agitated and subtlest only get in while the rest is dispersed into all the other parts of the body Now these very subtle parts of the blood make the animall spirits and they need not to this end undergoe any other change in the brain but only be separated from the other lesse subtle parts of the blood for what I here call spirits are but bodyes and have no other property unlesse tha they are bodies exceeding small which move very nimbly as the parts of a flame issuing from a torch so that they stay not in any one place but still as some get into the cavities of the brain some others get out through the pores in the substance of it which pores convey them into the nerves and from thence into the muscles by means whereof they mould the body into all the severall postures it can move The 11th Article How the muscles are moved FOR the only cause of the motion of all the members is that some Muscles shrink up and their opposites extend as hath been already said and the only cause why one muscle shrinkes rather than his opposite is that there come though never so little more spirits to the one than the other not that the spirits which flow immediatly from the brain are alone sufficient to move these Muscles but they dispose the other spirits which already are in these two Muscles of sally forth immediatly from one of them into the other by means whereof that from whence they came becomes longer and flaggier that wherein they are being suddenly swelled up by them shortens and attracts the member appendent to it which is easily conceived when it is known that there are but very few animal spirits which proceed continually from the brain to every Muscle but that there are abundance of others lockt in the same Muscle which move very swiftly in it sometimes in whirling round only in the places where they are this is when they find no passages open to get out at and sometimes by slipping into the opposite Muscle For there are little overtures in each of these Muscles through which hese spirits can slide from one to another which are so disposed too that when the spirits which come from the brain towards one of them are but never so little stronger than those going to theother they open all the entries through which the spirits of the other Muscle can fly into this and in the same instant bar up all those through which the spirits of this might get into that whereby all the spirits formerly contained in both Muscles crowd suddenly into one so swelling it up and shortning it while the other extends it self and gives The 12th Article How outward objects act contrary to the organs of the senses IT remains yet to know the causes why the spirits slide not from the brain into the Muscles always after one manner and wherefore they come sometimes more towards some than others For besides the action of the Soul which in truth is in us one of the causes as I shall shew hereafter there are yet two besides which depend not of any thing but the body which it is necessary to take notice of the first consists in the diversitie of motions excited in the organs of the senses by their objects which I have already amply enough explained in the Dioptricks but that those who see this may not need to have read ought else I will here repeat that there are three things to be considered in the sinews to wit their marrow or interiour substance which stretches it self out in the form of little threds from the brain the originall thereof to the extremities of the other members whereunto these threds are fastened next the skins wherein they are lapt which being continuous with those that invelope the brain make up litle pipes wherein these threds are enclosed lastly the animal spirits which being conveyed through these very pipes from the brain to the muscles are the cause that these thredd 's remain there entirely unmolested and extended in such a manner that the least thing that moves that part of the body whereunto the extremity of any one of them is fastened doth by the same reason move that part of the brain from whence it comes just as when a man pulls at one end of a string he causeth the other end to stirre The 13th Article That this Action of objects without may differently convey the spirits into the Muscles AND I have made it evident in the Diopticks how all the objects of the sight are not communicated to us any way but thus they move locally by mediation of transparent bodies between them and us those little thredd 's of the Optick nerves which are at the bottome of our eyes and after them the places of the brain from whence those nerves come they move them I say as many severall kinds of wayes as there are diversities of objects in things nor are they immediatly the motions made in the eye but in the brain that represent these objects to the Soul in imitation whereof it is easie to conceive that sounds odours heat pain hunger thirst and generally and objects as well of our other exteriour senses as our interiour appetites doe also excite some motion in our nerves which passes by means of them unto the brain and besides that these severall motions of the brain create in our soul different resentments it may so be that that without her the spirits direct their course rather towards some Muscles than others and so they may move our members which I will prove here only by one example If any one lift up his hand on a sudden towards our eyes as if he were about to strike although we know he is our friend that he does this only in jest and that he will be carefull enough not to doe us any hurt yet wee can scarce refrain from shutting them which shews it is not by the intermedling of our soul that they shut since it is against our will which is the only or at least the principall Action thereof but by reason this machine of our body is so composed that the moving of this hand up towards our eyes excites another motion in our brain which conveys the animal spirits into those muscles that close the eye-lids The 14th Article That the diversity of the spirits may diversifie their course THe other cause which serves to convey the animal spirits variously into the muscles is the unequal agitation of these spirits and the diversity of their parts for when any of their parts are more gross and agitated than the rest they passe forwards in a direct line into the cavities and pores of the brain and by this means are conveyed into toher muscles whereinto they should not had they been weaker The 15th Article What are the causes of their diversity ANd this inequality may proceed from the divers matters whereof they are composed as is seen in those who have
the rest to our Soul The 23th Article Of apprehensions which we attribute to objects from without us Those which we attribute to things without us to wit to the objects of our enses are caused at least if our opinion be not false by those objects which exciting some motions in the organs of the exteriour senses by intercourse with the nerves stir up some in the brain which make the soul perceive them So when we see the light of a torch and hear the sound of a bell this sound and this light are two everall actions who meerly in this regard that they excite two severall motions in some of our nerves and by meanes of them in the brain deliver the Soul two different Resentments which we so attribute to those Subjects which we suppose to be their causes that we think we see the very flame and hear the bell not onely feel certain motions proceeding from them The 24th Article Of apprehensions which we attribute to our body THe apprehensions which we attribute to our body or any of the parts thereof are those we have concerning hunger thirst and other our naturall appetites whereunto may be added paine heat and the rest of the affections we feel as in our members and not in the objects without us So we may at at the same time by the intercourse of the same nerves feel the coldnesse of our hand and the heat of the flame it drawes neere to or contrarily the heat of the hand and the cold of the aire whereto it is exposed and yet there is no difference between the Actions that make us feel the heat or the cold in our hand and those which make us feel that which is without us unlesse that one of these Actions succeeding the other we conceive the first to be already in us and that which followes not to be yet in us but in the object that causeth it The 25th Article Of the apprehensions which we attribute to our Soul THe Apprehensions attributed only to the Soul are those whereof the effects are felt as in the Soul it selfe and whereof any neer cause whereunto it may be attributed is commonly unknown Such are the resentments of joy wrath and the like which are sometimes excited in us by the objects which move our nerves and sometimes too by other causes Now although all our Apprehensions as well those attributed to objects without us as those relating to divers affections of our body be in truth Passions in respect of our Soul when this word is taken in the more generall signification yet it is usuall to restrain it to signifie onely those attributed to the Soul it selfe And they are onely these latter which I here undertake to explaine under the notion of Passions of the Soul The 26th Article That the imaginations which depend onely on the accidentall motion of the spirits may be as reall Passions as the apprehensions depending on the nerves IT is here to be observed that all the same things which the Soul perceives by intercourse with the nerves may also be represented to it by the accidentall course of the spirits and no difference between them but this that the impressions which come from the brain by the nerves are usually more lively and manifest than those the spirits excite there which made me say in the one and twentieth Article that these are onely as the shadow and representation of those It is also to be noted that it sometimes fals out this picture is so like the thing it represents that it is possible to be deceived concerning the apprehensions attributed to those objects without us or those referred to any parts of our body but not to be srved so concerning the Passions forasmuch as they are so neer and interiour to our Soul that it is impossible she should feele them unlesse they were truely such as she doth feel them So oftentimes when one sleeps and sometimes too being awake a man fancies things so strongly that he thinkes he sees them before him or feels them in his body though there be no such thing but although a man be asleep and doate he cannot feel himselfe sad ormoved with any other Passion but it is most true that the Soul hath in it that passion The 27th Article The definition of the Passions of the Soul AFter we have thus considered wherein the passions of the Soul differ from all other thoughts me thinkes they may be generally defined thus Apprehensions resentments or emotions of the Soul attributed particularly to it and caused fomented and fortified by some motion of the spirits The 28th Article An explication of the first part of the definition THey may be called Apprehensions when this word is used in a generall sense to signifie all thoughts that are not Actions of the Soul or the wills but not then when it onely signifies evident knowledges For experience shewes us that those who are most agitated by their Passions are not such as understand them best and that they are in the Catalogue of those apprehensions which the strict alliance between the soul and the body renders confused and obscure they may also be called resentments because they are received into the soul in the same manner as the objects of the exteriour senses and are not otherwise understood by her but they may justlier be stiled the emotions of the Soul not only because this name may be attributed to all the mutations befalling her that is all the various thoughts thereof but particularly because of all kinds of thoughts that she can have there are none that agitate and shake it so hard as these Passions doe The 29th Article An explication of the other part I Adde that they are attributed particularly to the Soul to distinguish them from other resentments relating some to exteriour objects as smells sounds colours the others to our body as hunger thirst pain I also subjoyn that they are caused fomented and fortified by some motion of the spirits to distinguish them from our Wills which cannot be called emotions of the Soul attributed to her but caused by her self as also to unfold their last and immediate cause that distinguisheth them again from other resentments The 30th article That the Soul is united to all the parts of the body joyntly BUt to understand all these things more perfectly it is necessary to know that the Soul is really joyned to all the body but it cannot properly bee said to bee in any of the parts thereof excluding the rest because it is One and in some sort indivisible by reason of the disposition of the organs which do all so relate one to another that when any one of them is taken away it renders the whole body defective and because it is of a nature that hath no reference to extension dimensions or other properties of matter whereof the body is composed but only to the whole masse or Contexture of Organs as appears by this that you cannot
