CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY Cornell University Library BF315 .S36 Unconscious mind by Alfred T. Schofield olin 3 1924 029 035 579 Cornell University Library The original of this book is in the Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924029035579 The Unconscious Mind aoKttm&Te rb KdK6v xarexert.' CO R TEX -Concou* I Front M ID BRAI < DlflGRBM OF NERVE HCTION. > This is purely diagrammatic. Na ivcA defined Centres or Ares have been as ytt demonstrated in the Brain. A sensory nerve current proceeding from the Skirt, etc, enters the Spinal Cord, and may be changed into motion at 1, a Spinal Befiex; or it may proceed to the Medulla and be changed into motion at 2, being a Natural Keflex ; or it may proceed to the Basal Ganglia by the Short Circuit, and be changed into motion at 3, being an Acquired Keflex; or it may proceed to the Cortex by the Long Arc, nse into Con- sciousness, and there be -changed at 4, being a Voluntary Action. This last is the only conscious sensation of the nor. DIAGRAM OF SENSORI-MOTOR ARCS. ^he Unconscious Mind by Alfred T. Schofield m.d. Author of " The Springs of Character " FOURTH EDITION NEW YORK: FUNK AND WAGNALLS COMPANY 44-60 E. 23RD STREET, 1908 CONTENTS PAGE INTRODUCTORY xi CHAPTER I. On Mind below Max CHAPTER H. The Scope op Mind in Man . . . 24 CHAPTER III. The Conscious Mind . . . . . . . . . . . . 52 CHAPTER IV. The Unconscious Mind 72 CHAPTER V. The Relations of the Unconscious and the Conscious . . 98 CHAPTER VI. The Unconscious MrxD and Habit . . . . . . . . 121 viii CONTENTS CHAPTER VII. PAGE The Unconscious Mind and its Qualities — Memory and Sleep . . . . . . . . . . • • • • • • 146 CHAPTER VIII. The Unconscious Mind in the Child . - . . . 169 CHAPTER IX. General Principles of Unconscious Education .. 187 CHAPTER X. The Unconscious Mind and its Detailed Education . . 210 CHAPTER XI. The Unconscious Mind and Sensation 237 CHAPTER XII. The Unconscious Mind and the Body Generally . . 252 CHAPTER XIII. The Unconscious Mind and the Special Senses — I. Sight 266 CHAPTER XIV. The Unconscious Mind and the Special Senses and Speech — II. Hearing, etc 284 CONTENTS ix CHAPTER XV. PAGE The Unconscious Mind and the Muscular System . . 294 CHAPTER XVI. The "Unconscious Mind and its Action on the Heaet, Lungs, Skin, Stomach ; and in Sex and Reproduction . . . . 308 CHAPTER XVII. The Unconscious Mind and Disease . . . . . . . . 325 CHAPTER XVIII. The Unconscious Mind and Therapeutics, I. . . . . 352 CHAPTER XIX The Unconscious Mind and Therapeutics, II. . . . . 374 CHAPTER XX. The Value op the Unconscious Mind . . . . . . 402 List op Some op the Books Quoted which are Helpful in Studying the Subject of " the Unconscious Mind " .. 419 Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 425 INTRODUCTORY The object of this work is to establish the fact of an unconscious mind in man, and to trace in brief some of its powers and the various ways in which they are exhibited. We shall hope to show that this mind is the seat of character and of conscience and the spirit-life ; the source of conduct, of instinct, of tact, and the thousand qualities that make us what we are ; the home of memory, the ultimate governor and ruler of all actions and functions of the body, and in every way a most important factor in our psychical and physical life. An attempt will be first made to trace some- thing of the dawn of mind amongst Planof lower animals, and then briefly to widen book - and deepen the radical conception of the mean- ing of the word " mind " as applied to man, so as definitely to include all unconscious psychic powers. We shall then consider consciousness — so long the god of psychologists — what it is and what it xii INTRODUCTORY is not ; and then turn our attention to the uncon- scious and show that it is probably the greater part of mind, consciousness being but the illumi- nated disc on which attention is riveted on account of its brightness, as if it were all, whereas we shall see in the shades around stretch mental faculties — deeper, wider, loftier, and truer. "We shall then trace the connection of the un- conscious with the conscious, and the bearings of the one on the other ; and shall next speak of unconscious mind and habit and its formation, the various qualities of the unconscious mind, and its action in memory and in sleep ; and then we must consider the great question of the education of the unconscious mind in man, and seek to show that the truest education and formation of character in children must inevit- ably be based upon it and not on the conscious ; and that the value of the ultimate man or woman actually depends upon the character and extent of this education. "We shall then touch briefly upon the connec- tion of the unconscious mind with sensation, and its rule over the body generally, and then in de- tail its connection with special sensation, the INTRODUCTORY