ILLUSIONS OF INTROSPECTION.
We have now, perhaps, sufficiently reviewed sense-illusions, both of
waking life and of sleep. And having roughly classified them according
to their structure and origin, we are ready to go forwards and inquire
whether the theory thus reached can be applied to other forms of
illusory error. And here we are compelled to inquire at the outset if
anything analogous to sense-illusion is to be found in that other great
region of presentative cognition usually marked off from external
perception as internal perception, self-reflection, or introspection.
_Illusions of Introspection defined._
This inquiry naturally sets out with the question: What is meant by
introspection? This cannot be better defined, perhaps, than by saying
that it is the mind's immediate reflective cognition of its own states
as such.
In one sense, of course, everything we know may be called a mental
state, actual or imagined. Thus, a sense-impression is known, exactly
like any other feeling of the mind, as a mental phenomenon or mental
modification. Yet we do not usually speak of introspectively
recognizing a sensation. Our sense-impressions are marked off from all
other feelings by having an objective character, that is to say, an
immediate relation to the external world, so that in attending to one of
them our minds pass away from themselves in what Professor Bain calls
the attitude of objective regard. Introspection is confined to feelings
which want this intimate connection with the external region, and
includes sensation only so far as it is viewed apart from external
objects and on its mental side as a feeling, a process which is next to
impossible where the sensation has little emotional colour, as in the
case of an ordinary sensation of sight or of articulate sound.
This being so, errors of introspection, supposing such to be found, will
in the main be sufficiently distinguished from those of perception. Even
an hallucination of sense, whether setting out from a subjective
sensation or not, always contains the semblance of a sense-impression,
and so would not be correctly classed with errors of introspection.
Just as introspection must be marked off from perception, so must it be
distinguished from memory. It may be contended that, strictly speaking,
all introspection is retrospection, since even in attending to a present
feeling the mind is reflectively representing to itself the immediately
preceding momentary experience of that feeling. Yet the adoption of this
view does not hinder us from drawing a broad distinction between acts of
introspection and acts of memory. Introspection must be regarded as
confined to the knowledge of immediately antecedent mental states with
reference to which, no error of memory can be supposed to arise.
It follows from this that an illusion of introspection could only be
found in connection with the apprehension of present or immediately
antecedent mental states. On the other hand, any illusions connected
with the consciousness of personal continuity and identity would fall
rather under the class of mnemonic than that of introspective error.
Once more, introspection must be carefully distinguished from what I
have called belief. Some of our beliefs may be found to grow out of and
be compounded of a number of introspections. Thus, my conception of my
own character, or my psychological conception of mind as a whole, may be
seen to arise by a combination of the results of a number of acts of
introspection. Yet, supposing this to be so, we must still distinguish
between the single presentative act of introspection and the
representative belief growing out of it.
It follows from this that, though an error of the latter sort might
conceivably have its origin in one of the former; though, for example, a
man's illusory opinion of himself might be found to involve errors of
introspection, yet the two kinds of illusion would be sufficiently
unlike. The latter would be a simple presentative error, the former a
compound representative error.
Finally, in order to complete this preliminary demarcation of our
subject-matter, it is necessary to distinguish between an introspection
(apparent or real) of a feeling or idea, and a process of inference
based on this feeling. The term introspective knowledge must, it is
plain, be confined to what is or appears to be in the mind at the moment
of inspection.
By observing this distinction, we are in a position to mark off an
_illusion_ of introspection from a _fallacy_ of introspection. The
former differs from the latter in the absence of anything like a
conscious process of inference. Thus, if we suppose that the derivation
by Descartes of the fact of the existence of God from his possession of
the idea to be erroneous, such a consciously performed act of reasoning
would constitute a fallacy rather than an illusion of introspection.
We may, then, roughly define an illusion of introspection as an error
involved in the apprehension of the contents of the mind at any moment.
If we mistake the quality or degree of a feeling or the structure of a
complex mass of feeling, or if we confuse what is actually present to
the mind with some inference based on this, we may be said to fall into
an illusion of introspection.
But here the question will certainly be raised: How can we conceive the
mind erring as to the nature of its present contents; and what is to
determine, if not my immediate act of introspection, what is present in
my mind at any moment? Indeed, to raise the possibility of error in
introspection seems to do away with the certainty of presentative
knowledge.
If, however, the reader will recall what was said in an earlier chapter
about the possibility of error in recognizing the quality of a
sense-impression, he will be prepared for a similar possibility here.
