Laws and Hypotheses for Behavior 259 



potent to produce it. I cannot produce a sneeze by think- 

 ing of sneezing. A child may have, in the case of some 

 simple bodily act, which he has done in response to certain 

 situations thousands of times, as adequate ideas of it as are 

 possessed by others, and yet be utterly unable to make him- 

 self do it; many adults show this same phenomenon, for 

 instance, in the case of swallowing a pill. And, of course, 

 one can have ideas of running a mile in two minutes, jump- 

 ing a fence eight feet high, or drawing a line exactly equal 

 to a hundred millimeter line, just as easily as of running the 

 mile in ten minutes, or jumping four feet. 



It is further certain that the thought of doing one thing 

 very often results in the man's doing something quite dif- 

 ferent. The thought of moving the eyes smoothly without 

 stops along a line of print has occurred to many people, who 

 nevertheless actually did as a result move the eyes in a series 

 of jumps with long stops. 



It is further certain that in many cases where an animal 

 does connect a given response with the image or thought of 

 that response, the connection has been built up by the laws 

 of exercise and effect. Such cases as appropriate responses 

 to, ' I will go to bed,' ' I will get up,' ' I will eat,' ' I will write 

 a letter/ f l will read/ or to the corresponding commands, 

 requests or suggestions, are observably built up by training. 

 The appropriate response follows the idea only if it has, 

 by repetition or reward, been connected with it or something 

 like it. If the only requirement in moral education were to 

 have the idea of the right act at the right time, the lives of 

 teachers and parents would be greatly alleviated. But the 

 decision to get up, or the idea of getting up or of being up, 

 is futile until the child has connected therewith the actual 

 act of getting up. 



The defender of the direct potency of conscious represent- 



