THE ORIGIN OF PLEASURE AND PAIN.
II.
IN the last number of the Review we gave evidence for specific pain nerves distributed throughout the body, for the probability of pleasure nerves in certain places, and for the possibility of such in all our sense-organs. We concluded that most of our æsthetic feelings are not sensations, but are associative central occurrences. It is this major part of aesthetics which we have now to account for. At once we say that the present distribution of pain and pleasure nerves in our body does not seem sufficient for this purpose. Holding fast to a common mode of origin for all our senses, we must, then, look further into biological development for our desired explanations.
Human anatomy and physiology were closed secrets till study of a long line of embryonic and morphologic modifications revealed them. It should be evident that human psychology can never be understood except by a like tracing out of present from past conditions. Since Darwin, 'the first sense' has been frequently discussed, but, on the whole, in a manner bringing the subject little credit. The first organs of sense, however, have long been the objects of sober biological research. As it is our task only to discover how pleasure and pain came to do what they now do, we may escape discussion of early amorphous creatures. We need not go outside of our line of ancestry, nor back of its first organized sensory system.[1]
- ↑ Should we go back of this period, we would find further grounds of probability for the theory to be put forward in this paper. The creature whose primary neural activities were best suited to the primary needs of organic evolution, would prosper most in organic development. A single sense, which was susceptible to various kinds of influences, would be of greater use than another susceptible to a single kind of influence. Also, the sense best adapted to mediating the particular range or degrees of influence most beneficial to the creature, would be of most service to it. Thus pain, though it be susceptible to as many kinds of influence as is pleasure, yet, since it is adapted to mediate the extreme rather than the medium or major ranges of influence playing upon animal organism, it would be less profitable as a primary
