 Section 8 of An Essay Concerning Human Understanding, by John Locke, Book 4 of Knowledge and Probability. Maxims, or axioms, are self-evident propositions. There are a sort of propositions which, under the name of maxims and axioms, have passed for principles of science, and because they are self-evident, have been supposed innate, without that anybody that I know ever went about to show the reason and foundation of their clearness or cogency, it may, however, be worthwhile to inquire into the reason of their evidence, and see whether it be peculiar to them alone, and also to examine how far they influence and govern our other knowledge. 2. Wearing that self-evidence consists. Knowledge, as has been shown, consists in the perception of the agreement or disagreement of ideas. Now where that agreement or disagreement is perceived immediately by itself, without the intervention or help of any other, there are knowledge is self-evident. This will appear to be so to any who will but consider any of those propositions which, without any proof, he assents to at first sight, for in all of them he will find that the reason of his assent is from that agreement or disagreement, which the mind, by an immediate comparing them, finds in those ideas answering the affirmation or negation in the proposition. 3. Self-evidence not peculiar to received axioms. This being so, in the next place let us consider whether this self-evidence be peculiar only to those propositions which commonly pass under the name of maxims, and have the dignity of axioms allowed them. And here it is plain that several other truths, not allowed to be axioms, partake equally with them in this self-evidence. This we shall see if we go over these several sorts of agreement or disagreement of ideas which I have above mentioned, these identity, relation, coexistence, and real existence, which will discover to us that not only those few propositions which have had the credit of maxims are self-evident, but a great many, even almost an infinite number of other propositions are such. 4. As to identity and diversity, all propositions are equally self-evident. 1. For first, the immediate perception of the agreement or disagreement of identity being founded in the minds having distinct ideas, this affords us as many self-evident propositions as we have distinct ideas. 2. Everyone that has any knowledge at all has, as the foundation of it, various and distinct ideas, and it is the first act of the mind without which it can never be capable of any knowledge, to know every one of its ideas by itself and distinguish it from others. 3. Everyone finds in himself that he knows the ideas he has, that he knows also when any one is in his understanding and what it is, and that when more than one are there he knows them distinctly and uncomfusedly one from another, which, always being so, it being impossible but that he should perceive what he perceives, he can never be in doubt when any idea is in his mind that it is there and is that idea it is, and that two distinct ideas, when they are in his mind, are there and are not one and the same idea, so that all such affirmations and negations are made without any possibility of doubt, uncertainty or hesitation, and must necessarily be assented to as soon as understood, that is, as soon as we have in our minds determined ideas which the terms in the propositions stand for, and therefore, whenever the mind with attention considers any proposition so as to perceive the two ideas signified by the terms and affirmed or denied one of the other to be the same or different, it is presently an infallibly certain of the truth of such a proposition, and this equally whether these propositions be in terms standing for more general ideas or such as are less so, VG, whether the general idea of being be affirmed of itself as in this proposition whatsoever is, is, or a more particular idea be affirmed of itself as a man is a man, or whatsoever is white is white, or whether the idea of being in general be denied of not being, which is the only, if I may so call it, idea different from it, as in this other proposition, it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be, or any idea of any particular being be denied of another different from it, as a man is not a horse, red is not blue. The difference of the ideas as soon as the terms are understood makes the truth of the proposition presently visible, and that with an equal certainty and easiness in the less as well as the more general propositions, and all for the same reason, these because the mind perceives in any ideas that it has the same idea to be the same with itself, and two different ideas to be different and not the same, and this it is equally certain of whether these ideas be more or less general, abstract and comprehensive, it is not therefore alone to these two general propositions whatsoever is, is, and it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be, that this sort of self evidence belongs by any peculiar right, the perception of being or not being belongs no more to these vague ideas, signified by the terms whatsoever and thing, then it does to any other ideas, these two general maxims amounting to no more in short, but this, that the same is the same, and the same is not different, are truths known in more particular instances as well as in those general maxims, and known also in particular instances before these general maxims are ever thought on and draw all their force from the discernment of the mind employed about particular ideas, there is nothing more visible than that the mind without the help of any proof or reflection on either of these general propositions perceives so clearly and knows so certainly that the idea of white is the idea of white and not the idea of blue, and that the idea of white, when it is in the mind, is there and is not absent, that the consideration of these axioms can add nothing to the evidence or certainty of its knowledge, just so it is as everyone may experiment in himself, in all the ideas a man has in his mind, he knows each to be itself and not to be another and to be in his mind and not away when it is there, with a certainty that cannot be greater and therefore the truth of no general proposition can be known with a greater certainty, nor add anything to this, so that in respect of identity our intuitive knowledge reaches as far as our ideas and we are capable of making as many self-evident propositions as we have names for distinct ideas, and I appeal to everyone's own mind whether this proposition, a circle is a circle, be not as self-evident a proposition as that consisting of more general terms, whatsoever is, is, and again whether this proposition, blue is not red, be not a proposition that the mind can no more doubt of as soon as it understands the words, then it does of that axiom it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be, and so of all the like. Five. In coexistence we have few self-evident propositions. Two. Secondly, as to coexistence, or such a necessary connection between two ideas that in the subject where one of them is supposed, there the other must necessarily be also, of such agreement or disagreement as this, the mind has an immediate perception, but in very few of them, and therefore in this sort we have but very little intuitive knowledge, nor are there to be found very many propositions that are self-evident, though some there are. VG, the idea of filling a place equal to the contents of its superficies, being annexed to our idea of body, I think it is a self-evident proposition that two bodies cannot be in the same place. Six. Three. In other relations we may have many. Thirdly, as to the relations of modes, mathematicians have framed many axioms concerning that one relation of equality as equals taken from equals the remainder will be equal, which with the rest of that kind, however they are received for maxims by the mathematicians and are unquestionable truths, yet I think that anyone who considers them will not find that they have a clearer self-evidence than these, that one and one are equal to two, that if you take from the five fingers of one hand, two, and from the five fingers of the other hand, two, the remaining numbers will be equal. These and a thousand other such propositions may be found in numbers which, at the very first hearing, force the assent and carry with them an equal, if not greater, clearness than those mathematical axioms. Seven. Four. Concerning real existence we have none. Fourthly, as to real existence, since that has no connection with any other of our ideas but that of ourselves and of a first being, we have in that concerning the real existence of all other beings not so much as demonstrative, much less a self-evident knowledge, and therefore concerning those there are no maxims. Eight. These axioms do not much influence our other knowledge. In the next place, let us consider what influence these received maxims have upon the other parts of our knowledge. The rules established in the schools that all reasonings are ex-precognitas et preconcesse seem to lay the foundation of all other knowledge in these maxims and to suppose them to be precognita whereby I think are meant these two things. First, that these axioms are those truths that are first known to the mind and secondly that upon them the other parts of our knowledge depend. Nine. Because maxims or axioms are not the truths we first knew. First, that they are not the truths first known to the mind is evident to experience as we have shown in another place. Book One. Chapter One. Who perceives not that a child certainly knows that a stranger is not its mother? That its sucking bottle is not the rod long before he knows that it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be? How many truths are there about numbers which it is obvious to observe that the mind is perfectly acquainted with and fully convinced of before it ever thought on these general maxims to which mathematicians in their arguings do sometimes refer them? Whereof the reason is very plain for that which makes the mind assent to such propositions being nothing else but the perception it has of the agreement or disagreement of its ideas according as it finds them affirmed or denied one of another in words it understands and every idea being known to be what it is and every two distinct ideas being known not to be the same it must necessarily follow that such self-evident truths must be first known which consist of ideas that are first in the mind