s at
scientific formulization. For a long time it has been the "spook
science" _per se_, and the imagination, now analyzed by M. Ribot in such
a masterly manner, has been one of the most persistent, apparently real,
though very indefinite, of psychological spooks. Whereas people have
been accustomed to speak of the imagination as an entity _sui generis_,
as a lofty something found only in long-haired, wild-eyed "geniuses,"
constituting indeed the center of a cult, our author, Prometheus-like,
has brought it down from the heavens, and has clearly shown that
_imagination is a function of mind common to all men in some degree_,
and that it is shown in as highly developed form in commercial leaders
and practical inventors as in the most bizarre of romantic idealists.
The only difference is that the manifestation is not the same.

That this view is not entirely original with M. Ribot is not to his
discredit--indeed, he does not claim any originality. We find the view
clearly expressed elsewhere, certainly as early as Aristotle, that the
greatest artist is he who actually embodies his vision and will in
permanent form, preferably in social institutions. This idea is so
clearly enunciated in the present monograph, which the author modestly
styles an essay, that when the end of the book is reached but little
remains of the great imagination-ghost, save the one great mystery
underlying all facts of mind.

That the present rendering falls far below the lucid French of the
original, the translator is well aware; he trusts, however, that the
indulgent reader will take into account the good intent as offsetting in
part, at least, the numerous shortcomings of this version.

I wish here to express my obligation to those friends who encouraged me
in the congenial task of translation.

A. H. N. B.

AUTHOR'S PREFACE

Contemporary psychology has studied the purely reproductive imagination
with great eagerness and success. The works on the different
image-groups--visual, auditory, tactile, motor--are known to everyone,
and form a collection of inquiries solidly based on subjective and
objective observation, on pathological facts and laboratory experiments.
The study of the creative or constructive imagination, on the other
hand, has been almost entirely neglected. It would be easy to show that
the best, most complete, and most recent treatises on psychology devote
to it scarcely a page or two; often, indeed, do not even ment