begin from the bodily species and arrive fi- to be formed, after its own will and pleasure,
TRINITY. 153
Cuap. X.] ON THE power; for when it endures hardship in so doing, on account of the condition of slavish mortality, then torment is the result, in such wise that nothing remains to the will save endurance. But the will averts the memory from the sense; when, through its being intent on something else, it does not suffer things present to cleave to it. As any one may see, when often we do not seem to ourselves to have heard some one who was speaking to us, because we were thinking of something else. But this is a mistake; for we did hear, but we do not remember, because the words of the speaker presently therefore, thrice combines as it were parent with offspring: first the species of the body with that to which it gives birth in the sense of the body; and that again with that which from it comes to be in the memory; and this also, thirdly, with that which is born from it in the intuition of the concipient's mind. But the intermediate combination which is the second, although its nearer to the first, is yet not so like thé first as the third is. For there are two kinds of vision, the one of [sensuous] rerception (sentcentis), the other of conception (cogétantis). But in order that the vision of conception may come to be, there is wrought for the purpose, in the memory, from the vision of [sensuous] perception something like it, to which the eye of the mind may turn itself i in conceiving, as the glance (aczes) of the eyes turns itself in [sensuously] perceiving to the bodily object. I have, therefore, chosen to put forward two | trinities in this kind: one when the vision of [sensuous] perception is formed from the bodily object, the other when the vision of conception is formed from the memory. But I have refrained from commending an intermediate one; because we do not commonly call it vision, when the form which comes to be in the sense of him who perceives, is enslipped out of the perception of our ears, through the bidding of the will being diverted elsewhere, by which they are usually fixed in the memory. Therefore, we should say more accurately in such a case, we do not remember, than, we did not hear; for it happens even in reading, and to myself very frequently, that when I have read through a page or an epistle, I do not know what I have read, and I begin it again. For the purpose of the will being fixed on something else, the memory was not so applied to the bodily sense, as the sense itself was applied to the letters. So, too, any one who walks with the will intent on something else, does not cee know where he has got to; for if he had not seen, he would not have walked thither, or would have felt his way in walking with greater attention, especially if he was passing through a place he did not know; yet, because he walked easily, certainly he saw; but because the memory was not applied to the sense ittrusted to the memory. Yet in all cases the ; will does not appear unless as the combiner | as it were of parent and offspring; and so, proceed from whence it may, it can be called neither parent nor offspring.'
CHAP. 10.—THE IMAGINATION ALSO ADDS EVEN self in the same way as the sense of the eyes was applied to the places through which he was passing, he could not remember at all even the last thing he saw. Now, to will to turn away the eye of the mind from that which is in the memory, is nothing else but
TO THINGS WE HAVE NOT SEEN, THOSE THINGS WHICH WE HAVE SEEN ELSEWHERE.
17. But if we do not remember except what we have [sensuously] perceived, nor conceive except what we remember; why do we often conceive things that are false, when certainly we do not remember falsely those things which we have perceived, unless it be because that will (which I have already taken pains to show as much as I can to be the. uniter and the separater of things of this kind) leads the vision of the conceiver that is to be formed, after its own will and pleasure, not to think thereupon,
CHAP, 9.——-SPECIES IS PRODUCED BY SPECIES IN SUCCESSION.
16. In this arrangement, then, while we begin from the bodily species and arrive finally at the species which comes to be in the intuition (confuitu) of the concipient, we find four species born, as it were, step by step one from the other, 'the second from the first, the third from the second, the fourth from the third: since from the species of the body itself, there arises that which comes to be in the sense of the percipient; and from this, that which comes to be in the memory; and from this, that which comes to be in the mind's eye of the concipient. And the will,
1 [Augustin's map of consciousness is as follows: (1). The corporeal species=the external object (outward appearance). (2). The sensible species=the sensation (appearance for the sense). (3). The mental species in its first form=present perception. (4). The mental species in its second form=remembered perception. These three '' species'' or appearances of the object: namely, corporeal, sensible, and mental, according to him, are combined in one synthesis with the object by the operation of the will. By
will,' he does not mean distinct and separate volitions : but the spontaneity of the ego—what Kant denominates the mechanism of the understanding, seen in the spontaneous employment of the categories of thought, as the mind ascends from empirical sensation to rational conception.
