
 
 Tliere is only one answer wliich does not either beg the 
 question at issue or overlook some one of its essential con- 
 ditions ; ^. e.. The mind has a native and original capacity 
 of reacting, when certain physiological data are present , 
 in such a way that the objects which serve to stimulate it 
 appear under the form of space. 
 
 Data for the Perception of Space. In the perception 
 of space relations by the muscular sense, touch, and sight, 
 the three senses through wliich it is accomplished, two 
 classes of data seem to be involved. Tiiese data are of a 
 ph^^sical kind and serve as basis for the mental reaction 
 just spoken of. They are muscular movements and local 
 signs. 
 
 I. Muscular Movement, Under the discussion of the 
 
IDEA OF SPACE, 115 
 
 muscular sense, the twofold nature of the sensations in- 
 volved was spoken of. Sensations of " effort " were dis- 
 tinguished from sensations of " resistance." Both of these 
 seem necessary to the finished feeling of movement, though 
 feelings of resistance play a predominating role. We learn 
 from pathological cases that if the feeling of resistance be 
 destroyed, a limb may be moved voluntarily, but there may 
 be no knowledge of the actual movement and, consequently, 
 no indication of space position. But, on the other hand, 
 the movement of a limb mechanically is felt as movement 
 when there is no voluntary motor discharge. Hence, 
 whether we hold that space is a succession of resistances? 
 or that space is an original element in the muscular experi- 
 ence, we still find the element of muscular resistance in our 
 first sensations of locality. AVe see below that movement 
 enters in the perception both of tactual and of visual space. 
 Inasmuch as feelings of resistance involve touch as well as 
 pure muscular experience, the second of our data, the 
 local sUjn, is brought into play. 
 
 II. Local Sign. By local signs are meant specific local 
 differences in the arrangement (Lotze) or structure (Wundt) 
 of the elements in the skin. By reason of these differences 
 localities partake in perception of the position they occupy 
 in space. I refer an excitation to my hand or foot ; why 
 do I give it such a specific reference ? Why do I locate a 
 pain in my right hand rather than in my left ? Simultaneous 
 sensations of a purely intensive nature, as tastes, sounds, 
 are fused together ; but simultaneous sensations from 
 neighboring points of the skin and retina preserve their 
 peculiar character and relation to one another, and we dis- 
 tinguish different localities because the sensations from 
 them are really different. As has been said, the first idea 
 of our own body results from muscular sensations w^hich 
 arise from early movements, and these sensations are vague 
 and confused ; yet even here the feeling of extension is 
 present, also vague and confused. Whence comes it ? It 
 
116 PERCEPTION. 
 
 can only come from initial differences of some kind which are 
 perpetuated through transmission to the brain. These differ- 
 ences, probably in the skin or sensor nerves, and possibly a 
 matter largely of association, afford a second datum for the 
 localization of sensations in different portions of the body. 
 The theory of local signs was first propounded by Lotze, 
 who, however, varied it in its application to different orders 
 of sensation. For sight he made the local sign consist in 
 the fixed amount of muscular movement which any retinal 
 point must undergo to be brought into the line of clearest 
 vision. Tliis is a different and definite quantity for every 
 point in the retina. In the skin the local sign, for Lotze, 
 was the combination of light accessory sensations which 
 are provoked in immediate connection with the point of 
 contact. There would be a varying amount of radiation of 
 stimulus in the skin according to the varjdng structural 
 consistency of the parts over which the skin is stretched, 
 as bone, nmscle, ligament. This hypothesis found devel- 
 opment in the more natural position that the local sign 
 was an implanted peculiarity in the structure of the skin 
 itself. A further theory, very w^idely adopted, and sug- 
 gested by Czermak, makes the local distinctions in the skin 
 due to the ramifications of the spread-out nerve fibrils, each 
 such nerve end reacting for its own position and being thus 
 a local sign. This position is most probable. It is supported 
 by the fact already cited, that the sensibility of the skin to 
 local differences varies greatly in different parts of the 
 body, and may be increased by the fixing of the attention, 
 by exercise, and in the hypnotic state. These latter condi- 
 tions tend to bring into play finer elements of the ramify- 
 ing nerve, and thus to diminish the distance between the 
 sensitive points. And the same facts tend to refute the 
 theory that the units of tactual feeling are found in 
 Weber's " circles of sensation." ' 
 
 • On the genercal theory of local signs see liibot, German Psychol, 
 of/y of To-day, chaps, iii. und iv. 
 
IDEA OF fiPACE. Ill 
 
 iJusidc'S the i^eneral coiisideratioii that some SJicli liypoth- 
 esis as that of local signs is necessaiy to the case, there is 
 direct evidence of the existence of these signs. Tlie fact 
 of varying local discrimination in the skin has been men- 
 tioned ; it is also true of the retina. The relative discrim- 
 ination of localities grows less delicate as we proceed 
 fi*om the center to the edge of the retina. The quality of 
 massiveness or extensity of sensations of touch and sight 
 depends upon the simultaneous independent excitation of 
 units of sensation, and can be accounted for only on the 
 assumption of some characteristic by which these units are 
 kept distinct. If the skin of the forehead be bent down 
 upon the nose and grow there, its irritation is felt still at 
 the foreliead. Tlie same is seen in the retina in certain 
 pathological affections, in whicli the retinal elements are 
 displaced : the irritating points of light falling upon these 
 elements are localized where they would be seen by 
 the healthy eye. 
 
 Synthesis of Data. But the fact of local signs, taken 
 in connection with muscular sensations, is not sufficient to 
 account for the perception of space. Wliatever these signs 
 be, the local color or tone they give is a modification in 
 quality alone, or an intensive change in the sensation in 
 question, and there still remains the necessity for a mental 
 reaction whereby this intensive sensation, modification, or 
 sign is construed in extensive form. How can we infer 
 differences of external position from differences in our 
 feelings ? Let a sensation of red be modified in any wa}'' 
 whatever as to its redness, and we are still absolutely in 
 the dark as to its location on the right hand or the left. 
 Nor would any number of partial sensations which I dis- 
 criminate in it, nor the order of these partial sensations in 
 coming to me, tell me that the colored object was " round 
 like an orange or a ball." Admitting the concomitant sen- 
 sations of Lotze, one of two things must be true : either 
 these concomitant sensations co-ordinate themselves in space 
 
118 PERCEPTION. 
 
 ill virtue of their own quality or they do not. If they do 
 thus co-ordinate themselves, why could not the original 
 sensations co-ordinate themselves? If they do not thus 
 co-ordinate themselves, what help are they to us in this 
 co-ordination ? They must be only data by which the 
 co-ordinating activity of mind proceeds in the matter of 
 space perception. 
 
 Tactual Perception of Space. Upon this basis the 
 mental reconstruction of spatial position proceeds in the 
 case of touch. Locality in the skin being tlius given, its 
 definition becomes very exact in experience. Feelings at 
 first vaguely localized are given precise spatial position. 
 This is rendered easy by the exploring power of active 
 touch. If left to passive touch from external objects it is 
 unlikely that we would ever arrive at a clear conception of 
 the extent and form of our own bodies. But by free 
 movement of the hands, with active touch, the relative 
 parts are explored. This is evident from the fact that 
 localization is most exact in the parts of the body most 
 open to active toucli and freest in movement, as tlie hand, 
 arm, tongue, as contrasted with the back and cheeks. 
 This process is also aided by our larger movements and 
 their reversal, and takes place with rapid advance in early 
 childhood. 
 
 Visual Perception of Space. As has been already in- 
 timated, the same data enter into the visual perception 
 of space, muscular movement, and local sign. The evi- 
 dence of the presence of local signs in the retina has also 
 been adduced. Ever since the time of Berkeley^ it has 
 been generally admitted that the original perception of the 
 eye is of a colored surface only: that is, that the eye has 
 no immediate perception of depth or distance. This is 
 shown most decisively by cases in which sight has been 
 restored to those who were born blind. About a dozen 
 cases of the removal of congenital cataract from the eyes 
 ^ Berkeley, TJceory of Vision. 
 
VISUAL SPACE!, 119 
 
 of persons of some age are on record, the oldest and most 
 famous being the Cheselden case/ In each of these cases 
 the evidence is very clear. When sight is restored the 
 patient sees everything in the same plane : there is no dis- 
 tance, no relief, nothing but a colored surface, and this 
 surface seems to be near the globe of the eye. The blind 
 man on whom Clieselden operated said that objects touched 
 his eye. Home's patient said the same of the sun and of 
 the head of the physician. The patients of Xunnely and 
 Franz had the same experience. 
 
 The muscular movements of the eye are of extreme 
 delicacy and variety. Tliere is for every point of the 
 retina a fixed amount and direction of movement necessary 
 to substitute for It tlie center of clearest vision ; and when 
 such a point, right, left, above, below, is excited there is 
 at once a tendenc}' to revolve the ball of the eye in such 
 a way as to bring the center of vision to this point. This 
 represents a given degree of central nervous discharge 
 to bring about the muscular strain. Since movement of 
 tlie eyes precedes vision, there are no means whereby such 
 movement can be ruled out ; and further, the influence it 
 exerts in localization is seen in the fact that if one of the 
 muscles of the eye be destroj^ed, so that no movement fol- 
 lows its stimulation, objects are localized as if this move- 
 ment had taken place." 
 
 The necessity for a reaction of consciousness upon these 
 data is the same as in the case of touch. Sensations from 
 
 ' See details of Cheselden and other cases in McCosh's PsycJiology, 
 vol. 1. p. 45. 
 
 ^ See references given by Wundt, Phys. Psych., 2d ed.,ii. p. 91, 
 and i. p. 375 : " For instance, one suffering from paresis of the right 
 external muscle of the eye, so that the muscle is able by the utmost 
 effort to effect a lateral movement of 20°, locates an object which in 
 reality is only 20^ distant from the median plane, at a point as far 
 outward as corresponds to the utmost outward movement of the 
 normal eye, and when asked to touch the object places his finger far 
 beyond it to the right." 
 
120 PERGUPTtOn. 
 
 the extended surface of tlie retina and from its movements 
 over the visual field can be only intensive and qualitative 
 modifications of consciousness, which are appreliended under 
 space-form by the mind's own reconstruction. The process 
 in this case is the same as in touch with tlie muscular sense. 
 
 Spatial perception by touch and the muscular sense pre- 
 cedes spatial perception by siglit. The idea, as a mental 
 acquisition, is probably gained rouglily before we see at all. 
 But this does not impair the fact of spatial perception by 
 sight. Having the idea of space, why do we clotlie the 
 data of sight with this form, and why do we not thus 
 clothe the sensations to which we do not assign a spatial 
 arrangement ? Evidently because sight offers also the data 
 which are necessary for the mental reconstruction of space. 
 
 Perception of Foreign Body. The distinction between 
 our own and a foreign body arises very early in child life 
 and is not subsequent to 1?iie completed idea of our own 
 body. As we have seen, the perception of our own bod}^ 
 as extended involves both distance or movement, and 
 resistance. In the primary feeling of resistance we have 
 the beginning of the perception of foreign body. The 
 amount of movement or distance, measured in muscular 
 sensation, indicates roughly, at first, but with great pre- 
 cision later, the localities of objects around us in reference 
 to our own body. This is greatly aided by active touch 
 and by sight. We feel round a bod3^ and give it the third 
 dimension, which we have already found to be an attribute 
 of our own body. The distinction between our own 
 members and other objects is further assisted by the 
 phenomenon of double touch ; that is, the two sensations 
 of touchinor and beinor touched, when we come in contact 
 with our own skin. In paralysis our own limbs are to us as 
 foreign bodies, inasmuch as the sensation of active touch is 
 present alone. Another important series of double sensa- 
 tions arises when the child sees and also feels his own move- 
 ments. Another important fact is that we both see and feel 
 our own movements, while we only see other movements. 
 
PEnCEPTTOX OF DTSTAXfE. \2\ 
 
 Visual Perception of Distance. The visual percep- 
 tion of distance or deptli proceeds upon the tactual and 
 muscular perception of distance. It consists in the ac- 
 quired interpretation of light and color differences in 
 terms of distance already given by the skin and muscles. 
 The original colored surface presented in vision is pro- 
 jected more or less distantly, according as its lights and 
 shades are associated with a greater or less muscular or 
 tactual coefficient. This is seen in the fact that the 
 original errors of sight, in respect to distance, are rectified 
 by touch and muscular movement. In the Trinchinetti 
 case tlie patient at first '* attempted to grasp an orange 
 with her hand very near the eye ; then, perceiving her 
 error, stretched out her forefinger and pushed it in a 
 straight line slowly until she reached her object." Other 
 patients have done the same, when first restored to sight. 
 This interpretation in terms of muscular and tactual feeling 
 becomes, in later experience, a matter of the sensitiveness 
 of the eye itself. Its own mechanism of movement and 
 retinal reaction gives data by association for the percep- 
 tion of depth. 
 
 A number of factors enter in the mechanical adjustment 
 of the eye to sight at different distances. Among them 
 we may mention : a. A muscular strain when the object 
 is near, due to the slight contraction of the pupil and the 
 swelling of the anterior surface of the crystalline lens. 
 This is called the sensation of accommodation, b. Differ- 
 ence in an object when seen near or far whh both ej^es. 
 The difference in the angle of vision of the two e3'es 
 enables us to see parts of the sides and thickness of the 
 object gazed at, and this datum of depth varies with the 
 distance, c. Strain arising from the varying angle made 
 by the lines of vision of the two eyes. When the object 
 is near the eyes turn toward each other ; this is known as 
 the sensation of convergence, d. Dimness of outline of a 
 distant object, or poor light, the retinal elements being but 
 
122 PERCEPTIOy. 
 
 feebly excited, e. Dirninislied size, fewer of the elements 
 being excited, f. In addition there are more general con- 
 siderations which aid our estimation of distance, such as 
 tlie number of intervening objects, the known size of the 
 object, and others. 
 
 The finer estimation of distance is a matter of cultiva- 
 tion and practice. Indications entirely lost to the ordi- 
 nary observer are unconsciously taken into account by the 
 sailor and artist ; such as tlie length of shadows, the air 
 perspective, and delicate discrimination of colors. All 
 this is clearly a matter of acquired judgment, which may 
 be improved to an endless degree almost by the exercise 
 of trained attention and study. In pictorial art the process 
 is reversed, the task of the artist being to interpret back 
 upon a plane surface those data of the perception of depth 
 which we all unconsciously proceed upon. So fixed do the 
 associations of distance become that, while our own sense 
 experiences were sufticient to convert our primitive sensa- 
 tions of color into a complex of objects about us, we need 
 a teacher of the elements of perspective to enable us to 
 revert again to the conditions of our original perception. 
 
 Localization of Sounds in Space. The position of 
 sounding objects in space is roughly indicated by the ear, 
 but this rough localization proceeds upon the previous per- 
 ception of objects by touch and sight. It is only after the 
 surrounding world is tolerably familiar and its sounds al- 
 ready associated with known objects, that the sensations of 
 hearing are definitely placed. This localization by the ear 
 involves distance and direction. The distance of sounding 
 bodies is judged from the intensity of the sound, especially 
 when the normal sound is well known. When the hearing 
 is impaired sounds are located farther away. The sense of 
 direction seems to arise from several causes, the principal 
 of which is the relative strength of the sound in the two 
 ears. The sounding body is located on the side on which 
 the ear receives more sound waves. If a sound be made on 
 
SENSE-TNTUITIOX. 123 
 
 the median vertical line through the head — say above — it 
 is not localized, but a slight variation on either side the 
 line is at once detected. Consequently, we locate sounds 
 as right and left, before and behind, much better than up and 
 down. Again, there is a tendency to locate loud sounds in 
 front, from the fact that more sound waves from that di- 
 rection are collected by the external ear. Delicate sensa- 
 tions of touch and muscular movement also in the ear aid 
 us in localizing sounds, though to a much less degree than 
 in tlie hearing of some animals wliose ear muscles are 
 largely developed. 
 
 Feeling of Equilibrium from the Ear. Recent in- 
 vestigations have shown that the feeling of equilibrium of 
 tlie body in space is due in part, at least, to combined 
 muscular and auricular sensations. The feeling of erect- 
 ness arises from muscular strain in the limbs and trunk. 
 The feeling of direction involves also the muscles of the 
 eye. Feelings of the rotation and general position of the 
 head in respect to the body are given by the semicircular 
 canals of the ear. These canals are projected in the three 
 dimensions of space to which they seem to have, respectively, 
 a determinate relation. 
 
 Ideal Product of Localization : Idea of Space. The 
 idea of space, as thus treated, is acquired in concrete per- 
 ception. Space, so far, has meant extension, considered as 
 an attribute of objects extended. The finished idea of 
 space, as a great void, is derived only b}^ a process of ab- 
 straction to be considered later. From the perception of a 
 body extended we pass to the conception of an extension or 
 space which this body fills : we abstract the body and leave 
 the space.* 
 
 § 5. Sexse-Intuitiox. 
 
 The third and last stage in the process of the perception 
 of the external world may be called Sense-Intuition. In 
 
 1 On theories of space-perception see my Handbook of Psychology, 
 vol. i. chap. viii. § 4. 
 
124 PEnCEPTIOK. 
 
 the first of tlie three stages under wliicli we found this 
 process naturally taking place, i. e., Differentiation, we saw 
 the breaking up of the general and vague sensory content 
 of the infant's consciousness into the discriminated sensa- 
 tions of the different senses; in the second, i. e., Localization, 
 these sensations have taken position in space ; in the third, 
 i. e., Sense- Intuition, sensations are gathered together in 
 the permanent units or wholes which we call " things" in 
 our ordinary dealings with the w^orld. 
 
 As illustrating the incompleteness of the perceptive proc- 
 ess at the stage to which we have now advanced, we may 
 imagine a consciousness holding a given number of well dif- 
 ferentiated and localized sensations ; say, a taste, a smell, 
 etc., as in "psychic blindness," These have no connection 
 among themselves at their first experience, although they 
 are given the same locality and occur at about the same 
 time. There is no reason that they should be thought of to- 
 gether, or that one should suggest the other. That is, there 
 is no reason that the intuition ^^Tp/e should emerge. There 
 is a furtlier process by which this important lack is supplied, 
 and sensations, until now isolated and disconnected, are 
 thrown into permanent complexes or groups. In this 
 further advance several necessary steps are apparent. 
 
 I. Attention. However sensations may be grouped in 
 the passing panorama of consciousness, they have no last- 
 ing connection unless their coexistence is attended to. And 
 not only so, but it is doubtful whether simple reflex at- 
 tention would be sufficient for the grouping of sensations 
 in a complex whole. It may at least be safely said that 
 the arranging and co-ordinating power of voluntary at- 
 tention greatly facilitates our earliest intuition of things. 
 It is here that the relating or apperceiving function of 
 active attention is most apparent. It will be seen in treat- 
 ing of memory that the degree and intensity of the power 
 of retaining and reproducing presentations depends upon 
 the degree of attention given to the original experience. 
 
SEKSE-IXTCITIOX. 125 
 
 This is especially true of the relations in wliicli these 
 original presentations stand to one another. The touch, 
 taste, color, smell, or any two or three of the qualities of 
 the apple are experienced, for the first time, in immediate 
 conjunction and, while merely a colligation of sensations, 
 are attended to as such, and their coexistence pictured. 
 At first the muscular and touch sensations, as localized, 
 precede, and upon these the sensations of other senses are 
 gradually linked. 
 
 II. Association: a principle by which presentations once 
 experienced together tend to come up in memory in the same 
 order and connection. By this principle the revival of one 
 of the former sensations tends to arouse the others with which 
 it was before experienced. In tlie further extension of our 
 experience additional sensations are added to the associated 
 group, as when we learn that an apple before known as 
 si)herical and red is also sweet and fragrant. Like asso- 
 ciations in general, this grouping of sensations becomes 
 fixed onh^ by much repetition and with the help of many 
 bodily movements. Thus the object in perception becomes 
 clearly defined and distinguished from others, and the ex- 
 ternal world takes on its permanent foi-m, as a whole of 
 various "things" existing in relation to one another. 
 
 An additional fact, important to the permanent fixing 
 and discrimination of percepts, is this, that we learn very 
 early to name objects as we perceive them. This is a 
 mental function to be considered later, and it need be noticed 
 here only to remark that it is a great auxiliary to the 
 lasting quality of our sense-intuitions. In the ordinary 
 education of children, when their knowledge of language 
 goes ahead of their experience of things, the names are 
 ready beforehand and are applied, under instruction, to 
 objects presented to them, with a number of qualities 
 clearly pointed out. Thus the process of growth in the 
 combination of qualities is greatly abbreviated. Teaching 
 by object lessons is therefore justified psychologically as a 
 
126 PERCEPTION. 
 
 method, in that it leads tlie child to attach the right name 
 to the right object, in the first place, and thus to avoid all 
 tentative and mistaken efforts at discrimination. 
 
 Motor Intuition.^ Muscular sensations gradually be- 
 come grouped or integrated in a similar way. With wider 
 use, a larger number of muscles are associated in the per- 
 formance of a common movement. These motor intuitions 
 take the form of ideal or pictured co-ordinations of move- 
 ment, which become more and more sure and automatic as 
 the muscles are exercised in groups after repeated effort. 
 The early random movements of the child are thus worked 
 up into the systematic co-ordinated muscular groups of the 
 adult life, by gradual adaptation to the environment : for 
 example, walking, piano pla^nng. 
 
 § 6. Reflection or Self-consciousness. 
 
 The highest form of consciousness is 5e{/*-consciousness. 
 The notion of self, like other notions, is a gradual growth. 
 Tiie vague feeling of the ego which the first affective ex- 
 periences afford, the feeling of modification in the con- 
 sciousness as the background or theater of presentation, 
 and the recurrence of this feeling again and again in con- 
 nection with objects new and old — and added to this the 
 mass of more constant organic and vital sensation — all this 
 is the beginning of the sense of personality or self. Its at- 
 tributes of permanence, identity, and activity become more 
 prominent with the development of will in connection with 
 muscular effort, and with the establishment of the relation 
 of subject and object which is finally a fundamental fact. 
 By reflection is meant the turning in of the mind to itself 
 as its own object. By the result of reflection is meant, 
 therefore, the knowledge which the mind has of its own 
 operations, recognized as its own. It is an advance on 
 the simple awareness of consciousness, in which there is 
 
 ^Compare Maudsley's discussiou, P/ii/siologt/ and Pathology of the 
 Mind, Americnn edition, chap. viii. 
 
IDEA OF SELF. 127 
 
 no reference to self as different from its object. In reflec- 
 tion, this reference has distinct place, and the self is dis- 
 covered through the act of attentive inspection, as having 
 and exercising the characteristics of mind. 
 
 Ideal Product of Reflection: Idea of Self Through 
 reflection, therefore, the idea of self is attained and assumes 
 its important place in the mental world. Round the self 
 as a center the intellectual life plays. To it all possible 
 forms of experience are referred. It brings coherence into 
 the circuit of consciousness, by giving it a center of refer- 
 ence and a circumference of limitation to the individual. 
 
EEPEESENTATIOK 
 MEMORY. 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 RETENTION AND REPRODUCTION. ^ 
 
 Our states of consciousness, as a general fact, are all lia- 
 ble to reproduction, recall, or revival. The original states 
 of consciousness are designated Presentations, or primary 
 states ; and the corresponding revived states, to which they 
 give rise, Representations, or secoyidary states. 
 
 § 1. General Nature of Memory. 
 
 The capacity to be revived on suitable conditions ex- 
 tends to all states of consciousness. This revival is most 
 vivid and facile for sensations of sight, touch, and sound, 
 from the fact already noticed that these sensations are 
 mostly presentative, having the forms of space and time. 
 Objects seen are readily pictured when the eyes are closed, 
 and sounds of tunes, and more especially of words, are re- 
 produced with great ease. In reading a page we recall 
 the sounds of the spoken words involuntarily ; and, if it 
 be a page of poetry, the rhythm and rhyme are caught by 
 the quick revival of the words and measures in succession. 
 Other sensations, as tastes and odors, are also capable of 
 reproduction. The fact that we distinguish and classify 
 them is sufficient proof of tliis. Their reproduction is 
 more obscure from the fact that, being more affective, they 
 caunot be pictured under the presentative forms of time 
 
 ' Qi. my Handbook of Psychology, vol. i. chap. ix. 
 
 138 
 
j^ATUBE OF MEMORY. 129 
 
 and space. But that these forms, and consequently 
 memory pictures in general, are not essential to memory, 
 is seen in the fact that pains and pleasures, and tlie emo- 
 tions, which are purely affective states, are remembered 
 with great distinctness ; these states afford no data for our 
 picturing faculty. According to Epicurus, the memory of 
 past pleasure and the imagination of future pleasure are 
 the principal source of our happiness. Sympathy depends 
 upon the revival of our own pains and pleasures ; for we 
 cannot sympathize strongly in cases which our own experi- 
 ence does not cover. And finally, the acts of will are pres- 
 ent in memory, giving, according to their nature, moral 
 satisfaction or regret. 
 
 Strictly speaking, a distinction is to be drawn between 
 states which are revii^ed after having once disappeared from 
 consciousness, and those which persist in consciousness a 
 short period after the external stimulus has ceased to act. 
 The latter is a mental after-image, somewhat like the 
 physical after-image on the retina, alread}^ mentioned. 
 Every percept clearly distinguished leaves its outline in 
 consciousness for a very small period, and then fades 
 rapidly away. In the case of a rapid succession of presen- 
 tations there is a coexistence of elements and not a 
 revival. This is the case, probably, with written and 
 spoken words, tunes, rapid rhythm. 
 
 Proof that Presentation and Representation differ 
 only in Degree or Intensity.^ Several kinds of evidence 
 ma}^ be adduced in support of the claim that presentation 
 and representation are one and the same process. 
 
 I. From Conscious7iess. We are aware in consciousness 
 of no peculiar marks of revived states by which to distin- 
 guish them from percepts, except that they are prevail- 
 ingly of less intensity. In the conscious reproduction the 
 conditions of the presentation are vaguely reproduced. 
 The representation of a name, sound, the tic-tac of the 
 'Cf. Rubier, Psychologic, pp. 153-157. 
 
130 BETENTIOJ^ AND REPRODUCTION. 
 
 pendulum, is referred to the ear. The image of an extended 
 object is formed as extended in the fiekl of vision. If we 
 try to recall the taste of an orange we seem to have a kind 
 of after-taste on the tongue. In recalling emotion the 
 general conditions of our first experience of it are found 
 with it in memory by the law of association. There is 
 this difference between the train of presentations and that 
 of representations, that the latter is accompanied by a feel- 
 ing of familiarity and anticipation. But it is doubtful 
 whether this feeling is present at the reproduction, unless 
 it involve a measure of comj^lexity which was also 
 present in the original. This feeling is present in the 
 perception, also, when by repetition an element of represen- 
 tation is involved in it. In the case of voluntary reproduc- 
 tion, it is true, there is the addition of an exercise of will, 
 which is of great importance in affording us a means of dis- 
 tinguishing between the percept and its image ; but this is 
 not necessary to the reproduction more than to the original 
 perception, since most of our memory pictures arise involun- 
 tarily.* It has its counterpart also in certain voluntary 
 efforts of perception ; as when we explore an unknown 
 scene with the eye or feel over an unknown surface. 
 
 II. Presentations and Representations have the same 
 Physiological Antecedents and Effects, The physiological 
 antecedents of both primary and secondary mental states 
 are spoken of later under the physical conditions of mem- 
 ory. It is sufficient to say, here, that the immediate ante- 
 cedents, the brain processes, are the same in both cases. 
 The remote antecedents of the percept — presence of an 
 object, and stimulus of the sense — are w'anting in the case 
 of the revived image ; but it is the immediate antecedent 
 upon which the representation depends. 
 
 The physical consequences or effects are also the same. 
 Mtiller says that the simple idea of a nauseous taste is some- 
 
 ' This relation to will is given due recognition in a later connection, 
 Tjelow, chap. xix. § 5. 
 
PllESEXTATIOJS' AND BEPRESENTATION. 131 
 
 times sufficient to produce sickness, the natural effect of tlie 
 real sensation. The visual picture of a person who has 
 once provoked our anger serves to produce it again with 
 the same physical expression. Intense mental picturing of 
 a primary color may so exliaust the retinal elements that 
 the compleraentar}" color is seen when the eyes are opened. 
 It is hard to think upon an energetic action without 
 imitating it, just as in the original attention to the perform- 
 ance of it by others we had such "a bodily tendency ; and 
 to have a word in mind is usually to form it with the 
 organs of speech. Further, the simple thought of great 
 cold makes one shiver. The thought of the drawing of a 
 sharp knife over glass sets one's teeth on edge, as Darwin 
 says. Anyone who has attended a clinical operation knows 
 how acute the suggested sensations of cutting are at first. 
 
 in. Frequent Confusion between Presentation and He- 
 presentation. The strongest, indeed the decisive, proof 
 that psychologically these two classes of states are really 
 one is this : we frequently mistake one for the other. 
 " The proof," said Reid, " that there is an essential differ- 
 ence of nature between these states is that we never con- 
 found a sensation, however feeble, with an image, or the 
 contrary." This is simply an error of observation. We 
 do often confound them, and several different cases of this 
 confusion may be pointed out. 
 
 1. Whe7i the intensity of the image is very great. This 
 is the case in hallucinations and insanity. " Patients con- 
 tinually hear voices speaking to them, or about them, reply- 
 ing to their most secret thoughts, suggesting to them pro- 
 fane and obscene ideas, and advising and threatening 
 them." * In these cases abnormal brain action gives the 
 image the verisimilitude of a sensation and the distinction 
 is completely lost. The same result may arise in normal 
 life from simple force of imagination. Newton could 
 bring before him, when in the dark, an image of the sun, 
 with all the characteristics of reality, and Goethe coulc^ 
 ' Maudsle^y, loc. cit. 
 
132 RETENTION AND REPRODUCTION 
 
 evoke an object and cause it to pass through a series of 
 transformations. 
 
 Further, there are cases of regular mistake in our per- 
 ceptions, in which an image passes for tlie real object. In 
 reading rapidly we do not see all the letters individualh^, 
 but pass over them with a supply of appropriate images. 
 Proof readers know this from sad experience. It is proba- 
 ble that we see the first letters of the words and the last, 
 slurring over the middle characters and supplying them 
 from our knowledge and from the connection. Yet we 
 think that each letter has been seen in order. Tlie blind 
 spot in the field of vision is filled in by the one-eyed man 
 and th« field seems to present an unbroken continuity. And 
 our acquired perceptions are often imaged additions to our 
 presentations and interpretations of them. In all these 
 cases the image is of such intensity as to seem homo- 
 geneous with the presentational field which it supple- 
 ments. 
 
 2. When the actual sensation is very feeble. The same 
 result is found when the sensation is reduced in intensity 
 to the similitude of the image. For example, when a sound 
 dies out little by little the time comes when one is uncer- 
 tain whether he still hears it or only remembers it. If the 
 two experiences were distinct in nature the line between 
 them would be very plain. Patients often cannot tell 
 whether they feel a pain or only imagine it. 
 
 This is especially the case in states of hypnotic hallu- 
 cination. Here a mere suggestion of the presence of an 
 object suffices to place its image in the conscious field of 
 the patient with a persistence and perceptive consistency 
 which nothing but a counter-suggestion can remove. The 
 image becomes for the patient an actual object for all the 
 senses, the ordinary tests of illusion* fail, and there is 
 absolutely no distinction to the subject between the image 
 and the reality. 
 
 In all cases in which there is no actual perceptive ex|)eri- 
 ' See chap. xiv. § 4. 
 
DEFIXITIOX OF MEMORY. 133 
 
 eiice to correct the force of images, we are liable to illusion, 
 and lience the mere absence of percepts is often sufficient 
 to cause the errors attributed above to the strens^theninor 
 or weakening of sensation. This is the case in dreaming. 
 The dream world is the only world then in consciousness, 
 and though its intensity is probably feeble, as is seen in 
 the fact that dreams do not linger generally in conscious- 
 ness, it is taken for real, simply from the absence of any- 
 thing more real wherewith to contrast it. 
 
 Definition of Memory. In considering the entire mental 
 function which we call memory, we find that it involves 
 several factors or stages, which are sometimes treated as 
 distinct operations, but may more properly be considered, 
 as we find them, together. Together they constitute a 
 chain of events whereby the mental life of the past is 
 retained and utilized in the present. First, there is the 
 permanent possibility of the revival of a past experience 
 wlien its first circumstances are repeated ; this is called 
 Retention. Kext, there is the actual return of the image 
 to consciousness : Reproduction. Third, this image is 
 known as having already been presented in our past expe- 
 rience : Recognition. And finally, there is, in most cases, 
 an immediate reference to the exact past time of its 
 first experience : Localization in time. These, taken to- 
 gether, constitut'e a finished act of memor}^ and will be 
 considered in the order of their actual rise in conscious- 
 ness. 
 
 Accordingly, memory may be defined as a mental revival 
 of conscious experience: in which the word experience 
 refers to the past and suggests Retention ; the term 
 revival answers to Reproduction ; and the word mental 
 makes the whole a conscious feat of Recognition. This 
 definition puts the case in the broadest light and admits 
 any interpretation of the subordinate operations which 
 may be consistent with fact. 
 
134 llETBNTION AND REPRODUCTION. 
 
 § 2. Retention. 
 
 It is seen, in the above analysis, tliat an act of memory 
 touches consciousness at two points : at the beginning, i. 6., 
 at the time of the original presentation, and at the end, 
 ^. e., in the act of conscious revival. We remember 
 nothing of which we were not conscious at the time of its 
 occurrence, nor do we remember anything when we are in 
 a state of unconsciousness. These two points of contact 
 conceded, the question at once arises : what of the inter- 
 vening period ? I saw, for example, a house yesterday or 
 last year ; I was conscious of the presentation. I recall 
 the image of the house to-day, or a year hence ; I am con- 
 scious of the representation. But where has it been in the 
 mean time, while I was not conscious of it? Several 
 answers to tliis question have been proposed. 
 
 Theories of Retention. I. linages, ice are told by the 
 metaphysicians,^ are stored avmyin the mind, in the pigeon- 
 holes of the soul, to be brought out for use when the proc- 
 esses of mind require them. This view, it is needless to 
 say, is not now advocated in this language. The mind has 
 no pigeon holes ; it is not a storehouse of images. But it 
 is maintained in more discriminating form by others who, 
 very commendably, wish to maintain the continuity of 
 mind over the chasm of forgetfulness which divides these 
 two points of conscious life. Yet it seems sufficient answer 
 to this to say that, if the image has left consciousness it 
 has left the mind, as far as we know. It is only by con- 
 sciousness that we can discover the image at all. This has 
 greater force in view of tlie complete fulfillment of all the 
 requirements of the case which we find in the theory 
 advocated below. 
 
 II. Rete7ition is due to a psychological habit. This the- 
 ory refers retention to habit, and conceives of habit as a 
 permanent disposition of the mind to do again, whenever 
 
 * See Hamilton on "Latent Images," Metaphysics, lect. xxx. 
 
THEORIES OF RETEXTIOX. 135 
 
 circumstances permit, what it has once clone — to think 
 again what it has once thought. As a description of the 
 actual fact this is true. Tliere is such a tendency, to a very 
 marked degree ; but it is merely an observed aspect of 
 memory, and, in noting it, we do not at all explain the ac- 
 tivity of memory. When we have called it a habit, a dis- 
 position, a permanent tendency of mind, what more can we 
 say? The questions arise : Is it based on psychological 
 grounds, or will physiological facts explain it? Is it an 
 ultimate law, or can it be reduced to simpler principles ? 
 Habits are not facts of consciousness, and we have no ex- 
 perience of them except by observation of the states which 
 are supposed to exemplify them ; so that they elude our 
 observation. If it is submitted, therefore, as an explana- 
 tion of retention that the mind becomes accustomed to 
 acting in certain waj^s, and so repeats itself, the ground of 
 this mental custom must be again referred to that chasm 
 of the unconscious which affords so ready a repository for 
 the outcasts of our ignorance. 
 
 AsVolkmann remarks, moreover, inasmuch as the repres- 
 entations are not essences, but functions, the dispositions 
 or habits of mind must be functional dispositions. Now a 
 functional disposition can only consist in a slight persist- 
 ence of the function, which, in turn, can only mean a con- 
 tinuation or persistence of the representation in complete 
 unconsciousness. By physical disposition or tendency we 
 may mean combination or arrangement ; a readiness of 
 parts for a given result. But in speaking of presentations, 
 as functions, we cannot employ such a meaning. Wundt 
 himself remarks : "If we carry the view (of dispositions of 
 mind) over from the physical to the mental, only conscious 
 presentations can be considered real presentations, while 
 those that are driven out of consciousness may be consid- 
 ered as mental dispositions of an iinhmmn hind io^Y2iV^. re- 
 vival." And he goes on to say : " The essential difference 
 between the spheres of the physical and mental consists in 
 
136 RETENTION AND nEPRODVCTION. 
 
 this, that in the former case we may hope to learn more of 
 the changes which we call dispositions, while on the mental 
 side this hope is forever forbidden, inasmuch as the limits 
 of consciousness are at the same time the limits of our 
 inner experience." * 
 
 III. The linage is suhco7iscious. The school of Herbart 
 support tlie theory that every image which is capable of 
 being revived in consciousness exists in a state of dimin- 
 islied intensity, having fallen below the " tliresliold " of con- 
 sciousness, to rise again when, for any reason, its intensity J 
 is heightened. This may mean that the representation 
 is vaguely or dimly conscious, lying in a state of diffused 
 attention, but still entering as a factor in the complex 
 whole of our present state ; in which case the theory is 
 true, as far as those images are concerned which can be 
 found, however dimly, in consciousness. But it then over- 
 looks the great mass of newly recalled facts ; facts which 
 are in no sense even in subconsciousness, as my memory of 
 a date in history when I am thinking of something to 
 which it is quite foreign. As for these entii'ely unconscious 
 states, the Herbartians have no alternative but to hold that 
 they lie, with minimum intensitj'^, in the depths of the 
 psychic life. This is the old metaphysical theory in more 
 modern guise. The phrase " unconscious presentation " 
 may be more scientific and less material than " latent im- 
 ages" or " stored-up ideas," but it is equally obscure — and 
 less picturesque. 
 
 Another pertinent objection to this theory is that it sup- 
 poses a degree of separateness or individuality in these 
 supposed unconscious states, which in real mental life is 
 impossible. If representations coexist, with slight inten- 
 sities, in unconscious mind, why do not those of the same 
 quality coalesce, as in real presentation ? I have a dis- 
 tinct memory of two notes, say c and c' : if they are both 
 present in subconsciousness, differing only in intensity from 
 ' Phys. Psych., 2d ed., ii. p. 205. 
 
 " 
 
THEORIES OF HETENTIOX 137 
 
 the real sensations, why do they not coalesce in a single 
 sound as real sounds do ? So generally with tliese states : 
 there is no interference or mutual hindrance, as in real ex- 
 perience. 
 
 General Criticism. As a general criticism of the pre- 
 ceding theories of retention, the following consideration 
 is of great importance. They agree, especially the first 
 and third, in regarding tlie representation or image as a 
 thing of itself, a something which exists, and whose pres- 
 ence somewhere else must be supposed, when it is not pres- 
 ent in consciousness. We are told the percept of the house 
 was in consciousness yesterday and the representation will 
 be again to-morrow ; the image of the house must be some- 
 where to-day. And tliese theories attempt to conjecture 
 the whereabouts of this image. Very slight consideration 
 leads us to see that this manner of thought is quite mis- 
 taken. The image is not a thing at all, to be stored away 
 or sunk in subconsciousness like a stone in a lake ; it is a 
 state, a mental product, dependent upon a process, and in 
 the absence of this process it simply ceases to exist. The 
 true answer to the question, as to where the presentation is 
 in the time between percept and memory, is JVowhere. Its 
 reinstatement is simply the reinstitution of the process 
 which at first gave it rise. Its recall is a recreation, really 
 a new presentation, not the old image. AVe never have 
 the same representation twice. We are thus led to another 
 theorj^ 
 
 IV. Physiological Theory of Retention. Disregarding 
 the fact of actual reproduction, which is considered below, 
 and looking only to the permanent possibility of such re- 
 production, that is, to the set of conditions of such a 
 kind as to make the revival of mental states at any 
 time real, we are led to the view that retention is physical, 
 a matter of the modification of brain and nerve structure 
 or function, such modification persisting and giving rise 
 to a phj'siological habit or tendency. Before proceeding 
 
138 BETEKTION AND REPRODUCTION. 
 
 farther to explain and defend this view some general ob- 
 jections may be met. 
 
 1. It is objected that physiological modifications coukl 
 not last as retention does, even admitting the general prin. 
 ciple tliat every organic modification must leave some trace 
 behind it. Here the question is simply as to the length of 
 an admitted process of obliteration. It is not held that these 
 modifications do not fade away and finally disappear, as 
 far as memory is concerned. The fact of forgetfulness, 
 seemingly absolute, establishes the tendency of these traces 
 to disappear. Therefore we only have to ask, liow long, 
 relatively, might thej^ last ? Admitting this point, we still 
 find it possible to hold that these nervous modifications 
 l^ersist indefiniteh'-, as memory sometimes appears to.^ 
 There are analogous cases of long persistence of physical 
 modification. If a key be laid upon a white paper, and ex- 
 posed to the sun, and the paper be then preserved in dark- 
 ness, the image of the key is visible for some years. Even in 
 case of organic modification where the physical elements 
 are undergoing perpetual renewal, the form persists. An 
 insignificant scar on the skin remains through life. The 
 virus of smallpox, or the presence once of an infectious 
 disease, leaves marks sometimes, throughout the elements 
 of the body, which are never erased. Muscular fiber is 
 permanently modified by exercise. We have a further 
 analogy in the permanent disposition Avhich the motor 
 centers assume for the co-ordination of movements. At 
 first complex movements are performed with great difficulty, 
 the central nervous disposition being wanting ; but after 
 some practice these dispositions become established and the 
 co-ordinated movements become semi-automatic. Of the 
 
 ' See Ribot, Leg Maladies de la Memoire, chap. iv. , and Taine, In- 
 telligence, 11. chap. 11., for remarkable cases of such memory. An 
 ignorant girl, during a severe illness In her twenty-fifth year, recited 
 long pieces of Greek, Latin, and Hebrew, which she had heard her 
 uncle repeat when she was nine years old. 
 
TBEOnY OF BETESTIOK 139 
 
 superior centers tlie same, in all probability, may be said. 
 Furtliermore, liypnotic experiments show beyond question 
 that experiences absolutely beyond recall in the normal 
 life may come readily back to the hypnotic somnambulist. 
 
 2. It is further objected that the brain does not afford 
 sufficient substance or accommodation for so many co- 
 existing memories, supposing them to be permanent traces, 
 either in the organism or its functions. But this difficulty, 
 although frequently urged, does not deserve serious thought. 
 According to the most moderate estimate, the large brain 
 contains about 600,000,000 cells and even a larger number 
 of fibers. And we are not at all obliged to think of these 
 elements as having a single function only. They are 
 known, on the contrary, to act together in specific con- 
 nections, and the varieties of connections of so many ele- 
 ments is simply infinite. Further, we have here, also, 
 analogous cases which settle the question without further 
 consideration : the coexistence of innumerable functional 
 dispositions in the motor arrangement of the nerves and 
 muscles of a single organ of the body ; the marvelous fact 
 of the life development of an organism incased in a single 
 germ, at first microscopic — a germ which possesses, in dis- 
 position or tendenc}^, all the organic characteristics of the 
 parents to the most minute detail, as the color of hair, 
 shape of face, and those indescribable similarities of feature 
 which constitute family resemblance, or the disposition to 
 peculiar motor habits.' If a single germ cell may possess 
 such inexplicable power of preserving differences of form 
 and function, what limit can we set to the similar power of 
 the brain ? 
 
 3. It is again objected that the reduction of retention to 
 a physical tendency and modification interferes with men- 
 tal continuity and destroys the unity of mind. This, how- 
 ever, is seen not to be the case, when we remember that we 
 
 ' See the case of three generations having the habit of striking the 
 nose with the fist while asleep, Paulhau, Physiologie de V Esprit, p. 164. 
 
140 RETENTION AND UEPRODUCTION 
 
 are dealing with tlio retention of individual states or pres- 
 entations, Avliose lapse from consciousness does not affect 
 the unity and continued persistence of consciousness itself. 
 If a presentation be quite out of consciousness it is lost to 
 the mental life, whatever be our theor}^ of its fate — wliether 
 it be in unconsciousness, weak consciousness, or in physical 
 disposition. The unity of consciousness, the conscious 
 active unity of apperception, remains present throughout all 
 the come and go of states, some other presentation taking 
 the place of that which is lapsed ; or, in other words, 
 another content occupying the active process. The unity 
 of the mental life consists, not in the persistence of single 
 states, buf: in the conscious oneness of the ego as voluntary 
 activit3\^ 
 
 Physical Basis of Memory. As to the nature of the 
 physical basis, which constitutes the primary condition of 
 retention, we may speak in general outline. In the case of 
 any sensation and its reaction in movement, two classes of 
 physical data are involved : sensor and motor. The sensa- 
 tion has its seat in the gray matter of the brain, from 
 which, by a fibrous connection, and through certain motor 
 elements in the brain or spinal cord, communication is 
 established with the muscular tissue. Each such sj^stem 
 of connected or associated elements is called a sensori-motor 
 circuit. Now every sensation, say that arising from a bell, 
 gives two kinds of modifications in the nervous system : 
 first, it works an unknown change in the sensor cells, and 
 second, it tends to establish motor connections. Accepting 
 this as the simplest type of such action, we can conceive of 
 innumerable modifications and complications of it. Numer- 
 ous motor connections may be possible from a single seat 
 of sensor change. For example, upon feeling a painful con- 
 tact with the body, we have numerous alternative move- 
 ments to relieve it. When a limb is fatigued we may move 
 
 ' See the section on ' ' Mental Unity " in my Handbook of Psychology, 
 vol. ii. chap. 11. § 6, 
 
THEORY OF llETENTION. 141 
 
 it into various positions of change. When we hear a word 
 we liave a tendency both to speak and to write it, involving 
 different motor connections, or we may make a gesture ex- 
 pressive of its meaning. In the same way, different sensory 
 centers become connected with one another by their fre- 
 quent association together : as the taste and color of an 
 apple. Now every time the sense in question is excited by 
 the same stimulus, the same course of transmission, by the 
 law of least resistance, is liable to be called into pla}" ; and 
 there is a tendency to confirm both the sensor modifi- 
 cation and the sensori-motor circuit. Thus greater facility 
 and rapidity are given to the process, and there arises in 
 the nervous organism a readiness or disposition to repeat 
 its own acts under similar circumstances. 
 
 Now in the case of reproduction, or memor}^, the same 
 nerve elements are affected, and in the same manner ; ex- 
 cept that the sensor centers are excited from within instead 
 of from without : from some other center instead of from 
 the end organ. For example, if instead of hearing the 
 striking of the bell I am thinking of architecture, then of 
 the cathedral at Thun, the bells of Thun arise to mind, and 
 I have a memory of the sound of a bell. This, by an estab- 
 lished association, excites, entirely from within, the center 
 of vision, giving a visual image of a bell ; this excites the 
 motor-connection with the organs of speech, and I pro- 
 nounce the Avord bell. Thus the same elements are brought 
 into play as in the actual presentations by the senses in- 
 volved — the bell itself being absent. This is the physical 
 basis of a memory. The organism is disposed toward the 
 revival of the state of consciousness of the original per- 
 ception. The execution of movements, at first difficult, be- 
 comes easy, then semi-automatic, and often irresistible, and 
 nothing remains to make the physical retention real repro- 
 duction, save the mental conditions Avhich inaugurate its 
 movement. In memory, the connection is ideo-tnotor. 
 
 Mental Conditions of Retention. The mental condi- 
 
142 RETENTION AND REPRODUCTION 
 
 tions of re.tention are the essential thing — not the reten- 
 tion itself, which we have found to be a matter of the 
 physical organism. First we note the intensity of the sen- 
 sation. Sensations or perceptions of slight intensity are 
 not remembered ; this is because they do not reach the 
 relating and fixing activity of apperception. It is proba- 
 ble that they are retained as bodily modifications and have 
 their influence upon the general cast of our memory, as is 
 shown in their possible recall in the hypnotic state. But, 
 not having been given a place and connection in the mental 
 life, they have no associations of sufficient strength to 
 accomplish their recall. Intense sensations, on the other 
 hand, draw the attention to themselves and are remem- 
 bered. Another condition, or facilitating circumstance, is 
 repetition of the first sense-experience. Repetition tends to 
 bring a presentation before the attention from the very 
 fact that it is the same experience we have before met. 
 A presentation which is at first too slight for notice and so 
 escapes attention, at another time, and under different con- 
 ditions, is apperceived and fixed in an escort of conscious 
 states. In many cases, also, the very fact of repetition 
 serves to add actual strength to the presentation, proceed- 
 ing upon the nervous modification or tendency begotten of 
 its earlier occurrence. 
 
 Tlie most important of these conditions, however, and 
 that to which those mentioned may be subordinated, is the 
 attention. The attention considered in its entire function 
 as the apperceptive agent of our mental life is, as shall be 
 seen later, the one essential mental condition of memor}^ 
 Here we deal only with its bearing on retention. It is a 
 universal principle that things attended to are remembered, 
 and things not attended to are forgotten. This arises 
 from a twofold effect of attention : first, as was seen in the 
 chapter on attention, it increases the intensity of presenta- 
 tions, and so gives them a greater strength and nearness in 
 the flow of niental states ; and, second, it gives them a 
 
CONDITIONS OF REPRODUCTION. 143 
 
 related position, as of contiguity, resemblance, cause, in 
 reference to other states with which or near which thej'' 
 occur. We shall see, in studying association,^ that our 
 mental experiences are never isolated. They are always 
 bound together by relations which the mind discerns in 
 apperception. The more closely and definitely they are 
 bound together the more permanent are our acquisitions ; 
 and the more loosely bound, the more easily dropped out 
 and lost. Now apperception is this binding. When we 
 say we experience a sight and attend to it we mean that 
 we bring out its details in relation to one another and in 
 relation to our earlier and later experience, giving them a 
 place in the permanent texture of our memory. 
 
 § 3. Reproduction. 
 
 s Primary Condition. The first condition of the 
 reproduction of an image is the ph3^siological disposition 
 which appears to constitute retention. Assuming reten- 
 tion, therefore, we inquire into the further elements of 
 reproduction. It is easy to see that this purely physical 
 modification does not account for the revival of an image 
 in consciousness. The essential element of memory is 
 lacking. The simple fact that matter modified as you 
 please does not remember serves to refute the theory of 
 " organic memory." We might, with as much reason, say 
 that the post remembers the nail which was driven into it, 
 because it retains a permanent modification in the arrange- 
 ment of its elements, or that the seasoned meerschaum pipe 
 remembers by virtue of the molecular changes which its 
 frequent use has wrought, as that the brain remembers 
 because of its molecular dispositions. Of the physical 
 process we may say : a. That it is the necessary basis 
 of memory, as far as our experience goes. h. That it 
 accounts for retention, c. That it gives direction to the 
 flow of our memories, by the determination of one of many 
 alternative nervous courses. But it is no more an approach 
 ' Chap. xii. 
 
144 RETENTION AND REPRODUCTION. 
 
 to an explanation of tlie revival in consciousness of an 
 image than of the first perception itself. The pliysical 
 process determines vjhat I shall remember : the mental 
 process, that I shall remember it. The primary condition, 
 therefore, of reproduction is the reinstatement of the 
 original presentation by a new apperceptive construction. 
 
 Supplementary Condition. It lias already been made 
 more or less clear that a reproduction is a recreation, a new 
 product, which is due to the same conditions as the orig- 
 inal perception, with the lack of the external stimulus. 
 This lack is, however, seeming rather than real, since the 
 central stimulus is as really supplied from within as though 
 the object were present. Admitting, then, the physiolog- 
 ical disposition of the organism, due to former experience, 
 we find the further supplementary condition of reproduc- 
 tion to be a neio stimulus of the centers, arising generally 
 from, an inner or mental source. This new stimulus, how- 
 ever, is not always mental, since there is a vast range of 
 bodily conditions from which the centers may be excited, 
 stimuli which may be called intra-organic in distinction 
 both from the excitations of the external world and from 
 those of the world of conscious states. Any stimulus which 
 fulfills the one condition of reproducing the physical func- 
 tion, as it operated in perception — the mental conditions 
 being again also present — suftices for the revival of a pres- 
 entation. 
 
 This theory of reproduction explains many mysterious 
 facts which are inexplicable on the theory of mental habit 
 or of unconscious memory. The whole field of unconscious 
 trains of ideas is covered by the consideration of an 
 organic process. We are often surprised at the sudden ap- 
 pearance in consciousness of a representation which has no 
 apparent connection with our train of thought.^ Yet, by 
 close attention, we can often find some dim association 
 
 ' Cf. Hamilton, Led. on Metaphysics, iv. cand Mill, Examination of 
 JIamiUou, chap. xv. 
 
AIDS TO REPRODUCTION. 145 
 
 with an earlier state. In consciousness we have forgotten 
 tiie connection, but an organic disposition asserts itself 
 through all the links of our earlier presentation, and the 
 unexpected idea is the consequence. This is supported by 
 the fact drawn from ps\'chometry, tliat in nmny reactions 
 tlie physiological process seems to take less time tlian the 
 mental/ It is quite conceivable, therefore, that when a 
 SLM'ies of nervous modifications follow one another very 
 quickly, sufficient time is not afforded between them for 
 the conscious presentation. Often, also, after vain efforts 
 to remember a date or name, we give it up, but when think- 
 ing of other things it suddenly pops up, so to speak, in 
 consciousness. It is possible that in our casting about for 
 the desired memory we have started a train of association 
 which has run its course in the organic dispositions, and 
 terminated successfully. These cases will be again re- 
 ferred to in the consideration of the association of ideas. 
 This explanation seems much more natural than the mys- 
 terious hypothesis of unconscious mind. 
 
 The principle that the same physical process is involved 
 in the reproduction as in the presentation is confirmed by 
 the distinction above noted between a persistent presenta- 
 tion and its revived image. The persistent presentation is 
 seen, at once, to depend upon the same excitation and nerve 
 process which gave the percept ; yet it remains when the 
 object is withdrawn. Hence we have every reason to be- 
 lieve that the revived image is due to the same nerve 
 process, since it differs from the persistent presentation 
 only in its separation from the external stimulus by a very 
 brief period of time. One is a prolongation of the primary 
 state, the other a restoration of it ; the former is the con- 
 tinuous effect of a continuous cause, the other the inter- 
 mittent effect of an intermittent cause. 
 
 Secondary Aids to Reproduction. There are certain 
 secondary conditions which tend to the most ready repro- 
 ' See chap. viii. § 7. 
 
146 BETENTION AND REPRODUCTION. 
 
 duction of mental pictures. In tlieir general nature thej 
 are almost identical with the auxiliary conditions of the 
 actual perception of objects, and so add new evidence of 
 the identity of the two classes of facts. Among them we 
 may notice : a. Intensity of the nervous stimulation. All 
 direct excitants of our nerve tissue, as coffee, opium, hash- 
 eesh, stimulate the reproduction of images and thus aid the 
 memory temporarily. So also any occurrence that excites 
 the nervous system as a whole, as a blow on the head, great 
 danger, a threat of death/ b. The absence or feeble iiiten- 
 sity of present states of consciousness. This tends to throw 
 the attention upon the revived image, which is ordinarily 
 feebler than the present presentation. For this reason we 
 close our eyes when trying to remember something, c. As 
 before, in the case of retention, the attention is the princi- 
 pal aid to reproduction. Representations must be attended 
 to, to be apprehended at all, and after this, attention makes 
 them still more distinct. Indirectly also, attention may be 
 used to call up representations. We think of an object or 
 event in some known relation to the one we wish to re- 
 member, and set a train of association going which secures 
 to us the desired image. Often, however, the fixing of the 
 attention may hinder the memory seriously, from the fact 
 that it tends to hold an image before the mind to the ex- 
 clusion of others and so impedes the flow of association. 
 d. By association, finally, as is seen later,^ the function of 
 reproduction is given consistency and unity, and made 
 available for the higher uses of mind. 
 
