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members. Every sensible impression made during this state causes a more than average effect, and yet the current of energy does not wait for outward stimuli. Independently altogether of what a man sees, or hears, or thinks, he is disposed to be active to an uncommon degree; these influences of sense and thought seem merely to direct or point the course of the current, they do not create it. A stream of power is flowing from the centres to the extremities; the movements of the individual are vehement, and hurried. Outward circumstances may control or modify them; inward self-sustaining power alone seems to prompt them. Excitement in fact is but an exalted degree of spontaneity, making a weak man for the moment equal to a stronger, and simulating the effects of natural vigour and freshness by an exhausting effort of the nervous centres. We shall afterwards see that, in reality, the stimulants supplied through the senses may not improperly be looked upon as causing or preparing a state of excitement during which the spontaneity of the centres is momentarily heightened to a more copious discharge.

(7.) As a farther confirmation, it may be remarked that sensibility and activity do not as a general rule rise and fall together; on the contrary, they often stand in an inverse proportion to each other. In comparing different characters, or the different states of the same individual, we may test the truth of this observation. The strong, restless, active temperament is not always marked as the most sensitive and emotional, but is very frequently seen to be the least affected by these influences. The activity that seems to sustain itself, costing the individual almost no effort, being his delight rather than his drudgery, and very little altered by the presence or the absence of stimulus or ends, is manifestly a constitutional selfprompting force; and such activity may be seen in innumerable instances in the living world. This feature makes one of the fundamental distinctions of character, both in individuals and in races; being seen in the restless adventurer, the indefatigable traveller, the devotee of business, the incessant meddler in affairs; in the man that hates repose and despises passive enjoyments. It is the pushing energy of Philip of

Macedon and William the Conqueror. On the other hand, sensitive and emotional natures, which are to be found abundantly among men, and still more abundantly among women, are not active in a corresponding degree, while the kind of activity actually displayed is plainly seen to result more from some stimulus or object than from an innate exuberance of action. The activity prompted by ends, by something to be gained or avoided, is easily distinguished from the other by its being closely adapted to those ends, and by its ceasing when they have been accomplished. He that labours merely on the stimulus of reward, rests when he has acquired a competency, and is never confounded with the man whose life consists in giving vent to a naturally active temperament, or a superabundance of muscular and central energy.

Although a less conclusive, because more complicated, consideration than those advanced in the previously cited proofs, I do not hesitate to bring this last consideration under the notice of observant readers as accurately chiming in with the main stream of the general argument on this subject. If action were strictly dependent on sensation and emotion, it would be found to be always proportional to those stimuli; but such proportion palpably and notoriously fails to hold good.

(8.) My last argument is one that can only be indicated here, the full illustration belongs to a more advanced stage of the exposition. In the proper place, I hope to be able to show that without this spontaneity of our actions, the growth of volition, or of activity guided to ends, would be impracticable.

Regions of Spontaneous Activity.

7. The natural tendency to act of their own accord belongs to all the muscles that are reckoned voluntary, and originates an extensive variety of movements. The muscles for the most part act in groups, being associated together by the organization of the nervous centres for the performance of actions requiring the concurrence of several of them. It will be convenient to refer at the present stage to the principal

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groupings thus formed, in order to pass in review the different kinds of actions that may arise independently of outward or foreign stimulation.

The locomotive apparatus is perhaps the most conspicuous of the voluntary groups. This involves, (taking vertebrate animals in general), the limbs or the anterior and posterior extremities with their numerous muscles, and the trunk of the body, which in all animals chimes in more or less with the movements of the extremities. In the outbursts of spontaneous action, locomotive effort, (walking, running, flying, swimming, &c.) is one of the foremost tendencies; having the advantage of occupying a large portion of the muscular system, and thus giving vent to a copious stream of accumulated power. No observant person can have missed noticing hundreds of instances where locomotion resulted from purely spontaneous effort. In the human subject, the locomotive members are long in being adapted to their proper use, and in the meantime they expend their activity in the dancing gestures and kicking movements manifested by the infant in the arms of the nurse.

