SECTION V.
TIME.
As SPACE is a comprehensive word, including all Positions, or the whole of synchronous order; so TIME is a comprehensive word, including all Successions, or the whole of successive order.
The difficulty of the exposition, in this case, consists not in the ideas; for they are clear and certain enough; but in finding expressions which will have even a chance of conveying to readers, who are not familiar with the analysis of mental phenomena, the ideas which it is my object to impart.
As all objects, considered as existing together, are said to exist in SPACE, so all objects considered as existing one after another, are said to exist in TIME.
Objects, however, are said to exist in Time, in two distinguishable cases; either when they are in constant flow; or, when they have, what we call, stability or duration. The constant passage of men, horses, vehicles, &c., in a busy and crowded street, is in Time; the permanence of St. Paul’s, in its well-known position, is also in Time. If Time mean the succession of the objects in the one case, it must mean something else in the other. It cannot mean the succession of St. Paul’s. But it may mean the idea of St. Paul’s, associated with the idea of other successions.
Of TIME itself we conceive, that it is never still. It is a perpetual flow of instants, of which only one can ever be present. The very idea of Time, therefore, is 117 an idea of successions. It consists of this, and of nothing else.
But there are no real successions, save successions of objects, that is of feelings in our minds.28 What, then, are the successions of TIME, which are the successions of nothing? To those who have thoroughly familiarized themselves with the account which we have given of abstract terms, and who can promptly and steadily conceive the mode of their signification, we can render an answer, which will be understood at once, and will be felt to be complete and satisfactory.
28 There is an unusual employment of language here, which if attention is not formally drawn to it, may embarrass the reader. By objects are commonly meant, those groups or clusters of sensations and possibilities of sensation, that compose what we call the external world. A single sensation, even external, and still less if internal, is not called an object. In a somewhat larger sense, whatever we think of, as distinguished from the thought itself and from ourselves as thinking it, is called an object; this is the common antithesis of Object and Subject. But in this place, the author designates as objects, all things which have real existence, as distinguished from the instants of mere Time, which, as he is pointing out, have not; and a puzzling effect is produced by his applying the name Object, in even an especial manner, to sensations: to the tickings of a watch, or the beatings of a patient’s pulse.—Ed.
We have shewn, how we form the abstracts, redness, from red; sweetness, from sweet; hardness, from hard; by simply dropping the connotation of the concrete term. Thus red, always means something red; redness, is the red without the something; so of sweetness, hardness, and so forth. When the ideas are more 118 complicated, the case is still the same. When we use the concrete, living, it always connotes something living; a living man, a living quadruped, a living bird, fish, insect, and so forth. When we use the abstract, life, we convey all that we convey by the term living, except the connotation. We say that John is healthy, James is healthy, on account of circumstances the idea of which forms a very complex idea. The concrete healthy always connotes an individual. Use the abstract, health, you have the idea without the connotation.
In applying this doctrine to the case of successions, we are ill supplied with appropriate names; and hence the difficulty of the case, both to the teacher, and the learner.
We have said that there are no real successions, but successions of objects. The tickings of my watch are successive sounds, that is, sensations. The beatings which are felt by the physician, in the artery of his patient, are successive feelings or sensations of touch.
When the different particulars of a scene in which a man has been engaged, of a battle, for example, in which he has commanded, pass through his mind, there is a succession of ideas. In all these cases of the successions of sensations, or ideas, there is always one present, others past, and others to come, that is, future. Drop the connotation of “something past,” “something present,” “something future.” You have pastness, presentness, and futureness. But pastness, presentness, and futureness, are TIME. TIME can neither be shewn, nor conceived, to be any thing else. It is a single-worded abstract, involving the meaning 119 of these three several abstracts. The true meaning of these abstracts is clearly made out from their concretes. The precise idea, therefore, marked by the word TIME; if the meaning of these abstracts is sufficiently apprehended; is at last apparent. Nor is there any mysteriousness in it whatsoever, but that which has arisen from misapprehension of that grand department of Naming, which belongs to abstract terms; and from inattention to that class of words, which are invented to supply the place, each of them singly, of several other words.
To our conclusion, that TIME is the equivalent of Pastness, Presentness, and Futureness, combined, it may be objected, that the word Time is applicable to all the three cases; as we can say, past time, present time, and future time, all with equal propriety. This, however, is so far from being any presumption against the conclusion, that it is a clear confirmation of it; since Time, standing by itself, marks no particular case, and, in order to do so, must have another mark applied to it to limit its signification. It is only because Time marks all the cases of pastness, presentness, and futureness, that it needs the marks past, present, or future, to confine its meaning; present time being merely another name for presentness, future time, for futureness, and past time, for pastness. The same thing is seen in the case of all other abstracts. Redness is the name of a certain colour, in all its modifications, and to whatever object belonging. But by the addition of an appropriate mark, we confine its meaning to any particular case; as when we say, the redness of a rose, the redness of scarlet, and so on.
