488 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



humanity, a kind of compost of individuals. But the implications 

 hinted here receive their most striking manifestation in language. 

 Now Herder, to give him his due, must he saluted as the herald of 

 V olkerpsychologie and of Sprachwissenschaft. So he stands aside from 

 the line under examination. For, even if it he recalled that phonology 

 can be classed as a physiological science, the matter terminates there. 

 Great as have been the contributions of W. von Humboldt, Bopp, 

 Grimm, Max Miiller and their coworkers, and much as has been accom- 

 plished by Waitz, Lazarus, Steinthal, McLennan, Spencer, Lubbock, 

 Tylor, Frazer and Westermarck, all sit more or less loose to physio- 

 logical psychology, which continues an investigation of individual far 

 more than of group processes. So, attractive and suggestive as Herder 

 is, perforce we rest content now with the bare reference to what I have 

 had the temerity to call his seminal mind. 



When we arrive at Herbart and Beneke the case presents a different 

 aspect. For they stand forth among the last great psychologists who 

 deal with mind as mind, to the exclusion of modern experimental 

 methods applicable chiefly to the body. After a manner their services 

 pale in the glow of the contemporary atmosphere; their work has been 

 bemused by pedagogists, misprized overmuch by psychologists, even if, 

 as Wundt says, 16 he owes most to Kant and Herbart, and even remem- 

 bering the work of Herbartians like Drohisch, Volkmann, Exner, 

 Striimpell, Cornelius and B. Zimmermann. 17 



Note, at the outset, that Herbart (1776-1841) and Beneke (1798- 

 1854) revolt strongly against the dominant Hegelian school, and that 

 both attempt a concrete study of consciousness. On one point they 

 differ decisively. Herbart's psychology, as the title of his chief work 

 urns — " Psychology as a Science, founded, for the first time, upon 

 Experience, Metaphysics and Mathematics," possesses a triple basis. 

 Beneke excludes the second and third, emphasizing experience as the 

 sole legitimate foundation. In this respect he takes the pioneer place 

 among those who raised the later cry, " Back to Kant ! " 



Thanks to the limits of this paper, Herbart's metaphysical doctrine 

 must disappear with a word. He held that the soul, in its own proper 

 nature, forms an original, changeless and simple entity. Psychological 

 processes originate in its resistance to intrusion from the outside, 

 therefore, the complexities of consciousness, just because they are com- 

 plex, fall within the reach of analysis. As results of mechanical in- 

 teraction they lie open to mathematical methods. Such procedure, of 

 course, leads straight to experience, and, on the whole, it may be 

 affirmed that, as his psychology prospers, the direct influence of his 

 metaphysic wanes. In this way a long step towards psychology viewed 



16 " Physiol. Psychologic," preface to the first edition, 1874. 

 "Cf. Mind, Vol. XIV., pp. 353 ff. (old series). 