What we are accustomed to call a purely presentative cognition is, in
truth, partly representative. A feeling as pure feeling is not known; it
is only known when it is distinguished, as to quality or degree, and so
classed or brought under some representation of a kind or description of
feeling, as acute, painful, and so on. The accurate recognition of an
impression of colour depends, as we have seen, on this process of
classing being correctly performed. Similarly, the recognition of
internal feelings implies the presence of the appropriate or
corresponding class-representation. Accordingly, if it is possible for a
wrong representation to get substituted for the right one, there seems
to be an opening for error.
Any error that would thus arise can, of course, only be determined as
such in relation to some other act of introspection of the same mind. In
matters of internal perception other minds cannot directly assist us in
correcting error as they can in the case of external perception, though,
as we shall see by-and-by, they may do so indirectly. The standard of
reality directly applicable to introspective cognition is plainly what
the individual mind recognizes at its best moments, when the processes
of attention and classifying are accurately performed, and the
representation may be regarded with certainty as answering to the
feeling. In other words, in the sphere of internal, as in that of
external experience, the criterion of reality is the average and
perfect, as distinguished from the particular variable and imperfect act
of cognition.
We see, then, that error in the process of introspection is at least
conceivable. And now let us examine this process a little further, in
order to find out what probabilities of error attach to it.
To begin with, then, an act of introspection, to be complete, clearly
involves the apprehension of an internal feeling or idea as something
mental and marked off from the region of external experience. This
distinct recognition of internal states of mind as such, in opposition
to external impressions, is by no means easy, but presupposes a certain
degree of intellectual culture, and a measure of the power of abstract
attention.
_Confusion of Internal and External Experience._
Accordingly, we find that where this is wanting there is a manifest
disposition to translate internal feelings into terms of external
impressions. In this way there may arise a slight amount of habitual and
approximately constant error. Not that the process approaches to one of
hallucination; but only that the internal feelings are intuited as
having a cause or origin analogous to that of sense-impressions. Thus to
the uncultivated mind a sudden thought seems like an audible
announcement from without. The superstitious man talks of being led by
some good or evil spirit when new ideas arise in his mind or new
resolutions shape themselves. To the simple intelligence of the boor
every thought presents itself as an analogue of an audible voice, and he
commonly describes his rough musings as saying this and that to himself.
And this, mode of viewing the matter is reflected even, in the language
of cultivated persons. Thus we say, "The idea struck me," or "was borne
in on me," "I was forced to do so and so," and so on, and in this
manner we tend to assimilate internal to external mental phenomena.
Much the same thing shows itself in our customary modes of describing
our internal feelings of pleasure and pain. When a man in a state of
mental depression speaks of having "a load" on his mind it is evident
that he is interpreting a mental by help of an analogy to a bodily
feeling. Similarly, when we talk of the mind being torn by doubt or worn
by anxiety. It would seem as though we tended mechanically to translate
mental pleasures and pains into the language of bodily sensations.
The explanation of this deeply rooted tendency to a slightly illusory
view of our mental states is, I think, an easy one. For one thing, it
follows from the relation of the mental image to the sense-impression
that we should tend to assimilate the former to the latter as to its
nature and origin. This would account for the common habit of regarding
thoughts, which are of course accompanied by representatives of their
verbal symbols, as internal voices, a habit which is probably especially
characteristic of the child and the uncivilized man, as we have found it
to be characteristic of the insane.
Another reason, however, must be sought for the habit of assimilating
internal feelings to external sensations. If language has been evolved
as an incident of social life, at once one of its effects and its
causes, it would seem to follow that it must have first shaped Itself to
the needs of expressing these common objective experiences which we
receive by way of our senses. Our habitual modes of thought, limited as
they are by language, retain traces of this origin. We cannot conceive
any mental process except by some vague analogy to a physical process.
In other words, we can even now only think with perfect clearness when
we are concerned with some object of common cognition. Thus, the sphere
of external sensation and of physical agencies furnishes us with the one
type of thinkable thing or object of thought, and we habitually view
subjective mental states as analogues of these.
Still, it may be said that these slight nascent errors are hardly worth
naming, and the question would still appear to recur whether there are
other fully developed errors deserving to rank along with illusions of
sense. Do we, it may be asked, ever actually mistake the quality,
degree, or structure of our internal feelings in the manner hinted
above, and if so, what is the range of such error? In order to
appreciate the risks of such error, let us compare the process of
self-observation with that of external perception with respect to the
difficulties in the way of accurate presentative knowledge.
