Class _..£L$>Ab CopyrightN COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. ^V tf - Mi, oA V * „■ * ,A x^ v'\ AT oo 1 * * •<* ~K* FRAGMENTS IN PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE V J FRAGMENTS IN PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE BEING COLLECTED ESSAYS AND ADDRESSES BY JAMES MARK BALDWIN PH.D. PRINCETON, HON. D.SC. OXON, LL.D. GLASGOW STUART PROFESSOR IN PRINCETON UNIVERSITY NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS 1902 ^&* $>v THE I tBRARY *F 6&NQAE83, Two Cowee Received APR. U 1902 CO*YW«MT BNTRt CL«tfc/XXr No, COPY B. _ Copyright, 1902 By Charles Scribner's Sons Published April, 1902 • • •. UNIVERSITY TRESS • JOHN WILSON AND SON • CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A. L TO MY WIFE Ifyzhn (&xtzn 23altifom WHOSE SYMPATHY AND HELP HAVE BEEN UNFAILING DURING ALL THE YEARS AND IN ALL THE INTERESTS OF MY PURSUIT OF PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE PREFATOKY NOTE The volume is made up of papers selected from a larger number scattered during fifteen years in various journals. It is thought worth while to gather them to- gether because — and the selections are made with view to this — they are related to larger topics on which I have published more extensively — or intend to — in separate works. The group of philosophical essays are intro- ductory to a developed view of the world. The critical and historical papers naturally stand more squarely on their own feet ; yet they too walk in a direction, and carry their own signboards. The strictly experimental studies, on the other hand, give results which in so far justify their own presence here either as contributing something to their respective topics, or as announcing ideas which have proved in some small way fruitful in the later literature. Speaking of signboards, it may be well to erect one or two of them in this place, in advance, though I know the risks of labelling things, and tremble before that risk. Yet one may be allowed to 'encourage his reader to start in — -or to discourage him from starting in! — -by telling him what the general direction is. At any rate so much is in my mind to say, not only for readers of these papers, but for those who may know the more connected discussions of my other books. vii PREFATORY NOTE First, the philosophical presupposition of a view which joins the words " Philosophy " and " Science " is, to my thinking, at once an Idealism and also a Natural- ism. No philosophy can to-day deny Naturalism; by Naturalism meaning the recognition of the right of Dame Nature, — physical, vital, mental, — to be and to do what she really is and does with no let nor hin- drance whatever, from us or from all the tribe of thought. If we allow science at all — knowledge of Nature, at all — then the ideal of science and of scientific explana- tion is once for all erected. The camel's body will follow his nose ! Philosophy at the best must saddle the camel — not hack him to pieces, nor essay to build a more comely beast from such of his disjecta membra as suit a finished taste ! Naturalism, which, in my usage of the term, is a name for science not for philos- ophy, must sweep the boards of every fact that " is, was, or ever shall be," of every fact of every kind, before its task is done, leaving not a pawn on any square of the board we call the cosmos. Second, Philosophy is a new reading of Science, a saying of this or that about knowledge — not a special species of knowledge, nor a discovery of what is new. Philosophy evaluates, estimates, criticises, unifies, enjoys. Philosophy says " How ? " — to Science's " What? " How can this and that both be true ? — how can the universe hold both man and nature ? — both fact and ideal ? — both " is " and " ought " ? How can action be immoral and thinking false ? — the world so beautiful and its second ring so hollow ! In short : How can and how must we men think Nature and act naturally ? — Nature being what and only what science makes her out to be. viii PREFATORY NOTE If such be one's presuppositions, then it follows that one's philosophy is simply one's thought — one's best thought — about Nature. Now another signboard — a personal signboard ! My best thought of nature, my type of philosophy, is an Idealism which finds that the universe of science, is, when all is said, a cosmos which is not only true but also beautiful, and in some sense good. Science tells us what is true ; that is science's prerogative : and what- ever may be science's final word about Nature, that word is in so far the truth of the matter. Philosophy then enters her questions : How can such truth be also good, beautiful, livable — or none of these ? While others say other things, and many others many other things, I say — using the liberty of this preface — it is true and good because it is beautiful. Nothing, I think, can be true without being beautiful, and nothing can be, in any high sense, good without being beautiful. In the words of my colleague and friend Professor A. T. Ormond (Foun- dations of Knowledge, p. 228 ) " the aesthetic principle is at the same time a demand and an intuition ... an ideal requirement and an intuition under which our world completes itself. ... It represents the point in our conceptions where worth and truth coalesce and become one." The ascription of beauty, a reasoned, criticised, thought-out ascription of aesthetic quality, is the final form of our thought about nature, man, the world, the All. Let this be our sign-board — vague-seeming as it is ! J. M. B. Princeton, March, 1902. IX CONTENTS Page Chapter I. Philosophy : its Relation to Life and Edu- cation ". . 3 II. The Idealism of Spinoza 24 III. Recent Discussion in Materialism .... 42 IV. Professor Watson on Reality and Time . 62 V. The Cosmic and the Moral ....... 70 VI. Psychology Past and Present 77 VII. The Postulates of Physiological Psychology 139 VIII. The Origin of Volition in Childhood . . . 159 IX. Imitation: a Chapter in the Natural His- tory of Consciousness 168 X. The Origin of Emotional Expression . . . 210 XI. The Perception of External Reality . . . 232 XII. Feeling, Belief, and Judgment 239 XIII. Memory for Square Size 248 XIV. The Effect of Size-Contrast upon Judg- ments of Position in the Retinal Field 257 XV. An Optical Illusion 275 XVI. New Questions in Mental Chronometry . . 283 XVII. Types of Reaction 287 XVIII. The "Type-Theory" of Reaction .... 303 -* xi CONTENTS Chapter XIX. The Psychology of Religion : p age 1. Historical 321 2. Psychological 327 3. Sociological 331 XX. Shorter Philosophical Papers: 1. Theism and Immortality 338 2. Moscow after the Coronation 345 3. Mr. Spencer's Philosophy 353 XXI. Shorter Literary Papers: 1. Contemporary Philosophy in France .... 359 2. Professor James' Principles of Psychology . . 371 XII FRAGMENTS IN PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE I PHILOSOPHY: ITS RELATION TO LIFE AND EDUCATION 1 " One seems to hear three conflicting voices throughout the centuries. The response made by one of these is: ' I can see nothing;' adding, with monstrous inconsistency: 'I have faith all the same in the inductions of physical science.' A contrary utterance comes from another voice : * / can see the universe through and through.' These two voices are apt to over- bear the third: '/ see enough,' it proclaims, 'to justify the faith that I am living in a universe in which the natural is subordinate to, yet in harmony with, the moral and spiritual order and purpose which my higher being requires; and I also find that the more I cultivate this faith by philosophical reflection, the better I can see the little that can be conquered by practical reason, and the more wisely I can shape my life.' " — Professor Fraser. The popular estimate of philosophy is generally unfavorable. Popularly philosophy, metaphysics, is considered the domain of speculation and theory, the subject most removed from human life, the philoso- pher's excuse, perhaps, for the neglect of the social and political duties of common men. \While philoso- phers, in their lives and acts, may give countenance to this view, philosophy abjures it; and she abjures it both in the name of the task she seeks to perform and of the tasks she has performed in the world. Philoso- phy has been the soul of the world's great movements in history, in politics, in art, in religion ; wherever an affair of human interest has gone deep enough to give 1 Inaugural address delivered at the University of Toronto in 1890. Reprinted from The Presbyterian and Reformed Review, January, 1894. 3 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE color to a nation's development, hindrance to human wrongs, or vigor to the higher aspiration of a people — there, therein, has been philosophy. The fallacious popular estimate of philosophy is easily explained ; it is fallacious because it is the popu- lar estimate. Philosophy has for a mission a task which the majority of men take for granted, at the v same time that they decry it and its pursuers. Men act on the supposition that the world is reasonable, that knowledge is true, that duty is right, that human affections and expectations are not a mirage of desert hopes, that nature has satisfactions for her own cravings, and that every phase of human emotion has an answering re- sponse somewhere ; but how many of us can justify these beliefs from our experience ? Who of us will en- deavor to explain the most legitimate and commonplace affairs of life ? When one attempts this he becomes a philosopher. He undertakes a task in which all men are interested. And yet when it takes to itself a name and proposes for itself a programme, this attempt is one in which most men take no interest. There is an important sense, however, in which the popular opinion of philosophy is true. The nature of the subject with which it deals ; the more or less con- jectural hypotheses which may be put forth with dog- matic assurance and confidence and some show of reason — hypotheses which often rest upon individual preju- dice or misconception, or exhibit ignorance of established fact; the traditional belief that no philosophy is true which does not explain the infinite and eternal, however it may neglect the concrete and empirical ; the audacity with which the metaphysician sometimes explodes his guns over the heads but beneath the regard of the plodding and successful worker in science — all these 4 PHILOSOPHY AND LIFE things have tended to bring speculation into disre- pute, and to make metaphysics synonymous with fancy. In the language of Clifford, "the word philosopher has come to mean the man who thinks it his business to explain everything in a certain number of large books." It is against this abuse of philosophy that I wish on this occasion especially to protest ; not against the criti- cism which is aimed at the extravagance of speculation. But in so far as philosophy in its true province and as concerned with its true problem is involved in this criti- cism, such aspersions are unjust, and they should be vigorously met — met on the ground of the popular con- siderations which are urged by the detractors of meta- physical study. With a view to such a popular presentation of the claims of philosophy, the problems which it undertakes to solve may engage our attention at the outset, and my first proposition is this : That philosophical problems are problems of human life. For example, what philosophical students call the world-problem : whence the world, what the world, why the world, whither the world? One philosopher an- swers: Whence the world? It is eternal. What the world ? It is matter and mechanism. Why the world ? It has no end nor purpose. Whither the world? To extinction or back to eternity. And we ask how the reply of the materialist bears upon human life. He answers : Man is part of, the world, man results from matter and mechanism, man is without purpose and without destiny. He eats, he drinks, to-morrow he dies ; nature and natural satisfactions are the only good : self-sacrifice, generosity, love, have no meaning beyond 5 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE gratification ; happiness is my legitimate end, and happi- ness alone is worthy of my striving. Now this doctrine is philosophical, and many a man believes it who does not live it out; while many an- other lives it out without formulating it. Convince a man that the mind is a function of the brain, that emo- tion is the discharge, the equilibrium, the interplay of nervous forces ; that the will is no more than complex feelings of innervation or inhibition ; and he must think more in reference to his physical personality and its impulses and satisfactions than of the pursuit of ideal things for which his theory gives him no justifi- cation. His conduct must have reference, tacitly at least, to the sphere of this particular kind of reality — to the principle in which he believes the order of things is ultimately grounded — and his altruistic part must live more or less under protest, or by inconsistent tolerance. Another philosopher says: What the world? I do not know. Whence, why, whither the world ? I do not know. I am ignorant of all explanation of the consti- tution, origin, and destiny of things, and what is more to the point, I flatter myself that I do not care. What bearing has this on human life ? This : — that the denial and neglect of problems does not banish them. If a man have any intellectual part, any sense of meaning in the events, or even in the dead matter, of creation, he must realize the inevitable interrogation marks which confront him, turn where he will. What is birth, life, death? What is the state? What is capital, labor, civilization? His whole environment presses in upon him like so many goads prodding him on to inquiry. To say ' I do not know ' is to deny himself the stature of manhood, the vigor of developed intelligence, to suppress 6 PHILOSOPHY AND LIFE the faculties of invention and imaginative construction, to put his hand to his own throat and choke off the potencies within him. Where were nature-discovery, labor-saving devices, practical conveniences and com- forts, to say nothing of ideal things, if an Agnostic theory of the world were kept consistently to the fore ? Still another says: What the world? An idea, a dream. Whence the world ? From my thought. Why the world? To condition my thought. Whither the world ? Back to the place of ideal forms — where the subjective idealist loves to lose himself in contemplation. What effect has this on life ? This : — it leads away from the material, the mechanical, the definite, to the vague, the shadowy, the unreal. Stern conditions are removed in thought, not in fact. Hard surroundings are scorned, not overcome. Humanity is neglected, not re- lieved. The subjective Idealist builds his own world and lives in it, the happiest of men but not the most useful. Incentive to action, the sting of stern inflexible reality does not penetrate his armor, and too often he lifts no effective arm to advance the commonplace utilities of life. Again, consider the problem of knowledge. Is there such a thing as knowledge? If so, of what? Of an external world, of self, of God? What is truth? y Answer this with the Positivist who admits no knowl- edge but of the external world, to whom consciousness has no legitimate voice, to whom the inner world is an illusion, and then take stock of human life. It is then measured in terms of the yard and pound — it is of value as it is brought into relation to the profits and losses of trade or the utilities of material acquisi- tion. Physical science receives all merited attention, discovery in nature transforms society ; but the sesthetic, 7 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE the poetic, and the human in any true sense, die out. American civilization is in some of its aspects at once an example and a warning of Positivism in individual and national life. Answer this question with the philosophical Sceptic, the pure experientialist to whom all that we call knowl- edge is a fleeting play of mental states, a panorama of subjective pictures with no reality either in the world or in mind — and estimate again the value of life. The material now vanishes with the ideal, positive science, conscious incentives, wealth, distinction, glory, fade from pursuit, for the material is a phantom show as mind and its utterances are. And what is left? Ask Hel- vetius, Diderot and La Mettrie. They answer for us: sensations, gleams of pleasure, atoms of living. Nihil- ism is its developed doctrine and anarchism its logical attitude toward all restriction and order. But the affirmative answer to the question, " Can we find truth?" brings back the worth of living. If our natural knowledge is true, then science is possible, dis- covery and invention are leading us on to the ultimate revelation of nature's secret things ; if the mind works true, then its intimations of spiritual reality, of emo- tional satisfactions, of self-realization by self-control and choice of the best are worth while and so are its assur- ances of a goal, a destiny. Note further, the bearing of the answer of this ques- tion upon society and its institutions. Society is a structure based upon rights, rights waived and rights secured, mutually understood and respected. Let the restraints be removed from within, the authority of the voice which teaches me altruism and reciprocity of obli- gation and duty, and I become an enemy to society, an iconoclast, an anarchist, a political libertine. If morality 8 PHILOSOPHY AND LIFE is custom, why may I not deviate from custom ? Who made custom my master ? If government is a compact, who may say that I am a party to the compact ; and, if unwilling, by what authority can I be compelled? If law is convention, and convention is convenience, why not my convenience? A doctrine which runs to the brink of the French revolution — of the social disinte- gration due to Individualism in philosophy, y. We are thus led to see that the problems which the philosophic spirit sets itself are not different from the ordinary questions of our lives. We judge men every day by their philosophy ; their views on just those ques- tions which philosophers discuss. My second proposi- tion, accordingly, is this : That its effects on life are, in a general way, and when historically interpreted, a legiti- mate test of the truth or falsity of a philosophical doctrine or system. This position is often denied. We are told we must love truth for truth's sake, and leave the consequences to themselves ; that the inquirer, the philosopher, can- not be responsible for consequences. This is sometimes true ; yet it is surprising in how few cases it is true. It is never true in philosophy. From the nature of the case, consequences enter as a part of the material of the phil- osophic construction — consequences in experience and life. Philosophy puts the question : How can I explain man and his environment? It is only half a solution to explain either man or his environment. Materialism explains man in terms of the environment, subjective idealism explains the environment in terms of man ; but no philosophy is true which leaves out of its reckoning any degree on the arc which measures the mutual relation between personality and nature. 9 / PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE Life is, therefore — to go a little deeper — the sphere of the interaction of man and nature, the sphere of ex- perience, the only storehouse of data from a philo- sophic solution. And all aspects of experience must have equal weight. It is the habit of natural science to magnify law, to deify universality, to disparage individ- uality, to ridicule heart ; this is the environment aspect of the question. The metaphysician and moralist is prone to magnify individuality, to deny law, to disparage the external ; this is the personality aspect. The rights of each must be fully recognized; yet the latter is and should be popularly emphasized in this generation for several reasons. In the first place, because the limitation of philosophi- cal data to experience carries the presumption that nature is always a party to experience, that that only is experience which consists in a reaction of man on nature. That this is a false presumption is seen in the larger half of human experience. The overwhelming testimony of life is that its greater part both has no material reference and is incapable of such a reference. The entire range of higher emotion points to needs which life never fully realizes, and by realizing, only enhances. The postulates of our ethical selves, which untutored intelligence spontaneously and daily reckons the most important, durable, and true of all our experiences, not only run above natural reactions, but often seem to run counter to them. The tendency of natural science is to the refusal to the heart of all share in the determina- tion of truth, the denial to the will of any validity in its requirement of a principle of regulation more inflex- ible for man than the principles of nature. Man may deny and violate natural law, bidding defiance to its material compulsion, and preserve that wholeness of inner 10 PHILOSOPHY AND LIFE truth which constitutes his integrity as man ; but who can escape the commandments of his own inner nature, the laAV of self-realization which tells him : " What thou art thou shalt act out, and wherein thou violatest the right thou thyself shalt suffer loss " ? But these inner truths should be further emphasized for their own sake ; it is strange that they should ever need emphasis. Why, if all facts are sacred and none are intentionally outraged, why should not facts of mind be as valid as facts of nature ? Why should not all facts of mind be as valid as any facts of nature ? Why is the emotional recoil which all men feel in the presence of cruelty not as good evidence that cruelty is contrary to the order of biological development as is found in the bleeding tissue which is left by a cruel blow ? Why is not the degenerate will which follows an egoistic theory of conduct as valid evidence that self-control is nature's higher law as are the physical effects which follow conduct on this theory ? It is as valid evidence, though in the former case we appeal to consequences, and in the latter case to law. But the former is law as much as is the latter. Biological evolution is based upon a principle whereby needs arise where satisfactions are, and where satisfactions are not found, there no need is; the economist develops the social organism on the same principle, that supply does not precede but always accompanies demand. Yet what treatment does the man receive at the hands of contemporary science who claims that an ethical demand is sufficient proof of its own normal satisfaction, and that mental intima- tions of immortality afford presumptive evidence of a future life? Yet the man of science knows that such inner experiences are facts, that they are expe- riences, and, in the face of such knowledge, sweeps them 11 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE away as sentiment or illusion, and exhorts the man who is as good a scientist and a better philosopher than him- self, by reason of a more comprehensive theory of ex- perience, to curb his imagination, and cease to trouble himself about consequences ! But the natural sciences demand a further philosophy than is afforded by the simple postulate of experience ; for the possibility of experience, of a relation at all be- tween man and nature, must have its philosophy. To go no deeper into the question, " How is experience pos- sible ? " than the strict empiricist would follow, it occurs to me to ask by what right he uses experience at all ; by what right his categories or types serve him for the generalization of possible experience ; by what right he constructs hypotheses which go beyond experience. I ask him why he exercises faith in his investigations of nature, why he ever trusts his facts out of his sight — by what right, in the name of all that is empirical, he ventures to prophesy in regard to nature. His whole procedure in these respects — which are fundamentally one — is in so far a refutation of a philosophy which recognizes no values or meanings except those which experience appears to justify. We find accordingly that both the facts of personality and the facts of environment must be recast in a deeper metaphysic of experience itself. This problem underlies all the empirical work, both of the naturalist and of the philosopher, and they are equally dependent on its ver- dict. But in this more abstruse discussion, the mental claims a certain priority and nature-science must be content with second place. The physical investigator, therefore, who so loudly declaims against metaphysics and presses it to a preliminary self-defence, in its recog- nition of anything not subject to gravitation and cohesion, 12 PHILOSOPHY AND LIFE is only insisting on a procedure which must result in a curtailment of his own claims ; either in the way of an admission of lack of certainty in his results, or in the way of the recognition of other grounds of assurance than those afforded by the atomistic and fragmentary re- sults of experience. There are those who are modest enough to take the first of these alternatives, and there are also those who are philosophical enough to take the second. We are led, therefore, both from a superficial view of experience and by a more critical philosophical method, to the view that a system of thought may be legitimately judged by its effects on life and character. But the further question at once arises : How are these results to be estimated? How am I to sav what elements of character are due to a man's philosophical opinions, and how far is he moulded by the current doctrines of his generation ? These are legitimate questions, and their proper answer greatly narrows the range of the thesis we are considering in two distinct particulars, one of which is a caution taught us by the student of science, and the other of which we draw from the domain of historical study. For we may say — and this is where we must love truth for truth's sake and take no account of consequences — that facts, established truths, are never to be disregarded nor denied in view of their results. Facts are sacred, lead where they will. Do they interfere with our views of life? Then our views of life are wrong. Do they conflict with authority ? Then authority must go, be it authority customarily considered even more sacred. I would be the last to hamper investigation with a shrink- ing timidity of consequences. It is the main merit of 13 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE the new movements in philosophy that they are throwing authority to the winds and letting facts stand for them- selves. But this is science, this treatment of isolated facts. Philosophy goes further in asking : How can I interpret these and other facts in a consistent theory ? Note carefully — not these facts only, but these and other facts. All facts are equal before law. Our theory must neglect none of them. Do they conflict with one another? Then my philosophy is not true, and it is quite possible that I am unable to construct a theory in the particular case that is true. A large number of phil- osophical questions to-day are in this stage waiting for further results from science, and on these questions phi- losophers should confess ignorance ; a modesty which is growing among us, and which is in striking contrast with the extravagant omniscience of some systems of metaphysics. Now, by consequences in life, I mean actual facts of my life — inner truths which are sacred, as facts. These we must preserve most loyally. But our cherished in- terpretations of them, our theories of living, these are no more than any hypotheses which serve their day and aid us to live until further truth teaches us to throw them aside, or reconstruct them with due reference to our new acquisitions. As far as disregard for conse- quences has reference to interpretations, it is just ; but when it includes fundamental mental experiences, those truths which go to make up our intellectual and moral integrity, it is wrong. It is in the latter interest, unfor- tunately, that the criticism of philosophy is usually made ; and it is sometimes in the former interest, unfor- tunately too, that the consequential argument is appealed to by speculative thinkers. Again, the bearings of a philosophy on life can only 14 PHILOSOPHY AND LIFE be discovered in a broad historical survey ; certainly not by a judgment of individual men. In individual cases it is the character that influences the philosophy as often as the reverse. Yet the history of philosophy studied by epochs and in periods of decided philosophical tendency, indicates results in morals, institutions, general life, which are unmistakable. We need no special historical research to inform us that Idealism inspired the mind in the blooming period of Greek art ; that Stoicism dominated the martial period of Roman greatness ; and that Mate- rialism has ruled in the history of French democracy. Whichever be cause and whichever be effect, phil- osophy and character, thought and life, can never be divorced. In view of the foregoing, a third position of general interest may be taken : That instruction in philosophy is an essential element in sound academic culture, and that to accomplish his true work in education the instructor in philosophy must be alive to the essential conditions of progress in each of several great departments of learning. The remarks already made to signalize the limitations of empirical science and its dependence on speculative theory indicate, in part, the relation of scientific study to philosophy in the course of university instruction. It is the boast of science that she stoops to small things, to the gathering and preserving of humble details, that she is ready to sacrifice the " lordly theory " to the " paltry fact," and it is a part of this pride that she should resent and expose the study which too often proceeds in igno- rant and arrogant neglect of the truths which she has established by patient and exhaustive toil. The opposi- tion of science, so far as it is reasonable, is not an oppo- 15 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE sition to philosophy, but to the vagaries in the name of philosophy, which clothe their barrenness in the garments of profound generalization, and scout the humane ends of utility which science aims to subserve. With these the true philosopher has as little patience as the true scientist, and it is his purpose as well as his interest to rid his vocation of the stigma which popular feeling and scientific criticism unite in casting upon it, and in which the voice of history none too loudly joins. Philosophy has been a screen for the scientific charlatan ; in her marble halls she has sheltered the mystic, the rhapsodist, the dreamer ; and certain of her geniuses, the greatest intellects the world has seen, have lost their moral birth- right and even their good name in the maze of guess-work which the irony of scientific men denominates meta- physics. But this is our misfortune as largely as our fault, and the sober thinkers of to-day are at one with the workers in science in demanding the restatement of philosophical problems in terms which admit of the application of exact methods, and imply reverence for the humblest truth. The return to experience in philosophy is as much needed as the return to philosophy is needed in the sciences of experience. Empiricism will not secure science, and speculation alone will afford no true basis for philosophy. The scientist must needs be a philoso- pher, and because in the past he has partially realized this need science has made advances ; on the other hand, the philosopher must needs be a scientist, and it is because in the past he has not realized this need that philosophy has not claimed her share in the discovery and application of truth. The philosophical function of the scientist is found in the imaginative construction which foreruns discovery; the philosopher builds his 16 PHILOSOPHY AND LIFE construction wider, but its foundation is where the scientist has laid it. The two disciplines are therefore necessary to each other, and their place is side by side in a liberal education. The elements of scientific method should precede abstract philosophy, and the later de- velopment of speculation should rest at once upon the data drawn from the laboratory and the museum, on the one hand, and from the gallery of the mind on the other, where are found the specimens of the psychologist ; that is, in facts within and facts without philosophy takes its rise. This demand has found fruit and practical justification in late years in the new directions in which philosophy has turned inquiry, and in the more exact methods by which many questions before regarded as simply specula- tive have been approached. In psychology the effect has been as marked for its novelty as for its healthful stim- ulus. Comparative and experimental psychology are the direct outgrowth of the modern scientific spirit, and it is to the merit of contemporary philosophy that the new work is receiving its hearty endorsement. M. Ribot may see in this movement the decay of speculation prophesied by Comte, and Dr. Maudsley may declare that an organic theory of mental unity seems, in view of the newer results, to be the most probable hypothesis ; but other workers insist that no results so far established by physiological psychology give even presumptive improb- ability to a spiritual and ideal theory of mind. I speak here with the conviction arrived at through earnest study in the laboratory and with the physicist, and with the caution which is born of a realization of unsettled prob- lems, and I say that neurological and psycho-physical research has done no hurt to an idealistic philosophy. But further than this, this is just the field in which 2 17 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE philosophy may redeem its reputation, and show its ability and willingness to handle its own problems in an exact way. Shall I give up my study of the mind because the physiologist challenges me to a searching examination of the points of common interest to him and to me? Shall I abandon the field to him, at the same time refusing to accept the results which he attains by laborious research ? However just my refusal of his results may be, it can be justified only after an intelligent estimate of his work. No, my better part is to join with him in a common effort, rendered more effectual perhaps by the combined gifts of the scientist and the philosopher, and render assistance in the search for truth which is of the utmost importance both for the science of the organ- ism and for the theory of the mind. This active interest in experimental psychology and a personal preparation for such work no professor of philosophy in this genera- tion should lack, in justice to his students and to truth. For the questions of neuro-psychology are receiving just now as much attention as are the questions either of pure physiology or of pure mental science. Psycho-physical laborations are growing in number and in importance, and special organs are being devoted to the publication of their results. No university course in mental science is now complete which does not present at least the methods and main results of scientific psychology, and the larger institutions in both worlds are seeking men of proper training for exact and original work. This cer- tainly indicates progress. If the additions which are being made are additions of fact outside the sphere of mind, they are valuable at least for physiology ; but if they bear in any way, however remotely, upon the mental, we should be free to enlarge our view of the sphere and aim of mental philosophy. 18 PHILOSOPHY AND LIFE Such study, however, should come after the descrip- tive and introspective study of the mind, and after the principles of logic, especially inductive logic, have been mastered. We shall then expect students who take philosophy freely to be better observers and reasoners than their fellows when they come to more advanced work either in philosophy or in science. In the study of literature and language the function of philosophy is plain, and its value the philologist and literary critic are generally quite ready to admit. Com- parative philology finds its fundamental explanation in comparative psychology, and the latter is only possible on the basis of a training in the interpretation of mental movements. The conjectures of the philologist and the hypotheses of the anthropologist may sometimes be con- firmed or corrected by a simple reference to the psychol- ogy of speech and the laws of the growth of conceptions. The study of the child mind, so long neglected by philosophers, but now becoming very important to men- tal theory, throws great light upon the growth of idioms of speech, grammatical forms and rhetorical rules, and is the only source of such information open to the philolo- gist. What is language but the expression of higher mental processes in their different stages, and who is able to interpret its forms and criticise its adequacy better than he who understands the mental movements of which it is the expression ? A further relation also exists between the student of language and the speculative thinker, namely, this : lan- guage is the product of human faculty, a record of human experience and achievement, and it is itself a part of that general humanity or life in which philosophy finds its problems. Not only then must the student of language, 19 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE in its deeper relations and meaning, see its bearing upon the more general hypotheses which philosophy advances, but the philosopher is true to the conditions of his prob- lem only as he is himself a philologist, or stands in the most sympathetic attitude towards the results of philo- logical study. Of literary criticism and composition the same may be said, but with added emphasis. The canons of literary art and appreciation are involved, in an intimate way, in our developed world-theory. ^Esthetics cannot be scien- tific unless it be true subjectively ; that is, all aesthetic composition is a matter of the constructive imagination, its subject matter, its poetic form, its adequate execution, all appeal to the ideal estimate to which philosophy seeks to give formulation. The questions which spring up around the aesthetic problem take deep hold upon the relations of life. The points of most lively present dis- cussion in literature and art turn upon our view of phil- osophic ethics and its relation to our sense of the beau- tiful. Who can write with authority on realism in art ? Certainly not the man who has no knowledge of the principles of ethics in their social application, on the one hand, and their relation to mental ideals on the other. I do not mean that literary taste is a matter of learning ; but it is nevertheless true that the critic, the instructor, must be able to throw his canons of taste and execution into form if he would justify the general principles of his distinctive school, or if he would instruct the intel- lect and refine the taste of the student; and all such formulations contribute to the philosophy of literature and art. The relation of this department to political and eco- nomic theories is also close and important. The theory 20 PHILOSOPHY AND LIFE of the state is one of the most difficult of philosophical problems, and its solution waits upon the decision of the psychologist and moralist. The most potent criticisms urged against the social visionary are drawn from psychology ; we say that his Utopia is impossible while man is constituted as he is, that is, while mental laws, passions, impulses, temperaments, are what they are. We go to the philosopher for the foundations of a political and social system under which man can work out his destiny. Society itself and the state are developed products of the human mind, and so the philosophy of human life must explain and justify society and the state. There is no other department of thought which takes so deep a hold upon popular morals and brings so promi- nently into view the popular character as the political. We cannot divorce our politics from our morals, nor our estimate of political desert from our judgment of personal character! But at the same time uninstructed popular movements are nowhere more damaging and extravagant, and nowhere else is there such a field for the arts of logical and emotional sophistry. Hence the necessity for the codification, the unification, the philosophy of duties and rights which is law. Individual thought and impulse is not law, individual conscience is not law ; but how do we know this, if not by the recognition of a uni- versal of thought and a universal of conduct, two great departments of philosophy? The economist and the legislator must understand human motives if they would construct a policy or form a statute opportunely. The only capable student of political and general history, and the only safe guardian of national franchise, is the man who knows something of the historic development of the human mind as seen in institutions, and knows on the other hand how to lead the popular thought of a constit- 21 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE uency to a higher plane of political theory. The dreamer in politics is, perhaps, more dangerous than the dreamer in philosophy, but he is always a dreamer in philosophy before he becomes a dreamer in politics ; and on the other hand the safest exponent of political progress is the man who studies most closely the laws of motive in conduct and the growth of ethical conceptions among the people. Such, in brief and defective outline, is the place and function of philosophy in the modern university, and cer- tainly such a theme or aggregate of themes is broad enough for a host of workers. No one man can by any combi- nation of gifts or courses of preparation do justice to this programme and at the same time do justice to himself. Hence many separate chairs are now devoted to this work in the larger institutions, chairs of Psychology, general and experimental, Logic, Ethics, Philosophy of Religion, Metaphysics, History of Philosophy, Peda- gogics, and ^Esthetics. The magnifying of philosophy, therefore, in view of what has been said, is not the magnifying of one branch of study at the expense of others, or of one mode of intel- lectual discipline in contrast with another ; it is, rather, the magnifying of study and discipline. Its concern is to reach the statement of facts which underlie all knowl- edge, and of rules for the conduct of the understand- ing in the various lines of research. It aims to make men vigorous thinkers, awake to alternatives, patient of hypotheses, cautious of conclusions, able in attack and defence, liberal and catholic in opinion. Excessive literary culture makes men in some degree erudite, pedantic, near- sighted to truth ; excessive scientific culture makes men in some degree positive, syllogistic, unsympathetic to 22 PHILOSOPHY AND LIFE the more problematical bearings of truth ; philosophical culture makes men, or should make men, judicial, toler- ant, alive to the infinite possibilities of truth, and full of reverence for truthful thought and most of all for truthful life. 23 II THE IDEALISM OF SPINOZA 1 Recent years have been rich in discussions of the historical position and work of the Jew Spinoza. His life has always had a singular charm and attractiveness from its stern uprightness and frank independence, and it has been a protest against the unjust personal attacks of many — theologians often — who fail to discriminate between opinion which is individual, and life which is universal. The man who thinks true but lives false is worse than the man who thinks false but lives true; and history utters few clearer and more emphatic words than those she uses to tell of Spinoza's nobility and grandeur of character. And yet Dr. Hodge, writing from the standpoint of dogmatic theology, is right in placing Spinoza in the front of the host of modern de- structive rationalists, as every one knows who appre- ciates the Spinoza revival of the eighteenth century. Herder and the author of the Wolfenbiittel fragments have a distinct background of Spinozism. Goethe said Spinoza was one of the overpowering influences of his life, and no one doubts it who reads the Geheimnisse. 1 This paper was written with especial reference to Sir F. Pollock's Spinoza, his Life and Philosophy, 1st ed., London, 1880 (a revised second edition appeared in 1899). Other English works which may be consulted are : Martineau, Study of Spinoza, and Types of Ethical Theory, chapter iii., bk. i., Sigwart, Der Spinozismus, and the historians (Ueberweg, Fischer, Erdmann). (From The Presbyterian Review, Jan., 1889.) 24 THE IDEALISM OF SPINOZA Schleiermacher would have been impossible without Spinoza. This is all true, and Spinozism is rightly considered the force that makes for Pantheism ; yet in philosophy we look at the foundations of things, and while we may con- tend strenuously with a man about our theological sys- tem, we do it the more hopefully when he is one with us in the fundamental postulates of our world theory. And so much the more if his sympathies are human and his aspirations Godward. In metaphysics Spinoza is on the side of Theism, the intuition of God, and pure morality; in the humanities he has been a preserving and cleansing power. The high idealistic tone of Ger- man literature, especially verse, was inspired and pre- served by him, and a similar wave of spiritual perception swept over England when Coleridge in his own way re- produced direct from the pages of the Ethics the doctrine of an all-pervading Reason and Love. Theology may have as much to fear from pantheism and mystic ideal- ism as from absolute scepticism or sensationalism — as much to fear from Spinoza as from Hume or D'Alem- bert — but philosophy has not, and for the same reason that an earthquake does more damage at the top of a building than at the bottom. The question, " Is Spinoza an idealist ? " has arisen, I think, largely from the fact spoken of above, that his influence has been decidedly idealistic, that is, idealistic in a broad human sense. A distinction must be care- fully preserved between the high spiritual view of things which is sometimes called idealism, and the definite form of philosophic thought that bears that name in many different systems, just as we hear of a materialism of life and thinking, when strict materialism in a philo- sophical sense is quite inapplicable. The inquiry before 25 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE us is concerned exclusively with the rigid philosophical meaning of idealism. No one is disposed to doubt that Spinoza was a high spiritual thinker ; our only question is: Does his system contain the germs of philosophic idealism, and if so is it an essential part of his thought, and what was his personal attitude toward it ? There are several principles to be observed in the application of the historical method to the development of philosophic thought — principles which are evident enough in statement, but difficult of application. First, all such development must be founded upon undoubted fact. Comte's application of his "law of the three stages," Hegel's development of " reason " in ancient ' history, and Jacobi's exposition of Spinoza, are cases of the violation of this requirement through misunder- standing or misrepresentation. Second, all development must begin with the stage reached by the doctrine which is developing, and not with the starting-point of the doctrine which is subsequently developed. To the neg- lect of this law is due, I think, half the misconstruction in the history of modern philosophy. A library of Locke commentaries is useless to-day because they begin to estimate him not where he left off, but where Hume began. Locke was not an enemy of a-priorism, but of innate ideas; and to judge him rightly we must deal with the latter doctrine as it was developing, and not with the former as it was afterward developed. There is a broad gulf here, and it is not fair to blow Locke into it because his house was built on the windward side. Third, philosophic doctrines in their interdepen- dence should exhibit a logical and essential rather than 26 THE IDEALISM OF SPINOZA an accidental connection. This principle is also of capi- tal importance. The controversy as to the Platonism of the Sermon on the Mount 1 illustrates the difficulty of distinguishing accidental from essential resemblances in trains of thought. But the principle is plain. Of two conflicting doctrines, that must be neglected which is of less importance in the author's general system, rather than that which is essential and whose erasure will wreck the entire work of his hands. Without prejudging either we must accept as the author's opinion that which is clearly advocated by him. 2 The Ethics of Spinoza is an effort to put a system of speculative metaphysics into strict mathematical form. Following the lead of Descartes, who made mathematical clearness and distinctness the test of necessary truth, Spinoza advanced certain self-evident propositions or axioms from which the closely linked chain of proposi- tions and demonstrations depends. It is Etluca ordine geometrica demonstrata. His other writings are more or less special or practical in their subject-matter, and it is to this great work that our attention must be especially given. It is evident at once to those who are at all familiar with the doctrine of Spinoza that implicit idealistic coloring, if it is to be found at all, must appear in the doctrine of " attributes." Remembering that to Spinoza " substance " is the absolute and infinite ground of all things, the self-caused, that of which nothing positive can be asserted or known, " that which is in itself 1 See parallel drawn by Martineau, Types of Ethical Theory, i., pp. 78-80. 2 An example of this is the conflict between Sir William Hamilton's doctrine of consciousness as the necessary characteristic of mind, and his theory of unconscious or " latent " mental images. The latter is his clearly expressed opinion. 27 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE and is conceived by itself," " whose concept needs not the concept of another thing for it to be formed from " (JEth., Def. 3), we can understand the definition of attri- bute as " that which intellect perceives concerning sub- stance, as constituting the essence thereof " (Def. 4) ; and again (Epist. 27), "it is called attribute with re- spect to the understanding, which attributes to substance such a determined nature as aforesaid." This definition of attribute, not as a manifestation of substance, but as what the intellect takes for a manifestation, looks imme- diately to the magnification of mind in relation to the world, a form of absolute idealism ; yet while we admit this fully from the point of view of this single doctrine, we maintain that the system, as a whole, cannot bear this construction; that insistence upon this aspect of the doctrine of attribute overthrows the doctrine of sub- stance and subverts the entire structure of the meta- physics ; and that this looking toward idealism is foreign to Spinoza's own view of his work. The argument may be conducted along the following lines : 1. All implicit development of Spinoza toward Ideal- ism rests upon the theory of perception advocated in Def. 4. 2. This theory of perception is not necessary to the general system ; indeed, it contradicts its fundamental conception. 3. Consequently this theory of perception must be modified in conformity with the great lines of Spinoza's thought, i. e., it must be given the form of absolute a realism. 1 Used in the sense of the " identity " philosophy, of which Spinoza is called the father. 28 THE IDEALISM OF SPINOZA II Turning to the development of the doctrine of attribute, we will remember that Spinoza's substance is not only infinite in its being, but also in its attributes. By defi- nition it is " absolutely infinite, . . . consisting of infinite attributes, whereof each one expresses eternal and infinite being." If there were not an infinity of attributes the substance would not be absolutely infinite, for here would be an unfulfilled possibility of enlargement. Further, each of these attributes, partaking of the nature of the absolute, is infinite, or, to preserve the distinction of Def. 4, would be perceived as such by an infinite intelligence. Man is endowed with the power of perceiving two of these attributes, matter or exten- sion, and mind — but not in their full extent. We can conceive an intelligence capable of mightier efforts than ours, of making the entire universe of thought and ex- tension its object ; this intellect would differ from ours in degree. And we can also conceive an intelligence that differs from ours in kind, one that is endowed with different capacities toward the absolute — that is, capa- ble of perceiving attributes of which we know nothing, and differing from others of its kind, like ours, in degree. So in passing from our present state of knowledge of the attributes to the state of knowledge that infinite intelli- gence enjoys, we must pass through an infinite number of stages, each representing an infinitely diversified series of intellects. But reasoning again from the impossi- bility of an unrealized possibility in reference to the absolute or its attributes, we reach the startling declara- tion that whatever is possible is actual. 1 So all these 1 Eth., i., 16. 29 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE intellects must exist, 1 and we seem to be giving to intel- lect a prominence that is discouraging. Yet this process of multiplying intellects is based upon Def . 4 — that is, it starts from the fact of perception, and not from that of reality. 2 But not only does intellect perceive the attributes in general, as one of these it perceives itself ; and we have another line of idealistic development, noticed briefly by Mr. Pollock. Mind is counted twice. The unity of the attributes in the absolute gives the famous proposi- tion, " ordo et connexio rerum est ordo et comnexio ide- arum" All the modifications, modes, of one of the at- tributes are accompanied by modifications in all the others — modifications that are identical in fact, though partaking in exhibition of the peculiarity of the attri- bute to which they belong. Pollock, following Erd- mann, and perhaps Spinoza himself, uses the figure of infinite planes 3 of infinite magnitude to represent the attributes and identical figures drawn all over these planes to represent the modes. Spinoza's doctrine will admit of its further extension. Let us conceive all things under the name substance as concentrated at a point, and from this point expanding in attributes, radia- 1 This seems to be hinted in Spinoza's answer (Epist. 68) to Tschirn- hausen's objection (Epist. 67), where we find the expression " infinite minds." See also Eth., ii., 7, and i., 10. 2 Herbart reasons somewhat the same, likening Spinoza's doctrine of attribute to his own doctrine of " accidental view " (zufdllige Ansicht). He says : " He who would draw idealism from this would greatly err. Of this enemy of the whole cosmology Spinoza thiuks so little that he puts under the axioms of the second part these : ' Man thinks ' and ' We are conscious of particular bodies variously affected,' " etc. (Metaph., i., § 49). 3 Lewes uses the figure of planes in the same connection ; his use of modes also is the same as Spinoza's, although he seems not to be aware of it {Problems of Life and Mind, ii., 16-22). 30 THE IDEALISM OF SPINOZA ting in infinite planes in all directions, and so consti- tuting an infinite sphere of existence. 1 Now let these planes be covered with figures varying infinitely in the limits of each plane, and not identical in the different planes. We know mind and body under different forms — under forms of thought and extension — and though, according to Spinoza, they are the same in essence, yet they are not perceived so by us. So these figures may differ in shape, provided they are reducible to an ultimate oneness. 2 To carry out the mathematical figure, let rec- tangular axes of three dimensions be drawn through the central point, and it is only necessary that all the figures in the plane of any two of these axes be reduced to the general equation of a circle in that plane, the common equation x 2 + y 2 = a 2 . The resulting equation must be that of a circle, for the modes are themselves substance, constituting in the in- finite mode the attribute, and in the great aggregate the universe, and the universe is represented as spherical. With this still inadequate conception of Spinoza's mighty flight of speculation — in Heinze's judgment the mightiest that the world has seen since Plato — we must ask by whom this universe is to be perceived? There cannot be another infinite, for by the doctrine of " Sameness of Indiscernibles " held by Spinoza, it would be identical with the infinite we are considering. There 1 Spinoza uses the word " globule," Tract, de Deo et Homine. This is the old scientific conception of the world, the stars being fixed in a spher- ical shell (so Anaximenes, Xenophanes, etc.), also current in Jewish spec- ulations, with which Spinoza was no doubt familiar. 2 Camerer says (Die Lehre Spinozas), quoting as authority Eth., iii., 6 : " Die Modi eines jeden Attributes involviren den Begriff ihres Attributes, nicht aber den eines Anderen." 31 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE cannot be an outside intellect less than infinite, for it would be inadequate to the conception. It must be per- ceived by some intellect, otherwise, by Def. 4, there would be no attributes. There is but one alternative remaining, and that is that the universe is perceived by the intellect that is within; that by reason of peculiar endowment, or by reason of its constitution as intellect, or by reason of an original pre-eminence in the world building, the attribute intellect wraps its mighty folds around all substantial existence. This is the alterna- tive to which Pollock is compelled to drive Spinoza. He says : x " Spinoza seems to say that every mode of every attribute, other than thought, has a several mind or modification of thought to itself," and 2 " the modes of thought are numerically equal to the modes of all the other attributes together — in other words, thought, instead of being coequal with the infinity of the other attributes, is infinitely infinite." Again, in summing up the discussion: " the intellect that perceives an attribute as constituting the essence of substance belongs to the attribute of thought. Thus, if we push analysis farther, we find that thought swallows up all the other attributes, for all conceivable attributes turn out to be objective aspects of thought itself." The words in italics — which are mine — strikingly indicate the alternative just described. It should be noticed, again, that the whole difficulty here, as in the last case, arises from the perception of the attri- bute and not from its reality — i. e. 9 from Def. 4. Ill Passing to the second stage of our argument, we are led to inquire what relation the doctrine of Def. 4 bears 1 P. 172, commenting on Epist. 