Page:Philosophical Review Volume 2.djvu/368

354 good the deficiency. When we come to the Qualitative Analysis of the complex products of our mental life, much valuable aid has been obtained from experiments properly styled psycho-physical, in the lower region of Sense and Instinct. But in the domains of Intellect, Feeling, and Will we are landed on Introspection almost exclusively. True, the experimental method has made attempts to grapple with the problems of Attention and Association, yet they only cover ground accessible to Introspection, although they may to a slight degree correct some of the inadvertencies of the introspective observer. It is only in so far as Quantitative Analysis is possible that we can speak of Psychology as a science in the proper sense. When we avail ourselves of outward signs, our means of measurement approach the precision of the objective departments of knowledge and a great enlargement of this resource is promised by the methods of psycho-physics. For Psychology we need (1) a mode of estimating the intensity of individual feelings in special moments and of recording that estimate, each of us operating on self; (2) a similar estimate of the states of other persons; (3) the generalizing of those estimates for definite circumstances in order to arrive at provisional laws of cause and effect in the region of feeling; (4) a summation of occasions of feeling throughout so as to deal with it in masses as regards both quantity and intensity. In the following fields B. thinks psycho-physical experiments may profitably be used as aids to Introspection: (1) In investigation concerning the muscular mechanism. (2) In the problems which Memory, Retentiveness, Reproduction, etc., present. (3) Memory lapses, or the momentary fluctuation of ideas in and out of consciousness. (4) The determination of the conditions of permanent association as against temporary or so-called 'Cram.' (5) Plurality of simultaneous impressions in each of the senses. (6) The influence exerted by Fixed Ideas. – "By the very nature of the case, the initiative in the most fruitful lines of inquiry will be most frequently taken by Introspection, which also by its powers of analysis will still open the path to the highest generalities of science."

J. E. C.

The hedonic aesthetic theory may be stated as follows. The beautiful is that which produces effects in us that are (relatively) permanently pleasurable in revival. In the case of the ugly, of