§ 47. Ideas are described by some as the representations or images of things. This cannot be true. It is inconceivable that the immense diversity of things which are objects of ideas, should have any proper represensations or images of them in the mind. Ideas, therefore, do not represent things, but merely correspond to them as signs to things signified. Ideas of numbers are states of mind corresponding to numbers; those of bodies are states of mind corresponding to bodies; and those of minds, are states of mind corresponding to minds. The same is true of others. All ideas are states of mind corresponding to their objects.

Farther than this, in respect to the essence of ideas, we have no means of judging. To the eye of superior intelligences, they may be known as certain states of spiritual substances, and may be objects of direct perception as such, but they are known to us only as ideas, and are objects of our perception only by means of consciousness taking note of our own ideas; and visible or audible signs indicating the ideas of others.

Considered without respect to their objects as being real or supposed, ideas are denominated conceptions; considered with respect to the grounds from which they are inferred, they are denominated judgments; considered with respect to their objects, they are denominated truths and errors; and considered with respect to the mind, as possessing and exercising them at will, they are denominated knowledge and opinions, and also thoughts and notions.

Classification of Ideas.

§ 48. One of the first things to be done in the investigation of ideas, is to divide and classify them properly. Any essential mistake on this point is liable to involve us in the greatest errors, and to produce the utmost confusion of ideas. It is our business in classifying ideas, to observe them accurately, and to take account of their real properties, without adding to them or subtracting from them. Every addition and subtraction by which we misconceive of different classes of ideas, will contribute to vitiate all our conclusions respecting them. Ideas are classified, like other objects, according to their agreements and disagreements. As far as they agree, they are to be referred to the same classes; as far as they disagree, they are to be referred to different classes.

Ideas all agree in the properties by which they are distinguished from sensations and other mental exercises; but they are the subjects of considerable diversities in other respects.

§ 49. The highest generic division of ideas is that which resolves them into two classes, according as their objects are real or imaginary. All ideas of real objects may be referred to one class, and those whose objects are in some degree imaginary, to another. Ideas of real objects are denominated truths; those of imaginary objects, errors and imaginations. Truths are of two kinds; particular, and general. Particular truths relate to particular objects; general truths, to classes of objects. Particular truths correspond to particular objects; general truths, to classes of objects.

Ideas of imaginary objects may be divided into errors and imaginations. Errors are of two kinds, embracing, 1. Ideas which are simply false; 2. Such as are absurd. Ideas are simply false, when they relate to objects which are not real, but which are conceivable, and not inconsistent with absolute universal truths. Any error in history or chronology is simply false, when the event to which it refers is conceivable. The idea that a whole is greater or less than the sum of all its parts, is absurd, because it is contrary to the absolute universal truth that the whole is equal to the sum of all its parts.

§ 50. Ideas of sensations, of ideas, and of other mental states, at the time of having those states, are denominated acts of consciousness; and we are said to be conscious of their objects. Thus we have the sensations of touch, and are conscious of touch; we have sensations of pain, and are conscious of pain; we form ideas of external objects, and are conscious of ideas; we form ideas of spiritual objects, and are conscious of them; and we feel emotions of pleasure or pain, and are conscious of them. The objects of consciousness are sensations, ideas, and other mental exercises occurring at the time; and acts of consciousness are ideas of those objects depending directly upon them. We perceive external objects by means of sensations, but we perceive sensations directly, without the intervention of any other state of mind.

Those ideas which occur agreeably to some principle of association or suggestion on account of having been enter

tained before, are called remembrances and recollections. I saw a friend yesterday at 3 o'clock P. M.; the arrival of that hour to-day, reminds me of him. My remembrance of him to-day depends on my having had perception of him yesterday.

All ideas which are deduced from other ideas considered as premises, or from sensations or other mental exercises, are called judgments; and the process of deducing or inferring them, is called judging. We compare two rules, and judge that they are equal or unequal; we examine a theory of morals, and judge that it is true or false; we hear a rap at the door, and judge that some person is there; we experience pain in some part of the body, and judge that there is some derangement of the vital organic powers.

Ideas which are formed arbitrarily as possible, or conceivable suppositions, are called imaginations. We see a man, and form ideas of him as an object of sight; we conceive of a man whom we saw yesterday, and form ideas of him as we saw him; but we imagine a man to be before us when we do not see him; and imagine one to have been before us yesterday, who was not before us, by an arbitrary exercise of conception. Ideas of this description are imaginations.

CHAPTER II.

