PART V

I would here willingly have proceeded to exhibit the whole chain of truths

which I deduced from these primary but as with a view to this it would

have been necessary now to treat of many questions in dispute among the

earned, with whom I do not wish to be embroiled, I believe that it will be

better for me to refrain from this exposition, and only mention in general

what these truths are, that the more judicious may be able to determine

whether a more special account of them would conduce to the public

advantage. I have ever remained firm in my original resolution to suppose

no other principle than that of which I have recently availed myself in

demonstrating the existence of God and of the soul, and to accept as true

nothing that did not appear to me more clear and certain than the

demonstrations of the geometers had formerly appeared; and yet I venture

to state that not only have I found means to satisfy myself in a short

time on all the principal difficulties which are usually treated of in

philosophy, but I have also observed certain laws established in nature by

God in such a manner, and of which he has impressed on our minds such

notions, that after we have reflected sufficiently upon these, we cannot

doubt that they are accurately observed in all that exists or takes place

in the world and farther, by considering the concatenation of these laws,

it appears to me that I have discovered many truths more useful and more

important than all I had before learned, or even had expected to learn.

But because I have essayed to expound the chief of these discoveries in a

treatise which certain considerations prevent me from publishing, I cannot

make the results known more conveniently than by here giving a summary of

the contents of this treatise. It was my design to comprise in it all

that, before I set myself to write it, I thought I knew of the nature of

material objects. But like the painters who, finding themselves unable to

represent equally well on a plain surface all the different faces of a

solid body, select one of the chief, on which alone they make the light

fall, and throwing the rest into the shade, allow them to appear only in

so far as they can be seen while looking at the principal one; so, fearing

lest I should not be able to compense in my discourse all that was in my

mind, I resolved to expound singly, though at considerable length, my

opinions regarding light; then to take the opportunity of adding something

on the sun and the fixed stars, since light almost wholly proceeds from

them; on the heavens since they transmit it; on the planets, comets, and

earth, since they reflect it; and particularly on all the bodies that are

upon the earth, since they are either colored, or transparent, or

luminous; and finally on man, since he is the spectator of these objects.

Further, to enable me to cast this variety of subjects somewhat into the

shade, and to express my judgment regarding them with greater freedom,

without being necessitated to adopt or refute the opinions of the learned,

I resolved to leave all the people here to their disputes, and to speak

only of what would happen in a new world, if God were now to create

somewhere in the imaginary spaces matter sufficient to compose one, and

were to agitate variously and confusedly the different parts of this

matter, so that there resulted a chaos as disordered as the poets ever

feigned, and after that did nothing more than lend his ordinary

concurrence to nature, and allow her to act in accordance with the laws

which he had established. On this supposition, I, in the first place,

described this matter, and essayed to represent it in such a manner that

to my mind there can be nothing clearer and more intelligible, except what

has been recently said regarding God and the soul; for I even expressly

supposed that it possessed none of those forms or qualities which are so

debated in the schools, nor in general anything the knowledge of which is

not so natural to our minds that no one can so much as imagine himself

ignorant of it. Besides, I have pointed out what are the laws of nature;

