X PERSONALITY AS A WHOLE 279 



Now with human personalities, the individual differences, If 

 so far from being negligible, are all-important. Each human 

 individual is a unique personality; not only is personality 

 in general a unique phenomenon in the world, but each 

 human personality is unique in itself, and the attempt at 

 ^' averaging '^ and generalising and reaching the common 

 type on the approved scientific lines eliminates what is the 

 very essence of Personality, namely, its unique individual 

 character in each case. The scientific procedure of 

 psychology, inevitable as it is for psychology as a scientific 

 discipline, is not very suitable in respect of a subject so 

 specially individual as Personality. But that is not all. 

 Psychology does not even purport to deal specially with 

 Personality. Its subject is more especially mind, mental 

 activity in its wider sense, the genesis and development of 

 the mental functions in the average human individual. 

 But, as we have seen, mind is merely one particular aspect 

 of Personality. The contribution towards Personality which 

 comes from the organic side is in important respects ignored 

 by psychology. But this contribution of the body is most 

 important; we know from practical experience in our 

 personal lives how important bodily functions and our 

 general physiological state are in the total make-up of the 

 Personality. Our nervous system, our digestive system, 

 above all our reproductive system have the most far-reaching 

 reactions on our Personality as a whole. A little more iodine 

 in the thyroid gland, for instance, may make the greatest 

 difference, not only for the general co-ordination of physio- 

 logical functions and bodily development as a whole, but 

 for the mind itself, and may even mean all the difference 

 between normal and deficient mentality, between normal 

 and stunted Personality. All this physiological side of 

 Personality, important as it is in its effects, simply falls 

 outside the scope of psychology and is assigned to other 

 branches of science. 



The result of this limitation of the province of psychology 

 is that even the mental side of Personality fails to be prop- 

 erly explored and understood. The subconscious Mind is 



