Selected quad for the lemma: sense_n

Word A	Word B	Word C	Word D	Occurrence	Frequency Band	MI	MI Band	Prominent
sense_n	brain_n	motion_n	nerve_n	2,721	5	11.0566	5	true

Text snippets containing the quad

ID	Title	Author	Corrected Date of Publication (TCP Date of Publication)	STC	Words	Pages
A57675	The philosophicall touch-stone, or, Observations upon Sir Kenelm Digbie's Discourses of the nature of bodies and of the reasonable soule in which his erroneous paradoxes are refuted, the truth, and Aristotelian philosophy vindicated, the immortality of mans soule briefly, but sufficiently proved, and the weak fortifications of a late Amsterdam ingeneer, patronizing the soules mortality, briefly slighted / by Alexander Ross.	Ross, Alexander, 1591-1654.	1645 (1645)	Wing R1979; ESTC R200130	90,162	146

it Lastly I hope you will not deny but some indivisible powers there are which work upon themselves else how can Angels and soules of men love and know themselves The atomes are your sanctuary to which you flie upon Sect. 54. Pag. 277. c. 32. all occasions For you will now have these materiall parts of bodies work upon the outward organs of the senses and passing thorow them mingle themselves with the spirits and so to the braine These little parts must needs get in at the Pag. 278. doores of our bodies and mingle themselves with the spirits in the nerves and of necessity must make some motion in the braine Doubtlesse if this be true there must needs be an incredible motion in the braine for if the atomes of two armies fighting should rush into your braine by the eye they will make a greater motion then Minerva did in Iupiters braine you would call for a Vulcan to cleave your head and let out those armed men who would cause a greater strugling in your head then the twins did in Rebecca's womb For I doe not think these little Myrmidons would lie so quiet in your braine as the Grecians did in the Trojan horse But if the materiall atomes of the object pierce the organ as for example of a horse then tell us how many atomes must meet to make up a little horse and how can that horse being bridled and sadled pierce your eye without huring of it especially if you should see mounted on his back such a gallant as S. George armed with a long sharp lance or Bellerophon upon Pegasus And if a thousand eyes should look at one time upon that object will it not be much lessened by losing so many atomes and parts as enter into so many eyes Or can the object multiply it selfe by diminution as the five loaves did in the Gospel Or suppose you should see as many horses at a time as were in Xerxes his army would there be stable-room enough in your braine to containe them all Or if you should see a thousand horses one after another doth the coming in of the later drive out the former Which way doe they come out the same they went in or some other way or do they stable all together there or doe they die in the braine Will not they perish the braine and poyson your optick spirits with which you say they are mingled Or suppose you should see in a looking-glasse a horse doth the atomes of that horse pierce first the glasse to get in and then break thorow the glasse again to get into your eye Sure if this be your new Philosophy you are like to have but few sectaries of these deambulatory wise men whom you call vulgar Philosophers Is it not easier and more consonant to reason that the image or representation of the object be received into the sense which reception we call sensation then to say that the very materiall parts which you call atomes should pierce the organ for then the same object must be both one and many and so if all the inhabitants of either hemisphere should look at once upon the Moon there must be as many Moons as there are beholders Againe wee distinguish that which you confound to wit first the organ which is called sensorium secondly the sensitive facultie which resides in the spirits thirdly the act of sensation which is caused by the object fourthly the object it selfe which causeth sensation but not the sense or facultie it selfe fifthly the species which is the image of the object sixthly the medium which is aire water c. seventhly the sensitive soul actuating the organ and in it judging and perceiving the object which diffuses and sends its species or spirituall intentionall qualities both into the medium the sensorium this is no more impossible then for the wax to receive the impression or figure of the seale without any of its matter What are words but motion and words are the chiefest Sect. 55. Pag. 283. c. 32. object of our remembrance Words are not motion but by the motion of the tongue words are uttered I beleeve you move your tongue many times when you speak not but if words were motion you must still speak when you move your tongue Words are articulate sounds but wee have already shewed that sounds are not motions but caused by motion or the collision of solid bodies And if words be the chiefe object of our memory we have spent our time ill for the end why we learne words and languages is to come by them to the knowledge of things And if we remember words onely then our knowledge is verball onely Doe you