Brown divided emotions into retrospective and prospective, but such a classification has no basis in a general biological view nor yet in a special analysis of the particular phenomena. It is evident that the two great classes of emotion from the point of view of struggle for existence will be response to injurer and to benefactor. These are the two prime qualities in things for which emotional notice is most needed as a service to life, and hence the broad and fundamental division of emotion must always be into that which is response to the harmful and that which is response to the beneficial. Here only is the great and constant distinction in the nature of emotions. Prospect and retrospect are equally meaningless in themselves considered. From a merely a priori biologic point of view we must, then, pronounce it quite unlikely that the time-sense should fundamentally differentiate emotion, but we should expect that the prime division would be with respect to cognised injury or benefit.

That time-sense is not a grand principle of division we also see plainly when we examine particular emotions. Thus, in the case of anger, while we can say at once that this is, in all its forms, repulse to injury, can we claim it is either prospective or retrospective emotion? The truth is, the thought of injury done, doing, or to be done, equally wakens anger in choleric individuals. The man who harmed me yesterday excites my anger, and so does the 177man whom I perceive to be now injuring me or about to injure me. The quality of the emotion is identically the same whether the object be considered as in past, present, or future. Even what seems to be a purely temporal emotion, like hope, which is usually regarded as wholly prospective, may yet have other temporal aspects. Thus, we sometimes say, “I hope it was not so,” where hope is obviously retrospective, or more strictly prospective-retrospective, having reference to expectation with desire that the event will turn out not to have happened.

But it may be said that, as emotion rests upon representation, the proper classification of the emotions will depend upon the divisions of representation which are essentially determined by the time-sense as representation of past or future. Representation with sense of representation implies a cognition of the thing as represented merely, and so as non-existent to present actual sensing, as something having been, or to be, sensed. The emotion arises thus on cognition of the experienceable, and includes always some dim impression of potency of object for harm or benefit at some time. However, though this may be the case, it is plain that it makes no radical distinction in emotion. If a man threatens me with some injury, this fires my rage, which is greatly increased if I catch him in the act of committing the injury threatened, or find that he has committed the evil deed. Change in time-sense may thus bring change in intensity of some emotions, but it does not determine quality of emotion. The prime factor as to kind of emotion is always, not any sense of time, but the personal value of the event, which may or may not receive a definite time determination. Indeed, a form of representation, before any sense of experience as merely subjective phenomenon is attained, is a prominent feature in the direct na?ve experience which constitutes by far the greater bulk in the total existent consciousness. Before experience is aware of itself and of the experienceable 178there is a certain purely subjective mirroring of that which is not present to sense, but has been, i.e., there is a re-occurrence in consciousness which has the subjective force of reality; though the objective actuality is lacking, such re-occurrence by association without the actual presence of the object stands, however, for reality to the mind experiencing—it is a direct intuition; the object, though unreal, is perfectly real to consciousness, and conveys no meaning, and so is not a basis for emotion. Yet in the higher representation with a sense of experience as integral element, the representation is sometimes practically timeless, though surcharged with emotion tendency. The highest objects which the mind represents have little time quality, and all the nobler sentiments, as love of truth, justice, etc., exist with little or no reference to time. So also in the very earliest representation, the object is seen in its feeling value—emotion basis—as soon as it is perceived as object; but this is as an immediate subjective realizing in which time-sense plays very little part. The conscious interpretation of past and future as a conscious connecting of the two is certainly not a primitive function. The time form is, then, on the whole, merely incidental in emotion, and is by no means a fundamental principle determining classification.