120 The accounts, which have been rendered of Time by different philosophers, so far as they have in them any acknowledged accuracy, are, all of them, parts, and but parts, of the analysis which we have thus been presenting. Dr. Reid says, Memory gives us the conception and belief of finite intervals of duration; and these we enlarge by our mental processes to infinity.4* We have already seen what Memory is. It is not a faculty, as Dr. Reid supposes, which “gives” any thing; it is an idea, formed by association of the particulars of a certain train; a train of antecedents and consequents, of which the present feeling is one extremity. Pastness is included under the term Memory. Memory is the name of a certain whole, and Pastness is the name of a part of that whole. Memory is a connotative term; what it notes, is the antecedence and consequence of the several parts of that which forms the chain of the remembrance; what it connotes, are the feelings themselves, the objects remembered. When what it connotes is left out, and what it notes is retained, we have the idea which is expressed by pastness.
4* Intellect. Powers. Essay III. ch. v. p. 583.
In the chain of memory, consisting of antecedent, antecedent, antecedent, traced back to any length from the present feeling, we call that which immediately precedes the present, the nearest; the next, we call more distant; the next, more distant still; and that, between which and the present feeling the greatest number of successions intervenes, we call the most distant, also the farthest back; but the farthest back of a series of successions, is the oldest, that between 121 which and the present time the greatest length of time has intervened. Greatest length of time, therefore, in this case, is only another name for greatest number of successions.
It has been already seen, that there is nothing in which we are so deeply interested, as an accurate knowledge of the antecedents and consequents, in the midst of which we exist. Of the different innumerable trains of antecedents and consequents which it is important for us carefully to mark, it is observed, that some succeed more quickly, some less. While the long pendulum of an eight-day clock is performing one oscillation, the short pendulum of a table-clock performs two or three.
What that is, to which we give the name of quickness, or slowness, in those successions; in other words, what is the state of consciousness which we have thus occasion to mark; has already been seen. Every succession, observed by us, is a case of sensation and memory; sensation of the consequent, memory of the antecedent. If we have observed simultaneously the oscillations of the two pendulums, mentioned above, we remember two or three antecedent oscillations of the short pendulum, before we get back to one of the long. It is a mere case, therefore, of the greater or less number of antecedents in a chain of memory, expounded in a preceding chapter.
In the knowledge, so important to us, of antecedents and consequents, it is not enough that we know what antecedents are followed by what consequents; much depends upon the quickness or slowness of the successions. It is, therefore, of the highest importance that we should have the means of marking them.
122 What we do is, to take some well-known case of successions, and to make that a standard, by which to ascertain the rest. We take, for example, the oscillations of a pendulum. So many of these we call a minute. So many minutes we call an hour. These minutes and hours, then, are so many oscillations, that is successions. We call them measures of time. But things are measurable only by parts of themselves; extension by extension, weight by weight, and so on. What is measured by succession, therefore, is itself nothing but succession.
Having assumed a certain case of successions as a standard, and marked it into quantities, by distinctive names, we mark or name all other successions, by the names applied to the standard case. Thus, that grand succession, on which so much of what we are interested in depends, a revolution of the earth upon its own axis, we distinguish, by the term, twenty-four hours; which we also call by the name, day; and afterwards make use of, as a standard, to mark still slower successions, such as a revolution of the moon about the earth, a revolution of the earth about the sun. In all these measurements, and expressions, of time, it is still seen, that there is nothing in reality conceived but successions.
Beside the standards, more distinctly conceived and expressed, there is always, in these estimates of time, a tacit reference to another standard, which is regarded as the unit, or minimum of time. The case here is precisely analogous to that of the unit, or minimum, of extension, which we have already observed. Our tactual, and muscular, senses are not sufficiently fine to discern objects of less than a certain magnitude. 123 The least which they can discern is tacitly assumed as the unit of extension. Nor are any of our senses fine enough to discern successions which have more than a certain degree of rapidity. Thus, if the seven primitive colours are made to pass with a certain velocity before the eye, they do not appear separate, but blended into one continuous white. In like manner, if sounds are made to succeed one another, at first, slowly, afterwards, with greater and greater rapidity, they cannot, at last, be distinguished as different sounds, but appear as one continuous sound. In fact, this is probably the account of all sounds, which are merely effects of the vibrations in the air, and therefore pulses; but often so quick, in succession, that no interval is distinguishable, and the perception is that of a continuous sound.
