{198} The Interrogative is easily explained. It is merely the

Relative, in a very elliptical form of expression. The interrogative

sentence, "_Who_ gave you that book?" when the subaudition is

supplied, is thus expressed: The person gave you the book, _and him_

I will you to name to me. "_What_ is the hour of the day?" is an

elliptical form of,--It is an hour of the day, _and it_ I will you

to tell me.

{199} SECTION VI.

ADVERBS.

The power of this class of words, in the great business of marking,

and the extent of the service rendered by them, will be so easily

seen, that a few words will suffice to explain them. Adverbs may be

reduced under five heads; 1, Adverbs of Time; 2, Adverbs of Place;

3, Adverbs of Quantity; 4, Adverbs of Quality; 5, Adverbs of

Relation. They are mostly abridgments, capable of being substituted

for longer marks. And they are always employed for the purpose of

putting a modification upon the Subject, or the Predicate, of a

Proposition. A few examples will suffice for the further elucidation

of this subject. "Anciently," is an adverb of time. It is of the

same import as the expression, "In distant past time." It is applied

to modify the subject, or predicate, of a proposition, as in the

following example: "A number of men anciently in England had wives

in common." "Had wives in common," is the predicate of the above

proposition, and it is modified, or limited, in respect to time, by

the word "anciently." Adverbs of place it is easy to exemplify in

the same manner. Under adverbs of quantity all those which mark

degrees may be included; as greatly, minutely: Thus, "He enlarged

greatly upon patriotism:" "Greatly" here means "in many words;" and

it modifies the predicate, "enlarged," &c. Adverbs of {200} quality

and relation are exceedingly numerous, because they are easily made

from the words which connote the quality or relation: thus, from

hard, hardly; from loud, loudly; from sweet, sweetly; from warm,

warmly: again, from father, paternally; from son, filially; from

magistrate, magisterially; from high, highly; from expensive,

expensively; and so on. In all this no difficulty is presented which

requires removing.[60]

[Editor's footnote 60: In many cases, and even in some of the

examples given, the adverb does not modify either the subject or the

predicate, but the application of the one to the other. "Anciently,"

in the proposition cited, is intended to limit and qualify not men,

nor community of wives, but the practice by men of community of

wives: it is a circumstance affecting not the subject or the

predicate, but the predication. The qualification of past and

distant time attaches to the fact asserted, and to the copula, which

is the mark of assertion. The reason of its seeming to attach to the

predicate is because, as the author remarked in a previous section,

the predicate, when a verb, includes the copula.--_Ed._]

{201} SECTION VII.

PREPOSITIONS.

It is easy to see in what manner Prepositions are employed to

abridge the process of discourse. They render us the same service

which, we have seen, is rendered by adjectives, in affording the

means of naming minor classes, taken out of larger, with a great

economy of names. Thus, when we say, "a man with a black skin," this

compound name, "a man with a black skin;" is the name of a

sub-class, taken out of the class man; and when we say, "a black man

with a flat nose and woolly hair;" this still more compound name is

the name of a minor class, taken out of the sub-class, "men with a

black skin."

Prepositions always stand before some word of the class called by

grammarians nouns substantive. And these nouns substantive they

connect with other nouns substantive, with adjectives, or with

verbs. We shall consider the use of them, in each of those cases.

1. Substantives are united to Substantives by prepositions, on

purpose to mark something added, something taken away, something

possessed or owned. Thus, a man with a dog, a horse without a

saddle, a man of wealth, a man of pleasure, and so on.

It was first shewn by Mr. Horne Tooke, that prepositions, in their

origin, are verbs, or nouns. Thus the prepositions in English, which

note the modifications effected by adding to, or taking from, were

{202} originally concrete words, which, beside something connoted by

them, marked particularly _junction_, or _disjunction_. In the use

of them as prepositions, that part of their signification, which we

have called the connotation, has been dropped; and the notation

alone remains. Prepositions, therefore, are a sort of abstract

terms, to answer a particular purpose. To express my idea of a man

with a dog (a very complex idea, consisting of two clusters; one,

that which is marked by the term man; the other, that which is

marked by the term dog); it is not enough that I set down the term

Man, and the term Dog; it is necessary, besides, that I have a mark

for that particular _junction_ of them, which my mind is making. For

that mark I use the preposition "with." "Without" denotes

disjunction in a similar manner, and requires no further

explanation. The preposition "of," by which possession or ownership

is denoted, (formerly, as remarked by Mr. Gilchrist, written _og_,

_oc_, _ac_, &c.), is _eke_, or add. If we suppose that our verb

_have_ is of the same origin, _of_ is merely the verb, which

signifies possessing; and the learner may thus conceive the nature

of its different applications.[7*] "A man of wealth," a man hav(ing)

wealth; "a field of ten acres," a field hav(ing) ten acres; so, "a

house of splendour;" "a woman of gallantry;" in all of which cases,

beside the two clusters of ideas, marked by the two names which the

preposition connects, there is an idea of possession coming between.

[*Mill's footnote 7: See note at p. 209.]

Here, however, a peculiarity is to be noted. When there is a

possessor, there is something possessed. {203} The preposition,

therefore, which marks the relation between the possessor and the

possessed, stands ambiguously between the active and the passive

power. It, therefore, partakes more of the active or the passive

signification, according to the position of the words which it is

employed to connect. In the instances previously given, we have seen

that it had clearly an active signification. In the following it has

clearly a passive. "The book of John;" the book _of_, hav(ed) John.

"The Creator of the world;" Creator hav(ed). "The wealth of

Croesus;" wealth hav(ed).

Of is employed in a partitive sense, when one of the words denotes a

part of the other; as "half of the army;" "many of the people;"

"much of the loss." In this case the idea of possession is

sufficiently obvious to support the analogy. The parts are

possessed, had, by the whole. "Part of the debt," part hav(ed) the

debt.

It is easy to see how the preposition with a substantive, serves the

purpose of a new adjective. Thus, in the expression, "a man with one

eye," the words, "with one eye," might have been supplied by an

adjective, having the same meaning or marking power; and the French

language actually has such an adjective, in the mark _borgne_. We

say, a man with red hair, and we have the adjective, red-haired; a

man of wealth, and we have the adjective, wealthy; a man of

strength, and we have the adjective, strong; cases which distinctly

exemplify our observation.

2. We come now to shew in what manner, and with what advantage,

prepositions are employed to connect Substantives with Adjectives.

The following {204} classes of adjectives will furnish sufficient

illustration of this part of the subject: 1, Adjectives of place or

position; *2, Adjectives of time or succession; 3, Adjectives

signifying profit or disprofit; 4, Adjectives of plenty or want; 5,

Adjectives signifying an affection or state of the mind.

Adjectives of position, such as near, distant, high, low, have the

ordinary power of adjectives, as marks upon marks; and an additional

power, which will best be explained by examples. When we say "a

distant house," "a neighbouring town;" the words "distant," and

"neighbouring," are not only marks upon "house," and "town," but

refer to something else: "a _distant_ house," is a house distant

from _something_; "a _neighbouring_ town," is a town neighbouring

_something_: it may mean "a house distant from my house," "a town

neighbouring my house:" in these cases, we should say that the

adjective has both a notation, and a connotation. The adjective

_distant_, for example, notes _house_, and connotes _my house_;

neighbouring, notes _town_, connotes _my house_. It is next,

however, to be observed, that the connotation, in such cases, would

be vague without a mark to determine it. The expression would be

very imperfect, if, after the word high, we were merely to put the

word "hill;" and say, "the house is high the hill;" or, "the house

is distant the post-town." Prepositions supply this defect. We say,

"the house is high _on_ the hill;" "the house is distant _from_ the

post-town." In the case of some adjectives, their juxta-position

makes the reference sufficiently precise; and in that case, the

preposition may be dispensed with; as, near the town, near the road,

&c.

{205} It is observable, that the adjectives of position are not

numerous. Some very general ones are used; and the sub-species are

formed out of them by the aid of prepositions. Thus we have the word

placed, which includes all positions; and this, joined with a

substantive and a preposition, marks positions of all kinds: thus we

can say, placed on the right hand, placed on the left hand, placed

behind the house, placed before the house, placed above it, placed

below it, placed in it, and so on.

It is not my intention to inquire into the precise meaning of each

of the prepositions. It is sufficient to have given a sample of the

inquiry, as in the case of the prepositions which connect

substantives with substantives; and to have shewn the mode of their

signification, as a kind of abstract terms, either active or

passive.

The varieties of time or succession are not many, and the words to

denote them, proportionally few. Previous, simultaneous, posterior,

are the principal adjectives; and the terms to which these words of

reference point, are marked by prepositions: thus we say, previous

to, simultaneous to, and also with; "with," as we have seen,

denoting junction, sameness of time.

Adjectives of profit or disprofit, need prepositions to mark their

connexion with the things benefited or hurt; as, hurtful to the

crop; good for the health. These adjectives afford a good example of

the manner in which generical adjectives are divided into numerous

sub-species, without the inconvenience of new names, by the aid of

the prepositions: thus, hurtful, which notes all kinds of

hurtfulness, is made to note {206} its various species, in the

following manner: hurtful to the health, hurtful to the eyes,

hurtful to the stomach, hurtful to the crops, hurtful to the

reputation: all different species of hurtfulness, which might be

noted by adjectives severally appropriated to them.

There is nothing particular to be remarked of the manner in which

adjectives of plenty, or want, or those signifying an affection of

the mind, are connected with the objects they connote, by

prepositions; we shall, therefore, proceed to shew the manner in

which verbs are connected with substantives, by their means.

3. All verbs are adjectives, either active or passive, put into a

particular form, for the sake of a particular connotation. All

actions, saving those which begin and end in the actor, have a

reference to a patient, or something acted on; and the being acted

on; the passion as it is called; has a reference to the actor.

Action, therefore, and passion, are relative terms, standing in the

order of cause and effect; agent and patient, are the names of the

subjects of the action and the passion, the cause and the effect.

Most actions are motions, or named by analogy to motions. In

applying terms denoting motion, there is particular occasion for

marking the two points of termination; the point at which it began,

and the point at which it ended. This is effected by the name of the

two places, and a preposition. The contrivance will be sufficiently

illustrated by an obvious example: "John travelled from London to

Dover:" "Travelled," the name of the motion; London, the point of

commencement; Dover, the point of termination: from, a word denoting

commencement, {207} connecting London with travelled; to, a word

signifying completion, connecting the word Dover, with the word

travelled.

Some verbs, which imply motion, have their main, or only reference,

to the point of its termination. Thus, he stopped at Dover: he

struck him on the head: he stabbed him in the side. These

prepositions, whatever their precise import, which we shall not now

stop to inquire, mark, when thus applied to the name of the place at

which the respective motions terminated, the connexion of the two

names, that of the motion, and that of its point of termination.

With respect to motions, we have occasion to mark, not only the

points of their commencement and termination, but also their

direction. The direction of a motion, by which we mean the position

of the moving body, at the several points of its course, can only be

marked by a reference to other bodies, whose position is known.

Thus, "He walked through the field." The direction of the walk, or

the position of the walking man, at the several moments of it, is

marked by a reference to the field whose position is known to me,

and a word which means from side to side. The expression, "It flew

in a straight line," is less full and particular in its marking, but

clear and distinct, as far as it goes, by reference to a

modification of position; namely, a line, with which I am perfectly

familiar.

