210 STUDIES IN LIFE AND SENSE. 



as that on which we purpose now to enter by a glance at some of 

 those general relations between the material frame and its immaterial 

 emotions which serve to demonstrate the tacit harmony exhibited 

 by the powers which rule and the subject that obeys. No facts of 

 physiology stand out in bolder relief than those which deal with the 

 common and united action of brain and body, in the ordinary affairs 

 of e very-day existence. So perfectly adjusted is this co-operation 

 between body and mind we speak of, that in the vast majority of 

 instances we ourselves the very subjects of its action may be 

 utterly ignorant of the existence of any such league. Like the system 

 of secret espionage which in its most perfect phases moves and lives 

 with us and beside us all unsuspected and unknown, the operations 

 which issue from the head-centre of our corporeal government may 

 be absolutely hidden from us whilst continually we live and act 

 under their behests. We literally take no thought for the morrow of 

 our existence, because we are accustomed to have so much of that 

 existence regulated independently of consciousness, and certainly 

 without the exercise of will. The food upon which we subsist is 

 inspected, so to speak, on its presentation to the senses ; but its 

 preparation, and its elaboration to form blood, are matters which are 

 adjusted by that perfect system of control which the nerve-centre 

 exercises over the commissariat department. Even before that food 

 has become ours, we may experience unconscious or automatic 

 action of the bodily processes, when, at the sight of the dainty, the 

 salivary glands are stimulated to the manufacture of their fluid, and 

 the " mouth waters " the digestive act in question being but the 

 natural, though somewhat ill-advised, prelude to the actual reception 

 by the mouth of the desired morsel. The circulation through our 

 body of the vital fluid, and the ceaseless thud of the central engine 

 of the blood-flow, similarly remind us of active processes on the 

 exact continuance of which our life depends, and which neverthe- 

 less are regulated apart from the will, and in greater part outside the 

 bounds of waking knowledge. 



The consideration of this practically uncontrolled continuance 

 of these actions becomes, in one view at least, of highly gratifying 

 nature since it is within the bounds of probability that, were the 

 control of such important processes a matter of unremitting at- 

 tention, the exigencies of human life, by withdrawing our attention 

 from their due regulation, might conduce to the premature ending of 

 life itself, whilst sleep itself in such an event would be an impossible 

 condition. In many other ways and fashions does the brief chronicle 

 of the bodily rule bring forcibly before us the independence of our 

 attention and consciousness in so far as the government of every- 

 day existence is concerned. The morning walk to business through 

 the crowded thoroughfares, when we are wrapt in the mantle of 



