CHAPTER SEVENTH.

MUSCULAR HABITS.

§. 194. Instances in proof of the existence of muscular habits.

FROM habits, considered as affecting the senses, the fransition is easy to MUSCULAR HABITS. On this subject therefore we shall now offer a few remarks.-Of the fact, that such habits exist, it is presumed no doubt can be generally entertained. Muscular habits may be detected in the gait and in the speech of men generally; they are found with specific characteristics in particular classes of men ; every mechanic forms them, and they vary in their aspect with his particular business. Hence the enlarged and powerful neck of the porter, the strong and brawny arm of the blacksmith, and the particular habitudes of all their movements.

But we will not delay on this part of the subject any farther than to point out a familiar instance of it. It is one of the most general kind, is of the most common occurrence, and yet perhaps has not often been made the subject of particular attention.--Every man's hand writing is an instance, and a proof of Muscular habit. In acquiring that art, the muscles have undergone a complete system of instruction. That instruction and training they practically and most punctually regard ever afterwards; so much so that we can tell a man's writing, to which we

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are accustomed, almost as readily as we recognize the man himself when we see him.-But this subject is introduced here, although the train of thought naturally led to it, not so much for its own sake, as in consequence of its connection with Volition.

§. 195. Considered by some writers to be involuntary.

It seems to have been the opinion of some writers, (among others of Drs. Reid and Hartley,) that bodily or muscular habits operate in many cases without design and volition on the part of the person who has formed them ; and that as they are without any attendant thought, without any preceding mental operation, such bodily acts are to be considered as purely mechanical or automatic. They endeavour to explain and confirm their views by the instance of a person, learning to play on the harpsichord. When a person first begins to learn, it is admitted by all, that there is an express act of volition, preceding every motion of the fingers. By degrees the motions appear to cling to each other mechanically; we are no longer conscious of volitions, preceding and governing them. other words there is nothing left but the motions; there is no act of the mind; the performance, admirable as it is, has the same character and the same merit with that of the action of a well-contrived machine.

§. 196. Objections to the doctrine of involuntary muscular

habits.

In

In replying to these views, it may be safely admitted, that, in playing the harpsichord and some other musical instruments, we have not always a distinct remembrance of volitions, and consequently the muscular effort has sometimes the appearance of being independent of the will. But this mere appearance is not sufficient to command our assent to the doctrine advanced by these writers, until the four following objections be set aside.

(1) The supposition, that the acts in question are automatic, is unnecessary. If it be true, as we have repeat

edly seen so much occasion to believe, that Habit is a general law of our nature, then it may be regarded as applicable not only to the muscular efforts, but to the preceding volitions themselves. It is implied in this view, (supposing it to be a correct one,) that such volitions may be very rapid, so as scarcely to arrest our attention a moment. Now the natural result of such slight attention will be, that they will exist and pass away without being remembered. These considerations are sufficient to explain the mere appearance, which is admitted to exist, but which Reid and Hartly attempt to explain by an utter denial of the putting forth of volitions at all. But if this be the case, then the supposition, that the acts in question are automatic and involuntary, is an unnecessary one.

(2) The most rapid performers are able, when they please, to play so slowly, that they can distinctly observe every act of the will in the various movements of the fingers. And when they have checked their motions so as to be able to observe the separate acts of volition, they can afterwards so accelerate tho e motions, and of course so diminish the power, (or what may be regarded as the same thing, the time of attending to them,) that they cannot recal the accompanying volitions. This is the rational and obvious supposition, that there is not an exclusion of volitions, but an inability to recollect them, on account of the slight degree of attention. Any other view necessarily implies an inexplicable jumble of voluntary and involuntary actions in the same performance.

(3.) If there be no volitions, the action must be strictly and truly automatic; that is, it must, from the nature of the case, be the motion of a machine. It must always go on invariably in the same track, without turning to the right hand or to the left. If this be the case in playing the harpsichord, which is by no means probable, it is certainly not in some other instances of habits. It must be supposed, that there is as much rapidity of volition put forth by the rope dancer, the equilibrist, the equestrian actor of the circus,&c. as by the player on the harpsichord. Now if it be admitted, that the ordinary steps of the sin

gular and surprising feats they perform are familiar to them, still the process is evidently not an invariable one. It may be pronounced impossible for them to perform experiments, which agree in every particular with preceding experiments. They are necessarily governed in their volitions and movements by a variety of circumstances, which arise on every particular occasion, and which could not be foreseen. Hence the muscular movements in these cases, being controlled by the will, are not mechanical; and as we have abundant reason to believe them often not less rapid in the performance, than the muscular movements are in playing the harpsichord, why should we consider these last mechanical and not voluntary?

(4) If the hypothesis of Reid and Hartley be true, then there is some general tendency or principle in our nature, by which actions originally voluntary are converted into mechanical actions. Nor will it be easy to show, why this principle should not extend further than mere bodily movements. It will be the result of this tendency to wrest all those powers which it reaches, whether bodily or mental, from the control of the will. In other words, when we consider the extent of its application, and its wonderful results, wherever it applies, we must conclude, that this principle will infallibly make men machines, mere automatons, before they have lived out half their days.--Such are some of the objections to the doctrine, that muscular habits are involuntary.

CHAPTER NINTII.

CONCEPTIONS.

§. 197. Meaning of conceptions and how they differ from certain other states of the mind.

We are now led, as we advance in the general subject of intellectual states of EXTERNAL ORIGIN, to contemplate the mind in another view, viz, as employed in giving rise to what are usually termed CONCEPTIONS. Without professing to propose a definition in all respects unexceptionable, we are entitled to say in general terms, that this name is given to any re-existing sensations whatever, which the mind has felt at some former period, and to the notions, which we frame of absent objects of perception. Whenever we have conceptions, our sensations and perceptions are replaced, as Shakspeare expresses it, in the "mind's eye," without our at all considering at what time, or in what place they first originated. In other words, they are revived and recalled, and nothing more.

Using therefore the term CONCEPTIONS to express a class of mental states, and in accordance with the general plan, having particular reference in our remarks here to such as are of external origin, it may aid in the better understanding of their distinctive character, if we mention more particularly, how they differ both from sensations and perceptions, and also from remembrances, with which last some may imagine them to be essentially the same.