THE IDEA AND THE INTELLECTUAL ACT.
21. Having shown that geometrical ideas are not sensible
representations, we can safely conclude that no kind of ideas are.
Could there be a difficulty concerning any, it would be concerning
geometrical ideas, for the objects of the latter can be sensibly
represented. When objects have no figure, they cannot be perceived by
any of the senses; to speak in such a case of sensible representations
is to fall into a contradiction.
22. These considerations draw a dividing line between the intellect
and the imagination; a line which all the scholastics drew, which
Descartes and Malebranche respected and made still more prominent,
but which Locke began to efface, and Condillac entirely obliterated.
All the scholastics recognized this line; but they, like many others,
used a language which, unless well understood, was of a character
to obscure it. They called every idea an image of the object, and
explained the act of the understanding as if there were a kind of form
in the understanding which expressed the object, just as a picture
presented to the eyes offers them the image of the thing pictured. This
language arose from the continual comparison which is very naturally
made between seeing and understanding. When objects are not present we
make use of their pictures, and thus, since objects themselves cannot
be present to our understanding, we conceive an interior form which
performs the part of a picture. On the other hand, sensible things
are the only ones which are strictly susceptible of representation;
we never discover within ourselves the form in which the objects
are portrayed, except in the case of imaginary representations; and
therefore it was rash to call this an idea, and every idea an imaginary
representation, in which the whole system of Condillac consists.
23. St. Thomas calls the representations of the imagination
_phantasmata_, and says that so long as the soul is united to the body
we cannot understand except _per conversionem ad phantasmata_; that is,
unless the representation of the imagination, which serves as material
for the formation of the idea, and assists in clearing it up, and
heightening its colors, precedes and accompanies the intellectual act.
Experience teaches that whenever we understand, certain sensible forms
relative to the object which occupies us, exist in our imagination.
Now, they are the images of the figure and color of the object, if it
have any; now, the images of those with which they are compared, or the
words which denote them in the language we habitually speak. Thus, even
when thinking of God, the very act by which we affirm that he is most
pure spirit, offers a kind of representation to the imagination under a
sensible form. When we speak of eternity, we see the _Ancient of days_,
as we have often seen him represented in our churches; when we speak of
the infinite intelligence, we imagine perhaps a sea of light; infinite
mercy, we picture to ourselves as a pitying likeness; justice, with
angry countenance. To force ourselves to form some conception of the
creation, we fancy a spring whence light and life both flow, and thus
also we endeavor to render immensity sensible by imagining unlimited
extension.
The imagination always accompanies the idea, but is not itself the
idea; and we perceive the evident and unimpeachable proof of the
distinction between the two, if we ask ourselves, while in the very
act of imagining a sea of light, an old man, an angry or placid
countenance, a fountain or extension, if God is any one of these, or
any thing resembling them; for, we very promptly answer, no, that this
would be impossible. All this demonstrates the existence of an idea
which has no connection with these representations, but essentially
excludes what is contained in them.
24. What we have said of the idea of God, may be said of many other
ideas. Rarely do we understand any thing into which the idea of
relation does not enter as an indispensable element. How then is
relation represented? In the imagination, in a thousand different
manners; as the point of contact of two objects; as the link which
unites them. But is relation any one of these? No! When we inquire in
what it does consist, is there the slightest shadow of doubt that it is
no one of these? Certainly not.
25. It is an error to call every idea an image, if you mean to consider
ideas as something distinct from the intellectual act, which places
itself before the understanding when it is in the exercise of its
functions. An image is that which represents, as a likeness: and how, I
ask, do we know that this representation or likeness exists? And how do
we know that in order to reason we need an internal form, which is, as
it were, a picture of the object? What is a picture beyond the sensible
order? There are, it is true, similarities in the intellectual order,
but not in the sense in which we perceive them in the material order.
I think; so does my neighbor: here is a similarity, since the same
thing is found in both one and the other, identical in species, but not
in number. But this similarity is of a different order from that of
sensible similarities.
26. When we understand, we know that which is in the object understood;
but whether this be understood by a simple act of the intellect, or
a medium be required to represent the similarity, we do not know. We
understand the thing, not the idea; and it is as difficult to say
how the intellect perceives without the idea, as it is to say how the
supposed representation refers to its object. How does our idea refer
to an object? If by itself, then by itself alone, since it is purely
internal, it refers to the external, and requires no intermediary to
place the subject in relation with external objects. What it does,
the intellectual act of itself alone can also do. If we perceive the
relation of the idea with the object by means of another idea, this
intermediate idea presents the same difficulty as the preceding idea;
and so at last we must come to a case in which there is a transition
from the intellect to the object without any intermediary.
If we see an object which is the image of another not known, we shall
see the object in itself, but we shall not know that it has the
relation of image, unless informed that it has: we shall know its
reality, but not its representation. The same will happen in ideas
which are images; these, therefore, do not at all explain how the
transition from the internal act to the object is made; for this would
require them to do for the understanding that which we find them unable
to do for themselves.
27. There is something mysterious in the intellectual act, which men
seek to explain in a thousand different ways, by rendering sensible
what they inwardly experience. Hence so many metaphorical expressions,
useful only so long as they serve merely to call and fix the attention,
and give an account of the phenomenon, but hurtful to science if they
go beyond these limits, if it be forgotten that they are metaphors, and
are never to be confounded with the reality.
By intelligence we see what there is in things, we experience the act
of perception; but when we reflect upon it we grope in the dark, as if
there were a dense cloud about the very source of light, preventing us
from seeing it with clearness. Thus the firmament is at times flooded
with the light of the sun, although the sun is encircled with clouds
and hidden from our view, so that we cannot even determine its position
upon the horizon.
28. One cause of obscurity in this matter is the very effort to
clear it up. The act of the understanding is, in its objective part,
exceedingly luminous, since by it we see what there is in objects;
but in its subjective nature, or in itself, it is an internal fact,
simple indeed, but incapable of being explained by words. This is not
a peculiarity of the intellectual act, it is common to all internal
phenomena. What is it to see, to taste, to hear? What is a sensation,
or feeling of any kind whatsoever? It is an inward phenomenon, of which
we are conscious, but which we cannot decompose into parts; nor can we
explain with words the combination of these parts. A word is enough to
indicate the phenomenon, but this word has no meaning for him who does
not now experience this phenomenon, or has not oat some former time
experienced it. No possible explanations would ever enable a man born
blind to understand color, or a deaf man sound.
The act of understanding belongs to this class; it is a simple fact
which we can point out, but not explain. An explanation supposes
various notions, the combination of which may be expressed by language;
in the intellectual act there are none of these. When we have said,
I think, or, I understand, we have said all. This simplicity is not
destroyed by objective multiplicity; the act by which we compare two or
more objects is just as simple as the act by which we perceive a single
object. If one act be not enough, more will follow; and finally one act
will unite or sum them all up; but it will not be a composite act.