Essays Towards a Theory of Knowledge | Page 3

that Time was born with
the Heavens, and that Sun, Moon, and Planets were created in order
that Time might be.
[12:1] This might be contrasted with the statement of M. Bergson who
tells us (Evolution créatrice, p. 11): "Plus nous approfondirons la
nature du temps plus nous comprendrons que durée signifie invention,
création de formes, elaboration continue de l'absolument nouveau."
[14:1] Recently, we believe, astronomers have favoured the view that
the day of Venus is equal in length to her year.

II
THE ORIGIN OF PHYSICAL CONCEPTS
"Penser c'est sentir," said Condillac. "It is evident," said Bishop
Berkeley, "to one who takes a survey of the objects of Human
Knowledge that they are either ideas actually imprinted on the senses or
else such as are perceived by attending to the passions and operations
of the Mind, or lastly ideas formed by help of memory and imagination
either combining, dividing, or barely representing those originally
perceived in the foresaid ways." J. S. Mill tells us, "The points, lines,
circles, and squares which one has in his mind are, I apprehend, simply
copies of points, lines, circles, and squares which he has known in his
experience," and again, "The character of necessity ascribed to the
truths of Mathematics and even, with some reservations to be hereafter
made, the peculiar certainty attributed to them is an illusion." "In the
case of the definitions of Geometry there exist no real things exactly
conformable to the definitions." Again Taine, "Les images sont les
exactes reproductions de la sensation." Again Diderot, "Pour imaginer
il faut colorer un fond et détacher de ce fait des points en leur

supposant une couleur differente de celle du fond. Restituez à ces
points la même couleur qu'au fond,--à l'instant ils se confondent avec
lui et la figure disparait," etc. Again, Dr. Ernest Mach, Vienna,
remarks, "We are aware of but one species of elements of
Consciousness: sensations." "In our perceptions of Space we are
dependent on sensations." Dr. Mach repeatedly refers to
"space-sensations," and indeed affirms that all sensation is spatial in
character.[18:1]
According to the view of Knowledge of which we have extracted
examples above, the ideas of the mind are originally furnished to it by
sensation, from which therefore are derived, not necessarily all our
Thoughts, but all the materials of Discourse, all that constitutes the
essence of Knowledge.
Our purpose at the moment is to show that this view is altogether false,
and our counter proposition is, that it is from our Activity that we
derive our fundamental conceptions of the external world; that
sensations only mark the interruptions in the dynamic Activity in which
we as potent beings partake, and that they serve therefore to denote and
distinguish our Experience, but do not constitute its essence.
We do not propose now to devote any time to the work of showing that
sensations from their very nature could never become the instruments
of Knowledge. We propose rather to turn to the principal ideas of the
external world which are the common equipment of the Mind in order
to ascertain whether in point of fact they are derived from Sensation.
Of course to some extent the answer depends on what we mean by
Sensation. If by that term we intend our whole Experience of the
external, then of course it necessarily follows--or, at least, we
admit--that our Knowledge of the external must be thence derived. But
such a use of the term is loose, misleading, and infrequent. The only
safe course is to confine the term Sensation to the immediate data of
the five senses--touch, sight, hearing, smell, and taste, with probably
the addition of muscular and other internal feelings. It is in this sense
that the word is usually employed, and has been employed by the
Sensationalist School themselves.

Now we might perhaps begin by taking the idea of Time as a concept
constantly employed in Discourse, but of which it would be absurd to
suggest that it is supplied to us by Sensation. It might, however, be
urged in reply that the idea of Time is not derived from the external
world at all, but is furnished to us directly by the operations of the
Mind, and that therefore its intellectual origin need not involve any
exception to the general rule that the materials of our Knowledge of the
world are furnished by Sensation alone. Without, therefore, entering
upon any discussion of the interesting question as to what is the real
nature of Time, we shall pass to the idea of Space.
Mach, the writer whom we have already quoted, in his essay on Space
and Geometry speaks constantly and freely of sensations of Space, and
as there can be no denial of the fact that Space is a constituent of the
external world, it would