J.— PSYCHOLOGY 171 



and time as conceived.' I would prefer to say he confuses the psycho- 

 logical and logical analysis of the idea. 



In his account of complex ideas he starts with what purports to be a 

 psychological account of how they are formed — viz. the operations of 

 compounding by putting together several simple ideas, and of abstracting 

 by ' separating them from all other ideas that accompany them in their 

 real existence.' These operations are set side by side with the operations 

 of comparison and seeing relations. Locke holds that such operations 

 are not present in animals. The complex ideas of animals are apparently 

 combinations of simple ideas given to, not made by, the animal. ' They 

 take in and retain together several combinations of simple ideas, as 

 possibly the shape, smell and voice of his master make up the complex 

 idea a dog has of him, or rather are so many distinct marks whereby he 

 knows him ; yet I do not think they do of themselves ever compound 

 them, and make complex ideas ' (IL xi. 7). These operations of mind 

 in building complex ideas are never brought into clear relation with the 

 operation which constitutes knowledge — viz. ' perception of the connection 

 of and agreement, or disagreement and repugnancy, of any of our ideas.' 

 Cutting across his attempted psychological account of how complex ideas 

 come to be formed, Locke gives a logical classification of complex ideas 

 according to the nature of their object or reference : there are ideas of 

 modes, of substances, and of relations. In this we have another example 

 of the confusion of the psychological and the logical standpoint, or shall 

 one say of transition from one to the other without any realisation of the 

 change in outlook ? 



No orthodox psychologist from the time of Wundt onward would have 

 admitted for a moment that his acceptance of sensations as psychological 

 simple elements was due to logical analysis. He would have declared 

 that it was due rather to the analysis of physiological events, viz. the 

 simple stimulation of a sensory receptor and the resultant excitation of 

 the central nervous system. 



I question whether any psychologist who sets out from simple sensations 

 is really determined by a search for what is primitive in experience. 

 That we do not experience simple sensations as such is, of course, admitted 

 on all hands ; when treated as elements they are often said to be reached 

 by ' hypothetical ' analysis. What I want to suggest is that such analysis 

 is the outcome of logic, not psychology. The method implies that 

 perceptual knowledge is a structure, the logical analysis of which will 

 yield the bricks out of which it is made. This is a teaching derived from 

 Locke's Essay. The use to which the Association school put Locke's 

 theory of association rests on this doctrine. The theory is given in a 

 section added to the fourth edition of the Essay, and was put forward as a 

 theory to explain strange aversions and likings, prejudices and errors. It 

 is never put on a level with the synthetic processes of knowledge wherein 

 there is perception of a relationship between ideas. Association is thus 

 primarily a way of uniting items which are discrete and have no intrinsic 

 connection with one another. 



Gestalt psychology to-day is never tired of proclaiming itself as a revolt 

 from Associationism. Even if we believe that Associationism in pure 



