Page:An Essay on the Principle of Population (1798).djvu/253

of the tooth-ache at the time I am writing this. In the eagerness of composition, I every now and then, for a moment or two, forget it. Yet I cannot help thinking that the process, which causes the pain, is still going forwards, and that the nerves, which carry the information of it to the brain, are even during these moments demanding attention, and room for their appropriate vibrations. The multiplicity of vibrations of another kind, may perhaps prevent their admission, or overcome them for a time when admitted, till a shoot of extraordinary energy puts all other vibration to the rout, destroys the vividness of my argumentative conceptions, and rides triumphant in the brain. In this case, as in the others, the mind seems to have little or no power in counteracting or curing the disorder, but merely