1805.}  Obfervations on Materialifm, the Ideal Syflem, tc, 
‘To the Editor of the Monthly Magazine. — 
SIR, 
AVING read with fome attention 
and much intereft in the Monthly 
Magazine for January laft the 24th nam- 
‘ber of the Enquirer, and the remarks on 
it with which the ingenivus and moft re- 
f{peStable Mr. Care. Lorrt his enriched 
the fame Magazine for March, I am induced 
to throw my mite into this treafury of ab- 
ftra& ipeculation. The obfervations 
which I have to offer are not, indeed, con- 
nected into any regular feries of arguments 
or criticifnis, nor-do they bear immedi- 
ately on any fubje&t of proof; yet they 
will perhaps be found to have no diftant 
relation to the moft important parts of 
the queftion agitated by thefe able wri- 
ters, who will, I am perfuaded, give them 
neither more nor lefs attention than they 
deferve. . 
I muft begin with one or two propoft- 
tions which to many readers will have the 
appearance of mere affertions ; for the na- 
ture of my defign and the limits of this< 
paper will not permit me to prove them, 
or even to adducethe arguments by which 
I am led to think them probable. I be- 
lieve-ind:ed that as much probability be- 
lones to them as can in general be made 
out on fubjects of this nature, ‘on which_ 
they who feek for conviction either by an 
appeal to the fenfes external or internal, 
or by a feries of identical propofitions 
like thofe of a mathematical demonjira- 
tion, feek for what they will never find. 
It appears to me that thofe who contend 
for the exiftence of what is called an zm- 
material principle or fubjtance in the frame 
and conftitution of man diftin® from his 
corporeal organization, employ arguments 
founded on the want of information and 
of clear ideas on the fubje&t: an unavoid- 
able want, which refle&ts no difgrace: 
but as thefe arguments are the iflue of 
ignorance, it is not to be wondered at, 
that the progeny is found to have all the 
infirmity of the parent. “al 
On the other hand, thofe who deny the 
exiftence of an immaterial principle in 
man labour under the fame ignorance ; 
but they make a better ufe of it. “ We 
fee no reafon, (they fay) to have recourfe 
to a principle of which we neither have 
nor can have an idea, becaufe it has never 
been the object of any of our fenfes ; and 
we are unwilling to confine our apprehen- 
fions of the power and operations of ‘the 
Author of Nature within bounds prefcrib- 
_ ed by the definitions and fyllogifins of a 
MonTuiy Mac. No, 104. 
84 
dialeétic which, in our opinion, is at once 
weak and arbitrary.” 
1. Ideas are faint images, veftizes or’ 
relics of certain fenfations. Senfations are 
“either the immediate effeéts of impreffions 
made on the external fenfes, and have 
therefore been called fen/ations of impref- 
jion ; oy they arfe from fome chauge, ac- 
tion, or affection of the internal organs’ of 
fenfe, and have, on that account, ben 
termed fenfations of confcioufnefs.* ‘The 
reader will have no difkculty in pro- 
perly referring his fenfations to one of 
thefe two clafles, if he only recollects that 
every fenfation which (vopularly fpeak- 
ing) has not a correfponding external im- 
preffion, is, in truth, a fez/ation of confet- 
oufue/s. ; 
2. Of the various and almo* innume- 
rable tribes of thefe fenfations few, tom- 
paratively fpeaking, leave behind them 
thofe images, veitiges or relics which are 
properly called zdeas. Vufibie figure, whe- 
ther at reit or in motion, and colour in 
the firft degree, and articulate and mufi- 
cal founds in the next, makeup the far 
‘greater part if not the whole number, 
<¢ Inter-eas ex (idez) eminent et diftinc- 
tius confervantur, que per vifum, deinde 
que per quditum receptz fuerunt. _ Reli- 
uz confufe funt, et a voluntate minus 
revocabiles.”"+ . Hence words written or 
{poken are the fource of fo largea pcrtion | 
: 5 : 
of our ideas and our knowledge. If any 
one be difvofed to controvert this linita- 
tion of the term idea, \ct him appreciate 
as well as he can the ideas he, fuppofes 
himielf to have of tates, of odours, of the 
objects of the fenfe of touch, of innume- 
rable pains and pleafures, which, while 
they exift, affect him in the moft fenfible 
manner, but, when they have ceafed, can - 
be recalled by no effort of the imagina- 
tion fimply exerted, and only by means 
of. their affociation with ideas properly fo 
termed, that is with ideas of vifible figure, 
articulate founds, &c. As an inftance 
of this we may remark that the actual 
fenfaticn of ficknefs can be produced by 
the fight, mention, or recollection of a 
loathfome obje& mach more readily than. 
any idea can be formed of that unpleafane , 
feeling at a time when it is not aétually 
present. . 
3, That the fiate or condition of the 
nervous fyRem produced either by exter. : 
* Cullen’s Inftit. of Medic. (1772) §36. 
+ Haller. Prim. Lin. § 553. ~ 
. Cia ‘ 
. 