and the ideas first in the mind it is evident are those of particular things from whence by slow degrees the understanding proceeds to some few general ones which being taken from the ordinary and familiar objects of sense are settled in the mind with general names to them thus particular ideas are first received and distinguished and so knowledge got about them and next to them the less general or specific which are next to particular for abstract ideas are not so obvious or easy to children or the yet unexercised mind as particular ones if they seem so to grown men it is only because by constant and familiar use they are made so for when we nicely reflect upon them we shall find that general ideas are fictions and contrivances of the mind that carry difficulty with them and do not so easily offer themselves as we are apt to imagine for example does it not require some pains and skill to form the general idea of a triangle which is yet none of the more abstract comprehensive and difficult for it must be neither oblique nor rectangle neither equilateral nor scaling on but all and none of these at once in effect it is something imperfect that cannot exist an idea wherein some part of several different and inconsistent ideas are put together it is true the mind in this imperfect state has need of such ideas and makes all the haste to them it can for the convenience of communication and enlargement of knowledge to both which it is naturally very much inclined but yet one has reason to suspect such ideas are marks of our imperfection at least this is enough to show that the most abstract and general ideas are not those that the mind is first and most easily acquainted with nor such as its earliest knowledge is conversant about 10 because on perception of them the other parts of our knowledge do not depend secondly from what has been said it plainly follows that these magnified maxims are not the principles and foundations of all our other knowledge for if there be a great many other truths which have as much self evidence as they and a great many that we know before them it is impossible they should be the principles from which we deduce all other truths is it impossible to know that one and two are equal to three but by virtue of this or some such axiom these the whole is equal to all its parts taken together many a one knows that one and two are equal to three without having heard or thought on that or any other axiom by which it might be proved and knows it as certainly as any other man knows that the whole is equal to all its parts or any other maxim and all from the same reason of self evidence the equality of those ideas being as visible and certain to him without that or any other axiom as with it it needing no proof to make it perceived nor after the knowledge that the whole is equal to all its parts does he know that one and two are equal to three better or more certainly than he did before for if there be any odds in those ideas the whole and parts are more obscure or at least more difficult to be settled in the mind than those of one two and three and indeed I think I may ask these men who will needs have all knowledge besides those general principles themselves to depend on general innate and self evident principles what principle is requisite to prove that one and one or two that two and two or four that three times two or six which being known without any proof do events that either all knowledge does not depend on certain pray cognita or general maxims called principles or else that these are principles and if these are to be counted principles a great part of numeration will be so to which if we add all the self evident propositions which may be made about all our distinct ideas principles will be almost infinite at least innumerable which men arrive to the knowledge of at different ages and a great many of these innate principles they never come to know all their lives but whether they come in view of the mind earlier or later this is true of them that they are all known by their native evidence are wholly independent receive no light nor are capable of any proof one from another much less the more particular from the more general or the more simple from the more compounded the more simple and less abstract being the most familiar and the easier and earlier apprehended but whichever be the clearest ideas the evidence and certainty of all such propositions is in this that a man sees the same idea to be the same idea and infallibly perceives two different ideas to be different ideas for when a man has in his understanding the ideas of one and of two the idea of yellow and the idea of blue he cannot but certainly know that the idea of one is the idea of one and not the idea of two and that the idea of yellow is the idea of yellow and not the idea of blue for a man cannot confound the ideas in his mind which he has distinct that would be to have them confused and distinct at the same time which is a contradiction and to have none distinct is to have no use of our faculties to have no knowledge at all and therefore what idea so ever is affirmed of itself or whatsoever to entire distinct ideas are denied one of another the mind cannot but ascent to such a proposition as infallibly true as soon as it understands the terms without hesitation or need of proof or regarding those made in more general terms and called maxims 11 what use these general maxims or axioms have what shall we then say are these general maxims of no use by no means though perhaps their use is not that which it is commonly taken to be but since doubting in the least of what have been by some men ascribed to these maxims may be apt to be cried out against as overturning the foundations of all the sciences it may be worthwhile to consider them with respect to other parts of our knowledge and examine more particularly to what purposes they serve and to what not of no use to prove less general propositions nor as foundations on consideration of which any science has been built one it is evident from what has been already said that they are of no use to prove or confirm less general self evident propositions two it is as plain that they are not nor have been the foundations where on any science have been built there is I know a great deal of talk propagated from scholastic men of sciences and the maxims on which they are built but it has been my ill luck never to meet with any such sciences much less anyone built upon these two maxims what is is and it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be and I would be glad to be shown where any such science erected upon these or any other general axioms is to be found and should be obligated to anyone who would lay before me the frame and system of any science so built on these or any such like maxims that could not be shown to stand as firm without any consideration of them I ask whether these general maxims have not the same use in the study of divinity and in theological questions that they have in other sciences they serve here to to silence wranglers and put an end to dispute but I think that nobody will therefore say that the Christian religion is built upon these maxims or that the knowledge we have of it is derived from these principles it is from revelation we have received it and without revelation these maxims had never been able to help us to it when we find out an idea by whose intervention we discover the connection of two others this is a revelation from God to us by the voice of reason for we then come to know a truth that we did not know before when God declares any truth to us this is a revelation to us by the voice of his spirit and we are advanced in our knowledge but in neither of these do we receive our light or knowledge from maxims but in the one the things themselves afford it and we see the truth in them by perceiving their agreement or disagreement in the other God himself affords it immediately to us and we see the truth of what he says in his unerring veracity three nor as helps in the discovery of yet unknown truths they are not of use to help men forward in the advancement of sciences or new discoveries of yet unknown truths Mr. Newton in his never enough to be admired book has demonstrated several propositions which are so many new truths before unknown to the world and are further advances in mathematical knowledge but for the discovery of these it was not the general maxims what is is or the whole is bigger than a part or the like that helped him these were not the clues that led him into the discovery of the truth and certainty of those propositions nor was it by them that he got the knowledge of those demonstrations but by finding out intermediate ideas that showed the agreement or disagreement of the ideas as expressed in the propositions he demonstrated this is the greatest exercise and improvement of human understanding in the enlarging of knowledge and advancing the sciences wherein they are far enough from receiving any help from the contemplation of these or the like magnified maxims would those who have this traditional admiration of these propositions that they think no step can be made in knowledge without the support of an axiom no stone laid in the building of the sciences without a general maxim but distinguish between the method of acquiring knowledge and of communicating it between the method of raising any science and that of teaching it to others as far as it is advanced they would see that those general maxims were not the foundations on which the first discoverers raised their admirable structures nor the keys that unlocked and opened those secrets of knowledge though afterwards when schools were erected and sciences had their professors to teach what others had found out they often made use of maxims i.e. laid down certain propositions which were self-evident or to be received for true which being settled in the minds of their scholars as unquestionable verities they on occasion made use of to convince them of truths in particular instances that were not so familiar to their minds as those general axioms which had before been inculcated to them and carefully settled in their minds though these particular instances when well reflected on are no less self-evident to the understanding than the general maxims brought to confirm them and it was in those particular instances that the first discoverer found the truth without the help of the general maxims and so may anyone else do who with attention considers them maxims of use in the exposition of what has been