Fundamental Philosophy, Vol. 2 (of 2). Balmes Jaime Luciano
to determinate objects; but at the side of these affections, limited to the sphere in which he is circumscribed, he experiences sentiments of a more elevated character, which make him spring beyond his orbit, and absorb, so to speak, his individuality in the ocean of infinity.
When man comes in contact with nature in herself, despoiled of all conditions relating to individuals, he experiences an indefinable sentiment, a kind of foretaste of the infinite. Go into an uninhabited region and sit down by the sea side; hark to the deafening roar of the waves breaking at your feet, and the whistling of the winds which have raised them; with eyes fixed on this immensity, see the azure line where the vault of heaven unites with the waters of the ocean: stand on a vast and desert plain, or in the heart of ancient forests; contemplate in the silence of night the firmament studded with stars, following their course in tranquillity, as they have followed it for ages past, and will follow it for ages to come: without effort, or labor of any kind, abandon yourself to the spontaneous movements of your soul, and you will see how sentiments spring up in it and move it to its very centre; how they elevate it above itself, and absorb it, as it were, in immensity. Its individuality vanishes from its own eyes, as it feels the harmony presiding over that immense creation of which it forms but a most insignificant part. In such solemn moments is it that inspired genius chants the glories of creation, and lifts one corner of the veil that hides the resplendent throne of the supreme Creator from the eye of mortals.
113. That calm, grave, and profound sentiment which masters us on such occasions, has no relation to individual objects; it is an expansion of the soul at a touch of nature, as the flower expands to the rays of the sun in the morning, it is a divine attraction by which the author of all created things raises us above the dust in which we drag out our brief days. Thus the heart and the understanding harmonize; thus the one foretastes what the other knows; thus we are warned in different ways, that the exercise of our faculties is not limited to the narrow orbit conceded to us upon this earth. Let us be on our guard, lest the heart be frozen with the coldness of insensibility, and the torch of the understanding quenched by the devastating blasts of skepticism.
CHAPTER XIX.
ELEMENTS AND VARIETY OF THE CHARACTERS OF SENSIBLE REPRESENTATION
114. I now come to examine the primitive elements of our mental combinations. I shall begin with their sensible elements. Extension enters into every act of representative sensibility; without it nothing is represented to us, and sensations are reduced to mere affections of the soul, having no relation to any object.
115. Extension, of itself, abstracted from its limitability, is susceptible of no combination; it only offers a vague, indefinite, immense representation, from which nothing distinct of itself results. But if limitability be joined to extension, figurability, that is, the infinite field over which geometrical science extends, will result.
116. Extension and limitability are then the two elements of sensible intuition. These elements may be offered to us in two ways, either joined to sensations which present to us determinate objects, or as productions of our own internal activity. If we see the disc of the moon, we have an intuition of the former class; and if we study the properties of a circle by producing within ourselves its representation, this will be an intuition of the latter class.
117. This internal activity, by which, at our will or caprice, we produce an indefinite number of representations, with an indefinite variety of forms, is an important phenomenon and one worthy of attention. It shows us that the productive activity is not limited to the purely intellectual order, since we detect it in the sensible order, not in any way whatever, but as unrolled on an infinite scale. Suppose a right line to be produced to infinity, besides it and in the same plane, we may infinite other lines; the variety of angles in which we may consider the position of the different lines will extend to the infinite; so that with right lines alone, the productive activity in the order of sensibility will know no limit. If we substitute curves for right lines, their combinations in form, in nature, in their respective positions and relations with determinate axes, will likewise be infinite: so that without quitting the sensible order, we discover within ourselves a force productive of infinite representations, and one needing no elements besides terminable or figurable extension.
118. The representative sensible faculty develops itself sometimes by the presence of an object; at other times, spontaneously, without any dependence on the will; and finally, at other times, in consequence of a free act. This is not the place to examine in what way the phenomenon of representation is connected with the affections of the corporeal organs; at present, we propose only to designate and explain facts in the ideological sphere, absolutely abstracting their physiological aspect.
Among the sensible representations just classified, which we may call passive, spontaneous, and free, there are differences worthy of observation.
119. Passive representation is given to the soul, independently of its activity. If we be placed in presence of an object, with our eyes open, it will be impossible not to see it, or even not to see it in a certain manner, if we do not change the direction of our eyesight or other condition of vision. For this reason, the soul seems, in the exercise of its senses, to be purely passive, since its representations necessarily depend on the conditions to which its corporeal organs in their relation to objects, are subject.
120. Spontaneous representation, or the faculty productive of sensible representations, seems also, since it operates independently of external objects and of the will, to be more or less passive, and its exercise to depend upon organic affections. And the fact that these sensations are wont to exist without any order, or at most, if they are recollections of old sensations, with that only which they had at another time, appears to indicate it. It is also worthy of note that these representations are sometimes offered to us, in spite of all the efforts of the will to dissipate and forget them: some are so tenacious as for a long time to triumph over all the resistance of freewill.
It is not easy to explain this phenomenon without recurring to organic causes, which, on determinate occasions, produce the same effect upon the soul, as the impressions of the external senses. It is certain that the internal representation reaches, in certain cases, so high a point of vividness, that the subject confounds it with the impressions of the senses. This can only be explained by saying that the interior organic affection has become so powerful, as to be equivalent to that which the impression of an object operating upon the external organ, could have caused.
121. In this spontaneous production it is to be remarked that present representations do not always correspond with others previously received; but a power of combination is developed in them from which result imaginary objects entirely new. This combination is sometimes exercised in a perfectly blind manner, and then follow extravagant results; but, at other times, this activity subjected to certain conditions produces, independently of free will, objects artistically beautiful and sublime.
Genius is nothing else than the spontaneity of the imagination and sentiment, developed in subordination to the conditions of the beautiful. Artists, not gifted with genius, do not lack strength of will to produce works of genius; nor are they wanting in imagination to reproduce a beautiful object if they have once seen it; they do not lack discernment and taste to distinguish and admire beautiful objects, nor are they ignorant of the rules of art or of all that can be said to explain the character of beauty; what they lack is that instinctively fine spontaneity which develops itself in the most recondite sinuosities of the soul, and far from being dependent upon the free will of its possessor, directs and domineers over him, pursues him in sleep as in the hours of waking, in the time of recreation as in that of business, and often consumes the very existence of the privileged man, as a furious fire bursts the sides of the frail cage that holds it.
122. Free production occurs when representations are offered to us by command of our will, and under the conditions it prescribes, as in works of art, and in the combinations of those figures which constitute the object of the science of geometry.
123. This a priori construction cannot be referred to a type existing in our imagination; since, as this type would then be the sensible representation itself, it would not need to be constructed. How then is it possible to form a representation of which we have not already the image? It is not enough to possess the elements, that is,