 Front Matter and Preface of Barclay's Treatise To the Right Honourable Thomas Earl of Pembroke, etc., Knight of the Most Noble Order of the Garter and One of the Lords of Her Majesty's Most Honourable Privy Council. My Lord, you will perhaps wonder that an obscure person who has not the honour to be known to Your Lordship should presume to address You in this manner, but that a man who has written something with a design to promote useful knowledge and religion in the world should make choice of Your Lordship for his patron will not be thought strange by anyone that is not altogether unacquainted with the present state of the Church and learning, and consequently ignorant how great an ornament and support you are to both. Yet nothing could have induced me to make you this present of my poor endeavours, were I not encouraged by that candor and native goodness which is so bright a part of Your Lordship's character. I might add, my Lord, that the extraordinary favour and bounty you have been pleased to show towards our society gave me hopes that you would not be unwilling to countenance the studies of one of its members. These considerations determined me to lay this treatise at Your Lordship's feet, and the rather, because I was ambitious to have it known that I am with the truest and most profound respect on account of that learning and virtue which the world so justly admires in Your Lordship. My Lord, Your Lordship's most humble and most devoted servant, George Barclay. Preface, what I here make public has, after a long and scrupulous inquiry, seemed to me evidently true and not unuseful to be known, particularly to those who are tainted with scepticism, or want a demonstration of the existence and immateriality of God, or the natural immortality of the soul. Whether it be so or no, I am content the reader should impartially examine, since I do not think myself any further concerned for the success of what I have written than as it is agreeable to truth. But to the end this may not suffer, I make it my request that the reader suspend his judgment till he has once at least read the whole through with that degree of attention and thought which the subject matter shall seem to deserve. For as there are some passages that, taken by themselves, are very liable, nor could it be remedied, to gross misinterpretation and to be charged with most absurd consequences, which nevertheless, upon an entire perusal, will appear not to follow from them. So likewise, though the whole should be read over, yet if this be done transiently, it is very probable my sense may be mistaken. Up to a thinking reader I flatter myself it will be throughout clear and obvious. As for the characters of novelty and singularity, which some of the following notions may seem to bear, it is, I hope, needless to make any apology on that account. He must surely be either very weak or very little acquainted with the sciences, who shall reject a truth that is capable of demonstration for no other reason but that it is newly known, and contrary to the prejudices of mankind. Thus much I thought fit to premise in order to prevent, if possible, the hasty censures of a sort of men who are too apt to condemn an opinion before they rightly comprehended. Introduction to Barclay's Treatise Philosophy being nothing else but the study of wisdom and truth, it may with reason be expected that those who have spent most time and pains in it should enjoy a greater calm and serenity of mind, a greater clearness and evidence of knowledge, and be less disturbed with doubts and difficulties than other men. Yet so it is, we see the illiterate bulk of mankind that walk the high road of plain common sense and are governed by the dictates of nature for the most part easy and undisturbed. To them nothing that is familiar appears unaccountable or difficult to comprehend. They complain not of any want of evidence in their senses and are out of all danger of becoming skeptics. But no sooner do we depart from sense and instinct to follow the light of a superior principle, to reason, meditate and reflect on the nature of things, but a thousand scruples spring up in our minds concerning those things which before we seemed fully to comprehend. Prejudices and errors of sense do from all parts discover themselves to our view, and endeavoring to correct these by reason, we are insensibly drawn into uncouth paradoxes, difficulties and inconsistencies which multiply and grow upon us as we advance in speculation, till at length, having wandered through many intricate mazes, we find ourselves just where we were, or, which is worse, sit down in a forlorn skepticism. Section 2 The cause of this is thought to be the obscurity of things or the natural weakness and imperfection of our understandings. It is said, the faculties we have are few and those designed by nature for the support and comfort of life, and not to penetrate into the inward essence and constitution of things. Besides, the mind of man being finite when it treats of things which partake of infinity, it is not to be wondered at if it runs into absurdities and contradictions out of which it is impossible it should ever extricate itself, it being of the nature of infinite not to be comprehended by that which is finite. Section 3 But perhaps we may be too partial to ourselves in placing the fault originally in our faculties and not rather in the wrong use we make of them. It is a hard thing to suppose that right deductions from true principles should ever end in consequences which cannot be maintained or made consistent. We should believe that God has dealt more bountifully with the sons of men than to give them a strong desire for that knowledge which he had placed quite out of their reach. This were not agreeable to the wanted, indulgent methods of providence which, whatever appetites it may have implanted in the creatures, does usually furnish them with such means as, if rightly made use of, will not fail to satisfy them. Upon the whole, I am inclined to think that the far greater part, if not all, of those difficulties which have hitherto amused philosophers and blocked up the way to knowledge are entirely owing to ourselves, that we have first raised the dust, and then complain we cannot see. Section 4 My purpose, therefore, is to try if I can discover what those principles are which have introduced all that doubtfulness and uncertainty, those absurdities and contradictions into the several sects of philosophy, in so much that the wisest men have thought our ignorance incurable, conceiving it to arise from the natural dullness and limitation of our faculties. And surely it is a work while deserving our pains to make a strict inquiry concerning the first principles of human knowledge, to sift and examine them on all sides, especially since there may be some grounds to suspect that those lets and difficulties which stay in embarrassed the mind in its search after truth, do not spring from any darkness and intricacy in the objects, or natural defect in the understanding, so much as from false principles which have been insisted on and might have been avoided. Section 5 How difficult and discouraging, so ever, this attempt may seem when I consider how many great and extraordinary men have gone before me in the like designs, yet I am not without some hopes, upon the consideration that the largest views are not always the clearest, and that he who is short-sighted will be obliged to draw the object nearer, and may, perhaps, by a close and narrow survey discern that which had escaped far better eyes. Section 6 In order to prepare the mind of the reader for the easier conceiving what follows, it is proper to premise somewhat, by way of introduction, concerning the nature and abuse of language. But the unraveling of this matter leads me in some measure to anticipate my design, by taking notice of what seems to have had a chief part in rendering speculation intricate and perplexed, and to have occasioned innumerable errors and difficulties in almost all parts of knowledge. And that is the opinion that the mind hath a power of framing abstract ideas or notions of things. He who is not a perfect stranger to the writings and disputes of philosophers must needs acknowledge that no small part of them are spent about abstract ideas. These are in a more special manner thought to be the object of those sciences which go by the name of logic and metaphysics, and of all that which passes under the notion of the most abstracted and sublime learning, in all which one shall scarce find any question handled in such a manner as does not suppose their existence in the mind and that it is well acquainted with them. Section 7. It is agreed on all hands that the qualities or modes of things do never really exist each of them apart by itself and separated from all others, but are mixed, as it were, and blended together, several in the same object. But we are told the mind being able to consider each quality singly or abstracted from those other qualities with which it is united does by that means frame to itself abstract ideas. For example, there is perceived by sight and object extended, colored, and moved. This mixed or compound idea the mind resolving into its simple constituent parts and viewing each by itself exclusive of the rest does frame the abstract ideas of extension, color, and motion. Not that it is possible for color or motion to exist without extension, but only that the mind can frame to itself by abstraction the idea of color exclusive of extension and of motion exclusive of both color and extension. Section 8. Again, the mind having observed that in the particular extensions perceived by sense there is something common and alike in all, and some other things peculiar as this or that figure or magnitude, which distinguish them one from another, it considers a part or singles out by itself that which is common, making thereof a most abstract idea of extension, which is neither line, surface, nor solid, nor has any figure or magnitude, but is an idea entirely rescinded from all these. So likewise the mind by leaving out of the particular colors perceived by sense that which distinguishes