CHAPTER XI.
Note 1, p. 118. Each sense seems to be perceptive, &c.] This passage seems to imply that all sentient impressions may, in a strict sense, be tangible impressions. Aristotle[1], in another treatise, observes that sentient bodies are bodies sensible of tangible impressions, and that tangible impressions only have contraries, which, in kind, are specific and causative. And, "thus, neither whiteness and blackness, sweetness and bitterness, or any other contraries save those alluded to, can form elementary distinctions." All which implies, perhaps, that the Touch is either the origin of or coeval with animal existence; and that the other senses are but for the higher forms of being. The properties, besides, which are attributed, so to say, to the Touch are, in contradistinction to those of the organs of relation, mainly concerned in the changes continually going on in inert bodies; and this consideration may have, in part, contributed to the speculative opinion just quoted.
Note 2, p. 120. It may be a question whether as all bodies, &c.] This is an argument to prove that, as there cannot be absolute contact of bodies in water, so neither
- ↑ De Gen. et Corr. II. 2. 2.
