resolved; that, however, he could not conceive a more likely method of coming to know it, than by considering those several particulars, to each of which we gave the name. It is hardly probable, said he, that music, painting, medicine, poetry, agriculture, and so many more, should be all called by one common name, if there was not something in each which was common to all. It should seem so, replied I.—What, then, said he, shall we pronounce this to be?-At this, I remember, I was under some sort of hesitation.-Have courage, cried my friend, perhaps the case is not so desperate. Let me ask you, Is medicine the cause of any thing?-Yes, surely, said I, of health. And agriculture, of what? Of the plentiful growth of grain.-And poetry, of what? Of plays, and satires, and odes, and the like.-And is not the same true, said he, of music, of statuary, of architecture, and, in short, of every art whatever?-I confess, said I, it seems so. Suppose, then, said he, we should say, it was common to every art to be a cause: Should we err?-I replied, I thought not. Let this then, said he, be remembered, that all art is cause." I promised him it should. b But how, then, continued he, if all art be cause, is it also true, that all cause is art?—At this again I could not help hesitating. -You have heard, said he, without doubt, of that painter famed in story, who being to paint the foam of a horse, and not succeeding to his mind, threw at the picture in resentment a sponge bedaubed with colours, and produced a foam the most natural imaginable. Now, what say you to this fact? Shall we pronounce art to have been the cause?-By no means, said Ì.What, said he, if instead of chance, his hand had been guided by mere compulsion, himself dissenting and averse to the violence? Even here, replied I, nothing could have been referred to his art. But what, continued he, if instead of a casual throw, or involuntary compulsion, he had willingly and designedly directed his pencil, and so produced that foam, which story says he failed in? Would not art here have been the cause?—I replied, in this case, I thought it would.-It should seem, then, 66 a Artis maxime proprium, creare et gignere. Cic. de Nat. Deor. L. ii. c. 22. Ἔστι δὲ τέχνη πᾶσα περὶ γένεσιν. “ All art is employed in production; that is, in making something to be." Arist. Ethic. 1. vi. c. 4. The active efficient causes have been ranged and enumerated after different manners. In the same Ethics they are enumerated thus: alria yàp dokovσ εἶναι φύσις, καὶ ἀνάγκη, καὶ τύχη· ἔτι δὲ νοῦς, καὶ πᾶν τὸ δι ̓ ἀνθρώπου. “The several causes appear to be nature, necessity, and chance; and besides these, mind, or intellect, and whatever operates by or through man." lib. iii. c. 3. The paraphrast An dronicus, in explaining this last passage, Nây tò di' àveρúnov, adds oîov téxvn, A ἄλλη τις πρᾶξις, “ as, for instance, art, or any other human action." Alexander Aphrodisiensis speaks of efficient causes, as follows: 'AAAà μǹv тà KUρίως αἴτια ποιητικὰ, φύσις τε, καὶ τέχνη, καὶ προαίρεσις. "The causes, which are strictly and properly efficient, are nature, art, and each man's particular choice of action.” Περὶ Ψύχης, p. 160. B. ed. Ald. In what manner art is distinguished from the rest of these efficient causes, the subsequent notes will attempt to explain. b See Valer. Max. 1. viii. c. 11. See also Dion. Chrysost. Orat. Ixiii. p. 590. said he, that art implies not only cause, but the additional requisite of intention, reason, volition, and consciousness; so that not every cause is art, but only voluntary or intentional cause.So, said I, it appears. : And shall we, then, added he, pronounce every intentional cause to be art?-I see no reason, said I, why not.-Consider, said he; hunger this morning prompted you to eat. You were then the cause, and that too the intentional cause, of consuming certain food and yet will you refer this consumption to art? Did you chew by art? Did you swallow by art?-No, certainly, said I. So by opening your eyes, said he, you are the intentional cause of seeing, and by stretching your hand, the intentional cause of feeling; and yet will you affirm, that these things proceed from art?—I should be wrong, said I, if I did: for what art can there be in doing what every one is able to do by mere will, and a sort of uninstructed instinct?-You say right, replied he, and the reason is manifest: were it otherwise, we should make all mankind universal artists in every single action of their lives. And what can be a greater absurdity than this?—I confessed that the absurdity appeared to be evident.