and, with no other principle upon which to found my reasonings except the

infinite perfection of God, I endeavored to demonstrate all those about

which there could be any room for doubt, and to prove that they are such,

that even if God had created more worlds, there could have been none in

which these laws were not observed. Thereafter, I showed how the greatest

part of the matter of this chaos must, in accordance with these laws,

dispose and arrange itself in such a way as to present the appearance of

heavens; how in the meantime some of its parts must compose an earth and

some planets and comets, and others a sun and fixed stars. And, making a

digression at this stage on the subject of light, I expounded at

considerable length what the nature of that light must be which is found

in the sun and the stars, and how thence in an instant of time it

traverses the immense spaces of the heavens, and how from the planets and

comets it is reflected towards the earth. To this I likewise added much

respecting the substance, the situation, the motions, and all the

different qualities of these heavens and stars; so that I thought I had

said enough respecting them to show that there is nothing observable in

the heavens or stars of our system that must not, or at least may not

appear precisely alike in those of the system which I described. I came

next to speak of the earth in particular, and to show how, even though I

had expressly supposed that God had given no weight to the matter of which

it is composed, this should not prevent all its parts from tending exactly

to its center; how with water and air on its surface, the disposition of

the heavens and heavenly bodies, more especially of the moon, must cause a

flow and ebb, like in all its circumstances to that observed in our seas,

as also a certain current both of water and air from east to west, such as

is likewise observed between the tropics; how the mountains, seas,

fountains, and rivers might naturally be formed in it, and the metals

produced in the mines, and the plants grow in the fields and in general,

how all the bodies which are commonly denominated mixed or composite might

be generated and, among other things in the discoveries alluded to

inasmuch as besides the stars, I knew nothing except fire which produces

light, I spared no pains to set forth all that pertains to its nature, --

the manner of its production and support, and to explain how heat is

sometimes found without light, and light without heat; to show how it can

induce various colors upon different bodies and other diverse qualities;

how it reduces some to a liquid state and hardens others; how it can

consume almost all bodies, or convert them into ashes and smoke; and

finally, how from these ashes, by the mere intensity of its action, it

forms glass: for as this transmutation of ashes into glass appeared to me

as wonderful as any other in nature, I took a special pleasure in

describing it. I was not, however, disposed, from these circumstances, to

conclude that this world had been created in the manner I described; for

it is much more likely that God made it at the first such as it was to be.

But this is certain, and an opinion commonly received among theologians,

that the action by which he now sustains it is the same with that by which

he originally created it; so that even although he had from the beginning

given it no other form than that of chaos, provided only he had

established certain laws of nature, and had lent it his concurrence to

enable it to act as it is wont to do, it may be believed, without

discredit to the miracle of creation, that, in this way alone, things

purely material might, in course of time, have become such as we observe

them at present; and their nature is much more easily conceived when they

are beheld coming in this manner gradually into existence, than when they

are only considered as produced at once in a finished and perfect state.

From the description of inanimate bodies and plants, I passed to animals,

and particularly to man. But since I had not as yet sufficient knowledge

to enable me to treat of these in the same manner as of the rest, that is

to say, by deducing effects from their causes, and by showing from what

elements and in what manner nature must produce them, I remained satisfied

with the supposition that God formed the body of man wholly like to one of

ours, as well in the external shape of the members as in the internal

conformation of the organs, of the same matter with that I had described,

and at first placed in it no rational soul, nor any other principle, in

room of the vegetative or sensitive soul, beyond kindling in the heart one

of those fires without light, such as I had already described, and which I

thought was not different from the heat in hay that has been heaped

together before it is dry, or that which causes fermentation in new wines

before they are run clear of the fruit. For, when I examined the kind of

functions which might, as consequences of this supposition, exist in this

body, I found precisely all those which may exist in us independently of

all power of thinking, and consequently without being in any measure owing

to the soul; in other words, to that part of us which is distinct from the

body, and of which it has been said above that the nature distinctively

consists in thinking, functions in which the animals void of reason may be

said wholly to resemble us; but among which I could not discover any of

those that, as dependent on thought alone, belong to us as men, while, on

the other hand, I did afterwards discover these as soon as I supposed God

to have created a rational soul, and to have annexed it to this body in a

particular manner which I described.