speak we only think the sense of what we would say yet that makes us move our tongues and lips much better and farre readier than if wee thought to move them in all the manners requisite to pronounce the same words Forasmuch as the habit we have acquired in learning to speak hath taught us to joyn the action of the Soul which by the intercourse of the kernell can move the tongue and the lipps with the signification of the words which follow out of these motions rather than with the motions themselves The 45th Article What the power of the Soul is in respect of her Passions OUr Passions also cannot be directly excited or takenaway by the action of our Will but they may indirectly by the representation of things which use to be joyned with the Passions which we will have and which are contrary to those we will reject Thus to excite in ones selfe boldness and remove fear it is not enough to have a will to do so but reasons objects and examples are to be considered of that perswade the danger is not great that there is ever more security in defence than flight that there is glory and joy in vanquishing whereas there is nothing to be expected but griefe and dishonour in flying and the like The 46th Article What is the reason that hinders the Soul from disposing her Passions totally NOw there is a peculiar reason why the Soul cannot suddenly alter or stop her Passions which gave me occasion to put formerly in their definition that they are not only caused but somented and fortified by some peculiar motion of the spirits the reason is they are almost all coupled with some emotion made in the heart and consequently in all the blood and spirits too so that till this emotion cease they remain present in our thoughts just as sensible objects are present in them while they act against the organs of our senses and as the Soul being very sattentive on any other thing may choose whether shewill hear a little noise or feel a little pain or no but cannot keep her self from hearing thunder or feeling fire that burns the hand so shee may easily overcome the smaller Passions but not the violentest and strongest untill after the emotion of the blood and spirits is allayed The most the Will can doe while this emotion is in its full strength is not to consent to its effects and to restrain divers motions whereunto it disposes the body For example if wrath makes me lift up my hand to strike the Will can usually restrain it if fear incites my legs to fly the Will can stop them and so of the rest The 47th Article Wherein consist those contestations which use to be imagined between the superiour and inferiour part of the Soul ANd it is only in the repugnance of those motions which the body by its spirits and the Soul by her Wil endeavour to excite at the same time in the kernall that all the contestations which use to be imagined between the inferiour part of the Soul called sensitive and the superiour which is reasonable or else between the naturall appetites and the Will consist for there is in us but one Soul only and this Soul hath no diversity of parts in it the same which is sensible is rationall and all her appetites are her Wills The errour committed in making her act two severall parts which are usually contrary one to another proceeds meerly hence that her functions have not been distinguished from them of the body to which only all that can be observed in us repugnant to our reason ought to bee attributed so that there is here no other contestation unlesse that the little kernell in the middle of the brain being driven on one side by the soul and on the other by the animall spirits which are only bodies as I laid down before it happens oftentimes that these two impulsions are contrary and that the strongest hinders the operation of the other Now we may distiguish two sorts of motions excited by the spirits in the kernell some represent to the soul the objects which move the senses or the impressions found in the brain which use not any violence on the Will others doe use violence to wit such as cause the Passions or motions of the body concomitant with them And for the first though they often-times hinder the action of the soul or else be hindered by it yet by reason that they are not directly contrary there is not any contestation observed in them it is only taken notice of among the last and the Wills which resist them for example between that violence wherewith the spirits drive the kernell to cause in the soul a desire of any thing and that wherewith the Soul beats it back by the will she hath to avoid the same thing and what chiefly makes this contestation appear is that the Will having not the power to excite the Passions directly as hath been already said is constrained to use art and fall on considering successively divers things if but one wherof chance to be strong enough to alter the course of the spirits one moment it is possible that which follows is not and so the others many immediately resume it a-again because the disposition preceding in the nerves heart and blood is not changed which makes the soul feel her self instigated almost in the same instant to desire and not desire the very same thing From hence it was that occasion was taken to imagine two contesting powers in her Yet there may some kind of contestation be conceived herein that oft times the same cause which excites some Passion in the soul excites also certain motions in the body whereunto the soul contributes not and which she stops or strives to sto assoon as ever she perceives them as is then tried when that which excites fearfullnesse causeth also the Spirits to enter into the muscles that serve to stirre the legges to run away and the Will to be bold stops them The 48th Article Wherein the strength or weaknesse of souls are known and what is the misery of the weakest NOw it is by the successe of these contestations that every one may understand the strength or weaknesse of his soul For those in whom the Will can most easily conquer the Passions and stop the motions of the body that come along with them have without doubt the strongest souls But there are some who can never try their own strength because they never let the Will fight with her own weapons but onely with such as are borrowed from some Passions to resist others Those which I call her own weapons are firm and determinate judgements concerning the knowledge of good and evil according to which she hath resolved to steere the actions of her life and the weakest soul of all is such an one whose Will hath not at all determined to follow certaine judgements but suffers it self to be swayed with the present Passions
drunk much wine The vapours of this wine entering suddenly into the blood mount up from the hear to the brain where they convert into spirits which being stronger and more abundant than ordinary are apt to move the body after many strange fashions This inequality of the spirits may also proceed from the divers dispositions of the heart liver Stomacke spleene and all other parts contributing to their production For it is principally necessary here to observe certaine little nerves inserted in the basis of the heart which serve to lengthen and contract the entries of its concavities by meanes whereof the blood there dilating more or lesse strongly produces spirits diversly disposed It is also to be noted that although the blood which enters into the heart comes thither from all the other parts of the body yet it falls out often times that more is driven thither from some parts than others by reason the nerves or muscles which answer to those parts oppresse or agitate it more and for that according to the diversity of the parts from whence it comes most it dilates it selfe diverfly in the heart and at last produces spirits of different natures as for example that which comes from the lower part of the liver where the gall is dilates it selfe otherwise in the heart than that which comes from the spleene and this after another manner than that which comes from the veines of the leggs or armes and lastly this quite otherwise than the juyce of meats when being newly come out of the stomack and bowels it passes through the liver to the heart The 16th Article How all the members may be moved by the objects of the sences and by the spirits without the help of the Soul Lastly it is to be observed that the machine of our body is so composed that all the changes befalling the motion of the spirits may so worke as to open some pores of the braine more than others and reciprocally that when any one of these pores are never so little more or lesse open than usuall by the Action of those nerves subservient to the senses it changes somewhat in the motion of the spirits and causes them to be conveyed into the muscles which serve to move the body in that manner it ordinarily is upon occasion of such an Action So that all the motions we make our will not contributing to them as it often happens that we sigh walk eat and to be short doe all actions common to us and beasts depend onely on the conformity of our members and the streame which the spirits excited by the heat of the heart follow naturally into the braine nerves and muscles Just as the motion of a watch is produced meerely by the strength of the spring and the fashion of the wheeles The 17th Article What the functions of the Soul are HAving thus considered all the functions belonging to the body only it is easie to know there remaines nothing in us which we ought to attribute to our Soul unlesse our thoughts which are chiefly of two kinds to wit some Actions of the Soul others her Passions Those which I call her actions are all our wills because we experimentally find they come directly from our Soul and seem to depend on nought but it as on the contrary one may generally call her Passions all those sorts of apprehensions and understandings to be found within us because oftimes our Soul does not make them such as they are to us and she alwayes receives things as they are represented to her by them The 18th Article Of the Will Again our Wills are of two sorts For some are actions of the Soul which terminate in the Soul it selfe as when we will love God or generally apply our thought to any object which is not materiall The other are actions which terminate in our body as in this case that we have onely a will to walke it followes that our legges must stir and we goe The 19th Article Of the Apprehension OUr Appprehensions also are of two sorts the Soul is the cause of some the Body of the other Those whereof the Soul is the cause are the apprehensions of our wills and all the imaginations or others thoughts thereon depending For we cannot will any thing but we must at the same time perceive that we doe will it And although in respect of our Soul it be an Action to will any thing it may be said also a passion in her to apprehend that she wills Yet because this apprehension and this will are in effect but one and the same thing the denomination comes still from that which is most noble therefore it is not customary to call it a Passion but onely an Action The 20th Article Of Imaginations and other thoughts framed by the Soul WHen our Soul applies her elfe to fancy any thing which is not as to represent to it selfe an inchanted Palace or a Chimera and also when she bends her selfe to consider any thing that is only intelligible not imaginable for example to ruminate on ones owne nature the apprehension she hath of things depends ptincipally on the Will which causeth her to perceive them Wherefore it is usuall to consider them as Actions rather than Passions The 21 Article Of Imaginations caused onely by the body Among the apprehensions caused by the body the greatest part depend on the nerves But yet there are some that depend not at all on them which are called Imaginations too as well as those I lately spoke of from which neverthelesse they differ herein that our Will hath no hand in framing them which is the reason wherefore they cannot be numbred among the actions of the Soul and they proceed from nothing but this that the spirits being agitated severall wayes and meeting the traces of divers impressions preceding them in the brain they take their course at haphazzard through some certaine pores rather than others Such are the illusions of our dreames and those dotages we often are troubled with waking when our thought carelessely roames witout applying it self to any thing of its own Now though some of these imaginations be Passions of the Soul taking this word in the genuine and peculiar signification and though they may be all called so if it be taken in a more generall acception yet seeing they have not so notorious and determined a cause as those apprehensions which the Soul receives by mediation of the nerves and that they seem to be onely the shadow and representation of the others before we can well distinguish them it is necessary to examine the difference between them The 22 Article Of the difference betwixt them and the other apprehensions ALL the apprehensions which I have not yet explained come to the Soul by mediation of the nerves and there is this difference between them that we attribute some of them to the objects from without that beat upon our senses some to our body or some parts of it and lastly
conceive the half or third part of a Soul nor what space it takes up and that it becomes not any whit less by cutting off any part of the body but absolutely withdraws when the Contexture of its organs is dissolved The 31th Article That there is a little kernell in the brain wherein the soul exercises her functions more peculiarly than in the other parts IT is also necessary to know that although the foul be joyned to all the body yet there is some part in that body wherein shee exercises her functions more peculiarly than all the rest and it s commonly believed that this part is the brain or it may bee the heart the brain because thither tend the organs of the senses and the heart because therein the Passions are felt but having searched this businesse carefully me thinks I have plainly found out that that part of the body wherein the soul immediatly exercises her functions is not a jot of the heart nor yet all the brain but only the most interiour part of it which is a certain very small kernell situated in the middle of the substance of it and so hung on the top of the conduit by which the spirits of its anteriour cavities have communication with those of the posteriour whose least motions in it cause the course of the spirits very much to change and reciprocally the least alterations befalling the course of the spirits cause the motions of the kernell very much to alter The 32th Article How this kernell is known to be the principall seat of the soul THe reason which perswades me that the soul can have no other place in the whole body but this kernell where shee immediatly exercises for functions is for that I see all the other parts of our brain are paired as also we have two eyes two hands two ears lastly all the organs of our exteriour senses are double and forasmuch as we have but one onely and single thought of one very thing at one and the same time it must necessarily be that there is some place where the two images that come from the two eyes or the two other impressions that come from any single object through the double organs of the other senses have some where to meet in one before they come to the soul that they may not represent two objects in stead of one and it may bee easily conceived that these images or other impressions joyn together in this kernell by intercourse of the spirits that fill the cavities of the brain but there is no other place in the body where they can be so united unlesse it be granted that they are in this kernell The 33th Article That the seat of the Passions is not in the heart FOr the opinion of those who think the soul receives her Passions in the heart it is not worth consideration for it is grounded upon this that the Passions make us feel some alteration there and it is easie to take notice that this alteration is only felt in the heart by the intercourse of a small nerve descending to it from the brain just as pain is felt in the feet by intercourse of the nerves of the foot and the starres are perceived as to be in the firmament by the intercourse of their light and the optick nerves so that it is no more necessary that our soul exercise her functions immediatly in the heart to make her Passions be felt there than it is necessary shee should be in the sky to