Kitabı oku: «Fundamental Philosophy, Vol. 2 (of 2)», sayfa 25

CHAPTER IV.
RELATION OF CORPOREAL SUBSTANCE TO ITS ACCIDENTS

18. In the idea of corporeal substance the idea of permanence is perfectly included, the idea of unity only imperfectly. The unity which we conceive in every corporeal substance is a factitious unity; since that which is constant is not one but an aggregate of many, as is proved by the divisibility of matter; out of every corporeal substance we may make many which will have the same right as the first to be called substances. A piece of wood is a substance; but we may slit it into several pieces which will be equally substances. These pieces, joined together, formed what are called one substance; but it is clear that this unity was very imperfect, and was rather a union than a unity, and that if we consider it as one, it was in relation to the unity of effect which it produced in us, by the connection which it gave to our sensations and to the phenomena which resulted from it.

19. Hence, every corporeal substance involves multiplicity, or combination of the elements which compose it. Experience informs us that this combination is not permanent; there is, consequently, no corporeal substance which does not imply at least one modification, namely, the arrangement of its parts. Abstracting the changes which this modification may undergo, it can never be confounded with the substance: although the bodies might be presented constantly to our senses with the same arrangement of the parts, the permanent being would be in the parts, not in their arrangement. The latter is something external which is added to the thing existing; there can be no union and combination without parts which are united and combined.

20. A difference which we observe between the substance and its modifications is, that the substance is independent of the modifications, but the modifications are not independent of the substance. The substance, while remaining the same, changes its accidents, but an accident cannot change its substance and remain the same. The same block may receive different figures successively; but a figure, numerically the same, cannot pass from one block to another. Two blocks may have a similar or a different figure, whether cubic, spherical, or pyramidal, and one may take the figure of the other; but in that case, the figures are not identical, but similar, they are specifically but not numerically the same.

21. If I am asked how I know that there is only similarity and not numerical identity in the figures which bodies take successively, that there is no permanence in the figures which change their subject, and consequently that the same figure cannot pass from one substance to another, in the same manner that the same substance passes from one figure to another; I shall not find it difficult to prove what I assert.

There is no one who does not see what an extravagant thing it would be for a cubic figure to leave a body and pass to another. What is this figure separated from the body? How is it preserved during the transition? Why is it not exactly the same in both, but presented with slight modifications? Has it undergone a modification in its passage from one body to another? Then there would be a modification of a modification, and the figure in itself abstracted from all body, would be a kind of substance of a secondary order, permanent under modifications. These are but absurd dreams in which that is applied to the concrete which belongs to the idea only in the abstract. This transition of the forms would suppose their separate existence, and thus we might have all kinds of abstract figures, cubes, spheres, circles, triangles, etc., subsisting in themselves without application to any thing figured.

22. A still stricter demonstration of this truth is possible. If we suppose a figure, numerically the same, to pass from one body to another; the block A, which loses the cubic form, transmits it to the body B. Now, this individual form cannot be in both at the same time. Suppose that after the cubic form has left the block A, we turn it back before it has touched the body B, evidently it will not be the same in both: therefore the body B has not acquired the same, but only a similar form. It is also evident that in order to give the cubic form, we need not take it from another; therefore, the form of one is not individually that of the other; otherwise we should have to say that it is and is not, that it is preserved and ceases to exist at the same time.

23. The term transmission or communication of motion, which is so much used in physical science, expresses something real so long as limited to the phenomenon which is under calculation; but it would be an absurdity, if it meant that the same motion which was in one body has passed to another. The sum of the quantities of motion is the same in elastic bodies after impact as before it; the velocity being divided between them, and the one gaining what the other loses. This is proved by calculation, and confirmed by experience. But it is evident that one body does not impart the same individual velocity which it contained to the other body; for not only can the velocity not be separated from the body and pass from one subject to another; but it cannot even be conceived except as a relation, the idea of which includes the ideas of a body moved, of space, and of time. It is true that Q representing the quantity of the motion before impact, the value of Q remains the same after impact; but this only expresses the phenomenon in relation to its effects, as subject to calculation; not that the velocity in the second member of the equation is composed of the parts of the first. Let A and B represent two bodies, the individual masses of which are expressed by these two letters; and V, v their respective velocities before impact. The quantity of motion will be Q = A × V + B × v. After impact there will be a new velocity which we may call w, and the quantity of motion will be Q = A × w + B × u. Mathematically speaking, the value of Q will be the same; but this only means that if the results of the motion be expressed in lines or numbers, we shall have the same after impact as before it; it does not and cannot mean that in the velocity u, considered as united to the subject, there is a portion of velocity which has been detached from V to be joined to v.

24. Hence, we do not conceive the accidents of bodies as possible without a subject in which they are inherent; and that substances are not inherent in another being, but are conceived and really exist without this inherence. A figure cannot exist without a thing figured, but the thing figured may still exist, through all other things are destroyed. The analysis of the nature of substance shows that its existence supposes the existence of another being which produced it; but relation between them is that of cause and effect, not of inherence, or that of the subject and its modification.

