Part 2

Before we attribute such vast powers to these Ideas or phantasms, the shadows of visual perception, it will be convenient to inquire into their nature, and endeavour to ascertain the laws by which they are regulated. In that state of mental relaxation, when the intellect is not intently occupied on any particular subject, numberless phantasms will involuntarily intrude: for, during the time we are awake, the mind is never wholly unoccupied, and such irregular presentations of Ideas constitute our reveries. However these ignes fatui may glimmer in their wanderings, tumultuously assemble, or abruptly depart; such confluence or dispersion contributes nothing to effective thought. As far as these Ideas or phantasms, the obsequious shadows of visual perception, can be traced, they are incapable of being summoned to appear by any voluntary command; but are consequently revived by the term or word for which the perception is commuted. Thus, having previously noticed them with attention, when we speak of St. Paul's Cathedral or Westminster Abbey, the attendant visions of these buildings immediately arise, and we are impressed with a memorial picture in conjunction with, and through the intervention of the word. The will possesses no power to unite or separate Ideas; they adhere to, and remain the unalterable deposits of perception. Let it next be asked, what human purpose can be effected by their sole agency? On those solemn occasions when we address our prayers to the Divine Source, can these effusions of grateful feeling, and humble petition, be conveyed in phantasms? Does not the lamenting and repentant sinner emphatically articulate his anxious supplications? Can any human contract be concluded by mere Ideas, or any system of jurisprudence be established on such visionary basis? Ideas therefore cannot enable us to perform our duty towards God, or our neighbour.[6]

In pursuing this important subject, the candid confession of Mr. LOCKE bewrays his distrust of the powers and efficiency of his favourite Ideas. "To form a clear notion of _Truth_, it is very necessary to consider Truth of Thought, and Truth of words distinctly one from another: but yet it is very difficult to treat of them asunder. Because it is unavoidable, in treating of mental propositions to make use of words; and then the instances given of _mental_ propositions, cease immediately to be barely mental, and become _verbal_. For a mental proposition, being nothing _but a bare consideration of the Ideas_, as they are in our minds _stripped_ of names, they lose the nature of purely mental propositions, as soon as they are put into words. And that which makes it _yet harder_ to treat of mental and verbal Propositions separately, is, that most men, if not all, in their THINKING, and reasonings within themselves, make use of WORDS, instead of Ideas, at least when the subject of their meditation contains in it complex Ideas. Which is a great evidence of the imperfection and uncertainty of our Ideas of that kind, and may, if attentively made use of, serve for a mark to shew us, what are those things, we have clear and perfect established Ideas of, and what not."--_Vol._ II. _C._ 5, _p._ 195. Mr. LOCKE was a patient and acute observer of that which passed in his own mind, when he strictly meditated any particular subject: and in this process he was likewise aware, in common with others, that he employed _words_ instead of Ideas in his thinking and reasoning within himself. By Ideas alone, he confesses that he could not advance; and for this evident reason, because Ideas are incapable of being communicated to others, or received by ourselves, excepting through a verbal medium. There is no evidence of Thought without it be perspicuously expressed in words addressed to the ear, or by their characters presented to the eye; and the vain consciousness we may feel that our mind is teeming with important Thoughts, is little to be relied on, until we are capable of expressing them orally, or exhibiting them in writing. It has been a prevailing opinion with those attached to the Ideal doctrine, and who are advocates for the spiritual process of Thought, that the Idea is first conceived mentally, and subsequently, by some process not explained, invested with the corresponding expression. It is however certain that the word itself, with the meaning that is attached to it, must be previously acquired, and thoroughly comprehended, before the abstract Idea, or naked Thought, can select the befitting expression, and ransack the vast range of a copious vocabulary. The believers in the extreme rapidity of thought to which we shall presently advert, must be alarmed at this manner of explanation, which necessarily constitutes Thought a two-fold process, and consequently would consume, at least double the time for its disclosure. Perhaps in all instances the phraseology we employ, like our manners, is derived from the society we frequent: that which is imbibed from persons of good education bears the stamp of superior discrimination and correctness, contrasted with the rude dialect of the vulgar: but it still remains unsolved, by what means these phantasms, or Ideas, accommodate themselves with the appropriate words to express the Thoughts they have conceived.