In using verbs of action and passion, that is, words which mark a

certain cluster of ideas, we have occasion to modify such clusters,

by adding to, or taking from them, not only ideas of Position, as

above, but various other ideas; of which the idea of {208} the

Cause, or End, of the action, the idea of the Instrument with which

it was performed, and the idea of the Manner of the performance, are

among the principal. "John worked;" to this, a mark of a certain

cluster of ideas, I want to make an addition, that of the Cause or

End of his working. That End is, Bread. To mark this as the cause of

his working, it is not enough to set down the name bread; I need a

mark to fix its connexion with the working, and the kind of its

connexion. I say, "John worked for (cause) bread." "John was robbed

for (cause of the robbery) his money." The ideas of manner and

instrument are commonly annexed by one preposition; "John worked

with (joining) diligence," the manner; "John worked with a spade,"

the same idea, as "John with (joined) a spade worked;" spade, the

instrument. "John worked by the job, worked by the day;" manner:

"John worked by machinery," the instrument. "He was killed with

barbarity, with a cudgel."

We say, done with hurry, or in a hurry, done in haste. "In," which

seems to mark a modification of position, is here applied to that

which does not admit of position. Hurry and haste seem in such

expressions to be personified; to be things which surround an

action, and in the midst of which it is done.

We have compound names for many actions. Thus we may say, "he hurt

John," or "he did hurt to John," "he gave a lecture to John," or,

"he lectured John." The reason why a preposition is required before

the patient, in the case of the compound name of the action, and not

of the single name, is, that the word which stands with respect to

the verb in the {209} immediate relation of the recipient or patient

of the action, is not the man, but the thing done. Thus, in the

phrase, "he did hurt to John," it is not John which is done, but

hurt: in the phrase, "he gave a lecture to John," it is not John who

is given, but a lecture. There are here as it were, two patients,

lecture, the primary, John, the secondary; juxta-position marks the

connexion of the primary; but a preposition is necessary, to mark

that of the secondary.

The following phrases seem to admit of a similar explanation. "He

reminded him of his promise;" "he accused him of perjury;" "he

deprived him of his wife:" the secondary patients being "promise,"

"perjury," "wife." He reminded him of his promise (hav(ed) his

promise); the promise being the thing had or conceived in the

reminding: accused him of perjury; perjury being the thing had in

the accusation, the matter of the accusation: deprived him of his

wife; his wife being the matter of the deprivation; the thing

hav(ed) in it.[61]

[Findlater's footnote 61: The ingenious speculations of Mr. Tooke

did great service to the cause of philology in England, by awakening

a very general interest in the subject. But his knowledge of the

cognate languages was far too circumscribed to warrant his sweeping

inductions. In his day, in fact, the accesses had not yet been

opened up to this new mine, nor the right veins struck that have

since yielded such rich results. Accordingly nearly all Tooke's

derivations are now discredited, and among others his account of

prepositions. One or two English prepositions, of comparatively

recent formation, seem to be formed from nouns; as _among_ Ang. Sax.

_gemang_ or _ongemang_, _gemang_ meaning "mixture;" and _against_,

Ang. Sax. _on-gegen_ in which _gegen_, from its use in cognate

dialects, appears to be {210} a noun, though its primary meaning is

not very clear. These however still involve a preposition which has

to be accounted for. _Between_, again, is _by twain_, "near two;"

and _except_, _save_, _during_ were originally participles in the

case absolute; "except this" was originally "this excepted," Lat.

hoc excepto. But the simple prepositions _in_, _of_, _by_ belong to

the radical elements of language, and are more independent of nouns

and verbs than nouns and verbs are of them. Comparative philology,

which did not exist in Tooke's days, has shewn, that, besides

predicative roots, as they are called--that is syllables expressive

of some action or property, such as "to go," "to eat," "to be

bright," "to speak," &c., which form the bases of nouns, adjectives,

and verbs--there was a class of roots denoting simply relations in

space, that is, place or direction (here or this, there or that, up,

down, away, &c.). It is easy to see how the audible marks of such

notions, at first, doubtless, vague enough, would be rendered

precise and intelligible by gesticulations; or perhaps the

gesticulations were the original signs, and the words mere

involuntary exclamations accompanying them, and in time taking their

place. These syllables have been called local, demonstrative, or

pronominal roots, and play a most important part in language. They

are joined to other roots to form derivatives of various kinds; and

it is of them that the inflexional endings of nouns and verbs are

built up. Singly or in combination, they constitute the pronouns,

personal as well as demonstrative. Abstract as are now the meanings

of _I_, _he_, they were once patent to the senses; _ma_ was an

emphatic "here," calling attention to the speaker; _sa_ or _ta_,

"there, that," something different from both speaker and hearer.

Most of the prepositions originated in roots of this class. The

roots of some of them, at least, are identical with those of

pronouns; others express direction, and thus imply motion. Thus _up_

means, "(motion) from below to above;" in the root FR (as in _for_,

_from_), which is represented in Sans. Gr. and Lat. by PR (pro), the

ground idea is, motion or removal from the speaker, in the front

direction. _Of_ is the Gothic _af_, Old Ger. _aba_ or _apa_, Sans.

_apa_, Gr. [Greek: a)po\] {211} Lat. _a_ or _ab_. It is not easy to

determine the precise physical relation primarily expressed by this

particle; probably "proceeding from," or "descending or depending

from." If there is any connection between _of_ and _have_, it is

more likely that _have_ is derived from _of_ than the reverse. That

not a few verbs have this kind of origin, is now recognised; the

English _utter_ from _out_ is a signal example.

The primary relations expressed by prepositions were always physical

or sensible; but the transition to the abstruse mental relations

which they now serve to mark (cause instrumentality, superiority,

&c.) is, as a rule, sufficiently obvious. For example, "issuing or

proceeding from" passes insensibly into "being part of," "belonging

to," "in the possession of."--_F._]

{212} SECTION VIII.

CONJUNCTIONS.

The Conjunctions are distinguished from the Prepositions, by

connecting Predications; while the Prepositions connect only Words.

There are seeming exceptions, however, to this description, the

nature of which ought to be understood. They are all of one kind;

they all belong to those cases of Predication, in which either the

subject or the predicate consists of enumerated particulars; and in

which the Conjunction is employed to mark the enumeration. Thus we

say, "Four, and four, and two, are ten." Here the _subject_ of the

predication consists of three enumerated particulars, and the

conjunction seems to connect words, and not predications. In like

manner, we say, "His bag was full of hares, and pheasants, and

partridges." In this last case, the _predicate_ is composed of

enumerated particulars. In these instances, the words called

conjunctions, appear to perform the business of prepositions, in

joining _words_: and in fact, they may be supplied by prepositions.

Thus, instead of "four, and four, and two, are ten," we may say

"four, with four, with two, are ten:" and, in the same way, "His bag

was full of hares, and pheasants, and partridges," may be put "full

of hares, with pheasants, with partridges." And nothing can be more

simple than such a variety in the use of such words.

{213} _With_ means _join_; _and_ means _add_.[62] These are words of

the same kind, and the same import; and nothing but use has

appropriated the one to the joining of words rather than

predications, the other to the joining of predications rather than

words.

[Findlater's footnote 62: This is according to Tooke's etymology,

who traces _and_ to an Ang. Sax. verb _anan_, to add. Unfortunately,

Anglo-Saxon scholars deny that there is such a verb. The nearest to

it is _unnan_, which means, however, merely "to wish well to," "to

favour." No satisfactory account has been given of _and_, but the

analogy of other conjunctions would connect it with a demonstrative

root. J. Grimm is inclined to consider it as a nasalised form of the

Lat. _et_; which in its turn may be an inversion of Greek [Greek:

ti\], just as _ac_, is of [Greek: kai\].

All conjunctions are essentially adverbs, and derive their

connective power from their adverbial meaning. This is well seen in

_also_, the radical meaning of which is "all (quite) in that (the

same) way." Most of the adverbs used as conjunctions are obviously

oblique cases of pronouns; so, as, than, when, where, tum, ubi,

quam, quum. In Gothic, _jah_, (Old Ger. _ja_, Finnish _ja_; of the

same origin as Eng. _yes_) takes the place of _and_, and means "in

that or the same (manner)." The Gr. [Greek: kai\] and the Lat. que,

"and," are similarly oblique cases from the root _ka_, and

equivalent to "in which or that (manner)." The identity of manner or

circumstance constitutes the mental bond. It is easy to see how a

preposition used adverbially and expressing proximity, distance, or

other relative position, would connect predications or ideas; _e.g._

"_After_ he had rested a little, he began again."--_F._]

Our object, however, on the present occasion, is distinct, both from

that of the grammarian, and that of the etymologist. We have shewn,

that a set of marks are exceedingly useful to connect single words,

and by what contrivances this end is accomplished; it remains for us

to shew, what use there is of marks {214} to connect Predications;

and by what contrivances that object is attained.

The occasions for the use of marks to connect Predications, seem to

be of two kinds.

First, When two Predications are to be marked, as following one

another.

Secondly, When they are to be marked, as modified, the one by the

other.

1. Those of the first kind need but few words for their explanation.

I may say, "Newton was a mathematician," "Locke was a

metaphysician," "Milton was a poet." So stated, these Predications

do not mark any particular order in my thoughts. I desire, however,

to show, that the ideas thereby expressed, were proximate parts of

the train in my mind. The word _and_, which means _add_, placed

between every pair, affords the requisite indication.

Like _and_, the conjunction _nor_ marks predications in sequence. It

differs from _and_ only in uniting negative predications. "The act

is not honourable, _nor_ is the man honest." In this case, it is

obvious that _nor_, whatever its origin, has the meaning of _and

not_. The predications then are two negative predications, the

sequence of which, is marked by the word _and_.

_But_, though it has been otherwise classed, and called adversative,

is of the same kind, and simply marks the sequence. Thus we say,

"Catiline was a brave man, but Catiline was a wicked man." The

meaning of _but_ is scarcely different from that of _and_, addition

being the fundamental idea signified by both of them. The

_opposition_ between the two predications is signified by the

predications themselves, not by the {215} connective.[63] In fact,

the sense would not be changed, if we substituted _and_ for _but_.

It is only because, in use, _but_ has been commonly confined to the

sequence of two _opposing_ predications, that the word _but_ is no

sooner expressed, than an _opposing_ predication is anticipated.

This is a simple case of association.

[Findlater's footnote 63: This is not strictly correct. _But_ is

compounded of the two prepositions or local particles _by_ and _out_

(Ang. Sax. _bi utan_); and the force of it, in the example given in

the text, may be thus paraphrased: "Catiline was a brave man; _but_

(_by_, near or beside that fact, put another fact, which is _out_,

away, or different from it, namely) Catiline was a wicked man." This

is something more than a simple case of association; the opposition

is expressed as well as the addition.--_F._]

2. It is not necessary for us to do more than exemplify the

principal cases in which one Predication is modified by another.

"The space is triangular, _if_ it is bounded by three straight

lines."

"The space is triangular, _because_ it is bounded by three straight

lines."

"The space is bounded by three straight lines, _therefore_ it is

triangular."

In each of these three propositions, there are two predications; the

one of which is dependent on the other. The dependence is that of

necessary consequence. The triangularity is the consequence of being

bounded by three straight lines.

In order to have names for two Predications thus related, we may

call the one the _conditioning_, the other the _conditioned_. In the

above instances, "The space is bounded by three straight lines," is

the _conditioning_ {216} predication; "The space is triangular," is

the _conditioned_.

There are two states of the conditioning predication; one, in which

it is contingent; another, in which it is positive. Observe, now,

the simple contrivance for marking the dependence of the

_conditioned_ upon the _conditioning_ predication, in all the above

cases.

In the first of the examples, "The space is triangular, _if_ it is

bounded by three straight lines," the _conditioning_ predication is

contingent. The word _if_, which is equivalent to _give_,[64]

prefixed to the conditioning predication, marks it both as the

conditioning predication, and as contingent.