-But if nothing, then, continued he, which we do by compulsion, or without intending it, be art; and not even what we do intentionally, if it proceed from mere will and uninstructed instinct; what is it we have left remaining, where art may be found conversant? Or can it, indeed, possibly be in any thing else, than in that which we do by use, practice, experience, and the like, all which are born with no one, but are all acquired afterward by advances unperceived. I can think, said I, of nothing else.-Let therefore the words habit and habitual, said he, represent this requisite, and let us say, that art is not only a cause, but an intentional cause; and not only an intentional cause, but an intentional cause founded in habit, or, in other words, an habitual cause.-You appear, said I, to argue rightly. But if art, said he, be what we have now asserted, something learnt and acquired; if it be also a thing intentional or voluntary, and not governed either by chance or blind necessity; if this, I say, be the case, then mark the consequences.-And what, said I, are they?—The first, said he, is, that no events, in what we call the natural world, must be referred to art; such as tides, winds, vegetation, gravitation, attraction, and the like. For these all happen by stated laws; by a curious necessity which is not to be withstood, and where the nearer and immediate causes appear to be wholly unconscious. I confess, said I, it seems so. In the next place, continued he, we must exclude all those admired works of the animal world, which, for their beauty and order, we metaphorically call artificial. The spider's web, the bee's comb, the beaver's house, and the swallow's nest, must all be referred to another source. For who can say, these ever learnt to be thus ingenious? or, that they were ignorant by nature, and knowing only by education?-None, surely, replied I. -But we have still, said he, a higher consideration. And what, said I, is that? It is, answered he, this: not even that Divine Power which gave form to all things, then acted by art, when it gave that form. For how, continued he, can that intelligence, which has all perfection ever in energy, be supposed to have any power, not original to its nature? How can it ever have any thing to learn, when it knows all from the beginning; or, being perfect and complete, admit of what is additional and secondary? I should think, said I, it were impossible.-If so, said he, then art can never be numbered among its attributes: for all art is something learnt, something secondary and acquired, and never original to any being which possesses it. So the fact, said I, has been established. If this, therefore, continued he, be true; if art belong not either to the divine nature, the brute nature, or the inanimate nature; to what nature shall we say it does belong?-I know not, said I, unless it be to the human.-You are right, said he; for every nature else, you perceive, is either too excellent to want it, or too base to be capable of it. Beside, except the human, what other nature is there left? Or where else can we find any of the arts already instanced, or, indeed, whatever others we may now fancy to enumerate? Who are statuaries, but men? Who pilots, who musicians?-This seems, replied I, to be the fact. Let us then, continued he, say, not only that art is a cause, but that it is man becoming a cause; and not only man, but man intending to do what is going to be done, and doing it also by habit; so that its whole idea, as far as we have hitherto conceived it, is, man becoming a cause, intentional and habitual. -I confess, said I, it has appeared so. Aristotle, in his Rhetoric, thus accurately enumerates all the possible manners, either direct or indirect, in which mankind may be said to act, or do any thing. Пávres δὴ πράττουσι πάντα, τὰ μὲν, οὐ δι' αὐτούς· τὰ δὲ, δι' αὐτούς· τῶν μὲν οὖν μὴ δι' αὐτοὺς, τὰ μὲν διὰ τύχην πράττουσι, τὰ δὲ ἐξ ἀνάγκης· τῶν δ' ἐξ ἀνάγκης, τὰ μὲν βίᾳ, τὰ δὲ φύσει· ὥστε πάντα, ὅσα μὴ δι' αὐτοῦς πράττουσι, τὰ μὲν ἀπὸ τύχης· τὰ δὲ φύσει τὰ δὲ βίᾳ. Οσα δὲ δι' αὐτοὺς, καὶ ὧν αὐτοὶ αἴτιοι, τὰ μὲν δι ̓ ἔθος, τὰ δὲ δι ̓ ὄρεξιν· καὶ τὰ μὲν διὰ λογιστικὴν ὄρεξιν, τὰ δὲ δι' ἀλόγιστον. Εστι δὲ ἡ μὲν βούλησις, μετὰ λόγου ὄρεξις ἀγαθοῦ ἄλογοι δ ̓ ὀρέξεις, ὀργὴ καὶ ἐπιθυμία. Ωστε πάντα ὅσα πράττουσιν, ἀνάγκη πράττειν δι ̓ αἰτίας ἕπτα· διὰ τύχην, διὰ βίαν, διὰ φύσιν, δι' ἔθος, διὰ λογισμὸν, διὰ θυμὸν, δι ̓ ἐπιθυμίαν. "All men do all things, either of themselves, or not of themselves. The things which they If And thus, said he, have you had exhibited to you a sketch of art. You must remember, however, it is but a sketch: there is tite. Hence it appears, that all things whatever which men do, they necessarily do through one of these seven causes; either through chance, compulsion, nature, custom, will, anger, appetite." Arist. Rhet. l i c 10. It remains, agreeably to this enumeration, to consider with which of these causes we ought to arrange art. As to chance, it may be observed, in general, of all casual events, that they always exclude intention or design: but intention and design are from art inseparable. Thus is the difference between art and chance manifest. As to external compulsion, we have it thus described: Βίαιον δὲ οὗ ἡ ἀρχὴ ἔξωθεν: that is, "an act of compulsion, the efficient principle of which is from without, independent of the doer." Arist. Ethic. 