Posthumous tracts

발행: 1847년

분량: 175페이지

출처: archive.org

분류: 미분류

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the body, and the connexion os euch with euch in the boni sos harmony; in other Words, to display philosophicatly, analytically, geometrically, and anatomically, the entire animal tangdom and iis paris, With the functions and

and that is I attempted this I should probably fuit in the

Impatiens animi lasso pollice sisterem opuS :

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SO, Under the circumstances, I have thought it most prudent to divide the labor, and to take up my pen at 8hortinterva is, alloWing myseis occasionalty a litile respite, to draW breath, and en te me to attend to my Other duties. For the minit is even as the pen : too much usage blunis iis p0int, and wears aWay iis fineness. Such, gentierea der, is the reason Which Will move me to recur at frequent interva is to the task I have prescribed sor mysei and to intrude myseis osten iapon your presence, proba lynot less than sive or siX times a year, With my publication8, or as they may properly be called, Psychological Τransactions. By this means, I hope, after a seW years, to gain the enit, and to be in a condition to declare the state os the foui, When iis connexion With the hody is dissolved bydeath, and it is test to iis oWn disposai. In the meantime,

most earnestly destring sor the reader both long life and weli belli g, I remain, his very devoted and obedient

I. S. E. G. O. F.

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bili ty be undoi ted, and iis truth ascertain ed. In a chain Osargument, is there be One question able linii, the Whole of tho Subsequent series depending therei on, and the conclusionalso, Will be similarly question te. Is a number of unknownor occult elements exist in disserent paris of the chain, thedoubi attaching in the end to the induction launded upon sucti premises, must be stili more considerable. The interpositionos the u nom quantity not only en genders and constitutes indistinciness and confusion in the generat idea, but places every idea in ambiguity. Uncertainty is the parent os uncertain ty. The bottom or laundation Os a hou se determines thesrmness of the superstructure. The strength of the sirst ormiddie link in a chain, determines the essicacy and poWer of the subsequent liniis, and of the chian itself, or tho hook at iis extremi ty, to sustain the weight Whicli is required. The fallure

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of a single part amounts to a loss of poWer in the whole. Asis the antecedent term in a syllogism, so is the conclusion; them Or Or minor must be demonstraled, for the other to be valid; for the validity of the consequences is in proportion to that os the premises. Is of severat numbers submitted to calculation, One be unkΠOWn, the sum Or quotient formed by their addition or division Will present the fame constant character; in eques error Will run through the aggregate or produci to that in the separate constituent numbers. One dissonance presentin a harmony Will osten produce the discord of the whole. Ina Word, the conclusion and the en d must respect ali the premises, OtherWise the effect WOuid not be similar to iis causes. Where the means have no evident likeness to the antecedent causes, the end is placed in doubt, or assumed doubifully. Where the connexion and quality of causes does not plainlyappear in the progression of the means to the edd, the liope os an effect to come is destroyon. Τhis then is the holbed os somany hypotheses, that in the analysis of causes, uncertainties e taen for certainties, and the mind attachos laseis to thoi mages of Occult objecis as to the spectral appe ances of adream. The consequence is, that Such hypotheses are rejectedon the Same principie as they are acknowledged, and the ammative and the infirmative, the negative fide and the positive, mae eques claim upon Our credit. The trub rational mind,hOWever, in no case dependS upon the ipse dixit of the speaher,

but upon the truth of What he says. The authority that is valid for it, is the truth of the matter. The SOul, aS the perpetuat mover of the bodily machine, continuassy agitates the fibriis of iis organs, and eliciis Or draWs there Om abundant images and Sigiis, but only those Whicli are similis

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may eastly foresee and guess What opinion Will prevail. In factthe opinion is put forWard and pronounoed to fuit the conceptionSand enlisi the applause of the vulgar, and lo Win the judgmentsounded upon the ideas of the organs. But the organs ure ignorant of everything that ouilies their particular sphere of Sen-Sation Or pereeption. Yet on their testimony, on tho faith of their declarations and pro D, the minu hesitates not to QOnclude, that Whateuer is internat to the minimal ray and unit os Sensation in the asoresaid organs, must be the Very simplest osthings, and have originaled from nothing; and that in this Way

os principies like these, and they try to scare and prohibit thophilosopher froni their cherished haunis, Wishing the eviden ceand decision of the senses to sotile every question, and to be thelimit os nature' s dopth and manys penetration; and the goal ofali linowledge and wisdom to be set Within the pu ely animal Sphere, sar Dom humanity and rationality. But the foui is

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as spectral and dreamy, although stili sile presses good ind

