the part of both, and he would probably find that when the hat was purchased the possibility of criticism on the ground of extravagance passed through her mind. The chaffing remark of the husband therefore in the mind of the wife had for a context all these past experiences which formed a setting and gave an unintended meaning to the remark. The angry response, therefore, was dictated by these antecedent experiences and not simply by the trivial matter of the cost of a hat, standing by itself. The event can only be interpreted in the light of these past conserved experiences. How much of all this antecedent experience was in consciousness at the moment is another question which we shall presently consider. I have often had occasion to interpret cryptic occurrences of this kind happening with patients or acquaintances. They make quite an amusing social game. (A knowledge of this principle shows the impossibility of outsiders judging the rightness or wrongness of misunderstandings and contretemps between individuals—particularly married people.) To complete the interpretation of this episode of the hat—although a little beside the point under consideration: plainly the anger to which the wife gave expression was the affect linked with and the reaction to the setting-complex formed by antecedent experiences. To state the matter in another way, these experiences were the formative material out of which a _psychological torch_ had been plastically fashioned ready to be set ablaze by the first touch of a match—in this case the chaffing remark or associated idea. This principle of the setting, which gives meaning to an idea, being the conserved neurograms of related antecedent experiences is strikingly manifest in pathological and quasi-pathological conditions. I will mention only two instances.