at facility of
transition, which is essential to it, we can satisfy ourselves
concerning the reality of this phaenomenon, it is well: But I must
confess I place my chief confidence in experience to prove so material
a principle. We may, therefore, observe, as the first experiment to our
present purpose, that upon the appearance of the picture of an absent
friend, our idea of him is evidently inlivened by the resemblance, and
that every passion, which that idea occasions, whether of joy or sorrow,
acquires new force and vigour. In producing this effect there concur
both a relation and a present impression. Where the picture bears him no
resemblance, or at least was not intended for him, it never so much
as conveys our thought to him: And where it is absent, as well as the
person; though the mind may pass from the thought of the one to that of
the other; it feels its idea to be rather weekend than inlivened by that
transition. We take a pleasure in viewing the picture of a friend, when
it is set before us; but when it is removed, rather choose to consider
him directly, than by reflexion in an image, which is equally distinct
and obscure.

The ceremonies of the Roman Catholic religion may be considered
as experiments of the same nature. The devotees of that strange
superstition usually plead in excuse of the mummeries, with which they
are upbraided, that they feel the good effect of those external motions,
and postures, and actions, in enlivening their devotion, and quickening
their fervour, which otherwise would decay away, if directed entirely to
distant and immaterial objects. We shadow out the objects of our faith,
say they, in sensible types and images, and render them more present to
us by the immediate presence of these types, than it is possible for
us to do, merely by an intellectual view and contemplation. Sensible
objects have always a greater influence on the fancy than any other;
and this influence they readily convey to those ideas, to which they
are related, and which they Resemble. I shall only infer from these
practices, and this reasoning, that the effect of resemblance in
inlivening the idea is very common; and as in every case a resemblance
and a present impression must concur, we are abundantly supplyed with
experiments to prove the reality of the foregoing principle.

We may add force to these experiments by others of a different kind, in
considering the effects of contiguity, as well as of resemblan