Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 3 "Philosophical Remains" (1883 ed.).djvu/132

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122
an introduction to the



CHAPTER II.


We have already[1] had occasion to establish and illustrate the radical distinction between consciousness on the one hand, and sensation on the other, or any other of those "states of mind," as they are called, of which we are cognisant. We showed that consciousness is not only distinct from any of these states, but is diametrically opposed, or placed in a direct antithesis, to them all. Thus, taking for an example, as we have hitherto done, the smell of a rose, it appears that so long as the sensation occasioned by this object remains moderate, consciousness, or the realisation of self in union with the feeling, comes into play without any violent effort. But, suppose the sensation is increased until we almost

"Die of a rose, in aromatic pain,"

then we affirm that the natural tendency of this augmentation is to weaken or obliterate consciousness, which, at any rate, cannot now maintain its place without a much stronger exertion. We do not say that this loss of self-possession, or possession of self,

  1. P. 69.