The close resemblance, in this respect, between sensations and ideas, is remarkable. When sensations are brought into close conjunction they become blended, and appear, not several, but one. We have seen, in a most important case of association, that when ideas are called up together in close conjunction, they, too, cease to be distinguishable, and, being blended together, assume, even where there is the greatest complexity, the appearance, not of many ideas, but of one. Of this we have very remarkable examples, in the two cases of SPACE, and TIME.
There is a certain succession, then, of sensations and ideas, in which the antecedent and consequent can be distinguished: another, in which the antecedent and consequent, on account of quickness, cannot be distinguished. The quickest that can be distinguished, is that to which, as the unit or minimum, a tacit 124 reference is made, in our several estimates of time.
Having thus shewn how far the account of TIME, presented by one of the most recent Philosophers of high name, goes in expounding the phenomenon, and how far it leaves it unexpounded; it will be instructive next to observe, how far the genius of the ancient Greek Philosophers carried them, in this important inquiry. It is satisfactory, that we can refer the unlearned reader to a very clear and accurate exposition of their doctrines, in a well known work in our own language, the “Hermes” of Mr. Harris; from which, for the sake of this convenience, the present account of those ancient doctrines shall be drawn.
“Time and Space,” says that author,5* “have this in common, that they are both of them by nature continuous. But in this they differ, that all the parts of Space exist at once and together, while those of Time only exist in Transition or Succession.” This is only transcribing the common language. What remained was, to shew what are the real facts couched under this language.6*
5* Hermes, B. I. ch. vii.
6* The expression of Ammonius, here quoted by Harris, comes nearer the fact than his own—ὁ χρόνος ὑφίστάται κατά μόνον τὸ ΝΥΝ, ἐν γάρ τῷ γίνεσθαι καί φθείρεσθαι τό εἶναι ἔχει. Time subsists only in a single NOW or INSTANT, for it hath its being in beginning and ceasing to be. In other words, Time never is; all you can say of it is only this, it has been, or it is about to be.—(Author’s Note.)
“In every given time we may assume anywhere a Now or Instant, and therefore, in every given Time, there may be assumed infinite Nows or Instants.
125 “A NOW or INSTANT is the Bound of every finite Time. But although a Bound, it is not a Part of Time. If this appear strange, we may remember, that if a Now or Instant were a Part of Time it being essential to the character of Parts, that they should measure the Whole, it would contain within itself infinite other nows; and this, it is evident, would be absurd and impossible.”
“The same Now or Instant, may be the end of one Time, and the Beginning of another; the first, necessarily Past Time, as being previous to the Now or Instant, which both Times include; the other necessarily FUTURE, as being subsequent. As, therefore, every NOW or INSTANT always exists in Time, and without being Time, is Time’s Bound; the Bound of Completion to the Past, and the Bound of Commencement to the Future: from hence we may conceive its nature or end, which is to be the Medium of Continuity between the Past and the Future, so as to render Time, through all its parts, one Intire and Perfect Whole.”
It must be obvious to every one, who has correctly followed me through the preceding deductions, that this mysterious language, if applied to actual successions, has a distinct meaning; if not so applied, it is jargon merely, without one idea annexed. This NOW, which is not Time, and, not being Time, is of course nothing else; this NOTHING, then, which, though nothing is the medium of continuity between Somethings, namely, time past, and time future, seems to be only a mysterious name for that link which is supposed to be between every antecedent and its consequent; which supposition of a link, or medium of continuity, we have already shewn to be a mere case 126 of association, involving a prejudice; the antecedent and consequent, and nothing else, being really included in a case of succession. Thus understood, however, it is a medium of continuity, forming the “Bound of Completion” to the previous train of successions, the “Bound of Commencement” to the following.
Mr. Harris proceeds to shew some of the conclusions, resulting from the account which he had thus rendered of Time. “In the first place,” he says, “there cannot (strictly speaking) be any such thing as time present.” We will draw from this a conclusion, which Mr. Harris appears not to have seen, or does not choose to acknowledge; That, if there be no such thing as Time present, neither can there be any such thing as Time past. For what is the past, but that which has been present? But if there be no such thing as time present, or time past, there can be no such thing as time future. Time, therefore, is an impossibility.