68. 2 P. 179. 32 THE IDEALISM OF SPINOZA to the general system of Spinoza. The strange incon- sistency seen in denning substance as that of which no positive predication can be made, and then in postula- ting attributes of this substance, gives us at once the reason for the qualifying clause of Def. 4 — viz., that attributes are only what intellect " perceives concerning substance." Nothing can be asserted of substance, he declares, for all assertion is definition ; if negative, then limitative, and if positive, then predicative; and defi- nition is to Spinoza subsumption. 1 But substance as defined (Def. 3) is incapable of subsumption ; conse- quently, no attribute can be asserted in reality, and the only way to reach phenomenal existence at all is to make extension and thought attributes in perception. The application of the third of the canons of criticism already laid down leaves us no doubt as to which of these alternatives is Spinoza's real view. His doc- trine of substance, on the one hand, is the corner-stone of his metaphysics. His first work, 2 discovered latest, and probably dating back to the time of his excommuni- cation, when he was most completely under the leading of Descartes, announces the unity of God or substance, and reasons a priori therefrom. The unity and uni- formity of nature is the supreme principle of the later developed " system of nature " and of the " psychology," and this leads directly to the doctrine of the absolute and ultimate sameness of the attributes in their identi- cal substance. This is given its due importance by Pollock. He says : 3 " The first and leading idea in Spinoza's philosophy is that of the unity and uniformity 1 Determinatio est negatio, Epist. 50. Cf. Schwegler, Gesckichte der Philosophic in Umriss, p. 106. 2 De Deo et Homine, Germ, translation by Auerbach, in collected works, ed. of 1871. 3 P. 84. Cf. Zeller, Geschichte d. deutschen Philosophie, 2d ed., p. 51. 3 33 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE of the world." In the " psychology " this doctrine, as has been often pointed out, is the historical culmination of the discussions which had given rise to the dualism of Descartes, the " occasionalism " of Malebranche, and the " pre-established harmony " of Leibnitz ; and as a solu- tion of the problem of the interaction of body and mind, it anticipates the u double-aspect theory " as held to-day by the "identity" philosophers of Germany and the positivists of England and France. It is therefore suffi- ciently clear that the doctrine of one absolute substance, with all that it carries in its train, is essential to the thought of Spinoza. On the other hand, the distinction between an attribute and what the mind takes for an attribute seems to be an after-thought. We have no evidence that the distinction between noumenon and phenomenon, absolute and rela- tive, things in themselves as opposed to things as they appear, was current until Kant. At any rate, Spinoza nowhere urges it, as is admitted by Pollock in a remarkable passage. "The manifestations," he says, 1 " are themselves the reality. Substance consists of attri- butes, and has no reality other than theirs. As for the suggestion that the perception of the understanding in this respect may be illusory — in other words, that the reality of things is unknowable — it is one which Spinoza was incapable of entertaining ; it is wholly foreign to his thought, and I submit that it ought to be to all sound thinking. ... To me it amounts to a contradiction in terms to speak of unknowable existence in an absolute sense. I cannot tell what existence means if not the possibility of being known or perceived." This is going to the utmost length in attributing realism to Spinoza, and though it is correct from the analogy of Spinoza's 1 P. 163. See also p. 299. 34 THE IDEALISM OF SPINOZA thought, as will be shown, yet it destroys utterly the distinction drawn in the definition of attribute, and which is our only warrant for an idealistic development. If Spi- noza was incapable of entertaining the suggestion that the perception of the understanding may be illusory, then he meant nothing by distinguishing between attributes as they are and as they are perceived, and the ground of our idealism disappears. Yet the assertion that this distinction is foreign to his thought is too strong, and cannot be maintained. The words of Epistle 27 are unmistakable: " I understand the same by attribute (or by substance), except that it is called attribute with respect to the understanding." l And again : 2 " The understanding must apprehend the attributes and affec- tions of God, and nothing else." Proposition 10 of the Ethics is merely an enlargement of this distinc- tion, and without it can have no place in the teaching of Spinoza. 3 There is no difference of opinion, therefore, as to the relative importance of the doctrines under discussion. Common consent seems to indicate and fairness seems to require that the doctrine of substance be the starting- point for the development, that Spinoza himself regarded it so, and that while the distinction of Def . 4 is a real one, and if maintained carries unlimited idealistic possi- bilities, yet its development is made impossible by the inherent contradictions to which it gives rise. 4 1 Pollock's translation. 2 Eth., )., 30. 3 Cf. Erdmann's strong position, Gesck. d. Philos., 3d ed., ii., p. 59 (sentence beginning, Was endlich den Spinoza selbst betrifft, etc.). This distinction is the basis of Martineau's classification of Spinoza's system as immanental rather than transcendental, although there are infinity-less- two transcendent attributes (Types of Eth. Theory). * That the balance of these two views of the attributes is not well 35 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE IV Let us, then, attempt to interpret Spinoza in the terms of our general result — i. e.j the removal of the coDdition of perception in the definition of attribute, in such a way that the universe is looked at artificially and simply as an external fact with which our mind has nothing to do. Thought is not really external to the universe — other- wise it had lost an attribute — but thought is entirely correlative with extension and innumerable other at- tributes. The results in the direction of idealism are striking in the extreme. The infinite stages of intellect, each representing infinitely diversified orders, will be no longer necessary ; for they arise for the complete per- ception of the attributes, and the necessity for this perception is gone. And not only will they be unneces- sary, but they will be impossible. Thought is one of the attributes co-ordinate and correlative with all the others, each of which is infinite, and to multiply intel- lects to the extension of thought beyond infinity is to institute a disparaging comparison of infinites, which is impossible. Thought is limited to its peculiar sphere, maintained in Spinoza's mind is clear from his declaration of the indepen- dence of the attributes as perceived. They are to be thought of as in themselves individually, but yet as constituting substance. See Herbart, Metaph., i., § 41, and Fischer, Geschichte, i., pt. 2, p. 285. It is difficult to say just what Pollock means by idealism in this connection ; probably only a tendency to subjectivism. It is not "subjec- tive idealism which turns the world into a phantom/' for he expressly disclaims this for Spinoza (p. 49), although in so doing he is not true to his reasoning on p. 175. Nor is it the milder Berkeleyan type, for on p. 170 we read : " It [Spinoza's system] is proof even against the objections to which Berkeley's Idealism is exposed." It seems to indicate only an undue and preponderating role given to the attribute mind. It is only necessary to interpret this in any one of the forms of historic idealism to see that Spinoza believed in none of them. 36 THE IDEALISM OF SPINOZA and we are freed from Pollock's charge that intellect is infinitely infinite. And in the other case, in which we found a passage to idealism, the same is true ; the sphere of existence now rolls on without being perceived in its entirety. The attributes, arranged in symmetrical and correlated harmony, fulfil the functions of their original endowment. Thought and extension assume form respectively in the modes or individuals of whose reality we are sensible. Modifications in one give modi- fications in the other through the bond of a living unity, and infinite forms of unknown existence repeat the story of the change. Nor is it necessary to infer that thought and extension are peculiarly related to each other or more intimately than others of the attributes. 1 We know only the two, but in the plane of intellect there may be figures, modes, which, while reducible to the ultimate equation of intellect, perceive three, four, an indefinite number of attributes, with as clear a con- sciousness, in as intimate a relation, as we perceive our two. 2 There are points, for example, at which the spiritual world interpenetrates the natural, and while our vision is dim and misty, we still may see that it runs parallel and very near to our own. But another piece of reasoning, and that in which Sir F. Pollock places most confidence in developing Spinoza toward idealism, remains to be considered, and to avoid misunderstanding, I quote the page at length. 3 It reads: "Let us now turn to the main point of Spinoza's implicit idealism. What is the conclusion to 1 See Tschirnhausen's objection, already referred to, Epist. 65 and 67 ; also Pollock, pp. 171, 172. i Spinoza's answer to Tschirnhausen. Erdmann, Gesch. d. Philos., 3d Auf ., Bd. ii., p. 60. 3 Pp. 175, 176. 37 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE which it really points ? What would Spinoza have done if he had not been hampered by a remnant of Cartesian dualism? We have to observe that each attribute is complete in itself ; the possibility of mutual interference is rigorously excluded. The perception of things as extended is not a relation between the extended thing and the perceiving mind, for they are incommensurable. Every extended thing has its correlate in thought, whether that correlate is part of a conscious mind or not ; and when it is a perception of a conscious mind, the perception is a mode of thought, and nothing else. And the thing correlated to the perception is not the object perceived, but the organism of the perceiving sub- ject. The series of ideas or modes of thought is whole or continuous ; no other attribute has any part in it. How, then, can we say that thought perceives exten- sion? — or what ground have we for making extension co-ordinate with thought, and in some way which, nevertheless, is not causation, necessary to its manifesta- tions? Putting out of sight the supposed & priori necessity for an infinity of attributes, let us assume extension and all its modes to be blotted out of exis- tence. Thought and its modes will by the hypothesis remain unaffected ; every mental correlate of a material fact will be precisely what it was before ; the psychical order of things, ordo et connexio idearum, will be un- altered," etc. This page, I venture to say, not only disregards the principle of exposition we are employing, but more especially ignores the great doctrine that Pollock him- self places at the base of Spinoza's system — i. e., the doctrine of the identity of the attributes, the oneness of substance. The author does not, indeed, substitute a lesser doctrine for a greater, but he rejects the greater 38 THE IDEALISM OF SPINOZA and leaves its place entirely vacant. To support this, I wish to take the propositions of the page in their succession, insert in each, when necessary to make it true to Spinoza, a clause illustrating the doctrine of unity, and note, finally, the result on the conclusion. He says : " Each attribute is complete in itself; the pos- sibility of mutual interference is rigorously excluded ; " — because of the incapacity of either attribute to modify itself. Again : " The perception of things as extended is not a relation between the extended thing and the perceiving mind, for they are incommensurable ; " in- stead, the perception is a relation between the extended thing and the perceiving mind, arising from the capacity of mind to perceive the correlated modifications in ex- tension. Again : " Every extended thing has its corre- late in thought, . . . and the perception is a mode of thought, and nothing else ; " instead, this perception is a mode of thought which has its corresponding modes in all the other attributes, including extension. Again : " The series of ideas or modes of thought is whole and continuous; no other attribute has any part. in it;" in- stead of the last clause Spinoza teaches that all the other attributes have the same series. 1 Now the thesis : "^Putting out of sight," etc., with the conclusion, " thought and its modes will remain unaffected," etc., as above. The incorrectness of this conclusion is now apparent. Thought and its modes, instead of remaining unaffected, will be blotted out with extension and its modes ; every mental correlate of a material fact will disappear with the material fact of which it is the corre- late. 2 The ordo et connexio idearum will no longer exist, as it is one with the ordo et connexio rerum. The effect 1 Ordo et connexio idearum est ordo et connexio rerum. 2 Cf. Hellferich, Spinoza u. Leibnitz, p. 35. 39 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE on the remaining propositions, which contain only an amplification of the conclusion, need not be followed out. Spinoza's true doctrine of the relation of thought to the universe is, I think, admirably brought out in Pollock's extension of the figure of the piano used by T. H. Huxley in his essay on Berkeley. It was only necessary for him to remain true to that exposition. Finally, we should be justified in claiming for Spinoza a realistic theory of knowledge, as Pollock inadvertently admits in the passage already quoted. Spinoza says dis- tinctly (Eth., L, prop. 30) : " For the true idea must necessarily agree with its object — that is, . . . what is present in the understanding as the object of thought must necessarily exist in nature." Again (Eth., I., prop. 4) he says : " The attributes are outside the intel- lect {extra intellectum)" And, indeed, to him the at- tributes are the measure of reality. Substance, or God, is absolutely real or infinite only in that it has an infinity of attributes. " The more reality or existence anything has the more attributes belong to it " (Mth. 9 L, 9). Herbart owes his doctrine of " reals," as he himself has shown, to this singular conception of Spinoza's; and Martineau declares that no pre-Kantian reader could have put any other construction on Spinoza's words than that whatever intellectus percipit is real. 1 What Spinoza might have done under the circumstances is an entirely different question, and one with which we are not concerned ; much less are we concerned with the inquiry as to what he would have done if " unhampered by a remnant of Cartesian dualism." We must deal with him as a fact, with his system as he left it, and a statement of the result a change of conditions would have had upon his teaching can in no sense be called a devel- 1 Study of Spinoza, p. 184. 40 THE IDEALISM OF SPINOZA opment. When Sir F. Pollock asks what ground we have for making extension co-ordinate with thought, he is asking whether Spinoza is right or not. This may be left to philosophers to discuss ; it is the business of the historian to record and interpret. 41 Ill EECENT DISCUSSION IX MATERIALISM 1 There are phases of contemporary materialism which have little in common with the doctrines of ancient and mediaeval materialists, and which in point of subtlety and philosophical attractiveness are quite in accord with the advanced position of nineteenth century thought. The idealist of to-day flatters himself that he avoids the inconsistencies of Berkeley and Fichte ; so the materialist smiles at the mention of Priestley, D'Alembert, and Hol- bach. But these growths respectively in idealistic and materialistic thought have not been parallel. Idealism has tended in the last thirty years to withdraw its gaze from the thought-ultimate as a monistic conception to perception as a dualistic relation, that is, from cosmic to psychological idealism ; while materialism has tended in quite the opposite direction, i. e., from the crude postulate of matter in bulk to the search for an ultimate material- istic principle, that is, from psychological to cosmic materialism. Each has strengthened its flank, and the battle is now joined between psychological idealism and metaphysical materialism. Spiritualism has gained vastly by this change of base. As long as the ontology of spirit rested upon a dogmatic assertion of universal mind, there was no weapon at hand wherewith to attack the corresponding assertion of 1 From The Presbyterian and Reformed Review, 1890, p. 353. 42 RECENT DISCUSSION IN MATERIALISM universal matter. I have as good right to assert a uni- versal as you have, and ghacun a son goilt is the rule of choice. But now that philosophy is learning to value a single fact more than a detailed system, and is sacrificing its systems to the vindication of facts, it is spiritualism and not materialism which is profiting by the advances of science. Materialism has appealed to the metaphysics of force, spiritualism has appealed to conscious process. Which is more in harmony with the scientific spirit of the day? The successive positions which modern materialism has taken in its necessary retreat into metaphysics, are interesting from a historical point of view. First it was matter and no mind ; then matter with a function, mind ; then matter, a force manifested in extension and mind ; then force, which is doubtless matter — but may be mind. First mind was brain ; then mind was a function of brain ; then mind and brain were manifestations of a material principle ; then the material principle became force, — which again may be mind. In stretching the lines of defence of the spiritualistic principle in psychology, we turn at once to the method of knowledge as a process, and we shall find it valuable for more than defence. For if we discover the indepen- dence of the thinking subject as regards the method, we may at once pass to its autonomy as regards the matter of the knowing process. That is, if we find a refutation of materialism in the psychology of knowing, we have so much the more ground for its refutation in the meta- physic of knowing, and the two considerations will present a consistent philosophy of knowing. What 43 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE then is the materialist's doctrine of the method of knowl- edge? There are four cosmological doctrines of knowledge, arising from four types of world-theory, assuming that the parties to the controversy are only mind and matter. First, monism of thought ; second, dualism of thought and matter (or force) ; third, absolute phenomenalism or agnosticism; and fourth, monism of matter (or force). On the first hypothesis, perception is a purely thought relation, and by definition the materialist cannot accept it. On the second, we have a realistic theory of knowl- edge in which the thought element rests upon the ultimate presupposition of thought and the materialist is again excluded. Upon the hypothesis of absolute phenome- nalism the support is cut equally from both subject and object. If both be phenomenal, there can be no ques- tion as to which is real, and the materialist and idealist are both defeated. The fourth supposition, monism of matter or force, is then the materialist's only alternative, and the first problem we propound to him is this : Given matter or force, how do you account for thought ? Is mind a function of organized matter ? The grounds upon which materialists have been led to assert that mind is motion, or in general some function of matter, are the principles of cosmic economy and uniformity of law; and they are in part justified as scientific. But the law of cosmic economy is inopera- tive except when cosmic outlay is purely hypothetical and when the phenomena in question may be explained in terms of the known. And the law of the uniformity of nature rests upon the principle of the conservation of energy, in this case upon the position that mental process is caused by physical forces and vice versa. Just here we reach the question crucial to psychological mate- 44 RECENT DISCUSSION IN MATERIALISM rialism: Has physiological psychology led to the dis- covery of any process of transition from nerve force to thought? This may be answered unequivocally and emphatically no. II. Schiff's Experiments Much has been made of the experiments of Scruff, whereby he has shown that mental operations are ac- companied by a discharge of heat. 1 M. Luys says : 2 " These experiments show us, on the one hand, that sustained intellectual work is accompanied by a loss of phosphorized substance on the part of the cerebral cell in vibration ; that it uses it up like an ignited pile which is burning away its own essential constituents; and that, on the other hand, all moral emotion perceived through the sensations becomes at the same time the occasion of a local development of heat." All this may be perfectly true and yet valueless for the debate. Every one admits that there is a loss of phosphorized substance during thought ; but this phosphorus is found passing off in the ordinary channels of the body (Byas- son and Beaunis), and this latter fact is used by Luys to prove the passage of thought back into a material form. In the first case, according to this ingenious thinker, phosphorus is expended during the intellectual operations, therefore (p. 78) "it (thought) uses it (phos- phorus) up ; " but phosphorus is also found passing from the body in the form of sulphates and phosphates and in increased quantities after periods of wakefulness and thought (Hammond), therefore (p. 70) these " serve as a chemical measure of the intensity of cerebral work 1 Archives de Physiologie, 1870, p. 451. 2 Brain and its Functions, pp. 78 and 79. 45 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE done in a given time." But, although it is a pity to interfere with this twofold transformation of energy, we deem it a much more credible hypothesis that the phosphorus of the cerebrum is the phosphorus of the passages, and that there has been no transformation at all. On either of the hypotheses equally a development of heat is possible during the play of intellectual forces. If mind and brain are distinct, and brain a necessary organ of mind, heat may be the equivalent in whole or in part of cerebral activity. In short, the evolution of heat means only that molecular change is going on in the brain, and this is no very startling discovery. III. Bain's Sensational Equivalence But to bring the question of correlation yet closer, what shall we say to Professor Bain's " sensational equi- valent " ? He says : " that there is a definite equivalence between mental manifestations and physical forces, the same as between the physical forces themselves, is, I think, conformable to all the facts. . . . Mental mani- festations are in exact proportion to their physical sup- ports. There is a sensational equivalent of heat, of food, of exercise, of sound, of light." * Let us examine the facts. I sit idly in my chair ; the bell strikes one, and I hear it so distinctly that I am roused from my revery. I begin to read; the bell strikes two, three, four, and I am quite unconscious of the sound. Where is the sensational equivalent of sound? Gone with the passage of attention, a psycho-physical function. I plunge my hands successively into a basin of water ; to one it 1 " Correlation of Nervous and Mental Force," in Stewart's Conserva- tion of Energy. 46 RECENT DISCUSSION IN MATERIALISM is warm, to the other cold. Where is the sensational equivalent of heat? Gone in relativity — partially, at least, a subjective estimation. I light a candle and my page is illuminated ; then a second, and the illumination is scarcely increased. Where is the sensational equiva- lent of light ? If it be said that changes in bodily con- dition alter the equivalent, we reply : How will you avoid these changes in establishing the equivalent ? It is like saying that conscience is uniform in its utterances, or would be if some were not perverted. We have only to ask : If some are perverted, where do you find the con- sensus of consciences which proves their uniformity? By actual experiment, the bodily conditions have been ruled out to a very great degree and a law approached which indicates uniformity of sensational contingence, but no such thing as sensational equivalence. We mean Fechner's logarithmic law of the ratio of growth between stimulus and sensation. Here is a uniformity of contin- gence such as we find constantly in nature in cases in which there is no proof of transformation or correlation of energy. My reading is contingent upon the burning of the gas, but who would say that the consumption of gas caused my reading, or that the energy of gas con- sumption passed into my thought ? So, if mind opera- tions be contingent upon brain operations, would we not expect uniformity in this contingency ? And the further parallel, drawn with great distinctness by Luys, Biichner, and Bain, between the healthy dis- charge of brain functions and the activity of mind, between the necessity for the regular feeding of the cortical cells and the free coursing of rich blood and the manifestations of clearness in thought, is just as true on one hypothesis as on the other. If mind works by cells, it works better by healthy cells, and if a whole 47 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE brain is necessary to the normal activity of mind, the removal of part of the brain necessarily deranges mind. We fail to see wherein this aspect of the facts supports one hypothesis rather than the other. If the case is thus in reference to a sensation equiva- lent, it is more unmistakable in reference to a thought equivalent, unless we be able to resolve all mental pro- cesses into sensation; and even under this unfulfilled condition we must pass from intensity, considered as a force equivalent of stimulus, to consciousness as such, an altogether new and subjective property. This has never been done. The last utterance of Professor Huxley is this i 1 "I cannot conceive how the phenomena of con- sciousness as such and apart from the physical process by which they are called into existence, are to be brought within the bounds of physical science. Take, for ex- ample, the feeling of redness. . . . Let us suppose the process of physical analysis pushed so far that one could view the last link of the chain of molecules, watch their movements as if they were billiard-balls, weigh them, measure them and know all that is physically knowable about them. . . . We should be just as far from being able to include the resulting phenomena of consciousness, the feeling of redness, within the bounds of physical science, as we are at present. It would remain as unlike the phenomena we know under the names of matter and motion as it is now." And again : " It seems to me pretty plain that there is a third thing in the universe, to wit, consciousness, which, in the hardness of my head and heart, I cannot see to be matter or force, or any conceivable modification of either, however intimately the manifestations of the phenomena of consciousness 1 " Science and Morals," reply to Mr. Lilly, in Fortnightly Review, Dec., J886. 48 RECENT DISCUSSION IN MATERIALISM may be connected with the phenomena we know as matter and force." We accept this opinion, however true it may be to Professor Huxley that he " finds even greater difficulties in exchanging the notes-of-hand of spiritualism for the solid coin of reality." Not only can- not consciousness be brought within the bounds of physical science, but physical science must be brought within the bounds of consciousness. Matter, force, physical science, as science, are nonentities outside of consciousness, that is, they are reducible, and the only irreducible we have left is consciousness, or thought. Professor Huxley may hold up his hands and cry, "I am an agnostic," if he choose, after admit- ting that "the arguments used by Descartes and Berkeley to show that our certain knowledge does not extend beyond our states of consciousness, appear to me as irrefragable now as they did when I first became ac- quainted with them some thirty years ago ; " but we feel compelled by logical consistency to admit that our one certainty not only is, but, by the necessities of conscious perception, always must be the existence of a mental world. The difficulties grow more insurmountable as mental phenomena advance in complexity. Bain, Lewes, Spencer, and Guyau have not shown that thought is a complex of sensations and much less that sensation supplies the forms of this complexity. Where, for example, is causation? Let Professor Huxley speak again : "If there is any- thing in the world which I do firmly believe in, it is the universal validity of the law of causation, but that uni- versality cannot be proved by any amount of experience, let alone that which comes to us through the senses. And when an effort of volition changes the current of my thoughts, or when an idea calls up another asso- 4 49 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE ciated idea, I have not the slightest doubt that the process to which the first of the phenomena in each case is due, stands in the relation of cause to the second. Yet the attempt to verify this belief by sensation would be sheer lunacy." The judgment, attention, appercep- tion, the will, to say nothing of conscious continuity and personal identity, all stand unaccounted for. Not only must the materialist bridge the chasm to consciousness with supplies of new material, but he must elaborate this material into the rich texture of our thought and further he must build the loom and supply the motive power to weave these splendid tapestries. IV. Double Aspect Theory Whatever else consciousness be, it makes possible all experience. This is where the double aspect theory fails, and fails despite Professor Wundt's subtle effort to make it secure. If mind and matter are two aspects of one truth, what is this truth ? The spiritualist answers : " If they are aspects, they are aspects to me, that is, the me antedates the aspects ; but the me is itself an aspect, hence there is but one aspect." Professor Wundt re- plies : " Not so ; admitting the twofoldness of percep- tion, subject and object are both real in perception. But by the law of consciousness the object is the not-me plus the me. Subtracting the me, we have left the not- me unknown forever by the terms of perception, but a substance objective to the me. Now of the me we cannot say that it is a substance, for though it is known immediately, it is not known substantively. The me is known only in the manifestations of thought. Conse- quently no such substance as mind can be postulated, and if we be driven to assert a monism, from percep- 50 RECENT DISCUSSION IN MATERIALISM tion alone, that is, a substantive monism, it must be a monism of the not-me." Professor Wundt, it is true, is saved from this conclusion by the spiritual element in his psychology ; but if his premise be true that the me is known only as manifestation and the not-me is known in a complex with the me as manifestation, what hinders the inference that the me is a manifestation of the not- me, i. e., materialistic monism ? We said that Professor Wundt is saved from this con- clusion by the spiritual element in his psychology. Re- sulting from his detailed and labored analysis of mental processes, viewed from a physiological point of view, he finds two irreducible elements, sensation and will. He contends that from these two data the whole intellectual life can be built up. Of these that which bears more unmistakable signs of ultimateness is the will. Here he is in accord with the new spiritualists of England and France. But unlike them in that they maintain a knowl- edge of self as power, he is compelled to reconcile the will functionally with his position already described that the not-me is the only known substance. For this reconcilia- tion he resorts to the monadology of Leibnitz. Given the two subjective irreducibles, sensation and will, we find their simplest common manifestation in instinct ( Trieb~) : instinct then is the bond of reconciliation, and is to be sought in the automatic habits of animals, the morphological properties of plants, and the chemical processes of the inorganic world, until we reach the atom, which contains potentially both ' the substantive not-me and the feeling and willing me. This position is strengthened by a resort to the Hege- lian logic. Professor Wundt maintains in his Loyik?- with Vacherot in France and the Neo-Hegelians in Eng- 1 LogiJc, I, p. 32. 51 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE land, that the " substance of things is the unity of thought," or, in his own words, 1 that " the fundamental laws of logical thought are at once laws of the objects of thought." Thus nature is realized thought and the sub- stantive not-me is, from an external point of view, " so expanded that it includes also in one substance-complex the psychic life manifestations : " while from an internal point of view, the not-me becomes a manifestation of thought. So we reach in the atom the substance of which mind and matter are the double faces ; or, to use his own words, " this substance in motion is the bearer of the psychic elementary phenomenon, instinct." To this very closely woven theory, several exceptions might be taken. In the first place, it might be denied that sensation, as such, is a mental ultimate ; there is a conscious form even in sensation. Conscious form, then, might be taken with will as our ultimates. We then might assert that instinct is not the synthesis of these ultimates, will and consciousness. Instinct, as Wundt defines it, may be both involuntary and unconscious. Again, upon this theory there must be a continuity of both aspects throughout the entire scale of plant and animal life as well as in the inorganic world; yet we have no evidence of any internal aspect when we pass out of the animal kingdom. There is an objective rationality no doubt in crystallization, but we can assert neither feeling nor will, and to admit the absence of either of these is to admit either that the inner aspect is absent or that feeling and will are not mental ulti- mates. Wundt refers the absence of consciousness to the absence of those conditions of permanent equilib- rium which are necessary to higher organized life, ad- mitting that inorganic matter has momentary flashes of 1 Physiologische Psychologie, 2d ed., \\. t p. 452. 52 RECENT DISCUSSION IN MATERIALISM consciousness. If sensation is ultimate and necessary to instinct, there can be no such thing as " unconscious instinct elements." But, further, admitting for the moment the existence of unconscious instinct elements, thus allowing to the atom an inner aspect, what have we gained by its pur- suit ? Mind and brain are inner and outer aspects of an unknown substance. To explain this dual inherence, we postulate an atom having inner and outer aspects, but whose substance is unknown. If the atom have not the two aspects, we cannot reach them in man ; if the atom have the two aspects, we do not account for them in man. And yet again, admitting Wundt's position that nature is realized thought and the processes of nature processes of the realization of thought, we deduce two impor- tant inferences. First, complexity of organism is the reflection and not the cause of complexity of thought, the opposite of the position of materialistic evolution. Wundt has actually drawn this inference. And, second, since thought must logically precede its realization, the inner must precede the outer aspect, and our monism is, after all, a monism of mind. V. Maudsley's Organic Unity of Mind 1 In an article in Mind, No. 54, Dr. Maudsley sums up the main argument of his Physiology and Pathology of Mind in three great points, which may be stated logically thus: First, the brain, as the organ of con- sciousness or thought, is capable of dual activity, this 1 This section has been published substantially in Mind (London), October, 1889. 53 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE duality making it impossible for- us to look for any unity in consciousness as far as the thought processes alone are concerned; second, the real unity of self is to be found in the affective or emotional life, which, third, finds its basal principle of unity in the organic unity of the body, i. e., in the nervous system. These points are closely interwoven, and present an account of the mental life to which spiritualists generally take broad exception. It is my purpose to indicate some considerations from a psychological standpoint, which tend to show that Dr. Maudsley's physiological data do not suffice for the interpretation he gives them. The facts bearing upon the dual nature of the hemi- spheres and the functional interpretation of them in regard to movement which Dr. Maudsley gives are conceded from the outset. It seems to be established that, besides the common functional activity of the hemi- spheres, that area over which they both have dominion, there is a something left to each alone, a large body of motor functions peculiar to each; and that either may dictate the performance of their common function, together with that which is peculiar to itself. It is when we pass on to consider " how the hemispheres act toward one another in thinking " (p. 166), that is, how they are related to each other as respects consciousness and its unity, that the question of psychological interest arises. In answering this question, Dr. Maudsley first cites the case in which we attempt to perform movements involving the separate activity of the hemispheres, as the performance of different movements with the two hands. He says (p. 166) : " If a person who is perform- ing one kind of act with one hand and another kind of act with the other hand, will endeavor to think of both 54 ' RECENT DISCUSSION IN MATERIALISM acts at the same moment, he will discover that he cannot do so ; although he can execute the different movements simultaneously, he cannot think them simultaneously; he must pass in thought from one to the other, a rapid alternation of consciousness takes place. This alterna- tion, though rapid, is by no means simultaneous ; it is distinctly successive, since there is an appreciable pause in the performance of it." After excluding other alter- natives, such as the co-existence of different conscious- nesses, he concludes that " there remains the supposition of an alternating action of the hemispheres correspond- ing to the alternating consciousness." This alternation, he goes on to show, gradually yields, on the part of the hemispheres, through repetition and education, to their union in simultaneous activity as a single organ (166), but consciousness preserves its method of " extremely rapid alternations." The conclusion, therefore, as re- spects intellectual unity, is that we find no basis for it in the functional activity of the hemispheres. This conclusion may be true, but the analysis it involves of the psychological unity of the states involved is so meagre and false that we cannot take it alone with us in our search for the true principle of unity. By consciousness in this connection Dr. Maudsley seems to mean attention. It is true that I cannot attend to the two movements at once, that my attention alternates usually even when the movements are simultaneous, but it is not true that I may not be conscious of the two movements at once. Repetition tends to make them elements of a single state of consciousness, just as repe- tition tends to make the hemispheres a single unit organ. A simultaneous consciousness is not a "distracted or dual consciousness," but an integrated consciousness, a new state whose elements are drawn from previous 55 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE states. Attention is a state of monoideism, but con- sciousness is not. Now this integration of states is possible only on the basis of a certain conscious unity as necessary to the mental life, as organic unity is to the members of the body in their variety of physical functions. If I move my right thumb to the left, is the movement my only consciousness ? Am I not conscious that it is my thumb, my movement? Are there not unnumbered organic, detached, stray peripheral sensations bound up with the act or with its very thought? And when I shift my attention and move my left thumb to the right, is there a pause in my consciousness of all these things ? Not at all ; I am just as conscious of my thumbs, of my organic affections, of myself, between the movements or during them. A simple change in my motor experience can in no sense be said to create a pause or break in my consciousness. Each hemisphere, instead of contribut- ing a separate consciousness, contributes an element to my single consciousness — in this case a motor element. And further, attention itself as a principle of active unity is dependent upon the complexity of the mental life. The selecting, relating, unifying, disposing func- tion of attention has been so emphasized in recent dis- cussion that it is needless to dwell upon it. I have thus briefly touched upon three elements of mental unity which analysis seems to give and which demand explanation whatever hypothesis we adopt. First, the subjective value of all modifications, both sensor and motor ; second, the subordination of incidents in consciousness, past and present, to the permanence of consciousness itself, which persists as the background of their flow ; third, the grasping and disposing movement of attention, which is always one. The class of move- 56 RECENT DISCUSSION IN MATERIALISM ments hitherto spoken of, L e., those which are controlled by the hemispheres individually, with no co-operation, bear only upon what are now called incidents and not upon the persisting aspect of mental unity. If the case rested simply upon this class of movements, Dr. Maudsley might strengthen himself by extending the difference of function not to the two hemispheres alone, but to each of the motor areas within each hemi- sphere. The centre for speech, for example, is probably distinct from the centre for the movement of the lower limbs. We can perform the two functions — say speak- ing and walking — simultaneously, but cannot attend to them simultaneously until a close association is brought about by education. Therefore, it might be argued that motor consciousness is a matter of successive states and lacks unity. From this point of view we have not two brains (centres), but, perhaps, a dozen. But the unity of the mental life, which the motor consciousness is here taken to represent, remains quite untouched. Dr. Maudsley next proceeds to consider those move- ments in which the hemispheres co-operate ; they " com- bine to dictate different movements of the two sides for a common end, just as the eyes combine the different visions of one object." The question is this: "From what higher source do the hemispheres obtain their governing principle of unity? How is it that when dictating different movements they yet have an under- standing to work together to a common end?" And his answer is again that the unity of the motor con- sciousness is . an educated unity, and that, like two acrobats, they learn to perform together "by much travail and pain." This is true and its importance is properly estimated; but it also must be criticised on the ground of what it leaves out. We are forced at 57 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE once to inquire: Whose is the "end or aim in view," the " conception or foresight of the act, its ideal accom- plishment " ? Certainly not the conception of the hemi- spheres themselves, though the figure of the acrobats would lead us to think so ; for how could such a con- ception be acquired by the hemispheres before the action had been actually performed? And if thus acquired, how could they unite in it without a central bureau of consciousness where the progress of the co-ordination of movement might be apprehended and recorded? The conception which precedes all effort at motor execution is a fact or scheme of unity, mental unity, an ideal unity of the motor consciousness to which the complex activity of the motor apparatus is to be reduced, by long and wearisome effort. Here, as in the former case, we find no fault with the account of what takes place in and for the motor consciousness ; but we cannot see how this consciousness can be considered for itself alone in independence of the higher thought conscious- ness in which alone the idea of motor co-operation ger- minates and bears fruit. The other figure which Dr. Maudsley uses in this connection makes the case still plainer. He says the hemispheres are related to each other, in such co-ordinated movements, as the eyes are in binocular vision, their early binary images being reduced by experience to a unitary perception. But the eyes do not accomplish this themselves. Let us suppose the eyes to be the seat of consciousness. Now, either each eye has its conscious- ness, or there is a single consciousness for both eyes. If each has its own consciousness, neither eye could be conscious of its disagreement with the other and their results could never be reduced to unity. If there is one consciousness for both eyes, it is in virtue of this unit 58 RECENT DISCUSSION IN MATERIALISM consciousness that a unit perception is attained and not from anything in the eyes themselves; that is, it is only through the interpretation of a unit consciousness, in which both images as such are possible, that they can be reduced to the form of single vision. The mental unity to be explained is something more profound than the simple consideration of these motor performances would lead us to expect ; it remains to see whether the organic solution offered by Dr. Maudsley is adequate. The two great questions here involved are these: Is the " unity of the intellectual life based upon the unity of feeling," and " this again upon the unity of the organic life " ? These questions are so comprehensive and far- reaching that only a few general considerations can be advanced in this connection. 1. The same line of argument by which Dr. Maudsley and others 1 prove the absence of unity in the motor consciousness, applies with undiminished force to the affective (or feeling) consciousness. Can we attend to two simple sensations in two peripheral organs at once, say a taste and the pain of a wound in the hand ? Not at all. The case is just the same as when we try to per- form two movements on different sides at once. There is the same alternation of attention until the sensations become united in a single attention-complex. The isola- tion of single affective states in our adult life is open to the same charge of psychological atomism as has been found attaching to the similar isolation of motor states. Indeed, simple feelings of movement are largely quali- tative affective states, and the argument from them applies to all states of the class. The feeling of effort which is bound up with movements seems to indicate 1 Horwicz. 59 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE a higher plane of intellectual unity, which the theory in question leaves quite out of account. 2. We may well notice that neither the manifoldness nor the unity of feeling could be apprehended as such in the absence of a circumscribing consciousness which, through its own unity, takes it to be what it is. Sup- pose we admit that at the beginnings of life the inner state is simply an undifferentiated continuity of sensa- tion ; what is it that feels or knows the subsequent differ- entiation of parts of this continuity ? It cannot be the unity of the continuity itself, for that is now destroyed ; it cannot be the differentiated sensations themselves, for they are many. It can only be a unitary subjectivity additional to the unity of the sensory content, i. e., a form of synthetic function which reduces the many to one in each and all of the stages of mental growth. The relations of ideas as units must be taken up into the unit idea of relation, to express what modern psychol- ogy means by apperception or the "mechanical connec- tion " must become the " presented connection," to use the terms employed by Mr. Stout in Mind, No. 53. 3. It is difficult to see how the higher intellectual unity, of which I have spoken, can find its basal princi- ple in the organic unity of the body. Admitting, with Dr. Maudsley, that mind exhibits organization, the pro- gressive organization of residua, we are never able to go outside of the unity of consciousness to find such men- tal residua. Indeed, there can be no such thing as a residuum, except as it is the same in nature as that of which it is a residuum ; and admitting further that the body is also an organization and an organization which proceeds in the most intimate and progressive parallelism with that of mind, we are yet unable to make mental organization a function of physical organization until 60 RECENT DISCUSSION IN MATERIALISM these propositions are established : (a) That the law of the organic and morphological growth of mind finds its proximate ground in the growth of body ; that is, that the methods of physical organization run also into mental organization. Now, as a fact, the great principle of mental organization, apperceptive synthesis, so far resists this interpretation. It seems, as Lotze says, to work by a method which is unique. (5) That mind in its pro- gressive organization does not exhibit stages or modes or form peculiarly its own. (e) That the two aspects of unity, physical and mental, are not themselves mem- bers of an underlying principle to which they are both secondary and which may be mind. Contemporary thought is tending, I think, to the recognition of the fact — as wholesome to the idealist as to the materialist — that the personality is one, that it includes mind and body, that we know these only in an apparently inseparable union, that mind is not mind without an object and that an object is not an object without mind, that a within is as necessary to a without as a without is to a within, and that rational unity lies deeper in the nature of things than either the empirical unity of the atomistic psychology or the organic unity of the nervous system. 1 1 The question of psychophysical unity is taken up from the genetic point of view in the writer's Mental Development in the Child and the Race, chap. ix. § 3, chap. x. § 3, chap. xi. § 1, and the conclusion reached that the actual process involved is that of motor synthesis or " synergy " effected by practical adjustment of the motor apparatus and of the attention. 61 IV PROFESSOR WATSON OX REALITY AND TIME 1 In a recent interesting article, Professor Watson aims to clear up the relation of time to the absolute. 2 He devotes most of his space to preliminary considerations in psychology and to the examination of Bradley's con- ception of reality and McTaggart's recent exposition of Hegel's doctrines of the absolute and of time. Professor Watson's own view of the time-process in its relation to the absolute is stated only as it is implicated in these criticisms, the positive treatment being reserved for a later article. The conclusion which he thus announces is in these words : " An absolute which manifests itself in the time-process, and yet is self -complete." This view, however, must not be considered as the traditional " reality-behind-appearance-view " of the transcendental- ists, as Professor Watson is at pains to say ; it is much nearer, as the present writer understands it, from the par- tial statements of Mr. Watson, to the later view of Lotze as contained in the Metaphysic (as contrasted with the Lotze of the Dictaten). This may be made plainer by further quotation. Professor Watson says : " If the absolute is self-complete apart from the time-process, it cannot be manifested in that process; if it is manifested 1 From the Psychological Review, September, 1 895, pp. 490 ff. . 2 "The Absolute and the Time-process," Philos. Review, July, 1895, pp. 335 If. PROFESSOR WATSON ON REALITY AND TIME in the time-process, whether it is self -complete or not, at least it cannot be self-complete apart from the time- process, but the time-process is essential to its self- completeness." " We reject as self-contradictory the conception of the Absolute as self-complete apart from the time-process." Lotze's view, with all its ins and outs, is well presented by Falckenberg in his recent arti- cles, and the pondering of his views, especially the dis- tinction whereby he finds succession necessary to an Absolute which is changing reality, while duration can- not be so considered, leads us to see that his problem is very similar to that which Professor Watson takes up when he goes on to say " we are immediately con- fronted by the difficulty that a world that is in process does not seem to be self-complete." It may not be fair at this stage of his discussion to anticipate that Professor Watson's solution will finally be similar to Caird's ; and it is difficult to see how he can finally get an Absolute which will be free from the charge of being " static : " but there are indications in this article that Professor Watson, who has the just reputation of being one of the ablest of the " Intellectual Idealists," is going to work that kind of thinking free from some of the weaknesses with which it has been beset in the eyes of those who are unable to find in the dynamic categories simply the " telling-off," by us finites, of a series of intellectual terms. 1 What I mean by indi- cations are these : Professor Watson in this article seems to recognize the need of some kind of an ontolog- ical construction of evolution, although there are indica- 1 Since this was written there has been a considerable further develop- ment of voluntaristic and " pragmatic " points of view. The " dynamic categories" are given notable treatment in Ormond's Foundations of Knowledge (1900). 