PHILOSOPHY, MENTAL. 



tions. The mind of the child is not left 

 to classify objects; but these objects are 

 presented to it already classed, owing to 

 the same word being 1 used to express 

 them ; and it is very interesting- to ob- 

 serve the efforts of the juvenile mind in 

 finding out some features of resemblance 

 between the objects which had previ- 

 ously been presented to him, and a new 

 object presented to him with the same 



IMAGINATION OH FANCT. 



127. In the use which Mr. Stewart 

 makes of the term imagination, it in- 

 cludes the fancy, and is in no respect a 

 distinct power, as he himself states, but 

 compounded of several others. " It in- 

 cludes," lie says, " conception or simple 

 apprehension, which enables us to form 

 a notion of those former objects of per- 

 ception or of knowledge, out of which 

 we are to make a selection ; abstraction, 

 which separates the selected materials 

 from the qualities and circumstances 

 which are connected with them in na- 

 ture; and judgment or taste, which 

 selects the materials and directs their 

 combination. To these powers we may 

 add that peculiar habit of association to 

 which 1 formerly gave the name of fancy; 

 as it is this which presents to our choice 

 all the different materials which are sub- 

 servient to the efforts of imagination." 

 " This," he observes in another place, 

 *' is the proper sense of the word, if 

 imagination be the power which gives 

 birth to the productions of the poet and 

 the painter," and, we may add, of genius 

 in general. We have no objection to 

 such an appropriation of the term ; in the 

 Hartleyan nomenclature, however, it is 

 used indiscriminately in the sense in 

 which the professor seems to employ 

 the fancy. 



128. The recurrence of ideas, says 

 Hartley, especially visible and audible 

 ones, in a vivid manner, but without any 

 regard to the order observed in past facts, 

 is ascribed to the power of imagination 

 or fancy. Every succeeding thought is 

 the result either of some new impression, 

 or of an association with the preceding. 

 It is impossible, indeed, to attend so 

 minutely to the succession of our ideas, 

 as to distinguish and remember for a 

 sufficient time the very impression or 

 association which gave rise to each 

 thought or conception; but we can do 

 this as far as it can be expected to be 

 done, and in so great a variety of instan- 



ces, that we have full right to infer it in 

 all. A reverie differs from imagination 

 only in this, that the person being more 

 attentive to his own thoughts, and less 

 disturbed by external objects, more of 

 his trains of ideas are deducible from as- 

 sociation, and fewer from new impres- 

 sions. It is to be observed, however, 

 that in all cases of imagination and reve- 

 rie, the train and complexion of the 

 thoughts depend, in part, upon the then 

 state of body or mind. A pleasurable 

 or painful state of the stomach, for in- 

 stance, joy or grief, will make all the 

 thoughts tend to the same cast. " Objects 

 and circumstances may be so disposed," 

 says Mr. Grant, (in a very valuable paper 

 on Reverie, for which see " Manchester 

 Memoirs," vol. i. or " Nicholson's Jour- 

 nal," vol. xv.) " as to give to reverie a 

 pleasing or pensive, a refined or an ele- 

 gant direction. I believe it is unnecessa- 

 ry to ask whether the mind will not be 

 more apt to depart from serious medi- 

 tation in a gaudy chapel, than in the 

 solemn gloom of a cathedral? It is re- 

 marked by an eminent medical writer, 

 that light, introduced by opening the 

 window-shutters, gave a gayer cast to the 

 ideas of a patient who laboured under 

 reverie. The study of Tasso was a Gothic 

 apartment, and he fancied his familiar 

 spirit to converse with him through a 

 window of stained glass." 



129. We might very easily enlarge on 

 this faculty, and particularly on the regu- 

 lation of it, as affecting the" character and 

 the happiness ; but we suppose that none 

 of our readers, who are much interested 

 in the pursuits of mental philosophy, are 

 without access to Dugald Stewart's " Ele- 

 ments,*' in the last chapter of which they 

 will find an elegant, scientific, and highly 

 important consideration of this point; and 

 as we have already gone to the limits of 

 our article, we must hasten to a conclu- 

 sion. Our object has been to lay before 

 or readers a view of the leading features 

 of the most important of all sciences, next 

 to religion, to which it is eminently 

 subservient; and in accomplishing this 

 object we have endeavoured to show its 

 practical value. We have, in many places* 

 made a most free use of Hartley's " Ob- 

 servations ;" and we shall think ourselves 

 happy if we shall have succeeded in 

 making the way smoother for an acquaint- 

 ance with that profound and invaluable 

 work, among such of our readers as 

 have not previously paid much attention 

 to the subject. To such we beg leave 

 to reccom.nie.n4 Mr. Belsham's "Ele- 