see the stars there The 34th Article How the Soul and the Body act one against another LEt us then conceive that the Soul holds her principall seat in that little kernell in the midst of the brain from whence she diffuseth her becames into all the rest of the body by intercourse of the spirits nerves yea and the very blood which participating the Impressions of the spirits may convey them through the arteries into all the members and remembring what was formerly said concerning this machine our body to wit that the little strings of our nerves are so distributed into all parts of it that upon occasion of severall motions excited therein by sensible objects they variously open the pores of the braine which causeth the animall spirits contained in the cavities thereof to enter divers wayes into the muscles by whose means they can move the members all the severall wayes they are apt tomove and also that all the other causes which can differently move the spirits are enough to convey them into severall muscles let us here adde that the little kernell which is the chief feat of the soul hangs so between the cavities which contain these spirits that it may be moved by them as many severall fashions as there are sensible diversities in objects but withall that it may be moved severall wayes by the soul too which is of such a nature that she receives as many various impressions that is hath as many severall apprehensions as there come severall motions into this kernell As also on the other side the machine of the body is so composed that this kernel being only divers wayes moved by the soul or by any other cause whatsoever it drives the Spirits that environ it towards the pores of the brain which convey them by the nerves into the muscles by which means it causeth them to move the members The 35th Article An example of the manner how the impressions of objects unite in the kernell in the middle of the brain AS for example if we see any creature come toward us the light reflected from his body paints two images one in each eye and these two images beget two others by intercourse with the optick nerves in the interiour superficies of the brain that looks towards its concavities from thence by intercourse of the spirits wherewith these cavities are filled these images glance in such a manner on the little kennell that these spirits encompasse it and the motion which composes any point of one of these images tends to the same point of the kernell to which that motion tends that frames the point of the other image which represents too part of this creature by which meanes the two images in the brain make up but one single one upon the kernell which acting immediately against the Soul shews her the figure of that creature The 36 Article An example how the Passions are excited in the Soul FUrthermore if this figure be very strange and hideous that is if it have much similitude with such things as have formerly been offensive to the body it excites in the Soul the Passion of fear afterwards that of boldness or else an affright or scaring according to the various temper of the body or the force of the soul and according as a man hath formerly protected himself by defence or flight against noxious things whereunto the present impression hath some resemblance for this renders the braine so disposed in some men that the
spirits reflected from the image so formed on the kernell go from thence to fall part into the nerves which serve to turn the back and stirre the legs to run away and part into those which as is spoken of before let out or draw upon together the orifices of the heart or which else so agitate the rest of the parts from whence the blood is sent that this blood not being rarified there in the usuall manner sends spirits to the braine that are fitting to maintain and confirm the passion of fear that is such as are proper to hold open or open again the pores of the brain that convey them into the very same nerves for the meere entry of these spirits into these pores excites in this kernell a particular motion instituted by nature to make the soul feel that passion and because these pores relate principally to the little nerves that serve to lock up or open wide the orifices of the heart this makes the soul feel it as if it were chiefly in the heart The 37th Article How it appears they are all caused by some motion of the spirits ANd because the like happens in all the other Passions to wit that they are principally caused by the spirits contained in the cavities of the brain seeing they direct their course towards the nerves which serve to enlarge or straiten the orifices of the heart either to thrust the blood in the other parts differently to it or whatsoever other way it be to feed the self same Passion it may be clearly understood by this wherefore I formerly inserted in my definition that they are caused by some peculiar motion of the Spirits The 38th Article An example of the motions of the Body that accompany the Passions and depend not of the Soul MOreover as the course which these spirits take towards the nerves of the heart is sufficient to give a motion to the kernell whereby fear is put into the soul even so by the meere going of the spirits at that time into those nerves which serve to stirre the legges to run away they cause another motion in the same kernell by meanes whereof the soul feels and perceives this flight which may in this manner be excited in the body by the meere disposition of the organs the soul not at all contributing to it The 39th Article How the same cause may excite divers Passions in divers men THe same impression that the presence of one formidable object workes upon the kernel and which causeth fear in some men may in others rouze up courage and boldnesse the reason whereof is that all braines are not alike disposed for the same motion of the Kernell which in some excites feare in others causeth the spirits to enter into the pores of the brain which convey them part into the nerves which serve to use the hands for defence and partly into those which agitate and drive the blood towards the heart in that manner as is requisite to produce spirits proper to continue this defence and retaine a will to it The 40th Article What the principall effect of the Passions is FOr it must be observed that the principall effect of all the Passions in men is they incite and dispose their Souls to will the things for which they prepare their Bodies so that the resentment of fear incites him to be willing to fly that of boldnesse to be willing to fight and so of the rest The 41th Article What is the power of the Soul in respect of the Body BUt the will is so free by nature that it can never be constrained and of two sorts of thoughts which I have distinguished in the Soul whereof some are her Actions to wit her Wils others her Passions taking that word in its generall signification which comprehends all sorts of apprehensions the first are absolutely in her owne power and cannot but indirectly be changed by the body as on the contrary the last depend absolutely upon the Actions which produce them and they cannot unlesse indirectly be changed by the Soul except then when her selfe is the cause of them And all the Action of the Soul consists in this that she meerely by willing any thing can make the little kernell whereunto she is strictly joyned move in the manner requisite to produce the effect relating to this Will The 42th Article How the things one would remember are found in the memory SO when the Soul would remember any thing this Will is the cause that the kernell nodding successively every way drives the spirits towards severall places of the braine untill they excounter that where the traces which were left there of the object one would remember are For these traces are nothing else but the pores of the braine through which the spirits formerly took their course by reason of the presence of that object have thereby accquired a greater facility to be open in the same manner again than the rest can have by the spirits that come to them so that these spirits meeting these pores enter into them easier than the others whereby they excite a peculiar motion in the kernell which represents the same object to the Soul and makes it know that is it she would remember The 43th Article How the Soul can imagine be attentive and move the Body SO when one would imagin any thing one hath never seen this Will hath the power to make the kernell move in the manner requisite to drive the spirits towards the pores of the braine by the opening of which this thing may be represented So when one would fix his attention some pretty while to consider or ruminate on one object this Will holds the kernell still at that time leaning ever to one side So in fine when one would walk or move his body any way this Will causes the kernell to drive the spirits towards the muscles which serve to that purpose The 44th Article That every Will is naturally joyned to some motion of the kernell but that by industry or habit itmay be annexed to another NOtwithstanding it is not alwayes the Will to excite in us any motion or other effect that can cause us to excite it but that changes according as nature or habit have differently joyned each motion of the kernell to each thought as for example if one would dispose his eyes to look on an object farr distant this Will causes the ball of them to dilate themselves and if one would prompt them to behold an object very neer this Will contracts them but if one thinks onely to dilate the ball he had as good doe nothing that dilates it not at all because nature hath not joyned the motion of the kernell which serves to drive the spirits to the optick nerve in that manner as is requisite to dilate or contract the ball of the eye with the will of dilating or contracting it but with the will of looking on objects remote or at hand and then when we
I also adde it is of that good which the impressions of the brain represent to her as her own that I may not confound this Joy which is a Passion with that Joy purely intellectuall which comes into the Soul by the sole action of the Soul and which may be called a pleasing emotion in her excited by her selfe wherein consists her enjoyment of good which her understanding represents to her as her own it is true while the Soul is joyned to the body this intellectuall Joy can hardly be rid of the company of that which is a Passion for as soon as ever our understanding perceives that we possesse any good although this good may be so farre different from all that belongs to the body that it be not imaginable yet will not the Imagination forbear to make immediatly some impression in the brain whereupon ensue the motion of the spirits which excite the Passion of Joy The 92 Article The Definition of Sadnesse SAdnesse is a displeasant languishing wherein consists the discommodity the Soul receives from evill or defect which the impressions of the brain represent unto her as belonging to her and there is also an intellectuall Sadnesse which is not the Passion but which wants but little of being accompanied by it The 93 Article What are the causes of these two Passions NOW when the intellectuall Joy or Sadnesse so excites that which is a Passion their cause is evident enough and one may see by their defintions that Joy comes from the opinion a man hath that he possesses some good and Sadnesse from the opinion of some evill or defect but it oft falls out that a man is Sad or joyfull and yet he cannot distinctly observe the good or evill which are the causes of it to wit when this good or this evill make their impressions in the brain without the intercourse of the Soul sometimes because they belong only to the body and sometimes too although they belong to the Soul because shee considers them not as good or evill but under some other notion the impression whereof is joyned in the brain with that of good and evill The 94th Article How the Passions are excited by Goods and evills which only respect the budy and wherein consists tick ling and pain SO when a man is in sound health and the weather is fairer then ordinary hee feels a lightsomnesse in himselfe which proceeds not from any function of the understanding but only from the impressions which the motion of the spirits makes in the brains and he feels himselfe sad likewise when his body is indisposed although he know not that it is Thus the tickling of the senses is so closely followed by Joy and pain by sadness that most men cannot distinguish them yet they differ so farre that a man may somtimes suffer pains with Joy and receive ticklings that displease but the cause why Joy commonly follows tickling is because all that is called tickling or a pleasing touch consists in this that the objects of the senses excite some morions in the nerves which would be apt to hurt them if they had not strength enough to resist it or the body were not well disposed which makes an impression in the brain which being instituted by nature to signifie this good disposition and this strength represents it to the Soul as a good belonging to her seeing she is united to the Body and so excites Joy in her the cause is almost the same why a man naturally takes delight to feel himself moved to all sorts of Passions yea even Sadness \ and Hatred when these Passions are caused only by strange adventures which he sees personated on a stage or by such like occasions which not being capable to trouble us any way seem to tickle the Soul by touching it And the reason why pain usually produces Sadness is because that feeling which is called pain proceeds alwayes from some action so violent that it offends the nerves so that being instituted by nature to signifie to the Soul the dammage the body receives by this action and its weaknesse-in not being able to resist it it represents each of them to him as evils alwayes displeasing unlesse then when they cause some good things which she esteems of more than them The 95th Article How they may also be excited by goods andevils which the Soul observes not though they belong to her as the delight a man takes to run into a danger or remember an evil past SO the delight which oft-times young men take to undertake difficult things and expose themselves to great perills though they do not so much as look for any profit or honour thereby comes from hence the conceit they have that they undertake a difficult thing makes an impression in the brain which being joyned to that which they may make if they thought it a good thing to be couragious fortunate active or strong enough to dare to hazzard so farre is the reason that they take delight in it and the content which old men take when they remember the miseries they suffered proceeds from hence they imagine to themselves it is a good thing that they could subsist in spight of them The 96th Article What are the motions of the blood and spirits that cause the five preceding Passions THe five Passions which I have here begun to explain are so joyned or opposed to one another that it is easier to consider them all together then to treat distinctly of each as I handled Admiration and their cause is not like that in the braine onely but also in the Heart Spleen Liver and all other parts of the body in as much as they serve to the production of the blood and afterwards of the Spirits For although all the veins convey the blood they contain into the heart yet it sometimes falls out that the blood of some of them is driven with a stronger force than the rest and it happens also that the overtures through which it enters into he heart or those through which it goes out are more dilated or contracted one time than another The 97th Article The principall experiments conducing to the knowledge of these motions in Love NOW considering the sundry alterations that experience lets us see in our bodies while our Soul is agitated with divers Passions I observe in Love when it is alone that is when it is not accompanied with any extream Ioy desire or Sadnes that the beating of the pulse is even much greater and stronger than ordinary that a man feels a gentle heart in his breast and quick digestion ofmeat so that this Passion is profitable for the health The 98 Article In Hatred ON the contrary I observe in Hatred that the pulse is uneven weaker and oftentimes faster that a man feels colds intermingled with I know not what sharp and pricking heat in the breast that the stomack ceases to do its office is enclined to vomit and reject the meats he hath
