The Story of the Mind | Page 6

illustrate this
single and peculiar sort of process as it goes on in the mind.
We may ask how the child apprehends an orange out there on the table
before him. It can not be said that the orange goes into the child's mind
by any one of its senses. By sight he gets only the colour and shape of
the orange, by smell he gets only its odour, by taste its sweetness, and
by touch its smoothness, rotundity, etc. Furthermore, by none of these
senses does he find out the individuality of the orange, or distinguish it
from other things which involve the same or similar sensations--say an
apple. It is easy to see that after each of the senses has sent in its report
something more is necessary: the combining of them all together in the
same place and at the same time, the bringing up of an appropriate
name, and with that a sort of relating or distinguishing of this group of
sensations from those of the apple. Only then can we say that the
knowledge, "here is an orange," has been reached. Now this is the one
typical way the mind has of acting, this combining of all the items or
groups of items into ever larger and more fruitful combinations. This is
called Apperception. The mind, we say, "apperceives" the orange when
it is able to treat all the separate sensations together as standing for one
thing. And the various circumstances under which the mind does this
give the occasions for the different names which the earlier psychology
used for marking off different "faculties."
These names are still convenient, however, and it may serve to make
the subject clear, as well as to inform the reader of the meaning of these
terms, to show how they all refer to this one kind of mental action.
The case of the orange illustrates what is usually called Perception. It is
the case in which the result is the knowledge of an actual object in the
outside world. When the same process goes on after the actual object
has been removed it is Memory. When it goes on again in a way which
is not controlled by reference to such an outside object--usually it is a
little fantastic, as in dreams or fancy, but often it is useful as being so
well done as to anticipate what is really true in the outside world--then
it is Imagination. If it is actually untrue, but still believed in, we call it
Illusion or Hallucination. When it uses mere symbols, such as words,

gestures, writing, etc., to stand for whole groups of things, it is
Thinking or Reasoning. So we may say that what the mind arrives at
through this its one great way of acting, no matter which of these forms
it takes on, except in the cases in which it is not true in its results to the
realities, is Knowledge.
Thus we see that the terms and faculties of the older psychology can be
arranged under this doctrine of Apperception without the necessity of
thinking of the mind as doing more than the one thing. It simply groups
and combines its material in different ways and in ever higher degrees
of complexity.
Apperception, then, is the one principle of mental activity on the side of
its reception and treatment of the materials of experience.
There is another term very current in psychology by which this same
process is sometimes indicated: the phrase Association of Ideas. This
designates the fact that when two things have been perceived or thought
of together, they tend to come up together in the mind in the future; and
when a thing has been perceived which resembles another, or is
contrasted with it, they tend to recall each other in the same way. It is
plain, however, that this phrase is applied to the single thoughts,
sensations, or other mental materials, in their relations or connections
among themselves. They are said to be "associated" with one another.
This way of speaking of the mental materials, instead of speaking of
the mind's activity, is convenient; and it is quite right to do so, since it
is no contradiction to say that the thoughts, etc., which the mind
"apperceives" remain "associated" together. From this explanation it is
evident that the Association of Ideas also comes under the mental
process of Apperception of which we have been speaking.
There is, however, another tendency of the mind in the treatment of its
material, a tendency which shows us in actual operation the activity
with which we have now become familiar. When we come to look at
any particular case of apperception or association we find that the
process must go on from the platform which the mind's attainments
have