Chapter 7

Introduction to a translation of the chapter upon instinct in Von Hartmann's "Philosophy of the Unconscious."

I am afraid my readers will find the chapter on instinct from Von Hartmann's "Philosophy of the Unconscious," which will now follow, as distasteful to read as I did to translate, and would gladly have spared it them if I could. At present, the works of Mr. Sully, who has treated of the "Philosophy of the Unconscious" both in the Westminster Review (vol. xlix. N.S.) and in his work "Pessimism," are the best source to which English readers can have recourse for information concerning Von Hartmann. Giving him all credit for the pains he has taken with an ungrateful, if not impossible subject, I think that a sufficient sample of Von Hartmann's own words will be a useful adjunct to Mr. Sully's work, and may perhaps save some readers trouble by resolving them to look no farther into the "Philosophy of the Unconscious." Over and above this, I have been so often told that the views concerning unconscious action contained in the foregoing lecture and in "Life and Habit" are only the very fallacy of Von Hartmann over again, that I should like to give the public an opportunity of seeing whether this is so or no, by placing the two contending theories of unconscious action side by side. I hope that it will thus be seen that neither Professor Hering nor I have fallen into the fallacy of Von Hartmann, but that rather Von Hartmann has fallen into his fallacy through failure to grasp the principle which Professor Hering has insisted upon, and to connect heredity with memory.

Professor Hering's philosophy of the unconscious is of extreme simplicity. He rests upon a fact of daily and hourly experience, namely, that practice makes things easy that were once difficult, and often results in their being done without any consciousness of effort. But if the repetition of an act tends ultimately, under certain circumstances, to its being done unconsciously, so also is the fact of an intricate and difficult action being done unconsciously an argument that it must have been done repeatedly already. As I said in "Life and Habit," it is more easy to suppose that occasions on which such an action has been performed have not been wanting, even though we do not see when and where they were, than that the facility which we observe should have been attained without practice and memory (p. 56).

There can be nothing better established or more easy, whether to understand or verify, than the unconsciousness with which habitual actions come to be performed. If, however, it is once conceded that it is the manner of habitual action generally, then all a priori objection to Professor Hering's philosophy of the unconscious is at an end. The question becomes one of fact in individual cases, and of degree.

How far, then, does the principle of the convertibility, as it