CHAPTER VII.. The Nature of Emotion.

THE NATURE OF EMOTION.

Analogy between perception and emotion—Constituent elements of emotion—Summary of the theory of James and Lange—Application of this theory to the higher emotions (religious, moral, æsthetic, intellectual)—Illegitimate confusion between the quality and intensity of emotion—Examination of a typical case: musical emotion—The most emotional of all the arts is the most dependent on physiological conditions—Proofs: its action on animals, on primitive man, on civilised man; its therapeutic action—Why certain sensations, images, and ideas awaken organic and motor states, and, consequently, emotion—They are connected either with natural or social conditions of existence—Differences and resemblances between the two cases—Antecedents of the physiological theory of emotion—Dualist position, or that of the relation between cause and effect—Unitary position; its advantages.

In entering on the subject indicated by the title of this chapter, we pass from the general manifestations of feeling (pleasures and pains) to its special manifestations; we descend from the surface to the deeper strata, in order to arrive at the fundamental and irreducible fact at the root of all emotion: attraction or repulsion, desire or aversion, in short, motion, or arrest of motion.

Already, in the Introduction, we have marked the place of emotion in the development of the life of the feelings, and, later on, in the second part of this book, we shall examine separately each of the primitive emotions, with its special determining characters. For the moment, we have only to do with the general characters common to all emotions.

This term, in the language of contemporary psychology, has replaced the words “passions,” “affections of the soul” (passiones, affectus animi), in use during the seventeenth century. Besides being consecrated by use, it has the advantage of emphasising the motor element included in every emotion (motus, Gemütsbewegung). Maudsley says that this word is an induction, summing up the experience of the human race, and the term “commotion,” formerly used to designate the same phenomena, expresses the fact still more clearly.

At first sight, and without entering into any analysis, every emotion, even of slight intensity, appears to us as affecting the entire individual, and expressing, in its complete form, what Bain has called the law of diffusion. Its external symptoms are movements of the face, the trunk, and the limbs; its internal, numerous organic modifications caused and dominated by the circulation—the organic function par excellence. The experiments of Lombard, Broca, Bert, Gley, Mosso, Tanzi, etc., have shown that any and every form of mental activity is connected with an increase in the circulation; but the latter is always above the average when an emotion is manifested. Emotional activity of a given kind, says Lombard, produces an increase of temperature in all parts of the body; it is, in general, more rapid and stronger than that which comes from intellectual activity. Mosso, who, by some well-known experiments, has been enabled to study even the slightest modifications of the circulation, concludes that “the action of the emotions on the cerebral circulation is much more evident than that of intellectual work, whatever its energy.” Emotion not only presents these vague and different characteristics, but every separate emotion is a complexus. Let us take the simplest and commonest—fear, anger, tenderness, sexual love; each one of them is a complete state in itself, a psycho-physiological fascicule constituted by a grouping of simple elements, differing with each emotion, but always comprising a particular state of consciousness, particular modifications of the functions of organic life, movements or tendencies to movement, arrest or tendencies to the arrest of particular movements. Every primary emotion is an innate complexus expressing directly the constitution of the individual; the emotions are organised manifestations of the life of the feelings; they are the reactions of the individual on everything which touches the course of his life, or his amelioration, his being, or his better being. In a certain manner, the primary emotions are analogous to the perceptions, which require a psycho-physiological organism adapted to a special function in relation to the external world; with this difference, that sight, hearing, smell, etc., have their own special and inalienable organs, while fear, anger, etc., have a diffused organism, the elements of which, combined in another manner, become the organism of another emotion.

It follows that the study of the emotions, from the point of view of pure psychology, can come to no definite conclusion. Internal observation, however subtle, can only describe the internal fact and note its gradations; regarding the conditions and the genesis of emotion, it can give no answer; it can only seize a bodiless emotion, an abstraction. There is no manifestation of psychic life, not excepting the perceptions, which depends more immediately on biological conditions. The great merit of James and Lange is that both of them, simultaneously and independently, have demonstrated the capital importance of physiological factors in emotion.

It is not my intention to explain at length the thesis of these two authors, though it is the most important contribution made to the psychology of the emotions for some time. It is becoming very well known, and, in any case, is easily accessible. Reduced to its essence, it may be summed up in two principal propositions:—

1. Emotion is only the consciousness of all the organic phenomena (external and internal) which accompany it, and are usually considered as its effects; in other words, that which common sense treats as the effect of emotion is its cause.

2. One emotion differs from another according to the quantity and quality of these organic states and their various combinations, being only the subjective expression of these different modes of grouping.

Footnote 68:

Lange’s book On the Emotions first appeared in Danish, and has been translated into German (1887) by Dr. Kurella, and into French (1895) by Dr. G. Dumas. W. James first explained his theory in an article in Mind (1884), and subsequently in his Principles of Psychology (1890), vol. ii. chap. xxv.

