Chapter XVI: Section I: Smell (11)

But in the present chapter he follows the example of some of the old logicians in adopting a second and more restricted meaning, expressive of the peculiar connotation which belongs to all concrete general names; viz. that twofold manner of signification, by which every name of a class signifies, on the one hand, all and each of the individual things composing the class, and on the other hand the common attributes, in consideration of which the class is formed and the name given, and which we intend to affirm of every object to which we apply the name. It is difficult to overrate the importance of keeping in view this distinction, or the danger of overlooking it when not made prominent by an appropriate phrase. The word Connote, which had been employed for this purpose, had fallen into disuse. But, though agreeing with the old logicians in using the word Connote to express this distinction, the author exactly reverses their employment of it. In their phraseology, the class-name connotes the attributes: in his, it notes the attributes, and connotes the objects. And he declares that in his opinion, their mode of employing the term is very absurd.

We have now to consider which of these two modes of employing it is really the most appropriate.

A concrete general name may be correctly said to be a mark, in a certain way, both for the objects and for their common attributes. But which of the two is it conformable to usage to say that it is the name of? Assuredly, the objects. It is they that are called by the name. I am asked, what is this object called? and I answer, a horse. I should not make this answer if I were asked what are these attributes called. Again, I am asked, what is it that is called a horse? and I answer, the object which you see; not the qualities which you see. Let us now suppose that I am asked, what is it that is called black; I answer, all _things_ that have this particular colour. Black is a name of all black things. The name of the colour is not black, but blackness. The name of a thing must be the name which is predicated of the thing, as a proper name is predicated of the person or place it belongs to. It is scarcely possible to speak with precision, and adhere consistently to the same mode of speech, if we call a word the name of any thing but that which it is predicated of. Accordingly the old logicians, who had not yet departed widely from the custom of common speech, considered all concrete names as the names of objects, and called nothing the name of an attribute but abstract names.

Now there is considerable incongruity in saying that a word connotes, that is, signifies secondarily, the very thing which it is a name of. To connote, is to mark something along with, or in addition to, something else. A name can hardly be said to mark the thing which it is a name of in addition to some other thing. If it marks any other thing it marks it in addition to the thing of which it is itself the name. In the present case, what is marked in addition, is that which is the cause of giving the name; the attributes, the possession of which by a thing entitles it to that name. It therefore seems more conformable to the original acceptation of the word Connote, that we should say of names like man or black that they connote humanity or blackness, and denote, or are names of, men and black objects; rather than, with the author of the Analysis, that they note the attributes, and connote the things which possess the attributes.

If this mode of using the terms is more consonant to propriety of language, so also is it more scientifically convenient. It is of extreme importance to have a technical expression exclusively consecrated to signify the peculiar mode in which the name of a class marks the attributes in virtue of which it is a class, and is called by the name. The verb "to note," employed by the author of the Analysis as the correlative of "to connote," is far too general to be confined to so specific a use, nor does the author intend so to confine it. "To connote," on the contrary, is a phrase which has been handed down to us in this restricted acceptation, and is perfectly fitted to be used as a technical term. There is no more important use of a term than that of fixing attention upon something which is in danger of not being sufficiently taken notice of. This is emphatically the case with the attribute-signification of the names of objects. That signification has not been seen clearly, and what has been seen of it confusedly has bewildered or misled some of the most distinguished philosophers. From Hobbes to Hamilton, those who have attempted to penetrate the secret of the higher logical operations of the intellect have continually missed the mark for want of the light which a clear conception of the connotation of general names spreads over the subject. There is no fact in psychology which more requires a technical name; and it seems eminently desirable that the words Connote and Connotative should be exclusively employed for this purpose; and it is for this purpose that I have myself invariably employed them.

In studying the Analysis, it is of course necessary to bear in mind that the author does not use the words in this sense, but sometimes in a sense much more vague and indefinite, and, when definite, in a sense the reverse of this. It may seem an almost desperate undertaking, in the case of an unfamiliar term, to attempt to rectify the usage introduced by the actual reviver of the word: and nothing could have induced me to attempt it, but a deliberate conviction that such a technical expression is indispensable to philosophy, and that the author's mode of employing these words unfits them for the purpose for which they are needed, and for which they are well adapted. I fear, however, that I have rarely succeeded in associating the words with their precise meaning, anywhere but in my own writings. The word Connote, not unfrequently meets us of late in philosophical speculations, but almost always in a sense more lax than the laxest in which it is employed in the Analysis, meaning no more than to imply. To such an extent is this the case, that able thinkers and writers do not always even confine the expression to names, but actually speak of Things as connoting whatever, in their opinion, the existence of the Things implies or presupposes.--_Ed._]

{300} In using these connotative names, it is often highly convenient to drop the connotation; that is, to leave out the connoted cluster.

