On Intelligence

ISBN: 9781332312511 出版年：2016 页码：588 H Taine Forgotten Books

IF I am not mistaken, we mean now-a-days by Intelligence, what was formerly called Understanding or Intellect — that is to say, the faculty of knowing; this, at least, is the sense in which I have taken the word. At all events, I here intend to examine our knowledge, that is to say, our cognitions, and nothing else. The words faculty, capacity, power, which have played so great a part in psychology, are only, as we shall see, convenient names by means of which we put together, in distinct compartments, all facts of a distinct kind; these names indicate a character common to all the facts under a distinct heading they do not indicate a mysterious and profound essence, remaining constant and hidden under the flow of transient facts. This is why I have treated of cognitions only, and, if I have mentioned faculties, it has been to show that in themselves, and as distinct entities, they do not exist.