s,--writing, dancing,
rowing, swimming, etc. All these actions, and indeed most of the
activities of daily life, must be consciously learned by practice and
repeated effort. How are these efforts guided? To arrive at an answer to
this question let us consider how a schoolboy practises his writing
lesson.

The boy begins by having before him a copy of the letters he is to
write. Under the guidance of the eye the hand traces these letters. At
each instant the eye points out to the hand the direction in which to
move. As the hand occasionally wanders from the prescribed direction the
eye immediately notes the deviation and bids the hand to correct it. The
hand responds to the demands of the eye, immediately, without thought on
the boy's part of nerve impulse or of muscular contraction. By repeated
efforts the boy improves upon his first clumsy attempts; with each
repetition he approaches nearer to the model.

In the course of this progress the muscular sense gradually comes to the
assistance of the eye as a sort of supplementary guidance. But at no
time is the eye relieved of the responsibility of guiding the hand in
writing. To sum this up, the movements of the hand in writing are
guided, so far as the consciousness is aware, directly by the sense of
sight.

We have here the law of voluntary muscular guidance. In all voluntary
movements the muscles are guided in their contractions, through some
instinctive process, by the sense or senses which observe the movements
themselves, and more especially, the results of the movements. In most
actions the two senses concerned are sight and muscular sense. The more
an action becomes habitual the more it tends to be performed under the
guidance of muscular sense, and to be free from the necessity of the
guidance of the eye. But muscular sense does not usually rise so high
into consciousness as sight, in the guidance of muscular activities.
Many oft-repeated movements, especially those of walking, become
thoroughly habitual and even automatic; that is, the muscular
contractions are performed as purely reflex actions, without conscious
guidance of any kind. But even in walking, the necessity may at any
instant arise for conscious guidance. In such a case the sense of sight
immediately comes into service; from reflex the movements become
voluntary, and consciously guided. In the case of most complex actions
the sense of sight furnishes the most important guidance.

If the muscular