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scious, of like antecedents, and a presence only of like presents without
recollection of the same.
The sameness of action of like persons placed under like circumstances
for the first time, resembles the sameness of action of inorganic matter
under the same combinations. Let us for the moment suppose what we
call non-living substances to be capable of remembering their antece-
dents, and that the changes they undergo are the expressions of their
recollections. Then I admit, of course, that there is not memory in any
cream, we will say, that is about to be churned of the cream of the pre-
ceding week, but the common absence of such memory from each
week s cream is an element of sameness between the two. And though
no cream can remember having been churned before, yet all cream in all
time has had nearly identical antecedents, and has therefore nearly the
same memories, and nearly the same proclivities. Thus, in fact, the
cream of one week is as truly the same as the cream of another week
from the same cow, pasture, &c., as anything is ever the same with any-
thing; for the having been subjected to like antecedents engenders the
closest similarity that we can conceive of, if the substances were like to
start with.
The manifest absence of any connecting memory (or memory of like
presents) from certain of the phenomena of heredity, such as, for exam-
ple, the diseases of old age, is now seen to be no valid reason for saying
that such other and far more numerous and important phenomena as
those of embryonic development are not phenomena of memory. 
Growth and the diseases of old age do indeed, at first sight, appear to
stand on the same footing, but reflection shows us that the question
whether a certain result is due to memory or no must be settled not by
showing that combinations into which memory does not certainly enter
may yet generate like results, and therefore considering the memory the-
ory disposed of, but by the evidence we may be able to adduce in sup-
port of the fact that the second agent has actually remembered the con-
duct of the first, inasmuch as he cannot be supposed able to do what it is
plain he can do, except under the guidance of memory or experience,
and can also be shown to have had every opportunity of remembering. 
When either of these tests fails, similarity of action on the part of two
agents need not be connected with memory of a like present as well as of
like antecedents, but must, or at any rate may, be referred to memory of
like antecedents only.
Returning to a parenthesis a few pages back, in which I said that con-
sciousness of memory would be less or greater according to the greater
or fewer number of times that the act had been repeated, it may be ob-
served as a corollary to this, that the less consciousness of memory the
greater the uniformity of action, and vice versa. For the less conscious-
ness involves the memory s being more perfect, through a larger number
(generally) of repetitions of the act that is remembered; there is therefore
a less proportionate difference in respect of the number of recollections
of this particular act between the most recent actor and the most recent
but one. This is why very old civilisations, as those of many insects, and
the greater number of now living organisms, appear to the eye not to
change at all.
For example, if an action has been performed only ten times, we will say
by A, B, C, &c., who are similar in all respects, except that A acts with-
out recollection, B with recollection of A s action, C with recollection of
both B s and A s, while J remembers the course taken by A, B, C, D, E,
F, G, H, and I - the possession of a memory by B will indeed so change
his action, as compared with A s, that it may well be hardly
recognisable. We saw this in our example of the clerk who asked the po-
liceman the way to the eating-house on one day, but did not ask him the
next, because he remembered; but C s action will not be so different
from B s as B s from A s, for though C will act with a memory of two
occasions on which the action has been performed, while B recollects
only the original performance by A, yet B and C both act with the guid-
ance of a memory and experience of some kind, while A acted without
any. Thus the clerk referred to in Chapter X. will act on the third day
much as he acted on the second - that is to say, he will see the policeman
at the corner of the street, but will not question him.
When the action is repeated by J for the tenth time, the difference be-
tween J s repetition of it and I s will be due solely to the difference be-
tween a recollection of nine past performances by J against only eight by [ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]