remember nothing in Divinity but words or are these the chiefest object of your memorie If this assertion be true Christians are of all men most miserable who spend their time strength and meanes to attaine the knowledge of those things which when they remember prove but words I have read of a verball and of a reall memorie some are apter to remember words then things others remember things better then words The medium which these bodies move in that is the memory Sect. 56. Pag. 286. c. 33. is a liquid vaporous substance in which they swim at liberty These atomes in this Chapter you call sometimes bodies and sometimes similitudes and species confounding qualities and substances as you are wont But if you take memory here for the organ or hinder-part of the brain that is not the medium but the receptacle of the species the medium are the spirits which conveigh the species from the phantasie to the memorie which two senses are neere neighbours in the braine much lesse can these bodies as you call them in the memorie be the memorie it selfe which is a facultie of the intellective soule in man of the sensitive in beasts And indeed the intellect and intellective memorie is one and the same power of the soule onely differing in this that as it keeps the species it is called memorie as it makes use of them in understanding it is called intellect And what need wee multiply faculties to no purpose for as the same facultie which apprehends judgeth also so the same facultie which understandeth remembers too And as these bodies or medium cannot be the memorie much lesse can they be reminiscence or recordation which is the motion of the impressed images in the memorie which reminiscence is onely in man because it requires discourse of which beasts are not capable You tell us of two effects of purging the one to Sect 57. Pag. 292. c. 34. make the humour more liquid the other to make the stomack or belly suck or vent it But indeed the effect of purging is not the liquefaction of the humour which is liquid enough of it selfe saving the melancholy humour which is somewhat thicker then the rest by reason 't is more earthy but the pituita and choler are liquid enough of themselves

therefore 't is not the work of the purge to liquefie the humour but by reason of its innate similitude it hath with the humour to draw it as the load-stone doth iron which similitude consisteth in their essentiall forms and in the properties flowing thence And as the load-stone draweth iron is not drawn by it so doth the medicament being the more active draw the humor but is not drawne by the humour Neither doe I think that the stomack or belly sucks the humor which is so offensive to it for simile trahit simile but the expulsive facultie of these parts wherein the humour lay being partly oppressed by the humor partly irritated by the medicament sends it away to the stomack or belly these also being quickly wearied with such troublesome guests send away the humour by vomit or by the stoole There riseth a motion of a certaine fume about the heart Sect. 58. Pag. 294. which motion is called pleasure Apuleius makes pleasure to be the childe of Cupid and Psyche you say that it is the motion of a fume about the heart of which Psyche cannot be the mother nor Cupid the father There are oftentimes fumes about the heart which beget more pain then pleasure and there are pleasures where are no fumes at all What fumes are there in beautifull objects of the eye with which it is delighted Musick affords pleasure to the eare but no fume at all and so the other senses have their pleasures in their objects without fumes for pleasure is nothing else but the apprehension of a convenient object or its species rather which object is the efficient cause of pleasure The forme or esience of pleasure consisteth in the fruition of that convenient object either by judging of it if present or by remembring it if absent If from this pleasure there proceed an elation of the mind by diffusing of the spirits this wee call joy Againe if pleasure consist in fruition it is rather a rest then a motion Besides if pleasure be the motion of a fume what think you of the soule Sure there are no fumes and yet there is pleasure in the soule And Angels have their pleasures too without fumes for I beleeve the fumes in Popish Churches doe as much please the Angels as they affright Divels Did Paradise the garden of pleasure called therefore Eden beget many fumes about Adams heart Or are there greatest pleasures where there be most of these cordiall fumes I think that where is most heat there are most fumes but so a lion should have more pleasure then a man for the lions heart is hotter and so our hearts are hotter in burning fevers then in health Moreover when at the first sounding of musick we take pleasure that pleasure quite vanisheth if we grow weary of the musick do the fumes then vanish also Lastly if beatitude consists in pleasure as many think then it is within our selves having these fumes and so we need not goe farre to be blessed But why should the fumes about the heart be pleasures rather then the fumes about the braine seeing in the brain is the phantasie and apprehension as also