ORIGIN OF EVILS, SINS, AND ERRORS.
9. In this conception of the soul, she will be foreign to the cause of the evils which the man does and suffers. These refer to the organism, that common part, understood as above. Although opinion be deceptive, and makes us commit much evil, and although opinion and ratiocination both belong to the soul, yet the soul may be sinless, inasmuch as we are only mastered by the worse part of our nature1. Often, indeed, we yield to appetite, to anger, and we are the dupes of some imperfect image. The conception of false things, the imagination2 does not await the judgment of discursive reason. There are still other cases where we yield to the lower part of ourselves; in sensation, for instance, we see things that do not exist, because we rely on the common sensation of soul and body, before having discerned its objects by discursive reason.
INTELLECT DID NOT GRASP THE OBJECT ITSELF.
In this case did the intellect grasp the object itself? Certainly not; and, therefore, it is not the intellect that is responsible for the error. We say as much for the “we,” according as we will or will not have perceived the object, either in the intellect, or in ourselves;—for it is possible to possess an object without having it actually present.
TRUE CONCEPTION ACT OF INTUITION.
We have distinguished from things common to soul and body, those peculiar to the soul. The former are corporeal, and cannot be produced without the organs, while the latter’s occurrence is independent of the body. Ratiocination is the essential and constitutive faculty of the real soul, because it determines the typical forms derived from sensation, it looks, it somehow feels the images, and really is the dominating part of the soul. The conception of true things is the act of intuitive thoughts.
MODIFICATIONS DERIVE FROM FOREIGN SOURCES.
There is often a resemblance and community between exterior and interior things; in this case the soul will not any the less exercise herself on herself, will not any the less remain within herself, without feeling any passive modification. As to the modifications and troubles which may arise in us, they derive from foreign elements, attached to the soul, as well as from passions experienced by the above described common part.
See St. Paul. Rom. for phantasy, or imagination; VII. 7-25. ↩
See IV. 3.29-31, also I. 1.9; Numenius, fr. II. 8, 19; III. See section 10. ↩