caten or at least corrupt them and convert them into ill humours The 99th Artick In Joy IN Joy that the pulse is even and quicker than ordinary but not so strong nor so great as in Love and that a man feels a pleasant heat which is not onely in the breast but spreads its self over all the exteriour parts of the body with the blood which is seen to flow abundantly thither and the mean while he sometimes loses his appetite because the digestion is lesse than usuall The 100th Article In Sadnesse IN Sadnesse that the pulse is weak and slow and that a man feels as it were strings about his heart which bind it close and Icycles that freez it and communicate their cold to the rest of the body yet in the mean while he hath sometimes a good appetite and feels his stomack not failing of its duty provided there be no Hatred mingled with the Sadnesse The 101 Article In Desire LAstly I observe this peculiar in Desire that it agitates the heart more violently than any of the other Passions and furnishes the brain with more spirits which passing from thence into the muscles make all the senses quicker and all parts of the body more agile The 102 Article The motion of the blood and spirits In Love THese observations and many more too long to insert gave me occasion to conceive that when the understanding represents to it self any object of Love the impression which this thought makes in the brain conveyes the animal spirits through the nerves of the sixth paire to the muscles about the intestines and the stomack in the manner requisite to make the juice of meats which convert into new blood passe suddenly to the heart without any demurre in the Liver and which being driven thither with greater force than that which is in the rest of the body it gets in thither in more abundance and excites a stronger heat by reason it is thicker than that which already hath been often rarified by passing and repassing through the heart which also causeth it to send spirits to the brain whose parts are grosser and more agitated than ordinary and these spirits fortifying the impression that the first thought of the object beloved stuck there bind the Soul to fix upon the thought and herein consists the Passion of Love The 103 Article In Hatred CContrarywise in Hatred the first thought of the object that breeds aversion so conveyes the spirits in the brain to the muscles of the stomack and intestines that they hinder the juyce of meats from mixing with the blood by contracting up all the passages through which it is used to runne and so conveyes it to the small nerves of the spleen and the lower part of the Liver where the receptacle of choler is that those parts of the blood which use to be cast out to those places get out and runne with that in the branches of the hollow vein to the heart which causeth much inequality in the heat of it seeing the blood that comes from the spleen is not heated nor rarified but with much difficulty and on the other side that which comes from the lower part of the Liver where the gall is inflamed and dilated suddenly by which consequence spirits that go to the brain have parts very unequall and motions very unusuall from whence it comes that they there fortifie the Id'aea of Hatred already imprinted and encline the souls to thoughts full of rancour and bitternesse The 104th Article In Joy IN Joy not onely the nerves of the spleen Liver stomack or intestines act but those in the rest of the body and particularly that about the Orifices of the heart which opening and dilating these Orifices enables the blood which the rest of the nerves have driven from the veins to the heart to get in there and issue forth in greater quantity then ordinary and because the blood which then gets into the heart hath often passed and repassed through it coming from the arteries into the veines it easily dilates and produces spirits whose parts being very equall and subtle are fit to form and fortifie the impressions of the brain which deal lively and quiet thoughts to the Soul The 105th Article In Sadnesse COntrariwise in Sadnesse the Orifices of the heart are hugely straitened by the small nerve that environs them and the blood of the veins is no whit agitated which causeth but very little to go to the heart and in the mean while the passages through which the juyce of meats glides from the stomack and entrailes to the Liver are open wherefore the appetite diminisheth not unlesse Hatred which is an ordinary companion of Sadnesse close them The 106th Article In Desire LAstly the Passion of Desire hath the peculiar property that the Will a man hath to attain any good or avoid any evill sends the Spirits of the brain immediately to all the parts of the body that may serve any wayes to actions requisire to that purpose and particularly to the heart and those parts which supply it with blood most that receiving it in greater abundance than ordinary it sends a great number of spirits to the brain as well to maintain and fortifie the Idaea of this Will as to passe from thence into all the organs of the senses and all the muscles which may be set on work to attaine what one desires The 107th Article What is the cause of these motions in Love ANd I deduce the reason of all this from what hath formerly been said that there is such a tye betwixt our soul and body that when we have joyned any corporall Action with any thought one of them never presents if selfe to us afterwards without the other As may be seen in such who with much aversnesse when they have been sick have taken some drink they can neither eat nor drink afterwards but they have the same aversion nay further they cannot think of their a version to medecines but the very same taste comes into their thought For met thinks the first passions our soul admitted when she was first joyned to our Body came from hence that sometimes the blood or some other juyce which got into the heart was an alimony more convenient than ordinary to maintain heat there which is the principle of life this caused the Soul to joyne in will to this alimony that is to love it and at the same time the spirits trickled from the braine into the muscles which might presse or agitate the parts from whence it came to the heart that they might send more of it thither and these parts were the Stomack and entrailes whose agiration augments the appetite or else the liver and lungs which the muscles of the Diaphragma may presse Wherefore the same motion of the spirits ever since accompanies the passion of Love The 108 Article In Hatred SOmetimes on the contrary some strange juyce came to the heart which was not good to cherish the heat
of it or which else might extinguish it wherefore the spirits which ascended from the heart to the braine excited in the Soul the passion of Hatred And at the same time also these spirits went from the braine to the nerves which might drive the blood from the spleene and the small veines of the liver to the heart to hinder this noxious juyce from getting in and more to those which might repell this juyce to the intrailes and the stomack or else sometimes to make the Stomack disgorge it From whence it comes that the same motions are used to accompany the Passion of Hatred And in the liver one may discern by the eye that there are inthe liver an abundance of veines or pipes indifferent broad through which the juyce of meates may passe from the Port-veine into the hollow-veine and from thence to the heart without stopping any whit at the liver but that there are also an infinite number of lesser ones where it may stop which alwayes contain a reserve of blood as the spleene doth too which blood being thicker then that which is in the other parts of the Body may better serve for nutriment to the fire in the heart when the Stomck and entrailes lack wherewithall to supply them The 109th Article In Joy IT hath also come to passe at the beginning of our life that the blood contained in the veines was an Alimony sufficiently convenient to maintain the heat of the heart and they contained so great an abundance of it that there was no need to exhaust nutriment elsewhere This hath excited in the Soul the Passion of Joy and at the same time hath caused the Orifices of the heart to be more open then ordinary and that the spirits trickling abundantly from the braine not onely into the nerves which serve to open these Orifices but also universally into all the rest which drive the blood of the veines to the heart hinder any from coming a fresh from the the liver splcen intrailes and Stomack Wherefore these very same motions accompany Joy The 110th Article In Sadnesse SOmetimes on the contrary it hath happened that the body hath wanted nutriment and this hath made the Soul feel her first Sadnesse at least that which hath not been joyned with Hatred this very thing hath also caused the Orifices of the heart to be contracted because they received but little blood and that a good quantity of this blood came from the spleen by reason that is as the last reserve which serves to supply the heart when there comes none to it from any where else Wherefore the same motions of the spirits and nerves which so serve to contract the Orifices of the heart and to convey the blood thither from the the spleen alwayes a company Sadnesse The 111th Article In Disire LAstly all the originall Desires which the Soul might have when it was newly joyned to the body were to admit things convenient for her and repell hurtfull and it was for the same purpose that from that instant the spirits began to move all the muscles and all the organs of the senses in all manners that they could move Which is the reason that now when the Soul desires any thing the whole body becomes more active and disposed to move than usually wichout it and then it fals out on the other side that the Body is so disposed then are the Desires of the Soul more strong and vehement The 112 Article What are the exteriour signes of these Passions WHat I have laid down here makes the differences of the pulse and all the other properties which I have here before attributed to these passions be fufficiently understood so that I need not stand any further to explaine them But because I have onely observed in each what may be remarkable onely when it is single and what shewes to know the motions of the blood and spirits that produce them it yet remaines that I should treat on divers exteriour signes which usually accompany them and which may be better noted when many of them are mixed together as ordinarily they are than when they are distinct The chief of these signes are the gestures of the eyes and face changes of colour tremblings languishing swouning laughter tears groanes and sighes The 113th Article Of the gestures of the eyes and face THere is no Passion but some particular gesture of the eyes declare it and it is so palpable in some that even the stupidst serving-men by the eye of their master observe whether he be angry with them or not But though a man may easily perceive these gestures of the eyes and know what they signifie yet it is not an easie matter to describe them because every one of them is composed of severall alterations which happen in the motion and figure of the eye which are so peculiar and so small that each of them cannot be discerned distinctly though the result of their conjunction be easily marked The same thing almost may be said of the gestures of the face which thus accompany the Passions for though they be greater then those of the eyes yet it is difficult to distinguish them they so little differ that there are men almost of the same aspect when they weep as others when they laugh It is true there are some very remarkable as the wrinkling of the forehead in wrath and certain motions of the nose and lips in indignation and derision but they seem rather to be voluntary then naturall And generally all the gestures as well of the face as eyes may be altered by the Soul when being willing to conceal her Passion she strongly imagines one contrary to it so that they may serve as well counterfeit as declare Passions The 114th Article Of changing Colour A Man cannot so easily refrain from blushing or looking pale when any Passion disposseth him thereunto because these changings depend not on the nerves and muscles as the former and because they come more immediately from the heart which may be called the source of the Passions seeing it prepares the blood and spirits to produce them Now it is certain that the colour of the face comes from nought but the blood which flowing continually from the heart through the arteries into all the veines and from all the veines into the heart colours the face more or lesse according as it more or lesse fills the little veines towards the superficies thereof The 115th Article How Joy causes blushing SO Joy renders the colour livelyer and more Vermillion because by opening the sluces of the heart it makes the blood flow quicker in all the veines and becomming hotter and more subtile it moderately raiseth up all parts of the face which makes the aspect of it more smiling and brisk The 116th Article How Sadnesse makes one look pale ON the contrary Sadness by contracting the Orifices of the heart makes the blood flow more slowly into the veins and that becomming colder and thicker hath not
