312 MENTAL FACULTIES. 



five senses in succession; and which, he attempts to show, from the 

 impressions received, may be able to develope gradually the different 

 intellectual and moral faculties. All these, he affirms, are derived from 

 impressions made on the external senses ; and he considers the whole of 

 human consciousness to be sensation variously transformed. 



The views of M. Condillac have been largely embraced, with more 

 or less modification; and, at the present day, many metaphysicians 

 believe, that impressions on the senses are the necessary and exclusive 

 materials for all intellectual acts. His case of the statue seems, how- 

 ever, to be by no means conclusive. It must, of course, be possessed 

 of a centre for the reception of impressions made upon different senses, 

 otherwise no perception could occur; and if we can suppose it possible 

 for such a monstrous formation as a being totally devoid of external 

 senses to exist; such a being must not only be defective in the nerves 

 which, in the perfect animal, are destined to convey impressions to the 

 brain, but probably in the cerebral or percipient part likewise. From 

 defective cerebral conformation, therefore, the different mental phe- 

 nomena might not be elicited. 1 If, however, we admit in such a case the 

 possibility of the cerebral structure, particularly of those portions that 

 are especially concerned in the function of thought, being properly 

 organized, it appears to us, that certain mental or moral manifestations 

 ought to exist. Of course, all knowledge of the universe would be pre- 

 cluded, because deprived of the instruments for obtaining such know- 

 ledge; but the brain would act as regarded the internal sensations. In 

 order that such a being may live, he must be supplied with the neces- 

 sary nourishment; possess all those internal sensations or wants that 

 are inseparably allied to organization ; and must, consequently, feel 

 the desires of hunger and thirst; but we have seen, that these sensa- 

 tions require the intervention of the brain as much as the external 

 sensations. Supposing him, again, to survive the period of puberty, he 

 must experience the instinctive changes, which occur at this period, and 

 which must furnish impressions to the encephalon. In this assumed 

 case, then, a certain degree of mental action might exist; and, under 

 the supposition of a properly organized brain, ideas limited, it is true, 

 in consequence of the privation of the ordinary inlets of knowledge 

 might be formed; and memory, imagination, and judgment be com- 

 patible within certain limits. 



The objections to the view, that the intellectual and^ moral sphere of 

 man and animals is proportionate to the number and perfection of the 

 external senses are overwhelming. Animals have the same number of 

 senses as man, and, frequently, have them more perfect ; yet in none 

 is the mental sphere co-extensive. The idiot has the external senses 

 as delicate as the man of genius, and often much more so; many of 

 those of the greatest talents having the senses extremely obtuse. It 

 has been already remarked, that the superiority of the human intellect 

 has been referred entirely to the sense of touch, and to the happy 

 organization of the human hand; but the case of Miss Biffin, and others, 

 and that of the young artist cited by M. Magendie, 2 negative this pre- 



1 Adelon, op. citat., i. 519. a See page 140'of this volume. 



