Fundamental Philosophy, Vol. 1 (of 2)Balmes, Jaime Luciano
Philosophy
Fundamental Philosophy, Vol. 1 (of 2)
Balmes, Jaime Luciano
Philosophy, Spanish
72. We may still further confirm this truth. Experience teaches, and
did it not exist, reason would still teach that there must be a limit
to the field of sight, according to our distance from the object. Thus,
when we fix our sight upon a wall of great extent we do not see it all,
but only a part. Now suppose an object of given magnitude to be within
the range of sight, but not so great as to cover the surface embraced
by the eye. According to Condillac's system, there can be no difference
in the perception, provided the color be the same; whence, it will
follow, that the sensation will be just the same, whether the object
occupy the whole, or only an exceedingly minute part, of the visual
field. It will likewise follow, that, if this visual field be, for
example, a great white curtain a hundred yards square, and the object a
piece of blue cloth a yard square, the sensation will be just the same
whether the blue cloth be one inch or ninety yards square.
73. These arguments, which must have occurred at least confusedly
to Condillac, made him hesitate in his expressions, and even use
contradictory language. We may have already observed this in
the passages cited, but we shall see it yet more clearly in the
following:--"We have no term to express with exactness the sentiment
that the statue modified by many colors at one time has of itself; but
in fine, it knows that it exists in many ways, and perceives itself in
a certain mode _as a colored point beyond which_ are others, in which
it turns to find itself; and under this point of view, it may be said,
that it _perceives itself extended_." He had before said, that color
did not seem extended to the statue, until, sight being instructed by
touch, the eye became accustomed to refer the one simple sensation to
all the points of the surface: and in the very next line, as we have
just seen, he asserts the contrary; the statue now perceives itself
to be extended, and the ideologist discovers no way of avoiding the
contradiction, but to warn us that the sentiment of extension will
be vague because it wants limits. This is a contradiction which we
have already made evident. But whence this want of limits? If various
figures of different colors, green, red, etc., be supposed to be upon
a visual field of a hundred yards square of white surface, the sight
will, as is evident, perceive the limits of these figures; where, then,
did Condillac discover that illimitation of which he talks?
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