In order to treat a subject scientifically, says Lange, we must fix our attention on objective marks; the study of colours only became scientific on the day when Newton discovered an objective character—the difference of refrangibility in coloured rays. Let us do the same with the emotions, for we shall find it possible. Each one of them shows itself by gestures, attitudes, organic phenomena, which are often, though very erroneously, considered secondary, accessory, consecutive. Let us study them, and so substitute for introspection an objective process of research. As it is best to begin with simple things, the author has confined himself “to some of the most definite and best characterised emotions: joy, fear, sorrow, anger, timidity, expectation,” and abstained from considering “those in which the physical facts were not very marked, and not easily accessible.”

This is followed by a minute description of the emotions already enumerated, and their physical symptoms, for which I refer the reader to the work itself. If we generalise, we shall see that the phenomena described can be classed in two groups—(1) modifications of muscular innervation: it diminishes in fear or sorrow, but increases in joy, anger, impatience; (2) vaso-motor modifications: constriction in fear and sadness, dilatation in joy and anger. Are these two groups of equal importance?—are they both primary? or is one subordinated to the other? As far as the actual state of our knowledge permits us to answer the question, says Lange, the vascular changes must be assumed as primary, since the slightest circulatory variations profoundly modify the functions of the brain and spinal marrow.

What is the significance of all this as regards the emotions? According to the current psychology, an emotional state subjected to analysis yields the following result:—(1) an intellectual state, perception, or idea, as a starting-point (e.g., a piece of bad news, a terrifying apparition, an injury received); (2) a state of feeling—the emotion: sorrow, anger, fear; (3) the organic states and movements resulting from this emotion. But the second point—the emotion conceived as such—is only an abstract entity, a mere hypothesis. Now, to be admissible, a hypothesis ought to explain all the facts and be necessary to their explanation. This is not the case here. We find, both in normal and in pathological life, emotions which are derived from no ideas, but, on the contrary, engender them: wine gives rise to joy, alcohol to courage; ipecacuanha causes a depression akin to fear, haschisch produces exaltation, and shower-baths calm it. Asylums are full of patients whose irritability, melancholy, and anguish are “causeless”—i.e., result from no perception or image. Here, we seize the true cause at its source; it lies in the physical influences. Let us therefore get rid of the useless hypothesis of a psychic entity called emotion, supposed to be intercalated between the perception or idea, and the physiological occurrences. Reversing the order admitted by common sense, we say: First an intellectual state, then organic and motor disturbances, and then the consciousness of these disturbances, which is the psychic state we call emotion.

W. James, in another way, and with other arguments, maintains the same thesis: “The bodily changes follow directly the perception of the exciting fact, and our feeling of the same changes as they occur is the emotion.” Reversing what is usually accepted as common sense, we must say that it is because we weep that we are sad, because we strike that we feel anger, because we tremble that we are afraid. In fear, suppress the palpitation of the heart, the hurrying breath, the trembling of the limbs, the widening of the muscles, the peculiar state of the viscera; in anger, the heaving of the chest, the congestion of the face, the dilatation of the nostrils, the clenching of the teeth, the staccato voice, the impulsive tendencies; in sorrow, get rid of tears, sighs, sobs, suffocation, anguish—what will remain?—a purely intellectual state, pale, colourless, cold. A disembodied emotion is a non-existent one.

This, no doubt, is a hypothesis without decisive proof. The crucial experiment could only be furnished by a man affected by total anæsthesia, external and internal, but without paralysis. Could such an one still experience any emotion? The case is absolutely unrealisable; James has only been able to find three individuals at all approaching it—one of whom (Strümpell’s case) is well known: the subjects are apathetic, but the emotional life is not entirely absent; Strümpell had on several occasions noted surprise, fear, and anger.

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Footnote 69:

Since the publication of James’s book, Dr. Berkeley has reported, in Brain (iv. 1892), two cases of general anæsthesia, cutaneous and sensory: the subjects are apathetic, but the presence of shame, sorrow, surprise, fear, and repulsion (the last-named as a substitute for anger) has been observed. Dr. Sollier, in an article in the Revue Philosophique (March, 1894), has reported some experiments made on subjects in a profoundly hypnotic state, in whom the peripheral and visceral sensibility had been abolished by suggestion. He comes to the same conclusions as James and Lange.

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We shall have to give up all hope of a positive and decisive experiment. The thesis in itself has so paradoxical a character that many objections may be raised against it.

1. Are there any real proofs that certain perceptions produce, by immediate physical influence, corporeal effects preceding the appearance of emotion? Assuredly. The reading of a poem—the recital of heroic deeds—music—may instantaneously cause a shudder of the whole body, cardiac palpitations, tears. If you scrape one piece of steel against another the whole nervous system is exasperated. Is it not well known that the mere sight of blood will cause syncope in certain persons? Finally, James alleges the pathological cases mentioned above by Lange, where “emotion is without object”—i.e., evidently dependent on a purely physical cause.