 Power of Imaging. Tlie power of recalling mental pic- 
 tures varies greatly with individuals and at different 
 periods of life. Images of sight are most distinct and last- 
 ing and become our type of memory pictures in general ; 
 
 ' Hepce, probably, the frequent, but not universal, experience of mi- 
 nute memory of past events when one is in danger, as of drowning ; 
 generally it is greatly overstated. 
 
 ^ Chap, xii, 
 
MENTAL GROWTH. U7 
 
 they arise also and become fixed very earlj^ in child life. 
 Persons who have this power to a marked degree are 
 known as having good imaginations, though simple revival 
 of images is tlie most rudimentary form of imagination. It 
 may be a bane to the mental life ratlier than an advantage, 
 as in the case of insistent and fixed ideas. In accordance 
 with the principle of attention already noticed, the images 
 of childhood are strongest in our memory. The attention 
 at that period is not burdened with details, and trivial 
 things are of great interest and importance : such images 
 are also recalled so often in after years that repetition 
 gives them great vividness and numberless associations. 
 Many old people are constantly led back in conversation to 
 their childhood, even when memory of middle life is fail- 
 ing. Galton has found the farther remarkable fact that a 
 small proportion of persons have a peculiar mental scheme 
 or diagram in consciousness in which they arrange num- 
 bers, colors, etc., when imaging them. " Number forms " 
 and other such peculiarities seem to be innate and heredi- 
 tary. Cases have long been known of individuals who at- 
 tach particular colors to particular sounds, such as green, 
 blue, etc., to certain letters of the alphabet. Griiber has 
 recently reported "disparate associations" of this kind be- 
 tween sight and taste, sight and smell, sound and taste, etc. 
 He even finds in one subject certain tastes accompanying 
 degrees of muscular exertion, and colors attaching to tem- 
 perature sensations.' 
 
 Retention and Reproduction as Mental Growth. The 
 growth of the mind through accumulated experience is a 
 matter of individual appreciation. There is a constant 
 enlargement of view and strength of purpose due to 
 
 'For a typical "Number Form" see my Handbook of Psyclwl- 
 ogy, vol. ii. appendix C ; also a variety of them in Galton 's Inqui 
 ri(S into Human Faculty. On the other peculiar facts mentioned see 
 x\\>o his discussious on " Mental Imagery " and " Color Associations " 
 \\\ the same hook. 
 
148 RETENTION AND REPRODUCTION 
 
 exercise. Every mental experience leaves tlie mind dif- 
 ferent, as every physical change leaves the body different. 
 Tliere is a progressive develojiment of self -hood — a realiza- 
 tion of mental possibility in the form of actual life, which 
 gives individuality to the man and colors his disposition. 
 In this sense all experience is retained mentall}^, retained 
 in the altered possibilities which it opens up. Proceeding 
 we shall find that mental habits appear stronger, perhaps, 
 than physical, and such habits, dispositions, vague feelings 
 of intellectual preference and aversion are the sum of all 
 the elements, however minute, of our past. 
 
CHAPTER XL 
 
 RECOGNITIOX AND LOCALIZATION.* 
 
 § 1. Recognition. 
 
 Recognition is the tliird stage reached in the develop- 
 ment of memory. Granted an image reproduced, a re- 
 presentation, it is then recognized. Representations are 
 " accompanied," says Locke, " with an additional perception 
 (feeling) indicating that they are not new, that they liave 
 been before experienced. This is ordinarily csiWedrecogni- 
 tion^ This additional fact of recognition, however, does 
 not always accompany revived images, and by the study of 
 the cases in which it is absent we are able to learn wliat 
 recoG^nition is. 
 
 Feeling of Familiarity. In a general view of recogni- 
 tion from the standpoint of common consciousness it con- 
 sists in the feeling of familiarity with which an imageor 
 object affects us. We say feeling, since the recognition, in 
 itself, accompanies the act of knowledge in which the 
 object or image is again presented ; that is, repro- 
 duction is assumed in recognition. This feeling of famil- 
 iarity is vague and often misplaced, and ordinarily goes 
 unanalyzed. 
 
 Distinction between Recognition of an Object and of 
 an Image. The means by which recognition arises vary 
 as the recognition is of an object or of an image. In the 
 case of the second perception of an object its recognition 
 is probably accomplished by means of an image which is 
 already recognized. We have a comparison between the 
 percept and the image, and feel them the same or 
 
 ' Cf. Diy Handbook of Psychology , vol. 1. chap. x. 
 149 
 
150 RECOGNITION AND LOCALIZATION. 
 
 similar. This is seen to be the case in frequent instances 
 in everyday life. If we are asked whether an object is 
 the same as one seen before, we often say we do not know, 
 for we do not remember how tlie former object looked ; 
 which means that we are unable to call up and recognize 
 any image with which the object present may be compared. 
 In the case of the recognition of an image such a procedure 
 is impossible. It would presuppose another image still, 
 and so on indefinitely. The question, therefore, is nar- 
 rowed down to the means by which we recognize a repro- 
 duced image.* 
 
 The recognition of an image depends upon the degree 
 in vjhich its apperceptive relatio7is are re-established. It has 
 already been seen that the reproduction of an image con- 
 sists in the reinstatement of the conditions, physical or 
 mental, of the original perception. Such a reinstatement 
 of the conditions suffices to bring an image back into con- 
 sciousness ; but it is not then necessarily recognized. It is 
 only when some of the mental connections — the relations 
 established among the perceptual elements by apperceptive 
 attention — are again more or less consciously presented 
 that the sense of familiarity is felt. It is necessary that 
 there be some accompanying conscious elements to which 
 the recognized elements are related. Often when an image 
 arises in consciousness we do not recognize it till we bring 
 back some association with it. Often, also, we see a face 
 and in so far recognize it as to feel vaguelj^ familiar with 
 it ; while we strive to bring up more of its apperceptive 
 connections in order fully to identify it. This first vague 
 recognition is probably due to the felt beginnings of the 
 revival of the spatial proportions of the face. 
 
 This is further proved by the fact that percepts which 
 are not related in the first presentation — for example single 
 isolated sensations, as the stroke of a bell — are not recog- 
 
 ' On theories of recognition see my Handbook of Psycliology, 
 vol. i. chap. X. § 1. 
 
THEORY OF ilECOGNlTtOX. 151 
 
 nizetl in the representation. We say of such presentations 
 that tliere is notliing distinguishing or characteristic about 
 thera whereby tliey should be recognized. But this is 
 only to say that tliere were no specific points of connection 
 between this image and others, or between the parts which 
 are separately apperceived. As soon as some sign is made 
 of a peculiar kind in connection with the image it is recog- 
 nized. Recent experiments by Lehmann on the recogni- 
 tion of differences of color strikingly confirm this view. 
 Different shades of gray, which could not be recognized 
 Avhen seen quite alone, were recognized when they were 
 given names beforehand, or when a number was attached 
 to each in the first perception. Of nine shades without 
 names or numbers, only forty-six per cent, gave true 
 recognitions ; while the same shades, with numbers, gave 
 seventy-five per cent, of correct identifications. Here the 
 introduction of a simple local relation in the perception 
 gave the necessary clew. The same appears in the experi- 
 ment noted above ; ^ my infant recognized her nurse after 
 her absence only when several senses re-enforced one 
 another. And further support is derived from the phe- 
 nomenon of so-called psychic blindness, deafness, etc., i. e., 
 recognition is absent in animals deprived of the higher 
 co-ordinating brain centers. 
 
 This view of the case also enables us to take account of 
 the subjective element of recognition, which is overlooked 
 in other theories. There is more in recognition than the 
 sense of familiarity with an image. There is the feeling 
 of ourselves as in familiar circumstances. It is one's self 
 who has been in this state before. Tids feeling of self 
 develops largely, as we have seen, in connection with active 
 attention. But attention is the organ of the process of 
 apperception. Consequently when by reinstatement of 
 this process the fact of recognition is experienced, it 
 carries with it essentially the feeling of an emphasized self : 
 the self of the first apperception is again evident in the self 
 ' Above, chap, v, § 3. 
 
152 RECOGNITION AND LOCALIZATION 
 
 of the reapperceptioii, and the sense of sameness of the ap- 
 perceptive content really arises with the sense of the same- 
 ness of the individual who has it. Recognition of the 
 image, therefore, and sense of personal identity, both rest 
 ultimately in differences in the amount^ ease, facility^ good 
 adjustment of the attention.^ 
 
 § 2. Ideal Pkoduct of Recognition : Personal Identity. 
 
 In the foregoing discussion the origin of the idea of 
 identity, in general, and the identity of self, becomes clear. 
 In our feeling of personal identity it is not self apart from 
 the events in consciousness of which we are conscious as 
 persisting : it is the consciousness of something which 
 abides in the midst of these events which constitutes tliis 
 feeling. It rests, first, upon reproduction, since a sirigle 
 present experience does not afford the duration or time 
 through which we feel ourselves to be the same. There 
 must be reproduced images with which our present ex- 
 perience is compared. But further, these images must be 
 recognized, and must carry with them that feeling of 
 familiarity which is afforded in the reinstatement of the 
 apperceptive process of attention. This activity is felt to 
 be my activity in the second experience as in the first, and 
 the recognition of the I takes place in virtue of this re- 
 peated activity. 
 
 § 3. Localization in Time. 
 
 The question as to the origin of the idea of time must 
 be approached, as in the similar problem of space, from 
 the standpoint of concrete perception of filled time. Time 
 in the abstract we do not know. We experience time only 
 as we experience events, definite and individual, in time. 
 We sometimes seem to apprehend the flow of pure time, 
 as in the night we lie awake in silence, conscious of the 
 vacancy of our minds ; but even then this flow of time is 
 ' Cf. below, chap. xix. § 5. 
 
IDEA OF TIME. 153 
 
 marked off by distinct events — tlie beating of the heart, the 
 direction of attention to fragmentary sentences or words 
 which flit over our consciousness and are looked at only to 
 be dismissed. 
 
 The inquiry then seems to be as to the localization of 
 events in time, as we have already considered the local- 
 ization of things in space. There are two general char- 
 acters of our notion of time which are ordinarily used in 
 attempting to define the notion ; w^m^Xy, duration and suc- 
 cession. These correspond in the case of time, respectively, 
 to length and position in the case of space. 
 
 The terms of the problem of localization in time are 
 analogous to those of localization in space. Why is it that 
 tlie experiences or events of our inner life are arranged in 
 time order, as before and after? It is quite possible that 
 it sliould be otherwise. Suppose a being with no memoiy 
 whatever ; to him each event would be now. There would 
 l)e no past or future ; every mental fact would be w^orth its 
 face value in the present, with no relation to other mental 
 facts. And again, granting the fact of memory, why is it 
 that each event takes its proper place in the line of time — the 
 place it occupied in the original experience and no other ? 
 And further, even though retained and reproduced in con- 
 sciousness as a present state, why does it not simply remain 
 a factor in the complex make-up of our present experience ? 
 In more general terms, how are states of consciousness of 
 a purely intensive and qualitative nature projected and 
 localized in time form ? 
 
 The answer, as before for space perception, is this : 
 By a mental reconstruction of time, loherehy conscious data 
 are interpreted in terms of succession. 
 
 Data for the Reconstruction of Time. The data upon 
 ■which the mental reconstruction of time proceeds are ex- 
 ceedingly obscure ; the more so because of the differences 
 between this process and that in the case of space, to which 
 it is supposed to be analogous. In case of space we have 
 
1 5 4 RE GO GNtTIOK AND LOCA LIZA TtON. 
 
 iioii-spatiul senses to compare with spatial senses. But 
 with time there is no sucli resource, and we are unable to 
 iix upon facts as absolutely necessary to the idea of time, 
 as shown by the absence of that idea in their absence. 
 There are one or two kinds of data, however, so consciously 
 involved in our localization of objects in time that they 
 may be safely indicated. 
 
 I. Intensity as an Indication of Time. Upon con- 
 sideration, the most evident characteristic of our past ex- 
 periences is their progressive fading, as they grow more 
 remote. In general, the last hour is more distinct than its 
 predecessor, and yesterday than the day before. It maj^ 
 therefore be stated as a general rule that the intensity of a 
 representation is a sign of its locality in time, in reference 
 to other representations brought with it into consciousness. 
 This rests upon the principle of memory, that — with cer- 
 tain exceptions, to be instanced later — the power of repro- 
 duction and the intensity of the reproduced image vary 
 inversely as the time elapsed since the original perception. 
 Presentations, therefore, experienced in the order a, b, c, dy 
 w^ould be reproduced in an order of intensity d, c, b, a ; and 
 this inverse intensive order serves as a sign for their mental 
 interpretation in the original time order «, b, c, d. This is 
 further supported by the fact that mistakes as to the rela- 
 tive time of events are occasioned by simple differences 
 in the intensity of their reproduction. Things which im- 
 pressed us stronglj^ linger in our memory and seem to be 
 recent, while later events are dim or forgotten. More 
 intense images also serve as rallying points or dates in the 
 past, around which other events are grouped. We date 
 many subsequent events from the death of a friend, the 
 burning of a house, or some other great occurrence. 
 
 The fact of the interpretation of intensities cannot be 
 deemed sufficient in itself, however, for time localization. 
 If uncorrected, the tendency to mistakes spoken of would 
 be a source of continual illusion. Of two successive pres- 
 
IDEA OF TIME. 155 
 
 entations the stronger would always be located last, what- 
 ever might be their real order. Hence we cannot stop here 
 with some, who call these differences of intensive coloring 
 the "temporal sign "; but must seek some further point of 
 reference in the mental life for these, as yet, confused 
 representations. 
 
 II. Movements of Attention as Indicating Position 
 in Time. Although not as clearly of simple import as the 
 fact of intensity, in its relation to localization in time, the 
 act of attention has an undoubted influence. From one 
 aspect, it assists and re-enforces the indication given by 
 intensive coloring. Attention pursues, in the main, a 
 regular rhythmical course and so brings out clearly the in- 
 tensive relations of successive mental facts. On the other 
 hand, it tends to subvert these indications, since strong 
 attention placed upon one presentation or a series in- 
 creases its intensity relatively to adjacent states of mind. 
 The former are thus thrown out of their true time 
 order. 
 
 As further evidence that the primary movement of the 
 attention is of extreme import in the genesis of the idea of 
 time, the following facts may be spoken of. a. The flow 
 of time seems accelerated when the attention is agreeably 
 occupied. This is most true when the occupation is varied 
 in easy stages, and the active efforts of mind are not 
 strongly taxed, h. The flow of time is, on the other hand, 
 impeded when the attention is kept in a strained or con- 
 centrated condition : this is due to weariness in the mental 
 life, which seems to have an immediate influence upon our 
 time intuition, c. Time flows slowly when exciting im- 
 pressions follow in such rapid succession as to leave the 
 attention in a state of confusion. Here there is not suflicient 
 time for the adjustment of the attention to the successive 
 excitations, and the perception of the lapse of time is, as a 
 consequence, confused, d. Time flows slowly when the 
 mind is unoccupied. There are no outstanding ideas upon 
 
156 llECOGNITION AND LOCALIZATION. 
 
 which the grasping and relating power of attention ma}'" 
 seize, e. After a given movement of attention, a future 
 movement over the same series is easy, while the rearrange- 
 ment of tlie series is difficult ; thus tlie absence of mental 
 effort is a sign of temporal order, f. In dreams, where the 
 force of attention is greatly diminished, the sense of time is 
 confused and mistaken. 
 
 The least inference which can be drawn from such facts 
 is this : that the varying states of our attentive mental life 
 are, in some way, signs employed in the mental reconstruc- 
 tion of time, i. e., temporal signs. These signs coexist with 
 those derived from our passive sense experiences, and to- 
 gether constitute a general class of data. The intensit}^- 
 phases of reproduced presentations, on the one hand, seem 
 to bear especially upon the succession of events in the past : 
 we think of succession by the number of things in time. 
 The phases of the attention bear especially upon the feeling 
 of duration in the present : we measure duration in terms 
 of our own attentive adjustment, as having experienced and 
 expecting to experience. Duration is the feeling of the 
 interval between things in time.^ 
 
 Mental Synthesis, 'i'he difference between the data and 
 their finished time form is sinipl}^ the difference between 
 the succession of ideas and the idea of succession. This 
 difference is very great. As Bradley puts it : " Suppose 
 there is a series of facts outside the mind, the question re- 
 mains. How can they get in ? "^ In oi'der to the succession 
 of ideas, only one need be present at a time, and they need 
 have no constant connection. But for the idea of succession 
 there must be at least two ideas before the mind, the pre- 
 ceding and the succeeding. This involves the bringing up 
 of past states to the level of the present. Now the mind 
 sees all its states in this way — brought up to the plane of 
 
 ^This distinction is due to Dr. Ward, "Psychology" in Encyc. 
 Brit., 9th ed. 
 
 '^ Principles of Logic, p. 74. 
 
umrs OF BUB A now. 157 
 
 the present. I think of four events which happened in four 
 successive days. They are all now present to my conscious- 
 ness, and it is only my present state of which I am conscious. 
 Of this state «, ^, c, d are factors. How is it that these 
 present intensive, qualitative states are projected in an order 
 of time, the same as their original occurrence ? How is it, 
 to use Ward's figure, that certain states are thrown back in 
 a line at right angles to this plane of the present ? " We 
 may, if we represent succession as a line, represent simulta- 
 neity as a second line at right angles to the first. Xow it 
 is with the former line that we have to do in treating of 
 time as it is, and with the latter in treating of our intuition 
 of time. . . In a succession of events, say of sense impres- 
 sions «, h, c, f7, 6, . . . the presence of h means the absence 
 of a and c, but the presentation of this succession involves 
 the simultaneous presence, in some mode or other, of tw^o or 
 more of the presentations a, 6, c, c^." * This is analogous, as 
 the same writer says, to the projection of the simultaneously 
 perceived points of the visual field in a line of spatial suc- 
 cession, representing distance. 
 
 It is seen at once that whatever be the qualitative color- 
 ing attaching to these simultaneous states, it can serve only 
 as datum for their temporal discrimination. If a is located 
 as before ^, and h as before c, it can only be through the 
 mental interpretation of some accompaniment of a, 5, and c, 
 respectively, by which their temporal position is deter- 
 mined. This interpretation or synthesis is called the inen- 
 tal reconstruction of time. 
 
 Units of Duration. If it be true that the sense of the 
 lapse of time depends intimately upon the rhythmical 
 phases of the attention, we would expect to find units of 
 duration in the flow of time which would correspond with 
 these phases. Experiments in determining the area of con- 
 sciousness show such units, in the maximal length of filled 
 time which we are able to compass with a single imme- 
 diate intuition. It was stated, in speaking of the area of 
 
 ' Loc. cit. 
 
158 RECOGNITION AND LOCALIZATION^. 
 
 consciousness, that about twelve distinct impressions of 
 sound, succeeding one another at intervals of .2 to .3 second, 
 could be held in consciousness together. Multiplying this 
 interval by the number of ijupressions, we have 2.4 to 3.6 
 seconds as approximately the extent of our distinct unit 
 consciousness of filled time. The maximal extent of our 
 intuition of empty time or pure duration is probably consid- 
 erably shorter, as is shown by experiments as to the cor- 
 rectness of our estimate of small periods of time. It is 
 found that we estimate correctly an empty period of .7 to 
 .8 second, shorter periods being overestimated and longer 
 periods made too short. The images given in this "unit" 
 constitute, in contrast with ordinary representations, our 
 so-called "primary memory." 
 
 It is through this unit consciousness of time that all time 
 distance is estimated. The representations that it includes 
 constitute the plane of the immediate present, which we 
 may consider, in reference to time, as a circle, the earlier 
 impressions in it passing out at one side and the later 
 coming in, as a constant stream. Time, as we know it, is 
 not a single line of succession, but numerous lines giving a 
 certain number of coexistences in the present. It is out of 
 this circle of the present that the past is projected in lines 
 at right angles to its plane, like distance from the field of 
 vision. This is but a figure to aid our conception, but so 
 natural and convenient a figure that we employ it even in 
 unreflective thinking : as when we say, an event is "so far 
 back," or that tw^o events happened " side by side." And 
 there is no reason, in the nature of the case, that intensive 
 data should be spoken of in terms of tirrie, rather than in 
 terms of space. ^ 
 
 Perception of Time by the Ear. Of the special senses 
 the ear is most acute in the appreciation and measurement 
 of time. Single sound stimuli are discriminated with great 
 
 ' On theories of time perception see my Handbook of Psychology, 
 vol. i, chap. X. 1 3, 
 
KiynS OF MEMORY. 159 
 
 delicacy and exactness, both of interval and of duration. 
 For this reason hearing is called the sense for the per- 
 ception of time. Its function, in this respect, is similar to 
 that of sight for space. It makes more exact and definite 
 the vague time series reported first, probably, by the mus- 
 cular sense and later by the other senses. This delicacy" of 
 time perception underlies the pauses of speech, the quan- 
 tity of vowel sounds, the metric flow of poetry, and, more 
 than all, the rhythm and technical "time" of music. 
 
 § 4. Ideal Product of Temporal Localization : Idea 
 OF Time. 
 
 From the conception of co-ordinated events in the form 
 of past time we pass by abstraction to the idea of time: 
 that is, we pass from filled to empty time. The point of 
 immediate experience is called the present, in relation to 
 the past, and the whole possibility of additional experience 
 is called the future. The future, therefore, is not time at 
 all, as the past is not : it is simply the anticipation of more 
 experience like that already placed in the past. The 
 finished product, the idea of time, is of late growth in the 
 mental life of the child. 
 
 § 5. Kinds of Memory : Local, Logical. 
 
 We have found memory, viewed entirely from the sub- 
 jective side, to be the revival of an image in its network 
 of relations w4th other images. Things are remembered in 
 groups, as they were at first perceived. This involves the 
 variety of relations which are possible in apperception. 
 The kinds of relations thus reproduced serve to aid us in 
 distinguishing between different kinds of memory. For 
 example, an image may carry with it the local connections 
 of its first perception ; that is, its locality was the promi- 
 nent feature of its apperception. Such memory is called 
 local memory. It is in this way that we memorize long 
 Sentences by the positioj:t on a printed or written page, qv 
 
160 RECOGNITIOy AND LOCALIZATION. 
 
 the parts and ornaments of a room. These memories are 
 fleeting and temporary, generally, from the fact that local 
 relations are accidental, and do not belong necessarih' to 
 the objects remembered. It is only as long as we can re- 
 produce the whole page that we oan recall the part desired. 
 The same also is true of temporal memories. Bej^ond these 
 extrinsic or accidental relations we find others which are 
 essential. Cause and effect, substance and property, whole 
 and parts, are such relations. Memory by means of these 
 is called logical memory. It is more permanent and valu- 
 able than local memory, from the fact that these relations 
 always subsist, and the related image is always suggested, 
 when that to which it is related is capable of being pre- 
 sented. It is seen at once that logical memories should be 
 cultivated rather than local, and that the latter, except 
 when only temporary acquisition is desired, should be 
 avoided. 
 
COMBINATION. 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 ASSOCIATION.! 
 § 1. General Nature of Association. 
 
 Definition of Association. In the foregoing chapters 
 reference has been repeatedly made to tlie principle of 
 "association of ideas"; indeed some knowledge of such a 
 principle is so generally implied in the affairs of life that 
 its familiarity has been assumed. Tlie truth that things 
 owe their cliaracter to their associations, that men are in- 
 fluenced, by their associates, is only a broader application 
 of the law which takes its rise in the mental life. 
 
 The conditions under wliich the revival of mental im- 
 ages in general is possible have been stated. It proceeds 
 upon a renewal of the nervous action which accompanied 
 the first perception, and the reinstatement of the original 
 apperceptive act with a sufficient intensity and duration. 
 This, however, does not suffice to infor?n us what it is that 
 gives specific direction to the flow of reproduced states. 
 Why is it that among an infinite number of possible repro- 
 ductions a particular representation rather than others is 
 revived? This question indicates the tiwe function of associ- 
 ation, which is the progressive revinal of particular mental 
 states. Tlie/«e^ of association may also be defined as the 
 relation hetxceen revived states of consciousness, icherehy con- 
 tinuity of successive representation is secured in the form of 
 neio integrated states. This we must fully explain. 
 
 ' Cf. my Handbook of Psych)lofjy, vol. i. chap, xi. 
 
 161 
 
162 ASSOCIATION. 
 
 Ground or Reason of Association : the Preceding Idea. 
 If we thus conceive of association, as the law of the con- 
 nection of rej)resentations in consciousness, and picture the 
 series of such representations, the nature of the connection 
 in each case is seen to lie in the character of the antecedent 
 image. For example, I am thinking at this instant of the 
 rain ; and why ? Because I have seen the heavens covered 
 with clouds. I have an idea of thunder because I have 
 just seen a flash of lightning. I think of Napoleon because 
 I have already thought of Caesar or Alexander. In each 
 such case the idea at present before me is determined b}^ 
 the idea which immediately preceded it. If the antecedent 
 idea had been different, so would also the subsequent idea. 
 If, for example, I had thought of Socrates instead of Alex- 
 ander, it is altogether improbable that Napoleon would 
 have come to mind. There are no states of mind which 
 can be com^jletely isolated from this chain of connected 
 links. Our whole mental life is a progressive series of 
 integrations of ideas. 
 
 Physiological Basis of Association. In speaking of the 
 pliysiological habits which lie at the basis of retention we 
 had occasion to point out the complex nature of the dispo- 
 sitions or tendencies in the mental life to which they give 
 rise. We may suppose both associative connections be- 
 tween localities or elements in the cerebral cortex,' and the 
 multiplication of these connections, in an intricate network 
 of fibrous and cellular tissue. Considering these connec- 
 tions as constituting the organic counterpart of tlie asso- 
 ciated mental life, we see at once the wide capacity it 
 affords for varied and related representation. The stimulus 
 of a single element in the network arouses many connec- 
 tions: first those best established and oftenest repeated, 
 then others in varying degrees of strength of revival. For 
 example, we may suppose the memories involved in the 
 sight, touch, sound, written signs, and spoken word of a 
 bell to be thus connected. The presentation of a bell to 
 * Above, chap. iii. 
 
LAWS OF ASSOCIATION. 163 
 
 view revives at once no less than five different memories : 
 the muscular memories involved in speaking the word bell, 
 the word as heard when spoken and seen when written, the 
 sound of the striking of the bell, and its hard, smooth 
 touch. These come up in varying degrees of readiness, 
 according as we are accustomed to exercise them respect- 
 ively in our experience with bells. Other more indistinct 
 memories, such as the church spire, dining rooms, crowd 
 in upon us, each having its correlative accompaniment in 
 the brain activities. The basis, therefore, of association is 
 the same as that of retention, and admits of the same 
 physiological explanation; that is to say, the mere possi- 
 bility of association in revived states is provided for in the 
 physiological retention of the related molecular changes 
 occasioned at their first experience. The actual revival, 
 however, as remembered states, is mental, as reproduction 
 and recognition are mental. For this reason the laws of 
 association are unconscious until critical examination of 
 the nature of associated states reveals them. 
 
 § 2. Laws of Association. 
 
 I. Particular or Secondary Laws. " When we seek," 
 says Aristotle, " after an idea which is not immediately 
 before us, we reach it through the mediation of another 
 idea, either by resemblance, or contrast, or contiguity.^'' ^ 
 Modern psychologists generally follow Aristotle in this 
 enumeration of the principles of association, at least as 
 respects resemblance and contiguity. Deferring the dis- 
 cussion of contrast, we may state two great laws of asso- 
 ciation, depending upon the two classes into which, in 
 introspection, the facts of the case seem to fall. 
 
 In the first place images are associated. That is, one 
 of two or more states, all of which are reproductions, pre- 
 cedes and brings up the others. The face of a friend, 
 whom I recall, recalls the place and time of our last meet- 
 ' Quoted by Rabier, P»ychologie, p. 184. 
 
164 ASSOCIATION. 
 
 ing. On the other hand, a new experience, a presentation, 
 may bring up images of the past. My new acquaintance 
 recalls some one of my old friends. These two classes of 
 facts exhaust the range of association. In the first of the 
 two cases the images which come up together have been 
 together in the mind before ; this is contiguity. Whatever 
 their former relation to each other may liave been, when 
 we experienced them, whether cause and effect, whole and 
 parts, or any other of the relations the mind discovers, it 
 matters not ; it is sufficient that they have been present 
 before in consciousness, as contiguous in time. In tlie 
 second case the presentation which tends to recall the 
 image is always seen to be like the latter in some respect ; 
 this is resemblance. Resemblance to an image — again dis- 
 regarding contrast — is the only characteristic of a presenta- 
 tion, which serves as ground for the immediate revival of 
 that image. 
 
 The two particular or secondary laws of association 
 may, in accordance with the preceding, be formulated 
 somewhat as follows : 
 
 1. Contiguity : Ideas which have been apperceived 
 together are reproduced under the same apperceptive 
 relations. 
 
 2. Resemblance: A presentation which in any way 
 resembles an image tends to cause the reproduction of 
 that image, with its related images. 
 
 It should be noted that it is only a new presentation to 
 which the law of resemblance can be said to apply as tend- 
 ing to revive past images. As soon as the presentation 
 is repeated its resemblance to the revived image is not 
 emphasized in the reproduction, but the fact that the 
 image which its former perception has left behind has once 
 coexisted with the image suggested at that time, makes it 
 a case of contiguity. For example, I meet a man B, and I 
 think of my friend A, whom he resembles. After that 
 |,l:e two images are associated together b^y reason of the 
 
LAWS OF ASSOCIATION. 165 
 
 contiguity tlius established ; so that when I see B again 
 tlie resemblance is not necessary to the suggestion, tliough 
 it still strikes rae, and is known to be the cause of the first 
 association. In this case the repeated perception adds 
 vividness and strength to the association, since the reality 
 of the object passes over in a measurQ to the image which 
 it calls up. 
 
 Tliis reduction of a large class of cases of seeming resem- 
 blance to contiguity is a step toward the elimination of 
 resemblance altogether, as an ultimate ground of associa- 
 tion. Further, while we hold that, from an empirical stand- 
 point, resemblance is an evident and real reason for the 
 connection between ideas, and must be recognized as such, 
 still, on reflection, we find it possible to reduce all cases of 
 resemblance, in their ultimate nature, to contiguity. In 
 every case of resemblance between a presentation and the 
 image it suggests, there may be said to be elements com- 
 mon to the two : elements in the present presentation 
 which affect us in an identical way with elements in the 
 image which it resembles. In a strange portrait, which we 
 say resembles a friend, there are certain points of feature 
 or expression, few or many, which are identical with our 
 friend's : these points coexist with others in the image of 
 our friend, and the whole image is brought up by this co- 
 existence or contiguity. In the presentation there are, say, 
 elements a, h, c, etc., and in the image, elements A, J, C ; 
 the common element b makes the presence of both neces- 
 sary. Taine formulates a law to express this process of 
 association: lVhe?i jjart of an idea appears in conscious- 
 ness the lohole appears. It may be added that the common 
 emotion accompanying a presentation and a memory may 
 supply the point of identity between them. 
 
 The great importance of the law of contiguity in oppo- 
 sition to resemblance is further emphasized by the experi- 
 ments of Lehmann already spoken of above.* The simple 
 addition of a mark, number, or name to the several shades 
 
 * See p. 151. 
 
16G ASSOCIATION. 
 
 of worsted aided the memory by contiguity, when the 
 resemblances of the pieces to one another were too great 
 for distinction. From all the variations in his experiments 
 lie draws the conclusion that " the law that best explains 
 the facts is the lavr of adjacency, in opposition to the law 
 of similarity." 
 
 Association by Contrast. Since Aristotle various 
 thinkers have cited contrast as a distinct principle of 
 association. It seems warranted at first sight by a variety 
 of well-marked experiences. The sight of a dwarf brings 
 up a giant, a bright color recalls strongly contrasted'colors, 
 sour makes one think of sweet. There can be no doubt, in 
 such cases of contrast, of the reality of the association ; 
 but are there not other reasons than that of contrast to 
 which it may be referred ? There are such reasons, it 
 seems, in all cases, and we are led to reduce these associa- 
 tions to resemblance, and ultimately to contiguity. 
 
 1. In most cases of contrast there is a standard of refer- 
 ence to which both the presentation and the revived 
 image are referred : this standard constitutes a point com- 
 mon to both ideas, a point of resemblance. For example, 
 the short man suggests the tall, since both are, at once, 
 thought of in comparison with an average man. The one is 
 short only as he is shorter than usual, and the other is tall 
 only as he is taller than usual. Thus in the very concep- 
 tion of the contrasted images a common element enters. 
 This common element is the b of our earlier illustration, 
 and secures the association by contiguity. . This variation 
 from a normal standard accounts also for the association of 
 emotional and volitional states, as great misery with great 
 happiness, great effort with complete inertness. v 
 
 2. Many instances of contrast arise from the early charac- 
 ter of our knowledge acquisitions. The beginnings of 
 knowledge involve, as has been seen, a process of distin- 
 guishing or differentiation : things are fixed and defined in 
 relation to other things. This tends to fix in CjHX minds 
 
UNIVERSAL OR PRIMARY LAW. 167 
 
 many instances of contrast. In early education tlie child 
 is taught to appreciate qualities in some objects by having 
 pointed out to him the conspicuous absence of these quali- 
 ties in other objects, until it becomes a mental habit. All 
 such primary connecting of contrasted things takes place 
 among contiguous states, and frequent repetition confirms 
 the association. If we had only seen regular oval leaves 
 they would have no contrasted associations ; but having 
 once been led to observe leaves which are very indentate, 
 the contrast at once presents itself afterward ; but the 
 association is due primarily to the contiguity thus estab- 
 lished. 
 
 3. It is also true that there is an emotional coloring in 
 cases of contrast, as in resemblance, which supplies a con- 
 necting point of similarity. Vague analogies which are 
 stronger by reason of inherent contrasts, and contrasts 
 which are brought out by an underlying analogy, occasion 
 a repetition of an affective state, which ties together the 
 members of the relation. For example, a three-handed 
 monstrosity brings to mind a one-handed monstrosity, and 
 all the circus oddities we have ever heard of come to mind ; 
 simply because they are all monstrosities, they excite in us 
 a common feeling of repulsion. They resemble one another 
 in the fact of variation from normal nature, and in the 
 common emotion this variation excites. The same may 
 be said of states which involve similar volitional accom- 
 paniments. 
 
 It seems true, therefore, that all cases of association 
 by contrast may be accounted for as either variations from 
 a mental standard, contiguities observed and established in 
 the process of the acquisitioji of knowledge, or emotional and 
 volitional resemblances. 
 
 II. Universal or Primary Law. One great principle 
 of associative reproduction has been found in contiguity 
 by succession, its special forms being simple contiguity, 
 resemblance, and contrast. The tendency to association 
 
168 ASSOCIATION. 
 
 by this law is greatly strengthened by other factors, whose 
 consideration leads to the underlying principle of all asso- 
 ciation. If such contiguity were the whole case only the 
 physical side of memory, that is, retention, would be opera- 
 tive in the reproduction ; and our memories would present 
 the uniform sequences and regular fadings which physical 
 dispositions undergo. The peculiarities of personal men- 
 tal life, the characteristics of individuals, which are so 
 striking in the varieties of form and content of memory, 
 would be greatly reduced. • But such a supposition is im- 
 possible, since memory is mainly mental, as perception is. 
 It is an active synthetic process of constructing relations. 
 Apperception, therefore, is the power which gives defini- 
 tive cast to our associations, and supplies the lack we liave 
 spoken of. The relations discovered in apperception in 
 their variety, and in their intensive phases, give char- 
 acter and deeper meaning to contiguous experiences. 
 
 Law of Correlation : Every association of mental states 
 is an integration, clue to the previous correlation of these 
 states in apperception. The relations which we discover 
 among the objects of our perception are very varied, and 
 many attempts have been made to classify tliem. Besides 
 the relations of time and resemblance which have already 
 found their place in association by contiguitj^, the principal 
 connections which the intelligence finds among its objects 
 are suhordination, causation, and design. The relation of 
 subordination has various applications, as whole and parts, 
 substance and accident, and underlies, as will be seen, the 
 use of the notions of genus and species in the operations 
 of reasoning. The real logical import of this relation 
 is onlj^ apprehended after the formation of general 
 notions and the growth of mind on its logical side. In 
 early childhood it is simply apperceived as contiguity. 
 Causation also, in its completed form, involves the ideas of 
 necessity and potency, which give it the form of a univer^ 
 sal relation between given data, while in child life it is 
 
nmVERSAL OR PnlMARY LAW. 169 
 
 simply successions of efforts and resistances. Design arises, 
 even later in life, since it involves more seldom the simple 
 fact of contiguity, and requires a larger stretch of expe- 
 rience for its generalization. 
 
 The very great value of correlations in our past expe- 
 rience is apparent without amplification. Mere contiguity 
 in time may fade and disappear, when a relation remains 
 intact. For example, all the circumstances surrounding the 
 first perception of a match, the time, persons, manner of 
 striking, material lighted, are long since forgotten ; but 
 the effect, a blaze of fire, is remembered. The elements of 
 potency and necessitj^, peculiar to causation and foreign to 
 mere contiguity, are in this case the means of memory. 
 Correlation is, for the mental life, the essential thing. 
 This has already been pointed out in the section on " kinds 
 of memory";^ and the reason for it is that contiguity, 
 which is merely the mental correlative of the physical proc- 
 ess, is supplemented by movements of the attention w^hich 
 give to our successive states an essential inner connec- 
 tion, corresponding to the relations of external things. 
 
 Examples readil}^ suggest themselves of memories which 
 show this difference. We remember a string of foreign 
 meaningless words only as long as the actual sounds persist 
 in consciousness. But if we detect, in the sounds, simi- 
 larities to words in our own tongue, they remain longer in 
 memory through this relation. But as before, it is only 
 after the words assume meaning and sense to us that they 
 become permanent acquisitions. McCosh tells the story of 
 a clergyman who asked a sailor boy to box the compass 
 backward, which he readily did from the correlations of 
 the points of direction with one another — they had the 
 same meaning both wa3'S ; but when the boy retorted by 
 asking the clergyman to repeat the Lord's Prayer back- 
 ward the clergyman was defeated. In the latter case 
 the words had no correlations or meaning, and tlfeir simple 
 contiguity was not sufficient for menlor^^ 
 ' See p. 159. 
 
170 ASSOCIATION. 
 
 Interest^ as Influencing Association. Aiiotlitr factor 
 which influences greatly the direction and character of our 
 associations is found in individual interests and talents. 
 As a general thing our preferences take the direction of 
 our talents. Individuals diifer notably in the manner in 
 which tlie same experiences impress them, and in the re- 
 lations they discover under the same external conditions. 
 An artist sees the red evening sk}^ with feelings only of 
 beauty and pleasure, while the farmer discovers in it prob- 
 abilities of ruin to his crops. The student of a practical 
 and utilitarian cast of mind cherishes his books only as a 
 means of increasing his chances of success or usefulness 
 in life, while his more ideal neighbor studies to secure a 
 broader mental range or an acquaintance wath deeper truths 
 for their own sake. In this there is an immediate intrusion 
 of the prevailing temperament into the web of daily ex- 
 perience, carrying the attention and effort over upon 
 specific relations of things ; which tends in its turn to fix 
 these correlations in mind and thus to heighten the dispo- 
 sition in its peculiarity. Interest gives direction to asso- 
 ciations, and associations becoming fixed give permanence 
 to interest. In general it may be said tliat mental work 
 is most successful when done along the line of inclination. 
 
 It may be well to point out the danger arising from the 
 free play of this law of association. Free exercise in the 
 line of inclination, to tlie exclusion of other well-directed 
 mental exertion, tends to develop great disproportion in 
 the growth of mind, especially in childhood. Children 
 sliould not be allowed to choose their mental pursuits. The 
 disciplinary value of compulsory application to things 
 which are distasteful is readily seen in the increased flexi- 
 bility of the attention, greater voluntary control of the 
 intellectual impulses, and the broadening of the mental 
 horizon. It is only after these qualities and capabilities 
 have been already attained by a well-balanced course of 
 
 * On the general psycliology of interest see below, chap. xix. § 1. 
 
Fonm OF ASSOCIATION'. 171 
 
 compulsory training tliat the student should be allowed to 
 devote himself to a more contracted circle of studies. 
 
 § 3. Forms of Associatiox. 
 
 Association by contiguity takes two great forms when 
 regarded in reference to the objects or events from which 
 our mental states arise. These events or objects may co- 
 exist in time or space, or they may be successive in time. 
 Thus distinguished we have association by Coexistence 
 and by Succession. When we come, however, to consider 
 that it is not objects which are associated, but our mental 
 states, and that, in reproduction, these states must be 
 projected in a time series whose form is always suc- 
 cession, w^e find that coexistence of objects gives rise to 
 succession of ideas. That this is true is seen from an ex- 
 amination of the two possible kinds of coexistence in space 
 and time. Objects which coexist in space, as has been 
 already seen, are apperceived by a rapid shifting of the at- 
 tention, the maximal unit of immediate apprehension, for 
 sounding bodies, being about twelve distinct stimuli, each of 
 which may be itself separately apperceived, and for sight 
 about five to seven, which are given as one. For the other 
 senses this range is still more contracted. Each such apper- 
 ceptive unit constitutes a single presentation, capable of 
 reproduction only as a whole, as one image, and not as 
 a number of coexisting images : consequently the next 
 image brouglit up is that to which the attention was next 
 shifted, and the representation of all sensation arising from 
 external stimuli must be in the form of succession. For 
 example, after looking at, say, twenty crosses on a black- 
 board, I reproduce them as four successive representations 
 of five crosses each, or in a longer series of smaller units, 
 the single crosses in each unit being reproduced not as co- 
 existent images, but as components of the unit image of 
 five. If they are reproduced as single crosses it is in suc- 
 cession, arising either from the apperception of each cross 
 
172 ASSOCIATION 
 
 separately, or from the information that the crosses are all 
 alike, which information takes the place of our own ex- 
 ploration. So, however rejDroducecl, the representation 
 arises from succession. 
 
 Passing to coexistence in time the same is found to be 
 true. Experiences which happen contemporaneously are 
 reproduced in a single complex, as one image, and not as 
 a plurality of images present together. For example, a 
 musical chord is reproduced in its effect, as one thing, the 
 whole giving a single modification. It is true we may 
 analyze this complex into its elements, but such an analysis 
 proceeds upon a previous anal^^sis of the actual presentation; 
 so that the factors comprised have really been presented 
 in succession. Suppose upon hearing the chord at first I 
 distinguished in the whole effect four tones ; the act of 
 distinguishing or relating these tones depends upon succes- 
 sive acts of attention. And in so doing, the separate tone 
 stimuli remain no longer coexistent, but are successive. 
 
 Thus we hold that the one form of contiguous reproduc- 
 tion is Succession. This we would expect from what has 
 already been found to be the plij^sical basis of memor3\ 
 Mental reproduction was seen to depend upon the persist- 
 ence of physical changes in tlie form of pln'siological 
 tendencies toward a series of successive brain changes; 
 these have their mental accompaniment in the succession 
 of conscious states under the law of association. By 
 the law of cause and effect these brain changes are a 
 series in time, the terms being sometimes complex 
 physically; but giving a result in consciousness which 
 is a single mental state, and not a coexisting pluralit}" 
 of states. If consciousness be one, and liave but one 
 center, these changes can only constitute for consciousness 
 one modification at a time, the result being a single pres- 
 entation. The presentations thus arising are thrown into 
 successive form by the rhythmic activity of attention, 
 under the limitation fixed by our units of duration.' If 
 ' See p. 157. 
 
COMPLEX ASSOCIATIONS. 1*73 
 
 these units of duration were longer or shorter the succes- 
 sion of our ideas would be slower or faster. . 
 
 Complex Associations. The complex character of the 
 physical tendencies which underlie associations has already 
 been remarked. It is impossible to isolate a single track 
 of nervous connection from the general network of elements 
 which constitute the ground of all mental reaction : and 
 the difficulty is almost as great in regard to mental phe- 
 nomena. The idea which we find associated with a preceding 
 state is only one, in most cases, of a great number of lines 
 of mental direction which are open for our pursuit. And 
 this complexity is enhanced when we remember that the 
 first idea is itself only one of the numerous associative 
 progeny of other states antecedent to it. These so-called 
 lines of direction — pursuing the figure of a field of con- 
 sciousness to which these lines would be perpendicular — 
 all tend outward from a given point. For example, the 
 year 1492 suggests the discovery of America, the great 
 events of tiie Italian Renaissance, the Humanistic move- 
 ment, and the Exodus of the children of Israel, together 
 with any or many individual associations which may have 
 been formed with it, such as the dates of other great 
 geographical discoveries. Now in the revival of this net- 
 work of relations the richness of its associations may serve 
 as a help or as a hindrance to memory, according as the 
 order of the revival be a converging or a diverging associa- 
 tion. 
 
 I. Converging Associations. In the converging associa- 
 tion the mind enters upon one of many paths, all of wiiich 
 lead to the same result. This is the great resource of 
 memory in cases of voluntary recollection. "We cast about 
 in consciousness for some idea related to the image we wish 
 to call up, and the probability of our finding such a path- 
 way to the goal depends upon the number of mental rela- 
 tions which have been formed around it. In case I wish to 
 ;-ecall the date 1492 J have only to think of anv one of th^ 
 
1V4 ASSOCIATION. 
 
 events mentioned which are associated with it, since they 
 all converge in their lines of suggestion to the one result. 
 II. Dwerging Associations. In this case the process is 
 reversed and the me;nory is hindered and embarrassed by 
 its possible alternatives. If I wish to remember the date 
 of the invention of gunpowder, and can only do so through 
 its association with the date 1492, I am liable, in the 
 absence of all other means of help, to go after it in con- 
 nection with the Exodus, or au}^ other of the divergent 
 lines of association, and can perhaps only reach the true 
 result, after liaving exhausted these possibilities by return- 
 ing again and again to the central idea. 
 
 § 4. Force of Association. 
 
 From the preceding remarks the influences which tend 
 to give force and permanence to an association are readily 
 seen. On the one hand, the physiological dispositions 
 which render reproduction possible, are made strong and 
 lasting in the nervous structui-e by frequent repetition of 
 the stimulus. Just to the degree of the repetition, as we 
 should expect, is tlie association strengthened and made 
 facile. This repetition, we may suppose, often takes place 
 in dreams. After seeing an object two or three times the 
 danger of again failing to recognize it is greatly reduced. 
 Yet the ph^^siological dependence is the least important 
 influence in the strengthening of association, since con- 
 tiguity, though more universal, is less important than cor- 
 relation in its establishment. The attention, which estab- 
 lishes the observed relations in association, is the most 
 important means of strengthening them. Strong attention 
 to a single chain of events is often sufticient to lix it 
 permanently in mind ; and we are generally able, when 
 troubled with forgetfulness in a particular connection, to 
 relate the desired event to some remembered fact, and thus 
 to hold it iu the memorv train. 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 IMAGINATION. » 
 § ]. Passive Imagixatiox. 
 
 The crowning phase of the imaging power of mind is the 
 imagination. It may be understood in tw^o senses. First, 
 imagination is often used to denote the general representa- 
 tive function of mind, the power of representing b}^ images, 
 thus inchiding memory and association, as well as the con- 
 structive working up of images. Second, the word is often 
 more properly restricted to this last process, that whereby 
 the material of representation at the disposal of the mind 
 is combined in forms of ideal construction, which are inde- 
 pendent, in a measure, of the arrangements of external 
 objects. While the latter is more properly the function 
 which now claims explanation, it is not well to disregard 
 the more general phases w^hich the broader definition has in 
 view. 
 
 Material of the Imagination. The material of the imag- 
 ination, as of the representative function generally, is sup- 
 plied entirely by the earlier function of presentation. The 
 imagination never creates. It serves only to give form to 
 ideas revived. The data of sense perception and self-con- 
 sciousness supply all its content. And further, its material 
 is alwa^^s capable of being represented in the form of mem- 
 ory pictures. 
 
 Proceeding, therefore, to consider the broad character- 
 istics of the imaging power, and disregarding the more par- 
 ticular processes which memory and association comprise, 
 we find that general imagination is Passive and Active, 
 
 ^ Cf. my Handbook of PsycJiology, vol. i. chap, xii, 
 
176 IMAGINATION. 
 
 Passive Imagination. By passive imagination is meant 
 tlie spontaneous uncontrolled play of images in conscious- 
 ness, from whatever cause they spring, and in whatever 
 arrangement they take form. It finds its simplest type in 
 the incoherent forms of dream consciousness. Here there 
 is no mental supervision of the flow of ideas, no true appre- 
 ciation of their relative value for the mental life, no exer- 
 cise of will in selecting or combining them. The physical 
 and intellectual causes of their production are free to work 
 their own effects, and the result is the storming of con- 
 sciousness, in its helpless state, with all the missiles of 
 sense. 
 
 Presuppositions : Memory and Association. It is read- 
 ily seen that the free play of images proceeds upon the 
 revival and association of images. The method of this 
 revival is both physical and mental, and consists only in the 
 wider range of the disjDOsitions of brain and mind which 
 have been seen to lie at the basis of memory and association. 
 
 1. The physical basis here presents its most complex and 
 intricate activity, as is seen in the boundless combinations 
 presented. Indeed, this infinite complexity and irregularity 
 have led many to deny the dependence of imagination upon 
 the laws which ordinarily govern reproduction. But we 
 have only to consider the real nature of the inter-connected 
 chains of cerebral association to see that the truth is what 
 the principle of association would lead us to believe. Let 
 us consider the prevailing cast of a subject's consciousness 
 to be determined by a great mass of systemic, emo- 
 tional, and presentative groups. These cover the entire 
 liistory of the past, and although their elements may be in 
 subconsciousness, they are yet each capable, upon the rein- 
 statement of the conditions of its first production, of assert- 
 ing itself, in whole or in part, above the level of the general 
 product. The result will not be the reproduction of long 
 connected series of states. From the nature of the brain, 
 the nerve elements which represent unessential or accidental 
 
MEMORY AXD ASSOCIATIOX. 177 
 
 mental modifications are also readily excited. As mental 
 states, they are outside the chain of ideas, and seem quite 
 detached and irrelevant ; but in their physical basis they 
 are reasonable effects. And this result is indefinitely added 
 to by the interplay of different cerebral trains. The 
 entire brain vibrates with its single members, and sur- 
 charged parts are thus excited by connections perhaps so 
 delicate and fine that there are no elements in conscious- 
 ness corresponding to them. Thus images far removed in 
 thought from one another and never consciously connected 
 are thrown toijether in imaQ:ination. 
 
 This state of complete confusion in consciousness rarely 
 extends over its whole area, however ; for while we are con- 
 scious at all there is a greater or less degree of mental 
 supervision. Even in dreams there is a glamour of logical 
 or aesthetic consistency throw^n over the most inconsistent 
 elements. AVe think we are making convincing arguments 
 or reciting delicious stanzas, when, awaking, we find it the 
 most meaningless jargon. And in states of light dreaming, 
 when the picture as a whole is coherent, new excitations of 
 the senses are accommodated to it. 
 
 As lias been said, dreams are the most evident type of 
 the free play of this physical causation. When we are 
 asleep, the active, distinguishing, correlating, and arrang- 
 ing function of mind is at rest ; some of the senses are 
 freely open to excitation from without, and the mechanical 
 element of our personality is predominant. Moreover, the 
 withdrawal of the blood supply from the brain, which is 
 the usual accompaniment of a reduced consciousness, tends 
 to alter the relative potential of its parts. It facilitates 
 the discharge of isolated regions, or exposes elements 
 whose ordinary activity is covered by larger or more recent 
 connections. As would be expected, very young children 
 dream very little. They have not formed the physical 
 habits which give to the reactive consciousness such 
 complexity. 
 
178 IMAGINATION. 
 
 In our waking states, also, we often indulge in the state 
 of uncontrolled representation, wliicb passive imagination 
 presents. When we relax all mental exertion, and fall into 
 reverie or day-dreams, this spontaneous flow of images is 
 realized. Yet the play of representations is never in our 
 waking states as detached and incoherent as in dreams. 
 We can usually detect, even in our states of completest 
 intellectual abandon, the successive connections in trains of 
 ideas, governed by the principles of regular association. 
 
 2. The subjective aspect of passive imagination is of more 
 importance and of greater obscurity than its physical basis. 
 And yet its phenomena are in the main of the same nature. 
 We would expect from the intricacy and confusion of this 
 physical network of connections that the mental facts 
 would present the same general appearance ; and that, on 
 the other hand, while, in the midst of this intricacy, the 
 laws of physics hold, so in the mental phenomena, the 
 laws of association must hold, through all the appearance 
 of lawless flow. The first part of this expectation, that 
 the images of imagination will show detached and inco- 
 herent form, is certainly realized in fact. The most strik- 
 ing characteristic of imagination is the strange and wanton 
 nature of its combinations. Detached parts of former 
 images are combined in unexpected and ridiculous forms. 
 Monsters before unknown are. put together from earlier 
 creatures of thought. Situations are devised which involve 
 persons and places impossible to be reached or associated 
 in real life. 
 
 And all that we know of the case leads us to the opinion 
 that tlie second of our expectations also holds good, and 
 that no stretch in the current of the life of fancy escapes 
 the principles of association. 
 
 § 2. Modes of Passive Imagination. 
 
 Imagination, in its passive form, takes on two general 
 modes; we first find a breaking up of the complexes of 
 
MODES OF PASSIVE LMAGIXATIOX. 179 
 
 experience into tlieir elements, small or great, and second, 
 we find that these elements take on new shapes. These 
 two modes may be called, respectively, Dissociation and 
 Composition. 
 
 I. Dissociation. From what has been said, the part 
 played by dissociation is evident. If there were no such 
 breaking up of representations imagination would be 
 simply memory. The same forms of mental process 
 would be indefinitely repeated. Our mental life would 
 be wearisome in its sameness, except as we widened the 
 range of our actual sense experience. As a process, disso- 
 ciation may be more or less prominent, and its thorough- 
 ness, or the contrary, indicates the degree of imaginative 
 power possessed by individuals, since construction or 
 recombination must be limited to the elements at hand. 
 In the process ab-eady described the ground or reason of 
 this dissociation may be seen. 
 
 1. It is often due to the breaking up of physical connec- 
 tions in the brain. The fact of forgetf ulness or fading of 
 memory is largely to be explained by the separation and 
 dissolution of brain circuits. The command of a lan- 
 guage, for example, may be lost from injury to the brain 
 leading to the loss of verbal memories or to the impaii- 
 ment of the movements of pronunciation. But single 
 words or letters, parts of former groups, may remain 
 clearly before us. By the dropping away of certain ele- 
 ments of a complex whole the others become more vivid 
 and the result is a more or less complete analysis. 
 
