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faint ftruggle, that fhews we are in an element which does not belong to us. So that when I speak of cause, and efficient cause, I only mean certain affections of the mind, that cause certain changes in the body; or certain powers and properties in bodies, that work a change in the mind. As if I were to explain the motion of a body falling to the ground, I would fay it was caused by gravity; and I would endeavour to fhew after what manner this power operated, without attempting to fhew why it operated in this manner: or if I were to explain the effects of bodies ftriking one another by the common laws of percuffion, I fhould not endeavour to explain how motion itself is communicated.

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IT is no fmall bar in the way of our inquiry into the cause of our paffions, that the occafion of many of them are given, and that their governing motions are communicated at a time when we have not capacity to reflect on them; at a time of which all fort of memory is worn out of our minds. For befides fuch things as affect us in various manners, according to their natural powers, there are affociations made at that early season, which we find it very hard afterwards to diftinVOL. I.

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guish

guish from natural effects. Not to mention the unaccountable antipathies which we find in many perfons, we all find it impoffible to remember when a fteep became more terrible than a plain; or fire or water more terrible than a clod of earth; though all thefe are very probably either conclufions from experience, or arising from the premonitions of others; and some of them impreffed, in all likelihood, pretty late. But as it must be allowed that many things affect us after a certain manner, not by any natural powers they have for that purpose, but by affociation; so it would be abfurd, on the other hand, to say that all things affect us by affociation only; fince fome things must have been originally and naturally agreeable or difagreeable, from which the others derive their afsociated powers; and it would be, I fancy, to little purpose to look for the cause of our paffions in affociation, until we fail of it in the natural properties of things.

SECT. III.

CAUSE OF PAIN AND FEAR.

I HAVE before obferved,* that whatever is qualified to caufe terrour, is a foundation capable of the fublime; to which I add, that not only thefe, but many things from which we cannot probably apprehend any danger, have a fimilar

*Part I. fect. 8.

effect,

effect, because they operate in a fimilar manner. I obferved too,* that whatever produces pleasure, pofitive and original pleasure, is fit to have beauty engrafted on it. Therefore, to clear up the nature of these qualities, it may be neceffary to explain the nature of pain and pleasure on which they depend. A man who fuffers under violent bodily pain, (I suppose the most violent, because the effect may be the more obvious;) I fay a man -in great pain has his teeth fet, his eye-brows are violently contracted, his forehead is wrinkled, his eyes are dragged inwards, and rolled with great vehemence, his hair ftands an end, the voice is forced out in fhort fhrieks and groans, and the whole fabrick totters. Fear or terrour, which is an apprehenfion of pain or death, exhibits exactly the fame effects, approaching in violence to those just mentioned, in proportion to the nearness of the cause, and the weakness of the fubject. This is not only fo in the human fpecies: but I have more than once obferved in dogs, under an apprehenfion of punishment, that they have writhed their bodies, and yelped, and howled, as if they had actually felt the blows. From hence I conclude, that pain and fear act upon the fame parts of the body, and in the fame manner, though somewhat differing in degree: that pain and fear confift in an unnatural tenfion of the nerves; that this is fome

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times accompanied with an unnatural ftrength, which fometimes fuddenly changes into an extraordinary weaknefs; that these effects often come on alternately, and are fometimes mixed with each other. This is the nature of all convulfive agitations, especially in weaker fubjects, which are the most liable to the fevereft impreffions of pain and fear. The only difference between pain and terrour is, that things which cause pain operate on the mind, by the intervention of the body; whereas things that cause terrour, generally affect the bodily organs by the operation of the mind fuggefting the danger; but both agreeing, either primarily, or fecondarily, in producing a tenfion, contraction, or violent emotion of the nerves,* they agree likewife in every thing elfe. For it appears very clearly to me, from this, as well as from many other examples, that when the body is difpofed, by any means whatfoever, to fuch emotions as it would acquire by the means of a certain paffion; it will of itself excite fomething very like that paffion in the mind.

*I do not here enter into the question debated among phyologifts, whether pain be the effect of a contraction, or a tention of the nerves. Either will ferve my purpofe; for by tenfion, I mean no more than a violent pulling of the fibres, which compofe any mufcle or membrane, in whatever way this is done.

SECT.

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TO this purpose Mr. Spon, in his Récherches d'Antiquité, gives us a curious ftory of the celebrated phyfiognomift Campanella. This man, it seems, had not only made very accurate obfervations on human faces, but was very expert in mimicking fuch as were any way remarkable. When he had a mind to penetrate into the inclinations of those he had to deal with, he compofed his face, his gesture, and his whole body, as nearly as he could into the exact fimilitude of the perfon he intended to examine; and then carefully obferved what turn of mind he feemed to acquire by this change. So that, fays my author, he was able to enter into the difpofitions and thoughts of people as effectually as if he had been changed into the very men. I have often observed, that on mimicking the looks and geftures of angry, or placid, or frighted, or daring men, I have involuntarily found my mind turned to that paffion, whose appearance I endeavoured to imitate; nay, I am convinced it is hard to avoid it, though one ftrove to separate the passion from its correspondent geftures. Our minds and bodies are fo clofely and intimately connected, that one is incapable of pain or pleasure without the other. Campanella, of

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