Neural Integration 177 



even though when viewed one by one or in secondary groups 

 they are antagonistic. 



Such a conception of the real nature of antagonistic re- 

 flexes is favored by the seemingly general fact that these 

 reflexes are seldom if ever really destructive of one another, 

 since they do not act upon one another simultaneously, 

 Their antagonism consists in a successional opposition to 

 one another. As they follow one another one acts in the 

 opposite direction to the other, and the antagonism is the 

 more real in that frequently they overlap to some extent. 

 But as already said this overlapping probably never amounts 

 to complete coincidence. Such overlappings and other 

 forms of partial opposition constitute the phenomena of in- 

 hibition which play a great role in the sum total of reflexes 

 of the organism. This is part of the method by which 

 transition is accomplished from one reflex to another, where 

 the same muscles, for example, execute both. But the fact 

 that the transition is accomplished normally "without con- 

 fusion," to use Sherrington's phrase, shows the subordina- 

 tion of the inhibitions to the organism as a whole. 



Another important fact to which Sherrington calls at- 

 tention is that inhibitions which reflexes produce upon one 

 another never, so far as is known, result in injury to the 

 tissues involved. Genuine opposition of reflexes, as of any 

 other sorts of physical or chemical action, would, according 

 to all our conceptions of natural bodies, have deleterious 

 effects on the opposing bodies. As a matter of fact, in- 

 hibiting reflexes not only do not injure the mechanisms in- 

 volved, but actually prepare them for greater functional 

 activity later on. 14 



This beneficent effect, as it might be called, of inhibition 

 is perhaps illustrated by certain forms of compensatory 

 reflexes. Thus, stimulation of the central end of the nerve 

 to the extensor muscles of the dog's knee results in contrac- 

 tion of the flexors of the hip and knee. But on removal of 