discovered and in silencing obstinate wranglers to come therefore to the use that is made of maxims one they are of use as has been observed in the ordinary methods of teaching sciences as far as they are advanced but of little or none in advancing them further two they are of use in disputes for the silencing of obstinate wranglers and bringing those contests to some conclusion whether a need of them to that end came not in the manner following I crave leave to inquire the schools having made disputation the touchstone of men's abilities and the criterion of knowledge educated victory to him that kept the field and he that had the last word was concluded to have the better of the argument if not of the cause but because by this means there was like to be no decision between skillful combatants whilst one never failed of a medius terminus to prove any proposition and the other could as constantly without or with a distinction deny the major or minor to prevent as much as could be running out of disputes into an endless train of syllogisms certain general propositions most of them indeed self evident were introduced into the schools which being such as all men allowed and agreed in were looked on as general measures of truth and served instead of principles where the disputants had not laid down any other between them beyond which there was no going and which must not be receded from by either side and thus these maxims getting the name of principles beyond which men in dispute could not retreat were by mistake taken to be the originals and sources from whence all knowledge began and the foundations where on the sciences were built because when in their disputes they came to any of these they stopped there and went no further the matter was determined but how much this is a mistake have already been shown how maximums came to be so much in vogue this method of the schools which have been thought the fountains of knowledge introduced as I suppose the like use of these maxims into a great part of conversation out of the schools to stop the mouths of cavaliers whom anyone is excused from arguing any longer with when they deny these general self evident principles received by all reasonable men who have once thought of them but yet their use herein is but to put an end to wrangling they in truth when urged in such cases teach nothing that is already done by the intermediate ideas made use of in the debate whose connection may be seen without the help of those maxims and so the truth known before the maxim is produced and the argument brought to a first principle men would give off a wrong argument before it came to that if in their disputes they proposed to themselves the finding and embracing of truth and not a contest for victory and thus maxims have their use to put a stop to their perverseness whose ingenuity should have yielded sooner but the method of the schools having allowed and encouraged men to oppose and resist evident truth till they are baffled i.e. till they are reduced to contradict themselves or some established principles it is no wonder that they should not in civil conversation be ashamed of that which in the schools is counted a virtue and a glory it is obstinacy to maintain that side of the question they have chosen whether true or false to the last extremity even after conviction a strange way to attain truth and knowledge and that which i think the rational part of mankind not corrupted by education could scarce believe should ever be admitted amongst the lovers of truth and students of religion or nature or introduced into the seminaries of those who are to propagate the truths of religion or philosophy amongst the ignorant and unconvinced how much such a way of learning is like to turn young men's minds from the sincere search and love of truth nay and to make them doubt whether there is any such thing or at least worth the adhering to i shall not now inquire this i think that baiting those places which brought the parapetetic philosophy into their schools where it continued many ages without teaching the world anything but the art of wrangling these maxims were no where thought to the foundations on which the sciences were built nor the great helps to the advancement of knowledge of great use to stop wranglers in disputes but of little use to the discovery of truths as to these general maxims therefore they are as i have said of great use in disputes to stop the mouths of wranglers but not of much use to the discovery of unknown truths or to help the mind forwards in its search after knowledge for whoever began to build his knowledge on this general proposition what is is or it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be and from either of these as from a principle of science deduced a system of useful knowledge wrong opinions often involving contradictions one of these maxims as a touchstone may serve well to show whether they lead but yet however fit to lay open the absurdity or mistake of a man's reasoning or opinion they are of very little use for enlightening the understanding and it will not be found that the mind receives much help from them in its progress in knowledge which would be neither less nor less certain were these two general propositions never thought on it is true as i have said they sometimes serve in argumentation to stop a wrangler's mouth by showing the absurdity of what he saith and by exposing him to the shame of contradicting what all the world knows and he himself cannot but own to be true but it is one thing to show a man that he is in an error and another to put him in possession of truth and i would feign know what truths these two propositions are able to teach and by their influence make us know which we did not know before or could not know without them let us reason from them as well as we can they are only about identical predications and influence if any at all none but such each particular proposition concerning identity or diversity is as clearly and certainly known in itself if attended to as either of these general ones only these general ones as serving in all cases are therefore more inculcated and insisted on as to other less general maxims many of them are no more than bear verbal propositions and teach us nothing but the respect and import of names one to another the whole is equal to all its parts what real truth i beseech you does it teach us what more is contained in that maxim then what the signification of the word totem or the whole does of itself import and he that knows that the word whole stands for what is made up of all its parts knows very little less than that the whole is equal to all its parts and upon the same ground i think that this proposition a hill is higher than a valley and several alike may also pass for maxims but yet masters of mathematics when they would as teachers of what they know initiate others in that science do not without reason place this and some other such maxims at the entrance of their systems that their scholars having in the beginning perfectly acquainted their thoughts with these propositions made in such general terms may be used to make such reflections and have these more general propositions as formed rules and sayings ready to apply to all particular cases not that if they be equally weighed they are more clear and evident than the particular instances that they are brought to confirm but that being more familiar to the mind the very naming them is enough to satisfy the understanding but this i say is more from our custom of using them and the establishment they have got in our minds by our often thinking of them then from the different evidence of the things but before custom has settled methods of thinking and reasoning in our minds i am apt to imagine it is quite otherwise and that the child when a part of his apple is taken away knows it better in that particular instance than by this general proposition the whole is equal to all its parts and that if one of these have need to be confirmed to him by the other the general has more need to be let into his mind by the particular than the particular by the general for in particulars our knowledge begins and so spreads itself by degrees to generals footnote this is the order in time of the conscious acquisition of knowledge that is human the essay might be regarded as a commentary on this one sentence our intellectual progress is from particulars and involuntary recipient see through reactive doubt and criticism into what is at last reasoned faith though afterwards the mind takes the quite contrary course and having drawn its knowledge into as general propositions as it can makes those familiar to its thoughts and accustoms itself to have recourse to them as to the standards of truth and falsehood footnote this is the philosophic attitude there in one consciously apprehends the intellectual necessities that were unconsciously presupposed its previous intellectual progress in philosophy we draw our knowledge into as general propositions as it can be made to assume and thus either learn to see it as an organic while in a speculative unity or learn that it cannot be so seen in a finite intelligence and that even at the last it must remain broken and mysterious in the human understanding by which familiar use of them as rules to measure the truth of other propositions it comes in time to be thought that more particular propositions have their truth and evidence from their conformity to these more general ones which in discourse and argumentation are so frequently urged and constantly admitted and this I think to be the reason why amongst so many self-evident propositions the most general only have had the title of maxims 12. Maxims, if care not be taken in the use of words, may prove contradictions. One thing further I think it may not be a miss to observe concerning these general maxims that they are so far from improving or establishing our minds in true knowledge that if our notions be wrong, loose or unsteady and we resign up our thoughts to the sound of words rather than fix them on settled determined ideas of things, I say these general maxims will serve to confirm us in mistakes and in such a way of use of words which is most common will serve to prove contradictions V. G. He that with Descartes shall frame in his mind an idea of what he calls body to be nothing but extension may easily demonstrate that there is no vacuum i.e. no space void of body by this maxim what is is for the idea to which he annexes the name body being bare extension his knowledge