970 Dynamic Theory. 



only in regard to the vividness of the recollection of the incidents and 

 circumstances leading to the original enjo}'ment in the first place, 

 but also in regard to the sensation of the enjoyment itself. The more 

 we dwell upon it, the more we enjoy it, and the happiness of one day be- 

 comes the happiness of a lifetime ; as "a thing of beauty is a joy forever. " 

 But with grievous and unhappy memories the case is apparently differ- 

 ent. While the recollection of the incidents and circumstances leading 

 to an unhappy event do not fade from memory, and may be kept bright 

 and vivid, the pain attending the recollection constantly diminishes in 

 all well balanced and healthy people. The reason is, that sensations of 

 pain indicate a state of inharmony or collision, in which one set of or- 

 gans are in antagonistical relations with others, the two opposite sorts 

 tending by their adverse actions to undo or neutralize each other. (See 

 page 7 11.) It is the same process which was discussed in the last 

 chapter under the title of inhibition. The organs of painful memories, 

 being in a condition of inharmony with the other organs previously 

 built up in the brain, the latter automatically by their activities tend to 

 inhibit the former, and so gradually reduce their vividness, while the 

 memories of the events themselves, so far as they may be considered 

 without connecting them too closely with our personalit} 7 , remain with- 

 out being antagonized and inhibited by the others. The possibility of 

 this sort of discrimination is confirmatory of the view here taken of the 

 distinction between thought and sensation, and the existence of sepa- 

 rate organs for the latter. If sensation were merely a part of the func- 

 tion of thought, it is difficult to see how it could be inhibited without 

 inhibiting the thought itself. But here we have satisfactory evidence 

 of the inhibition of sensibility by a gradual process operating upon 

 principles essentially the same as those of the rapid process by which it 

 can be made to take place in hypnotism. 



When a grief or pain is overpowering, attention is forced to it, and 

 it cannot be neutralized by the adverse action of the other organs. It 

 becomes a dominant idea, and the subject becomes dejected and melan- 

 choty, perhaps insane. 



Sensations of pleasure and pain are in one sense sensations of per- 

 ceptions or comparisons. If we hear a wonderful statement of some 

 things purporting to be fact, but which contradicts everything else we 

 know, there is an automatic comparison between the alleged new fact 

 and our standard organs, and since it cannot reinforce any one of them, 

 it is rejected or inhibited as to its pretension to be true. So that al- 

 though we afterwards remember the story, we fail to remember it as be- 

 ing true. A similar comparison automatically made in the case of 

 stimulations that relate to things which intimately concern ourselves, at 

 once settles the point whether they harmonize with the general run of 



