Darkness Terrible in its Own Nature
PERHAPS it may appear on inquiry that blackness and darkness are in
some degree painful by their natural operation, independent of any associations
whatsoever. I must observe, that the ideas of darkness and blackness
are much the same; and they differ only in this, that blackness is a
more confined idea. Mr. Cheselden has given us a very curious story of
a boy, who had been born blind, and continued so until he was thirteen
or fourteen years old; he was then couched for a cataract, by which operation
he received his sight. Among many remarkable particulars that attended
his first perceptions and judgments on visual objects, it gave him great
uneasiness; and that some time after, upon accidentally seeing a negro
woman, he was struck with great horror at the sight. The horror, in this
case, can scarcely be supposed to arise from any association. The boy
appears by the account to have been particularly observing and sensible
for one of his age; and therefore it is probable, if the great uneasiness
he felt at the first sight of black had arisen from its connexion with
any other disagreeable ideas, he would have observed and mentioned it.
For an idea, disagreeable only by association, has the cause of its ill
effect on the passions evident enough at the first impression; in ordinary
cases, it is indeed frequently lost; but this is, because the original
association was made very early, and the consequent impression repeated
often. In our instance, there was no time for such a habit; and there
is no reason to think that the ill effects of black on his imagination
were more owing to its connexion with any disagreeable ideas, than that
the good effects of more cheerful colours were derived from their connexion
with pleasuring ones. They had both probably their effects from their
natural operation. |