63 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE tions, too, that he may fall back on the resource to be found in the subjectivism of the category of change (pp. 867 f .) . Further, Professor Watson shows a certain unexpected affiliation with Lotze again, in essentially agreeing that the question of metaphysics is "what reality is ; not how it is made." He says : " If it is asked why the Absolute reveals itself gradually in the finite, I should answer that the question is absurd ; we cannot go behind reality in order to explain why it is what it is ; we can only state what its nature, as known to us, involves." Does not this seem to " indicate " that there may be some further agreement toward a dynamic view of reality, in spite of Professor Watson's contention that reality must be self-complete in the sense that it is intel- lectually " constructible " ? Then there is a third " indi- cation." It is found in the good piece of psychology which Mr. Watson gives us in this article in treating of conception and judgment. This psychological digres- sion is not new in its teachings ; it is a series of views made very clear by the newer logicians. I myself de- veloped substantially the same views in the first edition of my Handbook of Physiology, vol. I., in 1889. But the use which Professor Watson makes of the " organi- zation view," as I may call it, of conception and judg- ment, is what I find interesting. I shall speak of his point against Bradley further along ; here it is enough to point out that Mr. Watson finds reality a function of progressive mental organization, thus denying the very possibility of a construction of reality apart from this organization itself. How then can the inference be avoided that the abso- lute, also, as real arises by a mental construction ? But we have no intellectual organization of which the un- temporal, the logically self-complete, the undynamic, is 64 PROFESSOR WATSON ON REALITY AND TIME a function. Hence we find ourselves in the dilemma of either making the absolute subject of all the temporal and dynamic predicates or of denying its reality. Professor Watson, it is true, appears to avoid this issue, and to content himself with the old antithesis of the intellectualists : " The consciousness of the finite presupposes the consciousness of the infinite " (p. 368), and " we are compelled to regard all finite or dependent being as presupposing a self-determining principle " (p. 368). But— -why are we? I, for one, am not. To be sure, if we make a logical antithesis with a suppositi- tious finite, defined as dependent, at one pole, we must go on and put a supposititious infinite at the other pole ; but it is going back to scholastic logic to say that either must then have reality, or gets it by this logical dialectic. As a matter of fact, when I ask my consciousness for the mental organization which constitutes the concep- tion "infinite," I do not find any such (and in my pri- vate view, neither is there any for the logical term " finite " — but this is by the way). If this be true, that there is no mental construction of any such object as the infinite or the absolute, how, on Mr. Watson's true psychology, can there be a function of it called its " reality " ? Or is this the exception which proves the rule, in the doctrine of reality ? In his preliminary determination of the Absolute, in the course of which the examination of Bradley occurs, Professor Watson makes good use of the " organization view " of reality, as I have termed it for brevity's sake. The aim of his criticism is to show " that reality in its completeness must be a thinkable reality." "If it is meant that there is in reality something which cannot be made the object of thought, because it is unthinkable, I do not see what kind of reality this can be." 5 65 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE The argument is forcible, and, but for certain criticisms of limitation, it is, in my opinion, valid. It runs thus : If reality is, as a true psychology teaches, nothing apart from the mental construction or content itself which is said to be real, then there can be no room for Bradley's contention that the knowing or judging process always vitiates reality because it issues in a series of partial predications, none of which adequately expresses reality, and all of which are among themselves liable to contra- diction. This is, it will be remembered, the road which Bradley takes to show that all knowledge is appearance and issues in Schein. Now, says Watson, such a reality, separated from the organized content of knowledge, is quite supposititious : the very meaning of reality is psy- chologically just the mental organization itself at the different stages attained by progressive conception and judgment. So Bradley's distinction between that which would be real if we could get hold of it, and that which is not real because we have got hold of it, is throughout a false distinction. The criticism is valid, as I said, as against Bradley's impeachment of judgment ; but it is not valid as used by Professor Watson in his further positive contention that, if this be true, then reality must be capable of being thought, in whatever instance it be considered, and therefore, also, in the instance of the absolute. True as far as it goes, this latter view is inadequate psychologically, and proves in the sequel not only to leave other views open, but to allow a return to the essence of Bradley's contention. This I may take a little space to show. A reading of the recent new-school Logics, — Sigwart, Bosanquet, Bradley, and above all the later disciples of Brentano, — show us that there is partial agreement in regard to the predicate "existence." This agreement 66 PROFESSOR WA TSON ON REALITY AND TIME may be brought out in the light of the foregoing by say- ing that Professor Watson makes a simple conversion of a proposition which is (1), not universally true and is (2), not simply convertible. He says, in effect, mental constructions give us at once and ipso facto what we mean by reality ; hence all reality must be construed as an actual or possible mental construction. Taking the first member of the sentence first — it is not true as a universal. The Logics say differently ; and this is just the value of the partial agreement they are effecting as against the older interminable disputes as to whether existence added anything, when thought in connection with an object, to the mere thought of the object. The Logics say in answer to this question : No, the thought of existence adds nothing to the object as merely thought. And this is the valuable contention which Professor Watson enforces against Bradley. But the Logics then go on to say further : The thought of existence is a different psychological mode, nevertheless, and finds itself quite a different psychosis. The thought of a thing as existing has the mode, or is the psychosis, which we call belief ; and whatever it be that constitutes this " mode " different from that of the mere thought- content itself, it is a real difference which psychology must recognize. It is not all thought-constructions that carry the reality predicate ; it is only some of them — Sigwart would say, only those which are (ne- cessarily) so judged by us ; Bosanquet seems to wish to say, only those which carry some sort of necessity other than the necessity with which sensations break in upon us. But whatever the lines of distinctions be, they must be lines drawn by something else than thought; since the content remains the same — to be believed to be real or not — and existence is not a thought- 67 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE predicate. The distinctions involved are really, in my opinion, distinctions of attitude, motived largely by differences of feeling. Furthermore — to take up the second point — even if it were true that all mental constructions carried re- ality with them, still such a proposition could not be simply converted. There is a more primitive form of consciousness, a mode of dealing with content, which does not involve existence as a predicate, but which nevertheless suffices for our activities in the presence of realities. "Reality-feeling," as I have called it, precedes belief ; and belief — the assertion of the reality-predicate — gives a return to the " reality- feeling " again, after a transition period of doubt, hesitation, suspension of judgment. Without taking space for going into points made elsewhere, 1 for the added reason, also, that they are in a measure my indi- vidual views, I may be content to put in evidence the fact that it is only part of the realities which we get that are thought-constructions ; many of them are felt realities. For example, does not ethical appreciation always run ahead of cognitive description? The aes- thetic and other "worths," of our system of realities, are as such not objects of thought. If these points be true, how can we say that the absolute must, in virtue of psychological deliverances, be capable of being exhausted in terms of thought? It would seem to be a competent statement, if we should modify the sentence, "Reality in its complete- ness must be a thinkable reality," of Professor Watson ; and say : Reality in its completeness cannot be merely a thinkable reality ; even though it be capable of being 1 See my Feeling and Will, chap. vii. and the article " Feeling, Belief and Judgment" (from Mind, July 1, 1892), printed below in this volume. 68 PROFESSOR WATSON ON REALITY AND TIME thought, it must have in it the quality of moving the possible thinker in the way we call belief, ethical appre- ciation, etc. ; and farther, it may be so simple a thing to the consciousness in which we are supposing the appeal to do the thinking about it to be made, that it cannot be adequately thought at all, but rests as to certain of its apprehended aspects, in its own limpid immediacy. This would seem to be the conclusion from the appeal to psychology, if Professor Watson insists on making it; and such a simple "given" would seem in a measure to justify Mr. Bradley's insight in calling it "that" as opposed to "what." 69 V THE COSMIC AND THE MORAL In his paper on "Natural Law, Evolution, and Ethics," in this 1 Journal (July, 1895, p. 489), my friend Professor J. Royce presents under the caption of " Discus- sion " an interesting attempt to reconcile the " cosmic " with the " ethical process," apropos of the current discus- sions raised by Mr. Huxley's much-talked-of address ^on Evolution and Ethics. The development given by Mr. Eoyce is based upon the well-known distinction between the " world of description," and the " world of appreciation " of the same author's work, The Spirit of Modern Philosophy. He also refers to the article of his on " The External World and the Social Consciousness " in the Philosophical Review, "September, 1894. The currency already attained by these views of Mr. Royce makes it unnecessary that I should stop long on the preliminaries of his present paper. Briefly, the argument is this : All the formulas of natu- ral science are descriptions of phenomena which are held together just for the purposes of natural science. The growth of the thought of the objective is, genetically, the sorting out and grouping by these formulas of the items of experience which have two general characters : they are capable of " description," and also of " social verification." The description is necessary to their being statable as interconnected wholes or groups : the i From the Int. Journ. of Ethics, Oct., 1895. 70 THE COSMIC AND THE MORAL verification is necessary to their being the matter of science, L e., objectively there for the discovery of all men alike. The remaining contents of experience, not presenting these characters, are not thrown together under the statement of natural laws, or " cosmic pro- cess": they are capricious, in the sense that they are not describable; and they are subjective, in the sense that they are not verifiable. They are therefore set off over against the cosmic process : and when we come to see their character as involving desire, with certain ingre- dients of the desirable known as " the ideal/' the opposi- tion crystallizes into that of the " ethical " over against the " cosmic process." The distinction is, therefore, genetically one of the method and flow of experience ; it does not seem to require a corresponding division or dualism in the nature of reality itself. So far Mr. Royce's discussion seems to me to be very clear and, in its main contention, true. I think the dis- tinction in consciousness, when genetically considered, between the two points of view of " description " and "appreciation" is the root of opposition between the cosmic and the ethical. I am not able, however, to accept his tests of the objective ; and it may not be out of place, in view of the active discussions now going on, to examine his argument a little in detail. In the first place, Mr. Royce seems, after getting con- sciousness into this dilemma of the necessary antithesis between the "ought" and the "is," to find no psycho- logical way of getting consciousness out of it. He seems to say : " Remain a man of science and the moral sense is an illusion — remain a moralist and the man of science is a liar ! No man can be both at once. The only way that a reconciliation can be effected is by a philosophy which still recognizes the opposition, it is 71 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE true, but is able to reinforce the statement of one side with profounder reasons." The ethical process it is that is reinforced in Mr. Royce's philosophy, and so the pro- test of the spirit is heard in the court of claims of ulti- mate reality. Science is tolerated, then, not justified ultimately. Now this theory, it seems, does not " reconcile " the two processes ; it merely gives us an interesting account of the genesis of the opposition. It seems to require, both in its account of the description of phenomena and in that of the meaning of desire, the same opposition between a unity which is merely recognized as given, and a unity which is demanded, although not given. Pro- fessor Royce leaves the desire urging on to something essentially indescribable and unverifiable. He says: " The object of our ideal is desirable not in so far as it is describable, and, again precisely in so far as it is not yet verifiable [italics his]. Herein, then, lies a double contrast between the natural fact as such, and the object of desire as such." With this account of desire we should expect failure to get any real reconciliation ; for it confuses the " object " of desire with the fact that with the object there is what we call, very obscurely often, the accompanying sense of an ideal. But when we come to distinguish between the object and this ideal accompaniment, we see that the object is both describ- able and verifiable ; 1 and then we see that through the attainment of it — if perchance we do attain it — we have brought the ideal which it stood for nearer to a similar construction. It, too, becomes now in so far also describable and verifiable ; now not, however, as 1 I have developed elsewhere (Social and Ethical Interpretations, 3d ed., 1902, sects. 242 f.) the distinction between "thing of fact " and "thing as object of desire." 72 THE COSMIC AND THE MORAL ideal, but as fact. The sense called ideal still goes on to attach to a further object of desire. But inasmuch as by the successful pursuit of this object, then and there, we have so far realized our ideal, in so far we have turned the " ought " into the " is " ; we have made natural history out of the objects of our ethical cravings. May not this suggest a real reconciliation of the two points of view, and not merely give an account of the opposition which remains to plague Professor Royce ? The sense of ought, then, from my point of view, is the anticipation of more experience, not yet treated under the rubrics of description ; but so far as it is identi- fied with any object of desire, so far it is thought to exemplify the canons of description of that object, as being most nearly the sort of experience that expectation is reaching toward. And natural science, the " cosmic process," is the same series read backward. It is experi- ence fully described, and hence rid of that coloring of expectation and desire which, when it was looked at the other way, made it the vehicle for the realization of the ideal. When we come to the metaphysical point of view we find the same criticism of Mr. Royce in order. What shall we say to a " reconciliation " which still, as I think, allows the two parties to the controversy each to estab- lish his own side by cutting off half of consciousness and throwing it away ? The positivist may say : " From profound philosophical reasons, I find consciousness jus- tified in its descriptions ; it is under illusion in its appreciations." And the idealist turns the tables, justi- fying himself also on profound philosophical grounds. The reason that they can do this is found in Professor Royce' s failure to find an actual identity anywhere between the experiences described and the good desired : 73 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE instead of holding that the " is " is always, in so far, also the " ought " (that is, so far as it is the legitimate outcome of the cosmic process, i. e., is statable univer- sally, and is not a mere accident) ; but that, by the very movement by which consciousness gets it as an "is," it has to transcend it in a search for a further " ought." But if this is true, — if the series is one and the antithe- sis arises from the two points of view, " prospective and retrospective," from which it is viewed, — then a being who could hold both points of view adequately at once, would know no such opposition. He would " appreci- ate " the world as good without being under illusion, and also describes it as true without being a liar. This inadequacy, as I venture to think it, of Mr. Royce's paper, may be brought out also by the con- sideration of one other point. We may ask how one is to meet the objection that in giving a natural history of the distinction between the " is " and the " ought " one lays himself open to the charge of giving exclusive weight to the "is" after all. The very sense of appre- ciation is itself a cosmic product ; how then can it have any meaning apart from the details of history out of which it has arisen ? This very dilemma seems to me to be the fruitful source of confusion in Mr. Huxley's Address. He treats the "ought" in the body of the Address as in essential opposition to the u cosmic is " ; and in an appendix says it is nevertheless a variation which has been "selected." But if the moral sense is due to selection, we may ask, must it not have existed as a fact, a variation, say, before it was selected ? But if so, how can it as a fact have been in essential opposition to the series of facts which the theory of survival for utility presupposes? Now, I think Professor Royce's paper does not answer 74 THE COSMIC AND THE MORAL this question. He seems to leave a gap between the sense of the thing and the sense of its value; he says, however, that the sense of value attaches to all things ; and by making the essentially valuable aspect of the thing indescribable and unverifiable, he says in effect that it cannot be a natural history outcome. 1 On the contrary, apart from details of natural history which I have discussed at length elsewhere, 2 1 .think the matter described by the " is " is the inadequate content of that which we feel " ought "to be ; and the descrip- tion of what " oughted " to be, i. e., that which was the object of. description of a past " ought," is what " is." In short, the " ought " is a function of a mental content, of a descriptive " is," — a motor function, I think, — and so like every other function of content has its own natural history as a single fact ; but its meaning is progressive, prospective, and the discovery of its full meaning still remains a question apart from its origin and place in evolution. I can say, therefore, with Professor Royce : " Novelty is a conditio sine qua non of all ideal value when re- garded from a temporal point of view; " but I must add that novelty, as such, is not the only conditio sine qua non. Rather is the full fact what he calls in his context the " interestingly novel." For an object of desire there must be enough description to make the thing interest- ing ; and this description is the thought content. Real- ize the desire, and you in so far add to the description, and so set another content for further desire. It is just this progressively built up content, viewed first from 1 I know he gives it a natural history in the individual's private experience, but that seems to be, in a sense, apart from the cosmic movement. I have discussed this question in some detail in the paper on " Origin and Nature " cited below. 2 See my Mental Development, pp. 341 ff. 75 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE the point of view of novelty, then from that of history, then from that of novelty again, that the final identity of reality must rest upon. An all-comprehensive ex- perience would be appreciated as the all-good. So I say " nay ! " to this sentence of our author : " There is no chance of reconciling the metaphysically real and ulti- mate universality of the so-called cosmical processes, or processes according to describably rigid laws, with any even remotely ethical interpretation of the same reality." Rather must reality, when viewed metaphysi- cally, be both rigidly true and also divinely fair — so far as metaphysics may allow us to hold to either category as more than a device of human thinking. 1 In conclusion, I do not think this is the only topic the discussion of which calls for a reconciliation of the same two points of view. I have developed, in a paper in the Psychological Review (Nov. 1895, " The Origin of a Thing and its Nature," reprinted in the volume Development and Evolution, 1902) a general distinc- tion of " prospective " and " retrospective " points of view under which that between " description " and " apprecia- tion " may be subsumed. In general, I may add that the distinction, genetically considered, is that which I have endeavored to set out in extenso, and in part from a biological point of view, under the terms Habit and Accommodation, in the work on Mental Development. Under these principles, respectively, the "is" and the "ought" find their genesis. And with this the main psychological position of Professor Royce is, I think, quite in harmony. 1 This point embodies one of the essential approaches to the philoso- phy toward which the writer is now (1902) finding his personal views tending and which sees in the cestketic category, rather than in either that of truth or that of ethical worth, the real and final reconciliation. 76 VI PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT 1 I. Historical Modern psychology has had its principal develop- ment in Great Britain, Germany, and France. Ger- many has undoubtedly had greatest influence in this movement, considered in all its branches. The two main currents of development previous to the rise of the new so-called " scientific " psychology, designated as 44 speculative " and 44 empirical," had their initial impulse, as well as their fruitful pursuit, respectively in Ger- many and Britain. German psychology down to the rise of the Herbartian movement was a chapter of deductions from speculative principles ; English psy- chology was a detailed analysis of the experiences of the individual consciousness. Kant, Fichte, and Hegel may sufficiently represent the succession in Germany ; James Mill, John Stuart Mill, Hume, Keid, and Bain, that in Great Britain. The work of Herbart and his school tended to bring a more empirical treatment into German thought, and 1 In part, from The Psychological Review, July, 1894, being material prepared by the author (by request), in company with many others, in his capacity as "Judge of Award" for this subject, at the World's Columbian Exposition, for "A Historical and Educational Report," which the gov- ernment failed to publish. The report pays especial attention to the development of psychology in the United States. Later historical matter will be found in the writer's Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology under the various topics "Psychology." 77 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE its significance was twofold: it excited opposition to the speculative method, and it prepared the Germans for the results of English analysis. It is further a legitimate supposition that the spirit of experimental inquiry which has swept over Germany in this century was made more easily assimilable to workers in this department, also, by the patient and extraordinary at- tempt of Herbart in his Psychologic als Wissenschaft (1824) to construct a "mechanic" and "static" of mind. To German thinkers also belongs the credit due to originators of all new movements which show their vitality by growth and reproduction, in that the experi- mental treatment of the mind was first advocated and initiated in Germany. But of this I write more fully below. The contribution of France to psychology has been no doubt of less importance ; yet the work of its writers has also illustrated a fruitful and productive movement. It has been from the side of medicine that French work has influenced current wide-spread conceptions of the mind. Mental pathology and the lessons of it for the theory of mental functions have come possibly most of all from France ; or at any rate — not to disparage the admirable recent work of English and German investi- gators — the tendency, so to speak, of the French treat- ment of consciousness has been to approach mental operations from the abnormal side. In America the influences which have tended to con- trol psychological opinion have been mainly theological on one side and educational on the other. The absence of great native systems of speculative thought has pre- vented at once the rationalistic invasions into theology which characterized the German development, and also 78 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT the attempts at psychological interpretation which fur- nished a supposed basis of fact to the idealistic sys- tems. In Germany various " philosophies of nature " sought to find even in objective science support for theoretical world-dialectic : and psychology fared even worse, since it is, par excellence, the theatre for the exploitation of universal hypotheses. But in America until recently men did not speculate much: and those who did were theologians. So naturally the psychol- ogists were theologians also. Jonathan Edwards had a doctrine of the agent because free-will was a question of theology. The educational influence has been auxiliary largely to the theological. The absence of great universities with chairs for research ; the nature of the educational foundations which existed under denominational control ; the aim of education as conceived in the centres where the necessity for supplying growing towns with pastors was urgent ; the wholesome fact for our civilization that the Puritans had traditions in favor of the school and of religious education — all these things made it necessary only that books sound in their theological bearings, or affording homiletic lessons in living, should be written, in a topic of such central importance. Even the term " psychology " is only now becoming domesticated : "mental" and "moral" philosophy were the titles of courses of instruction on the " soul." The type of philosophy which these conditions en- couraged was, it may easily be imagined, realistic ; and it is probably for the reasons which I have indicated that the Scottish Natural Realism was the American type of thought, and is now, except in the great univer- sity centres where systematic philosophy has become an end in itself apart from its duty to theology and educa- 79 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE tion. So far as psychology was concerned, this realistic tendency was a great good. It led to a magnification of mental reality, to a reverence for the "utterances of consciousness," to a realistic interpretation of the "im- mediate knowledge of self," to the firm settling of the great "intuitions," cause, time, space, God, etc.; and in so far as this led to the direct examination of conscious- ness and to the testing of philosophical claims by con- sciousness, it prepared the way for a better and broader method. This tendency is marked even in the more influential works in theology. Channing and Emerson no less than Smith and Charles Hodge lay the corner- stone of argument again and again in the proof " from consciousness." This tendency to a psychological view of philosophy having its basis in the religious motive is seen also in Scotland, the home of realism: and it is there a part of the British method of thought which I have already spoken of. The works on psychology written in Amer- ica up to 1880 were, as we should expect, from the hands of theologians and educators, usually both in the same person ; for it is a further proof of the association of psychology and theology that the mental and moral philosophy in the colleges was almost without excep- tion put in the hands of the president of the college, and he was by unanimous requirement a preacher. So were written a series of works which are landmarks of American scholarship, props of evangelical theology, disciplinary aids of the highest value to the growing student, and evidences — to revert again to my argu- ment — of the two-fold influence I have indicated. Ed- wards's Freedom of the Will (1754), Tappan's Review of Edwards (1839) and Doctrine of the Will deter- mined by an Appeal to Consciousness (1840), Hickok's 80 ' PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT Mational Psychology (1848) and Empirical Psychology (1854), Porter's Human Intellect (1868) and Moral Science (1885), McCosh's Psychology (1887) and First and Fundamental Truths (1889) — these and other books like them show the psychology of America up to the decade beginning 1880. Speaking for psy- chology alone, it is easy to point out their merits and defects, not in my individual judgment, but as com- pared with the standards of the present year of the Exposition (1893). It is necessary, however, rather to show this by sketching the present and showing the new elements which have modified American work and whence they came. Coming to the present state of psychological thought, my task is made easier by reason of the divorce which has been forced between psychology as a science on the one hand and metaphysics on the other. As was said above, Herbart, while failing in his attempt to apply mathe- matics to mental " permutations and combinations," yet prepared the way for a new treatment of mental phe- nomena. After his attempt it began to be seen that the facts of conscious life were first in order of importance and were capable of treatment in a detailed way quite independently of the questions of Being, the Absolute, and the like. 1 The works of Volkmann, Lehrhuch der Psychologie (4th ed., 1894), and Lipps, Dei Grrund- thatsachen des Seelenlebens (1883) illustrate this. This was only to begin to do what had been doing in England since Locke. But the Germans now went further : they asked the question — which had been groped upon before by Descartes, by Leibnitz, and by Reid — how can psychology be a science when one of 1 The reader may refer to the article on " Herbart and Herbartanism," by Stout, in the writer's Dictionary of Philosophy (1901-2). 6 81 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE the evident conditions of the flow of mental states, of their integrity and their trustworthiness, the brain, is left quite out of account ? What is the law of connection of mind and brain? And is it possible to modify the brain and so to modify the mind? If so, then that great instrument of scientific work, ex- periment, may perform a part for the psychologist also, and his resources may thus be magnificently enlarged. This is the question of Experimental Psychology. It was answered in Germany in the affirmative. Lotze, in my view, deserves the credit of it, the credit of the great-minded constructive pioneer; and Wundt is the founder of the science in the sense that he first realized the expectations of Lotze's genius by actually planning and executing experiments on a large scale which made the affirmative answer an irreversible fact of history. Lotze's Medicinische Psychologie appeared in 1852, Wundt's G-rundzuge der Physiologischen Psychologie in 1874. Between the two, however, came Fechner, whose theoretical construction of the new work and its methods shows all the exactness of treatment of similar discussions of natural-science principles by physi- cists and chemists, and published the formulas in which he attempted to give universal statement to the dis- coveries of E. H. Weber on the intensity of sensation- states. Fechner's Elemente der Psychophysik appeared in 1860. Apart from its actual development this new method has profoundly modified the general conception of psychology even where its validity as a method has been denied. There has been nothing less than a revolution in the conception of psychology since the publication of the works just named. One of the motives of this 82 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT revolution thus came from Germany. The other — for it has two great phases — is due to English thinkers : the evolutionists, of whom Herbert Spencer (Principles of Psychology, 1855) was a pioneer. These two influ- ences are seen in two great points of contrast easily- made out between the psychology of to-day and that of yesterday in America. The latter I have described above: its two main characteristics, for purposes of the present contrast, are first, its character as so-called " faculty-psychology " ; and second, its character as hold- ing to what I may call a " ready-made " view of conscious- ness—technically an " intuition " view of consciousness. In opposition to these characters, current psychology is " functional " — holding to mental " functions " rather than to mental faculties ; and finds these functions to be " genetic " rather than intuitive — the functions " grow," instead of being "ready-made." The old conception of " faculties " made the different phases of mental process in large measure distinct from one another. Memory was a " faculty," a " power " of the mind; thought was another, imagination a third. The new functional conception asks how the mind as a whole acts, and how this one form of activity adapts itself to the different elements of. material which it finds available. The old terms " memory," " thought," etc., are retained; but with the distinct understanding that they do not stand for divisions in the mind, or different processes, one of which may be held in reserve when another is acting, etc. On the contrary, the process in consciousness is one ; and it is a psycho-physical process as well. The particular way in which this one function shows itself is a matter of adaptation to the changing conditions under which the activity is brought about. This transition is due in part also to the insight of 83 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE Herbart, and in part to the demand for unity insisted upon by the evolutionists. The other point of contrast is equally plain. The " genetic " point of view in current discussion is opposed to the older " intuitive " point of view. The mind is looked upon as having grown to be what it is, both as respects the growth of the man from the child, and as respects the place of man in the scale of conscious ex- istences. The understanding of mental facts is sought in the comprehension of their origin as well as their nature; and the question of the validity or worth of " intuitive " beliefs in consciousness is subordinated to the question as to how the mind came to have such beliefs. Both of these points of contrast have been further denned by the progress of general philosophy in America. The demand for unity in mental interpretation has not come from naturalistic evolution alone (John Fiske, Outlines of Cosmic Philosophy, 1874; Thompson, Sys- tem of Psychology, 1884) ; an equally pressing demand has come from idealistic metaphysics, which seeks for continuity in the series of animal minds as zealously as does the advocate of evolution. The influence of Hegel, as interpreted in the works of Green, and later in those of Caird, has been potent in effecting this transformation here. It is easy to see also that the same union of forces is quite feasible as respects the genetic development of the individual consciousness ; yet the new idealists have not done justice to this growing tendency in modern psychology, no doubt for the reason that idealism is based largely upon the analy- sis of the adult human consciousness. The line of cleavage, in the current discussions of general psychology, is drawn through the question of the 84 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT interpretation of mental " function " ; both sides claim- ing the same full liberty of genetic research and the same resources of analysis and experiment. The " As- sociationists," on the one hand, carrying on the tradition of the British empiricists, construe mental function after analogy with the interplay of physical forces in the objective world ; the " Apperceptionists," on the other hand, hold that mental function is in form an irreducible sort of process. Apart from original monographs on special topics, no work on psychology to-day commands much attention from general psychologists or from stu- dents of philosophy, which does not show itself alive to this main issue. The works of Lotze and Wundt have had great influence in America in the direction of this general statement of this problem in psychology: and it is especially the philosophy of Lotze which has been influential in replacing by a reasoned and critical phil- osophy the earlier theological dogmatic realism so long prevalent in the United States by inheritance from Scotland. On the literature of experimental psychology I can do no better than quote the following passage freely translated from the most recent 1 German work on general psychology, itself fully representative of the present state of knowledge — Grundriss der Psychologies by Professor Kulpe of the University of Leipzig (pp. 27 ft.): " About the middle of the nineteenth century experi- mental and psycho-physical psychology began its course in Germany. While Herbart recognized a threefold influence of the body upon the mind, ... it was Lotze who made a thorough beginning in the employment of the data of physiology. Lotze, indeed, began his work 1 That is, when this was written. 85 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE with certain metaphysical expositions after the manner of the older German writers, and is very far from the recognition of a universal psycho-physical parallelism. But he does not hesitate to speak of the nervous condi- tions of mental processes, and he had the good fortune to suggest hypotheses of value where exact knowledge was wanting. The real foundation of Experimental Psychology was laid, however, by G. T. Fechner, who sought to carry out in a thorough-going way the con- ception of a functional relation between mental and physical processes. Although the mathematical form which he gave to this relation . . . does not hold, yet he gave to the exact science of psychology an extraordi- nary impulse, by reason of the new conceptions which he introduced, the methods of procedure which he both formulated and applied, the working over which he gave to the material he had in hand, and the observations and researches which he himself carried out. . . . The union of the experimental and psycho-physical was finally accomplished by Wilhelm Wundt ... in his classical Grundzuge der Physiologischen Psychologie (1874, 4th ed., 1893). By this unity of conception and by his comprehensive treatment of all mental phenomena . . . he has made the current phrase 4 new psychology ' appli- cable. . . . Wundt gave a further important impulse to the cultivation of experimental psychology by founding the laboratory at Leipzig in 1879, and establishing the PhilosopTiische Studien, a journal devoted mainly to the publication of researches from his institute. " Additional works may be mentioned of very recent date, which must be reckoned in their character as belonging to the modern psychology thus founded by Wundt, although they differ more or less essentially in system and in theory from him and from one another : 86 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT Hoffding, Psychologie in Umrissen, 2d ed., 1893, Ger- man translation from the Danish (English translation, 1891) ; Ladd, Elements of Physiological Psychology, 1887 ; Sergi, La Psychologie Physiologique (transla- tion from the Italian, 1888) ; W. James, The Principles of Psychology, 1890 ; Ziehen, Leitfaden der physi- ologischen Psychologie (1891; 2d ed., 1893); Baldwin, Handbook of Psychology, 1891 (2d ed. ; 1st ed., 1889-90) ; J. Sully, The Human Mind, 1892. " We may mention also certain periodicals which rep- resent the same current of psychological thought: Phil- osophische Studien, edited by W. Wundt (1883 ff.) ; The American Journal of Psychology, edited by G. S. Hall (1887 ££.) ; Zeitschrift fur Psychologie und Physi- ologic der Sinnesorgane, edited by H. Ebbinghaus and A. Konig (1890 ££.)." The part taken by American students in the present psychological movement is seen in the fact that of the seven works thus cited by Kiilpe three are by Ameri- cans, and to them must be added Psychology : Descrip- tive and Explanatory (1894), by G. T. Ladd, and the journal The Psychological Review, edited by J. McK. Cattell and J. Mark Baldwin (1894 if.). Another im- portant French work of recent date is La Psychologie des Idees-Forces, by A. Fouillee (1893). 1 The position of psychology in the American colleges and universities is described in a further section below. Other important contributions to Experimental Psy- chology — apart from the long series of monographs and research articles published in Germany and America 1 Other later general treatises are Stout, Analytic Psychology, and Manual of Psychology ; Ebbinghaus, Psychologie (Bd. I.); Jodl, Lehrbuch der Psychologie ; Titchener, Experimental Psychology ; Miinsterberg, Grund- zuge der Psychologie (not, however, an exhaustive list). 87 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE — are Helmholtz, Physiologische Optik (1867, 2d ed., 1886, French translation), and Tonempfindungen (1863, English translation) ; Stumpf, Toyipsychologie (1883-90) ; and Munsterberg, Beitrage zur experimentellen Psychol- ogic, Parts I-IV (1889-93). The contribution from the side of mental pathology has become important on account of the rapprochement which has obtained in recent years between the alienist and the psychologist. The works of Pierre Janet, Automatisme psychologique (1889) and L'JEtat mental des Hysteriques (1892-93), x and of Bernheim, Sug- gestive Therapeutics (English translation, 1889), and Etudes de la Suggestion (1892), are most important. To them should be added the works of Ribot, Diseases of the Will, English translation (5th French ed., 1888) ; Diseases of Memory, English translation (5th French ed., 1888) ; Diseases of Personality (2d ed., 1888; Eng- lish translation, 1891), together with the many original contributions on the subject of hypnotism and aberra- tions of personality published in the Revue Philoso- phique (edited by Th. Ribot, vols. I-XXXVI, 1876 n\) and summed up in part in Les Alterations de la Per- sonam (1893 ; Eng. trans. 1896) of Alf. Binet. Further, the treatment of psychology in accordance with the British tradition, from the point of view of description and analysis, has been carried forward by Ward in the article " Psychology " in the Encyclopaedia Britannica, 9th ed. This type of research has also had its organ of publication in Mind : a Journal of Psy- chology and Philosophy, edited by G. Croom Robertson (vols. I-XVI, 1876 ff.) and by G. F. Stout (New Series 1892 IT.). Finally, the genetic treatment of consciousness has 1 Eng. trans., 1901 ; see also the later work Neuroses et les lde'es fixes. 88 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT been advanced by the works of Spencer, Principles of Psychology, 1855 (3d ed., 1880) ; Romanes, The Origin of Human Faculty, 1884-1888; Lloyd Morgan, Animal Life and Intelligence (1891) ; 2 and Galton, Pnquiries into Human Faculty (1883) and Natural Inheritance (1889). II. The Method and Main Divisions of Experi- mental Psychology To say that this is the age of science is only to repeat what is now trite and what no student either of philos- ophy or of history needs to be told. It • is the age of science because it is the age of devotion to science and of results in science. But it is a very different thing to say that this is the age of scientific method. Former ages have seen devotion to science and results in science, but I venture to say that no former age has, as an age, realized a scientific method. So prevailing, however, has the new method now become, and so customary to us, that it is only by historical study that we are able either to see that it is new, or to work ourselves into that degree of intellectual sympathy for the old which the earnest endeavor and unflagging patience of the heroes of philosophy in the past rightfully demand for all time. In characterizing our time by the word " scientific," as regards method, I mean to say something which is true in philosophy, politics, literature, as well as in the investigation of nature; and to dwell only on the department of thought in which such a method has been, and is, most difficult to realize. In philosophy 1 And later, Habit and Instinct (1896). Here also belong the present writer's works dealing with Mental Development (3 vols.). 89 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE it is not fully realized; and yet I believe that any class or school of philosophic thinkers who do not face toward the scientific east are steering up-current and will be absent when science and philosophy enter a common barge and together compass the universe of knowledge. For it is a part of the same conviction as to scientific method that neither science nor philosophy will ever succeed in compassing it alone. However painfully this advance may have been won and however loudly the dogmatists may deny its justification, it is sufficient here to signalize the fact that philosophy has in the present half century thrown open her doors to the entrance of critical and empirical methods, and that the results already accruing are evidence of the bigness of her future harvest. In general philosophy what has been called scientific method is better known, as I have said above, in a two- fold way, as empirical and critical. Retrospectively what we now have to rejoice in in philosophy is due about equally to two traditions, represented by Hume and Kant. The burden of current idealism, as far as it is worthy of consideration in our time, is to purify and conserve the work of Kant. And the burden of empiri- cism, under the same restriction, is to construct science within the domain claimed for it by Hume. In psychology the modern transformation comes most strongly out. Here we find an actual department of knowledge handed over to a new class of men for treat- ment, so remarkable is the demand for scientific method. It is no longer sufficient that a psychologist should be familiar with general philosophy and its history, or capable of acute logical criticism of systems ; it is necessary, if he would deal successfully with the new problems and gain the ear of the advanced philoso- 90 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT phical public, that he should reason from a basis of fact and by an inductive procedure. In short, he must not bring his philosophy as speculation into psychology, but must carry his psychology as fact, in its connection with physiology, anthropology, etc., into general philosophy. To illustrate this change, and its effect on general theories, recent discussions of the idea of space may be cited in comparison with the earlier and more specu- lative treatment. The reasonings of James, Wundt, Bain, Spencer, differ so essentially from the argumenta- tion of Kant and earlier men that it is almost impossible to find common ground between them. No one among those who accept Kant's results depends in our day very largely upon his reasons ; the question is shifted to another field. The physiologist has as much to say about it to-day as the psychologist, and the speculative philosopher has to recognize them both. This tendency of the day in philosophy may be ex- pressed by a chemical figure as a " precipitating " ten- dency. We are endeavoring, and successfully too, to throw all questions which are capable of such treatment to the bottom, as a precipitate — a psychological pre- cipitate — and are then handing them over to the psy- chologist for positive treatment. As long as our data remained in a solution of ninety parts water (which, being interpreted, means speculation), it was difficult to handle them scientifically. While admitting the utility and necessity of ontology in its place, current psychol- ogy claims that its place must be better defined than formerly it has been, and that whenever we can secure a sediment, a residuum, a deposit, apart from a specu- lative solvent, this is so much gain to positive science and to truth. One of the ideas which lie at the bottom of the so- 91 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE called " new psychology " is tlie idea of measurement. Measurement, determination in quantity and time, is the resource of all quantitative science, and as long as such a resource was denied to the psychologist he was called a scientist only in his function of description and classification. And the justification of the application of measurement to psychological facts has come, not from theoretical considerations — for they were all op- posed, and still are, in many of the books of the new idealism — but from practical attempts to do what phi- losophy declared to be impossible. That is, experiment has been the desired and only " reagent." It is true that theoretical justifications are now forthcoming of the application of experiment to consciousness, but they are suggested by the actual results and are not in sufficient currency to counteract the influence of Kant's ultimatum, for example, that a science of psychology was impossible. By experiment in this connection is meant experiment on the nervous system with the accompanying modifi- cations it occasions in consciousness. Efforts have been made in earlier times to experiment upon states of con- sciousness directly. Descartes deserves credit for such efforts, and for the intimation he gives us, in his theory of emotions, of an approach to mind through the body. But the elevation of such an approach to the place of a recognized psychological method was not possible to Descartes, Kant, or any one else who lived and theorized before the remarkable advance made in the second half of the xixth century in the physiology of the nervous system. And even as it is, many questions which will in the end admit of investigation from the side of the organism are still in abeyance till new light is cast upon obscure processes of the brain and nerves. 92 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT A little further reflection will show us that the em- ployment of experiment in this sphere proceeds upon two assumptions which are now generally admitted and are justified as empirical principles, at least by the re- sults. They are both assumptions which the physical scientist is accustomed to make in dealing with his material, and their statement is sufficient indication of their elementary importance, however novel they may sound to those who are accustomed to think and speak of mind as something given to us in entire independence of organic processes. The first of these assumptions is this : that our mental life is always and everywhere accompanied by a process of nervous change. This is seen to be necessary to any method which involves the passage of mind to body or the reverse by the interpre- tation of effects. Which is cause and which effect, the mental or the physical change, or whether they both are effects of an unknown cause, is immaterial — to consider such a question would be to introduce what I have called the " speculative solvent." It is sufficient to know that they are always together, and that the change in one may be indicated in symbols which also represent the change in the other. The second assump- tion is based upon the first, it is that this connection between mind and body is uniform. By this is meant what in general induction is called the uniformity of nature. Any relation sufficiently stable to admit of repeated experiment in the manipulation of its terms is in so far uniform. Experiment would be useless if the relation it tends to establish were not stable, since the result of one experiment would give no antecedent likelihood as to the result of others under similiar cir- cumstances. Experimental psychology, therefore, rests upon the assumption that a relation of correspondence 93 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE — be it co-existence or causation — once clearly made out between a mental and a nervous modification, it must hold good under any and every repetition of the same experiment under the same conditions. These two assumptions made, we have at once the possibility of a physical approach to the facts of con- sciousness. The result is a relative measurement of such facts in terms of the external stimulation of the nerves, in regular and normal conditions of the activity of attention. Further, it is apparent that such a means of experi- mentation may become available either under artificial or under natural conditions, according as the nervous stimulation is due to an external excitation, or arises from some unusual condition of the organism itself. All cases of brain or nervous disease, on the one hand, offer opportunities for boundless observation ; the mental functions showing changes due to the organic disturbances of disease. Here nature has arranged and actually performed the experiment for us; the only difficulty being the physiological one, that the cerebral states may be as obscure as the mental states which they are used to explain. All such cases of mental changes due to internal organic changes are classed together under the name of Physiological Psychology. It includes all questions which relate to nerve physi- ology and pathology, illusion, hallucination, mental disease, hypnosis, etc. On the other hand, experiments may be arranged for the normal stimulation of the sense-organs — skin, mus- cles, special senses — under artificial conditions, as ex- plained in part below. This is Experimental Psychol- ogy. On these lines modern scientific psychology falls into two great departments. As the normal prop- 94 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT erly precedes the abnormal, it is well to consider the line of researches based upon external experiment, con- fining ourselves to a more or less cursory view of results of historical interest. III. Psycho-Physics In attempting to give a succinct account of the growth and main results of what we have called external ex- perimental psychology, we must forewarn the reader that it is with very modest, and, it may be, minor facts that we are concerned. But this is a characteristic of the new method. Any fact in natural science is valuable for its own sake ; and it is only after there has been a vast accumulation of such facts, that broader principles may be inferred from them. The problems we are called upon to consider are such preliminary applications of experiment, and their full value for mental interpreta- tion is only now beginning to be apparent. We have already stated that the two conceptions of quantity and time, or duration, may be made applicable to facts of consciousness, thus giving us means of rela- tive measurement. According as we are dealing with one or the other conception — according as we are aim- ing at determinations in quantity of sensation, or in the duration of mental states, we may class experiments under two great divisions. All investigations into the quantity or intensity of sensations, go to constitute Psycho-physics, and all which aim at time determination go to make the department of the science called Psy- chometry. 1 Both of these branches of inquiry, it should be borne in mind, deal with the normal consciousness through simple excitations of the sense organs. 1 Now more properly known as mental Chronometry. 95 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE Psycho-physics deals with the measurement of the in- tensity, as it is popularly called, the quantity or mass, as the psychologist uses the words, of sensation. The conception of intensity needs no further explanation : it is simply the difference between the light of one candle and of two or more, the sound of a bell near and far. It is a property of all sensation. The problem which pre- sents itself is to reach a formula for such intensities in terms of the amount of stimulus required at the end organ to produce a given increase or decrease in con- scious intensity. To illustrate, suppose a candle illumi- nates my page to a certain extent ; how many candles would illuminate it enough to enable me to see twice as distinctly, or as distinctly at twice the distance ? Is there any general law of the ratio of intensity of external stimulus to intensity of internal sensations, which will hold good for all the senses? Or is there a different law for each of the senses ? Or again, is the entire case simply a matter of subjective estimation, varying with the mental and bodily conditions of the individual ? These questions were at one time hotly discussed, but have now been practically answered by the establishment of a single law of relation between stimulus and sensa- tion, which holds good for those of the senses found to be most easily accessible, has been partially proved for other classes of sensations, and is under judgment in default of sufficient experimentation for a remaining group of sense-experiences. Before entering more par- ticularly into details, however, it is well to define and explain several terms of current use among physiological psychologists. By excitation (or stimulus) is meant the external force which excites a sense organ, whether it be of sufn- 96 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT cient intensity to produce a sensation or not. The feeblest sensation which we are able to experience or feel from any sense is called the perceptible minimum ; the theoretical point at which such a sensation, when further enfeebled, disappears from consciousness, is the threshold of sensation ; and the amount of excitation which is just sufficient for the perceptible minimum of sensation, is the threshold excitation for that sense. For example, air vibrations are the excitation for sensations of sound, the feeblest sound which it is possible to hear under determined conditions is the perceptible minimum, and the number of units agreed upon — bells, tones, etc., — which are needed to produce this perceptible minimum makes the threshold excitation for this seuse. Further, the amount of excitation needed to raise or lower the intensity of a sensation by the smallest amount which can be distinguished and the corresponding difference in the sensation, are called the smallest perceptible difference in excitation and sensation respectively. Thus, if 1 unit be the threshold excitation for sound and an addition of J unit is necessary to produce any perceptible increase in the sensation, then J is the smallest perceptible differ- ence of excitation for sound. With these definitions in mind, we may turn to the problem of finding a law of measurement for intensities of sensation. The preliminary question as to a standard of measurement is already answered in the resort to experi- ment, viz., the standard must be a scale of excitation values, determined by physical measurement, as pounds, velocities, etc., etc. Given a threshold value of each ex- citation, we may double, treble, ... it, endeavoring to find some law of increase in the corresponding sensations whereby a corresponding internal scale may be erected. The first step is seen, therefore, to be the discovery of 7 97 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE the perceptible minimum of each sense, which may serve as zero point on the sensation scale, its exciting stimulus being the unit point on the excitation scale. This brings the investigator to an actual research on all the sense organs in turn — experiments to determine the minimum of sight, hearing, touch, etc. The methods by which this is done are simple. Any device by which excita- tion may be lowered or heightened gradually below or above the threshold may serve the purpose. For touch and the muscular sense small balls of cork may be used — differing so slightly in size that when placed, say on the back of the hand in succession, the difference between the last one which is felt, and the next which is too light to be felt, is as small as possible. By run- ning the series in the reverse order, from weights too small to be felt to others barely felt, and by an equa- tion and average of errors, the point is determined where the excitation produces the smallest perceptible sensation. As simple as this procedure seems, the conditions are so complicated in some of the senses as to occasion great embarrassment. The eye, for example, is found to have a " natural light " of its own, arising from mechanical movement, friction, or chemical action, from which it is never entirely free, and the smallest perceptible sensa- tion of light must always include this natural factor. The conditions of the body before the experiment also cause great variations, as is seen in experiments on temperature and smell sensations. The threshold value for temperature is much higher or lower, for example, according as the earlier state has been one of higher or- lower temperature. The following table exhibits the results of Fechner's historical experiments on the perceptible minimum: 98 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT Perceptible Minima Touch .... Pressure of .002 — .05 gr. Muscular Sense . Contraction of .004 mm., right internal muscle of the eye. Temperature . . £° Centigrade (normal heat of skin 18.4°). Sound .... Ball of cork 1.001 gr. falling .001 m. on glass, ear distant 91 mm. Light .... Cast on black velvet by standard candle distant 8ft. 7in. Space does not permit an examination of each of these determinations, and it is not necessary; for the actual numerical values are not of great importance. The fact that there is a minimum under normal conditions and its determination with sufficient accuracy to give ground for further inferences, is all that the theory requires. For that reason we pass on without giving other and later results, even where Fechner has not been confirmed by other experimenters. So far we have gained two points, i. e., the zero on the sensation scale and the unit value, a positive known quantity from the table above, on the excitation scale. We now cast about for means to graduate both scales in an ascending way by relatively equal values. It is a common fact of experience that excitations and sensations do not apparently sustain the ordinary relation of cause and effect to each other. Two candles do not illuminate a page twice as much as one; two violins, pitched in the same key do not double the sound of one ; and as intensities increase, it is a matter of ordinary observation, that very little variations are brought about by well marked changes in the stimulus. This result of general observation recurs to us as we advance in the consideration of the values on our scales, for we would expect from this rough judgment of daily life, that larger increments would have to be made' the higher we 99 LofC. PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE ascend on the excitation side to produce regular equal increments on the sensation side. This is confirmed by a further research undertaken on all the senses in turn, an experimental determination of the amount of increased excitation necessary to produce the least noticeable difference in sensations of the same kind. Let us suppose a given excitation for pressure, then increase it slightly until it is judged greater than before, determine the ratio of the increment to the former excitation, repeat the experiment with a much larger excitation, making the same fractional determina- tion and compare the results. It is found that the fractional increase in excitation necessary to produce a perceptible difference is constant for each sense. But this means that the absolute increase is not constant, but becomes greater as the intensity of the initial excitation grows greater. For example, if the initial excitations in two experiments be 6 and 9 grammes, a relative frac- tional increase of J would be in one case an absolute increase of 2 and in the other of 3 grammes. There are three general methods of determining the smallest perceptible difference for any sense, due in their for- mal statement and description to Fechner. I shall state these methods briefly in view of their importance in any work of this kind. They are known as the methods, 1. of least noticeable difference, 2. of true and false cases, and 3. of mean errors. There is a fourth, of especial impor- tance in researches on sight, called that of mean gradations (Plateau); but it is not necessary to speak of it further here. 1. The method of least noticeable difference is most direct. It consists in adding to a given excitation until the difference is barely perceived. The difference between the initial and the resulting excitation is the first determination of the quantity required. A plainly- 100 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT perceived difference is then added to the same initial excitation, and reduced till no longer perceived. This gives a second determination. The averaging of these two results is the correct value, which we may call DE, (difference or differential of excitation). Its ratio to the first excitation is expressed by the fraction ^-r;- The relative degree of sensibility for any sense, it will be observed, is inversely proportional to the amount of excitation required to give the smallest perceptible differ- ence in sensation, i. e., DE S (sensibility) =-pr-« 2. The method of true and false cases consists in comparing two excitations (say weights), the subject of the experiment judging them to be equal or not. The number of true and false judgments is recorded and the ratio between them indicates the approach of the differ- ence of excitation to its minimum value. The relative sensibility again varies, as the actual difference between the excitations varies, and also directly as the number of true judgments (in relation to total cases), i. e. t S (== total cases.) N (= true cases.) 