{301} A mark is needed, to show when it is meant that the connotation is dropped. A slight mark put upon the connotative term answers the purpose; and shews {302} when it is not meant that anything should be connoted. In regard to the word black, for example, we merely annex to it the syllable _ness_; and it is immediately {303} indicated that all connotation is dropped: so, in sweetness; hardness; dryness; lightness. The new words, so formed, are the words which have been denominated {304} ABSTRACT; as the connotative terms from which they are formed have been denominated CONCRETE; and, as these terms are in frequent use, it is necessary that the meaning of them should be well remembered.

It is now also manifest what is the real nature of ABSTRACT terms; a subject which has in general presented such an appearance of mystery. They are simply the CONCRETE terms, with the connotation dropped. And this has in it, surely, no mystery at all.[83]

[Editor's footnote 83: After having said that a concrete general name notes an attribute, that this, one of the sensations in a cluster, and connotes the objects which have the attribute, i.e. the clusters of which that sensation forms a part; the author proceeds to say that an abstract name is the concrete name with the connotation dropped.

This seems a very indirect and circuitous mode of making us understand what an abstract name signifies. Instead of aiming directly at the mark, it goes round it. It tells us that one name signifies a part of what another name signifies, leaving us to infer what part. A connotative name with the connotation dropped, is a phrase requiring to be completed by specifying what is the portion of signification left. The concrete name with its connotation signifies an attribute, and also the objects which have the attribute. We are now instructed to drop the latter half of the signification, the objects. What then remains? The attribute. Why not then say at once that the abstract name is the name of the attribute? Why tell us that _x_ is _a_ plus _b_ with _b_ dropped, when it was as easy to tell us that _x_ is _a_?

The noticeable thing however is that if _a_ stands merely for the sensation, _x_ really is a little more than _a_: the connotation (in the author's sense of the term) of the concrete name is not _wholly_ dropped in the abstract name. The term blackness, and every other abstract term, includes in its signification the existence of a black object, though without declaring what it is. That is indeed the distinction between the name of an attribute, and the name of a kind or type of sensation. Names of sensations by themselves are not abstract but concrete names. They mark the type of the sensation, but they do not mark it as emanating from any object. "The sensation of black" is a concrete name, which expresses the sensation apart from all reference to an object. "Blackness" expresses the same sensation with reference to an object, by which the sensation is supposed to be excited. Abstract names thus still retain a limited amount of connotation in both the author's senses of the term--the vaguer and the more specific sense. It is only in the sense to which I am anxious to restrict the term, that any abstract name is without connotation.

An abstract name, then, may be defined as the name of an attribute; and, in the ultimate analysis, as the name of one or more of the sensations of a cluster; not by themselves, but considered as part of any or all of the various clusters, into which that type of sensations enters as a component part.--_Ed._]

{305} It hence, also, appears that there can be no ABSTRACT term without an implied CONCRETE, though cases are not wanting, in which there is much occasion for the ABSTRACT term but not much for the CONCRETE; in which, therefore, the concrete is not in use, or is supplied by another form of expression.

{306} In regular and capricious languages, as our own, the dropping of the connotation of the concrete terms is not marked in a uniform manner; and this requires some illustration. Thus, heavy is a concrete term, and we shew the dropping of the connotation, by the same mark as in the instances above, saying heaviness; but we have another term which is exactly the equivalent of heaviness, and frequently used as the abstract of heavy; that is, weight. Friend is a concrete, connotative term, in the substantive form. Its connotation is dropped by another mark, the syllable ship; thus, friendship; in like manner, generalship; brothership; cousinship. The syllable age is another of the marks we use for the same purpose; pilotage, parsonage, stowage.

Among concrete connotative words, we have already had full opportunity of observing that verbs constitute a principal class. Those words all NOTE some _motion_ or _action_ and CONNOTE an _actor_. There is the same frequency of occasion to leave out the connotation in the case of this class of connotative words, as in other classes. Accordingly ABSTRACT terms are formed from them, as from the connotative adjectives and substantives. The infinitive mood is such an abstract term; with this peculiarity, that, though it leaves out the connotation of the _actor_, it retains the connotation of _time_.[84] {307} It is convenient, however, to have abstract terms from the verbs, which leave out also the connotation of time; such are the substantive _amor_ from _amo_, _timor_ from _timeo_, and so on.

[Editor's footnote 84: The infinitive mood does not always express time. At least, it often expresses it aoristically, without distinction of tense. "To love" is as abstract a name as "love," "to fear," as "fear": they are applied equally to past, present, and future. The infinitives of the past and future, as _amavisse_, _amaturus esse_, do, however, include in their signification a particular time.--_Ed._]

Verbs have not only an active but a passive form. In the passive form, it is not the _action_, but the _bearing_ of the action, which is NOTED; and not the _actor_, but the _bearer_ of the action, that is CONNOTED. In this case, also, there is not less frequent occasion to drop the connotation. By the simple contrivance of a slight alteration in the connotative term, the important circumstance of dropping the connotation is marked. In the case of the passive as the active form of verbs, the infinitive mood drops the connotation of the person, but retains that of the time. Other abstract terms, formed from the passive voice, leave out the connotation both of person and time. Thus from _legor_, there is _lectio_; from _optor_, _optatio_; from _dicor_, _dictio_; and so on.

