J.— PSYCHOLOGY 183 



an important subjective factor, we cannot be deterred by the conse- 

 quences of our belief. Indeed, if the percipient mind only registered 

 the objective world, could there be any important psychology of cognition ? 

 However, work such as that of Katz and Thouless on colour and size 

 constancies, work already brought to the notice of this Section, proves 

 sufficiently how autocratically the mind can deal with its sensory material. 

 The more relevant psychological questions raised by recent developments 

 of Gestalt-psychology are too large to be treated incidentally. It is enough 

 here to express admiration for the persevering and ingenious research 

 which they have stimulated. So to speak a little dogmatically, I hold 

 that the mind informs its sensory material, making the percept consistent 

 with certain subjective principles. This implies that the patterns of 

 experience are in some sense already latent in the subject's mind as he 

 confronts the world. Can we say how ? 



Alas, not very well. We must be content for the present with a small 

 but useful advance to be made along the following path. If one says that 

 perceiving is a response of the organism, meaning what one says, it 

 follows that the distinction between cognition and conation is not an 

 ultimate one. The general utility of the traditional division is not in 

 question, but in the end we have to recognise that the process of coming 

 to know is an activity, a piece of behaviour linked up with and sub- 

 ordinated to other behaviour. Conation must be the fundamental con- 

 cept, because the first duty of every organism is to remain alive, and it 

 needs to manage and control its environment to that end. Let us look 

 for a moment at other forms of behaviour. 



It is agreed that behaviour exhibits certain regularities of sequence 

 which entitle us to formulate laws. In describing the phenomena the 

 phrase which comes most readily to the tongue is that they exhibit 

 patterns. The word has of recent years been very freely used. It 

 requires no technical knowledge to understand the statement that a man's 

 business activities show a constant pattern, no matter how varied the details 

 with which he has to deal at different times. Our insight into the character 

 of acquaintances mainly rests upon the observation of their behaviour 

 patterns. It is very difficult to describe them, and still more difficult to 

 analyse them, but they are easily recognisable. They are, in fact, the 

 constancies without which social life would be impossible. The out- 

 standing example of patterns of behaviour is presented by the instincts. 

 In them we have themes which can be recognised as essentially the same 

 while the details of the activity vary thoroughly, just as the theme of a 

 symphony can be recognised through its development. But to say this 

 is to apply the term ' pattern ' as an objective description, and not as an 

 explanation. Whether in this field you prefer to speak of urges and drives, 

 or of fields of force and closure, is indifferent to the present argument, 

 which requires only two points conceded to it : first, that these patterns 

 of behaviour are observable, it being in virtue of them that the adjective 

 ' instinctive ' is applied, and, second, that the character of the organism 

 is among the causes which produce them. We note that the behaviour 

 of the human individual displays patterns which are similar in their 

 outline to those of animals, and which, arguing from them, we must 

 assert to depend upon the connate character of the organism. 



