312 BAIN ON THE EMOTIONS AXD THE WILL. 



suits of de-tailed analysis aided by development. Whether 

 we trace mental progression through the grades of the ani 

 mal kingdom, through the grades of mankind, or through 

 the stages of individual growth ; it is obvious that the ad 

 vance, alike in cognitions and feelings, is, and must l&amp;gt;o, 

 from the preservative to the more and more remotely rep 

 resentative. It is undeniable that intelligence ascends 

 from those simple perceptions in which consciousness is 

 occupied in localizing and classifying sensations, to percep 

 tions more and more compound, to simple reasoning, to 

 reasoning more and more complex and abstract more 

 and more remote from sensation. And in the evolution of 

 feelings, there is a parallel series of steps. Simple sensa 

 tions ; sensations combined together ; sensations combined 

 with represented sensations; represented sensations organ 

 ized into groups, in which their separate characters arc 

 very much merged ; representations of these representa 

 tive groups, in which the original components have be 

 come still more vague. In both cases, the progress 

 has necessarily been from the simple and concrete to 

 the complex and abstract : and as with the cognitions, 

 so with the feelings, this must be the basis of classifi 

 cation. 



The space here occupied with criticisms on Mr. Bain s 

 work, we might have filled with exposition and eulogy, had 

 we thought this the more important. Though we have 

 freely pointed out what we conceive to be its defects, let it 

 not be inferred that we question its great merits. We re 

 peat that, as a natural history of the mind, we believe it to 

 be the best yet produced. It is a most valuable collection 

 of carefully-elaborated materials. Perhaps we cannot bet 

 ter express our sense of its worth, than by saying that, to 

 those who hereafter give to this branch of Psychology a 

 thoroughly scientific organization, Mr. Bain s book will bo 

 indispensable. 