It is to be remarked that the Latin mode of forming abstract terms from verbs, by the termination "tio," has been adopted to a great extent in English. A large proportion of our abstract terms are thus distinguished; as action, association, imagination, navigation, mensuration, friction, motion, station, faction, legislation, corruption, and many others.

It is also of extreme importance to mark a great defect and imperfection, in this respect, of the Latin language. Such words as _lectio_, _dictio_, _actio_, are derived with equal readiness either from the supine, _lectum_, _dictum_, _actum_; or from the participle, _lectus_, _dictus_, _actus_. The supine is _active_, the participle, _passive_. From this circumstance probably it is, that {308} these abstract terms in the Latin language possess both the active and passive signification; and by this most unfortunate ambiguity have proved a fertile source of obscurity and confusion. This defect of the Latin language is the more to be lamented by us, that it has infected our own language; for as we have borrowed from the Latin language a great proportion of our abstract terms, we have transplanted the mischievous equivocation along with them. This ambiguity the Greek language happily avoided: thus it had [Greek: pra=xis] and [Greek: pra=gma] the first for the active signification of _actio_, the latter the passive.[85]

[Editor's footnote 85: I apprehend that [Greek: pra=gma] is not an abstract but a concrete term, and does not express the attribute of being done, but the thing done--the effect which results from the completed action.--_Ed._]

Of the abstract terms, of genuine English growth, derived from the concrete names of action, or verbs, the participle of the past tense supplied a great number, merely dropping the adjective, and assuming the substantive form. Thus, weight, a word which we had occasion to notice before, is the participle weighed, with the connotation dropped: stroke is merely struck; the _thing_ struck, the connotation, being left out: thought is the past participle passive of the verb to think, and differs from the participle in nothing, but that the participle, the adjective, has the connotation; the abstract, the substantive, has it not. Whether the concrete, or the abstract, is the term employed, is in such cases always indicated by the context; and, therefore, no particular mark to distinguish them is required.

{309} In our non-inflected language, a facility is afforded in forming a non-connotative from the connotative, in the active voice of verbs; because the connotative word is always distinguished by the presence of the persons of the verb, or that of some part of the auxiliary verb. The same word, therefore, answers for the abstract, as for the concrete; it being of course the abstract, when none of the marks of the concrete are present. Thus the word love, is both the verb or the connotative, and the substantive or the non-connotative; thus also fear, walk, ride, stand, fight, smell, taste, sleep, dream, drink, work, breath, and many others.

We have in English, formed from verbs, a great many abstracts or non-connotatives, which terminate in "th," as truth, health, dearth, stealth, death, strength. It may be disputed whether these words are derived from one part of the verb or another; but, in all other respects, the nature of them is not doubtful. The third person singular of the present, indicative active, ends in "th;" and, therefore, they may be said to be that part of the verb with the connotation dropped. The termination, however, of the past participle is "d," and we know that "th" and "d," are the same letter under a slight difference of articulation; and, therefore, they may just as well be derived from the past participle, and as often at least as they have a passive signification, no doubt are. Thus the verb trow, to think, has either troweth, or trowed; from one of which, but more likely from the last, we have truth: the verb to heal, has either healeth, or healed; from one of which, but more likely the last, we have health: the verb to string has stringeth, or stringed; {310} from one of which we have strength; thus from dieth, or died, death; from stealeth, or stealed, stealth; mirth in the same manner, from a verb now out of use; so heighth, length, breadth.[86]

[Findlater's footnote 86: The abstracts in _-th_ belong to a very early stage of the language. We cannot now form words like _health_, _truth_, as we can abstracts in _-ness_. As in the case of adjectives in _-en_ (_wooden_), and of preterites and participles like _fell_, _fallen_, that particular part of the vital energy of the language that produced them, is dead--ossified, as it were; and we cannot exemplify their formation by any process now going on. To account for many of them, we must suppose them formed from roots different from any now existing as separate words--roots from which the corresponding verbs and adjectives that we are acquainted with have been themselves derived by augmentation or other change. This being the case, it is impossible to say with certainty whether the immediate root of any particular abstract in _-th_ was a verb, a noun, or an adjective; and, indeed, the question need hardly be raised, since a primitive root was of the nature of all three.