xiii muscular system and the various other systems and organs of the body, including the question of sex and reproduction; and lastly, we must look somewhat carefully at it as a great power in disease and as a great agent in therapeutics, touching here on the question of faith and mind healing so closely connected with it, and con- cluding this monograph with a summary of its powers as established by evidence and observa- tion. If it is asked, why is this book written and this inquiry instituted? the answer is why this book is two-fold. First of all, on account of written. the great bearing of the question on many differ- ent branches of scientific research that are of practical interest. Secondly, because the whole subject-matter of it is hotly contested and vigor- ously denied by many scientists, at least in this country. As to its importance, the true definition of mind is the corner-stone of the foundation, or the key-stone of the arch, which supports the sciences of philosophy, metaphysics and psycho- logy. Its enlarged conception as here attempted has a most practical bearing on at least two other great sciences with which the whole wel- fare of the race is bound up : the science of xiv INTRODUCTORY education and child training for the formation of character, and the science of therapeutics. Those who have the patience to read the pages why not which follow will naturally ask why a written before. subject so great and so momentous should have been so little discussed, and treated hitherto as of such small importance. The answer appears to be this : So many psychologists — the high priests of the religion of mind — being com- mitted so generally to deny and refuse any ex- tension of it outside consciousness, though they cannot refrain from what Bibot calls "a sly glance" at the forbidden fruit, consistently ignore the existence of the Unconscious, their pupils naturally treading in their steps ; while the physician of the period, revelling in the multi- plication and elaboration of physical methods of diagnosis and experiment, is led to despise and contemptuously set aside as " only fancy " those psychical agencies which can cure, if they cannot diagnose. It may be asked, why was not an attempt Previous made sooner to give these unconscious attempts. f acu ities their proper place? It was made determinedly years ago in Germany, and since then in England by men who, to their INTRODUCTORY xv honour, undeterred by ridicule and contempt, made noble and partially successful efforts to establish the truth. But it is only now that the pendulum — so long swayed over to the material- istic side of the world's clock, under the pressure of Huxley and Tyndall and others, whose great works on this side led all men for a time to for- get almost that there was another — has begun to swing back; and men's ears are now open to hear, and their hearts to believe Spirit truths, especially when they are supported as they now are from the other side by the best physiologists. The psychological moment has, we trust, arrived for establishing the Unconscious on a firm and lasting basis, with the result that psychology will be rescued from the contempt into which it has fallen at the centres of learning, a contempt really due to adherence to an obsolete shib- boleth ; that medicine will occupy a higher and more philosophical position as it comprehends and gives due value to the psychical factor in disease and cure for the first time; while child culture will no longer remain the hap-hazard, capricious and contradictory task it has been, governed mainly by the maternal rule of thumb, but a reasonable and natural science, as it re- xvi INTRODUCTORY cognises what it is that has to be trained, and the methods given us for its accomplishment. The last question that will be asked is why the author, a medical man, undertakes taken by the all this. The importance of this ques- writer, tion will sink to insignificance when once the book is read, for it will then be seen how laboriously it has been sought to establish every point and every statement on the authority of others, with the effect that the book well- nigh appears to be little more than a collection of extracts. The writer himself claims no authority. He has been but the agent to collect and arrange the facts here given in an intelligible sequence, and he has been driven to this task from the simple fact that, being a physician in constant contact with nerve diseases and mental phenomena, he saw, for many years, the manifestation of uncon- scious powers he was forced to recognise as mental, and yet frequently he found the state- ment that they were so was received with doubt and ridicule. He was driven, therefore, to the further study of the phenomena of uncon- scious mind and also of writers in psychology and kindred sciences, with the result that he INTRODUCTORY xvii found the whole subject in chaos, vigorously denied and scouted on the one hand, gravely- asserted and, as it appeared to him, proved upon the other. After much thought, the writer therefore came to the conclusion that it might be some slight service to his day and generation if he wrote a brief review of the entire subject in, as far as possible, other and more scientific language than his own, so as to bring before thoughtful and practical men, especially in his own profession, the question as to whether this was not indeed a study worthy of their serious thought and further attention. If this present crude attempt therefore leads to this, and, above all, to the production of some scientific work on the subject by a more compe- tent hand, the writer will be well rewarded. 