3. The method of mean errors consists in comparing two stimuli (weights, etc.) and judging them equal, then in taking their real difference, positive and negative, in a great number of cases, adding these differences without regard to signs, and dividing by the entire number of cases. The mean error is thus arrived at. The sensibility is inversely proportional to the mean error, i, e., S = I. D (= mean error.) 101 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE Proceeding by one or all of these methods, we estab- lish the smallest perceptible difference of excitation for each of the senses. The following table gives these values as they are now established, subject to revision for certain classes of sensation, especially sight, when the conditions of experiment can be made more free from error: Least Noticeable Difference Touch i Muscular Sense ^ Temperature ^ Sound |- Light jfo The values given, it may be well to repeat, represent the amount of a given excitation which must be added to that excitation to be felt in consciousness. For ex- ample, if the eye is already stimulated by a light which represents 1,000 candles, at least 10 candles (a frac- tional increase of t ^q) must be added to produce any perceptible increase in the intensity of the light. Any number less than ten could have no effect on conscious- ness whatever. And so with the relative values given for the other senses. Now to revert to the problem which originally con- cerned us, — it will be remembered that the two deter- minations already arrived at for all the senses are only steps in a process of measuring the intensity of sensa- tions in terms of external stimuli. So far we have determined the smallest perceptible sensation (giving us the starting points on our scale) and the smallest perceptible differences of excitation as we proceed up- ward in the graduation of our scale. The results of this second research may be stated in general language thus : in order that sensation may increase by successive equal 102 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT additions, their excitations must increase by a constant fraction of the excitation itself, i. e., by additions which are not equal, but which increase as we ascend the scale of intensities. For example, the successive ad- ditions to a sound, to be barely perceived would require the following series of additions to the stimulus : l+i 1+3+ 3 1, — q— . o . etc-, or J, A if, etc., and the actual excitations would be the series 1, 4 3' 1_6 64 2 7' etc. This general principle is called the Law of Weber, and may be stated in a variety of ways, of which, perhaps the easiest to remember is this : that in order that sensa- tions may increase in intensity in an arithmetical series, their excitations must increase in a geometrical series. The law may be exhibited in a linear way to the eye in the following diagram (1) : PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE Let X represent a series of sensations 0, 1, 2, etc., in- creasing by a constant quantity from the zero point ; let the upright lines represent at each point the excitation necessary for the sensation of that intensity. Now by drawing the dotted lines parallel to X, it is seen that the succession additions made to the vertical are not equal, but grow constantly greater, i. e., for hearing, V v' y — y + g ' y" — y f + % » etc. Having erected these ver- tical lines by the law of increase given in the table, the curve abed, etc., may be plotted through their extremities, being the " curve of excitation." (2) 13 f etc. X The same relation may be shown in an inverse way, in (2) above, in which the scale of increasing excitation is given on the line X, the vertical lines representing the sensations increasing by a constant quantity. The curve connecting the extremities is now the " curve of sensa- tion," and is the obverse of the preceding. A further mathematical expression has been given to this law by Fechner. As we shall see below, it is open to some criticism ; yet it is ably defended, and whatever may be its fate as a mathematical deduction, the law of Weber as given above will not be involved. Assuming, says Fechner, that the smallest perceptible differences in sensation are equal for any value of the 104 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT excitation (an assumption which has no proof), and that very small increments of sensation and excitation are proportional to each other, we may throw Weber's form- ula into the following equation (DS being increment of sensation, DE increment of excitation, and K merely a proportional constant) : E in which all the quantities have been determined in the tables already given. Now considering this a differential equation, we may integrate by our calculus and reach the form : S = K. log E, or the sensation varies as the logarithm of the excitation, — the celebrated logarithmic law of Fechner, Considered under its more general form, as indicated in the principle of Weber, this law has an unequal application to different sensations. For sight, touch and hearing, it is fully established ; for taste and smell, it is still in doubt, by reason of the mechanical difficulties which these senses offer to experimental research. It applies under restrictions to our estimation of linear dis- tance, to our perception of the passage of small periods of time, and to our discrimination of local positions on the skin. In all cases, however, i'ts application is restricted within upper and lower limits of intensity of sensation. When too intense, the organism fails under the stimulus, reaching the limit of its normal respon- siveness, and when too faint, either the stimulus does not excite a conscious reaction, or the attention fails to discriminate the sensation. With so much in the way of exposition of Weber's law before us, it may not be out of place to indicate the 105 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE principal criticisms which have been urged against it, both in its general result and in the method of research which it involves. To say that it has been criticised is to express very mildly the state of discussion which the last twenty years have seen, especially for a period after the publication of Fechner's great work. Both of the two assumptions made by Fechner, that the perceptible differences of sensation of the same sense are equal for all intensities of stimulus, and that the increments of sensation and excitation are proportional, are called in question. The results of late physiological work tend strongly in favor of the first assumption and it is probably safely established. The second, with the application of the calculus of differentials, is so plainly subject to criticism that even its strongest advocates only attempt to justify it by the results. Really it is only infinitely small quantities that we are able to consider differentials or proportional to each other ; while by the law of growth, arrived at by Weber, they are shown not to be proportional. This argument, adverse to Fechner's formula, is ably presented by Delboeuf. Another objec- tion is brought, also, to the doctrine of " threshold." It is claimed that there is not a constant threshold for any of the senses, but that the minimum of sensation varies with the condition of the organism, the concentration of attention, etc. If this criticism should be shown, how- ever, to be valid, it might still be possible to establish a table of variations or a co-efficient of " personal equa- tion " for individuals, and still preserve the principle of Weber. The objection formerly drawn from the fatigue of the organ under prolonged experiment, is now met by the principle called by Fechner, the " parallel law " : if we perform the experiments at very close time intervals, we may consider the degree of exhaustion as approxi- 106 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT mately the same for any two successive excitations. Any modification, therefore, which either excitation undergoes from the element of fatigue, is corrected in the ratio between that and the other excitation. For example, the smallest perceptible difference DA above an excitation A, reached by adding a new excitation B, T> is expressed by 'the fraction -r-: but any modification which affects both B and A to an equal degree does not alter their ratio. The objection that Weber's law is as yet of very limited range loses its force in the presence of recent work. The senses to which it applies are the most accessible ; but efforts are every day more successful in making the apparatus of experiment available also for the more complicated sensations. It should be remem- bered that all research involving physiology requires patient and prolonged experiment ; indeed it is remark- able that so much positive work has already been done in this connection. The philosophical significance of Weber's law is the ground of main interest to us. That it is an established law of the relation of mind and body as respects sen- sation, that it confirms the general assumption that there is a universal and uniform connection between the mental and the physiological — these points we are con- strained to admit, whatever be our more particular inter- pretation of the law itself. As to its meaning for our theory of the mind, and whether it has any such meaning, there is more room for difference of opinion, and three distinct interpretations are commonly held among psychologists. Each of these is advanced in answer to the question which Weber's law obviously suggests, i. e., why does not the direct relation of cause and effect 107 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE hold between sensation and excitation : why is sensation proportional to the logarithm of excitation and not to excitation itself? The first of these interpretations, that of Fechner, is that Weber's law represents the ultimate principle of connection between mind and body: that they are so constituted as to act upon each other in a logarithmic relation. It is of necessary and universal application wherever mind and body are brought into organic connection. In short, on this view the law is strictly psycho-physical. This interpretation has been very gen- erally discredited, principally because it forbids all further research or explanation. Nothing is ultimate which may be explained, and if physical or mental reasons can be given — as the other two theories hold they can — for the disproportion between sensation and stimulus, then the assumption that it is ultimate is gratuitous. Fechner supports his view by two considerations, first, that the physiological theory, as stated below, is inade- quate, and second, that the law holds in cases of nervous exhaustion. The latter point is met by the consideration that in cases of extreme exhaustion the entire series of stimuli is intensified by a given amount throughout, and when the exhaustion is not extreme, it corrects itself by the " parallel law " spoken of above. Again, it is held, especially by Wundt, that the law is strictly psychological, that is, that the disproportion between sensation and excitation is due to the percep- tion or discrimination of the sensation. On this theory it is not the real sensation which is experimented upon, but perceived sensation ; and in the process of taking the sensation up into our apperceptive life it is modified as to its intensity. For example, the simple fact of attention to a sensation changes its intensity ; what effect 108 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT might not the act of directing the mind to it as is required in the above experiments, have upon it ? In estimating this interpretation, it may be said that it can never be critically established since we have no means of getting at the true worth of sensation except as it is interpreted in our attentive consciousness. By intensity we mean intensity to us, in our intellectual life and to speak of the intensity of sensations in any relative way, apart from the apperception and comparison of them, is to be unintelligible. Wundt, however, has an ulterior end in view — the support of his doctrine of appercep- tion — and he himself admits that he would not exclude the physiological interpretation. The third interpretation, which is probably the true one, makes the disproportion spoken of purely physiologi- cal. According to the advocates of this theory, the law of cause and effect does hold in this case, as in others, but a part of the internal cause is lost in the transmis- sion by the nerves, so that the true excitation at the brain centre is less than at the peripheral organ, and is in direct proportion to the intensity of the sensation which it causes. Briefly stated, the following facts tend to support this view: 1. the phenomenon of nervous arrest would lead us to expect a diminution of the stimu- lus between the sense-organ and the brain; 2. nerve action is dissipated in heat ; 3. force is lost in the excit- ing of the internal organ, hence, by analogy, we would expect the same in the stimulation of the centres; 4. the general parallel between electricity and nerve-action would indicate resistance to be overcome in the one case as in the other ; 5. on general grounds a loss of force may be expected in an extended or complicated mechanism. While not expressing a dogmatic opinion, yet a decided preference for the last view seems justified by the facts ; 109 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE although Wundt has been recently reinforced by reliable results, of which a monograph by Grotenfeldt 1 may be particularly mentioned. With this hasty and imperfect exposition the recent work, technically known as Psychophysics, may be left. We now turn to the second great class of problems which arise from external experiment, t. e., those which are concerned with the duration of mental states, and whose investigation constitutes Psychometry. IV. PSYCHOMETRY (MENTAL ChRONOMETRY) It is only within the last thirty years that anything like exact and scientific efforts have been made to meas- ure the time or duration of mental states. The necessity of some such measurement first arose in astronomy where the most exact determinations of transit and other periods had to be made. A source of error was early seen in the fact that time was taken up in the trans- mission of the excitation of the retina to the brain, and also by the impulse (given to the hand to record the event) in travelling from the brain to the hand. This element of personal equation in astronomical work is elevated to a distinct problem in Psychology and its conditions are extended to include all mental states which have the physical basis necessary to the em- ployment of exact experiment. We therefore have a " science of the duration of mental states." Before the rise of experiment in this connection, desultory treatment had been given to the comparative rapidity or slowness of our " ideas " ; such questions, as to whether all " ideas " were successive or some simul- taneous, speculations on the cause of the rapidity of 1 Das Webersche Geseztz. 110 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT dreams, etc. But being only general descriptions of fact and depending on individual experience and testimony, such observations were almost useless in general mental theory. With the positive work now done in this field, it is quite astonishing how many side lights are thrown on other questions and to what unexpected uses time determinations may be put. Proceeding upon the assumption already made and established in Psychophysics, we observe that any period of time which is occupied jointly by a physiologi- cal and a mental process, and which may be recorded by physiological movements traced by a time-registering apparatus, will involve as one of its factors the time of the mental process with its brain change. If then we have means of measuring the time taken by the physio- logical conduction alone, we may by subtraction find the former time. Now these conditions are realized in every instance in which we perform a movement in response or reaction to a stimulation from without. For example, suppose I hear a word and then write it ; the sensation of sound is the central link in a chain of nervous processes beginning in the ear and ending in the hand. From the ear the stimulus is transmitted to the brain, and from the brain the command to move is carried to the hand ; between these two processes, the third or " central " fact, sensation with brain change, has taken place. Now such a chain of events involving any stimulation and movement, and a conscious event con- necting them is called a " simple reaction," and the time that it takes is the " simple reaction time." The deter- mination of this time is the first problem of mental chronometry. The simple reaction time is determined for any sense with its reaction in movement (for example a sound and 111 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE consequent movement of the right hand) by connecting the hand movement with a very delicate clock (chrono- scope or chronograph) in such a way that there is an instantaneous stoppage of the clock upon the movement of the hand. This is arranged by directing the person experimented upon to press an electric button when he hears a signal (say a bell stroke). Now let the bell stroke emanate from the clock as it reaches a certain indication upon its dial — and our experiment is ready for trial. The experimenter stands ready to press the button — the bell sounds — he presses — the clock stops. The dial face now indicates the time which elapsed between the actual sound of the bell and the movement of the hand. Now calling the time taken up by the nervous process to the brain sensory time (S), the time occupied with the nervous conduction from the brain to the hand motor time (M), and the time of the " central" event between them, perception time (P), we can ex- press the simple reaction time (R) in this equation : (1) E = S + P + M, in which S and M are purely physiological. This determination has been made by a great many observers upon three of the senses, sight, hearing and touch, with remarkable uniformity of result. It varies with different classes of sensations and with individuals from -J- — ^ sec. 1 Recent experiments of Helmholtz and Dubois-Rey- mond have determined the velocity of both sensory and motor nerve conduction, so that we may substitute 1 The writer's average time is \ — \ sec., after considerable practice. See, however, the papers on " Reaction Time " below in this work for additional facts and distinctions. 112 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT known values for S and M in the formula given above, as follows : S + P + M = .15 sec. (about). S + M = .06 sec. (about). P = .09 sec. (about). The word "about" indicates variations for the differ- ent senses, etc. For all the senses the general law will hold that the purely physiological time (S + M) is less than half of the entire reaction time. Having the simple reaction experiment arranged, we may vary the conditions in a variety of ways and thus arrive at the most favorable mental attitudes for quick reactions. In the simple experiment, the excitation (sound above) was expected, but the exact moment of its occurrence was not known. If a warning is given to the " subject " by a preliminary signal, the reaction time is shortened. Again, if neither the kind of excitation nor the time of its occurrence is known, the time is greatly increased. From these two variations we gather that the state of the attention has a great influence upon the reaction. As we would expect from our ordinary experience, when the attention is taken unawares a longer time is required to respond actively to external influences. Another exceedingly important influence is practice. This is due to the artificial conditions of all experiment, and the increased facility we acquire by personal adjust- ment. We react a thousand times daily under less artificial circumstances, and since the reaction time is di- minished by practise, it is probable that our customary, habitual, responses to stimuli of sense are more quickly performed than the most favorable experiments would indicate. Having now reached what may be called the " mental " 8 113 . PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE time (P) the question arises : how is this to be divided between the perception or apprehension of the sensa- tion and the volition to respond by movement ? Two methods of experiment have been devised for breaking up this period into its elements. The first consists in experimenting on cases of very close physical associa- tion — as between hearing and speech, right hand and foot, etc., where the reaction is almost automatic and the will element is practically ruled out. The subject agrees beforehand to repeat any familiar word spoken to him as soon as he hears it. Experiments of this kind led Donders and Jaager to the following principle : the rela- tive times of perception and volition depend upon the degree of physiological association between the receiving and reacting organs ; when this association is close the mental time is largely taken up with perception, when loose, it is nearly all occupied with volition. The other method, that of Wundt and Baxt, consists in repeating the excitation one or more times before the voluntary impulse for the reaction is given. Thus the perception element is repeated and the difference be- tween this time and the simple reaction time is the time due to the additional acts of perception. For example, let two equal and moderate excitations, say bell strokes, follow each other quickly, the reaction being made only after the second; we then have the equation (here p represents the perception of the first stroke, which car- ried no volition with it) : (2) R' = S + p + P + M. Now, repeating the experiment with only one stroke, we have as before : (1) R = S + P + M. 114 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT Subtracting (1) from (2), we have : R' _ R = p. Here R/ and R are readings from the clock. This gives a numerical determination for p. The volition time will then be P — p. From this latter experiment a curious result follows if the successive excitations are of very different inten- sities. If the more intense follows in fact, it is, never- theless, heard first, and the less intense, really first, fol- lows after; or they may appear to be simultaneous though really successive. This is the case in general whenever the attention is strongly drawn to the second stimulus and follows from the principle already spoken of, that the attention, when concentrated, diminishes the reaction time. This will be the case in general when- ever the diminution in the reaction time of the second exceeds the real interval between the two. The same phenomenon is experienced often when one is awakened by a loud noise. He hears the noise after he awakes, though it was the noise that awaked him. It simply means that because of the dormancy or preoccupation of attention in dreamland, the reaction time of the sound is lengthened into his waking consciousness, while the shock to the nervous apparatus was sufficient to rouse him from sleep. This shows also that the order of associated states in memory depends upon the move- ments of attention in the first experience rather than upon the order of external events. The fact is also important in astronomical observation; a new excita- tion to the eye, such as the appearance of an expected star on the meridian, is anticipated by the attention and given a reaction earlier than its true position would confirm. 115 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE The distinction between perception and reproduction, that is, between the conscious form of a direct intuition and that of a memory picture, is very artificial, inasmuch as reproduced images enter in all our perceptions and influence their time. We have dealt heretofore with simple perception as if this influence did not exist, but a moment's reflection shows that it should be taken into ac- count in all time measurements. In the experiments of which I have spoken, in which attention plays a part, that is, in which the subject knew before he experienced the excitation, its nature and quality, the reaction time was diminished, for the reason that it was possible to call up a memory picture of previous experiences and hold it before the attention, in such a way that the voluntary impulse could be set in play almost immediately upon the discharge of the sensor centres. For example, if the subject expects the stroke of a bell, he recalls the sensation of a previously heard stroke, and the organs are in readiness to respond. So what we have called perception time really results from a diminution due to reproduction. The true time for perception must be obtained by experimenting with excitations entirely un- expected and the differences between the reaction time in this case and that of an expected excitation of the same nature, due to the influence of reproduction simply, is sometimes half the true perception time. The problem then arises to determine the reproduc- tion or simple association time, that is, the time which elapses between the full perception of a first image and that of a second which the first suggests. To do this we must first determine the time of a complete associa- tion reaction, that is, the time which elapses from (say) the hearing of a. word, as storm, and the utterance of a closely associated word, as wind. The association must 116 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT be spontaneous with the subject and the original word a monosyllable and very familiar. The uniformity of result is surprising considering the variety and indefi- niteness of our customary associations. Our equation is now (A representing the new element due to associa- tion) : (3) R'=S + P + A + M. Reacting again for the word alone without the associ- ated image, we have (1) R - S + P + M. By subtraction, A = R' — R, hence value for A. The average of experiments gives this value about | - | sec. These results hold only for close associations estab- lished by long habit, especially those dating back to childhood or early life. A third process upon which experiment has been employed is that of discernment, that is, the act of distinguishing between given images and indicating the distinction by choice. The excita- tion, say a red light, is agreed upon and is exhibited to the subject indiscriminately with another, say a blue ; the subject to react only when he sees the red. In this process, it is seen, two intellectual acts occur; 1. com- parison of the visible light with the reproduced image in consciousness, 2. a judgment as to their identity or non-identity, and these imply 3. the act first of all of simple perception and, 4. last of all the act of volition, as in the preceding cases. Letting 4 represent the whole distinction time, we have : (4) R' = S + P + D + M. Now reacting simply : (1) R = S + P + M. By subtraction, D = R' = R. 117 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE Thus arrived at, the time of distinction is found to be for two indiscriminate stimuli, £■$ — -^ sec. I say for two stimuli, for the time is lengthened, as we should expect, when the possible choices are increased. For example, if we use three lights, red, blue and green, the time occupied in a true discrimination is longer, and it increases geometrically. Wundt experimented with the letters of the German alphabet, and others with both English and German printed characters. It is found that it takes about |- sec, to see and name a single letter, and that it takes longer to distinguish the German characters than the English. The time of the judgment has also entered into all our measurements heretofore, and it is impossible to isolate judgment as a distinct function for purposes of experiment. As an act in time it can be viewed only in particular cases and under prescribed conditions, and even then the time is to be considered relatively to that of other processes which are necessarily involved. Trautscholt has studied the time of the " judgment of subordination " from genus to species. A word is spoken and the subject reacts as he conceives a word in logical subordination to the given concept, for example, animal — dog. An element of association, which it is impossible to eliminate, also enters largely here. By the same process as before, we find the value of J (judgment) from the equation of the entire reaction, to be about 1 sec. ; it is slightly longer than that of the simple association. It varies also with the specific quantity of the logical terms. That is, (a) the time is longest when the subject is abstract and the predicate a more general notion (virtue — honesty) ; (b) shortest when the subject is concrete and the predicate particular (hound — Bruno). Besides these and other positive results, additional 118 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT important contributions to psychological science have been made. It may be well, in closing, to indicate some of the more general bearings of these time measurements ; resting satisfied, however, with their mere statement, since we have no space left for theoretical considerations. The researches already mentioned have led to the de- termination of the " span " of consciousness — the sum of possible presentations held together in consciousness at the same time. It has long been a disputed point as to whether presentations are ever simultaneous. It has been shown by Dietze that our sound consciousness can compass from 10 to 12 regular successive excitations by a single effort of the attention. The number of presen- tations for sight is probably much less — about 5 or 6. The most favorable interval between the sound stimuli is .25 sec. When the number is greater, they are thrown into successive groups of 4, 5, or 6 ; showing that the limit of a single attentive act has been passed and consciousness then adapts itself by a rapid shifting of its focus. Again, as is readily seen, this work has tended to the emphasizing and defining of the voluntary side of the mind, as given in acts of the attention. The results here alone more than pay for the entire work the researches involve. That the will is to-day a question of capital importance both in psychology and general philosophy, and that philosophers are hopeful and ex- pectant of results in the theory of our active life as never before under the lead of speculation, is largely due, I think, to the new psychology. Realist and idealist are alike tying their cables to the anchorage of mental " activity ; " and when the recent International Congress of Psychologists, in session in Paris, announced, among the topics which needed special and immediate investiga- 119 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE tion, the " nature of mental effort," it was only an official expression of what was in the minds of us all. The experimental work described above has cleared up the problem of the attention in many of its conditions : its relation to the time-sense and the origin of the idea of time, its inseparable connection with muscular activity, 1 its bearing upon intensities everywhere in mental experi- ence, its influence in our perception of the external world and of space — indeed one cannot arise from the study of physiological psychology as it now spreads out be- fore us the data of which we have only noted certain divisions, without the overwhelming conviction that it is upon the theory of mental effort in attention, with feel- ings of resistance, that the general psychology of the future will be erected. 2 Such experiments also show the relatively reparable character of mental states in their dependence on physio- logical states, and at the same time the clear necessity of a circumscribing, grouping, and arranging form or scheme. In dealing with what I have called internal psychology as open to experiment, with abnormal and diseased states of mind, this question of unity and form becomes an open one ; but from the work now spoken of we have a certain emphasis of the modes of conscious activity. 1 A recent and important fact lately brought ont is, that the reaction time is often shorter if the attention be directed to the reacting sense (hand) rather than to the receiving sense (ear). See subsequent papers in this volume on " Reaction Time." 2 The prediction has now (1902) been fully realized in the extra- ordinary development of " motor " theories in connection with many general problems, and in the use made of the active functions in genetic psychology. 120 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT V. The Exhibits in Psychology at Chicago We are now prepared to consider the exhibits made in the interests of Experimental Psychology at the Columbian Exposition. It is evident that departments in which progress is in the main abstract and immaterial — such as the social, moral, and theoretical sciences — ■ cannot show their work to the eye, and they have here- tofore appeared at the world's great expositions only as their results have been embodied in things of practical life, — in education, and in institutions. It is, however, unfortunate that this should be so ; for the more ideal and spiritual aspects of a nation's life are just the aspects in which popular instruction is defective, and these are the aspects which should least of all be omitted in a survey of the conditions of present-day civilization. Yet it is so ; and it becomes easy to see, therefore, that it is only as psychology has become experimental and so has found it possible to state its problems and results in some degree in forms which allow of diagrammatic and mate- rial representation that it is able to " exhibit " itself. What psychology showed, therefore, at the Chicago Exposition was its experimental side. The exhibits bearing on psychology in its scientific aspects — as apart from the educational aspects, of which I shall speak later on — may be placed in order thus : (A) A collected exhibit made by the department of Anthropology, of which Professor F. W. Putnam of Harvard University was chief, under the immediate direction of Professor Joseph Jastrow of the University of Wisconsin, consisting of a Psychological Laboratory in operation with all its accessories. 121 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE (B) A collection of instruments shown in the Ger- man Educational Exhibit under the heading "Psycho- physics." (C) Instruments shown in the general exhibit of the " Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Mechanik und Optik." (D) The private exhibits of particular instrument- makers. (E) Exhibits made by single universities, — those by the University of Pennsylvania and the University of Illinois. I may consider these briefly in order. (A) The Laboratory for Experimental Psychology, gathered by the Department of Anthropology (Ethnology). — This laboratory constitutes the first attempt ever made to exhibit at an international fair the state of progress of the world in this branch. When taken in connection with the other laboratories exhibited by this department, i. e., in Anthropology and Neurology, it may be accepted, in its main features, as an adequate historical index of the psychological progress of the nineteenth century. The general features of the work- ing laboratory cannot be better described than in the words of the director, Professor Joseph Jastow. 1 The Psychological Laboratory. — " The object of this laboratory is to illustrate the methods of testing the range, accuracy, and nature of the more elementary mental powers, and to collect material for the further study of the factors that influence the development of these powers, their normal and abnormal distribution, and their correlation with one another. The laboratory is thus designed, not as are those connected with uni- versities, for special research, or for demonstrations and 1 Official Catalogue of Exhibits, Department M, in which full de- scriptions may be found. 122 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT instruction in psychology, but as a laboratory for the collection of tests. As in physical anthropometry the chief proportions of the human body are systematically measured, so in mental anthropometry the fundamental modes of action upon which mental life is conditioned are subjected to a careful examination. In both cases the first object is to ascertain the normal distribution of the quality measured. With this determined, each individual can find his place upon the chart or curve for each form of test and from a series of such compari- sons obtain a significant estimate of his proficiencies and deficiencies. It should not be overlooked that mental tests of this kind are burdened with difficulties from which physical measurements are comparatively free. Our mental powers are subject to many variations and fluctuations. The novelty of the test often distracts from the best exercise of the faculty tested, so that a very brief period of practice might produce a more constant and significant result. Fatigue and one's phys- ical condition are also important causes of variation. It is impossible in the environment of the present labora- tory to secure the necessary time and facilities for minimizing these objections. They detract more from the value of an individual record than from that of the combined statistical result. So much remains to be done in this line of investigation that at every step interesting problems are left unanswered. But what has been done emphasizes the importance and probable value of further research. The problems to be con- sidered, when once the normal capacity has been ascertained, are such general ones as the growth and development with age of various powers; what types of faculty develop earlier and what later ; how far their growth is conditioned upon age and how far upon .123 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE education; again, the difference between the sexes at various ages, differences of race, environment, social status, are likewise to be determined. The relation of physical development to mental, the correlation of one form of mental faculty with others, the effect of special training, — these, together with their many practical applications, form the more conspicuous problems to the elucidation of which such tests as are here taken will contribute. In addition to the interest in his or her own record, the individual has thus the satisfaction of con- tributing to a general statistical result." (B), (C), (D), (E) The Exhibits of (B) the German Educational Department, (C) the " Deutsche Gesellschaft fur Mechanik und Optik" (D) Individual Private Instru- ment-makers and (E) Separate Universities. — The. two German agencies mentioned as (B) and (C) send what may be considered as on the whole the best indication — when taken in connection with the special pieces of apparatus sent from German workshops to the collective exhibit of the department of Anthropology — of the application of modern mechanical skill to the construc- tion of instruments of the delicacy required for psy- chological experiment. These instruments are mainly adaptations of well-known principles, and often of well- known apparatus, used in experimental physiology, physical optics and acoustics, electricity, etc. The instruments shown by the German Mechanical and Optical Society are almost entirely common to psychol- ogy and other sciences. The pieces in the German Educational Exhibit are largely the special arrange- ments found useful in the laboratory at Leipzig, and so show very inadequately the real progress of the science in Germany. Yet they are of some historical interest. The collection is much less complete than that made by 124. PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT the German instrument-makers in connection with the collective exhibit in the Department of Anthropology. In this connection it should be mentioned that the account given of Experimental Psychology in Germany by Professor Wundt in the official book, " Die Deutschen Universitaten " (ed. by W. Lexis, 1893), is not adequate if considered (and probably the author did not intend it to be so considered) as an exposition of the present con- dition of this science and the place it occupies in the German universities. (D) The private exhibits of individual firms should be noted in the attempt to make one's conception of psycho- logical activity complete. French exhibitors did not combine as the Germans did, and so lost both in effect and in local position. Yet much of the finest work is done in Paris, as is witnessed by the cases of surgical, physical, and psychological instruments grouped in the north end of the Anthropology building. An examina- tion of the catalogues of the exhibitors may serve for this class of exhibits, as the united catalogues of the other collections mentioned serve in respect to them. The German makers have done their work more largely in connection with great university laboratories, and so have subserved better the needs of particular students in solving particular problems in physics and psychology : the French, on the other hand, have found the demand more marked from the side of clinical .medicine and experimental physiology. (E) The separate university exhibits of the Univer- sities of Pennsylvania and Illinois were located respec- tively in the Liberal Arts and the Illinois State Building.' The aim of the former was to present a working labora- tory restricted to a small number of topics. This original purpose was not subserved through the failure to provide .125 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE attendants to collect experimental data ; yet the arrange- ments for experiments in reaction-times and the visual sesthetics of form were instructive to visitors. VI. Psychology at the Columbian Exposition 1 The division of topics in science at Chicago, whereby such subjects as Neurology and Psychology were in- cluded under Ethnology, has had in the event considera- ble justification, in spite of much criticism and some ridicule. For when we look at the way in which Psy- chology in particular fares, in comparison with its fate at other expositions, the difference is very striking. 2 The principal, as it is also the official exhibit, in the department of Ethnology, is in the gallery at the north end of the Anthropological Building. It was gathered by Professor Joseph Jastrow of the University of Wisconsin, who was appointed assistant to Professor Putnam for this duty ; and no praise would be, I think, too high for this really admirable collection of apparatus, charts, etc., illustrating the principal problems and results of the " new psychology." Professor Jastrow's difficulties were great, and it is only fair to say that his success is also great. This main exhibit is displayed in three rooms, viz., a working laboratory, where a series of sense and memory tests are offered to candidates from the visitors in the building; an apparatus-room, which is well rilled with instruments topically arranged; and a third room partly devoted to the exhibition of graphic 1 From the Nation, Oct. 26, 1898. 2 The use of this principle of classification of scientific and other mate- rial in large groups, as against its arrangement in scattered exhibits, placed the Chicago Exposition, in my opinion, very far ahead of the late Exposition Universelle (1900) at Paris. 126 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT charts, showing some results of modern researches in a form easily taken in by the eye. This last feature is, however, very meagre, owing, I suppose, to the difficulty of getting authors to restate their results in such a form for a special occasion. Another room is given up to an anthropological library of books and journals, only mod- erately full and representative, and with a rather poor showing for Psychology. The collection of apparatus is probably the most complete, as a whole, that has ever been made, not- withstanding some obvious deficiencies. For example, instruments for sound and tone-experiments are almost altogether wanting ; and if this omission is excusable in the working laboratory, considering the incessant noises made by the busy fair-goers, it is unaccountable in a simple apparatus exhibit, except on the supposition that makers and owners could not be persuaded to contribute. The pieces for sight, muscle-sense, and color-sense are well chosen, and so is the apparatus for demonstrating the laws of reaction-time and other special psychophysi- cal principles. Of course, it is impossible, without becoming too technical, to give a detailed account of these instruments. In the testing-room, a series of interesting sense and memory tests are given to all comers. The educative value to those taking them, and to the public generally, is probably their greatest value under the circumstances, which are not conducive to scientific accuracy. More may be expected, however, from a series of results obtained from different colleges in this country, where the same tests were given to groups of students by competent instructors before the Fair opened. These results, together with a detailed description of the tests themselves, will, it is hoped, be published by Dr. Jastrow. 127 J PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE The arrangements for administering these tests, I may add, exhibit much ingenuity. 1 In conclusion, I may be allowed a word of reflection on the present state of experimental psychology so far as it is revealed in these exhibits. Most of the separate instruments are contrivances of particular men for the investigation of particular problems. The science has not yet reached the stage of real demonstration — the stage at which its acknowledged results may be stated under general principles of critical value, whose truth may be shown by a few representative experiments. No doubt we shall, in the future, have more demonstra- tion apparatus of recognized value — apparatus indis- pensable to teachers in class instruction. But it must be admitted that instruction in this field is now very haphazard, and each teacher is a law unto himself, •both as to what he shall teach and as to how he shall teach it. Another reflection is more encouraging. It arises from the very extraordinary display made by American in- stitutions and professors as compared with those from abroad. And this discrepancy cannot be attributed to lack of interest on the part of the foreign psychologists, for, despite such lack, it is still true that this continent has to-day more chairs for the prosecution of research and teaching than all the world besides, and as many laboratories.- The actual results so far attained dispel all fear that the movement is a mistake or a fad ; and, with a continuation of the liberal treatment already given to the subject by the universities, great things may be expected in the future. 1 For detailed accounts of psychological apparatus to date (1901), see Baldwin's Diet. o/Philos. and Psychol., I., " Laboratory and Apparatus," and on tests, see ibid. II., "Tests" (psychophysical.) 128 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT VII. Educational The educational aspects of the new work in psychology are of great importance. It is evident that education has two claims to make upon this study ; one of these claims the old psychology aimed to meet, the other it was incapable of meeting. The first of these two duties of psychology to education is this : it should take its place as a factor in liberal collegiate culture in both of the functions which a great branch of learning serves in the university curriculum, L e., undergraduate discipline and instruction, and post-graduate research discipline. The older psychology, especially in America where it was hampered by the conditions pointed out in an earlier section, did, as I say, aim to instruct undergraduates. But even in this it was a means to another end : it was propaedeutic to a philosophy and to a theology, both of which, as far as their demands upon " mental science " were concerned, were dogmatic and illiberal. But the graduate disciplinary function was never served in any sense by the faculty psychology nor by the philosophy founded upon it in America. The second great educative function of psychology is this : it Should mould and inform educational theory by affording a view of mind and body in their united growth and mutual dependence. Education is a process of the development of personality under the best attainable conditions; and psychology is the science which aims to determine the nature of such personality in its varied stages of growth, and the conditions under which its full development may be most healthfully and sturdily nour- ished. One of the first duties of psychology, therefore, is to criticise systems of education, to point out " the better way " in education everywhere, and to take no 9 129 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE rest until the better way is everywhere adopted. This duty the old psychology did not realize ; indeed, by its method and results it was cut off: from the realization of it. It shall now be my aim to show briefly how con- temporary psychology is addressing herself to all these undertakings. (a) Psychology as Research Discipline. — I begin with this point because it is the most striking fact about the present state of psychology in all countries where the experimental idea has been given entertainment. Prob- ably students and general readers hear more about " re- search " in connection with psychology than with any other branch. And it is odd — indeed to workers in other departments amusing — that all this claim to re- search ability, and talk about " original contributions to knowledge," is by professors who are yet smooth-faced and generally quite inexperienced in university affairs. A physicist who makes many contributions to knowl- edge is rare, but the "new psychology" has two men of research to every competent college instructor in its ranks. This, I take it, is a hopeful and encouraging state of things, and has its origin in two influences : first, the new impulse has come from Germany, where the univer- sity function corresponds very nearly to the graduate- discipline function in the few American institutions where graduate work is encouraged ; and second, because the actual state of the subject is such that research is a matter of comparatively less difficulty than in the older scientific branches. Yet the actual value of this condi- tion of things in the permanent development of the sub- ject must be held to be disciplinary and educational ; for the more serious and philosophical of the psychologists do not expect these first results of the new methods to 130 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT be revolutionary in their value, nor have the researches so far published been much more than suggestions of what may be done when the method is held under better control and those who apply it have had adequate disci- pline and training in its use. Accordingly, in my view, the very marked tendency to " research. " evident in the management of the new labo- ratory foundations of the colleges in this country is of main value as offering training to the future instruc- tors in psychology throughout the land, rather than as offering contributions to knowledge. The students in these laboratories come largely from colleges where experimental psychology is unprovided for or held up for criticism by professors of philosophy. The utilization of their results is, in most cases, manifestly impossible. The research discipline offered by graduate work is indispensable, however, as discipline, since it is at present the only substitute for undergraduate discipline. This, indeed, is the function of graduate work in the other departments of science in the universities. It is empha- sized, however, in psychology since, as I shall show below, undergraduate instruction in experimental psychology is still in an inchoate condition even in the few larger institutions in which it has been added to the under- graduate course of study. Chairs in experimental psy- chology occupied by men whose principal function is graduate discipline — although in some institutions the undergraduate function is being recognized — are now no longer novelties. In the United States the extension of this method of treatment has been rapid, and the estab- lishment of chairs and of laboratories extraordinary. The first laboratory, since closed, was established in 1883 at Johns Hopkins University. 