683 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



descent below the ideal point of indifference into the lower region 

 of pain. Pleasure, then, is felt directly as such, and not indirectly- 

 through a pain which it replaces ; and the sight enjoys without hav- 

 ing suffered. 



Modern physiology teaches us that the higher sensibility is con- 

 nected with special organs, like the eye, the ear, the nose, and the 

 mouth, while inferior sensibility is diffused through the body, without 

 connection with well-differentiated organs. Inferior sensibility informs 

 us of conditions that are material to our existence, as contact, hunger, 

 thirst, etc., and it has been organized through natural selection so as 

 to be alarmed when these conditions are threatened. Hence, inferior 

 sensibility is better adapted to suffering than to enjoyment. The 

 higher senses, on the other hand, particularly sight and hearing, 

 respond less to the needs of life than to superfluity, to conservation 

 than to progress, and are better adapted to pleasure than to pain. It 

 results from this that the mutual relations of enjoyment and suffering 

 are inverse for the higher and the lower senses. For general and 

 internal sensibility, for the sense of temperature or of touch, a distinct 

 pleasure presupposes some antecedent uneasiness or want. It is pleas- 

 ant to eat or drink when we are hungry or thirsty, and to plunge into 

 fresh water when the skin feels hot ; but, if, when we eat or drink 

 without previous hunger or thirst, we feel pleasure, it is because of 

 some particular effect of the aliment on the specialized sense of taste. 

 So, when the body is at the normal temperature, heat or cold will give 

 it but a slight gratification. Contrast with antecedent pain seems in 

 these cases to be necessary to present pleasure. On the other hand, 

 only a slight degree of divergence on the side of pain, as in the 

 case of a burn, a blow, or a colic, is enough to cause considerable 

 suffering. 



An opposite law rules in the higher senses, and particularly in those 

 which have very specialized organs. In them pleasure arises immedi- 

 ately, and is capable of acquiring a notable degree of distinction at the 

 very start from the point of indifference. This takes place in exci- 

 tations of the sight, hearing, smell, and tase. In return, the higher 

 senses are less subject to suffering than to simple annoyance. A dis- 

 cord, a piercing whistle, inharmonious colors, a dazzling light, and a 

 disagreeable odor, do not provoke any pain of the hearing or vision 

 comparable in intensity to that of a wound or a burn. These, we be- 

 lieve, are the real scientific reasons why the higher sensibility is free 

 from necessity and " hunger," while the lower sensibility is enslaved 

 to them. 



If we compare the higher with the lower senses in respect to their 

 activity, we shall find that a greater specialization corresponds with 

 a lessened passivity, and a greater share of central activity and will- 

 power. We have but little control over our internal organs ; we can 

 not, for example, put our stomach or our heart into the active attitude 