_Misreading of Internal Feelings._
First of all, it is noteworthy that a state of consciousness at any one
moment is an exceedingly complex thing. It is made up of a mass of
feelings and active impulses which often combine and blend in a most
inextricable way. External sensations come in groups, too, but as a rule
they do not fuse in apparently simple wholes as our internal feelings
often do. The very possibility of perception depends on a clear
discrimination of sense-elements, for example, the several sensations
of colour obtained by the stimulation of different parts of the
retina.[103] But no such clearly defined mosaic of feelings presents
itself in the internal region: one element overlaps and partly loses
itself in another, and subjective analysis is often an exceedingly
difficult matter. Our consciousness is thus a closely woven texture in
which the mental eye often fails to trace the several threads or
strands. Moreover, there is the fact that many of these ingredients are
exceedingly shadowy, belonging to that obscure region of
sub-consciousness which it is so hard to penetrate with the light of
discriminative attention. This remark applies with particular force to
that mass of organic feelings which constitutes what is known as
coenæsthesis; or vital sense.
While, to speak figuratively, the minute anatomy of consciousness is
thus difficult with respect to longitudinal sections of the mental
column, it is no less difficult with respect to transverse sections.
Under ordinary circumstances, external impressions persist so that they
can be transfixed by a deliberate act of attention, and objects rarely
flit over the external scene so rapidly as to allow us no time for a
careful recognition of the impression. Not so in the case of the
internal region of mind. The composite states of consciousness just
described never remain perfectly uniform for the shortest conceivable
duration. They change continually, just as the contents of the
kaleidoscope vary with every shake of the instrument. Thus, one shade
of feeling runs into another in such a way that it is often impossible
to detect its exact quality; and even when the character of the feeling
does not change, its intensity is undergoing alterations so that an
accurate observation of its quantity is impracticable. Also, in this
unstable shifting internal scene features may appear for a duration too
short to allow of close recognition. In this way it happens that we
cannot sharply divide the feeling of the moment from its antecedents and
its consequents.
If, now, we take these facts in connection with what has been said above
respecting the nature of the process of introspection, the probability
of error will be made sufficiently clear. To transfix any particular
feeling of the moment, to selectively attend to it, and to bring it
under the proper representation, is an operation that requires time, a
time which, though short, is longer than the fugitive character of so
much of our internal mental life allows. From all of which it would
appear to follow that it must be very easy to overlook, confuse, and
transform, both as to quality and as to quantity, the actual ingredients
of our internal consciousness.
From these sources there spring a number of small errors of
introspection which, to distinguish them from others to be spoken of
presently, may be called passive. These would include all errors in
detecting what is in consciousness due to the intricacies of the
phenomena, and not aided by any strong basis. For example, a mental
state may fail to disclose its component parts to introspective
attention. Thus, a motive may enter into our action which is so
entangled with other feelings as to escape our notice. The fainter the
feeling the greater the difficulty of detaching it and inspecting it in
isolation. Again, an error of introspection may have its ground in the
fugitive character of a feeling. If, for example, a man is asked whether
a rapid action was a voluntary one, he may in retrospection easily
imagine that it was not so, when as a matter of fact the action was
preceded by a momentary volition. When a person exclaims, "I did a thing
inadvertently or mechanically," it often means that he did not note the
motive underlying the action. Such transitory feelings which cannot at
the moment be seized by an act of attention are pretty certain to
disappear at once, leaving not even a temporary trace in consciousness.
We will now pass to the consideration of other illusions of
introspection more analogous to what I have called the active illusions
of perception. In our examination of these we found that a pure
representation may under certain circumstances simulate the appearance
of a presentation, that a mental image may approximate to a
sense-impression. In the case of the internal feelings this liability
shows itself in a still more striking form.
