Analysis of the Phenomena of the Human MindMill, James
PhilosophyPhilosophy
Analysis of the Phenomena of the Human Mind
Mill, James
Psychology
[Editor's footnote 22: I venture to think that it is not a
philosophically correct mode of expression, to speak of indigestion,
or of hunger and thirst, as names of ideas. Hunger and thirst are
names of definite sensations; and indigestion is a name of a large
group of sensations, held together by very complicated laws of
causation. If it be objected, that the word indigestion, and even
the words hunger and thirst, comprehend in their meaning other
elements than the immediate sensations; that the meaning, for
instance, of hunger, includes a deficiency of food, the meaning of
indigestion a derangement of the functions of the digestive organs;
it still remains true that these additional portions of meaning are
physical phenomena, and are not our thoughts or ideas of physical
phenomena; and must, therefore, in the general partition of human
consciousness between sensations and ideas, take their place with
the former, and not with the latter.--_Ed._]
{60} It is proper to remark, that, beside the internal feelings to
which I have hitherto directed the reader's attention, there are
others, which might be classed, and considered apart. The
blood-vessels, for example, and motion of the blood, constitute an
important part of our System, not without feelings of its own;
feelings sometimes amounting to states which seriously command our
attention. Of the feelings which accompany fever, a portion may
reasonably be assigned to the change of action in the blood-vessels.
There are states of feeling, very distinguishable, {61} accompanying
diseased states of the heart, and of the nervous and arterial
systems.
Beside the blood and its vessels, the glandular system is an
important part of the active organs of the body; not without
sensibility, and of course, not without habitual sensations. The
same may be said of the system of the absorbents, of the lymphatics,
and of the vascular system in general.
The state of the nerves and brain, the most wonderful part of our
system, is susceptible of changes, and these changes are accompanied
with known changes of feeling. There is a class of diseases which go
by the name of nervous diseases: and though they are not a very
definite class; though it is not even very well ascertained how far
any morbid state of the nerves has to do with them; it is not
doubtful that in some of those diseases there are peculiar feelings,
which ought to be referred to the nerves. The nerves and brain may
thus be, not only the organs of sensations, derived from other
senses, but organs of sensations, derived from themselves. On this
subject we cannot speak otherwise than obscurely, because we have
not distinct names for the things which are to be expressed.
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