102 SCIENCE AND METHOD. 



and I represent to myself the muscular sensations that 

 would have accompanied the movement. And by 

 the same movement of the left arm, accompanied 

 by the same sensations, I could equally have reached 

 the object B. 



And this is very important, since it is in this 

 way that I could defend myself against the dangers 

 with which the object A or the object B might threaten 

 me. With each of the blows that may strike us, 

 nature has associated one or several parries which 

 enable us to protect ourselves against them. The 

 same parry may answer to several blows. It is 

 thus, for instance, that the same movement of the 

 right arm would have enabled us to defend our- 

 selves at the moment a against the object A, and 

 at the moment fS against the object B. Similarly, the 

 same blow may be parried in several ways, and we 

 have said, for instance, that we could reach the object 

 A equally well either by a certain movement of the 

 right arm, or by a certain movement of the left. 



All these parries have nothing in common with one 

 another, except that they enable us to avoid the same 

 blow, and it is that, and nothing but that, we 

 mean when we say that they are movements ending 

 in the same point in space. Similarly, these objects, 

 of which we say that they occupy the same point in 

 space, have nothing in common, except that the same 

 parry can enable us to defend ourselves against them. 



Or, if we prefer it, let us imagine innumerable 

 telegraph wires, some centripetal and others centri- 

 fugal. The centripetal wires warn us of accidents 

 that occur outside, the centrifugal wires have to 

 provide the remedy. Connexions are established 



