BANDED IRON FORMATION'S - RULE THEM AND RULE THE WORLD OR THE SKYSCRAPERS Muro Banded Iron-Formation occurs in the Proterozoic Toto Schist Belt, central ... iron Formations (Regional Representations), Theophrastus, Athens, 1990

Muro Banded Iron-Formation occurs in the Proterozoic Toto Schist Belt, central Nigeria. It consists preponderantly of oxide facies and minor carbonate facies. The oxide facies is made up of alternating bands of quartz (metachert) with those of hematite + magnetite + martite ± goethite, chlorite, pyrrhotite and garnet. The carbonate facies consists of quartz (metachert) + siderite ± goethite. In the oxide facies the total iron content (Fe₂O₃t) ranges from 33.95% to 48.08% and the SiO₂ content from 50.33% to 64.50%. In the case of the carbonate facies, the Fe₂O₃t content varies from 15.42% to 20.66% and SiO₂ content from 66.84 to 72.86%. The Al₂O₃ content is generally low ranging from 0.1% to 0.54% in the oxide facies, and 0.24% to 0.31% in the carbonate facies. Chemically, the Muro Iron-Formation is similar to the Lake Superior-type iron-formations in terms of the distribution of the major and trace elements. This taken together with similarities in lithological associations indicates its deposition in similar environments i.e. shallow intra-continental or restricted/barred marine basin. The very low Al₂O₃ contents indicate minor clastic dilution of the original chemical precipitates.

Presentations. — Psychology must begin, then, by describing observed appearances (the literal translation of the word " phenomena ") without any prejudging of the issue as to what is the cause of these. So, though it may speak of such phenomena as if they were things, it must not be regarded as asserting that they are, at bottom, anything more than effects associated with brain-workings. It leaves, at the outset, that question open. Field of Presentation. — All such phenomena it styles "Presentations" and it regards them as located within the individual's private "Field of Presentation" (We shall employ this term in preference to the commoner "Field of Conscious- ness,' ' which is insufficiently definite.) This field of presentation contains, at any given instant of Time, all the phenomena which happen to be offered for possible observation. Let us take a concrete example of what that means. You are now reading this book, and your field of presentation contains the visual phenomena connected with the printed letters of the word you are regarding. It contains also, at the same instant, the visual phenomenon pertaining to the little numeral at the bottom of the page. This you "failed to notice"; but the numeral in question was, clearly, inside the area covered by your vision — it was affecting your brain via the eye, its psychical "correlate" was being offered to your attention. And that statement holds good for a host of other visual phenomena. On reflection, you will also agree that J 5 16 AN EXPERIMENT WITH TIME the field must have then contained — presented to attention but left "unnoticed" — certain muscular sensations such as pressures against your body, quite a number of sounds, and the pleasant feeling produced by the air flowing into your lungs as you breathed. Attention. — It would be unsafe to say that these comparatively unnoticed phenomena were not being consciously observed. When you are watching a fall of snow, observation may be concentrated upon a single floating flake ; but that does not mean that you fail to perceive the remainder. Were these to vanish, leaving the single flake in the air, their dis- appearance would instantly distract your startled attention from the object of your previous pre- occupation. When listening to the playing of an orchestra, you do not need to cease iollowing the music in order to be aware that the irritating person in the seat ahead has stopped beating time with his programme. As a general rule, however, observa- tion seems to be definitely centred upon one or another specific part of the crowd of presentations — though we have no psychical evidence to show that this is anything more than a matter of habit. Observation thus centred is called "Attention" It is usual to speak of the part of the field centred upon as being in the "Focus of Attention" ; and it is a matter of common knowledge that, at and around this " focus," attention may be concentrated in greater or less degree of intensity. In Physiology (the science which deals with the brain as a physical organism) the field of presenta- tion would be merely the particular part of the cere- brum which happens to be, at that moment, in the state of activity associated with the production of psychical phenomena. And the focus of attention AN EXPERIMENT WITH TIME 17 would be simply that particular brain path which the maximum current of nervous energy happened to be following. One would be apt to suppose, off- hand, that this maximum flow would be produced by whatever happened to be the greatest sensory stimulation; but such could not be the rule. The hungry man, coming to the luncheon table, has his attention focussed, not upon the brightness of the shining silver, but upon the far duller sensory stimulation of the well-browned mutton chop. Attention, therefore, may be either attracted from without the organism or directed from within. If we were to attribute such directing to the ultimate observer, we should be admitting him to the status of a full-blown animus with powers of intervention. For, as every schoolboy knows, the concentrating of attention has a very marked effect in the forma- tion of memories. But the physiologist would insist that we have no need to regard this internal directing of attention as originating in anything beyond the purely mechanical internal condition of the brain. Now, the field of presentation at any given moment may contain a great many observable phenomena besides those sensory appearances which we have been considering; It may contain, for example, "Memory Images."* What sort of a phenomenon is a "memory image"? Impressions. — Presentations may be divided into two sharply differing classes. The first of * I apologize to the modern psychologist for this revival of the ancient word " image." He will find, later on, that its use is perfectly justified, even though it does mean no more than the re-employment of a " disposition," or the rstimulation of a brain path. It has been rather surprising to discover how many persons there are who, while willing to concede that we habitually observe events before they occur, suppose that such prevision may be treated as a MINOR ogical difficulty, to be met by some trifling readjustment in one or another of our sciences or by the addition of a dash of transcendentalism to our metaphysics. It may well be emphasized that no tinkering or doctoring of that kind could avail in the smallest degree. If prevision be a fact, it is a fact which destroys absolutely the entire basis of all our past opinions, of the universe. Bear in mind, for example, that the foreseen event may be avoided. What, then, is its structure? I would suggest that we are lucky, on the whole, to be able to replace our vanished foundations by a system so simple as the ' ' serialism ' ' described in this book. Anyone who hopes to discover an explanation even simpler would be well advised to examine his own statement of the difficulty to be faced — viz., that we '''observe events before they occur." Let him ask himself to what time-orde? does that word " before " refer. Certainly not to the primary time- order in which the occurring events are arranged! He may see then that his statement {and every expression of his problem must bear that samegeneral form) is in itself a direct assertion that Time is serial. If Time be serial, the universe as described in terms of Time must be serial, and the descriptions, to be accurate, must be similarly serial — as suggested in Chapter XXV . If that be the case, the sooner we begin to recast physics and psychology on such lines, the sooner may we hope to reckon with our present discontinuities and set out upon a new and sounder pathway to knowledge. J. W. Dunne. Extract {by permission) from a letter written by Professor A. S. Eddington. ("Minkowski's world," referred to therein, is the "space-time" world adopted by Einstein for the purpose of his theory.} 1 ' I agree with you about ' serialism ' ; the ' going on of time ' is not in Minkowski's world as it stands. My own feeling is that the ' becoming ' is really there in the physical world, * but is not formulated in the description of it in classical physics (and is, in fact, useless to a scheme of laws which is fully deterministic). ' ' Yours truly, "A. S. Eddington. " Observatory, " Cambridge, " 1928, Feb. 1.

There does not appear to be anything in these 
pages that anyone is likely to find difficult to follow, 
provided that he avoids those occasional paragraphs 
in smaller print which have been written more par- 
ticularly for specialists. And Part V. may require 
reading twice. But there are a few commonplace 
semi-technical expressions which will crop up now 
and again ; and it is always possible that other people 
may be accustomed to attach to these words mean- 
ings rather different to those which the present writer 
is hoping to convey. Any such misunderstanding 
would result, obviously, in our being at cross-pur- 
poses throughout the greater part of the book. 
Hence it might be advisable for us to come to some 
sort of rough preliminary agreement, not as to how 
these terms ought rightly to be employed, but as 
to what they are to be regarded as meant to mean 
in this particular volume. By so doing we shall, at 
any rate, avoid that worst of all irritations to a 
reader — a text repeatedly interrupted by references 
to footnote or glossary. 

That the agreement will be entirely one-sided will 
make it all the easier to achieve. 



CHAPTER II 

Briefly, then : 

Let us suppose that you are entertaining a visitor 
from some country where the inhabitants are all 
born blind; and that you are trying to make your 
guest understand what you mean by "seeing.'' 
You discover, we will further assume, that the pair 
of you have, fortunately, this much in common : 
You are both thoroughly conversant with the mean- 
ings of all the technical expressions employed in 
the physical sciences. 

Using this ground of mutual understanding, you 
endeavour to explain your point. You describe 
how, in that little camera which we call the " eye," 
certain electro-magnetic waves radiating from a dis- 
tant object are focussed on to the retina, and there 
produce physical changes over the area affected; 
how these changes are associated with currents of 
" nervous energy " (possibly electrical) in the criss- 
cross of nerves leading to the brain-centres, and how 
molecular or atomic changes at those centres suffice 
to provide the "seer" with a registration of the 
distant object's outline. 

All this your visitor could appreciate perfectly. 

Now, the point to be noticed is this. Here is a 
piece of knowledge concerning which the blind man 
had no previous conception. It is knowledge which 
he cannot, as you can, acquire for himself by the 
ordinary process of personal experiment. In sub- 
stitution, you have offered him a description, framed 
in the language of physical science. And that sub- 
stitute has served the purpose of conveying the 
knowledge in question from yourself to him. 

