What is called will, indeed, is nothing more in itself, or by itself, than an Emotion of Desire. And Desire is the same thing, considered as a mental emotion, whether it be gratified or not. Thus Hunger is a name given to a sensation of pain, and a desire to get rid of that pain; but the desire, as a feeling, is the same in its nature, whether we have food within our reach or not. Take the hypothesis, that an individual is taken down and left at the bottom of a coal-pit. He desires first to get to the top of the pit; he becomes hungry, and he desires food; but is the desire in either of these cases will or power? He may will what he desires, as long as he pleases, but no result will follow. The act of his will can neither lift him to the top of the pit, nor bring food down to the bottom. But if food be carried down and placed on a table before him; or if a seat, suspended from a rope, be let down and drawn up alternately for some time before his eyes; he may then gratify both desires; he may eat food, and ascend to the surface of the earth; and his doing so will then, in either case, be called an act of the will. But in so far as the mind of the individual is concerned, there has been nothing more than two desires, which arise independently of the will, and which depend, not on the will, but on conditions altogether independent of the will for their gratification. We have the same phenomena in the moving of an arm. What is called our will in that case, is merely a desire; and whether it be gratified or not depends -first, on the mechanism of the body, -and, secondly, on that mechanism being free of paralysis; conditions which are by no means dependent on our will. We have, in a word, to discover by experiment what desires are followed by what is desired, just as we discover what is nourishing for the body. And, having ascertained the fact, and no fact can be more miraculous than that a desire of the mind should be followed by motion in the arm, or by some other result,-it becomes familiar by repeated experiment; and we at last say, that, when ever we will, we have the power of moving the arm, or of performing

another act which follows the desire. Philosophically speaking, the language is incorrect; but it is useful in common life, since will is applied to all those cases in which desire is followed by what is desired, and wishes to cases in which the desire is productive of no immediate consequences. But if a wish be vivid, and continue long, such as a desire for fame or character, it may accomplish its end indirectly; since knowledge tells us what has gi ven fame and character to others, and by recording such thoughts, multiplying such emotions, and forming such habits, as are judged to have conferred distinction heretofore, we may secure it for ourselves.

Our readers will now have got some general notion of Dr Brown's theory. A history of our feelings would, on his views, be a history of the mind; and an analysis of these feelings gives us only Sensations, Emotions, Feelings of Relation, and Conception, or renova tions of former feelings of every de scription, without regard to their pri mary causes. The whole of these feelings, however, depend upon and arise from the laws or principles of the mind itself; for although sensation be referred to external causes, as many of our feelings of relation may also be, the susceptibility is in the mind solely. In one sense, therefore, they may all be called internal Feelings, and the laws which regulate them may also be called Powers, but the power is clearly not human. It is given, fixed, and limited by the Great First Cause, in whose existence we are just as much bound to believe, as in the existence of an artist when we see a picture; since the works of nature give us feelings of relation, present us with evidence of design and benevo lence, and suggest a good and intelligent operator, equally with the works of art. These fixed laws, then, which direct the movements of mind, and which, at first sight, may seem to shake the foundations of religion and morality, are the very grounds and bulwarks of both: since, unless they appeared obvious, in all that surrounded us, and which they can do only by their uniformity, we should perceive no traces of design, and have nothing to guide us in our conduct. All would be chaos around us, and within our own breasts, if we could calculate on no uniformity in the course of nature, or in the man

the organization of the brain. A trumpet, which enables a partially deaf person to hear certain sounds, does not hear, but it is the means by which the person who employs it acquires his knowledge of certain sounds. The organs of the brain (considered as amounting to thirty-three) are held by phrenologists to be the instruments by which the mind acquires definite information on definite subjects: and these instruments vary, sometimes in their number, and always in their size and activity in different individuals. Hence the variety of tempers and talents. These organs occasion specific propensities and sentiments, and bestow certain Knowing and Reflecting faculties. And these account, according to phrenology, for all the varieties of thought and conduct in the human race. The Propensities and Sentiments, it is plain, might all be converted into Appetites or Emotions; or the latter into the former. The Knowing Faculties, again, may be considered as the instruments of Sensation and Perception, and the renovations of these primary feelings; while the Reflecting Faculties may be the means by which we acquire our Feelings of Relation, and their renovations. Comparison and Casuality, the two great reflecting faculties, might be the instruments of all our feelings of relation, whether as to place or time; but Wit and Imitation would have to be resolved into Emotions, or rather into feelings of relation, through Comparison and Casuality, accompanied with Emotions of Desire and of the Ludicrous combined. But we shall not, at the present stage, pursue this comparison farther; contenting ourselves with the remark, that there is nothing unphilosophical in the theory that certain propensities and talents are always conjoined with a certain organization and visible developement of brain; and that, as making the laws of mind observable by visible signs, it is analogous, at least, to the other schemes of a wise and good Providence. Nor need it be feared that phrenology will tell too much of cha racter. The complicated operation of the different organs, supposing them to be established, will always leave enough unascertained; and, as to harshness or rashness of judgment, they would be no more to be dreaded than they ought to be at present in

the physiognomical judgments which we are daily in the habit of passing upon each other. Firmness balances fear; benevolence and conscientiousness restrain destructiveness; and one set of propensities, sentiments, and faculties, so balance and restrain their opposites, that the very best characters, and those who have the most extensive range of feelings of relation, moral and intellectual, may also be those who have propensities which, taken alone, would constantly endan ger themselves, or disturb the peace of society.

