672 PHYSIOLOGY OF THE CEREBRUM 



The pathways between the centers which rouse our desires and the intel- 

 lectual regions of the cortex are not called upon merely to clothe the content 

 of sense experiences in ideas, to idealize them in short, nor merely to facilitate 

 their satisfaction by recognition of means to that end. But there is set up 

 along some associative pathway an interplay, a working of ideas which leads 

 to the maturation of self-consciousness as a contest between sense and reason. 

 Along with inciting impulses there arise some with which feelings of restraint 

 are connected and thus the discharge of memory pictures through the bodily 

 desires comes to have a distinctly moral significance. The motives are neces- 

 sarily robbed of all their ideal character the struggle between the sensuous 

 and the moral feelings is sure to lapse, the moment the force of the intellectual 

 centers is paralyzed and the rational content of the emotions disappears. Con- 

 trol of the emotions requires a powerful cerebrum, which probably means in 

 the first instance soundness of the frontal association centers. 



A purely mechanical factor is concerned in this control of the lower im- 

 pulses of the cerebrum. In so far as the bodily impulses do not arise by the 

 automatic excitations of the central nerve cells, they belong by nature to 

 the category of reflex processes, and like all reflexes are continually held in 

 check by the cerebrum. When the cerebrum becomes weak this mechanical 

 restraint is relaxed and the bodily incentive gains greater control over the 

 rational centers. 



Through the investigation of the material conditions of the mind's activity, 

 medicine is thus brought into immediate relations with the moral sciences, 

 and it is indeed conceivable that once she has properly grasped the problem, 

 she will unhesitatingly press forward to the front rank of those forces which 

 have made the moral elevation of mankind their chief concern. Investigation 

 to-day is not led, as was the philosophy of the Enlightenment in the Eighteenth 

 Century, by an instinctive hatred for the dogma of the immateriality of the 

 soul, for that dogma in no way prevents our undertaking the moral elevation 

 of the race from the bodily side. What we must insist upon is merely this 

 that the moral powers of the mind like its other powers depend to a great 

 extent upon the body. 



A general clearing up of problems pertaining to the hygiene of the brain 

 is therefore eminently necessary. Much remains to be done along this line, 

 if we are to succeed in strengthening and establishing the natural grounds 

 of the moral feelings even for future generations. Certain it is that our 

 efforts will be successful in a measure directly proportional to the opportunities 

 afforded the mentally and morally unfortunate of profiting by the deeper 

 insight and better desires of those whose lives are ruled by high ideals. 



But it is not alone the practical goals of life of which we get a glimpse 

 in these considerations of the mechanics of the mind. As that which we 

 already realize to be one of the noblest sides of our being, and which is 

 bestowed on mankind in virtue of the intellectual centers of the brain, becomes 

 embodied in the desire to comprehend the natural order of things in the 

 realm of spirit also, the real advances of our knowledge in this realm of 

 natural science lead' us with the compelling force of a natural law at last to 

 an ideal view of the world. The more the true magnitude of the real power 

 resident in the realm of mind itself is revealed to us, the more clearly do we 



