The Study of Consciousness and Behavior 15 



whereby he was sensitive to certain events, was able to 

 make certain movements, and not only had ideas but con- 

 nected them one with another and with various impressions 

 and acts. It was supposed to account for actual bodily 

 action as well as for the action-consciousness. It explained 

 the connections between ideas as well as their internal 

 composition. If a modern psychologist defines mind as the 

 sum total of consciousness, and lives up to that definition, 

 he omits the larger portion of the task of his predecessors. 

 To define our subject-matter as the nature and behavior 

 of men, beginning where anatomy and physiology leave 

 off, is, on the contrary, to deliberately assume responsibility 

 for the entire heritage. Behavior includes consciousness 

 and action, states of mind and their connections. 



Even students devoted to 'consciousness as such' must 

 admit that the movements of an animal and their connec- 

 tions with other features of his life deserve study, by even 

 their kind of psychologist. For the fundamental means 

 of knowing that an animal has a certain conscious state 

 are knowledge that it makes certain movements and knowl- 

 edge of what conscious states are connected with those 

 movements. Knowledge of the action-system of an animal 

 and its connections is a prerequisite to knowledge of its 

 stream of consciousness. 



There are better reasons for including the action-system 

 of an animal in the psychologist's subject-matter. An 

 animal's conscious stream is of no account to the rest of 

 the world except in so far as it prophesies or modifies his 

 action. 1 There can be no moral warrant for studying 

 man's nature unless the study will enable us to control 

 his acts. If a psychologist is to study man's consciousness 

 without relation to movement, he might as well fabricate 

 1 Unless one assumes telepathic influences. 