them one from another, and retaining that only which is common to all, makes an idea of color and abstract which is neither red nor blue nor white nor any other determined color. And in like manner, by considering motion abstractly not only from the body moved, but likewise from the figure it describes, and all particular directions and velocities, the abstract idea of motion is framed, which equally corresponds to all particular motions whatsoever that may be perceived by sense. Section 9. And as the mind frames to itself abstract ideas of qualities or modes, so does it by the same precision or mental separation attain abstract ideas of the more compounded beings which include several co-existent qualities. For example, the mind having observed that Peter, James, and John resemble each other in certain common agreements of shape and other qualities, leaves out of the complex or compounded idea it has of Peter, James, and any other particular man that which is peculiar to each, retaining only what is common to all. And so makes an abstract idea wherein all the particulars equally partake, abstracting entirely from and cutting off all those circumstances and differences which might determine it to any particular existence. And after this manner, it is said we come by the abstract idea of man, or if you please, humanity or human nature, wherein it is true there is included color because there is no man but has some color, but then it can be neither white nor black nor any particular color because there is no one particular color wherein all men partake. So likewise there is included stature, but then it is neither tall stature nor low stature nor yet middle stature, but something abstracted from all these. And so of the rest. Moreover, there being a great variety of other creatures that partake in some parts, but not all, of the complex idea of man, the mind leaving out those parts which are peculiar to men and retaining those only which are common to all the living creatures, frames the idea of animal, which abstracts not only from all particular men, but also birds, beasts, fishes, and insects. The constituent parts of the abstract idea of animal are body, life, sense, and spontaneous motion. My body is meant body without any particular shape or figure. There being no one shape or figure common to all animals without covering either of hair or feathers or scales, et cetera, nor yet naked. Hair, feathers, scales, and nakedness being the distinguishing properties of particular animals. And for that reason left out of the abstract idea. Upon the same account, the spontaneous motion must be neither walking nor flying nor creeping. It is nevertheless a motion. But what that motion is, it is not easy to conceive. Section 10. Whether others have this wonderful faculty of abstracting their ideas, they best can tell. For myself, I find indeed I have a faculty of imagining or representing to myself the ideas of those particular things I have perceived and of variously compounding and dividing them. I can imagine a man with two heads or the upper parts of a man joined to the body of a horse. I can consider the hand, the eye, the nose, each by itself abstracted or separated from the rest of the body. But then whatever hand or eye I imagine, it must have some particular shape and color. Likewise, the idea of man that I framed to myself must be either of a white or a black or a tawny, a straight or a crooked, a tall or a low or a middle-sized man. I cannot by any effort of thought conceive the abstract idea above described. And it is equally impossible for me to form the abstract idea of motion distinct from the body moving and which is neither swift nor slow, curvilinear or rectilinear, and the like may be said of all other abstract general ideas whatsoever. To be plain, I own myself able to abstract in one sense, as when I consider some particular parts or qualities separated from others, with which though they are united in some object, yet it is possible they may really exist without them. But I deny that I can abstract from one another or conceive separately those qualities which it is impossible should exist so separated or that I can frame a general notion by abstracting from particulars in the manner aforesaid, which last are the true proper acceptations of abstraction. And there are grounds to think most men will acknowledge themselves to be in my case. The generality of men which are simple and illiterate never pretend to abstract notions. It is said they are difficult and not to be attained without pains and study. We may therefore reasonably conclude that if such there be, they are confined only to the learned. Section 11. I proceed to examine what can be alleged in defense of the doctrine of abstraction and try if I can discover what it is that inclines the men of speculation to embrace an opinion so remote from common senses that seems to be. There has been a late, deservedly esteemed philosopher who, no doubt, has given it very much countenance by seeming to think the having abstract general ideas is what puts the widest difference in point of understanding betwixt man and beast. The having of general ideas, Sethi, is that which puts a perfect distinction betwixt man and brutes and is an excellency which the faculty of brutes do by no means attain unto. For it is evident we observe no footsteps in them of making use of general signs for universal ideas from which we have reason to imagine that they have not the faculty of abstracting or making general ideas since they have no use of words or any other general signs. And a little after. Therefore, I think, we may suppose that it is in this that the species of brutes are discriminated from men and it is that proper difference wherein they are wholly separated and which at last widens to so wide a distance. For, if they have any ideas at all and are not bare machines, as some would have them, we cannot deny them to have some reason. It seems as evident to me that they do, some of them, in certain instances, reason as they have sense. But it is only in particular ideas just as they receive them from their senses. They are the best of them tied up within those narrow bounds and have not, as I think, the faculty to enlarge them by any kind of abstraction. From Essay on Human Understanding, Part 2, Chapter 11, Sections 10 and 11. I readily agree with this learned author that the faculties of brutes can by no means attain to abstraction. But then, if this be made the distinguishing property of that sort of animals, I fear a great many of those that pass for men must be reckoned into their number. The reason that is here assigned why we have no grounds to think brutes have abstract general ideas is that we observe in them no use of words or any other general signs, which is built on this supposition, that the making use of words implies the having general ideas, from which it follows that men who use language are able to abstract or generalize their ideas. That this is the sense of arguing of the author will further appear by his answering the question he in another place puts. Since all things that exist are only particulars, how come we by general terms? His answer is, words become general by being made the signs of general ideas. From Essay on Human Understanding, Part 4, Chapter 3, Sections 6. But it seems to me that a word becomes general by being made the sign, not of an abstract general idea, but of several particular ideas, any of which it indifferently suggests to the mind. For example, when it is said the change of motion is proportional to the impressed force, or that whatever has extension is divisible, these propositions are to be understood of motion and extension in general, and nevertheless, it will not follow that they suggest to my thoughts an idea of motion without a body moved, or any determinate direction and velocity, or that I must conceive an abstract general idea of extension, which is neither line, surface nor solid, neither great nor small, black, white nor red, nor of any other determinate color. It is only implied that whatever particular motion I consider, whether it be swift or slow, perpendicular or horizontal or oblique, or in whatever object, the axiom concerning it holds equally true. As does the other of every particular extension, it matters not whether line, surface or solid, whether of this or that magnitude or figure. Section 12. By observing how ideas become general, we may, the better judge, how words are made so. And here it is to be noted that I do not deny absolutely there are general ideas, but only that there are any abstract general ideas. For in the passages we have quoted wherein there is mention of general ideas, it is always supposed that they are formed by abstraction, after the manner set forth in sections 8 and 9. Now if you will enact some meaning to our words and speak only of what we can conceive, I believe we shall acknowledge that an idea which considered in itself is particular becomes general by being made to represent or stand for all other particular ideas of the same sort. To make this plain by an example, suppose a geometrician is demonstrating the method of cutting a line in two equal parts. He draws, for instance, a black line of an inch in length. This, which in itself is a particular line, is nevertheless with regard to its signification general, since, as it is there used, it represents all particular lines whatsoever. So that what is demonstrated of it is demonstrated of all lines, or, in other words, of a line in general. And as that particular line becomes general by being made a sign, so the name line, which taken absolutely as particular, by being a sign is made general. And as the former owes its generality not to its being a sign of an abstract or general line, but of all particular lines that may possibly exist, so the latter must be thought to derive its generality from the same cause, namely the various particular lines which it indifferently denotes. Section 13. To give the reader a yet clearer view of the nature of abstract ideas and the uses there are thought necessary to, I shall add one more passage out of the essay on human understanding, which is as follows. 