242 ANIMAL AUTOMATISM. [LECT. 



temporary of Hartley, Charles Bonnet, the Genevese 

 naturalist, has embodied the doctrine in language of 

 such precision and simplicity, that I will quote the 

 little-known passage of his " Essai de Psychologic " 

 at length : 



" ANOTHER HYPOTHESIS CONCERNING THE MECHANISM 



OF IDEAS. 1 



" Philosophers accustomed to judge of things by that which 

 they are in themselves, and not by their relation to received 

 ideas, would not be shocked if they met with the proposition 

 that the soul is a mere spectator of the movements of its body : 

 that the latter performs of itself all that series of actions which 

 constitutes life : that it moves of itself : that it is the body alone 

 which reproduces ideas, compares and arranges them; which 

 forms reasonings, imagines and executes plans of all kinds, etc. 

 This hypothesis, though perhaps of an excessive boldness, never- 

 theless deserves some consideration. 



" It is not to be denied that Supreme Power could create an 

 automaton which should exactly imitate all the external and 

 internal actions of man. 



" I understand by external actions, all those movements which 

 pass under our eyes; I term internal actions, all the motions 

 which in the natural state cannot be observed because they take 

 place in the interior of the body such as the movements of 

 digestion, circulation, sensation, etc. Moreover, I include in this 

 category the movements which give rise to ideas, whatever be 

 their nature. 



" In the automaton which we are considering everything would 

 be precisely determined. Everything would occur according to 

 the rules of the most admirable mechanism : one state would 

 succeed another state, one operation would lead to another 

 operation, according to invariable laws ; motion would become 

 alternately cause and effect, effect and cause; reaction would 

 answer to action, and reproduction to production. 



1 " Essai de Psychologie," chap, xxvii 