THE FACULTY OF IDEAS.

§ 51. The faculties of sensation are located in different parts of the body, and some of them diffused through the whole of it. The faculty of ideas has no external organ, but is dependent for its powers on a healthy condition of the brain. To this extent the brain is an organ of thought. Concussion of the brain produces insensibility; congestion and inflammation interfere essentially with the appropriate exercise of ideas, and materially derange the intellectual powers. In what way the brain subserves the exercise of ideas it is not easy, perhaps not possible, to decide. The facts we learn from observation; the manner in which these results occur, is a matter of hypothesis.

Phrenological Theory of the Mental Faculties.

$52. The Phrenolgists teach that the brain is a congeries of different mental organs, and that each part of it is the organ of a particular variety of mental operations, just as the eye is an organ of sight, and the ear of hearing. The division and distribution which they have made of the mental faculties, are such as cannot be sustained by any just analysis of our mental operations. Dr. Gall professes to have discovered and located 27 Faculties. Dr. Spurzheim extended the list to 35, and introduced a new and improved nomenclature. The Mental Faculties, according to Spurzheim, consist of 9 Propensities; 3 Inferior Sentiments; 8 Superior Sentiments; 4 Perceptive Faculties; 6 Intellectual Faculties, and 2 Reflective Faculties.

The Propensities are, 1. Amativeness; 2. Philoprogenitiveness; 3. Inhabitiveness; 4. Adhesiveness; 5. Combativeness; 6. Destructiveness; 7. Secretiveness; 8. Acquisitiveness; 9. Constructiveness.

The Inferior Sentiments are, 10. Self-Esteem; 11. Approbativeness; 12. Cautiousness.

The Superior Senimentts are, 13. Benevolence; 14. Veneration; 15. Firmness; 16. Conscientiousness; 17. Hope; 18. Marvelousness; 19. Ideality; 20. Mirthfulness; 21. Imitation.

The Perceptive Faculties are, 22. Individuality; 23. Configuration; 24. Size; 25. Weight; 26. Color.

The Intellectual Faculties are, 27. Locality; 28. Calculation; 29. Order; 30. Eventuality; 31. Time; 32. Melody; 33. Language.

The Reflective Faculties are, 34. Comparison; Causality.

35.

$53. A system of Mental Philosophy that finds all these Faculties in the human mind, may, on the same principle, and with equal propriety, find any number of them. Instead of these 35 Mental Faculties a true analysis of our Mental exercises, gives; 1. The capacity of sensations, with their several species. 2. The capacity of ideas, with their several species. 3. The capacity of emotions, affections, and desires. 4. The capacity of purposes, choices, and volitions. The Faculty of Sensations is located in the different organs of sensation; that of Ideas is located in the brain.

The Faculty of Ideas cannot be divided into different local Faculties. It is essentially one, and to divide it would be to destroy it. The same Faculty by which we think of one thing, enables us to think of every thing; the same Faculty by which we have ideas of one class of objects, enables us to form ideas of all classes of objects. In this respect the Faculty of Ideas may be compared to any one of the senses which minister to it. The Faculty of attaining a sense of one color, is the Faculty of attaining a sense of all colors; and the Faculty of attaining a sense of one sound, is that of attaining a sense of all sounds. Destructiveness is not a mental faculty, a simple disposition to destroy is not an element of the human character.

§ 54. The absurdity of the Phrenological Philosophy is particularly observable in the distribution of ideas of number to one Faculty, and those of individuality to another ; the element of number is individuality; another name for unity. The same Faculty, therefore, which gives us ideas of one, must, from the nature of the case, give us ideas of both.

The division of the Mental Faculties adopted by the Phrenologists being erroneous, their whole system falls with it, and nothing is proved in favor of the organic relation of the brain to the exercise of ideas.

Rational Theory of the relation of the brain to ideas.

§ 55. Another theory of the relation of the brain to the exercise of ideas, is, that it is not in any proper sense an organ of thought; that all thinking is in the mind, and is a mental process not involving the action of material organs; but that the mind exists in juxtaposition to the brain, being extended with its extent, and pervading its substance; that the mind has two general functions; 1. Those of organic life; 2. Those of intellectual life; that the brain and nerves are the proper seat of the mind, and the organ through which it exercises and receives all the mental and material influences that belong to the phenomena both of organic and intellectual life.

The greater proportion of Mental Philosophers do not trouble themselves at all with this matter, but are contented with the fact that the mind thinks in some way, and by