PERCEPTIONS. 475 



nothing but states of ourselves, but, as already pointed 

 out, we have no hesitation in saying we feel a hard or a 

 cold, a rough or smooth body. When we look at a distant 

 object we usually make no demur to saying that we perceive 

 it. What we really feel is, however, the change produced by 

 it in our eyes. There are no parts of our Bodies reaching 

 to a tree or a house a mile off and yet we seem to feel all 

 the while that we are looking at the tree or the house and 

 feeling them, and not merely experiencing modifications of 

 our own eyes or brains. When reading we feel that what 

 we really see is the book; and yet the existence of the book 

 is a judgment founded on a state of our Body, which alone 

 is what we truly feel. 



We have the same experience in other cases, for example 

 with regard to touch. 



Hairs are quite insensible, but are imbedded in the sen- 

 sitive skin, which is excited when they are moved. But if 

 the tip of a hair be touched by some external object we be- 

 lieve we feel the contact at its insensible end, and not in 

 the sensitive skin at its root. So, the hard parts of the 

 teeth are insensible; yet when we rub them together we refer 

 the seat of the sensation aroused to the points where they 

 touch one another, and not to the sensitive parts around 

 the sockets where the sensory nerve impulse is really started. 



Still more, we may refer tactile sensations, not merely to 

 the distal ends of insensible bodies implanted in the skin, 

 but to the far ends of things which are not parts of our 

 Bodies at all; for instance, the distant end of a rod held 

 between the finger and a table. We then believe we feel 

 touch or pressure in two places; one where the rod touches 

 our finger, and the other where it comes in contact with 

 the table. We have, simultaneously, sensations at two 

 places separated by the length of the rod. If we hold the rod 

 immovably on the table we feel only its end next the fin- 

 ger. If we could fix it immovably on the finger while the 

 other end was movable on the table, we would lose the sen- 

 sation at the finger and only believe we felt the pressure 

 where the rod touched the table. When a tooth is touched 

 with a rod we only feel the contact at its end, unless it is 



