RATIONAL LIFE 273 



one is continuous under the same laws, passing 

 through the nerve-cells to the nerve-fibres, and con 

 tinuing onwards to the muscles. The mental activity 

 is discontinuous. After sensory movement has reached 

 the nerve-cells, it is not propagated by the aid of 

 nerve-fibres, or other physical structure. Sensory 

 impressions end ; intellectual activity comes from a 

 distinct source. It comes to receive these new im 

 pressions, in harmony with its own generalisations in 

 the past. Here is the contrast between man, and 

 animal. Here also is the contrast between physical 

 and mental in the life of man himself. An object 

 moves among the bushes ; the movement arrests the 

 eye of the cat, and of the dog, and of the man, in 

 exactly the same way. All three at once turn towards 

 the moving object. By all three, the movement of 

 the eye is similarly effected. The movement in each 

 case is a reflex, dependent on the sensory impression, 

 and bringing similar muscles into use. We account 

 for what has happened in the three cases, by reference 

 exclusively to nerves of sensibility, to nerve-cells 

 stimulated in the brain, and to motor-fibres brought 

 into use to work the muscles. But there is no such 

 continuity of action when thought and purpose are 

 formed by the man. No action of nerve sensibility 

 can reach rational generalisation, or work up such 

 generalisation, so as to originate it. The man remarks 

 that the movement which has arrested attention is 

 that of a bird, that the bird is a bullfinch; and 

 desiring to protect the bird, he calls back his dog, and 

 drives away the cat. In this course of action, nerve- 

 cells and nerve-fibres are called into use, just as 

 before, and these work just as they operate in every 



