Volume 1

The hand : its mechanism and vital endowments, as evincing design.

  • Bell, Charles, Sir, 1774-1842
Date:
1833
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The hand : its mechanism and vital endowments, as evincing design. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    asked—whether we can direct the hand without. knowing where the hand is? Must there not. be a feeling or knowledge of the position of the hand, before we can give it direction to an. object? And must we not have a conception of the relation of the muscles and of the position of the axis of the eye, before we can alter its direction to fix it upon a new object? It surprises me to find ingenious men refusing: their assent to the opinion, that the operation of: the muscles of the eye is necessary to perfect. vision, when the gradual acquisition of the: power may be seen in observing the awakening: sense in the infant. When a bright object is withdrawn from the infant’s eye, there is: a blank expression in the features; and an. excitement when the object is again presented. For a time, the shifting of the object is not attended with the searching action of the eye: but, by and by, the eye follows it and looks. around for it, when it is lost. In this gradual. acquisition of power in the eye, there is an exact. parallel to the acquisition of motion in the hand ;_, and in both instances, we seek to join the ex- | perience obtained by means of the muscular motion with the impression on the proper nerve © of sense. Some maintain that our idea of the position of an object is implanted in the mind and inde- pendent of experience. We must acknowledge