CHAP. VII.] REFLEX AND INSTINCTIVE MOVEMENTS. 199 



tion that follows a dash of cold water on the skin, and the writhings 

 produced by tickling, are instances attended with consciousness. 

 All muscular actions consequent on pain, and which are not the 

 immediate act of the will, are similar in kind, though the stimulus 

 producing them is unnatural. 



Reflective movements are sometimes called instinctive ; but this 

 term is better limited to actions resulting from a propensity in the 

 mind, of the meaning of which we are ignorant, but which we 

 follow blindly without reference to consequences. Such propensi- 

 ties are developed in animals much more than in man; arid in man 

 more during his infancy than in his mature state, when reason 

 asserts her domination over instinct. Instinct exhibits foresight ; 

 but it is the foresight of the Creator, and not of the creature. It 

 is the reason of God working with the material instruments of the 

 creature's reason, independently of the creature's will. Hence the 

 movements consequent on its impulses have all the concatenation 

 and character of movements impelled by reason through the will ; 

 while they are altogether independent of the will. Instinctive 

 movements approach the most nearly to voluntary ones. 



Thus passion, emotion, reflected stimulation, and instinctive im- 

 pulses will all excite involuntary movements of the voluntary mus- 

 cles; but, in the natural state of the body, all these causes are 

 found acting in harmony with one another, often conspiring to 

 produce the same movement. The power of the will to controul 

 them is but slight, and in some cases null. It differs with the 

 original strength of that faculty, with the temperament of the 

 individual, and especially with the degree in which it has been 

 affected by habit. The power of this law is in nothing more con- 

 spicuous than in its influence over the human will. A frequent 

 and energetic repetition of voluntary acts of controul over the in- 

 voluntary movements of passion, emotion, and instinct, is invariably 

 followed by an increased power of controul, and vice versd. This 

 also extends (but in a less degree) to those movements of voluntary 

 muscles, consequent on reflex stimulation, which are not essential 

 to life. 



AY hen movements, which have been at first voluntary, come to be 

 performed more or less unconsciously, they are styled mechanical. 

 A thousand instances of them might be given ; all voluntary ones 

 becoming more or less so by habit. The nervous paths through 

 which the mandates of the will pass to the muscles grow more 

 accessible and open by use; and less and less effort of volition 

 becomes necessary to thread them, every time that effort is made. 



