Page images
PDF
EPUB

• abfolutely exclude each other. Thus it is that fuch as border on the extreme in which the imagination and memory predo⚫minate, in proportion lose those qualities by which the un• derstanding is enabled to reafon juftly, confequentially, and methodically; and those who approach the other extreme, are in the fame proportion deprived of those qualities which contribute to pleasure and amufement. The former write with more ease, and the others with more connexion and Atrength.'

[ocr errors]

Mr. Condillac attributes the progrefs of the imagination, contemplation, and memory, intirely to the use of figns, of which he reckons three forts;

1. Accidental figns, or the objects which particular cir cumstances have connected with fome of our ideas, so as to render the one proper to revive the other. 2. Natural figns, or the cries which nature has established to express the pasfions of joy, of fear, or of grief, &c. 3. Inftituted figns, or those which we have chofen ourselves, and bear only an arbitrary relation to our ideas.

Man therefore, (our author obferves) by means of the figns which he is able to recall at pleasure, revives, or, at least, is often capable of reviving, the ideas which are connected with them: afterwards he obtains a greater command over his imagination, in proportion as he invents more figns, because he thereby procures more means of employing it.

As foon as the memory is formed, and the habit of the imagination is in our power, the figns recollected by the former, and the ideas revived by the latter, begin to free the foul from her dependence in regard to the objects by which the was furrounded. As fhe has it now in her power to recall the things which fhe has feen, the may direct all her attention towards them, and transfer it from the prefent object. At the fight of a picture, for instance, we recollect the knowledge we have of nature, and of the rules by which we learn to imitate; then we transfer our attention fuccef→ fively from this picture to that knowledge, and from that knowledge to this picture, or fucceffively to its different parts. But beyond all doubt our difpofing thus of our attention, is intirely owing to the affiftance afforded us by the vivacity of

the

the imagination, which is the effect of great memory. Otherwife we should not regulate it ourselves, but it would be intirely fubject to the action of the objects.

This manner of fucceffively applying our attention of ourfelves to different objects, or to the different parts of one object only, is what we call to reflect. Thus we fenfibly perceive in what manner reflexion arifes from imagination and-memory.

Our author then treats, in a very clear and philofophical manner, the several operations of distinguishing, abstracting, comparing, compounding, and decompounding our ideas; of affirming, denying, judging, reasoning, conceiving, underStanding.

What Mr. de Condillac has obferved concerning the defects and advantages of the imagination is new and entertaining.

In his opinion, the impreffions we feel under different circumftances, induce us to conect ideas, which we have it no longer in our power to feparate. We cannot, for instance, frequent company, without infenfibly connecting the ideas of a certain turn of mind and character with a particular figure and make. This is the reason that persons of a particular phyfiognomy, ftrike us more than others: for phyfiognomy is only an affemblage of features with which we have connected fuch ideas, as are never revived without being accompanied with approbation or diflike. We must not therefore be surprized if we are inclined to judge of other people from their phyfiognomy, and if fometimes even at first fight we conceive a diflike to them, or are prejudiced in their favour.

In confequence of thefe.connexions, we are frequently prepoffeffed even to excefs in favour of particular persons, and conceive intirely wrong notions in regard to others. This is because whatevet ftrikes us either in our friends or enemies, is naturally connected with the agreeable or disagreeable fenfations which they make us feel; and of course, the defects of the former are always overlooked, because of the other amiable qualities of which we fee them poffessed, while the most perfect endowments of the latter feem to partake

of their vices. Hence it is, that these connexions have a prodigious influence upon our conduct: they feed our love or our hatred, they encourage our esteem or our contempt, they excite our gratitude or refentment, and produce those fympathies, thofe antipathies, and all thofe whimsical inclinations for which we often find fuch difficulty to account. I think I have fomewhere read that Defcartes always preferved a liking for people that were fquint-eyed, because the first woman he fell in love with, happened to have this kind of blemish.

