_The opposite View._--On the other hand, Mr. Stewart maintains that all such acts, however easily and rapidly performed, do involve mental activity, some degree of attention, some special volition to produce them, although we may not be able to recollect those volitions afterward. The different steps of the process are, by the association of ideas, so connected, that they present themselves successively to the mind without any effort to recall them, without any hesitation or reflection on our part, and with a rapidity proportioned to our experience. The attention and the volition are instantaneous, and therefore not subsequently recollected. Still, he would say, the fact that we do not recollect them is no proof that we did not exercise them. The musician can, at will, perform the piece so slowly, as to be able to observe and recall the special act of attention to each note, and of volition to produce it. The difference in the two cases lies in the rapidity of the movement, not in the nature of the operation. _Objection to this View._--The only objection to this view, of much weight, is the extreme rapidity of mental action, which this view supposes. An accomplished speaker will pronounce, it is said, from two to four hundred words, or from one to two thousand letters in a minute, and each letter requires a distinct contraction of the muscles, many of them, indeed, several contractions. Shall we suppose then so many thousand acts of attention and volition in a minute? _Reply to this Objection._--To this it may be replied that the very objection carries with it its own answer, since if it be true that the muscles of the body move with such wonderful rapidity, it is surely not incredible that the mind should be at least equally rapid in its movements with the body. To show that both mind and body often do act with great rapidity, Mr. Stewart cites the case of the equilibrist, who balances himself on the slack rope, and at the same time balances a number of rods or balls upon his chin, his position every instant changing, according to the accidental and ever varying motions of the several objects whose equilibrium he is to preserve, which motions he must therefore constantly and closely watch. Now to do this, the closest attention, both of the eye and of the mind, to each of these instantaneous movements, is absolutely necessary, since the movements do not follow each other in any regular order, as do the notes of the musician, and cannot, therefore, by any association of ideas, be linked together, or laid up in the mind. _The Question undecided._--The question is a curious one, and with the arguments on either side, as now presented, I leave it to the reader's individual judgment and decision. Mr. Stewart is doubtless correct as to the rapidity of mental and muscular action. At the same time it seems to me _there are_ actions, whatever may be true in the cases supposed, that are purely _automatic_ and _mechanical_.