141 Westbouene Teebach^ Hyde Pabk, W, 1898. CHAPTEE I. ON MIND BELOW MAN. A CI/EAB concept of mind must be the basis of all true physiologico - psychical education, and also . -. , . ... Enlarged has a direct bearing in its issues on every concept stage of life ; more particularly on those earlier periods when the character is formed. It is not too much to say that true education or true child- culture must be based on a full and broad concept of mind. And this is becoming of increasing importance from the great interest that is being taken in the development of children. There can be no doubt that amongst psychologists the concept is changing and enlarging. The causal force at work is at present largely German, where the " new " is perhaps accepted as the " true " with a greater facility than with English scientists, who carry all their national stolidity and doggedness into their studies, and still move on stereotyped lines with proper reverence for established authority. Investigations and inferences are more boldly pushed and more rapidly made abroad, and perhaps not un- frequently supplemented by that inner consciousness whose dicta are alike incapable of verification or proof. 2 THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND "We have, however, in England, notable exceptions to the rule of " follow-my-leader," whom we shall often quote, but whom at present it is needless to name. Historically, distinguished men have from time to time striven to enlarge our concept, but with indifferent success, from the want of support from the physio- logical side, which only of late years has made much advance, and on which all future psychology must be increasingly based. A decided impetus, from an irregular but prolific source, has undoubtedly been re-: cently given in the phenomena laid bare by hypnotism, and it is somewhat significant that all modern psycho- logists feel constrained seriously to discuss and examine these manifestations. At the same time, deliberate efforts have not been wanting to check and ridicule all concepts of mind that exceeded the old time-honoured definitions, lest the new wine should burst the old bottles ; while many physiologists, so far from extending our horizon, have sought gradually to limit all idea of mind to a function of matter. Thus, while there is generally a consent to extend our ideas in many quarters, they are limited in others, either by flat denial of a non possumus kind, or by physiological materialism — both, though the off- spring of different schools, being probably expressions of the narrowness of our thoughts, compared with the breadth of our subject. Without further preface, therefore, we will proceed to consider the relations of mind and matter. Such questions bristle with difficulties, and, like unpractised ON MIND BELOW MAN 3 navigators, when exploring the stream of knowledge, we must take especial care at the outset not Relations to do more than survey at a distance those of mind and numerous rocks which project from either bank, on which we might early suffer shipwreck from the temptation to exceed our limitations. For instance, are the psychical and the physical the two Cartesian clocks, abysmally apart, which, when wound up, nevertheless correspond tick for tick ? This position is well stated by Crichton Browne. He says : "' These mental actions are incorrectly spoken of as the functions of the brain, for they certainly cannot hold the same relation to that organ that movement does to the muscles, or bile to the liver. Nothing can be derived from motion but another motion, nothing from mental process but another mental process ; and thus the facts of consciousness can never be explained by molecular changes in the brain, and all that we can do is to fall back on an hypothesis of psycho-physical parallelism, which assumes concomitant variations in brain and mind. There is a physical universe, of which only a fragment is known to us. There is a psychical universe, in a corner of which we live and move and have our being. We may picture these to ourselves as circles which impinge on each other at the first moment of conscious existence, which intersect more and more as life goes on, their largest intersection (including but a small segment of each) being reached when life is at its full, which then withdraw from each other as old age sets in, and part company at death. 