The structure of these derivatives is better seen in some of the other Teutonic dialects than in the English or the Anglo-Saxon, in which the affix is reduced to a mere consonant. Thus, for Eng. _depth_ the Gothic has _diupi-tha_; for _heigh-th_, _hauhi-tha_. In Old High German the affix _-tha_ becomes _-da_, and we have _heili-da_ corresponding to Eng. _heal-th_; _strenki-da_, to _streng-th_; besides a great number of analogous forms, such as _evi-da_, "eternity" (from the same root as _ever_; compare Lat. _aetas_ for _aevitas_). In modern German comparatively few of these derivatives survive; and in those that do; the _-da_ of the Old German has passed into _-de_, as in _ge-baer-de_, the way of 'bearing' oneself, behaviour; equivalent to Latin _habi-tus_. The modern German equivalents of _bread-th_, _leng-th_, are _breit-e_, _läng-e_; but in some of the popular dialects the older forms _breite de_, _läng-de_ are still retained; and in Dutch _warm-te_ corresponds to _warm-th_, and _grôt-te_ is _great-ness_. When we recollect that _th_ or _d_ in the Germanic languages represents in such cases the _t_ of the Greek and Latin (compare Gr. [Greek: me/lit (os)], honey with Goth. _milith_; Lat. _alter_ with Eng. _other_), we cannot help seeing how analogous is the formation of the class of words we are now considering to that of Latin past participles (ama-tus, dic-tus, audi-tus). In the case of those abstracts that seem to come more naturally from an adjective root than from a verb, we can conceive the adjective formed on the analogy of the past participle; just as there are in English adjectives having no possible verbal root, yet simulating past participles; as _able-bodi-ed_, _three-corner-ed_. The abstract noun would appear to have been originally distinguished from the participle, or participial adjective, by some additional affix, as in lec-t-io. In Greek and Latin this additional affix very often consisted in a reduplication of the formative element _t_, as if for the purpose of denoting multitude, generality; as in Greek ([Greek: neo/-têt-os]), Latin _juven-tut-is_, _sani-tat-is_. It is not impossible that Goth. _diupi-tha_, O.H.G. _heili-da_ are abbreviations of _diupi-tha-th_, _heili-da-d_, just as Lat. _sani-tat_ has dwindled down in modern Ital. to _sani-tà_.

In a great many words essentially belonging to the same class both in meaning and in mode of formation, the _-th_ has, for the sake of euphony or from other causes, given place to _t_ or _d_. Thus _mood_ corresponds to Goth. _mo-th_, and means a motion (Lat. _motus_) or affection (of the mind); _blood_, to Goth. _blo-th_; _theft_, is in Ang. Sax. _theof-th_. _Mur-ther_, from a root akin to Lat. _mori_; _burthen_, from the root of to _bear_, are of similar formation, with additional affixes.

All these considerations would seem to put Horne Tooke's proposed derivation of these abstracts from the third person singular of the present indicative of the verb, completely out of court. The famous case of _truth_ from _troweth_ is especially absurd. For one thing the Ang. Sax. verb _treowan_ does not mean "to think," but "to trust," "rely on," "believe." This implies a ground for the trust, and that ground lies in the quality expressed by the adjective, true. _Truth_ has the same relation, logically and etymologically, to _true_, that _dearth_ has to _dear_, _health_ to _hale_. Remarking on the identity in form between the Ang. Sax. _treow_, "trust," "a treaty," and _treow_, "a tree," Jacob Grimm suggests that they are radically related, and that the idea common to _tree_ and _true_ is firmness, fixedness. Thus the "true" would be the "firm" the "fixed"--what may be relied on. This view is supported by the analogy of the Lat. _robur_, which means both an oak and strength.--_F._]

{311} It would be interesting to give a systematic account of the non-connotatives, derived from English {312} verbs; and this ought to be done; but for the present inquiry it would be an operation misplaced. The nature of the words, and the mode of their signification, is all which here is necessary to be understood.

One grand class of connotative terms is composed of such words as the following: walking, running, flying, reading, striking; and we have seen that, for a very obvious utility, a generical name was invented, the word ACTING, which includes the whole of these specific names; and to which the non-connotative, or abstract term ACTION corresponds. There was equal occasion for a generical name to include all the specific names belonging to the other class of connotative terms; such as coloured, sapid, hard, soft, hot, cold, and so on. But language has by no means been so happy in a general name for this, as for the other class. The word SUCH, is a connotative term, which includes them all, and indeed the other class along with them; for when we apply the word SUCH to any thing, we comprehend under it all the ideas of which the cluster {313} is composed. But this is not all which is included under the word such. It is a relative term, and always connotes so much of the meaning of some other term. When we call a thing _such_, it is always understood that it is such _as_ some other thing. Thus we say, John is such as James. Corresponding with our "such as," the Latins had _talis qualis_. If we could suppose _qualis_ to have been used without any connotation of _talis_, _qualis_ would have been such a word as the occasion which we are now considering would have required. The Latins did not use _qualis_, in this sense, as a general concrete, including all the other names of the properties of objects other than actions. But they made from it, as if used in that very sense, a non-connotative or abstract term, the word QUALITY, which answers the same purpose with regard to both classes, as action does to one of them. That is to say; it is a very general non-connotative term, including under it the non-connotatives or abstracts of hot, cold, hard, soft, long, short; and not only of all other words of that description, but of acting, and its subordinates also.