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 most abstract, comprehensive and difficult. For it must be neither oblique nor rectangle, neither equilateral, equicrual, nor scalenon, but all and none of these at once. In effect, it is something imperfect that cannot exist, an idea wherein some parts of several different and inconsistent ideas are put together. It is true the mind in this imperfect state has a need of such ideas and makes all the haste to them it can for the conveniency of communication and enlargement of knowledge to both which it is naturally very much inclined. But yet one has reason to suspect such ideas or 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. From Essay on Human Understanding, Part 4, Chapter 7, Section 9 If any man has a faculty of framing in his mind such an idea of a triangle as his hair described, it is in vain to pretend to dispute him out of it, nor would I go about it. All I desire is that the reader would fully and certainly inform himself whether he has such an idea or no. And this, me thinks, can be no hard task for anyone to perform. What more easy than for anyone to look a little into his own thoughts and there try whether he has or can attain to have any idea that shall correspond with the description that is here given of the general idea of a triangle, which is neither oblique nor rectangle, equilateral, equicrual, nor scalenon, but all and none of these at once. Section 14 Much is here said of the difficulty that abstract ideas carry with them and the pains and skill requisite to the forming them. And it is on all hands agreed that there is need of great toil and labor of the mind to emancipate our thoughts from particular objects and raise them to those sublime speculations that are conversant about abstract ideas. From all which the natural consequence should seem to be, that so difficult a thing as the forming abstract ideas was not necessary for communication, which is so easy and familiar to all sorts of men. But, we are told, if they seem obvious and easy to grown men, it is only because by constant and familiar use they are made so. Now I would faint know at what time it is men are employed in surmounting that difficulty and furnishing themselves with those necessary helps for discourse. It cannot be when they are grown up, for then it seems that they are not conscious of any such painstaking. It remains therefore to be the business of their childhood. And surely the great and multiplied labor of forming abstract notions will be found a hard task for that tender age. Is it not a hard thing to imagine that a couple of children cannot pray together of their sugar plums and rattles and the rest of their little trinkets till they have first tacked together numberless inconsistencies and so framed in their minds abstract general ideas and annex them to every common name they make use of? Section 15 Nor do I think them a bit more needful for the enlargement of knowledge than for communication. It is, I know, a point much insisted on that all knowledge and demonstration are about universal notions to which I fully agree. But then it doth not appear to me that these notions are formed by abstraction in the manner premised. Universality, so far as I can comprehend, not consisting in the absolute positive nature or conception of anything, but in the relation it bears to the particular signified or represented by it, by virtue whereof it is that things, names, or notions being in their own nature particular are rendered universal. Thus, when I demonstrate any proposition concerning triangles, it is to be supposed that I have in view the universal idea of a triangle, which ought not to be understood as if I could frame an idea of a triangle which was neither equilateral nor scalenon nor equicruel, but only that the particular triangle I consider, whether of this or that sort, it matters not. Doth equally stand for and represent all rectilinear triangles whatsoever, and is in that sense universal. All which seems very plain and not to include any difficulty in it. Section 16. But here will be demanded how we can know any proposition to be true of all particular triangles, except we have first seen it demonstrated of the abstract idea of a triangle which equally agrees to all. For because a property may be demonstrated to agree with some one particular triangle, it will not thence follow that it equally belongs to any other triangle, which in all respects is not the same with it. For example, having demonstrated that the three angles of an isosceles rectangular triangle are equal to two right ones, I cannot therefore conclude this affection agrees to all other triangles which have neither a right angle nor two equal sides. It seems therefore that to be certain this proposition is universally true, we must either make a particular demonstration for every particular triangle, which is impossible, or once for all demonstrate of the abstract idea of a triangle in which all the particulars do indifferently partake, and by which they are equally represented. To which I answer that, though the idea I have in view whilst I make the demonstration be, for instance, that of an isosceles rectangular triangle whose sides are of a determinant length, I may nevertheless be certain it extends to all other rectilinear triangles, or what sort or bigness so ever. And that because neither the right angle nor the equality nor determinant length of the sides are at all concerned in the demonstration. It is true the diagram I have in view includes all these particulars, but then there is not the least mention made of them in the proof of the proposition. It is not said the three angles are equal to two right ones because one of them is a right angle or because the sides comprehending it are of the same length, which sufficiently shows that the right angle might have been oblique and the sides unequal, and for all that the demonstration have held good. And for this reason, it is that I conclude that to be true of any obliquangular or scalenon, which I demonstrated of a particular right-angled equal-cruel triangle, and not because I demonstrated the proposition of the abstract idea of a triangle. And here it must be acknowledged that a man may consider a figure merely as triangular without attending to the particular qualities of the angles or relations of the sides. So far he may abstract, but this will never prove that he can frame an abstract, general, inconsistent idea of a triangle. In like manner, we may consider Peter so forth as a man or so forth as an animal without framing the aforementioned abstract idea, either of a man or of animal, in as much as all that is perceived is not considered. Section 17 It were an endless, as well as a useless thing to trace the schoolmen, those great masters of abstraction, through all the manifold inextricable labyrinths of error and dispute which their doctrine of abstract natures and notions seems to have led them into. What bickerings and controversies and what a learned dust have been raised about those matters, and what mighty advantages has been from thence derived to mankind are things to this day too clearly known to need being insisted on. And it had been well if the ill effects of that doctrine were confined to those only who make the most avowed profession of it. When men consider the great pains, industry, and parts that have for so many ages been laid out on the cultivation and advancement of the sciences, and that notwithstanding, all this the far greater part of them remains full of darkness and uncertainty and disputes that are like never to have an end. And even those that are thought to be supported by the most clear and cogent demonstrations contain in them paradoxes which are perfectly irreconcilable to the understandings of men and that, taking all together, a very small portion of them does supply any real benefit to mankind otherwise than being an innocent diversion and amusement. I say the consideration of all this is apt to throw them into a despondency in perfect contempt of all study. But this may perhaps cease upon a view of the false principles that have obtained in the world amongst all which there is none, me thinks, hath a more wide and extended sway over the thoughts of speculative men than this of abstract general ideas. Section 18 I come now to consider the source of this prevailing notion and that seems to me to be language and surely nothing of less extent than reason itself could have been the source of an opinion so universally received. The truth of this appears as from other reasons so also from the plain confession of the ablest patrons of abstract ideas who acknowledge that they are made in order to naming, from which it is a clear consequence that if there had been no such things as speech or universal signs there never had been any thought of abstraction. See Part 3, Chapter 6, Section 39, and elsewhere of the essay on human understanding. Let us examine the manner wherein words have contributed to the origin of that mistake. First then, it is thought that every name has, or ought to have, one only precise and settled signification, which inclines men to think there are certain abstract determinant ideas that constitute the true and only immediate signification of each general name and that it is by the mediation of these abstract ideas that a general name comes to signify any particular thing, whereas in truth there is no such thing as one precise and definite signification annexed to any general name, they all signifying indifferently a great number of particular ideas, all which doth evidently follow from what has been already said and will clearly appear to anyone by little reflection. To this it will be objected that every name that has a definition is thereby restrained to one certain signification. For example, a triangle is defined to be a plain surface comprehended by three right lines, by which that name is limited to denote one certain idea and no other. To which I answer that in the definition it is not said whether the surface be great or small, black or white, or whether the sides are long or short, equal