Mr. Harris himself, indeed, goes a certain way toward this conclusion. “If no Portion of time,” he says, “be the object of any Sensation; further, if the Present never exist; if the past be no more; if the Future be not as yet; and if these are all the parts, out of which Time is compounded: how strange and shadowy a Being do we find it? How nearly approaching to a perfect non-entity?”7*
7* It is but justice to Aristotle, to say, that he expressed the right conclusion much more distinctly than Harris thought proper to do. His mode of inferring, as translated by Harris, is as follows: That, therefore, Time exists not at all, or at least, has but a faint and obscure existence, one may suspect from hence. A part of it has been, and is no more; a part of it is coming, and is not as yet; and out of these is made that Time, which is without end, and ever to be assumed farther and farther. Now, that which is made up of nothing but non-entities, it should seem was incapable ever to participate of Entity.—(Author’s Note.)
127 Mr. Harris then says, “Let us try, however, since the senses fail us, if we have not faculties of higher power, to seize this fleeting Being.” What then is it he does in the search of those “faculties of higher power?” It will be seen, from the following quotation, that he merely describes a few cases of actual succession; and says, that from them, by the help of memory, and imagination, we come by the idea of Time. But the Memory and Imagination of successions present to us nothing but the successions themselves. If then the Memory and Imagination of successions, give us the idea of Time, the idea of Time can only be some part or the whole of the idea of the successions.
“The World has been likened to a variety of Things, but it appears to resemble no one more than some moving spectacle (such as a procession or a triumph) that abounds in every part with splendid objects, some of which are still departing, as fast as others make their appearance. The Senses look on, while the sight passes, perceiving as much as is immediately present, which they report with tolerable accuracy to the Soul’s superior powers. Having done this, they have done their duty, being concerned with nothing, save what is present and instantaneous. But to the Memory, to the Imagination, and above all, to 128 the Intellect, the several Nows or Instants, are not lost, as to the Senses, but are presented and made objects of steady comprehension, however, in their own nature, they may be transitory and passing.
“Now it is from contemplating two or more of these Instants under one view, together with that Interval of Continuity, which subsists between them, that we acquire insensibly the Idea of TIME. For example: The Sun rises: this I remember: it rises again: this too, I remember. These Events are not together; there is an Extension between them—not however of Space, for we may suppose the place of rising the same, or at least, to exhibit no sensible difference. Yet still we recognise some Extension between them. Now what is this Extension, but a natural day? And what is that, but pure Time? It is after the same manner, by recognising two new Moons, and the Extension between these; two several Equinoxes, and the extension between these; that we gain Ideas of other Times, such as Months and Years, which are all so many Intervals, described as above; that is to say, passing Intervals of Continuity between two Instants viewed together.
“And thus it is THE MIND acquires the Idea of TIME. But this Time it must be remembered is PAST TIME ONLY, which is always the first Species, that occurs to the human Intellect. How then do we acquire the Idea of TIME FUTURE? The answer is, we acquire it by Anticipation. Should it be demanded still further, And what is Anticipation? We answer, that, in this case, it is a kind of reasoning by analogy from similar to similar; from successions of events, that are past already, to similar successions, 129 that are presumed hereafter. For example: I observe, as far back as my memory can carry me, how every day has been succeeded by a night; that night, by another day; that day, by another night; and so downwards in order to the Day that is now. Hence, then, I anticipate a similar succession from the present Day, and thus gain the Idea of days and nights in futurity. After the same manner, by attending to the periodical returns of New and Full Moons; of Springs, Summers, Autumns, and Winters, all of which, in Time past, I find never to have failed, I anticipate a like orderly and diversified succession, which makes Months, and Seasons, and Years, in Time future.”
It is to be observed, that, in the above passage, Harris, beside Memory and Imagination, introduces the name of Intellect, as concerned in generating the idea of Time. But it will be seen that he makes no use of it, whatsoever, in giving his explanation, nor mentions any other operations than those of, memory for the past, and anticipation for the future. Indeed, it appears from a passage of his work, immediately following, that when Mr. Harris, in this inquiry, uses the word Intellect, he means nothing but Anticipation and Memory. “There is nothing,” he says, “appears so clearly an object of the MIND or INTELLECT only, as the Future does, since we can find no place for its existence any where else. Not but the same, if we consider, is equally true of the Past.”8* Here we see, that 130 both the Future, and the Past, are said to be objects of the INTELLECT only. But the future is the object of anticipation, the past of memory; and both memory, and anticipation, as we have seen, are cases of association.