the originall of the senses Now pleasure consists in feeling and apprehension so that pleasure encreaseth as the sense and apprehension doe I beleeve Tobacco-suckers and Wine-bibbers will hardly admit of your Philosophy who define their pleasure by the motion of fumes in the braine rather then about the heart All that moveth the heart is either paine or pleasure Sect. 59. Pag. 298. Physicians tell us that the heart is moved by the vitall spirits the Aristotelians by the heat which is the soules instrument the heat moves it upward the hearts owne weight moves it downward and this is that they call systole and diastole not a compounded motion but two severall motions proceeding from divers principles for no naturall motion can be compounded nor can two contrary motions make up one nor is motion made of motions and not only are these two motions opposite in the heart but also different in respect of time Secondly paine and pleasure are passions of the appetite for every motion in the sensitive appetite is passion caused by externall objects being apprehended as good or evill but passions are not agents Thirdly what paine or pleasure moves the childes heart in the mothers belly or our hearts when we sleep or a heart after it 's taken out of the bodie We see it moves so long as any heat or spirits remaine in it but you will hardly beleeve that paine or pleasure moves it Fourthly if pain and pleasure move not the senses but the species of such objects which are convenient or inconvenient for us cause this motion and of this ariseth paine or pleasure how can these move the heart which never moved the sense The effect which we call paine is nothing else but a compression Sect. 60. Pag. 298. Paine is not a compression but the effect of compression and not of this neither for some pleasing compressions there are but of compression as it is offensive or hurtfull to our nature Neither are they generally Pag. 298. hard things which breed paine in us and those which breed pleasure oily and soft as you say for there are divers soft and oily things which being touched would not cause any pleasure in us A Toad is soft gold is hard but as the touching of this breeds no paine so the touch of that begets no pleasure Neither is the heart Pag 299. extremely passive by reason of its tendernesse and heat but rather active for heat is an active qualitie and where is most heat there is most activity therefore is the fire the most active of the elements and the heart the most active of all our members because of heat And how the heart is exceeding tender I know not the flesh of it is not so tender as of other parts Feare in its height contracteth Pag. 301. the spirits and thence 't is called Stupor Sorrow contracteth also the spirits what difference then do you put between sorrow and stupiditie You should have said a sudden contracting for stupor suddenly contracts those spirits which sorrow doth leasurely and by degrees Secondly you should have distinguished stupiditie for there is one that comes of feare another of admiration Thirdly feare and stupiditie are not the same thing for in feare there is an inordinate motion of the spirits in stupiditie there is an immobility of the same spirits Passion is nothing else but a motion of the bloud and Pag. 306. c. 35. spirits about the heart There is a continuall motion of the spirits and bloud about the heart even when wee sleep is there then also a continuall passion I think in sleep men are seldome troubled with passions Secondly if passion be continually in us then passions and patible qualities are ill distinguished by Logicians which make the one transient the other permanent Thirdly passion

and goe with the bodie Is not the understanding of a separated soule as capable to lodge and entertaine such guests as before Or are these little bodies made of dust that to dust they must returne Seventhly have all separated soules the same amplitude of knowledge then the soule of Iudas in hell hath as much knowledge as Abraham's soule in heaven but I see no reason for it Eighthly if life be a motion it is an imperfect thing consisting not in esse but in fieri and so the life of man both here and hereafter cannot be perfect no not in heaven And in a separated soule tell mee which is the mover the motion and the mobile Ninthly tell us what this Shee is that becomes an absolute spirit Is it the soule or is it life If the soule then she was before she was a spirit If life then motion may become a spirit I see it is not without cause you complaine of engulfing your selfe into the sea of contradiction Help your selfe out againe if you can But you plunge your selfe over head and eares when Sect. 17. Pag. 430. c. 10. you tell us That separated soules doe enjoy their knowledge without the help of externall objects phantasmes instruments or any other helps having all things requisite in themselves This is to deifie soules and to elevate them above the pitch of created entities For the Angels themselves have not such an eminent knowledge in that they stand in need of helps both externall to wit that supreme light and cleere looking-glasse of the Trinity in which they see all things as also of the