Can it be supposed that the abstract, naked, and incommunicable conception possesses an innate sagacity to clothe itself with a verbal garb, at best of capricious and transient fashion?

"Multa renascentur, quæ jam cecidere, cadentque Quæ nunc sunt in honore vocabula, si volet usus, Quem penes arbitrium est, et jus et norma loquendi."

It is certain that Ideas may exist in the mind, as the connected results, and enduring phantasms of visual perception, independently of words, and such condition is exemplified in those born deaf, who are consequently dumb: to whom the business of life is a mere pantomime, who only communicate the impulses of passion, and expose their want of comprehension.

"In dumb significants proclaim their Thoughts."--_Henry VIth._

From these examples it appears that a human being may possess a multitude of Ideas, and yet be wholly ignorant of language: and in the instances of those born blind, he may acquire speech to its fullest extent without having any Ideas, which therefore cannot be considered the necessary instruments of Thought. Thus, the presumed mutual intercourse, and reciprocal correspondence between Ideas and words is a very disputable conclusion.

When the Idea or phantasm that is connected with visual perception appears, in consequence of the word being mentioned (which by commutation is its substitute), the presentation is immediate. He who has visited and attentively noted interesting scenes, mountainous districts, cataracts or prospects, when they are mentioned, will have their phantasms or pictured images occur to him, and he will be aware of them, like the intrusion of a sudden flash. From this phenomenon the generally received opinion of the _rapidity_ of _Thought_ may in all probability have originated.

All popular and settled notions, however unfounded, like prejudices early imbibed, are with difficulty eradicated. Among these may be instanced the dictum of the astonishing rapidity of Thought, which is almost proverbial, and generally believed: even Mr. TOOKE, Vol. I., p. 28, conforms to this established maxim. "Words have been called _winged_: and they well deserve that name, when their abbreviations are compared with the progress which speech could make without these inventions; but when compared with the _rapidity_ of _thought_, they have not the smallest claim to that title." By calculation, the progress of light from the sun and other luminaries is said to be ascertained; and likewise the rate at which sound travels: but hitherto no contrivance has been fabricated to estimate the rapidity of thought. If the succession of our thoughts should be more rapid than they can be distinctly apprehended, confusion must ensue, and their rapidity would render them useless. Our perceptions are regulated by the same law. If the prismatic colours be painted on a surface which is revolved with great rapidity, the individual colours will not be apparent. The succession of sounds to a definite number, may be severally distinguished, in a certain interval: but if the succession be increased beyond the power of discrimination, they will impress the ear as one uniform sound. The same principle must regulate our thoughts, whether they be composed of Ideas or words, or, if it be possible, of both jumbled together. It does not appear that our thoughts for any useful purpose, which must imply their communication to others, or for a record in written characters, _can_ be more rapid than the intelligible pronunciation of the words themselves, and which, when delivered in quick succession, leave the short-hand-writer behind.[7]

As Ideas can be nothing more than the mere phantasms attendant on visual perception, which, like the perceptions of the other senses, are commuted for words, that, by the aid of memory, recall in their absence the objects that have been perceived; it would be difficult to suppose that Ideas could fortuitously or voluntarily assemble in a more rapid succession, than the words for which they have been commuted, without producing confusion. It frequently happens to inexperienced persons, in giving evidence before a legal tribunal, or in addressing a popular assembly, that they cannot proceed; and they are generally disposed to interpret this failure, to their thoughts occurring in a succession too rapid for their utterance. Allowing the apology to be correct, it is a proof that such rapidity is inconvenient, and renders the Thought wholly useless if it cannot be communicated.

When we attentively measure the steps of our own minds in the act of thinking, and also observe the progress of others, it will be found that effective Thought does not result from this rapid and tumultuous rush of Ideas; but is a very deliberate, and in many cases painful elaboration: and must, when committed to writing, be subjected to subsequent revisals and repeated corrections, and which must be applied to the _words_ constituting the sentence in which the thought is contained. From this general view of the subject, it is concluded that Ideas, the residuary phantasms of visual perception, cannot directly constitute or become the immediate instruments of Thought.

The present Essay being considered an humble attempt to investigate a portion of intellectual physiology, an apology will scarcely be deemed necessary for a short digression to inquire into the powers and faculties of the human mind: and which, when determined, may be viewed as the alphabet of mental science.

