ss in these lectures. A great deal of
what I shall have to say is not original; indeed, much recent work, in
various fields, has tended to show the necessity of such theories as
those which I shall be advocating. Accordingly in this first lecture
I shall try to give a brief description of the systems of ideas within
which our investigation is to be carried on.

* "Our Knowledge of the External World" (Allen & Unwin),
Chapters III and IV. Also "Mysticism and Logic," Essays VII
and VIII.

If there is one thing that may be said, in the popular estimation, to
characterize mind, that one thing is "consciousness." We say that we are
"conscious" of what we see and hear, of what we remember, and of our own
thoughts and feelings. Most of us believe that tables and chairs are
not "conscious." We think that when we sit in a chair, we are aware
of sitting in it, but it is not aware of being sat in. It cannot for
a moment be doubted that we are right in believing that there is SOME
difference between us and the chair in this respect: so much may be
taken as fact, and as a datum for our inquiry. But as soon as we try to
say what exactly the difference is, we become involved in perplexities.
Is "consciousness" ultimate and simple, something to be merely accepted
and contemplated? Or is it something complex, perhaps consisting in our
way of behaving in the presence of objects, or, alternatively, in the
existence in us of things called "ideas," having a certain relation
to objects, though different from them, and only symbolically
representative of them? Such questions are not easy to answer; but until
they are answered we cannot profess to know what we mean by saying that
we are possessed of "consciousness."

Before considering modern theories, let us look first at consciousness
from the standpoint of conventional psychology, since this embodies
views which naturally occur when we begin to reflect upon the subject.
For this purpose, let us as a preliminary consider different ways of
being conscious.

First, there is the way of PERCEPTION. We "perceive" tables and chairs,
horses and dogs, our friends, traffic passing in the street--in short,
anything which we recognize through the senses. I leave on one side for
the present the question whether pure sensation is to be regarded as a
form of consciousness: what I am speaking of now is perception, where,
according to conventional psychology, we go beyond the sensation to