152 EVOLUTION AND MAN S PLACE IN NATURE 



crimination is utilised so as to provide a higher know 

 ledge. Thus, in our own experience, the two powers, 

 sensibility and understanding, co-operate in securing 

 a two-fold knowledge, easily distinguished, conscious 

 ness of sensation, and knowledge of its significance. 

 The sensory impression is one thing ; its objective 

 significance is quite another thing. That the im 

 pression may be complex does not affect this dis 

 tinction. Any number of impressions from any 

 number of sensory sources, falling simultaneously on 

 a mind which has not yet experienced them separately, 

 will yield a single undivided object to that mind. 1 

 The noticing of any part whatever of our object is 

 an act of discrimination. - We discriminate objects, 

 and parts of objects. We contemplate present sensory 

 experience in the light of past experience. Only in 

 this way, can the meaning of the present sensory 

 experience be apprehended. Thus, by a power of 

 comparison, with memory, and use of the law of 

 causality, we have a knowledge of the qualities of 

 objects coming into contact with our organism. 

 Sensibility is the pre-requisite for such knowledge, 

 but it is insufficient for its attainment. Sensible 

 discrimination is the limit of experience for a great 

 portion of organic life on the earth. With us, it is 

 otherwise. Consequent on touching an object, or being 

 touched by an object, we have a knowledge of the 

 object itself, as a thing separate from other objects 

 around. The difference between sensible discrimination 

 and intelligent, is known within the lines of our own 

 experience. When we touch one object, and im- 



1 Text-Book of Psychology, by William James, p. 245. 

 \Ibid., p. 244. 