4 THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND But whatever image we may adopt we must hold fast to the truth that mind and matter are distinct essences, irreconcilable in their nature, though mysteriously accordant in their operations ; that only in the element- ary processes of mind, made up of sensory and motor elements, has correspondence with physical changes in the brain been traced out." 1 Or shall we follow Pro- fessor W. James, when he says : " The simple and radical conception dawns upon the mind that mental action may be uniformly and absolutely a function of brain action as effect to cause " ? 2 " This conception," he continues, " is the ' working hypothesis' which underlies all the 'physiological psychology ' of recent years." To adopt one theory is to be proclaimed a dualist ; to adopt the other, a monist, and the former position is certainly to be preferred of the two ; but neither contains the whole of the truth, though each contains a part. For instance, the abysmal distance between mind and , matter is shown in that, while " physical Distance and ir j connection phenomena are phenomena in space, psych- between c r J mind and ical phenomena are phenomena in time only," 3 for it is a fundamental thought to grasp that mind cannot have a "seat," as it has not any extension in space, having no relation with it that we know of. It does not cover a surface or fill a volume. It is only related to time. In this we follow, of course, the popular assumption that time and space are essenti- 1 Sir J. C. Browne, Brit. Medical Journal, 9th October, 1897 * W. James, Psychology, p. 6. ' James Sully, Human Mind, p. 7, ON MIND BELOW MAN 5 ally different, neglecting certain wild speculations as to time being, after all, a spatial extension (in a fourth dimension). The extent of the connection between mind and matter is indeed still unknown, though it has furnished material for discussion for centuries. Some, like Pro- fessor Clifford, make psychical action universal in matter, others, like Descartes, limit it to man only, while Schopenhauer, from a broader standpoint, says : " The materialists endeavour to show that all mental phenomena are physical, and rightly so, only they do not see that, on the other hand, every physical is at the same time metaphysical ". Lest, however, we should become dogmatic on these relations, we are reminded that the whole ourignor- material universe may be, after all, but an ™ c e e n °eof e inference of mind, and that matter and mind thm s 3 - may not be two, but one, the former being in this view a projection of the latter, rather than the latter a function of the former. Professor Herbert says : " The common supposition, then, that the material universe and the conscious beings around us are directly and indubitably known, and constitute a world of ' positive ' fact, in which reason can certainly pronounce without any exercise of faith ... is an entire mistake, based upon astonishing ignorance of the essential limitations of human know- ledge, of which thinkers who lived in the very dawn of philosophy were perfectly aware. The fact is, we are equally obliged to transcend phenomena, and to put 6 THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND faith in events and powers and realities which do not appear, when we recognise the past, or the distant, or the material universe, or the minds of men, as when we infer the existence of God and of the unseen world ." 1 That life involves mind has, of course, like all else, Life and ^ een vigorously disputed and equally vigor- mind - ously affirmed. " Life," says Professor Bas- com, " is not force ; it is combining power. It is the product and presence of mind." 2 No mechanical process can indeed ever adequately represent or ac- count for the processes of life, and yet life is not in itself a force ; it is a capacity to use force for unique ends. The extent to which the word " mind " may be em- ployed as the inherent cause of purposive movements in organisms is a very difficult question to solve. There can be no doubt that the actual agents in such movements are the natural forces, but behind these the directing and starting power seems to be psychic. " Prom the first movement," says Dr. E. Dunn, in the Journal of Mental Science, " when the primordial cell- germ of a human organism comes into being, the entire individual is present, fitted for human destiny. From the same moment matter, life, and mind are never for an instant separated, their union constituting the essential work of our present existence." Again, " one cannot forbear assuming in the vital process of each individual organism, an idea which continually 1 Prof. Herbert, Realistic Assumptions qf Modern Science Examined, p. 455 2 Prof. Bascom, Comparative Psychology, p. 68. ON MIND BELOW MAN 7 supports and renews the organism". 