Under its most general form—for its mechanism is not always the same—the law of transference consists in _directly_ attributing a sentiment to an object which does not itself cause it. There is no transference in the sense that the feeling is detached from the primary event in order to be connected with another; but there is a moment of generalisation or extension of the sentiment, which spreads like a drop of oil. This transference can be symbolically represented. Let us represent an intellectual state by A, and by _s_ the affective state which accompanies it; A by association excites B, C, D, E, etc., while _s_ is successively transferred to B, C, D, E, etc. Thus we have, first, (A)/_s_, B, C, D, E, etc., then (A,B,C,D,E, etc.)/_s_, so that C, D, or E can directly produce _s_ quite as A can, and even without the assistance of A. “The feeling is excited without the mediacy of the particular presentative element of which it was originally a concomitant” (Sully).[116] This law of transfer is of sufficient importance to delay us a little, because it plays a somewhat important part in the formation of complex emotions, and we shall need to recall it more than once. Besides, it does not always operate in the same manner. I distinguish two principal cases, according as the transfer is the result of contiguity, or of resemblance. ----- Footnote 116: _The Human Mind_, ii. 79. ----- _Transference by Contiguity._—When intellectual states have co-existed and formed a complex by contiguity, and one of them has been accompanied by a special sentiment, any one of these states has a tendency to excite the same sentiment.