CHAP. XXVI. ] WILL AND VOLUNTARY MOVEMENTS. 549 



different kinds of Movements which we are capable of 

 executing. So just were his observations that they still 

 represent the basis of our knowledge on this subject. 



Hartley sought also, though with less success, to make 

 a first rough classification of Movements, from the point 

 of view of the mental state or process by which they were 

 preceded, when he said : " Of the two sorts of Motion, 

 viz., Automatic and Voluntary, the first depends upon 

 Sensation, the last upon Ideas." 



This, even apart from certain necessary qualifications 

 which Hartley would have himself assented to, cannot be 

 regarded as a very correct generalization. Some auto- 

 matic actions, such as those of the Heart, Intestines, and 

 other viscera; are due to ' unfelt ' Impressions which can 

 scarcely be called Sensations ; whilst others are incited by 

 those ' internally initiated ' feelings known as Emotions 

 which are more akin to Ideas than to Sensations. Again, 

 Ideas are sometimes provocative of automatic movements, 

 as when to name only one of the best instances a ludi- 

 crous Idea impels us to Laughter ; though in multitudes 

 of other instances it is perfectly true that Ideas are the 

 primary incitors of Voluntary Movements. Between 

 these extremes, moreover, numerous insensible grada- 

 tions are to be met with : we have movements, for 

 instance, that are scarcely to be termed Automatic, and 

 yet which physiologists have also deemed desirable to 

 mark off from the category of strictly Voluntary Move- 

 ments as they have shown by their application to them 

 of the epithet ' Ideo-motor.' 



That actions, which are at first Voluntary, tend, after a 

 time, when frequently repeated, to become truly Automatic, 

 Hartley was, of course, fully aware. It was he who first 

 proposed to class such actions as ' Secondary Automatic,' 

 in opposition to those of his ' Primary Automatic ' category 



