The passage discusses the importance and function of fingers and hands, highlighting their ability to perform different types of grasping due to varying finger lengths. It emphasizes that fingers allow for dexterity and adaptability in handling objects and mentions the difficulty encountered when using fingerless gloves. The text concludes by noting that fingers are essential for sensing, counting, and performing divided tasks.
Function and Service of
Arms and Hands have been observed, and in youth, many successful experiments have been made. To ensure that the hands work better, they are equipped with various types of grasping capability. Through the means of the fingers, which all have different lengths, small and large objects can be handled. Due to the flexibility of the fingers, the hand can adjust itself proportionally to the various items to be grasped and held. Thus, they can increase and decrease according to the shape; this necessity of the fingers forms the foundation. Certain tasks, which could not be carried out by the Hand, would not be possible if not for the fingers being separate but made from one piece of flesh. This is why using mittens, which are gloves without fingers, challenges dexterity and causes difficulties in handling; therefore, a mocking term is 'Eating Fish with Mittens.' We have known a truthful master who, in acknowledgment of the fingers' simplicity, named them finders, not knowing if it was the common word. Because this naming seemed proper to us, we have also noted it with attention. For truly, by the fingers, we sense, touch, find, and experience, making us aware of almost everything. The fingers also serve us in counting, as they aid in division and partition. Similarly, one typically begins with the thumb in action, thus it is without doubt...