Page:Mind (Old Series) Volume 12.djvu/386

 ASSOCIATION AND THOUGHT. 373 others, because more constant, are not seen to be relative. And the relative part, because discrepant, belongs not to the thing ; the thing (what is left of it) exists out of relation. The result of this advance is, of course, inconsistent, and raises problems which psychology has not to take up. There is no need to exhibit its progress in detail. There are emotive attributes which the object palpably has and has not. A sword hurts when it cuts me, but, when it cuts something else, it may give pleasure or nothing. "What then has it got, and what does it give ? Further, when at rest f it certainly does not cut, and yet we call it cutting. Again, not only do things vary, but they vary and persist in spite of ray pleasure and action, and, at least to some extent, are not changeable by me. To that extent then, up to which my changes do not alter them, they are real altogether apart from my existence. And, where language comes in, because for others as for me, and again because in some points not for others as for me, the object becomes partially free from us all. What is discrepant collides and sets at liberty the remainder which has not come into collision. It is now easy to advance to the distinction between things and my thoughts about them. Disappointment re- flected on brings knowledge of error, and language, of course, co-operates largely. Desire and expectation have to yield to the thing. They cannot alter it, and it decides whether they succeed or not. Whatever they may be, and whether they exist or do not exist, and when one man thinks this and another man that, the object is, and becomes, what depends on itself. If our expectations then are not to fail they must depend upon things things not merely now and here, but in the distance and in the future. And the fact, more or less in- visible, controlling our thoughts which without it are failure, has now been developed. This is the theoretical object, though the interest we take in it is still mainly practical. But in thinking, it may be said, I am aware that I act ; I make an alteration, and this is a difficulty. And for meta- physics, without doubt, a grave problem arises ; but not for psychology. Objects are found to possess qualities regularly though not always ; take for instance colours. Hence an object may be changed, though not in itself, and therefore only for us. Again, the thing for me is altered when I change my position, turn my head, close my eyes, or cease to touch with my hands. But it comes again as before, and changes regularly on my movement. Still, my movement did not change it because I find it as before. It could not change it, because in the interval the thing acts as it would act if its qualities were there. And for others again, inde-