Psychology : an introductory manual for the use of students / by F. Ryland.

  • Ryland, Frederick, 1854-1902.
Date:
1900
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Psychology : an introductory manual for the use of students / by F. Ryland. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    174/360 (page 158)
    marked antithesis to the world of perception, and as a rival claimant on attention. Although we have ordinarily no difficulty in dis- criminating an idea from a percept, the child begins by confusing them. The infant with his “primitive credulity’’accepts memory-images as external realities; and he probably comes to recognize their distinctive character chiefly by the failure of his attempts to treat them as percepts. He comes to find that (1) percepts are, as a rule, more vivid and dis- tinct ; (2) they do not depend on his movements; (8) they occur suddenly and cease suddenly. Images, as mere images, have no reference to our own past; whereas what we ordinarily call a memory necessarily has such a reference. Revival of past im- pressions may therefore take the form of : (1) Imagination, where the image is developed, without any reference to the context in which we have experienced the percept. This development of the image may vary from a very slight to a very high degree of perfection. The musician imagines a tune very distinctly and completely, which the non-musical person imagines indistinctly, incompletely and in- accurately. (2) Memory, by which we mean imagination to- gether with a double reference, subconscious and con- scious, to our own past. In memory proper there is a kind of consciousness which it is difficult to characterize. This, indeed, accompanies all recognition, whether of a present percept or a revived percept (image). It is due