The Ethics by Benedictus de Spinoza (most important books of all time .txt) 📖

>imagination depend solely on its own nature-that is (I. Def.

vii.), if this faculty of imagination be free.

 

PROP. XVIII. If the human body has once been affected by two or

more bodies at the same time, when the mind afterwards imagines

any of them, it will straightway remember the others also.

Proof.-The mind (II. xvii. Coroll.) imagines any given body,

because the human body is affected and disposed by the

impressions from an external body, in the same manner as it is

affected when certain of its parts are acted on by the said

external body ; but (by our hypothesis) the body was then so

disposed, that the mind imagined two bodies at once ; therefore,

it will also in the second case imagine two bodies at once, and

the mind, when it imagines one, will straightway remember the

other. Q.E.D.

Note.-We now clearly see what Memory is. It is simply a

certain association of ideas involving the nature of things

outside the human body, which association arises in the mind

according to the order and association of the modifications

(affectiones) of the human body. I say, first, it is an

association of those ideas only, which involve the nature of

things outside the human body : not of ideas which answer to the

nature of the said things : ideas of the modifications of the

human body are, strictly speaking (II. xvi.), those which involve

the nature both of the human body and of external bodies. I say,

secondly, that this association arises according to the order and

association of the modifications of the human body, in order to

distinguish it from that association of ideas, which arises from

the order of the intellect, whereby the mind perceives things

through their primary causes, and which is in all men the same.

And hence we can further clearly understand, why the mind from

the thought of one thing, should straightway arrive at the

thought of another thing, which has no similarity with the first

; for instance, from the thought of the word pomum (an apple), a

Roman would straightway arrive at the thought of the fruit apple,

which has no similitude with the articulate sound in question,

nor anything in common with it, except that the body of the man

has often been affected by these two things ; that is, that the

man has often heard the word pomum, while he was looking at the

fruit ; similarly every man will go on from one thought to

another, according as his habit has ordered the images of things

in his body. For a soldier, for instance, when he sees the

tracks of a horse in sand, will at once pass from the thought of

a horse to the thought of a horseman, and thence to the thought

of war, &c. ; while a countryman will proceed from the thought of

a horse to the thought of a plough, a field, &c. Thus every man

will follow this or that train of thought, according as he has

been in the habit of conjoining and associating the mental images

of things in this or that manner.

 

PROP. XIX. The human mind has no knowledge of the body, and does

not know it to exist, save through the ideas of the modifications

whereby the body is affected.

Proof.-The human mind is the very idea or knowledge of the

human body (II. xiii.), which (II. ix.) is in God, in so far as

he is regarded as affected by another idea of a particular thing

actually existing : or, inasmuch as (Post. iv.) the human body

stands in need of very many bodies whereby it is, as it were,

continually regenerated ; and the order and connection of ideas

is the same as the order and connection of causes (II. vii.) ;

this idea will therefore be in God, in so far as he is regarded

as affected by the ideas of very many particular things. Thus

God has the idea of the human body, or knows the human body, in

so far as he is affected by very many other ideas, and not in so

far as he constitutes the nature of the human mind ; that is (by

II. xi. Coroll.), the human mind does not know the human body.

But the ideas of the modifications of body are in God, in so far

as he constitutes the nature of the human mind, or the human

mind perceives those modifications (II. xii.), and consequently

(II. xvi.) the human body itself, and as actually existing ;

therefore the mind perceives thus far only the human body.

Q.E.D.

 

PROP. XX. The idea or knowledge of the human mind is also in

God, following in God in the same manner, and being referred to

God in the same manner, as the idea or knowledge of the human

body.

Proof.-Thought is an attribute of God (II. i.) ; therefore

(II. iii.) there must necessarily be in God the idea both of

thought itself and of all its modifications, consequently also of

the human mind (II. xi.). Further, this idea or knowledge of the

mind does not follow from God, in so far as he is infinite, but

in so far as he is affected by another idea of an individual

thing (II. ix.). But (II. vii.) the order and connection of

ideas is the same as the order and connection of causes ;

therefore this idea or knowledge of the mind is in God and is

referred to God, in the same manner as the idea or knowledge of

the body. Q.E.D.

 

PROP. XXI. This idea of the mind is united to the mind in the

same way as the mind is united to the body.

Proof.-That the mind is united to the body we have shown from

the fact, that the body is the object of the mind (II. xii. and

xiii.) ; and so for the same reason the idea of the mind must be

united with its object, that is, with the mind in the same manner

as the mind is united to the body. Q.E.D.