8* Ibid. He goes on to say, that, from this same doctrine, that Time exists only in the mind, some philosophers inferred, that if mind did not exist, neither could Time. Πότερον δὲ μὴ οὔσης ψυχῆς εἴῃ ἂν ὁ χρόνος, ἀπορήσειεν ἄν τις. (Aristot. Nat. Auscult. 1. iv. c. 20.) Themistius, who comments the above passage, expresses himself more positively. Εἰ τοίνυν διχῶς λέγεται, τό τε ἀριθμητὸν, καὶ τὸ ἀριθμούμενον, τὸ μὲν, τὸ ἀριθμητὸν δηλαδὴ, δυνάμει, τὸ δὲ ἐνεργείᾳ, ταῦτα δὲ οὐκ ἂν ὑποσταίῃ, μὴ ὄντος τοῦ ἀριθμήσοντος, μήτε δυνάμει μήτ’ ἐνεργείᾳ,—φανερὸν ὡς οὐκ ἂν ὁ χρόνος εἴῃ, μὴ οὔσης ψυχῆς. (Them. p. 48. Edit. Aldi.)—(Author’s Note.)
In the cases of succession which he adduces, as examples, to shew, in what manner we acquire, he says, “insensibly,” the idea of time, he tells us, there is sensation of the consequent, memory of the antecedent, and beside these, “contemplation of two or more instants under one view, together with that Interval of continuity, which subsists between them.” But the contemplation of two instants, one prior, another posterior, in one view, with the interval between them, is a circumlocution for memory. It denotes obscurely, and imperfectly, that union, in one idea, of all the parts of a train, to which the name memory is affixed. From this contemplation, he says it is, “that we acquire the idea of Time.” The real meaning is thus shewn to be, that we acquire it from memory. Mr. Harris, therefore, at the bottom, agrees with Dr. Reid; and the same observations by which we shewed 131 the imperfection of Dr. Reid’s account, are equally applicable to that, of Mr. Harris. The case, in truth, is, that neither of them does any thing more than merely state the fact, without an attempt to explain it. That we cannot have the idea of time, without the observation of successions; and that memory is joined with sense in the observation of successions,—is the matter of fact. What TIME is, distinct from the memory and the sensations, they ought to have told us, but have not. They would not have found it difficult, had they been familiar with the distinction (of such infinite importance, in all accurate inquiries into the human mind) between the mode of signification of concrete words, and the mode of signification of abstract ones; the latter, in its more complicated cases, of not very easy comprehension. Unfortunately, we have no concrete term, corresponding with Time. Hence a great part of the difficulty of conceiving distinctly the meaning of the abstract. Time, also, is not the abstract name of any one train, but of all trains; as redness is not the name of one red, but of all reds. And there is this further complication, that the word “time” is never applied to any train, in particular; as time of a race, time of a battle, and so on; without the predominating association of that particular train, whatever it be, minutes, hours, or days, which we are accustomed to employ, as the measure of other successions. Without much and accurate practice, therefore, in conceiving the meaning of abstract terms, especially in the more complex and intricate cases; it is extremely difficult steadily to contemplate either TIME, as the 132 abstract name of all successive, or SPACE, as the abstract name of all simultaneous order.9*
9* “Multos autem in errorem ducit, quod voces generales et abstractas in disserendo utiles esse videant, nec tamen earum vim satis capiant. Partim vero à consuetudine vulgari inventæ sunt illæ ad sermonem abbreviandum, partim à philosophis ad docendum excogitatæ, non quod ad naturas rerum accommodatæ sint, quæ quidem singulares et concretæ existunt, sed quod idoneæ ad tradendas disciplinas, propterea quod faciant notiones, vel saltem propositiones, universales.”—Berkeley de Motu, s. 7. No predecessor of Berkeley was so fully aware, as he was, of the deceptions practised on the human mind by abstract terms.—(Author’s Note.)
It will be instructive, to recapitulate the indissoluble associations which are contained in the idea of Time. With every present event, is indissolubly associated the idea of an antecedent; with that antecedent, the idea of another antecedent; and so on without end. These are the ideas of Succession, and of Infinity; forced upon us by indissoluble association. The events of the present moment, are innumerable. With every one of these we associate the ideas of antecedents without end. This is the Past; an Infinity of simultaneous successions, each having antecedents, running back without end. These are successions in the concrete; successions of objects. Drop the connotation, to form the abstract, as is done in other cases; you have then successions without the objects; which is precisely the meaning of the word TIME.
As with every present event, and those infinite in number, is indissolubly associated the idea of a series of antecedents, without end, which, in the abstract, is 133 TIME PAST, so with every such event, is indissolubly associated the idea of a consequent, with that the idea of another consequent, and so on, without end; which, in the abstract, is TIME FUTURE.