25. These last observations explain another mark of corporeal substances. In the third chapter of this book we found the three characteristics of being, the relation of the permanent to the variable, and the subject of the variations; we now find a fourth, which is a negation, non-inherence in another. This negative characteristic is included in the positive one, permanent subject of variations; for it is clear that in conceiving a subject permanent amid variations we do not include inherence, but rather deny it, at least implicitly. Non-inherence supposes something positive, something on which is founded the denial of the necessity of being inherent. What is this something? We know not. We know that it exists, but its explanation is beyond our reach. It is probably inexplicable without the intuition of the essence of things; – an intuition which we have not.

CHAPTER V.
CONSIDERATIONS ON CORPOREAL SUBSTANCE IN ITSELF

26. The idea of substance, such as we have thus far explained it, implies a relation to accidents in general. The idea we are now examining is not that of an indeterminate substance, but of corporeal substance; and it must be confessed that it is difficult to conceive a particular corporeal substance without any accident. If I take from the paper, on which I am writing, its figure, extension, and all that relates to my senses, what is there left for me to conceive something particular and determinate, something which is not the idea of being in general, but of this being in particular? It is clear that, in order that the object may not disappear altogether, and losing its individuality be confounded in the universal idea, I must reserve something by which I can say this: that is to say, that which is here, or which has affected me in this or that manner, or has been the subject of such or such modifications. I consider at least its position with respect to other bodies, or its causality in relation to the effects which it has produced in me, or its nature as the subject of determinate accidents. Just as the idea of finite substance in general involves relation to certain accidents in general, the idea of a particular substance involves relation to particular accidents.

27. We find this relation in our mode of conceiving corporeal substance; we cannot assert that it is involved in the nature of the substance. This nature is unknown to us, and when we attempt to examine it, we pass to another question, that of the essence of bodies.

28. Neither can we say how far the identity of the corporeal substance continues under its different transformations. The partisans of corpuscular philosophy consider all transformations as mere local motions, and all the variations which we see in bodies as mere results of the different position of the corpuscles among themselves. Leibnitz resolved matter into an infinity of monads, differing from the atoms of Epicurus, but conducing to the substantial invariability of bodies, which are only a collection of indivisible substances, which he calls monads. The Aristotelians believed that, of the changes of bodies, some were accidental, as figure, motion, density, warmth, cold, etc.; others substantial, as the change of wood to ashes. But in all the variety of systems, all admit something permanent, the subject of the changes. The Atomists and Leibnitz evidently admitted the identity of the subject. As to the Aristotelians, although the change which introduced a substantial form different from the first substantially transformed the being, so that after the change of the substantial form it could not be said that one was substantially the other, they still thought there was a common subject in these substantial transformations, and this was what they called the first matter, materia prima. All systems of philosophy admit this clear and evident truth, that in the midst of the transformations of the corporeal world, there is something permanent.

29. This corporeal substance being a reality, must not only exist, but it must be something determinate. This substantial determination of the body, which makes it this particular thing, and distinguishes it in its internal nature, in its essence, from all other bodies of other species, the Aristotelians called the substantial form. The subject of this form, or actuality, which was common to all bodies, they called the materia prima, which was a pure potentiality, a sort of medium between pure nothing and actual being.

30. Ever since there have been schools of philosophy, these points have been disputed; and it is probable they always will be; but it is to very little purpose. We know the existence of the corporeal world, we know its relations to ourselves, we know its properties and its laws, so far as they are subject to our observation; but its intrinsic nature is beyond the reach of our senses, or our instruments. Increased acuteness of observation and improvement in the power and delicacy of instruments, discovers new mysteries, and man finds the barriers which he believed the ne plus ultra, removed from him as he advances. Will he ever be able to pass them? Will he ever make the entire circuit of this scientific world? Is the knowledge of the intrinsic nature of the subject of this infinity of phenomena which astonish us, reserved to the future? It is hard to believe it. The telescope, becoming more perfect, extends the limits of the universe, and seems to behold the infinitely great; the perfection of the microscope, advancing in the opposite direction, regards the infinitely little. Where are the limits? It is probable that man is not permitted to reach them while in this world. The mind of man in its fruitful activity, struggles alternately after the two extremes, but just as he flatters himself he is reaching the last limit, he feels that something stronger than himself withholds him from attaining the object of his noble desires; it is the chain that binds him to the mortal body, and obstructs the flight of his pure spirit.

CHAPTER VI.
SUBSTANTIALITY OF THE HUMAN ME

31. We have not found perfect unity in corporeal substances: all that are subject to our senses may be resolved into a number of others equally substances in their turn; a body is rather an aggregate of substances, than one substance. We do not find the unity in the bodies; we attribute it to them either inasmuch as they form a common link of our sensations, or inasmuch as we consider the different substances subordinated to one being and governing substance. Thus the parts of an animated body constitute a sort of unity, inasmuch as they are subordinate to the principle which animates them.

