Imatges de pàgina
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ESSAY I

OF ACTIVE POWER IN GENERAL.

CHA P. I.

Of the Notion of Active Power.

Ó confider gravely what is meant by Active Power, may seem altogether unnecessary, and to be mere trifling.

It is

not a term of art, but a common word in our language, used every day in discourse, even by the vulgar. We find words of the fame meaning in all other languages; and there is no reason to think that it is not perfectly understood by all men who understand the English language.

I believe all this is true, and that an attempt to explain a word fo well understood, and to show that it has a meaning, requires an apology.

The apology is, That this term, fo well understood by the vulgar, has been darkened by philofophers, who, in this as in many other instances, have found great difficulties about a thing which, to the rest of mankind, seems perfectly clear.

This has been the more eafily effected, because Power is a thing so much of its own kind, and fo fimple in its nature, as not to admit of a logical definition.

It is well known, that there are many things perfectly understood, and of which we have clear and diftinct conceptions,

CHAP. I. which cannot be logically defined. No man ever attempted to define magnitude; yet there is no word whofe meaning is more distinctly or more generally understood. We cannot give a logical definition of thought, of duration, of number, or of motion.

When men attempt to define fuch things, they give no light. They may give a fynonymous word or phrase, but it will probably be a worse for a better. If they will define, the definition will either be grounded upon a hypothefis, or it will darken the fubject rather than throw light upon it.

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The Ariftotelian definition of motion, that it is "Actus entis in potentia, quatenus in potentia," has been justly cenfured by modern Philofophers; yet I think it is matched by what a celebrated modern Philofopher has given us, as the most accurate definition of belief, to wit, "That it is a lively idea related to or affociated "with a present impreffion." Treatife of Human Nature, vol. i. p. 172. "Memory," according to the fame Philofopher, "the faculty by which we repeat our impreffions, fo as that "they retain a confiderable degree of their firft vivacity, and are somewhat intermediate betwixt an idea and an impreffion."

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EUCLID, if his editors have not done him injuftice, has attempted to define a right line, to define unity, ratio and number. But these definitions are good for nothing. We may indeed suspect them not to be EUCLID's; because they are never once quoted in the Elements, and are of no ufe.

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I shall not therefore attempt to define active power, that I not be liable to the fame cenfure; but fhall offer fome obfervations that may lead us to attend to the conception we have of it in our own minds.

1. Power is not an object of any of our external senses, nor even an object of confcioufnefs.

That

That it is not feen, nor heard, nor touched, nor tafted, nor CHAP. I fmelt, needs no proof. That we are not confcious of it, in the proper sense of that word, will be no less evident, if we reflect, that consciousness is that power of the mind by which it has an immediate knowledge of its own operations. Power is not an operation of the mind, and therefore no object of consciousness. Indeed every operation of the mind is the exertion of fome power of the mind; but we are conscious of the ope ration only, the power lies behind the fcene; and though we may juftly infer the power from the operation, it must be remembered, that inferring is not the province of consciousness, but of reason.

I acknowledge, therefore, that our having any conception or idea of power is repugnant to Mr LOCKE's theory, that all our fimple ideas are got either by the external senses, or by consciousness. Both cannot be true. Mr HUME perceived this repugnancy, and confiftently maintained, that we have no idea of power. Mr LOCKE did not perceive it. If he had, it might have led him to fufpect his theory; for when theory is repugnant to fact, it is easy to see which ought to yield. I am confcious that I have a conception or idea of power, but, strictly speaking, I am not confcious that I have power.

I shall have occafion to fhew, that we have very early, from our constitution, a conviction or belief of some degree of active power in ourselves. This belief, however, is not consciousness: For we may be deceived in it; but the teftimony of conscioufnefs can never deceive. Thus, a man who is struck with a palfy in the night commonly knows not that he has loft the power of speech till he attempts to speak; he knows not whether he can move his hands and arms till he makes the trial; and if, without making trial, he confults his consciousness ever so attentively, it will give him no information whether he has loft these powers, or still retains them.

From

CHAP. I.

From this we must conclude, that the powers we have are not an object of consciousness, though it would be foolish to cenfure this way of speaking in popular discourse, which requires not accurate attention to the different provinces of our various faculties. The teftimony of consciousness is always unerring, nor was it ever called in question by the greatest sceptics, ancient or modern.

2. A fecond obfervation is, That as there are fome things of which we have a direct, and others of which we have only a relative conception, power belongs to the latter class.

As this diftinction is overlooked by moft writers in logic, I shall beg leave to illustrate it a little, and then shall apply it to the present subject.

Of fome things we know what they are in themselves; our conception of fuch things I call direct. Of other things, we know not what they are in themselves, but only that they have certain properties or attributes, or certain relations to other things; of these our conception is only relative.

To illuftrate this by fome examples: In the university-library, I call for the book, prefs L, fhelf 10. No. 10.; the librarykeeper must have fuch a conception of the book I want, as to be able to distinguish it from ten thousand that are under his care. But what conception does he form of it from my words? They inform him neither of the author, nor the fubject, nor the language, nor the fize, nor the binding, but only of its mark and place. His conception of it is merely relative to thefe circumstances; yet this relative notion enables him to distinguish it from every other book in the library.

There are other relative notions that are not taken from accidental relations, as in the example juft now mentioned, but from qualities or attributes essential to the thing.

Of

Of this kind are our notions both of body and mind. What CHAP. I. is body? It is, fay Philofophers, that which is extended, folid and divisible. Says the querift, I do not ask what the properties of body are, but what is the thing itself; let me first know directly what body is, and then confider its properties? To this demand I am afraid the querift will meet with no fatisfactory answer; because our notion of body is not direct but relative to its qualities. We know that it is something extended, solid and divifible, and we know no more.

Again, if it should be asked, What is mind? It is that which thinks. I ask not what it does, or what its operations are, but what it is? To this I can find no answer; our notion of mind being not direct, but relative to its operations, as our notion of body is relative to its qualities.

There are even many of the qualities of body, of which we have only a relative conception. What is heat in a body? It is a quality which affects the sense of touch in a certain way. If you want to know, not how it affects the fense of touch, but what it is in itself; this I confess I know not. My conception of it is not direct, but relative to the effect it has upon bodies. The notions we have of all those qualities which Mr LocKE calls fecondary, and of those he calls powers of bodies, such as the power of the magnet to attract iron, or of fire to burn wood, are relative.

Having given examples of things of which our conception is only relative, it may be proper to mention fome of which it is direct. Of this kind, are all the primary qualities of body; figure, extenfion, folidity, hardness, fluidity, and the like. Of these we have a direct and immediate knowledge from our senses. To this class belong alfo all the operations of mind of which we are conscious. I know what thought is, what memory, what a purpose, what a promise.

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