EVOLUTION OF FEELING AND EMOTION 283 
its end, are sources of displeasure. This is the widest gene- 
ralization which we can frame, from a purely psychological 
point of view, as regards the conditions of pleasure and dis- 
pleasure respectively.” Here Dr. Stout seems carefully to 
avoid the commonly accepted and much advertised conclusion, 
that pleasure and pain (to use this more familiar word as 
the antithesis of pleasure) are themselves the end of conative 
endeavour. And he is so far right that they by no means 
constitute the sole or indeed the primary end of all conative 
process. Attention is a conative act; but its primary end 
is not pleasure, but rather, as Dr. Stout says,* the fuller 
presentation of the object. No doubt this brings pleasure ; 
but the fuller presentation comes first, and carries the pleasure 
with it. Instinctive response to felt stimulus falls within the 
conative attitude. In it there is that “inherent tendency 
to pass beyond itself and become something different,” which 
Dr. Stout assigns to conation as its chief characteristic. But 
the end is not pleasure, but simply the instinctive behaviour. 
And if we say that the attainment of this end does bring 
satisfaction, which is a form of pleasure, Dr. Stout would 
probably reply that this is rather a result of the process than 
its true end. 
Now, in such cases, what we are really dealing with is a 
class of organic processes having conscious accompaniments. 
No doubt the conscious accompaniments are of importance ; 
they certainly cannot be neglected by the psychologist : but 
their feeling-tone does not constitute that which makes 
instinct run its course. And I have introduced the subject 
for present discussion in this way to reinforce what has already 
been repeatedly urged in the foregoing pages, that individual 
behaviour, in its first intent, is a biological legacy with ends 
predetermined through heredity. The inherent tendency to 
pass beyond itself and become something different, which for 
the old psychology was a heaven-sent impulse, or, as Addison 
said, “an immediate impression from the first Mover and the 
Divine energy acting in the creatures,” becomes for the new 
* Op. cit., p. 65. 