spirits fortifies them and then they are at the same time actions of vertue and Passions of the Soul So though there be no vertue whereunto me thinks good birth so much contributes as that which causeth a man to esteem himselfe according to his just value and it be easie to believe that all Souls which God puts into our bodies are not equally noble and strong wherefore I called this vertue Generositie according to the acception of our language rather than Magnanimity the School tearms that it may be the more unknown yet it is certain that good education much conduces to correct the defects of our birth and that if a man busy himselfe frequently to consider what this free Disposition is and how great advantages accrue from a stedfast resolution to use it well as on the other side how vain and unprofitable all the cares that puzzle the ambitious are a man may by exciting the Passion in himselfe acquire the vertue of Generosity which being as the key of all the other vertues and a generall remedy against all the irregularities of Passions me thinkes this consideration ought to be very seriously noted The 162. Article Of Veneration VEneration or respect is an inclination of the Soul not onely to esteeme the object it reverenceth but also so submit to it with some kind of fear to endeavour to make it become gracious to her So that we bear only a Veneration to free causes which we conceive able to do good or evill to us without knowing which of the two they will doe For we bear Love and Devotion rather than a meer Veneration to those from whom we onely expect good and we bear Hatred to none but such as we only expect evill from and if we conceive the cause of this good or evil not to be free we do not submit ourselves thereunto to get the goodwill of it So when the Pagans bore a Veneration to woods springs mountains they did not properly reverence these inanimate things but the Divinities which they thought presided over them And t he motion of the spirits that excite this Passion is compounded of that which excites Admiration and that which excites Fear whereof I will speak hereafter The 163 Article Of Disdain JUst so that which I call disdaine is an inclination of the Soul to contemne a free cause by judging that though of its own nature it be able to doe either good or evill yet it is so far beneath us that it can doe us neither and the motion of the spirits that excite it is compounded of phose that excite Admiration and Security or Boldnesse The 164th Article Of the use of these two Passions ANd it is either Generosity or Deification and weaknesse of spirit that determine the good or ill use of these two Passions for by how much a mans Soul is more noble or generous so much the more inclination hee hath to give every one his own and so hath not only an extraordinaty HUmility towards God but without reluctancy bestowes all the honour and respect which are due to men to each according to the rank and authority he holds in the world and contemnes nothing but Vice On the contrary they who are of a mean and weak spirit are apt to sinne in excesses sometimes by reverencing and fearing things only worthy of contempt sometimes by insolently disdaining such as deserve to be reverenced and they often slip suddenly from extream impiety to superstition thence again from superstition to impiety so that there is no vice nor irregularity of spirit which they are not subject to The 165 Article Of Hope and Feare HOpe is a disposition of the Soul to perswade her that what she desires shall come to passe which is caused by a peculiar motion of the spirits to wit by those of Joy and desire mixed together and Feare is another disposition of the Soul which perswades her that it shall not come to passe and it is to be noted that though these two Passions be contrary to one another yet a man may have them both together to wit when he fancies to himselfe severall reasons whereof some make him conceive the accomplishment of his Desire is easie the other make it seeme difficult The 166 Article Of Security and Despaire ANd one of these Passions never accompanies Desire but it leaves room for the other for when Hope is so strong that it utterly expellâ—â— Fear it alters the nature thereof and is called Security and when a man is sure that what hee desires shall come to pass though hee still wish that it would come yet he nevertheless ceases to be agitated with the Passion of Desire which made him seek after the event with anxietie In like manner when Fear is so extream that it takes away all kind of Hope it converts into Despaire and this Despaire fancying the thing impossible clearly extinguisheth Desire which only is bent on things possible The 167th Article Of Jealousie JEalousie is a sort of Feare relating to the Desire a man hath to keep the possession of some good and it proceeds not so much from strength of reason which makes him conjecture he may lose it as the great value he sets on it which causeth him to dive into the least occasions of suspition and take them for very considerable arguments The 168 Article Wherein this Passion may be laudable ANd because a man ought more carefully to keep great goods than lesse this Passion may be just and laudable on some occasions as for example A Captain that guards a place of great importance ought to be jealous of it that is mistrust all means whereby it may bee taken and and honest woman is not to be blamed for being jealous of her honour that is not only beware of doing ill but also avoid even the least occasions of detraction The 169 Article Wherein it is blameworthy BUt a covetous man is to be laught at when he is jealous of his treasure that is when hee broods over it with his eyes and will never be farre from it lest it should be stollen from him for money is not worth keeping with so much care and a man that is jealous of his wife is contemned because it is an evidence hee loves her not as he should doe and hath either an ill opinion of himselfe or her I say he loves her not as he should doe for if he bore a true Love to her hee would never be enclined to mistrust her but it is not her whom he properly loves it is only the good he imagines to consist in enjoying her alone to himselfe and he would not be afraid to lose this good if he did not either conceive himselfe unworthy of it or his wife disloyall Moreover this Passion relates only to suspicions and mistrusts for he is not properly Jealous that endeavours to shun an evill when he hath just reason to fear it The 170 Article Of Irresolution IRresolution also is a sort of
alone hath more heat and motion than any of our limbs we may be assured that heat and all the motions within us seeing they depend not on the mind belong onely to the body The fifth Article That it is an errour to believe the Soul gives motion and heat to the body WHereby we shall eschew a very considerable error which many have faln into so farre that I believe it the cause of hindering the Passions and other things which belong to the soul from being explained hitherto It is this that seeing all dead bodies are deprived of heat and consequently of motion people imagine the absence of the soul wrought this cessation of motion and heat and so erroniously conceive that our naturall heat and all the motions of our body depend on the soul whereas indeed the contrary should be supposed that the soul absents it self in death only because this naturall heat ceaseth and the organs which seem to move the body are corrupted The sixth Article What is the difference betwixt a living and a dead dody THat we may then avoid this errour Let us consider that death never comes by any defect of the soul but onely because some one of the principall parts of the body is corrupted and conceive that the body of a living man differs as much from that of a dead one as a watch or any other AUTOMA that is any kind of Machine that moves of it self wound up having in it self the corporeall principle of those motions for which it was instituted with all things requisite for its action and the same watch or other engine when it is broken and the principle of its motion ceases to act The seventh Article A brief explication of the parts of the body and of some of its functions TO make this more intelligible I will in few words display the pieces and lineaments whereof this Machine our body is composed There is none that doth not already know there is within us a heart a braine a stomach muscles sinews arteries veins and the like it is as commonly known that meats eaten descend into the stomack and bowells from whence the juice of them trickling into the liver and all the veines mixes it self with the blood in them and by this means augments the quantity thereof Those who have heard talk never so little of Physick know besides this how the Heart is composed and how all the blood of the veines may with facility drop into the hollow vein on the right side of it and from thence passe into the Liver by a vessell called the venous arterie then return from the liver into the left side of the heart through the Pipe called the arterious vein and at length passe from thence into the great arterie the branches whereof spread themselves all over the body Yea even all those whom the authority of the Ancients hath not totally blinded and who have vouchsafed to open their eyes to examine the opinion of Harvy concerning the circulation of the blood make no doubt but all the veins and arteries of the body are like channells through which the blood continually and easily glides taking its course from the right cavity of the heart through the arterious veine whereof the branches are dispersed into every part of the Liver and joyned to those of the venous arterie by which it passeth from the Liver into the left fide of the heart from thence going into the great arterie the branches whereof being scattered over all the rest of the body are joyned to the branches of the hollow vein which cary the same blood again into the right cavity of the heart so that the two cavities are as it were the sluces of it through each of which all the blood passes every round it walks about the body Moreover it is notorious that all the motions of the members depend upon the muscles and that these Muscles are opposite to one another in such a manner that when one of them shrinks up it drawes after it that part of the body whereto it is knit which causes the muscle opposite to it to stretch forth at the same time then again if at another time this last shrink up the first gives way suffering the other to attract that part it is joyned unto In fine it is knowne that all these motions of the muscles as also all the senses depend on the sinews which are as little strings or like small tonnells coming all from the braine and containing as that does a certain aire or exceeding subtle wind which is tearmed the Animall spirits The eighth Article What is the principle of all these functions BUt it is not commonly known in what manner these animall Spirits and nerves contribute to these motions and senses nor what is the corporeall principle that makes them act wherefore although I have already glanced upon it in former writings I will not here omit to say succinctly that while we live there is a continuall heat in our heart which is a kind of fire that the blood of the veines feeds and this fire is the corporeall principle of tall the motions of our members The ninth Article How the motion of the heart is wrought THe f irst effect of it is that it dilates the blood wherewith the cavities of the heart are fill'd which is the reason that this blood having need of a larger room passes impetuously from the right cavity into the arterious vein and from the left into the great arterie then this dilatation ceasing immediately new blood from the hollow vein enters into the right cavity of the heart and from the veinous arterie into the left for there are little skins at the entrance of these foure vessells so contrived that they will not let the blood get into the heart but by the two last nor come out but by the other two The new blood being gotten into the heart is there immediately rarified as the former was Hence onely is that pulse or palpitation of the heart and arteries for this beating is reiterated as often as any new blood gets into the heart It is also this alone which gives motion to the blood and causeth it uncessantly to run very swiftly in all the arteries and veines by means whereof it conveyes the heart acquired in the heart to all the other parts of the body and is their nutriment The tenth Article How the animall spirits are begotten in the braine BUt what here is most considerable is that all the most lively and subtle parts of the blood that heat hath rarified in the heart continually enter in abundandance into the cavities of the braine and the reason why they go thither rather than any where else is because all the blood that issues out of the heart by the great artery bends its course in a direct line thither ward and it not being possible for all to get in because there are none but very narrow passages those parts thereof that are the most
