1891.] on the Implications of Science. 439 



existence, but a consciousness of doing something or having something 

 done to me — action or reaction. I have always indeed some feeling 

 and also some sense of my self-existence, but what I perceive primarily, 

 directly and immediately, is neither the feeling nor the self-existence, 

 but some concrete actual doing, being, or suffering, then experienced. 

 We can, indeed, become distinctly and explicitly aware of either the 

 feeling or the self-existence, by turning back the mind upon itself. 

 But to know that one has a feeling, or is in a state, or even that a 

 feeling exists, is plainly an act by which no one begins to think. It 

 is evidently a secondary act — an act of reflection. No one begins by 

 perceiving his perception, any more than he begins by expressly 

 adverting to the fact that it is he himself who perceives it. 



Let us suppose two men to be engaged in a fencing match. Each 

 man while he is parrying, lunging, &c., has his feelings or states, 

 and knows that it is he who is carrying on the struggle ; yet it is 

 neither his mental states nor the persistence of his being which 

 he directly regards, but his concrete activity — what he is doing 

 and what is being done to him. He may, of course, if he chooses, 

 direct his attention either to the feelings he is experiencing, or to his 

 underlying continuous personality. Should he do so, however, a hit 

 from his adversary's foil will be a probable result. 



But to become aware that one has any definite feeling, is a reflex 

 act at least as secondary and posterior as it is to become aware of the 

 self which has the feeling. I say " at least," but I believe that of 

 the two perceptions (1) of feelings and (2) of self, it is the 

 self which is the more prominently given in our primary direct 

 cognitions. I believe that a more laborious act of mental digging is 

 requisite to bring explicitly to light the implicit mental state, than to 

 bring forward explicitly the implicit self-existence. Men continually 

 and promptly advert to the fact that actions and sufferings are their 

 own, but do not by any means so continually and promptly advert to 

 the fact that the feelings they experience are existing feelings. 



Therefore I am convinced that one of the greatest and most 

 fundamental errors of our day is the mistake of supposing that we can 

 know our mental states or feelings more certainly and directly than 

 we can know the continuously existing self which has those feelings. 



Our perception of our continuous existence also involves the 

 validity of our faculty of memory which is implied in this way, as well 

 as in every scientific experiment we may perform. For we cannot 

 obviously have a reflex perception, either of our feelings or our self- 

 existence, without trusting our memory as to the past ; since, how- 

 ever rapid our mental processes may be, no mental act takes place 

 without occupying some period of time — and, indeed, nervous action is 

 not extremely rapid. In knowing therefore such facts by a reflex 

 act, we know by memory what is already past. Thus our certainty 

 as to our own continuous existence, necessarily carries with it a 

 certainty as to our faculty of memory. Therefore the mental idiocy 

 of absolute scepticism is the penalty that has to be paid for any real 



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