CONTENTS: June, 1891. No. 186.
LES RESULTATS DES THEORIES CONTEMPORAINES SUR L’ASSOCIATION DES
IDEES. By _B. Bourdon_.
COMMENT LA SENSATION DEVIENT IDEE. By _J. Payot_.
NOTES ET DISCUSSIONS. QU’EST-CE QUE LA PHYSIOLOGIE GENERALE? By
_Durand_ (_de Gros_).
CONTENTS: July, 1891. No. 187.
LA NOTION DE LIMITE EN MATHEMATIQUES. By _G. Milhaud_.
COUP D’OEIL SUR L’HISTOIRE DE LA PHILOSOPHIE EN RUSSIE (I). By
_F. Lannes_.
LES SOURCES DE LA PHILOSOPHIE DE L’INDE. By _P. Regnaud_.
M. Bourdon reviews the modes of association proposed by various
psychologists, and the factors which intervene to give force to
associations. Wundt alone; among psychologists has the great merit of not
placing ideas and sensations in actual opposition. The laws of ideology
are almost the same as those of physics; and the law of association ought
to be true not only for ideas, but for sensations and for objects. M.
Bourdon’s conclusion is that the theory of the association of ideas has
hitherto been treated from a too subjective and idealistic point of view.
He would substitute for the theory of _association_ of idea a theory of
a _society_ of phenomena, which conception he thinks better explains the
process.
In a preceding contribution to the _Revue Philosophique_ (May, 1890)
M. Payot showed that sensation is the translation into terms of
consciousness of that which, considered from the objective point
of view, is a reaction of the organism, as a whole, to an external
impression. Sensations are the irreducible element of the psychic life.
They contribute the materials which the mind modifies, combines, and
classes according to their relations, variable or invariable. This
is chronologically posterior to sensation, which has an affective
origin. The reactions corresponding to the most frequent sensations
become more and more rapid until consciousness, “which translates only
physiological states of a sufficient duration,” has not time to appear.
Here we have a reflex-act. In an intermediate zone where reactions take
a time sufficient for them to be conscious, the intellectual states,
to which the abstract name of the intellectual faculty has been given,
have birth. Differentiation operates between sensible and intellectual
facts, until they seem to belong to two irreducible faculties; but the
intellectual states are grafted on the sensible states, and although
the graft develops so greatly that the sensibility appears like a
parasite, the latter is the primitive trunk and through it the graft
exists by a kind of continued creation. Sensations are convenient
abstractions but nothing more. A sensation never presents itself in
the adult consciousness without a crowd of instantaneously evoked
relations. There is never absolute exclusion between perception and
sensation: these are two states which dissolve into each other, which
have no difference in nature, and which are separable only in gross.
Properly speaking there are no sensations, only perceptions more or less
complex. In sensation the state of mind is considered in itself without
reference to its relations; in perception attention is paid chiefly to
the relations. But sensation exists only for consciousness, as it can
never enter directly into intellectual constructions, but only through
the state of remembrance. Every sensation so far as we are sensible of
it is purely felt, and we effectuate our mental constructions not with
sensations, but with our remembrances of sensations. But the rôle of
sensation is still more restricted. However rapid its flight across
consciousness it instantaneously provokes the remembrance of numerous
sensations of differences and resemblances with anterior sensations. It
is an occasion for this, and nothing more. To be perceived, a sensation
must be followed by sensations different from itself. The mind seizes
relations of resemblance between sensations and resemblances between
relations: it classes them, the chaos unravels and organises itself.
The organisation has been progressive, but at all stages the procedure
is alike; it consists in disengaging remembrances more or less masked
by dissimilarities: this is the universal procedure of the mind and the
condition _sine qua non_ of thought.
In his article on _General Physiology_, M. Durand (de Gros) in criticism
of M. Ch. Richet’s article on this subject which appeared in the
April number of the _Revue Philosophique_, points out that Richet in
applying the term “general anatomy” to the anatomy of the tissues, and
“special anatomy” to the anatomy of the organs, overlooked the fact that
_generality_ and _speciality_ when used to express the two opposite sides
of a science express relations of abstract, nominal extension and not
real extension. Thus, by general chemistry is intended the consideration
of the higher laws governing the molecular actions of bodies, the
one on the other, whatever that may be, and the modes of composition
which result therefrom for each of them. General physiology should be,
therefore, the philosophy of the science of the functions of life,
that is to say, the higher laws embracing all these various particular
functions; special physiology having for its object these particular
functions in what is proper to each of them and distinguishes it from
the others. Physiology has reference, however, to the other animals as
well as man, and also to plants, and hence the term general physiology
has been applied to the physiology common to all living beings, and
special physiology to that which concerns the various animal and vegetal
species taken separately. But this is in reality comparative physiology,
and thus positive physiologists have made a false use of the term general
physiology, and have left the true general physiology unrecognised and
unnamed. In conclusion, M. Durand presents his conception of “organology.”
