…contributed to his death rather than the prevention of it ~ Eric Berne?
This action of external impressions which are appropriated by the internal powers is the first fundamental process in the genesis of the completed mind. If the union of impression and faculty be sufficiently strong, consciousness (not self-consciousness) arises, and definite sensations and perceptions begin to be formed. These primitive sensations, however, are not to be identified with the special senses, for each of these senses is a system of many powers which have grown into a definite unity, have been educated by experience. From ordinary experience it must be concluded that a second fundamental process is incessantly going on: the formation of new powers, which takes place principally during sleep. The third and most important process results from the fact that the combination between stimulus and power may be weak or strong; if weak, then tile two elements are said to be movable, and they may flow over from one to another of the already formed psychical products. Any formed faculty does not cease to exist on the removal of its stimulus; in virtue of its fundamental property, tenacity, it sinks back as a trace (Spur) into unconsciousness, whence it may be recalled by the application to it of another stimulus, or by the attraction towards it of some of the movable elements or newly formed original powers. These traces and the flowing over of the movable elements are the most important conceptions in Beneke's psychology. Through them he gives a rationale of reproduction and association, and strives to show that all the formed faculties are simply developments from traces of earlier processes. Lastly, similar forms, according to the degree of their similarity, attract one another or tend to form closer combinations.
