Analysis of the Phenomena of the Human Mind

by James Mill

IDENTITY.

There is one other term, which still requires explanation; and that is, IDENTITY, about which there would not have appeared any difficulty, had it not been for Personal Identity; which is, indeed, a complicated case, and, of course, involves the obscurity which great complexity implies.

We have already seen, on what account we use the marks, same, and different, when we apply them to two simple sensations, or when we apply them to two ideas, simple, or complex. In these cases, the terms are relative terms, and name the objects in pairs.

There is another case, that which now it is our business to explain, in which the name is not applied to two objects, but to the same object, at two different times. Thus it is, that I say, The bridge at Westminster, by which I crossed the Thames thirty years ago, is the same by which I crossed it yesterday. The crown which was placed on the head of George IV. at his coronation, is the same by which the kings of England have been crowned for many centuries. The words which we read in the Gospel of Matthew, are the same which were written by that evangelist. The words which we read in the poem called the Æneid are the same which were written by the poet Virgil. The church which is now at Loretto, is the same with that which belonged to the Virgin Mary at Nazareth, which in the month of May, in the year 1291, was 165 carried through the air by Angels, from Galilee to Tersato, in Dalmatia; and again on the 10th of December, 1294, about midnight, by what conveyance is not known, was set down in a wood in Italy, in the district of Ricanati, about a thousand paces from the sea.

It is evident, from the contemplation of these instances, which might be multiplied to any extent, that the word SAME, in this mode of applying it, is merely the name of a certain case of Belief: a belief which, in some of the instances, is, memory; in some, is grounded upon testimony; in some, upon circumstantial evidence; and, in some, upon both testimony and circumstances. Thus, the case of belief respecting Westminster-bridge, which I mark by the word, same, is Memory. The cases of belief respecting the crown of England, respecting the words of the gospel, respecting the church of Loretto, marked respectively by the word same, are founded on testimony, joined with circumstances.

As we have already shewn wherein Belief, in all its cases, consists, we have implicitly afforded the exposition of Identity. From same, the concrete, comes, in the usual way, sameness, the abstract, dropping only the connotation of the concrete. And Identity and Sameness are equivalent terms.

From the importance, however, which has been attached to these words, it seems necessary to shew to the learner, somewhat more particularly, the mode of tracing the simple ideas composing the clusters which they are employed to mark.

The Lily, when it produces its brilliant flower in summer, I call the same, with the plant which began 166 to shew itself above the surface of the ground, in spring, from a bulb, which I had planted in a particular spot of my garden. I also called it the same, from one day to another, though changing every day in its size, and other appearances, from its germination to the present time. For what reason have I done so? On account of certain circumstances, which every body can enumerate; its rising from a certain root; the uninterrupted continuity, by means of the stalk, between the root and the other parts of the plant; its being always found in the same place, that is, in the same synchronous order with certain other things; its corresponding with other plants, the growth of which I have observed, and so on. If it had grown in a flower pot, and been transferred from one to another, the enumeration of the circumstances would have been different; the evidence of its having grown from the same root would have been drawn from other circumstances. When I say, then, that the Lily I see, with its flowers in July, is the same with the Lily just emerging from the ground in April, I only express my belief of its having sprung from a certain root, and of its having vegetated, in connexion with that root, in the way of the plants grouped in the class called Lily.

I have a male Calf, of singular beauty, produced from my cow. I observe him from day to day. From day to day I call him the Same; and I do so when he has grown a bull of the greatest size. When I do so, I merely express my belief in a certain train of antecedents and consequents, with which experience has rendered me familiar. There is a certain train of antecedents and consequents, known to me by 167 observation, which I call the birth, growth, maturity; and, in one word, the Life, of the animal. The birth, growth, and maturity of one animal, is one series of successions; the birth, growth, and maturity of another animal, is another series of successions. When I apply the name Same, then, to any animal, I merely express my belief, that my present sight of the animal is part of a particular series, of which that perception is the last link.

The case, it will not be doubted, is perfectly analogous, when I transfer the term from one of the lower animals to one of my fellow men. The birth, infancy, childhood, youth, manhood, of a human being, are names for different parts of a certain series of antecedents and consequents. This series is known to me by experience; that is, by sensation, by memory, and other cases of association. The life of one man is one series. The life of another man is another series. When I say, then, that a man is the same, I merely express my belief in one of those series; belief that the particular man, of the present instant, is the last link of such and such a chain, and not of any other.