[Findlater's footnote 64: That _if_ has no connection with _give_,

is manifest from the cognate forms; Goth. _jabai_, Frisic _jef_,

Ang. Sax. _gif_, Old Ger. _ibu_, Lettish _ja_, all meaning primarily

"in which or in that case, or supposition." "_Jabai_--from which the

other Germanic forms are descended--appears to have originally been

a dative or instrumental case of _ja_, analogous to _tubya_ = Latin

_tibi_: compare _ibi_, _ubi_, Gr. [Greek: bi/ê|phi], Slavonic

_tebje_ = tibi."--Garnett.--_F._]

In the second of the examples, "The space is triangular, because it

is bounded by three straight lines," the _conditioning_ predication

is positive; the word _because_ (having the meaning of, _cause be_,

or _cause is_)[65] prefixed to it, marks it as at once the

conditioning predication, and also positive. If _for_ had been the

{217} mark instead of because, the artifice would have been still

the same, as _for_ has the meaning of _cause_.

[Findlater's footnote 65: The syllable _be_, in "because," "before,"

&c., is the simple preposition _by_, Sans. _abhi_, Gr. [Greek:

epi\], "near," "close to." _Therefore_ is _for that_; in which _for_

is a preposition, meaning primarily "position in front," and thence,

by metaphor, the relation of motive or cause.--_F._]

In the third of the examples, "The space is bounded by three

straight lines, _therefore_ it is triangular;" the order of the

predications is inverted, the _conditioning_ being put first. In

this case, therefore, we need a mark to show that the last

predication is conditioned, and conditioned by the preceding. This

is done by prefixing to it the compound word, _therefore_, of which

the first part _there_ is equivalent to _that_, and _fore_ or _for_

means _cause_. The expression in its elementary form being, "The

space is bounded by three straight lines; for that, or cause that,

the space is triangular."

In these cases we have examples of what are called, the Suppositive,

the Causal, and the Illative conjunctions.

The following are examples of what are called the Disjunctive.

"The ship was well manned; _else_ it would have been lost."

"_Unless_ the ship had been well manned, it would have been lost."

In these two examples, the conditioning *predications are, "The

ship was well manned;" "The ship had been well manned:" the

_conditioned_ is, "it would have been lost," in both instances.

The dependence here, between the _conditioning_ and _conditioned_,

is that of physical consequence. The ship's not being lost, was the

consequence of its being well manned. The contrivance for marking

this dependence is akin to that which we have traced in the former

instance.

In the first of the two examples, the _conditioning_ {218}

predication stands first. How do I mark that the next is

_conditioned_, and conditioned as a physical consequent? I interpose

the word _else_. This is part of an obsolete verb, signifying, _to

dismiss_, _to turn out_, _to take away_.[66] And the sentence is

thus resolved: "The ship was well manned," _take away that_ (take

away the cause, the effect is taken away also) "she would have been

lost."

[Findlater's footnote 66: _Else_ is the genitive of an obsolete

adjective, in Gothic _alis_, corresponding to Lat. _alius_; and is

analogous with Lat. _alias_.--_F._]

Other conjunctions of the disjunctive kind, as they are called,

would here have answered the same purpose with _else_. "The ship was

well manned, _otherwise_, she would have been lost." _Otherwise_

here is precisely of the same import as _else_. "The ship was well

manned;" that being dismissed, that being _other_ than it was; "it

would have been lost."

"The ship was well manned, _or_ it would have been lost." _Or_, in

German _oder_, is _other_. The resolution of this sentence,

therefore, is the same as the former.

In the second of the two examples, "_Unless_ the ship had been well

manned, it would have been lost," the contrivance is the same, with

a mere change of position. _Unless_, is a word of the same import,

rather the same word, as _else_. _Unless_ is PREFIXED to the

_conditioning_ predication, whereas _else_ is SUFFIXED; and that is

the difference.[67] The word _except_, which signifies _take_ {219}

_away_, may be substituted for _unless_. A peculiar application of

_if_ (_give_) may here also be exemplified. _If_ with the negative,

(_if not_,) has a similar signification with unless, except; "_If_

the ship had not been well manned, &c."

[Findlater's footnote 67: _Unless_ is simply _on less_,

corresponding to Fr. _à moins_, and is equivalent to _if

not_.--_F._]

Let us now pass to another case.

"_Although_ the ship was well manned, it was lost." The two

predications may change places, without change of meaning. "The ship

was lost, _although_ it was well manned."

What (as above) was to be marked by _else_, _unless_, _if not_,

_except_, and so on, was the connexion between a cause and its usual

effect; that is, the manning of a ship, and the safety of the ship.

What is to be marked in this case is the want of connexion between a

cause and its usual effect. It is done by similar means.

_Although_ is part of an obsolete verb, _to allow_, _to grant_.[68]

The two predications are: "The ship was well manned," "The ship was

lost." I want to mark between my two predications not only a

connexion, that of the antecedence and consequence of the predicated

events, but the existence of a consequent differing from that by

which the antecedent is usually followed. _Although_, prefixed to

the predication of the antecedent event, gives notice of another

predication, that of the consequent, and of a consequent differing

from that by which the antecedent might have been {220} followed:

_Grant_ such an antecedent, such and not such was the consequent.

[Findlater's footnote 68: _Although_ is a compound pronominal adverb

resembling Lat. _tamen_, and means "(the case being) quite thus

(yet)."--_F._]

The same connection is marked by other conjunctions. "The ship was

well manned, _nevertheless_ it was lost." _Nevertheless_, means _not

less for that_.[69] "_Notwithstanding_ the ship was well manned, it

was lost." _Notwithstanding_, is, _not being able to prevent_,

_maugre_, _in spite of_. The resolution of the above sentences is

obvious. "The ship was well manned, _yet_ it was lost." _Yet_ is the

verb _get_, and has here the force of _although_, _grant_. "The ship

was well manned, _yet_ (or got, that being got, had, granted) it was

lost."[70] "The ship was well manned, _still_, it was lost." _Still_

is part of an obsolete verb, _to put_, _to fix_, _to establish_.

"The ship was well manned, _still_ (that put, that supposed) it was

lost."[71]

[Findlater's footnote 69: _Nevertheless_ means literally, "not less

by (or for) that." In this compound _the_ is not the article, but an

adverb, in Ang. Sax. _thy_, "by that much," and corresponds to Lat.

_eo_ in the expression _eo minus_.--_F._]

[Findlater's footnote 70: _Yet_ is of pronominal origin like Gr.

[Greek: i)/ti], Ger. _jetzt_, and has no connection with the verb

_get_.--_F._]

[Findlater's footnote 71: _Still_ seems to be the adjective _still_,

quiet, used adverbially, and having the force of "undisturbed,

uninterrupted by that."--_F._]

A few more cases will exemplify all that is material in the marking

power of the conjunctions.

"We study, _that_, we may be learned." The connexion here, again, is

that of cause and effect. "We study:" "We may be learned," are the

two predications, between which the connexion in question is to

{221} be marked. The demonstrative pronoun performs the service. "We

may be learned, _that_ we study:" we study; what? to be learned.

"John is more learned than James is eloquent." The conjunction here

is a relative term, and consists of the two words, _more than_. The

two predications are, "John is learned," "James is eloquent." The

connexion between them is, that they are the two parts of a

comparison turning upon the point of greatness in degree. The two

words _more than_, suffice to mark that connexion. _Than_ is but a

mode of spelling and pronouncing _that_, which use has appropriated

to this particular case. "John is learned, more that (that being the

more, the other of course is the less), James is eloquent."[72]

[Findlater's footnote 72: _Than_ is only another form of _then_, and

marks that the one comes after the other, and is therefore

inferior.--_F._]

_As_, obsolete as a pronoun, only exists as a conjunction. It is a

word of the same import with _that_. The following will suffice in

exemplification of the marking property which it retains. "Virgil

was _as_ great a poet as Cicero an orator." The two predications

are, "Virgil was a great poet," "Cicero was a great orator." They

also are connected as the two parts of a comparison, turning upon

the point of equality in degree. _As_, or _that_, suffices to mark

that connexion. "Virgil was a great poet," _that_ (namely great)

Cicero was an orator. We shall see afterwards, in the composition of

RELATIVE TERMS, that every such term consists of two words, or the

same word taken twice. The conjunction here is a relative term, and

consists {222} of two words, namely, _as_, or _that_, taken twice.

"Virgil was a poet great, that that, an orator was Cicero;" the

first _that_ marking _great as poet_; the second _that_, marking

_great as orator_.[73]

[Findlater's footnote 73: _As_ is an oblique case of the

demonstrative root _sa_, and is equivalent to "in this (degree);"

and the nature of the connection is this: Virgil was a poet great in

this degree; Cicero was an orator great in this degree; that is, the

degree of greatness was the same in both.--_F._]

{223} CHAPTER V.

CONSCIOUSNESS.

"It is not easy for the mind to put off those confused notions and

prejudices it has imbibed from custom, inadvertency, and common

conversation. It requires pains and assiduity to examine its ideas,

till it resolves them into those clear and distinct simple ones out

of which they are compounded; and to see which, amongst its simple

ones, have or have not a necessary connexion and dependence one upon

another. Till a man doth this in the primary and original notions of

things, he builds upon floating and uncertain principles, and will

often find himself at a loss."--_Locke_, _Hum. Und._ b. ii. c. 13.

s. 28.

IT will now be instructive to retrace our steps, to look back upon

the space we have passed, and contemplate the progress we have made

toward our journey's end.

We have become acquainted with the elementary feelings of our

nature; _first_, those derived immediately from our bodies, whether

by impressions made on the surface of them, or unseen causes

operating on them within; _secondly_, the feelings which, after the

above mentioned feelings have ceased, are capable of existing as

copies or representatives of them.

We have also observed the manner in which those _secondary_

Feelings, to which we have given the name of IDEAS, flow, either

into _groups_, or into _trains_. And {224} we have explored the

system of contrivances, to which mankind have had recourse, for

MARKING those feelings, and the trains of them; so as either to fix

the knowledge of them for one's own use, or to make communication of

them to others.

In what has been thus already presented, it will be seen that

several expositions of considerable importance are included.

Sensations, and Ideas, are both feelings. When we have a sensation

we feel, or have a feeling; when we have an idea we feel, or have a

feeling.

Having a SENSATION, and having a feeling, are not two things. The

thing is one, the names only are two. I am pricked by a pin. The

sensation is one; but I may call it sensation, or a feeling, or a

pain, as I please. Now, when, having the sensation, I say I feel the

sensation, I only use a tautological expression: the sensation is

not one thing, the feeling another; the sensation is the feeling.

When, instead of the word feeling, I use the word conscious, I do

exactly the same thing, I merely use a tautological expression. To

say I feel a sensation, is merely to say I feel a feeling; which is

an impropriety of speech. And to say I am conscious of a feeling, is

merely to say that I feel it. To have a feeling is to be conscious;

and to be conscious is to have a feeling. To be conscious of the

prick of the pin, is merely to have the sensation. And though I have

these various modes of naming my sensation, by saying, I feel the

prick of a pin, I feel the pain of a prick, I have the sensation of

a prick, I have the feeling of a prick, I am conscious of the

feeling; the thing named in all these various ways is one and the

same.

{225} The same explanation will easily be seen to apply to IDEAS.

Though, at present, I have not the sensation, called the prick of a

pin, I have a distinct idea of it. The having an idea, and the not

having it, are distinguished by the existence or non-existence of a

certain feeling. To have an idea, and the feeling of that idea, are

not two things; they are one and the same thing. To feel an idea,

and to be conscious of that feeling, are not two things; the feeling

and the consciousness are but two names for the same thing. In the

very word feeling all that is implied in the word Consciousness is

involved.

Those philosophers, therefore, who have spoken of Consciousness as a

feeling, distinct from all other feelings, committed a mistake, and

one, the evil consequences of which have been most important; for,

by combining a chimerical ingredient with the elements of thought,

they involved their inquiries in confusion and mystery, from the

very commencement.

It is easy to see what is the nature of the terms CONSCIOUS, and

CONSCIOUSNESS, and what is the marking function which they are

destined to perform. It was of great importance, for the purpose of

naming, that we should not only have names to distinguish the

different classes of our feelings, but also a name applicable

equally to all those classes. This purpose is answered by the

concrete term Conscious; and the abstract of it, Consciousness.