1. iii. c. 1. Again, in the same treatise, l. vi. c. 4. we are told of the works of art, that they are such, & apxǹ èv tậ TOLOûvt," the efficient principle of which is in the doer, er agent." Thus, therefore, is art distinguished from compulsion. 66 These two causes, chance and compulsion, are mentioned and considered in the Dialogue, page 2. Nature, or rather natural necessity, is that cause through which we breathe, perspire, digest, circulate our blood, &c. Will, anger, and appetite, are (as already observed) but so many species of natural desire, considered either as assisted by reason, or else as devoid of it. Now though natural desire and natural necessity differ, because in the one we act spontaneously, in the other not spontaneously, yet both of them meet in the common genus of natural power. Moreover this is true of all natural power, that the power itself is prior to any energies or acts of that power. Οὐ γὰρ ἐκ τοῦ πολλάκις ἰδεῖν ἢ πολλάκις ἀκοῦσαι τὰς αἰσθήσεις ἐλάβομεν, ἀλλ ̓ ἀνάπαλιν, ἔχοντες ἐχρησάμεθα, οὐ χρησάμενοι ἔχομεν. “For [to instance in the natural powers of sensation] it was not from often seeing, and often hearing, that we acquired those senses; but, on the contrary, being first possessed of them, we then used them, not through any use or exercise did we come to possess them." Arist. Ethic. 1. ii. c. 1. Now the contrary to this is true in the case of any powers or faculties not natural, but acquired by custom and usage. For here there are many energies and acts, which must necessarily precede the exist ence of such power or habit, it being evident (as is said in the same chapter) that ἐκ τῶν ὁμοίων ἐνεργειῶν αἱ ἕξεις γίγνονται, "from similiar and homogeneous energies it is that habits are obtained." So again, in the same place: “A yàp deî μalóvras moleiv, Taura TоLOÛνTES μavbávoμev olov oikodoμοῦντες οἰκόδομοι γίνονται, καὶ κιθαρίζοντες Kidαρiotaí. "The things which we are to do, by having learnt, we learn by doing. Thus, by building, men become builders; and by practising music, they become musicians." Thus, therefore, is art distinguished from all natural power of man, whether natural necessity, will, anger, or appetite. But art has been already distinguished from chance and compulsion. So that being clearly not the same with six of those seven causes, by which all men do all things, it must needs be referred to the seventh; that is, to custom or habit. It must be observed, the natural causes or powers in man, considered as distinct from art, are treated in the Dialogue, page 3. And now, as we have shewn art to be a certain cause working in man, it remains to shew how it is distinguished from those other causes beside man, which we suppose to operate in the universe. These are either such causes as are below him, like the vegetative power, which operates in vegetables, the sensitive in animals; or else such causes as are above him, like God, and whatever is else of intelligence more than human. The causes below us may be all included in the common genus of nature; and of nature we may say universally, as well of nature without us as within us, that its several operations, contrary to those of art, are not in the least degree derived from custom or usage. Thus the author above cited: Οὐδὲν γὰρ τῶν φύσει ὄντων ἄλλως ἐθίζεται· οἷον ὁ λίθος φύσει κάτω φερόμενος, οὐκ ἂν ἐθισθείη ἄνω φέρεσθαι, οὐδ' ἂν μυ ρίακις αὐτὸν ἐθίζη τις ἄνω ῥίπτων, οὐδὲ τὸ πῦρ κάτω. “None of those things, which are what they are by nature, can be altered by being accustomed. Thus a stone, which by nature is carried downward, can never be accustomed to mount upward, no, not though any one should ten thousand times attempt it, by throwing the stone upward. The same may be said of accustoming fire to move downward." Ethic. 1. ii. c. 1. Again, in the works of nature, such as trees, animals, and the like, the efficient principle is vitally united to the subjects wherein it operates: ev avrois exovoi Taura Thy aρxhv. Ethic. 1. vi. c. 4. But in the works of art, such as statues or houses, still something wanting to make it a finished piece.-I begged to know what this was.-In order to that, replied he, I cannot do better, than remind you of a passage in your admired Horace. the efficient principle is disunited from the subjects, and exists not in the things done or made, but in the doer or artist, & ἀρχὴ ἐν τῷ ποιοῦντι ἀλλὰ μὴ ἐν τῷ ποιουMév. Ethic. 