Consciousness and Instinct. 131 



which they are proximately due, have no conscious accom- 

 paniments in the case of the first performance of an 

 instinctive act. Still, looking at the instinctive response 

 as a whole and in all its bearings, there seem good reasons 

 for supposing that, if it be automatic, it at any rate in some 

 way affords data to consciousness; and that if the chick 

 be an automaton, it is not merely an unconscious auto- 

 maton. But how, it may be asked, can the observer 

 decide whether consciousness be thus present as an 

 accompaniment, though, so far, without guiding influence ? 

 Only by watching the subsequent behaviour of the bird. 

 We are forced, then, to consider the after-effects in order 

 to determine whether the first peck is accompanied by 

 consciousness or not. And if we do thus watch the bird 

 in its subsequent efforts, we find that they rapidly improve 

 in accuracy, and soon have all the appearance of being 

 under guidance and control, so that they can be modified 

 or checked according to the nature of the object, nice or 

 nasty, as the case may be. Now, we may safely lay down 

 this canon: That which is outside experience can afford no 

 data for the conscious guidance of future behaviour. When 

 we say that conduct is modified in the light of experience, 

 we mean that the consciousness of what happened, say 

 yesterday, helps us to avoid similar consequences to-day. 

 If the happenings of yesterday were unconscious, they 

 could afford no data for to-day's behaviour. If, then, the 

 first peck is unconscious, it is as such completely outside 

 the experience of the chick, and can therefore afford no 

 data for subsequent guidance and control. Similarly, the 

 second, third, and succeeding pecks, so far as automatic 

 and unconscious, afford no data to experience. But 

 observation shows that the activities concerned in pecking 

 are not only guided to further perfection, but play a part 

 in that active life of the little bird which cannot without 



