ORIGIN OF PHYSICAL CONCEPTS 27 



tion of the blind and that of the vident. M. Villey 

 denies this altogether. He affirms that the image 

 of an object which the blind acquires by touch 

 readily divests itself of the characters of tactual 

 sensation and differs profoundly from these. He 

 takes the example of a chair. The vident apprehends 

 its various features simultaneously and at once ; 

 the blind, by successive tactual palpations. But 

 he maintains that the evidence of the blind is 

 unanimous on this point, that once formed in the 

 mind the idea of the chair presents itself to him 

 immediately as a whole, the order in which 

 its features were ascertained is not preserved, and 

 does not require to be repeated. Indeed, the idea 

 divests itself of the great bulk of the tactual 

 details by which it was apprehended, whilst the 

 muscular sensations which accompanied the act 

 of palpation never seek to be joined with the idea. 

 This divestiture of sensation proceeds to such 

 an extent that there is nothing left beyond what 

 M. Villey calls the pure form. The belief in the 

 reality of the object he refers to its resistance. 

 The origin of each of these is exert ional. The 

 features upon which the mind dwells, if it dwells 

 upon them at all, are les qualites qui sont con- 

 stamment utiles pour la pratique in a word, the 

 dynamic significance of the thing. 