 2. The same is true of the mental side of our memory. 
 By the principle already mentioned mental groups are 
 acted upon variously by the attention, and attain different 
 degrees of permanence in memory; so parts or elements of 
 these groups may also be affected. Of a long argument 
 I may remember, without effort, only a single step. Of a 
 face only the nose, perhaps, or the chin, is clear in mem- 
 ory. The whole of a word or sentence is often brought up 
 
ISO IMAGINATION. 
 
 in memory from the persistence of a single letter or com- 
 bination which before attracted the attention. Conse- 
 quently, in the progressive fading which all representation 
 undergoes, parts of groups, or elements of single images, 
 fall away, while other parts or elements stand out alone. 
 This, as before, constitutes a more or less complete analysis 
 of former complexes. In associations by resemblance, as we 
 have seen, points common to the two resembling presenta- 
 tions get similar emphasis. 
 
 3. Further than this, we will find in active imagination a 
 positive conscious separation of the parts of images. We 
 are conscious of a tendency toward the reduction of com- 
 plex products to their elements. We note irregularities 
 in outline, protuberances, inconsistencies, and thus isolate 
 portions of our representations. This is seen particularly 
 where the association is not a necessary one, and the parts 
 dissociated have a completeness and unity of their own : 
 as the wings, legs, head of a bird, considered each for 
 itself, or the subject, predicate, and copula of a jjropo- 
 sition. 
 
 II. Composition : Fancy. These detached data do not 
 remain without form in consciousness, but are built up into 
 new combinations. The forms of these combinations are, 
 as has been said, apparently capricious and without law 
 where there is no selection exercised in their arrano^e- 
 ment. 
 
 The combining function of passive imagination, viewed 
 in its product, is called ,/h?icy. Fancy is the familiar deck- 
 ing out of commonplace experience with images brought 
 from distant and unexpected regions. Incongruous ele- 
 ments are placed in juxtaposition, grotesque forms grow up 
 from most familiar elements, the most extravagant antith- 
 eses, and even contradictions, are allowed indulgence in 
 this delightful license of thought. It brings freshness into 
 the midst of tedious processes, and, in its subtle refinements, 
 appeals directly to the emotional and aesthetic nature. The 
 
BELATIOX OF FAKCT TO REALITY. ISl 
 
 passive automatic play of fancy is to be enipliasizecl in 
 contrast with the more purposive construction of active 
 imagination, which remains to be considered. 
 
 The student should notice also the erdai'ijlnrj and dimin- 
 ishimj functions of fancy. It brings about unexpected and 
 grotesque alterations in the size of things. Pygmies and 
 giants are ordinary acquaintances of our fancy. Tilings 
 which we fear or dread are apt to be very large, and things 
 which we ridicule or despise very small. It is probable 
 that this, as many other aspects of the imagination, is due 
 laro^elv to the emotional coloring of the time. The ordi- 
 nary cori-ectives of reality and thought being wanting, the 
 presentalive life is at the mercy of the emotional. The 
 idea which calls the emotion forth accommodates itself 
 to the emotion, by way of justification for it. 
 
 Relation of Fancy to Reality. Passive imagination is 
 characterized throughout by the absence of reference to 
 the real world. In it the mind frees itself, as it were, 
 from its accustomed bondage to external things, and makes 
 its universe entirely within. The truthful images of 
 memory are torn asunder and built up into forms never 
 realized in nature or in sober thouglit. Animals are given 
 voices, inanimate objects legs, and the world is peopled 
 with beings as strange as rare. Yet this is true only in the 
 nature of imagination, not in its actual results; for in its 
 active forms, as we sliall see, it maintains a constant though 
 covert reference to reality ; and even in the most automatic 
 play which is ever realized there is slight supervision 
 and correction from the underlying sense of consistency, 
 beauty, and truth. Tlie vague feeling of satisfaction or 
 dissatisfaction which we experience in connection with 
 our fancies is due to the habit of comparing our mental, 
 states with reality, and even in dreams, where all such 
 reference to the external world is impossible, we make 
 objects of our visions as truly as in the exj^erience of our 
 wakinor life. 
 
182 IMAGmATTOK. 
 
 § 3. Active or Construotia^e Imagination. 
 
 Definition. In addition to the processes described in tlie 
 foregoing, the active imagination involves the exercise of 
 will in some of its forms, whether it be the positive attempt 
 to control the images of fancy, or tlie merest supervision 
 and direction of their pla^^ This distinction is alreadv^ 
 made familiar in the cases of attention and memory. 
 Attention was found to be passive or reflex, and active or 
 voluntary, and memory takes two forms, reminiscence and 
 recollection, according as it is passive or active. 
 
 The distinction, however, in this case is not an absolute 
 one. The beginnings of mental supervision, or at least the 
 feeling of such supervision, is found in the most mechanical 
 play of images. Yet we shall find it valuable for purposes 
 of analysis, as the foregoing sections on passive imagination 
 seem to assure us. 
 
 This phase of imaging is further called constructive, 
 from the nature of its product. In it is emphasized again 
 the intentional nature of the compound state which is built 
 up. Passive combination or fancy is a kind of construc- 
 tion ; but here we deal with the purposive putting together 
 of elements for the attainment of an end of use or beauty. 
 This is the process of artistic and scientific construction. 
 
 § 4. Analysis of Constructive Imagination. 
 
 In analyzing the process of construction by the imagina- 
 tion we proceed upon the account already given of the 
 passive play of images. That is, the dissociation of the 
 elements of former ideal complexes is assumed, and their 
 readiness to be recombined under the guidance of an idea 
 or " plan." We may distinguish four factors or moments 
 in the process of construction : Natural Imjyulse or Appe- 
 tence, Intention, Selective Attention, and Feeling of Fitness. 
 These may be considered in this order: 
 
 I. Natural Impulse or Appetence. It is readily seen 
 
AITALTSTS OF COSSTnnCTIVE IMAGIXATIOX. 183 
 
 that if tlie automatic flo\v of images in imagination is to 
 be intentionally modified, there must be some imi)ulsion, 
 motiv^e, or desire whicli leads to it. An accidental modifi- 
 cation would be self-defeating, and would secure no sys- 
 tematic construction whatever. There must be some end 
 in view, however vague, and a natural tendency toward it, 
 an attraction or tlie contrary.' In a later chapter certain 
 tendencies of ours toward or from certain ends or actions 
 will become apparent. Leaving till then all further dis- 
 cussion of their nature, we simply note here that all exer- 
 cise of will springs from these "appetences," and that the 
 intelligent exercise of will always has in view, as its end, 
 objects Avhich arouse them. Among these " springs of 
 action" may be mentioned love of pleasure and aversion to 
 pain, the natural affections, love of the beautiful and the 
 right : principles which are common to all men in some 
 degree, but wliicli vary in force within very wide limits in 
 individuals. Any or all of such principles, which are 
 strong enough in the individual to lea<l to action, or to 
 give cast to the emotional life, may serve as basis for 
 imaginative construction. If we are led to hope for the 
 accomplishment of a desire, we picture ceaselessly the 
 actual attainment of it, ourselves enjoying its benefits and 
 our enemies discomfited. Nothing is allowed in the scene 
 which does not increase the pleasure, adverse elements, 
 even when known to be real, being discarded. Simply on 
 the ground of strong desire — of praise, money, truth — the 
 images of imagination are constructed, built u]) into a 
 consistent w^hole. Principal, however, among the appe- 
 tences which are predominating in the imagination are the 
 Love of the heautifid, and the Love of truth, or the desire 
 for knowledge. These lie at the basis of the general 
 kinds of constructive imagination, later designated Esthetic 
 and Sdentific. 
 
 ' See below, chap. xxv. p 2, and consult also my Handhook of Psych- 
 ology, vol. ii. chap. xiv. § 2, and chap. viii. § 6. 
 
184 iMAGtNATIOK. 
 
 II. Intention. Pornianent preference in character leads 
 to desire, as permanent and controlling, to accomplish 
 something in the line of its activity. And the entire life, 
 if circumstances do not prevent its satisfaction, is molded 
 with this end in view. Professions are cliosen, associations 
 formed, pleasures indulged in, all of which both satisly 
 this permanent desire and strengthen it. This may be 
 called Intention, Intention, as will be seen in the part 
 devoted to the volitional life,^ is a form of active readi- 
 ness or consent, permanent in its kind, and needing only 
 occasion or oj^portunity to flow forth into action. The 
 scientific man has a constant impulse or " intention " 
 toward the objects of his science. It has become to hiui 
 tlie chosen channel for the expenditure of his intellectual 
 energy. The artist likewise finds his whole life devoted 
 to the pursuit of the forms which gratify his sestlietic 
 nature. His consciousness is filled with images of the 
 beautiful, and liis intention is so spontaneous that it leads 
 right on to volition. 
 
 III. Selective Attention. We now reach the influence 
 wliicli controls the constructions of imagination, the at- 
 tention. Presupposing the native preferences and tenden- 
 cies which have been spoken of, the will, in attention, 
 builds up images, which meet its purpose, into forms of 
 novelty and beauty. The attention is given to reproduc- 
 tions with this construction in view. The scientist or 
 artist views his ideas as so much material, to be directly 
 used for the purpose of his science or art, and each image 
 in turn is scrutinized, alone and with its escort, to dis- 
 cover the possibilities of combination which lie inherent 
 in it. Images which do not present promise of usefulness 
 in the construction are withdrawn from attention and fade 
 away ; others which fit into the growing temple of imag- 
 ination are changed, divided, refined, combined, and cast 
 into forms more complete or beautiful. 
 
 The psychological value of this phase of the imagina- 
 ' BcloAv, chap, xxvii i^ 1. 
 
SELECTIVE ATTEXTTOJ^. 185 
 
 tioii consists in the prolonged and concentratcHl mental 
 reaction which it involves : what Newton called " patient 
 thought." Surface analogies are seen by the common 
 mind, and need no effort of construction ; but tlie hidden 
 properties, the relations which spread wide out through 
 nature and art — these are discovered only when the veils 
 that conceal them are pierced by the power of constructive 
 thought. Every scientific hypothesis is such a piece of 
 construction. Only the properties of the matter in hand 
 are taken which, by the selective attention, can be arranged 
 in a logical framework, to be tested by further appeal to 
 fact. Causes are imagined to be working alone, although 
 never so found, and their effects constructed. " So Newton 
 saw the planet falling into the sun, a thing that did not 
 take place, but which would take place if the tangential 
 force were suppressed." ^ 
 
 Tlie attention, therefore, in imagination, has a twofold 
 part. First, it is Exclusive, that is, it excludes representa- 
 tions which liave no meaning for the task in hand. This 
 is not a positive banishment from consciousness, since that 
 is impossible. The effort to banish an idea only makes it 
 more vivid, while the attention is held fixed upon it. But 
 it consists in the neglect of this particular idea, as unsuited 
 to the purpose of present pursuit. Thus withdrawn from 
 attention an image sinks into subconsciousness and is prac- 
 tically banished. Second, it is Selective : an image is held 
 clear before consciousness and thus found available in the- 
 growing result. 
 
 The result, therefore, is a product of apperception : 
 since the construction of imagination is strictly analo- 
 gous to the construction of the external world in sense 
 perception. In the latter case, objects and relations are 
 forced into consciousness to be arranged, co-ordinated, 
 reconstructed by the apperceiving function. Here the 
 data are supplied from the dissolution of former appercep- 
 tive syntheses, by a selective principle, only to be recom- 
 ^ Rabier, Psychohgie, p. 233 : compare ou this section. 
 
186 IMAGTJSrATTOlr. 
 
 billed by a second synthesis. In the first construction 
 reality is the corrective and guide ; it is only after repeated 
 experiences that our synthetic wholes in perception are 
 made correct. Here, in imagination, this corrective is 
 wanting ; but its place is supplied by the critical selection 
 of the attention. 
 
 IV. Feeling of Fitness. It must have become evident 
 that this selection of images by the attention proceeds 
 upon some principle. There must be some criterion of 
 choice, something either in the images themselves or in the 
 end which they are to subserve, which renders some avail- 
 able and others useless. The percej^tion of this fitness re- 
 quires in general two things : 
 
 1. An end or 2:furpose held in conscious thought, which is 
 to be realized by construction. It is readily seen that this 
 must be involved in the active as distinguished from the 
 passive imagination, since the volitional addition in this 
 case proceeds by motives. That is, the will is exerted only 
 for the accomplishment of something which is presented as 
 an idea, i. e., is an ideals This end or ideal aim, as shall 
 be seen in considering the aesthetic imagination, may be the 
 vaguest and most general notion, having only the charac- 
 teristics of the general class to which it belongs. An 
 artist desires to make something beautiful, or something 
 expressive ; an inventor, something useful. They begin, 
 with this vague thought, to select their images. And as 
 the construction proceeds, it is as new to them as to others, 
 and satisfies them, if it meet the general requirement of 
 their first thought. Later in the growing process the end 
 becomes more definite, as the possibilities of the creation 
 become evident. The artist then projects lines of possible 
 combination, to be filled in by actual representations. To 
 use the figure of George, this liypothetical advance of the 
 scientific imagination is like a net, thrown over the objects 
 
 ^ See the discussion of "ideals" below, chap. xxi. § 3, also my 
 Handbook of PaycJiology, vol. 11. chap. ix. §§ 2, 3. 
 
KINDS OF CONSTRUCTIVE IMACTXATWN. 187 
 
 of <'«)iisi(lorati<)n at tlie moment, its lines marking out the 
 path of future discovery. 
 
 2. Feeling of Adcfptation to this end. It is only neces- 
 sary at this point to show the presence of such a feeling, 
 not to discuss its nature or origin. It seems to consist in a 
 sense of the adaptation of means to end. Only by it is the 
 exclusive and selective attention guided in its choice of 
 elements. As a feeling, it extends throughout our entire 
 mental and active life. We pass involuntary^ judgment on 
 the fitness of an instrument for its use, of the material for 
 a garment, of an officer for his office. 
 
 This feeling, in its variations in individuals, is in large 
 part the basis of artistic talent. The general proportions 
 of things, the relativ^e value of details, the harmony of 
 discordant meanings, the reduction of varied elements to a 
 fundamental motive — these and many other problems of 
 the artist call tliis feeling prominently into phi}'. He says : 
 " I know not why, but I feel that it must be so." Some 
 men are almost destitute of such a sense. They sliow its 
 lack in the absence of personal and room adornment, in 
 incongruous and peculiar actions — actions inappropriate to 
 the circumstances. Tliis lack may be summed up concisely 
 as either the want of constructive imagination, or the want 
 of the sense of fitness in selecting: its material.* 
 
 ■& 
 
 § 5. Kinds of Constructive Imagination. 
 
 We are now prepared to gain a view of the entire process 
 of imagination looked at, not as the union of these separate 
 activities or factors, but as what it appears at first sight to 
 be, a single function of mind. Considering the subject- 
 matter of the imagination and the relation which its con- 
 structions bear to the world, two general fonns may be 
 distinguished : the Scientific and the Esthetic imagination. 
 
 I. Scientific Imagination. The scientific or acquisitive 
 
 ' See further discussion of this sense of fitness, below, chap. xxi. g 3. 
 
188 IMAOIKATION. 
 
 iniagiii.itioii is the imagination occupied with tlie discovery 
 of trutli. At first siglit it appears true that tlie construc- 
 tions of this faculty have no vahie for knowledge, and that 
 intellect only suffers from its exercise. But we find that 
 the imagination is the prophetic forerunner of almost all 
 great scientific discoveries. In science the mental factors 
 seen to underlie all imaginative construction are called into 
 play in a highly exaggerated way. The associative ma- 
 terial presented covers, generally, the whole area of the 
 data of the scientific branch in hand : familiarit}^ with tlie 
 principles and laws already discovered is assumed, and, in 
 general, a condition of mental saturation with the subject. 
 For this reason we look to scientific specialists for new 
 truths and hypotheses, and have no ear for the vagaries of 
 the dilettante and amateur. Native taste, preference, and 
 personal interest are also here highly significant. There is as 
 distinctly a scientific genius as there is an artistic genius. 
 Great discoverers in science have a facilit}^ in discovering 
 deep-seated analogies and relations, an appetence for 
 positive truth, a tendency to accept only the confirmed 
 deliverances of nature herself. They generally are men of 
 great emotional soberness and intellectual enthusiasm, if 
 the antithesis be allowed. Further than this, their imagi- 
 native process is largely under control. This is no doubt 
 the great essential, the preponderating force of the exclu- 
 sive and selective attention. Not only do great scientists 
 see deeply, but they are able, from an exquisite sense of 
 relative values in nature, and of relative fitness in fact, to 
 dissect, arrange, and classify, until from a few great gen- 
 eral resemblances the construction of a law is possible. 
 And it is only by tliis act of relating attention, or apper- 
 ception, that the actual law is finally constructed. A minor 
 scientist may collect data and draw from them generic re- 
 semblances, but, witli all his study and effort, he does not 
 construct. The trained, refined, and nature-given con- 
 structive force of attention alone does this. 
 
SGIEXTIFIC HYPOTHESES. 189 
 
 Relation of Scientific Imagination to Reality: 
 Scientific Hypotheses, Tliis form of imagination has 
 also been called acquisitive, and therein it is plain that it 
 h'as direct reference to our knowledge of the world and 
 things. It differs in this both from the passive exercise 
 of the imaging power, which has no guide but interest 
 and preference, and from the {esthetic, whose end is pleas- 
 ure in an ideal which is not realized in nature. The end 
 of the scientific imagination is truth, and its impelling 
 motive, love of truth. For this reason the corrective real- 
 ity which is wanting in the other cases returns here in its 
 full import. The data of this form of imagination are true 
 images, tlie elements of knowledge. Its constructions are 
 logical processes, through which further trutlis may be an- 
 ticipated by inference; and its anticipations are worthless, 
 unless they stand an exhaustive comparison with nature's 
 plienomena, and by it receive confirmation. The purpose 
 of scientific imagination, then, is utility, not pleasure. 
 
 The form of all such anticipations of nature is hypo- 
 thetical. There remains in consciousness, with it all, the 
 feeling that the product is subjective, a creation of mind, 
 and an eager desire to test its actual truth. The construc- 
 tions, therefore, of the scientific imagination are called 
 hypotheses. They carry various degrees of probability, 
 both subjective and objective. By subjective probability 
 is meant the amount of belief whicli we ourselves attach to 
 our constructions. Often the data are so well understood 
 and the process of construction so conscious that our be- 
 lief amounts to psychological certainty. 
 
 II. Esthetic Imagination. The aesthetic imagination 
 differs from tlie scientific, especially in the end toward 
 which the constructive process tends. Assuming the same 
 factors or stages in its development, the difference is seen 
 in the fact that the end is no longer knowledge, but beauty. 
 The selective attention, therefore, in this case, singles out 
 elements which satisfy the sense of the beautiful, whether 
 
190 IMAGINATION. 
 
 or not its construction is realizable in tlie combinations of 
 fact. What it is that constitutes the beautiful is to be 
 spoken of later/ Among the general relations which are 
 called beautiful are symmetry, harmony, unity in variety ; 
 representative materials which promise these aesthetic com- 
 binations are taken up and thrown into forms of construc- 
 tion. 
 
 The aesthetic imagination is accompanied by a lively 
 play of pleasurable excitement, which continues throughout 
 the continuance of the constructive work. It receives 
 great re-enforcement or decrease, according as the concep- 
 tion is skillfully or poorly worked out. The emotional life 
 is more intimately concerned than in scientific construc- 
 tion, and, instead of disturbing, it greatly assists the oper- 
 ation. The forms of aesthetic construction are also more 
 instantaneous and inexplicable, for the reason that they 
 arise from an emotional stimulus, and have no logical ami, 
 often, no conscious development. Great artists are usually 
 men of strong emotional temperament, and frequently 
 show a corresponding lack of high practical and theoretical 
 judgment. Their conceptions take shape spontaneously^ 
 with little selection of elements, or conscious blending ; 
 and when once satisfactorily executed, they are unwill- 
 ing to admit modification .except in unimportant details. 
 Further, the corrective standard of reference is now not 
 reality, but an ideal of universal acceptance — a form not 
 found in nature, but of which nature in her perfect work- 
 ing would be capable. The question as to the true prov- 
 ince of art, imitation or construction, as the two great the- 
 ories, realism and idealism respectively, announce it, cannot 
 be long unsolved from a standpoint of the psycholog}' of 
 ideals. If art is the production of the imagination at all its 
 ideals are imaginative constructions, not natural facts. The 
 act of putting a conception in oil or marble is not alone the 
 artist's part — a machine miglit do it better. The art value 
 
 ' ^Esthetic feelings, below, chap. xxi. § 7 ; see also my Handbook of 
 rsycholofjy, chap. ix. § 8, 
 
THE IXFIXITE. 191 
 
 extends to the conception. The execution is only the more 
 or less adequate means of expression. If imitation, there- 
 fore, be the whole of art, execution would be better left to 
 the camera and the death-mask. Tliere is no reason that 
 aesthetic ideals should not surpass nature as much as the 
 forms of practical invention surpass her rude contrivances 
 for usins: her own forces. Nature never constructs a 
 phonograph, just as she never puts human thought and 
 aspiration into simple color and form. 
 
 Laws of Imagination. From what has been said it is 
 evident that passive imagination proceeds by the secondary 
 laws of association. Contiguity, and Resemblance, while 
 active imagination proceeds by the primary law. Correla- 
 tion. In correlative association there is a deeper principle 
 underlying contiguity and resemblance, an essential apper- 
 ceptive relation ; so in constructive imagination there is a 
 deeper principle, a relation of truth or beauty, which under- 
 lies the simple contiguities and resemblances involved in 
 the compositions of fancy. 
 
 § 6. Ideal Product of Imagination : the Infinite. 
 
 It is from the imaging function that we attain the idea of 
 the Infinite, since it is only by tlie enlarging of the limited 
 data of perception that unlimited extent in time and space 
 can be constructed. We may look at the infinite under two 
 aspects : first, defined under its cognitive or representative 
 aspect, it is that to which nothing can be added, the perfect, 
 after its kind. It is called representative, since we find the 
 preparation of this idea in our psychological analj^sis of im- 
 agination. In the scientific imagination the limit of discov- 
 ery, or the infinite, is the sum of truth, and, in the ideal of 
 aesthetic construction, we have the perfect. The other we may 
 call the emotional aspect of the infinite, since it consists in the 
 feelings of inadequacy and awe which accompany all our 
 attempts to construct or picture the infinite. All images 
 are felt to be entirely out of place, and we think of the 
 infinite as stretching out beyond our utmost conception. 
 
CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 ILLUSIONS.^ 
 § 1. Nature of Illusion. 
 
 Helation of Illusion to Mental Pathology. The imag- 
 inative proct^ss described above answers to the normal 
 working of the reproductive function in its broadest aspect. 
 Yet this faculty is subject to various forms of derangement, 
 which greatly widen its sphere of influence in the mental 
 life, and at the same time afford us unexpected means of 
 gaining insight into its real nature. The study of illusions 
 belongs properly to the Pathology of mind. 
 
 In this connection, however, we have only to deal with 
 those irregular states of mind to which the regular proc- 
 esses sometimes give rise : that is, with individual unex- 
 pected states, rather than with the general and permanent 
 irregularities which constitute mental disease. Our view 
 includes the beginning of mental tendencies awaj^ from 
 the line of average results ; tendencies which, like all other 
 mental products, become fixed, through habit, in forms of 
 chronic delusion. It is in the reproductive faculty that 
 mental aberration generally takes its rise. We can readily 
 see how a failure in attentive selection of images gives 
 constructions which are untrue, how mistaken vistas of 
 memory may lead to fallacious processes, of thought and 
 mistaken forms of action. The imagination stands midw^ay 
 between perception and thought, and errors in its results 
 cause far-reaching illusion. 
 
 General Character of Illusion. By illusion, tlierefore, 
 in its broadest sense, we understand mental deception, or 
 
 ' Cf. ray Handbook of Psycliology, vol, i. chap. xiii. 
 
GENEliAL CHARACTER OF ILLUSION. 193 
 
 mistaken trust in the validity of a subjective state, be this 
 state what it niay. An unconscious logical fallacy is an 
 ilhision, an apparition of the senses is an illusion, a mistake 
 in color, due to expectancy, is an illusion, a religious super- 
 stition is an illusion. Viewed thus in its breadth as co- 
 incident with all the domain of our conscious life,two general 
 points may be found common to all classes of illusions: 
 first, the element of Belief \\h\ch. attaches to all illusional 
 states, and, second, the Represent alive Nature of all such 
 states. 
 
 I. Relation of Illusion to Belief It has been said that 
 trust in a mental state, or belief in its reality, is a common 
 characteristic of illusional states. We cannot enter here 
 into a discussion of the nature of belief, as a psychological 
 state, since it is not necessary to the case in hand. It is 
 sufficient to note that the mind preserves the same attitude 
 toward those reproductions which constitute illusions in 
 our mental life as toward those which have a corresponding 
 reality. The reason that the mind is thus disposed to 
 illusion is again reverted to later. We attribute to the 
 products of representation the correspondences which hold 
 between the presentations of former experience and inde- 
 pendent objects or events, external to us. And it is this 
 belief which gives tlie illusion its force. The criteria or 
 grounds of this belief, therefore, are those which justify 
 belief in the external world, as known in sense-perception.* 
 Our business now is simply to ask why in certain cases this 
 belief is misplaced. 
 
 II. Representati\)e Nature of Illusional States. The 
 second characteristic of all illusions is their representative 
 quality. It is only in a picture, or copy, or representation 
 that the reality of a thing can be simulated ; and it is only 
 as the reality is itself a mental picture, a presentation, that 
 a copy or representation can simulate it. For this reason 
 we reach a furtlier exclusion of states from the field of 
 illusion, i. e., tJiose sciisaiions, feelings, emotions, volitions 
 
 ' See section on "' Belief," below, chap. xix. g§ 4, 5. 
 
194 ILLUSIONS. 
 
 in which the affective element is predominant or unmixed. 
 Consequently, as we should expect, illusions of the eye 
 and ear are most common, and those of touch not unusual, 
 these senses being most presentative ; while deceptions in 
 taste and smell are rare, except when they arise purely 
 from mental causes, or from consistency^ with illusions 
 already established for sight or hearing/ 
 
 Illusion due to Interpretation. Considering these two 
 characteristics of illusions we are led to look upon all such 
 states as the result of mistaken interpretation. In per- 
 ception presentations are interpreted in terms of realit}^, 
 and the interpretation is true ; in illusion representations are, 
 for the same reasons, whatever they are, also interpreted 
 in terms of reality, and the interpretation is not true. We 
 say for the same reasons, meaning that the evidence which 
 leads to belief in the former case, the marks of reality 
 which we recognize, are also present in the second, and 
 induce belief here also. We are now led to ask : What are 
 the grounds of this interpretation ? 
 
 § 2. Grounds of Illusion. 
 
 I. Similarity of Presentations and Kepresentations. 
 The most misleading feature, without doubt, of represen- 
 tative mental products is their very close resemblance to 
 the original presentations. This has already been re- 
 marked in discussing the nature of mental images.'^ This 
 being the case, there is every reason to expect mistakes in 
 identification, unless there be some marks in the mental 
 accompaniment or escort of reproductions upon which the 
 mind may seize. That there are such differences is seen in 
 the possibility of detecting, and banishing illusions, but the 
 great similarities in the case lead us, in common life, to 
 overlook them. 
 
 ' For example, when we are already sure there is fire in the house 
 it is very easy to smell it. 
 2 See above, pp. 129 f . 
 
ABSENCE OF INTERNAL STIMULUS. 195 
 
 II. Absence of Internal Stimulus. The means by 
 which, in all cases of active imagination, a reproduction is 
 known to be such, is found, at least in part, in the feeling 
 of voluntary effort put forth in the revival. This effort is 
 directive, as has been seen in speaking of the selective 
 attention, and is accompanied by the weariness which all 
 attention occasions. We are conscious of having a mental 
 agency in the reproduction, of being ourselves responsible 
 in part for the outcome. This we may call an internal 
 stimulus, as contrasted with the sense or organic excitations 
 from which ordinary presentations arise. An entire train 
 or network of ideas may thus be built up, constituting 
 a secondary consciousness, parallel with the first or true 
 series of presentations. The voluntarily pictured scene 
 ma}^ arise before me — my distant home, friends, and all the 
 familiar surroundings, with myself among them. But be- 
 neath it all is my matter-of-fact present consciousness, 
 the true state of my mind, in diffused and vague attention. 
 I attach no belief to the former, because I feel myself 
 either responsible for its production or capable of modi- 
 fying or banishing it by my will. 
 
 In thj illuiional reproduction, on the other hand, there 
 is no suo!i feeling of origination or control. The image is 
 presented in the ordinary course of present experience, as 
 a part of the normal content of consciousness. And the 
 subject is led to the belief, in the absence of internal 
 causation, that the representation is due to an external 
 cause, that is, that it arises from an external object. In 
 this case we fail to keep distinct tlie two consciousnesses, 
 the imagined scene being as real to us as that in which we 
 actually move. 
 
 III. Intra-organic Stimulus: Physical Change. In 
 cases of illusion, if there be anj^ stimulus or cause at all, 
 and it be neither of mental nor of external origin, we are 
 driven to the third and true alternative : the stimulus is 
 intra-organic ; it arises from a given condition or modificc^-. 
 
196 ILLUSIONS. 
 
 tiou of the bodily organism itself. We have found that 
 the nervous process which underlies reproduction in gen- 
 eral is the same in its special seat and in its motor ten- 
 dency as the original perception, the stimulus arising 
 either at the nervous center or in some portion of the 
 nerve courses or endings. The peculiar fact that the stim- 
 ulus of a nerve course is always located at the extremity, 
 and that the special courses always react in the special 
 forms peculiar to their end organs, has also been remarked. 
 In these facts we have data for the projection of the 
 images which arise from central or general organic causes 
 into the field of real perception. Sensations of liglit, for ex- 
 ample, due to the self-discharge of the center for sight in the 
 brain — which may be the case when the irritability of the 
 center is very high — or to the existence of resident light- 
 points in the darkened retinal field, arising from spontane- 
 ous excitation by friction or disease, or again, to mechan- 
 ical violence done to the optic nerve at any point — are 
 alike referred to external luminous objects. There is noth- 
 ing in the central process to indicate the source of the 
 stimulus. The hearing also is often occupied with excita- 
 tions which have no external sound counterpart. Children 
 hear voices speaking to them, visionaries receive messages 
 from heaven. All of these are cases. of spontaneous excita- 
 tion in the ear or center, or are due to actual noises in the 
 head or body, convej^ed through the tissues to the auditory 
 apparatus. Among the causes of hallucination enumerated 
 by Griesinger are the following, which are entirely phys- 
 ical : (1) local disease in the organ of sense ; (2) deep 
 phj^sical exhaustion ; (3) outward calm and stillness — 
 absence of external stimulus, as in sleep ; (4) action of 
 drugs, hasheesh, opium, etc., and many deep-seated diseases. 
 IV". Mental Predisposition to Illusion. The physical 
 processes which underlie reproduction are liable to get into 
 the habit of discharging in certain ways, and the same may 
 ly'v' sai4 of the habits of mind. In the lirst place, the asso- 
 
MENTAL PREDISPOSITION TO ILLUSION 197 
 
 oiative law of interest holds, determining the kind of illusion 
 to which one is most liable. Further than this, long indul- 
 gence in any train of thought, or frequent repetition of the 
 same mental imagery, tends to give a whole class of images 
 a readiness and facility which often become organic and 
 illusional. But by far the most important class of cases 
 arising from mental predisposition come from a state of 
 high mental expectancy. In this state the image or idea 
 of the expected object or event is kept so constantly and 
 strongly in mind that the subject conceives of it as already 
 accomplished. Other events or images take on the form 
 of the expected event or image, by an assimilation to be 
 spoken of later on, A good illustration is found in the 
 anticipation of an expected sound, when it is to be in- 
 serted in a series of other sounds, the expectant attention 
 being strained to receive it/ The illusions of the theater 
 are due to this mental predisposition. And the success of 
 the spiritualist in bringing up ghosts, lifting tables, and 
 doing other wonders turns upon the readiness of his audi- 
 ence to fall into illusion. Furthermore, the state of expec- 
 tancy is greatly enhanced by the addition of violent emotion, 
 as fear or hope. When under a state of great fear the 
 most unoffending objects take on the form of our appre- 
 hension : ordinary noises become the footfall of burglars, 
 a harmless bush in a graveyard is a spirit, slight bodily 
 pains are made the symptoms of frightful diseases. The 
 emotion has an immediate influence in quickening and con- 
 centrating the attention, and the attention in turn keeps 
 the expected image present, even when the peripheral stim- 
 ulation is of the most opposed nature. And the illusion is 
 sometimes so powerful that it affects more than one sense. 
 
 A further and perhaps more common predisposition to 
 illusion, in the normal processes of mind, is found in the 
 assumption which we all readily make, that average and 
 ordinary experience is truthful. The growth of mind, 
 from its earliest stages, is based upon this assumption. 
 ' See chap. viii. § 7. 
 
198 ILLUSIONS. 
 
 Indeed, development in mind is the progressive adaptation 
 of the subjective to the objective, tlie refinement of liar- 
 mony in a relation of which each term is dependent on 
 the other. For this reason trust in sensations, images, 
 reasoning is a part of those processes themselves. It is 
 only when we find violence done to our trusts that the 
 feeling of illusion enters consciousness at all. The real 
 fact demanding explanation is not the question, why do 
 we confide in some states which are not real in fact, but 
 why do we not confide in all states. Just as the little 
 child confides in all men by nature, and learns from painful 
 experience that all cannot be trusted, so he confides at first, 
 also, in all his mental states, and learns by an experience 
 just as costly that some are deceptive. With this new 
 experience comes also the means of defense against 
 similar illusions, and so the indications are learned by 
 which, under careful weighing, the illusive state may be 
 detected. 
 
 § 3. Kinds of Illusion. 
 
 The general characteristics of all illusional states have 
 until now been considered. Looking at special cases more 
 closely we find that they may be divided into two general 
 classes : First, there are man^^ cases in which the state 
 w^hich constitutes the illusion, w^hile itself largely inde- 
 pendent of an external stimulus, is yet brought into con- 
 sciousness through some real object different in character 
 from what it is taken to be : that is, cases in which the 
 image seen is a misinterpretation of some real thing. 
 This is called Illusion Proper. Second, tlier^ are cases in 
 which the image is not connected with any external thing 
 whatever, but is a pure projection into the conscious field 
 of presentation. This is called Hallucination. 
 
 I. Illusion Proper. At the outset we find ourselves 
 face to face with the whole class of experiences in which 
 a mental state has a wTong value assigned to it. There 
 
KINDS OF ILLUSIOX. 199 
 
 are, really, two conscious values involved, one the rightful 
 stimulus as it breaks into consciousness, say the striking 
 of the clock ; the other, the image of something different, 
 formed within the domain of the same sense quality, and 
 usually prominent in consciousness before the time of the 
 illusion ; as the alarm of fire, into which the striking of 
 the clock is interpreted. The latter alone is an image in 
 the strict sense of the word, i. e., a representation. The 
 stimulus may not produce its proper presentation at all, 
 but it may yet be used to induce an improper one. 
 
 The identification may proceed upon similarities which 
 are verj^ vague. In states of strong emotional tension, 
 simply the quality of the affection — as coming from the 
 same sense — is suflicient to produce illusion; or even further 
 than this, the mere fact of sense stimulation brings the 
 dominant image into apperception, with all the marks of 
 reality. The fact that the sensorium is in a state of 
 reaction is sufficient, the special stimulus experienced 
 being interpreted into that aspect of the illusional image, 
 which would appeal to the same sense, if it were real. The 
 timid traveler in the woods of the West at night not only 
 mistakes trees for Indians, but every sound becomes the 
 soft tread of the savage. The dreaded thing is so in- 
 trenched in the center of converging lines of association 
 that the same image is called up whatever sense is brought 
 into play. It is easily seen also that this is more readil}^ 
 the case when the sense stimulation is uncertain or vague 
 in its character — as vision at night — since in this case there 
 are fewer points of opposition to be overcome. 
 
 The actual process, therefore, in cases of illusio!i proper 
 is one of Assimilation. The elements which should form 
 one image are assimilated to another, under conditions 
 of attentive or emotional excitement. Further, the in- 
 tensity of the actual sensation passes over to the false image, 
 thus bringing it into greater harmony with the actual en- 
 vironment. 
 
200 ILLUSIONS. 
 
 Elements of Reality in the Illusion Proper. In virtue 
 also of its extra-organic origin the illusion proper has ele- 
 ments of reality brought into it which are wanting to tlie 
 hallucination. The local relations of percepts give each 
 of them a peculiar character. A representation, on the 
 contrary, has no space locality. Even in our dreams, in 
 which the independence and isolation of the imaginations 
 from disturbing reality is as great as is possible, their 
 localization is vague and changing : the relations of space 
 are extremely confused. And their bond of connection 
 with one another in other respects is of so loose and un- 
 important a kind that the most startling and inconsistent 
 transformations do not surprise us. 
 
 In the assimilation, however, upon which illusion proper 
 rests these two characters are supplied by the assimilated 
 elements. The reproduced image steps into the shoes, so 
 to speak, of the sensation, and appropriates both its local 
 position and its bonds of connection in the network of 
 actual fact. The Indian seen in the forest is no longer a 
 vague, placeless image, flitting here and there in conscious- 
 ness, with no relations to other images, but he takes the 
 place of the tree which is assimilated to him, and all its 
 definiteness of place, time, and environment becomes his. 
 For this reason, as wnll appear, the detection of illusions is 
 more difficult than that of hallucinations. 
 
 II. Hallucination.* In hallucination all extra-organic 
 stimulation is wanting. The illusional image is a pure 
 projection of mind. For this reason we find that both the 
 mental and the physical process is of exaggerated intensity. 
 On the mental side it is only when the force of attention 
 has been so long or so violently exerted that an image 
 becomes fixed or imperative, that it attains the appearance 
 of actuality. And on the physical side not only is the 
 
 ' On the further classification and description of particular kinds of 
 illusions see the section on "Range of Illusion" in my Handbook of 
 Psychology, vol. i. chap. xiii. § 4. 
 
DETECTION AND RECTIFICATION OF ILLUSIONS. 201 
 
 nervous center liiglily excitable, but it is in actual movement; 
 its discharge is automatic : instead of proceeding from the 
 action of peripheral or central stimuli it proceeds in spite 
 of all opposing stimuli. This state, either of mind or body, 
 is always near the line of disease ; cases of hallucination 
 in normal health are extremely rare, and arise mostly from 
 great weariness in the mental life. Thorough-going hal- 
 lucinations are rare, further, from the absence of all means 
 of localizing them, and of connecting them properly with 
 outside states. Even when they are localized outside us 
 the absence of connections enables us to detect them. 
 Yet in some cases they carry their associated escort of 
 images with them, giving a consistent series of presenta-' 
 tions ; this is the case in hypnotic hallucination. 
 
 § 4. Detection and Rectification of Illusions. 
 
 In general, illusional states have all the characteristics of 
 presentations. They are intense ; they are localized ; they 
 are more or less fixed in an escort or ideal environment, 
 which gives them an apperceptive truthfulness and force ; 
 and they are beyond our control. For the detection of 
 illusion it is only necessary that an image lose some or all 
 of these attributes of reality : that is, that it become very 
 feeble, that it have no definite localization, that it appear 
 in consciousness with an inappropriate apperceptive escort, 
 or with none, or that it be subject to our voluntary influ- 
 ence. Hence from the nature of the illusional state itself 
 we have several means of detecting it, which, when found 
 existing together, make the case unmistakable. 
 
 1. Diminished Intensity. The fact of diminished in- 
 tensity, as distinguishing an image from a sense presenta- 
 tion, has already been dwelt upon. The fact applies to 
 all possible reproductions. This test is of little value in 
 cases of very vivid representation, and in cases where 
 localization enters, since, in such cases, this latter fact is 
 the controlling one. But in cases of vague sensation, and 
 
202 ILLUSIONS. 
 
 of sensations which are not customarily localized, we are 
 driven to the discrimination in intensity as the only means 
 of detecting illusion. 
 
 2. Absence of Definite Locality. On the other hand, 
 in the case of an image whose corresponding sensation 
 is always localized — as images of sight and touch — tlie 
 absence of spatial locality is at once a sufficient means of 
 testing it. However intense, detailed, clear, and persist- 
 ent, for example, the image of a house may be, if it is not 
 localized in front, behind, somewhere in the visual field, we 
 pronounce it at once an illusion. The same is also true, in 
 the main, of localization in time, in cases of illusion of 
 memory. 
 
 3. Inappropriate Escort. This test gives us a very 
 convenient and practicable method of banishing illusions 
 whenever sense perceptioji, generally, and logical thought 
 are normal. The character which we instinctively look for 
 in illusions is incongruity or contradiction. The primary 
 consciousness of the actual world, as it breaks in through 
 the open avenues of sense, presenting a consistent whole 
 reported by all the senses together, suffers immediate vio- 
 lence by the intrusion of a representation which has no 
 external truth. Incongruities and inconsistencies at once 
 arise. These may all be considered as some form of con- 
 tradiction in consciousness, and lead us to the principle 
 known as co7itradictory representation. Tliis principle may 
 be stated thus: qftvjo contradictory states of consciousness 
 one at least must be false. In the processes of reasoning we 
 find the same principle. In the sphere of representation 
 this contradiction takes a form of repressive or antagonistic 
 opposition among images, called inhibition ; ^ the quality 
 and range of escort being the ground of decision as to 
 which is true and which false. In many cases the 
 escort of the true presentation is already so fixed in 
 
 ' On the analogy between nervous and mental inhibition see Hand- 
 book of Psychology, vol. ii. chap. ii. § 4. 
 
IKAPPBOPBIATE ESCORT. 203 
 
 consciousness and confirmed by different experiences 
 that a lialliicination is at once detected. A visual 
 image is seen on the background of a wall or forest, 
 whicli latter comes strongly out when attended to, and 
 the hallucination disappears. An appeal is often made 
 to another sense to refute such an image. Tlie other sense, 
 as touch, establishes a different external series, and the hal- 
 lucination is detected.^ This last form of contradiction — 
 that between two different senses — affords the only prac- 
 ticable test, in many cases, of illusion proper in perception, 
 since, as has been seen, the real object in this case gives to 
 the illusional image its locality and escort, as far as a single 
 sense is concerned. There is nothing in the physical sur- 
 roundings to lead us to believe that the Indian is not really a 
 tree, or that the slight noise is not his tread. On approach- 
 ing and touching the tree, however, our illusion of sight is 
 rectified. Further, we have here the reason for frequent 
 hallucination and illusion when the organ of sense is 
 fatigued. The incapacity of the organ to produce the 
 normal presentation, and its proper escort, removes the 
 means of detecting^ creatures of the imas^ination. 
 
 This principle of contradiction also enables us to bring 
 to bear upon images the conclusions of a higher nature, 
 which we have before reached — conclusions based upon 
 sufficient reasons. Memory, natural law, testimony, expe- 
 rience, rational truth, any of these may lead us to dis- 
 believe in an image, though it persists in our conscious 
 life. A resident of New York would not believe that a 
 herd of buffalo had been seen in Central Park or a wild 
 Indian in his drawing room ; a stone unsupported in mid- 
 air Ave simply treat as an absurdity. In all such cases 
 the sense report is subordinated to higher knowledge or 
 conviction. 
 
 ' Christ appealed to this test in telling Thomas to touch his body ; 
 the vision might well have been a halluciuation, due to exhaustion or 
 grief. 
 
204 ILLVSI0N8. 
 
 4. Voluntary Control. Our ability to banish, modify, 
 or control a presentation is a further and the most unfail- 
 ing test of its reality, since resistance to our voluntary 
 eifort is the fundamental character of external reality. This 
 point has further explanation below.* 
 
 ^ See p. 258. 
 
ELABORATIOK 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THOUGHT.i 
 
 § 1. ISTature of Thought. 
 
 General Character of the Thinking Process. As a 
 departure in the mental life thought seems in its nature to 
 present processes hitherto wanting in our study. Thought, 
 thinking, reasoning, characterize an operation at first sight 
 distinct from imagination, memory, perception. Yet it is 
 from these subordinate operations, considered alone, that 
 thought is distinct, not from the process of apperception, 
 which includes them all. 
 
 Thought is not a " power " or " faculty " as held by the 
 old psychology. It is rather the fuller exhibition of the one 
 activity which we find in consciousness. In thought 
 only does the attention, which is limited by the senses in 
 perception, and misled by the range and freedom of repro- 
 duction, in imagination, get the upper hand, and follow its 
 own rubrics of independent action. As related to percep- 
 tion, therefore, thought may be called the synthesis of 
 percepts, as perception is the synthesis of sensations ; and 
 as related to imagination, it may be called the construction 
 of combinations in accordance with laws of its own, and 
 the laws of external truth ; just as imagination is the 
 construction of combinations in accordance with the laws 
 of mental reproduction. For example, we may imagine 
 Samson dead and the temple of the Pliilistines still stand- 
 
 * Cf. my Handbook of Psychology, vol. i. chap. iv. 
 
 205 
 
206 THOUGHT. 
 
 ing ; there is nothing in the mere coexistence of the rep- 
 resentations to forbid it. But we cannot thmk it, for it 
 violates tlie mental principle of cause and eifect. 
 
 Stages in Thought. The process which we call thought 
 has three stages which may be somewhat artificially dis- 
 tinguished from one another, i. e.. Conception, Judgment, 
 Reasoning. 
 
 § 2. Conception. 
 
 Process of Conception. Conception is the process by 
 which we reach the geiieral notion / which is, as shall be 
 seen below, a representative state of mind, holding the 
 attention upon a plurality or class of objects taken together, 
 or upon any individual considered as a member of a class, 
 and not as an individual. Man, tree, government, virtue, 
 are general notions. Considered as products of conception 
 they are called concepts, and considered as names, in 
 language, terms. The concept is related to the percept 
 somewhat as the percept to the sensation. The percept is 
 built up upon the basis of sensations, but can be applied 
 to a single sensation only as it is representative of others, 
 or carries the force of others in itself ; so a concept is 
 built up upon percepts, and can be applied to a single per- 
 cept only as it is taken to represent others. Tiie range of 
 a concept in its application to individuals is called its 
 Extension or breadth ; thus man has greater extension 
 tlian poet. It applies to a greater number of single things. 
 And the meaning of a concept in regard to the qualities, 
 attributes, or characteristics which it includes, is called its 
 Intension or depth ; thus poet has greater intension than 
 man, since, in addition to the qualities of all men, it 
 includes the quality of being poetical. The growth of the 
 concept may be observed from the side either of intension 
 or extension ; in the former case it is known as Abstrac- 
 tion; in the latter, as Generalization. 
 
 I. Abstraction. 1. Analysis. The finished perception 
 or intuition of a thing, it will be remembered^ involves ^ 
 
ABSTRACTION. 207 
 
 synthesis of sensational elements giving a percept. The 
 percept, in its first experience, however, is thrown into 
 consciousness by external causes and has no clear outline. 
 The cliild's first sight of liis father is only a mass of visual 
 sensations, and when he begins to use the name supplied 
 from without, he applies it to any man indiscriminately. 
 He has no such thing as a general conception of man ; for 
 the reason he calls a stranger papa is not that the term 
 applies equally to other men, but that he mistakes the 
 individual for the man he is accustomed to call papa. 
 Yet in the psychological state of the child we recognize 
 the beginning of a general notion — an image or symbol 
 which answers for any one of many individuals. So it is 
 probably, also, with animals. The peculiar features of 
 different men are undetected, and the intension of the 
 term, while very great, is of the most apparent super- 
 ficiality. This I believe to be the origin of the general 
 notion, i. e., a particular experience accepted and trusted 
 in as representative of other experiences. In adult think- 
 ing when new conceptions enter our mental life it is from 
 the broadest and vaguest mental pictures that they grad- 
 ually take form. My first experience of a new word, say 
 government, in my reading, gives me only the vague 
 meaning which I gather from the context. I carry this 
 conception, under which all conceivable forms of govern- 
 ment might pass, until from some other source my idea is 
 clarified. From this point increasing experience leads me 
 to limit the meaning of the term by dropping marks which 
 are not always present. Abstraction is not a voluntary 
 dropping off of certain qualities in order that another, 
 already selected, may be considered alone. This would 
 involve the conception which is in question beforehand 
 ready made. On the contrary, it is a gradual, unforeseen 
 process of elimination, as the discovery of truth necessitates 
 it. Instead of starting with different governments, ab- 
 stracting the quality of sovereignty from them all, and 
 
208 THOUOHT. 
 
 leaving behind their individual characters, I begin with a 
 vague notion of government, and by analysis through 
 experience find that sovereignty alone is essential to all 
 its forms. That is, the intensive meaning of my notion is 
 analyzed, and only those qualities retained which experi- 
 ence allows me to retain. This form of abstraction may 
 be called Analysis. 
 
 This process of analysis is furthered by the actual play 
 of representations in memory. By the law of the pro- 
 gressive fading of memories in the past, individual pecu- 
 liarities are lost, and individuals of the same general nature 
 are identified with one another. The dim, shadowy outline 
 thus recalled serves the purposes of the general notion, 
 while tlie particular feature or element of it which gets 
 repeated is emphasized and so " abstracted." This ac- 
 counts for the greater vagueness and indefiniteness of the 
 unessential and unremarked elements of the image, as the 
 notion becomes more general. This reduction of images 
 to a single "composite" or "generic image" is typified in 
 composite photography, as Galton has shown.* 
 
 2. Synthesis. Yet another result from experience is nec- 
 essary to the complete development of the concept : its 
 enlargement in intension. In tlie testing which we con- 
 stantly make of the adequacy of our notions we find that 
 not only must elements be dropped from our first tentative 
 concepts, but tliat others must be added. New discoveries 
 constantly increase the intension of familiar concepts. 
 Research in natural science reveals an unexpected property 
 in a substance, or mark in a specimen, w^hich is thereafter 
 a part of the concept. This continual addition to the in- 
 tension of the concept is synthesis. 
 
 We thus find two kinds of change constantly going on 
 in our concepts, both of which tend to define and purify 
 them into complete harmony with truth. But further, the 
 
 ^ Ifiquiiies into Ilumaii Faculty, cluipter on "Composite Por- 
 traiture," 
 
GENERALIZA TIOX. 209 
 
 same process, especially its synthetic aspect, tends to a 
 modification of the concept in its extension. 
 
 II. Generalization. Genei-alization is the process of 
 making more general the application of the class name to 
 individuals ; that is, the bringing of more individuals within 
 the class. Abstraction both hinders and aids this process : 
 it hinders it, inasmuch as by removing the vagueness 
 and superficiality of the concept it rules out objects at 
 first included, also because tlie synthesis of new qualities 
 increases the demand we make of new objects ; and it aids 
 it, since, in reducing the number of qualities included, it 
 enables more objects to meet the intensive requirement, and 
 since the discovery of a new quality tends to bring into 
 the class objects before overlooked which possess that 
 quality. 
 
 The process of generalization is exceedingly diflScult and 
 in actual life seldom absolutely exact. Only in cases of 
 complete induction can we rest safely in it. Mistakes and 
 fallacies in reasoning, failures in nature- discovery, are 
 usually found to rest in hasty or superficial generalization. 
 And further, we may remark at this point the very great 
 instability and mobility of our concepts. Since they are a 
 development in the mind depending upon experience, and 
 experience is unlimited, our concepts are always subject to 
 correction and revision. A concept which seems clear and 
 exact is given a different place and estimation in our 
 thought, often from an hour's conversation with another ; 
 we say we "see it in a new light." 
 
 Products of Conception. From conception, therefore, 
 we obtain two classes of ideas : the abstract notion, 
 which brings before us qualities regarded as more or less 
 distinct from the things in which they inhere ; and tlie 
 general notion, which brings before us things in more 
 or less disregard of the qualities which inhere in them. 
 The former is a concept in intension, the latter in exten- 
 sion. To these, as ready classes, the ordinary percep- 
 
210 THOUGHT. 
 
 tions of our adult life are referred by the most rapid 
 and careless reference. 
 
 Language in its Kelation to Conception. Words 
 answer the purpose in conception that images do in percep- 
 tion. They hold in a picture or symbol the result of 
 the apperceptive process. The reproduced image passes 
 through all the phases of memory and imaginative 
 construction without repeated reference to the real 
 objects ; so words carry through all the higher operations 
 of thought the summary of experience which the concept 
 represents. And, further,^by means of vocal articulation 
 they make its communication to others possible. Conse- 
 quently language has a twofold psychological utility : 1. 
 It fixates and expresses exact stages in mental product, 
 thus enabling the mind, instead of returning constantly to 
 its experiential sources, to take its departure from some 
 advanced position. 2. It thus greatly abbreviates and 
 facilitates thought. A name, once given to a conception, 
 holds it as a conquest, however circuitous and painful were 
 the original route to its acquisition. 
 
 Yet language often serves to confuse and hinder thouglit, 
 in that words tend to give a stability and fixedness to con- 
 ceptions, and do not admit of the progress and rectification 
 which the process of abstraction affords. A study of word 
 derivations shows the manner in which conceptions grow 
 away from the first meanings of the terms used. 
 
 The Use of Images in Conception. The image which 
 serves to give representative force to the concept has 
 already been spoken of. Further, it may be said that the 
 notions which are less general have an indistinct mental 
 picture, which presents the barest outline or scheme of the 
 class reality. This image is seen, if closely examined, to 
 result from a succession of images of particular objects 
 arising in quick succession, and then discarded as having 
 too great intension. There is a distinct feeling of tlie inad- 
 equacy of each image in turn, and this feeling persists iu 
 
JUDGMENT. 211 
 
 the final representation. As Lotze says, '* We feel that 
 any other color has an equal riglit to serve," as that which 
 we picture for the general concept of color. This vague 
 outline takes its particular features from the individuals to 
 which we have given most attention or from the properties 
 which, from experience, we have come to consider essential. 
 The effect of attention, also, is to bring out strongly cer- 
 tain properties in the concept to the neglect of others. 
 
 In the case of the more abstract notions, however, it is 
 very doubtful whether we proceed by any actual picture ; 
 as in the concepts virtue and gratitude. Yet the image 
 of the printed word often takes the place of such a picture. 
 In rapid discourse, also, we seem to use the words for 
 what they themselves convey, without further imaging. 
 There is no reason that the mere auditory image of a word 
 should not answer the purposes of the concept as well as a 
 visual image.^ 
 
 § 3. Judgment. 
 
 Its Nature. The second great stage in the thought 
 function is judgment. In the judgment the discovery and 
 assertion of relations between mental states and, through 
 them, between the things they represent, becomes the im- 
 portant event in consciousness. It proceeds upon the basis 
 of conception, for its elements are concepts in different 
 stages of growth. In its broadest definition, therefore. 
 Judgment is the mental assertion of the degree and kind of 
 relationship already arrived at in some stage of the process 
 of concejMon. 
 
 Tliis will be illustrated in some detail in the treatment 
 of the kinds of judgment ; "^ it suffices here to give a general 
 example. John is a man is a judgment. It asserts that 
 the general concept man has reached that stage of devel- 
 
 ^ On the relation of conception to reality, i. e. , the controversy 
 between Realism, Nominalism, etc., see my Handbook of Psychology^ 
 vol. i. chap. xiv. § 2. 
 * § 4, below. 
 
212 THOUGHT. 
 
 opment in extension or generalization tbat it includes the 
 single concept John ; or, to express the same relation con- 
 versely, this judgment asserts that the single concept John 
 has reached such a stage of development in intension that 
 its essential attributes include those of the general concept 
 man. That is, by a psychological assertion it is indicated 
 that the qualities of the concept man liave become attached 
 to the concept John. The expression of identity between 
 the two, found in the verb is, therefore, is merely the sign 
 of this mental movement. Indicating by a the sum of the 
 intensive marks already gathered up in the logical subject 
 (John), and by h the marks now added by the assertion in 
 judgment, the pyschological formula of judgment becomes, 
 
 a is (=) ab. 
 