Systems prematurely constructed, and under the impression of authority, have been especial impediments to our intellectual progress: and this truth has been remarkably exemplified in the works that have treated of the human mind. In the numerous treatises on this subject that have issued from the press, there is but little agreement concerning these powers or faculties, and it is evident that a definite number must be required: some writers enumerate more, others less, and it is not unusual for some of these metaphysical projectors to split a single and presumed faculty into a variety of subdivisions. To the acute and patient observer, it will appear that the operations of Nature are contrived with admirable simplicity; but man, in his endeavours to explain them, has generally resorted to a mysterious and discouraging complexity. Thus, as might be expected, the same faculty, according to different authorities, has dissimilar energies,--one is detected to encroach on the boundary of another, and when the mechanism of mind, fabricated by these scholastic dictators, is attempted to be set in motion, it is found incapable of working. For the grand moving power we have an undefined, and consequently unintelligible doctrine of _Ideas_, of supposed spiritual and directing agency; the admission of which would destroy the responsibility of a human being both here and hereafter, and degrade his ennobled condition to the instinct of the speechless brute. To endow these insubstantial and reflected phantasms with some activity and mimic play, a theory of the _association of Ideas_ has been erected, without having previously established that they are capable of such confederation. A wearisome catalogue of faculties, many of which are conjectural, has been enumerated; Abstraction, Conception, Contemplation, Consciousness, Comparison, Imagination, Judgment, Memory, Recollection, Reminiscence, Retention, Perception, Sensation, Reflection, Thought, Understanding, Volition, and many others that caprice has created, or a subtle discrimination helped to multiply. These are the materials out of which scholastic metaphysicians have fashioned their unresembling model, and deserted Nature. It is not intended in this abbreviated essay to settle the pretensions of these numerous faculties, the discussion of which would require an ample volume: and the award might probably be protracted, till the claim was forgotten. When we contemplate the dexterities that the hand performs, and the monuments of skill and taste that it has elaborated; it would only create unnecessary distinctions to affirm that it possessed the faculties of sculpturing, painting, writing, spinning, weaving, sewing, and numberless other manipulations: besides those that ulterior discoveries may enable it to accomplish. However profuse these constructors of the mind may have been in the accumulation of its component faculties, they appear to have little regarded language, its most prominent and important feature; _the universal menstruum of intelligence, and accredited currency for the circulation and exchange of thought_. There are two faculties or capacities that are peculiar to the human intellect, by which our species has attained a supremacy that leaves all other animated beings in a distant rear: the possession of which has rendered man a progressive being, and the race of animals so nearly stationary, that however they may be tortured into improvement, they feel no emulation to proceed, and the acquirement perishes where the brute expires. These undisputed faculties are Speech, with its recording characters, and the comprehension of numbers, the powerful sources of that pre-eminence which man has already attained, and to which he must be indebted for his further advancement.

As Ideas are wholly incompetent to explain the process of thought, the next inquiry will be, whether words are capable of affording the adequate solution. For this purpose, the simple experiment would be sufficient; and as we are conscious, under due attention of all the acts that the mind performs, every person, in proportion to his habits of deliberately noting that which passes within himself, will be enabled to institute this examination. It is however to be lamented, that Thought is not the constant or habitual exercise of the mind on the phenomena of Nature, the occurrences of life, or the subjects we listen to and peruse: but is only occasionally awakened by difficulties, excited by contention, or invoked by the promise of fame and by the hope of emolument. The usual course of education is but little calculated to promote the habitudes of thinking, and especially that teaching where authority dictates, and demonstration is neglected. Much of this instruction is enforced by degradation and terror; and the pupil, at an early age, is compelled to swallow doctrines which he is unable to comprehend, and consequently cannot digest, except through the peptic assistance of the scourge: and which, when matured by manhood, and enlightened by reason, he is forced to reject.

