CHAPTER XII. THE NATURE OF MIND, OR ITS POWERS AND FACULTIES.

We have seen, in the preceding chapters, that our only mode of gaining a knowledge of the natural attributes of God, is by the study of the nature of mind. We have seen also that the only way to discover the nature of mind is to examine what are its qualities, and how it acts and is acted upon in _our own experience_.

When we discover what our minds actually do, we find out what they have _power_ to do. The _faculties_ of mind are its _powers of acting_ as they are exhibited in our own experience.

The following presents a brief outline of the powers and faculties of mind as they have been classified and named by _the people_.

_Ideas_ is the word most frequently used to include _all_ the operations and states of mind.

Our ideas are often referred to as divided into two classes, viz., ideas gained by the senses, and ideas that pass through the mind without the aid of the senses.

Intellectual Powers.

The power to gain ideas by the five senses is called _sensation_ or _perception_.

The power to have ideas without the use of the senses is called _conception_.

_Per_ is the Latin word for _by_, and _con_ is the word for _without_. So we have _per_ceptions _by_ the senses, and _con_ceptions _without_ the senses.

_Imagination_ or _fancy_, is the power to make new combinations of our conceptions.

_Memory_ is the power of recalling past ideas, and of recognizing them as having existed before.

_Judgment_ is the power of comparing ideas, and noticing their relations to each other.

_Abstraction_ is the power of noticing certain parts or certain qualities of things, while other parts or qualities are unnoticed.

_Association_ is the power of recalling past ideas according to certain modes, called _laws of association_.

The above powers are usually classed together, and called _the intellectual powers_, or _the intellect_.

The Susceptibilities, or Feelings.

The powers of feeling various kinds of pleasure and pain, happiness and misery, enjoyment and discomfort, are called the _susceptibilities_, the _emotions_ and the _feelings_.

When any thing is found to be the cause of pleasurable feelings, there follows a desire to secure it, and it is called _good_. When any thing causes pain, a desire follows to avoid it, and it is called _evil_.

These _desires_ to secure good and avoid evil are called _motives_ (or movers), because they _move_ the mind to action in order to secure the good desired or to escape the evil feared. The objects that cause such desires are also called motives.

For example, _gold_ is called the motive that led a man to murder, and the _desire_ of gold is also called the motive of that act.(4)

Desires are measured as _strong_ or _weak_ by our own consciousness. When we desire two incompatible things and must choose one or the other, before the act of choice we are conscious that one creates a desire which is stronger than the other.

The only mode of deciding which desire is strongest, is by our own consciousness.

The Will.

The power of choosing, or willing, is called _the will_. It is also called the power of _volition_.

When several desires coexist, some of which must necessarily be denied in order to gratify others, we ordinarily choose that object which excites the strongest desire, as measured by our consciousness.

But it is often the case that we feel the strongest desire for that which is not _best_ for us. Thus, when sick we have tempting fruit and nauseous medicine before us, with power to choose either. Our intellect decides that the medicine is best for us, but our strongest desire is for the fruit.

In such a case we have power to choose _either_ that which excites the strongest desire or that which the intellect decides to be _best_, even when it does not excite the strongest desire.

This power is the chief feature of a _rational_ mind in distinction from an irrational mind.

And the belief that we have this power is to be placed as one of the principles of common sense, because all men talk and act as if they believe they possess this power. And if any person were to talk and act as if he did not believe that he had power to choose in either of these two ways, he would be regarded as having lost his reason.

Reason, or Common Sense.

Of the thoughts which continually pass through the mind, we find that some are attended with a feeling of the real existence of the objects of our thoughts, and others are not so attended. For example, we may think of a man with a certain form carrying a dagger and going to commit murder, and with this, a feeling that no such thing is really existing. Again, we may have this same idea attended with the conviction that it is a reality.

This feeling of the _reality_ of the objects of our thoughts is called _belief_, or _faith_.

Our minds are so made, that we necessarily believe not only that things _are_ really existing at the present time, but that things _will_ occur that are not now in existence. For example, we believe the sun will rise to‐morrow morning in another place nearer toward the north or south than it did the present morning. We believe the tide will rise higher or lower on a coming day than it did the present day. And thus multitudes of events are believed to be in the future.

Those things which really do or will exist, in distinction from those we may think of but which do not and will not exist, are called _truths_, or _realities_.

All our comfort and happiness depend on our believing _the truth_, meaning by truth the _reality_ of things. To believe that things exist when they do not, or that things are not existing when they are, involves certain pain, disappointment and mistake.

Our great safeguard from this is that part of our mental organization called _reason_, or _common sense_. This, as has been shown, consists in the necessary belief of certain truths by all men.

The _test_ by which these truths are identified and distinguished from all other knowledge, is the fact that usually all men talk and act as if they believed them, and that when they fail to do so, they are regarded as having “lost their reason.”

The truths thus necessarily believed are the foundation of the process called _reasoning_, which is a mode of establishing other truths by the aid of those already believed.

These principles of reason or common sense are often called by other names, such as _intuitions_, _intuitive truths_, _first principles_, etc.

Thus all the powers of mind are arranged in the four general classes, viz., _the intellect_, _the susceptibilities_, _the will_, and _reason_ or _common sense_.

In regard to the power of mind called _reason_, what is claimed here is, not that either the common people or metaphysicians have usually thus clearly set forth what is here so described and named; but that all men, learned and unlearned, allow that there are truths which are necessarily believed by all mankind; that these are the foundation of all _reasoning_, and that they _often_ are called _reason_. So when any one is found to lack a belief in certain of these intuitive truths, he is said to have “lost his reason.” And when any act or assertion is seen to contradict any of these truths, it is said to be “contrary to reason.”

Therefore it is proper to put the belief in these implanted truths as a distinct power of the mind, and to call it “the reason.” And as the belief of these truths is _common_ to all men, it is also proper to call it _common sense_.