 Law of Identity. The sign (=), in this formula, is 
 used as equivalent to the word is, since, in tlie judgment, 
 the fact that I use former experience as identical with (or 
 as representative of) new experience, is still acted upon: 
 indeed, it becomes a conscious principle of reasoning, in the 
 form of the Law of Identity or Kon-contradiction. The 
 formula exhibits the constant endeavor of the mind to 
 keep its experiences consistent. In the first member of 
 this equation of identity, a means the reality denoted by 
 the concept, in the second member a denotes my former 
 concept of this reality ; h denotes the addition Avhich I now 
 find this former concept must undergo to be true to, or 
 identical with, the new experience of a. Of course the 
 act of judging takes place only after this new experience, 
 so that what I really do by judgment is to bring my former 
 inadequate concept up to my new light. Expressed in 
 language, a judgment is called a Proposition. 
 
 Unity of the Judgment. We are led by the above to 
 see that the content of judgment is not two concepts at all, 
 but one, a concept /w// of relations. This is readily shown 
 by throwing the judgment into the form of the modified 
 
PARTS OF TEE PROPOSITION. 2l3 
 
 concept ab, above. For example, the judgment, the dog is 
 force, considered psj'cliologically, amounts to the adding 
 of the quality fierce, b, to the marks of dog, a, and the 
 product, rrb, is the single concept, fierce dog. Under tliis 
 aspect it corresponds to the real object, which is only 
 one. As far as this point is concerned, the judgment is 
 not distinguished either from the presentation or the concept: 
 they are all different stages in the progressive growth of 
 apperception. This unity of the judgment, as a mental 
 product, is further seen in simple judgments of existence, 
 i. e., giants exist ; where the predicate is not an attribute 
 or mark, but simply expresses the fundamental assumption 
 of all judgment, belief in reality. 
 
 The essential feature of judgment, in contrast with con- 
 ception, is therefore this, that it sets forth in a conscious 
 contemplative way the actual stage of the thought move- 
 ment. It brings out and emphasizes the belief which at- 
 taches to the concept in its progressive stages. In the 
 generalizing of the concept this belief was present, as each 
 new percept was brought within its range ; and in the 
 judgment each such belief becomes explicit, John is a 
 man, James is a man, etc. Asserted belief is, therefore, 
 necessary to judgment, and constitutes its distinguishing 
 mark.- 
 
 Parts of the Proposition. The verbal judgment, or 
 proposition, may be said to be made up of three parts or 
 terms : the subject, that concept of which the relation in 
 question is asserted ; the predicate, those elements of con- 
 ception which are asserted to bear this relation to the 
 subject ; and the copula, the verbal sign of the relation 
 between subject and predicate. In the judgment. Napoleon 
 
 'See the discussion of "Belief" below, and the corresponding 
 fuller treatment in Handbook of Psyclwlogy, vol. ii. chap. vii. On the 
 relation of judgment to belief the student may also consult my 
 article "Feehug, Belief, and Judgment," in Mind, New Series, 
 vol. i. (1892), p.'403. 
 
214 THOUGHT. 
 
 conquered Europe, these three parts are seen in the usual 
 order, subject, copula, predicate. 
 
 § 4. Kinds of Judgment. 
 
 I. According to Intension. Judgments may be con- 
 sidered with reference to their structure as being of two 
 kinds : Analytic and Synthetic. Psychologically, these 
 aspects of the judgment indicate different stages in the 
 further development of the concept. The analytic judg- 
 ment consists in an expansion of the subject in an assertion 
 whose predicate has been before included in the intensive 
 marks of the subject. For example, trees have trunks is 
 an analytic judgment, since the marks represented by the 
 word trunk are a necessary part of the concept tree, and its 
 assertion is merely an expansion of that concept. This 
 form of judgment, therefore, represents the development 
 of the concept in the stage of abstraction called above 
 analysis. The vague first-notion tends toward definition 
 and differentiation, by the dropping of accidental marks, 
 and the confirmation and assertion of those found to be 
 essential. The synthetic judgment, on the other hand, is 
 the product of the building up or synthetic process of 
 abstraction. It asserts predicates before undiscovered, or 
 unincluded in the notion as before made up. For example, 
 cows are ruminating animals is a synthetic judgment. 
 The quality of rumination is added to the notion cow, as a 
 mark. And synthetic judgments are constantly passing 
 into analytic. To the naturalist, the ruminating quality is 
 essential to the notion cow, and the judgment which 
 asserts it is analytic. 
 
 This distinction may be viewed also from the side of 
 extension. The continuous growth of concepts, through 
 the formation of successive synthetic judgments, is seen in 
 the process of education. The pupil's conception of the 
 thing in hand is enriched by all the predicates of his 
 instructor's knowledge. 
 
CATEGOmCAL JTTDGMENTS. ^15 
 
 II. According to Belief: 1. Categorical Judgments. 
 The simplest form of mental assertion, in wliicli an affirma- 
 tion or negation is made, is the categorical judgment. 
 
 a. Simple Categorical : the ordinary synthetic and an- 
 alytic judgments already spoken of. 
 
 h. The Existential Judgmetit rests upon a deeper mental 
 movement than either analysis or synthesis, and represents 
 the assertion, in a special way, of the belief which charac- 
 terizes judgment. It goes beyond belief in the consistency 
 and adequacy of concepts and their relations, and attaches 
 itself to belief in the external reality, in nature, of what 
 the concept represents. The moon exists is an existential 
 judgment.^ 
 
 Law of SuflB-cient Reason. The existential judgment 
 brings out not only the natural tendency to believe in the 
 facts of mind ; it supposes some question aroused, and its 
 refutation, through what we call evidence. There is no 
 psychological meaning in the judgment mermaids exists — 
 unless I have, or have had, some reason to doubt their ex- 
 istence. The judgment rests therefore upon the removal 
 of this doubt by evidence. Here w^e are brouglit face to 
 face with the conscious working of a great law of thought, 
 regulating and making consistent the content of represen- 
 tation, i. 6., the law of Sufficient Reason. In the judgment 
 of existence, the ground or reason which consciousness has 
 for accepting, rejecting, etc., for the first time becomes 
 evident to itself ; and we find that we cannot explain 
 further the fact that consciousness must work under such 
 a principle. 
 
 c. The Disjunctive Judgment is a form of categorical 
 statement, in which a disjunction, or assertion of alter- 
 natives, expresses the attitude of the mind with respect to 
 belief, toward a certain class of facts. Tliat is, the ground 
 
 ' On the nature of the existential judgment see the article already 
 referred to on "Feeling, Belief, and Judgment," in Mind, New 
 Series, vol. i. (1892), p. 403. 
 
^16 TBOVGHT. 
 
 of the statement is of such a nature, that more than a single 
 relation among the elements involved may be possible. 
 The assertion, therefore, has reference to all these possible 
 cases. For example, this inian is either a minister or a 
 lawyer is a disjunctive judgment, the reason of its assertion 
 being adequate to either conclusion, say the dress, manner, 
 conversation, of the person involved. Further search, or 
 clearer definition of the ground of the assertion, eliminates 
 all but one of these alternatives, and the judgment takes 
 the regular categorical form. 
 
 2, Hypothetical Judgments. The hypothetical judg- 
 ment stands, with reference to belief, midway between the 
 ordinary assertion of the analytic and synthetic judgments, 
 and that of the existential. The former express only belief 
 in the truth of the relations brought out in analj^is or 
 synthesis ; the existential judgment expresses only belief in 
 a reality of the object denoted : but the hypothetical judg- 
 ment has reference to both these phases of belief. In the 
 hj^pothetical, the ground or sufficient reason is cited, as tlie 
 mental condition upon which belief in the statement made 
 goes out. For example. If the 711 orals of the people are 
 corrupt^ the Republic will not live, is a hypothetical judg- 
 ment. The belief in the proposition (synthetic) the lie- 
 puhlic will not live, rests upon the belief (existential) in 
 the proposition the morals of the people are corrupt. The 
 failure of this belief in the sufficient reason, or ayitecedent, 
 removes the ground of belief in the result, or consequent, 
 and the mind is left in a state of uncertainty. The attitude 
 of the mind in this judgment may therefore be called one 
 of contingent belief.^ 
 
 § 5. Reasoning. 
 
 We now have to consider the combinations which are 
 effected among judgments in the processes of argument 
 
 ' On the " Relation of these different kinds of Judgment to one an- 
 other," see that head in Handbook of Psychology, vol. i. chap. xiv. § 5. 
 
THE SYLLOGISM. 217 
 
 and Inference. Reasoning takes two forms called Deduc- 
 tion and Induction. 
 
 I. Deduction: the Syllogism. Psychologically, the 
 syllogism may be defined as : The assertion of a relation 
 beticeeyi two concepts in consequence of the previous assertion 
 of the same relation between each of these two concepts and 
 a third. 
 
 TI]e parts of the syllogism tlins brought out are desig- 
 nated as follows : the tw^o relations first asserted are called 
 premises, major and minor ; the two concepts between 
 whicli the resulting relation is asserted, terms, major and 
 minor ; and the concept to which they sustain respectively 
 tlie relations of the premises, the middle term ; tlie 
 resulting judgment is further called the conclusion. For 
 example : 
 
 Major premise — All men are liable to error. 
 Minor premise — The president is a man. 
 Conclusion — The president is liable to error. 
 Major term — Quality of being liable to error. 
 Minor term — The president. 
 Middle term — Man. 
 
 From this definition, it appears that the unit of syllo- 
 gistic construction is the judgment. It is by the judg- 
 ment, as a psychological movement, that both the major 
 and minor terms are related to tlie middle term in the 
 premises, a!id it is by the judgment that their relation to 
 each other is made clear in the conclusion. 
 
 The fact that the product of the reasoning process is the 
 judgment, shows further that the mental act is the same 
 as in conception ; that is, that there is not a further 
 mental synthesis, in kind. The function of reasoning is 
 the multiplication and transformation of judgments, not 
 the derivation of new mental forms, nor the building up 
 of new products. Reasoning is, therefore, a process of 
 enrichment of our mental stores, through the going out of 
 
218 THOTTGET. 
 
 belief, over a wider range of fact, and into deeper penetra- 
 tion of its meaning. The implications of former beliefs, 
 which were vague or dimly apprehended, are unfolded, 
 conceptions remote and disconnected are brought into the 
 general harmony of truth, in relations, perhaps, befoi'e 
 unremarked. 
 
 Conceptual Interpretation of the Syllogism. We 
 may further define the syllogism in such a way as to show 
 the growth of the concept in it, remembering what has 
 been said as to the unity of the judgment : Syllogism is 
 the result of a synthesis whereby we reach a new stage in 
 the growth of a concept, in consequence of its tioofold 
 modification in the judgment. 
 
 As the former definition looks at the syllogism from the 
 side of its expression, this looks at it from the side of its 
 meaning. Its apparent strangeness vanishes as soon as we 
 refer the syllogism to the doctrine of conception as already 
 stated. 
 
 We have seen that the product of judgment is only the 
 concept, of which predication is made, modified by the 
 addition of new marks : a becomes ab. Thus arises the 
 major premise. In the minor premise the concept ab, or 
 middle term, is further modified by the addition of c, 
 minor term ; that is, ab becomes abc. The conclusion is 
 then simply the statement of the result, that a has be- 
 come abc: 
 
 a is (==) ab ; 
 
 (1) ab is (=) abc ; 
 hence a is (=) abc. 
 
 John is (John) man ; 
 
 (2) (John) man is (John man) mortal ; 
 hence John is (John man) mortal. 
 
 This simply means that the reality John requires that I 
 add to my notion John, the marks of man, and the marks 
 of man further carry with them the mark mortality. So 
 
iNDtJCTiON. 219 
 
 tliat my concept John must hereafter carry with it the 
 marks of man including the mark mortality. The process 
 exhibits again the striving of the mind to preserve the 
 identity of its conceptions through new experience. 
 
 § 6. Inductiox. 
 
 II. Induction. The second kind of reasoning, induction, 
 proceeds by a direct appeal to experience rather tlian by a 
 comparison of concept with concept. It reaches a state- 
 ment or " conclusion " of what new experience is likely to 
 be from what it has been. It represents, accordingly, the 
 tendency of consciousness to go a little ahead of the facts 
 already discovered to the construction of a statement or 
 hypothesis to explain them. The uses of induction have 
 already been discussed in the chapter above on "Method 
 in Psychology."* 
 
 Relation of Induction and Deduction. The two proc- 
 esses of induction and deduction do not exclude or in- 
 validate each other, but are the united engine of discovery 
 and proof. The first way of knowledge is by experience, 
 which is taken up in conception, and cast into the form of 
 hypothesis or empirical law, by induction. These first 
 stages in the growth of thought give us a point of elevation 
 for again exploring the varieties of experience, and bringing 
 new classes of fact under our conquest by deduction. Thus 
 there is a constant action and reaction between the two 
 processes of reasoning : one leading us from the particular 
 to the general, the other from the general back to the par- 
 ticular. And for each such excursion, we are richer in our 
 mental store. 
 
 § 7. Proof. 
 
 Proof is the inverse process of inference. In the syl- 
 logism and in induction, we are given premises, tlie sufficient 
 reason, to find the conclusion, the result : in proof, on the 
 
 ^ Chap. ii. 
 
220 THOUGHT. 
 
 contrary, we are given a conclusion, or tJieMs, to find its 
 sufficient reason, or ground. For example, given the thesis 
 the presideyit is liable to error, it is proved by finding the 
 sufficient reason, all men are liable to error and the 2:>resident 
 is a man. The essential nature of proof, therefore, consists 
 in establishing belief, or giving reality to a thesis. 
 
 The adequacy of the ground thus reached is tested by 
 throwing it into the regular forms of reasoning : either 
 deductively, as in a syllogism, concluding to the thesis ; or 
 inductively, by raising the thesis to tlie rank of a hypo- 
 thesis by the citation of particular cases in whicli it seems 
 to be true. Thus the tliesis, poets are liable to error, may 
 be proved by this deduction : 
 
 All men are liable to error ; 
 poets are men ; 
 
 \\QX\Qe poets are liable to error ; 
 or inductively, 
 
 Tennyson, Wordsworth, etc., are liable to error ; 
 but Tennyson, Wordsworth, etc., are poets ; 
 hence 2?oets are liable to error y 
 the major premise being a hypothesis tested in experience. 
 
 Deductive proof alone gives complete certaint}^, since 
 the ground is some rational or thoroughly established prin- 
 ciple. Its province is the proof of singulars, or of sub- 
 ordinate laws. Inductive proof, on the other hand, never 
 reaches absolute conclusiveness, except in exhaustive induc- 
 tions, and is of use in establishing general and higher laws. 
 It covers proof by analogy, testimony, circumstantial proof, 
 and other forms.* 
 
 § 8. Ideal Product of Thought: The Rational Function. 
 
 As a process of synthesis, thought brings into clearer 
 light and greater definiteness the ideal products of per- 
 
 ' On proof in general, see Sidgwick's excellent chapter in his 
 book on Fallacies. 
 
THE RATIONAL FUNCTION. 221 
 
 ception and representation : laiity, contradiction, identity, 
 etc. We come through thought, also, to the apprehension 
 and statement of the principles of Reason which underlie 
 and regulate all mental movement. The fundamental 
 forms of Reason, as far as they belong to intellect, have 
 already been noted in the foregoing discussion. These are 
 the laws of Identity and Sufficient Reason. Other rational 
 principles become apparent in connection with Feeling and 
 Will. Their more particular treatment belongs to " Theory 
 of Knowledge," a department of Metaphysics. For fuller 
 psychological treatment see Handbook of Psychology, vol. 
 i. chapc XV. 
 
PAET III. 
 FEELING, 
 
 CHAPTER XVI. 
 NATURE AND DIVISIONS OF SENSIBILITY.^ 
 
 § 1. Nature of Sensibility. 
 
 Definition. The term sensibility has been used hereto- 
 fore as almost synonymous with consciousness ; at least 
 the assumption has been made that when consciousness is 
 once reached, sensibility or feeling is its primary and most 
 general characteristic. 
 
 Empirical observation justifies this assumption. Our 
 final interpretation of all mental facts in common life is in 
 terms of personal feeling. How do I know that I am 
 willing a given act of conduct? Because \feel the act of 
 will. My immediate ground of confidence is a qualitative 
 state of being affected, which I have learned to distinguish 
 in my experience under the name will. How again do I 
 reach the assurance that I am thinking and not willing ? 
 By a similar awareness of feeling. I am affected in the 
 way which I call thought. The original awareness of con- 
 sciousness, therefore, is an affective state, and sensibility, 
 feeling, is its first content. 
 
 If this be true, we would expect to find feeling every- 
 where in the mental life. It would be a more or less 
 prominent accompaniment of all i^ossible states of con- 
 sciousness. This view, though generally admitted by 
 psychologists, is only partiall}^ accounted for on many of 
 ' Cf . Uarulbook of Psychology, vol. ii. chap, iii. 
 
M0S2' GENERAL MARKS OF SENSIBILITY. 223 
 
 the theories of sensibility ; it will become clearer after the 
 examination and description of the various classes of feelings. 
 
 Looked at from the fact of its universal presence, from 
 its priority among conscious states, and from its peculiar 
 subjectivity in opposition to the objective reference of 
 intellect and will, we may arrive at a general definition of 
 feeling : feeling is the subjective side of any modification 
 whatever of consciousness. As a general description we 
 may say, further, that feeling is the agitation, excitement, 
 of an event in consciousness, considered apart from what 
 the event itself is or means. 
 
 The fact of feeling is so clear in our common experience 
 that no more exact definition would be needed if it were 
 possible. What we mean by my consciousness in opposi- 
 tion to your consciousness sums up feeling. You can 
 know the object that I know and you can will the action 
 that I will, but you cannot by any possibility feel the 
 events that I feel ; if I endeavor to describe my feeling to 
 you, by so doing I make it the object of knowledge, and 
 my state of feeling is changed. This is subjectivity, this 
 peculiar and unapproachable isolation of the events of one 
 consciousness from another. 
 
 Most General Marks of Sensibility. A distinction 
 has already been drawn between common or general sen- 
 sibility, and the more particular kinds of affective modifi- 
 cation which we call sensations. The latter belon<?, 
 speaking generally, to the more differentiated portions of 
 the nervous system provided with special end-organs. 
 
 In common feeling , therefore, are included all modifica- 
 tions of sensibility which do not come under any of the 
 classes of special sensation. Stated thus negatively, the 
 way is open for the differentiation of this great fund of 
 sensibility into as many particular divisions as psycho- 
 logical analysis may be able to discover. 
 
 When such analysis has been pushed to its extreme and 
 qu:ilitative differences in sensibility have been pointed out 
 
224 NATURE AND DIVISIONS OF SENSIBILITY. 
 
 as far as may be, the point of interest then remaining has 
 reference to the most general marks of sensibility itself, 
 the common elements beneath all its concrete forms. What 
 is it that brings the special as well as the organic sensa- 
 tions, tlie vaguest feelings of physical unrest as well as the 
 acutest pang of an exposed nerve, all under the common 
 name feeling ? Such common marks we find, first, in the 
 fact of excitement or amount of consciousness ; and, fur- 
 ther, in the peculiar something wliicli we call pleasure 
 and pain — a second element which always accompanies 
 and colors mental excitement. 
 
 Pleasure and pain may be set apart, at least for con- 
 venience of exposition, from the particular mental plie- 
 nomena which they accompany. If pleasure and pain be 
 truly designated as a most general characteristic of sen- 
 sibility, then no mental state whatever is entirely neutral 
 as respects pleasure or pain. Yet in the great complexity 
 of the developed mental life, where cross-currents of feel- 
 ing interfere with one another and neutralize the effects of 
 one another, it is quite possible that pleasure and pain may 
 not enter as an outstanding feature of consciousness; indeed 
 such a neutrality as regards pleasure and pain may be 
 attained in states of high ( motional excitement, that while 
 feeling is at its maximum it seems to be without positive 
 hedonic coloring. 
 
 As concrete facts, however, pleasure and pain are always 
 elements added to some conscious content. It is in this 
 aspect that they are described as (hedonic) tone^ the states 
 of which they are the tone being more or less exactly dis- 
 coverable. 
 
 Farther, states of sensibility are complex and simple. All 
 events in consciousness which have distinct qualitative 
 value (sound, smell, fear) in addition to the general marks 
 of sensibility are "complex" states of feeling ; those which 
 are simply consciousness with pleasure or pain (if there are 
 any such) are " simple." 
 
DIVISIONS OF SEXSIBILITT. 225 
 
 § 2. Divisions of Sensibility. 
 
 In view of the foregoing, states of sensibility may be 
 thrown into the following table : 
 
 Sensibility : 
 
 I. Lower, or Sensuous Sensibility. 
 
 a. Complex : sensuous feelings. 
 
 1. Common sensuous feelings ) g^nsations. 
 
 2. Special sensuous feelings ) 
 h. Simple : sensuous tone. 
 
 II. Higher, or Ideal Sensibility. 
 a. Complex : ideal feelings. 
 
 1. Common ideal feelings ) e^^tions. 
 
 2. Special ideal feelings ) 
 h. Simple : ideal tone. 
 
 We have already discussed the quantity, or intensity, 
 and the quality of sensations : it remains to notice pleasure 
 and pain. Thus the entire "affective element" in sensa- 
 tion is exhausted. The " presentative element " has already 
 been found to be due to the apperceptive function. 
 
CHAPTER XYIL 
 
 PLEASURE AND PAIN.* 
 § 1. Physical Conditioxs of Pleasure and Pain. 
 
 General Conditions of Pain. Before an attempt is 
 made to report the more general organic conditions of 
 liedonic tone, the empirical cases of the rise of such pleas- 
 ure or pain should be enumerated. After that, perhaps, 
 some general characteristics of all such cases may become 
 apparent and serve to throw light upon the wider question. 
 Phenomena of sensuous pain, which may be considered 
 Urst, are clearly marked. 
 
 1. Too much stimulation is a cause of 2'><^in. This is 
 true, in the first place, of higli inUnsities in stimulation. 
 The actual experience of such painful intensities in the 
 cases of special sensation leads us to look for it in all forms 
 of sensibility. A blinding light is painful ; a loud noise 
 very close to the ear, rapid friction of the skin, great pres- 
 sure upon the muscles, etc., all give rise to painful feeling. 
 It is true also that very strong tastes and decided odors 
 are disagreeable or soon become so ; but the case of these 
 sensations seems to differ in some respect from that of the 
 senses which report acute pain, properly so called. Sensa- 
 tions of temperature, again, either heat or cold, give us 
 positive pain w^hen the degree of either stimulus is very 
 intense. It is possible that the apparent difference between 
 taste and smell and the other sensations, in this respect, 
 may be due to the fact that in them the end organ seems to 
 have a chemical function, while the other end organs are 
 largely mechanical. But it is enough here to point out the 
 
 ^ Cf . Handbook of Psychology, vol. ii. chaps, v. xi 
 
GENERAL CONDITIONS OF PAIN. 227 
 
 fact tliat some tastes and odors are always disagreeable, 
 however slight the stimulation be, and that otliers seem to 
 be always pleasurable, however intense the stimulation. 
 Bitter tastes, for example, are always normally disagree- 
 able, and sweet tastes normally agreeable. 
 
 The fact of too much stimulation may also take the form 
 of too long an application of it in duration. The organism 
 becomes exhausted and pain results. And a third case is 
 that in which the stimulation is too extended in its effects. 
 For example, a number of pin points drawn over the skin 
 give pain w^hen one of them would not. The eye can 
 accommodate a small point of light of a degree of bright- 
 ness which would be painful from a large surface. 
 
 2. Inflammation. The same painful effects follow ordi- 
 nary degrees of stimulation when an organ is in an in- 
 flamed condition. Irritation is painful when the skin, for 
 example, is stretched or distended. In diseased condition 
 of the eye the slightest degree of light may be painful. 
 
 The same is true also of the nerves themselves. Inflam- 
 mation may extend to the nervous tissue ; it is then sensi- 
 tive to slight degrees of stimulation, and the reaction is 
 painful. This painful tone is present often under intensi- 
 ties of stimulation to which the nerve is not ordinarily sen- 
 sitive. The general fact of this paragraph is expressed by 
 saying that a condition of hyperaesthesia extends also to 
 the p.iinful element in sensibility. It may also be added 
 that the opposite is not always true, but may be : namely, 
 that sensuous anaesthesia extends to the painful element in 
 sensibility. In other words, tactile or muscular anaesthesia 
 is not always accompanied by analgesia. 
 
 3. Summation of Stimuli. A painful reaction may be 
 brought about by the summation of stimuli themselves not 
 painful. Several electric sparks in succession are painful, 
 where one is not. This is probably only a further appli- 
 cation of the fact that high intensities are painful. It is 
 given a separate place, however, since here the high i\u 
 
228 PLEASURE AND PAIK 
 
 tensity does not become so until it reaches the center, while 
 in cases of intense stimulation the intensity is such at the 
 point of application on the periphery. 
 
 4. Ajypetites or Imjndses when denied give rise to pains 
 of want. Such pains are usually periodical, and indicate a 
 lack injurious to the organism. 
 
 Less General Conditions. Besides the above, several 
 more special conditions bring about a painful reaction in 
 some one or more of the various divisions of feelinor-. Ex- 
 
 o 
 
 posure to air is a cause of pain to tissue normally protected 
 by the skin ; disuse, or too slight stimulation, occasions pain 
 in the more complex of tlie special senses, as sight ; lack of 
 accommodation of the organ to its stimulus has sometimes 
 disagreeable tone, which is exaggerated when the stimu- 
 lation is intense. The tone of the organic feelings seems 
 to arise from any obstruction of the organic functions, 
 such as laceration, cramp, repletion, etc. Intermittency of 
 stimulation is also a frequent cause of pain, probably from 
 the failure of the organ to accommodate to the broken 
 stimulus. 
 
 Empirical Pacts concerning Pain. There are, in addi- 
 tion, certain facts brought out by physiologists w^hich 
 throw light upon pleasure and pain. First may be men- 
 tioned the interniittence of pain : the greater or less 
 intensity of painful feelings at successive moments, the 
 stimulus remaining constant. It is plainl}^ seen in electrical 
 stimulation — a clear rhythm, or rise and fall, of the painful 
 tone. A headache usually proceeds by throbs, a toothache 
 by jumps, and a felon on the finger changes its feeling 
 from a dull ache to a paroxysm of overpowering severity. 
 That it is due to nervous causes, and indicates the ebb and 
 flow of central processes, is claimed from such phenomena 
 In intermittent fever ; but in some cases it evidently de- 
 pends upon the rliythra of the vascular system, the dis- 
 tention and reaction of the blood vessels. 
 
 Another kind of intermittence is brought about b^ the 
 
k 
 
 EMPmiCAL FACTS COXGERXIXG PAIX. 220 
 
 coming and going of the attention. The effect of tlie at- 
 tention in increasing the intensity of affective states is 
 familiar ; hence we would expect that the concentration 
 and withdrawal of the attention w'ould have a marked in- 
 fluence upon the rise and fall of pain. Further, w^e know 
 that the attention, even when concentrated as steadily as 
 possible, is rhythmical ; so here appears a further possible 
 explanation of the intermittence spoken of. 
 
 Another interesting fact of painful feeling is what is 
 called its irradiation or diffusion. The locality of a painful 
 stimulus is less circumscribed as the stimulation becomes 
 intense. Besides the intensity, or quantity, this feeling 
 becomes massive or spread out. It is probably due to a 
 reial spreading of the cause of the painful feeling over a 
 greater area, both on the periphery and in the central seat. 
 
 Again, we may note a delay in the conscious awareness 
 of pain compared with the appearance of the sensation 
 with which it seems to be connected. Even w^hen the 
 stimulation is a very strong one, the sensation is clear in 
 consciousness before any pain is felt. A blow, for example, 
 is felt as contact or pressure a fraction of a second before 
 we begin to suffer from it ; a burn is particularly long in 
 reporting itself as pain. This delay may be measured by 
 comparing the reaction time of a painful stimulus — say the 
 decided prick of a pin — with that of a simple contact sensa- 
 tion at the same point on the skin. It is probably due to the 
 fact that the full force of the pain-stimulus is not reported 
 at once, but that the organ accommodates itself to it by a 
 series of partial transmissions. These transmissions are 
 summated at the center, and the result is a sufticiently 
 intense central stimulus to occasion a painful reaction. 
 
 Further, the duration, or lasting quality, of a painful 
 state of sensibilit}^ is remarkable. Pains do not pass away, 
 as painless sensations do, when the stimulation ceases. The 
 recovery of the organism is very slow. What is called an 
 after-image of some sensations seems here to be more truly 
 
230 PLEASURE AND PAIN. 
 
 an after-/ac^. It is probably due to the fact that the 
 intenser degree of stimulation necessary to pain gives more 
 decided and lasting character to the nervous change it 
 works than feeble stimuli do. This is supported b^^ the 
 observation that pains are more distinctly and easily reviv- 
 able than other affective experiences. A painful experi- 
 ence seems to hover constantly around us, and thrust its 
 unwelcome presence into our gayest hours. When we 
 remember that a revived image occupies the seat of the 
 original experience, we only have to assume a more lasting 
 effect to have resulted from a painful sensation, to account 
 for its more easy reproduction. 
 
 Finally, pain lowers the temperature of the painful region. 
 
 Conditions of Analgesia. Insensibility to pain under 
 conditions usually painful may be brought about by various 
 agencies. Cold of very great intensity has this effect, pain 
 becoming very acute and then subsiding altogether, as the 
 temperature is lowered. The withdrawal of blood from an 
 organ makes it insensible to pain. Lowered sensitiveness 
 to pain, however, is likely to be preceded by exalted 
 sensitiveness, as in the evident case of cold. Apparent 
 absence of pain is experienced when the intensity of a 
 painful stimulus is suddenly lowered, even though the 
 second intensit}^ would be painful under other circum- 
 stances. 
 
 Pain as Peeling and as Tone. The conditions of pain 
 now pointed out are conditions in the operation of the 
 various modes of sensibility, general or special ; that is, we 
 have been observing pain as tone. The important question 
 arises : Is pain always thus dependent on a definite form of 
 sensibility, or is it itself, as a form of sensibility, ever found 
 independent of its presence as tone ? There are some facts 
 which would indicate that pain has a functional independ- 
 ence, whatever we may say as to its anatomical ^ independ- 
 
 ' /. e., whether there are special nerve fibers which conduct pain, a 
 point on which experimental results are conflicting. 
 
PHYSICAL COXDITIOXS OF PLEASURE. 231 
 
 ence. For instance, pain may be destroyed without 
 impairing any of the other sensibilities, as in analgesia 
 brought on by chloroform ; and in general, under the 
 influence of anaesthetics, pain and memory disappear first 
 and together. On the other hand, other sensations may 
 be destroyed while the painful quality of their stimuli 
 remains. Thus, under pressure, sensations of touch, 
 temperature, and muscular movement may be destroyed 
 while pain remains. So, also, under loss of blood in a 
 member, sensations of touch disappear before pain, and 
 both before temperature, electric feelings, etc. In other 
 words, the various elements of common sensuous feeling 
 may be paralyzed separately. It does not follow, from 
 this, further, as we will see, that when the physical contri- 
 butions of pain are removed consciousness has been robbed 
 of its hedonic quality altogether. 
 
 Physical Conditions of Pleasure. It is not as easy to 
 point out the physical conditions of pleasure ; but in gen- 
 eral we find them opposed to those already indicated as 
 carrying painful tone. 
 
 1. Moderate Stimulation is pleasurable. This is readily 
 seen in the exercise of the special sense functions ; the eye 
 is pleased with mild colors, and the ear with pure tones. 
 Gentle touch, quiet muscular reaction, moderate tastes, are 
 usually agreeable. And it is true of moderate durations 
 and areas of stimulation, as well as of moderate intensities. 
 
 There are striking exceptions, however, to this rule. A 
 great many sensations are always painful ; when not giving 
 a painful reaction, the organs involved do not affect con- 
 sciousness at all. So the organic feelings. Certain tastes 
 and odors, also, are always disagreeable. Further, the 
 condition of neutrality seems very nearly reached in the 
 normal exercise of some of the sense functions, as, for ex- 
 ample, sight and hearing. 
 
 2. Pleasure arises from the Adjustment of an Organ to 
 its Stimulus. Muscular sensations are pleasurable within 
 
232 PLEASURE AND PAIK. 
 
 the range of easy effort. Stimuli of longer duration, winch 
 give time for the full adjustment of the organ, pass from 
 the painful to the pleasurable. Feelings for which we 
 are ready by anticipation are enjoyable. Yet this is also 
 subject to the qualification that perfect adjustment seems 
 in many cases (eye and ear) to have no feeling accompani- 
 ments whatever, either of pleasure or pain. 
 
 3. Activity is enjoyable. By this is meant function 
 within the limits set by the two conditions already men- 
 tioned. If activity is pleasurable, it is tlie moderate 
 activity of a well-adjusted organ. Yet there seem to be 
 more massive organic conditions of activity which are 
 pleasurable, even when such a general function involves 
 some particular pain. The football-player enjoys his sport, 
 even though he is never free from the pain of bruises 
 or scratches. In such cases, the vigor and energy of the 
 larger organs brought into play seem to overpower the 
 protests of the smaller, and silence their complaints. A 
 pain which would make one wretched if suffered in passive 
 silence is forgotten altogether in the pleasure of diligent 
 employment. This larger activity, however, which brings 
 pleasure, must itself conform to the conditions of modera- 
 tion and adjustment. 
 
 Moreover, these pleasures of activity, such as pleasures 
 of the chase, of sports, of general vigor, are more positive 
 apparently than an}^ other physical pleasures. The claim 
 already noticed, that in the absence of pain many states are 
 not really pleasurable, but merely neutral as regards tone, 
 does not seem to be well taken in this case. A condition 
 of fresh muscular vigor seems to intrude itself into con- 
 sciousness of its own force, and we become aware of pleasant 
 occupation with no evident reference to the corresponding 
 state of pain. Indeed, the opposite pleasures which result 
 from a cessation of muscular pain — the so-called pleasuies 
 of rest — are something quite distinct from these pleasures 
 of activity. 
 
CONCEPTION OF PLEASTTRE AND PAIN. SSa 
 
 Under this head, also, as including any function, and 
 not simply muscular activity, the pleasures arising from 
 the gratification of the organic appetites and instincts ap- 
 pear to fall. They are functions of periodical exercise, and 
 their normal working involves periodical stimulation. 
 They seem to involve pleasure over and above the prompt- 
 ing of painful appetite ; though this again is in dispute. 
 Yet it could hardly be said that all the pleasures of the 
 table are due to the cessation of the pangs of hunger. 
 
 Relativity of Sensuous Pleasure and Pain. The 
 fact referred to above, that many physical pleasures are 
 only relief from preceding states of pain, finds place with 
 other similar phenomena, under the law of relativity. 
 First, we may say that the existence of either state may 
 under certain circumstances arise from the cessation of the 
 other. Cases of seeming pleasure, which is explained as 
 absence of pain, have already been mentioned. Similarly, 
 tlie cessation of an active pleasure may give us temporary 
 pain and be the only cause of it. An element of higher 
 emotion, however, generally enters in this case. Again, 
 the intensity of pain or pleasure depends largely upon its 
 contrast with a preceding state. After an unusual trip to 
 the country, the painful toil of city life is all the harder to 
 bear ; so, after feasting the eyes upon a dish of luscious 
 fruit, the beggar's plate of herbs is all the more unpalatable. 
 So, also, the associations involved often convert pleasure 
 into pain, and the contrary. A little clever deceit will 
 make us enjoy a dish which before we found unpleasant. 
 
 § 2. Resulting Conception of Sensuous Pleasure 
 AND Pain. 
 
 From the foregoing brief description of the conditions 
 under which sensuous tone arises, we may put all such 
 feelings under two larger physical categories. A careful 
 examination of these conditions will show that all pleasures 
 and pains involve either a state of change in the organic 
 
234 PLEASURE AND PAIN 
 
 tissue, in the way of integration or disintegration^ or a 
 change in the relation of the organism to its environment, 
 in tlie way of adjustment or misadjustment. These two 
 aspects of the case may be considered separately. 
 
 Pleasure and Pain as resulting from Integration 
 and Disintegration. Considering pain from the side of 
 the organism, it is easy to see that all the pains of the bod}' 
 are due to disintegration of tissue, except those cases in 
 which any amount of stimulation seems to result in un- 
 pleasant tone, such as tastes always unpleasant. Tliat is, 
 very intense stimuli are known to injure, tear, wound the 
 organ stimulated ; stimuli summated to a painful degree 
 have the same effects. The cases of stimuli which are 
 always painful may be brought under the same category, if 
 we find it possible to review the response itself as a sign ot 
 such disintegration ; a position which the chemistry of 
 tastes and smells at least does not dispute. Bitter tastes, 
 for example, we may well consider as resulting from a 
 stimulus damaging to the taste apparatus ; so with strong 
 acids. 
 
 Yet we cannot say that all disintegration is painful, for 
 the moderate stimulation which usually gives pleasure is 
 also moderate disintegration. Any stimulation whatever 
 involves expenditure ; such expenditure means the libera- 
 tion of energy before stored up, and this using up of 
 energy is work done in the tissues. Hence w^e are obliged 
 to say that under some conditions, at least, disintegration 
 is pleasurable ; so the pleasure of exercise. 
 
 On the other hand, integration is sometimes pleasurable, 
 as in the case of pleasures of rest ; but integration is some- 
 times painful, as in the pains of inactivity and disuse. 
 What, then, shall we say ? 
 
 The state of the case seems to be about this : the life 
 process is a process both of integration and of disintegra- 
 tion ; the organism is built up, but is built up by previous 
 tearing down. Expenditure is the law of acquisition ; con- 
 
ADJUSTMENTS AND MISADJUSTMENTS. 235 
 
 sequently disintegration which ministers to health and 
 development is pleasurable, as integration also is. On the 
 otlier hand, disintegration may overstep the legitimate 
 expenditure of the life process, and become painful ; and 
 integration may also be painful, because too continuous to 
 permit the proper expenditure demanded for the life 
 process. 
 
 If, now, we consider pleasure and the absence of pain the 
 accompaniments of the normal life process, and pain the 
 accompaniment of any organic event which interferes with 
 tlie life process or checks it, we seem to have a consistent 
 conception ; it explains the facts, as far as integration and 
 disintegration are concerned. 
 
 Pleasure and Pain resulting from Adjustments and 
 Misadjustments. It has alread}^ been made evident that 
 integration as an organic process would not include all the 
 phenomena of pleasant or unpleasant tone. A variety of 
 cases point to the relative adjustment of the organism to 
 its stimulating environment as a principle of perhaps equal 
 importance. Wherever such misadjustment is so over- 
 powering as to affect the tissue of the organ in question, 
 the resulting pain comes clearly under the principle of dis- 
 integration ; but when such positive effects are not clearly 
 present, the fact of misadjustment is yet sufficient to cause 
 pain. Such is the disagreeable quality of musical discords, 
 glaring colors, unaccustomed muscular movements, etc. 
 
 Wlierever, therefore, there is conscious feeling at all 
 attaching to the adjustment of a sense organ, we may ^^y 
 that adjustment is pleasurable and misadjustment painful ; 
 a conclusion we would expect from our study of the 
 development of the nervous system. 
 
 General Conclusion on Sensuous Pleasure and Pain. 
 It now becomes evident that in tlie life process we have 
 the raison d^etre of pleasure and pain. But by life process 
 we must be careful to include life development as well as 
 simple life. The simple present life of an organism as con- 
 
236 PLEASURE AND PAIN. 
 
 stant function is more than covered by the facts as we have 
 observed them ; pleasure and pain have a prospective 
 future reference as well — reference to a fuller development 
 and potential growth. Accordingly, sensuous pleasure 
 may be defined as the conscious effect of that which makes 
 for the continuance of the bodily life or its advancement y' 
 and sensuous pain, the conscious effect of that which makes 
 for the decline of the bodily life or its limitation. 
 
 § 3. Primary Conditions op Ideal Tone. 
 
 1. So7ne degree of ideal change. As physical pain arises 
 from physical function, so higher pain comes with apper- 
 ception considered as ideal function. And in general, the 
 degree of ideal function, measured in terms of the emo- 
 tional excitement to which it gives rise, indicates also the 
 degree of pleasure or pain. Ideal change, the rearrange- 
 ment of elements in the apperceptive content of conscious- 
 ness, is accordingly the general condition of particular ideal 
 tone. 
 
 We may accordingly at once make use of the conception 
 of sensuous tone already arrived at, substituting for the 
 physical the apperceptive function, and for the adjustment 
 of end organs, that of attention ; and expect to find an ad- 
 equate conception of ideal pleasure and pain. Accordingly 
 we reach a second condition. 
 
 2. The degree and duration of attention : determining 
 ideal tone as pleasure or as pain. Excessive concentration 
 of the attention is painful ; yet the pain is directly merged 
 in the pain involved in the adjustment of the bodily organ. 
 Prolonged attention becomes painful by the law of fatigue. 
 On the other hand, moderate concentration and duration 
 of attention are pleasurable. 
 
 3. The degree of adjustment or misadjustment of the at- 
 tention. The conditions which involve distraction, or draw- 
 ing apart, or doing violence to the attention, are painful ; 
 those giving feelings of ease, flow, variety, measured con- 
 
SECONDARY CONDITIONS OF IDEAL TONE. 237 
 
 centration, etc., are pleasurable. It is probable that the 
 most pleasurable adjustment is that of finest and most exact 
 discrimination. Ward formulates tliis and the preceding 
 condition as follows : there is pleasure " in proportion as 
 the maximum of attention is effectively exercised." 
 
 § 4. Secondary Conditions of Ideal Tone. 
 
 The determinations already reached have evident appli- 
 cation to those states of feeling which arise around acts of 
 the attention regardless of the nature of the object to which 
 the attention is directed. Tiiere are other emotional states, 
 however, which are pronounced in their contribution to 
 the tone of consciousness. The great expressive emotions 
 (fear, love, anger), the sympathetic, the ethical, and 
 aesthetic are all at times controlling agents of pleasure or 
 pain. The question at once arises : Is it possible to bring 
 them under the formulas already enunciated ? This ques- 
 tion awaits an answer from the consideration of the con- 
 ditions under which objects come to be pleasure or pain 
 giving. 
 
 1. Objects of perception excite pleasure or pain only as 
 they have some present or future relation to our physical 
 well- or ill-being. Perception, as has been seen, is a sum- 
 ming up of sensations, in the form of synthesis. Kow an 
 object perceived gives us certain sensations only ; but 
 it suggests others which belong to the synthesis, and we 
 are thus able to anticipate them. The sight of falling rain 
 prophesies to me the unpleasantness of being wet ; the 
 sight of a lion, the pain of being eaten. The tone of per- 
 ception, therefore, as far as it refers to the object, is 
 intrinsically the prophecy of the tone of the sensations it 
 includes and suggests. 
 
 To illustrate : a child first sees a fire (yellow light sensa- 
 tion), grasps it (touch sensation), feels pain (sensuous tone, 
 due to damage to the life process). Again he sees the fire 
 (perception, carrying in it touch and pain memories) anci 
 
238 PLEASURE AND PAIN. 
 
 has fear, which is of painful tone. The point advanced is 
 that this latter tone, of fear, also has reference to the life 
 process. It is nature's way of utilizing simpler pain ex- 
 periences, just as perception is her way of utilizing sensa- 
 tional experiences. 
 
 2. Rejyresentations of objects excite pleasure and imin 
 only as the objects themselves excite them. This covers the 
 whole field of emotions which accompany reproduction — 
 memory, passive imagination, illusions, etc. The emotions 
 which such representations excite have qualitative coloring 
 (expectation, dread, etc.), but their tone is again due, as 
 the tone of perception is, to the anticipation of advantage 
 or damage from the pictured object. 
 
 3. The tone of the emotions which accompany conception 
 and thought has reference both (1) to physical and (2) to 
 intellectual well- or ill-being. 
 
 (1) The reference of conception and thought to physical 
 pleasure and pain is clear in some cases. My conception 
 of the work of dentists, for example, has a painful tone 
 which is as clearljr a warning of phj^sical damage as the 
 perception of my particular dentist is. So, also, the science 
 of dentistry, the logical framework of the art, considered 
 merely as a branch of instruction, cannot be rid of its 
 physical suggestiveness. The medical student grows faint 
 when he hears his first lecture on blood-letting. Con- 
 sequently, a positive part of the tone of higher aesthetic, 
 ethical, and logical emotion illustrates the law of physical 
 well-being. 
 
 In the case of aesthetic emotion, the element contributed 
 by association is largely of this sensational character. 
 Apart from the beauty of the purel}^ sensuous in music, its 
 associations are largely sensuous. A face often becomes 
 handsome from association at the table, the theater, on tlie 
 promenade, and the pleasure we take in it is a reverberation 
 of these associated pleasures of sense. 
 
 (2) So far, it is clear, we may carry a naturalistic view 
 
SECONDARY CONDITIONS OF IDEAL TONE. 239 
 
 of pleasure and pain, conceding that, whatever purpose 
 they may serve beside, all normal pleasures point to healthy, 
 and all normal pains to unhealthy, physical functions. 
 Does this exhaust the range of ideal tone ? Further consid- 
 eration convinces us that it does not. There are emotions 
 whose tone seems to violate the law of physical well-being. 
 
 We would expect, if consciousness is a s^^nthetic thing, 
 and if its synthesis becomes explicit in wliat \ve call 
 apperception or thought, that such a new thing in nature 
 would have its own principle of development. And we 
 would expect, further, that its development would be a 
 matter of conscious adaptation to its conditions of thinking 
 and willing. The most natural view of ideal pleasure and 
 pain, therefore, is to consider it an index of healthy or 
 unhealthy mental function. As physical pleasures, at first 
 ministering blindly to the welfare of the organism, grow 
 to attach to objects in relation to the organism ; so ideal 
 pleasures, while attaching still to attention as a function, 
 yet come to attach to its objects as well. On this view, 
 the tone of many emotions reflects the state of the mental 
 functions primarily. 
 
 This view is supported by abundant evidence. The 
 pleasures of intellectual pursuit lead their devotees to neg- 
 lect the body and even to continue this course in the face 
 of acute physical pain. Esthetic delight is so independent 
 of selfish motives that admiration is often called out by 
 what is destructive and terrifying. Ethical emotion, 
 wdth the happiness it always brings, may triumph over 
 physical impulse, when they come into conflict. Conse- 
 quently, we may hold that there is an element of hedonic 
 coloring arising with the changes >vhich occur in the con- 
 tent of consciousness. And we are led to define ideal 
 pleasure as the conscious effect of that which makes for the 
 conti)iua)ice of the apperceptive life or its advancement / 
 and ideal pain, the conscious effect of that lohich makes for 
 the decline of the apperceptive life or its limitation. 
 
240 PLEASURE AND PAIN. 
 
 § 5. Final Conclusion of Pleasuee and Pain. 
 
 Summing up all that has been said of pleasure and pain, 
 both sensuous and ideal, we may conclude that/;?easwre a7id 
 pain are the affective coloring, respectively, ichich conscious- 
 ?iess takes on in conditions of present or prospective well- or 
 ill-heing. 
 
 And we have found three classes of conditions upon 
 which pleasure and pain depend : first, physical conditions, 
 giving sensuous tone ; second, ideal conditions, giving rise 
 to the tone of states of attention ; third, a union of physi- 
 cal and ideal conditions, giving rise to the tone of the 
 higher emotions. 
 
 Complexity of Tone States. It is now clear that the 
 hedonic coloring of consciousness, at any time, is not a 
 simple thing. Pleasure or pain is reported from the 
 body and from the mind, from many organs of the body at 
 once, and from many mental " moments " at once. Hope 
 and fear may be struggling within, the will may be pain- 
 fully paralyzed, attention distracted, and with it all, a beat- 
 ing sun may annoy, an aching tooth distress, and all go to 
 make up a complex condition of tone. So mental and 
 physical conditions may combine to produce pleasure ; and 
 all possible combinations may, and do, arise in kaleidoscopic 
 order. 
 
 The elements, however, of this complex effect may be 
 generally distinguished in consciousness. They do not 
 coalesce except in their general tendency to produce emo- 
 tional excitement, which has its own tone. If the two 
 hands be held under two streams of water, very hot and 
 pleasantly cool, respectively, the two hedonic effects may 
 be clearly distinguished from each other. So the pain of 
 suspense arises from the excitement of alternating hope 
 and dread, and persists apart from the pleasure and pain of 
 those emotions themselves as they struggle in conscioua- 
 ness. 
 
CHAPTER XVIIL 
 
 NATURE AND DIVISIONS OF IDEAL FEELING. 
 
 Ideal vs. Sensuous Feeling. Is there an inner, or feel- 
 ing, side to the world of ideas ? Are we sensible of degrees 
 of feeling in the phases of the apperceptive process? The 
 simple answer of consciousness is, -yes ; and there is opened 
 before us the great class of feelings called ideal. Ideal 
 feelings, therefore, are the modificatlGns of sensibility which 
 accompany the exercise of the apperceptive function. 
 
 Ideal feeling is then, as Hodgson says, a new kind of 
 sensibility accompanying a new kind of nervous process. 
 Tiie apperceptive function has its organic basis in some kind 
 of a brain process which represents the combining of 
 special centers in the hemispheres and the dynamic union 
 of their energies. If the function performed by the at- 
 tention is new, so also are the modes of mental excitement 
 wliicli attacli to its different phases. 
 
 Ideal Feelings as Special and Common. The analogy 
 of sensuous feeling serves us to indicate another distinction. 
 Besides certain special feelings — sensations — which are 
 brought about by the exercise of particular organic func- 
 tions, we found a great fund of common sensibility — 
 organic feeling — which seemed to belong to the living 
 being as an organism. The motor feelings were found 
 everywhere — the muscles being the most general outlet 
 for the nervous process which brings feeling about. So 
 upon an examination of the " feelings of ideas," we are able 
 to make an analogous distinction. On the one side there 
 are the special kinds of mental excitement, which are de- 
 veloped in connection with particular synthetic processes : 
 memory yields regret, remorse, pride ; imagination throws 
 
 241 
 
242 NATURE AND DIVISIONS OF IDEAL FEELING. 
 
 us into expectation, hope, fear, love. Such states of 
 sensibility we may call emotions. They are the special 
 forms of ideal feeling just as sensations are special forms 
 of sensuous feeling. But they do not exhaust the subjec- 
 tive element of this stage of consciousness. There is an 
 undertone of feeling, a basis of sensibility, which is not 
 disturbed during the mutations of the emotional life — 
 feelings upon which all the emotions depend, feelings due 
 to the fact of mental sjmthesis itself ; such are the feeling 
 of reality, feeling of Interest, etc. These we may call 
 common ideal feelings. Further, all ideal sensibility would 
 be expected to have tone, as pleasurable or painful. It 
 will be profitable, accordingly, to turn attention to common 
 ideal feeing, and to special ideal feelings or emotions ; ideal 
 pleasure and pain having already been considered. 
 
COMMON IDEAL FEELIXG. 
 CHAPTER XIX. 
 
 INTEREST, REALITY, AND BELIEF.' 
 
 General Character of Common Ideal Feeling. The f ol- 
 
 lowing aspects of feeling coniiiioii to the intellectual proc- 
 esses may be profitably considered : interest, reality -feeling^ 
 belief. '' 
 
 § 1. Interest. 
 
 A general characterization of interest as a psychological 
 state is best reached when we ask why it is that we act 
 voluntarily in this way or that. The answer must invari- 
 ably be, because we are interested in this course of action 
 or that. As will appear later, the most important thing 
 about interest is its quality as stimulating the will. A 
 thing is interesting to me when, for any reason, it appeals 
 to my attention — when it is worth looking at — when it is 
 so related to me that I am led to investigate it ; and the 
 feeling of interest is this need of looking, investigating, 
 finding out about. A child is said to show no interest 
 when he is entirely satisfied with his toy and leaves it. 
 
 Physiological Basis of Interest and IndiflTerence. 
 On an earlier page, when gathering up our conception of 
 nervous function, we found reason to recognize two great 
 laws, i. e., the laws of habit and accommodation. And 
 
 ^ Cf. Wnidbook of Psycliology, vol. ii. chap. vii. 
 
 2 The feeling of cement or effort would naturally suggest itself also 
 liere as being one of the broadest aspects of intellectual feeling ; but 
 it comes up more properly under the detailed treatment of AYill 
 below. The feeling of seff also cannot be adequately treated here, 
 since it is so closely connected with the voluntary life ; yet as a 
 matter of classification it should not be omitted from commou ideal 
 feeling. 
 
244 INTEREST, REALITY, AND BELIEF. 
 
 occasion was taken to say of habit, that " psychologically 
 it means loss of oversight, diffusion of attention, subsiding 
 consciousness" ; and of accommodation, that "psychologi- 
 cally it means reviving consciousness, concentration of 
 attention, voluntary control — the mental state which has 
 its most general expression in what we know as interest.'''' 
 " In habit and interest we find the psychological poles cor- 
 responding to the lowest and the highest in the activities 
 of the nervous system." 
 
 Interest, then, is the most general awareness of the 
 process of our intellectual life, and as such represents the 
 highest and most unstable form of nervous integration. 
 Wherever there is the nervous basis of attention and will, 
 there is sufficient physical reason for the feeling of interest. 
 And wherever, by reason of fatigue or disease, attention 
 and will are not called out, the pliysical process is accom- 
 panied by the feeling of indifference ; that is, there is then 
 a reversion to a stratum of nervous structure and function 
 which is dominated more by habit. 
 
 Intellectual Conditions of Interest. The general 
 phvsiological analogies mentioned above lead to several 
 presumptions which we find neatly confirmed by the 
 psychology of interest. 
 
 1. Any reaction of consciousness which is repeated with- 
 out variation becomes uninteresting ; the nervous process 
 passes from the stage of fresh accommodation to the stage 
 of habit by the law of downward growth. 
 
 On the psychological side we may call this the principle 
 of repetition, and say that intellectual repetition diminishes 
 interest. We have only to understand a thing thoroughly 
 to lose our immediate interest in it. Very few novels are 
 worth reading a second time, if interest is the measure of 
 worth. It is hard to get up interest in the departments of 
 study which deal with descriptive details and statements 
 of fact, and present no new openings for thouglit. Tlie 
 conversation of our maiden aunts, detailing the illnesses 
 
DmcnnimATioK on exploration. 245 
 
 anci recoveries of our early cliildhood, no longer arouses our 
 enthusiasm. 
 
 2. On the contrary, new relations are interesting ; the 
 nervous growth is " upward," involving higher integra- 
 tions. Illustrations are not needed for anyone who has 
 ever reflected on the passion for news, the course of rumor, 
 and the delights of gossip for all mankind. This may be 
 called the principle of 7ioveltyj and we may say that the 
 intellectually iieio is interesting. 
 
 3. The contradictory of the feeling of interest is not in- 
 difference, but ennui, mental fatigue, boredom. Indiffer- 
 ence means the reign of nervous habit, the draining off of 
 energ}'^ in an accustomed channel. But ennui means the 
 distaste that arises from interest in avoiding. It is a pos- 
 itive feeling as truly as is fatigue. 
 