or unequal, nor with what angles they are inclined to each other. In all which there may be a great variety and consequently there is no one settled idea which limits the signification of the word triangle. It is one thing for to keep a name constantly to the same definition and another to make it stand everywhere for the same idea. The one is necessary, the other useless and impracticable. Section 19 But to give a further account how words come to produce the doctrine of abstract ideas it must be observed that it is a received opinion that language has no other end but the communicating our ideas and that every significant name stands for an idea. This being so and it being with all certain that names which yet are not thought altogether insignificant do not always mark out particular conceivable ideas it is straight away concluded that they stand for abstract notions. That there are many names in use among speculative men which do not always suggest to others determinant particular ideas or in truth anything at all is what nobody will deny. And a little attention will discover that it is not necessary even in the strictest reasonings significant names which stand for ideas should every time they are used excite in the understanding the ideas they are made to stand for. In reading and discoursing names being for the most part used as letters are an algebra in which though a particular quantity be marked by each letter yet to proceed right it is not requisite that in every step each letter suggests to your thoughts that particular quantity it was appointed to stand for. Section 20 Besides the communicating of ideas marked by words not the chief and only end of language as is commonly supposed there are other ends as the raising of some passion the exciting to or deterring from an action the putting the mind in some particular disposition to which the former is in many cases barely subservient and sometimes entirely omitted when these can be obtained without it as I think does not unfrequently happen in the familiar use of language. I entreat the reader to reflect with himself and see if a doth not often happen either in hearing or reading a discourse that the passions of fear love hatred admiration disdain and the like arise immediately in his mind upon the perception of certain words without any ideas coming between. At first indeed the words might have occasioned ideas that were fitting to produce those emotions but if I mistake not it will be found that when language is once grown familiar the hearing of the sounds or sight of the characters is often immediately attended with those passions which at first were want to produced by the intervention of ideas that are now quite omitted. May we not for example be affected with the promise of a good thing though we have no idea what it is or is it not the being threatened with danger sufficient to excite a dread though we think not of any particular evil likely to befall us nor yet frame to ourselves an idea of danger and abstract. If anyone shall join ever so little reflection of his own to what has been said I believe that it will evidently appear to him that general names are often used in the propriety of language without the speakers designing them for marks of ideas in his own which he would have them raise in the mind of the hearer. Even proper names themselves do not seem always spoken with the design to bring into our view the idea of those individuals that are supposed to be marked by them. For example when a schoolman tells me Aristotle had said it all I conceive he means by it is to dispose me to embrace his opinion with a deference and submission which custom has annexed to that name. And this effect is often so instantly produced in the minds of those who are accustomed to resign their judgment to authority of that philosopher as it is impossible any idea either of his person, writings, or reputation should go before. Enumerable examples of this kind may be given but why should I insist on those things which everyone's experience will I doubt not plentifully suggest onto him. Section 21 We have I think shown the impossibility of abstract ideas. We have considered what has been said for them by their ablest patrons and endeavored to show there of no use for those ends to which they are thought necessary. And lastly we have traced them to the source from whence they flow which appears evidently to be language. It cannot be denied that words are of excellent use in that by their means all that stock of knowledge which has been purchased by the joint labors of inquisitive men in all ages and nations may be drawn into the view and made the possession of one single person. But at the same time it must be owned that most parts of knowledge have been strangely perplexed and darkened by the abuse of words and general ways of speech wherein they are delivered. Since their four words are so apt to impose on the understanding whatever ideas I consider I shall endeavor to take them bare and naked into my view keeping out of my thoughts so far as I am able those names which long and constant use hath so strictly united with them from which I may expect to derive the following advantages Section 22 First, I shall be sure to get clear of all controversies purely verbal. The springing up of which weeds in almost all the sciences has been a main hindrance to the growth of true and sound knowledge. Secondly, this seems to be a sure way to extricate myself out of that fine and subtle net of abstract ideas which had so miserably perplexed and tangled the minds of men. And that with this peculiar circumstance that by how much the finer and more curious was the wit of any man by so much the deeper was he likely to be ensnared and faster held therein. Thirdly, so long as I can find my thoughts to my own ideas divested of words I do not see how I can easily be mistaken. The objects I consider I clearly and adequately know. I cannot be deceived in thinking I have an idea which I have not. It is not possible for me to imagine that any of my own ideas are alike or unalike that are not truly so. To discern the agreements or disagreements there are between my ideas to see what ideas are included in any compound idea and whatnot there is nothing more requisite than an attentive perception of what passes in my own understanding. Section 23 But the attainment of all these advantages doth presuppose an entire deliverance from the deception of words which I dare hardly promise myself so difficult a thing it is to dissolve a union so early begun and confirmed by so long a habit as that between words and ideas which difficulty seems to have been very much increased by the doctrine of abstraction. For so long as men thought abstract ideas were annexed to their words it doth not seem strange that they should use words for ideas for it being an impractical thing to lay aside the word and retain the abstract idea in the mind which in itself was perfectly inconceivable. This seems to me the principal cause why those men who have so emphatically recommended to others the laying aside all use of words in their meditations and contemplating their bare ideas have yet failed to perform it themselves. Of late many have been very sensible of the absurd opinions and the insignificant disputes which grow out of the abuse of words and in order to remedy these evils they advise well that we attend to the ideas signified and draw off our attention from the words which signify them but how good so ever this advice may be they have given others it is plain they could not have a due regard to do it themselves so long as they thought the only immediate use of words was to signify ideas and that the immediate signification of every general name was a determinate abstract idea. Section 24 But these being known to be mistakes a man may with greater ease prevent his being imposed on by words He that knows he has no other than particular ideas will not puzzle himself in vain to find out and conceive the abstract idea annexed to any name and he that knows names do not always stand for ideas will spare himself the labor of looking for ideas where there are none to be had it were therefore to be wished that everyone would use his utmost endeavors to obtain a clear view of the ideas he would consider separating from them all that dress and incumbrance of words which so much contribute to blind the judgment and divide the attention In vain do we extend our view into the heavens and pry into the entrails of the earth In vain do we consult the writings of learned men and trace the dark footsteps of antiquity We need only draw the curtain of words to hold the fairest tree of knowledge whose fruit is excellent and within the reach of our hand Section 25 Unless we take care to clear the first principles of knowledge from the embarrass and delusion of words we may make infinite reasonings upon them to no purpose We may draw consequences from consequences and be never the wiser The farther we go we shall only lose ourselves the more irrevocably and be the deeper entangled in difficulties and mistakes Whoever therefore designs to read the following sheets I entreat him to make my words the occasion of his own thinking and endeavor to attain the same train of thoughts and reading that I had in writing them By this means it will be easy for him to discover the truth or falsity of what I say He will be out of all danger of being deceived by my words and I do not see how he can be led into an error by considering his own naked undisguised ideas End of introduction to Barclay's treatise This recording is in the public domain Sections 1 to 14 of Barclay's treatise This is a LibriVox recording All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Sections 1 to 14 of a treatise concerning the principles of human knowledge Part 1 by George Barclay Section 1 It is evident to anyone who takes a survey of the objects of human knowledge that they are either ideas actually imprinted on the senses or else such as are perceived by attending to the passions and operations of the mind or lastly ideas formed by help of memory and imagination either compounding dividing or barely