Yet, though we must reject time as a cardinal principle of division in emotion, still we must acknowledge that the term retrospective emotion denotes a real group of mental phenomena, including revenge, regret, remorse, and kindred forms, which are marked as feeling for the past merely as past. However, pure retrospection is rare and late. The past does not for primitive mind stand by itself as something to be dwelt upon, to be thought about, to be moved by, and stirred to action. The immediate present absorbs the mind, and the past interests and excites only so far as bearing directly on the present. And so it is that the child lives in the present, the youth and man in the future, 179the old man in the past; and this denotes the relatively late appearance of pure retrospection and of emotion founded thereon. Emotion is first merely spectant, then prospective, then retrospective. However, when we say an emotion is concerned solely with the present in the very young, we mean, of course, the immediately prospective—that which has relation to but one sense and by association rouses emotion, as an apple, seen or handled by a child, awakens emotion, desire to taste. Where sense consciousness is not multiform, but single and uniform, as, doubtless, in very low organisms, there is no opportunity for any emotion, for there is no interpretation power. But the intensification of some one sense connection already attained may be a basis for emotion which we may loosely call emotion spectant, as when the greedy child eagerly eating an apple desires a larger bite, sweeter portion, etc. However,—though it has little classification value,—emotion can be only prospective or retrospective; and this is, of course, implied in its basis—representation. Emotion by its very nature must be a looking forward, or a looking backward, or both. As a feeling about, and not a direct feeling, this is obviously its unvariable cognitive content. The immediate and actual realization may be direct feeling or sensation, but it is never in itself emotion. Emotion is always over something, an experience of experience, and cannot thus be simple content. It is thus a consciously idealizing mode as distinguished from direct realization which is wholly self-contained.

One of the most important and interesting retrospective emotions is revenge. The cardinal idea in revenge is returning evil for evil. Not only must there be a paying back for past injury, but there must be an equivalence, eye for an eye, and tooth for a tooth; and the revengeful emotion is the meting out such purely retributive action. Exact return becomes the basis of a general usage in animal and human societies. Justice, law, and punishment 180rest upon the idea of inflicting duplicate or equivalent injury for injury received. Administrative justice is the specialization of revenge in the hands of a few members of a community, a social differentiation by which individuals in general secure their revenges at great economy by proxy. Further, the revengeful emotion is a smouldering hate which vents itself only some time after the immediate occasion. This is not the flush of anger which prompts to vigorous offensive action upon the injurer at the very moment of harm perceived, and it does not appear as stimulant to immediate self-conservative activities, but is simply the spirit of getting even for relatively long past injury.

What, now, is the function of revenge as a life factor? It surely does not mend my injury that I do another harm solely because he has some time harmed me, and the whole impulse might seem a pure waste of energy. But under natural selection revenge must arise in serviceability of some sort; and it is obvious that while revenge is of no use in mending the past, it yet has a large value with reference to future possible injury. Yet revenge is undeniably without conscious meaning for present or future; it is merely the spirit and determination to get even, and so its deterrent function is unconsciously attained. A dwelling in thought on the past per se, a feeling about it and acting on it, while it cannot help life directly, has a large value in its ultimate effect upon enemies. He who never forgets injury, and for whom by-gones are never by-gones, who never fails to return injury for injury, is feared and is less likely to be injured. Junker, the African traveller, remarks of the pygmies, “They are much feared for their revengeful spirit.” Thus, other things being equal, the most revengeful are the most successful in the struggle for self-conservation and self-furtherance. Though by itself considered irrational and foolish to inflict return injuries upon an injurer long after the immediate occasion, yet its 181deterrent effect is very great with reference to other assailants. Thus, pure retrospection may have unconsciously prospective value, or sometimes revenge may be really retrospective-prospective, as when one says, “I will fix him so he will not do that again.” Here function is consciously known, but in instinctive revenge there is no such foresight, and, in general, utility is no consideration with the revenger, whose mind is bent rather on doing great harm for its own sake to his enemy rather than benefiting himself. It is always the conscious or unconscious significance for the future that justifies revenge in the natural course of events; while it is no remedy for my hurt, if some one has put out my eye, to put out his in return, yet this revenge act, and so the feeling which prompts it, is of highest prospective value with reference to future possible enemies. Every one will know that I cannot be harmed with impunity. Despoil or injure the revengeful in any way and you inevitably suffer for it sooner or later, and so revenge acts as a protective psychical variation of high value. On the whole the revengeful is less likely than others to be molested and injured, and thus has a manifest advantage in the struggle for existence. Revenge has, then, also rightfully its own subjective sanction, a pleasure reaction, for revenge is, indeed, “sweet.”

