LITERARY NOTICES. 



Pleasure and Pain. 1 



This paper is essentially a discussion of the recent work by Mar- 

 shall on the same subject. 2 



It is therefore an attack on the so-called quale theory of pleasure 

 and pain — a theory which considers pain not a sensation but a form 

 of feeling and maintains "that all states of pleasure and pain are in- 

 cluded in a single series or continuum, passing from intense pleasure 

 through agreeableness, to extreme pain, and that all the several vari- 

 eties of pleasure and of pain are but phases or aspects of one and 

 the same mental element," in fact " pleasure-pain is an attribute 

 whose various phases must be considered as primary quales which af- 

 fect all presentation however wide, however narrow, somewhat after 

 the manner in which we grasp the notion of intensity as being com- 

 mon to all presentation." Pleasure-pain is the Gefiihlston of the 

 German. 



The author says "When, therefore, Mr. Marshall insists that a 

 pleasure or a pain is not to be classed as emotion, nor as intellect, 

 nor as will, although pleasure-pain phases accompany all these states, 

 he is saying, in effect, that these states are complexes, and that pleas- 

 ure or pain is one of the component elements, an entirely unobject- 

 ionable statement of fact. But when, under the requirements of the 

 quale-doctrine, pleasure and pain are classed together as similar phe- 

 nomena, some violence would seem to be done the facts of intro- 

 spection." 



The author does not consider it improbable that we may soon 

 hear of the discovery of a specialized sensory nerve of pleasure, with 

 a localized cerebral centre. 



He states that : 



i. Pain is presented in consciousness with the distinctness, the 

 definiteness, the vividness, and the isolation that are supposed to 

 characterize all sensations. 



2. Pleasure is a mental phenomenon as distinct from pain as heat 

 is from cold, or a sound from a color. 



1 Witmer, L. The Psychological Analysis and Basis of Pleasure and Pain. 

 Journ. New. and Mental Disease. XIX, 4. 



2 Marshall, H. R. Pain, Pleasure and /Esthetics. Macmillan & Co. 



