A second classification of attention has been suggested according to the answer to the question as to why attention is given.  Sometimes attention is given simply because the material itself demands it; sometimes for some ulterior reason.  The former type is called immediate or intrinsic attention; the latter is called derived, mediate, or extrinsic attention.  The former is given to the situation for its own sake; the latter because of something attached to it.  Forced attention is always derived; free attention may be either immediate or derived.  It is immediate and derived free attention that needs further discussion.

It should be borne in mind that there is no sharp line of division between immediate and derived attention.  Sometimes it is perfectly evident that the attention is given for the sake of the material—­at other times there can be no doubt but that it is the something beyond the material that holds the attention.  But in big, complex situations it is not so evident.  For instance, the musician composing just for the love of it is an example of immediate attention, while the small boy working his arithmetic examples with great care in order to beat his seatmate is surely giving derived attention.  But under some conditions the motives are mixed and the attention may fluctuate from the value of the material itself to the values to be derived from it.  However this may be, at the two extremes there is a clear-cut difference between these two types of attention.  The value of rewards and incentives depends on the psychology of derived free attention, while that of punishment and deterrents is wrapped up with derived forced attention.

Immediate free attention is the more valuable of the two types because it is the most highly unified and most strongly dynamic of all the attention types.  The big accomplishments of human lives have been brought to pass through this kind of attention.  It is the kind the little child gives to his play—­the activity itself is worth while.  So with the artist, the inventor, the poet, the teacher, the physician, the architect, the banker—­to be engaged in that particular activity satisfies.  But this is not true of all artists, bankers, etc., nor with the others all the time.  Even for the child at play, sometimes conditions arise when the particular part of the activity does not seem worth while in itself; then if it is to be continued, another kind of attention must be brought in—­derived attention.  This illustration shows the place of derived attention as a means to an end—­the same part played by forced attention in its relation to free.  Derived attention must needs be characteristic of much of the activity of human beings.  People have few well-developed capacities, and there are many kinds of things they are required to do.  If these are to be done with free attention, heartily, it will only be because of some value that is worth while that is attached to the necessary activity.  As