The higher feelings or emotions are distinguished from the simple
sense-feelings in being largely representative. Thus, a feeling of
contentment at any moment, though no doubt conditioned by the bodily
state and the character of the organic sensations or coenæsthesis,
commonly depends for the most part on intellectual representations of
external circumstances or relations, and may be called an ideal
foretaste of actual satisfactions, such as the pleasures of success, of
companionship, and so on. This being so, it is easy for imagination to
call up a semblance of these higher feelings. Since they depend largely
on representation, a mere act of representation may suffice to excite a
degree of the feeling hardly distinguishable from the actual one. Thus,
to imagine myself as contented is really to see myself at the moment as
actually contented. Again, the actor, though, as we shall see by-and-by,
he does not feel all that the spectator is apt to attribute to him,
tends, when vividly representing to himself a particular shade of
feeling, to regard himself as actually feeling in this way. Thus, it is
said of Garrick, that when acting Richard III., he felt himself for the
moment to be a villain.
We should expect from all this that in the act of introspection the mind
is apt, within certain limits, to find what it is prepared to find. And
since there is in these acts often a distinct wish to detect some
particular feeling, we can see how easy it must be for a man through
bias and a wrong focussing of the attention to deceive himself up to a
certain point with respect to the actual contents of his mind.
Let us examine one of these active illusions a little more fully. It
would at first sight seem to be a perfectly simple thing to determine at
any given moment whether we are enjoying ourselves, whether our
emotional condition rises above the pleasure-threshold or point of
indifference and takes on a positive hue of the agreeable or
pleasurable. Yet there is good reason for supposing that people not
unfrequently deceive themselves on this matter. It is, perhaps, hardly
an exaggeration to say that most of us are capable of imagining that we
are having enjoyment when we conform to the temporary fashion of social
amusement. It has been cynically observed that people go into society
less in order to be happy than to seem so, and one may add that in this
semblance of enjoyment they may, provided they are not _blasé_, deceive
themselves as well as others. The expectation of enjoyment, the
knowledge that the occasion is intended to bring about this result, the
recognition of the external signs of enjoyment in others--all this may
serve to blind a man in the earlier stages of social amusement to his
actual mental condition.
If we look closely into this variety of illusion, we shall see that it
is very similar in its structure and origin to that kind of erroneous
perception which arises from inattention to the actual impression of the
moment under the influence of a strong expectation of something
different. The representation of ourselves as entertained dislodges from
our internal field of vision our actual condition, relegating this to
the region of obscure consciousness. Could we for a moment get rid of
this representation and look at the real feelings of the time, we should
become aware of our error; and it is possible that the process of
becoming _blasé_ involves a waking up to a good deal of illusion of the
kind.
Just as we can thus deceive ourselves within certain limits as to our
emotional condition, so we can mistake the real nature of our
intellectual condition. Thus, when an idea is particularly grateful to
our minds, we may easily imagine that we believe it, when in point of
fact all the time there is a sub-conscious process of criticism going
on, which if we attended to it for a moment would amount to a distinct
act of disbelief. Some persons appear to be capable of going on
habitually practising this petty deceit on themselves, that is to say,
imagining they believe what in fact they are strongly inclined to doubt.
Indeed, this remark applies to all the grateful illusions respecting
ourselves and others, which will have to be discussed by-and-by. The
impulse to hold to the illusion in spite of critical reflection,
involves the further introspective illusion of taking a state of doubt
for one of assurance. Thus, the weak, flattered man or woman manages to
keep up a sort of fictitious belief in the truth of the words which are
so pleasant to the ear.
It is plain that the external conditions of life impose on the
individual certain habits of feeling which often conflict with his
personal propensities. As a member of society he has a powerful motive
to attribute certain feelings to himself, and this motive acts as a bias
in disturbing his vision of what is actually in his mind. While this
holds good of lighter matters, as that of enjoyment just referred to, it
applies still more to graver matters. Thus, for example, a man may
easily persuade himself that he feels a proper sentiment of indignation
against a perpetrator of some mean or cruel act, when as a matter of
fact his feeling is much more one of compassion for the previously liked
offender. In this way we impose on ourselves, disguising our real
sentiments by a thin veil of make-believe.
So far I have spoken of an illusion of introspection as analogous to
the slight misapprehensions of sense-impression which were touched on in
connection with illusions of sense (Chapter III.). It is to be observed,
however, that the confusing of elements of consciousness, which is so
prominent a factor in introspective illusion, involves a species of
error closely analogous to a complete illusion of perception, that is to
say, one which involves a misinterpretation of a sense-impression.
This variety of illusion is illustrated in the case in which a present
feeling or thought is confounded with some inference based on it. For
example, a present thought may, through forgetfulness, be regarded as a
new discovery. Its originality appears to be immediately made known in
the very freshness which characterizes it. Every author probably has
undergone the experience of finding that ideas which started up to his
mind as fresh creations, were unconscious reminiscences of his own or of
somebody else's ideas.
