[1] The eye is the only organ of sense that affords a connected
phantasm, vision or Idea. In the other senses, there is a memorial
connection, by which the perception is recognised as having previously
occurred, and consequently a consciousness of former perception. Without
these adjuncts the repetition of these perceptions would be useless as
instruments of knowledge. Avoiding a lengthened detail concerning the
other senses, it will be sufficient to instance the olfactory organ. If
we scent the essences of rose or jasmine, on the second presentation,
they are recognised as having occurred before: should we have smelled
the same perfumes from the living plants that exhale them, and by the
_eye_ noticed them, we should experience a phantasm or Idea of the
figure of the plants, but there would be no phantasm of the odour. The
excitation of the phantasm associated with the perception, and the
recollection of the perception without the phantasm, by the attribution
of a name, is, for the present, purposely concealed.
[2] Modification. A word of useless application, unless the _modus in
quo agit_, be defined.
[3] Of the supposed operations of these Ideas, and the purposes to which
they are subjected, a few, among abundant instances, are selected from
Mr. Locke's Essay. "Some Ideas _forwardly_ offer themselves to all men's
understanding; some sorts of truths result from any Ideas, as soon as
the mind puts _them_ into propositions: other Truths require a _train_
of Ideas _placed in order_."--_Vol._ I. _p._ 63.
"When the understanding is once stored with these simple Ideas, it has
the power to _repeat_, _compare_, and _unite_ them, even to an almost
infinite variety, and so can make at pleasure _new_ complex
Ideas."--_Vol._ I. _p._ 81.
"The next operation we may observe in the mind about its Ideas, is
COMPOSITION, whereby it puts together several of those simple ones it
has received from sensation and reflection, and _combines_ them into
complex ones."--_Vol._ I. _p._ 118.
"If either by any sudden very strong impression, or long fixing his
fancy upon one sort of thoughts, _incoherent_ Ideas have been _cemented_
together so powerfully, as to remain united."--_Vol._ I. _p._ 121.
"But there are degree of Madness as of folly, the disorderly _jumbling_
Ideas together, in some more, and some less." _Vol._ I. _p._ 122.
"The acts of the mind wherein it exerts its power over its simple Ideas,
are chiefly three. 1st. Combining several simple Ideas into one
_compound one_, and _thus_ all complex Ideas are made. The second, is
bringing _two Ideas_, whether simple or complex together, and _setting_
them by one another, so as to take a view of them _at once_, without
uniting them into one; by which way it gets all its Ideas of relations.
The third, is _separating_ them from all other Ideas that _accompany_
them in their real existence; this is called Abstraction."--_Vol._ I.
_p._ 124.
[4] The acquirement of language does not wholly consist in the
imitation of the word, but likewise in the comprehension that the
articulate sound is the representative of the object perceived. There
are some persons of defective intellect that I have seen, whose hearing
was perfect, and who could whistle some tunes, but who were unable to
learn their native language so as to understand what was said to them,
and consequently incompetent to afford an answer. In this particular
they approximate to the state of animals.
[5] "Nec missas audire queunt, nec reddere voces."
[6] On consulting the Concordance of CRUDEN, it does not appear
that the word IDEA, is to be found in our Translations of the Old and
New Testament. CRUDEN, although deemed a Lunatic, was a man of
persevering research and scrupulous accuracy.
[7] It is very probable that MARTIAL, in his eulogy of the
Roman Notarius, may have exceeded the actual performance.
"Currant verba licet, manus est velocior illis:
Nondum linga suum, dextra peregit opus."
_Lib. 14, Epig. 208._
[8] In imitation of the Auburn (American) prison, the Middlesex
magistrates, in their judicial wisdom, have adopted an entirely opposite
system; by imposing an awful silence in their house of correction. This
penance must press sorely on the criminals of the softer sex, to whom
tea and conversation (errors excepted) constitute the principal comforts
of life. CATULLUS seems to allude to this infernal art of exasperating
the miseries of incarceration.
"Nulla fugae ratio, nulla spes: OMNIA MUTA,
Omnia sunt deserta: ostentant omnia Lethum."