But, in order to show how I there handled this matter, I mean here to give

the explication of the motion of the heart and arteries, which, as the

first and most general motion observed in animals, will afford the means

of readily determining what should be thought of all the rest. And that

there may be less difficulty in understanding what I am about to say on

this subject, I advise those who are not versed in anatomy, before they

commence the perusal of these observations, to take the trouble of getting

dissected in their presence the heart of some large animal possessed of

lungs (for this is throughout sufficiently like the human), and to have

shown to them its two ventricles or cavities: in the first place, that in

the right side, with which correspond two very ample tubes, viz., the

hollow vein (vena cava), which is the principal receptacle of the blood,

and the trunk of the tree, as it were, of which all the other veins in the

body are branches; and the arterial vein (vena arteriosa), inappropriately

so denominated, since it is in truth only an artery, which, taking its

rise in the heart, is divided, after passing out from it, into many

branches which presently disperse themselves all over the lungs; in the

second place, the cavity in the left side, with which correspond in the

same manner two canals in size equal to or larger than the preceding,

viz., the venous artery (arteria venosa), likewise inappropriately thus

designated, because it is simply a vein which comes from the lungs, where

it is divided into many branches, interlaced with those of the arterial

vein, and those of the tube called the windpipe, through which the air we

breathe enters; and the great artery which, issuing from the heart, sends

its branches all over the body. I should wish also that such persons were

carefully shown the eleven pellicles which, like so many small valves,

open and shut the four orifices that are in these two cavities, viz.,

three at the entrance of the hollow veins where they are disposed in such

a manner as by no means to prevent the blood which it contains from

flowing into the right ventricle of the heart, and yet exactly to prevent

its flowing out; three at the entrance to the arterial vein, which,

arranged in a manner exactly the opposite of the former, readily permit

the blood contained in this cavity to pass into the lungs, but hinder that

contained in the lungs from returning to this cavity; and, in like manner,

two others at the mouth of the venous artery, which allow the blood from

the lungs to flow into the left cavity of the heart, but preclude its

return; and three at the mouth of the great artery, which suffer the blood

to flow from the heart, but prevent its reflux. Nor do we need to seek any

other reason for the number of these pellicles beyond this that the

orifice of the venous artery being of an oval shape from the nature of its

situation, can be adequately closed with two, whereas the others being

round are more conveniently closed with three. Besides, I wish such

persons to observe that the grand artery and the arterial vein are of much

harder and firmer texture than the venous artery and the hollow vein; and

that the two last expand before entering the heart, and there form, as it

were, two pouches denominated the auricles of the heart, which are

composed of a substance similar to that of the heart itself; and that

there is always more warmth in the heart than in any other part of the

body- and finally, that this heat is capable of causing any drop of blood

that passes into the cavities rapidly to expand and dilate, just as all

liquors do when allowed to fall drop by drop into a highly heated vessel.

For, after these things, it is not necessary for me to say anything more

with a view to explain the motion of the heart, except that when its

cavities are not full of blood, into these the blood of necessity flows, -

- from the hollow vein into the right, and from the venous artery into the

left; because these two vessels are always full of blood, and their

orifices, which are turned towards the heart, cannot then be closed. But

as soon as two drops of blood have thus passed, one into each of the

cavities, these drops which cannot but be very large, because the orifices

through which they pass are wide, and the vessels from which they come

full of blood, are immediately rarefied, and dilated by the heat they meet

with. In this way they cause the whole heart to expand, and at the same

time press home and shut the five small valves that are at the entrances

of the two vessels from which they flow, and thus prevent any more blood

from coming down into the heart, and becoming more and more rarefied, they

push open the six small valves that are in the orifices of the other two

vessels, through which they pass out, causing in this way all the branches

of the arterial vein and of the grand artery to expand almost

simultaneously with the heart which immediately thereafter begins to

contract, as do also the arteries, because the blood that has entered them

has cooled, and the six small valves close, and the five of the hollow

vein and of the venous artery open anew and allow a passage to other two

drops of blood, which cause the heart and the arteries again to expand as

before. And, because the blood which thus enters into the heart passes

through these two pouches called auricles, it thence happens that their

motion is the contrary of that of the heart, and that when it expands they

contract. But lest those who are ignorant of the force of mathematical

demonstrations and who are not accustomed to distinguish true reasons from

mere verisimilitudes, should venture. without examination, to deny what

has been said, I wish it to be considered that the motion which I have now

explained follows as necessarily from the very arrangement of the parts,

which may be observed in the heart by the eye alone, and from the heat

which may be felt with the fingers, and from the nature of the blood as

learned from experience, as does the motion of a clock from the power, the

situation, and shape of its counterweights and wheels.