 Interest of Discrimination or Exploration. These in- 
 tellectual conditions may be set apart as contributing to 
 interest of a particular sort — the interest of curiosity, of 
 exploration. It is never realized in its purit}^, because 
 emotional and other factors mentioned below come to 
 modify the exploring impulse. But in a cold, calculating 
 individual, who looks ahead and weighs the chances, these 
 conditions are most marked. In early child life interest is 
 almost altogether of the exploring kind. First, it is phj^si- 
 cal exploration ; the infant explores his ow^n body, then for- 
 eign bodies, his room, then adjacent rooms. The direction 
 of his attention is largely accidental, depending upon casual 
 stimulations. Then there begins a kind of moral explora- 
 tion, the understanding of his own dress, toys, utensils, the 
 fitting of things together, the meaning of facial and vocal 
 expression. The exploring instincts satisfied, his interest 
 is at an end. 
 
 This class of interesting experiences, however, belong to 
 the more superficial, shifting, and variable side of one's 
 life. They represent the come-and-go of the attention as 
 we follow its quick responses. Purely intellectual interest 
 
246 INTEnmST, nEALITT, AND BELIEF. 
 
 is, therefore, temporary ; it does not attach itself firmly 
 enough to its object to cause the latter to become one of 
 our interests or goods. I am interested in the morning 
 paper, the street sights, my afternoon drive, and the debat- 
 ing society ; but to-morrow a set of new engagements 
 carries my interest, and the experiences of yesterdaj^, now 
 past, only furnish one or two points at which my perma- 
 nent life interests have been touched. What, then, consti- 
 tutes more permanent interest, over and above the simple 
 interest of the intellectual act of discrimination? 
 
 Emotional and Active Interest. So far interest simply 
 represents a tendency to know. Its objects are mere objects 
 tliat come and go indifferently to us ; when we have learned 
 what they are and how they act, our curiosity is satisfied. 
 But bring them within the line of our emotional or voli- 
 tional reactions, and everything is changed. Does their 
 being what they are or doing what they do have anj^ effect 
 upon me ? Tliat is the vital question. The errand boy in 
 an ofiice carries fifty letters a day to his emploj-er, and they 
 have no interest for him ; he knows them to be letters for 
 X. Y. Z., and his curiosity is satisfied. But let one letter 
 come to himself, and then not the words it contains or the 
 love it brings interests him alone ; but the envelope, its 
 sides and corners, the stamp, the address, the very odor of 
 it, fairly burn him with tlieir interesting aspects. An}^- 
 thing, in short, gets interesting which has, besides its rela- 
 tion to other things and people, a power to make me feel 
 and act. I may know the presence of a thing and not be 
 interested ; but I cannot /"ee/ its presence, and much less 
 can I act upon its presence, without coming to think it to 
 be worth my close attention. And such emotional interest 
 seems to arise in different circumstances, as follows : 
 
 1. Whatever directly causes me pleasure or jKiin excites 
 interest. Here the reference to self is so immediate that 
 the knowing function which the attention brings with it is 
 simply a self -preserving function. I am interested in pain 
 
EMOTIONAL AND ACTIVE INTEREST. 247 
 
 to discover its cause and remove it, and in pleasure to 
 understand and continue it. This is what pleasure and 
 pain are for, to warn and advise ; and to say tliey interest 
 us is only to say that they carry this function into the life 
 of til ought. 
 
 The feeling of interest, therefore, seems to be an added 
 thing to the pleasure and pain tone. It arises in connec- 
 tion with the apprehending of the tone and its causes. 
 We would hardly say that an oj^ster is interested when a 
 sliarp instrument is thrust painfully between his shells. 
 The intrusion affects him, and it is in his interest to avoid 
 it ; but it is truer to say tliat it hurts than that it interests 
 him. Circumstances can be conceived in which pleasure 
 and pain would lack interest ; as, for example, the pain of 
 an incurable physical trouble or a preying mental anxiety ; 
 such pains are understood and endured without an}' but 
 the neo^ative interest of the endeavor to forc^et them. 
 
 2. Equally original is the interest aroused by our voli- 
 tional life. Ordinarily we act in reference to a thing 
 because we are interested in it, which means because we 
 are impelled by intellectual or emotional interest. But it 
 is still true that, after acting, our interest is .greater than 
 before. Any effort expended on a thing makes it more 
 worthful to us. The reader may have only the interest of 
 courtesy in a new method of shuffling cards or of holding 
 his pen ; but after one effort, his growing interest will lead 
 him to new endeavors. Again, even when there is at first 
 no thought of a thing, tool, utensil, etc., and it is used onl}^ 
 as a means to a more distant end, interest will gather around 
 it for itself after long use. Wiio does not i)art, with an 
 interest which is positive pain, from an old pair of shoes or 
 his last summer's straw hat? The increase which accrues 
 to interest by sharing it also illustrates this volitional and 
 emotional element. Sharing is the result of the emotion 
 of sympathy, and proceeds by action. 
 
 Here, again, it may be remarked that the interest attaches 
 
248 INTEnEST, BEALITT, AND BELIEF. 
 
 to the object, not to the activity, except in early child life, 
 when movements are themselves objects of interest. But 
 it attache^ to the object because it is related to my activity. 
 No one's else exertion arouses my interest in the same way. 
 
 Interest of Custom or Habit. Very slight self- obser- 
 vation is sufficient to show that while repetition diminishes 
 the temporary intellectual interest spoken of, it is still 
 often through habituation that real interests are formed. 
 There is a distinct line bej^ond which the customary ceases 
 to be tiring and becomes interesting. Before this line of 
 experience, things are faded and washed out ; but as we 
 grow accustomed to them, we begin to find ourselves expect- 
 ing to find them, relying upon them, appealing to them 
 with an interest born simply of old acquaintanceship. 
 
 It is undoubtedly through this principle of custom that 
 some of our deepest life interests are generated. We grow 
 to think of ourselves with certain accessories which have 
 always accompanied us. So a business man's interests 
 narrow down to his business, because all his habits bear 
 upon it. A man of college culture loses his interest in 
 literature and science because his regular routine in after- 
 life does not include such subjects. We become interested 
 in certain classes of people because we are thrown with 
 them. The cure of unfortunate love is separation, and the 
 hope of an unsuccessful suitor lies in the art of keeping 
 himself and his proposals in the mind of the woman he 
 hopes to win. 
 
 Definition of Interest. A thread of common value 
 may now be detected running through the complex phe- 
 nomena of interest. Objects are interesting only as they 
 affect us or are associated with objects that affect us. 
 And by the phrase "affect us," we mean — work some 
 change in the sensibility, which tends, by the law of 
 motor-reaction, to realize itself in activity. Given such a 
 modification of the affective consciousness, and interest 
 invariably arises. 
 
REALITY-FEELING. 240 
 
 Now, such aifective modifications may come in two 
 ways. The two great stimuli to activity are pleasure and 
 pain on the one hand, and suggestion on the other/ Sug- 
 gestion is passing, shifting, temporary ; the interest it 
 arouses is intellectual, temporary interest. But pleasure 
 and pain, in all their range, represent the constitutional 
 and permanent ; as stimuli to movement, they are recur- 
 rent. And the interests they arouse are the deep-seated 
 life-interests already examined. 
 
 Tlie common element, further, is an impulsive element — 
 a tendency element — realizing its object through the atten- 
 tion. Accordingly, in view of all tliat has been said, we 
 may define interest as impulse to attend. And since it is 
 in the attention that all mental synthesis takes place, we 
 may say, as an alternative statement, that interest is the 
 consciousness of a tendency to think. The amount of 
 interest an object or topic will have for us at any time is 
 the amount of calling out force it ex3rts iqyon the attention, 
 both by direct suggestion and by association. 
 
 Interest as Ideal Emotion. Consideration, therefore 
 justifies the view that interest is the subjective side of the 
 apperceptive function. Habit diminislies interest because 
 it diminishes the intensity and energy of presentative con- 
 struction ; but habit begets interest because it makes deep 
 and strong the lines of associative or representative con- 
 struction. By repetition, simple suggestions lose their 
 force ; but by repetition the moving principles of our 
 nature gain force as stimuli to the relating process of 
 attention. 
 
 § 2. Reality-Feeling. 
 
 Distinction between Belief and Sense of Reality. 
 Without entering at this point into the grounds of the dis- 
 tinction, two different sorts of feeling may be denoted by 
 tlie terms reality -feeling and belief. The phrase reality- 
 feeling denotes the fundamental modification of conscious- 
 ' See below, chap. xxiv. 
 
S50 INTEREST, REALITY, AND BELIEF. 
 
 ness which attaclies to the presentative side of sensational 
 states — the feeling which means, as the child afterward 
 learns, that an object is really there. By tlie word belief, 
 on the other hand, we may denote the feeling which 
 attaches to what may be a secondary or representative state 
 of mind, and indicates the amount of assurance we have at 
 the time that an object is there. The idea to which the 
 reality- feeling attaches, may be said to have its own 
 guarantee of its reality ; it is a given, and my feeling of it 
 is direct acquaintance with it. But the idea to which be- 
 lief attaches is guaranteed by some other mental state, by 
 what I know about it, or by its connection w^ith ideas 
 already guaranteed. This distinction and its bearings will 
 become clear as the exposition proceeds.* 
 
 Rise of Reality Feeling. The dawning consciousness 
 of a child — passive consciousness, as it has already been 
 called — is filled with affective sensational happenings. All 
 it lias at first is feeling, and feeling of one kind. This 
 feeling has no meaning whatever ; for by meaning we 
 mean interpretation in terms of something else, and there is 
 nothing else. The flash of light, the muscular sensation, 
 the pain, each is simply this, an experience. There can be 
 no distinction corresponding to reality and unreality, inner 
 and outer, subject and object, presentation and representa- 
 tion. 
 
 Reality-feeling, therefore, at this early stage, is simply 
 the fact of feeling ; nothing more, but this much. Exist- 
 ence is simply presence ; but presence is existence, and 
 whatever is, in consciousness, is real.^ 
 
 ' To the mind of the writer this distinction is a fundamental and 
 vital one. Yet it has, as far as he knows, been made nowhere in 
 psychologic^ literature, 
 
 2 In dreams the simple reality-feeling is present without belief, as 
 is proved by the fact that the grossest inconsistencies are accepted. 
 This simply shows that consciousness has lost its questioning attitude 
 altogether— belief as such does not arise ; but reality is there in its 
 full strength 
 
RISE OF UXnEALlTY-FEELIXG. Sol 
 
 Rise of Uni^eality-Feeling. Further, tlie early con- 
 sciousness soon experiences something quite different from 
 this feeling of presence. As soon as appetite and impulse 
 assert themselves, they are felt — indeed thej make the 
 keenest demands upon the early sensibility. As we adults 
 look at it, it is a feeling of lack, want, need ; but to the 
 infant it is simply a feeling, and a new one. But this new 
 feeling must very quickly get connected with the reality 
 or presence-feeling : say the sensation of the white surface 
 and warm touch of the milk-bottle, as following upon the 
 lack of food. In other words, a simple presence-feeling 
 becomes connected with a simple ahsence-iQoimg. As a 
 matter of fact, the two come together, and it is perhaps 
 the earliest felt distinction in the infant consciousness — 
 vague hunger-feeling, presence-feeling of taste and touch, 
 absence-feeling when the supply is cut off. This absence- 
 feeling is the first and original unreality 'feeling . 
 
 Closer examination again shows us that this unreality- 
 feeling has nothing to do with a negation of belief — with 
 doubt or hesitation, the true negation of belief. If the 
 sense of unreality arose as a contradiction of the sense of 
 reality, there would be some justification for this view. 
 But in that case we would not have a sense of unreality, 
 but a sense of the reality of a new and contradictory 
 experience. For example, the early consciousness has a 
 single candle before it — a reality-feeling. Suddenly the 
 candle goes out. Darkness is now a new reality-feeling. 
 A memory of the candle persists and conflicts with the 
 present darkness, and a new feeling arises — doubt, per- 
 plexity — the foundation of belief, as appears below. But 
 the unreality-feeling has an entirely different origin — in 
 our active impulsive nature. It comes before there is any 
 conflict, and lingers after such a conflict, distinct from the 
 feeling to which this conflict gives rise. 
 
 Degrees of Reality and Unreality-Feeling. Both of 
 these original forms of feeling must have degrees. Not 
 
252 mTEUEST, REALITY, AND BELIEF. 
 
 only to the child is the reality of food more intense and 
 consuming when it is hungry tlian when it is filled, but to 
 the mature man there are realities and realities. Everyone 
 of us has his true reality, liis real and eternal as opposed to 
 his unreal and temporal. Even external things sometimes 
 seem to bruise and wound us, so hard and stubborn does 
 their reality become ; and again, all the world seems thin, 
 flimsy, and unsubstantial. We believe many a fact of 
 which we fail to get a " realizing sense." Simple condi- 
 tions of the nervous system derange our sense of reality ; 
 and emotional conditions suflice to infuse body into our 
 life experiences or to render them ghosts of profitless pur- 
 suit. Confining ourselves, however, now to the infant's 
 life, we may say that his most vivid realities are those 
 sensational states which satisfy his appetites and needs. 
 
 Physiological Basis of the Reality- and Unreality- 
 Feeling. The organic basis of these feelings, it is easy to 
 see, is nothing more nor less than the organic basis of con- 
 sciousness itself. Any sensory process has its feeling of 
 reality element, and any tendency to movement has its 
 unreality-feeling, succeeded by reality-feeling, in the sen- 
 sory process which satisfies it. Further, this feeling of 
 need must arisa from a lack of sufficient stimulation in the 
 sensory seat, which lack is itself a stimulus to the motor 
 process by which the lack is supplied ; the connection 
 between the two processes being fixed by heredity and 
 experience. 
 
 Looked at more broadly, here is an organism in a world 
 of environing conditions ; a certain sensational process 
 represents its best life among these conditions. When it 
 fails of this normal sensational process, its very lack is a 
 stimulus to a motor process by which the normal sensa- 
 tional process is re-established. Assuming this normal 
 sensational process, whatever it may turn out to be, let us 
 call it the sensational coefficient. By this phrase is then 
 meant the element of nervous activity which, being present, 
 
REALITY- AND UmiEALITY-FEELlNG . 253 
 
 gives a sensation : over and above the activity which gives 
 a memory picture or arouses an impulse. The sensational 
 coefficient is the activity which is regularly aroused \>y a 
 real object. 
 
 In this feeling of reality we find the mental "predis- 
 position to illusion " referred to in a previous chapter.* If 
 the presence of the sensational coefficient gives "real" 
 coloring to a conscious state, then, whenever this coefficient 
 is present, reality is reached. But if, by reason of undue 
 excitability from disease, emotion, expectation, or other 
 internal causes, this coefficient is artificially brought about 
 when no reality corresponds, then illusion results. 
 
 Our general outcome so far is, accordingly, this : the 
 feeling of reality is simj^ly consciousness itself ; it is most 
 vivid ichen it accompanies a nervous process having the 
 sensational coefficient. The feeling of unreality arises in 
 connection loith appetites and impulses which residt from 
 the absence of the sen satioi^al coefficient i?i particular sensory 
 brain seats. This may be called the first stage in the 
 development of the consciousness of reality. 
 
 § 3. Belief. 
 
 The feeling of belief is a feeling which attaches to the 
 representative faculty primarily. It is only when memory 
 and imagination come to bring up rival candidates for our 
 acceptance that we believe or disbelieve. Tlie foregoing 
 discussion suffices to show that something else must be 
 added to the simple feelings of reality and unreality, as 
 these arise in connection with sensations, to constitute true 
 belief. The question of belief, put most broadly, is this : 
 Why is it that, of two images which come into my con- 
 sciousness, I discard the one as an imagination, a phantasm, 
 and accept the other as a memory or a present fact ? 
 
 Doubt Precedes Belief. It was said above that the 
 unreality-feeling comes in cases of apjietite, to oppose the 
 simple reality-feeling of presentation or memory. The 
 ^ Above, p. 196. 
 
254 lyTEUEST, REALITY, AND BELIEF. 
 
 reality-feeling doubtless attaches at first to a memory of a 
 caudle as to a real candle, and nothing contradicts it. 
 But, with other memories, this reality-feeling is rudely dis- 
 turbed. The memory of food suggested to an infant by 
 vain sucking at an empty bottle no longer has the reality- 
 feeling. Unreality takes its place. So certain memories 
 get labeled as unreal. And it is the discovery of this possi- 
 ble unreality — the discovery of the possible absence of the 
 sensational coefficient, as the impulse-satisfying thing — this 
 is the beginning of doubt. 
 
 That this is not theoretical only is proved from the 
 observation of young children. They have implicit con- 
 fidence in everything at first, but soon a stage is reached 
 of hesitation and doubt. Unaccustomed tilings have so 
 often brought pain that the new — the strange face, the 
 unusual expression of a familiar face, a new room, a new 
 plaything — are treated cautiously and with manifest dis- 
 trust. The question is : Can I trust the new image to 
 satisfy my impulse toward it ? 
 
 Development of Doubt. As the rise of doubt is due in 
 child life to the failure of a state to satisfy, to the absence 
 of the sensational coefficient, so all higher doubt can be 
 traced to like conditions. I doubt an image, a statement, 
 a law, because it does not meet the demands that I have a 
 riofht to make of it if its claim be true. Just as there is a 
 sensational coefficient, so there is an aesthetic coefficient, a 
 moral and an intellectual coefficient — that quality in each 
 of these fields which satisfies the demands of my nature in 
 these directions severally. I doubt that a face can be 
 called beautiful, because my aesthetic sense is not satisfied 
 with it. I doubt whether tuberculine cures consumption, 
 because my logical sense is not satisfied with the evidence ; 
 and so on everywhere. 
 
 There are a great many things in our lives which never 
 pass into the stage of doubt or belief at all ; things which 
 yemain under tlie rule of the simple sense of reality. My 
 
RESOLUTION OF DOUBT. 256 
 
 mother's love, for example, is a thing in which I cannot be 
 said to believe. It was one of the first realities of which I 
 became sensible. My realitv-feeling in reference to her 
 has never been disturbed one way or the other, and so it 
 has remained undoubted and unasserted. So it is with the 
 religious truth in which one is reared. It is a shock to the 
 sensibilities to ask the question, Do j^ou believe ? for the 
 first time ; it suggests the possibility of doubt, and puts us 
 under the necessity of turning simple reality into grounded 
 belief. But of other people than my mother — my books, 
 say ; and of other truth than religion — my history lesson, 
 say — I make certain demands, and condition what is truly 
 belief upon the way these demands are met. 
 
 Resolution of Doubt. As doubt arises from the atti- 
 tude of mind toward a new image, so doubt is resolved by 
 an actual resort to experience, as far as that is possible. In 
 the case of sensible things we try and see w^hether the 
 image have the sensational coefiicient. If the child has 
 once been fooled by an empty bottle it doubts the bottle 
 at its next appearance ; but its method of testing it is 
 always the same : it tries it. Does it get the needful sen- 
 sation ? — then reality is here ; if not, then not. In all 
 kinds of belief there are such tests, as appears more fully 
 below. 
 
 Nature of Belief. Now the feeling which follows in 
 every case is a feeling of resolved doubt ; it is not the 
 simple feeling of reality which prevailed before the doubt, 
 or of unreality as unsatisfied need. It is a larger, freer, 
 fuller state of mind. It is belie/ and disbelief', or better, 
 positive belief and negative belief ; for the two are one 
 state of mind. And the opposite of belief is doubt, as has 
 been seen.* 
 
 One only has to question himself with ordinary care to 
 
 ' The word belief is hereafter used to cover both belief and dis- 
 belief, the latter being eciuivalent to belief in somethipg which 
 negates tlmtr which is disbelieved. 
 
256 INTEREST, REALITY, AND BELIEF. 
 
 find the truth of this result. The very word belief brings 
 up suggestions of uncertainty. The mental side of this 
 state cannot be separated from the inheritance of associ- 
 ates which swing down tlie tide of consciousness to attach 
 themselves to it. As long as I am unaware of the real 
 force of a thing, its sensational, emotional, or convincing 
 property, I simply let it pass. There are thousands of 
 tilings about us, social conventions, red tape enactments, 
 customs of dress and daily habit, which I conform to be- 
 cause they are not worth the trouble of a more serious 
 attitude of mind. But what I believe has its pros and 
 cons ; and however vaguely, still really, I am better satis- 
 fied with t\\Q pros than with the cons. Kow, for the first 
 time, therefore, we have belief. And from the foregoing 
 its conditions are more or less plain. Of belief in sen- 
 sible things we may say it is a feeling of confirma- 
 tion and security oi^er and above the feeling of simple re- 
 ality. It is the distinct feeling of ratification which I 
 myself give to reality by being satisfied with it. I consent 
 to it. Without anticipating details which are not neces- 
 sary here, sensuous belief, and, by implication, all belief 
 with it, may be defined as cotisciousness of the personal 
 endorsement of reality.^ 
 
 Reaction of Belief on Reality. This may be called 
 the second stage in the development of the consciousness 
 of reality ; the simple reality-feeling has passed into be- 
 lief. Belief then becomes the test of reality. We turn 
 back ruthlessly upon all we have accepted and see whether 
 it will stand the tests of reality at this second stage ; 
 whether it is meeting the full demands which our credence 
 makes upon it. Realities to me then become what I be- 
 lieve, and what I believe is what meets the requirements of 
 my life. 
 
 ^ On the relation of Belief, as thus defined, to Judgment, see 
 my article "Feeling, Belief, and Judgment"' in Mind, N. S., vol. i. 
 p. 403. 
 
BELIEF m EXTERNAL REALITY. 257 
 
 Kinds of Belief. Broadening our outlook we are able 
 to distinguish several aspects or phases of this feelings 
 which we may call respectively belief in the external world, 
 belief hi memory, logical belief belief in ideals, etc. The 
 general theory already set forth leads us to see that in 
 each case there must be an impulse or tendency to a par- 
 ticular kind of experience, and that the reality of that 
 experience must depend upon its capacity to satisfy the 
 tendency involved. Calling in each case this ability to 
 satisfy the " coefficient," we have as many coefficients of 
 reality as there are fundamental tendencies of our nature. 
 
 § 4. Belief in External Reality. 
 
 Its CoeflB-cient.^ A few more words maybe said about 
 external reality as contrasted with the other kinds of 
 reality in which we believe. The question suggests itself : 
 What in consciousness is the sensational coefficient ? 
 Granted such a nervous process whenever a real object is 
 present, what mental changes does it work ? 
 
 We are now able to call upon the determinations already 
 made in regard to the grounds of illusion.^ The grounds 
 of illusion must be the marks which give the semblance, 
 the coefficient, of reality. Most generally speaking they are 
 two : first, very high intensity, and second, uncontrollable- 
 ness. Whenever a mental state is intense, be it sensation 
 or image, and resists all endeavor of ours to modify or 
 banish it, it carries our belief, it is real, as far as sensational 
 tests are concerned, i.e., as far as the sensational coefficient 
 goes. I may have often grounds for distrusting such a 
 state, other coefficients which I invoke as of more worth to 
 me in deciding the case than the sensational tests; but if 
 I had only the latter, if I were merely a being of sensations 
 and reactions, intense persistent states would always and 
 invariably sum up reality for me. 
 
 Of these two elements of the sensational coefficient the 
 latter is more important and essential. Siniple reality- 
 ^ Above, p. 194 ff. 
 
258 INTEREST, REALITY, AXD BELIEF. 
 
 feeling attaclies to intense and feeble images alike, pro- 
 vided no impulse arise which fails to find its satisfaction in 
 the feeble ones. But in the element of uncontrollableness 
 we have a confirmation of the impulse origin of all belief. 
 Our impulses, our life needs, are fixed and permanent, not 
 subject to our will or control ; so are their satisfactions, 
 the realities we have reached in our life experience. 
 
 Primacy of Muscular Sensations as Giving External 
 Reality. In an earlier place,' touch — with muscular 
 sensibility — was called the " controlling sense," because 
 questions of reality are referred to it for decision. We 
 now see why this is so. It is through muscular movement 
 that will and impulse and appetite, that all outgoing 
 processes, are realized. If natural satisfactions, therefore, 
 are the basis of belief in external reality, then the medium 
 of such satisfactions must be the medium also of the sense 
 of reality. And further, motor-reaction is itself an im- 
 pulsive, original thing, and takes place largely through the 
 stimulus of resistance ; consequently the presence of re- 
 sistances is itself the gratification of the need of motor- 
 development — perhaps the most general and fundamental 
 sensational need that we have. If we could get satisfac- 
 tions without muscular sensations, then the latter would 
 not be the tests of external reality. 
 
 Primary Criterion of External Reality. Consequently 
 it is only what we would expect that sensations of resist- 
 ance become the primary criterion of all external reality. 
 Anything that resists my will is believed to have present 
 reality. And it is not simply resistance through contact, 
 but, by generalization, resistance in any of the classes of 
 sensation. A stifling smoke resists my will to be rid of it, 
 that is, the physiological effort I make +o banish it shows 
 me that I have no control over it. 
 > Above, p. 95. 
 
I 
 
 BELIEF IN MEMORY. 259 
 
 § 5. Belief in Memory. 
 
 TliG Memory-coeflB-cient. By memoiy-coefficient is 
 meant the coloring of reality which some images have, as 
 re])resenting former states of consciousness : that by which 
 I distinguish a memory from a dream or a creature of the 
 imagination. In general terms, it is the question of recog- 
 nition over again : belief in memory is the feeling which 
 attaches to imacjes recoo^nized; and as recoo^nition has been 
 seen to rest in the sense of diminished expenditure or 
 easier adjustment of attention involved in the reinstate- 
 ment of a content in apperception, we have here a suffi- 
 cient statement of the intellectual conditions of the feel- 
 ing of memory-reality.* 
 
 As feeling, however, two very distinct forms of reality- 
 consciousness attach to memory : first, what we may call 
 the simple sense of revival or recurrence, and second, the 
 belief that what is thus recognized was itself a real ob- 
 jective thing when it was first experienced. I may re- 
 member a dream, recognize it, and believe in it as truly a 
 memory, and yet be in doubt as to whether it was a dream 
 or a real occurrence when I first experienced it. 
 
 The memory-coefficient of belief attaches properh^ only 
 to the first of these states : it answers the question, What 
 shall I recognize ? The further point of feeling — that 
 which attaches to the answer to the question. Is what I 
 recognize a reality ? — requires further inquiry into the 
 nature of the memory in question. Does the memory 
 recognized include memory of the sensational coefficient ? 
 Did I believe it to be a real object when I first experienced 
 it ? This question determines whether I shall feel it to be 
 the memory of an objective thing or no. So with any 
 other of the higher kinds of reality-coefficients jQt to be 
 spoken of. Do I recognize a former image of a beautiful 
 face? Yes; but do I recognize it as a living beautiful 
 face? That depends upon the kind of coefficient, sens^i,* 
 » Above, p. 150 ff, 
 
260 INTEREST, REALITY, AND BELIEF. 
 
 tional, imaginary, aesthetic, etc., of my earlier view of the 
 face. 
 
 Memory-coeflB.eient Proper. The question then, Why 
 do I recognize anything consciously at all? has its answer 
 in the memory-coefficient proper, viz., because I can repro- 
 duce it voluntarily by starting a chain of associations lead- 
 ing iqy to it. I have control over it in this sense, that it is 
 at my command for reproduction. My past is mine only 
 in as far as I can utilize it in my present. I refresh my 
 memory by rehearsing details, and thus bringing up points 
 which, if simply suggested to me without their earlier con- 
 nections, I might have failed to recognize. So we reach 
 two kinds of present reality : present external reality, 
 guaranteed by its independence of my will, and present 
 memory realit}^, guaranteed by subjection to my will. 
 
 Completed Criterion of External Reality. Besides 
 the primary criterion of external reality found in feelings 
 of resistance, a secondary criterion is, therefore, supplied by 
 memory. Of the two kinds of memories, both having the 
 memory coefficient, those which represent external realities 
 and those which do not, the former are important factors 
 in the development of our idea of the world without. 
 Among the trains of association by which memories may 
 be voluntarily brought up are certain muscular trains, 
 themselves accompanied by memories of resistance, and the 
 memories brought up by them are also so accompanied. It 
 is only these muscular resisting trains terminating in a re- 
 sisting experience which carry belief in external things 
 remembered. For example, I remember equally a merman 
 and a salesman. I can get the shopman again as a present 
 (resisting) reality by reproducing the series of muscular 
 (voluntary, but resisting) sensations required to revisit his 
 shop. But I can only get the merman as an image (unre- 
 sisting) by a train of ideal (voluntary, but unresisting) asso- 
 ciates. The former alone I do and must consider externally 
 real, The secondary criterion of external reality, there- 
 
BELIEF IN CONCEPTS AND THOUGHTS. 261 
 
 fore, is my ability to reinstate resisting experiences at 
 icill. 
 
 In this secondary criterion tlie element of persistence in- 
 cluded in our idea of external things seems to take its rise. 
 In saying things are, we mean also that they continue. That 
 is, as we have seen, we mean that we are able to go and 
 find them again, and find them with the same resistance 
 they showed when we experienced them before. To a 
 creature without memory reality would be simply resist- 
 ances got successive!}^ : but with memory as recognition 
 comes also persistence. 
 
 The history of opinion regarding belief in objective 
 things shows that the twofold nature of the complete crite- 
 rion has been generally overlooked.* 
 
 § 6. Belief in Concepts and Thoughts. 
 
 Thought-Coefacient." In conception we pass from the 
 simple reproduction of experience to the abstracting and 
 generalizing function of apperception. Conception, judg- 
 ment, reasoning, have been already described as the suc- 
 cessive efforts of consciousness to maintain identity 
 throughout the diversity of new experiences. The funda- 
 mental movement, therefore — what we may call the logical 
 impulse — is to secure identities or partial identities, resem- 
 blances, consistencies, in its content. The demand of 
 thought in general is agreement, consistency^ ; its opposite 
 is contradiction : this it cannot abide and be satisfied. 
 
 Consequently consistency^ the absence of presentative or 
 conceptual contradiction, is the thought-coefficient of belief. 
 Where no other coefficient conflicts, mere consistency 
 carries intellectual assent. But by intellectual assent, it 
 
 ^ Cf . the writer's article " The Coefficient of External Reality " in 
 Mind, xvi. 1891, p. 389. Also see the references to recent discussions 
 given in ray Handbook of Psychology, vol. ii. p. 166. 
 
 '■^ Compare the whole of chap. xv. above, and also chap, xiv, in my 
 Handbook, vol. i. 
 
QAO! 
 
 INTEREST, REALITY, AND BELIEF. 
 
 must be carefully noted, is meant formal assent, logical 
 asserft, indiiference as far as the logical impulse is con- 
 cerned. As to the belief in the objective truth of concepts 
 and judgments, the reality of their content, that is a farther 
 question. 
 
 § 7. Emotional Belief. 
 
 No detailed argument is required to show that strong 
 emotion has an influence on belief. So evident is this that 
 the emotional method of persuasion is universally recog- 
 nized. An idea which strongly excites us to some definite 
 emotion, hope, fear, anger, love, is easily believed in, and 
 the cherishing of the emotion is a means of intensifying 
 conviction in reference to its object. 
 
 The emotional coeflicient, therefore, consists, like the 
 sensational coeflicient, in i7itensity and iincontrollahleness. 
 While mere intensity does strengthen conviction, yet it 
 may be questioned whether it is not mainl}^ because it is 
 through intensity that we lose contro'l. As soon as we can 
 get our emotion under our will, and can say to ourselves, 
 "think calmly," the distorting influence of feeling disap- 
 pears.' 
 
 § 8. General Conclusion on Reality and Belief. 
 
 The consideration of the different coeflicients of belief 
 leads us to conclude that there are as many kinds of reality. 
 There is moral and aesthetic reality no less than logical and 
 sensational reality ; and there is the same reason for be- 
 lieving in one that there is in another, for both rest upon 
 the fact that our mental nature demands certain kinds of 
 satisfaction, and we find it possible to get them. Sensa- 
 tional reality will not satisfy our logical demands, for 
 nature is often refractory and illogical. Neither will logic 
 satisfy our moral and aesthetic demands, for the log- 
 
 ^ On the grounds of our moral and aesthetic beliefs see below, 
 chap. xxi. §§ 6, 7. 
 
COMPOSITE REALITIES. 263 
 
 ically true is often immoral and hideons. It is well, there- 
 fore, to write large the truth that logical consistency is not 
 the whole of reality, and that the revolt of the heart against 
 fact is often as legitimate a measure of the true in this 
 shifting universe as is the cold denial given by rational 
 conviction to the vagaries of casual feeling. 
 
 Composite Realities. The outcome of our life of belief 
 is the more or less complete adjustment of these kinds 
 of reality to one another. We find ourselves constantly 
 denying, minimizing, scouting the external world, as we 
 abstract our higher selves from connection with it. Ideal- 
 istic philosophy is a revolt from the sensational coefficient 
 in the name of the moral coefficient, however logical 
 a system of belief it claims to be as philosophy. 
 Materialism, on the contrary, is the worship of the 
 sensational coefficient as more real than any other. Re- 
 ligious trutli either tells us which to put under and which 
 to embrace, or bids us await a future state when all the 
 demands upon us will be harmoniously adjudicated. 
 
 What I, as an individual, therefore, believe is a composite 
 thing, a mixture of truths representing the degree of har- 
 mony I have succeeded in reaching among things, which, 
 taken singly, I am obliged to accept. Among them the 
 largest place is given to external or sensational reality. I 
 bring things wherever possible to the test of sensation. 
 No doubt this is because my connection with the external 
 world is most intimate and direct, and the penalties of its 
 disregard are most quick and sure. Next in practical im- 
 2:)ortance is the world of logic or demonstrative truth, 
 which holds its swaj" imperatively when sensation does not 
 vote a negative. The disregard and violation of aesthetic, 
 moral, and religious truth are due to the difficulty of decid- 
 ing just what these coefficients are, and of disentangling 
 them from the swarm of temporary emotional states which 
 have not the same claim to satisfaction. 
 
 Self the Ultimate Reality. Amid the variations of 
 
264 INTERmT, HEALITT, AND BELIEF. 
 
 composite reality the most fixed point of reference is 
 now seen to be the feeling of self. This is as far as psy- 
 chology can go with its analysis of reality. All reality is 
 given us through our own experience, and the center of 
 experience is self and its needs. 
 
 Existence. There are, moreover, as many kinds of 
 existence as there are coefficients of reality. We have 
 already seen that judgment involves belief in existence of 
 some kind, but not always external existence. It may be 
 mere mental existence (imagination-coefficient), as in the 
 world of fiction and mythology ; or ideal existence 
 (aestlietic coefficient) ; or logical existence (thought-coeffi- 
 cient), as belief in a hypothesis ; or it may be what we call 
 "real existence" (sensational coefficient), belief in external 
 reality. And tilings are constantly passing from one of 
 these kinds of existence to another. We learn that we had 
 mistaken the coefficient. Santa Claus passes from real 
 existence to imaginative existence ; disembodied spirits in 
 the minds of some undergo the contrary change in the 
 manner of their existence. 
 
 Relation of Belief to Will. If the foi-egoing theory of 
 belief be true it is evident that belief is not the feeling of 
 effort or volition. It is a feeling of willingness or con- 
 sent, but not of will. I often consent to reality against 
 my will. My consent to reality is a forced consent. The 
 effect of will upon belief is really the effect of voluntary 
 attention upon one or more of the coefficients alreadj'- men- 
 tioned. Attention may intensify an image and so give 
 greater sensational or emotional reality. It may also dwell 
 upon and bring out certain relational connections of an 
 image and so throw the logical coefficient on the side of 
 those connections : it may refuse to dwell upon those 
 relations which are distasteful. But it is not true that we 
 can believe what we will. To say we believe what we 
 need is not to say we believe what we want. 
 
 Definition. Belief was above defined as the conscious- 
 
INTEREST AND BELIEF. 265 
 
 ness of the personal indorsement of reality. Reality we 
 have now found to be a general term for that kind of ex- 
 perience which satisfies one or more of the needs of the indi- 
 vidual. Belief in anything is, then, put most generally, the 
 consciousness of the prese?ice of that thing as fitted to satisfy 
 a need: and it is distinguished from the earlier unreflecting 
 reality-feeling, which is the simple consciousness of a 
 presence. 
 
 Interest and Belief. A further interesting question is 
 the relation of these two states, considered as ideal feelings, 
 to each other. Interest is the feeling of an impulse to attend 
 aroused by an object ; belief is the feeling of the presence 
 of an object fitted to satisfy this and other impulses. 
 Interest has a distinct future or prospective reference. If 
 my future were forever cut off from an object my interest 
 in it would die away as soon as the image of it became so 
 faint and infrequent as not to arouse a strong impulse. 
 But, however thus cut off in the future, I would not lose 
 my belief in such an object : for the memory-coefficient of 
 it would last as long as memory itself, and with it tlie 
 peculiar coefficient of the object's own reality. Belief, 
 therefore, has a retrospective reference. Interest must be 
 perpetually renewed by new impulse, new apperceptive 
 activity ; belief can only be destroyed by experience which 
 compels me to conclude that it was at first misplaced. The 
 points of similarity between the two feelings are that they 
 both terminate on an intellectual object, and both arise in 
 connection with an impulsive mental outgo. 
 
SPECIAL IDEAL FEELINGS. 
 QUALITY, OR KINDS: AMOTIONS, 
 
 CHAPTER XX. 
 DIVISION : PRESENTATIVE EMOTIONS.* 
 
 § 1. Division. 
 
 General Nature and Characters. Special ideal feelings 
 or emotions have already been given their place among the 
 phenomena of sensibility. They are the feelings which 
 arise in connection with different phases of intellectual 
 activity, as far as these feelings stand clearly distinguished 
 in consciousness from one another. They are qualitatively 
 different (hope and fear, for example), as sensations (sound, 
 taste) are qualitatively different. 
 
 Besides distinctions of quality among emotions we are 
 able also to predicate of them quantity (or intensity), dura- 
 tion (time relations), and tone (pleasure and pain), reaching 
 the same four characters which we found to be present in 
 sensations.'^ 
 
 Kinds. Upon examination states of ideal sensibility 
 fall into two classes, which may be called respectively 
 emotions of activity and emotions of content ; i. e., first, 
 feelings of the operation of the apperceptive function with- 
 out reference to what it operates upon ; and second, feel- 
 ings excited by the particular object upon which the 
 
 ' Cf. Handbook of Psychology, vol. 11. chap. vill. 
 ' Above, p. 85. 
 
 I%6 
 
EMOTIONS OF ACTIVITY. 267 
 
 intellect operates. These classes of ideal feeling suggest 
 themselves for separate treatment. 
 
 § 2. Emotions of Activity. 
 
 It has already been seen that all mental activities reside, 
 that all apperceptive processes happen, in the attention ; 
 hence the great class of emotions of activity cluster round 
 the different phases of the attentive life. These feelings 
 again fall into two classes, which we may call feelings of 
 degree of adjustment and feelings of function, or activity 
 proper. 
 
 Emotions of Adjustment. It is an easy matter to get 
 these feelings experimentally. Attention to successive 
 stimuli — say sounds — following one another in very rapid 
 succession soon grows painful as a feeling of distraction 
 or confusion. The attention cannot adjust and readjust 
 itself in time to bring order into its stimulations. On the 
 contrary, when there is an even-measured flow in the 
 appeals to which the attention is open, we have a class of 
 feelings of abstraction or clearness. Again, a stimulus 
 may be so slight, vague, dim as to lead to violent con- 
 centration upon it, giving feelings of contraction or effort ; 
 and again, we often have the consciousness of unusual 
 breadth of view, comprehensiveness of range, expansion or 
 ease. 
 
 Emotions of Function. Although the line of distinc- 
 tion is inexact this class of emotions is conveniently 
 separated from the foregoing. 'J'hey are feelings of the 
 apperceptive process, as far as it is felt in operation ; still, 
 however, apart from the nature of the particular object of 
 its operation. The going out of the attention may be felt 
 as freshness, triumph, eagerness, alertness, hope, courage, 
 aspiration, elation ; or as hesitation, hidecision, anxiety, 
 timidity, melancholy, irritation, fear. The former of 
 these classes may be known in general as emotions of 
 exaltatio?i, and the latter as emotions of de2)ression. 
 
26S DIVISION: PUESENTATIVE EMOTIONS. 
 
 § 3. Emotions of Content, ^. e., having Reference to 
 Objects. 
 
 Perhaps the most convenient, as the most evident, 
 division of these emotions is based upon distinctions 
 among their objects, as regards the kind of belief-coeffi- 
 cient which they involve. 
 
 Proceeding on this plan we may diX'&imgm^h presentative 
 from relational emotions, and under the presentative order 
 we find, first, a great class which refer exclusively to self, 
 terminate on the ego ; for example, pride. These we may 
 call se//*-e motions, after analogy with tlie more affective 
 kinds of sensation, which, it will be remembered, have 
 most direct value as reflecting the subjective side of sense 
 experience. Another class under the presentative type 
 depend upon the relation of the object of the emotion 
 to one's self, as fear, etc. These we may call objective 
 emotions, after analogy with the knowledge element in 
 sensation. Relational emotions, on the other hand, termi- 
 nate upon objects which have certain complexities in 
 themselves apart from their connection with the individ- 
 ual. The presentative emotions carry belief in the sensa- 
 tional or memory coefficient ; the relational, in the logical 
 coefficient. 
 
 Further, under the objective emotions, we may dis- 
 tinguish the expressive from the sympathetic. The former 
 indicate a reaction in consciousness outward as an expres- 
 sion of personal feeling ; and the latter indicate a similar 
 reaction, which is now sufficiently described by the term 
 " sympathy." Again, feelings of relation fall into so-called 
 logical and conceptual feelings. 
 
 The divisions thus indicated may be presented to the 
 eye in the following table : 
 
 Presentative { ^^^J^.j;^, j Expressive 
 „,,. , Logical (Sympathetic 
 Relational | Conceptual 
 
 Emotions of 
 Content 
 
SELF.EMOTIONS. 269 
 
 § 4. Self-emotions. 
 
 The emotions which terminate on one's self must be 
 clearly distinguished from the feeling proper of self. The 
 feeling of self underlies all other forms of consciousness 
 when self-consciousness has once arisen. Assuming this to 
 be so, whatever self may be, we find that the contemplation 
 of self, when it becomes the object of our reflection, 
 arouses certain spontaneous and peculiar forms of emotional 
 excitement. These are the emotions of self. 
 
 Such emotions attend either an exalted estimate of 
 one's own person or possessions, or, on the other hand, a 
 depreciatory estimate. The former we may call emotions of 
 pride, and the latter emotions of humility. Looked at 
 casually, emotions of pride include the states ordinarily 
 called pride, vanity, haughtiness, conceit, superiority, com- 
 placency, arrogaiice, self -confidence, forwardness, etc.; and 
 under emotions of humilit}^ we have humility, modesty, 
 self debasement, self -distrust, inferiority, bashfulness, mean- 
 7iess of spirit, iceakness, poverty, shame, etc. 
 
 In different individuals these emotions have habitual 
 stimulation in very varying circumstances. One vain- 
 glorious mortal dwells always upon his past exploits ; 
 another, on the mighty deeds he is going to perform. One 
 humble spirit bears always in mind the weakness of his 
 earlier or present endeavors ; another lives in constant 
 dread that an occasion will arise in which his real short- 
 comings will become evident. Moreover, besides the com- 
 mon object, of them all, self, viewed in a narrow sense, 
 these emotions attach very broadly to anything in which 
 one's interest is wrapped up, or for which he is in any way 
 responsible. Without discussing the question as to whether 
 the extent of these feelings justifies our extending the notion 
 of self to include all the objective personal interests of the 
 man, it is still true that his self-feelings overflow, as ITume 
 maintained, and attach themselves to all objects with which 
 
270 DIVISION: PRESENTATIVE EMOTIONS. 
 
 he is closely and habitually associated. A man grows 
 proud of his college, his boarding house, even of the valor 
 of his enemies ; ashamed of his associates, of the shabby 
 dress of his grocer, of the venality of his political adver- 
 saries. Give me a real interest in anything whatever and 
 it becomes mine in an emotional sense : its fate affects me 
 in the same way, though not to the same degree, as a sim- 
 ilar fate to myself. 
 
 § 5. Objective Emotions. 
 The objective emotions are so called to indicate that they 
 arise in the presence of an object ; as feelings they are 
 subjective states, but they arise as differentiated qualitative 
 states ; and this differentiation seems to depend in some 
 way upon the relation of self to the objects which excite 
 them respectively. But the idea of self, as itself an object 
 presented in relation to the thing on which the emotion 
 terminates, is not necessarily present. Children show fear, 
 anger, etc., before they have the notion of self. The ob- 
 ject of the emotion does sustain a relation in adult con- 
 ception to self, and the emotion which is purely instinctive 
 (presentative) at first, thus becomes reasonable (represen- 
 tative). But the fact that the same emotion may not have 
 a conscious self-reference shows that such a reference is 
 not one of its essential conditions. 
 
 § 6. Expressive Emotions. 
 These emotions, further, find their place in the reactive 
 consciousness, as both the study of children and adult 
 reflection teach us. They rise in child life before volition 
 becomes prominent. Consequently the phrase expressive 
 emotion serves best to distinguish them. They are an 
 expression of the reaction or behavior of consciousness 
 when given objects are presented. They represent the 
 reactive, outgoing side of consciousness, as the affective 
 emotions or feelings of self represent the receptive or 
 reflective sicle. 
 
EMOTIONS OF ATTRACTION. 271 
 
 Looked at from this point of view, emotions rest upon 
 impulses, and exhibit the two great directions which appear 
 in impulse, i. e., toward or from an object as fitted to 
 satisfy, or the contrar3\ Careful distinction in terminology 
 — more careful and exact, no doubt, than the facts warrant 
 — gives over the active, impelling factor in a state of higli 
 emotion to impulse, and reserves for emotion only the 
 mental excitement, agitation, felt disturbance of conscious- 
 ness. This, at any rate, serves to cover both aspects of 
 tlie case, and gives us a terminology which may be consist- 
 ently maintained. 
 
 Having in view, therefore, the direction of the impulses 
 which the expressive emotions accompany, we may dis- 
 tinguish emotions of attraction from emotions of repidsion. 
 
 Emotions of Attraction. Under the general head of 
 attraction we may include all tendencies toward an object 
 or individual, or satisfaction in its presence, from the 
 slight feeling of approval to the boisterous expression of 
 social enjoyment, or to the quieter but stronger movings of 
 affection and love. And the progress of this emotion in 
 degree and closeness of attachment is an interesting and 
 typical chapter in the natural history of feeling. 
 
 Beginning with interest— the emotion of simple atten- 
 tion — an object becomes attractive as it comes into clear 
 relation with one's self. Both simple association, by the 
 egoistic reference already remarked upon, and increasing 
 knowledge of attractive qualities in the thing in question, 
 tend to increase its attracting force. Further, any effort 
 which may have been put forth in connection with such an 
 object increases its hold upon us, and, by strengthening our 
 interest, makes its presence a matter of need. 
 
 In this increased attractiv^eness of an object, however, we 
 discriminate clearly between persons and things. Famili- 
 arity with things always leads to attachment to them simply 
 by association and interest. If the thing is useful we be- 
 come further attached to it ; if it turn out useless we simply 
 
272 DIVISION: PRE8ENTATIVE EMOTIONS. 
 
 neglect it ; but it still has its place in its interesting environ- 
 ment. But tilings never arouse in us the opposite, repellant 
 emotion, except by some kind of association with persons. 
 
 In the case of persons, on the other hand, the simple 
 attachment which now becomes, in its earliest form, admi- 
 ration, passes over on further acquaintance with the object 
 into a more positive and vigorous emotion. Strengthen the 
 ties of association and self-relation (kinship, partnership, 
 etc.) sufficiently and the emotion of attachment becomes 
 affection and love. There is a line in the growth of the 
 emotion of attraction beyond which all revelations of char- 
 acter or action, however damaging, only deepen and 
 strengthen the earlier tie. But if this line has not already 
 been reached when damaging discoveries are made — if the 
 attractive emotion has only reached the stage of admiration 
 arising from intellectual interest and casual association — 
 then there comes a revulsion to emotion of repulsion. 
 
 Around these three stages in the growth of emotions of 
 attraction the varieties of such feelings may be grouped. 
 Admiration, the feeling of deep interest in persons, is 
 veneration when its object is elderly, superior, or of high 
 rank ; aioe when it is obscurely grand and imposing. 
 Attachment, the feeling of close association with and de- 
 pendence upon persons and things, has distinct colorings, 
 when felt toward inanimate objects, animals, inferior or 
 superior persons, etc. Affection, the feeling of profound 
 attraction toward persons, arising from the deejier ties of 
 family or common life interests, parallel opinions and aims, 
 or congenial dispositions, takes on innumerable forms known 
 by name as distinct emotions : feelings of confidence, 
 patience, security, help, congratidation, self -surrender, self- 
 denial, tenderness — in short, all the infinite emotional phases, 
 of past, present, and future reference, which poets have 
 sung and \vomen have felt since one human heart first 
 learned to enlarge its borders to include another. 
 ' All such feelings of attractiv eness take on peculiar (juali- 
 
EMOTIONS OF BEPULSION. 273 
 
 ties wlieii tlieir objects are matters of future or of past time. 
 The belief-coeflicient may be a representative in distinction 
 from tlie sensational (presentative) one, carrying the force 
 of the future on the one hand and of memory on the other : 
 these emotions are tlien called Ao^^e and joy respectively. 
 
 Emotions of Repulsion. The repelling impulses also 
 supply us with a group of emotions of enormous range and 
 importance. What has been said about the development 
 of the feeling of attraction applies with some modification 
 to this class also. Simple interest and some knowledge are 
 necessary to induce the feeling of unattractiveness in tlie 
 first instance ; it grows to be objection ablen ess in tilings 
 (mainly) or persons. The feelings toward things do not 
 pass into stronger emotion except througli association wn'th 
 persons. But with persons it passes into distaste, a posi- 
 tive feeling which becomes intense in abhorrence. At any 
 stage, except that of extreme repulsion, an attracting mo- 
 tive — kinship, pride, intellectual admiration, etc. — may 
 assert itself so strongly as to cause a revulsion of feeling 
 over to the attractive side : and attachments thus formed 
 are often most lasting and intense. 
 
 Many modifications of the so-called feeling of objection- 
 ableness might be mentioned : feelings of inferiority, of 
 jyoor breeding, of bad faith, dishdn, distrust, etc. So ])osi- 
 tive distaste may take form as impatience, scorn, rebellion, 
 impertinence, malice, vengeance, present fear, anger, hatred, 
 etc. And abhorrence has varieties in detestation, contemp)t, 
 disgust, loathing, etc. 
 
 All the emotions of this class also get generalized under 
 coefficients of future and memory reality respectively, and 
 become the opposites of hope and joy, ^. e.,fear (or, more 
 properly, dread) and sorron^. 
 
 § 7. Sympathetic Emotions. 
 
 The second division of presentative emotions has been 
 called sympathetic. The word " sympathy," in ordinary' 
 
274 DIVISION: PBE8ENTATIVE EMOTIONS. 
 
 usage, signifies the emotion wliicli is called out by the in- 
 telligence of such good or bad fortune to others as sustains 
 no immediate connection with our own. 
 
 An adequate psychological analysis of the conditions of 
 sympathy seems to yield the following results: 
 
 1. It is aroused by states clearly pleasurable or painful. 
 There is no occasion for sympathy with one who does not 
 need it ; ^ that is, with one who is not in a state of positive 
 feeling, good or bad. Further, the study of the first sym- 
 pathies of children shows that they extend to things as 
 well as to persons, and only gradually get narrowed down 
 to objects which feel. Sympathy as an emotion is shown 
 before the child makes any distinction between things that 
 feel and those that do not.'* But whatever the object be, 
 the emotion is called forth only by such happenings as 
 have before excited the child's own feelings of pleasure or 
 pain. 
 
 2. Some degree of interest is necessary to sympathy. 
 The confirmation of this appears broadly in everyday ex- 
 perience. I read in the morning paper that thousands of 
 people perish in a Chinese flood, and the cup of coffee that 
 follows it up is much more important to me than their 
 bereaved families. But a single death in my own com- 
 munity makes me at once solicitous in reference to the 
 deceased man's relatives. Yet mere exploring interest, 
 when it comes upon suffering, always starts the sym- 
 pathetic feeling. 
 
 3. My sympathy is In a rough lo ay proportionate to the 
 nearness of the individuaV s connection with myself . This, 
 again, needs no detailed proof : if my brother breaks his 
 leg I feel more sympathy than if a casual comrade meets 
 
 ' Only the painful causes of sympathy will be considered in detail: 
 this accords with the popular usage. The same considerations apply, 
 however, to the pleasurable exercise of sympatliy, 
 
 '^ Darwin observed sympathy in his child six months and eleveu 
 days Q\(X.—Mind, ii. p. 389, 
 
DEFIXITIO^ OF SYMPATHY. 275 
 
 the same misfortune : and the difference is greater still if 
 the latter be a favorite horse. 
 
 4. Sympathy is aroused, not merely hy real beings, hut 
 by any idea of suffering. It is not necessary that we be- 
 lieve in the object of our sympathies. Pictures in memory 
 Avin our sympathy, imaginations in fiction arouse it, vague 
 forebodings of misfortune to others excite it. Whenever 
 there arises in consciousness an idea of a conscious creature 
 — be he fact, memory, fancy, illusion, reality in any of its 
 kinds, that is, be he a possibility in any form — his fortune 
 as suffering or enjoying moves our sympath}^. 
 
 This is true in spite of our efforts — often successful as 
 they are — to suppress sympathetic emotion by dwelling 
 upon the unreality or ill desert of the subject of it. " Little 
 Dorrit" will move some readers in spite of their sense that 
 the character is fictitious. We all feel the stirrings of 
 fellow-feeling for the condemned criminal, even though we 
 be convinced of the justice of his sentence. In cases in 
 which we do suppress the emotion it is by getting rid of 
 the idea, turning the attention to something else, exciting 
 some new interest, that we do it ; not by depriving the 
 subject in question, the idea of suffering, of its force to 
 affect us. 
 
 Deflnition of Sympathy. It is plain, if these points be 
 true, that sympathy is an emotion aroused by any presen- 
 tation lohich suggests suffering. 
 
 In this definition several further considerations are in- 
 volved. By the use of the word " suggestion " an im- 
 portant distinction is intended between the object on which 
 SNnnpathy terminates and that by which it is caused. A 
 suggestion is a stimulating idea which is brought into con- 
 sciousness from without, or comes by an association, in 
 such a way that it does not belong in the course of my real 
 life. A suggested pain, for example, is a pain which I am 
 led to think of, but which I am not really suffering. Sug- 
 gested suffering has not the present coefficient of pain, but 
 
276 DIVISION: PRESENTATIVE EMOTIONS. 
 
 only a remembered coefficient of pain. Suggested suf- 
 fering, therefore, is the idea of pain as far as it differs 
 in consciousness from the actual pain of the experience 
 presented. 
 
 But the question arises : Does such a suggestion excite 
 sympathy ? Suppose a cruel father who punishes his child 
 hy pinching ; the presentation of the father may suggest 
 pain to the child ; but this does not seem to be sympathy 
 — it may be fear, or memory of pain. Yet, on looking 
 closer and observing children, we find that if the father 
 take the attitude which the pain before accompanied, real 
 sympathy is excited. Let him pinch a piece of wood, 
 paper, even his own finger, and the child a year old gives 
 clear expression to its sympathetic emotion. The child 
 does not need the notion of another person who suffers, nor 
 even of another object that suffers ; he only needs two 
 things : first, a presentation which suggests vivid pain, 
 and second, the absence of the coefficient of reality which 
 his own suffering had. In other words, the emotion of 
 sympathy does not require an object at all. It acquires 
 an object, and then maintains itself by the emphasis of this 
 object ; but in the first place it attaches to any convenient 
 presentation in close connection with its exciting cause. 
 
