NOTICES OF BOOKS. xli 



At the early stage now under consideration "purposive" and "definite" of course 

 mean no more than the simultaneous or successive association of the sensations excited 

 by the operation of a sense-stimulus. In the eye (to take the simplest case of muscular 

 mechanism) association connects together the whole number of sensations excited in and 

 round the eye, and systematises those sensory processes which begin with the simple light- 

 sensation ; it determines the form in which the eye transforms its sensations into perception. 

 This form is space-perception. Hence Wundt infers that the perception of space, psychologi- 

 cally regarded, is not an innate possession of the mind, but the product of an association of 

 sensations. This again is a crucial point in Wundt's psychology, in which (together with 

 Helmholtz, and to some extent Lotze) he differs from Hering, who maintains that space-per- 

 ception is innate and intuitive, and also from the English " Assoeiationists ". Wundt regards it 

 as a mental growth depending on elementary experiences, tactile and visual, e.g., in the latter on 

 the action of the ocular muscles. We obtain an independent knowledge of space relations by 

 theeye, not merelyfrom inherited facts of past experience, although he admits of these that they 

 form a certain psycho-physical " disposition " which abridges the process of individual space- 

 construction. 



And it is to the common action of the two organs of vision that we owe the greatest part 

 of our ideational development. Binocular vision is of fundamental import. The fusion of the 

 separate perceptions of the two eyes [central fusion, " the mental resultant of the originally 

 separate perceptions") into a single idea is typical of the mental processes of association, as is 

 the disorganisation which ensues when these perceptions cannot be co-ordinated. 



Ideas are thus derived from sensations in the regular course of development. But the 

 human mind never apprehends sensations with absolute indifference. In cognising we always 

 "feel" attraction or repulsion, or again are incited to some kind of action. Feeling and 

 1 Vill are the accompaniment of ideas and sensations. Xo separation in the last resort is 

 possible between sense and feeling. 



We sense and we feel ; sense-feeling is the affective tone of sensation, and is therefore 

 among the elementary constituents of our mental life, while the higher intellectual and aesthetic 

 feelings fall under the complex processes of consciousness. Will is not choice (which is a 

 complex process, and implies the pre-existence of simple volition), nor is it the outcome 

 of reflex action. Even the animal protozoa, much more the chick and the child, give 

 plain evidence of voluntary movement. Purposive reflexes have much rather been evolved by 

 practice from volitional actions. A motive is a particular idea with an affective tone attaching 

 to it, and motives are the causes of volition, internal and psychical. In volition, however, as 

 in sensation, the chief motive is not some particular sense-impression, but the entire trend of 

 consciousness, as determined by previous experiences, often indeed "sub-conscious," not 

 realised. It is the conflict of motives that gives to some voluntary actions the feeling of choice ; 

 where the present impression is very strong, and over-rules the rest,' we have the sense of 

 decision. 



The Theory of Volition, shortly stated, is as follows : — 



Feeling is independent of volition, but the reverse is impossible; voluntary activity al- 

 ways presupposes an antecedent voluntary tendency or feeling. Both these are elements of one 

 common process. "Activity" 1 implies two factors: (i) a change that occurs; (2) a subject 

 postulated to explain the change. 



In voluntary activity the change is always an alteration in the state of consciousness ; an 

 idea arises or disappears, becomes clear or obscure, etc. These ideational processes are in- 

 variably connected with feelings and emotions. In external voluntary actions the changes 

 which refer to movements of the body (muscle-sensations, etc. ) play the most important part. The 

 active subject, which is the direct cause of these ideational changes, may be called "self," 

 " ego," and again " willing subject," and so on, but in reality it is the sum of past experiences, 

 i.e., "consciousness". Will is therefore (a) feeling ; (b) change in ideational content; (c) 

 dependence of this change upon the whole trend of consciousness. 



Consciousness is essentially a dynamic process. The mind is not a " stage," remaining 

 when the "actors" have left — no idea once passed out of consciousness returns to it again. 

 New processes arise which exhibit relations and similarity to previous processes, but are not 

 identical with them. Nor is "consciousness" itself a mental fact, separable from its 

 constituent processes; "in" and "out" of consciousness is a misnomer. It is in having 

 the process that we are conscious of it, — the range of consciousness must be conceived as 

 denoting simply the sum of mental processes existing at a given moment. But as a collective 

 expression the concept is indispensable. 



