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10 ON LIFE AND ORGANISATION. 



mitted along the nerve to the vesicular matter of the central nervous 



organ. 



This process of sensation, then, lies partly -without, partly 

 within, the consciousness. The impression on what is called the 

 sensible part, and the transmission along the nerve, are beyond the 

 consciousness, and would continue so were its passage interrupted ; 

 but when it affects the nervous centre, it enters the region of con- 

 sciousness, it hecomes recognised, and assumes the form of a 

 psychological fact. 



It must be observed, however, that the apprehension now 

 under consideration is entirely subjective. The intelligence merely 

 apprehends an affection of itself. There has taken place no appre- 

 hension whatever of the object which produced the impression 

 transmitted and recognised. 



The apprehension of the ohject itself requires a higher phase 

 of intelligence. It requires a power of interpreting the sensa- 

 tion, or of apprehending it in a form peculiar to the kind of sensa- 

 tion, whatever that may be. 



The intelligence now no longer apprehends a sense — a mere 

 affection of itself — hut it apprehends an object from which pro- 

 ceeded the impression which induced that sense. 



This peculiar intuitive power possessed by the intelligence of 

 objectifying a sensation, is denominated, in the language of ancient 

 Psychology — Perception. 



We have now reached the point at which may be recognised 

 the difference between the intelligence in man and in the brute. 



From the first moment that the intelligence of an animal is 

 awakened by sensations, and contemporaneous with the correspond- 

 ing intuitive perceptions, it becomes conscious. It becomes con- 

 scious of external objects, as out of itself, and as having certain 

 relations to itself. It is able immediately and directly to determine 

 the position and other relations of the objects it perceives, in 

 relation to the surface of its own organism. 



It is enabled to do this immediately and directly, under the 

 influence of a power, acting according to certain laws — a power 

 to which we apply the collective term — Instinct. 



In man, again, where his intelligence has been awakened by 

 sensations, and contemporaneous with the corresponding percep- 