The synchronous Line, or Line of Extension, and the successive Line, or Line of Time, bear a pretty close analogy. As, in the Line of Extension, we have the concrete line, and the abstract line; the concrete line being the positions with the objects; the abstract or mathematical line, the positions without the objects; so, in the line of Time, we have the concrete line, and the abstract line; the concrete line being the successions with the objects; the abstract line, the successions without the objects; to which abstract line, we give the name TIME.
We have before remarked, as an important case of indissoluble association, that the idea of Position, that is, of a modification of Space, is indissolubly associated with the idea of every sensible object. It is now to be remarked, as a not less important case, that the idea of succession or of antecedent and consequent, that is, a modification of Time, is indissolubly associated with the idea of every object. The idea of a modification of Space, and the idea of a modification of Time, form parts of our complex idea of every object. It is no wonder that they appear to be necessary, seeing that they force themselves upon us, by irresistible association, with the idea of every object.29 30
29 As is shewn in the text. Time is a name for the aggregate of the successions of our feelings, apart from the feelings themselves. I object, however, in the case of time, as I did in the 134 case of Space, to considering it as an abstract term. Time does not seem to me to be a name (as the author says) for the pastness, the presentness, and the futureness of our successive feelings. It is rather, I think, a collective name for our feeling of their succession—for what the author called, in a previous section, the part of the process “which consists in being sensible of their successiveness,” for which part, he then said, “we have not a name.” This taking notice of the successiveness of our feelings, whether we prefer to call it a part of the feelings themselves, or another feeling superadded to them, is yet something which, in the entire mass of feeling which the successive impressions give us, we are able to discriminate, and to name apart from the rest. A perception of succession between two feelings is a state of consciousness per se, which though we cannot think of it separately from the feelings, we can yet think of as a completed thing in itself, and not as an attribute of either or both of the two feelings. Its name, if it had one, would be a concrete name. But the entire series of these perceptions of succession has a name, Time; which I therefore hold to be a concrete name.
However inextricably these feelings of succession are mixed up with the feelings perceived as successive, we are so perfectly able to attend to them, and make them a distinct object of thought, that we can compare them with one another, without comparing the successive feelings in any other respect. We can judge two or more successions to be of equal, or of unequal, rapidity. And if we find any series of feelings of which the successive links follow each other with uniform rapidity, such as the tickings of a clock, we can make this a standard of comparison for all other successions, and measure them as equal to one, two, three, or some other number of links of this series: whereby the aggregate Time is said to be divided into equal portions, and every event is located in some one of those portions. The succession of our sensations, therefore, however closely implicated with the sensations themselves, may be abstracted from them in thought, as completely 135 as any quality of a thing can be abstracted from the thing.
The apparent infinity of Time the author, very rightly, explains in the same manner as that of Space.—Ed.
30 In this section Mr. James Mill explains Time. He tells us that “it is a comprehensive word including all successions, or the whole of successive order” (p. 116)—”a perpetual flow of instants, of which only one can ever be present. The very idea of Time is an idea of successions. It consists of this and of nothing else” (pp. 116—117)—”it is the single worded abstract, involving the meaning of the three several abstracts, pastness, presentness, futureness” (p. 118). In the line of “Time, we have the concrete line, and the abstract line: the concrete line being the successions with the objects: the abstract line, the successions without the objects: to which abstract line, we give the name Time” (p. 133).
In p. 120 he gives us in a few words Dr. Reid’s explanation of Time:—and in pp. 124—130 he cites at greater length Aristotle’s explanation, as reproduced by Harris in the Hermes.
Both Aristotle and Reid include in their meaning of Time, not merely succession, but duration or continuity. Mr. James Mill includes only succession—antecedents and consequents. He thinks that continuity is nothing else than an illusion or prejudice, arising from extreme rapidity of succession (pp. 123—125).
“Time and Space (says Harris, cited p. 124) have this in common, that they are both of them by nature continuous. But in this they differ—that all the parts of space exist at once and together; while those of Time only exist in Transition or Succession.” Mr. James Mill proceeds to say—”This is only transcribing the common language. What remained was, to show what are the real facts couched under this language.”
Undoubtedly these facts ought to be shewn, and shewn fully. But I cannot think that they are shewn fully in the 136 present Chapter of the Analysis. On the contrary, a most important part of the case is omitted—Duration or Continuity—which Aristotle has put in the front of his exposition, and after him Reid as well as Harris.
If it were true that the word Time is the abstract, having for its concrete succeeding objects and nothing more, we should not need the term at all. The abstract term “Succession” already answers this purpose, much more perspicuously and obviously. But Time includes something more than succession. It comprehends not merely potentiality for succeeding objects or events, but also potentiality for continuous motions or sensations: it embraces duration as well as succession.