Thus, if we are in any way sentient; that is, have any of the

feelings whatsoever of a living creature; the word Conscious is

applicable to the feeler, and Consciousness to the feeling: that is

to say, the words are GENERICAL marks, under which all the names of

the subordinate classes {226} of the feelings of a sentient creature

are included. When I smell a rose, I am conscious; when I have the

idea of a fire, I am conscious; when I remember, I am conscious;

when I reason, and when I believe, I am conscious; but believing,

and being conscious of belief, are not two things, they are the same

thing; though this same thing I can name, at one time without the

aid of the generical mark, while at another time it suits me to

employ the generical mark.[74] [75]

[Bain's footnote 74: The mistake of Reid in raising Consciousness to

a separate faculty has been commented on by Brown, Hamilton, and

others. It must be allowed that to feel and to be conscious are not

two things but the same thing: that is to say, the use of the term

consciousness, whether in common life or in philosophical

discussion, does not point to knowing, and exclude feeling.

Consciousness is the widest word in our vocabulary. By common

consent it embraces everything that "mind" embraces; while one mode

of extricating the great problem of Perception from

self-contradictions, makes it mean more than mind strictly means. We

speak of the _object-consciousness_ as our attitude in being

cognisant of the extended universe; while our attitude under

feeling, and thought, we call _subject-consciousness_, or mind.

The object-consciousness follows one set of laws, the laws of matter

and space, as propounded in Mathematics, Natural Philosophy, and so

on. The subject-consciousness follows a different set of laws, such

as the laws of pleasure and pain, and the association of ideas,

treated of in Psychology. We are conscious objectively, in counting

the stars, we are conscious subjectively, in feeling oppressed by

their number.

The subject-consciousness comprises all our feelings and thoughts;

it enters into volition; and it makes a part of sensation, in which

both attitudes are conjoined. This {227} consciousness may be faint

and limited, or it may be intense and variegated. We may be in a

state of pleasure with little or nothing of thought accompanying; we

are still properly said to be conscious or under consciousness. But

we may add to the mere fact of pleasure, the _cognition of the

state_, as a state of pleasure, and as a state belonging to us at

the time. This is not the same thing as before: it is something new

superposed upon the previous consciousness. When we take note of the

fact that we are pleased, we proceed beyond the bare experience of

the present pleasure, to an intellectual act of comparison,

assimilation, or classification with past pleasures; we probably

introduce the machinery of language to express ourselves as pleased;

all this is so much _extra_ consciousness. These knowing operations

are not involved in mere feeling; we may feel without them. Indeed,

if the cognitive powers are brought into very active exercise upon

our feelings, as in the self-dissection of the Psychologist, the

feelings themselves are apt to subside.

It is thus correct to draw a line between feeling, and knowing that

we feel; although there is great delicacy in the operation. It may

be said, in one sense, that we cannot feel without knowing that we

feel, but the assertion is verging on error; for feeling may be

accompanied with a minimum of cognitive energy, or as good as none

at all; or it may be accompanied with an express application of our

knowing powers, which is purely optional on our part, and even

hostile to the full development of the feeling as feeling, as

pleasure or pain.

Reid wanted a name to express the act of scrutinizing or examining

the mind, and to correspond with such names as Perception,

Observation, for the study of the extended or object universe. He

used Consciousness for this purpose; a word that had been probably

more applied to our cognitive energies than to our experience of

mere feeling in its simplest manifestation. It is not often that

"consciousness" is employed as the popular designation of states of

feeling as such, states of marked enjoyment or suffering. On the

other hand, the word is frequently made use of to designate the act

of cognizing or {228} thinking of our states of feeling; for which,

however, self-consciousness is undoubtedly the more proper

appellative.

Hamilton terms "consciousness" a "condition" of our feelings and

mental operations; more correctly it is the operations themselves;

the consciousness is not the condition of the feeling, but the

feeling itself. More material is the opinion, held by Hamilton in

common with most of the German philosophers, that the foundation of

all consciousness is knowing; that we feel, only as we know that we

feel. He says, "It is evident that every mental phenomenon is either

an act of knowledge, or only possible through an act of knowledge:

for _consciousness is a knowledge--a phenomenon of cognition_."

("Metaphysics," Lect xi.) Now although we may not be able to rebut

this singular assertion by pointing to a state of feeling such as to

entirely exclude knowledge, we may ask, do the two properties, said

to be thus implicated, rise and fall in steady concomitance; the

more the knowledge, the greater the feeling? The answer must be

negative. A favourite doctrine of Hamilton, containing a certain

amount of truth, affirms an inverse ratio between knowing and

feeling; which it is difficult to reconcile with the present

doctrine. A new distinction must be laid down between the kind of

knowing that constitutes "feeling," and the kind of knowing that

constitutes "knowing" in the strict sense of knowledge. We may

concede to Hamilton that feeling must always be within reach of a

cognitive exertion, but it cannot be conceded that an actual

cognitive exertion is essential to the manifestation of the feeling.

Such exertion unless kept within narrow limits of intensity cools

down instead of promoting the emotional state.

The facts of the case appear to be best represented, by allowing the

state of Feeling to stand on its own independent foundation as a

mode of the subject-consciousness, or of mind. There may, and almost

always does, go along with it a certain degree of cognitive effort.

We can scarcely be under feeling, without performing some function

of an intellectual kind; the divisions of the mental energies do not

imply that they can exist in absolute separation. The act of

discriminating the {229} degree of feeling,--of pronouncing a

pleasure to be greater than, or equal to, some other pleasure,--is

properly an intellectual, or cognitive exercise; but this

discrimination does not make the feeling. So a feeling cannot exist

without impressing the memory in some degree, which is an

intellectual function; one may truly affirm that we do not feel

unless, immediately afterwards, we remember that we felt. It is an

incident or concomitant of feeling to leave an impression behind,

but this does not characterize or define the state of feeling. Being

an accompaniment or concomitant of an emotional excitement, we may

point to memory as a proof of its existence and a criterion of its

degree, but we should confuse all the boundaries of mental

phenomena, if we treated memory or retentiveness otherwise than as

an intellectual property, a property whose sphere is intellect and

not feeling.--_B._]

[Editor's footnote 75: Those psychologists who think that being

conscious of a feeling is something different from merely having the

feeling, generally give the name Consciousness to the mental act by

which we refer the feeling to ourself; or, in other words, regard it

in its relation to the series of many feelings, which constitutes

our sentient life. Many philosophers have thought that this

reference is necessarily involved in the fact of sensation: we

cannot, they think, have a feeling, without having the knowledge

awakened in us at the same moment, of a Self who feels it. But of

this as a primordial fact of our nature, it is impossible to have

direct evidence; and a supposition may be made which renders its

truth at least questionable. Suppose a being, gifted with sensation

but devoid of memory; whose sensations follow one after another, but

leave no trace of their existence when they cease. Could this being

have any knowledge or notion of a Self? Would he ever say to

himself, _I_ feel; this sensation is _mine_? I think not. The notion

of a Self is, I apprehend, a consequence of Memory. There is no

meaning in the word Ego or I, unless the I of to-day is also the I

of yesterday; a permanent element which abides through a succession

of feelings, and connects the feeling of each moment with the

remembrance of previous feelings. We have, no {230} doubt, a

considerable difficulty in believing that a sentient being can exist

without the consciousness of Itself. But this difficulty arises from

the irresistible association which we, who possess Memory, form in

our early infancy between every one of our feelings and our

remembrance of the entire series of feelings of which it forms a

part, and consequently between every one of our feelings and our

Self. A slight correction, therefore, seems requisite to the

doctrine of the author laid down in the present chapter. There is a

mental process, over and above the mere having a feeling, to which

the word Consciousness is sometimes, and it can hardly be said

improperly, applied, viz. the reference of the feeling to our Self.

But this process, though separable in thought from the actual

feeling, and in all probability not accompanying it in the

beginning, is, from a very early period of our existence,

inseparably attendant on it, though, like many other mental

processes, it often takes place too rapidly to be remembered at the

next instant.

Other thinkers, or perhaps the same thinkers on other occasions,

employ the word Consciousness as almost a synonyme of Attention. We

all know that we have a power, partly voluntary, though often acting

independently of our will, of _attending_ (as it is called) to a

particular sensation or thought. The essence of Attention is that

the sensation or thought is, as it were, magnified, or strengthened:

it becomes more intense as a whole, and at the same time more

distinct and definite in its various parts, like a visible object

when a stronger light is thrown upon it: while all other sensations

or thoughts which do or which might present themselves at the same

moment are blunted and dimmed, or altogether excluded. This

heightening of the feeling we may call, if we please, heightening

the consciousness of the feeling; and it may be said that we are

made more conscious of the feeling than we were before: but the

expression is scarcely correct, for we are not more conscious of the

feeling, but are conscious of more feeling.

In some cases we are even said to be, by an act of attention, made

conscious of a feeling of which we should otherwise have {231} been

unconscious: and there is much difference of opinion as to what it

is which really occurs in this case. The point has received some

consideration in a former Note, but there may be advantage in again

recalling it to remembrance. It frequently happens (examples of it

are abundant in the Analysis) that certain of our sensations, or

certain parts of the series of our thoughts, not being sufficiently

pleasurable or painful to compel attention, and there being no

motive for attending to them voluntarily, pass off without having

been attended to; and, not having received that artificial

intensification, they are too slight and too fugitive to be

remembered. We often have evidence that these sensations or ideas

have been in the mind; because, during their short passage, they

have called up other ideas by association. A good example is the

case of reading from a book, when we must have perceived and

recognized the visible letters and syllables, yet we retain a

remembrance only of the sense which they conveyed. In such cases

many psychologists think that the impressions have passed through

the mind without our being conscious of them. But to have feelings

unconsciously, to have had them without being aware, is something

like a contradiction. All we really know is that we do not remember

having had them; whence we reasonably conclude that if we had them,

we did not attend to them; and this inattention to our feelings is

what seems to be here meant by being unconscious of them. Either we

had the sensations or other feelings without attending to them, and

therefore immediately forgot them, or we never, in reality, had

them. This last has been the opinion of some of the profoundest

psychologists. Even in cases in which it is certain that we once had

these feelings, and had them with a lively consciousness (as of the

letters and syllables when we were only learning to read) yet when

through numberless repetitions the process has become so rapid that

we no longer remember having those visual sensations, these

philosophers think that they are elided,--that we cease to have them

at all. The usual impressions are made on our organs by the written

characters, and are transmitted to the brain, but these organic

states, {232} they think, pass away without having had time to

excite the sensations corresponding to them, the chain of

association being kept up by the organic states without need of the

sensations. This was apparently the opinion of Hartley; and is

distinctly that of Mr. Herbert Spencer. The conflicting suppositions

are both consistent with the known facts of our mental nature. Which

of them is the true, our present knowledge does not, I think, enable

us to decide.

The author of the Analysis often insists on the important doctrine

that we have many feelings, both of the physical and of the mental

class, which, either because they are permanent and unchangeable, or

for the contrary reason, that they are extremely fugitive and

evanescent, and are at the same time uninteresting to us except for

the mental processes they originate, we form the habit of not

attending to; and this habit, after a time, grows into an

incapacity; we become unable to attend to them, even if we wish. In

such cases we are usually not aware that we have had the feelings;

yet the author seems to be of opinion that we really have them. He

says, for example, in the section on Muscular Sensations (ch. i.

sect. vii.) "We know that the air is continually pressing upon our

bodies. But the sensation being continual, without any call to

attend to it, we lose from habit, the power of doing so. The

sensation is as if it did not exist." Is it not the most reasonable

supposition that the sensation does not exist; that the necessary

condition of sensation is change; that an unchanging sensation,

instead of becoming latent, dwindles in intensity, until it dies

away, and ceases to be a sensation? Mr. Bain expresses this mental

law by saying, that a necessary condition of Consciousness is

change; that we are conscious only of changes of state. I apprehend

that change is necessary to consciousness of feeling, only because

it is necessary to feeling: when there is no change, there is, not a

permanent feeling of which we are unconscious, but no feeling at

all.

