Zoonomia, Vol. I eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 655 pages of information about Zoonomia, Vol. I.

Zoonomia, Vol. I eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 655 pages of information about Zoonomia, Vol. I.

VII.  All animal motions which have occurred at the same time, or in immediate succession, become so connected, that when one of them is reproduced, the other has a tendency to accompany or succeed it.  When fibrous contractions succeed or accompany other fibrous contractions, the connection is termed association; when fibrous contractions succeed sensorial motions, the connexion is termed causation; when fibrous and sensorial motions reciprocally introduce each other, it is termed catenation of animal motions.  All these connections are said to be produced by habit, that is, by frequent repetition.  These laws of animal causation will be evinced by numerous facts, which occur in our daily exertions; and will afterwards be employed to explain the more recondite phaenomena of the production, growth, diseases, and decay of the animal system.

* * * * *

SECT.  V.

OF THE FOUR FACULTIES OR MOTIONS OF THE SENSORIUM.

    1. Four sensorial powers. 2. Irritation, sensation, volition,
    association defined.
3. Sensorial motions distinguished from fibrous
    motions.

1.  The spirit of animation has four different modes of action, or in other words the animal sensorium possesses four different faculties, which are occasionally exerted, and cause all the contractions of the fibrous parts of the body.  These are the faculty of causing fibrous contractions in consequence of the irritations excited by external bodies, in consequence of the sensations of pleasure or pain, in consequence of volition, and in consequence of the associations of fibrous contractions with other fibrous contractions, which precede or accompany them.

These four faculties of the sensorium during their inactive state are termed irritability, sensibility, voluntarity, and associability; in their active state they are termed as above, irritation, sensation, volition, association.

2.  IRRITATION is an exertion or change of some extreme part of the sensorium residing in the muscles or organs of sense, in consequence of the appulses of external bodies.

SENSATION is an exertion or change of the central parts of the sensorium, or of the whole of it, beginning at some of those extreme parts of it, which reside in the muscles or organs of sense.

VOLITION is an exertion or change of the central parts of the sensorium, or of the whole of it, terminating in some of those extreme parts of it, which reside in the muscles or organs of sense.

ASSOCIATION is an exertion or change of some extreme part of the sensorium residing in the muscles or organs of sense, in consequence of some antecedent or attendant fibrous contractions.

3.  These four faculties of the animal sensorium may at the time of their exertions be termed motions without impropriety of language; for we cannot pass from a state of insensibility or inaction to a state of sensibility or of exertion without some change of the sensorium, and every change includes motion.  We shall therefore sometimes term the above described faculties sensorial motions to distinguish them from fibrous motions; which latter expression includes the motions of the muscles and organs of sense.

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Zoonomia, Vol. I from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.