Context

The last three sections have been devoted to an explanation of the causes of the passions. The previous section has identified the imagination as one of these causes, to the extent that whatever affects the imagination affects the passions as well. This raises the issue of what influences the imagination and therefore indirectly the passions. The present and succeeding sections examine the influences of differences in time and space.

Background

This topic is original to the author.

The Treatise

1. An object may be contiguous to ourselves in space and/or in time. It may be located spatially next to our body or temporally at the present time. Every such object is “conceiv’d with a peculiar force and vivacity, and excel[s] every other object, in its influence on the imagination. The easy explanation for the strength of this conception is that we are intimately related to ourselves. We have the liveliest possible conception of ourselves, and this liveliness is transferred to what is related to ourselves. What is contiguous to us is closely related to us and as a result is conceived in a very lively way. [See Part I, Section 11, paragraph 4 on this point.] Any object distant from us loses “the advantage of this relation” and so will not be as conceived in as vivid a way as what is contiguous. This does not by itself explain why there is a loss of liveliness that is proportional to the distance. It seems that this requires “a more particular examination.”

2. The first, “obvious,” point to note is that the imagination is always concerned, to some extent, with what is present in space and time. No matter how much we think about objects that are remote or in the past, our passions and sensations push us to reflect on the present. The second point to remark is that when we conceive of objects that we think exist, “we take them in their proper order and situation, and never leap from one object to another, which is distant from it, without running over, at least in a cursory manner, all those objects, which are interpos’d betwixt them.” [For example, when someone in California thinks of a beach in Florida, he thinks in some slight way of the land between the two.] These two points are now joined. Suppose that I think of an object A which is distant from myself. By the second point, I must think of some object B located between myself and A. But to do so, according to the first point, I must reflect back upon myself. This backward, so to speak, direction impedes the progress of my thought toward A. The author describes the process in this way: “When we reflect, therefore, on any object distant from ourselves, we are oblig’d not only to reach it at first by passing thro’ all the intermediate space betwixt ourselves and the object, but also to renew our progress every moment; being every moment recall’d to the consideration of ourselves and our present situation.” From this consideration, it is “easily conceived” that the constant return of the thought to the self hinders its progress toward its intended object and as a consequence weakens its intensity. This effect is proportional to the distance: the farther the object from ourselves, the greater the effect of the interruptions. Conversely, “The fewer steps we make to arrive at the object, and the smoother the road is, this diminution of vivacity is less sensibly felt, but still may be observ’d more or less in proportion to the degrees of distance and difficulty.”

3. The author now summarizes his result with respect to the imagination: the nearer the object, the more intense its conception. He now ties this characteristic of objects to the subject of Book II: “If my reasoning be just, they must have a proportionable effect on the will and passions.” That is, the will and passions will be influenced much more strongly by nearby than by distant objects. This is confirmed by observation of ordinary life, in which people are far more concerned with the present and what is nearby than with things that are remote, leaving them “to the care of chance and fortune.” “Talk to a man of his condition thirty years hence, and he will not regard you. Speak of what is to happen to-morrow, and he will lend you attention. The breaking of a mirror gives us more concern when at home, than the burning of a house, when abroad, and some hundred leagues distant.”

4. Although the same general effect holds for remoteness in both space and time, it is considerably stronger with temporal distance than with spatial. The effect on our will or passions of something very far away is greater than that of something relatively near in time. Twenty years is not a long time in the course of history, but that distance diminishes the intensity of our conceptions much more than being halfway around the world.

5. The author claims that this difference in effects must be traced to differences in the properties of space and time. One need not delve into metaphysics to note that the parts of space exist together in a single time, while those of space are successive and do not co-exist. Thus, we may survey a large space, but only a moment of time, at once. “These qualities of the objects have a suitable effect on the imagination.” Because the union of parts of space appears to the senses, it does so in the imagination. This facilitates the imagination’s transition from one part of space to another. But the fact that the parts of time are not present together makes it much more difficult to move from one to another. “Every part must appear single and alone, nor can regularly have entrance into the fancy without banishing what is suppos’d to have been immediately precedent.” Because there is a greater interruption in the movement from one part to the other, there is a weakening of the force of the ideas and consequently of the passions, “which depend in a great measure, upon the imagination, according to my system.”

6. Another disparity in effects is found between past and future objects. We are more concerned with what we think will happen than what we recall has happened. It is easy to explain why future events have more influence on the will, since the will is responsible for our future actions but can do nothing about the past. But we must still account for the differential effects of the past and future upon the passions.

7. Thus far, the explanation of the effects of distance on the imagination has been based on the fact that our imaginations do not leap over it but rather move progressively from what is present to what is remote. This does not, however, explain the asymmetry in degree of vivacity between our conceptions of the past and the future, as the distances may be the same. What will provide an explanation is the relative ease with which we make the transition from the present to the future, as opposed to that from the present to the past. The author cites the order observed in historical narratives to illustrate his point. The historian generally moves forward in time and only relates a past event first when it is absolutely necessary.

8. As noted above in paragraph 2, the course of our imagination always begins with the present. So, the conception of a past or future object has as its starting point the present and will move either backward or forward in time. In nature, the movement is always from present to future, a forward movement. So if our thought moves from present to past, its movement is “contrary to nature“ or to “the natural course of the succession.” The movement forward in time, on the other hand, follows the natural course of things. “This easy progression of ideas favours the imagination, and makes it conceive its object in a stronger and fuller light, than when we are continually opposed in our passage, and are oblig’d to overcome the difficulties arising from the natural propensities of the fancy.” As a result, the weakening effect of a small distance of past time is greater than that of a much greater distance of future time. “From this effect of it on the imagination is deriv’d its influence on the will and passions.”

9. There is a further feature of our relation to the past and future which contributes to the effect just described. Consider two objects A and B placed equal intervals of time, one backward and one forward from the present. The two are on an almost equal footing when thought of abstractly. Although the past has happened and the future will happen, both stretches of time are tied equally to the present. If this near-equality were the only factor affecting the imagination, thought of the past and of the future would be equally influential on it. Although our imagination begins with the present, it is capable of conceiving the self as existing either in the past or in the future. Suppose that my imagination places me at some point C between the present and the past object A and at some point D between the present and future object B. Because moving forward is more natural than moving backward, my imagination will prefer the placement of myself in the future at D rather than in the past at C. “We advance, rather than retard our existence; and following what seems the natural succession of time, proceed from past to present, and from present to future.” Thus, when I place myself at D, I am bringing the future nearer, and the past farther away, from myself. So I think of the equal distances A and B differently when I place myself at D: A is receding and B is approaching. “The fancy anticipates the course of things, and surveys the object in that condition, to which it tends, as well as that, which is regarded as the present.” [This phenomenon reinforces the author’s explanation of the phenomenon that the thought of the future has a greater influence on the will and passions than that of the past.]

Dissertation II: Of the Passions

This topic is not discussed in Of the Passions.

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