Page:Mind (Old Series) Volume 9.djvu/358

 346 CHAELES MEECIEE: arrangement distorts and dislocates the actual relations of the feelings somewhat as Mercator's projection distorts the relations of land and water on the surface of the earth. Mercator's projection seeks to represent on a plane surface the relations existing on a curved surface, to reproduce in a diagram of two dimensions relations existing in space of two dimensions ; yet how imperfect is the result ! Judge, then, of the possibility of representing in space of one dimension relations that require three dimensions for their true exposition. A fairly adequate concept of the inter-relations of the Antagonistic feelings may, however, be gained, if we conform to the necessary conditions. Let us imagine the most general of the relations that govern the classification of these feelings the degree of noxiousness or the relative power of the noxious agent to be represented by a solid stem ; and let us suppose this stem to have five nodes, corresponding with the five relations that the cognised power of the noxious agent may bear to that of the organism ; the node at the top representing those in which the power of the agent is insignificant and the node at the bottom those in which its power is overwhelming. At each of these nodes the corresponding group of feelings enumerated in the table may be represented as arranged round the stem in what is known to botanists as a whorl ; each feeling being represented by a projection, separated from its adjoining fellows by a notch, which will be deeper or shallower according as the difference is more or less pro- nounced. Now, since there is no abrupt division between those agents that are approximately equal in power to the organism and those that are superior and inferior, nor is there any demarcation between these two groups and those which lie above and below them respectively, it follows that, to make the diagram correspond, we must imagine the projections that we have placed at the nodes to be extended up and down the stem as continuous buttresses, uniting the feeling placed at a node with the allied feelings at the nodes above and below on the same meridian of the stem. The notches will now become grooves and the stem a fluted column. Lastly, since those feelings which relate to an agent of greater power are of greater magnitude than those which relate to an agent of lesser power, they should be represented on our solid diagram by the greater size of the projections which correspond with them. The fluted column will thus become a fluted cone. At the base of the cone a great protuberance will represent the feeling of Terror, which is bounded by, and in some part continuous