23 quotes
There always remains a certain amount of arbitrary spontaneity in its action, without which it would be dead.
The Law of Mind (1892)
In the case of colors, there is a tridimensional spread of feelings.
The Law of Mind (1892)
Feeling which has not yet emerged into immediate consciousness is already affectible and already affected.
The Law of Mind (1892)
The first character of a general idea so resulting is that it is living feeling.
The Law of Mind (1892)
We are accustomed to speak of ideas as reproduced, as passed from mind to mind, as similar or dissimilar to one another, and, in short, as if they were substantial things; nor can any reasonable objection be raised to such expressions.
The Law of Mind (1892)
Let me now try to gather up all these odds and ends of commentary and restate the law of mind, in a unitary way.
The Law of Mind (1892)
Indeed, even this last moment will be recognized like the rest, at least, be just beginning to be so.
The Law of Mind (1892)
We have here a question of difficulty, analogous to the question of nominalism and realism.
The Law of Mind (1892)
One of the most marked features about the law of mind is that it makes time to have a definite direction of flow from past to future.
The Law of Mind (1892)
Consciousness must essentially cover an interval of time; for if it did not, we could gain no knowledge of time, and not merely no veracious cognition of it, but no conception whatever.
The Law of Mind (1892)
Some minds will jump here jump to the conclusion that a past idea cannot in any sense be present. But that is hasty and illogical.
The Law of Mind (1892)
Were the ends of a person already explicit, there would be no room for development, for growth, for life; and consequently there would be no personality.
The Law of Mind (1892)
The development of the human mind has practically extinguished all feelings, except a few sporadic kinds, [like] sound, colors, smells, warmth, etc., which now appear to be disconnected and separate.
The Law of Mind (1892)
A finite interval of time generally contains an innumerable series of feelings; and when these become welded together in association the result is a general idea.
The Law of Mind (1892)
What distinct meaning can attach to saying that an idea in the past in any way affects an idea in the future, from which it is completely detached?
The Law of Mind (1892)
The tendency to regard continuity, in the sense in which I shall define it, as an idea of prime importance in philosophy conveniently may be be termed synechism. The present paper is intended chiefly to show what synechism is, and what it leads to.
The Law of Mind (1892)
Wherever ideas come together they tend to weld into general ideas; and whenever they are generally connected, general ideas govern the connection; and these general ideas are living feelings spread out.
The Law of Mind (1892)
The only answer that I can at present make is that facts that stand before our face and eyes and stare us in the face are far from being, in all cases, the ones most easily discerned. That has been remarked since time immemorial.
The Law of Mind (1892)
But the extraordinary insight which some persons are able to gain of others from indications so slight that it is difficult to ascertain what they are, is certainly rendered more comprehensible by the view here taken.
The Law of Mind (1892)
Third, consider the insistency of an idea. The insistency of a past idea with reference to the present is a quantity which is less, the further back that past idea is, and rises to infinity as the past idea is brought up into coincidence with the present.
The Law of Mind (1892)