1 Carpenter goea further still. " The convertibility of physical forces and correlation of these with the vital and the intricacy of that nexus between mental and bodily activity which cannot be analysed, all leads upwards towards one and the same conclusion — the source of all power is mind. And that philosophical conclusion is the apex of the pyramid which has its foundation in the primitive instincts of humanity." 8 Besides attributing vital cell action to mind, at- tempts have recently been made definitely to V itai ceil indicate the exact location, if not of mind, aotion - which has no space-extension, at any rate of its activity. The general idea undoubtedly is that the sphere of psychic action in cells is the nucleus. " The seat of consciousness, or at least of mind, is the nuclear plasm, i.e., the chromatic granules are en- dowed with psychic power." " The brain or soul of the cell is the chromatin, as is now widely believed among cytologists. In it inheres the psychic and hereditary powers, and if it be removed from a cell, the rest of the protoplasm behaves automatically. The cell moves mechanically, cannot reconstruct itself, and finally wears down and decomposes. Chromatin has the power of interpreting stimuli, and its reactions are intelligently directed towards the preservation of its own life." 8 Chromatin or chromoplasm is the 1 F. Kirchener, Psychology, p. 141. 2 W. B. Carpenter, Mental Physiology, 4th edition. 3 Prof. Nelson in American Jowmal of Psychology, vol. iii., p. 369. See also Gruben, Beitrdgen von Kanntnisa den Physiologie vmd Biologi* dm Protozoal,, vol. i. See also Stolmikow vorgdnge in dm LebemztUen. 8 THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND stained part of the nucleus, which is made up also of a chromatic and a nuclear membrane. This action is apparently inherent, and in virtue of TLe mind in i*> every organic being has the appearance of protoplasm. being S elf-constructed ; there being an in- dwelling power, not only for purposive action in each cell, but for endless combinations of cell activities for common ends not at all connected with the mere nutrition of the single cell, but for the good of the completed organism. " Even empirically," says Schopenhauer, " every being stands before itself as its own handiwork." "But the language of Nature," he adds, " is not understood, because it is too simple." It would appear thus we cannot define where psychic action begins, for, however far we travel down in the scale of life, psychic action is seen. "Entirely ignorant as we are," Maudsley remarks, " we certainly cannot venture to set bounds to its power over those intricate invisible molecular movements which are the basis of all our visible bodily functions. . . . There are many more things in the reciprocal action of mind and organic ele- ments than are yet dreamt of in our philosophy." 1 " Unconscious processes of knowledge," says Soury, " are what we discover as the distant origin of the human understanding. I hold, with Paul Bert, that the psychological powers, in their most elementary forms, must be studied in the molecular movement of particles of protoplasm ... all psychical processes 1 Wwdsley, Min4 and Body, vo}. i., p. 39, ON MIND BELOW MAN 9 are ultimately reducible to phenomena of molecular mechanisms." 1 Binet concludes that these actions are not the result of " cellular " (or protoplasmic) irritability, but have every appearance of choice, "the nucleus being the focal seat of life in all its forms ". 2 All attempts of mechanical or chemical explanation of these movements are merely verbal. The entire cellu- lar body embodies in itself all the functions that, in consequence of an ulterior division of labour amongst pleuri-cellular organs, have been assigned to distinct elements. Descartes, on the other hand, as G. H. Lewes points out, 3 considers animals merely machines, and many others consider all vital phenomena not mere _ _ . , ... mechanisms. below consciousness as merely mechanical, probably because, to them, mind or psychic action and consciousness are identical. Even Romanes requires consciousness as a proof of the presence of mind. He says : " Two conditions require to be satisfied before we even begin to imagine that observed activities are an indication of mind. " 1. They must be displayed by a living organism. "2. They must be of a kind to suggest the presence of elements which we recognise have the distinctive characters of mind as such, viz., consciousness and choice." 4 "We trust, however, to be able to show that conscious- 1 Jules Sonry on the "Physiological Psychology of the Protozon," in Revm PMlosophique, January, 1891. 2 Binet, "Psychic life of Micro-organisms," Mind, voL xiv., p. 454, * Q. H. Lewes, Studies im Psychology, p. 23. *Q. Romanes, Animal Intelligence, p. 2. 