which being often contrary one to the other draw it backwards and forwards to either side and keeping her busie in contesting against her self put the soul into the most miserable estate she can be as then when fearfulnesse represents death as an extream evill which cannot be shunned but by flight if on the other side ambition represent the infamy of this flight as a mischief worse than death these two Passions variously agitate the Will which obeying now the one and then the other continually opposeth its own self and yields up the soul to slaverie and misfortune The 49th Article That the strength of the soul is not enough without the knowledge of truth IT is true there are very few men so wake and irresolute that they will nothing but what their present Passion dictates to them The most part have determinate judgements according to which they regulate part of their actions And though oft times these judgements be false and indeed grounded on some Passions by which the Wil hath formerly suffered her self to be vanquished or seduced yet because she persevers in following them then when the Passion that caused them is absent they may be considered as her own weapons and souls may be thought stronger or weaker according as they do smore or lesse follow these judgements and resist the present Passions contrary to them But there is a great deal of difference between the resolutions proceeding from some false opinion and those which are onely held up by the knowledge of the truth since following these last man is sure never to acquire sorrow or repentance whereas following the first they are inseparably companions after the errour is discovered The 50th Article That there is no soul so weak but well mannaged may acquire an absolute Mastery over her Passions IT will be commodious here to know that as before hath been said although every motion of the kernell seem to have been joyned by nature to each of our thoughts even from the beginning of our life they may yet he annexed to others by habit as experience shews in words that excite motions in the kernell which according to the institution of nature represent only to the soul their sound when they are pronounced by the Will or by the figure of their letters when they are written and which yet neverthelesse by a habit acquired by thinking what they signifie assoon as ever their sound is heard or their letters seen use to make us conceive the signification rather then the form of our letters or the sound of their sillables It is also convenient to know that although the motions as well of the kernell as the spirits and braine which represent certain objects to the Soul be naturally joyned with those that excite certain Passions in her yet they may by habit be separated and annexed to others very different and moreover that this habit may be acquired by one action onely and requires not a long usuage as as when a man at unawares meets with any nasty thing in a dish of meat which he hath a very good stomack to this accident may so alter the disposition of the brain thataman shall never afterwards see any such kind of meat without loathing whereas before he took delight in eating it The very same thing may be seen in beasts for although they have no reason nor it may be any thought all the motions of the spirits and the kernell which excite Passions in us yet are in them and serve to foment and fortifie not as in us the Passions but the motions of the nerves andmuscles their concomitants So when a dog sees a Partridge he is naturally enclined to run to it and when he heares a piece go off this noise incites him naturally to run away yet neverthelesse we ordinarily breed up spanniels so that the sight of a Partridge makes them couch and the noise of a discharged piece makes them run to it Now these things are profitable to know to encourage every one to study the regulation of his Passions For since with a little art the motions of the brain in beasts who are void of reason may be altered it is evident they may more easily in men and that even those who have the weakest Souls may acquire a most absolute Empire over all their Passions if art and industry be used to mannage and govern them The Passions of the Soul The second part Of the number and order of the Passions and explication of the six chief or Primitive The 51th Article What are the first causes of the Passions IT is knowne by what hath formerly been said that the utmost and neerest cause of the Passions of the Soul is nothing but the agitation by which the spirits move the little kernel in the middle of the braine But this is not sufficient to distinguish them from one another it is necessary therefore to seek after their originalls and examine their first causes NOw although they may sometimes be caused by the Action of the Soul which determines to conceive such or such objects as also by the meere temper of the body or by the impressions accidentally found in the brain as it oft befalls that a man feels himselfe sad or merry not knowing upon what occasion it appears neverthelesse by what hath been said that the same may bee excited also by the objects which move the senses and that these objects are their most oridinary and principall causes whence it followes that to find them all out it is sufficient to consider all the effects of these objects The 52 Article What is the use of them and that they may be numbered FUrthermore I observe that the objects which move the senses excite not divers Passions in us by reason of so many diversities in them but meerly because they may severall wayes hurt sor profit us or else in generall be important to us and that the use of all the Passions consists onely in this that they dispose the Soul to will the things which Nature dictates are profitable to us and to persist in this will as also the very agitation of the spirits accustomed to cause them dispose the body to the motions that further the execution of those things Wherefore to calculate them we are only to examine in order after how many considerable manners our senses may be moved by their objects And I will here make a generall muster of all the principall Passions according to order that so they may be found The order and Numeration of the Passions The 53 Article Admiration WHen the first encounter of any object surprizeth us and we judge it to be new or far different from what we knew before or from what we supposed it should have been we admire it and are astonished at it And because this may fall out before we know at all whether this object be convenient or no me thinkes admiration is the first of all the Passions And it hath no contrary because
rest derive their pedigree from them The 70th Article Of Admiration The definition and cause of it ADmiration is a sudden surprize of the Soul which causeth in her an inclination to consider with attention the objects which seem rare and extraordinary to her it is caused first by an impression in the brain that represents the object as rare and consequently worthy to be seriously considered after that by the motion of the spirits which are disposed by this impression to tend with might and main towards that place of the brain where it is to fortifie and conserve it there as also they are thereby disposed to passe from thence into the muscles which serve to hold the organs of the senses in the same scituation they are that it may be fomented by them if it bee by them that it was formed The 71 Article That there happens no alteration in the heart nor in the blood in this Passion ANd this Passion hath this peculiar quality it is observed not to be attended by any alteration in the heart and the blood as the other Passions are the reason whereof is that having neither good nor evill for its object but only the knowledge of the thing admired it hath no relation to the heart and blood on which depend all the good of the body but only with the brain where dwell the organs of the senses subservient to this knowledge The 72th Article Wherein consists the power of Admiration THis doth not hinder it from being exceeding powerfull notwithstanding the surprize that is the sudden and unexpected arrivall of the impression that alters the motion of the spirits which surprize is proper and peculiar to this Passion so that it at any time it doe happen to any of the rest as it usually does to all and encreaseth them it is because Admiration is joyned with them and the power of it consists in two things to wit the novelty and for that the motion which it causeth from the very beginning hath its full strength for it is certain such a motive is more operative then those which being eak at first and growing but by little and little may easily be diverted also it is certain that those objects of the senses which are new touch the brain in certain parts where it used not to be touched and that these parts being more tender or less firme then those that frequent agitation hath hardned augments the operation of the motions which they excite there which will not be deemed incredible if it bee considered that is the like reason which causeth the soles of our feet accustomed to a pretty stubborn touch by the weight of the body they bear but very little to feel this touch when we goe whereas another far lighter and softer when they are tickled is almost insupportable to us onely because it is is not usuall The 73th Article What Astonishment is ANd this surprize hath so much power to cause the spirits in the cavities of the brain to bend their course from thence to the place where the impression of the object admired is that it sometimes drives them all thither and finds them such work to conserve this impression that there are none which passe from thence into the muscles nor yet so much as deviate any way from the first tracts they followed into the brain this causes all the body to be unmoveable like a statue and that one can onely perceive the first represented face of the object and consequently not acquire any further knowledge of it it is thus when a man is said to be astonishted for astonishment is an excesse of admiration which can never be but evill The 74th Article For what use the Passions serve and what they are naught for NOw it is easie to gather by what hath formerly been said that the utility of all the Passions consists only in this that they fortifie and conserve in the Soul those thoughts which are good for her and which may else be easily obliterated as also all the discommodity they can cause consists in this that they strengthen and maintain those thoughts more then is necessary or fortifie and conserve others which ought not to be fixed there The 75th Article What is the peculiar use of Admiration ANd it may be said peculiarly of Admiration that it is as beneficiall for causing us to apprehend and keep in memory things whereof we were formerly ignorant for we admire nothing but what seems rare and extraordinary to us and nothing can seem so to us but because wee were ignorant of it or else at least because it differs from those things we knew before for it is this difference that makes it be called extraordinary Now although a thing unknown to us represent it self newly to our understanding or our senses we do not therefore retain it in memery unlesse the Idaea we have of it be fortified in our brain by some Passion or other or at least by application of our understanding which our Wills determines to a peculiar attention and reflexion And the rest of the Passions may serve to make us observe things as they seem either good or evill but we admire onely those which seem rare we see too that those who have no naturall inclination to this Passion are commonly very ignorant The 76th Article Wherein it is hurtfull and how the want of it may be supplyed and the excesse corrected BUt it falls out oftner that a man admires too much and is astonished in perceiving things of little or no consideration then too little and this may either absolutely take away or pervert the use of reason Wherefore although it is good to be born with some kind of inclination to this Passion because it disposeth us to the acquisition of Sciences yet we ought afterwards to endeavour as much as we can to be rid of it For it is easie to supply the want of of it by a peculiar reffection and attention whereunto our Will may alwayes oblige our understanding when we conceive the thing represented is worth the labour But there is no remedy to cure excessive admiration but to acquire the knowledge of most things and to be exercised in the consideration of all such as may seem to be most rare and strange The 77th Article That they are neither the most stupid nor the men of greatest parts who are most addicted to admiration FUrthermore although none unlesse blockheaded and stupid people but are naturally addicted to Admiration I do not say that they who have the most wit are alwayes most inclined to it but chiefly those who although they have a common sense good enough have no great opinion of their sufficiency The 78th Article That the excesse of it may be translated to a habit for want of correction ANd although this Passion seem to decrease by use because the more a man meets with rare things which he admires the more he usually ceases to admire them and thinks those
which may be presented to him afterwards but common Yet when it is excessive and causeth the attention to be fixed onely on the first image of the objects represented not acquiring any farther knowledge it leaves behind it a habit that disposeth the Soul to stop in the same manner on all other objects which present themselves provided they appear never so little new This prolongs the disease of those who are blindly inquisitive that is who seek out rarities only to admire them and not to understand them for by little and little they become so full of Admiration that things of no consequence are as apt to puzzle them as those whose scrutiny is commodious The 79th Article The definitions of Love and hatred LOve is an emotion of the Soul caused by the motion of the spirits which incite it to joyn in will to the objects which seem convenient to her and hatred is an emotion caused by the spirits which incite the soul to will to be separated from objects represented to be hurtfull to her I say these emotions are caused by the Spirits to distinguish Love and Hatred which are Passions and depend of the body as well from the judgements that encline the Soul to joyn in Will to the things she esteems good and separate from those shee esteemes evill as from the emotions which these Judgements alone excite in the Soul The 80th Article What is meant by joyning or separating in Will FUrthermore by the word Will I do not mean here Desire which is a Passion apart and relates to the future that of the consent whereby he at that instant considers himself as it were joyned to what he loves so that he imagineth a whole whereof he thinks himself to be but one part and the thing beloved another as on the contrary in Hatred he considers himself alone as a Whole absolutely separated from the thing whereunto he hath an aversion The 81 Article Of the usuall distinction between the Love of Concupiscence and Benevolence IT is frequent to distinguish that there are two sorts of Love one called Benevolence that is to say wishing well to what a man loves the other Concupiscence that is to say which caufeth to desire the thing beloved but me thinks this distinction belongs to the effects onely and not the essence of Love For assoon as a man is joyned in Will to any object of what nature soever it be he hath a well wishing to it that is to say he also thereunto joynes in Willt he things he believes convenient for it which is one of the main effects of Love And if he conceive it a good to possesse it or to be associated with him in any other manner than in Will he desires it which is also one of the most ordinary effects of Love The 82 Article How different Passions concurre in this that they participate of Love NOr is it necessary to distinguish as many sorts of Love as there are diversitie of objects which may be beloved For example although the Passions of the ambitious man for glory the avaritious for money the drunkard for wine the bestiall for a woman he would violate the man of honour for his friend or mistris and a good father for his children be in themselves very different yet in that they participate of Love they are alike but the foure first beare a Love meerely for the possession of the objects where unto their Passion relates and none at all to the objects themselves for which they have onely a desire mingled with other particular Passions Whereas the Love a good