 Kinds of Sympathetic Suggestion. We may sympa- 
 thize, therefore, without sympathizing with anything, and 
 at first this is the experience of the young child. But its 
 sympathy gets an object, and, by getting it, develops and 
 maintains itself. The fact that the suggesting presenta- 
 tion is generally the same as the suffering creature tends to 
 give stability to the object of the emotion. Tlien there 
 arises the apprehension of the physical signs of suffering, 
 for which the child inherits in some few instances a direct 
 susceptibility ; and these carry the objective reference of 
 the sympathies over to themselves. Indeed, it is probable 
 that the first suofsjestions of sufferino^ come from the facial 
 and vocal expressions of others, Imitation also leads to 
 
BETELOP^tEKT OF SYMPATHT. 277 
 
 the cojwing of the movements of emotional expression of 
 others, and tliis reacts to suggest the appropriate emotions 
 in tlie child liimself. 
 
 Development of Sympathy. The rise of sympathetic 
 emotion may be described in view of the foregoing. Con- 
 sidering only the feeling elements, in the light of what has 
 been said of the intellectual conditions of each, we may 
 distinguish three stages in this development, ^^ e., affect, 
 interest, concern. The effect we understand to be a simple 
 present state of feeling considered as having motive force : 
 say a present pain. Affects become strongly associated 
 with presentations, and this association is a process occur- 
 ring in the attention ; the exercise of the attention, then, 
 excites interest. Interest, further, as far as it arises in con- 
 nection with pleasures and pains remembered, introduces 
 concern, i. e., sj^mpathy become definite as terminating on 
 a distinct personal object. 
 
 Altruistic Element in Sympathy. The much discussed 
 question of egoism vs. altruism in the sympathetic emotion 
 may receive partial consideration here. If it be true that 
 suggested suffering excites s^^mpathy, and that it is only 
 suggested suffering that excites it, namely, suffering not 
 felt to be present as real suffering is, and for that reason 
 attributed, when knowledge is sufficiently advanced, to 
 someone else — then we must believe that sympathy is not 
 entirely egoistic. Suggested suffering is at first neither 
 egoistic nor altruistic, because neither the ego nor the alter 
 exists in consciousness when sympathy at first arises. The 
 reference of real pain to self, and of suggested pain to an- 
 other, seem to be both late acquirements. But as it is true 
 that the child gets his external objects clearly presented — 
 especially his external personal objects — before he clearly 
 presents himself, so sj'inpathy must be a conscious emo- 
 tional motive before self-seeking is. 
 
 Varieties of Sympathetic Emotion. A large number 
 of varieties or shades of emotion may be classed as sympa- 
 
278 DIVISION: PRESENTATtVE E^^0TI0^'^8. 
 
 thetic, i. e., kindness, be)ievole?ice, cliarltahleness, etc. Wlien 
 felt toward an equal in character or station we call it con- 
 gratulation, felloio -feeling, felloic-suffering, companionship, 
 common well or ill desert, solicitude, heartache ; toward an 
 inferior, compassion, pity, mercy ; toward one much su- 
 perior it approaches awe, but differs from it in an un- 
 n am able way. 
 
 Social Feeling. The further generalization of the idea 
 of personality to which developed sympathy attaches gives 
 the emotion a broader reference. Social feeling is sympa- 
 thetic emotion as it attaches to man in general. It can 
 only arise after the conception of man is reached, of man 
 as a multiplication of particular men like myself. As long 
 as men were not considered all *' like myself," but some 
 slaves, some barbarians, some Gentiles — only a few Greeks 
 or Hebrews — social feeling had only the range of the class 
 or race in the midst of which it arose. Particular forms 
 are feelings of equality, justice and injustice, rights, po- 
 litical and patriotic feelings, etc. Also under tliis head 
 should be included feelings of rivcdry, emulation, jealousy, 
 ambition, competition, love of fame or reputation, sensi- 
 tiveness — all the emotions, in fact, w^hich arise from the 
 association of man with man in social life. Intense pleasure 
 and pain both tend, it may also be remarked, to sociability 
 and communicativeness. 
 
 § 8. Repeesextative Emotions. 
 
 Presentative pass over into representative emotions when 
 the object is itself representative, ^. e., a memory, imagina- 
 tion, reproduction of any kind. It is sufficient to say here 
 that the emotion aroused by a reproduction is the same as 
 that of the original presentation in kind. They are pre- 
 vailingly, however, of much lower intensity. The time 
 element which they involve also gives them a new coloring : 
 the joys of memor}^ are, in a vague way, different from the 
 joys of the present or of the future. 
 
CHAPTER XXL 
 
 EMOTIONS OF RELATION.' 
 
 The higher reaches of apperception in conception, 
 judgment, and thought give rise also to characteristic 
 emotional states. The fundamental act of attention as 
 relating function gives most general coloring to this class 
 of feelings, and from it they also derive their name, rela- 
 tional feelings. 
 
 At the outset three very distinct kinds of emotional 
 experience may be distinguished : intellectual or logical 
 feelings, moral or feelings of right and wrong, and (Esthetic 
 or feelings of the beautiful. The latter two may be further 
 classed as conceptual feelings. 
 
 § 1. Logical Emotions. 
 
 By distinguishing the more fundamental emotions of 
 relation as logical, we intend to point out those to which 
 the coefficient of thought-belief attaches : those which at- 
 tend upon the various acts of judgment. First, we find a 
 class of feelings arising from hare relationship as itself the 
 object of consciousness, i. e., feelings of reasonableness and 
 nnreasonahleness, of contradiction, oi logical satisfaction, of 
 tendencies of thought, of ignorance, of the wiK'noici}, the 
 mgsterioiis, the inscrutihle, feelings of the inconclusiveness 
 of argument^ of the hypothetical, of the inconclusive, etc. 
 These feelings are in close affinity with the great class- 
 feelings already described as doubt and belief. 
 
 Connected with time relations we have what may be 
 called time-emotions, i. e., a^iticijyation, propthecy, presenti- 
 ment, hope, attaching to the conception of future times ; 
 
 ' Cf. Handbook of Psychology, vol. ii. chap, ix. 
 
 279 
 
2S0 EMOTIONS OF JIELATIOK 
 
 retrospection^ reverie, musing, regret, feeling of the irremedi- 
 able, of opportunity lost or improved, attaching to the con- 
 ception of the past ; and routine, surp^rise, amazement^ as- 
 tonishment, present opportunity^ hasty decision, attaching 
 to the idea of the immediate present. 
 
 Space relations also are reflected in emotional states : 
 feelings of distance, moral remoteness or neatmess, grandeur^ 
 pettiness, mental vacancy, besides the ordinary sensuous 
 feelings of spatial relations. 
 
 Other relationships give us feelings of coexistence or the 
 contrary, i.e., communion, community, compa7iy, loneli- 
 ness; of quantity, i. e., importance, insignificance, greatness, 
 abundance, economy, paucity ^poverty, completeness and in- 
 completeness ; of identity, i. e., sameness, resemblance, dif- 
 ference, contrast, quality ; of fitness, i. e., utility, useless- 
 ness, adequacy, insufficiency, redundancy, congruity and 
 incongruity, suitableiiess, adaptation, means and end; of 
 objective power, i. e., agency, destructiveness, might, fearfid- 
 ness. 
 
 The peculiarity of this whole class consists in the 
 conscious explicitness of the act of relating. Judgment 
 has been distinguished from conception and imagination 
 by this very feature. Yet as there is every degree of 
 progress from the more mechanical union of factors in the 
 pictures of passive imagination to the clear consciousness 
 of relation as found in judgment, so these feelings vary from 
 a most to a least degree of explicitness in this respect. 
 As might be anticipated, further, there is a class of emo- 
 tions attaching peculiarly to the least evident degree of 
 relationship, as it appears in the apperceptive process 
 before it reaches conscious assertion in judgment. These 
 we may now consider. 
 
 § 2. Conceptual Emotions. 
 
 The progress of the intellect from the involuntary com- 
 binations of fancy to the free constructions of imagination 
 
CONSTRUCTION OF IDEAS, 281 
 
 aiul conception lias alread}^ been depicted. This progress 
 is a matter of feeling also — the feeling of enlargement of 
 range, emancipation, constructive capacit}^, which is covered 
 in popular language by the phrase getting or having ideals. 
 If my imagination builds up for me something more pure 
 and satisfying in any particular — form, color, use — I say 
 that result approaches more nearly to my ideal in that 
 direction. If, again, I set myself to draw up a system of 
 philosophy, I express my satisfaction at each turn of its 
 development by saying it tends toward my ideal of a sjs- 
 tem ; and I reverence a character more because, as I think, 
 it more nearly embodies my ideal of a man. So in all con- 
 struction whatever, besides the feeling of the extent of 
 actual construction, there is a feeling of further possible 
 construction — construction beyond what I have done, yet 
 in the line of what I have done. 
 
 § 3. Construction of Ideals. 
 
 The process of constructive imagination has been de- 
 scribed.' It is tlie machinery by which ideals are pro- 
 duced. It is only necessary here to give the elements 
 before pointed out their proper place in the scheme of 
 feelings. 
 
 The appetence or moving force which impels a scientist 
 or artist to produce is the impulsive principle of need now 
 found to underlie belief and action in general. It belongs 
 among the higher impulses j^et to be discussed. Tlie 
 artist's intention expresses the permanence of this impulse 
 and its exhaustive range over the material available to him. 
 He selects his material under the law of voluntary interest. 
 What constitutes the fitness of his material is the problem 
 of what ideals are, and it is that aspect of the case to which 
 we must now turn. 
 
 Nature of Ideals. What are ideals ? AVhat is art from 
 the spectator's point of view? Evidentl}^ ideals are some- 
 thing felt in connection with present images ; something, 
 ^ Above, chap. xiii. § 4. 
 
282 tlMOTIONS OF BELATIOIT. 
 
 that is, in virtue of which peculiar feelings arise over and 
 above the simple feelings of apprehension. In other words, 
 conceptions of the kind produced under the lead of the 
 constructive imagination have a peculiar quality, which 
 leads us to pronounce them true, beautiful, or good. From 
 the essential nature of conception we are able to reach, in 
 a general way, the lines within which this quality must be 
 sought. 
 
 1. Conception proceeds by abstraction, and abstraction 
 has been seen to be the mental tendency to pursue identities 
 through the mazes of new experience. The gratification of 
 this pursuit of identities arises as a feeling of pleasure 
 whenever two elements of experience before disparate fall 
 together in a unity or common meaning. Without such a 
 process of identifying, with its accompanying gratification, 
 no conception whatever can take place. One element of 
 conceptual feeling, therefore, must arise from abstraction, 
 and this element may be best characterized as the feeling 
 of unity in a whole. 
 
 2. But an equally important, because opposite, aspect of 
 conception is generalization: the function wherebv a con- 
 cept gets application over a wider area of experience by a 
 modification of its content. In abstraction I preserve my 
 concept and neglect all experience which does not illustrate 
 it ; in generalization I accept my experience and modify 
 my concept to include it. It is a mental tendency away 
 from identity to variety, and its gratification brings another 
 element to conceptual feeling, i. e., the feeling of harmony 
 of parts. 
 
 3. The intension or depth of a concept begets a phase of 
 feeling in response to the peculiar value of it in experience, 
 while its extension excites only a feeling of its present 
 accidental application!. Man in intension excites in me the 
 sympathetic and social feelings ; it indicates humanity with 
 the living thrill of interest the word suggests ; but man in 
 extension simply means men, anybody, everybody, common- 
 
FEELING OF FITSES.^ 283 
 
 place and uninteresting. The emotion of intension let us 
 call the feeling for meaning^ a third essential ingredient in 
 conceptual emotion. 
 
 By meaning we mean interesting qualitj^, recognizing in 
 the word all the springs of interest, intellectual, emotional, 
 and volitional, already discussed. Our ideals are the 
 things of most absorbing interest to us. 
 
 4. Further conceptions are objective in their reference ; 
 they arise in the knowing function. Their objectivity 
 means both that there are objective relations presented, 
 but that these relations hold for others no less than for 
 myself. Both these aspects may be covered by the phrase 
 feeling of iiniversality : a fourth ingredient in conceptual 
 feeling. 
 
 Ideals, therefore, are the forms which ice feel our concep- 
 tions would take if ice icere able to realize in them a satis- 
 fying degree of unity, harmony, signifcance, and univer- 
 sality. The first two properties we may call ideal 
 form, the third, ideal meaning, and the fourth, ideal va- 
 lidity. 
 
 Peeling of Fitness. "We are now able to give more 
 exact definition to the state of consciousness before desig- 
 nated as feeling of fitness. It attaches to certain images 
 of imagination which are available for conceptual construc- 
 tion : namely, to those which tend to take form in ideals. 
 It indicates promise of progressive idealization under some 
 or all of the rubrics pointed out above. But it precedes 
 actual construction, since ideals are not positive construc- 
 tions. If conception follows, then the feeling of fitness 
 either becomes simple feeling of logical relation or it at- 
 taches in turn to the new product as far as it is felt to be 
 fit for further ideal construction. For example, I feel that 
 each fact discovered in nature or the laboratory must fit 
 in a construction of all similar facts called a law ; but 
 when this law, now a vague felt ideal, is itself discovered, 
 then my feeling of fitness attaches to it only as it in turn 
 
284 EMOTIONS OF RELATIOK. 
 
 serves as an element of a still broader ideal of systeniatic 
 science. 
 
 § 4. Range and . Kinds of Conceptual Feeling. 
 
 The various ideals to wbicli we find ourselves committed 
 with greater or less emotion may be classed under throe 
 heads, according to tbe classes of data which are felt to be 
 fit. First, we appreciate logical fitness by what we may 
 call feelings of the systematization of truth. Again, we 
 have ideals of character, feelings for the good, or ethical 
 feHings. And third, we grope- after ideals of beauty : we 
 have (Esthetic feelings. These may be considered in turn. 
 
 § 5. Feeling foe System in Mental Constkuction. 
 
 Scientific and Philosophical System. The exercise of 
 the scientific imagination is accompanied by the scientific 
 ideal, and its materials are selected as fit to realize this 
 ideal. Of all conceptual ideals the scientific is most plain. 
 Here the criteria of unity and variety have almost exclu- 
 sive voice, and apply throughout all the kinds of relation 
 which arise in the process of judging. The ideal is com- 
 plete unity of conception in the infinite variety of objec- 
 tive fact, and each new generalization in any science, as 
 chemistry, biology, psycholog}^, is in so far gratifying as a 
 partial realization of it. And the pursuit of philosophy 
 attains its gratification in the same endeavor after unity 
 of conception. 
 
 § 6. Ethical Feeling. 
 
 Its Coeflacient. Assuming that the moral feelings 
 accompan}^ the process of conception, we may ask after 
 their peculiarities. What is their general nature, and to 
 what kind of experiences do they attach ? Using the 
 words good and bad to express what we mean by moral 
 approval and disapproval, we may examine consciousness 
 to find their application. The moral coefficient is that in 
 
MORAL QUALITY. 285 
 
 experience which leads us to attach to it the predicates 
 good and bad ; it may be called, for the present, moral 
 quality. 
 
 Moral Quality. A rough generalization easily leads to 
 the conclusion that good and bad, in their moral signifi- 
 cance, attach onl}^ to possible actions. If I say a man has a 
 bad character I mean that he is capable of bad conduct. 
 If I say a knife is good I mean simply that it is useful ; 
 not that it is moral at all. But not all actions are moral. 
 Some actions are forced. I may be driven to perform an act 
 against ray will. This is not moral. So we reach a further 
 point, i. e., moral actions must be voluntary acts, or acts of 
 will, whatever will may turn out to be. Further, not all 
 voluntary actions are moral. I may dine at two o'clock 
 or at six ; I may take my walk north or south : these 
 actions are morally indifferent. What further peculiarity 
 attaches to some acts of will, whereby we call them good 
 or bad? 
 
 A reference to the general psychology of conceptual 
 feeling, as already developed, will throw light upon this 
 point. We found the feeling for ideals to involve in its 
 object harmony, meaning, and universality ; so, if the 
 moral feelings are rightly classed as conceptual, only those 
 states of will which fulfill these conditions in some degree 
 will be found to excite moral approval or disapproval. 
 
 Moral Quality as Harmony. Acts of will which are 
 moral can never be taken out of their environment in con- 
 sciousness and conduct, and pronounced good or bad. 
 Moral actions are those which are harmonious with each 
 other in reference to an ideal. A morally indifferent act 
 is an act which stands alone, which is of no value to any- 
 body except the doer, and of no value in the complex acts 
 which make up the doer's conduct. The reason that my 
 dinner hour is indifferent is that it has no value to anyone 
 but myself, and none to myself except my convenience. 
 As soon as it does become a matter of health to me, or 
 
286 EMOTIONS OF RELATION. 
 
 comfort to anyone else, i. 6., gets a setting of relations more 
 or less conscious, it does become moral. Moral quality, 
 therefore, attaches to an act of will considered as an ele- 
 ment in a complex of interests, my own and those of others. 
 Moral predicates attach to certain felt possibilities of conduct 
 considered in relation to all other possibilities of conduct. 
 
 Moral Quality as Universal. The univei-sality of ethical 
 feeling arises in consciousness in tw^o new and distinct 
 forms. Not only is morality objective in the sense that 
 others are held by me to the judgments that I myself make : 
 the universality of truth in general, but the existence and 
 claims of others enter as factors in the content of the feel- 
 ing for myself. The feeling of syynpathy is one of the 
 elements whose satisfaction this moral satisfaction as a 
 whole must include. And further, simple disinterestedness, 
 as all conceptual feeling involves it — value apart from gain 
 or loss to myself — does not here suffice ; but the feeling of 
 restraint, constraint, ohligation takes its place. These two 
 factors may be considered further. 
 
 Moral Sympathy. Moral sympathy attaches exclusively 
 to the idea of persons, and carries with it the notion of 
 self. The idea of suffering which was found sufficient for 
 sympathy as an expressive emotion now gains its full per- 
 sonal reference. This feeling may be described as the con- 
 sciousness of the equality of individuals in reference to 
 ideal good. 
 
 Moral Authority : Feeling of Obligation/ The second 
 aspect of moral universality is the feeling of ohligation., or 
 of subjection to moral authority. As already said, it is a 
 consciousness of both restraint and constraint. It is further 
 felt to be from within, i. e., not to have any assignable 
 cause outside of consciousness. It restrains from one course 
 of conduct and constrains to another. It does not enter 
 simply as a possible alternative which I may or may not 
 
 > Cf. wliat is said on the feeling of responsibility below, chap, 
 xxvii. g 4. 
 
FEELING OF OBLIGATION. 287 
 
 embrace, which may be neglected or not as I please ; but it 
 has an additional element of feeling, the feeling covered by 
 the word ought. I may go to a lecture or not ; I ought to 
 help my poor neighbor. This is ordinarily called the im- 
 perative aspect of ethical feeling. 
 
 Moral authority is the feeling that a peculiar worth at- 
 taches to certain motives or ends in relation to other motives 
 or ends. This worth is further not merely a recognized 
 worth in view of an ideal, but a worth felt to be imperative 
 upon my free choice. In other words, the sense of moral 
 authority may be defined, at the present stage of our 
 inquiry, as 2l feeling of an iniperatwe to the will to the free 
 choice of a moral end. 
 
 Upon this determination certain remarks may be ven- 
 tured. First, the imperative of the feeling of obligation is 
 an unconditional imperative. While it is true that it arises 
 only in connection with alternative courses of action, yet 
 when once arisen it is, as an ought-feeling, quite inde- 
 pendent of such connections and conditions. This Kant 
 has emphasized by the phrase "categorical imperative." 
 Second, the feeling of freedom is still present before alter- 
 natives, even when the moral imperative is clearly attached 
 to one of them. Though I feel that I ought to pursue a 
 certain course, still I feel free to disregard my own moral 
 injunction and pursue a different course. Third, that the 
 ought-feeling is alwaj^s relative to an ideal is seen in the 
 fact that the same course of conduct is at one time right, 
 at another wrong or indifferent. The moralit}", therefore, 
 as already said, covers the harmony of all possibilities with 
 reference to an ideal. And fourth, moral feeling always 
 attaches to the concrete, to particular acts of will. We 
 have no general feeling of right or wrong. AVe may vainly 
 attempt to depict the moral ideal as an abstract ideal, and 
 through it to arrive at the sense of rio^lit in the abstract : 
 but moral decisions, as such, are always decisions on actual 
 concrete possibilities of action. 
 
288 . EMOTIONS OF RELATION. 
 
 G-round of Moral Authority. The further question, 
 therefore, arises : How can such a principle of the activity 
 of will get its application to concrete courses of conduct ? 
 Why are not all acts of will included, i. e., why are they 
 not all moral? The following answer may be suggested 
 without further remark, i. e., the determination as to what 
 conduct in the concrete is morally imperative takes place 
 by a reaction of consciousness upon a group of alternatives 
 in such a way that these alternatives are arranged in a 
 scale of values with reference to the moral ideal and to 
 one another, the highest value being approved as relatively 
 right, and the others disapproved as relatively wrong. 
 
 In this position, it is seen, the determination of an act as 
 right or wrong is a relative determination — a determination 
 of the adjustment of particular alternatives to each other as 
 regards worth for an ideal. In other words, the particu- 
 lars are the material of different degrees of fitness for a 
 generalization. That generalization — could we make it — 
 would be the moral ideal, and the peculiar feeling of 
 approval or disapproval of the most fit in possible conduct 
 carries with it also the feeling of oughtness. The conclu- 
 sion on moral authority is, therefore, that it is psycholog- 
 ically " ultimate and unanalyzable." 
 
 Conclusion on Moral Coefacient. In regard to the sub- 
 jective side of moral quality — the conscious feeling of the 
 presence of the right or wrong — we are now able to speak 
 more definitely ; and we may conclude, in conformity with 
 what has already been said, that the moral coefficient is 
 the feeling of an attitude of the will toward or from one of 
 alternative courses of conduct as relatively fit or unfit for 
 construction in a moral ideal. And this fitness is, as far as 
 can be discovered : first, the degree in which a course of 
 conduct is felt to harmonize with most interests, to be 
 approved by others as well as by myself, and to be impera- 
 tive, though not executive, upon my choice. 
 
 Tiie moral coefficient is thus seen to have two sides, a 
 
THE ETHICAL END. 289 
 
 ^dhjective and an objective side. Subjectively it is an 
 approving attitude of will with felt obligation, all that is 
 meant by the word ought ; objectively it is harmony and 
 universality, what is meant by the word right. About the 
 ought the above is all that we have to say ; it is an ulti- 
 mate category of feeling, whatever its origin may have 
 been. As to the right, certain rules of conduct are usually 
 formulated, which find their highest expression in the 
 Christian principle of Love. 
 
 Moral Ideal : the Ethical End. Of the elements found 
 necessary to ideals generally, that is, necessary to con- 
 ceptual feeling, meaning was included no less than harmony 
 and universality. Having now looked at the elements of 
 harmony and universality involved in ethical feeling, it 
 remains to consider the element of meaning. To draw 
 again a distinction already made, not the spectator's point 
 of view alone must be considered, but the composer's, the 
 constructing agent's ; in this case, the doer's point of view. 
 If I would do right what kind of a pattern or end do I set 
 mj'self ? 
 
 Notion of End. An end is that which I consciously pre- 
 sent to myself for possible pursuit. It must be clearly 
 distinguished from motives, which are any influences what- 
 ever that may come to bear on the will, whether they be 
 consciously presented or not. Only some motives are ends. 
 Further, an end does not alwaj'S carry the presentation of 
 self ; a child has an end when it imitates the movements of 
 its nurse, before it gives evidence of reflection upon its own 
 mental states. Consequenth^ there may be more than one 
 end in consciousness at once ; which means that the end 
 is distinct from volition. Volition is the choice of a 
 particular end. 
 
 Subjective vs. Objective Ends. In saying that an end 
 must be consciously presented it is further meant to ex- 
 clude organic and biological results which seem to us to be 
 due to presentation or purpose. The physical organism 
 
290 EMOTIONS OF RELATION. 
 
 is full of adaptations all supposed to minister to the greatest 
 pleasure and to produce the least pain. Yet pleasure and 
 pain are not necessarily the ends of our voluntary physical 
 activities. In order to become subjective ends they must 
 be pictured as the objects of the voluntary process ; 
 otherwise, being organic, they are a form of objective 
 end. 
 
 Doctrine of Ethical Ideal or End. If what has been said 
 about moral quality and authority be true the doctrine of 
 the end is plain. The rightness of an act is only arrived 
 at in the concrete, ^. e., in relation to other acts. What I 
 ought to do, therefore, — the content of my choice, — is rela- 
 tive. The form, i. e., that I ought to do right, is always 
 the same no matter what the act be. It is a " universal 
 imperative." The form cannot be the end ; that would be 
 tautology, ^. 6., I ought to do what I ought. But an ade- 
 quate statement of the content as universal end demands a 
 perfect generalization of all possible concrete choices, 
 which is impossible. Hence there is no universal subjective 
 end. My ethical consciousness tells me universally that I 
 ought to do right, but it does not tell me universally what 
 I ought to do, to do right. In every dilemma I may be in 
 it is a question as to lohat, which I ought to choose ; not 
 whether I ought after I have chosen. 
 
 It follows from a sufficient understanding of the nature 
 of conceptual feeling that all statements of the ethical 
 ideal must be inadequate. Fitness for an end cannot mean 
 adequate embodiment of that end ; no one's alternatives of 
 conduct can cover the whole of the possible fields of ad- 
 justment of wills to one another in a developing social 
 organism. The ethical ideal, therefore, as far as it is con- 
 scious, is ^Ae degree of harmony and universality in conduct 
 which I find my emotional nature responding to with im- 
 perative urgency. As an ideal it is relative and changing 
 in the life of the individual and of the race ; yet that em- 
 bo4inient of it to which the individual or the race at any 
 
RULES OF CONDUCT. 291 
 
 time responds is of absolute and unequivocal validity then 
 and there. 
 
 The highest embodiment of the ethical ideal is the con- 
 ception of the character of God. This does not give a 
 statement of the ethical ideal, however, for the conception 
 of God as a perfect being is of a character which realizes 
 our moral predicates to perfection, and as such shifts with 
 our development and that of the race. Instead of the end 
 consisting in our conception of God's character, the reverse 
 is true. God's character to us results from our conception 
 of tlie moral end. 
 
 Rules of Conduct. There are, therefore, valid rules of 
 conduct which are imperative upon the individual, not be- 
 cause they are universal statements of the ideal, but be- 
 cause they generalize our concrete intuitions of the right. 
 They are the objective side of the moral coefficient. The 
 worth of each of them, however, in any case, depends upon 
 its support from the moral consciousness in that particular 
 case. Such principles are veracity, temperance, prudence, 
 mercy, forgiveness, etc. These rules are absolutely bind- 
 ing wherever the moral consciousness gives them an appli- 
 cation ; but they are not applied by the moral conscious- 
 ness universal^. For instance, veracity is sometimes sub- 
 ordinated to a higher demand of ethical feeling, such as 
 loyalty, humanity, or charity. 
 
 Conscience. In the word conscience the ethical con- 
 sciousness has its broadest characterization. Conscience 
 may mean and does mean three very distinct things — three 
 things, however, so essentially one as a mental fact that the 
 use of a single word to cover them has its full justification. 
 If we cut the mental life right through at the moment of 
 positive ethical feeling, getting a section of the mental 
 stream, so to speak, showing all there is at that moment, 
 this section is conscience. The tllree portions of the section 
 correspond to the three determinations we have already 
 made, i. e., moral quality^ moral aiithoriti/^ and moral ideal, 
 
292 EMOTIONS OF RELATION. 
 
 Let us take a concrete case of action from conscience : I 
 give money to a beggar because I am bound by conscience to 
 do so. The moral quality of my act is my feeling of its har- 
 mony with my better acts as a whole, and the exaction I 
 make upon other men to be charitable also ; without this 
 conscience would be wanting — the act would be indifferent. 
 The moral authority of the act is the feeling which at once 
 arises that this quality has an immediate reference to my 
 will. I am bound to choose it as my act ; without tliis 
 there is no conscience — conscience. is dead. The moral ideal 
 is the outreach of my feeling toward a state of will in which 
 such a relative and hesitating decision would yield to clearer 
 and more direct moral vision ; a state of will which I can- 
 not picture, cannot conceive, but which I feel my will is 
 meant for, and for which my present act for conscience' 
 sake is the only means to prepare me. 
 
 Consequently, from the point of view of the individual 
 consciousness, conscience is a spontaneous authoritative re- 
 action of approval or disapproval of one of alternative ends, 
 as of higher relative excellence vnth reference to an ideal un- 
 seen hut imperatively enjoined. 
 
 Emotions Akin to the Moral. Around the fundamental 
 moral emotions cluster a number of more special and 
 complex feelings. Moral approval and disapproval of 
 others in different degrees becomes vc\oy2\ praise and blame, 
 moral respect and contempt, moral reverence and disgust: 
 applied to self they are feelings of good conscience and 
 remorse, moral hope and despair. These latter take on 
 peculiar forms when complicated with the knowledge that 
 others know and judge our case, i. e., moral pride and 
 shame. These two feelings are the most powerful and 
 lasting of our moral nature, as witness the aggravated 
 punishment of the "Brand of Cain" and the "Scarlet 
 Letter." They bring all the motive and emotional force of 
 the sympathetic nature to reinforce the intrinsic sanctions 
 of dutv. Other forms of the ethical emotion whose factors 
 
u^STHETIC FEELING. 293 
 
 suggest tliemselves readily are repentance., moral penance, 
 moral restitution ; and moral cowardice and hesitation, on 
 one hand, contrasted with moral courage and resolution on 
 the other. The great class of religious feelings are also 
 most closely connected with ethical emotion and rest upon 
 it. 
 
 § 7. Esthetic Feeling. 
 
 In beauty, the elements of what we call the ideal seem 
 at the outset to be most fully set forth. The simplest 
 observation of beautiful things suffices to illustrate the 
 necessity of both unity and variety in form. There is no 
 beauty when unity is absolute, and it is only when arrange- 
 ment is possible to a degree which allows a distinction 
 between variety which is yet unity, which has a plan, and 
 variety which is multiplicity, which has no plan — that an}'' 
 such feeling arises at all. It is equally evident, also, that 
 moaning, significance, contributes to aesthetic effect. The 
 beauty of a landscape is cold and formal until the smoke of 
 a peasant's hut, or the spire of a country church, is added 
 to give it a touch of human interest. The village green 
 has more meaning than snow-clad Alps. And, further, we 
 feel the essential sharableness, universality, validity of all 
 beauty. I expect a face to appeal to you as it appeals to 
 me. 
 
 While all beauty, thus, has the ideal character, and is for 
 that reason conceptual, yet it is well to distinguish two 
 kinds of aesthetic emotion : that which attaches to more 
 sensuous experience, and is almost exclusively /b?';>?a/, and 
 that which attaches to more representative experiences, as 
 having meaning. Following Wundt, the former may be 
 called loirer and the latter /i/^/Z^e?* aesthetic feeling. 
 
 I. Lower Esthetic Peeling. It is difficult to determine 
 when the sense of the beautiful begins in child life. The 
 expression of such a sense is for a long time simply the 
 ordinary expression of pleasure — smile, active muscular 
 
294 EMOTIONS OF RELATION. 
 
 movements, etc. ; and the presumption is tliat simple pleasure 
 is all there is to express. Yet, by inquiring into the effects 
 upon the child of objects otherwise indifferent, expressions 
 due to form alone may be isolated. 
 
 The objective character of aesthetic impressions leads us 
 to look upon sight and hearing, the most presentative 
 senses, as the exclusive organs of sensuous beauty. The 
 objective form of sounds is time, and those of sight are 
 time and space. The formal element, therefore, in all 
 aesthetic feeling is unity and variety in time and space 
 relations. ~ 
 
 Further, in both time and space a distinction may be 
 made, with Hodgson, between static and dynamic relations. 
 Sounds which occur simultaneously, and spatial relations 
 which are perceived, to be stationary, are called static ; 
 sounds following one another, and space relations which 
 change through physical movement, are dynamic. The 
 ordinary words for these tw^o qualities are repose and 
 movement. 
 
 As regards time relations music is the purest and most 
 adequate illustration. In the chord the static qualit}^ is 
 illustrated. The variety of auxiliary tones is held in a 
 unity dominated by the fundamental. The single tone in 
 ordinary instruments is, further, a static effect, since in it 
 there is also a variety of secondary or over-tones which 
 give to it its peculiar timbre. In general, musical harmony 
 is the static form of the a3sthetics of time. The dynamic 
 element in the aesthetic feeling of time relations is pre- 
 sented by rliythm, complex transitions, beat, measure, 
 movement. It presents the formation and resolution of 
 harmonies in a series of effects, which are united in the 
 flow of the composition as a whole or of portions of it. 
 This dynamic aspect of the case is knowm in music as 
 melody. 
 
 In regard to relations of space the distinction between 
 static and dynamic, between rest and movement, is equally 
 
LOWER ESTHETIC FEELING. 2^5 
 
 plain. Architectural beauty illustrates the former ; beauty 
 of wheels in motion, birds in flight, the intricate evolutions 
 of the dance and the drill illustrate the latter. Consider- 
 ing the static quality, the question arises : What relations 
 of space are aesthetically most pleasing ? In plane figures 
 richness of division, together with evident simplicity of 
 plan, is the aesthetic desideratum. A square inscribed in a 
 circle is more pleasing than either the square or the circle ; 
 but two overlapping equilateral triangles in a circle pre- 
 sent still greater attractiveness. Investigations have been 
 made into the most tasteful laws of longitudinal and ver- 
 tical division. For the best effect longitudinal division 
 should be either perfect symmetry (bisection about a ver- 
 tical axis) or some proportion well away from symmetry. 
 Zeising's principle, called the "golden section," is that, in 
 horizontal division, the longer part {b) should be a mean 
 proportional between the shorter (c) and the whole (a), 
 viz., the proportion a : b : : b : c should hold. For vertical 
 lines it is held that the point of division should be two- 
 thirds to three-fourths up from the bottom, or the same 
 distance down from the top : as the arms on the erect 
 human bod}^, or the lowest broad-spreading boughs of the 
 arbor vitae. The quality in division which excites aesthetic 
 feeling we may call balance. 
 
 As regards plan the question is largely one of outline. 
 If the divisions are pleasing, in what kind of an outline 
 shall the lines of a design terminate ? TJie attempt has 
 been made, and probably with some success, to connect the 
 pleasure of outlines with the relative ease or difliculty of 
 the eye movements required to compass the figure in ques- 
 tion. The normal movement of the eye, except in its 
 vertical and horizontal axis, is a curve of gentle and some- 
 what irregular curvature. Hence the general principle 
 that curved lines present a more pleasing outline to the eye 
 than extended straight lines. And variations of the same 
 principle are, that curved outlines are more agreeable when 
 
296 EMOTIONS OF RELATIONE 
 
 the law of curvature changes slightly at frequent intervals ; 
 that transitions should be by curves rather than by short 
 turns or angles ; and that sudden irregularities are allowable 
 only when they can be brought under a regular law of 
 recurrence, ^. e., reduced to tlie general plan of the design 
 as a whole. Put more generally, the scheme of gesthetic 
 form for the eye conforms approximately to the field of 
 vision. The ideal of form is indicated b}^ tlie most facile 
 and pleasurable adaptation of the eye at once to detail, 
 and, by easy transition, to the plan as a whole. The erect 
 human form has been considered from antiquity the su- 
 preme illustration of beauty of form, both as regards 
 balance and outline. 
 
 The graphic arts and sculpture, called, as opposed to 
 music and architecture, the imitative arts, embody ideals of 
 space form. They are imitative only in the sense that they 
 represent objects taken from nature ; but imitation is alto- 
 gether subordinate, as is seen in the fact that only such 
 objects in nature are suited to the purposes of art which 
 are already recognized as embodying some ideal. A painter 
 paints a face either for its beautiful form or its beautiful 
 meaning, or both : if it has neither, it is not beautiful as a 
 picture of a face, and hence is not aesthetic, not art. Even 
 a portrait must idealize somewhat to be beautiful and satis- 
 fying. 
 
 Perspective in the graphic arts is the reduction of space 
 relations of depth to the form of the original field of vision 
 in two dimensions, i. e., to a flat surface. If it is true it con- 
 forms to the requirements of all spatial beaut}': it has a 
 visual center to which its lines of direction converge, and 
 if there be two or more of these centers they must be in 
 turn subordinate to yet another. 
 
 11. Higher Esthetic Feeling. We now come to consider 
 beauty apart from its framework of sense-perception. If 
 space and time relations were all that aesthetic ideals in- 
 cluded, beauty would be robbed of most of its power to 
 
EMOTIONS ALLIED TO THE ^ESTHETIC. ^^1 
 
 Influence and gladden us. It is the meaning, the suggestive- 
 ness of art that rouses in us feelings for ideals. This mean- 
 ing is by many writers simply made convertible with the 
 associations or memories w^iich the beautiful object calls up. 
 For example, a building becomes beautiful when we know 
 that it is a hospital for sick children. The knotted hands 
 of a workman suggest a lifetime of privation, toil, and de- 
 votion, and rouse in us emotions of respect and admiration. 
 Yet even in cases where simple association is most con- 
 spicuous the suggestions themselves involve ideals and 
 seem to bring them more vividly before us. The sug- 
 gested emotion does not terminate on the building, but on 
 the ideal of charity w^liich 'it represents ; not on the phys- 
 ical hands, but on the ideal of life which they suggest. 
 Association is, therefore, not the whole of w^hat we intend 
 by the word meaning. It is only as associations themselves 
 have meaning that they enter into the meaning of present 
 beauty. 
 
 In an earlier place meaning ^vas connected with the in- 
 tension of concepts. Intension includes all the data that 
 we have about objects. But we have more data about 
 objects than their simple presentative associates ; we have 
 also the feelings, of whatever kind, which they excite, and 
 the motor reactions to which they impel. All these ele- 
 ments must enter into the framework of aesthetic emotion 
 in its higher forms, i. e!, associative connections, emotional 
 revivals, volitional and ethical reverberations. And all 
 this framework must be conceived as representative of unity 
 in variety, harmony, universality, in a particular sphere. 
 That is, higher aesthetic feeling arises only by the tendency 
 of the abstracting and generalizing function to transcend 
 its immediate presented material. The complete aesthetic 
 coefficient, like the ethical end, is an ideal and cannot for 
 that very reason be given adequate formulation. 
 
 Emotions Allied to the Esthetic. The violation of 
 certain elements in the requirements of beauty, w^hile the 
 
298 EMOTIONS OF RELATION: 
 
 other elements are present, gives rise to distinct emotions. 
 In the comic we have violations of the law of consistency. 
 The comic is the aesthetically abortive. A joke turns on 
 a misplaced grammatical or logical relation, whicli, if 
 properly placed, would have been aesthetic. A comic situa- 
 tion is an incongruity, where the conceptual process 
 demands congruity and anticipates it. Hence the elements 
 of surprise, disproportion, and disliarmony, in all humor 
 and wit. The comic is a matter largely of meaning. The 
 grotesque, on the other hand, is the comic of form. The 
 picturesque illustrates a similar departure from normal 
 beauty, but not sufficiently so to lead to positive incon- 
 sistency. It applies especially to form, and is found in the 
 bold, sharp, irregular, unexpected in outline. In the 
 sublime the meaning attaches to particular feelings, those 
 aroused by the large, massive, forceful, and destructive ; it 
 seems also to include a coloring of fear and awe. 
 
 § 8. General Table of Feelings. 
 We have found the following divisions of feeling : 
 Qualitative Feelings 
 Sensuous Ideal 
 
 Common Special Common Special 
 
 Organic, Sensations | | 
 
 etc. Interest Reality Belief, 
 
 etc. 
 
 Emotions 
 
 Of Activity Of Content 
 
 Of Adjustment Of Function Presentative Relational 
 
 Self Objective 
 
 Logical Conceptual 
 
 Expressive Sympathetic 
 
 Systematic Ethical Esthetic 
 (Religious) 
 
CHAPTER XXII. 
 
 QUANTITY AND DURATION OF EMOTION.* 
 
 § 1. Quantity or Intensity. 
 
 Mental Excitement. The most general predicate which 
 we can make of the states of feeling arising about mental 
 operations is expressed by the term excitement. The word 
 means stimulation, and as physical stimuli bring about a 
 more or less diffused physical reaction or bodily excitement, 
 so presentations, ideas, stimulate higher states of feeling 
 in forms all of which exliibit the diffused property called 
 excitement. If we picture a logical machine, with no 
 feeling whatever, turning out s^'llogisms, we picture at the 
 same time the absence of that excitement which makes the 
 mind in its logical character different from such a machine. 
 "Coolness" is the popular word — "calmness" is more fit- 
 ting — to denote the absence of emotional excitement. For 
 the present we will consider such excitement on its con- 
 scious side, and call it mental, leaving the question of its 
 relation to nervous diffusion until its inner aspects have 
 been pointed out. 
 
 Relativity of Feeling. The general nature of feeling, as 
 dependent upon physical and mental processes, accounts 
 for its extreme variability in different and in the same cir- 
 cumstances. If feeling arises everywhere in consciousness 
 the present state of feeling must result from a great com- 
 plexity of bodily and mental conditions. The principle 
 of contrast has already been applied to the phenomena 
 of sensation,^ and its application to emotional states is 
 evident. 
 
 ' Cf . Handbook of Psychology, vol. ii. chap. x. 
 
 ' Above, p. 85. 
 
 S99 
 
300 qUANTITT AND DURATIOI{ OF EMOTION. 
 
 Emotional Expression. As the facts of hypnotism 
 show, tlie emotions belong in the reactive consciousness. 
 As forms of excitement they represent conditions of intense 
 stimulation, and find their physical basis in processes of 
 pronounced nervous change. As excitement simply, apart 
 from qualitative differences, emotion indicates a diffusive 
 outgoing wave of nervous action consequent upon height- 
 ened processes in the centers of the brain. Viewed qualita- 
 tively the particular emotions are correlated to nervous 
 discharges in particular directions and portions of the 
 nervous apparatus, issuing in muscular contractions to a 
 large degree differentiated and peculiar. Such muscular 
 indications of emotion are most clearl}^ marked in tlie face, 
 though the more intense extend to the limbs, and finally 
 take the form of massive and convulsive movements of the 
 trunk. So familiar are we with these forms of emotional 
 expression, and so expert have we become in reading them, 
 both from experience and by heredity, that our responses 
 to them are instinctive. Only the practiced observer is 
 able to analyze the common facial indications which we all 
 readily construe in terms of answering emotion. 
 
 A good deal of progress has been made by psychologists 
 in assigning to the different emotions their peculiar cor- 
 relatives in the muscular system. In general, each main 
 emotion expresses itself, not by the contraction of a single 
 muscle, but of a co-ordinated group of muscles. The smile 
 or weeping of an infant is, at the start, a matter of very 
 extended muscular innervation, and in adult life the entire 
 countenance seems to take on the semblance of thought or 
 laughter, and to support the brow or mouth in its assump- 
 tion of the leading role. The general facts of the case, 
 as respects the leading presentative emotions, are readily 
 observed by noting others, or by simulating emotion before 
 a mirror ; it is unnecessar}^ to go further into details which 
 are endless and wearisome. 
 
 The hypnotic state, especially the condition called by 
 
PHYSICAL BASIS OF EMOTION. 301 
 
 the Paris scliool catalepsy, affords a striking method of 
 studying expression.' 
 
 The fundamental emotional expressions are impulsive. 
 The child inherits the necessary vital reactions for its life 
 and growtli, and, besides these, certain muscular contrac- 
 tions indicative of pleasure and pain, joy and sorrow, i. e., 
 smiling, weeping, crowing, sobbing, etc. Very early more 
 distinct emotions grow up wath corresponding ready 
 formed reactions — fear, wonder, anger, love, jealousy, etc. 
 It is probable, from what we know of mental grow^th, that 
 the rise of these early emotions waits upon the development 
 of their appropriate nervous basis : which means also that 
 it waits upon the development of certain cortical centers. 
 Such general emotional expressions are either elevating 
 and exciting, or depressing and inhibiting. 
 
 Physical Basis of Emotion. Conceiving the problem of 
 expression under its widest reacli, the view required both 
 by the physiology of the nervous system and by the facts 
 of consciousness comes plainly out. Let us call the aspect 
 of nervous processes which belongs peculiarly to emotional 
 excitement the nervous coefficient of emotion, substituting 
 this phrase for the question-begging word expression. The 
 question then is : In what kind of a nervous process does 
 this coefficient consist? AYhat nervous process varies — 
 rises and falls, grows or contracts in extent — with corre- 
 sponding variations in conscious feeling ? 
 
 Now in the general conception of the nervous system 
 stated above, we found that personal consciousness was 
 present only when the system attained high integration. 
 We have also found that sensibility is only another name for 
 consciousness : intense consciousness is intense sensibility 
 or excitement. Excitement, therefore, is the kind of con- 
 sciousness which arises when nervous integration is intense, 
 i. e.f very complex and very unstable. This is the nervous 
 coefficient of emotion. Emotional expression is, then, the 
 ^ Compare Biuet and Fere, A niimd Magnetism, p. :iTT. 
 
302 QUANTITY AND DURATION OF EMOTION. 
 
 outgoing side of the nervous coefficient. Complexit}^ at the 
 centers means diffusion in discharge ; instability at the 
 centers means facility of discharge — just the two character- 
 istics of emotional expression. 
 
 Conscious Difiusion of Emotion. The element of dif- 
 fusion already pointed out in the nervous basis of emotion is 
 a marked characteristic, also, of mental excitement. Strong 
 emotions spread themselves out over the whole content of 
 consciousness, and our thought current becomes grave, gay, 
 elevated, depressed accordingly. Not only so, but we 
 objectify our feeling to an extent. The external Avorld 
 takes on the color of our mood. This is probably due to 
 our lack of control over strong emotion : we are unable 
 either to banish it or to pin it down to its peculiar object. 
 It is also especially true of the more deep-seated organic 
 conditions which give tone to consciousness as a whole. 
 Dysj^epsia is the most notorious enemy to good spirits. 
 
 Emotion and Passion.' Do we love our friends when 
 we are not thinking of them ? The answer to this question 
 introduces us to the great class of facts covered by tlie 
 ^\o\'di p(issio7i. By passion is meant the growth of emotion 
 in depth at the expense of expression. What we have 
 already learned of physical and mental habit would lead 
 us to expect a consolidation of emotions in a few great 
 habitual forms of reaction ; for this is what we find both 
 in the nervous organism and in the intellectual life. Nerv- 
 ous reactions become organized in subconscious motor 
 intuitions ; mental reactions become organized in percep- 
 tions, subconscious beliefs, and interests : so emotions take 
 on mentally subconscious forms. They become so habitual 
 as to be unremarked except when some new occasion calls 
 them out in the shape of emotional excitement. A man's 
 love for his fiancee is a matter of constant consciousness 
 and expression ; his love for his wife — it takes a burning 
 
 ' The word passion corresponds to Kant's Leidenschaft. The Gax- 
 inaus use Afekt to cover emotion as excitement. 
 
THEORIES OF EMOTION. 303 
 
 house or a drowning accident to bring fully into his con- 
 sciousness. Emotional excitement, however, remains the 
 method of expression of passion, and in popular speech the 
 term passion is given to such violent expressions them- 
 selves. The real passion, however, is deep-seated prevailing 
 emotional motive ; it enters profoundly into our notion of 
 character. 
 
 Among the most marked passions some are clearly in- 
 herited, others may be traced in their development from 
 occasional recurring experiences of emotion. The most 
 distinct classes of passions may be designated affections 
 and sentiments. Affections arise from the more interested 
 and personal classes of emotions : examples are sympathy, 
 love, contempt, be?ievolence, stoicism, pessimism. Senti- 
 ments spring rather from the more objective, disinterested 
 emotions : examples are reverence, respect, religious or irre- 
 ligious attitudes, love of beauty, morality, etc. 
 
 Theories of Emotion. Three general views are held as 
 to the nature of emotional excitement : intellectual theo- 
 ries hold that all feeling is ideal feeling, taking its rise 
 from the relation of ideas to one another as opposing or 
 reinforcing. This theory fails confessedly to account for 
 sensuous feeling. Physiological theories make all feel- 
 ing sensuous feeling in compounds of varying degrees of 
 complexity. Emotion is a higher form of organic pleasure 
 and pain, a biological function. This theory fails to 
 account for higher emotion, or, indeed, for feeling-qualities 
 generally. It involves a doctrine of unity of composition 
 throughout the entire affective life. Original theories are 
 opposed to these in holding, in some form, that feeling- 
 qualities are original subjective facts. The entire forego- 
 ing exposition of feeling is an argument for the "original" 
 view. 
 
 Reproduction of Emotion. From what has been said of 
 the conditions of the rise of emotion, the laws of its repro- 
 duction are evident. If emotion is present onl^- when aij 
 
304 QUANTITY AND DURATION OF EMOTION. 
 
 ideal object is present, and if an ideal object is present only 
 when the brain conditions of earlier sensation are reinstated, 
 then the laws of association of ideas with their basis in 
 dynamic cerebral processes are also the laws of the revival 
 of emotional excitement. 
 
 In conscionsness the dependence of revived emotion upon 
 revived ideas has the same evidence as that of first-hand 
 emotion upon presentations, ^. e., the evidence of invariable 
 concomitance. Among these ideas, however, we find re- 
 membered muscular and organic sensations. I may repro- 
 duce grief either by recalling a grievous event or by throw- 
 ing my countenance into the form of grief expression. If 
 I fail to get one of these, I fail to reproduce the emotion. 
 
 Further, we would expect the suggested emotion to vary 
 as one or another coefficient of reality attaches to tlie 
 revived experience. When an evefit is remembered and 
 recognized as a real event in my past life, the emotion it 
 arouses has a new qualitj^ from the fact of its present real 
 setting. I may remember my past object of wrath witli 
 present gratitude or affection, mj^ past hopes with present 
 regret, my past fears with present complacency. Or I may 
 voluntarily banish my present flow of thought, reinstate all 
 the conditions of the first experience, and thus bring back 
 the original emotion. In case of the memory of sensational 
 experiences, the reality feeling is much stronger and the 
 same emotion comes back with more or less force. This is 
 because the object is in these cases bound more closely with 
 my own feeling, and with difficulty put in a new emotionnl 
 setting. 
 
 As far as the same emotion is revived, it is not siniph^ a 
 picture of a former state, but a real state of feeling. When 
 I remember a pain, I am in pain ; but not necessarily in the 
 same pain. For example, I remember vividly a toothache, 
 I have a real pain at present, but it is not a toothache. By 
 the fact of memorv, it has lost its sensational coefficient, 
 but it has the memor^^ coefficient, and is real, It may by 
 
TRANSFER OF EMOTION BY ASSOCIATION. 305 
 
 its intensity become a real toothache, ^. e., get its sensa- 
 tional coefficient again, thus becoming an illusion. Tiie 
 picturing of the facial elements of expression is the most 
 immediate representative means of awaking similar feelings 
 — a widening of tlie fact already noted of the emotion of 
 sympath}^ 
 
 This affords an explanation of what is known as the con- 
 tagion of emotion in crowds, and on a broader scale, in com- 
 mon sentiments in communities and states. In a crowd, 
 fear will spread witli amazing rapidity, probably by the 
 semi-unconscious interpretation of muscular and vocal ex- 
 pression. So the styles of taste, morality, and custom are 
 inhaled, so to speak, from tlie emotional atmosphere in 
 which we live. 
 
 Transfer of Emotion by Association. It is a matter of 
 clear experience, also, that emotional excitement gets trans- 
 ferred by association to ideas by which it is not originally 
 aroused. The color black has become doleful and sad from 
 mourning associations, tlie sight of the postman in the 
 morning brings joyful emotion ; in fact, interests of the 
 deeper kind, as has been already remarked, arise from the 
 expenditure of emotion or action upon things at first unin- 
 teresting. The whole range of symbolism aud suggestive- 
 ness in art rests upon this fact of accrued feeling, when the 
 ideas from which it has accrued have become vague or sub- 
 conscious. 
 
 Conflict of Emotions. All mental conflicts are conflicts 
 of feeling. So-called conflicting ideas are those which are 
 felt to be in conflict, ^. e., those which introduce conflict 
 into the life of feeling. So the much talked of conflict of 
 feeling and reason is purely a conflict of feelings. Reason 
 here means the moving aspect of thought, the strength of 
 truth in setting the subject into action. I might apprehend 
 a truth clearly and yet find no conflict between it and my 
 life which denies it. It is only as it moves me, as I have an 
 emotion for it, that it makes a conflict for supremacy. But 
 
306 QUANTITY AND DURATION OF EMOTION. 
 
 emotional conflicts are real and tragic, especially when tbey 
 play around questions of duty. And it is the degree of 
 persistence and strength of the underlying ideas that gives 
 and takes the victory. Emotional conflicts, therefore, indi- 
 cate the hold that various kinds of truths have upon the 
 agent. One man surrenders to the sensational coefiicient: 
 tlie sensuous ; another gets an easy victory for the distant 
 and ideal ; while a third lives a life of irresolution or deci- 
 sion according to the accidental appeals of one truth or 
 another. 
 
 § 2. Duration of Emotion. 
 
 It is, of course, only a truism to say that emotions last 
 only as long as their causes last, but the twofold basis, 
 physical and intellectual, of emotion gives the truism some 
 special bearings. Cases are recorded of the absence of the 
 intellectual object and the continuance of the emotion, its 
 expression being obtrusive and vehement. It is less fre- 
 quent, but real, also, that emotional expression may be 
 apparently lacking, as in intense aesthetic, ethical, and 
 spiritual feeling. 
 
 Emotional Cessation and Relief. It follow^s also, from 
 the foregoing, that relief from emotion may be artificially 
 courted. Indulgence in strong outbursts of feeling tends 
 to allay their causes ; it exhausts the nervous processes 
 involved and induces other emotions. Knocking a man 
 down satisfies my feeling of vengeance more from the new 
 emotion of justice or honor vindicated than front nervous 
 expenditure ; but both satisfactions are real. Relief by 
 nervous expenditure follows, especially, in cases of emotion 
 which excite to action. It is always a relief to have done 
 something in an enjotional emergency whether it be suc- 
 cessful and wise or not. 
 
 Again, there is a great class of emotions which sharing 
 tends to relieve. Novelists make much of the smoldering 
 piQtlf in the growth of feeling. The immediate ef ect of 
 
EMOTIONAL CESSATION AND RELIEF. 307 
 
 sharing a personal emotion is to temper it by the sense of 
 sympathy and social community. Psychologically, several 
 elements enter in this sense of relief : a feeling arises that 
 the friend confided in justifies and defends the emotion ; 
 also, a feeling that help and support are secured. And 
 there is further relief by the cessation of the feeling of 
 isolation and loneliness which is the reverse of social 
 feeling. 
 
 Relief from sliaring is, however, temporary unless 
 assisted by other agencies. And the return of feeling is 
 more intense from the sense of social support. Apart from 
 its immediate effects, which are largely nervous, sharing 
 deepens emotion by fixing the ideal causes in the attention, 
 expanding the reasons for feeling fully in consciousness, 
 and giving additional associations to keep it constantly in 
 mind. Mourning garments, cards, etc., undoubtedly keep 
 grief alive. We often have emotions because we feel that 
 it is expected of us.^ Yet often one of the old associations 
 that has long seemed the dried channel of a forgotten joy 
 or grief empties upon us an overwhelming flood of sweet 
 or bitter memories. Such experiences we call revulsions of 
 feeling, and they sometimes give a new turn to the per- 
 manent current of the affective life. 
 
