discussed the conic sections, but were far from imagining that the idea of the ellipse could be the basis of a system of astronomy: the foci to them were simple points, the curve a line, and the relations of both the object of combinations at once profitless and without application. Ages pass away, and these foci are the sun, the curve the orbit of planets. The lines on the geometrician's table represented a world!
The intimate connection of mathematical and natural science cannot be questioned; and who shall say to what extent both are connected with ontological, psychological, theological, and moral science? The extended scale over which beings are distributed may at first sight seem to be an assemblage of unconnected objects, but seen with the eyes of science, it is perceived to be a delicately worked chain, whose links present, as we advance, greater beauty and perfection. We see the different realms of nature united by close relations: the sciences, of which they are the objects, mutually borrow each other's light, and enter on each other's territory. The complication of objects among themselves involves this complication of science; and the unity of the laws imposed upon different orders of beings makes all sciences approach, and tend to form, one only science. If it were given us to see the identity of their origin, the unity of the end and the simplicity of the means, we should come into the possession of the true transcendental science, the only science which involves all others, or more correctly speaking, the only idea in which every thing is represented as it is, and every thing seen without any necessity of combination, or effort of any kind, just as a magnificent landscape, its outlines, form, and colors are pictured on a perfectly clear mirror. In the meantime, we must rest satisfied with shadows of reality, and must see in the instinctive tendency of our understanding to simplify, to reduce every thing or make it approach as much as possible to unity, the announcement, the sign of this single science, this intuition of the one infinite idea; just as in the desire for happiness which agitates our heart, the thirst after enjoyment which torments us we discover a proof that all is not ended here below, and that our soul has been created for the possession of a good not to be attained in this mortal life.
51. If we compare men with men, and pay attention to the character of genius, the most elevated point of human intelligence, we shall see the truth of what has been said of the scale of human beings, and the progress of science. Men of true genius are distinguished by the unity and extent of their conceptions. If they treat a difficult and complicated question, they simplify it, consider it from a high point of view, and determine one general idea which sheds light upon all the others. If they have a difficulty to solve, they show the root of the error, and with a word dispel all the illusion of sophistry. If they use synthesis, they first establish the principle which is to serve as its basis, and with one dash trace the road to be followed in order to reach the wished-for result. If they make use of analysis, they strike in its secret resort the point where decomposition is to commence, they at once open the object, and reveal to us its most obscure mysteries. If there is question of a discovery, while others are seeking here and there, they strike the ground with their foot, and exclaim, "the treasure is here." They make no long arguments, nor evasions; their thoughts are few but pregnant; their words are not many, but in each of them is set a pearl of inestimable value.
52. No doubt there is in the intellectual order a single truth from which all other truths emanate, one idea which includes all other ideas. This philosophy teaches, and the efforts, the natural and instinctive tendencies of every intelligence, toiling after simplicity and unity, show it: such also is the dictate of common sense, which considers that thought the highest and most noble which is the most comprehensive and the most simple.(4)
CHAPTER V.
TRANSCENDENTAL SCIENCE IN THE HUMAN INTELLECTUAL ORDER CANNOT EMANATE FROM THE SENSES.
53. In the human intellectual order, such as it is in this life, there is no one truth from which all others flow: philosophers have sought one in vain; they have found none, for there was none to be found. In fact, where could it be found?
54. Would it emanate from the senses?
Sensations are as various as the objects which produce them: by them we acquire knowledge of individual and material things; but no one truth, source of all other truths, can be found in any one of these, or the sensations proceeding from them.
55. If we observe our impressions received through sensation, we shall perceive that they are all equal so far as the production of certainty is concerned. We are just as certain of the sensation caused by any noise whatever, as we are of that produced by an object which we see, an odorous body which we smell, a savory morsel which we taste, or any thing which strongly affects our sense of touch. There is no gradation in the certainty produced by these sensations: they are all equal; for if we speak of sensation itself, we experience it in such a manner as to leave no uncertainty; and if we speak of the relation of sensation with the existence of the object causing it, we are just as certain that the sensation called sight corresponds to an external object seen, as we are that an external object touched corresponds to the sensation called touch.
Hence we infer that no one sensation is the origin of the certainty of other sensations; in this they are all alike: and most men have no other reason than their experience why they should be sure of this certainty. We are aware that what happens to individuals from whose eyes cataracts have been removed, shows that simple sensation does not suffice for the due appreciation of the object perceived, and that one sense aids another: but this does not prove any one of them to be preferable; for as the blind man, whose sight was suddenly restored, did not form an exact judgment as to the size and distance of objects seen by sight only, but required the assistance of touch; so is it very probable that if a person of good eyesight had been deprived from his birth of the sense of touch, he would not be able, were this sense given him suddenly, to form an exact judgment concerning objects touched, until, by the aid of sight, he had become accustomed to combine the new and the old order of sensations, and learnt by practice to determine the relations of sensation with its object, or to know by sensation the properties of its object.
56. This fact of the blind man is however contradicted by others which lead to a directly opposite result. The youth, upon whom the oculist, Jean Janin, performed the same operation, and other persons blind from their birth, whose eyesight Luigi de' Gregori partly restored, did not, like the blind man of Cheselden, deem these objects stuck to their eyes, but that they saw them as things really external and separate. Rosmini thus relates it,[3] although he gives the preference to the Cheselden case, which he says was repeated in Italy by the professor Giacomo di Pavia with precisely the same results.
57. It is not easy to ascertain how this combination of one sensation with another enables us to judge rightly of external objects; chiefly because the development of our sensitive and intellectual faculties is completed before we can reflect upon it: and thus we find ourselves certain of the existence and properties of things before we have thought of certainty, and much less of the means of acquiring it.
58. But even supposing us, after occupying ourselves with sensations and their relations with objects, to set aside the certainty which we already have, and to act as if we sought it, we can find no one sensation the basis of the certainty of the other sensations. We should meet in that all the difficulties to be encountered in the others.
59. One of the chief difficulties upon this point is to determine the relations of the sense of sight with that of touch, and how far the one depends upon the other. We propose hereafter to examine these questions at some length, and we shall therefore now refrain from entering upon them, as well because they are not of a character to be incidentally investigated, as because whatever their solution, it is not at all opposed to what we shall here establish.
60. It would be of no advantage to us to know that the
