Comprehension of

the term energy.

In explanation of this paragraph, and of those which are to follow, I may observe, that the term energy, which is equivalent to act, activity, or operation, is here used to comprehend also all the mixed states of action and passion, of which we are conscious; for, inasmuch as we are conscious of any modification of mind, there is necessarily more than a mere passivity of the subject; consciousness itself implying at least a reäction. Be this, however, as it may, the nouns energy, act, activity, operation, with the correspondent verbs, are to be understood to denote, indifferently and in general, all the processes of our higher and our lower life, of which we are conscious. This being premised, I proceed to the second proposition.

Second.

Explanation of terms, power, faculty, etc.

II. Human existence, human life, human energy, is not unlimited, but on the contrary, determined to a certain number of modes, through which alone it can possibly be exerted. These different modes of action are called, in different relations, powers, faculties, capacities, dispositions, habits. In reference to this paragraph, it is only necessary to recall to your attention, that power denotes either a faculty or a capacity; faculty denotes a power of acting, capacity a power of being acted upon or suffering; disposition, a natural, and habit, an acquired, tendency to act or suffer. In reference to habit, it ought however to be observed, that an acquired necessarily supposes a natural tendency. Habit, therefore, comprehends a disposition and something supervening on a disposition. The disposition, which at first was a feebler tendency, becomes, in the end, by custom, that is, by a frequent repetition of exerted energy, a stronger tendency. Disposition is the rude original, habit is the perfect consummation. III. Man, as he consciously exists, is the subject of pleasure and pain; and these of various kinds: but as man only consciously exists in and through the exertion of certain determinate powers, so it is only through the exertion of these powers that he becomes the subject of pleasure and pain; each power being in itself at once the faculty of a specific energy, and a capacity of an appropriate pleasure or pain, as the concomitant of that energy.

Third.

Fourth.

IV. The energy of each power of conscious existence having, as its reflex or concomitant, an

appropriate pleasure or pain, and no pain or pleasure being competent

1 Here a written interpolation - Occupation, exercise, perhaps better [expressions than enas applying equally to all mental pro

ergy,

cesses, whether active or passive.] See below,

p. 595.-ED.

2 See above, lect. x. p. 123. Ed.

to man, except as the concomitant of some determinate energy of life, the all-important question arises, What is the general law under which these counter-phænomena arise, in all their special manifestations?

Pleasure and Pain opposed as contraries, not as contradictories.

In reference to this proposition, I would observe that pleasure and pain are opposed to each other as contraries, not as contradictories, that is, the affirmation of the one implies the negation of the other, but the negation of the one does not infer the affirmation of the other; for there may be a third or intermediate state, which is neither one of pleasure nor one of pain, but one of indifference. Whether such a state of indifference do ever actually exist; or whether, if it do, it be not a complex state in which are blended an equal complement of pains and pleasures, it is not necessary, at this stage of our progress, to inquire. It is sufficient, in considering the quality of pleasure as one opposed to the quality of pain, to inquire, what are the proximate causes which determine them: or, if this cannot be answered, what is the general fact or law which regulates their counter-manifestation; and if such a law can be discovered for the one, it is evident that it will enable us also to explain the other, for the science of contraries is one. I now proceed to the fifth proposition.

V. The answer to the question proposed is: the more perfect, the more pleasurable, the energy; the more imperfect, the more painful.

Fifth.

In reference to this proposition, it is to be observed that the answer here given is precise, but inexplicit; it is the enouncement of the law in its most abstract form, and requires at once development and explanation. This I shall endeavor to give in the following propositions.

Sixth.

VI. The perfection of an energy is twofold; 1o, By relation to the power of which it is the exertion, and 2°, By relation to the object about which it is converThe former relation affords what may be called its subjective, the latter what may be called its objective, condition.

sant.

The explanation and development of the preceding proposition is given in the following.

Seventh.

VII. By relation to its power: An energy is perfect, when it is tantamount to the full, and not to more than the full, complement of free or spontaneous energy, which the power is capable of exerting; an energy is imperfect, either 10, When the power is restrained from putting forth the whole amount of energy it would otherwise tend to do, or, 2o, When it is

stimulated to put forth a larger amount than that to which it is spontaneously disposed. The amount or quantum of energy in the case of a single power is of two kinds, - 1°, An intensive, and 2°, A protensive; the former expressing the higher degree, the latter the longer duration, of the exertion. A perfect energy is, therefore, that which is evolved by a power, both in the degree and for the continuance to which it is competent without straining; an imperfect energy, that which is evolved by a power in a lower or in a higher degree, for a shorter or for a longer continuance, than, if left to itself, it would freely exert. There are, thus, two elements of the perfection, and, consequently, two elements of the pleasure, of a simple energy its adequate degree and its adequate duration; and four ways in which such an energy may be imperfect, and, consequently, painful; inasmuch as its degree may be either too high, or too low; its duration either too long, or too short.