Revenge is apparently found in a considerable range in the animal kingdom, and seems universal in the genus homo. However, we cannot infallibly conclude from certain actions that revengeful emotion is present, and especially is this so in the case of animals. Thus, in the well-known instance of the elephant, who, observing a man passing by who had greatly annoyed him years before, suddenly drenched him with dirty water, we are not necessarily to suppose that this elephant was prompted by the emotion of revenge; although this may have been the case, we are not perfectly sure how far the elephant did the act merely as recompense for what the man had done, or how far the 182sight of the injurer, and so one likely to injure, roused to simple anger and defence against the threatening harmful. Many acts which seem like revenge are quite likely to be common defence or offence, are done with reference to what the object is and will be as injurious, based upon knowledge of the past, and not as merely retrospective retributive acts. Memory for injuries received is strong in many animals; that which has harmed is often recognised after many years as the harmful, and appropriate simple emotion, not revenge, is manifested. Rage, rather than revenge, is the usual emotion among lower animals in special instances where revenge might seem called for; and thus it is more likely that the elephant should rage and hate rather than have pure revenge as in the case considered.

However, somewhere rather late in sub-human psychism revengeful emotion certainly arose as an advantageous variation, and it grew in strength and prominence for many ages of psychic progress. At length it culminated, and began its decline with the marked increase of co-operative sociality, with which it must greatly interfere. Reprisal and counter-reprisal, vendetta, feud, is opposed to that social union which is strength; and so we see that tribes and nations in which the spirit of personal revenge has been a dominant trait have been left behind in the march of progress. Revengefulness, at least in the form of retributive personal violence for injuries done, is, in a highly civilized community, entirely superseded by the machinery of law. Instead of slaying a brother’s murderer I call upon the law to execute justice and retribution, and I bring certain designated ones among my fellows to secure my revenge. Where a man takes the law in his own hands, and kills or injures the violator of his home or the slayer of his nearest kin, he recedes to the lower unsocial plane from which civilization has arisen. Thus revengefulness, in certain forms at least, has become in the highest human 183communities a disadvantageous variation, and is gradually being eliminated. This negative elimination of revenge is also greatly hastened by the progress of certain ethical and Christian conceptions by which a new and opposite law of conduct is enforced, namely, the returning good for evil.

One of the most interesting and most retrospective of emotions is sorrow. Sorrow, grief and regret are wholly regardful of the past, are pains at the past. They are purely subjective or “mental” pains at the past, and in no wise pains from the past; they are not pains recurrent from past pains, but purely a painful emotion at the representation of past pain. Thus, a man says, “I did it to my own harm and hurt, and I have always been sorry I did it.” Here the sorrow-pain is evidently quite distinct from the direct pain of the injury; pain for the harm done is one thing, and pain from the harm done is another. I hurt myself, and I not only have this pain, but, being sorry that I did it, I have this new emotional pain added. Sorrow as painful emotion for the past is thus plainly unique and peculiar. To feel sorry over what has happened is a mode of feeling altogether different from feeling proud of it, angry at it, etc., and we may reasonably regard sorrow as a distinct genus of retrospective emotion. What, now, is the nature and function of this special emotion reaction?

We have to consider here only that simple primitive sorrow which is a painful emotion at regarding personal loss or failure. Such simple sorrow we see in the child who cries over spilled milk, in the man who expresses deep regret at the careless misstep by which he broke his leg. In this emotional reaction at the injurious the harmful is neither escaped nor repelled, as through fear and anger; the feeling disturbance is comparatively passive and purely reflective, and is not a spur to some immediate advantageous defensive or offensive activity. In sorrow we are pained emotionally at the trouble which has come upon 184us through our own agency or othe............