We have reached a milestone in the logic of Crusius, since we are now about to turn to its practical part, where the question is not so much about the structure of the capacities and activities of human understanding, but of the proper way to use them. The first topic to be covered in this practical part, Crusius says, is that of the diseases of understanding, that is, not just temporary errors, but constant conditions hindering the understanding from its proper purpose of knowing what is true.
Crusius thinks it evident from experience that human understanding can have diseases in the sense just mentioned. Furthermore, he identifies three causes for these diseases. Firstly, because understanding is subservient to the will, the will can through a repeated bad use of understanding create harmful habitual dispositions. Secondly, Crusius continues, the body restricts the activities of thinking, and if it repeatedly makes thinking difficult, it can create constant bad qualities in understanding. Finally, the human soul is conceived through external causes, which can create many innate imperfections in understanding.
Despite admitting the possibility of human understanding becoming diseased or corrupted, Crusius denies vehemently that such a disease could affect its essence. After all, he argues, God created the essence of understanding, so that it must be good. This is no contradiction, Crusius assures the reader, since it is as true as eyes being by their essence the vehicle for seeing, but sometimes having maladies that impair the vision. Thus, Crusius concludes, the diseases of understanding can concern only its grade or relations to other things.
Crusius divides diseases of understanding into two classes: physical weakness of the fundamental forces of understanding, and faulty state of understanding in relation to its use. Starting from the first option, Crusius divides weakness of the force of understanding into absolute and relative weakness. Of the two kinds, absolute weakness is measured by the inability of the understanding (or one of its capacities) to fulfill its purpose. Relative weakness, on the other hand, describes a situation where two capacities of the understanding – usually what Crusius calls lower and higher faculties – reverse their customary roles, so that a lower faculty escapes the regulation given by the higher faculty of understanding.
Crusius divides the second class of diseases of understanding – those pertaining to the state of understanding in relation to its use – into further kinds. Firstly, there are all the faults pertaining to attention, such as the lack of external or internal attention, purposeless attention or attention for worthless causes – Crusius underlines that a conscious ignorance of things should not be included in this group, and indeed, is a fault only if what is ignored is something useful or something that we are obligated to know. Secondly, there is the incapacity to think many things at the same time, whether because one cannot represent many ideas at once or because one cannot make many abstractions at once. Thirdly, there’s the inability to continue mediation for a long period in a row. In the fourth place, Crusius mentions doubt and lack of constancy in assent, but also the opposite failures of carefree assent and stubborn adherence to an assent once given. Finally, there’s the too great dependency of the understanding on the heightened activities of will.
All the described diseases of understanding, Crusius thinks, have detrimental effects: they make our observations faulty and concepts obscure, they make us confuse objects with one another and imaginations with sensations, they hinder us from concluding our thoughts, and top it all, the more they affect us, the more habitual they become. No wonder then that Crusius gives a long list of means for curing these diseases, most of which are easy to comprehend, such as practicing continuous thinking. As a main cure Crusius recommends virtuous disciplining of understanding. He notices a potential circle – understanding cannot be improved without virtue, but virtue cannot be improved without understanding – but thinks this circle is not fatal, because even a small step towards better in one leads also to improvements in the other.
In addition to morality and virtue, Crusius connects his account also with religion, pointing out that even the Bible recognises the corruption of the human understanding and the beneficial effects of morality on it. He is also quick to emphasise that the Bible does not condemn reason and understanding as essentially faulty. Even further, Crusius suggests that the fear of error should make us eager to search for divine providence, especially in matters involving our own happiness. Still, he underlines, curing the corruption of understanding can never be forced upon anyone, but always requires internal activity of the person in question.
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