MENTAL IMAGES 31
fore, that the continuity of our conscious life is maintained and we are able to connect the future with the past. By them we realize our personal identity through the years, and can link those years together with a purpose. They are the materials out of which we form our plans. With them we construct our ideal worlds and build our systems of phi losophy. As already indicated, language is only a system of conventional signs whose function is to represent them in their relations and combinations; and language is meaning less unless it is the conscious bearer of this precious freight, i.e., unless the words are at least accompanied by the feel ing " that they can, when there is need for it, call into con sciousness the images for which they stand. That royal function of mind, imagination, is absolutely limited in every phase of its task of guiding life into larger and larger fields of experience by the number, range, variety, distinctiveness and vividness of these images. Whatsoever sphere of activity a man is engaged in, his efficiency will depend upon the range of his experience and upon his ability to make an effective use of it ; and this is equivalent to saying, will depend upon the number and variety of relevant images in his mind, their distinctiveness, their vividness and their proper correlation with one another. This is no more true of the poet or the orator than it is of the man of action. The impractical vis ionary is usually supposed to be a man " of too much imag ination " ; but his trouble is deficiency rather than excess of imagination. It may be that he has too few images or a too limited variety, i.e., his experience may be too narrow. Or it may be that his mental images are badly correlated with one another. As he uses these images to construct his practical ideal and to lay out his plans for its realization, their number, variety, vividness and organization are insuf ficient to enable him to forecast his enterprise in all its essential elements, to " see " it in mental vision in proper re lation to all its essential conditions. Hence his failure. The trouble is that he sees too little, not too much. There are difficulties which he does not foresee, relations and cir-
�� �
