Hume : with helps to the study of Berkeley : essays / by Thomas H. Huxley.

Date:
1894
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Hume : with helps to the study of Berkeley : essays / by Thomas H. Huxley. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    It will be observed that the sensiferous wall and the external world are of the same nature; what- ever it is that constitutes them both is expressible in terms of matter and motion. Whatever changes take place in the sensiferous apparatus are con- tinuous with, and similar to, those which take place in the external world But, with the sen- sorium, matter and motion come to an end ; while phenomena of another order, or immaterial states of consciousness, make their appearance. How is the relation between the material and the im- material phenomena to be conceived ? This is 1 The following diagrammatic scheme may help to elucidate the theory of sensation :— Mediate Knowledge Immediate Knowledge Sensiferous Apparatus Objects of Sense -V Receptive. Transmissive. Sensificatory (Sense Organ) (Nerve) (Sensorimn) Sensations and other States of Conscionsness Hypothetical Substance of Matter Hj'pothetical Substance of Mind Physical World Mental World Not Self Self Non-Ego or Object Ego or Subject Immediate knowledge is confined to states of consciousness, or, in other words, to the phenomena of mind. Knowledge of the physical world, or of one’s own body and of objects e.xternal to it, is a system of beliefs or judgments based on the sensations. The term “self” is applied not only to the series of mental phenomena which constitute the ego, but to the fragment of the physical world which is their constant concomitant. The cor- ])ore.n,l self, therefore, is part of the non-ego ; and is objective in relation to the ego as subject.