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 man: I Of /the adjacent portions of the matter of the heavens. In view of the biblical doctrine, according to which the world and all that therein is was created at a stroke, he apolo- getically describes his attempt to explain the origin of the world from chaos under the laws of motion as a scientific fiction, intended merely to make the process more compre- hensible. It is more easily conceivable, if we think of the things in the world as though they had been gradually formed from elements, as the plant develops from the seed. We now pass to the Cartesian anthropology, with its three chief objects: the body, the soul, and the union of the two. 3. Man. The human body, like all organic bodies, is a machine. Artificial automata and natural bodies are distinguished only in degree. Machines fashioned by the hand of man perform their functions by means of visible and tangible instruments, while natural bodies employ organs which, for the most part, are too minute to be perceived. As the clock- maker constructs a clock from wheels and weights so that it is able to go of itself, so God has made man's body out of dust, only, being a far superior artist, he produces a work -of art which is better constructed and capable of far more wonderful movements. The cause of death is the destruc- tion of some important part of the machine, which prevents it from running longer ; a corpse is a broken clock, and the departure of the soul comes only as a result of death. The •common opinion that the soul generates life in the body is erroneous. It is rather true that life must be present before the soul enters into union with the body, as it is also true that life must have ended before it dissolves the bond. The sole principles of physiology are motion and heat. The heat (vital warmth, a fire without light), which God has put in the heart as the central organ of life, has for its function the promotion of the circulation of the blood, in the description of which Descartes mentions with praise the discoveries of Harvey {De Motu Cordis et Sanguinis in Ani- malibus, 1628). From the blood are separated its finest, most fiery, and most mobile parts, called by Descartes " animal