466 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



cal activity are presently, as a 'habit' is formed, relegated to lower 

 centers. And the realization of this tendency is accompanied by lapse 

 or loss of consciousness. We learn to walk, to swim, to bicycle, to 

 typewrite, to play a musical instrument, with conscious pains and ef- 

 fort. Later, if we practise enough, we do these things 'automatically,' 

 unconsciously. We may typewrite correctly while our attention is wholly 

 directed upon the meaning of our paragraph; we may play a musical 

 comi^osition correctly while we are engaged in an absorbing conversa- 

 tion. The original impulsive or selective or volitional action has be- 

 come automatic. We can, of course, bring its terms back to conscious- 

 ness; we can stop and 'think' that we are typewriting or playing the 

 piano or bicycling ; but if we do this, the movements become hesitating 

 and may be seriously deranged. If the natural tendency takes its 

 course, we finally reach a form of movement which (except that we 

 know its course of development) is not distinguishable from the phys- 

 iological reflex. 



Here is a bit of positive and unmistakable evidence. It is possible, 

 in the life history of the individual, for conscious movements to pass 

 -over into unconscious. Not only is it possible: it is a regular occur- 

 Tence. From the biological point of view, it is eminently useful; the 

 simplification of response to stimulus, its relegation to lower nervous 

 centers leaves the organism free for further adaptations. Is there not 

 some ground, then, for generalizing the facts, and saying that, prob- 

 ably, all unconscious movements have developed from conscious? This 

 is what Wundt has done, in his statement that 'the reflexes are volun- 

 tary actions that have become mechanical.* Only, his terminology is 

 at fault, for the antithesis of the voluntary is not the mechanical (all 

 actions, biologically regarded, are mechanical), but the unconscious 

 action; and the antithesis of the reflex is not the voluntary but the 

 complex, coordinated action. So difficult is it, even when one's thought 

 is scientifically clean, to avoid the language of 'common sense' ! 



I think that the reader who has recognized the weakness of the 

 opposing theory will take great comfort in this piece of undisputed 

 fact, and will be willing to generalize it farther than the logical canons 

 warrant. To myself, brought up in the faith that mind developed 

 somehow and appeared somewhere after the birth of life, and always 

 unsuccessful in my attempts to reconcile this faith with reason, Wundt's 

 counter-statement came as a real illumination. Nevertheless, as it 

 stands, it is nothing more than an argument from analogy ; we argue 

 from the individual to the race. Is there no evidence from the race 

 itself? 



* W. Wundt, Grundzilge der physiologischen Psychologie, ii., 1893, 591. 

 Cf. the historical discussion, 591-593, and PJiilos. Stud., i., 1883, 354 ff.; also J. 

 Ward, art. Psychology, Encycl. Brit., 9th ed., 43, col. a. 