In the concluding chapter of Mr. Bain's great work, there is an

enumeration of the various senses in which the word Consciousness is

used. He finds them no fewer than thirteen.--_Ed._]

{233} CHAPTER VI.

CONCEPTION.

"The generalizations of language are already made for us, before we

have ourselves begun to generalize; and our mind receives the

abstract phrases without any definite analysis, almost as readily as

it receives and adopts the simple names of persons and things. The

separate co-existing phenomena, and the separate sequences of a long

succession of words, which it has been found convenient to

comprehend in a single word, are hence, from the constant use of

that single word, regarded by the mind almost in the same manner, as

if they were only one phenomenon, or one event."--_Inquiry into the

Relation of Cause and Effect_. _By Thomas Brown, M.D._ Note M, p.

567.

THE philosophers, who erected CONSCIOUSNESS into what they called a

Power of the mind, have bestowed the same rank upon CONCEPTION.

When we have a Sensation, we are not said, in the ordinary use of

the word, to Conceive. If burned with the candle, I do not say, "I

conceive the pain;" I do not say, if I smelt putrescence, that "I

conceive the stench." It even seems to be not without a sort of

impropriety, if the term is ever applied to mark a simple Idea. We

should not, in ordinary language, say, "I conceive red," "I conceive

green." We say, however, "I conceive a horse," "I conceive a tree,";

I conceive a ship;" we say also, "I conceive an {234} argument," "I

conceive a plan." In these examples, which may be taken as a

sufficient specimen of the manner in which the term Conception is

used, we see that it is applied exclusively to cases of the

secondary feelings; to the Idea, not the Sensation; and to the case

of compound, not of single ideas. With this use, the etymology of

the word very accurately corresponds: I conceive, that is, _I take

together_, a horse; that is, the several ideas, combined under the

name horse, and constituting a compound idea. The term conception,

we have seen, applies not only to those combinations of ideas, which

we call the ideas of external objects, but to those combinations

which the mind makes for its own purposes.

It thus appears, that the word CONCEPTION is a _generical_ name,

like CONSCIOUSNESS; but less comprehensive. We call ourselves

conscious, when we have any sensation, or any idea. We say that we

conceive, only when we have some complex idea. It remains to be

inquired, whether by saying we conceive, or have a conception, we

mean any thing whatsoever beside having an idea.

If I say, I have the idea of a horse, I can explain distinctly what

I mean. I have the ideas of the sensations of sight, of touch, of

hearing, of smelling, with which the body and actions of a horse

have impressed me; these ideas, all combined, and so closely, that

their existence appears simultaneous, and one. This is my IDEA of a

horse. If I say, I have a CONCEPTION of a horse, and am asked to

explain what I mean, I give the same account exactly, and I can give

no other. My CONCEPTION of the horse, is merely my taking together,

in one, the simple ideas of the {235} sensations which constitute my

knowledge of the horse; and my IDEA of the horse is the same thing.

We may notice here, however, one of those curious illusions, which

the intimate associations of ideas with words, so often, and

sometimes so inconveniently, occasion. The term "I conceive," has

the form of an active verb; and with _the form of an active verb_

THE IDEA OF ACTION is so frequently conjoined, that we are rarely

able to separate them. By this means, the idea of activeness is

often mixed up with other ideas, when it is wholly misplaced and

illusive. I use the same form of expression when I say, I dream; as

when I say, I study, I argue, I imagine. In these cases the idea of

what I call activity is properly included: in the expression I

dream, it is not properly included; though the active form of the

verb so invariably calls up a certain idea of activity, and so

strongly tends to mix it with the other ideas, that in using the

term, "I dream," we seem to consider ourselves as, somehow, agents.

Even in using the term, "I die," we cannot escape the illusion;

though the ideas are so highly incongruous. It would be obviously

absurd to affirm that we are less active when we say we have an

idea, than when we say we have a conception, yet there is constantly

a feeling, when we use the phrase "I conceive," as if we were in

some manner active; and no such feeling, when we use the phrase

"I have an idea." The terms, therefore, the concrete "conceive,"

and its abstract "conception," are somewhat inconvenient, and

misguiding, as they infuse into the complex ideas to which they are

applied, an ingredient which does not belong to them.

The relation which the words, CONSCIOUSNESS, and {236} CONCEPTION,

bear to one another, is now, therefore, apparent. Consciousness is

the more _generical_ of the two names. Conception is the name of a

class _included under_ the name Consciousness. Consciousness applies

to sensations, and to ideas, whether simple or complex; to all the

feelings, whatsoever they may be, of our sentient nature. Conception

applies only to ideas; and to ideas, only in a state of combination.

It is a generical name including the several classes of complex

ideas.[76]

[Editor's footnote 76: The doctrine of this chapter is as just as it

is admirably stated. A conception is nothing whatever but a complex

idea, and to conceive is to have a complex idea. But as there must

always have been some cause why a second name is used when there is

already a first, there is generally some difference in the occasions

of their employment: and a recognition of this difference is

necessary to the completeness of the exposition. It seems to me that

conception and to conceive are phrases appropriated to the case in

which the thing conceived is supposed to be something external to my

own mind. I am not said to conceive my own thoughts; unless it be in

the ease of an invention, or mental creation; and even then, to

conceive it, means to imagine it realized, so that it may be

presented to myself or others as an external object. To conceive

something is to understand what it is; to adapt my complex idea to

something presented to me objectively. I am asked to conceive an

iceberg: it is not enough that I form to myself some complex idea;

it must be a complex idea which shall really resemble an iceberg,

_i.e._, what is called an iceberg by other people. My complex idea

must be made up of the elements in my mind which correspond to the

elements making up the idea of an iceberg in theirs.

This is connected with one of the most powerful and misleading of

the illusions of general language. The purposes of general names

would not be answered, unless the complex idea {237} connected with

a general name in one person's mind were composed of essentially the

same elements as the idea connected with it in the mind of another.

There hence arises a natural illusion, making us feel as if, instead

of ideas as numerous as minds, and merely resembling one another,

there were one idea, independent of individual minds, and to which

it is the business of each to learn to make his private idea

correspond. This is the Platonic doctrine of Ideas in all its

purity: and as half the speculative world are Platonists without

knowing it, hence it also is that in the writings of so many

psychologists we read of the conception or the concept of so and so;

as if there was a concept of a thing or of a class of things, other

than the ideas in individual minds--a concept belonging to

everybody, the common inheritance of the human race, but independent

of any of the particular minds which conceive it. In reality,

however, this common concept is but the sum of the elements which it

is requisite for the purposes of discourse that people should agree

with one another in including in the complex idea which they

associate with a class name. As we shall presently see, these are

only a part, and often but a small part, of each person's complex

idea, but they are the part which it is necessary should be the same

in all.--_Ed._]

{238} CHAPTER VII.

IMAGINATION.

THE IMAGINATION is another term, the explanation of which will be

found to be included in the expositions which have previously been

given.

The phenomena classed under this title are explained, by modern

Philosophers, on the principles of Association. Their accounts of

the mental process, to which the name Imagination is applied,

include their explanation of the laws of Association, or the manner

in which ideas succeed one another in a train, with little else,

except remarks on the causes to which diversity in the several kinds

of Imagination may be traced.

It is not to be overlooked that the term IMAGINATION is here used in

the sense which is given to it by philosophers when they rank it as

a particular power of the mind; for it is no doubt true, that it is

often used, in vulgar speech, as synonymous with Conception, and

with Supposition, and with Conjecture; as the verb, to imagine, is,

with the verbs, to discover, to suppose, conjecture, believe, and

perhaps others.

We have seen that Consciousness, and Conception, are names of

feelings, _taken one by one_: Consciousness {239} of _any_ of our

feelings so taken; Conception of a _particular class_ of them,

namely, complex ideas. IMAGINATION is not a name of any one idea. I

am not said to imagine, unless I combine ideas successively in a

less or greater number. An imagination, therefore, is the name of a

_train_. I am said to have an imagination when I have a train of

ideas; and when I am said to imagine, I have the same thing; nor is

there any train of ideas, to which the term imagination may not be

applied.

In this comprehensive meaning of the word Imagination, there is no

man who has not Imagination, and no man who has it not in an equal

degree with any other. Every man imagines, nay, is constantly, and

unavoidably, imagining. He cannot help imagining. He can no more

stop the current of his ideas, than he can stop the current of his

blood.

In the phrase we have just employed, "there is no man who has not

imagination," it is meant, that there is no man who now has not, who

has not always had, and who will not always have a train of ideas.

Imagination, therefore, is a word connoting _indefinite time_; it

is, to use the language of the Greek grammarians, aoristical. When

it connotes, which by the strain of the passage it may be made to

do, a _particular time_, it marks a _particular train_. When it

connotes _time indefinitely_, it marks _trains indefinitely_, any

train at any time.

The having or doing a thing at any time, means the potentiality of

having or doing it. Imagination, then, has two meanings. It means

either some one train, or the potentiality of a train. These are two

meanings which it is very necessary not to confound.

{240} There is great diversity of trains. Not only has the same

individual an endless variety of trains; but a different character

belongs to the whole series of trains which pass through the minds

of different individuals or classes of individuals. The different

pursuits in which the several classes of men are engaged, render

particular trains of ideas more common to them than other trains.

One man is a merchant; and trains respecting the goods in which he

deals, the markets in which he buys, and those in which he sells,

are habitual in his mind. Another man is a lawyer, and ideas of

clients, and fees, and judges, and witnesses, and legal instruments,

and points of contestation, and the practice of his court, are

habitually passing in his mind. Ideas of another kind occupy the

mind of the physician; of another kind still, the mind of the

warrior. The statesman is occupied with a train different from that

of any of the classes that have been mentioned; and one statesman

with a very different train from another, according as his mind is

running upon expedients which may serve the purpose of the day, or

arrangements which may secure the happiness of the population from

generation to generation. A peculiar character belongs to the train

which habitually occupies the mind of the mathematician. The mind of

the metaphysician is also occupied by a train distinguished from

that of other classes. And there is one man, yet to be mentioned,

the poet, the peculiarity of whose trains has been a subject of

particular observation. To such a degree, indeed, have the trains of

the poet been singled out for distinction, that the word

Imagination, in a more restricted sense, is appropriated to them. We

do not {241} call the trains of the lawyer, or the trains of the

merchant, imagination. We do not speak of them as imagining, when

they are revolving, each, the ideas which belong to his peculiar

occupation; it is only to the poet, that the epithet of imagining is

applied. His trains, or trains analogous to his, are those which

receive the name of Imagination.

It is then a question, to which we should find an answer, whether,

in that by which the trains of the poet differ from the trains of

other men, there be any thing which, being wholly absent from that

by which the trains of other classes are distinguished, lays a

foundation for this peculiarity of naming.

The trains of one class differ from those of another, the trains of

the merchant, for example, from those of the lawyer, not in this,

that the ideas follow one an other by any other law, in the mind of

the one, and the mind of the other; they follow by the same laws

exactly; and are equally composed of ideas, mixed indeed with

sensations, in the minds of both. The difference consists in this,

that the ideas which flow in their minds, and compose their trains,

are ideas of different things. The ideas of the lawyer are ideas of

the legal provisions, forms, and distinctions, and of the actions,

bodily, and mental, about which he is conversant. The ideas of the

merchant are equally ideas of the objects and operations, about

which he is concerned, and the ends toward which his actions are

directed; but the objects and operations themselves, are remarkably

different. The trains of poets, also, do not differ from the trains

of other men, but perfectly agree with them, in this, that they are

composed of ideas, and that those ideas succeed one another, {242}

according to the same laws, in their, and in other minds. They are

ideas, however, of very different things. The ideas of the poet are

ideas of all that is most lovely and striking in the visible

appearances of nature, and of all that is most interesting in the

actions and affections of human beings. It thus, however, appears

most manifestly, that the trains of poets differ from those of other

men in no other way, than those of other men differ from one

another; that they differ from them by this only, that the ideas of

which they are composed, are ideas of different things. There is

also nothing surprising in this, that, being trains of pleasurable

ideas, they should have attracted a peculiar degree of attention;

and in an early age, when poetry was the only literature, should

have been thought worthy of a more particular naming, than the

trains of any other class. These reasons seem to account for a sort

of appropriation of the name Imagination, to the trains of the poet.

