The main special character of olfactory images seems
to be conditioned by the fact that they are intermediate in character
between those of touch or taste and those of sight or sound, that they
have much of the vagueness of the first and something of the richness and
variety of the second. AEsthetically, also, they occupy an intermediate
position between the higher and the lower senses.[26] They are, at the
same time, less practically useful than either the lower or the higher
senses. They furnish us with a great mass of what we may call
by-sensations, which are of little practical use, but inevitably become
intimately mixed with the experiences of life by association and thus
acquire an emotional significance which is often very considerable. Their
emotional force, it may well be, is connected with the fact that their
anatomical seat is the most ancient part of the brain. They lie in a
remote almost disused storehouse of our minds and show the fascination or
the repulsiveness of all vague and remote things. It is for this reason
that they are--to an extent that is remarkable when we consider that they
are much more precise than touch sensations--subject to the influence of
emotional associations.
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