representing those originally perceived in the aforesaid ways By sight I have the ideas of light and colors with their several degrees and variations By touch I perceive hard and soft heat and cold motion and resistance and of all these more and less either as to quantity or degree Smelling furnishes me with odors the palate with tastes and hearing conveys sounds to the mind in all their variety of tone and composition and as several of these are observed to accompany each other they come to be marked by one name and so to be reputed as one thing Thus, for example, a certain color, taste, smell, figure, and consistency having been observed to go together are accounted one distinct thing signified by the name Apple Other collections of ideas constitute a stone, a tree, a book, and the like sensible things which as they are pleasing or disagreeable excite the passions of love, hatred, joy, grief, and so forth Section 2 But beside all that endless variety of ideas or objects of knowledge there is likewise something which knows or perceives them and exercises diverse operations as willing, imagining, remembering about them This perceiving, active being is what I call mind, spirit, soul, or myself by which words I do not denote any one of my ideas but a thing entirely distinct from them wherein they exist or which is the same thing whereby they are perceived for the existence of an idea consists in being perceived Section 3 that neither our thoughts nor passions nor ideas formed by the imagination exist without the mind is what everybody will allow and it seems no less evident that the various sensations or ideas imprinted on the sense however blended or combined together that is whatever objects they compose cannot exist otherwise than in a mind perceiving them I think an intuitive knowledge may be obtained of this by anyone that shall attend to what is meant by the term exists when applied to sensible things The table I write on I say exists that is I see and feel it and if I were out of my study I should say it existed meaning thereby that if I was in my study I might perceive it or that some other spirit actually does perceive it there was an odor that is it was smelt there was a sound that is it was heard a color or figure and it was perceived by sight or touch this is all that I can understand by these and the like expressions for as to what is said of the absolute existence of unthinking things without any relation to their being perceived that seems perfectly unintelligible their essay is per kippy nor is it possible they should have any existence out of the minds or thinking things which perceive them section four it is indeed an opinion strangely prevailing amongst men that houses mountains rivers and in a word all sensible objects have an existence natural or real distinct from their being perceived by the understanding but with how great an assurance and acquiescence so ever this principle may be entertained in the world yet whoever shall find in his heart to call it in question may if I mistake not perceive it to involve a manifest contradiction for what are the four mentioned objects but the things we perceive by sense and what do we perceive besides our own ideas or sensations and is it not plainly repugnant that any one of these or any combination of them should exist unperceived section five if we thoroughly examine this tenet it will perhaps be found at bottom to depend on the doctrine of abstract ideas for can there be a nicer strain of abstraction than to distinguish the existence of sensible objects from their being perceived so as to conceive them existing unperceived light and colors heat and cold extension and figures in a word the things we see and feel what are they but so many sensations notions ideas or impressions on the sense and is it possible to separate even in thought any of these from perception for my part I might as easily divide a thing from itself I may indeed divide in my thoughts or conceive apart from each other those things which perhaps I never perceived by sense so divided thus I imagine the trunk of a human body without the limbs or conceive the smell of a rose without thinking on the rose itself so far I will not deny I can abstract if that may properly be called abstraction which extends only to the conceiving separately such objects as it is possible may really exist or be actually perceived asunder but my conceiving or imagining power does not extend beyond the possibility of real existence or perception hence as it is impossible for me to see or feel anything without an actual sensation of that thing so it is impossible for me to conceive in my thoughts any sensible thing or object distinct from the sensation or perception of it section six some truths there are so near and obvious to the mind that a man need only open his eyes to see them such I take this important one to be to it that all the choir of heaven and furniture of the earth in a word all those bodies which compose the mighty frame of the world have not any subsistence without a mind that their being is to be perceived or known that consequently so long as they are not actually perceived by me or do not exist in my mind or that of any other created spirit they must either have no existence at all or else subsist in the mind of some eternal spirit it being perfectly unintelligible and involving all the absurdity of abstraction to attribute to any single part of them and existence independent of a spirit to be convinced of which the reader need only reflect and try to separate in his own thoughts the being of a sensible thing from its being perceived section seven from what has been said it follows there is not any other substance than spirit or that which perceives but for the fuller proof of this point let it be considered the sensible qualities are color figure motion smell taste etc i.e. the ideas perceived by sense now for an idea to exist in an unperceiving thing is a manifest contradiction for to have an idea is all one as to perceive that therefore wherein color figure and the like qualities exist must perceive them hence it is clear there can be no unthinking substance or substratum of those ideas section eight but say you though the ideas themselves do not exist without the mind yet there may be things like them where of they are copies or resemblances which things exist without the mind in an unthinking substance i answer an idea can be like nothing but an idea a color or figure can be like nothing but another color or figure if we look but never so little into our thoughts we shall find it impossible for us to conceive a likeness except only between our ideas again i ask whether those supposed originals or external things of which our ideas are the pictures or representations be themselves perceivable or no if they are then they are ideas and we have gained our point but if you say they are not i appeal to anyone whether it be sense to assert a color is like something which is invisible hard or soft like something which is intangible and so of the rest section nine some there are who make a distinction betwixt primary and secondary qualities by the former they mean extension figure motion rest solidity or impenetrability and number by the latter they denote all other sensible qualities as colors sounds tastes and so forth the ideas we have of these they acknowledge not to be the resemblances of anything existing without the mind or unperceived but they will have our ideas of the primary qualities to be patterns or images of things which exist without the mind in an unthinking substance which they call matter by matter therefore we are to understand an inert senseless substance in which extension figure and motion do actually subsist but it is evident from what we have already shown that extension figure and motion are only ideas existing in the mind and that an idea can be like nothing but another idea and that consequently neither they nor their archetypes can exist in an unperceiving substance hence it is plain that the very notion of what is called matter or corporeal substance involves a contradiction in it section ten they who assert that figure motion and the rest of the primary or original qualities do exist without the mind in unthinking substances do at the same time acknowledge that colors sounds heat cold and such like secondary qualities do not which they tell us our sensations existing in the mind alone that depend on and are occasioned by the different size texture and motion of the minute particles of matter this they take for an undoubted truth which they can demonstrate beyond all exception now if it be certain that these original qualities are inseparably united with the other sensible qualities and not even in thought capable of being abstracted from them it plainly follows that they exist only in the mind but I desire anyone to reflect and try whether he can by any abstraction of thought conceive the extension and motion of a body without all other sensible qualities for my own part I see evidently that it is not in my power to frame an idea of a body extended and moving but I must with all give it some color or other sensible quality which is acknowledged to exist only in the mind in short extension figure and motion abstracted from all other qualities are inconceivable where therefore the other sensible qualities are there must these be also to wit in the mind and nowhere else section 11 again great and small swift and slow are allowed to exist nowhere without the mind being entirely relative and changing as the frame or position of the organs of sense varies the extension therefore which exists without the mind is neither great nor small the motion neither swift nor slow that is they are nothing at all but say you they are extension in general and motion in general thus we see how much the tenant of extended movable substances existing without the mind depends on the strange doctrine of abstract ideas and here I cannot but remark how nearly the vague and indeterminate description of matter or corporeal substance which the modern philosophers are run into by their own principles resembles that antiquated and so much ridiculed