f false perception: in saying
that we _perceive_ light at all, we go beyond the pure sensation,
interpreting this wrongly.

Very closely connected with this limitation of our sensibility is
another which refers to the consciousness of the local seat, or origin
of the impression. This has so far its basis in the sensation itself as
it is well known that (within the limits of local discrimination,
referred to above) sensations have a particular "local" colour, which
varies in the case of each of the nervous fibres by the stimulation of
which they arise.[28] But though this much is known through a difference
in the sensibility, nothing more is known. Nothing can certainly be
ascertained by a mere inspection of the sensation as to the distance the
nervous process has travelled, whether from the peripheral termination
of the fibre or from some intermediate point.

In a general way, we refer our sensations to the peripheral endings of
the nerves concerned, according to what physiologists have called "the
law of eccentricity." Thus I am said to feel the pain caused by a
bruise in the foot in the member itself. This applies also to some of
the sensations of the special senses. Thus, impressions of taste are
clearly localized in the corresponding peripheral terminations.

With respect to the sense of smell, and still more to those of hearing
and sight, where the impression is usually caused by an object at a
distance from the peripheral organ, our attention to this external cause
leads us to overlook in part the "bodily seat" of the sensation. Yet
even here we are dimly aware that the sensation is received by way of a
particular part of the sensitive surface, that is to say, by a
particular sense-organ. Thus, though referring an odour to a distant
flower, we perceive that the sensation of odour has its bodily origin in
the nose. And even in the case of hearing and sight, we vaguely refer
the impressions, as such, to the appropriate sense-organ. There is,
indeed, in these cases a double local reference, a faint one to the
peripheral organ which is acted on, and a more distinct one to the
object or the force in the environment which acts on this.

Now, it may be said that the act of localization is in itself distinctly
illusory, since it is known that the sensation first arises in
connection with the excitation of the sensory _centre_, and not of the
peripheral fibre.[29] Yet it must at least be allowed that this
localization