3 



4 AN EXPERIMENT WITH TIME 

But in " seeing " there is, of course, a great deal 
more than mere registration of outline. There is, 
for example — Colour. 

So you continue somewhat on the following lines. 
That which we call a " red " flame sets up electro- 
magnetic waves of a certain length: a "blue" 
flame sets up waves exactly similar save only that 
they differ slightly in this matter of length. The 
visual organs are so constituted that they sort out 
waves showing such disparity in length, and this in 
such a way that these differences are finally regis- 
tered by corresponding differences in those physical 
changes which occur at the brain centres. 

From the point of view of your blind guest, this 
description, also, would be entirely satisfactory. 
He could now understand perfectly how it is that a 
physical brain is able to register wave-length-differ- 
ence. And, if you were content to leave it at that, 
he would depart gratefully convinced that the lan- 
guage of physics had again proved equal to the task, 
and that your description in physical terms had 
equipped him with a knowledge of, for instance, 
what other people call "red " as complete in every 
respect as that which they themselves possess. 

But this supposition of his would be absurd. For 
concerning the existence of one very remarkable 
characteristic of red he would still, obviously, know 
nothing whatsoever. And that characteristic (pos- 
sibly the most puzzling, and certainly the most 
obtrusive of them all) is — its redness. 

Redness? Yes. Without bothering about whether 
redness be a thing or a quality or an illusion or any- 
thing else, there is no escaping the fact (i) that it 
is a characteristic of red of which you and all seeing 
people are very strongly aware, nor the further fact 
(2) that your visitor, so far, would have not the 



AN EXPERIMENT WITH TIME 5 

faintest shadow of an idea that you or others experi- 
ence anything of the kind, or, indeed, that there 
could exist anything of the kind to be experienced. 
If, then, you intend to complete your self-imposed 
task of bringing his knowledge on the subject of 
"seeing" up to the same level as your own, there 
remains yet another step before you. 

Realizing this, you mentally glance down your 
list of physical expressions, and — a moment's 
inspection is enough to show you that, for the pur- 
pose of conveying to your blind guest a description 
of redness, there is not a single one of these expres- 
sions which is of the slightest use whatsoever. 

You might talk to him of particles (lumps, — 
centres of inertia), and describe these as oscillating, 
spinning, circling, colliding, and rebounding in any 
kind of complicated dance you cared to imagine. 
But in all that there would be nothing to introduce 
the notion of redness. You might speak of waves 
— big waves, little waves, long waves, and short 
waves. But the idea of redness would still remain 
unborn. You might hark back to the older physics, 
and descant upon forces (attractions and repul- 
sions), magnetic, electrical, and gravitational ; or 
you might plunge forward into the newer physics, 
and discourse of non-Euclidean space and Gaussian 
co-ordinates. And you might hold forth on such 
lines until exhaustion supervened, while the blind 
man nodded and smiled appreciation; but it is 
obvious that, at the end of it all, he would have no 
more suspicion of what it is that (as Ward puts it) 
' ' you immediately experience when you look at a 
field poppy " than he had at the outset. 

Physical description cannot here provide the 
information which experience could have given. 

Now, redness may not be a thing — but it is very 



6 AN EXPERIMENT WITH TIME 

certainly a fact. Look around you. It is one of 
the most staring facts in existence. It challenges 
you everywhere, demanding, clamouring to be 
accounted for. And the language of physics is 
fundamentally unadapted to the task of rendering 
that account. 

It is obvious that dubbing redness an " illusion " 
would not help the physicist. For how could 
physics set about describing or accounting for the 
entry of the element of redness into that illusion? 
The universe pictured by physics is a colourless 
universe, and in that universe all brain-happenings, 
including " illusions, *' are colourless things. It is 
the intrusion of Colour into that picture, whether 
as an illusion or under any other title, which requires 
to be explained. 

Once you have thoroughly realized that redness 
is something beyond a complex of positions, a com- 
plex of motions, a complex of stresses, or a mathe- 
matical formula, you will have little difficulty in per- 
ceiving that Colour is not the only fact of this kind. 
If your hypothetical visitor were deaf, instead of 
blind, you could never, by giving him books of 
physics to read, arouse in him even the beginning 
of a suspicion regarding the nature of "Sound," 
as heard. Now, Sound, as heard, is a fact : (put 
down this book and listen). But in the world 
described by physics there is no such fact to be 
found. All that physics can show us is an altera- 
tion in the positional arrangement of the brain par- 
ticles, or alterations in the tensions acting upon 
those particles. And in no catalogue of the mag- 
nitudes and directions of such changes could there 
be anything to suggest that there exists anywhere in 
the universe a phenomenon such as that which you 
directly experience when a bell tolls. In fact, just 



AN EXPERIMENT WITH TIME 7 

as physics cannot deal with the element of redness 
in "red," so is it inherently unable to account for 
the intrusion of that clear bell-note into a universe 
which it can picture only as an animated diagram of 
groupings, pushings, and pullings. 

But if, in such a diagram, there can be nothing of 
either Colour or Sound, is it likely to be of any use 
our hunting therein for phenomena like "Taste" 
and "Smell"? The utmost that we could hope 
to find would be those movements of the brain-par- 
ticles which accompany the experiences in question ; 
or, possibly, some day, the transference equations 
relating to some hitherto unsuspected circuit of 
energy. Your hypothetical visitor and yourself 
might each possess the fullest possible knowledge 
of these brain-disturbances, the most complete 
acquaintance with such energetic equations as may 
still remain to be written ; but, if you could actually 
taste and smell, and he could not, it is incontro- 
vertible that your knowledge of each of these 
phenomena would include something quite unknown 
to, and, indeed, quite unimaginable by, him. 

Now, when we say of any occurrence that it is 
"physical," we mean thereby that it is potentially 
describable in physical terms. (Otherwise the ex- 
pression would be wholly meaningless.) So it is 
perfectly correct to state that, in every happening 
with which our sensory nerves are associated, we 
find, after we have abstracted therefrom every 
known or imaginable physical component, certain 
categorically non-physical residua. 

But these remnants are the most obtrusive things 
in our universe. So obtrusive that, aided and 
abetted by our trick of imagining them as situated 
at our outer nerve-endings, or as extending beyond 
those endings into outer Space, they produce the 



8 AN EXPERIMENT WITH TIME 

effect of a vast external world of flaming lights and 
colours, pungent scents, and clamorous, tumultuous 
sounds. Collectively, they bulk into a most amaz- 
ing tempest of sharply-differentiated phenomena. 
And it is a tempest which remains to be considered 
after physics has completed its say. 

Physics. — Nor is this last a matter for wonder- 
ment. For the ideal object of physics is to seek 
out, isolate, and describe such elements in Nature as 
may be credited with an existence independent of 
the existence of any immediate observer. Physics 
is, thus, a science which has been expressly designed 
to study, not the universe, but the things which 
would supposedly remain in that universe if we were 
to abstract therefrom every effect of a purely sensory 
character. From the very outset, then, it renounces 
all interest in such matters as those colours, sounds, 
etc., of which we are directly aware,— matters essen- 
tially dependent upon the presence of an immediate 
observer, and non-existent in his absence, — and it 
limits itself to a language and a set of conceptions 
serviceable only for the description of facts pertain- 
ing to its own restricted province. 

Psychology and Psychical. — But, as scientific 
investigators of the situation in which we find our- 
selves, we cannot, of course, neglect to study a 
mass of phenomena so large and so obtrusive as to 
constitute, to first appearance, the whole of the 
world we know. Consequently, a separate science 
has gradually arisen which endeavours to deal with 
these and other of the rather bulky leavings of 
physics. This science is called "Psychology," 
and the facts with which it deals — facts existing 
only in the presence of an immediate observer 
— are dubbed "mental," or, more commonlv, 
"Psychical." 



CHAPTER III 

Now, although it is scientifically indisputable that 
the brain, regarded as a purely physical piece of 
mechanism, cannot create, unassisted and out of 
nothingness, any of those vivid psychical appear- 
ances we call "colour," "sound," "taste," etc., 
it may be taken as experimentally established that 
these phenomena do not come into existence unless 
accompanied by some stimulation of the corre- 
sponding sense organs. Moreover, they vary in 
character according to the character of the sense 
organ involved : lights and colours accompany 
activities of the optic nerves ; sounds are associated 
with the existence of ears ; tastes with palates. The 
psychical phenomena are different because the sen- 
sory organizations are different. Colour experi- 
ences in man range from violet to deep red, accord- 
ing to the wave-lengths of the electro-magnetic rays 
impinging upon the eye. If that wave-length be 
further slightly increased, the associated psychical 
experience is one of heat alone. But we know that, 
with a very little modification of the sensitive optical 
elements involved, those heat experiences would be 
accompanied by experiences of a visible infra-red 
colour. 

Thus, the physical brain, though it cannot create 
such sensory appearances, is a prime factor in their 
characterization, and, for that reason, an important 
factor in whatever process it may be that causes them 
to appear. 

The situation, thus far, is usually summed up in 
the cautious statement that these particular kinds of 



io AN EXPERIMENT WITH TIME 

psychical phenomena, on the one hand, and their 
corresponding sense-organ stimulations, on the 
other, invariably accompany one another, or run, so 
to say, on parallel tracks in Time. This, be it 
noted, is never advanced as an "explanation" : it 
is merely supposed to be a simple way in which the 
facts can be announced without dragging in the 
various metaphysical creeds favoured by the various 
announcers. 

