The Principles of Psychology, Volume 1 (of 2)James, William
Philosophy
The Principles of Psychology, Volume 1 (of 2)
James, William
Psychology
The primary self often has to invent an hallucination by which to mask
and hide from its own view the deeds which the other self is enacting.
Léonie 3[206] writes real letters whilst Léonie 1 believes that she
is knitting; or Lucie 2 really comes to the doctor's office, whilst
Lucie 1 believes herself to be at home. This is a sort of delirium. The
alphabet, or the series of numbers, when handed over to the attention
of the secondary personage may for the time be lost to the normal
self. Whilst the hand writes the alphabet, obediently to command, the
'subject,' to her great stupefaction, finds herself unable to recall
it, etc. Few things are more curious than these relations of mutual
exclusion, of which all gradations exist between the several partial
consciousnesses.
* * * * *
How far this splitting up of the mind into separate consciousnesses may
exist in each one of us is a problem. M. Janet holds that it is only
possible where there is abnormal weakness, and consequently a defect
of unifying or co-ordinating power. An hysterical woman abandons part
of her consciousness because she is too weak nervously to hold it
together. The abandoned part meanwhile may solidify into a secondary or
sub-conscious self. In a perfectly sound subject, on the other hand,
what is dropped out of mind at one moment keeps coming back at the
next. The whole fund of experiences and knowledges remains integrated,
and no split-off portions of it can get organized stably enough to form
subordinate selves. The stability, monotony, and stupidity of these
latter is often very striking. The post-hypnotic sub-consciousness
seems to think of nothing but the order which it last received;
the cataleptic sub-consciousness, of nothing but the last position
imprinted on the limb. M. Janet could cause definitely circumscribed
reddening and tumefaction of the skin on two of his subjects, by
suggesting to them in hypnotism the hallucination of a mustard-poultice
of any special shape. "J'ai tout le temps pensé à votre sinapisme,"
says the subject, when put back into trance after the suggestion has
taken effect. A man N., whom M. Janet operated on at long intervals,
was betweenwhiles tampered with by another operator, and when put
to sleep again by M. Janet, said he was 'too far away to receive
orders, being in Algiers.' The other operator, having suggested that
hallucination, had forgotten to remove it before waking the subject
from his trance, and the poor passive trance-personality had stuck for
weeks in the stagnant dream. Léonie's sub-conscious performances having
been illustrated to a caller, by a '_pied de nez_' executed with her
left hand in the course of conversation, when, a year later, she meets
him again, up goes the same hand to her nose again, without Léonie's
normal self suspecting the fact.
* * * * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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