131 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE The treatment of general psychology, also, is ade- quate as never before in the graduate instruction of the country. The courses of lectures and the instruction by the Seminar method gather large numbers of stu- dents who have already graduated in less pretentious colleges. The publication in recent years of so many systematic treatises, especially in America, has con- tributed to this ; a dominating influence in this matter being a work which has proved to be a vade mecum to psychological inquirers — the "Principles of Psychol- ogy" of Professor William James. B. Psychology as Undergraduate Discipline. — The position of psychology in the undergraduate curricula of the leading institutions also invites remark. Two im- portant changes may be discerned in recent years, both indicating the permanent breaking away of this disci- pline from its earlier hampering connections : first, the recognition of the aim of the science as self-knowledge and self-control; and second, the introduction of the experimental method of instruction. The first of these tendencies is shown in the re- markable change worked (and still working) in the qualifications and training of the occupants of chairs in philosophy and psychology. Even the smaller de- nominational institutions are following the lead of the great eastern foundations, and of the progressive state universities, in seeking men who are trained to the same rigorous interpretation of fact and search for it that are the first requisites of the genuine Naturforschcr in other branches of science. The guardianship of this important realm, the mind, from outside, in the sup- posed but mistaken interests of religious and ethical truth, has had its day in many institutions — at least in any sense that denies to the investigator and teacher 132 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT the full liberty of disputing hypotheses which facts do not support, and of stating those, however novel, which well-observed facts do support. Consequently philoso- phy and psychology are now self-controlling depart- ments in the colleges ; and so the courses of psychology are arranged with view both to the adequate instruction of the student in its history and results, and with view to that high discipline which the pursuit of the " moral " — as opposed to " physical " and " natural " — sciences undoubtedly gives. Second, the introduction of the experimental method of instruction has had its beginning. It consists in the actual demonstration of the leading facts of experi- mental and physiological psychology in the class-room with added opportunities for students to perform them upon one another, and, under certain topics, upon the dissected nervous systems of animals. One of the results is the greater concreteness and interest given to the subject for younger students and the correspondingly increased election of all the branches of the tree of philosophy in the later years. The union of the two functions of introspection and experimental observation thus secured renders this branch, in my opinion, of unique and as yet undeveloped value in the total dis- cipline of college life. It is evident that this undergraduate service cannot be adequately realized until the science which aims to render it is itself well developed and sufficiently cate- gorized. The actual condition of things suggests en- couragement, therefore, but not enthusiasm. It is evident that such a method of instruction is at present impossible to any but the original workers in this field, and they indeed are each a law unto himself. There are very few experiments of a psycho-physical or psy- 133 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE chological kind which are of such evident importance and value as to be recognized by all as available for class demonstration. And a more radical defect is that there are very few principles as yet formulated which can be adequately demonstrated by single or grouped experiments. The whole exhibit of apparatus at Chi- cago contained very few things which are suitable and convenient for untrained use or illustration ; this is an indication of the difficulties still in our way. It is a duty which experimental psychology owes to education to meet this need by bringing her results into line with the more elementary principles of general psychology, of providing simple apparatus which can be used by less expert instructors, and of preparing text-books for junior classes. While no text-book to-day exists for this purpose, it is yet gratifying that two such " Courses in Experimental Psychology " 1 have already been announced by competent writers, both American (Professor Sanford of Clark University and Professor Titchener of Cornell University). Reference to the latest catalogues of Brown, Wiscon- sin, and Michigan Universities (not to mention many others) may serve to show the nature of the courses offered in institutions where the work is as yet mainly undergraduate. C. Psychology in its Bearings on Pedagogy. — Finally, the relation of psychology to the science of education maybe given a word after the discussion of its place in practical education. Pedagogy as a science treats of the application of psychological principles to the development of normal and cultured personality. The ground-work of such a science must be afforded there- fore by psychology; and inasmuch as the teacher has 1 Both have now appeared (1902). 134 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT to do with body as well as mind and with mind princi- pally through the body, it is experimental or psycho- physical psychology to which this duty to theoretical education mainly comes home. It is needless to say that there is no such science of pedagogy in existence. Most of the books which have heretofore appeared in America on this topic — and their name is legion — are unworthy of serious attention. Further, the importation of the German a priori " Systems of Pedagogics " finds its main service in keeping awake the expectation and the amour penser of teachers : not in affording them much empirical assistance in their task. Yet it is encourag- ing that the phrases " child-study," " self-activity," " ap- perception," " scientific methodology," etc., are in the air, and every teachers' convention listens to reams of paper on such topics. Contemporary psychology is becoming aware of this duty also, however far she may yet be from performing it. Children are being studied with some soberness and exactness of method. Statistical investigations of the growth of school-children, of the causes and remedies of fatigue in school periods, of the natural methods of writing, reading, and memorizing, are being carried out. The results of several such inquiries were plotted for exhibit in the department of Anthropology at Chicago. Questions of school hygiene are now for the first time intelligently discussed. The relative values of different study-disciplines are being weighed in view of the needs of pupils of varying temperaments and preferences. And it only remains for the psychologists — themselves teachers — to set the problems and establish the methods, and all the enthusiasm that is now undirected or mis- directed will be turned to helpful account. Among those who have addressed themselves to this task in 135 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE this country with information and influence one name may be mentioned without invidious comparison, that of W. T. Harris, U. S. Commissioner of Education, Editor of the " International Education Series." 1 VIII. Psychology and Other Disciplines It is necessary, in conclusion, in order that this report may adequately present the conditions under which psychology exhibits herself and her historical progress, to speak briefly of the relations which this topic sustains to the other " moral " forces which make up largely the culture element in our present-day social environment. The traditional connection with philosophy is not severed by the new directions of our effort, but on the contrary they are made more close and reasonable. The change in psychological method was due in part, as I have said above, to changes in philosophical conception ; and it is only part of the same fact that scientific psychology is reacting upon philosophy in the way of healthful stim- ulus. Both the critical idealistic and the critical realistic methods of philosophy are richer and more profound by reason of the lessons of the new psychology. It was only just that the science which owed one of its earliest impulses in this country to a book from an advanced thinker of the former school, the " Psychology " of Pro- fessor John Dewey of the University of Michigan, should repay the debt by its reconstruction of the Kantian doc- trine of apperception in terms acceptable to the later thinkers of that school. And it is no small gain to both ^schools that their issue should be joined, as it is to-day, on ground which stretches beyond their old battle-fields 1 Series of pedagogical monographs based on Experimental Psychology are now being edited by Ziehen (German) and Binet (French). 136 PSYCHOLOGY PAST AND PRESENT by all the reach of territory covered by the modern doc- trines of Naturalistic Evolution and the Association Psychology. Philosophy escapes the charge of Lewes that her discussions are logomachy, when the disputants on both sides are able to look back upon those even of the late period of Lewes and admit the essential truth of both of their hotly-contested formulas. So far as this is the case, I venture to say that it is due to the progress of psychology in giving content to the terms of the logomachy and in enabling the best thinkers to reach more intuitions at once synthetic and more profound. The relation of psychology to theology is also now as close as ever, and must remain so. And the obligation must become one of greater mutual advantage as psy- chology grows to adult stature and attains her social self-consciousness in the organization of knowledge. The benefits which theology might have gained from psychology have been denied in great measure through the unfortunate attempt to impose the theological method upon the treatment of the whole range of mental fact. The treatment of "Anthropology" included in the text-books of systematic theology bears about the same relation to that of current Psychologies like Hoffding's and James' as the physiology of the philosophers not long since bore to the work of the neurologists and mor- phologists. It is evident, however, that this condition of things is now happily mending; and it is to the credit of James McCosh, lately President of Princeton College, that he first, of the theologians who were teach- ing philosophy in this country, welcomed and advocated the two new influences which I have taken occasion above to signalize as the causes of the better state of things : the influence of the German worl^ in psychology (see Preface to Ribot's German Psychology of To-day, 137 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE 1886) and that of the evolution theory in biology (see Religious Aspect of Evolution, 1888). Finally, I may note the growth of a new department of psychological study which aims to investigate the mental and moral life of man in its social and collec- tive conditions. The evident need in such subjects as Sociology and Criminology is the knowledge of the laws of human feeling and action when man is found in crowds, orderly or disorderly, and in organizations, legitimate or criminal. This need is now beginning to be felt both by sociologists and by psychologists, and we may hope that the questions already started in Italy by Ferri, Sighele (La foule criminelle, 1893), in France by Tarde (Les Lois de VImitation) and Guyau (Education and He- redity, Eng. trans. 1892), and in England by Spencer, may receive fruitful development in this country. It is an interesting sign of the times in education that the theological schools are beginning to realize the need of such knowledge of collective man, as part of the training of the ministry. Instruction in social questions is made a separate department in the Yale Divinity School and in the Chicago Theological Seminary, as well as in other such institutions. En resume, I have only to add that psychology is now the branch of knowledge which is developing in most varied and legitimate ways; and that the exhibition made at the Columbian Exposition, while not adequate in many respects, yet served, to those who studied it intelligently, to indicate the present gains and the future prospects of the science. 138 VII THE POSTULATES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY 1 The last thirty years have been rich in new things. We hear the claims of a new theology, a new literature, a new education. And if these departures were new as the styles are new, and exhibited the changing phases of intellectual taste alone, we might judge them ephemeral, and let them die. But when we remember that intel- lectual history is dynamic, that thought is the true reality, and a movement in thought an irrevocable step of progress or retrogression — that a new means an old and that age is decay, we feel the importance of radical changes in any of these departments, and wish to be well convinced before we endorse them. The present encouraging state of psychological science and its hopeful outlook into the future are due, no doubt, in large measure, to the clearer enunciation of the prin- ciples of the so-called " new psychology " and the wider range which contemporary science affords for their con- sistent application. The question was asked, indeed, long ago, " Can psychology be made a natural science ? " — and when the most acute thinker of modern times, from his seclusion at Konigsberg, confirmed as an oracle the negative of his predecessors, the impulse toward an empirical treatment of mind was again restrained for a century ; and necessarily restrained, since French empiri- 1 From The Presbyterian Review, July, 1887. 139 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE cism was sentimental rather than theoretical, and Eng- lish empiricism was agnostic rather than constructive. But the change is now making, and it seems to be the necessary outgrowth of sweeping tendencies of the times. M. Paul Janet describes the movement, whose product is a world-wide realism in general thought, as the recon- ciliation of science and philosophy, while yet he holds to the essential separateness of the two intellectual spheres ; but the change for psychology means more than this. Either philosophy is too general to mean anything, or it means the rationalizing of science ; in either case, we are told, psychology may dispense with philosophy as the other sciences dispense with it, except as their declared results form the ensemble of knowledge which, in its ultimate concatenation and adjustment, exhibits the work of a true philosophy. Physiological psychol- ogy has no quarrel with general philosophy as such nor with a metaphysic which is sufficiently modest ; it only asserts its right and its ability to deal with its own content after its own fashion, promising when it shall have attained full scientific self -consciousness to hand in its reports to the tribunal of higher and more general thought for a place in a developed world-theory. To say that the soul is natural is not to say that it is mechanical, nor is it to say that there is continuity of law in the natural and spiritual worlds ; on the contrary, it is to say that nature is intelligent and that the laws of thought are the laws of things. We know nature as we think it. Nature apart from thought would not be the nature that we know, since nature can be thought. Absolute being is impossible as long as being is a notion. A thing is an object, and a thing which is not thought is, as Zeller well remarks, a thing with nothing objective 140 POSTULATES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY about it — that is, no thing. And this is necessarily so from the nature of the perceptive process. Perception has both its objective and its subjective side ; that is, perception without an object cannot be perception, just as the object without perception cannot be an object, and the recognition of this duality is the fundamental idea of the new psychology. For twenty centuries men have been reasoning from the ego side of the equation of perception to the non-ego side, and the rich fruits of natural science are the consequence, while they have seldom thought to reason from the non-ego to the ego side, a process whose legitimacy stands or falls with its reverse. If you say I cannot reason from nature to mind, I reply that you cannot reason from mind to nature, since both rest upon the same perception. Why do I believe in external causation ? Because I have a causal judgment, and perceive that it works in nature. So to the extent of causation I conclude that nature can be read by thought. If there be subjective causation, nature could not have been constructed without objec- tive causation, and if there be objective causation, the mind could not have been constructed without subjec- tive causation; for the contrary in either case would invalidate perception. We must assume the validity of perception for all science. This being so, we rationalize nature, and afford, as we have already said, ground for a philosophy of things, but not until we have attained science, and not by a deductive method. The idealist is right in emphasizing consciousness, but wrong in refusing to see that con- sciousness is bipedal. M. Ravaisson is right in saying that " the true substance of things is the unity of thought," provided we say also that the true substance of thought is the unity of things. We may obtain 141 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE psychic data from without as well as from within, for the without is as necessary to the within as the within is to the without. Far from undermining the standpoint of the old psy- chology — that is, the inductive science of Aristotle and the British School, this position tends to confirm it ; for consciousness can never be escaped, and a ground- work of ascertained knowledge is necessary for scientific construction. The experimenter on association must know that there are ideas and that they are associated, and only a descriptive, that is, a subjective psychology can give these facts. This is admitted by the leaders of the new school, as Wundt, 1 Bain, Ribot, however much in their metaphysic or in the absence of metaphysic some of them may tend to positivism and however much they may exaggerate the relative importance of the objective method. As to the legitimacy, moreover, of such an expansion of psychology a test is ready at hand. Do psychic phe- nomena present the conditions necessary to the employ- ment of objective and naturalistic methods? Can the mind be subjected to experiment in analysis, synthesis, and measure ? Has the mind magnitudes, first, in dura- tion or time, second, in quantity or mass ? The first of these inquiries suggests the function of mathematics, the second the function of general dynamics, and together they constitute the question of method so fiercely dis- cussed in Germany during the last thirty years. It may be stated in classical language thus : 1 " With the same right with which the physicist conducts his investi- gations of the phenomena of nature, without reference to the subjective meaning of sensation and perception, with the same right can the psy- chologist investigate the course of men's experience, inasmuch as he may regard the external world as presentation merely, the pToduct of psycho- logical processes and laws " (Phys. Psych. II., 454). 142 POSTULATES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY (a) How is mathematical psychology possible ? (b) How is experimental psychology possible ? I have thrown these points of inquiry into the Kantian form because it is Kant who replies to them, with his usual conciseness and authority. He says in effect : : " Psychology can never be raised to the rank of an exact natural science," because (a) mathematics is not applicable to internal phenomena, " for the internal intuition in which these phenomena must be construed has only one dimension, time," and (6) experiment has no range in internal phenomena, for the varied phases of inner observation cannot be changed at will by ourselves or others, and moreover the very fact of observation alters the condition of the subject observed. These two objections hit precisely upon the points upon which a natural psychology as such must rest, and so long as they remained unanswered such a science was made im- possible. Two recent psychologists, Herbart and Wundt, have taken issue respectively here and there; we shall briefly interpret the answers they have given. Herbart is essentially a metaphysician. He postulates ontology and subsumes psychology as a department of the real. Like German thinkers generally, before the rise of the materialistic and positivist movements he " began up," to use Fechner's expressive figure, and " came down," instead of beginning down and going up. He knew the ego immediately, and from this knowledge postulated the universal category of the real, then by a direct circle, to escape the meshes of Fichteanism, as he himself says, 2 subsumed the ego as a species of the genus into which it had been expanded. If the ego be my first knowledge of the real, why may it not be the 1 Melaph. Anfangsgriinde d. Naturwissenschaft (Rosenkranz, 5, 310). 2 Tractate, Ueberdie Subsumption d. Psychologie, etc., Gottingen, 1835. 143 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE sum of the real ? If the ego be consistently subsumed from the first, whence comes my knowledge of the real ? This is the circle of the realist and the justification of the subjective idealist, and Herbart learned from Hegel to side with the former. But if he was thus saved from the meshes of Fichte, his original conception of the problem of general philosophy and its method saved him, on the other hand, from the fruitless dialectical development of the Hegelians. Philosophy, says he, is the elabora- tion of conceptions, the completion of internal facts. Matter, a simple thing, a logical subject, is to the senses no longer simple, but a sum of qualities or attributes, each of which is a real. Here is a contradiction. How can the presentation be elaborated and the logical oppo- sition eliminated? Such contradictions meet us on all hands, in our notions of motion, causation, the ego — "how can the subjective be immediately the same as the objective I ? " The reconciliation of logical opposites and the consequent rectification of the notion is the task of philosophy. This is readily recognized as the old problem of Hegel, and the antinomy is formally the same: a = no?i a. Hegel admits the validity of both members of the equa- tion and the reality of the contradiction, and aims to make the valid thinkable. Herbart denies the validity of the first member of the equation, makes a substitute for it, and aims to make the thinkable valid. Here is again, in Herbart, the standpoint of the new psychology — external validity. Suppose we represent an object by A, its notion by M, and its phenomenal manifestation by N; then in the interpretation of A, we have the equation M = N. But we find that this is not true. M in thought is a unit, a simple ; N in experience is an aggregate, a complex. As 144 POSTULATES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY valid, M must be one with N ; as thinkable, M must not be one with N. Assert the contradiction and deny the oneness — you have a thinkable M (claiming with Her- bart the ultimate basis of philosophy to be experience, hence the validity of N), but not a valid — and Herbart looks toward Comte ; deny the contradiction and assert the oneness, and you have a valid M, but not a thinka- ble — and Hegel looks toward Fichte. But if we have knowledge by the notion at all, M must be both valid and thinkable. So the notion must be elaborated, changed into conformity to the reality, from a simple to a complex. To illustrate this and at the same time contract our thought to an application that is psychological, let us look for a moment at the solution of the contradictions in the ego. As metaphysics is the science of the thinkableness of experience in general, so psychology is the science of the thinkableness of inner experience — how is a natu- ral science of psychology possible ? We have seen how Kant answered this question, and are now in a position to interpret the answer of Herbart, for the development of the preceding paragraph is true in terms of self. Let A be the ego as it is, M the ego of self-consciousness (subject), and N the ego of which M is conscious (object). Now, to make M equal to N, the presenting must be the same as the presented I — the subject identical with the object. But, says Herbart, the same entity cannot be in both members of a relation, " the subjective cannot be immediately the same as the objective I." Here is a contradiction. Philosophy must perform its function. The conception must be completed. Instead of a simple M must be a complex; wherein does the complexity reside ? To answer this question, we must inquire 10 145 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE into the nature of the real I, and in this answer we shall discover Herbart's true contribution to the new psychology. The soul is a " real " in a definite and technical sense. " Reals " are the simple, penetrable, innumerable, differ- entiated, spherical, ultimate postulates of existence. They are " pure position," and by reason of their pene- trableness can be conceived as overlapping or inter- penetrating each other ; this gives rise to material bodies or matter. " The grouping of the monads according to experience is called by us a thing." Thus the noumenon becomes phenomenon. Conceive the reals projected from the space of intellect into the space of sense, 1 and give to them motion in right lines, with all conceiv- able degrees of velocity. Each real becomes a centre of contending forces, and the resultant varies with the quality of the opposing reals. If reals of opposite quality come into opposition, a condition of permanent strife is induced in consequence of the continued action of unneutralized contraries. The tendency to maintain itself thus found in all things in their last analysis is called self-persistence. The ego, then, as simple being located at a point, strives to maintain itself against the action of vibrating cerebral elements. This opposition gives ideas, which, when viewed as inherent objects of the soul's self- consciousness, are efforts at psychic self-persistence and, considered in their independent relation, objects of in- ternal cognition. " The presentation of these objects," says Herbart, " may be a series of acts of self -persistence against interference from other essences." Now, the sum of these acts of self-persistence of our ideas or mental states must be identical with the subject itself, 1 For the doctrine of " intelligible space," see Metaphysik, § 7. 146 POSTULATES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY since the ego sees itself, substituting for the manifold- ness of its manifesting states the unity of the manifested I. So this substitution may be reversed. The true mul- tiplicity of consciousness must take the place of a mis- taken unity, and the conception of the ego is emended. M is no longer a simple but a complex. M = N is now both a valid and a thinkable equation, and the process of self-consciousness is vindicated. Whatever we may think of this metaphysic, we see in Herbart's idea of the interaction of representations or images, considered as forces, a new conception of internal facts. If psychic states tend to any degree to influence one another, if one dominates and others grow subordi- nate, this is sufficient confirmation, in so far, of the new conception, and makes possible a dynamic of mind. For such a science it is not necessary that mental states be forces per se in any occult or metaphysical sense nor still less in any materialistic sense, and Herbart distinctly discountenanced any such construction. It is only ne- cessary that they be potent in reference to one another. The advent of a new presentation in the field of con- sciousness detracts from the intensity of former images, a loud sound drowns a feeble sound, the sun blots out the moon. Force, then, intensity, mass, is the second dimension of mind, as time is the first, and Kant's objection to the employment of the methods of mass determination, drawn from natural science, is over- thrown. While we owe to Herbart the first step toward an experimental psychology, he himself was false to his conception. He built up a mathematical science as rigid as Euclid and as fallacious as Spinoza. Admitting the application of mathematics to psychic states, why may we not assume psychic axioms and construct a 147 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE deductive science ? You may, replies the experimental psychologist, provided you show us first the psychic axioms. Spinoza was at perfect liberty to use the mathematical method, provided he were willing to rear his temple on an axiomatic quicksand. Mill's doctrine of Euclid would probably be correct if his doctrine of Euclid's axioms were correct. This is the difficulty, and it is as old as Kant's second objection to a natural psychology. If a purely mathematical science fail, we must resort to an induc- tive science — that is, an experimental, either internal or external, or both. Kant objects in general terms : ex- periment has no application to internal phenomena, for the varied phases of inner observation cannot be changed at will by ourselves or others, and, moreover, the very fact of observation alters the conditions of the subject observed. How have these positions been met ? It would not do to say that recent work has first answered these objections, for the Scottish psychologists replied to them long ago by the employment of internal experiment. If a science of mind be possible at all, there must be laws of mind. What is the nature of these laws ? It does no good to attempt to define mind, as it does no good in the construction of physics to attempt to define matter. Whatever the ultimate constitution of matter be, physics deals with matter as we know it, and what- ever the ultimate constitution of mind be, psychology deals with mind as we know it. The nature of the soul, then, is not a question for psychology, but for ontology, or logic in its broad critical sense, and is at once relegated to general metaphysics. If the meta- physician decide that the soul is a substance, psychic phenomena remain the same ; and if he decide that the 148 POSTULATES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY soul is a function of the body, psychic phenomena are not changed by his decision ; so, evidently, the most sensible, as certainly the most logical, method of pro- cedure is to define psychology as the science of psychic phenomena, of all sorts whatever, and to consider the area of its domain the conscious wherever we find it. The psychologist is no longer a speculator,, but a seeker after facts. Pursuing our development, the question at once arises, What are psychic phenomena ? How do we know mind ? According as we answer this inquiry we take part with one or the other of two opposing parties within the school. We know mind only in its connection with matter, say English empiricists, consequently psychology as science is dependent upon physiology. It is necessary, therefore, to distinguish carefully the conservatives from the extreme left in the new school. The former comprise the German physiological psy- chologists, as Fechner, Lotze, Wundt; the latter, the positivist thinkers of England and France, Bain, Lewes, Ribot. The latter are as untrue to the new standpoint as were the old metaphysicians whom they criticise, in- asmuch as they take as definite an attitude toward the question of the substance of the soul. What, then, shall we say as to psychic laws ? If there be phenomena purely psychic, there must be laws purely psychic, and if there be phenomena psycho-physi- cal, there must be laws psycho-physical. But it must be remembered that purely psychic phenomena are such only in consciousness, and not in fact, and by a necessary consequence the psychic laws of such phe- nomena are quite subjective, and can in no way super- sede or contradict the psycho-physical laws, which control all psychic phenomena in fact. Psycho-physi- 149 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE cal laws cannot be confined to phenomena which are consciously psycho-physical, but must be recognized as in actual operation, even in the highest and most ideal processes of mind. This is only to say that there is a uniform connection between mind and body. If we admit this position we have a duality in the mental life, it is true, but a duality in operation merely, the real duality being that of the conscious and unconscious ; while if with Wundt we maintain the independence of laws purely psychic, we violate with him the uniformity of the psycho-physical connection and postulate a real duality of mental functions — the purely psychic and the psycho-physical. Wundt forfeits unity in the account of mind, and finds three problems on his hands instead of one: first, to account for the purely psychic; second, to account for the psycho-physical ; and third, to account for the duality. The position that the whole mental life is consciously or unconsciously psycho-physical may seem at first sight to be a concession to the extreme left, but in reality it is not so. Even if the question as to the nature of the psycho-physical were decided — which is an un- warranted assumption — on the side of the positivist, there still remains the fact that perception is a sub- jective process, that matter is matter only as it is known, and that the laws of thought are laws of things. As long as the materialist continues to think, so long is he a spiritualist, and so soon as he denies the reality of thought, he denies the existence of all objects. But setting aside the question of spiritualism as a problem of metaphysics, and gathering up the advance we have already made, the crucial question now con- fronts us — What is the nature of psycho-physical laws ? 150 POSTULATES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY It must be remembered at the outset that no answer to this question, which rests upon a preconceived hypothesis as to the nature of the soul, will be received by the new psychology. As an experimental science, it demands that the processes of induction be rigidly enforced, and the nature of the laws be decided by scientific interpreta- tion from the nature of the phenomena upon which they rest. There are, then, three distinct steps, each involv- ing long and detailed research in the various subordinate departments of physiological psychology : first, the obser- vation of psycho-physical facts in all their range with the aid of experiment and reliable testimony; second, the grouping of these facts under their various heads and the generalization of their common qualities ; third, the formulation of laws which shall be applicable to the whole or to distinct and necessary subdivisions of the psychological area. Then we shall be able, by a consen- sus of established relations, to make interpretations bear- ing upon mind and body and the nature of either. In short, we must do here what is done in every empirical science — at any rate, as much as we can. Physiological psychology is in the first of these stages, and it is useless as yet to expect, and profitless to attempt, more than minor generalizations. But astonishing activ- ity of research and proportionate fruitfulness of result are preparing the way, we believe, for greater discoveries. The approximate formulation of the laws of cerebral localization, the bearing of nervous inhibition and arrest upon psychic functions, the discovery of trains of cere- bral associations, the genetic derivation of the notion of space, the differentiation of nerve courses in the higher centres, the measurement of durations, mainly psychic, together with Fechner's law of the ratio of the growth of sensation and excitation — all afford data, in so far, 151 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE for a more sweeping and general hypothesis as to the nature of the psycho-physical connection. For example, the establishment of trains of cellular association goes far toward accounting for reflex activity, toward break- ing down the barriers to a comparative psychology, toward establishing a psycho-physical basis for the mental higher processes, and toward affording ground for some such hypothesis as Beaunis' as to the serial and functional interaction of the automatic and the voluntary. But it is only as experimental data become more extended and complete that their interpretation can be made more secure and the subterranean passages, so to speak, can be opened up toward the citadel of the self. As illustrating this position, the process by which the celebrated logarithmic law of Fechner was arrived at is, perhaps, the best case in point. 1 The problem presented to Fechner was in brief this: given a series of sense excitations — say of sight — increasing in intensity by a constant multiple, to derive the law, if there be one, of increase in intensity of the corresponding series of sen- sations. First of all, as is a necessary preliminary in the comparison of all commensurate intensities, there must be a term of constant value in each series, sustaining a necessary relation to the same in the other. We con- ceive the idea that the smallest perceptible sensation may be constant and that the excitation which produces it may be constant also, and after exhaustive experiment upon all the senses, find that this hypothesis is true. Let us then call the smallest perceptible sensation the threshold or zero value in the series of sensations and the corresponding excitation unity in its series, and we 1 A more detailed exposition of this topic is given in an earlier place (pp. 95 ff.). 152 POSTULATES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY have fulfilled the first condition of comparative measure- ment. We have a fixed point in each scale and the relation between them. We next ask in what way our sensation scale is to be graduated, but before this can be answered another detailed and delicate piece of research upon the sense organs must be instituted — namely, to determine whether the smallest perceptible differences of sensation have a constant value, and if so, what this value is for each of the senses. Again our hypothesis is experimentally verified, and we have added to our data a second gen- eralization, the value of the excitation which produces the smallest perceptible difference in sensation. At this stage we assume the mathematical principle that differentials are equal and consider the smallest per- ceptible differences as mathematical differentials, and by a summing up of all our knowledge, write the equation : ds = k — , e de in which ds is the differential of sensation, — the e differential ratio of excitation, and k the proportional constant. Whence by integration : s — k log. e ; that is, the sensation varies directly as the logarithm of the excitation. By this law the sensations in an ascend- ing series are directly calculated from the corresponding excitations, and our sensation scale is graduated. It is seen at once that the essential feature of this operation is its experimental quality. No less than three times we returned to direct experiment upon the 153 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE sense organs, and from the facts thus learned drew gen- eral truths, to serve in turn as premises for a wider inference. This affords a groundwork of observed fact to the final result, which, in so far as the experiments are reliable and the sources of error known, is not to be damaged by a hundred objections such as the a priori impossibility of the measurement of psychic magni- tudes or the error of the assumption of a uniform psy- cho-physical connection. In this law the first and second stages in the true development of an inductive science are exemplified, and the third, that of interpretation, or, as Mill says, of deduction, is yet to be attained. Considered alone, it is capable of several interpretations, and actually has sus- tained three, the physiological, the psycho-physical (Fech- ner), and the psychological (Wundt), and it is only as physiological psychology in its other paths of inquiry is adding to its laws that the first of these is being estab- lished. 1 Each of the considerations upon which the in- terpretation rests is a scientific generalization, and all but one are drawn from direct observation of the nervous system. In sharp contrast with this is the interpretation originally given by Fechner to the same law, viz., it is an ultimate and universal postulate of all interaction between mind and body. Mind and body, said he, are so constituted as to affect each other in a logarithmic relation, and this relation is the " how " of a pre- established harmony. This is to introduce a new meta- physical principle which forbids all further research, and the new psychology will have none of it. This single law, whatever we may say as to its scien- tific validity, suffices to illustrate the true method of 1 See the further statement of these interpretations in the earlier place. 154 POSTULATES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY inductive generalization, whether it be from an internal or from an external standpoint. The question as to the nature of psycho-physical laws is then to be left till the science is more mature. It has been so elsewhere. Kepler's discovery of the elliptical motion of the planets rested upon accumulated obser- vations of the actual positions of the heavenly bodies during centuries ; it would have been impossible with- out them. The laws of chemical synthesis rest upon observed facts of invariable combination, and we would consider the man a lunatic who attempted, for reasons of convenience or prejudice, to convince himself or others that the elements should combine otherwise. So when the psychologist asks that our judgment be sus- pended in this case in the interest of unprejudiced research, his position is only that of the physicist who will not assert categorically that all the physical forces are one, or that of the geographer who will not declare that all earthquakes are due to the cooling of the globe. Summing up the results of the foregoing discussion, we may enumerate teaching certain postulates of the science : .1. The naturalness of the psychic; psychology is a natural science. 2. The validity of the knowing process and the consequent reality of things; the function of experi- ment. 3. Uniformity of natural law in the domain of the psycho-physical ; the major premise and justification of induction. 4. Unity in the mental life ; approach to the higher processes. We now find it easy to exhibit to the eye the position 155 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE of physiological psychology in reference to the general science : Psychology. t i v Inductive. Deductive. Descriptive (Analytic). Genetic. Experimental. Internal. External. External. Internal. Cause to Effect. Cause to Effect. Hypnotism, Physiological Psychology. Dreams, Illusions, Neuro-psychology. Psycho-physics. Insanity, I etc. Psycho-dynamics. Psychometry. 1 And in accordance with our postulates we may define the science and its subdivisions as follows : Physiological psychology is the science of conscious phenomena accompanied by nervous change. Neuro-psychology is that branch of physiological psy- chology which deals with intra- organic phenomena and their interpretation. Psycho-physics deals with extra-organic phenomena and their interpretation. Psycho-dynamics is that branch of psycho-physics which deals with the interpretation of intra-organic phenomena in terms of psychic intensity or mass. Psychometry 1 deals with the interpretation of intra- organic phenomena in terms of psychic duration or time. It is not our object to enumerate results in any of these subdivisions of physiological psychology, nor to justify them as legitimate fields of inquiry ; but simply to indicate the common ground on which they rest. That they are well established and permanently so, 1 Mental Chronometry (see p. 110 above). 156 POSTULATES OF PHYSIOLOGICAL PSYCHOLOGY no one who is abreast of current thought can doubt. The questions of neuro-psychology are perhaps receiving more attention than those of any other department, either of physiology or mental science. Professors in psychology must now be men of scientific training and spirit. Psycho-physical laboratories are growing in im- portance, and special organs are being devoted to the publication of their results. Recent text-books on psychology vie with one another in incorporating * the fruits of experimental research. No university course in mental science is now complete which does not pre- sent at least the methods and main results of scientific psychology, even though it be only to attempt their re- futation, and our collegiate institutions are seeking men of proper training for exact and original work. This certainly indicates progress. If the additions that are making are additions of fact outside the domain of mind, their discovery aids some other science ; but if they belong to the psychic or bear in any way, how- ever remotely, upon it, the old psychology erred in defect, and should be free to enlarge its view. This is all that is demanded by conservative thinkers, and it is only as a department of the general philosophy of mind that they admit it to be a " new psychology " at all. Nature can be interpreted only as it is known, and knowledge of nature can be attained only through the canons of exact research; consequently spiritualists will be the first to reap advantage from any new light thrown upon the correlations of mind and body. As long as consciousness is immediate and matter is mediate there can be no question as to the ultimate adjustment of their claims, and there should be no hesitation in widening the borders of the philosophy of mind to embrace this domain ; at the same time that we do not 157 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE presume to draw the dividing lines which nature still conceals, and possibly always will, nor attempt in a spirit of dogmatism to settle the great questions which can be approached only through the most patient and extended toil. 158 VIII THE ORIGIN OF VOLITION IN CHILDHOOD 1 In earlier articles of this series 2 I have endeavored to trace the development of the child's active life up to the rise of volition. The transition from the involuntary class of muscular reactions to which the general word "suggestion" applies, to the performance of actions foreseen and intended occurs, as I have before intimated, through the persistence and repetition of imitative sug- gestions. The distinction between simple imitation and persistent imitation has already been made and illustrated (the " try-try-again " experience). Now, in saying that volition — the conscious phenomenon of willing — arises genetically on the basis of persistent imitation, what I mean is this : that the child's first exhibition of volition is its repeated effort, to imitate movements seen, noises heard, &c. An adequate analysis of will with reference to the fiat of volition reveals three great factors for which a theory of the origin of this function must provide. These three elements of the volitional process are desire, delibera- 1 From Science, Nov. 18, 1892. The theory of the rise of volition here announced was presented in detail at the International Congress for Experimental Psychology which met in London in August, 1892 ; a full abstract is to be found in the Proceedings of the Congress. It is worked out in detail in my Mental Development in the Child and the Race, chap. xiii. 2 "Suggestion in Infancy," Science, Feb. 27, 1891; "Infants' Move- ments," Science, Jan. 8, 1892 (now incorporated in Mental Development). 159 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE tion, and effort. Desire is distinguished from impulse by its intellectual quality, i. e., the fact that it always has reference to a presentation or pictured object. Organic impulses may pass into desires — when their objects be- come conscious. Further, desire implies lack of satis- faction of the impulse on which it rests — a degree of inhibition, thwarting, unfulfilment. Put more generally, these two characteristics of desire are: (1) a pictured object suggesting a satisfaction which it does not give, and (2) an incipient motor reaction which the imaged object stimulates but does not discharge. 1 The first clear cases of desire — as thus understood — in the life of the child are seen in the movements of its hands in grasping after objects seen. As soon as there is clear visual presentation of objects we find impulsive muscular reactions directed toward them, at first in an excessively crude fashion, but becoming rapidly refined. These movements are free and uninhibited — simple sensori-motor suggestive reactions. But I find, in ex- periments with my children, that the more or less ran- dom at grasping objects, which prevailed up to about the sixth month, tended to disappear rapidly in the two sub- sequent months — just about the time of the rise of imi- tation. During the eighth month, my child, H., would not grasp at highly-colored objects more than sixteen inches distant, her reaching distance being ten to twelve inches. 2 This training of impulse is evidently an asso- ciation of muscular sensations in the arm with visual ex- periences of distance. The suggested reaction becomes inhibited in a growing degree by a counteracting nervous process; and here are the conditions necessary to the 1 In my Handbook of Psychology, vol. ii., chap, xiv., § 2, there is a fuller development. 2 See Science, xvi., 1890, p. 247 {Mental Development, chap iii.). 160 ORIGIN OF VOLITION IN CHILDHOOD rise of desire. It is safe, indeed, I think, to say that desire takes its rise in visual suggestion and develops under its lead. The two further requisites to the process of volition are deliberation and effort. The word " deliberation " characterizes the content of consciousness, and may be best described as a state of polyideism, or relatively unre- duced plurality of presentations, with a corresponding plurality of motor tendencies (motives). The feeling of effort seems to accompany the passage of conscious- ness into a monoideistic state after deliberation. It arises just when an end is put to the motor plurality by synthesis or co-ordination. Deliberation may exist with- out effort, as is seen in deliberative suggestion and in pathological aboulia, in which a man is a prey to in- coordinated impulses. Now these further conditions of the rise of volition are present in childhood in persistent imitation, the try- try-again experience. In the pre-imitative period, the so-called efforts of infants are suggestive reflexes. My child, E., strained to lift her head in the second month when any one entered the room ; and in her fourth month, after being lifted by the clasping of both her hands around her mother's fingers, the mere sight of fingers extended before her made her grasp at them and attempt to raise herself. Such cases — on which many writers rely, as does Preyer — fall easily under sensori- motor suggestion as it borders on physiological habit. The nearest it comes to volition is that it may involve faint glimmerings of desire, but it certainly lacks all deliberation. Further, simple imitation can be readily accounted for without any appeal to deliberation or effort and even without an appeal to desire. In persistent imitation we have an advance on simple 11 161 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE imitation in two ways: (1) A comparison of the first result produced by the child (movement, sound) with the suggesting image or " copy " imitated, i. e., delibera- tion. This gives rise to the state of dissatisfaction, motor restlessness, which is desire, best described as " will-stimulus ; " (2) the outburst of this complex motor condition in a new reaction, accompanied in con- sciousness by the attainment of a monoideistic state (end) and the feeling of effort. Here, then, in persist- ent imitation we have, thus briefly put, the necessary elements of the volitional psychosis. The reason that in imitation the material for voli- tion is found is seen to be that here a certain "cir- cular process " maintains itself. In reactions which are not imitative (for example, an ordinary pain-move- ment reaction) this circular process, whereby the result of the first movement becomes itself a stimulus to the second, etc., is not brought about ; or, if it does arise, it consists simply in a repetition of the same motor event fixed by association — as the repetition of the ma sound so common with very young infants. Consciousness remains monoideistic. But in imitation the reaction performed comes in by eye or ear as a new and different stimulus; here is the state of motor polyideism neces- sary for the supervention of the feeling of effort. From this and other lines of evidence, 1 we are able to see more clearly the conditions under which effort arises. It seems clear that (1) the muscular sensations arising from a suggestive reaction do not present all the condi- tions ; in young children, just as in habitual adult per- formances, muscular sensations simply give a repetition 1 Other evidence is (a) a research on students, called " Persistent Imi- tation Experiment," and (b) evidence from the pathology of speech (both given in Mental Development in the Child and the Race). 162 ORIGIN OF VOLITION IN CHILDHOOD of the muscular event. The kinesthetic centre empties into a lower motor centre in some such way as that described by James (Psychology, II., p. 582) along the diagonal line mc, trip in the " motor square " diagram given below (Fig. 1). This is also true when (2) sensa- tions of the " remote " kinesthetic order (the sight or hearing of movements made) are added to the muscular 4 / l ; ^ v r}~ -r=4^r- 1 »""1 v \~~~ A " ■»1 \ H ~~~mF . Fig. I. — Simple Imitation, v, v' — visual seat ; mp = motor seat ; mt = muscle moved ; mc = muscle-sense seat ; A = " copy " imitated ; B = imi- tation made. The two processes v and v' coalesce and the reaction is re- peated without change or effort. sensations. They may all coalesce to produce again a repetition of the original reaction. The "remote" and " immediate " sources of motor stimulation reinforce each other. This is seen in a child's satisfied repetition of its own mistakes in speaking and drawing, where it hears and sees its own performances. Consequently (3) there is muscular effort only when the " copy " persists and is compared with the result of the first reaction ; that is, on the physical side, when the two processes 163 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE started by the " copy " and the reactive result reach the higher co-ordinating centre together. The stimulus to repeated effort arises from the lack of co-ordination or identity in the different stimulations which reach the centre of co-ordination simultaneously. The mental outcome, effort, accompanies the motor outburst of these combined influences, and, so soon as this outburst reproduces the " copy," the effort is said to " succeed," the subject is satisfied, " will-stimulus " disappears, and the reaction tends to become fixed as habit. Physiologically the point which distinguishes persist- ent imitation with effort from simple imitation with repetition is this conflict of processes in the centre. In simple imitation the excitement aroused by the reaction, as its result is reported inwards by the eye or ear, finds no outlet except that already utilized in the first dis- charge ; hence it passes off in the way of a repetition of this discharge. See Fig I. In persistent imitation the first reaction is not repeated. Hence we must suppose the development, in a new centre, of a function of co-ordination by which the two regions excited respectively by the original suggestion and the reported reaction coalesce in a common more voluminous and intense stimulation of the motor centre. A move- ment is thus produced which, by reason of its greater mass and diffusion, includes more of the elements of the " copy." This is again reported by eye or ear, giving a " remote " excitement, which is again co-ordinated with the original stimulation and with the after effects of the earlier imitations. The result is yet another motor stimulation, or effort, still of great mass and diffusion, which includes yet more elements of the " copy." And so on, until simply by its increased mass — by the greater range and variety of the motor elements enervated — 164 ORIGIN OF VOLITION IN CHILDHOOD the " copy " is completely reproduced. The effort thus succeeds. See Fig. II. When muscular effort thus succeeds by the simple fact of increased mass and diffusion of reaction, the use- less elements fall away because they have no emphasis. The desired motor elements are reinforced by their agree- ment with the " copy," by the dwelling of attention upon Fig. II. — Persistent Imitation with Effort. C = successful imitation; cc = co-ordinating centre. (Other letters same as in Fig. I.) The pro- cesses at v and v' do not coalesce but are co-ordinated at cc in a new reac- tion mp', mt', which includes all the elements of the "copy" (A) and more. The useless elements then fall away because they are useless and the successful act is established. them, by the pleasure which accompanies success. In short, the law of survival of the fittest by natural, or, in this case " functional," 1 selection assures the persistence of the reaction thus gained by effort. This theory of the physical process underlying volition is not open to the objections commonly urged against 1 The term " Functional Selection " is applied to this process in my Mental Development, 2d ed. 165 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE earlier views. How can we conceive the relation of mind and body ? The alternatives heretofore current are three : either the mind interferes with brain processes, or it directs brain processes, or it does nothing — these are the three. Now, on the view here presented, none of these is true. The function of the mind is simply to have a persistent presentation — a suggestion, a " copy." The law of sensori-motor reaction does the rest. The muscles reflect the influence of the central excitement ; this creates more excitement, which the muscles again reflect ; and so on until, by the law of " overproduction," which nature so often employs, the requisite muscular combination is secured 1 and persists. Further, a direct examination of the infant's earliest voluntary movements shows the growth in mass, diffu- sion, and lack of precision which this theory requires. In writing, the young child uses not only hand, or hand and arm, or hand, arm, tongue, face, but, with these, his whole body. In speaking, also, he "mouths " his sounds, screws his tongue and hands, etc. And he only gets his movements reduced to order after they have become by effort massive and diffuse. I find no support whatever, in the children themselves, for the current view of psy- chologists, i, e., that voluntary combinations are gradually built up by adding muscle to muscle and group to group. This is true only after each of these elements has itself become voluntary. Such a view implies that the infant 1 This application of the principle of " selection " to muscular move- ment is so simple a solution of this crucial problem that I fear I must have overlooked some suggestion of it in the literature of the subject. At any rate, the tracing of it in the phenomena of imitative suggestion has not occurred elsewhere. As a general hypothesis, however, it is inde- pendent of the question as to whether volition is first found in imitation. It is now (1902) confirmed by experimental evidence ; see especially LI. Morgan, Habit and Instinct, and Bair in Psychological Review, Sept., 1891. 