Psychoneural Parallelism. — The assumption 
that this "parallelism" of psychical and neural 
(nervous) events extends to all observable thought- 
experience — that there is no observable psychical 
activity without some corresponding activity of 
brain — is called "Psychoneural Parallelism" \ the 
activity in either class being referred to as the 
" correlate " of that in the other. 

The accumulated evidence in favour of this view 
is practically overwhelming. Hard thinking induces 
brain fatigue; drugs which poison the brain inter- 
fere with our reasoning processes; brain deteriora- 
tion affects our ability to form new memories. 
Above all, "concussion" of the brain appears to 
destroy all memory of the events which immediately 
f receded the accident — indeed, it is by the failure 
of the patient to remember what led up to that acci- 
dent that the physician diagnoses concussion. This 
provides us with almost indisputable evidence that 
the means of remembering are "brain-traces" 
which require a little time for their assured estab- 
lishment. 

That such brain-traces (insulated paths formed 
by the passage of nervous currents) do, in fact, 
exist, is well known; and, moreover, it has been 
shown that the greater the ability of the individual 
to perform associative thinking, the more numerous 



AN EXPERIMENT WITH TIME u 

and the more complex in their ramifications are the 
brain paths in question. 

Observer. — We have now arrived within intro- 
ductory range of that very meek-spirited creature 
known to modern science as the "Observer." It 
is a permanent obstacle in the path of our search for 
external reality that we can never entirely get rid of 
this individual. Picture the universe how we may, 
the picture remains of our making. On the other 
hand, it is, probably, equally true that, paint the 
picture how we will, we have to do it with the paints 
provided. But there is no reason why either of 
these limitations should invalidate the result re- 
garded as a map by which we may safely set our 
course. Moreover, we can test it in that respect; 
and experience has shown that, thus tested, it proves 
reliable. Therein lies the justification of our search 
for knowledge. 

It is worth noting that, from the study of a pic- 
ture, we may always infer a little about the character 
and situation of the unincluded artist. Science, 
indeed, is often obliged to decide that certain 
changes or peculiarities in what is observed are only 
to be accounted for by inferring changes or pecu- 
liarities in the observer. 

The general procedure, however, in every science, 
is to begin by the accurate tabulating of differences 
in what is observed. If we subsequently discover 
that these differences are due to the character or 
actions of the observer, we can note that such is the 
explanation of the difference and draft our science 
accordingly; but that addition to our knowledge 
does not invalidate our previous analysis of the 
differences as observed. 

All sciences deal only with a standard observer, 
unless the contrary is explicitly stated ; and 



12 AN EXPERIMENT WITH TIME 

psychology is no exception to this rule. Its ob- 
server is assumed to be any normally constituted 
individual. And this individual is the same observer 
as is ultimately employed in physics. In what the 
psychologist says about the colours of "after-im- 
pressions," and in what the physicist says about the 
"spectra" of certain stars, this same standard ob- 
server is implicated. And it is assumed that he is 
not colour-blind. 

Now, it must be admitted that the tenets of 
psychoneural parallelism are not very encouraging 
to this "observer." For they suggest that, when 
the brain-workings come to an end, the psychical 
phenomena cease likewise from troubling. More- 
over, the scientific procedure of pushing the ob- 
server as far back as possible — so as to get as much 
as possible of the picture into the category of that 
which is observed — tends to reduce him to the level 
of a helpless onlooker with no more capacity for 
interference than has a member of a cinema audience 
the ability to alter the course of the story develop- 
ing before him on the screen. Nor is there much 
more comfort to be obtained from a study of the 
various metaphysical interpretations (none of them 
offer an explanation) of this parallelism of Mind 
and Body. Idealist and Realist may dispute hotly 
as to precisely how far the observer colours, so 
to say, the phenomena which he observes ; but 
decisions arrived at in that respect need not suggest 
that he has any power of changing either the colour- 
ing he confers or the thing perceived as thus 
coloured — much less the ability to continue observ- 
ing when there is no longer any brain activity to be 
observed. 

Animism. — In this connection, however, we must 
recognize the existence of a small but very vigorous 



AN EXPERIMENT WITH TIME 13 

group of philosophers known as " Animists." In 
this twentieth century the leading exponent of 
Animism is indubitably Professor William Mc- 
Dougall, whose book, " Body and Mind," sets out 
the arguments for and against the theory with 
scrupulous fairness. Indeed, I cannot call to mind 
anyone who has stated the case against Animism 
with such devastating force. 

Animism holds that the observer is anything but 
a nonentity. He is no "conscious automaton." 
He may, indeed, stand right outside the pictured 
universe ; but he is a " soul, ' ' with powers of inter- 
vention which enable him to alter the course of 
observed events — a mind which not only reads the 
brain, but which employs it as a tool. Much as the 
owner of an automatic piano may either listen to 
its playing or play on it himself. 

The inference is that this observer can survive 
the destruction of that brain which he observes. As 
for his intervention, there is no insuperable objec- 
tion to that from the physical side. McDougall 
quotes and suggests various ways in which interven- 
tion could be effected without adding to or sub- 
tracting from the amount of energy in the nervous 
system. 

The man-in-the-street is always at a loss to 
understand why the great majority of men of science 
are so coldly opposed to the idea of a " soul." The 
religious man in particular cannot comprehend why 
his arguments should arouse not merely opposition, 
but bitter contempt. Yet the reason is not far to 
seek. It is not that the idea is attributed to man's 
inordinate conceit (though this is sometimes done 
by the unreflecting) ; for, all said and done, a navvy 
who can walk into a public-house and order a pot 
of beer is an infinitely more wonderful thing than 


is the biggest lump of cooling mud that ever swam 
in the skies. But there can be no reasonable doubt 
that the idea of a soul must have first arisen in the 
mind of primitive man as the result of observation 
of his dreams. Ignorant as he was, he could have 
come to no other conclusion but that, in dreams, he 
left his sleeping body in one universe and went 
wandering off into another. It is considered that, 
but for that savage, the idea of such a thing as a 
"soul" would never have even occurred to man- 
kind ; so that arguments subsequently introduced to 
bolster up a case thus tainted at its source can have 
no claim to anyone's serious attention. 

and the sensations themselves are connected with certain physical conditions which probably count for something in the estimate of their intensity : we have here to do with phenomena which take place on the surface of consciousness, and which are always connected, as we shall see further on, with the perception of a movement or of an external object. But certain states of the soul seem to us, rightly or wrongly, to be self-sufficient, such as deep joy or sorrow, a reflective passion or an aesthetic emotion. Pure intensity ought to be more easily definable in these simple cases, where no extensive element seems to be involved. We shall see, in fact, that it is reducible here to a certain quality or shade which spreads over a more or less con siderable mass of psychic states, or, if the expres sion be preferred, to the larger or smaller number of simple states which make up the fundamental emotion. For example, an obscure desire gradually be comes a deep passion. Now, you will see that Take, !or -^ e feeble intensity of this desire con- SSrw^oi a sisted at first in its appearing to be isolated and, as it were, foreign to the remainder of your inner life. But little by little it permeates a larger number of psychic elements, tingeing them, so to speak, with its own colour : and lo ! your outlook on the whole of your surroundings seems now to have changed radi cally. How do you become aware of a deep passion, once it has taken hold of you, if not by perceiving that the same objects no longer impress you in the same manner ? All your sensations and all your ideas seem to brighten up : it is like childhood back again. We experi ence something of the kind in certain dreams, in which we do not imagine anything out of the ordinary, and yet through which there resounds an indescribable note of originality. The fact is that, the further we penetrate into the depths of consciousness, the less right we have to treat psychic phenomena as things which are set side by side. When it is said that an object occupies a large space in the soul or even that it fills it entirely, we ought to understand by this simply that its image has altered the shade of a thousand perceptions or memories, and that in this sense it pervades them, although it does not itself come into view. But this wholly dynamic way of looking at things is repugnant to the reflective consciousness, because the latter delights in clean cut distinctions, which are easily expressed in words, and in things with well-defined outlines, like those which are perceived in space. It will assume then that, everything else remaining identical, such and such a desire has gone up a scale of magnitudes, as though it were permissible still to speak of magnitude where there is neither multiplicity nor space ! But just as consciousness (as will be shown later on) concentrates on a given point of the organism the increasing number of muscular contractions which take place on the surface of the body, thus converting them into one single feeling of effort, of growing intensity, so it will hypostatize under the form of a growing desire the gradual alterations which take place in the confused heap of co-existing psychic states. But that is a change of quality rather than of magnitude. What makes hope such an intense pleasure is the fact that the future, which we dispose of to our liking, appears to us at the same time under a multitude of forms, equally attractive and equally

possible. Even if the most coveted of these be 
comes realized, it will be necessary to give up the 
others, and we shall have lost a great deal. The 
idea of the future, pregnant with an infinity of 
possibilities, is thus more fruitful than the future 
itself, and this is why we find more charm in hope 
than in possession, in dreams than in reality. 