Father bears to his children is so pure that he desires to have nothing of them and would not possesse them any otherwise than he does nor be joyned neerer to them than he is already but considering them as other Selfes he seekes out their good as he would his owne or rather with more care because representing to himself that he and they make but one whole whereof he is not the better part he oftentimes prefers their interests before his own and fears not his ruine to save them The affections which men of honour bear to their friends is of this very same nature though it seldom be so perfect and that they bear to their Mistresse participates much of but it hath also a smatch of the other The 83th Article Of the difference between bare Affection Friendship and Devotion ME thinkes Love may more justly be distinguished by the esteeme a man makes of what he Loves in comparison of himself For when he vallues the object of his Love lesse then himself he bears only a bare Affection to it when he rates it equall with himself it is called friendship when more that Passion may becalled Devotion Thus a man may bear an Affection to a flow a bird a horse but unlesse he have a brain greatly out of tune he cannot have friendship but for men And they are so far the object of this passion that there is no man so defective but one may bear a perfect friendship to him if one but thinke ones selfe beloved by him and that one have a Soul truly noble and generous as shall accordingly be explained in the hundred fifty fourth and hundred fifty sixt Article As for Devotion the principall object thereof is undoubledly the Soveraigne Divinity whereunto a man cannot chuse but be devout If he but understand it as he ought to doe But a man may carry a Devotion to his Prince too to his Country to his City and even to a particular man when he esteemes him much more than himselfe Now the difference betwixt these three sorts of Love appears chiefly by their effects for since in all of them a man considers himselfe as joyned and united to the thing beloved he is ever ready to abandon the least part of all which to conserve the other he attones therewith Therfore in bare Affection he alwayes prefers himself before what he loves contrariwise in Devotion he so much prefers the thing before himselfe that he fears not to die for the conservation of it Whereof we have seen frequent examples in those who have exposed themselves to a certain death for the defence of their Prince or their City and sometimes too of particular Persons to whom they have been devoted The 84th Article That there are not so many sorts of Hatred as Love FUrthermore although Hate be directly opposite to Love yet it is not distinguished into so many sorts because a man observes not so much the difference between the evils a man is seperated from in Will as he does betwixt the goods whereunto he is joyned The 85 Article Of Liking and Horrour ANd I find only one considerable distinction alike in each It consists in this that the objects as well of Love as Hatred may be represented to the Soul by the exteriour senses or else by the interiour and ones own reason For we commonly call that good or evil which
they contain to break out impetuously through the gullet where it formes an inarticulate and clattering sound and as well the lungs by their blowing and this aire by breaking forth shove all the muscles of the Diaphragma breast and throat by which means they cause those of the face which have some connexion with them to move and it is only this gesture of the face with this inarticulate and clattering voyce that is called Laughter The 125th Article Wherefore it doth not accompany the greatest joyes NOw though laughter may seem to be one of the chiefe signes of Joy yet this cannot cause that but only when that is mean and that there be some little Admiration or Hatred mixed with it for it is found by experience that when a man is extraordinary Joyfull the occasion of this Joy never makes him break out into Laughter and besides he can never be so easily invited to it as when hee is Sad the reason whereof is that in the greatest Joyes the lungs are continually so full of blood that they cannot be blown up any more by fits The 126th Article What are the chiefe causes of it ANd I can mark but two causes which blow up the lungs thus suddenly the first is a surprizal of Admiration which being joyned to Joy may so quickly open the Orifices of the heart that a great abundance of blood getting in all together at the right side of it through the hollow veine is rarified there and passing from thence through the arterious veine blows up the lungs the other is the mixture of some liquour that augments the rarefaction of the blood and I find none fit for that purpose but the wheyest part of that which comes from the Spleen which part of the blood being driven to the heart by some light emotion of Hatred assisted by a surprize of Admiration and mixing there with the blood which comes from the other parts of the body which Joy causes to enter in thither abundantly may cause this blood to dilate much more then usual as we see many hquours swell up over the fire if one fling but a little vinegar into the vessel where they are for the wheyest part of the blood which comes from the spleene is of a nature like vinegar Experience also shews us that in all rencounters producing this lowd Laughter which-comes from the lungs there is still some little occasion of Hatred or at least of Admiration and those whose spleens are not sound are subject not only to be more sad but by intervalls more merry and disposed to laughter then others forasmuch as the spleene sends two sorts of blood to the heart one thick and grosse which causeth Sadnesse the other exceeding fluid and subtile which causeth Joy And oft-times after much Laughter a man feeles himselfe naturally enclined to sadnesse because the most fluid part of the blood of the spleene being exhausted the grosser followes it to the heart The 127th Article What is the cause thereof in Indignation FOr that kinde of Laughter which sometimes accompanies Indignation it is usually artificiall and seigned But when it is naturall it seemes to come from the Joy a man hath to see he cannot be hurt by the evil whereat he is offended and withall that he finds himselfe surprized by the novelty or the unexpected encounter of this evil So that Joy Hatred and Admiration contribute to it Yet I will suppose that it may be produced without any Joy by the meer motion of Adversion which sends the blood from the spleen to the heart where it is rarified and thrust from thence into the lungs which it easily blowes up when it findes them empty And generally whatsoever suddenly blowes up the lungs in this manner causeth the exteriour Action of Laughter except when Sadnesse alters it into groanes and shrickes that accompany tears Vives 3 de Anima cap de Risu Writes of himselfe which is very pertinent to this that when he had been a long time fasting the first bits he put in his mouth made him laugh which might come from hence his lungs empty of blood for want of nutriment was suddenly blowne up by the first juyce that passed from his Stomack to his heart or else the meer imagination of eating might convey it thither even before that of the meat might get thither The 128. Article Of the Originall of Teares AS Laughter is never caused by the greatest Joyes so Tears proceed not from an extream Sadnesse but an indifferent one and that accompanied with or followed by some resentment of Love or also of joy And to understand their originall well it must be noted that although abundance of vapours continually issue forth from all parts of our Body yet there is none from whence there come so much as from the eyes by reason of the greatnesse of the optick neerves and the multitude of little arteries through which they come and that as sweat is made of the vapours which issuing our of the other parts convert into water on the superficies of them so teares are made of vapours issuing from the eyes The 129. Article Of the manner how vapours turn into water NOw as I have written in the Meteors explaining after what manner the vapours of the aire convert into rain that is proceeds from their being lesse agitated or more abundant than ordinary so I beleeve that when those that issue from the Body are farre lesse agitated then usually although they are not so abundant yet they may convert to water which causeth the cold sweats that sometimes proceed of weaknesse when a man is sick And I beleeve that when they are more abundant provided they be not withall more agitated they also convert into water this causeth sweat when one useth exercise But then the eyes sweat not because while the Body is exerecised the greatest parts of the spirits going into the muscles which serve to move it there go lesse through the optick nerve to the eyes And it is but the same matter which compounds the blood in the veins or arteries and the spirits when it is in the brain nerves or muscles and vapours when it issues out in the likenesse of aire And lastly sweat tears when it thickens into water on the superficies of the Body or the eyes The 130. Article How that which hurts the eye excites it to weep ANd I can see but two causes that make the vapours issuing from the eyes to change into teares The first is when the figure of the pores through which they passe is changed by any accident whatsoever for that retarding the motion of these vapours and altering their order may cause them to convert into water So there needs only a straw in the eye to draw out some teares by reason that exciting paine in it it altars the disposition of the pores so that some becoming more narrow the small parts of the vapours passe lesse quickly through it and whereas formerly they issued out
both equally ill grounded Joy is commonly more hurtfull then Sadness because this enduing a man with reservednesse and Warinesse doth in some sort encline him to Prudence whereas the other render those who give themselves up thereunto inconsiderate and rash The 144th Article Of Desires whose events depend only on our selves BUt because these Passions cannot sway us to any actions but by the interposition of the Desire that they excite it is Desire which wee ought peculiarly to regulate and therein consists the principall part of Morality Now as I said just now it is alwayes good when it follows a true knowledge so it cannot chuse but be bad when it is grounded on an errour and me thinks the most ordinary errour committed in Desire is when a man doth not clearly enough distinguish the things which absolutely depend on our selves from those which doe not For concerning those which depend of us that is of our free disposition it is enough to know that they are good not to desire them with too much vehemence because it is a following of vertue to doe the good things that depend of us and it is certain he cannot have too ardent a Desire after Vertue Besides what we thus desire cannot chuse but be accomplished since it depending only on us we ever receive the plenary satisfaction wee expect but the usuall fault herein is not that we desire too much but too little and the soveraigne remedy against that is as much as in us lies to ridde the spirit of all kind of Desires less usefull then to strive to know clearly and consider with attention the goodness of that which is to be desired The 145 Article Of those which depend meerly on other causes and what Fortune is FOr those things which depend not any wayes of us how good soever they be they ought never to be desired with Passion not only because they may not befall and by this means afflict us so much the more by how much more they were desired but chiefly because when they possesse our thoughts they divert us from bending our affection to other things the acquisition whereof depends of our selves and there are two generall remedies against these idle Desires the first generosity which I will speak of hereafter the second is that we ought to reflect on divine Providence and imagine to our selves that it is impossible that any thing happen otherwise then this Providence hath determined from all eternity so that there is a kind of fatality or unresistable necessity to oppose Fortune to destroy her as a Chimera proceeding only from the errour of our understandings for wee can desire nothing but what we think in some manner possible and wee cannot suppose things which depend not of as possible seeing we think they depend not on Fortune that is wee suppose they may happen and the like hath happened formerly Now this opinion is only grounded upon this that wee not undersTanding all the causes contributary to every effect for when a thing which we supposed to depend on Forume doth not fall out that shewes some of the causes necessary to produce was wanting and consequently that it was absolutely impossible and that the like did never happen that is where a like cause of its Production was wanting so that had wee not been ignorant of that before we should never have imagined them possible nor consequently should ever have desired them The 146th Article Of those that depend of us and others too THis vulgar opinion then that there is without us a Fortune which causeth things to fall out or not to fall out according to her pleasure must be utterly rejected and it must be understood that all things are guided by a divine Providence whose eternall decree is so infallible and immutable that unless those things which the same decree hath pleased to let depend on our free disposition we ought to think for our parts that nothing happens but what of necessity must as if it were fatall so that without a crime we cannot desire it may happen otherwise But because the most part of our Desires extend to two things which depend not altogether on our selves nor altogether else-where we ought exactly to distinguish what in them depends on our selves that we may not let our Desire ramble any farther then that and for what is over and above though we should esteem the successe thereof absolutely fatall and immutable that our Desire busie not it selfe thereabout we should not omit to consider the reasons why it ought lesse or more to be hoped for that they may serve to regulate our actions For if for example wee had any businesse at a place whither wee might goe two severall wayes one whereof uses to be much safer than the other although the decree of Providence may be such that if we go that way which is conceived safest wee shall not escape robbing and on the contrary we might have gone the other way without any danger yet we ought not therefore to be indifferent which we take nor rest upon the immutable fatality of this decree But reason wills us to choose the way which used to be safest and our Desire herein ought to be fulfilled whatsoever evill befall us by following it because this evill or mischiefe having been as to us inevitable we have no occasion to wish to be exempted from it but only doe the best our understanding can comprehend as I suppose we have done and it is certain that when a man exerciseth himselfe so to distinguish betwixt Fatallity and Fortune he easily habituates himselfe so to regulate his Desires that seeing the fulfilling of them depends onely on our selves they may alwayes give us an absolute satisfaction The 147th Article Of the interiour emotions of the Soul I Will onely adde here one consideration which me thinks is very usefull to hinder us from receiving any discommodity by our Passions it is that our good and will depends chiefly of interiour emotions excited in the Soul onely by the Soul her self wherein they differ from these Passions which ever depend of some motion of the spirits And although these emotions of the Soul be often joyned to the Passions resembling them they may also be often found among other Passions and even spring from those that are contrary to them For example when a husband weeps for his deceased wife whom as oft it falls out it would vex him to see restored to life againe it may be his heart is straightned by Sadnesse which the solemnity of the funerall and the absence of a person whose conversation he was used to excite in him and it may be some remnants of Love or Pity which present themselves to his imagination draw true tears from his eyes notwithstanding that in the mean time he feels a secret Joy in the most interiour part of his Soul whose emotion is so strong that the Sadnesse and tears accompanying it cannot diminish any of its force And
