THE SKIN AND COMMON SENSATION. 975 



excite the active search for food. The drawing in of the muscle of the 



abdominal wall, which is the motor reply elicitable by the testicle, 



may be interpreted as protective in reference to its original intra- 

 abdominal location. 



How far the pain sensation is a part or an accompaniment of the reflex 

 reaction, which by calling upon motility protects the individual, is questionable. 

 Ordinarily the two are concomitant and colligated. Many l hold the motor re- 

 action to be secondary to the mental. There are, however, those who hold that 

 in the case of the " feelings " the psychical effect is secondary to the efferent 

 vascular 2 and visceral. 3 Of the coarser emotions it has been argued by James that 

 the feeling does not cause, but is caused by the bodily expression. The bodily 

 changes, according to him, follow directly the perception of the exciting fact, 

 and our feeling of the same changes as they occur is the emotion. Certain 

 experiments furnish evidence not highly satisfactory that all pleasurable 

 states of consciousness are accompanied by bodily movements of extension, and 

 all painful by movements of flexion. These movements may be very slight. 

 Miinsterberg 4 concludes that the feeling of agreeableness is the mental accom- 

 paniment and outcome of reflexly produced movements of extension, and dis- 

 agreeableness of the movements of flexion. Of the pain-feeling and the pain- 

 reflexes which are colligated results of certain stimuli, the latter, the reflexes, 

 seem to persist under conditions of mutilation of the central nervous system, 

 that are by most accepted to preclude the possibility of conscious reactions, and 

 in disease where feeling of pain is lost. 5 Granting the weight of evidence pre- 

 ponderates against the possession of capacity for pain by animal forms of low 

 neural organisation, 6 vestiges of the motor reflexes accompanying pain in 

 higher forms are nevertheless possessed by them. The motor part of the total 

 " pain reaction," both somatic and visceral, may have the more ancient 

 evolutional history. Sense pain of high intensity may therefore be a means 

 comparatively recently evolved, and now in evolution, for the better protection 

 of the higher organisms. It is probable, however, that in the earlier grades of 

 evolution of sense all species of sensation were more equally endowed with 

 affective tone. The skin, unlike the sheltered viscera, is bare to the vicissitudes 

 of the environment. Its more abundant opportunity has led in it to the more 

 complete evolution and education of a sense of pain. Feeling of pain works 

 beneficially for the preservation of the organism 7 possessing it, and since it is 

 in action before, and is maintained until the end of sexual maturity, favours 

 directly the preservation of the species. In the struggle for existence it is 

 doubtless one of the most potent weapons nature has devised. But it seems 

 to predicate a certain advanced grade of neural organisation. There is little 

 evidence that it is present in lowly organisms. To those possessing it the 

 higher animal forms it dispenses an enormous competitive advantage. It is 

 perhaps the primary determinant of "will." 8 It is noteworthy that in the 

 human race there is some evidence that it is more developed in civilised 

 than in uncivilised populations. The theory of utility is merely a conscious 



1 C. Bell, "Anatomy and Philosophy of Expression," London, 1806; H. Spencer, 

 "Principles of Psychology," London, 1855, vol. ii. ; C. Darwin, "Expression of the 

 Emotions," London, 1873; Duchenne, " Mechan. d. physionomie humaine," Paris, 1862; 

 Gratiolet, "Physionomie," Paris, 1866, etc. 



2 Lange, "Ueber Genmthsbewegungen, " Leipzig, 1887; Sergi, "Dolore e piacere," 

 Milano, 1894 ; Riv. di social., 1896, tome iii. p. 23. 



3 James, Mind, London and Edinb., 1884, vol. ix. ; "Psychology," vol. ii. p. 457 ; also 

 PsychoL Rev., N. Y. and London, 1894, vol. ii. 



4 " Lust and Unlust," "Beitr. z. exper. PsychoL," No. 4. 



5 See H. Weber, op. cit., p. 520 (footnote). 



6 See Loeb, Arch. f. d. ges. PhysioL, Bonn, 1894, Bd. Ivi. ; \V. W. Norman, ibid., 

 1897, Bd, Ixvii. 



7 H. Spencer, op. cit., vol. i. 



8 See Brentano, " Psycho!.," 1874, ch. viii. 