notion of materia prima to be met with in Aristotle and his followers without extension solidity cannot be conceived since therefore it has been shown that extension exists not in an unthinking substance the same must also be true of solidity section 12 that number is entirely the creature of the mind even though the other qualities be allowed to exist without will be evident to whoever considers that the same thing bears a different denomination of number as the mind views it with different respects thus the same extension is one or three or thirty six according as the mind considers it with reference to a yard a foot or an inch number is so visibly relative and dependent on men's understanding that it is strange to think how anyone should give it an absolute existence without the mind we say one book one page one line etc all these are equally units though some contain several of the others and in each instance it is plain the unit relates to some particular combination of ideas arbitrarily put together by the mind section 13 unity I know some will have to be a simple or uncompounded idea accompanying all other ideas into the mind that I have any such idea answering the word unity I do not find and if I had me thinks I could not misfinding it on the contrary it should be the most familiar to my understanding since it is said to accompany all other ideas and to be perceived by all the ways of sensation and reflection to say no more it is an abstract idea section 14 I shall further add that after the same manner as modern philosophers prove certain sensible qualities to have no existence in matter or without the mind the same thing may be likewise proved of all other sensible qualities whatsoever thus for instance it is said that heat and cold are affections only of the mind and not at all patterns of real beings existing in the corporeal substances which excite them for that the same body which appears cold to one hand seems warm to another now why may we not as well argue that figure and extension are not patterns or resemblances of qualities existing in matter because to the same eye at different stations or eyes of a different texture at the same station they appear various and cannot therefore be the images of anything settled and determinant without the mind again it is proved that sweetness is not really in the sapid thing because the thing remaining unaltered the sweetness is changed into bitter as in case of a fever otherwise vitiated palate is it not as reasonable to say that motion is not without the mind since if the succession of ideas in the mind becomes swifter the motion it is acknowledged shall appear slower without any alteration in any external object end of sections one to 14 recording by sue anderson 15 in short that anyone consider those arguments which are thought manifestly to prove that colors and taste exist in the mind and he shall find they may with equal force be brought to prove the same thing of extension figure and motion though it must be confessed this method of arguing does not so much prove that there is no extension or color in an outward object as that we do not know by sense which is the true extension or color of the object but the arguments foregoing plainly show it to be impossible that any color or extension at all or other sensible quality whatsoever should exist in an unthinking subject without the mind or in truth that there should be any such thing as an outward object 16 but let us examine a little the received opinion it is said extension is a mode or accident of matter and that matter is a substratum that supports it now I desire that you would explain to me what is meant by matter supporting extension say you I have no idea of matter and therefore cannot explain it I answer though you have no positive yet if you have any meaning at all you must at least have a relative idea of matter though you know not what it is yet you must be supposed to know what relation it bears to accidents and what is meant by it supporting them it is evident support cannot here be taken in its usual or literal sense as when we say that pillars support a building in what sense therefore must it be taken 17 if we inquire into what the most accurate philosophers declare themselves to mean by material substance we shall find them acknowledge they have no other meaning annex to those sounds but the idea of being in general together with the relative notion of its supporting accidents the general idea of being appeared to me the most abstract and incomprehensible of all other and as for its supporting accidents this as we have just now observed cannot be understood in the common sense of those words it must therefore be taken in some other sense but what that is they do not explain so that when I consider the two parts or branches which make the signification of the words material substance I'm convinced there is no distinct meaning annex to them but why should we trouble ourselves any farther in discussing this material substratum of support of figure and motion and other sensible qualities does it not suppose they have an existence without the mind and is not this a direct repugnancy and altogether inconceivable 18 but though it were possible that solid figure movable substances may exist without the mind corresponding to the ideas we have of bodies yet how is it possible for us to know this either we must know it by sense or by reason as for our senses by them we have the knowledge only of our sensations ideas or those things that are immediately perceived by sense call them when you will but they do not inform us that things exist without the mind or unperceived like to those which are perceived this the materialist themselves acknowledge it remains therefore that if we have any knowledge at all of external things it must be by reason inferring their existence from what is immediately perceived by sense but what reason can induce us to believe the existence of bodies without the mind from what we perceive since the very patrons of matter themselves do not pretend there is any necessary connection between them and our ideas I say it is granted on all hands and what happens in dreams frenzies and the like puts it beyond the spewed that it is possible we might be affected with all the ideas we have now though there were no bodies existing without resembling them hence it is evident the supposition of external bodies is not necessary for the producing of our ideas since it is granted they are produced sometimes and might possibly be produced always in the same order we see them in at present without their concurrence 19 but though we might possibly have all our sensations without them yet perhaps it may be thought easier to conceive and explain the manner of their production by supposing external bodies in their likeness rather than otherwise and so it might be at least probable there are such things as bodies that excite their ideas in our minds but neither can this be said for though we give the materialist their external bodies they by their own confession are never the near knowing how our ideas are produced since they own themselves unable to comprehend and what manner body can act upon spirit or how it is possible it shouldn't print any idea in the mind hence it is evident the production of ideas or sensations in our minds can be no reason why we should suppose matter or corporeal substances since that is acknowledged to remain equally inexplicable with or without this supposition if therefore it were possible for bodies to exist without the mind yet to hold they do so must needs be a very precarious opinion since it is to suppose without any reason at all that God has created innumerable beings that are entirely useless and serve to no manner of purpose 20 in short if there were external bodies it is impossible we should ever come to know it and if there were not we might have the very same reasons to think there were that we have now suppose when no one can deny possible and intelligence without the help of external bodies to be affected with the same train of sensations or ideas that you are imprinted in the same order and with like vividness in his mind I ask whether that intelligence have not all the reason to believe the existence of corporeal substances represented by his ideas and exciting them in his mind that you can possibly have for believing the same thing of this there can be no question which one consideration were enough to make any reasonable person suspect the strength of whatever arguments he may think himself to have for the existence of bodies without the mind 21 were it necessary to add any farther proof against the existence of matter after what has been said I could instant several of those errors and difficulties not to mention impurities which have sprung from that tenet it has occasioned numberless controversies and disputes in philosophy and not a few of far greater moment in religion but I shall not enter into the detail of them in this place as well because I think arguments a posteriori are unnecessary for confirming what has been if I mistake not sufficiently demonstrated a priori as because I shall hereafter find occasion to speak somewhat of them 22 I am afraid I've given cause to think I am needlessly prolix in handling this subject for to what purpose is it to dilate on that which may be demonstrated with the utmost evidence and a line or two to anyone that is capable of the least reflection it is but looking into your own thoughts and so trying whether you can conceive it possible for a sound or figure or motion or color to exist without the mind or unperceived this easy trial may perhaps make you see that what you contend for is a downright contradiction and so much that I am content to put the whole upon the issue if you can but conceive it possible for one extended movable substance or in general for any one idea or anything like an idea to exist otherwise than in a mind perceiving it I shall readily give up the cause and as for all that compages of external bodies you contend for I shall grant you its existence though you cannot either give me any reason while you believe it exists or assign