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KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL. 



after a great lapse of time the place of their 

 abode; and that the carnivorous animals have 

 not this sense more acute than the grami- 

 nivorous. 



As for hearing, I have demonstrated, that we 

 have hitherto been mistaken in attributing to this 

 the talent for music, and to the glottis the talent 

 for singing; that it is not the hearing, which 

 gives the capacity for language; that the lan- 

 guages, however imperfect or perfect they may 

 be, are not the creation of the hearing, but of 

 the cerebral organisation; that the irresistible 

 and lawless acts of certain deaf and dumb 

 persons should not be attributed to their want of 

 hearing, but to the imbecility of their minds, &c. 



I have rendered to the sight its just rights, of 

 which the philosophers had deprived it. I have 

 proved that the eye, without the aid of any other 

 sense, and without previous exercise or instruc- 

 tion, can perceive, not only the impressions of 

 light and colors, but likewise those of forms, 

 size, direction, number, and distance of objects 

 I have established, that the eye is not the organ 

 of the talent of painting, and I have seized the 

 occasion to show the great difference which exists 

 between the passive functions of our organs and 

 their active functions. I have also demonstrated 

 that man and animals fix objects; see, and look 

 actively, with one eye only. 



What I have rendered to sight I have taken 

 from touch. This sense is not, as most authors 

 regard it, the only mediator, the director, the 

 reformer, or rectifier of the other senses ; and its 

 degrees of perfection have no influence on the 

 intelligence and perfectibility of man and 

 animals. 



Thus I may refer my readers for all these ob- 

 jects to my large work. Here I shall confine 

 myself to extracting what concerns the five 

 senses, under their physiological and philoso- 

 phical relation. 



We call external senses the nervous systems, 

 which besides their internal action receive, by 

 means of external apparatuses, the impressions 

 of the exterior world, and produce in the brain 

 the sensations and ideas of these impressions. 



Consequently, these systems reveal to the 

 living being, the objects which exist out of him- 

 Silf; with each sense the animal discovers a new 

 world; thus the creation grows larger or smaller 

 for him, accordingly as he is endowed with senses, 

 more or less numerous or perfect. Without the 

 senses, animals and man would remain shut up 

 in themselves, and all their consciousness would 

 be limited to their internal life. But provided 

 with senses, they enter into communication with 

 the immensity of nature; associate with all the 

 beings which surround them, and a continual 

 action and reaction are established between ani- 

 mate and inanimate beings. 



What can interest man more than his senses, 

 to which he owes so many sensations, so many 

 enjoyments? Thus have they always been the 

 object of his most assiduous researches. Yet, 

 who would believe it? Not only has he re- 

 mained behind in the knowledge of their inte- 

 rior organic functure, as I have proved in my 

 anatomical description, Jbut further, he has not 

 been able to agree with himself in their peculiar 

 functions, and the influence which they exercise 



in the development of our minds. On this point, 

 the most extravagant, the most vague, and the 

 most irreconcileable opinions exist. It is true 

 some errors have been corrected, from time to 

 time, but no author has yet established prin- 

 ciples, which, in a physical and physiological 

 view, have offered a system carried out and 

 complete. 



Sometimes it is said, that we cannot, without 

 the aid of the senses, receive any idea; all our 

 knowledge, all the faculties of our minds and our 

 souls are the work of the external world; and 

 sometimes, again, we are allowed sensations and 

 ideas, but such as cannot be excited without the 

 mediation of the senses. In both cases, the per- 

 fection of the intellectual faculties of man, of the 

 different species of animals, and of the indi- 

 viduals, is regarded as a result of the perfection 

 and harmony of their senses. Sometimes, again, 

 the senses are only instruments, and the mind, 

 freely and independently of all organisation, 

 modifies the impressions which are transmitted to 

 it; sometimes there is admitted an external and 

 internal source of our sensations and ideas, and 

 they are both more or less subjected to the laws of 

 organisation. We continually hear complaints 

 repeated against the illusion of the senses. 

 Finally, some reject absolutely, the evidence of 

 the senses and all judgment which is based upon 

 it ; the external world then becomes the deceitful 

 image of our internal ; the sensible world is re- 

 jected, as the least worthy object of the research 

 of man, and it is only, when the philosopher has 

 learned to construct from himself the external 

 world, that he can elevate himself to general, 

 necessary, and eternal truths. 



If this last proposition be true, there is no need 

 of our collecting such numerous facts, in order, 

 by degrees, to deduce from them laws and prin- 

 ciples. In a short time the spring of our own ima- 

 gination will raise us to a higher rank than that to 

 which the longest and most active life would 

 enable us to attain, by the path of meditation 

 and of experience. But, if we receive our ideas 

 and all our knowledge solely from the senses, 

 then men and animals are the perpetual sport of 

 external fortuitous and versatile objects ; the 

 measure of the faculties has no other basis than 

 the perfection of the senses ; and education, the 

 end of which ought to be to render individuals 

 and nations what it is desirable they should be, 

 has no other secret than that of duly calculating 

 the action of the external world on the senses. 



If the material conditions of the faculties of 

 the soul and mind are bounded to the mere 

 organs of the senses, it is an idle project to 

 seek in the brain and its parts, the organs of 

 the highest faculties. If we must seek, without 

 any reserve, the principle of all the actions of 

 men and animals, in their internal and innate 

 nature, and if, inconsequence, we have not suffi- 

 cient regard to the influence of surrounding 

 objects and social institutions, we are in mani- 

 fest contradiction with the history of all ages and 

 all individuals. If, in fine, we admit that the 

 senses procure numerous materials, that the mind 

 works by means of the most noble implements, 

 and if we can establish that the internal man 

 himself is endowed with a number of disposi- 

 tions, we must seek for our ideas and our know- 