166 ORIGIN OF VOLITION IN CHILDHOOD at this stage knows that he uses his muscles, which is false ; knows which muscles he has learned to use, which is also false ; and is able to avail himself of muscles which he has not learned to use, which is equally false — not to allude to the fact that it leaves suspended in mid-air the problem as to how the new conbination in- tended gets itself carried out by the muscles. It is evident, also, that in accounting for the earliest voluntary movements as cases of persistent imitative suggestion, we are making the presentation which con- stitutes the " copy " a thing imported into consciousness, a "suggested" thing which is imposed upon the infant by the necessities of its receptive nature. So it seems to be. 1 Whether and how the mind ever gets away from this chain of suggestions or "copies," selects its own " copy " or end, and secures by its own choice the per- sistence of it — this is the question of voluntary atten- tion. Its consideration would lead us too far afield from our present topic, the babies. 1 It is possible that earlier obscure volitions might arise from the con- flicts of native impulses, if the complex conditions, as explained above, were realized. 167 IX IMITATION: A CHAPTER IN THE NATURAL HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS 1 Imitation is a matter of such familiarity to us all that it goes usually unattended to; so much so that professed psychologists have left it largely undiscussed. Whether it be one of the more ultimate facts or not, suppose we assume it to be so ; let us then see what we can explain by it, and where we may be able to trace its influence in the developed mind. § 1. We may make it a part of our assumption — what I have endeavored to prove elsewhere 2 — that an imitation is an ordinary sensori -motor reaction which finds its differentia in the single fact that it imitates : that is, its peculiarity is found in the locus of its muscular discharge. It is what I have called a " circular activity " on the bodily side — brain-state due to stimulus, mus- cular reaction which reproduces the stimulus, same brain-state again due to same stimulus, and so on. The questions to be asked now are : where in our psycho- 1 From Mind, Jan., 1894. This paper gives, in a summary way, some of the positions developed further in the volume entitled Mental Development in the Child and the Race, already referred to. It is now reprinted both as serving the purpose of a resume and also as being the first presentation of some of the views developed in that work (and also in the later volume, Social and Ethical Interpretations, 3rd ed., 1902). The numbered para- graphs are retained, as in the original publication, to mark the more abrupt transitions. 2 Science (N. Y.), 1891, p. 113. Cf. the paper just preceding this. 168 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS physical theory do we find place for this peculiar "circu- lar " order of reaction? — what is its value in conscious- ness and in mental development? — and how does it itself arise and come to occupy the place it does? If the only peculiarity about imitation is that it imitates, it would follow that we might find imitations wherever there is any degree of interaction between the nervous organism and the external world. The effect of imitation, it is clear, is to make the brain a " repeat- ing organ " ; and the muscular system is, so far as this function goes, the expression and evidence of this fact. The place of imitation in life development is theoreti- cally solvable in two ways, therefore : (1) by an exam- ination of organisms and minds for actual imitations, and (2) by the deduction of this function from the theory of repetition in neurology and psychology — this latter provided we find that nature does not herself present enough de-facto repetitions to secure the de- velopment of body and mind. If this latter condition be unfulfilled — that is, if nature does actually repeat her stimulations, light, sound and so forth, sufficiently often and with sufficient regularity to secure nervous and mental development — then imitation is probably a side phenomenon, an incident merely. Without taking either of these questions in the broadest sense, I wish, while citing incidentally cases of the occurrence of imitation, to show the importance of repetitions and of the imitative way of securing repetitions, in the progress of mind. § 2. If it be true, at the outset, that organic develop- ment proceeds by reactions, and if there be the two kinds of reaction usually distinguished, i. e., those which in- volve consciousness as a necessary factor and those which do not, then the first question comes : in which of these 169 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE categories do imitative reactions fall? Evidently in large measure in that involving consciousness. If we further distinguish this category in so far as it marks the area of conscious life which is " plumb up," so to speak, against the environment — directly open to external stimulation — by the word "suggestion," we have thus marked off the most evident surface features of imitation. Imitation is then, so far, an instance of suggestive reaction. 1 § 3. Now let us look more closely at the kind of con- sciousness, and find its analogies. A 'mocking bird imitates another, a beaver imitates an architect, a child imitates his nurse, a man imitates his rector. Calling the idea of the result, as we look at the result (not as the imitator may or may not look at it), the " copy," we find that we are forced to consider the psychological elements involved very different in these four cases. 1 It is not necessary, I think, to discuss in detail the meaning of this much- discussed but, in the main, very well-defined word — " suggestion." I have myself defined suggestion as " from the side of consciousness . . . the tendency of a sensory or an ideal state to be followed by a motor state" (Science, loc. cit.), [when this is] "typified by the abrupt entrance from without into consciousness of an idea or image (or a vaguely conscious stimulation) which tends to bring about the muscular or volitional effects which ordinarily follow upon its presence " (Handbook of Psychology, ii. 297). Janet says it is " a motor reaction brought about by language or percep- tion," Autom. Psych., p. 218 ; Schmidkunz : " die Herbeirufung eines Ereig- nisses durch die Erweckung seines psychischen Bildes," Psych, der Sugg. ; Wundt : " Suggestion ist Association mit gleichzeitiger Verengerung des Bewusstseins auf die durch die Association angeregten Yorstellungen," Hypnotismus u. Suggestion, Abs. ii. ; Ziehen: "In der Beibringung der Vorstellung liegt das Wesen der Suggestion," Philos. Monatschefte, xxix., 1893, p. 489. It is so marked a fact in current theory, especially on the pathological side, that I have found it convenient to use a special phrase for consciousness when in the purely suggestible condition, ?'. e., "reactire consciousness" {loc. cit. pp. 60 ff., and chap. xii.). The phrase " conscious reflex " is not good as applied to these suggestive reactions ; for they are cortical in their brain seat, and are not as definite as ordinary reflexes. 170 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS This copy as defined in our minds, we are forced to think, is also clearly defined in the mind of the man, it is rudely defined in the mind of the child, it is not defined at all in the mind of the mocking bird, and in the mind of the beaver it is something else which is defined, and rudely. These cases are ordinarily distinguished by mutually exclusive words, i. e., in order : volition, sug- gestion, reflex reaction, instinct. Yet this one thing they do have in common, a constructive idea which we see objectively, and which each, in its result, repeats. It will be profitable to inquire into the origin and signifi- cance of this "copy" in each of these cases. § 4. In the case of simple imitative suggestion we find what seems to be the most evident and schematic type. Here we have a simple visual or auditory copy stimulating the mind and the organism to a reaction which repeats the copy. But we find other reactions side by side with it which do not repeat a copy. Psychologists classify these reactions under the heads of instincts, impulses, reflexes, volitions. Now it is not making very great assumption in view of current theo- ries, to hold that imitations if repeated may become re- flex (reflex speech, reading, writing, etc., for example), nor to hold that reflexes when repeated and consoli- dated, become instincts either by heredity or by " coin- cident " variation which duplicates them in the next and following generations; 1 nor yet again to hold that in- stincts when snubbed, contradicted, and disused, are 1 While remaining neutral here as respects the " inheritance of acquired characters," I may add that the negative opinion — represented by the " coincident variation " view of the text — is my mature opinion. See the theory of " Organic Selection " developed in the volume Development and Evolution (1902). A summary statement will be found in the Diet, of Philosophy, art. " Organic Selection." 171 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE broken up into impulses. Then impulses consciously in- dulged, ratified, and repeated, in opposition to snubbing, evidently become volitions. If we did find it possible, at present, to admit these assumptions, and to give names to the two processes involved, calling the "repeating" process the law of habit, and the " snubbing " process the law of accommodation, we would have a suggestive line of thought based upon what is actually the state of things in the most advanced neurology. Yet we must not forget that both these principles are in operation at once, and we have a possible twofold derivation of each term in the series. For example, looked at from the point of view of accommodation, to the environment as Ziehen points out, impulsive actions are due to the breaking up of instincts ; but on the side of habit, or repetition, they represent volitions. 1 Now let us see how in these several cases we can ac- count for the reaction. In the case of simple suggestive imitation, the copy is in consciousness for reproduction, and is reproduced. How does this come about ? § 5. Suppose at first an organism giving random re- actions, some of which are useful; now development requires that the useful reactions be repeated, and thus made to outweigh the reactions which are damaging or useless. Evidently if there are any among the useful reactions which result in an immediate duplication of their own stimulus, these must persist, and on them must rest the development of the organism. These are the imitative reactions. Thus it is that an organism 1 Imitation is a " mode [of action] whereby intelligence may change or deflect an instinct ... it is true that the initial stage of such deflection occurs in the ' original ideas ' " [what are called " copies " in this paper] (Romanes, Mental Evolution in Animals, p. 219). For the present writer's fuller views on the origin of instinct, see Development and Evolution and, for a popular account, the little book Story of the Mind, chap. iii. 172 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS once endowed with the reacting property might so select its stimulations as to make its relations to its environment means to its own progress ; and imitative reactions, as now defined, would be one method to such selection. This, it is plain, assumes consciousness in such an organism ; for it is difficult to see how a reaction which reproduces its own stimulus in an exact mechanical way could ever begin, or ever stop when begun ; that is, how it would differ from a self -perpetuating whirlwind, or from an elastic ball forever rebounding between two equal resistances. This last we do find in certain cases, 1 but inasmuch as such reactions are self-repeat- ing, they do not present any law of development, and so approximate to a state of things in which conscious- ness might be conceived to be absent. At any rate, I find it more philosophical to make consciousness as original as anything else, and to hold with Lewes that living organisms are always conscious. 2 § 6. Development begun on this basis could only pro- ceed if two requisites were fulfilled : first, the reaction which maintains itself must persist, and second, there must be a constant creation of new copies. The first means consolidation of tissues, a law of increasing fixed- ness in nerve processes, tending to give rise to great 1 So with the endless repetitions of the same sounds by young children and parrots. Continued muscular tension kept up by circular discharge, until nervous exhaustion ensues, is characteristic also of the cataleptic condition. 2 To be sure it may be said that an organism cannot in any case be compared with such a self-repeating mechanical device (say a swinging pendulum), from the facts that it gets exhausted and it grows. This is true, and for this very reason I am unable to accept the purely chemical doctrine of life which Verworn states in the theory spoken of subsequently (§ 8, below). But why may not consciousness be the " something" which secures (or at least evidences) growth, or exhaustion ? 173 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE functional habits, which at any stage of progress repre- sent the acquired functions of the organism and its de- gree of adaptation to the environment. But, how is this persistence possible in the absence of the objective stimu- lus ? Evidently it is not possible, unless there be some way whereby the energies of the reaction in question may be started by something equivalent to the working of the original external stimulus. This is accomplished in the organism by an arrangement whereby a variety of copies conspire, so to speak, to " ring up " one another. When an external stimulus starts one of them, that starts up many others in a series, and all the reactions which wait upon these copies tend to realize themselves. Thus the great practised habits of the organism are con- firmed by stimulation again and again, while the in- creasing variety of the conspiring copies — constantly recruited from the new experiences of the world — make up a large and ever larger mass of elements, or centres, which vibrate in delicate counterpoise together. § 7. Of course it is evident that the arrangement thus sketched is the physical basis of memory. A memory is a copy for imitation taken over from the world into consciousness. Memory is a device to nullify distance in space and time. It remedies lack of immediate con- nection with the accidental occurrences of the world. Every act T set myself to do is either to imitate some- thing which I find now before me, or to reproduce, by making objective to myself, something whose elements I remember — something whose copy I find set within me by a " ring up " from elements which are in imme- diate connection with what is now before me. 1 1 The psychology of lying becomes clear when we remember that a lie is the emphasis of a " copy " just as truth-telling is. In children about two years old, truth or falsehood hangs largely upon the question what 174 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS § 8. The theory so far advanced, with extreme brevity, is in accord with that first announced (obscurely I think) by Tarde. 1 Tarde's theory is improved, in quotation, and endorsed by Sighele. 2 It may be analyzed into two factors, i. e. (a), the securing of repetitions by imita- tion, and (5), the theory of memory considered as a means of perpetuating and increasing the effects of repe- tition, in mental development, by the formation of habits. This latter moment I find only vaguely and in- adequately stated by Tarde. Further, M. Tarde's view assumes the fact of imitation, makes of it an original endowment or instinct, and is, in so far, open to the ob- jections which may be urged (cf. Bain, Senses and In- tellect, 3rd ed., pp. 413 ff., taken up below, § 28) against such a view. The theory which I am now proposing supplies this lack: it gives a derivation of imitation based upon an analysis of the imitative reaction itself. This analysis — the outcome of which I have expressed by calling imitation a "circular reaction," i.e., one which repeats its own stimulus — gives us a means of defining imitation and fixing the limits of the concept (below § 26) . 3 The third and fundamental factor, there- fore, which the development stated above endeavors to supply, is the rise of imitation from simple contrac- tility under two -concurrent agencies : (1) the occur- rence, among the " spontaneous variations " of discharge, copy elements come up first. Before he has learned to apply the tests to his images by which true memories are distinguished, the child simply re- acts upon the images that are there, no matter where they come from. 1 Les Lois de l' Imitation, chap. iii. ; published earlier in an article "Qu'est ce qu'une Socie'te," Revue Philosophique, xviii., 1884, p. 489. My views are, however, though in accord with, not the same as M. Tarde's — a matter which is spoken of in Social and Ethical Interpretations. 2 Lafoule criminelle, pp. 42 ff. 3 Cf. Tonnies, Philosophische Monatshefle, 1893, p. 298, on the neces- sity for definition in this field. 175 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE of movements which secure at once the repetition of the first stimulus, and (2), the continuance of such of these self-repeating reactions as are useful (pleasurable). Those which are damaging (painful) or useless, by that very fact, lower the vitality of the organism and so hinder their own recurrence. This derivation of imita- tion secured, we are able to develop independently the two principles urged by Tarde and Sighele, as follows in this paper. This derivation of imitative reaction is in line, I think, with the most important and thorougli contributions lately made to the theory of organic movement — so far as one who is not a professed biologist is entitled to an opinion. Two recent investigators have summed up evidence which supplies in great part the basis long de- siderated for a theory of muscular action and develop- ment. Eimer 1 has stated the facts which make it probable that all the " morphological properties of muscle are the result of functional activity." On this view contraction waves leave markings which account for both muscle-fibres and striation. The series of stages in the development of voluntary muscle which biologi- cal science is now cognizant of, is very striking. That there are no anatomical divisions corresponding to the striation of muscle is shown by recent observations. It remains, then, only to find a physiological conception of contraction which, while applicable primarily to unicel- lular creatures, provides for the development of the organism and the differentiation of its parts. Natural history requires, in the words of Engelmann, that u every attempt to explain the mechanism of protoplasmic move- ment must extend to all the other phenomena of con- 1 Zeitschrift fur wissen. Zoologie, liii. suppl. Bd. p. 67. 176 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS tractility." x This requirement the theory of contractility of Max Verworn seems to me to go far towards supply- ing, accordant as it is with the detailed results of Kiihne, Schultz, Engelmann, and others. The outcome of Ver- worn's work is a chemical theory of contractility which rests upon two known cases of chemical action. 2 Kiihne has proved that the oxygen of the air supplies a want to the outer layer of particles of a protoplasmic mass. The elements set free by this union find themselves im- pelled toward the centre by their affinity for the nuclear elements ; this new synthesis releases elements which again move outward toward the oxygen at the surface. 3 Thus there are two contrary movements : away from the nucleus, or expansion, and toward the nucleus, or con- traction. Considering the oxygen-action as stimulus, we have thus a reaction which repeats its own stimulus and thus perpetuates itself. This is just the type of reaction which our circular theory, as outlined above, requires. Verworn pushes the claim of this type of vital action right up through all the forms of muscular action — just as Eimer finds only the one type of function necessary to account for all the morphological varia- tions. I am certainly, therefore, within the bounds of biological evidence in claiming that the imitative type of reaction is very early in biological order and signifi- cance ; and especially so if it be found, as this paper en- deavors to hold, that the progress of consciousness can be accounted for in stages corresponding in its great 1 Quoted by Soury, Revue Philosophique, July, 1893, p. 45. 2 Die Bewegung der lehendigen Substanz (Jena, 1892). Verworn 's work is summarized by Soury (see last note). SeeBurdon Sanderson's remarks on " Chemiotaxis " in Nature, Sept. 14, 1893, p. 471. 3 The exhaustion of the nucleus by stimulation is shown by the work of Hodge, Changes due to Functional Activity of Nerve Cells (1893). 12 177 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE features with the stages of differentiation required by the plrysiological and anatomical theories. 1 The concomitance of higher and lower instances of the one * circular reaction " is seen in the voluntary contraction of a muscle because an act is pictured, de- sired, and imitated, on the one hand, and on the other hand, in the continued rhythmical performance of the same act automatically. 2 § 9. For example — resuming our analysis of con- sciousness : — you speak a word ; I at once write it. To-morrow, by reason of a brain lesion, I am unable to write the word when I hear you speak it, but I can still copy the word when you set it before me. The lesion has simply deprived me of the use of my internal visual copy by cutting the writing-reaction apparatus off from its connection with the auditory seat from which this visual copy was accustomed to be " rung up." But the simpler imitation of the external visual copy remains possible. A step further : I see a man and at once write his name. Here the visual image of the man rings up the auditory image of the name-word, tins rings up the visual copy-image of the written word, and this I imitate by writing. If any one had asked me why I wrote the man's name, I would have said : " Be- cause I remembered it." But each one of these images is itself a " copy," when needed for its own appropriate reaction. A young child, on seeing the man, would say "Man;" that is, he would imitate the auditory copy which the sight of the man rang up. And a certain 1 It should be said, however, that the early presence of reactions of the " circular " kind does not depend upon the truth of this particular physiological theory (of the action of oxygen). 2 See Chauveau on " The Sensori-motor Nerve Circuit of Muscles " in Brain, 1891, pp. 145 ff., and Exner on " Senso-mobilitiit " in PJiiiger's Archiv, xlviii., 592 ff. 178 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS child of mine would probably hasten to ask for a pencil in order to draw the man, that is, to imitate the sche- matic outline of man fixed in her memory by earlier efforts to imitate the external thing. § 10. The question as to how the different " copies " come to ring one another up, in such a system, is the question of association. They can at first act together only so far as the original external copies are together. In other words, association by contiguity is simply the transfer of external togetherness into internal together- ness. But suppose a present external copy rings up another copy which is only internal : why is this ? Evidently because there are some other elements of copy either external or internal which have been to- gether with both : this is association by resemblance or contrast. For example : your spoken word brings up my written word-copy. Why? Because sound and written copy existed together when I learned to write. Again, " man " seen brings up " name written." Why ? Because " man seen " and " name heard " were pres- ent together when I learned to speak, and afterwards " name heard " and " name written " were present to- gether when I learned to write. So " name heard " is the common element of copy. § 11. Reflection convinces us that we have now reached a principle of wide-reaching application in mental development. We see how it is possible for reactions which were originally simple imitative sugges- tions to lose all appearance of their true origin. Copy- links at first distinctly present as external things, and afterwards present with almost equal distinctness as internal memories, may become quite lost in the rapid progress of consciousness. New connections are estab- lished in the network of association, and motor dis- 179 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE charges are stimulated thus which were possible at first only by imitation and owed their formation to it. A musician plays by reading printed notes, and forgets that in learning the meaning of the notes he imitated the movements and sounds which his instructor made ; but the intermediate copies have so fallen away that his performance seems to offer no surface imitation at all. His copy-system for sound persists, of course, to the end to guide his muscular reactions. But a musician of the visual type goes further. He may play from memory of the printed notes ; that is, he may play from a trans- planted visual copy of notes which themselves are but shorthand or substitute expressions of earlier sound and muscular copies, and finally the name only of a familiar selection may be sufficient to start a performance guided only by a subconscious muscular copy series. If this principle should be proved to be of universal applica- tion we would then be able to say that every intelligent action is stimulated by copies whose presence the action in question tends to reproduce. 1 § 12. Returning to the earlier question of the origin of instinct and impulse, I venture to suggest — subject to criticism and in the face of apparent paradox — that both of them are explainable by this principle of modi- fied and compounded imitations. The bird's nest-build- ing instinct is probably the native carrying-out of an adaptation which was at first carefully copied and has now been reproduced by variation, so that the direct fragmentary reactions upon the present world combine 1 It is easy to see that the whole psychological theory of muscular control, whether central or peripheral in its seat, requires the production by the reaction of a sensation series which matches or repeats a copy series ; and inhibition in general represents the limitations which older structures and dispositions impose upon new reactions — they must con- form if possible to old organic "copy." 180 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS to make up the copy- whole which is our "idea" and the bird's creation. Likewise impulse is the trunk, the torso, of a reaction which has lost its copy and so failed to maintain itself in full operation — fully useful once, but now restricted and superseded by more complex activities. We have impulses and the animals have instincts because we have left the animals behind and by our rational volitions realize compounds of activity which instincts at their best only ape. In the insane asylums may be seen men in whom both the appearance of " idea," preserved in the animals by the equilibrium of instincts, and as the prevision characteristic of hu- man choice, are absent; and in these persons impulse, free from both checks, pkys itself out in fragmentary and destructive action. Like little children, before the training of volition, such patients learn only by imitation. § 13. Accommodation, then, is the principle by the action of which, in the constant exercise of circular reaction, new adaptations are acquired, and the system of copies to which it is the end of our actions to con- form, is indefinitely recruited. § 14. Continued accommodation is possible only be- cause the other principle, habit, all the time conserves, the past and gives points oVappui in solidified structure for new accommodations. Inasmuch, further, as the copy by transference from the world to the mind in memory, becomes capable of internal revival, accommo- dation takes on a new character — a conscious subjective character — as volition. Volition arises typically as a phenomenon of u persistent imitative suggestion," as I have argued in some detail elsewhere. 1 That is, volition 1 Proceedings of Congress of Experimental Psychology, London, 1892, pp. 49 ff. ; the paper immediately preceding, in this volume. 181 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE arises when a copy remembered vibrates with other copies remembered or presented, and when all the connections, in thought and action, of all of them are together set in motion incipiently. The residue of motive is connected with what we call attention, 1 and the final co-ordination of all the motor elements involved is volition, with choice. The physical basis of memory, association, thought, is also that of will — the cerebrum — and pathological cases show clearly that aboulia is funda- mentally a defect of synthesis in perception and mem- ory, 2 arising from one or more breaks in the copy system whose rise has been sketched in what precedes. § 15. There are several aspects of presentation and representation which offer less difficulty when brought into connection with our present topic. Recent discus- sions clearly show not only the possible dominance in consciousness of a copy-image so strong and habitual as to assimilate new experiences to its form and meaning ; but also that this assimilation is the very mode and method of the mind's digestion of what it feeds upon. Consciousness constantly tends to neglect the unfit, the mat apropos, the incongruous, and to show itself recep- tive to that which in any way conforms to its present stock. A child after learning to draw a full face — circle with spots for the two eyes, nose, and mouth, and projections on the sides for ears — will persist, when copying a face in profile, in drawing the circle with two eyes and two ears, failing to see the error, although only one ear is visible and no eyes. 3 The external 1 For an analysis of the relation of Reflex attention to sensation and movement, see chap, xiv., in Mental Development. 2 Cf. Janet, " Un cas d'Aboulie, &c.," in Revue Philosophique, March and April, 1891. 8 Cf. Passy's interesting observations in Revue Philosophique, 1891, ii, 614. 182 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS pattern is assimilated to the memory copy. The child has a motor reaction for imitating the latter ; why should not that answer for the other as well? As everybody admits, in one way or another, such assimilation is at the bottom of recognition, and of illusions, which are mostly mistaken recognitions. § 16. Passing on to the sphere of conception and thought, we find a remarkable opening for the law of imitation. The principle of Identity which represents the mental demand for consistency of experience, and the mental tendency, already remarked, to the assimila- tion of new material to old schemes, is seen genetically in the simple fact that repetitions are normal every- where in mental life because of the law of habit in its reactions. Just in so far as a new experience repeats an old one, to this degree it accomplishes what motor imitation would have accomplished, and makes future repetitions easier. To say that identity is necessary to thought, therefore, is only to say that it expresses in a generalization the method of mental development by imitative reaction. Identity is the formal or logical expression of the principle of Habit. § 17. The principle of Sufficient Reason is subject to a corresponding genetic expression, on the side of Ac- commodation. Sufficient reason, in the growing mind, is an attitude, a belief ; anything in its experience which tends to modify the course of its habitual reactions in a way which it must accept, endorse, believe — this has its sufficient reason, and it is accommodated to by imita- tion. I have argued elsewhere that a conflict between the established, the habitual, the taken for granted, the identified, on one hand, and the unidentified and un- assimilated, on the other hand, is necessary to belief. Belief arises in the child in the readjustment of himself 183 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE actively to new elements of reality. In so far as there is truth in this view, in so far does Sufficient Reason become a formal or logical statement of the fact of ac- commodation. Put more broadly : whenever we believe a new thing or accept its existence, we accommodate our attitude to its presence, we make place for it in our store of acquisitions for future use ; this means that we are prepared to reproduce it voluntarily and involun- tarily, to make it a part of that copy system which hangs together in our memory as representing a consistent course of conduct and the best adjustment we have been able to effect to our physical and moral environment. Imitation is then the method by which our living milieu in all its aspects gets carried over and reproduced within us. The dynamic relationships of the ele- ments of this reproduced world supply to us our sufficient reason. Our accompanying sense of acceptance and endorsement of these copies by our own action is belief ; and the familiarity which repetition engenders betokens the growth of habit and the recognition of identities. § 18. Conception proceeds by identities and sufficient reasons : and we get in this connection a genetic view of the active basis of the " general " notion. The child begins with what seems to be a general. His earliest experiences, carried over into memory, become gen- eral copies which stand as assimilative nets for every new event or object. All men are "papa," all colors are " wed," all food " mik." What this really means is that the child's motor attitudes are fewer than his receptive experiences. Each experience of man calls out the same attitude, the same incipient movement, the same coefficient of attention on his part, as that with which he hails "papa." In other words, each man is a repetition of the papa-copy and carries the 184 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS child out in action, just as his own imitative response to the papa-copy would have carried him out. But of course this does not continue. By accommodations, by experiences which will not assimilate, this tendency to habit is in part counteracted, his classes grow more numerous as his reactions do, his general notions more " reasonable," and he is on the proper road to a " rectifi- cation of the concept." § 19. Again, in the affective life we find evidence of the working of the imitative principle. The production of emotion depends upon the reinstatement by associa- tion or action of an ideal copy. Sympathy may be called, however, the imitative emotion par excellence. My child H. cried out when I pinched a bottle-cork in her fifth month, and wept bitterly, in her twenty-second week, at the sight of a picture of a man with bowed head and feet in stocks. 1 In such cases the presentation is assimilated to memory-copies of personal suffering, and so calls out the motor attitudes habitual to experiences of pleasure- or pain-giving objects. And the motor dis- charges — the emotional expressions — react to define and deepen the emotion itself. In many cases, how- ever, I think, the associative order is the reverse. The presentation of the expression of emotion in another stimulates motor expression in us, and this in turn reacts to arouse the hedonic state which usually stimu- lates such" a reaction. The two cases of sympathy in my child, given above, illustrate the truth of both these accounts. § 20. To speak of pleasure and pain for themselves — I see no way to find an absolute beginning for them anywhere in the course of mental development. If the 1 The picture on p. 227 of Bissell's Biblical Antiquities. 185 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE reactive or contractile process began without conscious- ness, then no doubt pleasure and pain were the first and simplest form of consciousness when the conditions of its rise were present. But if consciousness was present from the first, and if development depended upon the repetition of useful reactions, then that which through- out the whole animal series and in man constitutes the index in consciousness of profit and loss and so serves as its selective criterion — pleasure and pain — must have had the same place and rdle then as now. Other- wise why should it be at all? Preferring the alter- native which does not involve us in the question of the origin of consciousness — a preference for which more adequate reasons may be given in general philosophy — I think pleasure and pain must be held to be original accompaniments of vital reaction. 1 § 21. Our outcome then seems to be this, so far as the natural history conception is a valid one ; mental development on its active side might be accounted for on the basis of imitative repetition solely — as defined in the phrase "circular reaction" — provided contrac- 1 It is sufficient to suggest at this point that as far as psycho-physical theories of pleasure and pain have taken account of movement, as an element in mental development, they are in accord with the fundamental conception of this paper. Meynert {Pop. wiss. Vortrdge, iii.) bases the distinction between pleasure and pain, in their genesis, upon the inner processes which minister respectively to outward movements {Angriffs- bewegungen) and withdrawing movements (Abwehrhewegungen) ; and Miin- sterberg's recent suggestive experiments (Proc. Cong. Exper. Psych., Lon- don meeting, p. 132 ; and Beitrage, Heft iv. pp. 216 ff. ) bear in the direction of a similar distinction. It is clear that, in the main, outward movements, expansions, would be the stimulus-repeating, imitating, pleasurable move- ments; and withdrawing movements, contractions, would represent les- sened vitality and so pain. Rigor mortis is contraction ; and something similar is seen in unicellular creatures in the return to the spherical form when death comes. 186 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS tility and pleasure-pain 1 may be assumed to be original in the first manifestations of life. § 22. An interesting point comes to light when we ask the relation of these two factors to each other. If imitative function is anything like so fundamental as the foregoing account takes it to be — the means of selection among varied external stimulations — it be- comes evident in what sense pleasure and pain can be called the u object " of the reaction. Pleasure and pain are seen to be the index of a change brought about by a function. The repetition of this function is desirable, and this is secured by further imitation. The pleasure is enhanced by this repetition which aims at securing the continual presence of the copy ; that is to say, the pleasure accruing is something additional to the copy or "object" which the reaction aims at. The observation of young children directly and plainly confirms the truth of this position. The child invariably reacts at first upon objects. Suggestion, serving as a principle of accommodation, works regardless of the pleasure or pain which it gives rise to. I have illus- trated this elsewhere with concrete cases from infant life. 2 Romanes finds it in the animal world. 3 Pathology is full of striking illustrations of it. Further, the tran- sition from this naive suggestibility to the reflective consciousness in which pleasures and pains become con- siderations or ends, is marked in the life history of the infant. He learns to dally with his bottle, to postpone 1 This leaves untouched the mysteries of reproduction and heredity over which the chemists and the philosophers are at war. See what is said about the limitations of the " natural history conception," below, § 29. 2 Mental Development, chap. vi. 8 " There is abundant evidence of one individual imitating the habits of another individual whether the action imitated be beneficial or useless." (Mental Evolution in Animals, p. 220.) 187 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE his enjoyment, to subordinate a present to a distant pleasure, by a gradual process of acquired self-control. He gradually grows out of his neutrality to be a con- scious egoist ; but fortunately he learns at the same time, or even earlier, the elements of conscious altruism as well. In adult life it is undoubtedly true that we usually do things because we like to do them, but it is not always so. Just as the little child sometimes acts from mere suggestion, at the same time moved to tears by the anticipation of pain to result from it ; so to the man a copy may be presented so strongly for imitation, it may be so moving by its simple suggestiveness, that he acts upon it even though it have a hedonic coloring of pain. The principle of accommodation requires that it be so, for otherwise there could be no development, except within, the very narrow range of accidental discharge. No new adjustment or adaptation could be effected without risk of pain and damage. If the child never reacted in any way except those pleasurable ways guaranteed by his heredity or by his experience, how could he grow ? So if we sought only what we have already tasted, how could new appetites be acquired ? 1 § 23. There is another sphere of the operation of imitation into which we shall briefly enter — that of the social and moral. The growth of the notion of self is so important a genetic factor in social and moral life, that it may suffice to consider the influence of imita- tion in the development of the consciousness of self — an influence not sufficiently recognized. One of the most remarkable tendencies of the very 1 In the chapters on " Pleasure and Pain " in my Handbook of Psychol- ogy (ii., chaps, v. and xi.) I have pointed out that the " well-being " theory of pleasure and pain must be supplemented to include reference to future development. 188 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS young child in its responses to its environment is its readiness to recognize differences of personality. It responds to what I have elsewhere called " suggestions of personality." x As early as the second month it distinguishes its mother's or nurse's touch in the dark. It learns characteristic methods of being held and taken up, of patting, kissing, etc., and adapts itself by a marvel- lous accuracy of protestation or acquiescence to these personal variations. Its associations of personality come to be of such importance, that for a long time its happiness or misery depends upon the presence of cer- tain kinds of personality-suggestion. Of course this indicates a kind of memory, and a reaction which imitates or seeks to reproduce useful and pleasurable experiences. But yet it is quite a different thing from the child's behavior towards things which are not persons. Things come to be, with some few exceptions which are involved in the direct gratification of appetite, more and more unimportant : they are subordinated to regular treatment or reaction. But persons become con- stantly more important, as uncertain and dominating agencies of pleasure and pain. The fact of movement by persons and its effects on the infant seem to be the most important factor in this peculiar influence ; later the voice comes to stand for a person's presence, and at last the face and its expressions are equal to the person, with all its attributes. I think this distinction between persons and things, between agencies and objects, is the child's very first step away from a personally neutral consciousness. The sense of uncertainty or lack of confidence grows stronger and stronger in its dealings with persons — an uncer- tainty contingent upon the moods, emotions, nuances of 1 Science, loc. cit. 189 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE expression and shades of treatment of the persons around it. A person stands for a group of experiences quite unstable in its prophetic as it is in its historical meaning. This we may for brevity of expression, assuming it to be first in order of development, call the "projective stage " 1 in the growth of personal consciousness. Further observation of children shows that the instru- ment of transition from such a " projective " to a sub- jective sense of personality is the child's active bodily self, and the method of it is imitation. As a matter of fact, accommodation by actual mus- cular imitation does not arise in most children until about the seventh month — so utterly organic is the child before this, and so great is the impetus of its in- herited instincts and tendencies. But when the or- ganism is ripe, by reason of cerebral development, for the enlargement of its active range by new accommoda- tions, then he begins to imitate. And of course he imitates persons. Persons have become his interesting objects, the source of his weal or woe, his uncertain fac- tors. And further, persons are bodies which move. Among these bodies which move, which have certain projective attributes as described, a very peculiar and interesting one is his own body. It has connected with it certain intimate features which all others lack. Be- sides the inspection of hand and foot, by touch and sight, he has experiences in his consciousness which are in all cases connected with this body: strains, stresses, resistances, pains, etc., — an inner felt series along with the outer presented series. But it is only when a new kind of experience arises which we call effort — a set opposition to strain, stress, resistance, 1 The use of this word seems to be necessary in order not to encroach upon the recognized meanings of the words subjective and ejective. 190 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS pain : an experience which arises, I think, first as imita- tive effort — that there comes that great line of cleavage in his experience which indicates, as I have said above, the rise of volition, and which separates off the series now first really subjective. Here is the first germinating nucleus of self -hood over against object-hood. Situa- tions before accepted simply, are now set forward, aimed at, wrought ; and in the fact of aiming, working, the fact of agency, is the sense of subject. The subject sense is an actuating sense. What has formerly been projective now becomes subjective. The associates of other personal bodies, the attributes which made them different from things, are now attached to the child's body with the further peculiarity of actuation. This I may call the subjective stage in the growth of the self- notion. It rapidly assimilates to itself all the other elements by which the child's own body differs in his experience from other active bodies : the passive inner series of pains, pleasures, strains, etc. The self suffers as well as acts. All get set over against lifeless things, and against living bodies which act but whose actions do not contribute to his own sense of actuation or of suffering. Again, it is easy to see what now happens. The child's subject-sense goes out to illuminate these other persons. The projective is now lighted up, claimed, clothed on with the raiment of self-hood, by analogy. The projective becomes ejective, i. e., other people's bodies, says the child to himself, have experiences in them such as mine has. This is the third stage, the ejective, or "social" self. 1 1 I think an adequate apprehension of the distinctions conveyed by the three words " projective," " subjective," and " ejective " would banish the popular " psychologists' fallacy" beyond recall. 191 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE The ego and the alter are thus born together. Both are crude and unreflective, largely organic, an aggregate of sensations prime among which are efforts, pushes, strains, physical pleasures and pains. And the two get purified and clarified together by this twofold reaction between project and subject, and between subject and eject. My sense of myself grows by imitation of you, and my sense of yourself grows in terms of my sense of myself. Both ego and alter are thus essentially social creations. For a long time the child's sense of self includes too much : the circumference of the notion is too wide. It includes the infant's mother, and little brother, and nurse, in a literal sense. To be separated from his mother is to lose a part of himself ; as much so as to be separated from a hand or foot. And he is dependent for his growth directly upon these sugges- tions which came in for imitation from his personal milieu. It will be seen by readers of R. Avenarius 1 that the two stages of this development correspond to the two stages in his process of Introjection, whereby the "hypo- thetical" (personal-organic) element of the naturlichen Weltbegriff is secured. Avenarius finds, from analytical and anthropological points of view, a process of attribu- tion, reading-in (Einlegung), by which a consciousness comes to interpret certain peculiarities attaching to those items in its experiences which represent organ- isms and afterwards persons. The second stage is that whereby these peculiarities get carried back and attached to its own organism (Selbst-einlegung*) ; and recognized 1 Kritik der Reinen Erfahrung, and also der Menschliche Weltbegriff. The present writer judges the doctrines principally from the second-named work. The first is so obscurely written that one is tempted to confess a certain willingness to leave it unexplored. 192 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS as "subjective" (sensations, perceptions, thoughts), in both organisms, over against the regular " objective " elements contained in the rest of the world-experience. This general doctrine of Avenarius finds profound justification, I think, from the genetic sphere, as the two phenomena "personality-suggestion" and "imita- tion " indicate. The first stage is what I have called the "projective" stage of the self -notion in what pre- cedes. It is the stage in which the infant gets " person- ality-suggestions." It is simply the infant's way of getting "more copy" of a peculiar kind from its objective (personal) surroundings. The second stage is secured by imitation. The child reproduces the copy thus obtained, consisting of the physical signs and, through them, of their mental accompaniments. By this reproduction it " interprets " its projects as subjec- tive in itself, and then refers them back to the " other person " again. Avenarius, as far as I have been able to discover, has no means of passing from the first to the second stage, from project to subject. He speaks * of a certain confusion ( Verwechselung*) of the projective experience (T-Erfahrung) with the remaining personal elements in consciousness (M-Erfahrung) ; but what the true- leading-thread into this " confusion " and out of it is, he does not note. This is just what I claim the function of imitation does ; it supplies the bridge with two reaches. It enables me to pass from my experience of what you are, to an interpretation of what I am ; and then from this fuller sense of what I am, back to a fuller knowledge of what you are. 2 1 Loc. cit., § 51, p. 30, and § 95, p. 49. 2 In the use of the two facts, " personality-suggestion " and " imitation," my development is quite unindebted to Avenarius, who writes from the point of view of race history and criticism. I do not adopt the word 13 193 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE § 24. The two principles, habit and accommodation, now get application on a higher plane : a plane which is the theatre of the rise of moral sentiment. Again dis- claiming adequacy of treatment, I think some light falls on the growth of ethical feeling from the psychology of imitation. Moral sentiment arises evidently around acts and attitudes of will. It is accordingly to be expected that the account of the genesis of volition will throw some light upon the conditions of the rise of conscience. If it be true that present character is the deposit of all former reactions of whatever kind, and that what we call will is a general term for our concrete acts of volition; then according as these acts of volition are done in reference to suggestion from persons, or repre- sent partial expressions of personal character, there arises a division within the notion of self. Your suggestion may conflict with my desire: my desire may conflict with present sympathy. Self meets self, so to speak. It is no longer a matter of simple habit versus simple suggestion as is the case in infancy, before the self becomes a voluntary agent. It is now " introjection " since it covers too much ; my word " project" signifies the child's sense of others' personality before it has a sense of its own. The rest proceeds by imitation. This distinction of method raises a further question which should be carefully discussed in all problems for which a genetic solution is sought, i.e., how far the genetic process itself in the individual's growth has become a matter of race habit or instinct. That is, granted a process of origin correctly depicted, to what extent must we say that each new individual of the race passes through it in all its details? Does mental ontogenesis repeat mental phylogenesis? The origin of impulse and instinct illustrate the possible abbreviation of these processes and the starting of the individual from points of higher vantage. I am not prepared to say that an isolated child, for example, might not get a high self-notion (as he might learn to speak somehow) if deprived of all social suggestions ; but it would not be the self-notion that he does get. Cf. the note on Professor Bain's arguments to prove that imitation is not instinctive, below, § 28. 194 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS that form of habit which is personal agency coming into conflict with that form of suggestion which is also personal to me as representing my social self. Your example is powerful to me intrinsically ; not because it is abstractly good or evil, but because it represents a part of myself, inasmuch as I have become what I am in part through my sympathy with you and imitation of you. When I come to a new moral situation, therefore, my state is this : I am in a condition of relative equilibrium, or balance of two factors — my personal or habitual self, and my larger social suggestible self. The new experi- ence tends to destroy this equilibrium by reinforcing my " copy " on one side or the other, and so to lead me out for further habit or for new social adaptations. And now on this basis comes a new mental movement which seems to me to involve a further development of the imitative motif — a development which substitutes warmth and life for the horrible coldness and death of that view which identifies voluntary morality with sub- mission to a " word of command." The child, it is true, very soon comes across that most momentous thing in its moral environment which we call authority; and acquires that most significant thing in our moral equip- ment which we call obedience. He acquires obedience in one of two ways, or both : by suggestion or by punish- ment. The way of suggestion is the higher way,, because it proceeds by gradual lessons in accommoda- tion, until the habit of regularity in conduct is acquired in opposition to the capriciousness of his own reactions. It is also the better way because it sets before the child in an object lesson an example of that stability and lawful- ness which it is the end of all obedience to foster. Yet punishment is good and often necessary. Punishment 195 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE is nature's way: she inflicts the punishment first, and afterwards nurses the insight by which the punishment comes to be understood. A child's capricious move- ment brings the pain which represents all the organic growth of the race ; and so when we punish a child's capricious conduct, we are letting fall upon him the pain which represents all the social and ethical growth of the race. But by whatever method — suggestion or punishment — the object is the same : to preserve the child until he learns from his own habit the insight which is necessary to his own salvation through intelli- gent submission. But whether obedience comes by suggestion or by punishment it has this genetic value : it leads to another refinement in the sense of self, at first "projective" then subjective. The child finds himself stimulated con- stantly to deny his impulses, his desires, even his irregular sympathies, by conforming to the will of another. This other represents a regular, systematic, unflinching, but reasonable personality — still a person, but a very dif- ferent person from the child's own. Here is a copy which is a personal authority or law. It is " projective " because he cannot understand it, cannot anticipate it. And again it is only by imitation that he is to repro- duce it, and so to arrive at a knowledge of what he is to understand it to be. So it is a copy. It is its aim — so might the child say, were he an adult — and should be mine — if I am awake to it — to have me obey it, act like it, think like it, be like it in all respects. It is not I, but I am to become it. Here is my ideal self, my final pattern, my "ought" set before me. Only in so far as I get into the habit of doing and being like it, get my character moulded into conformity with it, only so far am I good. And like all other imitative functions 196 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS it teaches its lesson only by stimulating to action. I must succeed in doing, if I would understand. But as I thus progress in doing, I for ever find new patterns set for me ; and so my ethical insight must always find its profoundest expression in that yearning which anticipates but does not overtake the ideal. 