 ^ When nine years of age the writer lost a brother, and his memory 
 of mourning is largely of his consciousness of the importance of the 
 occasion and his desire to do himself and his family credit by his 
 deportment. 
 
PART IV. 
 
 WILL, 
 
 MOTOR ASPECTS OF SENSUOUS FEELING. 
 
 CHAPTER XXIII. 
 
 THE MOTOR CONSCIOUSNESS. » 
 § 1. Idea of the Motor Consciousness. 
 
 By the motor consciousness is meant the ensetnble of ele- 
 ments in consciousness, contributed in any way by the 
 motor apparatus. If there be consciousness of the condi- 
 tion of the motor areas in the brain, of the process of the 
 outward flow of the nervous current, of the movements 
 taking place or having taken place — all are elements of 
 the motor consciousness. The phrase, therefore, is most 
 general ; and it may be defined as consciousness in as far 
 as it is co7icerned loith muscular oiiovemeiit. 
 
 Law of Mental Dynamogenesis. Empirical observation 
 tends overwhelmingly to confirm the inference we would 
 expect from the law of nervous dynamogenesis,* i. e., that 
 every state of consciousness tends to realize itself in an 
 appropriate muscular movement. The nervous application 
 of the law leads up at once to its application to sensibility. 
 If every ingoing process produces an outward tension, or 
 tendency to muscular discharge, and the more intense and 
 integrated conditions of the centers be more delicately 
 adjusted to such a play of incoming and outgoing proc- 
 esses, then we would expect elements of consciousness 
 
 *Cf. Handbook of Psychology, vol. ii. chap. : 'f. 
 
 8Above, p. 38. 
 
 308 
 
MOTOR VATME OF THE SUBCONSCIOUS. 309 
 
 peculiar to tlie motor reaction. That is, we would expect 
 the affective consciousness to merge into the motor con- 
 sciousness, just as the ingoing nervous process tends to the 
 discharge of energy into the outgoing courses. 
 
 The analogy, therefore, may be put something like this : 
 the nervous system in its development has taken on the two 
 functions called stimulation and reaction. When con- 
 sciousness arises it is at least — whatever else it be — 
 an aid through pleasure and pain to the life process, and to 
 the further development of the system. Analogy would 
 lead us to look, therefore, for this new factor in connection 
 with each of the two essential nervous functions, stim- 
 ulation and reaction. 
 
 The concomitance of the nerve processes and their con- 
 scious states, if the above analogy holds in a simple way, 
 is shown in Fig. 16, which represents 
 the normal motor consciousness by 
 means of the "motor square"; in which 
 circles (o) represent elements of con- „jc 
 sciousness and crosses (x) nervous 
 processes. (Cf. Fig. 12, p. 46.) 
 
 Varieties of Motor Consciousness. If 
 it be true that all states of consciousness 
 tend more or less strongl}^ to bring about appropriate 
 muscular reaction, we should find several phases in motor 
 consciousness. And this is true. It is our task, accord- 
 ingly, at this point, to trace the motor bearing of the 
 different kinds of consciousness which have been already 
 distinguished, i. e., to discuss the motor value of the sub- 
 conscious, of reactive, and of voluntary consciousness, 
 respectively. 
 
 § 2. Motor Value of the Subconscious. 
 
 The facts already adduced to illustrate subconscious phe- 
 nomena are largely motor facts. Motor phenomena which 
 fall below the threshold of conscious reaction, belong partly 
 
310 THE MOTOR CONSCIOUSNESS. 
 
 to tlie subconscious and partly to the unconscious ; that is, 
 partly to very weak sensibilit}^ and partly to sentience. 
 But it is impossible to draw a line of distinction between 
 thera, and the attempt to do so would be quite artificial. 
 We shall, therefore, mass such reactions together under the 
 above heading, claiming, at the same time, license to include 
 those reactions which are, as reactions, purely nervous. 
 
 In the case of a subconscious reaction, we come across 
 the curious fact that a nervous process itself insufficient to 
 call out sensibility may have muscular effects which are 
 quite sensible. We respond to stimuli which we do not 
 discern, and which we fail afterward, perhaps, to discover 
 by introspection. We often speak or write words which 
 we do not mean and have not been thinking of. Associa- 
 tions often lack conscious links. We respond to a settling 
 chair by balancing the body, to differences in the material 
 we tread upon by increased muscular tension. In short, 
 close observation leads to the conclusion that we are con- 
 stantly alert to our surroundings whew we are appar- 
 ently uiiconscious of them. The whole class of co-ordinat- 
 ing reflexes already described belong here. The most 
 unmistakable class of cases covers suggestions made in the 
 hypnotic state which are carried out many daj^s afterward 
 in the normal state, the individual being unable to give any 
 reason for his action. In this case, we seem to have abso- 
 lute unconsciousness, a physiological reaction apart from 
 an}^ modification in the major consciousness, whatever we 
 may say about the existence of a secondary consciousness. 
 There are other states which are very vaguely or dimly 
 conscious, such as presentations of objects, or memories of 
 events, so habitual as to be reacted upon without attention. 
 We walk about our own house, hang our hats up, and rub 
 our shoes, and then, when asked, are unable to tell whether 
 we did any such thing or not. We wind our watch at 
 night, and learn the fact later only by tr^nng to wind it 
 again. We suddenly discover ourselves half dressed in the 
 
MOTOR VALUE OF REACTIVE CONSCIOUSNESS. 311 
 
 morning in garments we bad decided to wear no more. 
 We take a walk, forget our errand, and soon " rein up " in 
 tlie most unexpected part of the city. In the horse-cars 
 we brace ourselves from tlie jolting, move up and give 
 anotlier half the seat, and often pay our fare without taking 
 our attention from the morning paper. A nervous man 
 will arrange his necktie or stroke his mustache fifty times a 
 da^^ without " knowing " it, and all of us have our little 
 motor habits, which we are conscious of, but do not 
 observe. Perhaps as clear a case of direct adaptation of 
 our movements to objects of which we are only passively 
 conscious, is the way we pass about in a well-filled drawing- 
 room when wrapped in thought, avoiding all obstacles by a 
 most circuitous and irregular route. 
 
 § 3. Motor Value of the Reactive Coxsciousness. 
 
 The reactive consciousness has already been characterized 
 with sufficient clearness. It is marked off from passive con- 
 sciousness by the presence of a reaction of the attention, 
 i. €., by the presence of reflex attention.* The terra reac- 
 tion brings clearly out the fact that, in such cases, the 
 attention is in response to an unexpected stimulus. As 
 has been said above, there is just as truly a reaction in con- 
 sciousness as there is in the nervous system, although the 
 elements of the reaction are often thrown out of their true 
 order when taken up into the discriminating process. For 
 example, I hear a loud, unexpected sound, and turn my 
 head involuntarily in the direction from which it seems to 
 come. The order of events appears to be this : first, the 
 sound ; then my sensation of sound ; then the attentive 
 
 ' The relations of these so called kinds of consciousness to attention 
 may be illustrated as follows : 
 
 r Passive Diffused \ 
 
 Consciousness •] Reactive Reflex y Attention. 
 
 ( VoluHtary Voluntary ) 
 
312 THE MOTOR CONSCIOUSNESS. 
 
 impulse carrying with it, first, the grosser movements of 
 the head and trunk, and afterward, the finer movements 
 of the eye-muscles, etc., engaged when the attention is 
 concentrated ; then a discrimination of the sound through 
 the attention ; and finally, a motor response to it. This is 
 not the order, however, in which I myself apprehend or 
 recognize the diiferent elements in the reaction. About 
 the first thing I know in such a case is that I have suddenly 
 turned my head and bod}^ and am concentrating my atten- 
 tion upon something which I now subsequently learn to be 
 a sound. 
 
 Elements of the Keactive Consciousness. Taking the 
 reaction, then, as a felt reaction, and considering its ele- 
 ments in the order made typical in cases of nervous reac- 
 tion, we find, first, a stimxdus to the reactive consciousness, 
 i. e., whatever affective or feeling element in consciousness 
 calls out an involuntary act of attention ; second, the feel- 
 ing of expenditure in an act of attention which is drawn 
 out without volition, whatever this feeling may be found 
 to include ; and third, the feelings of the muscular move- 
 7nents appropriate to the particular stimulus. 
 
 Of these three elements of the reactive consciousness, 
 the last may be considered as comprehending only the 
 feelings of movements already executed ; that is, feelings 
 coming in from the grosser muscles of the body, etc. 
 These constitute a clear kinsesthetic or efferent contribu- 
 tion to the motor consciousness. 
 
 The stimultis in this form of consciousness is treated in 
 a later connection ; so it remains for us to inquire into the 
 feelings which properly belong to the act of involuntary 
 attention itself, so-called feelings of expenditure. And 
 they must be considered independently of feelings of 
 voluntary effort ; if we are able to reach a coherent con- 
 clusion regarding expenditure alone, it will be of great 
 service to us when we come to consider effort. 
 
FEELING OF EXPEXDITURE m ATTENTION. 313 
 
 § 4. Feelixg of Expenditl'ke in Attextiox. 
 
 Description. Inspection of an act of involuntary atten- 
 tion leads to the detection of the following elements. 
 
 1. Feeling of IieacU?iess to Attend: 3Iental Potential. 
 Sucli a feeling of readiness or pote?itial hsLS already appeared 
 in connection with muscular movement. Muscular fresh- 
 ness and vigor pervade the entire organic system ; so readi- 
 ness to give attention or to do intellectual work is a clear 
 and well marked state of consciousness. And the two seem 
 to be, in part at least, distinct from each other. After con- 
 tining myself to my writing table all the morning my atten- 
 tion loses its elasticity and readiness of concentration ; but 
 my muscular system begins to feel an overabundance of 
 energy, a pressing readiness for exercise. And when I give 
 up my intellectual task and indulge my craving for exer- 
 cise, I have a peculiar feeling of throwing off the mental 
 weight, of getting rid of the thraldom of ideas, in the easy 
 enjoyment of muscular activity. However we may account 
 for it, the difference in consciousnes's between feelings of 
 intellectual and of ni{mGi\\a.v potential is well marked. In- 
 tellectual readiness probably includes both nervous and 
 muscular freshness. 
 
 2. Feeling of Fatigue of Attention. The state of the 
 case is about the same between intellectual and muscular 
 fatigue. The question whether there is nervous fatigue 
 apart from the fatigue of particular muscles has already 
 been adverted to. It is difficult to divide this question in 
 two parts and suppose purely intellectual fatigue apart 
 from nervous fatigue. The feeling of fatigue in attention 
 may be taken, provisionally at least, to include, first, fatigue 
 of the nervous system, eitlier in the sensorium as a whole, 
 or in the particular elements which are brought into play in 
 the activity which occasions the fatigue, and, second, an 
 element of lowered muscular tone. 
 
 3. Feeling of Actirlfg in InroJuntary Attention. The 
 
314 THE MOTOn COKSCIOUSNESS. 
 
 central point of expenditure is reached in Che feeling 
 of actual activity during the attention. If readiness pre- 
 cedes the attention, and if fatigue follows it, what feeling 
 do we have during it — at the very moment of it ? Is there 
 a feeling of activity, apart from the feelings of all kinds 
 now described ? 
 
 Sensorial and Intellectual Attention. Further, involun- 
 tary attention is either sensorial, i. e., terminating on a part 
 of the body or on an object, or intellectual, i. e., terminating 
 on an image. The case of the sound which causes a start 
 is typical of the former : the play of images in passive 
 imagination, or reverie, when all control is withdrawn, illus- 
 trates the latter. The question before us may be put sepa- 
 rately for these two cases ; and the word "thought" will 
 be used to designate the play of ideas in apperception, apart 
 from any voluntary influence we may have over them. 
 
 The problem of the feeling of attention is thus simplified, 
 and three plain questions now confront us : First, are we 
 conscious of nervous outgo from the brain, or is our con- 
 sciousness only of the -effect of such outgo? Second, arc 
 we conscious of an activity of attention or thought, or only 
 of the effects of such an activity, that is, of thinking 
 thoughts, or only of thought thoughts ? And third, are 
 these two forms of consciousness one and the same thing ? 
 
 § 5. Theory of Feeling op Activity in Reflex 
 Attention. 
 
 Association or Effect Theory of Reflex Attention. 
 This theory regards reflex attention as an associated mass 
 of incoming muscular feelings and memories of such feel- 
 ings. It accordingly holds, in answer to the third question, 
 that the feeling of sensorial attention is the same in kind 
 as that of intellectual attention, the feelings involved in the 
 two cases arising from different classes of muscles and 
 muscular memories. Thus sensorial attention involves feel- 
 ings from limbs moved, with their traces left in memory, 
 
ACTIVITY iy REFLEX ATTENTTOX. 315 
 
 wliile feelings of intellectual attention are only from certain 
 muscles of the eye and eyebrow, skin of the skull, respira- 
 tion muscles, etc., with memories of former acts of atten- 
 tion. 
 
 Witliout citing detailed evidence this position seems well 
 made out ; it suffices, in proof, to observe that the feeling 
 of muscular expenditure is not present when the attention 
 is entirely absent. If my arm is raised mechanically by a 
 friend who comes softly behind me and grasps my hand I 
 do not feel muscular expenditure ; the feeling is quite 
 absent. After many such movements I begin to feel 
 fatigue, it is true, but it is clearly muscular fatigue : an 
 effect reported by the afferent process. The same is seen 
 in cases of sudden twitching of the muscles, due to isolated 
 discharges in the brain, and in pure reflexes : they are 
 known only after their occurrence. Consequentlj' the third 
 question may be thus disposed of. 
 
 In the next place, this theory replies to the second ques- 
 tion, above, i. e.. Are we conscious of the activity, process, 
 of thought, or -are we conscious only of the product of 
 thought? of thought relating, or of thought* relations ? 
 The answer is that we are conscious only of the latter, of 
 thoughts after they are thought. Whenever we catch 
 ourselves thinking either we feel that we have just thought 
 something or that we are just going to think something. 
 There is no process between the absence of the second term 
 of my thought and its presence, no gap at all. For ex- 
 ample, a loud sound calls my attention ; there is no interval 
 of conscious thinking, no feeling of thinking, between the 
 absence of the sound and its presence. The whole case is 
 a succession of feelings thrown into temporar}^ confusion 
 by a new feeling, and the eureJca-ieeXmg that results, when 
 I recognize the sound, is only the fortunate circumstance 
 that the series ends in a feeling that is familiar. Even 
 granted, moreover, that there is a synthesis in thought, yet 
 it is known by the presence of such synthetic constructions 
 
316 THE MO Ton C0N8CI0USKESS. 
 
 in tlioiiglit, not by any consciousness of tlie process of 
 making them. 
 
 This point, again, seems to be well taken as regards tlie 
 actual elements in consciousness at any given stage of 
 thought. It is a mistake to say that we feel a synthetic 
 activity in consciousness when volition is absent : all that 
 we feel is the coming together and disjoining again of 
 elements. That this is the result of an activity is an im- 
 plication, a necessary presupposition, not a felt fact. 
 
 Accordingly only the first of our three questions remains 
 for this theory to give reply to, i. e., Are we conscious of 
 nervous currents as tliey pass out of the brain, or are we 
 conscious only of the effects of such currents in actual 
 movements of the muscles ? The question is here limited 
 to cases of reactive consciousness or reflex attention, as 
 before. 
 
 The effect theory is not slow to answer this question 
 in accordance with its general tenor. Its advocates chal- 
 lenge their opponents to produce any case of such feelings 
 of expenditure that cannotlbe explained in terms of afferent 
 sensation. The present state of the discussion is briefly 
 indicated in a later connection.* 
 
 § 6. CoNCLUSiox ON Reflex Attextiox. 
 
 From the foregoing the conclusion is that as far as there 
 is a consciousness of self in reflex attention it is an objec- 
 tive, felt self, rather than a subjective, feeling, active self. 
 Whatever ground may be found subsequent!}^ for such an 
 active executive self, we find no such ground here. 
 
 This conclusion is thrown into prominence by the entire 
 group of facts of hypnotism. Here the subject is quite 
 and entirely reactive. His consciousness of his own power 
 of choice, exertion, initiative, is gone, and the mechanical 
 nature of his nervous processes works up through the rela- 
 tional consciousness which he still has. Instead of having 
 ' Below, chap. xxvV § 1. 
 
CONCLUSION ON REFLEX ATTENTION. 317 
 
 a suggestion from without, let us suppose him acting from 
 simple sense-stimuli, or from memories thrown into his 
 consciousness from within, and the whole case is plain 
 before us. Whatever feeling of activity a hypnotized man 
 may have, it is evidently an activity of his nervous system, 
 as it reflects the activity of the mind of someone else. 
 
CHAPTER XXIY. 
 
 STIMULI TO INVOLUNTARY MOVEMENT.* 
 
 Notion of Stimulus. An involuntary reaction in move- 
 ment has already been analyzed into its three aspects or 
 parts, i. e.f stimulus, consciousness of reaction, and actual 
 movement. Further, the second of these elements lias 
 been reduced to the third in cases where volition does not 
 enter. Leaving the third for discussion in connection with 
 voluntary movement, it remains to inquire into the nature 
 of the various stimulations which issue in conscious but 
 involuntary reaction. 
 
 By stimulus is meant the affective experience of any 
 kind which tends to issue in conscious motor reaction. 
 Looked at from the side of the nervous system it is the 
 new element of tension, whence ever it comes, which dis- 
 turbs the equilibrium outward. And from what we 
 already know of the nervous system we readily see that 
 such new elements of tension may come either from some 
 condition of the nervous organism or from outside the 
 system. Accordingly stimuli to the reactive consciousness 
 may be distinguished as organic and extra-organic. 
 
 § 1. Kinds of Motor Stimuli. 
 
 I. Extra-organic Stimuli to Movement: Beflexes. 
 
 The various special kinds of stimulation, as light, sound, 
 etc., have already been sufficiently discussed, as also have 
 the external causes of the more obscure phases of sen- 
 sibility. 
 
 All reflexes are stimulated from without, and they cover 
 a wide range of phenomena. They occur in earliest child-v 
 * Ct San^ook of Psychology, vol. ii. chap, xiii, 
 
 m 
 
SUGGESTION AS MOTOR STIMULUS 319 
 
 hood, i. e., sucking, winking, and probably the first 
 essentials of walking — a reflex alternation of the legs — 
 swallowing, etc. 
 
 Suggestion as Motor Stimulus.^ By suggestion is 
 meant a great class of phenomena typified by the abrupt 
 entrance from without into consciousness of an idea or 
 image which becomes a part of the stream of thought and 
 tends to produce the muscular and volitional effects which 
 ordinarily follow ujion its presence. I suggest a course of 
 action to my friend — he may adopt it. Besides this fact 
 of ideal suggestion there is what may be called ph]/siological 
 suggestion : covering the same class of phenomena in cases 
 where the suggestion does not attain the standing of a 
 conscious image, but remains subconscious. It is called 
 physiological because the nervous process, as in all cases of 
 very faint degrees of consciousness, is largely self-acting or 
 reflex. By physiological suggestion, therefore, is meant 
 the bringing about of a reaction subconsciously by means of 
 an extra-organic stimulus. 
 
 The clearest examples of such suggestions occur in sleep. 
 Words spoken to the sleeper get intelligently answered. 
 Positions given to his limbs lead to others ordinarily 
 associated with them ; the sleeper defends himself, with- 
 draws from danger, etc., etc. The early development of 
 the child's consciousness proceeds largely by such sugges- 
 tions. Before mental images are definitely formed and 
 subject to association we find many motor reactions stimu- 
 lated by such physiological suggestions from the environ- 
 ment. 
 
 From physiological the child passes to sensori-motor 
 suggestion, the type of reaction which illustrates most 
 clearly the law of dynamogenesis already stated.'^ In this 
 case it is a sensation, a clear state of consciousness, which 
 
 ' Cf. the writer's observjitions upon liis child m Science, xvil, 
 (1891), pp. 113 ff. 
 ' Above, p. 308. 
 
820 STIMULI TO INVOLUNTARY MOVEMENT. 
 
 liberates motor energy and produces movement. Besides 
 the inherited sensori-motor couples, which are numerous 
 and well marked, other reactions grow up early in life and 
 become habitual. Of the latter the following may be 
 mentioned in particular : 
 
 1. Sleep-suggestions. The early surroundings and 
 methods of inducing sleep become powerful reinforcements 
 of the child's drowsiness, or even substitutes for it.^ 
 
 2. Food and clothing suggestions. These represent the 
 spheres of most frequent and highly spiced joys and sor- 
 rows, and their reactions soon take on the involuntary and 
 yet highly purposive character which marks our adult atti- 
 tudes toward dress and the table. 
 
 3. Suggestions of personality . The child shows prefer- 
 ences for individuals at a remarkably early age. He seems 
 to learn and respond to a personal presence as a whole. 
 Probably the voice is the first indication of his nurse's or 
 mother's personality to which he responds, then touch, then 
 the sight of the face. 
 
 4. Imitative suggestion. The simple imitation of move- 
 ments and sounds, clearly manifested about tlie seventh 
 month of life. 
 
 In ideo-motor or ideal suggestion we pass to the motor 
 aspects of images, reproductions. And here the motor 
 accompaniments are largely associations and follow the 
 laws of association. As soon, further, as reproductions 
 come up, with their suggested trains, we find the rise of 
 will : that is, they become stimuli to the voluntary con- 
 sciousness — a topic for later discussion. Yet there is a 
 state of conflict and hindrance among presentations which 
 is mechanical in its issue, the attention being drawn in a 
 reflex way. So states of vexation, divided counsel, con- 
 flicting impulse, and hasty decision against one's desire for 
 deliberate choice. We often find ourselves drawn violently 
 apart, precipitated through a whirl of suggested courses 
 ' See the writer's detailed observations, loc. cit. 
 
ORGANIC STIMULI TO MOVEMENT. 321 
 
 into a course we feel unwilling to own as our own. This 
 is the case in the disease called aboulia, or loss of will. Tlie 
 man is prey to conflicting impulses. This state, called by 
 tlie writer deliberative suggestion, characterizes many 
 actions of the young cliihl before will is clearly exercised.^ 
 
 II. Organic Stimuli to Movement. Again, the results 
 of the former classification of the organic sources of feeling 
 serve to cover a great area of the present topic. In general, 
 any condition of the organism, be it active or passive, 
 which is suflicient to reach consciousness, tends to muscular 
 expression, either natural or acquired. Any derangement 
 of the digestion, respiration, or circulation quickens or 
 deadens muscular tone, and conies out, if not in the face, 
 yet in the conduct of the man. The muscular feelings 
 themselves, so large a portion of the "general sensibility," 
 reflect direct changes in the tendency and direction of 
 motor reactions. Diseases of the nervous system find their 
 diagnosis in their effects upon the muscular apparatus : 
 paralysis means rigidity ; epilepsy, convulsions ; sleep, 
 flabbiness of the muscles. The effects of organic stimula- 
 tion upon the motor consciousness is best seen in conditions 
 of pleasure and pain. 
 
 Expressive Reactions. Among direct or native reac- 
 tions an important class are called expressive: they are 
 differentiated muscular movements which reflect uniformly 
 various affective states of consciousness. These reactions 
 have already been discussed above.^ 
 
 Pleasure and Pain as Stimuli to Movement. Perliaps 
 the most direct and invariable stimulus to involuntary 
 movement is pain. And its motor force is independent, as 
 it seems, of the intrinsic experience of which it is the tone. 
 The motor force of a sensation of light, for example, may 
 be in direct antagonism to the motor force of the pain 
 which the light causes to a diseased eye. Despair begets 
 
 ^ See the article just cited for a detailed example, 
 » Above, p. 300. 
 
•322 STIMULI TO INVOLUNTABY MOVEMENT. 
 
 inaction, but the painf ulness of it begets restlessness. This 
 is only to say that the tone is an element of sensibility 
 apart from the sensation it accompanies, and that both the 
 one and the other have motor force. 
 
 Yet the fact that there are no experiences absolutely in- 
 different as respects pleasure or pain gives tlie motor aspect 
 of them an universality and importance which must be 
 acknowledged and provided for in anj^ mental theory. It 
 is a question answered often in the negative whether any 
 course of conduct is ever pursued without primary reference 
 to the pleasure it will bring or the pain it will avoid. 
 However this question may be answered, it may be said at 
 this point that no line of muscular reaction is possible in 
 which an element of motor discharge due to pleasure or 
 pain has not entered. This must be true if the funda- 
 mental position is true that every ingoing process alters the 
 equilibrium of the central system and modifies the direction 
 of its outward tendency. Pleasure and pain arising from 
 bodily states may, therefore, be called the most general 
 internal stimuli to the reactive consciousness. 
 
 Nature of Pleasure and Pain Reactions. We have 
 already seen that moderate activities are generally pleas- 
 urable. It would be expected, therefore, that pain would 
 have a deadening and quieting effect upon the muscular 
 system : that such an effect would tend, by reducing mus- 
 cular activity to a moderate amount, to alleviate the pain 
 and induce pleasure. It may, as a fact, be said that a 
 painful motor reaction tends to suppress itself. 
 
 Again, in cases of extreme pain, we would expect, in 
 addition to the above, that the activities of other motor 
 elements would reinforce the inhibitory process, i. e., draw 
 off energy from the painful reaction. Accordingly we 
 find that violent pain stimulates a diffused and convulsive 
 motor reaction. 
 
 And yet again, since pleasure accompanies moderate 
 function, we would expect the same two considerations \q 
 
MOTOR SPONTANEITY. 323 
 
 operate for the continuance of a pleasurable reaction ; 
 namely, that the life process would be furthered by the 
 repetition of a pleasurable reaction, and by the quieting of 
 other activities which interfere with it and dissipate its 
 energ\\ Hence we may say, a 2^^^ctsiirable motor reaction 
 tends to jyersist. 
 
 Motor Spontaneity. The observation of infants clearly 
 tends to show tliat movement is no less original a fact than 
 feeling. It is impossible to say whether all antenatal 
 movements are in response to feeling conditions, as claimed 
 by some, just as it is impossible to prove that the begin- 
 ning of feeling is possible only after sufficient physical 
 organization to make motor reaction possible, as claimed 
 by others. It is altogether probable that the two kinds 
 of phenomena are equally original, and depend upon each 
 other. This is certainly the case, at any rate, at the dawn 
 of independent life. Internal conditions of the organism 
 itself are sufficient stimuli to an endless variety of move- 
 ments. Such reactions, which are simply the discharges, 
 the outbursts, of the organism, independent of definite 
 external stimulation, are called sjyotitaneoifs. So the inces- 
 sant random movements of infants and the extraordinary 
 rubber-like activity of the year-old child. 
 
 The movements of infants seem to indicate greater 
 intensity of motor feeling than is found in adults. A 
 child's extreme restlessness is due to a high feeling of 
 2)otential or readiness of discharge ; and fatigue is accom- 
 panied by a correspondingly complete collapse of muscular 
 movements. This follows from the mobility of the infant's 
 cerebral elements before they are pressed into definite 
 connections and systems which give them greater inertia, 
 on the one hand, and greater general capacities for con- 
 tinued expenditure on the other. 
 
 Upon this superfluity of motor energy is built up the 
 so-called play-instincfj which is not definite enougli in its 
 channels to be classed properly as an instinct. The energv 
 
324 STIMULI TO INVOLUNTARY MOVEMENT. 
 
 of the muscles is brought under voluntaiy control to gratify 
 other senses than the muscular sense itself. Educationally, 
 play is important, as tending to give the child mobility of 
 movement, and a sense of arrangement, form, and complex 
 situation ; it is also a valuable aid to the growth of the 
 inventive and constructive faculty. 
 
 § 2. Impulse and Instinct. 
 
 In the foregoing section the stimuli to the reactive con- 
 sciousness have been seen to come from within or without 
 the organism. As originating mainly within they may be 
 called in general impulsive, and as originating mainly with- 
 out, iiistinctive. With such an inexact distinction for the 
 present, the more definite inquiry into imjiulse and instinct 
 may be begun. 
 
 Impulse. By an impulsive character we understand 
 one in which activity predominates ; but activity of a 
 somewhat capricious kind. We contrast a creature of 
 impulse with a creature of reason. And this means more 
 than that the impulsive individual can give no adequate 
 reason for his outbursts ; it means also that no one else 
 can. Impulses are essentially unreasonable to the onlooker. 
 They are capricious in the sense that they are, to a degree, 
 idiosyncratic. 
 
 In this case, as in so many others, the result of close 
 anal^^sis is only a confirmation of our ordinary definition. 
 Looked at from the side of pliysiology, sensory and motor 
 processes are such only as they are correlative and antithetic 
 to each other. The physiological unit is an arc, a reaction. 
 Psychologically we find a similar state of things. At the 
 beginning, as far as investigation can discover, there is an 
 element of motor feeling — of going out, as well as of taking 
 in. And this "going out " element gets to itself, wherever 
 we find consciousness, a kind of personality or idiosyncrasy, 
 seen in its selective reactions, and in the kind of character 
 which it builds up. The ribs, so to speak, of consciousness 
 
IMPTILSB. 325 
 
 go in pairs, just as the sensor and motor nerves serve as rib- 
 pairs in the nervous system ; and taken together as pairs tliey 
 constitute, on our last analysis, the foundation of all con- 
 scious life. In dealing with sensibility we are dealing 
 with one side of this pair. What sensibility is is an in- 
 scrutable mystery : it is an ultimate psychological fact. 
 And the same is true of impulse : it is tl>e other element in 
 tlie fundamental pair. 
 
 Yet, in the way of description, we may make the fol- 
 lowing observations about impulse, in the light of what we 
 know of phj'siology and of general consciousness. 
 
 1. Impulse belongs to t/ie reactive co)iscioi(S7iess : it does 
 not involve deliberation and will. A deliberative character 
 is a man who controls his impulses, that is, one who brings 
 his will to bear effectually upon his impulses. On the other 
 hand, very strong and varied impulses tend to overpower 
 and paral^^ze the will. Impulse should therefore find its 
 general condition in the physiology and psychology of the 
 involuntary life. It follows.that the end of impulse is not 
 pictured in consciousness. 
 
 2. Impulses are never quite beyond control in normal 
 circumstances. They are sufficiently internal and unreflex 
 to be subject to voluntary negation. Yet their influence 
 upon the volitional life may be very great, as appears later 
 in the consideration of them as motives to action. In cases 
 of long indulgence or weak resolution their subjugation can 
 only be indirectly accomplished ; that is, by the active 
 pursuit of other lines of activity, by which the force of the 
 unprofitable impulse is drained off into adjacent channels. 
 
 3. The idiosyncratic character of impulse must be due 
 largely to constitutional tendencies of individuals derived 
 from inheritance or from peculiar conditions of life. The 
 effects of inheritance in this particular are very marked. 
 Nothing is so evidently inherited as active tempera- 
 ment. And in the individual life the growth and decay 
 of impulse is also easily observed. Discouraging circum- 
 
326 STTMXTLI TO mVOLXINTARY MOVEMENT. 
 
 stances or continued ill fortune may reduce a man of hope- 
 ful impulses to a prevailing pessimism and lack of interest. 
 This characteristic individuality of impulse prevents its 
 division into classes, and makes it impossible to formulate 
 for single impulsive reactions any exact laws of stimulation. 
 
 4. Impulse is, therefore, internaUi/ sthnulated : and can- 
 not geyierally he analyzed into definite reflex elements. This 
 is true on both the physiological and the psychological side. 
 A physiological impulse cannot be traced directly and uni- 
 formly to a particular stimulus : it seems to be rather the 
 outcome of what is peculiar to the central process, and to 
 result from the growth of the system. And, on the other 
 hand, we cannot trace impulses in consciousness to uniform 
 psychological antecedents. They seem to represent the 
 state of consciousness as a whole, apart from the theoretical 
 worth of particular images. Impulses of fear in nervous 
 persons are, and persist in being, quite independent of 
 argument and persuasion. Our reasoned conclusions fre- 
 quently have to fight their way through many opposing 
 impulsive tendencies. 
 
 Yet it is generally through the presence of some definite 
 object or image that impulses are clearly manifested. What 
 may have been a vague feeling of unrest or disquiet turns 
 into an impulsive motor reaction Avhenever it finds its 
 appropriate object, as Jessen remarks. 
 
 Definition of Sensuous Impulse. Accordingly we may 
 define sensuous impulse psychologically as the original 
 tendency of consciousness to express itself in motor terms 
 as far as this tendency exists cqjart from particidar stimu- 
 lations of sense. 
 
 Kinds of Senuous Impulse. Confining ourselves for the 
 present to the sensuous side of impulse, we find that such 
 tendencies are either positive or 7iegative — toward or away 
 from a present stimulating object. The impulses following 
 pain are away from the cause of pain, those arising from 
 pleasure toward the source of pleasure. They do not in- 
 
INSTIXCT. 327 
 
 volve, however, definite purpose, or the adoption of con- 
 scious ends. Tiie purposive character wliicli they have is 
 a case, as far as psychology goes, of original adaptation. 
 
 Farther, such impulses are eithev furthering ov inhibitory^ 
 respectively, of motor reaction. The effect of moderate 
 pain is, generally, quieting or inhibitory. Yet an impor- 
 tant class of physical pains induce definite and violent 
 motor agitation : these are the discomforts arising from 
 phj^sical lack or unsatisfied appetite. All the animal appe- 
 tites are native and their appropriate motor apparatus comes 
 into impulsive activity. The impulses which spring from 
 pleasurable states are uniformly furthering. 
 
 Instinct. The general word impulse was given to the 
 more complex motor tendencies as far as they are internally 
 initiated : similarly, complex reactions which are stimulated 
 from the environment are called Instincts. The division 
 between the two classes is thus abroad line of demarcation, 
 subject to exceptions and anomalous cases on both sides. 
 From the standpoint of common observation two great 
 characters seem to attach to instinct : first, they are consid- 
 ered a matter of the original endowment of an organism, 
 and further, they are thought to exhibit the most remarkable 
 evidence in nature of the adaptation of organisms to their 
 living medium. 
 
 Assuming in advance that instinct is a complex motor 
 phenomenon stimulated from without, empirical observation 
 enables ns to make the following remarks in the way of 
 further description. 
 
 1. Like impulse, instinct belongs to the reactive consciotis- 
 ness. This is now sufficiently understood. 
 
 2. Ordinarily instinct is not under voluntary control. 
 Here the case differs from the phenomenon of impulse. 
 
 3. Instincts are, as a rule, definite and uniform: thej 
 lack the idiosyncratic and individual variations of impulse. 
 
 4. Instincts are correlated xoith definite stimulation, to 
 which they afford reflex reaction. 
 
328 STIMULI TO INVOLUNTARY MOVEMENT. 
 
 In saying that instincts are reflex we bring to mind all 
 tlie characteristics of such reactions : their mechanical 
 nature as fixed types of nervous process, their irresistible- 
 ness as phenomena of consciousness, their particular forms 
 as belonging to distinct animal species. They represent 
 the consolidated nervous structure which is transmitted by 
 inheritance, and the low form of consciousness which has 
 not character enough to be impulsive. 
 
 In saying that they are reflex it is further meant that 
 instincts do not carry consciousness of the effects which 
 they work. The hen, Avhen she first " sits " on her nest, 
 has no picture of her future brood, and no purj^ose to hatch 
 her dozen eggs. In saying she has an instinct to " sit " we 
 mean that when her organic condition (warmth, etc.) is so 
 adjusted to the environment (nest, eggs, etc.) that hatching 
 will ensue,, she sits by a necessity of her reflex nervous 
 organism. So we cannot say that migrator}^ birds have a 
 picture of the country to which thej'' fly for the first time, 
 or an anticipation of the congenial warmth of a southern 
 clime: all we can say is that, atmospheric and other con- 
 ditions acting as stimuli, the bird's migratory instinct shows 
 itself as an appropriate motor reaction. 
 
 Complexity of Instinct. But the simple concept of 
 reflex reaction needs some modification in view of the 
 marvelous complexity of observed instincts. If the pur- 
 posive adaptations of the organism were limited to a single 
 reflex arc, i. e., to a sense-stimulation and a muscular move- 
 ment in reaction, the life of the animal world would be cut 
 off at a low level of development. The adaptation to its 
 environment on the part of the nervous system must gain 
 this complexity in two ways : first, by a co-ordination of 
 muscular elements in a single group for a common end — 
 what we n\2ij call 2^ coexisting complexity ; or, second, a union 
 of successive motor reactions in a dependent series for a com- 
 mon end — what we may call a serial complexity. Both of 
 these are realized in animal instinct. The bird's nest- 
 
DBFtNITION OF ANIMAL INSTINCT. 329 
 
 building involves both the simultaneous performance of 
 many muscular reactions and the long succession of move- 
 ments in flight, etc., from day to day, which in voluntary 
 life we call the employment of means to end. 
 
 Definition of Animal Instinct. From the point of view 
 of consciousness, instincts are original tende?icies of con- 
 sciousness to express itself in motor terms in response to 
 definite hut genercdly complex stimulations of sense ; i, e., 
 they are inherited motor intuitions. . 
 
 Variability of Instinct. This general theory of 
 instinct is furtlier strengthened by the fact of variability, 
 possible modification, or entire loss of an instinct by reason 
 of changes in the stimulating conditions. Recent observa- 
 tions have established this point beyond question. The 
 child loses the power of sucking after he has been weaned ; 
 and if he re-learn it, it must be by a gradual process. 
 Birds in confinement lose the nest-building instinct. Bees 
 will so modify their hive structure as to overcome new and 
 quite artificial obstacles, while still retaining the architec- 
 tural principle essential to economy of material. We ac- 
 cordingly reach a broad class of phenomena which seem to 
 lie on the border line between impulse and instinct, as now 
 defined, and which tend to bring unity into this phase of 
 conscious life. The facts may be gathered under the fol- 
 lowing points : 
 
 1. Decay of Instinct from Disuse: a principle which 
 explains itself. Physiologically it means the encroachment 
 of nervous combinations, which are used upon tlie material 
 or connections of such disused instincts, the result being 
 a readjustment of elements in a way whicli destroys the 
 former instinctive reaction. 
 
 2. Modification of Instinct from Imperfect Adjustment. 
 This means the reversion of reflex co-ordinations to a less 
 complex type. The bird that has lost the nest-building 
 instinct may still retain the egg-laying and mating in- 
 stincts, although in a wild state it is difficult to draw any 
 
330 STIMTILI TO INVOLUNTART MOVEMENT. 
 
 line of division between them. Tlie adaptation of the 
 reaction to that degree and kind of stimulus actually present 
 is wonderful, but still a fact. It is probable that this mod- 
 ification of instinct is due in part to the influence of mem- 
 ories of earlier experiences, the present elements of stimu- 
 lation working by help of reinforcement from their own 
 memories. In this way the elements essential for a present 
 reaction are emphasized. Imitative suggestions tend, in 
 the same way, to modify instincts. Voluntary selection, 
 also, breaks up instincts, until in many cases only the im- 
 pulses remain, so to speak, instinctive. 
 
 3. Natural Exhaustion of Instincts. Many instinctive 
 reactions naturally spend themselves and die away. Thus 
 the infant's sucking instinct, the gregarious instinct in 
 some, the bashful instinct in others. In many cases the 
 instinct of modesty seems to disappear altogether as life 
 advances. So many pln^sical enjoyments disappear and 
 the enthusiasms of youth fade and perish together. Such 
 instincts represent phases merely in the life history of the 
 physical and mental organism. 
 
 § 3. Affective Nature op all Stimuli to Movement. 
 
 Affects. In the foregoing notice of different classes of 
 stimuli the fact has been assumed that they are all phe- 
 nomena of feeling. We feel the force, the motor worth, of 
 a suggestion, a pain-, an impulse. An idea simply as an 
 idea — if such could be realized — might not react in move- 
 ment ; but the simple presence of an idea in consciousness 
 is itself a feeling, and only in as far as it affects us does it 
 move us. 
 
 We may accordingly apply the term affects to all stimuli 
 to involuntary movement. When I am affected I am 
 moved through my own inner state of sensibility^ And 
 such affects also figure, as will appear, in the voluntary 
 consciousness as well ; but there they stand in contrast 
 with another great class of stimulations, which together 
 
DIVISION OF AFFECTS. 331 
 
 with tliem constitute motives. Affects, therefore, are the 
 antecedents of invohintary movements, as motives, includ- 
 ing affects, are the antecedents of acts of will. 
 
 Division of Affects. From the above description of 
 motor stimuli we may conclude that involuntary movement, 
 when not spontaneous and not a simple reflex — that is, when 
 it is stimulated through consciousness — results from one or 
 more of the causes in the following table : 
 f Pleasure and pain. 
 
 . Su«^sjestion. 
 
 Stmuli^ T 1 
 
 Impulse. 
 
 [instinct. 
 
MOTOR ASPECTS OF IDEAL FEELING, 
 
 CHAPTER XXY. 
 
 STIMULI TO VOLUNTARY MOVEMENT.' 
 
 The Voluntary Motor Consciousness. The general 
 analysis already found convenient for the reactive con- 
 sciousness holds for the voluntar}^ We find that in all 
 cases of intended bodily movement there is, first, a reason 
 why we will the reaction ; second, the actual decision or 
 act of will ; and third, the resulting movement. All the 
 " reasons why," taken together, constitute stimuli to volun- 
 tary movement, and they may be considered first. 
 
 § 1. General Stimuli. 
 
 I. Interest in an Object. The most evident character- 
 istic of intentional action is that something is intended, i. e., 
 that a presentation of some kind is set before consciousness. 
 The notion of an end foreseen, which we found absent in 
 instinct and impulse, and undefined in ethical feeling, here 
 becomes explicit. Psychology finds here, in common 
 phraseology, one of its safest distinctions. 
 
 Yet it is easy to see that an object thus presented or 
 apperceived must carry some interest in order to be pursued. 
 I will to move my leg, either that I may walk — my present 
 interest ; or that I may relieve a strain— also my present 
 interest. Some degree of present emotional interest, 
 therefore, may be said to be the most general stimulus to 
 volition. 
 
 ^ Cf . Handbook of Psycliology, vol. 11. chap. xiv. 
 
ORIGIN OF VOLITION. 333 
 
 Origin of Volition. As the young child's earliest in- 
 terests are its crying physical needs, it is probable that 
 voluntary movement takes its rise in the adjustment of 
 spontaneous and reflex movements to varying conditions, 
 of suggestion and impulse. As a fact, we find the random 
 movements of the infant very soon taking on the char- 
 acter of tentative voluntary imitations and explorations. 
 I hold that the first clear cases of volition in the child are 
 seen in "persistent imitation" — its " try, try again," in imi- 
 tating movements seen and noises heard.^ These nascent 
 efforts and their reverses gradually give rise to well-formed 
 beliefs in points of objective reality, upon which volun- 
 tary reactions become rapidly habitual. 
 
 II. Affects as Stimuli to Voluntary Movement. The 
 influences which bear on voluntary movement are farther 
 and explicit expressions of the influences already found to 
 effect involuntary reaction. The general law that sense- 
 modifications tend to pass off in motor reactions bears 
 riglit up into the voluntary sphere. Suggestion which 
 produces involuntary movement tends to produce volun- 
 tary ; so of pleasure and pain^ emotion, impulse. The 
 psycliology which separates volition from reaction so 
 sharply as to deny any influence upon the will to other 
 stimuli than pictured ideas is false. The conditions back 
 of an act of choice are never limited to the alternatives 
 between which the choice is made. There is beneath it all 
 a dumb, unexpressed mass of affects — organic, partially felt 
 tendencies outward, which give coloring to the whole proc- 
 ess. A decision made at night is reversed in the morning, 
 when no new information has been received. A trifling 
 physical accident will distort vision, arouse emotion, and 
 reverse decision. Tliis fact, that our most abstract acts of 
 volition are strongly influenced by subconscious affective 
 
 ' See my paper on " The Origin of VoUtion in Childhood," Science, 
 No. 511, 1892, p. 286 ; also in Proceedings of Congress for Ex^er, 
 Psychology, London meeting, 1892. 
 
334 STIMULI TO VOLUNTABY MOVEMENT. 
 
 conditions, is only beginning to have the recognition it 
 deserves. 
 
 § 2. Special Stimulus to Volition : Desire. 
 
 Apart from the more general influences already described 
 we find at the basis of all voluntary movement the great 
 fact of desire. Understanding the term as synonymous 
 with wish — as the words are popularly used — our concep- 
 tion will grow more exact as we proceed. 
 
 Impulse as Basis of Desire: Appetence. The remarks 
 already made about sensuous impulse lead to an inquiry as 
 to the ground of the attracting and repelling force inherent 
 in certain emotions. There are original intellectual impulses 
 accompanjdng and carrying forward the apperceptive proc- 
 esses, as there are physical impulses preserving and fur- 
 thering the physical life. These intellectual impulses lie 
 at the bottom of the earlier classification of the emotions : 
 logical impulse ; 5e{/*-impulses, seen in ambition, vainglory, 
 self- depreciation ; sympathetic impulses, seen in generosity, 
 self-denial, impulse to rescue, bravery for others, etc.; 
 impulses for ideals^ of truth, the good, and the beautiful. 
 As terminating on particular classes of objects such 
 impulses are often called appetences. 
 
 Desire and its Objects. The impulsive basis of desire, 
 however, is not the whole. Intellectual impulse is a 
 directed impulse, an impulse conscious of the object of its 
 satisfaction. This objective reference it is that distin- 
 guishes desire from centrally initiated reactions generally. 
 The distinction is seen clearly in certain experiences of 
 restless impulsiveness which w^e feel, when there is no defi- 
 nite object of desire. Restlessness, both mental and 
 physical, tends to pass off in diffused accidental chan- 
 nels. The shifting, aimless, often destructive, muscular 
 movements of the nervous dyspeptic find their counter- 
 part in similar movements of his attention and emotions. 
 JSut when this outward tendency is chained down to a 
 
BISE OF DESIRE. 335 
 
 single outlet clearly pictured in consciousness, we have 
 desire. 
 
 The object of desire is, tlierefore, that after which desire 
 reaches out ; and these objects are innumerable. In gen- 
 eral, any presentation whatever that arouses an impulsive 
 movement of consciousness becomes by that fact the object 
 of desire. 
 
 Rise of Desire. The first clear cases of desire in the 
 cliild express themselves by movements of the hands in 
 grasping after objects seen. As soon as there is attention, 
 giving a clear visual presentation of an object, we find im- 
 pulsive muscular reactions directed toward it, at first in an 
 excessively crude fashion, but becoming rapidl}^ refined. 
 The writer found, in experiments with his own child,' that 
 the vain grasping at distant objects which prevailed in a 
 lessening degree up to the sixth month of life tended to 
 disappear in the two subsequent months. During the 
 eighth month the child would not grasp at colored objects 
 more than sixteen inclies distant, her reaching distance be- 
 ing ten to twelve inches. This training of desire is evi- 
 dently an association of muscular (arm) sensations with 
 visual experiences of distance. It is, therefore, probably 
 safe to say that desire takes its rise in visual sugc/estion and 
 develops wider its lead. The earlier feelings of lack and 
 need springing from appetite are vague and organic, and 
 cannot be called desires : they have no conscious pictured 
 objects. 
 
 Desire and its Tone. The hedonic coloring of desire is 
 always a state of pain, especially when the impulsive tend- 
 ency is intense or long restrained. It begins with a state 
 of uneasiness or restlessness. The basis of desire, like that 
 of appetite, is a functional need : this state of need or lack 
 is in itself painful, and its gratification pleasurable. But 
 both the removal of the pain and the gaining of the pleasure 
 are conditioned upon the presence of the object upon which 
 ' See Science, xvi. (1890), p. 347. 
 
336 STIMULI TO VOLUNTARY MOVEMENT. 
 
 the function in question is legitimately exercised. For 
 example, in hunger the lack in the nutritive function is felt 
 as pain ; the function is brought into exercise by its appro- 
 priate object, food ; and the exercise of the function is 
 pleasurable. So with the student, the lack of mental occu- 
 pancy is painful, the pain is relieved by securing an appro- 
 priate subject of application, and the function thus estab- 
 lished gives pleasure. Originally, therefore, the hedonio 
 coloring of tlie satisfaction of desire is purely an accompani- 
 ment, not in any sense the object of the desire, unless the 
 pleasure itself he 2ncturecl to consciousness and intentionally 
 aimed at. Observations of children at the period when 
 volition is arising show that the first stages of volition deal 
 most directly with objects ; that the child only learns by 
 degrees to manipulate objects in order to increase or 
 lengthen pleasure, ^. e., learns that he can modif v his nat- 
 ural reactions and subordinate them to the pursuit of the 
 pleasure which they have incidentally afforded him. The 
 infant's appetites are at first directed to objects which sat- 
 isfy : he drinks and casts his bottle energetically from him. 
 After some eight or nine months he begins to dally with 
 liis bottle, to stop a while and return again, to continue after 
 his appetite is satisfied ; and in the child of two years and 
 older the pleasure of eating has clearly superseded the 
 simple desire for food, and has become itself an object of 
 pursuit. 
 
 Coefacient of the Desirable. A further question has 
 reference to the attribute or quality of an image which 
 makes it the object of desire. Why is it that there is an 
 impulsive tendency to or from certain presentations ? 
 The answer requires a closer analysis of both the mental 
 and the physical conditions involved. 
 
 On the mental side it is well to remember that the 
 various coefiicients of belief are found in the need-satisfy- 
 ing quality of various mental experiences. In desire the 
 deniands for such satisfaction become explicit, and the pre- 
 
PHYSICAL BASIS OF DESIRE.. 337 
 
 sented objects come to have value and satisfying reality 
 according as they afford fit termini for reaction. The repro- 
 duction of suck an object suggests its appropriate satisfac- 
 tions, but the representation is wanting in body, reality, 
 coefficient. Here, then, is one attribute of an imaged 
 object of desire, ^. e., the suggestion it gives of satisfactions 
 :ichich it does not bring. 
 
 Further, what are these suggestions ? What form do 
 they take? Evidently the form that all suggestions take : 
 motor form. They tend to pass off in the channels of 
 action appropriate to the kind of satisfaction for which 
 they stand. Now either the imaged object is sufficiently 
 real in its connections to cause motor reactions, in which 
 case desire is, partially at least, satisfied, or it is only com- 
 petent to give what Ward calls " incipient action," i. e., a 
 tendency to react which is held in check by the conscious- 
 ness of the object's unreality. In this latter case there is 
 continued desire and a second element is reached, i. e., as 
 inci2nent motor reaction which the imaged object stimulates 
 but does not discharge. 
 
 These two aspects of desire are equally important. And 
 on closer view we see that the}^ stand in the case of phys- 
 ical desire for the twofold criteria of objective reality with 
 which we are now familiar. These criteria were seen to 
 be, first, present satisfying quality; and second, liability to 
 reproduction at the terminus of a voluntary muscular series. 
 Now desire, as appears above, arises when an image excites 
 consciousness as these criteria would, i. e., suggests satis- 
 faction without giving it, and stimulates a muscular series 
 without providing it a terminus. Or put as a single for- 
 mula, we may say that an image is desired when it suggests 
 satisfactions ichich are neither immediately present nor 
 available by volition. 
 
 Physical Basis of Desire. The conception of the phys- 
 ical process underlying desire must await the conception of 
 the processes which underlie the perception of the different 
 
338 STIMULI TO VOLUNTARY MOVEMENT. 
 
 kinds of reality. If the sensational reality of an object 
 reflects itself in consciousness through a certain brain- 
 process, then the idea of that object would rest upon a 
 process lacking the peculiar element which stood for reality. 
 The motor outlet in the two cases is the same : for the 
 incipient reaction is the ordinary reaction which the object 
 in question calls forth, except that it is incipient. Physi- 
 ologically, therefore, desire is the brewing of a motor 
 storm : the beginning of what is to be when the discharge 
 has gathered its full force in the presence of the real object. 
 
 § 3. Motive. 
 
 All the stimuli to voluntary consciousness now discov- 
 ered may be gathered under a single term, i. e., motive^ 
 which shall denote aiiy influence whatever ichich tends to 
 bring about voluntary action. Motives are seen to fall 
 into two great classes according as they represent pictured 
 objects of pursuit, or the subconscious, organic, habitual, 
 or purely affective, springs of action whose main influence 
 is the coloring they give to consciousness as a whole. The 
 former class of motives are ends^ the latter affects. No 
 sharp line can be drawn between them as stimuli ; for, as 
 has been seen, they pass constantly into one another. Yet 
 in consciousness the line is both plain and important. As 
 will appear below, it is only ends which are available as 
 distinct lines of direction for volition, in definite cases of 
 choice. 
 
CHAPTER XXYI. 
 
 VOLUNTARY MOVEMENT. ' 
 
 So far the springs of voluntary action have been ex- 
 plored. What do these springs lead to ? In other words, 
 what is voluntary action ? Confining ourselves as before 
 to muscular movement we find two great kinds of expe- 
 rience attaching to all movements which we are willing 
 to claim as our personal performances. These we may call 
 respectively feeling of effort and feeling of consent. We 
 are willing to claim any movements of our bodies which 
 we consent to, or which we make an effort to bring about. 
 These two feelings may be considered more closel}^ 
 
 § 1. Feelings of Effort axd Consent. 
 
 What is meant by muscular effort, as a type of experi- 
 ence, is clear when we examine a particular act of volun- 
 tary movement : say lifting the arm to a definite height 
 in front of the body. Omitting the elements already 
 found present in reactive or mechanical movement, two 
 great cases of effort present themselves — cases which we 
 may call positive and negative : effort to do, and effort not 
 to do. In positive effort we strive to bring about move- 
 ment : let us call this feeling the^a^ of will. In negative 
 effort we strive to put an end to a movement, to control or 
 suppress it : this we may call t\\Qnegetoi will. For exam- 
 ple, I am charged with not moving a paralyzed arm, and 
 I reply, " No, but I tried to ! " This is the fiat. A child 
 is blamed for moving, and he cries ; " Yes, but I tried 
 not to ! " This is the neget. 
 
 There are certain new factors involved in a fiat of will, 
 factors both psychological and physiological. 
 
 ' Of. Handbook of Psycholorjy, vol. 11. chap. xv. 
 
340 VOLUNTARY MOVEMENT. 
 
 Psychological Elements of the Fiat. 1. First, there is a 
 conscious selection of the course to be pursued. I agree 
 with myself, as it were, that my right hand is to be raised, 
 to be raised so higli, so high in front, etc. The end of the 
 desire is clearly emphasized and cleared of all extraneous 
 uncertainties. There is a feelinsc of the richness of alter- 
 native possibilities, of more or less deliberation upon them, 
 and of satisfaction as to the readiness of all the apparatus, 
 as far as my selecting activit}^ can go. 
 
 This feeling of prej^aration by selection and exclusion, 
 of the adoption of the particular alternative for realization, 
 is altogether new in consciousness. There is nothing like 
 it in simple reactive movements. There I do not know 
 the real nature either of the stimulus or of the movement 
 till the reaction is an accomplished fact. Here I know 
 what movement I am to make and why I make it. In 
 sliort, here is a clear, conscious case of end as already found 
 in desii-e considered as stimulus to will ; a sense of adopt- 
 ing^ accepting, ratifying this particular end as my own 
 present desire. 
 
