The Scottish Philosophy [196]
heads of contiguity, resemblance, and contrast, he intimates his belief that they may all be reduced to a finer kind of contiguity. As the latest speculations have not yet got down to the depths of this subject, it may be useful to know the hints thrown out by Brown, who seems to me to be so far on the right track, but not to have reached the highest fountain from which the stream issues: --
"All suggestion, as I conceive, may, if our analysis be sufficiently minute, be found to depend on prior existence, or at least on such immediate proximity as is itself very probably a modification of coexistence." He begins with resemblance: "if a portrait be faithfully painted, the effect which it produces on the eye that perceives it is the same, or very nearly the same, as the effect produced on the eye by similar light reflected from the living object; and we might therefore almost as justly say, that when any individual is seen by us repeatedly he suggests himself by resemblance, as that he is thus suggested by his portrait." This surely comes very close to Hamilton's principle, that resembling objects, so far as they are alike, are the same, and to his law of repetition or identity. The following brings us quite as near his law of redintegration In many other cases, in which the resemblance is less complete, its operation may, even without such refinement of analysis as that to which I have alluded, be very obviously brought under the influence of contiguity. Thus, as the drapery forms {330} so important a part of the complex perception of the human figure, the costume of any period may recall to us some distinguished person of that time. A ruff like that worn by Queen Elizabeth brings before us the sovereign herself, though the person who wears the ruff may have no other circumstance of resemblance: because the ruff and the general appearance of Queen Elizabeth, having formed one complex whole in our mind, it is necessary only that one part of the complexity should be recalled -- as the ruff in the case supposed -- to bring back all the other parts by the mere principle of contiguity. The instance of drapery, which is but an adjunct or accidental circumstance of the person, may be easily extended to other instances, in which the resemblance is in parts of the real and permanent figure." " In this manner, by analyzing every complex whole, and tracing, in the variety of its composition, that particular part in which the actual similarity consists, -- and which may therefore be supposed to introduce the other parts that have formerly coexisted with it, -- we might be able to reduce every case of suggestion from direct resemblance -- to the influence of mere contiguity." " By the application of a similar refined analysis to other tribes of associations, even to those of contrast, we may perhaps find that it would be possible to reduce these also to the same comprehensive influence of mere proximity as the single principle on which all suggestion is founded." I am far from holding that this analysis into parts of the concrete idea starting the suggestion, furnishes a complete solution of the difficulties connected with fixing on one ultimate law; but it seems to set us on the right track. He gives us a somewhat crude, but still important, classification of what he calls the secondary laws of suggestion, which induce one associate conception rather than another. He mentions longer or shorter continuance; more or less liveliness; more or less frequently present; more or less purity from the mixture of other feelings; differences of original constitution; differences of temporary emotion; changes in the state of the body; and general tendencies produced by prior habits. Had this arrangement been presented by another he would have proceeded to reduce
"All suggestion, as I conceive, may, if our analysis be sufficiently minute, be found to depend on prior existence, or at least on such immediate proximity as is itself very probably a modification of coexistence." He begins with resemblance: "if a portrait be faithfully painted, the effect which it produces on the eye that perceives it is the same, or very nearly the same, as the effect produced on the eye by similar light reflected from the living object; and we might therefore almost as justly say, that when any individual is seen by us repeatedly he suggests himself by resemblance, as that he is thus suggested by his portrait." This surely comes very close to Hamilton's principle, that resembling objects, so far as they are alike, are the same, and to his law of repetition or identity. The following brings us quite as near his law of redintegration In many other cases, in which the resemblance is less complete, its operation may, even without such refinement of analysis as that to which I have alluded, be very obviously brought under the influence of contiguity. Thus, as the drapery forms {330} so important a part of the complex perception of the human figure, the costume of any period may recall to us some distinguished person of that time. A ruff like that worn by Queen Elizabeth brings before us the sovereign herself, though the person who wears the ruff may have no other circumstance of resemblance: because the ruff and the general appearance of Queen Elizabeth, having formed one complex whole in our mind, it is necessary only that one part of the complexity should be recalled -- as the ruff in the case supposed -- to bring back all the other parts by the mere principle of contiguity. The instance of drapery, which is but an adjunct or accidental circumstance of the person, may be easily extended to other instances, in which the resemblance is in parts of the real and permanent figure." " In this manner, by analyzing every complex whole, and tracing, in the variety of its composition, that particular part in which the actual similarity consists, -- and which may therefore be supposed to introduce the other parts that have formerly coexisted with it, -- we might be able to reduce every case of suggestion from direct resemblance -- to the influence of mere contiguity." " By the application of a similar refined analysis to other tribes of associations, even to those of contrast, we may perhaps find that it would be possible to reduce these also to the same comprehensive influence of mere proximity as the single principle on which all suggestion is founded." I am far from holding that this analysis into parts of the concrete idea starting the suggestion, furnishes a complete solution of the difficulties connected with fixing on one ultimate law; but it seems to set us on the right track. He gives us a somewhat crude, but still important, classification of what he calls the secondary laws of suggestion, which induce one associate conception rather than another. He mentions longer or shorter continuance; more or less liveliness; more or less frequently present; more or less purity from the mixture of other feelings; differences of original constitution; differences of temporary emotion; changes in the state of the body; and general tendencies produced by prior habits. Had this arrangement been presented by another he would have proceeded to reduce