Let us try to discover the nature of an increasing 
intensity of joy or sorrow in the exceptional 
The emotions cases where no physical symptom inter- 
sJr!ow. an Their venes. Neither inner joy nor passion 
successive j s an i so i a ted inner state which at first 

luL&cS corrs~ 

uuve chXes occupies a corner of the soul and gradu- 
5 oS e P8 ychic aNy spreads. At its lowest level it is 
tates. verv iik e a turning of our states of con 

sciousness towards the future. Then, as if their 
weight were diminished by this attraction, our ideas 
and sensations succeed one another with greater 
rapidity ; our movements no longer cost us 
the same effort. Finally, in cases of extreme 
joy, our perceptions and memories become tinged 
with an indefinable quality, as with a kind of heat 
or light, so novel that now and then, as we stare 
at our own self , we wonder how it can really exist. 
Thus there are several characteristic forms of 
purely inward joy, all of which are successive 
stages corresponding to qualitative alterations 
in the whole of our psychic states. But the num 
ber of states which are concerned with each of 
these alterations is more or less considerable, and, 
without explicitly counting them, we know very 



CHAP, i THE AESTHETIC FEELINGS II 

well whether, for example, our joy pervades all 
the impressions which we receive in the course of 
the day or whether any escape from its influence. 
We thus set up points of division in the interval 
which separates two successive forms of joy, and 
this gradual transition from one to the other makes 
them appear in their turn as different intensities 
of one and the same feeling, which is thus sup 
posed to change in magnitude. It could be easily 
shown that the different degrees of sorrow also 
correspond to qualitative changes. Sorrow begins 
by being nothing more than a facing towards the 
past, an impoverishment of our sensations and 
ideas, as if each of them were now contained 
entirely in the little which it gives out, as if the 
future were in some way stopped up. And it 
ends with an impression of crushing failure, the 
effect of which is that we aspire to nothingness, 
while every new misfortune, by making us under 
stand better the uselessness of the struggle, 
causes us a bitter pleasure. 

The aesthetic feelings offer us a still more 
striking example of this progressive stepping in 
The aesthetic f new elements, which can be detected 
S in the fundamental emotion and which 
differ- seem to increase its magnitude, although 
ent feelings. j n rea ijty they do nothing more than 
alter its nature. Let us consider the simplest 
of them, the feeling of grace. At first it is only 
the perception of a certain ease, a certain facility 
in the outward movements. And as those move- 



12 TIME AND FREE WILL CHAP. I 

ments are easy which prepare the way for others, 
we are led to find a superior ease in the movements 
which can be foreseen, in the present attitudes 
in which future attitudes are pointed out and, as 
it were, prefigured. If jerky movements are 
wanting in grace, the reason is that each of them 
is self-sufficient and does not announce those 
which are to follow. If curves are more graceful 
than broken lines, the reason is that, while a curved 
line changes its direction at every moment, every 
new direction is indicated in the preceding one. 
Thus the perception of ease in motion passes over 
into the pleasure of mastering the flow of time 
and of holding the future in the present. A third 
element comes in when the graceful movements 
submit to a rhythm and are accompanied by music. 
For the rhythm and measure, by allowing us to fore 
see to a still greater extent the movements of the 
dancer, make us believe that we now control them. 
As we guess almost the exact attitude which 
the dancer is going to take, he seems to obey us 
when he really takes it : the regularity of the 
rhythm establishes a kind of communication be 
tween him and us, and the periodic returns of the 
measure are like so many invisible threads by 
means of which we set in motion this imaginary 
puppet. Indeed, if it stops for an instant, our 
hand in its impatience cannot refrain from making 
a movement, as though to push it, as though to 
replace it in the midst of this movement, the 
rhythm of which has taken complete possession 



CHAP. I THE AESTHETIC FEELINGS 13 

of our thought and will. Thus a kind of physical 
sympathy enters into the feeling of grace. Now, 
in analysing the charm of this sympathy, you will 
find that it pleases you through its affinity with 
moral sympathy, the idea of which it subtly sug 
gests. This last element, in which the others are 
merged after having in a measure ushered it in, 
explains the irresistible attractiveness of grace. 
We could hardly make out why it affords us such 
pleasure if it were nothing but a saving of effort, 
as Spencer maintains. 1 But the truth is that 
in anything which we call very graceful we imagine 
ourselves able to detect, besides the lightness 
which is a sign of mobility, some suggestion of a 
possible movement towards ourselves, of a virtual 
and even nascent sympathy. It is this mobile 
sympathy, always ready to offer itself, which is 
just the essence of higher grace. Thus the in 
creasing intensities of aesthetic feeling are here 
resolved into as many different feelings, each one 
of which, already heralded by its predecessor, 
becomes perceptible in it and then completely 
eclipses it. It is this qualitative progress which 
we interpret as a change of magnitude, because 
we like simple thoughts and because our language 
is ill-suited to render the subtleties of psychological 
analysis. 

To understand how the feeling of the beautiful 
itself admits of degrees, we should have to submit 

1 Essays, (Library Edition, 1891), Vol. ii, p. 381, 



!4 TIME AND FREE WILL CHAP. I 

it to a minute analysis. Perhaps the difficulty 
The feeling of which we experience in defining it is 
to : p largely owing to the fact that we look 
upon the beauties of nature as an- 
terior to those of art: the processes 
of art are thus supposed to be nothing 
more than means by which the artist expresses 
the beautiful, and the essence of the beautiful 
remains unexplained. But we might ask our 
selves whether nature is beautiful otherwise than 
through meeting by chance certain processes of 
our art, and whether, in a certain sense, art is not 
prior to nature. Without even going so far, it 
seems more in conformity with the rules of a sound 
method to study the beautiful first in the works 
in which it has been produced by a conscious effort, 
and then to pass on by imperceptible steps from 
art to nature, which may be looked upon as an 
artist in its own way. By placing ourselves at this 
point of view, we shall perceive that the object of 
art is to put to sleep the active or rather resistant 
powers of our personality, and thus to bring us 
into a state of perfect responsiveness, in which 
we realize the idea that is suggested to us and sym 
pathize with the feeling that is expressed. In the 
processes of art we shall find, in a weakened form, a 
refined and in some measure spiritualized version 
of the processes commonly used to induce the state 
of hypnosis. Thus, hi music, the rhythm and 
measure suspend the normal flow of our sensations 
and ideas by causing our attention to swing to and 



CHAP, i THE AESTHETIC FEELINGS 15 

fro between fixed points, and they take hold of us 
with such force that even the faintest imitation 
of a groan will suffice to fill us with the utmost 
sadness. If musical sounds affect us more power 
fully than the sounds of nature, the reason is that 
nature confines itself to expressing feelings, where 
as music suggests them to us. Whence indeed 
comes the charm of poetry ? The poet is he with 
whom feelings develop into images, and the images 
themselves into words which translate them while 
obeying the laws of rhythm. In seeing these 
images pass before our eyes we in our turn experi 
ence the feeling which was, so to speak, their 
emotional equivalent : but we should never realize 
these images so strongly without the regular move 
ments of the rhythm by which our soul is lulled 
into self-forgetfulness, and, as in a dream, thinks 
and sees with the poet. The plastic arts obtain 
an effect of the same kind by the fixity which 
they suddenly impose upon life, and which a 
physical contagion carries over to the attention of 
the spectator. While the works of ancient sculp 
ture express faint emotions which play upon them 
like a passing breath, the pale immobility of the 
stone causes the feeling expressed or the move 
ment just begun to appear as if they were fixed for 
ever, absorbing our thought and our will in their 
own eternity. We find in architecture, in the 
very midst of this startling immobility, certain 
effects analogous to those of rhythm. The sym 
metry of form, the indefinite repetition of the same 



10 TIME AND FREE WILL CHAP, i 

architectural motive, causes our faculty of percep 
tion to oscillate between the same and the same 
again, and gets rid of those customary incessant 
changes which in ordinary life bring us back with 
out ceasing to the consciousness of our personality : 
even the faint suggestion of an idea will then be 
enough to make the idea fill the whole of our mind. 
Thus art aims at impressing feelings on us rather 
than expressing them ; it suggests them to us, and 
willingly dispenses with the imitation of nature 
when it finds some more efficacious means. Nature, 
like art, proceeds by suggestion, but does not com 
mand the resources of rhythm. It supplies the 
deficiency by the long comradeship, based on 
influences received in common by nature and by 
ourselves, of which the effect is that the slightest 
indication by nature of a feeling arouses sympathy 
in our minds, just as a mere gesture on the 
part of the hypnotist is enough to force the 
intended suggestion upon a subject accus 
tomed to his control. And this sympathy is 
shown in particular when nature displays to us 
beings of normal proportions, so that our atten 
tion is distributed equally over all the parts of the 
figure without being fixed on any one of them : 
our perceptive faculty then finds itself lulled and 
soothed by this harmony, and nothing hinders 
any longer the free play of sympathy, which is 
ever ready to come forward as soon as the obstacle 
in its path is removed. 