But it is time now to return to the metaphysics of Dr Brown; for there are some of his doctrines respecting Intuition which require farther elucidation. It would have been more systematical, we are aware, to have commenced with what is now to be considered; but, on subjects so very abstract, there is a propriety in repeating some views, and preparing the mind gradually for others, Dr Brown is of opinion, that, although there is intuition somewhere in the steps by which we reach a belief in external nature, there is also some reasoning in the progress. Our opinion is dif ferent. He does not pretend that reasoning precedes our belief of mental identity. We cannot say how we be lieve that the mind which feels to-day, is the same mind which felt yesterday, and which will feel to-morrow. Yet in this single proposition we have implied no less than four primary intuitive convictions. There is, first, a belief of self-existence of something that feels. There is, secondly, a be lief that what feels to-day felt yester day. There is in this, thirdly, a be lief in time, or a notion of before and after. There is, fourthly, a belief that what thought yesterday, and feels to day, will also feel to-morrow. In the last instance, there is a gift of prophecy. Consciousness tells us, and can tell us, of nothing but the past and the present. At no one moment of our existence can consciousness ever do more. We have not felt what is to come. Yet here there is a belief of what is to occur hereafter; and we are conscious, no doubt, of this faith in the future. We have, in one word, a notion of cause and effect,belief that we shall think to-morrow, because we think to-day, and thought yester day, a belief in the invariable course

a

of nature. That this belief of invariable sequence, that what has burnt us once will, in the same circumstances, burn us again, and that what has thought will think again,-is intuitive, primary, and not dependent on experience, is insisted on by Dr Brown more anxiously than any other proposition to be found in his work. But if established, as we think it is, does this invariableness of sequence not imply something else than ourselves? Does it not imply the existence of some principle, or power, or substance, distinct from the mind itself? We cannot, it is quite certain, apply the notion of cause and effect to external things,—to conduct in relation to something not willed by ourselves, without taking the belief of something extraneous for granted; and we cannot, we confess, form an idea of selfexistence and mental identity, without a belief, by implication, of some thing else than our own minds. But, in all events, we have various intuitive convictions implied in the notion of mental identity; and as we cannot, confessedly, trace backwards to the time when our belief in external nature began to exist; and as Dr Brown expressly allows this belief to be implied in every perception; why not allow it, at once, to be, like so many others, a primary intuitive conviction? "The feeling," he remarks, "to which we give the name of a rose is indeed a state of the mind, and of the mind only; but this very state of the mind, which arises, in certain circumstances, independently of any volition on our part, is a state of belief, of the existence of something distinct from ourselves, and corporal, to which we give the name of a rose. To perceive is to make this very reference, and to make it undoubtingly. The slate of the mind does not lead to the belief, BUT IT IS THE BELIEF; and, therefore, while the mind continues to be impressed with this and similar feelings, that are as much beyond the control of our reason as our will, it must, by the very nature of the feelings, be a BELIEVER in the outward things which its perceptions seem to point

out."

The impossibility of not believing in the existence of external nature is here admirably stated. But if there be a "necessity in our nature" for this belief, why should we have recourse

VOL. VI.

to a step of reasoning in accounting for it? If by the step of reasoning be meant a feeling of relation, we would readily admit it; since the irresistible force, which constrains us to believe in the existence of external objects,in the existence of our own bodies,is a feeling of relation between our own minds and external nature. For the state of our minds, for the moment, consists of a belief that our minds exist, and that external objects, invested with certain qualities perceivable by our minds, exist also. But when so much is implied, and believed, without proof, in the early and irresistible belief of mental identity, some modesty should be observed in calling for demonstration. The phrase is not applicable, and can have no meaning when applied to those primary laws, tendencies, and feelings or intuitions, on which all demonstration is erected. For the truth of these we can appeal only to the evidence of consciousness. They are the foundations on which all reasoning rests; for what else, indeed, is the process which we call reasoning but the recording of our feelings, and attending to the feelings of relation which arise in our minds when its Sensations, Thoughts, and Emotions, are compared with each other? The starting up of these in the mind, and our feelings of their mutual relations, is, and are just as absolute, and independent of our will, as the relations which the sides of a triangle bear to one another. When the triangle is presented, the relations are perceived, and believed to be immutable. The conviction arises in our minds, from the nature of our minds. But so do all our intuitive convictions. There is no difficulty, however, in presenting to all eyes the same triangle; but there is great difficulty in giving to ull minds the same thoughts. In the case of the triangle, which consists of three lines connected together in a certain manner, and nothing more, we have the thing itself; for although the feelings of relation which it occasions are not presented to the eye, the sign which occasions them is before all eyes, and the relations are referred to directly, as seen in the triangle, and not to any thing signified by it. But we cannot present our internal Sensations, Thoughts, or Emotions, to the eye of another. We are

3 E