tomy of the heart." We would change his language so far as to put feelings in the place of passions and affections, and then subscribe our AMEN to the sentiment.

The three respectable, and even celebrated volumes, now brought under review, relate chiefly to the feelings of the human mind. Dr. Smith treats of those which are commonly called moral, and styles them sentiments. We shall give our own classification of human feelings, with some general laws in relation to them, and derive as much aid from our authors as we can, in support of the same. If we differ from them, we hope the simplicity and perspicuity of our plan, together with their own consciousness, will convince our readers, that it is with sufficient

reason.

The word heart, used in the philosophical, and even common acceptation of the word, is of the same import with the faculty of feeling. Our feelings are all mental operations of this one faculty; which is an inherent, constituent part of the mind. In other words, there is something in every human mind whereby it is enabled, under certain circumstances, to exercise a great variety of feelings; of which we are all CONSCIOUS. This is the only proof of any mental fact.

ALL HUMAN FEELINGS may be divided into sensations and emotions.

Our sensations are those feelings which are immediately consequent upon our perceptions of external objects, through the five bodily senses.

Our emotions are those feelings which are consequent upon other mental operations than our perceptions, by the

senses.

Emotions are subdivided into affections and passions. Affections are those emotions of the mind which are naturally pleasurable to us.

Passions are those emotions of the mind which are naturally painful to us.

This brief classification includes every feeling of which we are conscious; and in agreeable sensations and affec tions consists all our happiness; while all our unhappiness consists in painful sensations and passions. Our other mental operations are productive of felicity or pain

only mediately, as they excite our feelings; and hence we say that we feel pleasure or pain, but never that we feel a thought, a volition, or agency. Our faculty of feeling is the sensitive part of our nature, and were not our thoughts, volitions, and agency followed by feelings, they would be the occasion neither of happiness nor of unhappiness.

The reasons which we assign for our nomenclature in the classification, are these; we have different kinds of feelings, and it is desirable to distinguish them; we have a scarcity of words descriptive of mental operations, and therefore sensation, emotion, affection and passion ought not to be indiscriminately used; and the derivation, besides the customary designation of the terms, will justify our specific appropriation of them.

That feeling is the most general of these terms, and in common language covers all the rest, will be readily admitted, for we feel sensations, we feel affections, and we feel passions. Sensation too, is used by all philosophers who have written on this subject, for the feelings which the mind has immediately consequent upon some perception, called an act of touching, seeing, hearing, smelling, or tasting. That our sensations will not result from an impression on the external organs alone, is evident, from the fact, that the mind is often so engaged, that bodily impressions are not perceived, and sensations are not felt, when those impressions are actually made. Thus we have been so absorbed in thought as not to see a man whose image was formed on the retina of the eye; and not perceiving him, felt no sensation of any kind. Emotion, from its derivation, signifies a motion from something within. At any rate, we choose to use it, to describe any feeling that proceeds from some mental act that originates within the mind; and indeed every feeling which is not a sensation. Affection is commonly used in a good sense, to denote pleasing, amiable, and desirable emotions: and passion, from passio, or wabs, signifies suffering, or painful feeling.

These terms we shall invariably employ, as we have done in the former numbers of this Review, according

to the meaning which we have ascribed to them, unless it be when they occur in quotations from other authors. We shall now record a few laws relative to feelings, which relate to persons awake, not insane, not afflicted with idiocy, and not destitute of any one of the natural faculties of the human mind. We derive them from our consciousness of what passes within us, and from the expression of the consciousness of mankind in general. Rule I. Every sensation is consequent upon some act of perception, through the senses.

Rule II. Every act of perception is followed by some

sensation.

Rule III. The weakness or vigour of a sensation, is always proportionate to the weakness or vigour of the perception antecedent to it.

Rule IV. The will can regulate the sensations only by regulating the perceptions of the mind.

Rule V. Sensation is ultimately dependent on objects which exist without the mind.

Rule VI. Every emotion is consequent upon some previous mental operation, distinct from perception by the senses.