2. If the theory is true, we ought to be able to awaken the emotion itself, by voluntarily producing the manifestations of a special emotion. In the majority of cases, this criterion is inapplicable, for the majority of the organic phenomena manifesting emotion cannot be produced at will; the experiment therefore remains a partial one. However, so far as it is possible, it rather corroborates than invalidates the hypothesis. If you remain seated for a long time in a melancholy attitude, you will be overcome by sadness. If you are sad assume a cheerful attitude, join a merry company, and you will gradually leave your sadness behind. It is objected that many actors, while playing their parts, present the perfect appearance of an emotion which they do not feel. James gives the results of a remarkable census taken in America on this point; the answers do not all agree, some saying that they act with the brain, others with the heart; some feel the emotions of the character, others do not. I think that James might have mentioned what takes place with certain hypnotised subjects; if their limbs are placed in the attitude of prayer, anger, menace, or affection (which amounts to a suggestion conveyed by the muscular sense), the corresponding emotion is produced.

3. The manifestation of an emotion, instead of increasing, causes it to disappear; thus, a violent burst of tears relieves sorrow. This objection does not discriminate between the feelings during the manifestation and those after it. Emotion is always experienced while the manifestation persists; but, when the nervous centres are exhausted, calm naturally follows. Is it not said of certain men that they would feel more if they were less “demonstrative”? This is because the exuberance of their mode of expression rapidly exhausts them, and does not permit the emotion to be a lasting one, while a bilious temperament, which does not spend itself, remains like a quiescent volcano.

I have only quoted from James and Lange what was strictly necessary in order to understand their theory. I declare my acceptance of it in the main, but without admitting the dualist position which they seem to have adopted. I shall explain myself on this point in subsequent parts of this chapter; for the moment, we have to show that the physiological theory applies to the whole region of the emotions.

II.

We have seen, in fact, that Lange expressly confines himself to some simple emotions, and refuses to venture further. W. James concentrates his efforts on the “coarse emotions,” the others (“the subtler emotions”) he only refers to in passing, limiting himself to some remarks on æsthetic emotion. However, I think it necessary to treat this subject otherwise than by merely passing it by. Indeed, the very numerous advocates of the opposite view have maintained that the physiological theory, while it may be accepted, for want of a better, for the inferior forms of emotion, becomes insufficient as we rise to the higher, and that every attempt to apply it to the superior forms would result in failure.

We must first come to a clear understanding of the value of the terms inferior and superior, coarse and subtle; they can only denote degrees in evolution. The inferior or coarse emotions have also been called “animal,” because common to man and the greater number of animals. The superior or subtle emotions are properly “human,” though their germs are to be found in the higher animals.

The first are connected with sensations and perceptions, or with their immediate representations; they are in close and direct relation with the preservation of the individual or the species. The second are connected with images of a less and less concrete character, or with concepts; they are related in a more vague and indirect manner to the conditions of existence of the individual or the species.

We may also say that “inferior” is synonymous with “primary, simple”; “superior” with “derivative, complex.” How is the transition from inferior to superior forms produced? For the moment, it is of no importance to know—it is sufficient to observe that it has taken place.

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Footnote 70:

Vide infra, part ii. chap. vii.

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Thus, just as, in the intellectual order, there is an ascending scale, leading from the concrete, successively, to the lower, medium, and higher forms of abstraction, so in the affective order there is a scale ascending from fear or anger to the most ideal emotions. And in the same way as the highest conception retains the characteristics of the concrete whence it sprang, on pain of being merely an empty word, so the most ethereal sentiments cannot entirely lose the characters which constitute them emotions, on pain of disappearing as such.

I shall not insist on these theoretic remarks; the direct observation of facts is preferable, and gives a clearer answer.

The superior and truly human forms of emotion are reducible to four principal groups: the religious, moral, æsthetic, and intellectual sentiments. Although the somatic characters accompanying each of these will be noted with the greatest care in the second part of this work, it will be necessary, even at present, to enumerate the principal in advance. We must more especially be on our guard against the common error which insists in seeking emotion where nothing remains of it save a mere survival and shadow. If, e.g., we take the most intellectualised forms of the religious or the æsthetic sentiment, we shall have much trouble in recovering the physiological conditions of its existence. There is nothing surprising in this, all we have in this case being an abstract or extract of emotion, a simple mark, an emotional scheme, an affective substitute equivalent to those intellectual substitutes which take the place of the concrete. What we must study is true emotion, felt and expressed, not inadequately recalled to memory, a pale remnant of what once was an emotion.