The exposition of Aristotle is adapted to readers and debates so different from those of the present day, that it often appears strange, and even mystical, when ever so well translated. In the present case, however, we derive satisfaction from knowing, that his doctrine is, with a very small reserve, adopted by Hobbes, the most anti-mystical of all philosophers. (Hobbes’ First Grounds of Philosophy—Part II., Sect. 7. 3). Aristotle has given a theory of Time at great length, perfectly clear as to its main features, though in several of its details, obscure and difficult to follow. I will add that throughout nearly the whole exposition, he keeps the abstract in close implication with the concrete: the neglect of which precaution, by many philosophers, is so justly censured by the Author of the Analysis.
Aristotle, according to a practice frequent with him, begins by enumerating various puzzles and difficulties which stand in the way of any theory (διαπορῆσαι Physic. IV. 10. p. 217. 6. 30). In doing this, here as elsewhere, he states the difficulties in a manner somewhat paradoxical. The citation of page 126, (together with note, page 127,) are all taken from this preliminary excursion, the beginning and end of which Aristotle distinctly marks (Physica IV. c. 10. p. 217 b. 30. p. 218 a. 30). He then proceeds to exposition; and after remarking that Time is one and alike every where, amidst the greatest 137 diversity of events succeeding each other—he says that it is not indeed identical with Motion, (as some theorists considered it), but that it is nevertheless inseparable from Motion being one of the aspects or appurtenances of Motion. Magnitude or Body moved—Motion—Time—all go together in Aristotle’s conception. Magnitude is continuous: Motion is continuous: Time is continuous (Physica IV. 11. p. 219. a. 12. 223. a. 10): Line is continuous. On the other hand, the Point is separate and indivisible; no two Points have any common term: a Line is not made up of Points, but of smaller Lines; and every Line has Points for its bounds or limits. What the Point is to a Line, the Now or Instant is to Time: the Instant is not a portion of Time, but the boundary of each portion, and the conjoining boundary between Time past and Time future. (Physica IV. 11. p. 220. a. 5-25—VI. 3. 234. a. 1-24).
Aristotle defines Time as the Number of Motion according to Former and Later: i.e., Continuous Motion, considered as numerable and successive. To take the words of Harris, from Aristotle (cited p. 128 of the Analysis)—“It is from contemplating two or more Instants under one view, together with that Interval of Continuity which subsists between them, that we acquire insensibly the Idea of Time.”—“Months and Years are all so many Intervals described as above; that is to say, passing Intervals of Continuity between two Instants viewed together.”
Mr. James Mill hardly does justice to this exposition, when he observes (p. 131)—“Neither Harris nor Reid does anything more than merely state the fact, without an attempt to explain it. That we cannot have the idea of time, without the observation of succession; and that memory is joined with sense in the observation of successions,—is the matter of fact. What Time is, distinct from the memory and the sensations, they ought to have told us, but have not.”—In this passage, the word “sensations” is evidently used by Mr. James Mill as equivalent to “successions” or successive 138 sensations: and the observation appears to me not well founded. I think that Aristotle has told us, and Harris after him, what Time is, distinct from the successive sensations. It includes Motion and the Continuity of Motion. These are elements of which Mr. James Mill takes no notice: and they supply the deficiency of which he complains.
It is one of the many merits of Mr. James Mill’s Analysis that he has paid more attention to movements and muscular sensibility, as elements of our consciousness, than philosophers had done before him. But in this chapter unfortunately, he has left them out, and has confined himself to successions. The explanation of Time, given in the main by Aristotle, is completed and elucidated by Professor Bain in his work on the Senses and the Intellect (chapter on the Muscular Feelings, sect. 20—23, pp. 95, 96; compare also p. 183, in ed. 3rd). The feeling of continuance in our muscular exertions, of longer or shorter duration in the sweep of our limbs, is one of the primordial varieties of sensibility. A longer expenditure of our energy affects the consciousness differently from a shorter. In a full sweep of the arm, we are conscious of the instant of commencement as antecedent,—the interval of continued effort,—and the instant of termination as following. This is the clearest illustration of that which Aristotle and Harris describe as Time: two instants former and later, with continuous interval between them. Motion is the most striking and obvious example of Continuity, and is therefore employed by Aristotle as the basis for his exposition of Time. The eternal and uniform motions of the celestial bodies were to him the most impressive of all phenomena; the great standard by which all other motions were to be measured. Hobbes also takes the Line as the proper exponent of time. But though motion affords the best and amplest illustrations of Continuity, it is not motion only that is felt as continuous. The sense of continuance is felt in regard to other impressions also. Professor Bain observes—”All impressions made on the mind, whether those of muscular energy, or those of the ordinary senses, are felt differently according as they endure 139 for a longer or a shorter time. This is true of the higher emotions also. The continuance of a mental state must be discriminated by us from the very dawn of consciousness; and hence our estimate of time is one of our earliest mental aptitudes. It attaches to every feeling that we possess”—(p. 93).