It follows from this analysis that the feeling of 



CHAM THE AESTHETIC FEELINGS 17 

the beautiful is no specific feeling, but that every 
feeling experienced by us will assume 

Stages in the > f. , . , , ,, 

aesthetic emo- an aesthetic character, provided that it 
has been suggested, and not caused. It 
will now be understood why the aesthetic emotion 
seems to us to admit of degrees of intensity, and 
also of degrees of elevation. Sometimes the feel 
ing which is suggested scarcely makes a break in 
the compact texture of psychic phenomena of 
which our history consists ; sometimes it draws 
our attention from them, but not so that they 
become lost to sight ; sometimes, finally, it puts 
itself in their place, engrosses us and completely 
monopolizes our soul. There are thus distinct 
phases in the progress of an aesthetic feeling, 
as in the state of hypnosis ; and these phases 
correspond less to variations of degree than to 
differences of state or of nature. But the merit 
of a work of art is not measured so much by the 
power with which the suggested feeling takes hold 
of us as by the richness of this feeling itself : in 
other words, besides degrees of intensity we 
instinctively distinguish degrees of depth or eleva 
tion. If this last concept be analysed, it will be 
seen that the feelings and thoughts which the artist 
suggests to us express and sum up a more or less 
considerable part of his history. If the art which 
gives only sensations is an inferior art, the reason 
is that analysis often fails to discover in a sensa 
tion anything beyond the sensation itself. But 
the greater number of emotions are instinct with a 



x g TIME AND FREE WILL 

thousand sensations, feelings or ideas which pervade 
them : each one is then a state unique of its kind 
and indefinable, and it seems that we should have 
to re-live the life of the subject who experiences it 
if we wished to grasp it in its original complexity. 
Yet the artist aims at giving us a share in this 
emotion, so rich, so personal, so novel, and at 
enabling us to experience what he cannot make us 
understand. This he will bring about by choos 
ing, among the outward signs of his emotions, 
those which our body is likely to imitate mechani 
cally, though slightly, as soon as it perceives them, 
so as to transport us all at once into the indefin 
able psychological state which called them forth. 
Thus will be broken down the barrier interposed 
by time and space between his consciousness and 
ours : and the richer in ideas and the more preg 
nant with sensations and emotions is the feeling 
within whose limits the artist has brought us, the 
deeper and the higher shall we find the beauty thus 
expressed. The successive intensities of the aes 
thetic feeling thus correspond to changes of state 
occurring in us, and the degrees of depth to the 
larger or smaller number of elementary psychic 
phenomena which we dimly discern in the funda 
mental emotion. 

The moral feelings might be studied in the same 

The moral W ^ ^ 6 ^ US ^^ P^ V aS an exam pl e 

feelings. Pity. It consists in the first place in putting 

Iti increasing 

" * Onese ^ mentally in the place of others, in 
suffering their pain. But if it were 



CHAP, i THE MORAL FEELINGS 1 9 

nothing more, as some have maintained, it would 
inspire us with the idea of avoiding the wretched 
rather than helping them, for pain is naturally 
abhorrent to us. This feeling of horror may indeed 
be at the root of pity ; but a new element soon 
comes in, the need of helping our fellow-men and of 
alleviating their suffering. Shall we say with La 
Rochefoucauld that this so-called sympathy is a 
calculation, " a shrewd insurance against evils to 
come " ? Perhaps a dread of some future evil 
to ourselves does hold a place in our compassion 
for other people s evil. These however are but 
lower forms of pity. True pity consists not so 
much in fearing suffering as in desiring it. The 
desire is a faint one and we should hardly wish to 
see it realized ; yet we form it in spite of ourselves, 
as if Nature were committing some great injustice 
and it were necessary to get rid of all suspicion 
of complicity with her. The essence of pity is thus 
a need for self-abasement, an aspiration down 
wards. This painful aspiration nevertheless has a 
charm about it, because it raises us in our own 
estimation and makes us feel superior to those 
sensuous goods from which our thought is tem 
porarily detached. The increasing intensity of 
pity thus consists in a qualitative progress, in a 
transition from repugnance to fear, from fear 
to sympathy, and from sympathy itself to hu 
mility. 

We do not propose to carry this analysis FURther. 

The psychic states whose intensity we have 

just defined are deep-seated states which 

conscious MINDS NEVER TAKE DEATHNOTE 

OF THESE STATES OF SATI

A CLEAN KILL - A ARMY BOOK FROM THE RED ARMY THAT GIVES SOME LETHAL POINTS TO A FAST KILL IN THE RIB CAGE OR BY SPLEEN RUPTURE OR SMASH THE BALLS IN MALE FOES INCLUDES DROWNING AND DUST IN THE RESPIRATORY TRACT THEY DON'T USE POLONIUM IN THE 80'S AND PREFERED THE USE OF RICINUM POWDER UND SO WEITER A GOOD BOOK THAT USED TO BE FREE OF CHARGE IN THE GOOD CCCP TIMES

NAS ÁGUAS POUCO PROFUNDAS EMBOSCAR COLONOS

E OUTRAS FORÇAS DO IMPERIALISMO CAPITALISTA

ESCAROTICOS E ESTYPIOS 1856 EMPREGADOS PARA PARAR HEMORRAGIAS

E FEBRES HEMORRÁGICAS OU DIMINUIR OS SEUS EFEITOS

TINTURAS OU BEVERAGES OF SESQUICHLORETO DE FERRO

SOLUÇÕES SATURADAS DE ALÚMEN E DE SULPHATO DE ZINCO

COM ÁCIDO SULPHURICO

CONCENTRED SOLUTION OF SILVER NITRATE

NYTRATO DE PRATA CRYSTALLIZADA - CAUTERIO

SOLUÇÃO ALCOÓLICA DE BICHLORETO DE MERCÚRIO

ÁCIDO AZÓTHICO PURO

SEIXAL 205 INDIVIDUOS CHOLERA MORBUS MORRERAM 94

46 MACHOS E 48 FÊMEAS

TRATAMENTO

LIMONADA SULPHURICA E SUMMO DE LIMÃO COM DUAS COLHERES

DE ÁCIDO AZÓTHICO PURO (COLHERES DE CHÁ ...)

IPECAUNHA ÁGUA FRIA À DISCRIÇÃO (OU ÁGUA MORNA SE O DOENTE AGUENTAR

COZIMENTO DE QUINOA VINHO DO PORTO

MISTURA DE STROGONOFF EM VINHO DO PORTO

TIME OF DEATH 10 HORAS E 51 MINUTOS

BOOKS? WHO WANT BOOKS ? ....PRISON LIBRARIAN A GOOD JOB ....I read a book once. Green, it was.....LIVROS? EU LI UMA VEZ UM LIVRO ACHO QUE ERA VERDE ---LOST IN TRANSLATION THE NATION AND THE NOXIOUS NOTION ....A ARTE DE BEM CAVALGAR TODA A CELA - One: Bide your time. (raises index finger) Two: Keep your nose clean. (raises middle finger) And three: don't let the bastards grind you down. (Mackay turns around in shock to see Fletcher still has two fingers up) Oh, sorry (raises third finger). PUBLICADO EM 1976 EM PORTUGAL E VENDIDO AO QUILO PELOS EDITORES PARA CORTES DE PAPEL REVENDIDO POR 20$00 JUNTAMENTE COM CENTOS DE LIVROS DO PREC NO TERREIRO DO PAÇO POR VENDEDORES AMBULATÓRIOS NO INÍCIO DOS ANOS 80...JUNTAMENTE COM DISCOS DE 33 ROTAÇÕES Cheer up, could be worse. State the country's in, we could be free.’ ‘Doctor: I want you to fill one of those containers for me. Fletcher (other side of the room): What, from 'ere?

Any questions?

Fletch: Any point?

Mackay: None whatsoever.

