HABIT. 115 



thing. Who is there that has never wound up his watch on 

 taking off his waistcoat in the daytime, or taken his latch- 

 key out on arriving at the door-step of a friend ? Very 

 absent-minded persons in going to their bedroom to dress 

 for dinner have been known to take off one garment after 

 another and finally to get into bed, merely because that was 

 the habitual issue of the first few movements when per- 

 formed at a later hour. The writer well remembers how, 

 on revisiting Paris after ten years' absence, and, finding 

 himself in the street in which for one winter he had attended 

 school, he lost himself in a brown stud}^ from which he was 

 awakened by finding himself ujDon the stairs which led to 

 the apartment in a house many streets away in which he 

 had lived during that earlier time, and to which his steps 

 from the school had then habitually led. We all of us have 

 a definite routine manner of performing certain daily offices 

 connected with the toilet, with the opening and shutting of 

 familiar cupboards, and the like. Our lower centres know 

 the order of these movements, and show their knowledge 

 by their ' surprise ' if the objects are altered so as to oblige 

 the movement to be made in a different way. But our 

 higher thought-centres know hardly anything about the 

 matter. Few men can tell off-hand which sock, shoe, or 

 trousers-leg they put on first. They must first mentally 

 rehearse the act ; and even that is often insufficient — 

 the act must be performed. So of the questions. Which 

 valve of my double door oi3ens first ? Which way does my 

 door swing ? etc. I cannot tell the answer ; yet my hand 

 never makes a mistake. No one can describe the order in 

 which he brushes his hair or teeth ; yet it is likely that the 

 order is a pretty fixed one in all of us. 



These results may be expressed as follows : 

 In action grown habitual, what instigates each new 

 muscular contraction to take place in its appointed order 

 is hot a thought or a percejjtion, but the sensation occa- 

 sioned by the muscular contraction just finished. A strictly 

 voluntary act has to be guided by idea, perception, and 

 volition, throughout its whole course. In an habitual ac- 

 tion, mere sensation is a sufiicient guide, and the upper 