 When the muscles have not before been voluntarily 
 used there is a feeling of separateness, aloofness, from the 
 bodily apparatus ; of a futile attempt to select. Let the 
 reader try for tlie first time to move his ear. We feel in 
 this case that we could, if we could only find the right 
 button to press, the right fulcrum on which to rest the 
 lever. There is a distinct consciousness of search, located 
 in the side of the head. 
 
 2. There is, second, a feeling of the waxing importance 
 of this end to me in my consciousness. It persists steadily 
 there, grows large, overshadows every other claimant. It is 
 as if my cheeks were being distended by a wind from within 
 — larger and larger, till it is all that I can hold : but still I 
 hold it, and I feel that I alone hold it. No one helps me 
 or hinders. 
 
 This feeling of enlargement^ of absorption in an idea, iti 
 
PSTCnOLOGICAL ELEMENTS OF THE FIAT. U\ 
 
 foiiiul also ill the reactive consciousness. Sometimes an 
 idea emerges uninvited from the background of sensibility, 
 and stalks boldly before the footlights of consciousness, 
 throwing a shadow over all the occupants of the front 
 rows — and holds me against my will. In the present case, 
 however, there is a coloring of feeling flowing forward 
 from the end-feeling (1, above) and backward by antic- 
 ipation from the fiat-feeling (3, below) which is absent 
 in cases of involuntary enlargement in consciousness. 
 
 3. The feeling of/a«— Let it be ! Let it go ! I hold it 
 no longer. The time is come for action and I act. Here 
 the feeling is absolutely peculiar to the voluntary life. It 
 is the kernel of felt self-agency. The outburst of the 
 reactive consciousness is accompanied by a helpless, run- 
 away-horse feeling : but here the outburst is felt as the 
 urging on of a steed well under rein. This is the conscious- 
 ness of volitio7i proper. 
 
 4. A feeling of control over the muscles : of ability to 
 reconsider, to withhold the fiat. The same feeling extends 
 also to the mental flow. 
 
 5. A feeling of antagonism to the muscular system. *'I 
 tried to " is urged and accepted as suflicient answer to the 
 charge " you did not act." James has called this element 
 of consciousness the " dead lift " of effort, and it is here 
 tliat effort proper seems to be something added to the voli- 
 tion-feeling. The muscles lie like lifeless Avood against 
 the outoroinor of one's force. It carries with it conscious- 
 ness of difficulty, resistance, volition and yet stronger 
 volition, with the felt expenditure already characterized. 
 
 6. There is an intensifying and enlarging of the rela- 
 tional complex of which the end is a part. By acting we 
 hnow more about the act. The particular reaction gets 
 itself compared with others, throws light on the actor's 
 capacity, precision, strength, and forms a valuable measure 
 for the carrying out of future desires of a similar kind. 
 
 7. Finally, we have distinct sensations of movement if 
 
342 VOLTTNTART MOVEMENT. 
 
 the member move : an agglomerate of touch, temperature, 
 and muscular sensations. In normal circumstances, if there 
 be no actual movement, these sensations are not felt. 
 
 Physiological Accompaniments of the Fiat. On the 
 physical side we find, when voluntary reactions are well 
 established, certain significant facts. 
 
 1. An enormously increased complexity in the muscular 
 ajDparatns available. This is in most striking contrast to 
 the simplicity and uniformity of reflex and impulsive 
 movements. The latter stimulate particular reactions 
 which are repeated in fixed and comparatively simple nins- 
 cular arrangements. Voluntary movements, on the con- 
 trary, break up, redispose, and reunite the elements of these 
 reactions in numberless ways. 
 
 2. There is a direct increase in energy available in the 
 particular muscles toward which volition is directed. 
 Muscles can do more work when they are voluntarily 
 worked. 
 
 3. There is greater rapidity, definiteness, and precision 
 of reaction here than in impulsive movements ; and this 
 gain is proportionate to the sharpness with which the end 
 intended is pictured. More muscles become available by 
 effort, but by repeated effort fewer become necessar3% 
 Repetition tends to improve a voluntary reaction in these 
 respects, since it tends to reduce the carrying out of the 
 pictured end to the type of a compound reflex, the volition 
 only serving to start the flow of nervous energy outward. 
 
 4. Tiiere is a sustained equilibrium of the motor a})pa- 
 ratus as a whole, due to education, and no longer a matter 
 of conscious effort. The infant must learn to hold his head 
 up ; and that the adult is really actively engaged in holding 
 his head up all the time is seen in the fact that it falls, he 
 "nods," when he groAvs drowsy. So the body is in a state 
 of constant muscular tension called by Beclard " static con- 
 traction." A little careful attention to the limbs enables 
 one to detect these conditions of tension, and release them 
 
PSYCHOLOGICAL FACTORS AY THE XEGET. 343 
 
 wlien tliey are not necessary. One lias never learned to 
 rest properly who is not able consciously to throw his 
 muscles "out of gear," so to speak, and sit or lie as heavy 
 as a piece of wood. It is astonishing how much strength 
 is gained by this absolute repose of the muscles.' 
 
 Psychological Factors in the Neget. There are certain 
 adde<l elements of consciousness involved in an act of 
 negative volition. 
 
 1. A sense of strong clash and conflict between a present 
 reaction now operating, or about to operate, and the end 
 which I desire and will. It is more positive than the mere 
 separation felt in the "dead weight" feeling. In this case 
 I am actively opposed : I do not urge a lazy horse on, but 
 I rein a fiery horse in. " I moved, hut I tried not to^ 
 This is negative effort proper. 
 
 2. When it is a voluntary reaction which is negated, 
 there is a feeling of " calling one's self oif," of withholding 
 the nerve-energy necessary to continue the function. This 
 is negative volition. If the function continue it is invol- 
 untary, and I oppose it by " negative effort." 
 
 3. In many cases there is a feeling of helplessness and of 
 casting about for means to circumvent and prevent the 
 nervous discharge indirectly. This goes perhaps as far as 
 an appeal to others to hold the offending limb and prevent 
 its reaction. 
 
 4. Finally, there are sensations from the stopping of 
 movement in the muscles and joints. 
 
 Physiological Accompaniments of the Neget. The 
 physical machinery of negative volition is : 1. Tiie stimu- 
 
 ' The general realization of some means of relieving the " static 
 contraction " of the average American would be a public gain. The 
 writer gains this rest by fancying himself away from all possible 
 interruptions, as lying on shipboard on a smooth sea ; it is greatly 
 helped also by consciously imitating the appearances of sleep — breath 
 by slow, deep inhalations and quick exhalations, etc. Every five 
 minutes not actively occupied should be seized upon for such relaxa- 
 tion of the muscles. 
 
344 VOLUNTAnt MOVEMENT. 
 
 latioii of the muscles antagonistic to those which realize 
 the reaction negated. The injured party who will not 
 bow to his enemy on the street " leans back for very 
 straightness " : when we determine not to smile we produce 
 a contrary grimace. 
 
 2. Experiments show, also, a direct relaxation of the 
 muscles whose reaction is negated. 
 
 Feeling of Consent. The. feeling of consent is denied 
 by many to have volitional significance ; yet the fact that 
 it always involves an idea or end and indicates an active 
 attitude toward this end — that is, an attitude rather than 
 mere apprehension or belief — controverts this view. I do 
 not consent to the fall of the Niagara River as I behold it 
 pouring out its strength ; but I do consent to my child's 
 going to see it. In the latter case there is a clear reference 
 to my will. 
 
 Summary on Muscular Effort. Gathering up the ele- 
 ments now seen to be present in effort we find a distinct 
 consciousness of opposition between what we call self and 
 nmscular resistance. Consciousness is unmistakable on 
 tliis point. In the reactive consciousness the ego-feeling 
 is present, but it is of an ego involved in the general 
 tendency of the muscular adjustments. In the voluntary 
 it is an ego which inspects the movement beforehand, 
 selects and approves, or withholds itself and condemns. 
 Whatever the ego be, and whatever we may decide as to 
 the meaning of this consciousness of opposition, it yet 
 exists, and must be given the complete recognition due to 
 such a clear empirical fact. 
 
 Muscular Effort and the Attention. The first point 
 mentioned above, as characterizing voluntary movement, 
 was the feeling of preparation ; i. e., the relating, selecting, 
 adopting of the end to be realized. Now, as has been 
 shown, tliis selecting of one of many presentations takes 
 place only in the attention ; it is either itself involuntary^ 
 or itself a fiat. If involuntary, it is a matter of reactive 
 
DEVELOPMEyr OF VOLUXTAUT MOVEMEXT. 845 
 
 conscionsncss, in wliich case the resulting reaction in move- 
 ment is involuntary also. When a man acts at random, 
 having no time for deliberation, or perhaps no information 
 to deliberate on — throws a mental penny, so to speak, to 
 guide his choice — his action is not voluntary at all. 
 
 In all voluntary movement, therefore, there is an earlier 
 fiat than the will to move, ^. e., the fiat of attention to the 
 particular idea of movement. In general, the two forms 
 of volition may be clearly distinguished in consciousness. 
 I may attend as closely as I please to an idea of movement, 
 keep it resolutely before me, and yet not reach a decision 
 to perform it. Yet in the cases in which I do reach such 
 a decision I do so only by concentrating my attention upon 
 the idea to the exclusion of all others. When I am not 
 able to reach a decision it seems to be due to a defect in 
 ray attention ; other ideas share it with the muscular idea. 
 Consequently it is the degree of preparation, i. e., volun- 
 tary attention, which leads to the expansion of a presenta- 
 tion till it so fills consciousness as to overflow in volition. 
 The entire question as to what volition is, is accordingly 
 thrown back upon an investigation of the exercise of 
 voluntary attention. Voluntary movement is only a par- 
 ticular case of voluntary attention. 
 
 Development of Voluntary Movement. There are 
 three stages, therefore, in the development of voluntary 
 movement : 1. Voluntary attention to a presentation which, 
 in turn, stimulates a native muscular reaction. This is the 
 state of thinors in infants' suororestive and imitative reac- 
 tions. 2. Voluntary attention to a presentation of move- 
 ment, which stimulates the movement presented. This is 
 the state of things in all our endeavos to learn new mus- 
 cular combinations, making them our end. 3. Voluntary 
 attention to an end for which a muscular reaction is a 
 necessary means. This takes us back to the first state of 
 things again. By the process of learning (2, above) we 
 have gained new adaptations, and by repetition they have 
 
346 VOL XrNTARY MO VEMENT. 
 
 become unconscious means, just as tlie native reactions (1, 
 above) are. So in writing, for example. That is, we find, 
 tlie organism gives us so much (1), we improve upon it by 
 effort (2), and, having patented our improvements, so to 
 speak, we liand them back to tlie organism again (3). 
 
 Theory of Innervation. Any theory of a uniform nerv- 
 ous basis of will admits certain points ; ^. e., an efferent 
 process following upon a central process, this efferent 
 process stimulating a muscular reaction which is reported 
 in turn to consciousness by an afferent process. A further 
 question arises as to the exact locus in this series of the 
 feeling of effort. Do we feel effort when the energy of 
 muscular stimulation gets ready to leave the brain, or when 
 the incoming processes report actual movements? Put 
 technically, are effort-feelings entirely kincesthetic, income- 
 feelings, or do they involve also feelings of innerviation, 
 outgo-feelings ? 
 
 Analogy from the general build of the nervous system, 
 as analyzed above, would lead us to look for an element of 
 consciousness from the outgoing or reacting process no less 
 than from the incoming or receiving process. Evidence 
 pro and con, however, cannot be presented here.^ 
 
 ' See full references on this debate in Handbook of Psychology, 
 vol. ii. pp. 349-350. 
 
CHAPTER XXVII. 
 
 VOLITION.! 
 
 Purpose. In the last chapter we found that voluntary 
 movement is only a particular case of voluntary attention. 
 The preparation for movement involves the selection of a 
 particular presentation, and its accomplishment is only a 
 matter of the reiteration of this selection when tlie proper 
 ideal and motor conditions are present and fill consciousness. 
 For example, I determine at twelve o'clock to dine with a 
 friend at six. I have selected and willed this act ; but in 
 the mean time other ideas — knowledge of the hour, present 
 duties, etc. — occupy my consciousness with the intended 
 act. My state of will is then purpose or, when it represents 
 a more permanent element in character, intention. When 
 six arrives these presentations foreign to my purpose disap- 
 pear, the dining act alone persists, fills my attention, and I 
 walk to the house of my friend. My volition at six repeats 
 my volition at twelve, except that the two involve a some- 
 w^hat different background of accompanying consciousness. 
 In both cases I give myself with all its immediate conse- 
 quences : in one case, these consequences are apparent only 
 in my mental life ; in the other, they shed themselves out 
 through my muscles into the physical world. If I resolve 
 to break into a house I am a burglar, though I be arrested 
 before I move a muscle. Hence there is only one fiat, one 
 volition, and that is to give my attention to a presentation. 
 
 § 1. Voluntary Attention as Choice. 
 
 Law of Motives. Volition, considered as an act of 
 attention, always involves some measure of division in con- 
 » Cf . Handbook of PsycJwlogy, vol. 11. chap. xvi. 
 
 347 
 
S48 VOLITION. 
 
 sciousiiess — some, measure of confusion clue to unadjusted 
 claims. The various classes of claims which are to be 
 adjusted in an act have been pointed out. They are the 
 springs of action or motives, any affective tendencies what- 
 ever that represent active conditions of consciousness. Mj^ 
 whole personality, as has been made clear, is an expressive 
 thing : its expressive side is as real and elementary as its 
 receptive side. Consequently at every moment the man is 
 expressing himself somehow, and what he is expressing 
 is the outcome of all the elements in him w^hich seek 
 expression. 
 
 Farther, the whole of the present possibilities of the man 
 are summed up in these tendencies outward : they represent 
 his entire self at the moment that he acts, i. e., his make-up 
 as the present conditions of his environment are suited to 
 call it out. Given conditions which favor the expression 
 of a number of his motives at once, and they all clamor for 
 exclusive recognition. For example, a brakeman's hand is 
 freezing to the iron ; intense pain, a physical spring of 
 action, prompts him to desert his brake. But he quickly 
 calculates the chances of collision, or an open bridge : 
 intellectual motive urging him to remain faithfully at his 
 post. And with this last there come the picturing of 
 wounded passengers, the cries of those in danger — a new 
 emotional motive, ^vhich brings with it a warm flood of 
 sympathy leading to a quick and easy decision on the side 
 of duty. The decision is the man's decision ; it expresses 
 the nature of this man and no other ; and it is the outgoing 
 of his nature in a line which the particular circumstances 
 open to him. Accordingly we may saj^, first, that all 
 volition results from a more or less complex aggregation of 
 motives ; and, second, that this aggregation of motives 
 exhausts the possible alternatives of present action. 
 
 The first position is clear from the analysis of the 
 affective basis of volition above, in which the different 
 stimuli to volition were pointed out. It is impossible that 
 
NATURE OF MOTIVES. 349 
 
 any one of these should act alone, for a man is never free 
 from his body, on one side, or his higher ideals, on another 
 side, or his emotional tone, on a third. They are all present 
 always in normal life. 
 
 The second position shows us that any doctrine according 
 to which a man can transcend his motives, hold aloof from 
 them, despise and reject them, simply asks us to chase a 
 fire-fly. If you remove a man's motives you remove the 
 man ; for what is the man but body and mind ? The 
 whole content of volition disappears. To will at all a 
 something must be willed, but this something is a pictured 
 something, bearing some relation to myself. The reason I 
 Avill it is because it moves me — is my motive. Let me 
 picture never so strongly the fabulous — the utterly unin- 
 teresting and indifferent — and will in reference to it is 
 impossible. I can never make new motives, nor will a thing 
 that does not for some reason find a responsive echo in my 
 breast. 
 
 Nature of Motives. It is also plain that a motive is 
 nothing in itself. It is only a name for a partial expression 
 of the nature of an agent. Consequently motives can in 
 no sense be considered as forces which expend their ener- 
 gies upon the will, or which fight each other. These con- 
 ceptions of current psychology are nothing short of myths 
 — myths which have " darkened counsel without wisdom " 
 long enough. Apart from the motives there is no will to 
 fight against, and as to struggling with each other — that 
 would mean either that each of the motives had a will of 
 its own or that there was no common life whose full real- 
 ization is the best satisfaction of them all. Here is a 
 developing principle — call it what we may — whose different 
 life-furthering adaptations represent a hierarchy of worths. 
 One wortli is chosen. If it be the best the others are also 
 furthered with it by their very denial ; if it be lower than 
 tlie best it suffers with the others through its gratification ; 
 both because, as elements of a common life, all are involved 
 
850 VOLITION. 
 
 in the gratification of each. How, then, can they be con- 
 ceived as separate entities contending in a theater which 
 is cold stone to all of them? Rather they are all vital 
 elements in the functional synthesis of a living conscious- 
 ness. 
 
 Effects as Motives. Among motives two great classes 
 have been distinguished, affects and ends. The former are 
 immediate influences upon the will, unpictured, unreckoned, 
 unavoidable. The latter are reflective motives, pictured, 
 estimated, subject to conscious selection or rejection. 
 Now it is plain that these two classes of motives stand on 
 very different planes in the mental life as regards their 
 volitional worth. If all volition is in view of an end, then 
 it is only by strengthening the influence of particular ends 
 that affects enter. If I grow greatly excited, for example, 
 over a particular choice, my excitement colors my choice 
 only in so far as it presses home ujDon me one alternative 
 of my choice. My physical health alters my opinions and 
 reactions, not by supplying me a new end, but b}^ bright- 
 ening a consideration here, dulling another there, rendering 
 the attention sluggish, and so limiting the range of my 
 consideration, or stimulating it greatly, and so pitching the 
 entire intellectual play at a higher key. What actual 
 volition is concerned with, therefore, is ends and ends only. 
 
 Volitional Apperception. How, then, does an end pass 
 into a volition — how does it get the fiat which makes it an 
 act ? Careful questioning of consciousness leads us to see 
 that the picturing of ends is in no respect different from 
 the picturing of anything else. It is an ordinary act of 
 apperception, by which new elements of conscious content 
 are taken up in an integration with the old established 
 complex of presentation. The new end gets in only as 
 far as it is adjusted and harmonized with old ends ; the old 
 ends themselves, a single integrated group, take on a new 
 complexion from the new element of experience thus 
 absorbed. The attention moves throughout the series of 
 
VOLITIONAL APPERCEPTION. 351 
 
 elements, grasping, relating, retaining, selecting, and when 
 the integration it effects swells and fills consciousness — that 
 is the fiat. Just as soon as the elements of the end-com- 
 plex cease to act as partial influences, causing the move- 
 ments of attention by their own vividness, and the atten- 
 tion gets its hold upon its integrated content as a grand 
 related situation, the fiat goes forth. 
 
 For example, I have been accustomed, after careful 
 thought, to pursue a given line of business policy. It is 
 tlie outcome of all my thinking, feeling, and past action — 
 an integration, a motor situation, which exhausts my 
 motives and represents my present volitional attitude. A 
 friend gives me new information ; it gets an entrance by 
 its own intrinsic hold upon my attention ; it becomes an 
 element in the situation ; every other element gets a new 
 adjustment ; and when I make up my mind again, get con- 
 trol of the situation through relative stability in the apper- 
 ceptive outcome — then I am at once in action — my fiat is 
 given. 
 
 Now no one end has brought about this result. I do not 
 adopt one and utterly deny others. I adopt the situation 
 in which all have entered and to which they have given 
 each its own significance. It is true that the exigencies of 
 conduct narrow me down to a very small number of expres- 
 sions. I must either go to the opera or stay away. But 
 neither alternative represents my true mind. I decide to 
 go, provided ; to stay away, if; and whichever I do it is 
 with the clear consciousness that I am not realizing my 
 ideal volitional situation in the premises. Instead of 
 indulging one of my ends I am acting on a compromise, 
 which really satisfies none. 
 
 Volitional apperception, therefore, differs from general 
 apperception onh^ in its explicit motor reference. This 
 reference, as has been seen, is present in all apperception ; 
 no state of consciousness lacks it. But when I have action 
 in view the moving quality of the elements of my synthesis 
 
352 VOLITION. 
 
 is more felt. Generally, my decision is simply consent — 
 the passage of " the adopting act." I consent to a thing 
 when I give it my sanction. This is volition ; but not as 
 full a volition as the volition of conduct. When I know 
 that my own fate is involved, that it is I who must act, 
 there is a fullness of emotional warmth and reality that gives 
 new affective coloring to the ends involved, and perliaps 
 radically alters the outcome. 
 
 Controlling Motive. The controlling motive, conse- 
 quent! 3^, is tlie motive which wins the fiat. But it is very 
 difficult to find anything that it controls. It does not exist 
 at all after the fiat, for the outcome of the fiat is a new 
 end in which all the motives have entered. So it does not 
 control conduct, which is the expression of the fiat. For 
 the same reason it does not control the volition itself. 
 Every one of the motives is controlling in the same sense, 
 i. e., of entering essentially in the result. The only advan- 
 tage it has over other motives is that it becomes the final 
 channel of expression in conduct, an advantage denied to 
 them. In this sense it controls the other motives, but only 
 in this sense. 
 
 Deliberation. The state of division, balance, and inde- 
 cision described is ordinarily called deliberation. Its 
 nature is now sufficiently clear. Its duration depends upon 
 the complexitj^ of the considerations which arise, the even- 
 ness of their motive influence, and the absence of pressing 
 urgencj^ of choice. Individuals vary greatly in the thor- 
 oughness of their deliberative processes. As a rule, delib- 
 erate, slow decisions are safest, though, as has been seen, 
 it is possible that an unexpected flash of conceptual feeling 
 may carry the day in favor of an unseen aspect of truth. 
 An important additional motive in deliberation is the state 
 of mind called caution, arising from a sense of the danger 
 of hasty decision. 
 
 Choice. Choice is the fiat itself — the adopting act — as 
 it terminates upon an end. It is volition considered not as 
 
POTENTIAL AND FINAL CHOICE. 353 
 
 the general form of will, whatever content it may be exer- 
 cised upon, but a particular volition upon one of alternative 
 pictured ends. A choice is always a definite particular 
 choice. And it includes, as a phenomenon in consciousness, 
 the feeling of the continuance of the partial ends which enter 
 in deliberation. It does not quench one desire to resolve to 
 satisfy another. And the intellectual act of apperception? 
 whereby the course chosen is constituted, may find itself 
 in need of constant reiteration to maintain itself. We 
 need to be constantly reminded of the reasons of our faith 
 in order not to lose it. The greatest moral victories are 
 subsequently lost through the stolen march of a desire or 
 impulse once successfully subdued. Choice, therefore, is 
 tlie feeling of the settlement of a question which is still a 
 possible question. It is a volitional declaration with a 
 felt interrogation. As soon as our decisions pass out of 
 the range of consideration they are not properly choices 
 any longer ; they become, then, elements in character. 
 
 Potential and Final Choice. In regard to the perform- 
 ance of a course of conduct t\vo stages or aspects of choice 
 may be distinguished, potential and final choice. By 
 potential choice is meant a man's decision as far as it 
 results from his own character, disposition, personal prefer- 
 ences, etc. Potential choice covers the whole range of 
 affective motives, the dumb, unpictured influences which 
 get in their work silently. It includes also the ends which 
 one's own character, memory, knowledge supply ; in short, 
 it represents the decision I reach when " left to myself." 
 It is potential choice that we feel sure about in reference 
 to our friends ; it is more approximately a constant thing 
 from day to day. It represents the great currents of our 
 lives, the habitual lines of activity, opinion, and interest, 
 of which more remains to be said below. 
 
 Final choice, on the contrary, is real choice, active 
 choice, acting choice. It is the full outcome of deliber- 
 ation frorn whatever sources considerations may come. 
 
354 VOLITION. 
 
 It is the adjustment, the compromise, as it was called above, 
 of all the actual circumstances of the case. It is choice as 
 a spectator looks at it and asks, what did he do ? Not, 
 what did he personally most wish, or did his action satisfy 
 his ideal situation ? It is, further, in the later stages of 
 deliberation that potential choice suffers the revision which 
 makes volition actual. It is brought about by the more 
 unessential, the less interesting considerations. Many a 
 fond wish is murdered by the present demands of cruel 
 circumstance. It is also here, in the more or less open 
 interval between potential and actual choice, that the 
 estimable qualities of open-mindedness and ingenuousness 
 appear. The open-minded man is receptive to new sug- 
 gestions, arguments, and emotional appeals. His habits of 
 action have not become so petrified about him as to block 
 up the channels of new volitional reaction. Othcis " are 
 not so, but are like the house which is founded upon a 
 rock." Nothir]g but an earthquake can shake the man 
 whose potential equates with his actual choice regularly. 
 
 Feeling of Alternatives. The feeling of open alterna- 
 tives which is said to characterize choice rests, when an 
 act of volition is closely scrutinized, in one of two places : 
 either before the volition, that is, during deliberation, or 
 after it. Before volition the possible alternatives are 
 actually present as candidates for the position of control- 
 ling motive. We know that one of them, and only one, 
 will be the final channel of expression. Any one is eligible 
 for this. They are really alternatives also in the sense 
 that the outcome is not yet foreseen ; consciousness has 
 not yet reached the stage at which there is any outcome at 
 all. But these two considerations exhaust the meaning of 
 felt alternatives before volition. This feeling is further 
 complicated with that of obligation. 
 
 After volition, as already said, the motives persist. The 
 circumstances of deliberation throng back upon us ; espe- 
 cially after a hard, long-fought decision do we live b^ 
 
MORAL CHOICE. 355 
 
 retrospection in the past. But further than this, we feel 
 that another revision is possible ; that new light may come 
 to us, and our decision may be reversed. Here, again, 
 tlierefore, are two senses in whicli alternatives are felt : 
 one, the persistence of the conditions of a choice already 
 made, the Nachhlang of our effort, the drifting smoke of 
 the battle-field ; the other, the gathering again of the con- 
 ditions of choice, tlie preparation of a new issue. This 
 latter, therefore, is identical with the similar feeling before 
 volition. Accordingly the feeling of alternatives is always 
 a sense of contemporaneous motives or of reminisce?ices of 
 such. 
 
 As to volition itself, however, it is accompanied by no 
 feeling of alternatives. On the contrar}^ it is felt as a 
 peculiarly exclusive, definite, intolerant thing. It ter- 
 minates alternatives, and tills consciousness with a single, 
 apperceived presentation. As Ribot phiases it, voluntary 
 attention is a state of moroideism. If I attend to two 
 things at once it is because I will both things ; together 
 they give the end. The end itself is one and undivided. 
 This cessation of deliberation is accompanied by an emo- 
 tional coloring of relief which is highly pleasurable ; and 
 it is in sharp contrast to the unpleasant tone of conflict 
 Avhich characterizes indecision. 
 
 Moral Choice. Moral choice involves the moral impulse 
 as a motive principle. In decisions in which moral feelings 
 are not involved this principle is practically absent. As 
 soon, however, as the coefficient of the right in conduct is, 
 or is likely to be, disregarded, a new coloring is given to 
 all the phases of the act of volition. In addition to the 
 consideration of expediency, which is the unwritten law of 
 choices morally indifferent, the consideration of right enters 
 through the ethical feelings. Each pictured end has its 
 value as relatively fit or unfit for construction in an ideal 
 of conduct. 
 
 There are two peculiarities about the moral motive^ 
 
356 VOLITION. 
 
 however, when considered as entering among the factors 
 of deliberation. First, it is not itself a pictured end 
 alternative to other ends. We have found that the moral 
 ideal is not presentable. It is rather realized in tlie 
 relative adjustment of other ends to one another. Conse- 
 quently the moral motive is not realized hy withdrawal 
 from the ordinary conditions of action, or by its own 
 abstract pursuit ; it does not present for itself a distinct 
 channel of expression. It enters to dignify and justify one 
 of the ordinary series of alternatives, as of more worth in 
 a scale of moral values. 
 
 Second, the moral motive, as said in an earlier connec- 
 tion, carries with it the felt authority of a categorical 
 imperative. I may decide on the expediency of a course 
 and then disregard it, with no blame, no remorse ; but 
 when I decide on its rightness this very decision is a 
 recognition of an authority beyond which there is no 
 appeal. 
 
 Choice and Habit. In the sphere of volition, as else- 
 where, the law of habit has striking applications. Ends tend 
 by repetition to coalesce with one another. Complex scries 
 of volitions become so closely integrated that a starting 
 fiat is all that is necessary to bring about a series of well- 
 adjusted motor reactions. Here, again, two great views of 
 habituation open before us. First, the voluntary shifting 
 of attention, the effort to select, arrange, accomplish, 
 becomes unnecessary by the law that association takes over 
 the work of intelligence. Thus the surface of conscious- 
 ness is made more calm from moment to moment, and the 
 attention is left free for new fields of exploration. Such a 
 combination of elements in a single voluntary movement 
 we may call an act. Thus opening a book and turning to 
 the place desired is an act ; but it represents innumerable 
 efforts, failures, and partial successes extending over years 
 of child life. An act is what was called in an earlier con- 
 peotion a " motor intuition." * 
 
 » Above, p. 136. 
 
INTELLECTUAL EFFORT: ITS FORMS. 357 
 
 Second, tliese acts get segregated in like manner ; lose 
 their individuality in what are called disposUio)is. Our acts 
 grow more and more alike ; our day's devices become 
 routine ; our satisfactions vary with our education, and fall 
 back under the lead of impulse. Nothing, in short, in 
 w^hich our agency is involved escapes the solidifying, uni- 
 fying effects of habit. 
 
 The result is that ends get back to the status of affects, 
 and our voluntary life becomes more limited in the range 
 of clear consciousness. Even the power to rebel against a 
 habit is itself a matter of habit. A habit is hopelessly 
 fixed when there is no disposition to break it up. 
 
 Hence the extreme importance, on the part of teachers, 
 of a clear understanding of the laws of volition in its early 
 rise and progress. Variety should be everywhere pro- 
 vided in the tasks for children. Choices which involve 
 self-denial should be dwelt upon, illustrated, and encour- 
 aged. No pains should be spared to give the child an in- 
 telligent view of the claims of others upon him, in order 
 that the habits which he does form may be beneficent and 
 moral. 
 
 Intellectual Effort: its Forms. Effort to accomplish 
 an intellectual task is characterized by the marks already 
 found attaching to muscular effort. Indeed the latter is 
 but a particMlar case of the former. The effort to keep 
 up a train of thought, to suppress an emotion, to bring 
 order and coherence into the mental flow, has the same 
 feelings of fiat, dead-lift, resistance already found in the 
 earlier case. If we can manage to keep the attention well 
 fixed upon the object of desire the battle is won — it swells 
 and fills consciousness, and w^ins volition. 
 
 Special forms that more intellectual effort takes are 
 resolution, determmatio7i, perseverance, doggedness : all the 
 manifestations of so-called strength of will. Tliey all 
 express the more or less habitual exercise of attention as 
 it eains control and comes to characterize the individual. 
 
358 VOLITION. 
 
 They refer more especially to potential choice, as reflecting 
 character. 
 
 § 2. Character. 
 
 The conception of character, apart from the metaphysics 
 of it, properly attaches to the active side of personality. 
 It means the essential part of a man, that which is most 
 himself, but it is interpreted, like everything else, in its 
 expression. Action is the only and the adequate expression 
 of a man. So character means the present agent, the 
 possible actor. The notion also includes the idea of perma- 
 nence. Character is that expression of a man which is most 
 constant, habitual, and, in consequence, most unconscious, 
 unpremeditated, genuine. 
 
 Wiiile the most permanent expression of personality, 
 nevertheless character is not a stationary thing. It is a 
 progressive, developing thing. Especially in early life 
 the change and development of character are superficially 
 evident and present the only adequate statement of the 
 problem of education. As has already been seen, the 
 growth of mental function as a whole waits in early life 
 upon the growth of the phj^sical organism ; in later life it 
 becomes more independent, developing under the law of 
 volition ; but in both cases it is still, wdth the physical 
 organism, subject to influences from the conditions which 
 envelop the personality as a whole. 
 
 We ma}^ speak of the " innate gift of nature " as a man's 
 endowment, that wliicli he starts with, received by inlierit- 
 ance. It includes all his potencies for development as far 
 as they can be conceived apart from the external conditions 
 in which alone they can be developed. On the other hand, 
 the sum of these external conditions from birth upward, 
 considered as influencing character, we may call environ- 
 ment. 
 
 The question as to the nature of present character is 
 accordingly this : what is the law of the development of 
 
DEVELOPMENT OF CHARACTER. 359 
 
 a man's eiulowiuent in relation to his environment ? Two 
 great principles already arrived at find further applica- 
 tion here, i. e., the principles of adaptation and habituation. 
 
 Development of Character through Choice. It is bj^ 
 choice that these principles get their application. Choice 
 plaj'^s the part in tiie development of character that nervous 
 reactions play in the development of the sentient organism. 
 Nervous reactions were found to be to a degree selective 
 and adaptive ; and further, it appeared that such adapta- 
 tions become fixed in structure by the principle of habit. 
 So choice is selective and adaptive, and its reactions create 
 tendencies toward those habitual performances which are 
 the outcome of character. 
 
 It is in final choice that the reaction of endowment 
 upon new environing conditions becomes evident. A 
 man's potential choice represents that which is already 
 in him. Any modification of potential choice is due to 
 influences from without, to environment. The consequent 
 reaction tends to identify the man with the new considera- 
 tion before foreign to him. He has taken it up in his 
 deliberation, given it a place in the list of motives which 
 appeal to him, and thus disclosed a desire, whim, prefer- 
 ence, now more important to him because he ^once has 
 harbored it. Character, accordingly, as an expressive 
 thing, has thus taken a step in its development through 
 adaptation to its social environment. 
 
 The potential choice of a man at any time, therefore, 
 represents all the final choices of his past life. Each link 
 in the chain of volitions, from the present back to his first 
 exercise of choice, has involved these elements. The very 
 first act of choice of a human being is already expressive 
 of the accommodation of himself to his circumstances. 
 Indeed, it is through the stress of circumstances, through 
 the necessity imposed by. muscular resistances, violent 
 pains, and crying appetites, that volition in the first place 
 takes its rise. 
 
360 VOLITION. 
 
 Further, it is easy to see that environment enters in the 
 development of character in three ways. First, the way 
 we have already seen ; it presents new ends for choice. 
 Second, it becomes a conscious influence over our prospec- 
 tive choices. We decide our questions subject to future 
 light, circumstance, fortune. The character thus grows 
 pliable, the will cautious, action hypothetical. Tins result 
 of environment is a more complex and refined application 
 of the law of Jiabituation. Where uniformity of experience 
 prevails action grows habitual. Where lack of uniformity 
 prevails distrust and caution grow habitual. The latter is 
 more unusual, since uniformity is more easily seen and 
 accommodated to ; but it is equally real — the tendency of 
 reflective thought upon the relative values of experiences, 
 to make men skeptical in their opinions and unentliusiastic 
 in their deportment. It simply means that indecision, 
 which is the enemy of habit, paralyzes volition ; for habit 
 makes volition spontaneous and impulsive. 
 
 Third, the principal influence of environment is un- 
 doubtedly before and during the early rise of volition. 
 In very early childliood authority is the controlling influ- 
 ence in molding actual choice, and thus in fixing character. 
 So important is this that some writers find in the " word 
 of command" the foundation of all subsequent autliority, 
 moral as well as legal. However this maybe, the observa- 
 tion of children shows to what a remarkable extent the 
 authoritative suggestion of a parent sets the inclinations 
 and forms the habits of his child. Even in the matter of 
 physical appetites likes and dislikes may be to a large 
 extent controlled. Imitation and suggestion start reactions 
 which become habitual. The unconscious lesson of a bad 
 example learned by a child from his father is one of nature's 
 most impressive pieces of moral instruction. Moral con- 
 tagion of character is as direct and unconscious as physical 
 contagion of disease. Further, early social conditions, 
 family, school, and play associates, create a milieu which 
 
INlTtATlOJS' OF MOTIVES BY ATTENTTON. 3G1 
 
 makes endowment practically helpless as to the methods of 
 its expression during the early years of life. Educationally 
 the tremendous influence of environment is the more 
 apparent since >t is just at this period that the child 
 begins to reach those conceptions which serve as point of 
 departure for moral feeling. 
 
 § 3. Initiation of Motives by Attention. 
 
 Coming closer to the actual method of voluntary atten- 
 tion, we seem to find a wide range of apparent exceptions 
 to the law of motives as now stated. The attention, we 
 know, intensifies a mental state. It is possible simply by 
 dwelling upon a consideration to increase its importance to 
 us, to give it preponderating influence in our deliberation, 
 and, finally, to convince ourselves of its supreme desirable- 
 ness. It looks, if not like the initiation of new motives by 
 the attention, at least like the initiation of new intensity in 
 old motives. This effect is further exaggerated by the 
 fading out of other motives in consequence of the with- 
 drawal of the attention from them in favor of the "star 
 actor." The important question is : Is this exercise of the 
 attention itself unniotived ? independent of the conditions 
 of endowment and environment already pointed out? 
 This question must be answered in the negative, for several 
 reasons. 
 
 1. Such a result often follows upon the involuntary exer- 
 cise of the attention. By a sudden stimulus from without 
 the attention is shifted, leaves the chain of deliberation, 
 dwells upon an alternative before subordinate, and so 
 changes the throw of volition. A burglar greedy of gain 
 contemplates a robbery, but a harmless noise starts associa- 
 tions which suggest danger, and he deserts his enterprise. 
 Any incident which arouses the attention from its line of 
 easiest passage, and gets it concentrated upon a different 
 train, is apt to modify choice. So lawyers aim to divert 
 the attention of jurymen from the claims of mercy by 
 
362 VOLITION. 
 
 exhibiting bloody weapons, dwelling upon terrible inci- 
 dents, and thus getting the attention under the lead of 
 strong emotion. In these cases there is clearly no factor 
 apart from the environment and the elements of character 
 which respond to it. 
 
 2. It seems possible to divide all cases of such apparent 
 initiation of motive intensity into two classes : one, the 
 cases of involuntary attention mentioned, and the other, 
 cases of deliberation. If I have no intention at all in the 
 matter, no trace of preference for the motive whose inten- 
 sity is strengthened, then it is clearly involuntary — a matter 
 of the reactive consciousness. But as soon as any such 
 preference comes in — any physical, mental, or emotional 
 motive for wisliing to intensify this particular alternative — 
 then my choice is already made, and I am fooling myself 
 in thinking that I am reaching an unbiased decision. 
 Most of the instances are of this latter kind. They are the 
 becoming conscious of the great class of volitional stimuli 
 already described as affects. Habit, for example, becomes 
 conscious in its influence on volition ; vague physical and 
 emotional states which are never distinguished from the 
 fundamental tone of our personality reveal themselves thus, 
 as elements of it. 
 
 Hence we may conclude that this phenomenon is only a 
 phase of the general mystery of attention. By attention 
 deliberation takes place, and choice is the outcome of this 
 deliberation. When we are absolutely outside the range 
 of deliberation, instead of finding ourselves in the presence 
 of altogether unconditioned activity, we only revert back 
 to activity of the reflex type. 
 
 § 4. Freedom of the Will. 
 
 In the light of the foregoing the problem of the freedom 
 of the will takes at least an intelligible form of statement. 
 Freedom of the man is perhaps a better way of stating 
 it. Yet the term freedom suggests a comparison with the 
 
inDETERMimSM. 363 
 
 conditions of physical causation which is essentially mis- 
 leadino^. The statement of the followinsj alternative views 
 may suffice to bring out the real i)oint at issue in the free 
 will controversy. 
 
 I. Indeterminism. On this view of volition choice is 
 absolutely unconditioned. The will, or the agent through 
 the will, asserts itself as it sees fit : it is in no way condi- 
 tioned either upon motives, brain activities, or external cir- 
 cumstances. Pure indeterminism is also called accidentalism. 
 In opposition to such a view of volition it may be said : 
 
 I. It is altogether unpsychological. The most thorough 
 search of consciousness discovers no such cases of abso- 
 lutely unmotived choice. 2. It leads logically to one of 
 two alternatives : either the will has no relation whatever 
 to its social and physical environment, in which case it can 
 have in turn no influence of any kind upon it, or it moves 
 by chance, whim, caprice, which if true would violate the 
 uniformity and stability of character. 3. It is altogether 
 unnecessary for the purpose for which it is usually urged, 
 i. e., in the interest of moral responsibility and obligation ; 
 for an unrelated will would be responsible to no authority, 
 and a will that moved by chance would know no law. In- 
 determinism is claimed chiefly by those who fail to see that 
 in holding volition to be motiveless they cut off the agent 
 himself from all voluntar}^ expression. 
 
 II. External Determinism ; the view of all those who 
 by aii}^ method bring volition within the chain of natural 
 cause and effect ; all who hold that there is no activity in 
 the voluntary or relational consciousness not reducible to 
 motive forces. On this view, that is, motives are forces in 
 reference to one another, effects in reference to the brain in 
 which they have their causal support : volition is the con- 
 sciousness of the outcome of a conflict of forces. It is part 
 of the "epiphenomenon" theory of consciousness already 
 explained. This theory in turn evokes several criticisms. 
 
 1. The theory begs the difiiculty oi p.jssing from the 
 
364 VOLITION, 
 
 external to the internal — from a brain process to conscious- 
 ness. It forgets that this gulf has not been crossed. To 
 assume a uiiiform psyclio-physical connection is a very 
 different thing from assuming that consciousness is an 
 epiphenomenon. If determinism ever be established at all 
 it ^\\\ be a determinism which reduces volition to other 
 states of consciousness, not one that presumes to blot out 
 consciousness altogether. 
 
 2. After we get in consciousness we have no right to 
 apply the law of physical causation to motives. It is a 
 most wanton assumption from every point of view, except 
 that of physical analogy. Motives persistently elude the 
 application of the sj^mbolism of natural causation. Where 
 in the play of motives is the law of resultant ? Statistics 
 showing uniformity of marriages, crimes, etc., in a com- 
 munity, simply prove that men have a common nature, and 
 are appealed to b}'' common motives ; and that variations 
 of choice positive and negative equate with each other. 
 The same is true of the number of drowning accidents on 
 the seacoast, and it would be just as logical to claim that 
 all who were drowned were pushed into the water and held 
 under as to claim that uniformity in the aggregate indicates 
 cause and effect in individual choice. 
 
 3. Physical causation presents us no analogy to the 
 selecting, intensifying, abbreviating, and synthesizing 
 activity of attention. As far as the analysis of pln^siolog- 
 ical function has gone reflex action is its purest type ; 
 yet even in the cerebral processes which underlie volition 
 directive modifications of the reflex have to be presupposed. 
 Even though the law of conservation sweep through the 
 brain, as we hold it does, yet it is onh^ when selective 
 consciousness is present, and presumably because it is 
 present, that the resulting reactions are what they are. In 
 order to prove the position, apperception would have to be 
 reduced to association, and association made a function of 
 ceiebral dynamics only. 
 
IMMANENT DETERMINISM. 365 
 
 4. As a matter of fact, we know no external influence 
 which can compel the will. When we do influence another 
 it is by previous knowledge of his inner character — the 
 mental habits spoken of ; but that, at its best, is by no 
 means a certain device. It is true that if there were no 
 other consideration against motive determinism this fact 
 might be considered due to the complexity of the forces 
 involved ; but in the fact of the conscious synthesis of 
 choice it seems to have a readier explanation. 
 
 III. Immanent Determinism. This doctrine holds that 
 there is in man a principle of realization — the realization 
 both of himself and of an universal consciousness through 
 him. In volition this principle attains advancement. The 
 innermost nature of a man is, therefore, necessarily 
 expressed in every act of choice. It is a free expression of 
 what the man is, and, consequently, of all that he repre- 
 sents as part of the world ; but it, at the same time, 
 unconsciously realizes a broader development in which all 
 individuals are factors. 
 
 As far as this theory is psychological it is tenable. 
 Whatever is immanent must be included in the nature of 
 that in which it is immanent : so volition is, after all, for 
 psychology, simply the expression of the nature of the man 
 himself. It is, however, a metaphysical doctrine. 
 
 IV. Freedom as Self-Expression. Our view is now 
 narrowed down to very strait limits. The considera- 
 tion of motives has led to several determinations : 1. 
 Choice is never motiveless. 2. The end chosen is always 
 a synthesis of all present motives, and is adequately 
 expressed by no one of them. 3. This synthesis is an activ- 
 ity sui generis: it finds no analogy in the composition 
 of physical forces. 
 
 These positions find their only explanation in the sup- 
 position that the existence back of choice includes in its 
 own nature both the motives and the volition. The mo- 
 tives do not grow into volition, nor does the volition stau4 
 
366 VOLITIOK 
 
 apart from tlie motives. The motives are partial expres- 
 sions^ the volition is a total expression of the same existejice. 
 How tlie motives pass into or stimulate volition — that is the 
 law of mental development. The relation of this law to 
 brain development is again a higher exhibition of that psy- 
 cho-physical connection Avhich has been assumed — a connec- 
 tion which is real, butwhich yet does not prejudice the laws 
 of development on one side or the other. As lias been said, 
 this seems to point to some underlying unity in M'hich the 
 antithesis between the mechanism and volition is resolved. 
 
 Freedom, therefore, is a fact, if by it we mean the ex- 
 pression of one's self as conditioned by past choices and 
 present environment. It is not a fact in any sense which 
 denies that volition is thus conditioned, hrst, upon the 
 actual content of consciousness as it swings down the tide 
 of the personal life and presses outward for motor expres- 
 sion ; and second, upon the environing circumstances which 
 draw the motor consciousness out. Free choice is a syn- 
 thesis, the outcome of which is, in every case, conditioned 
 upon its elements, but in no case caused by them. A 
 logical inference is conditioned upon its premises, but it is 
 not caused by them. Both inference and choice express 
 the nature of the conscious principle and the unique 
 method of its life. 
 
 Peeling of Freedom. The feeling of freedom seems to 
 be made up of two other feelings about equally, i. e., the 
 feeling of alternatives and the feeling of agency or power. 
 The latter is rather a felt reminiscence than a state of 
 original sensibility. It rests largely upon memory of past 
 stimulations or inhibitions of the movements now alterna- 
 tive to one another. Preyer holds that there is true will 
 only when there is positive inhibitory power over the 
 movement in question in each case. This is clearly not the 
 case in imitative volition, when the movement is attempted 
 for the first time : but yet in these cases past volitions 
 of other movements are sufficient to give the memory of 
 
EFFECTS OF VOLITION. 367 
 
 power. It is probable that this feeling of power or agency 
 gets rapidly generalized away frona muscular movements in 
 particular, to alternative ends to which muscular reactions 
 are only means. The feeling of alternatives, as has been 
 seen, also goes before volition, or is also due to reminiscence. 
 Hence the feeling of freedom is subject to the criticism 
 alread}^ urged against the sense of alternatives : it depends 
 upon the division in consciousness which I feel it is for 
 myself, my own apperceptive activit}'^, to solve in the 
 future. At the moment of volition there is no feeling of 
 freedom. Rather, when the fiat goes forth, there is a sense 
 of irrevocableness, of once-for-all conclusiveness — a feeling 
 of having thrown one's self over a moral precipice. 
 
 Feeling of Responsibility . As soon as an act has taken 
 place a new phase of feeling arises, that of responsihility . 
 It arises only when the stimuli to will have been stamped 
 with the seal of one's private ownership. I do not feel 
 responsible for my desires, impulses, emotions, except as 
 far as I have ratified them at some time by my choice. 
 Responsibility is a feeling of a past explicit choice, just as 
 freedom is the feeling of the possibility of such a future 
 choice. As attaching to all final choice, this feeling is 
 called natural responsibility. It is only the sense of owner- 
 ship in the deed and its consequences. When the motive 
 conditions include a command imposed by an external 
 authority it becomes legal responsibility ; when the imper- 
 ative of duty is a felt condition in the decision it is moral 
 responsibility. The feeling of moral responsibility for 
 wrongdoing passes quickly into remorse. 
 
 § 5. Effects of Volitiox. 
 
 Expressive Effects. The immediate effects of voluntary 
 attention have already been briefly mentioned. Physio- 
 logically, we find certain sensations of concentration in the 
 head, principally at the sense-organ through which the 
 stimulus is received. The skin of the head is drawn for- 
 
368 VOLITION. 
 
 ward and knotted on the forehead, in visual attention. 
 ^Experiments show an increase in the blood supply in the 
 organ attended to. In attention to a picture of imag- 
 ination, or in attentive thought, the eyes roll upward and 
 around, and there is a feeling of exploration or searching 
 in the back of the skull. In strong effort, moreover, there 
 is a setting of the epiglottis and a compression of the jaws. 
 All these indications are additional to the explosive or 
 inhibitive effect to which the effort itself is aimed, and 
 which it in so far accomplishes. 
 
 These expressive changes are rather the accompaniments 
 than the effects of attention. They bear much the same 
 relation to volition that emotional expression does to 
 mental excitement. They are, in the main, common to 
 reflex and voluntary attention and can be artificially pro- 
 duced. A brainless animal can be stimulated in such a 
 way as to show the expression of high attention. 
 
 Effects Proper The more legitimate effects of volun- 
 tary attention are the muscular contractions and inhibitions 
 which follow it. Attempts are being made to bring these 
 also under the conquest of artificial production, the belief 
 being that volition as a self-determining thing will then go 
 to the wall. Fere claims that the increase in force, rapidity, 
 and precision of movements voluntarily attended to ma}^ 
 be brought about by mechanical means (weights, high air- 
 pressure, lying posture, etc.), the additional force coming 
 from other parts of the system. Beclard contends that the 
 extremest muscular tension is found in the immobility or 
 static contraction characteristic of voluntary attention, and 
 that the attention is this extreme expenditure of nervous 
 force ; he points to the fact that the diffusion and repose 
 of attention is at once the relaxation of all muscular con- 
 traction down to the complete inactivity, on both sides, 
 seen in sleep. Loeb and others find that when definite 
 motor centers are destroyed there is a prolonged period of 
 inertia in the limbs affected j more voluntary effort has to 
 
PHYSICAL CONTROL. 369 
 
 be made to move them. This is held to indicate that 
 effort is the drawing of nervous forces from other regions. 
 Chauveaii finds it possible to produce the voluntary co-or- 
 dinations of movement in walking, in animals, by stimulat- 
 ing certain sensor nerves. 
 
 As to the experimental endeavor, there is no reason that 
 it should not be to some degree guccessful. Why should 
 not there be — indeed, must there not be ? — a physical 
 antecedent to every such physical change ? and why may 
 not physiology in some cases discover it ? But w^hen there 
 is such an artificial production of the effects of attention, 
 what does it prove concerning volition ? It only proves 
 that conservation holds in brain activities, a position readily 
 enough admitted. Volition might be the one law of 
 mental development still, on either of the hypotheses 
 already advanced to explain the relation of consciousness 
 to the nervous system.* 
 
 Physical Control. The extremely complex system of 
 checks and counter-checks which we call physical control, 
 in adult life, has had a slow development. Assuming the 
 directive influence of consciousness, becoming explicit in 
 the early efforts of an infant, we find that it avails itself of 
 the general sensori-motor law already noted under the head 
 of suggestion. The basis of all consists in spontaneous, 
 reflex, and instinctive movements. Such movements, when 
 painful, tend to subside by the immediate inhibitive effect 
 of pain. When pleasurable, by a parallel law, they tend 
 to continue. Thus a link is formed between sensation and 
 movement whereby memories of pleasures and pains become 
 stimulants to adaptive reactions. Such a primitive law of 
 self-preservation is seen in lower orders of life, where there 
 is no deliberative choice, and where the conditions are such 
 tliat a very narrow range of adaptations sufiices to continue 
 the creature's existence. But with the human infant this 
 is altogether insufticient. Tiie extraordinar}^ complexity of 
 the life for which he is destined renders necessary a mus- 
 ^ Above, chap. v. § 4. 
 
370 VOLITION. 
 
 cular pliability which cannot wait upon the exigencies of 
 accidental or instinctive motor experience. Hence his 
 long infancy is spent in strenuous effort. To his natural 
 aversion to pain he adds deliberate contrivance to avert it ; 
 to suggestion he adds persistent imitation ; to experience 
 he adds voluntary experiment. And all his education is 
 supported by instruction from without. The muscular 
 system is thus brought under voluntary control generally, 
 so far as to subserve the demands of life ; and in particular 
 directions, farther, as employment or preference demands it. 
 
 Such control extends to the inhibition in part of many 
 reflex functions, such as coughing, sneezing, shivering, etc., 
 reaches to some few of the automatic processes, and tends 
 to break up instincts and dispose their elements differently. 
 Only those muscles are available for will which have 
 organic connection with the cerebrum. Some of the avail- 
 able muscles of the body, however, never come under vol- 
 untary control, because they are not of use. For example, 
 the muscles of the ear may be made available for moving 
 the ear voluntarily after repeated effort. 
 
 Moral Control. Similarly the impulses and desires are 
 brought under a law of reasonable activity. The lawless 
 indulgences of childhood partly correct themselves by their 
 natural penalties. But in this sphere conflicts between 
 immediate and remote results render the pleasures and 
 pains of experience altogether inadequate as a guide of life. 
 The balancing of results which is the slow work of pru- 
 dence is supplemented by the counsels and forced precepts 
 of teacher and parent. Obedience is the schoolmaster to 
 self-restraint. And graduall}^ reverence for persons be- 
 comes reverence for moderation, and obedience passes into 
 prudential control. Moral control is in its development 
 closely connected with prudential ; but, as has been seen 
 above, it finds its law of operation in the moral imperative 
 which sets its own type of obedience and administers its 
 own sanctions. 
 
BATIOXAL ASPECTS OF VOLITION. 371 
 
 Further, just as physical coKtrol passes into the state of 
 subconscious innervation and contraction necessary for 
 the uprightness, due balancing, and habitual adjustments 
 of the body, so with mental and moral control. The 
 well-harmonized mental life is a life of regulated flow : 
 imagination is adjusted to fact, association held in to the 
 requirements of logical procedure, emotion restricted to its 
 due impelling influence, will moderated by deliberation. 
 All this is a gradual outcome, and the final result takes its 
 coloring from the degree of mental equilibrium we con- 
 sciously attain by our individual choices and efforts. 
 Volitions conform more and more to the rule of a guiding 
 intention, right or wrong. Just as in the sphere of sen- 
 suous feeling there is a fund of common fixed sensibility, 
 coensesthesis, so in the mental sphere we find a similar 
 fund of relatively permanent will-stimulus, a conceptual 
 coenaesthesis, so to speak, or temperament. Thus, also, 
 moral choices become habitual, and rightness of choice 
 passes into virtue of character. 
 
 § 6. Rational Aspects of Volition. 
 
 Intuition of Power. The rise of the intuition of power 
 has already been briefly indicated. The above analysis of 
 effort reveals to us the concrete fact — voluntary attention 
 — in which it ultimately rests. Whatever their metaphj^s- 
 ical validity may or may not be, we reach the ideas of 
 self-agency and other-agency through efforts of our own 
 against resistances. Just as space and time are revealed 
 as intuitions through intellectual synthesis, and just as 
 ideals are felt apprehensions of truths which lie beyond 
 intellectual construction, so in volition we must recog- 
 nize a regulative principle of agency, or jyower, which 
 is the essence of experiences characterized by the term 
 " will." 
 
 Intuition of Obligation. The categorical nature of the 
 feeling of obligation has also been noted above. We 
 
372 VOLITION. 
 
 found that duty was imperative and, in its form of 
 command, universal. In other words, obligation is a 
 regulative and constitutive principle of the activity of 
 will. Given the right, the must of our obligation to per- 
 form it is the most unequivocally binding thing that we 
 mortals know. 
 
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