7. The ideas of the sensations which attend the action of the muscles are among the most important of the elements which constitute our being. From these we have the ideas of resistance, of compressibility, of hardness, of softness, of roughness, of smoothness, of solidity, of liquidity, of weight, of levity, of extension, of figure, of magnitude, of whole and of parts, of motion, of rest. It is, indeed, to be observed, that these are all complex ideas, and that other feelings than the mere muscular feeling are concerned in their composition. In almost all the ideas referrible to the muscular feelings, of sufficient importance to have names, the Will is included. The muscular action is the consequent, the Will the antecedent; and the name of the idea, includes both. Thus the idea of resistance is the thought, or idea, of {58} the feelings we have, when we will to contract certain muscles, and feel the contraction impeded.[19] [20] [Editor's footnote 19: Rather, when we will to contract certain muscles, and the contraction takes place, but is not followed by the accustomed movement of the limb; what follows, instead, being a sensation of pressure, proportioned to the degree of the contraction. It is not the muscular contraction itself which is impeded by the resisting object: that contraction takes place: but the outward effect which it was the tendency, and perhaps the purpose, of the muscular contraction to produce, fails to be produced.--_Ed._] [Bain's footnote 20: It is unnecessary to advert to the operation of the Will, (in the first instance at least,) in considering the feelings of muscular action. The will is the principal, but not the only, source of our activity. The mere spontaneous vigour of the system may put the muscles in motion. Likewise the muscular pleasure itself operates, by the fundamental law of the will, for its own continuance; a process not commonly called voluntary. In these circumstances, it seems advisable to consider and describe the consciousness of muscular exertion by itself, and without reference to the will.--_B._] There is no feeling of our nature of more importance to us, than that of resistance. Of all our sensations, it is the most unintermitted; for, whether we sit, or lie, or stand, or walk, still the feeling of resistance is present to us. Every thing we touch, at the same time resists; and every thing we hear, see, taste, or smell, suggests the idea of something that resists. It is through the medium of resistance, that every act by which we subject to our use the objects and laws of nature, is performed. And, of the complex states of consciousness, which the philosophy of mind is called upon to explain, there is hardly one, in which the feeling or idea of resistance is not included.