Part 1 (2/2)

CONSCIOUSNESS AS A PROCESS OR STREAM--In looking in upon the _, but a _process_ The _thing_ forever eludes us, but the process is always present

Consciousness is like a streaical discussion, has its rise at the cradle and its end at the grave It begins with the babe's first faint gropings after light in his neorld as he enters it, and ends with the ht in his old world as he leaves it The stream is very narrow at first, only as wide as the few sensations which coroider as the rand sum total of life's experience

This mental stream is irresistible No power outside of us can stop it while life lasts We cannot stop it ourselves When we try to stop thinking, the streaes its direction and flows on While ake and while we sleep, while we are unconscious under an anaesthetic, even, some sort of mental process continues So--we ”feel slow”; again the streahts come with a rush; or a fever seizes us and deliriu our control, and a hts takes the place of our usual orderly array In different persons, also, thenaturally slow- and some naturally quick in their operations

Consciousness resembles a stream also in other particulars A stream is an unbroken whole from its source to its mouth, and an observer stationed at one point cannot see all of it at once He sees but the one little section which happens to be passing his station point at the time The current may look much the same from moment to moment, but the component particles which constitute the streaht Its stream is continuous from birth till death, but we cannot see any considerable portion of it at one time

When we turn about quickly and look in upon our minds, we see but the little present one and will never return The thought which occupied us a moment since can no more be recalled, just as it was, than can the particles coiven point in its course in precisely the same order and relation to one another as before This means, then, that we can never have precisely the saht of the moment cannot have the saht of this ain; that all we can know of our minds at any one time is the part of the process present in consciousness at that moment

[Illustration: FIG 1]

[Illustration: FIG 2]

THE WAVE IN THE STREAM OF CONSCIOUSNESS--The surface of our mental stream is not level, but is broken by a hich stands above the rest; which is but another way of saying that soht than the rest Only e are in a sleepy reverie, or not thinking about , does the stream approximate a level At all other tiht, to the ht think about A thousand and one objects are possible to our thought at anyoccupy a secondary place, or are not present to our consciousness at all They exist on the e of consciousness, while the one thing occupies the center We ht in a cold room The charm of the writer, the beauty of the heroine, or the bravery of the hero so occupies theteeth are unnoticed Consciousness has piled up in a high wave on the points of interest in the book, and the bodily sensations are for the row dull for a es in a flash Hero, heroine, or literary style no longer occupies the wave

They forfeit their place, the wave is taken by the bodily sensations, and we are conscious of the sive way to the next object which occupies the wave Figs

1-3 illustrate these changes

[Illustration: FIG 3]

CONSCIOUSNESS LIKENED TO A FIELD--The consciousness of any moment has been less happily likened to a field, in the center of which there is an elevation higher than the surrounding level This center is where consciousness is piled up on the object which is for the ht The other objects of our consciousness are on the , but any of them may the next moin, or it may drop entirely out of consciousness This moment a noble resolve may occupy the center of the field, while a troublesoer di pain fro the mind, and lo! the tooth holds sway, and the resolve dione

THE ”PILING UP” OF CONSCIOUSNESS IS ATTENTION--This figure is not so true as the one which likens ourto the flow of our thought; but whichever figure we ey is always piled up higher at one point than at others Either because our interest leads us, or because the will dictates, the ht think about, and directed to this one thing, which for the time occupies chief place In other words, we _attend_; for this piling up of consciousness is nothing, after all, but attention

3 CONTENT OF THE MENTAL STREAM

We have seen that ournow faster, noer, ever shi+fting, never ceasing We have yet to inquire what constitutes the material of the streaht--what is the _content_ of consciousness? The question cannot be fully answered at this point, but a general notion can be gained which will be of service

WHY WE NEED MINDS--Let us first of all ask whatist would say, in order that they may _adapt_ themselves to their environment Each individual from mollusc to man needs the amount and type of mind that serves to fit its possessor into its particular world of activity Too little le for existence On the other hand a mind far above its possessor's station would prove useless if not a handicap; a mollusc could not use the mind of a man

CONTENT OF CONSCIOUSNESS DETERMINED BY FUNCTION--How e and type of consciousness will best serve to adjust us to our world of opportunity and responsibility? First of all we athering knowledge Second, we reatfrom the emotions Third, we must have the power to exert self-compulsion, which is to say that we possess a _will_ to control our acts These three sets of processes, _knowing_, _feeling_, and _willing_, we shall, therefore, expect to findup the content of our mental stream

Let us proceed at once to test our conclusion by introspection If we are sitting at our study table puzzling over a difficult proble_ forms the wave in the stream of consciousness--the center of the field It is the chief thing in our thinking The fringe of our consciousness is ht fro on in the next rooht which coh to occupy the center of the field

But instead of the study table and the proble to do If we are aged, _ing in and occupy the field to such extent that the fire burns low and the roorows cold, but still the for, visions of the future in of the field, while the ”castles in Spain” occupy the center

Our meer, hate, envy, joy And, indeed, these ees thein, and the mind is occupied with its sorrow, its love, or its joy

Once more, instead of the probleive us the necessity ofus now in this direction, now in that, so that the question finally has to be settled by a suprele of the hich each one knows for hi battle of motives occupy the center of the field while all else, even the sense of tiave way in the face of this conflict! This struggle continues until the decision is made, when suddenly all the stress and strain drop out and other objects ain have place in consciousness

THE THREE FUNDAMENTAL PHASES OF CONSCIOUSNESS--Thus we see that if we could cut the streaht cut a streae knife, and then look at the cut-off section, we should find very different constituents in the stream at different ti itself in _perceiving_, _reing_, _reasoning_, or the acts by which we gain our knowledge; at another in _fearing_, _loving_, _hating_, _sorrowing_, _enjoying_, or the acts of feeling; at still another in _choosing_, or the act of the will These processes would make up the stream, or, in other words, these are the acts which theits work We should never find a time when the stream consists of but one of the processes, or when all these modes of mental activity are not represented They will be found in varying proportions, now , but some of each is always present in our consciousness The nature of these different elements in our mental stream, their relation to each other, and theperplexity yet in perfect harmony to produce the wonderful _mind_, will constitute the subject-es which follow

4 WHERE CONSCIOUSNESS RESIDES

I--the conscious self--dwell soer tips touch the object I wish to examine, I seem to be in them