42 jESSAYS SCIENTIFIC AND PHILOSOPHICAL. 



identical, and the observer is only in the judicial 

 attitude necessary for observation when nothing is 

 going on i.e. when there are no facts to observe. 

 Hume had said almost the same : 



" Should I attempt to experiment on my own mind, 'tis 

 evident this reflection and premeditation would so disturb 

 the operation of any natural principles as must render it 

 impossible to form any just conclusion from the pheno- 

 menon." 



Hence Comte's conclusion is, psychology is no 

 science, but a branch of physiology. 



But this view Herbert Spencer will have none 

 of. Between the physiological order and the 

 psychological there is a barrier which at present 

 is absolute : 



"Physiology (we are told) cannot properly appropriate 

 subjective data, or data wholly inaccessible to external obser- 

 vation." It "ceases to be physiology when it imports into 

 its interpretations a psychical factor, a faculty which no 

 physical research whatever can disclose or identify, or get 

 the remotest glimpse of. ... Psychology under its subjective 

 aspect is a totally unique science, independent of, and anti- 

 thetically opposed to, all other sciences whatever." 



In fact, a purely physiological psychology is as 

 impossible as a subjective account of somnambulism. 

 It is only psychology so far as it is false to its 

 physiological method. 



All this, we take it for granted, Mr. Romanes 

 would allow. Psychological facts must be primarily 

 and directly known in the consciousness of the 

 individual, even if, with Mr. Sully, we allow that 