any use to it when it is supposed to exist I say the bare possibility of your opinions being true shall pass for an argument that it is so 23 but say you surely there is nothing easier than for me to imagine trees for instance in a park or books existing in a closet and nobody by to perceive them I answer you may so there is no difficulty in it but what is all this I beseech you more than framing in your mind certain ideas which you call books and trees and the same time omitting to frame the idea of any one that may perceive them but do not you yourself perceive or think of them all the while this therefore is nothing to the purpose it only shows you have the power of imagining or forming ideas in your mind but it does not show that you can conceive it possible the objects of your thought may exist without the mind to make out this it is necessary that you conceive them existing unconceived or unthought of which is a manifest with pregnancy when we do our utmost to conceive the existence of external bodies we are all the while only contemplating our own ideas but the mind taking no notice of itself is deluded to think it can and does conceive bodies existing unthought of or without the mind though at the same time they are apprehended by or exist in itself a little attention will discover to any one the truth and evidence of what is here said and make it unnecessary to insist on any other proofs against the existence of material substance 24 it is very obvious upon the least inquiry into our thoughts to know whether it is possible for us to understand what is meant by the absolute existence of sensible objects in themselves or without the mind to me it is evident those words mark out either a direct contradiction or else nothing at all and to convince others of this i know no readier or fair way and to entreat they would calmly attend to their own thoughts and if by this attention the emptiness or repugnancy of those expressions does appear surely nothing more is requisite for the conviction it is on this therefore that i insist to wit that the absolute existence of unthinking things are words without a meaning or which include a contradiction this is what i repeat and inculcate and earnestly recommend to the attentive thoughts of the reader 25 all our ideas sensations notions or the things which we perceive by whatsoever means they may be distinguished are visibly inactive there is nothing of power or agency included in them so that one idea or object of thought cannot produce or make any alteration in another to be satisfied of truth of this there is nothing else requisite but a bare observation of our ideas for since they and every part of them exist only in the mind it follows that there is nothing in them but what is perceived but whoever shall attend to his ideas whether of sense or reflection will not perceive in them any power or activity there is therefore no such thing contained in them a little attention will discover to us that the very being of an idea implies passiveness and inertness in it and so much that it is impossible for an idea to do anything or strictly speaking to be the cause of anything neither can it be the resemblance or pattern of any active being as is evident from section eight once it plainly follows that extension figure and motion cannot be this cause of our sensations to say therefore that these are the effects of powers resulting from the configuration number motion and size of corpuscles must certainly be false 26 we perceive a continual succession of ideas some are new excited others are changed or totally disappear there is therefore some causes of these ideas whereupon they depend and which produces and changes them that this cause cannot be any quality or idea or combination of ideas is clear from the preceding section i must therefore be a substance but it has been shown that there is no corporeal or material substance it remains therefore that the cause of ideas is an incorporeal active substance or spirit 27 a spirit is one simple undivided active being as it perceives ideas it is called the understanding and as it produces or otherwise operates about them it is called the will hence there can be no idea formed of a soul or spirit for all ideas whatever being passive and inert we to section 25 they cannot represent unto us by way of image or likeness that which acts a little attention will make it plain to anyone that to have an idea which shall be like that active principle of motion and change of ideas is absolutely impossible such is the nature of spirit or that which acts that it cannot be of itself perceived but only by the effects which it produces if any man shall doubt of the truth of what is here delivered let him but reflect and try if he can frame the idea of any power or active being and whether he has ideas of two principal powers marked by the names will and understanding distinct from each other as well as from a third idea of substance or being in general with a relative notion of its supporting or being the subject of the aforesaid powers which is signified by the name soul or spirit this is what some hold but so far as I can see the words will soul spirit do not stand for different ideas or in truth for any idea at all but for something which is very different from ideas and which being an agent cannot be like unto or represented by any idea whatsoever though it must be owned at the same time that we have some notion of soul spirit and the operations of the mind such as willing loving hating and as much as we know or understand the meaning of these words 28 I find I can excite ideas in my mind at pleasure and very and shift the scene as oft as I think fit it is no more than willing and straightway this or that idea rises in my fancy and by the same power it is obliterated and makes way for another this making and unmaking of ideas doth very properly denominate the mind active thus much is certain and grounded on experience but when we think of unthinking agents or of exciting ideas exclusive of volition we only amuse ourselves with words 29 but whatever power I may have over my own thoughts I find the ideas actually perceived by sense have not alike dependence on my will when in broad daylight I open my eyes it is not in my power to choose whether I shall see or know or to determine when particular objects shall present themselves to my view and so likewise as to the hearing and other senses the ideas imprinted on them are not creatures of my will there is therefore some other will or spirit that produces them end of sections 15 to 29 sections 30 to 44 of Bartley's treatise this is a LibriVox recording all LibriVox recordings are in the public domain for more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org recording by Talking Meet sections 30 to 44 of a treatise concerning the principles of human knowledge part one by George Bartley 30 the ideas of sense are more strong lively and distinct than those of the imagination they have likewise a steadiness order and coherence and are not excited at random as those which are the effects of human wills often are but in a regular train or series the admirable connection thereof sufficiently testifies the wisdom and benevolence of its author now the set of rules or established methods wherein the mind we depend on excites in us the ideas of sense are called the laws of nature from these we learn by experience which teaches us that such and such ideas are attended with such and such other ideas in the ordinary course of things 31 this gives us a sort of foresight which enables us to regulate our actions for the benefit of life and without this we should be eternally at a loss we could not know how to act anything that might procure us the least pleasure or remove the least pain of sense but food nourishes, sleep refreshes and fire warms us but to sow in seed time is the way to reap in the harvest and in general that to obtain such or such ends such or such means are conducive all this we know not by discovering any necessary connection between our ideas but only by the observation of the subtle laws of nature without which we should be all in uncertainty and confusion and a grown man no more know how to manage himself in the affairs of life than an infant just born 32 and yet this consistent uniform working which so evidently displays the goodness and wisdom of that governing spirit whose will constitutes the laws of nature is so far from leading our thoughts to them that it rather sends them wandering after second causes for when we perceive certain ideas of sense constantly followed by other ideas and we know this is not of our own doing we forthwith attribute power and agency to the ideas themselves and make one the cause of another than which nothing can be more absurd and unintelligible thus for example having observed that when we perceive by sight a certain round luminous figure we at the same time perceive by touch the idea or sensation called heat we do from thence conclude the sun to be the cause of heat and in like manner perceiving the motion and collision of bodies to be attended with sound we are inclined to think the latter the effect of the former 33 the ideas imprinted on senses by the author of nature are called real things and those excited in the imagination being less regular vivid and constant are more properly termed ideas or images of things which they copy and represent but then our sensations be they never so vivid and distinct are nevertheless ideas that is the exist in the mind are perceived by it as truly as the ideas of its own framing the ideas of sense are allowed to have more reality in them that is to be more strong orderly and coherent than the creatures of the mind but this is no argument they exist without the mind they are also less dependent on the spirit or thinking substance which perceives them in that they are excited by the will of another and more powerful spirit yet still they are ideas and certainly no idea whether faint or strong can exist otherwise than in a mind perceiving it 34 before we proceed any further it is necessary we spend some time in answering objections which may probably be made against