26 PROCEEDINGS OF THE CANADIAN INSTITUTE. 



to it do not seem sufficient, when it is compai-ed with similar specu- 

 lations of science of recent date, to warrant its oflF-hand rejection. 



Mr. Alfred S. Johnson, M.A., Fellow of University Colleg^e, 

 Toronto, read the following paper on 



THE LA.W OF HABIT. 



Habit, more than any other principle of nature, may be said to be 

 the governing jjrinciple of life. All the phases of our existence, con- 

 scious and imconscious, physical, psychical, moral, social, are under 

 its control. Occasionally, it is true, there come into men's lives 

 experiences of an exceptional character, elevating, ennobling, or 

 depressing, which ever afterward in retrospection stand alone like 

 mountain-peaks towering above the monotonous plain of common 

 life. Occasions like these, however, are the exception. The vast 

 majority of the actions and experiences of life are on a level plain : 

 at every point the sway of habit obtains, and the general appearance 

 which the plain presents is determined by the habits which have 

 predominated in the individual life. 



An instance or two, taken from different parts of our nature, will 

 here suffice to show the wide spread influence of habit. The muscular 

 movements of a very young child are generally performed at random, 

 being the outcome of mere inboi'n spontaneous energy. If any co- 

 ordinated movements are found, they are instinctive, or due to reflex 

 processes, and not primarily under control of the will, though capable 

 within certain limits of being bi'ought into subjection. To trace the 

 steps in the development of voluntaiy power of co-ordinated move- 

 ment, e.g., in learning to walk, is merely to show the influence of 

 habit upon the physical part of our nature. Gradually, through the 

 susceptibility of the child's organism to the plastic influence of 

 repetition, the motions of its limbs become co-ordinated, linked 

 together after a regular manner, and the necessity for strenuous 

 attention and voluntary effort at every step dies away. Similarly, 

 in learning to play upon a musical instrument. The great difficulty 

 felt at first in making the movements of the fing(U'3 follow one another 

 coi-rectly is lessened by patient practice, the customary motion becomes 

 easier, until a stage is reached where the mere act of sitting down to 

 the instrument, or commencing the series of movements' involved in 