_Quantus_, is another concrete which has a double connotation like _qualis_. It connotes not only the substantive with which it agrees, but also, being a relative, the term _tantus_, which is its correlate. By dropping both connotations, the abstract QUANTITY is made; a general term, including under it the abstracts of all the names by which the modifications of greater and less are denominated; as large, small, a mile long, an inch thick, a handful, a ton, and so on.

Much remains, beside what is here stated, of the full explanation of the mode in which _talis qualis_, {314} _tantus quantus_, are made conducive to the great purposes of marking. But this must be reserved till we come to treat of RELATIVE TERMS, in general.

We have previously observed, that one of the purposes for which we abstract, or sunder the parts of a complex idea, marked by a general name, is, to form those adjectives, or connotative terms, which, denoting differences, enable us to form, and to name, subordinate classes. We now come to the next of the great purposes to which abstraction is subservient, and it is one to which the whole of our attention is due.

Of all the things in which we are interested, that is, on which our happiness and misery depend, meaning here by things, both objects and events, the most important by far are the successions of objects; in other words, the effects which they produce. In reality, objects are interesting to us, solely on account of the effects which they produce, either on ourselves, or on other objects.

But an observation of the greatest importance readily occurs; that of any cluster, composing our idea of an object, the effects or consequents depend, in general, more upon one part of it than another. If a stone is hot, it has certain effects or consequences; if heavy, it has others, and so on. It is of great importance to us, in respect to those successions, to be able to mark discriminately the real antecedent; not the antecedent combined with a number of things with which the consequent has nothing to do. I observe, that other objects, as iron, lead, gold, produce similar effects with stone; as often as the name _hot_ can, in like manner, be predicated of them. In the several clusters therefore, hot stone, hot iron, hot gold, {315} hot lead, there is a portion, the same in all, with which, and not with the rest, the effects which I am contemplating are connected. This part is marked by the word _hot_; which word, however, in the case of each cluster, connotes also the other parts of the cluster. It appears at once, how much convenience there must be in dropping the connotation, and obtaining a word which, in each of those cases, shall mark exclusively that part of the cluster on which the effect depends. This is accomplished by the abstract or non-connotative terms, heat, and weight.

Certain alterations, also, are observed in those parts of clusters on which such and such effects depend; which alterations make corresponding alterations in the effects, though no other alteration is observable, in the cluster, to which such parts belong. Thus, if a stone is more or less hot, the effects or successions are not the same; so of iron, so of lead; but the same alteration in the same part of each of those clusters, is followed by the same effects. It is true, that we know nothing of the alteration in the cause, but by the alteration in the effects; for we only say that a stone is hotter, because it produces such other effects, either in our sensations immediately, or in the sensations we receive from other objects. It is, however, obvious that we have urgent use for the means of marking, not only the alterations in the effects, but the alterations in the antecedents. This we do, by supposing the alterations to be those of increase and diminution, and marking them by the distinction of lower and higher degrees. But, for this purpose, it is obvious that we must have a term which is not connotative; because we suppose no alteration in any {316} part of the cluster but that which is not connoted; thus we can say, with sufficient precision, that a greater or less degree of heat produces such and such effects; but we cannot say, that a greater or less degree of hot stone, of hot iron, of hot any thing else, produces these effects.

This then, is another use, and evidently a most important use, of abstract, non-connotative terms. They enable us to mark, with more precision, those successions, in which our good and evil is wholly contained.

This also enables us to understand, what it is which recommends such and such aggregates, and not others, for classification. Those successions of objects, in which we are interested, determine the classifications which we form of them.

Some successions are found to depend upon the clusters, called objects, all taken together. Thus a tree, a man, a stone, are the antecedents of certain consequents, as such; and not on account of any particular part of the cluster.

Other consequents depend not upon the whole of the cluster, but upon some particular part: thus a tall tree, produces certain effects, which a tree not tall, cannot produce; a strong man, produces certain effects, which a man not strong cannot produce. When these consequents are so important, as to deserve particular attention, they and their antecedents must be marked. For this purpose, are employed the connotative terms marking differences. These terms enable us to group the clusters containing those antecedents into a sub-class; and NON-CONNOTATIVE or ABSTRACT terms, derived from them, enable {317} us to speak separately of that part of the cluster which we have to mark as the precise antecedent of the consequent which is engaging our attention.

It is presumed, that these illustrations will suffice, to enable the reader to discern the real marking power of abstract terms, and also to perceive the mode of their formation.

{318} CHAPTER X.

MEMORY.

"The science of metaphysics, as it regards the mind, is, in its most important respects, a science of analysis; and we carry on our analysis, only when we suspect that what is regarded by others as an ultimate principle, admits of still finer evolution into principles still more elementary."--_Inquiry into the Relation of Cause and Effect_, _by Thomas Brown, M.D._ P. iv. s. i. p. 331.

IT has been already observed that if we had no other state of consciousness than sensation, we never could have any knowledge, excepting that of the present instant. The moment each of our sensations ceased, it would be gone, for ever; and we should be as if we had never been.