An additional reason may be seen in another circumstance, which also

affords an interesting illustration of a law of association already

propounded; namely, the obscuration of the antecedent part of a

train, which leads to a subsequent, more interesting than itself. In

the case of the lawyer, the train leads to a decision favourable to

the side which he advocates. The train has nothing pleasurable in

itself. The pleasure is all derived from the end. The same is the

case with the merchant. His trains are directed to a particular end.

And it is the end alone, which gives a value to the train. The end

of the metaphysical, and the end of the mathematical inquirer, is

the discovery of truth: {243} their trains are directed to that

object; and are, or are not, a source of pleasure, as that end is or

is not attained. But the case is perfectly different with the poet.

His train is its own end. It is all delightful, or the purpose is

frustrate. From the established laws of association, this

consequence unavoidably followed; that, in the case of the trains of

those other classes, the interest of which was concentrated in the

end, attention was withdrawn from the train by being fixed upon the

end; that in the case of the poet, on the other hand, the train

itself being the only object, and that pleasurable, the attention

was wholly fixed upon the train; that hence the train of the poet

was provided with a name; that in the cases of the trains of other

men, where the end only was interesting, it was thought enough that

the end itself should be named, the train was neglected.

In conformity with this observation, we find, that wherever there is

a train which leads to nothing beyond itself, and has any pretension

to the character of pleasurable (the various kinds of reverie, for

example), it is allowed the name of Imagination. Thus we say that

Rousseau indulged his imagination, when, as he himself describes it,

lying on his back, in his boat, on the little lake of Bienne, he

delivered himself up for hours to trains, of which, he says, the

pleasure surpassed every other enjoyment.

Professor Dugald Stewart has given to the word Imagination, a

technical meaning; without, as it appears to me, any corresponding

advantage. He confines it to the cases in which the mind forms new

combinations; or, as he calls them, creations; that is, {244} to

cases in which the ideas which compose the train do not come

together in the same combinations in which sensations had ever been

received. But this is no specific difference. This happens, in every

train of any considerable length, whether directed to any end, or

not so directed. It is implied in every wish of the child to fly, or

to jump over the house; in a large proportion of all his playful

expressions, as puss in boots, a hog in armour, a monkey preaching,

and so on. It is manifested in perfection in every dream. It is well

known that, for the discovery of truths in philosophy, there is a

demand for new trains of thought, multitudes of which pass in review

before the mind, are contemplated, and rejected, before the happy

combination is attained, in which the discovery is involved. If

imagination consists in bringing trains before the mind involving a

number of new combinations, imagination is probably more the

occupation of the philosopher than of the poet.

Mr. Stewart appears not to have understood the real distinction

between the use of the words Conception, and Imagination; that the

one is the name of a single idea, the other that of a train. He also

involves, without seeming to be wholly aware of it, the idea of a

train destined to a particular end in the meaning which he bestows

on the word Imagination. Imagination is with him, not the name of a

train having merely new combinations, but of a train having new

combinations, and those destined to some end. But this is not more

the character of the trains which belong to the painter and the

poet, as his language appears to imply, than it is of the lawyer, or

the metaphysician; or, indeed, the professors of many {245} of the

vulgar arts; the tailor, for example, and the mantua-maker.[77]

[Bain's footnote 77: The foregoing analysis of the Imagination

brings to view some of the important points of distinction between

it and the other faculties; for example, the circumstance that the

trains and constructions of the Imagination are their own ends, and

not a means to farther ends, as in the constructions of science and

of the industrial arts. All creative originality is not imagination;

the steam-engine was not a product of this faculty.

The main features that distinguish the Imagination seem to be these

three:--

1. It is a faculty of the CONCRETE, like Perception and Memory, and

not of the Abstract, as the scientific faculties. When we imagine a

thing, we picture it to the mind, as far as we are able, in its full

concrete reality. Our imagination of a scene in the tropics is of

the character of an actual perception; it embraces, or should

embrace, whatever would strike the view of any one surveying the

reality.

2. Imagination rises above Perception and Memory, in being a

CONSTRUCTIVE faculty. It alters, re-arranges, puts together the

materials of perception and memory to satisfy certain demands of the

mind. In this respect, it is more than Conception, which as viewed

by the author, is also a faculty of the concrete, but introduces no

novelty of combination. Conception may involve a great constructive

effort, as when we try to picture to ourselves a poet's creation by

the help of his language; nevertheless, the term imagination loses

its characteristic force, and leaves an important meaning without a

name, if applied to this conceiving or realizing effort. The

imaginative stretch belongs to the poet or artist; the power of

conceiving is what the reader of a poem brings into exercise.

3. Imagination is swayed by some PRESENT EMOTION. This is another

way of expressing the author's view that it is an end in itself. If

we were to use the general word "feeling," we should encounter the

difficulty of separating imagination {246} from common industry,

which is all intended to gain pleasures or ward off pains.

The brief designation "present emotion" approximates to, but does

not fully bring out, the precise operation of the feelings in the

constructions of Imagination. When, actuated by the love of the

marvellous, any one invents a fabulous story, or highly exaggerates

a real occurrence, the process is a typical instance of the

imaginative workings.

The Fine Arts are the domain of Imagination; the one goes far to

specify the other. If the coincidence were exact, Imagination would

be defined by a definition of the Æsthetic emotions. Now, although

any original construction, selected and put together to gratify an

Æsthetic emotion, is a work of Imagination, yet imagination is not

exhausted by fine art. The picture that an angry man draws of his

enemy would be called an effort of imagination, but not a work of

fine art. All our emotions,--Wonder, Fear, Love, Anger,

Vanity--determine the constructions of the intellect, when called

into active exercise; and for these constructions we have no other

name but imagination, whether they may, or may not give pleasure as

works of art.

Perhaps this exceptional region may be marked out by a statement of

the perverting influence, or bias, of the feelings in matters of

truth and falsehood, or in works of utility. When the true and the

useful, instead of being determined by their own ends, or their

proper criteria, are swayed by extraneous emotions--giving birth to

mythical or fictitious creations--we have the corrupting

substitution of Imagination for Reason in men's judgments and

opinions.

Thus, Fear is a potent spur to Imagination; its creations may not be

æsthetically agreeable, and therefore may not come under the

definition of Fine Art; yet they are fairly to be described as

perverting the judgment of true and false.--_B._]

{247} CHAPTER VIII.

CLASSIFICATION.

"Dans l'ordre historique, la philosophie transcendante a devancé la

philosophie élémentaire. Il ne faut point s'en étonner; les grands

problèmes de la métaphysique et de la morale se présentent à

l'homme, dans l'enfance même de son intelligence, avec une grandeur

et une obscurité qui le séduisent et qui l'attirent. L'homme, qui se

sent fait pour connoître, court d'abord à la vérité avec plus

d'ardeur que de sagesse; il cherche à deviner ce qu'il ne peut

comprendre, et se perd dans des conjectures absurdes ou téméraires.

Les théogonies et les cosmogonies sont antérieures à la saine

physique, et l'esprit humain a passé à travers toutes les agitations

et les délires de la métaphysique transcendante avant d'arriver à la

psychologie."--_Cousin_, _Frag. Philos._ p. 75.

THE process by which we connect what we call the objects of our

senses, and also our ideas, into certain aggregates called classes,

is of too much importance not to have attracted the attention of

those who have engaged in the study of mind. Yet it is doubtful,

whether metaphysicians have regarded CLASSIFICATION as an original

power of the mind, or have allowed that what is included under that

name might be resolved into simpler elements. The term Abstraction,

I think, they have generally taken as the name of a distinct, and

original, power, not susceptible of further analysis. But, in doing

so, it seems (for the language of writers {248} is too loose on this

subject, to allow us the use of more affirmative terms), they have

restricted the name to the power of forming such ideas as are

represented by the terms, hardness, softness, length, breadth,

space, and so on. And this operation they rather consider as

subservient to classification, than as that operation itself. The

process, however, of grouping individuals into classes, has been

regarded as sufficiently mysterious. The nature of it has been the

object of deep curiosity; and the erroneous opinions which were

entertained of it bewildered, for many ages, the most eminent

philosophers; and enfeebled the human mind.

What (it was inquired) is that which is really done by the mind,

when it forms individuals into classes; separates such and such

things from others, and regards them, under a certain idea of unity,

as some thing by themselves? Why is the segregation thought of? And

for what end is it made? These questions all received answers; but

it was many ages before they received an answer approaching the

truth; and it is only necessary to read with care the writings of

Plato and of Aristotle, and of all philosophers, with very few

exceptions, from theirs to the present time, to see, that a

misunderstanding of the nature of General Terms is that which

chiefly perplexed them in their inquiries, and involved them in a

confusion, which was inextricable, so long as those terms were

unexplained.

The process in forming those classes was said to be this. The Mind

leaves out of its view this, and that, and the other thing, in which

individuals differ from one another; and retaining only those in

which they all agree, it forms them into a class. But what is {249}

this forming of a class? What does it mean? When I form a material

aggregate; when I collect a library; when I build a house; when I

even raise a heap of stones; I move the things, whatever they may

be, and place them, either regularly or irregularly, in a mass

together. But when I form a class, I perform no operation of this

sort. I touch not, nor do I in any way whatsoever act upon the

individuals which I class. The proceeding is all mental. Forming a

class of individuals, is a mode of regarding them. But what is meant

by a mode of regarding things? This is mysterious; and is as

mysteriously explained, when it is said to be the taking into view

the particulars in which individuals agree. For what is there, which

it is possible for the mind to take into view, in that in which

individuals agree? Every colour is an individual colour, every size

is an individual size, every shape is an individual shape. But

things have no individual colour in common, no individual shape in

common, no individual size in common; that is to say, they have

neither shape, colour, nor size in common. What, then, is it which

they have in common, which the mind can take into view? Those who

affirmed that it was something, could by no means tell. They

substituted words for things; using vague and mystical phrases,

which, when examined, meant nothing. Plato called it [Greek:

i)de/a], Aristotle, [Greek: ei)=dos], both, words taken from the

verb to see; intimating, something as it were seen, or viewed, as we

call it. At bottom, Aristotle's [Greek: ei)=dos], is the same with

Plato's [Greek: i)de/a], though Aristotle makes a great affair of

some very trifling differences, which he creates and sets up between

them. The Latins, translated both [Greek: i)de/a], and {250} [Greek:

ei)=dos], by the same words, and were very much at a loss for one to

answer the purpose; they used _species_, derived in like manner from

a verb to see, but which, having other meanings, was ill adapted for

a scientific word; they brought, therefore, another word in aid,

_forma_, the same with [Greek: o(/rama], derived equally from a verb

signifying to see, which suited the purpose just as imperfectly as

_species_; and as writers used both terms, according as the one or

the other appeared best to correspond with their meaning, they

thickened by this means the confusion.

After a time, unfortunately a long time, it began to be perceived,

that what was thus represented as the object of the mind in the

formation of classes, was chimerical and absurd; when a set of

inquirers appeared, who denied the existence of all such objects,

affirmed that ideas were all individual, and that nothing was

general but names. The question rose to the dignity of a

controversy; and to the hateful violence of a religious controversy.