that space cannot be without body is certain for he knows his own idea of extension clearly and distinctly and knows that it is what it is and not another idea though it be called by these three names extension body space which three words standing for one and the same idea may no doubt with the same evidence and certainty be affirmed one of another as each of itself and it is as certain that whilst I use them all to stand for one and the same idea this predication is as true and identical in its signification that space is body as this predication is true and identical that body is body both in signification and sound 13. Instance in vacuum but if another should come and make to himself another idea different from Descartes of the thing which yet with Descartes he calls by the same name body and make his idea which he expresses by the word body to be of a thing that have both extension and solidity together he will as easily demonstrate that there may be a vacuum or space without a body as Descartes demonstrated the contrary because the idea to which he gives the name space being barely the simple one of extension and the idea to which he gives the name body being the complex idea of extension and resistibility or solidity together in the same subject these two ideas are not exactly one and the same but in the understanding as distinct as the ideas of one and two white and black or as of corporality and humanity if I may use those barbarous terms and therefore the predication of them in our minds or in words standing for them is not identical but the negation of them one of another these this proposition extension or space is not body is as true and evidently certain as this maximum it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be can make any proposition 14. But they prove not the existence of things without us but yet though both these propositions as you see may be equally demonstrated these that there may be a vacuum and that there cannot be a vacuum by these two certain principles these what is is and the same thing cannot be and not be it neither of these principles will serve to prove to us that any or what bodies do exist for that we are left to our senses to discover to us as far as they can those universal and self evident principles being only our constant clear and distinct knowledge of our own ideas more general or comprehensive can assure us of nothing that passes without the mind their certainty is founded only upon the knowledge we have of each idea by itself and of its distinction from others about which we cannot be mistaken whilst they are in our minds although we may be and often are mistaken when we retain the names without the ideas or use them confusedly sometimes for one and sometimes for another idea in which cases the force of these axioms reaching only to the sound and not the signification of the words serves only to lead us into confusion mistake and error it is to show men that these maxims however cried up for the great guards of truth will not secure them from error in a careless loose use of their words that I have made this remark in all that is here suggested concerning their little use for the improvement of knowledge or dangerous use in undetermined ideas I have been far enough from saying or intending they should be laid aside as some have been too forward to charge me I affirm them to be truths self evident truths and so cannot be laid aside as far as their influence will reach it is in vain to endeavor nor will I attempt to abridge it but yet without any injury to truth or knowledge I may have reason to think their use is not answerable to the great stress which seems to be laid on them and I may warn men not to make an ill use of them for the confirming themselves in errors 15 they cannot add to our knowledge of substances and their application to complex ideas is dangerous but let them be of what use they will in verbal propositions they cannot discover or prove to us the least knowledge of the nature of substances as they are found and exist without us any further than grounded on experience and though the consequence of these two propositions called principles be very clear and their use not dangerous or harmful in the probation of such things wherein there is no need at all of them for proof but such as are clear by themselves without them these where our ideas are determined and known by the names that stand for them yet when these principles these what is is and it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be are made use of in the probation of propositions wherein our words standing for complex ideas VG man horse gold virtue there they are of infinite danger and most commonly make men receive and retain falsehood for manifest truth and uncertainty for demonstration upon which follow error obstinacy and all the mischiefs that can happen from wrong reasoning the reason where of is not that these principles are less true or of less force in proving propositions made of terms standing for complex ideas then where the propositions are about simple ideas but because men mistake generally thinking that where the same terms are preserved the propositions are about the same things though the ideas they stand for are in truth different therefore these maxims are made use of to support those which in sound and appearance are contradictory propositions and is clear in the demonstrations above mentioned about a vacuum so that whilst men take words for things as usually they do these maxims may and do commonly serve to prove contradictory propositions as shall yet be further made manifest sixteen instance in demonstrations about man which can only be verbal for instance let man be that concerning which you would buy these first principles demonstrate anything and we shall see that so far as demonstration is by these principles it is only verbal and gives us no certain universal true proposition or knowledge of any being existing without us first a child having framed the idea of a man it is probable that his idea is just like that picture which the painter makes of the visible appearances joined together and such a complication of ideas together in his understanding makes up the single complex idea which he calls man where of white or flesh color in England being one the child can demonstrate to you that a negro is not a man because white color was one of the constant simple ideas of the complex idea he calls man and therefore he can demonstrate by the principle it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be that a negro is not a man the foundation of his certainty being not that universal proposition which perhaps he never heard nor thought of but the clear distinct perception he hath of his own simple ideas of black and white which he cannot be persuaded to take nor can ever mistake one for another whether he knows that maxim or no and to this child or anyone who have such an idea which he calls man can you never demonstrate that a man hath a soul because his idea of man includes no such notion or idea in it and therefore to him the principle of what is is proves not this matter but it depends upon collection and observation by which he is to make his complex idea called man another instance secondly another that hath gone further in framing and collecting the idea he calls man and to the outward shape adds laughter and rational discourse may demonstrate that infants and changelings are no men by this maxim it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be and I have discourse with very rational men who have actually denied that they are men 18 a third instance thirdly perhaps another makes up the complex idea which he calls man only out of the ideas of body in general and the powers of language and reason and leaves out the shape wholly this man is able to demonstrate that a man may have no hands but be quadrupes neither of those being included in his idea of man and in whatever body or shape he found speech and reason joined that was a man because having a clear knowledge of such a complex idea it is certain that what is is 19 little use of these maxims improves where we have clear and distinct ideas so that if rightly considered I think we may say that where our ideas are determined in our minds and have annexed to them by us known and steady names under those settled determinations there is little need or no use at all of these maxims to prove the agreement or disagreement of any of them he that cannot discern the truth or falsehood of such propositions without the help of these and the like maxims will not be helped by these maxims to do it since he cannot be supposed to know the truth of these maxims themselves without proof if he cannot know the truth of others without proof which are as self evident as these upon this ground it is that intuitive knowledge neither requires nor admits any proof one part of it more than another he that will suppose it does takes away the foundation of all knowledge and certainty and he that needs any proof to make him certain and give his assent to this proposition that two are equal to two will also have need of a proof to make him admit that what is is he that needs a probation to convince him that two are not three that white is not black that a triangle is not a circle etc. or any other two determined distinct ideas are not one and the same will need also a demonstration to convince him that it is impossible for the same thing to be and not to be twenty their use dangerous where our ideas are not determined and as these maxims are of little use where we have determined ideas so they are as I have showed of dangerous use where our ideas are not determined and where we use words that are not annexed to determined ideas but such as are of a loose and wandering signification sometimes standing for one and sometimes for another idea from which follow mistake and error which these maxims brought as proofs to establish propositions where in the terms stand for undetermined ideas do by their authority confirm and rivet end of section eight recording by Jennifer Henry section nine of an essay concerning humane understanding by John Locke book four of knowledge and probability this is a labor box recording all labor box recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit labor box dot org chapter eight of trifling propositions one some propositions bring no increase to our knowledge whether the maxims treated of in the forgoing chapter be of that use to real knowledge as is generally supposed I leave to be considered this