vin PRACTICAL JUDGMENT 165 



stinctive or habitual. 1 The action may be so far novel that 

 I may never have left a book in this particular room before. 

 Experience gives knowledge of certain relations which are 

 utilised in action when they can be so applied to present 

 circumstances as to lead up to a desired end. The relations 

 may be first perceived in circumstances in which they are 

 indifferent, and give rise to no reaction. They are after- 

 wards applied in fresh circumstances, and so become a 

 guide to action. Clearly, in such instances, there is no 

 preformed habit. 



As judged from outward action, then, the certain 

 signs of purposive action appear so far to be these two : 

 The relation upon which it is based may be experi- 

 enced without leading to the formation of a habit ; 2 

 and again, may be applied in circumstances differing 

 from those in which it was originally perceived. Action 

 may often be purposive without possessing these marks, 

 but where we find these marks we may be sure that it 

 is purposive. 



e. Idea and Desire. 



The purposive act, not being guided by response to per- 

 ception, is determined by reference to an end. This act of 

 reference we know in the human consciousness as an idea. 

 We are thus brought to the primitive function that ideas 

 fulfil in conduct. As long as impulses are fixed in rela- 

 tion to stimulus, whether by heredity or habit, action 

 neither requires nor tolerates any further guide. But if 

 the ends of an impulse are to be served by actions varying: 



f T ' 1 & 



irom case to case, a unitorm reaction to uniform stimulus 

 will no longer do. Minor adjustments to perceived varia- 

 tions are effected by present consciousness in sensori- 

 motor action, but if behaviour is to be suitably adapted to 

 remote results something more is required, and the case 



1 This statement applies only to the determining factors of the act, for, 

 just as the walking is a reflex, so my turning one way or another may be, 

 when once the general direction is fixed, carried out more or less 

 mechanically. Conscious adjustments constantly make use of subordinate 

 mechanical factors. 



2 The clearest case of this is, of course, where the relation experienced 

 is not between the action of an organism and its effects, but between two 

 or more events or objects which it perceives. 