They who affirmed the existence of general ideas were called

Realists, they who denied their existence Nominalists. There can be

no doubt, that of the two the Nominalists approached, by far, the

nearest to the truth; and their speculations tended strongly to

remove from mental science the confusion in which the total

misapprehension of abstract terms had involved it. But the clergy

brought religion into the quarrel, and as usual on the wrong side.

Realism was preached as the doctrine which alone was consistent with

orthodoxy; the Nominalists were hunted down; and persecution, well

knowing her object, clung to the books as well as the men; so that

the books of the Nominalists, {251} though the art of printing

tended strongly to preserve them, were suppressed and destroyed, to

such a degree, that it is now exceedingly difficult to collect them;

and not easy to obtain copies even of the most remarkable.

The opinion, that the particulars in which the individuals of a

class agree were distinct Objects of the Mind, soon made them

distinct EXISTENCES; they were the Essence of things; the Eternal

Exemplars, according to which individual things were made; they were

called UNIVERSALS, and regarded as alone the Objects of the

Intellect. They were invariable, always the same; individuals, not

the objects of intellect but only the low objects of sense, were in

perpetual flux, and never, for any considerable period, the same.

Universals alone have Unity; they alone were the subject of science;

Individuals were innumerable, every one different from another; and

cognoscible only by the lower, the sensitive part of our nature.

Endless were the subtleties into which ingenious men were misled, in

the contemplation of those Fictions; and wonderful were the

attributes which they bestowed upon them. "It is, then, on these

_permanent_ Phantasms," says Mr. Harris, copying the ancient

Philosophers, "that the human mind first works, and by an energy as

spontaneous and familiar to its nature, as the seeing of colour is

familiar to the eye, it discerns at once what in MANY is ONE; what

in things DISSIMILAR and DIFFERENT is SIMILAR and the SAME. By this

it comes to behold a kind of _superior_ Objects; a new Race of

Perceptions, more comprehensive than those of sense; a Race of

Perceptions, _each one of which, may be found entire and whole in

the separate_ {252} _individuals of an infinite and fleeting

multitude, without departing from the unity and permanence of its

own nature_."[8*] Here we have something sufficiently mystical; a

thing which is, at once, ONE, and MANY; which is ONE, it seems, by

its very nature, and yet may exist, entire and whole, in the

separate individuals of an infinite MULTITUDE. This is a specimen of

their Doctrine; a specimen of what they call THE SUBLIME in

Intellection.

[Mill's footnote 8: Hermes, b. iii. ch. 4.]

But this is not all. For as, when we form a minor class, as _man_,

there is a certain ONE, the object of intellect, complete in every

individual; MANY, therefore, and at the same time, ONE; so when we

form a larger class, _animal_, there is a certain ONE, the object of

intellect, complete in every one of those individuals. And when we

go still higher, as to the grand class, BODY, there is always a ONE,

the object of intellect, complete in every one of those more

numerous individuals. When we mount up to the very summit, and

embrace all things in one class, BEING, there is in like manner a

ONE, the object of intellect, complete in every individual that

exists. This is the grand ONE; the ONE pre-eminently. This is _the_

ONE; [Greek: to/ e(/n]; ONENESS; ONE in the abstract. This was a

conception deemed truly SUBLIME. The loftiest epithets were

bestowed upon [Greek: to/ e(/n], _the_ ONE. It was DIVINE; it was

more than that; for being not concrete, but abstract, it was

DIVINITY. All things were contained in _the_ ONE; and _the_ ONE

was in all things. _The_ ONE was the source and principle of Being.

It was immutable, eternal.

{253} These ONES they also called by the names of _Internal Forms_,

and _Intelligible Forms_. Thus Harris: "Let us suppose any man to

look for the first time upon _some Work of Art_; as, for example,

upon a Clock; and, having sufficiently viewed it, at length to

depart. Would he not retain, when absent, an Idea of what he had

seen? And what is it, _to retain such Idea_? _It is to have_ A FORM

INTERNAL _correspondent to_ THE EXTERNAL; only with this difference,

that the _Internal Form is devoid of the Matter; the External is

united with it_, being seen in the metal, the wood, and the like.

Now, if we suppose this Spectator to view _many such Machines_, and

not simply to view, but to consider every part of them, so as to

comprehend how those parts all operate to one End, he might be then

said to possess a kind of INTELLIGIBLE FORM, by which he would not

only understand and know the clocks, which he had seen _already_,

but every Work, also, of like Sort, which he might see _hereafter_."

We might here remark upon the mystical jargon, which is thus

employed to obscure the simple fact, that after a man has seen an

individual of a particular kind he has the idea of that individual;

and after he has seen various individuals of the same kind, he has

ideas of the various individuals, and has them combined by

association. But we must hear Mr. Harris a little further.

After telling us that there are two orders of these _immutable_

INTELLIGIBLE FORMS; _one_ belonging to the Contemplator of objects,

and subsequent to their existence; _another_ belonging to the Maker

of them, being the archetype, according to which they were formed;

he thus proceeds: "The WHOLE VISIBLE {254} WORLD, exhibits nothing

more than so many passing pictures of these IMMUTABLE ARCHETYPES.

Nay, through these it attains even a Semblance of Immortality, and

continues throughout ages to be SPECIFICALLY ONE, amid those

infinite particular changes, that befall it every moment. May we be

allowed then to credit those speculative men, who tell us, _it is in

these permanent and comprehensive_ FORMS _that the_ DEITY _views at

once, without looking abroad, all possible productions both present,

past, and future; that this great and stupendous view is but a view

of himself, where all things lie enveloped in their Principles and

Exemplars, as being essential to the fulness of this universal

Intellection_?"

I shall exhibit but one other specimen of the mode of speculating

about these imaginary Beings, from another great master of the

ancient philosophy, Cudworth. Both Aristotle and Plato, he says,

"acknowledged two sorts of Entities, the one mutable, or subject to

flux and motion, such as are especially individual corporeal things;

the other immutable, that always rest or stand still, which are the

proper objects of certain, constant, and immutable knowledge, that

therefore cannot be mere nothings, non-entities.

"Which latter kind of being, that is, the immutable essence, as a

distinct thing from individual sensibles, Aristotle plainly asserts

against Heraclitus, and those other flowing philosophers in these

words: 'We would have these philosophers to know, that besides

sensible things that are always mutable, there is another kind of

being or entity of such things as are neither subject to motion,

corruption, nor generation.' And elsewhere he tells us, that this

immovable essence {255} is the object of theoretical knowledge, of

the first philosophy, and of the pure mathematics.

"Now these immutable entities are the universal _rationes_, or

intelligible natures and essences of all things, which some compare

to unities, but Aristotle to numbers; which formally considered, are

indivisible: saith he, 'The essences of things are like to numbers;'

because if but the least thing be added to any number, or subtracted

from it, the number is destroyed.

"And these are the objects of all certain knowledge. As for example,

the objects of geometry are not any individual material triangles,

squares, circles, pyramids, cubes, spheres, and the like; which

because they are always mutable, nothing can be immutably affirmed

of them; but they are those indivisible and unchangeable _rationes_

of a triangle, square, circle; which are ever the same to all

geometricians, in all ages and places, of which such immutable

theorems as these are demonstrated, as that a triangle has

necessarily three angles equal to two right angles.

"But if any one demand here, where this [Greek: a)ki/nêtos ou)si/a],

these immutable entities do exist? I answer, first, that as they are

considered formally, they do not properly exist in the individuals

without us, as if they were from them imprinted upon the

understanding, which some have taken to be Aristotle's opinion;

because no individual material thing is either universal or

immutable. And if these things were only lodged in the individual

sensibles, then they would be unavoidably obnoxious to the

fluctuating waves of the same reciprocating Euripus, in which all

individual material things are perpetually whirled. But because

{256} they perish not together with them, it is a certain argument

that they exist independently upon them. Neither in the next place,

do they exist somewhere else apart from the individual sensibles,

and without the mind, which is that opinion that Aristotle justly

condemns, but either unjustly or unskilfully attributes to Plato.

For if the mind looked abroad for its objects wholly without itself,

then all its knowledge would be nothing but sense and passion. For

to know a thing is nothing else but to comprehend it by some inward

ideas that are domestic to the mind, and actively exerted from it.

Wherefore these intelligible ideas or essences of things, those

forms by which we understand all things, exist no where but in the

mind itself; for it was very well determined long ago by Socrates,

in Plato's Parmenides, that these things are nothing but _noëmata_:

these species or ideas are all of them nothing but _noëmata_, or

notions that exist no where but in the soul itself.' Wherefore, to

say that there are immutable natures and essences, and *_rationes_ of

things, distinct from the individuals that exist without us, is all

one as if one should say, that there is in the universe above the

orb of matter and body, another superior orb of intellectual being,

that comprehends its own immediate objects, that is, the immutable

_rationes_ and ideas of things within itself, by which it

understands and knows all things without itself.

"And yet notwithstanding though these things exist only in the mind,

they are not therefore mere figments of the understanding: for if

the subjects of all scientifical theorems were nothing but figments,

then all truth and knowledge that is built upon them would {257} be

a mere fictitious thing; and if truth itself, and the intellectual

nature be fictitious things, then what can be real or solid in the

world? But it is evident, that though the mind thinks of these

things at pleasure, yet they are not arbitrarily framed by the mind,

but have certain, determinate, and immutable natures of their own,

which are independent upon the mind, and which are not blown away

into nothing at the pleasure of the same being that arbitrarily made

them.

"But we all naturally conceive that those things have not only an

eternal, but also a necessary existence, so that they could not ever

but be, such and so many as they are, and can never possibly perish

or cease to be, but are absolutely undestroyable.

"Which is a thing frequently acknowledged in the writings of both

those famous philosophers, Plato and Aristotle. The former of them

calling those things, 'things that were never made, but always are,'

and 'things that were never made, nor can be destroyed.' 'Things

ingenerable and unperishable;' _Quæ_ Plato _negat gigni sed semper

esse_ (as Tully expresseth it) _et ratione et intelligentia

contineri_. And Philo the Platonical Jew, calls the [Greek: ta\

Noêta\], which are the same things we speak of, [Greek:

a)nagkaio/tatai ou)si/ai], the most necessary essences, that is,

such things as could not but be, and cannot possibly not be. And

Aristotle himself calls the _rationes_ of things in his metaphysics,

not only [Greek: chôrista\] and [Greek: a)ki/nêta], things separate

from matter and immutable, but also [Greek: a)ï/dia], or eternal;

and in his ethics likewise, he calls geometrical truths [Greek:

a)ï/dia], eternal things, 1. 3, c. 5; 'where he makes the

geometrical truth concerning the incommensurability betwixt the

{258} diameter and the side of a square, to be an eternal thing.'

Elsewhere he tells us, that 'Science, properly so called, is not of

things corruptible and contingent,' but of things necessary,

incorruptible and eternal. Which immutable and eternal objects of

science, in the place before quoted, he described thus: 'Such a kind

of entity of things has neither motion nor generation, nor

corruption,' that is, such things as were never made, and can never

be destroyed. To which, he saith, the mind is necessarily

determined. For science or knowledge has nothing either of fiction

or of arbitrariness in it, but is 'the comprehension of that which

immutably is.'