I think may confidently be affirmed that there are universal propositions which though they be certainly true yet they add no light to our understanding bring no increase to our knowledge such are two as first identical propositions first all purely identical propositions these obviously and at first blush appear to contain no instruction in them for when we affirm the said term of itself whether it be barely verbal or whether it contains any clear and real idea it shows us nothing but what we must certainly know before whether such a proposition be either made by or proposed to us indeed that most general one what is is may serve some times to show a man the absurdity he is guilty of when by circumlocution or equivocal terms he would in particular instances deny the same thing of itself because nobody will so openly bid defiance to common sense as to affirm visible and direct contradictions in plain words or if he does a man is excused if he breaks off any further discourse with him but yet I think I may say that neither that received maximum nor any other identical proposition teaches us anything and though in such kind of propositions this great and magnified maximum boasted to be the foundation of demonstration may be and often is made use of to confirm them yet all it proves amounts to no more than this that the same word may with great certainty be affirmed of itself without any doubt of the truth of any such proposition and let me add also without any real knowledge three examples for at this rate any very ignorant person who can but make a proposition and knows what he means when he says I or no may make a million of propositions of whose truth he may be infallibly certain and yet not know one thing in the world thereby for instance what is a soul is a soul or a soul is a soul a spirit is a spirit a fetish is a fetish etc these all being equivalent to this proposition namely what is is for instance what hath existence hath existence or who hath a soul hath a soul what is this more than trifling with words it is but like a monkey shifting his oyster from one hand to the other and had he but words might no doubt have said oyster in right hand is subject and oyster in left hand is predicate and so might have made a self evident proposition of oyster for instance oyster is oyster and yet with all this not have been one with the wiser or more knowing and that way of handling the matter would much at one have satisfied the monkey's hunger or a man's understanding and they would have improved in knowledge and bulk together for secondly propositions in which a part of any complex idea is predicated of the whole to another sort of trifling propositions is when a part of the complex idea is predicated of the name of the whole a part of the definition of the word defined such are all propositions wherein the genus is predicated of the species or more comprehensive of less comprehensive terms for what information what knowledge carries this proposition in it namely lead is a metal to a man who knows the complex idea the name lead stands for all the simple ideas that go to the complex one signified by the term metal being nothing but what he before comprehended and signified by the name lead indeed to a man that knows the signification of the word metal and not of the word lead it is a shorter way to explain the signification of the word lead by saying it is a metal which at once expresses several of its simple ideas then to enumerate them one by one telling him it is a body very heavy fusible and malleable five as part of the definition of the term defined a like trifling it is to predicate any other part of the definition of the term defined or to affirm any one of the simple ideas of a complex one of the name of the whole complex idea as all gold is fusible for fusibility being one of the simple ideas that goes to the making up the complex one the sound gold stands for what can it be but playing with sounds to affirm that of the name gold which is comprehended in its received signification it would be thought little better than ridiculous to affirm gravely as a truth of moment that gold is yellow and I see not how it is any jot more material to say it is fusible unless that quality be left out of the complex idea of which the sound gold is the mark in ordinary speech what instruction can it carry with it to tell one that which he had been told already or is he supposed to know before for I am supposed to know the signification of the word another uses to me or else he is to tell me and if I know that the name gold stands for this complex idea of body yellow heavy fusible malleable it will not much instruct me to put it solemnly afterwards in a proposition and gravely say all gold is fusible such propositions can only serve to show the dis ingenuity of one who will go from the definition of his own terms by reminding him sometimes of it but carry no knowledge with them but of the signification of words however certain they may be six instance man and Paul free every man is an animal or living body is as certain a proposition as can be but no more conducing to the knowledge of things than to say a Paul free is an ambling horse or a name ambling animal both being only about the signification of words and make me know but this that body sense and motion or power of sensation and moving are three of those ideas that I always comprehend and signify by the word man and when they are not to be found together the name man belongs not to that thing and so of the other that body sense and a certain way of going with a certain kind of voice are some of those ideas which I always comprehend and signify by the word Paul free and when they are not to be found together the name Paul free belongs not to that thing it is just the same and to the same purpose when any term standing for anyone or more of the simple ideas that altogether make up that complex idea which is called man is affirmed by the term man for instance suppose a Roman signified by the word homo all these distinct ideas united in one subject corporeatus sensibilitus potentia see move in the rationalitus risibilitus he might no doubt with great certainty universally affirm one more or all of these together of the word homo but did no more than say that the word homo in his country comprehended in its signification all these ideas much like a romance night who by the word Paul free to signify these ideas body of a certain figure four legged with sense motion ambly name white used to have a woman on his back might with the same certainty universally affirm also any or all of these of the word Paul free but did thereby teach no more but that the word Paul free in his or romance language stood for all these and was not to be applied to anything where any of these was wanting but he that shall tell me that in whatever thing sense motion reason and laughter were united that thing had actually a notion of God or would be cast into a sleep by opium made indeed an instructive proposition because neither having the notion of God nor being cast into sleep by opium being contained in the idea signified by the word man we are by such propositions taught something more than barely what the word man stands for and therefore the knowledge contained in it is more than verbal seven for this teaches but the signification of words before a man makes any proposition he is supposed to understand the terms he uses in it or else he talks like a parrot only making a noise by imitation and framing certain sounds which he has learned of others but not as a rational creature using them for signs of ideas which he has in his mind the hearer also is supposed to understand the terms as the speaker uses them or else he talks jargon and makes an unintelligible noise and therefore he trifles with words who makes such a proposition which when it is made contains no more than one of the terms does and which a man was supposed to know before for instance a triangle half three sides or saffron is yellow and this is no further tolerable than where a man goes to explain his terms to one who is supposed or declares himself not to understand him and then it teaches only the signification of that word and the use of that sign eight but adds no real knowledge we can know then the truth of two sorts of propositions with perfect certainty the one is of those trifling propositions which have a certainty in them but it is only a verbal certainty but not instructive and secondly we can know the truth and so maybe certain in propositions which affirm something of another which is a necessary consequence of its precise complex idea but not contained in it as that the external angle of all triangles is bigger than either of the opposite internal angles which relation of the outward angle to either of the opposite internal angles making no part of the complex idea signified by the name triangle this is a real truth and conveys with it instructive real knowledge nine general propositions concerning substances are often trifling we have little or no knowledge of what combinations there be of simple ideas existing together in substances but by our senses we cannot make any universal certain propositions concerning them any further than our nominal essences lead us which being to a very few and inconsiderable truths in respect of those which depend on their real constitutions the general propositions that are made about substances if they are certain are for the most part but trifling and if they are instructive are uncertain and such as we can have no knowledge of their real truth how much so ever constant observation and analogy may assist our judgment in guessing hence it comes to pass that one may often meet with very clear and coherent discourses that amount yet to nothing for it is playing that names of substantial beings as well as others as far as they have relative significance affixed to them may with great truth be joined negatively and affirmatively in propositions as their relative definitions make them fit to be so joined and propositions consisting of such terms may with the same clearness be deduced one from another as those that convey the most real truths and all this without any knowledge of the nature or reality of things existing without us by this method one may make demonstrations and undoubted propositions in words and yet thereby advance not one jot in the knowledge of the truth of things for instance he that having learned these following words with their ordinary mutual relative acceptations and next to them for