Sense of Taste

Through this sense we distinguish flavored substances; the tongue is the organ of this sense, but the discernment is completed in the psychical seat in which the psychical faculties are concentrated; through taste we are guided to the selection of foods, which we discern and distinguish by their humors into different kinds, into sour, into sweet.

Into bitter, salty, and astringent, and we accept what is pleasant and reject what is unpleasant; the wisdom of God through the organ of smell acts to remove all that cannot benefit our life in taste and in the dissolving of its humors. Taste is a sense of great value, for it communicates faithfully and in detail to the soul every kind of flavor whose quality the soul apprehends. The organ of this sense, the tongue, by the manner of its construction is the most skillful servant of the needs of the rational soul; wise divine wisdom has constructed it so that it becomes the testing ground of all earthly substances; it appears that she had in view the entire creation whose humors she measured, and she populated it so abundantly that it not only executes this function but also can distinguish artificially complex medicines and through digestion remove what is harmful, and above all else to serve. But at the same time, as it was necessary to be an auditory organ of voice, sufficient for every requirement of spoken reason; the structure of the mouth in general appears to have been made such as to have all the phonetic sounds at its disposal.

To the organ of this sense she placed a wise servant; that releases all. Divine wisdom had in view all the phonetics in the structure of the mouth; we turn to the ears of the human person, and she placed it in harmony with the sound-bearing world; therefore she connected this organ through an appropriate conductive organ with the ear because of their kinship and because of the necessary readiness for the needs of immanent reason.

Taste, moreover, becomes a source of many pleasures and greatly affects the moral character of humans; because of these qualities of taste and because of its relation to the psychical faculties and its contribution to the development of the human person, its function can be regarded as more spiritual than material; for if

If taste were directed only toward the nourishment and sustenance of the body, any organic body would be sufficient for this function, as is observed in certain classes of animals. But since a spiritual purpose was sought, the organ of this sense, the tongue, received its structure more for that purpose. Hence taste leads us to a positive conclusion, that such perfection of it was created to serve more the needs of the rational soul than the (material) body, and testifies to the wisdom of the divine Creator and the spiritual nature of the human person; let us see now also how the taste of animals and what are their gustatory organs.

The tongue is a common sensory organ; and animals do sense the humors of various substances, but the variety of the structure found in the co-classes of animals in general and its lack in some testifies both to the difference of the function of each and to the specificity of the end.

Just as the human person through the tongue senses the kinds of humors; for which reason it also received form, shape, and configuration, and possesses the elements of its substance.

This difference in the shape and substance of the tongue, which varies according to the variety of animals, generates the difference in taste and consequently the difference in the sensation arising from taste. Whence it is possible to differ not only in kind, degree, quality, and quantity, but also to be entirely lacking, because it is absurd to accept identity where the diversity of things speaks of dissimilarity. The difference of sensation is confirmed also by the kind and manner of food and the manner of the varied construction of the stomachs, and it is observed that the tongue of animals is predetermined more for the function of nourishment than for the functions of higher necessity. If we investigate and seek another purpose in the construction of this organ, we shall find that it was made to remain in harmony with the instinctive impulses of the animal, about which alone it revolves; the artificial training to which some animals are brought through laborious efforts by humans testifies more to the limited circle of these animals than to anything else; for, having escaped the bonds confining them with the help of the human person, they ought to have entered into a new phase, into which the human person once entered without any assistance, and been shown to be rational beings like him; the trained animals ought to have uttered and taught their offspring the learned words, to multiply them and form their own language, even if imperfect; but they did nothing of the sort; artificial imitation, and nothing more than that.

It is wonderful how those of ape-lineage do not bring forth their progenitor ape, but continually bring forth the dog as proof of the rational soul of animals. Even more wonderful is their reasoning through which they arrive at the conclusion of the similarity between human and animal; because they see in each class of animals a virtue and do not regard it as instinctive as has been demonstrated, but as rational. Why has no ape ever succeeded in speaking, while this has been achieved by dogs and birds? How, if they understand many things, have they not managed despite many external forms of reason to move their tongue? Behold, therefore, in the tongue of the animal no other purpose appears than that of nourishment and instinctive virtue.

The incompleteness of taste in animals is also testified to by the hardness of their skin and by the poisoning of many animals, whose taste has not discerned the poisonous humors of plants; besides this, they often eat such wretched foods as they would never have tasted if they had the perfection of human taste; many eat inorganic substances, as birds do; how at all does this enrich the storehouse of animal knowledge? Where is the similarity of sensation among so many varieties and that of the human person?

How then does only human sense respond to universal substances and exist in perfect harmony with the intellect of the human person who seeks knowledge of universal objects? Knowledge of the universal. This harmony of taste with the reason of the human person testifies to his destiny, the understanding of all things, and the superior position of the human person in creation. The human person was created such that from all things he draws knowledge, while the animal is to perpetually unfold the instinctive program; let us see also what conclusion comes from the investigation of the sense of smell.