Mental Philosophy: Including the Intellect, Sensibilities, and Will — John Shaqi
Mental Philosophy: Including the Intellect, Sensibilities, and WillHaven, Joseph
Philosophy
Mental Philosophy: Including the Intellect, Sensibilities, and Will
Haven, Joseph
Psychology
II. REPRESENTATIVE, {1. Of the Actual, _Memory_.
{2. Of the Ideal, _Imagination_.
III. REFLECTIVE, {1. Synthetic, _Generalization_.
{2. Analytic, _Reasoning_.
IV. INTUITIVE, _Original Conception_.
§ III.--HISTORICAL SKETCH--VARIOUS DIVISIONS OF THE MENTAL FACULTIES.
_The earlier Division._--The general division of the powers of the
mind, for a long time prevalent among the earlier modern philosophers,
was into _two_ chief departments, known under different names, but
including under the one what we now term the intellect, under the
other what we designate as the sensibilities and the will, which
were not then, as now, distinguished from each other in the general
division, but thrown into one department. Under the first of these
departments, they included the thinking and reasoning powers, the
strictly intellectual part of our nature; under the second, whatever
brings the mind into action--the impelling and controlling power or
principle--the affections, emotions, desires, volitions, etc. The names
given to these two divisions varied with different writers, but the
difference was chiefly in the name, the principle of division being
the same. By some authors they were designated as the _contemplative_
and the _active_ powers, by others _cognitive_ and _motive_. The
latter was the nomenclature proposed by Hobbes. Others again adopted
the terms understanding and will, by which to mark the two divisions;
Locke, Reid, some of the French philosophers, and, in our own country,
Edwards, followed this division. Stewart designates them, the one class
as the _intellectual_, and the other as the _active_ and _moral_
powers. Brown objects to this phraseology on the ground that the
intellectual powers are no less active than the other. He divides the
mental powers or states primarily into what he calls _external_ and
_internal_ affections of the mind, comprehending under the former all
those mental states which are immediately preceded by and connected
with the presence of some external object; under the latter, those
states which are not thus immediately preceded. The latter class he
divides into intellectual states and emotions, a division corresponding
essentially to those of the authors previously mentioned, the emotions
of Brown comprehending essentially the powers which others had termed
motive, or active and moral.
_Prevalence of this Method._--This twofold division of the mental
powers, under different names, as now stated, has been the one
generally prevalent until a comparatively recent date. It may doubtless
be traced, as Sir William Hamilton suggests, to a distinction made by
Aristotle, into _cognitive_ and _appetent_ powers.
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