278 SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY OF THE ORGANISM 



stimuli and all effects of them. We said that in psychology 

 the words " association," " memory," " experience," " abstrac- 

 tion " and so on are generally used to signify what can only 

 be called "the historical basis of reacting' 1 by the true 

 naturalist. But at present we are dealing with 

 " psychology " of the most exclusive nature, for all that is 

 is regarded as psychological in our present consideration. 

 The second portion of our conscious series now shows us 

 fully developed what from another point of view had been 

 included in the one phrase of the " historical basis." And 

 so we understand that the ultimate event that relates to 

 the brain in the first portion of our conscious series must 

 be such as to allow the " historical basis " to come into 

 manifestation. Now, on the other hand, this " historical 

 basis " has been created by series of phenomena similar to 

 the one we are studying ; that is to say, cerebral pheno- 

 mena were also included in these series : and thence it 

 follows that the ultimate process of the first portion of 

 the conscious series we are studying, whenever it acts at 

 all in such a way as to awake the historical basis, must 

 be different, say, on the fourth time of its going on from 

 what it was the first, second, and third times. But, as all 

 the former steps of the first portion of our conscious series 

 are not different the fourth time from what they were the 

 first, second, and third times, 1 they cannot bear in themselves 

 the sufficient reason for the becoming different with conse- 

 cutive repetitions of the ultimate phenomenon of that first 

 portion. Therefore the reason of this becoming different 

 must lie in the brain itself as a phenomenon. A certain 

 ultimate process of the first portion of any conscious series 



1 Except perhaps in as far as " functional adaptation " comes into play. 