1. The religious sentiment is attached—perhaps more than any other—to physiological conditions, because closely connected with the instinct of self-preservation, with the saving of the soul, under whatever form the believer may conceive it. The intensity of the emotion alone is what concerns us; its quality is a matter for critical appreciation. We take the observable fact in the rough, whether legitimate or not. Now, does not the believer, whatever his degree of culture, whatever his religion, at the moment when he feels the emotion, tremble, turn pale, exhibit the sacer horror, the overwhelming awe which may end in unconsciousness, the prostrate attitude? Have not the mystics over and over again described the violent disturbances which agitate them, the internal tempest which ravages them, till, calm being re-established, they express themselves in language frequently recalling that of sexual love? The designation “hysterical,” bestowed, rightly or wrongly, on many of them, is based on the physical symptoms described by themselves. And have not the methods employed to excite, revive, or strengthen religious emotion, from the wine of the ancient Bacchanals to the noisy concerts of the Salvation Army, a direct physiological influence on the organs? What of the action of the rites which are only the fixed expression of a particular form of belief? and the miracles which happen in all religions to those who have “the faith which saves”—do they not take place in the organism? We might fill many pages with the mere enumeration of the material conditions surrounding, sustaining, evoking the religious sentiment, as we find it in fact in contemporary life, or in history. Nothing is more chimerical than to conceive religious emotion as an unmixed act, a psychological entity existing in and by itself, independently of its physiological concomitants. Suppress all these, and what remains?—a pure idea, cold and colourless. It is very evident that the physiological factors which show themselves so vividly in intense emotion, are attenuated by the effect of temperament, of repetition, and of custom; but in the same measure also, emotion is enfeebled and attenuated; a lofty religious conception and a profound religious emotion are two exceedingly different psychical phenomena. We shall come back to this point later on.

2. Moral emotion, also, must not be confounded with the moral idea. The abstract notion of justice, duty, categoric imperative, acts on some, and is without influence on others. Moral emotion, not factitious and conventional, but really felt and experienced, is a shock and an impulse that carries one away; it always shows itself by internal and external movements; it acts like an instinct. Sympathy, which places us in unison with others, making us feel their happiness and misery, is (as we shall see later) a property of animal life which imperatively requires physiological conditions, and cannot exist without them; now the part played by sympathy in the genesis of the moral emotions is quite clear. Is not the man who runs to arrest a thief or a murderer, being merely a witness, and not himself robbed or assaulted, subjected to a disturbance which is really physiological? In explosions of maternal love, in acts of sudden self-devotion, is there not a raptus which shakes the whole individual from head to foot? If these facts, among so many others, are not sufficient, let us consider what takes place in masses of people under strong excitement, in certain cases of the psychology of crowds. “If into the term morality we import the momentary appearance of certain qualities, such as abnegation, devotion, disinterestedness, self-sacrifice, the sense of justice, we may say that crowds are sometimes accessible to a very lofty morality ... a much loftier one, indeed, than that of which the isolated individual is capable. Only collectively is humanity capable of great acts of disinterestedness and devotion.” But in this state of enormously magnified moral emotion, is it conceivable that the physiological factors are negligible? Are they not the natural and necessary vehicles of moral contagion?

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Footnote 71:

G. Le Bon, Psychologie des foules, pp. 46 et seq.

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3. I shall be very brief in treating of intellectual emotion, since it is rare, and usually temperate in character; however, when it springs up with the true characteristics of intense emotion, it does not deviate from the rule. Most human beings are not passionately eager for the search after or the discovery of pure truth, any more than they are afflicted by privation of it; but those possessed by this demon are given up to him, body and soul. Their emotion is no more independent of physiological conditions than any other. The biographies of learned men furnish us with innumerable examples: the perpetual physical sufferings of Pascal, Malebranche nearly suffocated by the palpitations of his heart when reading Descartes, Humphrey Davy dancing in his laboratory after having made the discovery of potassium, Hamilton suddenly feeling something “like the closing of a galvanic circuit” at the moment of discovering the method of quaternions, etc. There is no need to extend our search so far; everyday life provides us moment by moment with examples which, though prosaic, are none the less valuable as proofs. The instinct of curiosity is at the root of all intellectual emotion, whether lofty or commonplace. Does not the man who perpetually watches his neighbour’s conduct and the thousand petty details of his life, feel when his puerile curiosity is baffled, all the physical anguish of unsatisfied desire?

4. If we are to believe certain over-subtle critics, æsthetic emotion would have the privilege of moving in the region of pure contemplation. This assertion is founded on the error pointed out above, which consists in taking into account only the quality of the emotion, not its intensity. They put a critical emotion, purified, sublimated, stripped as far as possible of its somatic resonance, in the place of the true, primitive emotion, whence all the others have issued, and which they, like the rest of men, have begun by experiencing; for even the most refined cannot begin at the end. It is an abstract mode of feeling substituted for the concrete. W. James makes, on this point, some excellent remarks, to which we refer the reader (op. cit., pp. 428 et seq.). Complete æsthetic emotion, without regard to its quality, does not always require advanced culture. The savage who, along with his companions, excites himself over his dance and song, becomes intoxicated with sound and motion; the naïve spectator quite carried away by the interest of a crude melodrama; the Spanish peasant, contemplating his church crammed with rococo ornaments and strangely-dressed saints: all these experience the concrete emotion which shakes the frame, makes the heart beat, produces tears, laughter, or gestures.

