[477] See a paper on Insistent and Fixed Ideas by Dr. Cowles in American Journal of Psychology, i. 222; and another on the so-called Insanity of Doubt by Dr. Knapp, ibid. iii. 1. The latter contains a partial bibliography of the subject.
[478] Quoted by Ribot, op cit. p. 39.
[479] The silliness of the old-fashioned pleasure-philosophy saute aux yeux. Take, for example, Prof. Bain's explanation of sociability and parental love by the pleasures of touch: "Touch is the fundamental and generic sense.... Even after the remaining senses are differentiated, the primary sense continues to be a leading susceptibility of the mind. The soft warm touch, if not a first-class influence, is at least an approach to that. The combined power of soft contact and warmth amounts to a considerable pitch of massive pleasure; while there may be subtle influences not reducible to these two heads, such as we term, from not knowing anything about them, magnetic or electric. The sort of thrill from taking a baby in arms is something beyond mere warm touch; and it may rise to the ecstatic height, in which case, however, there may be concurrent sensations and ideas.... In mere tender emotion not sexual, there is nothing but the sense of touch to gratify, unless we assume the occult magnetic influences.... In a word, our love pleasures begin and end in sensual contact. Touch is both the alpha and omega of affection. As the terminal and satisfying sensation, the ne plus ultra, it must be a pleasure of the highest degree.... Why should a more lively feeling grow up towards a fellow-being than towards a perennial fountain? [This 'should' is simply delicious from the more modern evolutionary point of view.] It must be that there is a source of pleasure in the companionship of other sentient creatures, over and above the help afforded by them in obtaining the necessaries of life. To account for this, I can suggest nothing but the primary and independent pleasure of the animal embrace." [Mind, this is said not of the sexual interest, but of 'Sociability at Large.'] "For this pleasure every creature is disposed to pay something, even when it is only fraternal. A certain amount of material benefit imparted is a condition of the full heartiness of a responding embrace, the complete fruition of this primitive joy. In the absence of those conditions the pleasure of giving ... can scarcely be accounted for; we know full well that, without these helps, it would be a very meagre sentiment in beings like ourselves.... It seems to me that there must be at the [parental instinct's] foundation that intense pleasure in the embrace of the young which we find to characterize the parental feeling throughout. Such a pleasure once created would associate itself with the prevailing features and aspects of the young, and give to all of these their very great interest. For the sake of the pleasure, the parent discovers the necessity of nourishing the subject of it, and comes to regard the ministering function as a part or condition of the delight" (Emotions and Will, pp. 126, 127, 132, 133, 140). Prof. Bain does not explain why a satin cushion kept at about 98º F. would not on the whole give us the pleasure in question more cheaply than our friends and babies do. It is true that the cushion might lack the 'occult magnetic influences.' Most of us would say that neither a baby's nor a friend's skin would possess them, were not a tenderness already there. The youth who feels ecstasy shoot through him when by accident the silken palm or even the 'vesture's hem' of his idol touches him, would hardly feel it were he not hard hit by Cupid in advance. The love creates the ecstasy, not the ecstasy the love. And for the rest of us can it possibly be that all our social virtue springs from an appetite for the sensual pleasure of having our hand shaken, or being slapped on the back?
[480] Emotion and Will, p. 352. But even Bain's own description belies his formula, for the idea appears as the 'moving' and the pleasure as the 'directing' force.
[481] P. 398.
[482] P. 354.
[483] P. 355.
[484] P. 390.
[485] Pp. 295-6.
[486] P. 121.