10 THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND ness is not an essential quality of mind, and certainly among these lower organisms the mechanical theory does not cover the ground even when consciousness cannot he assumed. " The conception of mechanism," as Von Hartmann says, " does not exhaust the facts ; but the performance of the mechanism, when it exists, always leaves some- thing over to be performed by psychic action. More- over, the fitness of the mechanism includes the fitness of its origin, and this again always remains the work of the soul." 1 " The unity and connections of the organism cannot be in the individual substance or processes, but only in the power that harmonises them. Whether this vital power be called plastic soul or vital force, its existence is as little to be disputed as that of the mechanical and chemical forces." 2 "Mind [a very general term] may be predicated of all animal life in one sense or another ; and we may also favour the view of Agassiz and others that a spiritual element is the organising cause in every embryo-cell, determining its development." 3 Again : " It is a psychical power which, aided by the unconscious representation of the type and the means requisite for the end of self-preservation, brings about these circumstances, in consequence of which the per- petuation of the normal condition must ensue according to general physical and chemical laws. In every dis- 'Bd. v. Hartmann, Philosophy of the Unconscious, vol. i, p. 199. a Kirchener, Psychology, p. 142. 'Prof. Barker (New York), Formation of Habit in Man, p. 34, Victoria Institute. ON MIND BELOW MAN 11 turbance this process occurs unless the power of the unconscious will in mastering its circumstances is too small, so that the disturbance induces a permanent abnormality or death." 1 " The Cartesian doctrine that animals are walking automata, which merely ape us with the semblance of a psychical life, is looked upon to-day by every feel- ing man as an almost revolting error. How long will it be before our modern physiologists finally free them- selves from the not smaller error in principle that the organic manifestations of life of the lower central organs of the nervous system are mere mechanical contrivances without any spark of inner life ? " 2 Eegarding the unicellular organisms, Professor W. H. Thompson, in his Belfast address in 1894, *■ , "Mind in says : " The amoeba presents active and unicellular organism. spontaneous movements, and here one not only meets with a power of choice, but also an intelli- gent consciousness in selecting food ". Maudsley observes : " An organism plainly has the power (call it intelligence or call it what you will) of feeling and eschewing what is hurtful to it, as well as of feeling and ensuring what is beneficial to it ". 8 Perhaps one instance of this may be given. Bomanes observes : " No one can have watched the movements of certain infusoria without feeling it difficult to believe that these little animals are not actuated by some amount of intelligence. There is a rotifer whose body 1 Ed. v. Hartmann, Philosophy of the Unconscious, vol. lit . p. 149. ''■Ibid., vol. iit, p. 236. 3 Maudsley, Mind and Body, vol. i., p. 7. 12 THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND is of a cup shape, provided with a very active tail armed with strong forceps. I have seen a small specimen of this rotifer attach itself to a much larger one with its forceps, the large rotifer at once becoming very active, and springing about with its burden till it came to a piece of weed. It took firm hold of the weed with its own forceps, and began a most extraordinary series of movements to rid itself of the encumbrance. It dashed from side to side in all directions ; but not less sur- prising was the tenacity with which the smaller rotifer retained its hold, although one might think it was being almost jerked to pieces. This lasted several minutes, till eventually the small rotifer was thrown violently away. It then returned to the conflict, but did not succeed a second time in establishing its hold. The entire scene was as like intelligent action on the part of both animals as could well be imagined. So that if we were to depend upon appearances alone, this one observation would be sufficient to induce one to impute conscious determination to these micro-organisms." 1 " Wonderful is the instinct of the holothurise which live in the Philippine Islands of the South Sea. These devour coral sand ; and if they be taken away from their native haunts, they of their own accord eject the whole of the digestive canal with all other organs con- nected therewith in order to form new viscera more in harmony with the altered media." 2 Sir William Dawson says : "An amoeba shows voli- l G. Romanes, Animal Intelligence, p. 18. *Ed. v. Hartmann, Philosophy of the Unconscious, vol. iii, p. 14