In the form of a dialogue M. Milhaud meets the objections made to the
notion of limit in Mathematics. The question whether to have a limit,
for anything variable, is not synonymous with attaining a limit, is
considered in connection with Zeno’s problem of Achilles and the
tortoise, the strict solution of which is, not that Achilles will
never overtake the tortoise, but that he will not overtake it on this
side of a spot situated at a distance of 10/9 of a metre from the
starting-point, within a period equal to 10/9 of a second commencing
at the instant of starting. To the objection that by its very nature
the limit cannot be attained, as where the limit and the variable
element which indefinitely approaches it are essentially different,
it is replied that when a variable element has a limit, this element
is a _quantity_ and the limit is a quantity of the same kind, quality
being neglected. In the proposition: the length of the circumference is
the limit of the perimeters of the inscribed polygons, the limit is a
quantity of the same kind, that of length. It is not necessary to know
whether the definition accords with reality. M. Milhaud then shows by
reference to the properties of an unlimited series of inscribed polygons
and the corresponding circumscribed polygons, that two such series of
geometrical lengths satisfying the required conditions can always be
considered as defining a new length, superior to all the first and
inferior to all the others. As to its existence, it can be said only
that a length exists only as determined, as limited; and a state of
length, or a particular length has a right to exist, provided that the
properties of quantity which condition it are not contradictory. The
essence of mathematical space, breadth, length is only the content of
their definitions. Mathematics owes its existence to the condition of
creating for itself a world of fictions. There is a divergence of opinion
as to whether incommensurables should be represented by lengths or by
numerical symbols, but the divergence is a last echo of the endless
discussions which the notions of infinity and continuity have raised
among mathematicians.
Philosophic thought, says M. Lannes, presents, in Russia, in its past
history, a very poor condition. Philosophy does not exist, unless that
name be given to such moral precepts, or domestic recommendations as we
find in “the instruction” of a Vladimir Monomaque or in the “Domostroï.”
The Russian mind was easily guarded against the liberties of thought,
regarding science and philosophy with contempt and holy dread. There, as
during the Middle Ages in the rest of Europe, the end to attain, to which
all others were subordinated, was the safety of the soul. It was only
with Peter the Great that thought took a freer flight, notwithstanding
the restrictions that it had still to support. The Little Russians were
the first to turn towards western instruction. In order to meet the
Jesuits, who appeared in Russia about the middle of the 16th century,
with the arms they used, scholastic philosophy was introduced into the
college of Pierre Mohila, at Kief. Aristotle was taken as guide and the
teaching was in Latin. Under Alexis Mikhaïlovitch, rational, natural, and
moral philosophy began to be taught in a formal manner at the Academy
of Moscow. Peter the Great ordered an important place to be given to
rhetoric and dialectics, and the mention of logic, psychology, and
metaphysics in the programme of the Academy. In 1755 logic, metaphysics,
and morality entered into the teaching of philosophy at the University.
In the 18th century two currents of ideas manifested themselves, of
which some are connected with mysticism, others with the influence of
French philosophy. The former became associated, through Novikof and
Schwartz, with free-masonry, which was regarded as a means of acquiring a
knowledge of God, of nature, and of man, of becoming a better Christian,
a better citizen, and a better family head. Novikof and Schwartz founded
the “Society of the Friends of Instruction,” and through their zeal
a mass of moral and religious books were published for distribution
in places of instruction. The influence of the French “philosophers”
of the 18th century was preponderant in Russia in the second half of
the 18th century. Voltaire enjoyed the greatest favor, and his renown
was universal. Freethought penetrated the middle classes, and even
conservative and religious men denied miracles in the course of history,
considered religion as a political instrument, and attacked the ignorance
and cupidity of the clergy. On the happening of the French revolution
Catherine was frightened and took rigorous measures against those who
wished to use freedom of thought.
Questions of pedagogy held a great place in the thoughts of Catherine.