32. We do not conclude from this that true unity does not exist in bodies; if we could know their essence, we should doubtless discover it, whether in the monads, as maintained by Leibnitz, or in something else more or less resembling them. Although this knowledge of their essence is denied us, reason leads us to this unity. The composite is formed of parts; if these parts are in turn formed of others, we must at last come to something which has no parts; here we find the indivisible, or rather, the true unity. This reasoning is equally valid, even though we suppose matter to be infinitely divisible. Infinite divisibility would suppose an infinity of parts into which any body may be divided: these parts would therefore exist; these infinitesimal elements would be real: the unity would be in them.

33. Independently of the external world, we find the idea of substance in ourselves; consciousness reveals its real application and perfect unity. Consciousness makes known to us that we think, desire, feel, and experience an infinity of affections, some of which are subject to our will and are the product of the internal activity of our soul; others are independent of us, they come without our will, and often against it, and it is not always in our power to reproduce them even if we wish it.

This ebb and flow of ideas, volitions, and sentiments, have a point in which they are connected, a subject which receives them, remembers them, combines them, and seeks or avoids them; this being, of which we are internally conscious, philosophers have called the me. It is one and identical under all transformations; this unity, this identity, is an indisputable fact which consciousness reveals to us. Who could make us doubt that the me which thinks at the present moment is not the same which thought yesterday, which thought years ago? Notwithstanding the variety of thoughts and desires, the changes of opinion and will, who could deprive us of the firm and deep conviction which we have that we are the same who experience them all, that there is something here within us which is the subject of them all?

34. If there were not something in us permanent in the midst of this variety, the consciousness of the me would be impossible. Memory and combination would also be impossible; for there would be within us only a succession of unconnected phenomena. Thinking is impossible without something which thinks and remains identical under the variety of the forms of thought. There is, therefore, within us a simple subject which connects all the changes which occur in it: there is a substance. In it there is unity: the unity which we only find in corporeal substances after an infinite series of decompositions, is presented to us in the spiritual substance, at the first instant, as a simple internal fact, without which, all the phenomena which we perceive within us are absurd, and all experience of the external world impossible.

Without the unity of the me there can be no sensation, and without sensation no experience of the beings around us.

CHAPTER VII.
RELATION OF THE PROPOSITION, I THINK, TO THE SUBSTANTIALITY OF THE ME

35. The proposition, I think, can have no sense unless we admit that the soul is a substance. Philosophy loses its resting-point, and all that experience within us is a series of unconnected phenomena, incapable of being observed, or subjected to any rule.

36. My present thought is not individually my thought of yesterday, as my thought of to-morrow will not be my thought of to-day. These thoughts, considered in themselves and abstracted from a subject in which they are found, have no connection with one another: perhaps their objects are without any relation to each other, or even contradictory; perhaps the thought of to-day is the denial of the thought of yesterday.

37. The same is true of all thoughts, all acts of the will, of all sentiments, imaginary representations, and sensations, and, in general, of all that I experience within myself. Turning my attention to all internal affections, whatever they may be, I see in them only a series of phenomena, a sort of current of existences passing away and disappearing, some never to return, others to reappear at a different time, expressly presenting this difference. The reappearance is not individual, but similar: the affection which is repeated is not the same, but another resembling it. When the affection returns, I am conscious of its presence at the time, and conscious of its presence at a previous time; this double consciousness constitutes recollection, makes me distinguish between the two affections, and necessarily implies the judgment that one is not the other. There would be no recollection, if the affection recalling were identified with the affection recalled. A thing presents itself, but does not recall itself.

38. Therefore every thing passes away within us never to return, the disappearance is real, the reappearance but apparent; that which ceases to be can never return to be again; there may be a similar thing, but not the same; that which was, is passed, and time does not retrace its steps.

39. Therefore, the series of internal phenomena, considered in themselves and abstracted from the subject in which they reside, are necessarily unconnected, and there is no way of subordinating the terms of the series to any law, or connecting link.

40. Still this law exists in all our intellectual acts; reason, without laws which govern it, would be the greatest of absurdities; this link is found in all our affections. That they pass from us with their distinction and difference and resemblance is a fact of our mind, to which we are subjected, as to a primitive and inevitable condition of our existence.

41. The proposition, I think, in the sense in which the word think includes all internal affections, does not relate to isolated phenomena alone, but it necessarily implies a point, which we call the me, in which these phenomena are connected. If this point does not exist, if it is not one and identical, the thought of to-day can have no connection with the thought of yesterday: they are two distinct things, at different times, and perhaps contradictory: when I say to-day, I think, and mean that the I is the same as in the proposition, I thought yesterday, my language would be absurd; if they are mere phenomena, two thoughts without any connecting link, the me is nothing, I cannot say, I thought, I think; but I must say there was thought, there is thought. If, then, you ask me, where? in whom? I must reply, that there is no where, no who; I must deny the supposition, and confine myself to repeating, there was thought, there is thought.

42. To say me, it is necessary to suppose a permanent reality; a reality, because that which is not real is nothing; permanent, because that which passes away disappears, ceases to be, and cannot serve as the point to unite other things.