The same would be the case if we had only ideas in addition to sensations. The sensation would be one state of consciousness, the idea another state of consciousness. But if they were perfectly insulated; the one having no connexion with the other; the idea, after the sensation, would give me no more information, than one sensation after another. We should still have the consciousness of the present instant, and nothing more. We should be wholly incapable of acquiring experience, and accommodating our actions {319} to the laws of nature. Of course we could not continue to exist.

Even if our ideas were associated in trains, but only as they are in Imagination, we should still be without the capacity of acquiring knowledge. One idea, upon this supposition, would follow another. But that would be all. Each of our successive states of consciousness, the moment it ceased, would be gone for ever. Each of those momentary states would be our whole being.

Such, however, is not the nature of man. We have states of consciousness, which are connected with past states. I hear a musical air; I recognise it as the air which was sung to me in my infancy. I have an idea of a ghost; I recognise the terror with which, when I was alone in the dark, that idea, in my childish years, was accompanied. Uniting in this manner the present with the past, and not otherwise, I am susceptible of knowledge; I am capable of ascertaining the qualities of things; that is, their power of affecting me; and of knowing in what circumstances what other circumstances will take place. Suppose that my present state of consciousness is the idea of putting my finger in the flame of the candle. I recognise the act as a former act;[87] and this recognition is followed {320} by another, namely, that of the pain which I felt immediately after. This part of my constitution, which is of so much importance to me, I find it useful to name. And the name I give to it is MEMORY. When the memory of the past is transferred into an anticipation of the future, by a process which will be explained hereafter, it gets the name of experience; and all our power of avoiding evil, and obtaining good, is derived from it. Unless I remembered that my finger had been in the flame of the candle; and unless I anticipated a similar consequent, from a similar antecedent, I should touch the flame of the candle, after being burned by it a hundred times, just as I should have done, if neither burning nor any of its causes had ever formed part of my consciousness.

[Bain's footnote 87: The recognition of an act as a former act, or of a present sensation as having formerly occurred, is a *phase of the intellectual power named consciousness of Agreement, or Similarity, which is both an essential of our Knowledge, and a means of mental Reproduction. The defectiveness of the author's view of this function of the intellect has been elsewhere commented on.--_B._]

Our inquiry is, what this part of our constitution, so highly important to us, is composed of. All inquirers are agreed, that it is complex; but what the elements are into which it may be resolved, has not been very successfully made out.

It is proper to begin with the elements which are universally acknowledged. Among them, it is certain, that IDEAS are the fundamental part. Nothing is remembered but through its IDEA. The memory, however, of a thing, and the idea of it, are not the same. The idea may be without the memory; but the memory cannot be without the idea. The idea of an elephant may occur to me, without the thought of its having been an object of my senses. But I cannot have the thought of its having been an object of my senses, without having the idea of the animal at the {321} same time. The consciousness, therefore, which I call memory, is an idea, but not an idea alone; it is an idea and something more. So far is our inquiry narrowed. What is that which, combined with an idea, constitutes memory?

That memory may be, the idea must be. In what manner is the idea produced?

We have already seen in what manner an idea is called into existence by association. It is easy to prove that the idea which forms part of memory is called up in the same way, and no other. If I think of any case of memory, I shall always find that the idea, or the sensation which preceded the memory, was one of those which are calculated, according to the laws of association, to call up the idea involved in that case of memory; and that it was by the preceding idea, or sensation, that the idea of memory was in reality brought into the mind. I have not seen a person with whom I was formerly intimate for a number of years; nor have I, during all that interval, had occasion to think of him. Some object which had been frequently presented to my senses along with him, or the idea of something with which I have strongly associated the idea of him, occurs to me; instantly the memory of him exists. The friend with whom I had often seen him in company, accidentally meets me; a letter of his which had been long unobserved, falls under my eye; or an observation which he was fond of producing, is repeated in my hearing; these are circumstances all associated with the idea of the individual in question; the idea of him is excited by them, and with the mere idea of the {322} man, all the other circumstances which constitute memory.

The necessary dependence of memory upon association, may be proved still more rigidly in this way. It has been already observed, that we cannot call up any idea by willing it. When we are said to will, there must be in the mind, the idea of what is willed. "Will, without an idea," are incongruous terms; as if one should say, "I can will, and will nothing." But if the idea of the thing willed, must be in the mind, as a condition of willing, to will to have an idea in the mind, is to will to have that in it, which, by the supposition, is in it already.

