PERSISTENCE OF FEELINGS IN IDEA.

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by an emotion, we have a further means of characterizing it. If it be a pleasure intensely felt, the fact is shown by the efforts made to secure the continuance of the delight; if a pain, a corresponding energy, with a view to deliverance, attests the circumstance. The volitional character of a feeling, therefore, is an indication of its pleasurable or painful nature, liable only to the disturbing influence of a fixed idea. All our pleasures stimulate us more or less to active pursuit; all our pains to precautionary efforts. When we see a man's avocations, we infer what things give him satisfaction, or cause him suffering. We read the pangs of hunger, cold, and disease, and the pleasures of exercise and repose, repletion, warmth, music, spectacle, affection, honour, and power, in the everyday industry of mankind. The freely-chosen conduct of any living creature is the ultimate, though not infallible, criterion of its pleasures and pains. Accordingly, I shall still abide by the method observed in discussing the sensations, of specifying under each emotion the conduct flowing from it, or the manner and degree of its stimulation of the Will.

Intellectual Characters of Feeling.

16. In describing the successive classes of sensations, I adverted to the power that they possess of continuing as ideas after the actual object of sense is withdrawn. This property of Persistence, and also of recurrence in Idea, belonging more or less to sensational states, is their intellectual property; for intellect is made up of ideas, and these are first stimulated in the mind by realities. The same distinction applies, although in a less marked degree, to the emotions generally; some are more disposed than others to leave traces and be recovered without the original exciting cause. The Tender emotion, as a general rule, has an easy persistence, while Anger more speedily exhausts itself. The emotions of Fine Art are said to be 'refined,' owing partly to the circumstance of their existing as remembered, or anticipated, emotions more readily, and at less expense to the system, than some of

B

the other pleasures. Moreover, each separate emotion has modes of manifestation both gross and refined-as in the contrast of vulgar marvels with the novelties of scientific discovery.

17. The revival of an emotion in idea depends upon various conditions, such as have been discussed under the law of association by contiguity. Besides the circumstance just alluded to, namely, that some kinds of feeling are, by nature, more persisting, it is a peculiarity of Individual Characters to retain certain emotions in preference to others. One man, for example, has a facility in keeping up the emotion arising from the love of gain, another lives more easily in family pride, and a third in fine art. Then, there is to be taken into account the fact of Repetition, so largely concerned in acquisition in general. An emotion often felt, is apt, in consequence, to be more readily remembered, imagined, or acted upon, than one that has been but rarely experienced. And in addition to all these permanent causes, there are Temporary Circumstances that affect the restoration of an emotional state. The prevailing tone and temper of the moment favours the assumption of one class of feelings, and repudiates other sorts. The state of fear is necessarily hostile to the feeling of confidence; love, in the ascendant, renders it difficult to revive even the idea of hatred or indignation. We may note, lastly, the state of the Bodily Organs, and the nervous system generally; for a certain freshness or vigour in those parts is requisite both for emotions in their full reality, and for their easy recurrence in idea.

The recovery of an emotional state after a lapse of time, independent of the original stimulus, implies some link of Association between it and other things, through whose instrumentality the revival takes place. When we remember the feelings experienced during the recital of some stirring tale, we do so in consequence of the presence of an associated object or circumstance-such as the place, a person present at the same time, or otherwise. There must, therefore, be a process of Contagious adhesion between emotions and the imagery of

CAUSING A SUSTAINED VOLITION.

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the world at large. This is one of the intellectual properties of emotion, and has been exemplified in the exposition of the law of contiguity (§ 46). The more intellectual classes of feelings are the most disposed to this alliance with things in general. The same peculiarity that fits an emotional state for existing as an idea, fits it also for being linked with places, persons, names, and all sorts of objects, so as to put it in the way of being resuscitated.

The re-instating force of Similarity in difference applies to the Emotions no less than to the Emotional Sensations (Similarity, § 15). The same emotional state may arise sometimes in one connection, and sometimes in another; a certain shade of Fear, Anger, or Self-complacency, may be developed in a variety of circumstances; it will then happen that, by the attraction of similars, the one occasion will suggest the others. This is a strictly intellectual process, although relative to the workings of emotion.*

Mixed Characters of Emotion.