But if it be asked how it happens that the blood in the veins, flowing in

this way continually into the heart, is not exhausted, and why the

arteries do not become too full, since all the blood which passes through

the heart flows into them, I need only mention in reply what has been

written by a physician 1 of England, who has the honor of having broken

the ice on this subject, and of having been the first to teach that there

are many small passages at the extremities of the arteries, through which

the blood received by them from the heart passes into the small branches

of the veins, whence it again returns to the heart; so that its course

amounts precisely to a perpetual circulation. Of this we have abundant

proof in the ordinary experience of surgeons, who, by binding the arm with

a tie of moderate straitness above the part where they open the vein,

cause the blood to flow more copiously than it would have done without any

ligature; whereas quite the contrary would happen were they to bind it

below; that is, between the hand and the opening, or were to make the

ligature above the opening very tight. For it is manifest that the tie,

moderately straightened, while adequate to hinder the blood already in the

arm from returning towards the heart by the veins, cannot on that account

prevent new blood from coming forward through the arteries, because these

are situated below the veins, and their coverings, from their greater

consistency, are more difficult to compress; and also that the blood which

comes from the heart tends to pass through them to the hand with greater

force than it does to return from the hand to the heart through the veins.

And since the latter current escapes from the arm by the opening made in

one of the veins, there must of necessity be certain passages below the

ligature, that is, towards the extremities of the arm through which it can

come thither from the arteries. This physician likewise abundantly

establishes what he has advanced respecting the motion of the blood, from

the existence of certain pellicles, so disposed in various places along

the course of the veins, in the manner of small valves, as not to permit

the blood to pass from the middle of the body towards the extremities, but

only to return from the extremities to the heart; and farther, from

experience which shows that all the blood which is in the body may flow

out of it in a very short time through a single artery that has been cut,

even although this had been closely tied in the immediate neighborhood of

the heart and cut between the heart and the ligature, so as to prevent the

supposition that the blood flowing out of it could come from any other

quarter than the heart.

