THE EARLIEST ORGANIC MOVEMENTS, 465 



multiply his tropisms till they cover the whole field of organic move- 

 ment; he is only consistent in so doing, just as he is consistent in re- 

 fusing to speak of 'visual perception' and in martyrising his linguistic 

 consciousness to the term 'photo-reception,' But, though it rain tro- 

 pisms, the psychologist may go without his umbrella. 



However, when all is said, is there not at least a presumption in 

 favor of the unconscious-movement theory ? That is the theory adopted 

 by the men who made the investigations; and, surely, they ought to 

 know, if anybody knows. Would it not be good common sense to take 

 their conclusions, instead of speculating about what may be? I have 

 no great objection; save on that single score of scientific methodology, 

 I have no objection. For it is one of the cardinal points of the theory 

 which I hold, that a movement which at first was conscious may pres- 

 ently lose its conscious character; that the physical may in course of 

 time replace the psychophysical. The fact, then, if it be a fact, that 

 ants and bees are nowadays mere reflex machines will mean that they 

 started out, so to say, with a certain endowment of mind, which they 

 have lost in the process of adaptation to their special environment; 

 and the similar fact that paramecium has its one stereotyped form of 

 motor reaction to stimulus will mean that it, too, had at first its 

 modicum of mind, which it has lost* on its journey throiigh the ages. 

 The evidence for this view I have yet to give. If it be sound, then the 

 automatism of the lower animals does not in the least degree affect the 

 theory that mind is as old as life. 



And now for the alternative theory, — which must, I suppose, always 

 strike the biologist, more especially if he be physiologist, as fanciful 

 and far-fetched ; the theory that the first animal movements were con- 

 scious, and that all our present movements, the reflexes included, are 

 the direct descendants of conscious movements. What is the evidence 

 in its favor? 



If we consider the facts of organic movement as they are pre- 

 sented in our own experience; if, following the rule of psychological 

 enquiry, we set out from an examination of our own action and con- 

 duct; we find that the phenomena cannot be brought at once under 

 the head of any single principle, but that they rather result from the 

 joint operation of two different tendencies. On the one hand, we are 

 continually enlarging our sphere of action; conduct grows more com- 

 plex; new motives are formed, new adaptations made; there is a tend- 

 ency towards more and more complicated or specific coordinations of 

 movements. The realization of this tendency is always accompanied 

 by consciousness, by the mental formations that are known, both in 

 popular speech and in psychology, as choice, resolve, deliberation, judg- 

 ment, doubt, etc. On the other hand, there is a tendency towards the 

 simplification of movement; coordinations that at first involved corti- 



VOL. LX. — 30. 