Rule VII. The nature and degree of every emotion are dependent on, and according to, the nature and degree of the antecedent mental operation, which is the occasion of it.

Rule VIII. The will can regulate the emotions of the mind, only by regulating those other mental operations which occasion them.

Rule IX. Any human feeling may be a motive to

volition.

It will be an obvious remark, resulting from a consideration of these rules, that our Creator has made the intellectual, paramount to the sensitive part of our mental nature. He designed that our understanding should rule our heart, both in temporal and in spiritual concerns. We have less control over our sensations than our emotions, because we are sometimes under a necessity of perceiving external objects; but to a certain extent, nevertheless we can regulate our perceptions, and thereby govern a great portion of our sensations.

That we may keep our hearts with all diligence, it is only requisite that we should, under the influence of right motives, choose to take the proper measures for doing it, by shunning the repetition of perceptions which lead to sinful sensations, and by employing the understanding in such a way, that it shall think only of holy subjects, and so be productive only of holy emotions.

It may be expected, that having classified all human feelings, we should name the most distinguished individuals. We will do it.

Our sensations are as various as the perceptions of external objects which occasion them, and the objects themselves which are perceived. The most conspicuous of them are, the sexual feelings, hunger and thirst, which are called appetites; because, figuratively speaking, they seek something to satiate them. Our other sensations generally derive their names, when they have any, from the qualities of external things, which being perceived occasion those sensations. Usually we couple an adjective descriptive of the quality with the verb feel. Thus we say, I feel hot, I feel cold, I feel warm, &c. If we touch a rough object, the feeling consequent upon the perception of the roughness by the touch, we call a sensation of roughness. In like manner, we speak of feelings, or sensations, of smoothness, hardness, softness, and the like. A great multitude of sensations are consequent upon our perceptions through the eye, for which we have no distinguishing terms. Let a man ride into the country, for instance, and every new object seen, will be the occasion of a new sensation, different from any one occasioned by the sight of any different object; and when he returns, instead of describing the peculiarity of each sensation, he can only say, "the country looks beautifully; and I have had a very pleasant ride."

Every different effect produced in or upon the body, being perceived, occasions a distinct feeling. Thus, from the pricking of a pin, we have one sensation; from the act of pinching, another; from the gout in the system, another; from tasting twenty different liquors, twenty more; and instead of naming each distinct and different sensation, we merely say, that "we feel pleasure or pain" VOL. I. No. 3.

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in the part of the body, which we judge to be the organ affected, or the bodily instrument of the particular perception, that occasions the feeling. Pleasure and pain are attributes of feeling; and the feeling really is in the mind. We say the pain is in one of our bodily organs of perception, merely because we have the painful sensation through the instrumentality of that organ. For the same reason we say the pleasant taste is in our mouth.

Our emotions are not quite so destitute of names as our sensations.

Among the AFFECTIONS we enumerate, 1. Love, which is a pleasing emotion consequent upon some agreeable sensation, or some thought that something is lovely in the object loved.

2. CONTENTMENT, is another pleasing emotion, conse quent upon our conception and judgment that the thing with which we are contented is not to be dispraised or blamed. It is a feeling which often results from contemplating conduct, circumstances, or events that neither displease, nor afford much, if any, positive gratification. We are contented with things which we feel no inclination to praise, and which we cannot censure. Cogan says, "Contentment expresses the acquiescence of the mind in the portion of good we possess."

3. DESIRE is an affection which we feel, in conse quence of loving an object, or an action, and judging that it would be for our happiness to possess the one, or to have the other accomplished. A WISH is the verbal expression of a desire.

4. PITY is an emotion consequent upon our apprehension of the suffering of another, and a desire to afford relief. Some may question whether this should not be called a passion instead of an affection; but appeal being made to consciousness, the last umpire in matters of this sort, we are compelled to say, that we have never felt pity without having some degree of satisfaction in the emotion. It always gives us some agreeable feeling to repeat and hear, if it is fifty times a day,

"Pity the sorrows of a poor old man,

Whose trembling limbs have borne him to your door."

5. HOPE is an affection consequent upon a desire after