Note.-This proposition is comprehended much more clearly from

what we have said in the note to II. vii. We there showed that

the idea of body and body, that is, mind and body (II. xiii.),

are one and the same individual conceived now under the attribute

of thought, now under the attribute of extension ; wherefore the

idea of the mind and the mind itself are one and the same thing,

which is conceived under one and the same attribute, namely,

thought. The idea of the mind, I repeat, and the mind itself are

in God by the same necessity and follow from him from the same

power of thinking. Strictly speaking, the idea of the mind, that

is, the idea of an idea, is nothing but the distinctive quality

(forma) of the idea in so far as it is conceived as a mode of

thought without reference to the object ; if a man knows

anything, he, by that very fact, knows that he knows it, and at

the same time knows that he knows that he knows it, and so on to

infinity. But I will treat of this hereafter.

 

PROP. XXII. The human mind perceives not only the modifications

of the body, but also the ideas of such modifications.

Proof.-The ideas of the ideas of modifications follow in God

in the same manner, and are referred to God in the same manner,

as the ideas of the said modifications. This is proved in the

same way as II. xx. But the ideas of the modifications of the

body are in the human mind (II. xii.), that is, in God, in so far

as he constitutes the essence of the human mind ; therefore the

ideas of these ideas will be in God, in so far as he has the

knowledge or idea of the human mind, that is (II. xxi.), they

will be in the human mind itself, which therefore perceives not

only the modifications of the body, but also the ideas of such

modifications. Q.E.D.

 

PROP. XXIII. The mind does not know itself, except in so far as

it perceives the ideas of the modifications of the body.

Proof.-The idea or knowledge of the mind (II. xx.) follows in

God in the same manner, and is referred to God in the same

manner, as the idea or knowledge of the body. But since (II.

xix.) the human mind does not know the human body itself, that is

(II. xi. Coroll.), since the knowledge of the human body is not

referred to God, in so far as he constitutes the nature of the

human mind ; therefore, neither is the knowledge of the mind

referred to God, in so far as he constitutes the essence of the

human mind ; therefore (by the same Coroll. II. xi.), the human

mind thus far has no knowledge of itself. Further the ideas of

the modifications, whereby the body is affected, involve the

nature of the human body itself (II. xvi.), that is (II. xiii.),

they agree with the nature of the mind ; wherefore the knowledge

of these ideas necessarily involves knowledge of the mind ; but

(by the last Prop.) the knowledge of these ideas is in the human

mind itself ; wherefore the human mind thus far only has

knowledge of itself. Q.E.D.

 

PROP. XXIV. The human mind does not involve an adequate

knowledge of the parts composing the human body.

Proof.-The parts composing the human body do not belong to

the essence of that body, except in so far as they communicate

their motions to one another in a certain fixed relation (Def.

after Lemma iii.), not in so far as they can be regarded as

individuals without relation to the human body. The parts of the

human body are highly complex individuals (Post. i.), whose

parts (Lemma iv.) can be separated from the human body without in

any way destroying the nature and distinctive quality of the

latter, and they can communicate their motions (Ax. i., after

Lemma iii.) to other bodies in another relation ; therefore (II.

iii.) the idea or knowledge of each part will be in God,

inasmuch (II. ix.) as he is regarded as affected by another idea

of a particular thing, which particular thing is prior in the

order of nature to the aforesaid part (II. vii.). We may affirm

the same thing of each part of each individual composing the

human body ; therefore, the knowledge of each part composing the

human body is in God, in so far as he is affected by very many

ideas of things, and not in so far as he has the idea of the

human body only, in other words, the idea which constitutes the

nature of the human mind (II. xiii) ; therefore (II. xi.

Coroll.), the human mind does not involve an adequate knowledge

of the human body. Q.E.D.

 

PROP. XXV. The idea of each modification of the human body does

not involve an adequate knowledge of the external body.

Proof.-We have shown that the idea of a modification of the

human body involves the nature of an external body, in so far as

that external body conditions the human body in a given manner.

But, in so far as the external body is an individual, which has

no reference to the human body, the knowledge or idea thereof is

in God (II. ix.), in so far as God is regarded as affected by the

idea of a further thing, which (II. vii.) is naturally prior to

the said external body. Wherefore an adequate knowledge of the

external body is not in God, in so far as he has the idea of the

modification of the human body ; in other words, the idea of