instance substance man animal form soul vegetative sensitive rational may make several undoubted propositions about the soul without knowing at all what the soul really is and of this sort a man may find an infinite number of propositions reasonings and conclusions in books of metaphysics school divinity and some sort of natural philosophy and after all know as little of God spirits or bodies as he did before he set out 10 and why he that hath liberty to define for instance to determine the signification of his names of substances as certainly everyone does in effect who makes them stand for his own ideas and it makes their significations at a venture taking them from his own or other men's fancies and not from an examination or inquiry into the nature of things themselves may with little trouble demonstrate them one of another according to those several respects and mutual relations he has given them one to another where in however things agree or disagree in their own nature he needs mind nothing but his own notions with the names he hath bestowed upon them but thereby no more increases his own knowledge than he does his riches who taking a bag of counters calls one in a certain place a pound another in another place a shilling and a third in a third place a penny and so proceeding may undoubtedly reckon right and cast up a great sum according to his counters so placed and standing for more or less as he places without being one jot the richer or without even knowing how much a pound shilling or penny is but only that one is contained in the other 20 times and contains the other 12 which a man may also do in the signification of words by making them in respect of one another more or less or equally comprehensive 11 thirdly using words variously is trifling with them though yet concerning most words used in discourses equally argumentative and controversial there is this more to be complained of which is the worst sort of trifling and which sets us yet further from the certainty of knowledge we hope to attain by them or find in them namely that most writers are so far from instructing us in the nature and knowledge of things that they use their words loosely and uncertainly and do not by using them constantly and steadily in the same significations make plain and clear deductions of words one from another and make their discourses coherent and clear how little so ever they were instructive which were not difficult to do did they not find it convenient to shelter their ignorance or obstinacy under the obscurity and perplexedness of their terms to which perhaps in advertency and ill custom doing many men much contribute 12 marks of verbal propositions first predication in abstract to conclude barely verbal propositions may be known by these following marks first all propositions were into abstract terms are affirmed one of another are barely about the signification of sounds for since no abstract idea can be the same with any other but itself when its abstract name is affirmed of any other term it can signify no more but this that it may or ought to be called by that name or that these two names signify the same idea thus should anyone say that parsimony is frugality that gratitude is justice that this or that action is or is not temperate however specious these and the like propositions may at first sight seem yet when we come to press them and examine nicely what they contain we shall find that it all amounts to nothing but the signification of those terms 13 secondly a part of the definition predicated of any term secondly all propositions were in a part of the complex idea which any term stands for is predicated of that term are only verbal for instance to say that gold is a metal or heavy and thus all propositions were in more comprehensive words called genera are affirmed of subordinate or less comprehensive called species or individuals are barely verbal when by these two rules we have examined the propositions that make up the discourses we ordinarily meet with both in and out of books we shall perhaps find that a greater part of them than is usually suspected are purely about the signification of words and contain nothing in them but the use and application of these signs this I think I may lay down for an infallible rule that wherever the distinct idea any word stands for is not known and considered and something not contained in the idea is not affirmed or denied of it there are thoughts stick holy in sounds and are able to attain no real truth or falsehood this perhaps if well heated might save us a great deal of useless amusement and dispute and very much shorten our trouble and wondering in search of real and true knowledge end of section 9 section 10 of an essay concerning human understanding by John Locke book 4 of knowledge and probability this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org chapter 9 of our threefold knowledge of existence 1. general propositions that are certain concern not existence 2. hitherto we have only considered the essences of things which being only abstract ideas and thereby removed in our thoughts from particular existence that being the proper operation of the mind in abstraction to consider an idea under no other existence but what it has in the understandings gives us no knowledge of real existence at all where by the way we may take notice the universal propositions of whose truth or falsehood we can have certain knowledge concern not existence and further that all particular affirmations or negations that would not be certain if they were made general are only concerning existence they declaring only the accidental union or separation of ideas in things existing which in their abstract natures have no known necessary union or repugnancy 2. a threefold knowledge of existence but leaving the nature of propositions and different ways of predication to be considered more at large in another place let us proceed now to inquire concerning our knowledge of the existence of things and how we come by it I say then that we have the knowledge of our own existence by intuition of the existence of God by demonstration and of other things by sensation 3. our knowledge of our own existence is intuitive as for our own existence we perceive it so plainly and so certainly that it neither needs nor is capable of any proof for nothing can be more evident to us than our own existence I think I reason I feel pleasure and pain can any of these be more evident to me than my own existence if I doubt all other things that very doubt makes me perceive my own existence and will not suffer me to doubt of that for if I know I feel pain it is evident that I have as certain perception of my own existence as the existence of the pain I feel or if I know I doubt I have a certain perception of the existence of the thing doubting as of that thought which I called out experience then convinces us that we have an intuitive knowledge of our own existence and an internal infallible perception that we are in every act of sensation reasoning or thinking we are conscious to ourselves of our own being and in this matter come not short of the highest degree of certainty End of Section 10 1. We are capable of knowing certainly that there is a God Though God has given us no innate ideas of himself though he has stamped no original characters on our minds wherein we may read his being yet having furnished us with those faculties our minds are endowed with He hath not left himself without witness since we have sense perception and reason and cannot want a clear proof of him as long as we carry ourselves about us nor can we justly complain of our ignorance in this great point since he has so plentifully provided us with the means to discover and know him so far as is necessary to the end of our being and the great concernment of our happiness But though this be the most obvious truth that reason discovers and though its evidence be, if I am a stake not, equal to mathematical certainty yet it requires thought and attention and the mind must apply itself to a regular deduction of it from some part of our intuitive knowledge or else we shall be as uncertain and ignorant of this as of other propositions which are in themselves capable of clear demonstration To show therefore that we are capable of knowing i.e. being certain that there is a God and how we may come by this certainty I think we need go no further than ourselves and that undoubted knowledge we have of our own existence 2. For man knows that he himself exists. I think it is beyond question that man has a clear idea of his own being he knows certainly he exists and that he is something. He that can doubt whether he be anything or no I speak not to no more than I would argue with pure nothing or endeavor to convince non-entity that it were something if anyone pretends to be so skeptical as to deny his own existence for really to doubt of it is manifestly impossible let him for me enjoy his beloved happiness of being nothing until hunger or some other pain convince him of the contrary this then I think I may take for a truth which everyone's certain knowledge assures him of beyond the liberty of doubting these that he is something that actually exists 3. He knows also that nothing cannot produce a being therefore something must have existed from eternity in the next place man knows by an intuitive certainty that bear nothing can no more produce any real being than it can be equal to two right angles if a man knows not that non-entity or the absence of all being cannot be equal to two right angles it is impossible that he should know any demonstration in Euclid if therefore we know there is some real being and that non-entity cannot produce any real being it is an evident demonstration that from eternity there has been something since what was not from eternity had a beginning and what had a beginning must be produced by something else 4. And that eternal being must be most powerful next it is evident that what had its being and beginning from another must also have all that which is in and belongs to its being from another to all the powers it has must be owing to and received from the same source this eternal source then of all being must also be the source and original of all power and so this eternal being must be also the most powerful 5. And most knowing again a man finds in himself perception and knowledge we have then got one step further and we are certain now that there is not only some being but some knowing intelligent being in the world there was a time then