[108] M. Janet has studied this subject, under the title “Une illusion d’optique interne” (Rev. Phil., 1877, III. pp. 497 et seq.) and explains the illusion by supposing that the apparent duration of a certain portion of time, in the life of each individual, is proportional to the total duration of his life.
[109] Nichols, op. cit., p. 502.
[110] Analysis of the Sensations, Chicago, 1897, pp. 110 et seq.
[111] H. Spencer, Psychology, I., § 91, p. 215.
[112] Horwicz, Psychologische Analysen, III., 145. Guyau, Genèse de l’idée du temps, pp. 35 et seq.
[113] Beiträge zur experimentellen Psychologie, II., 1889.
[114] Van Ende cites a large number of facts in point, but they are not all equally convincing. Histoire naturelle de la croyance, pp. 208-212.
[115] Romanes, Animal Intelligence, p. 314. It should be remarked that the author only reports the fact from another witness—that the narrator said it had occurred “thirty years before,” and “that he did not pretend to remember under what precise circumstances the habit of coming into the street was acquired.”
[116] According to Delambre, the Chaldæans could only discover the cycle which the Greek mathematicians called saros by studying their commemorative notes; i. e., from a considerable mass of observations, they extracted or abstracted a constant recurrence.
[117] For details see, in addition to Nichols’s article as previously cited, Sully, The Human Mind, II., Appendix E, and James, Psychology, I., pp. 632 et seq.