1. vi. c. 4. It is, indeed, possible, that, even in works of art, the subject and efficient cause may be united, as in the case of a physician becoming his own patient, and curing himself. But then it must be remembered, that this union is катà σνμßεВηkòs, merely accidental, and no way essential to the constituting of art, considered as art. By this, therefore, is art clearly distinguished from nature, whose definition informs us that it is ἀρχὴ τὶς καὶ αἰτία τοῦ κινεῖσθαι καὶ ἠρεμεῖν ἐν ᾧ ὑπάρχει πρώτως, καθ' αὐτὸ καὶ μὴ κατὰ σvμßeВηкós: “a certain principle or cause of moving and ceasing to move, in some subject wherein such principle exists immediately, essentially, and not by way of accident." Arist. Natur. Ausc. 1. ii. c. 1. The causes which are of rank superior to man, such as the Deity, can have nothing to do with art, because being (as is said in the Dialogue, p. 4,) "perfect and complete, and knowing all from the beginning, they can never admit of what is additional and secondary." Art, therefore, can only belong to beings like men; who, being imperfect, know their wants, and endeavour to remove them by helps secondary and subsequent. It was from a like consideration that Pythagoras called himself a philosopher; that is to say, (according to his own explication of the name,) "a lover and seeker of what was wise and good," but not a possessor, which he deemed a character above him. Consonant to this we read in Plato's Banquet, θεῶν οὐδεὶς φιλοσοφεῖ, οὐδ ̓ ἐπιθυμεῖ σoods yevéolai σTi yap, etc.: "no god philosophizes, or desires to become wise, for he is so already. Nor, if there be any other being wise, doth he philosophize, for the same reason. On the other hand, neither do the indocile philosophize; for this is the misfortune of indocility, without being virtuous, good, or prudent, to appear to oneself sufficient in all these respects. In general, therefore, he who thinketh himself in no want, desireth not that which he thinks himself not to need. 'Who, then," said Socrates to Diotima, (the speaker of this narration,) who are those who philosophize, if they are neither the wise nor the indocile? That (replied she) may be now conspicuous even to a child. They are those of middle rank, between these extremes."" Plat. vol. iii. p. 203. edit. Serrani. Here we see (agreeably to what is said in the Dialogue, page 4,) that as to acquired, or secondary habits, some beings are too excellent for them, and others too base; and that the Deity, above all, is in the number of those transcendent, and is thus, as a cause, distinguished from art. Vid. Amm. repl'EpμEV. p. 26. b. et omnino eis karny. p. 127, 128. There are, besides the Deity and nature now spoken of, certain other external causes, which are mentioned in the first note as distinct from art; namely, chance and necessity. But of these hereafter, when we consider the subject of art. The Peripatetic definition of nature, given above, though in some degree illustrated page 11, (note g,) yet being still, from its brevity, perhaps, obscure, the following explication of it is subjoined. In the first place, by "nature," the Peripatetics meant that vital principle in plants, brutes, and men, by which they are said to live, and to be distinguished from things inanimate. Nature, therefore, being another name for "life," or a vital principle, throughout all subjects, is universally found to be of the following kind; namely, to advance the subject, which it enlivens, from a seed or embryo, to something better and more perfect. This progression, as well in plants as in animals, is called "growth." And thus is it that nature is a principle of motion.-But then this progression, or growth, is not infinite. When the subject is mature, that is, hath obtained its completion and perfect form, then the progression ceases. Here, therefore, the business of the vital principle becomes different. It is from henceforward no longer employed to acquire a form, but to preserve to its subject a form already acquired. And thus is it that nature is a principle of rest, stability, or ceasing to move. And such indeed she continues to be, maintaining, as long as possible, the form committed to her care, till time and external causes in the first place impair it, and induce at length its dissolution, which is death. And thus it has been shewn how nature may be called a principle both of motion and ceasing to move. As to the rest of the definition, namely, that nature is a principle, which inheres in its subject immediately, essentially, and not by way of accident; no more is meant by this, than that the nature or life in every being, which hath such principle, is really and truly a part of that being, and not detached and separate from it, like the pilot |