SPECIAL TEXT: "Intelligence is eternal, and exists upon a self-existing principle. It is a spirit^[D] from age to age and there is no creation about it." (Joseph Smith, "King Follett Sermon," April, 1844.)

[Footnote A: This little work (206 pages) is by William Pollard, some years Professor of Rational Philosophy in St. Louis University. It is a short treatise on the "Initial Philosophy," the ground work necessary for the consistent pursuit of knowledge, (1896).]

[Footnote B: I cite the abridged (teachers') edition of the Professor's, "Principles of Psychology."]

[Footnote C: This sermon as published in the "Era" is accompanied by explanatory notes, hence the "Era" is cited. It is also published in "Journal of Discourses," Vol. VI.]

[Footnote D: "A spirit from age to age"—not "Spirit from age to age:" but a "spirit"; that is an entity, a person, an individual. The Prophet's statement here could well be taken as an interpretation of Doc. & Cov. Sec. 93:29. See Lesson II.]

DISCUSSION.

1. Intelligence Defined: The sense in which the term "Intelligence" is to be used in this discussion is that of a mind, or an intelligent being, Milton make's such use of the term as the latter when he represents Adam as saying to the angel Raphael, who has given him a lesson on human limitations:

"How fully hast thou satisfied me, pure
Intelligence of heaven, angel serene!"^[A]

[Footnote A: "Paradise Lost," viii:181.]

And so Alfred Tennyson:

"The great Intelligences fair
That range above our mortal state."^[A]

[Footnote A: "In Memoriam," lxxxv.]

God is also sometimes referred to as the "Supreme Intelligence." It is in this sense, then, that I use the term Intelligence; a being that is intelligent, capable of apprehending facts or ideas; possessed of power to think.

2. Intelligence: Consciousness: In other words the term Intelligence is descriptive of the thing to which it is applied. Therefore Intelligence (mind) or Intelligences (minds), thus conceived are conscious. Conscious of self and of not self; of the me and the not me. "Intelligence is that which sees itself, or is at once both subject and object." It knows itself as thinking, that is, as a subject; thinking of its self, it knows itself as an object of thought—of its own thought. And it knows itself as distinct from a vast universe of things which are not self; itself the while remaining constant as a distinct individuality amid the great universe of things not self. Fiske calls Consciousness "the soul's fundamental fact;" and "the most fundamental of facts."^[A] It may be defined as the power by which Intelligence knows its own acts and states. It is an awareness of the mind. By reason of it an Intelligence, when dwelling in a body—as we best know it (man)—knows itself as seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching; also as searching, and finding; as inquiring and answering; as active or at rest; as loving or hating; as contented or restless; as advancing or receding; as gaining or loosing, and so following in all the activities in which Intelligences, as men, engage.

[Footnote A: "Studies in Religion," p. 245.]

3. Generalization: By another power or faculty of Intelligence (mind) it can perceive, as connected with the things that sense perceives, something that cannot be taken in by sense perception; that is to say, Intelligence can generalize. Sense can get at the individual, concrete thing only: "this triangle," "this orange" "that triangle," "those oranges," etc. By the consideration of the individual, concrete object, however, the mind can form an idea, a concept, a general notion—"triangle," "orange"—which does not specify this or that individual object, but "fits to any individual triangle or orange past, present, or future, and even the possible oranges that never shall be grown."^[A] In other words Intelligence can rise from consideration of the particular to the general.

[Footnote A: "The Truth of Thought," p. 41.]

4. Perception of a priori^[A] Principles: Again there are a priori principles, which the mind can perceive to be incontrovertible and of universal application, by mere reflection upon the signification of the principles and without going into the applications.^[B] Such for example as that one and one make two. That two and one make three. Also, to continue the illustration above, borrowed from the late Professor Wm. James, for some time Professor of Psychology in Harvard University.—"White differs less from gray than it does from black; that when the cause begins to act the effect also commences. Such propositions hold of all possible 'ones,' of all conceivable 'whites' and 'grays' and 'causes.' The objects here are mental objects. Their relations are perceptually obvious at a glance, and no sense-verification is necessary. Moreover, once true, always true, of those same mental objects. Truth here has an 'eternal' character. If you can find a concrete thing anywhere that is 'one' or 'white' or 'gray' or an 'effect' then your principles will everlastingly apply to it. It is but a case of ascertaining the kind, and then applying the law of its kind to the particular object. You are sure to get truth if you can name the kind rightly, for your mental relations hold good of everything of that kind without exception."^[C]

[Footnote A: A priori, from something prior or going before, hence from antecedent to consequent; from cause to effect. See illustrations in the text quoted from James.]

[Footnote B: "Truth of Thought," p. 41.]

[Footnote C: "Pragmatism"—James—(1908), pp. 209, 210.]

5. Imagination: By a mind-power known as imagination, or imaginative memory, Intelligences, as known to us through men, can hold before consciousness, in picture, what has been perceived by an outward sense, and this even when the outward sense has been shut off from the outward world of matter. I once saw an orange tree with a number of ripe oranges scattered through its branches, but on other branches were orange blossoms. What the outward senses then perceived, when I was standing before the tree, has been shut off, but at will I can call before the vision of my mind and hold in consciousness the picture of that tree with its mixture of ripe fruit and fruit blossoms. This power of imagination, is also constructive. Intelligences (men) can put before themselves in mental picture, combinations which are fashioned from the varied stores of memory.^[A] As I have elsewhere said: I am this moment sitting at my desk, and am enclosed by the four walls of my room—limited as to my personal presence to this spot. But by the mere act of my will, I find I have the power to project myself in thought to any part of the world. Instantly I can be in the crowded streets of the world's metropolis. I walk through its well remembered thoroughfares, I hear the rush and roar of its busy multitudes, the rumble of vehicles, the huckster's cries, the cab-men's calls, sharp exclamations and quick retorts in the jostling throngs, the beggar's piping cry, the sailor's song, fragments of conversation, broken strains of music, the blare of trumpets, the neighing of horses, ear-piercing whistles, ringing of bells, shouts, responses, rushing trains and all that mingled din and soul-stirring roar that rises in clamor above the great town's traffic.

