other classes, and complex sensations may be resolved into simple ones; but simple sensations are ultimate objects of thought, and ultimate facts in experience, which can be known only by being felt, and which can be described only by being referred to their appropriate agents, organs, objects, and uses. To understand colors, we must see; to understand sounds, we must hear; and to understand the other sensations, we must experience them. But having had experience of any class of sensations in some degree, we may attain ideas of other classes and other varieties of them, by reasoning. The different classes of sensations form one beautiful and harmonious system of things, to be observed, considered and reasoned from. With them, knowledge, not opinion, merely commences. We feel pain, henceforth pain becomes a fact in our experience, and an object of our knowledge. We know both that there is such a thing, and that we have felt it, and may feel it again. We experience the sensations of color, and henceforth understand that there are such things as colors. So of all the other sensations. In reasoning from our sensations we may fall into errors; but the sensations themselves, from which our reasoning commences, are matters of the utmost certainty. § 5. How the mind is affected in sensations, or what the nature of the mind is, other than that of a being capable of sensations and ideas, it does not fall within the purpose of this chapter to inquire, and it may not be possible fully to determine. We confine our views for the present, to sensations considered simply as ultimate facts in the experience of sentient beings, and as certain states of the mind. The first sensation in the experience of a sentient being, is the commencement of intellectual life. With it consciousness begins; and from it the acquisition of knowledge and the play of imagination commences. Sensation after sensation follows, drawing after it thought after thought; and introducing the rational mind to a knowledge of itself and of the external world; and launching it forth on broad oceans of experiment in the pursuit of boundless good. § 6. Sensations may be considered as possessing quality and quantity. The quality of sensations is that which is peculiar to them as a generic class of mental phenomena; and which distinguishes each class of sensations from others. It is therefore incapable of definition, and can only be de scribed by those terms which describe sensations as a distinct class of phenomena. In respect to quality, however, sensations admit of being distributed into three classes; Pleasing, Painful, and Indifferent; examples of which may be multiplied indefinitely. We no sooner experience sensations than we begin to reason from them to their causes, and to form ideas of external objects, and estimate those objects according to the sensations which they produce. The quality of the sensations which we derive from material objects is the primary ground of the estimates which we form respecting them. From touch we form ideas of objects as tangible; from sound, as audible; from sight, as visible and colored. So we estimate objects of pleasing sensations as pleasing; those of painful sensations as painful; and those of sensations which are indifferent, as indifferent. The sensible qualities of objects are all relative to the capacities of sensation, according to which they are estimated. That which produces the sensation of sweetness is sweet, and that which produces the opposite sensation of bitterness, is bitter; and as far as the capacities of sensation in different persons, differ, objects to them, will be relatively different. It is on this account that many articles of food which are agreeable to some, are disagreeable to others. The articles are essentially the same, but relatively different. The general agreement of mankind in their estimates of sensible objects, depends on the possession of similar capacities of sensation. As a general rule, men are similarly affected by similar objects. What is colored to one, is colored to all; what is sweet to one, is sweet to all; and what is resisting to one, is resisting to all. § 7. The quantity of sensations may be resolved into two elements, time and intensity. All sensations occupy time, and their quantity, other things being equal, is proportionable to the times during which they continue. The intensity of sensations is a quality independent of time, and dependent on other appropriate conditions. It denotes the quantity of sensations considered with respect to given times, or without respect to time. The amount of pain which we experience is in proportion to its intensity and time; and pains may differ in intensity from those which are the slightest that can be felt, to such as are too great to be endured for any considerable