TWO KINDS OF DESIRES: OF THE BODY; AND OF THE COMBINATION, OR NATURE.
Why therefore should we recognize two kinds of desires, instead of acknowledging only one kind in the living body? Because nature differs from the body to which it gives life. Nature is anterior to the body because it is nature that organizes the body by moulding it, and shaping it; consequently, the origin of desire is not in nature, but in the passions of the living body. If the latter suffer, it aspires to possess things contrary to those that make it suffer, to make pleasure succeed pain, and satisfaction succeed need. Nature, like a mother, guesses the desires of the body that has suffered, tries to direct it, and to lure it back. While thus trying to satisfy it, she thereby shares in its desires, and she proposes to accomplish the same ends. It might be said that the body, by itself, possesses desires and inclinations; that nature has some only as a result of the body, and because of it; that, finally the soul is an independent power which grants or refuses what is desired by the organism.