THE RENAISSANCE OF PSYCHOLOGY 



The psychology embodied in it had to be sifted out of 

 the philosophical context by later historians. Stratton 

 has been able to compile a "Physiological Psychology 

 among the Greeks." Gardner Murphy has set contemporary 

 psychology in a perspective of the preceding centuries. 

 Psychology, as we recognize it, had to await a general 

 renaissance of the scientific method and the objective 

 attitude, and to await particularly a more searching bio- 

 logical insight. Besides psychosophy and psychology, 

 there is the practical interest in the affairs of mind, for 

 which the term psychognosis has been suggested. The 

 diagnosis of human character, the judgment of men and 

 motives, ever with a hope of control or prediction of 

 fate, has made the "mental" man the proper study of 

 mankind. It is quickened by the experience with minds 

 disordered seeking cure, no less than with strange exper- 

 iences demanding explanation, hinting at a hidden order 

 of "psychic" world. 



This threefold body of interests is persistent: (^) the 

 place of mind in the world at large; (^) the mechanisms of 

 the mental activities and their association with bodily 

 functions centrally; (c) the varieties of character, the vicis- 

 situdes of the human scene, the direction of mental affairs, 

 including the relief of ills that mind is heir to. Gradually 

 the scientific claimant came to be recognized as the legiti- 

 mate sovereign, absorbing the philosophical and the practi- 

 cal dominions in an inclusive rule. 



The historical sequence appears also in terms of concepts 

 of phusis or nature, by virtue of which things come to be and 

 are maintained. How nature is regarded determines all else. 



The story of science centers about the nature of nature. 

 It encounters a strong preconception as to what nature 

 should be to conform to human desires or beliefs; it meets 

 with the tendency to imagine forces beyond nature, or 

 miracles setting aside nature; it emerges with an objective, 



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