THE ROOT-PRINCIPLES OF MIND. 55 



Feeling and of Choice into the vegetable kingdom. If it is 

 true that plants manifest so little evidence of Feeling that 

 the term can only be applied to them in a metaphorical sense, 

 it is also true that the power of Choice which they display is 

 of a similarly undeveloped character ; it is limited to a single 

 act of discrimination, and therefore no one would think of 

 applying the term to such an act, until analysis reveals that 

 in such a single act of discrimination we have the germ of 

 all volition. 



Let it therefore be understood that the difficulty which 

 we are considering arises merely from the gradual manner in 

 which the faculties in question arose. The rudimentary 

 power of discriminative excitability which a plant displays 

 is commensurate with the rudimentary power of selective 

 adjustment which it manifests in its movements ; and, just as 

 the one is destined by developmental elaboration to become a 

 self-conscious subjectivity, so the other is destined, by a 

 similar elaboration, to become a deliberative volition. 



I shall now briefly glance at the ascending scale of 

 organisms, with the view of showing that this proportional 

 relation between the grade of receptive and that of executive 

 ability is manifested throughout the series. I desire to make 

 it plain that the power of discrimination which in its higher 

 manifestations we recognize as Feeling, and the power of 

 selective adjustment which in its higher manifestations we 

 recognize as Choice, are developed together, and throughout 

 their development are commensurate. 



Amoeba is able to distinguish between nutritious and non- 

 nutritious particles, and in correspondence with this one act 

 of discrimination it is able to perform one act of adjustment ; 

 it is able to enclose and to digest the nutritious particles, 

 while it rejects the non-nutritious. Some protoplasmic and 

 unicellular organisms are able, also to distinguish between 

 light and darkness, and to adapt their movements to seek the 

 one and shun the other; while in " Animal Intelligence" 

 some observations are given which seem to show that the 

 discriminative ami adjnative powers of these organisms m;iy 

 go farther even than this. The insectivorous plants, as we 

 have already seen, are able to distinguish, not only between 

 nutritious and non-nutritions particles, but also between 



ditteivnt kinds of contact ; and, in correspondence with this 



advance in receptive power, we observe a commensurate 