When we do not limit our consideration to the simple energies of individual powers, but look to complex states, in which a plurality of powers may be called simultaneously into action, we have, besides the intensive and protensive quantities of energy, a third kind, to wit, the extensive quantity. A state is said to contain a greater amount of extensive energy, in proportion as it forms the complement of a greater number of simultaneously coöperating powers. This complement, it is evident, may be conceived as made up either of energies all intensively and protensively perfect and pleasurable, or of energies all intensively and protensively imperfect and painful, or of energies partly perfect, partly imperfect, and this in every combination afforded by the various perfections and imperfections of the intensive and protensive quantities. It may be here noticed, that the intensive and the two other quantities stand always in an inverse ratio to each other; that is, the higher the degree of any energy, the shorter is its continuance, and, during its continuance, the more completely does it constitute the whole mental state, — does it engross the whole disposable consciousness of the mind. The maximum of intensity is thus the minimum of continuance and of extension. So much for the perfection, and proportional pleasure, of an energy or state of energies, by relation to the power out of which it is elicited. This paragraph requires, I think, no commentary.

Eighth.

VIII. By relation to the object (and by the term object, be it observed, is here denoted every objective cause by which a power is determined to activity), about which it is conversant, an energy is perfect, when this object is of such a character as to afford to its power the condition requi

site to let it spring to full spontaneous activity; imperfect, when the object is of such a character as either, on the one hand, to stimulate the power to a degree, or to a continuance, of activity beyond its maximum of free exertion; or, on the other hand, to thwart it in its tendency towards this its natural limit. An object is, consequently, pleasurable or painful, inasmuch as it thus determines a power to perfect or to imperfect energy.

But an object, or complement of objects simultaneously presented, may not only determine one but a plurality of powers into coäctivity. The complex state, which thus arises, is pleasurable, in proportion as its constitutive energies are severally more perfect; painful, in proportion as these are more imperfect; and in proportion as an object, or a complement of objects, occasions the average perfection or the average imperfection of the complex state, is it, in like manner, pleasurable or painful.

Ninth. Definitions of Pleasure and Pain.

IX. Pleasure is, thus, the result of certain harmonious relations, of certain agreements; pain, on the contrary, the effect of certain unharmonious relations of certain disagreements. The pleasurable is, therefore, not inappropriately called the agreeable, the painful the disagreeable; and, in conformity to this doctrine, pleasure and pain may be thus defined:

Pleasure is a reflex of the spontaneous and unimpeded exertion of a power, of whose energy we are conscious.1 Pain, a reflex of the overstrained or repressed exertion of such a power.

I shall say a word in illustration of these definitions. Taking pleasure, pleasure is defined to be the reflex

The definition of Pleasure illustrated.

1. Pleasure the reflex of energy.

of energy, and of perfect energy, and not to be either energy or the perfection of energy itself, -and why? It is not simply defined an energy, exertion, or act, because some energies are not pleasurable, being either painful or indifferent. It is not simply defined the perfection of an energy, because we can easily separate in thought the perfection of an act, a conscious act, from any feeling of pleasure in its performance. The same holds true, mutatis mutandis, of the definition of pain, as a reflex of imperfect energy.

Again, pleasure is defined the reflex of the spontaneous and unimpeded,― of free and unimpeded, exertion of a power, of whose

1 This is substantially the definition of Aristotle, whose doctrine, as expounded in the 10th book of the Nicomachean Ethics, is more fully stated below, p. 584. In the less accurate dissertation, which occurs in the 7th

book of the same treatise, and which perhaps properly belongs to the Endemian Ethics, the pleasure is identified with the energy itself.ED.

2. Spontaneous and unimpeded.

energy we are conscious. Here the term spontaneous refers to the subjective, the term unimpeded to the objective, perfection. Touching the term spontaneous, every power, all conditions being supplied, and all impediments being removed, tends, of its proper nature and without effort, to put forth a certain determinate maximum, intensive and protensive, of free energy. This determinate maximum of free energy, it, therefore, exerts spontaneously: if a less amount than this be actually put forth, a certain quantity of tendency has been forcibly repressed; whereas, if a greater than this has been actually exerted, a certain amount of nisus has been forcibly stimulated in the power. The term spontaneously, therefore, provides that the exertion of the power has not been constrained beyond the proper limit, the natural maximum, to which, if left to itself, it freely springs.

Again, in regard to the term unimpeded, — this stipulates that the power should not be checked in the spring it would thus spontaneously make to its maximum of energy, that is, it is supposed that the conditions requisite to allow this spring have been supplied, and that all impediments to it have been removed. This postulates of course the presence of an object. The definition further states, that the exertion must be that of a power of whose energy we are conscious. This requires no illustration. There are powers in man, the activities of which lie beyond the sphere of consciousness. But it is of the very essence of pleasure and pain to be felt, and there is no feeling out of consciousness. What has now been said of the terms used in the definition of pleasure, renders all comment superfluous on the parallel expressions employed in that of pain.

3. Of which we are conscious.

Pleasure,-Positive

and Negative.

On this doctrine it is to be observed, that there are given different kinds of pleasure, and different kinds of pain. In the first place, these are twofold, inasmuch as each is either Positive and Absolute, or Negative and Relative. In regard to the former, the mere negation of pain does, by relation to pain, constitute a state of pleasure. Thus, the removal of the toothache replaces us in a state which, though one really of indifference, is, by contrast to our previous agony, felt as pleasurable. This is negative or relative pleasure. Positive or absolute pleasure, on the contrary, is all that pleasure which we feel above a state of indifference, and which is, therefore, prized as a good in itself, and not simply as the removal of an evil. On the same principle, pain is also divided into Positive or Abso