WILL. 



591 



ment, Tliis movement produces the feeling of burn, as its 

 effects come back to the centre S' ; and this centre by a 



Fig. 92. 



second connate path discharges into M", the centre for 

 withdrawing the hand. The movement of withdrawal 

 stimulates the centre S^ and this, as far as we are concerned, 

 is the last thing that happens. Now the next time the child 

 sees the candle, the cortex is in possession of the secondary 

 paths which the first experience left behind. S", having been 

 stimulated immediately after S', drained the latter, and now 

 S' discharges into S' before the discharge of M' has had time 

 to occur ; in other words, the sight of the flame suggests the 

 idea of the burn before it produces its own natural reflex ef- 

 fects. The result is an inhibition of M', or an overtaking 

 of it before it is completed, by M*. — The characteristic phy- 

 siological feature in all these acquired systems of paths lies 

 in the fact that the new-formed sensory irradiations 

 keep draining things forward, and so breaking up the ' motor 

 circles ' which would otherwise accrue. But, even apart from 

 catalepsy, we see the ' motor circle ' every now and then 

 come back. An infant learning to execute a simple move- 

 ment at will, without regard to other movements beyond it, 

 keeps repeating it till tired. How reiteratively they 

 babble each new-learned word ! And we adults often catch 

 ourselves reiterating some meaningless word over and over 

 again, if by chance we once begin to utter it ' absent-mind- 

 edly,' that is, without thinking of any ulterior train of words 

 to which it may belong. 



One more observation before closing these already too 

 protracted physiological speculations. Already (Vol. I. p. 71) 

 I have tried to shadow forth a reason why collateral inner- 