Norman Stanley Fletcher, 'you have pleaded guilty and it is now my duty to pass sentence.
'You are a criminal who accepts arrest as an occupational hazard, 'and presumably accepts imprisonment in the same casual manner.
'We therefore commit you to the maximum term allowed for these offences.
'You will go to prison for five years.
' # 'David Hamilton! The happy sound of Radio One! # 'Here's a request from Bridget in Dundee for Ricky, who has blue eyes and looks like David Essex! 'Bridget is 16, 'works in a cake factory, and her job is to spot flawed almonds.
'She met Ricky briefly at a dance last summer on the Ayrshire coast.
'All she knows is that he's from Glasgow' .
.
And his hobby is beating up lavatory attendants! I'm listening to that! And I'M not! Sentimental slush! I have to listen to Friday Night Is Music Night! And I sit through Rosko! But I draw the line at David Hamilton! The wireless is never off in this nick.
They're piping Tony Blackburn into the kitchens.
Yes, they believe we're in prison to be punished.
Anyway, I wanted to hear the request slot - "Hello, Young Lovers" corner.
Oh, yeah? I sent a request in for Denise.
Denise? My fiancee.
Oh, that Denise.
I wanted to express my feelings of undying love.
I asked for "Everlasting Love".
You should have asked for "My Ding-A-Ling" (!) I've listened all week and it ain't been on.
You'd think MY needs were greater than some almond sorter's.
Did you write on prison notepaper? Yeah, you had my last sheet of Basildon Bond.
That's it then.
Are they biased against prisoners?! Not officially, but I can't recall hearing a prisoner's request.
Forces, yes, and ack-ack batteries, but never no-one from no nick, no.
We have a bad enough time without having requests denied! That's discrimination! AND five stamps up the spout.
You can see their point of view.
The public are bound to take offence.
You're all listening to "Family Favourites", and they read a postcard with a Parkhurst postmark! "Can 'Mad Dog' Hollister have Clair de Lune?" Clair de Lune? Yes, that's French for "by the light of the silvery moon".
I thought it might be a cultural conversation.
Hey, maybe you can tell us the ruling.
Ruling, Godber? Yeah, Miss Lonely Loins here .
.
wants to know whether the BBC ever play prisoners' requests.
No.
The answer to that is no - it could cause embarrassment.
Embarrassment? The prisoner's family might have excused his absence by saying that he was abroad, or working on an oil-rig.
Oh, I see.
No doubt your wife, Fletcher, has told your friends you are on a five-year safari (!) No, she just says I'm doing missionary work in Scotland.
The practice was also open to abuse.
There was nothing to stop prisoners sending messages in code across our airwaves.
Oh, yeah.
That is a point, innit? Some heart-warming Christmas message from an old lag to his wife and family, eh? "Can we have Harry Secombe singing The Impossible Dream?" He really meant, "Be outside E-wing with a ladder on Boxing Day and a mince pie.
" Good idea.
It's an abuse of privilege, which is why I'm here.
Not a social call? Six soft toilet rolls have disappeared from the Governor's closet - his personal water-closet.
Would you Adam and Eve it? Whatever next? Knowing you, probably the seat.
Don't look at ME, sir.
Nor me.
It's writing-paper I'M short of.
It's not right.
We've had to give him prison-issue tissue.
That's rough (!) Rough, yeah! I'll say it is.
That'll wipe the smile off his face! Fortune has given you two privileged positions here.
Don't jeopardise them by any infraction of the rules.
I'll say no more.
Thank you.
Thanks for the advice.
To which we'll pay great heed.
Now naff off.
Certainly! Certainly! He's always picking on us.
It's his suspicious mind, the nosey nerk.
Care for a glass of toilet roll? You've got one! Yeah.
I did have six.
Where's the other five? I traded them.
Who to? There are still a few felons with a bit of refinement.
There are two embezzlers on the bottom landing.
There's an unfrocked dentist and a lot of white-collar felons who'd jump at this sort of stuff.
What do you get? I'm owed some nice merchandise.
I'm promised a cricket sweater, a pair of Hush Puppies and a box of after-dinner mints.
Hey What? Share and share alike! What? It's a rule of the house, isn't it? Share my toilet roll? It's only fair.
Share my toilet roll, Godber?! Look at all these socks I've darned! All right.
Mind how you go! Hello, Dad! Hello, Ingrid, love.
Hey, Fletch, this is me mum.
Pleased to meet you, Mr Fletcher.
The pleasure's mine.
This is my eldest, Ingrid.
Sit down, Fletcher! And you, Godber! This isn't a royal garden party, you know! Who's he? That's Mr Mackay.
Charmless Celtic nerk! Who's the boy? Eh? Oh, that's Lennie Godber - my temporary cell-mate.
He's from Birmingham, but he has got O-level geography.
You need it to get around Birmingham.
How's your mother? Oh, she's fine.
She sends her love.
Oh, good.
How's your sister? Marion's fine.
She's got a new job! Can't she keep a job for more than three weeks? The bosses molest her, she alleges.
She flaunts herself, don't she? Skirts right up to her expectations.
Where is she now? Timothy Whites.
They won't molest her there - they're all qualified pharmacists.
Her flat fell through.
What flat? The one she shared with six people.
Six! Fell through the floor, I should think! No, the rent went up, so she's home, pro tem.
How's young Raymond? Fine! He won the mile in the school sports.
Did he? Ah.
If I had, I might not be here now.
He swims for the school and he's the stage manager in the school play.
Why isn't he in it? He played Yum-Yum in the Mikado last year.
His voice has gone.
Oh.
Well, he's on 30 a day.
He's what?! He's only 14! 30 a day! That's terrible! That's a dreadful waste of money.
He saves the coupons! That's OK then (!) He wants an aqualung.
He'll need one if he has 30 a day! He wants to go skin-diving in St Ives.
It's all extra-curricular.
Don't he fancy anything INSIDE the classroom? Mostly the girls, Dad! 'Ere, I don't want him getting no girl into trouble! Well, if YOU hadn't, I wouldn't be here! We don't want any coarse remarks of that nature! I can't believe my ears when I hear kids today! There's nothing wrong! You and Mum have proved your love wasn't an infatuation Silver wedding! I still don't want my love-life to be a yardstick! Raymond's only 14! When what happened happened to your mother and me, we were mature 16-year-olds.
In Highgate Cemetery, it was.
But WE had something behind us.
The tomb of Karl Marx.
No, but your mum had a nice, steady job in Gamages, and I had my plastering diploma from borstal.
Talking of Highgate Cemetery, how's YOUR love-life? Oh, least said Is it still Eddie Risley? I've warned you about him.
He's a crook! He's straight, Dad! He's just a tough businessman.
Yeah (!) It isn't fair, people saying he'd sell his own mother.
I heard that.
Who from?! The two blokes who bought his mother.
It's no good talking to you.
You've got a blind spot about him.
So have you.
Giving you a bad time, isn't he? I don't know where I am with him.
You don't half pick 'em, do you? You're a bonny girl.
You could have anyone you wanted, you could.
And also, you're not getting any younger - 24.
That's not old! It is for a teenager! And a spinster! Oh, Dad! Things have changed since your day! Girls don't want to be tied down so quick.
They see alternatives to marriage.
Not in Muswell Hill, they don't.
They've twinned the Odeon! I'm talking about moral standards! What do social commentators know? Nothing about the real world! They all live in NW1! Never been further north than Hampstead or further south than Sloane Square! In the REAL world, Birmingham, Muswell Hill Are you wearing a bra? I don't need to, Dad! What do you mean? My breasts are firm and pliant.
Please, Ingrid! This isn't St Tropez! It's Slade bleeding Prison! The men here would go berserk at the sight of a shin, never mind unfettered knockers! Dad! I'm sorry, but it has to be said.
You are very naive about the effect your body can have on a shackled male.
Dad, YOU are naive in some ways.
I'm sure no-one's even noticed! Godber? Godber! GODBER! What?! What? Are you awake? What's the matter? You got any snout? No.
Would you believe it? Yeah, I would, you inconsiderate nerk! I thought you'd given up! I felt like starting again.
Mind your head.
Me mum bought me some Maltesers.
No, thanks.
And cake.
No, thanks! If you haven't got snout, go back to sleep! Thanks, you old scrote! What's the matter, anyway? I've got things on my mind.
Like what? MY business! Oh, come on.
You've woken me up now.
I just get depressed at times, that's all.
Stinking stir! KICKS TABLE That's not like you, Fletch.
A father's place is with his kids, giving them affection and guidance.
I've got three, you know.
Yeah, I know.
14, 19 and 24.
Why the gap between each? Circumstances dictated that.
How? Well, I had to keep going in prison for five years, didn't I? Teens is a terrible age - you expect trouble.
But you'd think my Ingrid would have learnt a few lessons by now.
She seemed a nice girl to me.
She had lovely I know what she had lovely! I'm her father.
Be careful, Godber! Eyes! I was gonna say eyes.
Lovely eyes.
Big and blue.
Oh, yeah.
And a nice smile, which seemed to indicate a warm nature.
True, true.
I hope you don't mind me saying this .
.
but I couldn't help overhearing a bit of what you said.
Most of us did.
Oh, yeah? This Eddie don't seem good enough for her.
He's not.
He says he's in the motor trade - he forges car log-books.
Not that SHE'D believe it.
How can YOU be sure? I bought two off him.
They weren't much cop either.
He spelt Citroen with an S.
Well, I shouldn't worry too much.
He'll get rumbled, and that'll give her time to find someone new.
And I should think young Marion will settle down now at Timothy Whites.
Don't worry about Raymond - I smoked at 14.
And congratulations on your silver wedding.
Did you earwig ALL my conversation? Why didn't you talk to your mother? It's a long schlep from Birmingham! She's doesn't have much to say - just a list of family ailments.
No news of Denise? She don't talk about Denise - she don't approve.
Why not? She uses green nail-varnish and doesn't wear a bra.
Her and Ingrid have a lot in common.
Your Ingrid's got nicer knockers! Fletcher, could I have a word? I'm playing draughts.
It IS important.
I wouldn't ask otherwise.
So is THIS, innit? Duty calls.
We'll have to call it a draw.
Half each.
Sorry to disturb you in association hour.
That's OK.
It's only draughts.
Not your game as a rule, is it? No.
There's not much else to do now.
Look at the Ping-Pong ball.
Oh, I am sorry! It is a mess.
Yeah.
Anyhow, I wanted a quiet word.
I'm all ears.
Do you know where Godber is? He'll be at one of his poxy evening classes.
Tuesday - woodwork.
He's up in front of the Governor.
Is he? The lad? What's he done? He's attacked a prisoner in the kitchen.
He attacked Jackdaw with a soup ladle.
I don't believe it! It's quite true! It was a severe and unprovoked attack, the officer said.
I don't believe it! I know Jackdaw gets on everybody's nerves, but Lennie's a passive sort of boy.
He wouldn't hurt a fly! I thought you might throw some light on the matter.
I dunno He seemed his usual self this morning.
At lunchtime he was cheerful.
But Mr Pringle did slip on a bit of orange peel and hurt his back, so we was ALL cheerful.
Fletcher! Be serious! Godber is in trouble! It's so irrational, you see.
I like that lad, you know.
I think he shows a lot of promise.
It's the system, innit? It's turning an affable young lad into a violent criminal! You're sitting on a volcano which could at any time erupt into violence and mayhem! Fletcher, you've got your finger on the pulse.
How can we avert this? Well, there is one thing you could do to postpone the holocaust.
What? You could indent for another Ping-Pong ball.
Fletcher! Well then? Well then, what? I heard.
Heard what? I heard you hit Jackdaw with a ladle.
Heard right then, didn't you? Must've had your reasons.
I did.
Ain't you going in the cooler then? No.
Lucky lad! Lucky, am I?! Yeah! Assault, innit, ladling a fellow prisoner?! Automatic cooler offence, ladling.
I just got loss of privileges, due to the mitigating circumstances.
You must have had mitigating circumstances! Look, you don't HAVE to tell me.
You don't HAVE to say what drove you to launch into Jackdaw with a deadly weapon, to wit, one ladle! I won't then.
I'd rather not.
Oh, I see.
I see! It hasn't occurred to you that your hitherto blameless record is due in no small part to yours truly.
I'm only the guy who showed you the ropes, kept you on the rails, loaned you his soft toilet-paper! I'm not ungrateful! Every time I go to the bog, I'm not ungrateful.
Having eavesdropped into MY private life, don't you think it's time I knew something about yours?! I got bad news! Jackdaw took the mick, so I hit him when my mind was disturbed! News? Yeah! What news?! Oh.
It's a Dear John letter.
In my case it's Dear Lennie.
Naturally.
Yours, but not forever, Denise, eh? That's right.
So it's the DEMISE of Denise! That's not funny, Fletcher! Was that a joke? Not what I call a joke! Don't you think I've seen it happen hundreds of times? It's inevitable.
At least she's honest.
They're all at it like knives while we're here! But her main concern in her last letter was whether to get a budgerigar or a canary! In your future life together? Yeah.
One decision you won't have to make.
I suppose not.
Look, I know it's only academic now, but .
.
speaking personally, from personal experience .
.
I would say that always, by and large .
.
I would plump for a budgerigar.
Oh.
Why? They're more friendly, and canaries are prone to draughts, you know.
I think it's the angle of the tail.
I speak from experience, 'cos we had a canary once.
Surly little bleeder! As you say, it's academic.
Yeah.
He's dead now.
So, Denise has had Someone's There's another man, is there? Do you know him? His name's Kenneth.
He's in the merchant navy, so there's no contest.
I see.
Jolly Jack Tar, the sailor with the navy-blue eyes and all the gold braid? Sun shines out of his port-hole, I know.
Don't worry, it's only temporary.
Once he's at sea, you'll be out with Denise, and he'll be up the Persian Gulf.
Then you can just assume your rightful place in her affections.
It's just temporary.
I don't think so.
No sweat.
She's married him.
She's what? Last Saturday.
She thought I should know.
Married him.
The Cross Keys did them proud - pate and salad.
Well, I'm appalled.
I don't know what to say.
Pate and salad! Mum's coming next month.
She would have come today, only the doctor forbade it.
He said she'd be a fool to herself.
Nothing serious? Just something going round.
Marion ain't with Timothy Whites no longer.
Ain't she? Dispensed with her services, have they? She's got a job selling shirts.
She shows them round the offices.
Makes a change from showing her knickers.
She's found another flat in Maida Vale, and what you'll be most glad to hear is that me and Eddie have split up.
Have you? Not before time, girl! That's a great relief to us all.
Yeah, we was very worried about that liaison.
Do you mind?! Get on with your own visit, please! Sorry, Mrs Godber.
Haven't you got any news from the home front, dear? Well, I can't think of anything to say.
It's like visiting people in hospital.
Force yourself, love.
Here, here, here! He does bird impressions.
You all know the procedure! Conversation will be confined to the person opposite the prisoner.
There will be no fratricide here.
That's what I told him.
So if you'll excuse us, Godber Sorry, Fletch.
Sorry, miss.
That's all right.
So, you've given Eddie the big E.
That's good.
Stick to what I tell you in future, right? I do! Ain't you noticed how discreet I am today? What do you mean? Last time I embarrassed you, so this time I've given you no cause.
I don't get you.
Oh, Dad, look! I'm wearing a bra! Look at that, look at that! What? It's a Ping-Pong ball, innit? Two-star! You don't play! I don't, but some nerks here do! Ping-Pong balls are scarce.
I'll get four ounces of snout for this! Look at that! Fletch Yeah? Can I ask you something? # Feel free! # No, no, no! What? You know when I was worried after that letter about the stigma of being an ex-con? Yeah.
Do you think it'll be hard working my way back into society? Depends on the breaks.
Did YOU have any difficulty? No, I've never had any trouble, 'cos I always go straight.
Straight back into crime.
But with you it's different.
You're young.
You've got an honest face.
Is that enough? Yeah, I think so.
Character, that's what you've got.
Character.
You're a good lad.
So you think then, that if a girl cared for me, she'd forgive my past misdemeanours? Yeah, if she's a human being.
Any human being would.
You've got to learn to believe in yourself, 'cos I believe in you.
Do you? Of course.
I'll post this then.
Could you get Barrowclough to post it outside? Who to? BBC? Yes, on plain notepaper.
"Hello, Young Lovers" corner?! Is all this for the benefit of that slag, Denise? No, not her! Who then? Ingrid.
My Ingrid? Our eyes met across the room.
My daughter Ingrid? And we both knew.
You think I'll let my Ingrid take up with you?! A juvenile delinquent from Birmingham! Fletch! Be careful! Why? You've crushed your Ping-Pong ball.