Besides, it is enough to recall the researches inaugurated by Fechner in his Vorschule der Æsthetik, and since continued, especially in Germany, under the name of elementary æsthetics, which so greatly emphasise the part played by the sensory element in the genesis of æsthetic pleasure and pain. We may thus briefly summarise them: There are two constituent factors in the æsthetic sentiment—one direct, connected with sensations and perceptions; the other indirect, connected with representations (images and associations of ideas). One or the other predominates, according to the particular art: the direct factor in music and the plastic arts, the indirect in poetry. The direct factor, by its very definition, depends on the organism. The colours are not simple sensations, they have an affective tone proper to themselves. According to Wundt, white suggests gaiety; green, a quiet joy; while red corresponds to energy, strength, etc. We may or may not admit these correspondences; Scripture gives others, and they probably vary from one individual to another; but the principle is unassailable. Féré’s previously quoted experiments, on exciting and depressing colours, tend in the same direction. It is the same with sounds:—according as they are high, deep, or medium, they induce a special mood. If from simple sensation we pass to perceptions, direct physical action is not doubtful; we find it in the arrangement of colours, in the phenomena of contrasts, in the outlines and forms of certain lines, in the innate pleasure of symmetry and regularity, in rhythm, measure, cadence, in the perception of harmony and dissonance, etc. In truth, the authors cited, have insisted rather on the sensory action than on the organic and motor modifications accompanying it. But it always remains indisputable that the æsthetic sentiment is necessarily connected with physiological conditions.

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Footnote 72:

Wundt, Physiologische Psychologie, 4th (German) ed., chap. xx.; Külpe, Grundriss der Psychologie, p. 250 (English edition), § 38; Sully, Sensation and Intuition, Part II.; Grant Allen, Mind, July 1879 (“The Origin of the Sense of Symmetry”).

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Since we are maintaining the proposition that the intensity of even the superior emotions is in direct ratio to the quantity of the physiological occurrences accompanying them, I propose in the following paragraphs to examine a single one separately, and in some detail.

Which is the most emotional of all arts? Music. There is no possible doubt as to the answer—eliminating, of course, those persons on whom it has no effect, and who must be rejected for the purposes of this argument. No art has a deeper power of penetration, no other can render shades of feeling so delicate as to escape every other medium of expression. So much is unanimously admitted.

Is the most emotional art also—as required by our thesis—the most dependent on physiological conditions? Yes, and if we wish to demonstrate this, facts are so numerous that the only difficulty is to choose between them. Let us leave aside every intellectual element, all representations, either vague or distinct, evoked by music; let us, further, avoid all metaphysical dissertations on its nature and its revelation of the Infinite, or its origin in the human species, in order to confine ourselves to its physical and affective aspect, and to grasp the connection.

In the first place, we shall find that music has an effect on many animals. Although on this point many nursery tales and marvellous anecdotes have been handed down from antiquity, yet—having made deduction of all apocryphal stories—we find a large number of observations and experiments which must be considered accurate. They are to be found in the writings of various musicians or historians of music (Grétry, Fétis, etc.). Dogs, cats, horses, lizards, serpents, spiders, not to mention many birds, are the examples most frequently quoted. Experiments made at the Jardin des Plantes, Paris, particularly on the elephants, at the beginning of this century, have been many times referred to, and are both varied and conclusive. Are we to conclude from them that these animals are melomaniacs? Some authors appear to have no doubt on this point, having a natural inclination to neglect the physical side of the phenomenon, and to interpret it in a quasi-human sense. It is much more probable that the sensations of sound and movement (animals being very sensitive to rhythm) act directly on the organism, and indirectly on the vital functions, and produce a physical state of pleasure or pain; perhaps in the highest, such as the elephant, a certain affective state approximating to emotion. In short, music acts like a burn, like heat, cold, or a caressing contact. I have on this point consulted writers of recognised competence in musical psychology. M. Dauriac writes to me: “Relative consonances and dissonances, composed of major or minor thirds, produce pleasurable or painful effects on the organism, independently of any impression or æsthetic judgment.” M. Stumpf has been kind enough to reply by a long letter, amply furnished with quotations from original authorities, whence he concludes that “der Grund hiervon dürfte ein rein physiologischer sein.”

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Footnote 73:

They will be found in Beauquier, Philosophie de la musique, p. 65.

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Let us turn to primitive man. The question becomes less simple; but the physical element still preponderates. Music consists only of rhythm, marked by clumsy and noisy instruments, whose principal effect is to increase the vibration of the nervous system. The aborigines of America are able, during four consecutive hours, to intoxicate themselves with rhythmic sounds having no melodic significance. Among certain tribes, diviners and sorcerers employ the drum in order to produce in themselves a sort of ecstasy; it is a true intoxication through sound, and especially through motion—i.e., an affective state excited directly by external and internal sensations. We have here before us the genesis of emotion.

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Footnote 74:

For details on this point, Wallaschek’s interesting work on Primitive Music should be consulted.

