CHAP, x.] OF THOUGHT. 435 



First of all, the reflex action is absolutely unconscious. There 

 is an agitation of the afferent fibres, excitation of the cells, which 

 react upon the efferent fibres. At a higher degree, the nervous 

 cell sensibilises : it becomes conscious of the vibration of its 

 molecules; it experiences the sensations of touch, taste, &c.,more 

 or less varied and numerous according as the organ is more or 

 less perfect. At the same time it has impressions of pain or of 

 pleasure. At this stage the conscious being is still very inferior ; 

 each sensation, each impression, dies as soon as it is born ; there 

 is no chain of conscious phenomena, no link, no relation in the 

 psychical life. But everything changes, when the nervous cell 

 preserves the trace of the reflex act of which it has been the 

 centre. It is, so to speak, impregnated with it, as certain phos- 

 phorescent substances catch the luminous rays, as a plate of 

 prepared collodion stores up the luminous waves. 1 From that 

 moment, the conscious phenomena are linked together ; those 

 which come last find in the nervous centres the echo of those 

 which have preceded them. Speaking in the language of the 

 psychologists, we may say that the faculties are now born. The 

 traces of past sensations and impressions become recollections; 

 there is memory. Then these recollections are disunited, group 

 themselves capriciously, forming complex pictures, fictitious as a 

 whole, though formed of old sensations and impressions ; this is 

 imagination. But from persistent impressions of pain and pi 

 sure spring desires to escape the former, to feel the latter. 

 Impressionability, sensibility, imagination, gather round these 

 desires, and are more or less vigorously incited by them. This 

 co-ordination of impressions, sensations, images, with the attain- 

 ment of one object in view, becomes ratiocination, and the 

 faculty of effecting this co-ordination is what psychologists have 

 called understanding, intelligence, reason ; in the same way that 

 the conscious result of every confrontation, every comparison, 

 amongst themselves, of impressions, sensations, &c., is called 

 idea, thought. Finally, every desire preceded and accompanied 

 1 J. Luys, Itecherches sur le Syst&me Nerveux, etc., p. 270. 



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