[Footnote A: "Sensations, once experienced, modify the nervous organism, so that copies of them arise again in the mind after the original outward stimulus is gone. No mental copy, however, can arise in the mind, of any kind of sensation which has never been directly excited from without.

"The blind may dream of sights, the deaf of sounds, for years after they have lost their vision or hearing; but the man born deaf can never be made to imagine what sound is like, nor can the man born blind ever have a mental vision. In Locke's words, already quoted, 'the mind can frame unto itself no one new simple idea.' The originals of them all must have been given from without. Fantasy, or Imagination, are the names given to the faculty of reproducing copies of originals once left. The imagination is called 'reproductive' when the copies are literal; 'productive' when elements from different originals are recombined so as to make new wholes" (Wm. James: "Psychology," p. 302).]

At will, I leave all this and stand alone on mountain tops in Syria, India, or overlooking old Nile's valley, wrapped in the awful grandeur of solemn silence. Here I may bid fallen empires rise and pass in grand procession before my mental vision and live again their little lives; fight once more their battles; begin again each petty struggle for place, for power, for control of the world's affairs; revive their customs; live again their loves and hates, and preach once more their religions and their philosophies—all this the mind may do, and that as easily and as quickly as in thought it may leave this room, cross the street to a neighbor's home, and there take note of the familiar objects within his habitation.^[A]

[Footnote A: "Mormon Doctrine of Deity," p. 132.]

6. Ratiocination:^[A] "The mind (Intelligence) can combine various general principles or individual facts and principles; and in the combination and comparison of them, it can perceive other facts and principles.^[B] In other words, Intelligence is capable of reasoning; of building up conclusions from the data of its knowledge. It has the power of deliberation and of judgment; by which it may determine that this state or condition is better than another state or condition. That this, tending to good, should be encouraged; and that, tending to evil, should be discouraged, or, if possible, destroyed.

[Footnote A: The process of deducing conclusions from premises.]

[Footnote B: "The Truth of Thought," p. 40.]

7. Power of Volition: Intelligence, as embodied in man, is also conscious of the power, within certain limitations, to will, and to perform what he wills to do: To rise up, to sit down; to raise his arm, to let it fall; to walk, to run, to stand; to go to Paris, to Berlin, or to Egypt; to write a book, to build a house, to found a hospital; to control largely his actions, physical and moral; he can be sober or drunken; chaste, or a libertine; benevolent or selfish; honest or a rogue. Having deliberated upon this and that and having formed a judgment that one thing is better than another, or that one condition is better than another, he has power to choose between them and can determine to give his aid to this and withhold it from that. So that volition, within certain limitations at least, seems also to be a quality of Intelligence.^[A] It is of course possible to conceive of Intelligence and its necessarily attendant consciousness, existing without volition; but Intelligence so conceived is shorn of its glory, since under such conditions it can make no use whatsoever of its powers. Its very thinking would be chaotic; its consciousness distressing. If active at all its actions would be without purpose and as chaotic as its thinking would be, unless it could be thought of as both thinking and acting as directed by an intelligent, purposeful will external to itself: which would still leave the Intelligence a mere automaton, without dignity or moral quality, or even intellectual value.^[B] I therefore conclude that while it is possible to conceive of Intelligence with its necessarily attendant consciousness as without volition, still, so far as we are acquainted with Intelligence, as manifested through men, volition—sometimes named soul-freedom or free-agency is a quality that within certain limitations, attends upon Intelligences and may be an inherent quality of Intelligence, a necessary attribute of its very essence, as much so as is consciousness itself.

[Footnote A: Seventy's Second Year Book, Lesson I and IV.]

[Footnote B:

"Freedom and reason make us men,
Take these away, what are we then?
Mere animals, and just as well
The beasts may think of heaven or hell."
—"Latter-day Saints' Hymn Book," p. 263.]

8. Recapitulation: We have found, then,

1. That Intelligences are eternal—self-existing intelligent entities;

2. That they are called Intelligences because intelligence is their chief characteristic;

3. That being intelligent consciousness is in them a necessary quality;

4. That they are both self-conscious, and conscious of an external universe not self;

5. That Intelligences have the power to generalize—to rise from the contemplation of the particular to the general, from the individual to universal;

6. That Intelligences can perceive the existence of certain a priori principles that are incontrovertible—necessary truths—which form a basis of knowledge;

7. That Intelligences as known through men possess a power of imagination or imaginative memory by which they hold pictures of sense perceptions before the mind and may form from them new combinations of thought and consciousness;

8. That Intelligences have power to reason (ratiocination), to deliberate, to form judgments;

9. That Intelligences have volition, physical, mental and moral, within certain limitations—a power both to will and to do; in other words they are free, or free agents.

It should be understood that these brief remarks respecting Intelligence and Intelligences are in no sense a treatise, even brief and cursory, on psychology; they are made merely to indicate some of the chief qualities that are inseparably connected with Intelligence and Intelligences so that when the words are used in this treatise, some definite idea may be had as to what is meant.