The imagination derives her graces from the privilege fhe has of borrowing whatever appears moft amiable and moft agreeable in the various parts of nature, in order to adorn the fubject the handles. Nothing comes amifs to her; fhe makes every thing her own, as foon as fhe knows it can increase her luftre. She is like a bee that culls the treasure from the choiceft flowers: or like a coquette, who, eager to please her admirers, confults her caprice rather than her reafon. Always complaifant, fhe accommodates herself to our tastes, to our paffions, and to our weaknesses. One fhe attracts and perfuades by her lively and winning air; another fhe furprizes and aftonifhes by her grand and noble deportment. Sometimes fhe diverts us with her entertaining difcourfe; at other times the fucceeds by the boldness of her fallies. Here fhe affects a foftnefs in order to engage us there fhe languishes and weeps in order to move us; and if occafion requires, fhe will foon put on the mask to excite us to laughter. As fhe is fecure of her empire, fhe wantonly exercifes her caprice in every thing. Sometimes she is pleafed with giving an air of grandeur to the most trivial subjects; and at other times to give an air of ridicule to fubjects the moft ferious and the most sublime, Though the alters every thing fhe touches, yet she frequently fucceeds, when the endeavours only to please: in every other cafe fhe muft neceflarily mifcarry. Her empire ceafes, where that of analyfis commences.

She borrows not only of nature, but likewife of the most abfurd and moft ridiculous chimeras, provided they have the fanction of prejudice. Little does it fignify whether

they

they are falfe or not, if we are inclined to think them true. The chief point the imagination has in view, is amusement; yet she is not at variance with truth. Her fictions are all juft, when conformable to the analogy of our nature, to our knowledge, and to our prejudices. But as foon as fhe deviates from thefe, her ideas become monftrous and extravagant.

Nothing is beautiful that is not true: and yet every truth is not always beautiful. In order to fupply this defect, the imagination connects it with ideas the moft proper for embellishing it, and by this reunion it forms a whole, in which we find both folidity and amufenent. Of this there are infinite numbers of inftances in poetry. There we fee how fiction, which would be always ridiculous if divested of truth, embellishes truth, which would be always infipid, if divefted of fiction. This mixture is ever pleasing, provided the ornaments are chofen with difcernment, and judiciously scattered. And indeed the imagination is the fame as dress to a beautiful perfon: it must lend her every affiftance, in order to appear with all the advantage her form is capable of receiving.

:Subfequent to this we meet with a chapter on reason, good fenfe, wit, with the several fpecies of them and their contraries, which, our author obferves, all equally refult from the fame principle, namely, the connexion of ideas one with the other, which connexion is produced by the use of figns. What the Abbé hath here advanced concerning the difference of talent and genius is, in our opinion, a little too refined, and not without fome degree of obfcurity, occafion'd, we imagine, by the different ideas which a Frenchman and an Englishman affix to the word talent. The Abbé then proceeds to confider the operation by which we give figns to our ideas.

This operation (fays he) is the refult of the imagina'tion, which presents figns to the mind with which, it had 'been as yet unacquainted; and of the attention which con'nects them with our ideas. It is one of the most effential operations in the study of truth; and yet it is one of those which are least known. I have already fhewn the use and

6

[blocks in formation]

neceffity of figns in acquiring a habit of the operations of ⚫ the mind. I fhall now demonftrate the fame thing, confidering them in regard to the different fpecies of ideas. This is a truth which cannot be too often exhibited under different ❝ views.

• Arithmetic furnishes us with a very fenfible example of the neceffity of signs. If after having given name to a unit, we did not fucceffively imagine others for the feveral ideas. 'which we form by the multiplication of this first one, it • would be impoffible for us to make any progrefs in the knowledge of numbers. We difcern different combinations, only because we have cyphers which are themselves very di • ftinct. Take away these cyphers, take away all the signs in ufe, and we fhall find it impoffible to preserve any idea • of those combinations. Can we form to ourselves a notion even of the smallest number, without confidering several objects, each of which is in fome measure the sign to which we affix the unit? For my part, I perceive the numbers two or three, only as I represent to myself two or three different objects. If I proceed to the number four, I am obliged for greater eafe, to imagine two objects on one fide and two on ❝ the other: coming to number fix, I cannot help diftributing ⚫ them by two and two, or three and three; and if I have a * mind to go further, I shall soon be under a neceffity of con fidering feveral units as a fingle one, and to reunite them for this purpofe in a fingle object.

[ocr errors]

Hence it is beyond all manner of doubt, that if a perfon ⚫ wanted only to calculate for himself, he would be equally obliged to invent figns, as if he wanted to communicate his calculations. But why fhould that which is true in < arithmetic, not be the fame in other fciences? Should we be capable ever to reflect on metaphyfics and morals, if we < had not invented figns to fix our ideas, in proportion as we formed new combinations? Should not words be the fame in regard to our ideas in the feveral fciences, as cyphers are to our ideas in arithmetic? In all probability the ignorance of this truth is one of the caufes of the confufion which prevails in works of metaphyfics and morality. In order to handle this fubject methodically, we must take a

( cur

ą

« PreviousContinue »