But there are many other circumstances which evince that what I have

alleged is the true cause of the motion of the blood: thus, in the first

place, the difference that is observed between the blood which flows from

the veins, and that from the arteries, can only arise from this, that

being rarefied, and, as it were, distilled by passing through the heart,

it is thinner, and more vivid, and warmer immediately after leaving the

heart, in other words, when in the arteries, than it was a short time

before passing into either, in other words, when it was in the veins; and

if attention be given, it will be found that this difference is very

marked only in the neighborhood of the heart; and is not so evident in

parts more remote from it. In the next place, the consistency of the coats

of which the arterial vein and the great artery are composed,

sufficiently shows that the blood is impelled against them with more

force than against the veins. And why should the left cavity of the heart

and the great artery be wider and larger than the right cavity and the

arterial vein, were it not that the blood of the venous artery, having

only been in the lungs after it has passed through the heart, is thinner,

and rarefies more readily, and in a higher degree, than the blood which

proceeds immediately from the hollow vein? And what can physicians

conjecture from feeling the pulse unless they know that according as the

blood changes its nature it can be rarefied by the warmth of the heart, in

a higher or lower degree, and more or less quickly than before? And if it

be inquired how this heat is communicated to the other members, must it

not be admitted that this is effected by means of the blood, which,

passing through the heart, is there heated anew, and thence diffused over

all the body? Whence it happens, that if the blood be withdrawn from any

part, the heat is likewise withdrawn by the same means; and although the

heart were as-hot as glowing iron, it would not be capable of warming the

feet and hands as at present, unless it continually sent thither new

blood. We likewise perceive from this, that the true use of respiration is

to bring sufficient fresh air into the lungs, to cause the blood which

flows into them from the right ventricle of the heart, where it has been

rarefied and, as it were, changed into vapors, to become thick, and to

convert it anew into blood, before it flows into the left cavity, without

which process it would be unfit for the nourishment of the fire that is

there. This receives confirmation from the circumstance, that it is

observed of animals destitute of lungs that they have also but one cavity

in the heart, and that in children who cannot use them while in the womb,

there is a hole through which the blood flows from the hollow vein into

the left cavity of the heart, and a tube through which it passes from the

arterial vein into the grand artery without passing through the lung. In

the next place, how could digestion be carried on in the stomach unless

the heart communicated heat to it through the arteries, and along with

this certain of the more fluid parts of the blood, which assist in the

dissolution of the food that has been taken in? Is not also the operation

which converts the juice of food into blood easily comprehended, when it

is considered that it is distilled by passing and repassing through the

heart perhaps more than one or two hundred times in a day? And what more

need be adduced to explain nutrition, and the production of the different

humors of the body, beyond saying, that the force with which the blood, in

being rarefied, passes from the heart towards the extremities of the

arteries, causes certain of its parts to remain in the members at which

they arrive, and there occupy the place of some others expelled by them;

