FEELING AND ENERGY. 



465 



sence of feeling. No more would the inference 

 be warranted in reference to ordinary physical 

 forces. 



But some may think that actions even of the 

 erratic kind are far more indicative of the pres- 

 ence of feeliug than those that can be predicted 

 and calculated with mathematical precision. The 

 latter are so evidently subject to law that it seems 

 to reduce feeling to the position of a " slave to 

 blind forces " if we regard ordinary physical 

 forces to be accompanied by feeling. This kind 

 of reasoning I imagine would not have much 

 weight with those philosophers who have come 

 to the conclusion that all animal action is auto- 

 matic ; the action of mankind not excepted. And 

 the objection is clearly not a logical one, for the 

 presence of law and order in the connections of 

 feeling with action cannot be shown to be either 

 inconceivable or inconsistent with psychological 

 facts. On the contrary, the regularity with which 

 like feelings are observed to be followed by like 

 actions is so constant that the actions not only of 

 men, but of all animals, are generally calculated 

 and predicted therefrom. If, then, the connection 

 of all " feeling-prompted actions " with law is rec- 

 ognized, both by philosophers and by people in 

 daily life who have no interest in psychological 

 theories, what argument can be drawn therefrom 

 against the connection of feeling with the orderly 

 operation of physical processes ? Clearly none. 

 If order and law be observed in the one case, why 

 not in the other ? 



But this orderly operation of physiological ac- 

 tivity has been supposed to go on sometimes in 

 the absence of feeling. The incessant action of 

 the heart and its vessels, that of the organs of 

 digestion, and many if not most of our " invol- 

 untary " actions, are alleged to be unattended by 

 feeling. In answer to this I should say that it is 

 a question whether the thing which is alleged to 

 occupy no share of our attention should not be 

 described as simply occupying our attention least. 

 The fact, as has been pointed out by some writers, 

 that, when the heart and digestive organs are in 

 any diseased or abnormal condition, sensations 

 arise forcibly detaining the attention, proves that 

 what may thus command at occasions much at- 

 tention may continually be a factor in our feel- 

 ings, though intellectually we take no note of it. 

 What I mean by this will be best illustrated by 

 dealing with a class of alleged facts of the same 

 kind comprehended under the heads of " feeling- 

 less automatic action," or " unconscious cerebra 

 tion." 



Nothing is more common as a fact of experi 

 102 



ence than our forgetting that we used certain 

 words in conversation or debate. We cannot be- 

 lieve now that we said so-and-so; or, admitting 

 that we may, we explain it as a lapsis lingua?, as 

 if due to the mere machinery of vocal utterance 

 unattended by consciousness. Then, again, we 

 sometimes lay past an object, as the banker cited 

 by Dr. Carpenter laid by his safe-key, and forget 

 where we have laid it. Or we may often do some- 

 thing very different from what we originally in- 

 tended, like the gentleman, again mentioned by 

 Carpenter, who went up-stairs to dress for dinner 

 and " unconsciously " undressed and went to bed. 



The statement that we do anything uncon- 

 sciously, in the sense of not associating with it all 

 the circumstances that an ordinarily rational being 

 will usually include, is quite a truism ; but the 

 absence of the usual compounding of the separate 

 cognitions of surrounding circumstances with our 

 cognitions of the act we are performing is one 

 thing to admit, and the entire absence of con- 

 sciousness or feeling in connection with any act 

 is quite another. The former is what we might 

 expect from the complex character of the nervous 

 system as a compound of feeling organs, which 

 complexity renders it liable to operate in parts 

 more or less in isolation from each other. Recol- 

 lection means a feeble revival of the excitement 

 originally made in the nerves by that object or 

 set of circumstances which we are said to remem- 

 ber. When we fail to remember it the revival 

 does not take place, because the original excite- 

 ment was not made in nerves directly connected 

 with those nerves which are the seat of our men- 

 tal state when we are trying or wishing to remem- 

 ber. This is proved by our recollecting unexpect- 

 edly (after giving it up in despair) in a different 

 mental connection — that is, in connection with 

 nerves having a different physical connection. 

 Then are we convinced that it is possible that 

 what we supposed was not attended by feeling or 

 consciousness was really so attended after all. 



The mere fact that feeling organs may not 

 operate in connection with one another is no 

 proof that they do not feel individually. In any 

 case the statement as to the absence of feeling 

 in any organ is on a par with the statement that 

 a given organ does feel : neither statement can 

 claim to be supported by absolute proof. The 

 question, therefore, is resolved into one of con- 

 sistency with known facts, and I have endeav- 

 ored to show that the facts cited under the terms 

 "unconscious cerebration" and " feelingless re- 

 flex action " are explainable quite consistently 

 with the supposition that all action is prompted 



