ACQUISITIONS IN ABSTRACT SCIENCE. RETENTIVENESS IN SCIENCE. 439 70. By science, I here understand the artificial symbolism and machinery, requisite for expressing the laws and properties of the world, as distinguished from the actual appearances of things to the common eye, of which I have already spoken under the heads of natural conjunctions, successions, &c. Thus, a treatise on Astronomy is a mass of algebraical calculations and numerical tables. Nothing can well be more unlike the aspects of sun, moon, and planets, than the formulæ and tables expressing the scientific relations of these bodies. The OBJECT sciences range from the extremely abstract and symbolical, such as Mathematics, where nature in its obvious guise is utterly excluded, to the more concrete subjects of Natural History, wherein some part at least of the acquisition consists in storing up the common appearances of animals, plants, and minerals. The conditions of the acquirement differ, according as any branch is nearer the one or the other extreme. Thus, theoretical Mechanics, Astronomy, and Optics, come under the mathematical class. The experimental parts of Chemistry, Physiology, and Anatomy approach the other end of the scale: in these, the adhesiveness of the natural history mind for sensible appearances and properties, is of the highest consequence. To advert to the more abstract sciences, which represent science as most opposed to our unscientific images and notions of the things about us :-the symbols of Arithmetic and Mathematics in general, the symbols and nomenclature of Chemistry (combining proportions, atoms, &c.), the nomenclature and abstractions of Physiology (cells, corpuscles, ultimate fibres, secreting glands), require a peculiar cast of intellect for their acquisition; and they are so far of a piece that the mental adhesiveness suited for one would not be much at fault in any other. They are a collection of bare forms not remarkably numerous, which are to be held in the mind with great tenacity, and to be accepted as the sole representatives of the phenomena. The selfdenial that enables us to dwell among algebraical symbols, concentrating the force of the brain upon them, to the exclusion of all those things that gratify the various senses and emotions, this abnegation, so to speak, of human interest, is the moral peculiarity of the mathematician. It is not necessary that the mathematical mind should be entirely destitute of attraction for colour and beauty, and picturesqueness, and music, but it is necessary for such a mind to cast all these out of the view, and to grapple with the artificial symbols that express the important truths of the world. The interest in attaining the sure and certain laws of the universe, is the motive for immersing the mind in such a cheerless labyrinth of uncouth characters; this motive being once strong in an individual, the other chief requisite is great natural adhesiveness for arbitrary symbols, an adhesiveness that, if depending on local causes, results, in a considerable measure, from the moderate degree of the competing sensibility of the eye-the feeling of Colour. The symbols of a science are few in comparison with the words of a language, but the hold of the one must be much more severe than of the other. A circle used as a diagram in Euclid, must make a deeper impression than a circle as an alphabetic letter. With Euclid's circle has to be associated innumerable lines and constructions, which can never be all presented to the eye at one time, but must be firmly held in idea alone, ready to be brought up on the hint being given; to the alphabetical circle there is no such array of ideal appendages; it is conceived simply as it can be written, and only as regards its visible difference from the other letters of the same alphabet. It is this complication of visible figures, with a multitude of associates not possible to exhibit at once to the eye, and which yet must all be at command, that gives such an intellectual character to scientific reasonings. The Geometrician must retain, in connexion with a circle, all the constructions of Euclid's Third Book, and, if need be, all the constructions that ACQUISITIONS IN THE EXPERIMENTAL SCIENCES. 441 precede and give foundation to these, and likewise the language that represents in words what cannot be presented to the eye; all which puts to a severe test the cerebral adhesiveness for uninteresting forms. Moreover, this adhesion must rapidly get firm at every step, otherwise the earlier steps of a deduction would be lost before the later were fixed. In an algebraical problem, where x is put for one thing, and y for another, the learner must, by the force of a single repetition, remember all through that these letters stand for such and such things. Persons not rapidly impressed with these arbitrary connexions, are unqualified for mathematics. In Arithmetic, the ciphers, their additions, subtractions, multiplications, and the decimal system of reckoning, are of the nature of associations of symbolical forms, and require the firm concentration of the mind upon arbitrary signs for the sake of the end they serve. In Algebra, the same operation is carried to a higher complexity, but without any difference in the nature of the machinery. In Geometry, a host of definitions have to be remembered; that is, a line, a space, a