---

Fletch: Oh, by the way - when you have your medical, tell him you've got bad feet.

Godber: Why?

Fletch: 'cos then you might get your brothel-creepers back. Otherwise you'll be given prison boots - and they're guaranteed to give you bad feet for the rest of your life!

---

Doctor: Suffer from any illness?

Fletch: Bad feet.

Doctor: (annoyed) Suffer from any illness?

Fletch: (insistently) Bad feet!

Doctor: Paid a recent visit to a doctor or hospital?

Fletch: Only with my bad feet.

Doctor: Are you now or have you at any time been a practicing homosexual?

Fletch: What, with these feet? Who'd have me?

Doctor: (stamps his form) Right, you're A-1.

Fletch: A-1! 'ang on, 'ang on, I can hardly walk here, doctor! (pretends to limp over to scales)

---

Doctor: Now I want you to fill one of those containers for me.

Fletch: What, from 'ere?

---

Godber: I'm only in here due to tragic circumstances.

Fletch: Which were?

Godber: I got caught.

---

Heslop: I read a book once. Green, it was.

---

Fletch [explaining to Godber about the early lights-out]: If you wanna watch Z Cars, forget it. You'll have to get your kicks from the Wombles of bleedin' Wimbledon.

---

The Hustler [1.2]

[Fletcher is on the farm, feeding the pigs]

Fletch: You eat like pigs an' all!

---

Mackay: What have you got there, Fletcher?

Fletch: [sotto voce] Crown jewels. [out loud] Chicken feed!

Mackay: Empty it.

Fletch: It'll make a terrible mess, Mr Mackay!

Mackay: Empty it!

[Fletch empties the bag, which contains nothing but chicken feed]

Mackay: All right Fletcher, just don't let me catch you thieving!

Fletch: I won't, Mr Mackay.

Mackay: You won't what?

Fletch: I won't let you catch me, Mr Mackay!

---

A Night In [1.3]

Fletch [to Godber]: We could go out, you know... yeah, I could phone up a couple of them dolly birds that dance on Top of the Pops. What are they called? Pan's People. There's one special one - beautiful Babs. Dunno what her name is.

---

Fletch: That's what you've got to tell yourself, you're just having a quiet night in.

Godber: Trouble is, I've got six hundred and ninety-eight quiet nights in to go.

---

Prison officer: (Fletch has just sat on Godber's needle) What's going on 'ere, then? (indicates Fletch) Did you assault this man, Godber?

Godber: No, he sat on me darning needle.

Officer: That true, Fletcher?

Fletch: Naff off, can't you see I'm in agony?

Officer: Why don't you get a move on? (Walks out of the cell)

Fletch: Why don't you go home an' see who's been sleeping with your old lady while you were night duty.

[Officer returns to the cell, looking bemused]

Officer: (sarcastically) Ha, ha, ha. Oh that is original, Fletcher. I've been havin' that for the last seven years. (wanders off)

Fletcher: So's she an' all.

---

A Day Out [1.4]

[Barrowclough and the prisoners are trapped in a locked church]

Barrowclough: Come on, Fletcher, you've been convicted of breaking and entering.

Fletch: Ah - "entering" being the operative word, Mr Barrowclough. I ain't never been convicted of breaking out of nowhere.

---

Ways And Means [1.5]

Fletch: Lots of famous people have been illegitimate, you know. William the Conqueror.... Napper Wainwright....

McLaren: Who's Napper Wainwright?

Fletch: He was a screw at Brixton. Mind you, he was a bastard.