In the case of present emotional states this liability to confuse the
present and the past is far greater. Here there is something hardly
distinguishable from an active illusion of sense-perception. In this
condition of mind a man often says that he has an "intuition" of
something supposed to be immediately given in the feeling itself. For
instance, one whose mind is thrilled by the pulsation of a new joy
exclaims, "This is the happiest moment of my life," and the assurance
seems to be contained in the very intensity of the feeling itself. Of
course, cool reflection will tell him that what he affirms is merely a
belief, the accuracy of which presupposes processes of recollection and
judgment, but to the man's mind at the moment the supremacy of this
particular joy is immediately intuited. And so with the assurance that
the present feeling, for example of love, is undying, that it is equal
to the most severe trials, and so on. A man is said to _feel_ at the
moment that it is so, though as the facts believed have reference to
absent circumstances and events, it is plain that the knowledge is by no
means intuitive.
At such times our minds are in a state of pure feeling: intellectual
discrimination and comparison are no longer possible. In this way our
emotions in the moments of their greatest intensity carry away our
intellects with them, confusing the region of pure imagination with that
of truth and certainty, and even the narrow domain of the present with
the vast domain of the past and future. In this condition differences of
present and future may be said to disappear and the energy of the
emotion to constitute an immediate assurance of its existence
absolutely.[104]
The great region for the illustration of these active illusions is that
of the moral and religious life. With respect to our real motives, our
dominant aspirations, and our highest emotional experiences, we are
greatly liable to deceive ourselves. The moralist and the theologian
have clearly recognized the possibilities of self-deception in matters
of feeling and impulse. To them it is no mystery that the human heart
should mistake the fictitious for the real, the momentary and evanescent
for the abiding. And they have recognized, too, the double bias in these
errors, namely, the powerful disposition to exaggerate the intensity and
persistence of a present feeling on the one hand, and on the other hand
to take a mere wish to feel in a particular way for the actual
possession of the feeling.
_Philosophic Illusions._
The opinion of theologians respecting the nature of moral introspection
presents a singular contrast to that entertained by some philosophers as
to the nature of self-consciousness. It is supposed by many of these
that in interrogating their internal consciousness they are lifted above
all risk of error. The "deliverance of consciousness" is to them
something bearing the seal of a supreme authority, and must not be
called in question. And so they make an appeal to individual
consciousness a final resort in all matters of philosophical dispute.
Now, on the face of it, it does not seem probable that this operation
should have an immunity from all liability to error. For the matters
respecting which we are directed to introspect ourselves, are the most
subtle and complex things of our intellectual and emotional life. And
some of these philosophers even go so far as to affirm that the plain
man is quite equal to the niceties of this process.
It has been brought as a charge against some of these same philosophers
that they have based certain of their doctrines on errors of
introspection. This charge must, of course, be received with some sort
of suspicion here, since it has been brought forward by avowed disciples
of an opposite philosophic school. Nevertheless, as there is from our
present disinterested and purely scientific point of view a presumption
that philosophers like other men are fallible, and since it is certain
that philosophical introspection does not materially differ from other
kinds, it seems permissible just to glance at some of these alleged
illusions in relation to other and more vulgar forms. Further reference
to them will be made at the end of our study.
These so-called philosophical illusions will be found, like the vulgar
ones just spoken of, to illustrate the distinction drawn between passive
and active illusions. That is to say, the alleged misreading of
individual consciousness would result now from a confusion of distinct
elements, including wrong suggestion, due to the intricacies of the
phenomena, now from a powerful predisposition to read something into the
phenomena.
