Page:Ferrier's Works Volume 3 "Philosophical Remains" (1883 ed.).djvu/75

Rh faithfully the facts and expressions of common sense as given in their primitive obscurity, and then by construing them without violence, without addition, and without diminution into clearer and more intelligible forms.

In observance and exemplification, then, of this rule, let us now take up an expression frequently made use of by common sense, and which, in the preceding chapter, we had occasion to bring forward, that expression, to wit, constantly in the mouth of every one, "my mind," or let it be "my emotion," "my sensation," or any similar mode of speech; and let us ask, What does a man, thus talking the ordinary language of common life, precisely mean when he employs these expressions? The metaphysician will tell us that he does not mean what he says. We affirm that he does mean what he says. The metaphysician will tell us that he does not really make, or intend to make, any discrimination or sundering between himself and his "mind;" or we should rather say his "state of mind." We affirm that he both intends to make such a separation, and does make it. The metaphysician declares that by the expression "my emotion" the man merely means that there is one of them, namely, "emotion," that this is himself (the being he calls "I"), and contains and expresses every fact which this latter word denotes; and in making this averment the metaphysician roughly subverts and obliterates the language of the man. We, however, reverencing the canon we have just laid