532 



main stock of human ideas and capabilities of action ; to the 

 second he had traced the process of memory ; the third he 

 would show to be mainly instrumental in invention, and in 

 various ways operative in art and literature, as also upon human 

 character and conduct, and, lastly, upon the operations of judg- 

 ment and reasoning. 



The formation of new ideas by the mind might, he ob- 

 served, be effected by means, not directly to be described as 

 single operations of thought ; of this nature were purely ar- 

 tistic ideas, which might be framed by rules according to certain 

 models, and then become ideas of association or not, according 

 to circumstances. Such results were excluded from the author's 

 inquiry, and were only mentioned to guard against any mis- 

 conception, and for the sake of a distinction, which would be 

 available in his illustrations. 



The process at present to be considered by the author is 

 mainly distinguishable from that examined in his first Essay, 

 by the fact that, while the first class of associations were 

 framed gradually from the immediate repetition of acts or per- 

 ceptions, those now to be explained were instantaneously put 

 together from general analogies, which were, liowever, them- 

 selves framed from habitual experience, like the former. These 

 analogies are insensibly contracted through life, and are the 

 nearest approach to universal ideas, consisting of characters, 

 forms, colours, proportions, and properties, which are variously 

 combined throughout all known existence. Such are the ele- 

 ments of conceptual power, or the faculty of spontaneous as- 

 sociation, of which the action and exercise could be variously 

 determined by the habits and character of each individual. 



The author briefly exemplified the mode of operation ; and 

 went on to say that he would pursue the subject in relation 

 to literary composition and art,^ — to moral sentiment, — and, 

 lastly, to the operations of reasoning. 



From this the author gave an explanation shewing the 

 justice of Mr. Locke's distinction between wit and judgment. 