when there was no knowing being and when knowledge began to be or else there has been also a knowing being from eternity if it be said there was a time when no being had any knowledge when that eternal being was void of all understanding I reply that then it was impossible there should ever have been any knowledge it being as impossible that things wholly void of knowledge in operating blindly and without any perception should produce a knowing being as it is impossible that a triangle should make itself three angles bigger than two right ones for it is as repugnant to the idea of senseless matter that it should put into itself sense perception and knowledge as it is repugnant to the idea of a triangle that it should put into itself greater angles than two right ones 6. And therefore God thus from the consideration of ourselves and what we infallibly find in our own constitutions our reason leads us to the knowledge of this certain and evident truth that there is an eternal most powerful and most knowing being which whether anyone will please to call God it matters not the thing is evident and from this idea duly considered will easily be deduced all those other attributes which we ought to ascribe to this eternal being if nevertheless anyone should be found so senselessly arrogant as to suppose man alone knowing and wise but yet the product of mere ignorance and chance and that all the rest of the universe acted only by that blind haphazard I shall leave him with that very rational and emphatical rebuke of toly to be considered at his leisure what can be more sillily arrogant and misbecoming than for a man to think that he has a mind and understanding in him but yet in all the universe beside there is no such thing or that those things which with the utmost stretch of his reason he can scarce comprehend should be moved and managed without any reason at all nay I presume I may say that we more certainly know that there is a God than that there is anything else without us when I say we know I mean there is such a knowledge within our reach which we cannot miss if we will but apply our minds to that as we do to several other inquiries which a man may frame in his mind does or does not prove the existence of a God I will not hear examine for in the different make of men's tempers and application of their thoughts some arguments prevail more on one and some on another for the confirmation of the same truth but yet I think this I may say that it is an ill way of establishing this truth and silencing atheists to lay the whole stress of so important a point as this upon that soul foundation and take some men's having that idea of God in their minds for it is evident some men have none and some worse than none and the most very different for the only proof of a deity and out of an over fondness of that darling invention cashier or at least endeavor to invalidate all other arguments and forbid us to harken to those proofs as being weak or fallacious which our own existence and the sensible parts of the universe offer so clearly and cogently to our thoughts that I deem it impossible for a considering man to withstand them for I judge it as certain and clear a truth as can anywhere be delivered that the invisible things of God are clearly seen from the creation of the world being understood by the things that are made even his eternal power and Godhead though our own being furnishes us as I have shown with an evident and incontestable proof of a deity and I believe nobody can avoid the cogency of it who will but as carefully attend to it as to any other demonstration of so many parts yet this being so fundamental a truth and of that consequence that all religion and genuine morality depend there on I doubt not but I shall be forgiven by my reader if I go over some parts of this argument again and enlarge a little more upon them 8. Recapitulation, Something from Eternity There is no truth more evident than that something must be from eternity I never yet heard of any one so unreasonable or that could suppose so manifest a contradiction as a time wherein there was perfectly nothing this being of all absurdities the greatest to imagine that pure nothing the perfect negation and absence of all beings should ever produce any real existence it being then unavoidable for all rational creatures to conclude that something has existed from eternity let us next see what kind of thing that must be 9. Two sorts of beings cogitative and incogitative there are but two sorts of beings in the world that man knows or conceives first such as our purely material without sense perception or thought as the clippings of our beards and pairings of our nails secondly sensible thinking perceiving beings such as we find ourselves to be which if you please we will hear after call cogitative and incogitative beings which to our present purpose if for nothing else are perhaps better terms than material and immaterial 10. Incogitative being cannot produce a cogitative being if then there must be something eternal let us see what sort of being it must be and to that it is very obvious to reason that it must necessarily be a cogitative being for it is as impossible to conceive that ever bear incogitative matter should produce a thinking intelligent being as that nothing should of itself produce matter let us suppose any parcel of matter eternal great or small we shall find it in itself able to produce nothing for example let us suppose the matter of the next pebble we meet with eternal closely united and the parts firmly at rest together if there were no other being in the world must it not eternally remain so a dead inactive lump is it possible to conceive it can add motion to itself being purely matter or produce anything matter then by its own strength cannot produce in itself so much as motion the motion it has must also be from eternity or else be produced and added to matter by some other being more powerful than matter matter as is evident having not power to produce motion in itself but let us suppose motion eternal to yet matter incogitative matter and motion whatever changes it might produce of figure and bulk could never produce thought knowledge will still be as far beyond the power of motion and matter to produce as matter is beyond the power of nothing or non entity to produce and I appeal to everyone's own thoughts whether he cannot as easily conceive matter produced by nothing as thought to be produced by pure matter when before there was no such thing as thought or an intelligent being existing divide matter into as many parts as you will which we are apt to imagine a sort of spiritualizing or making a thinking thing of it vary the figure and motion of it as much as you please a globe cube cone prism cylinder etc whose diameters are but one hundred thousandth part of a g r y will operate no otherwise upon other bodies of proportional bulk than those of an inch or foot diameter and you may as rationally expect to produce sense thought and knowledge by putting together in a certain figure and motion gross particles of matter as by those that are the very minutest that do anywhere exist they knock impel and resist one another just as the greater do and that is all they can do so that if we will suppose nothing first or eternal matter can never begin to be if we suppose bare matter without motion eternal motion can never begin to be if we suppose only matter and motion first or eternal thought can never begin to be for it is impossible to conceive that matter either with or without motion could have originally in and from itself sense perception and knowledge as is evident from hence that then sense perception and knowledge must be a property eternally inseparable from matter and every particle of it not to add that though our general or specific conception of matter makes us speak of it as one thing yet really all matter is not one individual thing neither is there any such thing existing as one material being or one single body that we know or can conceive and therefore if matter were the eternal first cogitative being there would not be one eternal infinite cogitative being but an infinite number of eternal finite cogitative beings independent one of another of limited force and distinct thoughts which could never produce that order harmony and beauty which are to be found in nature since therefore whatsoever is the first eternal being must necessarily be cogitative and whatsoever is first of all things must necessarily contain in it and actually have at least all the perfections that can ever after exist nor can it ever give to another any perfection that it hath not either actually in itself or at least in a higher degree it necessarily follows that the first eternal being cannot be matter eleven therefore there has been an eternal wisdom if therefore it be evident that something necessarily must exist from eternity is also as evident that that something must necessarily be a cogitative being for it is as impossible that incogitative matter should produce a cogitative being as that nothing or the negation of all being should produce a positive being or matter twelve the attributes of the eternal cogitative being though this discovery of the necessary existence of a eternal mind does sufficiently lead us into the knowledge of God since it will hence follow that all other knowing beings that have a beginning must depend on him and have in other ways of knowledge or extent of power and what he gives them and therefore if he made those he made all the less excellent pieces of this universe all inanimate beings whereby his omniscience power and providence will be established and all his other attributes necessarily follow yet to clear this up a little further we will see what doubt can be raised against it thirteen whether the eternal mind may be also material or know first perhaps it will be said that though it be as clear as demonstration can make it that there must be an eternal being and that being must also be knowing yet it does not follow but that thinking being may also be material let it be so it equally still follows that there is a God for there be an eternal omniscient omnipotent being it is certain that there is a God whether you imagine that being to be material or know but herein I suppose lies the danger and deceit of that supposition there being no way to avoid the demonstration that there is an eternal knowing being men devoted to matter would willingly have it granted that that knowing being is material and then letting slide out of their minds