1 My sense of moral ideal, therefore, is my sense of a possible perfect, regular will in me in which the personal and the social self — my habits and my social calls — are completely in harmony : the sense of obligation in me is the sense of lack of such harmony — of the actual discrepancies in my various thoughts of self, as my actions and tendencies give rise to them. And the thought of this ideal self, made ejective, as out of and beyond me — this is embodied in the moral sanctions of society, and finally in God. 2 The value of the ejective sense of moral self is seen in the great sensitiveness we have to the supposed opinions of others about our conduct. It is an ingredient of extraordinary influence. From the account given of the rise of the sense of obligation, we should expect the two very subtle aspects of this sensitiveness which are actually present. First, in general, our dread and fear before another's fancied opinion is in direct proportion to our own sense of self-condemnation. Consciousness is clear on this point. It must be so if it is true that our sense of self-condemnation is of social origin, i. e., arises from our imitative response to the well-sanctioned 1 Cf, the paper on " The Cosmic and the Moral," above. 2 On the distinctively social function of imitation, Tarde and Sighele both dwell in the works named, the latter endeavoring to lay the foun- dations of a science of "collective psychology." See also, for the ex- tended development of the theory of the origin of the moral conscious- ness, the writer's Social and Eth. Interpretations (with the new matter added in the third edition, 1902). 197 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE opinions and commands of others. But second, the in- telligent observation of the opinions of others, and the suffering of the penalties of social law, react back con- stantly to purify and elevate the standards which one sets himself. There is, therefore, a constant progress, from the action and reaction of society upon the in- dividual and the individual upon society. § 25. In a recent article, Professor Josiah Royce 1 dis- tinguishes between the two earlier phases of self which I have pointed out, but does not develop the third. Yet he indicates clearly and with emphasis the twofold element of conflict under which the moral sense de- velops. The ordinary accounts on the natural history side, from Darwin 2 to the present, simply describe a conflict in consciousness between sympathy and selfish- ness. This fails to do justice to the "law" element in the genesis of morality. I should go farther than Royce does in emphasizing this element, believing as I do that there is no sense of oughtness until the child gets the basis laid of a habit which not only calls upon him to deny his private selfishness in favor of sympathy, but also his private sympathies in favor of reasonable regularity learned through submission. The opposition, between my regular personal ideal and all else — whether it be the regularity of my selfish habit or the irregularity of my generous responses — this is the essential condition of the rise of obligation. And it is in as far as this ought-feeling goes out beyond the copy-elements drawn from actual instances of action, and anticipates better or more ideal action, that the antithesis between the "ought " and the " is " has its psychological justification. The question whether obedience is a case of imita- 1 International Journ. of Ethics, July, 1893, p. 430. 2 Descent of Man, parti, chap. iii. 198 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS tion 1 is largely a matter of definition. So far as the copy set in the " word of command" is reproduced, the reaction is imitative. A child cannot obey a command to do what he does not know how to do. The circumstances of his doing it, however, the forcible presentation of the copy by another person, this seems only to add additional elements to the copy itself. The child has in view, when he obeys, not only the thing he is to do, but the circumstances — the consequences, the punishment, the reward — and these also he seeks to reproduce or to avoid. On the other hand, it may well be asked whether all of our voluntary imitations, and actions generally, are not cases of obedience ; for it is only when an idea gets certain force, and sanctions, and social setting, that it is influential in bringing us out for its reproduction. Of course this is only further play on definitions ; but it serves to indicate the real elements in the situation. When Tonnies says that obedience comes first and imitation afterwards, he refers to voluntary imitation of a particular type. An infant does not obey a com- mand until he has learned how to perform it ; and that suffices, with its sanctions, to give him " copy " for imita- tion in a broader sense. § 26. It is possible, on the basis of the preceding development, to lay out a scheme of notions and terms to govern the discussion of the whole matter of imi- tation. This has been the " loose joint " in many discussions : the utter lack of any well-defined limits set to the phenomena in question. Tarde practically claims all cases of organic or social resemblance as instances of imitation, overlooking the truth, as one 1 See discussion by Tarde, he. cit., and Paulhan, Revue Philosophiqne, Aug., 189, p. 1790: also Tonnies, PhilosopMsche Monatshefte, 1893, p. 308. 199 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE of his critics takes pains to point out, that two things which resemble each other may be common effects of the same cause. Others are disposed to consider the volun- tary imitation of an action as the only legitimate case of imitation. We have reason to think, however, that volition requires a finely complex system of copy- elements, whose presence can be accounted for only on the basis of earlier imitation reactions. Further, it is the lower, less volitional t}^pes of mind that imi- tation especially characterizes. If we then say that imitation always involves a presentation or image of the situation or object imitated — a position very near the popular use of the term — then we have great difficulty in accounting for those reactions which repro- duce subconscious, vaguely present stimulations : for example, the acquisition of facial expression, the con- tagion of emotion, the growth of style in dress and institutions — what may be called the influence of the 44 psychic atmosphere." I think we have found reason from the analysis above, to hold that our provisional definition of imitation is just: an imitative reaction is in its type one which repeats its own stimulus. This is what we find the nervous and muscular mechanism suited to, and this is what we find the organism doing in a progressive way in all the types of function which we have passed in review. If this is too broad a definition, then what I have traced must be given some other name, and imi- tation applied to any more restricted function that can be clearly and finally marked out. Adhering then to the definition which makes of imitation an organic type, we may point out its various "kinds," according to the degree in which a reaction of the general type has, by complication, abbreviation, sub- 200 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS stitution, inhibition, departed in the development of consciousness from its typical simplicity. We find in fact three great instances of function, all of which conform to the imitative type. First : simple contractility which reproduces its stim- ulus. This may be called biological imitation. 1 Under this head fall all cases lower down than the conscious picturing of copies: lower down in the sense of not involving, and never having involved, for their execu- tion, a conscious sensory or intellectual stimulus, with the possibility of its revival as memory. On the nervous side, such reactions may be called subcortical ; and in view of another class mentioned below, they may be further qualified as 'primarily subcortical. These " biological " reactions are evidently first in order of development, and represent the gains or ac- commodations of the organism made independently of the conscious picturing of copies. They represent organic responses which are useful for repetition. They serve for the accumulation of material for conscious and voluntary actions. In the animals, the scope of such action is very limited, because of the complete instinctive equipment which yo ung animals bring into the world ; but in human infants it plays an important part as the means of the gradual reduction to order and utility of the random spontaneous movements. I have noted its presence under the phrase " pre-imi- tative " or " physiological " suggestion 2 in another place. It is under this head that the so-called 1 Called " organic imitation " or " circular reaction " in Mental Develop- ment ; the latter named term is the better. 2 Science, xxvii., 1891, p. 113. Of course the phrase pre-imitative did not contemplate the broader use of the term imitation which I am now employing, but limited it to conscious imitation. 201 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE " selective" function of the nervous system finds its first illustration. 1 Second : we pass to 'psychological or cortical imita- tions. The criterion of imitation — the copy for repro- duction — is here preserved in the shape of conscious sensations and images. The copy becomes consciously available in two ways : first, as sensation, which the imita- tive reaction seeks to continue or reproduce (as the imita- tion of words heard, movements seen, etc.); and second, as memory. In this latter case there arises desire, in which there is consciousness of the imitative tendency as respects an agreeable memory- copy; and with the persistence of such a copy, and its partial repression by other elements of memory, comes volition. We find, accordingly, two kinds of psychological or cortical imitation, which I have called in the article already quoted 2 respectively " simple " and " persistent " imita- tion. Simple imitation is the sensory-motor or ideo- motor suggestion which reproduces its own stimulus ; and persistent imitation is the " try-try-again " experi- ence of early volition. Third: a great class of facts which we may well 1 This distinction between young children and the young of animals gives us the reason that we do not find clear imitations as common among the animals as we should expect — monkeys and parrots possibly excepted. In the words of Preyer (Physiologie des Embryos, p. 545), " the more kinds of co-ordinated movement an animal brings into the world, the fewer is he able to learn afterwards/' The child is par ex- cellence the animal that learns ; and if imitation is the way to learn, he has " chosen the better part " in being more imitative than the rest. Animal imitativeness is generally understated, however — cf. the remark- able performances of dogs, cats, birds, etc., in the way of imitation in Romanes' Evol. of Mind in Animals, chap. xiv. The most social animals, including man, are the most imitative, as we should expect ; since both sociability and imitation are connected with what we have called" person- ality-suggestion." 2 " The Origin of Volition," above. 202 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS designate by the term plastic or secondarily-subcortical imitation, i. e., all the cases of stimulus-repeating re- action which once represented conscious adaptation, but have become what is ordinarily called " secondary- automatic " and subconscious. These cases we have found readily explainable by the hypothesis of lapsed links in the memory copy system, or, put more shortly, by the principle of habit. So we find under this head- ing such fundamental facts for social psychology as the social phenomena of contagion, fashion, mob-law, which Tarde and Sighele so well emphasize, the imitation of facial and emotional expression, moral influence, organic sympathy, personal rapport, etc. The term plastic serves to point out the rather helpless condition of the person who imitates, and by so doing interprets in his own action the more intangible influences of his estate in life. 1 § 27. Before concluding, I wish to draw attention to certain more obscure instances of imitation, and assign them their place in the general scheme of development. The social instances noticed at length by Tarde, and summarized under so-called " laws," are easily reduced to more general principles. Tarde enunciated a law based on the fact that people copy thoughts and opinions before they copy dress and customs : i. e., " imitation proceeds from the internal to the external." As far as this is true it is only partialh r imitation. Thoughts and opinions are copied because they are most important ; and as the copier thinks with another 1 An extremely subtle and interesting phenomenon under this head is that usually described as the influence of example on personal belief. What we call persuasion is largely the suggestion of the emotion which accompanies strong conviction, with the corresponding influence which the emotion suggested has upon the logical relationships apprehended by the victim. 203 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE he acts with him, since like thought produces like conduct. But in fact is there such a general truth? American ladies take their styles in dress from the French, bat they do not defer to the sentiments of French social circles ; • they rather imitate in litera- ture and higher things the opinions of the English, whose dress they consider inferior. Further, a child imitates persons, and what he copies most largely are the personal points of evidence, so to speak ; the boldest, most external manifestations, not the inner essential mental things. It is only as he grows to make a con- scious distinction between thought and action that he gives the former a higher valuation. Again, Tarde's laws relative to imitation mode and imitation coutume — the former having in its eye the new, fashionable, and popular, the fad; the latter, the old, venerable, and customary — are so clearly partial statements of the principles of accommodation and habit, as they get application on a broader social scale, that it is not necessary to dwell further upon them. 1 The phenomena of hypnotism illustrate most strikingly the reality of imitation at a certain stage of mental life. Delboeuf makes it probable 2 that the characteristic peculiarities of the " stages " of the Paris school are due to this influence ; and the wider question may well be opened whether suggestion generally, as understood in hypnotic work, might not be better expressed by some formula which recognizes the fundamental sameness of all reactions — normal, pathological, hypnotic, degenera- tive — which exhibit the form of stimulus-repeating or " circular " process characteristic of simple imitation. In 1 Tarde's other principle that "inferiors imitate superiors" is clearly a corollary from the view that the progressive ideal personality arises through social suggestion. 2 Revue Philosophique, xxii. pp. 146 ff. 204 IMITATION: HISTORY OF CONSCIOUSNESS normal, personal, and social suggestion the copy elements are in part unrecognized, and their reactions are subject to inhibition and blocking-off by the various voluntary and complicated tendencies which have the floor. In sleep, the copy elements are largely spontane- ous images thrown up by the play of association or stimulated by outside trivialities, and all so weak that while action follows in the dream-persons, it does not follow in the dreamer's own muscles. In hypnotic somnambulism all copy elements are from the outside, thrown in ; the inner fountains are blocked ; action follows upon idea, whatever it is. Even the idea of no action is acted out by the lethargic, and the idea of fixed action by the cataleptic. 1 And all the vagaries of Luys himself get " demonstrated " with reality enough, because Luys sets the "copy." Further, in certain cases of madness (folie a deux, etc.) the afflicted patient acts out responses to a certain personal copy which has become fixed in the progress of the disease, and perhaps has aided in its production. 2 In all these cases, the peculiar character of which is the performance, under conditions commonly called those of aboulia, 3 of reactions which require the muscular co-ordinations usually employed by voluntary action, we have illustrations of " plastic " 1 It may be well to quote Janet's summary of his determinations of the characteristic features of general catalepsy, on the one hand, and the synthesis cd, on the other hand. But it does not determine the particular coefficient of reality belonging to either ab or cd. Or we may approach the hypothetical from the side of the existential, getting the hypothetical judgment of existence, " if ab exists so does cd." In this case, not only does the belief-feeling envelop both ab and cd, as before ; but, further, the par- ticular coefficient of reality attaching in common to them both is now expressed. This last form of judgment is, therefore, from our present point of view, the richest 1 See Venn, Emper. Logic, 243 ; Baldwin, Handb. of Psychol, led., i. 293. 245 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE and most notable. In it we catch both belief as felt co- efficient, and existence as asserted predicate (*. e., the reality-coefficient made the P of predication). The above account, it will be seen, suggests an ex- planation also to the negative existential judgment — a point of great difficulty to Herbart, Brentano, and Hille- brand — by saving the predicative force of the existence- sign. Yet by the negation in this judgment, as now explained, no element of content is cut off from S ; what is denied is belief in a positive coefficient of reality ; or as Erdmann 1 and Sigwart say, it is the rejection of an attempted positive judgment of existence. The element of belief which accompanies all judgment, described above as felt recognition of a reality-coefficient, gives us the line of separation between formal and material logic. The judgments A, E, I, O, cannot be purely formal, nor can the syllogisms constructed from them ; for every S and P in each one of them has its belief-value — its reality-coefficient — and every actual case of inference means the development of concept sub- jects to the limitations of thought in that particular sphere of reality. This reference to reality is probably what Hillebrand is contending for in his doctrine of " Double Judgments," so far as I understand it. The truth of every conclusion rests upon the presupposition from the supplying of which the hypothetical syllogism arises, just as the hypothetical judgment arises from the supplying of the ground of Belief in the categorical judgment that the two premises have the same kind of reality. The syllogism : — A is B B is C A is C, 1 Loc. cit. i. 349 ff. 246 FEELING, BELIEF, AND JUDGMENT to be valid, really requires belief that the proposition, If A is B and B is C, then A is C, applies to the particular elements of content in question. Without this presup- position, securing the same coefficient to both premises, the conclusion would be false ; as, for example : — All men who have died will rise again, The man Borneo died, The man Borneo will rise again. The " man Romeo " and the " all men " have different coefficients of reality — different material reference, as is indicated by the difference of type — and the conclu- sion is invalid. 247 XIII I. Memoey foe Square Size 1 The experiments of this study were performed at To- ronto (by the present writer with Mr. W. J. Shaw), during the winter of 1892-3. The object was to deter- mine the accuracy of the memory for size, as affected by the lapse of time. A figure of two dimensions was selected for experiment because of the tendency to meas- ure linear size in terms of well-known units of length. Circles tend to be measured by their radii, but in the case of the square, the impression is that of the area, and the natural memory-image is not so liable to be corrected by comparison with standards fixed in mind by repeated experience. The experiments proceeded by three different methods. (1) Selection from a Variety. A single figure (the nor- mal, 150 mm. square) was drawn on a blackboard and shown to a large college class ; after a certain time a number of squares of various sizes were shown simul- taneously, and the class was requested to designate the one that appeared to be the same size as the normal. The squares ranged from 130 to 210 mm. by intervals of 20 mm., and the time intervals were 10, 20, and 40 min- utes. The class consisted of about 225 persons, of 1 Prom The Psychological Review, May, 1 895. Reported by Professor H. C. Warren to the American Psychological Association, December, 1893. (Cf. the Abstract in the Proc. Amer. Psych. Ass., 2nd Meeting, 1893.) 248 MEMORY FOR SQUARE SIZE whom some 50 were women. (2) Identification. Here the normal square was first shown, and afterwards one other square; the subjects were asked to say whether the latter appeared to be greater, equal to, or less than the normal. The time intervals were the same as before, and the second square was in every instance 20 mm. greater than the normal. Both series were treated by the " method of right and wrong cases," and the two results showed remarkable agreement. The percentage of right cases is shown in Table I. Table I I. By Selection. II. By Identification. 10 min. . . 64.1 87.6 20 » 59.3 82.7 40 " 36.4 58.5 Plotting the results (Fig. 1), we find the memory curves, as they may be called, practically parallel, but the degree of accuracy is much higher by the second method than by the first. In each there is a rapid fall- ing off: at first, then a period of gradual descent, and finally another rapid drop. The greater accuracy of the results in II is partly due to the manner of stating the question. Should the memory-image of the normal square either remain unaltered, or decrease in size, the subject would respond correctly that the second square was the greater, and he would respond incorrectly only if his memory-image had increased sensibly in size from its original. Whereas, in the series by Selection his 249 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE responses would be classed as incorrect if his memory- image had either increased or decreased sensibly. A further source of error in the series by Selection was the disturbance due to simultaneous contrast between the figures. Some special experiments were afterwards made to determine the effect of this contrast (see II, below). In discussing the form of the two memory-curves so reached, it should first be observed that their real origin is not at A, but at a point, or points, near B. For the Curves for the methods of Selection (I) and Identification (II). Verti- cal lines give percentage of correct cases. Horizontal divisions give time intervals in minutes. difference of 20 mm. is very much greater than the least perceptible difference between two squares observed in immediate succession; hence, even if a considerable interval should elapse before the second square is shown, no incorrect judgment will be given. The effect of this is to make the first falling off, when once it begins, even more rapid than is indicated in the diagram, and possibly also to carry out the parallelism between the two curves still further. The reason for the sudden falling off may lie in the conditions of the experiments. The subjects began to take notes on a lecture immediately after the normal square was shown, and there was consequently a 250 MEMORY FOR SQUARE SIZE sudden withdrawal of attention from the memory- image, allowing it to decrease greatly in distinctness at once. After this first influence had taken effect, there was, it seems, but little change until the ordinary factors which tend to make the image more vague began to take effect. The work of these factors, which one would scarcely expect to become apparent within 40 minutes, may have been hastened by the fatigue arising from steady application. 1 (3) The third series proceeded by what was termed the Method of Reproduction. A normal square having been shown, as before, the subjects were asked, after the stated interval, to draw on paper a square of the same size. The normal in this case was 170 mm. square. The reproductions were almost always too small, their average being 146.0 after 20 minutes and 146.4 after 40 minutes. This result was rather unex- pected, as the other series had indicated a tendency of the memory-image to increase in size beyond the original. It may be attributed to two factors: (1) The muscles of the hand were fatigued from continuous writing, and this tended to give the impression of a figure larger than that actually drawn. (2) The paper on which the drawing was made was not much larger than the actual size of the normal; any figure coming close to the edges would appear very large, since it occupied so large a portion of the field. Hence there was a tendency to draw the square too small. On this account it was decided to separate the results obtained by this method from the others, in which the conditions were more nearly alike. 1 The results were examined for a possible difference between the two sexes, but the variations were neither marked nor constant in direction. 251 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE II. Further Experiments on Memory for Square Size 1 The experiments were taken up at this point by Messrs. Warren and Shaw, at Princeton. A possible objection to the Selection Method lay, as has been said, in the disturbing influence of simultaneous contrast. To investigate this, the following experiment was performed : Ten squares, ranging between 100 and 190 mm., were drawn in promiscuous order on a large sheet of paper ; on another sheet of the same size a single square was drawn as normal, and the two sheets were placed in different rooms. The subjects observed the normal first, and going at once to the other room designated the square which appeared equal to it. The normal used was 120 mm. in one instance and 170 mm. in another. In each case there was a marked attraction towards the centre of the series, the average for the normal of 120 mm. being 123.3, and for that of 170 mm., 165. On this account it seemed desirable to supplement the Toronto experiments by others, and to employ a some- what different method, using a series which combined the advantages of Selection and Identification. The object was to determine the threshold, i. e., the (average) least perceptible difference from the normal after a given period of time. In each experiment the normal was first shown, and after the interval another square as near the threshold as the latter could be determined from the previous experiments; the experiments were continued until the threshold was found. When the squares were shown in immediate succession (interval of 1 This section is by Professor H. C. Warren and Mr. W. J. Shaw. 252 MEMORY FOR SQUARE SIZE no minutes = perception), the threshold was found to be 3 mm. for squares of about 150 mm. When the interval was increased it was found to make an essential difference whether the second square was the larger or the smaller. For an interval of 10 minutes the threshold was 8 mm. if the second was smaller, while it was but 5 mm. if the second was larger ; for 20 minutes it was somewhat less than 8 mm. if the second was smaller, and less than zero (a minus quantity!) if the second was larger; that is, when two squares of the same size were shown, 20 min- utes apart, the second was pronounced the smaller by over 50 per cent of the subjects (actually, 63 per cent). That this result was not accidental (the conditions rendered any collusion impossible) was proved by the substantial agreement of all the experiments, pointing as they did without exception in the same direction. The entire series (marked a in Table II) was performed on the same objects, a college class of about 50, Juniors and Seniors, on nine separate occasions, the 10-minute intervals being taken first. Besides this the table shows two experiments (marked b) on two other college classes of 50 and 65 respectively, where squares of 150 and 160 mm. were used, with a 20-minute interval, the normal being smaller in the former case and larger in the latter. The lack of practice makes the threshold much greater in these instances than in the others, but they exhibit a similar difference, depending on the order of sequence. The line of values marked c shows the experiments on squares immediately succeeding one another (0 minutes interval), taken with still another set of subjects, and the two values marked d are taken from the earlier experiments by Identification. These results unite to show that besides the growth of inaccuracy, or indistinctness, in the memory-image, 253 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE there is another factor at work, by which the memory- image tends to grow larger as the time interval increases. The table gives three cases which allow direct compari- son between an increasing and a decreasing sequence: (1) With unpractised observers (see b), 10 mm. increase Table II Interval Difference between I (normal) and II. and order. 20mm. 12mm. 10mm. 8 mm. 5 mm. 3 mm. o mm. omin, III — — 95(c) 87(c) 63(c) 4 mm.=: 59 2 mm.= 44 00 85= (c) 10 min. . — — — — 50(a) — f- 1 < U 10 min. . II>I . . 87(d) — 70(a) 53 (a) — — 20 min. . IKI . . — — 75(b) 94 (a) 75(a) 65 (a) (63< J 94 — 20 min. . II>I . . 82(d) 82(a) 37(b) 67(a) — — (13> (a) The figures denote percentage of right answers, except under mm., where they denote the judgment (=,>, or <,) actually- made. The normal was 150 mm. square. from the normal was noted by only 37% after 20 minutes, while the same amount of decrease was noted by 75%. (2) With practised observers (a), 8 mm. increase was noted by 67%, and the same decrease by 49%. (3) With the same observers as (2), the final test, after consider- able practice, was with two equal squares, separated by 254 MEMORY FOR SQUARE SIZE 20 minutes interval ; 63% pronounced the second square smaller, 24% equal, and 13% larger. Comparing this with the observations on the threshold for perception, we see that while half of the subjects can distinguish a difference in the latter case only when it amounts to 3 mm., in case of a 20-minute interval a majority actually think they perceive a difference when none exists, indi- cating plainly that their memory-image has grown by more than 3 mm., apart from any increase in the extent of the territory lying " below the threshold.' ' These results are not so satisfactory as the earlier series (see Table I) for determining the actual law of the threshold, on account of the increased degree of practice as the experiments proceeded. But they bring out clearly this fact of the growth, or exaggeration, of the memory-image. The close of the college year prevented an extension of these experiments to intervals of 40 minutes with the same set of men. A word or two may be in place here regarding the relation between single experiments on a number of subjects and a series of experiments on a single indi- vidual. In any experiments where a number of results are combined and their averages taken, what is sought is a representative value. By multiplying the trials, accidental influences are eliminated and we obtain a value representative of the given individual under the given conditions. If the individual represents some peculiar type, we should further compare his results with those obtained from individuals of other types. If, however, what we desire is the observation of an average individual, we must make sure that our object is such, by comparing him with others. Rather than repeat the entire series on several individuals, we may save time 255 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE and labor by performing a single experiment on a number together. There are then a number of precau- tions to be taken. (1) Each subject must understand perfectly the nature of the judgment to be made. (2) The judgments must be entirely independent. (3) The subjects must be representative — not drawn from some one peculiar class ; and they must be governed by sen- sibly the same conditions. (4) Finally, care must be taken with the objective conditions of the experiment, so that no vitiating circumstances shall creep in. — In the present instance, every precaution was taken to fulfil the first two and the last of these requirements, and, a number of doubtful results having been rejected, the remainder fulfilled the conditions exactly, so far as a most careful scrutiny and attention on the part of the two observers could determine. Further, the subjects were acted upon by sensibly the same conditions during the given interval/ There is, of course, room for variety of opinion as to how far representative a college class is to be considered, and what allowances, if any, should be made for differences in previous occupation and differ- ences in location with reference to the platform where the squares were shown. The writers are inclined to minimize these differences, and as to the former ques- tion, it is urged that a body of men like those under consideration are representative of the average educated male of twenty-one years. We believe the results to be far more satisfactory than a quantity of experiments on merely one or two individuals, and think that this cumulative method, under which alone are possible cer- tain experiments involving a great amount of time, may safely be used in connection with the more usual procedure. 256 XIV THE EFFECT OF SIZE-CONTRAST UPON JUDGMENTS OF POSITION IN THE RETINAL FIELD 1 I. Problem, Apparatus, and Methods. — The indi- cation given in the preceding paper that the arrange- ment of squares of various sizes in the visual field has an influence upon the identification of one of them as of a certain remembered size, suggested a farther research. It occurred to the writer that any influence of contigu- ous squares upon each other would be accurately measured by their joint influence upon the subject's estimate of some other distance in the visual field. Such a distance as that lying between the squares lends itself directly to this purpose. An arrangement was readily effected, whereby the ratio of the sides of two squares to each other was varied in a series of values, while the distance between the squares was kept constant. Any regular variations then in the judgment of this latter distance, such as that of its mid-point, — i. e., the bisection of the distance between the squares, — would be due to the variations in the ratio of the square-sizes. Such a problem shows practical bearings also in all matters which require esti- mates of balance, division, proportion in right lines between masses, objects, etc., in the field of vision : such matters as the hanging of pictures, designing of cuts, vignettes, architectural plans, etc., involving fine values. 1 From The Psychological Review, May, 1895. 17 257 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE Of course all variations from the correct location of a mid-point, or other critical point, lying between two masses of material, color, etc., should be allowed for in applying the formulae of aesthetic effect. A further complication also arises when movement enters into the case: the movement of the contrasted masses toward or from each other, of the eye from one to the other along the line of connection, or of the element of this line whose evolution describes the line. Fig. I. Experimental Arrangements. — The following descrip- tion (with Fig. 1) of my device for investigating the problem is given in some detail, since it meets the essential requirements of such experimentation and is so simple in principle that it may be adopted by others who desire to carry this kind of experimentation further. The dark room (R) communicates with room I (R') by a single window (W) which is completely filled with 258 SIZE-CONTRAST white cardboard. In this cardboard two square holes are cut (S and S 1 ) whose sides are of determined ratio to each other, and whose distance from each other is measured by a slit bearing a known ratio in length to the side of the larger square. On the wall beside the window (at Ax) is fixed the axis of movement of a long needle which is moved upon this axis by a pin carried round the face of the clock motor (Cm) of a Rothe poly- graph. The movement of one end of the needle upward by the pin and downward by its own weight, is reversed by the other end of the needle, which so carries an arrow-head or pointed marker up and down the mm. scale marked upon the slit. The needle bears at A the armature of an electromagnet. The magnet (E) under the armature is fixed to the cardboard and its connec- tions are carried into room R/ and terminate in a punch- key (K) on a table directly in front of the window W. The reagent sits at this key, and closes the current when the needle reaches the mid-point of the slit ; the needle is arrested by the attraction of the magnet (E), and the reading is given on the scale rara. The appar- atus works automatically, giving a series of experiments, with alternating up and down movement of the needle, until the motor runs down. A gas jet in room R is focussed through a large reading lens upon the scale rara., converting the small point of the needle seen by the reagent from the other room, into a moving bead of light ; the background of the squares and of the slit is the black of the dark-room wall, and the whole is seen by him upon the white surface of the cardboard. For the horizontal arrangement of the squares, the whole apparatus is simply shifted 90°, bringing the axis of movement of the needle below the window. With the arrangements thus described experiments 259 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE were carried out on two persons ; Sh., (W. J. Shaw) and T. (G. A. Tawney), with results as given in this report. Both were practised in psychological experimentation, but Sh. more than T. S 1 In the case of each, the series of values of the ratio ^~ was ^-, J-, \, Jg, which gives, when S has the constant value of 20 cm., the following series of values for S 1 , i. e.> 10, 5, 2.50, 1.25 cm. A constant value for the distance between the squares was selected which seemed about as likely to occur in ordinary arrangements and experiments as any other, i. > > t> o O O o o 1 9 H 10 3 2 H 15 20:10 5 14 20:5 1 7 8 5 1 6 17 20 : 2.5 1 9 10 6 1 7 33 520:1.25) I 20 : j 5 18 43 23 51 6 20 4 8 10 Totals 79 8 28 265 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE V. Rectification Method. — It is evident that a second series of indications may be obtained from the experi- ments given above in cases in which the reagent ex- presses his sense of the correctness or incorrectness of his result in each experiment. Both Sh. and T. were instructed to indicate after each experiment whether or not the bead gave a satisfactory result when stopped, and also in which direction the result should be rectified to give satisfaction. Records were kept of all such indications. Since it involved a secondary fixing of the mid-point, it approaches the " fixation " method ; but since it followed upon the earlier determination made when the needle was in motion, it involves influences akin to those of the " approach " method ; so it may be considered a combination of the earlier methods and a refinement upon both of them, for it requires a second act of judgment or criticism of the result already ren- dered in each trial. So let us call it the " rectification " method. It is further apparent that this rectification of the result of any given experiment may take one of four phases. It may be a judgment that the needle has gone too far, this we may call rectification by " reversal ; " or that it has not gone far enough, rectification by " sup- plementing." And each of these kinds of rectification will include again two instances. There will be re- versals when the movement is in the .direction of the prevailing error (i. e., away from the larger square), and when the movement is contrary to the direction of the prevailing error (i. e., toward the greater square). And the same two cases occur for the " supplemental " rectifications. The cases of rectification in the experiments on Sh. and T., both of whom were instructed to use the method, 266 SIZE-CONTRAST may be thrown into the following tables, in which the four kinds of rectification are distinguished. Results for Sh. Rectification of Results Secured by Ap- proach Method. Vertical Arrangement. — Giving the figures for Sh. in the vertical arrangement we have Table V. From this table we may conclude as follows : 1. Of the rectification of results secured by the ap- proach method, the " reversals " are nearly twice as frequent as the " supplemental. " 2. The " reversals "are 5 times as frequent when the bead moves against the tendency to error as when it moves in the same direction. 3. The " supplemental " are 2J times as frequent when the bead moves in the direction of the error as when it moves in the contrary direction. 4. Rectifications take place in jL- the entire number of experiments. Horizontal Arrangement. — The rectifications of Sh. for the horizontal arrangement are shown in Table VI (first line). Table VI. — Hor. Arrgt. No. Rects. Method. Ratio of Sides in cm. Reversals. Supp'mentals. -4-= o 02 go o u -(J > o 3 go" o > O 24 7 •a O H 32 19 g o u > o 3 3 1 CO O ■+3 o 3 5 13 -t-3 o H Sh. T. 38 25 App. Fix. Whole series lumped. 8 12 6 6 267 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE It results from this table : 1. The " reversals " number 5 times the " supplemen- tal " among the rectifications of data derived by the approach method. 2. The " reversals " are 3 times as many when the bead moves in the direction contrary to the prevailing error (i. e., toward the larger square), as when it moves in the opposite direction. 3. The supplemental are equally divided between the two cases of opposite movement of the bead. 4. The number of rectifications is about J of the num- ber of experiments. Results for T. Rectifications of Results Secured by the Fixation Method. Vertical Arrangement. — The results of T. with the vertical arrangements appear in Table VII. Table VII. — T. Fix. Method. Ver. Arrgt. Ratio of Reversals. Supple 'tals. go co No. Sides g co fa co Reets. in cm. o 4h o i — i ■£ ■43 i— j t> > > > o o o o o o 3 % H 7 3 H 10 20:10 3 10 19 20:5 12 5 17 i 1 2 19 20 : 2.5 3 1 4 6 9 15 31 5 20: 1.25 I ) 20 : \ 7 22 9 . 16 4 11 15 Total . . 79 15 37 18 24 42 Table VII. shows the following: 1. Rectifications by " supplementing " are \ more fre- 268 SIZE-CONTRAST quent than those by "reversal" when the results are secured by the fixation method. 2. The " reversals" are J more frequent when the bead moves in the direction of error than when it moves in the contrary direction. 3. The " supplemental " are J more frequent when the bead moves in the direction contrary to that of the prevailing error than when it moves in the same direc- tion as the error. 4. The entire number of rectifications is 1 of the en- tire number of experiments. Horizontal Arrangement. — The rectifications of T. for the horizontal arrangement are given in Table VII (second line). 1. Results. — The "reversals" are three times the " supplemental " in the fixation method, horizontal ar- rangement. 2. The reversals are \ more when the bead moves in the direction of error than when it moves in the opposite direction. 3. The " supplemental " are five times more when the beads move contrary to the direction of error than when it moves in the same direction. This result, however, is based on too small a number of cases to be taken as a numerical ratio. 4. The number of rectifications is \ of the whole number of experiments. VI. General Interpretation of Results. — We are now able to gather up the results shown in the earlier tables in some more comprehensive statements, based upon the whole number of experiments taken together. I. Considering the results for the direction and amount of error without regarding the influence of the direction of movement of the light-bead, we may plot curves 269 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE showing the tendency and amount of error for each of the two arrangements by each of the two methods. In Fig. 2 the horizontal ordinate represents the constant series of ratios of the square sides to each other; the vertical ordinate, the size of the error and its duration (above the abscissa denoting error away from the larger square). Curves (1) and (2) give the results by the approach method, vertical and horizontal arrangements respectively; curves (3) and (4) the results by the fixa- 4 ■ *■—-/■■ / ./ / FSg. S Me 0) — ~i2>. M H tion method, vertical and horizontal respectively. The location of the various points of the curves is determined in each instance by the figures given in the appropriate table above. The curves are numbered to correspond with the respective tables. Inspection of the four curves gives certain general results which unite and summarize the results already shown from the separate tables above. 1. The four curves (representing 1,928 experiments) agree in establishing a tendency to error away from the larger square of from 1 to 4.5 mm. when the side of the larger square is 20 cm. 270 SIZE-CONTRAST 2. The close parallelism of three of the curves in their common direction, and the general parallelism of all the four, establishes the fact that the tendency to error in- creases with the relative increase of the side of the larger square. 3. The position of curves (1) and (3), considered in relation to the position of curves (2) and (4), shows that the tendency to error, when the squares are ar- ranged vertically, is about twice as great as when they are arranged horizontally. 4. Comparison of curves (1) and (2) with curves (3) and (4) shows that the method of fixation gives more uniform results than the method of approach ; and also that the difference in results between the vertical and horizontal arrangements is less when the fixation method is used. It follows from this that eye-move- ments over a line hinder the correct estimate of the parts of that line, and that this influence of eye-movement is greater for vertical than for horizontal directions. II. Considering the results with regard to the direc- tion of movement of the light-bead by both methods and in both arrangements, we may plot the curves of Fig. 3, 271 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE in which the ordinates remain as in Fig. 2, the points on curves (1) and (2) give the amount of error for the several contrast ratios for the case of movements of the bead away from and toward the larger square respec- tively by the approach method, and the points on curves (3) and (4) give the amount of error for the same two cases respectively, by the fixation method. These amounts are reached by combining the figures for " down " and " right " movements in the tables of verti- cal and horizontal arrangements of the approach method, for each contrast ratio, and combining similarly the " up " and " left " results of the corresponding tables of the fixation method. Inspection of these four curves (again representing the entire 1,928 experiments) leads us to certain conclusions. 1. Comparisons of curves (1) and (3) with curves (2) and (4) shows that the error is greater when the bead is moving in the direction of the error. 2. This is especially the case when the approach method is adopted, the error then being twice as great when the movement is in the direction of the normal error as when it is in the contrary direction : compari- sons of curves (1) and (2). 3. It follows that the influence already found to be due to eye-movements varies according to the particular direction of the movement along the line explored. If the eye-movement is toward the larger of the areas con- trasted, it tends to correct the normal error of judg- ment in the estimation of the line which connects the two areas. If the movement is, on the contrary, away from the greater area, it exaggerates the normal error of judgment. III. The details of the instances of " rectification " given above serve to confirm these general conclusions, 272 SIZE-CONTRAST both as to the normal error itself and as to the influence of eye-movements upon it. By the approach method the rectifications by reversal are two to five times more frequent than those by supplementing. This shows that the rectifications in this instance are really corrections of the influences now found to be due to eye-movements. Further, reversals are three to four times as frequent when the bead moves against the tendency to error as when it moves in the direction of this tendency. This shows that these corrections are much more likely in direction opposite to that in which we now find the real contrast error to occur. When moving in the direction of the contrast error the eye-movement influence gets support from that error, and so fails of detection, and even secures supplementing in this direction more fre- quently than the movement in the opposite direction does. This is an indirect determination of the true direction of the contrast error in agreement with the direct experimental result. The rectifications in the fixation method, on the other hand, are equally divided between the " reversals " and the " supplemental, " showing that the influence of eye- movement is largely eliminated by this method. And further, the distribution of both supplemental and re- versals between the two cases of movement, in one direction or the other, is now directly reversed, i. e.\ the reversals are more frequent when the bead moves in the direction of error, and the supplementals when it moves contrary to this direction, a result which seems to show that in this case the tendency to error from contrast is in conflict with the normal influence of eye -movements, and the correction is made to increase the latter in one direction, and to diminish the former (or their sum) in the other direction. 18 273 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE The entire number of rectifications of all kinds (about \ of the whole number of experiments) may be taken as a sort of quantitative indication of the function of second-judgment, or deliberation, upon sensory deter- minations of such a complex character as those involved in these experiments. It is interesting to note that this second judgment, however, does not tend in the general result to correct the error of first judgment ; for there are about |- more cases of rectifications by displacement toward S 1 (the direction of the error) than toward S. The only case in which the correction does work to give greater accuracy to the result is that of the use of the fixation method, where both the original and second judgments are comparatively free from eye-movements and their after effects. Finally, the great uniformity of the error of judgment is seen in the small number of cases (69 in the entire series of 1,928 experiments) in which the mid-point was located in the direction opposite to the prevailing error (that is, located too far toward the large square). And even this number represents too high a figure, since the sum of the variations of this kind in all but two series gave only 28 cases (i. e., in 1,679 experiments) ; the two giving the very abnormally large figures 20 in 100 experiments (app. method, horiz. arrangement) and 21 in 149 experiments (fix. method, vert, arrangement) being evidently affected by some temporary influences. A series of experiments has already been begun with a stationary stimulus (thus ruling out the influence of eye-movements) 1 ; and I hope also to complicate the case with variations planned to introduce aesthetic elements into the problem. 1 See the next paper. 274 XV AN OPTICAL ILLUSION 1 I reproduce, in one of the accompanying diagrams (A), the arrangement used in a research published in The Psychological Review (II., May, 1895, p. 244), 2 the result of which was to show that the judgment, i. e., of the midpoint between two such squares as those of Figure A, is subject to illusion. The actual midpoint, marked by the short bar on the line of connection be- tween the squares, is regularly judged to be too far toward the smaller. I should like to gather further results by the use of the Figures A and B, and your readers may be willing to assist as follows : Ask people of both sexes, but recording the differ- ence of sex, the following questions strictly in the order named, first of Figure A. They should be entirely ignorant of the experiment and its results. Question 1. Holding the figure before the eyes with the bottom of the page down, is the line connecting the squares bisected by the short line or not, and if not, is the real midpoint further to the right (R) or to the left (L)? Question 2. Holding the page with the bottom of it turned to the right hand, ask whether the midpoint is 1 From Science, November 27, 1896. 2 See the preceding paper. 275 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE marked by the line or whether it is farther up (U) or farther down (D). Question 3. Holding the figure with the bottom of the page upwards, ask as in question 1. Question 4. Holding the figure with the bottom of the page toward the left hand, ask as in question 2. Then taking Figure B, ask the same questions in Fig. A. the same order, being careful to have the person still altogether uninstructed as to the results of the first series and also to connect the two series, carefully dis- tinguished, with the same person by name or initials. When using one figure, the other should be covered. The results, whether from one person or from many, may be sent to the undersigned, who will receive them with thanks. Results from those who know what the illusion is and what to expect need not be sent, except 276 AN OPTICAL ILLUSION in cases of persons who do not get the illusion at all, or who only get it for one of the figures. Any known defects of eye-sight should be reported ; also indications of tastes or pursuits, as of architects, artists, etc., likely to modify the results. I should also be glad to be referred to any literature which seems to touch upon this illusion. Fig. B. The interest of this method of investigating the illu- sion is that it exactly reverses the conditions of the research reported in the preceding paper. There the midpoint was determined by the reagent, and was placed too far toward the smaller square. If this be a true illusion, it was argued, the actual middle should be judged too far toward the smaller square. This was fully proved to be the case by the replies which came 277 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE in by hundreds. The following summary report of these and other results not yet published in detail is from the Proceedings of the American Psychological Association, December, 1897 1 1 An Optical Illusion. — This report gave the result of further experiments of the " Illusion " reported above, i. e., that the point fixed upon as the midpoint between two square areas is located too far toward the smaller area, the amount of the displacement increasing with the ratio of the larger to the smaller square side. The following new results are reported : 1. The earlier results are confirmed on additional observers. 2. The illusion holds, though much lessened in amount and with some exceptions, for the determination of the midpoint between two parallel lines of different lengths. 3. The. illusion requires a figure of certain — not exactly determined — maximum size, *, e., the illusion does not appear when the eyes of the observer are too near, but appears when he retires backward from the figure. The author also reports having established the reverse illusion, i. e., the misjudgment of the midpoint when act- ually marked, in the figure just described. It is held to lie too far toward the larger square. This result is completely established by returns in a great many answers to a request printed in Science (November 27, 1896) with an accom- panying figure, — principally returns from students col- lected by teachers of psychology and science. The author intends to investigate the effect upon the illusion of variation in the distance between the areas, and also to test various explanations of it. He has already found that the element of "perspective" has probably little influence on it; 2 also that the principle of "equilib- 1 See The Psychological Review, March, 1898, p. 166. A more popular exposition with discussion of the possible applications of the illusion in architecture, etc., is given in my Story of the Mind, chap, vi., Hi. 2 This is reversed by later experiment ; it is probable that " perspec- tive " enters largely into the case. See further below (and Figure DJ. . 278 AN OPTICAL ILLUSION rium " does not account for it, seeing that (a) the illusion is contrary in its direction to that which this principle would produce, and that (b) it holds under conditions which ex- clude the operation of this principle. The fact of this reverse illusion establishes the point made in the original paper, that the experimental conditions — involving the following of a light-bead along the line — were, under the control methods employed, entirely adequate, and so meets the criticisms of Binet and Witasek. Certain aesthetic applications of the illusion will be indicated in the detailed paper. Variations of this illusion are shown in Plate C, Figures 1-5 2 in each of which the short upright bar is the central point, and is seen somewhat displaced toward the larger masses or longer lines on one side. Of special interest is Figure 5' (Plate C) which shows the same deviation when one figure is inside the other. Of the general explanations, that of contrast (which means only that sizes, distances, and positions in the field of vision are judged relatively to one another, whatever we may discover to be the more special reason for it in particular cases) has been invoked ; indeed it was to study visual contrast that the experiments given in the preceding paper were first devised. 2 It has been made probable, however, especially by Thiery, that an element of perspective enters into many geometrical illusions — L e., the viewing of a figure as if part of it extended back from the plane of the paper, an arrange- 1 After Jud.d: see his important paper, Psychological Review, May, 1899, pp. 241 ff. From here on the text, and also Figs. D and E, are now first published. 2 It is also so classed by Sanford, Course in Experimental Psychology, experiment 197. See Sanford's article " Optical Illusions," in the writer's Dictionary of Philosophy and Psychology, for a general treatment of the subjects, with many figures and citations of literature. 279 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE FlG.l. N. Fig.2. i — < Fig.3. 