The English translator has failed to make clear the sharply defined psychology of | these chapters, by loosely rendering '' sextire,' ''to perceive,"' and '' cogitare'" to think.—W.G.T.S.]
THE WORKS OF ST. AUGUSTIN.
[Book XI.
no corporeal things, except either those we remember, or from those things which we remember. .
through the hidden stores of the memory; and, in order to conceive [imagine] those things which we do not remember, impels it to take one thing from hence, and another from thence, from those which we do remember; and these things combining into one vision make something which is called false, because it either does not exist externally in the nature of corporeal things, or does not seem copied from the memory, in that we do not remember that we ever saw such a thing. For who ever saw a black swan? And therefore no one remembers a black swan; yet who is there that cannot conceive it? For it is easy to apply to that shape which we have come to know by seeing it, a black color, which we have not the less seen in other bodies; and because we have seen both, we remember both. Neither do I remember a bird with four feet, because I never saw one; but I contemplate such a phantasy very easily, by adding to some winged shape such as I have seen, two other feet, such as I have likewise seen.? And therefore, in conceiving conjointly, what we remember to have seen singly, we seem not to conceive that which we remember; while we really do this under the law of the memory, whence we take everything which we join together after our own pleasure in manifold and diverse ways. For we do not conceive even the very magnitudes of bodies, which magnitudes we never saw, without help of the memory; for the measure of space to which our gaze commonly reaches through the magnitude of the world, is the measure also to which we enlarge the bulk of bodies, whatever they may be, when we conceive them as great as we can. And reason, indeed, proceeds still beyond, but phantasy does not follow her; as when reason announces the infinity of number also, which no vision of him who conceives according to corporeal things can apprehend. The same reason also teaches that the most minute atoms are infinitely divisible; yet when we have come to those slight and minute particles which we remember to have seen, then we can no longer behold phantasms more slender and more minute, although reason does not cease to continue to divide them. So we conceive
CHAP, II.—NUMBER, WEIGHT, MEASURE.
18. But because those things which are impressed on the memory singly, can be conceived according to number, measure seems to belong to the memory, but number to the vision; because, although the multiplicity of such visions is innumerable, yet a limit not to be transgressed is prescribed for each in the memory. Therefore, measure appears in the memory, number in the vision of things: as there is some measure in visible bodies themselves, to which measure the sense of those who see is most numerously adjusted, and from one visible object is formed the vision of many beholders, so that even a single person sees commonly a single thing under a double appearance, on account of the number of his two eyes, as we have laid down above. Therefore there is some measure in those things whence visions are copied, but in the visions themselves there isnumber. But the will which unites and regulates these things, and combines them into a certain unity, and does not quietly rest its desire of [sensuously] perceiving or of conceiving, except in those things from whence the visions are formed, resembles weight. And therefore I would just notice by way of anticipation these three things, measure, number, weight, which are to be perceived in all other things also. In the meantime, I have now shown as much as I can, and to whom I can, that the will is the uniter of the visible thing and of the vision; as it were, of parent and of offspring; whether
in [sensuous] perception or in conception, | and that it cannot be called either parent or! offspring. Wherefore time admonishes us to seek for this same trinity in the inner man, and to strive to pass inwards from that animal and carnal and (as he is called) outward man, of whom I have so long spoken. And here we hope to be able to find an image of God according to the Trinity, He Himself helping our efforts, who as things themselves show, and as Holy Scripture also witnesses, has regulated all things in measure, and number, and weight.'
t Vid. Retract. Il. xv. 2. [Augustin here says that when he wrote the above, he forgot what is said in Leviticus xi. 20, of '* fowls that creep, going upon all four, which have legs above their feet to leap withal upon the earth."'—W.G.T.S.]}
2 Wisd. xi. 21.