CHAP, vi.] SOME OTHER SENSATIONS. 283 



" renal colic," caused by the impact of a calculus in the ureteris 

 referred by us not to the ureter itself but to adjoining parts, to 

 the corresponding somatic segment ; and so in other instances. 

 We can also recognize certain characters in different pains, 

 beyond that of the mere degree of intensity ; wa speak of pains 

 as being burning, aching, gnawing, cutting, throbbing and the 

 like. But in all cases the pain remains a mere sensation ; when 

 it comes, all we can say is that we feel in a particular region of 

 the body a pain of a certain intensity and having a certain 

 character. We infer that something is wrong, but the pain in no 

 way tells us what the wrong is ; we may call the pain a burning 

 one because it is more or less like the pain which we feel when 

 the skin is burnt ; but in the vast majority of cases heat has 

 nothing whatever to do with pains of a burning character ; and so 

 with other kinds of pain, the character of the pain does not in 

 itself tell us anything about its cause. 



Are we then to regard pain as a sensation of a kind by itself, 

 the very threshold of which, the very least amount of which that 

 can in any way affect our consciousness, must be regarded as 

 already pain ? In attempting to answer this question the fol- 

 lowing considerations deserve attention. 



We are in a certain obscure way aware of what we may call 

 the general condition of our body. To put an extreme case, if 

 the whole of our abdominal viscera were removed we should be 

 aware of the loss. We should be aware of this through more 

 ways than one. The tactile sensations from the abdominal skin 

 would be in such a case different from the normal, and moreover 

 the muscular sense of the abdominal walls and of all the muscles 

 whose actions bear on the abdomen, would make us aware of the 

 void. But beyond all these indirect ways, it is probable that 

 we should in a more or less obscure manner be directly conscious 

 of the loss. It is probable that sensory impulses, not of the 

 character of pain, are continually, or from time to time, passing 

 upwards from the abdominal viscera to the central nervous 

 system. These do not affect our consciousness in such a distinct 

 manner as to enable us to examine them psychologically in 

 the same way that we are able to examine special sensations 

 such as those of sight, or even sensations of pain ; they are even 

 less well defined than those of the muscular sense ; nevertheless 

 they do enter, though obscurely, into our consciousness, so that 

 we become aware of any great change in them, and they have 

 been spoken of under the title of " common " or " general sensi- 

 bility." In discussing ( 643) the manner in which the manifold 

 coordinate movements of the body were carried out we" saw 

 reasons for thinking that the central processes of the nervous 

 system were largely determined by varied afferent impulses which 

 produce their effects without giving rise to any sharp and 

 decided change of consciousness ; many of these are probably 