There is a state of mind familiar to all men, in which we are said to try to remember. In this state, it is certain that we have not in the mind the idea which we are trying to have in it. How then is it, that we proceed in the course of our endeavour to procure its introduction into the mind? If we have not the idea itself, we have certain ideas connected with it. We run over those ideas, one after another, in hopes that some one of them will suggest the idea we are in quest of; and if any of them does, it is always one so connected with it, as to call it up in the way of association. I meet an old acquaintance, whose name I do not remember, and wish to recollect. I run over a number of names, in hopes that some of them may be associated with the idea of the individual. I think of all the circumstances in which I have seen him engaged; the time when I knew him, the place in which I knew him, the persons along with whom I knew him, the things he did, or the things he suffered; and, if I chance upon any idea with which the name is {323} associated, then immediately I have the recollection; if not, my pursuit of it is in vain.[88]

[Bain's footnote 88: This process seems best expressed by laying down a law of Compound or Composite Association; under which a plurality of feeble links of connexion may be a substitute for one powerful and self-sufficing link.--_B._

[The laws of compound association are the subject of one of the most original and profound chapters of Mr. Bain's treatise (The Senses and the Intellect. Part ii. Chap. 3.).--_Ed._]]

There is another set of cases, very familiar, but affording very important evidence on the subject. It frequently happens, that there are matters which we desire not to forget. What is the contrivance to which we have recourse for preserving the memory; that is, for making sure that it will be called into existence, when it is our wish that it should. All men, invariably employ the same expedient. They endeavour to form an association between the idea of the thing to be remembered, and some sensation, or some idea, which they know beforehand will occur at or near the time when they wish the remembrance to be in their minds. If this association is formed, and the sensation or the idea, with which it has been formed, occurs; the sensation, or idea, calls up the remembrance; and the object of him who formed the association is attained. To use a vulgar instance; a man receives a commission from his friend, and, that he may not forget it, ties a knot on his handkerchief. How is this fact to be explained? First of all, the idea of the commission is associated with the making of the knot. Next, the handkerchief is a thing which it is known beforehand will be frequently seen, and of {324} course at no great distance of time from the occasion on which the memory is desired. The handkerchief being seen, the knot is seen, and this sensation recalls the idea of the commission, between which and itself, the association had been purposely formed.

What is thus effected through association with a sensation, may be effected through association with an idea. If there is any idea, which I know will occur to me at a particular time, I may render myself as sure of recalling any thing which I wish to remember at that time, by associating it with this idea, as if I associated it with a sensation. Suppose I know that the idea of Socrates will be present to my mind at twelve o'clock this day week: if I wish to remember at that time something which I have to do, my purpose will be gained, if I establish between the idea of Socrates, and the circumstance which I wish to remember, such an association that the one will call up the other.

A very remarkable application of this principle offers itself to our contemplation, in the artificial memory which was invented by the ancient orators and rhetoricians. The orator made choice of a set of objects, sufficient in number to answer his purpose. The ideas of those objects he taught himself, by frequent repetition, to pass through his mind in one constant order. The objects which he chose were commonly such as aided him in fixing them according to a certain order in his memory; the parts, for example, of some public building, or other remarkable assemblage. Having so prepared himself, the mode in which he made use of his machinery was as follows. The topics or sentiments of his speech were {325} to follow in a certain order. The parts of the building he had chosen as his instrument had previously been taught to follow by association, in a certain order. With the first of these, then, he associated the first topic of his discourse; with the second, the second, and so on. The first part of the building suggested the first topic; the second, the second; and each another, to the end of his discourse.[89]

[Bain's footnote 89: The conditions of the success of this expedient are interesting to study as illustrations of the working of association. The supposition is that the parts of the building are perfectly coherent in the mind, that they can recall each other easily and rapidly. The advantage gained will depend entirely upon the superior facility of attaching a head of discourse to the visible appearance of a room, as compared with the facility of attaching it to a previous head. If we can form an enduring bond between a topic and the picture of an interior, by a smaller mental effort than is necessary to conjoin two successive topics, there is a gain by the employment of the device; the difference of the two efforts is the measure of the gain. Probably the result would depend upon the relative force of the pictorial and the verbal memory in the individual mind. In minds where the pictorial element prevails, there might be a positive advantage; in cases where the pictorial power is feeble and the verbal power strong, there would almost certainly be a dead loss.--_B._]

We not only have ideas of memory, individually taken; that is, separately, each by itself; as in the instances which we have just been considering: we have also trains of such ideas. All narratives of events which ourselves have witnessed are composed of such trains. The ideas forming those trains do not follow one another in a fortuitous manner. Each succeeding idea is called up by the one which {326} precedes it; and every one of these successions takes place according to a law of association. After a lapse of many years, I see the house in which my father died. Instantly a long train of the circumstances connected with him rise in my mind: the sight of him on his death-bed; his pale and emaciated countenance; the calm contentment with which he looked forward to his end; his strong solicitude, terminating only with life, for the happiness of his son; my own sympathetic emotions when I saw him expire; the mode and guiding principles of his life; the thread of his history; and so on. In this succession of ideas, each of which is an idea of memory, there is not a single link which is not formed by association; not an idea which is not brought into existence by that which precedes it.

Whensoever there is a desire to fix any train in the memory, all men have recourse to one and the same expedient. They practise what is calculated to create a strong association. The grand cause of strong associations is repetition. This, accordingly, is the common resource. If any man, for example, wishes to remember a passage of a book, he repeats it a sufficient number of times. To the man practised in applying the principle of association to the phenomena in which it is concerned, the explication of this process presents itself immediately. The repetition of one word after another, and of one idea after another, gives the antecedent the power of calling up the consequent from the beginning to the end of that portion of discourse, which it is the purpose of the learner to remember.

