SIR WILLIAM HAMILTON'S PHILOSOPHY. 79 



knowledged mental forces •which produce classification, be grouped 

 together and thus be distinguished as a subordinate species from the 

 whole genus of the mental states. But, waiving altogether the legiti- 

 mate doubt whether any classification is possible before self-consciousness 

 arises, it is evident that the classification, described by Mr. Mill, no* 

 only could not originate the definite antithesis of me and that which is 

 not I, but could not originate any contradictory antithesis whatever. I 

 and that which is not I are, as contradictory, necessarily exclusive of 

 each other; and to suppose that the distinction between a species and 

 its genus could produce the consciousness of two things which are 

 mutually exclusive, is to suppose that a process takes place for the pro- 

 duction of this particular effect, which is never known to take place in 

 any other instance. Such a hypothesis, one need not fear to say, will 

 not be defended by the most distinguished exponent of the principles 

 of scientific induction. 



This defect in Mr. Mill's analysis of self-consciousness the theory of 

 Professor Bain might be taken as an effort to supplement. With the 

 latter indeed there is none of the diffidence regarding the possibility of 

 analysing self-consciousness, which has been noticed as characterising 

 the discussion of the subject by the former. Adopting a theory of Mr. 

 Lewes' Phi/siohgtj of Common Life, Professor Bain attributes "sensa- 

 tion or feeling, that is, consciousness" to all the nervous ganglia, 

 though of course such a consciousness is explained as being in reality 

 not the consciousness of the animal, of whose organism the ganglia form 

 a part, but the consciousness of as many separate inferior animals as 

 there are ganglia. The process, by which these separate consciousnesses 

 are gathered into one united consciousness, is explained by Professor 

 Bain,* but need not be considered here. It is obvious, however, that, 

 starting from such a doctrine, he must refuse, as he does with perfect 

 explicitness, to recognize self-consciousness as essential to mental life, 

 at least in its rudimentary forms; and he maintains even that the 

 conscious distinction of the self and the notself is unnecessary to know- 

 ledge, that a veritable act of knowledge may take place wifhout any 

 one being conscious that he knows. The remarks I quote are in refer- 

 ence to the first proposition in Professor Ferrier's Institutes of Mela- 

 physics, that " along with whatever any intelligence knows, it must, 

 as the ground or condition of its knowledge, have some cognizance of 



* The Emotions and the Will, pp. 600-1, 2iid edition. 



