MENTAL STATES AND PROCESSES. 73 



its reference to psychical as well as physical processes. 

 It tends to give rise to a persuasion that psychical acts, 

 which our own minds show us to be different in nature, 

 are themselves fundamentally similar, because there 

 may be a similarity in the physical processes which 

 accompany both. 



Mr. Romanes makes * the great distinction between 

 recepts and concepts to consist in the former being 

 *Weceived,'' while, he tells us, the latter "require to be 

 conceived^ But in forming recepts as well as concepts, 

 we need to be active agents as well as passive recipients. 

 In both cases the psychical entity energizes and evolves 

 something new, according to the nature of the entity 

 which acts. A merely sensitive psychical entity, or 

 Soul, t can (it is admitted on all hands) evolve recepts 

 as a consequence of receiving due sensuous stimuli. A 

 rational Soul can (it is admitted on all hands) also 

 evolve concepts as a consequence of receiving due 

 intellectual stimuli. It evolves in either case active, 

 psychical states, which existed potentially before stimu- 

 lation, but, of course, not actually. So much must be 

 universally admitted. We, of course, further contend 

 that a merely sensitive psychical entity, such as the soul, 

 or principle of individuation,;]: of an amoeba, an ant, or 

 an ape, cannot by any stimulation be made to evolve 

 an intellectual product. 



Mr. Romanes proceeds to ask,§ " To what level of 



* p. 49- 



t As to this term, see " On Truth," pp. 390-392, 422, 424? 42?) 



430, 434. 



X As to this term, see Ibid., pp. 422, 433-435- § P- 5^. 