She confided the care of pedagogic reforms to Betski, who showed that
true education is that which unites the development of the body, of the
mind, and of the heart; but the moral element ought to have the first
place. Alexander I. re-established philosophic liberalism and sought
to excite interest in social, economic, and political questions. The
university of Moscow was reorganised, and one of the faculties included
dogmatic and moral theology, theoretical and practical philosophy,
natural, political and popular rights. Philosophy also established itself
in the new universities of Kharkof, Kazan, and Petersburg. But minds
were possessed with more living ideas and various tendencies, political,
moral, religious, sceptical, led to the establishment of numerous secret
societies whose starting point was the masonic alliance. About 1816,
Schröder had introduced into the foreign lodges a spirit of cosmopolitan
humanity. Fessler saw in the lodges a means of moral education, the basis
of civic education. In order to be received as a mason, it was necessary
to pass through certain “consecrations,” to obtain certain “degrees of
knowledge.” Among those “consecrated” by Fessler was Spéranski who,
notwithstanding his mysticism, was imbued with the principles of the
Revolution. On the reaction under Prince Galitzyn, the minister of
public instruction, science was given a mystical end, and religion was
declared to be the supreme science. The sciences which could do injury
to religion, as geology, were either discarded, or directed to be taught
according to the spirit of Holy Scripture. As to philosophy, the teaching
of moral philosophy, which does not separate morality from the faith,
was alone allowed. The treatises of the Kantian Jacob were forbidden, as
containing scandalous theories. In general, in the universities, during
the first year of the nineteenth century the objects of philosophic
study were somewhat vague. The utility of the sciences, of education,
of the individual characters of peoples, enthusiastic discourses on
free will, on the rights of reason, on the spirit and forces of nature.
Fessler and Vellanski introduced the German philosophy and principally
that of Schelling, which became in some sort the lever which put in
movement ideas on the independence and the nationality of civilisation.
The most ardent champion of Schelling’s doctrine was Odoievski, whose
external personality marks curiously the idea entertained of philosophy
and philosophers between 1820 and 1845. A philosopher was represented as
a sort of romantic Faust, leading a kind of life different from common
mortals. If he occupied himself with physical sciences, the philosopher
was regarded as the equal of a sorcerer with terrible powers. M. Lannes
concludes his present article with a sketch of the life and philosophy
of Galitch, who on his return to St. Petersburg from a three years
tour through Europe wrote a dissertation on philosophy, in which he
explained the development of beings by the double action of _activity_
and _passivity_, the one being cause, the other product. In 1819 Galitch
taught in the University logic, psychology, and metaphysics, and later
he received authority to teach the history of philosophy, to which he
gave an _eclectic_ character, in accordance with the instructions of
his hierarchical superiors. In his _esoteric_ teaching he initiated his
friends into the philosophy of Schelling. In that year he published a
“History of Philosophic Systems,” the appearance of which was a rare
novelty in the Russian Scientific World. He subsequently published
several other works, but the manuscript of one on the “Philosophy of
the History of Humanity,” which cost him much labor was destroyed by
fire. The merit of Galitch is to have wished to establish in Russia
philosophy _as science_. He assigned to the study of philosophy the
whole encyclopedia of the sciences, but true philosophic knowledge
is the knowledge of the unity from which external phenomena flow. M.
Lannes gives an analysis of Galitch’s “Picture of Man,” where, before M.
Renouvier, he says of freedom, “it can itself begin an entire series of
phenomena, which are then linked together in the relations of dependence,
that is to say are the necessary acts of a voluntary principle.” Galitch
deserves to occupy a small place in the general history of the philosophy
of humanity. If there existed before him a science of the relations of
the soul and the body, he was at least one of the first to elaborate a
programme of what is called to-day _comparative psychology_.
M. Regnaud finds the sources of the philosophy of India in India itself,
as they appear in all their simplicity and primitive character in
the Rig-Veda, the very ancient collection of liturgical hymns of the
Brahmans. The whole doctrine implied by both the Vedic cult and the
text of the hymns is resumed in a verse of the Rig Veda. “Each day the
same liquid rises and descends; the rains vivify the earth, the fires
of the sacrifice vivify the sky.” The libations destined to feed the
fire of sacrifice and which consisted of inflammable liquids, such as
the _ghrita_ or clarified butter, were poured out each time that the
sacrifice was celebrated into the atmosphere (or the sky) whose life
they maintained, in like manner as liquid and solid foods sustain the
life of man. The whole religious conception of the Vedic epoch consists
then in the idea of an endless _circulus_, of a perpetual exchange
of the elements of life, in an immense body which is the universe,
whose arterial centre is the sacrifice, and the fire the motor, the
distributer, and so to say the brain. (Paris: Félix Alcan.)
Ω.
REVUE DE L’HYPNOTISME. April, 1891. No. 10. 5th YEAR.