8. There are two sorts of pleasure, whereof the one seemeth to affect the corporeal organ of the sense, and that I call sensual; the greatest part whereof, is that by which we are invited to give continuance to our species; and the next, by which a man is invited to meat, for the preservation of his individual person: the other sort of delight is not particular to any part of the body, and is called the delight of the mind, and is that which we call joy. Likewise of pains, some affect the body, and are therefore called the pains of the body; and some not, and those are called grief.
CHAPTER VIII.
[1, 2.] Wherein consist the pleasures of sense. [3, 4.] Of the imagination, or conception of power in man. [5.] Honour, honourable, worth. [6.] Signs of honour. [7.] Reverence. [8.] Passions.
Wherein consist the pleasures of sense.
1. Having in the [first section] of the precedent chapter presupposed, that motion and agitation of the brain which we call conception, to be continued to the heart, and there to be called passion; I have therefore obliged myself, as far forth as I am able, to search out and declare from what conception proceedeth every one of those passions which we commonly take notice of: for, seeing the things that please and displease, are innumerable, and work innumerable ways, men have not taken notice but of a very few, which also are many of them without name.
2. And first, we are to consider, that of conceptions there are three sorts, whereof one is of that which is present, which is sense; another, of that which is past, which is remembrance; and the third, of that which is future, which we call expectation: all which have been manifestly declared in the second and third chapters; and every of these conceptions is pleasure or pain present. And first for the pleasures of the body which affect the sense of touch and taste, as far forth as they be organical, their conceptions are sense: so also is the pleasure of all exonerations of nature: all which passions I have before named, sensual pleasures; and their contrary, sensual pains: to which also may be added the pleasures and displeasures of odours, if any of them shall be found organical, which for the most part they are not, as appeareth by this experience which every man hath, that the same smells, when they seem to proceed from others, displease, though they proceed from ourselves; but when we think they proceed from ourselves, they displease not, though they come from others: the displeasure of this is a conception of hurt thereby from those odours, as being unwholesome, and is therefore a conception of evil to come, and not present. Concerning the delight of hearing, it is diverse, and the organ itself not affected thereby: simple sounds please by equality, as the sound of a bell or lute: insomuch as it seems, an equality continued by the percussion of the object upon the ear, is pleasure; the contrary is called harshness, such as is grating, and some other sounds, which do not always affect the body, but only sometime, and that with a kind of horror beginning at the teeth. Harmony, or many sounds together agreeing, please by the same reason as the unison, which is the sound of equal strings equally stretched. Sounds that differ in any height, please by inequality and equality alternate, that is to say, the higher note striketh twice, for one stroke of the other, whereby they strike together every second time; as is well proved by Galileo, in the first dialogue concerning local motion: where he also sheweth, that two sounds differing a fifth, delight the ear by an equality of striking after two inequalities; for the higher note striketh the ear thrice, while the other strikes but twice. In like manner he sheweth wherein consisteth the pleasure of concord, and the displeasure of discord, in other difference of notes. There is yet another pleasure and displeasure of sounds, which consisteth in consequence of one note after another, diversified both by accent and measure; whereof that which pleaseth is called an air; but for what reason one succession in tone and measure is a more pleasing air than another, I confess I know not; but I conjecture the reason to be, for that some of them imitate and revive some passion which otherwise we take no notice of, and the other not; for no air pleaseth but for a time, no more doth imitation. Also the pleasures of the eye consist in a certain equality of colour: for light, the most glorious of all colours, is made by equal operation of the object; whereas colour is perturbed, that is to say, unequal light, as hath been said, chapter II. [section 8]. And therefore colours, the more equality is in them, the more resplendent they are; and as harmony is pleasure to the ear, which consisteth of divers sounds; so perhaps may some mixture of divers colours be harmony to the eye, more than another mixture. There is yet another delight by the ear, which happeneth only to men of skill in music, which is of another nature, and not, as these, conception of the present, but rejoicing of their own skill; of which nature are the passions of which I am to speak next.
Of the imagination, or conception of power in man.
3. Conception of the future, is but a supposition of the same, proceeding from remembrance of what is past; and we so far conceive that anything will be hereafter, as we know there is something at the present that hath power to produce it: and that anything hath power now to produce another thing hereafter, we cannot conceive, but by remembrance that it hath produced the like heretofore. Wherefore all conception of future, is conception of power able to produce something. Whosoever therefore expecteth pleasure to come, must conceive withal some power in himself by which the same may be attained. And because the passions, whereof I am to speak next, consist in conception of the future, that is to say, in conception of power past, and the act to come; before I go any further, I must in the next place speak somewhat concerning this power.
4. By this power I mean the same with the faculties of the body, nutritive, generative, motive, and of the mind, knowledge; and besides these, such further power as by them is acquired, viz. riches, place of authority, friendship or favour, and good fortune; which last is really nothing else but the favour of God Almighty. The contraries of these are impotencies, infirmities, or defects of the said powers respectively. And because the power of one man resisteth and hindereth the effects of the power of another, power simply is no more, but the excess of the power of one above that of another: for equal powers opposed, destroy one another; and such their opposition is called contention.