innate species or idea both of universalities and of singularities without which they can have no knowledge therefore à fortiori if Angels stand in need of such helps much more must departed soules Secondly memorie remaines in departed soules but memory or recordation is by help of the species laid up in the mind to the understanding of which when the mind applies it selfe this is called recordation Thirdly though the intelligible species depend from the senses and phantasie in their fieri or being yet they have no dependence from them in their conservation For the sensible species in sleepe serve the phantasie though the common sense and all the outward are bound up and as it were dead Fourthly in Angels and departed soules there are divers habits both of love and knowledge and vertue yea of tongues also in respect of entitie though there be no use nor exercise but after a spirituall way of speaking now habits are the causes of action and in vaine should they be left in the soule if she by them did not worke and actually understand neither can the effect to wit actuall understanding subsist without its cause which is the habit for this is such an effect as depends in its conservation from the cause Fiftly understanding and the manner of understanding accompany the nature of the soule but the nature of the soule is the same here and hereafter therefore the manner of understanding must be the same to wit by the species Sixtly Whereas the soules departed do specifically differ from the Angels they must have a different manner of understanding to wit by discourse but this way needs help not of the phantasme or senses being all commerce with the body is taken away but of the species Hence then it is apparent that departed soules stand in need of helps and of objects of their understanding and that they have not all things requisite in themselves which objects are externall in respect of their essence though the species be inherent or adherent to the soules much more externall are these objects which they see in God although God himselfe is not intelligible by any species by reason of his immensity neither doth the soule understand it selfe by any species nor doth she know except by revelation what is done or doing here on earth which she must needs know if she had all things requisite for knowledge in her selfe but indeed Abraham is ignorant of us and Israel knows us not Nesciunt mortui quid hic agatur De cura pro mortuis nisi dum hic agitur saith S. Austin Our looking upon the phantasmes in our braine is not our Sect. 18. Pag. 430. c. 10. soules action upon them but it is our letting them beat at our common sense that is our letting them work upon our soule The phantasie being a corporeall sense cannot work upon the soul which is a spirit it is not then the phantasie that works upon the soule but the agent intellect refines purifies and makes more spirituall those phantasmes or species which are represented by the phantasie and so impresseth them in the passive intellect and this is called understanding The agent intellect is the force or quality of the soule mediating betweene the phantasie and passive intellect framing the intelligible species which the passive intellect receiveth and so by the one power the soule acteth and by the other suffereth but not at all by the phantasie whose hand cannot reach so high as to knock at the gates of the soule It must then be a spirituall power that must worke upon a spirit the passive intellect is rasa tabula like cleane paper having no innate species or images of objects in it selfe but what it receiveth from the active intellect so that the phantasie helps the understanding onely dispositivè not efficienter being rather the materiall then efficient cause of understanding furnishing those species which the active intellect refineth and impresseth in the passive If you should ask whether our understanding is an action or a passion I answer that it consists in both for not only doth it receive the intelligible species but also operats upon them And this is that action of the soule which you deny and what do you talke of letting our phantasmes beat at our common sense The phantasmes will beat whether you will or no. If you will not beleeve me beleeve your owne dreames in sleep I suppose your phantasmes then beat when you could be content they would spare their labour and be quieter But so long as the spirits do make their intercourse betweene the phantasie and the common sense there will be an agitation and beating of the phantasmes But it seemes you take the soule and common sense for the same thing when you say that to let the phantasmes beat upon the common sense is to let them work upon the soule They may beat upon the one and not work upon the other for the soul suffers not but by it selfe and her suffering is perfective not destructive as that of the matter is But she doth not worke upon or deduce her selfe out of possibility into act considered as the same thing but in respect of her divers faculties whereof the one is the efficient the other the patient and resembles the matter and if it were not so we should never actually understand for what should excite the