Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 15.djvu/769

 A THEORY OF SOCIAL MOTIVES JSS

whenever our isolated farmer returns home in the evening, ex- hausted, there is little mention of the experience of the day. He shuns the thought of the day's work. Or, if he speaks of it, it is a brief word to his wife in order that he may enjoy her sympathy. That is, as the workman becomes weary, the wife and home, or the companions and the saloon, or other symbols of the second level become more intensely suggestive. From this second level the individual may, under certain conditions, drop to the third level. Thus, while at work, workmen often begin talking of their saloon companions, then, as their weariness in- creases, they become more absorbed in these images until these are no longer images but instinct and what the man wants is no longer his companions but his spree. Again, I have seen working- girls buoyed up in their weariness by the thought of a summer vacation in the country. The more weary they became the more intense became their anticipation of the vacation. Finally some- thing prevented their going and in the abandon of their intense disappointment they resorted to amusements which sink one deep in the instinctive life.

In expansive cognition we note that states cognitively unlike are associated because their feeling-tones are alike. A beautiful sunset or the new scenery witnessed during a trip reminds one of one's friends and makes one wish they were present to enjoy it. It also reminds one of one's religion ; members of my groups tell me they cannot enjoy nature without feeling the power behind it. That is, the expansive stimulus of beautiful scenery sets up an associative process which runs through the entire range of expansive symbols, social and religious, so that states cognitively unlike are associated because they have the same feeling-tone. Ribot defines "raisonnement emotionnel" as

"un processus dont la trame tout entiere est affective, c'est-a-dire, con- siste en un etat de sentiment qui, en restant identique ou en se transformant, determine le choix et renchainem«nt des etats intellectuels : ceux-ci ne sont qu'un revetement, un moyen necessaire pour donner du corps a cette forme de logique. L'association a base affective est tres differente ; elle se developpe au hasard, sans etre dirigee vers un but prefixe."*

"La logique des sentiments, pp. 2, 3.