square, a circle, must be associated with certain other lines and constructions, with the assistance of language. ‘A circle is a line equally distant from a central point.' The association here is between the visible aspect of the circle, with its central point, and a line drawn from the centre to the circumference, which line is a representative line, and may be drawn anywhere round the whole compass of the figure. This principle of representation is a thing of the intellect entirely; for, in addition to the sensible object, there is a fact, or a multitude of facts, that cannot be made apparent to the eye at one and the same moment. In the experimental and concrete sciences-as Heat, Electricity, Chemistry, Anatomy, and Natural History in general -the consideration of the actual appearances to the senses, mixes largely with the artificial symbols and abstractions, and hence the value of a good adhesiveness for colour and shape, for touch, and even for taste and smell, in storing up the objects of those sciences. The Mathematical mind may be quite at fault here, just as the Natural History mind is apt to be unsuited for the mathematical group of subjects. In Anatomy, for example, there is a vast detail of bones, ligaments, muscles, blood vessels, nerves, &c., and the visual adhesiveness for mere colour is an element in the recollection, as with a map, or a pictorial landscape. The tactual adhesiveness is of some value in this class of objects, and in the various objects of the natural history class-minerals, plants, and animals, all which are handled as well as seen. Thus it is that there are, for the OBJECT Sciences, two classes of scientific minds, represented by the extreme terms, Mathematics and Natural History-the abstract or artificial, and the concrete or real. As regards the modes of human interest or fascination, a greater number of classes could be made out: pure mathematics, as in Algebra and Geometry, would have a different set of votaries from mathematics applied in Mechanics, Astronomy, Optics, &c.; and the natural history group would be both separated from experimental Physics and Chemistry, and broken up into its component members, Mineralogy, Geology, Botany, and Zoology. 71. In the next place, as regards the SUBJECT world, we have one comprehensive science, termed Mind, Mental Science, Mental Philosophy, Psychology, &c. Although the science of mind comprehends many phenomena of an object character, namely, all the outward or observed accompaniments of mind, and all the outward displays of human action, thought, and feeling, it is nevertheless essentially based on the consciousness possessed by each of our own mental states. The taking cognizance of the facts of our own mind, as phenomena to be known and studied, is one of the meanings of the name 'consciousness.' A better designation is self-consciousness, or the power of introspection. Locke applies the name 'Reflection' to this operation; it has also been called the Internal Sense, because it is, to the subject world, what the External Senses are to the object world. There is, in some individuals, a special aptitude for this department of knowledge. An abundant recollection of sub CONDITIONS OF A KNOWLEDGE OF THE MIND. 443 ject states-of feelings and ideas considered as to their mental sequences-is necessary to the mental philosopher, and is of value to all persons requiring a knowledge of mind for their respective vocations; among whom we may instance the Poet, the Historian, the Orator, the Politician, the Teacher, the Preacher. It is no easy matter to lay down the precise intellectual conditions of the special retentiveness for the phenomena of mind. We have not here the advantage of a distinct organ to appeal to, as with the pictorial memory, or the musical memory; and yet it is an indisputable fact, that feelings and the successions of ideas, considered as knowledge, are better discriminated, identified, and remembered by some men than by others. A good general adhesiveness, coupled with a motive to concentrated attention on the laws of mind, would obviously go a considerable way. But if we are farther to inquire into the circumstances that confer a select and special power of retaining subject states in the memory, like the susceptibility to colour applied to the recollection of visible images, we have only negative conditions to appeal to. Given a certain plastic energy of the mind, that energy will be directed, either upon the object world, or upon the subject, or upon both, in varying proportions. If there be an almost exclusive bent towards the outward, there will be the minimum of attention paid to the inner world of the subjective consciousness. If the outer world attracts us in only a moderate degree, there will be large surplus of force available for the other. Now, it is not difficult to assign the forces and dispositions that constitute our Object regards. They follow strictly the object side of our being, namely, movement in the first instance, and, in the next, those sensations that, by connecting themselves closely with movement, are looked upon as object properties. Perhaps the foremost circumstance inclining to the objective point of view is a great endowment for muscular action in all its forms. In some minds, the forces of the system are profusely inclined towards bodily movement and activity. |