A kind of illusion in which the passive element seems most conspicuous
would be the error into which the interrogator of the individual
consciousness is said to fall respecting simple unanalyzable states of
mind. On the face of it, it is not likely that a mere inward glance at
the tangle of conscious states should suffice to determine what is such
a perfectly simple mental phenomenon. Accordingly, when a writer
declares that an act of introspection demonstrates the simple
unanalyzable character of such a feeling as the sentiment of beauty or
that of moral approval, the opponent of this view clearly has some show
of argument for saying that this simplicity may be altogether illusory
and due to the absence of a perfect act of attention. Similarly, when it
is said that the idea of space contains no representations of muscular
sensation, the statement may clearly arise from the want of a
sufficiently careful kind of introspective analysis.[105]
In most cases of these alleged philosophical errors, however, the active
and passive factors seem to combine. There are certain intricacies in
the mental phenomenon itself favouring the chances of error, and there
are independent predispositions leading the mind to look at the
phenomenon in a wrong way. This seems to apply to the famous declaration
of a certain school of thinkers that by an act of introspection we can
intuit the fact of liberty, that is to say, a power of spontaneous
determination of action superior to and regulative of the influence of
motives. It may be plausibly contended that this idea arises partly
from a mixing up of facts of present consciousness with inferences from
them, and partly from a natural predisposition of the mind to invest
itself with this supreme power of absolute origination.[106]
In a similar way, it might be contended that other famous philosophic
dicta are founded on a process of erroneous introspection of subjective
mental states. In some cases, indeed, it seems a plausible explanation
to regard these illusions as mere survivals in attenuated shadowy form
of grosser popular illusions. But this is not yet the time to enter on
these, which, moreover, hardly fall perhaps under our definition of an
illusion of introspection.
_Value of the Introspective Method._
In drawing up this rough sketch of the illusions of introspection, I
have had no practical object in view. I have tried to look at the facts
as they are apart from any conclusions to be drawn from them. The
question how far the liability to error in any region of inquiry
vitiates the whole process is a difficult one; and the question whether
the illusions to which we are subject in introspection materially affect
the value of self-knowledge as a whole and consequently of the
introspective method in psychology, as many affirm, is too subtle a one
to be fully treated now. All that I shall attempt here is to show that
it does not do this any more than the risk of sense-illusion can be said
materially to affect the value of external observation.
It is to be noted first of all that the errors of introspection are much
more limited than those of sense-perception. They broadly answer to the
slight errors connected with the discrimination and recognition of the
sense-impression. There is nothing answering to a complete hallucination
in the sphere of the inner mental life. It follows, too, from what has
been said above, that the amount of active error in introspection is
insignificant, since the representation of a feeling or belief is so
very similar to the actual experience of it.
In brief, the errors of introspection, though numerous, are all too
slight to render the process of introspection as a whole unsound and
untrustworthy. Though, as we have seen, it involves, strictly speaking,
an ingredient of representation, this fact does not do away with the
broad distinction between presentative and representative cognition.
Introspection is presentative in the sense that the reality constituting
the object of cognition, the mind's present feeling, is as directly
present to the knowing mind as anything can be conceived to be. It may
be added that the power of introspection is a comparatively new
acquisition of the human race, and that, as it improves, the amount of
error connected with its operation may reasonably be expected to become
infinitesimal.
It is often supposed by those who undervalue the introspective method in
psychology that there is a special difficulty in the detection of error
in introspection, owing to the fact that the object of inspection is
something individual and private, and not open to common scrutiny as the
object of external perception. Yet, while allowing a certain force to
this objection I would point out, first of all, that even in
sense-perception, what the individual mind is immediately certain of is
its own sensations. The relatively perfect certainty which finally
attaches to the presentative side of sense-perception is precisely that
which finally attaches to the results of introspection.
In the second place, it may be said that the contrast between the inner
and the outer experience is much less than it seems. In many cases our
emotions are the direct result of a common external cause, and even when
they are not thus attached to some present external circumstance, we are
able, it is admitted, by the use of language, roughly to compare our
individual feelings. And such comparison is continually bringing to
light the fact that there is a continuity in our mental structure, that
our highest thoughts and emotions lead us back to our common
sense-impressions, and that consequently, in spite of all individual
differences of temperament and mental organization, our inner experience
is in all its larger features a common experience.
I may add that this supposition of the common nature of our internal
experience, as a whole, not only underlies the science of psychology,
but is implied in the very process of detecting and correcting errors of
introspection. I do not mean that in matters of feeling "authority" is
to override "private judgment." Our last resort with respect to things
of the mind is, as I have said, that of careful self-inspection. And the
progress of psychology and the correction of illusion proceed by means
of an ever-improving exercise of the introspective faculty. Yet such
individual inspection can at least be _guided_ by the results of others'
similar inspection, and should be so guided as soon as a general
consensus in matters of internal experience is fairly made out. In point
of fact, the preceding discussion of illusions of introspection has
plainly rested on the sufficiently verified assumption that the calmest
and most efficient kind of introspection, in bringing to light what is
permanent as compared with what is variable in the individual cognition,
points in the direction of a common body of introspected fact.