That the remembrance is produced in no other way, {327} is proved by a decisive experiment. For, after a passage has been committed to memory in the most perfect manner, if the learner attempts to repeat it in any other order than that, according to which the association was formed, he will fail. A man who has been accustomed to repeat the Lord's Prayer, for example, from his infancy, will, if he has never tried it, find the impossibility of repeating it backwards, small as the number is of the words of which it consists. That words alone, without ideas, suggest one another in a train, is proved by our power of repeating a number of words of an unknown language.[90] And, it is worth observing, that the power of arithmetical computation is dependent upon the same process. Thus, for example, when a child learns the multiplication table, and says, 11 times 11 is 121, or 12 times 12 is 144, he annexes no ideas to those words; but, by force of repetition, the expression 12 times 12 instantly calls up the expression 144, or 11 times 11 the expression 121, and so upwards from twice 2, with which he begins. In illustrating the mode in which repetition makes association more and more easy, I used the process of arithmetical addition as a striking example. Persons little accustomed to the process perform it with great difficulty; persons {328} much accustomed to it, with astonishing facility. In men of the first class, the association is imperfectly formed, and the several antecedent expressions slowly suggest the proper consequent ones; in those of the latter class the association is very perfectly formed, and the expressions suggest one another with the greatest expedition and ease.

[Editor's footnote 90: There is here a lapse, of mere expression. The meaning is not that words suggest one another without ideas; words do not suggest words, but the ideas of words. The author intended to say that words, or the ideas of them, often suggest the ideas of other words (forming a series) without suggesting along with them any ideas of the things which those words signify.--_Ed._]

Thus far we have proceeded with facility. In Memory there are ideas, and those ideas both rise up singly, and are connected in trains by association. The same occurs in Imagination. Imagination consists of ideas, both suggested singly, and connected in trains, by association. This is the whole account of Imagination. But Memory is not the same with Imagination. We all know, when we say, we imagine a thing, that we have not the same meaning, as when we say, we remember it. Memory, therefore, has in it all that Imagination has; but it must also have something more. We are now, then, to inquire what that additional something is.

There are two cases of Memory. One is, when we remember sensations. The other is, when we remember ideas. The first is, when we remember what we have seen, felt, heard, tasted, or smelt. The second is, when we remember what we have thought, without the intervention of the senses. I remember to have seen and heard George III, when making a speech at the opening of his Parliament. This is a case of sensation. I remember my conceptions of the Emperor Napoleon and his audience, when I read the account of his first address to the French Chambers. This is a case of ideas.

{329} We shall consider the case of sensations first. What is it to remember any thing I have seen?

First, there is the idea of it; and that idea brought into existence by association.

But, in Memory, there is not only the idea of the thing remembered; there is also the idea of my having seen it. Now these two, 1, the idea of the thing, 2, the idea of my having seen it, combined, make up, it will not be doubted, the whole of that state of consciousness which we call memory.[91]

[Editor's footnote 91: The doctrine which the author thinks "will not be doubted" is more than doubted by most people, and in my judgment rightly. To complete the memory of seeing the thing, I must have not only the idea of the thing, and the idea of my having seen it, but the belief of my having seen it; and even this is not always enough; for I may believe on the authority of others that I have seen a thing which I have no remembrance of seeing.--_Ed._]

But what is it we are to understand by what I have called "the idea of my having seen the object?" This is a very complex idea; and, in expounding, clearly, to the comprehension of persons, not familiar with these solutions, the import and force of a very complex idea, lies all the difficulty of the case.

It will be necessary for such persons to call to mind the illustrations they have already contemplated of the remarkable case of association, in which a long train of ideas is called up so rapidly as to appear but one idea; and also the other remarkable case, in which one idea is so strongly associated with another, that it is out of our power to separate them. Thus, when we use the word battle, the mind runs over the {330} train of countless acts, from the beginning of that operation to the end; and it does this so rapidly, that the ideas are all clustered into one, which it calls a battle. In like manner, it clusters a series of battles, and all the intermediate operations, into one idea, and calls it a campaign; also several campaigns into one idea, and calls it a war. Of the same nature is the compound idea, which we denote by the word year; and the still more compound idea, which we denote by the word century. The mind runs over a long train of ideas, and combines them so closely together, that they assume the appearance of a single idea; to which, in the one case, we assign the name year, in the other, the name century.

In my remembrance of George III., addressing the two Houses of Parliament, there is, first of all, the mere idea, or simple apprehension; the conception as it is sometimes called, of the objects. There is combined with this, to make it memory, my idea of my having seen and heard those objects. And this combination is so close, that it is not in my power to separate them. I cannot have the idea of George III.; his person and attitude, the paper he held in his hand, the sound of his voice while reading from it, the throne, the apartment, the audience; without having the other idea along with it, that of my having been a witness of the scene.