The Online Library of Liberty

A project of Liberty Fund, Inc.

• Selections From the Scottish Philosophy of Common Sense
• Introduction
• Thomas Reid
• I.—: Introduction to the Philosophy of Common Sense
• § 1.: The Importance of the Subject, and the Means of Prosecuting It
• § 2.: The Impediments to Our Knowledge of the Mind
• II.—: Analysis of a Typical Sensation
• § 1.: The Sensation Considered Abstractly
• § 2.: Sensation and Remembrance, Natural Principles of Belief
• § 3.: Judgment and Belief In Some Cases Precede Simple Apprehension
• § 4.: Two Theories of the Nature of Belief Refuted—conclusions From What Hath Been Said
• § 5.: Apology For Metaphysical Absurdities—sensation Without a Sentient, a Consequence of the Theory of Ideas—consequences of This Strange Opinion
• § 6.: The Conception and Belief of a Sentient Being Or Mind Is Suggested By Our Constitution—the Notion of Relations Not Always Got By Comparing the Related Ideas
• § 7.: There Is a Quality Or Virtue In Bodies, Which We Call Their Smell—how This Is Connected In the Imagination With the Sensation
• § 8.: That There Is a Principle In Human Nature, From Which the Notion of This, As Well As All Other Natural Virtues Or Causes, Is Derived
• § 9.: Whether In Sensation the Mind Is Active Or Passive?
• III.—: Knowledge and Reality
• § 1.: Of Hardness
• § 2.: Of Natural Signs
• § 3.: Of Extension
• § 4.: Of the Visible Appearances of Objects
• § 5.: Of Perception In General
• § 6.: Of the Process of Nature In Perception
• Appendix: of Cause and Power
• IV.—: The Operations of the Mind
• § 1.: Principles Taken For Granted
• § 2.: Of Hypotheses and Analogy
• § 3.: Of Perception
• § 4.: Of Sensation
• § 5.: Of Primary and Secondary Qualities
• § 6.: Of Conception
• § 7.: Of Judgment
• § 8.: Of Common Sense
• § 9.: The First Principles of Contingent Truths
• § 10.: First Principles of Necessary Truths
• V.—: Of Morals
• § 1.: Of Benevolent Affection In General
• § 2.: There Are Rational Principles of Action In Man
• § 3.: Of Regard to Our Good On the Whole
• § 4.: Of the Notion of Duty, Rectitude, Moral Obligation
• § 5.: Observations Concerning Conscience
• § 6.: That Moral Approbation Implies a Real Judgment
• Adam Ferguson
• Of Man’s Progressive Nature
• James Beattie
• Of the Perception of Truth In General
• Dugald Stewart
• I.—: Of the Object of Philosophy, and the Method of Prosecuting Philosophical Inquiries
• II.—: Of the Association of Ideas
• III.—: Of the Power Which the Mind Has Over the Train of Its Thoughts
• IV.—: Of the Influence of Association On Our Active Principles, and On Our Moral Judgments
• V.—: Of Certain Laws of Belief, Inseparably Connected With the Exercise of Consciousness, Memory, Perception, and Reasoning

§ 1.

The Sensation considered abstractly

Let us now attend carefully to what the mind is conscious of when we smell a rose or a lily; and, since our language affords no other name for this sensation, we shall call it a smell or odour, carefully excluding from the meaning of those names everything but the sensation itself, at least till we have examined it.

Suppose a person who never had this sense before, to receive it all at once, and to smell a rose—can he perceive any similitude or agreement between the smell and the rose? or indeed between it and any other object whatsoever? Certainly he cannot. He finds himself affected in a new way, he knows not why or from what cause. Like a man that feels some pain or pleasure formerly unknown to him, he is conscious that he is not the cause of it himself; but cannot, from the nature of the thing, determine whether it is caused by body or spirit, by something near, or by something at a distance. It has no similitude to anything else, so as to admit of a comparison; and, therefore, he can conclude nothing from it, unless, perhaps, that there must be some unknown cause of it.

It is evidently ridiculous to ascribe to it figure, colour, extension, or any other quality of bodies. He cannot give it a place, any more than he can give a place to melancholy or joy; nor can he conceive it to have any existence, but when it is smelled. So that it appears to be a simple and original affection or feeling of the mind, altogether inexplicable and unaccountable. It is, indeed, impossible that it can be in any body: it is a sensation, and a sensation can only be in a sentient thing.

The various odours have each their different degrees of strength or weakness. Most of them are agreeable or disagreeable; and frequently those that are agreeable when weak, are disagreeable when stronger. When we compare different smells together, we can perceive very few resemblances or contrarieties, or, indeed, relations of any kind between them. They are all so simple in themselves, and so different from each other, that it is hardly possible to divide them into genera and species. Most of the names we give them are particular; as the smell of a rose, of a jessamine, and the like. Yet there are some general names—as sweet, stinking, musty, putrid, cadaverous, aromatic. Some of them seem to refresh and animate the mind, others to deaden and depress it.