The locomotive action agitates the whole length of the spine up to the articulations of the neck and head. The members concerned, however, have many movements besides, especially in man, and these are found to arise no less. readily. Thus the movements of the arms are extremely various, and all of them may burst out in the spontaneous way. The grasp of the hand is the result of an extensive muscular endowment, and at an early stage manifests itself in the round of the innate and chance movements.

The erections and bendings of the body are outlets for spontaneous activity, more especially erection, which implies the greatest effort. When superfluous power cannot run into the more abundant opening of locomotive movement, it expends itself in stretching and erecting the body and limbs, to the extreme point of tension. This is accompanied by greater vigour of inspiration of the breath, and consequent increase of expiration. The erection extends to the carriage of the head and the distension of the eyes, mouth, and features.

G

The vocal organs are a distinct and notable group of the active members. The utterance of the voice is unequivocally owing on many occasions to mere profusion of central energy, although more liable than almost any other mode of action to be stimulated from without. In man the flow of words and song, in animals the outbursts of barking, braying, howling, are often manifestly owing to no other cause than the 'fresh' condition of the vocal organs.

Among the varied movements of the human face, including the internal movements of the tongue and jaw, we can single out two or three distinct groupings. The eyes have their independent centre of energy, whence results a spontaneously sustained gaze upon the outer world. When no object specially arrests the attention, the activity of the visual movements must be considered as mainly due to central power. In the blind this is necessarily the sole influence at work. In a person deprived of the sight of one eye, we find that eye still kept open, but not so wide as the other. The mouth is also subject to various movements which may often be the result of mere internal power, as is seen in the contortions indulged in after a period of immobility and restraint. The jaws find their use in masticating the food, but failing this, they may put forth their force in biting things put into the mouth, as we see in children not yet arrived at the age of chewing. The tongue is an organ of great natural activity, being endowed with many muscles, and having a wide scope of action. In the spontaneous action of the voice, which is at first an inarticulate howl, the play of the tongue, commencing of its own accord, gives the articulate character to utterance, and lays a foundation for the acquirement of speech.

Among the special aptitudes manifested among the lower animals we find very well-marked examples of the spontaneity of action. The destructive weapons belonging to so many tribes are frequently brought into play without any stimulus or provocation, and when no other reason can be rendered than the necessity for discharging an accumulation of inward energy. As the battery of the Torpedo becomes charged by the mere course of nutrition, and requires to be periodically

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relieved by being poured upon some object or other, so we may suppose that the jaws of the tiger, the fangs of the serpent, the spinning apparatus of the spider, require at intervals to have some objects to spend themselves upon. It is said that the constructiveness of the bee and the beaver incontinently manifests itself even when there is no end to be gained; a circumstance not at all singular if we admit the spontaneous nature of many of the active endowments of men and animals.

The spontaneous activity is always observed to rise and fall with the vigour and state of nutrition of the general system, being abundant in states of high health, and deficient during sickness, hunger, and fatigue. Energetic movements, moreover, arise under the influence of drugs and stimulants acting on the nerves and nerve centres; also from fever and other disease. Convulsions, spasms, and unnatural excitement, are diseased forms of the spontaneous discharge of the active energy of the

nerve centres.

OF THE MUSCULAR FEELINGS.

8. We are now brought to the express consideration of the first class of phenomena proper and peculiar to mind, namely, States of Feeling, Consciousness, or Emotion; these we have from the outset recognised as one of the three distinct manifestations of our mental nature. To give a systematic and precise account of the states of human consciousness, a Natural History of the feelings, is one of the professed objects of the science of mind. The attempt is scarcely paralleled by any mode of procedure occurring in the sciences that embrace the outer world; the only instructive analogy that I know of, is found in some of the branches of Natural History proper, as for example, Mineralogy, where a great effort of scientific classification is needed to reduce to order the vast variety of mineral substances.

I reckon it inexpedient at this early stage to enter upon a justification of the method and order of description herein adopted for the systematic delineation of the conscious states. When the method has been fully exemplified, the character