We thus perceive that the sense of continuance is just as much an original presentation to our consciousness, as the sense of succession. This is an important fact, which has not been sufficiently adverted to in the exposition of complex ideas such as Time and Space. The fundamentum of Continual Quantity is an immediate manifestation of our sensitive discriminations not less than that of Discrete Quantity. The complex Idea of Time embodies both.a Mr. James Mill insists everywhere, with laudable emphasis, upon the necessity of seeking the meaning of every abstract term in the concrete particulars out of which it grows. But in explaining Time, he has not set before himself all the concrete particulars in their full variety and amplitude. Confining himself to Succession, and scarcely touching Continuance, he has not been led to follow out the facts of motion in all their diversified aspects, nor the many abstractions and generalisations which 140 spring from comparison of motions with each other, under some one of these aspects.
a Aristotle’s definition of Time was much discussed by his contemporaries and successors. Both his pupils, Theophrastus and Eudemus, accepted it: but there were many objectors, and the earliest of them notified to us is, Straton of Lampsakus, pupil and successor of Theophrastus. Straton objected on the ground that the definition combined Number and Motion—Discrete Quantity and Continual Quantity—which combination he held to be inadmissible. But this seems no valid objection. Aristotle very properly recognises the two as distinct varieties of Quanta—(see Categor. p. 4, b. 20): but that is no reason why both of them may not be combined in the same complex idea—especially when we see that each of them has its distinct root in different original presentations of our discriminative consciousness.
See Simplikius ad Aristot. Physic. IV. Scholia, p. 394, b. 27—47. Brandis.
In a note to this chapter of the Analysis (p. 129) attention is called by Mr. James Mill to another important doctrine cited by Harris out of Aristotle—to the relative nature of Time. Can there be any time, apart from the percipient mind? asks Aristotle—since time is the numerable element in motion, and there can be no numeration without a rational mind to number.b He does not affirm positively, but he speaks as conceiving number and the numbering mind to be Relatum and Correlatum, so that the former cannot exist without the latter.c Both Alexander of Aphrodisias and Themistius thought so likewise after him: though Boëthius and other commentators dissented from the opinion.d Upon this general question of relativity, Aristotle is not always consistent with himself. Though he declares explicitly, that Relata reciprocate in predication, and are implicated each with the other—and though he says that “the Soul is in a certain sense all things” (i.e. is the implied correlate of all our beliefs and disbeliefs, affirmations and negations)—yet in other places, he limits this 141 universal principal by exceptions, which some of his commentators deprecate as inadmissible.e—G.
b Aristot. Physica. IV. 14, p. 223, a. 26.
c So also Hobbes’ First Philosophy, Part II. 7, 3, 5:—”Seeing all men confess a year to be time, and yet do not think a year to be the accident or affection of any body, they must needs confess it to be, not in the things without us, but only in the thought of the mind.” (Here Hobbes goes too far, divesting time of all objective character; instead of considering it as relative to the mind, which implies a subjective and an objective aspect combined. The next passage exhibits this.) “Time is the phantasm of before and after in motion: which agrees with the definition of Aristotle. Time is the number of motion according to former and latter—for that numbering is an act of the mind. To divide Space or Time, is nothing else but to consider one and another within the same—division is not made by the operation of the hands, but of the mind.”
d Themistius ad Aristot. Physic. IV. p. 337, in Spengel’s edition of Themistius—partly extracted by Brandis in Scholia to Aristotle, p. 393, b. 27.
e Aristot. Categor., c. 7, p. 6, a. 37, b. 28; p. 7, b. 23. Scholia ad Categor., p. 65, b. 10—20. Brandis.
Aristot. de Animâ, III., 8, 431, b. 21, ἡ ψυχὴ τὰ ὄντα πώς ἐστι πάντα· ἢ γὰρ αἰσθητὰ τὰ ὄντα ἢ νοητὰ, ἔστι δ’ ἡ ἐπιστήμη μὲν τὰ ἐπιστητά πως, ἡ δ’ αἴσθησις τὰ αἰσθητά.
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