18. There are certain important aspects and characteristics of our feelings that do not belong exclusively to any one of the three foregoing heads, but which are of a mixed or compound nature. When a feeling prompts the will strongly, as, for example, hunger, it is farther to be ascertained whether the same power belongs to it as an idea, a recollection, or au anticipation. This last circumstance obviously involves the property of intellectual continuance; if the feeling is one that does not persist, the action on the will ceases when the pressure of the reality ceases. If, on the contrary, the feeling is retained as an idea, the influence on the will is a more enduring nature; we have then a perpetual resolution and not a mere impulse of a moment. The power of causing a sustained volition, or perpetual will, is therefore a compound attribute, involving both a volitional and an intellectual property.

• The whole subject of Ideal Emotion is so important, that at a later stage I shall devote a chapter to the elucidation of it in detail.

All the systematic provisions and precautions of human life grow out of feelings thet spur us to action, both when they are present in reality, and while existing only as ideas. The constant labour for food implies that the sensation of hunger has an intellectual persistence as well as an active stimulus. There are not a few examples of states of sensation, very powerful in prompting action while they last, but having scarcely any force when the reality becomes a mere idea. Our organic pains are often of this nature; a fit of neuralgia or dyspepsia, for whose removal no sacrifice would be thought too great, if happening but seldom, is apt to be unheeded after having passed away. It is the frequent recurrence of such attacks that at last produces the perpetual will of precautionary prudence; repetition makes up for the natural deficiency in the intellectual property of existing as an idea. There are other pains that from the very first take a deeper hold on the mind, and maintain their volitional influence in the absence of the reality. The feeling of disgrace is an instance. Most people retain a lively sense of this danger, so as to be always ready to avoid whatever is likely to incur it. The pain of disgrace may not be greater for the moment than the pain of toothache; but, to whatever circumstance owing, the ideal persistence of the one is so much beyond the persistence of the other, as to make the enormous difference between the preventive measures maintained against the two evils.

Individual constitutions differ considerably in respect to the classes of pains that take the greatest hold of the intellect, and thereby influence the course of action. In some minds, the physical sensations of organic pain are forgotten as soon as passed, and consequently the least possible care is taken to obviate them; with others, a lively sense of their misery presides over all the actions of life.

In the conflict of opposite motives, it is common to have one feeling in the actual opposed to another in the idea. This is the case when present gratification is restrained by the consideration of remote consequences. In order that the

CONTROL OF THE THOUGHTS.

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dread of the future may prevail over the present, it is necessary that the intellectual hold of the absent evil should be sufficient to keep alive the volitional spur belonging to the reality. Thus it is that what is termed self-control, prudential restraint, moral strength, consists in the intellectual permanency of the volitional element of our feelings.

A parallel illustration holds with reference to pleasures. Weakly remembered, they do not, in absence, stimulate the voluntary efforts for securing them; more strongly remembered, they become standing objects of pursuit. It may be said, in this case, that if we had the memory of them in full, more is needless; just as a man that has a book by heart cares not to take up the volume; but memory in matters of enjoyment is seldom, if ever, full actually. The usual case is to have the remembrance of the pleasure, with the consciousness that it falls short of the reality; and this is a spur to obtain the full fruition. Such is Desire.

19. Control of the Intellectual Trains and Acquirements.Among the effects produced by states of feeling are to be reckoned those that enable us to store up impressions of the outer world, constituting the materials of our knowledge or intelligence. The exercise of the senses upon things around us is a mode of voluntary action, and is governed more or less by the accompanying feelings. Objects that please the eye receive in turn a protracted gaze; and in consequence they are more deeply stamped upon the recollection. Things utterly indifferent to us pass unheeded, and are forgotten. A painful spectacle repels the vision; but in this case the state of revulsion so excites the nervous susceptibility that a very strong impression may be left, although the glance has been never so transient. Thus it is that both pleasure and pain are, although in different ways, stimulants of the attention and aids to intellectual retentiveness. We hence become conversant with all things that have the power of kindling agreeable or disagreeable emotion; our minds are stored with recollections of what we love or hate.

There is something at first sight anomalous in the pro