1 Fig, 5. C. 1-5 280 AN OPTICAL ILLUSION Fig.D. FiG.E. 281 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE ment in which the distant object is normally smaller and the line of distance or perspective is foreshortened. This influence probably enters in this case : as may be seen by viewing Fig. D in the two possible perspec- tives. First bring up the large square by focussing it as nearer and view the smaller one as more distant — the whole making a tunnel opening having its large end towards the observer. In this case the illusion is exag- gerated ; the bar seems still nearer the large end of the tunnel. This would mean that the normal illusion is due to our tendency to view the figure — and similar figures, such as the two concentric circles or squares — as representing a solid object extending backward. If, however, we reverse our visual accommodation so as to make the figure a truncated pyramid lying on its side with the small end toward the observer (the large square above thus being beyond the plane of the paper), the illusion tends to disappear. This comes out better, if after practising on Fig. D, in which the corners are connected by lines to favor the projection, the same be tried with Figure 5, Plate C, in which the bar falls on the plane of one side of the pyramid. 1 Similarly the other figures of Plate C may be viewed as solid objects standing on one end or the other with corresponding effect upon the illusion. 2 See also Fig. E. 1 The writer lias been interested, since knowing of this illusion, in reproducing the conditions of judging such a midpoint in actual perspec- tive. The conditions were admirably fulfilled in looking down from the hill-top upon the funicular railway at Marseilles. The two cars in their passage in contrary directions balance each other and meet precisely at the half-way distance. The point at which they meet seems, however, to the observer at the top to be much too far toward the lower end of the road. 2 The matter is a difficult one to experiment on, seeing that individuals vary so much, both in their natural tendencies to see in perspective, and also in their ability to shift from one accommodation to another. 282 XVI NEW QUESTIONS IN MENTAL CHRONOMETRY 1 In view of an article in the Medical Record for March 4, 1893, it may be of interest to its readers to have a further note on the subject of the "Psychology of Reaction- time." The distinction between "sensory" and "mus- cular " reaction was first made public by Lange, 2 work- ing under Wundt ; and it seemed from his results, and others immediately following him, 3 that the distinction was sound. Indeed it appears reasonable from the point of view of general psychological theory. All we know of the attention, as well as what we know of the relation of attention to voluntary movement, makes it seem likely that a reaction would be shorter if the attention be con- centrated beforehand on the proposed movement (mus- cular or motor reaction), than if it be concentrated on the signal to which the subject is instructed to react (sensory reaction). 4 Recent researches, however, have given results which have tended to make a reconsidera- tion of the question necessary ; indeed some experiments have been so negative that certain investigators are disposed to throw over the distinction altogether. 5 I am sure that this would be to go too far. I have en- 1 From the Medical Record (N. Y.), April 15, 1893. 2 Philosophische Studien, iv., p. 479. 8 Martius, ibid., vi., p. 167 ; Titchener, ibid., viii., p. 138. 4 This is the distinction in question. 5 Cattell, Philosophische Studien, viii., p. 403. 283 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE deavored incidentally, in an article now in print for the July issue of the Philosophical Review, 1 to account for the conflicting results of experiment in this field by borrow- ing from the medical psychologists the results of their brilliant analysis of the speech function, on the basis of its pathology. The recognition of the great forms of aphasia — i.e., sensory and motor — and the correspond- ing recognition of the existence of visual, auditory, and •motor speech types, gives a strong presumption that the distinction between sensory and motor in the voluntary movements of speech and writing applies as well to vol- untary movements of all kinds ; that is, to all movements which have been learned by attention and effort. This means that a man is an " auditive," or a " visual," or a "motor" in his voluntary movements generally. His attention is trained by habit, education, etc., more upon one class of images than upon others, his mind fills up more easily with images of this class, and his mental pro- cesses and voluntary reactions proceed by preference along these channels of easiest function. If this be true it is evident that a man's reaction-time will show the influence of his memory type. The motor- reaction we should expect to be most abbreviated in the man of the motor- type ; and less abbreviated, or not so at all, in the "visual" or "auditory" man. And ex- perimental results must perforce show extraordinary variations as long as these typical varieties are not taken account of. We are accordingly, I think, a long way off from any such exact statement of absolute difference be- tween sensory and motor reaction-time as Wundt makes in his last edition. 2 i Article entitled "Internal Speech and Song," Phil. Rev., July, 1892 (chap. xiv. of Mental Development). 2 Phjsiologische Psychologie, 3d ed., ii., pp. 261 ff. 284 MENTAL CHRONOMETRY The position is in direct accord with Pick's * interest- ing argument for the central seat of the motor disturb- ances which result, in certain cases of anaesthesia, from the closure of the eyes. It is really the attention which is disturbed in these cases, through the loss of its usual support from the sense of sight ; it is not a loss of " mus- cle sense " only. In addition — and this I wish to bring to the attention of the medical men who busy themselves with aphasia — the indications of memory " type " afforded by reaction- times ought to support the analysis of speech from aphasic cases (that is, when we psychologists have gone as far on our side as the physicians have on theirs ! ). A man with a relatively short " sensory reaction " would be of the sensory type, and would be peculiarly liable to sen- sory forms of aphasia — loss of speech through word- blindness, word-deafness, etc., and to paraphasia and paragraphia. On the other hand, one whose " motor " re- action-time is very short, would be liable to loss of speech from interference with his muscular memories. For ex- ample, I think it is likely that patients like those of Grashey, Bastian, Charcot, and others, who could read or speak only by tracing the letters with the hand-, were probably of the motor type and would have given rela- tively short motor reactions. I am not sure that such a correspondence could be made out in actual cases of aphasia, but it is an interesting deduction, and possibly medical men may find opportunity of testing it with the aid of a portable instrument such as the chronometre d'Arsonval. In my laboratory a research is now nearing completion which has given experimental ground for this main posi- tion. I have three practised reaction-time subjects who 1 Zeitschrift fur Psychologies etc., iv., pp. 261 ff. 285 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE illustrate three distinct types. In one, the motor (hand) reaction is shorter than the sensory (hearing) ; in the sec- ond, the two kinds are about equal ; while in the third (a musician), the sensory is about one-quarter shorter than the motor. 1 I hope, before publishing the results in de- tail, to bring other tests to bear for the determination of the relative influence of sight, sound, and muscle-sense respectively in the reactions of the different types. One of these tests has gone far enough, however, to enable me to make a further distinction in the character of motor reactions, i. e., between what may be called vis- ual motor reaction (motor attention with sight of the organ employed to react — involving the optische Be- wegungsbilde of the Germans) and kinesthetic motor reaction (motor attention without sight of the reacting organ). In my experiments, so far, the " visual motor " reaction is shorter than the " kinesthetic motor," except in subjects of the extreme motor type ; in these latter the " kinesthetic motor " is shorter, the visual motor-time approximating the sensory reaction-time. This research was suggested by the cases already referred to of loss of voluntary movement through closure of the eyes, taken with the further observation that even though the eyes are open in these cases, voluntary movement is still im- possible until the gaze of the patient be directed to the particular limb in question. The distinction between " visual motor " and " kinesthetic motor " reaction-time has interest, I think, from other points of view as well. 2 1 Cattell reports a similar case, loc. cit., p. 406. 2 See the next paper for the full report of this research. 286 XVII TYPES OF REACTION i The experiments reported in this paper were carried out in the University of Toronto in 1892-93. Three questions were set for research, all of them bearing on the question of the degree of relativity of reaction-times : as to the difference of a single individual's times, ac- cording as there were subjective (attention) or objective (qualitative stimulus) changes in the conditions of his reaction ; or as to differences of reaction-times for differ- ent individuals under identical conditions. To secure results comparable in the respects in which comparisons were desired, certain precautions were made, as follows : (1) each reagent reacted at the same hour from day to day, and at the same hour with each other reagent whose reaction was to be compared with his ; (2) the order of change in the conditions of reaction (as sensory-motor, light-dark, visual-kinsesthetic, etc.) was kept in the main the same for the different reagents. The Hipp and D'Arsonval chronoscopes were used, both controlled by the records of a Konig tuning-fork recording on the drum of the Marey motor. The "light" reactions were taken in a room of good south morning exposure, and those in the dark, in a dark closet of the same room. The stimulus was in all cases an auditory one — a sharp metallic click — and the re- 1 With the assistance of W. J. Shaw. From The Psychological Review, May, 1895. 287 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE acting movement was a pressure downward of the right forefinger (in the case of the D'Arsonval instrument, a pinch of that finger and the thumb). The reagents were, besides the writers (B. and S.), Mr. Faircloth (F.), a student who had had only the experience gained from the practical work in this subject of the course in ex- perimental psychology. His reactions were ready and unconfused, and from all appearances he was a normal and more than usually suitable man for such work. The fourth, Mr. Crawford (C), is an honor student in this subject in Princeton. His reactions were taken in the course of another investigation, and being so few in number, they are included only because they indicate a case of a capable reagent whose sensory is shorter than his motor reaction. We hope to test him further. I. Variations in the Results. — : Table I shows the relative reliability of the two instruments in these experiments. Table I. — Clock-corrections. Instrument. Const. Error. sec. Yar. Error, sec. D'Ars., Hipp, .19 .019 .0622 .0156 All the results secured by each instrument are cor- rected by the constant error of that instrument, before being used either for comparison among themselves or for compounding with the results of the other instru- ment, in the tables which follow. The smaller variable error of the Hipp chronoscope makes the results of that instrument much more reliable in the matter of absolute 288 TYPES OF REACTION time-measurement. But in the conclusions drawn below, only those results are used in which the quantity sought is a relative one, and in which the two clocks confirmed each other in giving ratios of difference of the two quan- tities compared, both of which are in the same sense, and each of which is larger than the largest possible ratio of difference arising from the variable error of the clock to which it belongs. The mean variations are not given in the tables which follow, because they are too complex to be of any value. These variations were, different for the two clocks, as we should expect from the variable errors of the instru- ments themselves ; they also varied with the disposition of the subject in the various groups of results which are treated together. 1 The different mean variations for the different lots of experiments varied from 10 ) The school of Schleiermacher — called above emo- tionalists — went further than Kant in denying to reli- gion any sphere having separate intellectual content. The healing of the breach between Verstand and Ver- nwnft, together with the reconciliation of pure and prac- tical reason in the post-Kantian Identity Philosophy, left no dualism anywhere — no chasm on the right bank of which religion might perch and find its view directed backwards upon the secular or experiential fields of knowledge and faith. This made it necessary to find in 323 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE religion some form of psychological reaction upon the one universal object, the Absolute, implicit in knowl- edge. This reaction is emotional, taking form in two phases of sentiment which give character to religious experience and furnish its criteria. These are "feel- ing of dependence" upon God, the object of worship, and " feeling of mystery," awe, reverence towards Him. The work of this school has the advantage, from the psychological point of view, of pointing out definite psychological experiences as necessary to religion — a thing which the intellectualists found it impossible to do, seeing that the idea of God, whether content or intuition, is universal and, in so far, undefinable ; it is essentially a universal of all experience. This led the way to — or at least was quite consistent with it — the positive or scientific investigation which is now of the first importance, and which in its two-fold form may be called " genetic." (4) Genetic or Scientific Research by the historical and evolution methods. This has taken on two great forms, respectively named anthropological and psy- chological. It deals with the origin and development of religion, and may therefore be distinguished as " genetic." (a) The Anthropogenetic view. The treatment of religion as illustrating historical evolution is now yield- ing most important results. 1 As to the anthropological problem, we may note (1) that this study, by recognizing the essentially religious nature of primitive rites and cults, confirms the view that no one form of intellectual con- tent — no one " idea " as such — is necessary to religion. Rather what is common to " low " and " high " religions 1 The reader may consult the articles on the Evolution and Philosophy of " Religion," written by other hands, in the Dictionary of Philosophy. 324 THE PSYCHOLOGY OF RELIGION alike is certain active and emotional attitudes which ideas of various objects may call forth. Yet only such objects as do call these attitudes forth are religious, and this throws the actual criterion on the side of emotion and action. Here anthropology confirms the " emotional " view (ef. b below). (2) The objects of religious veneration, therefore, have an emotionally symbolic value. The gods are not experienced objects; they are termini for dependence, faith, reverence, awe, etc. Their value is necessarily pitched higher as man develops and reduces much of his experience to objective changes obeying law. The God is ever the something behind the cloud, the some- one behind nature — the someone who breaks law and works his will for his own, for ours, for a priest's, for a redeemer's sake. And cults, religious institutions, cere- monials, sacrifices, etc., are attempts to cope with this unexperienced higher something ; to bring into experi- ence for satisfaction, help, salvation, that which cannot be known to sense or opened to knowledge. (3) This, then, it becomes evident, raises a question which psycholog}^ alone can answer : why this constant drift, this groping beyond sense and thought, this demand — recurring in this form and that at every stage of more culture and of less culture — for a more- than-I, a being beyond, a God? This is the question of the impulse, propensity, spring of action which religion involves ; and we come back to psychology, and indeed to the instinct view, in case we find no further analysis possible. (4) In later investigations, moreover, the fact is con- stantly recognized that religion is a social phenomenon. No man is religious by himself, nor does he choose his God, nor devise his offering, nor enjoy his blessing alone. 325 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE The whole is most intimately associated with social con- vention, custom, law — nay, often it is these, and about the whole of these. The priest is ruler, lawgiver, medi- cine man, no less than agent and embodiment of the divine afflatus. Religious sanctions often dictate social and ethical sanctions, though this dependence at later stages of culture may be reversed. 1 (5) The object of religion has personal form, what- ever that may mean at the stage of evolution reached by a people. This is one of the facts earliest observed, and perhaps the one most universally admitted by anthropol- ogists. The theories of Animism, Ghost and Ancestor Worship, religious Personification and Ejection, all recog- nize and aim to formulate this class of phenomena. (b) The Psychogenetic view. Here finally the ap- peal is made directly to psychological investigation ; and having taken account of anthropological researches as showing actual religious products embodied in insti- tutions, the psychologist comes to his investigation with the checks and controls afforded by so much historical knowledge. This narrows his quest ; for if religion is an active and emotional experience, a social experience, and also an evolutional or racial product, in these we have guiding threads of importance. Then, as to the ob- ject, it follows from the historical facts that the object of religion is a symbol, a meaning or intent, not a content ; it may preserve its meaning while changing its content. What genetic notion fulfils this condition? Again, how can this object take on a series of quasi-perso?ial 1 This is recognized as a safe result by the writers of the articles on philosophy and evolution of religion already referred to. The readers may consult the writer's treatment of the religious sanction, as related to other forms of sanction, in the volume Social and Ethical Interpretations, chaps, viii., x. See also the further remarks below, iii. 326 THE PSYCHOLOGY OF RELIGION forms, which involve social relationships ? This also restricts and aids the psychological determination. II. Psychological The strictly psychological problem considered as meet- ing these requirements falls apart into two : we ask for an account (1) of the unity of religious experience, and (2) of the variety of religious experience. The ques- tion of unity is that of the one religious spring of action common to all religions and normal to all individuals. The second question is as to how this common impulse or motive takes the forms shown in different religions (comparative religion), in the genetic stages in the his- tory of culture (evolution of religion), and in religious individuals (the psychology of prophets, religious seers, founders of: sects, the inspired, the genius, etc.) The latter constitutes a variational psychology of religion, and can proceed only on the basis of the determination of the normal religious impulse, although by collecting data it may aid the former, as do variational statistics in other branches of inquiry. Very little has been done under this latter head ( I 354 MR. SPENCERS PHILOSOPHY belongs to Spencer. What is the use trying to complete a psychology simply as such ? What is the good trying with Wundt to abstract " pure feeling " from " pure sensation " when really each is pure mythology ? Is it not the defect of biology also that it tries too much to complete a biology merely as such, without the help of psychology? When two sciences are ripe enough to fall together and be one, that is good ; and there is no earthly use in trying to keep them as far as possible apart in the meantime. In this, I think, Spencer was right. There is only one evolution, let us keep an eye on both sides of it. 3. As to Mr. Spencer's positive contributions to psy- chology, these I may not discuss in detail. They are mainly incidental to the ideas in the service of which his speculations were made. His theories have nearly all been disproved ; I mean his particular theories. But his contributions by the way are of very great importance. And many of the disproved theories have been guiding- threads for thought and motives for research to countless workers. One cannot open a competent book in any of three or four great departments of thought, without finding the most fruitful discussions turning about the hypotheses of Spencer. I take it that this is one of the greatest scientific services of a great man — to lead others in definitely directed effort — even when his private views go down in the result. And now for the cons. Here what there is to say seems to me to be mainly a statement of the limitations incident to the very qualities which we have found to be Mr. Spencer's principal claim to our admiration. Every great idea seems in its first blush simpler than it is. Natural selection, for example, is proving itself by giving ground. But the fame of its 355 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE author, Darwin, does not suffer from that — even apart from the fact that Darwin was wiser than are his disciples ! We are now saying " back to Darwin," and although we can never say " back to Spencer," yet Spencer has his place fixed for all that. The real hmitations of Spencer are evident just in this contrast with Darwin. 1. Spencer's genetic Psychology was an idea, just as his genetic Biology and Sociology were ideas, and the same idea. But he could not prove this idea in all these departments. He could only see the evident and surface facts which his idea was likely to explain. This he did in a very remarkable way in the System of Synthetic Philosophy, the completion of which you are celebrating to-day. It is marvellous that a single mind should have been able' to make so many happy hits in so rapid and, in a good sense, superficial survey of all these fields. But it was, I think, rather that he had a wonderfully fruitful idea than that he had a wonderfully great mind. He was armed with the thought which all the natural sciences are tending to prove true; but the same sciences are showing that almost all the ways in which he took this idea to work were not true. This means that Mr. Spencer's personal theories were in the direction of his gifts — toward a deductive, hypothetical, inexact way of treating scientific details. 2. Then as to his method, that too is a great limita- tion. It has always seemed to me that Mr. Spencer was a great example of the costliness of analogy. Analogy, analogy everywhere ! It is not a part of the intercon- nection of the sciences that the facts of one should be explained by analogies from another; yet such a pro- cedure Spencer constantly falls into. Chemical analogies in biology, biological analogies in psychology and soci- ology, mechanical analogies — integrations, dissolutions, 356 MR. SPENCER'S PHILOSOPHY reintegrations — all the way through. In psychology this is especially deplorable, since it leads to a general ten- dency — also apparent in the sociology — to be satisfied with inadequate analysis ; and inasmuch as the analogies are drawn from spheres of simpler activities, it is just the refinements which characterize the higher as higher that escape it. Everybody knows the flat sterility which results when the association theory is applied to the higher reaches of thought and conduct. It is like prov- ing a bed of tulips to be mere onions by going through them and nipping off the tell-tale blooms. So to solve the problems of psychology by biological or chemical analo- gies, is to make use of a weapon which, figuratively speaking, nips off all the blooms ! But this is only part of a greater limitation, to wit : 3. Mr. Spencer's view of evolution is not what we are coming to-day to consider the true thought of natural genesis. Herein is the real and essential limitation of Spencer's work considered from a philosophical point of view — and possibly I am departing from the topic of psychology in mentioning it. He believes, I think, that the new not only comes out of the old, but that it is explained by the full statement of the old. . Now this is a philosophy ; and it is a levelling-down philosophy — whatever we say to the question as to where it finally lands us. It tends to state the tulip in terms of its roots. Now this is the motive of science, but when it is made a philosophy and a presupposition to science, then it is baleful. For besides rendering it excessively difficult to be a good scientist — not to judge it as a philosophy — it makes the thinker liable to continual " illusions of simplicity " — thus to designate the fallacy of taking things to be too simple. So with Mr. Spencer's psy- chology : it impresses one as a series of great illusions of 357 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE simplicity. Many of his generalizations depend each upon just one striking fact of easy interpretation from his point of view. The "surplus energy theory" of play, the " dream theory " of spirit, the " dance theory," the " vocal theory." And many of the more important principles which are not of so easy an interpretation seem nevertheless to owe their place as corner stones in the system to this same tendency to simplification. Such are "utility "in ethics, "use inheritance" in biology, etc. 4. The same thing is seen in the ease with which diffi- cult places are glossed over. A bridge of analogy or often of mere vagueness of expression covers a yawning gap, often at a most critical place. This, however, is. so common a criticism of Mr. Spencer, that I need not take it further. In conclusion I may say that the balance to the good in any fair estimate of Mr. Spencer's work is so enor- mous, that we should not hesitate to recognize as correct the verdict of all the world to the effect that he is one of the main factors in the main movement in the history of modern thought. 358 XXI SHORTER LITERARY PAPERS I. Contemporary Philosophy in France 1 M. Taine introduces his readers to the founder of modern French Spiritualism in his usual racy way. " One morning, in 1811, M. Royer-Collard, who had just been named Professor of Philosophy at the Sor- bonne, was walking among the quais, with a very em- barrassed air. He had been reading Condillac — but embrace Condillac ! — believe and teach that all our ideas are transformed sensations, that space is perhaps an illusion! — these formulas exhaled a vapor of scepticism which was stifling to the fervent Christian, the austere moralist, the man of order and authority. But he was new in philosophy, he had no doctrine of his own, and, bon gre mal gre, he must possess himself of one. Sud- denly he perceived, in the window of a second-hand book store, between a worn-out Crevier and an Alma- nach des Cuisinieres, a strange little book, a modest, ancient denizen of the quais, whose leaves had never before been turned: Inquiry into the Human Mind on the Principles of Common Sense, by Thomas Reid. He opened the book, and lo, a refutation of Condillac! 1 Combien ee UvreV ' Trente sous.'' He bought it, and founded the new philosophy in France." New philosophy then, it is the old philosophy now. New as a nom de guerre in the warfare with the sensa- 1 From the New Princeton Review, III., 1887, pp. 337 f. 359 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE tionalism of the eighteenth century, old as the con- servator of politics, literature, and morals in the middle of the nineteenth. For we now have a new " spiritual- ism," preserving, indeed, the traditions of the old, and claiming the same influence on the side of liberty and good order, but positing theses which would startle the good soul of Royer-Collard, and boasting no longer of its descent from Reid and Dugald Stewart. This descent, however, is very clear. If we may remodel the figure by which De Tocqueville indicates the evo- lution of later French literature, we may say that Reid begat a son in his old age and called his name Maine de Biran, that Maine de Biran lived twenty years and begat Victor Cousin, and that Victor Cousin, being a mighty man and strong, is begetting every day. The characteristics of the old spiritualism are very marked. It was born of the exigencies of the post- revolution period, when thinking men sought first of all an antidote to Rousseau. Be it what and come whence it may, give us truth, liberty, God ! " Was it then to play with him, O Nature, that thou didst form man ? If this philosophy be that of human nature, do not enter, O my soul, into its secrets! " So cried Reid. Frenchmen had entered, by force ; they added to the Scot's intuitive dread, a living experience of its horrors, and hailed " common sense " as the potent remedy. This is the first characteristic. But the ontological spirit was abroad in Germany, and soon found its way across the Rhine. Maine de Biran discarded a descriptive psychology, but, preserv- ing still the introspective method, saw absolute being in the soul, the essence of which is will. " The will is not different from the Ego." l The soul is efficient, and 1 Oeuvres, iv., p. 180. 360 PHILOSOPHY IN FRANCE the will is its phenomenal manifestation. And the soul is one throughout and indivisible. Here is the restora- tion both of efficient and of final cause which were banished by the destructive criticism of the preceding age — a restoration which persists in the new Spirit- ualism and gives color even to the thought of the Positivists. When Victor Cousin went to Munich, in 1818, and surrendered his liberty to Hegel, he only made at a single step the advance from Biran, the Fichte of France, which his new master had made from the real Fichte, through the mediation of Schelling. The "new spiritualism " is the product of what has been called the nineteenth-century tendency — the ten- dency toward the reconciliation of philosophy and sci- ence. The concessions have been greater on the side of philosophy, since more philosophers have become scientific than scientists philosophic. M. Paul Janet defines the university philosophy as it became official about 1830 as follows: 1 " Do you admit God, the soul, liberty, the future life ? Then you are a Spiritualist. If not, then not — il ri'y a pas de milieu. The Positivist is in no sense a Spiritualist, neither indeed can be." M. Yacherot, the historian of the " new spiritualism," speaks quite recently in a different key : 2 "I do not believe that in the presence of these revelations (of science) it is possible to maintain the spiritualistic tradi- tion entire. I am more and more convinced that the time is come to put science at the side of spiritualism, by the employment of its methods, its principles, and its incon- 1 Philosopkie frangaise contemporaine, p. 40. 2 Le nouveau Spiritualisme (1884). 361 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE testable conclusions. The old theology, which separates God from the world, has had its day, as the old physiology, which separates the soul from the body, and the old ontol- ogy, which separates spirit from matter." " Philosophy must bend to experience." " Spiritualism must bend to sci- entific methods." What could the Positivists wish more ? Where is metaphysic ? If you mean the metaphysic of the noume- non, the metaphysic of the Unknowable, the Absolute, it is excluded, replies M. Vacherot. By what law? By the law of experience. But if you mean the meta- physic of intuition, the ontology of introspection, I em- brace it. " The true ontology is only a psychological revelation." This is the method, principle, and conclu- sion of metaphysic, and positive science confirms it. This brings us back to the Scottish psychology, with the modifications of the later German realists ; that is, we see in M. Vacherot on the speculative side, a true disciple, as he claims, of Cousin and Jouffro}^, and on the positive side we find a wide concession to the claims of natural science. As might be expected, this advance toward Comte is repudiated by thinkers of the old school, and many brilliant works have been called out in the discussion. M. Ravaisson, in the second edition of his Philosophy in France in the Nineteenth Century, 1 continues to maintain his " spiritualistic positivism " — namely, that " the true substance of things is the activity of thought." He finds his doctrine in Aristotle, and traces it through Descartes, Leibnitz, Kant, and Biran, especially emphasizing the position of the last. " Being," said Biran, " is imme- diately known in the activity of the ego," and, adds 1 La Philosophic en France au XIX Steele (1884). 362 PHILOSOPHY IN FRANCE Ravaisson, " this being, through the mediation of will, is universal, absolute, and all-embracing." He inverts the formula of the materialists, and thinks he has escaped its implications. But matter is spirit and spirit is divine, hence matter is divine, and we are as nearly materialists as spiritualists, because we are at once neither and both. M. Lachelier, in doctrine the disciple, but in power the master of Ravaisson, constructs a doctrine of the develop- ment of thought in the categories of efficient and final cause, which is at once profound and obscure. Efficient and final cause are one in the unity of thought, which unity is embodied in the law of sufficient reason, but two in the unity of nature. Final cause gives a raison d'etre to exter- nal things, as efficient cause to internal, and by it we reach objectivity, activity, liberty. But we are constrained to ask wherein the difference consists between the two kinds of cause in respect to objectivity, if both are for- mal. How is final cause a road to things, even on the doubtful supposition that it is necessary to the unity of thought ? On this side of the general philosophic controversy we must also name Renouvier, whose critical system is better known to English students, 1 Francesque Bouil- lier, 2 one of the ablest defenders of the soul from the standpoint of general psychology, and the acute theolo- gian Pressense\ 3 Nearer to the position of the " new spiritualists " and yet maintaining full independence, we find a line of well- known scientific men whose detailed and comprehensive work has won glory for France. M. Cournot i main- 1 See Essais de Critiques g&ne'rales. 2 Sur la vrai Conscience (1882). 8 A Study of Origins. Eng. trans. 2d edition. * Materialisme, Vitalisme, Rationalisme (1875). 363 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE tains a dynamic theory of matter, and a nisus formativus or architectonic principle of life, which is teleologic. M. Naudin, the distinguished botanist, takes arms against Darwin, disputes insensible modifications, natural selec- tion, and variation of species, substituting an internal primordial plastic force for the external and mechan- ical causes of the naturalistic evolutionists, and rising through the theory of second causes to orthodox theism. Claude Bernard, in a series of articles published in one volume after his death, 1 combats all forms of physical vitalism, and works out a spiritualistic theory of life. His celebrated definition of life is often quoted : La vie, c'est la mort — a sentence which, according to Janet, caused Hegel to " shake with joy." Every phenomenon of life is accompanied with organic destruction; but life continues. This is creation. Death is chemical, life is morphological and directive. On the extreme left we find the Positivists holding a strong position. They remember well the supremacy gained in 1852, when one of the chairs of philosophy in the Normal School was abolished because speculation was unpopular, and their rule of ten years, during which the spiritualistic tradition was barely preserved in Caro and Lemoine. They had also a season of rejoicing just after the Franco-Prussian war, when the Association movement was extended to France in translations of Spencer, Mill, and Bain, and gained influence in Taine's Intelligence and Ribot's English Psychology. A series of articles in the Revue Scientifique for 1874 expounded the work of Wundt and the German physiologists, and on January 1 — curiously enough the very day on which the British quarterly Mind appeared — the Revue Phil- osophique mailed its first issue. It would not be just to 1 La science expe'rimentale. See, also, La Vie (1878). 364 PHILOSOPHY IN FRANCE call the philosophical position of either of these magazines w positive," but the position of Professor Ribot and many of his co-laborers justifies us in mentioning the Revue Philosophique at least among the influences which make for Positivism. Its most important contributions have been from Espinas, Charles Richet, Delbceuf, and the members of the medical school of the Saltpetriere (Asy- lum for women), especially Charcot, the director. There can be no doubt that the " positive" view of things is, as Lange maintains, stimulating to scientific endeavor and discovery, simply on the general principle that men work hardest along the lines of their belief. And as far as philosophy is made scientific, that is, empirical, this benefit accrues to philosophy also, while the domain of speculative reservation remains untouched. Psychology is the disputed province, and hence the rise of experimental psychology. It is an exotic, it is true, but it has taken firm root, and is now the most promis- ing tree in the philosophic orchard of France. Two events of importance have recently tended to dignify this departure and to make it official : one is the appointment of M. Ribot to a chair in Experimental Psychology at the Sorbonne, the first of the kind ever founded in France ; 1 the other is the founding of the 44 Society for Physiological Psychology." It is difficult to summarize results when activity is so great and discussion so warm, but we may indicate important works. M. H. Beaunis has the honor of making the first reliable experiments with view to establishing the reaction time for olfactory and gustatory sensations. He published his results in 1883, in the Revue Medical de VEst and the Revue Philosophique. 1 As it happens, M. Ribot has just now resigned (1902) and M. Pierre Janet has been named as his successor. 365 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE An account of his work will be found in his recent book, Conditions of Cerebral Activity, 1 etc. In the same work he treats of the forms of muscular contraction and arrest, and establishes, with the aid of the experiments of Wundt and Brown-Sequard, an important physio- logical principle, viz., that every manifestation of nervous activity undergoes an arresting influence which is due either to the original exciting cause or to the action of another nervous region. So that in every peripheral excitation two forces are set in play, positive or exciting, and negative or resting, and the resultant is the sensation energy of the excitation. If this is so, the excitability of the different regions of the nervous system depends upon the varying force of the arrest. M. Beaunis' psychological inferences are very interest- ing, and we transcribe them, only remarking that his physiological conception is founded upon established facts. He says : "This hypothesis puts in new light the mechanism of the psychic functions, and permits the interpretation of a number of facts which have been heretofore inexplic- able. . . . The central primal fact which rules the whole question is the duality seen at the basis of every psychic act, the double tendency, activity and its arrest — the fact that the psychic act is the result of two contrary move- ments. Transport the action of arrest into the domain of consciousness and you have the hesitation which accom- panies a voluntary movement or an intellectual determina- tion, into the sphere of emotion, you have the fluctuations of passion, into the sphere of pure speculation, the reserves of metaphysical doubt. All our intellectual life is a strife of tendencies, — impulsion and arrest." 1 Recherches exp&imentales sur les Conditions de V Activity celebrate, etc. (1884). 366 PHILOSOPHY IN FRANCE We note below the bearing of the doctrine upon ethical discussion. M. Beaunis has also prepared another work, Internal Sensations, for the " International Scientific Series." The best work in brain physiology has been done by Charcot 1 and Marique. 2 The latter investigates the functions of the psycho-motor centres of the brain, giving first a very exhaustive critical summary of the work of his predecessors, and attempts to show, by means of association fibres connecting the psycho-motor and sensory centres, that their combined function is identical with that of similar pairs in the reflex gang- lionic centres of the spinal cord. His fundamental assumptions are that " consciousness does not alter the conditions," and that the motor centres are co-ordinators, and not, through the will, originators of movement, as Ferrier and spiritualists in general hold. On the more varied problems of physiological psychol- ogy, we note M. Ribot's Diseases of Memory, of Will (1883), and of Personality. (1885), the detailed work on hypnotism by Binet and Fere, Pierre Janet, and Charcot, 3 and the investigation of Delboeuf in psycho-physics. 4 A more general work on psychology, especially fine in its comprehensiveness and vigour for classroom work, is that of Professor Rabier, 5 of the Lyc^e Charlemagne, member of the Superior Council of Public Instruction. He writes from the standpoint of advanced spiritualism subordinating ontology to psychology, but with a re- ceptive attitude toward the results of the empirical 1 Lemons sui- les Localisations cerebrales and numerous articles. 2 Recherches expe'r. sur le Mecanisme des Fonc. des Centres-psychomoteurs du Cerveau (Hopital St. Jean. Brussels, 1885). 3 Revue philosophique, 1884-6. 4 Psychophysique ( 1 883 ) . Also, Examen critique de la Loi psychophysique. 5 Lecons de Philosophic : I. Psychologie (1884). 367 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE school. He borrows largely, and generally improves what he borrows, as, for example, Biran's theory of cause and Taine's theory of sense-perception. He attempts to reconcile empiricism and intellectualism in a doctrine which he denominates intelligent empiricism : knowledge is empirical ; it begins with experience, but with internal experience, that is, with consciousness of the ego, which is intelligent. This is certainly, as Victor Brochard remarks, only a jeu de mots, and M. Rabier is an intuitionist after all. His book, as a whole, is perhaps the finest resume of the results of modern psychology to date (1884). Turning finally to the ethical discussion, we are at once struck with the brilliant play of the same forces. Ethical territory is the citadel of the spiritualistic philosophy, devoted once, it is true, to the completest destruction, but never again to be undermined by the sewer-canals of the burrowing sensualism of the Revolu- tion period. No intelligent Frenchman cares to question now the political function of philosophy, nor the ethical function of politics. Ask De Tocqueville, Laboulaye, Janet, and Guizot for their opinion on this subject. Taine may follow Voltaire, and the mantle of the Encyclopedists may fall upon weaker thinkers of to-day, but they will find that they have a more dangerous enemy to meet than had their illustrious predecessors. The corner-stone of the new ethics was laid in the lurid light of the politics of the Reign of Terror and the Commune, and this corner-stone is a principle which rests deeper in the foundation of human life than the theology of Malebranche or the ethics of Leibnitz. What is the principle ? Will, efficient, final, free, ultimate ; the dominating idea, as we have seen, in general specula- tion, and the pivot of ethical discussion in France. To 368 PHILOSOPHY IN FRANCE show that this is true, it is only necessary to name the four works which are to-day, from the standpoints of the different schools, exerting the widest influence: Theory of Morals, Janet; Sketch of an Ethic without Obligation nor Sanction, 1 Guyau ; Liberty and Determin- ism? Fouillee ; The Ethical Principle^ Secretan. The authors of three of these are disciples, to a greater or less degree, of Biran, and M. Guyau's doctrine is im- portant both as leading the opposition and as attempting the construction of a " positivist" ethics. M. Paul Janet's work is well known in the recent English translation. The essay of M. Fouille'e ap- peared first in 1872, giving rise to wide discussion, and is now entirely recast. It is a direct attempt to recon- cile scientific determinism with personal liberty by the intercalation of mean terms, drawn respectively from the external or mechanistic — the fortune physique — and the internal or voluntary — the fortune morale. The contribution of Biran, as I have said, was the introduc- tion of will-force into the primitive intellectual act. A sense of effort accompanies every intellectual move- ment, and the categories are more than forms — they are forms of a spontaneous activity, will. This bridges the Kantian chasm between the voluntary and the intel- lectual life. Upon this basis M. Fouillee constructs a doctrine of " idea-forces." Every idea has a volition-en- ergy, necessary to itself. The intelligence is the vehicle of volition, and the sum of the ideas is at once the act of the willing self, — this on the side of the morale. But every idea is accompanied by a physical modifica- tion, and a consequent discharge of physical force. The 1 Esquisse d'une Morale sans Obligation ni Sanction (1884). 2 La liberte'et le Determinisme (1884). 3 La Principe de la Morale (1884). 24 369 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE resultant of these forces is a sense manifestation, — this on the side of the physique. Hence a double play of forces, necessarily parallel, since functionally homolo- gous, in one of which volition resides and in the other mechanism. The theoretical reconciliation is derived from the conception itself of " idea-force," and it is well to observe that the idea of freedom becomes a domi- nating influence in the play of those forces. The stronger the conviction of freedom, the stronger is its " idea-force," and the more real the freedom which it indicates. " Idea-force " is a contribution to ethical terminology, but the conception is familiar to those who know Herbart's Mechanic of Mind, and Wundt's theory of apperception. Another recent and very important work by M. Fouille'e is his Critique of Contemporary Ethical Systems} M. Secretan, on the other hand, assumes freedom as a postulate of the moral life. He constructs a social ethics upon an original obligation to act as part of a whole. " I recognize myself as a free element of a whole." Reason is a mode of will — another modification of Biran — and will, the individual, exists in immediate communion with Will, the Universal. We rise to posi- tive religious life and communion. M. Guyau, on the other hand, represents the evolution ethics in France, substituting the expression " least pain " for Mr. Spen- cer's "least resistance," and banishing freedom, final cause, and obligation to law. Life is the moral end, and the struggle for existence the earnest of its attainment. We must also mention M. Caro, the historian of pessi- mism, who delightfully characterizes the complaint of those who are dissatisfied with the present order of 1 Critique des systemes de morale contemporaines (1883). 370 JAMES' PRINCIPLES OF PSYCHOLOGY things, as a magnification of the mat en moi into the mat en soi. II. James' Principles of Psychology 1 The fact that a recent issue of the Revue Pliilosophique mentioned this book as the " long-announced treatise of Professor James," indicates that interest in it is not con- fined to this continent. I think it is safe to say that no book on psychology, in any language, has been so eagerly waited for in this generation, and it is as safe to say that no other book on psychology has appeared in this generation in English that was as well worth waiting for. The book is about half made up of review articles, in many cases, but not all, revised and brought down to the latest publications. One of its most striking fea- tures is its breadth of reference to other writers in all languages. It is undoubtedly one of the most appreci- ative books of the work of thinkers everywhere that we have in English. Professor James has also given his book additional value by incorporating, in locis, full quotations from the most available and weighty authori- ties. The result is a book from which a reader, not versed in the history of thought, may get a pretty fair conception of the problems and schools of modern phil- osophy, so far as such problems rest upon psychological or physiological data. In point of style Professor James is an acknowledged 1 The Principles of Psychology, by William James, Professor of Psy- chology in Harvard University. 2 vols., pp. xii, 689, and vi, 704. American Science Series, Advanced Course. New York : Henry Holt & Co., 1890. From the Educational Review, April, 1891. 371 \ PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE master, particularly as regards clearness, simplicity, and picturesque illustration. In this last respect he is surpassed, I think, by few writers on philosophical sub- jects now living. In philosophizing, two distinct literary methods or general styles are available, "massive" and "perspec- tive " styles. The massive style proceeds by a statement of one's position, with its modifications, all, as it were, in a single mass. It is involved and cumbersome, but painstaking and not misleading. The perspective style, on the contrary, proceeds by a receding series of proposi- tions, each more or less distinct, and each so clear that it seems final. It need not be said that this style is attractive. It simplifies philosophical thought, brings out clear issues and pins the vague ; but it is mislead- ing, especially to the novice in philosophy. Professor James' literary method possesses this " per- spective " quality to an extraordinary degree. He is even more panoramic than Taine. But Professor James suffers from what we may call inverse perspective, — a quality which invites no end of adverse criticism of his views from men who ought to embrace him as an ally. By the phrase " inverse perspective," I mean that he states the novel and most radical side of his doctrine first, and magnifies his difference from current views ; then his whole subsequent discussion tends to tone down and modify the earlier statement. The reader's first impression is one of alarm, then of less alarm, then of no alarm at all, but probably of self-congratulation that such an authority agrees with his own views after all. This is so important a consideration, that it is only just to our author to tell his general readers to read him with suspended judgment, not to do him the discredit of thinking they understand him from a single 372 JAMES' PRINCIPLES OF PSYCHOLOGY page or a single chapter, and above all not to quote him without the extremest care that a counter quotation may not be possible. 1 As to the method, Professor James advocates the positivist point of view of natural science, based both upon introspection and experiment, a method which late work has now fully justified. " This book, assuming that thoughts and feelings exist, and are vehicles of knowledge, thereupon contends that psychology, when she has ascertained the empirical correlation of various sorts of thoughts or feelings with definite conditions of the brain, can go no further — can go no further, that is, as a natural science. If she goes further she becomes metaphysical." (Preface.) That is, it is no longer empirical psychology. But Professor James' own treat- ment shows that interpretation is the essential need of the hour, even in empirical psychology. His greatest originality is not where he claims it — in the point of view. The present writer has advocated this point of view for several years, and half a dozen others could be named who have ; but his originality is in his theoretical construction of data — in matters of interpretation. In the same connection, under the phrase " psycholo- gist's fallacy " (L, 196), Professor James emphasizes a point which in our day needs supreme emphasis. " The 1 In this respect Professor James is to be compared only with Mr. Bradley. He speaks of Bradley's " subtle, witty, but decidedly long-winded critique of the association of ideals " (ii., 604). I would not think of apply- ing " long-winded " to Professor James ; but neither is it just to Mr. Bradley. It might be said that they are both consummate masters of what I have called a " perspective " literary method. (The criticism made above may now, 1902, be extended to Professor James' later publications, The Will to Believe and Philosophical Conceptions and Practical Results. Each of these has stimulated various "interpretations " of the author's meaning, which Professor James in turn vigorously repudiates. It is no doubt in part due to this writer's independent and at times capricious use of terms.) 373 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE great snare of the psychologist is the confusion of his own standpoint with that of the mental fact about which he is making his report ". . . . " he himself, knowing an object in his way, gets easily led to suppose that the thought which is of it, knows it in the same way in which he knows it, although this is often very far from being the case." This is the very bane of current speculative idealism, as far as its treatment of psychology goes. It reads into the child the speculative essentials of mind — self -activity, timeless identity, community with an absolute self-identical consciousness, etc. The first thoughts of a child are aware of the objects and of nothing else. But the psychologist, in looking at it, sees the " thought's object, plus the thought itself, plus, possibly, all the rest of the world. We must avoid substituting what we know (suppose) the consciousness is for what it is a consciousness of." So important is this warning of Professor James that I would not hesi- tate to devote all my space to sounding it out. Take this from Green : " A consciousness by the man of him- self must be taken to go along with the perceptive act itself. Not less than this, indeed, can be involved in any act that is to be the beginning of knowledge at all. It is the minimum of possible thought or intelligence." On this assumption of the Greens and the Cairds and the Morrises, Professor James is not a whit too severe in this remark : " This is a perfectly wanton assumption, and not the faintest shadow of reason exists for suppos- ing it true. As well might I contend that I cannot dream without dreaming that I dream, swear without swearing that I swear, etc., as maintain that I cannot know without knowing that I know " l (I., 274). Unity 1 A good example of this fallacy in current discussion is the following damaging (?) charge which Professor Watson brings against Mr. Spen- 374 JAMES' PRINCIPLES OF PSYCHOLOGY of treatment might have been brought into Professor James'' account of "thought" if he had generalized the essentials of his theory in some such conception as that denoted nowadays by the word " apperception." I ven- ture to think, subject to correction, that all of the author's theories concerning "knowledge about" a thing, as contrasted with mere " acquaintance with " a thing, are covered by the current conception of apper- ception. But before pressing this view, let us get hold, as clearly as we can, of his view of knowledge in general. According to Professor James' way of thinking, what we have in consciousness is a stream flowing in time, — and empirical description of consciousness must begin with this stream, not with simple hypothetical sensations. This stream may be called, indiscriminately, Feeling or Thought, 1 for there is no valid distinction between them. Feeling is immediately cognitive, i, e., it has an object which it knows. What we are conscious of at any mo- ment is a segment of this stream, a cut through it, so to speak, and this is our unit of division of the stream into parts. Each such conscious segment or cut is a Feeling or Thought of an object. This object may be a single simple thing, 2 in which case the segment is a sensation, and knows the thing by " acquaintance," or it may be cer, i. e., that he makes " the occurrence of a sensation the same thing as the consciousness of that occurrence." Mind, lx., p. 543. Professor Wat- son reads into the consciousness of a sensation the knowledge (appercep- tion) of it as a sensation. 1 In what follows I attempt to state briefly and plainly the common idea which runs through the chapters on " The Stream of Thought," " Conception," " Discrimination and Comparison," "Sensation" "Asso- ciation," "The Perception of Things" ("Feeling or thought" turns out after all to be merely loose terminology. See below). 2 But the thing or object itself may be a relation ; that is, there are direct feelings of relation (i., 245-248). 375 PHILOSOPHY AND SCIENCE of different related external things or events, in which case it still has only a single object, the entire complex experience, but the Feeling or Thought is now a per- ception, conception, etc. ; its knowledge is " knowledge about " the thing or things. Knowledge about a thing is knowledge of its relations. Acquaintance with it is lim- itation to the bare impression which it makes " (I., 259 ; II., 77). Following him I shall use the words Thought and Feeling simply for such a segment of the stream. Now the present Thought may have as its object other Thoughts or segments of the stream, i.e., it may know the past, and this is memory — the fact that a present Thought may know (cognize, feel) what has gone be- fore in the same stream. The rule by which the exact segment of the past to be thus known is determined, is association, which is reduced to the single principle of contiguity. The reason that it is my own past that my present Thought knows (remembers) and no one's else past, we cannot say, except that my own past has a feel- ing of warmth (familiarity) to me, which no one's else past has to me, and by which I reach sV rvX ^ ^ * %L v^v ^ Deacidified using the Bookkeeper process. Neutralizing agent: Magnesium Oxide Treatment Date: August 2004 PreservationTechnologies A WORLD LEADER IN PAPER PRESERVATION j 1 1 1 Thomson Park Drive Cranberry Township, PA 16066 (724)779-2111 m 'otf - o (V A^ . A > .