the principles we have heather to lay down in doing of which if i seem to products to those of quick apprehensions i hope it may be pardoned since all men do not equally apprehend things of this nature and i am willing to be understood by everyone first then it will be objected that by the foregoing principles all that is real and substantial nature is banished out of the world and instead thereof a chimerical scheme of ideas takes place all things that exist exist only in the mind that is they are purely notional what therefore becomes of sun moon and stars what must must we think of houses rivers mountains trees stones nay even of our own bodies are all these but so many chimeras and illusions of the fancy to all which and whatever else of the same sort may be objected i answer that by the principles premised we are not deprived of any one thing in nature whatever we see feel here or any wise conceive or understand remains as secure as ever and is as real as ever there is a rearum mature and the distinction between realities and chimeras retains its full force this is evident from section 29 30 and 33 where we have shown what is meant by real things in opposition to chimeras or ideas of our own framing but then they both equally exist in the mind and in that sense they are alike ideas 35 i do not argue against the existence of any one thing that we can apprehend either by sense or reflection but the things i see with my eyes and touch with my hands do exist really exist i make not the least question the only thing whose existence we deny is that which philosophers call matter or corporeal substance and in doing of this there is no damage done to the rest of mankind who i dare say will never miss it the atheist indeed will want the color of an empty name to support his impiety and the philosophers may possibly find that they have lost a great handle for trifling and disputation 36 if any man thinks this detracts from the existence or reality of things he is very far from understanding what has been premised in the plainest terms i could think of take here an abstract of what has been said there are spiritual substances minds or human souls which will or excite ideas in themselves at pleasure but these are faint weak and unsteady in respect of others they perceive by sense which being impressed upon them according to certain rules or laws of nature speak themselves the effects of a mind more powerful and wise than human spirits these latter are said to have more reality in them than before by which is meant that they are more affecting orderly and distinct and that they are not fictions of the mind perceiving them and in this sense the sun that i see by day is the real sun and that which i imagine by night is the idea of the former in this sense here given of reality it is evident that every vegetable star mineral and in general each part of the mundane system is as much a real being by our principles as by any other whereas other men mean anything by the term reality different from what i do i entreat them to look into their own thoughts and see 37 i will be urged that thus much at least is true to it that we take away all corporeal substances to this my answer is if that word substance be taken in the vulgar sense for a combination of sensible qualities such as extension, solidity, weight and the like this we cannot be accused of taking away but if it be taken in a philosophic sense for the support of accidents or qualities without the mind then indeed i acknowledge that we take it away if one may be sent to take away that which never had any existence not even in the imagination 38 but after all say you it sounds very harsh to say we eat and drink ideas and are clothed with ideas i acknowledge it does so the word idea not being used in common discourse to signify the several combinations of sensible qualities which are called themes and it is certain that any expression which varies from the familiar use of language will seem harsh and ridiculous but this does not concern the truth of the proposition which in other words is no more than to say we are fed and clothed with those things which we perceive immediately by our senses the hardness or softness the color, taste, warmth, figure or such like qualities which combined together constitute the several sorts of victuals and apparel have been shown to exist only in the mind that perceives them and this is all that is meant by calling them ideas which word if it was as ordinarily used as thing would sound no harsher nor more ridiculous than it i am not for disputing about the propriety but the truth of the expression if therefore you agree with me that we eat and drink and are cland with the immediate objects of sense which cannot exist unperceived or without the mind i shall readily grant it is more proper or conformable to custom that they should be called things rather than ideas 39 if it be demanded why i make use of the word idea and do not rather in compliance with custom called things i answer i do it for two reasons first because the term thing in contradistinction to idea is generally supposed to denote somewhat existing without the mind secondly because thing have a more comprehensive signification than idea including spirit or thinking things as well as ideas since therefore the objects of sense exist only in the mind and are with all thoughtless and inactive i choose to mark them by the word idea which implies those properties 40 but say what we can someone perhaps may be apt to reply he will still believe his senses and never suffer any arguments how plausible so ever to prevail over the certainty of them be it so assert the evidence of sense as high as you please we are willing to do the same that what i see here in field of exist that is to say is perceived by me i know more doubt than i do my own being but i do not see how the testimony of sense can be alleged as a proof for the existence of anything which is not perceived by sense we are not for having any man turn skeptic and disbelief his senses on the contrary we give them all the stress and assurance imaginable nor are there any principles more opposite to skepticism than those we have laid down as shall be here after clearly shown 41 secondly it will be objected that there is a great difference betwixt real fire for instance and the idea of fire betwixt dreaming or imagining oneself burnt and actually being so if you suspect to be only the idea of fire which you see do but put your hand into it and you will be convinced with a witness this and the like may be urged in opposition to our tenants to all which the answer is evident from what have been already said and i shall only add in this place that if real fire be very different from the idea of fire so also is the real pain that it occasions very different from the idea of the same pain and yet nobody will pretend that real pain either is or can possibly be an unperceiving thing or without the mind any more than its idea 42 thirdly it will be objected that we see things actually without or at distance from us and which consequently do not exist in the mind it being observed that those things which are seen at the distance of several miles should be as near to us as our own thoughts in answer to this i desire it may be considered that in a dream we do often perceive things as existing at a great distance off and yet for all that those things are acknowledged to have their existence only in the mind 43 but for the fuller clearing of this point it may be worthwhile to consider how it is that we perceive distance and things placed at a distance by sight for that we should in truth see external space and bodies actually existing in it some nearer others further off seems to carry with it some opposition to what have been said of their existing nowhere without the mind the consideration of this difficulty it was that gave birth to my essay towards a new theory of vision which was published not long since wherein it is shown that distance or outness is neither immediately of itself perceived by sight nor yet apprehended or judged off by lines and angles or anything that has a necessary connection with it but that it is only suggested to our thoughts by certain visible ideas and sensations attending vision which in their own nature have no manner of similitude or relation either with distance or things placed at a distance but by a connection taught us by experience they come to signify and suggest them to us after the same manner that words of any language suggest the ideas they are made to stand for in so much that a man born blind and afterwards made to see would not at first sight think the things he saw to be without his mind or at any distance from him see section 41 of the aforementioned treatise 44 the ideas of sight and touch make two species entirely distinct and heterogenous the former are marks and prognostics of the latter that the proper objects of sight neither exist without mind nor are the images of external things was shown even in that treatise though throughout the same the contrary be supposed true of tangible objects not that to suppose that vulgar error was necessary for establishing the notion therein laid down but because it was beside my purpose to examine and refute it in a discourse concerning vision so that in strict truth the ideas of sight when we apprehend by them distance and things placed at a distance do not suggest or mark out to us things actually existing at a distance but only admonish us what ideas of touch will be imprinted in our minds at such and such distances of time and in consequence of such or such actions it is I say evident from what has been said in the foregoing parts of this treatise and in section 147 and elsewhere of the essay concern and vision that visible ideas are the language whereby the governing spirit on whom we depend informs us what tangible ideas he is about to imprint upon us in case we excite this or that motion in our own bodies but for a fuller information in this point I refer to the essay itself end of sections 30 to 44 recording by talky meat in amsterdam and talky meat dot live journal dot com end of sections 30 to 44