nderstanding has dawned. But
the highest faculty of the intellect is the rational intelligence,
which perceives beauty, truth, and goodness. This is the last to
develop. Traces of its working may be perhaps discovered below man,
but only in man does it become dominant. Through it I perceive my
rights and duties, and come to the consciousness of my own
personality as a moral agent. This tells me of the relation of my
own personality to other persons and things. And these are evidently
the most important objects of human study. The attainment of this
knowledge and the development of this faculty are evidently the goal
of human intellectual development. This it is which has insured
progress and raised man ever higher above the brutes.

Before we can proceed to the study of the will we must clearly
recognize and define certain modes of mental and nervous action,
which sooner or later manifest themselves in muscular activity. For,
while certain of our bodily activities are clearly voluntary, others
take place wholly, or in part independently, of the individual will.
Between these different modes of bodily action we must distinguish
as clearly as may be possible.

1. Reflex Action. I touch something cold or hot in the dark,
suddenly and unexpectedly. I draw back my hand involuntarily and
before I have perceived the sensation of cold or heat. You tell me
to keep my eyes open while you make a sudden pass at them with your
hand. I try hard to do so, but my eyes shut for all that. I shut
them unconsciously and against my own will. I say, "They shut of
themselves." Now, this is not true, but the explanation is not
difficult. These and similar actions are entirely possible, although
the continuity between spinal marrow and brain may have been so
interrupted by some accident that sensation in the reflexly active
part fails altogether. A bird flaps its wings after its head is cut
off, and yet the seat of consciousness and will is certainly in the
brain. A patient with a "broken back," and paralyzed in his legs,
will draw up his feet if they are tickled, although he is entirely
unable to move them by any effort of his will and has no
consciousness of the irritation.

The physiological action is in this case clear. The vibration of the
nerve caused by the tickling travels from the foot to the
appropriate centre in the spinal marrow, and here gives rise to, or
is switched off as, a motor impulse travelling back to the muscles
of th