The Religious Sentiment. Daniel G. (Daniel Garrison) Brinton

of the generative organs considers himself sinful. His depressed tone of mind passes over into religious melancholy; ‘he is forsaken by God; he is lost.’ All his afflictions have a religious color.” In a similar strain, Feuchtersleben says: “In the female sex especially, the erotic delusion, unknown to the patient herself, often assumes the color of the religious.”47 “The unaccomplished sexual designs of nature,” observes a later author speaking of the effects of the single life, “lead to brooding over supposed miseries which suggest devotion and religious exercise as the nepenthe to soothe the morbid longings.”48

      1

      In his essay entitled, Ueber den Geschlechtsunterschied und dessen Einfluss auf die organische Natur, first published in 1795.

      2

      “Der alte Dualismus von Geist und Körper, der Jahrhunderte hindurch nach Versöhnung gerungen, findet diese heute nicht zwar in der Einheit der Substanz, wohl aber in der Einheit des Gesetzes.” Dr. Heinrich Boehmer, Geschichte der Entwickelung der Naturwissenschaftlichen Weltanschauung in Deutschland, s. 201 (Gotha, 1872).

      3

      Elements of Physio-Philosophy, § 3589. Eng. trans., London, 1847.

      4

      Von Feuchtersleben, The Princi

1

In his essay entitled, Ueber den Geschlechtsunterschied und dessen Einfluss auf die organische Natur, first published in 1795.

2

“Der alte Dualismus von Geist und Körper, der Jahrhunderte hindurch nach Versöhnung gerungen, findet diese heute nicht zwar in der Einheit der Substanz, wohl aber in der Einheit des Gesetzes.” Dr. Heinrich Boehmer, Geschichte der Entwickelung der Naturwissenschaftlichen Weltanschauung in Deutschland, s. 201 (Gotha, 1872).

3

Elements of Physio-Philosophy, § 3589. Eng. trans., London, 1847.

4

Von Feuchtersleben, The Principles of Medical Psychology, p. 130 (Eng. trans., London, 1847).

5

“The fundamental property of organic structure is to seek what is beneficial, and to shun what is hurtful to it.” Dr. Henry Maudsley, Body and Mind, p. 22.

“The most essential nature of a sentient being is to move to pleasure and from pain.” A. Bain, On the Study of Character, p. 292 (London, 1861).

“States of Pleasure are connected with an increase, states of Pain with an abatement of some or all of the vital functions.” A. Bain, Mind and Body, p. 59.

“Affectus est confusa idea, quâ Mens majorem, vel minorem sui corporis, vel alicujus ejus partis, existendi vim affirmat.” Spinoza, Ethices, Lib. III. ad finem.

6

The extension of the mechanical laws of motion to organic motion was, I believe, first carried out by Comte. His biological form of the first law is as follows: “Tout état, statique ou dynamique, tend à persister spontanément, sans aucune altération, en resistant aux perturbations extérieures.” Système de Politique Positive, Tome iv. p. 178. The metaphysical ground of this law has, I think, been very well shown by Schopenhauer to be in the Kantian principle that time is not a force, nor a quality of matter, but a condition of perception, and hence it can exert no physical influence. See Schopenhauer, Parerga und Paralipomena, Bd. II, s. 37.

7

“Aller Genuss, seiner Natur nach, ist negativ, d. h., in Befreiung von einer Noth oder Pein besteht.” Parerga und Paralipomena. Bd. II, s. 482.

8

“No impression whatever is pleasant beyond the instant of its realization; since, at that very instant, commences the change of susceptibility, which suggests the desire for a change of impression or for a renewal of that impression which is fading away.” Dr. J. P. Catlow, The Principles of Aesthetic Medicine, p. 155 (London, 1867).

“Dum re, quem appetamus fruimur, corpus ex ea fruitione novam acquirat constitutionem, á quá aliter determinatur, et aliæ rerum imagines in eo excitantur,” etc. Spinoza, Ethices, Pars III, Prop. lix.

9

“Feeling and thought are much more real than anything else; they are the only things which we directly know to be real.” – John Stuart Mill. —Theism, p. 202. How very remote external objects are from what we take them to be, is constantly shown in physiological studies. As Helmholtz remarks: “No kind and no degree of similarity exists between the quality of a sensation, and the quality of the agent inducing it and portrayed by it.” —Lectures on Scientific Subjects, p. 390.

10

The Philosophy of Consciousness, p. 72.

11

The Gospel of John (ch. xviii.) leaves the impression that Pilate either did not wait for an answer but asked the question in contempt, as Bacon understood, or else that waiting he received no answer. The Gospel of Nicodemus, however, written according to Tischendorf in the second century, probably from tradition, gives the rest of the conversation as follows: “Pilate says to him: What is truth? Jesus says: Truth is from heaven. Pilate says: Is not there truth upon earth? Jesus says to Pilate: See how one who speaks truth is judged by those who have power upon earth!” [ch. iii.]

12

The most acute recent discussion of this subject is by Helmholtz, in his essay entitled, “Recent Progress in the Theory of Vision.”

13

George Boole, Professor of Mathematics in Queen’s College, Cork, was born Nov. 2, 1815, died Dec. 8, 1864. He was the author of several contributions to the higher mathematics, but his principal production is entitled: An Investigation into the Laws of Thought, on which are founded the mathematical Theories of Logic and Probabilities [London, 1854.] Though the reputation he gained was so limited that one may seek his name in vain in the New American Cyclopedia [1875], or the Dictionnaire des Contemporains [1859], the few who can appreciate his treatise place the very highest estimate upon it. Professor Todhunter, in the preface to his History of the Theory of Probabilities, calls it “a marvellous work,” and in similar language Professor W. Stanley Jevons speaks of it as “one of the most marvellous and admirable pieces of reasoning ever put together” (Pure Logic, p. 75). Professor Bain, who gives a synopsis of it in his Deductive Logic, wholly misapprehends the author’s purpose, and is unable to appraise justly his conclusions.

14

The Institutes of Metaphysic, p. 459, (2nd edition.)

15

An Outline of the Necessary Laws of Thought,

47

Elements of Medical Psychology, p. 281.

48

J. Thompson Dickson, The Science and Practice of Medicine in relation to Mind, p. 383 (New York, 1874).