The mind Mes not repose in the system os Preestablished Harmony, because it involves unknown incomprehensibis elementa and occult qualities. We may dismiss the systems of the old philosophers, and of the ages noW passing into Oblivion, Whicli SyStems are partialty exploded and OutWorn by time, and p tialty stilli in repute. Were We to spend Our essoris in eXplaining and commenting upon them, me should couri the destinyof Sisyphus, and be turning the fame stone that Our contemporaries, and especialty our sathers, Who Worshipped the urns, and hissed Qth reverentiat lips the ashes of the ancients, have so Osten rolled round and round Hready. Besides, there arestill Writers Who sancy that they are not Josing the time thatthey bestoW upon the old philosophy; and the reader Cin Consuli these Writers, d he pleases. At the present day againother classes have arisen, Who attempt to explain in a clear manner the mutuat action and reaction os the body and the Sotai, et ther by occasiones Causes, or et se by a peculiar Ρhysical Influx; and thinii that in this Wiso the nature os the animal WOrid, emeloped confessedly in many coverings, and beset byprodigious diffinities, is unsWathed to iis core, and Iaid bareto Sight. It is, hoWever, no part of our intention to tineeither fide in this matter, so as to pronounce upon the diSputants, or tO SheW the relative extent of their services in the investigation of the intercoi se betWeen the soci and the bOdy.

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and asterWards to confirm them by experienee, We are notbound in this case to take up the opinions and arguments of Others, Or to refute them; but Only to represent causes, and tosti eW the connexion belWeen principies and facis. FOr unlessthere be an analytices, philosophicat, geometrical and mechanicia nexus and coincidetice belWeen principies and eXperienee, the principies are mere hallucinations and dreams of the brain. On the other haud, Where this genuine connexion eriStS, thecauses likeWise represent themselves Simultaneousty in con-ΠeXion and series, and We Obviate ali systematical and hypothetical arguments at Once, and this so completely, that it Wouldbe lost time and pians to refute them. They are suffcientlydisproved is causes and connexion are demonstrated. The truthlies in these, and cannot lail to be unique, and speas Ioudlyenough sor iise , in the mere facts of demonstrating, and confirming by experience. There lies in demonstrations immense force; ΠV, they ει- the miud to their si de aWay Dom the

influence of iis very senses. HOWeVer, let us see Whether therebe any prerogative ad vantages in the system of Ρreest lished Harmony, as it is termed; Whether it serves to conduci us to any deeper knoMedge of the animal microcosm; and Whether, therelare, by iis means, We may enter, Without any other fore-gone Delphian ulterance and response, into the more Secretpenetralia and Oracles os animal nature : Or Whether, On theother hand, it too is but an obscure soOthsaying, and equallyWith other systems precipitates the iniud into occult qualities,

the philosophices tripod, slsing the mouilis of the propheis and

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Thoro is in the foui a unique larce, namely, R lareo representative of the universe, and this force produces ali perceptions, Whicli perceptions have their sufficient reason in a forcerepresentative of the universe. In Other Woriis, there is in the solvi a series os perceptions and appetitions,' and therosoreos volitions; but in the body a series of motions; and the two series harmonige and conspire, each With each, by virtve of the respective natures of the foui and the body. The above forceis proper to the foui, independent of every externat principie,

und of tho body itself, and thus it is the forco by Which thesoul produces in One continued series ali perceptions and appetitions. The foui Would represent perceptions and appetitions in the fame Way that it noW does, Were there no bOdy, Or novisibio Wortu in existence. Τhis force is bound to ObserVe certain laWs; consequently there a re laWs Os perceptionS, RS Wellas of appetitions, and the laW Os sensations contians the essentiat determinations of the soles. And the laW os imaginationmust have some Share in the J- Os sensation, and vice versa.

Tho action of tho internat principie that causes the change Or the puSSage DOm One perception to another, may be termed an appetition. '' Leibnitet, La Mona-

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titions os ille foui, depend upon the motions os the nervous fluidcirculating in the motory nerves. By virtve Os the mechanismos tho body there arise hom tho material ideas os sensibio Objecis, motions an sWering to the volitions and appetitions of the foui; apari Dom any immediate eXtrin sic determination. Consequently om the series of motions in the body, a reason may be gi Vensor the origin of the perceptions and appetitions in the foui, audsor the peculiar nature and quali ty of Such perceptions and appetitions ; and vice versa. The presenue Os materies ideas intho brain contributes in no respect WhateVer to produce them. MoreOVer, ait these predicaments may be understood, Without Supposing the soles to exert any action on the body: nny, theyali bappen naturalty ; and even the faut Os mutuat intercoiarsemay be intelligibly explained by the very nature of the foui

much as materies ideas, as they are called, are Con Sentaneous With the sensations and perceptions of the Soul, as also are themotions of the body With the appetitions and volitions of thosoul: that the reason is given in perception, Why both sensualand materies ideas arise; and vice versa: ulso that the suid qualities of the foui limo their oWn laWs; and that there is a series On both haniis, in the hody as in the foui, agreeably towhicli, and in conformity to these laWs, ali these predicatos

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causate lies in the cause. Nor again has the mind a moment' sdifficulty in admitting, that every assection and quality has iis

potnted laWs; because these laWs, or the fact of their exist- ence, is dictaled to us by the variety and constancy os mutuat operations subsisting betWeen the hody and the organs on the

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