and that according to the situation, shape, or smallness of the pores with

which they meet, some rather than others flow into certain parts, in the

same way that some sieves are observed to act, which, by being variously

perforated, serve to separate different species of grain? And, in the last

place, what above all is here worthy of observation, is the generation of

the animal spirits, which are like a very subtle wind, or rather a very

pure and vivid flame which, continually ascending in great abundance from

the heart to the brain, thence penetrates through the nerves into the

muscles, and gives motion to all the members; so that to account for other

parts of the blood which, as most agitated and penetrating, are the

fittest to compose these spirits, proceeding towards the brain, it is not

necessary to suppose any other cause, than simply, that the arteries which

carry them thither proceed from the heart in the most direct lines, and

that, according to the rules of mechanics which are the same with those of

nature, when many objects tend at once to the same point where there is

not sufficient room for all (as is the case with the parts of the blood

which flow forth from the left cavity of the heart and tend towards the

brain), the weaker and less agitated parts must necessarily be driven

aside from that point by the stronger which alone in this way reach it I

had expounded all these matters with sufficient minuteness in the treatise

which I formerly thought of publishing. And after these, I had shown what

must be the fabric of the nerves and muscles of the human body to give the

animal spirits contained in it the power to move the members, as when we

see heads shortly after they have been struck off still move and bite the

earth, although no longer animated; what changes must take place in the

brain to produce waking, sleep, and dreams; how light, sounds, odors,

tastes, heat, and all the other qualities of external objects impress it

with different ideas by means of the senses; how hunger, thirst, and the

other internal affections can likewise impress upon it divers ideas; what

must be understood by the common sense (sensus communis) in which these

ideas are received, by the memory which retains them, by the fantasy which

can change them in various ways, and out of them compose new ideas, and

which, by the same means, distributing the animal spirits through the

muscles, can cause the members of such a body to move in as many different

ways, and in a manner as suited, whether to the objects that are presented

to its senses or to its internal affections, as can take place in our own

case apart from the guidance of the will. Nor will this appear at all

strange to those who are acquainted with the variety of movements

performed by the different automata, or moving machines fabricated by

human industry, and that with help of but few pieces compared with the

great multitude of bones, muscles, nerves, arteries, veins, and other

parts that are found in the body of each animal. Such persons will look

upon this body as a machine made by the hands of God, which is

incomparably better arranged, and adequate to movements more admirable

than is any machine of human invention. And here I specially stayed to

show that, were there such machines exactly resembling organs and outward

form an ape or any other irrational animal, we could have no means of

knowing that they were in any respect of a different nature from these

animals; but if there were machines bearing the image of our bodies, and

capable of imitating our actions as far as it is morally possible, there

would still remain two most certain tests whereby to know that they were

not therefore really men. Of these the first is that they could never use

words or other signs arranged in such a manner as is competent to us in

order to declare our thoughts to others: for we may easily conceive a

machine to be so constructed that it emits vocables, and even that it

emits some correspondent to the action upon it of external objects which

cause a change in its organs; for example, if touched in a particular

place it may demand what we wish to say to it; if in another it may cry

out that it is hurt, and such like; but not that it should arrange them

variously so as appositely to reply to what is said in its presence, as

men of the lowest grade of intellect can do. The second test is, that

although such machines might execute many things with equal or perhaps

greater perfection than any of us, they would, without doubt, fail in

certain others from which it could be discovered that they did not act

from knowledge, but solely from the disposition of their organs: for while

reason is an universal instrument that is alike available on every

occasion, these organs, on the contrary, need a particular arrangement for

each particular action; whence it must be morally impossible that there

should exist in any machine a diversity of organs sufficient to enable it

to act in all the occurrences of life, in the way in which our reason

enables us to act. Again, by means of these two tests we may likewise know

the difference between men and brutes. For it is highly deserving of

remark, that there are no men so dull and stupid, not even idiots, as to

be incapable of joining together different words, and thereby constructing

a declaration by which to make their thoughts understood; and that on the

other hand, there is no other animal, however perfect or happily

circumstanced, which can do the like. Nor does this inability arise from

want of organs: for we observe that magpies and parrots can utter words

like ourselves, and are yet unable to speak as we do, that is, so as to

show that they understand what they say; in place of which men born deaf

and dumb, and thus not less, but rather more than the brutes, destitute of

the organs which others use in speaking, are in the habit of spontaneously

inventing certain signs by which they discover their thoughts to those

who, being usually in their company, have leisure to learn their language.

And this proves not only that the brutes have less reason than man, but

that they have none at all: for we see that very little is required to

enable a person to speak; and since a certain inequality of capacity is

observable among animals of the same species, as well as among men, and

since some are more capable of being instructed than others, it is

incredible that the most perfect ape or parrot of its species, should not

in this be equal to the most stupid infant of its kind or at least to one

that was crack-brained, unless the soul of brutes were of a nature wholly

different from ours. And we ought not to confound speech with the natural

movements which indicate the passions, and can be imitated by machines as

well as manifested by animals; nor must it be thought with certain of the

ancients, that the brutes speak, although we do not understand their

language. For if such were the case, since they are endowed with many

organs analogous to ours, they could as easily communicate their thoughts

to us as to their fellows. It is also very worthy of remark, that, though

there are many animals which manifest more industry than we in certain of

their actions, the same animals are yet observed to show none at all in

many others: so that the circumstance that they do better than we does not

prove that they are endowed with mind, for it would thence follow that

they possessed greater reason than any of us, and could surpass us in all

things; on the contrary, it rather proves that they are destitute of

reason, and that it is nature which acts in them according to the

disposition of their organs: thus it is seen, that a clock composed only

of wheels and weights can number the hours and measure time more exactly

than we with all our skin.

I had after this described the reasonable soul, and shown that it could by

no means be educed from the power of matter, as the other things of which

I had spoken, but that it must be expressly created; and that it is not

sufficient that it be lodged in the human body exactly like a pilot in a

ship, unless perhaps to move its members, but that it is necessary for it

to be joined and united more closely to the body, in order to have

sensations and appetites similar to ours, and thus constitute a real man.

I here entered, in conclusion, upon the subject of the soul at

considerable length, because it is of the greatest moment: for after the

error of those who deny the existence of God, an error which I think I

have already sufficiently refuted, there is none that is more powerful in

leading feeble minds astray from the straight path of virtue than the

supposition that the soul of the brutes is of the same nature with our

own; and consequently that after this life we have nothing to hope for or

fear, more than flies and ants; in place of which, when we know how far

they differ we much better comprehend the reasons which establish that the

soul is of a nature wholly independent of the body, and that consequently

it is not liable to die with the latter and, finally, because no other

causes are observed capable of destroying it, we are naturally led thence

to judge that it is immortal.