time without overpowering the vital system. § 8. The nature of sensations as effects of certain causes, is one of their distinguishing properties, and one that is early observed by every sentient being. It is by this means that sensations become the signs of things, and answer their great purpose as conditions and means of knowledge. Sensations do not occur in all cases necessarily as the effect of organic conditions adapted to produce them. Visible objects may be before the eye, and not be seen; sounds may vibrate upon the ear, and not be heard; and the conditions of pain may exist in the different organs of the body, and pain not be felt. This often occurs when the mind is intensely engaged in other exercises, and also in sleep. Hence the use of diversion and business to allay pain, and induce an insensibility to painful objects. Hence, too, the greater intensity both of the pains and pleasures of sense when we make them the exclusive objects of our attention. We infer, therefore, that attention is to a great extent one of the conditions of sensation; and that the appropriate mastery of the mind over this class of its phenomena, is exercised to a great extent through the medium of attention. Those who are most disengaged from other mental exercises, and who attend most to the sensations which they experience, other things being equal, experience from given objects sensations of the greatest intensity; and in proportion as the mind is engaged in other exercises, its capacities of sensation are for the time impaired or entirely suspended. § 9. The capacities of sensation admit of different degrees of susceptibility. Different persons possess constitutional differences in this respect; and the susceptibilities of the same persons are different in different states of health and sickness, and in different stages of life. Those whose susceptibilities are greatest, other circumstances being equal, experience sensations of the greatest intensity from given objects; and some are the subjects of sensations of the greatest intensity in circumstances and from objects which do not excite the sensibilities of others at all. is § 10. Sensations occur by means of organs. The eye an organ of sight, the ear of hearing, the mouth of taste, PART THIRD. PHILOSOPHY OF THE EMOTIONS, AFFECTIONS AND WILL. CHAPTER I. ORIGIN, NATURE, AND OFFICE OF EMOTIONS. 415. Emotions. 417. Emotions compared with sensations. 418. Power of experiencing emotions. 421. Mode of exercising and improving the capacity of experiencing emotions. 422. Effect of association. 423. Complex emotions. 424. Illustration of the emotions. 425. Variety and ends of the emotions. CHAPTER II. PRINCIPAL VARIETIES OF THE EMOTIONS. 427. Principal orders of emotions. 428. Emotions relating to the beautiful. 429. Beauty of visible objects. 430. Relation of beauty to love. 431. Emotions relating to the sublime. 432. Mirth. 433. Emotions relating to novelty. 434. Triteness. 435. Emotions relating to hap piness. 436. Emotions relating to intentional benefits and injuries; regret. CHAPTER III. 301 309 THE AFFECTIONS. 437. Basis of the affections. 438. Conditionality of affections. 439. Moral character. 440. Love and hatred. 441. Pleasurable nature of love, and painful nature of hatred. 442 Nature of hatred. 443. Self-love. 444. Selfishness. 445. Domestic and social affections. 446. Love of God. 447. Capacity of the affections subject to modification. 448. Hope and fear. 449. Nature universality and objects of hope and fear. CHAPTER IV. PHILOSOPHY OF DESIRES. 450. Nature of desires. 451. Co-existence of desires. 452. 315 328 CHAPTER V. IS MISERY IN ANY CASE AN OBJECT OF DELIGHT? § 462. Objects of pleasure and pain. 463. Punishment of children. 464. Punishment of malefactors. 465. Revenge and retaliation. 467. Growth of revenge. 468. Conclusion. 469. Practical consequences. 470. Doctrine of the Scriptures. 471. True nature of revenge. CHAPTER VI. NATURE AND EXERCISES OF THE WILL. 472. The will. 473. Choices. 474. Rational nature of choices. 475. Effect of immoderate appetites and affections on choices. 476. Moral character of choices. 477. Purposes. 478. Conditions of purposes. 479. Necessity of correct judgments. 480. Office and moral character of purposes. 481. Volitions. 482. Voluntary corporeal action. 483. Voluntary mental exercises. 484. Relation of volitions to desires. CHAPTER VII. GENERAL LAWS OF THE WILL. $485. Influence of choices. 486. Mutual influence of the will and other mental faculties. 487. Limitation of the capacity of willing. 488. Office of good and evil. 489. Dísagreement of the will with general judgments. Will of animals. 490. Free actions. 491. Necessary actions. CHAPTER VIII. CONDITIONALITY OF THE WILL. 492. Dependence of the will on ideas of possible good or 339 346 359 365 |