"Moreover, these things have a constant being, when our particular

created minds do not actually think of them, and therefore they are

immutable in another sense likewise, not only because they are

indivisibly the same when we think of them, but also because they

have a constant and never-failing entity; and always are, whether

our particular minds think of them or not. For the intelligible

natures and essences of a triangle, square, circle, pyramid, cube,

sphere, &c., and all the necessary geometrical verities belonging to

these several figures, were not the creatures of Archimedes, Euclid,

or Pythagoras, or any other inventors of Geometry; nor did then

first begin to be; but all these _rationes_ and verities had a real

and actual entity before, and would continue still, though all the

geometricians in the world were quite extinct, and no man knew them

or thought of them. Nay, though all the material world were quite

swept away, and also all particular created minds annihilated

together with it; yet there is no doubt but the {259} intelligible

natures or essences of all geometrical figures, and the necessary

verities belonging to them, would notwithstanding remain safe and

sound. Wherefore these things had a being also before the material

world and all particular intellects were created. For it is not at

all conceivable, that ever there was a time when there was no

intelligible nature of a triangle, nor any such thing cogitable at

all, and when it was not yet actually true that a triangle has three

angles equal to two right angles, but that these things were

afterward arbitrarily made and brought into being out of an

antecedent nothing or non-entity; so that the being of them bore

some certain date, and had a youngness in them, and so by the same

reason might wax old, and decay again; which notion he often harps

upon, when he speaks of the [Greek: Ei)/dê], or forms of things, as

when he says, 'there is no generation of the essence of a sphere,'

that is, it is a thing that is not made; but always is: and

elsewhere he pronounces universally of the [Greek: Ei)/dê], 'The

forms of material things are without generation and corruption,' and

'that none makes the form of any thing, for it is never generated.'

Divers have censured Aristotle in some of such passages too much to

confound physics and metaphysics together; for indeed these things

are not true in a physical, but only in a metaphysical sense. That

is, the immediate objects of intellection and science, are eternal,

necessarily existent, and incorruptible."[9*]

[Mill's footnote 9: "A Treatise concerning Eternal and Immutable

Morality. By Ralph Cudworth, D.D."--pp. 241--250.]

Under the influence of such notions as these, men {260} were led

away from the real object of Classification; which remained, till a

late period in metaphysical inquiry, not at all understood. Yet the

truth appears by no means difficult to find, if we only observe the

steps, by which the mind acquires its knowledge, and the exigencies

which give occasion to the contrivances to which it resorts.

Man first becomes acquainted with individuals. He first names

individuals. But individuals are innumerable, and he cannot have

innumerable names. He must make one name serve for many individuals.

It is thus obvious, and certain, that men were led to class solely

for the purpose of economizing in the use of names. Could the

processes of naming and discourse have been as conveniently managed

by a name for every individual, the names of classes, and the idea

of classification, would never have existed. But as the limits of

the human memory did not enable men to retain beyond a very limited

number of names; and even if it had, as it would have required a

most inconvenient portion of time, to run over in discourse, as many

names of individuals, and of individual qualities, as there is

occasion to refer to in discourse, it was necessary to have

contrivances of abridgment; that is, to employ names which marked

equally a number of individuals, with all their separate properties;

and enabled us to speak of multitudes at once.[78]

[Editor's footnote 78: The doctrine that "men were led to class

solely for the purpose of economizing in the use of names," is here

reasserted in the most unqualified terms. The author plainly says

that if our memory had been sufficiently vast to contain a name for

every individual, the names of classes and the idea of

classification would never have existed. Yet how (I am obliged to

ask) could we have done without them? We could not have dispensed

with names to mark the points in which different individuals

resemble one another: and these are class-names. The fact that we

require names for the purpose of making affirmations--of predicating

qualities--is in some measure recognised by the author, when he says

"it would have required a most inconvenient portion of time to run

over in discourse as many names of individuals _and of individual

qualities_ as there is occasion to refer to in discourse." But what

is meant by an individual quality? It is not _individual_ qualities

that we ever have occasion to predicate. It is true that the

qualities of an object are only the various ways in which we or

other minds are affected by it, and these affections are not the

same in different objects, except in the sense in which the word

same stands for exact similarity. But we never have occasion to

predicate of an object the individual and instantaneous impressions

which it produces in us. The only meaning of predicating a quality

at all, is to affirm a resemblance. When we ascribe a quality to an

object, we intend to assert that the object affects us in a manner

similar to that in which we are affected by a known class of

objects. A quality, indeed, in the custom of language, does not

admit of individuality: it is supposed to be one thing common to

many; which, being explained, means that it is the name of a

resemblance among our sensations, and not a name of the individual

sensations which resemble. Qualities, therefore, cannot be

predicated without general names; nor, consequently, without

classification. Wherever there is a general name there is a class:

classification, and general names, are things exactly coextensive.

It thus appears that, without classification, language would not

fulfil its most important function. Had we no names but those of

individuals, the names might serve as marks to bring those

individuals to mind, but would not enable us to make a single

assertion respecting them, except that one individual is not

another. Not a particle of the knowledge we have of them could be

expressed in words.--_Ed._]

{261} It was impossible that this process should not be involved in

obscurity, and liable to great {262} misapprehension, so long as the

manner, in which words become significant, was unexplained. After

this knowledge was imparted, and pretty generally diffused, the

value of it seemed for a long time to be little understood.

Words become significant purely by association. A word is pronounced

in conjunction with an idea; it is pronounced again and again; and,

by degrees, the idea and the word become so associated, that the one

can never occur without the other. To take first the example of an

individual object. The word, St. Paul's, has been so often named in

conjunction with the idea of a particular building, that the word,

St. Paul's, never occurs without calling up the idea of the

building, nor the idea of the building without calling up the name,

St. Paul's. The effect of association is similarly exemplified in

connecting the visible mark with the audible. Children learn first

to speak. They learn next to read. In learning to speak, they

associate the audible mark with their sensations and ideas; the

sound tree is associated with the sight of the tree, or the idea of

the tree. In learning to read, a new association has to be formed.

The _written word_ is a _visible_ sign of the _audible_ sign. What

reading accomplishes, by degrees, is, to associate the visible sign

so closely with the audible, that at the same instant with the sight

of the word the sound of it, and with the sound of it the sense,

occurs.

After the explanations which have been already {263} given, no

difficulty can remain about the manner in which names come to

signify the _individuals_ of which they are appointed to be the

marks.

Let us now, proceeding to the simplest cases first, and by them

expounding such as are more complicated, suppose that our name of

one individual is applied to another individual. Let us suppose that

the word, foot, has been first associated in the mind of the child

with one foot only; it will in that case call up the idea of that

one, and not of the other. Here is one name, and one thing named.

Suppose next, that the same name, foot, begins to be applied to the

child's other foot. The sound is now associated not constantly with

one thing, but sometimes with one thing, and sometimes with another.

The consequence is, that it calls up sometimes the one, and

sometimes the other. Here two things, the two feet, are both of them

associated with one thing, the name. The one thing, the name, has

the power of calling up both, and in rapid succession. The word foot

suggests the idea of one of the feet; this foot with its name, is a

complex idea; and this complex idea suggests its like, the other

foot with its name.

This is a peculiar and a highly important case of association; but

not the less simple and indisputable. We have already sufficiently

exemplified the two grand cases of the formation of complex ideas by

association;--that in which the ideas of synchronous sensations are

so concreted by constant conjunction as to appear, though numerous,

only one; of which the ideas of sensible objects, a rose, a plough,

a house, a ship, are examples;--and that in which the ideas of

successive sensations are so concreted; of which, the idea of a

{264} tune in music, the idea of the revolution of a wheel, of a

walk, a hunt, a horse-race, are instances.

It is easy to see wherein the present case agrees with, and wherein

it differs from, those familiar cases. The word, man, we shall say,

is first applied to an individual; it is first associated with the

idea of that individual, and acquires the power of calling up the

idea of him; it is next applied to another individual, and acquires

the power of calling up the idea of him; so of another, and another,

till it has become associated with an indefinite number, and has

acquired the power of calling up an indefinite number of those ideas

indifferently. What happens? It does call up an indefinite number of

the ideas of individuals, as often as it occurs; and calling them up

in close connexion, it forms them into a species of complex idea.

There can be no difficulty in admitting that association does form

the ideas of an indefinite number of individuals into one complex

idea; because it is an acknowledged fact. Have we not the idea of an

army? And is not that precisely the ideas of an indefinite number of

men formed into one idea? Have we not the idea of a wood, or a

forest; and is not that the idea of an indefinite number of trees

formed into one idea? These are instances of the concretion of

synchronous ideas. Of the concretion of successive ideas indefinite

in number, the idea of a concert is one instance, the idea of a

discourse is another, the idea of the life of a man is another, the

idea of a year, or of a century, is another, and so on. The idea,

which is marked by the term "race of man," is complex in both ways,

for it is not only the idea of the present generation, but of all

successive generations.

{265} It is also a fact, that when an idea becomes to a certain

degree complex, from the multiplicity of the ideas it comprehends,

it is of necessity indistinct. Thus the idea of a figure of one

thousand sides is incurably indistinct; the idea of an army is also

indistinct; the idea of a forest, or the idea of a mob. And one of

the uses of language, is, to enable us, by distinct marks, to speak

with distinctness of those combinations of ideas, which, in

themselves, are too numerous for distinctness. Thus, by our marks of

numbers, we can speak, with the most perfect precision, of a figure

not only of a thousand, but of ten thousand sides, and deduce its

peculiar properties; though it is as impossible, by the idea, as by

the sensations, to distinguish one of a thousand, from one of a

thousand and one, sides.

Thus, when the word man calls up the ideas of an indefinite number

of individuals, not only of all those to whom I have individually

given the name, but of all those to whom I have in imagination given

it or imagine it will ever be given, and forms all those ideas into

one,--it is evidently a very complex idea, and, therefore,

indistinct; and this indistinctness has, doubtless, been the main

cause of the mystery, which has appeared to belong to it. That this,

however, is the process, is an inevitable result of the laws of

association.

It thus appears, that the word, _man_, is not a word having a very

simple idea, as was the opinion of the Realists; nor a word having

no idea at all, as was that of the Nominalists; but a word calling

up an indefinite number of ideas, by the irresistible laws of

association, and forming them into one very {266} complex, and

indistinct, but not therefore unintelligible, idea.

It is thus to be seen, that appellatives, or general names, are

significant, in two modes. We have frequently had occasion to recur

to the mode in which the simple ideas of sensation are associated or

concreted, so as to form what we call the complex ideas of objects.

Thus, I have the complex ideas of this pen, this desk, this room,

this man, this handwriting. The simple ideas, so concreted into a

complex idea in the case of each individual, are one thing signified

by each appellative; and this complex idea of the individual,

concreted with another, and another of the same kind, and so on

without end, is the other of the things which are signified by it.

Thus, the word rose, signifies, first of all, a certain odour, a

certain colour, a certain shape, a certain consistence, so

associated as to form one idea, that of the individual; next, it

signifies this individual associated with another, and another, and

another, and so on; in other words, it signifies the class.

The complexity of the idea, in the latter of the two cases, is

distinguished by a peculiarity from that of the former. In applying

the name to the odour, and colour, and so on, of the rose, concreted

into one idea, the name is not the name of each of the sensations

taken singly, only of all taken together. In applying the name to

rose, and rose, and rose, without end, the name is at once a name of

each of the individuals, and also the name of the complex

association which is formed of them. This too, is itself a peculiar

association. It is not the association of a name with a number of

particulars clustered together {267} as one; but the association of

a name with each of an indefinite number of particulars, and all

those particulars associated back again with the name.

This peculiarity may require a little further explanation. It is

well known, that between an idea, and the name which stands for it,

there is a double association. The name calls up the idea in close

association, and the idea calls up the name in equally close

association; and this they have a tendency to do in a series of

repetitions; the name bringing up the idea, the idea the name, and

then the name the idea again, and so on, for any number of times.

This is, in great part, the way in which language is learned, as we

observe by the repetitions to which children are prone. And this,

indeed, is what, in many cases, we mean when we speak of dwelling

upon an idea. It is a familiar observation, that no idea dwells in

the mind, or can; for it has innumerable associations, and whatever

association occurs, of course, displaces that by which it is

introduced. But if the idea which thus displaces it, again calls it

up, and these two go on calling up one another, that which is the

more interesting of the two appears to be that which alone is

occupying the attention. This alternation is frequent between the

name and the idea.