Thought requires knowledge as its basis, and in proportion to its extent on any given subject, the investigation will be productive. This knowledge may be acquired by conversation, reading, or experiment, and these require Language, or a composition of words. Knowledge supplies the materials for thought, and every thought must be a distinct proposition, or sentence composed of words. A single word, although it possesses a distinct meaning, cannot constitute a thought, which implies a separate proposition or inference contained in a sentence: still less can it be supposed to result from an individual phantasm or Idea. When it is considered that language is composed of words adapted by position to represent all the phenomena and contingencies of human affairs, and that we employ them, _by commutation_, for all that we can experience as sentient and intellectual beings, we shall be able to understand that they are the mental currency previously described, and that they are the only instruments of intelligence to which we can resort for the communication of our thoughts, or for the process of their elaboration. They must be expressed in words, and by words prepared for such expression. Without attempting to investigate the different kinds of words, or parts of speech, the province of general or philosophical grammarians, whose unsettled disputes still perplex the patient and modest inquirer, it will be sufficient to remark that we possess words adapted to convey all the shades of opinion and degrees of feeling: and when these words, under the guidance of acquired knowledge, are perspicuously arranged into a proposition or sentence, they constitute Thought: and the act of thinking consists in their correct selection and arrangement for the purpose of promulgation by speech or writing, and which is very properly termed composition. When we reflect, that from our infancy to the natural decline of our intellectual powers, we are employed, during our waking hours, in the exercise of language;[8]--by conversation, often desultory, where we range through a variety of topics, as the bird sports from branch to twig; to the more deliberate act of composition, where the mind enduringly broods on the subject;--or when we read, and attentively consider the thoughts of others:--these occupations contribute to augment our vocabulary, and fix the meaning of the words we employ. By these words, and the intelligence that resides in them, although many centuries have passed by, we participate, and feel impregnated with the pure and exalted spirit that conceived the Iliad and Odyssey. Time has not diminished the vigour or impaired the beauty of those memorials that have survived the extinction of the Grecian states, and the glory of the eternal city; and such is the luminous correspondence of Language, that by transfusion into our vernacular idiom, we may receive a satisfactory measure of the original inspiration. Let it be kept in view, that Ideas, the frail associates of a perception, possess no permanence, are incapable of being transferred, and must fade away when our existence terminates. It is the word that forms the nucleus, and contains the intellectual deposit, that may become the inheritance of future generations.

This process, in no manner or degree tends to subvert the spiritual nature of Thought, which has its source in the capacities whereby we perceive, remember, and comprehend that significant sounds or words are the commuted representatives of the objects of intelligence. The perceptive organs of many animals are more exquisitely endowed than man, and their local memory more retentive; yet they are wholly incapable of comprehending language or calculating numbers;--capacities by which the Creator has exclusively dignified the human race.

It may excite some surprise that an Essay on Thought should be connected with the construction of a perspicuous sentence. To explain this conjunction, it may be urged, that there can be no evidence of thought, until it is promulgated by speech or written character: and, on all important occasions, such communications of meaning become absolutely necessary. Acquiescence or dissent may indeed be tacitly conveyed, by holding up the hand, or by ballot, without condescending to offer any verbal reasons for the adoption or rejection of the proposed measure. Affirmation or negation does not in any manner constitute Thought; such determination may result from caprice, from ignorance, or from prejudice, without the slightest consideration. Thought requires some proposition clearly conceived and perspicuously expressed in a sentence; and the clearness of the Thought will be ascertained by the perspicuity of its verbal expression. There may be some difficulty respecting the precise meaning of individual words, arising from the corruptions of the ignorant; but more especially from the perversions of writers who have been deemed authorities. This distortion of the original sense, is, in a certain degree, incidental to all living languages, which being in childhood acquired by the ear, the learner is compelled to adopt the signification of words, and employ the current phraseology of those with whom he associates. When he is subsequently taught to speak and write by rule, or grammatically, generally at an age anterior to the exercise of reason, he is coerced to imbibe that which is forced in the way of instruction. Even at a more advanced period the student cannot readily comprehend how a perspicuous sentence is formed by the position of individual words, each bearing a distinct signification, which it is presumed must be the fact: but Mr. DUGALD STEWART, in his _Philosophical Essays_, _p._ 155, has introduced a doctrine entirely opposite to this well-founded position. "So different is all this from the fact, that our words when examined _separately_, are _often_ as completely insignificant as the letters of which they are composed: deriving their meaning _solely_ from the connexion, or relation in which they stand to others."