Page:Encyclopædia Britannica, Ninth Edition, v. 20.djvu/85

Rh PSYCHOLOGY 73 as of the causes of feeling, we find it still more strikingly true that only in pleasurable states is there an efficient expenditure of attention. It is needless now to dwell upon this point, although any earlier mention of it would hardly have been in place. But we should fail to realize the con- trast between the motor effects of pleasure and of pain if we merely regarded them as cases of diffusion. The in- tenser the feeling the intenser the reaction, no doubt, whether it be smiles or tears, jumping for joy, or writhing in agony ; but in the movements consequent on pleasure the diffusion is the result of mere exuberance, an overflow of good spirits, as we sometimes say, and these movements, as already remarked, are always comparatively purposeless or playful. Even the earliest expressions of pain, on the contrary, seem but so many efforts to escape from the cause of it ; in them there is at least the blind purpose to flee from a definite ill, but in pleasure only the enjoyment of present fortune. From Plato downwards psychologists and moralists have been fond of discussing the relation of pleasure and pain. It has been maintained that pain is the first and more fundamental fact, and pleasure nothing but relief from pain ; and, again, on the other side, that pleasure is prior and positive, and pain only the negation of pleasure. So far as the mere change goes, it is obviously true that the diminution of pain is pro tanto pleasant, and the diminu- tion of pleasure pro tanto unpleasant ; and if relativity had the unlimited range sometimes assigned to it this would be all we could say. But we must sooner or later recognize the existence of a comparatively fixed neutral state, deviations from which, of comparatively short duration and of sufficient intensity, consti- tute distinct states of pleasure or pain. Such states, if not of liminal intensity, may then be further diminished without reversing their pleasurable or painful character. The turning-point here implied may, of course, gradually change too, as a result, in fact, of the law of accommodation. Thus a long run of pleasure would raise "the hedonistic zero," while to the small extent to which accommodation to pain is possible a continuance of pain would lower it. But such admission makes no material difference where the actual feeling of the moment is alone concerned and retrospect out of the question. On the whole it seems, therefore, most reasonable to regard pleasure and pain as emerging out of a neutral state, which is prior to and distinct from both, not a state of absolute indifference, but of simple contentment, marked by no special active display. But it is by reference to such state of equi- librium or aira.6ia that we see most clearly the superior volitional efficacy of pain upon which pessimists love to descant. " Nobody," says Von Hartmann, " who had to choose between no taste at all for ten minutes or five minutes of a pleasant taste and then five minutes of an unpleasant taste, would prefer the last." Most men and all the lower animals are content "to let well alone." To ascertain the origin and progress of purposive action it seems, then, that we must look to the effects of pain rather than to those of pleasure. Necessity is the mother of invention, and all things are full of labour. It is true that psychologists not unfrequently describe the earliest purposive movements as appetitive ; or at least they treat appetitive and aversive movements as co-ordinate and equally primitive, pleasures being supposed to lead to actions for their continuance as much as pains to actions for their removal. No doubt, as soon as the connexion between a pleasurable sensation and the appropriate action is completely established, as in the case of imbibing food, the whole process is then self-sustaining till satiety begins. But the point is that such facility was first acquired under the teaching of pain, the pain of unsatisfied hunger. The term " appetite " is apt both by its etymology and its later associations to be misleading. What are properly called the " instinctive " appetites are when regarded from their active side movements determined by some existing un- easy sensation. So far as their earliest manifestation in a particular individual is concerned, this urgency seems almost entirely of the nature of a vis a tergo ; and the movements are only more definite than those simply ex- pressive of pain because of inherited pre-adaptation, on which account, of course, they are called "instinctive." But what one inherits another must have acquired, and we have agreed here to leave heredity on one side and consider only the original evolution. But if none but psychological causes were at work this evolution would be very long and in its early stages very uncertain. At first, when only random movements ensue, we may fairly suppose both that the chance of at once making a happy hit would be small and that the number of chances, the space for repentance, would also be small. Under such circumstances natural selection would have to do almost everything and subjective selection almost nothing. So far as natural selection worked, we should have, not the individual subject making a series of tries and perfecting itself by practice, as in learning to dance or swim, but we should have those individuals whose stuff or structure happened to vary for the better surviving, increasing, and displacing the rest. How much natural selection, apparently unaided, can accomplish in the way of complicated adjustment we see in the adaptation of the form and colour of plants and animals to their environ- ment. Both factors, in reality, operate at once, and it would be hard to fix a limit to either, though to our minds natural selection seems to lose in comparative im- portance as we advance towards the higher stages of life. But psychologically we have primarily to consider sub- jective selection, i.e., first of all, the association of parti- cular movements with particular sensations through the mediation of feeling. The sensations here concerned are mainly painful excitations from the environment, the re- curring pains of innutrition, weariness, &c., and pleasur- able sensations due to the satisfaction of these organic wants pleasures which, although not a mere " filling up," as Plato at one time contended, are still preceded by pain, but imply over and above the removal of this a certain surplus of positive good. There seem only a few points to notice, (a) When the movements that ensue through pleasure are themselves pleasurable there is ordinarily no ground for singling out any one; such movements simply enhance the general enjoyment, which is complete in itself and so far contains no hint of anything beyond. (6) Should one of these spontaneous movements of pleasure chance to cause pain, no doubt such movement is speedily arrested. Probably the most immediate connexion possible between feeling and purposive action is that in which a painful movement leads through pain to its own suppres- sion. But such connexion is not very fruitful of conse- quences, inasmuch as it only secures what we may call internal training and does little to extend the relation of the individual to its environment, (c) Out of the irregular, often conflicting movements which indirectly relieve pain some one may chance to remove the cause of it altogether. Upon this movement, the last of a tentative series, attention, released from the pain, is concentrated ; and in this way the evil and the remedy become so far associated that on a recurrence of the former the many diffused movements become less, and the one purposive movement more, pronounced ; the one effectual way is at length established and the others, which, were but pallia- tives, disappear, (d) When things have advanced so far that some one definite movement is definitely represented along with the painful sensation it remedies, it is not long before a still further advance is possible and we have pre- ventive movements. Thanks to the orderliness of things, dangers have their premonitions. After a time, therefore, the occurrence of some signal sensation revives the image of the harm that has previously followed in its wake, and a movement either like the first, or another that has to be selected from the random tries of fear occurs in time to avert the impending ill. (e) In like manner, provided the cravings of appetite are felt, any signs of the presence of pleasurable objects prompt to movements for their enjoy- XX. 10