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Civilised man, exceptions apart, is sensitive to music in different degrees, from the peasant or artisan, who, like the savage, prefers tunes with a well-marked rhythm, to the most cultivated amateur. But for all states the primary effect is a physical one. “Musical vibration is only one particular mode of perceiving that universal vibration—that music of life which animates all beings and all bodies, from the lowest to the highest. From this point of view, musical art may be called the art of sensibility par excellence, since it regulates the great phenomenon of vibration, into which all external perceptions resolve themselves, and transfers it from the region of the unconscious, in which it was hidden, to that of consciousness.” Music acts on the muscular system, on the circulation, the respiration, and the parts dependent on them. Intense sounds (the big drum, kettledrum, etc.) give the whole body a shock, over-acute sounds cause muscular contractions. I know a musician who is thrown into convulsions by too marked a discord. Let us add to these the well-known effects of horripilation, of thrills passing down the back or over the scalp, of sudden sweats, of tickling, of epigastric constriction. Grétry had already noted that the pulse is sensitive to rhythm; and he has recorded several observations made on himself, showing that the pulsations are accelerated or retarded according to the rhythm of a chant heard internally. It would be an interminable task to enumerate the purely physical effects of the musical impression. The conclusion to be drawn is, that while certain arts at once awaken ideas which give a determination to the feelings, this of music acts inversely. It creates dispositions depending on the organic state and on nervous activity, which we translate by the vague terms—joy, sadness, tenderness, serenity, tranquillity, uneasiness. On this canvas the intellect embroiders its designs at pleasure, varying according to individual peculiarities.

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Footnote 75:

Beauquier, op. cit., p. 56.

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We might go further, and pass from the general to the particular. If music, by its effect on the organism, creates dispositions, momentary affective situations, the differences in voice, instrument, timbre, must produce different and special dispositions, which is indisputable. The tonality of a piece must act in the same way, which is also admitted by many composers. It is true that they are not agreed on the definition and the significance of every tone, and that many amusing discrepancies might be selected from their writings. (So the key of E flat minor, which, for Gevaert, is powerful and majestic, indicates, according to Grétry, an imminent catastrophe.) Here, more than elsewhere, over-precise definition is injurious.

Let me add a remark on the therapeutic action of music. We have abundant evidence that this was known in the most ancient times. From the Greek physicians to Leuret, who employed it in his moral treatment of insanity, a long series of cures have been attributed to it. A well-known Russian physiologist, Tarchanoff, has recently lauded and recommended its rational employment in disorders of the nervous system; but it does not act through occult, mysterious, spiritual influences; it acts physically, as a kind of vibratory medicine. The researches of Boudet de Paris, Mortimer Granville, Buccola, Morselli, Vigouroux, furnish proofs of this.

Although we might say much more on this subject, the above will be sufficient to show that the most emotional of the arts is also that most intimately dependent on the modifications of the organism. This has seemed to me an argument not to be neglected in favour of the physiological theory of emotion.

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Footnote 76:

Gurney, in a criticism of James’s hypothesis (Mind, ix. 425), says: “There is plenty of music from which I have received as much emotion in silent representation” [i.e., by purely internal audition, or merely reading the notes] “as when presented by the finest orchestra; but it is with the latter condition that I almost exclusively associate the cutaneous tingling and hair-stirring.” Professor James has, in my opinion, answered this objection (Psychology, ii. pp. 469, 470), which I should be inclined to refer to the problem of the “revivability of impressions,” to be examined later on.

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III.

We have just shown that the so-called higher forms of emotion do not escape from the necessity of physiological conditions; but there is yet another question, still in obscurity and suspense, which, by reason of its importance, ought to be elucidated. It is this: Why have certain internal or external states, certain images, certain ideas, the privilege of exciting certain organic and motor states, and, in consequence, emotion? How is this connection, this nexus, established? for experience teaches us that it is not necessary: in the same individual the same perception or idea may awaken an emotion, whereas in another case it may produce nothing. In other words, there are perceptions, images, and concepts which remain purely intellectual states without affective accompaniment, at least with none accessible to consciousness. There are others which are immediately enveloped and, as it were, submerged in the emotion which they produce. Let us note that the question comes before us, whatever opinion we may adopt as to the genesis of emotion. As usually accepted, the order is this: intellectual state, affective state, organic states. According to the physiological hypothesis, the order is as follows: intellectual state, organic states, affective state. Passing from one thesis to the other, the problem is subject to but one variation: Why is a certain intellectual state sometimes coupled with an intellectual state, and sometimes not? This is on the first hypothesis. Why is a certain intellectual state sometimes accompanied by organic and motor modifications, sometimes not? This is on the second hypothesis.

The answer is the same in both cases: the intellectual state is accompanied by an affective state whenever there is a direct relation with the conditions of existence, natural or social, of the individual. In order to justify this proposition we must examine in succession these two forms of the conditions of existence.

