Sight is the sense of the understanding which perceives; hearing is the sense of the reason which thinks and apprehends.
 Arthur Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation (1819). copy citation

add
Author Arthur Schopenhauer
Source The World as Will and Representation
Topic sight reason
Date 1819
Language English
Reference
Note Translated by R. B. Haldane and J. Kemp
Weblink http://www.gutenberg.org/files/40097/40097-h/40097-h.html

Context

“Sensations of hearing are exclusively in time, and therefore the whole nature of music consists in degrees of time, upon which depends both the quality or pitch of tones, by means of vibrations, and also their quantity or duration, by means of time. The sensations of sight, on the other hand, are primarily and principally in space; but secondarily, by reason of their duration, they are also in time. Sight is the sense of the understanding which perceives; hearing is the sense of the reason which thinks and apprehends. Words are only imperfectly represented by visible signs; and therefore I doubt whether a deaf and dumb man, who can read, but has no idea of the sound of the words, works as quickly in thinking with the mere visible signs of conceptions as we do with the real, i.e.,” source