---

Men Without Women[1.6]

---

Series 2

Just Desserts [2.1]

---

Heartbreak Hotel [2.2]

[Fletch has a question for Mackay]

Fletch: 'Ol love-lorn Lenny here wants to know whether the BBC ever play prisoner requests.

Mackay: No. Oh no. The answer to that is no. On the grounds that it could cause embarrassment."

Godber: Embarrassment?

Mackay: To the prisoner's families. The families might've excused his absence by telling the neighbours that the felon in question was abroad, or working on a North Sea oil rig.

Godber: Oh. I see.

Mackay: No doubt your wife, Fletcher, has told your friends that you are on a five-year safari. [chuckles at his own joke]

Fletch: No. She just tells them I'm doing missionary work in Scotland.

---

[Godber has just asked Fletch if he would make it outside of prison]

Fletch: With you, it's different. I mean, you're young, you're 'ealthy, you've go an honest face.

Godber: Is that enough?

Fletch: Yeah, I think so, yeah. Character, that's what I can read there. That's what you've got, son. Character. [pats him on the shoulder] You're a good lad.

Godber: So you think, Fletch, that if somebody cared for me. Like, a girl, like, she'd... uh... forgive me past misdemeanours?

Fletch: Yeah. If she's any sort of human being, yes she would, yeah. Any human being would. [places his hand on his shoulder] You see, you've got to learn to believe in yourself, ain't ya, eh? 'Cause I believe in ya.

Godber: Do ya?

Fletch: Of course I do, yeah.

Godber: [handing him an envelope] Oh, well, I'll post this, then. Could you get your mucker, Barrowclough to post it in the village for me quite, like?

Fletch: [Reading envelope] Who is it? BBC?

Godber: Yeah. It's on plain notepaper, so they won't know it's from a prisoner.

Fletch: "'Ello Young Lovers Corner?" Is all this soul searching just for the benefit of that slag Denise?

Godber: No! Not 'er.

Fletch: Who, then?

Godber: [tentative] Ingrid.

Fletch: [obviously shocked and infuriated, smiles falsely] My Ingrid?

Godber: [poetically] Our eyes met across the crowded room.

Fletch: My daughter Ingrid?

Godber: [continuing] And though we didn't know each other, we both knew -

Fletch: [interrupting him in fury] You think I'd let my daughter Ingrid hang out with the likes of you!? [Grabs him by the shirt and raising his fist] A JUVENILE DELINQUENT FROM THE BACKSTREETS OF BIRMINGHAM!!!

Godber: Fletch! Fletch! Fletch! Be careful!

Fletch: WHY!?

Godber: You've crushed your ping-pong ball.

---

Disturbing The Peace [2.3]

---

Mr. Mackay: I think some of you wrongly assumed that I had left you for good. But, as you see, nothing could be further from the truth. Only... I am somewhat disturbed to hear what has been happening in my absence. So now... We're going to have a new regime here, based not on lenience and laxity but on discipline, hard work and blind, unquestioning obedience. Feet will not touch the floor. Lives will be made a misery. [At the door] I am back, and I am in charge here.

[Mr. Mackay leaves, but as he walks down the corridor, Fletch and Godber start singing]

Fletch and Godber: [singing] For 'e's a jolly good fellow, for 'e's a jolly good fellow, for 'e's a jolly good fellow, and so say all of us.

Other inmates: [joining in] And so say all of us, and so say all of us. [Mackay smiles proudly and continues to march to the exit] For 'e's a jolly good fellow, for 'e's a jolly good fellow, for 'e's a jolly good fellow... And so say all of us!

---

[Fletch and his friends are cleaning a floor. Mr. Wainwright walks through it with dirty feet, leaving boot marks.]

Fletch: [annoyed] Mr. Wainwright! Now look what you've done!

[Wainwright wanders over, leaving more dirty marks]

Fletch: We'll have to do it all again now, won't we? [Wainwright nods with a smirk on his face]

[Fletch sulkily dips his cloth into his bucket of water and throws it on the floor, deliberately near Wainwright's shoes. Wainwright's smile fades and he angrily steps forward and crushes Fletch's hand with his boot. A cry of pain is heard.]

---

Fletch: [Talking about Wainwright] Do you know what sorts of curtailments we've suffered? Shorter telly hours, no fraternisation in the exercise yard, and he's only removed our ping-pong table to put in your flamin' mess.

Barrowclough: Yeah, well, that's only until our billiard table is re-covered.

Fletch: Oh yeah, yeah, well, yeah.

Barrowclough: Well, it was your fault it wanted re-covering.

Fletch: Our fault?

Barrowclough: Well, some prisoner certainly tampered with it.

Fletch: Can you prove that!?

Barrowclough: Well, we can surmise it. When Nosher Garrett went over the wall, he was picked up in Blackpool wearing a green baize suit.

---

No Peace For The Wicked[2.4]

Fletch [sings]: Born free..... till somebody caught me..... now I'm doin' solit'ry.....

Fletch [sings]: I believe for every bit of rain that falls..... someone gets wet.

---

Happy Release [2.5]

---

The Harder They Fall [2.6]

[Fletch, under Grouty's orders, is trying to get Godber to throw his fight]

Fletch: [Slowly] I've got to ask you... Well, I've got to tell you, what someone has asked me... Well, told me... Well, that they was wondering you see... Well, they was insisting if you could see your way clear... Not that you've got much choice... Oh Gawd, I don't know how to say this to you, son.

Godber: But, what is it you're trying to say, Fletch?

Fletch: Tomorrow night ain't gonna be your night, Len.

Godber: How?

Fletch: Big Grouty wants you to take a dive in the second (round). [Godber looks aghast, while Fletch stares solemnly at his boots] It's no good looking at me like that. 'Course your shocked, I know you'll be shocked. I'm ashamed.

Godber: [Still aghast] I can't do that, Fletch.

Fletch: I know, I know that, I know that. I respect you for that. But you gotta try and see the position that I'm in, see?

Godber: Well, I appreciate that, Fletch, but I just can't do it!

Fletch: [pleading] But why not? I mean, what does it mean? It's meaningless. Just inter-wing fightin'! What is it, it's meaningless!

Godber: [shouting] I know that!

Fletch: [taking his arm] Well then why can't you do it? For me?

Godber: I've already promised Billy Moffet I'd go down in the first. (Moffet is Grouty's rival)

---

Christmas Special (1975)

No Way Out

[The prisoners are singing the carol Good King Wenceslas:

Prisoners: Good King Wenceslas looked out, on the feast of Stephen. When the snow lay round about, deep and crisp and even. Brightly shone the moon that night, though the frost was cruel...

Mackay: [Entering] SILENCE!

Fletcher: [continuing maliciously] ... When a Scotsman came in sight, hollerin' -

Mackay: That'll do, Fletcher.

---

[Fletcher is in hospital with a broken leg after falling through a false escape tunnel he was showing to Mackay, who is visiting him]

Mackay: There is one question I'd like to ask... [crosses to door and checks nobody is outside] What became of the soil that was excavated from the tunnel?

Fletch: Ah now, wait a minute, I don't know what you're imagining about our relationship, but do not presume you've got a new informer in your back pocket. Everything's just the same, it's still them and us, I'm still on the side of us.

Mackay: Perfectly harmless question, Fletcher, for future reference. I just want to know they disposed of the soil.

Fletch: [insistently] I can't help ya!

[Mackay smiles, takes a green bottle of whisky from his packet, shows it to Fletcher and places it on his dinner tray]

Mackay: Scotland's finest.

Fletch: [checking the bottle] With a couple of nips out of it, I see.

Mackay: Well, still a rare treat.

Fletch: Bribes, is it?

Mackay: Christmas present.

[Fletch reaches for the bottle again, but Mackay rests a finger on it to stop him]

Mackay: Come along Fletcher. Just between you and me.

Fletch: Is that door closed?

Mackay: [grinning triumphantly] Oh yes. And there's no-one outside.

Fletch: Christmas present?

Mackay: Christmas present.

[Fletch takes the bottle, unscrews the cap and takes a glass]

Fletch: You wanna know how they disposed of the soil?

Mackay: Simple as that.

Fletch: I'll tell ya.

Mackay: I thought you might.

Fletch: [pouring himself some whisky and leaning in close] They dug another tunnel and put the earth down there.

[Mackay smiles and leaves, but freezes when he realises that Fletch has made a fool of him -- since if true, what did they do with the earth from the 'other tunnel'?]

---

Christmas Special (1976)

The Desperate Hours

---

Series 3

A Storm In A Teacup [3.1]

---

Poetic Justice [3.2]

Fletch [to Rawley, the judge who sentenced him]: If I'd known you was crooked I could have slipped you a few bob!

---

Rough Justice [3.3]

---

Pardon Me [3.4]

[Fletch and Blanco are playing Monopoly]

Fletch [draws a Chance card]: Would you Adam and Eve it? "Go to jail".

---

[Blanco is just about to leave the prison on a pardon]

Fletch: Here here, come here. [Blanco approaches] Listen, we all know that you didn't kill your old lady, see. Which means that some other bloke did. And you've paid the penance for it, right? But I don't want you going out there harbouring any thoughts of revenge, alright?

Blanco: No. I know 'im wot did it. It were the wife's lover. But don't worry, I shan't go round searching for him, 'e died years ago.

Fletch: Well, that's alright then...

Blanco: That I do know. It were me that killed him!