1st Period.—Sensations or images connected with the natural conditions of existence.

We have here to do with a question of genesis; we must therefore begin with the humblest phenomena. The primordial sense, the only one in certain animals, is touch combined with internal sensations. Let us remark that, in its origin, the “knowledge” which we take in its lowest degree has only a practical value; sensation is a monitor, an aid, an instrument, a weapon with only one aim—the preservation of the individual,—and completely subordinated to that end; otherwise, it is nothing but a useless manifestation, a luxury. The nexus between the sensations and the organic and motor reactions is therefore innate—i.e., it results from the very constitution of the animal. If it fails, the conditions of existence are at fault. The primordial tissue, says Spencer, must be differently affected, according as it is in contact with nutritive matter (ordinarily soluble) or with innutritive matter (ordinarily insoluble). The contraction by which the tactual surface of a rhizopod absorbs a fragment of assimilable matter is caused by a commencing absorption of this matter, i.e., contact and absorption are the same thing. The action of certain agents is followed by a retractile movement, or, on the contrary, by movements of a character to assure the continuance of the impression. These two kinds of movement are, in this writer’s view, respectively the phenomena and the signs of pleasure and pain. The tissue, therefore, acts in such a manner as to assure pleasure and avoid pain, by a law as physical and natural as that by which a magnet turns towards the pole, or a tree to the light. Without inquiring whether pleasure and pain exist in this case—a purely hypothetical assumption—there are, at least, objective phenomena denoting a nexus of utility between the sensation and the expansive or retractile movements.

Passing from these inferior organisms to those provided with several senses, we find no change. Each order of sensation acts in the same way. The animal is better informed, and consequently better protected and armed—that is all. Finally, when certain images (i.e., recollections of pleasures and pains experienced) excite an emotional state, the mechanism remains the same, and tends towards the same end. It is therefore not without reason that we have above assimilated every form of primary emotion to a psycho-physiological organism adapted to a particular end.

It is needless to review the primary emotions and to show that the sensation, the perception, or the image only produces organic or motor troubles when the preservation of the individual or the species is at stake. The intellectual state (sensation, perception, or image) can instinctively—i.e., through an innate mechanism—produce immobility, oppression, withdrawing into one’s self, flight (fear); or, on the contrary, aggressive movements, attack (anger), or movements of attraction, accompanied by phenomena peculiar to each species (sexual love).

To sum up, every event of this kind, reduced to its simplest expression, consists in (1) an intellectual fact, analogous to a spring moving the whole machine, (2) an unconscious, half-conscious, or conscious reaction of the instinct of self-preservation; this being by no means an entity, as we have already said, but the organism itself under its dynamic aspect.

2nd Period.—Perceptions, images, or ideas connected with social conditions of existence.

Up to the present, we have only considered emotional reaction in its relations with nature—i.e., with the physical environment. Its domain is much more extensive; in man, and in many animals, it is adapted to the social environment. At bottom, the mechanism remains the same. A perception, an image, or an idea excites an emotion, because related, directly or indirectly (in the latter case the relation is conceived, inductively or deductively), to the social conditions of the individual. The natural ego has its needs and tendencies; the same is true of the social ego, grafted on the other, or rather, one with it; consequently, the mechanism comes very frequently into play; the circumference is extended, but the centre remains the same.

Let us note the differences between the two periods. In the latter we have (1) a preponderance of representations and concepts—i.e., the superior forms of knowledge; (2) instead of a natural, innate association between certain perceptions and certain emotional reactions—associations which may be called anatomical, because fixed in the individual organism—there are secondary, acquired associations, less solidly fixed, sometimes entirely artificial, which result from experience, from education, from habit, from imitation. I give some examples, by way of elucidation, and in order to avoid repetition.

The feeling of property is derived from a natural condition of existence—nutrition. It is first manifested—in the form of a prevision—in some animals who store up a reserve of food for the future. In primitive man this instinct extends to clothes, weapons, the cave or hut which he inhabits; later on, with the nomadic life, to herds and flocks; then to agricultural products, silver, gold, paper money; finally to that impalpable thing called credit, which has merely an imaginary existence. Thus it gradually takes on a social character. The knowledge of any loss or any gain, actual or possible, produces an emotion in the individual, because it shows him that his adaptation to social conditions is diminished or augmented.

The sentiment of “self-feeling” is innate, primary. Let us imagine ourselves in a society where the questions of rank, precedence, etiquette, are of capital importance—in an aristocratic monarchy like that of Louis XIV.—and we shall see what a ferment of emotions may be raised by an occurrence which, to our eyes, seems futile and irrelevant. If we read Saint-Simon’s Mémoires, we see him boiling over with indignation when a courtier is unduly accorded the privileges of a duke and peer, and his wife is granted a stool in the Queen’s presence. He spends his time in incessant visits, forms coalitions, does all in his power to move the ministers or the Parliament, and finally exults in his victory. However factitious and puerile this agitation may seem, it results from the same physiological mechanism as the simplest emotions: from the instinct of personal preservation—not of his natural ego, but of his ego qua courtier of the Grand Monarque. If he fails, he is injured, depreciated, lessened in his conditions of social existence.

