Home, Henry, Lord Kames (1696-1782)

Elements of Criticism

London and Edinburgh

Printed for A. Millar, London; and A. Kincaid and J. Bell, Edinburgh

1762

"This is verified by experience; from which we learn, that different passions having the same end in view, impel the mind to action with united force. The mind receives not impulses alternately from these passions, but one strong impulse from the whole in conjunction."

Next in order, according to the method proposed, come external effects. And this leads to passions in particular, which involving desire are the causes of action. Two coexistent passions that have the same tendency, must be similar. They accordingly readily unite, and in conjunction have double force; which must hold whether the two passions have the same or different causes. This is verified by experience; from which we learn, that different passions having the same end in view, impel the mind to action with united force. The mind receives not impulses alternately from these passions, but one strong impulse from the whole in conjunction. And indeed it is not easy to conceive what should bar the union of passions that have all of them the same tendency. (I.ii.4, pp. 170-1)

Motion::Impulse

ECCO-TCP

11 entries in ESTC (1762, 1763, 1765, 1769, 1772, 1774, 1785, 1788, 1795, 1796).

See Elements of Criticism, 3 vols. (Edinburgh: Printed for A. Millar, London; and A. Kincaid & J. Bell, Edinburgh, 1762). <Link to ESTC><Link to Vol. I in ECCO-TCP><Vol. II><Vol. III>

Reading Elements of Criticism, ed. Peter Jones, 2 vols. (Indianapolis: Liberty Fund, 2005). [Text based on 6th edition of 1785]

11/18/2013