or the discourse the demonstration whereby an eternal knowing being was proved necessarily to exist would argue all to be matter and so deny a God that is an eternal cogitative being whereby they are so far from establishing that they destroy their own hypothesis for if there can be in their opinion eternal matter without any eternal cogitative being they manifestly separate matter and thinking and suppose no necessary connection of the one with the other and so establish the necessity of an eternal spirit but not of matter since it has been proved already that an eternal cogitative being is unavoidably to be granted now if thinking and matter may be separated the eternal existence of matter will not follow from the eternal existence of a cogitative being and they suppose it to no purpose 14 not material first because each particle of matter is not cogitative but now let us see how they can satisfy themselves or others that this eternal thinking being is material one I would ask them whether they imagine that all matter every particle of matter thinks this I suppose they will scarce say since there would be as many eternal thinking beings as there are particles of matter and so an infinity of gods and yet if they will not allow matter as matter that is every particle of matter to be as well cogitative as extended they will have as hard a task to make out to their own reasons a cogitative being out of incogitative particles as an extended being out of an extended parts if I may so speak 15 to secondly because one particle alone of matter cannot be cogitative if all matter does not think I next ask whether it be only one atom that does so this has as many absurdities as the other for then this atom of matter must be alone eternal or not if this alone be eternal then this alone by its powerful thought or will made all the rest of matter and so we have the creation of matter by a powerful thought which is that the materialists stick at for if they suppose one single thinking atom to have produced all the rest of matter they cannot ascribe that preeminency to it upon any other account than that of its thinking the only suppose difference but allow it to be by some other way which is above our conception it must still be creation and these men must give up their great maximum ex nihilo nil fit if it be said that all the rest of matter is equally eternal as that thinking atom it will be to say anything at pleasure though ever so absurd for to suppose all matter eternal and yet one small particle in knowledge and power infinitely above all the rest is without any the least appearance of reason to frame in hypothesis every particle of matter as matter is capable of all the same figures and motions of any other and I challenge anyone in his thoughts to add anything else to one above another sixteen three thirdly because a system of incogitative matter cannot be cogitative if then neither one particular atom alone can be this eternal thinking being nor all matter as matter i.e. every particle of matter can be it it only remains that it is some certain system of matter truly put together that is this thinking eternal being this is that which I imagine is that notion which men are apt to have of God who would have him a material being as most readily suggested to them by the ordinary conceit they have of themselves and other men which they take to be material thinking beings but this imagination however more natural is no less absurd than the other for to suppose the eternal thinking being to be nothing else but a composition of particles of matter each where of his incogitative is to ascribe all the wisdom and knowledge of that eternal being only to the juxtaposition of parts then which nothing can be more absurd for unthinking particles of matter however put together can have nothing thereby added to them but a new relation of position which it is impossible should give thought and knowledge to them seventeen and whether this corporeal system is in motion or at rest but further this corporeal system either has all its parts at rest or it is a certain motion of the parts where in its thinking consists if it be perfectly at rest it is but one lump and so can have no privileges above one atom if it be the motion of its parts on which its thinking depends all the thoughts there must be unavoidably accidental and limited since all the particles that by motion cause thought being each of them in itself without any thought cannot regulate its own motions much less be regulated by the thought of the whole since that thought is not the cause of motion for that it must be antecedent to it and so without it but the consequence of it whereby freedom, power, choice, and all rational and wise thinking or acting will be quite taken away so that such a thinking being will be no better nor wiser than pure blind matter since to resolve all into the accidental unguided motions of blind matter or into thought depending on unguided motions of blind matter is the same thing not to mention the narrowness of such thoughts and knowledge that must depend on the motion of such parts but there needs no enumeration of any more absurdities and impossibilities in this hypothesis however full of them it may be than that before mentioned since let this thinking system be all or a part of the matter of the universe it is impossible that any one particle should either know its own or the motion of any other particle or the whole know the motion of every particle and so regulate its own thoughts or motions or indeed have any thought resulting from such motion. 18. Matter not co-eternal with an eternal mind secondly others would have matter to be eternal not withstanding that they allow an eternal cogitative immaterial being this though it not take away the being of a God yet since it denies one and the first great piece of his workmanship the creation let us consider it a little matter must be allowed eternal why because you cannot conceive how it can be made out of nothing why do you not also think yourself eternal you will answer perhaps because about 20 or 40 years since you began to be but if I ask you what that you is which began then to be you can scarce tell me the matter where of you are made began not then to be for if it did then it is not eternal but it began to be put together in such a fashion and frame as makes up your body but yet that frame of particles is not you it makes not that thinking thing you are for I have now to do with one who allows an eternal immaterial thinking being but would have unthinking matter eternal too therefore when did that thinking thing begin to be if it did never begin to be then have you always been a thinking thing from eternity the absurdity whereof I need not confute till I meet with one who is so void of understanding as to own it if therefore you can allow a thinking thing to be made out of nothing as all things that are not eternal must be why also can you not allow it possible for material being to be made out of nothing by an equal power but that you have the experience of the one in view and not of the other though when well considered creation of a spirit will be found to require no less power than the creation of matter may possibly if we would emancipate ourselves from vulgar notions and raise our thoughts as far as they would reach to a closer contemplation of things we might be able to aim at some dim and seeming conception how matter might at first be made and begin to exist by the power of that eternal first being but to give beginning and being to a spirit would be found a more inconceivable effect of omnipotent power but this being what would perhaps lead us too far from the notions on which the philosophy now in the world is built it would not be pardonable to deviate so far from them or to inquire so far as grammar itself would authorize if the common settled opinion opposes it especially in this place where the received doctrine serves well enough to our present purpose and leaves this past doubt that the creation or beginning of any one substance out of nothing being once admitted the creation of all other but the creator himself may with the same ease be supposed nineteen objection creation out of nothing but you will say is it not possible to admit of the making anything out of nothing since we cannot possibly conceive it I answer no because it is not reasonable to deny the power of an infinite being because we cannot comprehend its operations we do not deny other effects upon this ground because we cannot possibly conceive the matter of their production we cannot conceive how anything but impulse of body can move body and yet that is not a reason sufficient to make us deny it possible against the constant experience we have of it in ourselves in all our voluntary motions which are produced in us only by the free action or thought of our own minds and are not nor can be the effects of the impulse or determination of the motion of blind matter in or upon our own bodies for then it could not be an our power or choice to alter it for example my right hand writes whilst my left hand is still what causes rest in one and motion in the other nothing but my will a thought of my mind my thought only changing the right hand rests and the left hand moves this is a matter of fact which cannot be denied explain this and make it intelligible and then the next step will be to understand creation for the giving a new determination to the motion of the animal spirits which some make use of to explain voluntary motion clears not the difficulty one jot to alter the determination of motion being in this case no easier nor less than to give motion itself since the new determination given to the animal spirits must be either immediately by thought or by some other body put in their way by thought which was not in their way before and so must owe its motion to thought either of which leaves voluntary motion as unintelligible as it was before in the meantime is an overvaluing ourselves to reduce all to the narrow measure of our capacities and to conclude all things impossible to be done whose manner of doing exceeds our comprehension this is to make our comprehension infinite or God finite when what he can do is limited to what we can conceive of it if you do not understand the operations of your own finite mind that thinking thing within you do not deem it strange that you cannot comprehend the operations of that eternal infinite mind who made and governs all things and whom the heaven of heavens cannot contain end of section eleven