The case already cited, of Malebranche, to whom Descartes’ Traité de l’homme “caused such violent palpitations of the heart that he was obliged continually to leave his book in order to breathe,” called forth Fontenelle’s remark that “Truth, which is invisible and of no practical utility, is not wont to find so much sensibility among men.” No doubt; but to the true man of science the pursuit of truth is one of the necessary conditions of existence. For others it is a mere luxury, to the loss of which they are quite indifferent.

I think we have thus replied to the question previously put—why certain sensations, images, ideas, have the privilege of producing organic and motor changes which, translated into the language of consciousness, constitute the emotional state—and justified our answer. The sensation, the image, the idea, are only occasional causes, incapable by themselves of producing any emotion: it springs from the inmost personality of the individual—from his organisation—expresses it directly, and participates in its stability and its instability.

IV.

The hypothesis of James and Lange—considered, at first, as a paradox—has suggested so many remarks, criticisms, objections, answers, and arguments for and against, that I find it impossible to give a summary of them. Yet it is not without precedent. Lange, in his Addenda, mentions as his precursors, Malebranche, Spinoza, and some other less celebrated authors. The legitimate claims of Descartes, in his treatise Sur les Passions de l’Âme, have also since been vindicated. The physiologists, too, ought not to be forgotten: Maudsley indicated the same view, without insisting on it. The superiority of James and Lange consists in having put it clearly and endeavoured to support it by experimental proofs. I have already said that it seems to me the most probable explanation for those who do not represent the emotions to themselves as psychological entities. The only point in which I differ from these authors relates to their way of putting the proposition, not to its substance.

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Footnote 77:

I may indicate, somewhat at random, the principal documents for this controversy: Wundt, Philosophische Studien, vi. 3, p. 349 (he criticises Lange only); Gurney, Mind, July 1884; Marshall, ib., October 1884; Stanley, ib., January 1886; Worcester, Monist, January 1893; Psychological Review, September and November 1894, January 1895, etc.

Footnote 78:

“Though written in the earliest days of modern science, this work will bear comparison with anything that has been produced in recent years. It will be difficult, indeed, to find any treatment of the emotions much superior to it in originality, thoroughness, and suggestiveness. The position maintained is similar to that now held by Professor James, but Descartes does not content himself with defending in a general way the assertion that emotion is caused by physical change. After coming to the conclusion that there are six passions from which all the others are derived, he attempts to show that a special set of organic effects is concerned in the production of each of these primary states.”—D. Irons in Philosophical Review, May 1895, p. 291.

Footnote 79:

“When any great passion causes all the physical and moral troubles which it will cause, what I conceive to happen is that a physical impression made on the sense of sight or of hearing is propagated along a physical path to the brain, and arouses a physical commotion in its molecules; that from this centre of commotion the liberated energy is propagated by physical paths to other parts of the brain; and that it is finally discharged outwardly through proper physical paths, either in movements or in modifications of secretion and nutrition. The passion that is felt is the subjective side of the cerebral commotion—its motion out from the physical basis, as it were (e-motion), into consciousness.”—Pathology of Mind, 1879, p. 222.

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It is evident that our two authors, whether consciously or not, share the dualist point of view with the common opinion which they are combating; the only difference being in the interversion of cause and effect. Emotion is a cause of which the physical manifestations are the effect, says one party; the physical manifestations are the cause of which emotion is the effect, says the other. In my view, there would be a great advantage in eliminating from the question every notion of cause and effect, every relation of causality, and in substituting for the dualistic position a unitary or monistic one. The Aristotelian formula of matter and form seems to me to meet the case better, if we understand by “matter” the corporeal facts, and by “form” the corresponding psychical state: the two terms, by-the-bye, only existing in connection with each other and being inseparable except as abstract conceptions. It was traditional in ancient psychology to study the relations of “the soul and the body”—the new psychology does not speak of them. In fact, if the question takes a metaphysical form, it is no longer psychology; if it takes an experimental form, there is no reason to treat it separately, because it is treated in connection with everything. No state of consciousness can be dissociated from its physical conditions: they constitute a natural whole, which must be studied as such. Every kind of emotion ought to be considered in this way: all that is objectively expressed by movements of the face and body, by vaso-motor, respiratory, and secretory disturbances, is expressed subjectively by correlative states of consciousness, classed by external observation according to their qualities. It is a single occurrence expressed in two languages. We have previously assimilated the emotions to psycho-physiological organisms; this unitary point of view, being more conformable to the nature of things and to the present tendencies of psychology, seems to me, in practice, to eliminate many objections and difficulties.

Whether we adopt this theory or not, we have in any case acquired the certainty that the organic and motor manifestations are not accessories, that the study of them is part of the study of emotion. We shall therefore have to speak of them in some detail.