The Internal Self

The External and the Internal Self § 5. The External and the Internal Self. — The idea of the Self includes in all but its latest and most abstract developments the idea of the body as the vehicle of perception and motor activity. There is also another powerful reason why the body should be regarded as part and parcel of the Self. The idea of the Self essentially includes the idea of its relation to other selves. But it can only exist for other selves in so far as it appears to them in bodily form. But however important the body may be, it can never be regarded as the whole Self or even as the most essential part of the Self. Its attitudes and movements, so far as they differ from those of other material things, appear to be initiated by something inside the organism. They follow on volitions, emotions, painful and pleasant sensations, and the like. These experiences constitute the inner Self, and the body as it presents itself to the external observer is their instrument used in a way more or less analogous to that in which other material instruments are used. The contrast between inner and outer Self is emphasised by the process of ideational thinking, in which the body may be apparently quiescent, while the mind is active. The same is true of dreams. Thus even in the most primitive stages of human development, we find an antithesis recognised between the body as outer husk and the soul as inner kernel. But we find that the more primitive modes of representing the existence of the inner Self differ essentially from our own. Modern theories regard the soul as simply an immaterial substance, or identify it with the brain, or say that it is just the continuous series of conscious states themselves. All these views are very remote from those which are naturally and inevitably taken in earlier stages of mental development. The savage cannot find out what the inner Self is by exploring the inside of the body, for this is possible only after death; and after death the inner Self no longer manifests its local presence. Thus post mortem examination can only show that the inner Self is not an internal organ of the body; that it is not the brain or heart or lungs. On the other hand, the conception of a simple immaterial substance, or of a mere series of conscious states, presupposes a development of the power of conceptual abstraction entirely beyond the reach of the savage. In all his practical dealings with the world, he has to do with things extended in space and appreciable by his senses. Even in his social relations, other persons only exist for him in their bodily presentment. Now we have seen how very slow and gradual a process it is by which the primitive mind disengages what is essential in a conception from the irrelevant material in which it is imbedded. This makes it impossible for the savage to disengage in its abstract unity the conception of a purely immaterial existence. Hence, in ideally representing the internal Self, he follows the analogy of his general experience of personal beings. The internal Self is for him more or less a repetition of the external Self. "If a man lives and moves, it can only be because he has a little man inside who moves him."* * Fraser, The Golden Bough, vol. i., p. 121. This mode of thinking is perhaps partly originated and in any case it is strongly confirmed by certain special experiences. Among these dreams play a prominent part. A man who is absent or dead appears to another in his dreams. The impression of the actual presence of the person dreamt of is often extremely strong, and easily suggests the theory that though the ordinary external body is lying in the grave or at a distance, the inner counterpart of this body, the soul, has actually appeared to the dreamer. But such apparitions are not confined to dreams. All pathological conditions of body and mind, due to disease, drugs, hunger, exhaustion, and so on, tend to produce hallucinations of this kind; and these conditions are very common among savages, much more so than among ourselves. Add to this the extreme difficulty which the human mind finds in realising the termination of personal existence after death. The difficulty is not merely that of realising annihilation in the abstract, but of realising that the dead person has ceased to play his habitual part in the ordinary life of the living. The habits of thinking and acting of his surviving friends and relatives have grown up and become fixed on the assumption of his presence among them. There is always a conflict between these preformed habits and the new conditions introduced by his decease, and the conflict is often intense and distressing. The survivor feels a shock of surprise, often painful, when he misses his intimate friend from his usual place. His rooted habits of thought lead him to ideally represent the dead as still having an existence analogous to his existence when alive. He is thus prepared to meet illusions, hallucinations, and dreams, in which the dead appear once more with the personal appearance and garments of the living, with no incredulity. On the contrary, the natural and necessary explanation for his mind is that what he sees is actually present. We must remember that physiological and psychological theories of the origin of dreams and hallucinations are utterly beyond the range of savage conception. The relation between the ordinary body and the internal impersonation is not conceived in a mechanical way. The unity of the whole individual is not accounted for by the interaction between the internal Self and the external Self. On the contrary, the reason why body and soul are in sympathetic communion lies ultimately in the bare fact that they form part of the same individual. In ordinary waking life, the soul is supposed to be locally present in the body. But it may depart from the body without severing the connexion between them. At least a modified form of sympathetic communion may still continue between them. The final departure of the soul means the death of the body; but a temporary departure is often supposed to involve only illness, or trance, or dreams. The sympathetic communion which is independent of local presence is well brought out in the case of dreams. The savage will ascribe the soreness and fatigue of his body to the painful struggles which his soul has undergone in dream wrestlings with other souls during its temporary migrations. So presents and sacrifices to the departed are usually offered at the tomb as if to the body; the benefit goes to the soul. It is very commonly believed that the burying of the body with appropriate rites is an indispensable condition of the soul's welfare. Thus the Greeks supposed that the shades of the dead must haunt the banks of Styx or wander about the earth, until their bodies received the rites of sepulture. After these, they could pass to the under world and mix with their own kind. It is instructive that the regions to which departed spirits are supposed to go are in primitive thought generally represented as faint reproductions of the actual world, and the society of ghosts as analogous to the society of the living, retaining such relations as that of master and slave, rich and poor, and the like.