when we read strange adventures in a book or see them personated on a stage it sometimes excites Sadnesse in us sometimes Joy or Love or Hatred and generally all the Passions according to the diversity of objects that offer themselves to our imagination but withall we take a delight to feel them excited in us and this delight is an intellectuall Joy which may as well spring from Sadnesse as all the rest of the Passions The 148 Article That the exercise of Vertue is a Soveraigne remedy against the Passions NOw forasmuch as these interiour emotions doe touch us neerest to the quick and consequently have more power over us then the Passions they differ from which are met withall in them it is certain that provided our Soul have wherewithall to content her interiour part all the troubles that come from abroad are not able to hurt her but rather serve to augment her Joy in that seeing she cannot be injured by them it lets her understand her own perfection And that our Soul may be thus contented she need do nothing but exactly follow the track of Vertue For whosoever hath lived so that his Conscience cannot hit him in the teeth for failing to doe all things which he judged to be best which is the thing I mean here by following the track of Vertue he from thence receives a satisfaction so effectuall to make him happy that the most violent assaults of the Passions shall never be strong enough to trouble the tranquility his Soul The Passions of the Soul The third part Of Particular Passions The 149th Article Of Estimation and Contempt NOw the six Originall Passions are explained which are as the kinds or Genera whereof all the rest are but sorts or Species I will here succinctly observe what there is peculiar in every one of the rest and I will keep still the same order wherein I have formerly marshall'd them The two first are Estimation and contempt For though they commonly signifie onely the opinions a man hath without any Passion of the vallue of any thing yet because from these opinions doe often spring Passions which want peculiar names me thinkes these may be attributed to them And Estimation as it is a Passion is an inclination of the Soul to represent unto her selfe the vallue of the thing esteemed which inclination is caused by a peculiar motion of the spirits so conveyed into the braine that they there fortifie the impressions belonging to that purpose As on the contrary the Passion of contempt is an inclination of the Soul to consider the meannesse or smallnesse of what it contemnes caused by the motion of the spirits which fortifie the Idea of this smallnesse The 150 Article That these two Passions are but Sorts of Admiration SO both these Passions are but sorts of Admiration For when we neither admire the greatnesse nor smallnesse of an object we make neither more nor lesse account of it than reason dictates to us we ought to doe so that we then esteeme or contemne it without Passion And though oft-times Estimation be excited in us by Love and Contempt by Hatred that is not so alwayes and proceeds onely from this that a man is more or lesse inclined to consider the greatnesse or smallnesse of an object as he hath more or lesse affection to it The 151 Article That a man may esteem or contemne himselfe NOw these two Passions may generally relate to all sorts of objects but they are especially remarkable when we referre them to our selves that is when it is our own merit that we either esteem or contemne and the motion of the spirits which cause them is then so manifest that it even changes the countenance gesture gate and generally all the actions of those who conceive a better or worse opinion of themselves than ordinary The 152 Article For what cause a man may esteem himselfe ANd because one of the chiefe parts of Wisdome is to know in what manner for what cause every one ought to esteem or contemn himself I will here endeavour to give my opinion thereof I observe but one thing in us which may give us just cause to esteem our selves to wit the use of our free Disposition and our empire over our Wills For only the actions depending on this free Disposition are those for which wee may justly be praised or blamed and it makes us in some manner like unto God by making us masters of our selves provided wee doe not lose the priviledges it gives us by our unworthiness The 153 Article Wherein Generosity consists SO I believe true Generosity which causeth a man to set himself at the highest rate he justly may consists only partly in knowing there is nothing which truly he can call his own unlesse this free Disposition of his Wills nor wherefore he ought to be praised or blamed unlesse for using that well or ill and partly in feeling a constant and firme resolution in himselfe to use it well that is his Will shall never be wanting to undertake and execute such things as hee shall judge to be best which is to follow Vertue absolutely The 154th Article That it restraines a man from contemning others THose who have this knowledge and resentment of themselves are easily perswaded that every other man hath such of himselfe too because there is nothing in it that depends of any thing else Wherefore they never contemne any body and though they oft-times see other men commit errours that make their weaknesse appeare yet they are evermore enclined to excuse than blame them and to believe that they doe it rather for want of knowledge than good will And as they doe not think themselves much inferiour to those who have greater estates honours nor yet more wit knowledge beauty or generally that surpass them in any other perfections so they do not esteem themselves much above those whom they surpasse because all these things seem very little considerable to them in comparison of their good Will for which only they esteem themselves and which they suppose is or at least may be in every other man The 155th Article Wherein vertuous Humility consists SO the most generous use to be most humble and Vertuous Humility consists only in this that the reflexion wee make on the infirmity of our own nature and the faults we may have formerly committed or those we are like to commit which are no whit lesse than those committed by others is the reason why we do not preferre our selves before any body but think that others who have their free Disposition as well as we may use it as well The 156th Article What the properties of Genorosity are and how it serves for a remedy against all unruliness of the Passions THey who thus are generous are naturally addicted to doe great things and yet to undertake nothing they are not capable of and because they esteem nothing greater than to doe good to other men and to contemn their own
Fear which causing the Soul to waver between severall actions that she may doe is the cause she cannot execute any and thereby she hath time to choose before she determines on them Whereof truly some good use may be made but when it lasts longer than it ought and it takes up that time to debate which is required to act it is very evill Now I say it is a sort of Feare though it may so fall out when a man hath choyce of many things whose goodnesse is equally apparent that he may bee at a stand and irresolute and yet not be afraid For this sort of Irresolution comes onely from the subject presented and not from any emotion of the spirits Wherefore it is not a Passion unlesse the sear of failing in his choyce encrease the uncertainty But this fear is so usuall and so strong in some that oftentimes although they have not any choyce and though they see only one thing to take or leave yet it seizes on them and causeth them unprofitably to stop there and search after others and then it is an excesse of Irresolution which proceeds from too great a Desire to doe well and an imbecillity in the understanding which having no clear and distinct notions hath only a great company of confused ones Wherefore the remedy against this excesse is to accustome a mans selfe to frame certaine and determinate Judgements concerning all things that present themselves and conceive he doth alwayes doe his duty when he doth what he conceives to be best though it may be he conceive amisse The 171 Article Of Courage and Boldnesse COurage when it is a Passion and not a habit or naturall inclination is a certain heat or agitation which disposeth the Soul to addict her powerfully to the execution of the things she will doe of what nature soever they be and Boldnesse is a sort of Courage that disposeth the Soul to the execution of things most dangerous The 172 Article Of Emulation AND Emulation also is a sort of it but in another sense for Courage may be considered as a kind or Genus that is divided into as many sorts or Species as there are severall objects and as many more as it hath causes In the first sence Boldnesse is a sort in the other Emulation and this last is nothing else but a heat which disposeth the Soul to undertake things that she hopes may succeed with her because shee sees them succeed with others and so it is a sort of Courage whose externall cause is example I say the externall cause because it ought ever besides that to have an internall one which consists in this that the body is so disposed as Desire and Hope are stronger to drive abundance of blood to the heart than Fear or Despaire to hinder it The 173 Article How Boldnesse depends on Hope FOr it is to be noted that although the object of Boldnesse be difficulty from whence commonly ensues Fear or even Despaire so that it is in most dangerous and desperate affairs that most Boldnesse and Courage is required neverthelesse there must be some Hope or else a man must be assured that the end he propounds to himselfe shall succeed to oppose himselfe vigorously against the difficulties he shall encounter But this end is different from this object For he can not be assured and despairing of the same thing at the same time So when the Decij flung themselves in the midst of their enemies and ran upon a certain death the object of their Boldnesse was the difficulty of keeping their lives in this action of which difficulty they utterly despaired for they were sure to die but their end was to animate their souldiers by their example and make them winne the victory of which they had Hope or else their end was to get Fame after their death whereof they were assured The 174 Article Of Cowardice and fearfulnesse COwardice is directly opposite to Courage and is a Ianguishing or coldnesse which hinders the Soul from addicting her selfe to the execution of things which she would doe if she were exempted from this Passion And fearefulnesse or affright the contrary to Boldnesse is not onely a coldnesse but a distraction and astonishment of the Soul that robs her of the power to resist evils which she thinks are neer her The 175 Article Of the use of Cowardice NOw although I cannot be perswaded that nature hath bestowed on man any Passion that is alwayes vicious and hath not some good and laudable use yet I am very much puzzeled to divine what these two are good for Only me thinkes Cowardice is of some use when it causeth a man to be free from paines he might be incited to take for reasons like truths if other more certain truths which make them be judged unprofitable had not invited this Passion in him For besides her exemption of the Soul from these paines it is then also very usefull to the Body for that retarding the motion of the spirits it hinders the forces thereof from being dissipated But is commonly very hurtfull because it diverts the Will from profitable Actions And because it proceeds from hence that a man hath not Hope or Desire enough to correct it he need onely augment these two Passions in himselfe The 176 Article Of the use of Fearfulnesse AS for Fearfulnesse or affright I see not how it can ever be laudable or usefull Neither is it one particular Passion but onely an excesse of Cowardice astonishment and Fear which is alsayes vicious as Boldnesse is an excesse of Courage ever good provided the end proposed be good And because the chiefe cause of Fearfulnesse is surprize there is no better way to be rid of it than to use premeditation and prepare ones selfe against all events the fear whereof may cause them The 177 Article Of Remorse REmorse of conscience is a sort of Sadnesse which comes from the scruple a man hath that a thing he hath done or hath not done is not good And it necessarily presupposes doubt For if he had been absolutely assured that what he did had been evill he had refrained from doing it since the Will enclines us not to any things but such as have an appearance of goodnesse And if he were assured that what he hath already done were evill it would breed repentance and not only Remorse Now the use of this Passion is to make him examine whether the thing he doubts of be good or no and to hinder him from doing it another time if he be not assured that it is good But because it presupposeth an evill the best way were never to be subject to feel it and it may be prevented the same way as a man may be exempted of Irresolution The 178 Article Of Derision DErision is a sort of Joy mingled with Hatred which proceeds from this that a man perceives some little evill in a person whereof he thinks him worthy He hates this evil and rejoyces to see